Most Popular Books by Peter Boxall

Completely revised and updated to include the most up-to-date selections, this is a bold and bright reference book to the novels and the writers that have excited the world''s imagination. This authoritative selection of novels, reviewed by an international team of writers, critics, academics, and journalists, provides a new take on world classics and a reliable guide to what''s hot in contemporary fiction. Featuring more than 700 illustrations and photographs, presenting quotes from individual novels and authors, and completely revised for 2012, this is the ideal book for everybody who loves reading.

Peter Boxall''s The Value of the Novel offers a reappraisal of the ethical, political and literary value of the novel as a genre at turning point in the history both of literature and of criticism. As the dominant critical concerns of the twentieth century faded, and new cultural and technological environments emerged, Boxall argues that we lost our collective sense of the purpose of the novel. This book responds to this predicament by demonstrating why and how the novel matters to us today. Ranging from Daniel Defoe to Zadie Smith, Boxall shows how the formal properties of the novel allow us to imagine the worlds in which we live. This is a vibrant, compelling and richly informed critical perspective that asks us to see anew how central fiction is to our idea of the world, and how richly the novel informs our attempts to understand our present and our future.

This book develops a new theoretical account of the historical role of the novel in fashioning our bodies and environments.

One of the few available books of criticism on the topic, this monograph presents the fullest account to date of Don DeLillo''s writing, situating his oeuvre within a wider analysis of the condition of contemporary fiction, and dealing with his entire work in relation to contemporary political and economic concerns for the fist time. Providing a lucid and nuanced reading of DeLillo''s ambivalent engagement with American and European culture, as well as with modernism and postmodernism, and globalization and terrorism, this fascinating volume interrogates the critical and aesthetic capacities of fiction in what is an age of global capitalism and US cultural imperialism.

Strategy and Human Resource Management is concerned with examining how HR strategy impacts on an organisation''s chances of survival and its relative success, and with understanding how it varies across important organisational, industry and societal contexts. It takes an analytical approach, which examines and explains what managers do and why they do it before offering any sort of prescription for what the authors think they should do. This approach is grounded in research but is brought to life with examples, cases and vignettes to offer a practice-orientated analysis of the subject. As well as explaining important general principles in strategic HRM, critical features of the different contexts in which they are applied are examined. For this fifth edition, there is increased coverage of contemporary topics, including capital markets and increasing financialisation, Industry 4.0, the shaping of employee voice under different varieties of capitalism and the effects of austerity. Strategy and Human Resource Management retains, however, the classic sources that are fundamental to the subject while also including important theoretical advances and the best new studies of strategies in the world of work and people.

Samuel Beckett is widely regarded as ''the last modernist'', the writer in whose work the aesthetic principles which drove the modernist project dwindled and were finally exhausted. And yet despite this, it is striking that many of the most important contemporary writers, across the world, see their work as emerging from a Beckettian legacy. So whilst Beckett belongs, in one sense, to the end of the modernist period, in another sense he is the well spring from which the contemporary, in a wide array of guises, can be seen to emerge. Since Beckett looks at a number of writers, in different national and political contexts, tracing the way in which Beckett''s writing inhabits the contemporary, while at the same time reading back through Beckett to the modernist and proto-modernist forms he inherited. In reading Beckett against the contemporary in this way, Peter Boxall offers both a compelling re-reading of Beckett, and a powerful new analysis of contemporary culture.

The widespread use of electronic communication at the dawn of the twenty-first century has created a global context for our interactions, transforming the ways we relate to the world and to one another. This critical introduction reads the fiction of the past decade as a response to our contemporary predicament – one that draws on new cultural and technological developments to challenge established notions of democracy, humanity, and national and global sovereignty. Peter Boxall traces formal and thematic similarities in the novels of contemporary writers including Don DeLillo, Margaret Atwood, J. M. Coetzee, Marilynne Robinson, Cormac McCarthy, W. G. Sebald and Philip Roth, as well as David Mitchell, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Dave Eggers, Ali Smith, Amy Waldman and Roberto Bolaño. In doing so, Boxall maps new territory for scholars, students and interested readers of today''s literature by exploring how these authors narrate shared cultural life in the new century.

The Possibility of Literature is an essential collection from one of the most powerful and distinctive voices in contemporary literary studies. Bringing together key compositions from the last twenty-five years, as well as several new pieces, the book demonstrates the changing fate of literary thinking over the first decades of the twenty-first century. Peter Boxall traces here the profound shifts in the global conditions that make literature possible as these have occurred in the historical passage from 9/11 to Covid 19. Exploring questions such as ''The Idea of Beauty'', the nature of ''Mere Being'', or the possibilities of Rereading, the author anatomises the myriad forces that shape the literary imagination. At the same time, he gives vivid critical expression to the imaginative possibilities of literature itself - those unique forms of communal life that literature makes possible in a dramatically changing world, and that lead us towards a new shared future.

J Curve is a humorous contemporary tale of how a high flyer in business allows greed to become his main motivation and potentially his downfall. The story opens in October 2014 in the City of London. Brett Hunter, the supposedly suave and sophisticated, Managing Director of Sobbolds Leisure; brewery owners, with an extensive portfolio of hotels, pubs, restaurants and much more, is about to embark on his biggest deal to date. The takeover of Gulbey- Barrett''s, the sleeping drinks conglomerate giant. Hunter believes that he is nearing the pinnacle of his career, with the social trappings associated with this. His parallel life though is driven by greed. In the weeks that follow Hunter''s world begins to disintegrate, but he hasn''t got to where he is without the ability to fight his corner. Max Shadpole though, the Executive Editor of The Sunday Post, a national tabloid newspaper has been on his case for a long time and whilst Hunter is distracted by the impending business deal, Max edges towards exposing the real Hunter. Throughout J Curve looks at the characters and their lives; magnifying warts and all of those involved in the impending City takeover. The glamorous, high flying bankers, Jayne Russell and Jane Morgan play prominent roles and their contrasting characters are illuminated as the story progresses. The Directors at Gulbey''s, in particular the upstanding Edward Goodyear and the eccentric Guy Gulbey, prove that tragedy and day to day humour are both fundamental to everyday life. Threaded throughout the story is how life at the top can be very lonely. J Curve avoids the technicalities of business, concentrating on how life spins in many directions for all those involved, moving at a fast pace, culminating in many revelations and an unexpected twist of fate.

As a 56 years old male living in the suburbs of London, sport has played a major part in my life. Life in the Medium Paced Lane tracks 40 years of performing at the highest level (achieveable). Like limbo, the bar gets lower as time moves on. This is a memoir that will excite most of the population (okay slightly ambitious). It takes in the sixties (just) through to the noughties. It encompasses a sporting life that has rubbed shoulders with the good, great and the ugly. From the playing fields of Essex to international encounters on the other side of the world. Catching a cricket ball from a superstar to plucking an egg out of the midnight sky. The grandeur of Lord''s to a burning sofa on a wicket in South Essex. Hopefully as humorous as it is true. A page turning read that leaves you just wondering...well just wondering - Enjoy!

Des Mille et Une Nuits aux ouvrages les plus contemporains et d''Aragon à Zweig, Les 1001 livres qu''il faut avoir lus dans sa vie propose une sélection des romans qui peuvent marquer une vie.

This study tests the argument that human resource management in hotels enhances service-recovery performance and job satisfaction through empowering front-line employees to respond to service failures. After an initial phase of qualitative interviewing, dyadic data were gathered through a large-scale survey in thirty hotels in Sri Lanka. The results of structural equation modelling show that the HR practices and management styles adopted in this context help to develop job competence, which is then related to service-recovery performance and job satisfaction. However, they show that service recovery is carefully stage-managed and ''staircased'' in this hotel context with empowerment strongly related to hierarchical level. Empowerment to address service failures is important in these hotels but it is deliberately graduated according to rank. While employee training shows benefits for both parties, greater job autonomy would enhance the well-being of these service workers. Full paper available at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhm.2019.03.006.

Managers make choices regarding the types of employment structures that meet the needs of the firm, and workers make choices regarding the types of arrangement that meet their needs. Various streams of literature offer perspectives on why employment or contracting might be preferred but it is often the perspective of the firm that dominates the analysis. This kind of one-sidedness weakens our understanding of employment as a relationship. It lacks recognition of the importance of mutuality: of matching the needs of the worker with the needs of the business. This paper reports research investigating management decisions to use self-employed contractors or employees for particular jobs, and workers'' decisions to seek or accept organizational employment or self-employment. Some 80 in-depth interviews were conducted with managers and workers across two industries (energy supply and engineering consultancy) with the intent of studying two groups of workers differing dramatically in skill levels. While largely confirming existing theory on the management conditions relevant to the contracting-out of work, the study identifies factors that make a contracting relationship more beneficial, thus suggesting propositions for further research on worker preferences.

Using a two-wave survey of 315 workers in a lean manufacturing plant, this study examines how work intensification affects employee wellbeing and how its effects may be ameliorated. It demonstrates that work intensification is transmitted into poorer wellbeing through greater emotional exhaustion. It shows that this mediation process is moderated by line-manager support, which buffers the relationship between emotional exhaustion and wellbeing. The study suggests that the health-impairing risks of high work intensity in lean settings can be reduced through better supervisory support. Ensuring that line managers have the opportunity, skills and motivation to offer good support to workers is a vital aspect of the interventions needed to counteract the health risks posed by lean production. Full paper available at https://doi.org/10.1177/0143831X19890678.

Many authors have advocated a human-centric view of Industrie 4.0 automation, in which the human operator works with augmented powers and capabilities such as super-strength, artificial intelligence and virtual reality, although their roles are still in the manufacture of the product. A human-automation symbiosis in the production process, with robotic and IOT tools helping to extend and meld the capabilities of the Operator to accomplish the tasks of production is a proposed goal. The approach taken in the present work does not, however, envisage a super-human outcome. Rather, the goal is the unleashing of human creative potential, as a complement to the robotic and virtual world of the automated production system.Agile manufacturers typically run small scale operations (20 people or less), make short runs of many products and are continuously involved in their design - both at detailed and conceptual levels. This can be a strength in terms of international competitiveness where knowledge of the production process, the product end user needs, and the machinery and tooling itself combine to produce innovation. SME manufacturers are actually designers. Their employees think about design as they manufacture. We foresee that the Operator may transition to a Maker - a person who works alongside the automated production system but with a different role - one which is essentially creative, rather than assisting or monitoring non-discretionary work flow steps or processes.For full paper go to https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0360835218305278.

This multi-level study analyses the ''black box'' of HRM in an Australian cinema chain, a standardized service environment. Management''s espoused goals for the casual workers who run the cinema service include attempts to build customer-oriented behaviour, both directly and via empowerment, and also efforts to ensure compliance with company policies and to enhance employee commitment. Our analysis of an employee survey and supervisory performance ratings shows that it is behavioural compliance that is positively associated with rated performance rather than customer-oriented behaviour. While customer service is an important value, it is willing engagement with a highly scripted, efficiency-oriented work process that makes it happen, not a more empowering form of work design. On the other hand, the management process also fosters a level of employee commitment, which has some value in a tight labour market. The study demonstrates the way in which actual models of HRM can contain a complex and ''contradictory'' set of messages, consistent with critical accounts of the labour process and suggesting that notions of ''internal fit'' need to recognize such tensions. It underlines the importance of identifying the multiple goals in management''s espoused theories of HRM and then assessing their links via managerial behaviour and employee responses to performance outcomes.

Approximately 30 years since my paper with Peter Dowling on ''Human Resource Management and the Industrial Relations Tradition'' was published in Labour and Industry, this paper reflects on how the academic literature on Human Resource Management (HRM), particularly strategic HRM, has developed. Starting with a reprise of the claims in the original article, it offers an overview of the state of the field and concludes that there is a mixed report card for the last 30 years. There is clearly a need to more carefully theorise the economic motives of the firm and to understand the history and variety of employer behaviour in its diverse context. Hard work continues to be required in integrating theories from different disciplines and academics need to be open to research methods beyond their own personal preference. However, strategic HRM has become a more balanced subject, which embraces both sides of the employment relationship: employee well-being and organisational performance. While improving the rigour of our research methods is going to be important in the next 30 years, research in strategic HRM should also focus on making a better contribution to societal debates about the opportunities and problems of employment relations. Full paper available at https://doi.org/10.1080/10301763.2018.1427423.

This paper examines the impact of oil and gas facilities on rural residential property values using data from Central Alberta, Canada. The influences are evaluated using two groups of variables characterizing hazard effects and amenity effects. A spatial error model was employed to capture the spatial dependence between neighbouring properties. The results show that property values are negatively correlated with the number of sour gas wells and flaring oil batteries within 4 km of the property. Indices reflecting health hazards associated with potential rates of H2S release (based on information from Emergency Response Plans and Zones) also have a significant negative association with property prices. The findings suggest that oil and sour gas facilities located within 4 km of rural residential properties significantly affect their sale price.

Among the measures taken by the Australian government to address one of the worst droughts on record in the Murray-Darling Basin, exit package issues have rarely been investigated. A stated preference survey was designed to identify the range of water prices required for irrigators to sell all their water entitlements and leave the irrigation industry. Farmer participation responses are generally price elastic. There are large regional differences in price elasticities, but within a region there are few differences based on subgroups of farmers.

Drawing on the job demands-resources and effort-reward imbalance models, this study investigates the mediating roles of intrinsic motivation and distributive justice in the relationships between line-manager support and employee wellbeing (job satisfaction, work engagement and physical health). Responses to a survey of 357 front-line workers in a Chinese manufacturer were analysed through structural equation modelling. We find, in this context, that line managers are a strong determinant of employee wellbeing when they foster the intrinsic motivation of employees and their perceptions of organisational justice. Such findings are helpful for our understanding of attitudes in the Chinese workforce and underline the value of analysing multiple mediating mechanisms and multiple wellbeing outcomes in human resource management-wellbeing research. Full paper available at https://doi.org/10.1080/09585192.2017.1423103.

PurposeGrounded in the theory of person-organisation fit, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the extent to which instrumental work values influence the relationship between HR practices and employee well-being (measured by job satisfaction) in a sample of Chinese workers.Design/methodology/approachQuestionnaire data for this cross-sectional, quantitative study were collected from 371 front-line workers in a Chinese manufacturer. Structural equation modelling was used to test the hypotheses.FindingsThe results show that work instrumentalism significantly reduces the positive effect of training on job satisfaction while boosting the positive effect of remuneration on job satisfaction. In contrast, there is no evidence for an interaction between instrumentalism and employee involvement.Practical implicationsThe results imply that the degree to which HR practices are effective in promoting job satisfaction among these Chinese workers depends both on their work-value orientations and on the implications of the particular HR practice. Managers concerned about job satisfaction in China need to consider the impact of work values and the goals of particular HR practices.Originality/valueChina makes an enormously important contribution to world manufacturing output but the authors need a better understanding of how Chinese workers are likely to interpret and respond to HR practices if employee well-being in Chinese enterprises is to be fostered.Full paper available at https://doi.org/10.1108/PR-01-2017-0015.

High-involvement models of working are associated with high levels of worker influence over the work process, identified through worker perceptions of their jobs and working environment. This article reviews what is known about the conditions that foster the adoption of such models. Drawing on studies of worker participation in management since the 1950s, the article seeks to understand what explains the dispersion of high-involvement work processes in the private sector. In terms of understanding the potential for worker involvement in decision-making, the article argues that it is important to analyse the way in which managers develop production systems in firms. A range of conditions in manufacturing and in services are then discussed. While economic incentives are critical, the ongoing existence of societal differences, including a pronounced ''Nordic effect'', suggests that economically unattractive environments do not necessarily lack opportunities to enhance worker well-being through greater involvement. Full paper available at https://doi.org/10.1177/0143831X15599584.

The measurement of passive use values has become an important issue in environmental economics. In this paper we examine an extension or variant of contingent valuation, the choice experiment, which employs a series of questions with more than two alternatives that are designed to elicit responses that allow the estimation of preferences over attributes of an environmental state. We also combine the information from choice experiments and contingent valuation to test for differences in preferences and error variances arising from the two methods. Our results show that choice experiments have considerable merit in measuring passive use values.

This article uses national-level data to examine the benefits for workers of better skill utilisation and the question of how opportunities to use skills in the workplace can be enhanced. Analysis of the New Zealand data in the 2005 and 2015 rounds of the International Social Survey Programme confirms that better skill utilisation is generally associated with a broad range of beneficial outcomes, including higher employee income, better opportunities for career advancement, higher job satisfaction, greater organisational commitment and lower turnover intentions. In addition, skill utilisation serves as a significant mediator between work autonomy and employee outcomes, particularly in the 2015 survey. As a general rule, better utilisation of employee skills will occur in organisational climates in which employee autonomy is encouraged. Full paper available at https://doi.org/10.1177/0022185618819169.

This paper uses two recent large-scale surveys in New Zealand to test the various reasons given for lower rates of union membership among younger workers. Younger workers'' disproportionate location in smaller workplaces and those industries where union reach is lowest accounts for a substantial part of their lower union density. Along with the tendency of younger workers to explore their options through labour turnover, this factor offers a much better explanation for the younger-older worker union density gap than do assertions about a growth in individualism in Generations X and Y.

We examine the propensity of respondents to choose the status quo (SQ) or current situation alternative as a function of complexity in two separate state-of-the-world choice experiments. Complexity in each choice set was characterized as the number of single and multiple changes in levels of attributes from the current situation and the order of the choice task in the sequence of multiple tasks provided to respondents. We show that increasing complexity leads to increased choice of the SQ and that a respondent''s age and level of education also influenced this choice. We outline the effects of the alternate approaches for incorporating the SQ into welfare measurement. These findings have implications for the design of stated preference experiments, examining passive use values and for empirical analysis leading to welfare measurement.