Sexuality and the Erotic in the Fiction of Joseph ConradAwarded third place for The Adam Gillon Book Award in Conrad Studies 2009 The book presents a sustained critique of the interlinked (and contradictory) views that the fiction of Joseph Conrad is largely innocent of any interest in or concern with sexuality and the erotic, and that when Conrad does attempt to depict sexual desire or erotic excitement then this results in bad writing. Jeremy Hawthorn argues for a revision of the view that Conrad lacks understanding of and interest in sexuality. He argues that the comprehensiveness of Conrad's vision does not exclude a concern with the sexual and the erotic, and that this concern is not with the sexual and the erotic as separate spheres of human life, but as elements dialectically related to those matters public and political that have always been recognized as central to Conrad's fictional achievement. The book will open Conrad's fiction to readings enriched by the insights of critics and theorists associated with Gender Studies and Post-colonialism. |
From inside the book
Results 6-10 of 56
... Il Conde ' have spread outside the territory of this single tale . The innocent reading of the tale is usefully exemplified in the opening words of R. L. Mégroz's 1931 account . There is the lonely , proud man of fine feeling.
... words , with the same indulgence with which we regard children . Part of our shock of outrage at the ' abominable outrage ' which befalls him is that we have been made to feel that his innocence preserved so long deserves to be ...
... word ' trick ' , Carabine suggests that the tale is written in such a manner as to ' deceive ( say ) the readers of a summer number of a magazine , but artfully designed to persuade the discriminating reader to detect another , untold ...
... word ' clue ' . Moreover that experience of retrospective recognition and comprehension that is granted by the final pages of the detective story , when certain elements that have gone before now stand out as significant , is one that ...
... word frightened is fatal . It seems as if it had been written withought " any thought at all . It takes away all sense of reality – for if you read the sentence in its place on the page You will see that the word frightened ( or indeed any ...
Contents
1 | |
17 | |
2 The exotic and the erotic in An Outcast of the Islands and Heart of Darkness | 61 |
3 The erotics of cruelty in A Smile of Fortune The Planter of Malata The Secret Agent Victory and Freya of the Seven Isles ... | 77 |
4 Voyeurism in The ShadowLine and Under Western Eyes | 131 |
Conclusion and? | 153 |
Notes | 159 |
Bibliography | 166 |
Index | 173 |