Idealism and Romanticism

Abstract

The literary aesthetics of the eighteenth century is discussed with regard to the growth of the novel as a literary genre, noting it that is not incorporated much into aesthetics. It is in the late eighteenth century that Romantic philosophers such as Friedrich Schlegel begin to develop a philosophy of the novel based on its appeal to subjectivity and unstable perspectives, summed up in the term ‘irony’. Hegel’s reaction to Schlegel and less elevated role for the novel is explored along with related aspects of his literary aesthetics. This chapter then covers the role of nature, particularly as known to chemistry as a model for understanding and appreciating the novel, or at least setting up the possibility of doing so.