{"product_id":"2026200015436-secondhand-the-country-the-city","title":"The Country \u0026 The City","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eCondition remarks:\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBook: Good\u003cbr\u003eJacket: Chipped and worn with some minor damage\u003cbr\u003ePages: Good\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAt the heart of English literature lies a tension so deeply embedded in the culture it is rarely questioned — the pastoral dream of the country set against the brutal energy of the city — and Raymond Williams tears this divide open with forensic brilliance in The Country and the City. Drawing on centuries of English writing, from the country-house poems of Ben Jonson and Andrew Marvell to the industrial novels of George Eliot and Thomas Hardy, Williams uncovers how the idealisation of rural life has functioned not as innocent nostalgia, but as a calculated concealment of class exploitation, agrarian poverty, and imperial power.\n\nWilliams writes with the rare authority of a scholar who is simultaneously a literary critic, a cultural historian, and a working-class man shaped by the very landscapes he analyses. His argument is sweeping yet meticulously grounded: the sentimentalisation of the country and the demonisation of the city are twin myths that have served the interests of a ruling class across generations. A landmark of cultural materialism and one of the most influential works of literary criticism produced in the twentieth century, The Country and the City leaves the reader permanently unable to view an English pastoral poem — or a city skyline — in quite the same way again.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Secondhand Stock","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49203221201115,"sku":"2026200015436-SECONDHAND","price":15.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0523\/7646\/9701\/files\/4600522f-eab1-4b27-b94a-8289d6d1f1eb.png?v=1788146017","url":"https:\/\/bookgrocer.com\/products\/2026200015436-secondhand-the-country-the-city","provider":"Book Grocer","version":"1.0","type":"link"}