Authorship, Activism and Celebrity - by Sandra Mayer & Ruth Scobie

About the Book

Book Synopsis

Since long before the age of celebrity activism, literary authors have used their public profiles and cultural capital to draw attention to a wide range of socio-political concerns. This book is the first to explore - through history, criticism and creative interventions - the relationship between authorship, political activism and celebrity culture across historical periods, cultures, literatures and media. It brings together scholars, industry stakeholders and prominent writer-activists to engage in a conversation on literary fame and public authority.

These scholarly essays, interviews, conversations and opinion pieces interrogate the topos of the artist as prophet and acute critic of the zeitgeist; analyse the ideological dimension of literary celebrity; and highlight the fault lines between public and private authorial selves, 'pure' art, political commitment and marketplace imperatives. In case studies ranging from the 18th century to present-day controversies, authors illuminate the complex relationship between literature, politics, celebrity culture and market activism, bringing together vivid current debates on the function and responsibility of literature in increasingly fractured societies.

Review Quotes

"Authorship, Activism, and Celebrity offers a welcome account of literary activism that is historically and culturally diverse, from the 18th to the 21st centuries, from England to South Africa to Tamil Nadu. Featuring a range of scholarly and creative positions on the question of whether celebrity impedes or empowers literary authors' capacity to militate for social change, this volume is intellectually capacious in its analysis of 'the complex entanglements of celebrity, artistic integrity and political agency.'" --Lorraine York, Distinguished University Professor of English and Cultural Studies, McMaster University, Canada, and author of Reluctant Celebrity: Affect and Privilege in Contemporary Stardom (2018)

"Authorship, Activism and Celebrity is a unique collection of essays on a topic which is not only 'cutting edge' in terms of academic interest, but which also has obvious relevance to contemporary authorship, particularly where authors find themselves on the front line in defence of freedom of speech, thought and action. The editors of this ground-breaking volume have brought together a fascinating range of scholars and practitioners in a collection which is as important for understanding the historical context of literary celebrity activism as it is in helping to comprehend its contemporary relevance and importance. It explores the interplay of celebrity status and literary activism through a mixture of interviews and email exchanges with contemporary activist authors and literary celebrities such as Benjamin Zephaniah and Antjie Krog, transcripts of round-table discussions and more traditional scholarly essays. The latter range across time and space from the early days of celebrity authorship in the 18th and 19th centuries to the present. The book's juxtaposition of historically situated essays with insight and comment from contemporary activist authors makes it both a significant scholarly work of literary history and an important social document in itself." --Simon Morgan, Professor and Head of History, Leeds Beckett University, UK

"This is a highly pertinent and important work that is urgent reading for students and scholars." --Mary Luckhurst, Professor and Head of School of Arts, University of Bristol, UK

About the Author

Sandra Mayer is a literary and cultural historian based at the Austrian Academy of Sciences, working on the intersections of literary celebrity, activism and life-writing.
Ruth Scobie is a scholar of eighteenth-century literature and colonialism. She is the author of Celebrity Culture and the Myth of Oceania in Britain 1770-1823 (2019).