Taboo and Transgression in British Literature from the Renaissance to the Present develops an innovative overview of the interdisciplinary theoretical approaches to the topic that have emerged in recent years. Alongside exemplary model analyses of key periods and representative primary texts, this exciting new anthology of critical essays has been specifically designed to fill a major gap in the field of literary and cultural studies. This book traces the complex dynamic and ongoing negotiation of notions of transgression and taboo as an essential, though often neglected, facet to understanding the development, production, and conception of literature from the early modern Elizabethan period through postmodern debates. The combination of a broad theoretical and historical framework covering almost fifty representative authors and uvres makes this essential reading for students and specialists alike in the fields of literary studies and cultural studies.

"Horlacher and his collaborators have re-opened the door on taboo. The collection is ground-breaking in its expansion of traditional definitions and its broad historical sweep. An introductory historical and theoretical section is followed by literary analyses displaying a rich variety of approaches to the disruptive powers of literary texts from early modern to contemporary. Taboo and Transgression is a timely provocation displaying a consistently high quality of critical theory and practice." - Ronald Corthell, Professor and Chair, Department of English, Kent State University

"With its chapters ranging from Renaissance literature to Postmodernism, Taboo and Transgression offers an unprecedented introduction to the topic. A fair balance of theoretical challenge and historical depth, as well as the representativeness of the literary examples - with a focus on highly canonized texts - will make the volume an ideal companion for English courses at university. This conceptually well-wrought, well-structured, and highly coherent volume will appeal to university teachers as well as (advanced) students of English literature and will provide a valuable fundament for further research on taboo/transgression in other media and in less-canonized texts." - Astrid Erll, Professor, University of Wuppertal

Autorentext

STEFAN HORLACHER Professor of English Literature and Chair of the English Department at Dresden University of Technology, Germany.

STEFAN GLOMB Senior Lecturer in English Literature at Mannheim University, Germany.

LARS HEILER Senior Lecturer in English and American Literatures at the University of Kassel, Germany.

Inhalt
PART I: THEORETICAL AND HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES Taboo, Transgression and Literature: An Introduction; S.Horlacher Taboo and Transgression: A Socio-Historical and Socio-Cultural Perspective; U.Böker Against Censorship: Literature, Transgression and Taboo from a Diachronic Perspective; L.Heiler PART II: LITERARY ANALYSES Hamlet, Macbeth and 'Sovereign Process'; J.Drakakis The Taboo of Revolutionary Thought after 1660 and Strategies of Subversion in Milton's Paradise Lost and Bunyan's The Holy War; J.M.Gurr Worshipping Cloacina in the Eighteenth Century: Functions of Scatology in Swift, Pope, Gay, and Sterne; J.M.Gurr The Organic Uncanny: Taboo, Sexuality and Death in British Gothic Novels; S.Butter & M.Eitelmann The Age of Transition as an Age of Transgression? Victorian Poetry and the Taboo of Sexuality, Love and the Body; S.Heinz Metrical Taboos, Rhythmic Transgressions: Historico-Cultural Manipulations of the Voice in Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century Poetry; C.Scott 'Logicized' Taboo: Abjection in George Eliot's Daniel Deronda; A.Horatschek Revaluating Transgression in Ulysses; S.Glomb Taboo, Transgression and (Self-)Censorship in Twentieth-Century British Theater; F.Degenring The Holocaust and Aesthetic Transgression in Contemporary British Fiction; L.Heiler