George Santayana

The great philosopher, essayist, poet, and novelist masterfully offers his fascinating outline of Aesthetics Theory. Drawing on the art, literature, and social sciences involved, Santayana discusses the nature of beauty, form, and expression.

Being the Outline of Aesthetic Theory

The Sense of Beauty

A novel of of ideas, expressed in the birth, life, and early death of Oliver Alden. Published in 1935, George Santayana's The Last Puritan was the American philosopher's only novel. It became an instant best-seller, immediately linked in its painful voyage of self discovery to The Education of Henry Adams. It is essentially a novel of ideas, expressed in the birth, life, and early death of Oliver Alden.The Last Puritan is volume four in a new critical edition of The Works of George Santayana that restores Santayana's original text and provides important new scholarly information. Books in this series - the first complete publication of Santayana's works - include an editorial apparatus with notes to the text (identifying persons, places, and ideas), textual commentary (including a description of the composition and publication history, along with a discussion of editorial methods and decisions), discussions of adopted readings, lists of variants and emendations, and line-end hyphenations. Irving Singer's new introduction to this edition takes up Santayana's philosophical and artistic concerns, including issues of homosexuality raised by the depiction of the novel's two protagonists, Oliver and Mario, and of the relationship between Oliver and the rogue character Jim Darnley. In his thoughtful analysis Singer finds the term "homosexual novel" too reductionist and imprecise for what Santayana is trying to achieve. Singer brings to light the author's skillful and inventive methods for perceiving and interpreting reality, including ideal forms of friendship, and his success in exploring the pervasive moral problems that people face throughout their existence.

A Memoir in the Form of a Novel

The Last Puritan

This edition of his autobiography restores passages that were deleted in the original book because of the publisher's sensitivities about lawsuits, printing and production convenience, a general desire by editors to "soften" some of his remarks, and his own request that portions be published only after his death.

Fragments of Autobiography

Persons and Places

Influential philosopher, poet, and literary critic George Santayana (1863-1952) was a thorough naturalist, concerned with the ideal factors in human experience. He held that everything possesses a natural basis and that everything natural has an ideal development. In this one-volume edition of his early work, The Life of Reason (originally published 1905-6), Santayana argues that rational life is embodied in various ideal forms, including religion, and that religion may be embodied in reason. However, this is not to say that religion is grounded in science; rather, religion is poetic, a rendering of natural events in a dramatic form. Hence, to take so-called religious truths as literal claims is preposterous.

The Life of Reason

The Life of Reason  (Five Volumes in One)

Reason in Religion

and Character and opinion in the United States

The genteel tradition in American philosophy

الإحساس بالجمال ،تخطيط لنظرية علم الجمال

Or, The Phases of Human Progress

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Introduction, and Reason in Common Sense

Reason in religion

The Life of Reason, Or, The Phases of Human Progress: Reason in art

Book Second of Realms of Being

The Realm of Matter

Little Essays Drawn from the Writings of George Santayana

The third of five books in one of the greatest works in modern philosophical naturalism. Santayana's Life of Reason, published in five books from 1905 to 1906, ranks as one of the greatest works in modern philosophical naturalism. Acknowledging the natural material bases of human life, Santayana traces the development of the human capacity for appreciating and cultivating the ideal. It is a capacity he exhibits as he articulates a continuity running through animal impulse, practical intelligence, and ideal harmony in reason, society, art, religion, and science. The work is an exquisitely rendered vision of human life lived sanely. In this third book, Santayana offers a naturalistic interpretation of religion. He believes that religion is ignoble if regarded as a truthful depiction of real beings and events; but regarded as poetry, it might be the greatest source of wisdom. Santayana analyzes four characteristic religious concerns: piety, spirituality, charity, and immortality. He is at his most profound in his discussion of immortality, arguing for an ideal immortality that does not eradicate the fear of death but offers a way for mortal man to share in immortal things and live in a manner that will bestow on his successors the imprint of his soul. This critical edition, volume VII of The Works of George Santayana, includes notes, textual commentary, lists of variants and emendations, bibliography, and other tools useful to Santayana scholars. The other four books of the volume include Reason in Common Sense, Reason in Society, Reason in Art, and Reason in Science.

George Santayana

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