Sentimental figures of empire in eighteenth-century Britain and France /

Numerous studies of sentiment and sentimentality in the 18th century have been published. These include literary analyses and general works on the social impact of sensibility (e.g., G. J. Barker-Benfield's The Culture of Sensibility: Sex and Society in Eighteenth-Century Britain, CH, Apr'93, 30-4548), books on the political impact and implications of feeling (e.g., Markman Ellis's The Politics of Sensibility, CH, Jan'97, 34-2614), and a plethora of historical and social studies of imperialism, slavery, and abolitionism. Festa (Harvard) looks at sentimental texts, both British and French, as agents for helping readers establish emotional contact with the distant lands and peoples of colonial empire while preserving the individualized sense of self. She reviews sentimental novels, abolitionist tracts, and slave narratives and autobiographies in tracing how the commercial commoditization of people affected how Europeans saw themselves and their world during the imperial expansion. Thoroughly researched and densely annotated, this is a book for scholars of 18th-century literature, culture, society, and ideas. Summing Up: Recommended. Graduate students through faculty. H. Benoist Our Lady of the Lake University of San Antonio