Genetics and the Literary Imagination

Studying works by Doris Lessing, Ian McEwan, A.S. Byatt, Kazuo Ishiguro, and Jackie Kay, this book explores the impact on literature of the gene-centric model of human nature that entered mainstream culture in the wake of the discovery of the structure of DNA.

List of contents

• Introduction: The Secret of Life


• 1: Doris Lessing's Evolutionary Epic


• 2: A.S. Byatt's Biological Reason


• 3: Ian McEwan: the Literary Animal


• 4: Clone Lives: Eva Hoffman and Kazuo Ishiguro


• 5: Postgenomic Histories: Margaret Drabble and Jackie Kay

About the author

Clare Hanson is Emeritus Professor of English at the University of Southampton. She is author and editor of 11 books including A Cultural History of Pregnancy: Pregnancy, Medicine and Culture 1750-2000 (Palgrave, 2004), Eugenics, Literature and Culture in Post-war Britain (Routledge, 2012), Katherine Mansfield and Psychology (with Gerri Kimber and Todd Martin, Edinburgh UP, 2016), and The History of British Women's Writing Vol 9, 1945-1975 (with Susan Watkins, Palgrave, 2017).

Summary

Studying works by Doris Lessing, Ian McEwan, A.S. Byatt, Kazuo Ishiguro, and Jackie Kay, this book explores the impact on literature of the gene-centric model of human nature that entered mainstream culture in the wake of the discovery of the structure of DNA.

Additional text

Her analysis is insightful and her prose... is extremely readable. Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty.

Product details

• Authors: Hanson , Clare Hanson, Clare (Emeritus Professor of English Hanson, Hanson Clare
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 31.05.2020
• EAN: 9780198813286
• ISBN: 978-0-19-881328-6
• No. of pages: 212
• Series: Oxford Textual Perspectives
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Linguistics and literary studies > General and comparative literary studies; English, SCIENCE / History, LITERARY CRITICISM / Science Fiction & Fantasy, LITERARY CRITICISM / Modern / 20th Century, History of Science, Literary studies: from c 1900 -, Literary studies: fiction, novelists & prose writers, Literary studies: fiction, novelists and prose writers, Literary studies: c 1900 to c 2000, Genetics (non-medical)