A History of Ambiguity

Description

Ever since it was first published in 1930, William Empson's Seven Types of Ambiguity has been perceived as a milestone in literary criticism-far from being an impediment to communication, ambiguity now seemed an index of poetic richness and expressive power. Little, however, has been written on the broader trajectory of Western thought about ambigu

Anthony Ossa-Richardson is lecturer in English literature at the University of Southampton. He is the author of The Devil's Tabernacle: The Pagan Oracles in Early Modern Thought (Princeton).

"A History of Ambiguity is unambiguously wonderful - the sort of book I thought no one could write any more . . . Ossa-Richardson's book is an epic love song to scholarship . . . . it's well written and intelligently funny. Ossa-Richardson has the big picture in mind."---Robert Eaglestone, Times Higher Education "Ossa-Richardson demonstrates his mastery of the two classic attributes of the intellectual historian: first, a willingness to do justice to the variety of forms that ideas can take, and second, a close attention to detail in the establishment of intellectual genealogies. As a work of intellectual history, this book is a remarkable achievement."---James Everest, Essays in Criticism