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Despite the recent upsurge of interest in Theodor Adorno's work, his literary writings remain generally neglected. Yet literature is a central element in his aesthetic theory. Building on the current emergent interest in modern philosophical aesthetics, this book offers a wide-ranging account of the literary components of Adorno's thinking. Bringing together original essays from a distinguished international group of contributors, it offers the reader a user-friendly path through the major areas of Adorno's work in this area. It is divided into three sections, dealing with the concept of literature, with poetry and poetics, and with modernity, drama and the novel respectively. At the same time, the book provides a clear sense of the unique qualities of Adorno's philosophy of literature by critically relating his work to a number of other influential theorists and theories including contemporary postmodernist thought and cultural studies.
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Adorno and Literature DAVID CUNNINGHAM NIGEL MAPP, Editors Continuum Adorno and Literature This page intentionally left blank Adorno and Literature Edited by DAVID CUNNINGHAM and NIGEL MAPP continuum L O N D O N N E W Y O R K Continuum International Publishing Group The Tower Building, 11 York Road, London SE1 7NX 80 Maiden Lane, Suite 704, New York, NY 10038 © David Cunningham, Nigel Mapp and Contributors 2006 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN: HB: 0-8264-8752-1 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. Typeset by Aarontype Limited, Easton, Bristol Printed and bound in Great Britain by MPG Books Ltd, Bodmin, Cornwall Contents Notes on Contributors Acknowledgements Abbreviations Introduction David Cunningham and Nigel Mapp Part I: Philosophy, Aesthetics and Literature 1. Literature and the Modern System of the Arts: Sources of Criticism in Adorno Stewart Martin 2. Adorno's Critical Presence: Cultural Theory and Literary Value Martin Ryle and Kate Soper 3. Interpretation and Truth: Adorno on Literature and Music Andrew Bowie 4. Adorno and the Poetics of Genre Eva Geulen Part II: Poetry and Poetics 5. Lyric Poetry Before Auschwitz Howard Caygill 6. The Truth in Verse? Adorno, Wordsworth, Prosody Simon Jarvis 7. Lyric's Expression: Musicality, Conceptuality, Critical Agency Robert Kaufman 8. Returning to the 'House of Oblivion': Celan Between Adorno and Heidegger Iain Macdonald Part III: Modernity, Drama and the Novel 9. Forgetting — Faust: Adorno and Kommerell Paul Fleming 10. Adorno's Aesdietic Theory and Lukács's Theory of the Novel Timothy Hall 11. No Nature, No Nothing: Adorno, Beckett, Disenchantment Nigel Mapp vii x xi 1 9 26 40 53 69 84 99 117 133 145 159 vi Contents 12. Late Style in Naipaul: Adorno's Aesthetics and the Post-Colonial Novel Timothy Bewes 13. After Adorno: The Narrator of the Contemporary European Novel David Cunningham Index 171 188 201 Notes on Contributors Timothy Bewes is Assistant Professor in the English Department at Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island. He is also an editor of the journal New Formations. His publications include the books Cynicism and Postmodernity (1997) and Reification, or the Anxiety of Late Capitalism (2002). Andrew Bowie is Professor of German at Royal Holloway College, University