Cian Duffy is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Centre for Eighteenth-Century Studies at the University of York.

'Cian Duffy's book is important for its refutation of the popularly held belief that Shelley's early materialism gave way to a Berkeleyan idealism … its correction of the conventional view that Kant is the source of Shelley's responses to the sublime … impressive … in its relation of canonical to marginal texts … as well as its highly persuasive extended readings of these texts. Duffy's accessible style allows Shelley's ideas to be seen clearly.' The Times Literary Supplement

• Introduction: approaching the Shelleyan sublime; 1. From religion to revolution, 1810–13; 2. Cultivating the imagination, 1813–15; 3. Mont Blanc and the Alps, 1816; 4. Writing the revolution: Laon and Cynthia, 1817–23; 5. 'Choose reform or civil war', 1818–19; Conclusion: 'Good and the means of good', 1822; Notes; Bibliography; Index.