Studying English Literature in Context
Critical Readings
- Editor: Paul Poplawski
- Date Published: October 2022
- availability: Available
- format: Paperback
- isbn: 9781108749572
Paperback
-
Ranging from early medieval times to the present, this diverse collection explores the myriad ways in which literary texts are informed by their historical contexts. The thirty-one chapters draw on varied themes and perspectives to present stimulating new readings of both canonical and non-canonical texts and authors. Written in a lively and engaging style, by an international team of experts, these specially commissioned essays collectively represent an incisive contribution to literary studies; they will appeal to scholars, teachers and graduate and undergraduate students. The book is designed to complement Paul Poplawski's previous volume, English Literature in Context, and incorporates additional study elements designed specifically with undergraduates in mind. With an extensive chronology, a glossary of critical terms, and a study guide suggesting how students might learn from the essays in their own writing practices, this volume provides a rich and flexible resource for teaching and learning.
Read more- Enables students to reflect on and develop their own academic practice, providing thirty-one critical essays and including a study guide with review questions and activities
- Offers students a clear sense of how to analyse texts within their contexts and provides a reliable source of detailed historical information to which lecturers can refer students on a range of courses
- Covers the whole span of English literature, making it easy for lecturers to ensure a solid grounding in their students' knowledge and understanding of the subject field
Reviews & endorsements
'An impeccable selection of wide-ranging but sharply focused texts in their historical and cultural contexts by seasoned scholars with a keen sense of the past as well as a sharp eye for essential contemporary issues such as feminism, environmentalism, immigration, and politics. The crisp and succinct essays are packed with engaging questions that suggest lively classroom discussion as well as thoughtful critical examination.' Stephen Kern, Ohio State University
See more reviews'Studying English Literature in Context helps ease students' transition from second- to third-level study by offering scholarly essays that are written specifically for students. This makes academic writing and argument more accessible to students coming to such material for the first time, with the further resources offering the additional benefit of helping students think more critically about what they are reading. This book offers new university students much needed support as they work towards the broader and deeper critical inquiry in which they will engage at later stages of their programme. It is likely to be widely assigned in undergraduate survey courses and much used.' Naomi McAreavey, University College Dublin
'Driven by the conviction that texts are fruitfully understood within the context of their time, this enormously hospitable and adaptable book manages, without strain, to appeal both to scholars and students, to bookworms and neophytes. It covers the entire history of English literature and drama with a ease and dexterity matched only by ambition and range. The collection deploys an innovative hinged structure in which each of the thirty-one essays is supplemented by a critical reflection that allows the author to reflect upon the preceding essay he or she has just written, while also mapping the scholarly field. Pedagogically, that will afford students a critical example of how to position their own work while also informing them, without dryness, of the scholarly tradition to which they contribute. This collection is suffused with the balm of utility, clear-sightedness and practical good sense and deserves a place on reading lists wherever English literature is nurtured and cherished.' Ronan McDonald, The University of Melbourne, Australia
'Studying English Literature in Context will undoubtedly advance the theory and practice of cultural materialist pedagogy in higher education. I recommend this lively and enjoyable volume as a valuable resource for teachers and students of English Literature and as an excellent anthology of scholarly essays in its own right.' Caroline Franklin, Swansea University
'Studying English Literature in Context is a superb collection of essays by leading scholars that will foster stimulating response, reignite debate, and demand intellectual engagement by readers of representative texts from the long history of English. The authors recognise that from The Dream of the Rood's multivalence to Aphra Behn's colonial novel Oroonoko and Grace Nichols' feminist poetry, literature both contributes to, as well as reflects socio-cultural critique, linking past modes of creative expression with current conversations about form, textual ambiguity, literary resistance, and periodisation. In addition to this impressive set of critical interpretations, generous resources are provided to situate the student in the long chronology and complex range of generic, stylistic, material, and performative possibilities offered by literature. The whole volume works to ensure enhanced understanding of the significance of poetry, prose, and drama both to authors and creators and to audiences globally; as Poplawski anticipates, this book offers contextured readings, encouraging connections between eras, affect, and modalities to amplify the power of the written and spoken word.' Elaine Treharne, Stanford University
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×Product details
- Date Published: October 2022
- format: Paperback
- isbn: 9781108749572
- length: 674 pages
- dimensions: 245 x 190 x 30 mm
- weight: 1.45kg
- availability: Available
Table of Contents
Introduction Paul Poplawski
Section I. Medieval English, 500–1500:
1. Finding the dream of the rood in old English literature Emily V. Thornbury
2. The translator as author: The case of Geoffrey Chaucer's the Parliament of Fowls Filip Krajnik
3. Arthurian romance as a window onto medieval life: The Case of Ywayne and Gawayne and The Awntyrs off Arthure K. S. Whetter
Section II: The renaissance, 1485–1660:
4. The renaissance in England: A meeting point Alessandra Petrina
5. 'Mr Spencer's moral invention': The global horizons of early modern epic Jane Grogan
6. Arden of Faversham Christa Jansohn
7. 'A little touch of Harry in the night' – mysteries of kingship and the stage in Shakespeare's the life of king Henry the fifth Ina Habermann
8. Poems and contexts: The case of Henry Vaughan Robert Wilcher
Section III: The restoration and eighteenth century, 1660–1780:
9. Periodising in context: The case of the restoration and eighteenth Century Lee Morrissey
10. Truth-telling and the representation of the Surinam 'Indians' in Aphra Behn's Oroonoko Oddvar Holmesland
11. 'The pamphlet on the table': The life and adventures of sir Launcelot Greaves Richard J. Jones
Section IV: The romantic period, 1780–1832:
12. 'Transported into asiatic scenes': Romanticism and the orient Daniel Sanjiv Roberts
13. Historical fiction in the romantic period: Jane Porter, Walter Scott and the sublime hero Fiona Price
14. Jane Austen and her publishers: Northanger Abbey and the publishing context of the early nineteenth century Katie Halsey
15. 'O for a life of sensations' or 'the internal and external parts': Keats and medical materialism Paul Wright
Section V: The victorian age, 1832–1901:
16. Poetry and science in the victorian period Jordan Kistler
17. 'In characters of tint indelible': Life writing and legacy in Charlotte Brontë's Villette Maria Frawley
18. Money, narrative and representation from Dickens to Gissing Ben Moore
19. Reading and remediating nineteenth-century serial fiction: Closing down and opening up Sheridan Le Fanu's Carmilla Fionnuala Dillane
20. Public places, private spaces in Fin de Siècle British women's writing Sue Asbee
Section VI: The Twentieth Century, 1901–1939:
21. D. H. Lawrence's women in Love: An anthropological reading Stefania Michelucci
22. The epigraph for T. S. Eliot's Marina: Classical tradition and the modern era Anna Budziak
23. Passing as a male critic: Mary Beton's coming of age in Virginia Woolf's a room of one's own Judith Paltin
Section VII: The twentieth and twenty-first centuries, 1939–2020:
24. An ecocritical reading of the poetry of Ted Hughes Terry Gifford
25. Women publishers in the twenty-first century: Assessing their impact on new writing – and writers Catherine Riley
26. Crisis and community in contemporary British theatre Clare Wallace
Section VIII: Postcolonial literature in english:
27. Complexities and concealments of eros in the African novel: Chinua Achebe's things fall apart F. Fiona Moolla
28. Bessie Head's feminism of everyday life Loretta Stec
29. The gender politics of Grace Nichols: Joy and resistance Izabel F. O. Brandao
30. 'The all-purpose quote': Salman Rushdie's meta-contextuality Joel Kuortti
31. Postcolonial literature and the world, 2017–2019: Contemporary complexities Ulla Rahbek
Appendices
Appendix A: Glossary of critical terms
Appendix B: Study guide: Learning from the essays
Appendix C: Essays listed by genre and theme
Index.
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