Spaventa, Bertrando

Spaventa, Bertrando 

Born June 26, 1817, in Bomba; died Feb. 20, 1883, in Naples. Italian Hegelian philosopher.

Spaventa became a professor of philosophy at Naples in 1861. He, F. De Sanctis, and S. Spaventa represented the left wing of Neapolitan Hegelianism. Denying the genetic primacy of the spirit with respect to nature and emphasizing the unity of spirit and nature as two inseparable but distinct elements of the universe, Spaventa interpreted this unity in a spirit of idealist im-manentism; this was subsequently developed by Italian Neo-Hegelianism. Naturalistic anthropological tendencies became noticeable in Spaventa’s late period. The humanist and anticlerical trend characteristic of Spaventa’s views was related to the Risorgimento movement. Among Spaventa’s students was A. Labriola.

WORKS

Saggi di critica filosófica, política e religiosa, vol. 1. Naples, 1867,
Principi di filosofía italiana. Naples, 1867.
Lógica e metafísica. Barí, 1911. (Second ed. of Principi di filosofía italiana.)
Idealismo e realismo. Naples, 1874.
Kant e l’empirismo. Naples, 1880.
La filosofía italiana nelle sue relazioni con la filosofía europea. Bari, 1908.

REFERENCES

Berti, G. “B. Spaventa, A. Labriola e l’hegelismo napoletano.” Societä, 1954, issues 3–5.
Vacca, G. Politico e filosofía in B. Spaventa. Bari, 1967.

S. A. EFIROV