Research Catalog

Counterfeit culture : truth and authenticity in the American prose epic since 1960

Title
Counterfeit culture : truth and authenticity in the American prose epic since 1960 / Rob Turner, University of Exeter.
Author
Turner, Rob, 1985-
Publication
Cambridge, United Kingdom ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 2019.

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StatusFormatAccessCall NumberItem Location
Book/TextUse in library JFE 19-8860Schwarzman Building - Main Reading Room 315

Details

Description
ix, 221 pages; 24 cm.
Summary
"Counterfeit Culture explores the possibility of writing epic in an age of alternative facts. Examining six attempts to forge an American prose epic since 1960, this study goes on to trace a national tradition of inauthenticity, stretching back across four centuries. In works by authors such as Pynchon, Gaddis and Burroughs, the contemporary turn away from truth and authenticity can be seen as a return to an established line of literary tricksters and confidence men, with tropes of fraud and artifice running deep in the American grain. Combining archival work with historically-inflected analysis of literary narrative, this book ranges through questions of identity, technology, history, and music in its engagement. From Marguerite Young's inquiry into psychological disintegration to William T. Vollmann's ongoing cycle of false histories, the study introduces a new reading of the American epic"--
Series Statement
Cambridge studies in American literature and culture ; 182
Uniform Title
Cambridge studies in American literature and culture ; 181.
Subjects
Genre/Form
  • Criticism, interpretation, etc.
  • History.
Note
  • Series numbering corrected to 181 per publisher.
Bibliography (note)
  • Includes bibliographical references and index.
Contents
Introduction: America and the "Way to the devil" -- Marguerite Young's flood of consciousness -- William Gaddis and the "novel-writing-machine" of Andy Warhol -- "Paper reality": William S. Burroughs and the cut-up method -- "Bad history": Thomas Pynchon and the apocryphal epic -- "History shambles on": William T. Vollmann and the Seven dreams cycle -- Conclusion: "Every story has two tails".
Call Number
JFE 19-8860
ISBN
  • 9781108428484
  • 1108428487
LCCN
2018051984
OCLC
1079411189
Author
Turner, Rob, 1985- author.
Title
Counterfeit culture : truth and authenticity in the American prose epic since 1960 / Rob Turner, University of Exeter.
Publisher
Cambridge, United Kingdom ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 2019.
Type of Content
text
Type of Medium
unmediated
Type of Carrier
volume
Series
Cambridge studies in American literature and culture ; 182
Cambridge studies in American literature and culture ; 181.
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Chronological Term
1900-1999
Research Call Number
JFE 19-8860
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