Discourse on Language, pt. 1

"Literature is the expression of a feeling of deprivation, a recourse against a sense of something missing. But the contrary is also true: language is what makes us human. It is a recourse against the meaningless noise and silence of nature and history."

-Octavio Paz

I am not sure that I agree with everything in this quote, but what I do like about it, very much, is that it asserts the reality and validity of language--the fact that only human beings can discourse about first causes, motives, beauty . . . and, despite the possibility of misunderstanding, whether deliberate or unintentional, we can, indeed, still gain some measure of knowledge about these things.
This topic is one of recurring, almost compelling, importance for me; I shall continue to poke at it.

the voice of silence

Without [eating and drinking with Christ], there is no progress toward the Kingdom of Heaven, which is the only goal of the Catholic life, whose only language is music--the etymological root of which means "silence," as in "mute" and "mystery." Music is the voice of silence, and so it follows that to enter with Our Beloved Lord into that prayer of quiet and to pray to Our Blessed Lady that He might lead us there, we must learn to speak that langague too, that is, we must know music and especially the music of words which is poetry.

-John Senior, The Restoration of Christian Culture

i have wondered of late whether it is a bad thing that i no longer have a constant obsession for music--even good, quiet, "ordered" music. there is so much noise, of course, even "noise pollution." but art stems from silence, because silence is necessary for contemplation. all good art springs from and leads to contemplation, and we cannot contemplate when we are surrounded by noise. i think of scenes in movies, or even people that i know, who "prepare" to paint by listening to some music to create a certain mood. surely this is artificial. surely true art cannot spring from a falsely created state of mind or emotion. this is hardly "strong emotion recollected in tranquility."
the sound of silence, indeed!

Pieper

Pieper has become a mainstay, because he says such things as this:

Music articulates the inner dynamism of man's existential self . . . but 'music' is never some impersonal, abstract energy; it is 'performed' by musicians with all their distinctive individualities . . . and since the inner growth into ethical personhood is not determined by any unchangeable law of nature but is a process shaped and threatened by countless dangers and interferences, a thousand different expressions of pretense, error, and confusion can also appear. Thus the musical articulation may include a shallow contentment with the facile availability of the cheapest 'goods', the rejection of any ordered structure, the despairing denial that man's existential becoming has a goal at all or that such a goal could be reached.

Only the Lover Sings

Gilson

Etienne Gilson's Arts of the Beautiful sort of misses the whole picture, i think, but this is a good quote:

“To assign art its end is to assign its nature.”

a solid basic premise

"The question of the value of poetry, then, is to be answered by saying that it springs from a basic human impulse and fulfills a basic human interest.  To answer the question finally, and not immediately, one would have to answer the qeustion as to the value of those common impulses and interests . . . As we enter into a study of poetry it is only necessary to see that poetry is not an isolated and eccentric thing, but springs from the most fundamental interests which human beings have."

-Cleanth Brooks and Robert Penn Warren,

Understanding Poetry

I must confess that, despite my long love for and commitment to T. S. Eliot, I have come to the conclusion that New Criticism is an incomplete method.  I will assert, however, that it is a necessary starting point:  to realize that poetry is on some level essential to human nature, and that, since human beings were created in the image and likeness of God, it is a fundamental impulse to create in some manner.

On a slightly different note, I was wondering today if all the poets--that is, those with poetic imaginations--are going into video games?  But when playing a video game, you're not really using your own imagination; you are entering into someone else's imagination, in a way that leaves no room for the sort of imaginative interaction that occurs in art.  I will have to think about it some more, but it's an interesting thought, at least.

the Main Point

Art is only a means to life, to the life more abundant.  It is not in itself the life more abundant.  It merely points the way, something which is overlooked not only by the public, but very often by the artist himself.  In becoming an end it defeats itself.

-Henry Miller

Pater's philosophy

Pater calls himself an Epicurean, illustrating exactly how he implements this philosophy in his novel Marius the Epicurean, a sort of creepy novel where Marius is accidentally martyred because of his love for experiencing pleasure through beauty.  Of course, understood from another perspective, the love of beauty does, indeed, lead to salvation.  What one must keep in mind with Pater, however, is that beauty does not actually mean beauty, but pleasure.  Aristotle contrasts this to the virtuous life, where those who strive for virtue experience pleasure as a side, and do not need to go chasing pleasure as an appendage to life, as its own or an additional goal.  In addition, it is eminently clear in his writings that Pater does not think, oh epicureanism is the truest, most noble philosophy that will lead to the right ends.  Rather, Pater specifically chooses epicureanism as the philosophy which best fits the ends he desires to achieve; namely, pleasure.

Which leads to the speculation:  how honest are we, really, in our search for truth?  Do we honestly desire it, or are we, too, searching for whatever system will justify the ends we want?

chapter one due tuesday . . .