Book Description

This book is the first collected volume to be entirely dedicated to the work of contemporary Anglo-American writer Patrick McGrath. It follows the international conference that was held in his presence at Perpignan University, France, in May 2011. It comprises nine chapters (as well as an introduction and an index) written by scholars specializing in Gothic and American literature, each dealing with specific aspects of McGrath’s work. The volume seeks to encompass the author’s whole literary production to date, spanning a 25-year writing career. It also features an exclusive afterword written by the author himself, who attended all the papers given during the conference with great attention and often intensely enthusiastic reactivity. The editor’s intention is twofold. The idea was first to provide a comprehensive survey of Patrick McGrath’s writing, returning to the aspects that are usually associated with the author’s work, such as his artful narrative control, his inclination for stories of “transgression and decay”, as well as his long-lasting reflexive relationship with the Gothic and the Grotesque. Yet the aim of this volume is also to open new directions for the study of McGrath’s texts, taking into account the noticeable evolution of the writer’s literary production, its growing Americanization and gradual distanciation with modes of excess. It seems that it is no longer possible to tag McGrath’s work as neo- or ‘postmodern’ Gothic. His books’ growing complexity and change of horizons call for fresh investigations. This book will be of interest to students of McGrath’s work, scholars of the Gothic and its contemporary manifestations, as well as to all academics specializing in contemporary American fiction.