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A seminal text in the burgeoning field of David Foster Wallace studies, the original edition of Understanding David Foster Wallace was nevertheless incomplete as it addressed only his first four works of fiction--namely the novels The Broom of the System and Infinite Jest and the story collections Girl with Curious Hair and Brief Interviews with Hideous Men. This revised edition adds two new chapters covering his final story collection, Oblivion, and his posthumous novel, The Pale King.  Tracing Wallace's relationship to modernism and postmodernism, this volume provides close readings of all his major works of fiction. Although critics sometimes label Wallace a postmodern writer, Boswell argues that he should be regarded as the nervous leader of some still-unnamed (and perhaps unnamable) third wave of modernism. In charting a new direction for literary practice, Wallace does not seek to overturn postmodernism, nor does he call for a return to modernism. 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Like the books that serve as its primary subject, Boswell's study directly confronts such arcane issues as postmodernism, information theory, semiotics, the philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein, and poststructuralism, yet it does so in a way that is comprehensible to a wide and general readership- the very same readership that has enthusiastically embraced Wallace's challenging yet entertaining and redemptive fiction.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50386506907921,"sku":"CIN1643360698G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50397694820625,"sku":"CIN1643360698VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1643360698.jpg?v=1751214776"},{"product_id":"understanding-cormac-mccarthy-book-steven-frye-9781570038396","title":"Understanding Cormac McCarthy","description":"Offers a comprehensive treatment of McCarthy's fiction, assessing with the author's aesthetic and thematic concerns, his philosophical and religious influences, and his participation in Western literary traditions.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50391420698897,"sku":"CIN1570038392G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1570038392.jpg?v=1751277108"},{"product_id":"understanding-david-mamet-book-brenda-murphy-9781643363820","title":"Understanding David Mamet","description":"A new preface covers Mamet's most recent plays and nonfiction writingUnderstanding David Mamet analyzes the broad range of David Mamet's plays and places them in the context of his career as a prolific writer of fiction and nonfiction prose, as well as drama. 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Then Lang examines how vivid characters, striking use of dramatic techniques, and wide range of allusions combine in Rash's best-known book, which is also his most accomplished novel to date, Serena.  After a study of Rash's most recent novel, The Cove, Lang returns to Rash's latest work in short fiction: his Frank O'Connor Award-winning Burning Bright and Nothing Gold Can Stay, both of which demonstrate his wide-ranging subject matter and characters as well as his incisive portraits of both contemporary Appalachian life and the region's history. 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The book's analyses of key works in the Baldwin canon--among them, Go Tell It on the Mountain, Giovanni's Room, \"Sonny's Blues,\" Another Country, The Fire Next Time, and The Devil Finds Work--demonstrate the consistency, contrary to some critics' claims, of Baldwin's vision and thematic concerns.  As police violence against people of color, a resurgence in white supremacist rhetoric, and pushback against LGBTQ rights fill today's headlines, James Baldwin's powerful and often-angry words find a new resonance. From early on, Baldwin decried the damning potential of alienation and the persistent bigotry that feeds it. Yet, even as it sometimes wavered, his hope for both the individual and the nation remained intact. 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Tracing Morrison's developing art and her career as a public intellectual, Furman examines the novels in order of publication. She also decodes their collective narrative chronology, which begins in the late seventeenth century and ends in the late twentieth century, as Morrison delineates three hundred years of African American experience. In Furman's view Morrison tells new and difficult stories of old, familiar histories such as the making of Colonial America and the racing of American society.  In the final chapters Furman pays particular attention to form, noting Morrison's continuing practice of the kind of \"\"deep\"\" novelistic structure that transcends plot and imparts much of a novel's meaning. 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