Iconoclastic in spirit, Magical Realism and the History of the Emotions in Latin America is the first study of affect and emotion in magical realist literature. Against the grain of a vast body of scholarship, it argues that magical realism is neither exotic commodity nor postcolonial resistance, but an art form fueled by a search for spaces of wonder in a disenchanted world. Linking the rise and fall of magical realism and kindred narrative forms to the shifting value of wonder as an emotional experience, Magical Realism and the History of the Emotions proposes a radical new approach to canonical novels such as One Hundred Years of Solitude. Received as “one of the most convincing manifestations of the ‘turn to affect’ in contemporary Latin American critical thought,” Magical Realism and the History of the Emotions draws on affect theory, the history of emotions, and new materialism to reframe key questions in Latin American literature and culture.

Click here to purchase Magical Realism and the History of Emotions in Latin America.

REVIEWS

“Magical Realism and the History of the Emotions in Latin America makes a valuable contribution to a crowded area of research by approaching magical realism through affect studies, the history of the emotions, and new materialist studies. Impeccably researched in all areas of expertise, [it] is a sophisticated study that models the kinds of innovative readings that new emotions-based and object-oriented theories may facilitate in Latin American literary and cultural studies.”—Modern Language Quarterly

“Una de las más convincentes demostraciones de la productividad del llamdo ‘giro afectivo’ en el pensamiento crítico latinoamericano contemporáneo. Un acercamiento pionero a la maravilla en el marco de la cuestión del afecto y las emociones en la historia de América Latina.”—Revista de crítica literaria latinoamericana

“This is an excellent scholarly contribution that does not limit itself to regional contexts and instead traces transcultural and transnational connections in the study and reevaluation of the Latin American chronicle and magical realist narratives. . . .Essential.”—Choice

“An erudite, thought-provoking, and intellectually-probing volume. Jerónimo Arellano succeeded in bringing to the fore the theory of affect to the cultural history of Latin America and, in doing so, shed new light on both canonical and less canonical works from different times. It is a contribution to Latin American studies meant to last.”—Revista de Estudios Hispánicos

“The innovative interdisciplinary approach . . . offers a significant contribution to the studies of affectivity in Latin American and cultural studies.”—The Latin Americanist

“This study sheds a novel light on an already extensively researched topic. The argument is daring, subtle and remains engaging throughout the book.”—Forum for Modern Language Studies

“How do we experience wonder? Have people always felt wonder in the same way? How has the way we write about wonder changed over time? These questions lie at the heart of Jerónimo Arellano’s Magical Realism and the History of the Emotions in Latin America, which examines expressions of wonder in Spanish colonial writings and in Latin American magical realism. . . . Arellano rejuvenates the field by interpreting canonical texts through the critical lens of affect studies.”—Transmodernity

“A very well researched study . . . contributing to the current critical re-examination and re-assessment of magical realism”—Bulletin of Latin American Research

“La alta calidad teórica y la profundidad de las reflexiones, además de la acertada combinación de la historia de las emociones con los estudios de los afectos, hacen de este libro una aportación significante para los estudios culturales y una aplicación inteligente del estudio de los sentimientos a un ámbito interdisciplinario.”—Iberoamericana

“Magical Realism and the History of the Emotions in Latin America successfully directs the insights of the affective turn in the humanities towards magical realism and Latin America. This changes the game as far as our thinking about magical realism is concerned.”—Christopher Warnes, University of Cambridge

“Arellano’s brilliant study recasts the genealogy of the marvelous ordinary in Latin American literature. It provides a fresh, new look at a seemingly overanalyzed literary mode, Magical Realism, by contextualizing it with contemporary theories of affect, the cultural history of wonder, the sociality of emotions, as well as the changing structures of feeling and material practices. This book reveals a new history of wonder from the margins of the colonial/modern world-system, by revisiting the historical relationship—in both temporal and spatial terms—among magical realist narratives’ expression of wonder and those of the early modern Wunderkammer (cabinet of wonder) and the chronicles of the New World.”—Ignacio López-Calvo, University of California, Merced

“Jerónimo Arellano’s refreshing study is a subtle, thoughtful, and stimulating reassessment of Latin American literary history. Using notions of both affectivity and emotion, Arellano sheds new light on the wonder discourse of the ‘New World’ and comprehensively punctures and problematizes the common assumption that modern Magical Realist writing is essentially rooted in traditional versions of such a discourse.”—Philip Swanson, Hughes Professor of Spanish, University of Sheffield, UK

About the author:

Jerónimo Arellano is assistant professor of Latin American literature and culture at Brandeis University.

Jocelyn Harris’s new book, Satire, Celebrity, and Politics in Jane Austen, continues to receive high accolades. Read on for praise of the recent Bucknell Press publication.

Please follow this link to a page where you can purchase Jocelyn Harris’s new book:
https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781611488395/Satire-Celebrity-and-Politics-in-Jane-Austen

In Satire, Celebrity, and Politics in Jane Austen, Jocelyn Harris argues that Jane Austen was a satirist, a celebrity-watcher, and a keen political observer. In Mansfield Park, she appears to base Fanny Price on Fanny Burney, criticize the royal heir as unfit to rule, and expose Susan Burney’s cruel husband through Mr. Price. In Northanger Abbey, she satirizes the young Prince of Wales as the vulgar John Thorpe; in Persuasion, she attacks both the regent’s failure to retrench, and his dangerous desire to become another Sun King. For Elizabeth Bennet in Pride and Prejudice, Austen may draw on the actress Dorothy Jordan, mistress of the pro-slavery Duke of Clarence, while her West Indian heiress in Sanditonmay allude to Sara Baartman, who was exhibited in Paris and London as “The Hottentot Venus,” and adopted as a test case by the abolitionists. Thoroughly researched and elegantly written, this new book by Jocelyn Harris contributes significantly to the growing literature about Austen’s worldiness by presenting a highly particularized web of facts, people, texts, and issues vital to her historical moment.

REVIEWS

“[Jocelyn Harris is a giant who looms] large in the landscape of Austen scholarship…. [Satire, Celebrity, and Politics in Jane Austen positions] Austen as a writer of political import…because she commented incisively on the corruption of national leaders in her own day…. [These] chapters raise the important question of whether women’s celebrity, including Austen’s own, is received differently from men’s by the public.”
—Tulsa Studies in Women’s Literature (Fall 2020)

“Harris’s monograph represents the crowning achievement of a career devoted to placing Austen’s novels in rich historical context…. In her newest book, Harris presents Austen as much more keenly aware of politics and celebrity figures—from bestselling novelists to the royal family—than has hitherto been recognized…. To re-encounter Austen’s works through the eyes of a scholar as knowledgeable as Harris is a bracing experience. She establishes with admirable thoroughness the degree of likelihood of every possible influence and parallel that she delineates. And she acknowledges scrupulously how her ideas intersect with and build on those of fellow scholars. The result is a master class in scholarly thinking and research.”
—European Romantic Review (2019)

“Ultimately, this book has much to teach Austen enthusiasts and scholars, as well as general readers interested in British literature, European history, and women’s studies…. Harris’s study provides a fascinating comparative narrative that illuminates Austen’s works in light of the events and lives of famous people from her time. Harris’ book fully captures the gamut of Austen’s life as well as her works, for it offers us an opportunity to expand our thinking on all of Austen’s writings —from her juvenilia up to her last piece of writing, her verses on Winchester. The result is a fresh way of seeing Austen as a flexible writer, editor, and reviser who taps into current events and furtively—and satirically—tucks them into her tales.”
—Early Modern Women: An Interdisciplinary Journal (Spring 2020)

“Jane Austen has changed a lot in the past couple of decades. Not many scholars (and hopefully fewer and fewer readers) attach much credence to the image of the retired spinster, marooned in villages and rectories in the backwaters of Hampshire, but equally not many have tried to alter our perception of Austen quite as dramatically as Jocelyn Harris does in this remarkable book…. In all of her arguments, Harris uses painstaking research to connect [then-current] events to Austen, her movements and her letters, to show why they might have worked their way into the fiction…. By the end, we are presented with two Austens: one removed from the world of contemporary events and aspiring to some higher, universal plane, and one embracing current affairs, satire, and celebrity. There is, as Harris admits, no way of knowing which is right, and the ‘truth’ will in all probability lie somewhere between the two, but no one who reads this scholarly, meticulous book will ever discount the possibility that a very different Austen lies beneath the official family portrait.”
—The Cambridge Quarterly (2019)

“Harris is well established as a guide to the wider thought-world of the author…. In her latest book her expertise and questing curiosity are brought to bear on a set of themes that have not generally been associated with Austen.”
—Emma Clery, University of Southampton; Times Literary Supplement (February 2018)

“New Zealand academic Jocelyn Harris’s excellent Satire, Celebrity and Politics in Jane Austen published early this year shows what a keen political observer Austen was, and how her interest in the celebrities of the day, such as actress Dorothea Jordan and Sara Baartman (an African woman with very large buttocks who was exhibited in English freak shows as “the Hottentot Venus”), influenced and inspired characters in Austen’s fiction.”
—Susannah Fullerton; The Australian (July 2017)

“[T]his is a wonderfully rich and convincing presentation of much new material. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Lower-division undergraduates and above.
—CHOICE

“This book is an enjoyable one for anyone who has read Austen’s novels or watched productions of them on television…. Jocelyn Harris is an excellent writer. For an academic study, the usual jargon and allusions to various post-modern theories are happily absent in this book. It is packed with detail and citations. It’s is valuable for Cook enthusiasts because of its chapter on Molesworth Phillips, and the broader considerations surrounding the death of Captain Cook.”
—Cook’s Log

“Satire, Celebrity, and Politics is unfailingly fascinating in its dissection of Jane Austen, the satirist, and the text is enhanced by a well-chosen selection of contemporary portraits and gloriously scurrilous cartoons. The ‘stories behind the stories’ always make for an interesting read and Harris has produced a book that will be read with great pleasure by academics and devoted readers alike.”
—Jane Austen’s Regency World

“Burney scholars will find Jocelyn Harris’s latest book Satire, Celebrity, and Politics in Jane Austen an enriching read.… [It] responds to, and expands upon, the work of critics who have demonstrated that Austen was so much more than the domestic, apolitical novelist her family portrayed her to be.… Harris reinforces the image of Austen as a well-informed and sharp-minded woman who was seriously engaged with the socio-political issues of the day…. With a keen eye for detail, Harris exposes the subtle connections between the unrestrained, public laughter surrounding such figures and the more restrained, oblique laughter in the novels, thereby deepening our understanding of Austen’s skill for sature in the process.”
—Elles Smallgoor, Burney Newsletter

“Jocelyn Harris’s book, which reflects on the ways in which Jane Austen’s work may have been influenced by what she knew about certain celebrities of her time, is a pleasant and accessible read…. On the whole…I would emphasise the thorough research into the socio-historical context that has gone into this book, and which makes it of interest to anyone who would like to know more of current events during Austen’s lifetime.”
—Rita J. Dashwood, The Jane Austen Society (Spring 2018)

“In Satire, Celebrity, and Politics in Jane Austen, University of Otago Emeritus Professor Jocelyn Harris approaches Austen in terms of the world in which she lived, using what is known of everything from her social networks to contemporary media portrayals of prominent figures, to argue that her novels are much more than mere domestic dramas…. Although primarily an academic text, Satire, Celebrity, and Politics has much of interest here for the lay reader too. The glimpses it offers into regency England and diversions into topics as diverse as the disputed accounts of Cook’s death and the misbehavior of the Prince Regent are as interesting as the primary analysis…. [Harris’s formidable thesis] is standing its ground in the fierce world of Austen scholarship.”
—Cushla McKinney, The Otago Daily Times (July 2018)

“Harris’s impressive new book, Satire, Celebrity, and Politics in Jane Austen (2017), builds on the work of her pioneering 1989 study, deepening our sense of what Austen may have been up to in crafting her novels…. Harris’s well-written, deeply researched, and timely book has a great deal to offer…. It is difficult to find any scholarship on these subjects that is simultaneously attentive to Austen’s fiction, to the history of theory and criticism, and to the minutiae of Austen family history and biography. Harris weaves all of these kinds of evidence and arguments together to great effect…. For years to come, readers and critics will be weighing the massive number of new insights in this book, troubling through their implications for our future readings of Austen, politics, history, and popular culture.”
—Devoney Looser, Arizona State University

“Last year’s bicentenary commemoration of the death of Jane Austen has given her readers many reasons for celebration. This book is one of them…. Jocelyn Harris in this careful, enthusiastic and learned book shows how Jane Austen achieves vision through observation and creates a new and distinctive world from a recognisable world.”
—Tony Voss, Jane Austen Society of Australia

“Jocelyn Harris has studied the influences on Jane Austen’s writing for a long time…. [Her] thoroughness and detailed and intriguing analysis are exceptional. The text is dense. Her sleuth work is incredible and includes compelling evidence…. The twenty-first century student of Jane Austen will never read her in the same way after reflecting on Jocelyn Harris’s latest book.”
—Sylvia Kasey Marks, NYU Tandon School of Engineering

“Like most members of JASNA, I think that I know Jane Austen, but after reading Jocelyn Harris’s latest book, I’m not so sure…. For many readers…Jane Austen is isolated, safely removed from controversies of personality or politics. Jocelyn Harris overturns that view of Jane Austen and demonstrates just how connected the author was to her contemporary scene. Harris’s work…will prompt scholars to penetrate deeper into her suggested connections.”
—David Wheeler, JASNA News

“Throughout Satire, Celebrity, and Politics, we are thoroughly persuaded of Harris’s main argument that Austen ‘was a politician, in the former sense of a person keenly interested in practical politics….’ [Harris conducted] capacious research.”
—Melissa Rampelli, Holy Family University

“Harris’s thoroughness and detailed and intriguing analysis are exceptional…. Her sleuth work is incredible…. The twenty-first century student of Jane Austen will never read her in the same way.”
—Sylvia Kasey Marks, NYU Tandon School of Engineering, The Eighteenth-Century Intelligencer (March 2019)

“Harris’ book offers a fascinating study of Austen’s engagement with the cult of celebrity of her time.”
—Jennifer Golightly, Colorado College, Restoration and Eighteenth-Century Theatre Research (Winter 2016)