British Literature 1640-1789 - Keywords

An indispensable reference for scholars and students of eighteenth-century English literature
 
This addition to the celebrated Wiley-Blackwell Keywords series explores the meanings of fifty-eight of the most important words in British literature of the period 1640-1789. Professor DeMaria focuses on words used with frequency and urgency throughout the works of most major and several minor writers of the British Neoclassical era, with the occasional reach back to the early seventeenth century for a definitive usage found in Francis Bacon, for instance, and look forward to the nineteenth century to the works of Wordsworth, Austen, and Keats. Through discussions of words such as atom, economy, humanity, labor, machine, slavery, society, and system he reveals underlying assumptions about the way writers of the period thought about the physical and social world. Likewise, considerations of words such as happiness, passion, truth, and virtue shed light on the ethical and moral commitments of the age. Unlike dictionaries and many big-data semantics projects, this book brings forth the ambiguities, nuances, and ironies that accrued to word usages during the period through a heightened awareness of the contexts in which they occurred.
* Highlights and exposes the salient cultural and literary debates and metamorphic moments of cultural thought
* Reveals an increase in irony and a decrease in allegorical usage as an important trend in the evolution of literary language during the Neoclassical period
* Stresses the contexts within which words or phrases appear in order to offer a fuller understanding of their meanings and significance than available from digital databases
* Draws upon a vast compilation of sources from one of the most transformative eras of English literature
 
Rigorous in its scholarship and historical reach, British Literature 1640-1789: Keywords is an indispensable resource which scholars and students of British Neoclassical literature will want to keep close at hand. It is certain to become a fixture of most university reference libraries.

List of contents

Note on References ix
 
Short Titles and Abbreviations x
 
Introduction xii
 
A 1
 
Address 1
 
Admiration and Wonder 5
 
Advancement 7
 
Ardor 10
 
Atheism 13
 
Atom 16
 
Attention 21
 
B 25
 
Barbarism 25
 
Beauty 27
 
Belief 31
 
Business 35
 
C 39
 
Conversation 39
 
D 43
 
Domestic 43
 
E 47
 
Economy 47
 
Enthusiasm 50
 
Expedient 54
 
Experience 57
 
F 61
 
Fortune 61
 
G 67
 
Genius 67
 
God 70
 
Grubstreet 75
 
H 79
 
Happiness 79
 
Humanity 85
 
I 89
 
Idea 89
 
Imagination 93
 
J 98
 
Judgment 98
 
L 102
 
Labor 102
 
Learning and Literature 106
 
Life 110
 
M 116
 
Machine and Engine 116
 
Man 120
 
Melancholy 123
 
Modern 126
 
N 130
 
National 130
 
Nature 133
 
News 139
 
Nice 142
 
Novel 144
 
P 148
 
Passion 148
 
Patriot 152
 
Philosophy 155
 
Pride 158
 
Primitive 163
 
R 168
 
Reason 168
 
Revolution 173
 
Romance 177
 
S 181
 
Savage 181
 
Science 184
 
Sensibility 188
 
Slavery 192
 
Society 195
 
Spleen 199
 
System 201
 
T 205
 
Truth 205
 
V 211
 
Virtue 211
 
W 218
 
War 218
 
Wit 222
 
Woman 225
 
World 229
 
Index 235

About the author

Robert DeMaria, Jr. is the Henry Noble MacCracken Professor of English Literature at Vassar College where he has taught since 1975. He is the author of three monographs on Samuel Johnson and the general editor of the Yale Edition of the Works of Samuel Johnson, in which he has co-edited three volumes. He has also edited and co-edited several collections for Wiley Blackwell, including British Literature 1640-1789, 4th Edition; Classical Literature and Its Reception; and The Blackwell Guide to British Literature.

Summary

An indispensable reference for scholars and students of eighteenth-century English literature

This addition to the celebrated Wiley-Blackwell Keywords series explores the meanings of fifty-eight of the most important words in British literature of the period 1640-1789. Professor DeMaria focuses on words used with frequency and urgency throughout the works of most major and several minor writers of the British Neoclassical era, with the occasional reach back to the early seventeenth century for a definitive usage found in Francis Bacon, for instance, and look forward to the nineteenth century to the works of Wordsworth, Austen, and Keats. Through discussions of words such as atom, economy, humanity, labor, machine, slavery, society, and system he reveals underlying assumptions about the way writers of the period thought about the physical and social world. Likewise, considerations of words such as happiness, passion, truth, and virtue shed light on the ethical and moral commitments of the age. Unlike dictionaries and many big-data semantics projects, this book brings forth the ambiguities, nuances, and ironies that accrued to word usages during the period through a heightened awareness of the contexts in which they occurred.
* Highlights and exposes the salient cultural and literary debates and metamorphic moments of cultural thought
* Reveals an increase in irony and a decrease in allegorical usage as an important trend in the evolution of literary language during the Neoclassical period
* Stresses the contexts within which words or phrases appear in order to offer a fuller understanding of their meanings and significance than available from digital databases
* Draws upon a vast compilation of sources from one of the most transformative eras of English literature

Rigorous in its scholarship and historical reach, British Literature 1640-1789: Keywords is an indispensable resource which scholars and students of British Neoclassical literature will want to keep close at hand. It is certain to become a fixture of most university reference libraries.

Product details

• Authors: Robert DeMaria
• Publisher: Wiley & Sons
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Release: 21.09.2023, delayed
• EAN: 9781119181620
• ISBN: 978-1-119-18162-0
• Series: Keywords in Literature and Culture (KILC).
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Linguistics and literary studies > English linguistics / literary studies; Literaturwissenschaft, Englische Literatur, Literature, Englische Literatur / 18. Jhd., 18th Century English Literature