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Publication Date
5-12-2023
Description
Enriching and complicating the history of fiction between Richardson and Fielding at mid-century and Austen at the turn of the century, this collection focuses on it-narratives, a once popular form largely forgotten by readers and critics alike, and advances important work on consumer culture and the theory of things. The contributors bring new texts—and new ways of thinking about familiar ones—to our notice. Topics range from period debates about copyright to the complex relationships with object-riddled sentimental fictions, from anti-Semitism in Chrysal to jingoistic imperialism in The Adventures of a Rupee. Essays situate it-narratives in a variety of contexts: changing attitudes toward occult powers, the development of still-life painting, the ethical challenges of pet ownership, the cult of Sterne and the appearance of genre fiction, the emergence of moral-didactic children’s literature, and a better-known tradition of Victorian thing-narratives. Stylistically and thematically consistent, the essays in this collection approach it-narratives from various theoretical and historical vantage points, sketching the cultural biography of a neglected literary form.
Keywords
novel, things, fiction, objects, animals, Richardson, Fielding, Jane Austen, Sterne, thing-narratives, Chrysal, Charles Johnstone, The Adventures of a Rupee, Helenus Scott, Francis Coventry, whore's biography, late eighteenth century, Paul Klee, Thomas Gainsborough, Jan Weenix, 18th-century literature, 18th-century culture, 18th-century England, thing theory, The Rape of the Lock, Victorian period, Victorian literature, Alexander Pope, cult of Sterne, Thomas Rowlandson
Rights
Copyright © 2007 by Rosemont Publishing & Printing Corp Copyright © 2023 Bucknell University Press [paperback] All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. Please contact Bucknell University Press, Hildreth-Mirza Hall, Bucknell University, Lewisburg, PA 17837-2005. The only exception to this prohibition is "fair use" as defined by U.S. copyright law.
Language
eng
ISBN
9781684484706