Nationalism and Literature: The Politics of Culture in Canada and the United States

ISBN-13: 9780521579124 / Angielski / Miękka / 1996 / 226 str.

Sarah M. Corse; Jeffrey C. Alexander; Steven Seidman

Opis

This analysis of two hundred American and Canadian novels offers a new theory of national literatures, demonstrating that national canon formation occurs in tandem with nation-building. It accounts for cross-national differences and illuminates the historically constructed and symbolic nature of the relationship between literature and the nation-state. High-culture national literatures are selected as different from other novels; popular-culture bestsellers are mass market commodities for the largest, least differentiated audience.

Recenzje

"Sarah Corse's comparative study of Canadian and American literature...asks why two industrialized, predominantly English-speaking neighboring nations should espouse such radically different images of their own national characters." Graham Fraser, College Literature

Spis treści

1. Introduction: cultural fields and literary use; 2. Nation-building and the historical timing of a national literature in the United States; 3. Nation-building and the historical timing of a national literature in Canada; 4. The canonical novels: the politics of cultural nationalism; 5. The literary prize-winners: revision and renewal; 6. The bestsellers: the economics of publishing and the convergence of popular taste; 7. Literary meaning and cultural use; Appendices.