Literature as Communication

The foundations of mediating criticism

Roger D. Sell | Åbo Akademi University

Hardbound – Available

ISBN 9789027250964 (Eur) | EUR 120.00

ISBN 9781556198380 (USA) | USD 180.00

Paperback – Available

ISBN 9789027250971 (Eur) | EUR 44.00

ISBN 9781556198397 (USA) | USD 66.00

e-Book –

ISBN 9789027298966 | EUR 120.00/44.00*
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This book offers foundations for a literary criticism which seeks to mediate between writers and readers belonging to different historical periods or social groupings. This makes it, among other things, a timely intervention in the postmodern “culture wars”, though the theory put forward will be of interest not only to students of literature and culture, but also to linguists.
Sell describes communication in general as strongly interactive, as very much affected by the disparate situationalities of “sending” and “receiving”, yet as by no means completely determined by them. Seen this way, men and women are both social beings and individuals, capable of empathizing with sociohistorical formations which are alien to them, sometimes even to the extent of changing their own life-world. By treating literary activity as communicational in this same dynamic sense, Sell radically modifies the main paradigms of twentieth-century literary theory, casting much new light on questions of genre, interpretation, affect and ethics.

[Pragmatics & Beyond New Series, 78] 2000. xiv, 348 pp.

Publishing status:

https://doi.org/10.1075/pbns.78

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements | p. ix

1. Introduction | p. 1

2. A-Historical De-Humanization | p. 29

3. The Historically Human | p. 77

4. Literature as Communication | p. 119

5. Interactive Consequences | p. 177

6. Mediating Criticism | p. 253

Glossary | p. 281

Name Index | p. 333

Subject Index | p. 341

“Both Literature as Communication and Mediating Critism are books which should be read by every scholar concerned with literary theory and linguistic criticism, and by every linguist interested in the outer reaches of pragmatics and interactional discourse analysis — or by anyone who won't choose sides between literature and language.”

José Ángel García Landa, Universidad de Zaragoza, Spain, in Language and Literature, Vol 12(3), 2003

“Especially because of the clear and concise presentation of the relevant terminology I would not hesitate to recommend this book to be included in the list of suggested books to read for final-year undergraduates.”

Charles Briffa, University of Malta, Malta, in Language and Literature, Vol 11:2, 2002

“Literature in Communication is a significant document worth using as a textbook in postgraduate departments of English. It is one of the books that should make a difference to literary practices in this decade.”

R.K. Singh, Department of Humanities & Social Scienes, Indian School of Mines in International Journal of Communications, Vol. 12, no. 1 (Jan-Jun 2002)

“Sell's books, Literature as Communication in particular, have made me think long and hard, and I have profited greatly from them. They have thus affected me and effected a change. That is, I take it, what the author wanted to achieve, and that is the true measure of his success.”

Sven-Johan Spånberg in Moderna Språk, Spring 2003

“Sell marshals an impressive amount of evidence for his communicative theory of literature. To say that the range of his reading and scholarship is wide is an understatement, and the amount of information provided does not make for easy reading. But these two books do indeed constitute a "timely intervention," to quote the blurb of Literature as Communication, in the current cultural debate. By giving a powerful boost to historical scholarship, which both New Criticism and Deconstruction to a climate of opinion less given to arid theorizing and dogmatism.”

Sven-Johan Spånberg, in Moderna Språk, Spring 2003

“Sell has painstakingly argued a brave and genuinely useful approach to literature, one both far-reaching and textually intimate. His work begs the reasonable discussion of its merits and deserves the attention of future critical theorists.”

Evan Willner, Boston University, in Essays of Criticism, Vol 52:2, 2002

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