Writing the Reader: Configurations of a Cultural Practice in the English Novel

Dorothee Birke

Open Access Published by De Gruyter 2016

Writing the Reader

Configurations of a Cultural Practice in the English Novel

Dorothee Birke

Volume 59 in the series linguae & litterae

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110399844

Overview
Contents

About this book

The history of the novel is also a history of shifting views of the value of novel reading. This study investigates how novels themselves participate in this development by featuring reading as a multidimensional cultural practice. English novels about obsessive reading, written in times of medial transition, serve as test cases for a model that brings together analyses of form and content.

Author / Editor information

Dorothee Birke, Univ. of Freiburg, Germany, and Univ. of Aarhus, Denmark.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	I
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	V
Acknowledgements Open Access Download PDF	IX
Abbreviations of Titles Open Access Download PDF	XI
Part I
Chapter 1. Writing the Reader Open Access Download PDF	3
Chapter 2. The Reader in the Text: Dramatizing Literary Communication Open Access Download PDF	30
Part II
Chapter 3. The Ambivalent Rise of the Novel Reader: Charlotte Lennox’s The Female Quixote Open Access Download PDF	55
Chapter 4. The Institutionalization of Novel Reading: Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey Open Access Download PDF	91
Chapter 5. Psychologizing Reading as Social Behaviour: Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s The Doctor’s Wife Open Access Download PDF	126
Part III
Chapter 6. Looking Forward, Looking Back: Novel Reading in the Twenty-First Century Open Access Download PDF	169
Chapter 7. Taking Stock of the Novel Reader’s History: Ian McEwan’s Atonement Open Access Download PDF	175
Chapter 8. The Nostalgic Future of Novel Reading: Alan Bennett’s The Uncommon Reader Open Access Download PDF	201
Concluding Remarks Open Access Download PDF	225
Works Cited Open Access Download PDF	234
Index of Names Open Access Download PDF	254

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: De Gruyter
Audience: Scholars of Literary Studies
Pages
- Front matter: 11
- Main content: 256
Keywords: History of reading; English novel; narrative theory; reader figures in fiction

eBook

Published: August 8, 2016
ISBN: 9783110399844

Hardcover

Published: August 8, 2016
ISBN: 9783110307634