Anger, Gratitude, and the Enlightenment Writer - Hardcover

Coleman, Patrick

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0199589348 ISBN 13: 9780199589340

Verlag: OUP Oxford, 2011

Inhaltsangabe

Book by Coleman Patrick

Über diesen Titel

Críticas

Coleman has intelligently identified a fascinating question in early modern socioliterary studies. (Gillian Pink, French Studies)

This volume is a poignant and elegant contribution to eighteenth-century literary studies and to the history of emotions more generally. ... Coleman's attention to detail renders this well-written analysis an important read for scholars of eighteenth-century French literature and of the history of emotions more generally. (Karen A. Pagini, French Review)

Reseña del editor

Anger, Gratitude, and the Enlightenment Writer examines how writers as diverse as Rousseau, Diderot, Marivaux, and Challe discuss the social appropriateness of anger and gratitude in regulating social life. Emotions are social transactions, with rules identifying when and where it is appropriate to express one's feelings and, especially in the case of anger and gratitude, who is allowed or expected to put them on display. Defining the kinds of slight or favor that demand an angry or a grateful response became problematic in eighteenth-century France under the pressure of two contradictory developments which were both crucial to Enlightenment thinking about sociability. The first drew on the ideal of moral equality as it spread beyond the salons to the social world at large. Writers claimed for themselves an entitlement to anger at personal slight that had been hitherto reserved for aristocrats, and a respectful hearing for their indignation at public injustice despite their lack of official standing. The philosophes also argued their writing made them social benefactors in their own right, more deserving of their readers' gratitude than obliged to any patron. The second gave a new twist to longstanding philosophical notions about transcending emotional disturbance and dependence altogether. A personal ideal became a public goal as Enlightenment thinkers imagined a society where all significant social interaction was governed by the impersonal rule of law. Occasions for personal slight or obligation would disappear, and with them reasons for anger and gratitude. Instead of serving as a model of emotional legitimacy, authors would derive their prestige from their rationality and objectivity. By exploring the interplay between these two attitudes toward anger and gratitude this book provides a fresh perspective on the French Enlightenment.

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: OUP Oxford
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2011
• ISBN 10: 0199589348
• ISBN 13: 9780199589340
• Einband: Tapa dura
• Sprache: Englisch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 272