Literary and linguistic theories in eighteenth-century France : from nuances to impertinence
Edward Nye (Author)
"'Linguistic' theories in the eighteenth-century are also theories of literature and art, and it is probably better, therefore, to think of them as 'aesthetic' theories. As such, they are answers to the age-old question 'what is beauty?; but formulated, also, to respond to contemporary concerns. Edward Nye considers a wide range of authors from these two perspectives and draws the following conclusions; etymology is a theory of poetry, dictionaries of synonymy, prosody and metaphor are theories of preciosity, and Sensualism is a theory of artistic representation."--Jacket
History
x, 250 pages : illustrations ; 21 cm
9780198160120, 0198160127
45350307
1. The History of 'Nuances': Imitation in the Eighteenth Century
1.1. The 'querelle du coloris'
1.2. Le Blon's invention of colour engraving
1.3. Castel's colour harpsichord and colour weaving
1.4. Girard and synonymy
1.5. Condillac's Art d'ecrire
1.6. Bievre's 'calembours'
1.7. Diderot's article 'Beau'
1.8. D'Alembert, Court de Gebelin, and encyclopaedias
1.9. The theory of genres
2. Preciosity and its Discontents
2.1. Marivaux and two kinds of 'clarte'
2.2. Houdar de La Motte's idea of poetry and prose
2.3. Criticism of preciosity
2.4. Fenelon's compromise
2.5. Girard's compromise: Synonymes francois
2.6. Dumarsais's compromise: Traite des tropes
2.7. Olivet's compromise: Prosodie
3. Condillac's Idea of 'Nature'
3.1. Semiosis
3.2. Empathy in the origin of language
3.3. From 'nature' to 'second nature' in language
3.4. Diderot and composition in painting
3.5. Empathy and gesture in the 'drame bourgeois'
3.6. Rousseau and the figurative origins of language
3.7. Buffon's universal style
4. Linguistic and Poetic Sound Symbolism
4.1. De Brosses's theory of phonomimetism
4.2. Court de Gebelin's theory of phonomimetism
4.3. Sound symbolism in poetry
4.4. Diderot's hieroglyph
4.5. The perfect language
4.6. De Piis and sound symbolism in poetry
4.7. 'Etymologie' as a theory of poetry
5. The Dissolution of Language
5.1. The linguistic philosophy of 'ideologie'
5.2. Universal language schemes: Locke, Delormel, and Maimieux
5.3. L'Epee's sign language
5.4. Sicard's sign language
5.5. Condillac's algebraic language
5.6. The literary aesthetics of 'impertinence'
5.7. Mercier's literary aesthetics
5.8. Mercier and necrophilia
5.9. Mercier's Tableau de Paris
App. La Motte, OEdipe, tragedie, Act III, scene vi, extract
App. La Motte, OEdipe, tragedie en prose, Act III, scene v, extract