Daphna Erdinast-Vulcan
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198184997
- eISBN:
- 9780191674426
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198184997.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism, European Literature
This study engages with the troubled question of authorial subjectivity and ethics in Modernism in general and in Conrad's short fiction in particular, and offers an original theoretical perspective, ...
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This study engages with the troubled question of authorial subjectivity and ethics in Modernism in general and in Conrad's short fiction in particular, and offers an original theoretical perspective, inspired by the work of Derrida and the early philosophical writings of M. M. Bakhtin. Part One of the book focuses on the relational dynamics in Under Western Eyes and The Secret Sharer, and develops a ‘heterobiographical’ reading matrix, which serves as a psycho-textual and philosophical approach to modes of authorial presence in the text. Part Two offers close readings of ten short stories spanning the whole of Conrad's career and clustered into five chapters — Writing and Fratricide, The Pathos of Authenticity, The Poetics of Cultural Despair, The Romantic paradox, and Addressing the Woman. This part of the book engages with the interpretative problems posed by these stories through a cultural-historical perspective, linking Conrad's essentially Romantic sensibility and his unique position on the threshold of Modernism with some of the issues that have emerged from the ‘Postmodern turn’: the relationship between metaphysics and subjectivity, the conception of inter-subjectivity as prior to and constitutive of subjectivity; the permeability of textual and psychological boundary-lines; and the desire for subjective aesthetization.Less
This study engages with the troubled question of authorial subjectivity and ethics in Modernism in general and in Conrad's short fiction in particular, and offers an original theoretical perspective, inspired by the work of Derrida and the early philosophical writings of M. M. Bakhtin. Part One of the book focuses on the relational dynamics in Under Western Eyes and The Secret Sharer, and develops a ‘heterobiographical’ reading matrix, which serves as a psycho-textual and philosophical approach to modes of authorial presence in the text. Part Two offers close readings of ten short stories spanning the whole of Conrad's career and clustered into five chapters — Writing and Fratricide, The Pathos of Authenticity, The Poetics of Cultural Despair, The Romantic paradox, and Addressing the Woman. This part of the book engages with the interpretative problems posed by these stories through a cultural-historical perspective, linking Conrad's essentially Romantic sensibility and his unique position on the threshold of Modernism with some of the issues that have emerged from the ‘Postmodern turn’: the relationship between metaphysics and subjectivity, the conception of inter-subjectivity as prior to and constitutive of subjectivity; the permeability of textual and psychological boundary-lines; and the desire for subjective aesthetization.
Jacqueline Howard
- Published in print:
- 1994
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198119920
- eISBN:
- 9780191671258
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198119920.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century and Victorian Literature, Criticism/Theory
This is the first full-length study of Gothic to be written from the perspective of Bakhtinian theory. The author uses Bakhtin's concepts of heteroglossia and dialogism in specific historical ...
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This is the first full-length study of Gothic to be written from the perspective of Bakhtinian theory. The author uses Bakhtin's concepts of heteroglossia and dialogism in specific historical analyses of key works of the genre. Her discussions of Ann Radcliffe's Mysteries of Udolpho, Matthew Lewis's The Monk, Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey, and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein demonstrate that the discursive ambiguity of these novels is not inherently subversive, but that the political force of particular discourses is contingent upon their interaction with other discourses in the reading process. This position enables the author to intervene in feminist discussions of Gothic, which have claimed it as a specifically female genre. The author suggests a way in which feminists can appropriate Bakhtin to make politically effective readings, while acknowledging that these readings do not exhaust the novels' possibilities of meaning and reception. Drawing on the most up-to-date debates in literary theory, this is a sophisticated and scholarly analysis of a genre that has consistently challenged literary criticism.Less
This is the first full-length study of Gothic to be written from the perspective of Bakhtinian theory. The author uses Bakhtin's concepts of heteroglossia and dialogism in specific historical analyses of key works of the genre. Her discussions of Ann Radcliffe's Mysteries of Udolpho, Matthew Lewis's The Monk, Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey, and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein demonstrate that the discursive ambiguity of these novels is not inherently subversive, but that the political force of particular discourses is contingent upon their interaction with other discourses in the reading process. This position enables the author to intervene in feminist discussions of Gothic, which have claimed it as a specifically female genre. The author suggests a way in which feminists can appropriate Bakhtin to make politically effective readings, while acknowledging that these readings do not exhaust the novels' possibilities of meaning and reception. Drawing on the most up-to-date debates in literary theory, this is a sophisticated and scholarly analysis of a genre that has consistently challenged literary criticism.
Andy Stafford
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780197266670
- eISBN:
- 9780191905391
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197266670.003.0015
- Subject:
- Literature, Film, Media, and Cultural Studies
Using an unpublished seminar that Roland Barthes delivered in 1966–7, this chapter considers the challenge to rewrite, re-use, and ‘re-cover’ other writers’ texts. It shows, first in Critique et ...
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Using an unpublished seminar that Roland Barthes delivered in 1966–7, this chapter considers the challenge to rewrite, re-use, and ‘re-cover’ other writers’ texts. It shows, first in Critique et vérité, then across the seminar ‘La linguistique du discours’, and finally in the 1970 essay S/Z, that Barthes was developing a creative, literary-critical, practice rather than promoting ‘la nouvelle critique’. In this spirit of creative criticism, using Kristeva, Bakhtin, and Menippus, Barthes designed his radical approach to Balzac in S/Z. An egregious reading of Barthes’s approach notwithstanding (Bremond and Pavel, 1998), three elements are identified in his essayistic rewriting of Balzac’s Sarrasine that point to creative criticism: digression, drama, and historiality. These techniques allow Barthes’s essay both to distance and bring nearer the ‘tutor-text’ Sarrasine which, written in 1830, raised important questions about the cusp of modernity, and how to write criticism as literature.Less
Using an unpublished seminar that Roland Barthes delivered in 1966–7, this chapter considers the challenge to rewrite, re-use, and ‘re-cover’ other writers’ texts. It shows, first in Critique et vérité, then across the seminar ‘La linguistique du discours’, and finally in the 1970 essay S/Z, that Barthes was developing a creative, literary-critical, practice rather than promoting ‘la nouvelle critique’. In this spirit of creative criticism, using Kristeva, Bakhtin, and Menippus, Barthes designed his radical approach to Balzac in S/Z. An egregious reading of Barthes’s approach notwithstanding (Bremond and Pavel, 1998), three elements are identified in his essayistic rewriting of Balzac’s Sarrasine that point to creative criticism: digression, drama, and historiality. These techniques allow Barthes’s essay both to distance and bring nearer the ‘tutor-text’ Sarrasine which, written in 1830, raised important questions about the cusp of modernity, and how to write criticism as literature.
Marlé Hammond
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780197266687
- eISBN:
- 9780191905407
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197266687.003.0003
- Subject:
- Literature, 18th-century Literature
This chapter represents a narratological breakdown of the tale. Drawing on the theory of Seymour Chatman, Mikhail Bakhtin and Georg Lukács, I discuss the tale and its relationship to the ʿUdhrī love ...
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This chapter represents a narratological breakdown of the tale. Drawing on the theory of Seymour Chatman, Mikhail Bakhtin and Georg Lukács, I discuss the tale and its relationship to the ʿUdhrī love tale, the popular epic and the novel in terms of its discourse, setting, characters and events. I argue that the tale has a plot with a ‘homophonic’ texture, whereby a ‘melody’ of singular events (such as the abduction, torture and rescue of Laylā) overlays a ‘drone’ of repeated events (namely battle scenes). I conclude with a comparison of the tale with its twentieth-century novelistic adaptation and a discussion of what the comparison reveals about the pre-history of the Arabic novel.Less
This chapter represents a narratological breakdown of the tale. Drawing on the theory of Seymour Chatman, Mikhail Bakhtin and Georg Lukács, I discuss the tale and its relationship to the ʿUdhrī love tale, the popular epic and the novel in terms of its discourse, setting, characters and events. I argue that the tale has a plot with a ‘homophonic’ texture, whereby a ‘melody’ of singular events (such as the abduction, torture and rescue of Laylā) overlays a ‘drone’ of repeated events (namely battle scenes). I conclude with a comparison of the tale with its twentieth-century novelistic adaptation and a discussion of what the comparison reveals about the pre-history of the Arabic novel.
KEN HIRSCHKOP
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198159612
- eISBN:
- 9780191673641
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198159612.003.0003
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
The chapter focuses on the logic of the unwilling transformation of the novel becoming a privileged form of culture. The efforts of post-glasnost Bakhtin scholarship made it even harder to know about ...
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The chapter focuses on the logic of the unwilling transformation of the novel becoming a privileged form of culture. The efforts of post-glasnost Bakhtin scholarship made it even harder to know about Bakhtin’s life. There were a lot of Bakhtin myths that were not generated by Soviet censorship but in the course of its demise. Indirectly, they reveal that the founding myth of the Bakhtin scholarship itself is caused by the heavy hand of official politics and Stalinist repression. A substantially revised and enlarged text, Problems of Dostoesky’s Poetics, concerned the rediscovery of Bakhtin himself. In the United States, the choice between a non-Marxist Bakhtin and his Marxist comrades appeared as a choice between social systems. This allowed Morson to enlist Bakhtin in the fight for ‘American progressive ideals’. The chapter goes on to reveal more truths about Mikhail Bakhtin’s history which debunked many myths.Less
The chapter focuses on the logic of the unwilling transformation of the novel becoming a privileged form of culture. The efforts of post-glasnost Bakhtin scholarship made it even harder to know about Bakhtin’s life. There were a lot of Bakhtin myths that were not generated by Soviet censorship but in the course of its demise. Indirectly, they reveal that the founding myth of the Bakhtin scholarship itself is caused by the heavy hand of official politics and Stalinist repression. A substantially revised and enlarged text, Problems of Dostoesky’s Poetics, concerned the rediscovery of Bakhtin himself. In the United States, the choice between a non-Marxist Bakhtin and his Marxist comrades appeared as a choice between social systems. This allowed Morson to enlist Bakhtin in the fight for ‘American progressive ideals’. The chapter goes on to reveal more truths about Mikhail Bakhtin’s history which debunked many myths.
Murray Pittock
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- May 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780199232796
- eISBN:
- 9780191716409
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199232796.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century Literature and Romanticism
This book addresses the main non-English Romanticisms of the British Isles. It begins by challenging the terms of its own title by asking ‘what is Romanticism’, and ‘what does the term ‘national ...
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This book addresses the main non-English Romanticisms of the British Isles. It begins by challenging the terms of its own title by asking ‘what is Romanticism’, and ‘what does the term ‘national literature’ mean’? It then proceeds to explain and define the answers to these questions, providing certain triggers by the presence of which a national literature can be recognized, and also deals with two major problems which are holding back the development of a new and broader understanding of British Isles Romanticisms: the survival of outdated assumptions in ostensibly more modern paradigms, and a lack of understanding of the full range of dialogues and relationships across the literatures of these islands. The theorists whose work chiefly inform the book are Bakhtin, Fanon, and Habermas, although they do not define its arguments, and an alertness to the ways in which other literary theories inform each other is present throughout the book.Less
This book addresses the main non-English Romanticisms of the British Isles. It begins by challenging the terms of its own title by asking ‘what is Romanticism’, and ‘what does the term ‘national literature’ mean’? It then proceeds to explain and define the answers to these questions, providing certain triggers by the presence of which a national literature can be recognized, and also deals with two major problems which are holding back the development of a new and broader understanding of British Isles Romanticisms: the survival of outdated assumptions in ostensibly more modern paradigms, and a lack of understanding of the full range of dialogues and relationships across the literatures of these islands. The theorists whose work chiefly inform the book are Bakhtin, Fanon, and Habermas, although they do not define its arguments, and an alertness to the ways in which other literary theories inform each other is present throughout the book.
Emily Van Buskirk
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691166797
- eISBN:
- 9781400873777
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691166797.003.0002
- Subject:
- Literature, Women's Literature
This chapter explains the concept of post-individualist prose as a pointed departure from nineteenth-century Realism. This is a fragmentary, documentary literature that restricts itself to the realm ...
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This chapter explains the concept of post-individualist prose as a pointed departure from nineteenth-century Realism. This is a fragmentary, documentary literature that restricts itself to the realm of “fact,” while being free to range outside the conventions of established genres. The post-individualist person's primary dilemma is a crisis in values, and Ginzburg treats writing as an ethical act. The chapter considers how writing serves as an “exit from the self,” a process by which the self becomes another, leaving behind the ego. It then turns to two of Ginzburg's narratives (“Delusion of the Will” and “A Story of Pity and Cruelty”), which concern the dilemmas of moral action in response to the death of a loved one. The traumatized subject uses techniques of “self-distancing” to deal with his or her sense of self and of the past by constructing a complete and responsible self-image, embedded within a social milieu, and then trying to connect it with his or her actions. Ginzburg's techniques of “self-distancing” are examined side-by-side with Shklovsky's concept of ostranenie (“estrangement”) and Bakhtin's vnenakhodimost' (“outsideness”).Less
This chapter explains the concept of post-individualist prose as a pointed departure from nineteenth-century Realism. This is a fragmentary, documentary literature that restricts itself to the realm of “fact,” while being free to range outside the conventions of established genres. The post-individualist person's primary dilemma is a crisis in values, and Ginzburg treats writing as an ethical act. The chapter considers how writing serves as an “exit from the self,” a process by which the self becomes another, leaving behind the ego. It then turns to two of Ginzburg's narratives (“Delusion of the Will” and “A Story of Pity and Cruelty”), which concern the dilemmas of moral action in response to the death of a loved one. The traumatized subject uses techniques of “self-distancing” to deal with his or her sense of self and of the past by constructing a complete and responsible self-image, embedded within a social milieu, and then trying to connect it with his or her actions. Ginzburg's techniques of “self-distancing” are examined side-by-side with Shklovsky's concept of ostranenie (“estrangement”) and Bakhtin's vnenakhodimost' (“outsideness”).
Julian Johnson
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- May 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195372397
- eISBN:
- 9780199870844
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195372397.003.0004
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western, Opera
The Wunderhorn songs, and the symphonies that draw on them, are discussed in relation to the idea of Humor as understood in romantic literature (especially Jean Paul) as an inverted form of the ...
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The Wunderhorn songs, and the symphonies that draw on them, are discussed in relation to the idea of Humor as understood in romantic literature (especially Jean Paul) as an inverted form of the sublime and also to the idea of the carnivalesque as understood by Bakhtin. Both are related to the idea of irony in Mahler's music and explored through considering the tone with which his music speaks—in both the Wunderhorn songs and the symphonies. The chapter also explores the extent to which Mahler's music is constituted from borrowed voices, understood both as allusions to other historical styles as well as more direct echoes of the music of other composers. Incidences of quotation are rare in Mahler and are much less important than his weaving together of plural stylistic idioms.Less
The Wunderhorn songs, and the symphonies that draw on them, are discussed in relation to the idea of Humor as understood in romantic literature (especially Jean Paul) as an inverted form of the sublime and also to the idea of the carnivalesque as understood by Bakhtin. Both are related to the idea of irony in Mahler's music and explored through considering the tone with which his music speaks—in both the Wunderhorn songs and the symphonies. The chapter also explores the extent to which Mahler's music is constituted from borrowed voices, understood both as allusions to other historical styles as well as more direct echoes of the music of other composers. Incidences of quotation are rare in Mahler and are much less important than his weaving together of plural stylistic idioms.
Thomas L. Brodie
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195138368
- eISBN:
- 9780199834037
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195138368.003.0003
- Subject:
- Religion, Biblical Studies
It is not fully clear why Genesis consists of literary diptychs – narratives in dialog – rather than linear narrative. Yet, diptych structure is central to Genesis. The complexity of diptychs ...
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It is not fully clear why Genesis consists of literary diptychs – narratives in dialog – rather than linear narrative. Yet, diptych structure is central to Genesis. The complexity of diptychs corresponds significantly to the complex nature of reality, of art, and of ideas. This complexity also corresponds partly to Mikhail Bakhtin's theory of truth as dialogical. The diptych is mind‐opening.Less
It is not fully clear why Genesis consists of literary diptychs – narratives in dialog – rather than linear narrative. Yet, diptych structure is central to Genesis. The complexity of diptychs corresponds significantly to the complex nature of reality, of art, and of ideas. This complexity also corresponds partly to Mikhail Bakhtin's theory of truth as dialogical. The diptych is mind‐opening.
J. R. Watson
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198270027
- eISBN:
- 9780191600784
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/019827002X.003.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Literature
Considers the traditional view of hymns as second‐rate literature, and the neglect of them by most literary critics, apart from Donald Davie and Lionel Adey. Hymns have been thought of as belonging ...
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Considers the traditional view of hymns as second‐rate literature, and the neglect of them by most literary critics, apart from Donald Davie and Lionel Adey. Hymns have been thought of as belonging to the church, rather than to the world. Church critics have not helped by concentrating on content and function in worship. There is a need to understand the form of hymns, and the inseparable nature of form and content (Bakhtin).Less
Considers the traditional view of hymns as second‐rate literature, and the neglect of them by most literary critics, apart from Donald Davie and Lionel Adey. Hymns have been thought of as belonging to the church, rather than to the world. Church critics have not helped by concentrating on content and function in worship. There is a need to understand the form of hymns, and the inseparable nature of form and content (Bakhtin).
George Pattison
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- February 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780199279777
- eISBN:
- 9780191603464
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199279772.003.0007
- Subject:
- Religion, Theology
Language must be led by what is extra-linguistic. This chapter explores ideas of vision that might inform thinking about God in language. Drawing from Bakhtin and Tillich, from an icon of Andrei ...
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Language must be led by what is extra-linguistic. This chapter explores ideas of vision that might inform thinking about God in language. Drawing from Bakhtin and Tillich, from an icon of Andrei Rublev, and from the film After Life, the idea of a reverse vision is developed; vision that flows back upon itself, as offering one idea of vision that might aid non-technological thinking. In light of P. Florensky’s reflections on truth, this is connected with the notion of liturgy as a site of active remembrance and hope.Less
Language must be led by what is extra-linguistic. This chapter explores ideas of vision that might inform thinking about God in language. Drawing from Bakhtin and Tillich, from an icon of Andrei Rublev, and from the film After Life, the idea of a reverse vision is developed; vision that flows back upon itself, as offering one idea of vision that might aid non-technological thinking. In light of P. Florensky’s reflections on truth, this is connected with the notion of liturgy as a site of active remembrance and hope.
Galin Tihanov
- Published in print:
- 2000
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198187257
- eISBN:
- 9780191674679
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198187257.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This book is a comparative study in the history of ideas. It is an innovative examination of the intellectual background, affiliations and contexts of two major twentieth-century thinkers, and an ...
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This book is a comparative study in the history of ideas. It is an innovative examination of the intellectual background, affiliations and contexts of two major twentieth-century thinkers, and an historical interpretation of their work in aesthetics, cultural theory, literary history, and philosophy. Unlike all existing texts on Lukács and Bakhtin, the book offers a comparison of their writings at different stages of their intellectual development and in the broad context of the ideas of their time. It introduces unknown archival material and discusses hitherto disregarded or overlooked texts by Lukács and Bakhtin. The book puts forward new readings of the best-known work on Dostoevsky, Rabelais, and Goethe, and treats in an original way the question of the coherence of Bakhtin's oeuvre. It offers valuable insight into the sources of Bakhtin's terminological repertoire, and through examination of Bakhtin's and Lukács's intellectual affiliations, into the limits and substance of their originality as thinkers. Lukács and Bakhtin emerge from the book as thinkers, whose intellectual careers followed strikingly similar paths. They both were confronted with similar agendas and questions posed for them by their time. Bakhtin however, had to find answers not only for this common agenda, but also to the answers that Lukács himself had already provided.Less
This book is a comparative study in the history of ideas. It is an innovative examination of the intellectual background, affiliations and contexts of two major twentieth-century thinkers, and an historical interpretation of their work in aesthetics, cultural theory, literary history, and philosophy. Unlike all existing texts on Lukács and Bakhtin, the book offers a comparison of their writings at different stages of their intellectual development and in the broad context of the ideas of their time. It introduces unknown archival material and discusses hitherto disregarded or overlooked texts by Lukács and Bakhtin. The book puts forward new readings of the best-known work on Dostoevsky, Rabelais, and Goethe, and treats in an original way the question of the coherence of Bakhtin's oeuvre. It offers valuable insight into the sources of Bakhtin's terminological repertoire, and through examination of Bakhtin's and Lukács's intellectual affiliations, into the limits and substance of their originality as thinkers. Lukács and Bakhtin emerge from the book as thinkers, whose intellectual careers followed strikingly similar paths. They both were confronted with similar agendas and questions posed for them by their time. Bakhtin however, had to find answers not only for this common agenda, but also to the answers that Lukács himself had already provided.
Leszek Koczanowicz
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780748644056
- eISBN:
- 9781474408691
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748644056.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Democratization
Contemporary democracy is in crisis. People are losing faith in in a system of democratic institutions that can cope with current social problems. The book sheds new light on this issue, drawing on ...
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Contemporary democracy is in crisis. People are losing faith in in a system of democratic institutions that can cope with current social problems. The book sheds new light on this issue, drawing on the ideas of M. M. Bakhtin, American pragmatism, and others to show that dialogue in democracy can transcend both antagonistic and consensual perspectives. The author provides an overview of the history of the dialogue-vs.-antagonism opposition as it is embedded in modern political theory, and outlines the concept of dialogue in contemporary political thought. The author argues that dialogue is a value in and by itself and that it aims at better understanding rather than at consensus. Therefore, the main purpose of the democratic system is to promote better understanding. This idea is labelled as “non-consensual democracy.” The author goes on to demonstrate that Bakhtin’s theory of dialogism can usefully amend and augmet the ways in which community is addressed in political theory, allowing us to overcome allowing us to overcome the liberalism-vs.-communitarianism debate. To conclude, he introduces the concept of |”critical community,” i.e., a "dialogical, self-reflective community critical of its own tradition," to show that collective identities can be constructed in critical dialogue with the tradition and the values of a community.Less
Contemporary democracy is in crisis. People are losing faith in in a system of democratic institutions that can cope with current social problems. The book sheds new light on this issue, drawing on the ideas of M. M. Bakhtin, American pragmatism, and others to show that dialogue in democracy can transcend both antagonistic and consensual perspectives. The author provides an overview of the history of the dialogue-vs.-antagonism opposition as it is embedded in modern political theory, and outlines the concept of dialogue in contemporary political thought. The author argues that dialogue is a value in and by itself and that it aims at better understanding rather than at consensus. Therefore, the main purpose of the democratic system is to promote better understanding. This idea is labelled as “non-consensual democracy.” The author goes on to demonstrate that Bakhtin’s theory of dialogism can usefully amend and augmet the ways in which community is addressed in political theory, allowing us to overcome allowing us to overcome the liberalism-vs.-communitarianism debate. To conclude, he introduces the concept of |”critical community,” i.e., a "dialogical, self-reflective community critical of its own tradition," to show that collective identities can be constructed in critical dialogue with the tradition and the values of a community.
Ken Hirschkop
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198159612
- eISBN:
- 9780191673641
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198159612.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This book makes a break with earlier interpretations of Bakhtin’s work. Using recent Russian scholarship, it explodes many of the myths which have surrounded Bakhtin and his work, and lays the ground ...
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This book makes a break with earlier interpretations of Bakhtin’s work. Using recent Russian scholarship, it explodes many of the myths which have surrounded Bakhtin and his work, and lays the ground for a new, more historically acute sense of his achievement. Through a comprehensive reading of Bakhtin’s work, the book demonstrates that his discussion of the philosophy of language, literary history, popular festive culture, and the phenomenology of everyday life revolved around a lifelong search for a new kind of modern ethical culture. A detailed examination of the major works reveals the careful interweaving of philosophical and historical argument which makes Bakhtin at once so compelling and so frustrating a writer. The book treats Bakhtin not as a metaphysician or a philosopher for the ages, but as a writer inevitably drawn into the historical conflicts produced by a modernizing and democratizing Europe. As a consequence, Bakhtin becomes a more sober but also more original writer, with a striking contribution to make to the definition of the democratic project.Less
This book makes a break with earlier interpretations of Bakhtin’s work. Using recent Russian scholarship, it explodes many of the myths which have surrounded Bakhtin and his work, and lays the ground for a new, more historically acute sense of his achievement. Through a comprehensive reading of Bakhtin’s work, the book demonstrates that his discussion of the philosophy of language, literary history, popular festive culture, and the phenomenology of everyday life revolved around a lifelong search for a new kind of modern ethical culture. A detailed examination of the major works reveals the careful interweaving of philosophical and historical argument which makes Bakhtin at once so compelling and so frustrating a writer. The book treats Bakhtin not as a metaphysician or a philosopher for the ages, but as a writer inevitably drawn into the historical conflicts produced by a modernizing and democratizing Europe. As a consequence, Bakhtin becomes a more sober but also more original writer, with a striking contribution to make to the definition of the democratic project.
David Shepherd
- Published in print:
- 1992
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198156666
- eISBN:
- 9780191673221
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198156666.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature, Criticism/Theory
Although metafiction has been the subject of much critical and theoretical writing, this is the first full-length study of its place in Soviet literature. Focusing on metafictional works by Leonid ...
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Although metafiction has been the subject of much critical and theoretical writing, this is the first full-length study of its place in Soviet literature. Focusing on metafictional works by Leonid Leonov, Marietta Shaginyan, Konstantin Vaginov, and Veniamin Kaverin, it examines, within a broadly Bakhtinian theoretical framework, the relationship between their self-consciousness and their cultural and political context. The texts are shown to challenge notions about the nature and function of literature fundamental to both Soviet and Anglo-American criticism. In particular, although metafictional strategies may seem designed to confirm assumptions about the aesthetic autonomy of the literary text, their effect is to reveal the shortcomings of such assumptions. The texts discussed take us beyond conventional understandings of metafiction by highlighting the need for a theoretically informed account of the history and reception of Soviet literature in which the inescapability of politics and ideology is no longer acknowledged grudgingly, but is instead celebrated.Less
Although metafiction has been the subject of much critical and theoretical writing, this is the first full-length study of its place in Soviet literature. Focusing on metafictional works by Leonid Leonov, Marietta Shaginyan, Konstantin Vaginov, and Veniamin Kaverin, it examines, within a broadly Bakhtinian theoretical framework, the relationship between their self-consciousness and their cultural and political context. The texts are shown to challenge notions about the nature and function of literature fundamental to both Soviet and Anglo-American criticism. In particular, although metafictional strategies may seem designed to confirm assumptions about the aesthetic autonomy of the literary text, their effect is to reveal the shortcomings of such assumptions. The texts discussed take us beyond conventional understandings of metafiction by highlighting the need for a theoretically informed account of the history and reception of Soviet literature in which the inescapability of politics and ideology is no longer acknowledged grudgingly, but is instead celebrated.
Michael Macovski
- Published in print:
- 1994
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195069655
- eISBN:
- 9780199855186
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195069655.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century Literature and Romanticism
Extending and modifying the works of Bakhtin, Gadamer, Ong, and Foucault—though drawing primarily on Bakhtin's theory of dialogue—this book constructs a theoretical model of “dialogic romanticism” ...
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Extending and modifying the works of Bakhtin, Gadamer, Ong, and Foucault—though drawing primarily on Bakhtin's theory of dialogue—this book constructs a theoretical model of “dialogic romanticism” and applies it to a range of Romantic texts. Literary discourse is seen as a composite of voices—interactive voices which are not only contained within the literary text but extend beyond it, to other works, authors, interpretations, and discourses. The book holds that varieties of dialogic forms and meanings were particularly pronounced during the Romantic epoch, and accordingly traces the manifestations of dialogues within Romantic discourse, beginning with Wordsworth and Coleridge and extending to those nineteenth-century prose works most often treated as “Romantic”: Frankenstein, Wuthering Heights, and Heart of Darkness.Less
Extending and modifying the works of Bakhtin, Gadamer, Ong, and Foucault—though drawing primarily on Bakhtin's theory of dialogue—this book constructs a theoretical model of “dialogic romanticism” and applies it to a range of Romantic texts. Literary discourse is seen as a composite of voices—interactive voices which are not only contained within the literary text but extend beyond it, to other works, authors, interpretations, and discourses. The book holds that varieties of dialogic forms and meanings were particularly pronounced during the Romantic epoch, and accordingly traces the manifestations of dialogues within Romantic discourse, beginning with Wordsworth and Coleridge and extending to those nineteenth-century prose works most often treated as “Romantic”: Frankenstein, Wuthering Heights, and Heart of Darkness.
Daphna Erdinast-Vulcan
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198184997
- eISBN:
- 9780191674426
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198184997.003.0003
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism, European Literature
This chapter turns to ‘The Secret Sharer’ and studies the story through its relation to ‘Under Western Eyes’. It argues that the same isomorphic paradigm overruns the boundaries of the text: both the ...
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This chapter turns to ‘The Secret Sharer’ and studies the story through its relation to ‘Under Western Eyes’. It argues that the same isomorphic paradigm overruns the boundaries of the text: both the fictional and the historical subjects. ‘The Secret Sharer’ enacts the return of autobiographical desire. Against the breach of sovereign subjectivity in Under Western Eyes, Conrad deploys a strategy of aestheticization in the short story, setting up an imaginary relationship of identification, which enables the subject — both the textual and the biographical subject — to holster up an artificial sense of selfhood against the threat of psychic dissolution. Against the transgression of boundary lines or the dynamics of heterobiography which operate as a structuring principle in the novel, the narrator of ‘The Secret Sharer’ tries to aestheticize and frame himself, to reclaim the ground lost in the writing of the novel.Less
This chapter turns to ‘The Secret Sharer’ and studies the story through its relation to ‘Under Western Eyes’. It argues that the same isomorphic paradigm overruns the boundaries of the text: both the fictional and the historical subjects. ‘The Secret Sharer’ enacts the return of autobiographical desire. Against the breach of sovereign subjectivity in Under Western Eyes, Conrad deploys a strategy of aestheticization in the short story, setting up an imaginary relationship of identification, which enables the subject — both the textual and the biographical subject — to holster up an artificial sense of selfhood against the threat of psychic dissolution. Against the transgression of boundary lines or the dynamics of heterobiography which operate as a structuring principle in the novel, the narrator of ‘The Secret Sharer’ tries to aestheticize and frame himself, to reclaim the ground lost in the writing of the novel.
Roger Keys
- Published in print:
- 1996
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198151609
- eISBN:
- 9780191672767
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198151609.003.0004
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism, European Literature
Significant progress in the analysis of fiction and in genre theory came in the middle of the 1920s with the work of Mikhail Mikhailovich Bakhtin and his school, and also that of Viktor Vinogradov. ...
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Significant progress in the analysis of fiction and in genre theory came in the middle of the 1920s with the work of Mikhail Mikhailovich Bakhtin and his school, and also that of Viktor Vinogradov. As far as the general study of Symbolist/modernist prose was concerned, one of the best summaries of critical insights attained was embedded in Fëdor Grits's short book on Shklovskii, published in 1927.Less
Significant progress in the analysis of fiction and in genre theory came in the middle of the 1920s with the work of Mikhail Mikhailovich Bakhtin and his school, and also that of Viktor Vinogradov. As far as the general study of Symbolist/modernist prose was concerned, one of the best summaries of critical insights attained was embedded in Fëdor Grits's short book on Shklovskii, published in 1927.
KEN HIRSCHKOP
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198159612
- eISBN:
- 9780191673641
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198159612.003.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
The chapter focuses on Mikhail Bakhtin as a social critic. He wrote critically about the history of the European novel, the epistemology of the human sciences, ethics, and the philosophy of language. ...
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The chapter focuses on Mikhail Bakhtin as a social critic. He wrote critically about the history of the European novel, the epistemology of the human sciences, ethics, and the philosophy of language. Bakhtin examined the communication of his day and of the past with a careful eye and critical intent. In a lifetime of writing, Bakhtin argued for the redemptive potential of the culture embodied in works of modern verbal art. He made a case ‘for the novel’ or ‘artistic prose’. There was an evident gap between public culture and actual subjectivity that moved him to write. He interpreted the social crisis following the First World War as a crisis of responsibility in Towards a Philosophy of the Act. The move from dialogue to dialogism was an awkward and incomplete gesture in Bakhtin’s work. But it thematized tensions between modernity, democracy, and dialogue.Less
The chapter focuses on Mikhail Bakhtin as a social critic. He wrote critically about the history of the European novel, the epistemology of the human sciences, ethics, and the philosophy of language. Bakhtin examined the communication of his day and of the past with a careful eye and critical intent. In a lifetime of writing, Bakhtin argued for the redemptive potential of the culture embodied in works of modern verbal art. He made a case ‘for the novel’ or ‘artistic prose’. There was an evident gap between public culture and actual subjectivity that moved him to write. He interpreted the social crisis following the First World War as a crisis of responsibility in Towards a Philosophy of the Act. The move from dialogue to dialogism was an awkward and incomplete gesture in Bakhtin’s work. But it thematized tensions between modernity, democracy, and dialogue.
KEN HIRSCHKOP
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198159612
- eISBN:
- 9780191673641
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198159612.003.0002
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
The chapter discusses the uncertain hold of the theory of dialogism on the tensions between modernity, democracy, and dialogue. Bakhtin got it right. He made a philosophical discovery. He revealed ...
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The chapter discusses the uncertain hold of the theory of dialogism on the tensions between modernity, democracy, and dialogue. Bakhtin got it right. He made a philosophical discovery. He revealed the truth about language. He pushed the social study of the literary forward. The chapter goes on to demonstrate the relative failure of Author and Hero and Discourse in the Novel to secure a straight path from the simple fact of dialogue to the higher reaches of verbal art. Bakhtin refused to get a grip on the historical roots of the redemptive intersubjectivity embodied in the latter. There are distinct transformations that link Author and Hero to Discourse in the Novel and they are — the symmetry of language, politics, populism, consummation, and history. However a decade later the idea of dialogism effectively secularized all the older distinctions and with this secularity philosophy ceded its privileged role to the novel.Less
The chapter discusses the uncertain hold of the theory of dialogism on the tensions between modernity, democracy, and dialogue. Bakhtin got it right. He made a philosophical discovery. He revealed the truth about language. He pushed the social study of the literary forward. The chapter goes on to demonstrate the relative failure of Author and Hero and Discourse in the Novel to secure a straight path from the simple fact of dialogue to the higher reaches of verbal art. Bakhtin refused to get a grip on the historical roots of the redemptive intersubjectivity embodied in the latter. There are distinct transformations that link Author and Hero to Discourse in the Novel and they are — the symmetry of language, politics, populism, consummation, and history. However a decade later the idea of dialogism effectively secularized all the older distinctions and with this secularity philosophy ceded its privileged role to the novel.
