Karoline von Günderrode

Abstract Philosophical Fragments is a volume of translations of short pieces by the German philosopher and poet Karoline von Günderrode (1780–1806), with accompanying introductions. Günderrode’s work provides original responses to the same questions that concerned male philosophers of her time, especially those in the German Idealist and early German Romantic traditions: What is it to be an individual human being? What is the nature of the universe? Do we have free will, or are our actions determined by operations beyond our control? What can we know about the world, and how? What happens to us after we die? How should we behave while we are alive? What forms of social and political life should we foster? This volume makes available in English, in many cases for the first time, the most philosophically significant of Günderrode’s published and unpublished works along with excerpts from her letters and notes on philosophical topics. The short introductions accompanying each text explicate the ideas embedded in Günderrode’s writing, connecting them to intellectual debates of the day and to relevant work by better-known philosophers including Kant, Plato, Schelling, Herder, Schleiermacher, Hemsterhuis, Schlegel, and Novalis. The general introduction provides a more comprehensive orientation to Günderrode’s philosophy, considering her metaphysics, epistemology, social and political thought, ethics, aesthetics, and reflections on gender, death, friendship, and human identity. The volume is written to be accessible to students and the general public as well as scholars.