{"title":"Books by Ritchie Robertson","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"9780141979403","title":"The Enlightenment","description":"\u003cb\u003e'The best single-volume study of the Enlightenment that we have' \u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eLiterary Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe Enlightenment is one of the formative periods of Western history, yet more than 300 years after it began, it remains controversial. It is often seen as the fountainhead of modern values such as human rights, religious toleration, freedom of thought, scientific thought as an exemplary form of reasoning, and rationality and evidence-based argument. Others accuse the Enlightenment of putting forward a scientific rationality which ignores the complexity and variety of human beings, propagates shallow atheism, and aims to subjugate nature to so-called technical progress.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnswering the question 'what is Enlightenment?' Kant famously urged men and women above all to 'have the courage to use your own understanding'. Robertson shows how the thinkers of the Enlightenment did just that, seeking a rounded understanding of humanity in which reason was balanced with emotion and sensibility. His book goes behind the controversies about the Enlightenment to return to its original texts and to show that above all it sought to increase human happiness in this world by promoting scientific inquiry and reasoned argument. His book overturns many received opinions - for example, that enlightenment necessarily implied hostility to religion (though it did challenge the authority traditionally assumed by the Churches). It is a master-class in 'big picture' history, about one of the foundational epochs of modern times.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43201535279282,"sku":"9780141979403","price":20.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780141979403.jpg?v=1786011767"},{"product_id":"9780192804556","title":"Kafka","description":"\u003cp\u003e'When Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from troubled dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a monstrous insect ...' So begins Franz Kafka's most famous story Metamorphosis.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFranz Kafka (1883-1924) is among the most intriguing and influential writers of the twentieth century. During his lifetime he worked as a civil servant and published only a handful of short stories, the best known being The Transformation. All three of his novels, The Trial, The Castle, and The Man Who Disappeared [America], were published after his death and helped to found Kafka's reputation as a uniquely perceptive interpreter of the twentieth century. Kafka's fiction vividly evokes bizarre situations: a commercial traveller is turned into an insect, a banker is arrested by a mysterious court, a fasting artist starves to death in the name of art, a singing mouse becomes the heroine of her nation. Attending both to Kafka's crisis-ridden life and to the subtleties of his art, Ritchie Robertson shows how his work explores such characteristically modern themes as the place of the body in culture, the power of institutions over people, and the possibility of religion after Nietzsche had proclaimed 'the death of God'. The result is an up-to-date and accessible portrait of a fascinating author which shows us ways to read and make sense of his perplexing and absorbing work.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56225628422517,"sku":"9780192804556","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780192804556_26aed407-ebf4-41ec-8f13-97254fcfacbe.jpg?v=1786011713"},{"product_id":"9780199689255","title":"Goethe","description":"In 1878 the Victorian critic Matthew Arnold wrote: 'Goethe is the greatest poet of modern times... because having a very considerable gift for poetry, he was at the same time, in the width, depth, and richness of his criticism of life, by far our greatest modern man.'In this Very Short Introduction Ritchie Robertson covers the life and work of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832): scientist, administrator, artist, art critic and supreme literary writer in a vast variety of genres. Looking at Goethe's poetry, novels and drama pieces, as well as his travel writing, autobiography, and essays on art and aesthetics, Robertson analyses some of the key themes in his works: love, nature, religion and tragedy. Dispelling the misconception of Goethe as a sedate Victorian sage, Robertson shows how much of his art was rooted in turbulent personal conflicts, and draws on recent research to present a complete portrait of the scientific work and political activity which accompanied Goethe's writings.ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56227194667381,"sku":"9780199689255","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780199689255_e68a92c1-8adb-4d43-bc97-0c4932c19e42.jpg?v=1786012759"},{"product_id":"9781781884652","title":"Enlightenment and Religion in German and Austrian Literature","description":"\u003cp\u003eReligion and enlightenment, the twin themes of this volume, always exist in tension. The tensions, affinities, and conflicts between the two, as they play out in German literature from Goethe, Schiller and Kleist down to Kafka and Thomas Mann, are explored in this volume, with one section examining their interplay in the neglected Austrian Enlightenment. Thanks to the historical and textual criticism of the Bible, the ‘sea of faith’ began its withdrawal sooner in Germany than in England, and this collection traces its retreat, looking especially at Nietzsche’s militant opposition to Christianity and at the expression in some modernist writing of a distinctly post-Christian and even post-human outlook.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eRitchie Robertson is Taylor Professor of German at the University of Oxford. This book aims to make more widely available some 27 of his essays on the theme of Enlightenment and religion, in both Germany and Austria, which are otherwise widely scattered in journals published over the last twenty years.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56312815124853,"sku":"9781781884652","price":80.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781781884652_43944364-872e-4427-bd26-c75b247fd71f.jpg?v=1786025973"},{"product_id":"kafka-judaism-politics-and-literature","title":"Kafka: Judaism, Politics, and Literature","description":"Kafka wrote Das Urteil, his first major work of literature, in a single night in the autumn of 1912. It was for him a breakthrough, and closely connected with it was the awakening of his interest in Jewish culture. This is a general study of Kafka, which explores the literary and historical context of his writings, and links them with his emergent sense of Jewish identity. What is emphasized throughout is Kafka's concern with contemporary society - his distrust of its secular, humanitarian ideals - and his desire for a new kind of community, based on religion.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57507629400437,"sku":"9780198158141","price":56.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780198158141.jpg?v=1787042637"}],"url":"https:\/\/backstory.london\/collections\/author-ritchie-robertson.oembed","provider":"Backstory","version":"1.0","type":"link"}