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'"Intermitting Power": De Quincey's Sublime Identifications'

Steven Vine

Prose Studies, Volume: 30, Issue: 2, Pages: 142 - 158

Swansea University Author: Steven Vine

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DOI (Published version): 10.1080/01440350802372941

Abstract

In an ambivalent reception, Thomas De Quincey’s writings identify with and parody Kant’s sublime in the 'Critique of Judgment' (1790). In his essays on the 'aesthetics' of murder, De Quincey mocks Kant’s rational sublime as itself murderous, but he also embraces that sublime as a...

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Published in: Prose Studies
ISSN: 0144-0357 1743-9426
Published: London Routledge 2008
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URI: https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa11467
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spelling 2014-05-15T16:35:11.4539335 v2 11467 2012-06-14 '"Intermitting Power": De Quincey's Sublime Identifications' 8adad05ceecbaab7f4b2be512149b4d7 Steven Vine Steven Vine true false 2012-06-14 FGHSS In an ambivalent reception, Thomas De Quincey’s writings identify with and parody Kant’s sublime in the 'Critique of Judgment' (1790). In his essays on the 'aesthetics' of murder, De Quincey mocks Kant’s rational sublime as itself murderous, but he also embraces that sublime as a phantasm of power. The essay argues that by embodying Kantian sublimity in a series of 'intermitting' identifications, De Quincey dramatises the sublime as a theatre of conflict. In this situation, De Quincey himself is empowered and disempowered, and made a subject of elevation and abjection; this means that his work throws into sharp relief the discordant politics of the sublime. Via Kant, De Quincey identifies with both potency and privation, the twin poles of the sublime, with the result that in the fields of philosophy, murder, autobiography, nationality, politics and modernity his writings enact and anatomise the ideological dissonances of sublime power. The essay shows how De Quincey exposes and dramatizes the conflicts of sublime power in his 'Confessions of an English Opium-Eater' (1821, 1856), 'Suspiria de Profundis' (1845), his essays on murder (1827, 1839, 1854), his commentaries on Kant, and his accounts of the ‘literature of power.’ In his writings on the antithetical effects of opium, we find a self variously empowered and disempowered, elevated and prostrated – both an imperial and a ‘pariah’ subject. De Quincey’s texts, in this sense, show how the sublime heights of Kantian idealism are collapsed by the compulsive return of what they try to repress - in De Quincey’s case, violence, murder, nightmare, dependency, materiality, the body, modernity, the Oriental ‘other.’ Journal Article Prose Studies 30 2 142 158 Routledge London 0144-0357 1743-9426 De Quincey, Kant, the sublime, identification 1 8 2008 2008-08-01 10.1080/01440350802372941 COLLEGE NANME Humanities and Social Sciences - Faculty COLLEGE CODE FGHSS Swansea University 2014-05-15T16:35:11.4539335 2012-06-14T15:38:36.2426643 Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences School of Culture and Communication - English Language, Tesol, Applied Linguistics Steven Vine 1
title '"Intermitting Power": De Quincey's Sublime Identifications'
spellingShingle '"Intermitting Power": De Quincey's Sublime Identifications'
Steven Vine
title_short '"Intermitting Power": De Quincey's Sublime Identifications'
title_full '"Intermitting Power": De Quincey's Sublime Identifications'
title_fullStr '"Intermitting Power": De Quincey's Sublime Identifications'
title_full_unstemmed '"Intermitting Power": De Quincey's Sublime Identifications'
title_sort '"Intermitting Power": De Quincey's Sublime Identifications'
author_id_str_mv 8adad05ceecbaab7f4b2be512149b4d7
author_id_fullname_str_mv 8adad05ceecbaab7f4b2be512149b4d7_***_Steven Vine
author Steven Vine
author2 Steven Vine
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publishDate 2008
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doi_str_mv 10.1080/01440350802372941
publisher Routledge
college_str Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences
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hierarchy_top_title Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences
hierarchy_parent_id facultyofhumanitiesandsocialsciences
hierarchy_parent_title Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences
department_str School of Culture and Communication - English Language, Tesol, Applied Linguistics{{{_:::_}}}Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences{{{_:::_}}}School of Culture and Communication - English Language, Tesol, Applied Linguistics
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description In an ambivalent reception, Thomas De Quincey’s writings identify with and parody Kant’s sublime in the 'Critique of Judgment' (1790). In his essays on the 'aesthetics' of murder, De Quincey mocks Kant’s rational sublime as itself murderous, but he also embraces that sublime as a phantasm of power. The essay argues that by embodying Kantian sublimity in a series of 'intermitting' identifications, De Quincey dramatises the sublime as a theatre of conflict. In this situation, De Quincey himself is empowered and disempowered, and made a subject of elevation and abjection; this means that his work throws into sharp relief the discordant politics of the sublime. Via Kant, De Quincey identifies with both potency and privation, the twin poles of the sublime, with the result that in the fields of philosophy, murder, autobiography, nationality, politics and modernity his writings enact and anatomise the ideological dissonances of sublime power. The essay shows how De Quincey exposes and dramatizes the conflicts of sublime power in his 'Confessions of an English Opium-Eater' (1821, 1856), 'Suspiria de Profundis' (1845), his essays on murder (1827, 1839, 1854), his commentaries on Kant, and his accounts of the ‘literature of power.’ In his writings on the antithetical effects of opium, we find a self variously empowered and disempowered, elevated and prostrated – both an imperial and a ‘pariah’ subject. De Quincey’s texts, in this sense, show how the sublime heights of Kantian idealism are collapsed by the compulsive return of what they try to repress - in De Quincey’s case, violence, murder, nightmare, dependency, materiality, the body, modernity, the Oriental ‘other.’
published_date 2008-08-01T03:13:16Z
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score 11.013686

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