“Reduced to one last hope, that Death might rise
To fill the solemn sky like some dark sun,
And bring to blossom all they might have done!”
Charles Baudelaire, The Death of Artists
An Introduction
Any attempt to philosophize “death” ought to answer some foundational questions such as the ontological status of death, or what does one refer to when one talks about death. If “death” refers to mere biological death of a person, not very distinct from everyday conception of it, then the basic question evolves into why, in fact, does one need to inquire it philosophically−I mean, is it necessity to inquire it as a biological phenomena, in which the concept has itself not many intelligible determinations to delve into? In that sense of the concept, the problems that we pick up would not be concrete enough to make sense of the concept in its overall temporal and spatial references. The notion of death cannot be separable to the notion of existing in this world, therefore the references of the both notion gives us several hints about the spirit of the time in which they have developed that content. This introduction may seem irrelevant at first, yet it actually aims to raise the issue of “contemporaneousness” regarding a question of philosophy through referring to the certain era that the concept of inquiry is employed and to the effect the spirit of time has on itself. Therefore, I adopt an understanding that there is something contemporary with any philosophical question concerning death, and acknowledging this fact would relieve us from the mere biological determinations that are imposed on any definition of death. This kind of a change in comprehension would radically change the sources one seeks to make sense of a question, in our case, the question of the ontological status of death and of why does one need to inquire it philosophically.
For this, I will trace between the poetry of Baudelaire to defend an alternative conception of death: I will argue that death (as commonly understood as biological phenomena) has no special distinction from any kind of this-worldly absences, what is more−and more important−this is related to the “contemporary” conception of death.
Walter Benjamin, who has studied Baudelaire intensely, employs the imagery and symbolism of Baudelaire in his accounts and cultural criticism of history, modernity and modern city. Benjamin argues in his writings on Baudelaire that the fact that the communication in its ordinary sense become impossible due to the fact that there is an intensity of external stimuli coming from modern cities that start to establish themselves, makes artists−especially the ones like Baudelaire who is very sensible and responsive towards his time and surroundings, and who builds his complete aesthetics and aesthetical judgments by taking these impressions of modern city at his focus−search for new ways to express, or rather mediate their thoughts, in other media, like poetry (Benjamin 2006, 21). This comment is important, as it refers to the shortcomings of the standard ways of communicating thoughts in chaotic time of establishing modern city. Thus, my appeal to poetical works, in this paper, to have a grasp of the question of death is mainly because of the fact that through these works one can have a direct access to the prevailing feelings and ideas of the time without attempts to generalize a particular perception through notions and accounts. Another reason would be the nature of the art itself: Art, in any form, has a direct linkage to the idea of immortality, and thus to the idea of death, as it is an attempt to defy death, in a sense that as it defines it. I mean as the alterations in the definition of death as a particular time defines it changes, we can encounter its most immediate expressions in the domain of art. That is why I will trace back to the perception of death in Baudelaire. Yet, before that exploration, I will provide some philosophical grounds to the notion of “absence”, or specifically “this-worldly absence”, in order to find how an ontology of death can be built on the notion of ordinary absences, as well as how would that framework redefines the notion of being and existence, at the same time.
Philosophical Status of “Absences”
Existentialists are the ones who have attempted to define the notion of death along the similar lines that I have introduced in the introduction. Although, I will take Hegel, where we can find the first traces of this conception of “absence” and of death, let me start with an influential example given by P.L. Landsberg. Lansberg acknowledges that death has something that goes beyond mere biological experiences of extreme oldness and illnesses. Then he gives an example of “the death of we” (1998, 45) in order to explicate that the living people, on an experience of death of a beloved one, would experience death “to a certain degree”. Landsberg refers these forms of intimate human interaction as “community”, which is built at least with two independent people. Every individual would know that they comprise a part of that community, which has many living features just like humans. With the death of a person in that community, we would never talk about the same living community no more, it is also dead with the breaking moment of one of its member’s death. In that situation, to what degree the remaining person experiences death, and in what sense of death does he experience? It is the irreversible sense of absence of an “another” to share living moments and memories. Acknowledgment of the community as to some degree as oneself brings with itself the experience of death in the core of one’s existence.
What is exciting about this “the death of we” example is first that it can be broadened to the all people arranged in different communities, all experiencing a death of one of the communities he or she was a part, even though he or she does not know in person the other one, death of the other may still affect him or her. And, secondly, it enables a subject to experience death without needing to die−by doing this, this account also enables any attempt to think about the experience of death, otherwise, if we take the account of biological death, this would be impossible to achieve, because in terms of biological death, whether it is an experience or not would be open to discussion (because the dead subject would not make use of his experience of dying afterwards, it would make that experience questionable to a degree). In Landsberg’s case, on the other hand, the absence of “the other” would be enough to give the subject an idea and an experience of death that he or she would later connect the impression of this experience in his or her life afterwards. Another thing with this thought is that for a “community” to be destroyed, in fact, no one needs to die biologically−in the case of an introduction of a hostility to the current relationship, for example, would result in the similar experience of absence. Thus, one can generalize this example to all communities (human pairs) that have diverse relations to each other, and for some reason, have broken the links that hold the community together.
As I try to show with the example of “the death of we”, the idea of mutual existence and the absence of such an existence, that was once built, are crucial for human cognition to make sense of his situation in this world, as well as of the relations to others. As I have mentioned, in Hegel, as far as I think, we have a similar employment of “absences”. To explicate that, I will elaborate on his discussion of “being-for-itself”.
Hegel, in his Science of Logic, in which he engages in presentation of the philosophical concepts, without presupposing anything in advance, starts with nothingness and by a philosophical activity that he calls “speculative”, he aims to justify being, essence and concept along with the concepts that they are associated, in an organic development. The doctrine of being is the first step in this organic development, its subject is the most immediate part of our cognitive activity: namely, the outside reality. Hegel divides the step of development of being as quality, quantity and measure. In the qualitative determinations, Hegel starts with “nothingness”, i.e. without assuming anything, and claims that as it has no determinations at all, to distinguish it from the pure being, it is the being itself. This move sets the possibility of introducing all the concepts that metaphysics employ−which were put to test to question their legitimacy and intelligibility after Hume. The being that gained some determinations is the existence (or being-there). This represents the reality of qualitative determinations for Hegel, then he introduces the one that represents the ideality: Being-for-itself (2010, 152). This category is the last one that will give rise to the quantitative determinations. Hegel claims that the best example would be given as “I” to the category of being-for-itself. The forces of repulsion and attraction guides this “I” to be both in relation to itself and to the outside of itself. Thus, we can talk about One and the repulsion of One−that posits itself as Many. At this level of determination, Hegel claims, One lacks an inward distinction and excludes the other from itself. Thus, at this level, Many does not set itself forth completely. Yet, only in the category of quantity, One can grasp the other of itself (as if it has learned to count).
I have talked about this, also in the example of master and slave dialectics, Hegel’s argument relies on the category of being-for-itself. What declares the end or “death” of the “master” is its constant negation of the “slave”, i.e. its other (Ibid. 237)−though, Hegel gives the argument in a more historical context. In this example, the supposed reciprocal relation would be devoid of its life content when one of the parts is rejected to be cognized as a proper subject, “I”, that has the similar cognitive capacities with oneself. In fact, although conceptual, the representation of death is much more complex than the one in the example of “the death of the we”. It gives no reference at all to biological death, but it depicts an experience of death as in our first existential example. Here, the cognition of the abstract “I” of others affects its existence. If the “I” falls short of cognizing the other of itself, then it would not cease to exist and would be capable of determining itself more. The “absence” of the other, when one is not able to cognize it, forces “I” to experience death in a non-biological sense again, an irreversible absence. The fact that Hegel employs this notion in the development of history, to argue that some stages of history cannot develop more than this level, favors my idea that the experience of death can be represented fruitfully in terms of one’s future experiences, or in a way to be used to make sense of the world one lives in.
When we talk about “future”, it is impossible not to mention Heidegger. His account is the last one that I will talk about in terms of understanding the notion of “absence”, and it is maybe the most intricate one. In Being and Time, Heidegger qualifies the human beings with their inclination to think and act in terms of future, or by prioritizing the future. In this “future”, unlike our ordinary conception of it, there are not only plenty of possibilities to choose between to shape our lives, but there is also a more fundamental reality, namely “nothingness” that contrasts its being. Heidegger as well talks about the anxiety as a proper feeling towards one’s being in the world, as one’s being is always surrounded with nothingness and death should not be understood as merely a biological end point, but also as marking Being’s ‘ownmost’ possibility (1998, 100). With coming to terms with the future possibility of death, Dasein gains a new cognition regarding primordial reality. Heidegger defines the overall existence of Dasein as “thrownness into death” (Ibid. 99)− referring to the fact that the death, the nothingness, is the “future possibility” that has utmost importance to the existence of Dasein. Heidegger also refers to an important concept of himself, the authenticity, in this discussion. For Dasein to be authentic, it must be in the phase of being- towards-death (Ibid. 101). What does this sentence mean? “Authenticity” refers to the activities and qualities special to human− only if they have achieved a certain level of cognition. For Heidegger, then, at this level Dasein is to understand that one’s ground is the nothingness. The experience of “death” as a future possibility, and in the form of nothingness, is necessary, as well as fundamental, to understand the being itself, in this framework. Inauthentic Dasein concerns nothing but the present, the everyday base matters. Whenever it tries to delve into future possibility, and realize that its foundations lie there, it constructs its authenticity. Also, the introduction of the notion of “authenticity” strengthens the idea that death is defined in terms of its time and space−contemporarily. Because, as far as I understand, just like in other two accounts I have presented, the development of such “high” cognition can be found in earlier ages, yet its complexity is achieved with the enhanced possibilities of outside reality. Though, this form of cognition may be found in all humans through history in an unmediated form, its coming to an apparent form is rather modern.
Authenticity represents the highest forms of human activities in terms of apprehension. Thus, it would be proper to refer the domain of art without contradicting the philosophical grounds. In art, indeed, the authenticity of human activity is reached to such a level that art not only constantly affirms death and life at the same time, but also in art, we encounter an aim at immortality−therefore, providing one more involved account of death.
On “Fleeting Beauty”
The feeling that passes into us from Baudelaire’s poems, which he describes the atmosphere of newly emerging modern city with the most innate impressions of a poet, is that modern age has its own myths with its own forms of existence and attributes to the notion of death. Baudelaire employs the image of devil and celebrates the conventional evils of his times−this affirmation can be seen as a “death drive” in a more contemporary sense. In one of his poems, To a Woman Passing-by, extinguishing image of a woman passing by in a street of Paris is depicted as if being a moment of death−yet, at the same time it is celebrated as well. What Benjamin calls “love at last sight” is this situation of a dweller of a big city who lives among the constant flashing and fading images coming from the crowds−under such conditions of existence, “love at first sight” has no meaning anymore, but the capacity to fall in love while knowing there will be no second encounter is celebrated. Baudelaire calls it the spleen, a sentiment mixed of melancholy and resentment, the proper attitude towards modernity in which one needs to acknowledge more absences than before.
The general outline above, on the relevance of Baudelaire to the current issue would be enough to clarify the reason why I choose him: First of all, he intensely deals with “absences” and death with a unique symbolism combining myths and modern world, which is more than a representation of being trapped between classical and modern era, but in fact it is an indicator of a high capacities of sensing and cognition. Secondly, Baudelaire represents what is “contemporary” and modern in all sense−and somewhat awkwardly in a universally valid sense. He can be given as an example of what would a “contemporary” be like, or how can one appreciate the contemporary. His conception of death share some common features with the philosophical accounts that I have described, he depicts ordinary “absences” as death experience, and it is a level of depiction that goes beyond what is necessary to deal with the biological death.
I am quoting a poem by Baudelaire, named A Passing Glance (À Une Passante) in Parisien Scenes (Tableaux Parisiens) (Baudelaire 2006, 243).
In the midst of a deafening roar, svelte
And tall, and dressed in black from head to toe,
She passed me, wreathed in majestic sorrow
Jewelled hand lifting the hem of her skirt,
Ladylike, and graceful, and statuesque.
I shook like a fool, drinking from those eyes
Tempestuous as ashen, angry skies
A deadly joy, a sweetness full of risk.
Lightning – gone dark! Slipping away from me,
Beauty that offered life in one quick glance−
Life seen no more, before Eternity?
Elsewhere… too far! too late! Never, perchance…
For you ignored me –or pretend to−
Who could have won your love, as you well knew!
This poem, apart from its capacity to give highest forms of aesthetical taste, is the one in which we can see Baudelaire’s reference to the notion of “absence”. It is also the most referred poem of Baudelaire by Walter Benjamin. Benjamin’s reading is very influential and eye-opening as well, though he does not involve in a metaphysical discussion of death and absence. Benjamin reads this poem as a metaphor of history. He claims that, with modernity, many of our sensory input are to be recorded as fleeting impressions, it is hard to build an enduring sense of experience. Benjamin sees this poem as an attempt to capture a moment in history, that would otherwise be merged with the past. It is a failed address to a female figure. Benjamin discusses intensely (Benjamin 2006, 15) about reading this poem as a negative figure− in other words, as an absence of a central figure, which is the crowds, in Baudelaire’s poetry. Indeed, the parts that are most impressive and that carry the whole content and emotion, are the ones in which Baudelaire depicts the “fleeting” of the woman that he encounters, and what happens during her absence. Elsewhere, Benjamin depicts this situation of urban poet as “lover− not at first sight, but at last sight. He has to encounter the disillusionment at the right time he encounters the enchantment.
My reading of this poem represents the experience of absence of a woman figure as the experience of death itself. It contains a demolition of “the community of we” that our urban poet has imagined− even before it was built. It contains a disillusionment with the female figure, as she never recognizes him as an “other”. After all, it contains −more than anything− a pleasure taken from one’s own destruction: The poet is in a constant affirmation of what is happening to him− losing an image of a beauty, having only an experience of an absence regarding that moment. Though it has a strong urge for self-destruction, it also attempts at the immortality. The poet wants to possess the whole moment of his experience of death, and expresses himself in a poem− which would be impossible in the case of an ordinary understanding of the death. This acknowledgment that he can actually achieve immortality comes with realizing the boundaries of his experience and of the boundaries of expressing these experiences. It is like being-for- itself that acknowledges its boundaries− that it is bounded with others, and only after that make an attempt to more intelligible forms of infinity (Hegel names base forms of infinity as false infinity, that we encounter in being- for-itself when it not yet encounters other than itself).
Baudelaire has written three poems that has the word “death” as its title. These are The Death of Lovers, The Death of the Poor and The Death of Artists. In The Death of the Poor, Baudelaire this time treats death as something positive, as the hope that the poor people wait through their lives. While depicting death as a “pauper’s purse”, “attic room protected from the wind, in the Heavens” and as a “Seraph”, Baudelaire again affirms death as a possibility that defines our lives. The most fruitful muse of an artist lies in death, the best possible life for poor is death itself. In fact, in these poems, one can find all the possibility of experiences in the acknowledgment of death.
In some of Baudelaire’s poems, we encounter death in the symbolic images of Satan, Spleen (literally meaning “black bile”, but refers to a state mixed with melancholy and resentment), Plutus, Eros, and even in the image of City. In nearly all of them he achieved to synthesize Heideggerean spirituality and the chaos of modern city.
To Conclude
I tried to present the philosophical foundations of a conception of death as not being any different than any worldly experiences. In order to do this, I refer to mostly existential philosophers as well as to Hegel’s account of being- for-itself and of how human cognition of the others takes place. I choose the poetry of Baudelaire to see the most mediated representations of the relation of absence to death. Yet, the most importantly I choose him because he favors my idea that there is something contemporary about the definition of death, the time and place where the concept “death” is defined completely shapes the connotations and the ontological status of it. In the contemporary world, the excess of sensory stimuli (the ones that can include the biological death of people around us) leads us to be unresponsive to most of them, thus a need to build a new mode of experience (not only the experience of death, but experience in general). Thus, the representation of death given by our “urban poet” is more valid considering the spirit our time explained than a biological representation, which can better be inspected through medicine in our time than in art and philosophy. Then the question of why do we need to understand death would be answered, then, by saying that because such an understanding, even if it cannot be achieved thoroughly, provides one with a more subtle and fruitful understanding of one’s life, being and memories.
Bibliography
Charles Baudelaire. Complete Poems. Translated from French by Walter Martin. Mancherter: Fyfield Books, 2006.
Walter Benjamin. The Writer of Modern Life. Essays on Charles Baudelaire. Edited by Michael W. Jennings. Translated by Howard Eiland, Edmund Jephcott, Rodney Livingston, and Harry Zohn. Belknap Press, 2006.
W. F. Hegel. Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences in Basic Outline. Part 1. Science of Logic. Translated and edited by Klaus Beinkman and Daniel O. Dahlstrom. Cambridge, 2010.
Jeff Malpas and Robert C. Solomon (editors). Death and Philosophy. Routledge, 1998.
BESTE GÜN ASLAN 