Secrecy and Community in 21st-Century Fiction

by María J. López (Editor), Pilar Villar-Argáiz (Editor)

Overview

Secrecy and Community in 21st-Century Fiction examines the relation between secrecy and community in a diverse and international range of contemporary fictional works in English. In its concern with what is called 'communities of secrecy', it is fundamentally indebted to the thought of Jacques Derrida, Jean-Luc Nancy and Maurice Blanchot, who have pointed to the fallacies and dangers of identitarian and exclusionary communities, arguing for forms of being-in-common characterized by non-belonging, singularity and otherness.

Also drawing on the work of J. Hillis Miller, Derek Attridge, Nicholas Royle, Matei Calinescu, Frank Kermode and George Simmel, among others, this volume analyses the centrality of secrets in the construction of literary form, narrative sequence and meaning, together with their foundational role in our private and interpersonal lives and the public and political realms. In doing so, it engages with the Derridean ethico-political value of secrecy and Derrida's conception of literature as the exemplary site for the operation of the unconditional secret.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781501372193
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	08/25/2022
Pages:	248
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.53(d)

About the Author

María J. López is Senior Lecturer of English at the University of Córdoba, Spain.

Pilar Villar-Argáiz is Senior Lecturer of British and Irish Literatures at the University of Granada, Spain.

Table of Contents

Notes on contributors
Foreword
Joseph Hillis Miller (University of California, Irvine, USA)
Acknowledgements
Introduction: Secrecy and community in twenty-first-century fiction
María J. López (University of Córdoba, Spain)
Part One. SECRECY, LITERARY FORM AND THE COMMUNITY OF READERS
1. Secrecy and community in ergodic texts: Derrida, Ali Smith and the experience of form
Derek Attridge (University of York, UK)
2. Protective mimicry: Reflections on the novel today
Nicholas Royle (University of Sussex, UK)
3. 'Where all is known and nothing understood': Narrative sequence and textual secrets in Toni Morrison's Love
Paula Martín-Salván (University of Córdoba, Spain)
4. Challenging stereotypes of femininity through secrets in Alice Munro's fiction
Mercedes Díaz Dueñas (University of Granada, Spain)
5. Zoë Wicomb and the secrets of the canon
Liani Lochner (Université Laval, Canada)
Part Two. COMMUNITIES OF SECRECY
6. Cryptaesthetic resistance and community in Jhumpa Lahiri's The Lowland
María Luisa Pascual Garrido (University of Córdoba, Spain)
7. Queering the Maori crypt: Community and secrecy in Witi Ihimaera's The Uncle's Story
Gerardo Rodríguez-Salas (University of Granada, Spain)
8. Secrecy, invisibility and community in Jeanette Winterson's The Daylight Gate
Juan L. Pérez-de-Luque (University of Córdoba, Spain)
9. Novel mediums: The art of not speaking in (and of) Hilary Mantel's Beyond Black
Hannu Poutiainen (Tampere University, Finland)
Part Three. SECRECY, POSTCOLONIALISM AND DEMOCRACY
10. Shame and the idea of community in Ian Holding's Of Beasts and Beings and What Happened to Us
Mike Marais (Rhodes University, South Africa)
11. 'Whilst our souls negotiate': Secrets and secrecy in Jonathan Franzen's Purity
Jesús Blanco Hidalga (University of Córdoba, Spain)
12. Conversing with spectres: Secrets and ghosts in Viet Thanh Nguyen's The Refugees
Kim L. Worthington (Massey University, New Zealand)
Index

Editorial Reviews

"The secret as index of ineradicable opacity rather than hidden knowledge to be disclosed; the forms of community that come from honoring the singularity and inviolability of others; and literature as an especially revelatory location for both of these operations - these are among the insights provided by this well-conceived, eclectic collection. Secrecy and Community highlights the urgency of recasting our sense of the present through the medium of Derrida's late work. It is an impressive and moving achievement, and a welcome addition to contemporary thought." --Greg Forter, Professor of English, University of South Carolina, USA, and author of Critique and Utopia in Postcolonial Historical Fiction: Atlantic and Other Worlds (2018)

"This much-needed volume of essays extends Derridean theory through close readings of a wide range of 21st-century narrative texts, thus demonstrating the complex interrelationship between secrets and community, identity politics and literature." --Leslie W. Lewis, Susan D. Morgan Distinguished Professor of English, Goucher College, USA, and author of Telling Narratives: Secrets in African American Literature (2017)

"Many anthologies on secrecy exist, but only a few include cutting-edge essays and vivid empirical studies. In this timely book, the studies compiled by María J. López and Pilar Villar-Argáiz explore the link between secrecy, community, democracy and literature with admirable articulacy and precision. This volume attests to the intersectional articulation of these elements, and will contribute much to research on the different dimensions of literary secrecy." --Eduardo Barros Grela, Professor of English Studies, University of A Coruña, Spain, and co-editor of American Secrets: The Politics and Poetics of Secrecy in the Literature and Culture of the United States (2011)

From the Publisher