'Facts alone are wanted in life,' exclaims Mr Gradgrind at the beginning of Dickens' Hard Times. Literature is not about facts alone, and - despite two and a half thousand years of arguments - no one can agree on what it is, or how to study it. But, argues Robert Eaglestone, it is precisely the open-ended nature of literature that makes it such a rewarding and useful subject.
Eaglestone shows that studying literature can change who you are, turning you from a 'reader' into a 'critic': someone attuned to the ways we make meaning in our world. Literature is a living conversation which provides endless opportunities to rethink and reinterpret our societies and ourselves. With examples ranging from Sappho to Skyrim, this book shows how literature offers freer and deeper ways of thinking and being.
- ISBN13 9781509532346
- Publish Date 23 July 2019 (first published 25 January 2019)
- Publish Status Active
- Publish Country GB
- Imprint Polity Press
- Format eBook
- Pages 160
- Language English
- URL http://wiley.com/remtitle.cgi?isbn=150953234X