'White' by Marie Darrieussecq: a review

My name is white: Michael Worton is enthralled by Marie Darrieussecq's Antarctic meditations

Afterword

Book description: Luce Irigaray: Teaching explores ways to confront new issues in education. Three essays by Irigaray herself present the outcomes of her own experiments in this area and develop proposals for teaching people how to coexist in difference, reach self-affection, and rethink the relations between teachers and students. In the last few years, Irigaray has brought together young academics from various countries, universities and disciplines, all of whom were carrying out research into her work. These research students have received personal instruction from Irigaray and at the same time have learnt from one another by sharing with the group their own knowledge and experience. Most of the essays in this book are the result of this dynamic way of learning that fosters rigour in thinking as well as mutual respect for differences. The central themes of the volume focus on five cultural fields: methods of recovery from traumatic personal or cultural experience; the resources that arts offer for dwelling in oneself and with the other(s); the maternal order and feminine genealogy; creative interpretation and embodiment of the divine; and new perspectives in philosophy. This innovative collaborative project between Irigaray and researchers involved in the study of her work gives a unique insight into the topics that have occupied this influential international theorist over the last thirty years

'The Possibility of an Island' by Michel Houellebecq: a review

A dog's life (poodles excepted): Michel Houellebecq's misanthropy is all too evident in 'The Possibility of an Island ' says Michael Worton

Of models and metrics: the UK debate on assessing humanities research

Professor Michael Worton (UCL) is the Chair of an expert group set up in July 2006 by the Arts & Humanities Research Council to examine alternative ways to assess research. The group has developed a complex metrics-based system using quantitative information about a university department’s research activity and research outcomes to determine how to distribute billions of pounds in research funding distributed to UK Universities in the future. This paper, on the background to the group's work, was presented to a conference on Peer Review hosted by the European Science Foundation (ESF), the European Heads of Research Councils (EuroHORCs) and the Czech Science Foundation (Grantová agentura eské republiky, GA R), held in Prague on 12-13 October 2006. See also UCL News, 9 September 2006. Arts metrics plan revealed. http://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/news-articles/inthenews/itn06091

Sifting clues to the mind of a literary genius: careful scrutiny of one of Beckett’s student’s old lecture notes offers an insight into the complex influences behind his work, writes Michael Worton

Introduction: Most famous for plays such as Waiting for Godot, End Game and Happy Days, in which tramps philosophise about parsnips, aged parents live in rubbish bins, and a fadedly genteel lady sits buried to her waist in the sand endlessly deciphering the words on her toothbrush, Samuel Beckett has been described as one of the most pessimistic writers of modern times, yet his work also makes people laugh across the world. In these two highly readable books we are given insights into the complexity of both the man and his works

Reading Kate Chopin through contemporary French feminist theory

Book description: Although she enjoyed only modest success during her lifetime, Kate Chopin is now recognised as a unique voice in American literature. Her seminal novel, The Awakening, published in 1899, explored new and startling territory, and stunned readers with its frank depiction of the limits of marriage and motherhood. Chopin's aesthetic tastes and cultural influences were drawn from both the European and American traditions, and her manipulation of her 'foreignness' contributed to the composition of a complex voice that was strikingly different to that of her contemporaries. The essays in this Companion treat a wide range of Chopin's stories and novels, drawing her relationship with other writers, genres and literary developments, and pay close attention to the transatlantic dimension of her work. The result is a collection that brings a fresh perspective to Chopin's writing, one that will appeal to researchers and students of American, nineteenth-century, and feminist literature. • Covers all of Chopin’s oeuvre in its historical and international literary context • Offers a variety of theoretical approaches to reading her work • Emphasises for the first time the transatlantic dimension of her fictio