How did social, cultural and political events in Britain during the 1970s shape Contemporary British Fiction?Exploring the impact of events like the Cold War, miners' strikes and Winter of Discontent, this volume charts the transition of British fiction from post-war to contemporary.Chapters outline the decade's diversity of writing, showing how the literature of Ian McEwan and Iain Sinclair interacted with the experimental work of B.S. Johnson. Close contextual readings of Welsh, Scottish, Northern Irish and English novels map the steady break-up of Britain. Tying the popularity of Angela Carter and Fay Weldon to the growth of the Women's Liberation Movement and calling attention to a new interest in documentary modes of autobiographical writing, this volume also examines the rising resonance of the marginal voices: the world of 1970s British Feminist fiction and postcolonial and diasporic writers.Against a backdrop of social tensions, this major critical reassessment of the 1970s defines, explores and better understands the criticism and fiction of a decade marked by the sense of endings.

Covers regional writing, feminist and experimental writing and major events such as the miner's strike.

Series Editors' PrefaceAcknowledgementsContributorsIntroduction: Britain in the 1970s - Controversies and CulturesNick Hubble, John McLeod and Philip Tew1 Selective Traditions: Refreshing the Literary History of the SeventiesMark P. Williams2 The Ordinariness of the Extraordinary Break-Up of BritainNick Hubble3 1970s Feminist FictionSonya Andermahr4 Black British Culture and Fiction in the 1970sJohn McLeod5 'This Time It's Personal': Reliving and Rewriting History in 1970s FictionSam Goodman6 Turbulent Times: Conflicts, Ideology and the Experimental British Novel, 1969-1979Philip Tew7 Fiction, Representation and the Contemporary British Novel: A Story of the American Reception of British Novels of the 1970sDoryjane Birrer8 Melancholy Interest: J. G. Farrell's Troubles and thePolitics of PerspectiveTimeline of WorksTimeline of National EventsTimeline of International EventsBiographies of WritersIndex