Angels and Absences: Child Deaths in the Nineteenth CenturyVanderbilt University Press, 1997 - Всего страниц: 252 What is the difference between public and private feeling, and how far can we deduce past feelings from the words that have been left us? Why do child deaths figure so often and so prominently in the literature of the nineteenth century, and how was the theme of the death of a child used to elicit such poignant responses in the readers of that era? In this fascinating new book, Laurence Lerner vividly contrasts the contempt with which twentieth- century criticism so often dismisses such works as mere sentimentality with the enthusiasm and tears of nineteenth-century contemporaries. Drawing examples from both real and literary deaths, Lerner delves into the writings of well-known authors such as Dickens, Coleridge, Shelley, Flaubert, Mann, Huxley, and Hesse, as well as lesser known writers like Felicia Hemans and Lydia Sigourney. In the process, he synthesizes fresh ideas about the thorny subjects of sentimentality, aesthetic judgment, and the function of religion in literature. Lerner's forthright and evocative prose style is enjoyable reading, and he excels in teasing out the moral implications and the psychosocial entanglements of his chosen narrative and lyrical texts. This is a book that will illuminate an important aspect of the history of private life. It should have wide application for those interested in the history, sociology, and literature of the nineteenth century. |
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... grief for this infant . Leopold cared only for his wife : when the news of the child's death was brought him , he ... grief took place , and if we ask why , there seem several possible answers . First , the mother was still alive . As we ...
... grief can leave us convinced of its genuine- ness and immediacy . This does not mean that the statements of faith were hypocritical : it means that if we view them from the outside , we shall see them as a semiotic system , governing ...
... grief , however , to reduce it to the sentimentalizing undoubtedly present in the writing : it would amount to ... grief but also as a modification of real grief : hence his reluctance to read the episode — though it clearly did not ...