This is a sweeping and provocative work of aesthetic theory: a trenchant critique of the philosophy of art as it developed from the eighteenth century to the early twentieth century, combined with a carefully reasoned plea for a new and more flexible approach to art. Jean-Marie Schaeffer, one of France's leading aestheticians, explores the writings of Kant, Schlegel, Novalis, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, and Heidegger to show that these diverse thinkers shared a common approach to art, which he calls the "speculative theory." According to this theory, art offers a special kind of intuitive, quasi-mystical knowledge, radically different from the rational knowledge acquired by science. This view encouraged theorists to consider artistic geniuses the high-priests of humanity, creators of works that reveal the invisible essence of the world. Philosophers came to regard inexpressibility as the aim of art, refused to consider second-tier creations genuine art, and helped to create conditions in which the genius was expected to shock, puzzle, and mystify the public. Schaeffer shows that this speculative theory helped give birth to romanticism, modernism, and the avant-garde, and paved the way for an unfortunate divorce between art and enjoyment, between "high art" and popular art, and between artists and their public. Rejecting the speculative approach, Schaeffer concludes by defending a more tolerant theory of art that gives pleasure its due, includes popular art, tolerates less successful works, and accounts for personal tastes. "[A] remarkable work...[Schaeffer's] writing is governed by ...the ideals of clarity and consequence, the ideas of logic, truth, and evidence...Schaeffer is so precise and unrelenting a philosophical critic that one wonders how some of the philosophies he anatomizes here can possibly survive the operation."--From the foreword by Arthur C. Danto
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A work of aesthetic theory: a trenchant critique of the philosophy of art as it developed from the eighteenth century to the early twentieth century.
Foreword. The Speculative Philosophers of Art by Arthur C. Danto ix Introduction 3 Part One: WHAT IS PHILOSOPHICAL AESTHETICS? CHAPTER 1 Kantian Prolegomena to an Analytic Aesthetics 17 THE JUDGMENT OF TASTE AND FINALITY WITHOUT REPRESENTATION OF A SPECIFIC END 19 NATURAL BEAUTY AND ARTIFICIAL BEAUTY: THE STATUS OF THE FINE ARTS 31 GENIUS AND TASTE 40 THE WORK OF ART IN KANT AND IN ROMANTICISM 49 AESTHETICS, META-AESTHETICS, AND THEORY OF ART 55 Part Two: THE SPECULATIVE THEORY OF ART CHAPTER 2 The Birth of the Speculative Theory of Art 67 Poetry as the Sublation of Metaphysics (Novalis) 72 FROM PHILOSOPHY TO POETRY 73 THE SPECULATIVE THEORY OF POETRY 81 QUESTIONS 90 The History of Literature as a Speculative Project (Friedrich Schlegel) 96 HISTORICISM 97 LITERATURE 102 THEORY AND HISTORY OF LITERATURE 107 LITERATURE AS AN ORGANISM 114 ANCIENT AND MODERN 121 THE THEORY OF GENRES 129 CHAPTER 3 The System of Art (Hegel) 135 ART 138 ART, PHILOSOPHY, AND RELIGION 146 PHILOSOPHICAL KNOWLEDGE OF ART: SYSTEM AND HISTORY 152 ART AS AN ORGANIC SYSTEM 158 THE ARTS 166 THE ART OF ART: POETRY 174 CHAPTER 4 Ecstatic Vision or Cosmic Fiction? 182 From AnagoGy to Artistic Redemption (Schopenhauer) 186 THE PLACE OF ART 186 FROM ART TO THE ARTS 194 FROM ART AS DETACHMENT TO PHILOSOPHICAL WISDOM 201 The Fiction of Truth and the Truth of Fiction (Nietzsche) 208 ART AS A FUNDAMENTAL METAPHYSICAL ACTIVITY 210 THE GENEALOGY OF ART 222 ART AND THE WILL TO POWER 230 CHAPTER 5 Art as the Thought of Being (Heidegger) 237 HEIDEGGER AND ROMANTICISM 239 ART AND TRUTH OF BEING 246 ART AS HISTORICAL FOUNDATION AND AS ECSTATIC DEVIATION 252 POETRY AND THOUGHT 256 AN INTERPRETIVE PRACTICE 265 CONCLUSION What the Speculative Tradition Misunderstood 273 THE SPECULATIVE THEORY OF ART IN "THE MODERN ART WORLD" 274 THE SPECULATIVE THEORY OF ART AS A PERSUASIVE DEFINITION: CONCERNING "MODERNIST" HISTORICISM 284 AESTHETICS AND ART 292 ON AESTHETIC PLEASURE 298 Notes 309 Index of Names 347 Index of Concepts 351
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"Art of the Modern Age is an important contribution to the field, and its readership should not be limited to philosophers. While Schaeffer is not afraid to do the necessary detail work, he never gets mired in issues of merely scholastic interest."--F.L. Rush, Bookforum "This academically solid, well-documented book ... [offers] very good background for courses in the history of aesthetics or art theory."--Choice
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Produktdetaljer

ISBN
9780691144368
Publisert
2009-07-26
Utgiver
Vendor
Princeton University Press
Vekt
510 gr
Høyde
229 mm
Bredde
152 mm
Aldersnivå
U, P, 05, 06
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Heftet
Antall sider
376

Oversetter

Biographical note

Jean-Marie Schaeffer is Research Director at the Centre National de la recherche scientifique in Paris. He is also a member of the Centre de recherches sur les arts et la langage (Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, Paris). His books include "Les Celibataires de l'Art: Pour une esthetique sans mythes" and "Qu'est-ce qu'un genre litteraire?" Arthur C. Danto is Johnsonian Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at Columbia University.