Shifting perspectives between eclectic cultural criticism and intellectual history, Nash (English, Indiana U.) charts the appearance of the wild man in novels, broadsheets, pamphlets, and fair booths throughout eighteenth century England, and discusses how his portrayal reveals a complex alter ego to the idealized abstraction of "the citizen of the Enlightenment." Nash reflects on the exchange between literary accounts and real material beings, offering that expressions of the wild man helped shape preconceptions by which real beings were observed and recognized by Europeans. Annotation (c) Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)