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On Reading the Will
studies the will, will-power and wilfulness, the will to death or
the will to power, as well as lack of will. It surveys many texts
– from Augustine, Shakespeare, Dickens, Trollope, George Eliot and
D.H. Lawrence – in order to analyse the history of its different
meanings: whether these imply rational or irrational drives, or
the sexual appetite, or the testamentary will. This last is a particularly
interesting form of the will, in that it asserts the desire to control,
and to have an identity beyond death.
… Drawing on philosophies of the will in Schopenhauer and
Nietzsche, the book studies music as the embodied will in Wagner
and Verdi. Considering the law and its prohibitions as a form of
the will, it sees how these produce a perverse will. Drawing on
Freud and Lacan it studies interrelationships between the law which
prohibits and the desire which wills, how desire creates the law,
and the law desire. What stands out is that the authors studied
are fascinated by the will as unknowable and irresistible, as rational
and countermanding rationality, as divided and imperious. Chapters
include how wills motivate plots in Shakespeare and the Victorian
novel. Discussion of opera and Nietzsche focuses on the will as
an unconscious force.
… With sustained discussion of texts, and supporting arguments
through a range of key thinkers in cultural theory, this book is
indispensable for readers of literature, law, music and philosophy.
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| Preface
and Acknowledgements
Introduction:
Reading the will
I Definitions
II Schopenhauer
III St Paul with Lacan
IV On reading the will
Part 1: The Will and Identity
Chapter
1 The Will: Three Instances
I Augustine
II ‘Fiat Voluntas dei’: Piers Plowman
III Troilus and Cressida
Chapter
2
‘I’ll be Revenged on the Whole Pack of You’: Shakespeare and
Marston
I The Daughter’s Discontent
II ‘What you will’
II Malvolio/ Malevole
IV ‘Motiveless Malignity’
Chapter
3 Law and Will in Measure for Measure
Chapter
4 The ‘Craft of Will’ in Shakespeare’s Poetry
I Masculine wills
II ‘A Lover’s Complaint’
III The Woman’s will
Part 2: The Posthumous Life of the Will
Chapter
5 Dickens and Trollope
I Trollope and the lawyers
II Dickens: the failure of will
III Little Dorrit
IV Responsibility
Chapter
6 George Eliot and the ‘Murderous Will’
I The Mill on the Floss
II To Felix Holt
III Middlemarch
IV Daniel Deronda
Part 3: The Will to Truth
Chapter
7 Schopenhauer, Music and Freud
I Tristan und Isolde
II The Force of Destiny
Chapter
8 Nietzsche’s ‘Will to Power’
I Prelude
II The Will to Power
III On Punishment
IV Revenge
V Heidegger
VI Eternal Return
VII Mahler
Chapter 9: Conclusion: Foucault and vouloir-savoir
Notes
Bibliography
Index
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Reviews to follow |
Publication Details
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Hardback ISBN: |
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978-1-84519-499-4 |
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Page Extent / Format: |
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292 pp. / 229 x 152 mm |
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Release Date: |
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March 2012 |
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Illustrated: |
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No |
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Hardback Price: |
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£50.00 / $69.95 |
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| This book can be ordered online or by telephone. |
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For the UK and Rest of the World:
Gazelle Book Services
tel. 44 (0)1524-68765 |
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For the United States:
International Specialized Book Services
tel. (1) 503 287-3093 or (800) 944-6190 |
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For Canada:
University of Toronto Distribution
tel. (1) 800-565-9523 |
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