K. Amian, Rethinking Postmodernism(s). Charles S. Peirce and the Pragmatist Negotiations of Thomas Pynchon, Toni Morrison, and Jonathan Safran Foer

Katrin AMIAN

Rethinking Postmodernism(s). Charles S. Peirce and the PragmatistNegotiations of Thomas Pynchon, Toni Morrison, and Jonathan Safran Foer

Rodopi

coll. "Postmodern Studies" n°41

Amsterdam / New York, 2008, 239 p.
ISBN 978-90-420-2415-1

RÉSUMÉ

Rethinking Postmodernism(s) revisits three historicalsites of American literary postmodernism: the early postmodernism ofThomas Pynchon's V. (1961), the emancipatory postmodernism of ToniMorrison's Beloved (1987), and the late or post-postmodernism of Jonathan Safran Foer's Everything Is Illuminated(2002). For the first time, it confronts these texts with thepragmatist philosophy of Charles Sanders Peirce, staging a conceptualdialogue between pragmatism and postmodernism that historicizes andrecontextualizes customary readings of postmodern fiction. The book isa must-read for all interested in current reassessments of literarypostmodernism, in new critical dialogues between seminal postmoderntexts, and in recent attempts to theorize the ‘post-postmodern' moment.

TABLE DES MATIÈRES

Acknowledgements
Introduction
1. Toward a New Postmodern Language Game: C. S. Peirce and the Pragmatist Language of Creativity and Consensus
Productive In/Stabilities: Susanne Rohr's Peircean Theory of Reality Constitution
Beyond Rohr's Model: Creativity, Consensus, and the Language of ‘Negotiations'
2. Creativity and Power: Thomas Pynchon's V.
Destabilizing Play: V. 's Creative Guesswork
Stifling Control: V.' s Objects of Desire
Play and Control: Re-Engaging the ‘Paradox' of Postmodern Fiction
3. Consensus and Difference: Toni Morrison's Beloved
(De-)Constructing Intersubjectivity: Beloved's Politics of Reading
Reworking Consensus: The Women's Gathering and Beloved's ‘Referential Debt'
4. Creativity and Consensus: Jonathan Safran Foer's Everything Is Illuminated
Staging Creativity: Everything's Playful Destabilizations
Performing (Inter)Subjectivities: Everything's Epistolary Mediations
Reworking Consensus: Toward a ‘Moral' Vision of ‘Collective Creation'
Conclusion
Works Cited