Marius the Epicurean: His Sensations and Ideas [Paperback]

Walter Pater (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 10, 2003

An elaborately written philosophical novel of ancient Rome which incorporates a retelling of Apuleius' story of Cupid and Psyche. It was as a critic and a humanist that Walter Pater (1839-1894), professor at Oxford, led the revival of interest in Renaissance art and humanism, becoming a powerful influence on his own and succeeding generations, claiming disciples as diverse as Virginia Woolf and Ezra Pound. This philosophic novel is generally considered his masterpiece. It is the story of a young man's spiritual and aesthetic awakening in ancient Rome. Marius, a grave and thoughtful man, reacts to the diverse philosophical forces of his times by journeying from Stoicism to Cyrenaicism to Epicureanism, and finally to Christianity. The Golden Book of Lucius Apuleius, the stoicism of Marcus Aurelius, the tranquil beauties of the old Roman religion, and the lurid horrors of the Christian persecution are interestingly and imaginatively depicted. "A style of perfectly finished beauty, full of an exquisite restraint, and, after all, only the fitting and adequate expression of the exactest thinking." --Athenaeum "Any one who cares to think on counsels of perfection for man's life will find profound and original thought about the ideal elements still at hand in modern days for use, and many wise reflections, sown among these pages. It is a rare work and not carelessly to be read. Some exquisiteness of taste, some delight in scholarship, some knowledge of what is best worth knowing in the historic expressions of man's aspiration, and, above all, that 'inward tacitness of mind' the reader must bring to its perusal." --Nation "The polish of the style, the depth and refinement of the thought, the picturesque descriptions, and the lofty sentiment of the book as a whole, together with the beautiful gravity and impressiveness that mark it generally, make it a work far out of the ordinary current of fiction." --Boston Saturday Evening Gazette

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

From the Back Cover

With his thoughtful sensibility and appreciation of the artistic experience, Walter Pater exerted a dramatic influence over the Aesthetics of the mid to late 19th century: a movement of creative intellectuals, from writer Oscar Wilde to painter James McNeill Whistler, who held that art should be sensual and beauty the highest ideal. Pater's "cult of beauty" also profoundly affected 20th-century arts, literary, and cultural criticism.

Here, in his only novel, a forerunner to the works of James Joyce first published in 1885, Pater takes us on one young man's personal journey from paganism to Christianity in ancient Rome, a didactic work in which Pater explores the role of religion in culture and in art and celebrates the aestheticism he championed in his criticism.

Also available from Cosimo Classics: Pater's The Renaissance. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 364 pages
• Publisher: University Press of the Pacific (June 10, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1410206645
• ISBN-13: 978-1410206640
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.9 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #575,392 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars superb edition of seminal text, May 24, 2008

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Paul Fox (Statesboro, GA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Marius the Epicurean: His Sensations and Ideas (Paperback)

It's great to see this book republished as more than a shoddy, unintroduced print-on-demand edition. It is, without doubt, one of the most important texts from the late-Victorian period, Pater's aesthetics being influential upon not only the Decadents of the 1890s, but for many of the Moderns as well. This edition is a steal, has great notes and a fine introduction. Valancourt are doing sterling work reproducing classics that haven't been seen in decent editions for years, if not decades. I can recommend browsing their catalogue either on Amazon or their homepage- it's well worth it.