{"id":225,"date":"2004-05-24T09:58:55","date_gmt":"2004-05-24T13:58:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vmalt\/?p=225"},"modified":"2005-12-31T16:18:36","modified_gmt":"2005-12-31T21:18:36","slug":"literary-production-numbers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/literary-production-numbers","title":{"rendered":"Literary Production Numbers"},"content":{"rendered":"

British literary critic James Wood reviews The Oxford English Literary History, Vol. XII: 1960-2000: The Last of England?<\/em>, and sharpens his knives<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Mind you, Stevenson’s three lines on A House for Mr Biswas<\/strong> make one glad that the rules [of the Oxford guide regarding what constitutes an “English” writer] allowed him to venture no further: “The novel uses its broad range of characters and their conflicts for comic effect, but they also offer extended insight into a complex, multiracial society, both hopeful and fearful for its future.” That sentence might be a Rorschach test: if you find nothing much the matter with it, you are an unsaved academic. Apart from the inconvenience of being largely untrue — there are almost no non-Indians of any significance in the novel — and its grating habit of sounding less like criticism than an AGM report, it is almost morally offensive that this should be the only description of that marvellous novel.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

British literary critic James Wood reviews The Oxford English Literary History, Vol. XII: 1960-2000: The Last of England?, and sharpens his knives: Mind you, Stevenson’s three lines on A House for Mr Biswas make one glad that the rules [of the Oxford guide regarding what constitutes an “English” writer] allowed him to venture no further: … <\/p>\n

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That never ceases to amaze me.\" With his debut novel, The Latinist (WW Norton), Mark Prins has created a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Art"","block_context":{"text":"Art","link":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/art"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/prinscomp.jpg?fit=1163%2C800&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/prinscomp.jpg?fit=1163%2C800&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/prinscomp.jpg?fit=1163%2C800&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/prinscomp.jpg?fit=1163%2C800&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/prinscomp.jpg?fit=1163%2C800&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":1930,"url":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/this-and-that","url_meta":{"origin":225,"position":1},"title":"This and that","author":"Gil","date":"March 16, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"While finishing Love & Sleep, the second novel in John Crowley's \u00c3\u2020gypt cycle, this week, I came across the word, \"rufous.\" I checked with my dog Rufus to see if he knew what it meant, but he was as clueless as I was. 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