From «Moby-Dick» to «Finnegans Wake»: Essays in Close Reading- Edited by Janusz Semrau (Warsaw Studies in English Language and Literature)

This volume is a posthumous revised edition of selected papers by Andrzej Kopcewicz on classic works of American and Irish fiction, published originally between 1979 and 2005. The book opens with two introductory sketches: a semi-theoretical one on intertextuality and a semi-historical one on the interaction of high and low literary forms. The gist of the book are textual analyses of the intricacies and reciprocities of some of the best-known works by Herman Melville, Frank R. Stockton, Henry Adams, Thomas Pynchon, Gilbert Sorrentino, Donald Barthelme, Paul Auster, Flann O'Brien, and James Joyce. While the essays lend themselves to being read in any order, as well as in isolation, the underlying Peircean-Joycean premise of the book is a semiotic-mythical commodius vicus of palimpsestic recirculation. Informed by a combination of poetic sensibility and disciplined as well as erudite mind, the ten essays collected here demonstrate that the agenda and methods of the more traditional close reading and the more contemporary intertextuality are not exclusive of each other. Some Remarks On Intertextuality -- Some Remarks On The Interaction Of High And Low Literary Forms -- The Whale And The Rocket : Herman Melville's Moby-dick And Thomas Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow -- Elements Of Puritanism In Thomas Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow -- The Machine In Henry Adams, Frank R. Stockton, And Thomas Pynchon -- Auster, Emerson, Borges, Burton, And Melville's Scrivener -- Donald Barthelme's Snow White And James Joyce's Finnegans Wake -- Finnegans Wake And Donald Barthelme's The Dead Father -- Finnegans Wake And Flann O'brien's At Swim-two-birds -- Finnegans Wake In Flann O'brien's At Swim-two-birds And In Gilbert Sorrentino's Mulligan Stew. Andrzej Kopcewicz ; Edited By Janusz Semrau. This Volume Is A Posthumous Revised Edition Of Selected Papers By Andrzej Kopcewicz On A Number Of Diverse Nineteenth- And Twentieth-century Works Of American And Irish Fiction--editor's Preface. Includes Bibliographical References And Index. Contents 6 Editor’s preface 8 Some remarks on intertextuality 12 Some remarks on the interaction of high and low literary forms 26 The whale and the rocket: Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick and Thomas Pynchon’s Gravity’s rainbow 36 Elements of Puritanism in Thomas Pynchon’s Gravity’s rainbow 44 The machine in Henry Adams, Frank R. Stockton, and Thomas Pynchon 58 Auster, Emerson, Borges, Burton, and Melville’s Scrivener 84 Donald Barthelme’s Snow White and James Joyce’s Finnegans wake 100 Finnegans wake and Donald Barthelme’s The Dead Father 116 Finnegans wake and Flann O’Brien’s At Swim-Two-Birds 150 Finnegans wake in Flann O’Brien’s At Swim-Two-Birds and in Gilbert Sorrentino’s Mulligan stew 178 Index of names 238