[Recensione a:] Stella Lange, Gefühle schwarz auf weiß. Implizieren, Beschreiben und Benennen von Emotionen im empfindsamen Briefroman um 1800, Winter, Heidelberg 2016 (Germanisch-Romanische Monatsschrift. Beihefte 77)

The task that Stella Lange assumes with this study is to trace a parable of the development of the concept of emotion between the XVIII and the XXI century, considering the theoretical repercussions that the emotional turn can have on the interpretation of the Briefkultur in the classical-romantic epoch. For this reason, the critical works on which Lange insists most are of a cognitive nature - thinking for example of the text by Antonio Damasio, "Der Spinoza-Effekt. Wie Gefühle unser Leben bestimmen" (I ed.2003). Lange thus characterizes the difference in his approach to the subject compared to exemplary studies on the subject, such as Albrecht Koschorke, "Körperströme und Schriftverkehr. Mediologie des 18. Jahrhunderts" (1999, 20032), which interpolates the historical-medical discourse with that relating to the rhetoric of affects, or with respect to that of Antje Arnold, "Rhetorik der Empfindsamkeit. Unterhaltungskunst im 17. und 18. Jahrhundert" (2012), which focuses mainly on the communicative and media aspect of the Briefkultur, starting from the rhetorical models of the discourse of the ancient world