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COPYRIGHT 2004 Modern Humanities Research Association
Monsters in the Italian Literary Imagination. Ed. by KEALA JEWELL. Detroit: Wayne State University Press. 2001. 325 pp. $34.95. ISBN 0-8143-2838-5.
In the introduction the editor presents background to the study of monsters as social organization of knowledge. Starting with the work of French science historian Georges Canguilhem, she presents his distinction of 'monstrous' as belonging to the domain of childish fantasy and myth, and 'monstrosity' as a legitimate subject of scientific enquiry, relevant to natural laws. She explains, 'In this collection, monsters are broadly understood as part of a web of beliefs anchored in the epistemological constructs of various historical periods. [...] When we explain them, we produce the knowledge that orders our worlds' (p. 11). She gives various historical reasons why the study of monsters is relevant to Italian literature, including an explanation of how the thought of certain Italian...
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