Philipp Löffler - European Studies in North American Literature and Culture: Pluralist Desires : Contemporary Historical Fiction and the End of the Cold War in EPUB, MOBI, PDF
9781571139528 1571139524 In Pluralist Desires, Philipp Lffler explores the contemporary historical novel in conjunction with three cultural shifts that have crucially affected political and intellectual life in the United States during the 1990s and 2000s: the end of the Cold War, the decline of postmodernism, and the re-emergence of cultural pluralism. Contemporary historical fiction -- from Don DeLillo's Underworld and Philip Roth's American trilogy to Richard Powers's Plowing the Dark and Toni Morrison's A Mercy -- relates and authorizes these developments by imagining the writing of history as a powerful form of world-making. Rather than asking whether history can ever be true, contemporary historical fiction investigates the uses of history for our individual lives. How can we use history to make our individual lives meaningful and worthy in the face of an unknown future? Pluralist Desires approaches these issues by excavating the origins of 19th-century pluralism and its revival in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, revealing how major American novelists have appropriated the genre of the historical novel in the pursuit of selfhood rather than truth. Lffler complements standard accounts of the end of history with a selection of careful close readings that fundamentally reposition the form and the function of the historical novel in contemporary American culture. Philipp Lffler is Assistant Professor of American Literature at the University of Heidelberg, Germany., In Pluralist Desires, Philipp Loffler explores the contemporary historical novel in conjunction with three cultural shifts that have crucially affected political and intellectual life in the United States during the 1990s and 2000s: the end of the Cold War, the decline of postmodernism, and the re-emergence of cultural pluralism. Contemporary historical fiction - from Don DeLillo's Underworld and Philip Roth's American trilogy to Richard Powers's Plowing the Dark and Toni Morrison's A Mercy - relates and authorizes these developments by imagining the writing of history as a powerful form of world-making. Rather than asking whether history can ever be true, contemporary historical fiction investigates the uses of history for our individual lives. How can we use history to make our individual lives meaningful and worthy in the face of an unknown future? Pluralist Desires approaches these issues by excavating the origins of 19th-century pluralism and its revival in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, revealing how major American novelists have appropriated the genre of the historical novel in the pursuit of selfhood rather than truth. Loffler complements standard accounts of the end of history with a selection of careful close readings that fundamentally reposition the form and the function of the historical novel in contemporary American culture. Philipp Loffler is Assistant Professor of American Literature at the University of Heidelberg, Germany., In Pluralist Desires, Philipp Löffler explores the contemporary historical novel in conjunction with three cultural shifts that have crucially affected political and intellectual life in the United States during the 1990s and 2000s: the end of the Cold War, the decline of postmodernism, and the re-emergence of cultural pluralism. Contemporary historical fiction -- from Don DeLillo's Underworld and Philip Roth's American trilogy to Richard Powers's Plowing the Dark and Toni Morrison's A Mercy -- relates and authorizes these developments by imagining the writing of history as a powerful form of world-making. Rather than asking whether history can ever be true, contemporary historical fiction investigates the uses of history for our individual lives. How can we use history to make our individual lives meaningful and worthy in the face of an unknown future? Pluralist Desires approaches these issues by excavating the origins of 19th-century pluralism and its revival in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, revealing how major American novelists have appropriated the genre of the historical novel in the pursuit of selfhood rather than truth. Löffler complements standard accounts of the end of history with a selection of careful close readings that fundamentally reposition the form and the function of the historical novel in contemporary American culture. Philipp Löffler is Assistant Professor of American Literature at the University of Heidelberg, Germany., The Cold War's end coincided with two developments that had profound impact on political and intellectual life during the 1990s and 2000s: the decline of postmodernism and the comeback of cultural pluralism. The contemporary historical novel-from DeLillo's Underworld and Roth's "American Trilogy" to Powers's Plowing the Dark and Morrison's A Mercy-exemplifies these developments by imagining the writing of history as a powerful form of world-making, taking up a nineteenth-century tradition of philosophical pragmatism that replaced universal truth with plurality of belief and experience. Rather than questioning the representability of history, contemporary historical fiction asks how we can use history to make our individual lives meaningful in the face of an unknown future. It sees its value no longer in what we know about history-a question of universal truth-but in what we feel about it-a question of difference and subject plurality. Philipp Löffler excavates the origins of nineteenth-century pluralism and its revival in the last two decades, revealing how major American novelists have appropriated the historical novel in the pursuit of selfhood rather than truth, fundamentally repositioning the genre in contemporary American culture. Philipp Löffler is Assistant Professor of American Literature at the University of Heidelberg, Germany.
9781571139528 1571139524 In Pluralist Desires, Philipp Lffler explores the contemporary historical novel in conjunction with three cultural shifts that have crucially affected political and intellectual life in the United States during the 1990s and 2000s: the end of the Cold War, the decline of postmodernism, and the re-emergence of cultural pluralism. Contemporary historical fiction -- from Don DeLillo's Underworld and Philip Roth's American trilogy to Richard Powers's Plowing the Dark and Toni Morrison's A Mercy -- relates and authorizes these developments by imagining the writing of history as a powerful form of world-making. Rather than asking whether history can ever be true, contemporary historical fiction investigates the uses of history for our individual lives. How can we use history to make our individual lives meaningful and worthy in the face of an unknown future? Pluralist Desires approaches these issues by excavating the origins of 19th-century pluralism and its revival in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, revealing how major American novelists have appropriated the genre of the historical novel in the pursuit of selfhood rather than truth. Lffler complements standard accounts of the end of history with a selection of careful close readings that fundamentally reposition the form and the function of the historical novel in contemporary American culture. Philipp Lffler is Assistant Professor of American Literature at the University of Heidelberg, Germany., In Pluralist Desires, Philipp Loffler explores the contemporary historical novel in conjunction with three cultural shifts that have crucially affected political and intellectual life in the United States during the 1990s and 2000s: the end of the Cold War, the decline of postmodernism, and the re-emergence of cultural pluralism. Contemporary historical fiction - from Don DeLillo's Underworld and Philip Roth's American trilogy to Richard Powers's Plowing the Dark and Toni Morrison's A Mercy - relates and authorizes these developments by imagining the writing of history as a powerful form of world-making. Rather than asking whether history can ever be true, contemporary historical fiction investigates the uses of history for our individual lives. How can we use history to make our individual lives meaningful and worthy in the face of an unknown future? Pluralist Desires approaches these issues by excavating the origins of 19th-century pluralism and its revival in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, revealing how major American novelists have appropriated the genre of the historical novel in the pursuit of selfhood rather than truth. Loffler complements standard accounts of the end of history with a selection of careful close readings that fundamentally reposition the form and the function of the historical novel in contemporary American culture. Philipp Loffler is Assistant Professor of American Literature at the University of Heidelberg, Germany., In Pluralist Desires, Philipp Löffler explores the contemporary historical novel in conjunction with three cultural shifts that have crucially affected political and intellectual life in the United States during the 1990s and 2000s: the end of the Cold War, the decline of postmodernism, and the re-emergence of cultural pluralism. Contemporary historical fiction -- from Don DeLillo's Underworld and Philip Roth's American trilogy to Richard Powers's Plowing the Dark and Toni Morrison's A Mercy -- relates and authorizes these developments by imagining the writing of history as a powerful form of world-making. Rather than asking whether history can ever be true, contemporary historical fiction investigates the uses of history for our individual lives. How can we use history to make our individual lives meaningful and worthy in the face of an unknown future? Pluralist Desires approaches these issues by excavating the origins of 19th-century pluralism and its revival in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, revealing how major American novelists have appropriated the genre of the historical novel in the pursuit of selfhood rather than truth. Löffler complements standard accounts of the end of history with a selection of careful close readings that fundamentally reposition the form and the function of the historical novel in contemporary American culture. Philipp Löffler is Assistant Professor of American Literature at the University of Heidelberg, Germany., The Cold War's end coincided with two developments that had profound impact on political and intellectual life during the 1990s and 2000s: the decline of postmodernism and the comeback of cultural pluralism. The contemporary historical novel-from DeLillo's Underworld and Roth's "American Trilogy" to Powers's Plowing the Dark and Morrison's A Mercy-exemplifies these developments by imagining the writing of history as a powerful form of world-making, taking up a nineteenth-century tradition of philosophical pragmatism that replaced universal truth with plurality of belief and experience. Rather than questioning the representability of history, contemporary historical fiction asks how we can use history to make our individual lives meaningful in the face of an unknown future. It sees its value no longer in what we know about history-a question of universal truth-but in what we feel about it-a question of difference and subject plurality. Philipp Löffler excavates the origins of nineteenth-century pluralism and its revival in the last two decades, revealing how major American novelists have appropriated the historical novel in the pursuit of selfhood rather than truth, fundamentally repositioning the genre in contemporary American culture. Philipp Löffler is Assistant Professor of American Literature at the University of Heidelberg, Germany.