Political Essay on the Island of Cuba: A Critical Edition
About this ebook
Humboldt’s most controversial book, Political Essay on the Island of Cuba was banned, censored, and willfully mistranslated to suppress Humboldt’s strong antislavery sentiments. It reemerges here, newly translated from the original two volume French edition, to introduce a new generation of readers to Humboldt’s astonishing multiplicity of scientific and philosophical perspectives. In their critical introduction, Vera Kutzinski and Ottmar Ette emphasize Humboldt’s rare ability to combine scientific rigor with a cosmopolitan consciousness and a deeply felt philosophical humanism. The result is a work on Cuba of historical import that will attract historians of science as well as cultural historians, political scientists, and literary scholars.
About the author
Vera M. Kutzinski is the Martha Rivers Ingram Professor of English, professor of comparative literature, and director of the Alexander von Humboldt in English (HiE) project at Vanderbilt University. Ottmar Ette is chair of romance literature at the University of Potsdam, Germany, and the author of many books on Humboldt.
