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Books > Language & Literature > Literature: history & criticism > Literary theory
The book unravels the dynamics of capitalist development, critically assesses the socialist experiment in charting out a course of development different from capitalism, explains the contradictions in the post-Independence development process in India, evaluates other efforts outside the state towards ushering in 'development', and then proposes an alternative path to progress - an employment based ecologically sustainable model of decentralized development based on local resource endowment and heightened mass consciousness which will take the country out of the dependency paradigm. This book is co-published with Aakar Books, New Delhi. Taylor & Francis does not sell or distribute the print versions of this book in India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.
'Controversy was the breath of Marx's life and he revelled in it. We are therefore not at all apologetic', wrote Puran Chand Joshi in the preface to Karl Marx: A Symposium, published in 1968 commemorating the 150th birth anniversary of Marx, adding further, (It is) 'in the best Indian tradition to operate with belief and hope that it is only through the clash of ideas that truth emerges.' At a time, when a Marxian renaissance has been taking place in academia, Joshi's words reverberate with a new vitality, an evanescence of 'official Marxism' and official Marxist parties notwithstanding. There is no denying that the so-called Marxists now pay dearly for wavering 'between a rather mechanistic interpretation of crisis and its opposite: the conviction that capitalism could only be overcome by an act of will.' This book is the outcome of an international conference on Karl Marx organised by ADRI in Patna between June 16 and 20, 2018 keeping the new Marxian reality in mind. Over 50 scholars from across the world sent papers to the Conference, covering topics such as economics, politics, society, philosophy, etc. ADRI welcomed them with an open mind in sync with the Marxian reawakening that treats Marx historically and critically. This book is co-published with Aakar Books, New Delhi. Taylor & Francis does not sell or distribute the print versions of this book in India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.
In Reading Contingency: The Accident in Contemporary Fiction, David Wylot constructs an innovative study of the relationship between plotted accidents in twenty-first century British and American fiction, the phenomenology of reading, and a contemporary experience of time that is increasingly understood to be contingent and accidental. A synthesis of literary and cultural analysis, narratology, critical theories of time and the philosophy of contingency, the book explores the accident's imagination of contemporary time and the relationship between reading and living in novels by writers including A.M. Homes, Nicola Barker, Noah Hawley, J.M. Coetzee, J.G. Ballard, Jesmyn Ward, Jennifer Egan, and Tom McCarthy.
Queer Rebels is a study of gay narrative writings published in Spain at the turn of the 20th century. The book scrutinises the ways in which the literary production of contemporary Spanish gay authors - Jose Luis de Juan, Luis G. Martin, Juan Gil-Albert, Juan Goytisolo, Eduardo Mendicutti, Luis Antonio de Villena and Alvaro Pombo - engages with homophobic and homophile discourses, as well as with the vernacular and international literary legacy. The first part revolves around the metaphor of a rebellious scribe who queers literary tradition by clandestinely weaving changes into copies of the books he makes. This subversive writing act, named 'Mazuf's gesture' after the protagonist of Jose Luis de Juan's This Breathing World (1999), is examined in four highly intertextual works by other writers. The second part of the book explores Luis Antonio de Villena and Alvaro Pombo, who in their different ways seek to coin their own definitions of homosexual experience in opposition both to the homophobic discourses of the past and to the homonormative regimes of the commercialised and trivialised gay culture of today. In their novels, 'Mazuf's gesture' involves playing a sophisticated queer game with readers and their expectations.
The essays in this volume provide a theorization of what we might call the "denatured" wild, in other words a notion of environmental "restoration" or "reinhabitation" that recognizes and reconfigures the human factor as an interdependent entity. Acknowledging the contributions of Marco Armerio, Serenella Iovino, Giovanna Ricoveri, Patrick Barron and Anna Re among others, Ecocritical Approaches to Italian Culture and Literature: The Denatured Wild negotiates the ground within the historicizing, theoretical perspectives, and surveying spirit of these writers. Despite the central role that nature has played in Italian culture and literature, there has been an evident lack of critical approaches free of the bridles of the socio-political manipulations of nationalism. The authors in this collection, by recognizing the groundbreaking work of many non-Italian ecocritics, challenge the narrowly defined conventions of Italian Studies and illuminates the complexities of an Italian ecocriticism that reveals a rich environmentally engaged literary and cultural tradition.
Is there anything that can be said about the value of a novel, story or film other than that one likes it? If such factors were made known, writers could use them to write books that readers would not only like better but would feel are worth reading. Do the techniques in books on writing produce such novels? Are some books good even though we do not like them? Should we force ourselves to like a book because an English professor or a critic insinuates that only people with good taste like that particular book? Do the "arbiters of good taste" have grounds supporting their claims that the books they like are good? What is the body of knowledge on which such expertise would have to depend? Do they have a right to impose their tastes on students and on the public? (148 words. limit - 150 words/200 words)
Paul Gordon proposes a new theory of art as synaesthetic and applies this idea to various media, including works--such as movies, illustrated books, and song lyrics--that explicitly cross over into media involving the different senses. The idea of art as synaesthetic is not, however, limited to those "cross-over" works, because even an individual poem or novel or painting calls upon different senses in creating its syn-aesthetic "meaning." Although previous studies have often devolved into those who see an obvious connection between art and synaesthesia and those who adamantly reject such a notion, Synaesthetics furthers our understanding of synaesthesia as an important, if not essential, component of artistic expression.
There is a broad consensus that digital narrative is "spatial," but what this critical term means and how it is used varies greatly depending on the discipline from which it is approached. Digital Narrative Spaces brings together essays by prominent scholars in electronic literature and other forms of digital authorship to explore the relationship between story and space across these disciplines. This volume includes an introduction with Marie-Laure Ryan's typology of space, followed by thought-provoking individual chapters which explore innovative explorations of electronic literature, locative media, literary tourism, and the mapping of real-world literary spaces. The collection closes with an essay analyzing continuities and discontinuities in theory of space across the chapters. This volume will provide an important framework for establishing a dialogue across disciplines and future scholarship in these fields.
Serrano calls for a reassessment of the practice of World Literature with six case studies taken from the Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Korean and Latin American traditions. Although in recent years the field has adopted more inclusive and wide-ranging criteria for college-level anthologies of World Literature, and has seen the collection and publication of critical readers, book-length introductions, and even a history, the theoretical predisposition of most of its practitioners paradoxically has led to a shrinking of its horizons and a narrowing of its vision. Reexamining World Literature asks scholars to look beyond the current dominant definition of World Literature (works in English with broad reach or works in other languages with significant circulation in English translation) in order to engage with a range of complex texts that elude the field's assumptions. World Literature need not be a we-are-the-world of shared values, but instead should ask readers to question what those values are.
Following the basic presumptions of the early law-as-literature movement, past approaches have mainly focused on textuality and narrativity as the common denominators of law and literature, and have largely ignored the topic of fictionality. This volume provides a much needed analysis of this gap.
Challenging the notion that modernism is marked by an "inward turn" - a configuration of the individual as distinct from the world - this collection delineates the relationship between the mind and material and social systems, rethinking our understanding of modernism's representation of cognitive and affective processes. Through analysis of a variety of international novels, short stories, and films - all published roughly between 1890 and 1945 - the contributors to this collection demonstrate that the so-called "inward turn" of modernist narratives in fact reflects the necessary interaction between mind, self, and world that constitutes knowledge, and therefore precludes any radical split between these categories. The essays examine the cognitive value of modernist narrative, showing how the perception of objects and of other people is a relational activity that requires an awareness of the constant flux of reality. The Fictional Minds of Modernism explores how modernist narratives offer insights into the real, historical world not as a mere object of contemplation but as an object of knowledge, thus bridging the gap between classical narratology and modernist experimentation.
In this title, first published in 1985, Michael Bristol draws on several theoretical and critical traditions to study the nature and purpose of theatre as a social institution: on Marxism, and its revisions in the work of Mikhail Bakhtin; on the theories of Emile Durkheim and their adaptations in the work of Victor Turner; and on the history of social life and material culture as practiced by the Annales school. This valuable work is an important contribution to literary criticism, theatre studies and social history and has particular importance for scholars interested in the dramatic literature of Elizabethan England.
In The Deconstruction of Sex, Jean-Luc Nancy and Irving Goh discuss how a deconstructive approach to sex helps us negotiate discourses about sex and foster a better understanding of how sex complicates our everyday existence in the age of #MeToo. Throughout their conversation, Nancy and Goh engage with topics ranging from relation, penetration, and subjection to touch, erotics, and jouissance. They show how despite its entrenchment in social norms and centrality to our being-in-the-world, sex lacks a clearly defined essence. At the same time, they point to the potentiality of literature to inscribe the senses of sex. In so doing, Nancy and Goh prompt us to reconsider our relations with ourselves and others through sex in more sensitive, respectful, and humble ways without bracketing the troubling aspects of sex.
- Uses a very broad range of examples across history and media, so easy to adopt on existing courses - The introduction offers a detailed history and theory of the field, ensuring students are fully grounded in the area - Provides a "toolbox" - all of the information, terminology, technique and analysis that a student needs to complete a cross/inter media study - Covers contemporary topics such as social media and videogames to thoroughly engage students - Detailed case studies are used to cement the theoretical and analytical knowledge
This collection of primary sources examines literary and cultural criticism over the long nineteenth century. Volume 2 of 4 explores the subject of drama criticism. This volume will be of great interest to students of literary history.
This collection of primary sources examines literary and cultural criticism over the long nineteenth century. Volume 3 of 4 explores the subject of Authorship, Journalism and the Nineteenth-Century Press. This volume will be of great interest to students of literary history.
Pragmatism is a humanist philosophy. In spite of the much-debated renaissance of pragmatism, however, a detailed discussion of the relationship between pragmatism and humanism is still a desideratum. It is difficult to understand the complexity of pragmatism without considering the significance of humanism. At least since the 1970s, humanism, mostly in its liberal version, has been vehemently attacked and criticized. In pragmatism, however, a particular understanding of humanism has persisted. Bringing literary studies, philosophy, and intellectual history together and establishing a transatlantic theoretical dialogue, Pragmatism and Poetic Agency endeavors to elucidate this persistence of humanism. Schulenberg continues the thought-provoking argument he developed in his previous two monographs by advancing the idea that one can only grasp the unique contemporary significance of pragmatism when one realizes how pragmatism, humanism, anti-authoritarianism, and postmetaphysics are interlinked. If one appreciates the implications and consequences of this link, then one is in a position to see pragmatism's antifoundationalist and antirepresentationalist story of progress and emancipation as continuing the project of the Enlightenment.
Originally published in 1991, Medieval Texts and Images is a collection of essays which critically examines medieval manuscripts. The book contains a wide range of contributions, the first examines the relationship of the Legende Doree and its relationship to the aristocratic patrons who commissioned these manuscripts; the second scrutinises the tradition of French illumination as it was developed in Paris in the so-called Bedford Master's workshop in the 1420s. The text examines liturgical texts of the medieval period and written and liturgical contributions to Renaissance art. Other contributions include an investigation into the written scroll within the painted composition, comparing various compositional and thematic functions in the depiction of a Crucifixion and a study of Christian vernacular poetry. This collection provides a comprehensive overview of the use of text and image in medieval literature.
Originally published in 1987, this title is a comprehensive study focused on experimental forms in eighteenth-century fiction. It suggests that the eighteenth-century novel is misread because it is judged with the templates of nineteenth and twentieth century versions of 'the novel' in mind, rather than as a standalone genre. Looking at works from well-known authors of the time this learned and lively book, gently but precisely undermines a basic category of modern literary understanding.
This book primarily focuses on the concept of forgetting, with particular emphasis on how we can trace the forgotten in contemporary life writing and memory texts. It consists of two main parts: the first concentrates on life writing in particular and what the author calls "scenes of forgetting"; the second examines both fiction and autobiographies that deal with questions of collective memory/forgetting. The book's principal aim is to map methods and strategies writers employ when writing the forgotten - it argues that forgetting is a constant companion in any memory text and plays a decisive role in the memory work performed in the texts. The main theoretical objective is to examine carefully the connection between collective memory and personal memory, by drawing from two disciplines at once: memory studies and theories on life writing. By considering both areas of research, the conclusions of this study are able to feed into both theoretical perspectives.
Recognizing the determination of a canon as an ongoing process of discussion and debate, which helps us to better understand the concept of meaningful and important literature, this edited collection turns a critical spotlight on young adult literature (YAL) to explore some of the most read, taught, and discussed books of our time. By considering the unique criteria which might underpin the classification of a YAL canon, this text raises critical questions of what it means to define canonicity and designate certain books as belonging to the YAL canon. Moving beyond ideas of what is taught or featured in textbooks, the volume emphasizes the role of adolescents' choice, the influence of popular culture, and above all the multiplicity of ways in which literature might be interpreted and reflected in the lives of young readers. Chapters examine an array of texts through varied critical lenses, offer detailed literary analyses and divergent interpretations, and consider how themes might be explored in pedagogical contexts. By articulating the ways in which teachers and young readers may have traditionally interpreted YAL, this volume will extend debate on canonicity and counter dominant narratives that posit YAL texts as undeserving of canonical status. This text will be of great interest to graduate and postgraduate students, academics, professionals, and libraries in the field of young adult literature, fiction literacy, children's literacy and feminist studies.
Collage in Twenty-First-Century Literature in English: Art of Crisis considers the phenomenon of the continued relevance of collage, a form established over a hundred years ago, to contemporary literature. It argues that collage is a perfect artistic vehicle to represent the crisis-ridden reality of the twenty-first-century. Being a mixture of fragmentary incompatible voices, collage embodies the chaos of the media-dominated world. Examining the artistic, sociopolitical and personal crises addressed in contemporary collage literature, the book argues that the 21st Century has brought a revival of collage-like novels and essays.
Transcending the Postmodern: The Singular Response of Literature to the Transmodern Paradigm gathers an introduction and ten chapters concerned with the issue of Transmodernity as addressed by and presented in contemporary novels hailing from various parts of the English-speaking world. Building on the theories of Transmodernity propounded by Rosa Maria Rodriguez Magda, Enrique Dussel, Marc Luyckx Ghisi and Irena Ateljevic, inter alia, it investigates the links between Transmodernity and such categories as Postmodernity, Postcolonialism and Transculturalism with a view to help define a new current in contemporary literary production. The chapters either follow the main theoretical drives of the transmodern paradigm or problematise them. In so doing, they branch out towards various issues that have come to inspire contemporary novelists, among which: the presence of the past, the ascendance of new technologies, multiculturalism, terrorism, and also vulnerability, interdependence, solidarity and ecology in a globalised context. In so doing, it interrogates the ethics, aesthetics and politics of the contemporary novel in English. |
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