The Dialectic of Artistic Form

This translation of Losev's aesthetic treatise is prefaced by a thorough analysis of Losev's sources and an outline of the continuing relevance of his aesthetic theory to present-day aesthetics.

The early aesthetics of Alexei Losev is one of the best examples of pre-communist Russian thought and one of the last attempts to build a grand philosophical system on the basis of pagan and Christian Neoplatonism, Russian personalism, phenomenology, and the dialectical trend in German Idealism. Losev's brilliant dialectical-phenomenological thinking anticipates many twentieth-century discoveries in phenomenological and dialectical aesthetics within a coherent and elegant account of artistic form. Losev's insights into the nature of aesthetic perception and artistic form also anticipate many recent discoveries in neurobiological aesthetics, thus harmonizing the phenomenological approach in aesthetics with the scientific. The translation of Losev's aesthetic treatise is prefaced by a thorough analysis of Losev's sources and an outline of the continuing relevance of his aesthetic theory to present-day aesthetics.

Inhalt
I. Main definitions 1. The primary dialectical tetractys - 2. Some necessary dialectical details within the structure of the tetractys - 3. Tetractys as intelligence - 4. The categorial structure of the energy of the essence (and in particular of its expression) - 5. A phenomenologo-dialectical map of the real name, or of energetic expressiveness - 6. The definition of the notion 'artistic form' - II. Antinomics 7. A phenomenological dialectic of the notion 'artistic form.' Antinomies of fact - 8. Antinomies of understanding, or expression - 9. Antinomies of meaning - 10. Antinomies of myth - 11. Antinomies of adequateness - 12. Antinomies of isolation, or of isolated autarky (self-sufficiency) - 13. Summary of the phenomenologo-dialectical analysis of the notion 'artistic form' - 14. Classification of the types of artistic form: a) eidetic types - 15. Classification of the types of artistic form: b) mythical types and c) person-based types - 16. Classification of the types of artistic form: d) modificational person-based types - 17. Classification of the types of artistic form: e) stylistic and f) compositional types - 18. General overview of the dialectic of particular types of artistic form