The Nation in British Literature and Culture

A comprehensive overview of how Britain came into being and how literature and culture have both enabled and interrogated 'Britishness'.

Andrew Murphy (Edited by)

9781009378857, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 30 September 2023

393 pages
28 x 19 x 2.6 cm, 0.784 kg

The Nation and British Literature and Culture charts the emergence of Britain as a political, social and cultural construct, examining the manner in which its constituent elements were brought together through a process of amalgamation and conquest. The fashioning of the nation through literature and culture is examined, as well as counter narratives that have sought to call national orthodoxies into question. Specific topics explored include the emergence of a distinctively national literature in the early modern period; the impact of French Revolution on conceptions of Britishness; portrayals of empire in popular and literary fiction; popular music and national imagining; the marginalisation and oppression of particular communities within the nation. The volume concludes by asking what implications an extended set of contemporary crises have for the ongoing survival both of the United Kingdom, both as a political unit and as a literary and cultural point of identity.

Part I. Origins: 1. What is Britain? Andrew Murphy
2. Wales in Britain Helen Fulton
3. Scotland in Britain Gerard Carruthers
4. Ireland in Britain Jim Smyth
5. England in Britain Krishan Kumar
Part II. Writing the Nation: 6. Cultural borrowings Edward Wilson-Lee
7. Tradition and transformation in literature Neil Rhodes
8. Milton and the remaking of the Nation in seventeenth-century England David Loewenstein
Part III. Revolutions and Empires: 9. The American revolution Jerome Tharaud
10. The French revolution David Duff
11. 'And what should they know of England who only England know?' Ania Loomba
12. Rather unpleasant stories: popular fictions of Empire Matthew P. M. Kerr
13. Sun-drowned streets and wasted lives: imperial decline and the colonial Novel Praseeda Gopinath
Part IV. Making the Modern Nation: 14. 'It's being so cheerful that keeps me going': the nation in the second world war Gill Plain
15. The new British J. Dillon Brown
16. Censorship Celia Marshik
17. 'Wake up the Nation': modern pop and the quest for a New England Ben Winsworth
18. Queer Nation Brian Lewis
Part V. Futures: 19. The future of the Union: a political science perspective Etain Tannam
20. What is British Literature now? Kristian Shaw
21. Borderline Britain Andrew Murphy.

Subject Areas: Literary studies: general [DSB]