Theorizing the Avant-Garde: Modernism, Expressionism, and the Problem of Postmodernity (Literature, Culture, Theory)

Theorizing the Avant-Garde: Modernism, Expressionism, and the Problem of Postmodernity (Literature, Culture, Theory)

by RichardMurphy (Author)

Synopsis

In Modernism, Expressionism and Theories of the Avant Garde, Richard Murphy mobilises theories of the postmodern to challenge our understanding of the avant-garde. He assesses the importance of the avant-garde for contemporary culture and for the debates among theorists of postmodernism such as Jameson, Eagleton, Lyotard and Habermas. Murphy reconsiders the classic formulation of the avant-garde in Lukacs and Bloch, especially their discussion of aesthetic autonomy, and investigates the relationship between art and politics via a discussion of Marcuse, Adorno and Benjamin. Combining close textual readings of a wide range of films as well as works of literature, it draws on a rich array of critical theories, such as those of Bakhtin, Todorov, MacCabe, Belsey and Raymond Williams. This interdisciplinary project will appeal to all those interested in modernist and avant-garde movements of the early twentieth century, and provides a critical rethinking of the present-day controversy regarding postmodernity.

$39.01

Quantity

10 in stock

More Information

Format: Paperback
Pages: 336
Edition: 1st ed.
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 22 Apr 1999

ISBN 10: 0521648696
ISBN 13: 9780521648691
Book Overview: Challenges conventional approaches to the avant-garde through a wide-ranging, interdisciplinary take on postmodernism.

Media Reviews
...original and fascinating... Journal of English and Germanic Philology
Murphy's book nevertheless makes an entirely persuasive and superbly documented case for the continuing impact of the historical avant-garde on the culture of postmodernity. College Literature