The Pulse of Modernism: Physiological Aesthetics in Fin-de-Siècle Europe

381 Pages·2015·28.049 MB·English

by  Robert Michael Brain

IN VIVO
The Cultural Mediations of Biomedical Science
PHILLIP THURTLE and ROBERT MITCHELL, Series Editors
in vivo: the cultural mediations of biomedical science
is dedicated to the interdisciplinary study of the medical and life sciences,
with a focus on the scientific and cultural practices used to process data,
model knowledge, and communicate about biomedical science. Through
historical, artistic, media, social, and literary analysis, books in the series
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The Pulse of Modernism: Physiological Aesthetics in Fin-de-Siècle Europe
by Robert Michael Brain
THE PULSE OF MODERNISM
Physiological Aesthetics in Fin-de-Siècle Europe
ROBERT MICHAEL BRAIN
university of washington press
Seattle and London
sponsored in part by duke university’s center for
interdisciplinary studies in science and cultural theory
© 2015 by the University of Washington Press
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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or
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university of washington press
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library of congress cataloging-in-publication data
Brain, Robert Michael, 1959–
The pulse of modernism : physiological aesthetics in Fin-de-Si?cle Europe /
Robert Michael Brain.
pages cm. — (In Vivo)
Includes bibliographical references.
isbn 978-0-295-99320-1 (hard cover : acid-free paper) —
isbn 978-0-295-99321-8 (pbk. : acid-free paper)
1. Aesthetics—Physiological aspects. 2. Modernism (Aesthetics)—Europe.
3. Modernism (Literature)—Europe. 4. Modernism (Art)—Europe. I. Title.
bh301.p45b73 2015
111’.85094—dc23
2014040342
The paper used in this publication is acid-free and meets the minimum
requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—
Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ansi z39.48–1984.∞
For Parisa
Why is there such a thing as beauty in sound, color, scent, or rhythmical
movement in nature? What causes beauty to emerge? . . . Art is the greatest
stimulant to life: how could one understand it as aimless, as useless, as l’art
pour l’art?
Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols (1889)
A bit later, some innovators emboldened themselves. They deliberately
broke with conventions, demanding no more than their instinct for rhythm
and the sensitivity of their ear, the cadences and the musical substance of
their verses. Their attempts also depended on the theoretical research found
on the works of phoneticians, and on the recordings of the voice. . . . In
the period between 1880 and 1890, several hardy spirits undertook to
construct a doctrine of art derived from then fashionable theses of psycho-
physics. The study of sensibility by the methods of physics, research into
the (hypothetical) correspondence of sensations, the energetic analysis of
rhythm, were all enterprises not without effect on painting and poetry.
Paul Valéry, “Existence du symbolism” (1936)
[The work of art bears] a hidden rhythm—still more vital that we perceive
it ourselves—of our soul, similar to those sphygmographic traces that auto-
matically inscribe the pulsations of our blood.
Marcel Proust, “Sur la lecture,”
preface to John Ruskin, Sésame et les lys (1906)
Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction xiii
Part 1. Experimentalizing Life 3
1 / Representation on the Line:
Graphic Method as Experimental System 5
2 / The Vibratory Organism: Protoplasm and General Physiology 37
3 / Visible Speech: Experimental Phonetics
and the Physiology of Vocalization 64
Part 2. Experimentalizing Art 93
4 / Algorithms of Pleasure: Art as Expert System 95
5 / Liberating Verse: Rhythm and Measure in Poetry 150
6 / Sensory Fusion: Evolution and Synesthesia
in Art and Aesthetics 174
7 / Art for Life’s Sake: Kinesthesia, Empathy, and
Abstraction in Early Modernism 201
Conclusion 226
Notes 231
Bibliography 289
Index 334

Acknowledgments
MANY YEARS OF WORK AND AN ENORMOUS AMOUNT OF SUPPORT
has made this book possible. Early research was carried out with
fellowships from the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) and
the University of Cambridge Renaissance Trust. Much of the subsequent
research was carried out during fellowships at the Max Planck Institute for
the History of Science in the research groups of Lorraine Daston (1998, 2000,
2010) and Otto Sibum (2003, 2005). Further research was conducted with
a Harvard University Tozzer Faculty Research Grant (1999), a University of
British Columbia HSS/SSHRC Research Grant, and a visiting professorship
at the Department of the History of Science and Ideas at Uppsala University.
I am also grateful for the generosity of my faculty colleagues at the Univer-
sity of British Columbia, especially Danny Vickers and Anne Gorsuch, for
patience and support in various forms, including permitting me to take time
off to complete this project.
Several people provided critical late-stage assistance with the manu-
script. My colleagues Alexei Kojevnikov and Neil Safier read chapters and
provided crucial advice, as well as practical and moral support. I am deeply
indebted to two anonymous referees, one of whom I now know to be John
Tresch, for lengthy reports brimming with skill, insight, professionalism,
and generosity that helped me improve this book in many ways; to John and
the second referee, whoever you are, my enduring gratitude. Special thanks
to Audra Wolfe of the Outside Reader for providing timely and indispensable
developmental editing expertise. John Pickstone read the completed manu-
script and made numerous helpful suggestions. I am also grateful for precise
copyediting help from Eric Michael Johnson and, especially, Ken Corbett,
who worked beyond the call of duty in the face of critical deadlines. Working
with Tim Zimmerman, my editor at the University of Washington Press, has
been a pleasure. Many thanks as well to Phillip Thurtle and Robert Mitchell,
the In Vivo series editors, for good advice and strong support.
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