Talk:Friedrich Schiller
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I might point out that the "Schiller Institute" under external links is one of the many front organizations for the Lyndon LaRouche network, the radical (and I might add, a highly dubious) political figure. Not only does the "Schiller Institute" have little to do with Schiller (and a lot to do with unrelated "physical economy" theories) but also many of the ethical and aesthetic ideas suggested by this institution seem to misunderstand or flatly ignore those espoused by its namesake. I suggest that this link be removed if for no other reason than to avoid anachronistically misrepresenting Schiller as a proponent of the view that so-called Producerism is metaphysically significant under some kind of neo-Hegelian system. Any argument along these lines would be polemical at best.
Schiller was only married once, and that to Charlotte von Lengefeld. People did not respect him a lot more for being ennobled. On the contrary, he was uncomfortable with it.
I am planning to merge this article Friedrich Schiller with this shorter but valuable and interesting article Schiller and also weave in some material from the 1911 encyclopedia. Hope that's okay. Ortolan88 17:36 Jul 27, 2002 (PDT)
Oops, I already did it before seeing your note. Below is the original short-Schiller article. -- Marj Tiefert 03:07 Sep 8, 2002 (UTC)
Friedrich Schiller, dubbed Germany's "poet of freedom" for his revolutionary writings, attempted to bring Classical culture to semi-feudal Germany in the late eighteenth century. The profound impact of his poetry and plays has inspired operas of Verdi's and the ninth symphony of Beethoven's (Schiller's "An Die Freude" are the lyrics sung in the fourth movement).
In his early life, he and his poor family intended him to be a clergyman. But the Duke of Württemberg asked him to enroll at his new military college. Schiller's father could not refuse, as the dukes had tyrannical power at the time. And Schiller was trained as a military doctor. While in the arduous and oppressive school, he read Rousseau and Goethe and spoke about Classical ideals with his classmates. At school, he wrote his first play about a group of naive, rebellious revolutionaries and their tragic failure, called "The Robbers."
Later, he would flee from his military position to pursue a career as a playwright and champion the Classical ideals which he recognized were lost in Germany. He befriended Goethe, and wrote many more plays including "Fiesco" and "Love and Intrigue," the latter for commission from a theater owner. Then he would write "Don Carlos" and the unfinished "Demetrius," which occuppied his thoughts until his death. He also wrote many philosophical papers on ethics and aesthetics, finding that beauty must be conceived in the mind by applying reason to the senses and emotions. His philosophy glorified heroic statesmanship and helped to oppose the oligarchical duchies of his time to create the Weimar Renaissance.
I'm not quite sure what the "Credits" part at the end of the article (inserted by 4.63.108.220) is supposed to be. It links to a page that does not exist. Just delete? --KF 17:26, 31 Aug 2003 (UTC)
- Unless someone can clarify this mysterious item, I vote to delete it. --Jose Ramos 01:49, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)
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- After seeing Andrew Fuller mentioned in Votes for Deletion, I went ahead and excised the nonsense. --Jose Ramos 02:05, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)
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[edit] "Stuttgart region"
Wouldn't it make sense to refer to Baden Wŭrttenberg (or however it's spellled!) rather than 'Stuttgart region'? Vanky 18:49, 24 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Baden-Württemberg would be an anachronism. We should say "in the Duchy of Württemberg", as it was at the time. john k 21:45, 24 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Thank you for the correct spelling(!) and the historical info. Vanky 00:25, 25 Feb 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Unintelligible Statement
To say that "beauty must be conceived in the mind by applying reason to the senses and emotions" is to say nothing. I would like to see an example of someone using syllogistic arguments about what they experience through smell, sound, etc., and, as a result, finding some object to be beautiful. Lestrade 12:33, 28 September 2005 (UTC)Lestrade
- I agree that that formulation was murky at best. I have re-written and expanded that section, in hopes of making Schiller's ideas a bit more accessible. --HK 22:09, 28 September 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Kant & Reason
I understand that Schiller did not know Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. He only made references to Kant's other critiques, those of practical reason and judgment. These dealt with morality and beauty. He may have been given an explanation of Kant's writings by Karl Reinhold. Schiller seemed to have been searching for an absolute basis for his art. By choosing reason, he may have been in error. Since reason is merely arriving at a conclusion through the use of syllogism, it is foreign and alien to the creation of art. Lestrade 12:31, 29 September 2005 (UTC)Lestrade
- You seem to be confusing reason with logic. Schiller's conception of reason would have been informed by Plato, who made an explicit distinction between reason and logic, considering logic to be a decidedly inferior mode of mental activity. --HK 14:47, 29 September 2005 (UTC)
Please define "reason" so that I do not confuse it with the process of forming a conclusion through syllogism. Lestrade 12:51, 30 September 2005 (UTC)Lestrade
- Plato and his followers make a distinction between logic, i.e. reasoning that proceeds via Syllogism from a premise {which Plato calls understanding,) and reason. This passage, part of what is sometimes referred to as the divided line appears in Book VI of Plato's Republic:
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- And when I speak of the other division of the intelligible, you will understand me to speak of that other sort of knowledge which reason herself attains by the power of dialectic, using the hypotheses not as first principles, but only as hypotheses -- that is to say, as steps and points of departure into a world which is above hypotheses, in order that she may soar beyond them to the first principle of the whole; and clinging to this and then to that which depends on this, by successive steps she descends again without the aid of any sensible object, from ideas, through ideas, and in ideas she ends.
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- I understand you, he replied; not perfectly, for you seem to me to be describing a task which is really tremendous; but, at any rate, I understand you to say that knowledge and being, which the science of dialectic contemplates, are clearer than the notions of the arts, as they are termed, which proceed from hypotheses only: these are also contemplated by the understanding, and not by the senses: yet, because they start from hypotheses and do not ascend to a principle, those who contemplate them appear to you not to exercise the higher reason upon them, although when a first principle is added to them they are cognizable by the higher reason. And the habit which is concerned with geometry and the cognate sciences I suppose that you would term understanding and not reason, as being intermediate between opinion and reason.
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- You have quite conceived my meaning, I said; and now, corresponding to these four divisions, let there be four faculties in the soul-reason answering to the highest, understanding to the second, faith (or conviction) to the third, and perception of shadows to the last-and let there be a scale of them, and let us suppose that the several faculties have clearness in the same degree that their objects have truth.[1]
- Edgar Allen Poe makes a similar point in his humorous story, Mellonta Tauta. Here, "creeping" and "crawling" refer to induction and deduction:
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- Now I do not complain of these ancients so much because their logic is, by their own showing, utterly baseless, worthless and fantastic altogether, as because of their pompous and imbecile proscription of all other roads of Truth, of all other means for its attainment than the two preposterous paths - the one of creeping and the one of crawling - to which they have dared to confine the Soul that loves nothing so well as to soar. [2]
- --HK 14:17, 8 October 2005 (UTC)
To prove what Schiller is saying, why not quote from the horse's mouth? Logic is deductive. Poe attacked deduction in many of his works. his detective Dupin is a brilliant example of this. Schiller quotes will soon be inserted. --Ibykus prometheus 22:30, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Vandalism?
65.185.213.33 added this article and several others to the Pantheists category. I suspect vandalism. Anyone agree? Charivari 08:08, 20 January 2006 (UTC)
Seems likely. I propose that it be removed until the anonymous user returns to offer some documentation. --HK 15:37, 20 January 2006 (UTC)
- I note now that User:Grye has declared Schiller to be both a pantheist and a freemason, awarding him membership in both categories. There is no documentation offered to this effect, and I propose that this documentation be added to the article before those categories are re-inserted. For, now, I am reverting. --HK 07:56, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
- How now brown cow? I just moved his cat:Pantheists to reflect an alphabetical order to the catagories, as seems to be the norm. I in no way said anything about him being one, as is distinctly evident from the edit history. As far as Freemasonry goes, here's cite and source: Talk:List of Freemasons. main article edited accordingly. Grye 08:54, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Links
Deleted the last link in list, not only because it was broken, but also because -after having found the updated link (http://www.pushkinpress.com/vonschiller-man.html), it led to a commercial website that sold "The Ghost-Seer", which is not so hard to find.
i would like to see a bit more discussion of the plays. after all, schiller is considered to be germany's most important playwright. i'll add some content and you all can see what you think. --Smithgrrl 02:04, 21 August 2006 (UTC)
i've made some more changes to the article, and will try to fill in the blanks as time permits. eventually, i'll try to re-structure it so it's a bit less repetitive, but he's an awfully important author and so worth the time, i think. thanks -- --Smithgrrl 03:45, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
