Modernism, Fiction and Mathematics

Reviews / Votes

[The book] does not force mathematical concepts on literary works, but analyses texts which are deeply concerned with mathematics and its role in our approach to physical reality, but also as a cultural expression and even moral guideline. It is truly interdisciplinary, i. e. it does not rely on popularizations of science or previous works in the field of 'science and literature' but turns to the original source texts and to research from historians of science for the reconstruction of the relevant mathematical concepts and theories. -- Dirk Vanderbeke * Anglia * this is the guidebook to get if you want to make a first step into mathematical territory from that of literature....Engelhardt's mathematical interpretation sheds light on what would remain obscure to most readers by deftly outlining the historical debates that inform the fictional text, but she also interprets these mathematical concerns in fictional terms and thus offers a fresh perspective on the larger modernist crisis of representation....a well-written, thoughtful study whose scope radiates beyond its immediate focus and hopefully will have an impact in more than one scholarly context -- Sascha Poehlmann * Anglistik * Wide-ranging in its interdisciplinary foci and treatment of modernism, Modernism, Fiction, and Mathematics convincingly demonstrates the presence of mathematics in modernist literature and postmodernist reconsiderations of modernism. -- Rebecah Pulsifer, Ohio Federation of Teachers * JML 43.2 * Contrasting [Pynchon] to Broch and Musil, comparing modernist to post-modernist writing, makes Engelhardt's book a gem among the few studies linking mathematics and literature. -- Johann A. Makowsky * Notices of the American Mathematical Society * Modernism, Fiction and Mathematics, published in the Edinburgh Critical Studies in Modernist Culture series, is a valuable addition to this collection of monographs on modernist art in its intersection with the contextual foundations of material culture, science, philosophy and the like. -- Sergej Macura, University of Belgrade, RS * Orbit: A Journal of American Literature, 7(1): 8, 1-49 * Persuasively and engagingly, Nina Engelhardt demonstrates that modernism's relation to contemporary mathematics was often more analogous than adversarial. This fascinating study extends understanding of modernism within its historical and cultural context, opening up a seldom-explored area through incisive critical discussion of mathematics and narrative innovation. * Randall Stevenson, University of Edinburgh *