Le Grand Transit Moderne: Mobility, Modernity And French Naturalist Fiction - Couverture souple

Duffy, Larry

 
9789042018150: Le Grand Transit Moderne: Mobility, Modernity And French Naturalist Fiction
Couverture souple
ISBN 10 : 9042018151 ISBN 13 : 9789042018150
Editeur : Editions Rodopi B.V., 2005

Synopsis

This book explores fictional responses to the changing transport and urban infrastructure of nineteenth-century France, arguing that networks of movement (and an accompanying ‘culture of networks’) which had become firmly established by the time of the Second Empire constitute a privileged subject for representation, and that naturalist fiction in particular is that representation’s privileged form. Contextualizing the study’s critical focus by way of a brief historical outline of the development of infrastructural networks in nineteenth-century France and a delineation of the problematical parameters of French naturalism, Duffy examines literary representations of new forms and conceptualisations of movement, principally in works by Flaubert, Zola, and Maupassant. Other authors discussed include the Goncourt brothers, Huysmans, Baudelaire and Claretie. Literary texts are examined alongside a range of related scientific, sociological and medical texts. What emerges strikingly from consideration of these works and the discourses they – often subversively – incorporate, is that movement, central to nineteenth-century industrial society’s view of itself, is frequently perceived and presented self-deludingly in the idealised metaphorical terms of smoothly-functioning systems of perpetual motion, and that naturalist fiction, by exploiting to their full potential the same metaphors in its narratives, challenges this ‘anti-entropic’ vision.

Les informations fournies dans la section « Synopsis » peuvent faire référence à une autre édition de ce titre.

Présentation de l'éditeur

This book explores fictional responses to the changing transport and urban infrastructure of nineteenth-century France, arguing that networks of movement (and an accompanying culture of networks) which had become firmly established by the time of the Second Empire constitute a privileged subject for representation, and that naturalist fiction in particular is that representations privileged form. Contextualizing the studys critical focus by way of a brief historical outline of the development of infrastructural networks in nineteenth-century France and a delineation of the problematical parameters of French naturalism, Duffy examines literary representations of new forms and conceptualisations of movement, principally in works by Flaubert, Zola, and Maupassant. Other authors discussed include the Goncourt brothers, Huysmans, Baudelaire and Claretie. Literary texts are examined alongside a range of related scientific, sociological and medical texts. What emerges strikingly from consideration of these works and the discourses they often subversively incorporate, is that movement, central to nineteenth-century industrial societys view of itself, is frequently perceived and presented self-deludingly in the idealised metaphorical terms of smoothly-functioning systems of perpetual motion, and that naturalist fiction, by exploiting to their full potential the same metaphors in its narratives, challenges this anti-entropic vision.

Les informations fournies dans la section « A propos du livre » peuvent faire référence à une autre édition de ce titre.

Éditeur
Editions Rodopi B.V.
Date d'édition
2005
Langue
anglais
ISBN 10 
9042018151
ISBN 13 
9789042018150
Reliure
Broché
Nombre de pages
325
Coordonnées du fabricant
non disponible
Personne responsable
non disponible