| "Drawing
on a broad range of contemporary theory—Russian formalism, Riffaterre,
and deconstruction in particular—Smith proposes a conception of realism
that assimilates and transforms what others have said on the subject.
In the end he plumps for a coherence theory of realism, in accord
with Lotman's precept that 'facts' emerge at the intersection of two
semiotic systems. Those uncomfortable with this conclusion can supplement
it with the theories of fictional reference provided by Thomas Pavel
and Marie-Laure Ryan. Readers interested in the novels that he treats—Don
Quixote, Emma, Anna Karenina, Ulysses, and Gravity's Rainbow—will
find Smith's discussion of them perceptive, informed, theoretically
sophisticated, and unforbiddingly readable."—Wallace Martin, University
of Toledo
Literary Realism and the Ekphrastic Tradition examines representative
texts and the theories of realism upon which they are based. It
studies the foundations of these theories in the philosophies of
language contemporaneous with them. Beginning with Adamicism, Mack
Smith looks at the way humanist, rationalist, empiricist, Kantian,
positivist, and poststructuralist theories of language are textually
dramatized. He considers the cultural and personal influences that
affect historical notions of realism and reality. He also demonstrates
the rhetorical basis of realism by considering a mimetic device
used by novelists in rendering a faithful version of reality—ekphrasis, the narrative description of a work of art. Smith seeks a middle
ground between the extremes of theory and interpretation, discourse
and reality, and textualism and history, thus making an important
contribution to the revaluation of literary studies. |
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