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Before Enlightenment
Play and Illusion in Renaissance Humanism
Series: - Brill's Studies in Intellectual History, Volume: 326
Author:
In Before Enlightenment: Play and Illusion in Renaissance Humanism, Timothy Kircher argues for new ways of appreciating Renaissance humanist philosophy. Literary qualities â tone, voice, persona, style, imagery â composed a core of their philosophizing, so that play and illusion, as well as rational certainty, formed pre-Enlightenment ideas about knowledge, ethics, and metaphysics.
Before Enlightenment takes issue with the long-standing view of humanismâs philosophical mediocrity. It shows new features of Renaissance culture that help explain the origins not only of Enlightenment rationalists, but also of early modern novelists and essayists. If humanist writings promoted objective knowledge based on reasonâs supremacy over emotion, they also showed awareness of oneâs place and play in the world. The animal rationale is also the homo ludens.
Before Enlightenment takes issue with the long-standing view of humanismâs philosophical mediocrity. It shows new features of Renaissance culture that help explain the origins not only of Enlightenment rationalists, but also of early modern novelists and essayists. If humanist writings promoted objective knowledge based on reasonâs supremacy over emotion, they also showed awareness of oneâs place and play in the world. The animal rationale is also the homo ludens.
Timothy Kircher, Ph.D. (1989), is Hege Professor of History at Guilford College. He has published monographs and articles on Renaissance humanism, including The Poetâs Wisdom: The Humanists, the Church, and the Formation of Philosophy in the Early Renaissance (Brill, 2006).
âThis fine book adds great depth and meaning to the study of Renaissance humanism. Kircherâs writing is crisp, his analyses are clear-eyed, and throughout he strikes a series of fine balances: between examinations of humanist classics with examinations of lesser known texts (often in manuscript); between Latin and vernacular; between Italian and ultramontane. Throughout, his writing is informed, but not dominated, by the history of continental philosophy.â
Christopher S. Celenza, Johns Hopkins University
âKircherâs insightful interpretation of [â¦] a broad compendium of humanist writing alone makes the book a useful additional to a scholarly library. [â¦] It provides a subtle and rich investigation of humanist thought and writing revealed though a careful and original reading of a great many texts.â Kenneth Bartlett, University of Toronto. In: Renaissance Quarterly, Vol. 76, No. 3 (Fall 2023), pp. 1071â1072. âThe strength of this new intellectual history is that it is not only attuned to the philosophical contributions of the early humanists, but it also considers the indirectness of literary mediaâincluding letters, dialogues, translations, orations, novels and poetryâas integral to humanist philosophy.â
Eva Plesnik, University of Toronto. In: Annali d'italianistica, Vol. 40 (2022), pp. 449â451.
Christopher S. Celenza, Johns Hopkins University
âKircherâs insightful interpretation of [â¦] a broad compendium of humanist writing alone makes the book a useful additional to a scholarly library. [â¦] It provides a subtle and rich investigation of humanist thought and writing revealed though a careful and original reading of a great many texts.â Kenneth Bartlett, University of Toronto. In: Renaissance Quarterly, Vol. 76, No. 3 (Fall 2023), pp. 1071â1072. âThe strength of this new intellectual history is that it is not only attuned to the philosophical contributions of the early humanists, but it also considers the indirectness of literary mediaâincluding letters, dialogues, translations, orations, novels and poetryâas integral to humanist philosophy.â
Eva Plesnik, University of Toronto. In: Annali d'italianistica, Vol. 40 (2022), pp. 449â451.
Acknowledgements
List of Illustrations
1 The Riddles of Renaissance Humanism
â1âRenaissance Humanism in the History of Early Modern Ideas
â2âFinders and Seekers in Renaissance Humanism
â3âRenaissance Humanism in the History of Philosophy
â4âLiterary Modalities of Humanist Expression and Overview of Chapters
2 Esse et videri: To Be and to Seem (Knowledge)
â1âPiccolominiâs Dream
â2âQuattrocento Hypocrisy: The Play of Appearances
â3âTrecento Antecedents: Appearing and Seeming in Petrarch and Boccaccio
â4âWalking Knowledge: The Transience and Accumulation of Perception
â5âSixteenth-Century Simulations
3 The Procession of Virtue (Ethics)
â1âReason as the Guide to Virtue: Finding the Moral Way
â2âThe Virtues of Pedagogy
â3âThe Morality of Rational Love
â4âFortuneâs Challenge to Virtue
â5âLaying Down the Moral Habits: Dialogues of the Dead
â6âFortune and Folly in the Sixteenth Century
4 The Beauty of the Whole (Metaphysics)
â1âPoetica Theologia to Poetica Metaphysica
â2âPrometheus the Light-Bringer: the Mediator between Humanity and Divinity
â3âApproaching the Sun: the Upper Reaches of Humanist Conceptions of Reality
â4âChaos Theory: the Circulation of Atomism
â5âThe Limits of Vision Beneath the Earthly Veil
â6âOntological Rupture: Momus as Alter-Prometheus
â7âThe Swiftness of Time: Playing with Plutarch
5 The End of Humanism â and the Humanities?
â1âQuestions of Humanism and the Humanities
â2âThe End in Rabelaisâs Cinq livres / Five Books
â3âBemboâs Walking Knowledge and the Limited Outlook
â4âThe Turnings of Self-Study as Humanismâs Physics and Metaphysics
Bibliography
Index
List of Illustrations
1 The Riddles of Renaissance Humanism
â1âRenaissance Humanism in the History of Early Modern Ideas
â2âFinders and Seekers in Renaissance Humanism
â3âRenaissance Humanism in the History of Philosophy
â4âLiterary Modalities of Humanist Expression and Overview of Chapters
2 Esse et videri: To Be and to Seem (Knowledge)
â1âPiccolominiâs Dream
â2âQuattrocento Hypocrisy: The Play of Appearances
â3âTrecento Antecedents: Appearing and Seeming in Petrarch and Boccaccio
â4âWalking Knowledge: The Transience and Accumulation of Perception
â5âSixteenth-Century Simulations
3 The Procession of Virtue (Ethics)
â1âReason as the Guide to Virtue: Finding the Moral Way
â2âThe Virtues of Pedagogy
â3âThe Morality of Rational Love
â4âFortuneâs Challenge to Virtue
â5âLaying Down the Moral Habits: Dialogues of the Dead
â6âFortune and Folly in the Sixteenth Century
4 The Beauty of the Whole (Metaphysics)
â1âPoetica Theologia to Poetica Metaphysica
â2âPrometheus the Light-Bringer: the Mediator between Humanity and Divinity
â3âApproaching the Sun: the Upper Reaches of Humanist Conceptions of Reality
â4âChaos Theory: the Circulation of Atomism
â5âThe Limits of Vision Beneath the Earthly Veil
â6âOntological Rupture: Momus as Alter-Prometheus
â7âThe Swiftness of Time: Playing with Plutarch
5 The End of Humanism â and the Humanities?
â1âQuestions of Humanism and the Humanities
â2âThe End in Rabelaisâs Cinq livres / Five Books
â3âBemboâs Walking Knowledge and the Limited Outlook
â4âThe Turnings of Self-Study as Humanismâs Physics and Metaphysics
Bibliography
Index
All interested in Renaissance humanism, literature, philosophy, and intellectual history, and anyone concerned with the origins of the early modern novel and essay. Keywords: Renaissance, Early Modern, humanism, philosophy, history, literature, comparative literature, Neolatin, classical reception, phenomenology.