Sublime

Abstract

In early modern thought, the sublime is a great or noble quality of literature or art, which is characterized by an irresistible and overwhelming effect and which produces strong and often conflicting emotions such as awe, fear, and admiration in its recipients. From the mid-sixteenth century onwards, a growing interest in Pseudo-Longinus’ Greek treatise Peri hypsous (On the Sublime) emerged throughout Europe. The sublime as described by Longinus had an inherently dual nature: it could be seen as a type of style with corresponding stylistic devices and prescripts, as well as a ravishing and transporting effect, which emerges from genius and defies the rules of style. In the course of the seventeenth century, the latter interpretation of the Longinian sublime gained the upper hand and fuelled debates on the effects of literature, and later also of art, architecture, music, and spectacle. Besides Longinus’ theory of sublimity, the early modern sublime was also shaped by the religious notion of sacer horror, the natural philosophy of Lucretius and Pascal’s idea of infinity, and operated in a web of neighboring concepts such as magnificence, le merveilleux, la meraviglia, and le je ne sais quoi.