Imperial masochism [[electronic resource] ] : British fiction, fantasy, and social class / / John Kucich

• Autore: Kucich John
• Pubblicazione: Princeton, : Princeton University Press, c2007
• Edizione: Course Book
• Descrizione fisica: 1 online resource (272 p.)
• Disciplina: 823/.89353
• Soggetto topico: English fiction - 19th century - History and criticism; Masochism in literature; Social classes in literature; Imperialism in literature
• Soggetto geografico: Great Britain Colonies History 19th century
• Note generali: Description based upon print version of record.
• Nota di bibliografia: Includes bibliographical references and index.
• Nota di contenuto: Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- A Note On Texts -- Introduction. Fantasy and Ideology -- Chapter One. Melancholy Magic -- Chapter Two. Olive Schreiner's Preoedipal Dreams -- Chapter Three. Sadomasochism and the Magical Group -- Chapter Four. The Masochism of the Craft -- Conclusion -- Index
• Sommario/riassunto: British imperialism's favorite literary narrative might seem to be conquest. But real British conquests also generated a surprising cultural obsession with suffering, sacrifice, defeat, and melancholia. "There was," writes John Kucich, "seemingly a different crucifixion scene marking the historical gateway to each colonial theater." In Imperial Masochism, Kucich reveals the central role masochistic forms of voluntary suffering played in late-nineteenth-century British thinking about imperial politics and class identity. Placing the colonial writers Robert Louis Stevenson, Olive Schreiner, Rudyard Kipling, and Joseph Conrad in their cultural context, Kucich shows how the ideological and psychological dynamics of empire, particularly its reorganization of class identities at the colonial periphery, depended on figurations of masochism. Drawing on recent psychoanalytic theory to define masochism in terms of narcissistic fantasies of omnipotence rather than sexual perversion, the book illuminates how masochism mediates political thought of many different kinds, not simply those that represent the social order as an opposition of mastery and submission, or an eroticized drama of power differentials. Masochism was a powerful psychosocial language that enabled colonial writers to articulate judgments about imperialism and class. The first full-length study of masochism in British colonial fiction, Imperial Masochism puts forth new readings of this literature and shows the continued relevance of psychoanalysis to historicist studies of literature and culture.
• Titolo autorizzato: Imperial masochism
• ISBN: 1-282-12968-6; 9786612129681; 1-4008-2740-X
• Formato: Materiale a stampa
• Livello bibliografico: Monografia
• Lingua di pubblicazione: Inglese
• Record Nr.: 9910777727703321
• Lo trovi qui: Univ. Federico II