Translocality in Contemporary City Novels

Translocality in Contemporary City Novels explores the layering and blending of two or more distant settings in twenty-first-century Anglophone novels, drawing on multidisciplinary research to explore a corpus of thirty-two novels set in ninety-seven cities. Lena Mattheis examines six common strategies used to make translocal experiences narratable and relatable, combining and developing techniques from narratology, human geography, transculturality, diaspora spaces, and postcolonial perspectives.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 251 pages
Publication date: 20 March 2022
Publisher: Springer Nature Switzerland AG

Translocality in contemporary city novels emerges as a response to the growing prevalence of a phenomenon known as translocality, which involves the intermingling and fusion of two or more geographically distant settings. Recognizing translocal and transcultural writing as a global phenomenon, this book employs a multidisciplinary approach, drawing from globalisation theory, narrative studies, and urban studies to investigate a collection of thirty-two novels authored by renowned authors like Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Dionne Brand, Kiran Desai, and Xiaolu Guo. These novels are set in a staggering ninety-seven cities.

In her examination, Lena Mattheis delves into six prevalent strategies employed in contemporary urban fiction to render translocal experiences of the world narratable and transform them into relatable narratives. These strategies include simultaneity, palimpsests, mapping, scaling, non-places, and haunting. Mattheis further combines and expands upon various theories, approaches, and techniques from diverse research fields, including narratology, human geography, transculturality, diaspora spaces, and postcolonial perspectives. Through this interdisciplinary approach, she develops a comprehensive set of cross-disciplinary techniques in literary urban studies.

This book offers valuable insights into the evolving landscape of contemporary city novels, shedding light on the ways in which authors navigate the complexities of globalization, cultural hybridity, and urbanization. By exploring the strategies employed to represent translocality, Mattheis provides a framework for understanding the ways in which literature can capture the multifaceted experiences of modern cities and their inhabitants.

Weight: 354g
Dimension: 210 x 148 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9783030666897
Edition number: 1st ed. 2021