Theories of Ugliness: An Unseemly Aesthetic History

Why has our preoccupation with concepts, standards, and theories of the beautiful not resulted in a correspondingly comprehensive theoretical treatment of the ugly? Theories of Ugliness remedies this by gathering and scrutinising ideas of the ugly and unsightly from across the history of Western aesthetic and philosophical writing. Taking in ancient, medieval and early modern concepts, all the way through to more recent Anglo-American conceptions, this book reveals the extraordinary preoccupation with ugliness exhibited by some of Germany’s leading philosophers. Fascinating insights into ugliness from dialectical, categorical or purely aesthetic perspectives are found in thinkers such as Hegel, Lessing, Schlegel, Nietzsche, Adorno, Julia Kristeva and most notably Karl Rosenkranz. Whether as a counterpoint to beauty, a target of negation, a literary device, or a victim of humour, ugliness runs throughout the history of Western thought. This compelling study brings that thought together to offer a fresh view that will change the way that scholars think about the ugly.

Table of Contents:
Introduction Part One: Early Reflections 1. Plato and Aristotle 2. Medieval Absence 3. Maggi, Rocco, and the Early Modern Era Part Two: The German (and European) Tradition 4. Lessing and Early German Thinkers 5. Hegel and the Earliest Hegelians 6. Rosenkranz and Schasler 7. Nietzsche and the Writers 8. The Academic Philosophers 9. Theodor Adorno’s Elevation of Ugliness 10. Recent Continental Perspectives Part Three: The Anglo-American Tradition 11. From Darwin to the Neo-Hegelians 12. Contemporary Perspectives: Goodman, Sibley, and Danto Part Four: A Contemporary Objective Idealist Theory of Ugliness Afterward Works Cited

About the Author :
Mark William Roche is Professor of German Language and Literature, and Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame, USA. He is author of Alfred Hitchcock: Filmmaker and Philosopher (Bloomsbury Academic, 2022), and Why Literature Matters in the 21st Century (2004).

Review :
A cursory review of Western Aesthetics reveals that Beauty has received far more philosophical attention than Ugliness, its supposed opposite. But as Mark Roche amply demonstrates in his book Theories of Ugliness, a history of the concept of unrivaled comprehensiveness, it has been a recurring topic of discussion since the time of Plato and Aristotle and continuing into the present. Prof. Roche’s history is not only encyclopedic in scope; it is critical both in the sense that it locates with great clarity the weaknesses in myriad theories but also it underlines their continuing insights. This culminates in the presentation of his own sophisticated contribution to the field. In effect, Prof. Roche has provided aestheticians with a foundation for an invigorated exploration of the concept of ugliness by outlining its lineage and advancing a viewpoint that is sure to stimulate lively exchange. In short, Theories of Ugliness is an indispensable text for anyone wishing to join that conversation. Beautifully written about an ugly subject, exhaustive in its historical scope, and lucid in its systematic analysis, this book explores the concept of ugliness. By introducing a number of innovative concepts, Roche reminds us that the ugly needs to be understood both in opposition to and in complementarity with the beautiful. This is a must-read for everyone interested in modern aesthetics as well as popular culture.