[lbo-talk] The Conservative Mind

Michael Pollak mpollak at panix.com
Mon Oct 3 16:59:39 PDT 2011


On Mon, 3 Oct 2011, Ferenc Molnar wrote:


> [Burke] is also central to this rather hard to pin down stream of
> thought:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sublime_(philosophy)

He's a founder but he's also an outlier. As wiki suggests, most of the tradition didn't take up his central preoccupations which are very peculiar to him. When the tradition became an influential current of thought, it was mainly founded on the awe felt in the presence of vastness, like oceans or mountains or the starry night. Burke doesn't care about any of that except, oddly, insofar as it might hurt us.

But if you're intersted in Burke and the sublime, I think you'll love (or hate -- but at least find interesting) the last chapter in Corey's book, where he discusses Burke's concept of the sublime in some detail and argues that while it might be at the margin of artistic developments, it is at the center of modern (post-French Revolution) conservatism.

BTW, FWIW, my favorite summary of the intellectual history of sublime is the introductory essay in Andrew Wilton's book _Turner and the Sublime_.

Michael



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