The Routledge Companion to Literature and Art explores the links between literature and visual art from classical ekphrasis through to contemporary experimental forms. The collection’s engagement with diverse literary and cultural artifacts offers a comprehensive survey of the vibrant interrelationships that currently inform literary studies and the arts. Featuring four sections, the first part provides an overview of theoretical approaches to art and literature from philosophy and aesthetics through to cognitive neuroscience. Section two examines one of the most important intersections between text and image: the workings of ekphrasis across poetry, fiction, drama, comics, life and travel writing, and architectural treatises. The third and fourth sections consider intermedial crossings from antiquity to the present. The contributors examine the rich intermedial experiments that range from manuscript studies to infographics in graphic narratives, illuminating the vibrant ways in which texts have intersected with illustration, music, dance, architecture, painting, photography, media installations, and television. Throughout this dynamic collection of 37 chapters, the contributors evolve existing critical debates in innovative new directions. The volume will be a critical resource for advanced undergraduate and graduate students, as well as specialist scholars working in literary studies, philosophy of art, text and image studies, and visual culture.

On this day 24th June 1920 I turned fourteen. I plan to have a very exciting future now that I have thrown off the SHACKLES of SCHOOL! A detective is what I would most like to be. I cannot think of any reason why I could not be one. Except perhaps I am too young. And I don't like blood. Nancy Parker has recently been engaged in her first position - as a housemaid for the very modern Mrs Bryce. It's not Nancy's dream job (she'd rather be investigating crimes like they do in her beloved six-penny thrillers) but as Mrs Bryce starts to entertain her new neighbours with lavish parties, it becomes clear that something strange and interesting might be afoot. Local burglaries, a cook with a deep, dark secret - and Mrs Bryce's own glamorous but murky past. Will Nancy solve the mysteries while still keeping on top of her chores? A hilarious and energetic middle-grade mystery, narrated part in the third person and part through Nancy's journal.

Maidservants, Mystery, and Murder! Everyone's favourite housemaid-detective is back! Now Nancy has a new job working at Oxcoombe Grange. It's great except for one thing - Nancy is convinced the house is haunted! Ella Otter, now a reluctant pupil at nearby Seabourne Grammar School for Girls, demands a scientific investigation. Together, Nancy and Ella set out to do some spooky snooping, and to uncover the mysteries of the Grange's cellars. But in doing so they make a few enemies, discover a few surprising secrets, and put themselves into a little more danger than they were bargaining for . . . A funny and energetic middle-grade mystery, narrated part in the third person and part through Nancy's illustrated journal. Perfect for fans of Murder Most Unladylike and The Mystery of the Clockwork Sparrow.

A collection of three short plays for women. Designed to be performed together over one evening, the set is comprised of two comedies and one drama, these plays deal with relationships, careers and domestic violence.

In this candid, funny, and often heartbreaking memoir, E.V. Anderson, author of The Many Lives of Lilith Lane, lays bare his troubled childhood. Born to a single mother of five in Camden, New Jersey, one of the most dangerous cities in the country, E.V. never quite fit in. He endured years of torment from his drug-addicted older brother, and spent his youth hiding away with his comic books and imagination. When his comics started to lose their appeal and cocaine grew more enticing, E.V. knew he was in trouble. Through it all, he never lost hope, even as tragedy struck his family. Tales of a New Jersey Nothing is a true story of the bonds we share with family, friends, and lovers that tear us apart, but ultimately make us stronger.

It was the age of Jim Crow, riddled with racial violence and unrest. But in the world of Our Gang, black and white children happily played and made mischief together. They even had their own black and white version of the KKK, the Cluck Cluck Klams—and the public loved it. The story of race and Our Gang, or The Little Rascals, is rife with the contradictions and aspirations of the sharply conflicted, changing American society that was its theater. Exposing these connections for the first time, Julia Lee shows us how much this series, from the first silent shorts in 1922 to its television revival in the 1950s, reveals about black and white American culture—on either side of the silver screen. Behind the scenes, we find unconventional men like Hal Roach and his gag writers, whose Rascals tapped into powerful American myths about race and childhood. We meet the four black stars of the series—Ernie “Sunshine Sammy” Morrison, Allen “Farina” Hoskins, Matthew “Stymie” Beard, and Billie “Buckwheat” Thomas—the gang within the Gang, whose personal histories Lee pursues through the passing years and shifting political landscape. In their checkered lives, and in the tumultuous life of the series, we discover an unexplored story of America, the messy, multiracial nation that found in Our Gang a comic avatar, a slapstick version of democracy itself.