Table of Contents

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS ix ACKNOWLEDGMENTS xi INTRODUCTION: Goethe Coins a Phrase 1 PART ONE: CIRCULATION Chapter 1: Gilgamesh's Quest 39 Chapter 2: The Pope's Blowgun 78 Chapter 3: From the Old World to the Whole World 110 PART TWO: TRANSLATION Chapter 4: Love in the Necropolis 147 Chapter 5: The Afterlife of Mechthild von Magdeburg 170 Chapter 6: Kafka Comes Home 187 PART THREE: PRODUCTION Chapter 7: English in the World 209 Chapter 8: Rigoberta Menchu in Print 231 Chapter 9: The Poisoned Book 260 CONCLUSION: World Enough and Time 281 BIBLIOGRAPHY 305 INDEX 319

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A stunning achievement. Damrosch gives 'world literature' the largest possible scope--ranging from cuneiform to hieroglyphics, from low German to Nahuatl--a jaunt across several millennia and a dozen languages. -- Wai Chee Dimock, Yale University Displaying great intelligence, immense literary and historical culture, and unassuming modesty, Damrosch intervenes in contemporary debates over 'world literature.' Readers will be dumbfounded by his range. He treats cuneiform-inscribed shards, Egyptian hieroglyphics, medieval German female mystics, Inca chronicles, Kafka translations and contemporary Native protest literature will equal philological attention, poise and erudition. -- Wlad Godzich, University of California, Santa Cruz

About the Author

David Damrosch is the Ernest Bernbaum Professor and Chair of Comparative Literature and director of the Institute for World Literature at Harvard University, and a past president of the American Comparative Literature Association.

Reviews

"What Is World Literature? has become a touchstone of every debate on the subject."---Alexander Beecroft, Modern Philology