MONSTERS AND THEIR MEANINGS IN EARLY MODERN CULTURE by Wes Williams ( 9780199577026 )

Item Details

Title:

MONSTERS AND THEIR MEANINGS IN EARLY MODERN CULTURE
MIGHTY MAGIC

By:

Wes Williams

Format:

Hardback

List price:

£145.00

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£126.88

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12.5% off

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£18.12

ISBN 10:

0199577021

ISBN 13:

9780199577026

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Publisher:

OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS

Pub. date:

26 May, 2011

Pages:

362

Description:

Wes Williams explores the place of monsters in the early modern imagination, charting the migration of the monstrous from natural history to moral philosophy, from descriptions of creatures found in the external world to the drama of human motivation, of sexual and political identity. At its centre are readings of major works of French literature.

Synopsis:

To call something 'monstrueux' in the mid-sixteenth century is, more often than not, to wonder at its enormous size: it is to call to mind something like a whale. By the late seventeenth 'monstrueux' is more likely to denote hidden intentions, unspoken desires. Several shifts are at work in this word history, and in what Othello calls the 'mighty magic' of monsters; these shifts can be described in a number of ways. The clearest, and most compelling, is the translation or migration of the monstrous from natural history to moral philosophy, from descriptions of creatures found in the external world to the drama of human motivation, of sexual and political identity. This interdisciplinary study of monsters and their meanings advances by way of a series of close readings supported by the exploration of a wide range of texts and images, from many diverse fields, which all concern themselves with illicit coupling, unarranged marriages, generic hybridity, and the politics of monstrosity.Engaging with recent, influential accounts of monstrosity - from literary critical work (Huet, Greenblatt, Thomson Burnett, Hampton), to histories of science and 'bio-politics' (Wilson, Ceard, Foucault, Daston and Park, Agamben) - it focusses on the ways in which monsters give particular force, colour, and shape to the imagination; the image at its centre is the triangulated picture of Andromeda, Perseus and the monster, approaching. The centre of the book's gravity is French culture, but it also explores Shakespeare, and Italian, German, and Latin culture, as well as the ways in which the monstrous tales and images of Antiquity were revived across the period, and survive into our own times.

Illustrations:

36 black-and-white halftones

Publication:

Imprint:

Oxford University Press

Prizes:

Winner of Shortlisted for the 2012 R.H. Gapper Book Prize.

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Returnable

Some other items by this author:

CRIES FROM THE DEEP DARK

PILGRIMAGE AND NARRATIVE IN THE FRENCH RENAISSANCE (HB)