Constellations of a Contemporary Romanticism

Constellations of a Contemporary Romanticism takes its title and point of departure from Walter Benjamin's concept of the historical constellation, which puts both &quote;contemporary&quote; and &quote;romanticism&quote; in play as period designations and critical paradigms. Featuring fascinating and diverse contributions by an international roster of distinguished scholars working in and out of romanticism-from deconstruction to new historicism, from queer theory to postcolonial studies, from visual culture to biopolitics-this volume makes good on a central tenet of Benjamin's conception of history: These critics &quote;grasp the constellation&quote; into which our &quote;own era has formed with a definite earlier one.&quote; Each of these essays approaches romanticism as a decisive and unexpired thought experiment that makes demands on and poses questions for our own time: What is the unlived of a contemporary romanticism? What has romanticism's singular untimeliness bequeathed to futurity? What is romanticism's contemporary &quote;redemption value&quote; for painting and politics, philosophy and film?