Critical Approaches to Joseph Conrad

Critical Approaches to Joseph Conrad

  • Author: Szczeszak-Brewer, Agata
  • Publisher: University of South Carolina Press
  • ISBN: 9781611175295
  • eISBN Pdf: 9781611175301
  • eISBN Epub: 9781611175301
  • Place of publication:  South Carolina , United States
  • Year of digital publication: 2015
  • Month: August
  • Language: English

Critical Approaches to Joseph Conrad is a collection of essays directed to both new and experienced readers of Conrad. The book takes into account recent developments in literary theory, including the prominence of ecocriticism, ecopostcolonial approaches, and gender studies. Editor Agata Szczeszak-Brewer offers a comprehensive and comprehensible introduction to Conrad's most popular texts, also addressing the most recent academic debates as well as the conversations about narrative and genre in Conrad's canon.

Students and scholars of Conrad, twentieth-century literature, and modernism will appreciate the clear, accessible prose by nineteen internationally recognized contributors who approach Conrad in different ways, from postcolonial and ecocritical perspectives, through explorations of gender, to psychoanalysis, narrative theory, and political analysis. Beginning with a biographical introduction by Szczeszak-Brewer, the collection offers an essay outlining the cultural and historical contexts that influenced Conrad's fiction and an essay on reception of Conrad's work.

Following that, contributors provide critical approaches to Heart of Darkness, Lord Jim, Typhoon, Nostromo, The Secret Agent, The Secret Sharer, and Under Western Eyes. In these sections scholars offer insights about complex issues in Conrad's fiction, ranging from the study of specific literary tools and narrative development in his books to the political theories in Conrad's portrayal of the threat of terrorism and violent revolutions.

  • Cover
  • Contents
  • Acknowledgments
  • Chronological List of Works
  • Introduction
  • PART I: Conrad’s Contexts
    • Joseph Conrad: Historical and Cultural Contexts
    • Conrad’s Critical Reception
  • PART II: Critical Approaches to Heart of Darkness
    • “The great demoralization of the land”: Postcolonial Ecology in Heart of Darkness
    • The Elephant in the Text: Toward a Post-Humanist Reading of Heart of Darkness
    • Conrad and Coppola: Rendering Empire Visible
    • Reinventing the Congo through Western Eyes: Echoes of Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness in Michaela Wrong’s In the Footsteps of Mr Kurtz
  • PART III: Critical Approaches to Other Major Texts
    • The Imitable Joseph Conrad
    • Maternal Return: Lord Jim’s Spectral Narrative
    • The Other Side of the Page in Typhoon
    • Ideas Have Consequences: Women in the Compromised World of Nostromo
    • History in Ruins: Reading Nostromo
    • A Simple Tale? The Writing and Rewriting of The Secret Agent
    • “The Secret Sharer”: When the Other Is the Self
    • Sensationalized Stories of Russian Revolutionary Terrorism in Under Western Eyes
    • Chance and Betrayal in Under Western Eyes
  • Appendix: Sources for Further Reading
  • Notes
  • Works Cited
  • Contributors
  • Index
    • A
    • B
    • C
    • D
    • E
    • F
    • G
    • H
    • I
    • J
    • K
    • L
    • M
    • N
    • O
    • P
    • R
    • S
    • T
    • U
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