LEADER 03433nam 22006614a 450 001 9910455094803321 005 20200520144314.0 010 $a0-8047-7097-2 024 7 $a10.1515/9780804770972 035 $a(CKB)1000000000817672 035 $a(EBL)912081 035 $a(OCoLC)793166848 035 $a(SSID)ssj0000334426 035 $a(PQKBManifestationID)11255935 035 $a(PQKBTitleCode)TC0000334426 035 $a(PQKBWorkID)10260765 035 $a(PQKB)10208516 035 $a(MiAaPQ)EBC912081 035 $a(DE-B1597)564265 035 $a(DE-B1597)9780804770972 035 $a(Au-PeEL)EBL912081 035 $a(CaPaEBR)ebr10329909 035 $a(OCoLC)1178770253 035 $a(EXLCZ)991000000000817672 100 $a20080716d2009 uy 0 101 0 $aeng 135 $aur|n|---||||| 181 $ctxt 182 $cc 183 $acr 200 10$aAesthetic materialism$b[electronic resource] $eelectricity and American romanticism /$fPaul Gilmore 210 $aStanford, Calif. $cStanford University Press$dc2009 215 $a1 online resource (404 p.) 300 $a"Parts of Chapter 3 were originally published in ATQ, Volume 16, No. 4, December 2002. Reprinted by permission of The University of Rhode Island."--T.p. verso. 311 $a0-8047-6123-X 320 $aIncludes bibliographical references (p. [219]-235) and index. 327 $aIntroduction : the word "aesthetic" -- Idealist aesthetics and the republican telegraph -- Aesthetic electricity -- Frederick Douglass's electric words : aesthetic politics and the limits of identification -- Mad filaments : Walt Whitman's aesthetic body telegraphic -- Conclusion : aesthetic electricity caged. 330 $aAesthetic Materialism: Electricity and American Romanticism focuses on American romantic writers' attempts to theorize aesthetic experience through the language of electricity. In response to scientific and technological developments, most notably the telegraph, eighteenth- and nineteenth-century electrical imagery reflected the mysterious workings of the physical mind as well as the uncertain, sometimes shocking connections between individuals. Writers such as Whitman, Melville, and Douglass drew on images of electricity and telegraphy to describe literature both as the product of specific economic and social conditions and as a means of transcending the individual determined by such conditions. Aesthetic Materialism moves between historical and cultural analysis and close textual reading, challenging readers to see American literature as at once formal and historical and as a product of both aesthetic and material experience. 606 $aAmerican literature$y19th century$xHistory and criticism 606 $aAuthors, American$y19th century$xAesthetics 606 $aElectricity in literature 606 $aTelegraph in literature 606 $aRomanticism$zUnited States 608 $aElectronic books. 615 0$aAmerican literature$xHistory and criticism. 615 0$aAuthors, American$xAesthetics. 615 0$aElectricity in literature. 615 0$aTelegraph in literature. 615 0$aRomanticism 676 $a810.9/003 700 $aGilmore$b Paul$f1970-$01044301 801 0$bMiAaPQ 801 1$bMiAaPQ 801 2$bMiAaPQ 906 $aBOOK 912 $a9910455094803321 996 $aAesthetic materialism$92469860 997 $aUNINA