Synopses & Reviews
Shelley and Vitality reassesses Percy Shelley's engagement with early nineteenth-century science and medicine, specifically his knowledge and use of theories on the nature of life presented in the debate between surgeons John Abernethy and William Lawrence. Sharon Ruston offers new biographical information to link Shelley to a medical circle, and major canonical works are reconsidered to address Shelley's politicized understanding of contemporary scientific discourse.
About the Author
Sharon Ruston is Lecturer in English Literature to the University of Wales, Bangor.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements * List of Abbreviations Cited * Introduction: A New Dawn * What is Life? * The Vitality Debate * Materialism and Atheism * PART 1: THE VITALITY DEBATE, 1814-19 * Vitality and Radical Scientists * Humphry Davy and Romantic Scientist * Abernethy and Lawrence * After 1819 * PART 2: SHELLEY'S KNOWLEDGE OF THE 'SCIENCE OF LIFE' * 1811 * Shelley and Bart's * Lawrence and the Bracknell Circle * Shelley's Notes on Davy * PART 3: THE POLITICAL BODY:
PROMETHEUS UNBOUND * The Furies and Animal Life * Electricity as Life * Earth as a Living Being * Utopian New Life * PART 4: 'THE PAINTED VEIL': DEFINING LIFE * Sensibility and the Figure of the Poet * Mutability * The Painted Veil * Materialism * PART 5: 'THE POETRY OF LIFE' * Life Cycles * Vitally Metaphorical * Posthumous Life * Beginnings and Endings * Conclusion * Notes * Bibliography * IndexAcknowledgements * List of Abbreviations * Introduction: A New Dawn * The Vitality Debate, 1814-1819 * Shelley's Knowledge of the 'Science of Life' * The Political Body:
Prometheus Unbound * 'The painted veil': Defining Life * 'The Poetry of Life' * Conclusion * Notes * Works Cited * Index