The Body In Parts: Fantasies Of Corporeality In Early Modern Europe 21

An examination of how the body--its organs, limbs, and viscera--were represented in the literature and culture of early modern Europe. This provocative volume demonstrates, the symbolism of body parts challenge our assumptions about "the body" as a fundamental Renaissance image of self, society, and nation.

The Body in Parts: Fantasies of Corporeality in Early Modern Europe 21

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In recent decades the body, its uses and its history, have become a focus of critical and historical investigation. (1) Still more recently the study of imaginary bodies that do not entirely correspond to the "real" body has come into prominence, marking the emergence of exo-corporeal theory. (2) In the context of early modern studies, we have seen the combination of the first approach or method--a material history of the body--with new histories and psychologies of not only the body, but of bodily fantasies. (3) This current fascination with corporeal experience and fantasy is in part a response to Foucault's works, to feminist and gender theory, and, last but not least, to the technology-induced anxieties of our historical moment. (4) The ongoing exploration of pre-modern fantasies of the body, its pleasure or pain, and its real or imagined vulnerabilities sheds light on the history of sexuality, as well as the transformation and evolution of our understanding of the mind-body continuum. 2ff7e9595c