Published June 2022
Residual Figuration in Samuel Beckett and Alberto Giacometti
Lin Li
Studies In Comparative Literature 53
- ‘In this ambitious yet focused study of the relationship between certain formal characteristics in Samuel Beckett’s dramatic works and Alberto Giacometti’s art, Lin Li not only clarifies these two artists’ shared milieu, but also sheds light on new ways to understand both subjecthood and reading more generally.’ — Charlie Clements, Modern Language Review 2024, 119.1, 139-41 (full text online)
Published April 2022
Words Like Fire: Prophecy and Apocalypse in Apollinaire, Marinetti and Pound
James P. Leveque
Studies In Comparative Literature 50
- ‘This book is a welcome contribution to avant-garde studies in Europe and North America... Devoted primarily to poetry, it examines the early literary activities of three giants who helped shape our response to the twentieth century: Guillaume Apollinaire in France, F. T. Marinetti in Italy, and Ezra Pound in England and America. To my knowledge, this is the only book-length study of all three poets, each of whom—officially or unofficially—headed a major literary movement.’ — Willard Bohn, Modern Language Review 118.4, October 2023, 587-89 (full text online)
From Puppet to Cyborg: Pinocchio’s Posthuman Journey
Georgia Panteli
Studies In Comparative Literature 40
- ‘Panteli achieves no small feat by negotiating seven case studies across three decades and even more national contexts and languages, and the book’s strength is in capaciously demonstrating how the Pinocchio myth can be a useful, even playful, lens for approaching contemporary texts in which the human condition is desired or negotiated.’ — Kelly McKisson, Modern Language Review 118.4, October 2023, 595-97 (full text online)
Published December 2021
A Poetics of the Image: Paul Celan and André du Bouchet
Julian J. I. Koch
Studies In Comparative Literature 52
- Sieghild Bogumil-Notz, Monatshefte 116.1, 2024, 175-78 (full text online)
Published July 2021
Fragments, Genius and Madness: Masks and Mask-Making in the fin-de-siècle Imagination
Elisa Segnini
Studies In Comparative Literature 56
- ‘The wide-ranging approach of the book, which also engages with recent debates in decadence and early modernist studies, openly challenges the “abrupt separation between authors associated with the ‘half-mock interlude of decadence’ and those considered exponents of symbolism, and thus part of early modernism”... The author keeps steady command of her arguments while navigating and scrutinising several artifacts from different cultures, though of course each case study shows its own fine tuning.’ — Giulio Milone, Synergies 2, 2021, 65-68 (full text online)
- ‘Elisa Segnini leads her readers on a journey through fin-de-siècle Europe with one extra stop in Japan. The universe unveiled by Segnini is populated by uncanny mask makers, men in drag, grotesque masquerades, deathly plaster casts, gruesome masks of exceptional men, criminals, and deviants... A distinctive contribution to a field that can only benefit from engaging with the anthropological, medical, and legal discourse that underlies the artistic production of the fin de siècle.’ — Alessandra Crotti, Rivista di studi vittoriani 53, 2022, 121-25
Published September 2020
Mary Shelley and Europe: Essays in Honour of Jean de Palacio
Edited by Antonella Braida
Studies In Comparative Literature 55
- ‘A wonderful selection of essays which discusses an aspect of Mary Shelley’s life that was so important to her art and yet is perhaps under-emphasised in discussing her work.’ — Jacqueline Mulhallen, Women's Writing 6 March 2022
Metaphor in European Philosophy after Nietzsche: An Intellectual History
Andrew Hines
Studies In Comparative Literature 54
- ‘This monograph is exactly as its title would suggest: a lively intellectual history of metaphor in (mostly) twentieth-century European philosophy... does the impossible, succeeding very clearly in defining and outlining the history of metaphor (which [Hines] does comprehensively and deeply, I might add).’ — Christopher O’Hara, Forum for Modern Language Studies 58.1, January 2022, 127-28 (full text online)
- ‘Throughout the book, [Hines] suggests that studying the metaphors of ideologies would be an apt use case — he cites examples from The Language of the Third Reich, Victor Klemperer’s study of Third Reich rhetoric — yet he can only hint at how exactly this is to be done. As a historical result, Hines has produced an excellent overview over the development of metaphor theory, and has assembled a canon whose surprising star, Hans Blumenberg, is also still the least known in the Anglosphere. Not everyone will agree with this selection — nor with the pivotal position Nietzsche has in it — but for any future study of metaphor theories, this book will be indispensable.’ — Hannes Bajohr, Contributions to the History of Concepts 17.2, Winter 2022, 123–27 (full text online)
Samuel Butler and the Science of the Mind: Evolution, Heredity and Unconscious Memory
Cristiano Turbil
Studies In Comparative Literature 48
Published September 2019
Comparative Literature in Britain: National Identities, Transnational Dynamics 1800-2000
Joep Leerssen
Studies In Comparative Literature 27
- ‘This is a study of the rare kind of which it can truthfully be said that it is definitive: the description fits Leerssen’s book perfectly. To those still living who launched comparative literature in the new universities some 50 years ago it will come as a happy reminder of an exciting time of innovation and change which they were fortunate to have been part of. To those of a later generation it will reveal that what happened in the 1960s did not emerge from nowhere: a long and honourable history, ably explored by Professor Leerssen, led up to it.’ — John Fletcher, Journal of European Studies 50.3, 2020, 302-321 (full text online)
- ‘The publication of [this book] is welcome news... The entire section on the nineteenth century is a treasure house of insights into cross-national and comparative ways of approaching knowledge... This is, all in all, a book to be heartily recommended for a wide variety of readers interested in comparative studies in the humanities and social sciences, while being of particular interest to those wishing to understand the evolution of literary and cultural studies.’ — Barnita Bagchi, History of Humanities Fall 2020, 554-56
Published April 2019
Depicting the Divine: Mikhail Bulgakov and Thomas Mann
Olga G. Voronina
Studies In Comparative Literature 47
- ‘Olga G. Voronina’s careful comparative study brings to light many of the parallel narrative strategies in Mikhail Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita and Thomas Mann’s Joseph and His Brothers... What sets Bulgakov and Mann apart from the mainstream, as Voronina convincingly shows, is their decision to engage polemically with biblical texts.’ — Thomas Seifrid, Comparative Literature Studies 57.3, 2020, 559-62
- ‘В заключение хочу сказать, что книга Ольги Ворониной инновативна в постановке исследовательской проблемы и плодотворна в ее решении. Завершаю рецензию на книгу цитатой из другого булгаковского романа: «Она дышит! Она живет!».’ — Irina Belobrovtseva, Scando-Slavica 67.2, 2021, 287-94 (full text online)
- ‘Voronina has created a convincing, far-researching, unique and engaging study of Bulgakov's and Mann's poetic versions of biblical narratives, which both de- and re-mythologize the source text and are characterized by syncretism and rich intertextuality. The book is undoubtedly interesting and inspiring not only for Slavic and German scholars but also for any reader who is interested in a different and innovative approach to the study of comparative literature. The spiritual, scientific, and scholarly merits of this book perfectly complement one another.’ — Natalia Kaloh Vid, Slavic Review full text online)
- ‘The first comparative study of The Master and Margarita and Joseph and His Brothers, and an important and original contribution to research on Bulgakov’s and Mann’s novels as well as on biblical literature in more general terms.’ — Sarah Fengler, Oxford Comparative Criticism and Translation 30 September 2021
- ‘Depicting the Divine is a meticulously researched, impressive close reading of two novels... a valuable contribution to literary studies. In her nuanced close readings and thorough research of the two novels Voronina applies a specialist’s insight to both Bulgakov and Mann, paying attention to linguistic subtleties in the two languages and explaining them well to the English reader.’ — Eric Laursen, Russian Review 80.4, October 2021, 713-14 (full text online)
A Modernist in Exile: The International Reception of H. G. Adler (1910-1988)
Edited by Lynn L. Wolff
Studies In Comparative Literature 42
- ‘A very impressive collection of moving and thought-provoking essays... Because the contributors to this book have such detailed and specialized knowledge of H. G.’s life and work, and such a masterly ability to contextualize his wide-ranging achievement and relate their new work to earlier critical work, they set a new standard in Adler scholarship. Consequently this fascinating volume will doubtless enhance H. G.’s reputation both as an intellectual and as a writer of prose fiction, and become necessary reading for anyone who has any kind of interest in him and his work.’ — Richard Sheppard, Journal of European Studies 50.3, Autumn 2020, 295–301 (full text online)
- ‘This volume dedicated to H.G. Adler will prove edifying to seasoned scholars and newcomers alike... In contrast to Adorno, who - similar to many postmodernists - collapses traditions of value into barbarity and admits no distinction between the two, Adler struggles to maintain, describe, and explain the possibility of human goodness in the face of overwhelming evil. It is certainly true for Adler that in the world of the camps much, if not most, of the ability for ethical action was destroyed - but not all. And since this is true, Adler’s work challenges his readers to face the truth in its entirety and to define the scale of human value they will adhere to in the face of barbarity.’ — Traci S. O’Brien, Monatshefte 112.4, Winter 2020, 747-50
Published August 2018
Utopian Identities: A Cognitive Approach to Literary Competitions
Clementina Osti
Studies In Comparative Literature 41
Published February 2018
The Modern Culture of Reginald Farrer: Landscape, Literature and Buddhism
Michael Charlesworth
Studies In Comparative Literature 36
- ‘The clear strengths of this book are in its lucid prose, historical accuracy, and truly fascinating subject matter... Richly supported in terms of diverse textual materials, the book is also visually stunning and contains a number of wonderful illustrations, photographs, and reproduced artworks... Charlesworth’s book presents a compelling case for a renewed interest in Reginald Farrer’s writings, and will remain the definitive work on this topic for many years to come.’ — Jeffrey Mather, Modern Language Review 115.1, 2020, 164-65 (full text online)
Published September 2017
Sublime Conclusions: Last Man Narratives from Apocalypse to Death of God
Robert K. Weninger
Studies In Comparative Literature 43
- unsigned notice, The Year's Work in English Studies 98.1, 2019, 657-58
Published February 2017
Reflections in the Library: Selected Literary Essays 1926–1944
Antal Szerb
Studies In Comparative Literature 46
- ‘Skillfully translated from Hungarian by Peter Sherwood, edited with utmost circumspection by Zsuzsanna Varga, provided with a magisterial Introduction by Ágnes Péter and a foreword by Galin Tihanov, reveals much about its author, the novelist, scholar, and man of letters Antal Szerb and his mindset... Reflections in the Library can be seen, among its other achievements, as a gesture of proclaiming, now to the English-speaking world, the lasting relevance of Szerb’s legacy... Although Szerb’s life’s work was left unfinished, his contribution to the art of the essay is large and remarkable enough to merit a sequel.’ — Ákos Farkas, Hungarian Cultural Studies 10, 2017 (full text online)
- ‘This is a beautifully produced and judiciously edited selection of essays by a major writer from early-twentieth-century Hungary... All of the essays reveal Szerb’s sparkling wit and humour as well as his acumen: describing Chesterton as a great scholar and sophisticated clown, he prophecies that Shaw’s work will outlive Chesterton’s, while his essays on Gogol and Proust equally overflow with aphoristic wit. It is a must-have volume both for critics and general readers: beautiful, touching, and remarkably up-to-date prose on nineteenth-century European literature.’ — unsigned notice, Forum for Modern Language Studies 55.1, January 2019, 119-20
Published July 2015
Oscar Wilde and the Simulacrum: The Truth of Masks
Giles Whiteley
Studies In Comparative Literature 35
- ‘The strength of this study for the reader of Wilde is the way in which Whiteley seeks to connect Wilde’s theoretical writings with his fictions. This is central to its Deleuzian approach, its ‘active refusal of the critical either-or’, its determination to find the complementarity between Wilde the ‘producer of concepts’ and Wilde the producer of ‘percepts and affects’ (p. 24)... there is intellectual provocation at every turn, and difficulty to be celebrated.’ — Anne Varty, The OScholars April 2017
- ‘Giles Whiteley’s provocative monograph announces a reading of Wilde ‘through Deleuze and postmodern philosophical commentary on the simulacrum’. It also signals a challenge to ‘recent neo-historicist readings’ which ‘limit [Wilde’s] irruptive power’. Drawn to Deleuze’s notions of ‘disjunctive synthesis’, Whiteley emphasizes Wilde’s credentials as a ‘serious’ thinker, presenting him as a fusion of philosopher and artist. Where many recent critics have been at pains to place him in a precise historical and cultural context, Whiteley maintains that Wilde’s ‘contemporaries’ are properly determined by his intellectual outlook, and are therefore drawn from his past (Plato, Aristotle, Hegel), present (Arnold, Ruskin, Baudelaire, Nietzsche), and future (Deleuze, Blanchot, Foucault, and Klossowski, among others).’ — Nick Freeman, Modern Language Review 116.2, April 2017, 499-500 (full text online)
- ‘From the point of view of presentation, the volume is of the highest standard... Oscar Wilde and the Simulacrum is, in my opinion, an important contribution to Wilde studies in at least two respects. Firstly, it pertinently resituates Wilde’s works within the intellectual context in which they were conceived and convincingly challenges the idea according to which Wilde’s philosophy of art is simply a derivative, Platonic and Hegelian, idealism. Secondly, it stages a large number of fruitful encounters between Wilde’s texts and contemporary theory, thereby taking much further Richard Ellmann’s intuition that Wilde was ‘one of us’ and shedding new light on the Irishman’s literary production. Oscar Wilde and the Simulacrum is itself a Deleuzian event, creating ‘lines of flight’ and causing renewed delight in the reader’s apprehension of Wilde’s shimmering surfaces.’ — Xavier Giudicelli, Cahiers victoriens et édouardiens 85, Spring 2017
Published March 2015
Samuel Butler against the Professionals: Rethinking Lamarckism 1860–1900
David Gillott
Studies In Comparative Literature 32
- ‘Gillott’s book provides a convincing and well-structured analysis of the work of the novelist, art historian and amateur scientist Samuel Butler in the late nineteenth-century British context, focus- ing in particular on his research on art and literature.’ — Cristiano Turbil, British Journal for the History of Science 49.2, 2006, 300-01
Published September 2013
Likenesses: Translation, Illustration, Interpretation
Matthew Reynolds
Studies In Comparative Literature 30
- ‘The collection reveals an impressive breadth of scholarship, travelling between disciplines and across centuries from George Stubbs’s equestrian paintings, through the more familiar Reynoldian territory of Robert Browning, to the conspicuously contemporary, ‘Dante on the Tube’. This diversity effectively demonstrates ‘continuities’ in literature, impressing upon the reader the contemporary relevance of earlier works through juxtaposition.’ — Rebecca Butler, Modern Language Review 110.3, July 2015, 793-94 (full text online)
Published June 2013
Prometheus in the Nineteenth Century: From Myth to Symbol
Caroline Corbeau-Parsons
Studies In Comparative Literature 25
- ‘The truly interdisciplinary reach of Corbeau-Parsons’ work... makes it much more than (just) an exercise in comparative literature... What emerges from Corbeau-Parsons’ engaging study and her analysis of some stunning works of art is a powerful sense of the remarkable autonomy of the Prometheus figure, so much so that one is almost tempted to echo Wilamowitz in Der Glaube der Hellenen and exclaim: ‘The gods are there’!’ — Paul Bishop, Journal of European Studies 44.1, 2014, 81-82
- ‘A well-written, systematic and comprehensive examination of the Prometheus myth and its many artistic adaptations and nuances.’ — Harriet Hustis, BARS Review 45, 2015
- ‘Throughout this impressive book, which forms part of the Legenda Studies in Comparative Literature series, Caroline Corbeau-Parsons explores the Symbolist fascination with the Prometheus myth, tracing its origins in antiquity, its rediscovery in the Renaissance, its centrality in versions of German, French, and English Romanticism, and finally its use by Mallarmé, Moreau, and others.’ — Paul Wright, Modern Language Review 110.3, July 2015, 788-89 (full text online)
Published May 2013
The Realist Author and Sympathetic Imagination
Sotirios Paraschas
Studies In Comparative Literature 28
- ‘The arguments are based throughout on meticulous research, close attention to textual detail, and an adroit engagement with literary theory. They are also conveyed with notable elegance and clarity. Paraschas is not afraid to contest claims made by such influential theorists as Paul de Man, whose view of realism as a regression from the ironic novel of the eighteenth century is here neatly reversed. Undergraduates would find his admirably succinct introductory discussion of the ‘realist author’ a source of elucidation and stimulus.’ — Michael Tilby, French Studies 68.3, July 2014, 405-06
- ‘In arguing for a more nuanced understanding of the realist mode, Paraschas has written an important contribution to nineteenth-century French studies, and a book that will serve as an invaluable reference for students and scholars alike.’ — Andrew Watts, Modern Language Review 110.2, April 2015, 516-17 (full text online)
- ‘Extremely useful for understanding the attitude of early nineteenth-century Realists and their attempts to present verisimilitude as art.’ — Catherine Winters, Nineteenth-Century French Studies 43.3-4, 2015
Published May 2011
The Art of Comparison: How Novels and Critics Compare
Catherine Brown
Studies In Comparative Literature 23
- ‘Brown's core chapters gracefully use varied conceptual tools and interdisciplinary viewpoints, all of which are engagingly woven into an organic whole, so that the reader emerges from this ambitious enterprise appreciating what notable work can be done when translation theory and practice are not seen as separate entities but as intercommunicative.’ — Andrew Radford, Translation and Literature 20, 2011, 403-08
- ‘Dexterously connects Eliot, Tolstoy and Lawrence to the considerations of nationalism and supranationalism at the heart of critical debates within and about comparative literary scholarship... Convincingly demonstrates that we as literary critics should open our ears and our minds to unlikely literary conversations, as well as the fresh knowledge and pleasure we may glean from them.’ — Katherine Anderson, George Eliot-George Henry Lewes Studies 62-63 (September 2012), 124-26
Published March 2011
Alienation and Theatricality: Diderot after Brecht
Phoebe von Held
Studies In Comparative Literature 17
- ‘This is a rich and rewarding study that opens up important new perspectives not only on its two chosen thinkers, but also on the questions of acting both onstage and in society more generally.’ — Joseph Harris, French Studies 66.4 (October 2012), 557
- ‘[Held's] general principle is surprisingly simple and compelling: While the 'self-alienating artifice' of Diderot's calculating actor succeeds for the most part at immedsing the audience to identification and illusion, there are moments at which it suddenly comes to the fore... Jolted by this 'sudden emergence of alienation', the spectator is now 'faced with her own involvement in the operation of delusion'.’ — Florian Nikolas Becker, Brecht Yearbook 37 (2012), 253-58
Published February 2011
Borges and Joyce: An Infinite Conversation
Patricia Novillo-Corvalán
Studies In Comparative Literature 24
- ‘Deftly employs cultural, geographical, biographical, linguistic and literary analysis; in doing so, it provides readers with a better understanding of Joyce, Borges, and the connections between them.’ — unsigned notice, Forum for Modern Language Studies 49.2 (2013)
- ‘...The engaging central thesis, of the surprisingly fruitful interaction between these two seemingly dissimilar authors.’ — Ben Bolig, Modern Language Review 108.3, 2013, 983-85 (full text online)
- ‘This is an ambitious and satisfying book that illuminates, through the prism of Borges, the work of Joyce and, through Joyce, the work of Borges... It is a very welcome and important addition to our libraries.’ — Lucia Boldrini, James Joyce Quarterly 49.3/4, May 2014, 689-92
Published April 2010
Yeats and Pessoa: Parallel Poetic Styles
Patricia Silva McNeill
Studies In Comparative Literature 19
- ‘A very worthwhile study which demonstrates how two poets from small, peripheral European nations reflected the Zeitgeist of their times in poetry which posterity has come to regard as among the most important produced in either nation or language.’ — Jean Andrews, Modern Language Review 106.3, July 2011, 840-41 (full text online)
Turning into Sterne: Viktor Shklovskii and Literary Reception
Emily Finer
Studies In Comparative Literature 18
- ‘In [Finer's] own inventive readings, the impact of Sterne and English eighteenth-century narrative experiments is dominant in Shklovskii’s journalism and fiction of the mid 1920s. The overt play with convention evident in his non- fiction, as in his novels, exemplifies in a double sense the khod konia — both the knight’s move of artistic indirection and the hobby horse of Shandean digressions.’ — Dale E. Peterson, Slavonic and East European Review 89.4, October 2011, 720-21 (full text online)
- ‘Emily Finer’s first monograph represents a significant advance on any other coverage of Viktor Shklovskii (1893–1984) and his work in literature to date... An outstanding study for those interested in early twentieth-century Soviet culture, comparative literature and literary reception, close readings of English literature in Russian translation, and the publication and dissemination of English literature in Russia and the Soviet Union.’ — Rosemari Baker, Slavonica 17.1, April 2011, 54-55