my mind on books

I recently read Accident: A Philosophical and Literary History by Ross Hamilton (University of Chicago Press, 2007), which surprisingly turned out to have a lot to do with changing concepts of the self in Western culture, from Aristotle to postmodernism. I had some difficulty following the argument in this densely woven academic text, so it was something of a relief to find my response echoed by Terry Eagleton’s review:

“But there are times when the subject threatens to disappear under this imposing weight of learning, only to re-emerge just when one thought it had sunk without trace. Hamilton does not keep a sharp enough eye on the storyline. There is a grand narrative struggling to get out of this study, which is the mysterious tale of the disappearing substance.”

Here is a quote from Hamilton’s conclusion that sort of sums up and perhaps gives a flavor of the book:

“we can point to shifts in the value assigned to aspects of accident that demarcate a series of important attitudinal domains: The reign of substance as the enduring quality with respect to accident lasted into the eighteenth century. During the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, a shift occurred from seeking qualitative resemblances to the exploration of differences. Toward the end of the nineteenth century, a second shift replaced the retrospective sense of self with anticipatory self-structuring and gave primacy to inwardly determined self-definition. A third shift, one that began in the twentieth century and is accelerating rapidly, sacrificed the claim of a substantive self. According to critics like Foucault or Virilio, this movement threatens to extinguish the self completely.” (p. 301)

After the jump there are some notes from my reading…

Introduction

A symbiotic relationship exists between accidental qualities and accidental events.
The notion of identity interacts as much with the understanding of accidental qualities as with the understanding of accidental events.
The value of substance relative to the value of accident serves as a marker in the cultural identification of what it means to be “modern.” (p 8-9)

Ch. 1 – Aristotle to Augustine
Augustine “revalued accident as a Christian sign”… “acknowledged the power of accidental events to generate self-definition” (p. 41)

Ch.2 – Christian theology – Dante, Aquinas, transubstantiation, Raphael’s frescoes in the Stanza della Segnatura of the Vatican
“Transmuted into theological understanding, Aristotle’s concept of substance has become divine” (p. 68)

Ch. 3 – Reformation, secularization of accident, skepticism – Montaigne, Hamlet
Skepticism creates a conceptual space for new solutions, to be occupied by science.

Ch.4 – Descartes, Pascal, Locke
Locke …”inverted the traditional primacy of substance over accident. Regarding substance as a concept that lay outside the purview of scientific study, he gave new importance to accidental qualities — as empirically observable facts — and new value to accidental events — as sites of empirical analysis.” (p. 117)

Ch. 5 – print culture – Defoe (Robinson Crusoe), Fielding (Tom Jones), Sterne (Tristram Shandy) “The extent to which qualities of mind were conditioned by mental as well as physical accidents became an accepted literary understanding.” (p. 160)

Ch. 6 – Rousseau, Diderot (Jacques the Fatalist)
Rousseau “structured a textual identity around the manipulative response to contingency as a vehicle for self-actualization.” (p. 187)

Ch. 7 – accidental sublime – Wordsworth, Kant – “substantive accident capable of producing…spiritual elevation…was known as the sublime” (p. 202)

Ch. 8 – Darwin, Jane Austen, George Eliot (Daniel Deronda)
“conflict between whether identity resided in qualities that were acquired through experience or qualities that were innate or inherent … became a focus of expanded debate” (in 19th c) (p. 217)

Ch. 9 – Degas, photography, Freud, Musil (Man Without Qualities)
“the self defined as pure possibility has become devoid of content” (p. 272)

Ch. 10 – Surrealism, Breton, Buster Keaton, ‘Alien,’ Derek Jarman (Blue)

Conclusion – p. 301 “we can point to shifts in the value assigned to aspects of accident that demarcate a series of important attitudinal domains: The reign of substance as the enduring quality with respect to accident lasted into the eighteenth century. During the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, a shift occurred from seeking qualitative resemblances to the exploration of differences. Toward the end of the nineteenth century, a second shift replaced the retrospective sense of self with anticipatory self-structuring and gave primacy to inwardly determined self-definition. A third shift, one that began in the twentieth century and is accelerating rapidly, sacrificed the claim of a substantive self. According to critics like Foucault or Virilio, this movement threatens to extinguish the self completely.”

cited book to check out later: The Making of the Modern Self: Identity and Culture in Eighteenth-Century England by Dror Wahrman