Introduction
The introduction lays out the argument of the book: modernity has been investigated as a process of discipline, this needs to be supplemented by an investigation of the increasing role emotions have played. If, until the later decades of the nineteenth century, the actors had aimed at avoiding excesses and achieving a balance, the years leading up to the First World War discovered intense fervor as their ideal—no longer were restraint and control to save the nation and the community, but the ability to feel passionately and to translate these passions into action. The investigation of this process requires to look beyond social norms shaping emotions. It brings together the experience of the actors, the interpretation they gave to their experience and the knowledge they produced on its basis, as well as the practices into which they translated their interpretation.