The Moral of the Story
Literature and Public Ethics
The Moral of the Story
Literature and Public Ethics
Description
The contributors to The Moral of the Story, all preeminent political theorists, are unified by their concern with the instructive power of great literature. This thought-provoking combination of essays explores the polyvalent moral and political impact of classic world literatures on public ethics through the study of some of its major figures-including Shakespeare, Dante, Cervantes, Jane Austen, Henry James, Joseph Conrad, Robert Penn Warren, and Dostoevsky. Positing the uniqueness of literature's ability to promote dialogue on salient moral and intellectual virtues, editor Henry T. Edmonson III has culled together a wide-ranging exploration of such fundamental concerns as the abuse of authority, the nature of good leadership, the significance of "middle class virtues" and the needs of adolescents. This collection reinvigorates the study of classic literature as an endeavor that is not only personally intellectually satisfying, but also an inimitable and unique way to enrich public discourse.
Table of Contents
Chapter 2 Henry James' The Princess Casamassima:Revolution and the Preservation of Culture
Chapter 3 Love, Law, and Rhetoric: The Teachings of Francesca in Dante's Inferno
Chapter 4 Aliens Are Us? Walker Percy's Response to Carl Sagan on Wandering and Wondering
Chapter 5 Shakespeare's Henry V and the Act of Ethical Reflection
Chapter 6 Rabelais and Pascal: Wise Kings and Anguished Men
Chapter 7 Chinua Achebe and the Nature of Social Change
Chapter 8 A Place in the World: Delinquency and the Search for Liberty in Cervantes' Rinconete and Cortadillo
Chapter 9 The Great-Souled Woman: Jane Austen as Public Moralist
Chapter 10 True and False Liberalism: Stolypin and His Enemies in Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's August 1914
Chapter 11 The Alchemy of Power and Idealism: Dostoevsky's "Grand Inquisitor"
Chapter 12 Democratic Envy in Sinclair Lewis' It Can't Happen HereI
Chapter 13 Natural Right, Conventional Right, and Setting Things Aright: Joseph Conrad's The Secret Sharer
Chapter 14 The Beauty of Middle-Class Virtue: Willa Cather's O Pioneers
Chapter 15 Robert Penn Warren's Brother to Dragons: Complicity and the Beginning of Innocence
Chapter 16 Fatherhood and Friendship in the Modern Regime: Jean Dutourd's The Springtime of Life
Chapter 17 Mark Twain on Democratic Statesmanship: A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court
Chapter 18 Pagan Virtue and Christian Charity: Flannery O'Connor on the Moral Contradictions of Western Culture
Product details
| Published | 20 Sep 2000 |
|---|---|
| Format | Ebook (Epub & Mobi) |
| Edition | 1st |
| Extent | 272 |
| ISBN | 9780739157862 |
| Imprint | Lexington Books |
| Series | Applications of Political Theory |
| Publisher | Bloomsbury Publishing |
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