Contemporary literature
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This document provides summaries of several literary works and their authors: - Ghostwritten by David Mitchell follows nine interconnected stories across different times and places that are united by a theme of human connection. - The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood is set in a dystopian future where the U.S. is ruled by a totalitarian Christian theocracy and explores themes of women's subjugation. - Freedom by Jonathan Franzen chronicles an American family and their complex relationships over many years as they relocate from Minnesota to Washington D.C.
Contemporary literature
- 2. is literature with its setting generally after World War II. It include contemporary romance. It is a subgenre of romance novels, generally with the setting after World War II. The largest of the romance novel subgenres, contemporary romance novels are set in the time when they were written, and usually reflect the mores of their time.
- 3. Literature of the 20th century refers to world literature produced during the 20th century. The range of years is written from 1900 through the 1990s. Technological advances during the 20th century allowed cheaper production of books, resulting in a significant rise in production of popular literature and trivial literature, comparable to the development in music. Towards the end of the 20th century, electronic literature developed as a genre due to the development of hypertext and later the world wide web.
- 4. Born: 2 August 1942 (age 71) Lima, Peru Occupation: Author, journalist Language: Spanish Nationality: ChileanAmerican Notable award(s): National Prize for Literature
- 5. The House of the Spirits •is the debut novel by Isabel Allende. •The book was first conceived by Isabel Allende when she received news that her one hundred year-old grandfather was dying, and she began to write him a letter that ultimately became the starting manuscript of The House of the Spirits. •The story details the life of the Trueba family, spanning four generations, and tracing the post-colonial social and political upheavals of Chile. The story is told mainly from the perspective of two protagonists (Esteban and Alba) and incorporates elements of magical realism.
- 6. Born: November 18, 1939 Ottawa, Ontario, Canada Occupation: Novelist, poet Nationality: Canadian Genres: historical fiction, speculative fiction, science fiction, dystopian fiction Notable work(s): The Handmaid's Tale, Cat's Eye,Alias Grace, The Blind Assassin,Oryx and Crake, Surfacing
- 7. The Handmaid's Tale is set in the near future, in a totalitarian Christian the ocracy which has overthrown the United States government, The Handmaid's Tale explores themes of women in subjugation and the various means by which they gain agency.
- 8. Born: August 17, 1959 (age 54) Western Springs, Illinois Occupation: Novelist, essayist Nationality: American Genres: Literary fictionLiterary movementSocial realism Notable work(s): The Corrections (2001),Freedom (20 10 Notable award(s): National Book Award 2001 James Tait Black Memorial Prize 2002
- 9. Freedom follows several members of an American family, the Berglund's, as well as their close friends and lovers, as complex and troubled relationships unfold over many years. They have one daughter, Jessica, and a son, Joey, who early on displays an independent streak and an interest in making money. Joey becomes sexually involved with a neighborhood teen named Connie and begins to rebel against his mother, going so far as to move in with Connie, her mother, and her mother's boyfriend Blake, making Patty and Walter increasingly unstable. After several unhappy years the family relocates to Washington, D.C., abandoning the neighborhood and house they worked so hard to improve. Walter takes a job with an unorthodox environmental project, tied to big coal.
- 10. Born: 21 June 1948 (age 65) Aldershot, England Occupation: Novelist, screenwriter Nationality: English
- 11. “First Love, Last Rites” is told by an unnamed narrator who lives with his girlfriend in a quayside apartment in England. Both are seventeen or eighteen years of age. It is early summer, and the lovers, filled with youthful passion, make love regularly on a mattress-covered table in front of a big, open window. Once, while they are lying on the table, the narrator becomes aware of clawing sounds behind the wall; shortly afterward, Sissel also hears the noise. The narrator and Sissel continue to lie on the mattresscovered table, talking and making love. Sissel develops foot rot, the smell mingling with the smells of mud and seaweed coming in through the window. The narrator hears the creature in the wall and imagines it is his own creature in Sissel’s body—one of feathers, claws, and gills. Sissel hears the creature also, and her lover thinks the scratching sound that grows out of their lovemaking is part of her fantasy also. By mid-July, the lovers touch less, no longer enjoying their room. Adrian comes to visit them every day and wants to fight with Sissel as in former days. He is sincerely disgusted when the lovers touch.
- 12. Born: 12 January 1969 (age 44) Southport, England, United Kingdom Occupation: Novelist Nationality: BritishAlma materUniversity of Kent Notable work(s): Ghostwritten number9dream,Cloud Atlas, Black Swan Green, The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet Notable award(s): John Llewellyn Rhys Prize 1999 Ghostwritten
- 13. A gallery attendant at the Hermitage. A young jazz buff in Tokyo. A crooked British lawyer in Hong Kong. A disc jockey in Manhattan. A physicist in Ireland. An elderly woman running a tea shack in rural China. A cult-controlled terrorist in Okinawa. A musician in London. A transmigrating spirit in Mongolia. What is the common thread of coincidence or destiny that connects the lives of these nine souls in nine far-flung countries, stretching across the globe from east to west? What pattern do their linked fates form through time and space? A writer of pyrotechnic virtuosity and profound compassion, a mind to which nothing human is alien, David Mitchell spins genres, cultures, and ideas like gossamer threads around and through these nine linked stories. Many forces bind these lives, but at root all involve the same universal longing for connection and transcendence, an axis of commonality that leads in two directions--to creation and to destruction. In the end, as lives converge with a fearful symmetry, Ghostwritten comes full circle, to a point at which a familiar idea--that whether the planet is vast or small is merely a matter of perspective--strikes home with the force of a new revelation. It marks the debut of a writer of astonishing gifts.
- 14. Born: 26 July 1856 Dublin, Ireland Died: 2 November 1950 (aged 94) Ayot St Lawrence, Hertfordshire, England Occupation: Playwright, critic, political activist Nationality: Irish Genres: Satire, black comedy Literary movement: Ibsenism, naturalism Notable award(s): Nobel Prize in Literature 1925 Academy Award for Writing Adapted Screenplay 1938 Pygmalion
- 15. Shaw was conscious of the difficulties involved in staging a complete representation of the play. Acknowledging in a "note for technicians" that such a thing would only be possible "on the cinema screen or on stages furnished with exceptionally elaborate machinery", he marked some scenes as candidates for omission if necessary. Of these, a short scene at the end of Act One in which Eliza goes home, and a scene in Act Two in which Eliza is unwilling to undress for her bath. The others are the scene at the Embassy Ball in Act Three and the scene with Eliza and Freddy in Act Four.