Description
Book SynopsisThe resulting picture of the emotional agency of criticism opens up a new angle on Blake's literary and visual legacy and offers a vivid interrogation of the practical potential of theoretical discourse.
Trade ReviewGoldsmith's subtle, complicated and counterintuitive study, flows out of what he calls a 'sustained interdisciplinary "surge" in the theoretical, historical and cognitive study of emotion.' -- Simon Jarvis Times Literary Supplement An imaginative, deeply learned, and passionately argued book. The thinking and writing are sustained throughout at exceptionally high levels... The book makes an original and important contribution to Blake studies. -- G.A. Rosso Blake/An Illustrated Quarterly A major reading of Blake, a significant contribution to affect studies, and a provocative meditation on the state of the profession... Seeing critical reading s the interaction of agitation with slow time could offer a healing message for a divided profession, but there will always be those who are impatient to make a positive difference. Thanks to Steven Goldsmith's outstanding book, both sides can now find sustenance in the work of William Blake. -- David Simpson Modern Language Quarterly
Table of ContentsIntroduction: The Future of Enthusiasm
Part I: Devil's Party
1. Blake's Agitation
2. Blake's Virtue
Part II: A Passion for Blake
Introduction: Critique of Emotional Intelligence
3. "On Anothers Sorrow"
Toward an Auditory Imagination: Interlude on Kenzaburo Oe's Rouse Up O Young Men of the New Age
4. Strange Pulse
Wordsworth's Pulsation Machine, or the Half-Life of Mary Hutchinson: Interlude on "She was a Phantom of delight"
5. Criticism and the Work of Emotion
Acknowledgments
Appendix
Notes
Index
