Eureka

Susan Levine author Susan F Levine author

Format:Hardback

Publisher:University of Illinois Press

Published:8th Sep '04

Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back

Eureka cover

Scholarly annotated edition of Poe's Eureka

Representing Poe's fantastical thoughts on how the universe was formed and what its future might be, this edition aims to put "Eureka" in proper context. It includes Poe's proposed emendations to the text and sources and explains the setting in which it was produced, tying "Eureka" to world trends in philosophy and fast-breaking news in astronomy.Originally published in 1848, Eureka is Poe's book on how the universe was formed, how it functions, and what its future might be. Poe provides a physical, scientific explanation for the interconnectedness of all things--an idea at the heart of much of nineteenth-century romanticism and American Transcendentalism in particular. 
 
This user-friendly edition puts Eureka in context, explaining Poe's excellent grasp of then-new developments in astronomy, his often-prescient projections from what was known to what might come next (Poe is especially good on space-time), and the close connections between Eureka and the thought and attitudes of his era.
 
Through extensive annotations this edition of Eureka demonstrates intimate connections with Poe's poetry, fiction, and criticism, with his career and aspirations, his humor and satire, and his love of grand literary effects.
 
It also presents a carefully edited text, including Poe's own emendations from several copies which he marked for the revised reprinting that he hoped would follow, and related documents
 

"Eureka, Poe's testament, the synthesis of his analytic ideas, offers itself as a treatise on nothing less than cosmology. Having begun as a scientific lecture, it winds up as an apocalyptic revelation... It may be read as a rationalistic counterstatement to the metaphysics of Transcendentalism, or as a pioneering experiment in the embryonic genre of science fiction... 'Eureka!' is his heart-cry. 'I have found it!' he breathlessly seems to announce." -- Harry Levin in The Power of Blackness

ISBN: 9780252028496

Dimensions: 229mm x 152mm x 25mm

Weight: 513g

232 pages