re. The beauty of fine art reaches further, and lasts longer, than the beauty of literature. And the beauty of music lasts longer than the beauty of fine art. Music is the most universal, the most timeless, of the arts. 12. Educated Laymen A culture of scholars isn’t a healthy culture. A culture that is preoccupied with recapturing the faded beauty of old classics isn’t a healthy culture. But a popular culture that appeals chiefly to uneducated people is also unhealthy. The best culture is a culture that appeals to educated laymen. The best culture respects the old classics, but it also respects the pleasure that contemporary artists provide. The best culture avoids the sterility of scholar culture, and also avoids the barbarism of popular culture. Modern culture isn’t healthy, it isn’t a culture of educated laymen. Modern culture is divided between sterile scholar culture and barbaric popular culture. 13. Goethe Goethe’s novels have little interest for modern readers. Gide described one of Goethe’s novels as “unbelievably silly”; Gide said that Goethe “could not have written it at present.”(5) Like Goethe’s novels, Scott’s novels strike modern readers as dull, though they were once considered immortal classics. There is a certain progression in the history of the novel, a progression that has relegated many early novelists, including Scott and Goethe, to obscurity. The history of the novel casts doubt on the old theory that art, unlike science, is timeless and never progresses. Goethe’s poetry, like most poetry, holds little attraction for those who read it in translation. (As Robert Frost said, “poetry is what gets lost in translation.”) Goethe’s best works, for those who read him in translation, are his autobiography and his conversations, as recorded by Eckermann. His autobiography is as pleasurable to read as Rousseau’s autobiograp...
