Resonant Alterities

Book excerpt: »Resonant Alterities« bridges the gap between sound studies and literary criticism. A queer ghost story by Vernon Lee, an occultist novel of psychic adventure by Algernon Blackwood, a dystopian science fiction tale by J.G. Ballard and a post-traumatic short novel by Don DeLillo are its primary objects of analysis. Each is explored within the context of its contemporary cultural debates on sound. Meanwhile, all four theory-enriched readings focus on intersecting and desire-laden processes of meaning making, knowledge production and subject formation. Focal points are aurally/audio-visually structured phenomena expressive of both collective and individual anxieties.