The image and the fire : the subversive anthology in the twentieth century /
"The Image and the Fire examines the coterie anthology - a small, outsider literary collection - as a key, yet understudied, instrument of literary intervention within American modernism. Whit Frazier Peterson argues that these anthologies, produced outside of institutional or canonical framewo...
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Format: | Book |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Amherst :
University of Massachusetts Press,
[2026]
|
| Subjects: |
| Summary: | "The Image and the Fire examines the coterie anthology - a small, outsider literary collection - as a key, yet understudied, instrument of literary intervention within American modernism. Whit Frazier Peterson argues that these anthologies, produced outside of institutional or canonical frameworks, served as deliberate challenges to dominant literary paradigms. Distinct from academic anthologies that helped codify the American literary canon, coterie anthologies were used by both white and Black avant-garde movements to disrupt prevailing cultural narratives and assert alternative literary visions. Through close analysis of three seminal case studies - Des Imagistes, edited by Ezra Pound; Fire!!, a short-lived but groundbreaking magazine from the Harlem Renaissance, co-edited by Wallace Thurman; and Black Fire, compiled by Amiri Baraka and Larry Neal during the Black Arts Movement - Peterson traces a genealogy of the coterie anthology as a politically charged genre. He reveals how Black American writers and editors, particularly during the Harlem Renaissance and the Black Arts Movement, reappropriated and reconfigured this type of anthology format from white modernists. Ultimately, The Image and the Fire positions the coterie anthology as a site of aesthetic and ideological contestation, one through which marginalized literary communities engaged in acts of cultural self-definition, canon revision, and formal innovation. By foregrounding the coterie anthology's role in shaping a hybrid American modernism, Peterson contributes to ongoing conversations in literary studies around race, authorship, and the politics of literary form"-- |
|---|---|
| Physical Description: | xvi, 252 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references and index. |
| ISBN: | 9781625349507 1625349505 9781625349514 1625349513 |