Ebook: Ambrose Bierce and the Dance of Death

OC Sharon Talley draws on psychoanalytic theory to illuminate the connections between BierceOCOs life and works, without ever losing sight of the historical contextsOCoespecially his experience in the Civil WarOCothat also shaped his creativity. This judicious and comprehensive book will give a major boost to the reassessment of BierceOCOs place in American letters.OCO OCoPeter L. Rudnytsky, author of "Reading Psychoanalysis: Freud, Rank, Ferenczi, Groddeck" "Ambrose Bierce and the Dance of Death" uses psychoanalytic theory in combination with historical, cultural, and literary contexts to examine the complex motif of death in a full range of BierceOCOs writings. Scholarly interest in Bierce, whose work has long been undervalued, has grown significantly in recent years. This new book contributes to the ongoing reassessment by providing new contexts for joining the texts in his canon in meaningful ways. Previous attempts to consider Bierce from a psychological perspective have been superficial, often reductive Freudian readings of individual stories such as OC An Occurrence at Owl Creek BridgeOCO and OC The Death of Halpin Frayser.OCO This new volume not only updates these interpretations with insights from post-Freudian theorists but uses contemporary death theory as a framework to analyze the sources and expressions of BierceOCOs attitudes about death and dying. This approach makes it possible to discern links among texts that resolve some of the still puzzling ambiguities that haveOCountil nowOCoprecluded a fuller understanding of both the man and his writings. Lively and engaging, "Ambrose Bierce and the Dance of Death" adds valuable new insights not only to the study of Bierce but to that of nineteenth-century American literature in general. Sharon Talley is the author of the "Student Companion to Herman Melville." Her articles have been published in "Nineteenth-Century Prose, American Imago, "and the "Journal of MenOCOs Studies." She is associate professor of English at Texas A&M UniversityOCoCorpus Christi."