The Making of London London in Contemporary Literature

by Groes, Sebastian

• ISBN13: 9780230348363
• ISBN10: 023034836X
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2011-09-15
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan

Summary

London has become the focus of a ferocious imaginative energy since the rise of Thatcher. The Making of Londonanalyses the body of work by writers who have committed their writing to the many lives of a city undergoing complex transformations, tracing a major shift in the representation of the capital city.

Author Biography

Sebastian Groes is Senior Lecturer in English Literature at Roehampton University, London, UK He has written extensively on modern and contemporary fiction, the London novel, and edited collections including Ian McEwan (2009) Kazuo Ishiguro (2010),Julian Barnes (2011) and Kazuo Ishiguro, New Critical Visions of the Novels (Palgrave,2011).

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Acknowledgements
List of Abbreviations
Introduction From 'ellowen deeowen' to 'Babylondon': London is a Language
'Fabricked Out Of Literature and Myth': Maureen Duffy's Londons
'Of Real Experience Mixed with Myth': Michael Moorcock 
'A Zoo fit for Psychopaths': J.G. Ballard versus London
'Struck Out of Pure Invention': Iain Sinclair's London
'In Pre-ordained Patterns': Peter Ackroyd's London Palimpsests
'Beyond the Responsibility of Place': Ian McEwan's Londons
'In a Prose so Diagonal and Mood Warped': Martin Amis's London Scatology
'Through a Confusion of Languages': Salman Rushdie and Hanif Kureishi
'Kyan you imagine dat?': The New London Languages of Zadie Smith and Monica Ali
Conclusion: London Undone?
Chronology of Contemporary London
Notes
Bibliography
Index