Information Multiplicity
American Fiction in the Age of Media Saturation
Published on 3. July 1998
Book
Hardback
320 pages
978-0-8018-5704-1 (ISBN)
Description
This text describes how a new sort of fractilized realism has redefined thought itself - from the High Modernist "stream of consciousness" into what the machine psychologist Daniel Dennet refers to as "multiple drafts" or "circuits" operating concurrently in the human brain. In a series of close readings, the author traces how such a viral influx of information into human consciousness has been replicated in works by Thomas Pynchon ("Gravity's Rainbow" and "Vineland"), Joseph McElroy ("Lookout Cartridge"), William Gaddis ("J.R."), Don DeLillo ("Libra") and William Gibson ("Necromancer").
Reviews / Votes
Making thoughtful use of Deleuze, Guattari, and even Baudrillard, Johnston offers a learned yet clear analysis; this volume will become indispensable to college and university collections of literary criticism.-Choice
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Baltimore, MD
United States
Target group
College/higher education
Professional and scholarly
Dimensions
Height: 229 mm
Width: 152 mm
Thickness: 23 mm
Weight
590 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-8018-5704-1 (9780801857041)
DOI
10.56021/9780801857041
Copyright in bibliographic data is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or its licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Book
07/1998
Johns Hopkins University Press
€33.00
Article not available for order
E-Book
07/1998
Johns Hopkins University Press
€23.49
Available for download
Person
John Johnston teaches in the department of English at Emory University.
Content
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Part I: Writing (in) the Machinic Universe
Chapter 1. The Literary Assemblage: Writing Machines and Late Capitalism
Chapter 2. Information and Mediality: The Novel as Psychic Apparatus
Part II: The Novel of Information Multiplicity
Chapter 3. Rocket-State Assemblage: Gravity's Rainbow
Chapter 4. Narration, Delirium, Machinic Consciousness: Lookout Cartridge
Chapter 5. Capitalism and Entropic Flow: JR
Part III: The Novel of Media Assemblages
Chapter 6. Fictions of the Culture Medium: The Novels of Don DeLillo
Chapter 7. An American Book of the Dead: Media and Spectral Life in Vineland
Chapter 8. The Disappearance of Media: Cyberspace in Neuromancer
Coda. "Change for the Machines": The Complexity of Bodies in Synners
Notes
Index
Introduction
Part I: Writing (in) the Machinic Universe
Chapter 1. The Literary Assemblage: Writing Machines and Late Capitalism
Chapter 2. Information and Mediality: The Novel as Psychic Apparatus
Part II: The Novel of Information Multiplicity
Chapter 3. Rocket-State Assemblage: Gravity's Rainbow
Chapter 4. Narration, Delirium, Machinic Consciousness: Lookout Cartridge
Chapter 5. Capitalism and Entropic Flow: JR
Part III: The Novel of Media Assemblages
Chapter 6. Fictions of the Culture Medium: The Novels of Don DeLillo
Chapter 7. An American Book of the Dead: Media and Spectral Life in Vineland
Chapter 8. The Disappearance of Media: Cyberspace in Neuromancer
Coda. "Change for the Machines": The Complexity of Bodies in Synners
Notes
Index