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Publisher: Cambridge University Press, Cambridge and New York, NY, 2008, £45 $90 (hbck); £17.99 $32.99 (pbck).
ISBN: 978 0 521 83167 3 (hbck); 978 0 521 53938 8 (pbck). Cambridge Companions to Philosophy
Readers may recall the earlier Cambridge Companion to Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831) edited by Frederick [2] Beiser (1993), a professor of philosophy at the University of Syracuse. Beiser is right to say that much has happened since that time, and this new Companion , with its new title, aims to bring Hegel scholars and students up to date. It is a snapshot of current research, a useful source of current critical sources, and an attempt to realign our knowledge of Hegel by giving more emphasis to relatively underplayed aspects of his work. Among these are his philosophy of religion, his philosophy of art (or aesthetics), and his nature-philosophy and engagement with science.
In taking this approach, Beiser and his fellow contributors both reflect growing interest in Hegel as a whole (not just his ideas about society, history and politics) and also how Hegel sits within that wider framework of ideas and debate at his time and later. Much of his work, such as lectures on aesthetics and science, were first given and/or published in the early nineteenth-century, giving the clue to the title of the new Companion . This frame of reference, however, picks up on only some of the intellectual climate at the time, before and afterwards. For instance, frequent comparisons are made, rightly, with the ontology and epistemology of Kant, and, going back further, with the scientific ideas of Aristotle and even some of the mystics; we have some connections...