That's interesting. Why did you choose to study literature when you had never read a book?Quote:
Originally Posted by kainso
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That's interesting. Why did you choose to study literature when you had never read a book?Quote:
Originally Posted by kainso
Firstly, I didn't know what exactly I have chosen. I thought it is just something related to studying a foreign language which is desirable and competitive in Hong Kong. You know students do go in Art programmes when they are not sure of what to do next.Quote:
Originally Posted by cipherdecoy
Apart from that reason, I want to know more about semantics. That means I do have some interest in linguistics. Things like what consists of a word and how one is different or related to one another , is facinated to a foreign learner.
Mindless escapism? Reading isn't mindless at all. It is the least mindless escapism there is. Watching sports though is like watching grass grow.Quote:
Originally Posted by kilted exile
Depends on how you read. I dont read to examine the techniques used or any of that stuff. I read for the story, I have no thoughts about "high" and "low" literature. I will as happily read Grisham as Dickens (shocking as the thought may be to some). I am reading to escape into another place from my life & hassles contained therein - It distracts me for a couple of hours just like watching sports, which I also thoroughly enjoy, possibly (nah scratch that probably) more than I enjoy readingQuote:
Originally Posted by Leabhar
Why not?
Literature, movies, visual art, and music are first and foremost entertainment. I don’t go to the movies or read a book or visit a museum because I want to improve my soul. If that was my goal I would be better off consulting a rabbi or spending my hours working in a soup kitchen or volunteering for the Peace Corps. No, I do these activities first and foremost because I want to keep occupied during the day in a way that gives me pleasure and prevents boredom from seeping into my life. I read to be entertained.
Drkshadow03... Interesting post. I don't see that your description of reading differs all that greatly from my own. I read for aesthetic pleasure. This would seemingly be merely another way of saying I read for entertainment. I don't read to improve my soul or make myself into a better person. I doubt art can do that. Perhaps reading can broaden my perspectives... make me aware of other persons, other cultures, other beliefs... but if I am honest, that is not why I read. I read because I enjoy it... because engaging in a dialog with other minds through their writings gives me pleasure.
Where a lot of people around here seem to take their page from Harold Bloom, I have more affinity with Bloom’s student, Camille Paglia. Like her I am unimpressed with the elitist attitude that implies one can only enjoy Madonna or Beethoven... classical music or punk rock. What I love about Paglia is that she can discuss the originality and importance she finds in the aesthetics of Madonna with the same acuity and depth she is able discuss traditional poetry.
For me it’s not about whether rock n’ roll is better than classical music, but rather simply recognizing they are different styles of music which produce different sounds and have depth in their own unique ways. So far this hasn’t overturned judging by aesthetics, but it does call into question whether there really are universal aesthetic qualities.
The "elitist" stance isn't taking a position suggesting that one style or genre is better than another, but rather it is simply admitting that some art and some artists are better than others... that we find them more worthy of expending time and effort upon... that ultimately they are more entertaining... or we derive more pleasure from them. As one becomes more experienced in reading... or in the experience of any art form... one often finds that there is a far greater pleasure to be found in certain works which once seemed difficult... even incomprehensible... and conversely, one may discover that there is less pleasure to be derived from works which are cliche... commonplace... or lacking in other areas that one has come to appreciate: language, originality of metaphor or narrative, the development of character.
I agree that in some ways Harold Bloom represents an older entrenched approach to criticism and aesthetics. As an artist I have long held with Picasso's declaration that great art is produced in the same manner as the Renaissance princes produced their children... by a merger of the aristocratic and the peasant. To a degree, I suspect that had Bloom been alive during the age of his beloved Shakespeare he may have rejected him along with all the other playwrights... for certainly the theater of Shakespeare's age was almost as suspect in terms of aesthetics as today's TV and Hollywood movies. But what we term "high art" (just like culture itself) has always benefited from the influx of fresh blood... "peasant stock"... outside or "low" influences. I agree that the ability to discern great classic rock, jazz, bluegrass, science fiction, horror... or any other genre involves the same sort of aesthetic judgments that one uses with classical music or classic literature. Does this call into question universal aesthetic values? I am not sure I would go that far. T.S. Eliot spoke of all the works of art forming a sort of ideal order or dialog which each new work of genuine merit alters to some degree... however slight. Whether I like it or not I am always making comparisons. certainly I will look at the Rolling Stones or the Stanley Brothers first within their own genres... but then I will also compare them within the whole of music. Of course such judgments are not the same as personal preferences. I can freely admit that in many instances works of art that are less important... less innovative... less brilliant in pure aesthetic terms... may actually give me greater pleasure. I would admittedly rather listen to Puccini... or even the Stones or Johnny Cash... over Stravinsky. By the same token there are any number of writers who have given me far more pleasure than James Joyce... but I'm not about to confuse that personal pleasure with actual artistic merit. That is what I have a problem with when I am confronted by declarations that Proust or Milton or Goethe, etc... are overrated... or lacking is any aesthetic merit... such seems to confuse personal preference with artistic worth.
As a reader I began with genre fiction. Before I ever experienced the unforgettable poetry and characters of Shakespeare, before I ever read the playful tone of Philip Roth, before I ever knew the desperation of seeking true love with Jane Austen, there were spaceships and monsters and demons and chosen ones and the vast coldness of space stretching out with all its terrible mysteries and uncharted territories. Science fiction and fantasy taught me that the quality of prose is not the end all and be all of fiction—certainly I learned later in my life to enjoy aesthetics, to understand what it is that makes Shakespeare the best, to appreciate the rapture of reading a sentence by Hawthorne that epitomizes the very essence of good writing. However, I also learned that a great deal of fiction is about the imagination itself, whose quality cannot be entirely assessed by limiting oneself to focusing on aesthetics.
I surely do not disagree. I cut my own teeth upon science fiction and fantasy and ghost stories... and simple childhood poetry... nursery rhymes... etc... surely led to an appreciation of the flow and the cadence and the music... and the sound of language itself.
Of course the problem with using abstract terms like “aesthetics” is that everyone will have a slightly different understanding of what that term means. One could convincingly argue that the author’s imagination is intimately attached to their aesthetics. In the case of someone like Borges it isn’t a fault or a deficiency that his characters generally remain underdeveloped because that wasn’t the point of his work or what he was trying to do; the term as it is being used here implies that a writer’s goals and how they shape their art, the overall floor plan so to speak, is their aesthetics. However, if I defended the mediocre writing of many science fiction writers on the grounds of their imaginative vision most traditionalists would probably call foul... It seems then that by aesthetics we still in fact mean first and foremost good prose.
Intriguing argument. I would counter by suggesting that the language is the form through which the artist conveys ideas... feeling... thoughts... A marvelous, innovative, imaginative vision poorly presented... given a flawed or stilted form would strike me a quite different from a work of art in which a more commonplace idea or image is conveyed through a marvelous form. Conveying an expression of love...presenting one more image of a landscape or still life or nude... are not the most original visions... but may certainly result in the most brilliant works of art when given a form of true genius. In the visual arts there are artists working within the genre of science fiction illustration who you might argue present imagery that is quite "imaginative"... but the mundane, cliche manner in which this imagery is presented strikes me as seriously flawed where a painter who focuses repeatedly upon a a simple still life motif but does so brilliantly is not necessarily flawed... although certainly "limited" in scope.
I was very struck by one of JBI’s recent comments where he pointed out that it is not WHAT is said, but HOW it is said. This is some great insight, and yet I am not sure it ultimately works for me and my reasons for reading. The problem I have with emphasizing the "how" over the "what" is I feel it transforms the written word into a kind of visual art, in my opinion. The written word can transmit ideas in a way that static visual art with a character, figure or scene perpetually suspended in time cannot. It ignores precisely what is inherently and uniquely different between these art forms. The amount of time we spent trying to figure out what an author meant, what issues concerned him or her, what a symbol meant in a story, the historical background in a work, during my formal academic training has convinced me there are serious problems with overemphasizing aesthetics as the major criteria for judging the written word.
I somewhat suspect you are reducing the notion of aesthetics merit to signify only the beauty of the language. That in itself varies from artist to artist. There is a huge difference between the beauty of Shakespeare's English and Kafka's almost dry, matter-of-fact prose, Hemingway's crisp, minimalism, or Calvino's crystalline prose... but all are clearly "beautiful" and perfectly attuned to what the writer's intentions were. But surely character development, metaphor, symbolism, the narrative... all of this and more are part of the experience of reading... and part of what is taken into consideration in forming a critical opinion. The same is no less true of a work of visual art. Abstract formal elements such as color, texture, composition, line, etc... are all imminently important in that they are the language through which the artist speaks... but this does not negate the image, narrative, emotional impact, etc...
My formal training is in American Literature, I have a Masters in English, and I will soon be finished with an additional Masters in Library Science. I found in my literature classes that talking about an author’s aesthetics was devalued; students and professors hardly ever bothered to make aesthetic judgments.
Arguably, this is much due to the fact that aesthetic judgments are imagined as somewhat "elitist" in many academic schools of thought. It also owes to the idea that in many of these same schools of thought art is not to be appreciated as art... for the pleasure that it gives... but rather is a means to an end... a way of illustrating certain appropriate and inappropriate ways of thinking. The content... the WHAT is far more important than questions of form or HOW. My own formal "training" or education was in visual art... in creating artistic works. It was accepted that everybody has their own vision... their own concerns that are important to them. In discussing the art of others one did not ignore the content... WHAT was being expressed... but neither was it open to criticism that might suggest that "I don't like what you have to say; I don't like what you find important" or "I don't like the way you think." The goal was to develop the artist... not to remake them in the teachers' or student's own image of what is acceptable or valued... and as such the focus was upon developing the formal language through which anything must be conveyed... the form/HOW.
That’s why I am always bemused when people seem to think what literary critics primarily do is sit around and make aesthetic judgments. Discussion in my classes revolved around deciphering the texts and making an interpretation of a work’s meaning and central ideas.
There is certainly something to be said about an excess of discussions about who is better that whom. By and large these are pointless. On the other hand, when someone has asked why Shakespeare is a great writer or Tolkein is mediocre I have seen a good deal of discussion centering upon far more than the aesthetic merits of the prose. My initial introduction to criticism was through art criticism. The classic form of art criticism involved 1.description, 2. interpretation, 3. judgment.
Discussion of a work’s aesthetics only mattered in so far as it could help reveal the author’s meaning.
By "aesthetics" I presume I might substitute "form". Different schools of thought emphasize form/how over content/what, or the inverse. My experience in art school was almost purely "formalist". My experience when attaining my license for teaching was quite the opposite. Content was everything, and to even make a suggestion that a work was formally weak or flawed was considered close-minded. Personally, I feel that there must be a balance between both content and form because content is inherent in form. The experience we gain from reading Shakespeare or listening to Mozart or looking at Giotto can not be reduced to a simple meaning or definition divorced from the form because the content... the experience is part of the whole... is engaged through the form.
I could have began my essay by saying art begins with meaning. We don’t tell ourselves oral myths to appreciate the texture of words in a story, we didn’t start drawing pretty cave paintings for the sake of aesthetic pleasure but rather to enchant the animal with magic and be able to eat that night (to draw on one theory); certainly, these things might have aesthetic qualities, but that wasn’t their primary purpose. The primary purpose was to convey meaning, to transmit truths...
Perhaps... but then there comes a point at which one recognizes that there are multiple works of art where the intention... on the surface... is the same... and yet some works resonate more... longer. Why? Because they offer a greater or more lasting form of pleasure. They convey a story... enchant with magic... present a beautiful image... they do so though a marvelous form. Yes, Michelangelo may have wanted initially to merely tell the narrative of the Biblical creation... to convey an admiration for the beauty of the human body... but those abstract elements... the texture, the value, the line, the artist's touch, the seductive colors, the anatomical mastery... and distortions... all of these became just as important to the artist... and just as important to the experienced audience.
I find Oscar Wilde's art for art's sake problematic to say the least.
I've always found that Oscar Wilde was right about everything... and said it with greater wit than most:D. Seriously, I don't imagine art-for-art's-sake as meaning that the content is irrelevant... but rather that it is irrelevant in offering a judgment upon artistic merits. The alternative is a criticism based upon external or non-artistic values... where one can devalue a work of art because it doesn't fit into the accepted religious values, social values, political values, etc... To my mind this leads to a false art... an art that gives form not to what the artist really believes, but what he or she has been told to believe... or has been told is acceptable. To my mind this leads to the death of art.
Maybe literature and art is for the good of improving your soul because entertainment itself is good for the soul.
One can only hope.:)
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"Anyone can become angry - that is easy, but to be angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose, and in the right way - that is not easy." - Aristotle
I guess reading not only entertanis me, it enlightens me and makes me more knowledgeable...
I find Oscar Wilde's art for art's sake problematic to say the least.
I've always found that Oscar Wilde was right about everything... and said it with greater wit than most.
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This is so true. You can look at the sayings of Wilde and question them, but in the end you will find that he is right and with that brilliant at the same time. I love Stephen Fry's thoughts on Wilde, he said that "his opinions on art were so high that most people thought he was joking" which of course he wasn't.
Why do I read?.......
Escapism? Partly.
To gain knowledge? Sure.
For the sheer joy of it? Absolutely!!
I hate to be a scuttle butt, but I just don't find our individual motives all that interesting, whether we read for pleasure or for our careers. I would narrow the scope, and ask what makes a literate reader? Why are some readers more discerning, more insightful? Will reading itself actually survive as the technology changes? Boards like these and online communities of other kinds have already changed how we interact, and not always for the better.
The OP is:Quote:
Originally Posted by Jozanny
So, if you would like to discuss another aspect of reading, please start another thread addressing that issue. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by WICKES
No thank you. I am not all that interested in additional inconclusiveness and the usual alliances over various theories.:wave:Quote:
Originally Posted by Scheherazade
http://img206.imageshack.us/img206/6...tabletvtg9.gifQuote:
Originally Posted by Jozanny
I am not going to quote your response, Stluke, because it's extremely long and I don't necessarily want to go through it point by point.
1) I should note that my response, while certainly containing critiqueable points as I went beyond the basics to why I read, was still very much my own answer to why I personally read, and should not be construed as everyone else = wrong.
2) I accept that aesthetics in and of themselves can be pleasurable. I also mentioned that a few times in my original post in case that wasn't clear.
3) I agree that form and content are closely linked as both a writer and a reader and a scholar (?). With that said it seems to me one of the major differences between our viewpoints is which side do we emphasize or lean towards a little bit more.
Certainly if you skip down to the last three paragraphs of this blog post on The Great Gatsby that I did, starting with the quoted section, there is no denying that I am discussing aesthetic construction of the sentence and the artistry of using a particular piece of punctuation, yet I think it also shows that am still centrally concerned with how that aesthetic decision creates meaning and what it has to say to us.
I mean I get what you're saying. Content and form are interlinked. When discussing one you'll inevitably be discussing the other. Even what makes one theme origin in comparison to a different writer dealing with that same theme often comes down to differences in aesthetics and HOW they say it.
However, this still doesn't solve all the problems for me that I hinted at, part of it is my own fault because I never brought up specific examples. Certainly a book like Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke doesn't epitomize good prose and certainly not the best that fiction has to offer in the way of purely aesthetic pleasure; I've made that arguement quite explicitly myself right here. On the other hand, I think the novel is extremely deep, with frightening conclusions, and thought-provoking themes that could fill multiple class discussions without ever getting boring.
I know what this means Drk, but I am going to quibble and press you on it, especially since you and luke are interlinking why and how.Quote:
Content and form are interlinked.
There are not too many *forms* prose can take on a printed page. Fiction and non-fiction are styled more than formed, and I'd hesitate to use the word form about plays, as well, because plays are scripts which are nearly always adapted to a visual mode--the classic plays only became textually centered because New Critics had to eat.
Poetry is really the only genre which owns *form*, but even here, poetry is a dialectical tension between lyric (singing, singing related to ritual) and narrative, and can never be truly appreciated unless it is spoken and listened to, as well as read. Even in the 21st century, with its post-structural anxiety, poetry still needs to be spoken--so I'd be cautious about tying form to content without pinning down what form actually means and how conscious readers are of its affectation.
Fiction and non-fiction would be more a difference in content, than form or style.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jozanny
Perhaps this is true for the classic plays, but plays are (at least now) as much a literary form than a theatrical one, so I have some doubts about your objection... but it in facts all comes down to semantics here. But in the end I think this is all pointless because I believe you have simply misinterpreted what (I believe) was meant:Quote:
and I'd hesitate to use the word form about plays, as well, because plays are scripts which are nearly always adapted to a visual mode--the classic plays only became textually centered because New Critics had to eat.
From what I understood from the discussion is not what you imply here. Content would be the "denotation" (as in Russell's denotation) of the words. Form again is the term used by Russel to express what I think was meant in this context (see Russel's On denotation) which is basically the linguistic vehicle to the denotation. And therefore form could be described as the "physical" aesthetics while content as the "platonic" (for lack of a better term?) aesthetics. And while we can divide in such way aesthetics, the point is that it implies that one should see aesthetics as an unified notion, and that the divisions are mostly analytical in nature.Quote:
Poetry is really the only genre which owns *form*, but even here, poetry is a dialectical tension between lyric (singing, singing related to ritual) and narrative, and can never be truly appreciated unless it is spoken and listened to, as well as read. Even in the 21st century, with its post-structural anxiety, poetry still needs to be spoken--so I'd be cautious about tying form to content without pinning down what form actually means and how conscious readers are of its affectation.
But others can correct me as to what they meant, as I don't want to put words in one's mouth.
You are absolutely right and I too subscribe to your ideas, and life at times becomes meaningless and we have nothing to value in life, not even god, for there are people suffering ad infinitum and some are famished. If really god is kind they must be helped. They are not helped in anyway. Do they have to suffer because of Karma? What else otherwise?Quote:
Originally Posted by WICKES
I read because it means something to me and without it I would be lost. I find that many of the questions I have about life are the same ones writer's have been dealing with for centuries. I have felt love, betrayal, the need for revenge, the need to escape from..., the uselessness of breathing, fear, curiosity and through books, my feelings are shared and interacted with. While reading I am having a dialogue with writer. Sometimes I am confirmed, many times contradicted and very often enlightened.
I would not be able to separate or say which I like more, poetry or prose both are fundamental to me. I need the force of poetry as much as I need the story.
Quote:
Originally Posted by WICKES
wickes...i do empathize with a lot of what youre saying...but if you have indeed read the bible, your second paragraph is most unfortunate...
Not reading is not possible in today's context, and of course every day can not go without reading something, and of course without engaged ourselves in books, for it has been an integral part of life and we can not do away with this habit, and this is really an important habit. If a good engages us we will have so many advantages, and we can keep ourselves from indulgences in baser elements.
I can not pass a single day, and always am occupied by books. Whenever I feel down as it is not unique to myself but to all that we feel down at times, and when I do feel I take to books, and of course in books I can find solace.
All I can find in books is a storehouse of imagination and a reservoir of inspiration and something to describe that I run short of words.
Today, I live with ideas, and of course without them it is difficult to go ahead commercially and also in our interaction in society. We need to be updated with social phenomena and it is indeed books that help us in every aspect and without books we are nowhere and we will have to trail behind. As such the role of a good book in shaping our minds, directing us is not calculable at all.
I was actually working in a grocery store when I was approached by someone, who by accent, and appearance appeared to be a native English speaker, approached me because he couldn't read what was written on a milk carton, and couldn't even get through the date, to find when it could be consumed by. In truth, it is possible to function without reading, but boy is it tiring/boring/strenuous. Better off learning to read in a few months than spending your life illiterate.Quote:
Originally Posted by blazeofglory
My naivete meter on that remark puts you somewhere between "If they don't have any bread, let them eat cake." and "Why don't all of these foreigners just learn to speak English?" You've been singularly blessed with educational opportunities, and as an educated man ought to realize that the rest of the world might not share in the same level of resources both human and financial which would allow them to pick up languages or skills the way you do. If a man has reached adulthood without learning to read, then he probably has mental or learning deficiencies coupled with extreme poverty. Besides the fact that language skills are best developed in early childhood and harder to acquire as we age, there's still the fact that if a person is illiterate then they will not have learned how to learn effectively thus prolonging the teaching process.Quote:
Originally Posted by JBI