Book contents
- The Market Logics of Contemporary Fiction
- Cambridge Studies in Twenty-First-Century Literature and Culture
- The Market Logics of Contemporary Fiction
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- Part I The Emergence of Market Metafiction
- Part II The Phantasmagorias of Contemporary Finance
- Part III The Market Knows
- Part IV The Moment of Market Metafiction
- Notes
- Index
Part IV - The Moment of Market Metafiction
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 July 2019
- The Market Logics of Contemporary Fiction
- Cambridge Studies in Twenty-First-Century Literature and Culture
- The Market Logics of Contemporary Fiction
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- Part I The Emergence of Market Metafiction
- Part II The Phantasmagorias of Contemporary Finance
- Part III The Market Knows
- Part IV The Moment of Market Metafiction
- Notes
- Index
Summary
This chapter argues that market metafiction has emerged as the vanguard fictional style of the post-financial crisis period. It begins by discussing the work of Tao Lin and Chris Kraus. The remainder of the chapter analyses two recent works of market metafiction that exemplify the paradigm, even as they register and contest differing financial and literary market logics. In Ben Lerner’s 10:04 (2014), attempts to deal with risk and uncertainty central to derivatives trading provide models for “hedging” between different forms of literary value, so that underperformance in market terms may be offset against critical approbation. In Teju Cole’s Open City (2011), meanwhile, the depredations of what David Harvey calls “the Wall Street–IMF–Treasury complex” are seen to be of a piece with the global publishing industry’s exploitation of images of African suffering. In his novel, Cole deliberately sidesteps these stereotyped and voyeuristic images, while at the same time acknowledging the privilege that permits him (now a relatively affluent and highly educated New Yorker) to perform precisely such a resistance to market-dictated convention.
Keywords
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Market Logics of Contemporary Fiction , pp. 185 - 261Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2019