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Marshall McLuhan and Northrop Frye
Apocalypse and Alchemy
B.W. Powe (Author)
9781442616165
Paperback / softback, published 21 April 2014
368 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 2.2 cm, 0.54 kg
“Bruce Powe is a rare intellectual figure in the Canadian landscape. He has the sensibility and eloquence of a literary critic, and the power of persuasion of a cultural critic, definitely in the same league with the Canadian giants of the twentieth century.” - Francesco Guardiani, Dept. of Italian, University of Toronto ‘There will likely be many McLuhan and Frye commentaries in the future, and with any luck some will be brilliant, but no one will ever write with such passion as Powe’s on the vision of these two beleaguered spiritual explorers.’ - Philip Marchand (National Post, June 27, 2014) ‘Powe masterfully examines the theories of his teachers--Marshall McLuhan and Northrop Frye and finds coherence within the legendary conflict between the two, which ignited a synergy that is at once destructive and revealing.’ - J.L. Aucoin (Choice vol 52:03:2014)
Marshall McLuhan and Northrop Frye are two of Canada’s central cultural figures, colleagues and rivals whose careers unfolded in curious harmony even as their intellectual engagement was antagonistic. Poet, novelist, essayist and philosopher B.W. Powe, who studied with both of these formidable and influential intellectuals, presents an exploration of their lives and work in Marshall McLuhan and Northrop Frye: Apocalypse and Alchemy. Powe considers the existence of a unique visionary tradition of Canadian humanism and argues that McLuhan and Frye represent fraught but complementary approaches to the study of literature and to the broader engagement with culture. Examining their eloquent but often acid responses to each other, Powe exposes the scholarly controversies and personal conflicts that erupted between them, and notably the great commonalities in their writing and biographies. Using interviews, letters, notebooks, and their published texts, Powe offers a new alchemy of their thought, in which he combines the philosophical hallmarks of McLuhan’s “The medium is the message” and Frye’s “the great code.”
Acknowledgments Prologue: The Juncture of Marshall McLuhan and Northrop Frye in 1946 Intentions and Overview, Apocalypse and Alchemy in McLuhan and Frye Presences and Signatures: These Figures in their Ground The Critical Conflict Between McLuhan and Frye The Harmonies in Two Seers: Orchestrations and Complementarities Alchemy, Synergy in the Thinking of McLuhan and Frye The Lessons of Two Teachers: Guidance and Signs Notes Bibliography Index