This is the only collection of its kind to focus on one of the most important aspects of the cultural history of the Romantic period, its sources, and its afterlives. Multidisciplinary in approach, the volume examines the variety of areas of enquiry and genres of cultural productivity in which the sublime played a substantial role during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. With impressive international scope, this Companion considers the Romantic sublime in both European and American contexts and features essays by leading scholars from a range of national backgrounds and subject specialisms, including state-of-the-art perspectives in digital and environmental humanities. An accessible, wide-ranging, and thorough introduction, aimed at researchers, students, and general readers alike, and including extensive suggestions for further reading, The Cambridge Companion to the Romantic Sublime is the go-to book on the subject.
Introduction: The romantic sublime, then and now Cian Duffy; Part I. The Sublime Before Romanticism: 1. The classical sublime Patrick Glauthier; 2. The natural sublime in the seventeenth century Dawn Hollis; 3. The sublime in eighteenth-century English, Irish and Scottish philosophy Cian Duffy; 4. The Nordic sublime Lis Møller; Part II. Romantic Sublimes: 5. German romanticism and the sublime Christoph Bode; 6. The romantic sublime and Kant's critical philosophy Timothy M. Costelloe; 7. Alpine sublimes Patrick Vincent; 8. Urban sublimes Matthew Sangster; 9. Highlands, lakes, wales Simon Bainbridge; 10. Science and the sublime Richard C. Sha; 11. Musical sublimes Miranda Stanyon; 12. The arctic sublime Robert W. Rix; 13. The body and the sublime Norbert Lennartz; 14. The sublime in romantic painting Nina Amstutz; 15. From the sublime to the ridiculous Andrew McInnes; 16. The sublime in American romanticism Cassandra Falke; Part III. Legacies: 17. The Victorian chthonic sublime Tatjana Jukić; 18. Mapping the nineteenth-century sublime Joanna E. Taylor, Christopher Donaldson and Ian N. Gregory; 19. The romantic sublime and environmental Crisis Tess Somervell.
Cian Duffy is professor and chair of English literature at Lund University, Sweden. He has published on various aspects of the cultural life and intellectual history of Europe in the Romantic period, including work on the Shelley circle, on the sublime, and on Romanticism in the Nordic countries.
