Lives of the Novel
Subtitle: A History
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Published: 2013
Language: eng
Number of pages: 360
ISBN-13: 9780691121895
Subjects: Fiction, general
Description: This is a boldly original history of the novel from ancient Greece to the vibrant world of contemporary fiction. Thomas Pavel argues that the driving force behind the novel's evolution has been a rivalry between stories that idealize human behavior and those that ridicule and condemn it. Impelled by this conflict, the novel moved from depicting strong souls to sensitive hearts and, finally, to enigmatic psyches. Pavel makes his case by analyzing more than a hundred novels from Europe, North and South America, Asia, and beyond. The result is a wide-ranging survey of the novel and a provocative reinterpretation of its development. -- Publisher website.