Romance Writing (Cultural History of Literature) - Hardcover

Pearce, Lynne

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0745630049 ISBN 13: 9780745630045

Publisher: Polity, 2007

Synopsis

Romance Writing explores the changing nature of both the romance genre and the discourse of romantic love from the seventeenth century to the present day. Indeed, it is one of the first studies to approach romantic love as both genre and discourse in more than sixty years.

Faced with the challenge of writing a cultural history for what is commonly understood to be one of lifes most universal, a-historical and cross-cultural phenomena, Lynne Pearce has invoked the concept of the gift to calculate loves added value at different cultural/historical moments. Building upon those philosophical traditions which have argued for the powerfully transformative nature of romantic love, Pearce shows how in the history of literature lovers have utilized its spark to change not only themselves, but also their worlds, through acts of creativity and heroism. The gift of love ranges from the simple gift of a name in the seventeenth century, through notions of immortality, self-sacrifice and selfhood in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, through to the liberating temporal and spatial dislocations of the postmodern age. The opening chapter, The Alchemy of Love, also undertakes an in-depth engagement of the changing nature, and meaning, of romantic love.

Providing a judicious blend of close reading and cultural history, Romance Writing will be essential reading for undergraduate students as well as postgraduates and scholars working in the field, while also offering much of interest to the general reader.

About this title

Book Description:

Romance Writing explores the changing nature of both the romance genre and the discourse of romantic love from the seventeenth century to the present day. It is the first major historical engagement of romantic love, as both genre and discourse, since the 1940s. Faced with the challenge of writing a lsquo;cultural historyrsquo; for what is commonly understood to be one of lifersquo;s most universal, a-historical and cross-cultural phenomena, Lynne Pearce has invoked the concept of the gift to calculate loversquo;s lsquo;added valuersquo; at different cultural / historical moments. Building upon those philosophical traditions which have argued for the powerfully transformative nature of romantic love, Pearce shows how -- in the history of literature -- lovers have utilized its spark to change not only themselves, but also their worlds, through acts of creativity and heroism. The lsquo;gift of loversquo; ranges from the simple lsquo;gift of a namersquo; in the seventeenth century, through notions of immortality, self-sacrifice and selfhood in the nineteenth- and twentieth-centuries, through to the liberating temporal and spatial dislocations of the postmodern age. The opening chapter, lsquo;The Alchemy of Loversquo;, also undertakes an in-depth engagement of the changing nature, and meaning, of romantic love. Providing a judicious blend of close reading and cultural history, Romance Writing will be essential reading for undergraduate students as well as postgraduates and scholars working in the field; it will also be of interest to the general reader.

About the Author:

Lynne Pearce is Professor of Literary Theory and Women’s Writing, University of Lancaster

About this edition

• Publisher: Polity
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 0745630049
• ISBN 13: 9780745630045
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 232