Date: Thu, 09 Apr 1998 15:15:41 -0400
From: Louis Irwin <lirwin1-AT-ix.netcom.com>
Subject: Re: BHA: Aesthetics


Colin,

Rejecting my aspect 1 is not an option because it does not involve a 
subjective element.  Recall 1 is "The form of the object, its relations to 
things present and absent."  To reject it you would have to deny, for 
example, the existence of specific key relationships in a work by Mozart.  
All you can do is to maintain that the objective form of a work is 
irrelevant to your aesthetic perception and/or enjoyment of the object, in
other words that 1 is irrelevant to 3.  That is what I accused you of
doing, namely restricting attention to 1 and 3 (and rejecting 1).  And you
do say that you "don't reject that objects/events etc have a form, only
that this form is aesthetically objective."  So here you do accept 1 but
deny that 1 is aesthetically relvant, which is to say you reject 2.

So our disagreement must come down to whether the objective form of a thing 
is relevant to its aesthetic appreciation.  It baffles me how anyone could 
dispute such a thing.  I'm not saying that knowledge of form automatically
produces appreciation, merely that it's a key ingredient.

Do you really think Pavarotti is taking opera to the masses rather than
offering the crudest of consumer products?  (Or did I misread your drift?)
This is an awful example.  You could have cited Louis Armstrong, Duke
Ellington, King Oliver, Thelonius Monk and numerous others as examples of
mass music, and no one would complain about dilution of standards.  But
that buffoon Pavarotti? (And, no question, he was great in his day, 20-30
years ago.)

I am of course sorry to learn that England is drowning in High Art and that
football is on the wane.  Must be the decline of Empire. :)

Louis Irwin 





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