Violet Paget (1856–1935), also known under the pseudonym Vernon Lee, was a French-born British writer famous for her supernatural fiction and contributions to the field of aesthetics. She also wrote more than a dozen books on a variety of subjects ranging from music to travel, and today she is best remembered for her original ideas and amusing use of irony. First published in 1913, “The Beautiful – An Introduction to Psychological Aesthetics” is a collection of classic essays by Paget that explore the issue of beauty from a variety of angles, analysing the very nature of beauty and why it is enjoyed. Contents include: “The Adjective 'Beautiful'”, “Contemplative Satisfaction”, “Aspects Versus Things”, “Sensations”, “Perception of Relations”, “Elements of Shape”, “Facility and Difficulty of Grasping”, “Subject and Object”, “Empathy”, “The Movement of Lines”, “The Character of Shapes”, etc. Other notable works by this author include: “The Prince of the Hundred Soups: A Puppet Show in Narrative” (1883), “The Countess of Albany” (1884), and “Miss Brown” (1884). Read & Co. Science is proudly republishing this collection of classic essays now in a new edition complete with a specially-commissioned new biography of the author.
