Entangled Voices: Genre and the Religious Construction of the Self - Hardcover

Ruf, Frederick J.

 
9780195102635: Entangled Voices: Genre and the Religious Construction of the Self
Hardcover
ISBN 10: 0195102630 ISBN 13: 9780195102635
Verlag: Oxford University Press, 1997

Inhaltsangabe

In this book, Ruf tries to understand how the concepts of "voice" and "genre" function in texts. To this end, he joins literary theorists in the discussion about "narrative". Ruf rejects the idea of genre as a fixed historical form that serves as a template for readers and writers; instead, he suggests that we imagine different genres, whether narrative, lyric, or dramatic, as the expression of different voices. Each voice, he asserts, possesses different key qualities: embodiment, sociality, contextuality, and opacity in the dramatic voice; intimacy, limitation, urgency in lyric; and a "magisterial" quality of comprehensiveness and cohesiveness in narrative. These voices are models for our selves, composing an unruly and unstable multiplicity of selves. Ruf applies his theory of "voice" and "genre" to five texts: Dineson's Out of Africa, Donne's Holy Sonnets, Primo Levi's The Periodic Table, Robert Wilson's Einstein on the Beach, and Coleridge's Biographia Literaria. Through these literary works, he discerns the detailed ways in which a text constructs a voice and, in the process, a self. More importantly, Ruf demonstrates that this process is a religious one, fulfilling the function that religions traditionally assume: that of defining the self and its world.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Frederick J. Ruf is Associate Professor of Theology at Georgetown University.

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In this book, Ruf tries to understand how the concepts of "voice" and "genre" function in texts. To this end, he joins literary theorists in the discussion about "narrative". Ruf rejects the idea of genre as a fixed historical form that serves as a template for readers and writers; instead, he suggests that we imagine different genres, whether narrative, lyric, or dramatic, as the expression of different voices. Each voice, he asserts, possesses different key qualities: embodiment, sociality, contextuality, and opacity in the dramatic voice; intimacy, limitation, urgency in lyric; and a "magisterial" quality of comprehensiveness and cohesiveness in narrative. These voices are models for our selves, composing an unruly and unstable multiplicity of selves. Ruf applies his theory of "voice" and "genre" to five texts: Dineson's Out of Africa, Donne's Holy Sonnets, Primo Levi's The Periodic Table, Robert Wilson's Einstein on the Beach, and Coleridge's Biographia Literaria. Through these literary works, he discerns the detailed ways in which a text constructs a voice and, in the process, a self. More importantly, Ruf demonstrates that this process is a religious one, fulfilling the function that religions traditionally assume: that of defining the self and its world.

„Über diesen Titel“ kann sich auf eine andere Ausgabe dieses Titels beziehen.

Verlag
Oxford University Press
Erscheinungsdatum
1997
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0195102630
ISBN 13 
9780195102635
Einband
Gebundene Ausgabe
Anzahl der Seiten
136
Kontakt zum Hersteller
preigu GmbH & Co. KG
mail@preigu.de

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