Italy in Crisis: 1494
Edited by Jane Everson and Diego Zancani
Legenda (General Series) •1 November 2000

  • ‘The eight chapters are prefaced by a stimulating introduction, and rounded off by a helpful index: in all a splendid collection of original and scholarly essays.’ — Paul Diffley, Italian Studies LVII, 2002, 167-8
  • notice, The Year's Work in Modern Language Studies 62, 2000, 395

Michel Foucault: Form and Power
Dan Beer
Legenda (General Series) •1 May 2002

  • ‘Beer's book is a dialogue with Foucault, including critiques of his arguments by Baudrillard and Derrida. It has been suggested that the seductive beauty of Foucault's language masks the frailty of some of his positions, and Beer provides close analysis of the stylistic strategies he deploys.’ — unsigned notice, Forum for Modern Language Studies XXXIX, 2003, 465-6
  • ‘After Beer we can return to Foucault's texts with a new imagination and a new sensitivity to the force of his style.’ — Jeremy Carrette, Modern Language Review 99.2, 2004, 502-3 (full text online)

Reinventing Community: Identity and Difference in Late Twentieth-Century Philosophy and Literature in French
Jane Hiddleston
Legenda (General Series) •4 February 2005

  • ‘This is a lucid, cogently-argued work that is both extensive and focused. As such it represents an important contribution to the urgent discussion of community and the fraught relationship between "singular-plural" beings and the collectivities they form.’ — Nicole Simek, French Review 80.3, 2007, 670-71

Roger Laporte: The Orphic Text
Ian Maclachlan
Legenda (General Series) •1 November 2000

  • ‘Maclachlan admirably pulls off the difficult task of maintaining a just tension between the demands of critical exegesis and the demands of the work itself... succeeds in opening a space for their reading and indicating the importance of this reading.’ — Patrick ffrench, French Studies LVI.3, 2002, 432-3
  • Elisa Bricco, Studi francesi XLVI, 2002, 2

The Artificial Self: The Psychology of Hippolyte Taine
Hilary Nias
Legenda (General Series) •1 October 1999

  • ‘Given the relative dearth of serious work on the writers who formed the philosophical backbone to nineteenth-century literary France, a study of any one of them is welcome, a study of this quality of scholarship, insight and precision a real feast.’ — David C. J. Lee, Modern Language Review 96.3, 2001, 830-1 (full text online)
  • ‘This authoritative study of Taine's indirectness and inconclusiveness will be an indispensable foundation.’ — unsigned notice, Forum for Modern Language Studies 37.3, 2001, 347
  • ‘A probing and stimulating contribution to Tainian studies.’ — Thomas H. Goetz, Nineteenth-Century French Studies 29.3-4, 2001, 370-1

The Backward Look: Memory and the Writing Self in France 1580-1920
Angelica Goodden
Legenda (General Series) •1 July 2000

  • ‘Reads like an essay by Montaigne... an ambitious and thought-provoking study.’ — Michéle Bissiére, French Review 76.3, 2003, 592-3
  • ‘It is salutary to read a thoughtful, level-headed and well-informed account of the representation of the self in French writing... there is no doubting the depth, range and persuasiveness of the thesis advanced.’ — Anthony Strugnell, French Studies LVII.3, 2003, 428-30

Towards a New Material Aesthetics: Bakhtin, Genre and the Fates of Literary Theory
Alastair Renfrew
Legenda (General Series) •7 December 2006

  • ‘Alastair Renfrew's book offers an intricate and critical reading of what he sees as the decisive moment of origin of European literary theory in order then to fashion from that reading a (post-)theoretical position for our own time.’ — Graham Pechey, Modern Language Review 103.4, October 2008, 1184-85 (full text online)
  • ‘Genre becomes in Renfrew's treatment of it a useful map for guidance along some of the more intriguing twists and turns in the Bakhtin canon... An important addition to the growing library of Bakhtiniana.’ — Michael Holquist, Slavonic and East European Review 87.1, 2009, 114-15 (full text online)
  • ‘Exceptional new work being produced on the Russian polymath, some of the most interesting of which was coming out of the University of Sheffield, whose Bakhtin Centre supports the work of an outstanding group of language theorists... Karine Zbinden and Alastair Renfrew are two of the excellent younger scholars from the Bakhtin Centre.’ — Michael Bernard-Donals, Slavic Review 68.1, Spring 2009, 193-95

Women in Italian Renaissance Culture and Society
Edited by Letizia Panizza
Legenda (General Series) •1 July 2000

  • ‘In her introduction Letizia Panizza writes that one of the aims of the collection is to recover neglected areas of Italian culture and society, which she has done... Many of the essays are quite good; all are informative.’ — Elissa B. Weaver, Renaissance Quarterly 2002, 713-15
  • ‘Offers a vast and well-organized view of the position that early modern women occupied in Italy from 1400 to 1650... I highly recommend the collection.’ — Rinaldini Russell, Forum Italicum 36.1, 2002, 214-15
  • ‘The above is merely a fraction of the content. There is certainly richness in this volume. Many branches of scholarship gain by having these articles in print and they are an eloquent testimony to the vitality of scholarship in this area.’ — Olwen Hufton, Modern Language Review 97.1, 2002 (full text online)
  • ‘This excellent book of essays... retains the liveliness and originality of the conference held at Royal Holloway, University of London, ... with the added bonus that all those given in Italian have been translated, so that - as the editor says - we can benefit from the work of many specialists, some of whose work has not previously been available in English.’ — Alison Brown, Italian Studies LVII, 2002, 171-2
  • ‘Without doubt, the most important volume yet published in English on the specific contribution of women to culture and society in Italy in the Renaissance... The coherence of the volume is assured by a number of overarching themes.’ — unsigned notice, Forum for Modern Language Studies XXXIX, 2003, 480

Thinking with Shakespeare: Comparative and Interdisciplinary Essays
Edited by William Poole and Richard Scholar
Legenda (General Series) •23 February 2007

  • ‘In his witty, deeply learned and humane "Last Word", Nuttall reminds us that the famous principle of economy in explanation, Ockham's Razor, when applied to Shakespeare's plays, should be renamed "Ockham's Beard", which prompts us to ask of any of Shakespeare's plays, "What else is going on?"... What makes this collection distinctive is that nearly all of these essays focus centrally on genre.’ — Paul Cefalu, Shakespeare Quarterly 59.3, Fall 2008, 345-48
  • ‘Frank Kermode once referred to Nuttall (who died in 2007) as "probably the most philosophically-minded of modern literary critics", and the volume reflects this emphasis... A stimulating collection of pieces, of relevance not just to Shakespeareans but also to anyone with an interest in questions of the nature of literary value.’ — unsigned, Forum for Modern Language Studies 46.1, January 2010, 118-19

Sex in Imagined Spaces: Gender and Utopia from More to Bloch
Caitríona Ní Dhúill
Legenda (General Series) •23 April 2010

  • ‘Ni Dhúill's study shines a bright light on the hitherto neglected importance of sex and gender questions in utopian societies. Sex In Imagined Spaces is a cogently argued, beautifully written, and highly original contribution to knowledge in utopia studies and beyond; it not only mobilizes important wider cultural developments for the analysis of literary texts, but also gives a brilliant gender-theoretical spin to the double function of utopian texts as vision and critique.’ — Anna Katharina Schaffner, Germanistik in Ireland 7 (2013), 228-30
  • ‘This excellent monograph tackles the concept of utopia by repositioning it within the fields of literature and creative practice examined through the lens of the gendered body.’ — unsigned notice, Forum for Modern Language Studies 49.2 (2013)
  • ‘This is an excellent book which deals with the relationship between utopian desire, gender relations, and social outcome in a nuanced and intelligent way.’ — Peter Thompson, Modern Language Review 108.3, 2013, 948-49 (full text online)

Sublime Worlds: Early Modern French Literature
Emma Gilby
Legenda (General Series) •7 December 2006

  • ‘In a book which deals with aspects of a certain literary experience, the presence of Pascal alongside Corneille and Boileau here may at first surprise. The overriding concern with cognition and models of communication, however, vindicates his inclusion, and indeed adds a richness to Gilby's already suggestive study... A sensitive, detailed and compelling treatment, challenging several idées reçues along the way.’ — James Ambrose, Modern Language Review 103.3, July 2008, 851-52 (full text online)
  • ‘Gilby's theory of the sublime as a movement stressing the horizontality of communication rather than the verticality of loftiness offers new insights and adds to earlier work on sublimity by Jules Brody and Marc Fumaroli.’ — C. J. Gossip, New Zealand Journal of French Studies 30.1, 2009, 49-50
  • ‘Gilby’s conception of the sublime is neatly mirrored in her own work, which offers a series of close, nuanced readings that in turn suggest greater insights into the century more generally.’ — unsigned notice, Forum for Modern Language Studies 47.1, January 2011
  • ‘A compelling case for seeing the seventeenth-century French reception of the Longinian sublime as a broader, deeper, and more varied development than is commonly assumed.’ — Richard Scholar, French Studies 65.1, January 2011, 92-93

After Bataille: Sacrifice, Exposure, Community
Patrick ffrench
Legenda (General Series) •24 August 2007

  • ‘In pursuing Bataille’s legacy ffrench seeks not simply to see where it has got to but makes an invaluable contribution to it.’ — Patrick Crowley, Modern Language Review 105.1, January 2010, 254-55 (full text online)
  • ‘Patrick ffrench’s outstanding study provides multiple, meticulously drawn contexts in which Bataille’s writing and thought emerge in a new light, in terms both of their own development over some three decades and of their relation to other, key intellectual trajectories before, during and after that period... essential reading not only for those interested in Bataille but also for anyone concerned with the intellectual and literary history of twentieth-century France.’ — unsigned, Forum for Modern Language Studies 46.1, January 2010, 112-13

Experiment and Metaphysics: Towards a Resolution of the Cosmological Antinomies
Edgar Wind
Legenda (General Series) •1 May 2001

Jacques Derrida and the Institution of French Philosophy
Vivienne Orchard
Legenda (General Series) •4 February 2011

  • ‘Orchard’s careful attention to significant details promises to refresh thinking in an important area of theory and philosophy.’ — Sarah Wood, French Studies 66.4 (October 2012), 581

The Near and Distant God: Poetry, Idealism and Religious Thought from Hölderlin to Eliot
Ian Cooper
Legenda (General Series) •3 October 2008

  • ‘This is an intellectually distinguished, engagingly written and outstandingly original book, which succeeds admirably in its aim of tracing the close and continuous connection of lyric poetry, philosophical idealism and religious thought from Hölderlin to Eliot... Its achievement is as relevant to theology as it is to German Studies and deserves the widest possible readership.’ — unsigned, Forum for Modern Language Studies 46.1, January 2010, 110
  • ‘A sophisticated example of how literary studies may benefit from approaches that are theologically and spiritually mindful.’ — Helena M. Tomko, Modern Language Review 105.2, 2010, 512-13 (full text online)
  • ‘This study is densely written (something that should be applauded rather than criticized!) and cogently argued... Intellectually highly rewarding.’ — Rüdiger Görner, Comparative Critical Studies 7.2–3, 2010, 405-08
  • ‘He avoids the pitfall of many comparable studies, in which poems are merely mined for their philosophical content--a fate that especially Holderlin, Rilke, and Eliot have frequently suffered in the past. His readings of the poems emphasize the process of writing and reading--in these processes, transcendence can be experienced, and the promise of community be enacted. Cooper's fine analytical skills give us many fresh perspectives on a series of major poems.’ — Johannes Wich-Schwarz, Christianity and Literature Autumn 2010
  • ‘What seems like a huge and bold undertaking is impressively achieved... compelling and, at times, beautiful writing.’ — Carly McLaughlin, Archiv für das Studium der neueren Sprachen und Literaturen 248, 2011, 166-67
  • ‘Cooper succeeds in establishing the centrality of theology to the work of Hölderlin, and in tracing the afterlife of Hölderlin's poetic religiosity he expands our awareness of the prehistory of the high modernist struggle to come to terms with Spirit.’ — Nathaniel Davis, Journal of Modern Literature 35.1, Fall 2011, 196-99

Dante the Lyric and Ethical Poet: Dante lirico e etico
Edited by Zygmunt G. Barański and Martin McLaughlin
Legenda (General Series) •23 April 2010

  • ‘The essay by Justin Steinberg deserves emphasis... it makes a significant contribution to modern Dante scholarship. In a well-argued and well-documented approach, Steinberg discusses Dante’s dreams in Vita nova and the author’s use of dreams to explore questions of truth and fiction.’ — Unn Falkeid, Renaissance Quarterly 64.1, Spring 2011, 157-58
  • ‘All in all, then, this is an impressive volume—a shade formidable, I would say, in respect of its user unfriendliness (acres of text on the page and a rather intrusive accumulation of translations and references in the body of the text)—but impressive for all that.’ — John Took, Modern Language Review 107.1, January 2012, 290-92 (full text online)

Force from Nietzsche to Derrida
Clare Connors
Legenda (General Series) •23 April 2010

Regarding Lost Time: Photography, Identity, and Affect in Proust, Benjamin, and Barthes
Katja Haustein
Legenda (General Series) •30 January 2012

  • ‘Katja Haustein’s monograph charts new territory in the expanding study of autobiographical writing in the light of photography... this volume will no doubt be of great benefit to specialists of these three seminal authors, as well as to those working in comparative studies.’ — Kathrin Yacavone, French Studies 67.2 (April 2013), 271-72
  • ‘Katja Haustein undertakes a titanic task: to bring together three bulwarks of twentieth-century intellect, each one so seminal in their own right that even the thought of combining them in one study would seem quixotic. Haustein not only accomplishes the task, but manages to bring out a genuinely comparative account... it is a very useful book to have read, and one which, I am certain, I will return to again and again.’ — Eleni Papargyriou, Comparative Critical Studies 10, 2013, 407-09
  • ‘This book contains several beautiful, thoughtfully chosen illustrations, and is a useful source of information about scholarship in German on Proust... a significant and stimulating contribution to the scholarship on these three important writers.’ — Áine Larkin, Modern Language Review 110.1, January 2015, 228-29 (full text online)

The Picture as Spectre in Diderot, Proust, and Deleuze
Thomas Baldwin
Legenda (General Series) •4 February 2011

  • ‘Current critical debates on both spectrality and ekphrastic poetics are greatly enriched by Thomas Baldwin’s tightly woven and theoretically intricate study.’ — Margaret Topping, French Studies 67.1 (January 2013), 125

Victor Hugo, Jean-Paul Sartre, and the Liability of Liberty
Bradley Stephens
Legenda (General Series) •12 May 2011

  • ‘Liberty may be a liability, but in Hugo and in Sartre it has two strong, subtle, and surprisingly complementary exponents. For the detail of its analyses and for the breadth of its final perspectives, this volume is, therefore, a welcome addition to the Legenda imprint.’ — Owen Heathcote, French Studies 66.3, July 2012, 422-23
  • ‘Bradley Stephens explores unexpected, intriguing connections between Victor Hugo's and Jean-Paul Sartre's visions of liberty in this clearly written study... Brings a unique analysis of Hugo's and Sartre's work, offering insights that may challenge readers to reconsider their previous understandings.’ — Marva A. Barnett, Modern and Contemporary France 20.2, 2012, 281-82
  • ‘Stephen’s work provides equally valuable insights for Hugo and Sartre specialists as it does for students of modern culture. Previous scholarship is pleasingly woven into Stephens’s argument and his writing style is quick and fluid, itself more dynamic as the work progresses.’ — Andrea S. Thomas, Nineteenth-Century French Studies 41.3-4, 2013, 326-28
  • ‘Informed by the latest literary criticism, up to speed with philosophical debates, knowledgeable on secondary literature in English and in French on both Hugo and Sartre... Stephens sets up a dialogue between Hugo, the nineteenth-century writer and Sartre, whom Foucault (in-)famously referred to as ‘a man of the nineteenth century’... This book is excellent on philosophy of language and moral philosophy, and it should be of interest to scholars of either Hugo or Sartre, or both, as well as to post-modernists interested in human experience and freedom.’ — Jean-Pierre Boulé, Sartre Studies International 19.1, 2013, 91-102

Enlightenment Cosmopolitanism
Edited by David Adams and Galin Tihanov
Legenda (General Series) •26 August 2011

Symbol and Intuition: Comparative Studies in Kantian and Romantic-Period Aesthetics
Edited by Helmut Hühn and James Vigus
Legenda (General Series) •21 December 2012

  • ‘Skilfully planned and structured, the volume offers original research on less familiar material while it lucidly covers most of the essential formulations of the symbol from the late eighteenth century onwards, thus speaking to readers of different backgrounds... It is Hühn and Vigus’s broad conception of the subject that ensures the collection’s originality and secures its unique place among the increasing studies of the symbol.’ — Stephanie Dumke, Angermion 7, 2014, 191-93
  • ‘This rich volume successfully inducts its readers into key aesthetic-philosophical debates around 1800, while at the same time breaking new ground by extending our understanding of the variations and functions of ‘symbol’ and ‘intuition’ within the works of individual writers and thinkers. It also makes meaningful comparisons and connections between texts that have not been discussed together before. The editors have drawn together a wide range of international scholars from the fields of German, English, and philosophy into a timely discussion.’ — James Hodkinson, Modern Language Review 110.3, July 2015, 786-88 (full text online)

Transformative Change in Western Thought: A History of Metamorphosis from Homer to Hollywood
Edited by Ingo Gildenhard and Andrew Zissos
Legenda (General Series) •4 March 2013

  • ‘This audacious volume is concerned with nothing less than the almost 3000-year metamorphosis of the concept of metamorphosis in the Western imaginary... A most compelling entry in the history of ideas.’ — Dan Curley, Bryn Mawr Classical Review online, 2014.09.41
  • ‘The volume is exciting, enjoyable as well as serious, and therefore not only suggestive for future research but also set to be useful in teaching. I would happily assign relevant portions of it in courses on classical traditions and receptions. Whether in the classroom or elsewhere, it deserves to reach a large audience.’ — Benjamin Eldon Stevens, American Journal of Philology 135.3, Fall 2014, 492-96

Renaissance Keywords
Edited by Ita Mac Carthy
Legenda (General Series) •23 February 2013

  • ‘A thoughtful, well-written and engaging volume whose accessible presentation of wide-ranging but precise detail should appeal to the Renaissance specialist and the general reader alike.’ — unsigned notice, Forum for Modern Language Studies 50.2, April 2014, 231
  • ‘These chapters share an approach, drawing insights from close attention to both dictionary definitions and uses of terms in different contexts, and thereby provide excellent examples of ‘word histories’.’ — Hugh Roberts, French Studies 68.2, April 2014, 241-42
  • ‘By bringing together intellectual history and philology in ways that are both rigorous and ambitious, the essays in Renaissance Keywords constitute a great contribution to the field of Renaissance and early modern studies. The book, however, transcends the limits of its field and offers anyone interested in the history of ideas important insights of the ways in which lan- guage in its ever-evolving nature determines ideas and worldviews.’ — Pablo Maurette, Modern Philology 112.3, February 2015, E231-33

Shandean Humour in English and German Literature and Philosophy
Edited by Klaus Vieweg, James Vigus and Kathleen M. Wheeler
Legenda (General Series) •4 March 2013