How Literary Worlds Are Shaped: A Comparative Poetics of Literary Imagination (Narratologia) (Narratologia, 54)

Literary studies still lack an extensive comparative analysis of different kinds of literature, including ancient and non-Western. __How Literary Worlds Are Shaped. A Comparative Poetics of Literary Imagination__ aims to provide such a study. Literature, it claims, is based on individual and shared human imagination, which creates literary worlds that blend the real and the fantastic, mimesis and genre, often modulated by different kinds of unreliability. The main building blocks of literary worlds are their oral, visual and written modes and three themes: challenge, perception and relation. They are blended and inflected in different ways by combinations of narratives and figures, indirection, thwarted aspirations, meta-usages, hypothetical action as well as hierarchies and blends of genres and text types. Moreover, literary worlds are not only constructed by humans but also shape their lives and reinforce their sense of wonder. Finally, ten reasons are given in order to show how this comparative view can be of use in literary studies. In sum, __How Literary Worlds Are Shaped__ is the first study to present a wide-ranging and detailed comparative account of the makings of literary worlds.

Literary studies still lack an extensive comparative analysis of different kinds of literature, including ancient and non-Western. How Literary Worlds Are Shaped. A Comparative Poetics of Literary Imagination aims to provide such a study. Literature, it claims, is based on individual and shared human imagination, which creates literary worlds that blend the real and the fantastic, mimesis and genre, often modulated by different kinds of unreliability. The main building blocks of literary worlds are their oral, visual and written modes and three themes: challenge, perception and relation. They are blended and inflected in different ways by combinations of narratives and figures, indirection, thwarted aspirations, meta-usages, hypothetical action as well as hierarchies and blends of genres and text types. Moreover, literary worlds are not only constructed by humans but also shape their lives and reinforce their sense of wonder. Finally, ten reasons are given in order to show how this comparative view can be of use in literary studies. In sum, How Literary Worlds Are Shaped is the first study to present a wide-ranging and detailed comparative account of the makings of literary worlds.

Die Reihe Narratologia publiziert innovative Monographien und Sammelbände zur modernen Erzähltheorie und zu ihrer fachgeschichtlichen Rekonstruktion aus allen philologischen Disziplinen. Sie stellt das erste narratologische Forum dieser Art in Deutschland dar. Neben literarischen Texten stehen u. a. auch das Alltagserzählen, Wort-Bild-Texte, Erzählen im Film und in den neuen Medien sowie das Erzählen in Historiographie, Ethnologie, Medizin und Rechtswissenschaft im Fokus der Reihe.

Die Publikationssprachen der Reihe sind Deutsch und Englisch. Alle Bände werden zweifach begutachtet.

How Literary Worlds Are Shaped Studies A Wide Variety Of Literature Across Cultures And Ages. The Main Aim Is To Show That Literature All Over The World Has For Millennia Employed An Array Of Related Themes And Techniques. By Its Broad Scope And Detailed Analysis, This Volume Offers The First Extensive Comparative Account Of The Makings Of Literary Worlds.