Understanding Barthes, Understanding Modernism: (Understanding Philosophy, Understanding Modernism)

Understanding Barthes, Understanding Modernism is a general assessment of the modern literary and philosophical contributions of Roland Barthes. The first part of the volume focuses on work published prior to Barthes's death in 1980 covering the major periods of his development from Writing Degree Zero (1953) to Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography (1980). The second part focuses both on the posthumously published material and the legacies of his work after his death in 1980. This later work has attracted attention, for example, in conjunction with notions of the neutral, gay writing, and critiques of everyday life. The third part is devoted to some of the critical vocabulary of Barthes in both the work he published during his lifetime, and that which was published posthumously.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgments Introduction Understanding Barthes, Understanding Modernism Jeffrey R. Di Leo (University of Houston, Victoria, USA) and Zahi Zalloua (Whitman College, USA) Part I: Mapping Barthes 1 Roland Barthes's Myth of Photography Jean-Michel Rabaté (University of Pennsylvania, USA) 2. Barthes and the Search for Rigor Thomas Pavel (University of Chicago, USA) 3. Barthes and the French Classics Michael Moriarty (University of Cambridge, UK) 4. The Pleasure of Paradigm: Sade, Fourier, Loyola Rudolphus Teeuwen (National Sun Yat-Sen University, Taiwan) 5. Understanding Barthes, Understanding Proust Thomas Baldwin (University of Kent, UK) 6. Take Two: Barthes and Film in the Age of Mythologies Steven Ungar (University of Iowa, USA) 7. Barthes, Bazin, and Écriture Dudley Andrew (Yale University, USA) 8. Barthes's Hedonism Jeffrey R. Di Leo (University of Houston, Victoria, USA) Part II: Legacies and Afterlives 9. Point Counterpoint: Derrida's “The Deaths of Roland Barthes” Brian O'Keeffe (Barnard College, USA 10. Objects of Desire: Chosisme after OOO Zahi Zalloua (Whitman College, USA) 11. Orpheus Turning: The Reader to Come in Camera Lucida Daniel T. O'Hara (Temple University, USA) 12. No Wish to “Understand” nor to “Grasp”: Opacity in the Work of Roland Barthes and Édouard Glissant Andy Stafford (University of Leeds, UK) 13. Roland Barthes and Don DeLillo on Living Together/Apart Herman Rappaport (Wake Forest University, USA) 14. Barthes: Visual Culture and Homosexual Sociabilities Magali Nachtergael (University of Paris 13, France) Part III: Glossary 15. Author Andy Stafford (University of Leeds, UK) 16. Codes Andy Stafford (University of Leeds, UK) 17. Haiku Brian O'Keeffe (Barnard College, USA) 18. Jouissance Andy Stafford (University of Leeds, UK) 19. The Neutral Andy Stafford (University of Leeds, UK) 20. Readerly/Writerly Warren Motte (University of Colorado Boulder, USA) 21. Sign Dinda L. Gorlée (University of Bergen, Norway) 22. Semiology Dinda L. Gorlée (University of Bergen, Norway) 23. Structuralism Dinda L. Gorlée (University of Bergen, Norway) 24. Studium/Punctum Andy Stafford (University of Leeds, UK) 25. Work/Text Gerald Prince (University of Pennsylvania, USA) Notes on Contributors Index

About the Author :
Jeffrey R. Di Leo is Professor of English and Philosophy and Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences at the University of Houston, Victoria, USA. He is editor and founder of the critical theory journal symploke, editor and publisher of the American Book Review, and Executive Director of the Society for Critical Exchange. He has written, edited, or co-edited twenty-five books including the Bloomsbury Handbook of Literary and Cultural Theory (2019). Zahi Zalloua is the Cushing Eells Professor of Philosophy and Literature and a professor of French and Interdisciplinary Studies at Whitman College, USA, and Editor of The Comparatist. He is the author of five books, including Žižek on Race: Toward an Anti- Racist Future (2020), Theory's Autoimmunity: Skepticism, Literature, and Philosophy (2018), and Continental Philosophy and the Palestinian Question: Beyond the Jew and the Greek (2017). He has edited volumes and special journal issues on globalization, literary theory, ethical criticism, and trauma studies.

Review :
Understanding Barthes, Understanding Modernism is a further testament to the enduring insistence of the writing and thought of Roland Barthes. Mapping Barthes' brilliance across the inevitably multiple and heterogeneous constellation of his interventions, exploring and extending his legacies, and, in superbly Barthesian style, offering punctual insights into the "conceptual inventory' generated by his writing, the volume succeeds in making of the reading of Barthes' work a paradoxical experience of newness and return. The volume will be required reading for any who seek to understand Barthes' vital contribution to his time and ours. An extremely stimulating collection by a transatlantic group of distinguished contributors, this volume combines very rich essays on many aspects of Barthes' work, from the earliest to the latest, with useful summaries of key ideas. Any student of Roland Barthes will find things of interest here. Reading Barthes means thinking about modernity in all its forms. Providing a panoramic account of Barthes's engagement with literature, aesthetics, popular culture, and philosophy, the essays in this collection illuminate our understanding of Barthes's multi-faceted thought and show how his insights continue to resonate and to inform inquiry across disciplinary boundaries. This book is a necessary inclusion on the shelf of any Barthes scholar as it fully explores the vast constellation of his thought through nuanced and comprehensive studies and applications of his work.