In 850 analytical articles, this two-volume set explores the developments that influenced the profound changes in thought and sensibility during the second half of the eighteenth century and the first half of the nineteenth century. The Encyclopedia provides readers with a clear, detailed, and accurate reference source on the literature, thought, music, and art of the period, demonstrating the rich interplay of international influences and cross-currents at work; and to explore the many issues raised by the very concepts of Romantic and Romanticism.

Poetry. Visual Poetry. A selection from over 40 years of Bennett's work, introduced by Ivan Argüelles: "Where to begin writing about this baffling and certainly most 'avant- garde' of all poets living and working in the USA today? Bennett's reputation is international, and his interest in Mesoamerican culture has drawn him frequently to that part of the world where he is a recognized figure. His experimentations over the years have encompassed multiple techniques, including visual poetry, and his own 'polyglottery,' moving in and out of English, Spanish, Portuguese, French or some Mesoamerican language. What may seem aleatory is in fact more intentional and grounded than is first apparent. Bennett has roots in traditional literatures, those of Siglo de Oro Spain and of Elizabethan England, but he is capable of transducing those literatures, metamorphosing them by way of the avant-garde movements of the 20th century, into something utterly innovative and New, such as few contemporary artists have done."

Platonic Romanticism had a dark underside from its inception: Romantic Disillusionism, encompassing the Gothic and the new demonic doppelganger. The Classical Tradition's conflict between Plato and Pyrrho, foundationalism and scepticism, optimism and pessimism was thus continued. Lord Byron's was the most listened-to and echoed voice of Romantic Disillusionism in Europe, though by far not the only one. This comparative study of a multiplicity of sceptical English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Polish, and Czech voices shows how traditional Pyrrhonic arguments were updated to suit the decades of the Romantic Movement, surviving as a subversive countercurrent to later Victorianism and resurging in the literature of the Decadence and Fin de Siècle.

Poetry. "Bennett has been the avant in avant-garde in the latter half of the 20th century with his Lost and Found Times, one of the great 'small press poetry rags' of all time, and then through his Luna Bisonte Prods press. OLVIDOS ('Memories'; though the word also and literally means 'things forgotten') is quite possibly his masterpiece. 339 pages of zany often inarticulate expositions of a kind of lunar madness that can only be the work of the descendent of such poets as Vicente Huidobro and Guillaume Apollinaire. There is most likely something for everyone here from minimalist visual techniques and zen-like koans to architectured poems such as 'olvidos y fragmentos' with its enigmatic phrase 'lock the boot.' But then the entire text is one immense sequence of enigmatic and puzzling dicta, summed up best in his own portmanteau word, 'hablacagada.' This is an important work and should place Bennett centrally on the map of great, innovative American poets."—Ivan Argüelles

Focusing on the arcades of 19th-century Paris--glass-roofed rows of shops that were early centers of consumerism--Benjamin presents a montage of quotations from, and reflections on, hundreds of published sources. 46 illustrations.

Frederick Rennie Emerson (1895-1972) was a dynamic presence in the cultural and intellectual life of Newfoundland and Labrador for much of the twentieth century. A musician, lawyer, educator, and folklore enthusiast, Emerson was a central figure in the preservation and mediation of Newfoundland culture in the tumultuous decades prior to and following Confederation with Canada in 1949. Glenn Colton shows how Emerson fostered greater awareness and understanding of Newfoundland's cultural heritage in local, national, and international contexts. His collaboration with song collector Maud Karpeles in the late 1920s preserved some of the most cherished folk songs in the English language, and a decade later, his lectures at Memorial University College emphasized folk traditions and classical repertoire to inspire cultural discovery for an entire generation. As Newfoundland's representative on the first Canada Council and vice-president of the Canadian Folk Music Society, he played a crucial role in shaping Canadian cultural policy during the transformative years of the mid-twentieth century. Colton also reveals the meaningful creative works Emerson composed in response to the same cultural heritage he documented and preserved: his one-act drama Proud Kate Sullivan (1940) is a pioneering depiction of Newfoundland life, and the folk-inspired Newfoundland Rhapsody (1964) is one of few examples of symphonic music composed by a Newfoundlander of his generation. Newfoundland Rhapsody explores Newfoundland society, Canada's emerging arts scene, and the international folk music community to offer a new lens through which to view the cultural history of twentieth-century Newfoundland and Canada.

It does not treat Romanticism as a limited "period" dominated by some construed singular master-ethos or dialectic; rather, it follows the literary patterns and dynamics of Romanticism as a flow of interactive currents across geocultural frontiers