Melville: Fashioning in Modernity - Stephen Matterson (week 1)

Melville: Fashioning in Modernity (2014) provides a radically fresh approach to Melville studies, focusing on the symbolic functions of clothing in his writing: its relationship to private and public identity, class, power, justice, authority, uniformity, transgression, civilization, and savagery.

Through close readings of both major and minor works, supplemented with historical context, Matterson elaborates on the crisis of modernity using the recurring themes of social and existential alienation, the malleability and rigidity of identity, and clothing as representative of writing itself.

Schedule:

• Week 1: Introduction - Chapter 2
• Week 2: Chapters 3 and 5

Melville: Fashioning in Modernity:

• Pdf
• Amazon

This meetup is part of the series Fig Leaves and Fancy Pants.