"'Postmodernism' has become so familiar a term in recent years that it is easy to forget how complex, challenging and politically charged postmodern theory can be. We are even sometimes told that postmodernism is over, or that it never existed." This text remains one of the clearest and most incisive introductions to the field. Perhaps more importantly, it is a discussion of why postmodernism matters. Working through the issue of representation in art forms from fiction to photography, Linda Hutcheon sets out post-modernism's highly political challenge to the dominant ideologies of the western world. A new epilogue traces the fate of the postmodern over the last ten years and into the future, responding to claims that it has, once and for all, 'failed'.