The Novel and the Sea

Description

For a century, the history of the novel has been written in terms of nations and territories: the English novel, the French novel, the American novel. But what if novels were viewed in terms of the seas that unite these different lands? Examining works across two centuries, The Novel and the Sea recounts the novel's rise, told from the perspective

Margaret Cohen teaches in the Department of Comparative Literature at Stanford University, where she holds the Andrew B. Hammond Chair of French Language, Literature, and Civilization. She is the author of "Profane Illumination" and "The Sentimental Education of the Novel".

Winner of the 2012 Barbara and George Perkins Prize, The International Society for the Study of Narrative Winner of the 2010-2011 Louis Gottschalk Prize, American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies Second Runner-Up for the 2011 Harry Levin Prize, American Comparative Literature Association "In her bracing, often scintillating book about the associations of prose fiction and the ocean since the early eighteenth century, Margaret Cohen laments that critics have themselves tended not to trouble readers with the details of adventures at sea... [H]er revisionist account is much needed."--Matthew Beaumont, Times Literary Supplement "Cohen's ambitious and refreshing analysis productively connects oceanic studies, studies of the novel, and comparative literature of the long nineteenth century, brings an old archive into a new critical frame, and offers new possibilities for theorizing the novel-as-form."--Gretchen J. Woertendyke, Novel "[M]any ... texts touched on or explored at length in The Novel and the Sea receive equal, illuminating, and masterful treatment as individual representatives of the many genres of the maritime book. Further, that treatment is less interpretation than searching description. Bringing to bear a historically specific and technical lexicon, Cohen restores these texts' legibility. Practicing a form of so-called surface reading more interested in what the texts forthrightly say than in what they conceal, she renews their pertinence. No critic could hope to do more."--Cannon Schmitt, Victorian Studies "Cohen's eminently readable, learned, and well-illustrated book deserves a wide readership."--Studies in English Literature "Lucid, original, and steeped in references both scholarly and popular, this book will particularly delight those who love the sea."--Choice "Cohen's breadth and depth of research is immense, even awe-inspiring... The Novel and the Sea is a brilliant work of literary scholarship and an important book to the studies of literature of the sea."--Richard J. King, Sea History "Maritime historians often find entertainment by reading maritime novels... Margaret Cohen's book promises to add welcome background and perhaps new direction to a pleasurable pursuit."--Louis Arthur Norton, Northern Mariner "In The Novel and the Sea Margaret Cohen makes a compelling case for the sea novel that celebrates the thrill of adventure neglected by the 'land' novel. Maritime fiction specialists will be drawn to the book's detail, but the assessment of 'the novel' from the stimulating new perspective of the sea also appeals to a more general readership... This is an invigorating assessment of representations of sailing and the sea, which occupies a carefully plotted position within this increasingly popular area of research."--Alexandra Phillips, Project Muse