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(Re)encountering Individuality: Schlegel's Romantic Imperative as a Response to Nihilism

2011; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 54; Issue: 6 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/0020174x.2011.628078

1502-3923

Keren Gorodeisky,

German Literature and Culture Studies

Abstract Abstract According to Friedrich Schlegel: "The Romantic imperative demands [that] all nature and science should become art [and] art should become nature and science"; "[P]oetry and philosophy should be made unified", and "life and society [should be made] poetic". The aim of this paper is to explain why Schlegel believes that this is an imperative that constrains philosophy and ordinary life. I argue that the answer to this question requires that we regard the Romantic imperative as a response to the skeptical worry that was introduced by Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi as nihilism. The aspect of nihilism that I discuss concerns the worry that we are incapable of experiencing individuals qua individuals. According to Schlegel, this skeptical threat requires a reorientation in thought and philosophical method, one that must be modeled on the aesthetic orientation towards the world. More precisely, the experience of individuals qua individuals, which is called into question by the nihilist, depends on the special normative structure of the creative and critical attitude towards art and beauty that Schlegel called Romantic Poesie. Kant failed to address nihilism because he failed to recognize that the normative structure that he himself ascribed to the judgment of taste is required also for experiencing individuals as individuals, and for being properly responsive to persons. Notes 1. By Early German Romanticism, I refer to the group formed mainly around Friedrich Schlegel and August Wilhelm Schlegel in Jena and Berlin roughly between 1794 and 1801. 2. Schlegel, Fragments on Literature and Poesy, in: Kritische Friedrich-Schlegel-Ausgabe, vol. XVI, p. 134, no. 586. All citations from Schlegel are to this edition and are followed by the volume, page and, when relevant, fragment numbers. Abbreviations: Critical Fragments [CF], Athenaeum Fragments [AF], Lectures on Transcendental Philosophy 1800–1801 [TP]. 3. I borrow the idea of using this phrase to explain a central aspect of Schlegel's Romantic project from Frederick Beiser's illustrative use of the term both in the title and in the body of his book The Romantic Imperative. 4. Schlegel draws the connection between poetry and morality also in Ideas, II, p. 264, no. 89, no. 90, and in CF, II, p. 148, no. 16 that I cite below. 5. This is a paraphrase of the notorious epithet that Rudolph Haym ascribed to Schlegel's Romantic fellow traveler, Novalis. Haym referred to Novalis as a "poetically exaggerated Fichte", in Haym (1882 Haym, R. 1882. Die romantische Schule, Berlin: Gaertner. [Google Scholar], p. 332). 6. For a clear account of this concept, see Beiser (2003b Beiser, F. 2003b. The meaning of 'romantic poetry'. The Romantic Imperative, : 6–22. [Google Scholar]). 7. See mainly, Beiser (2002 Beiser, F. 2002. 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Friedrich Schlegel, Romanticism, and the re-enchantment of nature. Inquiry, 48: 3–25. [Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) respectively. 9. For his endorsement of Kant's project, see for example, AF, II, p. 200, no. 220, and no. 357. His general agreement with Kant's general view of the essential role of both receptivity and spontaneity in knowledge appears in his criticism of Fichte's philosophy in On the Science of Knowledge (1796), XVIII, pp. 3–14, nos. 1–125; The Spirit of the Science of Knowledge (1797–1798), XIII, pp. 31–39, nos. 126–227; and Beilage I and Beilage II, XVIII, pp. 505–16, 517–21. 10. Some of his other criticisms of Kant appear in XVIII, p. 5, no. 10; IXX, p. 346, in TP, XII, p. 163 and in XII, p. 268; XII, p. 291. 11. For detailed accounts of Jacobi's thought in English, see Beiser (1987 Beiser, F. 1987. The Fate of Reason: German Philosophy from Kant to Fichte, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar], Ch. 2 and 4); Beiser (1992 Beiser, F. 1992. Enlightenment, Revolution and Romanticism: The Genesis of Modern German Political Thought, 1790–1800, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. [Google Scholar], Ch. 6); Di Giovanni (1994 Di Giovanni, G. 1994. "Introduction: The unfinished philosophy of Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi". In F.H. Jacobi: The main Philosophical Writings and the Novel Allwill [MPW], Edited by: George di Giovanni. Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press. [Google Scholar], specifically pp. 154–76). 12. This use of the term appears in Letter to Fichte. In The Fate of Reason (1987), Frederick Beiser explains Jacobi's use of the term "nihilism" by reference only to this understanding of the term (pp. 81–83). However, in a recent conversation, Beiser clarified that he now believes that Jacobi used the term in the two senses I introduce in the body of the text. 13. See for example, Jacobi, "Concerning the Doctrine of Spinoza", pp. 187, 189. 14. Here I follow Paul Franks's masterful reconstruction of Jacobi's understanding of nihilism. See Franks (2000 Franks, P. 2000. "All or nothing: Systematicity and nihilism in Jacobi, Reinhold, and Maimon". In The Cambridge Companion to German Idealism, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) and Franks (2005 Franks, P. 2005. All or Nothing, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. [Google Scholar], Ch. 2 and 3). 15. I am not interested in Jacobi's own criticism of Kant here, but only in Schlegel's appropriation of it. The former is controversial since it presupposes that Kant is a subjective idealist like Berkeley. Schlegel's criticism is independent of this reading of Kant, and therefore, it does more justice to Kant's view. Moreover, since I take the first sense of nihilism to be applicable to Kant's project only if it is read as a form of subjective idealism, I focus only on the second sense of nihilism. 16. Nihilism has an additional ontological sense as a worry about the possibility of individual existence. I do not discuss this sense of nihilism in this paper because I don't think Schlegel is concerned about it. 17. The textual evidence for this interpretation is cited in the rest of the paper. 18. See mainly, Critique of the Power of Judgment [CPJ] Unpublished Introduction [UI], V–VII, 20:211–221, and Introduction [I], IV–V, 5:179–86. I explain Kant's view of this capacity below. Citations to Kant's works are to the title or abbreviated title of the work, preceded by the volume and page number of the Akademie Ausgabe. Citations to the Critique of Pure Reason [CPR] are cited in the standard way, by the page numbers of both the first [A] and second [B] editions. Citations from the Anthropology are quoted from Kant (1978 Kant, I. [1800] 1978. Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View, Edited by: Victor Lyle Dowdell. Illinois: Southern Illinois University Press. [Google Scholar]). Citations from all of Kant's other works are quoted from The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant. Modifications to these translations are noted in the text. Abbreviations: Jäsche Logik [JL]; Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals [G], Religion within the Boundaries of Reason Alone [R], Metaphysik Mrongovius [MM]. 19. In AF, no. 82, for example, Schlegel distinguishes between demonstrations and proofs, on the one hand, and proposals or witty definitions, on the other hand. For discussions of wit [Witz], see CF, II, p. 158, no. 96; p. 160, no. 109, of irony, see, CF, II, p. 160, no. 108, of spiritual love, Dialogue On Poetry, II, pp. 333–34, and of the longing [Sehnsucht] for the infinite, see TP, XII, p. 6. 20. For Schlegel's requirement that experience in general (be it the experience of an individual or not) be constrained by some "limit", see Concerning the Theory of Scientific Knowledge, XVIII, pp. 3–14. 21. The universality that Kant attributes to theoretical and practical concepts, and the subjective but universal norm of the judgment of taste (Section VI) are both normative rather than merely quantitative. Concepts are universal by virtue of their being representations that provide rules for the unification of other representations (CPR, B94/A69, A79/B105; JL, 9:101), and the CI is universal in the sense that it embodies a law—a universal unconditional requirement. Accordingly, the distinction I draw between general norms and individual norms is itself normative and not merely quantitative. 22. For example, it is always possible that we find another concept that represents Caius more specifically than the proper name "Caius". For Kant, a proper name does not represent its object by means of its individual features. As a concept, it necessarily represents its object by means of features that are in principle general and applicable to other objects. The one exception for Kant is the concept of omnitudo realitatis (All of Reality), CPR, A571/B591–A583/B611. 23. In his terms, all cognition is "discursive," A68/B93, A299–300/B256–57, and G, 412. 24. For only a drop in the bucket, see Fragments on Literature and Poesy, XVI, p. 138, no. 634 and AF, II, p. 244, no. 415). Cf. Novalis's claim that a work of art must be regarded as a "living individual" (Novalis, 1965 Novalis. 1965. Schriften: Die Werke Friedrich von Hardenbergs [NS], Edited by: Paul Kluckhon, Hans-Joachim Mähl and Richard Samuel. Stuttgart: Verlag W. Kohlhammer. [Google Scholar], vol. II, p. 534, no. 3). 25. CPJ, UI, 20:215–16, cf. 20:216–17 and I, 5:180. I use the expression "reflecting judgment in its logical use," or "logical reflecting judgment" to refer to the activity that Kant takes to be required in order to form empirical concepts and particular laws of nature. 26. See for example, CPJ, UI, 20:203–04n and I, 5:183 respectively. 27. E.g., it allows us to take the complementary relations among features such as branches and leaves (of whatever kind) as limiting the scope of properties that belong to the intension of the possible concept "tree"—but not to any individual tree. For an excellent explanation of this capacity, see Zuckert (2007 Zuckert, R. 2007. Kant on Beauty and Biology, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]). 28. CPJ, UI, 20:224. Here I paraphrase Kant's distinction between logical reflecting (and determining) judgments and judgments of taste. 29. CPJ, §77, 5:407. The distinction I draw here between a composite unity and a reciprocal or holistic unity corresponds to Kant's distinction between compositum and totum (CPR, A438/B466), and between "analytic universal" and "synthetic universal" (CPJ, §77, 5:407). On my reading, Schlegel's distinction between practical unity and physical unity (Fragments on Literature and Poesy, XVI, p. 103, no. 217), and his distinction between an aggregate [Aggregat] and a "technical whole" [technisches Ganzes] (On Philology, XVI, p. 40, no. 60) correspond to this pair of composite and holistic–reciprocal unities. 30. "…was er durchaus nicht vollenden oder vereingen kann" (CF, II, p. 159, no. 103). 31. For passages about the individuality characteristic of beauty and art, see references in footnote 24. For the individual nature of communities and of nature as a whole, see primarily TP, part II. I thank the anonymous referee of Inquiry for drawing my attention to the significance of this point. 32. G, 4:401, 412. Kant connects the idea of determination to the idea of a law. Laws determine the existence of their objects, whether the objects are things in nature or rational wills (Metaphysics of Natural Science, 4:468–69). 33. About the interrelations of those capacities, see Kant's lectures edited as Metaphysik Mrongovius (1782–3), 28:881 and MM, 6:385. 34. R, 6:26. Within the scope of this paper I cannot explain the details of Kant's account, particularly the complexity of his distinction between humanity and personality (R, 6:26). 35. Our respect for persons is "connected (wholly a priori) with the concept of the will or a rational being as such" (G, 4:426 [the second italics are mine]). 36. One might think that this problem can be solved by reference to Kant's account of the feeling of respect. But although this notion indicates that Kant's view leaves room for emotions and feelings in morality, it does not provide the kind of individual norms that Schlegel looks for. For Kant regards the special feeling of respect as a kind of "rational–emotive" counterpart of a concept, and it is grounded in the concept of the moral law, i.e., in a general norm (MM, 6:401; G, 4:401n). 37. See mainly, CPJ, UI, 20:222–25, I, 5:189–92, 5:211, 5:215, 5:217, 219, 4:284–85, 5:286, 5:287–88, 5:289, 5:290. 38. Particularly, dependent judgments of taste and judgments about fine art. See mainly, CPJ, 5:229–31. 39. 1845, located in the Alte Nationalgalerie, Berlin. One might object to this example and claim that although it is suitable for explaining Schlegel's view, it fails to do justice to Kant's aesthetics because, allegedly, Kant draws a sharp distinction between artistic and natural beauty. Many of the Romantics (above all A.W. Schlegel) accused Kant of illegitimately drawing such a sharp distinction. However, I hold (in agreement with a growing tendency in the literature on the third Critique) that the distinction he draws is not sharp as the Romantics suggested it is. On Kant's account, judgments of fine art and judgments of natural beauty have the same normative form, just as the form of natural beauty is the same as the form of artworks. Kant claims, "beauty (whether it be beauty of nature or of art) can in general be called the expression of aesthetic ideas" (5:320), and, "the judging of artistic beauty will subsequently have to be considered as a mere consequence of the same principles which ground the judgment of natural beauty" (UI, 20:251). Therefore, I think that discussions of artistic beauty can exemplify Kant's view of the normative structure of the judgment of taste in general, whether it is of natural beauty or of art. 40. 5:236. Although I cannot explain the source of this necessity here, suffices it to say that Kant explains it by reference to the grounding I point to at the end of Section VII. See also, CPJ, 5:216–19, and 5:286–89. 41. Novalis puts the point nicely: "For poetry, like philosophy, must be a harmonious mood of our mind, where everything is made beautiful, where everything finds its proper aspect— everything finds an accompaniment and surrounding that suits it" (NS, III, p. 558, no. 21). 42. Since Kant claims that teleological judgments of organism are, like aesthetic judgments, merely reflecting, one might think that they are also subjectively universal. However, and although Kant is far from being unambiguous about the judgments of organisms, he regards them as objective and as issuing concepts of objective ends. E.g., UI, 20:239–40, 20:236–37. 43. On lawfulness as the necessary condition of experience, see CPR, B162–63. For Schlegel's requirement that experience be constrained by some "limit", see reference in footnote 20. 44. I thank Jody Graham and Joshua Spencer for drawing my attention to this paradox. 45. KA, XVIII, pp. 505–16, 517–21. Within the scope of this paper, I cannot explain either of these two notions of transcendental grounding, and the way they are designed to alleviate the sense of paradox. I would only note that Schlegel does not regard this transcendental grounding as a foundational and linear form of grounding, but as a dialectical process. As such, he makes room for the possibility of change and revision, that is, for the possible need to revise an individual norm in light of changes in the individual whose experience it governs. 46. I thank Kelly Jolley and Gabriel Gottlieb for instructive questions that helped me articulate this understanding of Schlegel's view. 47. I thank the anonymous referees of Inquiry, Dafi Agam-Segal, Reshef Agam-Segal, Frederick Beiser, Eric Marcus, Arata Hamawaki, Kelly Jolley and Fred Rush for instructive comments on earlier drafts of this paper. Earlier versions of this paper were presented at a session on German Romanticism in the 2008 meeting of the Eastern Division of the APA, at Auburn University, at the 2009 British Society of the History of Philosophy Conference on Transcendental Philosophy at Manchester Metropolitan University, and at the 2010 GPPC Conference on the Relevance of Romanticism at Villanova University. I thank the audiences on those occasions.