ABC of Reading Trg

ABC of Reading TRG examines the writings of Steve McCaffery and bpNichol, with a special focus on their collaborative work as the Toronto Research Group (TRG). The book expands what little criticism there is on the Group's collaborations by exploring their engagements with literary theory, by differentiating between each writer's personal concerns, and by reading their reports in conjunction with their individually authored writings.AKAKOn the one hand, it reads TRG's reports "against the grain"ói.e. it attempts to uncover the unconscious links among repressed affective and political elements that circulate throughout their writing. This approach predominantly entails situating TRG in the shadow of perspectives developed by Lacan, Fredric Jameson and Slavoj Zizek. On the other hand, it also reads the TRG reports sympathetically, by underlining their construction of a positive, productive desire which does not centre on lack, but which actively celebrates multiplicity and affirmation, an approach that chiefly reads the group in the light of theories proposed by Barthes, Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, and Julia Kristeva. Readers can operate this book either by reading it conventionally from beginning to end, or by following chains of thought, indicated by superscript letters which link non-sequential chapters togetheróa device borrowed from Book 5 of bpNichol's The Martyrology. The rhetorical artifice of the alphabetical framework affords a means to preserve one of the TRG's most significant contributions to research writing on contemporary poetics, i.e. their simultaneous stress on both form and critical investigation.AKAKIn the end, ABC of Reading TRG is not so much about what the Toronto Research Group's reports are about, but about what they invite us to think about.AKAKOther critical books on bpNichol available from Talonbooks:AKAKbpNichol: What History Teaches AKTracing the Paths: Reading Writing the Martyrology AKOther titles in The New Canadian Criticism Series:AKAKTimothy Findley and the Aesthetics of Fascism AKbpNichol: What History Teaches AKMichael Ondaatje: Word, Image, Imagination AKMargaret Atwood: A Feminist Poetics AKGeorge Bowering: Bright Circles of Colour AKAK--------------------------------------------------------------------------------AKAKISBN 0-88922-423-4; $16.95 Canada / $12.95 U.S.A.AK©1999; 144 ppAKAKAK--------------------------------------------------------------------------------AKAKTo order TalonbooksJaeger, Peter is the author of 'ABC of Reading Trg' with ISBN 9780889224230 and ISBN 0889224234.