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rmtbray's review
2.0
A history of ideas about smell, cleanliness, health and illness in France, starting in the early modern period up to the turn of the 20th century... I didn't read all of this in detail because it was research for an essay, but what I did read wasn't particularly easy to follow, dates weren't often mentioned so it was hard to trace exactly what was happening, and it was hard to follow exactly what Corbain was getting at in several chapters. Maybe this was because he was writing about difficult, commonly changing ideas, but first it was odour carries illness, then it doesn't, then it does again... I would recommend [b:Concepts of Cleanliness: Changing Attitudes in France Since the Middle Ages|11148544|Concepts of Cleanliness Changing Attitudes in France Since the Middle Ages|Georges Vigarello|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1328037676s/11148544.jpg|2009555] instead of this, an earlier book that explains things much more clearly.
atsundarsingh's review
4.0
Difficult, but incredibly interesting work to contextualize the absence of scent from everyday/historical analysis. Corbin connects the history of smell to germ theory, the rise of the individual, and even to architecture in unexpected and exciting ways.
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