Philipp Erchinger
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781474438957
- eISBN:
- 9781474453790
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474438957.003.0009
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century and Victorian Literature
The argument of this chapter is that the writing of sensation fiction was itself part of the critical endeavour to make sense of the enormous excitement that it produced. There is, in other words, a ...
More
The argument of this chapter is that the writing of sensation fiction was itself part of the critical endeavour to make sense of the enormous excitement that it produced. There is, in other words, a tendency towards self-investigation and self-reflection inherent in the sensational imagination. Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s Lady Audley’s Secret and Aurora Floyd, for instance, seem to read and review, repeatedly, the very art that constitutes them. In accordance with Braddon’s letters to Edward Bulwer-Lytton, these novels, being engaged in a quest for their own meaning and social function, are uncertain about the very sensational effects that they helped to create. Likewise, the stories of Wilkie Collins’s Armadale and The Moonstone contain within themselves various models of the creative activity through which they were assembled and made into their characteristically suspended, drawn-out shape. By means of such models, the chapter argues, Collins’s writing makes itself legible, between the lines, as an experimental practice that composes its form as it goes along, rather than on the basis of a predefined plan.Less
The argument of this chapter is that the writing of sensation fiction was itself part of the critical endeavour to make sense of the enormous excitement that it produced. There is, in other words, a tendency towards self-investigation and self-reflection inherent in the sensational imagination. Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s Lady Audley’s Secret and Aurora Floyd, for instance, seem to read and review, repeatedly, the very art that constitutes them. In accordance with Braddon’s letters to Edward Bulwer-Lytton, these novels, being engaged in a quest for their own meaning and social function, are uncertain about the very sensational effects that they helped to create. Likewise, the stories of Wilkie Collins’s Armadale and The Moonstone contain within themselves various models of the creative activity through which they were assembled and made into their characteristically suspended, drawn-out shape. By means of such models, the chapter argues, Collins’s writing makes itself legible, between the lines, as an experimental practice that composes its form as it goes along, rather than on the basis of a predefined plan.
Bjorn Krondorfer
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- June 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780804768993
- eISBN:
- 9780804773430
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Stanford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.11126/stanford/9780804768993.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Theology
This book examines how men open their intimate lives and thoughts to the public through confessional writing. It examines writings—by St. Augustine, a Jewish ghetto policeman, an imprisoned Nazi ...
More
This book examines how men open their intimate lives and thoughts to the public through confessional writing. It examines writings—by St. Augustine, a Jewish ghetto policeman, an imprisoned Nazi perpetrator, and a gay American theologian—that reflect sincere attempts at introspective and retrospective self-investigation, often triggered by some wounding or rupture and followed by a transformative experience. The book takes seriously the vulnerability exposed in male self-disclosure while offering a critique of the religious and gendered rhetoric employed in such discourse. The religious imagination, it argues, allows men to talk about their intimate, flawed, and sinful selves without having to condemn themselves or to fear self-erasure. Herein lies the greatest promise of these confessions: by baring their souls to judgment, these writers may also transcend their self-imprisonment.Less
This book examines how men open their intimate lives and thoughts to the public through confessional writing. It examines writings—by St. Augustine, a Jewish ghetto policeman, an imprisoned Nazi perpetrator, and a gay American theologian—that reflect sincere attempts at introspective and retrospective self-investigation, often triggered by some wounding or rupture and followed by a transformative experience. The book takes seriously the vulnerability exposed in male self-disclosure while offering a critique of the religious and gendered rhetoric employed in such discourse. The religious imagination, it argues, allows men to talk about their intimate, flawed, and sinful selves without having to condemn themselves or to fear self-erasure. Herein lies the greatest promise of these confessions: by baring their souls to judgment, these writers may also transcend their self-imprisonment.
Zoltan Torey and Daniel C. Dennett
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- August 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780262512848
- eISBN:
- 9780262255189
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- The MIT Press
- DOI:
- 10.7551/mitpress/9780262512848.003.0006
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Mind
This chapter presents a definition of “reflective awareness” to introduce the link between it and language. It treats reflective awareness as synonymous with “consciousness,” i.e. the knowing that ...
More
This chapter presents a definition of “reflective awareness” to introduce the link between it and language. It treats reflective awareness as synonymous with “consciousness,” i.e. the knowing that one knows. In thinking about itself, the brain is faced with a myriad of difficulties because it becomes “thinker” and “thought” at once, and this duality is beyond introspection. The generality of this duality makes it more problematic, apart from the brain trying to identify a phenomenon that is constantly part of what is being experienced. There are two main difficulties that must be addressed in the brain’s self-investigation. First, the brain cannot get past regressive circularities about itself; and second, it cannot allow inquiry into itself if this undermines its sense of security.Less
This chapter presents a definition of “reflective awareness” to introduce the link between it and language. It treats reflective awareness as synonymous with “consciousness,” i.e. the knowing that one knows. In thinking about itself, the brain is faced with a myriad of difficulties because it becomes “thinker” and “thought” at once, and this duality is beyond introspection. The generality of this duality makes it more problematic, apart from the brain trying to identify a phenomenon that is constantly part of what is being experienced. There are two main difficulties that must be addressed in the brain’s self-investigation. First, the brain cannot get past regressive circularities about itself; and second, it cannot allow inquiry into itself if this undermines its sense of security.
