Nearly Relevant

Nonsense, Fiction, and Miscellaneous Things

Harold Bloom postulates a principal footing of aesthetic value. I tend to agree.

"The cardinal principle of the current School of Resentment can be stated with singular bluntness: what is called aesthetic value emanates from class struggle. This principal is so broad that it cannot be wholly refuted. I myself insist that the individual self is the only method and the whole standard for apprehending aesthetic value."¹

It seems to me the idea of class struggle creating the particulars of an aesthetic is a case of mistaken identity; A block of agreement has been mistaken for an aesthetic. More than one individual valuing an aesthetic does not bring into existence the aesthetic but rather produces an agreement. Alternative aesthetics are not negated by a lack of agreement. The particulars of alternative aesthetics - whether held communally, individually, or by any other manner of modification distinguishing the aesthetic as alternative - still exist as an aesthetic. The lack or presence of a supporting mob whether that mob is elitist or high brow, common or low brow, popular or avant-garde, neither defines nor negates an aesthetic and its facets.
It's not unlike the admonition, 'Throwing the baby out with the bathwater.' A grouping of baby with bathwater - no distinguishment between the 2 - leads to throwing the baby out with the bath water. Likewise, group support of or aversion to an aesthetic - which a group support seems endemical to aesthetics defined by class struggle - is not in and of itself the aesthetic. Rather, group support or aversion relates to the idea of agreement or disagreement with aesthetic and not the aesthetic itself.

Posted: Friday, January 9, 2015 with 16 comment(s).

Categories: Miscellaneous, Stories, Books, and Authors,

Tags: Harold Bloom,

Report Abuse

Navigation

Home: Nearly Relevant RSS

Blog Search

Tags

robinson crusoe sailing youth literature zaniness DANIEL DEFOE repentence Mark Twain A CONNECTICUT yANKEE IN kING ARHUR'S COURT HAITI Pat Robertson Rush Limbaugh The Red Badge of Courage Henry Fleming Stephen Crane Don Quixote Knights Honor Stonehenge Li'l Stonehenge ColorPix® colors text background scam email get rich quick Veteran Veteran's Day Nov. 11 Short story Guns policies Poem Spring Seasons Flowers Woods huMor weaTHerMen America joke cows hurricane Irene hurricane preparedness story adventure marooned true accounts Nonsense humor stupid politics 2012 elections The Confetti Machine student stress bluster 'That Evening Sun Go Down' William Faulkner Piano Man brick books Herman Melville Moby Dick reading 'Ball of Fat' Anton Chekhov The Corrections Tomatoes Opuscule 2 idiocy Walks with Men bibleread2013 Hamlet Willa Cather Brian Turner Abelard and Heloise Letters Joseph M. Marshall III card game weird 'The Catcher in the Rye' J.D. Salinger The Sun Also Rises Ernest Hemingway Cormac McCarthy The Road 'Waiting for Godot' 'Orlando' Virginia Woolf John Hawkes Harold Bloom Oliver Twist Charles Dickens The New York Trilogy Paul Auster Truman Capote 'Breakfast at Tiffany's' Writing Errancy: Outcasts_Capitalism_and_Mobility Alberto Lopez Cuenca Denis Johnson mastering english E Minus web world wide web Intermission Vasim and Savim NoLie Scam email

Archives

January, 2016 (3) December, 2015 (4) November, 2015 (3) September, 2015 (2) August, 2015 (1) June, 2015 (1) May, 2015 (3) April, 2015 (1) March, 2015 (1) February, 2015 (1) January, 2015 (2) December, 2014 (2) November, 2014 (1) October, 2014 (1) September, 2014 (1) August, 2014 (3) July, 2014 (3) June, 2014 (1) May, 2014 (3) April, 2014 (1) March, 2014 (2) February, 2014 (2) January, 2014 (2) December, 2013 (2) November, 2013 (2) October, 2013 (1) September, 2013 (3) August, 2013 (2) July, 2013 (3) June, 2013 (1) May, 2013 (2) April, 2013 (3) March, 2013 (1) February, 2013 (3) January, 2013 (3) December, 2012 (4) October, 2012 (2) September, 2012 (3) August, 2012 (2) July, 2012 (3) June, 2012 (2) May, 2012 (4) April, 2012 (3) March, 2012 (3) February, 2012 (3) January, 2012 (1) December, 2011 (3) November, 2011 (2) October, 2011 (3) August, 2011 (2) July, 2011 (1) June, 2011 (1) May, 2011 (2) April, 2011 (2) March, 2011 (2) January, 2011 (1) December, 2010 (1) November, 2010 (1) September, 2010 (1) August, 2010 (1) July, 2010 (2) April, 2010 (2) January, 2010 (1) December, 2009 (2) November, 2009 (2) October, 2009 (3)