Focusing on the lineage of pivotal African American and Irish women writers, the author argues that these authors often employ strategies of indirection, via folkloric expression, when exploring unpopular topics. This strategy holds the attention of readers who would otherwise reject the subject matter. The author traces the line of descent from Mary Lavin to Éilís Ní Dhuibhne and from Zora Neale Hurston to Toni Morrison, showing how obstacles to free expression, though varying from those Lavin and Hurston faced, are still encountered by Morrison and Ní Dhuibhne. The basis for comparing these authors lies in the strategies of indirection they use, as influenced by folklore. The folkloric characters these authors depict-wild denizens of the Otherworld and wise women of various traditions-help their creators insert controversy into fiction in ways that charm rather than alienate readers. Forms of rhetorical indirection that appear in the context of folklore, such as signifying practices, masking, sly civility, and the grotesque or bizarre, come out of the mouths and actions of these writers' magical and magisterial characters. Old traditions can offer new ways of discussing issues such as sexual expression, religious beliefs, or issues of reproduction. As differences between times and cultures affect what "can" and "cannot" be said, folkloric indirection may open up a vista to discourses of which we as readers may not even be aware. Finally, the folk women of Morrison, Ní Dhuibhne, Hurston, and Lavin open up new points of entry to the discussion of fiction, rhetoric, censorship, and folklore.

Focusing on the lineage of pivotal African American and Irish women writers, Jacqueline Fulmer argues that these authors often employ strategies of indirection, via folkloric expression, when exploring unpopular topics. This strategy holds the attention of readers who would otherwise reject the subject matter. Fulmer traces the line of descent from Mary Lavin to Éilís Ní Dhuibhne and from Zora Neale Hurston to Toni Morrison, showing how obstacles to free expression, though varying from those Lavin and Hurston faced, are still encountered by Morrison and Ní Dhuibhne. The basis for comparing these authors lies in the strategies of indirection they use, as influenced by folklore. The folkloric characters these authors depict-wild denizens of the Otherworld and wise women of various traditions-help their creators insert controversy into fiction in ways that charm rather than alienate readers. Forms of rhetorical indirection that appear in the context of folklore, such as signifying practices, masking, sly civility, and the grotesque or bizarre, come out of the mouths and actions of these writers' magical and magisterial characters. Old traditions can offer new ways of discussing issues such as sexual expression, religious beliefs, or issues of reproduction. As differences between times and cultures affect what "can" and "cannot" be said, folkloric indirection may open up a vista to discourses of which we as readers may not even be aware. Finally, the folk women of Morrison, Ní Dhuibhne, Hurston, and Lavin open up new points of entry to the discussion of fiction, rhetoric, censorship, and folklore

Focusing on the lineage of pivotal African American and Irish women writers, Jaqueline Fulmer argues that these authors often employ strategies of indirection, by way of expressions of folklore, when exploring unpopular topics, to attract readers who would otherwise reject the subject matter.

A reading of the oeuvre of Toni Morrison — fiction, non-fiction, and other — drawing extensively from her many interviews as well as her primary texts. The author aligns Morrison's novels with the works of Virginia Woolf and William Faulkner, assessing her works as among the most innovative, and most significant, worldwide, of the past fifty years.

The most substantial collection of critical essays on Morrison to appear since her death in mid-2019, this book contains previously unpublished essays which both acknowledge the universal significance of her writing even as they map new directions. Essayists include pre-eminent Morrison scholars, as well as scholars who work in cultural criticism, African American letters, American modernism, and women's writing. The book includes work on Morrison as a public intellectual; work which places Morrison's writing within today's currents of contemporary fiction; work which draws together Morrison's “trilogy” of Beloved, Jazz, and Paradise alongside Dos Passos' USA trilogy; work which links Morrison to such Black Atlantic artists as Lubaina Himid and others as well as work which offers a reading of “influence” that goes both directions between Morrison and Faulkner. Another cluster of essays treats seldom-discussed works by Morrison, including an essay on Morrison as writer of children's books and as speaker for children's education. In addition, a “Teaching Morrison” section is designed to help teachers and critics who teach Morrison in undergraduate classes. The Bloomsbury Handbook to Toni Morrison is wide-ranging, provocative, and satisfying; a fitting tribute to one of the greatest American novelists.

A reading of the oeuvre of Toni Morrison—fiction, non-fiction, and other—drawing extensively from her many interviews as well as her primary texts, Toni Morrison: A Literary Life, second edition provides an overview of Morrison’s intellectual growth as an artist. Linda Wagner-Martin aligns Morrison's novels with the works of Virginia Woolf and William Faulkner, assessing her works as among the most innovative, and most significant, worldwide, of the past fifty plus years. The revised edition includes new discussion of God Help the Child, The Origin of Others, and The Source of Self-Regard. These additions present and intensify scholarship on Morrison’s major literary contributions, but also trace her significant role as a public intellectual, bringing to light the consistency of Morrison’s aesthetic and political visions.

Focusing on the lineage of pivotal African American and Irish women writers, Jacqueline Fulmer argues that these authors often employ strategies of indirection, via folkloric expression, when exploring unpopular topics. This strategy holds the attention of readers who would otherwise reject the subject matter. Fulmer traces the line of descent from Mary Lavin to ¿l¿N¿huibhne and from Zora Neale Hurston to Toni Morrison, showing how obstacles to free expression, though varying from those Lavin and Hurston faced, are still encountered by Morrison and N¿huibhne. The basis for comparing these authors lies in the strategies of indirection they use, as influenced by folklore. The folkloric characters these authors depict-wild denizens of the Otherworld and wise women of various traditions-help their creators insert controversy into fiction in ways that charm rather than alienate readers. Forms of rhetorical indirection that appear in the context of folklore, such as signifying practices, masking, sly civility, and the grotesque or bizarre, come out of the mouths and actions of these writers' magical and magisterial characters. Old traditions can offer new ways of discussing issues such as sexual expression, religious beliefs, or issues of reproduction. As differences between times and cultures affect what "can" and "cannot" be said, folkloric indirection may open up a vista to discourses of which we as readers may not even be aware. Finally, the folk women of Morrison, N¿huibhne, Hurston, and Lavin open up new points of entry to the discussion of fiction, rhetoric, censorship, and folklore.

How fictional representations of dead bodies develop over the twentieth century is the central concern of Lisa K. Perdigao's study of American writers. Arguing that the crisis of bodily representation can be traced in the move from modernist entombment to postmodernist exhumation, Perdigao considers how works by writers from F. Scott Fitzgerald, William Faulkner, Willa Cather, and Richard Wright to Jody Shields, Toni Morrison, Octavia Butler, and Jeffrey Eugenides reflect changing attitudes about dying, death, and mourning. For example, while modernist writers direct their plots toward a transformation of the dead body by way of metaphor, postmodernist writers exhume the transformed body, reasserting its materiality. Rather than viewing these tropes in oppositional terms, Perdigao examines the implications for narrative of the authors' apparently contradictory attempts to recover meaning at the site of loss. She argues that entombment and exhumation are complementary drives that speak to the tension between the desire to bury the dead and the need to remember, indicating shifts in critical discussions about the body and about the function of aesthetics in relation to materialized violence and loss.

The failure to understand communicative practices and preferences of local communities is a frequent reason why development fails to produce expected results. Drawing on field research from settings in Indonesia, Uganda, Namibia, and Ivory Coast, this book addresses local viewpoints and gender concepts; the procedures of deliberation, negotiation, and appropriation; and the clashes of underlying language ideologies and language-based social and conceptual projections. It is argued that communicative factors are not reducible to economic ones, but need independent attention in development planning, and are ultimately decisive for outcomes. The book also includes a CD with video sampling. (Series: Swiss: Forschung und Wissenschaft - Vol. 4)

Though the short story is often regarded as central to the Irish canon, this text was the first comprehensive study of the genre for many years. Heather Ingman traces the development of the modern short story in Ireland from its beginnings in the nineteenth century to the present day. Her study analyses the material circumstances surrounding publication, examining the role of magazines and editors in shaping the form. Ingman incorporates recent critical thinking on the short story, traces international connections, and gives a central part to Irish women's short stories. Each chapter concludes with a detailed analysis of key stories from the period discussed, featuring Joyce, Edna O'Brien and John McGahern, among others. With its comprehensive bibliography and biographies of authors, this volume will be a key work of reference for scholars and students both of Irish fiction and of the modern short story as a genre.