The Sublime A Reader in British Eighteenth-Century Aesthetic Theory [Paperback]

This anthology makes many key eighteenth-century texts on the Sublime readily available for the first time.The unavailability of many crucial early texts has resulted in a conception of the Sublime often limited to the definitions of its most famous theorist, Edmund Burke. This anthology offers students and scholars ready access to a deep and complex tradition of writing.The unavailability of many crucial early texts has resulted in a conception of the Sublime often limited to the definitions of its most famous theorist, Edmund Burke. This anthology offers students and scholars ready access to a deep and complex tradition of writing.The concept of the Sublime has influenced aesthetic and theoretical debate ever since it was first widely invoked in the eighteenth century. However, the unavailability of many crucial early texts has resulted in a conception of the Sublime often limited to the definitions of its most famous theorist Edmund Burke. Andrew Ashfield and Peter de Bolla's valuable anthology, which includes an introduction, and headnotes to each entry, now offers students and scholars ready access to a deep and complex tradition of writing on the Sublime, many of them never before reprinted in modern editions.Introduction; 1. The longinian tradition; 2. Rhapsody to rhetoric; 3. Irish perspectives; 4. The Aberdonian Enlightenment; 5. Glasgow and Edinburgh; 6. From the picturesque to the political; Commentary notes; Sources and further reading.