Romantic Dynamics: The Poetics of Physicality

by M. Lussier

Overview

Romantic Dynamics creatively collides English poetry with a wide range of exotic concepts associated with the 'new physics' of relativity and quantum to uncover their shared concerns for indeterminacy, uncertainty, relativity, and complexity in a chaotic universe. This interdisciplinary work traces the elaboration of dynamical models of cosmos and consciousness in works by Blake, Byron, Coleridge, the Shelleys and Wordsworth, finding in those works an exploration of the interpenetration of psyche and phenomena. This model, the author argues, establishes a new metaphoric terrain liberated from the classical mechanics of Newtonian thought and more easily traversed with models articulated by Bohr, Einstein and Hawking.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780312226718
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan UK
Publication date:	10/11/1999
Series:	Romanticism in Perspective:Texts, Cultures, Histories
Edition description:	2000
Pages:	220
Product dimensions:	5.98(w) x 9.02(h) x 0.03(d)

About the Author

Mark S. Lussier is Associate Professor of Literature in the Department of English at Arizona State University.

Table of Contents

Preludium: On Synchronicity
• Romantic Dynamics, or Towards a Physical Criticism
• Blake's Deep Ecology, or the Ethos of Otherness
• At The Limit of Physical Theory, or Physical Dynamics in Coleridge's Rime Blake's Vortex, or the Quantum Bridge in Milton
• Reconstructing Byronic Time, or Temporality and Memory in The Giaour
• The Rhythmic Universe, or Spatial Dynamics in Shelley's Poetics
• Methodic Sadism/Symbolic Misogyny: Romantic Resonses to Science as Ideology

Editorial Reviews

This is a very fine book, indeed, which makes a real contribution to our understanding of Romanticism, science, and ecological thought. Romantic Circles Review

From the Publisher

Lussier (English, Arizona State U.) calls into question the assumed tension between Romantic poetry and physical theory, arguing that the Romantics did in fact use and depend upon contemporary physical theory, including cosmology and neuroscience. He explores the work of several poets, covering topics such as Blake's "Deep Ecology," the physical dynamics of Coleridge's , and temporality and memory in Byron's . Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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