{"id":1755,"date":"2020-10-05T11:21:27","date_gmt":"2020-10-05T09:21:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/?p=1755"},"modified":"2020-10-05T11:21:27","modified_gmt":"2020-10-05T09:21:27","slug":"new-book-representations-of-masculinity-in-literature-and-film-focus-on-men","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/2020\/10\/05\/new-book-representations-of-masculinity-in-literature-and-film-focus-on-men\/","title":{"rendered":"NEW BOOK!: REPRESENTATIONS OF MASCULINITY IN LITERATURE AND FILM – FOCUS ON MEN<\/strong>"},"content":{"rendered":"

\tLast March I published the post \u201cHow Entitlement and Villainy Connect\u201d (https:\/\/blogs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/2020\/03\/03\/how-entitlement-and-villainy-connect-as-i-explain-in-masculinity-and-patriarchal-villainy-from-hitler-to-voldemort\/<\/a>) to publicise my first monograph in English Masculinity and Patriarchal Villainy in British Fiction: From Hitler to Voldemort<\/em> (Routledge, 2019). Now is the turn to launch my second book in English, Representations of Masculinity in Literature and Film: Focus on Men<\/em> (http:\/\/www.cambridgescholars.com\/representations-of-masculinity-in-literature-and-film<\/a>). Both are part of my research in Masculinities Studies and, as such, are necessarily similar. Yet, at the same time they are very different examples of how academic research is done. I think that is worth some comment.<\/p>\n

\tEvery mature scholar accumulates a long list of articles published in journals along the years and there comes a time when it makes sense to see how they can be put together as a book. I believed that time had come two years ago, when I first submitted a proposal for the book now published. It is the habitual convention not to reprint chapters of books in other books (or only exceptionally) but is not uncommon to collect together journal articles. Or that is what I had assumed. I have read many books of this type but something seems to have changed because by the time I put my collection together I was told that this type of book was no longer interesting. The editor of the first book series to which I submitted the proposal was even rude to me about this: \u201cwhy would anyone want to publish work available elsewhere?\u201d he told me in a rather cold email message, which truly surprised (and hurt) me. I attribute this to his being a sociologist used to scientific publication which, certainly, is hardly ever published in collections (unlike what is more habitual in the Humanities). The second commissioning editor I approached was far more welcoming but told me that she\u2019d rather publish new research by me. This is how I finally published Masculinity and Patriarchal Villainy in British Fiction: From Hitler to Voldemort<\/em> a book, which as I explained in my previous post, had been since 2008 in the making. <\/p>\n

\tThe very week that Routledge published my book, a commissioning editor from Cambridge Scholars Publishing sent me an e-mail message asking whether I knew of any project that they might publish. I had edited for them the collective volumes Recycling Culture(s)<\/em> (2008) and Persistence and Resistance in English Studies: New Research<\/em> (co-edited with David Owen and Elisabet Pladevall). These gather together papers presented at two conferences celebrated at my university, UAB, expanded for book publication. My experience with CSP had been good and it occurred to me then that they might welcome my collection. So they did, and here\u2019s the book, of which I am immensely satisfied. A matter that makes this book very special to me as that I chose for the cover a beautiful selfie that my nephew \u00c1lex took a while ago (for a class project in which students were asked to produce a self-portrait). I had originally called the book Focus on Men: Representations of Masculinity in Literature and Film<\/em>, but, as happened in the case of the Routledge book, I was asked to reverse the order of title and subtitle (apparently libraries prefer the more self-explanatory titles). The photo, which shows Alex holding his glasses in his hand, ready to focus on his future whenever he chooses, illustrates very well my \u2018focus on men\u2019 concept, and there it is. It\u2019s very beautiful and it makes me very proud to have it on the cover of my book.<\/p>\n

\tI must clarify that Representations of Masculinity in Literature and Film: Focus on Men <\/em>consists of six previously published articles and six new chapters (some had been online as working papers for a while, some are new). Here are the contents:<\/p>\n

Introduction: Why We Should Focus on Men vii
\nChapter One. Queerying Antonio: Michael Radford\u2019s The Merchant of Venice<\/em> and the Problem of Heterosexism 1
\nChapter Two. Heathcliff\u2019s Blurred Mirror Image: Hareton Earnshaw and the Reproduction of Patriarchal Masculinity in Wuthering Heights<\/em> 21
\nChapter Three. In Bed with Dickens: Ralph Fiennes\u2019s The Invisible Woman<\/em> and the Problematic Masculinity of the Genius 47
\nChapter Four. Recycling Charlie, Amending Charles: Dodger<\/em>, Terry Pratchett\u2019s Rewriting of Oliver Twist<\/em> 66
\nChapter Five. Between Brownlow and Magwitch: Sirius Black and the Ruthless Elimination of the Male Protector in the Harry Potter<\/em> Series 87
\nChapter Six. Odysseus\u2019s Unease: The Post-war Crisis of Masculinity in Melvyn Bragg\u2019s The Soldier\u2019s Return<\/em> and A Son of War<\/em> 112
\nChapter Seven. A Demolition Job: Scottish Masculinity and the Failure of the Utopian Tower Block in David Greig\u2019s Play The Architect<\/em> and Andrew O\u2019Hagan\u2019s Novel Our Fathers<\/em> 133
\nChapter Eight. Rewriting the American Astronaut from a Cross-cultural Perspective: Michael Lopez-Alegria in Manuel Huerga\u2019s documentary film Son & Moon<\/em> 161
\nChapter Nine. Discovering the Body of the Android: (Homo)Eroticism and (Robo)Sexuality in Isaac Asimov\u2019s Robot Novels 186
\nChapter Ten. Educating D\u00eddac, Humankind\u2019s New Father: The End of Patriarchy in Manuel de Pedrolo\u2019s Typescript of the Second Origin<\/em> 213
\nChapter Eleven. Obi-Wan Kenobi and the Problem of the Flawed Mentor: Why Anakin Skywalker Fails as a Man 232
\nChapter Twelve. The Anti-Patriarchal Male Monster as Limited (Anti)Hero: Richard K. Morgan\u2019s Black Man\/Th3rteen<\/em> 251<\/p>\n

I must say that it was not easy at all to come up with this final list, which is limited, as I say, to what I have published in journals (at any rate relatively little in comparison to what I have published in collective books). The other matter that worried me very much was how to place the articles, written in very different periods and circumstances, in a way that made sense. The other book, Masculinity and Patriarchal Villainy in British Fiction: From Hitler to Voldemort<\/em>, is a monograph designed from scratch to cohere as much as possible. Yet in this one I had an immense variety of articles, from Shakespeare to Richard K. Morgan. I decided that perhaps that was the key: look at the chronology of the texts analysed and try to organise the volume this way. Of course, I have deviated from my own rule because the three chapters dealing with Dickens come after a chapter on Victorian Wuthering Heights<\/em> but deal with 21st century texts. I wanted to build a nice gradation so that the reader would be taken gently from the 16th to the 21st century, from Elizabethan drama to post-cyberpunk. I hope it works\u2026 Of course, the articles were not written in this orderly fashion. The oldest one, the chapter dealing with Hareton in Emily Bront\u00eb\u2019s masterpiece, originates in the lecture I gave back in 2001 in my official examination to get tenure, whereas the most recent piece happens to be the chapter on Asimov\u2019s amazingly attractive robot R. Daneel Olivaw, which I wrote in 2019. It is, in any case, a real pleasure, to see together work that has a similar intellectual origin but that was until now scattered in very many different places (or that had been rejected in some cases by unsympathetic peer reviewers and, yes, I mean the chapter on Sirius Black, which with six rejections is my own personal record).<\/p>\n

\tI must express here my absolute frustration with how the demands of our academic tasks prevent us from concentrating on writing books. I truly believe that both monographs and collections should be our main focus in publishing and not articles and chapters in collective books. Do not misunderstand me: shorter pieces are important and, as I am arguing, it makes good sense to collect them now and then in books. What I do not accept, and protest against, is the fact that books count so little for research assessment (at least in Spain). When I apply to be assessed in 2023, my next deadline, the Routledge book will only count as one of the five publications I need to inform about, even though it is 110,000 pages long and has nine chapters which equal nine articles. The idea that a book counts the same as a 5000 word article is simply ludicrous but these are the rules which assessment agency ANECA follows, inspired by the scientific fixation with the paper. I will not include my CSP book among my most valuable publications, not because I think it is not representative of what I do as a researcher (quite the opposite) but because ANECA will most likely argue that it is research corresponding to an earlier period. Actually, I will include one of the articles reprinted as a book chapter but referencing its original publication in a journal. This lack of enticement to publish monographs is, I think, a serious error for it is in monographs where we express our most sustained intellectual efforts. Articles and book chapters are fine but they are short bursts of energy in comparison to writing a monograph, which is steady, focused intellectual work (what we learn to do in doctoral dissertations).<\/p>\n

\tThe other matter that needs to be born in mind, apart from ANECA\u2019s criteria, is time. I have managed to publish the monograph and the collection in about two years because my university scrupulously respects the legality marked by the decree known as \u2018Decreto Wert\u2019 of 2011. According to this decree, researchers with at least three six-year periods of research validated by the Ministerio can be allowed to teach 16 ECTS instead of the habitual 24 ECTS. I have been in this privileged situation for the last five years (if I recall correctly), which explains my productivity. The monograph was written in a period of one year during which I had no teaching duties. The collection has been assembled during Covid-19 lockdown, which has certainly facilitated matters to me not because I had less teaching to do but because I had no long commute to take my energy away. Now that I\u2019m back to teaching face-to-face I have no time or energy to start a new book, even though title, chapter list and bibliography are ready and waiting.<\/p>\n

\tBack to Representations of Masculinity in Literature and Film: Focus on Men<\/em>, I\u2019m quoting my own text in CSP\u2019s website to note that collectively, these essays argue that, although much has been written about men, it has been done from a perspective that does not see masculinity as a specific feature in need of critical appraisal. Men need to be made aware of how they are represented in order to alter the toxic patriarchal models handed down to them and even break the extant binary gender models. For that, it is important that men distinguish patriarchy from masculinity, as is done here, and form anti-patriarchal alliances with each other and with women. This book is, then, an invitation to men\u2019s liberation from patriarchy by raising an awareness of its crippling constraints. This begins, I add, by showing men how they are represented (mostly how they self-represent) in order to see where the positive models and the negative failures are. I find that, on the whole, men\u2019s fictional representation is far less flattering than feminist criticism, focused on women\u2019s deficient representation by men, usually assumes. The flaws are there for all to see, if you care to look, whereas the positive models are few and far between. A matter that puzzles me very much is that whenever positive models emerge they are not human (Asimov\u2019s Daneel), are destroyed by their authors (Sirius Black and others), or prevented from bringing on deep changes. This is because, I believe, men have no collective agenda to improve their self-representation as, unlike women, they do not see themselves as a class (or so-called \u2018minority\u2019) but as a constellation of individuals. Please, recall that I always distinguish between men and patriarchy and that I would like to see men becoming collectively aware of the way in which they can be anti-patriarchal. I have found in the texts analysed some anti-patriarchal attitudes but not a sense that this is an actual position that can be actively assumed by a majority of men.<\/p>\n

\tEnjoy!!!<\/p>\n

I publish a post once a week (follow @SaraMartinUAB). Comments are very welcome! Download the yearly volumes from http:\/\/ddd.uab.cat\/record\/116328. Visit my website http:\/\/gent.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last March I published the post \u201cHow Entitlement and Villainy Connect\u201d (https:\/\/blogs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/2020\/03\/03\/how-entitlement-and-villainy-connect-as-i-explain-in-masculinity-and-patriarchal-villainy-from-hitler-to-voldemort\/) to publicise my first monograph in English Masculinity and Patriarchal Villainy in British Fiction: From Hitler to Voldemort (Routledge, 2019). Now is the turn to launch my second book in English, Representations of Masculinity in Literature and Film: Focus on Men (http:\/\/www.cambridgescholars.com\/representations-of-masculinity-in-literature-and-film). Both […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":98,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,16,23],"tags":[212,296],"class_list":["post-1755","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cultural-studies","category-film-studies","category-masculinities-studies","tag-gender-studies","tag-literary-studies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1755","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/98"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1755"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1755\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}