The public does not desire horror, yet enjoys it in art and suffers it in life. When we deal with the monstrous marriage of the abject and the sublime, the consequent thrill of enjoyment is never appeased, always problematic, often unresolved and finally borders on physiological if not pathological narcissism. The public is well acquainted with this ‘rhetoric of effects’; rhetoric of extreme effects, which transforms the spectator into voyeur or victim, into an apathetic torturer, whenever cruelty is shown without respite. A look of horror greets the enjoyment of extremes and enjoyment to the extreme as well; the Eighteenth Century teaches us that lesson. The century of good taste elaborates a sense of the limits, since representing horror means choosing not so much to domesticate it as to render it more enjoyable. It is a game of limits that are not limits anymore, as we can allude to an infinity that often shows the features of the sublime.

In Absolutist Attachments, Chloé Hogg uncovers the affective and media connections that shaped Louis XIV’s absolutism. Studying literature, painting, engravings, correspondence, and the emerging periodic press, Hogg diagnoses the emotions that created absolutism’s feeling subjects and publics. Louis XIV’s subjects explored new kinds of affective relations with their sovereign, joining with the king in acts of aesthetic judgment, tender feeling, or the “newsiness” of emerging print news culture. Such alternative modes of adhesion countered the hegemonic model of kingship upheld by divine right, reason of state, or corporate fidelities and privileges with subject-driven attachments and practices. Absolutist Attachments discovers absolutism’s alternative political and cultural legacy—not the spectacle of an unbound king but the binding connections of his subjects.

Imagine mathematics, imagine with the help of mathematics, imagine new worlds, new geometries, new forms. Imagine building mathematical models that make it possible to manage our world better, imagine solving great problems, imagine new problems never before thought of, imagine combining music, art, poetry, literature, architecture, theatre and cinema with mathematics. Imagine the unpredictable and sometimes counterintuitive applications of mathematics in all areas of human endeavour. This seventh volume starts with a homage to the Italian artist Mimmo Paladino who created exclusively for the Venice Conference 2019 ten original and unique works of art paper dedicated to the themes of the meeting. A large section is dedicated to the most recent Fields Medals including a Homage to Maryam Mirzakhani including a presentation of the exhibition on soap bubbles in art and science that took place in 2019. A section is dedicated to cinema and theatre including the performances by Claire Bardainne & Adrien Mondot. A part of the conference focused on the community of mathematicians, their role in literature and even in politics with the extraordinary example of Antanas Mockus Major of Bogotá. Mathematics in the constructions of bridges, in particular in Italy in the Sixties was presented by Tullia Iori. A very particular contribution on Origami by a mathematician, Marco Abate and an artist, Alessandro Beber. And many other topics. As usual the topics are treated in a way that is rigorous but captivating, detailed and full of evocations. This is an all-embracing look at the world of mathematics and culture. The world, life, culture, everything has changed in a few weeks with the Coronavirus. Culture, science are the main ways to safeguard people's physical and social life. Trust in humanity's creativity and ability. The motto today in Italy is Everything will be fine. This work is addressed to all those who have an interest in Mathematics.

This book takes the reader on a philosophical quest to understand the dark side of emotions. The chapters are devoted to the analysis of negative emotions and are organized in a historical manner, spanning the period from ancient Greece to the present time. Each chapter addresses analytical questions about specific emotions generally considered to be unfavorable and classified as negative. The general aim of the volume is to describe the polymorphous and context-sensitive nature of negative emotions as well as changes in the ways people have interpreted these emotions across different epochs. The editors speak of ‘the dark side of the emotions’ because their goal is to capture the ambivalent – unstable and shadowy – aspects of emotions. A number of studies have taken the categorial distinction between positive and negative emotions for granted, suggesting that negative emotions are especially significant for our psychological experience because they signal difficult situations. For this reason, the editors stress the importance of raising analytical questions about the valence of particular emotions and focussing on the features that make these emotions ambivalent: how – despite their negativity – such emotions may turn out to be positive. This opens up a perspective in which each emotion can be understood as a complex interlacing of negative and positive properties. The collection presents a thoughtful dialogue between philosophy and contemporary scientific research. It offers the reader insight by illuminating the dark side of the emotions.

The Palgrave Encyclopedia of the Possible represents a comprehensive resource for researchers and practitioners interested in an emerging multidisciplinary area within psychology and the social sciences: the study of how we engage with and cultivate the possible within self, society and culture. Far from being opposed either to the actual or the real, the possible engages with concrete facts and experiences, with the result of transforming them. This encyclopedia examines the notion of the possible and the concepts associated with it from standpoints within psychology, philosophy, sociology, neuroscience and logic, as well as multidisciplinary fields of research including anticipation studies, future studies, complexity theory and creativity research. Presenting multiple perspectives on the possible, the authors consider the distinct social, cultural and psychological processes - e.g., imagination, counterfactual thinking, wonder, play, inspiration, and many others - that define our engagement with new possibilities in domains as diverse as the arts, design and business.

"Medieval Obscenities examines the complex and contentious role of the obscene - what is offensive, indecent or morally repugnant - in medieval culture from late antiquity through to the end of the middle ages in western Europe. Its approach is multidisciplinary, its methodologies divergent and it seeks to formulate questions and stimulate debate." "The essays examine topics as diverse as Norse defecation taboos, the Anglo-Saxon sexual idiom, sheela-na-gigs, impotence in the church courts, bare ecclesiastical bottoms, rude sounds and dirty words, as well as the modern reception and representation of the medieval obscene. The volume demonstrates not only the vitality of medieval obscenity, but its centrality to our understanding of medieval life."--Jacket.