Everyday Stories: The Literary Agenda by Rachel Bowlby (English) Paperback Book

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Ordinary life is full of words, images, and stories: we spend our days talking and writing about what's going on, and what has happened. Rachel Bowlby makes us think again about this life: always the same, always slightly changing. Drawing out the stories that surround us, she explores everyday stories, old and new--in literature and in real life.

FORMATPaperback LANGUAGEEnglish CONDITIONBrand New Publisher Description

The Literary Agenda is a series of short polemical monographs about the importance of literature and of reading in the wider world and about the state of literary education inside schools and universities. The category of 'the literary' has always been contentious. What is clear, however, is how increasingly it is dismissed or is unrecognised as a way of thinking or an arena for thought. It is sceptically challenged from within, for example, by the sometimes rivalclaims of cultural history, contextualized explanation, or media studies. It is shaken from without by even greater pressures: by economic exigency and the severe social attitudes that can follow fromit; by technological change that may leave the traditional forms of serious human communication looking merely antiquated. For just these reasons this is the right time for renewal, to start reinvigorated work into the meaning and value of literary reading.We live in days, no leaving them or choosing them. What's in a day? With their natural narrative arc they begin and they end, and in between we talk about how they are going or wonder 'where' they have gone. They eachhave their small stories, non-stories, ephemeral stories. So every day slips by, most days much like most other days. We eat, we sleep, we go to work; we endure, enjoy, continue. Day after day, daybefore day, it is the recurring of no particular story in endless, beginningless succession. At the same time, any single day is also a unique date, with its multi-digit identity, its moment-at last, and never again-of here and now, today. And on longer scales, the slow small shifts of ordinary days and their surrounding stories will eventually remake the days that have been and gone as the times that are no more. An ordinary day from decades, let alone centuries ago mustnow be a 'once' long passed away, the old days to be regretted-or to be revived in all the curiosity of their historical difference.Everyday Stories makes us think again aboutthe ordinary life we are in, day after day and day by day: always the same, and always slightly changing. Entering into the single day, drawing out the stories that surround us, this book goes into everyday stories of many descriptions, old and new: both in literature and in that story-laden place and time we call real life.

Author Biography

Rachel Bowlby has taught at the University of Sussex, the University of Oxford, and the University of York, as well as at Princeton University and UCL. She is the author of books on the history of shopping; on Virginia Woolf and feminist criticism; on psychoanalysis and Greek tragedy in relation to changing family forms in the contemporary world; and, most recently, on ideas of parenthood.

Table of Contents

Introduction1: The Daily Narrative Journey2: Commuting3: Numbered Days and Diaries4: Single Men and Single Days5: How Not to be Parented: Speech Creatures in Pamela and Pride and Prejudice6: The Psychological Moment7: Marion Milner's Days of One's Own8: 'An Ordinary Mind on an Ordinary Day'9: Woolf's Untold Stories10: ConsumingAcknowledgementsBibliography

Review

This is a stylish book, full of pleasures ... a sharp and intelligent account of seemingly familiar worlds. * Sophie Ratcliffe, Times Literary Supplement *thought provoking book * David Marx *a wonderfully provocative speculation and a reminder of how exceptional, not everyday, Bowlby's thinking is at its best. * Shahidha Bari, Times Higher Education *

Promotional

Illuminates the connections between real life and the literary

Long Description

The Literary Agenda is a series of short polemical monographs about the importance of literature and of reading in the wider world and about the state of literary education inside schools and universities. The category of 'the literary' has always been contentious. What is clear, however, is how increasingly it is dismissed or is unrecognised as a way of thinking or an arena for thought. It is sceptically challenged from within, for example, by the sometimes rivalclaims of cultural history, contextualized explanation, or media studies. It is shaken from without by even greater pressures: by economic exigency and the severe social attitudes that can follow fromit; by technological change that may leave the traditional forms of serious human communication looking merely antiquated. For just these reasons this is the right time for renewal, to start reinvigorated work into the meaning and value of literary reading.We live in days, no leaving them or choosing them. What's in a day? With their natural narrative arc they begin and they end, and in between we talk about how they are going or wonder 'where' they have gone. They eachhave their small stories, non-stories, ephemeral stories. So every day slips by, most days much like most other days. We eat, we sleep, we go to work; we endure, enjoy, continue. Day after day, daybefore day, it is the recurring of no particular story in endless, beginningless succession. At the same time, any single day is also a unique date, with its multi-digit identity, its moment-at last, and never again-of here and now, today. And on longer scales, the slow small shifts of ordinary days and their surrounding stories will eventually remake the days that have been and gone as the times that are no more. An ordinary day from decades, let alone centuries ago mustnow be a 'once' long passed away, the old days to be regretted-or to be revived in all the curiosity of their historical difference.Everyday Stories makes us think again aboutthe ordinary life we are in, day after day and day by day: always the same, and always slightly changing. Entering into the single day, drawing out the stories that surround us, this book goes into everyday stories of many descriptions, old and new: both in literature and in that story-laden place and time we call real life.

Review Quote

"This is a stylish book, full of pleasures...this is a sharp and intelligent account of seemingly familiar worlds." --Times Literary Supplement "thought provoking book" --David Marx "a wonderfully provocative speculation and a reminder of how exceptional, not everyday, Bowlby's thinking is at its best." --Shahidha Bari, Times Higher Education

Feature

Draws attention to a fascinating subject, known to everyone but previously unexploredIlluminates the connections between real life and the literaryWritten in a clear and engaging style

Details ISBN0198727690 Author Rachel Bowlby Publisher Oxford University Press Series The Literary Agenda Year 2016 ISBN-10 0198727690 ISBN-13 9780198727699 Format Paperback Pages 208 Media Book Imprint Oxford University Press Subtitle The Literary Agenda Place of Publication Oxford Country of Publication United Kingdom DEWEY 809.05 Short Title EVERYDAY STORIES Language English Birth 1957 Affiliation University College London Publication Date 2016-06-23 UK Release Date 2016-06-23 AU Release Date 2016-06-23 NZ Release Date 2016-06-23 Audience Undergraduate We've got this

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