Kant's Critique of Taste : The Feeling of Life

"Immanuel Kant's Critique of Judgment is widely recognized as a founding document of modern aesthetics, but its legacy has fallen into disrepute. In this book Katalin Makkai calls for the rediscovery of Kant's aesthetics, showing that its centerpiece, his investigation of the judgment of taste, paints a compelling portrait of our relationships with works of art that we love. At its heart is a scene of aesthetic encounter in which one feels oneself to be 'animated' - brought to life - by an object, finding there to be something in one's experience of it, beyond what there is to know about it, that one wants to explore and articulate. Tracing Kant's insight that to judge is to reveal one's sense of what bears judging, and hence of what matters, Makkai situates Kant's aesthetics within his larger study, begun in the first Critique, of judgment's fundamental role in the life of the mind."--Quatrième de couverture "Zadie Smith loves the music of Joni Mitchell, but for a long time she could not stand it. What did this transformation take? "I didn't come to love Joni Mitchell by knowing anything more about her, or understanding what an open-tuned guitar is, or even by sitting down and forcing myself to listen and re-listen to her songs. I hated Joni Mitchell-and then I loved her. Her voice did nothing for me- until the day it undid me completely."1 Something changed, and in her search for words to articulate what it involved Smith lands on these: "A sudden, unexpected attunement.""-- Provided by publisher This book offers a new interpretation of Kant's aesthetics in the Critique of Judgment that shows its relevance to contemporary debates. It is aimed at philosophers, primarily those interested in Kant or in aesthetics, but it will also interest scholars of art theory, criticism, and cultural theory.