Transnational Railway Cultures

Since the advent of train travel, railways have compressed space and crossed national boundaries to become transnational icons, evoking hope, dread, progress, or obsolescence in different cultural domains. Spanning five continents and a diverse range of contexts, this collection offers an unprecedentedly broad survey of global representations of trains. From experimental novels to Hollywood blockbusters, the works studied here chart fascinating routes across a remarkably varied cultural landscape.

Auteur

Steven D. Spalding is an Independent Scholar with a Ph.D. from the University of Michigan and a D.E.A. from the Université de Paris VIII. He is editor of the Transfers special section on Railways and Urban Cultures (2014) and co-editor of the books Trains, Mobility and Culture (2012) and Trains, Literature and Culture (2012).

Contenu

Introduction
Benjamin Fraser and Steven Spalding

Chapter 1. The Railway Arts: Sound and Space Beyond Borders
Aimée Boutin
    Chapter 1 Appendix

Chapter 2. The Sonic Force of the Machine Ensemble: Transnational Objectification in Steve Reich's Different Trains (1988)
Benjamin Fraser

Chapter 3. A Genealogy of Apocalyptic Trains: Snowpiercer and Its Precursors in the Transnational Literature of Transport
John D. Schwetman

Chapter 4. Dangerous Borders: Modernization and the Gothic Mode in Horror Express (1972) and Howl (2015)
Fernando Gabriel Pagnoni Berns, and Juan Juve

Chapter 5. Anachronism, Ambivalence, and (Trans)National Self-reference: Tracking the English Literary Chunnel from 1986 on
Heather Joyce

Chapter 6. Crossing Borders On and Beyond the Train in Joan of Arc of Mongolia (1989)
Steven D. Spalding

Chapter 7. The Cosmopolitan Writer: Exploring Representations on the Underground Railways of Buenos Aires and Paris through Julio Cortázar
Dhan Zunino Singh

Chapter 8. Literary Railway Bazaars: Transnational Discourses of Difference and Nostalgia in Contemporary India
Abhishek Chatterjee

Chapter 9. Memories of Trains and Trains of Memory: Journeys from Past-Futures to Present-Pasts in El Tren de la Memoria (2005)
Araceli Masterson-Algar

Chapter 10. Nord-Sud: The Parisian Metro and Transnational Avant-Garde Artistic Mobilities and Movements in Early Twentieth-Century Paris
Scott D. Juall

Conclusion: Mind the Gap
Benjamin Fraser and Steven D. Spalding