Zoom

In the Sun King's Cosmos: Comets and the Cultural Imagination of Seventeenth-Century France

Name: In the Sun King's Cosmos: Comets and the Cultural Imagination of Seventeenth-Century France
Brand: Northwestern University Press
SKU: 9780810148123
Price: 60.99 USD
Availability: InStock

$60.99

Hurry Up! Only 3 Left in Stock!

Out of stock >

Guarantee safe & Secure checkout

Availability: Only few left!

Contributors:

Claire Goldstein

Publisher:

Northwestern University Press

Binding:

Hardcover

Book Category:

Literary Criticism, Science

Book Subcategory:

European, Modern, Space Science

Book Topic:

French, 17th Century, Astronomy

Series:

Rethinking the Early Modern

Shipping & Return +

The product is eligible for a complimentary return within 30 days from the date of purchase. Furthermore, individual items are shipped within 24 hours of receiving the order.

Rating and Reviews +

Specifications +

Release Date:

02/15/25

ISBN 13:

9780810148123

Weight:

0.97 lbs

Size:

9.10 x 6.20 x 0.80 inches

Pages:

296

Mint Condition +

product description

Description

Offering a new history of a formative cultural and political era through the cosmic phenomena that captured the public's imagination

In the winters of 1664-65 and 1680-81, the French public was galvanized by two bright comets whose elliptical orbits could not be mapped with contemporary geometry and that thus seemed to appear in random and unpredictable locations. Bookending the period during which Louis XIV's sun king mythology was created, these comets defied the heliocentric order to which French politics and culture aspired. As Claire Goldstein demonstrates, literary texts, cultural institutions, and architecture inspired by comets offer a different perspective on the relationship between sensory experience, ideology, and artistic form.

In the Sun King's Cosmos: Comets and the Cultural Imagination of Seventeenth-Century France presents an alternative view of a formative era in cultural and political history, when distinctly modern forms of power and control were established through a regime of the spectacular. Goldstein shows how comets allow us to see the seventeenth century in ways that complicate the narrative of a race toward rationalization, classicism, and modernity, indexing instead a messy period in which the spectacular was sometimes also inscrutable.

About the Author

CLAIRE GOLDSTEIN is a professor of French at the University of California, Davis. She is the author of Vaux and Versailles: The Appropriations, Erasures, and Accidents That Made Modern France.

In the Sun King's Cosmos: Comets and the Cultural Imagination of Seventeenth-Century France

Description

Recently Viewed Products

Recently viewed products

Secure Payment

Online Offers

Quick Refunds

Curated Items