Deep surfaces
Subtitle: mass culture & history in postmodern American fiction
By: Philip E. Simmons.
Publisher: University of Georgia Press
Published: 1997
Place of publication: Athens
Language: eng
Number of pages: 236
Subjects: American fiction -- 20th century -- History and criticism; Postmodernism (Literature) -- United States; Mass media and literature -- United States -- History -- 20th century; Literature and history -- United States -- History -- 20th century; Popular culture -- United States -- History -- 20th century; Collective behavior in literature; Popular culture in literature; History in literature
Description: Deep Surfaces explores the relations between mass culture - especially as reflected in and perpetuated by film, television, and advertising - and historical thinking in the work of such contemporary American novelists as Thomas Pynchon, Don DeLillo, E. L. Doctorow, Ishmael Reed, Bobbie Ann Mason, and Nicholson Baker. By considering mass culture from a postmodern theoretical perspective, Philip E.

Simmons places his readings of fiction within a larger argument about how mass culture is shaping postmodern conditions of knowledge. In particular, Simmons shows how mass culture is related to the ways we construct and perceive history, and how certain developments in fiction mark the novel's participation in a larger mass culture.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [217]-227) and index.