Performed Being: Word Art as a Human Inheritance

The study of the oral tradition presently lies at the crossroads of several new lines of research that promise to transform the shape of literary criticism and critical theory forever. The nature of this change may perhaps be indicated by an analogy with the revolution in the study of biology which was wrought by the theory of evolution.--Page 66.Frederick Turner (University of Texas, Dallas), former editor of the Kenyon Review, is at home in anthropology and modern science as well as literary studies. He also is a wellpublished poet, whose book-length epic poem The New World appeared in 1985. His essays range from an examination of refl exivity in Thoreau to a study of space and time in Chinese verse, and on to the collection entitled Natural Classicism (1985)