At the end of the 18th century, scientists for the first time demonstrated what medieval and Renaissance alchemists had long suspected: ice is not lifeless but vital, a crystalline revelation of vigorous powers. Studied in esoteric and exoterical representations of frozen phenomena, several Romantic figures including Coleridge and Poe, Percy and Mary Shelley, Emerson and Thoreau challenged traditional notions of ice as waste and instead celebrated crystals, glaciers, and the Poles as special disclosures of a holistic principle of being. This text explores this ecology of frozen shapes in detail, revealing not only a neglected current of the Romantic age but also a secret history and psychology of ice.
- ISBN10 0312292996
- ISBN13 9780312292997
- Publish Date 16 May 2003
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 12 March 2013
- Publish Country US
- Imprint St Martin's Press
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 288
- Language English