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110-459: The play portrays the visit of an elderly professor and his glamorous, much younger second wife, Yelena, to the rural estate that supports their urban lifestyle. Two friends—Vanya, brother of the professor's late first wife, who has long managed the estate, and Astrov, the local doctor—both fall under Yelena's spell while bemoaning the ennui of their provincial existence. Sonya, the professor's daughter by his first wife, who has worked with Vanya to keep

220-505: A polyamorous relationship that he called "tetragamy". He had an on-and-off relationship with a young dancer, Caroline Richter (she also used the surname Medon after one of her ex-lovers). They met when he was 33 and she was 19 and working at the Berlin Opera. She had already had numerous lovers and a son out of wedlock, and later gave birth to another son, this time to an unnamed foreign diplomat (she soon had another pregnancy but

330-625: A prophetic dream that urged him to escape from the city. As he arrived in his new home in Frankfurt , he supposedly had another supernatural experience , an apparition of his dead father and his mother, who was still alive. This experience led him to spend some time investigating paranormal phenomena and magic . He was quite critical of the available studies and claimed that they were mostly ignorant or fraudulent, but he did believe that there are authentic cases of such phenomena and tried to explain them through his metaphysics as manifestations of

440-960: A Broadway production of Uncle Vanya has been staged in the Vivian Beaumont Theater by director Lila Neugebauer . The cast includes Steve Carell as Uncle Vanya, Allison Pill as Sonya, William Jackson Harper as Astrov, Alfred Molina as Alexander Serabryakov, Anika Noni Rose as Yelena, Jonathan Hadary as Telegin/"Waffles," Jayne Houdyshell as Mama Voinitski, and Mia Katigbak as Marina. Other actors who have appeared in notable stage productions of Uncle Vanya include Michael Redgrave , Paul Scofield , Peter O'Toole , Albert Finney , Franchot Tone , Cate Blanchett , Peter Dinklage , Jacki Weaver , Antony Sher , Ian McKellen , Richard Armitage , Simon Russell Beale , William Hurt , George C. Scott , Donald Sinden , Michael Gambon , Trevor Eve , and Laurence Olivier . "Are you Uncle Vanya?" "I am." [Gunshot sounds] "Ouch!" Over

550-467: A Buddhist text he regarded Buddhism as the most distinguished religion. His studies on Hindu and Buddhist texts were constrained by the lack of adequate literature, and the latter were mostly restricted to Theravada Buddhism . He also claimed that he formulated most of his ideas independently, and only later realized the similarities with Buddhism. Schopenhauer read the Latin translation and praised

660-467: A Journey in the Years 1803, 1804, and 1805 , a description of their family tour of Europe, which quickly became a hit. She found his dissertation incomprehensible and said it was unlikely that anyone would ever buy a copy. In a fit of temper Arthur told her that people would read his work long after the "rubbish" she wrote was totally forgotten. In fact, although they considered her novels of dubious quality,

770-692: A civil servant twelve years younger than her; he considered the relationship an act of infidelity to his father's memory. He settled for a while in Rudolstadt , hoping that no army would pass through the small town. He spent his time in solitude, hiking in the mountains and the Thuringian Forest and writing his dissertation, On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason . Schopenhauer completed his dissertation at about

880-515: A demonstration for the a priori nature of causality. Kant openly admitted that it was Hume 's skeptical assault on causality that motivated the critical investigations in Critique of Pure Reason and gave an elaborate proof to show that causality is a priori . After G. E. Schulze had made it plausible that Kant had not disproven Hume's skepticism, it was up to those loyal to Kant's project to prove this important matter. The difference between

990-610: A distance because Johanna warned him about her son's depressive and combative nature, or because Goethe was then on bad terms with Arthur's language instructor and roommate, Franz Passow . Schopenhauer was also captivated by the beautiful Karoline Jagemann , mistress of Karl August, Grand Duke of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach , and he wrote to her his only known love poem. Despite his later celebration of asceticism and negative views of sexuality, Schopenhauer occasionally had sexual affairs—usually with women of lower social status, such as servants, actresses, and sometimes even paid prostitutes. In

1100-471: A failed homicide, and published the reworked play, much more successfully, under the title Uncle Vanya . A dominant theme in The Wood Demon is that destruction of the environment and of people's lives are closely linked together. The play was initially a collaboration between Chekhov and Alexey Suvorin . As such, it is full of biographical material collected during their time spent together in

1210-487: A friendly welcome to Austrian soldiers who wanted to shoot revolutionaries from his window and as they were leaving he gave one of the officers his opera glasses to help him monitor rebels. The rebellion passed without any loss to Schopenhauer and he later praised Alfred I, Prince of Windisch-Grätz for restoring order. He even modified his will, leaving a large part of his property to a Prussian fund that helped soldiers who became invalids while fighting rebellion in 1848 or

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1320-643: A great honor to a young philosopher, who was finally acknowledged by his intellectual hero. They mostly discussed Goethe's newly published (and somewhat lukewarmly received) work on color theory . Schopenhauer soon started writing his own treatise on the subject, On Vision and Colors , which in many points differed from his teacher's. Although they remained polite towards each other, their growing theoretical disagreements—and especially Schopenhauer's extreme self-confidence and tactless criticisms—soon made Goethe become distant again and after 1816 their correspondence became less frequent. Schopenhauer later admitted that he

1430-405: A happy mood, Sonya goes to ask the professor if Yelena may play the piano. Sonya returns with his negative answer. Vanya, Sonya, and Yelena have been called together by Serebryakov. Vanya urges Yelena, once again, to break free. Sonya complains to Yelena that she has loved Astrov for years but he doesn't notice her. Yelena volunteers to question Astrov and find out if he is in love with Sonya. Sonya

1540-498: A letter to his friend Anthime he claims that such affairs continued even in his mature age and admits that he had two out-of-wedlock daughters (born in 1819 and 1836), both of whom died in infancy. In their youthful correspondence Arthur and Anthime were somewhat boastful and competitive about their sexual exploits—but Schopenhauer seemed aware that women usually did not find him very charming or physically attractive, and his desires often remained unfulfilled. He left Weimar to become

1650-518: A lower-quality version of Kant's and considering it useful only because Fichte's poor arguments unintentionally highlighted some failings of Kantianism. He also attended the lectures of the famous Protestant theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher , whom he also quickly came to dislike. His notes and comments on Schleiermacher's lectures show that Schopenhauer was becoming very critical of religion and moving towards atheism . He learned by self-directed reading; besides Plato, Kant and Fichte he also read

1760-474: A pamphlet, and Marina knits. Vanya complains of the heaviness of his heart, and Sonya, in response, speaks of living, working, and the rewards of the afterlife: "And our life will grow peaceful, tender, sweet as a caress…. You've had no joy in your life; but wait, Uncle Vanya, wait…. We shall rest." Although the play had previous small runs in provincial theatres in 1898, its metropolitan première took place on 7 November [ O.S. 26 October] 1899 at

1870-774: A permanent fixture in the Moscow Art Theatre. The play was adapted as the stage-play Dear Uncle by the British playwright Alan Ayckbourn , who reset it in the 1930s Lake District . This adaptation premiered from July to September 2011 at the Stephen Joseph Theatre . In January 2014 24/6: A Jewish Theater Company performed TuBishVanya , a modern adaptation that incorporated Jewish and environmental themes. In 2023, an off-off-Broadway production of Uncle Vanya performed in an unmarked Manhattan loft for an audience of 40. Directed by Jack Serio and using

1980-466: A philosopher, and even in Berlin he attended more lectures in sciences than in philosophy. During his days at Göttingen, he spent considerable time studying, but also continued his flute playing and social life. His friends included Friedrich Gotthilf Osann , Karl Witte , Christian Charles Josias von Bunsen , and William Backhouse Astor Sr. He arrived at the newly founded University of Berlin for

2090-456: A play he published a decade earlier. By elucidating the specific changes Chekhov made during the revision process—these include reducing the cast from almost two dozen down to nine, changing the climactic suicide of The Wood Demon into the famous failed homicide of Uncle Vanya , and altering the original happy ending into an ambiguous, less final resolution—critics such as Donald Rayfield , Richard Gilman , and Eric Bentley have sought to chart

2200-404: A pleasure tour, Heinrich used the opportunity to visit some of his business associates abroad. Heinrich presented Arthur with a choice: he could either stay at home to begin preparations for university or travel with them to further his merchant education. Arthur chose to travel with them. He deeply regretted his choice later because the merchant training was very tedious. He spent twelve weeks of

2310-407: A prerequisite for an academic career. His mother moved away, with her daughter Adele, to Weimar —then the centre of German literature —to enjoy social life among writers and artists. Arthur and his mother did not part on good terms. In one letter, she wrote: "You are unbearable and burdensome, and very hard to live with; all your good qualities are overshadowed by your conceit, and made useless to

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2420-406: A satirical poem about one of the schoolmasters. Although Arthur claimed that he left voluntarily, his mother's letter indicates that he may have been expelled. Arthur spent two years as a merchant in honor of his dead father. During this time, he had doubts about being able to start a new life as a scholar. Most of his prior education was as a practical merchant and he had trouble learning Latin;

2530-889: A student at the University of Göttingen in 1809. There are no written reasons about why Schopenhauer chose that university instead of the then more famous University of Jena , but Göttingen was known as more modern and scientifically oriented, with less attention given to theology. Law or medicine were usual choices for young men of Schopenhauer's status who also needed career and income; he chose medicine due to his scientific interests . Among his notable professors were Bernhard Friedrich Thibaut , Arnold Hermann Ludwig Heeren , Johann Friedrich Blumenbach , Friedrich Stromeyer , Heinrich Adolf Schrader , Johann Tobias Mayer and Konrad Johann Martin Langenbeck . He studied metaphysics , psychology and logic under Gottlob Ernst Schulze ,

2640-443: A third of his—was near bankruptcy. Arthur offered to share his assets, but his mother refused and became further enraged by his insulting comments. The women managed to receive only thirty percent of their savings while Arthur, using his business knowledge, took a suspicious and aggressive stance towards the banker and eventually received his part in full. The affair additionally worsened the relationships among all three members of

2750-525: A translation by Paul Schmidt , the cast featured Will Brill as Astrov, Julia Chan as Yelena, David Cromer as Vanya, Will Dagger as Telegin, Marin Ireland as Sonya, Bill Irwin as Serebryakov (replaced by Thomas Jay Ryan ), Virginia Wing as Marina, Ann McDonough as Maria, and Nathan Malin as Yefim. Among the actors who have played Uncle Vanya on Broadway are Ralph Richardson , Nicol Williamson , Tom Courtenay , and Derek Jacobi . Since April 2024,

2860-420: A vial of Astrov's morphine , presumably to commit suicide; Sonya and Astrov beg him to return it, which he eventually does. Yelena and Serebryakov bid farewell. When Yelena says goodbye to Astrov, she embraces him, and takes one of his pencils as a souvenir. Serebryakov and Vanya make their peace, agreeing all will be as it was before. Once the outsiders have departed, Sonya and Vanya settle accounts, Maria reads

2970-529: A while he contemplated marriage to a rich Italian noblewoman—but, despite his mentioning this several times, no details are known and it may have been Schopenhauer exaggerating. He corresponded regularly with his sister Adele and became close to her as her relationship with Johanna and Gerstenbergk also deteriorated. She informed him about their financial troubles as the banking house of A. L. Muhl in Danzig—in which her mother invested their whole savings and Arthur

3080-435: Is an immoral waste of vitality. Astrov is forced to depart to attend to a patient, after making a speech on the preservation of the forests, a subject he is passionate about. Vanya declares his love to an exasperated Yelena. Several days later. Before going to bed, Serebryakov complains of pain and old age. Astrov arrives but the professor refuses to see him. After Serebryakov falls asleep, Yelena and Vanya talk. She speaks of

3190-476: Is free from striving or suffering. For Schopenhauer, human "willing"—desiring, craving, etc.—is at the root of suffering . A temporary way to escape this pain is through aesthetic contemplation. Here one moves away from ordinary cognizance of individual things to cognizance of eternal Platonic Ideas —in other words, cognizance that is free from the service of will. In aesthetic contemplation, one no longer perceives an object of perception as something from which one

3300-451: Is heard from offstage and Serebryakov returns, chased by Vanya, wielding a pistol. He fires again at the professor, but misses. He throws the gun down in self-disgust. A few hours later, Marina and Telegin discuss the planned departure of Serebryakov and Yelena. Vanya and Astrov enter, Astrov saying that in this district, only he and Vanya were "decent, cultured men" and that years of "narrow-minded life" have made them vulgar. Vanya has stolen

3410-405: Is merely a secondary phenomenon that does not distinguish humanity from the rest of nature at the fundamental, essential level. The advanced cognitive abilities of human beings, Schopenhauer argues, serve the ends of willing—an illogical, directionless, ceaseless striving that condemns the human individual to a life of suffering unredeemed by any final purpose. Schopenhauer's philosophy of the will as

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3520-467: Is no longer an individual who suffers as a result of servitude to one's individual will but, rather, becomes a "pure, will-less, painless, timeless, subject of cognition". The pure, will-less subject of cognition is cognizant only of Ideas, not individual things: this is a kind of cognition that is unconcerned with relations between objects according to the Principle of Sufficient Reason (time, space, cause and effect) and instead involves complete absorption in

3630-479: Is pleased, but wonders whether uncertainty is better than knowledge. When Yelena asks Astrov about his feelings for Sonya, he says he has none, thinking that Yelena has brought up the subject of love to encourage him to confess his own feelings for her. Astrov kisses Yelena, and Vanya sees them. Upset, Yelena begs Vanya to use his influence to allow her and the professor to leave immediately. Yelena tells Sonya that Astrov doesn't love her. Serebryakov proposes to solve

3740-450: Is separated; rather "it is as if the object alone existed without anyone perceiving it, and one can thus no longer separate the perceiver from the perception, but the two have become one, the entirety of consciousness entirely filled and occupied by a single perceptual image". Subject and object are no longer distinguishable, and the Idea comes to the fore. From this aesthetic immersion, one

3850-442: Is therefore not an empirical concept drawn from objective perceptions, as Hume had maintained; instead, as Kant had said, objective perception presupposes knowledge of causality. By this intellectual operation, comprehending every effect in our sensory organs as having an external cause, the external world arises. With vision, finding the cause is essentially simplified due to light acting in straight lines. We are seldom conscious of

3960-629: Is truly fulfilling. A storm starts and Astrov talks to Sonya about the house's suffocating atmosphere; he says Serebryakov is difficult, Vanya is a hypochondriac, and Yelena is charming but idle. Sonya begs Astrov to stop drinking, telling him it is unworthy of him. It becomes clear that Sonya is in love with him and that he is unaware of her feelings. Astrov leaves; Yelena enters and makes peace with Sonya, after mutual antagonism. Yelena reassures Sonya that she had strong feelings for Serebryakov when she married him, though that has proved illusory. Yelena confesses her unhappiness, and Sonya eulogises Astrov. In

4070-458: Is will ( Wille ). The empirical world that appears to us as representation has plurality and is ordered in a spatio-temporal framework. The world as thing in-itself must exist outside the subjective forms of space and time. Although the world manifests itself to our experience as a multiplicity of objects (the "objectivation" of the will), each element of this multiplicity has the same blind essence striving towards existence and life. Human rationality

4180-712: The Upanishads (he called them "the production of the highest human wisdom", and believed that they contained superhuman concepts) and the Buddha , and put them on a par with Plato and Kant. He continued his studies by reading the Bhagavad Gita , an amateurish German journal Asiatisches Magazin , and Asiatick Researches by the Asiatic Society . Schopenhauer held a profound respect for Indian philosophy ; and loved Hindu texts . Although he never revered

4290-526: The Brockhaus publishing firm held her in high esteem because they consistently sold well. Hans Brockhaus (1888–1965) later claimed that his predecessors "saw nothing in this manuscript, but wanted to please one of our best-selling authors by publishing her son's work. We published more and more of her son Arthur's work and today nobody remembers Johanna, but her son's works are in steady demand and contribute to Brockhaus' reputation." He kept large portraits of

4400-519: The French Revolution , were republicans , cosmopolitans and Anglophiles . When Gdańsk became part of Prussia in 1793, Heinrich moved to Hamburg —a free city with a republican constitution. His firm continued trading in Danzig where most of their extended families remained. Adele , Arthur's only sibling, was born on 12 July 1797. In 1797, Arthur was sent to Le Havre to live with

4510-553: The Moscow Art Theatre . Constantin Stanislavski played the role of Astrov while Chekhov's future wife Olga Knipper played Yelena. The initial reviews were favorable but pointed to defects in both the play and the performances. As the staging and the acting improved over successive performances, and as "the public understood better its inner meaning and nuances of feeling", the reviews improved. Uncle Vanya became

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4620-631: The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth ; later in the Kingdom of Prussia Danzig ) on Św. Ducha 47 (in Prussia Heiliggeistgasse), the son of Heinrich Floris Schopenhauer  [ de ] (1747–1805) and his wife Johanna Schopenhauer (née Trosiener; 1766–1838), both descendants of wealthy German patrician families. While they came from a Protestant background, neither of them was very religious; both supported

4730-403: The empirical world is merely a complex of appearances whose existence and connection occur only in our mental representations . Schopenhauer did not deny that the external world existed empirically but followed Kant in claiming that our knowledge and experience of the world is always in some sense dependent on us . For Schopenhauer in particular, the spatiotemporal form and causal structure of

4840-436: The 'differentiation between phenomena and the thing-in-itself ( noumena ), based on the proof that between everything and us there is always a perceiving mind.' In other words, Kant's primary achievement is to demonstrate that instead of being a blank slate where reality merely reveals its character, the mind, with sensory support, actively participates in constructing reality. Thus, Schopenhauer believed that Kant had shown that

4950-552: The (1840) prize despite being the only contestant. The Society was appalled that several distinguished contemporary philosophers were mentioned in a very offensive manner, and claimed that the essay missed the point of the set topic and that the arguments were inadequate. Schopenhauer, who had been very confident that he would win, was enraged by this rejection. He published both essays as The Two Basic Problems of Ethics . The first edition, published September 1840 but with an 1841 date, again failed to draw attention to his philosophy. In

5060-658: The August 1821 incident are unknown. He claimed that he had just pushed her from his entrance after she had rudely refused to leave, and that she had purposely fallen to the ground so that she could sue him. She claimed that he had attacked her so violently that she had become paralyzed on her right side and unable to work. She immediately sued him, and the process lasted until May 1827, when a court found Schopenhauer guilty and forced him to pay her an annual pension until her death in 1842. Schopenhauer enjoyed Italy, where he studied art and socialized with Italian and English nobles. It

5170-650: The Schopenhauer family. He shortened his stay in Italy because of the trouble with Muhl and returned to Dresden. Disturbed by the financial risk and the lack of responses to his book he decided to take an academic position since it provided him with both income and an opportunity to promote his views. He contacted his friends at universities in Heidelberg, Göttingen and Berlin and found Berlin most attractive. He scheduled his lectures to coincide with those of

5280-508: The University of Leipzig sponsored an essay contest about Schopenhauer's philosophy, which was won by Rudolf Seydel 's very critical essay. Schopenhauer's friend Jules Lunteschütz made the first of his four portraits of him—which Schopenhauer did not particularly like—which was soon sold to a wealthy landowner, Carl Ferdinand Wiesike, who built a house to display it. Schopenhauer seemed flattered and amused by this, and would claim that it

5390-583: The Upanishads in his main work, The World as Will and Representation (1819), as well as in his Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), and commented In the whole world there is no study so beneficial and so elevating as that of the Upanishads. It has been the solace of my life, it will be the solace of my death. As the relationship with his mother fell to a new low, in May 1814 he left Weimar and moved to Dresden . He continued his philosophical studies, enjoyed

5500-405: The approaches of Kant and Schopenhauer was this: Kant simply declared that the empirical content of perception is "given" to us from outside, an expression with which Schopenhauer often expressed his dissatisfaction. He, on the other hand, was occupied with the questions: how do we get this empirical content of perception; how is it possible to comprehend subjective sensations "limited to my skin" as

5610-733: The arrogant request to schedule lectures at the same time as his own, Hegel still voted to accept Schopenhauer to the university. Only five students turned up to Schopenhauer's lectures, and he dropped out of academia . A late essay, "On University Philosophy", expressed his resentment towards the work conducted in academies. After his trying in academia, he continued to travel extensively, visiting Leipzig , Nuremberg , Stuttgart , Schaffhausen , Vevey , Milan and spending eight months in Florence. Before he left for his three-year travel, Schopenhauer had an incident with his Berlin neighbor, 47-year-old seamstress Caroline Louise Marquet. The details of

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5720-465: The author of Aenesidemus , who made a strong impression and advised him to concentrate on Plato and Immanuel Kant . He decided to switch from medicine to philosophy around 1810–11 and he left Göttingen, which did not have a strong philosophy program: besides Schulze, the only other philosophy professor was Friedrich Bouterwek , whom Schopenhauer disliked. He did not regret his medicinal and scientific studies; he claimed that they were necessary for

5830-463: The book after it was published in December 1818. In September 1818, while waiting for his book to be published and conveniently escaping an affair with a maid that caused an unwanted pregnancy, Schopenhauer left Dresden for a year-long vacation in Italy. He visited Venice , Bologna , Florence , Naples and Milan , travelling alone or accompanied by mostly English tourists he met. He spent

5940-424: The child was stillborn). As Schopenhauer was preparing to escape from Berlin in 1831, due to a cholera epidemic, he offered to take her with him on the condition that she left her young son behind. She refused and he went alone; in his will he left her a significant sum of money, but insisted that it should not be spent in any way on her second son. Schopenhauer claimed that, in his last year in Berlin, he had

6050-567: The cultural life, socialized with intellectuals and engaged in sexual affairs. His friends in Dresden were Johann Gottlob von Quandt , Friedrich Laun , Karl Christian Friedrich Krause and Ludwig Sigismund Ruhl, a young painter who made a romanticized portrait of him in which he improved some of Schopenhauer's unattractive physical features. His criticisms of local artists occasionally caused public quarrels when he ran into them in public. Schopenhauer's main occupation during his stay in Dresden

6160-493: The development of Chekhov's dramaturgical method through the 1890s. Rayfield cites recent scholarship suggesting Chekhov revised The Wood Demon during his trip to the island of Sakhalin , a prison colony in Eastern Russia, in 1891. Notable casts At Professor Serebryakov's country estate, Astrov and Marina discuss how old Astrov has grown and his boredom with life as a country doctor. Vanya enters and complains of

6270-531: The discord in the house, and Vanya speaks of dashed hopes. He feels that he has misspent his youth and he associates his unrequited love for Yelena with the disappointment of his life. Yelena refuses to listen. Vanya believed in Serebryakov's greatness and was happy to support Serebryakov's work; he has become disillusioned with the professor and his life feels empty. Astrov returns and the two talk. Sonya chides Vanya for his drinking, and points out that only work

6380-403: The disruption caused by the visit of Serebryakov and his wife, Yelena. Serebryakov, Yelena, Sonya, and Telegin return from a walk. Out of earshot of Serebryakov, Vanya calls him "a learned old dried mackerel" and belittles his achievements. Vanya's mother, Maria Vasilyevna, who idolizes Serebryakov, objects. Vanya also praises Yelena's beauty, arguing that faithfulness to an old man like Serebryakov

6490-464: The editor of the first collected works of Schopenhauer. In 1848, Schopenhauer witnessed violent upheaval in Frankfurt after General Hans Adolf Erdmann von Auerswald and Prince Felix Lichnowsky were murdered. He became worried for his own safety and property. Even earlier in life he had had such worries and kept a sword and loaded pistols near his bed to defend himself from thieves. He gave

6600-725: The essential reality behind the world as representation is often called metaphysical voluntarism . For Schopenhauer, understanding the world as will leads to ethical concerns (see the ethics section below for further detail), which he explores in the Fourth Book of The World as Will and Representation and again in his two prize essays on ethics, On the Freedom of the Will and On the Basis of Morality . No individual human actions are free, Schopenhauer argues, because they are events in

6710-402: The estate going, suffers from her unrequited feelings for Astrov. Matters are brought to a crisis when the professor announces his intention to sell the estate, Vanya and Sonya's home, with a view to investing the proceeds to achieve a higher income for himself and his wife. Uncle Vanya is unique among Chekhov's major plays because it is essentially an extensive reworking of The Wood Demon ,

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6820-510: The everyday world of experience, and indeed the entire material world related to space and time, is merely 'appearance' or 'phenomena,' entirely distinct from the thing-in-itself.' In Book Two of The World as Will and Representation , Schopenhauer considers what the world is beyond the aspect of it that appears to us—that is, the aspect of the world beyond representation, the world considered " in-itself " or " noumena ", its inner essence. The very being in-itself of all things, Schopenhauer argues,

6930-408: The external world are contributed to our experiences of it by the brain as it renders perceptions. Schopenhauer reiterates this in the first sentence of his main work: "The world is my representation ( Die Welt ist meine Vorstellung )". Everything that there is for cognition (the entire world) exists simply as an object in relation to a subject—a 'representation' to a subject. Everything that belongs to

7040-439: The families of soldiers who died in battle. As Young Hegelians were advocating change and progress, Schopenhauer claimed that misery is natural for humans and that, even if some utopian society were established, people would still fight each other out of boredom, or would starve due to overpopulation. In 1851, Schopenhauer published Parerga and Paralipomena , which contains essays that are supplementary to his main work. It

7150-422: The family of his father's business associate, Grégoire de Blésimaire. He seemed to enjoy his two-year stay there, learning to speak French and fostering a life-long friendship with Jean Anthime Grégoire de Blésimaire. As early as 1799, Arthur started playing the flute. In 1803, he accompanied his parents on a European tour of Holland , Britain, France, Switzerland , Austria and Prussia . Viewed as primarily

7260-460: The family's financial problems by selling the estate and investing the proceeds, which will bring in a significantly higher income (and, he hopes, leave enough over to buy a villa for himself and Yelena in Finland). Angrily, Vanya asks where he, Sonya, and his mother would live, protests that the estate rightly belongs to Sonya, and that Serebryakov has never appreciated his self-sacrifice in managing

7370-414: The family. Despite his hardship, Schopenhauer liked his father and later referred to him in a positive light. Heinrich Schopenhauer left the family with a significant inheritance that was split in three among Johanna and the children. Arthur Schopenhauer was entitled to control of his part when he reached the age of majority. He invested it conservatively in government bonds and earned annual interest that

7480-551: The famous philosopher G. W. F. Hegel , whom Schopenhauer described as a "clumsy charlatan". He was especially appalled by Hegel's supposedly poor knowledge of natural sciences and tried to engage him in a quarrel about it already at his test lecture in March 1820. Hegel was also facing political suspicions at the time, when many progressive professors were fired , while Schopenhauer carefully mentioned in his application that he had no interest in politics. Despite their differences and

7590-488: The intellect produces the world as representation. He set out his theory of perception for the first time in On Vision and Colors , and, in the subsequent editions of Fourfold Root , an extensive exposition is given in § 21. Schopenhauer saw his philosophy as an extension of Kant's, and used the results of Kantian epistemological investigation ( transcendental idealism ) as starting point for his own. Kant had argued that

7700-585: The most active early followers was Julius Frauenstädt , who wrote numerous articles promoting Schopenhauer's philosophy. He was also instrumental in finding another publisher after Brockhaus declined to publish Parerga and Paralipomena , believing that it would be another failure. Though Schopenhauer later stopped corresponding with him, claiming that he did not adhere closely enough to his ideas, Frauenstädt continued to promote Schopenhauer's work. They renewed their communication in 1859 and Schopenhauer named him heir for his literary estate. Frauenstädt also became

7810-416: The objective perception of things that lie "outside" of me? The sensations in the hand of a man born blind, on feeling an object of cubic shape, are quite uniform and the same on all sides and in every direction: the edges, it is true, press upon a smaller portion of his hand, still nothing at all like a cube is contained in these sensations. His Understanding draws the immediate and intuitive conclusion from

7920-474: The pair in his office in Leipzig for the edification of his new editors. Also contrary to his mother's prediction, Schopenhauer's dissertation made an impression on Goethe, to whom he sent it as a gift. Although it is doubtful that Goethe agreed with Schopenhauer's philosophical positions, he was impressed by his intellect and extensive scientific education. Their subsequent meetings and correspondence were

8030-673: The preface to the second edition, in 1860, he was still pouring insults on the Royal Danish Society. Two years later, after some negotiations, he managed to convince his publisher, Brockhaus, to print the second, updated edition of The World as Will and Representation . That book was again mostly ignored and the few reviews were mixed or negative. Schopenhauer began to attract some followers, mostly outside academia, among practical professionals (several of them were lawyers) who pursued private philosophical studies. He jokingly referred to them as "evangelists" and "apostles". One of

8140-416: The process that interprets the double sensation in both eyes as coming from one object, that inverts the impressions on the retinas, and that uses the change in the apparent position of an object relative to more distant objects provided by binocular vision to perceive depth and distance. Schopenhauer stresses the importance of the intellectual nature of perception; the senses furnish the raw material by which

8250-470: The property. Vanya begins to rage against the professor, blaming him for his own failures, wildly claiming that, without Serebryakov to hold him back, he could have been a second Schopenhauer or Dostoevsky . He cries out to his mother, but Maria insists that Vanya listen to the professor. Serebryakov insults Vanya, who storms out. Yelena begs to be taken away, and Sonya pleads with her father on Vanya's behalf. Serebryakov exits to confront Vanya further. A shot

8360-540: The resistance felt, that this resistance must have a cause, which then presents itself through that conclusion as a hard body; and through the movements of his arms in feeling the object, while the hand's sensation remains unaltered, he constructs the cubic shape in Space. If the representation of a cause and of Space, together with their laws, had not already existed within him, the image of a cube could never have proceeded from those successive sensations in his hand. Causality

8470-655: The rest of his life, except for a few short journeys. He lived alone except for a succession of pet poodles named Atman and Butz. In 1836, he published On the Will in Nature . In 1838, he sent his essay " On the Freedom of the Will " to the contest of the Royal Norwegian Society of Sciences in 1838 and won the prize in 1839. He sent another essay, " On the Basis of Morality ", to the Royal Danish Society of Sciences in 1839, but did not win

8580-463: The same time as Hegel's—also failed, as did his inquiries about relocating to other universities. During his Berlin years, Schopenhauer occasionally mentioned his desire to marry and have a family. For a while he was unsuccessfully courting 17-year-old Flora Weiss, who was 22 years younger than himself. His unpublished writings from that time show that he was already very critical of monogamy but still not advocating polygyny —instead musing about

8690-698: The same time as the French army was defeated at the Battle of Leipzig . He became irritated by the arrival of soldiers in the town and accepted his mother's invitation to visit her in Weimar. She tried to convince him that her relationship with Gerstenbergk was platonic and that she had no intention of remarrying. But Schopenhauer remained suspicious and often came in conflict with Gerstenbergk because he considered him untalented, pretentious, and nationalistic . His mother had just published her second book, Reminiscences of

8800-584: The summer of 1888. The play is linked with stories already written or in the process of being written, that stemmed from Chekhov's journey in 1887 to Kharkov and Taganrog . The failure of The Wood Demon was one of the motivations for Chekhov's journey through Siberia and why he abstained from writing a play for the next seven years after which he rose to fame . Schopenhauer Arthur Schopenhauer ( / ˈ ʃ oʊ p ən h aʊər / SHOH -pən-how-ər ; German: [ˈaʁtuːɐ̯ ˈʃoːpn̩haʊɐ] ; 22 February 1788 – 21 September 1860)

8910-496: The title Senilia . In the spring of 1860 his health began to decline, and he experienced shortness of breath and heart palpitations; in September he suffered inflammation of the lungs and, although he was starting to recover, he remained very weak. The last friend to visit him was Wilhelm Gwinner; according to him, Schopenhauer was concerned that he would not be able to finish his planned additions to Parerga and Paralipomena but

9020-523: The tour attending school in Wimbledon , where he was confused by strict and intellectual Anglicans who he described as shallow. He continued to sharply criticize Anglican religiosity later in life despite his general Anglophilia. He was also under pressure from his father, who became very critical of his educational results. In 1805, Heinrich drowned in a canal near their home in Hamburg. Although it

9130-408: The usual social life such as balls, parties and theater. By that time Johanna's famous salon was well established among local intellectuals and dignitaries, the most celebrated of them being Goethe . Arthur attended her parties, usually when he knew that Goethe would be there—although the famous writer and statesman seemed not even to notice the young and unknown student. It is possible that Goethe kept

9240-414: The weather and always getting enough sleep. He had a great appetite and could read without glasses, but his hearing had been declining since his youth and he developed problems with rheumatism . He remained active and lucid, continued his reading, writing and correspondence until his death. The numerous notes that he made during these years, amongst others on aging, were published posthumously under

9350-457: The whole, comprehends its essence, and finds that it is constantly passing away, caught up in vain strivings, inner conflict, and perpetual suffering". The negation of the will, in other words, stems from the insight that the world in-itself (free from the forms of space and time) is one. Ascetic practices, Schopenhauer remarks, are used to aid the will's "self-abolition", which brings about a blissful, redemptive "will-less" state of emptiness that

9460-447: The will as thing in-itself is free, as it exists beyond the realm of representation and thus is not constrained by any of the forms of necessity that are part of the principle of sufficient reason. According to Schopenhauer, salvation from our miserable existence can come through the will's being "tranquillized" by the metaphysical insight that reveals individuality to be merely an illusion. The saint or 'great soul' intuitively "recognizes

9570-710: The will. Upon his arrival in Frankfurt, he experienced a period of depression and declining health. He renewed his correspondence with his mother, and she seemed concerned that he might commit suicide like his father. By now Johanna and Adele were living very modestly. Johanna's writing did not bring her much income, and her popularity was waning. Their correspondence remained reserved, and Arthur seemed undisturbed by her death in 1838. His relationship with his sister grew closer and he corresponded with her until she died in 1849. In July 1832, Schopenhauer left Frankfurt for Mannheim but returned in July 1833 to remain there for

9680-572: The winter months in Rome , where he accidentally met his acquaintance Karl Witte and engaged in numerous quarrels with German tourists in the Caffè Greco , among them Johann Friedrich Böhmer , who also mentioned his insulting remarks and unpleasant character. He enjoyed art, architecture, and ancient ruins, attended plays and operas, and continued his philosophical contemplation and love affairs. One of his affairs supposedly became serious, and for

9790-539: The winter semester of 1811–12. At the same time, his mother had just begun her literary career; she published her first book in 1810, a biography of her friend Karl Ludwig Fernow , which was a critical success. Arthur attended lectures by the prominent post-Kantian philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte , but quickly found many points of disagreement with his Wissenschaftslehre ; he also found Fichte's lectures tedious and hard to understand. He later mentioned Fichte only in critical, negative terms —seeing his philosophy as

9900-488: The works of Schelling , Fries , Jacobi , Bacon , Locke , and much current scientific literature. He attended philological courses by August Böckh and Friedrich August Wolf and continued his naturalistic interests with courses by Martin Heinrich Klaproth , Paul Erman , Johann Elert Bode , Ernst Gottfried Fischer , Johann Horkel , Friedrich Christian Rosenthal and Hinrich Lichtenstein (Lichtenstein

10010-552: The world is, therefore, 'subject-dependent'. In Book One of The World as Will and Representation , Schopenhauer considers the world from this angle—that is, insofar as it is representation. Kant had previously argued that we perceive reality as something spatial and temporal not because reality is inherently spatial and temporal, but because that is how our minds operate in perceiving an object. Therefore, understanding objects in space and time represents our 'contribution' to an experience. For Schopenhauer, Kant's 'greatest service' lay in

10120-520: The world of appearance and thus are subject to the principle of sufficient reason: a person's actions are a necessary consequence of motives and the given character of the individual human. Necessity extends to the actions of human beings just as it does to every other appearance, and thus we cannot speak of freedom of individual willing. Albert Einstein quoted the Schopenhauerian idea that "a man can do as he will, but not will as he will." Yet

10230-1081: The world simply because you cannot restrain your propensity to pick holes in other people." His mother, Johanna, was generally described as vivacious and sociable. She died 24 years later. Some of Arthur's negative opinions about women may be rooted in his troubled relationship with his mother. Arthur moved to Hamburg to live with his friend Jean Anthime, who was also studying to become a merchant. He moved to Weimar but did not live with his mother, who even tried to discourage him from coming by explaining that they would not get along very well. Their relationship deteriorated even further due to their temperamental differences. He accused his mother of being financially irresponsible, flirtatious and seeking to remarry, which he considered an insult to his father's memory. His mother, while professing her love to him, criticized him sharply for being moody, tactless, and argumentative, and urged him to improve his behavior so that he would not alienate people. Arthur concentrated on his studies, which were now going very well, and he also enjoyed

10340-487: The years, Uncle Vanya has been adapted for film several times. The Wood Demon The Wood Demon or Leshy (Russian: Леший , romanized : Leshy , 1889) is a comedic play in four acts by Anton Chekhov . Written in September and October 1889, it was totally reworked in December, and premiered on December 27, 1889 at the private Abramova Theatre in Moscow. This second version of The Wood Demon

10450-660: Was a Dutch merchant, Ambassador of the Netherlands in Gdansk, son of pastor Johannes Soermans (1670–1754) and grandson of Martinus Soermans (1638–1705). Arthur Schopenhauer's paternal great-greatgrandfather, Johann Schopenhauer (1630–1701), was farmer in Petershagen and son of Simon Schopenhauer (1580–1660) and grandson of Salomon Schopenhauer (born 1550). Arthur Schopenhauer was born on 22 February 1788, in Gdańsk (then part of

10560-449: Was a German philosopher. He is known for his 1818 work The World as Will and Representation (expanded in 1844), which characterizes the phenomenal world as the manifestation of a blind and irrational noumenal will. Building on the transcendental idealism of Immanuel Kant (1724–1804), Schopenhauer developed an atheistic metaphysical and ethical system that rejected the contemporaneous ideas of German idealism . Schopenhauer

10670-598: Was a wealthy merchant in Danzig. Arthur Schopenhauer's paternal grandmother, Anna Renata Schopenhauer (1726–1804), was the daughter of a Dutch merchant and the Dutch ambassador to the Hanseatic city of Danzig Hendrik Soermans (1700–1775). Arthur Schopenhauer's maternal grandfather, Christian Heinrich Trosiener  [ de ] (1730–1797) was a merchant in Danzig and a councilor from the middle class. Arthur Schopenhauer's maternal grandmother, Elizabeth Trosiener (1745–1818),

10780-544: Was also a friend whom he met at one of his mother's parties in Weimar). Schopenhauer left Berlin in a rush in 1813, fearing that the city could be attacked and that he could be pressed into military service as Prussia had just joined the war against France . He returned to Weimar but left after less than a month, disgusted by the fact that his mother was now living with her supposed lover, Georg Friedrich Konrad Ludwig Müller von Gerstenbergk  [ de ] (1778–1838),

10890-731: Was among the first thinkers in Western philosophy to share and affirm significant tenets of Indian philosophy , such as asceticism , denial of the self , and the notion of the world-as-appearance . His work has been described as an exemplary manifestation of philosophical pessimism . Though his work failed to garner substantial attention during his lifetime, he had a posthumous impact across various disciplines, including philosophy, literature, and science. His writing on aesthetics , morality , and psychology have influenced many thinkers and artists. Arthur Schopenhauer's paternal grandfather, Andreas Schopenhauer  [ de ] (1720–1793),

11000-516: Was at peace with dying. He died of pulmonary-respiratory failure on 21 September 1860 while sitting at home on his couch. He died at the age of 72 and had a funeral conducted by a Lutheran minister. In November 1813 Goethe invited Schopenhauer to help him on his Theory of Colours . Although Schopenhauer considered colour theory a minor matter, he accepted the invitation out of admiration for Goethe. Nevertheless, these investigations led him to his most important discovery in epistemology: finding

11110-500: Was becoming less interested in intellectual fights, but encouraged his disciples to do so. His private notes and correspondence show that he acknowledged some of the criticisms regarding contradictions, inconsistencies, and vagueness in his philosophy, but claimed that he was not concerned about harmony and agreement in his propositions and that some of his ideas should not be taken literally but instead as metaphors. Academic philosophers were also starting to notice his work. In 1856,

11220-692: Was completed in April 1890 and received the permission to be staged by Imperial Theatres in May. It was published by the Rassokhin Publishers on 23 August 1890. The play was first refused by the Alexandrinsky Theatre of Saint Petersburg and the Maly Theatre of Moscow . Eight years after this play failed, Chekhov returned to the work. He reduced the cast list by half, changed the climactic suicide into an anti-climax of

11330-548: Was daughter of pharmacist Georg Lehmann (died 1762) and his wife Susanna Concordia Lehmann, née Neumann (born 1718). Arthur Schopenhauer's paternal great-grandfather, Johann Schopenhauer  [ de ] (1670–after 1724), was the mentioned merchant in Gdansk. Arthur Schopenhauer's paternal great-grandmother, Marie Elizabeth Schopenhauer, née Lessig, was a daughter of merchant Andreas Lessig (1658–1713). Arthur Schopenhauer's paternal great-grandfather through paternal grandmother, Hendrik Soermans  [ de ] (1700–1775),

11440-414: Was greatly hurt by this rejection, but he continued to praise Goethe, and considered his color theory a great introduction to his own. Another important experience during his stay in Weimar was his acquaintance with Friedrich Majer —a historian of religion , orientalist and disciple of Herder —who introduced him to Eastern philosophy (see also Indology ). Schopenhauer was immediately impressed by

11550-545: Was his first chapel. As his fame increased, copies of paintings and photographs of him were being sold and admirers were visiting the places where he had lived and written his works. People visited Frankfurt's Englischer Hof to observe him dining. Admirers gave him gifts and asked for autographs. He complained that he still felt isolated due to his not very social nature and the fact that many of his good friends had already died from old age. He remained healthy in his own old age, which he attributed to regular walks no matter

11660-576: Was his first successful, widely read book, partly due to the work of his disciples who wrote praising reviews. The essays that proved most popular were the ones that actually did not contain the basic philosophical ideas of his system. Many academic philosophers considered him a great stylist and cultural critic but did not take his philosophy seriously. His early critics liked to point out similarities of his ideas to those of Fichte and Schelling, or to claim that there were numerous contradictions in his philosophy. Both criticisms enraged Schopenhauer. He

11770-725: Was his last visit to the country. He left for Munich and stayed there for a year, mostly recuperating from various health issues, some of them possibly caused by venereal diseases (the treatment his doctor used suggests syphilis ). He contacted publishers, offering to translate Hume into German and Kant into English, but his proposals were declined. Returning to Berlin, he began to study Spanish so he could read some of his favorite authors in their original language. He liked Pedro Calderón de la Barca , Lope de Vega , Miguel de Cervantes , and especially Baltasar Gracián . He also made failed attempts to publish his translations of their works. A few attempts to revive his lectures—again scheduled at

11880-423: Was his seminal philosophical work, The World as Will and Representation , which he started writing in 1814 and finished in 1818. He was recommended to the publisher Friedrich Arnold Brockhaus by Baron Ferdinand von Biedenfeld, an acquaintance of his mother. Although Brockhaus accepted his manuscript, Schopenhauer made a poor impression because of his quarrelsome and fussy attitude, as well as very poor sales of

11990-619: Was more than double the salary of a university professor. After quitting his merchant apprenticeship, with some encouragement from his mother, he dedicated himself to studies at the Ernestine Gymnasium, Gotha , in Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg . While there, he also enjoyed social life among the local nobility, spending large amounts of money, which deeply concerned his frugal mother. He left the Gymnasium after writing

12100-622: Was possible that his death was accidental, his wife and son believed that it was suicide. He was prone to anxiety and depression , each becoming more pronounced later in his life. Heinrich had become so fussy, even his wife started to doubt his mental health. "There was, in the father's life, some dark and vague source of fear which later made him hurl himself to his death from the attic of his house in Hamburg." Arthur showed similar moodiness during his youth and often acknowledged that he inherited it from his father. There were other instances of serious mental health problems on his father's side of

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