A History of Aesthetic

Published in 1892 by a leading British philosopher, this book traces aesthetic theory from ancient Greece to the Victorian era.

Bernard Bosanquet (Author)

9781108040228, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 8 December 2011

526 pages
21.6 x 14 x 3 cm, 0.66 kg

After more than ten years teaching ancient Greek history and philosophy at University College, Oxford, the British philosopher and political theorist Bernard Bosanquet (1848–1923) resigned from his post to spend more time writing. He was particularly interested in contemporary social theory, but he was also concerned with philosophical questions about art and aesthetics. In this area, Bosanquet had been influenced by William Morris (1834–96) and John Ruskin (1819–1900), as well as the German philosopher Hegel (1770–1831), and their ideas underlie this book, published in 1892. Bosanquet considered aesthetic theory to be a branch of philosophy, and this work focuses on the evolution of theories about beauty. He begins by considering influential ancient Greek and Roman concepts before seeking out the aesthetic consciousness of the middle ages. The latter part of the book is concerned with theories from eighteenth- and nineteenth-century philosophers.

Preface
1. Proposed treatment, and its connection with the definition of beauty
2. The creation of a poetic world, and its first encounter with reflection
3. The fundamental outlines of Greek theory concerning the beautiful
4. Signs of progress in Greek theory concerning the beautiful
5. Alexandrian and Greco-Roman culture to the reign of Constantine the Great
6. Some traces of the continuity of the aesthetic consciousness throughout the middle ages
7. A comparison of Dante and Shakespeare in respect of some formal characteristics
8. The problem of modern aesthetic philosophy
9. The data of modern aesthetic philosophy
10. Kant - the problem brought to a focus
11. The first steps of a concrete synthesis - Schiller and Goethe
12. Objective idealism - Schelling and Hegel
13. 'Exact' aesthetic in German
14. The methodical completion of objective idealism
15. Beginnings of a theoretical reunion of content and expression
Appendix
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: History of Western philosophy [HPC]