The Enthusiast: Anatomy of the Fanatic in Seventeenth-Century British Culture by Miller, William Cook

The Enthusiast: Anatomy of the Fanatic in Seventeenth-Century British Culture

Regular price$51.95
/
Shipping calculated at checkout.

Format

The Enthusiast tells the story of a character type that was developed in early modern Britain to discredit radical prophets during an era that witnessed the dismantling of the Church of England's traditional means for punishing heresy. As William Cook Miller shows, the caricature of fanaticism here called the Enthusiast began as propaganda against religious dissenters, especially working-class upstarts, but was adopted by a range of writers as a literary vehicle for exploring profound problems of spirit, soul, and body and as a persona for the ironic expression of their own prophetic illuminations.

Taking shape through the public and private writings of some of the most insightful authors of seventeenth-century Britain--Henry More, John Locke, the Third Earl of Shaftesbury, Mary Astell, and Jonathan Swift, among others--the Enthusiast appeared in various guises and literary modes.

By attending to this literary being and its animators, The Enthusiast establishes the figure of the fanatic as a bridge between the Reformation and the Enlightenment, showing how an incipient secular modernity was informed by not the rejection of religion but the transformation of the prophet into something sparkling, witty, ironic, and new.



Author: William Cook Miller
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Published: 07/15/2023
Pages: 258
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.18lbs
Size: 9.00h x 6.00w x 0.75d
ISBN: 9781501770807

About the Author

William Cook Miller is Assistant Professor of English at the University of Rochester. His work has appeared in the journals New Literary History and Studies in Philology.


We offer worldwide shipping.

All baymarbookgroup.ca orders over $100
(before taxes) are eligible for FREE standard shipping within Canada and
the United States.

Estimated Delivery Times Outside the USA

Area / Country Standard International Shipping
(Not Trackable)
International Courier Trackable 
Asia 10-14 days 4-6 days
Australia 18-20 days 4-6 days
Canada 10-14 days 4-6 days
Caribbean 14-18 days 4-6 days
Europe 10-14 days 4-6 days
India 16-20 days 4-6 days
Latin America 10-14 days 4-6 days
Middle East 16-20 days 4-6 days

Recently viewed