Some of the essays included here originated as talks given at a conference at the Huntington Library on October 26–27, 2007, also with the title “American Literature’s Aesthetic Dimensions.” We wish to thank Robert C. Ritchie, formerly W. M. Keck Foundation Director of Research at the Huntington, for his support of the conference (which was generously funded by the William French Smith Endowment), as well as Caroline Powell and Susi Krasnoo for their kind organizational assistance. Several friends and colleagues served as chairs and moderators (Alison Hills, Catherine Jurca, Maria Karafilis, Samuel Otter, Nancy Ruttenburg, and Elisa Tamarkin), and they, along with the many members of the lively audience, deserve our thanks as well. Those who spoke at the conference (Edward Cahill, Christopher Castiglia, Max Cavitch, Julie Ellison, Jonathan Freedman, Dorothy J. Hale, Eric Lott, Trish Loughran, Sianne Ngai, Wendy Steiner, Cindy Weinstein, and Ivy Wilson) benefited greatly from the exchanges and challenges that the conference enabled. The published collection now includes a host of essays not originating at the conference (those by Dorri Beam, Nancy Bentley, Mary Esteve, Christopher Looby, Elisa New, and Sianne Ngai—whose essay here is different from the talk she gave at the conference—as well as the afterword by Charles Altieri), and we thank them for adding their contributions to the conversation already in progress.
Our editor at Columbia University Press, Philip Leventhal, has been interested, understanding, patient, and strongly supportive (when necessary), and we have greatly enjoyed working with such a talented editor. Our deep gratitude goes also to Alison Alexanian and Susan Pensak for seeing this volume through the editorial and production process so deftly and wisely. The reviewers for the press gave us astute and pointed advice, which we have tried to use to the collection’s advantage; they deserve our sincere thanks, and it is a pleasure to express our gratitude to one of them (James Davis of Brooklyn College) by name. We would also like to thank colleagues in the field, many of whom appear in this volume’s notes, for helping to bring this book to fruition. They include Hester Blum, Gregg Crane, Mark Eaton, Michael Gilmore, Karen Jacobs, Wyn Kelley, Mark Maslan, John Matthews, Geoff Sanborn, Peter Stoneley, Ezra Tawil, and Robert von Hallberg. Many thanks to Jonathan Katz, chair of Caltech’s Division of Humanities and Social Sciences, for his financial support of the project.
Several of these essays have been previously published elsewhere, and we are grateful for permission to reprint them here. Max Cavitch, “Stephen Crane’s Refrain,” is reprinted by permission from ESQ: A Journal of the American Renaissance 54 (2008): 33–54, copyright © 2008 by the Board of Regents of Washington State University. Wendy Steiner’s essay provided much of the material for the conclusion to her recent book, The Real Real Thing: The Model in the Mirror of Art (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2010), and is reprinted by permission of the University of Chicago Press, copyright © 2010 by the University of Chicago. Cindy Weinstein, “When Is Now? Poe’s Aesthetics of Temporality,” is reprinted by permission from Poe Studies/Dark Romanticism: History, Theory, Interpretation 41 (2008): 81–107, copyright © 2008 by the Board of Regents of Washington State University. An earlier version of Jonathan Freedman’s essay, “What Maggie Knew: Game Theory, The Golden Bowl, and the Possibilities of Aesthetic Knowledge,” was published in the Cambridge Quarterly 37, no. 1 (2008): 98–113 and is reprinted by permission of Oxford University Press, copyright © the author. Dorothy J. Hale, “Aesthetics and the New Ethics: Theorizing the Novel in the Twenty-First Century,” is reprinted by permission of the Modern Language Association of America from PMLA 124 (2009): 896–905, copyright © 2009 by the Modern Language Association of America. Eric Lott, “Perfect Is Dead: Karen Carpenter, Theodor Adorno, and the Radio; or, If Hooks Could Kill,” is reprinted by permission of Criticism: A Quarterly for Literature and the Arts 50 (2008): 219–34, copyright © 2009 by Wayne State University Press.
The collection is dedicated to our teachers, and that is by now a very large category for both of us, given how much we know we have learned over the years from numerous instructors, colleagues, and friends—too many to be named here. But Christopher Looby wishes to single out one particular teacher to whom to dedicate his contributions to this volume—one out of many inspirational undergraduate and graduate professors he could name, along with all those fellow students, departmental colleagues, and wise friends whose intelligence and learning he has been pleased to enjoy and exploit. Sacvan Bercovitch’s rare combination of acute intelligence, prodigious learning, and scholarly imagination continue to represent for him a beautiful and unmatched ideal of critical accomplishment. Cindy Weinstein has been fortunate to study with the very best of teachers (and friends) at Brandeis and Berkeley, but she wishes to dedicate her contributions to this volume to Michael Gilmore and Eric Sundquist. Their exemplary scholarship and steadfast friendship have been her foundation and ideal.