Disciplining the Imagination

<p>Disciplining the Imagination examines the relationship between Newtonianism <span style=color: var(--base-text); font-family: Work Sans -apple-system BlinkMacSystemFont Segoe UI Roboto Helvetica Neue Arial sans-serif Apple Color Emoji Segoe UI Emoji Segoe UI Symbol; font-size: 1rem;>and prose narrative in eighteenth century Britain. The main argument made in this </span><span style=color: var(--base-text); font-family: Work Sans -apple-system BlinkMacSystemFont Segoe UI Roboto Helvetica Neue Arial sans-serif Apple Color Emoji Segoe UI Emoji Segoe UI Symbol; font-size: 1rem;>book is that writers like Daniel Defoe Henry Fielding and David Hume enacted </span><span style=color: var(--base-text); font-family: Work Sans -apple-system BlinkMacSystemFont Segoe UI Roboto Helvetica Neue Arial sans-serif Apple Color Emoji Segoe UI Emoji Segoe UI Symbol; font-size: 1rem;>dramatized and problematized the heightened confidence in human knowledgemaking </span><span style=color: var(--base-text); font-family: Work Sans -apple-system BlinkMacSystemFont Segoe UI Roboto Helvetica Neue Arial sans-serif Apple Color Emoji Segoe UI Emoji Segoe UI Symbol; font-size: 1rem;>abilities which characterized the widespread diffusion of Newtonianism. </span><span style=color: var(--base-text); font-family: Work Sans -apple-system BlinkMacSystemFont Segoe UI Roboto Helvetica Neue Arial sans-serif Apple Color Emoji Segoe UI Emoji Segoe UI Symbol; font-size: 1rem;>In these writers prose narrative was used as a platform to explore the concept </span><span style=color: var(--base-text); font-family: Work Sans -apple-system BlinkMacSystemFont Segoe UI Roboto Helvetica Neue Arial sans-serif Apple Color Emoji Segoe UI Emoji Segoe UI Symbol; font-size: 1rem;>of fiction in light of the new epistemological standards of accuracy introduced by </span><span style=color: var(--base-text); font-family: Work Sans -apple-system BlinkMacSystemFont Segoe UI Roboto Helvetica Neue Arial sans-serif Apple Color Emoji Segoe UI Emoji Segoe UI Symbol; font-size: 1rem;>Isaac Newton's scientific works. The chapters of this book investigate how narrators </span><span style=color: var(--base-text); font-family: Work Sans -apple-system BlinkMacSystemFont Segoe UI Roboto Helvetica Neue Arial sans-serif Apple Color Emoji Segoe UI Emoji Segoe UI Symbol; font-size: 1rem;>in Defoe's A Journal of the Plague Year Fielding's Tom Jones and Hume's </span><span style=color: var(--base-text); font-family: Work Sans -apple-system BlinkMacSystemFont Segoe UI Roboto Helvetica Neue Arial sans-serif Apple Color Emoji Segoe UI Emoji Segoe UI Symbol; font-size: 1rem;>The History of England concern themselves with how to best acquire reliable </span><span style=color: var(--base-text); font-family: Work Sans -apple-system BlinkMacSystemFont Segoe UI Roboto Helvetica Neue Arial sans-serif Apple Color Emoji Segoe UI Emoji Segoe UI Symbol; font-size: 1rem;>knowledge on complex natural social or cultural phenomena while inviting their </span><span style=color: var(--base-text); font-family: Work Sans -apple-system BlinkMacSystemFont Segoe UI Roboto Helvetica Neue Arial sans-serif Apple Color Emoji Segoe UI Emoji Segoe UI Symbol; font-size: 1rem;>readers to reflect on the limits and perils of fiction.</span><br></p>