Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Vorlesungen über die Aesthetik [Essays on Aesthetics]

Andrew Sola

Ed. by Gerhard P. Knapp, University of Utah
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.4.1: German-language Writing and Culture: Germany, 500-present.
Vol. editors: Gerhard P. Knapp (University of Utah), Jennifer Marston William (Purdue University), Herbert Rowland (Purdue University), Jill E. Twark (East Carolina University)

Domains

Aesthetics

Dates

First circulation or publication 1820 - 1829

Places

Germany, Baden-Württemberg (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Essays/ Lectures (any)

Resources

Why must one turn either the creation of art or the appreciation of art into a rigorous philosophical discipline? After all, isn’t art simply a luxury that we appreciate in our spare time for amusement? And if art has a practical function, isn’t it merely to develop our moral faculties through the imaginative practice of putting ourselves in another’s place? Also, with respect to the continuous debates about good and bad art, doesn’t the appreciation of art simply boil down to an issue of taste anyway? When compared to reality, isn’t art simply a deceptive facsimile of it? Lastly, doesn’t art, since it springs forth from the imaginative capacities of the mind, resist any attempt to codify its rules scientifically or philosophically?

G. W. F. Hegel, in his Lectures on Aesthetics, argues that art—he means...

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4722 words

Citation: Sola, Andrew. "Vorlesungen über die Aesthetik". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 05 April 2012 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=8654, accessed 09 June 2026.]