Title: Literary trauma
Description: "This book examines portrayals of political and psychological trauma, particularly sexual trauma, in the work of seven American women writers. Concentrating on novels by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Pauline Hopkins, Gayl Jones, Leslie Marmon Silko, Dorothy Allison, Joyce Carol Oates, and Margaret Atwood, Harvitz investigates whether memories of violent and oppressive trauma can be preserved, even transformed into art, without reproducing that violence.

The book encompasses a wide range of personal and political traumas, including domestic abuse, incest, rape, imprisonment, and slavery, and argues that an analysis of sadomasochistic violence is our best protection against cyclical, intergenerational violence, a particularly timely and important subject as we think about how to stop "hate" crimes and other forms of political and psychic oppression."--BOOK JACKET.
Subjects: American Psychological fiction, American fiction, History and criticism, Memory in literature, Psychic trauma in literature, Psychoanalysis and literature, Sadism in literature, Sex crimes in literature, Violence in literature, Women and literature, Women authors, American fiction, women authors, American fiction, history and criticism, Sex in literature, LITERARY CRITICISM, American, General, American Literature, English, Languages & Literatures
Places: United States