Examines the eighteenth-century French, English, and German movement away from Cartesian rationalism and towards both a rejection of reason leading to romanticism and revolution, and an application of reason leading to a discussion of civil and human rights.
By exploring the writings of great authors (including Pope, Voltaire, Goethe, and Laclos) and with the aid of videos and other materials, we will try to bring this exciting period in early modern Europe to life. Subjects will include the rise and fall of Reason, the path from Sensibility to Romanticism, and the road to Revolution that these movements engineered. Read some of the books that changed the Western World, filled with bold ideas, dangerous thoughts, daring deeds, blackguardly men, libidinous women, witty conversations, truth, vice, virtue!