The geopolitics of Shelley’s Laon and Cythna and The Revolt of Islam revolve around its half-mythical, half-historical Mediterranean setting. Centred in Argolis and the Golden City, the poem’s geography is a translation both of the clashing forces that shaped the French Revolution in the 1790s and of the mount- ing tensions between Greece and Turkey in the 1810s. It also references a broader Continental panorama of imperial–national struggles instigated by the restoration process decreed by the Congress of Vienna. Throwing light on Shelley’s engagement with Restoration-era politics, this essay reads the poem’s geogra- phy and recursive narrative structure as thematic-formal vehicles for reflecting on the Napoleonic aftermath as another episode in the unending conflict between freedom and ‘anarchy’ that the poet saw as the core engine of universal history.
Shelley’s Revolt in the Mediterranean: Writing Restoration / Saglia, Diego. - In: KEATS-SHELLEY REVIEW. - ISSN 0952-4142. - 32:2(2018), pp. 148-157. [10.1080/09524142.2018.1520464]
Shelley’s Revolt in the Mediterranean: Writing Restoration
Diego Saglia
2018-01-01
Abstract
The geopolitics of Shelley’s Laon and Cythna and The Revolt of Islam revolve around its half-mythical, half-historical Mediterranean setting. Centred in Argolis and the Golden City, the poem’s geography is a translation both of the clashing forces that shaped the French Revolution in the 1790s and of the mount- ing tensions between Greece and Turkey in the 1810s. It also references a broader Continental panorama of imperial–national struggles instigated by the restoration process decreed by the Congress of Vienna. Throwing light on Shelley’s engagement with Restoration-era politics, this essay reads the poem’s geogra- phy and recursive narrative structure as thematic-formal vehicles for reflecting on the Napoleonic aftermath as another episode in the unending conflict between freedom and ‘anarchy’ that the poet saw as the core engine of universal history.File | Dimensione | Formato | |
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