Constructing Charisma
Description
Railroads, telegraphs, lithographs, photographs, and mass periodicals-the major technological advances of the 19th century seemed to diminish the space separating people from one another, creating new and apparently closer, albeit highly mediated, social relationships. Nowhere was this phenomenon more evident than in the relationship between celebrity and fan, leader and follower, the famous and the unknown. By mid-century, heroes and celebrities constituted a new and powerful social force, as innovations in print and visual media made it possible for ordinary people to identify with the famous; to feel they knew the hero, leader, or "star"; to imagine that public figures belonged to their private lives. This volume examines the origins and nature of modern mass media and the culture of celebrity and fame they helped to create. Crossing disciplines and national boundaries, the book focuses on arts celebrities (Sarah Bernhardt, Byron and Liszt); charismatic political figures (Napoleon and Wilhelm II); famous explorers (Stanley and Brazza); and celebrated fictional characters (Cyrano de Bergerac).
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Edward Berenson is Professor of History and French Studies and Director of the Institute of French Studies at New York University. His numerous publications include The Trial of Madame Caillaux (University of California Press 1992), Heroes of Empire: Five Charismatic Men and Europe's Quest for Africa, (University of California Press 2010) and The Statue of Liberty: A Transatlantic Story (Yale University Press 2012).
Content
Introduction
Edward Berenson and Eva Giloi
Part I: Constructing Charisma
Chapter 1. "Charisma and the Making of Imperial Heroes in Britain and France, 1880-1914."
Edward Berenson
Chapter 2. "'So Writes the Hand that Swings the Sword': Autograph-hunting and Royal Charisma in the German Empire, 1861-1888."
Eva Giloi
Chapter 3. "The Workings of Royal Celebrity: Wilhelm II as Media Emperor."
Martin Kohlrausch
Part II: Celebrity as Performance
Chapter 4. "From the Top: Liszt's Aristocratic Airs."
Dana Gooley
Chapter 5. "Celebrity Gifting: Mallarmé and the Poetics of Fame."
Emily Apter
Chapter 6. "Rethinking Female Celebrity: The Eccentric Star of Nineteenth-Century France."
Mary Louise Roberts
Part III: The Politics of Fame
Chapter 7. "Byron, Death, and the Afterlife."
Stephen Minta
Chapter 8. "The Historical Actor."
Peter Fritzsche
Chapter 9. "Celebrity, Patriotism, and Sarah Bernhardt."
Kenneth E. Silver
Chapter 10. "Heroes, Celebrity and the Theater in Fin-de-Siècle France: Cyrano de Bergerac."
Venita Datta
Conclusion: "Secular Anointings: Fame, Celebrity, and Charisma in the First Century of Mass Culture.
Leo Braudy
