Shelley's Romantic Nonviolence: Aesthetics and Politics in an Age of Revolution

The Romantic age in Britain was characterized by dramatic historical and political violence, leading to a crisis of agency in the reform movement of the early nineteenth century. Percy Bysshe Shelley intervened with a nonviolence program rooted in the redefining of aesthetics as the primary site for a critique of the violence of post-revolutionary Europe. Shelley's Romantic Nonviolence explores the implications of Shelley's nonviolence for later artists and reformers.

Format: Hardback
Length: 224 pages
Publication date: 01 January 2021
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd

The Romantic age in Britain was marked by significant historical and political violence, including the French Revolution, Reign of Terror, and Napoleonic Wars abroad, as well as the dramatic social changes brought about by industrialization and political agitation at home. This era witnessed a crisis of agency in the early nineteenth century, particularly in the aftermath of Waterloo and Peterloo, as the reform movement grappled with the role of violence in achieving social progress. In his book, "Romantic Nonviolence," Matthew C. Borushko explores how Percy Bysshe Shelley addressed this crisis through a unique political program of nonviolence, rooted in the redefinition of aesthetics as the primary site for critiquing the violence of post-revolutionary Europe. Drawing on the dynamic historical contexts in which Shelley wrote and informed by twentieth-century theory, Borushko demonstrates how Shelley's body of work reimagined the potential of art as a political force and examined the implications of Shelley's nonviolence for subsequent artists and reformers, including George Bernard Shaw and Mohandas K. Gandhi.

Dimension: 234 x 156 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781472449542