THE THEORY OF NATURAL BEAUTY AND ITS EVIL STAR: KANT, HEGEL, ADORNO
by
RODOLPHE GASCHÉ University at Bu Valo, State University of New York
ABSTRACT In the aftermath of Kant, that is, with Schelling and Hegel, the natural beautiful is no longer a major concern of aesthetic theory. According to Adorno, an evil star hangs over the theory of natural beauty. The essay examines the reasons for this neglect of the beautiful of nature by confronting Kant’s account of natural beauty with Hegel’s theory about the fundamental de ciencies of beauty in nature and locates them in the essential indeterminacy of everything that belongs to nature. Inquiring into what Adorno seeks to achieve by playing Kant and Hegel o V against one another, it is shown that this indeterminacy of nature is both an index of nature’s interconnectedness with myth- ical violence and the promise of a freedom from myth.
For quite some time now, it has been taken for granted that aes- thetic theory is primarily, if not exclusively, concerned with the arts. Securing its disciplinary status seems to have been a function of this self-limitation to arti cial beauty. Indeed, during the past two cen- turies, aesthetic theory seems to have only been able to carve out an independent area of competence for itself by excluding natural beauty as a pre-Romantic and, above all, Romantic remnant from its con- cerns. Indeed, the natural beautiful has been neglected in aesthetic re ection, even outrightly repressed, as Adorno contends. In light of the critical reevaluation of aesthetic theory that is underway today— the renewed interest in the sublime is one, but only one, indication in which this reassessment is taking place—it is only natural that we should seek to remind ourselves of the concept of natural beauty and of what it promised. Furthermore, this situation also gives us, perhaps, an opportunity to rethink this concept by inquiring into the epistemic and ethical underpinnings that have informed the modern concept of natural beauty. In preparation of such a re ection that, I believe, would restore to aesthetics its philosophical credentials, the status of this concept in the history of aesthetics, inevitably, becomes an
Research in Phenomenology , 32 © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands 2002 104 rodolphe gasché issue. Highly predominant in the aesthetic theories of the eighteenth century up to Kant, the notion of the beautiful of nature becomes suddenly irrelevant in aesthetic re ection after Kant. In Aesthetic Theory , Theodor W. Adorno holds that at least since Schelling and Hegel an unlucky, ill-fated, or even evil star—Unstern—has hung over the the- ory of natural beauty. 1 According to Adorno, the reason for this the- ory’s lack of good fortune derives precisely from the fact that it is a theory about nature. Following Benjamin, Adorno explains this nega- tive valuation of nature on the grounds that what natural beauty tells us is not only uncertain but that “in its uncertainty, natural beauty inherits the ambiguity of myth.”2 Furthermore, as his talk of an unlucky star suggests, the repression and, especially, the sacri ce of natural beauty in Idealist aesthetics is tied to an aspect of nature that Benjamin repeatedly associated with mythical violence. 3 But before we can inquire into this evil star that is the cause of the dismissal of the theory of natural beauty and the “sacri ce” of its very object, we need to address some of the more basic questions, namely: Why is natural beauty the prime paradigm of the beautiful in Kant’s aesthetics; what is at stake for Hegel in relegating the beautiful of nature to a secondary role in his aesthetics; and nally, what does Adorno seek to achieve in play- ing Kant and Hegel o V against one another? But while we seek to address these questions in order to determine what the theory of aes- thetics’ unlucky star is, an additional question cannot be avoided. Undoubtedly, natural beauty has received short shrift in aesthetic the- ory in the aftermath of Idealism. But does a return to the question of natural beauty mean that it is time to reverse the hierarchical rela- tion between it and the beauty of art? Does one not need to acknowl- edge that it is not possible to conceive of the beautiful without weigh- ing natural beauty against the beauty of art, and vice-versa? Thus any diVerence between the two invariably implies some sort of hierarchy. But in order to do justice to the neglected natural beautiful, is it nec- essary (or even possible) to reverse the dominant hierarchy? What if the reasons for subordinating natural beauty to arti cial beauty are compelling, even to the point that the only way of doing justice to the beauty of nature is to rethink the hierarchy that exists between the two kinds of beauty? I start my investigation with Kant’s theory of natural beauty. The Critique of Judgment is manifestly the place to start such an inquiry. Yet, for reasons that will only become clear later, I turn to a much more unlikely source, namely, a short paragraph in the part on “The Doctrine