Centuries’ Ends, Narrative MeansThis pathbreaking work uses the approaching conclusion of the second millennium as a context for discussing questions concerning temporal division and narrative continuity. It investigates assumptions about teleology and eschatology while exploring the ways in which temporal division affects the creation and production of cultural texts and, reciprocally, the ways in which narrative techniques, forms, and conventions shape, explain, and justify history. Through this exploration, the volume examines how temporal thresholds tend simultaneously to reinforce and to disrupt conceptual boundaries. The sixteen essays use the significance typically invested in historical junctures marked by a centenary advance to investigate perceived paradigm shifts and the consequent reactions to these implicit and explicit transitions. By doing so, they also seek to illuminate the relations between narrative and history, and to enhance understanding of our present historical moment. |
Contents
Stories of History and Narrative | 13 |
Historical and Ideological | 58 |
Being Done with Narrative by Cubism and André Malraux | 79 |
Trahernes Centuries | 89 |
Turners Frontier Thesis as a Narrative | 117 |
Rogue Nationalism | 138 |
War and Population Control | 151 |
the U S Border | 160 |
Whats Awkward About The Awkward Age? | 212 |
Gender and Desire in History | 223 |
Hamlet The Revengers Tragedy | 238 |
Once Upon a Time Not Long Ago O | 261 |
Posthuman Narratives | 276 |
Fin de Siècle and the Technological Sublime | 302 |
Notes | 319 |
Index | 379 |
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aesthetic American argues Awkward Age Bagehot Barthes become Black body Bois Bois's border called century chess claims concept critical cultural studies cyberpunk death degeneration discourse Elizabethan emplotment endgame England English essay fact fiction fin de siècle frontier frontier thesis gender Gérard de Nerval gynoids Hajime Sorayama Hamlet human ideological imagination immigration James kind language literary literature logic London Lukács male Max Jacob meaning Meditations metaphor misogyny modern mourning narration nature Nordau novel particular philosophy play players political postmodern queen question race reality reconstruction relation representation rogue rules scene sense Seth Seth Brundle sexual social space specific story storytelling structure symbolic sympathy teleology temporal theater theory Thomas Thomas Traherne tion traditional Traherne Traherne's trans transsexuality ture turn Turner Turner's narrative University Press vagabonds vagrancy W. E. B. Du Bois White Wittgenstein writing York