DOCSLIB.ORG

Durham E-Theses

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Durham E-Theses Durham E-Theses The political ideas of William Hazlitt (1778-1830) Garnett, Mark Alan How to cite: Garnett, Mark Alan (1990) The political ideas of William Hazlitt (1778-1830), Durham theses, Durham University. Available at Durham E-Theses Online: http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/6186/ Use policy The full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that: • a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in Durham E-Theses • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders. Please consult the full Durham E-Theses policy for further details. Academic Support Oce, Durham University, University Oce, Old Elvet, Durham DH1 3HP e-mail: [email protected] Tel: +44 0191 334 6107 http://etheses.dur.ac.uk ABSTRACT OF A THESIS SUBMITTED FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY, 1990. "The Political Ideas of William Hazlitt, 1778-1830" MARK ALAN GARNETT Department of Politics, Durham University. The purpose of the thesis was to examine William Hazlitt's political thought from the viewpoint of the history of ideas. Such a study should lead to a greater appreciation of his value as a political critic. The received notion that he was a radical provided a starting-point for investigation. Hazlitt's theoretical work in philosophy and politics was found to be of interest, but his views on contemporary personalities and events are more revealing. He opposed hereditary despotism, but not all fo.rms of monarchy, and he was ambivalent about the possibility and propriety of constitutional reform. His criticism of "progressive" thinkers such as Rpbert Owen was more destructive than his critique of the conservative Edmund Burke, despite the superficial hostility of the latter work. Emotionally, he sided with Whigs and reformers, but this was a half-hearted commitment, and his analysis reveals some sympathy for their opponents. In order to properly judge Hazlitt's political position, a framework was devised by which ideological evidence may be appraised with maximum objectivity. Ideologies, it is argued, are ethical understandings of the world which arise from varying views of human nature. It was found that Hazlitt's view that human nature is a mixture of passion and reason was more pessimistic than that held by most contemporary liberals. His position is best described as conservative liberalism. It was not radicalism, which implies a rigid notion of the best form of human society. This interpretation helps to explain some of Hazlitt's views which have puzzled previous commentators, such as his admiration for Napoleon. His ambivalence permitted him to respond to characters and events with unusual flexibility when his volatile temper allowed, although it made systematic work unlikely. He is a perceptive and often objective critic who deserves greater recognition outside literary studie~. THE POLITICAL IDEAS OF WILLIAM HAZLITT (1778-1830) "Let us think what we please of what we really find, but prejudge nothing" William Hazlitt. Notes of a Journey Through France and Italv. M.A GARNETT DEPARTMENT OF POLITICS DURHAM UNIVERSITY, 1990. A SUBMISSION FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY. The copyright of this thesis rests with the author. No quotation from it should be published without his prior written consent and information derived from it should be acknowledged. "The copyright of this thesis rests with the author. No quotation from it should be published without his prior written consent and information derived from it should be acknowledged." ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS During the three years of work on a thesis, obligations mount up to the point that the list of acknowledgements threatens to occupy the same space as a major chapter. I am conscious that the following paragraph does not include all the names that it should, and that it is impossible to give proper recognition to many of those are mentioned. I should like to take this opportunity to thank the British Academy for their generous financial support, and the staff of the Department of Politics, Durham University, for their helpful and friendly conduct. Of the many individuals who have given up time to assist me, I must record my special gratitude to: Dr. Jeremy Black, Professor Marilyn Butler, Professor John Cannon, Dr. Geoffrey Carnall, Dr. Jonathan Clark, Dr. John Derry, Or. David Jasper, Dr. Stanley Jones, Dr. David Manning, Professor Michael Oakeshott, Dr. Frank O'Gorman, The Rt. Hon. Mr. J. E Powell, Mr. Bill Ruddick, Professor J.R Watson and Dr. John Whale. I am very grateful to the members of the Politics Department Seminar Group (particularly to Professor and Mrs. Alan Milne for their hospitality to this group), and to the Shakespearians for a never-failing flow of good humour and eighty-shillings. There are some debts which must be acknowledged separately in order to mark my deepest gratitude; to Professor Harry Dickinson, whose patience rivals his knowledge; to the Rt. Hon. Sir Ian Gilmour (Bart.), for his generosity and stimulating talk; to Dr. David Sweet, whose support has never flagged over many years: to Miss Sally Cottam, who has held up remarkably well; to Nick and Susan Lamb, for their charming company and doubtful musica 1 taste; to my supervisor. Mr. Henry Tudor, for his quiet wit and wisdom: and, finally, to my parents, Betty and Allan Garnett, who have supported me through everything and to whom, with all my love, this thesis is gratefully dedicated. - 1 - CONTENTS INTRODUCTION • .......••..••.•....•..•................• 3 PART ONE: THEORETICAL 1) HAZLITT'S PHILOSOPHY .•...•.•.•....•............•. 11 2) THEORY OF POLITICS ••............••••.......•...•. 31 3) HAZLITT AND THE PROBLEM OF IDEOLOGY •.•..•.•.••..• 51 PART TWO: ISSUES 1) THE MONARCHY . .•....•...•••....••..•...••••.•...•. 74 2) PATRIOTISM ••....••...•••.••..•.•••••..........••. 81 3) SECTS AND PARTIES ................................ 92 4) HAZLITT AND THE POLITICS OF DISSENT •••..•••....• 117 PART THREE: FRIENDS AND FOES 1) FRIENDS ....•...•.••••••...•.••....••.•..•...••.. 131 2) FOES ••....•..••.•.••..•...•.•....••........••... 152 3) THE NAPOLEONIST. .••..••..•..••......•..•.•.•.... 185 4) MUSINGS ON MISANTHROPY •.•••..•.•.••.•..••....•.. 206 CONCLUDING REHARKS ................................. 222 Bib 7 i ography •...................................... 232 - 2 - INTRODUCTION While William Hazlitt seems to have secured a chapter in most literary histories, he is a footnote at best in the history of political ideas. His views are regularly quoted in connection with such contemporaries as Burke, Godwin and Bentham, yet his own political thinking has not been made the subject of any full-length study. There are several good reasons why this should now be rectified. Firstly, Hazlitt has interested so many generations that he must be recognised as "essentially a great man - a master-mind", 1 worth tracing through all his diverse fields of interest. As Crane Brinton has noted, politics coloured most of his work, and Hazlitt felt confident that he 2 had much of value to say on men and affairs. Secondly, a proper study of Hazlitt's work may shed stronger light on his contemporaries. If we know the stand-point from which he discussed the Utilitarians, the Owenites and the anti-Jacobins, we may quote his words with renewed confidence - or with greater caution. Thirdly, it will be possible to examine Hazlitt's credentials as a chronicler of events. Hitherto it would be fair to say that historians have not recognised him as a trustworthy authority, except when they have required telling quotations about certain of his contemporaries. This seems to be inconsistent; surely, if unacceptable bias afflicts his interpretation of events, then his views on personalities should be equally inadmissible, since Hazlitt personalised politics to an unusual degree. It is certain that without a thorough investigation of his political position, judgements concerning his reliability would be premature. Once Hazlitt's bias has been identified, his readers will be able to allow for it. It is the primary purpose of this thesis, therefore, to establish Hazlitt's position in the ideological context of his time. It would be wrong to deny that much of value has already been - 3 - 3 written on Hazlitt's politics. In any work on his ideas, political concerns would be impossible to disentangle from the chosen material. Recent accounts, however, have concentrated heavily upon his contribution to literary criticism. It is understandable that these studies have not been directed towards a close scrutiny of his political ideas. But this is work that must be done, not only to establish Hazlitt's credentials in the field, but also because an element of caricature tends to creep in when political positions are accepted without criticism. Samuel Johnson, for example, was clearly a Tory in his political allegiance, and by most critics in the past this was interpreted to entail a position on many issues which Johnson himself would have rejected. A similar fate, I would argue, has befallen Hazlitt; he has been labelled a radical, and critics have imposed upon him a set of standards - some relevant to the historical context, but others wildly anachronistic - by which his consistency and value has been measured. In the case of Johnson, critics have at least begun to re-examine the validity of 4 the traditional view. It is time that the same compliment was granted to Hazlitt. There are many pitfalls awaiting all students in the history of ideas, and in the case of Hazlitt some of these dangers are unusually acute. For instance, there is a great danger of being kidnapped by one's subject; since Hazlitt was a powerful political writer his views are peculiarly seductive. It is tempting to find as few faults as possible with his message, and even to join with him in battles which are long over.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Toward Liberalism: Politics, Poverty, and the Emotions in the 1790S Peter Denney Griffith University
    Toward Liberalism: Politics, Poverty, and the Emotions in the 1790s Peter Denney Griffith University I n the volatile atmosphere of the mid-1840s, the leading exponent of Victorian liber- alism, John Stuart Mill, published an essay in the Edinburgh Review in which he rejected the assumption that political economy encompassed a “hard-hearted, unfeeling” approach Ito the question of poverty.1 Entitled “The Claims of Labour,” a major purpose of the essay was to advocate self-help as the key to improving the condition of the laboring classes. According to Mill, the promotion of self-help was an urgent matter, for there had been a revival of the belief that the situation of the poor could be ameliorated either by charity or by the redistribution of property. It was as if people had forgotten the population theory of Thomas Robert Malthus, who, beginning in the late 1790s, argued that such schemes exacerbated the problem of poverty by discouraging the laboring classes from developing qualities like restraint and industriousness that were crucial not just to their improvement but to their survival. Radical and conservative critics alike condemned Malthus both for the bleakness of his theory and for the cold, calcu- lating attitude it seemed to endorse. While understanding such criticism, Mill dismissed these detractors as the “sentimental enemies of political economy.”2 At the same time, he insisted that political economy was compatible with sympathy, if not with sentimentality. If interpreted cor- rectly, it generated a view of the poor that mixed empirical observations with positive emotions, producing a sense of optimism regarding the future of the laboring classes.
    [Show full text]
  • Globalizing Bentham
    Globalizing Jeremy Bentham The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation Armitage, David R. 2011. Globalizing Jeremy Bentham. History of Political Thought 32(1): 63-82. Published Version http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/imp/ hpt/2011/00000032/00000001/art00004 Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:11211544 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Open Access Policy Articles, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#OAP - 1 - GLOBALIZING JEREMY BENTHAM1 David Armitage2 Abstract: Jeremy Bentham’s career as a writer spanned almost seventy years, from the Seven Years’ War to the early 1830s, a period contemporaries called an age of revolutions and more recent historians have seen as a world crisis. This article traces Bentham’s developing universalism in the context of international conflict across his lifetime and in relation to his attempts to create a ‘Universal Jurisprudence’. That ambition went unachieved and his successors turned his conception of international law in more particularist direction. Going back behind Bentham’s legacies to his own writings, both published and unpublished, reveals a thinker responsive to specific events but also committed to a universalist vision that helped to make him a precociously global figure in the history of political thought. Historians of political thought have lately made two great leaps forward in expanding the scope of their inquiries. The first, the ‘international turn’, was long- 1 History of Political Thought, 32 (2011), 63-82.
    [Show full text]
  • Utilitarianism in the Age of Enlightenment
    UTILITARIANISM IN THE AGE OF ENLIGHTENMENT This is the first book-length study of one of the most influential traditions in eighteenth-century Anglophone moral and political thought, ‘theological utilitarianism’. Niall O’Flaherty charts its devel- opment from its formulation by Anglican disciples of Locke in the 1730s to its culmination in William Paley’s work. Few works of moral and political thought had such a profound impact on political dis- course as Paley’s Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy (1785). His arguments were at the forefront of debates about the constitution, the judicial system, slavery and poverty. By placing Paley’s moral thought in the context of theological debate, this book establishes his genuine commitment to a worldly theology and to a programme of human advancement. It thus raises serious doubts about histories which treat the Enlightenment as an entirely secular enterprise, as well as those which see English thought as being markedly out of step with wider European intellectual developments. niall o’flaherty is a Lecturer in the History of European Political Thought at King’s College London. His research focuses on eighteenth- and nineteenth-century moral, political and religious thought in Britain. He has published articles on William Paley and Thomas Robert Malthus, and is currently writing a book entitled Malthus and the Discovery of Poverty. ideas in context Edited by David Armitage, Richard Bourke, Jennifer Pitts and John Robertson The books in this series will discuss the emergence of intellectual traditions and of related new disciplines. The procedures, aims and vocabularies that were generated will be set in the context of the alternatives available within the contemporary frameworks of ideas and institutions.
    [Show full text]
  • Donald J. Greene
    Recent Studies in the Restoration and Eighteenth Century DONALD J. GREENE I IT IS instructive for any literary student, but especially for a contributor to a new scholarly journal, to browse in the early numbers of those journals that started a genera- tion ago-to read Ronald Crane's ruthless dissections, in the early PQ annual bibliographies, of Continental theses ponderously chasing the elusive abstractions "neo-classicism" and "pre-romanti- cism" through jungles of logomachy; to encounter, in RES, such wise words of Ronald McKerrow's as (1928) "Our interest now lies, not in inventing neat phrases which will serve to label these periods [of literature] and emphasize the watertight nature of their divisions, but in showing how they are interlocked one with another," or these (1934) castigating "a time when an attitude of simple faith towards the dicta of the earlier literary histories was more customary than is the rule at present, and when the pic- turesqueness of an anecdote or the ingenuity of a theory seemed too often to have been accepted as evidence of its truth." ExpeUas naturam furca, tamen usque recurrit. In 1960 (this survey attempts Ito cover late 1959 and most of 1960), were we in eighteenth- century studies as far advanced as Crane's and McKerrow's readers toward the ideal for which they strove? The tendency to compart- mentalize and isolate a period of literature-to "professionalize" it, in the worst sense of the term-seems innate in human mental sloth. To take one's notions of eighteenth-century history or philo- sophy or theology from the convenient summaries of Lecky or Leslie Stephen in Professor So-and-so's literary history is easier than to go to the original sources or to serious contemporary schol- arship in those disciplines.
    [Show full text]
  • Spirit of the Age.Indb
    The Spirit of the Age Anamnesis Anamnesis means remembrance or reminiscence, the collection and re- collection of what has been lost, forgotten, or effaced. It is therefore a matter of the very old, of what has made us who we are. But anamnesis is also a work that transforms its subject, always producing something new. To recollect the old, to produce the new: that is the task of Anamnesis. a re.press series The Spirit of the Age: Hegel and the Fate of Thinking Paul Ashton, Toula Nicolacopoulos and George Vassilacopoulos, editors re.press Melbourne 2008 re.press PO Box 40, Prahran, 3181, Melbourne, Australia http://www.re-press.org © re.press 2008 This work is ‘Open Access’, published under a creative commons license which means that you are free to copy, distribute, display, and perform the work as long as you clearly attribute the work to the authors, that you do not use this work for any commercial gain in any form whatsoever and that you in no way alter, transform or build on the work outside of its use in normal academic scholarship without express permission of the author (or their executors) and the publisher of this volume. For any reuse or distribution, you must make clear to others the license terms of this work. For more information see the details of the creative commons licence at this website: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.5/ British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication Data The spirit of the age : Hegel and the fate of thinking Bibliography.
    [Show full text]
  • Kaiser-MA-1942.Pdf
    A LITERARY COMPARISON BETWEEN WILLIAM HAZLITT'S THE SPIRIT OF THE AGE AND RICHARD HORNE'S A NEW SPIRIT OF THE AGE. BY SISTER MARY LEONARD KAISER, 0. S. E. A THESIS Submitted to the faculty of the Creighton University in Partial Fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in the Department of English OMAHA, 1942 ACKNOWLEDGMENT The writer wishes to acknowledge her gratitude to Reverend Mother Lucy Dooley, O.S.B, and to the Sisters of Mount St. Scholastics for the opportunity of pursuing this study. She also wishes to express her sincere appreciation for the valuable assistance so graciously extended by Reverend Paul Smith, S.J. TABLE OP CONTENTS CHAPTERS INTRODUCTION I I THE SPIRIT OF THE AGE 1 II A NEW SPIRIT OP THE AGE 16 III THE TREATMENT OF THE POETS IN HAZLITT AND HORNE 29 IV THE TREATMENT OP THE PROSE WRITERS IN HAZLITT AND HORNE 43 V SAME AUTHORS IN BOTH BOOKS 54 VI CONCLUSION 62 BIBLIOGRAPHY 70 INTRODUCTIOK The old order changeth, yielding place to new Tennyson, Morte D fArthur Change is a universal thing* It is the rise and fall of the tide of existence* It is a natural thing and proof of the rhythm in nature* This element of un­ rest and continual search for causes in the minds of man is manifested in the words they write, for words are the symbols of thought* These thoughts, translated into the prevailing literature, are the reflection of the change in the universe* In this study of two books, embodying the spirits of two separate ages, we shall see these truths exempli­ fied* In Maslitt's, The spirit of the
    [Show full text]
  • The Romantic Period 1785-1830
    http://www.englishworld2011.info/ The Romantic Period 1785-1830 1789—1815: Revolutionary and Napoleonic period in France.—1789: The Revolution begins with the assembly of the States- General in May and the storming of the Bastille on July 14.— 1793: King Louis XVI executed; England joins the alliance against France.—1793—94: The Reign of Terror under Robespierre. 1804: Napoleon crowned emperor.—1815: Napoleon defeated at Waterloo 1807: British slave trade outlawed (slavery abolished throughout the empire, including the West Indies, twenty-six years later) 1811—20: The Regency—George, Prince of Wales, acts as regent for George III, who has been declared incurably insane 1819: Peterloo Massacre 1820: Accession of George IV The Romantic period, though by far the shortest, is at least as complex and diverse as any other period in British literary history. For much of the twentieth century, scholars singled out five poets—Wordsworth, Coleridge, Byron, Percy Shelley, and Keats, adding Blake belatedly to make a sixth—and constructed notions of a unified Romanticism on the basis of their works. But there were problems all along: even the two closest collaborators of the 1790s, Words- worth and Coleridge, would fit no single definition; Byron despised both Cole- ridge's philosophical speculations and Wordsworth's poetry; Shelley and Keats were at opposite poles from each other stylistically and philosophically; Blake was not at all like any of the other five. Nowadays, although the six poets remain, by most measures of canonicity, the principal
    [Show full text]
  • Paper 4 Romanticism: the French Revolution and After And
    Paper IV Unit I Romanticism: The French Revolution and After and Romantic Themes 1.1. Introduction During the second half of the 18th century economic and social changes took place in England. The country went through the so-called Industrial Revolution when new industries sprang up and new processes were applied to the manufacture of traditional products. During the reign of King George III (1760-1820) the face of England changed. The factories were built, the industrial development was marked by an increase in the export of finished cloth rather than of raw material, coal and iron industries developed. Internal communications were largely funded. The population increased from 7 million to 14 million people. Much money was invested in road- and canal-building. The first railway line which was launched in 1830 from Liverpool to Manchester allowed many people inspired by poets of Romanticism to discover the beauty of their own country. Just as we understand the tremendous energizing influence of Puritanism in the matter of English liberty by remembering that the common people had begun to read, and that their book was the bible, so we may understand this age of popular government by remembering that the chief subject of romantic literature was the essential nobleness of common men and the value of the individual. As we read now that brief portion of history which lies between the Declaration of Independence (1776) and the English Reform Bill of 1832, we are in the presence of such mighty political upheavals that “the age of revolution” is the only name by which we can adequately characterize it.
    [Show full text]
  • Spirit of the Age V1 N3 Jul 21 1849
    __/ ~--------..... ~--·--~- ...~ .. ·--r.l-.¢~.---·--· THE --·--- - -----·------ - --- - - -- ------ -- ----- ---·---- VOL. I.' NEW-YORK, SATURDAY, JULY 21, 1849. NO. 3. WM. H. CHANNING, EDITOR. Ol<'FICE, CLINTON HALL. FOWLERS & WELLS, PUBLISHERS. Selcdeb l)loctrn. For The Spirit of the Age. "A NEW HEAVEN AND A NEW EARTH." From Graham'• Ma11:az!ne. I choose a mystical title, but I do not intend to treat a myati. THE FIRE OF DRIFT-WOOD. cal subject as will be seen as I progress. By 1 IDEA OF BY ll. W. LONGFELLOW, a new Heaven, undcrst.ind a new Goo. The iden of God being the gmnd central or pivotal Iden, the Ws pt within the f11rm-house old, all-embr11cing or uriitary idea; ns is this i<lea in the mind ol Hu­ Whose wiudowa, looking o'er the bay, manity, ~o is HumRnity's conception nf Heaven. or the bierar­ Gave to the sea-breeze, damp and cold, • cbic.11 crention over which God reign> ; of the In ~s by which this An easy entrance, night and day. heaven is governed ; of the series of intelligent beingH which descend from God, the head or pivot, down to W!LD, the Inst and •ot far·away we saw the port--- Tbe strange, old-t'ashiondd, silent town·­ connecting link with the animal kingdom; of tho Destiny of ~he light-bouse--tbe dismantled tort-­ these hi11rarchie~ of intelligences; of the cause of evil; of the The wooden houses, quaint and brown. action of Providence ; of the function of matter, &c. We sat nnd talked until the night The nature of this idea determines the universal philosophy D~sc~ndiog filled the little room; or M11nkind 1 the theory which they f!ntertain of the spiritual Our faces faded from the sight, universe or heaven.
    [Show full text]
  • The Age of Eclecticism
    The Age of Eclecticism Q The Age of Eclecticism Literature and Culture in Britain, 1815–1885 Christine Bolus-Reichert The Ohio State University Press Columbus Copyright © 2009 by The Ohio State University. All rights reserved. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Bolus-Reichert, Christine, 1969– The age of eclecticism : literature and culture in Britain, 1815–1885 / Christine Bolus- Reichert. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-8142-1103-8 (cloth : alk. paper)—ISBN 978-0-8142-9201-3 (cd-rom) 1. English literature—19th century—History and criticism. 2. Eclecticism in literature. 3. Tennyson, Alfred Tennyson, Baron, 1809–1892—Criticism and interpretation. 4. Kingsley, Charles, 1819–1875—Criticism and interpretation. 5. Arnold, Matthew, 1822–1888—Criticism and interpretation. 6. Pater, Walter, 1839–1894—Criticism and interpretation. 7. Hardy, Thomas, 1840–1928—Criticism and interpretation. I. Title. PR451.B64 2009 820.9'008—dc22 2009015109 This book is available in the following editions: Cloth (ISBN 978-0-8142-1103-8) CD-ROM (ISBN 978-0-8142-9201-3) Cover design by Janna Thompson-Chordas Text design by Juliet Williams Type set in Adobe Granjon Printed by Thomson-Shore, Inc. The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials. ANSI Z39.48-1992. 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Y CONTENTS Acknowledgments vii Introduction 1 P A R T I T O W A R D A N A G E O F EC LE C T ICI SM Chapter 1 History’s
    [Show full text]
  • Perplexed Poetics: Romanticism and the Vortex of Ideologies
    City University of New York (CUNY) CUNY Academic Works Student Theses Baruch College Spring 5-16-2019 Perplexed Poetics: Romanticism and the Vortex of Ideologies Jaime Luque Lau CUNY Bernard M Baruch College How does access to this work benefit ou?y Let us know! More information about this work at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu/bb_etds/87 Discover additional works at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu This work is made publicly available by the City University of New York (CUNY). Contact: [email protected] Luque Lau 2 CONTENTS Abstract 3 Introduction 5 I. The Vertiginous Legacy of Romanticism 10 II. Lyrical, Critical: The Forefathers’ Tangle with Poesy 21 III. “I am the fool of passion” 37 Conclusion 48 Notes 50 Works Cited 53 Luque Lau 3 Abstract In three parts, this thesis explores the tension between the critical and emotional poetics in Romantic poetry, as well as the entanglement of individual will and politics. As a point of entrance, the first part focuses on the major and current trends of scholarly discourses about Romanticism. I will examine Jerome McGann’s influential book of criticism on Romanticism, Romantic Ideology, in juxtaposition with Marc Redfield’s The Politics of Aesthetics: Nationalism, Gender, Romanticism. In particular, the discussion of the two books suggest the problems of aesthetic-political and historical discourses; specifically, I argue that McGann’s critical examination of “Romantic ideology” reflects a symptomatic avoidance of individuality and subsequently the affective quality that Romantic poets infused in their poetry. The second part traces the problematic tradition of ideological critiques and ventures into the “perplexed poetics” of Romanticism—perplexed because Romanticism challenges our critical tendency to separate thought from emotional perplexity.
    [Show full text]
  • John Stuart Mill's Idea of History: a Rhetoric of Progress
    CORE Metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk Provided by Portal de Revistas Científicas Complutenses John Stuart Mill’s Idea of History 63 John Stuart Mill’s Idea of History: A Rhetoric of Progress Rosario López1 ABSTRACT This paper examines the crucial role the idea of history plays in John Stuart Mill’s social and political thought. Insofar as Mill argues that histori- cal change and progress are synonyms, the latter deserves a careful attention. However, academic literature has mostly regarded Mill’s philosophy of histo- ry a topic of minor importance. Some of his philosophical views on history, it will be argued, clearly affect his political views, but they also inform his sci- entific study of society. Accordingly, historical research aims both at under- standing the past to guide society’s future. By analysing the different sources from which Mill draws inspiration, the paper considers his views against the background of his personal and intellectual context. Mill’s temporary depres- sion, along with Macaulay’s criticism of the utilitarian ahistorical conception of politics, triggers an enquiry into the appropriate method to study society, which eventually places history at its core. His reading of Coleridge and a number of French thinkers reflects a renewed interest in the discipline. The article discusses, first, Mill’s interpretation of Coleridge as Bentham’s op- posite pole. Later in the article, I highlight Mill’s debts to Comte and Saint- Simon, especially as regards what he calls the “Inverse Deductive Method”. Some remarks on French historiographers, like Mignet, Dulaure, Sismondi, Michelet and Guizot, also support my argument.
    [Show full text]