‎DUBOS, JEAN-BAPTISTE‎
‎Kritische Betrachtungen über die Poesie und Mahlerey. 2 vols. - [FIRST GERMAN TRANSLATION OF THIS SEMINAL WORK IN AESTHETIC THOUGHT]‎

‎Kopenhagen, Mummischen Buchhandlung, 1760 - 1761. 8vo. Uniformly bound in three contemporary half calf bindings. Previous owner's name and a few annotation to pasted down front end-paper. A nice set. (16), 461, (2) pp. (10), 526 pp." (24), 287, (1) pp.‎

Reference : 61849

‎Exceedingly rare first complete German translation of Dubos’ seminal work in aesthetic thought which had a profound influence on the development of theatrical art and music throughout the Enlightenment. Here Dubos asserts that art cannot merely be beautiful but must also move the heart: “Le sublime de la poésie et de la peinture est de toucher et de plaire"". “It was not until 1760 and 1761, some four decades after the publication of the first edition of the original, that the first complete translation of the Réflexions critiques into German appeared in Copenhagen. The anonymous translator was Gottfried Benedict Funk, who at that time worked as a tutor for the court preacher Johann Andreas Cramer in Copenhagen, in a circle of Enlightenment thinkers sometimes called Kopenhagener Kreis (Copenhagen circle). Funk substitutes (albeit inconsistently) the French literary examples referred to by Du Bos with German ones, his choice testifying to aesthetic influences of this circle.[86] For lack of competence, he deals with music only marginally, the exception being references to the oratorio Der Tod Jesu (1755) by Karl Wilhelm Ramler and Carl Heinrich Graun.” (Lessmann, From the Ear to the Heart: Music Listening, Pleasure, and the German Reception of Du Bos). Dubos was a pioneer of sensibility in an era dominated by Cartesian rationalism. His work had a profound impact and earned high praise from Voltaire in multiple writings and served as the foundation for the fine arts sections of Diderot and d'Alembert's Encyclopédie.‎