Friedrich Schiller's play : a theory of human nature in the context of the eighteenth-century study of life.

TL;DRAbstract

Friedrich Schiller's psychological theory of play, his hypothesis about human nature, is embedded in the Aesthetic Letters . Its trans-historical value owes much to the committed interest in life in the late Enlightenment, and the theory itself is an example of that period's enthusiastic study of living organisms. It is within this context--of eighteenth-century natural history, natural philosophy and medicine--that the theory can be profitably evaluated. That it is also an example of the connection of the humanities of the time and the emerging life sciences suggests its usefulness as a paradigm today: as a general theory of human nature, it might serve as a bio-cultural ground for the humanities. In this dissertation, Schiller's theory's situation in several contemporary contexts is explored and its relevance to the contemporary humanities and biological sciences, asserted Chapter II presents Schiller's theory of play. In hypothesizing a theory of species-specific drives, Schiller ap

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