Forbidden Knowledge: From Prometheus to Pornography

Forbidden Knowledge boldly traces the tragic arc of Western literature and culture as it explores the notion of "forbidden knowledge," from the sexual innocence of Adam and Eve to the awe-inspiring discoveries of modern scientists who have created the atomic bomb and recombinant DNA. The result is a dire portrait of human presumption and of a culture that has abandoned all limits in the quest for knowledge and experience. The harrowing imagery that Shattuck presents is matched only by his faith that we can understand our grievous loss of innocence by reexamining our greatest myths and stories of the last two thousand years. In lively, lucid prose Shattuck explores our uncertain fate through such myths as that of Prometheus and a wide range of literary works, including Milton's Paradise Lost, the writings of the Marquis de Sade, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Melville's Billy Budd, and the poetry of Emily Dickinson. Parents and teachers should be aware that Chapter VII does not make appropriate reading for children and minors. In this seminal work, Shattuck breaks new ground in opening up a crucial subject never before accorded this full-scale treatment. Forbidden Knowledge impels us to a renewed effort to think judiciously about morality and the sacred during a decade of radical skepticism. Forbidden Knowledge represents the capstone of Roger Shattuck's career as one of America's most original and gifted thinkers.… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member drewandlori

It makes some interesting points, but tends to make them over and over and over. If you read it, I would recommend skimming heavily.

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LibraryThing member TheBentley

Shattuck's only effective argument in this considerably over-written scholarly study is his argument that violent pornography correlates strongly with sexually sadistic serial killers (although he fails to even address the issue of whether violent pornography is a cause or an effect in that

correlation). Shattuck is a literary scholar attempting sociology, and frankly, he's not very good at it. His concept of language and myth as potential contagion has promise as a literary theory, but it was worthy of far more development than it was given.

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LibraryThing member jvalamala

Interesting, in all but the chapter on the Marquis de Sade. Perhaps the author would have benefited more from extending his reading out into the literature of other cultures (he's certainly well-read). Get a fresh perspective on a civilization sweltering in sin. There's no merit in devolving into

an embarrassing and childish fetish of western literati. What do they say about trawling the sordid for the sublime?

The unicorn and sphinx? Hmm....

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LibraryThing member neurodrew

Shattuck is an English professor with an interesting critical review of knowledge that should remain hidden, including criticism of the fashion for De Sade, and of recent episodes in genetics.

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