STEFAN MORAWSKI

The Aesthetic Views of Marx and Engels

I . A CONSIDERABLE LITERATURE h a s Engels by G. Mayer. Marx's readings in grown up around the aesthetic thought of aesthetics prior to 1840 are known only Karl Marx (I8I8-I883); that of Friedrich from letters; his research notebooks before Engels (I820-I895) has received less treat- then are lost, but exist thereafter and are ment. Every assessment properly begins surveyed to 1856 by M. Rubel ("Les cahiers with their actual essays, observations, and de lecture de Karl Marx," International remarks on literature and art. The initial Review of Social History, II, iii [1957], collection of this material was published 392-418 and V, i [I960], 39-76). The Lif- in 1933, in Russian (Ob iskusstvje, ed. A. shitz editions provide the primary source Lunacharski, M. Lifshitz, and F. P. Schil- of other major compilations, e.g., by Jean ler [Moscow]). An augmented Russian Freville (Paris 1937, rev. ed. 1954), V. Ger- edition appeared in 1938; a collection fur- ratana (Milan, 1954), and anonymously ther enlarged was published in German in edited volumes in English (New York, 1948 {Über Kunst und Literatur, ed. M. 1947) and Spanish (Havana, 1965). In ad- Lifshitz [Berlin]), and a yet larger two- dition to the introductory essays to volume collection, edited by Lifshitz, in compilations, the chief interpretations of Moscow in 1957. Another two volume the aesthetic views of Marx and Engels edition, published in Berlin in 1967-68 and are: Peter Demetz, Marx, Engels, and the edited by M. Kliem, offers certain new ma- Poets (Chicago, 1967; Ger. ed., Stuttgart, terials without supplanting the 1948 1959. For a critique, see L. Baxandall, Lifshitz edition. Marx's and Engels's youth- Partisan Review, Winter 1968, pp. 152-56); ful poems, narratives, and aesthetic views Georgij M. Fridlender, K. Marx i F. En- in the late I830's and early I840's are gels i woprosi litjeraturi (Moscow, 1962); found in the so-called MEGA (Historisch- Andrei N. Jezuitow, Woprosi rjealizma w kritische Gesamtausgabe, Frankfurt a.M., estjetike Marxa i Engelsa (Moscow, 1963); 1927-, I Abt., Bd. I). The materials from Georg Lukacs, K. Marx und F. Engels als this period are most fully interpreted by Literaturhistoriker (Berlin, 1948) and Beit- A. Cornu {Karl Marx et Friedrich Engels, räge zur Geschichte der Ästhetik (Berlin, la vie et leur oeuvres, Paris, 1954-62); 1954), pp. 191-285; Pavel S. Trofimov, Cornu bases his work upon the biog- raphy of Marx by F. Mehring and of Otsherki istorii marksistskoj estetiki (Mos- cow, 1963), pp. 5-108; Hans Koch, Marxis- mus und Ästhetik (Berlin, 1962); Henri STEFAN MORAWSKI, professor of aesthetics at the Lefebvre, Contribution à l'esthétique (Paris, University of Warsaw, Poland, taught at the University of California, Berkeley, in the summer 1953); Adolfo Sanchez Vazquez, Las ideas of 1966. He has published many works on aesthet- estéticas de Marx (Mexico City, 1965); Mik- ics in Polish and English. hail Lifshitz, The Philosophy of Art of Karl 302 STEFAN M O R A W S K Î Marx (New York, 1938: Russ. ed., Moscow, ses in direct consultation. Twice Marx 1933); Max Raphael, Proudhon Marx Pi- made plans to write systematically on casso (Paris, 1933), pp. 123-85; W. C. Hof- aesthetics. During the winter of 1841—42 fenschefer, Iz istorii marksistskoj kritiki he worked with Bruno Bauer on a critique (Moscow, 1967), chaps. V and VI; Vera Ma- of Hegel's view of art and religion. And chackova. Der junge Engels und die evidence suggests that he endeavored in Literatur (Berlin, 1961); Franz P. Schiller, 1857 to comply with a request from the Engels kak literaturnij kritik (Moscow, New American Cyclopedia for an article 1933). on "Aesthetics" (to this end, apparently, he again went through F. T. Vischer's writings, 2. Demetz with many other Western E. Miiller's history of ancient Greek aesthet- scholars has sharply demarcated the aes- ics, and other works). Neither undertaking thetic thought of Engels from that of Marx. was carried through to culmination. The To Marx is attributed European taste— question of how their many texts on aes- to Engels, German and provincial taste; thetic matters should be organized is left Marx is said to have been remote from open. A mere chronological ordering would the notion of realism while Engels advo- not in itself be especially enlightening. I will cated it. In truth, just as their home first discuss these problems: (a) whether backgrounds were different, so were the two phases, pre-Marxian and Marxian, enthusiasms of their youth. Engels, who occur in their writings on art and litera- was drawn to the ideas of the funges ture; and (b) the patterns of structural Deutschland movement, practiced literary thematic coherence to be found among criticism. Marx, who was early introduced their scattered ideas and comments. to the classical literary heritage, eagerly The former of these problems cannot imbibed it, and he pursued philosophy and be disposed of, surely, without engaging aesthetics (at Bonn University he was a the question of the Marxian philosophy student of A. W. Schlegel). Yet their early and world-view in its general develop- writings indicate converging trends of in- ment. In Pour Marx (Paris, 1966; Eng. ed., tellectual development; and with the be- 1969), Louis Althusser reopened this con- ginning of their lifelong intimate col- troversy. He regards The German Ideol- laboration (September 1844), their aesthetic ogy as a coupure épistemologique (the views interpenetrated. One can speak term is Bachelard's); in this work of 1845 confidently of the coalescence of their Althusser locates an abandoning of the major aesthetic ideas, a unity of approach, ambiguous idea of humanism in favor of a while noting that their temperaments scientific, i.e., Marxist approach. The no- were not identical and that each had special tion of such a "cut-off point" seems im- interests. Thus is explained their individ- possible to sustain, however. The efficacy ual accent on some topics and problems. of the Marxian world-view does not sub- Marx was more enthusiastic about abstract sist in its being purely scientific—for it thinking, and the more systematic. Engels is social science and treats of a different was the more sensitive and spontaneous. kind of knowledge, and as social science Marx was university trained. The brilliant certain of its obvious elements already Engels was largely self-educated. Marx's appear in the 1844 Manuscripts. Thus to ideal, as Cornu characterizes it, was impose this demarcation on the developing Prometheus; and Engels's, Siegfried of the aesthetic thought of Marx and Engels Nibelungenlied. But the coalescence of would prove equally artificial: a number their approaches is evident, especially in of the concerns they expose in early writ- the two major critiques—E. Sue's The ings, such as artistic freedom vs. aliena- Mysteries of Paris (in The Holy Family, tion (Marx's commentary of 1842 on cen- 1845) and F. Lassalle's drama Franz von sorship), art's genesis in the labor process Sickingen (see the 1859 correspondence with (1844 Manuscripts), tendentiousness (En- the author)—where their views coincide gels on funges Deutschland), recur in their although they were not writing their analy- most mature phase. We shall be consider- The Aesthetic Views of Marx and Engels 303 ing here the whole of their aesthetic of all on the fundamental methodological thought, starting from 1842, when despite postulate that aesthetic phenomena are to some continuing traces of the thought of be regarded as a cultural activity of homo Hegel and Feuerbach, the two classic sapiens in his slow progress to self-reali- thinkers of Marxism undertake the fashion- zation within the matrix of socio-his- ing of their distinctive world-view. torical processes. The non-isolate phe- This brings us to our second problem: nomena of the arts, which variously de- how to go about systematizing the nu- pend on other manifestations of culture, merous scattered texts on art and litera- social, political, moral, religious, and ture. We must initially distinguish the scientific, influence in turn these other texts which elaborate a topic explicitly spheres of activity. Moreover, the system and coherently from fragments which have of mutual dependencies and complex in- a thesis but partially developed and thus terrelations is in each case twofold. It is synchronic, occurring across the structure somewhat unclear, and we must dis- of society within a given moment, and tinguish the texts from the hasty or terse diachronic, occurring as an aspect of his- comments which do not in themselves torical process influenced by the past, and supply the tenable foundation for a thesis. exercising possible influence on the future I will call the first category dominant nature of culture. The continual dynamic themes, the second observations, and the flux and change in aesthetics and the arts third remarks. Within the first category derive chiefly from the rise and decline of belong the discussions of the genesis of the always complex ideological outlooks the aesthetic sense, the alienation of the which, in the final analysis, are conditioned artist, realism, tendentiousness, and the by the general contradictions and evolu- class equivalents of art. Among the topics tion of class society. But the dynamism comprised in the second category are the arises also from the contradiction between nature of aesthetic qualities and of aes- crystallized ideological outlooks and emer- thetic experience, the universally human gent attitudes, possessing a strictly emo- equivalents in artworks and the enduring tional and conational energy of the mo- values of art, the comic and tragic, form ment, which we may call "psycho-social" and style. Within the third category be- and "mythological" in character. It should long reflections-in-passing on such themes be further emphasized that aesthetic phe- as the distinction between science and art, nomena traverse two distinct cultural the relation of philosophy to artistic fields of development which, though in- creation, the hierarchy of artistic values. terpenetrating, in some degree normally The discussions of Sickingen and the Sue transmit their incongruence to the aes- novel, the most sustained writings by Marx thetic phenomena as well. These related and Engels on aesthetic matters, are a but often incongruent fields of develop- primary source for the dominant themes, ment are the idiogenetic (comprising the around which are oriented the general stimulus of past aesthetic achievement methodological assumptions and formula- upon present aesthetic project) and the tions of both men. To exclude, on the allogenetic (comprising the stimulus given other hand, the observations and remarks the aesthetic field by that which is in —which mostly stem from Marx—from other respects external to it). The above the tally of aesthetic disicela membra, elements of the Marxian perspective, pre- would result in an unjustifiable depletion sented here in great brevity, can be em- of the scope and complexity of the Marx- braced by the term historicism. ian aesthetic discourse. Marx and Engels framed the questions regarding the genesis and the function of 3. Debate still surrounds many issues of art (or, more broadly conceived, regard- Marxian aesthetic thought. But, concern- ing aesthetic consciousness) against the ing the nature of certain formulations, context of history. The development of art all parties approximately agree, and most yielded its hidden meaning in relation to 304 STEFA N M O R A W S K I the evolution of human civilization, the that: (a) desires, sometimes contradictory far-flung consequence of class antagonisms, beliefs, rather than fully rationalized the irrepressible desire of men for emanci- opinion must play a considerable role; (b) pation from tyranny, injustice, and hun- the individuality of the artist's vision has ger. The historical approach led them to a paramount importance, however it may emphasize alienation and also disaliena- have been developed in and conditioned tion, and thus to make an analysis of by a social milieu; (c) the transaction of man-the-maker, homo faber, who in a not the artist with the reality of nature—al- distant future might gain the capacity though mediated, as it must be, through to exchange collectively his exhaustive toil culture—bears a strong imprint of naïveté and oppressive ignorance for a mode of and a unique freshness: the artist seeks to social being which would more resemble culturalize nature anew and does so in play: that is, when, as homo aestheticus, he striking his bargain with reality in its might freely and creatively achieve the totality. totality of his potential faculties. That Turning now to a closer look at the aesthetic ideas and artistic expression de- chief aesthetic issues raised by Marx and velop with a relative autonomy within Engels, we cannot fail to emphasize that their operative traditions is recognized by our presentation is an effort to reconstruct this historicism. At the same time it is a the aesthetic body of their disiecta mem- methodology which cannot fail to stress bra; we shall focus upon their texts which the significance as elements of art of that are, generally speaking, most relevant to realism and of that tendentiousness which key questions and solutions in European distinctively couple and relate the artwork aesthetic thought up to and including the to the historical process and its ideologi- present. We have concluded that in general cally dominant features. Additionally this the aesthetic thought of Marx and Engels methodology entails three major historicist is integral with their broader world-view. notions without which the Marxian ap- From this conclusion, however, two dif- proach to aesthetics would be incomplete ferent and mutually incompatible addenda and incomprehensible. These are the have at times been deduced, and both stress upon human labor, which qualifies have to be rejected. The first—and it is the foundation of all culture; the in- notoriously common—says the Marxian sistence upon the epochs of social revolu- approach is extrinsic to every question of tion as essential to the progress of the art, i.e., it is only general-philosophical or species; and finally the view that com- socio-political. The other addendum—see munism is, for man, at once an ideal he Robert C. Tucker, Philosophy and Myth in sets himself and the real, historical move- Karl Marx (London, 1961)—terms the ment of his progress. It is in light of these whole of communist theory "fundamentally views that the work processes are regarded aesthetic in character": in other words, at once as the original locus of aesthetic something of a quasi-Schillerian anthropol- activity and as a given from which aes- ogy with the ideal des spielenden Menschen. thetic culture never can become wholly detached, that the arts are regarded as a conductor of attitudes toward radical 4. Marx's reflections on the genesis of the social change, and, finally, that the in- aesthetic sense could not, in his time, be eradicable idea of art as the legislator and founded upon empirical data. Like others, liberator of mankind is regarded now as he therefore devised a strictly philosophi- directly related to the communist ideal cal argument, directing it against the and movement. theistic and naturalistic solutions to this problem. Without recourse to the seven- Let us join these few explanatory com- teenth century's je ne sais quoi, or to a ments to the basic methodological perspec- naturally endowed specific instinct, or to a tive of Marx and Engels. In considering divinely endowed specific impulse, Marx art a specific form of social conscious- explained the aesthetic sense as having ness, one can only mean in this domain emerged during the historical process of The Aesthetic Views of Marx and Engels 305 human labor. It is thus for Marx a spe- of Marx's view: (a) originally man ar- cifically human faculty distinguished from tistically shapes the construction of his the drives of the animal world. Homo objects, expressing his power to master faber develops and refines his aesthetic humanly the material world, (b) At length sense while shaping work skills, mastering his object's structure (inherent measure, the material world in practice and idea. proportion) can become the pivotal pur- An active artistic competence is therefore pose of the artistic process; to this stage, initially achieved: the physical world is in which a predominant functionalism is made over to the harmonious use or meas- departed from, is linked the emergence of ure (Mass) of man, while at the same time apractical aesthetic contemplation, (c) Re- outlet is found for the human play ca- sponsiveness to certain properties—such pacity (Spiel seiner eignen körperlichen as color, sound, and shape—appears when und geistigen Kräfte). Homo faber is in the aesthetic sense has become highly con- process of becoming homo ludens. The scious, definite, and relatively autonomous. aesthetic sense in its strider, contemplative It is the final step of the rudimentary aspect is a derivation of later develop- process in which art and its subjective ment; called by Marx the "mineralogi- components devolve from mankind's cal sense," it is dependent upon relatively labor. In Marx's world-view this process apractical detachment. Thus Marx's ac- occurs over millions of years, from early count of the objective and subjective paleolithic times to the late neolithic appropriation (Aneignung) by primitive era. We have but offered a schema for de- man of reality to his needs may be re- fining the relations wherein aesthetic formulated, as, through a social praxis properties acquired various kinds of sig- which unfolds his aesthetic (more precisely, nificance for man; our reconstruction artistic) sense, this man all the while of this Marxian historical concept is sup- affirms himself (his "human essence"). Cer- ported and clarified by Marx's observations tain texts related to this dominant theme on the nature of art and of aesthetic offer problems. In discussing precious experience in general. In the 1844 Manu- metals in A Contribution to the Critique scripts measure (Mass) is held to be the of Political Economy, Marx declares that objective foundation of beauty; the their colors constitute "aesthetic proper- Grundrisse der Kritik der Politischen ties" which stimulate "the most popular Ökonomie Stresses the compact structure of form of aesthetic sense." True, Marx calls antique Greek art (geschlossene Gestalt, this a widespread rather than historically Form und gegebene Begrenzung) in de- rudimentary phenomenon. Nonetheless, scribing its achievement. The notion of having asserted some primary, sensuous Mass within the total world-view of Marx physical qualities, he seems at least to has been interpreted variously. In the qualify the notion of structural artistic present context, it appears to indicate both qualities (Mass) historically evolved by man the reproduction of the structures of in his labor process, as the foundation of physical reality and those specific qualities the aesthetic sense. Might one construe of symmetry, regularity, proportion, and two types of aesthetic qualities here, neither harmony which comprise a coherent excluding the other, with color-sensitiv- whole that rivals reality. Mass denotes ity being an innately endowed and nat- in any case the inner compact structure ural capacity, exercised to be sure by a of the artwork—even where stress is given labor-constituted mankind in its leisure? to reproducing the structure of real ob- This conciliatory hypothesis is ruled out jects. Such stress, vitally significant to the by the 1844 Manuscripts and Capital. A nature of the aesthetic properties of primi- knowledge of those works leaves one no tive art, is found to reappear, especially in other possibility than to try to recon- the realm of the applied arts, through- struct Marx's notion of the developmental out the entire history of culture. However, stages of the aesthetic sense. The following Lukacs, whose treatment of mimesis in would appear to be a fair representation Die Eigenart des Ästhetischen (1964) re- 306 STEFAN M O R A W S K I mains the best and most thorough on this by an organic unification of aesthetic and Marxian topic, in discussing Marx's no- ethical principles. That this is so, however, tion of Mass overstresses its mimetic as- in no way undermines the conclusion we pect. Lukacs seeks and fails to show that are led to as we examine Marx's observations in the Marxian concept all art is mimesis. on the nature of art and the aesthetic ex- Similarly, Marx's observations regarding perience—namely, that he regarded both the peculiarity of the aesthetic experience the subject and the object constituting an appear to contradict the view presented aesthetic field as somehow complete and by Lukacs in part. In the 1844 Manu- harmonious structures; at the moment of scripts Marx notes that a merchant as the experiencing of artistic values, each merchant sees no beauty in minerals and, evinces a relative autonomy in respect in the Contribution, he comments that a to other human functions and to the larger diamond affords aesthetic pleasure on the setting; so that subject and object together breast of a girl but not in the capacity of momentarily constitute a "rival world" to a ware. In the latter passage, he treats the that in which we live. This autotelicism aesthetically pleasing object as having a nonetheless incorporates cognitive and usefulness (use-value) as opposed to the ideological functions—art's specific inte- exchange-value of such objects treated as gration, and the experience of art which commodities. It is evident that for Marx enriches the human psyche, evince links the use-value of the aesthetic object does with the world which are never severed. not, however, coincide with a practical or The observations of Marx and Engels applied function (the grinder's use of a concerning form support our interpreta- diamond). This apractical nature of the tion. For them, form is the ensemble of aesthetic experience is underscored in artistic means, or the requisite har- Marx's several descriptions of labor under monious organization of elements within non-capitalistic conditions in Capital, or in a total aesthetic structure. That they wrote the Grundrisse where he says of medieval little on problems of form is to be ex- handicraft: "This work is still half ar- plained only in part by Engels's letter to tistic, it has still the aim in itself (Selbstz- Mehring (1893), in which he declared they weck)." had been "bound" first to lay the main emphasis on content. Marx's and Engels's It is of significance in this respect that discussion of Sickingen, in fact, shows Marx deems aesthetic experience to possess them committed to Gehaltästhetik priori- a synthetic character: as a commingling of ties—which, we may stress again, in no intellectual, emotional, and sensual ele- way contradicts their view that the realized ments, it is a-theoretical. Thus in Marx's artwork is an autotelic structure. For both "Introduction to the Critique of Political men, style consisted of the individual Economy," the intellectual and the re- quality of an artwork. This observation ligious appropriations of reality are ex- they did not elaborate in respect to the plicitly distinguished from the artistic. And general discussion of the nature of art. in a letter referring to A. Ruge's criti- We shall not attempt to make that link, cisms of Shakespeare, Marx scoffed at the the evidence being useful for guesswork suggestion that appreciation of the latter only. should be based on whether or not he possessed a "philosophical system." An ar- Consideration of the issues presented tistic world-view was clearly not to be above leads one to the subject of the confused with other modes of cognition. alienation of the artist and of art as a Marx and Engels never explicitly treated dominant theme. Marx centered his in- the relation of moral and aesthetic values, vestigations on the capitalist epoch. Some except in attacking the shallow pietistic of his comments on the artist's situation morality of E. Sue's novel. On the other in pre-capitalist society offer reason, how- hand, Marx's anthropological ideal—the ever, to believe that in this domain as in rich harmonious individuality embodying all others he regarded alienation as a con- the whole of human powers—is arrived at comitant of human activity throughout the The Aesthetic Views of Marx and Engels 307 brief history of civilization. During the the very process of production: setting ascent of the species from purely animal for it a uniformity, repetitiveness, tempo, existence—this process of a progressively etc., which makes of work a routine to socialized mankind, which has at the same which both owner and worker are en- time occurred only through the most slaved; for this system the human auto- disastrous social oppression, exploitation, maton is wanted, while creative activity and struggle—artistic alienation was becomes dysfunctional and alien, (c) The evinced as at once a contributory cause channeling of human potential to serve and one major consequence of religious the need of capitalistic profit in every ideology, of the church as an institution, area of experience causes the estrangement of the various political formations of power, of man from his "human nature." Given etc. However, the intensity of alienation is this social system the artist, like any fac- qualitatively heightened with the appear- tory hand, became "free" to offer or with- ance of the capitalist marketplace. When hold his income-producing services as and art becomes a commodity intended for a where he chose. But he could not evade quite unknown purchaser, pricing becomes the larger necessities imposed on survival a competitive imperative which is often and achievement by the system. His ability depreciative of the level and the effort of might be exploited freely, for his art had workmanship. What is more, the commu- somehow to go into this marketplace which nity of values, of interests and taste and appropriated it to serve various needs, all knowledge, which once bound the artist ultimately shaped or engendered by capi- and public collapses in the society of in- talist growth. If the artist planned to ignore creasing expertise and depersonalized a living income and to thwart otherwise calculation. The people most excluded the system's instrumental designs upon his from the values of art are the new urban art, he might survive, but not without his working class, who have neither the production suffering estrangement for wages nor the leisure to gain access. At the other, because less worldly, reasons. Van- same time individuality here and there ished was the era when Milton could spin gains new possibilities and "freedom" as out his poetry as does a spider his web. all communal bonds excepting the money Indeed, many forms of art and poetry nexus are broken down; some superior art languished or disappeared as their pre- is produced, but it bears the traces of its conditions were subverted. Neither the epoch and, moreover, is the prerogative bourgeoisie nor the proletariat now con- of an elite, while for others there is but stituted an apt public for recognizing and cheap and stupid trash and spectacle. It is welcoming the best in contemporary art, not surprising that Marx and Engels should or even for responding to the classical have gazed fondly at Greek antiquity as heritage. Beyond the estrangements of hu- an era of unmatched aesthetic expression. man potential in this desolate era, how- For them, with respect to aesthetic achieve- ever, Marx anticipates a time of disaliena- ment, the Renaissance and the Middle tion, of communism. Ages too dwarfed the present. The subse- quent period had seen the gradual tri- At a level of unparalleled mastery of umph of the capitalistic organization the world and society, with the economy of production, which affected all areas of of scarcity (even in its highest form) sur- human activity and, therefore, all modes of passed, life will again acquire an aesthetic consciousness as well. Not only the ex- substance resembling that of primitive ploited but also those who benefit from ex- times. Highly productive and knowledge- ploitation are deprived of aesthetic realiza- able, man will come into his own as homo tion by an alienation threefold in character: ludens. If Marx did not presume to offer a (a) Laboring man, homo faber, is parted detailed concept of the future, he did touch from his product; the ownership of capi- upon three of its elements. Individual crea- tal determines its use or exchange, (b) The tive capacities would be developed fully: owners' competition for profit determines every one who is potentially a Raphael will become so. Work would take on an aesthetic 308 STEFA N M O R A W S K I character, evolving as a Selbstbetätigung, or structural autotelicism will in some degree free play, of physical and psychic faculties. have been neglected. Indubitably, on the And man's possibilities or versatility would other hand, they regard the ideological become universal: there will be no profes- engagement of an artist as blatant aliena- sional painters but only painting itself tion when he served reactionary class forces, among the unlimited possible activities of but the opposite of alienation when he every one. To single out any one of the defended the standpoint of the progressive three elements must lead to confusion. class. They did not use the term class Kostas Axelos in Marx, penseur de la equivalent (it was introduced by Plek- technique (Paris, 1961) takes up a one- hanov), yet the many allusions in their sided notion of Arbeit als freies Spiel, and writings to artists of the past and present concludes that Marx believed that art in show that they did assess an artist's stand- the traditional sense would wither away. point through reference to demonstrable One may suggest that Marx indeed antici- ideological class values. They located such pated all the three great effects which values (let us emphasize) not in an artist's would result from the definitive emanci- class of origin but rather in the manifest pation of man and from the accompanying data of his artworks. As to the ideologi- revaluation of all values. In what degree cal equivalents they defined: these were was his expectation Utopian? A satisfactory most often of socially broad significance answer will be given only by future his- and associated the artist (Dante, Chateau- torical development. For their part Marx briand) with the conscious Weltanschauung and Engels, from 1844 to the end of their of an entire historical class. Sometimes the lives, focused their attention continually equivalent was defined more narrowly in upon the nature of capitalism. They main- association with a particular political out- tained that the liberation of mankind was look (Shelley, Heine, funges Deutschland). predicated upon the ending of the his- Marx and Engels most frequently took this torically atavistic and oppressive division course in writing of their contemporaries. between "stupid, ignorant masses" and It was natural that they did so and that "solitary geniuses." Proletarian revolu- they should make much use of the tion would secure this advance. And dis- dichotomy of bourgeoisie/proletariat to alienated man would emerge as homo represent the principal contending posi- aestheticus. tions. But since other, non-predominant classes might simultaneously achieve ar- The remaining dominant themes of tistic representation, they did not confine Marx and Engels have a bearing on the themselves to this formulation: thus men- alienation problem inasmuch as works of tions of the literary representatives of the art evince an ideological standpoint. The shopkeepers described in Marx's 18th involvement of an artist in class strife— Brumaire, or the ideological involutions of whether he is aware or unaware of it, Goethe which Engels dissects with care. whether he depicts social antagonisms or Their use of class analysis is clearly sensi- presents his viewpoint tendentiously—has tive, flexible, and based upon the work of a bifurcated significance: on the one hand, art. And it is not always the paramount it is opposed to alienation; on the other issue, nor is it to be raised in an univocal hand, it is imprinted with it. Nowhere do way. Thus the tragical is their chief cate- Marx and Engels reflect upon particular gory when they discuss the representations artworks in order to locate the presence both of a premature revolution (the of artistic alienation defined as such Sickingen correspondence) and an ancien (although the alienation of artists is dis- régime in its myopic struggle to survive cussed in terms of experiences which have (in Marx's "Toward the Critique of Hegel's a similar effect upon, say, scholars or Philosophy of Law"). Incidentally, their ob- journalists). If, parenthetically, we may servations on the tragical laid no claim extrapolate, their remarks on revolutionary to affording the adequacy of a theory. art suggest that where ideological engage- The analysis of class equivalents has ment is emphasized in an artwork, its The Aesthetic Views of Marx and Engels 309 both its foundation and its test in their socially emergent elements, or whether the notion of realism. The term does not oc- depiction of those elements in decay might cur in Marx, whose comments on the Sue be adequate. This ambiguity about a novel, the play by Lassalle, and the great positive rendering of the social dynamism nineteenth-century novelists of England, is a question of realism. As such it is dis- however, prove that his notion coincided tinct from another dominant theme, that with what Engels expounded in letters to of tendentiousness, on which Marx and Minna Kautsky and Margaret Harkness. Engels are clear. Realism, as Engels de- Realism is the artistic-cognitive value of clared in his letter to Minna Kautsky, an artwork. Their comments on Balzac signifies a rendering of the implicit dia- demonstrate that the definition of the lectics of social reality, the trend or cognitive equivalent is broader than that tendency spontaneous to history. Consist- of the ideological (which we have seen to ently Marx and Engels differentiated what be class-situated). Thus while an artist's may be termed latent, inherent cognitions realist tendency will manifest his attitude of tendency from explicit and didactic toward contemporary class strife, a direct tendentiousness characteristic of l'art en- correlation of the artistic-cognitive values gagée. In his polemics with the German and the socio-political or philosophical poet Freiligrath, where Marx explained opinions of the artist does not necessarily that to be an artist responsible to the obtain. Balzac was a professed and quite revolutionary party means nothing other sincere Royalist; nonetheless his cycle of than to express the historical tide, the novels constitutes an indictment of Roy- emergent importance of the oppressed pro- alist doctrine. Marx and Engels examined letariat, Marx emphasized the innate the cognitive equivalent of an artwork for Tendenz of all genuine, truthful creation. the range and scope of its historical per- In his essay on the poetry of Georg Weerth, spective. In this respect they scrutinized, however, Engels offers praise of a mani- not the expression of a strictly given class fest tendentiousness whereby the artist as outlook, but rather the capacity to express a missionary seizes the future from the the dominant and typical traits of socially womb of the present and holds it before conflicted reality in a given period. As the readers' gaze. The former function of historical typicality entails freshness of Tendenz, we can see, is correlated with character and event, the notion of realism artistic-cognitive values, and the latter with demands individuality and specificity (cf. ideological commitment. their remarks on Shakespeare). Engels's The remarks of both men on a emphasis on fidelity to detail should not, hierarchy of artistic values, together with however, be regarded as the essence of his Marx's observation on art's enduring val- position. Here Marx's comment (Capital, ues, relate closely to another dominant vol. Ill) about "many variations and grada- theme, most appropriately termed the tions" whereby typicality may be embodied universally human equivalent of art. Marx appears relevant. Realism was a dominant directly touched upon this issue only in theme explicitly developed as such. But analyzing the heroine Fleur de Marie, of while it has often and most regrettably been Sue's novel. She manifests a vitality tran- taken as the fundamental and virtually scending her bourgeois milieu; and even sole principle of Marxist aesthetics, the author, in his otherwise clumsy, moral- lacunae are evident. For example, Marx istic caricature of human values, was com- and Engels did not state whether in their pelled to acknowledge her joie de vivre. view, optimally, typical characters always Universally human equivalents are im- must be set in typical circumstances, and plicit throughout Marxian thought, how- whether such circumstances always should ever: in the prospect of disalienation, and entail typical characters. Nor did Marx in the value attributed to rich individ- and Engels affirm whether in every case uality, victorious will, spontaneity of depiction of the typical patterns of reality enthusiasm, and intellectual passion, as in its social dynamism should include the these qualities are animated in and ex- 310 STEFAN M O R A W S K I pressed by, for example, Aeschylus and fort at reconstructing the aesthetic views of Shakespeare. Marx's important, somewhat Marx and Engels can only point to this obscure passage on the glory of Greek art lacuna. is relevant here. It can chiefly be con- sidered as (a) an excursus on the formal, 5. The study of the sources or incentives harmonious qualities achieved in the art for the aesthetic thought of Marx and of antiquity (cf. Max Raphael, cited above). Engels has not to date been thorough- This interpretation should not deflect our going. The reliance of scholars upon pre- attention, however, from two other crucial conceived ideas has led to misinterpreta- criteria for art's endurance to be found tions of three kinds. One approach (e.g., in the passage. These are (b) its capacity Lifshitz) almost wholly neglects idio- to express artistically the whole of a society genetic, that is, intra-aesthetic, influences. (here mediated by a mythology, which A second (e.g., Jezuitow) sees in the de- is in turn rooted to a specific level and veloping views on art of both men an kind of economic maturity), and (c) its "ontogenetic" recapitulation of the "phil- expression of the highest human values, ogenetic" progress, in German and Euro- of man's total self-affirmation (here by a pean aesthetics, between the late Enlight- naïve and young people, for whom art pro- enment and Hegel. Yet another approach vides the fullest means of such expression). (e.g., Fridlender) mechanically takes over Criterion (b) refers to art's cognitive into aesthetics the dictum of Lenin that equivalent while (c) refers to its uni- German classical philosophy, English po- versally human equivalent. Cognitive and litical economy, and French Utopian social- universally human values intermingle; ism were the chief sources of Marxism. and both exact the criterion of (a) adequacy None of these procedures satisfies. One of form to the values embodied. Finally can no longer doubt the centrality and high there is the criterion of (d) a progressive importance of the idiogenetic stimuli; this orientation (in a strict sense the ideological has empirically been confirmed after equivalent). This value cannot appear thorough research on the period from the alone, according to Marx and Engels; as Enlightenment to Schiller by my student artistic value it must have adequate formal Stanislav Pasura in his doctoral disserta- expression and it is, moreover, the (dis- tion, "Marks a klasyczna estetyka nie- guised) expression of universally human miecka" (Warsaw, 1967). The parallels be- values. A hierarchy or priority of the tween Marx's conceptions and those of values here described was never explicitly German aesthetics from this time are strik- formulated by either man. We have al- ing. In Marx's letters of 1837 to his ready found in their aesthetic ideas a father and his reading excerpts to 1842 Gehaltästhetik, however; and of the content (MEGA, pp. 115-18) there is evidence of values—if we consider Marx's great at- an ardent study of the literature of aes- tachment to the Greek model and the thetics and of a knowledge of it far sur- ideal of an unalienated mankind both in passing what was to be expected of a primitive communities and in the com- philosophy student of the time. The early munist future of an emancipated humanity writings of Engels leave us in no doubt —priority perhaps must go to universally that he devoured the aesthetics of the human values of art. More than this sug- funges Deutschland movement and, through gestion we cannot hazard. But let us re- it, Lessing and Goethe and Schiller. There call that along with the four kinds of is evidence proving that Marx returned in value discussed above and the dominant 1851-52, 1857, and 1874 to a study of the themes to which they correspond, original- aesthetic heritage; and there must have ity of artistic style was highly esteemed by been other times. We shall not itemize the both men. How this value is related to the individual works Marx and Engels are defi- others, how its effect is registered in the nitely known to have read; rather we want total aesthetic matrix, one again cannot say to consider the (obviously vital) stimulation without resorting to interpolation. Our ef- exercised more generally upon them by the The Aesthetic Views of Marx and Engels 311 dominant aesthetic thought of their time. specialist was unknown in primitive so- This entails in the first place German classi- ciety and the autonomization of art cal aesthetics—not Hegel alone as its "sum- occurred at a later time. Marx probably mit," as some have said, but also the stimu- benefited from the thought of Schiller lus of many predecessors and in many ways. on this topic too. Schiller had differentiated The fascination of Greek culture for Marx the animal senses from those strictly hu- and Engels stems from Winckelmann, and man; the latter, being more detached from an entire tradition of German philosophy reality, made possible a freie Ideenfolge leads up to the posing of the alienation and the emergence of a Spieltrieb which problem. Winckelmann, Kant, Schiller, impart to man's actions and his products a and minor writers too (e.g., K. Heyden- particularity of form and result at last in reich, M. Herz) contrasted the ideal of ästhetischer Schein. As to the nature of the rich, harmonious personality against the aesthetic, Marx's thought points back the atomization of contemporary life. That to the freies Spiel der Seelenkräfte of art should play the leading role in achiev- Kant. But the solution to this problem in ing man's inner integration and full adapta- its subjective/objective aspect—i.e., the tion to the social world was a widespread thesis concerning the harmony of the view. Bearing a certain eschatological stamp, aesthetic object correlated with the auto- this aesthetic anthropology is found even in telic and integral character of the aes- the most general speculative writings of the thetic experience—Marx had ready in time: Fichte's Letters of 1794 ("Über Geist Heydenreich, Herz, and Schiller. That this und Buchstab in der Philosophie"), or the line of thought was then prevalent is evi- anonymous essay "Das älteste System-pro- dent enough—cf. K. Chr. F. Krause's gram des deutschen Idealismus" (1796, at- Abriss der Ästhetik (1837). And there is no tributed by Cassirer to Hölderin, by Walzel doubt that the 1844 Manuscripts employ to F. Schlegel, by Allwohn and Zeltner notions and even phrasings identical with to Schelling, and even to Hegel—see A. those of Feuerbach in The Essence of Nivelle, Les Théories esthétiques en Alle- Christianity (1841). Marx's and Engels's magne de Baumgarten à Kant, 1955). emphasis on the artistic value of "content" There were numerous commentaries also points to the tradition of Gehaltästhetik on the progress of artistic alienation, ob- from Schiller through Hegel to the young served by G. Forster in "Die Kunst und Vischer; and to funges Deutschland as well. das Zeitalter" (Thalia, no. 9, 1789), by Like the representatives of the latter group, Fichte in the aforementioned work, by they rejected Hegel's belief that art was in A. W. Schlegel in "Briefe Über Poesie, permanent decline; and from this group Silbenmass und Sprache" (Hören, 1795), they learned to respect tendentiousness in and finally by Hegel (his notion of the an artwork. They were also in accord with "Zerfallen der Kunst"). This trend in the view of Vischer (Ästhetik, t. II, 2, § 484) thought—which could be termed Rous- that beauty is possessed of its own tend- seauian—finds the contemporary of Marx, ency, contained in the artwork itself. F. T. Vischer, speaking of capitalist so- The stimulus of Hegelian aesthetics is ciety's sterile, authoritarian, and bureau- especially apparent in the references of cratic apparatus which destroys beauty Marx to the comic and the tragic, the and in particular degrades the aesthetic reflections on the enduring glory of Greek demands of the working masses (Ästhetik, art, and of course the concept of the typi- 1846-57, t. II, I, § 364, 375-76). The cor- cal, which is central to the position of both relation of the genesis of the aesthetic men on realism. Thus German classical sense and art with the labor process ap- aesthetics must be considered the principal pears in A. W. Schlegel (op. cit.); he indi- influence. But let us recall that the issues cated a primary and primordial role for of alienation and disalienation could as rhythm, and traced it in the natural and well have been discovered from the writings the social relations of man with the of Rousseau and the Utopian socialists; world. He also suggested that the artist- Diderot likewise had seen the genesis of 312 STEFA N M O R A W S K I art in the process of labor; and the con- historicist perspective, which appears at troversy around realism (which profoundly the start of the eighteenth century and modified the German notion of "das develops through Montesquieu and Rous- Besondere im Allgemeinen") stemmed from seau, Winckelmann and Herder, the the ideas of Lessing and Diderot on heroes French doctrinaires and Hegel's histori- typifying a social condition, the prefaces osophy, to the English economists and of Balzac's novels, the impact of the liter- French historians. The modern idea of ary and painterly movement of the 1840's progress, shading into utopianism, is a re- and 1850's (G. Sand, Courbet, Champ- lated and important non-aesthetic influ- fleury, English novelists of the rank of ence. Having come to the fore in European Dickens and Thackeray). The subsequent thought during the revolutionary 1770's, battle over Zola and the naturalistic novel this trend of social and political ideology affords a background to Engels's letters interjected its desire for the justice and concerning realism—and his acknowledge- wisdom of collective life either back into ment of a realistic "truth of detail" can- a distant past or toward a distant future— not be detached from his emphatic concern and the more it did so, the more unbear- for typicality of character and situation, able became the capitalist system to its which he directed against the naturalistic representatives. The 1844 Manuscripts echo current. Thus his letter of December this sigh for the "noble savage" in the de- 13, 1883, to Laura Lafargue declares that scription of primordial, unalienated man. Balzac's "revolutionary dialectics" taught The vision of harmony between man and him more of the history of France during society in ancient Greece—here Marx fol- 1815-48 than had the professional his- lowed Winckelmann, Hölderlin, Hegel, and torians. The first class interpretation of others—likewise partakes of this trend. For art, however tentative and deficient, ap- Marx, however, the notion of a better hu- pears with Mme. de Staël and the French man condition was oriented primarily to- doctrinaires (Guizot, Ballanche, de Barante). ward the future, and here he and Engels To this account of sources we must finally joined others who discerned an undeniable add that Marx, a vastly erudite scholar, human progress: Condorcet, and Fichte; surely went behind the historically imme- the eighteenth-century Utopians such as diate aesthetic principles, much as he did Morelly or Don Deschamp; the "industrial indeed learn from these writers and think- Utopians" Saint Simon and Owen. ers. The conceptions of Plato, Aristotle, and And last. Romanticism. Though one Dürer were components of his intellectual cannot fail to note their incessant philo- inheritance. sophical, ideological, and aesthetic struggle Such is the idiogenetic background for against the Romantische Schule, against the development of Marxian aesthetics. We Schelling and Solger, though in the con- have already shown, however, that the text of their time, Marx and Engels were aesthetic thought of Marx and Engels anti-romantics; nonetheless the prevailing cannot be dissociated from their general matrix of aesthetic controversies, of modes world-view. The non-aesthetic context is of for framing antinomies, could not but first-rate importance. If Hegelian aes- become the cradle of their reflections in thetics did not exert the sole or the main this domain. The influence appears in the influence on Marxian thought in this way they structure questions about (a) the domain (notwithstanding the key impor- freedom of the artist versus his responsibil- tance of such ideas as versinnlichter Geist, ity to nation, society and mankind; (b) Weltzustand, das Typische), Hegelian the artist as lonely virtuoso of beauty or philosophy did indirectly shape the body of priest of eternal truth versus his revolu- dominant themes, observations, and re- tionary commitment; (c) a peculiarly aes- marks we have been discussing. No less thetic function of art versus cognitive can we neglect the profound influence on and moral functions; (d) unbridled in- their aesthetics of the entire great philo- dividualist fantasy versus artistic obedience sophical movement pushing to the fore the to definite laws of the spirit or of nature; The Aesthetic Views of Marx and Engels 313 (e) aut delectare aut prodesse. That Marx and comfort of a suffering mankind. The and Engels could not condone such antin- homo aestheticus—Marx concluded—could omies is evident—but to shake off entirely be prognosticated, but his advent de- their pervasive influence upon the period manded the radical socio-political transfor- was another matter. mation of all mankind. And so too the We have thus far seen what Marx and artist had to make a choice: would he Engels accepted and critically assimilated in delude himself in an ivory tower, or par- structuring their intellectual premises; it ticipate in revolutionary progress by em- remains to consider what they rejected, bracing its vicissitudes to the very end? for a sketch of their negative choices is Tendentiousness has a new meaning for likewise instructive and symptomatic. They Marx and Engels, not found in the writings directly or indirectly attacked the objec- of their predecessors. Tendenz is recon- tive idealism of Krause, Weisse, and Hegel, ceived in light of the Marxian world- and the subjective idealism of Kant, Fichte, view, and historical reality is described as the Romantische Schule. Rejecting the "tendentious." The question of realism is art-for-art's-sake doctrine, they opposed a here modified. To the notion of the Hegel- trite didacticism with virtually the same ian type (der Dieser) depicted in definite determination. They respected the value circumstances, their idea of realism intro- of form but opposed formalism. While they duces a consciousness of the historically never disclaimed the presence of a na- dynamic elements; ideology is here con- tural impulsion underlying aesthetic ex- sidered a component of artistic choice perience, they could not accept the natu- and discrimination, the nature of a pro- ralistic notion of a particular aesthetic found and true tendentiousness being such instinct somehow common to man and as to further the artistic-cognitive values other animals. unified within the aesthetic entity. Again, the genesis of aesthetic consciousness is 6. In view of the tremendous panorama newly interpreted in the perspective of of their latent or manifest sources, Marx dialectical and historical materialism. and Engels might perhaps be thought to The use of new theoretical calipers and have contributed almost nothing to the chemicals on the metamorphosis of homo history of aesthetic thought. Indeed the faber into homo ludens suggests strongly attempt has been made, by a number of that art is a consummate social phenome- Western scholars on the subject, to more non, and even the process of its auton- or less blur much of their conception into omization must be regarded and under- that of Hegel and the French realist doc- stood historically. Finally the class equiva- trine in the I850's. The counterpart prac- lence of art was the Marxian topic accepted tice of some Soviet scholars has been to as such by all students of the subject. While identify Marxian thought with the views class equivalence had earlier been educed, of Belinsky or Chernyshevsky. In each Marx and Engels made a thesis of it, and case, the endeavors are based on an im- they explored its complexities. We may permissibly selective use of data. Having properly conclude that at least the domi- sought here to reconstruct Marxian aes- nant themes of Marx and Engels raised thetics without any extrapolations, in an new issues in nineteenth-century aesthet- unavoidably outline form, we do not find ics. the whole of its lineaments reducible to To suggest that their aesthetic ideas com- the sum of the existing sources; nor are its prise a full-blown theory would be an over- parts identical with other, coeval proposi- statement. But to dismiss these ideas as tions. Marx approached the problems of fortuitious and incidental speculations, or alienation and disalienation in an entirely as utterances of sheer taste and preference, new way because of his innovating his- would not be less irresponsible. For we toriosophy. He reframed the terms of the believe our reconstruction demonstrates old dilemma which saw art both as de- that these aesthetic ideas have an internal bilitated and dying out, and as the hope coherence undisturbed by any serious in- 314 STEFAN M O R A W S K I consistency; organized and sustained by not all-encompassing; they offer no final a well-developed philosophy about several system. The contribution made by an dominant themes, these ideas are addressed aesthetic approach, however, eludes defini- to problems considered in all traditional tion by such a test. A proper standard aesthetic treatises and up to today to be would be the originality of the contribu- among the most significant and funda- tion in its own time, and its influence on mental. About this one should be em- theory, criticism, and even artistic creativ- phatic. It is of course true that Marx and ity in the future. By this test the aesthetic Engels wrote on certain problems not at ideas of Marx and Engels have historical all. The body of their aesthetic thought is and theoretical importance.