This Master's Thesis studies the theme of the stroll (promenade) and the various metaphors it inspires in a selection of humanist works from the 16th and 17th centuries. Furthermore, it attempts to show that the image of the promenade acts as an emblem to various intellectual trends here united under the concept of openness. The diverses uses of the promenade are each considered to be emblematic of a level of ouverture which, in turn, forms the subject of a section of the thesis: I. Openness to the world, where the theme of the stroll is studied in relation to another great humanist commonplace: that of the "book of the world"; II. Openness to the other, where, with special emphasis on Jacques Tahureau's Dialogues (published in 1565), the promenade is shown to be emblematic of the sociability so highly regarded by humanists; III. Rhetorical openness, where, with particular emphasis on Montaigne's Essays (published between 1580 and 1595) and Etienne Pasquier's Letters (published between 1585 and 1619), are examined the rhetorical meanings of the promenade; and finally IV. Philosophical openness, where, with particular emphasis on Francois La Mothe Le Vayer's La Promenade (published between 1662 and 1664), the emblem of the stroll is shown to be inextricably linked to philosophical skepticism. A brief epilogue points to the literary future of the promenade and links the aesthetics of humanist openness to some contemporary epistemological trends.

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Thesis (M.A.)--University of North Carolina at Greensboro, 2007. / Title from PDF title page screen. Advisor: Roberto E. Campo; submitted to the Dept. of Romance Languages-French. Includes bibliographical references (p. 84-87).

Univ., Diss.--Mainz, 2006.

This dissertation asks how literature relates to practices of self-formation. In search of a way to describe this relation with greater concreteness, it examines how specific literary genres mediate formative practices and how literary texts appropriate those genres. Three case studies focus on works written by canonical German-language authors in the years after 1900, when the established relations between literature and practice were breaking down. Rilke's Stunden-Buch revives the devotional prayer book; Kafka's Betrachtung looks back to literary contemplation and meditation; and Walser's “Der Spaziergang” draws on the tradition of literary walking journals. Close readings show how these texts transform the practices regulated by their source genres when those genres began to lose the self-evidence they once enjoyed. The study seeks to strengthen our critical vocabulary for describing literature’s claim on everyday life by demonstrating how practices of self-formation manifest at the textual level. The texts studied can no longer reproduce their source genres’ unambiguous relation to practices (respectively, devotion, reflection, and walking). However, they incite new forms of aesthetic activity to overcome endemic problems with modern social life.