Understanding Kristeva, Understanding Modernism

"""Erudite. Intriguing. Capacious. This book is not an introduction but rather a kaleidoscopic deep-dive into Kristevian thought, at the intersections of literature, philosophy, politics, psychoanalysis, all in the context of European modernism. A serious and timely collection of new perspectives on the work of one of the most important intellectuals of our time."" --Alice Jardine, Professor of Romance Languages and Literatures and Studies of Women, Gender and Sexuality, Harvard University, USA, and author of At the Risk of Thinking: An Intellectual Biography of Julia Kristeva (Bloomsbury, 2020) ""This important collection cements Kristeva's status as one of the most important interlocutors of the European modernist avant-garde. Her revolutionary agenda - which she herself has described as situated at the razor's edge between poetry and reality, and which spans over half a decade of prolific writing - is both celebrated and scrutinized by the authors gathered in this volume. Each examines the many faces of modernism as they emerge in her work (revolutionary, sublimatory, abject, melancholic, self-critical...), and as they relate to aesthetic and theoretical considerations, or what Maria Margaroni describes in her introduction as the bleeding edge of modernism. This is essential reading not only to Kristeva scholars but also to those trying to understand, more generally, the legacy of the modernist project for our troubled times."" --Fanny Söderbäck, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Södertörn University, Sweden ""This interdisciplinary collection provides an original analysis of the constitutive role of European modernisms in Kristeva's thought and in turn shows a critical relevance of Kristeva's theory for modernist studies. An indispensable reading for anyone interested in vexed transnational dialogues between modern aesthetics, politics and psychoanalysis."" --Ewa Ziarek, Professor of Comparative Literature and Global Gender And Sexuality Studies, University at Buffalo, USA"