Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-8bljj Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-26T19:20:44.815Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Chapter 6 - Imaginary Europe

De la littérature considérée dans ses rapports avec les institutions sociales, 1800

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 August 2023

John Claiborne Isbell
Affiliation:
University of Texas, Rio Grande Valley
Get access

Summary

Chapter 6 reviews De la littérature. When Staël published this work, she had spent the previous decade growing older alongside the French Revolution, but the coup of 18 Brumaire had just ushered in the Consulat: Napoleon’s star was on the rise. This was not the most obvious time for an ex-minister for war to become a literary historian. Why then did Staël choose this juncture to write and publish her 400-page tractatus? Though we could descend into the weeds of Staël’s many literary details, we would there risk succumbing to a range of propagandist forces. Genevan, liberal, female, and Protestant, Staël has faced two centuries of critics eager to sideline or indeed privatize her achievements, presenting them as tangential to the public shaping of what it means to be French. This chapter argues that Staël’s 1800 work is engagé and focused on saving the Revolution if not the Republic.

Type
Chapter
Information
Staël, Romanticism and Revolution
The Life and Times of the First European
, pp. 58 - 67
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

  • Imaginary Europe
  • John Claiborne Isbell, University of Texas, Rio Grande Valley
  • Book: Staël, Romanticism and Revolution
  • Online publication: 03 August 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009362719.008
Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • Imaginary Europe
  • John Claiborne Isbell, University of Texas, Rio Grande Valley
  • Book: Staël, Romanticism and Revolution
  • Online publication: 03 August 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009362719.008
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Imaginary Europe
  • John Claiborne Isbell, University of Texas, Rio Grande Valley
  • Book: Staël, Romanticism and Revolution
  • Online publication: 03 August 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009362719.008
Available formats
×