A Fable for Interpretation

Once upon a time, a European trader who had never been to India arrived for the first time in that ancient land. As he was walking the streets from the port to the market, he saw a snake-charmer sitting by the roadside. The charmer played an incoherent jumble on his pipe, and the snake slithered upwards and swayed to the music.

"What a poor musician you are." the European observed "I know a great deal about the Indian musical tradition" (which was true) "and I know that you play very poorly, without any sense of unity of melody."

"Sit here and play it yourself" the Indian suggested dispassionately.

The instrument was about six inches long and was very similar to the a recorder. The European picked it up and began to play an English marching song. The snake attacked him and bit him. He died.

"The poor unfortunate fellow." the indian observed sadly. "He didn't understand that while I do make music, my real work of art is the proper union of the music with the snake. All would do well to remember this. It destroys all differences between the objective value of the art and judgements of taste."

My Personal Library

I recently went through the exercise (and I think you should too) of looking through my family's library and deciding which things I thought I would want to take with me, should I ever leave the library behind. I selected based on my opinion of them, whether I thought I would need my own personal copy (not just a library copy) and the likelihood of them being in another library (I didn't take Frankenstein for example). A book could either fit category 2 or categories 3+1 to be selected. Some Chesterton works only fit #1.

And then, when I was done, I arranged them. Not historically, and not alphabetically, but in quite another fashion. I arranged them in order from most Literary to Most Theoretical, which sort of corresponds to Most Dionisyian to Most Apollonian. Now that you know what Dionisian and Apollonian mean, (if you read the last post) you might want to see my list and my ordering. Please comment on my arrangement. Books that are both very Apollonian and very Dionisyan are generally placed close to the middle.

List of books from Most Literary to Most Theoretical

Category 1: Poetry

The Yale Complete works of Shakespeare
Beowulf
The Odes of Horace

Category 2: Prose

Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte, with notes by Joseph Pearce
Nancy Drew: the Thirteenth Pearl
The Hardy Boys: While the Clock Ticked

Intermediate Category 1: Historical Fiction

Come Rack! Come Rope! By Robert Hugh Benson (a story about Catholics in Elizabethian times)
Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather
Spanish Lover by Spearman (the story of Don Juan of Austria)

Intermediate category 2: Literary Criticism

A Student’s guide to Classics
The Politically Incorrect guide to English and American Literature by Elizabeth Cantor
Shadowplay by Claire Asquith (Sort of like the Da Vinci Code for Shakespeare, except that it’s
both scholarly and rabidly pro-Catholic.)

Intermediate category 3: The Silmarillion

Category 3: History, Theology, and practical matters

St. Francis of Assisi by GK. Chesterton
G.K. Chesterton on War and Peace (Nespaper articles written around WWI)
33 Questions about American History you’re not supposed to Ask by Thomas Woods
The Bible
The Everlasting man by GK Chesterton (The theoretical midpoint of the collection)
The American Boy’s handy book
The Student’s guide to the Core Curriculum by Mark Henrie
The Student’s guide to Liberal Learning by Father James V. Schall
The Philosophy of Tolkien by Peter Kreeft
Saint Thomas Aquinas by GK Chesterton
The Story of Thought by Brian Magee (history of philosophy)
The Catechism (book on Catholic doctrine)

Category 4: Art Theory

The Elements of Music by Ralph Turek
The Art of Counterpoint

Intermediate category 4: Aesthetics

Placing Aesthetics by Robert H Wood
Art And Scholasticism by Jaques Maritain

Category 5: Philosophy

Philosophy 101 by Peter Kreeft
Socrates meets Marx by Peter Kreeft
Socrates meets Descartes by Peter Kreeft
The Hellenistic Philosophers (selections from Stoics, Epicureans, etc)
Thomas Aquinas on Human Nature (Selections from Summa, commentaries, etc)
Five Texts on the Mideval Problem of Universals (If you don’t understand the title, don’t read the book.)

But Look anway.

If I have internet in Florence I will be sending lots of pictures to this blog in June. Woo Hoo!

Warning. We Hibernate in the Summer

As I am out of school and not supposed to post from home, there will be very few posts this summer, I think. So if you visit every day, be prepared for a very conservative (as in unchanging) blog.

The Artistic Temperament...NOT!

Since I haven't posted anything in a relatively long time, you might be inspired to recall G.K. Chesterton's magnificent essay "On the Wit of Whistler." What is happening to the poster during his absence of posts? Is he fairly exploding with unexpressible artistic impulses, just like the minor poet? Or is he simply not being visited by his muse and is being an ordinary person?

The answer is neither. I am being visited by the muse, but the idea is so big that it is takes a long sitting to get out, and time is going through a recession for me right now. This one will be only temporary, as I do not practice inflation or bailouts.

The Index and Les Miserables

I was just informed that Les Miserables used to be on the Catholic Church's now-abolished Index of Forbidden Books because of its strong pro-French-Revolution sentiments. I am not forbidding discussion of this book on this blog, just advising caution.

A note about the Index: though it no longer has binding power, we are still encouraged to avoid books that could be a danger to our salvation and can commit sin by reading such books. What books these are will vary from person to person (Example: Descartes (who was on the index years ago) is no danger to Peter Kreeft, though he might be to Peter Jaros.) The index did not prevent the flow of knowledge because people who had a good cause to read the books within it were permitted to do so.

Provocation

Once upon a time, I had a post that got 50 comments in two days. It was like being in, well, not where I am now. So, if you have an idea controversial enough yet unstupid enough to get that sort of response from us, please post it in the comments box. Try to make it relevant to the blog topic.

Hans Lundahl is back!

look on the post about him and on "the Book, Part IV'

The Dead Blog Syndrome

There is a deadly malady going around Blogger. An infectious disease known as "The Dead Blog Syndrome". This disease is highly contagious. It starts as a lack of desire to write. It gradually consumes you until you are unable to write anything at all.

If you read this, you are vulnerable to The Dead Blog Syndrome". Beware!!!!

Do We Have A Dead Blog?

Where have all the new posts gone? Long time passing..... Anyway, it would seem that this blog has had a lot of dead time lately. How much dead time does it take for the blog to be dead? Old Fashioned Liberal, I think we need another dead blog poem.

The Polls Are Closed!!!!

I will assume the role of statician here. As I'm sure you've all noticed,
the two polls have been closed for some time now. Popular opinion
states that polls are usefull and the Romantic Period was the greatest
era in music. That sums it up folks!!!

The Disapearance of Our Friend Hans Lundahl

I'm not upstaging you by posting about the temperaments, Old
Fashioned Liberal, so I'm keeping my promise. :-)

I have noticed that our friend Hans hasn't been around lately;
here or on any of his blogs. Now, due to my mistrust of
governments in general (particularly our present ones), I would
say that he "disappeared" due to the French government disliking
him. But that's just my conspiracy theory. :-) If you're out there,
Mr. Lundahl, maybe you wouldn't mind letting us know? That way,
I wouldn't be falsely accusing the French government. :-)

Labels

I would highly encourage all new visitors to investigate the labels list on the right side of the screen. It is an excellent way for you to see what sorts of older articles we've got that might interest you.

Diversitheehee

Just wanted to point out the somewhat high level of internationalism on this blog. Although all its contributors are American citizens (at least the last time I checked), Don Pedro wants to obtain Argentinian citizenship. Additionally, we have two international commenters: Hans Lundahl (France) and Relentless (Canada).

Notice that this required no affirmative action or propaganda or even conscious seeking.