Book ID: CBB001201847

The Age of Insight: The Quest to Understand the Unconscious in Art, Mind, and Brain, from Vienna 1900 to the Present (2012)

unapi

Kandel, Eric R (Author)


Random House


Publication Date: 2012
Physical Details: xvii + 636 pp.; ill.; bibl.; index
Language: English

A brilliant book by Nobel Prize winner Eric R. Kandel, The Age of Insight takes us to Vienna 1900, where leaders in science, medicine, and art began a revolution that changed forever how we think about the human mind---our conscious and unconscious thoughts and emotions---and how mind and brain relate to art. At the turn of the century, Vienna was the cultural capital of Europe. Artists and scientists met in glittering salons, where they freely exchanged ideas that led to revolutionary breakthroughs in psychology, brain science, literature, and art. Kandel takes us into the world of Vienna to trace, in rich and rewarding detail, the ideas and advances made then, and their enduring influence today. The Vienna School of Medicine led the way with its realization that truth lies hidden beneath the surface. That principle infused Viennese culture and strongly influenced the other pioneers of Vienna 1900. Sigmund Freud shocked the world with his insights into how our everyday unconscious aggressive and erotic desires are repressed and disguised in symbols, dreams, and behavior. Arthur Schnitzler revealed women's unconscious sexuality in his novels through his innovative use of the interior monologue. Gustav Klimt, Oscar Kokoschka, and Egon Schiele created startlingly evocative and honest portraits that expressed unconscious lust, desire, anxiety, and the fear of death. Kandel tells the story of how these pioneers---Freud, Schnitzler, Klimt, Kokoschka, and Schiele---inspired by the Vienna School of Medicine, in turn influenced the founders of the Vienna School of Art History to ask pivotal questions such as What does the viewer bring to a work of art? How does the beholder respond to it? These questions prompted new and ongoing discoveries in psychology and brain biology, leading to revelations about how we see and perceive, how we think and feel, and how we respond to and create works of art. Kandel, one of the leading scientific thinkers of our time, places these five innovators in the context of today's cutting-edge science and gives us a new understanding of the modernist art of Klimt, Kokoschka, and Schiele, as well as the school of thought of Freud and Schnitzler. Reinvigorating the intellectual enquiry that began in Vienna 1900, The Age of Insight is a wonderfully written, superbly researched, and beautifully illustrated book that also provides a foundation for future work in neuroscience and the humanities. It is an extraordinary book from an international leader in neuroscience and intellectual history.

...More
Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB001201847/

Similar Citations

Book Larson, Wendy; (2009)
From Ah Q to Lei Feng: Freud and Revolutionary Spirit in 20th Century China (/isis/citation/CBB001020718/)

Article Young, Allan; (2012)
The Social Brain and the Myth of Empathy (/isis/citation/CBB001251568/)

Article Richard Leblanc; (2019)
The White Paper: Wilder Penfield, the Stream of Consciousness, and the Physiology of Mind (/isis/citation/CBB650149989/)

Article Allocca, Nunzio; (2017)
L’errore di Damasio: cervello, emozione e cognizione in Descartes (/isis/citation/CBB952893823/)

Book Biess, Frank; Gross, Daniel M; (2014)
Science and Emotions after 1945: A Transatlantic Perspective (/isis/citation/CBB001422039/)

Article Ghassemzadeh, Habibollah; Posner, Michael I.; Rothbart, Mary K.; (2013)
Contributions of Hebb and Vygotsky to an Integrated Science of Mind (/isis/citation/CBB001320368/)

Chapter Lunbeck, Elizabeth; (2012)
The Narcissistic Homosexual: Genealogy of a Myth (/isis/citation/CBB001201489/)

Article Gere, Charlie; (2004)
The Technologies and Politics of Delusion: An Interview with Artist Rod Dickinson (/isis/citation/CBB000501612/)

Book Hagner, Michael; (1999)
Ecce Cortex: Beiträge zur Geschichte des modernen Gehirns (/isis/citation/CBB000110603/)

Article Cotti, Patricia; (2011)
Sexuality and Psychoanalytic Aggrandisement: Freud's 1908 Theory of Cultural History (/isis/citation/CBB001232225/)

Article Kauders, Anthony D.; (2013)
Truth, Truthfulness, and Psychoanalysis: The Reception of Freud in Wilhelmine Germany (/isis/citation/CBB001212922/)

Book Plamper, Jan; Lazier, Benjamin; (2012)
Fear: Across the Disciplines (/isis/citation/CBB001450931/)

Book Thomas W. Polger; Lawrence A. Shapiro; (2016)
The Multiple Realization Book (/isis/citation/CBB840684441/)

Book Rob Boddice; (2017)
Pain: A Very Short Introduction (/isis/citation/CBB078010554/)

Thesis Habinek, Lianne; (2009)
“Such Wondrous Science”: Brain and Metaphor in Early Modern English Literature (/isis/citation/CBB001562859/)

Thesis Wald, Stephen E.; (2008)
Minds Divided: Science, Spirituality, and the Split Brain in American Thought (/isis/citation/CBB001561399/)

Article Gallo, Rubén; (2011)
Freud's Mexican Readers (/isis/citation/CBB001035659/)

Article Pelaprat, Etienne; Hartouni, Valerie; (2011)
The Neural Subject in Popular Culture and the End of Life (/isis/citation/CBB001252271/)

Thesis Stefan Schöberlein; (2018)
Cerebral Imaginaries: Brains and Literature in the Transatlantic Sphere, 1800-1880 (/isis/citation/CBB941757615/)

Authors & Contributors
Schöberlein, Stefan
Folsom, Ed
Polger, Thomas W.
Leblanc, Richard
Plamper, Jan
Biess, Frank
Concepts
Neurosciences
Psychology
Philosophy of mind
Brain
Science and literature
Science and culture
Time Periods
20th century, late
20th century
20th century, early
19th century
21st century
Early modern
Places
United States
Germany
England
Americas
Russia
China
Comments

Be the first to comment!

{{ comment.created_by.username }} on {{ comment.created_on | date:'medium' }}

Log in or register to comment