Obsolete Objects in the Literary Imagination: Ruins, Relics, Rarities, Rubbish, Uninhabited Places, and Hidden TreasuresTranslated here into English for the first time is a monumental work of literary history and criticism comparable in scope and achievement to Eric Auerbach’s Mimesis. Italian critic Francesco Orlando explores Western literature’s obsession with outmoded and nonfunctional objects (ruins, obsolete machinery, broken things, trash, etc.). Combining the insights of psychoanalysis and literary-political history, Orlando traces this obsession to a turning point in history, at the end of eighteenth-century industrialization, when the functional becomes the dominant value of Western culture. Roaming through every genre and much of the history of Western literature, the author identifies distinct categories into which obsolete images can be classified and provides myriad examples. The function of literature, he concludes, is to remind us of what we have lost and what we are losing as we rush toward the future. |
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Page 64
... categories, let us therefore define the lowest common denominator, our constant in the singu- lar. At the beginning of ... negative predicates that have already been used. Let us speak of (images of) nonfunctional corporality, providing ...
... categories, let us therefore define the lowest common denominator, our constant in the singu- lar. At the beginning of ... negative predicates that have already been used. Let us speak of (images of) nonfunctional corporality, providing ...
Page 77
... negative " nor was missing . . . nor . . . nor ... " If the vileness of such objects and the inevitable avarice that ... category of texts to be defined here than this single text by Martial might suggest . In the lines that precede the ...
... negative " nor was missing . . . nor . . . nor ... " If the vileness of such objects and the inevitable avarice that ... category of texts to be defined here than this single text by Martial might suggest . In the lines that precede the ...
Page 84
... category withdraws and another takes its place , as transformation . It is ... negative not only logically but in various concrete ways , from the ... negative categories . To complete this part of the tree once and for all , I shall add ...
... category withdraws and another takes its place , as transformation . It is ... negative not only logically but in various concrete ways , from the ... negative categories . To complete this part of the tree once and for all , I shall add ...
Page 104
... category that has not yet been defined . Acceptance and refusal of values are shared out here with such perfect ... negative equivalence with God the creator ? 12 As in the first example of the venerable - 104 A Tree Neither Genealogical ...
... category that has not yet been defined . Acceptance and refusal of values are shared out here with such perfect ... negative equivalence with God the creator ? 12 As in the first example of the venerable - 104 A Tree Neither Genealogical ...
Page 105
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Contents
1 | |
17 | |
47 | |
67 | |
Twelve Categories Not to Be Too Sharply Distinguished | 206 |
Some TwentiethCentury Novels | 343 |
Praising and Disparaging the Functional | 375 |
Notes | 407 |
Index of Subjects | 481 |
Index of Names and Texts | 487 |
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Obsolete Objects in the Literary Imagination: Ruins, Relics, Rarities ... Francesco Orlando No preview available - 2006 |
Common terms and phrases
adjectives already ambivalence ancien régime ancient antifunctional antiquity appears Balzac Baroque become Bibliothèque castle catachresis century chap chapter character Chateaubriand Comédie humaine contamination culture dead death desolate-disconnected Everyman's Library examples fact functional furniture genre Gothic novel historical turning point human hyperbole Ibid imagery images Jerusalem Delivered kitsch La Comédie humaine la Pléiade Les Rougon-Macquart less lines literary literature magic memory metaphor metonymy Milan modern Mondadori narrative narrator nature negative category night nonfunctional corporality novel objects Oblomov Oeuvres complètes opposition Orlando outdoing Oxford University Press palace Paris passage past Pléiade poem poetic precious-potential present pretentious-fictitious protagonist quoted refer relationship remains reminiscent-affective repressed ruins seems semantic tree semipositive category sense sinister-terrifying solemn-admonitory space sterile-noxious story supernatural symbolic tercet thematic constants theme things threadbare-grotesque tion tradition trans treasure Turin venerable-regressive walls words worn-realistic