 |
GetTextbooks.com
Compare Prices & Save up to 90% |
|
|
|
| Login | Sign up | Settings | My Wish List |
 | | The World Republic of Letters (Convergences: Inventories of the Present) by Pascale Casanova, M. B. DeBevoise (Translator) ISBN-10: 9780674010215 ISBN-10: 0-674-01021-3 ISBN-13: 9780674010215 ISBN-13: 978-0-674-01021-5 Paperback 2007-04-30 Harvard University Press Find Lowest Price |
Editorials | ||
Product Description "The ""world of letters"" has always seemed a matter more of metaphor than of global reality. In this book, Pascale Casanova shows us the state of world literature behind the stylistic refinements--a world of letters relatively independent from economic and political realms, and in which language systems, aesthetic orders, and genres struggle for dominance. Rejecting facile talk of globalization, with its suggestion of a happy literary ""melting pot,"" Casanova exposes an emerging regime of inequality in the world of letters, where minor languages and literatures are subject to the invisible but implacable violence of their dominant counterparts. Inspired by the writings of Fernand Braudel and Pierre Bourdieu, this ambitious book develops the first systematic model for understanding the production, circulation, and valuing of literature worldwide. Casanova proposes a baseline from which we might measure the newness and modernity of the world of letters--the literary equivalent of the meridian at Greenwich. She argues for the importance of literary capital and its role in giving value and legitimacy to nations in their incessant struggle for international power. Within her overarching theory, Casanova locates three main periods in the genesis of world literature--Latin, French, and German--and closely examines three towering figures in the world republic of letters--Kafka, Joyce, and Faulkner. Her work provides a rich and surprising view of the political struggles of our modern world--one framed by sites of publication, circulation, translation, and efforts at literary annexation. " | ||
Reviews | ||
Interesting but repetitive. The book is interesting but repetitive. I agree with another reviewer who said that it could be shorter. Moreover, I think that it looks too much at the past just at a moment when, with the changes Internet is bringing about, the situation is changing very quickly. I did not have the feeling that I was reading about The World Republic of Letters as it is now but as it was some years ago. | ||
Redundancy Casanova's book probably reads better in the original French than in this lumbering translation. Nonetheless, in any language the book suffers from constant repetition of the same ideas. The book could easily have been one hundred pages shorter. Much of the discussion goes over old ground. The concluding chapter is not revelatory at all, but is worth pondering. Experienced readers might do well to skip directly to it. | ||
The geography of literature The rise of geography in the social sciences has now officially entered the field of literary theory. I read this book as a person caught between different cultural and national identities and as a writer and artist caught between traditions and questions of how - and what - to represent. It was a thrilling read for me although not everyone, I suspect, will like the implications of this book. This isn't really the forum to go into them, but they are potentially revolutionary - and potentially liberating. Casanova's method draws heavily on the political sociology of Pierre Bourdieu and the historical sociology of Ferdinand Braudel. English-language fans of Immanuel Wallerstein and David Harvey will find fascinating correspondences. There are moments when I felt that she might be pushing her thesis too far, only to have my doubts dispelled within moments. 'The World Republic of Letters' is, I believe, the tip of the iceberg: these ideas will ripple out beyond literature into the broader cultural studies field. I hope many more people - especially writers who are, like me, baffled by the seeming bankruptcy of contemporay fiction - will engage with this book. It is only when we are stripped of our illusions and fantasies of what constitutes art and beauty that we shall be finally able to become true artists. | ||
An Ideal Work of Scholarship I read this book in the original (French) while writing my dissertation (comparative literature), and quoted from it often. The writing is engaging, the author covers an encyclopedic range of writers and literary periods, and she brings a compelling theoretical perspective to fundamental questions of cultural development and social history. The book is particularly authoritative in the crucial question of how literary vernaculars legitimate themselves--a question as central to contemporary post-colonial literatures as it was to the early-modern writing of the 16th and 17th centuries. That Casanova can speak meaningfully to readers and researchers at both ends of the modern literary spectrum indicates the magnitude of her scholarly achievement. This is the kind of book that all of us who are in the academic racket would like to have written, and it is one that anyone interested in literary studies would enjoy and profit from reading. I'm looking forward to reading this translation to remind myself of what I liked about the original, and to catch any nuances that my quite non-native command of French would have missed. Thank you, Harvard, for bringing this book out in translation: please put it out in paperback, as well! | ||
Since no one else has yet reviewed ... I have not read this book! However, since there's not much info here about it, thought I would refer interested parties to a review in the Jan.3 '05 issue of The Nation by Wm. Deresiewicz, which I quote from: "(this book) is almost certain to become quite famous among intellectuals around the world over the next few years"; and in summing up "the main thrust of Casanova's argument, which covers roughly the last century and a half, is unimpeachable. She has created a map of global literary power relations where none had existed, and she has raised a host of further questions." A very positive review. | ||