Overview

In the mid-twentieth century, Virginia Woolf published ‘Six Articles on London Life’ in Good Housekeeping magazine, a popular magazine where fashion, cookery and house decoration is largely featured. This first book-length study of what Woolf calls ‘little articles’ proposes to reassess the commissioned essays and read them in a chronological sequence in their original context as well as in the larger context of Woolf’s work. Drawing primarily on literary theory, intermedial studies, periodical studies and philosophy, this volume argues the essays which provided an original guided tour of London are creative and innovative works, combining several art forms while developing a photographic method. Further investigation examines the construct of Woolf’s essays as intermedial and as partaking both of theory and praxis; intermediality is closely connected here with her defense of a democratic ideal, itself grounded in a dialogue with her forebears. Far from being second-rate, the Good Housekeeping essays bring together aesthetic and political concerns and come out as playing a pivotal role: they redefine the essay as intermedial, signal Woolf’s turn to a more openly committed form of writing, and fit perfectly within Woolf’s essayistic and fictional oeuvre which they in turn illuminate.

Full Product Details

Author:   Christine Reynier (University Paul-Valéry Montpellier, France)
Publisher:   Taylor & Francis Ltd
Imprint:   Routledge
Volume:   1
Weight:   0.385kg
ISBN:  

9781138321113

ISBN 10:   1138321117
Pages:   180
Publication Date:   04 July 2018
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Tertiary & Higher Education ,  Undergraduate
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In Print  
This item will be ordered in for you from one of our suppliers. Upon receipt, we will promptly dispatch it out to you. For in store availability, please contact us.

Table of Contents

Contents Introduction Woolf’s essays and their critical appraisal. Woolf’s essays in Good Housekeeping magazine. Composition, publication, reception The purpose of the book Part I: The Good Housekeeping Essays as Intermedial essays Chapter One The humble art of description in the ‘Six Articles on London life’ Introduction The documentary impulse Practicing the art of description in ‘The Docks of London’ and ‘Oxford Street Tide’ Renewing the art of description in Good Housekeeping magazine Developing the ‘critical attitude’ Conclusion Chapter Two The Art of photography in the Good Housekeeping essays ‘The Docks of London’ as an apparatus for the other essays The photographic method in ‘Great Men’s Houses’ The photographic method in ‘Abbeys and Cathedrals’ Chapter Three The art of architecture in the Good Housekeeping essays Redefining architecture as democracy in ‘This is the House of Commons’ and ‘Portrait of a Londoner’ Intermediality and Woolf’s ethics of doubt Constructing the essay as an intermedial form Part II: ‘The Common Pool’ Chapter Four Woolf’s ghosts in the Good Housekeeping essays Woolf’s plea for democracy: a dialogue with her forebears The intermedial dialogue with John Ruskin ‘Adaptive reuse’ and the political debates of the 1930s Chapter Five Virginia Woolf and Heritage Woolf’s survival theory Poverty as usus: the ‘common pool’ An ethical posture? Poverty as an economic and aesthetic concept Woolf and Benjamin Part III Reassessing the Good Housekeeping essays Chapter 6 The Good Housekeeping essays as cultural and creative essays The Good Housekeeping essays as part and parcel of Woolf’s essays The theoretical thrust of Woolf’s essays Woolf’s ‘humble’ theory Chapter Seven The Good Housekeeping essays at the crossroads The photographic turn Implementing the theory of usus Constructing history as trace The political turn Conclusion The Good Housekeeping essays and The Arcades Project Straddling the divide between high and low culture

Reviews

Author Information

Christine Reynier is Professor of English Literature at the University Paul-Valéry Montpellier3, France. She is the author of Virginia Woolf's Ethics of the Short Story (Palgrave 2009) and a number of articles on modernist writers (Ford Madox Ford, Rebecca West, Virginia Woolf, etc.). She is co-editor (with M. Duyck and M. Basseler) of Reframing the Modernist Short Story (Journal of the Short Story in English, 2015) and (with B. Coste and C. Delyfer) of Reconnecting Aestheticism and Modernism (Routledge, 2017).

Tab Content 6

Author Website:  

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

No review item found!

Add your own review!

Countries Available

All regions