On Not Reading The Soldier’s Pocket-book for Field Service

This essay focuses on Garnet Wolseley’s controversial war instruction manual, The Soldier’s Pocket-book for Field Service (1869). While the Pocket-book’s contribution to discussions of reading and soldiers’ education has carved out a significant place for it in Victorian military history, in its day it was constantly contested and undermined by contradictory representations, as a book much talked about but little read. This essay is an exercise in tracing these eccentric reception histories, as an acute reminder that books may well have vibrant intellectual lives without actually being read. To examine the literary and material circulation of the Pocket-book in the late nineteenth century, it draws on archival research in the Macmillan Archive and Wolseley’s private papers to discuss the genesis of the text not just as a compendium of information but also as an object that is handled, carried, and exchanged. I juxtapose these considerations with episodes in the representation of the Pocket-book: in an anti-war pamphlet; an anonymous satirical drawing found in Wolseley’s personal scrapbooks; and in Kipling’s short stories about British soldiers in colonial South Asia. In all of these, the Pocket-book is characterized as a dubious, even dangerous text – one that was neither read, nor should be. The examples demonstrate three of the different trajectories through which the Pocket-book emerged as an unread book in the Victorian imagination: through encouragements not to read, rejection, and misappropriation.     

Numitorius’ Parody of Vergil,Ecl. 3. 1–2.

Numitorius’ line should be read: non, verum Aegones nostri sic rure locuntur (instead of Aegonis), i.e. a generic plural ‘(people like our Aegon’).     

Critica (IV) some fresh conjectures on Horace: Epistles II and Ars Poetica

In this article I propose (1) to delete et at Ep. 2. 1. 46, (2) to read vati instead of vatem at 2. 1. 133, (3) his instead of hic at 2. 2. 84, (4) non ita longe instead of non ita pridem at Ars 254, and (5) to put a question mark after natura at 353.     

Dithyrambs and Ploughshares: The Cycle of Creation and Criticism in Nietzsche's Aesthetics

Pairing Thus Spoke Zarathustra with On the Genealogy of Morality foregrounds tensions between artistic creation and critical interpretation in Nietzsche's work. From The Birth of Tragedy to his genesis of the concept, Will to Power, Nietzsche describes the real, or “what is,” in terms of a creative, form-giving force. We might therefore read Zarathustra—a linguistically experimental, richly allegorical, self-reflexive, modernist prose poem—as the pre-eminent, artistic mode of philosophical expression, at least for Nietzsche. But Zarathustra is followed by a sober Abhandlung (treatise), which professes a scientific goal of “getting to the bottom of things” by uncovering the contingency, origin, and fabricated nature of supposedly eternal, “given” values. These instantiations of Nietzsche-the-artist and Nietzsche-the-critic suggest art's “double” or contradictory nature—a nature that accents its kinship with philosophy. Zarathustra and the Genealogy, read together, hint that the destruction of idols—or de-constructive, critical interpretation more generally—is not just supplemental to, but a necessary moment within the aesthetic itself.     

Corrections

Correction
History and Theory 45: 1, 110‐123 .
Online publication date: 2‐Feb‐2006. We inadvertently printed three erroneous internal cross references in S. H. Rigby's review of Miguel Cabrera's Postsocial History: An Introduction in the February 2006 issue of History and Theory (vol. 45, no. 1, pp. 110‐123) :

On p. 114, "p. 458" should read "p. 112." On p. 120, the two references to "p. 460" should both read "p. 114."

Professor's Rigby's review was rescheduled from an earlier issue and unfortunately we did not notice that these references needed to be updated.     

MOVING BEYOND BIOPOWER: HARDT AND NEGRI'S POST-FOUCAULDIAN SPECULATIVE PHILOSOPHY OF HISTORY

I argue in this paper that the attempt by Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri in Empire and Multitude to “theorize empire” should be read both against the backdrop of speculative philosophy of history and as a development of the conception of a “principle of intelligibility” as this is discussed in Michel Foucault's recently published courses at the Collège de France. I also argue that Foucault's work in these courses (and elsewhere) can be read as implicitly providing what I call “prolegomena to any future speculative philosophy of history.” I define the latter as concerned with the intelligibility of the historical process considered as a whole. I further suggest, through a brief discussion of the classical figures of Kant, Hegel, and Marx, that the basic features of speculative philosophy of history concern the articulation of both the telos and dynamics of history. My claim is that Hardt and Negri provide an account of the telos and dynamics of history that respects the strictures imposed on speculative philosophy of history by Foucault's work, and thus can be considered as providing a post‐Foucauldian speculative philosophy of history. In doing so, they provide a challenge to other “theoretical” attempts to account for our changing world.     

Postmodernist Histories

ABSTRACT

Since 1829, it has been the received and accepted scholarly opinion that Jonathan Edwards did not read the writings of George Berkeley and thus was not influenced thereby in the development of his own Idealism. This essay contends otherwise. With new evidence available, it is shown to be highly probable that Edwards has a historical as well as conceptual connection to the Idealism of Berkeley. A historical connection is argued for by utilizing Edwards’s “Catalogue” to establish a timeline that illustrates when he penned his own Idealist writings in connection to when he read Berkeley. A conceptual connection is argued for by focusing upon both several idiosyncratic Berkeleyisms of style and two Berkeleyan theses also found in Edwards’s writings. Finally, the conceptual connection between the two are strengthened, after demonstrating how Berkeleyan Idealism singularly differs from other prominent Early Modern Idealisms. By examining what Edwards read, how he wrote, and how he thought, a reasonable case is set forth for affirming a historical and conceptual connection between Edwards and Berkeley. Thus, after two centuries of dispute, there is finally justified merit for labeling Edwards as a Berkeleyan Idealist.     

Henry Savile's Tacitus and the English role on the Continent: Leicester,Hotman, Lipsius

This article argues that Henry Savile's widely admired Tacitus of 1591 should not be read as an implied call for a more aggressive English stance against Spanish advances on the Continent (as one recent article suggests), but precisely for a more restrained and prudential approach. Secondly, it calls into question the generally accepted view that Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex, played a prominent role in the composition of the book. It argues that in reconstructing the work's original intellectual context and especially that of the supplement The Ende of Nero and the beginning of Galba, the main emphasis should not be on Essex's political and military career, but on that of his stepfather Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. The article provides an investigation (as far as the surviving information allows) of the background in Continental politics and political thought in relation to the text of The Ende, which suggests that it should primarily be read from the perspective of the unsuccessful English intervention in the Low Countries in 1585–88.     

The Roots of Terrorist Motivation: Shame,Rage, and Violence in The Brothers Karamazov

Abstract

Dostoevsky's most famous novel dealing with terrorism is his work The Demons. In this first-ever novel about terrorism, he carefully analyzed the various factors that contributed to the rise of modern terrorism. This article argues that Dostoevsky's subsequent novel, The Brothers Karamazov, is equally important in understanding the motivations of individual terrorists. The author argues that The Brothers Karamazov is fundamentally a novel about the rage and violence that are the byproducts of shame and humiliation. If modern counterterrorism policymakers, analysts, and operatives are serious about understanding the fundamental motivations of modern terrorists, it may benefit them to read (or reread) The Brothers Karazamov in this light.     

The Ideologization of the Child: Zdeňka Bezděková and Marie Majerová

Abstract

This article traces the changes in two novels, Zdenňka Bezděková’s ?íkali mi Leni and Marie Majerová’s Bruno, made once the Communist-Party regime in Czechoslovakia was firmly established. For example, German paedophilia is changed to bullying in Bezděková and pre-war Czech political antisemitism deleted from Majerová. In both works Czech nationalist misoteutonism is changed into internationalist Communism. The author pays close attention to changes in language and style in both works. Though Majerová’s novel seems no longer to be read, Bezděková’s remains standard reading for adolescents, and in the twenty-fi rst century continues to be read with its somewhat rabble-rousing afterword by the novelist Karl Nový. The essay demonstrates how children can be made into things rather than people for the sake of a political ideology.     

Andrea's Baggage: Reading (in) Laforet's Nada

One overlooked feature of Andrea's arrival in Barcelona at the beginning of Nada is the old and battered suitcase that she drags with her to her relatives’ apartment. It is filled almost entirely with books, books that—we may assume—she has read and plans to read again. Reading, it is clear, has played a large part in her intellectual and psychological formation as a teenager, but one of the strands of her overall maturation process during the forthcoming year will involve achieving a greater understanding of the distortions involved in how people (including her) see life through the optic of literature and literature through the optic of life. Gradually disabused of her overly literary adolescent imaginings, then, she eventually becomes a writer—of the text that is Nada—who is well aware of the traps that reading and writing hold.     

Textual and Exegetical Issues in Vergil's Fifth and Seventh Eclogues

(I) At 5. 3 read considimus instead of consedimus, (II) at 8 certet instead of certat, (III) at 38 pupurea instead of purpureo, (IV) at 66 understand altaria as apposition to duas tibi, Daphni as well, (V) at 7. 5 take pares not as a predicative, but as governing cantare (‘equally competent at singing’) reflecting Theocr. 8. 4. (VI) Arguing against identifying Micon (29–30) with Corydon I take si proprium hoc fuerit (31) as expressing Corydon's own hope as a hunter, (VII) I modify the usual interpretation of Thyrsis' response (33–35), (VIII) find the idea that Thyrsis impersonates Galatea in 41–44 improbable and (IX) at 64 prefer the ancient reading Veneris instead of corylos.     

Reading the Body: Mystical Theology and Spiritual Actualisation in Early Seventeenth‐Century Lima*

In early seventeenth‐century Lima, Peru, female visionaries composed texts of their bodies, and texts composed their bodies. This fact can be explained, in part, by the belief that an individual could gain access to and appropriate the language of God (His spiritus) in distinct ways. Mystical narratives, stigmata, as well as the spoken words of enraptured visionaries communicating with absent souls were considered readable texts because the object to be read could be a book, a painting, or the body itself. Thus the reading of, and listening to, texts was parallel to Lima's visionaries entering a state of spiritual ecstasy (arrobamiento), and “reading” their bodies as living books, which perforce became a readable space.     

Schicksalsmächte

In the first and longer part of his study (I)? the author seeks to reassess both the word‐for‐word meaning and the contextual function of the much debated line 183 nee nulla interea est inaratae gratia terrae. He sees the reason for the impasse of commentators (recently Mynors) in the fact that inaratus is wrongly taken as a negated adj. ("unploughed") whereas it makes better sense taking it as the past participle of inarare (i.e. “ploughed"). St. Ambrose may have read the line in this way. In the second part (II) the author tries to find out how the controversial nullo tantum se Mysia cultu / iactat et ipsa suas mirantur Gargara messis (I 102–103) makes sense in its context. Basing his understanding on the parallel at Aen. 6,876f. he ends up with pleading that cultus should be understood in a more general way ‐ something in the vein of “beautiful quality”;, “refined condition”;.     

La prose metrique de l'ancienne historiographie romaine

In this attempt at an overall interpretation of Hadrian's poem (Büchner fr. 3) the author discusses the meaning of vagula and blandida in 1. 1 and puts a comma after vagula. He assesses in particular the two most disputed lines of the poem, 3 and 4, taking quae as an exclamation and adding some reasons for combining loca with pallidula rigida nudula. As to the marked use of diminutives ‐ 5 in as many lines ‐ the author sees no reason for giving them a uniform emotional meaning, but argues for grouping them into three categories according to the semantic value of the primitive involved. He discusses also how to read 1. 5 syntactically. In the last part of the study the aim is to show in what particular sense the poem can be reasonably taken as a product of the emperor's pen on his very deathbed.     

Sovetskaya Arktika journal as a source for the history of the Northern Sea Route

This paper is about reading and using the Soviet texts published in the 1930s on the Northern sea route (NSR) and the Arctic in general. The history of the NSR exploration and exploitation and its current potential as a round-the-year transportation waterway connecting the Pacific and the Atlantic is outlined. Specific features of the 1930s’ sources for the study of the NSR are explored using the example of the journal Sovetskaya Arktika (The Soviet Arctic), published between 1935 and 1941. The representation of the Northern Sea Route in this journal is described from two perspectives: what was presented (and what wasn't) and how it was presented. Special characteristics of the language used are considered to be interesting examples of the Soviet version of “totalitarian language” (newspeak, langue de bois). Historical sources written in this kind of language require special skills and special caution to read, interpret, and use.     

Circean transformation and the poetics of Milton’s Masque

ABSTRACT

Circe’s presence in A Masque Presented at Ludlow Castle (Comus) invites readers to read both Milton’s Circe and Milton’s own poetic activity through long and intertwined traditions of theology and literary commentary. Stretching from Augustine and Aquinas to the commentaries and translations of Homer and Ovid by Sponde, Sandys, and Chapman, these traditions use Circe to explore and conflate the possibility, the permanence, and the experience of both human and literary transformation. Taken up by Townshend and Jones in their Caroline court masque Tempe Restored, they become essential intertexts for Milton’s Masque. Milton embeds this discourse in his masque – a genre that places metamorphosis at the heart of its poetics – to examine the nature of Renaissance intertextuality and the authorial self and interrogate his own use of Renaissance practices of imitatio and aemulatio. In Comus’ wood, Circean transformation becomes a touchstone for the virtuous soul and the virtuous poet alike.