Comforting Myths: Concerning the Political in Art

Comforting Myths: Concerning the Political in Art - Hardcover

$19.95
$19.95
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Comforting Myths: Concerning the Political in Art
  • Comforting Myths: Concerning the Political in Art
Comforting Myths: Concerning the Political in Art - Hardcover

Comforting Myths: Concerning the Political in Art - Hardcover

by Rabih Alameddine
$19.95
$19.95

Book Overview

by Rabih Alameddine (Author)

A timely and urgent inquiry by one of global literature's leading lights

In this concisely argued and illuminating book, the PEN/Faulkner Award-winning author Rabih Alameddine takes the subject of politics and art head-on, questioning the very premise of dividing these two pillars of culture into an either/or proposition. He reveals how a political dimension enlarges a work of art rather than making it less beautiful or reducing it to a polemic, as we are so often and carelessly taught. But he also ponders what makes art political to begin with: how essential is the artist's conscious political intent, and what does the reader or viewer contribute to the work's political capability or significance? In exploring these questions, Alameddine engages intensely with his role as an immigrant and a gay author writing inside a globally dominant, often oblivious culture, and invokes the work of numerous writers, from Tayeb Salih and Aleksandar Hemon to Teju Cole and Salman Rushdie, who also struggle to be heard as something more than an "other." The book features throughout Alameddine's brilliantly relatable voice--shrewd, humorous, challenging, and as honest about his own limitations as he is about his passions.

Author Biography

Rabih Alameddine is an award-winning fiction writer and Chair of the Lannan Center for Poetics and Social Practice at Georgetown University. His most recent novel is The Wrong End of the Telescope.

Number of Pages: 96
Dimensions: 0.55 x 7.56 x 4.88 IN
Publication Date: October 22, 2024
ISBN9780813952512
Author Rabih Alameddine
PublisherUniversity of Virginia Press
GenreEducation and Literature
FormatHardcover
PublishedOctober 2024
LanguageENG- English
Pages96
Weight1.0 lb
Target AudienceAdults
Print SizeStandard Print

Related Subjects

Language Arts & Disciplines Literary Criticism Nonfiction

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More by Rabih Alameddine

The Wrong End of the Telescope

The Wrong End of the Telescope - Paperback

The Wrong End of the Telescope - Paperback

By Rabih Alameddine

About Rabih Alameddine

Rabih Alameddine is the author of the novels The Wrong End of the Telescope; Angel of History; An Unnecessary Woman; The Hakawati; I, the Divine; Koolaids; the story collection, The Perv; and one work of nonfiction, Comforting Myths. He has won the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction and was a finalist for the National Book Award. He received the Dos Passos Prize in 2019, a Lannan Award in 2021, and the Bill Whitehead Lifetime Achievement Award in 2025.

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