Description
Book SynopsisThis collection of essays assesses the work of a number of American intellectuals, including Susan Sontag, F.O. Mathieson, Daniel Bell and Hannah Arendt, who have addressed issues of culture and its multifaceted relations to politics, history, sociology and literary criticism.
Trade Review
'Each essay exposes stronger connections than one might imagine between the lives and writings of some of America's important critics. What is nice about the entire collection is that each essay spends more time on history and biography than critical analysis.' (Borderlines: Studies in American Culture Vol.4 , No. 1, 1997)
'. . . The book offers a rich harvest of insights (some even refreshingly novel) into the interior of a number of American critical paradigms - some central, some marginal, but all undoubtedly relevant.' (Newsletter of the European Association for American Studies)
Table of Contents
Introduction, David Murray
1. Southern Literary and Intellectual History in the Twentieth Century: The Agrarians to Richard Weaver, Michael Kreyling
2. The Agony of the Avant-Garde: Philip Rahv and the New York Intellectuals, Hugh Wilford
3. F.O. Mattheissen's "Devotion to the Possibilities of Democracy" and his Place as an American Intellectual, Richard Bradbury
4. Susan Sontag: The Intellectual and Cultural Criticism, Liam Kennedy
5. Stanley Cavell: Must We Believe What We Say?, Michael Wood
6. The Person in Place: Lewis Mumford, Pioneer of Cultural Criticism, Clive Bush
7. Coming of Age in America: Margaret Mead and Karen Horney, Helen Carr
8. Erik H. Erikson's Critical Themes and Voices: The Task of Synthesis, Lawrence J. Friedman
9. Philip Rieff, Jerry Z. Muller
10. Hannah Arendt, Richard H. King
11. Garry Wills, Stephen J. Whitfield
12. Black Intellectuals Past and Present, Ross Posnock
13. Culture at Modernity's End: Daniel Bell and Fredric Jameson, Nick Heffernan
Index
