Romantic Things: A Tree, a Rock, a Cloud

Jacobus, Mary

ISBN 10: 022627134X / ISBN 13: 9780226271347

Published by University of Chicago Press, 2015

May have limited writing in cover pages. Pages are unmarked. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less. Seller Inventory # G022627134XI4N00

Synopsis:

Our thoughts are shaped as much by what things make of us as by what we make of them. Lyric poetry is especially concerned with things and their relationship to thought, sense, and understanding. In Romantic Things, Mary Jacobus explores the world of objects and phenomena in nature as expressed in Romantic poetry alongside the theme of sentience and sensory deprivation in literature and art.

Jacobus discusses objects and attributes that test our perceptions and preoccupy both Romantic poetry and modern philosophy. John Clare, John Constable, Rainer Maria Rilke, W. G. Sebald, and Gerhard Richter make appearances around the central figure of William Wordsworth as Jacobus explores trees, rocks, clouds, breath, sleep, deafness, and blindness in their work. While she thinks through these things, she is assisted by the writings of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Jacques Derrida, and Jean-Luc Nancy. Helping us think more deeply about things that are at once visible and invisible, seen and unseen, felt and unfeeling, Romantic Things opens our eyes to what has been previously overlooked in lyric and Romantic poetry.

About the Author: Mary Jacobus is professor emerita of English at Cornell University and at the University of Cambridge, where she directed the Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences, and Humanities until 2011.

Bibliographic Details

Title: Romantic Things: A Tree, a Rock, a Cloud
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Publication Date: 2015
Binding: Paperback
Condition: Very Good
Dust Jacket Condition: No Jacket