Essaying Montaigne. A Study of the Renaissance Institution of Writing and Reading. Von John O'Neill.

Gutes Ex. - Englisch. // Vorsatz mit SIGNATUR von John O'Neill; mit kurzer Widmung; Brief-Beilage vom Autor; mit SIGNATUR. - Michel Eyquem de Montaigne (* 28. Februar 1533 auf Schloss Montaigne im P�gord; � 13. September 1592 ebenda) . war Jurist, Politiker, Philosoph und Begr�nder der Essayistik. Er war zuallererst ein Skeptiker, auch Humanist, dem r�misch-katholischen Glauben verbunden sowie Politiker mit Zugang zu den einflussreichen Pers�nlichkeiten der franz�sischen Monarchie am Ende der Renaissance und zu Beginn der Reformation und der beginnenden Gegenreformation. // In Essaying Montaigne John O'Neill combines wide-ranging Renaissance scholarship with an innovative theory of the bodily practices of reading and writing. He argues that the Essays are to be regarded as an exercise of the literary body, funding the joy of reading and writing. Nevertheless, O'Neill rejects the contemporary identification of textuality and sexuality, as well as the more extravagant metaphors of literature as neurosis or self-alienation. Rather, he defends the Essays as a work of friendship and family resistant to theories of literary alienation fostered by Freudianism and Marxism. Through a careful exploration of the Renaissance concept of literary anxiety and of the classical institution of friendship, the invention of the self-essay is shown to engage the mutual competence and freedom of the reader and writer and to strengthen both against the evil of dominant discourse. O'Neill is then able critically to engage a number of rival readings of the Essays by contemporary French and English scholars whose interpretations are found to violate his principle of the mutual literary competence involved in any essaying of the Essays. (Verlagstext) // INHALT : To the reader ---- Society and self-study: the problem of literary authority ---- Literary anxiety and the romance of books Rival readings ---- The paradox of communication: reading the 'Essays' otherwise ---- Writing and embodiment ---- Reading and temperament On living and dying as we do ---- On public and private life ---- Portrait of the essayist without qualities 1 - Civilization, literacy and barbarism -Votes ---- Bibliography ---- Index. ISBN 0710009372