The Textual Condition of Nineteenth-Century Literature
Fiction & Literature, Literary Theory & Criticism, British, Books & Reading
| Author: | Josephine Guy, Ian Small | ISBN: | 9781136471926 |
| Publisher: | Taylor and Francis | Publication: | March 12, 2012 |
| Imprint: | Routledge | Language: | English |
| Author: | Josephine Guy, Ian Small |
| ISBN: | 9781136471926 |
| Publisher: | Taylor and Francis |
| Publication: | March 12, 2012 |
| Imprint: | Routledge |
| Language: | English |
In this important new book, Guy and Small develop a new account of literary creativity in the late nineteenth century, one that combines concepts generated by text-theorists concerning the embodied nature of textuality with the empirical insights of text-editors and book historians. Through these developments, which the authors term the ‘textual turn,’ this study examines the textual condition of nineteenth-century literature. The authors explore works by Dickens, Wilde, Hardy, Yeats, Swinburne, FitzGerald, Pater, Arnold, Pinero and Shaw, connecting questions about what a work textually ‘is’ with questions about why we read it and how we value it. The study asks whether the textual turn places us in a stronger position to analyze the value of a nineteenth-century text—not for readers of the nineteenth century, but of the twenty-first. The authors argue that this issue of value is central to their discipline.
In this important new book, Guy and Small develop a new account of literary creativity in the late nineteenth century, one that combines concepts generated by text-theorists concerning the embodied nature of textuality with the empirical insights of text-editors and book historians. Through these developments, which the authors term the ‘textual turn,’ this study examines the textual condition of nineteenth-century literature. The authors explore works by Dickens, Wilde, Hardy, Yeats, Swinburne, FitzGerald, Pater, Arnold, Pinero and Shaw, connecting questions about what a work textually ‘is’ with questions about why we read it and how we value it. The study asks whether the textual turn places us in a stronger position to analyze the value of a nineteenth-century text—not for readers of the nineteenth century, but of the twenty-first. The authors argue that this issue of value is central to their discipline.
