Idealist Epistemology and the Baudelairean Experience of Modernity: Fragments in the Dark (Romania Viva, 54)

This study proposes an epistemological model on the basis of a streamlined and heavily modified German Idealism. With an analytical focus on the French Second Empire, the underlying research question is rather straightforward: how is knowledge created in material modernity? Using my epistemological model as a methodology for cultural criticism, a second research question emerges: how does the creation of knowledge in material modernity affect human existence? In this context, my argument revolves around the work of Charles Baudelaire, who, as the first poet of modernity, serves as a cultural-critical gateway. I conclude that the specific conditions of material modernity eventually produce an epistemological darkness ultimately leading to fatalism in the guise of a materialist teleology. Cover HalfTitle Series Page Title Page Copyright Page Dedication Contents Table of Figures Abstract Acknowledgements Chapter 1 Darkness There: Introduction Hypothesis Methodology Trajectory Chapter 2 Compagnon’s Conundrum: Review of Baudelairean Modernity Benjamin, Schizophrenia, dédoublement Time, Trauma, Violence Le Beau dans le mal: Ethics, Politics, ‘Second Empire Aesthetics’ Le Mal Le Beau Le Beau moderne: Correspondances, Déchéance, ‘Baudelairean Aesthetics’ Correspondances Déchéance La Seconde Révolution: Prose, Poetry, ‘Baudelairean Poetics’ La Première Révolution La Seconde Révolution Part I: Analysis Chapter 3 The a priori of Experiencing Modernity: A Return to Charles Baudelaire as the First Poet of Modernity Perceiving Space and Time: Baudelaire’s Modern Artist and Child Walter Benjamin and the First Poet of Modernity Fragmented a priori and the Bergsonian Selves Essai sur les données immédiates de la conscience (1889) ‘La Chambre double’ (1862): ‘Mais un coup terrible, lourd’ Chapter 4 The Epistemological Dialectic of Experiencing Modernity: Between Individual and Instant Photography, Memory, Imagination—and Happiness ‘L’Horloge’ (1857): The Engagement with the Instant is Elitist ‘L’Horloge’ (1860): The Engagement with the Instant is Socio-Collective Two Forms of Happiness Idealist Epistemology in ‘A une passante’ Hegelian Dialectic and the Instant as Object Itself ‘Un éclair ... puis la nuit!—Fugitive beauté’ Part II: Synthesis Chapter 5 The a posteriori of Experiencing Modernity: Representing Modern Human Existence Exchange, Communication, the Blasé and the Dandy ‘La Fausse Monnaie’ (1864): Exchange ‘Les Yeux des pauvres’ (1864): Communication ‘The Metropolis and Mental Life’ (1903): The Blasé and the Dandy Darkness There: Society and Existence from the Viewpoint of Death Chapter 6 Conclusion to Experiencing Modernity: Les Fleurs du Mal and Le Spleen de Paris ‘Les Projets de préface’ (posthumously between 1868–1968) ‘Lettre à Arsène Houssaye’ (1862) ‘Les Bons Chiens’ (1865) Bibliography