MARC Record from marc_columbia

LEADER: 02316cam a2200349 i 4500
001 11689192
005 20160223150843.0
008 150514s2015 enk b 001 0 eng d
019 $a908374816
020 $a9780198746836$qhardback
020 $a0198746830$qhardback
024 $a40025547474
035 $a(OCoLC)909250485$z(OCoLC)908374816
035 $a(OCoLC)ocn909250485
035 $a(NNC)11689192
040 $aERASA$beng$erda$cERASA$dBTCTA$dBDX$dYDXCP$dNhCcYBP
050 4 $aPN56.A44$bZ56 2015
082 04 $a809/.9337$223
100 1 $aZiolkowski, Theodore,$eauthor.
245 14 $aThe alchemist in literature :$bfrom Dante to the present /$cTheodore Ziolkowski.
250 $aFirst edition.
264 1 $aOxford :$bOxford University Press,$c2015.
300 $ax, 237 pages ;$c23 cm
336 $atext$btxt$2rdacontent
337 $aunmediated$bn$2rdamedia
338 $avolume$bnc$2rdacarrier
504 $aIncludes bibliographical references and index.
520 8 $aUnlike most other studies of alchemy and literature, which focus on alchemical imagery in poetry of specific periods or writers, this book traces the figure of the alchemist in Western literature from its first appearance in the Eighth Circle of Dante's 'Inferno' down to the present. From the beginning alchemy has had two aspects: exoteric or operative (the transmutation of baser metals into gold) and esoteric or speculative (the spiritual transformation of the alchemist himself). From Dante to Ben Jonson, during the centuries when the belief in exoteric alchemy was still strong and exploited by many charlatans to deceive the gullible, writers in major works of many literatures treated alchemists with ridicule in an effort to expose their tricks. From the Renaissance to the Enlightenment, as that belief weakened, the figure of the alchemist disappeared, even though Protestant poets in England and Germany were still fond of alchemical images. But when eighteenth-century science almost wholly undermined alchemy, the figure of the alchemist began to emerge again in literature-now as a humanitarian hero or as a spirit striving for sublimation.0.
650 0 $aAlchemy in literature.
650 0 $aSymbolism in literature.
650 0 $aEuropean literature$xHistory and criticism.
852 00 $bglx$hPN56.A44$iZ56 2015