{"title":"Brian Cosgrove","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eBrian Cosgrove\u003c\/strong\u003e explores the rich intersections of literature and culture with a thoughtful eye, inviting readers into nuanced examinations that often challenge conventional interpretations. His works, such as \u003cem\u003eJames Joyce's Negations\u003c\/em\u003e, delve deeply into the fabric of artistic expression, making them essential for those fascinated by modernist literature and critical theory.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eRooted firmly in \u003cem\u003eArts \u0026amp; Culture\u003c\/em\u003e, Cosgrove’s writing offers both insightful scholarship and compelling analysis. Readers can expect a collection that enriches their understanding of literary complexities and cultural dialogues through meticulous research and engaging prose.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"james-joyces-negations-by-brian-cosgrove-9781904558859","title":"James Joyce's Negations","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"book-description\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe main purpose of this book is to validate a reading of Joyce in negative terms. Central to the enquiry is an examination of the roles of irony and of indeterminacy.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIrony, interpreted in metaphysical rather than merely rhetorical terms, is envisaged as deriving from two separate if related orientations, one associated with Friedrich Schlegel, the other with Gustave Flaubert. Insofar as Joyce's work (including \u003cem\u003eUlysses\u003c\/em\u003e) owes more to the latter than the former, it forgoes the genial humour central to Schlegel's theories, and embraces instead the ironic detachment and formal control of a Flaubertian perspective. Such irony (which entails a suspicion of sentiment and a related dehumanisation of character, as in some of the stories in \u003cem\u003eDubliners\u003c\/em\u003e) becomes normative in Joyce, and along with a similarly deflationary parody pervades \u003cem\u003eUlysses\u003c\/em\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIn addition, a persistent indeterminacy is established as early as \u003cem\u003eThe Dead\u003c\/em\u003e, so that it becomes impossible in that story to adjudicate between not just contradictory but mutually exclusive interpretations. Such indeterminacy is pushed to further extremes in \u003cem\u003eUlysses\u003c\/em\u003e, with its notorious proliferation of narrative perspectives. As a corollary to the work's encyclopaedic inclusiveness and quotidian particularism, every detail tends to assume the same significance as every other; the consequence being that (in Gyorgy Lukacs' famous formulation) we lose all sense of any 'hierarchy of meaning'.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eFrom that, it is but a step to Franco Moretti's assessment that in \u003cem\u003eUlysses\u003c\/em\u003e, everyday existence remains 'inert, opaque - meaningless', and that in fact the whole point is to represent the meaningless precisely 'as meaningless'. Indeterminacy, in effect, ushers in the possibility of nihilism. The analysis of \u003cem\u003eUlysses\u003c\/em\u003e culminates with the attempt (unavailing in both cases) to discover in either Bloom or Molly a genuine source of countervailing affirmation.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe study concludes with a brief consideration of the polysemic vocabulary of \u003cem\u003eFinnegans Wake\u003c\/em\u003e as a logical extrapolation of the poetics of indeterminacy.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Unknown","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47470979645676,"sku":"9781904558859","price":123.99,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/9781904558859-james-joyce-s-negations.jpg?v=1775230715"}],"url":"https:\/\/bookhero.co.nz\/collections\/brian-cosgrove.oembed","provider":"Book Hero","version":"1.0","type":"link"}