Beat Generation Writers as Readers of World Literature

Dear Colleagues,

Scholarship increasingly recognizes the Beat Generation as far more than a movement restricted to the US. One of the reasons for worldwide interest in their work is that they understood literature as a global phenomenon: besides that they were well read in American and British literature, their own interests extended to the literatures of multiple European countries, North Africa, Latin America, and Asia. Although there is a long-standing tradition of characterizing their knowledge as meager and superficial, and their curiosity especially about non-Euro-American cultures as exoticizing and appropriative, recent research shows deeper, more sophisticated, more receptive engagements.

This special issue of Humanities seeks to explore the ways that Beat Generation writers read world literature and incorporated what they learned from it in their own writing. In this context, “literature” is broadly understood as also including philosophical texts, religious texts, and religious practices. Submissions on how Beat Generation writers contributed to the idea of literature as a global phenomenon are especially welcome.

Please submit articles of up to 8,000 words to Hassan Melehy (hmelehy@unc.edu) by 15 October 2018. Queries welcome.

Prof. Dr. Hassan Melehy
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

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Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Humanities is an international peer-reviewed open access quarterly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.