Terry Eagleton's _The Ideology of the Aesthetic_

Eagleton's The Ideology of the Aesthetic wants to refigure aesthetics as a dialectical, ambiguous discourse. He stresses both the liberating power and the oppressive power of aesthetics; indeed, for Eagleton, aesthetics links up with important questions related to history, politics, and ethics, but deployed in bourgeois society aesthetics can destroy ideals.

Eagleton definitely assumes vast knowledge of aesthetics, Marxism, literature, and academic texts. He also assumes that the reader has some familiarity with German aesthetics/philosophy, and their influence in shaping Western culture. I would argue that Eagleton expects his audience to be aware that aesthetics has been misinterpreted and misread; hence, his attempt to reroute it back on track. He believes, and rightly so I would say, that his work will reinvigorate the dialectic.

What interests me the most in these chapters we've read are two things: First, Eagleton's notion that aesthetics must be understood in terms of the dialectic. I admire that he is trying to understand how the apparent "misreading" happened (like Williams and Marcuse, too), and I don't think we should forget how complex the aesthetic can be. The second thing that interests me, however, is Eagleton's dismissal and critique of postmodernism. Now, I am definitely not an expert on postmodernism -- and particularly not on Jameson, Lyotard, and the others Eagleton mentions. I would not even suggest that Eagleton has misread these postmodernists; I don't think he has. But I wonder how we might reconcile the concerns of postmodernism (that, as I understand them generally, want to destabilize the status quo) with Marxist dialectics. Yes, postmodern wants to smash binaries (is this the same as dialecticism?), but it wants to do so because binaries are a vestige -- and, undoubtedly, a huge part -- of bourgeois classism. So aren't these theoretical projects two sides of the same coin?

As I've been reading these last few weeks, I'm intrigued with the connection of aesthetics to ethics. Not because it surprises me (historically or otherwise) but because I think it might be interesting to read someone who does not align the two. How much does our belief that aesthetics must align with ethics compartmentalize or thwart its potential excesses? Another lame question: Can't we just enjoy something? ;) (I know, I know, I know...)