Aesthetics of the Sublime and Its Connotations and Properties in Postmodern Literature

Abstract

Abstract: This paper explores Kant's classification of aesthetics as the beautiful and the sublime, and with an interpretation of Lyotard's proposition that postmodern aesthetics is the aesthetics of the sublime, it suggests that postmodern sublimity lies mainly in viewing postmodern literature as an art for protest, highlighting how to tell a story instead of what a story is, and regarding the indeterminacy as the primary aesthetic principle as in the slogan of "Vive la difference," and it then achieves strangeness through radical experiment and eclecticism, and derives pleasure by adjusting expectations. The paper argues that postmodern literature, if judged by traditional or Pythagorean aesthetics, shows no beauty as it knows not how to talk about its beauties.

Key words: beauty, aesthetics of the sublime, aesthetic property, postmodern literature, the unpresentable

Chen Qi, Hu Quansheng. Aesthetics of the Sublime and Its Connotations and Properties in Postmodern Literature[J]. Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art, 2016, 36(4): 94-102.

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(1)依据里蒙-凯南的看法,在这场争论中,写实派的主张(realistic argument)视人物为人,纯粹派的主张(purist argument)视人物为文字,前者的理论基础是模仿说,后者的理论基础是符号学(详见Rimmon-Kenan,Chapter 3)。另依据博特卢西和迪克逊的看法,传统理论视人物为人,近当代理论视人物为符号(详见Bortolussi&Dixon,Chapter 5)。
(2)比如格雷贝斯注意到:在后现代主义的文学艺术那里,“除了运用新媒体外,所有的艺术生产和文学都拾起了在现代主义中发现和发展的概念和表现模式”(Grabes67)。又如达恩也注意到:“没有哪一个叙事技巧被标为后现代主义所独有”(D'haen 272)。
(3)斯科龙斯基称“先锋派画家在其作品中运用去形的脸部(或躯体)”为“去形美学”(an aesthetics of deformation)(Skowronski 72)。
(4)杜尚拿来一只尿壶,命名曰《泉》,署名“理查德·马特先生”,然后送去纽约展览,被拒绝。据说后来杜尚解释说:“是否真是马特先生亲手所做无关紧要。重要的是他选择了它。他将一件日常生活用品,放在这样的环境里,给它一个新标题和新视角,它原先的使用意义消失了,但却为这个物体创造一种新思想”(转引自Grabes 36)。
(5)不少批评家认为不确定性是后现代主义的特征、标准或标志。如达恩认为“‘不确定性'是哈桑以降被认为是经典后现代主义的基本标准”(D'haen 277)。又如哈维视不确定性为“后现代思想”三大标志之一,另外两个标志是“碎片化”和“强烈怀疑通用或说‘统一'话语”(Harvey9)。
(6)中国学者赵毅衡认为“日日新”(Make It New)是现代派高举的旗帜,而“篇篇怪”(Make It Strange)是后现代派高举的旗帜(赵毅衡17),窃以为很有见地。

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Aesthetics of the Sublime and Its Connotations and Properties in Postmodern Literature

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