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Living with Monsters: A Study of the Art of Characterization in Aldous Huxley’s Novels (Literary Criticism and Cultural Theory)
by Indrani DebAldous Huxley is one of the most well-known modernist intellectuals of the first half of the twentieth century, excelling in novels, essays, philosophical tracts, and poems. His novels are special in that they use a unique form – the novel of ideas – with which to satirize human nature and the pride regarding human achievement. Few readers of English literature are not acquainted with books like Point Counter Point, Eyeless in Gaza and Brave New World (novels dealt with in detail). A proper study of Huxley’s characterization in his novels opens up a veritable treasure-house of history, philosophy, psychology, and incisive satire. "Characterology", as the art of projecting different kinds of characters is called, is an ancient art, which either aimed at representing the entire universe in a single individual, or the same in a variegated form through various individuals. Huxley uses the latter kind in his representation of character, and as such, a study of the characters of his novels opens up a general interpretation of the universe as a whole.
Maternal Fictions: Writing the Mother in Indian Women’s Fiction (Routledge Research in Postcolonial Literatures)
by Indrani KarmakarThis book constitutes a feminist literary analysis of motherhood as presented in selected Indian women’s fictions across a diverse range of geographical, linguistic, class and caste contexts. Situated at the crossroads of motherhood studies and literary studies, this book offers a rigorous examination of the prosody and politics of motherhood in this corpus. In its five thematically focused chapters, the book scrutinises in depth such key concerns as maternal ambivalence; maternal agency and caste; mother–daughter relationships; motherhood and diaspora; and non-biological motherhood. It attempts to understand the literary ramifications of these issues in order to identify the ways in which fiction writers reconceive of the notion of motherhood and maternal identities from and against multiple perspectives. Another pressing concern is whether these Indian women writers’ visions furnish readers with any different understandings of motherhood as compared to dominant Western feminist discourses. Maternal Fictions advances feminist literary criticism in the specific area of Indian women’s writing and the overarching areas of motherhood and literature by acting as a launchpad into a complex constellation of ideas concerning motherhood. The fictional universe is at once ambivalent, diverse, contingent, grounded in a specific location, and yet well placed to converse with discourses emanating from other times and places.
Of Love and Loss: Hardy Yeats Larkin (Routledge Studies in Contemporary Literature)
by Tom McAlindonA study of the poetry of Hardy, Yeats, and Larkin in relation to their shared preoccupation with time, change, and loss, the most ancient and fertile theme in lyric and reflective verse, known to earlier English poets as mutability. Though the importance of the socio-political and ideological context is in every case acknowledged, the literary-history context is viewed as primary: hence the introductory survey of foundational Renaissance and Romantic poets with whose work Hardy, Yeats, and Larkin were thoroughly familiar. Although a preoccupation with the subject of time and change in the work of these three poets is a critical commonplace, no one has ever isolated it for special attention, or used it to link them either together or with their historical predecessors. This is an entirely new approach to their work. The critical methodology employed is evidential and analytical rather than theoretical, focussed throughout on the meaning and the mood of each poem and the distinctive individuality of each poet.
Trauma, Posttraumatic Growth, and World Literature: Metamorphoses and a Literary Arts Praxis (Literary Criticism and Cultural Theory)
by Suzanne LaLondePandemics, global climate chaos, worldwide migration crises? These phenomena are provoking traumatic experiences in unprecedented ways and numbers. This book is targeted for clinicians, scientists, cultural theorists, and other scholars and students of trauma studies interested in cultivating interdisciplinary understandings of trauma and posttraumatic conditions, especially resistance, resilience, and posttraumatic growth. Following clinicians’ invitation for trauma survivors to wear a philosopher’s hat, to engage in creative activities, and to employ cognitive exercises to combat psychic constriction, I introduce the concept of a Literary Arts Praxis. The Praxis is built on clinical research and literature seeped in existential, phenomenological, and aesthetic themes. I argue that an educational training in a Praxis might help trauma survivors to get at trauma, as they engage in imaginative escapades, while forging alliances with characters; interpretative exercises, such as triggering emotions through phenomenological experiences; and creative writing endeavors, that include turning testimonies into imaginative stories.
Maternal Fictions: Writing the Mother in Indian Women’s Fiction (Routledge Research in Postcolonial Literatures)
by Indrani KarmakarThis book constitutes a feminist literary analysis of motherhood as presented in selected Indian women’s fictions across a diverse range of geographical, linguistic, class and caste contexts. Situated at the crossroads of motherhood studies and literary studies, this book offers a rigorous examination of the prosody and politics of motherhood in this corpus. In its five thematically focused chapters, the book scrutinises in depth such key concerns as maternal ambivalence; maternal agency and caste; mother–daughter relationships; motherhood and diaspora; and non-biological motherhood. It attempts to understand the literary ramifications of these issues in order to identify the ways in which fiction writers reconceive of the notion of motherhood and maternal identities from and against multiple perspectives. Another pressing concern is whether these Indian women writers’ visions furnish readers with any different understandings of motherhood as compared to dominant Western feminist discourses. Maternal Fictions advances feminist literary criticism in the specific area of Indian women’s writing and the overarching areas of motherhood and literature by acting as a launchpad into a complex constellation of ideas concerning motherhood. The fictional universe is at once ambivalent, diverse, contingent, grounded in a specific location, and yet well placed to converse with discourses emanating from other times and places.
Of Love and Loss: Hardy Yeats Larkin (Routledge Studies in Contemporary Literature)
by Tom McAlindonA study of the poetry of Hardy, Yeats, and Larkin in relation to their shared preoccupation with time, change, and loss, the most ancient and fertile theme in lyric and reflective verse, known to earlier English poets as mutability. Though the importance of the socio-political and ideological context is in every case acknowledged, the literary-history context is viewed as primary: hence the introductory survey of foundational Renaissance and Romantic poets with whose work Hardy, Yeats, and Larkin were thoroughly familiar. Although a preoccupation with the subject of time and change in the work of these three poets is a critical commonplace, no one has ever isolated it for special attention, or used it to link them either together or with their historical predecessors. This is an entirely new approach to their work. The critical methodology employed is evidential and analytical rather than theoretical, focussed throughout on the meaning and the mood of each poem and the distinctive individuality of each poet.
Trauma, Posttraumatic Growth, and World Literature: Metamorphoses and a Literary Arts Praxis (Literary Criticism and Cultural Theory)
by Suzanne LaLondePandemics, global climate chaos, worldwide migration crises? These phenomena are provoking traumatic experiences in unprecedented ways and numbers. This book is targeted for clinicians, scientists, cultural theorists, and other scholars and students of trauma studies interested in cultivating interdisciplinary understandings of trauma and posttraumatic conditions, especially resistance, resilience, and posttraumatic growth. Following clinicians’ invitation for trauma survivors to wear a philosopher’s hat, to engage in creative activities, and to employ cognitive exercises to combat psychic constriction, I introduce the concept of a Literary Arts Praxis. The Praxis is built on clinical research and literature seeped in existential, phenomenological, and aesthetic themes. I argue that an educational training in a Praxis might help trauma survivors to get at trauma, as they engage in imaginative escapades, while forging alliances with characters; interpretative exercises, such as triggering emotions through phenomenological experiences; and creative writing endeavors, that include turning testimonies into imaginative stories.
French Comic Drama from the Sixteenth to the Eighteenth Century (Geoffrey Brereton on French Tragic and Comic Drama)
by Geoffrey BreretonIn tracing the course of French comedy from the Renaissance, through the age of Louis XIV and the eighteenth century, to the eve of the Revolution, originally published in 1977, Geoffrey Brereton shows how it evolved from the crude farces and experimental plays of the sixteenth century to become a rich and highly sophisticated dramatic genre. The main emphasis is on the work of the principal dramatists, notably Molière (whose plays and career are given a detailed and enlightening treatment), Corneille, Scarron, Marivaux and Beaumarchais, with some space devoted to the more neglected writers, such as the ‘cynical generation’ of Dancourt, Regnard, Lesage and others; and all the plays are seen in the context of the theatrical conventions that helped to shape them. Different types of comedy are analysed, including comedy of character and of manners, as well as the romantic, burlesque and bourgeois forms and the development of the opéra-comique. At the same time Dr Brereton examines the influences on French comedy – influences as varied as those of the farce, the Italian commedia dell’arte, the Spanish comedia and the eighteenth century drame – and the way in which these were absorbed and exploited by French comic dramatists. Since comedy, more than any other kind of drama, reflects the contemporary social scene, attention is drawn to social conditions and attitudes, and some of the more striking parallels with modern social preoccupations are pointed out. Written in a very lively and readable style, and containing much stimulating and original comment, as well as providing the basic facts, it gives a considerable insight into the nature of French comedy during its most formative and fruitful period. A substantial bibliography and other reference material increase the usefulness of this book to the student of French drama.
French Tragic Drama in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (Geoffrey Brereton on French Tragic and Comic Drama)
by Geoffrey BreretonOriginally published in 1973, the history of French tragedy and tragicomedy from their origins in the sixteenth century to the last years of Louis XIV’s reign is here surveyed in a single volume. Beginning with a brief account of the development of drama from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance, Dr Brereton examines the plays as types of drama, the circumstances in which they were produced and their reception by contemporaries. The traditionally great figures of Corneille and Racine are treated at some length, but their work is seen in perspective against the plays of their predecessors and of their own time. Garnier and Montchrestien are discussed, among others, as notable writers of Renaissance humanist tragedy. Sections are devoted to secondary but still important dramatists such as Mairet, Rotrou, Du Ryer, Tristan L’Hermite, Thomas Corneille and Quinault. A long chapter on Alexandre Hardy reviews the work of this neglected author and stresses his interest as a transitional link between the two centuries and as a vigorous pioneer of a type of drama which flourished for several decades after him concurrently with French ‘classical’ tragedy. The main currents of critical theory, social attitudes and stage history are described in their relation to the development of the drama. Well over a hundred plays are discussed or summarized; and the author has constantly referred back to the original material and has avoided an over-simplification of a vast subject which contains more exceptions and anomalies than has generally been recognized in the past. Chronological tables of the works of major dramatists, summaries of numerous plays and a bibliography containing modern editions of plays are included.
French Comic Drama from the Sixteenth to the Eighteenth Century (Geoffrey Brereton on French Tragic and Comic Drama)
by Geoffrey BreretonIn tracing the course of French comedy from the Renaissance, through the age of Louis XIV and the eighteenth century, to the eve of the Revolution, originally published in 1977, Geoffrey Brereton shows how it evolved from the crude farces and experimental plays of the sixteenth century to become a rich and highly sophisticated dramatic genre. The main emphasis is on the work of the principal dramatists, notably Molière (whose plays and career are given a detailed and enlightening treatment), Corneille, Scarron, Marivaux and Beaumarchais, with some space devoted to the more neglected writers, such as the ‘cynical generation’ of Dancourt, Regnard, Lesage and others; and all the plays are seen in the context of the theatrical conventions that helped to shape them. Different types of comedy are analysed, including comedy of character and of manners, as well as the romantic, burlesque and bourgeois forms and the development of the opéra-comique. At the same time Dr Brereton examines the influences on French comedy – influences as varied as those of the farce, the Italian commedia dell’arte, the Spanish comedia and the eighteenth century drame – and the way in which these were absorbed and exploited by French comic dramatists. Since comedy, more than any other kind of drama, reflects the contemporary social scene, attention is drawn to social conditions and attitudes, and some of the more striking parallels with modern social preoccupations are pointed out. Written in a very lively and readable style, and containing much stimulating and original comment, as well as providing the basic facts, it gives a considerable insight into the nature of French comedy during its most formative and fruitful period. A substantial bibliography and other reference material increase the usefulness of this book to the student of French drama.
French Tragic Drama in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (Geoffrey Brereton on French Tragic and Comic Drama)
by Geoffrey BreretonOriginally published in 1973, the history of French tragedy and tragicomedy from their origins in the sixteenth century to the last years of Louis XIV’s reign is here surveyed in a single volume. Beginning with a brief account of the development of drama from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance, Dr Brereton examines the plays as types of drama, the circumstances in which they were produced and their reception by contemporaries. The traditionally great figures of Corneille and Racine are treated at some length, but their work is seen in perspective against the plays of their predecessors and of their own time. Garnier and Montchrestien are discussed, among others, as notable writers of Renaissance humanist tragedy. Sections are devoted to secondary but still important dramatists such as Mairet, Rotrou, Du Ryer, Tristan L’Hermite, Thomas Corneille and Quinault. A long chapter on Alexandre Hardy reviews the work of this neglected author and stresses his interest as a transitional link between the two centuries and as a vigorous pioneer of a type of drama which flourished for several decades after him concurrently with French ‘classical’ tragedy. The main currents of critical theory, social attitudes and stage history are described in their relation to the development of the drama. Well over a hundred plays are discussed or summarized; and the author has constantly referred back to the original material and has avoided an over-simplification of a vast subject which contains more exceptions and anomalies than has generally been recognized in the past. Chronological tables of the works of major dramatists, summaries of numerous plays and a bibliography containing modern editions of plays are included.
Comedy (Routledge Library Editions: Comedy)
by L. J. PottsOriginally published in 1949 this book is a study of comedy based on representative works of drama and narrative, mainly in English, from Chaucer to Bernard Shaw. The theme is that comedy implies a philosophy of life that is fairly constant, despite the changes in social conditions and fashions of thought. There is a bibliographical index and the book is illustrated fully and widely by quotations from English comic writers.
Comedy: The European Heritage (Routledge Library Editions: Comedy)
by L. J. PottsOriginally published in 1949 this book is a study of comedy based on representative works of drama and narrative, mainly in English, from Chaucer to Bernard Shaw. The theme is that comedy implies a philosophy of life that is fairly constant, despite the changes in social conditions and fashions of thought. There is a bibliographical index and the book is illustrated fully and widely by quotations from English comic writers.
The Comedy of Manners (Routledge Library Editions: Comedy)
by Kenneth MuirOriginally published in 1970, this title starts with an introduction, in which Professor Muir distinguishes between the Comedy of Manners and other types of comedy and traces its origins in English and French literature, there are then chapters on the major writers – Etherege, Dryden, Wycherly, Congreve, Vanbrugh, Farquhar – and on Jeremy Collier’s attack on the immorality and profaneness of the plays. This is followed by a discussion of the reasons for the decline of comedy in the eighteenth century and an account of its revival by Sheridan and, belatedly, by Wilde. Professor Muir takes issue with a number of recent critics on the dramatic value of the plays.
Comic Drama: The European Heritage (Routledge Library Editions: Comedy)
by W. D. HowarthEver since comedies were first performed in the ancient world, the definition of the term ‘comedy’ has been debated by both playwrights and critics. Originally published in 1978, this volume does not attempt a precise definition, but reviews the various interpretations that have been put forward through the ages, taking as evidence important theoretical writings as well as the plays themselves, and pointing out not only common features but also notable exceptions. The comic drama of Western Europe since the Renaissance is here surveyed in a series of chapters devoted principally to the tradition of European comedy as it developed in the major national literatures. The perspective is expanded to include, on the one hand, the origins in classical Greece and Rome and, on the other, the influence of cinema, radio and television comedy at the time – American as well as European. A structural basis for the volume as a whole is provided in an analytical introduction, where the essential problems are defined: such issues as the relationship between comedy and satire, comedy and farce; the distinction between laughter and smile; the respective claims of realism and fantasy; the role of plot and of dialogue; the place of sentiment and of moral teaching; and the possibility of comic catharsis. In this way the nature and evolution of European comedy is presented in an original and coherent form, not only offering an invaluable aid to students seeking guidance in literature of which they are not making a specialist study, but stimulating the more experienced reader to think again about familiar plays.
Greek Comedy (Routledge Library Editions: Comedy)
by Gilbert NorwoodOriginally published in 1931, this book surveys the origin and development of Greek Comic Drama, with full discussion not only of Aristophanes and Menander but also of other important playwrights whose work had usually received scant notice because only fragments of it have survived. The important papyrus-finds of the previous forty years have been expounded and used. The final chapter is an introduction to comic metre and rhythm.
In Praise of Comedy: A Study in its Theory and Practice (Routledge Library Editions: Comedy)
by James FeiblemanFirst published in 1939, the original blurb reads: We have learned much lately concerning theories of laughter, yet laughter is only what we do about comedy. What is comedy itself? In this work the history of comic instances is combed in the search for the truth about comedy. Today, when laughter is stifled in so many countries, an exposition of comedy shows it to have a universal and necessary character. Comedy, as its natures reveals, is one criterion of the state of human culture; it is highly contemporary and requires freedom – but freedom for adventure, not for routine. After a chapter devoted to the explanation of a logical theory of comedy, the modern comedians are examined, and the humour of every one, from the Marx Brothers to surrealism, from Gertrude Stein to Mickey Mouse, from James Joyce to Charlie Chaplin, is shown to be a constant, inherent in the same set of unchanging conditions.
Last Laughs: Perspectives on Women and Comedy (Routledge Library Editions: Comedy)
by Regina BarrecaFirst published in 1988, the 19 original essays (and three "Sylvia" cartoons) included in this volume deal with the gender-specific nature of comedy. This pioneering collection observes the creation of women’s comedy from a wide range of standpoints: political, sociological, psychoanalytical, linguistic, and historical. The writers explore the role of women’s comedy in familiar and unfamiliar territory, from Austen to Weldon, from Behn to Wasserstein. The questions they raise will lead to a redefinition of the genre itself.
The Comedy of Manners (Routledge Library Editions: Comedy)
by Kenneth MuirOriginally published in 1970, this title starts with an introduction, in which Professor Muir distinguishes between the Comedy of Manners and other types of comedy and traces its origins in English and French literature, there are then chapters on the major writers – Etherege, Dryden, Wycherly, Congreve, Vanbrugh, Farquhar – and on Jeremy Collier’s attack on the immorality and profaneness of the plays. This is followed by a discussion of the reasons for the decline of comedy in the eighteenth century and an account of its revival by Sheridan and, belatedly, by Wilde. Professor Muir takes issue with a number of recent critics on the dramatic value of the plays.
Comic Drama: The European Heritage (Routledge Library Editions: Comedy)
by W. D. HowarthEver since comedies were first performed in the ancient world, the definition of the term ‘comedy’ has been debated by both playwrights and critics. Originally published in 1978, this volume does not attempt a precise definition, but reviews the various interpretations that have been put forward through the ages, taking as evidence important theoretical writings as well as the plays themselves, and pointing out not only common features but also notable exceptions. The comic drama of Western Europe since the Renaissance is here surveyed in a series of chapters devoted principally to the tradition of European comedy as it developed in the major national literatures. The perspective is expanded to include, on the one hand, the origins in classical Greece and Rome and, on the other, the influence of cinema, radio and television comedy at the time – American as well as European. A structural basis for the volume as a whole is provided in an analytical introduction, where the essential problems are defined: such issues as the relationship between comedy and satire, comedy and farce; the distinction between laughter and smile; the respective claims of realism and fantasy; the role of plot and of dialogue; the place of sentiment and of moral teaching; and the possibility of comic catharsis. In this way the nature and evolution of European comedy is presented in an original and coherent form, not only offering an invaluable aid to students seeking guidance in literature of which they are not making a specialist study, but stimulating the more experienced reader to think again about familiar plays.
Greek Comedy (Routledge Library Editions: Comedy)
by Gilbert NorwoodOriginally published in 1931, this book surveys the origin and development of Greek Comic Drama, with full discussion not only of Aristophanes and Menander but also of other important playwrights whose work had usually received scant notice because only fragments of it have survived. The important papyrus-finds of the previous forty years have been expounded and used. The final chapter is an introduction to comic metre and rhythm.
In Praise of Comedy: A Study in its Theory and Practice (Routledge Library Editions: Comedy)
by James FeiblemanFirst published in 1939, the original blurb reads: We have learned much lately concerning theories of laughter, yet laughter is only what we do about comedy. What is comedy itself? In this work the history of comic instances is combed in the search for the truth about comedy. Today, when laughter is stifled in so many countries, an exposition of comedy shows it to have a universal and necessary character. Comedy, as its natures reveals, is one criterion of the state of human culture; it is highly contemporary and requires freedom – but freedom for adventure, not for routine. After a chapter devoted to the explanation of a logical theory of comedy, the modern comedians are examined, and the humour of every one, from the Marx Brothers to surrealism, from Gertrude Stein to Mickey Mouse, from James Joyce to Charlie Chaplin, is shown to be a constant, inherent in the same set of unchanging conditions.
Last Laughs: Perspectives on Women and Comedy (Routledge Library Editions: Comedy)
by Regina BarrecaFirst published in 1988, the 19 original essays (and three "Sylvia" cartoons) included in this volume deal with the gender-specific nature of comedy. This pioneering collection observes the creation of women’s comedy from a wide range of standpoints: political, sociological, psychoanalytical, linguistic, and historical. The writers explore the role of women’s comedy in familiar and unfamiliar territory, from Austen to Weldon, from Behn to Wasserstein. The questions they raise will lead to a redefinition of the genre itself.
Tragicomedy (Routledge Library Editions: Comedy)
by David L. HirstIn this brief study, originally published in 1984, David Hirst examines the meaning of the term ‘tragicomedy’ by elucidating the most important theories of the genre and by analysing those plays which represent its most vital and influential expression. He draws a distinction between tragicomedies and conceived as a careful fusion of contrasted dramatic elements and as a mixed genre which seeks to exploit a volatile combination of theatrical extremes. In the first part he compares neo-classical romance and satire. The plays of Shakespeare, Fletcher and Corneille, seen in the context of the literary theory of Guarini, are contrasted with Marlowe and the writers of revenge tragedy. The second part examines the conflict of Romanticism and realism in nineteenth- and twentieth-century theatre. Shaw, Chekhov and the Absurdists are viewed in relation to the key theories of tragicomedy expounded by Brecht, Artaud and Pirandello. The study concludes with a consideration of certain significant contemporary plays – by Edward Bond, Peter Nichols and Peter Barnes – in the context of the historical development of the genre.
The Art of Greek Comedy (Routledge Library Editions: Comedy)
by Katherine LeverOriginally published in 1956, this is a critical analysis of the comedies of Aristophanes and Menander studied in the context of the history of comedy, of the allied arts, and of contemporary life. Aristophanes and Menander are deservedly the most famous writers of Greek comedy. The extant comedies of Aristophanes are notable for wit, comical action, beautiful poetry, and the dramatization of such problems as health of mind and body, sex, money, government, law, religion, education, and drama, music and poetry. Menander portrays with delicate and sympathetic understanding a world in which the seeming evils of loss and discord eventually lead to the genuine goods of discovery and concord. The art of Aristophanes is critically examined in three chapters and that of Menander in one. For centuries Dionysos had been worshipped in a spirit of ecstasy which manifested itself in song, dance and the wearing of masks and costumes, pantomime, farce, and satire. The processes by which these diverse elements were developed and fused into the complex literary form of Old Comedy are the subject of the first three chapters. Aristophanes was not only pre-eminent as a writer of Old Comedy; he also participated in the transformation of Old Comedy into Middle Comedy, a curious and interesting dramatic form which is fully treated in the seventh chapter. In the last chapter the emergence of New Comedy is traced and the art of Menander criticized. The book ends with a brief indication of the various forms in which the spirit of Greek comedy had survived to the present day.