Sexuality and the Erotic in the Fiction of Joseph Conrad

by Jeremy Hawthorn

Overview

Awarded third place for The Adam Gillon Book Award in Conrad Studies 2009
The book presents a sustained critique of the interlinked (and contradictory) views that the fiction of Joseph Conrad is largely innocent of any interest in or concern with sexuality and the erotic, and that when Conrad does attempt to depict sexual desire or erotic excitement then this results in bad writing. Jeremy Hawthorn argues for a revision of the view that Conrad lacks understanding of and interest in sexuality. He argues that the comprehensiveness of Conrad's vision does not exclude a concern with the sexual and the erotic, and that this concern is not with the sexual and the erotic as separate spheres of human life, but as elements dialectically related to those matters public and political that have always been recognized as central to Conrad's fictional achievement. The book will open Conrad's fiction to readings enriched by the insights of critics and theorists associated with Gender Studies and Post-colonialism.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780826495273
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	03/23/2007
Series:	Continuum Literary Studies
Pages:	190
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x 0.50(d)

About the Author

Jeremy Hawthorn is Emeritus Professor of British Literature at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim. He has published many books and articles on fiction and on literary theory.

Table of Contents

1. Closeted characters and cloistered critics in ‘Il Conde', Lord Jim, Victory and The Shadow Line2. The exotic and the erotic in An Outcast of the Islands and Heart of Darkness3. The erotics of cruelty in ‘A Smile of Fortune', ‘The Planter of Malata', The Secret Agent, Victory and ‘Freya of the Seven Isles'4. Voyeurism in The Shadow-Line and Under Western Eyes Conclusion - and? NotesBibliographyIndex