The Art of Literature
()
About this ebook
Arthur Schopenhauer
Nació en Danzig en 1788. Hijo de un próspero comerciante, la muerte prematura de su padre le liberó de dedicarse a los negocios y le procuró un patrimonio que le permitió vivir de las rentas, pudiéndose consagrar de lleno a la filosofía. Fue un hombre solitario y metódico, de carácter irascible y de una acentuada misoginia. Enemigo personal y filosófico de Hegel, despreció siempre el Idealismo alemán y se consideró a sí mismo como el verdadero continuador de Kant, en cuyo criticismo encontró la clave para su metafísica de la voluntad. Su pensamiento no conoció la fama hasta pocos años después de su muerte, acaecida en Fráncfort en 1860. Schopenhauer ha pasado a la historia como el filósofo pesimista por excelencia. Admirador de Calderón y Gracián, tradujo al alemán el «Oráculo manual» del segundo. Hoy es uno de los clásicos de la filosofía más apreciados y leídos debido a la claridad de su pensamiento. Sus escritos marcaron hitos culturales y continúan influyendo en la actualidad. En esta misma Editorial han sido publicadas sus obras «Metafísica de las costumbres» (2001), «Diarios de viaje. Los Diarios de viaje de los años 1800 y 1803-1804» (2012), «Sobre la visión y los colores seguido de la correspondencia con Johann Wolfgang Goethe» (2013), «Parerga y paralipómena» I (2.ª ed., 2020) y II (2020), «El mundo como voluntad y representación» I (2.ª ed., 2022) y II (3.ª ed., 2022) y «Dialéctica erística o Arte de tener razón en 38 artimañas» (2023).
Read more from Arthur Schopenhauer
The Suffering of the World: From the Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Essential Schopenhauer: Key Selections from The World as Will and Representation and Other Writings Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The World as Will and Representation Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Art of Being Right Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 1 of 3) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe World as Will and Idea - Vol. I. Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Wisdom of Life Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Complete Works of Arthur Schopenhauer Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Art of Being Right Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5The World as Will and Representation or Idea III Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Suffering of the World Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsOn the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficien and On the Will in Nature Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to The Art of Literature
Related ebooks
An Introduction to the Study of Literature (Barnes & Noble Digital Library) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Student's Guide to Literature Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5English Literature: Its History and Significance for the Life of the English-Speaking World Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5English Literature, Its History and Its Signi the English-Speaking World Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAn Introduction to English Literature (Barnes & Noble Digital Library) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsElementary Guide to Literary Criticism Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry of Horace Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsEnglish Literature Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English-Speaking World Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Epic Poems Collection Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsEssays in English Literature, 1780-1860 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Poet's Survival Guide Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMacbeth Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAspiring Poetry: Through Famous and Classic Forms Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGreat English Essays: From Bacon to Chesterton Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Varieties of Metaphysical Poetry Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Canterbury Tales Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Poetics of Aristotle Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A History of English Literature Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAmores Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5English Victorian Poetry: An Anthology Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5William Shakespeare’s Sonnets: With linked Table of Contents Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Meaning and Interpretation: Wittgenstein, Henry James, and Literary Knowledge Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5Mrs. Dalloway (Annotated) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Complete Poems of John Donne Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Metamorphosis Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5On the Sublime Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5English Literature Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Sonnets of Shakespeare Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Essays in the Art of Writing Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Philosophy For You
Plato and a Platypus Walk Into a Bar...: Understanding Philosophy Through Jokes Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Four Loves Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Art of War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Art of Loving Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Republic by Plato Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Sun Tzu's The Art of War: Bilingual Edition Complete Chinese and English Text Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Meditations: Complete and Unabridged Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Inward Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Denial of Death Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Human Condition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Beyond Good and Evil Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Course in Miracles: Text, Workbook for Students, Manual for Teachers Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Mindfulness in Plain English: 20th Anniversary Edition Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The City of God Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tao Te Ching: A New English Version Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Daily Stoic: A Daily Journal On Meditation, Stoicism, Wisdom and Philosophy to Improve Your Life Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Courage to Be Happy: Discover the Power of Positive Psychology and Choose Happiness Every Day Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Allegory of the Cave Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Fear: Essential Wisdom for Getting Through the Storm Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tao Te Ching: Six Translations Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Experiencing God (2021 Edition): Knowing and Doing the Will of God Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Egyptian Book of the Dead: The Complete Papyrus of Ani Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Lying Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Bhagavad Gita (in English): The Authentic English Translation for Accurate and Unbiased Understanding Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5
Reviews for The Art of Literature
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
The Art of Literature - Arthur Schopenhauer
GENIUS
ON AUTHORSHIP
THERE are, first of all, two kinds of authors: those who write for the subject’s sake, and those who write for writing’s sake. While the one have had thoughts or experiences which seem to them worth communicating, the others want money; and so they write, for money. Their thinking is part of the business of writing. They may be recognized by the way in which they spin out their thoughts to the greatest possible length; then, too, by the very nature of their thoughts, which are only half-true, perverse, forced, vacillating; again, by the aversion they generally show to saying anything straight out, so that they may seem other than they are. Hence their writing is deficient in clearness and definiteness, and it is not long before they betray that their only object in writing at all is to cover paper. This sometimes happens with the best authors; now and then, for example, with Lessing in his Dramaturgie, and even in many of Jean Paul’s romances. As soon as the reader perceives this, let him throw the book away; for time is precious. The truth is that when an author begins to write for the sake of covering paper, he is cheating the reader; because he writes under the pretext that he has something to say.
Writing for money and reservation of copyright are, at bottom, the ruin of literature. No one writes anything that is worth writing, unless he writes entirely for the sake of his subject. What an inestimable boon it would be, if in every branch of literature there were only a few books, but those excellent! This can never happen, as long as money is to be made by writing. It seems as though the money lay under a curse; for every author degenerates as soon as he begins to put pen to paper in any way for the sake of gain. The best works of the greatest men all come from the time when they had to write for nothing or for very little. And here, too, that Spanish proverb holds good, which declares that honor and money are not to be found in the same purse—honora y provecho no caben en un saco. The reason why Literature is in such a bad plight nowadays is simply and solely that people write books to make money. A man who is in want sits down and writes a book, and the public is stupid enough to buy it. The secondary effect of this is the ruin of language.
A great many bad writers make their whole living by that foolish mania of the public for reading nothing but what has just been printed,—journalists, I mean. Truly, a most appropriate name. In plain language it is journeymen, day-laborers!
Again, it may be said that there are three kinds of authors. First come those who write without thinking. They write from a full memory, from reminiscences; it may be, even straight out of other people’s books. This class is the most numerous. Then come those who do their thinking whilst they are writing. They think in order to write; and there is no lack of them. Last of all come those authors who think before they begin to write. They are rare.
Authors of the second class, who put off their thinking until they come to write, are like a sportsman who goes forth at random and is not likely to bring very much home. On the other hand, when an author of the third or rare class writes, it is like a battue. Here the game has been previously captured and shut up within a very small space; from which it is afterwards let out, so many at a time, into another space, also confined. The game cannot possibly escape the sportsman; he has nothing to do but aim and fire—in other words, write down his thoughts. This is a kind of sport from which a man has something to show.
But even though the number of those who really think seriously before they begin to write is small, extremely few of them think about the subject itself: the remainder think only about the books that have been written on the subject, and what has been said by others. In order to think at all, such writers need the more direct and powerful stimulus of having other people’s thoughts before them. These become their immediate theme; and the result is that they are always under their influence, and so never, in any real sense of the word, are original. But the former are roused to thought by the subject itself, to which their thinking is thus immediately directed. This is the only class that produces writers of abiding fame.
It must, of course, be understood that I am speaking here of writers who treat of great subjects ; not of writers on the art of making brandy.
Unless an author takes the material on which he writes out of his own head, that is to say, from his own observation, he is not worth reading. Book-manufacturers, compilers, the common run of history-writers, and many others of the same class, take their material immediately out of books; and the material goes straight to their finger-tips without even paying freight or undergoing examination as it passes through their heads, to say nothing of elaboration or revision. How very learned many a man would be if he knew everything that was in his own books! The consequence of this is that these writers talk in such a loose and vague manner, that the reader puzzles his brain in vain to understand what it is of which they are really thinking. They are thinking of nothing. It may now and then be the case that the book from which they copy has been composed exactly in the same way: so that writing of this sort is like a plaster cast of a cast; and in the end, the bare outline of the face, and that, too, hardly recognizable, is all that is left to your Antinous. Let compilations be read as seldom as possible. It is difficult to avoid them altogether; since compilations also include those text-books which contain in a small space the accumulated knowledge of