Experimental life : vitalism in Romantic science and literature / Robert Mitchell.

  • Mitchell, Robert, 1969-
Date:
2013
  • Books

About this work

Description

Experimental Life establishes the multiple ways in which Romantic authors appropriated the notion of experimentation from the natural sciences. If the objective of the Romantic movement was nothing less than to redefine the meaning of life itself, what role did experiments play in this movement? While earlier scholarship has established both the importance of science generally and vitalism specifically, with regard to Romanticism no study has investigated what it meant for artists to experiment and how those experiments related to their interest in the concept of life. Experimental Life draws on approaches and ideas from contemporary science studies, proposing the concept of experimental vitalism to show both how Romantic authors appropriated the concept of experimentation from the sciences and the impact of their appropriation on post-Romantic concepts of literature and art. Robert Mitchell navigates complex conceptual arenas such as network theory, gift exchange, paranoia, and biomedia and introduces new concepts, such as cryptogamia, chylopoietic discourse, trance-plantation, and the poetics of suspension. As a result, Experimental Life is a wide-ranging summation and extension of the current state of literary studies, the history of science, cultural critique, and theory.--Back cover.

Publication/Creation

Baltimore : Johns Hopkins University Press, 2013.

Physical description

viii, 309 pages ; 24 cm

Contents

Introduction: Three eras of experimental vitalism -- Romanticism, art, and experiments -- Suspended animation, slow time, and the poetics of trance -- A cold northern breeze: life, orientation, and abandoned experiments -- Chylopoeisis: nausea, digestion, and the collapsurgence of system -- The media of life -- Cryptogamia -- Conclusion: biopolitics and experimental vitalism.

Bibliographic information

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Languages

Where to find it

  • LocationStatus
    History of Medicine
    AOB.AI.AA7-8
    Open shelves

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Identifiers

ISBN

  • 9781421410883
  • 1421410885