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Overview
Through a broad-ranging survey of the allegory, utopia, the historical novel and the epic in post-colonial literature, Jean-Pierre Durix proposes a critical reassessment of the theory of genres. He argues that in the new literatures, which are often rooted in hybrid aesthetics, the often decried mimesis must be viewed from a completely different angle. Analyzing texts by Gabriel García Márquez, Salman Rushdie, Alejo Carpentier, Wilson Harris and Edouard Glissant, he pleads for the redefinition of "magic realism" if the term is to retain generic relevance.
Synopsis
Through a broad-ranging survey of the allegory, utopia, the historical novel and the epic in post-colonial literature, Jean-Pierre Durix proposes a critical reassessment of the theory of genres. He argues that in the new literatures, which are often rooted in hybrid aesthetics, the often decried mimesis must be viewed from a completely different angle. Analyzing texts by Gabriel García Márquez, Salman Rushdie, Alejo Carpentier, Wilson Harris and Edouard Glissant, he pleads for the redefinition of "magic realism" if the term is to retain generic relevance.
Booknews
Durix (English, U. de Bourgogne, Dijon, France) warns western readers that they no longer enjoy the cultural hegemony to delineate such categories as realism, fantasy, and magic in the literature emerging from their former colonies, nor to assign what they have always taken as a universal hierarchy to them. He analyzes novels by Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Salman Rushdie, proposes a narrower definition of Magic Realism. and examines the hybrid aesthetic theories of Edouard Glissant and Wilson Harris. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.