Alison Gibbons

Provides a clear introduction to the key terms and frameworks in cognitive poetics and stylisticsHow do texts create meaning? How do we arrive at our textual interpretations? Why do we become 'lost in a book' or feel deep emotion in response to a literary character? Through close attention to the way texts are written and the language they use, as well as what we know about the human mind, 'Contemporary Stylistics' provides readers with the tools to begin answering these questions. In doing so, it introduces the theoretical principles and practical frameworks of stylistics and cognitive poetics, supplying the practical skills to analyse your own responses to literary texts. Including innovative activities for students and with case studies of work by writers like Dylan Thomas, EL James and Kazuo Ishiguro, this is a detailed analysis of contemporary stylistics that offers both historical contextualization of the discipline and points towards its possible future direction. Key Features:Introduces the key terms for each contemporary stylistic frameworkOutlines the foundations of the discipline and addresses cutting-edge developments such as reader response research, corpus methods, multimodality and reader emotion Contains practical analyses, innovative exercises for students, and further reading suggestions in each chapterAddresses the recent attention to multimodal and digital literature and research into empiricism and emotionEach topic is explored through original analyses of a wide range of texts, including poetry, prose, dialogue, song lyrics, political discourse, and linguistic transcriptsThere are stylistic and cognitive poetic analyses through the book. The key case studies include:'The Canal' Lee Rourke (2010)'Zang Tumb Tumb' by Marinetti (1914)'River in Spate' by Louis MacNeice'Under Milk Wood' by Dylan Thomas (1954)'Space Sonnet & Polyfilla' by Edwin Morgan (1977)'In Defense of Our Overgrown Garden' by Matthea Harvey (2000)'House of Cards''What is the What' by Dave Eggers (2006)'Ash Wednesday' by Ethan Hawke (2002)'Fresh Meat''Fifty Shades of Grey' by E. L. James (2012)'Received Pronunciation' by Sally Goldsmith (2012)'The house is not the same since you left' by Henry Normal (1993)'The Lives of Others' by Neel Mukherjee (2014)'My Name is Lucy Barton' by Elizabeth Stroud (2016)'How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia' by Mohsin Hamid (2013)'The Unconsoled' by Kazuo Ishiguro (2005)'The One Ronnie''The Girl on the Train' by Paula Hawkins (2015)'I Am The Song' by Charles Causley'Hypothetical' by Maria Taylor'This is the Poem in which I Have Not Left You' by Julia Copus (2012)'13, rue Therese' by Elena Mauli Shapiro (2011)'Illuminae' by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff (2015)'Karen' by Blast Theory (2015)'Blood Story' by Melvin Burgess

Provides a clear introduction to the key terms and frameworks in cognitive poetics and stylisticsHow do texts create meaning? How do we arrive at our textual interpretations? Why do we become 'lost in a book' or feel deep emotion in response to a literary character? Through close attention to the way texts are written and the language they use, as well as what we know about the human mind, 'Contemporary Stylistics' provides readers with the tools to begin answering these questions. In doing so, it introduces the theoretical principles and practical frameworks of stylistics and cognitive poetics, supplying the practical skills to analyse your own responses to literary texts. Including innovative activities for students and with case studies of work by writers like Dylan Thomas, EL James and Kazuo Ishiguro, this is a detailed analysis of contemporary stylistics that offers both historical contextualization of the discipline and points towards its possible future direction. Key Features:Introduces the key terms for each contemporary stylistic frameworkOutlines the foundations of the discipline and addresses cutting-edge developments such as reader response research, corpus methods, multimodality and reader emotion Contains practical analyses, innovative exercises for students, and further reading suggestions in each chapterAddresses the recent attention to multimodal and digital literature and research into empiricism and emotionEach topic is explored through original analyses of a wide range of texts, including poetry, prose, dialogue, song lyrics, political discourse, and linguistic transcriptsThere are stylistic and cognitive poetic analyses through the book. The key case studies include:'The Canal' Lee Rourke (2010)'Zang Tumb Tumb' by Marinetti (1914)'River in Spate' by Louis MacNeice'Under Milk Wood' by Dylan Thomas (1954)'Space Sonnet & Polyfilla' by Edwin Morgan (1977)'In Defense of Our Overgrown Garden' by Matthea Harvey (2000)'House of Cards''What is the What' by Dave Eggers (2006)'Ash Wednesday' by Ethan Hawke (2002)'Fresh Meat''Fifty Shades of Grey' by E. L. James (2012)'Received Pronunciation' by Sally Goldsmith (2012)'The house is not the same since you left' by Henry Normal (1993)'The Lives of Others' by Neel Mukherjee (2014)'My Name is Lucy Barton' by Elizabeth Stroud (2016)'How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia' by Mohsin Hamid (2013)'The Unconsoled' by Kazuo Ishiguro (2005)'The One Ronnie''The Girl on the Train' by Paula Hawkins (2015)'I Am The Song' by Charles Causley'Hypothetical' by Maria Taylor'This is the Poem in which I Have Not Left You' by Julia Copus (2012)'13, rue Therese' by Elena Mauli Shapiro (2011)'Illuminae' by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff (2015)'Karen' by Blast Theory (2015)'Blood Story' by Melvin Burgess

Since the turn of the millennium, there has seen an increase in the inclusion of typography, graphics and illustration in fiction. This book engages with visual and multimodal devices in twenty-first century literature, exploring canonical authors like Mark Z. Danielewski and Jonathan Safran Foer alongside experimental fringe writers such as Steve Tomasula, to uncover an embodied textual aesthetics in the information age. Bringing together multimodality and cognition in an innovative study of how readers engage with challenging literature, this book makes a significant contribution to the debates surrounding multimodal design and multimodal reading. Drawing on cognitive linguistics, cognitive psychology, neuroscience, semiotics, visual perception, visual communication, and multimodal analysis, Gibbons provides a sophisticated set of critical tools for analysing the cognitive impact of multimodal literature.

Since the turn of the millennium, there has seen an increase in the inclusion of typography, graphics and illustration in fiction. This book engages with visual and multimodal devices in twenty-first century literature, exploring canonical authors like Mark Z. Danielewski and Jonathan Safran Foer alongside experimental fringe writers such as Steve Tomasula, to uncover an embodied textual aesthetics in the information age. Bringing together multimodality and cognition in an innovative study of how readers engage with challenging literature, this book makes a significant contribution to the debates surrounding multimodal design and multimodal reading. Drawing on cognitive linguistics, cognitive psychology, neuroscience, semiotics, visual perception, visual communication, and multimodal analysis, Gibbons provides a sophisticated set of critical tools for analysing the cognitive impact of multimodal literature.