Writing in Limbo
Modernism and Caribbean Literature
Format:Hardback
Publisher:Cornell University Press
Published:18th Mar '92
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
This hardback is available in another edition too:
- Paperback£15.99(9781501719905)
In Simon Gikandi’s view, Caribbean literature and postcolonial literature more generally negotiate an uneasy relationship with the concepts of modernism and modernity—a relationship in which the Caribbean writer, unable to escape a history encoded by Europe, accepts the challenge of rewriting it. Drawing on contemporary deconstructionist theory, Gikandi looks at how such Caribbean writers as George Lamming, Samuel Selvon, Alejo Carpentier, C. L. R. James, Paule Marshall, Merle Hodge, Zee Edgell, and Michelle Cliff have attempted to confront European modernism.
Gikandi’s pursuit of his broader conception of ‘Caribbean modernism’ pays ample dividends in the space it gives him to read the novels with something like the detailed attention they all deserve but rarely enjoy. Writing in Limbo takes the fiction of the Caribbean seriously and helps integrate its study into a wider American problematic. This is a powerfully argued book written in a limpid style. It marks its terrain with great assurance and conducts its textual analyses with a fine attention to detail. Writing in Limbo is the best book on its topic and a significant advance in the criticism of Caribbean literature.
-- Peter Hulme * NWIG: New West Indian GuiISBN: 9780801425752
Dimensions: 229mm x 152mm x 25mm
Weight: 907g
276 pages