A different earth
Subtitle: literary space in Mary Shelley's novels
By: Rebekka Rohleder
Series: Britannica et Americana -- 34; Britannica et Americana -- 34.
Publisher: Universitätsverlag C. Winter
Published: 2019
Place of publication: Heidelberg
Language: eng
Number of pages: 284
ISBN-13: 9783825369835
Subjects: Criticism and interpretation; Geography in literature; Society in literature; Space and time in literature
Description: Inspired by the spatial turn, this book takes a fresh look at three of Mary Shelley's novels: Frankenstein, The Last Man, and Lodore. It examines the literary and social spaces constructed in these three novels. The novels complement each other in the way in which the interaction between text and space is played through in each of them. In all three, however, space emerges as a socially and politically powerful construct, and the literary text itself is seen to play an important role in its construction. The three novels also implicitly reflect on their own role in this process. In this way, Shelley makes the naturalising logic of the spatial imagination visible, and challenges this logic in the process. Thus, the focus on literary space opens up an interesting perspective from which Shelley's political and aesthetic concerns can be re-examined.