10.8 Schopenhauer — «Ueber Lerm und Geräusch» — Epoché
What you will be able to do Read Arthur Schopenhauer's short essay Ueber Lerm und Geräusch (1851), complete: a philosopher's complaint against noise, and above all against the cracking of whips in city streets. Analyse the moves of a polemic: thesis, explanation by analogy, appeal to authority, narrowing from the general to the particular, refutation, proposal, rhetorical question. Recognise the language of polemic: superlatives, coined compound adjectives, and the resumptive Das that throws the object to the front. Read critically: separate Schopenhauer's argument from his contempt for manual workers. Sentences from this text, before the notes. Read the German aloud; all of them come back below. German English Der Lerm aber ist die impertinenteste aller Unterbrechungen, But noise is the most impertinent of all interruptions, Bisweilen quält und stört ein mäßiges und stätiges Geräusch mich eine Weile, Sometimes a moderate, steady noise torments and disturbs me for a while, weil sie unempfindlich gegen Geräusch sind: because they are insensitive to noise: da er sogar unsere eigenen Gedanken unterbricht, ja, zerbricht. since it interrupts, indeed breaks apart, even our own thoughts. Darum also sind die eminenten Geister stets jeder Störung, Unterbrechung und Ablenkung, vor Allem aber der gewaltsamen durch Lerm, so höchst abhold gewesen; That is why eminent minds have always been so very averse to every disturbance, interruption and distraction, above all to the violent kind caused by noise; die leiseste Berührung mit der Peitsche wirkt mehr. the lightest touch of the whip has more effect. Prerequisites : 10.7 — you need the analysis of arguments from 10.1 Argument and 10.2 Argument ; you have read Kant in 10.7 Argument , whom Schopenhauer names in his first sentence. About this text Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) wrote his main work, Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung , in 1818, and was ignored for decades. Fame came only with Parerga und Paralipomena (1851), two volumes of essays and aphorisms on life, reading, women, death and much else, written in a clear, sharp and often furious German that made him one of the great stylists of the language. He lived alone in Frankfurt am Main with his poodles and was known for his sensitivity to noise. The text here is chapter 30 of the second volume, complete, about 850 words, from the first edition of 1851 as transcribed in German Wikisource. Schopenhauer's later additions in his own copy are left out. The essay is short, but every move of a polemic is in it. It also shows the prejudices of its author: he wants the coachmen beaten and speaks of the Proletarier with open contempt. Read these passages as evidence of how the argument works, and how it overreaches. The plan Step What Schopenhauer does Where thesis with a joke Kant wrote on living forces; Schopenhauer will write a lament on them, because their use in knocking and hammering has tormented him all his life. paragraph 1, first sentence the opponents Those who smile at this are insensitive to noise, and they are the same people who are insensitive to reasons, thoughts and art. paragraph 1 authority Nearly all great writers complained of noise: Kant, Goethe, Jean Paul. paragraph 1 explanation by analogy A great mind interrupted is worth no more than an ordinary one, like a diamond cut into pieces or a scattered army; its strength is concentration, like a concave mirror. paragraph 1 from genus to species The worst noise of all: the cracking of whips in the streets. paragraph 2 refutation The cracking is not even useful: the horses are used to it. paragraph 2 proposal and demand A police order requiring a knot at the end of every whip; five blows of the stick for offenders. paragraph 2 rhetorical question and hope Shall the thinking mind be the only thing without protection? Other nations should lead the way; Thomas Hood on the noisy Germans. paragraph 2 literature One work to recommend: Bronzino's comic verse letter on the noise of an Italian city. paragraph 3 Where the argument overreaches. The essay mixes a reasonable claim, that concentrated thought needs quiet, with an insult, that those who do not mind noise have thick brains, and with a class prejudice, that the whip is the mockery of the hand-working part of society against the head-working part. A good reader notes the difference. The insult is an ad hominem : it attacks the people who disagree instead of their reasons. The language of polemic. Schopenhauer heaps up superlatives, die impertinenteste aller Unterbrechungen , den unverantwortlichsten und schändlichsten Lerm , and coins compound adjectives on the spot: hirnzerschneidende , gedankenmörderische . German makes such words easily; here they turn a sound into a murder. A third device is the resumptive pronoun: a long daß clause stands first, and Das takes it up again before the verb, Das werden mir alle Philanthropen der Welt … nicht einreden . The order is that of an angry speaker, not of a calm writer, and that is the point. Worked example A close reading of the explanation by analogy in paragraph 1. Ich lege mir die Sache so aus: The colon announces the explanation. sich etwas auslegen , to interpret something to oneself , marks it as his own view. wie ein großer Diamant, in Stücke zerschnitten, an Werth nur noch eben so vielen kleinen gleich kommt; oder wie ein Heer, wenn es zersprengt, d. h. in kleine Haufen aufgelöst ist, nichts mehr vermag; Two comparisons with wie , one from wealth and one from war. Both say the same: a whole is worth more than its parts. so vermag auch ein großer Geist nicht mehr, als ein gewöhnlicher, sobald er unterbrochen, gestört, zerstreut, abgelenkt wird; The so answers the wie : as the diamond, so the mind. The four participles pile up, each a little stronger, the way noise itself breaks in again and again. weil seine Ueberlegenheit dadurch bedingt ist, daß er alle seine Kräfte, wie ein Hohlspiegel alle seine Strahlen, auf einen Punkt und Gegenst