Distinguished by its unconventional approach and extraordinary range, this beautifully written book offers new insights into the works—and times—of poets writing between the death of Shakespeare and the execution of Charles I. Well over a hundred original readings provide illuminating discussions of the “canonical” poets such as Milton, Herbert, and Jonson, as well as enlightening reevaluations of many “minor” poets, including Herrick, Waller, and Lovelace. The discussion is organized around five themes: Counselors and Kings, Poets, Life and Death, The Commonwealth, and Men and Women. This organization allows Hammond to use shared references and images in the works to reveal previously unsuspected connections between poems of very different schools, and to illustrate in considerable depth how seventeenth-century poetry reflects the political, social, religious, and sexual experience of the uncertain pre-Restoration years. The book has a subtle, almost musical structure; each chapter quietly picks up the threads of discussion in previous chapters. The result is a seamlessly woven narrative that guides the reader lightly, never intruding on the reading of the poetry itself.

Seventeenth-century poets betray a reluctance to separate life from art; many of their poems are about apparently trivial or unfamiliar things—the “fleeting things” of the title. Gerald Hammond has used his rare knowledge of the period to unlock images and references that have previously been overlooked or misunderstood, creating a fresh view of the poetry—and poets—of this fascinating period.

A Choice Outstanding Academic Title of the Year

The idea of world literature has garnered much attention recently as a discipline that promises to move humanistic study beyond postcolonial theory and antiquated paradigms of “national” literary traditions. In Forget English! Aamir Mufti scrutinizes the claims made on behalf of world literature by its advocates. The notion of a borderless, egalitarian global literature has obvious appeal, he notes, but behind it lurks the continuing dominance of English as a literary language and a cultural system of international reach.

“Mufti’s historical perspective and insightful analyses of India’s anglophone novel generate constant echoes with the realities of anglophone writings in other cultures.”
—Eva Shan Chou, Times Higher Education

“Mufti’s book is in one sense a quarrel with Salman Rushdie’s overly enthusiastic celebration of English-language ‘postcolonial’ South Asian literature, but more important, the book extends, qualifies, and enriches Edward Said’s work on Orientalism, demonstrating that despite its promise, world literature does not eliminate the dominant role of the Anglophone book market in shaping South Asian literature…Mufti’s book is both accessible and theoretically informed.”
—K. Tölölyan, Choice

From Mariano Azuela's 1915 novel Los de abajo to Rosamaría Roffiel's Amora of 1989, fragmented narrative has been one of the defining features of innovative Mexican fiction in the twentieth century. In this innovative study, Carol Clark D'Lugo examines fragmentation as a literary strategy that reflects the social and political fissures within modern Mexican society and introduces readers to a more participatory reading of texts.

D'Lugo traces defining moments in the development of Mexican fiction and the role fragmentation plays in each. Some of the topics she covers are nationalist literature of the 1930s and 1940s, self-referential novels of the 1950s that focus on the process of reading and writing, the works of Carlos Fuentes, novels of La Onda that came out of rebellious 1960s Mexican youth culture, gay and lesbian fiction, and recent women's writings.

With its sophisticated theoretical methodology that encompasses literature and society, this book serves as an admirable survey of the twentieth-century Mexican novel. It will be important reading for students of Latin American culture and history as well as literature.