Walker Percy, Fyodor Dostoevsky, and the Search for Influence

Fiction & Literature, Literary Theory & Criticism, European, Eastern European, American
Cover of the book Walker Percy, Fyodor Dostoevsky, and the Search for Influence by Jessica Hooten Wilson, Ohio State University Press
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Jessica Hooten Wilson ISBN: 9780814275764
Publisher: Ohio State University Press Publication: November 8, 2017
Imprint: Ohio State University Press Language: English
Author: Jessica Hooten Wilson
ISBN: 9780814275764
Publisher: Ohio State University Press
Publication: November 8, 2017
Imprint: Ohio State University Press
Language: English

Although Walker Percy named many influences on his work and critics have zeroed in on Kierkegaard in particular, no one has considered his intentional influence: the nineteenth-century Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky. In a study that revives and complicates notions of adaptation and influence, Jessica Hooten Wilson details the long career of Walker Percy. Walker Percy, Fyodor Dostoevsky, and the Search for Influence demonstrates—through close reading of both writers’ works, examination of archival materials, and biographical criticism—not only how pervasive and inescapable Dostoevsky’s influence was but also how necessary it was to the distinctive strengths of Percy’s fiction.
 
 
From Dostoevsky, Percy learned how to captivate his non-Christian readership with fiction saturated by a Christian vision of reality. Not only was his method of imitation in line with this Christian faith but also the aesthetic mode and very content of his narratives centered on his knowledge of Christ. The influence of Dostoevsky on Percy, then, becomes significant as a modern case study for showing the illusion of artistic autonomy and long-held, Romantic assumptions about artistic originality. Ultimately, Wilson suggests, only by studying the good that came before can one translate it in a new voice for the here and now.
 

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

Although Walker Percy named many influences on his work and critics have zeroed in on Kierkegaard in particular, no one has considered his intentional influence: the nineteenth-century Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky. In a study that revives and complicates notions of adaptation and influence, Jessica Hooten Wilson details the long career of Walker Percy. Walker Percy, Fyodor Dostoevsky, and the Search for Influence demonstrates—through close reading of both writers’ works, examination of archival materials, and biographical criticism—not only how pervasive and inescapable Dostoevsky’s influence was but also how necessary it was to the distinctive strengths of Percy’s fiction.
 
 
From Dostoevsky, Percy learned how to captivate his non-Christian readership with fiction saturated by a Christian vision of reality. Not only was his method of imitation in line with this Christian faith but also the aesthetic mode and very content of his narratives centered on his knowledge of Christ. The influence of Dostoevsky on Percy, then, becomes significant as a modern case study for showing the illusion of artistic autonomy and long-held, Romantic assumptions about artistic originality. Ultimately, Wilson suggests, only by studying the good that came before can one translate it in a new voice for the here and now.
 

More books from Ohio State University Press

Cover of the book Mobility and Modernity by Jessica Hooten Wilson
Cover of the book Metafilm by Jessica Hooten Wilson
Cover of the book Literatures of Liberation by Jessica Hooten Wilson
Cover of the book It's in There!® by Jessica Hooten Wilson
Cover of the book Culinary Poetics and Edible Images in Twentieth-Century American Literature by Jessica Hooten Wilson
Cover of the book Hip Sublime by Jessica Hooten Wilson
Cover of the book Novel Nostalgias by Jessica Hooten Wilson
Cover of the book Media of Serial Narrative by Jessica Hooten Wilson
Cover of the book Rhetoric as a Posthuman Practice by Jessica Hooten Wilson
Cover of the book Divergent Trajectories by Jessica Hooten Wilson
Cover of the book The Problem Body by Jessica Hooten Wilson
Cover of the book Reimagining the Middle Passage by Jessica Hooten Wilson
Cover of the book Good Words by Jessica Hooten Wilson
Cover of the book Financial Basics by Jessica Hooten Wilson
Cover of the book Style and the Single Girl by Jessica Hooten Wilson
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy