
Character as Form
Aaron Kunin(Author)
Bloomsbury Academic (Publisher)
Published on 7. March 2019
Book
Paperback/Softback
248 pages
978-1-4742-2272-3 (ISBN)
Description
What if the Renaissance had the right idea about character? Most readers today think that characters are individuals. Poets of the Renaissance understood characters as types. They thought the job of a character was to collect every example of a kind, in the same way that an entry in a dictionary collects definitions of a word.
Character as Form celebrates the old meaning of character. The advantage of the old meaning is that it allows for generalization. Characters funnel whole societies of beings into shapes that are compact, elegant, and portable.
This book tests the old meaning of character against modern examples from poems, novels, comics, and performances in theater and film by Shakespeare, Moliere, Austen, the Marx Brothers, Raul Ruiz, Denton Welch, and Lynda Barry. The heart of the book is the character of the misanthrope, who, in Shakespeare's phrase, "banishes the world."
Character as Form celebrates the old meaning of character. The advantage of the old meaning is that it allows for generalization. Characters funnel whole societies of beings into shapes that are compact, elegant, and portable.
This book tests the old meaning of character against modern examples from poems, novels, comics, and performances in theater and film by Shakespeare, Moliere, Austen, the Marx Brothers, Raul Ruiz, Denton Welch, and Lynda Barry. The heart of the book is the character of the misanthrope, who, in Shakespeare's phrase, "banishes the world."
Reviews / Votes
Idiosyncratic, often brilliant. * New York Review of Books * The extraordinary value of Kunin's book lies in his sensitivity to these aesthetic codes, to the way that artworks selectively augment and mute different aspects of their subjects. This is how content happens, and Kunin has an extremely good ear (and eye) for it. * Los Angeles Review of Books * Character as Form is a bracingly original study of narrative character. * Modern Philology * Throughout, [Kunin's] analysis is acute and lucid. * Times Literary Supplement * Combine[s] moments of thoughtful close reading with a vast and eclectic corpus is impressive; perhaps its most useful and intriguing contribution is the notion that ideas of 'character' not only permeate and shape our engagement with fictional people but also underpin their engagements with each other. * Modern Language Review *More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Target group
Professional and scholarly
College/higher education
Illustrations
20 bw illus
Dimensions
Height: 198 mm
Width: 129 mm
Thickness: 14 mm
Weight
270 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-4742-2272-3 (9781474222723)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

Aaron Kunin
Character as Form
E-Book
03/2019
1st Edition
Bloomsbury Academic
€30.99
Available for download

Aaron Kunin
Character as Form
E-Book
03/2019
1st Edition
Bloomsbury Academic
€30.99
Available for download
Person
Aaron Kunin is Associate Professor of English, Pomona College, USA. He is the author of two books of poetry, Folding Ruler Star: Poems (2005) and The Sore Throat and Other Poems (2010) and a novel, The Mandarin (2008).
Content
Introduction
1. Many is not more than one
2. Banish the world
3. What fiction means
4. The wish to be an object
Acknowledgments
Works cited
Index
1. Many is not more than one
2. Banish the world
3. What fiction means
4. The wish to be an object
Acknowledgments
Works cited
Index