Hostile bodies in the city FINAL REVISED 27.11.18.pdf (318.89 kB)
The City's Hostile Bodies: Coriolanus's Rome and Carson's Belfast
When change is articulated in literary cities, from the early republican Rome of Coriolanus (1608) to the Troubles Belfast of Ciaran Carson‘s Belfast Confetti (1989), bodies become agents of that change. These bodies-at-war induce stasis: a civil war in which the domestic is politicized, the political domesticated. To resolve the violence at the heart of evolving polities, hostile bodies claim sovereignty over the city: Shakespeare‘s plebeians or Coriolanus; Carson's unionists or nationalists. Both texts resolve antagonisms through the paradoxical logic of hospitality, realizing divided yet fully functioning cities where hosts hospitably contest with other hosts, and bodies underpin the political (r)evolutions.
History
Published in
Modern Language ReviewPublisher
Modern Humanities Research AssociationAcceptance Date
2019-02-07Publication Date
2020-01-01Version
- AM (Accepted Manuscript)
Citation
Taylor-Collins, N. (2020) 'The City's Hostile Bodies: Coriolanus's Rome and Carson's Belfast', Modern Language Review, 115(1), 17–45. DOI: 10.5699/modelangrevi.115.1.0017Print ISSN
0026-7937Cardiff Met Affiliation
- Cardiff School of Education and Social Policy
Copyright Holder
- © The Publisher
Language
- en