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Early Modern Players of Folly
Pranič, Martina ; Procházka, Martin (advisor) ; Pfister, Manfred (referee) ; Nováková, Soňa (referee)
Early Modern Players of Folly Thesis Abstract This thesis examines the ways in which folly is used in early modern literature. It asks: how is it that such an ephemeral concept proliferated and endured in the culture of early modern Europe? My understanding of early modern folly as a discursive phenomenon that was used as a way of questioning the knowledge of the ostensibly reasonable world is illustrated by case studies of four characters-four players of folly. Dedicated a chapter each, they are Till Eulenspiegel, the great German jester; Pomet Trpeza, a typically Ragusan wit of Marin Držić's Dundo Maroje; Brother Jan Paleček, a Bohemian representative of holy folly; and Sir John Falstaff, the embodiment of folly in Shakespeare's 1 and 2 Henry IV. Although they emerge from different cultural, linguistic and generic traditions, they nonetheless share a propensity for employing folly in ways that uncover possibilities for new understandings and challenge rigid certainties of the world around them. Early modernity, the era that produced the works I explore, has become associated with shifts and instabilities. In this Age of Discovery, man was compelled to understand afresh a suddenly unfamiliar world. However, where man and his reason reign, folly gladly follows. I read each of my four players of folly as...
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The Aesthetic Aspect of Knowledge Acquisition in the European Renaissance and Early Modern Period
Avxentevskaya, Maria ; Procházka, Martin (advisor) ; Pfister, Manfred (referee) ; Vermeir, Koen (referee)
Maria Avxentevskaya How to discover things with words? John Wilkins: from inventio to invention Abstract in English My doctoral thesis explores the functions of rhetorical and dialectical devices in the argumentative style of John Wilkins (1614−1672). My study traces the development of his discursive techniques in scientific narratives, theological writings, and linguistic treatises, with the aim to examine how the interplay between cognitive and performative language enhanced early-modern practices of knowledge-making. I argue that the procedures of dialectical rhetoric, apart from being popular perlocutionary tools, were effective as heuristic instruments. Language was one of the important agents in the performing of science, and my study employs the concept of "performative knowing" as a key to Wilkins's dialectical and scientific inventions. The idea of performative knowing straddles several constituents derived from the analytic philosophy and speech act theory. From this perspective, Wilkins's undertakings appear as a coherent exercise in the art of making knowledge through persuasive communication. My thesis explores how Wilkins's argumentative method departs from baroque rhetorical flair of The Discovery of a World in the Moone (1638), explores the capacity of rhetoric to impart scientific...
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Early Modern Players of Folly
Pranič, Martina ; Procházka, Martin (advisor) ; Pfister, Manfred (referee) ; Nováková, Soňa (referee)
Early Modern Players of Folly Thesis Abstract This thesis examines the ways in which folly is used in early modern literature. It asks: how is it that such an ephemeral concept proliferated and endured in the culture of early modern Europe? My understanding of early modern folly as a discursive phenomenon that was used as a way of questioning the knowledge of the ostensibly reasonable world is illustrated by case studies of four characters-four players of folly. Dedicated a chapter each, they are Till Eulenspiegel, the great German jester; Pomet Trpeza, a typically Ragusan wit of Marin Držić's Dundo Maroje; Brother Jan Paleček, a Bohemian representative of holy folly; and Sir John Falstaff, the embodiment of folly in Shakespeare's 1 and 2 Henry IV. Although they emerge from different cultural, linguistic and generic traditions, they nonetheless share a propensity for employing folly in ways that uncover possibilities for new understandings and challenge rigid certainties of the world around them. Early modernity, the era that produced the works I explore, has become associated with shifts and instabilities. In this Age of Discovery, man was compelled to understand afresh a suddenly unfamiliar world. However, where man and his reason reign, folly gladly follows. I read each of my four players of folly as...
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