Novel Sounds : Southern Fiction in the Age of Rock and Roll / Florence Dore.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Dore, Florence, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Rock music in literature.

American fiction--Southern States--History and criticism.

American fiction.

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

Rock music--Social aspects--United States.

Rock music.

Rock music--Southern States--History and criticism.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (195 pages)

Place of Publication:

New York, NY : Columbia University Press, [2018]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

The 1950s witnessed both the birth of both rock and roll and the creation of Southern literature as we know it. Around the time that Chuck Berry and Elvis Presley put their electric spin on Southern vernacular ballads, a canonical group of white American authors native to rock's birthplace began to write fiction about the electrification of those ballads, translating into literary form key cultural changes that gave rise to the infectious music coming out of their region. In Novel Sounds, Florence Dore tells the story of how these forms of expression became intertwined and shows how Southern writers turned to rock music and its technologies-tape, radio, vinyl-to develop the "rock novel." Dore considers the work of Southern writers like William Faulkner, Flannery O'Connor, and William Styron alongside the music of Bessie Smith, Lead Belly, and Bob Dylan to uncover deep historical links between rock and Southern literature. Along with rock pioneers, Southern authors drew from blues, country, jazz, and other forms to create a new brand of realism that redefined the Southern vernacular as global, electric, and notably white. Resurrecting this Southern literary tradition at the birth of rock, Dore clarifies the surprising but unmistakable influence of rock and roll on the American novel. Along the way, she explains how literature came to resemble rock and roll, an anti-institutional art form if there ever was one, at the very moment academics claimed literature for the institution.

Contents:

Frontmatter

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments

INTRODUCTION: MINSTREL REALISM AT THE BIRTH OF ROCK

1. FUGITIVES AND FUTILITY: AGRARIAN BALLAD NOVELS IN BOB DYLAN'S MOMENT

2. NEW CRITICAL NOISE IN MUSIC CITY: THOMAS PYNCHON'S WILLIAM FAULKNER

3. THE BALLAD'S GENDER: FEMININITY AND INFORMATION IN GEORGIA

4. THE LEAD BELLY THING: WILLIAM STYRON'S RECORDS

CODA. NOBEL SOUNDS: BOB DYLAN'S NOVEL PRIZE

Notes

Bibliography

Discography

Filmography

Index

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 16. Mai 2019)

ISBN:

9780231546058

023154605X

OCLC:

1020295649