Chapter 46 Part III The World as Representation Revisited §46

It is obvious that Laocoon is not exclaiming among the famous group of carved images.It is natural, then, that the point which always astonishes us again and again in general is that we must exclaim when we imagine ourselves in Laocoon; Severe physical pain and sudden, great physical fear, and all reflective thinking that might make a person endure in silence, are now completely excluded from consciousness, [then,] natural instinct will The exclamation is used not only to express pain and fear, but also to scare back the attacking enemy by calling for help.Although Winkelmann has found that [Laocoon] has no expression of exclamation, when he tries to defend the artist [who created this work], he goes so far as to describe Laocoon as a Stoic, thinking that Laocoon Aukon reserved his dignity, disdain to cry out according to natural instinct, but added useless restraint on top of his pain, and gritted his teeth to hold back the painful expression.Therefore, what Winkelmann saw in Laocoon was "the tested spirit of a great man, struggling with extreme pain and trying to suppress his painful expression and hide the pain in his heart. He is not like Virgil. [Laocoon in the poem] exclaimed like that, but only sighed in agony" and so on ("Complete Works of [Winkelmann]", Vol. It is [the same book] Volume VI, page 104 and subsequent pages).Lessing criticized this view of Winckelmann in his Laocoon and corrected it with the point indicated above.Lessing replaced the psychological reason with a purely aesthetic reason, thinking that beauty, the principle of ancient art, does not allow such an expression of exclamation.He adds another argument, that a static work of art cannot tolerate a erratic, impermanent state; [however] this argument is proved to the contrary by hundreds of examples of graceful Statues are images caught in changing movements, such as dancing, fighting, chasing, and so on.Goethe, in his article on Laocoon, which was the inaugural issue of the literary magazine La Temple (p. 8) even considers this very brief moment in the movement of choice necessary. ——In our day, although Shi ("God of the Age" 1797 No. 10) solves the problem in this way when he attributes everything to the highest authenticity of expression, he said that Laocoon did not exclaim because he was He was about to die in suffocation, and he could no longer exclaim.Finally, Feano (Roman Studies, vol. I, pp. 426ff.) reviews and compares all three opinions, while adding nothing new himself, but only compromising the Just three opinions.

I can't help but wonder [why] such prudent people have to go to such lengths to find some inadequate reasons, to grasp some psychological and physiological arguments to explain this matter; [in fact] this matter The reasons for this are at hand, and are obvious to the unprejudiced;—it is all the more strange that Lessing, so close to the correct explanation, still misses the real point. Before doing any psychological and physiological research, the question of whether Laocoon would exclaim in his position-and he said that I am completely on the positive side-; The decision is made by the figure itself, that is to say, the only reason why the exclamation should not be expressed in this group of figures is because [the art of exclamation] is completely outside the realm of sculpture.It is impossible to mold a screaming Laocoon out of marble, but one can only carve a Laocoon with his mouth open, unable to speak out, a Laocoon whose voice stops at the throat.The essence of the exclamation, and thus its effect on the audience, is entirely in the sound of [exclamation], not in the opening of the mouth.The opening of the mouth, which is necessarily accompanied by exclamation, must first be motivated by the sound produced by the opening of the mouth; then, as a characteristic of this behavior, the opening of the mouth is permissible, even necessary, although this has detracted from the beauty [of the work].But plastic art itself is completely amateurish in expressing exclamation, which is impossible.It would be very unwise to show in the plastic arts the means of exclamation, the forceful means of destroying all the contours of the face and the rest of the expression, that is, the opening of the mouth; To do so is to put before our eyes the means which incidentally require many sacrifices, while the purpose of the means, the exclamation itself, and the effect of exclamation on [our] emotions are still lacking.What's more, it's not just lack of payment. When people do this, they just create a pitiful appearance that every effort is ineffective; it can be compared to a watchman who catches ghosts for fun after he is asleep. Wax plugged [his] horns, and then yelled fire to wake him up, but couldn't blow the horns in vain. — On the other hand, exclamations [looks] are quite permissible within the sphere of the narrative or performing arts, since they contribute to the truth [of art], which That is, the complete expression of the idea.This is the case in literature and art - literature and art require the reader's imagination [cooperation] to make what it describes more intuitive and vivid - so Laocoon in Wittener [in the poem] is like a bull in the as when he broke free from his bonds with an axe; so Homer ("Iliad" XX, pp. 48-53) also made Mars, the god of war, and Minerva, the god of wisdom, utter a very terrible cry, but This detracted neither from the majesty of their god nor from the beauty of their god.It is the same in dramatic art, and Laocoon on the stage simply has to exclaim.Sophocles also made Philocdete cry, and probably did so on the ancient stage.I remember a completely similar situation. In London, I saw the famous actor Kemper playing the role of American Lola in the play "Picharlo" translated from Germany.Lola is a savage but a noble character, but after he is injured, he screams loudly and violently, which is very effective in the plot, because it is the most expressive character of the character, which greatly contributes to the [artistic The] authenticity. —On the contrary, a painted or carved voiceless caller is more ridiculous than painted music.This has already been condemned in Goethe's "Temple", because [in the plastic arts] call signs are more detrimental to other expressions and [total] beauty than music; Some operations can also be regarded as actions that mark the character of the person, and as long as it does not require violent body movements or crooked mouth and cheeks, it can be painted very decently, such as the saint Checilia playing the organ, Romans Raphael's "The Violinist" at the Chiara Gallery and more. ——Therefore, because art has its own boundaries and cannot express Laocoon's pain with exclamation, then the artist has to resort to all other means to express Laocoon's pain.The artist did this perfectly, as Winckelmann's large pen writes; The description of it can still retain its full value and truth.