Sociability and Society

K. Ludwig Pfeiffer is Emeritus Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Siegen and at Jacobs University Bremen. He is the author of The Protoliterary: Steps toward the Anthropology of Culture (Stanford, 2002), in addition to his many books in German.

• Introduction1. Conceptualizing the Symposium2. Power and Signs of Power in the Middle Ages3. Sociability and the Humanities4. The Splintering of Culture: Reading versus Salon5. Proust and Nineteenth-Century Salons6. The Silence of Power: English Clubs or Oligarchy versus Democracy7. A Symptomatology of Critical Shifts8. Securing Power and Auxiliary Evidence9. The Paradigm of Isolation and Its Consequences: Joseph Conrad10. Beyond the Sympotic: Aesthetic Productivity and Sociable Bonding in the Detective Novel11. Consequences and Conclusion(s): The Anthropological-Institutional Trap and the Resurrection of Literature

"Sociability and Society switches with ease and elegance between theoretical argumentation, historical narrative, and literary criticism. An intensive, interesting, and inviting book for students of European cultural history, qualitative social theory, and literature."—Rüdiger Campe, Yale University "In this important and thought-provoking book, Pfeiffer tracks the history of the social form of the symposium and its multifarious successors. His open, essayistic style perfectly suits his protean subject matter."—Peter Gilgen, Cornell University "Sociability and Society is a fascinating, far-ranging, and important book."—Eric Sandberg, Partial Answers