Anesthetic Reading: Ether, Nitrous Oxide, and Nineteenth-Century Interpretation

Abstract

Abstract: Anesthetics like ether and nitrous oxide were popular medical and recreational drugs in the nineteenth century, but, I argue, they also formed the basis of a distinctive interpretive practice. Reading “under the influence” brought the affective resonances of a text to the fore while disrupting logical thinking, opening alternative reading paths. Across the anesthetic experiences of nineteenth-century American writers such as Margaret Fuller, Henry David Thoreau, and William James, two features recur—ineffability and plurality—that together define what I call “anesthetic reading.” Centering James, I show how he performs an anesthetic interpretation of Benjamin Paul Blood, an obscure American mystical philosopher, through a mosaic citational practice whose extensive footnotes stack parallel readings. Ultimately, these experiences suggest a method for non-intoxicated “anesthetic reading” in the present, where readers follow affective lines of insight while remaining sensitive to the ephemeral interpretations that develop out of slow, attentive reading.