Comparative literature Books

Book SynopsisThis open access book provides translations of early German versions of Titus Andronicus and The Taming of the Shrew. The introductory material situates these plays in their German context and discusses the insights they offer into the original English texts.English itinerant players toured in northern Continental Europe from the 1580s. Their repertories initially consisted of plays from the London theatre, but over time the players learnt German, and German players joined the companies, meaning the dramatic texts were adapted and translated into German. There are four plays that can legitimately be considered as versions of Shakespeare's plays. The present volume (volume 2) offers fully-edited translations of two of them: Tito Andronico (Titus Andronicus) and Kunst über alle Künste, ein bös Weib gut zu machen / An Art beyond All Arts, to Make a Bad Wife Good (The Taming of the Shrew). For the other two plays, Der Bestrafte BrudermordTable of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgements Preface Introduction to Tito Andronico (Titus Andronicus) The Relationship of Tito Andronico to Titus Andronicus Issues of Race in Tito Andronico The Source of Tito Andronico The Peacham Drawing Titus and Vespasian and the Ur-Titus The Chapbook Prose History and the Ballad German Titus Plays in the Seventeenth Century Textual Introduction The Engelische Comedien vnd Tragedien of 1620 and 1624 Friedrich Menius and the 1620 Engelische Comedien vnd Tragedien The 1620 Engelische Comedien vnd Tragedien and Their Theatrical Origins Conclusion The 1620/1624 Engelische Comedien vnd Tragedien: Extant Copies Editorial History Introduction to Kunst über alle Künste, ein bös Weib gut zu machen (The Taming of the Shrew) The Relationship of Kunst über alle Künste to The Taming of the Shrew Characters and Plot: Correspondences and Differences Adapting the Plot of The Taming of the Shrew Soliloquies and Asides Verbal, Cultural and Dramatic Language The Taming of the Shrew in German in the Seventeenth Century Textual Introduction The Early Editions and Their Contexts: Publication, Paratext and Authorship The Order of Publication of the Two Editions of 1672 Extant Copies of the Early Editions Editorial History A note on the translations A note on the commentary and collation TITO ANDRONICO IN ENGLISH TRANSLATION KUNST ÜBER ALLE KÜNSTE, EIN BÖS WEIB GUT ZU MACHEN IN ENGLISH TRANSLATION Appendix: Doubling charts for Tito Andronico and Kunst über alle Künste, ein bös Weib gut zu machen Abbreviations and references Index

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Book SynopsisThis book reveals how a remarkable ancient Greek and Latin poetic form -- the alcaic metre -- found its way into English poetry, and continues shaping the imagination of poets today. English poets have always admired the extraordinary beauty and intricacy of the alcaic stanza (Tennyson called it the grandest of all measures') and their inventive responses to the ancient alcaic have generated remarkable innovations in the rhythms, sounds and shapes of modern poetry. This is the first book-length study of this neglected strand of English literary history and classical reception. Attending closely to the rhythm and texture of their verses, John Talbot reveals surprising connections between English poets across five centuries, among them Mary Shelley, Milton, Marvell, Tennyson, Edward FitzGerald, Wilfred Owen, W. H. Auden and Donald Hall. He gives special attention to a flourishing of English alcaics during the late twentieth and twenty-first centuries, and what it suggests about the chanTrade ReviewThis book offers an original study of the reception/appropriation of the so-called Alcaic strophe in English-language poetry, and through deft close readings of several poems from the early modern period up to today rightly demonstrates that a neglect or ignorance of the use of classical metrics comes at the cost of a “dimension of poetic expressiveness”. -- Peter Liebregts, Professor of Modern Literatures in English, Leiden University, The NetherlandsTable of ContentsAcknowledgements Preface 1 Coming Late to Latin: Wilfred Owen, John Hollander 2 ‘A Marvel of Metrical Disruptions’: The Alcaic Strophe Itself 3 ‘Blossom Again on a Colder Isle’: Mary Sidney, Alfred Tennyson 4 ‘The Same, But Not the Same’: Tennyson’s In Memoriam Stanza 5 ‘The Ear Grows Dissatisfied’: Robert Bridges, W. H. Auden Afterword: From Inheritance to Quarry: The Alcaic in Postmodernity Notes Index Bibliography

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Book SynopsisAlessandra Aloisi is Lecturer in French Literature and Thought at the Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages of the University of Oxford, UK. She is co-editor, with M. Piazza and M. Sinclair, of Maine de Biran's 'Of Immediate Apperception' (Bloomsbury, 2020).Trade ReviewIn a world obsessed with attentional issues, often aligned with a nostalgic longing for rancid forms of authority, Alessandra Aloisi’s book awakens us to the emancipatory power of not paying attention where attention is supposedly due. From Pascal to Proust, through Rousseau and Leopardi, she calls forth the irreverent magic of literary studies to reclaim the affirmative freedom of distraction, read as an untamed alternative to obedience and conformity. * Yves Citton, Professor in Literature and Media at the University Paris 8 and Author of The Ecology of Attention, France *Table of ContentsAcknowledgements Introduction Chapter 1: Divertissement 1. Montaigne and Pascal, or the Difference between Ethics and Morality 2. The Sublime Misanthropist 3. A Man Alone in a Room 4. Maine de Biran Criticizing (Voltaire Criticizing) Pascal 5. Assault on the Inner Citadel 6. Chasing a Hare 7. The Theory of Pleasure Chapter 2: The Power of Flies 1. Augustine and Pascal 2. Serendipity 3. A Distracted Mathematician 4. Distraction and Trains of Thought 5. What is Essential is (In)visible to the Eye 6. Involuntary Memory 7. The Spider and the Connoisseur 8. ‘The Entire History of You’ Chapter 3: Rêverie 1. Dreams, Reveries, and Fantasies 2. Reveries and Childhood 3. Journey, Movement, and Solitude 4. Distraction and Automatism 5. The System of the Soul and the Beast, or the Dangers of Distraction 6. Distraction and Somnambulism 7. Reveries and the History of Madness 8. Distraction and Common Sense 9. Idleness and Laziness Conclusion: Distraction and Laughter Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisTable of ContentsFrequently Cited Texts and Abbreviations Preface and Acknowledgements Introduction: 'Growing Up to be Hanged' PART ONE: Dickens - And The Eighteenth Century CHAPTER I - Abolition and Dickens CHAPTER 2- Fielding, Hogarth, and Dickens CHAPTER 3 - Barnaby Rudge: Poe, and Caleb Williams PART 2 - Derrida - The French Revolution Onwards CHAPTER 4 - Deconstruction and Justice CHAPTER 5 – The Death Penalty Seminars CHAPTER 6 - Decapitation in A Tale of Two Cities CHAPTER 7 - On the USA: Violence and Terrorism In Conclusion Index

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Book SynopsisContends that the twentieth century novel's approach to character fundamentally shifted in response to contemporaneous theories of psychic connection

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Book SynopsisA significant new contribution to Hemmingway scholarship, this book seeks to show that the moral world of The Sun Also Rises is profoundly unstable, and that every character can be seen as being both endorsed and critiqued by the text. This is manifested especially in Jake's status as a partially reliable narrator, and above all in his judgment of Brett. Jake consistently hides his true feelings for Brett from the reader and from himself, as he seeks to appear in control of his life. Reading the text in this way also renders the novel's famous conclusion less decisive than is usually assumed. This book will be of interest to upper-level undergraduates as well as graduate students and scholars.Trade Review"Russell Weaver's The Moral World of The Sun Also Rises offers an exacting but thoroughly accessible analysis of the ethical framework of Ernest Hemingway's storytelling in his famous 1926 tale of expatriates adrift in Paris and Pamplona. With a canny eye for narrative detail, Weaver opens up new dimensions within the novel that made Hemingway famous, demonstrating how much more complexly nuanced the conflicts of Jake, Brett, Bill, Mike, and Robert Cohn are as they search for stability in a world besieged by chaos." —Kirk Curnutt, Coeditor with Suzanne del Gizzo of The New Hemingway Studies “Russell Weaver’s The Moral World of The Sun Also Rises demonstrates the continuing power of skillful close reading. Weaver’s deep dive into Hemingway’s dialogue and Jake Barnes’s narration yields a fascinating vision of the novel’s ethical complexities. A must-read for Hemingway aficionados.“ —James Phelan Distinguished University Professor of English at Ohio State University Author of Somebody Telling Somebody Else: A Rhetorical Poetics of Narrative.

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Book SynopsisInterdisciplinary and cross-cultural research, aided by linguistics, archaeology, and prehistoric and historic data, provides a view of sacred and secular life in ancient times. In every Near Eastern and Indo-Iranian religion there was a belief in an orderly cosmos and society which could be troubled by an unorderly force. The social and political aspects of a society were organized and maintained by that cosmic order, and interpreted and reinforced by the religious authorities and heads of states. The cosmogonic and eschatological myths are reinforced in a society in the same manner. They justify the process of the creation and also the ensuing historical chronicles as understood by a society. Since the creation and beginning of everything are experienced and not historically documented, they are categorized as mythical. As an example, in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, the doctrine of creation is solely based on the Book of Genesis; consequently, the religious concepts and theorTable of ContentsPreface – List of Abbreviations and Symbols – The Background – Near East: Egypt and Mesopotamia – Indo-Europeans – Old Europe – Indo- Iranians – Vedic Indians – Zoroastrian Iranians – Afterword – Bibliography – Index.

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Book SynopsisA comparative study of breath and breathing as a core poetic and compositional principle in modern literature.Breathing and its rhythms-liminal, syncopal, and usually inconspicuous-have become a core poetic compositional principle in modern literature. Examining moments when breath''s punctuations, cessations, inhalations, or exhalations operate at the limits of meaningful speech, Stefanie Heine explores how literary texts reflect their own mediality, production, and reception in alluding to and incorporating pneumatic rhythms, respiratory sound, and silent pauses. Through close readings of works by a series of pairs-Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg; Robert Musil and Virginia Woolf; Samuel Beckett and Sylvia Plath; and Paul Celan and Herta Müller-Poetics of Breathing suggests that each offers a different conception of literary or poetic breath as a precondition of writing. Presenting a challenge to historical and contemporary discourses that tie breath to the transcendent and the natural, Heine traces a decoupling of breath from its traditional association with life, and asks what literature might lie beyond.

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Book SynopsisA comparative study of breath and breathing as a core poetic and compositional principle in modern literature.Breathing and its rhythms-liminal, syncopal, and usually inconspicuous-have become a core poetic compositional principle in modern literature. Examining moments when breath''s punctuations, cessations, inhalations, or exhalations operate at the limits of meaningful speech, Stefanie Heine explores how literary texts reflect their own mediality, production, and reception in alluding to and incorporating pneumatic rhythms, respiratory sound, and silent pauses. Through close readings of works by a series of pairs-Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg; Robert Musil and Virginia Woolf; Samuel Beckett and Sylvia Plath; and Paul Celan and Herta Müller-Poetics of Breathing suggests that each offers a different conception of literary or poetic breath as a precondition of writing. Presenting a challenge to historical and contemporary discourses that tie breath to the transcendent and the natural, Heine traces a decoupling of breath from its traditional association with life, and asks what literature might lie beyond.

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Book SynopsisArgues for a decolonial reinterpretation of Sophocles'' classical tragedy, Antigone, that can help us to rethink the anti-colonial politics of militant mourning in the Americas.Sophocles''s classical tragedy, Antigone, is continually reinvented, particularly in the Americas. Theater practitioners and political theorists alike revisit the story to hold states accountable for their democratic exclusions, as Antigone did in disobeying the edict of her uncle, Creon, for refusing to bury her brother, Polynices. Antigone in the Americas not only analyzes the theoretical reception of Antigone, when resituated in the Americas, but further introduces decolonial rumination as a new interpretive methodology through which to approach classical texts. Traveling between modern present and ancient past, Andrés Fabián Henao Castro focuses on metics (resident aliens) and slaves, rather than citizens, making the feminist politics of burial long associated with Antigone relevant for theorizing militant forms of mourning in the global south. Grounded in settler colonial critique, black and woman of color feminisms, and queer and trans of color critique, Antigone in the Americas offers a more radical interpretation of Antigone, one relevant to subjects situated under multiple and interlocking systems of oppression.

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Book SynopsisArgues for a decolonial reinterpretation of Sophocles'' classical tragedy, Antigone, that can help us to rethink the anti-colonial politics of militant mourning in the Americas.Sophocles''s classical tragedy, Antigone, is continually reinvented, particularly in the Americas. Theater practitioners and political theorists alike revisit the story to hold states accountable for their democratic exclusions, as Antigone did in disobeying the edict of her uncle, Creon, for refusing to bury her brother, Polynices. Antigone in the Americas not only analyzes the theoretical reception of Antigone, when resituated in the Americas, but further introduces decolonial rumination as a new interpretive methodology through which to approach classical texts. Traveling between modern present and ancient past, Andrés Fabián Henao Castro focuses on metics (resident aliens) and slaves, rather than citizens, making the feminist politics of burial long associated with Antigone relevant for theorizing militant forms of mourning in the global south. Grounded in settler colonial critique, black and woman of color feminisms, and queer and trans of color critique, Antigone in the Americas offers a more radical interpretation of Antigone, one relevant to subjects situated under multiple and interlocking systems of oppression.

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Book SynopsisAddresses the question of how language affects the subject of speech through readings of confessional, philosophical, and fictional writings.At least since Aristotle''s Peri hermeneias, there has been talk of the pathos of language, of language as "symbols of the affections in the soul." The way these affections are registered, however, suggests that they are themselves structured like language. For Aristotle and others, language is suffered before any sense can be voiced. The pathos of language thus becomes a question of how language affects the subject of speech and, in the last analysis, of how language could respond to these questions of language. Passive Voices (On the Subject of Phenomenology and Other Figures of Speech) approaches these questions, first, through readings of Augustine''s investigations into language and mind and Edmund Husserl''s descriptions of passive synthesis. It then traces the further resonance of Augustine''s and Husserl''s interventions in selected literary experiments by Georges Bataille, Franz Kafka, and Maurice Blanchot that recall Husserl and Augustine while exceeding the restrictive fictions of phenomenological "science." In drawing out the echoes that emerge across confessional, philosophical, and fictional writings, this book exposes the ways in which speech occurs in the passive voice and affects any claim to experience.

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Book SynopsisAddresses the question of how language affects the subject of speech through readings of confessional, philosophical, and fictional writings.

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Book SynopsisTraces the development of the Chinese love story during the Song and Yuan dynasties.Love stories formed a major part of the classical short story genre in China from as early as the eighth century, when men of letters began to write about romantic encounters. In later centuries, such stories provided inspiration for several new literary genres. While much scholarly attention has been focused on the short story of both the medieval and late imperial eras, comparatively little work has been attempted on the interim stage, the Song and Yuan dynasties, which spanned some five hundred years from the tenth to the fourteenth centuries. Yet this was a crucial developmental period for many forms of narrative literature-so much so that any understanding of late imperial narrative should be informed by the earlier tradition. The first study of its kind in English, The Chinese Love Story from the Tenth to the Fourteenth Century traces the development of the love story throughout this important yet overlooked era. Using Tang dynasty stories as a point of comparison, Alister D. Inglis examines and appraises key new themes, paying special attention to period hallmarks, gender portrayal, and textuality. Inglis demonstrates that, contrary to received scholarly wisdom, this was a highly innovative period during which writers and storytellers laid a fertile foundation for the literature of late imperial China.

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Book SynopsisTraces the development of the Chinese love story during the Song and Yuan dynasties.Love stories formed a major part of the classical short story genre in China from as early as the eighth century, when men of letters began to write about romantic encounters. In later centuries, such stories provided inspiration for several new literary genres. While much scholarly attention has been focused on the short story of both the medieval and late imperial eras, comparatively little work has been attempted on the interim stage, the Song and Yuan dynasties, which spanned some five hundred years from the tenth to the fourteenth centuries. Yet this was a crucial developmental period for many forms of narrative literature-so much so that any understanding of late imperial narrative should be informed by the earlier tradition. The first study of its kind in English, The Chinese Love Story from the Tenth to the Fourteenth Century traces the development of the love story throughout this important yet overlooked era. Using Tang dynasty stories as a point of comparison, Alister D. Inglis examines and appraises key new themes, paying special attention to period hallmarks, gender portrayal, and textuality. Inglis demonstrates that, contrary to received scholarly wisdom, this was a highly innovative period during which writers and storytellers laid a fertile foundation for the literature of late imperial China.

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Book SynopsisExamines twentieth-century Mexican literature and philosophy within the broad panorama of Latin American and European existentialisms.With their emphasis on freedom and engagement, European existentialisms offered Latin Americans transformative frameworks for thinking and writing about their own locales. In taking up these frameworks, Latin Americans endowed them with a distinctive ethos, a turn towards questions of identity and ethics. Stephanie Merrim situates major literary and philosophical works-by the existentialist Grupo Hiperión, Rosario Castellanos, Octavio Paz, José Revueltas, Juan Rulfo, and Rodolfo Usigli-within this dynamic context. Collectively, their writings manifest an existentialist ethos attuned to the matters most alive and pressing in their specific situations-matters linked to gender, Indigeneity, the Mexican Revolution, and post-Revolution politics. That each of these writers orchestrates a unique center of gravity renders Mexican existentialist literature an always shifting, always passionate adventure. A Latin American Existentialist Ethos takes readers on this adventure, conveying the passions of its subjects lucidly and vibrantly. It is at once a detailed portrait of twentieth-century Mexican existentialism and an expansive look at Latin American literary existentialism in relation-and opposition-to its European counterparts.

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Book SynopsisWith their emphasis on freedom and engagement, European existentialisms offered Latin Americans transformative frameworks for thinking and writing about their own locales. In taking up these frameworks, Latin Americans endowed them with a distinctive ethos, a turn towards questions of identity and ethics. Stephanie Merrim situates major literary and philosophical works?by the existentialist Grupo Hiperión, Rosario Castellanos, Octavio Paz, José Revueltas, Juan Rulfo, and Rodolfo Usigli?within this dynamic context. Collectively, their writings manifest an existentialist ethos attuned to the matters most alive and pressing in their specific situations?matters linked to gender, Indigeneity, the Mexican Revolution, and post-Revolution politics. That each of these writers orchestrates a unique center of gravity renders Mexican existentialist literature an always shifting, always passionate adventure. A Latin American Existentialist Ethos takes readers on this adventure, conveying the passions of its subjects lucidly and vibrantly. It is at once a detailed portrait of twentieth-century Mexican existentialism and an expansive look at Latin American literary existentialism in relation?and opposition?to its European counterparts.

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Book SynopsisA probing, generative analysis of Knausgrd''s My Struggle, with implications for our understanding of the novel form more broadly in the twenty-first century.Norwegian author Karl Ove Knausgrd''s six-volume, 3600-page autobiographical novel, My Struggle, has been widely hailed for its heroic exploration of selfhood, compulsive readability, and restless experimentation with form and genre. Knausgård and the Autofictional Novel explains why. Across four chapters, Claus Elholm Andersen shows how Knausgård confronts, challenges, and rejects the symbiotic relationship between novels and fiction, particularly via a technique of "auto-fictionalization." The fifth chapter then explores the further breakdown of this relationship in autofiction by Sheila Heti, Rachel Cusk, and Ben Lerner, taking readers to what Lerner called "the very edge of fiction."

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Book SynopsisProvides the first book-length analysis of modernism and the Anthropocene.

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Book SynopsisAnalyses contemporary Iranian literature in both Iran and its diaspora, in relation to the social, economic and political fields.

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Book SynopsisThe first critical study that theorises the Italian Gothic and examines its main forms and manifestations across arts, media, and disciplinesTrade Review"This imaginatively conceived volume is impeccable in its scholarship, and opens up new ways of thinking about Italian culture in the past two centuries. It does so with great critical insight and panache, dispelling long-held critical prejudices against the Gothic as genre and mode, and unsettling canonical views and critical frameworks. The volume makes for rich and compelling reading." -Giuliana Pieri, Royal Holloway University of London

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Book SynopsisThe volume offers a survey of the contribution of German literature and culture to the evolution of ecological thought. As the field of ecocritical theory and practice is rapidly expanding towards transnational and global dimensions, it seems nevertheless necessary to consider the distinct manifestations of ecological thought in various cultures. In this sense, the volume demonstrates in twenty-six essays from different disciplines how German literature, philosophy, art, and science have contributed in unique ways to the emergence of ecological thought on national and transnational scale. The volume maps the most important and characteristic of these developments both on a theoretical and on a textual-analytical level. It is structured in five parts ranging from proto-ecological thought since early modern times (part I) to major theoretical approaches (part II), environmental history (part III), and ecocritical case studies (part IV), to ecological visions in different media and art foTrade ReviewThis broad and comprehensive survey of German ecological thought is an especially welcome addition to the growing body of scholarship on the environment in the German tradition. Many prominent critics discuss the most crucial aspects from proto-ecological models to environmental theory, history, literature, and art--a must read for everyone interested in ecology and German culture. -- Sabine Wilke, University of WashingtonAt a time when the tension between the local and the global requires that we reconsider our multiple roots and porous place-identities, Ecological Thought in German Literature and Culture is a canonic work that enriches not just 'nationally-oriented' academic studies, but also the entire debate on environmental culture. Skillfully encompassing theoretical approaches, philosophy, history, literature, and the arts, this elegant and challenging volume is the most complete and state-of-the-art guide to examine German culture through the lens of the environmental humanities. -- Serenella Iovino, Professor of Comparative Literature, University of Turin, ItalyTable of ContentsIntroduction Gabriele Dürbeck, Urte Stobbe, Hubert Zapf, and Evi Zemanek Part I: Proto-Ecological Thought 1.Cultural History of the Four Elements Anke Kramer 2.Goethe’s Concept of Nature: Proto-Ecological Model Heather Sullivan 3.Nature, Language, and Religion: Herder and Beyond Kate Rigby 4.Poet and Philosopher: Novalis and Schelling on Nature and Matter Berbeli Wanning 5.Alexander von Humboldt as Ecologist Caroline Schaumann Part II: Theoretical Approaches 6.Heidegger’s Ecological Criticism Silvio Vietta 7.Ecocriticism and the Frankfurt School Timo Müller 8.The Ethics and Aesthetics of Landscapes Angelika Krebs 9.Niklas Luhmann’s Theory of Social Systems Hannes Bergthaller 10.Risk Theory Benjamin Bühler 11.Cultural Ecology Hubert Zapf Part III: Environmental History in Germany 12.Thinking the Disaster: A Historical Approach Francois Walter 13.Industrial Pollution in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries Martin Bemmann 14.Cultural Landscapes in Germany – Continuities, Ruptures, and Stewardship Werner Konold 15.Environmentalism in Germany since 1900: An Overview Richard Hölzl 16.History of Substances Jens Soentgen Part IV: Ecocritical Case Studies of German Literature 17.From Baroque Pastoral to the Idyll Jakob Heller 18.German Ecopoetry Axel Goodbody 19.Elemental Poetics: Material Agency in Contemporary German Poetry Evi Zemanek 20.Grimms’ Fairy Tales and Their Impact on Christa Wolf’s Störfall Urte Stobbe 21.German Cold War Bunker Narratives Wolfgang Lückel 22.Climate Change Fiction and Ecothrillers Gabriele Dürbeck Part V: Ecological Visions in Painting, Music, Film, and Land Art 23.The Perception of German Landscapes Nils Büttner 24.Beethoven’s Natures Aaron S. Allen 25.Visions of Nature and Ecological Thought in German Feature Films Matthias Hurst 26.American Land Art and Ecological Landscape Aesthetics in Europe Udo Weilacher

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Book SynopsisIn Literary Narratives and the Cultural Imagination: King Arthur and Don Quixote as National Heroes the author examines traditional Arthurian and Cervantine literary narratives to discuss how the two literary figures became paladins of their respective nations. Whereas the former bestows upon the homeland a positive image of Britain, based on military might, a glorious past and a promise of return, the latter contributes to a negative image of Spain based on a narrative of defeat and faded glory. In the analysis of the political intentions behind the literature that gave wings to the rise as paragons of these very famous literary characters, a semblance of the national imaginaries of the countries of their birth appears. Indeed, the tradition of Waterloo and the tradition of La Mancha are polar opposites in their Weltanschauung, and they only have in common that both heroes, Arthur and Quijote, are depicted as paladins of justice, benefactors, and redeemers of their land of birth. It iTrade ReviewHeroes today are in short supply, so this book by Ma. Odette Canivell should be celebrated as she takes us back to two of the greatest heroes ever invented where myth and reality are hopelessly intertwined. Many might think it difficult to say anything new about these two protean characters, but Ma. Odette Canivell succeeds through a novel approach that compares and contrasts not only the two heroes themselves but also their evolution in literature. -- Victor Bulmer-Thomas, Honorary Professor, Institute of the Americas, University College LondonMaria Canivell turns what could be a simple comparatist literary history into a fiercely passionate vindication of Don Quixote as a national hero, by dint of his political skepticism, blind self-perception, and philosophical streak. In her reckoning, the better-known and existentially secure King Arthur takes second place, precisely due to his certainty about human affairs. Throughout this well-considered and immaculate study surfaces a manifesto, an act of advocacy. If Don Quixote had an attorney, it would be Canivell. Ranging from Heidegger to Mitsubishi, Otto Rank to Disney, this author's study argues that heroes are marketed as much as they are created. Along the way, the histories of Spain and England are examined as fashioning these two heroes who, paradoxically, serve as precursors of those nations. -- Johnny Payne, Mount Saint Mary's UniversityEnergetic and thought-provoking. I have always thought that the Spaniards and the English (I choose these terms carefully and deliberately) are each the other’s favorite historical rival and Other. It was an inspired idea to compare two such great national fictional heroes, Alonso and Arthur, and María Canivell’s analysis brings out not only the contrasts between these popular characters but, even more significantly, between the two countries that gave them life and still revere them. -- Gerald Martin, University of PittsburghIn Literary Narratives and the Cultural Imagination, Maria Odette Canivell presents a fascinating account of the evolution of “national heroes” who embody the traits to which their respective nations aspired, and who in doing so affect the “life, perception, and imaginations” of the nations they serve. The figure of King Arthur emerged from dim history into legend and literature to represent virtues of the monarchy and eventually British national pride, tradition, and optimism. The entirely literary figure of Don Quijote represented a great nation in decline, suffering from the loss of empire and economic hardship, desiring to fight reality with dreams. Canivell’s comparison of these characters combines meticulous scholarship and a deep love of her subject to produce a lively and informative study. -- Robert Hoskins, Professor Emeritus, James Madison UniversityTable of ContentsIntroduction: 35 Million Kings Chapter 1: Is the Hero Still Worshipable? Chapter 2: To Be Or Not To Be Arthur: Is That The Question? Chapter 3: In A Place of La Mancha Whose Name I Cannot Recall. . . Chapter 4: The Path to Herodom Chapter 5: How to Win Friends and Influence Others

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Book SynopsisIn Literary Narratives and the Cultural Imagination: King Arthur and Don Quixote as National Heroes the author examines traditional Arthurian and Cervantine literary narratives to discuss how the two literary figures became paladins of their respective nations. Whereas the former bestows upon the homeland a positive image of Britain, based on military might, a glorious past and a promise of return, the latter contributes to a negative image of Spain based on a narrative of defeat and faded glory. In the analysis of the political intentions behind the literature that gave wings to the rise as paragons of these very famous literary characters, a semblance of the national imaginaries of the countries of their birth appears. Indeed, the tradition of Waterloo and the tradition of La Mancha are polar opposites in their Weltanschauung, and they only have in common that both heroes, Arthur and Quijote, are depicted as paladins of justice, benefactors, and redeemers of their land of birth. It iTrade ReviewHeroes today are in short supply, so this book by Ma. Odette Canivell should be celebrated as she takes us back to two of the greatest heroes ever invented where myth and reality are hopelessly intertwined. Many might think it difficult to say anything new about these two protean characters, but Ma. Odette Canivell succeeds through a novel approach that compares and contrasts not only the two heroes themselves but also their evolution in literature. -- Victor Bulmer-Thomas, Honorary Professor, Institute of the Americas, University College LondonMaria Canivell turns what could be a simple comparatist literary history into a fiercely passionate vindication of Don Quixote as a national hero, by dint of his political skepticism, blind self-perception, and philosophical streak. In her reckoning, the better-known and existentially secure King Arthur takes second place, precisely due to his certainty about human affairs. Throughout this well-considered and immaculate study surfaces a manifesto, an act of advocacy. If Don Quixote had an attorney, it would be Canivell. Ranging from Heidegger to Mitsubishi, Otto Rank to Disney, this author's study argues that heroes are marketed as much as they are created. Along the way, the histories of Spain and England are examined as fashioning these two heroes who, paradoxically, serve as precursors of those nations. -- Johnny Payne, Mount Saint Mary's UniversityEnergetic and thought-provoking. I have always thought that the Spaniards and the English (I choose these terms carefully and deliberately) are each the other’s favorite historical rival and Other. It was an inspired idea to compare two such great national fictional heroes, Alonso and Arthur, and María Canivell’s analysis brings out not only the contrasts between these popular characters but, even more significantly, between the two countries that gave them life and still revere them. -- Gerald Martin, University of PittsburghIn Literary Narratives and the Cultural Imagination, Maria Odette Canivell presents a fascinating account of the evolution of “national heroes” who embody the traits to which their respective nations aspired, and who in doing so affect the “life, perception, and imaginations” of the nations they serve. The figure of King Arthur emerged from dim history into legend and literature to represent virtues of the monarchy and eventually British national pride, tradition, and optimism. The entirely literary figure of Don Quijote represented a great nation in decline, suffering from the loss of empire and economic hardship, desiring to fight reality with dreams. Canivell’s comparison of these characters combines meticulous scholarship and a deep love of her subject to produce a lively and informative study. -- Robert Hoskins, Professor Emeritus, James Madison UniversityTable of ContentsIntroduction: 35 Million Kings Chapter 1: Is the Hero Still Worshipable?Chapter 2: To Be Or Not To Be Arthur: Is That The Question?Chapter 3: In A Place of La Mancha Whose Name I Cannot Recall. . . Chapter 4: The Path to Herodom Chapter 5: How to Win Friends and Influence Others

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Book SynopsisEuropean Writers in Exile collects a series of original essays that address the writers' universal existential dilemma, when viewed through the lens of exile: who am I, where am I from, and what do I write, and to whom? While we often understand the term exile to refer to writers who have either been forced to leave their home country or region or chosen self-exile, this term need not be defined so narrowly, and the contributors to this volume explore a range of interesting and evolving definitions. Various countries in Europe have long been both a refuge for people and writers from many countries and a strife-torn region which has forced many to flee within the continent or beyond it. The phrase in exile involves writers moving across borders in multiple directions and for multiple reasons, including for reasons of duress or personal quest, and these themes are addressed and critiqued in these essays.This volume naturally examines the cataclysmic and near-universal exilic experiences Trade ReviewAfter a plethora of books on narrowly focused groups of literary exiles, literary exile destinations, or the conditions from which political, literary and other exiles have escaped, this volume does something very new and valuable. It examines the experience of exile, across time and geography, to provide readers with new ideas and angles to understand the phenomenon itself. Birkenstein and Hauhart have done a great service for all readers interested in exiled artists, and given us much to think about as we consider further research. -- Richard Bodek, College of CharlestonTable of ContentsPreface: On the Experience of Exile Robert C. Hauhart and Jeff Birkenstein 1. Social Exile in Nineteenth Century England Charlotte Fiehn 2. Zola’s English Exile: the Private Pages of a Public Author Katherine Ashley 3. "All Europe contributed": Joseph Conrad's Experience and Representation of Exile Kelly C. MacPhail 4. Thomas Mann – An American? From Fascination to Disillusionment – The Black Swan as a Literary Account of Mann’s Exile Experiences Katarzyna Bałżewska 5. James Joyce, Dubliners, and Exile Jeff Birkenstein 6. Franz Kafka’s Exile of the Mind Robert C. Hauhart 7. Professor Pnin in Exile: Nabokov and the Liminal Experience of the Post-War Émigré Academic Rowena Clarke 8. Specks in the City: Shklovsky and Nabokov in Berlin Rossitsa Terzieva-Artemis 9. Hannah Arendt and Leo Strauss: The Tradition of Political Thought and the Modern Age Shmuel Lederman 10. Arthur Koestler’s Fictional Self-Reflections of Exile Andrea Gay Tyndall 11. In Search of the Doppelganger: Homecoming from Exile Irina Golovacheva 12. Milan Kundera, the Novel, and the Problem of History Liani Lochner 13. Norman Manea’s Exile between Predicament and Redemption Brînduşa Nicolaescu 14. Lessons from Exile—Eva Hoffman as Theoretician and Practitioner of Otherness Johannes Evelein 15. “Receive me kindly, stranger that I am”: W.G. Sebald’s Existential Exile Marion Rohrleitner 16. Transnational Modes of Exile in Caryl Phillips’s Narratives: Or, What it Feels Like to be Both Of and Not Of Svetlana Stefanova

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Book SynopsisThis book offers a futuristic vision going beyond the common paradigms of postcolonility, diaspora, and globalization, speculating a framework beyond master-slave dialectic. This new paradigm locates a humanitarian space purifying ego through various forms- writing and theorizing new ideas. Authors focus on writers from Mauritius to India.

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Book SynopsisWhether perusing a recipe or learning what a literary character eats, readers approach a text differently when reading about food. Read My Plate: The Literature of Food explores what narrators and characters (in fiction, in performance, and in the popular genre of the food memoir) cook and eat. Beat poet Allen Ginsberg, the inmates of the Terezin concentration camp, performance artist Karen Finley, novelist Jhumpa Lahiri, playwright Suzan-Lori Parks, and the celebrated chef-turned-travel-journalist Anthony Bourdain are just a few examples of the writers whose works are discussed. Close readings of the literal and figurative plates in these texts allow a unique form of intimate access to the speakers' feelings and memories and helps readers to understand more about how the dynamics of race, ethnicity, gender, religion, and social class affect what the narrators/characters eat, from tourtière to collard greens to a school lunch bento box.Trade ReviewDeborah R. Geis expands our understanding of the literature of food, both in terms of genre and of methods to approach a portion of food writing. Her delicate explication of food memoir and performance art through lenses of gender, race, and migration melds with treatment of more traditional texts of fiction and poetry to yield a deeply empathetic contemplation about food’s personal and political resonance. -- Miriam Mara, Arizona State UniversityTable of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction Chapter One. The Hungry Yawp: Eating and Orality in Whitman and Ginsberg Chapter Two. The Politics of Gluttony in Second-Generation Holocaust Literature Chapter Three. Chukla Bukla: Cooking, Bengali-Indian-Anglo-American Writers, and the Merging of Cultures Chapter Four. Feeding the Audience: Food, Feminism, and Performance Art Chapter Five. The Last Black Man’s Fried Chicken: Soul Food, Memory, and African American Culinary Writing Chapter Six. Cooking Up a Storm: Recent Food Memoirs and the Angry Daughter Chapter Seven. Eat and Run: Food Writing, Masculinity, and the “Male Midlife Crisis” Chapter Eight. School Lunch: Bicultural Conflicts in Asian-American Women’s Food Memoirs Conclusion Bibliography Index About the Author

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Book SynopsisWhether perusing a recipe or learning what a literary character eats, readers approach a text differently when reading about food. Read My Plate: The Literature of Food explores what narrators and characters (in fiction, in performance, and in the popular genre of the food memoir) cook and eat. Beat poet Allen Ginsberg, the inmates of the Terezin concentration camp, performance artist Karen Finley, novelist Jhumpa Lahiri, playwright Suzan-Lori Parks, and the celebrated chef-turned-travel-journalist Anthony Bourdain are just a few examples of the writers whose works are discussed. Close readings of the literal and figurative plates in these texts allow a unique form of intimate access to the speakers' feelings and memories and helps readers to understand more about how the dynamics of race, ethnicity, gender, religion, and social class affect what the narrators/characters eat, from tourtière to collard greens to a school lunch bento box.Trade ReviewDeborah R. Geis expands our understanding of the literature of food, both in terms of genre and of methods to approach a portion of food writing. Her delicate explication of food memoir and performance art through lenses of gender, race, and migration melds with treatment of more traditional texts of fiction and poetry to yield a deeply empathetic contemplation about food’s personal and political resonance. -- Miriam Mara, Arizona State UniversityTable of ContentsAcknowledgmentsIntroduction Chapter One. The Hungry Yawp: Eating and Orality in Whitman and Ginsberg Chapter Two. The Politics of Gluttony in Second-Generation Holocaust LiteratureChapter Three. Chukla Bukla: Cooking, Bengali-Indian-Anglo-American Writers, and the Merging of Cultures Chapter Four. Feeding the Audience: Food, Feminism, and Performance ArtChapter Five. The Last Black Man’s Fried Chicken: Soul Food, Memory, and African American Culinary Writing Chapter Six. Cooking Up a Storm: Recent Food Memoirs and the Angry DaughterChapter Seven. Eat and Run: Food Writing, Masculinity, and the “Male Midlife Crisis”Chapter Eight. School Lunch: Bicultural Conflicts in Asian-American Women’s Food MemoirsConclusionBibliographyIndexAbout the Author

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Book SynopsisAn Ironic Approach to the Absolute: Schlegel's Poetic Mysticism brings Friedrich Schlegel's ironic fragments in dialogue with the Dao De Jing and John Ashbery's Flow Chart to argue that poetic texts offer an intuition of the whole because they resist the reader's desire to comprehend them fully. Karolin Mirzakhan argues that although Schlegel's ironic fragments proclaim their incompleteness in both their form and their content, they are the primary means for facilitating an intuition of the Absolute. Focusing on the techniques by which texts remain open, empty, or ungraspable, Mirzakhan's analysis uncovers the methods that authors use to cultivate the agility of mind necessary for their readers to intuit the Absolute. Mirzakhan develops the term poetic mysticism to describe the experience of the Absolute made possible by particular textual moments,examining the Dao De Jing and Flow Chart to provide an original account of the striving to know the Absolute that is non-linear, non-totalizTrade Review"Mirzakhan states that her purpose in writing is pedagogical, and her attention to her readers and skill as a communicator are evident throughout this sensitive text. As Mirzakhan claims, Schlegel’s writings on irony and the Dao De Jing are mutually illuminating, especially as deployed by Mirzakhan. Mirzakahn’s patient, insightful unpicking of Schlegelian irony and its resistance to Hegel’s criticism in the early chapters provides an access point to some of the most apparently counter-intuitive claims of this ancient text. Mirzakhan’s careful exposition of the use of metaphor, performance and other indirect forms of communication in the Dao De Jing guide the reader towards what is unspoken, unilluminated – that which exceeds language and thought – at the heart of Schlegel’s philosophy. Mirzakhan concludes with a lucid account of John Ashbery’s poem Flow Chart that brings the encounter with the Absolute into the 20th century."--Anna Ezekiel, University of York -- Anna Ezekiel, University of York"The philosophical significance of Early German Romanticism has regained considerable recognition and, within this movement, Friedrich Schlegel deserves special attention. Karolin Mazakhan's well-written study succeeds in illuminating the complex ironic features of Schlegel's work by comparing it in an original way with that of other writers, ancient (Laozi) and contemporary (Ashbery)."--Karl Ameriks, University of Notre Dame -- Karl Ameriks, University of Notre DameTable of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction: Paradox and Philosophizing Together1. An Ironic Approach2. To Be Ironic Is Divine: Hegel’s Aesthetics and the Threat of Irony 3. Another Way to the Absolute: Language and Naming in the Dao De Jing4. How to Read a River: Poetic Mysticism in John Ashbery’s Flow ChartBibliography About the Author

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Book SynopsisThis book aims to examine the heritage of Victor Shklovsky in a variety of disciplines. To achieve this end, we drew upon colleagues from eight different countries across the world USA, Canada, Russia, England, Scotland, the Netherlands, Norway, and Hong Kong in order to bring the widest variety of points of view on the subject. But we also wanted this book to be more than just another collection of essays of literary criticism: we invited scholars from different disciplines literature, cinematography, and philosophy who have dealt with Shklovsky's heritage and saw its practical application in their fields. Therefore, all these essays are written in a variety of humanist academic and scholarly styles, all engaging and dynamic.Trade ReviewEngaging, uneven, and seminal - very much reflecting the spirit of Shklovsky's own work - , this wide-ranging collection revisits some of his key ideas and tests their relevance today. -- Galin Tihanov, George Steiner Professor of Comparative Literature, Queen Mary University of LondonOf all the Petrograd Formalists, Viktor Shklovsky wrote the most brashly, loved the most lyrically, coped most pragmatically with the horrors of his era, and lived the longest. As critic, creative writer and closet lay philosopher, Shklovsky was—as one contributor to this volume puts it—always a public figure in history but careful “to avoid being one with it.” It took hard work to survive. To make a living, Shklovsky edited banned film scripts to get them past the censor and ghostwrote books for less gifted colleagues. As he confessed to his Italian interviewer Serena Vitale near the end of his life, there were only two things he never wrote: poetry, and denunciations. This wide-ranging volume celebrates Shklovsky’s legacy in thing theory, feminist formalism, defamiliarization in film, the limits of the translatable, and provides newly-sensitized readings of world literature from Cervantes through Tolstoy, Lewis Carroll, Pynchon and Borges. A fine tribute to Soviet Russia’s most cosmopolitan monolingual critic. -- Caryl Emerson, Princeton UniversityTable of ContentsIntroduction Irina Evdokimova Part I: Shklovsky’s Heritage in Literature Chapter 1: Thinking in Images, Differently: Shklovsky, Yakubinsky, and the Power of Evidence Michael Eskin Chapter 2: The Odyssey of Viktor Shklovsky: Life after Formalism Basil Lvoff Chapter 3: The Eternal Wonderer, or Who was Viktor Shklovsky? Slav N. Gratchev Chapter 4: Defamiliarization in translating Lewis Carroll’s Wonderland. Victor Fet and Michael Everson Chapter 5: Viktor Shklovsky on Narrative David Gorman Chapter 6: Defamiliarization and Genre: Semiotic Subversions in The Crying of Lot 49 and “Death and the Compass.” Melissa Garr Chapter 7: Shklovsky and Things, or Why Tolstoy’s Sofa should matter. Sergei Oushakine Chapter 8: The Motherland will Notice her Terrible Mistake:* Paradox of Futurism in Jasienski, Mayakovsky and Shklovsky Norbert Francis Chapter 9: Framing and Threading Non-Literary Discourse into the Structure of Cervantes´s Don Quixote II Rachel Schmidt Chapter 10: Shklovsky and World Literature. Grant Hamilton Chapter 11: Racism and Robots: Defamiliarizing Social Justice in Rosa Montero’s Tears in the Rain and the 21st Century. Steven Mills Part II: Shklovsky’s Heritage in Arts Chapter 12: Shklovsky’s Dog and Mulvey’s Pleasure: The Secret Life of Defamiliarization. Eric Naiman Chapter 13: Reading Viktor Shklovsky’s “Arts as Technique” in the Context of Early Cinema. Annie Van den Oever Part III: Shklovsky’s Heritage in Philosophy Chapter 14: Philosophical work of Russian formalism Alexander Markov Chapter 15: Shklovsky as a Technique: Literary Theory and the Biographical Strategies of a Soviet Intellectual Ilya Kalinin Chapter 16: From a New Seeing to a New Acting: Viktor Shklovsky's Ostranenie and Analyses of Games and Play. Holger Pötzsch

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Book SynopsisThis book examines the heritage of Victor Shklovsky in a variety of disciplines. To achieve this end, Slav N. Gratchev and Howard Mancing draw upon colleagues from eight different countries across the worldthe United States, Canada, Russia, England, Scotland, the Netherlands, Norway, and Chinain order to bring the widest variety of points of view on the subject. Viktor Shklovsky's Heritage in Literature, Arts, and Philosophy is more than just another collection of essays of literary criticism: the editors invited scholars from different disciplinesliterature, cinematography, and philosophywho have dealt with Shklovsky's heritage and saw its practical application in their fields. Therefore, all of these essays are written in a variety of humanist academic and scholarly styles, all engaging and dynamic.Trade ReviewViktor Shklovsky (1893–1984) was a powerhouse of early Soviet literary and cultural theory. He was also one of the earliest Soviet film critics, and from the 1920s through the 1970s he worked as a screenwriter for Goskin (i.e., USSR State Committee for Cinematography). This collection of 16 essays examines all facets of Shklovsky’s legacy on literature, criticism, cinematography, and philosophy. Unlike most scholarship on Shklovsky, the present volume treats not only his best-known works—for example, Art as Device (1917) and Theory of Prose (1925)—but all his contributions and his influence into the late 1970s. The book’s three parts focus on Shklovsky’s three main areas of investigation: literature, the arts, and philosophy. Particular focus is placed on his legacy in the broad Soviet cultural landscape: on early cinema, on philosopher Yuri Tynyanov, on the Soviet intelligentsia, and on world literature. As one would expect, several essays explore the impact of Shklovsky’s concept of defamiliarization on other authors/works and contexts, from Lewis Carroll’s Wonderland to Cervantes’s Don Quixote. This is a book for specialists interested in expanding their knowledge of Shklovsky and his impact beyond his well-known work.Summing Up: Recommended. Graduate students, researchers, faculty. * Choice *Engaging, uneven, and seminal - very much reflecting the spirit of Shklovsky's own work - , this wide-ranging collection revisits some of his key ideas and tests their relevance today. -- Galin Tihanov, George Steiner Professor of Comparative Literature, Queen Mary University of LondonOf all the Petrograd Formalists, Viktor Shklovsky wrote the most brashly, loved the most lyrically, coped most pragmatically with the horrors of his era, and lived the longest. As critic, creative writer and closet lay philosopher, Shklovsky was—as one contributor to this volume puts it—always a public figure in history but careful “to avoid being one with it.” It took hard work to survive. To make a living, Shklovsky edited banned film scripts to get them past the censor and ghostwrote books for less gifted colleagues. As he confessed to his Italian interviewer Serena Vitale near the end of his life, there were only two things he never wrote: poetry, and denunciations. This wide-ranging volume celebrates Shklovsky’s legacy in thing theory, feminist formalism, defamiliarization in film, the limits of the translatable, and it provides newly-sensitized readings of world literature from Cervantes through Tolstoy, Lewis Carroll, Pynchon, and Borges. A fine tribute to Soviet Russia’s most cosmopolitan monolingual critic. -- Caryl Emerson, Princeton UniversityVictor Shklovsky, though among the most influential literary theorists of the 20th century, remains, paradoxically, little known. This volume brings together Russianists who contextualize Shklovsky's achievement alongside scholars in other fields—most notably Hispanists—who attest to its impact. If you use the concept of 'defamiliarization' in your classes or publications—and who doesn't?—you will want to read this book. -- William Childers, Brooklyn CollegeTable of ContentsIntroductionIrina Evdokimova Part I: Shklovsky’s Heritage in Literature Chapter 1: Thinking in Images, Differently: Shklovsky, Yakubinsky, and the Power of EvidenceMichael Eskin Chapter 2: The Odyssey of Viktor Shklovsky: Life after FormalismBasil Lvoff Chapter 3: The Eternal Wonderer, or Who was Viktor Shklovsky?Slav N. Gratchev Chapter 4: Defamiliarization in translating Lewis Carroll’s Wonderland.Victor Fet and Michael EversonChapter 5: Viktor Shklovsky on NarrativeDavid Gorman Chapter 6: Defamiliarization and Genre: Semiotic Subversions in The Crying of Lot 49 and “Death and the Compass.”Melissa Garr Chapter 7: Shklovsky and Things, or Why Tolstoy’s Sofa should matter.Sergei Oushakine Chapter 8: The Motherland will Notice her Terrible Mistake:* Paradox of Futurism in Jasienski, Mayakovsky and ShklovskyNorbert Francis Chapter 9: Framing and Threading Non-Literary Discourse into the Structure of Cervantes´s Don Quixote IIRachel Schmidt Chapter 10: Shklovsky and World Literature. Grant Hamilton Chapter 11: Racism and Robots: Defamiliarizing Social Justice in Rosa Montero’s Tears in the Rain and the 21st Century.Steven Mills Part II: Shklovsky’s Heritage in ArtsChapter 12: Shklovsky’s Dog and Mulvey’s Pleasure: The Secret Life of Defamiliarization.Eric Naiman Chapter 13: Reading Viktor Shklovsky’s “Arts as Technique” in the Context of Early Cinema.Annie Van den Oever Part III: Shklovsky’s Heritage in Philosophy Chapter 14: Philosophical work of Russian formalism Alexander Markov Chapter 15: Shklovsky as a Technique: Literary Theory and the Biographical Strategies of a Soviet IntellectualIlya Kalinin Chapter 16: From a New Seeing to a New Acting: Viktor Shklovsky's Ostranenie and Analyses of Games and Play.Holger Pötzsch

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