The Ulysses Delusion [electronic resource] : Rethinking Standards of Literary Merit /
Konchar Farr, Cecilia.author.
Popular fiction follows literature professors wherever they go. At coffee shops or out for drinks, after faculty meetings or classes, even at family reunions - they are persistently pressed to talk about bestselling novels. Questions immediately follow: What do I mean when I say a book is "good"? Why do contemporary novels like these, conversations like these, matter to professors of literature? Shouldn't they be spending their time re-reading The Great Gatsby? The Ulysses Delusion confronts these questions and answers their call for more engaged conversations about books. Through topics like the Oprah's Book Club, Harry Potter, and Chick Lit, Cecilia Konchar Farr explores the lively, democratic, and gendered history of novels in the US as a context for understanding how avid readers and literary professionals have come to assess them so differently.
Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Popular fiction follows literature professors wherever they go. At coffee shops or out for drinks, after faculty meetings or classes, even at family reunions - they are persistently pressed to talk about bestselling novels. Questions immediately follow: What do I mean when I say a book is "good"? Why do contemporary novels like these, conversations like these, matter to professors of literature? Shouldn't they be spending their time re-reading The Great Gatsby? The Ulysses Delusion confronts these questions and answers their call for more engaged conversations about books. Through topics like the Oprah's Book Club, Harry Potter, and Chick Lit, Cecilia Konchar Farr explores the lively, democratic, and gendered history of novels in the US as a context for understanding how avid readers and literary professionals have come to assess them so differently.
Machine generated contents note: -- Preface: Ransoming a Reading Nation -- PART I: THE CRIME -- 1. Come and Get it -- 2. Bring Money -- PART II: INVESTIGATIONS -- 3. Reading Lolita at St. Kate's -- 4. Oprah's Book Club and the Summer of Faulkner -- 5. Lost in a Chick Lit Austenland -- 6. What I learned from The (Book) Group -- 7. Storytelling with Jodi Picoult -- 8. Re-Reading Rand -- 9. Writing Wizardry -- PART III: THE DEAL -- 10. Redefining Excellence.
Literature-Philosophy.
Sociology.
Literature.
Culture-Study and teaching.
Fiction.
Literature-History and criticism.
Literary Theory.
Gender Studies.
Literature, general.
Cultural Theory.
Fiction.
Literary History.