Volume 25 of 1650–1850: Ideas, Aesthetics, and Inquiries in the Early Modern Era investigates the local textures that make up the whole cloth of the Enlightenment. Ranging from China to Cheltenham and from Spinoza to civil insurrection, volume 25 celebrates the emergence of long-eighteenth-century culture from particularities and prodigies. Unfurling in the folds of this volume is a special feature on playwright, critic, and literary theorist John Dennis. Edited by Claude Willan, the feature returns a major player in eighteenth-century literary culture to his proper role at the center of eighteenth-century politics, art, publishing, and dramaturgy. This celebration of John Dennis mingles with a full company of essays in the character of revealing case studies. Essays on a veritable world of topics—on Enlightenment philosophy in China; on riots as epitomes of Anglo-French relations; on domestic animals as observers; on gothic landscapes; and on prominent literati such as Jonathan Swift, Arthur Murphy, and Samuel Johnson—unveil eye-opening perspectives on a “long” century that prized diversity and that looked for transformative events anywhere, everywhere, all the time. Topping it all off is a full portfolio of reviews evaluating the best books on the literature, philosophy, and the arts of this abundant era.

Laurence Sterne’s A Sentimental Journey through France and Italy continues to be as widely read and admired as upon its first appearance. Deemed more accessible than Sterne’s Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, and often assigned as a college text, A Sentimental Journey has received its share of critical attention, but—unlike Tristram Shandy—to date it has not been the subject of a dedicated anthology of critical essays. This volume fills that gap with fresh perspectives on Sterne’s novel that will appeal to students and critics alike. Together with an introduction that situates each essay within A Sentimental Journey’s reception history, and a tailpiece detailing the culmination of Sterne’s career and his death, this volume presents a cohesive approach to this significant text that is simultaneously grounded and revelatory.

There is no shortage of explanations for the longevity of Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, which has been interpreted as both religious allegory and frontier myth, with Crusoe seen as an example of the self-sufficient adventurer and the archetypal colonizer and capitalist. Defoe’s original has been reimagined multiple times in legions of Robinsonade or castaway stories, but the Crusoe myth is far from spent. This wideranging collection brings together eleven scholars who suggest new and unfamiliar ways of thinking about this most familiar of works, and who ask us to consider the enduring appeal of “Crusoe,” more recognizable today than ever before.