In neglecting postcolonial literature’s aesthetic dimension, this book demonstrates, we are overlooking an essential aspect of this literature and a critical perspective on its sociopolitical function and value. Bahri shows how attention to the aesthetic innovations and utopian impulses of postcolonial works uncovers their complex relationship to ideology, reanimating their potential to make contributions to the larger project of social liberation.
This book is freely available in an open access edition thanks to the generous support of Emory University and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
Excerpts from “Journey of the Magi,” in Collected Poems 1909–1962 by T. S. Eliot, copyright 1936 by Harcourt, Inc., copyright 1964, 1963 by T. S. Eliot, are reprinted by permission of Harcourt, Inc., and Faber and Faber Ltd.
Excerpts from “Belderg,” “Come to the Bower,” and “The Digging Skeleton,” from Poems 1965–1975 by Seamus Heaney, copyright 1980 by Seamus Heaney, and excerpts from “Antaeus,” “Exposure,” “Funeral Rites,” “Hercules and Antaeus,” and “Viking Dublin: Trial Pieces,” from Opened Ground: Selected Poems 1966–1996 by Seamus Heaney, copyright 1998 by Seamus Heaney, and from North by Seamus Heaney, copyright 1995 by Seamus Heaney, are reprinted by permission of Farrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC, and Faber and Faber Ltd.
Copyright 2003 by the Regents of the University of Minnesota
