Middlebrow Matters

Middlebrow is a derogatory word that connotes blandness, mediocrity and a failed aspiration to ‘high’ culture. However, when appropriated as a positive term to denote that wide swathe of literature between the challenging experimentalism of the high and the formulaic drive of the popular, it enables...

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מחבר ראשי: Holmes, Diana
פורמט: Online
שפה:אנגלית
יצא לאור: Liverpool University Press 2021
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גישה מקוונת:1004081
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author Holmes, Diana
author_browse Holmes, Diana
author_facet Holmes, Diana
author_sort Holmes, Diana
collection Directory of Open Access Books
description Middlebrow is a derogatory word that connotes blandness, mediocrity and a failed aspiration to ‘high’ culture. However, when appropriated as a positive term to denote that wide swathe of literature between the challenging experimentalism of the high and the formulaic drive of the popular, it enables a rethinking of the literary canon from the point of view of what most readers actually read, a criterion curiously absent from dominant definitions of literary value. Since women have long formed a majority of the nation’s reading public, this perspective immediately feminises what has always been a very male canon. Opening with a theorisation of the concept of middlebrow that mounts a defence of some literary qualities disdained by modernism, the book then focuses on a series of case studies of periods (the Belle Époque, inter-war, early twenty-first century), authors (including Colette, Irène Nemirovsky, Françoise Sagan, Anna Gavalda) and the middlebrow nature of literary prizes.
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spelling doab-20.500.12854ir-364342025-07-31T10:59:28Z Middlebrow Matters Holmes, Diana Languages Literary studies fiction novelists & prose writers France English French thema EDItEUR::D Biography, Literature and Literary studies::DS Literature: history and criticism::DSK Literary studies: fiction, novelists and prose writers Middlebrow is a derogatory word that connotes blandness, mediocrity and a failed aspiration to ‘high’ culture. However, when appropriated as a positive term to denote that wide swathe of literature between the challenging experimentalism of the high and the formulaic drive of the popular, it enables a rethinking of the literary canon from the point of view of what most readers actually read, a criterion curiously absent from dominant definitions of literary value. Since women have long formed a majority of the nation’s reading public, this perspective immediately feminises what has always been a very male canon. Opening with a theorisation of the concept of middlebrow that mounts a defence of some literary qualities disdained by modernism, the book then focuses on a series of case studies of periods (the Belle Époque, inter-war, early twenty-first century), authors (including Colette, Irène Nemirovsky, Françoise Sagan, Anna Gavalda) and the middlebrow nature of literary prizes. 2021-02-10T12:58:18Z 2019-01-22 23:55 2018-12-01 23:55:55 2020-03-16 03:00:26 2020-04-01T10:56:54Z 2018-10-31 book 1004081 OCN: 1100490961 http://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/26001 9781786949523 https://directory.doabooks.org/handle/20.500.12854/36434 eng Contemporary French and Francophone Cultures open access image/jpeg image/jpeg image/jpeg image/jpeg image/jpeg n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/20.500.12657/26001/1/1004081.pdf https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/20.500.12657/26001/1/1004081.pdf https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/20.500.12657/26001/1/1004081.pdf https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/20.500.12657/26001/1/1004081.pdf https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/20.500.12657/26001/1/1004081.pdf Liverpool University Press 10.2307/j.ctvt1sk8w 10.2307/j.ctvt1sk8w aa5f0a3b-b4a0-4754-9840-b645b364c5ef Knowledge Unlatched b818ba9d-2dd9-4fd7-a364-7f305aef7ee9 9781786949523 Knowledge Unlatched (KU) KU Select 2018: HSS Frontlist Books Liverpool 102590 KU Select 2018: HSS Frontlist Books open access
spellingShingle Languages
Literary studies
fiction
novelists & prose writers
France
English
French
thema EDItEUR::D Biography, Literature and Literary studies::DS Literature: history and criticism::DSK Literary studies: fiction, novelists and prose writers
Holmes, Diana
Middlebrow Matters
title Middlebrow Matters
title_full Middlebrow Matters
title_fullStr Middlebrow Matters
title_full_unstemmed Middlebrow Matters
title_short Middlebrow Matters
title_sort middlebrow matters
topic Languages
Literary studies
fiction
novelists & prose writers
France
English
French
thema EDItEUR::D Biography, Literature and Literary studies::DS Literature: history and criticism::DSK Literary studies: fiction, novelists and prose writers
topic_facet Languages
Literary studies
fiction
novelists & prose writers
France
English
French
thema EDItEUR::D Biography, Literature and Literary studies::DS Literature: history and criticism::DSK Literary studies: fiction, novelists and prose writers
url 1004081
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