Cambridge Contexts in Literature
7 total works
Critical introductions to a range of literary topics and genres. Landscape and Literature introduces students to the exploration of different ways in which landscape has been represented in literature. It focuses on key aspects of this topic such as the importance of pastoral, contrasts between city and country, eighteenth-century developments from neo-classical to picturesque and Romantic ideas of the sublime, regional novels of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and varied styles of twentieth-century poetry from the Georgian poets to Heaney and Hughes. Poems and prose extracts from writers such as Marvell, Wordsworth, George Eliot, Hardy, Lawrence and Seamus Heaney are included.
Critical introductions to a range of literary topics and genres. Shakespeare's reputation since his death has been so spectacular that we can be misled into thinking of him as a genius working in inspired solitude. But theatre is practical, collaborative and commercial, and plays emerge from the historical, cultural and social influences of their birth. Shakespeare on Stage provides invaluable information on the theatre of Shakespeare's lifetime, but it also explores a wider context.
The Gothic Tradition
by John Smart, Pamela Bickley, Ian Brinton, and Stephen Siddall
Published 26 June 2000
Critical introductions to a range of literary topics and genres. The gothic influence on modern writers such as Angela Carter, Iain Banks and Stephen King is vivid and great as is the effect on the world of film and rock music. Part of the function of this book is to offer some guidance: not in terms of a fixed or definitive set of Gothic characteristics, but rather in giving a framework for questions and explorations.
Critical introductions to a range of literary topics and genres. Modernism and After focuses on those writers working in English between 1910 and 1939 whose work signalled a dramatic change in the sense of what art could and should be. An overview of Modernism is provided, but the book recognises that the term should not become a strait-jacket into which we try to fit a writer's individual distinctiveness. Rather, siginificant poetry and prose works are explored in the light both of the events of the time and of other 'modernist' developments in areas such as music, architecture and the visual arts.
Satire
by Jane Ogborn, Peter Buckroyd, Pamela Bickley, Ian Brinton, and Stephen Siddall
Published 8 February 2001
Critical introductions to a range of literary topics and genres. The purpose of satire is to expose human hypocrisy, vice and folly, and because these aspects of human behaviour are not particular to any one historical period, satires can be understood by readers at any moment in time. This book explores the social and political circumstances to deepen that understanding. Text extracts are included from Jonathan Swift, Alexander Pope, Lord Byron, E.E. Cummings and Evelyn Waugh.
Post-Colonial Literature
by Christopher O'Reilly, John Smart, Pamela Bickley, Ian Brinton, and Stephen Siddall
Published 19 April 2001
Critical introductions to a range of literary topics and genres. This book encompasses experiences of the British Empire such as life in Nigeria before the arrival of the British, through to the British retreat from the Empire after the Second World War and on to reggae and 'dub' beats of black British poetry today. Includes writing from Indian, African, South African and Caribbean authors such as Salman Rushdie, Chinua Achebe, J.M. Coetzee and Derek Walcott.
Critical introductions to a range of literary topics and genres. Looking back on 20th century British drama from its' historical, social and political perspective enables the reader to set each play in a broader context. Contents include a selection of play extracts from well-known authors including Harold Brighouse, John Osborne, Harold Pinter, Tom Stoppard and Timberlake Wertenbaker.