George Moore and the Quirks of Human Nature

Edited by María Elena Jaime de Pablos and Mary Pierse

Oxford: Peter Lang

273 pp. | ISBN 978-3-0343-1752-8 | £40.00

The engaging figure of Irish writer George Moore (1852-1933) comes to life in this collection of essays on his works and influences. So often considered as dangerously controversial in his lifetime, his literary output can now be appreciated as groundbreaking, artistically sophisticated and particularly significant for the innovations he introduced into English literature. In this volume, international Moore scholars venture into previously unexplored literary, historical and psychological territory as they shine new light on Moore’s diagnoses, and on his presentation of human quirks. In turn, and in a Moorian spirit, the author is critically examined for his alleged feminist credentials, his spiritual understanding, his cultural insights and his literary experimentation. The analytical focus is sharp; the presence of Joyce, Yeats, Wilde, Zola and Dujardin is strong; and the surrounding atmosphere of Revival Ireland is unmistakable, albeit with a French colouring. This is an entertaining and enlightening compilation that will engage the reader and provide much relevant material for specialists across a variety of fields.

Contents: Adrian Frazier: Moore and Joyce: Confessions of a Young Man as an Influence on A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man – Stoddard Martin: Moore versus Wilde: The Vagaries of Spite – Robert Becker: The Contrarian George Moore – Mary Pierse: Moore and Fogazzaro, Body and Soul: Zeitgeister of the Fin de Siècle? – Conor Montague: Philosophical Dialogue between the Brothers Moore (1903-1905): A Capacity for Misunderstanding – Elizabeth Grubgeld: George Moore’s Autobiographies and the Vampiric Grasp of Home: To be Seduced, Transfixed, and Terrified – Jayne Thomas: George Moore and the Unconscious in Evelyn Innes and Sister Teresa: ‘Shapes from an Underworld’ – Melanie Grundmann: Diseased Human Natures and their Menace to Society – Fabienne Gaspari: George Moore’s Sense of Paradox in A Mere Accident: ‘In Large and Serpentine Curves’ – Kathi R. Griffin: Esther Waters as Parody: Naturalism, Victorian Morality, and the ‘Bulges’ of Human Nature – José Antonio Hoyas Solís: Early Feminist or Mainstream Writer? A Linguistic Analysis of George Moore’s Portrayal of Women in Three Novels – María Elena Jaime de Pablos: Nora Glynn in The Lake: ‘A Natural Woman’ – Kathryn Laing: ‘On Women, on Art, on Life’: George Moore (1852-1933) and Hannah Lynch (1859-1904) – Catherine Smith: Listening to Héloïse in George Moore’s Héloïse and Abélard: ‘A Barbarian Girl and a Great Sorceress’.

Available from http://www.peterlang.com?431752