OT: Single volume history of the philosophy of art?
Your Pal Brian
and doctrines through the ages, from Greek to Medieval to
Renaissance and right on up.
I've done Amazon searches but only came up with hyperspecialized
stuff like "The Skeptical Sublime: Aesthetic Ideology in Pope and
the Tory Satirists" or "Fascist Spectacle: The Aesthetics of
Power in Mussolini's Italy" or God help us "The Way of Inuit Art:
Aesthetics and History in and Beyond the Arctic".
(I find Amazon's search feature growing more and more useless
with each improvement they make, but regardless...)
I've also found a few primary source "readers", but I'm looking
for context, a big players, commanding heights, "Burke said this,
Ruskin said that, then Collingwood responded with the other" kind
of thing.
And as always, the shorter the better. Gregg Toland said a real
expert can explain anything in four hours anyway.
Any ideas?
Brian
dobe...@dropsocal.rr.com
>I've also found a few primary source "readers", but I'm looking
>for context, a big players, commanding heights, "Burke said this,
>Ruskin said that, then Collingwood responded with the other" kind
>of thing.
Walter Jackson Bate (Harvard prof, very famous & now dead) compiled a
history of criticism sort of thing, which started with ancient Greek &
went up to Gasset & Eliot & contemporaries. We used it in grad school.
Parts are either excerpts or whole works, & most are theoretical in
nature. Is this what you're looking for? It's not really history,
though -- it's a compilation of theorists, aestheticians & critics.
Your Pal Brian
Do you mean Criticism: The Major Texts?
I'll certainly check it out. I may have to settle for a "reader" type
thing in the end, but I would like a big-picture history if I can find
one.
Right now I'm reading a book (which you'd probably like actually,
doberdude) called The History and Theory of Rhetoric by James Herrick:
A book just like that but about aesthetics would be just what I need.
One I'm considering is Philosophy of Art by Noel Carroll:
...which divides the issue up by the various schools of thought - art as
representation, art as expression, art as form - and then gives the pros
and cons of each position.
Another organized like that is Aesthetics by Anne Shepard:
And then there's a discursive journalistic type thing called But Is It
Art? by Cynthia Freeland:
But I'd still like a straight history if I can find a good one.
Brian
dobe...@dropsocal.rr.com
>Do you mean Criticism: The Major Texts?
>
>http://tinyurl.com/2wx5x
Yes, that's the one. I don't think it's really what you're looking
for. I just don't know of a general history of aesthetics.
>One I'm considering is Philosophy of Art by Noel Carroll:
>http://tinyurl.com/376vo
>...which divides the issue up by the various schools of thought - art as
>representation, art as expression, art as form - and then gives the pros
>and cons of each position.
A related work, a study of stupendous scope & one that is still highly
esteemed, is Erich Auerbach's "Mimesis," which traces the
representation of reality in fictive & other types of literature in
the West. It's from that great postwar era of literary scholarship, &
Auerbach was a heavy-hitter. I betcha Carroll even refers to Auerbach.
Check the index.
What about that "Aesthetics" title that's part of the Oxford Readers
series? It's being sold with the Carroll book on Amazon.
All right . . . back to my "Frankenstein" DVDs.
Your Pal Brian
> All right . . . back to my "Frankenstein" DVDs.
Heh. You are wise in your generation.
Brian