Showing papers in "Modern Language Review in 2005"

The Twilight of the Middle Class: Post-World War II American Fiction and White-Collar Work

Abstract: Acknowledgments ix INTRODUCTION: The Twilight of the Middle Class 1 CHAPTER ONE: Ayn Rand and the Politics of Property 33 CHAPTER TWO: Race Man,Organization Man,Invisible Man 53 CHAPTER THREE: "The So-Called Jewish Novel" 70 CHAPTER FOUR: Flannery O'Connor and the Southern Origins of Identity Politics 95 EPILOGUE: The Postmodern Fallacy 113 Notes 131 Index 155

Milton and the idea of the fall

Abstract: Introduction Part I. Fallen Culture: 1. The fall 2. Augustinianism 3. The quarrel over original sin 1649-60 4. The heterodox fall 5. The fall in practice Part II. Milton: 6. Towards Paradise Lost 7. Paradise Lost I: the causality of primal wickedness 8. Paradise Lost II: God, Eden, and man 9. Paradise Lost III: creation and education 10. Paradise Lost IV: fall and expulsion Conclusion.

Crime Fiction 1800-2000: Detection, Death, Diversity

Abstract: Edit Item From its first appearance nearly two hundred years ago, the genre of crime fiction has had a compulsive hold on the imagination of audiences all around the world. Many different detectives have appeared: from the plodding policemen (and a few -women) of the nineteenth century, to the heroic detectives like Sherlock Holmes and Philip Marlowe; and on to the innovative investigators who, in recent years, have embodied the concerns of newly-heard social forces detectives who are feminist, Afro-American, lesbian, gay, and even postmodern. ​ ​ Stephen Knight's fascinating book is a full analytic survey of crime fiction from its origins in the nineteenth century to the most recent developments. Knight explains how and why the various forms of the genre have evolved, explores major authors and movements, and examines the work of many little-known writers of significance. Drawing on the insights of the best scholarship and criticism, both traditional and up-to-date, Knight argues that the genre as a whole has three parts the early development of Detection, the growing emphasis on Death, and the modern celebration of Diversity. ​ ​ With full references, and written in a highly readable style, this is the essential guide to a popular and enduring genre a musthave for readers of crime fiction everywhere!

'I Am Not He': Narcissus and Ironic Performativity in Medieval French Literature

Abstract: Scholars have discussed extensively the medieval French use of Narcissus and mirrors to figure love experience. However, the claim to be like Narcissus is often closely associated with a counter-claim to be unlike him. Focusing on Benoit de Sainte-Maure’s Roman de Troie, Bernart de Ventadorn’s ‘Can vei la lauzeta mover’, and Guillaume de Lorris’s Roman de la rose, I argue that this counter-claim is caught up in a larger process of affirmation. For a loving subject really to become like Narcissus requires both the establishment and the negation of such an identification. Examining this dual movement entails a reconceptualization of Narcissus.

Proust's a la Recherche as Intertext of Makine's le Testament Francais

Abstract: When Andrei Makine won the Prix Goncourt and Prix Medicis in 1995 with Le Testament francais, reviewers compared him to Proust. This article considers A la recherche as an intertext for Makine's novel, focusing particularly on the portrayal of the narrator-protagonist's literary vocation in each of the works. Through close analysis of superficially similar episodes, the article argues that Makine's actual message is very different from Proust's and that, like Proust rewriting his own models, Makine has created an A la recherche ‘d'une autre epoque’, a work that distinguishes itself from its intertext by obvious references to it.