Lovers, Rakes, And Ideal Husbands – Men In Love in Eighteenth-Century Literature | Rom (31.01.2023)
ISECS Congress, Rome, June 27–30, 2023
The concepts of love and emotion in general both undergo a paradigmatic shift the during the
eighteenth century. Whereas the early decades are still dominated by rationalism and a dualism
that considers reason as superior to affects it therefore needs to control, this changes significantly
as the century goes on, leading to all sorts of portrayals of love: The feeling can be devouring and
dangerous but also reasonable and, finally, ennobled in the form of romantic love.
As the canon has long been dominated by male perspectives, most of the love poems one finds in
traditional anthologies, are those of men in love. However, the focus of literary research does not
necessarily lie on the specifically male aspects of those voices. Whether in canonical or less
recognized works, whether by male or female authorship, men in literary narrative works on the
other hand have their specific roles to play as the popular story of female virtue pursued, destroyed,
or rewarded calls for male counterparts acting as pursuers as well as saviors. The images presented
of men in love change and evolve along with the concept of love itself over the course of the
century with innovation often drawing on the resurrection of ideas from before the ‘Age of
Reason’: Anacreon and the bucolic world of shepherds both serve as points of reference for
pushing a reevaluation of erotism on the one hand, virtuous tenderness on the other. In a similar
way, Goethe’s Römische Elegien develop their initially scandalous combination of physical love
and poetic inspiration on the authority of Catullus, Tibullus and Propertius.
The panel seeks to investigate the variety of literary portraits of men in love and connect them with
the different types of love they represent and try to condemn or establish: men who suffer from
love as a disease; men who embrace love following Anacreon’s example; rakes and seducers;
reasonable or sentimental lovers presented as ideal husbands and so on. It assembles papers
focusing on exemplary literary portrayals as well as overall assessments in the context of
eighteenth-century gender debates.
For more information see: https://www.isecs-roma2023.net/en/calls
PD Dr. Kristin Eichhorn
Universität Stuttgart, Institut für Literaturwissenschaft
Keplerstr. 17
70174 Stuttgart