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Johns Hopkins University | AS.010.432

Therapies of Art and Literature from Antiquity to Early Modern Europe

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This seminar examines the myriad ways artists and writers geared their work toward the therapeutic healing of mind, body, and soul, and the role images and texts could play in programs of individual and collective transformation. Taking as our point of departure the ancient tradition of spiritual exercises and inner dialogue, Petrarch's therapy of the passions, and the revival of consolatory letters, we will consider how the Christian artist could invest their work with medicinal, magical, sacramental, or spiritual efficacies, and even take on the mantle of a "physician of souls." Intersections with the histories of medicine and religion will lead us to the ways natural medicine and the thaumaturgical practices associated with pilgrimage could be transposed into the arena of spiritual therapy. Featured authors include Cicero, Marcus Aurelius, Augustine of Hippo, Boethius, Petrarch, Michel Foucault, Pierre Hadot, and Allain de Botton; artists include Hieronymus Bosch, Albrecht Dürer, Matthias Grünewald, and many others.

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