The Aesthetics of Ugliness
Anna Elizabeth Baker
Los Altos Hills, CA
M.A., University of Virginia, 2004
B.A., University of California, Berkeley, 2001
A Dissertation presented to the Graduate Faculty
of the University of Virginia in Candidacy for the Degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures
University of Virginia
December 2008
Benjamin K. Bennett, Ph.D.
Jeffrey Grossman, Ph.D.
Beth Bjorklund, Ph.D.
Allan Megill, Ph.D.
UMI Number: 3353829
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©Anna Elizabeth Baker
The Aesthetics of Ugliness
December 2008
Ph.D. Graduate Arts and Sciences
ABSTRACT
Title: The Aesthetics of Ugliness
Against the backdrop of eighteenth century history, philosophy
and literature, this dissertation investigates the changing discourse
concerning ugliness. Specifically, this study examines how the previously
negligible role of ugliness develops into a functional one within aesthetics
and Enlightenment culture; further, ugliness comes to manifest itself
formally and thematically in literature.
This investigation focuses on four authors that epitomized the
interstices between culture critique and aesthetic philosophy: Gotthold
Ephraim Lessing, Friedrich Schiller, Heinrich von Kleist and Mary
Shelley. This project consists of four chapters, which focuses on these
authors who challenged the normative constraints of representation by
reappropriating ugliness. Each chapter focuses on a specific type of
ugliness: Jewish, criminal, female, and foreign ugliness. Chapter 1,
which is a discussion about Gottfried Ephraim Lessing's Nathan der
Weise, examines the connection between Jewishness and ugliness. Using
Moses Mendelssohn as his model for Nathan, Lessing shows how racial
stereotypes adversely affect society. Chapter 2 focuses on Friedrich
Schiller's aesthetic essays and his novella "Der Vebrecher aus verlorener
Ehre" in order to demonstrate the fallacy between the Enlightenment
project of tolerance and the pernicious connection between ugliness and
social expulsion. Chapter 3 investigates the constructedness of female
beauty in Heinrich von Kleist's Das Kathchen von Heilbronn while
Chapter 4 focuses on Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and the consequences
of negative judgments against non-Europeans. Each of these authors
demonstrates their political and social consciousness, and each author
reappropriates ugliness as a valuable weapon against social prejudices.
This dissertation addresses this historical juncture, specifically how
ugliness assumes a useful function in philosophical and social views.
The Aesthetics of Ugliness
Figure 1: Otto Dix, Das alte Liebespaar
Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION 3
ENGAGING THE UGLY: LESSING, MENDELSSOHN AND NATHAN 18
THE JEW AS LITERARY MOTIF 20
ARGUING FOR DIEJUDBN 23
UGLY DEBATES AND THE PARABLE 30
MENDELSSOHN AND NATHAN 34
THE GERMAN SOCRATES 40
LESSING'S UGLY POSITION 46
AN UGLY TEXT? 57
CONCLUSION 65
UGLY JUNCTURE: PHYSIOGNOMY AND MORALITY IN SCHILLER'S VERBRECHER
67
NARRATIVE STRUCTURING 73
THE STATE OF THE BODY 83
CHRISTIAN WOLF/F 86
PHYSIOGNOMY: LAVATER, ABEL AND SCHILLER 89
THE UGLY DEBATE 103
CONCLUSION Ill
THE UGLY WOMAN? KLEIST'S KUNIGUNDE AS THE TRAGIC HEROINE 114
THE MARKINGS OF LANGUAGE 117
ENLIGHTENED AUTONOMY 121
PERFORMING FEMALE 127
THE BEAUTIFUL REPRESENTATION 134
UNMASKING BEAUTY 137
THE CONSTRUCTION OF KLEIST'S WOMEN 141
MALE VIOLENCE, TWO KUNIGUNDE'S 144
UNMASKING MALE (DIS)ILLUSION 148
CONCLUSION 157
THE SUBLIMELY UGLY: THE ETHICS OF READING MORAL MONSTROSITY AND
THE [DIS]MEMBERED BODY IN MARY SHELLEY'S FRANKENSTEIN 159
THE UGLY MONSTER 162
THE SUBLIMELY UGLY 166
UGLY HUMANITY 172
THE DISMEMBERED BODY AND THE SUBLIMELY MORAL 176
MORAL MONSTROSITY 181
ETHICS OF READING 189
CONCLUSION 207
WORKS CITED 209
2
Thank you to my family and friends.
This would not have been possible without
your constant support, kindness, and willingness
to consume massive amounts of Arch's.
Introduction
"Ach was wollt ihr euch verwohnen
In dem Hasslich-Wunderbaren!" (Goethe 2001)
The title of my study, The Aesthetics of Ugliness, creates the
expectation of a systematic approach to the philosophical treatment of
ugliness; instead, this dissertation addresses the changing significance
and function of ugliness in literature and phi