In:
Journal of American Studies, Cambridge University Press (CUP), Vol. 35, No. 3 ( 2001-12), p. 413-431
Abstract:
Nearly every handbook of critical theory acknowledges Kenneth Burke
(1897–1993) to be the twentieth-century North American critic who was most ahead of his time. Yet he seems to have been so ambitious that we
still do not know how to place him. Indeed, it would require the space of a whole book to trace the extensive but scarcely documented impact
which he has had. Concepts for which many other critics became famous may be traced back to him: ‘‘the order of words’’ (Frye); ‘‘the rhetoric
of fiction’’ (Booth); ‘‘blindness and insight’’ (De Man); ‘‘narrative as a socially symbolic act’’ (Jameson); ‘‘the anxiety of influence’’ (Bloom).
Indeed, it may well be that very anxiety which has led so many contemporary critics to repress his memory. But there is a change in the
critical climate, corresponding to the global. This article is written in the hope that Burke will shortly be recognized as the first critic systematically
to analyse culture and literature from an ecological perspective. As the dating of our epigraph indicates, he initiated this project over half a
century before the rise of ecocriticism in the United States. Moreover, this was no passing phase for him; his whole career may be understood as a
profound experiment in green thinking.
Type of Medium:
Online Resource
ISSN:
0021-8758
,
1469-5154
DOI:
10.1017/S0021875801006697
Language:
English
Publisher:
Cambridge University Press (CUP)
Publication Date:
2001
detail.hit.zdb_id:
1466472-0
SSG:
7,26
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