Cannibals and Philosophers

by Daniel Cottom

"Taking us to the heart of the Enlightenment via the stomach, Daniel Cottom argues that the period was from the beginning obsessed with guts and disgust as much as it was with mind and reason. In Cannibals and Philosophers, Cottom traces how human flesh became a new thing in the Enlightenment - a flesh of sensibility, a surface of stimuli that at once inspired and disturbed artists and philosophers. Examining paintings, digestion, machines, spa waters, and kissing as cultural forms, and interweaving these examinations with new readings of literary and philosophical texts, Cottom locates a new focus on the inner working of the body, a "visceral turn" in Enlightenment thinking. The most radical image of this visceral turn appeared in the figure of the cannibal - a figure who, in popular imagination, bore a striking resemblance to the image of the philosopher.". "Focusing on literature, art, philosophy, science, technology, anthropology, popular culture, and social history, Cotton provide