5.

The sublime in art and literature

Before I can apply my Kantian account of the moral significance of the sublime
to my interpretation of Beckett's Molloy, I need to analyse one last major area of
Kant's aesthetic theory: his theory of art. My interpretation of Kant's theory of
aesthetic reflective judgement consists of two major components: (1) The
disinterested feeling claiming its own universal validity must be regarded as the
subjective aspect of the cognition of an object of nature, and (2) the basis for the
claim to universal validity is the necessity of judging objects under the principle of
purposiveness in order to supplement determinative judgements under the
categories of understanding. Judgements of taste are based on the feeling of a
mental state which is a subjective condition of cognition of an object as a totality
and of the interrelations between objects. The judgement of sublimity is a special
kind of aesthetic reflective judgements, one which concerns objects that are not
subsumed under the principle of the purposiveness of nature, but under the
principle of the purposive use of nature for man's freedom as a rational subject.
My discussion starts with the problem of how to apply the principles for
judging nature to intentionally created artifacts. Since art is an intentional product,
it is purposive, but that does not mean that we can judge it reflectively under a
principle of the purposiveness of nature. This principle guides reflective
judgements of nature under the hypothetical assumption of its purposive
arrangement. Judgements about real intentions are determinative. To explain how
these objects also can be subject to aesthetic reflective judgements, Kant's
perspective changes from the question of how the subject judges the object to how
the object is produced. His answer is that these objects do have non-intentional
aspects that must be judged reflectively. Judging these aspects requires that we
regard art as if it were nature, i.e. as non-intentionally produced, but we must still
be aware of its artificial origin.
We are justified in judging fine art this way, Kant claims, because the non-
intentional aspects have their source in a natural talent called genius. Genius is a
natural disposition over which the artist has no rational control, and through which
nature gives the rule to art. Thus genius produces exemplary works. Genius is the
ability to express aesthetic ideas. I understand aesthetic ideas to be those aspects of
a representation of an object (either of art or of nature) that give rise to the free
play of the cognitive powers. Thus aesthetic ideas are the products of the activity
 5. The sublime in art and literature 233

of imagination. They give rise to many thoughts, Kant says, and I argue that these
ideas enable us, in the objective aspect of the reflective judgement, to find a
concept for the object. Every work of fine art is an intentional product, and having
genius is not sufficient to become an artist. One must also be able to present
aesthetic ideas in a suitable way. That requires 'academic' training in the
appropriate skills combined with the use of taste to refine the work. In this chapter,
I argue that for the creation of sublime works of art, not only genius, trained skills,
taste, but also a feeling for the sublime are required.
Several commentators have understood Kant to claim that art cannot be
sublime. This is strange, considering the number of sublime works of art described
in Kant's works. I offer a different interpretation of the crucial passages, as saying
that in a critique of the judgement of sublimity, sublime objects of art are not
suitable examples because they are also intentionally produced. I then discuss
some of the examples of sublime art in Kant's work that show that both
architecture and poetry, according to him, can be sublime. I argue that, according
to his theory, there is nothing that prevents works of painting, sculpture, and
music, from being sublime. Also, novels should be included among works of fine
art as Kant defines it. I claim that novels are, just like poems, suitable vehicles for
giving rise to the feeling of the sublime.
I then turn to the problem of how a bounded form like the novel can be
sublime. I discuss and reject a proposal that the sublime in art is the non-
determinable aesthetic ideas presented within a bounded, beautiful form. I suggest
that we must distinguish between 'form' and 'content' as used in art criticism, and
'form' and 'material' of the object of aesthetic assessment as understood by Kant.
Aesthetic reflective judgement is always concerned with the form of the object
understood as the structuring activity of the cognitive powers, but the material that
is structured encompasses both the form and content of the work as discussed in art
criticism. What we judge in the pure aesthetic judgement of the work of art is how
we feel when cognising the object. This is just one of the many perspectives under
which we can judge a work of art, but it is a necessary aspect of every work of fine
art.
 S. The sublime in art and literature
234

5. 1 Art andpurposiveness

Intentional production and aesthetic judgement

The last part of the Analytic of Aesthetic Judgement (KU§§43-53) introduces a

new aspect of Kant's Critique; aesthetic reflective judgements of art. Obviously
this causes problems for an interpretation that takes the assumed purposiveness of
nature to be the guiding principle of aesthetic reflective judgements. The principles
guiding aesthetic judgements about art can hardly be identical with those guiding
aesthetic judgements about nature, because there are significant differences
between nature and art, as also Kant emphasises:
Kunst wird von der Natur, wie Tun (facere) vom Handeln oder Wirken
überhaupt (agere), und das Produkt, oder die Folge der erstem als Werk (opus)
von der letztern als Wirkung (effectus) unterschieden. (KU§43, 303)

Works of art are intentionally produced, i.e. they are the results of actions with
particular ends. Now any conscious human action is directed towards an end, and
therefore Kant distinguishes art from science (which enables one to produce the
desired effects immediately) and craft (where the attraction lies only in the utility
of the product) (KU§43, 303 f). A work of art is an intentionally produced object1
which requires skill, not only theoretical knowledge, and which pleases on its own
account and not due to its usefulness.
By this introduction to his discussion of the aesthetic judgement of art, Kant's
perspective has changed from being almost solely concerned with the subject's
judgement of her own mental state to a focus on the object and the source of its
production. This remains the main perspective throughout the discussion of art,
although discussed within the context of aesthetic reflection on these objects. The
earlier analyses of the judgements of taste and sublimity are clearly presupposed.
Why this change of perspective? The answer lies in the difference between art and
nature. When we make conceptual judgements of nature under the principle of
purposiveness, this purposiveness cannot be more than a subjective assumption we
must resort to, because of our limited cognitive capacities. Then the judging
subject must require that everybody should share her mental state if this judgement
is going to have more than private validity. But when the object of judgement is

'Object' is used in a wide sense here. Obviously there are problems in calling
symphonies, poems or novels objects, but this is not a problem I have to deal with in
this context. In a Kantian frame of reference, an aesthetic object is something that we
judge by disinterested pleasure. The ontological status of the aesthetic object is
irrelevant.
 5. 1 Art and purposiveness 235

intentionally produced, then the judgement is based on a real, not an assumed

purposiveness, since we must assume that a real purpose is the reason for the
existence of an artifact. This is a determinative judgement, which means that it is
objectively valid. Since the judgement is universally valid objectively it follows
that the mental state is one that everybody must share (KU§8, 215), and no
assumption about the merely subjective universal validity of the mental state is
necessary. The intentional origin of artifacts means that these objects cannot
immediately be judged according to the principle of purposiveness without
purpose since they have real purposes2.
To avoid the unacceptable conclusion that a work of art cannot be subject to
aesthetic reflective judgement, Kant has to discuss the creation of works of art to
find out how they can be subject to judgements of taste despite being intentionally
produced. The condition is that there be something about these works that cannot
be thought of as an effect of the artist's intentions. These objects are intentionally
produced to be judged aesthetically, and to achieve that, the artist must
intentionally create a work containing features not controlled by his intentional
purpose. This is a common feature of all (good) works of fine art: a description of
these works as intentionally produced cannot grasp all relevant aspects of them.
We must resort to reflective judgement to achieve cognition of the object as a
whole.
This problem of intended purposes does not occur in judgements of natural
objects, but has to be solved when it comes to artifacts. Therefore some of Kant's
main questions and answers in his discussion of the aesthetic reflective judgement
of fine art are: 1. How can intentional products be judged according to a principle
of purposiveness without purpose? As we shall see his answer is that the work of
art must be judged as (partially) non-intentional (KU§45, 306 f). 2. How can the
artist intentionally produce something that is non-intentional? By releasing a
creative force that is not controlled by his intentions: genius (KU§46, 307 f)· 3.
What is involved in this talent called genius? The exhibition of aesthetic ideas
(KU§49, 312 f). 4. Can this talent be expressed in other artifacts beside objects of
fine art? Yes (KU§48, 313). He also discusses the relation between genius and
taste, and which art forms are to be included among the fine arts. The change of
perspective in the discussion of the judgement of art represents no departure from
his general aesthetic theory as expounded in the earlier parts of the Critique. It is

2
When judging an artifact, we may be uncertain about the purpose of the object, but that
is not the issue here. When making a determinative judgement, a claim to objective
validity is made, i.e. a truth claim is made, which does not necessarily express the truth.
See Allison, Transcendental Idealism, 72.
 5. The sublime in art and literature
236

necessary to justify his claim that we judge these intentional products under the
formal principle of the purposiveness of nature. Then the deduction of judgements
of taste is valid for the judgement of objects of art in the same way as it is for the
judgement of objects of nature.
I have mentioned earlier Kant's view that there are three ways in which a
natural object can be pleasing: as agreeable, as beautiful, or as good. Kant uses the
same tripartite division for works of art, which are classified as agreeable art, fine
(literally: beautiful) art [schöne Kunst] (KU§44, 305), or are which is judged
according to the perfection of the object (KU§48, 311 f). Kant's main concern
here as in the main part of the previous discussion, is the pure judgement of taste,
and therefore fine art becomes the focus of the discussion. He does, however,
contrast to fine art with agreeable art, and has some problem drawing the line
between the two forms of art, especially in his discussion of music (KU§51, 325).
In the end he settles on the moral significance of art as the feature that
distinguishes fine art from agreeable art that only pleases the sensations:

Doch in aller schönen Kunst besteht das Wesentliche in der Form, welche für
die Beobachtung und Beurteilung zweckmäßig ist, ... nicht in der Materie der
Empfindung (dem Reize oder der Rührung), wo es bloß auf Genuß angelegt ist,
welcher nichts in der Idee zurückläßt, den Geist stumpf, den Gegenstand nach
und nach anekelnd, und das Gemüt, durch das Bewußtsein seiner im Urteile
der Vernunft zweckwidrigen Stimmung, mit sich selbst unzufrieden und
launisch macht. Wenn die schönen Künste nicht nahe oder fern mit
moralischen Ideen in Verbindung gebracht werden, die allein ein selbständiges
Wohlgefallen bei sich fuhren, so ist das letztere ihr endliches Schicksal.
(KU§52, 325 f)

The last sentence says that fine art must be connected, closely or remotely, with
moral ideas if dullness of the spirit and disgust with the object of art is to be
avoided as the long-term result. Kant apparently means that if a work of art is not
thus connected with moral ideas, the pleasure the spectator takes in the object is
merely that of charm and emotion. This pleasure is one that in the long run affects
the spectator negatively. My suggestion is that fine art is closely connected with
morality in our judgement of sublime objects, and remotely in our judgement of
beautiful objects. In the judgement of the sublime, the feeling is related to a
purposive use of the object for the supersensible, i.e. moral, vocation
[Bestimmung] of human beings, and is directly connected to the reflection on
moral ideas. Beauty has a remote connection with moral ideas both because it is as
a symbol of morality and because the judgement of taste is a judgement under the
 5. 1 Art and purposiveness 237

principle of purposiveness. This principle is ultimately said to be an indeterminate

concept of the supersensible substrate of humanity (KU§57, 340 f) 3 .
When it comes to the distinction between fine art judged as free and as
accessory beauty, the picture is less clear, since Kant appears to demand that every
aesthetic reflective judgement of art must accord with a concept of the object's
perfection, which seems to imply that it is not pure.
Wenn aber der Gegenstand für ein Produkt der Kunst gegeben ist, und als
solches für schön erklärt werden soll: so muß, weil Kunst immer einen Zweck
in der Ursache (und deren Kausalität) voraussetzt, zuerst ein Begriff von dem
zum Grund gelegt werden, was das Ding sein soll... . (KU§48, 311)

This passage, where Kant seems to claim that all aesthetic judgement of art is
applied (i.e. judging the object as accessory beauty), is somewhat obscure. Is
'thing' here the work of art or is it the object(s) represented in the work of art? If
the latter is the case, then our judgement would not concern the object of art, but
the content represented in it. That would require all art to be representational,
which seems to be what Kant means when he states that artistic beauty is a
beautiful representation [ Vorstellung] of a thing (KU§48, 311). On the other hand,
he uses ornamental designs and music without words to exemplify free beauty
because they represent nothing (KU§ 16, 229) which shows that Kant does not hold
art to be necessarily representational, at least not in the strong sense suggested in
§48. Thus, the concept involved in a judgement of art is not a concept of the
represented object, since not all fine art is representational.
The concept that is needed is a concept of the work of art itself. But do we
need just the awareness of it as fine art by contrast with other intentionally
produced artifices, or a more specific concept? My suggestion is that we need a
concept of the intentions behind the art work, for if we first determine the
intentional form and content of the work, then we are able to determine what is
purposive without being intended by the artist. And that is what is required for us
to make a pure aesthetic judgement of the object.

Purposiveness without purpose in works of art

The key to judging art under the principle of merely formal purposiveness, is to
regard the art work as not completely determined by human intention, i.e. we
regard it as if it were nature:

3
See chapter 4.6.
 S. The sublime in art and literature
238

Die Natur war schön, wenn sie zugleich als Kunst aussah; und die Kunst kann
nur schön genannt werden, wenn wir uns bewußt sind, sie sei Kunst, und sie
uns doch als Natur aussieht.... Also muß die Zweckmäßigkeit im Produkte der
schönen Kunst, ob sie zwar absichtlich ist, doch nicht absichtlich scheinen; d.i.
schöne Kunst muß als Natur anzusehen sein, ob man sich ihrer zwar als Kunst
bewußt ist. (KU§45, 306 f)

In the first sentence Kant suggests a reciprocal relation between art and nature,
in that nature must look like art to be beautiful and art must look like nature to be
beautiful. In determinative judgement, nature is regarded as mechanistic, in terms
of causal laws, whereas in reflective judgement we judge nature under the
principle of purposiveness, seeing organic objects as purposive wholes, as well as
all of nature as composing a purposive totality. In this technical (drawing on the
Greek term techne, meaning both art and other productive skills) judgement we
regard nature as an intentionally created whole, i.e. as art. Aesthetic reflective
judgement as the subjective aspect of teleological judgement presupposes this idea
of nature as art, and (assuming the correctness of my interpretation) Kant refers to
this principle when he says that nature is beautiful when it looks like art.
The latter sentence is concerned with the fact that products of art are always
intentionally produced, and we are usually aware of, and concerned with, this
intention when we experience these objects. Then it seems as if our judgement is
not pure, because there is a real purpose in the principle of purposiveness; i.e. the
judgement is conceptual, not aesthetic. Guyer has however pointed out that since
the intention in the creation of fine art is the production of disinterested pleasure,
this is no problem:

Because what the concept of fine art requires is only the intention to produce
pleasure through the free play of the cognitive faculties, there is no way in
which the recognition of the intention alone can determine the response to a
work of fine art; yet precisely where that intention is successfully
accomplished, it will also be the case that no mere concept alone can be seen as
fully determining the response to the work. ... in a crucial respect a work of
artistic genius does not merely look like a work of artistic genius but is one, and
thus has no need to look like one at all.4

Guyer correctly says that intention to give disinterested pleasure must be

contained in the concept of fine art. The problem with his account is that this is not
sufficient to distinguish between a failure and a success in producing fine art. And
it is the aesthetic judgement, not the production, of objects that is Kant's concern.
This means that Kant wants to capture with his definition only objects that can be

4
Guyer, Claims of Taste, 355 f.
 5. 1 Art and purposiveness 239

judged as fulfilling the intention involved in creating art, i.e. objects that actually
lead to someone taking pleasure in the purposiveness of the form of these objects.
If an artifact is to be judged as fine art, there must be something more about it
than just the intention to produce disinterested pleasure, namely that there is
something about the object that does appear purposive without being intentionally
created. In this sense the object must look like nature, i.e. it must be purposive
without this purposiveness being part of the intention. We should not take 'look
like' in a literal sense. What it means is merely that the object must be such that we
judge it not only according to what we know or assume to be the artistic intentions,
but also as a product of nature. Art does not have to imitate nature, but must be
nature in the sense that we judge it at least partially to display the same non-
intentional purposiveness that is found in nature. Guyer is right when he points out
that defining something as a work of art means defining it as something that is
produced with the intention to produce pleasure. He is wrong when he claims that
this intention makes the requirement that art must look like nature superfluous. The
artifact is a work of art only when the intention is successfully accomplished, and
this is only the case when the object looks like nature.
To make a pure judgement of art, a particular attitude is required, which
disregards all interest and feelings based on concept (such as the pleasure in the
good). We have already encountered this requirement in the discussion of the
aesthetic judgement of nature, but now another element is added to the
appearances, concepts and feelings involved in the experience of an object. The
aesthetic judgement of an art work is made by disregarding the intention involved
in producing the object. This disregard allows the judgement to be pure. We
achieve this attitude when we regard the object as if it were a product of mere
nature, although we are still conscious of its artificial origin (KU§45, 306). When
we judge art as if it were nature, the subject's mental state must be one of free play
of the cognitive powers and we demand that everybody should share this mental
state.
Accordingly, the connection between taking nature as art and art as nature is
more than a mere word play, but there is a significant difference in the meaning of
the words as they are used in these two relations. The first relation deals with what
principle we have to assume to make any pure aesthetic reflective judgement,
whereas the other deals with what attitude we have to take to be able to judge this
particular object (of art) according to the principle assumed in the first relation.
Thus there is no real reciprocity between the two expressions; the latter is
dependent on the assumptions of the former, whereas the opposite is not the case.
240 5. The sublime in art and literature

5.2 Genius and aesthetic ideas

Genius and non-intended purpose in art

How can intentionally produced art be judged under the principle of the
purposiveness of nature, when it is not part of nature? The justification for the
subjective necessity of an aesthetic judgement of nature is based on it being a
judgement of the subject's mental state when making a teleological judgement, a
state we require everybody to share. But this claim to universal validity for our
feeling is only required as long as there is no real purpose 5 in the object we are
judging, because knowledge of the real purposiveness of the object would give us
a conceptual basis for judging the object determinatively. When such a conceptual
basis is available, then a shared state of mind is not a necessary presupposition for
the judgement.
In art there is a real purpose in the sense that the artist creates the object
intentionally, and we are entirely justified in ascribing real purposiveness to the
object. But if Kant's account of the aesthetic reflective judgement is to be
successfully transferred from nature to art, the work of art cannot be completely
explained by the deliberate intentions of the artist. There must also be a
purposiveness without a real purpose which means that we cannot fully determine
the object as being created according to a particular plan accounting for every
single element and relation within the finished product. If we could, there would be
no point in a demand to universal assent for our state of mind when cognising the
object. Then the object would not be judged according to the principle of
purposiveness, but determined conceptually according to the known purpose (as
we can do when judging commercial products such as pop music or so-called soap
operas on television), and the art would not be fine, but mechanical (KU§45, 306).
Beautiful art must not only be intentionally produced, but must also contain
elements that can be judged under the heuristic principle of a purposiveness of
nature. These non-intentional elements must have a source different from the
intentional, conceptual aspects of the work, a source Kant calls genius:

5
When we judge the action of a person, we always judge it as directed towards an end,
i.e. as being based on a purpose. This judgement issues a claim to objective validity.
This is distinguished from the heuristic judgement of nature under the concept of real
purposiveness (KU VIII, 193), which is merely a device for making sense of nature for
our judgement. This kind of real purposiveness can be represented only by reflective
judgements with intersubjective validity.
 5.2 Genius and aesthetic ideas 241

Genie ist das Talent (Naturgabe), welches der Kunst die Regel gibt. Da das
Talent, als angebornes produktives Vermögen des Künstlers, selbst zur Natur
gehört, so könnte man sich auch so ausdrücken: Genie ist die angeborne
Gemütsanlage (ingenium), durch welche die Natur der Kunst die Regel gibt.
(KU§46, 307)

Fine art is defined as the art of genius. When the rules of art are given by a
natural disposition, we have no access through rational means to the rules
determining art, and we have no way of knowing the real purpose in an object of
art. We cannot even claim there to be any such purpose behind the rules of the
work of art, because that would be tantamount to asserting a real (intentional)
purpose in nature's apparently purposive regularities. We are no more warranted in
claiming real purposiveness for this lawfulness than for any other of nature's
empirical regularities.
Although we can say that art is intentionally produced, and we can find out
everything about how the artist planned and executed the creation of a work of art,
we have no possible access to the essential factor in the creation of art, the factor
that makes fine art into an object of disinterested pleasure. This factor is not even
accessible to the artist himself, because it is a talent whose operation cannot be
described in rules 6 . The decisive element in fine art is its exemplary originality in
the sense that it does not follow rules but creates them, so that they can be
discovered and followed by others (KU§46, 307f). Because fine art cannot occur
except as the result of the creative talent called genius, nature is the basis for the
rules of art (compare KU§57, 344).
The creative work of genius cannot be rational in the sense of expressing the
autonomy of man, as the ability to judge, both practically and theoretically, does..
But it must be accessible to rational judgement, i.e. it must be possible to see it as
being as law-governed as any other natural phenomenon. Since genius is not
rational in the first sense, it must be part of man understood as nature, as subject to
the regularities of nature. Man viewed as nature is man governed by causally
determined physical and psychological laws. Not all of man's actions can be
completely explained according to the principles of determinative judgement even
if regarded solely from the empirical point of view, and perhaps the most
important phenomenon that escapes our capacity for determinative judgement is

6
Kant's view of the inspired, non-rational basis of the creative arts has a striking
similarity with Plato's understanding of poetry in e.g. The Republic, 607B-608B, as is
pointed out in D. Crawford, 'Kant's Theory of Creative Imagination', 176 ff. Crawford
argues that this similarity stops at the assessments of the value of art, in that Kant
emphasises its moral significance, whereas Plato wanted to banish poetry from the ideal
state due to its attractive irrationality.
 S. The sublime in art and literature
242

the creative element in fine art. However much we understand of man's

psychology, we seem unable to explain the causality of the creative process,
presumably because its fundamental characteristic is originality, and we must
instead judge it reflectively under the principle of the purposiveness of nature.
Kant does not express this connection between the judgements of art and nature
explicitly, but there are several passages supporting this interpretation. He states
that art is purposive on its own (KU§44, 306), i.e. it is not created to serve some
other goal we can determine conceptually. Furthermore, there are several elements
in the description of genius pointing in the same direction:

Man sieht hieraus, daß Genie 1) ein Talent sei, dasjenige, wozu sich keine
bestimmte Regel geben läßt, hervorzubringen: nicht Geschicklichkeitsanlage zu
dem, was nach irgend einer Regel gelernt werden kann; folglich daß
Originalität seine erste Eigenschaft sein müsse. ... 3) Daß ... der Urheber eines
Produkts, welches er seinem Genie verdankt, selbst nicht weiß, wie sich in ihm
die Ideen dazu herbei finden, auch es nicht in seiner Gewalt hat, dergleichen
nach Belieben oder planmäßig auszudenken und anderen in solchen
Vorschriften mitzuteilen, die sie in Stand setzten, gleichmäßige Produkte
hervorzubringen. (KU§46, 307 f)

It is impossible to describe the rules of the products of genius, because

otherwise one could learn to have genius. But one can describe the rules of each
single work of art. Thus it is possible to copy fine art without being a genius, but
without being able to determine the last, and decisive factor in the production of
art: How to create art? The creative element, the element that is the defining
characteristic of fine art, is impossible to determine causally. Even the artist
himself cannot plan the production of it. If this element had been determined, then
the creative process could have been repeated in new situations by anybody who
had acquired the skill. Therefore we have to judge the creative element of a work
of art as a purposive product of nature while recognising that this judgement is
only valid for human judgement; it does not have objective validity. In this sense,
the judgement of art is part of our judgement of nature, and accounts for the claim
to subjective universality for our feeling when cognising the object.
This particular attitude of regarding art as if it were nature is not the same as
regarding art in the same way as we regard nature. On the contrary, the attitude
must include the awareness of the intentionality of the art work, an awareness that
enables us to disregard this intentionality in the pure aesthetic judgement of the
work. This intentionality we can describe as conceptual purposiveness, to contrast
it with the purposiveness of genius, and it includes didactic elements, imitation of
objects and events, creation of narratives, expression of wit, as well as structural
 S.2 Genius and aesthetic ideas 243

features belonging to the different genres of art. Kant emphasises thè importance
of expressing the material provided by genius in a proper form (KU§47, 311). In a
total aesthetic assessment also the question of the intentions expressed in the work
is of interest, as well as its moral content, its complexity, its originality and so
forth. The pure aesthetic judgement is an integral, and even essential, part of this
judgement (KU§52, 326), but it is clearly not Kant's view that pure aesthetic
judgement alone is adequate for a proper assessment of a work of art7. But if we do
not take this judgement into account, our assessment of the object of art lacks an
essential component, a component that is an element in Kant's basic description of
fine art:

Schöne Kunst dagegen ist eine Vorstellungsart, die für sich selbst zweckmäßig
ist und, obgleich ohne Zweck, dennoch die Kultur der Gemütskräfte zur
geselligen Mitteilung befördert. Die allgemeine Mitteilbarkeit einer Lust führt
es schon in ihrem Begriffe mit sich, daß diese nicht eine Lust des Genusses,
aus bloßer Empfindung, sondern der Reflexion sein müsse; und so ist
ästhetische Kunst, als schöne Kunst, eine solche, die die reflektierende
Urteilskraft und nicht die Sinnenempfindung zum Richtmaße hat. (KU§44,
306)

Kant's claim is that the pleasure we take in art, if it is to be reckoned as fme art
and not mere enjoyment, must be a universally communicable feeling, which is the
basis for aesthetic reflective judgement. Thus we cannot assess a work of fine art
as a work of fine art without judgement of taste or sublimity being a part of the
assessment, but that requires an awareness of how we are affected by the work in
other ways as well.

Expression of aesthetic ideas and the purpose of art

Genius includes the ability to express aesthetic ideas (KU§49, 317), and Kant
says that

7
To distinguish the pure judgement from the accessory judgement and other conceptually
based pleasures in the object, we must be able to determine these different feelings, i.e.
we must clarify the possible ways to judge the object aesthetically (by feeling).
Furthermore, in the discussion of pure and accessory judgement of nature, Kant states
the moral value of judgements of accessory beauty (KU§16, 230 f), and finds the
development of taste to be part of the moral project of cultivating humanity in ourselves
(KU§60, 355 f). The connection between aesthetic judgements in general and moral
development is a large topic, which, regrettably, I cannot discuss adequately within the
context of this work.
 5. The sublime in art and literature
244

unter einer ästhetischen Idee aber verstehe ich diejenige Vorstellung der
Einbildungskraft, die viel zu denken veranlaßt, ohne daß ihr doch irgend ein
bestimmter Gedanke, d.i. Begriff adequät sein kann, die folglich keine Sprache
völlig erreicht und verständlich machen kann. (KU§49, 314)

An aesthetic idea is defined as a special kind of representation in the

imagination of the subject experiencing the object. This representation induces
much thought, without one determinate concept being adequate to the imagined
material. In this case imagination must be free, since it cannot be determined by a
particular concept. When this representation of the imagination leads to many
thoughts, this relation between the cognitive powers is a relation of free play. My
conclusion is that genius is the ability to create an object that is such that it
expresses aesthetic ideas. Aesthetic ideas are those aspects of an object that give
rise to a free play between the cognitive powers in the representation of the object.
Kant accordingly says that both natural and artistic beauty is expression of
aesthetic ideas (KU§51, 320).
This interpretation deviates considerably from other interpretations. Guyer, for
instance, who takes as his point of departure Kant's statement that an aesthetic idea
is the counterpart to an idea of reason, in that the first is a representation of the
imagination to which no concept can be adequate, and the latter is a concept to
which no intuition can be adequate (KU§49, 314). He takes an example (KU§49,
315) as paradigmatic, and finds that in the production of art there must be three
elements involved; first, a rational idea which is the content of the work and
second, an indeterminate amount of particular images (e.g. Jupiter's eagle). He
continues:

Third, intervening between these two elements, is the aesthetic idea properly so
called, the idea of the imagination that suggests the idea of reason on the one
hand and the indeterminate array of images on the other. In this case that would
be nothing other than the imaginative idea of Jupiter himself as the
embodiment of majesty or sublimity.8

There are two problems with this interpretation. First, if Kant, by calling
aesthetic ideas the counterparts to rational ideas means that rational and aesthetic
ideas belong together in the sense that every aesthetic idea is the embodiment of a
rational idea, the consequence is that there would be an image adequate to this
rational idea, and a concept adequate to this aesthetic idea. That contradicts Kant's
own definitions of rational and aesthetic ideas. I find it more plausible that Kant in
this passage gives his reason for calling these representations of the imagination

8
Guyer, Claims of Taste, 358.
 5.2 Genius and aesthetic ideas 245

'ideas'. Since these images cannot be conceptualised, and rational ideas cannot be
intuited, they both differ from concepts of the understanding, but in opposite ways.
Kant says this is the main reason for calling these representations ideas, although
he also says that aesthetic ideas strive towards something that lies beyond the
bounds of experience (KU§49, 314). But he does not say that this something is an
idea of reason; it may well be just another nature. I take Kant to mean that the
imagination can create fictitious worlds, such as the one found in fairy tales,
science fiction, or fantasy literature. Ideas of reason and aesthetic ideas are
counterparts because they are defined as opposites. They do not come together in
pairs, nor can the aesthetic ideas be captured in any concept. The image of Jupiter
can be conceptualised through the descriptions of him in Roman mythology, which
means that this image cannot be an aesthetic idea as Kant defines it.
The other problem is that Guyer's reading attaches art too strongly to ideas of
reason. According to Kant, judgements of the sublime involve ideas of reason,
whereas judgements of taste are connected to cognition, and thus, concepts of
understanding. On the basis of this distinction between the two kinds of aesthetic
reflective judgements, the implication of Guyer's reading is that all art is sublime
rather than beautiful 9 . With beautiful works of art such as Leonardo da Vinci's
Mona Lisa, Michelangelo's David, or a pastoral poem, there are no ideas of reason
of which these works are the embodiments, since they are artistic depictions of a
particular person (notwithstanding the mythical character of the Biblical David) or
event. If these images embody any concept, it must be empirical concepts of the
objects they represent. The examples Kant uses to illustrate aesthetic ideas mostly
involve ideas of reason, making Guyer's interpretation reasonable. But leading up
to these examples we fmd a passage that indicates that this connection is just one
of the two ways we use the creativity of imagination:

Die Einbildungskraft ... ist nämlich sehr mächtig in Schaffung gleichsam einer
andern Natur aus dem Stoffe, den ihr die wirkliche gibt. Wir unterhalten uns
mit ihr, wo uns die Erfahrung zu alltäglich vorkommt; bilden diese auch wohl
um: zwar noch immer nach analogischen Gesetzen, aber doch auch nach
Prinzipien, die höher hinauf in der Vernunft liegen ... wobei wir unsere Freiheit
vom Gesetze der Assoziation ... fühlen, nach welchem uns von der Natur zwar
Stoff geliehen, dieser aber von uns zu etwas ganz anderem, nämlich dem, was
die Natur übertrifft, verarbeitet werden kann. (KU§49, 314)

The first part of the second sentence deals with the creation of art according to
laws analogous to those of nature, whereas the latter part deals with art involving

9
Crawford, 'Theory of Creative', 173 f. takes aesthetic ideas to be symbols of ideas of
reason. This interpretation suffers from the same problems as Guyer's.
 5. The sublime in art and literature
246

ideas of reason. My claim is that the first part describes the creation of beautiful
art, which follows the rules of nature in some way or another, and the latter deals
with sublime art, which involves ideas of reason. This is a parallel to the
distinction between the boundedness of the beautiful and the unboundedness of the
sublime (KU§23, 244). We can read the passage as a transition from a general
discussion of aesthetic ideas, to a more specific concern with the sublime. In the
discussion following this passage, Kant is concerned with sublime poetry, which is
evident both from the example discussed by Guyer, as well as from the poems
cited later in the section (KU§49, 315f).
Thus there must be some concept(s) involved in the expression of aesthetic
ideas, but they do not have to be ideas of reason. The relation between the
expression of aesthetic ideas and these concepts can be understood in parallel with
the interpretation of the judgement of nature under the principle of purposiveness,
where the aesthetic judgement is based on the subjective aspect of a conceptual
reflective judgement. When we make a reflective judgement, imagination
structures the represented material in many ways under the principle of
purposiveness, resulting in a rich variety of thoughts. This free play is experienced
through our disinterested feeling, which is judged aesthetically. The cognitive goal
is to find concepts which enable us to make sense of the object, but the feeling is
as such independent of this cognitive determination in teleological judgement.
When Kant talks about the concepts or ideas involved in art, his concern is with
this cognitive aspect for which the aesthetic aspect is a subjective condition. The
play with aesthetic ideas is the basis on which the cognitive judgement is
exercised.
But if this model is relevant for the judgement of art as well, the question is:
what kind of teleological judgement is involved? Art seems to have no aim beyond
giving rise to the pleasure in the free play of the faculties, and does not result in
any conceptual judgement of purposiveness. The solution may lie in the rule-
giving function of genius. Genius displays an exemplary originality which gives
the rule to art:
Weil aber das Genie ein Günstling der Natur ist, dergleichen man nur als
seltene Erscheinung anzusehen hat: so bringt sein Beispiel für andere gute
Köpfe eine Schule hervor, d.i. eine methodische Unterweisung nach Regeln,
soweit man sie aus jenen Geistesprodukten und ihrer Eigentümlichkeit hat
ziehen können: und für diese ist die schöne Kunst sofern Nachahmung, der die
Natur durch ein Genie die Regel gab. (KU§49, 318)

Not only in practical freedom do human beings give rules directed towards an
end; but we do so even as subject to the laws of nature. These rules are expressed
 5.2 Genius and aesthetic ideas 247

in art, and can be found by reflective judgement under the principle of

purposiveness, i.e. in teleological judgement. The rules of the art work are
conceptually expressed, and lack objective validity. We cannot subsume these
rules under causal laws of understanding, and they have only subjective validity
like all merely reflective judgements. Still, they contain a demand for
intersubjective validity, since they are based on a mental state we require
everybody to share. Human creativity issues rules that are determined under the
principle of the purposiveness of nature, and the subjective aspect of this objective
judgement is the intersubjectively valid feeling underlying aesthetic judgements of
the art work.

The purposive formation of the work of art

Kant is careful to emphasise that the inspired, free imaginations of genius is not
sufficient to make a work of fine art. A work of art that is not properly structured
cannot be an example of fine art:

Das Genie kann nur reichen Stoff zu Produkten der schönen Kunst hergeben;
die Verarbeitung desselben und die Form erfordert ein durch die Schule
gebildetes Talent, um einen Gebrauch davon zu machen, der vor der
Urteilskraft bestehen kann. (KU§47, 310)

Here Kant makes a distinction between form and matter that is different from
the better known one in the critical philosophy, where the distinction deals with the
empirical matter and the a priori form of appearances in experience (KrV
A86/B118). This distinction also differs from the distinction drawn between form
and matter of the object in aesthetic judgement, where aesthetic reflective
judgement is a judgement of the form of the object. Kant held that all thinking was
characterised by the distinction between form and matter (KrV A266/B322), which
accounts for the several different senses of this pair of concepts in his works 10 . The
distinction he draws at this point cannot be the one that is common in all art
criticism, either, the distinction between what is expressed in the work, and how
these expressions are organised or structured to be presented in the most adequate
way, a distinction that can be understood several ways:

Some art critics use the word "form" to mean approximately the composition of
a painting - "It is a pointillist painting" would not be a form-statement in this

10
See the discussion of the different senses of form and matter in Longuenesse, Capacity
to Judge, 147 ff.
 5. The sublime in art and literature
248

usage. Others, to mean the whole design, in contrast to what the painting
represents - "It contains a red patch" would be a form-statement in this usage.
Others, to mean "how" the objects are arranged on the picture-plane - "thickly"
and "gracefully" would be form-terms in this usage. And there are other
varieties."

Regardless of how we define this distinction, it is not the one Kant has in mind.
Both the form and the content (in such uses of the words) of a work of art can be
subject to pure aesthetic judgement, as Guyer points out:
Genius thus lies in the ability to produce both form and content and the "happy
relation" between them which makes the former especially successful for the
expression of the latter.12

This understanding of Kant's view is related to the marriage of form and

content as presented by Nussbaum 13 , regarding form in the traditional sense to be
an integral part of the content.
We must look for yet another meaning of form and matter in this context. Since
producing the form requires training, it must have to do with those elements that
are conventionally accepted, i.e. the elements that are already known and
determined. These can be formal features, e.g. rhythmical patterns or rules of
proportion; conventions for expressing content, e.g. symbols and allegories; as
well as material for content, such as Biblical and traditional stories, historical
events, natural phenomena, and so forth. These elements are mechanical, in the
sense that one can be trained in the presentation of them within each art form. In
the actual context, form comprises all these non-original elements that together
encompass all the intentional aspects of the object of art. The content consists of
the non-intentional creative elements that Kant calls aesthetic ideas, which are
recognised by their original exemplary nature.
Thus it is clear that no object of art can be the product of genius only, but must
always intentionally be presented in a frame of rules and conventions. We can
judge the object on several levels, then: (1) As an object, it is judged
determinatively according to the laws of nature. (2) As a human artifact, it is
judged according to the intention we must presuppose as the ground for its
production, i.e. it is judged as intentionally purposive. (3) As a work of fine art, we
must judge it as a work of nature through genius, and (4) the subjective aspect of
this judgement is the pure aesthetic judgement of the work. But these perspectives
are not independent aspects of the total experience of the object; to see it as an

11
M. C. Beardsly, Aesthetics, 166.
12
Guyer, Claims of Taste, 360.
13
Nussbaum, Love's Knowledge, 3 f.
 5.2 Genius and aesthetic ideas 249

artifact (2) we must see it as an object (1), and to judge it as a work of genius (3,4)
we must see these creative imaginations as arranged within an intentional whole
(2). In the passage cited above, the matter is the product of genius and the form is
the intentional work of art when this creative element is disregarded. The
distinction I have drawn between judgements under the principle of the
purposiveness of nature and those about intentional purposes is the same as the
distinction Kant draws between the material of genius and the conventional
academic form. He is concerned with our pure aesthetic judgement as an element
in human judgement of the world, a context of which art is only a part. His central
perspective on art is as the rule-governed product of man as part of nature, not as a
free, rational agent.
The work of art cannot consist of the material of genius only. If these
imaginations are not presented in a properly constructed form, there will be
nothing to judge:
man weiß nicht recht, ob man mehr über den Gaukler, der um sich so viel
Dunst verbreitet, wobei man nichts deutlich beurteilen, aber desto mehr sich
einbilden kann, oder mehr über das Publikum lachen soll, welches sich
treuherzig einbildet, daß sein Unvermögen, das Meisterstück der Einsicht
deutlich erkennen und fassen zu können, daher komme, weil ihm neue
Wahrheiten in ganzen Massen zugeworfen werden, wogegen ihm das Detail
(...) nur Stümperwerke zu sein scheint. (KU§47, 310)

If a work of art is to be judged, it must be a structured or designed presentation

of the material. Although a work of art can have 'contents' other than the products
of genius, Kant's concern is merely with how this material of genius is organised.
And this structuring is not an inspired product of genius; it is the result of hard
labour in finding the correct form through trial and error (KU§48, 312). Kant is
not clear on how this structuring comes about, because he says, as quoted above,
that the ability to form the material into fine art requires academic training, but at
the same time he says that taste (and the power of judgement in general)
disciplines genius (KU§50, 319). But the capacity for taste is part of the power of
aesthetic judgement, not only a skill acquired in school or an activity (KU§48,
313). The power of judgement requires the presence of an object, an event, an
action, or at least some potential actions or objects if it is to be exercised.
Judgement cannot give rise to objects or actions, be they imaginary or real. In this
respect, judgement is a passive faculty, even though it is active as a self-legislating
faculty. Thus taste must guide the artist in finding the right form for the material
that is to be expressed. But how can taste guide the artist? Kant seems to think that
the artist attempts to find a suitable form for his ideas through making a sketch or a
 5. The sublime in art and literature
250

model, and judges this form in order to decide to what extent it is suitable for his
purpose:

Diese Form aber dem Produkte der schönen Kunst zu geben, dazu wird bloß
Geschmack erfordert, an welchem der Künstler, nachdem er ihn durch
mancherlei Beispiele der Kunst, oder der Natur, geübt und berichtigt hat, sein
Werk hält, und, nach manchen oft mühsamen Versuchen, denselben zu
befriedigen, diejenige Form findet, die ihm Genüge tut: daher diese nicht
gleichsam eine Sache der Eingebung, oder eines freien Schwunges der
Gemütskräfte, sondern einer langsamen und gar peinlichen Nachbesserung ist,
um sie dem Gedanken angemessen und doch der Freiheit im Spiele derselben
nicht nachteilig werden zu lassen. (KU§48, 312 f)

I f the model does not express the ideas the artist aims to present, a new version
of the work is produced, and again judged, and this process continues until the
artist has found the optimal way of expressing her aesthetic ideas.
This shows why an academically trained talent is necessary to create works of
art. Giving the right form to the creations o f the imagination cannot be a case o f
fooling around without knowing how to gain the effects one is seeking. The artist
must know how to use the instruments of each particular art to succeed to the
satisfaction of her own and other people's taste. This skill is a question of
understanding the rules of the art (besides having some physical abilities that are
necessary in some arts, notably music and the visual arts) and how to apply them in
general, but finding the right application in each concrete case is a question o f
taste. The rule-governed activity requires a concept of the purpose o f the product
and is performed by the faculty of understanding, which is the faculty o f concepts
and, accordingly, rules (KU§49, 317). Thus, when the elements of imagination,
understanding, and genius (spirit [Geist]) are balanced to the satisfaction o f taste, a
product o f fine art is produced (KU§50, 320). The academically trained skills,
guided by imagination and understanding, are employed in producing a product
according to an intentional end. This involves a concept of what the work of art is
going to be, but still this is no complete determination of the end product. To
become a work o f fine art, it must be a product of genius as well, and this aspect o f
the work cannot be judged according to what we take to be the calculated purpose
o f the work. It can only be judged reflectively under the principle of
purposiveness, where our knowledge of human intentionality is o f little help, due
to the non-rational character of genius.
Kant's sketch of the creative process appears sound when applied to beautiful
art. But when the material that is to be presented is sublime, not beautiful, it is not
obvious that taste is called for at all since taste is not involved in the judgement of
 5.2 Genius and aesthetic ideas 251

sublimity. On the other hand, the sublime work of art too is given an intentional
and purposive presentation, so perhaps taste has a role to play even in these works
of art. There are two possibilities here: 1) The production of a sublime work of art
requires taste to supply the work with the correct presentation even though its
content is sublime, and also calls for judgement of taste. 2) The production of the
sublime work of art requires feelings for the sublime rather than taste and what are
needed in the creation of such a work of art are imagination, understanding,
genius, and feeling 14 . Besides, the faculty of reason must be involved, too, since
the conceptual aspect of the judgement of the sublime is ideas of reason.
Option 2) gains support from the Kantian discussion of the relation of genius to
taste, where Kant seems to be singularly preoccupied with fine art as the art of
beauty and pays no heed to the sublime (KU§48, 311 f and §50, 319), which
perhaps is natural given that fine art [schöne Kunst] in German is literally the art of
the beautiful. We could say that Kant was concerned with the production of
beautiful art when discussing genius, and if he had cared to discuss the sublime (a
mere appendix, as we recall), he would have substituted it for taste in his account
of the faculties involved in the creation of fine art. This attempt will not work,
though, because Kant would have taken care to use 'aesthetic reflective
judgement' (or just 'judgement' as an imprecise abbreviation) rather than 'taste' if
he did not think that judgement of taste was necessary for the production of
sublime art. This is supported by the sublime poems referred to in the section
between the two sections connecting genius and taste (KU§49, 315 f) and by
Kant's emphasis on the special role of taste in the creation of fine art:

Der Geschmack ist, so wie die Urteilskraft überhaupt, die Disziplin (oder
Zucht) des Genies. (KU§50, 319)

This is not decisive evidence for the conclusion that Kant meant that taste is
necessary in the production of sublime art as it is in the creation of beautiful art,
but it clearly supports that conclusion. In the Anthropology we find another
passage indicating that Kant did hold that taste is necessary in the creation of
sublime works of art:
Das Erhabene ist zwar das Gegengewicht, aber nicht das Widerspiel vom
Schönen: weil die Bestrebung und der Versuch, sich zu der Fassung
(apprehensio) des Gegenstandes zu erheben, dem Subjekt ein Gefühl seiner

14
Kant calls the ability to judge the sublime 'feeling', just as the ability to judge the
beautiful is called 'taste': "Denn, so wie wir dem, der in der Beurteilung eines
Gegenstandes der Natur, welchen wir schön finden, gleichgültig ist, Mangel des
Geschmacks vorwerfen: so sagen wir von dem, der bei dem, was wir erhaben zu sein
urteilen, unbewegt bleibt, er habe kein Gefühl." (KU§29, 265)
 S. The sublime in art and literature
252

eigenen Größe und Kraft erweckt; aber die Gedankenvorstellung desselben in

Beschreibung oder Darstellung kann und muß immer schön sein. (A 243)

If the presentation of the sublime in art must be beautiful, taste must be a

necessary faculty in making this work of art.
I am left with option 1), but this can also be divided into two different
assertions: i) Judgements of taste and judgements of the sublime are both
necessary in the creation of sublime art, or ii) the creation of sublime art require
the same faculties as the creation of beautiful art, which means that no judgement
of sublimity is necessary in its production. The latter suggestion gains plausibility
from the grounds mentioned above, i.e. Kant was concerned with the sublime
when writing these paragraphs so it is implausible that he should have forgotten to
mention this judgement in case it was necessary. Besides, the presentation of the
sublime in a work of art is the presentation of an illusion of infinity or
overwhelming force, as we have seen above, and this illusion must be presented as
a form (i.e. as bounded) to be cognised. Although the work of art is judged
sublime, the presentation of these sublime images can only be made in a bounded
form, and need only the reflective aesthetic judgement of objects of form, which is
taste, in its production.
The problem with this is that if the aesthetic ideas that genius is expressing are
sublime, how can the artist recognise the proper form by taste? The artist has these
images that he wants to express, and through his artistic skill he sets himself a
goal. Take W. B. Yeats' The Second Coming as an example. Yeats' aesthetic ideas
needed a form, and he chose a rather short poem rich in thought-provoking
imagery of a world in disarray and the threat of subsequent terror. He found some
words expressing the ideas he already had imagined. But how could he know that
these words expressed the images he tried to express unless he felt them himself
when he read his drafts at different stages? Or how could he know that an early
draft did not express these images, without judging the poem according to the
principles of the sublime? Although creating a work of art requires a bounded
form, one cannot decide that this form is rightly judged as sublime unless the
judgement of the sublime is involved in the creative process. Thus, in producing a
sublime work of art the following faculties are required: imagination,
understanding, reason, genius, judgement of taste, and judgement of the sublime.
My conclusion is that any sublime work of art requires both kinds of aesthetic
 5.3 The sublime in art 253

reflective judgement, not only in the process of producing the work, but in the
judgement of the finished work, as well, if it is to be cognised in all aspects 15 .

5.3 The sublime in art

Sublime objects of art

In his discussion of the sublime Kant mainly employs examples of natural

objects, and he says that the sublime in art16 is always restricted by the conditions
of an agreement with nature (KU§23, 245). This warrants the assumption that art
can be sublime, but one can easily get the impression that the sublime in art is
merely an appendix to the sublime in nature, and even in some sense inferior. But
as we have already seen, Kant does not avoid sublime art altogether; he uses both
the pyramids and St. Peter's in Rome as examples in his exposition. Thus it is an
exaggeration when Guyer claims that "works of art seem to have no part in Kant's
image of the sublime" 17 . Kant suggests in his discussion of genius that poetry can
be sublime just as nature:

So sagt z.B. ein gewisser Dichter in der Beschreibung eines schönen Morgens:
"Die Sonne quoll hervor, wie Ruh aus Tugend quillt". Das Bewußtsein der
Tugend, wenn man sich auch nur in Gedanken in die Stelle eines Tugendhaften
versetzt, verbreitet im Gemiite eine Menge erhabener und beruhigender
Gefühle. (KU§49, 316)

Even more convincing as an illustration of Kant's inclusion of the sublime in

the aesthetic judgement of poetry is a passage from the first Critique:

Die unbedingte Notwendigkeit, die wir, als den letzten Träger aller Dinge, so
unentbehrlich bedürfen, ist der wahre Abgrund für die menschliche Vernunft.
Selbst die Ewigkeit, so schauderhaft erhaben sie auch ein Haller schildern mag,
macht lange den schwindligen Eindruck nicht auf das Gemüt; denn sie mißt nur
die Dauer der Dinge, aber trägt sie nicht. (KrV A613/B641)

15
Remember the pyramids that were judged sublime when regarded from the right
distance. They must be judged by taste when seen from further away or at close range.
But we need not judge the pyramids under both principles, as the leading constructors
(in this connection they must have been the artists) had to do in order to create these
sublime constructions.
16
Kant says that art (i.e. fine art) is produced through freedom (KU§43, 303), presupposes
a purpose in its cause (KU§48, 311), and pleases on its own account unlike craft which
pleases on account of its effect (KU§43, 304).
17
Guyer, Experience of Freedom, 264.
 5. The sublime in art and literature
254

The important point here is that it is Haller's poetical depiction of eternity that
is sublime, not the fact that we think the idea of eternity when reading his poetry,
although this fact explains why our judgement must be sublime. Poetry can lead to
ideas of reason just as objects of nature do, and apparently there is no difference in
the way they bring about the aesthetic feeling of the sublime.
There is an apparent contradiction between this claim and Kant's statement that
the sublime in art must conform to that of nature, if the latter claim means that the
sublime in art is in some way secondary. On the other hand, my interpretation of
aesthetic reflective judgements as based on a principle of purposiveness or
purposive use of nature seems to put objects of nature in a suitably privileged
position when compared with objects of art. Objects of art must be regarded as if
they were objects of nature to be subject to a pure aesthetic judgement. This
attitude means disregarding the intentionally produced elements of the object and
focusing on the creative elements that are produced by genius.
If I am correct to assume that these principles of purposiveness are subjectively
necessary for aesthetic reflective judgements, his claim that there is a requirement
of conformity to the sublime of nature for sublime objects of art is explained. But
we need to know how this claim to conformity can be understood. To say that fine
art requires the originality of genius, and that genius is a natural talent that cannot
be determined according to the rules of understanding, is not the same as saying
that art has to meet certain conditions to be in harmony with nature. To decide
whether the only condition that sublime art must meet is production by the natural
talent for originality called genius, it can be useful to examine Kant's use of
examples in the exposition of the sublime.
Kant is clearly reluctant to furnish his exposition of the sublime with examples
of works of art. Rather than this being a consequence of an impossibility of pure
judgements of sublime art, I believe it is due to Kant's wish to avoid misleading
examples on a rather complex issue. Support for this assumption can be found in
Kant's rejection of using sublime objects of art in his exposition:
Ich ... bemerke nur, daß, wenn das ästhetische Urteil rein (mit keinem
teleologischen als Vernunfturteile vermischt) und daran ein der Kritik der
ästhetischen Urteilskraft völlig anpassendes Beispiel gegeben werden soll, man
nicht das Erhabene an Kunstprodukten (z.B. Gebäuden, Säulen u.s.w.), wo ein
menschlicher Zweck die Form sowohl als die Größe bestimmt, noch an
Naturdingen, deren Begriff schon einen bestimmten Zweck bei sich führt ... ,
sondern an der rohen Natur ..., bloß sofern sie Größe enthält, aufzeigen müsse.
(KU§26,252 f)
 5.3 The sublime in art 255

Crowther mistakenly assumes this to mean that judgements about the sublime
in art are of secondary importance to Kant since they "involve teleological
considerations and would thereby lack 'pure' aesthetic status."18 Literally Kant is
only saying that he is looking for a suitable example for a critique and in that
context art products as well as objects with a known purpose in nature should be
avoided. My suggestion is that Kant holds these to be unsuitable examples because
the reader could misunderstand what kind of pleasure Kant is talking about if he
used examples where feelings of sublimity, feelings of pure or accessory beauty,
as well as moral and other non-reflective feelings could be present. Kant's reason
for using primary examples from crude nature is to avoid misunderstandings, not
to label judgements of the sublime in art secondary to those of nature. Thus we
have the capacity to make pure aesthetic judgements concerning the sublime in
objects of art.
Kant wanted to avoid art and purposive nature when providing examples of the
sublime, because in these cases our judgement (understood as the aggregate of our
assessments of the work) includes concepts of the purpose of the object,
contradicting the counterpurposiveness that characterises the sublime. This
problem is relevant even for those movements within modern art that aim to
undermine determinable meanings and purposes in the work, e.g. surrealism, the
theatre of the absurd, abstract expressionism, including novels such as Molloy.
Producing a work of art is in itself a purposive action. Using works of art to
discuss the judgement of sublimity was even more problematic at Kant's time,
when works of art generally were considered to be representations of objects. Even
Kant seems close to this position, as is evident in his distinction between natural
and artistic beauty:

Eine Naturschönheit ist ein schönes Ding·, die Kunstschönheit ist eine schöne
Vorstellung von einem Dinge. (KU§48, 311)

Although Kant's definition of fine art is connected to his analysis of aesthetic

reflective judgements rather than to art as representation of natural objects, the
requirement that the work of art must look like nature or be viewable as nature
(KU§45, 306f) also points in the direction of a theory of representation. If we
consider the most clearly mimetic art forms, sculpture and painting, works within
these art forms are, or used to be, static and restricted in size. It seems to follow
that works within these art forms had to be judged as beautiful (or, at least, non-
sublime) representations. The restrictions on size made a representation of the

18
Crowther, Kantian Sublime, 152.
 5. The sublime in art and literature
256

mathematically sublime difficult, just like the static nature of these art forms led to
problems in the representation of the dynamically sublime19. On the other hand:
painting is defined by Kant as sensible illusion (KU§51, 322 f) and attempts by
painters to create illusions of infinity or of overwhelming force had become
standard in the so-called sublime landscape painting of the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries20. This illusion is, however, never complete because the
spectator must be conscious of the artificial character of the object, which draws
his attention to the purposive character of the art work. Thus the illusion is broken
and even the presented object is seen as a purposive creation, and not as
counterpurposive for cognition which is a condition for the experience of the kinds
of sublimity mentioned here.
One could object that the artistic imitation of a beautiful object of nature would
be subject to the same kind of interference from the consciousness of the artistic
intention, and that is of course correct. This explains why Kant mentions
ornamental designs and music among the free beauties, along with flowers and
some kinds of birds (KU§16, 229). He may think that we do not judge these works
according to purpose (i.e. intention), but that would be a rather dubious claim21. I
think that his idea is that these objects are not immediately connected with a
particular purpose, so it is easier to avoid contusing the pure and the applied
aesthetic judgements of them. When we see a horse, our idea of a beautiful horse is
shaped by a conventional ideal of a healthy, lean, strong racehorse. It is difficult to
disregard this ideal, but we have to disregard all feelings based on this ideal if we
want to judge the horse as a free beauty. So when there is no such purpose or ideal
immediately associated with the object, it is much easier to make a pure judgement
of taste. Therefore abstract art forms are better when we want to avoid that our
pure judgement is confused by feelings arising from the concept of the artist's
intentions.
There is an important difference between works of art used to exemplify
judgements of taste and works of art used to exemplify judgements of the sublime.
The object is seen as purposive for cognition when it is judged to be beautiful or
ugly, a purposiveness that is compatible with the intentional purpose of the work
of art. Both are kinds of purposiveness connected to the act of cognition, whereas

19
The dynamically sublime can be static, though, as is the case with Kant's bold,
overhanging rocks (KU§28, 261).
20
Prime examples can be found in the work of J. M. W. Turner.
21
He also seems to be in trouble when he says that birds and flowers cannot be
determined as to their respective purposes, since he states that all living organisms must
be judged according to the principle of intrinsic purposiveness (KU§66, 376)
 5.3 The sublime in art 257

the purposiveness of the sublime is connected with the object's

counterpurposiveness for cognition. Thus the two aspects we can judge the object
under (as an intentionally purposive work of art and as sublime object), contradict
each other.
This explains the problems involved in art works creating an illusion of the
sublime. When an illusion of infinity or overwhelming power is created, the
represented object must also be given a physical form which must not only be part
of a purposive work of art, but also be a cognitively purposive object for merely
reflective judgement. An illusion of something infinite is not, in fact, infinite. It
just looks infinite. The representation of a starry night in van Gogh's famous
painting is not unlimited like the starry heavens Kant calls sublime. The sublime in
representational art must always be both purposive and counterpurposive for
cognition, and in this latter aspect must be a purposively created illusion. This
explains why Kant found sublime works of art in general not to be suitable
examples of the sublime in his exposition. Experiencing the sublime in
representational art is not in any way ruled out by its unsuitability for didactical
purposes, though. Still one can say, as a general rule, that the more aspects an
object can be experienced under, the more difficult it is to make a pure aesthetic
judgement about it, especially when this judgement requires the simulation of
something unlimited within a limited presentation.

Sublime art in the Critique of Judgement

Kant thought that art could be sublime, as his examples show. Even in Kant's
time, not all kinds of art were thought of as mere imitations of the physical world
as painting and sculpture were supposed to be (KU§51, 322 f), although the rule
was that art should imitate life. As we will learn from the following examples of
sublime art mentioned in the third Critique, his main focus is not representation,
but how the subject is affected.
Poetry is called a play with ideas (KU§51, 321) and is deemed the highest form
of art apparently because it expands nature:

[Die Dichtkunst] stärkt das Gemüt, indem sie es sein freies, selbsttätiges und
von der Naturbestimmung unabhängiges Vermögen fühlen läßt, die Natur, als
Erscheinung, nach Ansichten zu betrachten und zu beurteilen, die sie nicht von
selbst, weder fur den Sinn noch den Verstand in der Erfahrung darbietet, und
sie also zum Behuf und gleichsam zum Schema des Übersinnlichen zu
gebrauchen. (KU§53, 326)
258 S. The sublime in art and literature

The free production of poetry is clearly not restricted to imitation of nature, but
includes images or illusions that cannot be experienced in nature. The creation of
poetry is almost entirely the result of genius, as Kant says in a parenthesis prior to
the sequence cited. This claim is rather odd, since poetry also requires skill in
shaping images, and has until the twentieth century been shaped a rich variety of
rules and conventions. These images can be accompanied by the feeling of the
sublime, as Kant indicates when he says that poetry lets the mind feel its ability to
use nature as a schema of the supersensible. But he declares in the following
sentence that the understanding can also use the illusions of poetry purposively.
The implication is that poetry can be both beautiful and sublime.
Representations in poetry are free from determination by nature, but they
certainly have some basis in the forms of nature, since they can be used by the
understanding or can be employed like some objects of nature to give rise to the
feeling of the sublime. This explains why poetry, unlike the pictorial arts, can
provide didactic examples of the sublime, since the poetical play with ideas does
not necessarily represent objects of nature, but rather something that is both
particular and incapable of being subsumed under determinate concepts. A
painting or a sculpture (for Kant), on the other hand, contains an imitation of a
particular object:

Die ästhetische Idee (Archetypon, Urbild) liegt zu beiden in der

Einbildungskraft zum Grunde; die Gestalt aber, welche den Ausdruck
derselben ausmacht (Ektypon, Nachbild) wird entweder in ihrer körperlichen
Ausdehnung (wie der Gegenstand selbst existiert) oder nach der Art, wie diese
sich im Auge malt (nach ihrer Apparenz in einer Fläche) gegeben. (KU§51,
322)

The two centuries succeeding this text have of course changed these art forms
completely, first by the early nineteenth century interest in depicting both
mathematically and dynamically sublime landscapes, and later by the introduction
of non-mimetic, abstract painting and sculpture, which for Lyotard exemplifies the
aesthetics of the Kantian sublime applied to modern art. 22 Kant's frame of
reference explains why he does not discuss sublime visual arts.
Kant says that poetry has the highest aesthetic value (KU§53, 326). The reason
may be that poetry enables us to combine the beautiful and the sublime within one
work, a combination that may make fine art even more artistic [noch künstlicher]
(KU§52, 325). Kant's examples of poetry exhibit such combination, although their

22
Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition, 77 ff. I think Lyotard is simplifying both Kant's
theory and the aim of contemporary painting in this short argument, but he has a point.
 5.3 The sublime in art 259

artistic value can be doubted. One is written by Frederick the Great and translated
from French, apparently by Kant himself:

Laßt uns aus dem Leben ohne Murren weichen und ohne etwas zu bedauern,
indem wir die Welt noch alsdann mit Wohltaten überhaüft zurücklassen. So
verbreitet die Sonne, nachdem sie ihren Tageslauf vollendet hat, noch ein
mildes Licht am Himmel, und die letzten Strahlen, die sie in die Lüfte schickt,
sind ihre letzten Seufzer für das Wohl der Welt. (KU§49, 315 f)

The other is by Withof, of whose work Kant cites just a single line and takes
the liberty of altering a word 23 : "die Sonne quoll hervor, wie Ruh' aus Tugend
quillt" (KU§49, 316). Both poems combine the beautiful with the noble sublime,
i.e. the image of virtuous conduct, and seem to be chosen more for political
reasons than for their suitability in this context. More in keeping with Kant's
exposition of the sublime is the famous footnote attached to this passage:

Vielleicht ist nie etwas Erhabneres gesagt, oder ein Gedanke erhabener
ausgedrückt worden, als in jener Aufschrift über dem Tempel der Isis (der
Mutter Natur): "Ich bin alles was da ist, was da war, und was da sein wird, und
meinen Schleier hat kein Sterblicher aufgedeckt." (KU§49, 316)

The main lesson to learn from this is that poetry and other literary expressions
are very well suited to the sublime, and that the sublime also can be presented in
combination with the beautiful. Considering the distinction between the beautiful
object as bounded and the sublime as connected to the representation of
unboundedness, it is a bit odd that one aesthetic object can be judged as being
both. On the other hand, the sublime is connected to the way we experience an
object, and Kant provides many examples of bounded objects that we judge
sublime, for example in architecture.
The only objects of art used as examples in the analytic of the sublime proper
are the pyramids and [Link]'s Basilica in Rome. I believe this use of examples
from architecture can be explained by the particular status of architecture as
compared with other fine arts:
[Die Baukunst] ist die Kunst, Begriffe von Dingen, die nur durch Kunst
möglich sind, und deren Form nicht die Natur, sondern einen willkürlichen
Zweck zum Bestimmungsgrunde hat, zu dieser Absicht, doch auch zugleich
ästhetisch-zweckmäßig, darzustellen. Bei der [Baukunst] ist ein gewisser
Gebrauch des künstlichen Gegenstandes die Hauptsache, worauf, als
Bedingung, die ästhetischen Ideen eingeschränkt werden. (KU§51, 322)

23
See KU§49, 316, note 50 in Pluhar's translation.
 S. The sublime in art and literature
260

Architecture does not imitate forms of nature; it is the art of creating forms
determined by purposes. A building is meant for a particular use, something that
should lead us to expect that Kant would classify it as belonging to craft
[Handwerk] rather than fine arts, since the distinction between these activities is
that the first is attractive through its effect, whereas the second pleases on its own
account. But Kant qualifies the classification by stating that this is not the only
relevant distinction between these activities, and that he does not want to discuss
whether all of the seven fine arts really belong in that group (KU§43, 304). I
suppose that a more detailed classification of the arts would result in the division
of architecture into two groups; one primarily oriented towards utility, the other
towards the expression of beauty and grandeur24. Kant emphasises that in every
fine art there is a basis of craft knowledge, exemplified by the correctness and
richness of language as well as of prosody and meter required in poetry (KU§41,
304). This means that the practical orientation of architecture has to be considered
even when the artistic purposes are primary.
It is evident that Kant's examples of sublime architecture are buildings in
which the craft aspect is subordinate, even though both are examples of superior
craftsmanship. St. Peter's and the pyramids are built to honour divinities, and size,
material, and the labour of building and decoration go far beyond their uses as
church and tombs. The purpose of these buildings is to signify the real sublime25.
Signifying the real sublime in art is an exercise in contradiction: The real sublime
is supersensible, i.e. it cannot be imagined or conceptualised according to the laws
of understanding, but representing an object or idea is an act of imagination, and
signifying the real sublime in art should be impossible. On the other hand,
exploiting the purposive use of the contra-purposive aesthetic sublime may be the
way to navigate around this problem. Then the construction involves creating the
illusion of something that is beyond the comprehension of the imagination. Since it
is created by activities of the imagination, it cannot actually be non-
comprehensible, but, as described by Kant, these buildings succeed in creating
exactly this feeling of being of a size that exceeds the power of imagination. This
explains the particular suitability of architecture in exemplifying the mathematical

24
Perhaps the most influential tradition in architecture of the twentieth century,
fiinctionalism, saw the ideal of architecture in the combination of these two aspects of
the art: Beauty in construction was determined by the function of the building.
25
The real sublime for Kant is, as we have seen the autonomy of rational beings; but the
worship of the divine can be seen as a recognition of the superiority of the
supersensible. It is only when we are conscious of our own worth that we can at the
same time worship God in the right way, i.e. in repectful devotion without fear (KU§28,
263).
 5.3 The sublime in art 261

sublime. Traditionally it is the only art form that creates works of a size that can
make them appear to be without limit (when regarded from the right perspective)26.
And it is reasonable that this impressive architecture was reserved for expressions
of the power of the divine.
Kant does not mention another element common to medieval cathedrals of
Europe that also can be regarded under the heading of the sublime: the figures of
devils and monsters used as ornamentation on both outer and inner walls. These
figures can be regarded as an attempt to add a dynamically sublime element to the
mathematically sublime size of the building. In The Name of the Rose, Eco
attempts to imagine the psychological effect of this on a young monk in the
thirteenth century27, and the description is clearly one of the feeling of the sublime.
Perhaps the Enlightenment philosopher Kant found these images mainly to express
superstition, and thus not something that could be judged as sublime (compare
KU§40, 294)?
The concept of the sublime is very often invoked to describe particular works
of music or passages within such works, but Kant does not seem to think of music
in those terms. He is not sure whether it is a fine art (subject to aesthetic reflective
judgement) or merely an agreeable art (a free play of sensations without any
cognitive function) (KU§44, 305). After arguing for both views he seems to
conclude that since there is an objective, mathematical basis for the sensations and
since there appears to be definite limits, common to all human beings, to our
ability to distinguish tones, music is subject to reflective judgement and is a fine
art. In the final sentence of the paragraph, however, Kant seems to leave the
question open whether music is a pure fine art or a mixture between fine and
agreeable art (KU§51, 325)28. The latter option is probably explained by the
secondary qualities of the single tones. If the single tones have a subjective
component, this subjectivity must also be part of the relation between the tones in
a composition29.
Thus it is clear that whatever reason Kant had for arguing against the aesthetic
value of music he does not give it the credit it is due as an art form. Weatherstone
discusses this inadequacy and shows one of the most decisive deficiencies in

26
Today there are made sculptural works of this scale, such as some kinds of land art.
Christo's Running Fence and Surrounded Islands, for instance.
27
U. Eco, The Name of the Rose, 41 ff.
28
Later he has changed his mind and says that music is more an agreeable than a fine art,
KU§54, 332.
29
This is suggested in a footnote by Pluhar in his translation, n.62, 195.
262 5. The sublime in art and literature

Kant's account to be his failure to see that pieces of music are appreciated as
formal unities, not as single tones, and that tones have two aspects:
If Kant had analysed tone into pitch and timbre, he would have found it much
easier to see how musical forms are cognized, and he would not have been so
ready to equate tones and colours. The pitch of any note in a musical
composition is meaningful only in relation to the other notes of the
composition30. By the interrelation of pitches within a composition, a composer
is able to create clear formal structures.31

When attention is directed to melody, rhythm, harmony and other formal

elements, we have a way to distinguish between fine and agreeable art in music in
the same way as in visual art and poetry, a distinction Kant appears to have
difficulty in making when his main focus is on single notes.
To create music, the originality of genius is required, as in other arts, and when
music is a fine art in this sense, there are good reasons to believe it can be both
beautiful and sublime. Examples of sublime music might be the painful 'noise' of
the religious music of Tibet, the Indonesian Gamelan music, or Arvo Pärt's use of
silence and dynamical movement in his music. The judgement of music is the
judgement of a purposive whole in which the purpose of this whole escapes us,
since there is an element of creative originality, of genius, which cannot be
explained as an effect of a plan or describable intention. This is not altered by the
fact that this creativity must be presented within a frame of rhythm and rules of
harmony. That music can be sublime as well as beautiful Kant seems to admit
indirectly in his discussion of how the fine arts can be combined:

Auch kann die Darstellung des Erhabenen, sofern sie zur schönen Kunst
gehört, in einem gereimten Trauerspiele, einem Lehrgedichte, einem
Oratorium sich mit der Schönheit vereinigen; und in diesen Verbindungen ist
die schöne Kunst noch künstlicher. (KU§52, 325)

In the oratorio, the elements of beauty and sublimity are united, but whether
both elements are expressed in the music, or Kant means that the religious text is
the sublime element and that music contributes beauty is difficult to tell. I assume
the first reading is plausible on the ground that he says that the sublime is united,
not merely combined, with beauty in these art forms. But if he is willing to go that
far, he should also admit that music as a fine art can be sublime on its own.

30
It is interesting that even colours have a relational character, changing appearance
according to the colour(s) of their surroundings.
31
M. Weatherstone, 'Kant's Assessment of Music in the Critique of Judgement', 64.
 5.3 The sublime in art 263

Sublime novels

Kant held that art could be sublime, as is evident from his own use of sublime
poetry and architecture. He did not provide any examples of sublime visual art and
music, and I have suggested that the reasons for this deficiency need not be any
inherent trait in these art forms preventing them from being sublime. But to apply
Kant's theory of the sublime to Beckett's Molloy, it must also be possible for
novels to be sublime. The novel, understood as a narrative fiction of a certain
length, had developed into a separate genre at Kant's time 32 , but he was not likely
to know it in any form that would make it natural to include it among the fine arts.
Since the novel, as it has developed, long ago has been accepted as a form of art,
we can take as a tentative assumption that it can be included within fine art in the
Kantian sense.
Music and the visual arts are experienced perceptually, and as such they are
like any other object of experience; we cognise them by subsuming the sensible
under concepts. Judging literature is more complex, in that we start with concepts
that evoke images in us when we read the text. Basically, these images are
connected to what Beardsley calls the cognitive import of the text, i.e. its capacity
to convey information. Together with the emotive import of the text, i.e. its
capacity to affect the hearer's feeling, this is how we are affected by a work of
literature or any other linguistic expression. 33 Furthermore one can argue that
literature is an institutional concept, defined within a practice:

There are no syntactic, semantic, or even more loosely 'rhetorical' features of a

text that define it as a literary work. A text is identified as a literary work by
recognizing the author's intention that the text is produced and meant to be
read within the framework of conventions defining the practice (constituting
the institution) of literature.34

Lamarque and Haugom Olsen says that the constitutive conventions giving a
literary work aesthetic value reside in the imaginative and the mimetic dimensions
of the work 33 . It is the first of these dimensions Kant takes to be constitutive of
works of art, through the notion of aesthetic ideas.
Maybe Kant would agree with the institutional foundation of this theory, since
he claims that many artifacts should have the form of fine art, but we do not call
them fine art on that account (KU§48, 313). To have the form of fine art, an object

32
P. Lamarque and S. Haugom Olsen, Truth, Fiction, and Literature, 268.
33
Beardsley, Aesthetics, 117 f.
34
Lamarque and Haugom Olsen, Truth, Fiction, 255 f.
35
Ibid. 261.
 5. The sublime in art and literature
264

must express aesthetic ideas, but, since objects of nature do that as well, such
expression is not sufficient to call an object art. Fine art is the art of genius, which
means that it is created for no other purpose than to express aesthetic ideas, but if
such an expression is to be possible, there must exist conventions that enable us to
recognise the work as a work expressing this kind of intention. The institution of
art is a condition for the recognition of the object as one made with the intention of
being a work evoking aesthetic ideas. But the institutional account would not
satisfy Kant completely, because he would hold that the mere intention to produce
a work of fine art is not enough; the intention must be successfully realised for the
artifact to become a work of art. The work must actually produce the imaginative
free play called aesthetic ideas, for it to be a work of art.
The understanding of literature as presented above is broad enough to include
both poems, short-stories, and novels, and since this conception does not go
beyond Kant's definition of fine art as artifacts produced for the purpose of
evoking aesthetic ideas in the audience, literature in this sense is a fine art. Now
poetry was a primary vehicle for expressing the sublime in art, but it does not
follow that the same is the case with prose fiction. But if we consider what kind of
ideas that are included in sublime poetry, it is clear that these ideas underlie a
significant portion of the grand tradition of prose fiction, as well:

Der Dichter wagt es, Vernunftideen von unsichtbaren Wesen, das Reich der
Seligen, das Höllenreich, die Ewigkeit, die Schöpfung [Link]. zu versinnlichen.
(KU§49, 314)

The finitude of human life in contrast with eternity has been a central theme of
Western literature, along with other themes associated with the sublime. This is
clearly the case if one reads the canon suggested by Bloom, which starts with
Dante and ends with Beckett, containing works selected for "their sublimity and
for their representativity" 36 , including both poetry, plays, and prose fiction. The
role of the sublime in Conrad's Heart of Darkness or Kafka's The Process may be
less direct than in the poetry of Blake or T. S. Eliot, but is decisive for the way in
which the reader experiences the work.
Indirectly, we can gain further support for the claim that there can be sublime
novels from Kant's discussion of the combination of fine arts in works such as
tragedies written in verse and oratorios, both of which can display the sublime
combined with beauty (KU§52, 326). These art forms have a narrative structure
just as novels have, and warrant the conclusion that the bounded structure of

36
Bloom, The Western Canon, 2.
 5.3 The sublime in art 265

narratives does not prevent them from exhibiting the sublime. The decisive point is
whether these works lead the reader to a reflection on ideas of reason.

Purposive form and sublime content

A sublime work of art must be both beautiful and sublime, but how do these
two aspects relate to each other in the judgement about the work? In the case of the
pyramids and St. Peter's Basilica, the answer seems rather straightforward if one
allows for some simplification. The buildings are sublime when regarded from
some particular distances or perspectives; from all other points of view they appear
restricted and are judged by taste. The same is the case for medieval cathedrals
like the one in Chartres, situated in the middle of a town with narrow streets that
force the spectator to see it from a perspective that shows it as sublime, and the
similar case of New York skyscrapers. But when we experience a sublime painting
or poem, there is no equivalent to the distance that can be called the sublime
perspective of architecture (unless there are paintings that are exceptions to this
general point, like gigantic murals or other large-scale paintings).
Kirk Pillow has provided an original interpretation of this problem by
suggesting that in a work of art, the sublime content is situated within a beautiful
form37, and we judge both the form and the content in an aesthetic judgement. This
interpretation has several elements in common with my understanding of Kant,
since Pillow shows that Kant's theory allows for sublime works of art, and he
locates the sublime in aesthetic ideas as produced by the imagination of genius.
Pillow also argues that the sublime must be presented within a work that is judged
by taste. Immediately it appears as if this interpretation can solve my problem of
how a bounded work of art can be sublime, but the details of Pillow's theory are in
some ways problematic. The main argument is that a work of art has a form that is
judged by taste, and that form is "the spatial and temporal form of objecthood, as
Kant has retained it from the first Critique, combined with a generous conception
of the imagination's free play"38. This form is the medium for the expression of
aesthetic ideas which, according to Pillow, must be the sublime content of the
work of art, since the "hallmark of the aesthetic idea is the inexhaustibility of its
content'39. This means that the aesthetic idea cannot be (aesthetically)
comprehended in the same way as the mathematically sublime cannot be

37
K. Pillow, 'Form and content in Kant's aesthetics', 444 f.
38
Ibid. 448.
39
Ibid. 453.
 S. The sublime in art and literature
266

comprehended (KU§26, 251 f). Therefore this content is judged according to the
aesthetic reflective judgement of sublimity. The aesthetic judgement of art is two
judgements in one, one judgement of taste for the form, and another judgement of
the sublime for the content, with a smooth transition between them40.
Nowhere does Kant indicate that all objects of art are sublime, and Pillow
solves this possible challenge by interpreting Kant as saying that not all beautiful
works of art present aesthetic ideas,41 but the passage he refers to does not say
exactly that:
Reich und original an Ideen zu sein, bedarf es nicht so notwendig zum Behuf
der Schönheit, aber wohl der Angemessenheit jener Einbildungskraft in ihrer
Freiheit zu der Gesetzmäßigkeit des Verstandes. (KU§50, 319)
Claiming that a work of art does not have to be rich and original in ideas is not
the same as saying that no aesthetic ideas are needed. If Kant means what Pillow
suggests, he contradicts his own definition of art as the product of genius (unless
he contradicts his definition of genius as the ability to express aesthetic ideas, a
definition which entails that every product of genius manifests this ability and
hence must express or contain ideas, KU§49, 317). A picture, a poem, or a piece
of music that lacks either taste or genius is called a would-be [seinsollenden] work
of fine art (KU§48, 313), a clear indication that beautiful forms cannot lack
aesthetic ideas altogether, and still be classified as art. If we accept Pillow's
interpretation, all proper works of art must be sublime, and that is contrary to
Kant's position (KU§45, 306 f).
I will also question the claim that aesthetic ideas are sublime just because they
are inexhaustible in content and cannot adequately be comprehended in a concept,
since the mathematical sublime involves the inability to comprehend a totality in
imagination. The sublime involves the short-coming of imagination, whereas in
aesthetic ideas it is understanding that fails to provide an adequate concept, and
aesthetic ideas seem to be a sequence of loose associations not necessarily
involving any demand for the imagination of the totality of these ideas.
The claim that all aesthetic ideas are sublime is even more questionable when
we consider the fact that this interpretation is based on the aesthetic reflective
judgement of the content of a work of art. 'Form' may mean different things in
different contexts in Kant's works, and the same can be said about 'content' or

40
Ibid. 457.
41
Ibid. 458. Pillow says that "not all beautiful form presents aesthetic ideas", but for his
argument to be successful, he must also claim that objects of art can be beautiful
without presenting aesthetic ideas at all, which is why I have specified his claim this
way.
 5.3 The sublime in art 267

'matter', but since aesthetic reflective judgement is explicitly said to deal with the
form (or even the formlessness as is the case with the sublime) of the object, one
should clarify in what sense this content can be regarded as having a form, or
being formless. One possibility implicit in Pillow's account is that the aesthetic
idea is a separate object of judgement, which makes the aesthetic judgement
concern the form (or formlessness) of this object (i.e. the aesthetic idea). On this
reading, I must presuppose that the form of the aesthetic idea is not identical with
the form of the object of art, a supposition that is highly problematic.
Aesthetic ideas are the product of imagination when not guided by determinate
concepts, and they must be present in all reflective aesthetic judgement, be it of
nature or art:
Man kann überhaupt Schönheit (sie mag Natur- oder Kunstschönheit sein) den
Ausdruck ästhetischer Ideen nennen: nur daß in der schönen Kunst diese Idee
durch einen Begriff vom Objekt veranlaßt werden muß, in der schönen Natur
aber die bloße Reflexion über eine gegebene Anschauung, ohne Begriff von
dem was der Gegenstand sein soll, zur Erweckung und Mitteilung der Idee, von
welcher jenes Objekt als der Ausdruck betrachtet wird, hinreichend ist.
(KU§51,320)

Kant here says that the judgement of taste (and presumably the judgement of
the sublime) in nature as well as in art always includes the experience of aesthetic
ideas expressed by the object. A reasonable supposition is that these ideas are the
creations of imagination in the effort to find a concept for the representation under
the principle of the purposiveness of nature. And as argued earlier, the form of the
object is our mental state in this cognitive process under the principle of
purposiveness. It is important to note that Kant says that the object is regarded
[betrachtet] as an expression of aesthetic ideas, which means that there is no claim
about the real properties of the object, but only about the creative structuring of the
object by imagination (which of course raises the problem of how to separate the
object from the cognitive structuring of it in Kant's account). Now we can say that
the difference between objects of art and natural objects does not consist in art's
ability expresses aesthetic ideas (since both art and nature do that), but in the
intentionality that lies behind the creation of art.
If we assume that this interpretation is correct, Pillow's suggestion faces further
problems. If objects of nature have content consisting of aesthetic ideas, which, as
Pillow argues, are formless and thus sublime, then all objects have sublime
content. Instead of the traditional Kantian problem of everything being beautiful,
this account entails that everything is sublime. This unhappy conclusion can only
be avoided by severing the connection Pillow establishes between aesthetic ideas
 5. The sublime in art and literature
268

and the sublime. On my interpretation, Kant holds that aesthetic ideas must be
present in beautiful objects, in ugly objects, and in sublime objects, as well as in
those that are judged as both beautiful and sublime. Then Pillow's main point
contradicts Kant's view on the connection between an object's expression of
aesthetic ideas and its suitability for pure aesthetic judgement.
I have argued above that Kant's notion of the form of objects is not equal to
form as the word is used in art criticism. Aesthetic ideas can be expressed both in
the form and in the content of the work of art ('form' and 'content' are here
understood in the art criticism sense), and both form and content belong to the
material of the object. The aesthetic judgement is not concerned with this material,
but with the form of the object, which is the structuring activity of imagination and
understanding. This structuring activity of aesthetic reflective judgement can be
called a production of aesthetic ideas in accordance with the object, but we are not
judging these ideas, but merely the state of mind, i.e. our feeling, when performing
this creative activity. Even in the 'objective' (teleological) aspect of reflective
judgement we are unable to know the aesthetic ideas, since there are no objects
adequate to these intuitions (KU§49, 314); they are not cognisable. But we must
consider the teleological judgement to be the cognitive result of this creative
imaginative process.
Pillow holds that aesthetic ideas must be sublime since they are not
determinable, and because they are said, in one important passage, to lead to the
reflection on rational ideas (KU§49, 315). This passage is the same as the one
Guyer discussed when concluding that aesthetic ideas stand in a direct relation to
ideas of reason. I believe that the argument I used to question Guyer's view also is
valid against Pillow. The full context of the passage, although obscure, indicates
that aesthetic ideas do not have to be accompanied by ideas of reason. These ideas
are only involved in the production of sublime art. In beautiful art, the artist draws
on his experience of nature and still creates a work expressing aesthetic ideas.
There remain promising suggestions in Pillow's interpretation of Kant, since
the sublime in art must be presented within a humanly made form and accordingly
be restricted by man's natural capacities, which means that the work of art cannot
be formless even though we judge it to be so. The suggestion that the sublime can
be the content within this form, combined with the point that a visual object of art
can be sublime from some perspectives and beautiful or ugly from other, allows
for the possibility that an object of art can be judged in several ways. When judged
as a totality, the object always has a form that must be judged by taste, even if it is
an object that is incomplete or deliberately breaks the rules of completeness by (in
narrative literature) lacking beginning or end in the conventional sense, or (in
 5.3 The sublime in art 269

poetry or music) by breaking any possible establishment of a rhythm. Every

aesthetic trick of that kind will be unable to evade the establishment of the work as
a totality, which is what Kant probably means when he says that for judging an
object of art we must base the judgement on a concept of what the thing is meant
to be. This is related to the hermeneutic assumption that a text as a whole is
meaningful and that this is the basis for understanding42, a principle that can be
extended to all meaningful material, including art.
But there are other perspectives on art, which we can call judgements about its
content. In these judgements, we are not concerned with the totality as such, but
with different aspects of the work considered in isolation. These aspects can be
either sublime, beautiful or both (or ugly or aesthetically indifferent for that
matter). It must be noted that talking of aesthetic reflective judgements of the
content of a work of art requires caution; we are still judging the form of the object
in Kant's sense, i.e. the mental state we are in when cognising the object. We are
not really judging the object or an aspect of it, but the feeling of the subject who
experiences the object. But we nonetheless judge an aspect of the object in that we
do cognise the different aspects of the object, and the aesthetic judgement is a
judgement of our mental state when cognising these aspects. This mental state will
vary according to which object or which aspect of an object we are experiencing,
and will be a judgement of taste if it is the subjective aspect of a conceptual
judgement 43 under the principle of purposiveness, and will be a judgement of the
sublime if it is the subjective aspect of a conceptual judgement under the purposive
use of the object for man's supersensible vocation.
If we return to Yeats' The Second Coming, his images of things falling apart
and loss of meaning can be judged by taste as part of a purposive totality44,
although this totality can hardly be described as beautiful. But the threatening end
describing the beast slouching towards Bethlehem, taking the place of the expected
saviour, is an image associated with evil conquering good and thus an image of the
powerlessness of man. The image of the beast belongs to the dynamically sublime
and represents a different aspect of the poem from the first, already apocalyptic

42
Gadamer, Wahrheit und Methode, 271.
43
It is, as argued in chapter two, sufficient that we have a potential cognition of the object
under this principle, i.e. that the object can be judged under this principle.
44
Destruction is only possible against the background of something constructed, and is
also associated with the hope of a new beginning. Kant also stresses the value of
judging the apparently disagreeable, and thus, counterpurposive under the principle of
purposiveness (KU§67,379). This sense of counterpurposive is not the same as the
principle associated with the sublime, where the object is counterpurposive because it is
not overtaxing our cognitive capacities, not because we do not see its function within
the totality.
 5. The sublime in art and literature
270

part. This second, sublime part is not possible without the first part as a
background, since the first part builds up towards a solution, a salvation which is
denied. These parts must be judged under the two principles of purposiveness and
purposive use of nature (genius) respectively. These are two aspects of the poem,
and they belong to the purposive totality of the poem, purposive in the sense that it
is an object, since it has limits and structural elements that together create a whole.
A work of art has a many-faceted content formed in certain ways to express
this content. The pure aesthetic judgement can either be a judgement of the work
as a whole, where all aspects contribute to this purposive totality, or it can concern
one of its aspects. We can judge both this totality (of content) as well as one or
more of its aspects (of content) aesthetically, but in both cases we judge the form
of the object, i.e. our feeling when cognising the object under teleologica!
principles. The form of the work of art, i.e. its structure and style, is in a way
inseparable from the content in the aesthetic judgement, since both are parts of the
conceptual judgement of the object of art, of which the aesthetic judgement is the
subjective aspect. Thus the discussion of the art critic's form belongs to the
conceptual analysis of the work of art, which is necessary to disentangle the
various judgmental aspects of the work of art such as its pure aesthetic, applied
aesthetic, conceptual, moral, and entertaining features. That Kant holds that the
work of art gives rise to several such kinds of judgements is clear from his brief
but very rich discussion of the feelings of gratification, approval and disapproval,
games and play, humour, respect, and naivety in the comment that ends the
Analytic of Aesthetic Judgement (KU§54, 330 ff). We can find further support in
his assertion that moral treatises and sermons, too, should display taste (KU§48,
313)45. These factors indicate that human artifacts (in a wide sense) can be judged
in many ways, and that a work of art does not have to be exclusively an object of
pure aesthetic reflective judgement.

Aesthetic, cognitive, and moral judgements of art

If I am right in my reading of Kant, his theory opens the way for pluralistic
interpretations of art. A work of art can be judged in several different, even

45
If moral treatises can be subject to pure aesthetic judgement, it does not follow that
works of art can be subject to moral judgements, but it shows that the aesthetic and the
ethical do not necessarily belong to different spheres, and that the same work can be
judged according to both principles. Whether the work belongs to the genre of moral
treatises or that of narrative literature should not make any difference.
 5.3 The sublime in art 271

contradictory ways, without that necessitating a rejection of one of the

contradicting positions. Kant's discussion of the relation between free and
accessory beauty shows one aspect of this pluralism:
Ein Geschmacksurteil würde in Ansehung eines Gegenstandes von
bestimmtem innern Zwecke nur alsdann rein sein, wenn der Urteilende
entweder von diesem Zwecke keinen Begriff hätte, oder in seinem Urteile
davon abstrahierte. Aber alsdann würde dieser, ob er gleich ein richtiges
Geschmacksurteil fällte, indem er den Gegenstand als freie Schönheit
beurteilte, dennoch von dem andern, welcher die Schönheit an ihm nur als
anhängende Beschaffenheit betrachtet (auf den Zweck des Gegenstandes sieht),
getadelt und eines falsches Geschmacks beschuldigt werden, obgleich beide in
ihrer Art richtig urteilen: der eine nach dem, was er vor den Sinnen, der andere
nach dem, was er in Gedanken hat. (KU§16,231)

It is worth noticing that this pluralism is not in any way relativistic; both
judgements are right, and both could have been wrong, and we are warranted in
claiming universal assent for both kinds of aesthetic judgement. I argued above
that these two kinds of judgement can and should be supplemented by further
aspects, and further support can be gathered from Kant's examples of poetry,
where the importance of their moral messages is underscored (KU§49, 315f), and
his inclusion of didactic poems within fine arts (KU§52, 325). One could say that I
am spending time on the obvious by proving that Kant meant that works of art
should be both interpreted as meaningful expression as well as judged by
disinterested feelings, but Kant's focus on the pure aesthetic judgement has led
commentators to think that he held this to be the only genuine way to assess art:

Some philosophers of art who have argued for a theory very like the
Presentational theory (Kant, Fiedler) have, it is true, stipulated that we should
free ourselves from all concepts when we approach art: but it is hard to attach
much sense to such an extreme demand.46

Such misunderstandings used to be common, and perhaps have even been

among the causes of the formalist preoccupation of twentieth century theories of
art, including a sceptical attitude to ethical and political interpretations of art 47 .
Besides, my aim is to show how the Kantian sublime can be part of the judgement
of literature, and to decide its role vis-à-vis different conceptual interpretations of
such works. Therefore it is important to show that Kant's theory at least implies a
pluralistic theory of interpretation.

46
R. Wollheim, Art and its Object, 61.
47
Booth, Company, 36 f.
 5. The sublime in art and literature
272

The main conclusions of my discussion of Kant's fragmented theory of art can

be summed up as follows: (1) Fine art is a human artifact with the purpose of
expressing aesthetic ideas, which are the qualities that are judged by pure aesthetic
reflective judgements. (2) This requires genius, an inspirational ability that is not
rationally guided, and as such a part of man as nature. (3) Also human artifacts that
do not have the expression of aesthetic ideas as their primary purpose can express
aesthetic ideas, and thus display genius. (4) Fine art, including novels, can be
sublime.