Radiant Textuality—Literature After the World Wide Web

Jerome McGann has been at the forefront of the digital revolution in the humanities. His pioneering critical projects on the World Wide Web have redefined traditional notions about interpreting literature. In this trailblazing book, McGann explores the profound implications digital media have for the core critical tasks of the humanities. Drawing on his work as editor of the acclaimed hypertext project The Rossetti Archive, he sets the foundation for a new critical practice for the digital age. Digital media, he demonstrates, can do much more than organize access to great works of literature and art. Beyond their acknowledged editorial and archival capabilities, digital media are also critical tools of unprecedented power. In McGann’s practical vision, digital tools give scholars a flexible, dynamic means for interpreting expressive works—especially those that combine text and image. Radiant Textuality demonstrates eloquently how new technologies can deepen our understanding of complex, multi-layered works of the human imagination in ways never before thought possible.

Jerome McGann is the John Stewart Bryan University Professor, University of Virginia, and a founding fellow of UVA's Institute for Advanced. He is a leading scholar in fields ranging from 18th century to contemporary literature to the theory of textuality.