Samuel Beckett's legacies in American fiction : problems in postmodernism / James Baxter.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Baxter, James, author.

Contributor:

John, Ruth, and Sally Ruth MacCorkell Fund.

Series:

New interpretations of Beckett in the twenty-first century

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Beckett, Samuel, 1906-1989--Influence.

Beckett, Samuel.

Beckett, Samuel, 1906-1989.

American fiction--20th century--History and criticism.

American fiction.

Influence (Literary, artistic, etc.).

Genre:

Criticism, interpretation, etc.

Physical Description:

ix, 262 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm.

Place of Publication:

Cham : Palgrave Macmillan, an imprint of Springer Nature Switzerland AG, [2021]

Summary:

Samuel Becketts Legacies in American Fiction provides an overdue investigation into Becketts rich influences over American writing. Through in-depth readings of postmodern authors, Robert Coover, Donald Barthelme, Thomas Pynchon, Don DeLillo, Paul Auster and Lydia Davis, this book situates Becketts post-war writing of exhaustion and generation in relation to the emergence of an explosive American avant-garde. In turn, this book provides a valuable insight into the practical realities of Becketts dissemination in America, following the authors long-standing relationship with the countercultural magazine Evergreen Review and its dramatic role in redrawing the possibilities of American culture in the 1960s. While Beckett would be largely removed from his American context, this book follows his vigorous, albeit sometimes awkward, reception alongside the authors and institutions central to shaping his legacies in 20th and 21st century America. Everyone knows Becketts influence is global, but this is the first study to examine his influence on fiction in America with the thoroughness the topic deserves. It is a fresh, lucid, and necessary book, which sheds fascinating new light not just on Beckett but on postmodernism and its legacy. Bran Nicol, Professor of English Literature, University of Surrey James Baxter has achieved brilliant new insights about Beckett's legacy by carefully tracing some of the contexts and engagements created by his presence in American writing. This book has important implications, not just within the fields of Beckett Studies and modern American fiction, but also more broadly with regard to thinking about literary influence. Professor Steven Matthews (University of Reading).

Contents:

Machine generated contents note: 1. Beckett in America: `somehow not the right country'

2. Evergreen Review, 1957-1984: Beckett and the American `Underground'

3. Problems and Pratfalls: Robert Coover, Donald Barthelme and Metafictional Style After Beckett

4. `Between zero and one': Opposing Tendencies in the Exhaustive Fiction of Samuel Beckett and Thomas Pynchon

5. Don DeLillo's Reinvention of `Beckett World'

6. Paul Auster, Lydia Davis and Beckett's Post-Millennial Legacies

7. A `Postmodern Icon'?.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Local Notes:

Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the John, Ruth, and Sally Ruth MacCorkell Fund.

Other Format:

ebook version :

ISBN:

9783030815714

3030815714

OCLC:

1257401535

Publisher Number:

99989131347