4,994 words
Of peasant ancestry on his father’s side and boasting aristocratic (boyar) maternal roots, the Romanian poet, prose writer, and editorialist Mihai Eminescu (1850-1889) had not put his modest inherited wealth to waste. Educated in the German language since childhood, Eminescu was culturally — if not always geopolitically — an enthusiastic Germanophile. (more…)
Caspar David Friedrich, Greifswald in Moonlight, 1817.
9,130 words
As men and women of the Right, we are searchers for Truth. We believe that by finding Truth and living by Truth, we might know Beauty, and we might know ourselves. Essence is our mission and with it, survival. And so this essay will try to surface and then sketch three fundamental “lifeways,” (more…)
Phil Eiger Newmann, Beethoven, 2020.
2,640 words
Today is the 250th anniversary of the christening of Ludwig van Beethoven, a titan of classical music and one of the greatest composers of all time. Beethoven transformed every genre in which he wrote and singlehandedly changed the trajectory of classical music. Rooted in the Classical idiom of Mozart and Haydn, he paved the way for the Romantic era and influenced composers such as Brahms, Liszt, and Wagner. His works remain cornerstones of the classical repertoire. (more…)
8,232 words
As an American, I find European theories about this country and its character intriguing (or amusing) — particularly those formed from intimate experience. Of course, such theories presuppose that there is and has been such a thing as “the American people,” or “ethny” from which to draw an assessment. I submit two, not quite antithetical, but competing European judgments about the United States. (more…)
Benjamin Haydon, The Anti-Slavery Convention, 1840, 1841.
5,142 words
The white race is uniquely altruistic. Why? This is a very difficult question to answer. It is easy to understand altruistic behavior for the benefit of one’s family members. This is common among animals. Mother bears will put their lives in danger to protect their cubs from attack. Sacrifices for one’s relatives and ingroup ethnic members (more…)
4,585 words
An important question for those on the Dissident Right to ask is how humans ought to relate to nature; both their own “human nature” as well as the “outside” world. Depending on one’s religious beliefs, this might be the most important question there is. History seems to indicate two conventional approaches to this question. (more…)
4,445 words
Why does Scruton not examine the role of Melot in Death-Devoted Heart more closely?
Tristan und Isolde echoes themes from Romeo and Juliet and Othello, so it is unlikely that Wagner did not have both plays in mind when he composed his opera. The Othello theme is especially clear in the regrets expressed by King Marke that he could not clearly see, just as Othello could not clearly see. Melot, like Iago, faces death if he cannot make good the claim of adultery; (more…)
5,223 words
Sir Roger Scruton, who died of cancer on January 12th, 2020 at the age of seventy-five, wrote more than fifty books, was the editor of the conservative publication The Salisbury Review, and in his final years was briefly chairman — dismissed and subsequently reinstated — of the Conservative Government’s “Building Better, Building Beautiful Commission.”
I once met Roger Scruton. He invited me to his flat in London in 1982 where I remember enjoying his excellent wine. (more…)
3,401 words
John Lauritsen
The Shelley-Byron Men: Lost Angels of a Ruined Paradise
Pagan Press, 2017
Ordinarily, I wouldn’t think of reviewing a book on Shelley, Byron & Co.; mainly because I know little about them, other than what used to be generally known among the educated (before English was replaced with gender studies and time off for anti-Trump demos), plus what I read from Camille Paglia. (more…)
4,506 words
Part 2 of 2. Part 1 here.
Schleiermacher’s Philosophy of Mind
According to Schleiermacher, the task of philosophy is the “immersion of the Spirit into the innermost depths of itself and of things in order to fathom the relations of their [spirit and nature] being-together.”[1] Schleiermacher’s philosophy, like German idealism in general, was very influenced by, and a reaction to, the critical transcendental philosophy of Immanuel Kant. (more…)
4,148 words
Part 1 of 2. Part 2 here.
“I feel sure that Germany, the kernel of Europe, will arise once more in a new and beautiful state, but when this will happen, and whether the country will not first have to experience even greater difficulties […] God alone knows.” — Friedrich Schleiermacher, 1806[1]
4,193 words
The words “sublime” and “numinous” have shifted in meaning somewhat over recent years. The word “sublime,” I presume, would now generally be interpreted to mean something of particularly great beauty, or an action particularly well executed. It would not be limited to a narrow usage but could be applied to any thing or action of particular excellence, perhaps with a slightly pretentious connotation of elegance. (more…)
4,384 words
English original: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3
Antes de entrar no assunto principal, eu gostaria de fazer três observações preliminares:
Eu hesitei em aceitar seu convite para falar sobre a figura do dândi, pois esse tipo de questão não é meu tema principal de interesse.
Eu finalmente aceitei porque redescobri um ensaio lúcido e magistral de Otto Mann, (more…)
7,106 words
I want to maintain that after a hundred years of romanticism, we are in for a classical revival, and that the particular weapon of this new classical spirit, when it works in verse, will be fancy.[1] And in this I imply the superiority of fancy—not superior generally or absolutely, for that would be obvious nonsense, but superior in the sense that we use the word good in empirical ethics—good for something, superior for something. (more…)
Wyndham Lewis, “Red Duet,” 1914
1,095 words
Edited by Alex Kurtagić
Editor’s Note:
The following is an excerpt from Jonathan Bowden’s Heat. (more…)
Wyndham Lewis, Portrait of T. S. Eliot, 1938
5,352 words
Part 1 of 2
The First World War brought to a climax a cultural crisis in Western Civilization that had been developing for centuries: money overwhelmed tradition, as Spengler would have put it[1] (or, to resort to the language of Marx, the bourgeoisie supplanted the aristocracy).[2] Industrialization accentuated the process of commercialization, with its concomitant urbanization and the disruption of organic bonds and social cohesion. This has thrown societies into a state of perpetual flux, with culture reflecting that condition.
It was—and is—a problem of the primacy of Capital. (more…)
3,733 words
English original here
1 – Fichte e o Destino da Nação Alemã
J. G. Fichte (1762-1814), o primeiro dos grandes idealistas alemães pós-kantianos, é uma figura importante na ascensão do nacionalismo alemão – e tem sido muitas vezes acusado de ser um dos pais fundadores do Nacional-Socialismo.
Philipp Veit, “Germania,” 1848
4,354 words
Portuguese translation here
1. Fichte and the Destiny of the German Nation
J. G. Fichte (1762–1814), the first of the great post-Kantian German Idealists, is an important figure in the rise of German nationalism – and has often been accused of being one of the founding fathers of National Socialism.
Ludwig Fahrenkrog, “The Holy Fire”
1,311 words
Part 2 of 2
Translated by Greg Johnson
The Paganism of Hamsun and Lawrence
If Hamsun and Lawrence carry out their desire to return to a natural ontology by rejecting rationalist intellectualism, this also implies an in-depth contestation of the Christian message. (more…)
Knut Hamsun
2,378 words
Part 1 of 2
Translated by Greg Johnson
The Hungarian philologist Akos Doma, educated in Germany and the United States, has published a work of literary interpretation comparing the works of Knut Hamsun and D. H. Lawrence: (more…)
1,501 words
Czech version here
Edward Elgar (June 2, 1857–February 23, 1934) was a leading figure in the last generation of European Romantic composers, which includes Giacomo Puccini (1858–1924), Gustav Mahler (1860–1911), Richard Strauss (1864–1949), Jean Sibelius (1865–1957), Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872–1958), and Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873–1943).
Charles Baudelaire, 1821–1867
1,790 words
Translated by Greg Johnson
Part 2 of 3. Part I: here
Translations: Czech, Portuguese
The Mission of the Artist According to Baudelaire
5,404 words
An address delivered on October 15, 1924, Nietzsche’s eightieth birthday, at the Nietzsche Archive, Weimar
Looking back at the nineteenth century and letting its great men pass before the mind’s eye, we can observe an amazing thing about the figure of Friedrich Nietzsche, something that was hardly noticeable in his own time. (more…)
