Historical Dictionary of Postmodernist Literature and Theater (Historical Dictionaries of Literature and the Arts)

Postmodernist literature embraces a wide range of forms and perspectives, including texts that are primarily self-reflexive; texts that use pastiche, burlesque, parody, intertextuality and hybrid forms to create textual realities that either run in opposition to or in parallel with an external reality; fabulations that develop both of these strategies; texts that ironize their relationship to reality; works that use the aspects already noted to more fully engage with political or cultural realities; texts that deal with history as a fiction; and texts that elude categorization even within the variety already explored. For example, in fiction, a postmodernist novel might tell a story about a writer struggling with writing (only, perhaps, to find that he is a character in a book by another writer struggling to write a book). The Historical Dictionary of Postmodernist Literature and Theater examines the different areas of postmodernist literature and the variety of forms that have been produced. This is accomplished through a list of acronyms, a chronology, an introductory essay, a bibliography, and several hundred cross-referenced dictionary entries on individual postmodernist writers, the important postmodernist aesthetic practices, significant texts produced throughout the history of postmodernist writing, and important movements and ideas that have created a variety of literary approaches within the form. By placing these concerns within the historical, philosophical, and cultural contexts of postmodernism, this reference explores the frameworks within which postmodernist literature of the late twentieth and early twenty-first century operates. 0810855984......Page 1 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data......Page 5 Contents......Page 6 Editor’s Foreword......Page 8 Preface......Page 10 Reader’s Notes......Page 12 Acronyms, Abbreviations, and Non-English Usage......Page 14 Chronology......Page 16 Introduction......Page 30 – A –......Page 42 – B –......Page 63 – C –......Page 97 – D –......Page 122 – E –......Page 142 – F –......Page 151 – G –......Page 161 – H –......Page 178 – I –......Page 193 – J –......Page 199 – K –......Page 211 – L –......Page 215 – M –......Page 232 – N –......Page 261 – O –......Page 273 – P –......Page 283 – Q –......Page 313 – R –......Page 315 – S –......Page 333 – T –......Page 364 – U –......Page 372 – V –......Page 374 – W –......Page 380 Bibliography......Page 388 About the Author......Page 446 Postmodernist literature embraces a wide range of forms and perspectives, including texts that are primarily self-reflexive; texts that use pastiche, burlesque, parody, intertextuality, and hybrid forms to create textual realities that run either in opposition to or parallel with an external reality; fabulations that develop both of these strategies; texts that ironize their relationship to reality; works that more fully engage with political or cultural realities; and texts that deal with history as fiction. For example, a postmodernist novel or play might feature a writer struggling with writing, only to later discover that he is a character in a book by another writer struggling to write Fran Mason. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 347-404).