“We read the works of the older literature differently from those of our own age; we enjoy them purely aesthetically, that is, indirectly, disinterestedly, perfectly aware of their fictitiousness and of our self-deception.”

Source: The Social History of Art, Volume IV. Naturalism, impressionism, the film age, 1999, Chapter 1. Naturalism and Impressionism

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Arnold Hauser 34
Hungarian art historian 1892–1978

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