Coming of Age in Contemporary American FictionEdinburgh University Press, 2007 M04 18 - 200 pages This book explores the ways in which a range of recent American novelists have handled the genre of the 'coming-of-age' novel, or the Bildungsroman. Novels of this genre characteristically dramatise the vicissitudes of growing up and the trials and tribulations of young adulthood, often presented through depictions of immediate family relationships and other social structures. This book considers a variety of different American cultures (in terms of race, class and gender) and a range of contemporary coming-of-age novels, so that aesthetic judgements about the fiction might be made in the context of the social history that fiction represents. A series of questions are asked:* Does the coming-of-age moment in these novels coincide with an interpretation of the 'fall' of America?* What kind of national commentary does it therefore facilitate?* Is the Bildungsroman a quintessentially American genre?* What can it usefully tell us about contemporary American culture? Although the focus is on the conte |
From inside the book
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Page 11
... voice of 1950s disaffected youth (rather than its imagined form as it was understood by the adult J. D. Salinger) then contemporary adolescents will perhaps inevitably appear less morally engaged than their predecessors. Nor do ...
... voice of 1950s disaffected youth (rather than its imagined form as it was understood by the adult J. D. Salinger) then contemporary adolescents will perhaps inevitably appear less morally engaged than their predecessors. Nor do ...
Page 14
... voice into the twentieth century, and to articulate a desire for a new beginning in the era immediately following the Holocaust and atomic weaponry; it is that urge to escape the challenges of growing up and of acquiring a history that ...
... voice into the twentieth century, and to articulate a desire for a new beginning in the era immediately following the Holocaust and atomic weaponry; it is that urge to escape the challenges of growing up and of acquiring a history that ...
Page 16
... voice of fourteen-year-old Huck is the principal reason why the novel is both a children's classic and simultaneously the subject of a great deal of sophisticated academic criticism. That voice combines statements of the boy's ...
... voice of fourteen-year-old Huck is the principal reason why the novel is both a children's classic and simultaneously the subject of a great deal of sophisticated academic criticism. That voice combines statements of the boy's ...
Page 17
Kenneth Millard. that is faithful to the idiom of an adolescent. The voice of Huck Finn is still the model for the contemporary streetwise (male) adolescent, especially where a problematic relationship with the father is involved, or ...
Kenneth Millard. that is faithful to the idiom of an adolescent. The voice of Huck Finn is still the model for the contemporary streetwise (male) adolescent, especially where a problematic relationship with the father is involved, or ...
Page 18
... voice, in which the speakers reveal an astute critical awareness that their stories, however spontaneously they are expressed, are nevertheless formally structured, and therefore run the risk of an artful contrivance which is contrary ...
... voice, in which the speakers reveal an astute critical awareness that their stories, however spontaneously they are expressed, are nevertheless formally structured, and therefore run the risk of an artful contrivance which is contrary ...
Contents
1 | |
15 | |
Growing up in the Sixties | 46 |
Chapter 3 Citation and Resuscitation | 72 |
Life Sentences | 98 |
Chapter 5 Lexicon of Love | 130 |
6 Memoirs and Memorials | 154 |
Conclusion | 181 |
Bibliography | 183 |
Index | 189 |
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Common terms and phrases
adolescence adult aesthetic American argued attempt attention authority becomes begins believes Bone Bone’s called challenges chapter characterised characters child childhood circumstances closely coming of age coming-of-age contemporary critical crucial culture death defined depiction desire dramatises Edgar especially example experience expression father feel fiction final Fishboy further genre girls gives growing idea identity important innocence integral interest interpretation issue kind knowledge language linguistic Lisbon Lucille Lucille’s Maisie male means metafiction Mona Mona’s moral mother narrative narrator nature never novel origin parents particular partly past Phillip politics protagonist Prozac Nation Purple question reader reading recognise relationship respect response Ruth scene sense significant simply simultaneously social society speak specific story structure subjectivity suicide symbolic takes tell things understanding United voice women writing young