Bulletin of the Santayana Society, No. 22 Fall 2004

              Santayana's Lectures on Aesthetics
George Santayana was a reluctant professor; not indifferent to his role, but
willing to play the role only on his terms. The "professor's chair," according
to Santayana, was one of the "traps that strangle philosophy" and "as soon as
possible [he] got out... ."1 Santayana became a lecturer in 1889, shortly after taking
his Ph.D. from Harvard, and was given the task of teaching a class on aesthetics in
1892-93, which had not been offered at Harvard previously. "I was a kind of poet, I
was alive to architecture and the other arts, I was at home in several languages:
'aesthetics' might be regarded as my specialty" (pp 393). From his experience teaching
the course he would write The Sense of Beauty, which not only established him in the
faculty, but established him as an original thinker in philosophy. Previously Santayana
had published cartoons, reviews, articles, and poetry for the Latin School Register,
Harvard Lampoon, Harvard Monthly, Mind, and the Atlantic Monthly. His only
published book before The Sense of Beauty was an 1894 collection of poems entitled
Sonnets and Other Verses.
In 1950 Santayana was interviewed by Catherine Casey and said The Sense of
Beauty: "was prompted not by the Holy Ghost, but by being told by good friends that it
would be better to write something if I wanted to stay on at Harvard."2 Pressed by
friends and professional pressures, Santayana chose this overlooked subject to make
his appearance as an innovative voice in the philosophical world. "My sham course in
'aesthetics' had served its purpose and so had my little book. ... I was reappointed
year by year ... with ... a seat in the Faculty, which I seldom occupied" (pp 393).
The publication of The Sense of Beauty brought Santayana together with the
publishing house of Charles Scribner's Sons. The Sense of Beauty, according to
Santayana, "established pleasant relations between [him] and Scribner which have
lasted for fifty years" (pp 393). The immediate benefit of this relationship for
Santayana was that the editors encouraged him to revise and be more aware of his
writing style. Santayana wrote the following to Scribner's regarding The Sense of
Beauty, "I am conscious of my inexperience in writing, and value your suggestions
very much."3
The importance of this book for Santayana's professional career stretches beyond
establishing Santayana's status on the Harvard faculty and his relationship with
Charles Scribner's Sons. The Sense of Beauty was a philosophical treatise on
aesthetics at a time when the subject was not talked about widely, let alone written and
published on. According to John McCormick "The Sense of Beauty was the first
American treatise on [aesthetics], and among the first in Britain or on the continent"
(MCCORMICK 127). And as Arthur Danto points out it remains solidly in "the thin
canon of aesthetics."4
"Maxims," Columbia Manuscript Collection, IX: 12, copyright 1967, Daniel Cory. Cited in
Animal Faith and Spiritual Life edited by John Lachs (New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts,
1967, p. 168).
2 Catherine Casey, "Philosopher Lives in the Nun's Nest," Continental Daily Mail, 19 July 1950,
p.4. Cited in John McCormick's George Santayana: A Biography (New York: Paragon House,
1988, p. 127), to be abbreviated as MCCORMICK.
3 Letter to Charles Scribner's Sons dated 26 July 1896 from George Santayana.
4 "Introduction," The Sense of Beauty. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press Critical Edition, 1986, p. xv.