The Concept of the “Folk Spirit” in the Work of P.I. Novgorodtsev “Political Folk Poetry in Italy During the Renaissance”

Abstract

Every national philosophical tradition has its own “permanent” topics and questions. For Russian philosophy the question of authenticity is still one of the most debatable in contemporary history of philosophy. Typically, it is placed in the paradigm “pro et contra”, which stems from 19^th-c., when the problem of the origins of Russian philosophy emerged, and which divided thinkers into two opposing camps. The attitude towards to the West, towards is a marker of the philosopher’s belonging to one direction or another. The figure of P.I. Novgorodtsev, a prominent representative of the Russian philosophical and legal school, is in line with this issue, since the question of whether the philosopher belongs to the orthodox neo-Kantian school calls into question the originality of his own constructions. The article analyzes unique materials –  a draft of a previously unpublished manuscript by P.I. Novgorodtsev “Political folk poetry in Italy during the Renaissance”, as a result of which new arguments are presented in favor of the originality of his philosophical views, which are largely in line with the traditions of Russian philosophical culture. The main concept of this work “folk spirit” is reconstructed, through which folk political creativity is interpreted by P.I. Novgorodtsev not only as a phenomenon of national culture, interesting for historical, cultural and ethnographic research, but also as one of the essential factors in the formation of a social ideal. It is shown that popular consciousness, expressed in political poetry, is one of the forms of sensibility for the philosopher, which makes it possible to consider it as a synthesis of ethical and legal views and aesthetic perception. This is a significant difference from Western European philosophy, in which “truth,” “goodness,” and “beauty” are separated by intradisciplinary boundaries. As a result, it was concluded that the methodology of analyzing the folk poetry of P.I. Novgorodtsev, on the one hand close to the ideas of F. Jacobi, on the other, going deep into the domestic tradition of ethical-aesthetic synthesis, casts doubt on the unambiguity of classifying P.I. Novgorodtsev as a neo-Kantian school adherent.

Funding: the work was carried out within the framework of the scientific project of the Russian Academy of Sciences (grant) No. 22-28-01805/23 "Primary Sources of Russian Philosophy of the XIX–XX Centuries in the State Archives of Russia: State and Prospects of Study".