Quotes 2017 #119

"Bayle brought to the darkening complexities of early nineteenth century European life (Napoleon; imperialism; industrialisation; the apparent consolidation of European society into the warring camps of bourgeoisie and proletariat) the clarity and powers of analysis that he had learned from largely seventeenth- and eighteenth-century models."

Andrew Brown, Stendhal.

Andrew Brown is undoubtedly one of the best literary critics of my generation and le plus barthesien of any. His two small books, Stendhal and Flaubert, are gems.