Susan Sontag

The author relates her theories of literary criticism to the total aesthetic experience.

And Other Essays

Against Interpretation

'A dazzling intellectual performance' Vogue Against Interpretation was Susan Sontag's first collection of essays and made her name as one of the most incisive thinkers of our time. Sontag was among the first critics to write about the intersection between 'high' and 'low' art forms, and to give them equal value as valid topics, shown here in her epoch-making pieces 'Notes on Camp' and 'Against Interpretation'. Here too are impassioned discussions of Sartre, Camus, Simone Weil, Godard, Beckett, Lévi-Strauss, science-fiction movies, psychoanalysis and contemporary religious thought. Originally published in 1966, this collection has never gone out of print and has been a major influence on generations of readers, and the field of cultural criticism, ever since. 'Sontag offers enough food for thought to satisfy the most intellectual of appetites' The Times

Against Interpretation and Other Essays

Nathan Johnson

Ana Hein

A few great essays like "Notes on Camp" but for the most part, I disagree a lot with Sontag, or at least the way she argues, especially in the first two essays. Also she's just a little too dense and quick to throw out philosophers off the cuff for my liking

elif sinem

Against interpretation, notes on "camp", the sci fi movie one, and one culture/new sensibility one are my favorites. Soooo good and all four a must read!!! Sontag is a terrific writer and it's killer how she brings her opinions so clearly onto the table. Her depth of thought is astonishing. (Also her hating the state of the novel, girl me too!) But the majority of these essays where on the French New Wave and I know way too little of it. Also, some of these sentences just do not end and have many big words that it was too much for my poor eyes at night.

Against Interpretation And Other Essays

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