The Origins of Kant's Aesthetics

Organized around eight themes that are relevant to aesthetic theory, this book examines the sources and development of Kant's aesthetics.

Robert R. Clewis (Author)

9781009209427, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 26 January 2023

288 pages
23.5 x 15.8 x 2.1 cm, 0.55 kg

Organized around eight themes central to aesthetic theory today, this book examines the sources and development of Kant's aesthetics by mining his publications, correspondence, handwritten notes, and university lectures. Each chapter explores one of eight themes: aesthetic judgment and normativity, formal beauty, partly conceptual beauty, artistic creativity or genius, the fine arts, the sublime, ugliness and disgust, and humor. Robert R. Clewis considers how Kant's thought was shaped by authors such as Christian Wolff, Alexander Baumgarten, Georg Meier, Moses Mendelssohn, Johann Sulzer, Johann Herder, Francis Hutcheson, David Hume, Edmund Burke, Henry Home, Charles Batteux, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and Voltaire. His resulting study uncovers and illuminates the complex development of Kant's aesthetic theory and will be useful to advanced students and scholars in fields across the humanities and studies of the arts.

Introduction
Part I. Aesthetic Judgment and Beauty: 1. On Rules of Taste
2. Beauty Free
3. Beauty Grounded
Part II. Genius and the Fine Arts: 4. Genius, Thick and Thin
5. Classifying the Fine Arts
Part III. Negative and Positive States: 6. Meet the Sublime Now: It's a Negative Pleasure
7. Ugliness and Disgust: Disagreeable Sensations
8 Playing with Humor
Closing Reflections.

Subject Areas: Ethics & moral philosophy [HPQ], Philosophy: aesthetics [HPN], History of Western philosophy [HPC]