Melville's gravity: necessity, art, democracy. Issue 11 (2nd November 2021)
- Record Type:
- Journal Article
- Title:
- Melville's gravity: necessity, art, democracy. Issue 11 (2nd November 2021)
- Main Title:
- Melville's gravity: necessity, art, democracy
- Authors:
- Greiman, Jennifer
- Abstract:
- ABSTRACT: This essay examines the aesthetics of gravity across Herman Melville's prose and poetry to argue that, rather than a figuration of irresistible necessity, the law of gravitation introduces unanticipated contingencies and modes of action into Melville's work. Building on the insights of scholars who have identified the philosophical significance of thrownness and fallenness in Melville's writing, this essay argues that the force of gravity also foregrounds aesthetics and politics – specifically the politics of abolition and war. Reading Melville's work alongside that of Frederick Douglass, this essay argues that both writers escape what Hannah Arendt describes as the fallacy of mathematic metaphors for political action. In emphasising figural elasticity, and not literal force, in gravitational pull, both Melville and Douglass find in it a surprising source of militant democratic potential.
- Is Part Of:
- Textual practice. Volume 35:Issue 11(2021)
- Journal:
- Textual practice
- Issue:
- Volume 35:Issue 11(2021)
- Issue Display:
- Volume 35, Issue 11 (2021)
- Year:
- 2021
- Volume:
- 35
- Issue:
- 11
- Issue Sort Value:
- 2021-0035-0011-0000
- Page Start:
- 1799
- Page End:
- 1814
- Publication Date:
- 2021-11-02
- Subjects:
- Gravity -- aesthetics -- necessity -- abolition -- democracy
Literature, Modern -- 20th century -- History and criticism -- Periodicals
Criticism -- Periodicals
Criticism, Textual -- Periodicals
Semiotics -- Periodicals
801.95 - Journal URLs:
- http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rtpr20/current ↗
http://www.tandfonline.com/ ↗
http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/titles/0950236X.asp ↗ - DOI:
- 10.1080/0950236X.2021.1968182 ↗
- Languages:
- English
- ISSNs:
- 0950-236X
- Deposit Type:
- Legaldeposit
- View Content:
- Available online (eLD content is only available in our Reading Rooms) ↗
- Physical Locations:
- British Library DSC - 8813.780460
British Library HMNTS - ELD Digital store - Ingest File:
- 20074.xml