Bøker av Richard Bradford

A COMPANION TO LITERARY EVALUATION The first critical survey devoted solely to literary evaluation When we read a novel, watch a play, or hear lyric poetry in performance, we intuitively make a private assessment of its artistic qualities. Yet it is commonly assumed within academia that literature cannot be defined. Consequently, the question of "is it any good" is hardly ever addressed in the world of literary studies. Bridging the gap between the non-academic literary world and the university, A Companion to Literary Evaluation helps readers balance instinctive judgment and reasoned assessment to articulate how or why a particular author, playwright, or poet inhabits an exalted position while others do not. A diverse panel of contributors explores key issues from various perspectives, including analytical aesthetics, the philosophy of literature, opinionated bias, and common sense. It covers topics from lyric poetry, newspaper reviewing, literary translation, and the question of Shakespeare's genius, to the simple notion of how a life of reading books alters our sense of what is good and what is not. Throughout the book, easily accessible chapters emphasize the importance of maintaining clarity of values in the evaluation of literary works, illustrate how seemingly divergent perspectives sometimes overlap, discuss the impact of Modernism, the teaching of evaluation in schools, relativism versus subjectivism in assessing literary value, and more. Incorporating methodologies that demonstrate why literature can be treated as something different from other forms of language, A Companion to Literary Evaluation is a must-read for undergraduates, research students, lecturers, and academics in search of fresh perspectives on standard literary critical issues.

The first biography to examine Mailer's life as a twisted lens, offering a unique insight into the history of America from the end of World War II to the election of Barack Obama.Twice winner of the Pulitzer Prize, firstly in 1969 for The Armies of the Night and again in 1980 for The Executioner's Song, Norman Mailer's life comes as close as is possible to being the Great American Novel: beyond reason, inexplicable, wonderfully grotesque and addictive.The Naked and the Dead was acclaimed not so much for its intrinsic qualities but rather because it launched a brutally realistic sub-genre of military fiction - Catch 22 and MASH would not exist without it. Richard Bradford combs through Mailer's personal letters - to lovers and editors - which appear to be a rehearsal for his career as a shifty literary narcissist, and which shape the characters of one of the most widely celebrated World War II novels.Bradford strikes again with a merciless biography in which diary entries, journal extracts and newspaper columns set the tone of this study of a controversial figure. From friendships with contemporaries such as James Baldwin, failed correspondences with Hemingway and the Kennedys, to terrible - but justified - criticism of his work by William Faulkner and Eleanor Roosevelt, this book gives a unique, snappy and convincing perspective of Mailer's ferocious personality and writings.

This is not another quantum mechanics text on conventional lines. Most topics covered in undergraduate quantum physics courses are notable for their absence. Instead this book concentrates upon understanding the intriguing conceptual issues raised by quantum mechanics. It is neither a book for experts nor a "popular physics" book. It is intended for the serious student, but at undergraduate or early postgraduate level. The aim is to demystify ("unweird") quantum mechanics by analysing the many conundrums it presents in terms of the theory's own language, namely Hilbert space algebra. It should be regarded as complementary to standard treatments, not a replacement for them. A rapid reprise of the Hilbert space formalism of quantum mechanics is first presented and then applied to a wide range of topics including, (a) the reason why "which path" information destroys interference, (b) the reason why quantum states cannot be non-destructively copied, (c) what the uniquely quantum "observability of counterfactuals" means, (d) why constantly monitoring a pure quantum state can prohibit its evolution, (e) analyses of interference experiments involving entangled particles and so-called "delayed choice", "quantum erasure" and "delayed erasure" interference, (f) the quantum formulation of entropy, (g) the definition and quantification of entanglement in both pure and mixed quantum states, (h) the two convincing arguments against "hidden variables" in quantum mechanics, and hence the irreducibly indeterministic nature of quantum measurement, (i) what is meant by decoherence and how it can be quantified, (j) why big things tend not to be "quantum mechanical" - and why they sometimes are, and more often than you think, (k) a brief taster for quantum communication and quantum cryptography, and (l) quantum teleportation: what it is and what it isn't. Traditional topics are not ignored entirely. The book includes a rather idiosyncratic treatment of symmetry and conservation laws, the uncertainty principle, and a detailed chapter on algebraic methods in Hilbert space with which all physics students of a theoretical bent should be familiar. In particular the book places great emphasis from the start on appreciating the distinction between pure quantum states and mixed states, which avoids unnecessary confusion. By the end the reader should have a sensible, physicists', perspective on Schrodinger's cat and understand what exactly is meant by being able to extract the result of a quantum computer's computation without turning it on.

Though small, Ireland has one of the richest literary cultures on the globe.

Is Shakespeare any Good? reveals why certain literary works and authors are treated as superior to others, and questions the literary establishment s criteria for creating an imperium of great writers.

Martin Amis's life could itself provide the formula for an enthralling work of fiction. Son of one of the most popular and best-loved novelists of the post-War era, he has forged a groundbreaking manner of writing that owes nothing to the style of his father, nor indeed to anyone else. He relished and recorded the bizarre, turbulent atmosphere of Britain and the US during the 1970s and 80s, arguably the transformative period of the late 20th century. No other contemporary writer has proved so magnetic for the popular press: he has, despite himself, achieved celebrity status. Of late, his reputation as a novelist has been matched by his outspoken, challenging writing on contemporary global politics, and he has earned the status as the Orwell of the early 21st century.Martin Amis offers the real Martin Amis, a cabinet of contrasts: tortured, eloquently aloof, kind, obsessive, loved by women, a dedicated family man, often the architect of his own undoing, and a literary genius. Moreover, this fascinating biography discloses the autobiographical thread that runs through Amis's books.Richard Bradford has talked with Amis at length, questioned him on his childhood, his private history, his opinions and the inspiration for his fiction, and these exchanges are supplemented by interviews with a large number of his friends and fellow writers.Praise for Richard Bradford's previous titles:Praise for Lucky Him: The Life of Kingsley Amis:'Nearly all critical biographies relate the work to the life - insidiously, tendentiously, helplessly. Richard Bradford is different: he does it convincingly, and with vigour. The result is an original and stimulating book'. Martin Amis'I found Bradford's approach refreshing. Rare among literary academics he writes clearly, doesn't show off and knows a lot about his subject. He presents a fascinating chronicle of the development of Amis's brilliant ear for speech... He also brings out the full extent of the symbiosis between Amis and his best friend Philip Larkin: in a way Larkin invented Amis.' Craig Brown'At his better moments Bradford... rises to Amis's stylistic level.' Humphrey Carpenter

In this study, Bradford reasserts the value of Jakobson's work on poetry and poetics. Exploring Jakobson's thesis that poetry is the primary object of language, he demonstrates how vital Jacobson's work is to an understanding of language and poetry.

This introductory text examines literary history from the Renaissance to postmodernism. It provides close readings of individual books, treating them as paradigms which can both reflect and unsettle their linguistic and cultural contexts.