Chapters in this book

1. Frontmatter i
2. CONTENTS v
3. List of Figures vi
4. Acknowledgements viii
5. Series Editors’ Preface x
6. Abbreviations xi
7. Introduction 1
8. Part I
9. 1 The missing keyword: Raymond Williams, Paul Valéry 17
10. 2 The force of abstraction: Marx and Marxism 31
11. 3 Abstract, ‘abstract’: modernist visual art 69
12. Part II
13. 4 ‘If it can be done why do it’: Gertrude Stein 105
14. 5 ‘Resist the intelligence almost successfully’: Wallace Stevens 132
15. 6 ‘The Proustian equation is never simple’: Samuel Beckett 158
16. Part III
17. 7 Writing lived abstraction: James, Bergson, Whitehead, Deleuze 181
18. 8 Staging modernist abstraction: Yasmina Reza, John Logan, Lee Hall 206
19. Conclusion: Herbert Read and aesthetic education 229
20. Bibliography 236
21. Index 248