Virtual Americas

Transnational Fictions and the Transatlantic Imaginary

Fiction & Literature, Literary Theory & Criticism, American, Nonfiction, Social & Cultural Studies, Political Science, International, International Relations
Cover of the book Virtual Americas by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease, Duke University Press
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease ISBN: 9780822384045
Publisher: Duke University Press Publication: August 15, 2002
Imprint: Duke University Press Books Language: English
Author: Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
ISBN: 9780822384045
Publisher: Duke University Press
Publication: August 15, 2002
Imprint: Duke University Press Books
Language: English

Arguing that limited nationalist perspectives have circumscribed the critical scope of American Studies scholarship, Virtual Americas advocates a comparative criticism that illuminates the work of well-known literary figures by defamiliarizing it—placing it in unfamiliar contexts. Paul Giles looks at a number of canonical nineteenth- and twentieth-century American writers by focusing on their interactions with British culture. He demonstrates how American authors from Herman Melville to Thomas Pynchon have been compulsively drawn to negotiate with British culture so that their nationalist agendas have emerged, paradoxically, through transatlantic dialogues. Virtual Americas ultimately suggests that conceptions of national identity in both the United States and Britain have emerged through engagement with—and, often, deliberate exclusion of—ideas and imagery emanating from across the Atlantic.

Throughout Virtual Americas Giles focuses on specific examples of transatlantic cultural interactions such as Frederick Douglass’s experiences and reputation in England; Herman Melville’s satirizing fictions of U.S. and British nationalism; and Vladimir Nabokov’s critique of European high culture and American popular culture in Lolita. He also reverses his perspective, looking at the representation of San Francisco in the work of British-born poet Thom Gunn and Sylvia Plath’s poetic responses to England. Giles develops his theory about the need to defamiliarize the study of American literature by considering the cultural legacy of Surrealism as an alternative genealogy for American Studies and by examining the transatlantic dimensions of writers such as Henry James and Robert Frost in the context of Surrealism.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

Arguing that limited nationalist perspectives have circumscribed the critical scope of American Studies scholarship, Virtual Americas advocates a comparative criticism that illuminates the work of well-known literary figures by defamiliarizing it—placing it in unfamiliar contexts. Paul Giles looks at a number of canonical nineteenth- and twentieth-century American writers by focusing on their interactions with British culture. He demonstrates how American authors from Herman Melville to Thomas Pynchon have been compulsively drawn to negotiate with British culture so that their nationalist agendas have emerged, paradoxically, through transatlantic dialogues. Virtual Americas ultimately suggests that conceptions of national identity in both the United States and Britain have emerged through engagement with—and, often, deliberate exclusion of—ideas and imagery emanating from across the Atlantic.

Throughout Virtual Americas Giles focuses on specific examples of transatlantic cultural interactions such as Frederick Douglass’s experiences and reputation in England; Herman Melville’s satirizing fictions of U.S. and British nationalism; and Vladimir Nabokov’s critique of European high culture and American popular culture in Lolita. He also reverses his perspective, looking at the representation of San Francisco in the work of British-born poet Thom Gunn and Sylvia Plath’s poetic responses to England. Giles develops his theory about the need to defamiliarize the study of American literature by considering the cultural legacy of Surrealism as an alternative genealogy for American Studies and by examining the transatlantic dimensions of writers such as Henry James and Robert Frost in the context of Surrealism.

More books from Duke University Press

Cover of the book Forms of Knowledge in Early Modern Asia by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
Cover of the book Necro Citizenship by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
Cover of the book Ziegfeld Girl by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
Cover of the book Race on the Line by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
Cover of the book The Color of Modernity by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
Cover of the book A Nervous State by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
Cover of the book Stuart Hall's Voice by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
Cover of the book Southern Capitalism by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
Cover of the book From the Grassroots to the Supreme Court by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
Cover of the book Touching Feeling by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
Cover of the book Protestantism and Politics in Eastern Europe and Russia by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
Cover of the book Warring Souls by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
Cover of the book Becoming Imperial Citizens by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
Cover of the book Women on the Verge by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
Cover of the book A Small World by Paul Giles, Donald E. Pease
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy