Literature and culture of the Chicago Renaissance : postmodern and postcolonial development / edited by Yoshinobu Hakutani.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Hakutani, Yoshinobu, 1935- editor.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

American literature--Illinois--Chicago--History and criticism.

American literature.

Chicago (Ill.)--Intellectual life--20th century.

Chicago (Ill.).

Chicago (Ill.)--In literature.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (341 pages)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

New York, NY : Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, [2019]

Summary:

The Chicago Renaissance has long been considered a less important literary movement than the Harlem Renaissance. While the Harlem Renaissance began and flourished during the 1920s, but faded during the 1930s, the Chicago Renaissance originated between 1890 and 1910, gathered momentum in the 1930s, and paved the way for the postmodern and postcolonial developments in American Literature. To portray Chicago as a modern, spacious, cosmopolitan city, the writers of the Chicago Renaissance developed a new style of writing based on a distinct cultural aesthetic that reflected ethnically diverse sentiments and aspirations. Whereas the Harlem Renaissance was dominated by African American writers, the Chicago Renaissance originated from the interactions between African and European American writers. Much like modern jazz, writings in the movement became a hybrid, cross-cultural product of black and white Americans. The second period of the movement developed at two stages. In the first stage, the older generation of African American writers continued to deal with racial issues. In the second stage, African American writers sought solutions to racism by comparing American culture with other cultures. The younger generation of African American writers, such as Ishmael Reed, Charles Johnson, and Colson Whitehead, followed their predecessors and explored Confucianism, Buddhist Ontology, and Zen. This volume features essays by both veteran African Americanists and upcoming young critics. It is highlighted by essays from scholars located around the globe, such as Toru Kiuchi of Japan, Yupei Zhou of China, Mamoun Alzoubi of Jordan, and Babacar M'Baye of Senegal. It will be invaluable reading for students of Americanists at all levels.

Contents:

Cover

Half Title

Title Page

Copyright Page

Table of Contents

List of figures

List of contributors

Acknowledgements

Introduction

PART I: Interactions of African and European American Writers

1. The Chicago Renaissance, Dreiser, and Wright's Spatial Narrative

Notes

References

2. Chicago as Metaphor in the Writings of Theodore Dreiser and Richard Wright: Tracing the Literary Lineage

3. Theodore Dreiser's "Nigger Jeff," Richard Wright's "Big Boy Leaves Home," and Lynching

4. Chicago in Dreiser's Sister Carrie, Farrell's Studs Lonigan, and Wright's Native Son

5. "Careful Candors": Gwendolyn Brooks, T. S. Eliot, and the Poetics of Social Critique

PART II: African American Writers and Race Issues

6. The Illinois Writers' Project and Its Impact on the Second Chicago Renaissance

The Chicago IWP Office

The Significance of the Chicago Office in American Letters

7. Wright's The Long Dream as Racial and Sexual Discourse

8. Frank Marshall Davis of Chicago and the Young Barack Obama of Hawaii

9. Landscapes of the Imagination: Clarence Major, Leon Forrest, and the Black Chicago Renaissance

10. The Intuitionist and The Underground Railroad: Colson Whitehead Works on Race Issues

The Intuitionist's Mysterious Narration

Vagary as the Author's Tool

A New Metaphor for Inhumanity

Intuitionism, Sight, and Invisibility

Communicating with Everything

The Perfect Elevator/Novel

Delivering Messages

The Underground Railroad

PART III: Cross-Cultural Visions in African American Postmodernism and Postcolonialism

11. Wright and Transnationalism: A Reading of Pagan Spain

References.

12. The Western and Eastern Thoughts of Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man

13. Ishmael Reed's Mumbo Jumbo: A Reading through Confucianism

14. Neo-HooDooism in Ishmael Reed's Japanese by Spring: Lost Boundary between Fact and Fiction

15. "All narratives are lies, man, an illusion": Buddhism, Postmodernism, and Postcolonialism in Charles Johnson's Middle Passage and Dreamer

16. African Legacy and Chicago Politics in Barack Obama's Dreams from My Father

Defining Transnationalism and Cosmopolitanism

Africa as Absence and Presence

Barry and Africa

Kenyan Neocolonial Politics in Dreams from My Father

The Faith from Home: Cosmopolitanism in Obama's Chicago Politics

Cosmopolitanism as Cross-racial Alliance and Activism in Dreams

Index.

Notes:

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

1-000-00861-4

1-000-00177-6

0-429-28371-7

9780429283710

OCLC:

1109175554