On Rochester's Libertinism
Below is the selection of readings we'll be officially discussing in class. However, as you'll quickly find out if you scan through the Rochester entry on Wikipedia, he was a writer as famous for his wholehearted, articulate embrace of libertinism and debauchery as for his conventional poetry.
"Libertinism" was a strangely influential and subversive philosophy during the late 17th and early 18th centuries, embodied not only in the work of Rochester but of the Marquise de Sade in France, and the novel Le Liasons Dangereuse, among other popular works of the day. On one level libertinism would seem to be just an extreme form of Hedonism, where physical pleasure is one's top priority. On another level, however, libertinism seems to go far beyond a simple pursuit of pleasure. It seems to move towards a wholesale rejection of reason, law, morality, and at times, paradoxically, existence itself. There’s certainly a dark, furious strain underlying some of the playfulness in much of the poetry of Rochester, a darkness apparent even in some Restoration sex farces such as The Country Wife. At times this philosophy of irreverence and debauchery seems almost to amount to a form of nihilism.
If you’re interested in some of the more extreme examples of Rochester’s literary libertinism, you can check out some examples by clicking here, here, or here. Heads up – there are definitely explicitly adult themes present.
Below is the selection of readings we'll be officially discussing in class. However, as you'll quickly find out if you scan through the Rochester entry on Wikipedia, he was a writer as famous for his wholehearted, articulate embrace of libertinism and debauchery as for his conventional poetry.
"Libertinism" was a strangely influential and subversive philosophy during the late 17th and early 18th centuries, embodied not only in the work of Rochester but of the Marquise de Sade in France, and the novel Le Liasons Dangereuse, among other popular works of the day. On one level libertinism would seem to be just an extreme form of Hedonism, where physical pleasure is one's top priority. On another level, however, libertinism seems to go far beyond a simple pursuit of pleasure. It seems to move towards a wholesale rejection of reason, law, morality, and at times, paradoxically, existence itself. There’s certainly a dark, furious strain underlying some of the playfulness in much of the poetry of Rochester, a darkness apparent even in some Restoration sex farces such as The Country Wife. At times this philosophy of irreverence and debauchery seems almost to amount to a form of nihilism.
If you’re interested in some of the more extreme examples of Rochester’s literary libertinism, you can check out some examples by clicking here, here, or here. Heads up – there are definitely explicitly adult themes present.
Class Readings:
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