From modernism to postmodernism : : concepts and strategies of postmodern American fiction / / Gerhard Hoffmann.

• Superior document: Postmodern studies ; 38
• Author: Hoffmann, Gerhard 1931-2018.
• Place / Publishing House: Amsterdam ;, New York : : Rodopi,, 2005.
• Year of Publication: 2005
• Language: English
• Series: Postmodern Studies 38.
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (751 p.)
• Notes: Description based upon print version of record.
• Bibliography: Includes bibliographical references (p. 689-739) and index.
• ISBN: 9401202427; 1423791185
• Hierarchical level: Monograph
• Statement of Responsibility: Gerhard Hoffmann.

This systemic study discusses in its historical, cultural and aesthetic context the postmodern American novel between the years of 1960 and 1980. A general overview of the various definitions of postmodernism in philosophy, cultural theory and aesthetics provides the framework for the inquiry into more specific problems, such as: the broadening of aesthetics, the relationship between aesthetics and ethics, the transformation of the artistic tradition, the interdependence between modernism and postmodernism, and the change in the aesthetics of fiction. Other topics addressed here include: situationalism, montage, the ordinary and the fantastic, the subject and the character, the imagination, comic modes, and the future of the postmodern strategies. The authors whose fiction is treated in some detail under the various aspects thematized are John Barth, Donald Barthelme, Richard Brautigan, Robert Coover, Stanley Elkin, Raymond Federman, William Gaddis, John Hawkes, Jerzy Kosinski, Thomas Pynchon, Ishmael Reed, Ronald Sukenick, and Kurt Vonnegut.