The Order of Mimesis: Balzac, Stendhal, Nerval and Flaubert (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9780521369770)

This book is a challenging investigation of the idea of literary mimesis in the light of contemporary literary theory. Drawing on a range of theoretical perspectives developed in and around the work of Barthes, Kristeva, Genette and Derrida, Dr Prendergast explores approaches to the concept of mimesis and relates these to a number of narrative texts produced in the period which literary history familiarly designates as the age of realism: Balzac's Illusions Perdues and Splendeurs et Mis res des Courtisanes, Stendhal's Le Rouge et le Noir, Nerval's Sylvie and Flaubert's L'Education Sentimentale. The book is not merely expository however: one of the author's aims is to engage with much of the polemical debate which has surrounded the topic, in the belief that a recognition of the historical conditions determining both the theory and practice of mimesis must be recovered.

Author: Christopher Prendergast
ISBN-10: 0521369770
ISBN-13: 9780521369770
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Language: English
Published: 10/28/1988
Pages: 300
Format: Paperback
Weight: 0.84lbs
Size: 8.50h x 5.50w x 0.67d