Misanthropy in the age of reason : hating humanity from Shakespeare to Schiller / Joseph Harris.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Harris, Joseph, 1976- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Misanthropy.

Misanthropy in literature.

Genre:

Literary criticism.

History.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (305 pages)

Place of Publication:

Oxford, England : Oxford University Press, [2023]

Summary:

Bringing together a range of material from various genres, periods, and countries, this comparative study explores the developing status of misanthropy in the European literary and intellectual imagination from the late Renaissance to the dawn of Romanticism.

Contents:

cover

Title Page

Copyright Page

Acknowledgements

Notes

Contents

Introduction

Prologue: Vices and Services

Definitions and Methodologies

Hateful Judgements: Misanthropy between Thought and Emotion

Hatred and Its Objects

Hatred and Gender

The Misanthropic Woman: Two Case-Studies

Of Wolves and Men

Misanthropic Hypocrisies

Historicizing Misanthropy

1 Misanthropic Origins: Timon of Athens

Introduction: Timon before Shakespeare

Shakespeare's Timon

Curses and Planetary Plagues

Timon's Cynical Mirror: Apemantus

Fury Spent: Timon's Final Visitors

Conclusion: Timon after Timon

2 Misanthropy for a Polite Age?: Molière's Le Misanthrope

Introduction: From Timon to Alceste

Complaisance, Complicity, and Friendship

Comedy and Reputation: Alceste as Laughing-Stock

From Theory to Practice: Oronte and Célimène

Leaving Society

Conclusion

3 Risible Animals: Misanthropic Satire

Introduction: Misanthropic Laughter?

Satires on Man: Boileau, Rochester, Gottsched

Boileau, Satire VIII

Rochester, `A Satyr against Reason and Mankind'

Gottsched, `Der Mensch'

Regnard, Démocrite

Swift, Gulliver's Travels

4 Self-love and Other-hatred (Pascal, Hobbes, Rousseau, Leopardi)

Introduction: Hateful People

Blaise Pascal (1623-62): Between Secular and Divine Misanthropy

Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679): All against All

Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-78): Civilization and Its Discontents

Giacomo Leopardi (1798-1837): Harnessing Hatred

5 Alceste's Afterlives: Le Misanthrope after Molière

Early Adaptations

Wycherley, The Plain Dealer: Selective Rudeness

Voltaire, La Prude: Misanthropic Tartuffery

Le Misanthrope Criticized

Donneau de Visé, `Lettre écrite sur la comédie du Misanthrope'.

Rousseau, Lettre à d'Alembert: Misanthropy Misrepresented

Marmontel, Apologie du théâtre: Alceste Redeemed

Alceste Corrected

Marmontel, Le Misanthrope corrigé: Conversation and Conversion

Demoustier, Alceste à la campagne: The Misanthrope Tamed

Philinte's Return

Fabre d'Églantine, Le Philinte de Molière: Misanthropic Integrity

Le Misanthrope au Gymnase: Egoism Confounded

Conclusion: Into the Nineteenth Century

6 Philanthropic Misanthropy

Hate the Sin, Hate the Sinner: Misanthropy from Vice to Virtue

Shaftesbury and Boyer d'Argens: The Misanthrope in Society

Van Effen and Rabener: Reclaiming the Slur

Misanthropic Apologetics: Stockdale's Swift and Rousseau's Rousseau

Stockdale: Beyond Misanthropy

Rousseau: Portrait of the Writer as a Frustrated Philanthrope

Melancholic Sensibilities and Disappointed Idealism

Misanthropic Philanthropy in Action: Schiller's Der Menschenfeind

7 Cures, Conversions, and Corrections

Introduction: Solitude and Its Discontents

Altered Egos: Delisle, Timon le misanthrope

Root Causes: Lovesick Melancholy

Wounded Pride: Kotzebue, Menschenhass und Reue

Talking Cures: Between Reason and Emotion

Misanthropy in Process: Pahl, Oswald, der Menschenhasser

Belated Enlightenment: Raimund, Der Alpenkönig und der Menschenfeind

8 Malicious Misanthropy

Degeneracy: Sickness, Bestiality, Monstrosity

Rousseau's Impossible Villain

Pockels: Pathological Villainy

Persecution and Revenge

Scott, The Black Dwarf

Curses and Deadly Fantasies

Pleasures Perverse and Pathological: Schadenfreude

Villiers, Chaubert

or, the Misanthrope

Poetic Misanthropy and Misanthropic Poetry

Epilogue

Bibliography

Primary Texts

Secondary Texts

Index.

Notes:

Description based on print version record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780192693280

019269328X

9780191959639

0191959634

9780192693273

0192693271