Bibliographie du dix-neuvieme siecle, Annee 2002 (review)

Entering its fifth year of publication this bibliography, dedicated to capturing "la dix-neuviémité" in all its diversity, is divided as in previous years according to types of works: Éditions de textes (E), Ouvrages non collectifs (O), Ouvrages collectifs (C), Revues et publications périodiques (R). Lettres, Arts, Sciences, and Histoire constitute the four major areas of the bibliography.

Philippe Régnier advises in the Preface that it is up to readers to choose the itinerary that is appropriate to their needs or current interests, or to vary their mode of approach according to their objectives. A person can in effect read the Bibliographie linearly or in different ways: in a syntagmatic manner while using it as a continuous text, a chronicle, a guide, an annual account of 19^th century novelties; or in a paradigmatic way, by borrowing entries in turn from any of the three indexes to the bibliography, namely, the Index auteurs et personnes du XIX^e siècle, Index de la critique, and the Index thématique.

To illustrate as succinctly as possible the rich categories of "sciences" and "lettres" and the interaction of the two, the following is a brief survey of the entries listed under the index term "sciences et littérature." Two texts and one collective work are listed: one text in German on literary pathology in nineteenth-century France (O272) and the other Une Histoire sentimentale des sciences, described as a "trésor de curitosités, d'anecdotes et de textes insolites," in which the nineteenth-century is well represented (O743). The collective work contains studies of dream images in German, Austrian, and Swiss literature and culture from works of authors such as Lichtenberg, Grillparzer, and others (C88).

The remaining eight entries refer to journals that include articles on science and literature. The fact that these journals are from Germany (2), Japan (1), and the United States (2), as well as France (3) provides a good example of the editors' efforts to make this bibliography an internationally comprehensive reference tool for the study of the nineteenth century. Relevant articles are: Friedrich Schlegel and literature explained by chemistry (R40); "Heinrich von Kleist and Earthquakes: Science, Faith, Superstition and Politics" (R104); "Le Père Goriot: science(s) et narration de la physionomie" (R121); "Psychiatrie phénoménologique et sciences littéraires: la présomption dans l'œuvre d'Heinrich von Kleist" (R126); "The relative influence of Cuvier and Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire on Balzac" (R137); "Alphonse Daudet ou la tentation du déterminisme scientiste" (R264); a PMLA issue "Cluster on Science in the 19^th Century" (R268); the last item under this index item being a "Conversation avec Michel Serres: Jules Verne, la science et l'homme contemporain"(R338).

Histoire, one of the other four main areas covered by this bibliography, is divided in the Index thématique into theory of history, the history of France, literary history, and historians and historiography. References listed under the index term "histoire (théorie)" include: two reference works by German historians, Johann Gustav Droysen (a condensed version of his Historik [1857] (E86) and Andreas Buller's Die Geschichtstheorien des 19. Jh dealing with the theories of Karl Marx and J-G. Droysen (O128); the Acts of the 4TH colloquium of Heidelberg on Historicization examine the idea that historicism may be a specifically European tendency and includes contributions on the history of religions, sciences and the arts (C139); and an item on the examination of the philosophy of historical sciences in the Romantic period (C217). Although the last entry listed under this index term "Victor Hugo ou Les frontières effacées: horizons du romantisme" contains several papers on history or the sense of history in Hugo's works, it contains several comparative literary studies as well on other topics that do not appear...