Reframing Twenty-First Century American Literature: 'Post-postcritical Reading' Through Materiality, Affect, and Representation

Norrick-Rühl, Corinna; Schultermandl, Silvia

Abstract

Building on ongoing debates around 'contemporary' literature and reading practices in the twentyfirst century, we offer an interdisciplinary reading of two recent novels: Rebecca F. Kuang's Yellowface (Harper Collins / William Morrow, 2023) and Lost Children Archive by Valeria Luiselli (Penguin Random House / Knopf, 2019) through three key concepts: materiality, affect, and representation. We argue that a reading of these two texts through our three key terms has the potential to respond productively not only to the seismic shifts in twenty-first century reading culture but also to the seismic shifts in our two 'sister' disciplines concerned with reading: book studies and literary studies.