Modernist Crisis and the Pedagogy of Form

Matthew Cheney is Assistant Professor and Director of Interdisciplinary Studies at Plymouth State University, USA. He is the author of a book of fiction, Blood: Stories (2016).

Modernist Crisis and the Pedagogy of Form is a timely book in a time of crisis. With his astute and eloquent analyses of three major authors-the British Virginia Woolf, enshrined in the literary canon; the South African-born J. M. Coetzee, a Nobel Prize winner; and the American Samuel R. Delany, inducted into the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame-Matthew Cheney argues on behalf of the relevance of literature and the humanities in our own era. Woolf, Coetzee, and Delany wrote 'as Rome was burning,' and Cheney shows that they were not fiddling but rather, in their challenging of the boundaries between fiction and nonfiction, crafting new ways of learning, thinking, and teaching.

• AcknowledgmentsNote on Punctuation and Editions CitedAbbreviations1. Introduction2. Here and Now: The Years3. Into Crisis: "The Tale of Plagues and Carnivals"4. Improper Arts: The Mad Man5. Away from Crisis: Elizabeth Costello, Diary of a Bad Year, Summertime6. ConclusionReferencesIndex