Distraction : Problems of Attention in Eighteenth-Century Literature

Language: English

Published by Johns Hopkins University Press Sep 2016, 2016

1421420120 / 9781421420127

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Neuware - Enlightenment writers fiercely debated the nature of distraction in literature.Early novel reading typically conjures images of rapt readers in quiet rooms, but commentators at the time described reading as a fraught activity, one occurring amidst a distracting cacophony that included sloshing chamber pots and wailing street vendors. Auditory distractions were compounded by literary ones as falling paper costs led to an explosion of print material, forcing prose fiction to compete with a dizzying array of essays, poems, sermons, and histories. In Distraction, Natalie M. Phillips argues that prominent Enlightenment authors--from Jane Austen and William Godwin to Eliza Haywood and Samuel Johnson--were deeply engaged with debates about the wandering mind, even if they were not equally concerned about the problem of distractibility.Phillips explains that some novelists in the 1700s--viewing distraction as a dangerous wandering from singular attention that could lead to sin or even madness--attempted to reform diverted readers. Johnson and Haywood, for example, worried that contemporary readers would only focus long enough to 'look into the first pages' of essays and novels; Austen offered wry commentary on the issue through the creation of the daft Lydia Bennet, a character with an attention span so short she could listen only 'half-a-minute.' Other authors radically redefined distraction as an excellent quality of mind, aligning the multiplicity of divided focus with the spontaneous creation of new thought. Laurence Sterne's Tristram Shandy, for example, won audiences with its comically distracted narrator and uniquely digressive form.Using cognitive science as a framework to explore the intertwined history of mental states, philosophy, science, and literary forms, Phillips explains how arguments about the diverted mind made their way into the century's most celebrated literature. She also draws a direct link between the disparate theories of focus articulated in eighteenth-century literature and modern experiments in neuroscience, revealing that contemporary questions surrounding short attention spans are grounded in long conversations over the nature and limits of focus.…

Seller Inventory # 9781421420127

Title
Distraction : Problems of Attention in Eighteenth-Century Literature
Author
Natalie M Phillips
Publisher
Johns Hopkins University Press Sep 2016
Publication year
2016
Condition
Neu
Binding
Buch
Language
English
ISBN 10
1421420120
ISBN 13
9781421420127
Item weight
544 grams
Dimensions
234x160x23 mm

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