New Books In Literary Studies

Though most renowned for his award-winning Tibetan films, Pema Tseden, is also a prolific author and translator. Enticement(State University of New York Press 2018) is a collection of Pema Tseden’s short stories edited and translated by Patricia Schiaffini-Vedani and Michael Monhart, with assistance from Southwest University’s Carl Robertson and INALCO’s Francoise Robin. Along with a translator’s introduction and author’s preface, the 10 short stories selected with input from the author himself range from the realistic to the fantastic.  For the more realistic stories, lovingly playful descriptions of everyday Tibetan life bring a relatively apolitical look at contemporary Tibetan experience that defies simplistic interpretation. In the more fantastic stories, some of the same issues appear through descriptions that are stubbornly not realistic. Throughout the stories a narrative style and thematic influences from Tibetan oral traditions, his portrayal of media within media, and his tendency to use concl

Studies of Hindu saints tend to focus primarily on the saints themselves—their words, teachings, and practices—rather than tending to the often complex and complicated world of texts and traditions about those saints—which is how we have come to know them. Even when hagiographical writings are addressed, more often than not such writings are presumed to belong to a monolithic tradition in which certain texts simply contain more information or stories about the saints than others. In Śiva’s Saints: The Origins of Devotion in Kannada according to Harihara’s Ragaḷegaḷu (Oxford University Press, 2018), Gil Ben-Herut, Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at the University of South Florida, challenges such presumptions through his close examination of the text and contexts of the 12th-century Vīraśaiva hagiographical text Ragaḷegaḷu written in Kannada by Harihara. Providing theoretical insight into notions of sainthood itself as well as the politics of commemoration and the contentious worlds of ever-changing r

When and where did Jesus offer himself to God? What role does Jesus’ death play in his high-priestly self-offering in heaven? Answering these questions are crucial for understanding the book of Hebrews rightly. Tune in as R. B. Jamieson answers those questions, as we talk about his recent book: Jesus’ Death and Heavenly Offering in Hebrews (Cambridge University Press, 2019).R. B. Jamieson is an associate pastor of Capitol Hill Baptist Church in Washington, DC. He earned an MDiv and ThM from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, and a PhD in New Testament from the University of Cambridge, where he also taught Greek. In addition to his published doctoral work, he is the author of a variety of books including Understanding Baptism and Understanding the Lord’s Supper.Michael Morales is Professor of Biblical Studies at Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, and the author of The Tabernacle Pre-Figured: Cosmic Mountain Ideology in Genesis and Exodus(Peeters, 2012), and Who Shall Ascend the Mountain of t

Richard Gombrich's new book, Buddhism and Pali (Mud Pie Slices, 2018), puts the richness of the Pali language on display. He introduces the reader to the origins of Pali, its linguistic character, and the style of Pali literature. Far more than just an introductory book, Richard argues not only that the Pali Canon records the words of the Buddha, but that the Buddha himself is responsible for the Pali language. Richard shows that by learning about Pali, we learn about the spirit of Buddhism itself.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In On the Mediterranean and the Nile: The Jews of Egypt (Indiana University Press, 2017),  Aimée Israel-Pelletier, Professor and Head of French at the University of Texas at Arlington, looks at the work of five Egyptian Jewish writers. She confronts issues of identity, exile, language, immigration, Arab nationalism, European colonialism, and discourse on the Holocaust. Israel-Pelletier's volume is a hugely important part of the project recovering and transmitting Egyptian Jewish life and thought.Max Kaiser is a PhD candidate at the University of Melbourne. He can be reached at kaiser@student.unimelb.edu.au. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What might Levi-Strauss and structuralism have to offer to psychoanalysis beyond the incest prohibition and the Oedipus complex? What happens if we understand Lacan’s notion of the symbolic as creative, rather than prohibitory? And what’s the difference between the psychoanalyst and the shaman? Shanna de la Torre’s Sex for Structuralists: The Non-Oedipal Logics of Femininity and Psychosis (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018) performs a careful reading of Freudian, Lacanian and structuralist texts in order to offer a new way of conceiving of the objects and aims of psychoanalysis today. Alongside it she introduces us to an alternative perspective on Lacan emerging from analysts associated with GIFRIC, a Lacanian school based in Quebec. Listen in as we work our way through some of the book’s major concerns and their implications for theory and practice. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/literary-studies

Today, we're talking to Janelle Adsit about her book, Toward an Inclusive Creative Writing (Bloomsbury, 2017). In it, Adsit takes a hard look at the way American colleges and universities teach creative writing. What do students who enter creative-writing classrooms encounter as these young men and women hope to discover who they are and can be as writers? Does the teaching they receive help or hinder them? As Adsit’s title suggests, one of the problems she’s found with writing instruction in our institutions is that it’s too exclusive, too centered on limited and limiting ideas of what counts as good writing and, by extension, who can be good writers. Too often, in writing classrooms across the country, students encounter models that are predominately male and predominately white. How, Adsit asks, can we foster the writing of students who don’t identify with these models? How can we guide our students to write from and give voice to their own diversity? At stake in these questions is not merely the experienc

How can detective fiction explain the social world? In Detecting the Social: Order and Disorder in Post-1970s Detective Fiction(Palgrave Macmillan, 2019), Mary Evans and Hazel Johnstone, both from the London School of Economics' Department of Gender Studies,  and Sarah Moore, a Senior Lecturer at the University of Bath's Department of Social and Policy Sciences, set out a radical agenda for contemporary social theory grounded in an analysis of detective fiction since the 1970s. The book uses a range of examples from the genre, as well as comparative discussions with previous eras of detective fiction. In doing so, the book demonstrates how questions of modernity, globalisation, trust in institutions, blame and responsibility, gender and gender relations, along with the rise of neoliberalism and the transformation of the social state since the 1970s can be understood through key works such as Larsson's Millennium Trilogy. By showing an alternative to 'unpeopled' social theories, the book will be key readi

It's often touted that Rumi is one of the best-selling poets in the United States. That may be the case but popular renderings of the writings of this 13th-century Muslim have largely detached him from the Islamic tradition, and specifically Sufi mysticism. In Radical Love: Teachings from the Islamic Mystical Tradition (Yale University Press, 2018), Omid Safi, Professor of Islamic Studies at Duke University, places Jalal al-Din alongside luminaries within the rich archive of Islamic Sufi poetry. In this anthology of newly translated poetry Safi focuses on love, especially ‘ishq/eshq, what he renders as “radical love.” The volume organizes translations of Qur’an and Hadith, Sufi mystics and poets into four thematic sections: God of Love, Path of Love, Lover & Beloved, and Beloved Community. Radical Love does an excellent job of introducing readers to key ideas from Islamic mysticism that are rooted in first hand knowledge of Arabic and Persian texts. This book is valuable to both the scholar and the student be

Is repetition always bad? The Letter to the Hebrews lies at the heart of a tradition that views repetition always negative. But is this the best understanding of Hebrews? Nicholas Moore says, ‘No.’ Tune in as we talk with Nicholas J. Moore about his recent book, Repetition in Hebrews: Plurality and Singularity in the Letter to the Hebrews, Its Ancient Context, and the Early Church (Mohr Siebeck, 2015). In this special double-feature interview, we will also discuss Albert Vanhoye’s A Perfect Priest: Studies in the Letter to the Hebrews, co-edited and co-translated by Nicholas Moore and Richard Ounsworth.Reverend Dr. Nicolas Moore is Director of the MA Programmes at Cranmer Hall, and teaches Practical Theology, Anglicanism, and Biblical Studies and Patristics.Michael Morales is Professor of Biblical Studies at Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, and the author of The Tabernacle Pre-Figured: Cosmic Mountain Ideology in Genesis and Exodus (Peeters, 2012), and Who Shall Ascend the Mountain of the Lord?:

Alan Jacobs is a renowned literary critic, with a talent for writing that books that speak to our current predicaments. A professor at Baylor University, his recent work includes a “biography” of the Book of Common Prayer, a discussion of The Pleasures of Reading in an Age of Distraction and How to Think: A Survival Guide for a World at Odds. Today we catch up with Professor Jacobs to discuss his most recent publication, The Year of Our Lord 1943: Christian Humanism in an Age of Crisis (Oxford University Press, 2018). Drawing on interventions made at the height of global war by T. S. Eliot, W. H. Auden, C. S. Lewis, Simone Weil and Jacques Maritain, Jacobs shows how leading intellectuals worried about a world in crisis and how they imagined it might be set right.Crawford Gribben is a professor of history at Queen’s University Belfast. His research interests focus on the history of puritanism and evangelicalism, and he is the author most recently of John Owen and English Puritanism (Oxford University Press, 20

Denis Diderot has long been regarded as one of the leading figures of the French Enlightenment, thanks to his editorship of the influential multi-volume Encyclopédie. As Andrew S. Curran explains in his biography Diderot and the Art of Thinking Freely (Other Press, 2019) however, this was just one product of his wide-ranging literary efforts. The son of a cutler, Diderot underwent training for a life in the church, only to abandon it for an uncertain literary career. Initially finding success as a translator, his early works gained Diderot both acclaim and led to his imprisonment for several months. It was soon after his release that Diderot began work on the Encyclopédie, a years-long project that proved an important vehicle for spreading many of the ideas of the Enlightenment. Curran demonstrates that editing the Encyclopédie served as a way for Diderot to advance his views while avoiding the brunt of the controversy they engendered, with many of his later, often radical works not published until many years

Victoria Brownlee is the author of an exciting new contribution to discussions of early modern religion and literature. Her new book, Biblical Readings and Literary Writings in Early Modern England, 1558-1625 (Oxford University Press, 2018), offers an illuminating account of how, why, when, where and by whom Bibles were read in early modern England, as well as a series of case studies of particular characters or passages in the Old and New Testaments. Why did Bible reading matter so much in the England of Elizabeth I and James VI/I? Did it matter that the Bible was an illustrated text? Why did expositors work so hard to limit the language of the Song of Songs, when creative writers worked so hard to expand its reference? Join us on this podcast as Dr. Brownlee suggests answers to these and other questions about readings of the Bible in early modern England.Crawford Gribben is a professor of history at Queen’s University Belfast. His research interests focus on the history of puritanism and evangelicalism, and

This 2018 reprint of Little Man, Little Man exemplifies communal and collaborative textual production. The story was written by James Baldwin and illustrated by French artist Yoran Cazac. It was published in 1976 and then went out of print. In this new edition, scholars Nicholas Boggs and Jennifer DeVere Brody write the introduction, while Baldwin’s nephew and niece, Tejan Karefa-Smart and Aisha Karefa-Smart write the foreword and afterword respectively. In Little Man, Little Man, which Baldwin alternately described as a children’s book for adults and an adults’ book for children, we see a slice of a Harlem neighborhood through the eyes of young TJ. The story presents a complex and multifaceted vision of black childhood in America and nudges the contemporary reader to think critically about what it means to see through the eyes of a child and to be seen by those in one’s world.Nicholas Boggs was an undergraduate at Yale when he discovered James Baldwin's out-of-print "children's book for adults," Little Man,

From Indonesia’s declaration of independence in 1945 up until today, the relationship between Indonesian nationalism, Islam, and modernity has been a key subject of debate. One of the central figures in this debate was the great writer, journalist, public intellectual – and pious Muslim from Minangkabau, West Sumatra, Haji Abdul Malik Karim Amrullah, better known by his pen-name, Hamka. Largely self-taught, Hamka was one of Indonesia’s most prolific writers. Between the 1920s and his death in 1981 he penned novels, short stories, biographies, memoirs, self-help books, travel books, histories, and many studies of Islam, including a famous thirty-volume commentary on the Qur’an. In Hamka's Great Story: A Master Writer’s Vision of Islam for Modern Indonesia (University of Wisconsin Press, 2016), James R. Rush traces the development of Hamka’s thinking as expressed through these works against the backdrop of Indonesia’s tumultuous modern history, including late Dutch colonial rule, the Japanese occupation, the In

In her new book, Mandarin Brazil: Race, Representation, and Memory (Stanford University Press, 2018), Ana Paulina Lee (Columbia University) analyzes representations of the Chinese in Brazilian culture to understand their significance for Brazilian nation-building in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Lee has assembled a multidisciplinary archive encompassing literature, visual culture, theater, popular music, and diplomatic correspondence. Although their numbers in Brazil were not as large as immigration from Japan, the Chinese were nevertheless portrayed as non-white, sexually deviant, and unfree labor—in sum, a threat to dominant ideologies of branqueamento (racial whitening) and mestiço nationalism. Attentive to events and perspectives on both sides of the Pacific Ocean, Lee makes a distinctive contribution to the growing literature on Asian American history and cultural studies beyond North America and the Caribbean.Ian Shin is an assistant professor of American culture at the University of Michigan.Learn

As scholars and readers, we often view literary history in rigid, simplistic terms. We imagine that nineteenth-century aesthetic and thematic preoccupations withered away as 1899 became 1900, only to be replaced immediately by a new literature of the twentieth century. In their dynamic, wide-ranging collection Melanie V. Dawson and Meredith L. Goldsmith challenge this conventional understanding of American literary history. Drawing together a diverse range of essays focused on iconic turn-of-the century writers such as Edith Wharton, Jack London and Sarah Piatt, as well as lesser-known authors like Jessie Fauset and Laura Jean Libbey, American Literary History and the Turn toward Modernity (University Press of Florida, 2018) encourages readers to reconsider their understanding of literary “modernity.” The essays contained in this wonderful new collection, published just this year by the University Press of Florida, interrogate the popular construction of literary culture between 1880 and 1930. Paying close at

McKenzie Wark’s new book offers 21 focused studies of thinkers working in a wide range of fields who are worth your attention. The chapters of General Intellects: Twenty-One Thinkers for the Twenty-First Century (Verso, 2017) introduce readers to important work in Anglophone cultural studies, psychoanalysis, political theory, media theory, speculative realism, science studies, Italian and French workerist and autonomist thought, two “imaginative readings of Marx,” and two “unique takes on the body politic.” There are significant implications of these ideas for how we live and work at the contemporary university, and we discussed some of those in our conversation. This is a great book to read and to teach with! Carla Nappi is the Andrew W. Mellon Chair in the Department of History at the University of Pittsburgh. You can learn more about her and her work here.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Alec Nevala-Lee’s Astounding is the first comprehensive biography of John W. Campbell, who, as a writer and magazine editor, wielded enormous influence over the field of science fiction in the mid-20th century.“His interests, his obsessions, and his prejudices shaped what science fiction was going to be,” Nevala-Lee says.Many people are familiar with Campbell’s name because it’s on the award given out every year by the World Science Fiction Society—the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. (This year, the award went to Rebecca Roanhorse, who was on the podcast in September; other winners who’ve been on the show include Ada Palmer, Andy Weir, and Mur Lafferty.)From 1937 through the 1960s, Campbell used the magazine Astounding Science Fiction (now named Analog) to popularize science fiction and its potential to predict the future. But he also used the magazine to promote pseudosciences (like psionics and dianetics), and his legacy is tarnished by views that were “clearly racist.”“He was quite content to k

What can the Weimar Republic teach us about how democracies fail? How could the same vibrancy that gave us cultural touchstones spawn Nazism? In his new book Weimar Germany: Promise and Tragedy (Princeton University Press, 2018), Eric D. Weitz challenges the belief that the fledgling democracy was doomed to fail. In an encompassing examination of the short-lived republic’s political, economic, intellectual, and cultural life, Eric skillfully weaves vivid stories into a overarching narrative. History does not repeat itself, but it does rhyme, and Weimar Germany has much to say that echoes in the here and now. Eric D. Weitz is Distinguished Professor of History and the former Dean of Humanities and Arts at the City College of New York (CCNY). He has been the recipient of many fellowships and awards including the German Academic Exchange Service, the Guggenheim Foundation, and National Endowment for the Humanities. Weitz’s academic work and public engagement covers the Holocaust, the Armenian Genocide, and the g