Laughter and Power

260 Seiten, Taschenbuch

Kurzbeschreibung des Verlags

Laughter and power are here examined in a variety of contexts, ranging from the satires of Renaissance Humanism through to the polemics of contemporary journalism. How do the powerful use laughter as a cultural weapon which reinforces their position? How do the powerless use laughter as a last resort in their self-defence? Sixteenth-century intellectuals applied their satires to a campaign against intolerance. Seventeenth-century absolutism demanded of comedy that it serve its interests. Yet subversive humour survived, even at the court, and led through the Enlightenment to its apogee in the black humour of Sade. Twentieth-century experimental fiction owes that trend a conscious debt. Meanwhile an aesthetic tradition, represented here by Flaubert, Beckett and Queneau, incites a laughter which releases tension rather than raising awareness. As humour theorists, Bergson, Freud and Koestler help focus these concerns.

• Reihe: European Connections
• Themen: Biographie, Literatur und Literaturwissenschaft Geschichte und Kritik Literaturwissenschaft, allgemein 1600 bis 1800
• ISBN: 9783039105045
• Sprache: Englisch
• Erscheinungsdatum: 03.03.2006
• Größe: 21 x 14.8 cm
• Verlag: Peter Lang Group AG, International Academic Publishers
• Band herausgegeben von: John Parkin, John Philllips