The first English translation of Novalis’s unfinished notes for a universal science, Das Allgemeine Brouillon.
Novalis is best known in history as the poet of early German Romanticism. However, this translation of Das Allgemeine Brouillon, or ‘Universal Notebook, ‘ finally introduces him to the English-speaking world as an extraordinarily gifted philosopher in his own right and shatters the myth of him as a mere daydreaming and irrational poet. Composed of more than 1, 100 notebook entries, this is easily Novalis’s largest theoretical work and certainly one of the most remarkable and audacious undertakings of the ‘Golden Age’ of German philosophy. In it, Novalis reflects on numerous aspects of human culture, including philosophy, poetry, the natural sciences, the fine arts, mathematics, mineralogy, history, and religion, and brings them all together into what he calls a ‘Romantic Encyclopaedia’ or ‘Scientific Bible.’
Novalis’s Romantic Encyclopaedia fully embodies the author’s own personal brand of philosophy, ‘Magical Idealism.’ With meditations on mankind and nature, the possible future development of our faculties of reason, imagination, and the senses, and the unification of the different sciences, these notes contain a veritable treasure trove of richly poetic and philosophic thoughts.
Table of Content
Acknowledments
Introduction
Text by Novalis: Notes for a Romantic Encyclopaedia
Appendix: Extracts from the Freiberg Natural Scientific Studies (1798/99)
Notes to Introduction
Notes to Text by Novalis
Notes to Appendix
Select Bibliography
Index
About the author
Novalis (1772–1801) was the foremost poet-philosopher of early German Romanticism. Universally acclaimed as a poetic genius for such works as Hymns to the Night and the unfinished novel Heinrich von Ofterdingen, he especially favored the fragment form for his philosophical meditations. The latter reach their climax in this volume, his astonishing plan for a universal science. David W. Wood is a Ph D candidate in German Idealism at the Sorbonne in Paris. He is the translator of Goethe and Love by Karl Julius Schröer.
