The poetics of protest : literary form and political implication in the victim-of-society novel

The Resource The poetics of protest : literary form and political implication in the victim-of-society novel
Label
The poetics of protest : literary form and political implication in the victim-of-society novel
Title remainder
literary form and political implication in the victim-of-society novel
Statement of responsibility
George Goodin
Creator
Subject
Genre
Language
eng
Summary
Goodin takes a formalistic approach to political expression in the victim-of-society novel, asking the question, how do the formal features of the novel constrain thematic expression? He notes that the writer must balance the protagonist's role as victim against the role as resilient human being capable of dealing with his or her problems. If the protagonist is too strong, both help and reform become unnecessary; if too weak, the situation becomes hopeless, thus limiting the power and appeal of the work as art and as political protest. Goodin offers a schema of different types of victims: the innocent, the virtuous, the flawed, and the pseudo, examining twenty different novels. He concludes by examining the options the writers have with respect to the character and fate of their protagonists. Hewing to a rather old-fashioned insistence on the interaction between the text and society, Goodin suggests that even though imperfect, these novels probably have decreased the amount of injustice in the real world
Action
digitized
Cataloging source
N$T
Dewey number
809.3/93520694
Index
index present
LC call number
PN3448.P6
LC item number
G66 1985eb
Literary form
non fiction
Nature of contents
  • dictionaries
  • bibliography

Context

Context of The poetics of protest : literary form and political implication in the victim-of-society novel

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