Cambridge U. Pr.

The Cambridge companion to Foucault, 2d ed.

In this collection of 13 essays, which includes five new pieces for this edition, contributors assess the work of Foucault and its continuing influence in a range of disciplines far beyond philosophy. Gutting (philosophy, U. of Notre Dame) provides an able introduction to Foucault's basic themes and tropes, with the essays following addressing such topics as Foucault's approach to history and his The History of Madness, an assessment of Foucault's thought about the "exhaustion of the cogito," a summary of Foucault's thought on power and the exclusivity of knowledge, two pieces on ethics, including one on ethics as aesthetics and other on Foucault's interpretation of ethics in imagination, Foucault's interesting reactions to Heidegger, Nietzsche, Habermas, phenomenology, psychoanalysis and modernism and the interesting reactions of queer theorist and feminists to Foucault. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

The Cambridge companion to William Blake.

This guide approaches the difficulties of grasping Blake's extravagant and revelatory works by offering a variety of critical and historical explanations. The essays provide biographical, literary, art historical, political, religious and bibliographical introductions to Blake, along with a chronology, a guide to further reading and a glossary. The introduction by Eaves (English, U. of Rochester) foregrounds Blake's abstruseness, while offering reassurances about the rewards of penetrating his complexities. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Crusader art in the Holy Land; from the Third Crusade to the fall of Acre, 1187-1291. (CD-ROM included)

Medievalists and serious students of the Crusades will find a wealth of information in this unusually rich and substantial resource. Folda (history of art, U. of North Carolina, Chapel Hill) provides an in-depth account of the complex history of the Crusades from Saladin's reconquest of Jerusalem in 1187 until the Crusaders were expelled from Acre in 1291. Arranged chronologically, text on the history of each era is followed by exhaustive discussion of the art and architecture, with attention to coinage, pilgrimage and pilgrimage art, relics, icons, castles, pottery, churches, metalwork, stonework, wood carving, textiles, and manuscripts. Frequent quotation of primary sources (in their original language with English translation) enrich the text. The volume is oversize (9.25x12.25 inches and illustrated with some color plates and many b&w images, including maps and ground plans. An initial chapter discusses the historiography of the topic; a concluding chapter is devoted to the question of crusader art as a concept. The included CD-ROM contains a corpus of the 27 Crusader manuscripts from this period, with images of all the illuminated pages, examples of the non-illuminated ones, and some comparative material. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

English culture and the decline of the industrial spirit, 1850-1980, 2d ed.

The world's first great industrial nation has never been comfortable with industrialization; Wiener explores the ambivalence to modern industrial society that has shaped a spectrum of cultural expression in England: in literature, journalism, architecture, and social, historical, and economic thought. The second edition examines the historiography of the past 20 years. Wiener (history, Rice U.) is also the author of Men of Blood: Violence, Manliness, and Criminal Justice in Victorian England (Cambridge, 2003). (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Michelangelo's Last Judgment.

Five American art historians analyze the famous Renaissance painting in the Sistine Chapel at the Vatican, in many cases comparing the final work with his drawings for it. Their topics include the historical and religious circumstances of the painting; the hidden clue to the resurrection of the body; painting, criticism, and Michelangelo's Last Judgment in the age of the Counter-Reformation; and the Cappela Paolina frescoes. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Rome.

The first of a projected five-volume series (the other volumes will feature Venice, the northern court cities, Naples, and Florence), this work presents six chronological chapters, each written by a senior scholar in the field, on the art of Rome from 1300-1600. Refreshingly, in a field long characterized by a focus on style, this volume is marked by new research, new methods, and a focus on the broader context of the work of art. The result is a fresh look at Renaissance Rome through discussion of works of painting and sculpture — many of them, like Michelangelo's ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, very familiar — derived from an analysis of the written sources for the light they shed on many issues, especially the often profound impact of patronage, the influence of ritual and other kinds of use, and trends within the Church, which commissioned much of Rome's art. Ending with an in-depth discussion of the Counter-Reformation, the rich approach employed in this text expands the reader's understanding of the Renaissance beyond the lives of artists and their works. The volume contains a thorough survey of Roman monuments, is written at a level accessible to the beginning undergraduate student, and contains a wealth of excellent (mainly b&w) illustrations, making it suitable for both seminars and lecture courses. The contributors are Meredith Gill (U. of Notre Dame), Steven Ostrow (U. of California, Riverside), Clare Robertson (U. of Reading, UK), Ingrid Rowland (American Academy in Rome), and Hall (Temple U.). (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Sanctuaries and the sacred in the ancient Greek world.

For undergraduate and advanced high-school students who have o previous acquaintance with the ancient Greek world, Pedley (U. of Michigan-Ann Arbor) offers an initial point of reference on the working of Greek sanctuaries and their place in ancient Greek society, as a foundation of more detailed and scholarly studies. He emphasizes what the sanctuaries looked like, the experiences ancient visitors might have had when they visited them, the activities that took place, and changes that happened to and in the sanctuaries over time and into the Christian and Turkish eras. The glossary does not indicate pronunciation. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Values of beauty; historical essays in aesthetics.

Guyer (philosophy, U of Pennsylvania) collects 13 papers on the history of aesthetics most published or written since 1996 and three not previously published. He considers ideas expressed in the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries, pivoting on Kant, about such aspects as the importance of beauty, the cognitive significance of fictions, the links between aesthetics and morality, the nature of genius and artistic creation, and how aesthetic values can be distinct from and yet connected to and supportive of the range of values called moral. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)