Behavior change in the modern age - help me identify this recent book and the list where I saw it

June 9, 2010 7:29 PM

Behavior change in the modern age - help me identify this recent book and the list where I saw it

Something that's been driving me crazy: I saw a book mentioned within a list of other interesting books and thought I'd marked it to read later. Turns out not. The book was about how modern people are psychologically different from their forebears in the Middle Ages and pre-industrial age due to the effects of industrialization and urbanization, and why this makes it hard for moderns to understand previously-written literature.

Ring any bells? Bonus points for resurrecting the list from the ashes :)

posted by mjklin to Society & Culture (3 answers total)

It sounds a little like At Day’s Close: Night in Times Past which is lurking on my to-read list. Less about the literature part, though.
posted by donnagirl at 9:16 PM on June 9, 2010

Best answer: Think I found it...here. The book is The Crisis of the Twelfth Century by Robert Bartlett.

90% certain this is it. But I'll add At Day's Close to my list too...thanks!
posted by mjklin at 1:17 PM on June 10, 2010

I see your question was answered, but you may also be interested in the following books:

Disenchanted Night: The Industrialization of Light in the Nineteenth Century by Wolfgang Schivelbusch
The Railway Journey: The Industrialization and Perception of Time and Space (also by Schivelbusch)
Electrifying America: Social Meanings of a New Technology, 1880-1940 by David Nye
posted by dhens at 1:34 PM on June 10, 2010