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Good Fiction Guide

July 16, 2009 by Roy Johnson

reference guide and essays on ideas for further reading

Do you like reading good quality fiction – but you’re not sure what to read next? Good Fiction Guide is designed for you. It’s combination of short essays describing popular literary genres and topics, with lists of suggested reading. It then adds potted biographies of writers, with tips on which of their works are most approachable. The general idea is to lead you onto any number of recommendations for ‘further reading’, all of which will be of good quality.

Good Fiction Guide This is because they are by classic writers – Balzac, Dickens, Turgenev, Woolf – or because their contemporary writing is of a literary kind – Salman Rushdie, Angela Carter, Julian Barnes. So it’s a good mixture of the traditional and the new. The book begins with thirty-four articles on a mixture of genres – short story, fantasy – place – France, Canada – and topics such as ‘war’, ‘humour’, and ‘the sea’. These are written by enthusiasts who range from academics to popular writers, and each one includes their top twelve recommended titles.

The bulk of the book is taken up with over a thousand thumbnail sketches of writers and their best-known work. Clive James cheek by jowl with Henry James and Thomas Hardy followed by Robert Harris.

The emphasis is firmly on modern and contemporary literature, and I suspect that despite the introductory essays, most readers will find the biographies the ideal ground for browsing and picking up ideas for further reading. They also make this compilation a reasonable quick reference book for those concerned with modern literature.

© Roy Johnson 2005

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Good Fiction Guide, (ed Jane Rogers) Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2nd edition 2005, pp.548, ISBN: 0192806475


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Filed Under: Literary Studies Tagged With: English literature, Fiction, Good fiction guide, Literary studies, Recommended reading

Modern English Writing

July 9, 2009 by Roy Johnson

General survey of literature in English 1960-2003

Modern English Writing is an introduction to contemporary literature, and a survey of ‘British and Irish’ writing from 1963 to the early 2000s. John McRae and Ronald Carter introduce the social and political background to the period – which will be useful for those people who haven’t lived through it. They give a brief account of the writer’s major works, discuss the themes that emerge, and highlight links and differences with their contemporaries. These expositions are punctuated by mini-essays outlining special themes which emerged during the period, and commenting on developments in language, culture.

Modern English WritingIn the theatre they single out as major figures Stoppard, Orton, Beckett, and Pinter. Then coming more up to date, they make a strongly argued case for the importance of Sarah Kane, who committed suicide in 2000. However, it’s the novel which gets the lion’s share of their attention. The names go racing past with few surprises: Durrell, Golding, Murdoch, Amis (pere et fils). What’s interesting here is their mention of names who seemed important at the time but who are now largely unread or on their way to becoming forgotten: Anthony Powell, D.M.Thomas, Muriel Spark, Angus Wilson.

There is a group whose value is in the balance, but whose stock (I predict) seems likely to sink. Malcolm Bradbury, David Lodge, Doris Lessing, Margaret Drabble, and her sister A.S.Byatt

Of course it is difficult to see who if anyone from the recent crop will last. Formerly ‘big’ names from the 1960-1980s are already beginning to disappear, and if you look back further than that into the review pages of literary newspapers and magazines at who was being touted as important or the next big thing, your reaction is likely to be “Who he?”

The main novelty to emerge from the last half century or so has been the emergence of writers from other cultures (often former colonies) who have chosen to write in English. The most recent are all represented here: Timothy Mo, Salman Rushdie, Kazuo Ishiguro, Anita Desai, and Vikram Seth, whose novel in sonnet form, The Golden Gate, is undoubtedly a masterpiece.

As we move closer to the present, it’s more difficult to say who is worth listing and who not. The younger but now middle-aged generation of writers such as Ian McEwan are given as much space and attention as Nobel prizewinner V.S.Naipaul. But the authors pack in as many names from the world of contemporary fiction as possible, giving fair space to Irish and Scottish writers, as well as English. They also include mention of sub-genres such as detective fiction and children’s literature.

They finish off with a survey of poetry. Few surprises here: Larkin, Hughes, Heaney, and Harrison. But they manage to come smack up to date with a very appreciative piece on Simon Armitage.

Anyone could quibble about who is included or excluded, or argue about the amount of space devoted to a particular writer; but anybody looking for guidance or suggestions on literature in UK English in the last fifty years will find this useful.

There are also some useful appendices – lists of literary prizewinners, a late 20th century literary timeline, and a bibliography of further reading. It’s an excellent source if you need suggestions for further reading, or you are studying modern British literature.

© Roy Johnson 2004

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John McRae and Ronald Carter, The Routledge Guide to Modern English Writing, London: Routledge, 2nd edn, 2004, pp.216, ISBN: 0415286379


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Filed Under: 20C Literature, Literary Studies Tagged With: English literature, Fiction, Literary studies, Modern English Writing, Modern fiction

Point of view – how to understand it

September 12, 2009 by Roy Johnson

free pages from our English Language software program

Point of view – definition

point of view ‘Point of view’ is a term from literary studies which describes the outlook from which events are related.

redbtn It is used of a statement which offers a particular viewpoint or perspective on something.

redbtn This viewpoint might be that that held personally by the writer or speaker, but it could also be that of a deliberately created fictional character.


Examples
  • I think Bill’s taste in clothes is appalling.
    [My point of view.]
  • “I think Bill’s taste in clothes is appalling” John said sneeringly.
    [John’s point of view.]
  • She tried desperately to persuade me of her husband’s honesty.
    [My point of view.]

Use

redbtn ‘Point of view’ is an important concept in analysing and understanding both speech and writing.

redbtn Point of view may be overt and explicit, or it may be subtly implied.

redbtn It is often used to create character by presenting recognisable opinions.

redbtn It may also be used to present psychology in depth by revealing unconscious thoughts.

redbtn Information may often be presented from a particular point of view without revealing the source – which the observer is invited to guess.

redbtn It may also be mischevously imitated for ironic effect.

redbtn NB! Point of view is more than just an ‘opinion’. It also implies an identifiable source.

redbtn The concept of ‘point of view’ is essentially concerned with identifying the source of information.

redbtn This is not always a straightforward matter, because statements may contain more than one point of view.

redbtn In the first example – I think Bill’s taste in clothes is appalling – we are given only one point of view: that of the ‘I’ who is making the statement. We have no way of putting this view into any other perspective. Strictly speaking, we do not know if Bill’s taste is bad or not. We only know the opinion of ‘I’ about the matter.

redbtn In the second example – “I think Bill’s taste in clothes is appalling” John said sneeringly – the same statement is made by John, and this is reported to us by someone else – the narrator. The narrator informs us that the statement was made ‘sneeringly’. This casts John’s opinion into a critical light, because the term ‘sneering’ carries very negatives overtones.

redbtn Thus in this second example we have two points of view – John’s and the narrator’s. One is passing comment on the other. This gives the reader more information with which to make judgements.

redbtn In the third example – She tried desperately to persuade me of her husband’s honesty – there are again two points of view, though the second is less obvious this time.

redbtn The first point of view is that of the ‘me’ recounting events. This person – the narrator – controls what we know. The second point of view is that of the ‘she’ who is discussing her husband. This view however comes to us from the narrator – the ‘me’.

redbtn The terms ‘desperately’ and ‘persuade’ suggest that this effort is being made under emotional pressure – and that the attempt is not succeeding.

redbtn But the person recounting this event [the narrator] might have a bias of some kind, or prejudice against the woman. We tend to believe that narrators are telling the truth, but what if this person were a robber who had just broken into the house and was stealing the family jewels?

redbtn The point here is that we cannot know if the husband is actually honest or not. We only have two points of view – that of the wife who is trying to persuade a narrator, and failing. [It’s a complex business, isn’t it?]

redbtn Sometimes a point of view may be implied rather than directly stated. Consider the following example, from a story which concerns a young girl making a journey at night:

A faint wind blowing off the water ruffled under Fenella’s hat, and she put up her hand to keep it on. It was dark on the Old Warf, very dark; the wool sheds, the cattle trucks, the cranes standing up so high, the little squat railway engine, all seemed carved out of solid darkness. Here and there on a rounded wood pile, that was like the stalk of a huge black mushroom, there hung a lantern, but it seemed afraid to unfurl its timid, quivering light in all that blackness; it burned softly, as if for itself.

[KATHERINE MANSFIELD]

redbtn Here the first point of view is that of a narrator – telling the story of Fenella, the young girl. But then in the second sentence, starting with terms such as ‘cranes standing up so high’ and ‘the little squat railway engine’, the events are narrated from the young girl’s point of view – as they might seem to her.

redbtn This is a very typical example of a writer using ‘point of view’ to offer readers an imaginative experience – in this case seeing the world as it would be perceived by a young girl.

redbtn Point of view may also be impersonated, assumed, or mischevously implied in both speech and writing for ironic effect.

redbtn To summarise, point of view is important because we need to place any statement into a context before we can evaluate it properly.

Self-assessment quiz follows >>>

© Roy Johnson 2003


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Filed Under: English Language Tagged With: English language, Fiction, Point of view, Writing

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