Spinoza and the Specters of Modernity

Spinoza and the Specters of Modernity draws new theoretical conclusions from a study of Spinoza's legacy in the age of Goethe and beyond, largely transmitted through the writings of Herder, that will have implications for the study of German intellectual history and, more broadly, the study of religion and literature. Michael Mack describes how a line of writers and thinkers re-configured Spinoza's ideas and how these ideas thus became effective in society at large. Mack shows that the legacy of Spinoza is important because he was the first thinker to theorize narrative as the constitutive fabric of politics, identity, society, religion and the larger sphere of culture. Indeed, Mack argues for Spinoza's writings on politics and ethics as an alternative to a Kantian conception of modernity.