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Description
Postmodern fiction presents a challenge to the reader: instead of
enjoying it passively, the reader has to work to understand its
meanings, to think about what fiction is, and to question their own
responses. Yet this very challenge makes postmodern writing so much fun
to read and rewarding to study. Unlike most introductions to
postmodernism and fiction, this book places the emphasis on literature
rather than theory. It introduces the most prominent British and
American novelists associated with postmodernism, from the 'pioneers',
Beckett, Borges and Burroughs, to important post-war writers such as
Pynchon, Carter, Atwood, Morrison, Gibson, Auster, DeLillo, and Ellis.
Designed for students and clearly written, this Introduction explains
the preoccupations, styles and techniques that unite postmodern authors.
Their work is characterized by a self-reflexive acknowledgement of its
status as fiction, and by the various ways in which it challenges
readers to question common-sense and commonplace assumptions about
literature.
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