Enacting history in Henry James : narrative, power, and ethics

Resource Information

The work Enacting history in Henry James : narrative, power, and ethics represents a distinct intellectual or artistic creation found in University of Liverpool. This resource is a combination of several types including: Work, Language Material, Books.

Label

Enacting history in Henry James : narrative, power, and ethics

Title remainder

narrative, power, and ethics

Statement of responsibility

Edited by Gert Buelens

Contributor

• Buelens, Gert

Subject

• Ethics in literature
• Fiction -- Technique
• James, Henry, 1843-1916 -- Knowledge | History
• James, Henry, 1843-1916 -- Technique
• Literature and history -- United States -- History
• Narration (Rhetoric) -- History -- 19th century
• Narration (Rhetoric) -- History -- 20th century
• Power (Social sciences) in literature
• Reader-response criticism

Language

eng

Summary

The Jamesian mode of writing, it has been claimed, actively works against an understanding of the way truth, history and power circulate in his texts. In this collection of essays, leading scholars of James analyse the strategies James used to address these crucial issues. Enacting History in Henry James claims that, because the type of knowledge available in James's fiction is never of a cognitive kind, the reader can never know 'truth' in any verifiable sense. James's writing instead promises an experiential type of knowledge, one that is attained by participating in the power games and moral dramas that unfold within the text. This collection argues that reading James ultimately requires not just an emotional responsiveness, but also an ethical assumption of responsibility for the act of reading. By placing James's work in a fresh theoretical context, this book throws fresh light on this most enigmatic of writers

Cataloging source

UkCbUP

Index

index present

Literary form

non fiction

Nature of contents

dictionaries