"'Spectacular Narratives' is doubly remarkable, both as an important re-interpretation of Stephen Crane's major fiction and as a model of the current historical and cultural criticism. Giorgio Mariani's elegant, lucid essay sees Crane caught in the crossfire of his age, an ironic debunker of the jingoistic popular culture whose writing in vivid dispatches and in 'The Red Badge of Courages' is inspired by the spectacle of war to make war into a spectacle. This subtle and intelligent study demonstrates again that texts cannot be read apart from the drama of their writing." (Myra Jehlen, University of Pennsylvania)
"Giorgio Mariani's reading of Stephen Crane is both original and highly illuminating. He skillfully traces a complex web of interactions between genre and text, as well as between textual criticism and socio-historical interpretation. The result is a significant advance in our understanding not only of a major American author, but of a whole cultural and historical phase as well." (Alessandro Portelli, University of Rome)
