Reading an erased code
Subtitle: romantic religion and literary aesthetics in France
By: Michel Despland.
Series: University of Toronto romance series; University of Toronto romance series (Unnumbered)
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
Published: 1994
Place of publication: Toronto; Buffalo
Language: eng
Number of pages: 222
Subjects: Romanticism -- France.; Christianity in literature.; French literature -- 19th century -- History and criticism.; Romantisme -- France.; Christianisme dans la littérature.; Littérature française -- 19e siècle -- Histoire et critique.
Description: The end of the eighteenth century, an age of political and cultural crisis particularly in France, saw a shift in the meaning of belief. Simply put, a break in continuity occurred between the old, religious and a new, literary reading of Scripture. Michel Despland selects five writers who were caught up in this new reading of the old religious text and who came to write about religion in innovative ways.

The five writers treated by Despland helped shape a broader definition of belief, one that included individual sensibility. The works they produced are, in a sense, new religious texts. They did not just restate or reinterpret the code, but achieved a new kind of narrative, which has become dominant in the modern era and has shaped individual relationships to all codes.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [205]-218) and indexes.
Chiefly material previously published in various publications between 1983 and 1989.