Hopeful Vision

This monograph recuperates the concept of entertainment as a legitimate basis for 'small screen' criticism. It suggests that critical approaches to television might treat the text as an object of potential which actively engages and provides for aesthetic experience through entertainment.

Aesthetic experience is characterised by emotion, and this study shows how the textual production of specifically forward feelings such as anticipation, aspiration, fear or dread may be mobilised and made sense of, shaping our sense of the future and its objects of hope. The argument is demonstrated by case studies arranged from 'light' to 'dark' in tone - as varied as Eurovision and Succession, The Repair Shop and The Leftovers showing how these provide potentially significant, affecting encounters that are 'hopeful' in varying degrees and guises. Hope is adopted both as a theme of analysis and as a critical strategy of interpretation which privileges entertainment efficacy, and thus moves towards a more viewer-centric appreciation of cultural value.

This is an original and wide-ranging study of television entertainment that raises questions scholars often avoid. Its focus is entertainment's affective dimension, and the author explores issues such as hope, optimism and pessimism across a variety of programmes and genres with verve and conviction. A real achievement.-- "Stephen Lacey, Emeritus Professor, University of South Wales"

Helen Piper is Associate Professor in Television Studies in the Department of Film and Television at the University of Bristol. She has published widely on television forms, aesthetics and genres within the categories of reality television, light entertainment and crime drama, including the monograph The TV Detective - Voices of Dissent in Contemporary Television which was awarded the BAFTSS Best Book Award in 2016. Her academic career follows a previous career as a talent agent and working as a senior manager for BBC Worldwide and BBC Entertainment.

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