The Birth of European Romanticism
Truth and Propaganda in Staël's 'De l'Allemagne', 1810–1813

An important study of the book which invented European Romanticism, Staël's De l'Allemagne.

John Claiborne Isbell (Author)

9780521032001, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 23 November 2006

288 pages
21.6 x 14 x 1.6 cm, 0.371 kg

"This is an important book that will undoubtedly encourgae debate across the spectrum of romantic criticism....The Birth of European Romaticism has great appeal to a wide general public as well as to specialists in the area." Philip Mellen, Germanic Notes and Reviews

It was through Staël's best-seller De l'Allemagne that the term 'Romanticism', coined in Germany, reached Europe and America. Around this term, Staël built a new and universal agenda: her manifesto offered Napoleon's Europe an alternative to everything he stood for. The new universe she revealed helped to bury the neo-Classical world and to shape the nineteenth century. In this important work, Dr Isbell reasserts Staël's place in history and analyses her vast agenda, which covers every Classical and Romantic divide in art, philosophy, religion, and society from 1789 to 1815. This investigation sheds light upon the two different revolutions that created modern Europe, seen here by a leader of both.

Acknowledgements
List of abbreviations
Author's note
Introduction
1. Birth of a nation - Staël's Romantic Germany in 1810
2. Romantic literature and politics
3. Philosophy and ethics in Napoleonic Europe
4. Religion, love, enthusiasm - a new Enlightenment
Conclusion
Appendix: De l'Allemagne titles and dates
Notes
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Literary studies: c 1800 to c 1900 [DSBF]