Richard Bradford - Böcker

Crime fiction has been one of the most popular genres since the 19th century, but has roots in works as varied as Sophocles, Herodotus, and Shakespeare. In this Very Short Introduction Richard Bradford explores the history of the genre, by considering the various definitions of 'crime fiction' and looking at how it has developed over time. Discussing the popularity of crime fiction worldwide and its various styles; the role that gender plays within the genre; spy fiction, and legal dramas and thrillers; he explores how the crime novel was shaped by the work of British and American authors in the 18th and 19th centuries. Highlighting the works of notorious authors such as Edgar Allan Poe, Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie, and Raymond Chandler -- to name but a few -- he considers the role of the crime novel in modern popular culture and asks whether we can, and whether we should, consider crime fiction serious 'literature'. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.

Contemporary Publishing and the Culture of Books is a comprehensive resource that builds bridges between the traditional focus and methodologies of literary studies and the actualities of modern and contemporary literature, including the realities of professional writing, the conventions and practicalities of the publishing world, and its connections between literary publishing and other media. Focusing on the relationship between modern literature and the publishing industry, the volume enables students and academics to extend the text-based framework of modules on contemporary writing into detailed expositions of the culture and industry which bring these texts into existence; it brings economic considerations into line alongside creative issues, and examines how employing marketing strategies are utilized to promote and sell books.Sections cover: The standard university-course specifications of contemporary writing, offering an extensive picture of the social, economic, and cultural contexts of these literary genres The impact and status of non-literary writing, and how this compares with certain literary genres as an index to contemporary culture and a reflection of the state of the publishing industry The practicalities and conventions of the publishing industry Contextual aspects of literary culture and the book industry, visiting the broader spheres of publishing, promotion, bookselling, and literary culture Carefully linked chapters allow readers to tie key elements of the publishing industry to the particular demands and features of contemporary literary genres and writing, offering a detailed guide to the ways in which the three core areas of culture, economics, and pragmatics intersect in the world of publishing.Further to being a valuable resource for those studying English or Creative Writing, the volume is a key text for degrees in which Publishing is a component, and is relevant to those aspects of Media Studies that look at interactions between the media and literature/publishing.

This introductory book takes the reader through literary history from the Renaissance to Postmodernism, and considers individual texts as paradigms which can both reflect and unsettle their broader linguistic and cultural contexts. Richard Bradford provides detailed readings of individual texts which emphasize their relation to literary history and broader socio-cultural contexts, and which take into account developments in structuralism and postmodernism. Texts include poems by Donne, Herbert, Marvell, Milton, Pope, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Blake, Keats, Hopkins, Browning, Pound, Eliot, Carlos Williams, Auden, Larkin and Geoffrey Hill.

This introductory book takes the reader through literary history from the Renaissance to Postmodernism, and considers individual texts as paradigms which can both reflect and unsettle their broader linguistic and cultural contexts. Richard Bradford provides detailed readings of individual texts which emphasize their relation to literary history and broader socio-cultural contexts, and which take into account developments in structuralism and postmodernism. Texts include poems by Donne, Herbert, Marvell, Milton, Pope, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Blake, Keats, Hopkins, Browning, Pound, Eliot, Carlos Williams, Auden, Larkin and Geoffrey Hill.

Written by teachers who are also at the forefront of the development of critical theory, The State of Theory offers a diversity of perspectives, both practical and theoretical, on the current state of literary studies in education.

In Roman Jakobson Richard Bradford reasserts the value of Jakobson's work, arguing that he has a great deal to offer contemporary critical theory and providing a critical appraisal the sweep of Jakobson's career.Bradford re-establishes Jakobson's work as vital to our understanding of the relationship between language and poetry. By exploring Jakobson's thesis that poetry is the primary object language, Roman Jakobson: Life, Language, Art offers a new reading of his work which includes the most radical elements of modernism. This book will be invaluable to students of Jakobson and to anyone interested in the development of critical theory, linguistics and stylistics.

In Roman Jakobson Richard Bradford reasserts the value of Jakobson's work, arguing that he has a great deal to offer contemporary critical theory and providing a critical appraisal the sweep of Jakobson's career.Bradford re-establishes Jakobson's work as vital to our understanding of the relationship between language and poetry. By exploring Jakobson's thesis that poetry is the primary object language, Roman Jakobson: Life, Language, Art offers a new reading of his work which includes the most radical elements of modernism. This book will be invaluable to students of Jakobson and to anyone interested in the development of critical theory, linguistics and stylistics.

Richard Bradford provides a definitive introductory guide to modern critical ideas on literary style and stylistics. It will provide students with a basic grasp of stylistics and literary analysis.This comprehensive and accessible guidebook for undergraduates examines:* the terminology of literary form* how literary style has evolved since the sixteenth century* the role of stylistics in twentieth century criticism* the discipline of stylistics from classical rhetoric to post-structuralism* the relationship between literary style and its historical context* style and gender* examples of poems, plays and novels from Shakespeare to the present day.

Richard Bradford provides a definitive introductory guide to modern critical ideas on literary style and stylistics. It will provide students with a basic grasp of stylistics and literary analysis.This comprehensive and accessible guidebook for undergraduates examines:* the terminology of literary form* how literary style has evolved since the sixteenth century* the role of stylistics in twentieth century criticism* the discipline of stylistics from classical rhetoric to post-structuralism* the relationship between literary style and its historical context* style and gender* examples of poems, plays and novels from Shakespeare to the present day.

There is a crying need for an accessible, comprehensive guide to John Milton for the thousands of students who make their way through his poetry every year on literary survey and seventeenth century literature courses. Where many previous guides have dragged their way through Paradise Lost, Richard Bradford brings Milton to life with an overview of his life, contexts, work and the relationship between these, and of the main critical issues surrounding his work.

There is a crying need for an accessible, comprehensive guide to John Milton for the thousands of students who make their way through his poetry every year on literary survey and seventeenth century literature courses. Where many previous guides have dragged their way through Paradise Lost, Richard Bradford brings Milton to life with an overview of his life, contexts, work and the relationship between these, and of the main critical issues surrounding his work.

Contemporary Publishing and the Culture of Books is a comprehensive resource that builds bridges between the traditional focus and methodologies of literary studies and the actualities of modern and contemporary literature, including the realities of professional writing, the conventions and practicalities of the publishing world, and its connections between literary publishing and other media. Focusing on the relationship between modern literature and the publishing industry, the volume enables students and academics to extend the text-based framework of modules on contemporary writing into detailed expositions of the culture and industry which bring these texts into existence; it brings economic considerations into line alongside creative issues, and examines how employing marketing strategies are utilized to promote and sell books.Sections cover: The standard university-course specifications of contemporary writing, offering an extensive picture of the social, economic, and cultural contexts of these literary genres The impact and status of non-literary writing, and how this compares with certain literary genres as an index to contemporary culture and a reflection of the state of the publishing industry The practicalities and conventions of the publishing industry Contextual aspects of literary culture and the book industry, visiting the broader spheres of publishing, promotion, bookselling, and literary culture Carefully linked chapters allow readers to tie key elements of the publishing industry to the particular demands and features of contemporary literary genres and writing, offering a detailed guide to the ways in which the three core areas of culture, economics, and pragmatics intersect in the world of publishing.Further to being a valuable resource for those studying English or Creative Writing, the volume is a key text for degrees in which Publishing is a component, and is relevant to those aspects of Media Studies that look at interactions between the media and literature/publishing.

Since the 1950’s Amis has been one of the most popular novelists in Britain. From Lucky Jim (1954) to The Biographer’s Moustache (1995) his novels have mixed realism, fantasy, black comedy and satire. His public image has been equally varied: angry young man, left wing liberal, club-land Tory, shameless misogynist. This book shows us the real Amis. He offers us versions of ourselves but he does not instruct or explain. His technical craftsmanship rivals that of the modernists but he remains accessible to the ordinary reader. Amis’s novels remind us that fiction can be as engaging and immediate as television and film, but also that the medium of language is more effective than either of these in its ability to consume our anxieties, doubts and pleasures.

A ground-breaking and intensely revealing examination of the life of the 20th century's most iconic writer.Ernest Hemingway was an involuntary chameleon, who would shift seamlessly from a self-cultivated image of hero, aesthetic radical, and existential non-conformist to a figure made up at various points of selfishness, hypocrisy, self-delusion, narcissism and arbitrary vindictiveness. Richard Bradford shows that Hemingway’s work is by parts erratic and unique because it was tied into these unpredictable, bizarre features of his personality. Impressionism and subjectivity always play some part in the making of literary works. Some authors try to subdue them while others treat them as the essentials of creativity but they endure as a ubiquitous element of all literature. They are the writer’s private signature, their authorial fingerprint.In this new biography, which includes previously unpublished letters from the Hemingway archives, Richard Bradford reveals how Hemingway all but erased his own existence through a lifetime of invention and delusion, and provides the reader with a completely new understanding of the Hemingway oeuvre.

Is Shakespeare any Good? reveals why certain literary works and authors are treated as superior to others, and questions the literary establishment’s criteria for creating an imperium of “great” writers. Enables readers to articulate and formulate their own arguments about the quality of literature – including works that convention forbids us to dislikeDismantles the claims of academic criticism – particularly Theory – to tell us anything useful about why we like or appreciate literatureChallenges and shatters many longstanding beliefs about literature and its evaluationPoses serious questions about the value of literature, and studying literature, and presents these in a lively and entertainingly provocative manner

An authoritative review of literary biography covering the seventeenth century to the twentieth centuryA Companion to Literary Biography offers a comprehensive account of literary biography spanning the history of the genre across three centuries. The editor – an esteemed literary biographer and noted expert in the field – has encouraged contributors to explore the theoretical and methodological questions raised by the writing of biographies of writers. The text examines how biographers have dealt with the lives of classic authors from Chaucer to contemporary figures such as Kingsley Amis.The Companion brings a new perspective on how literary biography enables the reader to deal with the relationship between the writer and their work. Literary biography is the most popular form of writing about writing, yet it has been largely neglected in the academic community. This volume bridges the gap between literary biography as a popular genre and its relevance for the academic study of literature. This important work: Allows the author of a biography to be treated as part of the process of interpretation and investigates biographical reading as an important aspect of criticismExamines the birth of literary biography at the close of the seventeenth century and considers its expansion through the eighteenth, nineteenth and twentieth centuriesAddresses the status and writing of literary biography from numerous perspectives and with regard to various sources, methodologies and theoriesReviews the ways in which literary biography has played a role in our perception of writers in the mainstream of the English canon from Chaucer to the present dayWritten for students at the undergraduate level, through postgraduate and doctoral levels, as well as academics, A Companion to Literary Biography illustrates and accounts for the importance of the literary biography as a vital element of criticism and as an index to our perception of literary history.

THE WILEY BLACKWELL COMPANION TO CONTEMPORARY BRITISH AND IRISH LITERATUREAn insightful guide to the exploration of modern British and Irish literatureThe Wiley Blackwell Companion to Contemporary British and Irish Literature is a must-have guide for anyone hoping to navigate the world of new British and Irish writing. Including modern authors and poets from the 1960s through to the 21st century, the Companion provides a thorough overview of contemporary poetry, fiction, and drama by some of the most prominent and noteworthy writers. Seventy-three comprehensive chapters focus on individual authors as well as such topics as Englishness and identity, contemporary Science Fiction, Black writing in Britain, crime fiction, and the influence of globalization on British and Irish Literature.Written in four parts, The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Contemporary British and Irish Literature includes comprehensive examinations of individual authors, as well as a variety of themes that have come to define the contemporary period: ethnicity, gender, nationality, and more.A thorough guide to the main figures and concepts in contemporary literature from Britain and Ireland, this two-volume set: Includes studies of notable figures such as Seamus Heaney and Angela Carter, as well as more recently influential writers such as Zadie Smith and Sarah Waters.Covers topics such as LGBT fiction, androgyny in contemporary British Literature, and post-Troubles Northern Irish FictionFeatures a broad range of writers and topics covered by distinguished academicsIncludes an analysis of the interplay between individual authors and the major themes of the day, and whether an examination of the latter enables us to appreciate the former.The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Contemporary British and Irish Literature provides essential reading for students as well as academics seeking to learn more about the history and future direction of contemporary British and Irish Literature.

The first critical survey of its kind devoted solely to literary evaluation Companion to Literary Evaluation bridges the gap between the non-academic literary world, where evaluation is deeply ingrained, and the world of academia, where evaluation is rarely considered. Encouraging readers to formulate and articulate arguments that balance instinctive judgment and reasoned assessment, this unique volume addresses key issues regarding literary values from the perspective of analytical aesthetics and the philosophy of literature. Bringing together a diverse panel of contributors, the Companion explores competing theories of literary evaluation, the reasons for evaluating theater and lyric poetry in performance, the question of value in literary theory, debates over Modernism's negative impact on literature, the possibility of evaluating aesthetic beauty through scientific and formalist methods, the nature and status of literary evaluation as a branch of criticism, aesthetics in applied and community theater, evaluation outside academia, the perils of extreme relativism and subjectivism in literary evaluation, evaluation in schools and much more. Contributors question and reassess the reputations of authors across the canon, from Shakespeare and James Shirley to T S Eliot, Kathleen Raine, Virginia Woolf, Joyce and Beckett amongst others. The Companion: Illustrates how seemingly divergent perspectives on the artistic qualities and value of literature can sometimes overlapCovers the standard range of literary genres, while including others such as unfinished novels, freelance journalism, and lyric poetry in performanceOffers methodologies that demonstrate why literature can be treated as something different from other forms of language and therefore assessed as artExplores the importance of maintaining clarity and specificity in the evaluation of literary worksCompanion to Literary Evaluation is a must-read for undergraduates, research students, lecturers, and academics in search of fresh perspectives on standard literary critical issues.

THE LIFE OF THE AUTHOR An expansive biography of John Milton, including an assessment of his poetry and prose and an account of the ways in which he has been presented over the past three and a half centuries—written by a leading scholar in the fieldIt is hard to overstate the role that John Milton played in the historical, political and literary controversies of seventeenth century England; his writings and very life challenged the status quo. Living through one of the most tumultuous periods in British history, Milton was involved at every turn. Struggling to reconcile his private beliefs with his involvement with a radical political experiment, a republic which involved the killing of the monarch, his star rose and fell several times during his life. Married three times, struck blind at a cruelly early age, he was a famed pamphleteer and political activist whose revolutionary political credos placed him in mortal danger after the Restoration. Milton’s varied life makes for fascinating reading but it also produced some of the most important poetry in the English language. Paradise Lost, the only poem in English recognized as an epic, challenged conventional thinking on widespread topics from religion and gender equality to the fundamental question of why we behave as we do.This fascinating new biography is divided into two parts. The first separates the man from the myth, and elucidates the complicated details of Milton’s life from his early years as a literary artist uncertain of his destiny, through his work as a propagandist for the Cromwellian republic, to his rewriting of the Old Testament story of the Fall as a poetic allegory of more recent history. The second looks at how biographers and critics from the seventeenth century to the present day have distorted and manipulated the personality of Milton to suit their biases. Balancing accessibility with academic rigor, this volume:Examines the significant aspects of Milton’s life and work, including his poetry and prose, his government writings, his travels, and his final yearsExplores Milton’s Protestant and republican influences in Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained, and his other literary worksHighlights the differences and similarities between Milton’s poetry and political proseFollows the history of biographical and critical presentations of Milton from the seventeenth century onwards, including his adoption as a hero of Romanticism and his survival in the twentieth century as, allegedly, a sceptical humanistAddresses modern critiques of Milton in Marxism, Feminism, and other branches of TheoryThe Life of the Author: John Milton. Poet and Revolutionary is essential reading for undergraduate and graduate students, university lecturers, and academic researchers in relevant fields, particularly seventeenth century poetry and history, as well as literary biography and the history of criticism.

Richard Bradford's new introduction to poetry begins with and answers the slippery question, 'what is poetry?'. The book provides a compact history of English poetry from the 16th century to the present day and surveys the major critical and theoretical approaches to verse. It tackles the important issues of gender, race and nationality and concludes with a lengthy account of how to recognise good poetry. This engaging and readable book is accessible to all readers, from those who simply enjoy poetry through university first years to graduate students. Poetry: The Ultimate Guide provides the technical and critical tools you need to approach and evaluate poetry, and to articulate your own views.

Richard Bradford's new introduction to poetry begins with and answers the slippery question, 'what is poetry?'. The book provides a compact history of English poetry from the 16th century to the present day and surveys the major critical and theoretical approaches to verse. It tackles the important issues of gender, race and nationality and concludes with a lengthy account of how to recognise good poetry. This engaging and readable book is accessible to all readers, from those who simply enjoy poetry through university first years to graduate students. Poetry: The Ultimate Guide provides the technical and critical tools you need to approach and evaluate poetry, and to articulate your own views.

The Novel Now is an intelligent and engaging survey of contemporary British fiction. Discusses familiar names such as Martin Amis, Ian McEwan, Salman Rushdie, and Angela Carter and compares them with more recent authors, including David Mitchell, Ali Smith, A.L. Kennedy, Matt Thorne, Nicola Barker, and Toby Litt Incorporates original coverage of subgenres such as chick lit, lad lit, gay fiction, crime fiction, and the historical novel Discusses the ways in which notions of regional identity and tribalist views have surfaced in UK and Irish fiction, and how post-Imperial sensibility has become a feature of the ‘British’ novel Situates contemporary fiction within its socio-cultural and literary contexts.

The Novel Now is an intelligent and engaging survey of contemporary British fiction. Discusses familiar names such as Martin Amis, Ian McEwan, Salman Rushdie, and Angela Carter and compares them with more recent authors, including David Mitchell, Ali Smith, A.L. Kennedy, Matt Thorne, Nicola Barker, and Toby Litt Incorporates original coverage of subgenres such as chick lit, lad lit, gay fiction, crime fiction, and the historical novel Discusses the ways in which notions of regional identity and tribalist views have surfaced in UK and Irish fiction, and how post-Imperial sensibility has become a feature of the ‘British’ novel Situates contemporary fiction within its socio-cultural and literary contexts.

Concrete', 'pattern' or 'shaped' poems are well documented as experimental curiosities. While giving some attention to this sub-genre the book shifts the focus to the ways in which visual form manifests itself in traditional verse, examining poems by Milton, Wordsworth, Eliot, Olson, T.E. Hulme, Auden, Williams, Larkin and Charles Tomlinson. It examines how the tactile presence of the poem on the page transcends the routine distinctions between genre and historical context, emerging as a significant but largely unexamined contribution to modernist poetics. The interpretative methodology is radical, adapting Wollheim's twofold thesis grounded in the aesthetics of visual art to the author's own concept of the double pattern Graphic Poetics challenges the accepted protocols of reading and interpreting verse and considers how poetry is involved in a dialogue with such theoreticians as Derrida. Introducing a new perspective on how poems work and on how they generate effects, it shows how poets use devices previously unrecognised and unacknowledged, techniques which are more commonly associated with visual arts than with literature.

'Concrete', 'pattern' or 'shaped' poems are well documented as experimental curiosities. While giving some attention to this sub-genre the book shifts the focus to the ways in which visual form manifests itself in 'traditional' verse, examining poems by Milton, Wordsworth, Eliot, Olson, T.E. Hulme, Auden, Williams, Larkin and Charles Tomlinson. It examines how the tactile presence of the poem on the page transcends the routine distinctions between genre and historical context, emerging as a significant but largely unexamined contribution to modernist poetics. The interpretative methodology is radical, adapting Wollheim's 'twofold thesis' - grounded in the aesthetics of visual art - to the author's own concept of the 'double pattern'.Graphic Poetics challenges the accepted protocols of reading and interpreting verse and considers how poetry is involved in a dialogue with such theoreticians as Derrida. Introducing a new perspective on how poems work and on how they generate effects, it shows how poets use devices previously unrecognised and unacknowledged, techniques which are more commonly associated with visual arts than with literature.

A variously tragic tale of escapism and assimilation, Richard Bradford's The Durrells explores the truth behind the image. The Durrells are probably the most celebrated literary family of the 20th century. Gerald turned them into celebrities with his tripartite memoir, beginning with My Family and Other Animals (1956) which told of his experiences with his widowed mother Louisa and three siblings during their time in 1930s Corfu. We know of the Durrells from their own writings and from the image of them created by TV, film and biographical accounts of specific figures. What we do not know is the truth. Using previously unpublished material from the Jersey Archive, Richard Bradford unravels the lives of the famous four children of the Corfu era – Larry, Gerry, Margo and Lesli – as they find themselves geographically and emotionally divided amongst a backdrop of imperial decline and unrest. The children of moneyed colonialists, they were already used to being treated with aghast fascination by the island’s locals, and by expatriate Britons as a disgrace to the homeland. Yet their story goes beyond the Ionian Sea, and The Durrells delves into the complex social and political circumstances in which the family lived, with seemingly constant threats of war and endangerment to both themselves and their natural environment.

The first biography to examine Mailer's life as a twisted lens, offering a unique insight into the history of America from the end of World War II to the election of Barack Obama.Twice winner of the Pulitzer Prize, firstly in 1969 for The Armies of the Night and again in 1980 for The Executioner's Song, Norman Mailer’s life comes as close as is possible to being the Great American Novel: beyond reason, inexplicable, wonderfully grotesque and addictive.The Naked and the Dead was acclaimed not so much for its intrinsic qualities but rather because it launched a brutally realistic sub-genre of military fiction – Catch 22 and MASH would not exist without it. Richard Bradford combs through Mailer’s personal letters – to lovers and editors – which appear to be a rehearsal for his career as a shifty literary narcissist, and which shape the characters of one of the most widely celebrated World War II novels.Bradford strikes again with a merciless biography in which diary entries, journal extracts and newspaper columns set the tone of this study of a controversial figure. From friendships with contemporaries such as James Baldwin, failed correspondences with Hemingway and the Kennedys, to terrible – but justified – criticism of his work by William Faulkner and Eleanor Roosevelt, this book gives a unique, snappy and convincing perspective of Mailer’s ferocious personality and writings.