British Philosophers, 1500-1799


Book Description

Essays on British philosophers engaged with philosophical topics and used methods that were both different from and continuous with those that were taken up by British philosophers of the next two centuries. Major focus on the influence of Francis Bacon, who launched the era's most influential British attack on the traditional theories and practices of philosophy itself offering an alternative vision of a profoundly different and more powerful form of philosophy.




Literary Research and the British Renaissance and Early Modern Period


Book Description

This guide provides the best practices and reference resources, both print and electronic, that can be used in conducting research on literature of the British Renaissance and Early Modern Period. This volume seeks to address specific research characteristics integral to studying the period, including a more inclusive canon and the predominance of Shakespeare.




Guide to Reference in Genealogy and Biography


Book Description

Profiling more than 1400 print and electronic sources, this book helps connect librarians and researchers to the most relevant sources of information in genealogy and biography.




Literary Research and the British Eighteenth Century


Book Description

The 18th century in Britain was a transition period for literature. Patronage, either by a benefactor or through subscription, lingered even as the publishing and bookselling industries developed. The practice of reviewing books became well established during the second half of the century, with the first periodical founded in 1749. For the literary scholar, these gradual changes mean that different search strategies are required to conduct research into primary and secondary source material across the era. Literary Research and the British Eighteenth Century addresses these unique challenges. It examines how the following all contribute to the richness of literary research for this era: book and periodical publishing; a growing literate society; dissemination of literature through salons, private societies, and coffee houses; the growing importance of book reviews; the explosion of publishing; and the burgeoning of primary source material available through new publishing and digital initiatives in the 21st century. This volume explores primary and secondary resources, including general literary research guides; union library catalogs; print and online bibliographies; scholarly journals; manuscripts and archives; 18th-century books, newspapers, and periodicals; contemporary reception; and electronic texts and journals, as well as Web resources. Each chapter addresses the research methods and tools best used to extract relevant information and compares and evaluates sources, making this book an invaluable guide to any literary scholar and student of the British eighteenth century.




Women Philosophers of the Seventeenth Century


Book Description

In this rich and detailed study of early modern women's thought, Jacqueline Broad explores the complexity of women's responses to Cartesian philosophy and its intellectual legacy in England and Europe. She examines the work of thinkers such as Mary Astell, Elisabeth of Bohemia, Margaret Cavendish, Anne Conway and Damaris Masham, who were active participants in the intellectual life of their time and were also the respected colleagues of philosophers such as Descartes, Leibniz and Locke. She also illuminates the continuities between early modern women's thought and the anti-dualism of more recent feminist thinkers. The result is a more gender-balanced account of early modern thought than has hitherto been available. Broad's clear and accessible exploration of this still-unfamiliar area will have a strong appeal to both students and scholars in the history of philosophy, women's studies and the history of ideas.




British Rhetoricians and Logicians, 1500-1660


Book Description

Survey of British-born writers who produced texts on rhetoric or logic between 1500 and 1660. Provides biographies meant to serve students and scholars of British literature who require information on educators, theologians, and statesmen who influenced and shaped the rhetorical culture that produced great works of literature.




The Book of Dead Philosophers


Book Description

Diogenes died by holding his breath. Plato allegedly died of a lice infestation. Diderot choked to death on an apricot. Nietzsche made a long, soft-brained and dribbling descent into oblivion after kissing a horse in Turin. From the self-mocking haikus of Zen masters on their deathbeds to the last words (gasps) of modern-day sages, The Book of Dead Philosophers chronicles the deaths of almost 200 philosophers-tales of weirdness, madness, suicide, murder, pathos and bad luck. In this elegant and amusing book, Simon Critchley argues that the question of what constitutes a 'good death' has been the central preoccupation of philosophy since ancient times. As he brilliantly demonstrates, looking at what the great thinkers have said about death inspires a life-affirming enquiry into the meaning and possibility of human happiness. In learning how to die, we learn how to live.




Mary Astell and John Norris


Book Description

Given the progress made in recent years in recovering the writings of early modern women, one might expect that a complete set of the important works of Mary Astell (1666-1731) would have been reissued long before now. Instead, only portions of the thought of the 'First English Feminist' have reached a wide academic audience. This volume presents a critical and annotated edition of the correspondence between Astell and John Norris of Bemerton (1657-1711), Letters Concerning the Love of God, which was published in three separate editions during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries (1695, 1705, 1730). This work had profound significance in eighteenth-century intellectual and religious circles, and represents a crucial step in the development of Norris and Astell's philosophical and theological opposition to that most prominent of Enlightenment figures, John Locke. Letters Concerning the Love of God includes, as contextual material, Norris's Cursory Reflections upon a Book Call'd, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690), the first published philosophical response to (as Bishop Stillingfleet would later put it) Locke's 'new way of ideas,' and Astell's biting and comprehensive attack on Locke in the 'Appendix' to the second edition of The Christian Religion, As Professed by a Daughter of the Church of England (1717). These texts serve to place both Letters and its authors in the contentious philosophical-theological climate to which they belonged, one wherein, most significantly, Locke's present-day preeminence had yet to be realized. The editors' extensive introduction and annotations to this volume not only provide background on the historical and biographical elements, but also elucidate philosophical and theological concepts that are perhaps unfamiliar to modern readers.




Philosophy


Book Description

A newly reorganized, up-to-date overview of key reference works in philosophy, reflects a veritable explosion of reference sources, both print and online, published over the past decade. Nearly 300 of the 700+ entries consist of new material, with an additional 50 entries substantially revised and updated. English-language sources are emphasized, but important non-English works are also well represented. For professional philosophers, philosophy educators, students from beginning to graduate, and librarians. This guide represents a substantial updating and complete re-organization of the author's 1997 Philosophy: A Guide to the Reference Literature, 2nd edition (1st edition, 1986). It reflects a veritable explosion of reference sources, both print and online, in the field of philosophy over the past decade. Nearly 300 entries (or 40 percent) are entirely new. An additional 50 or so entries have substantial revisions recording new editions, changes in serial publications, series, and websites, or additional volumes completed in multi-volume sets. In addition, it has been entirely re-organized along topical lines. Each of its twenty-three chapters is divided into four sections: (1) general sources, (2) history of philosophy, (3) branches of philosophy, and (4) miscellanea. This new arrangement accords better with the greatly expanded range of philosophy reference sources and makes it easier for the user to identify related sources of different types (bibliographies, dictionaries, web gateways, etc.) on the same topic. Like its predecessor Guide to Reference Sources in Philosophy, the 3rd edition aims to serve a diverse audience of professional philosophers, philosophy educators, students from beginning to graduate, and librarians. All entries include generous annotations that are often evaluative as well as descriptive. English-language sources are emphasized, but non-English works important to researchers or of interest to users with facility in other languages are also well-represented.




The Philosophy of Mary Astell


Book Description

Jacqueline Broad presents a new account of the philosophy of Mary Astell (1666-1731), which situates Astell's feminist, political, and religious views in the context of her wider philosophical vision. She argues that at the heart of Astell's thought lies a theory of virtue which emphasises generosity of character, benevolence, and moderation.