Literary and Cultural Responses to Mnemonic Landscapes Spaces in Transit

This book offers a profound exploration of "spaces in transit," a concept that bridges urban spaces, natural environments, and the archival and architectural echoes of the past with their representations in literature, art, and commemorative practices. Through 14 meticulously crafted essays, this volume delves into the intricate interplay between spatial and cultural memory, framed by theories of geocriticism, feminism, race, postcolonialism, and more.

Key concepts such as "deep spaces," "implicative spaces," and "landmark poetic spaces" are introduced, inviting readers to consider the fluidity and mutability of memory-laden sites. The essays critically examine how these spaces are continually reinterpreted and renegotiated, challenging ideologically rigid narratives. The volume is organized into three thematic parts: "Historyscapes," "Artscapes," and "Mythic Urbanscapes and Naturescapes," each offering unique insights into the mnemonic appropriations of physical and literary spaces.

This collection is essential for scholars and students in urban studies, environmental studies, memory, and literary studies, providing a comprehensive study of contemporary cultural and theoretical trends. It invites readers to rethink the sedentary-nomadic continuum of memory and space, offering a fresh perspective on the dynamic nature of cultural and collective memory.

.- 1. Spaces in Transit: An Introduction Lourdes López-Ropero.- Part I Historyscapes: Re-Constructing Mnemonic Traces of the Past.- Preface Marzena Sokolowska-Paryz.- 2. Performing Memory Through Transience: Architectural and Archival Ruins in Rodolphe Hammadi and Patrick Chamoiseau’s Guyane: Traces-mémoires du bagne [French Guiana: Memory-traces of the Penal Colony] Erica L. Johnson.- 3. Commemorating Contested National Park Landscapes: The Canada 150 Discovery Pass and White Scopic Disremembering Laura McKinley.- 4. Ghosts and Shadows: Art, Urbanscape and Memory after the Fall of the Berlin Wall Caroline Perre.- 5. Transitory Spaces, Memory and Intermediality in Teju Cole’s Everyday is for the Thief and Open City Birgit Neumann and Gabriele Rippl.- 6. The Spatiality of Memory in Thomas Hardy’s Wessex Novels Julia Wiedemann.- Part II  Artscapes: Form as Meaning in Commemorative Practice.- Preface Marzena Sokolowska-Paryz.- 7. “Our Landscape is its own Monument”: Using “Muscle Memory” to Make Home Space in Alien Environments in the Work of Jade de Montserrat Alan Rice.- 8. “A ‘silence’ that will not quite stay put”: The Sites and Sights of Landmark Poetics in the Works of Lemm Sissay and Dorothea Smartt Deirdre Osborne.- 9. Rewriting Statues, Battling Amnesia: Frances Presley’s Poetic Commemoration of Historical Women in “Female Figures” Teresa Martínez-Quiles.- 10. Re-Memorializing Space: Simon Armitage’s Still, Photography as an Art Project, and the Western Front in British National/Cultural Memory Marzena Sokolowska-Paryz.- Part III   Mythic Urbanscapes and Naturescapes: Undoing Ideologies and Resurfacing Layers of Space.- Preface Marzena Sokolowska-Paryz.- 11. Surveying Topographies of Abuse: Counter-Monumental Impulse and Implicative Spaces of Memory in Monica Ali’s In the Kitchen Lourdes López-Ropero.- 12. The Cityscape of Memory and Transition in Peter Ackroyd’s London Novel Petr Chalupský.- 13. Poetic Spaces of Imagination and Environmental Memory in Ted Hughes’s Remains of Elmet Lorraine Kerslake.- 14. Reforming Visions of New York: Mnemonic Landscapes of the Modern CityRoss J. Wilson.- 15. Toponymic Negotiations, Memorial Arenas: The Politics of Re-Naming All-Black Towns in Toni Morrison’s Paradise and Colson Whitehead’s Apex Hides the Hurt Paula Martín Salván.- 16. Conclusion and Proposals for Further Inquiry Lourdes López-Ropero and Marzena Sokolowska-Paryz.

Lourdes López-Ropero is Associate Professor in the English Department at the University of Alicante, Spain, where she teaches Contemporary and World Literature in English. Her primary research focus has been in the fields of postcolonial studies and memory studies, with an emphasis on Caribbean and Black-British literature. She is the author of The Anglo-Caribbean Migration Novel: Writing from the Diaspora.

Marzena Sokolowska-Paryz is University/Associate Professor at the Institute of English Studies, University of Warsaw, Poland. She is the author of Reimagining the War Memorial and The Myth of War in British and Polish Poetry, 1939-1945. She has co-edited The Great War in Post-Memory Literature and Film and The Enemy in Contemporary Film.