Literary Darwinism: Evolution, Human Nature, and Literature

by Carroll,Joseph

• ISBN13: 9780415970136
• ISBN10: 041597013X
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2004-02-27
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

In Literary Darwinism, Carroll presents a comprehensive survey of this new movement with a collection of his most important previously published work, along with three new essays. The essays and reviews give commentary on all the major contributors to the field, situate the field as a whole in relation to historical trends and contemporary schools, provide Darwinist readings of major literary texts such as Pride and Prejudice and Tess of the d'Urbervilles, and analyze literary Darwinism in relation to the affiliated fields of evolutionary metaphysics, cognitive rhetoric, and ecocriticism. Collecting the essays in a single volume will provide a central point of reference for scholars interested in consulting what the "foremost practitioner" (New York Times) of Darwinian literary criticism has to say about his field.

Table of Contents

Introduction	vii
Acknowledgments	xxvii
Part 1: Mapping the Disciplinary Landscape
1 The Use of Arnold in a Darwinian World	3	(12)
2 Biology and Poststructuralism	15	(14)
3 "Theory," Anti-Theory, and Empirical Criticism	29	(12)
4 Out of Eden and to the Left: A Review of John Ellis's Literature Lost: Social Agendas and the Corruption of the Humanities	41	(4)
5 Literary Study and Evolutionary Theory: A Review of Books by Alexander Argyros, Walter Koch, Karl Kroeber, Robert Storey, Frederick Turner, and Mark Turner	45	(18)
6 Pinker, Dickens, and the Functions of Literature	63	(6)
7 Wilson's Consilience and Literary Study	69	(16)
8 Ecocriticism, Cognitive Ethology, and the Environments of Victorian Fiction	85	(18)
Part 2: Adaptationist Literary Studies: Theory and Practical Criticism
1 The Deep Structure of Literary Representations	103	(14)
2 Universals in Literary Study	117	(12)
3 Human Universals and Literary Meaning: A Sociobiological Critique of Pride and Prejudice, Villette, O Pioneers!, Anna of the Five Towns, and Tess of the d'Urbervilles	129	(18)
4 Organism, Environment, and Literature	147	(16)
5 Adaptationist Criteria of Literary Value: Assessing Kurten's Dance of the Tiger, Auel's The Clan of the Cave Bear, and Golding's The Inheritors	163	(24)
6 Human Nature and Literary Meaning: A Theoretical Model Illustrated with a Critique of Pride and Prejudice	187	(32)
Part 3: Darwin and Darwinism
1 The Origin of Charles Darwin: A Review of Three Darwin Biographies	219	(8)
2 Modern Darwinism and the Pseudo-Revolutions of Stephen Jay Gould	227	(20)
References	247	(18)
Index	265