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Paratexts: Thresholds of Interpretation (Literature, Culture, Theory)

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Paratexts (titles, epigraphs, notes and the like) add dimensions of meaning and effect, theme and rhetorical power to literary works; yet, oddly, before Genette, they were taken for granted, that is: mis-taken. Like his other major works, Narrative Discourse, and Palimspestes, Paratexts is a clear, well supported, and coherent encyclopedia of sub-forms defined and illustrated in a series of brilliant analyses. Genette's insights improve the reader's, not only into works both know, but above all, perhaps, into those as yet unread by either. Of all recent French theorists, Genette is closest in spirit and method (as well as accessibility) to mid-century American formalists. And though his work can be exploited by cultural studies and even gender theorists, it remains sharply focused on the alpha and omega of literary study: the text. David Lee Rubin