THE AESTHETIC ATTITUDE By HERBERT SIDNEY LANGFELD object in the It is now in place, before proceeding further with the factors of [psychical] distance, to explain more fully the nature of the aesthetic attitude, and it will then be more clearly seen what place distance has in such an attitude, for it is not entirely clear from Dr. Bullough's own description.1 When one views an object aesthetically, one lives in the sense that one allows oneself to be entirely swayed by the laws of the object without any opposition upon one's own part. It is a very active participation, and the term "passive" can in the sense that one allows oneself to be led. What is added through the imagination is prescribed by the totality of the object, and one's adjustments are shaped accordingly, the Participation in the beautiful object be used only From chapter 3 of The Aesthetic Attitude, Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1920, by special arrangement with the publishers. The author is a professor of psychology in Harvard University. "Psychical Distance as a Factor in Art and an Aesthetic Principle," British Journal of Psychology, vol. 5, pp. 87-118. Professor Langfeld explains: "The term 'distance' is used metaphorically and not in the sense of spatial or temporal separation. It may for that reason be misleading to some readers, and further, the phrase 'psychical distance' has an unfortunately mystical connotation. In one place, Dr. Bullough uses the term 'detachment' . . . Let it be supposed that an individual is on a ship during a storm, and there is serious danger of shipwreck. It is quite possible that even in such a situation, a man of artistic temperament would admire the movements of the waves, and the dash of the spray, entirely oblivious of danger, and with no concern as to what the high seas may ultimately do to the ship. Descriptions of such a state of mind, even in situations of extreme danger, are frequently found in literature. For Dr. Bullough there would here be complete psychical distance. Suddenly, however, a wave larger than any previous one approaches and the artist's muscles set in preparation to meet the blow. Dr. Bullough would say that at that instant he has entirely lost his distance, that is, his aesthetic attitude. It will now be better understood why Dr. Bullough has termed the distance 'psychical,' for it denotes the mental attitude." (The Aesthetic Attitude, pp. 57-58.) In Masefield's narrative poem Dauber, the pitiful-heroic landsman who dreads the sea but loves it and desires above all things to paint its very nature, endures long tortures from brutish sailors and appalling waters in an effort to achieve the 'psychical distance' that shall make him the revealing artist of his chosen subject. And when his soul has conquered fear, he dies-not an artist, but a sailor.-Editor. object being allowed in all ways to dictate the manner of such adjustment. The aesthetic attitude may be likened to rowing downstream with the current and following all of its windings. One is here active in that one moves with the stream, but passive in that one opposes no resistance to the force which is carrying one on. The attitude is lost when one attempts to push upstream or off on the side eddy of one's choice. One is reminded of an illustration by Fidus of children in a boat paddling with the stream who think they are pushing while in reality they are drifting with the current. What is meant is best shown by the attitude at the drama. Here one follows and lives the acts of each of the players as Yielding to the plot unfolds, instead of identifying oneself the drama with one actor and, in the eagerness to meet the developing situation, anticipating events contrary to the central idea of the author. In the truly aesthetic participation, one is swayed back and forth by the conflicting forces. One is successively hero, villain, and clown. One awaits the attack with the actor, and does not advance to meet it otherwise than as depicted. If the scene involves the ringing of the church bell, one does not, in one's imagination, stroll toward the church, unless there are indications that it is intended that one should. It may be objected that one frequently allows one's imagination to wander from the plot and to build a plot of one's own. That is true, but then, for the moment, one becomes playwright instead of audience. The artist is bound as well as the audience. He is bound by his own unified plan and so long as he keeps within it, he too is a servant of the characters and walks and talks with them all. The man who lost his distance at the play of Othello by imagining his wife in the place of Desdemona ceased to feel Personal the total conflict in that he became identified involvement with Othello alone and no longer lived in the lines of the playwright. By that act the aesthetic attitude was lost. Actors have often felt flattered by effects upon their audience which were totally unaesthetic. A famous actor delighted to recount an incident which occurred while he was playing The Middleman. He was a poor inventor who had used up his last resources and could not obtain sufficient fuel to keep up the furnace fire in which the pottery was being hardened. Only a few moments more and his fortune would have been made. Moved by the excitement of the scene, a man in the gallery threw down fifty cents, shouting, “Here, old man, buy wood with it." This active participation was proof of the realism of the scene, but an actor with ideals of his art would scarcely care to act before an audience composed entirely of such individuals. Such an attitude as that just described is typical of the melodrama where the audience frequently hisses the villain and applauds the hero when it is not warning him of approaching danger; truly an attitude which is highly enjoyable to those concerned. Such participation can, however, scarcely be termed aesthetic, for it is opposing oneself to the tendencies and motives of the play. Another actor has described the fright of one of the musicians in the orchestra when the actor rushed down the stage toward him in one of his most dramatic scenes. The musician never became accustomed to this scene. Night after night he started back in terror before the onrush of the actor. So pleased was the latter that at the end of the engagement he presented the musician with a box of cigars. It would be difficult for anyone in the musician's position to have retained his aesthetic outlook, to have been so occupied by the plot and acting that he would have followed the actor in thought instead of retreating before him; but if that was also the effect upon the rest of the audience, the play could not be considered a success so far as beauty is concerned. Even applause at critical points of the acting, so annoying to the lover of dramatic art, although an indication of appreciation, is also proof that the audience has for the time lost its distance and slipped away from the purely asthetic. As an example from the appreciation of nature, one may stand upon the shore in deep enjoyment of the "cold gray mist and the dawn," one may be enchanted by the lines of the waves, the soft spray of the foaming waters as it slides up the smooth beach, one may feel the movement of the water and the lines of the beach Yielding as it inclines to meet it, and the unity of the total situation. One may become so absorbed in the harmony of lines and color that one is entirely oblivious of the fact that water has touched one's shoes. It is obvious that when one retreats before the waves one loses one's distance, that the water is no longer a thing of beauty, but a force that is compelling one to withdraw. It cannot be said that the loss of aesthetic attitude is due to the intrusion of the thought of self into consciousness, and for that reason one ceases to "repose" in the object, for one's flight may be so nearly reflex and instantaneous that there is no place or time for self-consciousness. It might be asked whether in the backward movement one were not still living in the scene. To this one may reply that the movements would not be according to any requirement of the scene itself, and they would not be a part of or harmonize with the picture that has been before one as an object of aesthetic enjoyment. One may enjoy the tone of the bugle call aesthetically and retain one's distance by the contemplation of fundamental tone and overtones. One's usual attitude, however, is a nonaesthetic one; the sound starts a movement the manner of which is in no way prescribed by the sound itself, nor in harmony with it. A group of individuals hearing it will all understand its meaning, but the variations in response may be as great as the number of individuals and the enjoyment may be either in the sound itself, in the manner of response, or in the union of the two. Effects of sculpture In entering an art gallery one comes suddenly upon a Greek statue with outstretched hand. There may be an involuntary tendency to put out one's hand under a misapprehension that the statue invites it, but the manner of stretching one's own hand is not indicated by the statue, and there can therefore be no question of the harmony of this movement with the movements as indicated by the lines of the figure. This first surprised attitude, then, is non-aesthetic and in sharp contrast with the attitude assumed when enjoying the beauty of the statue. There is also in this latter attitude the tendency to stretch the arm, but it is in order to feel the full value of the lines of the statue. It is an extension of the arm with the arm of the statue and not toward it, and thus a movement in harmony with the rest of the statue as intended by the sculptor. A full description of the nature of this participation or empathy' is not in question here, but will be discussed in the following chapter. The intention here is merely to make clear the general distinction between the aesthetic and non-aesthetic activities of the observer. The natural attitude toward environment The aesthetic attitude as thus described is diametrically opposed to one's usual attitude toward one's environment, the one which one learns to assume by reason of the struggle for existence. In this latter attitude, we are continually opposing forces. Our organism becomes set or adjusted to meet and overcome obstacles, while, as has been stated above, the aesthetic set is directed toward experiencing in ourselves the various relations which the elements of the objejct have to one another and not our own independent action in regard to them. Biologically it is the more independent action which is of significance and interest, and for this reason it is for most of us the habitual mode of response. The aesthetic attitude, on the other hand, is not only more unusual, but one that for most individuals has to be cultivated if it is to exist at all in the midst of the opposing and therefore disturbing influences which are always present. We are accustomed to put out our hand in greeting, to retreat from advancing waves, and to brace ourselves against attack. The man who does not seem to have this attitude is considered somewhat abnormal, and the artist who has developed the contrary mode of response belongs to the type so frequently called erratic. If the word 'In chapter 5, Professor Langfeld discusses the theory of Einfühlung developed by Theodor Lipps and others. Empathy is the alternative term used by E. B. Titchener in his Experimental Psychology of the Thought Processes. In contemplating a Grecian column or a Gothic arch, we feel the force that lifts and rounds it; in gazing at a painted tree or waterfall or human form we share its dynamic quality and live its life. We read ourselves into the artistic creation, making it more than material, and yet reffect in our very physical states the material expressions of its supposedly spiritual being. The tactual and movement values demanded of the sculptor and the painter are felt by empathy. |