The Emergence of Social Space: Rimbaud and the Paris Commune Contributor(s): Ross, Kristin (Author), Eagleton, Terry (Foreword by) |
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ISBN: 1844672069 ISBN-13: 9781844672066 Publisher: Verso
Binding Type: Paperback - See All Available Formats & Editions Published: January 2008 Annotation: A thrilling ride through the literature of Rimbaud in a France in the throes of revolution. "Verso's beautifully designed "Radical Thinkers" series, which brings together seminal works by leading left-wing intellectuals, is a sophisticated blend of theory and thought. The authors whose writings are included in the series have worked tirelessly to expose the mechanisms by which culture and knowledge are manufactured, managed and controlled."--Ziauddin Sardar, "New Statesman" Click for more in this series: Radical Thinkers |
Additional Information |
BISAC Categories: - Poetry | European - English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh |
Dewey: 821.8 |
Series: Radical Thinkers |
Physical Information: 0.6" H x 5.08" W x 7.8" L (0.48 lbs) 190 pages |
Themes: - Cultural Region - British Isles - Chronological Period - 19th Century |
Features: Bibliography, Illustrated, Index, Price on Product - Canadian, Table of Contents |
Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
Publisher Description: The 1870s in France - Rimbaud's moment, and the subject of this book - is a decade virtually ignored in most standard histories in France. Yet it was the moment of two significant spatial events: France's expansion on a global scale, and, in the spring of 1871, the brief existence on the Paris Commune - the construction of the revolutionary urban space. Arguing that space, as a social fact, is always political and strategic, Kristin Ross has written a book that is at once a history and geography of the Commune's anarchist culture - its political language and social relations, its values, strategies, and stances. Central to her analysis of the Commune as a social space and oppositional culture is a close textual reading of Arthur Rimabaud's poetry. His poems - a common thread running through the book - are one set of documents among many in Ross's recreation of the Communard experience. Rimbaud, Paul Lafargue, and the social geographer lis e Reclus serve as emblematic figures moving within and on the periphery of the Commune; in their resistance to the logic and economy of the capitalist conception of work, in their challenge to work itself as a term of identity, all three posed a threat to the existing order. Ross looks at these and other emancipatory notions as aspects of Communard life, each with an analogous strategy in Rimbaud's poetry. Applying contemporary theory, to a wealth of little-known archival material, she has written a fresh, persuasive, and original book. |
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