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3.91 AVERAGE
3.91 AVERAGE
I read this book when it first came out and had a hard time not arguing against some of Acocella's assertions, particularly her stance against feminist academics, which is the heart of this book. After this second reading it still seems like Acocella has an axe to grind against feminist academics, particularity those who claim Cather as a lesbian. I'm personally quite happy that Cather has been claimed as a lesbian. This book gives the reader an idea of how Cather's reputation has ebbed & flowed over the decades according to the political and cultural needs of her critics and readers, but it does suffer from her often dismissive attacks against interpretations or schools of thought with which Acocella disagrees. Academic literary scholarship is a weird world, sometimes it seems like another planet, and Acocella is critiquing that world. She is reactionary and dismissive, yet I enjoyed re-reading this book (perhaps because I'm no longer an academic). It is probably only of interest to hard-core Cather fans who are familiar with academic literary scholarship.
In which Joan Acocella criticizes Cather critics for projecting their own biases and agendas onto Cather's novels... by projecting her own bias and agenda onto their criticism.
Let me tell you, I am all about interrogating critical methodologies and conventional wisdom and the ivory tower party line. I am preparing to write a dissertation that asks a lot of the same questions Acocella does about how we fold authors and books into queer and feminist canons. But holy jeez. This book is bananas. At one point, Acocella argues that if Cather were a repressed lesbian, she would have hidden her lesbianism better.
I'm halfway done--and I read the first half in one sitting. We'll see if things change in the second.
Let me tell you, I am all about interrogating critical methodologies and conventional wisdom and the ivory tower party line. I am preparing to write a dissertation that asks a lot of the same questions Acocella does about how we fold authors and books into queer and feminist canons. But holy jeez. This book is bananas. At one point, Acocella argues that if Cather were a repressed lesbian, she would have hidden her lesbianism better.
I'm halfway done--and I read the first half in one sitting. We'll see if things change in the second.