Taste and Ideology in Seventeenth-Century France

di Michael Moriarty (Autore)

Cambridge University Press, 2009

This book analyses the use of the crucial concept of 'taste' in the works of five major seventeenth-century French authors, Mere, Saint Evremond, La Rochefoucauld, La Bruyere and Boileau. It combines close readings of important texts with a thoroughgoing political analysis of seventeenth-century French society in terms of class and gender. Dr Moriarty shows that far from being timeless and universal, the term 'taste' is culture-specific, shifting according to the needs of a writer and his social group. The notion of 'taste' not only helped to shape a new dominant culture, but also registered the conflicts within that culture between a view of taste that presupposted the values of 'polite society' as an exclusive (though not necessarily aristocratic) group, and a view that stressed the value of the classical-humanist tradition as a source of standards ratified by a broader public. this study sheds light not only on the central concept, but also on the individual authors discussed and on the norms of French classical literature in general.

• Autore: Michael Moriarty
• Editore: Cambridge University Press
• Collana: Cambridge Studies in French
• Anno: 2009
• Rilegatura: Paperback / softback
• Pagine: 244 p.
• Dimensioni: 216 x 140 mm
• Peso: 320 gr.
• EAN: 9780521113366

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