Indiscernible Counterparts : The Invention of the Text in French Classical Drama

Braider, Christopher

ISBN 10: 0807892793 / ISBN 13: 9780807892794

Published by UNC Department of Romance Studies, 2003

About this Item

Unread book in perfect condition.

Seller Inventory # 760529

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Indiscernible Counterparts : The Invention of the Text in French Classical Drama
• Publisher: UNC Department of Romance Studies
• Publication Date: 2003
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0807892793
• ISBN 13: 9780807892794
• Condition: As New

About this title

Synopsis

While the plays of classical France achieve an unprecedented scenic perfection, what ultimately distinguishes classical drama is its unique awareness of its literary properties: the canny excavation of its resources as the site, instrument, and product of a concerted act of writing. But this self-conscious literariness also bears witness to the era’s corollary awareness of the predicament in which even great art works stand as the occasion and counterpart of a critical, often ironic act of reading. In “inventing,” that is, creating and discovering, the text as a vehicle of self-determining authorship, the “grands classiques” simultaneously invent the key critical insights shaping the methods we ourselves bring to bear on the poetic monuments they have left us. The literary monument thereby becomes its own “indiscernible counterpart,” deliberately engaging what, in theory, ought to escape it ― the deconstructive “other” only another contrives to see.

About the Author

Christopher Braider is associate professor in the Department of French and Italian at the University of Colorado at Boulder.