At the Speed of Light There is Only Illumination collects a dozen re-evaluative essays on Marshall McLuhan and his critical and theoretical legacy; from intellectual adventurer creating a complex architecture of ideas to cultural icon standing in line in Woody Allen’s Annie Hall. Given McLuhan’s prominent status in many academic disciplines, the contributors reflect a multi-disciplinary background. John Moss and Linda Morra chose the essays from a gathering of McLuhan’s academic devotees. The contribution – from “McLuhan as Medium” and “McLuhan in Space” to “What McLuhan Got Wrong” and “Trouble in the Global Village” – to provide a kaleidoscope of new views. As Moss writes of the collected essays: “Some are big and some are small, some exegetic and some confessional, some stand as major statements and others are sidelong glances; some resonate with the concerns of public discourse and others are private or privileged or impious and provocative. Each consists of many parts, each a design on its own. They speak to each other…they may have come together as one version of what happened.”
John Moss is the author of various books, including Invisible among the Ruins, The Paradox of Meaning, and Being Fiction; he teaches at the University of Ottawa.
Linda Morra completed her doctorate at the University of Ottawa. She co-edited with Camille La Bossiere Robertson Davies: A Mingling of Contrarieties (University of Ottawa Press) and has published a number of articles on Canadian literature.