The Nation in British Literature and Culture
The Nation in British Literature and Culture
$120.00
USDThe Nation and British Literature and Culture charts the emergence of Britain as a political, social and cultural construct, examining the manner in which its constituent elements were brought together through a process of amalgamation and conquest. The fashioning of the nation through literature and culture is examined, as well as counter narratives that have sought to call national orthodoxies into question. Specific topics explored include the emergence of a distinctively national literature in the early modern period; the impact of French Revolution on conceptions of Britishness; portrayals of empire in popular and literary fiction; popular music and national imagining; the marginalisation and oppression of particular communities within the nation. The volume concludes by asking what implications an extended set of contemporary crises have for the ongoing survival both of the United Kingdom, both as a political unit and as a literary and cultural point of identity.
- Provides a comprehensive overview of the historical fashioning of the British state
- Explores in detail the way in which literature and culture can serve the process of national imagining and can also be used to interrogate that process
- Examines how the modern British nation is constituted, politically and culturally, and asks whether it is sustainable in its current form
Product details
August 2023Hardback
9781009378857
393 pages
235 × 158 × 28 mm
0.71kg
Available
Table of Contents
- Part I. Origins:
- 1. What is Britain? Andrew Murphy
- 2. Wales in Britain Helen Fulton
- 3. Scotland in Britain Gerard Carruthers
- 4. Ireland in Britain Jim Smyth
- 5. England in Britain Krishan Kumar
- Part II. Writing the Nation:
- 6. Cultural borrowings Edward Wilson-Lee
- 7. Tradition and transformation in literature Neil Rhodes
- 8. Milton and the remaking of the Nation in seventeenth-century England David Loewenstein
- Part III. Revolutions and Empires:
- 9. The American revolution Jerome Tharaud
- 10. The French revolution David Duff
- 11. 'And what should they know of England who only England know?' Ania Loomba
- 12. Rather unpleasant stories: popular fictions of Empire Matthew P. M. Kerr
- 13. Sun-drowned streets and wasted lives: imperial decline and the colonial Novel Praseeda Gopinath
- Part IV. Making the Modern Nation:
- 14. 'It's being so cheerful that keeps me going': the nation in the second world war Gill Plain
- 15. The new British J. Dillon Brown
- 16. Censorship Celia Marshik
- 17. 'Wake up the Nation': modern pop and the quest for a New England Ben Winsworth
- 18. Queer Nation Brian Lewis
- Part V. Futures:
- 19. The future of the Union: a political science perspective Etain Tannam
- 20. What is British Literature now? Kristian Shaw
- 21. Borderline Britain Andrew Murphy.
