Fin de Sicle and its Legacy [Paperback]

Contrary to popular conceptions of decadence, this volume of essays argues that the 1900s, otherwise known as la fin de Siecle, were in fact a time of essentially positive and progressive dramatic change.Contrary to popular conceptions of decadence, this volume of essays argues that the 1900s, otherwise known as la fin de Siecle, were in fact a time of essentially positive and progressive dramatic change.For many years the term fin de si?cle has been used to imply a state of decadence which was thought to have pervaded 'civilised' European society in the years around 1900. This volume of essays, which draw on a very wide range of disciplines, argues that the period was in fact one of dramatic change, essentially positive and forward-looking in character. This was the period of the rise of the giant corporation, of mass production and mass consumption, and of the development of the generation and distribution of electrical energy. Novel social features such as mass politics, mass media, and mass sport involved the body of ordinary people and in the arts, complex reactions to contemporary social reality were aroused and expressed. This was also the period which gave birth to the study of quantum mechanics, relativity physics, mental processes and genetics. This volume forms part of a sequence of collections of essays which began with The Enlightenment in National Context (1981) and has continued with Romanticism in National Context (1988). They bring together comparative, national and interdisciplinary approaches to the history of great movements in the development of human thought and actions.List of illustrations; Notes on contributors; Introduction; 1. A legacy of fin-de-si?cle; 2. Fin-de-si?cle: industrial transformation Alfred D. Chandler Jr; 3. The electrical century: the beginnings of electricity supply in Austria Roman Sandgruger (translated from German by Richard Hockaday); 4. Heralds of modernity: cars and planes from invention to necessity Richard Overy; 5.lÓ.