Enlightenment phantasies : cultural identity in France and Germany, 1750-1914 /
Harold Mah.
- x, 227 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
identity as phantasy in Enlightenment in France and Germany -- Man with too many qualities : the young Herder between France and Germany -- Language of cultural identity : Diderot to Nietzsche -- Strange classicism : aesthetic vision in Winckelmann, Nietzsche, and Thomas Mann -- Classicism and gender transformation : David, Goethe, and Staël -- French Revolution and the problem of time : Hegel to Marx. Introduction:
"For centuries the histories of France and Germany have been linked in ways both productive and destructive, and each nation's sense of itself has often been shaped by admiration of or hostility toward the other. Harold Mah explores the interweaving paths of German and French cultural identity that emerged in the Enlightenment and continued through the nineteenth century and into the twentieth." "Mah's book examines how attempts to define cultural identities were caught up in issues of language, gender, classical revival, politics, and modernity. Enlightenment Phantasies presents the shaping of cultural identity in narratives accessible not only to specialists but also to students and all readers concerned with the history of Western culture."--Jacket.