Summary

"Examples of faux authenticity abound in today's marketplace. Trading on the commercial appeal of the ersatz real, however, is far from a twenty-first century invention. As Consuming Traditions investigates, the allure of commodified nostalgia and the selling of the "genuine" article emerged as powerful forces in early twentieth-century Britain." "Elizabeth Outka redefines the debates surrounding literary modernism and the market as she explores the marketing of authenticity, a crucial but overlooked development in the history of modernity. With an interdisciplinary approach that probes novels, plays, advertisements, and architecture, Consuming Traditions presents a convincing case for how the "commodified authentic" - the selling of objects and places allegedly free of commercial taint - marks a critical turn in modern culture and offers a new way to understand literary modernism and its complex negotiation of tradition and novelty. Drawing on cultural studies, theories of consumerism, and works by Shaw, Forster, Woolf, Joyce, and others, Outka examines how literature both enacted and critiqued the larger revolution in material culture."--BOOK JACKET.

Notes

Includes bibliographical references ( p. 199-207) and index. 1.Introduction: Selling Authenticity --Pt. I.Commodified Nostalgia and the Country Aesthetic --2.The Past Is a Present Country: Model Towns and Commercial Utopias --3.Buying Time: E. M. Forster and the Neo-nostalgic Home --Pt. II.Urban Authenticities --4.The Vanishing Act of Commercialism: Selfridges, Modernity, and the Purified Marketplace --5."Lustrous behind Glass":Woolf, Window Shopping, and Authentic Display --6.Conclusion: Modernist Excursions.

Classification

• LCC: PR478
• Dewey Decimal: 820.9/112

Book Details

• Language: eng
• Physical Description: xviii, 214 p. : ill. ; 25 cm.
• Edition Info: (alk. paper)

Subjects

• Literature & Fiction -- History & Criticism -- Criticism & Theory -- General
• Literature & Fiction -- History & Criticism -- Criticism & Theory -- General AAS
• Literature & Fiction -- History & Criticism -- Movements & Periods -- Modernism
• Literature & Fiction -- World Literature -- British -- General
• Literature & Fiction -- World Literature -- British -- General AAS
• Literature & Fiction -- World Literature -- United States -- History & Criticism -- Literary Theory
• Nonfiction -- Social Sciences -- Anthropology -- Cultural
• English literature -- 20th century -- History and criticism
• Modernism (Literature) -- Great Britain
• Material culture in literature
• Nostalgia in literature
• Authenticity (Philosophy) in literature
• Consumption (Economics) -- Psychological aspects
• Commercial products -- Psychological aspects
• Commerce in literature
• Marketing -- Great Britain -- History -- 20th century

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