Figuring Death, Figuring Creativity

the long version

How does thought become manifest in works of art? How do literature and the arts influence and enrich our knowledge of death and creativity? This essay presents a new and fascinating method for cross-cultural and interdisciplinary studies in the humanities. According to Kant's Critique of Judgement, literature and art have worked, from the beginning, towards not only expanding but also transcending the realm of common experience. They strive to represent the unrepresentable, speak of the ineffable and advance into areas beyond all rational analysis, beyond the limits at which all attempts at philosophical or scientific explanations fail. Proceeding from the assumption that a history of cultural knowledge is not congruent with a history of abstract concepts or rational ideas, this essay presents a new and fascinating cross-cultural and interdisciplinary approach for analysing the powers of literature and art to form aesthetic ideas of lasting cultural impact.