The Schopenhauer-Galaxy

Abstract

My paper discusses the methodical question of the cultural unconscious, taking up the concept of “mentalities” by the Annales school of historiography, and Pierre Bourdieu’s notion of “habituality”. The scope is to describe contemporary manifestations in philosophy, literature and artwork in epistemic terms. Is there a modernist mentality, encompassing different disciplines, genres, and authors? In a case study, Friedrich Nietzsche’s Birth of Tragedy, Richard Wagner’s Ring of the Nibelungen, and Kasimir Malevich’s Suprematism are subjects of a discourse analysis. Their common denominator is the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer, whose legacy is paradigmatic for the intellectual field between European Symbolism and avant-garde.