The Cambridge Companion to the City in Literature
The Cambridge Companion to the City in Literature
From the myths and legends that fashioned the identities of ancient city-states to the diversity of literary performance in contemporary cities around the world, literature and the city are inseparably entwined. The international team of scholars in this volume offers a comprehensive, accessible survey of the literary city, exploring the myriad cities that authors create and the genres in which cities appear. Early chapters consider the literary legacies of historical and symbolic cities from antiquity to the early modern period. Subsequent chapters consider the importance of literature to the rise of the urban public sphere; the affective experience of city life; the interplay of the urban landscape and memory; the form of the literary city and its responsiveness to social, cultural and technological change; dystopian, nocturnal, pastoral and sublime cities; cities shaped by colonialism and postcolonialism; and the cities of economic, sexual, cultural and linguistic outsiders.
- Provides an academic yet accessible survey of the city and its literary constructs
- Varied and comprehensive in scope
- Presents the most current scholarship on the city in literature
Reviews & endorsements
'This volume provides a comprehensive examination of the city and its various meanings and contradictions … The book transcends genre, period boundaries and national divisions, making it an important starting point for those interested in any aspect of the city.' Forum for Modern Language Studies
Product details
October 2014Hardback
9781107028036
320 pages
229 × 152 × 22 mm
0.64kg
6 b/w illus.
Available
Table of Contents
- Introduction Kevin R. McNamara
- 1. Celestial cities and rationalist utopias Antonis Balasopoulos
- 2. The city in the literature of antiquity Susan Stephens
- 3. The medieval and early modern city in literature Karen Newman
- 4. The spectator and rise of the modern metropole Alison O'Byrne
- 5. Memory, desire, lyric: the flâneur Catherine Nesci
- 6. Social science and urban realist narrative Stuart Culver
- 7. The socio-economic outsider: labor and the poor Bart Keunen and Luc de Droogh
- 8. The urban nightspace James R. Giles
- 9. Masses, forces, and the urban sublime Christophe den Tandt
- 10. Fragment and form in the city of modernism Arnold Weinstein
- 11. Cities of the avant-garde Malcolm Miles
- 12. Urban dystopias Rob Latham and Jeff Hicks
- 13. Postmodern cities Nick Bentley
- 14. Colonial cities Seth Graebner
- 15. Postcolonial cities Caroline Herbert
- 16. The translated city: immigrants, diasporans, and cosmopolitans Azade Seyhan
- 17. Gay and lesbian urbanity Gregory Woods
- 18. Some versions of urban pastoral Kevin R. McNamara and Timothy Gray.
