Bibliograph

What is a classic?, postcolonial rewriting and invention of the canon, Ankhi Mukherjee ; editor, Hent de Vries

Type

Label

What is a classic?, postcolonial rewriting and invention of the canon, Ankhi Mukherjee ; editor, Hent de Vries

Language

eng

Index

no index present

Literary Form

non fiction

Main title

What is a classic?

Nature of contents

dictionaries

Responsibility statement

Ankhi Mukherjee ; editor, Hent de Vries

Series statement

Cultural memory in the present

Sub title

postcolonial rewriting and invention of the canon

Summary

What Is a Classic? revisits the famous question posed by critics from Sainte-Beuve and T. S. Eliot to J. M. Coetzee to ask how classics emanate from postcolonial histories and societies. Exploring definitive trends in twentieth- and twenty-first century English and Anglophone literature, Ankhi Mukherjee demonstrates the relevance of the question of the classic for the global politics of identifying and perpetuating so-called core texts. Emergent canons are scrutinized in the context of the wider cultural phenomena of book prizes, the translation and distribution of world literatures, and multimedia adaptations of world classics. Throughout, Mukherjee attunes traditional literary critical concerns to the value contestations mobilizing postcolonial and world literature. The breadth of debates and topics she addresses, as well as the book's ambitious historical schema, which includes South Asia, Africa, the Middle East, the West Indies, Australia, New Zealand, Europe, and North America, set this study apart from related titles on the bookshelf today

Target audience

adult

Classification