Literature and Materialisms sheds light on the current new wave of materialisms and assesses the impact on literary theory and criticism. It maps the similarities and differences between speculative realism, object-oriented philosophy, and vitalism. A genealogy of materialisms, vitalisms, empiricisms, and realist approaches - from Heraclitus to Badiou, including Lucretius, Spinoza, Marx, Althusser, Barad, Spivak, Deleuze, Bennett, Harman, and other contemporary thinkers - puts these new trends into perspective.

This book investigates the relations between literature - from Marquis de Sade to objectivist poetry - and materialism and analyses the material aspects of literature, its structure and texture, its commodification and its capacity to resist market imperatives. It explores how literary style might be understood as a mediation between the 'immaterial' and the concrete features of a text.

This volume provides students and academics with an accessible overview of the study of literature and materialism.

About the Author

Frederic Neyrat is Associate Professor and Mellon-Morgridge Professor of Planetary Humanities in the English department of UW-Madison, (USA).

Book Information
ISBN 9781138675704
Author Ursula Heise
Format Paperback
Page Count 187
Imprint Routledge
Publisher Taylor & Francis Ltd
Weight(grams) 453g