Will Self and Contemporary British Society is a detailed and timely study of one of the most popular and controversial literary authors of our time and his engagement with a series of diverse yet interlinked themes. Self is renowned for juxtaposing the fantastic with the quotidian in creative and surprising ways, which has earned him plaudits as one of the most singular and insightful voices in Britain today. In this critical study Self emerges as one of those rare writers whose innovative narrative modes and experimental techniques have resulted in fresh perspectives on some of the most challenging and controversial issues in contemporary British society. Graham J. Matthews reveals Self to be a serious thinker whose novels, short stories, and journalism treat issues that are essential for understanding contemporary Britain: psychiatry and medical discourse; gender and sexuality; urbanism and the illusions of consumer society; satire and the role of literature in society. Will Self and Contemporary British Society captures the continuity as well as the evolution of Self's style to demonstrate that his incisive analyses of the present make him one of the indispensable voices of our time.

Graham J. Matthews is Lecturer in Twentieth Century Literature at Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University. He is the author of Ethics and Desire in the Wake of Postmodernism (2012), co-editor of Violence and the Limits of Representation (2013), and has contributed to numerous journals and edited collections on contemporary literature.

Introduction: The Magus of the Quotidian
1. 'This Great Torrent of Verbiage': Will Self and Satire
2. 'The Unfailing Regularity of Dr Busner': Will Self and the Psychiatrists
3. 'These Artisans of the Body': Will Self and the Doctors
4. 'Fucking and Fighting': Will Self and Gender
5. 'A Psyche Available for Product Placement': Will Self and Consumption
6. 'Dissolving the Mechanised Matrix': Will Self and Psychogeography
Bibliography
Index