Modernism, Nationalism, and the Novel

by Pericles Lewis

Overview

In Modernism, Nationalism, and the Novel, Pericles Lewis shows how political debates on national identity inspired radical experiments with narrative form among modernist writers. He suggests that far from abandoning the political concerns of nineteenth-century realism, modernists used the emphasis on individual consciousness to explore ways in which the modern nation-state shapes the psyches of its subjects. Tracing this theme through Joyce, Proust, and Conrad, among others, Lewis claims that modern novelists gave life to a whole generation of narrators who forged new social realities in their own images.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780521661119
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	04/24/2000
Pages:	252
Product dimensions:	5.98(w) x 9.02(h) x 0.71(d)
Lexile:	1620L (what's this?)

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments; Note on texts; 1. The modern novelist as redeemer of the nation; 2. The crisis of liberal nationalism; 3. 'His sympathies were in the right place': Conrad and the discourse of national character; 4. Citizens of the Plain: Proust and the discourse of national will; 5. 'Il vate nazionale': D'Annunzio and the discourse of embodiment; Conclusion; Notes; Select bibliography; Index.

Editorial Reviews

"Lewis offers a rich analysis and a plausible claim...Strongly recommended..." Choice

"Modernism, Nationalism and the Novel is valuable as a comparative study; it provides sound and ambitious research of the connections between four modernists that belong to different national backgrounds...The richness of the various connections established between the modernists novels belonging to different European literatures...Thgis interest on political theoties and their significant weight in Lewis's research make this book essential not only for the literary critic also for the general reader interested in political history." English Literature in Transition 2002

"[Lewis] makes a compelling case." Research in African Literatures

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