Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung

Two hundred years ago, in December 1818 (under the year 1819), Brockhaus published the later world-famous main work of Arthur Schopenhauer, "The World as Will and Representation." With the claim of being "one single thought" viewed from various perspectives, it encompasses, in organic unity, epistemology, metaphysics, aesthetics, and ethics. From the abstract and superficial empirical-scientific worldview (Book 1), it initially leads to its metaphysical foundation, which can only be understood through the experience of one's own body by analogy as "will" (Book 2). The will thus serves as the key to interpreting the world in terms of its essence and the suffering intensified by the omnipresent egoism, but also regarding the possibilities of redemption through aesthetic contemplation (Book 3) and ethical behavior up to the denial of the will.