Get 20M+ Full-Text Papers For Less Than $1.50/day. Start a 14-Day Trial for You or Your Team.

Learn More →

Claustrophilia and Exalted Imagination: Fictional Responses to a Pascalian Problem in the Works of Xavier de Maistre and Jan Potocki

Claustrophilia and Exalted Imagination: Fictional Responses to a Pascalian Problem in the Works... Abstract: This article explores the topics of confinement and claustrophilia in Xavier de Maistre’s Voyage autour de ma chambre (1795) and Expédition nocturne autour de ma chambre (1825), and in Jan Potocki’s Manuscrit trouvé à Saragosse (1791–1814). These works resonate with ideas put forward by Blaise Pascal in the Pensées , more precisely with the reflections on man’s need for constant diversion, represented though the image of his incapacity to stay alone in a room. The fictions of de Maistre and Potocki have in common that they stage literary prison scenes where the characters experience confinement as stimulating for their creativity, giving way to a specific freedom of the imagination. The article argues further that, if the claustrophilia advocated by de Maistre and Potocki appears as responses to the problem of man’s restlessness as examined by Pascal, these responses depend on a Rousseauist understanding of the notion of exalted imagination. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Nineteenth-Century French Studies University of Nebraska Press

Claustrophilia and Exalted Imagination: Fictional Responses to a Pascalian Problem in the Works of Xavier de Maistre and Jan Potocki

Nineteenth-Century French Studies , Volume 45 (1) – Sep 21, 2016
Download PDF
16 pages

Loading next page...
 
/lp/university-of-nebraska-press/claustrophilia-and-exalted-imagination-fictional-responses-to-a-Uzkmi0p0Oi

References

References for this paper are not available at this time. We will be adding them shortly, thank you for your patience.

Publisher
University of Nebraska Press
Copyright
Copyright © 2008 The University of Nebraska Press.
ISSN
1536-0172
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

Abstract: This article explores the topics of confinement and claustrophilia in Xavier de Maistre’s Voyage autour de ma chambre (1795) and Expédition nocturne autour de ma chambre (1825), and in Jan Potocki’s Manuscrit trouvé à Saragosse (1791–1814). These works resonate with ideas put forward by Blaise Pascal in the Pensées , more precisely with the reflections on man’s need for constant diversion, represented though the image of his incapacity to stay alone in a room. The fictions of de Maistre and Potocki have in common that they stage literary prison scenes where the characters experience confinement as stimulating for their creativity, giving way to a specific freedom of the imagination. The article argues further that, if the claustrophilia advocated by de Maistre and Potocki appears as responses to the problem of man’s restlessness as examined by Pascal, these responses depend on a Rousseauist understanding of the notion of exalted imagination.

Journal

Nineteenth-Century French Studies – University of Nebraska Press

Published: Sep 21, 2016

There are no references for this article.