In this Book

  • Necessary Luxuries: Books, Literature, and the Culture of Consumption in Germany, 1770–1815
  • Book
  • Matt Erlin
  • 2014
  • Published by: Cornell University Press
    • Viewed
    • View Citation
buy this book Buy This Book in Print
summary

The consumer revolution of the eighteenth century brought new and exotic commodities to Europe from abroad—coffee, tea, spices, and new textiles to name a few. Yet one of the most widely distributed luxury commodities in the period was not new at all, and was produced locally—the book. In Necessary Luxuries Matt Erlin considers books and the culture around books during this period, focusing specifically on Germany where literature, and the fine arts in general, were the subject of soul-searching debates over the legitimacy of luxury in the modern world.

Building on recent work done in the fields of consumption studies as well as the New Economic Criticism, Erlin combines intellectual-historical chapters (on luxury as a concept, luxury editions, and concerns about addictive reading) with contextualized close readings of novels by Campe, Wieland, Moritz, Novalis, and Goethe. As he demonstrates, artists in this period were deeply concerned with their status as luxury producers. The rhetorical strategies they developed to justify their activities evolved in dialogue with more general discussions regarding new forms of discretionary consumption. By emphasizing the fragile legitimacy of the fine arts in the period, Necessary Luxuries offers a fresh perspective on the broader trajectory of German literature in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century, one that allows us to view the entire period in terms of a dynamic unity, rather than simply as a series of literary trends and countertrends.

The consumer revolution of the eighteenth century brought new and exotic commodities to Europe from abroad—coffee, tea, spices, and new textiles to name a few. Yet one of the most widely distributed luxury commodities in the period was not new at all, and was produced locally: the book. In Necessary Luxuries, Matt Erlin considers books and the culture around books during this period, focusing specifically on Germany where literature, and the fine arts in general, were the subject of soul-searching debates over the legitimacy of luxury in the modern world.Building on recent work done in the fields of consumption studies as well as the New Economic Criticism, Erlin combines intellectual-historical chapters (on luxury as a concept, luxury editions, and concerns about addictive reading) with contextualized close readings of novels by Campe, Wieland, Moritz, Novalis, and Goethe. As he demonstrates, artists in this period were deeply concerned with their status as luxury producers. The rhetorical strategies they developed to justify their activities evolved in dialogue with more general discussions regarding new forms of discretionary consumption. By emphasizing the fragile legitimacy of the fine arts in the period, Necessary Luxuries offers a fresh perspective on the broader trajectory of German literature in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century, recasting the entire period in terms of a dynamic unity, rather than simply as a series of literary trends and countertrends.

Table of Contents

  1. Cover
  2. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. Cover
  2. p. i
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. Title Page, Copyright, Dedication
  2. pp. i-vi
  3. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. Title
  2. p. iii
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. Contents
  2. pp. vii-viii
  3. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. Dedication
  2. p. v
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. List of Illustrations
  2. pp. ix-x
  3. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. Acknowledgments
  2. pp. xi-xvi
  3. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. List of Illustrations
  2. pp. ix-x
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. Introduction: Guilty Pleasures
  2. pp. 1-23
  3. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. Acknowledgments
  2. pp. xi-xii
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. 1. The Conceptual Landscape of Luxury in Germany
  2. pp. 24-52
  3. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. Epigraph
  2. pp. xiii-xiv
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. 2. Thinking about Luxury Editions in Late Eighteenth- and Early Nineteenth-Century Germany
  2. pp. 53-77
  3. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. Introduction: Guilty Pleasures
  2. pp. 1-23
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. 3. The Appetite for Reading around 1800
  2. pp. 78-99
  3. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. 1. The Conceptual Landscape of Luxury in Germany
  2. pp. 24-52
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. 4. The Enlightenment Novel as Artifact: J. H. Campe’s Robinson der Jüngere and C. M. Wieland’s Der goldne Spiegel
  2. pp. 100-138
  3. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. 2. Thinking about Luxury Editions in Late Eighteenth- and Early Nineteenth-Century Germany
  2. pp. 53-77
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. 5. Karl Philipp Moritz and the System of Needs
  2. pp. 139-174
  3. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. 3. The Appetite for Reading around 1800
  2. pp. 78-99
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. 6. Products of the Imagination: Mining, Luxury, and the Romantic Artist in Novalis’s Heinrich von Ofterdingen
  2. pp. 175-202
  3. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. 4. The Enlightenment Novel as Artifact: J. H. Campe’s Robinson der Jüngere and C. M. Wieland’s Der goldne Spiegel
  2. pp. 100-138
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. 7. Symbolic Economies in Goethe’s Die Wahlverwandtschaften
  2. pp. 203-231
  3. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. 5. Karl Philipp Moritz and the System of Needs
  2. pp. 139-174
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. Conclusion: Useful Subjects?
  2. pp. 232-242
  3. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. 6. Products of the Imagination: Mining, Luxury, and the Romantic Artist in Novalis’s Heinrich von Ofterdingen
  2. pp. 175-202
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. Works Cited
  2. pp. 243-258
  3. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. 7. Symbolic Economies in Goethe’s Die Wahlverwandtschaften
  2. pp. 203-231
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. Index
  2. pp. 259-264
  3. open access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. Conclusion: Useful Subjects?
  2. pp. 232-242
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. Works Cited
  2. pp. 243-258
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. Series
  2. p. ii
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
  1. Copyright
  2. p. iv
  3. open access
    • View HTML View Summary
Back To Top

This website uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience on our website. Without cookies your experience may not be seamless.