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Joy of the Worm: Suicide and Pleasure in Early Modern English Literature

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SKU 9780226816500 Categories ,
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Consulting an extensive archive of early modern literature, Joy of the Worm asserts that voluntary death in literature is not always a matter of tragedy.   In this study, Drew Daniel identifies a surprisingly common aesthetic attitude that he calls “joy of the worm,” a...

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Description

Product ID:9780226816500
Product Form:Paperback / softback
Country of Manufacture:US
Series:Thinking Literature
Title:Joy of the Worm
Subtitle:Suicide and Pleasure in Early Modern English Literature
Authors:Author: Professor Drew Daniel
Page Count:288
Subjects:Literary studies: general, Literary studies: c 1500 to c 1800
Description:Select Guide Rating
Consulting an extensive archive of early modern literature, Joy of the Worm asserts that voluntary death in literature is not always a matter of tragedy.   In this study, Drew Daniel identifies a surprisingly common aesthetic attitude that he calls “joy of the worm,” after Cleopatra’s embrace of the deadly asp in Shakespeare’s play—a pattern where voluntary death is imagined as an occasion for humor, mirth, ecstatic pleasure, even joy and celebration.  Daniel draws both a historical and a conceptual distinction between “self-killing” and “suicide.” Standard intellectual histories of suicide in the early modern period have understandably emphasized attitudes of abhorrence, scorn, and severity toward voluntary death. Daniel reads an archive of literary scenes and passages, dating from 1534 to 1713, that complicate this picture. In their own distinct responses to the surrounding attitude of censure, writers including Shakespeare, Donne, Milton, and Addison imagine death not as sin or sickness, but instead as a heroic gift, sexual release, elemental return, amorous fusion, or political self-rescue. “Joy of the worm” emerges here as an aesthetic mode that shades into schadenfreude, sadistic cruelty, and deliberate “trolling,” but can also underwrite powerful feelings of belonging, devotion, and love.
Imprint Name:University of Chicago Press
Publisher Name:The University of Chicago Press
Country of Publication:GB
Publishing Date:2022-05-02