It is exciting to realise how little of what we call modern thinking actually is MODERN (another reflection would be to think about how little of it actually is THINKING, but that is an oxymoron I will leave to days when my brain is brighter - which probably means it is a euphemism for never). As you can detect from my less than catchy introductory catch-phrase, I have spent some hours reading German Enlightenment theory on intermediality and intertextuality. As is always the case when you spen...

حاول الناقد الإلماني ليسنج في كتابه "لاؤوكون" أن يرد الشعر إلى فلسفة زمانية، والتصوير إلى فلسفة مكانية في محاولة لرصد أوجه الاختلاف بينهما، وقد دفعه ذلك إلى اختيار اسم لاؤوكون عنوانا لكتابه، ولاؤوكون هو أحد كهنة طروادة اليونانيين للإله أبولو غضبت عليه الالهة "فسلطت عليه أفاعي ضخمة قتلته هو وأولاده، وقد أثارت هذه الأسطورة خيال المثالين والشعراء من اليونان والرومان، فصنعوا تماثيل تصور عذاب لاؤوكون والأفاعي تطوقه، ثم جاء فرجيل شاعر الرومان فصور جزعه في شعره" . ومن ثم التقط ليسنج الخيط من التمثال وا...

Fairly interesting. In some ways, this responds to Winckelmann's assertions in his essay on Greek art. Quite similar in content, involving lengthy discussion of ancient Greek art. Has a somewhat more polemical style, however.

This treatise is a raw undertaking- it comprises a struggle much like that depicted in the cover: namely, to be the Solon giving laws to the wild tribe of artists and intellectuals. Doomed to failure, I read as if it were me wrestling against the monster snakes with my family.

As an artist, I learned lots of things from this book. It's great for people who're interested in philosophy and aesthetic theories.

Though this book is very much a product of the eighteenth century, Lessing's thoughts and musings on the differences between painting and poetry are still relevant today. Scholars interested in all the various art mediums, including television/film, painting, sculpture, performance art, plays, novels, poetry, and etc., will find use and interesting musings in Lessing's work. Here, he charges poetry and painting with the task of depicting beauty, using the Laocoön statue as his main lens. Because...

This is incredibly incisive.

Essential, perhaps the most important book for anyone who's going to direct either on-stage or in cinema or to become professional artist.

This is a brilliant book by a man who was both ahead of his time and a captive of the age in which he lived. Just as Lessing shows us the limits of painting and poetry, their strengths and weaknesses as media of artistic expression, he also shows us the strengths and weaknesses of the Enlightenment -- rational, smart, analytical, discarding the prejudices of prior eras, but at the same time limited by an excessive faith in reason and unable to see its limits, sometimes harsh and lacking in human...

I have recently taken a renewed interest in German literature, of which I was briefly obsessed in my mid-twenties, so I'm revisiting some texts from Lessing that I browsed years ago, now with a better understanding of both his place in late Enlightenment critical discourse and in German literary history. I had read portions of Laocoon previously in my years doing media studies, but this is first time I've read the entire book. Lessing's book-length essay, which he rather humbly describes as a co...

This is far more interesting than I had expected. Lessing begins this dissertation with examining the renowned statue of Laocoon – an event frozen in time – with Virgil’s description of the event during the Trojan War from the The Aeneid. Each art has its strengths and weaknesses. Then he compares the Iliad of Homer and Philoctetes of Sophocles with sculpture and painting to establish a foundation in criticism. The distinctions and advantages found in these arts are lessons for any lover of the

I am working on a more thorough write-up. This was a vexing book. One must remove oneself as a reader to a wholly different aesthetic culture, in order to make sense of the author's argument. However, it is hard to avoid frequently wondering if Lessing had a very narrow sense of what visual art can do...

ég veit ekki alveg hvort mér fannst efni bókarinnar sem slíkt eitthvað sérstaklega áhugavert eða relevant - en það gefur mér samt svo mikla ánægju að lesa svona old school mælskulist og fræðimennsku.

excellent book the truth is that you have a structure in the book that goes out of the ordinary

„Der Endzweck der Wissenschaft ist Wahrheit. Der Endzweck der Künste hingegen ist Vergnügen.“ Ein weiteres Buch auf der langen Liste der „Die Uni wollte es so“ – Bücher. Trotz eines Ratings von gerade mal zwei Sternen muss ich sagen ich fand Laokoon an sich nicht wirklich schlecht, ich hab ganz einfach nur nicht alles so richtig verstanden.Lessings Schreibstil ist recht flüssig und angenehm, ins Besondere für ein Sachbuch und es hat sich recht schnell gelesen, besonders im Vergleich zu so man

Very clear, accessible presentation of a worthwhile argument. Laocoon might seem a little obsolete in its eponymous subject, drawn from ancient Greek statuary, and Lessing’s distinction between painting and poetry uneventful in light of today’s (mixed) media – with Lessing’s expository voice an artifact in its own right, – but contemporary thought has rather fostered than outgrown the spatiotemporal dialectic in art. I will admit that Lessing straggles occasionally over the course of 29 chapters...

A fascinating disquisition on the practices of visual and verbal arts and in what ways their capacities for representation differ (if you're not interested in the intricacies of the dating of the specific Laocoön statue, though, take my advice and skip the last couple of chapters - the aesthetic essay that makes up the rest of the book stands on its own perfectly well without it).

This isn't a light read, babies. But I highly recommend this for those who study the Greek classics, poetry, art history or any happy combination of the few!

For people interested in aesthetic theory this is a must read. People who aren't will still find this essay engaging and easy to read.

I liked this one. But I suck at philosophy (who knew it was possible).

Michel Chaouli taught us about the silent scream, which can also be seen in _The Godfather III_, using Laocoon.

Ok, so I only had to read chapters 1-17, but still. It's crossed off the Master's list, it's crossed off of Goodreads...