Cool Characters: Irony and American Fiction

Charting a new course in the criticism of postwar fiction, Cool Characters examines the changing status of...
CHF 95.09
CHF 95.09
SKU: 9780674967885
Product Type: Books
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Author: Lee Konstantinou
Format: Hardcover
Language: English
Subtotal: CHF 95.09
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Cool Characters: Irony and American Fiction by Konstantinou, Lee

Cool Characters: Irony and American Fiction

CHF 95.09

Cool Characters: Irony and American Fiction

CHF 95.09
Author: Lee Konstantinou
Format: Hardcover
Language: English

Charting a new course in the criticism of postwar fiction, Cool Characters examines the changing status of irony in American cultural and political life from World War II to the present, showing how irony migrated from the countercultural margins of the 1950s to the cultural mainstream of the 1980s. Along the way, irony was absorbed into postmodern theory and ultimately became a target of recent writers who have sought to create a practice of "postirony" that might move beyond its limitations.

As a concept, irony has been theorized from countless angles, but Cool Characters argues that it is best understood as an ethos: an attitude or orientation toward the world, embodied in different character types, articulated via literary style. Lee Konstantinou traces five such types--the hipster, the punk, the believer, the coolhunter, and the occupier--in new interpretations of works by authors including Ralph Ellison, William S. Burroughs, Thomas Pynchon, Kathy Acker, Dave Eggers, William Gibson, Jennifer Egan, Jonathan Lethem, and Rachel Kushner.

For earlier generations of writers, irony was something vital to be embraced, but beginning most dramatically with David Foster Wallace, dissatisfaction with irony, especially with its alleged tendency to promote cynicism and political passivity, gained force. Postirony--the endpoint in an arc that begins with naive belief, passes through irony, and arrives at a new form of contingent conviction--illuminates the literary environment that has flourished in the United States since the 1990s.



Author: Lee Konstantinou
Publisher: Harvard
Published: 03/07/2016
Pages: 384
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.50lbs
Size: 9.30h x 6.10w x 1.30d
ISBN: 9780674967885


Review Citation(s):
Choice 08/01/2016

About the Author
Konstantinou, Lee: - Lee Konstantinou is Assistant Professor in the English Department at the University of Maryland, College Park.

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