"This book shows how American literary culture in the first half of the twentieth century saw "irony'" emerge as a term to describe intersections between aesthe

Shortlisted for the 2015 Modernist Studies Association Book Prize This book shows how American literary culture in the first half of the twentieth century saw �

The logic of modernity is an ironical logic. Modern irony, a flash of genius produced by Romantic theorists, is first discussed, e.g. in Hegel and Kierkegaard,

"An earlier version of chapter 1 appeared as "Avant-Garde in a Different Key: Karl Kraus's The Last Days of Mankind," Critical Inquiry 40, no. 2 (Winter 2014):

The Politics of Irony in American Modernism traces how "irony" emerged as a term to describe intersections between aesthetic and political practices in American