Friedrich Schiller and Enlightenment Critical Review of Lukac's Interpretation of Aesthetic Education

Enlightenment era is in terms of political issues a time of tensions. In theoretical domain we are witness to fundamental changes and in it’s interact in social domains we are confronted with radical and conservative political stances. Recently, research focuses on Enlightenment and its thinkers from this point of view, which was inaugurated by the ideas of Margaret C. Jacob and became with the works of Jonathan Israel in the center of attention. Schiller takes definitely a political stance in his philosophical work entitled On the Aesthetic Education of Man that was authored after the French Revolution. Lukács argues that these letters show Schiller’s conservative ideas. Are we confronted with a Schiller, who seeks to keep the status quo after the French Revolution? This essay allows a skeptical view of Lukacs’ conception of the aesthetic education and shows that aesthetic education is based on radical ideas.