SOURCE: Introduction to Essays in the Philosophy of Art by R. G. Collingwood, edited by Alan Donagan, Indiana University Press, 1964, pp. ix-xx.

In the following essay, Donagan offers an overview of Collingwood's theoretical writings on art.

R. G. Collingwood is generally acknowledged to have contributed more to the philosophy of art and the philosophy of history than any other British philosopher of his time. His Principles of Art (1938) and Idea of History (1946) are readily obtainable and widely studied. Yet, despite his beautiful and vigorous prose style, neither of these important books is fully intelligible by itself. You must go to The New Leviathan (1942) if you would understand the philosophy of mind that he partly developed in The Principles of Art; and you will probably misinterpret the methodology of The Idea of History if you neglect his impassioned but revealing Autobiography (1939).

In order fully to master Collingwood's philosophy of...