Contemporary Fictions of Attention

Reading and Distraction in the Twenty-First Century

Alice Bennett

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781474282635
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Literary Criticism for Comparative Literature
• Index: Literature

With the supposed shortening of our attention spans, what future is there for fiction in the age of the internet? Contemporary Fictions of Attention rejects this discourse of distraction-crisis which suggests that the future of reading is in peril, and instead finds that contemporary writers construct 'fictions of attention' that find some value in states or moments of inattention. Through discussion of work by a diverse selection of writers, including Joshua Cohen, Ben Lerner, Tom McCarthy, Ali Smith, Zadie Smith, and David Foster Wallace, this book identifies how fiction prompts readers to become peripherally aware of their own attention. Contemporary Fictions of Attention locates a common interest in attention within 21st-century fiction and connects this interest to a series of debates surrounding ethics, temporality, the everyday, boredom, work, and self-discipline in contemporary culture.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• 1 Fictions of Attention
• 2 ‘Focus, People!’ (David Foster Wallace)
• 3 Present-Mindedness (Joshua Cohen)
• 4 The Distraction of Both (Ali Smith)
• 5 Amputated Attention (Tom McCarthy)
• 6 Beginning to Mind (Zadie Smith)
• 7 Reading Absorption (Ben Lerner)
• Notes
• Works Cited
• Index