Publisher's Synopsis
Galvano Della Volpe was the dominant philosopher of Italian Marxism for twenty years after the Liberation. His most important book was a work of aesthetic theory-Critique of Taste. Della Volpe, proponent of a robust materialism in all his writings, was concerned to rehabilitate the inherently rational and intellectual nature of art. Opposing both the sociological reductionism of Plekhanov or Luk�cs, and the formalist irrationalism of Croce or New Criticism, Della Volpe's aim was to demonstrate that conceptual meaning is always inseparable from aesthetic effect.
Whether he is discussing Pindar or G�ngora, Cleanth Brooks or Roland Barthes, Goethe or Mallarm�, Della Volpe is always challenging, always illuminating. Critique of Taste represents one of the major crossroads of twentieth-century aesthetics.
