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This study presents the formative period of the English novelist E. M. Forster (1879-1970) with a special stress on the usage of symbolism in his early fiction. The book offers a new approach to Forster's symbolism derived from the theoretical studies of Michael Riffaterre and his concept of symbolic systems - subtext and syllepsis. The author presents the most important symbols as used in the discussed novels and their usage in Forster's later works. A further part of the study concentrates on the issue of spatial symbolism. The symbolism of the Italian novels A Room with a View and Where Angels Fear to Tread is presented as an artistic means for the introduction of social issues especially important for the writer, as well as a method of concealed presentation of issues which for social and personal reasons Forster could not include openly in his works such as homosexuality.
List of contents
Contents: Forster, E. M. - Italian Novels - Symbol - Symbolism - Modernism - Edwardian literature - Homosexuality - Gay and lesbian studies - Subtext.
About the author
The Author: Krzysztof Fordo¿ski, born in 1970, studied at Adam Mickiewicz University Poznä and University College Galway. He gained his M.A. in English studies in 1994 and his Ph.D. in 2002 at the Adam Mickiewicz University Poznä. His main fields of interest are English literature at the turn of the 19th and 20th century, literary translation and history of England. The author published an anthology of English literature in 1999, a monograph of the American novelist William Wharton in 2004, and numerous scholarly articles. He is also an active literary translator, author of translations of over thirty books, both fiction and non-fiction.
Report
«[...] the book by Fordonski can be appreciated by both the es-tablished researchers and those who just begin their scientific adventure with the works of Forster. While on the one hand it neatly sums up Forster's approach related to the construction of symbol and the use of symbolic patterns, on the other it offers a genuine springboard and a tool for those who would like to concentrate on pursuing further either certain symbols or patterns of symbolic meanings, looking for intricate connections, for in-stance, within a particular collection of short stories.»
(Anna Kwiatkowska, Polish Journal of English Studies 3.2/2017)
