Ebook: New Directions in Philosophy and Literature

Maps out how new developments in 21st-century philosophy intersect with the study of literature

• Includes an orientational introduction by Claire Colebrook, one of the world's foremost authorities in the field
• Engages dynamic debates about what it means to be human in face of recent developments in science and technology, the repercussions of anthropogenic climate change, and the overall nature of our contemporary moment
• Draws on new developments in philosophy including speculative realism, object-oriented ontology, the new materialisms, posthumanism, analytic philosophy of language and metaphysics, and ecophilosophy
• Offers close readings of a range of texts from 19th- and 20th-century classics such as Walden, Uncle Tom’s Cabin and Nineteen Eighty-Four to contemporary novels such as A Visit from the Goon Squad, Oryx and Crake and The Stone Gods

This forward-thinking, non-traditional reference work uniquely maps out how new developments in 21st century philosophy are entering into dialogue with the study of literature. Going beyond the familiar methods of analytic philosophy, and with a breadth greater than traditional literary theory, this collection looks at the profound consequences of the interaction between philosophy and literature for questions of ethics, politics, subjectivity, materiality, reality and the nature of the contemporary itself.

Literary Case Studies

Oryx and Crake and Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood

So Close by Hélène Cixous,

10:04 by Ben Lerner

Kapow! by Adam Thirlwell

A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan

Ralph Waldo Emerson’s essays

‘Mississippi’ by William Faulkner

The Flood by Maggie Gee

The Ship by Antonia Honeywell

The Map and the Territory by Michel Houellebecq

Solar by Ian McEwan

When the Floods Came by Clare Morrall

Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell

Percy Bysshe Shelley’s poetry

Super Sad True Love Story by Gary Shteyngart

Walden by Henry David Thoreau

Kapitoil by Teddy Wayne

The Intuitionist by Colson Whitehead

The Stone Gods by Jeanette Winterson

William Wordsworth’s poetry

Contributors

Ridvan Askin, University of Basel, Switzerland

R. Scott Bakker, critically acclaimed novelist and independent scholar

Frida Beckman, Stockholm University, Sweden

R. M. Berry, Florida State University (Emeritus), USA

Charlie Blake, University of West London, UK

Astrid Bracke, HAN University of Applied Sciences, Nijmegen, Netherlands

Rey Chow, Duke University, NC, USA

Claire Colebrook, Penn State University, USA

Arne De Boever, California Institute of the Arts, USA

Nicky Gardiner, University of Huddersfield, UK

Alison Gibbons, Sheffield Hallam University, UK

Evan Gottlieb, Oregon State University, USA

Graham Harman, Southern California Institute of Architecture, USA

Birgit Mara Kaiser, Utrecht University, Netherlands

Ingeborg Löfgren, Uppsala University, Sweden

Robert P. Marzec, Purdue University, IN, USA

Helen Palmer, Kingston University London, UK

Adrian Parr, University of Texas Arlington, USA

Graham Priest, City University of New York, USA and University of Melbourne (Emeritus), Australia

David Rudrum. University of Huddersfield, UK

Babette B. Tischleder, University of Göttingen, Germany

Josh Toth, MacEwan University, Canada

Robin van den Akker, Erasmus University College Rotterdam, Netherlands

Timotheus Vermeulen, University of Oslo, Norway

Bryan Vescio, High Point University, NC, USA

David Watson, Uppsala University, Sweden