Capitol Hill Blue Forums Misc. Topics Ain't This America What is distinctive about American art and letters

Must have been sleeping, eh?

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Excellent! That was almost droll, Skyhawk!

You seem to have some embers of humor in your nature; I hope that you will fan them into a brighter fire!

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being patronising really persuades people doesnt it?

I think that we agree much more than we disagree.

I think it is wise to make a distinction between taste, which is subjective, and aesthetic judgment, which has a core that is objective, and does not change.

I agree with Shakespeare, when he has Hamlet say,

"Now this overdone, or come tardy off, though it make the unskillful laugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve, the censure of which, one must in your allowance o'erweigh a whole theatre of others."

The objective core of art is notoriously difficult to define, but in a finger-pointing way of defining it, I think it comes down to the traditional cliché of the Good, the True, the Harmonious. As Plato said in the Philebus,

"If we are not able to capture the Good in a single idea, we shall do so with three: Beauty, Harmony, and Truth."

The highest works of art are those which best permit goodness, truth and harmony to shine through them; that is why Bach and Mozart are greater than any rock-and-roll or heavy metal music.

It may be objected that even in heavy metal music, American militarism and Nazi ritual there are aesthetic components which have a certain "beauty" of their own. This is true, but to become Platonic, these are very dim, fading shadows of the true Beauty which shines forth in the great works of Art. In general, whatever aesthetic components such trash possesses are merely formal, superficial craftsmanship and illuminate true Beauty very ill. Bach, on the other hand, raises us to a transcendent realm where we glimpse what the angels sing to God.

Germany produced Bach, and many, many other towering figures in the arts. Europe is resplendent with Great Art.

The United States produced Elvis.

American barbarism, if it had any sense, would bend the knee and worship at the shrine of European Greatness.

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And flattering their vanity rarely causes them to think.

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We'll remember not to do that to you, numan.

Trying to avoid those that have been mentioned and granting that even the best can produce clunkers, I offer for consideration:

Arthur Miller
Eugene O'Neill
Stephen Crane
H.L. Mencken
Lillian Hellman
Cecil B. deMille
W. D. Griffith
Frank Baum
Robert Frost
Gwendolyn Brooks
Frank Norris
Clifford Odets
William Faulkner
Gene Kelly
Langston Hughes
Louisa May Alcott
Jack Wolf
Washington Irving
Harper Lee
Ernie Kovacs
Robin Williams
Charles Schultz
Al Capp
Jim Henson
Walt Disney

for starters

first, do not pretend to tell me what i mean. you may well possess a great deal of rote knowledge and you might even have a bit of that old high brow palate, but your intelligence is centered in your ego and your arrogance knows no bounds. yes, yes, we are called upon here to avoid such remarks but it is impossible to sit back and watch this go on without saying it outright. too bad for you, numan - interesting nomenclature by the way - because you are missing out on so much of the beauty that is life from the perch where you have placed yourself. i hope one day you will come down off that self-imposed perch and join the rest of us low brows by enjoying the dirt and grime and toil that is the human race. it's actually one of the finest places i have ever been and i have been just about every place a person could possibly go. good luck to you on your journey, i hope you find what you're looking for.

I cannot remember any instance of you sinking to that level of vulgarity.

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