Robert C. Solomon
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195368536
- eISBN:
- 9780199852031
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195368536.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Mind
This book states that we live our lives through our emotions, and that it is our emotions which give our lives meaning. What interests or fascinates us, who we love, what angers us, what moves us, ...
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This book states that we live our lives through our emotions, and that it is our emotions which give our lives meaning. What interests or fascinates us, who we love, what angers us, what moves us, what bores us; all of this defines us, gives us character, constitutes who we are. This book illuminates the rich life of the emotions: why we don't really understand them, what they really are, and how they make us human and give meaning to life. The book provides a guide to cutting-edge scientific research, as well as to what philosophers and psychologists have said on the subject, but it also emphasizes the personal and ethical character of our emotions. The book shows that emotions are not something that happen to us, nor are they irrational in the literal sense; rather, they are judgments we make about the world, and they are strategies for living in it. Fear, anger, love, guilt, jealousy, compassion—they are all essential to our values, to living happily, healthily, and well.Less
This book states that we live our lives through our emotions, and that it is our emotions which give our lives meaning. What interests or fascinates us, who we love, what angers us, what moves us, what bores us; all of this defines us, gives us character, constitutes who we are. This book illuminates the rich life of the emotions: why we don't really understand them, what they really are, and how they make us human and give meaning to life. The book provides a guide to cutting-edge scientific research, as well as to what philosophers and psychologists have said on the subject, but it also emphasizes the personal and ethical character of our emotions. The book shows that emotions are not something that happen to us, nor are they irrational in the literal sense; rather, they are judgments we make about the world, and they are strategies for living in it. Fear, anger, love, guilt, jealousy, compassion—they are all essential to our values, to living happily, healthily, and well.
Neil Websdale
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- May 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195315417
- eISBN:
- 9780199777464
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195315417.003.004
- Subject:
- Social Work, Children and Families, Crime and Justice
Chapter 4 focuses on eight perpetrators of familicide (7 male, one female) drawn from 77 cases (76 being male perpetrators) exhibiting a prior history of domestic violence and varying degrees of ...
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Chapter 4 focuses on eight perpetrators of familicide (7 male, one female) drawn from 77 cases (76 being male perpetrators) exhibiting a prior history of domestic violence and varying degrees of livid coercion. The author examines the early socialization of offenders, perpetrators’ searches for intimacy, including the lure of romance, and the parts played by aggressive and hostile, livid coercive behavior, sexual jealousy and obsessive attempts to control their partners. These outwardly intimate arrangements required much impression management, with livid coercive hearts evidencing intense shame, rage, and depression. Victim maneuverability, resistance, and agency are consistent themes and convey a strong sense of the contingent nature of domination and the problems associated with commonly used notions of “control” in violent interpersonal relationships. The discussion of the actual killings raises the possibility that familicide fleetingly dissipates or dissolves unbearable feelings of humiliated fury, recovering, momentarily, a lonely patina of pride.Less
Chapter 4 focuses on eight perpetrators of familicide (7 male, one female) drawn from 77 cases (76 being male perpetrators) exhibiting a prior history of domestic violence and varying degrees of livid coercion. The author examines the early socialization of offenders, perpetrators’ searches for intimacy, including the lure of romance, and the parts played by aggressive and hostile, livid coercive behavior, sexual jealousy and obsessive attempts to control their partners. These outwardly intimate arrangements required much impression management, with livid coercive hearts evidencing intense shame, rage, and depression. Victim maneuverability, resistance, and agency are consistent themes and convey a strong sense of the contingent nature of domination and the problems associated with commonly used notions of “control” in violent interpersonal relationships. The discussion of the actual killings raises the possibility that familicide fleetingly dissipates or dissolves unbearable feelings of humiliated fury, recovering, momentarily, a lonely patina of pride.
Ruth Rothaus Caston
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- January 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199925902
- eISBN:
- 9780199980475
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199925902.001.0001
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Prose and Writers: Classical, Early, and Medieval, Ancient Greek, Roman, and Early Christian Philosophy
The passions were a topic of widespread interest in antiquity. This is a study on their role in Roman love elegy (1st c. BCE), a genre rife with passions and jealousy in particular. Jealousy does ...
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The passions were a topic of widespread interest in antiquity. This is a study on their role in Roman love elegy (1st c. BCE), a genre rife with passions and jealousy in particular. Jealousy does appear in a number of earlier genres, but never with the centrality and importance it has in elegy. This book offers an exceptional opportunity to investigate the ancient representation of jealousy in its Roman context, as well as its significance for Roman love elegy itself. The narrators portray themselves as poets and as experts of love, championing a view of love that stands in marked contrast to the criticisms that Stoic and Epicurean philosophers had raised. Elegy provides rich evidence of the genesis and development of erotic jealousy: we find suspicions and rumors of infidelity, obsessive attention to visual clues, and accusations and confrontations with the beloved. The Roman elegists depict the susceptibility and reactions to jealousy along gendered lines, with an asymmetric representation of skepticism and belief, violence and restraint. But jealousy has ramifications well beyond the erotic affair. Underlying jealousy are fears about fides or trust and the vulnerability of human relations. These are prominent in love relationships, of course, but the term has broader application in the Roman world, and the poetic narrator often extends his fears about trust into many other dimensions of life, including friendship, religion, and politics. The infidelity rampant in the love affair indicates a more general breakdown of trust in other human relations. All of these features have implications for the genre itself. Many of the distinctive elements of Roman elegy—its first-person narration, obsessive recordkeeping, and role-playing—can be seen to derive from the thematic concern with jealousy. As such, jealousy provides a new way of understanding the distinctive features of Roman love elegy.Less
The passions were a topic of widespread interest in antiquity. This is a study on their role in Roman love elegy (1st c. BCE), a genre rife with passions and jealousy in particular. Jealousy does appear in a number of earlier genres, but never with the centrality and importance it has in elegy. This book offers an exceptional opportunity to investigate the ancient representation of jealousy in its Roman context, as well as its significance for Roman love elegy itself. The narrators portray themselves as poets and as experts of love, championing a view of love that stands in marked contrast to the criticisms that Stoic and Epicurean philosophers had raised. Elegy provides rich evidence of the genesis and development of erotic jealousy: we find suspicions and rumors of infidelity, obsessive attention to visual clues, and accusations and confrontations with the beloved. The Roman elegists depict the susceptibility and reactions to jealousy along gendered lines, with an asymmetric representation of skepticism and belief, violence and restraint. But jealousy has ramifications well beyond the erotic affair. Underlying jealousy are fears about fides or trust and the vulnerability of human relations. These are prominent in love relationships, of course, but the term has broader application in the Roman world, and the poetic narrator often extends his fears about trust into many other dimensions of life, including friendship, religion, and politics. The infidelity rampant in the love affair indicates a more general breakdown of trust in other human relations. All of these features have implications for the genre itself. Many of the distinctive elements of Roman elegy—its first-person narration, obsessive recordkeeping, and role-playing—can be seen to derive from the thematic concern with jealousy. As such, jealousy provides a new way of understanding the distinctive features of Roman love elegy.
Mike W. Martin
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- September 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780195304718
- eISBN:
- 9780199786572
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195304713.003.0015
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Moral Philosophy
This chapter begins by illustrating how love can simultaneously involve sickness and immorality, using examples of jealousy, unrequited love, and sadomasochism. It then outlines a virtue-oriented ...
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This chapter begins by illustrating how love can simultaneously involve sickness and immorality, using examples of jealousy, unrequited love, and sadomasochism. It then outlines a virtue-oriented conception of healthy love, illustrating how moral and therapeutic conceptions of love overlap. The chapter concludes by replying to Robert Bellah's criticisms of the therapeutic trend regarding love.Less
This chapter begins by illustrating how love can simultaneously involve sickness and immorality, using examples of jealousy, unrequited love, and sadomasochism. It then outlines a virtue-oriented conception of healthy love, illustrating how moral and therapeutic conceptions of love overlap. The chapter concludes by replying to Robert Bellah's criticisms of the therapeutic trend regarding love.
Ruth Rothaus Caston
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- January 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199925902
- eISBN:
- 9780199980475
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199925902.003.0007
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Prose and Writers: Classical, Early, and Medieval, Ancient Greek, Roman, and Early Christian Philosophy
The conclusion suggests that many of the features characteristic of jealousy are actually responsible for some of the more distinctive elements of Roman elegy itself. Jealousy is not merely the ...
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The conclusion suggests that many of the features characteristic of jealousy are actually responsible for some of the more distinctive elements of Roman elegy itself. Jealousy is not merely the subject matter of elegy: it creates and structures elegy’s various generic features. Jealousy thus provides a much more satisfying explanation for the specific character of Roman elegy than the various theories about its origins that have typically been put forward.Less
The conclusion suggests that many of the features characteristic of jealousy are actually responsible for some of the more distinctive elements of Roman elegy itself. Jealousy is not merely the subject matter of elegy: it creates and structures elegy’s various generic features. Jealousy thus provides a much more satisfying explanation for the specific character of Roman elegy than the various theories about its origins that have typically been put forward.
Paul Borgman
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- May 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195331608
- eISBN:
- 9780199868001
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195331608.003.0004
- Subject:
- Religion, Biblical Studies
Immediately following the slaying of Goliath and Saul's mystifying query about who that young slayer was, David becomes the object of Saul's fear and murderous jealousy, a mini‐drama of cat‐and‐mouse ...
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Immediately following the slaying of Goliath and Saul's mystifying query about who that young slayer was, David becomes the object of Saul's fear and murderous jealousy, a mini‐drama of cat‐and‐mouse that takes up the last half of I Samuel and Saul's suicide. The contrast between David and Saul continues to be spelled out, implicitly but surely, through various repetitions of narrative detail, most conspicuously the motifs of fear and of sword‐and‐spear use. Still another and striking pattern, to be taken up in the following chapter, occurs in the middle of David's fleeing from Saul, when twice David spares the king's life—and spares, as well, the life of a common fool. The two motifs of this chapter plus the triadic pattern of the next serve to further illustrate just what distinguishes David from Saul. Such advancing clarity, of course, functions also to explain better the mind of God in fastening on David rather than Saul.Less
Immediately following the slaying of Goliath and Saul's mystifying query about who that young slayer was, David becomes the object of Saul's fear and murderous jealousy, a mini‐drama of cat‐and‐mouse that takes up the last half of I Samuel and Saul's suicide. The contrast between David and Saul continues to be spelled out, implicitly but surely, through various repetitions of narrative detail, most conspicuously the motifs of fear and of sword‐and‐spear use. Still another and striking pattern, to be taken up in the following chapter, occurs in the middle of David's fleeing from Saul, when twice David spares the king's life—and spares, as well, the life of a common fool. The two motifs of this chapter plus the triadic pattern of the next serve to further illustrate just what distinguishes David from Saul. Such advancing clarity, of course, functions also to explain better the mind of God in fastening on David rather than Saul.
Heidi R. M. Pauwels
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195369908
- eISBN:
- 9780199871322
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195369908.003.0008
- Subject:
- Religion, Hinduism
Chapter 5 studies how goddesses cope with the threat of “the other woman.” It compares free‐spirited Shurpanakha's attempt to seduce Rama with the Gopis’ jealousy for sophisticated Kubja, Krishna's ...
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Chapter 5 studies how goddesses cope with the threat of “the other woman.” It compares free‐spirited Shurpanakha's attempt to seduce Rama with the Gopis’ jealousy for sophisticated Kubja, Krishna's lover in Mathura. The older versions tended towards the burlesque with some problematic behavior of the heroes, which later versions downplay. Shurpanakha becomes the negative example of the vamp who is punished severely, we hardly hear about Sita's reaction. The Gopis’ jealousy of Kubja is extensively described in the medieval sources, but the televised version turns Kubja into an exemplary devotee and completely erases the erotic aspects of the encounter with Krishna. Contemporary films too tend to turn such co‐wives into long‐suffering devotees, absolving the men from all blame and recommending self‐sacrifice in the interest of their men for wife and lover alike. Movies discussed are Hamara Dil aapke paas hai, Satyam Shivam Sundaram, Devdas, Main Tulsi tere aangan ki, and Souten.Less
Chapter 5 studies how goddesses cope with the threat of “the other woman.” It compares free‐spirited Shurpanakha's attempt to seduce Rama with the Gopis’ jealousy for sophisticated Kubja, Krishna's lover in Mathura. The older versions tended towards the burlesque with some problematic behavior of the heroes, which later versions downplay. Shurpanakha becomes the negative example of the vamp who is punished severely, we hardly hear about Sita's reaction. The Gopis’ jealousy of Kubja is extensively described in the medieval sources, but the televised version turns Kubja into an exemplary devotee and completely erases the erotic aspects of the encounter with Krishna. Contemporary films too tend to turn such co‐wives into long‐suffering devotees, absolving the men from all blame and recommending self‐sacrifice in the interest of their men for wife and lover alike. Movies discussed are Hamara Dil aapke paas hai, Satyam Shivam Sundaram, Devdas, Main Tulsi tere aangan ki, and Souten.
Elliott Antokoletz
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- May 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195365825
- eISBN:
- 9780199868865
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195365825.003.0006
- Subject:
- Music, Opera
This chapter looks at Act III, Scene I — one of the towers of the castle — and examines the idea of Mélisande's hair as object of manifold symbolic significance, the seduction of Pelléas in the magic ...
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This chapter looks at Act III, Scene I — one of the towers of the castle — and examines the idea of Mélisande's hair as object of manifold symbolic significance, the seduction of Pelléas in the magic of the night, and the threatening arrival of Golaud. Intervallic expansion serves as basis for dramatic tension and change of mood. This scene also expresses passion and sensuality in terms of diatonic and chromatic saturation, and represents Golaud and fate by the whole-tone-1 collection. The chapter also explores dramatic parallels and polarities. Increasing passion and impending fate are represented by chromatic (octatonic) compression of the whole-tone set by common tritone projections. This scene reveals the emergence of Pelléas, then Golaud. in the darkness, while Mélisande's dilemma is symbolized by heightened dramatic polarity and complex pitch-set interactions. Finally, Act III, Scene 2, the vaults of the castle; Scene 3, a terrace at the entrance of the vaults, dark and light; and Scene 4, before the castle, are examined. These all develop Golaud's expression of jealousy; based on a primary manifestation of the whole-tone cycles and their cells. The chapter further addresses the principle of polarity.Less
This chapter looks at Act III, Scene I — one of the towers of the castle — and examines the idea of Mélisande's hair as object of manifold symbolic significance, the seduction of Pelléas in the magic of the night, and the threatening arrival of Golaud. Intervallic expansion serves as basis for dramatic tension and change of mood. This scene also expresses passion and sensuality in terms of diatonic and chromatic saturation, and represents Golaud and fate by the whole-tone-1 collection. The chapter also explores dramatic parallels and polarities. Increasing passion and impending fate are represented by chromatic (octatonic) compression of the whole-tone set by common tritone projections. This scene reveals the emergence of Pelléas, then Golaud. in the darkness, while Mélisande's dilemma is symbolized by heightened dramatic polarity and complex pitch-set interactions. Finally, Act III, Scene 2, the vaults of the castle; Scene 3, a terrace at the entrance of the vaults, dark and light; and Scene 4, before the castle, are examined. These all develop Golaud's expression of jealousy; based on a primary manifestation of the whole-tone cycles and their cells. The chapter further addresses the principle of polarity.
Robert A. Kaster
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780195140781
- eISBN:
- 9780199789283
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195140781.003.0005
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, European History: BCE to 500CE
This chapter investigates the various scripts of invidia, the Latin term from which English “envy” is ultimately derived, though the Latin term is of much wider application. A system or “taxonomy” of ...
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This chapter investigates the various scripts of invidia, the Latin term from which English “envy” is ultimately derived, though the Latin term is of much wider application. A system or “taxonomy” of scripts is described, and it is shown how the emotion — a form of distress felt when you see another person enjoy some sort of good — ranges from sheer malice to righteous indignation depending on whether or not the person experiencing the emotion is applying some principle of right or fairness. The chapter then shows how the different forms of the script commonly interacted in Roman social life.Less
This chapter investigates the various scripts of invidia, the Latin term from which English “envy” is ultimately derived, though the Latin term is of much wider application. A system or “taxonomy” of scripts is described, and it is shown how the emotion — a form of distress felt when you see another person enjoy some sort of good — ranges from sheer malice to righteous indignation depending on whether or not the person experiencing the emotion is applying some principle of right or fairness. The chapter then shows how the different forms of the script commonly interacted in Roman social life.
Mark R. Leary
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780195172423
- eISBN:
- 9780199786756
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195172423.003.0004
- Subject:
- Psychology, Social Psychology
Most negative emotions are not the direct consequences of real emotion-producing events, but rather occur because people imagine themselves in past or future situations and engage in rumination about ...
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Most negative emotions are not the direct consequences of real emotion-producing events, but rather occur because people imagine themselves in past or future situations and engage in rumination about them. Even when the threat is real, negative emotions often do not help people deal with the danger. This chapter examines the ways in which people create their own emotional distress by imagining future events, thinking about significant others, creating an ego that must be defended against attack, attributing the causes of their behaviors and emotions, and worrying about the appraisals of other people. Among the emotions discussed are anxiety, depression, anger, jealousy, guilt, shame, and social anxiety.Less
Most negative emotions are not the direct consequences of real emotion-producing events, but rather occur because people imagine themselves in past or future situations and engage in rumination about them. Even when the threat is real, negative emotions often do not help people deal with the danger. This chapter examines the ways in which people create their own emotional distress by imagining future events, thinking about significant others, creating an ego that must be defended against attack, attributing the causes of their behaviors and emotions, and worrying about the appraisals of other people. Among the emotions discussed are anxiety, depression, anger, jealousy, guilt, shame, and social anxiety.
Alfred R. Mele
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- February 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199208913
- eISBN:
- 9780191723759
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199208913.003.06
- Subject:
- Psychology, Cognitive Neuroscience
This chapter focuses on three specific kinds of delusional confabulation — confabulations associated with the Capgras' syndrome, delusional jealousy (or the Othello syndrome), and the reverse Othello ...
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This chapter focuses on three specific kinds of delusional confabulation — confabulations associated with the Capgras' syndrome, delusional jealousy (or the Othello syndrome), and the reverse Othello syndrome. The aim is to shed some light on what sorts of causes of belief-acquisition or belief-persistence would support or challenge the idea that beliefs expressed in delusional confabulations in general are beliefs the person is self-deceived in acquiring or retaining. In the case of the confabulations, there are significant grounds for caution about the claim that self-deception is involved. But this is not to say that the same grounds for caution are present in all kinds of delusional confabulation.Less
This chapter focuses on three specific kinds of delusional confabulation — confabulations associated with the Capgras' syndrome, delusional jealousy (or the Othello syndrome), and the reverse Othello syndrome. The aim is to shed some light on what sorts of causes of belief-acquisition or belief-persistence would support or challenge the idea that beliefs expressed in delusional confabulations in general are beliefs the person is self-deceived in acquiring or retaining. In the case of the confabulations, there are significant grounds for caution about the claim that self-deception is involved. But this is not to say that the same grounds for caution are present in all kinds of delusional confabulation.
Jerome Neu
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780199862986
- eISBN:
- 9780199949762
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199862986.003.0014
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Moral Philosophy
This chapter presents the author's reply to his critics and addresses specific interesting issues they raise. He considers it interesting that all three of his critics focus (to varying degrees) on ...
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This chapter presents the author's reply to his critics and addresses specific interesting issues they raise. He considers it interesting that all three of his critics focus (to varying degrees) on jealousy. This says something about the significance of jealousy in our lives, a significance perhaps not surprising given that it is compounded, in important and complex ways, of fear and anger—two emotions that are, on anybody's account, basic emotions. And jealousy is, at least in relation to its erotic forms, importantly tied to love. Since jealousy operates in the space of fear, anger, and love, it is natural that it should assume a central place in discussions of emotion of the kind we are having now.Less
This chapter presents the author's reply to his critics and addresses specific interesting issues they raise. He considers it interesting that all three of his critics focus (to varying degrees) on jealousy. This says something about the significance of jealousy in our lives, a significance perhaps not surprising given that it is compounded, in important and complex ways, of fear and anger—two emotions that are, on anybody's account, basic emotions. And jealousy is, at least in relation to its erotic forms, importantly tied to love. Since jealousy operates in the space of fear, anger, and love, it is natural that it should assume a central place in discussions of emotion of the kind we are having now.
Joshua Landy
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780195169393
- eISBN:
- 9780199787845
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195169393.003.0003
- Subject:
- Literature, World Literature
While the first stage of Proust's training consists in bringing the acolyte to recognize the importance of “subjective truth” — rule-governed distortion of the data of sense by an individual ...
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While the first stage of Proust's training consists in bringing the acolyte to recognize the importance of “subjective truth” — rule-governed distortion of the data of sense by an individual perspective — over objective fact, the second stage goes further, introducing this time the necessity of full-blown self-deception. If Marcel's experiences of love and jealousy are anything to go by, knowledge of others is often inaccessible and sometimes unendurable. Should we wish to sustain love, therefore — and there are good reasons for doing so — imagination and illusion are going to be indispensable. Yet our illusions must also be lucid, if we are to maintain our dignity; and our illusions are fragile, requiring convoluted strategies for their protection. This is what lies behind the otherwise unaccountable behavior of Marcel with regard to Albertine, object of his love and fierce suspicion. On the one hand, Marcel obsessively investigates her behavior; on the other, he bypasses opportunities that seem to promise him decisive information, and routinely relies on sources that he knows to be untrustworthy. The only possible explanation is that Marcel, at a certain level, does not want to know the truth; if he appears to seek it, it is only in order to give himself the impression that he is attempting to resolve his doubts. Thus, his will to knowledge, as Nietzsche would say, paradoxically ends up serving his will to ignorance, being itself driven by a second-order will to ignorance: a drive to remain unaware of just how much one does not know.Less
While the first stage of Proust's training consists in bringing the acolyte to recognize the importance of “subjective truth” — rule-governed distortion of the data of sense by an individual perspective — over objective fact, the second stage goes further, introducing this time the necessity of full-blown self-deception. If Marcel's experiences of love and jealousy are anything to go by, knowledge of others is often inaccessible and sometimes unendurable. Should we wish to sustain love, therefore — and there are good reasons for doing so — imagination and illusion are going to be indispensable. Yet our illusions must also be lucid, if we are to maintain our dignity; and our illusions are fragile, requiring convoluted strategies for their protection. This is what lies behind the otherwise unaccountable behavior of Marcel with regard to Albertine, object of his love and fierce suspicion. On the one hand, Marcel obsessively investigates her behavior; on the other, he bypasses opportunities that seem to promise him decisive information, and routinely relies on sources that he knows to be untrustworthy. The only possible explanation is that Marcel, at a certain level, does not want to know the truth; if he appears to seek it, it is only in order to give himself the impression that he is attempting to resolve his doubts. Thus, his will to knowledge, as Nietzsche would say, paradoxically ends up serving his will to ignorance, being itself driven by a second-order will to ignorance: a drive to remain unaware of just how much one does not know.
Angela Smith
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198183983
- eISBN:
- 9780191674167
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198183983.003.0002
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
In spite of Virginia Woolf’s insistence in her personal writing on the significance of her relationship with Katherine Mansfield, some of her biographers pay scant attention to it, although this is ...
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In spite of Virginia Woolf’s insistence in her personal writing on the significance of her relationship with Katherine Mansfield, some of her biographers pay scant attention to it, although this is not true of Mansfield’s major biographers, Antony Alpers and Claire Tomalin, who each include a chapter on the friendship. Though they were literally foreigners to each other, with Mansfield prizing her colonial childhood increasingly as she grew older, they had border crossings in common: those traced in this chapter concern their abjection in illness, their bisexuality, their responses to childlessness, and their complex gender relationships with their editor husbands and with their fathers, as they move from late-Victorian childhood to young womanhood at the beginning of the new century. There is throughout the record of the relationship in the letters and diaries of the two writers a sense of Woolf’s intensity of feeling for Mansfield: admiration, love, and the hatred that stems from jealousy.Less
In spite of Virginia Woolf’s insistence in her personal writing on the significance of her relationship with Katherine Mansfield, some of her biographers pay scant attention to it, although this is not true of Mansfield’s major biographers, Antony Alpers and Claire Tomalin, who each include a chapter on the friendship. Though they were literally foreigners to each other, with Mansfield prizing her colonial childhood increasingly as she grew older, they had border crossings in common: those traced in this chapter concern their abjection in illness, their bisexuality, their responses to childlessness, and their complex gender relationships with their editor husbands and with their fathers, as they move from late-Victorian childhood to young womanhood at the beginning of the new century. There is throughout the record of the relationship in the letters and diaries of the two writers a sense of Woolf’s intensity of feeling for Mansfield: admiration, love, and the hatred that stems from jealousy.
Angela Smith
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198183983
- eISBN:
- 9780191674167
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198183983.003.0007
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
During the time that she was writing Jacob’s Room, Virginia Woolf was involved in the most intense phase of her friendship with Katherine Mansfield. In an entry in her diary where she says that she ...
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During the time that she was writing Jacob’s Room, Virginia Woolf was involved in the most intense phase of her friendship with Katherine Mansfield. In an entry in her diary where she says that she is planning to begin the book in the following week, she remarks, ‘I can wince outrageously to read K. M.’s praises in the Athenaeum. Four poets are chosen; she’s one of them’. The joint stimulus of jealousy and affinity acted as a spur, and Woolf forged ahead with the new book at the same time as she said what proved to be her final farewell in person to Mansfield, on August 23, 1920. The insecurity caused by missing Mansfield and envying her literary success combines with fear of T. S. Eliot’s intellectuality and his admiration of James Joyce’s fiction, and Woolf’s diary records that she has stopped writing Jacob’s Room;. This chapter focuses on the ways in which the movement of the narrative voice in Mansfield’s ‘The Daughters of the Late Colonel’ and Woolf’s Jacob’s Room expresses boundaries and overcrossings.Less
During the time that she was writing Jacob’s Room, Virginia Woolf was involved in the most intense phase of her friendship with Katherine Mansfield. In an entry in her diary where she says that she is planning to begin the book in the following week, she remarks, ‘I can wince outrageously to read K. M.’s praises in the Athenaeum. Four poets are chosen; she’s one of them’. The joint stimulus of jealousy and affinity acted as a spur, and Woolf forged ahead with the new book at the same time as she said what proved to be her final farewell in person to Mansfield, on August 23, 1920. The insecurity caused by missing Mansfield and envying her literary success combines with fear of T. S. Eliot’s intellectuality and his admiration of James Joyce’s fiction, and Woolf’s diary records that she has stopped writing Jacob’s Room;. This chapter focuses on the ways in which the movement of the narrative voice in Mansfield’s ‘The Daughters of the Late Colonel’ and Woolf’s Jacob’s Room expresses boundaries and overcrossings.
Adam Watt
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- September 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199566174
- eISBN:
- 9780191721519
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199566174.003.0004
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century and Contemporary Literature, European Literature
Through close analysis of a number of scenes (Swann reading a letter addressed to Forcheville, Norpois commenting on the narrator's writing, Elstir ‘reading’ the church façade ...
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Through close analysis of a number of scenes (Swann reading a letter addressed to Forcheville, Norpois commenting on the narrator's writing, Elstir ‘reading’ the church façade at Balbec, Mlle Vinteuil's friend deciphering the septet, the narrator himself reading the Goncourt journal), this chapter shows how reading, although often positively enlightening, can just as often destabilize us in our interactions with others. Reading is shown to be a complex blend of receptivity and creative translation. The chapter shows the effects of desire (of various sorts) and of jealousy on readers. The reflexive function of the narrator's reactions to the Goncourt journal, encourage us in turn to consider our own act of reading, is considered; the experiences of life and of reading are shown to be inextricably connected and instructively flawed.Less
Through close analysis of a number of scenes (Swann reading a letter addressed to Forcheville, Norpois commenting on the narrator's writing, Elstir ‘reading’ the church façade at Balbec, Mlle Vinteuil's friend deciphering the septet, the narrator himself reading the Goncourt journal), this chapter shows how reading, although often positively enlightening, can just as often destabilize us in our interactions with others. Reading is shown to be a complex blend of receptivity and creative translation. The chapter shows the effects of desire (of various sorts) and of jealousy on readers. The reflexive function of the narrator's reactions to the Goncourt journal, encourage us in turn to consider our own act of reading, is considered; the experiences of life and of reading are shown to be inextricably connected and instructively flawed.
Peter Otto
- Published in print:
- 2000
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198187196
- eISBN:
- 9780191674655
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198187196.003.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century Literature and Romanticism, Poetry
This introduction chapter explains the coverage of this book, which is about William Blake's prophetic poetry in The Four Zoas. This book argues that this work is structured as a coherent, albeit ...
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This introduction chapter explains the coverage of this book, which is about William Blake's prophetic poetry in The Four Zoas. This book argues that this work is structured as a coherent, albeit complex and multi-voiced narrative which details the history and outlines the relations that constitute the body of the fallen Albion. It suggests that Blake revision of this poem was designed to open multiple conflicting layers of text or to introduce a providential framework intrinsically. It discusses the elements of transcendence, sublime, love, and jealousy contained in the poem.Less
This introduction chapter explains the coverage of this book, which is about William Blake's prophetic poetry in The Four Zoas. This book argues that this work is structured as a coherent, albeit complex and multi-voiced narrative which details the history and outlines the relations that constitute the body of the fallen Albion. It suggests that Blake revision of this poem was designed to open multiple conflicting layers of text or to introduce a providential framework intrinsically. It discusses the elements of transcendence, sublime, love, and jealousy contained in the poem.
John Kerrigan
- Published in print:
- 1997
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198184515
- eISBN:
- 9780191674280
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198184515.003.0004
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature, Film, Media, and Cultural Studies
The chapter now turns on the Greek mythical figure Medea, one who was abandoned by Jason and was left with two sons. In many twists of the tale she was one who was insanely jealous of Jason's lady ...
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The chapter now turns on the Greek mythical figure Medea, one who was abandoned by Jason and was left with two sons. In many twists of the tale she was one who was insanely jealous of Jason's lady pursuits, sending poisonous robes to her rivals and even killing her own children to strike revenge. Jealously is a dangerous emotion that obscures logic and seeks violence. But she is also seen as one that was betrayed, one that was left waiting alone to care for her children. Her honor had been disgraced, and to some this justifies her revenge. But murder is not without punishment, and in one account, Medea kills herself. Her story is one of the most tragic stories in Greek mythology.Less
The chapter now turns on the Greek mythical figure Medea, one who was abandoned by Jason and was left with two sons. In many twists of the tale she was one who was insanely jealous of Jason's lady pursuits, sending poisonous robes to her rivals and even killing her own children to strike revenge. Jealously is a dangerous emotion that obscures logic and seeks violence. But she is also seen as one that was betrayed, one that was left waiting alone to care for her children. Her honor had been disgraced, and to some this justifies her revenge. But murder is not without punishment, and in one account, Medea kills herself. Her story is one of the most tragic stories in Greek mythology.
Susanne M. Sklar
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780199603145
- eISBN:
- 9780191731594
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199603145.003.0004
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Literature
Jerusalem's character is informed by many biblical figures – especially the harlot, the bride, and the Woman clothed with the Sun in the Book of Revelation. In his heroine, Blake challenges notions ...
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Jerusalem's character is informed by many biblical figures – especially the harlot, the bride, and the Woman clothed with the Sun in the Book of Revelation. In his heroine, Blake challenges notions of divine jealousy, the veneration of virginity central to Boehme's vision of Sophia (Divine Wisdom), and the righteousness preached by Joanna Southcott in her dramatic London ministry. In Blake's poem Jerusalem is condemned as a harlot because of her ‘dishounorable’ forgiveness; (Chapter One); she is severed from humanity and the land she seeks to redeem (Chapter Two); in maternal anguish she descends into mechanistic mills and nearly loses her mind (Chapter Three); but then she confronts those who destroy the earth, faces a dragon who eats her, and rises — enabling all living creatures to participate in ‘the Divine Body, the Saviour's Kingdom’ (Chapter Four).Less
Jerusalem's character is informed by many biblical figures – especially the harlot, the bride, and the Woman clothed with the Sun in the Book of Revelation. In his heroine, Blake challenges notions of divine jealousy, the veneration of virginity central to Boehme's vision of Sophia (Divine Wisdom), and the righteousness preached by Joanna Southcott in her dramatic London ministry. In Blake's poem Jerusalem is condemned as a harlot because of her ‘dishounorable’ forgiveness; (Chapter One); she is severed from humanity and the land she seeks to redeem (Chapter Two); in maternal anguish she descends into mechanistic mills and nearly loses her mind (Chapter Three); but then she confronts those who destroy the earth, faces a dragon who eats her, and rises — enabling all living creatures to participate in ‘the Divine Body, the Saviour's Kingdom’ (Chapter Four).
Catherine Epstein
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199546411
- eISBN:
- 9780191701429
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199546411.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
This book is the biography of Arthur Greiser, the man who initiated the Final Solution in Nazi-occupied Poland. Beginning with his early years prior to the First World War, it charts his rise to Nazi ...
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This book is the biography of Arthur Greiser, the man who initiated the Final Solution in Nazi-occupied Poland. Beginning with his early years prior to the First World War, it charts his rise to Nazi prominence in Danzi and his years as the Nazi territorial leader of the Warthegau, to his trial and execution in post-war Poland. Between 1939 and 1945, Greiser was in charge of the Warthegau — an area of western Poland annexed to Nazi Germany. In an effort to ‘Germanize’the area, he introduced a multitude of dreadful policies: he spearheaded an influx of hundreds of thousands of ethnic Germans, segregated Germans from Poles and introduced wide-ranging discriminatory measures against the Polish population. The first and longest-standing ghetto, the largest forced labour program, and the first mass gassings of Jews in Nazi-occupied Europe, were all initiated by this man. His biography reveals how nationalist obsessions, political jealousies, and personal insecurities shaped the policies of a man who held remarkable power in his Nazi fiefdom. It brings to light questions of why anyone could imagine genocide and ethnic cleansing to be solutions to political problems.Less
This book is the biography of Arthur Greiser, the man who initiated the Final Solution in Nazi-occupied Poland. Beginning with his early years prior to the First World War, it charts his rise to Nazi prominence in Danzi and his years as the Nazi territorial leader of the Warthegau, to his trial and execution in post-war Poland. Between 1939 and 1945, Greiser was in charge of the Warthegau — an area of western Poland annexed to Nazi Germany. In an effort to ‘Germanize’the area, he introduced a multitude of dreadful policies: he spearheaded an influx of hundreds of thousands of ethnic Germans, segregated Germans from Poles and introduced wide-ranging discriminatory measures against the Polish population. The first and longest-standing ghetto, the largest forced labour program, and the first mass gassings of Jews in Nazi-occupied Europe, were all initiated by this man. His biography reveals how nationalist obsessions, political jealousies, and personal insecurities shaped the policies of a man who held remarkable power in his Nazi fiefdom. It brings to light questions of why anyone could imagine genocide and ethnic cleansing to be solutions to political problems.
