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Heute Abend, als ich die Landschaftsmalereien der achtzehnten und neunzehnten Jahrhundert fuer Comps recherchierte, habe ich etwas ausgezeichnet entdeckt. Normalerweise finde ich Fussnoten ganz aergerlich, aber John Ruskin, der die Analyse der modernischen europaeischen Landschaftsmaler geschrieben hat, gab den deutschen Philosophen ein Bitch-Slap in einer Fussnote:*
[This afternoon, while I researched landscape painting of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries for comps, I found something spectacular. Normally I find footnotes annoying, but John Ruskin, who wrote the study on modern European landscape painters, dealt a bitch slap to German philosophers in a footnote:]
"In fact (for I may as well, for once, meet our German friends in their own style), all that has been subjected to us on this subject seems object to great objection; that the subjection of all things (subject to no exceptions) to senses which are, in us, both subject and abject, and objects of perpetual contempt, cannot but make it or ultimate object to subject ourselves to the senses, and to remove whatever objections existed to such subjection. So that, finally, that which is the subject of examination or object of attention, uniting thus in itself the characters of subness and obness [my personal favorite] (so that, that which has no obness in it should be called sub-subjective, or a sub-subject, and that which has no subness in itshould be called upper or ober-objective, or an ob-object); and we also, who suppose ourselves the objects of every arrangement, and are certainly the subjects of every sensual impression, thus uniting in ourselves, in an obverse or adverse manner, the characters of obness and sub-ness, must both become metaphysically dejected or rejected, nothing remaining in us objective, but subjectivity, and the very objectivity of the object being lost in the abyss of this subjectivity of the Human.
There is, however, some meaning in the above sentence, if the reader cares to make it out; but in a pure German sentence of the highest style there is often none whatever. See Appendix II. 'German Philosophy.' " (Ruskin 1878, vol. 3, 158).
I found this particularly enthralling because later in the afternoon, while reading a German article on "Frauen und Landschaft" [Women and Landscape"], the third sentence in the damn thing was almost as long as Ruskin's lovely parody.
*I felt inspired.
[This afternoon, while I researched landscape painting of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries for comps, I found something spectacular. Normally I find footnotes annoying, but John Ruskin, who wrote the study on modern European landscape painters, dealt a bitch slap to German philosophers in a footnote:]
"In fact (for I may as well, for once, meet our German friends in their own style), all that has been subjected to us on this subject seems object to great objection; that the subjection of all things (subject to no exceptions) to senses which are, in us, both subject and abject, and objects of perpetual contempt, cannot but make it or ultimate object to subject ourselves to the senses, and to remove whatever objections existed to such subjection. So that, finally, that which is the subject of examination or object of attention, uniting thus in itself the characters of subness and obness [my personal favorite] (so that, that which has no obness in it should be called sub-subjective, or a sub-subject, and that which has no subness in itshould be called upper or ober-objective, or an ob-object); and we also, who suppose ourselves the objects of every arrangement, and are certainly the subjects of every sensual impression, thus uniting in ourselves, in an obverse or adverse manner, the characters of obness and sub-ness, must both become metaphysically dejected or rejected, nothing remaining in us objective, but subjectivity, and the very objectivity of the object being lost in the abyss of this subjectivity of the Human.
There is, however, some meaning in the above sentence, if the reader cares to make it out; but in a pure German sentence of the highest style there is often none whatever. See Appendix II. 'German Philosophy.' " (Ruskin 1878, vol. 3, 158).
I found this particularly enthralling because later in the afternoon, while reading a German article on "Frauen und Landschaft" [Women and Landscape"], the third sentence in the damn thing was almost as long as Ruskin's lovely parody.
*I felt inspired.
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