Hugh Kenner

Hugh Kenner teaches first-rate students at the University of Georgia, where he is Franklin and Callaway Professor of English. He is planning a book on Benoit Mandelbrot.

Rules, Rules

Hugh Kenner, 18 July 1996

Grammar could once seem synonymous with all learning, including magic and astrology; hence French grimoire (book of spells) and English glamour. But as early as the 14th century its OED sense 1. a had emerged:

Pwaise the wabbit

Claudia Johnson, 1 August 1996

Hugh Kenner’s lively Chuck Jones: A Flurry of Drawings belongs to the ‘Portraits of American Genius’ series launched two years ago by the University of California Press with the...

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Impersonality

Barbara Everett, 10 November 1988

One day a long while ago Philip Larkin dropped a remark in passing about the difficulties of his current private life. He made it in the form of a jokey generalisation about the impossibility of...

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Ireland at Swim

Denis Donoghue, 21 April 1983

The Crane Bag is a magazine, published twice a year: each issue deals with one theme. In Irish legend, the crane bag contained the alphabet of knowledge. The bag belonged to Manannan, god of the...

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The Ultimate Novel

William Empson, 2 September 1982

So far, I may have given more expression of preference than solid argument. I need now to list the main details throughout the book which prepare the reader for Stephen to accept the Bloom Offer....

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The Ultimate Novel

William Empson, 19 August 1982

It is wonderful how Professor Kenner can keep on about Ulysses, always interesting and relevant and hardly repeating himself at all. His book gives a survey of books about Ulysses, mentioning...

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