Writing Against Time

200 Pages·2013·6.434 MB·English

by  Michael Clune

W R ITING AGA INST TIME

W R I T I N G AG A I N S T T I M E
Michael W. Clune
STANFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
STANFORD, CALIFORNIA
Stanford University Press
Stanford, California
©2013 by the Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any
means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or in any
information storage or retrieval system without the prior written permission of
Stanford University Press.
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free, archival-quality paper
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Clune, Michael W., author.
Writing against time / Michael W. Clune.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8047-7081-1 (cloth : alk. paper)--ISBN 978-0-8047-7082-8 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Literature, Modern--History and criticism. 2. Time in literature. I. Title.
PN56.T5C56 2013
809'.93384--dc23 2012035993
Typeset by Bruce Lundquist in 10/14 Minion
CON TEN TS
Acknowledgments vii
Introduction: Writing Against Time 1
1 Imaginary Music 23
2 The Addictive Image 57
3 Big Brother Stops Time 87
4 The Cultured Image 115
Conclusion: From Representation to Creation 139
Notes 151
Bibliography 171
Index 185

ACK NOW LEDGMEN TS
my thanks go first to aaron kunin, both for the example of his own work
and for the gift of his intellectual friendship, which has so enriched the writing
of this book. Amy Hungerford, Walter Benn Michaels, Kerry Larson, David
Drewes, James Kuzner, and the two anonymous readers for the press offered
valuable advice on various drafts. I’d also like to thank Frances Ferguson, Mark
Pedretti, Jonathan Flatley, and the members of my Forms of Life seminars in
2009 and 2010. Emily-Jane Cohen has been a wonderful editor, and I am grate-
ful for her support of this project. For their assistance with the scientific por-
tions of this book I’d like to thank Rebecca Traynor, Mike Robinson, Nancy
Campbell, Daniel Lende, John Sarneki, and Ming Li and the members of his
lab. I’ve benefitted from the generous responses of the audiences who have
heard parts of this project; I’d like to extend special thanks to Mary Esteve,
James Narajan, William Marling, J. D. Connor, Garrett Stewart, Athena Vrettos,
Oren Izenberg, Gary Stonum, Allison Carruth, and Andrew Hoberek. The
Mellon Foundation provided crucial support in the early stages of this project,
and the College of Arts and Sciences at Case Western Reserve University pro-
vided support during its completion. This book is dedicated to Colleen, with
timeless love.
An early version of Chapter 3 appeared in Representations 107; and an el-
ement of the argument in Chapter 2 was published in Behavioral and Brain
Sciences 31.4 as a brief piece coauthored with Rebecca Traynor and John Sarneki.
Part of Chapter 4 appeared in Criticism 50.3 (Copyright 2008 Wayne State Uni-
versity Press, reprinted with permission of Wayne State University Press).

W R ITING AGA INST TIME