Revealing links among literature, rhetoric, and democracy, Rosa A.
Eberly explores the public debate generated by amateurs and
professionals about their readings of four controversial literary
works: two that were censored in the United States and two that
created conflict because they were not censored.
In Citizen Critics, Eberly compares the outrage sparked by the
publication of James Joyce's Ulysses and Henry Miller's Tropic of
Cancer with the relative quiescence that greeted the much more
violent and sexually explicit content of Bret Easton Ellis's
American Psycho and Andrea Dworkin's Mercy. Through a close reading
of letters to the editor, reviews, media coverage, and court cases,
Eberly shows how literary critics and legal experts defused
censorship debates by shifting the focus from content to aesthetics
and from social values to publicity. By asserting their authority
to pass judgments -- thus denying the authority of citizen critics
-- these professionals effectively removed the discussion from
literary public spheres.
A passionate advocate for treating reading as a public and
rhetorical enterprise rather than solely as a private one, Eberly
suggests the potential impact a work of literature may have on the
social polity if it is brought into public forums for debate rather
than removed to the exclusive rooms of literary criticism. Eberly
urges educators to use their classrooms as protopublic spaces where
students can learn to make the transition from private reader to
public citizen.
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