On 18/04/12 17:29, David Bircumshaw wrote:
> (For me, an unsolved problem, since I agree with Trotsky's analysis
I just found this... this is one of the great books on literary theory
and criticism, that deserves closer attention. (It is also available
online from marxist.org)
excerpts from: http://www.socialistaction.org/auciello4.htm
Review of Trotsky's "Literature and Revolution"
/by Joe Auciello /June 2005 issue of Socialist Action/
Forty years ago the canon-defining "Norton Anthology of American
Literature" contained little writing by women and African Americans, and
nothing by Hispanics and American Indians. The literature of America was
not only white and male; it was presented as a direct outgrowth of the
literature of England. No others need apply.
Today, such an edition could not be published. No teacher would assign
it, and no student would accept such a narrow perspective as
informative, much less
definitive. This profound change in the literary landscape did not
result from the discovery of treasure troves of previously unpublished
literature (though research scholars, especially African Americans, have
made important discoveries).
Cultural change of this magnitude requires, first, a mass civil rights
movement, a women's liberation movement, a struggle for gay and lesbian
rights.Antiwar activists who learned to "Question Authority" also raised
questions in their classrooms as students and later as scholars and
teachers. Taken together,
all the movements for peace and social change combined to mold an
audience who would want to read this new literature and influenced the
writers who created it (as well as the publishers who profited from
printing it).
--
http://abdevpoetics.blogspot.com.au/
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