120 CHAPTER FOUR .. MUSIC AND OPERA
FORMAL AND TECHNICAL QUALITIES
We all have favorite forms of music: tejano, reggae, rock, rhythm and blues, rap, gospel, or Classical. Occasionally we are surprised to find that our favorite tune or musical form was once something else: a rock tune that first was an operatic aria, or an ethnic style that combines styles from other ethnic traditions. W hatever the case, all music comprises rhythms and melodies-they differ only in the ways they are put together. In this chapter we shall con centrate first on some traditional forms, but after that we discuss qualities that apply to all music.
Music has often been described as the purest of the art forms because it is free from the physical restrictions of space that apply to the other arts. However, the freedom enjoyed by the composer becomes a constraint for us lis teners because music places significant responsibility on us. That responsibility is especially critical when we try to learn and apply musical terminology, because we have only a fleeting moment to capture many of the character istics of music. A painting or a sculpture stands still for us; it does not change or disappear, despite the length of time it takes us to examine and appreciate. Our attempt to grasp musical terminology appears more challenging because many of the concepts seem technical and most of the terminology foreign: specifically Italian. Nonetheless, music plays such a natural and ever-present role in our lives that we undoubtedly know and can perceive more than we suspect at both a formal and a technical level.
FORMS
At a formal level, our experience of a musical work begins with its type, or form. The term fonn is a very broad one. In addition to the forms we identify momentarily, all of which are associated with what we call "classical" (seri ous, or "high" art) music, we can also identify broader "forms" of music of which "classical" is only one-for example, the musical forms of jazz, pop/rock, and so on (see the Companion Website: Music, Musical Forms). As we will see in Chapter 11, the term Classical also refers to a specific style of music within this broad "classical" form.
The basic form of a music composition shapes our ini tial encounter by providing us with some specific parameters for understanding. Unlike our experience in the theatre, we usually find an identification of the musi cal composition, by type, in the concert program. Here are a few of the more common forms: three vocal forms and three instrumental forms. We will encounter a few more
in Part II of the text, and will define them within their historical contexts.
Mass The mass is a sacred choral composition consisting of five
'sections: Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus; �Ad Ag;UJi Dei. tKEE-ree-ay; KRAY-doh; SAHNK-toos; AHN-yoos-day ee). These also form the parts of the mass ordinary-the Roman Catholic church texts that remain the same from day to day throughout most of the year. The Kyrie text implores, "Lord , have mercy upon us. Christ, have mercy upon us. Lord, have mercy upon us." The Gloria text begins, "Glory be to God on High, and on earth peace, good will towards men." The Credo states the creed: "We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth," and so on. The Sanctus confirms, "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Hosts: Heaven and earth are full of thy glory. Glory be to thee, 0 Lord Most High." The Agnus Dei (Lamb of God), implores , "0 Lamb of God, that takest away the sins of the world, have mercy upon us. 0 Lamb of God, that takest away the sins of the world, have mercy upon us. 0 Lamb of God, that takest away the sins of the world, grant us thy peace." (Listen to "Kyrie" from the Pope Marcellus Mass by Palestrina [Pa-Ieh STREE-nahl, music CD track 7.) The requiem mass, which often comprises a musical program, is a special
V�ass for the dead. -
Cantata A cantata is usually a choral work with one or more
"'soloists and an instrumental ensemble. Written in several movements, and typified by the chu�h cantata of the Lutheran church of the Baroque period, it often includes chorales and organ accompaniment. The word "cantata" originally meant a sung iece. The Lutheran church can-
ta exemplified by those ofJohahn Sebastian Bach) uses a religiOUS text, either original or drawn from the Bible or based on familiar hymns-chorales. In essence, it served as a sermon in music, drawn from the lectionary (pre scribed Bible readings for the day and on which the ser mon is based). A typical cantata might last twenty-five minutes and include several different movements-cho ruses, recitatives, arias, and duets.
Oratorio An oratorio is a lar e-scale composition usin chorus, vocal soloists, and orchestra. orma y an oratorio sets ; narrative text (usually bilill'cal) , but does not emp[oy acting, scenery, or costumes. The oratorio was a major
evelmeIll of the Baroque period. This type of musical composition unfolds through a series of choruses, arias, duets, recitatives, and orchestral interludes. The chorus of an oratorio has special importance and can comment on or participate in the dramatic exposition. Another feature of the oratorio is the use of a narrator, mh� recitativ§. (vo�al lines imitating the rhythms and inflections of nor-
-mal speech) tell the story aaaconnect the various pa� Like operas, oratonos can last more than two hours.
- (Listen to Handel's "Hallelujah Chorus" from the oratorio Messiah, music CD track 9.)
Fugue �ue is a polyphonic (see p. 127) composition based on one main them...e,.. It can be written for a group of instruments or voices or for a single instrument like an organ or harpsichord. Throughout the composition, d.i.i: faent melodic lines, called "voices," imitate the subjec� The top melodic line is the soprano and the bottom line the bass. A fugue usually includes three, four, or five voic es. The composer's exploration of the subject typically passes through different keys and combines with different melodic and rhythmic ideas. Fugal form is extremely flex ible: the only constant feature is the beginning, in which a single, una<::companied voice states the theme. The lis tener's task, then, is to remember that subject ancUollow it through th;.. various manipulations that f911ow.
Symphony n orchestral com osition, usually in four movements, a
symphony typically lasts etween twenty and forty-five minutes . In this large work, the composer explores the full dynamic and tonal range of the orchestral ensemble. The symphony came from the Classical period of the late eighteenth century and evokes a wide range of carefully �d emotions throug.h contrasts of tempo and mood. The sequence of movements usually begins with an active fast movement, changes to a lyrical slow move ment, moves to a dancelike movement, and closes with a bold fast movement. The opening movement almost always takes a specific shape-sonata form-in which a theme is introduced, alternated, and repeated. In most Cla ssical symphonies, each movement is self-contained with its own set of themes. Unity in a symphony occurs panly from the use of the same key in three of the move ments and also from careful emotional and musical com plement among the movements. (Listen to Haydn's S!,mphony No. 94 in G Major, "Surprise", music CD track 11; also Beethoven'S Symphony No.5 in C Minor-first movement, music CD track 14. In the Haydn, listen for
CHAPTER FOUR + MUSIC AND OPERA 121
the theme's mood. In the Beethoven, listen for repetition of the theme.)
Concerto A solo concerto Ckahn-CHAIR-toh) is an extended com-
�position for an instrumental soloist and orchestra. Reaching its zenith during the Classical period of the eighteenth century, it typically contains three movements, in which the first is fast, the second slow, and the third fast. ,.Concertos jojn a soloist's virtuosity and interpretive skills with the wide-ranging dynamics and tonal colors of �n orchestra. The concerto thus provides a dramatic con trast of musical ideas and sound in which the soloist is tJ;te
�ically, concertos present a great challenge to the soloist and a great reward to the listener, who can delight in the soloist's meeting of the techniqll and interpretive challenges of the work. Nonetheless, the concerto bal ances the orchestra and soloist, which act as partners, fOCUSing on the interplay between them. Concertos can last from twenty to forty-five minutes (listen to Brandenburg Concerto No.2 in F Major, music CD track 8). Typically, during the first movement, and sometimes the third, of a Classical concerto, the soloist has an unaccom panied showpiece called a cadenza.
Common in the late Baroque period of the seventeenth century (see Chapter 11), the concerto &rosso is a compo sition for several instrumental soloists and small orch§; tra (in contrast to the solo concerto-see above). In the
-
Baroque style, contrast between loud and soft sounds and large and small groups of performers was typical. In a concerto grosso, a small group of soloists (two to four) contrasts a larger group called the tutti consisting of between eight and twenty players. Most often a concerto grosso contains three movements contrasting in tempo and character. The first movement is fast; the second, slow; and the third, fast. The opening movement, usually bold, explores the contrasts between tutti and soloists. The slow movement tends to be more lyrical, quiet, and intimate. The final movement is lively, lightheaned, and sometimes dancelike.
COMPOSITION
Understanding vocabulary and being able to identify its application in a musical composition helps us to compre hend communication using the musical language, and thereby to understand the creative communicative intent of the composer and the musicians who bring the com position to life. The ways in which musical artists shape the characteristics that follow bring us experiences that can challenge our intellects and excite our emotions.
122 CHAPTER FOUR .. MUSIC AND OPERA
As in all communication, meaning depends upon each of the parties involved; communicators and listeners must assume responsibility for facility in the language utilized.
Among the basic elements by which music is com posed, we discuss six: (1) Sound; (2) Rhythm; (3) Melody; (4) Harmony; (5) Tonality; and (6) Texture.
Sound Musical composers design sounds and silences. In the broadest sense, sound is anything that excites the audito ry nerve: sirens, speech, crying babies, jet engines, falling trees, and so on. We might even call such sources noise. Musical composition, although it can employ even "noise," usually depends on controlled and shaped sound, consistent in quality. We distinguish music from other sounds by recognizing four basic properties: (1) pitch; (2) dynamics; (3) tone color; and (4) duration.
PITCH Pitch is a physical phenomenon measurable in vibrations per second. Therefore, when we describe dif ferences in pitch we describe recognizable and measura ble differences in sound waves. A pitch has a steady, con stant frequency. A faster frequency produces a higher pitch; a slower frequency produces a lower pitch. Making a sounding body-a vibrating string, for example-small er makes it vibrate more rapidly. Musical instruments designed to produce high pitches, such as the ·piccolo, therefore tend to be small. Instruments designed to pro duce low pitches tend to be large-for instance, bass viols and tubas. In music, we call a sound that has a definite Jljtcb a tone �
In Chapter 1 we discussed color. It comprises a range of light waves within a visible spectrum. Sound also com prises a spectrum, whose audible pitches range from 16 to 38,000 vibrations per second. We can perceive 11,000 dif ferent pitches! That exceeds practicality for musical com position. Therefore, by convention musicians traditional ly divide the sound spectrum into at least ninety equally spaced frequencies comprising seven and a half o ctaves. A piano keyboard consists of eighty-eight keys (seven
q Dii
D� E�
4.1 Part of the piano keyboard, with pitches.
F G A
,.j
! Q. Q. Q. ! -!! Q. -! -!! ! ..!II � -!! ..!II ..!II j � "E
0 a ==
� � � � � � 0 ::c ::c I I i i i
i i
! I
I I
do re mi Fa sol 10 Ii do
Major scale Minor scale (diatonic)
do re mi Fa sol 10 Ii do I
I I
i i i I
i I
i I I
! Q. Q.
t Q. t Q.
-!! -!i -!i � ..!II "5
1 " "5 "E "E
� ::c � ::c ..c: ::c
b -b c: 0
�
4.2 The maior and minor scales.
octaves plus two additional notes), which represents the same number of equally spaced pitches (Fig. 4.0.
A scale JD arrangemeat of pitSAeS played jD ascend� ing or descending order-is a conventional organization of the frequencies of the sound spectrum. The thirteen equally spaced pitches in an octave comprise a chromatic scale. However, the scales that sound most familiar to us are the major and minor scales, each of which consists of an octave of eight pitches. The distance between anl:!�o pitches is an interval. Intervals between two adjacent
�pitches are half steps. Intervals of two half steps are whole steps. The major scale-do re mi fa solla ti do (recall the song, "Doe, a deer ... " from The Sound of Music)-has a specific arrangement of whole and half steps (Fig. 4.2). Lowering the third and sixth notes of the major scale gives us the harmonic (the most common) minor scale.
Not all music conforms to the conventions of Western scales. European music prior to approximately 1600 C.E. does not, nor does Eastern music, which makes great use of quarter tones. In addition, some contemporary Western music departs completely from the conventions of to nality. Listen, for example to tracks 1 and 2 on the music CD. These examples represent cultures whose music does not conform to the Western conventions of pitch, scale, and tonality.
DYNAMICS We call degrees of loudness or soft music dynamicS. Any tone can e oud, soft, or anywhere in between. Dyn-;mics describe the loudness or softness of the tones, measured in decibels, and depend upon the physical phenomenon of amphtude Of vibration. Emp loying greater force in the production of a tone creates wider sound waves and causes greater stimulation of the auditory nerves. This means that the size of the sound wave, not its number of vibrations per second, changes.
---------------------.......... -... � -------
VOICE
r Soprano
STRINGS
WOODWINDS
BRASSES
PERCUSSION
Women's �
Mezzo-soprano
Bass drum
Cello (violoncello)
� Contralto
CHAPTER FOCR + MUSIC AND OPERA 123
Men's .........
Baritone �
Boss
English horn
Trombone
Triangle
Snore drum Cymbal
4.3 The key sources of musical tone in on orchestro (instruments not to scale).
124 CHAPTER FOUR .. MUSIC AND OPERA
Composers indicate dynamic level with a series of spe cific notations:
pp pianissimo (pee-yah-NEE-see-moh) very soft p piano soft mp mezzo (MEHT-zoh) piano moderately soft mf mezzo forte (FOR-tay) moderately loud f forte loud ff fortissimo very loud
The notations of dynamics that apply to an individual tone, such as p, mp, and I, may also apply to a section of music. Changes in dynamics may be abrupt, gradual, wide, or small.
As we listen to and compare musical compositions we can consider the use and breadth of dynamics in the same sense that we consider the use and breadth of palette in painting. Compare the different dynamic treatments of music CD track 1, "Han Ya Xi Shui," particularly the end ing, with music CD track 19, Debussy's "Clair de Lune."
TONE COLOR Tone color, or timbre (TAM-ber), is the characteristic of tone that allows us to distinguish a pi.tch played on a violin, for example, from the same pitch. played on a piano:..ln addition to identifying characteris tic differences among sound-producing sources, tone color can also refer to differences in uali of tones pro duce by the same source. Here the analogy 0 "tone color" is particularly appropriate. We describe a tone pro duced with an excess of air-for example, by a breathy human voice-as "white." Figure 4.3 illustrates some of the various sources that produce musical tone and account for its variety of tone colors (see the Companion Website: Music, Instruments) .
I n the keyboard family, the piano could b e considered either a stringed or a percussion instrument since it pro duces its sound by vibrating strings struck by hammers. The harpsichord sets strings in motion by plucking, and the organ makes sound by air.
Electronically produced music, available since the development of the RCA synthesizer at the Columbia Princeton Electronics Music Center in the 1950s, has become a standard source in assisting contemporary com posers. Originally electronic music fell into two categories: (1) the electronic altering of acoustically produced sounds, which came to be labeled as musique concrete, and (2) elec tronically generated sounds. However, advances in tech nology have blurred those differences over the years.
DURATION Another characteristic of sound is duration: the length of tim@ '1HmHie'R contjnues without "jnremlp-
-�ration in musical composition uses a set of con'":
Note Values
o J J » ) J J Whole Half Quarter Eighth Sixteenth Thirty-second Sixty-fourt.
Rests
Sixty-fourtl
4.4 Musical notation.
ventions called notation (Fig. 4.4). This system consist! of a series of symbols (notes) by which the compose: indicates the relative duration of each tone. The system � progressive-each duration notation uses a symbol eithel double or half the duration of the other notes. Muska notation also includes a series of symbols that denote the duration of silences in a composition. These symbols called rests, have the same values as the symbols for dura tion of tone.
Rhythm Rhythm comprises recurring pulses and accents that cr - ate I entl la e patterns. it out rhythm we have only an aimless rising and falling of tones. Composing music means placing each tone into a time or rhythmical rela tionship with every other tone. As with the dots and dash es of the Morse code we can "play" the rhythm of a musi cal composition without reference to its tones. Each sym bol of the musical notation system denotes a duration rel ative to each other symbol in the system. Rhythm consists of: (1) beat; (2) meter; and (3) tempo (see''tfie Comp""iffiWh
Website: Music, Rhythm).
BEAT The individual pulses we hear are called beats. Beats �ay be grouped into rhythmic patterns by placing accents every few beats. Beats form basic units of time and the background against which the composer places notes of various lengths. ,
� � � iMJ7'�{)r--<-METn Normal musical practice groups clusters of beats into units called measures. When these groupings are reg ular and reasonably equal they comprise simple meters. When the number of beats in a measure equals three or two it constitutes triple or duple meter. We, as listeners, can distinguish between duple and triple meters because of their different accent patterns. In triple meter we hear an accent every third beat-ONE two three, ONE twO three-and in duple meter the accent is every other beat-ONE two, ONE two. If four beats occur in a meas-
-
ure (sometimes called quadruple meter), the second a ccent is weaker than the first-ONE two THREE four, ONE two THREE four.
Listen to music CD track 3, a sample of Ghanaian drumming. Here we find a definite triple meter, as con trasted with the duple meter in music CD track 6, "As Vesta Was Descending." W hen accent occurs on normal ly unaccented beats, we have syncopation, as also occurs in the Ghanaian drumming piece. Sometimes repetitive patterning or strict metrical development does not occur. The free-flowing rhythm of music CD track 4, "0 ViridissimaVirga," by Hildegard of Bingen (see Chapter 10) illustrates the lack of strict metrical development.
TEMPO .l.empo is the rate of speed of the composition. A composer may notate tempo in two ways. The first method is by a metronome marking, such as � ::; 60 means that the piece should be played at the rate of sixty quarter notes (.J) per minute. Such notation is precise. The other method is less precise and involves more descriptive ter minology in Italian:
Largo (broad)
} Grave (grahv) (grave, s olemn)
Lento (slow)
Adagio (ah-DAH-zhee-oh) (leisurely) }
Andante (at a walking pace)
Moderato (m oderate)
Allegro (cheerful)
Vivace (vee-VAH-chay) (vivacious)
Presto (very quick)
Melody
}
}
Melody com rises a succession of sounds wi
Very slow
Slow
Moderate
Fast
Very fast
an tonal organization We can visualize melody as linear and essentially horizontal. Two other terms, tune and theme, relate to melody as parts to a whole. For example, the tune in Figure 4.5 is a melody.
However, a melody is not always a tune. In general, the term tune implies singability, and many melodies can not be considered singable. A theme is also a melody. However, in musical composition theme specifically means a central musical idea, which may be restated and varied throughout a piece. Thus a melody is not neces sarily a theme.
Related to t heme and melody is the motif Cmoh-TEEF), Or motive, a short melodic or rhythmi�around which
CHAPTER FOUR ... MUSIC AND OPERA 125
light
4.5 "The Star-Spangled Banner" (excerpt).
_a composer may design a composition. F or example, in Beethoven's Symphony No. 5 in C Minor (music CD track 14) the first movement develops around a motif of four notes.
In listening for how a composer develops melody, theme, and motif we can use two terms to describe what we hear: conjunct and disjunct. Conjunct melodies com prise notes close together, stepwise, on the musical scale. For example, the interval between the opening notes of the soprano line of]. S. Bach's chorale "Jesu Joy of Man's Desiring" from Cantata 147 (Fig. 4.6) never exceeds a whole step. Disjunct melodies contain intervals of two steps or more. However, no formula exists for determin ing disjunct or conjunct characteristics; no line marks where a melody ceases to be disjunct and becomes conjunct. These constitute relative, desCriptive terms. For example, the opening melody of "The Star-Spangled Banner" (see Fig. 4.5) is more disjunct than the opening melody of "Jesu Joy of Man's Desiring"-or the latter is more conjunct than the former.
4.6 ':Jesu Joy of Man's Desiring" (excerpt).
Harmony
W hen two or more tones sound at the same time, we have harmony. This is essentially a vertical arrangement, in contrast with the horizontal arrangement of melody. However, harmony also has a horizontal property: move ment forward in time. In listening for harmony we listen for how simultaneous tones sound together.
Two tones played simultaneously constitute an inter val; three or more form a chord. When we hear an interval or a chord we respond first to its consonance or dissonance. Consonant harmonies sound pleasant and stable in their arrangement, while dissonant harmonies sound tense and unstable. Consonance and dissonance, however, are not absolute properties. Essentially they derive from conven tion and, to a large extent, culture. Dissonance to our ears may be consonance to someone else's, and vice versa. We
126 CHAPTER FOUR • MUSIC AND OPERl\
--------------------�Pr�-------------------
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
W olfgang Amadeus Mozart (MOHT-zahrt;
. 1756-91) is often considered the greatest musical genius of all time. His output
especially in view of his short life-was enormous and included sixteen operas, forty-one symphonies, twenty-seven piano and five violin concertos, twen ty-five string. quartets, nineteen masses, and other works in every form popular in his time. Perhaps his greatest single achievement is in the characteriza tion of his operatic figures.
Mozart was born on January 27, 1756, i n Salzburg, Austria. His father, Leopold Mozart, held the position of composer to the archbishop and was a welJ-known violinist and author of a celebrated theoretical treatise on playing the instrument. When Wolfgang was only six years old, his father took him and his older sister, Maria Anna, (called Nannerl) on tours throughout Europe during which they per formed as harpsichordists and pianists-separately and together. They gave public concerts and played at the various courts. In Paris in 1764, Wolfgang wrote his first published works, four violin sonatas. In London he came under the influence of Johann Christian Bach. In 1768 young Mozart became hon orary concertmaster for the archbish@p of Salzburg.
In 1772, however, a new archbishop came to power, and the cordial relationship Mozart enjoyed with the previous archbishop came to an end. By 1777 the situation became so strained that the young composer asked to be relieved of his duties, and the archbishop grudgingly agreed.
In 1777 Mozart traveled with his mother to Munich and Mannheim, Germany, and to Paris,
need, above all, to determine how the composer utilizes these two properties . Most Western music sounds primari ly consonant. Dissonance, on the other hand, can be used for contrast, to draw attention to itself, or as a normal part of harmonic progression.
As its name implies, harmonic progression involves the movement forward in time of harmonies. In discussing pitch we noted the convention of the major and minor scales-the arrangement of the chromatic scale into a sys tem of tonality. When we play or sing a major or minor scale we note a particular phenomenon: our movement
where she died. During this trip alone, Mozart com posed seven violin sonatas, seven piano sonatas, a ballet, and three symphonic works, including the Paris Symphony.
The final break between Mozart and the archbish op occurred in 1781, but before that time Mozart had unsuccessfully sought another position. Six years later, in 1787, Emperor Joseph II finally engaged him as chamber composer-at a salary con siderably smaller than that of his predecessor. Mozart's financial situation worsened steadily, and he incurred significant debts that hounded him until his death.
Meanwhile, his opera The Abduction from the Seraglio (suh-RAH-Iee-oh) enjoyed great success in 1782; in the same year he married Constanze Weber, the daughter of friends. He composed his great Mass in C Minor for her, and she was the soprano soloist in its premiere.
During the last ten years of his life, Mozart pro duced most of his great piano concertos; the four horn concertos; the Haffner, Prague, Unz,. and Jupiter symphonies; the six string quartets dedicat ed to Haydn; five string quintets; and the major operas, The Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni, Cosi /1Jn Tutte, La C/emenza di Tito, and The Magic Flute. Mozart could not complete his final work, the Requiem, because of illness. He died in Vienna on December 5,1791, and was buried in a mass grave. Although the exact nature of his illness is unknown, no evidence exists that Mozart's death was deliber ately caused (as the popular movie, Amadeus, implies). Learn more at www.mozartproject.org.
from do to re to mi to fa to sol to la is smooth and seems natural. But when we reach the seventh tone of the scale, ti, something happens. It seems as though we must con tinue back to do·, the tonic of the scale. Try it! Sing a major scale and stop at t1. You feel uncomfortable. Your mind tells you that you must resolve that discomfort by return ing to do. That same sense of tonality-that sense of the tonic-applies also to harmony. Within any scale a series of chords may be developed on the basis of the individual tones of the scale . Each of the chords has a subtle rela tionship to each of the other chords and to the tonic. That
relationship creates a sense of progression that leads back to the chord based on the tonic.
Tonality Utilization of tonality or key has taken composers in various directions over the centuries. Conventional tonality, employing the major and minor scales and keys, forms the basis for most sixteenth- to twentieth centur y Western music, as well as traditionally oriented music of the twentieth century.
In the early twentieth century, some composers aban doned traditional tonality. Atonal compositions sought the freedom of any combination of tones without the necessity of having to resolve chordal progressions. Typically compositions using traditional tonality begin in a home key, modulate away, and return at the end.
Texture Texture in painting and sculpture denotes surface quali ty-roughness or smoothness . Texture in weaving denotes the interrelationship of the warp and the woof the horizontal and vertical threads in fabric. The organi zation in Figure 4.7 would be described as open or loose texture; that in Figure 4.8, closed or tight. No single musical arrangement corresponds to either of these spa tial concepts. The characteristic called sonority describes
. the relationship of tones played at the same time. A chord with large intervals between its members would have a more open, or thinner, sonority (or texture) than a chord with small intervals between its tones; that chord would have a tight , thick, or close sonority or texture. Tradi tionally, however, musical texture refers to the wa in which composers use me 0 ic ines in their pieces. Three basic musical textures comprise ,:nonophony, polyphonx..... and homophony.
- �--�----
--
r 4.7 Open (loose) texture.
\1
4.8 Closed (tight) texture.
CHAPTER FOUR .. MUSIC AND OPERA 127
MONOPHOf-,lY When a single musical line exists without accompanjment, the piece has a monophonic texture. Many voices or instruments may play at the same time, as in the Gregorian chant illustrated on music CD track 4, but as long as they sing the same notes at the same time in unison-the texture remains monophonic. In Handel's "Hallelujah Chorus" (music CD track 9), there occur instances in which men and women sing the same notes in different octaves. This still represents mono phony.
POLYPHONY Polyphony means "many-sounding," and it occurs when �a or more meJodic lines of relatively equal !!!.terest perform at the same time. This combining tech nique, also called counterpoint, appears in Palestrina's "Kyrie" from the Pope Marcellus Mass (music CD track 7). When the counterpoint uses an immediate restatement of the musical idea, as in the Desprez, then the composer utilizes imitation.
HOMOPHONY When chords accompany one main melody, we haveh'Omopfiomc texture. Here the composer focuses attention on the melody by supporting it with subordinate sounds. In a Bach chorale, for example, all four voices sing together simultaneously. The main melody occurs in the soprano, or top, part. The lower parts sing melodies of their own, which differ from the main melody, but, rather than being independent as would be the case in polyphony, they support the sopra no melody and move with it in a progression of chords related to the syllables of the text.
SENSE STIMULI
OUR PRIMAL RESPONSES We can find no better means of illustrating the sensuous effect of music than to contrast two totally different musi cal pieces. Debussy's "Clair de Lune" (music CD track 19) provides us with an example of how musical elements can combine to give us a relaxing and soothing experience. Here, the tone color of the piano, added to the elements of a constant beat in triple meter, consonant harmonies, subtle dynamiC contrasts, and extended duration of the tones combine in a richly subdued experience that engages us but lulls us at the same time. In contrast, Stravinsky'S «Auguries of Spring: Dance of Youths and Maidens" from The Rite of Spring (music CD track 21) has driving rhythms, strong syncopation, dissonant har monies, wildly contrasting dynamics, and the broad tonal
128 CHAPTER FOUR .. MUSIC AND OPERA
palette of the orchestra to rivet us and ratchet up our excitement leveL We cannot listen to this piece or the frantic pulsations of Leonard Bernstein's (1918-90; BURN-stine) "Mambo" (music CD track 23) without experiencing a rise in pulse rate. In all cases, our senses have responded at an extremely basic level over which we have, it would seem, little controL
Music contains a sensuous attraction difficult to deny. At every turn it causes us to tap our toes, drum our fin gers, or bounce in our seats in a purely physical response. This involuntary motor response perhaps represents the most primitive aspect of our sensuous involvement-as primitive as the images in Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring. If the rhythm is irregular and the beat divided or synco pated, as in this piece of music, we may find one part of our body doing one thing and another part doing some thing else. Having compared the Debussy and Stravinsky pieces, do we have any doubt that a composer's choices have the power to manipulate us sensuously?
From time to time throughout this chapter, we have referred to certain historical conventions that permeate the world of music. Some of these have a potential effect on our sense response. Some notational patterns can form a kind of musical shorthand, or perhaps mime, that con veys certain kinds of emotion to the listener. This, of course, has little meaning for us unless we take the time and effort to study music history. Some of Mozart's string quartets, for example, indulge in exactly this kind of com munication-another illustration of how expanded knowledge can increase the depth, value, and enjoyment of the aesthetic experience.
THE MUSICAL PERFORMAN CE
A certain part of our sense response to music occurs as a result of the nature of the performance itself. As we sug gested earlier in the chapter, the scale of a symphony orchestra gives a composer a tremendously variable can vas on which to paint. Let's pause, momentarily, to famil iarize ourselves with this fundamental aspect of the musi cal equation. As we face the stage in an orchestral concert, we note perhaps as many as one hundred instrumentalists facing back at us. Their arrangement from one concert to another is fairly standard, as illustrated in Figure 4.9.
A large symphony orchestra can overwhelm us with diverse timbres and volumes; a string quartet cannot. Our expectations and our focus change as we perceive the per formance of one or the other. Because, for example, we know our perceptual experience with a string quartet will not involve the broad possibilities of an orchestra, we tune ourselves to seek the subtler, more personal mes sages within that particular medium. The difference
between listening to an orchestra and listening to a quar tet is similar to the difference between viewing a museum painting of monumental scale and the exquisite technique of a miniature.
Programmatic suggestion can have much to do with sensual response to a musical work. Debussy's Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun elicits images of Pan frolicking through the woodlands and cavorting with the nymphs on a sunny afternoon. Of course, much of what we imag ine has been stimulated by the title of the composition. Our perception is heightened further if we know the poem by Mallarme (mah-Iahr-MAY) on which the sym phonic poem is based. This piece represents program music, which comprises instrumental music associated with a story, poem, idea, or scene. Absolute music compris es instrumental music without a program. Titles, and especially text, in musical compositions may be the strongest devices a composer has for communicating directly with us. Images are triggered by words, and they can stimulate our imaginations and senses to wander freely "in tune" with the musical development. Johannes Brahms called a movement in his Ger man ReqUiem "All Mortal Flesh is as the Grass"; we certainly receive a philo sophical and religious communication from that title. Moreover, when the chorus ceases to sing and the orches tra plays alone, the instrumental melodies stimulate images of fields of grass blowing in the wind.
Harmony and tonality both have considerable impor tance in stimulating· our senses. Just as paintings and sculpture stimulate sensations of rest and comfort or action and discomfort, so harmonies create a feeling of repose and stability if consonant and a sensation of rest lessness and instability if dissonant. Harmonic progres sion that leads to a full cadential resolution leaves us feel ing fulfilled; unresolved cadences puzzle and perhaps irri tate us. Major or minor tonalities have Significantly dif fering effects: major sounds positive; minor, sad or mys terious. The former seems close to home, and the latter exotic. Atonal music sets us adrift to find the unifying thread of the composition.
Melody, rhythm, and tempo have close parallels to the use of line in painting, and the term melodic contour could be seen as a musical analogue to this element of painting. At this point we should consider enhancing and express ing our responses in all the arts by noting the shared ter minology among the arts disciplines-for example, line, form, color, rhythm, repetition, and harmony-and grasping the nuances of how that terminology applies across diSciplinary lines. When the tones of a melody are conjunct and undulate slowly and smoothly, they trace a pattern having the same effect as their linear visual coun terpart-sensuous, soft, comfortable, and placid.
CHAPTER FOUR + MUSIC AND OPERA 129
,..-
I Snore Drum (1) Tympani (4) Trumpets (4) Cymbals (1 pair) i Tuba (1)
Xylophone (1) Boss Drum (1)
Glockenspiel (1) French Horns (6) Trombones (4)
1 Clarinets (3) Contrabassoon (1)
Horps (2) Piccolo (1) English Horn (1)
� Flutes (3) Oboes (3) Double Boss (8)
Second Bass Clarinet (1) Bassoons (3)
Piano (1) Violins (16)
I Violas (12)
I First Violins (1 8)
I Condudor I Cellos (10)
4.9 Typical seating plan for a large orchestra (about 100 instrumentolists), showing the placement of instrumental sections,
When melodic contours are disjunct and tempos rapid, the pattern and response change:
In conclusion, it remains for us as we respond to music to analyze how each of the elements available to the com poser has in fact become a part of the channel of commu nication, and how the composer (consciously or uncon sciously) has put together a work that elicits sensory responses from us. The "Thinking Critically" section at the end of this chapter offers some suggestions on effec tive listening.
�--- ---- ��-� .... -.... -- .. --�
Ideology
T his chapter brings tagether twa natians that we have already intraduced but left rather underdevelaped: .E.0wer and the
social CQPsR;�];l.Qf reality. Every saciety attempts ta guarantee its' own cantinuing existence. A saciety maintajnsitself by:reproducin� its institutians and)t� structure.af,�acj.9.Lre.ktigp�R? Ta da sa, it has ta continuausly reproduce the things necessary far its existence, from the resaurces ta produce faod and shelter far its peaple, ta the labar neces sary ta transform these resources inta commadities, ta the individuals willing and able ta participate in the institutians and .occupy their assigned roles in the sacial relatianships. But we have been suggesting throughaut this baak that the institutians and relatianships that consti tute a saciety always embady structures .of pawer and inequality. If a society is ta cantinue existing, it must, therefare, ensure that its particu lar relatians .of pawer-its particular hierarchies .of ecanamic, palitical, and cultural power-cantinue ta .operate with same appearance .of legit imacy in the lives .of the general papulatian. One way .of daing that is ta use farce ta cantrol peaple's lives and to actively suppress appasitian. �11hling and...n:tQI:�.QflDt way io.volyesg¥tting eeaple ta - -y_ �cept an ideolo&1�12articula� w�.Y QLth�kll,}g a�d seeing"the wa�ld ./f' lhat makes the eXlstmg.2!g<gl.lZ,!h()D�o�J.reJatlo�QQear nafUreT and inevitable. Althaugh suchid.eill!lgica1 power the.....attempt to define --- r�lity in l?articular wa�has always been part of social life, its
1 93
. ./
MAKING SENSE OF THE MED IA
importance increased significantly in the eighteenth and nineteenth . centuries, as part of the processes of modernization in Europe and
America. Historically, becoming modern involved the democratiza tion of both political and cultural life. As "the masses" gained political power and cultural literacy, partly as a result of the develop�e�t of new communication media, the use of force became more diffIcult, costly, and visible, and thus it became an instrument only of last resort. Instead, society came to rely more and more on the ideologi cal possibilities of communication and culture.
IDEOLOGY, REAilTY, AND REPRESENT ATION
The issue of ideology is closely tied to the discussion in the previous
two chapters: �dia ma�� meanings ane! �ganize them into vari
ous codes and systems. Implicit in these argu ments is the assumption
th�t'ili�s�=�des intejin�t!�f!.hty; they make the world meaningful and
comprehensible. T.b� .. Jnt!Qd�cti0I1. � .f . t�r.IT1�)i�� .r�fl{ity..and.J:bg.J1 1Qrld.
signals _ the _m�ve from._ gu��!i on�_ gf �eanJng . . t�.q1Jg§.tj.��g�esen:
tation .from.cuHvre tQ ideo19gy. After all, th ere are lots of mearungful
·t�xts {hat do not ne�-;���rily�iaim to describe an actual reality. Much of
the time, people assume they know the dif ference between fact and
fiction; although, as we shall see, this assum ption is very problematic.
Many meaningful statements explicitly descr ibe a world that is not
actual (for example, a world in which a man with super strength and
X-ray vision constantly saves the world from bad guys). That world
might be one that we can imagine; it might ev en be one that we assume
to be plausible. Or there may be certain featu res of that world that we
take to be descriptive of our own world. For example, we might agree
that the legitimate law enforcement agencie s need help, or that the
difference between the good guys and the bad guys is obvious. Other
meaningful texts describe fantasies that people may take to be describ
ing impossible realities or at least realities th at they would not want
to see actualized. People experience the world only through th
e cultural codes of
meaning that enable them to interpret or make sense of the world. Yet
people are capable of understanding many co des �f me�g that :�ey
are incapable of experiencing as possible or even Imagmable realIties.
In other words, certain codes of meaning are not only intelligible, they
194
Ideology
are also assumed to be descriptions or possible descriptions of the wor
. ld. As descriptions or representations, particular codes appear
. ObVlOUS, commonsensical, and even natural. They are assumed to be objective descriptions of how things are and, more often than not, of how things have to be.
The word representation literally means "re-presentation." To �e-pres:,
nt somet�ng �eans to take an original, mediate it, and "play It bac� .
. But, agam, this process almost necessarily alters the reality of
the . ongmal: �ejJ!���� g2!�!DY£l¥.�_�ma\2n�aim on and. allout.. _;e�l,�!y: but It IS not the same as realism. It is not merely a matter of
realistIcall� . constructing an imagined world; it is not merely a matter
of what cnhcs have called "the willful suspension of disbelief. " In this sense of r�alism, the producer of a text will try to maximize the experi ence and Impact of the text on the audience by drawing the audience into the universe that the text has created. Hence, as we have noted films use continuity editing to create the illusion, not that this is the real wor
. ld, but that the world the film creates has a reality of its own, a
r�alIty that acts in much the same way as the reality of the world out SIde the text behaves. Even so-called reality TV is a representation. The producers use a variety of techniques (such as hand held cameras "confessional" type interviews, or "surveillance camera" type images) to convince the audience that what is presented is unmediated, or at least less m
.
ediated than what is on television the r . est O
. f . t . h
. e time.
/ .10 make a [email protected].!J:¥-ta..bide.tJ;lIait....QWll. .£resence in and operation o�lh':._t�t As we have already suggested, a produc�r w�o IS aImmg for realism will avoid editing practices that emphaSIze his or her own interventions; for example, audiences notice such things as jump cuts, when cinematographers and video editors keep � camera a�d subjects in the same position but edit out a portion of a fIlmed or VIdeotaped sequence. They not only notice that some thing is missing but are also reminded that the world they are seeing is not "real" because it has been produced. The illusion of realism is broken. And
. for just this reason, media producers seek to avoid jump
cuts: They aIm for a seamless, involving presentation that draws the audience's attention into the content. The audience must "forget" for a mo�ent that the text is "just a text" producing meaning: Its realism, whic
. h may or may �ot necessitate that the world of the text has specific
relations to the audIence's everyday reality, depends on the audience's ability to imagine the actualization of that world.
1 95
MAK ING SENSE OF THE MED I A
two of the authors were wat ching the .
first For example, when 1 d
. dway through the mOVIe, as . . 1990 we were start e ml . d Batman mOV1e � ' . . hen a college student
sitting behm us Batman is scalmg a b.Ull
dmg, ; 1" U to then, we guess, he had fou
nd blurted out, "Cheez, ls that fad
ey . d
� a bat costume and hopping off If own-up resse m . f the portraya 0 a gr . 0 D nnis Muren the supervI
sor 0 f tly plaus1ble. r, as e ' . skyscrapers per ec d
. f e Academy Award Winner special effects for Terminator
2 a.n � SlX- l
t m
hy Everyone can tell if . t "Reality 1S so OUC .
in that category, put 1 , hin . unbelievable, you've lost the
something isn't real. Once somet g IS
" ( t d in Pollak 1991, p. B2). li . audience quo e ' h h d is not necessarily rea stIc,
t· on the ot er an , . Representa lOn, . 1't Realism as a genre IS 1 t king a claIm on rea
1 y. although it is a w�ys s a . which articular texts might atte
mpt to only the most ObVIOUS way
� k
P 1 'ms about reality. But even . 11 tl at 1S to ma e c al operate ideolog�ca y-
1. . k f 11 the Disney animated movies- can
the most fantastic texts-thm 0 a'd I . not a characteristic
of texts still be effective ideologically. F
o l r
1 t eo d ogy
dl�eployed in society.ln?.s1.ar as ,r th ys they are oca e an . --r-themselves but 0) e wat makes a claim about t�e�e!Y }�at its � �,!eXl�g!z�������r;;;;d--;��ibl�� tT;;;;:'p �W;,t i:.,.i;ieologica1. ence lives m-about what l�!1£LP��--A -' 1'" f 1992 "riots" erupted --�"""�
� �
"""""""'f 11 ing example: In pn 0 ,
Consider the 0 ow C l'f rnia J'ury acquitted fou r
f Ventura County, a 1 0 , ,
in Los Angeles a ter a . f the beating of moto nst
. harges stemmmg rom P olice officers on c . th nation and many acroSS V· t lly every person In e ,
h' h Rodney King. lf ua 'd f the beating, in w IC d t dly seen a home VI eo 0
h the world, ha repea e . ff' No one challenged t e
58 r by pollce 0 lCers. King was struck lffies . ture real events. But to render a "truth" of the videotape: l� dId .cal Ph d t interpret the reality of the . . the Kmg tna a 0 . verdict, the Jurors m d on them one verslOn, ting attorneys presse videotape. The prosecu b lice officers out of control; the that King wa� savagely.
be;:e;th� �� police officers acted reason�bly defense's verSIOn of reality . d'fferent ideological artlcu-. t ces One pIcture, two 1 . . under the Clrcums an · 1 ,",,..,,t� ... e ..... t�at,,,,.....,r; the...x�:I£.,
���rnntlOn l'r But a so no lC . .. -""""' ..... lations, two different rea I Ie� .
1 " . t "-rath� than as "p�tsl" or \ I ", cl..t}:le events following the tr�.::'�.""''''' :r1 n oillo:�l.&l:boice ,_ , -" . ' 71 -"V'e'flci n uonsmg -�gn � �e ' . -:; <" "demonstratIons, ,!?r e ......,. ........ ��.� • ..".- ""':" b omm' g representatlOn; '" __ -a r' - tt of meanmg ec --rd�ology is not only a ma er d inequality Although the h estion of power an . f h it is also about t e qu . ' d 'th the French philosophes 0 t
e
f 'd 1 gy ongmate WI hil concept O l eo 0 . t s the German p oso-. tl eighteenth century, I wa . Enlightenment m le . 1 M who developed the con cept In
pher and political economIst Kar arx
1 9 6
Ideology
its present form. Writing in the nineteenth century, Marx wanted to understand how minorities were able to maintain power and why the vast majority of people accepted a system and even acted in ways the consequences of which seemed to be against their own interests. Why did subordinated populations accept their subordination and even act in ways that continue that status? Quoting Marx (1975),
In the social pro.duction which men carry on they enter into definite
relations that are indispensable and independent of their will; these
relations of production correspond to a definite stage of development
of their material powers of production. The totality of these relations
of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real
foundation on which legal and political superstructure arise and to
which definite forms of social consciousness correspond, The mode of
production of material life determines the general character of the
social, political, and spiritual processes of life, It is not the conscious·
ness of men that determines their being, but, on the contrary, their
social being determines their consciousness. (p. 425)
Marx is concerned here with simple questions. How do societies maintain and reproduce structures of social difference and power? Why do some people see themselves as superior and thus justify their privileged position in society? More important, why do people who are subordinated accept their subordination? In some societies, hierarchy is maintained through the use of force; you may be surprised to learn that even less than a hundred years ago, factory owners often used force to subdue workers and to compel them to accept their exploitation (Ewen, 1976). Even today, force is often used against illegal immigrants and in many Third World countries. However, most modem democra cies eschew the use of force in favor of ideology. If those in power can succeed in constructing a dominant vision that justifies social inequal ities, and they can win agreement to this vision, then their position of power is reasonably secure; force becomes unnecessary. The construc tion of such a consensus is thus always tied to the particular interest groups that struggle for power in society. �atjon ilFld.:r;ll.ammROIIiI"Q-Q.f,.. such a consensus is called hegemom . ...
L�t's take-"iS' e examp e: fu the nineteenth-century American South, the dominant ideology represented Blacks as inferior, often not quite human, beings. To the extent that both Blacks and Whites agreed to this ideology (and notice that this agreement was often unconscious
1 97
, . t/
... , "." -' r
MAKING SENSE OF THE MEDIA
because it seemed so commonsensical), the system of subordination and subjugation endured. Of course, not everyone-certainly not all Blacks and not all Whites-accepted race-based subordination as a nat ural fact, and some struggled against it And often force was used to subdue such disagreements. Still, the ideology was largely successful for many decades. Paradoxically, this ideology often was more humane in its consequences than less discriminatory ideologies; in treating Blacks as not fully and rationally human, it allowed for interracial rela tionships of a fairly wide range, and it usually protected Blacks as if they were like children. For all of the horrors of this period, then, we should not forget that Northerners who staked out the moral high ground often ended up treating Blacks worse than did southern Whites. Nonetheless, and certainly by today's standards in the United States, any ideology that justifies the enslavement of any human by another is unjustifiable.
In�the_conterp.P9rf:1rX,�Qr!f!'.Jh!;_m�g.t'Las�jDY9!y�9j�_t.he gr�duc .!L9n._oUg�0IQgy.;,a}.Ub����e. After all, they are, as we have suggested, perhaps the most important producers of meaning and the codes of meaning in contemporary society. Furthermore, they are often a central and important part of people's everyday lives. They have the potential, then, to become the site at which meanings become more than mean ing. J::Yhen.the.media. become. representations,_when they m�-t.. claims �� . .!bf_"Y.eY_i.il�_tyQrl91§,=tl�)1,b?J;Qme�p,o.w:exfuLideologkal.jpsjjtu ,tiOp.s, And they are, therefore, potentially a source of great conflict and struggle.
Almost all media texts, from the news to Evenjbody Loves Raymond, can be seen as ideological. Although it is true that not all media texts (whether apparently factual news reports or obviously fictional enter tainment programs) support the status quo or the power structure, what is often presupposed or taken for granted is a set of relationships that usually do: The dominant codes of the media in the United States, for example, rarely if ever question whether a business enterprise should make a profit or whether politics is defined solely by the elec toral system as opposed, for example, to organized protest Similarly, the media seem to regularly present the world in a way that makes assumptions about such things as the primacy of the nuclear family, the necessity of working for wages, and the relative value of various segments of the population; in these media portrayals, these values seem commonsensical, universal, and even unquestionable. That is,
1 9 8
Ideology
the media, like other ideological operators, are constantly hiding the gap between reality and their representations of it. Even alternative media operate ideologically. They just may not share the mainstream ideology. But ideology cannot be understood simply in terms of particular unrelated acts of representation, or particular unrelated codes of meaning, �pplied to particular events, people, relations, or practices. It a�ways Involves ways of representing, seeing, and thinking about reality. In Ways of Seeing, John Berger (1972) gives a number of examples of the new ways of seeing the world that characterized the emer�en7e of n:odern society � Europe. Berger points, for example, to artIsts practIce of representIng people with their possessions as a new perceptual system for thinking about the value of individuals. S�milarly, he points to the ways in which women are represented in VIsual arts (from painting to advertiSing) as the passive objects of an unseen man's gaze.
Another example of a "way of seeing" the world touches some of the deepest assumptions about reality in the United States, where the laws, economy, and value system all seem to be centered on the "natural" priority of the individual. Americans tend to see individuals as th� most basic and valued unit of social life. Perhaps this in part explaInS Americans' hostility to socialism, as well as the effectiveness of negative rhetorical appeals that attack social alternatives (from singlesource health care to labor unions) as so�ialist. It might also explain most Americans' suspicion of religious cults, because they are based on the community as the basic unit of social life. Ideologies are not merely particular systems of representation or ways of seeing. � are also ways of excluding and limiting, for they -.l }et the �ounda:ies k on what we gr.Ei:..able to-1lnderstand as I2.Qs��� JiIaeologles are also not neutral. In defining the terms within which reality is experienced, perceived, and interpreted, they are always arti
. cul�ted or connected to the struggle of one group or another to �amtam or challenge particular social organizations, particular rela-tIons of power. !s!t;ology is,. then, abQyt,tryiug..to...ge.Lpeup!e W. see..t.be �grl.d..ac.c.ording.J;f).th.e�h�Lms�code.s..tl14.t..h�en..selby one or *�roups of p.:.££le, Us�illx)hQ.�e who control tb�12Q.wer within' �y. Although some ideological codes are explicitly linked to polit�cal positions and philosophies (think of the ideologies of commUnIsm and capitalism, or of the Democrats and the Republicans),
199
MAKING SENSE OF TH E MEDIA
ideology is a much more pervas ive and common feature of socia
l
existence . Capitalist societies, for example,
need to have people who are
willing to sell their labor so th at someone else can profit from
it.
Capitalist ideology needs to have people believe that anyone can b
e
economically successful who is willing to apply himself or herse
lf.
People who "fail" must have som ething wrong with them. (What mu
st
constantly remain hidden is the fa ct that there are structural inequali
ties in the system and that the sys tem in fact needs such inequalities
.)
Similarly, the two-party system depends upon people's unshakab
le
belief that the two-party system g uarantees them a real say in the go
v
ernance of their country. Patriarch y-the assumed superiority of men
and the masculine over women a nd the feminine-requires that al
l
people take as "natural and obvio us" that men are stronger, more rat
io
nal, better rulers, natural family heads, and so on. An example of
an
ideological or taken-for-granted a ssumption about the natural way o
f
organizing television can be seen in the fact that American televisio
n
programs are always interrupted b y commercials. Whereas Americans
find watching this unproblematic and have no problems connecting
the segments into a single narrati ve, people from other cultures ofte
n
complain that they find it difficul t to follow the story and distinguis
h
the program segments from comm ercials. As we shall see in Chapter 9,
ideology is always involved in th e way that the media treat various
segments of the society.
REALITY AND THEORIES OF I DEOLOGY
Reality is a somewhat paradoxic al concept because reality is what
most people assume exists indep endently of any concept or repre
sentation. Reality is what exists, end of discussion. Thousands of
years of argument in metaphysics (the theory of the nature of reality
)
and epistemology (the theory of knowledge of reality) quickly di
s
proves the commonsense assump tion that reality is not a problem
.
Even if reality is what it seems, h owever, the question remains how
human beings can know and talk about it. The most common theory
,
and the most commonsensical, a. .§§.Umes tha��5..a��itilli1.-2f
�riillact? (what actually exists or happens),j.he�.nw:nil ll_�jngs. .
�t-el-Y-Fercei\Le3uchJ�<;:t�LjiI! d _�h� t _ !��se.pef(;epti?��J an3_��
'")(1(1
Ideology
�acts they cor e d ) � ._ : . r: sE.9n to �an be accuratel d 'b even m1rrored.by th .
. " .��' Y . � scn f�;L.calllured or
_ __ . e vanous verba ancLvisuaLl --' ..
£llllure...Every society assumes that its own g�g1¥!��of h�man
provide the only and m t perceptlOns and languages
sorts of realism have two OS ac
t c fl urate representation of reality. These
grea aws' They are thn . cannot explain ' .
. e ocentnc and they ffilspercephons halluci t' d'
so forth. , na lOns, 1sagreements, and
A second theory goe b k I PI t h '
s ac at east as far as the Greek philos h a 0, w 0, rn The Republic, offered the foIl
. op er
humans' relationship to realit I ' owmg fable to describe
been prisoners in a cave h �' �agrne that some people have always
wall. Behind them f ,c arne so that they can only see the back
, 19ures move and dance in fr t f f' shadows on the back wall The ri
. on 0 a He, casting
cave and never having se�n th �. soners, havmg never been out of the
are real and that they are al� 1furesl�
assume both that the shadows
I 0 rea 1ty. Plato was sugg f h
peop e confuse appearances (wh' h d h es rng t at
I . 1C 0 ave some cau I . d .
re ahon to reality) for reality 't If PI sa or rn eXlcal
b 1 se . ato drew an abs 1 t d" .
etween people's experie f h 0 u e IshnctlOn
d nce 0 t e world-an experie f .
:er :��::�::�: S���dw l�t
e h alit
t Y itself·
d The latter exists b::n� :::;
a�:� , ou an un erstand' f h
causal relationship, people are inca b mg 0 t. e nature of this
Such a "phenomenal" theor mak pa Ie
. of knowrng reality itself.
of reality. y es expenence the other inferior half
. A third the
. ory asserts that ��ru.�"l�J1Q t . .real....iJ;wml .
Errect se�ls rafuer,..th FEQauGt.ci.h; . . .bM.i.� v" people create and re-create .
um.aU..JJl.¥£nhoo.. ...,.something
In this view no independe ( t prOd
l �ce� marntaill, repair, and transform).
, n rea 1ty IS ever availabl t h rather, the things that ar t k b
e 0 uman beings; e a en to e real are real b h
socially constructed, or re resented as r . eca�se .t ey are
.3e� �o be made to mean. PThe cla' h eal. A�co�drng .to thIS v1ew,..!E!1:.. . . , Ir
implies that communi J:' . lffi t at realIty IS sOClally constructed
chain or sliding of Sig�;' lOn. IS always doubly articulated: First, the
. 1ers IS stopped to produce me ' d
ond, parhcular meanings are th I . anmg, an ,sec-
d emse ves articulated to oth .
an events as their representations The f t ' h . er practices
ing or significance' the second th HS IS t e production of mean
of reality And ' ' f
, e representation and construction . mso ar as each of thes f l '
from a P OSitiO�f - P-;
----h--·,,- -·����
�!?ns E..��ssible only _
_ wer, t en, the SOCIal co st, f f -
--- - ;-.- - always a .-ryocess inextricabb -1 t€G
� ruc ill.1L.QlJ@!.UUs-
"';-"-_ __ �. ¥_re a . ,....tGl-tn€-re.lati.,Qns f .
sOClety,l.Jotice that such a theo d . .
.. _. 2.., p.£��E.2!1_�_ _
ry oes not necessanly imply that there
MAKING SENSE OF THE MED IA
is nothing that is not language or culture, that there is �o materi�l reality. It does, however, imply that insofar as human be�ngs �xpen ence any reality, such reality is always the double articulatlOn of culture, an ideo!ogical product.
. Each of these theories of reality and knowledge offers a dIfferent account of the operation of ideology. Because human existence is always more complicated than its theoretical description, each of them has a certain truth and describes at least certain moments of the rela tions of power constructed within and by the cultural and communi cation environments in which people live.
A Realistic Theory of Ideology
/ The most commonly held theory of ideology, �£aJisLth.e.ru� �de91Qgy_aQ....1al�� .. <:..on��� For example� Marx and Engels (1970) claimed that the dominant ideas of a socIety are the ideas of the dominant class. That is, the class that holds power (for example, the capitalist class) attempts to imp�se its .
ideas, its �ersion of reality, on the rest of society. These ideas mtentIOnally n:Isrepre sent the world, at least from the point of view of the real mterests of the working class. The capitalist class tells the world that it .is the natural order of things that labor power be sold as a commodIty on the market, that the quality of one's being is measured by one's life, that the family is where one lives out one's real life, and so on. The fact that workers believe them means that, in one way or another (and Marx never quite figured out how), they are brainwa�hed. They are suffering from false consciousness because they are takmg as true knowledge ideas that are false. (This formulation assumes that there must exist true knowledge and that there must be some way to tell the difference.)
This theory of ideology also implies that there is a direc� corre- spondence between social position (such as .
class me�ber�hIp) an� knowledge and interests. Thus there is something called the mterests of the working class, which can be defined independently of any par ticular social struggle and defined solely by the fact that workers sell their labor as a commodity. Moreover, there is a truth that would describe their reality. Similarly, the capitalist class has its own interests and its own truth. The problem comes when the truth of the capitalist class is universalized and naturalized, then offered as the truth for
202
Ideology
everyone, as if it were both the way the world is and the way it has to be. In other words, ideas, knowledge, and culture are simply a reflec tion of the social position of those who produce them. They are not real; they are nothing but the effect of more real and determining social and economic relations.
Such a view of ideology is common in the contemporary world. As we shall see in Chapter 9, it plays a central role in many discussions about the politics of identity, as when one member of a group accuses another of having bought into the mindset of the dominant group. Equally common, some critics of contemporary society assume that the media are consciously and intentionally feeding the population false information and a false set of attitudes about the way the world is and has to be. In fact, some critics assume that, on the basis of the social identity of the producer of a particular text (by which they usually mean the board of directors of the responsible corporation), one can know the ideological bias of a text. Capitalists produce procapitalist texts that intentionally misrepresent reality to the audience for the sake of maintaining their own power. Male-run corporations produce pro masculine texts that intentionally misrepresent reality to the audience for the sake of maintaining their own power.
Experience and Ideology
A phenomenal theory of reality adds a layer to the analysis of ide�log� . . gXR�p�n��, al.way� jrL§Q ID��n§� J£lLe�2�J:.��.ha.�2..� r�tyi.)t always eXIsts at a dIstance from reality. And xgte4(Reri�JKg ,/ .h� it§...9o.Wn..s orkru..tIalth .. 1t is, at the very least, the necessary starting point for any attempt to discover the truth of reality. Experience is the dimension through which human beings live the meaningfulness of their culture. That is, a phenomenal theory emphasizes the fact that human beings live in a meaningful world, but it still privileges the real world as if it could be accessed outside of the codes of meaning that define people's experience of it. [email protected])!: of reality giyes v r..i.sa..to a hllmanistic theo�y 9f.ideology,
This theory of ideology emphasizes the more humanistic and less economistic side of Marx's (1975) writings. It refuses to reduce culture and knowledge to a mirror image of reality or to a direct effect of some thing else; it refuses to ignore the active role of meaning in human life. Instead, this theory begins with the assumption that people's position
203
MAKING SENSE OF THE MEDIA
in the social world determines their experience of the world through the mediation of the cultural and communication forms that have emerged naturally and authentically from that position. That is, rather than assuming that there is a natural correspondence between social position and truth, a humanistic theory of ideology assumes a natural correspondence between social position, cultural forms, and experi ence. First, social position determines experience. By virtue of being working class, a worker is alienated from his or her labor, whether or not he or she knows it. By virtue of being a woman or a person of color, one inevitably has certain experiences of the world. For example, every woman has had the experience of being "sized up" by men, and any person of color has had the experience of being treated differently from White people. Second, left to their own devices, groups produce their own cultural forms and institutions, which accurately express and represent their experience.
However, precisely because these social groups are politically and economically subordinated, their culture is also subordinated to the cultural institutions and forms of the dominant class. The domi nant culture tries, through any number of means, to replace and dis place the authentic culture of the subordinate. It may simply drive or crowd their institutions out of business in the name of profit, in the way that the record and radio industries basically defeated and erased the music hall tradition of the working class. It may marginal ize the cultural products and practices of the subordinate groups by constructing them as unworthy of serious consideration, or of social support. It may castigate them as vulgar, profane, obscene, dangerous, and even unpatriotic. Or it may appropriate them by making them a part of the dominant cultural codes so that these authentic expressions of subordinate experience are transformed from a challenge to the dominant values into a reaffirmation. This is called recuperation. For example, during the protests against the Vietnam War, dominant news media reporting on demonstrations would often emphasize that the very fact of such protests confirmed the unique privilege (freedom) of American society. In the process, the actual object of the protest (for example, the war in Vietnam or the disproportionate number of Blacks serving in the armed forces) was forgotten or ignored (Gitlin, 1980).
The result of this contest between an authentic culture and a dominant culture is that the subordinate group's ability to express and
204
Ideology
represent its authentic experience is negated. The dominant culture misrepresents and redefines others' experience. Thus the subordinate group comes to experience the world in the codes of the dominant group; its experience is made inauthentic because of the mediating power of cultural or communicative codes. While the truth of knowl edge (as an authentic relation to the world through experience) and ideological misrepresentation are still at stake, the key terms are no longer truth and reality but experience and culture.
The correspondence that such a theory assumes-a correspon dence between one's position in and perspective on reality, experi ence, and cultural forms-is reflected in the assumption that there is a structural homology or parallelism that operates and can be read across these diverse dimensions. It is as if, everywhere one looks, one sees a particular message that can be taken to describe the structure of culture and experience, whether the authentic or the dominant. For example, consider Raymond Williams's (1992) discovery of the structure of mobile privatization. Mobile privatization, in its simplest terms, defines a structure in which the individual avoids the hostile world by retreating into the privacy and safety of the home. The outside world is beamed into the home via the mass media; no longer do individuals need to foray out into the world to gather information. Williams argues that this "structure of feeling" describes at least a significant part of the culture and experience of contemporary life and that it can be read from a wide range of texts and aspects of the mass media.1
Social Constructionism and Ideology
-'22!.h..�����l.l�.2rt.�Q).gg�m tbilLl��glQK¥�.i§..llt�9,m� VC" j�D§�Qi§tQX,tio.n.Qt.£.Qrr�c!a2.1�misJ;�t.ese.ntatiQn Qf.realily. In the end, ideology is a kind of bias operating within culture and knowledge. But social :?�::,�i,����?e::!.���,�t th:::,}s a�!�,?�� r���,�t-srcreor representatIons that wouFdatiow one to measure the truth or .... ) �,9!.����tions. lOe'010gy IS nm-�mas''''oecaiis'e-rf carmO'tb� -;<r measured against something that is not ideological, or that exists out-side of ideology. ODe <:an 0Bly com}J.are..ane.ideoIQgic.g,Ln::1?J�.�lltllliQll.. �er. Phenomenal theories of reality that contrast it to "mere appearance" assume that people (or at least the critic or scholar) have at some level an unmediated (nonideological) experience of the world
205
MAKING SENSE OF THE MEDIA
that can serve as a normative yardstick against which to judge specific ideologies.2
People live within the systems of representation; they experience the world according to their codes of meaning. T here is nothing outside of them that allows them to measure or judge their truth. Ideologies, then, are the systems of meaning within which people live in reality or, to put it differently, live their relationship to reality. They define how people experience the world, what they take for granted. Ideologies define what is taken to be common sense; the truth of ideological state ments appears obvious and even natural. But people are often unaware of many of these ideological codes, because the codes are unconscious and often unchallengeable.
If realist theories deny experience any significance, and humanis tic theories make experien�e into the privileged access to truth, a social constructionist theory argues that experience itself is what ideology produces. It suggests that the most powerful and important effect of ideological representations is that they construct our most fundamen tal and basic experiences of the world. When Richard Nixon and even Robert Kennedy went hunting for Communists in the 1950s, they hon estly saw such figures everywhere and viewed them as a real menace. T here was no way to argue against this ideology by appealing to some experience outside of another ideology. In other words, an ideology is self-contained and nonfalsifiable.
T he twentieth-century French philosopher Louis Althusser (1970) was the leading proponent of such a theory of ideology, arrived at, he argued, by bringing the insights and arguments of semiotics and struc turalism to bear on the question of ideology. Althusser defined ideology as the systems of representation in which people live out their imaginary relationship to their real conditions of existence. Notice: What is at stake here is not people's relations to reality but their relationship to a rela tionship. What is this imaginary relationship if not people's already meaningfully interpreted relations to the world? To put it simply, there is no way out of experience. Experience is the beginning and end of ideology. It is the world in which human beings always exist, and it is the product of ideological experiences.
If this theory is accurate, then it would seem to follow that the more obvious the truth of an experience is and the more certain people are of that truth, the more ideological that experience is. Consider the following analogy: Two people are talking. Person A says that his arm
206
Ideology
is broken. Person B says that it is not Onl " . of fact. (Even judgments of s h . Y one IS nght m this matter uc rna tters of fact' 1 pow��. As Michel Foucault [1973] has de
mvo ve relations of medlcme is partly a hi t f
monstrated, the history of s ory 0 the reorg . . example, Who has the . aruzati on of power: For P
power to dIagnose su h thin erson A had said that he ' . c gs?) But suppose
There is an obvious proble:� m pa
b m, and B had challenged this claim.
f · ere, ecause Person A d a expenence and not fact. rna e a statement i1 . . ' we assume that pe 1 d eged empmcal access to th . op e 0 have some priv-
th elr OWn experien I at I see red, although l b ' ceo cannot be mistaken
th y, can e mIstaken that th . ere. et a constructionist th f . ere IS something red . eory 0 IdeOlogy Just such experiential stat seems to suggest that ements, statements th t secure, are in fact the most ideological.
a seem to be the most How does this production of ex . indiViduals into its signifyin s
per�ence Work? 1t '"Y0rk� b.r E.u� �ore or t��e�r;sI'O����;' a w�y as to make them of th . . ns, m IVlUuals b �=....--_ ... __ �. own experiences Yo k �- "- .. - - -_ �co�Jti ut1iors . �.--.; .... . u now when you" " � IS, you authorize yo"li'rown . t . see a red car. That th m erpretatlOn as the t th b e SOurce and author of th t ru ecause you are Ideology works in J'ust thO e s alteme�� and hence of the experience IS way t poslho . d' . . of their own ideological st t . ns m IVldua1s as the subjects P 1 b a ements and hence f th . ! eop e�e them$e1ves to b th b' 0 err experiences. ill L t ."� .e e ar Iters of an . lac constructed b�i d 1 ·'1 =r -""':� expenence that is thi --- - - ,,-� eo ogica codes Althus -(19;7"-'''' . .... _ s process as interpellation" fut 11--: ser 0) describes assilm ind" d 1 .. . _erp-�_ahQn '§ ig.go Qg,y��h;I;�, ��J.��,<�s to S �gtIC ositions within ' = -�Lt� �lOhc2 renr esentatio,n"'!of: � . 'l":""""t ---.......--. I1s 02:'n communicative f --��i,Ij.�-;..:xzP����.u.eg l� ��'r � We can further explicate this rather d ' . . two experiments First p' k IffIcult nohon by suggesting t . " IC up something th t en In the first-person singul h a Someone else has writ-I �s� �ak� a Dud. You will find that you b ' . . r or a report. Now read it you feel yourself living wh t thegm to Idenhfy with the I in the text, that a e person who Wr t 't l' seems to become part of y h- 0 e 1 lVed, and that it Thr h ou, or ra t er you seem t b . aug an identification with the I .; b ' 0 ecome part of it. Identi
.ty, but, of Course, this will onl '� egms to become part of your
What IS going on. y e temporary because you know
. Now, try a second experiment· The . Imagine that the world that' . next tJme you go to a movi e that you are i n i t . Ask yo l
i f s re
h Presented on the screen is real and
Th' k urse W ere are you st d' In about your field f '. an mg in that world a V ISIOn, what you can and
. cannot see;
MAKING SENSE O F T HE MED I A
that will pretty clearly define where you are. Then, ask yours
elf if
you could be standing anywhe re else. Even if you can imagine
other
positions, you will still be una ble to actually put yourself in th
em;
you remain firmly rooted where you are. Why? You are position
ed by
the camera. Because the cam era that filmed the scene is you
r only
source of information about the world of the movie, you are bas
ically
forced to identify with the cam era and to be in the place it de
fines
for you . Films represent a reality that d
oes not exist outside the film.
Viewers experience it accordin g to the way they are positione
d in
relation to what appears on th e screen. They can see only wh
at the
camera shows them . More imp ortant, in most commercial Holly
wood
films, the camera never violat es people's sense of their perce
ptual
position in the world by showi ng them something that it wou
ld be
impossible for them to see. The y cannot see what is going on b
ehind
a wall or in another place or behind their backs. The camera
may
turn around, but it must alway s do so in predictable ways that
do not
violate the viewers' sense of wh ere they are standing in relation
to the
film's world. These two experiments illustr
ate the process of interpellation .
Interpellation literally means "putting into the space." Theo
rists
use it to describe the way in which different codes-the co
des of
language or the codes of the ci nema, for example-place peop
le into
particular positions that define their subjectivity and experien
ce of
the world. It is a bit like walkin g down the street and hearing s
ome
one say, "Hey you." You turn around thinking that perhaps
they
have called to you . In that ins tance, you have been hailed an
d posi
tioned-interpellated by that s ingle simple utterance. Interpe
llation
makes the individual into a sub ject (a speaker of language) resp
onsi
ble for every word that he or s he speaks and for the reality tha
t these
words imply. Return to the im age in Chapter 5 of a game of musi
cal
chairs: Meaning is created whe n the moving signifiers stop mo
ving,
and some signifiers slide below others into the chairs, taking o
n the
fu nction of signifieds. Interpel lation answers the question of
why
the music stops. The individua l speaker stops the music; it is
his or
her apparent intention that cre ates the meaning. To put it an
other
way, it is the I who is both insid e and outside of language tha
t
draws the line between the sign ifier and the signified. (See Bo
x 7 . 1 ,
"Interpellation and Advertising. ")
208
pellation and Advertising
� o s �t of advertisements ran on television a few years ago f
mod;1\J rClse equipment. One advertisement featured an a
Ideology
. \ another an attractive female model Both vOlceo e\� nd Imager A . . co
" :d y. vOlceover would intone "Th'
����:nt n ��n���e
c ���-�fh
shot of a finely mu�cle] f. . ���:Jv:�� shoulders ' ' 0 t "
er body parts suc�/ � ' our leg " "your . ' ur s omach, and end with "This I.
" ' pan led by a m-shot of the m d I f '
0 be you accom-
was the close t advertisement � e rom the wta . This final image
was the only ti e saw the pers��S e f� o c!
hOW e entire model, and
. What we wo I e to focus on here i t ,i . . . Interpellation by th ertiseme t li I
. s e .4 licit use of Ideological
reminds us that ide 0 . s n . e eVlsl n ' olar Mimi White ( 1 992)
are systems r e t t' to construct individua so ' I b' "
sen a Ions that "function
and recognition of one' v cia su Je ' s, ntributing to the production
, . sense of> d ty" (p 1 69) N Ing Implicitly hails the au 'e b t l,. , " ow, all advertis-
"This could be you " What t ' u I I . vertlsement was more explicit:
to the hailing and �ays i�Pli 't � e , If an audience member responds
. h ' ould be me"? I th
IS t e ad asking you to do? WH . ' n 0 er words, what
is "you," who are you? Wh�t t s sklng you to believe or value? If this
world, one's place in it an 0 umptlons does one make about the
At its most basic, to y " t ets thln�: don.e?
mean that one is or ide fie th b ' � be me �o thiS particular ad could
disposable income, It oul, ean t�at Ite, middle class, with a certain
sonality, intelligenc Int aJiity d values appearance over per-
one's body and 0 ,' Ii '7 ' an , so
. \ could mean that one sees
to work on my a '
I S a continuing ie'ct to be worked on ("I need
d ' i ' a so on my relatio .
� and
an on my ed ati nd ") It Id , on my decorating;
ally based a �h, of �h�t i ' cou
, mea one buys into a cultur-
ness of th 'Po ,� but their b:��n�ld�red at I\e: not only the white- Gould me n ;tl ne buys into the'
a� .
of bo ifr and so on. And it
proble (in case the proble �o lon
l tha� p . �ng things solves
li evi' " interpellates its aUd m 0 not ooklng Ii models).
d' lence In many way , II
IreG ad s. We are hailed as " " eCla y through
b d you or perhaps as p " " '
ro c ,� , game shows talk shows a d we In news 1 � � e a h 'I d '
, n across the um (Aile
ahd ' as ,;� al e when a television host looks directly
n,
10 ' I 0 us. Each of these instances can be viewed a
�0.l . ��� l
i ��
t a a U s ���c�s
���:�����i� the lerms of reference
l)i�lng us to value? What is It ' k' IS It asking us to believe?
Who benefits if we ' see the w�r�d
l�h�S u�:��O? And, finally, we shou
209
MAKING SENSE OF THE MED I A
I n this way, b y having reporters "embedded" with the troops during the second Iraq War, and reporting live from the battlefront, the Pentagon sought to interpellate the audience by increasing the audience's identification with the troops (and therefore with the war effort itself) by placing them in the shoes of a person in combat. Positioning the audience in this way makes them feel more directly a part of the war itself. The reality of the war that was presented was that as experienced by some of the U.S. troops, and not the reality of others (such as the Iraqi troops or civilians, or diplomats, or others).
If ideologies are somehow linked to particular power relations and interests, then it appears that one has to assume that ideologies somehow distort reality for the sake of the interests of those in power. Returning to the example above, it is in the interest of capitalists to con struct an ideology of the free market of labor, but such a market does not actually exist, or so it would seem. But, according to social con structionism, an ideology is not a biased view of a reality that can be described outside of ideology. This problem is known as mystification.
Ideology mystifies in two Wqys. First, Kg�C�l!se an ideology pre- senEli�If�h�§�1 ;��-u;�§1,jJ hiQ��)t� conn��trQn !QThti;;.k ests', of particular �9cial grolJPS QLPow�r. blocs in society. By making th� labor market, as it functions in capitalisn;.: '�ppea;:' to be the only rational and natural form of labor, for example, the ideology of capi talism hides the ways in which this particular form of the labor mar ket exploits workers for the benefit of capitalists. Second,}deolo�y !£.. !E.ysttiY1I2g"p_r�s!�eIL��������'?��,�h�!��Uty"llJ_� . resents. For /fexamPle, the ideology of patriarchy represents women as the weaker sex and thus continues the privileged position of men in society, Precisely because of the commonsensical nature of this ideological
I representation, parents often treat boys and girls differently. Boys will
. be encouraged to participate in activities that augment their strength, and they are allowed to be rough, whereas girls will be guided toward
\ more passive pursuits. Or consider a different example: Marx (1977) said that the major figure of capitalist ideology is the commodity, something made to be sold. Capitalist ideology represents everything, including labor, as a commodity. Through the power of this ideology, everything in capitalism-including workers-becomes a commodity, The mystification arises not because things are not commodities (they are) but because they need not be. In a different ideology, such as the communism Marx envisioned, labor need not be rewarded on
2 1 0
Ideology
the basis of its value, but o� the basis " humane life. of people s reqUIrements for a Or, to return to the question of at ' different system of child '
p narchy, one can imagine a , reanng that would h dIsprove the apparently natu I d 'f'e ' among ot er things, ra I lerences between th B new system would not actu 11 d ' e sexes. u t this a y Isprove patriarchy h patriarchy with a different ' so muc as replace which would in turn create .
�onstructlO� or representation of reality, I s own realIty.
IDEOLOGY AND STRUGGLE One need not choose among these theories f ' , seen to have different uses Th . I
0 IdeologIes, for each can be . e SocIa constructi . t h the broad terrain on which " oms t eory describes a SOCIety s COrnrnun' ti actively determine both the tru tur f '
Ica on and cultural life s c e o SOCIal r I ti h ' their relationship to the world. Still 't h r e a ons IpS (power) and
ations in which ideology b , l as Ittle to say about specific situ-ecomes a more c ' struggle, A humanistic theory f 'd 1
onsclOUS and explicit site of attempts on the part of subor:in�t:�
���e . s�ribes the
. struggle between
life outside of the control of the dom' n�es
. to defme a part of their
ity to which they a�sign d' ma�t maJ.onty, a space of authentic-a Irect relationship t th ' b ' It also describes some of the r ( . 0 elf su ordmation. �:�=:::a��
O !:�e�,,:�rii�;
e t��:��t:S d:���;��a:�:;: :o:��
concerned with the way dornm' ti' , rnm� IOn. Both of these theories are a on IS achIeved and ' . the construction of a cultur 1 ,
mamtamed through , a consensus usmg the f cation, But neither theory add h ' , means 0 cornrnuni-
. resses t ose SItuations wh th ' . consensus IS precarious enough that it b ' . ere e eXIsting
explicit ideological war that often cons . can
l ���mtamed only by an
ence. A realist theory of ide 1 . ft CIOUS Y IssIrnulates to the audi
political economic battles (f � ogy IS 0
1 en u�ef�l for describing explicitly
. r examp e, capItalism vs co ' ) ,
A SOCIal constructionist theory maintains th .
, rnrnunlsm ,
mvqlves practices of articulation, In Cha ter 5 at Ideology always
, event or media product can have multi 1 p " We a:gued that any
The same media product ca b d P e m�anmgs or lOterpretations. , n e rea as telllOg a n b f d ' stones, We argued that m . um er 0 Ifferent , , " eanlOg was produced b link' ' mg SIgniflers, signs, or texts, Similarl
� 109 or arhculat- number of different stories about real '�'
there b
exlst at ��y moment a 1 y or a out speCIfIc events that
2 1 1
M A KING SENSE O F THE MED I A
occur. Ideology is then the product o f a double articulation: First, a text is articula ted to a certain meaning, and then a meaning has to be artic ulated to reality to become an ideological code. Consider any govern ment scandal (from Watergate to Irangate to the latest one): Every scandal elicits a number of stories, each of which seems to make sense of the "facts . " Each version has different consequences, and each is related to different political interest groups. For example, Watergate was a scandal of the corruption of a small group within the Republican Party; Watergate was a phony scandal invented by Democrats to embar rass the Republicans; Watergate was a sign of the corruption that has become pervasive in American politics; Watergate was a "nonevent," no different from the way politics has ever been conducted.
Notice that it does make a difference which of these stories becomes the accepted one, which becomes "knowledge" that most A mericans share. It is this struggle to make specific meanings and stories into taken-for-granted representations of reality that defines the struggle over ideol ogy. If articulation describes the way specific meanings can b e attached to specific signs or texts, it also describes the way a partic ular set of meanings can be linked to m a terial or nondiscursive prac tices and events. Remember the example of the Trobriand Islanders, who believed that sex has nothing to do with reproduction: As a story, it can be humorous and entertaining to Westerners; but, as an id eol ogy, that story had been successfully articulated to reality so that the islanders actually experienced the world in its terms.
The question of how reality is represented, the choice between d ifferent stories or pictures of reali ty, is not random. Nor is the decision freely made by each individual in isolation. Individuals do not get to decide that reality is this way, even though the rest of the world dis a grees with them. The construction of a socially shared representation of reality is always implicated in society's attempt to reproduce its own e xistence and to ensure the continued viability of the pa rticular relations of power characterizing that society.
On the other hand, although one ideology (or more accurately, an ideological formation, because it is composed of numerous state ments that might not fit seamlessly together) is usually dominant, there are always competing stories about events and reality in a society. The dominant ideology defines the taken-for-granted or commonsense real ity of the vast majority of people in the society. How does this work? Ideology can be effective only if it appears to be u nquestionably true,
2 1 2
Ideology
to be so obvious and natural that an rati to its interpreta tions. Recreational d �
f onal h uman would assent
demonized by contemporary . gs,
. or example, have become conservatIve Ideolo . d . . the common sense of A "
gIes, an mcreasmgly men can SOCIety To stand d tain drugs to argue that th . up an speak for cer-
led to beli�ve seems a1m e t y
. are no� the evil force that we have been , os ImpossIble Inde d th d ' . marijuana is quite clear in th d b ' e , e emoruzatlOn of
medicinal p urposes In this :
a e ates
. a�o� t the use of marijuana for
of reality become b�th natu I y, ;pec�c Ideological representations
ideology assume that any r:�o�:l b � versal. Those living within an
sense perceptions; if they do t th emg wo�ld share their common-
h no , en something must b . t em. The construction of "welfare "
e wrong WIth chea t the American public 'd
q f
ueens as lazy parents out to .
provI es a urther exam Ie. There are always multiple ideol ' ' . p
. is not quite the same as s .
ogles WIthin any gIven society. This aymg, as we did in Ch t 5 always many meanings t ' F . ap er , that there are or s ones. or an Ideolog . h It is a representation An 'd I . Y IS more t an a story: . � �� eo Qg}{-emb.o� t�la · b . /. group that th;"_mearun' g.o t . -� JrrL�y.<-'i, F iJfhrul r . ' �= ... H!""- � ll: S ory.....represen t li hI C ologies are always in co ' h' t : ' - " . '� ��_§. •. I� - u ' onsequently, ide-mpe IOn WIth each oth Th ' struggle between ideologies to achieve dorrun' eInr. h ere IS always a b ance, t at sense I cannot e seen as passive "d " h ' peop e opes w 0 unkno . I ' by a single dominant ideology B } . , wmg y are marupula ted
how reality will or must be re ' ecause t tere IS no Sure way to establish
in the struggle over ideolo presen:e
, d, peop�e ar� �onstantly involved
tells a story about wh hi g�· The Bnhsh medIa cntIc Stuart Hall (1 985) en s young Son wa I . simultaneously something ab t hi '
s e , arnmg the colors and ou s own Idenhty Th 1 understand why he was "bl k " b '
, e Son cou d not ac , ecause m fact h b particular color has been arti ' ,
, e was rown, But a color carries with it a parh'
c l ulated tO
f a part�cular social identity That cu ar set 0 meanmgs ' In Wi these are largely negative, as in black rna '
. estern cultures, of black at funerals And th .
glC, black humor, the wearing . ese mearungs a . d . tion, This articulation is t re carne mto the articula-
ralizes and legitimates th P e
ar b and
d . p ar�el of a racist ideology that natu-su or mahon of Bl k B H out that one of the most i
ac s, ut all also points the ideological struggle torr;:::::;::����
t �l����
e civi , l rights �truggle was
tions and to rearticulate it to a " , rom ItS negatIve connota
Or consider another example 0 7�:e p�ItI�e
. Image: "Black is beautiful. "
the authors were owin e ar cu ahon of color and race: When
labeled flesh TOd: r
y that g u
l P, �ne of the crayons in the Crayola box was . co or IS peach.
2 1 3
I
' I ')t
MAK I N G SENSE O F T H E MEDIA
les hetween competing i�.Q!Qgi�1 'C u lture m' volves cons�ilnt stf1,l.gg_._,�l.( �.,, __ �_�_"._ -"��=qople '
� . ,,,-
1... ..l::-to Selmeft't9 . . .. _ . r'" ' . :-:-- " ---r - to gain the l!p.p.er�J?laRl:t, . , , ' . _
' code��9S . � t.t�IEP. m�·' __ -=·"�-f-:-ts parh'cular meanings, to expenenc-- -' ''= . I d terms 0 1 into seemg the wor m l ' 1 formations are not as coherent ing the world in its ter�s. I�eo o�Ica
f y have made it appear. As and systematic as the dISCUSSiOn t U . S
G ar rn a
. (1971 ) argued common . d ' f Antomo ramsCi h, ...... � •. _, _..., the Italian journalist an . cn IC
e On the contrary, it is made up of_ sens� ��ysJ:.¥mat!S str1.!<;�'';'_ 'd"� eiSta'lliil!!8L asslimptions .' �tradicto f�gm�ll�Lme�g ... an_fr ' an"' · n�ber of different ' . �- �l rl �h � so,...;phr ;�h eIlts om :V ' __ . ..-, ._ b !Lth��bUfu,. ' '''''''''''''J-MJMh '�� -",w, .......... . f kn ledge jl.....,Q1l . . - remember where these bItS 0 ow sources. Often, no one can bl' h d They are now, as Gramsci h . truth was esta IS e . ongmated or how t eir
. t ry ' we have lost the ability to h traces without a n mven 0 , bl
describes t ern, d hy they seemed so reasona e remember where they came from an w
at some time. . f articular text need not be deter-Thus the ideologiCal effects 0 a p
arrative One can watch h t t I ' ty of the program or n . mined only by t e o a I t f the films unacceptable and . find many aspec s o
. '1 the Batman mOVIes, h h t finding notions of Vigi an-I ' f b t leave t e t ea er . certainly unrea IS iC, U f h l ' ce strongly articulated (or rearlic-tism and the incompetence 0 t e Ps? 1 '1 I consider the Rambo films: . , mon sense. Imi ar y, ulated) m one s com . hole one might argue that at least Looking at the narratIve a� a 1 w
. ' f the movies makes the federal one possible ideol ogical arhcu at h iOn
. 0
bably not the most common . t th enemy But t at IS pro d
government m o e ' . h ' h ere more likely linke to . 1 ff t of these mOVIes, w IC w .. . .
ideologlca e ec d . d ' ' dualism and even JIngOIstIc various notions of violence an
:;n:; I Day displaced the Cold War patriotism . More recently, In d�en
h e
my as the feared Other into . b y relocatmg t e ene k
fear of commumsm . f' . f the 1 950s one can as B . the SCi- 1 mOVIes 0 , outer space. ut, as m
th ts facing the United States f' l . eally about new rea w hether the 1 m IS r . . h ested less about particu-. some cntIcs ave sugg , here on Earth or IS, as
h d to reassert a strong sense of iden-. n d more about t e nee t the
l ar enemIes a . th face of political challenges 0 tity against a commo� ene�? I:n d
e di fferences. To put it simply, is the established system of Idenhh�s
b t alien species really a backlash . I f sci fi mOVIes a ou C Id
current reVIva 0 - . . ts and the end of the 0 . . f racism new Immlgran , against femmlsm, an
1 M' . Black films seem to undermine any ') 0 the other hand, the en In War . n . iformly threatening others. ability to represent alIens as u�
t ublic spectacles presents a One of the most int�re�tmg �ece; tl � complexity of ideological good opportunity for thinkmg a ou 1
7 1 4
Ideology
struggle and the differences between the theories of ideology we have discussed here. On August 31, 1 997, Diana, Princess of Wales, was killed in an automobile accident in Paris while fleeing with her lover from the paparazzi. The world media coverage was unrivaled, and the public response unprecedented. Over a billion people watched the funeral; millions of people sent flowers or waited for hours to sign books of condolences from all Over the World. The dea th of Diana, the "people 's princess, " was the occasion for a worl d wide collective act of public and private m Ourning. Let us begin by conSidering how each of the three theories of ideology might be used to enlighten Ou r understand ing of this event. An ideological realist migh t interpret this event as another media spectacle that distracts public attention from the serious problems of contemporary SOCiety by fOcusing on the life of another member of the rich and famous. A fter all, Diana's worldwide celebrity was itsel f a construction of the med ia. Dian a 's image as the people's princess is false consciousness, beca use, in reality, she was a wea lthy member of the ruling elite who used most of her time and m oney in conspicuous consumption of exorbitantly priced designer fashion. A hu manistic theorist might talk about the ritual aspects of her life and her dea th. Beginning with her marriage and ending, for the moment, with her funeral, Diana 's entire life and image as Princess of Wales was a media ritual celebrating all sorts of common values and dreams. Like the mythic Cinderella, the fairy tale that was Princess Diana's marriage reaffirmed our faith in love, m a rriage, and the apparently happy ending suggested b y the myth that Prince Charming is waiting around the corner for every woman. Diana 's life reaffirmed Our belie f in the importance of compassion, charity, and, in the contemporary p olitica l clima te, volunteerism . But the events leading up to her divorce and her dea th were a spectacle of another order, reaffirming Our Worst fears about dysfunctional m a rriages, unsupportive families, and the victimization of women in contemporary society. The social constructionist might make a n umber of observations. First, he or she might raise the question of Dian a 's relationShip to contemporary notions of royalty and the pOwer of the monarchy in contemporary British life. Diana 's death seems to have challenged the monarchy in new and powerful ways that threaten to either reform or end its power. Second, a social constructionist might want to inquire into the grounds for the very real and powerful emotional identification with
MAKING SENSE O F THE MEDIA
Diana that marked the worldwide response to her death. Psychiatrists reported that women patients talked about her life and d eath as public parables about the changing nature of life for women in contemporary society, from eating disorders to abuse. Finally, the social constructionist could use Diana's life and death to talk about the changing nature and role of celebrity in the media; how the traditional and tabloid press are implicated in the development of the paparazzi and journalists who spend their lives stalking celebrities to provide the apparently insatiable demand for coverage. Are these changes in the media themselves related to other aspects of contemporary definitions of entertainment and news, and the blurring o f the distinction between them?
The question remains, Where is ideology produced? Where is it found? Where are the struggles over ideology taking place? The answer is simple: wherever l anguage, culture, and media are found . For it is in the
���"""""-.. shared culture of a society that ideology resides. And as the media have gro�wn to b e · themosHmportari.f arld-vfSlble cultural institutions of the society, they have become the most important ideological battlefield. It is in the media that one finds not only the dominant ideology-from which people learn the commonsense view of reality-but also subor dinate ideologies struggling to change that commonsense view.
NOTES
1 . In fact, Williams discovers this structure through an analysis of the econom ics, technology, and cultural forms of television.
2. See Marx's Das Kapital (Capital, 1 977), where he describes ideology as a necessary misrepresentation.
SUGGESTED READINGS
Althusser, L. (1971 ) . Lenin and philosophy, and other essays (B. Brewster, Trans.). London: New Left Books.
Berger, J. ( 1 972). Ways of seeing. London: Penguin. Gramsci, A. (1971 ). Selections from The prison notebooks (Q. Hoare & G . Nowell
Smith, Trans.). New York: International Publishers.
Marx, K., & Engels, F. ( 1 972). The German ideology. New York: International Publishers.
2 1 6
- 193-216
Introduction to the Philosophy of Art
THE MEANING OF ART The appropriate expression for our subject is the Philosophy of Art, or, more precisely, the Philos ophy of Fine Arts. By this expression we wish to exclude the beauty of nature. In common life we are in the habit of speaking of beautiful color, a beautiful sky, a beautiful river, beautiful flowers, beautiful animals, and beautiful human beings. But quite aside from the question, which we wish ROtiO discuss here, how far beauty may be predi cated oisuch objects, or how far natural beauty maybe placed side by side with artistic .beauty, we must begin by maintaining that artistic beauty isr;higher than the beauty of nature .. For the beauty of art is beauty bom - and hom again - olthe spirit. And as spirit and its products stand higher . than nature· ruld its phenomena, by . so much the beauty that resides in art is superior to the·beauty of nature.
. To. say that spirit and artistic' beauty stand
higher than natural beauty, is to say very lillie, fur : "higher" is a very indefinite expression, which.·states the difference between. them a s ·q�titative and external. The "higher" quality of �tand of artistic beauty does not at all stand �lla merely relative position to nature. Spirit only .IS the true essence and content of the world, so that ,w�tever is ,beautiful is truly beautiful only
. Whenlt partakes of this higher essence. and is produced by it. In this sense natural beauty ap- ".:ngs':UY .� a
. r�flection of the beauty that be
•.... ' , spmt; It IS an imperfect and incomplete ,�slOn of the spiritual substance. ',·:";:tConfining ourselves to artistic beauty, we " :;
s first co�sider
. certain difficulties, The first
: , ' uggests Itself IS the question whether art i s >.,a.J.!:lWortl! f . h'l �1_" . Y 0 a p I osophic treatment. To be 'c ··art an� beaut� pervade, like a kindly genius,
of hfe, and joyously adorn all its outer phases, softening the·gravity and
by Joseph Loewenberg,
the burd�n of actual existence, furnishing plea sure for Idle moments, and, where it can accom pl�sh n?thing positive, driving evil away by occu� pymg Its place. Yet, although art wins its way everywhere with its pleasing forms, from the crude adornment of the savages to the splendour of the temple with its marvellous wealth of deco ration, art itself appears to fail outside the real aims of life. And though the creations of art can not
, be said to be directly disadvantageous to the
senous purposes of life, nay, on occasion actu ally further them by holding evil at bay, on the whole, art b�longs to the reIaxati'on and leisure of the mind, while the substantial interests of life demand its exertion. At any rate, such a view ren ders art a superfluity, though the tender and emo tional ffifluence which is wrought upon the mind by �cupation with art is not thought necessarily detnmental, because effeminate. ' .
�ere are others, again, who, though acknowl edgmg art to be a luxury, have thought it neces sary to defend it by pointing to the practical ne� cessities of the fine arts and to the relation they bear to morality and piety. Very serious aims have been ascribed to art. Art has been rec()m mended as a mediator between reason and sensu ousness, between inclination and duty, as the rec oncilor of all these elements constantly warring with
, one another. But it must be said tha�, by
making art serve two masters, it is not rendered thereby more worthy of a philosophic treatment. �stead of being an end in itself, art is degraded mto a means of appealing to higher aims, on the one hand, and to frivolity and idleness on the other.
Art considered as means offers another difficulty which springs from its fonn. Granting that art can be subordinated to serious aims and m.at the res,
ults which it thus produces will be sig mficant, stIll the means used by art is deception, for beauty is appearance, its fonn is its life; and one must admit that -a ;true and real purpose should not be achieved through deception, Even
INTRODUCTION TO THE PHILOSOPHY OF ART
if a good end is thus, now and then, attained by art its success is rather limited, and even then de ception cannot be recommended as a worthy means; for the means should be adequate to the dignity of the end, and truth can be produced by truth alone and not by deception and semblance.
It may thus appear as if art were not worthy of philosophic consideration because it is sup posed to be merely a pleasing pastime; even when it pursues more serious aims it does not correspond with their nature. O n the whole, it is conceived to serve both grave and light interests, achieving its results by means of deception and semblance.
As for the worthiness of art to be philosophi cally considered, it is indeed true that art can be used as a casual amusement, furnishing enjoy men(and pleasure, decorating ou{ surroundings, lending grace to the external conditions of life, and giving prominence to other ()bjects through ornamentation. Art thus employed is' indeed not an independent or free, but rather a subservient art. That art. might serVe other purposes and still retain its pleasure�giving function, is a relation which it has in common with thought. For sci ence, too, in the hands of the servile understand ing is' used for finite ends and accidental means, and is thus not self-sufficient, but is determined by outer objects and circumstances. On the other hand, science can emancipate itself from such service and can rise in free independence to the pursuit of truth, in which the realization of its own aims is its proper furiction.
Art'is not genuine art until it has thus liberated itself. It fulfils its highest task when it has joined the same sphere with religion and philosophy and has become a certain mode of bringing to con sciousness and expression the divine meaning of things, the deepest interests of mankind, and the most universal truths of the spirit. Into works of art the. nations have wrought their most profound ideas and aspirations. Fine Art often constitutes the key, and with many nations it is the only key, to an understanding of their wisdom and religion. This character art has in common with religion and philosophy. Art's peculiar feature, however, consists in its ability to represent in sensuous form even the highest ideas, bringing them thus nearer to 'the character of natural phenomena, to
the senses, and to feeling. It is the height supra-sensuous world into which thought re but it always appears to immediate consci and to present experience as an alien Through the power of philosophic thi' are able to soar above what is merely here,a sensuous and finite experience.' But spmt heal the breach between the supra-sensuous' the sensuous brought on by its own adv produces out of itself the world of fine· art as first reconciling medium between what is merelj external, sensuous, and transient, and the WOl:lill of pure thought, between nature with its reality and the infinite freedom of phil reason.
Concerning the unworthiness of art bee its character as appearance and deception, be admitted that such criticism would net, without justice, if appearance could be said to � equivalent to falsehood and thus to somethinft1
. that ought not to be. Appearance is essen' .
.' reality; truth could. not be, did it not .. through.appearance. Therefore not appearance� general can be objected to, but merely the ' :;
ular kind of appearance through which art: to "portray truth. To charge the appear which art chooses to embody its ideas as .. ' tion, receives meaning only by comparisonwiilf, the external world of phenomena and its imril!idi� ate materiality, as well as with the inner world �, sensations and feelings. To these two worlds �; are wont, in our empirical work-a-day life,to � tribute the value of actuality, reality, and truth, in': contrast to art, which is supposed to be lacldng'\ such reality and truth. But, in fact, it is jusrtlle'. whole sphere of the empirical inner andiOu�' world that is not the world of true reality; indeed i t may be called a mere show and a cruel d� tion in a far stricter sense than in the case of;l!lt Only beyond 'the immediacy of sense and oLex;· ternal objects is genuine reality to be fount!, Truly real is but the furidamental· essence and:the underlying substance of nature and of spirit, and the universal element in nature and in spirit is precisely what art accentuates and makes visible� This essence of reality appears also in the com mon outer and inner world, but it appears in the form of a chaos of contingencies, distorted by the immediateness of sense perception, and by the
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL
capriciousness and conditions, events, characters, etc. Art frees the true meaning .of appearances from the shoW and deception of this bad and tran sient world, and invests it with a higher reality and a more genuine being than the things of ordi nary life.
THE CONTENT AND IDEAL OF ART
The content of art is spiritual, and its form is sen suous; both sides art has to reconcile into a united whole. The first requirement is that the content, which art is to represent, must be worthy of artis tic representation; otherwise we obtain only a bad unity, since a content not capable of artistic treatment is made to take on an artistic form, and ' a :matter prosaic in itself is forced into a form quite opposed to its inherent nature.
The second requirement demands of the con tent of art that it shall be no abstraction. By this is not meant that it must be concrete, as the sen suous is alleged to be concrete in contrast to everything spiritual and intellectual. For every thing that is genuinely true, in the realm of thought as well as in the domain of nature, is concrete, and has, in spite of universality, never- 1heless, a particular and subjective character. By
<saying, for example, that God is simply One, the . ;SlIpremeBeing as such, we express thereby noth
ing .but a lifeless abstraction of an understanding ."devoid of reason. Such a God, as indeed he is not ":mnceived in his concrete truth, can furnish no itxllltentfof'art, least of all for plastic art. Thus the '��B ancl the Turks have not been able to repre .�ttheir God, who is still more abstract, in the :':'jIositive manner in which the Christians have
•. .
theirs. For in Christianity God is con- ',:��"",..w his truth, and therefore concrete, as a
a subject, and, more precisely still, as ;·iilUlIIl,,·Whot he is as spirit appears to the reli
·consciousness as a Trinity of persons, at the same time is One. Here the essence
reconciled unity of universality and such .unity alone being concrete.
a content in order to be true must be this sense, art demands the same con
because a mere abstract idea, or an ab cannot manifest itself in a partic
�en:SUOI1S unified form.
If a true and therefore concrete content is to have its adequate sensuous form and shape, this sensuous form must - this being the third re quirement - also be something individual, com pletely concrete, and one. The nature of concrete ness belonging to both the content and the representation of art, is precisely the point in which both can coincide and correspond· to each other. The natural shape of the human body, for example, is.a sensuous concrete object, which i s perfectly adequate to represent the spiritual i n its concreteness; the view should therefore be aban doned .that an existing object from the external world is accidentally chosen by art to express .a spiritual idea. Art does not seize upon this or that form either because it simply finds it or because it can find no .Qther, but the concrete spiritual content itself carries with it the element of exter nal, real, yes, even sensuous, representation. And this is the reason why a sensuous concrete object, which bears the impress of an essentially spiri tual content, addresses itself to the inner eye; the outward shape whereby the content is rendered visible and imaginable aims at :an existence only in our heart and mind. For this reason alone are content and artistic shape harmoniously wrought. The mere sensuously concrete external nature as such has not this purpose for its only origin. The gay and :variegated plumage of the birds shines unseen, and their song dies away unheard; the torch�thistle which blossoms only for a night withers without having been admired in the wilds of southern forests; and these forests, groves of the most beautiful.and luxuriant vegetation, with the most odorous and fragrant perfumes, perish and waste, no more enjoyed. The work of art is not so unconsciously self-irnmersed, but it is es sentially a question, an address to the responsive soul, an appeal to the heart and to the mind.
Although the sensuous form in which art clothes its content is not accidental, yet it is not the highest form whereby the spiritually concrete may be grasped. A higher mode than representa tion through a sensuous form, is thought. True and rational thinking, though in a relative sense abstract, must not be one-sided, but . concrete. How far a definite content ·can be adequately treated by art and how f ar it needs, according to its nature, a higher and more spiritual form, is a
INTRODUCTION TO THE PHILOSOPHY OF ART
distinction which we see at once, if, for example, the Greek gods are compared with God as con ceived in accordance with Christian notions. The Greek god is not abstract but individual, closely related to the natural. human form. The Christian God is also a concrete personality, but he is purely spiritual, and can be known only as spirit and in spirit His sphere of existence is therefore essentially inner knowledge, and not the outer natural shape through which he can be repre sented but imperfectly and not in the whole depth of his essence.
But the. task of art is to' represent a spiritual idea to· direct contemplation in sensuous form, and not in the form of thought or of pure spiritu ality. The value and dignity of such representa tion lies in the correspondence and unity of the two sides, of the spiritual content and its sensu ous embodiment, so that the petfection and ex cellency of art must depend upon the grade of inner harmony and union with which the spiritual idea and the sensuous form interpenetrate. , The requirement of the conformity of spiritual idea and sensuous form might at first be inter preted as meaning that any idea whatever would suffice, so long' as the concrete form represented this idea and no other. Such a view, however, would confound the ideal of art with mere cor rectness, which consists in the expression ,of any meaning in its appropriate form. The artistic ideal is not to be thus understood. For any content whatever is capable, according to the standard of its own nature, of adequate representation, but yet it does not for tl;Iat reason lay claim to artistic beauty in the ideal sense .. Judged by the standard of ideal beauty, even such correct representation will be defective. In this connection we may re mark that the defects of.a work of art are not to be considered simply as always due to the inca pacity of the artist; defectiveness of form has also its root in . defectiveness of content. Thus, for in stance, the Chinese, Indians, Egyptians, in their artistic objects, their representations of the gods, and their idols, adhered to formlessness, or to a vague and inarticulate form, and were not able to arrive at genuine beauty, because their mytholog ical ideas, the content and conception of their works of art, were as yet vague and obscure. The more perfect in form works of art are, the more
profound is the inner truth of their content thought. And it is not merely a question 0 greater or lesser skill with which the obj external nature are studied and copied, � certain stages of artistic consciousness and tic activity, the misrepresentation and dist of natural objects are not unintentional tee inexpertness and incapacity, but conscious ation, which depends upon the content that consciousness, and is, in fact, demanded We may thus speak of imperfect art, which, own proper sphere, may be quite perfect technically and in other respects. When pared with the highest idea and ideal of art,' indeed defective. In the highest art alone idea and its representation in perfect con because the sensuous form of the idea is in the adequate form, and because the which that form embodies, is itself a ge content.
The higher truth of art consists, then, in spiritual having attained a sensuous form quate to its essence; And this also
.
principle of division for the philosophy For the Spirit, before it wins the true no meaning of its absolute essence,has to through. a series of stages which cons ., _ very life. To this universal evolution there corre::i sponds a development of the phases of art, undei1 the form of which the Spirit - as artist - attainS� to'a comprehension of its own meaning. "'-%)
This evolution within the spirit of art has-� sides. The development is, in the first placeia� spiritual and universal one, insofar as a gradual' series of definite conceptions of the universe ""i' of nature,. man, and God - finds artistic repler' sentation. In- the second place, this universaLde·: velopment of art,embodying itself in sensuous form, determines definite modes of artisticex� pression and a totality of necessary distinctionS within the sphere of art. These constitute the par;' ticular arts.
We have now to consider three definite relll· tions of the spiritual idea to its sensuous expres; sion.
SYMBOLIC ART Art begins when the spiritual idea, being itself still indefinite and obscure and ill-comprehended,
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL
is made the content of artistic forms. As indefi nite, it does not yet have that individuality which the artistic ideal demands; its abstractness and one-sidedness thus render its shape defective and whimsical. The first form of art is therefore rather a mere search after plasticity than a capac ity of true representation; The spiritual idea has not yet found its adequate form, but is still en gaged in striving and struggling after it. This fOml we may, in general,call the symbolic form of art; in such form the abstract idea assumes a shape in natural sensuous matter which is for eign to it; with this foreign matter the artistic creation begins, from which,however, it seems unable to free itself. The objects of external na ture are reproduced unchanged, but at· the same time the meaning of the spiritual idea is attached to them. They thus receive the vocation of ex-' pressing it, and must be interpreted as if the spir itual idea were actually present in them. It is in deed true that natural objects possess an aspect which makes them capable of representing a uni versal meaning, but in symbolic art a complete correspondence is not yet possible. In it the cor Iespondence is confined to an abstract quality, as when. for example, a lion is meant to stand for :strength.
�'l::ThiS abstract relation brings also to conscious �sthe foreignness of the spiritual idea to nat :ural phenomena. And the 'spiritual idea, having Mother reality to express its essence. expatiates malLthese natural shapes, seeks itself in their un l�stand disproportion, but finds them inadequate
:�illtthen exaggerates these natural phenomena �'shapes them into the huge and the boundless. ':� spiritual idea revels in them, as it were,
and ferments in them, does violence to ·distorts and disfigures them into grotesque
and endeavors by the diversity, hugeness, of such forms to raise the natural
to the spiritual leveL For here it is the idea which is more or less vague and
while the objects of nature have a IV "'_'''.6 fonn. JCOll1mlltv of the two elements to each
relation of the spiritual idea to a negative one. The spiritual as a
element and as the universal sub all things, is conceived unsatisfied with
all externality, and in its sublimity it triumphs over the abundance of unsuitable forms. In this conception of sublimity the natural objects and the human shapes are accepted and left unaltered, but at the same time recognized as inadequate to their own inner meaning; it is this inner meaning which is glorified far and above every worldly content.
These elements constitute, in general; the character of the primitive artistic pantheism of the Orient, which either invests even the lowest objects with absolute significance, or'forces all phenomena with violence to assume the expres sion of its world-view. This art becomes there fore bizarre. grotesque, and without taste, or i t represents th e infinite substance in its abstract freedom turning away with disdain from the illu sory . and perishing mass of appearances. Thus the meaning can never be completely molded into the expression, and, notwithstanding all the aspi ration and effort, the incongruity between the spiritual idea and the sensuous form remains in superable. This is, then, the first form of art - symbolic art with its endless quest, its inner struggle, its sphinxlike mystery, and its sub linllty.
CLASSICAL ART
In the second form of art, which we wish to des ignate as the classical, the double defect of sym bolic art is removed. The symbolic form is im perfect, because the spiritual meaning which it seeks to convey enters into consciousness in but an abstract and vague marmer, and thus the con gruity between meaning and form must always remain defective and therefore abstract. This double aspect disappears in the classical type of art; in it we find the free and adequate embodi ment of the spiritual idea in the form most suit able to it, and with it meaning and expression are in perfect accord. It is classical art, therefore, which first affords the creation and contempla tion of the completed ideal, realizing it as a real fact in the world.
But the congruity of idea and reality in classi cal art must not be taken in the formal sense of the agreement of a content with its external form; otherwise every photograph of nature,
INTRODUCTION TO THE PHILOSOPHY OF ART
every picture of a countenance, landscape, flower, scene, etc., which constitutes the aim of a representation, would, through the conformity of content and form, be at once classical. The peculiarity of classical art, on the contrary, con sists in its content being itself a concrete idea, and, as such, a concrete spiritual idea, for only the spiritual is a truly classical content. For a worthy object of such a content, Nature must be consulted as to whether she contains anything to which a spiritual attribute really belongs. It must be the World-Spirit itself that invented the proper form for the concrete spiritual ideal; the subjective mind - in this case the spirit of art - has only found it, and given it natural plastic existence in accordance with free individual spirituality. The form in which the idea, as spiri tual and individual, clothes itself when revealed as a temporal phenomenon, is the human fo-,:m. To be sure, personification and anthropomor phism have frequently been decried as a degra dation of the spiritual; but art, insofar as its task is to bring before direct contemplation the spiri tual in sensuous form, must advance to such an thropomorphism, for only in its body can mind appear in an ad7:\uately sensuous fashion. The migration of souls is, in this respect, an abstract notion, and physiology should make it one of its fundamental principles that life has necessarily, inits evolution, to advance to the human shape as the only sensuous phenomenon appropriate to the mind.
The human body as portrayed by classical art is not represented in its mere physical existence, but solely as the natural and sensuous form and garb of mind; it is therefore divested of all the defects that belong to the merely sensuous and of all the finite contingencies that appertain to the phenomenal. But if the form must be thus puri fied in order to express the appropriate content, and, furthermore, if the conformity of meaning and expression is to be complete, the content which is the spiritual idea must be perfectly capa ble of being expressed through the bodily form of
'Hegel means the transmigration of souls into the bodies of other animals; this notion is "abstract" because it presumes that the soul has an ideal reality that allows it to be put into any earthly envelope. [Ed.]
man, without projecting into another sphere: yond the physical and sensuous represen . The result is that Spirit is characterized as a ticular form of mind, namely, as human and not as simply absolute and eternal; but absolute and eternal Spirit must be able to and express itself in a manner far more spi
This latter point brings to light the de£ classical art, which demands its dissolution. its transition to a third and higher form, tO'i the romantic form of art.
ROMANTIC ART
The romantic form of art destroys the unity . spiritual idea and its sensuous form, and back, though on a higher level, to the differ and opposition of the two, which symbolic left unreconciled. The classical form of art tained, indeed, the highest degree of per£ which the sensuous process of art was capa realizing; and, if it shows any defects, the de£ are those of art itself, due to the limitation 0 sphere. This limitation has its root in the gen attempt of art to represent in sensuous con· . form the infinite and universal Spirit, and . attempt of the classical type of art to blend completely spiritual and sensuous existence· . the two appear in mutual conformity. But in suchr� a fusion of the spiritual and sensuous aspec��: Spirit cannot be portrayed according to its true:� essence, for the true essence of Spirit is its infi;j nite subjectivity; and its absolute internal me . ing does not lend itself to a full and free e sion in the confinement of the bodily formasits.� only appropriate existence. I���
Now, romantic art dissolves the inseparable;� unity which is the ideal of the classical type, 1J6;'� cause it has won a content which goes beyond tbe� classical form of art and its mode of expression;; This content - if familiar ideas may be recalled, - coincides with what Christianity declares ito', be true of God as Spirit, in distinction to the' Greek belief in gods which constitutes the essen'.� tial and appropriate subject for classical art. The; concrete content of Hellenic art implies the unity; of the human and divine nature, a unity which,;' just because it is merely implied and immediaie; permits of a representation in an irnmediatel(
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL
visible and sensuous mold. The Greek god is the object of na"ive contemplation and sensuous imagination; his shape is, therefore, the bodily shape of man; the circle of his power and his essence is individual and confined. To man the Greek god appears as a being and a power with whom he may feel a kinship and unity, but this kinship and unity are not reflected upon or raised into definite knowledge. The higher stage is the knowledge of this unconscious unity, which un derlies the classical form of art and which it has rendered capable of complete plastic embodi ment. The elevation of what is unconscious and implied into self-conscious knowledge brings about an enormous difference; it is ,the infinite difference which, for example, separates man from ,the, animal. Man is an animal, but, even in his animal functions, does not rest satisfied with the potential and the unconscious as the animal does,but becomes conscious of them. reflects upon them, and raises them - as, for instance, the process of digestion - into self-conscious science; And it is thus that man breaks through the boundary of his merely ,immediate and un conscious existence, so that, just because he knows himself to be animal. he ceases in virtue of such knowledge to be animal, and, through sucbself-knowledge only, can characterize him self as mind or spirit. ' •. '. If in the manner just described the unity of the human and divine nature is raised from an imme .diate to a conscious unity, the true mold for the �aIity of this content is no longer the sensuous, ¥JIIllediate existence of the spiritual, the bodily frame of man, but self-conscious and internal ,con��plation. For this reason Christianity, in ��IC�g God as Spirit - not as particularized mdiVldual mind, but as absolute and universal '�i?t-:- retires from the sensuousness of imagi ;�on mtothe sphere of inner being, and makes t�.and n ot the bodily form, the material and �qOf its ��ntent; an� thus the. unity .of the 'J;", an and dIVIDe nature IS a conscIous unIty ca- �le f
' ;.m: realization only by . spir�tual knowledge. �.' w content, won by thIS UUlty, IS not depen
<,. , upon sensuous representation; it is now ex- :llfrom
such imm�diate existence. In �is .' Owever, romantIc art becomes art WhICh nds itself, carrying on this process of self-
transcendence within its own artistic sphere and artistic form.
Briefly stated, the essence of romantic art con sists in the artistic object being the free, concrete, spiritual idea itself, which is revealed in its spiri tuality to the inner, and not the outer, eye. In con formity with such a content, art can, in a sense, not work for sensuous perception, but must aim at the inner mood, which completely fuses with its object, at the most subjective inner shrine, at the heart, the feeling. which, as spiritual feeling, longs for freedom within itself and seeks and finds reconciliation only within the inner recesses of the spirit This inner world is the content·of ro mantic art, and as such an inner life, or as its re flection, it must seek embodiment. The inner life thus triumphs over the outer world - indeed, so triumphs over it that the outer world itself is made to proclaim its victory, through which the sensuous appearance sinks into worthlessness.
On the other hand, the romantic type of art, like every other, needs an external mode of ex pression. But the spiritual has now retired from the outer mode into itself, and the sensuous ex ternality of form assumes again, as it did in sym bolic art, an insignificant and transient character. The subjective, finite mind and will, the particu" larity and caprice of the individual, of character, action or of incident and plot, assume likewise the character they had in symbolic art The exter nal side of things is surrendered to accident and committed to the excesses of the imagination, whose caprice now mirrors existence as it is, now chooses to distort the objects of the outer world into a bizarre and grotesque medley, for the ex ternal form no longer possesses a meaning and significance, as in classical art, on its own ac count and for its own sake. Feeling is now every thing. It finds its artistic refiection, not in the world of external things and their forms,but in its own expression; and in every incident and ac cident of life, in every misfortune, grief, and even crime, feeling preserves or regains its heal ing power of reconciliation.
Hence, the indifference, incongruity, and an tagonism of spiritual idea and sensuous form, the characteristics of symbolic art, reappear in the ro mantic type, but with this essential difference. In the romantic realm, the spiritual idea, to whose
INTRODUCTION TO THE PHILOSOPHY OF ART
defectiveness was due the defective forms of symbolic art, now reveals itself in its perfection within mind and feeling. It is by virtue of the higher perfection of the idea that it shuns any ad equate union with an external form, since it can seek and attain its true reality and expression best within itself.
This, in general terms, is the character of the symbolic, classical, and romantic forms of art, which stand for the three relations of the spiritual idea to its expression in the realm of art. They consist in the aspiration after, and the attainment and transcendence of, the ideal as the true idea of beauty.
THE PARTICULAR ARTS
But, now, there inhere in the idea of beauty dif ferent modifications which art translates into sensuous forms. And we find a fundamental principle by which the several particular arts may be arranged and defined - that is, the species of art contain in themselves the same es sential differences which we have found in the three general types of art. External objectivity, moreover, into which these types are molded by means of a sensuous and particular material, ren� ders them independent and separate means of re alizing different artistic functions, as far as each type finds its definite character in some one defi nite external material whose mode of portrayal determines its adequate realization.2 Further more, the general types of art correspond to the several particular arts, so that they (the particular arts) belong each of them specifically to one of the general types of art. It is these par ticular arts which give adequate and artistic external being to the general types.
ARCHITECTURE
The first of the particular arts with which, ac cording to their fundamental principle, we have
lHegel's point is that while the art forms of architecture, sculpture. and poetry have intrinsic correspondences with the symbolic, the classical. and the romantic modalities of art. re spectively. there nevertheless exist classical and romantic forms of architecture. symbolic and romantic forms of sculp ture, symbolic and classical forms of poetry. [Ed.]
to begin, is architecture. Its task consistsin illl
shaping external inorganic nature that it � comes homogeneous with mind, as an artistib1 outer world. The material of architecture is mall: ter itself �n its immediat� externality a� a hea� mass subject to mechanIcal laws, and Its fonilS� remain the forms of inorganic nature,. but � merely arranged and ordered in accordance witii' the abstract rules of the understanding, the rulei: of symmetry. But in such material and in suel forms the ideal as concrete spirituality carinoi be realized; the reality which is represented:iJ{ them remains, therefore, alien to the spiritual idea, as something external which it has not penetrated or with which it has but a remote and! abstract relation. Hence the fundamental type of architecture is the symbolical form of art. Forai is architecture that paves the way. as it were, fot' the adequate realization of the God, toiling and wrestling in his service with external nature; and seeking to extricate it from the chaos"{)f finitude, and the abortiveness of chance. By thiS means it levels a space for the God, framesM external surroundings, and builds him his tern; pIe as the place for inner contemplation andfm: reflection upon the eternal objects of the spirit It raises an enclosure around those gathered to-: gether, as a defense against the threatening
, of
the wind, against rain, the thunderstorm, and wild beasts, and reveals the will to assemble, though externally, yet in accordance with the artistic form. A meaning such as this, the art of architecture is able to mold into its material and its forms with more or less success, according as the determinate nature of the content whichit seeks to embody is more significant or more trivial, more concrete or more abstract, more deeply rooted within its inner being or more dim and superficiaL Indeed, it may even ad vance so far as to endeavor to create for such meaning an adequate artistic expression with its material and forms, but in such an attempt it has already overstepped the bounds of its own sphere, and inclines towards sculpture, the higher phase of art. For the limit of architecture lies precisely in this, that it refers to the spiritual as an internal essence in contrast with the exter nal forms of its art, and thus whatever is en-
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL
dowed with mind and spirit must be indicated as something other than itsel[
SCULPTURE
Architecture, however, has purified the inorganic external world, has given it symmetric order, has impressed upon it the seal of mind, and the temple of the God, the house of his community, stands ready. Into this temple now enters the God himself. The lightning-flash of individuality strikes the inert mass, permeates it, and a form no longer merely symmetrical, but infinite and ,spiri tual, concentrates and molds its adequate bodily snape. This is the task of sculpture. Inasmuch as iil it the inner spiritual element, which architec turecan no more than hint at, completely abides With the sensuous form and its external matter, Ellas 'both sides are so merged into each other that 'neither predominates, sculptUre has the clas �ictiJforrn of art as its fundamental type. In fact. :thesehsuous realm itself can command no' ex pression which cOllld not'be that of tlie spmtual Sphere, jiist'as, conversely, no spiritual content
, ' can attain perfect plasticity in sculpture which is , l'n"Capable of being adequately presented to per"
, iception in bodily form. It is sculpture whichcir ;�tslBr:our vision the spirit in its bodily 'frame, ·in'memate unity with it, and in an attitude of ' �"" ,''',",' l,� J !' , , . . � I ;peace and 'repose; and the form in' tum is ani- ' maffia;by the' content of spiritual individuality.
,�reforeihe external senSllOUS matter is here " wrought, either according to its mecharucal ,
. alone, as heavy mass. or in forms peculiar . nature, or as indifferent' to color, ideal forms of the human shape, and .
of the spatial dimensions. In this last '�"".I_ ... _- should be credited with having, . the inner and spiritual essence in its repose and essential self-possession. To
, . and unity with itself corresponds e�temal element which itself persists' in
repose. Such an element is the form . 'abstract spatiality. The spirit which
replrese:nts is that which is solid in it- , broken up in the play of con-
and passions; nor does itS external of the portrayal of such a manifold
play, but it holds to this one side only, to the ab straction of space in the totality of its dimen sions.
THE DI!:VELOPMENT OF THE ROMANTIC ARTS
After' architecture has built the temple and the hand of sculpture has placed inside it the statue of the God, then this sensuously visible God faces in the spacious halls of his house 'the com munity. The community is the spiritual, self reflecting element in this sensuous realm, it is the animating subjectivity and inner life. A new prin ciple of art begins with it. Both the content of art and 'the medium which embodies it in outward form now demand particularization, individual ization,and the subjective mode of expressing these. The solid unity which the God possesses in sculpture breaks up into the plurality of inner in dividual lives,' whose unity is not sensuous, but essentially ideal.
And now God comes to assume the aspect which makes him truly spiritual. As a hither-and thither, as an alteration between the unity within himself and his realization in subjective knowl edge and individual consciousness, as well as in the common and unified life of the man individu als, he is genuinely Spirit ..:... the Spirit in his community. ·In his community God is released from the abstractness of a mysterious self identitY, as well as from'·the naIve imprisoninent in a bodily shape, in which he is represented by sculpture. Here he is exalted into spirituality, subjectivity, and knowledge. Forthis reason the higher content of art is now this spirituality in 'its absolute form. But since what chiefly reveals it self' in this stage is not the serene repose of God in himself, but rather his' appearance, his being, and his manifestation to others, the objects of artistic representation are now the most varied subjective expressions of life and activity for their own sake, as human passions, deeds, events, and, in general, the wide range of human feeling, will, and resignation. In accordance with this con tent, the sensuous element must differentiate and show itself adequate to the expression of subjec tive feeling. Such different media are furnished
INTRODUCTION TO THE PHILOSOPHY OF ART
by color, by the musical sound, and finally by the sound as the mere indication of inner intuitions and ideas; and thus as different forms of realizing the spiritual content of art by means of these media we obtain painting, music, and poetry. The sensuous media employed ill these arts being in dividualized and in their essence recognized as ideal, they correspond most effectively to the spiritual content of art, and the union between spiritual meaning and sensuous expression devel ops, therefore, into greater intimacy than was possible in the case of architecture and sculpture. This intimate unity , however, is due wholly to the subjective side.
Leaving, then, the symbolic spirit and archi tecture and the classical ideal of sculpture be hind, these new arts in which form and content are raised to a n ideal level borrow their type from the romantic form of art, whose mode of expres sion they are most eminently fitted to voice. They' form, however, a totality of arts, because the ro mantic type is the most concrete in itself.
PAINTING The first art in' this totality, which is akin to sculpture, is painting. The material which it uses for its content and for the sensuous expression of that content is visibility as such, in so far as it is . individualize!f, viz., specified as. color. To be sure, the media employed in architecture and sculpture are also visible and colored, but they are not, as.in painting, visibility as such, not the simple light which contrasts itself with darkness and in combination with it becomes color. This visibility as' a subjective and ideal attribute, re quires . neither, like architecture, the. abstract me chanical form of mass which we find in heavy matter, nor, like sculpture, the three dimensions of sensuous space, even though in concentrated and organic plasticity, but the visibility which ap pertains to painting has its differences on a more ideal level, in the particular kind of color; and thus painting frees art from the sensuous. com pleteness in space peculiar to material things only, by confining itself to a plane surface.
On the other hand, the content also gains in varied particularization. Whatever. can find room
in the human heart, as emotion, idea, and' pose, whatever it is able to frame into a d this variety of material can constitute the colored content of painting. The whole of particular existence, from the highest tions of the mind down to the most isolated jects of nature, can obtain a place in this art even finite nature, in its particular scenes and peets, can here appear, if only some allusion spiritual element makes it akin to thoughL feeling.
MUSIC The second art in which the romantic form realizatioIl, . on still a higher leyel than in ing, is music. Its material, though still sensu advances to a deeper subjectivityandgr specification. The idealization of the se music brfugs about by negating space: In . the indifferent extension of space whose a' ance painting admits and consciously imi c0!lcentrated and idealized into, a singh� p But in the form of a motion and tremor ilf material body within itself,this single POint�; coIlles a concrete and active process. withln:ti\f idealization of matter. Such an incipie�t id�aIij� of matter which no longer appears under the spa; tial fOrm. but as. temporal ideality, is sound --'�� sensuous acknowledged as ideal, whoseabstJ:i# visibility is transformed into audibility. Sound; ai' it were, exempts th� ideal from its absorptio�;� matt yr. . ' . . ". i':�,
This earliest animation and inspiration of mat:. ter furnishes .the medium for the inner and ,ifltlf· mate life, of. the spirit,. as yet on an indefinill) level; it is through the tones of music that th,�, heart pours out its whole scale of feelings and. passions. Thus as sculpture constitutes the central point between architecture and the arts of roman· tic subjectivity, so music forms the center ofth�, romantic arts, and represents the point of trap< sition, between abstract spatial sensuousness, which belongs. to painting, and the abstract spiri: ' tuality of poetry. Within itself music has, like ar, chitecture, an abstract quantitative relation, as a contrast to its iriward and emotional quality;. ¥ also has as its basis a permanent law to which me
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL
tones with their combinations and successions must confonn.
3
POETRY
For the third and most spiritual expression of the romantic fonn of art. we must look to poetry. Its characteristic peculiarity lies in the power with which it subjugates to the mind and to its ideas the sensuous element from which music and painting began to set art free. For sound. the one external medium of which poetry avails itself, is in it no longer a feeling of the tone itself. but is a sign which is, by itself, meaningless. 'This sign, moreover, is a sign of an idea which has become concrete, . and not merely of indefinite feeling and of its nuances and grades. By this means the tone becomes the word. an articulate voice, whose function it is to indicate thoughts and ideas. The negative point to which music had advanced now reveals itself in poetry as the . oompletely concrete point, as the spirit or the self.consciousness of the individual, which spontaneously unites the infinite space of its ide� with the time-element of sound. But this se�uous element which, in music. was still in '�ediate union with inner feelings and moods. �. m poetry, divorced from the content of con- �ousness, for in poetry the mind determines
· '�s. £antent on its own account and for the sake , �,ifs ideas, and while it employs sound to ex �ss �em, yet sound itself is reduced to a sym-
, ��'Wlthout value or meaning. From this point of ,� sound may just as well be considered a '.'il\ere <letter, for the audible, like the visible, is .
' . to a mere suggestion of mind . . . � genuine mode of poetic representation
mner perc , eption and the poetic imagina
·"''l;(l���·''',;ll . And smce all types of art share in this poetry runs through them all, and devel
, mclep(�ndent:lv in each. Poetry, then. is art of the spirit which has attained
and which does not depend for its
refers to the mathematical basis of the diatonic laws of harmony and counterpoint that derive
realization upon external sensuous matter, but expatiates only in the inner space and inner time of the ideas and feelings. But just in this, its highest phase, art oversteps the bounds of its own sphere by abandoning the hannoniously sensuous mode of portraying the spirit and by passing from the poetry of imagination into the prose of thought.
SUMMARY
Such, then, is the organic totality of the several arts; the external art of architecture, the objective art of sculpture, and the subjective arts of paint ing, music, and poetry. The higher principle from which these are derived we have found in the types of art, the symbolic, the classical, and the romantic, which form the universal phases of the idea of beauty itself. Thus symbolic art finds its most adequate reality and most perfect applica tion in architecture, in which it is self-complete , and is not yet reduced, so to speak, to the inor ganic medium for another art. The classical fonn of art, on the other hand, attains its most com plete realization in sculpture, while it accepts ar chitecture only as fonning an enclosure round its products and is as yet not capable of developing painting and music as absolute expressions of its meaning. The romantic type of art, finally, seizes upon painting, music, and poetry as its essential and adequate modes of expression. Poetry, how ever, is in conformity with all types of the beauti ful and extends over them all, because its charac teristic element is the aesthetic imagination, and imagination is necessary for every product of art, to whatever type it may belong.
Thus what the particular arts realize in indi vidual artistic creations are, according to the philosophic conception, simply the universal types of the self-unfolding idea of beauty. Out of the external realization of this idea arises the wide Pantheon of art, whose architect and builder is the self-developing spirit of beauty, for the completion of which, however, the his tory of the world will require its evolution of countless ages.
I NTRODU CTION TO THE PHILOSOPHY OF ART 371 \
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BOOK X
"And, indeed," 1 said, "I also recognize in many other aspects of 59, this city that we were entirely right in the way we founded it, but I say this particularly when reflecting on poetry."
"What about it?" he said. "In not admitting at all any part of it that is imitative. For that the
imitative, more than anything, must not be admitted looks, in my opin ion, even more manifest now that the soul's forms have each been separated out."
"How do you mean?" "Between us-and you all won't denounce me to the tragic poets and
all the other imitators-all such things seem to maim the thought of those who hear them and do not as a remedy have the knowledge of how they really are."
"What are you thinking about in saying that?" he said. "It must be told," 1 said. "And yet, a certain friendship for
Homer, and shame before him, which has possessed me since child hood, prevents me from speaking. For he seems to have been the first teacher and leader of all these fine tragic things. Still and all, a man must not be honored before the truth, but, as 1 say, it must be told."
"Most certainly," he said. "Then listen, or rather, answer." "Ask."
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"Could you tell me what imitation in general is? For I myself scarcely comprehend what it wants to be."
::Then it follo�s," he said, "that I, of course, will comprehend it." That wouldn t be anything strange ," I said, "since men with
duller vision have often, you know, seen things before those who see more sharply."
"That's so," he said. "But with you present I couldn't be very eage�
, to say whatever might occur to me, so look yourself."
Do you want us to make our consideration according to our customary procedure, beginning from the following point? For we are, presumably, accustomed to set down some one particular form for each of the particular 'manys' to which we apply the same name. Or don't you understand?"
"I do." "Then let's now set down any one of the 'manys' you please· for
example, if you wish, there are surely many couches and tables." ,
"Of course." "But as for ideas for these furnishings, there are presumably two,
one of couch, one of table." "Yes." · "Aren't we also accustomed to say that it is in looking to the idea
of each implement that one craftsman makes the couches and another the chairs we use, and similarly for other things? For presumably none of the craftsmen fabricates the idea itself. How.could he?"
"In no way." "Well, now, see what you call this craftsman here." "Which one?" "He who makes everything that each one of the manual artisans
makes separately." :?hat's a clever and wonderful man' you speak of."
Not yet. In an instant you'll say that even more. For this same manual artisan is not only able to make all implements but also makes ev�rything that grows naturally from the earth, and he produces all ammals-the others and himself too-and, in addition to that pro duces earth and heaven and gods and everything in heaven and �very thing in Hades under the earth."
:?hat's quite a wonderful sophist you speak of," he said. Are you distrustful?" I said. "And tell me, in your opinion could
there be altogether no such craftsman; or in a certain way, could a mak�r of all these things come into being and in a certain way not? Or aren t �?u aware that you yourself could in a certain way make all these thmgs?
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"And what," he said, "is that way?" . .
"It's not hard," I said. "You could fabricate them quickly in many ways and most quickly, of course, if you are willing to
take a mirror and
carry it around everywhere; quickly you will make t he sun and the
things in the heaven; quickly, the earth; and quick ly,
. yourself and the
other animals and implements and plants and everyt hmg else that was
just now mentioned." "Yes," he said, "so that they look like they are; howe
ver, they
surely are not in truth." "Fine," I said, "and you attack the argument at just the r�g�t
place. For I suppose the painter is also one of these craftsmen, Isn t he?"
"Of course he is." "But I suppose you'll say that he doesn't truly make what he
makes. And yet in a certain way the painter too d oes make a couch,
doesn't he?" " "Yes" he said, "he too makes what looks like a couc
h.
"And what about the couchmaker? Weren't you just saying that he doesn't make the form, which is what we, of course
, say is just a couch,
but a certain couch?" "Yes " he said, "I was saying that." "Th�n, if he doesn't make what is, he wouldn't make the being but
something that is like the being, but is not being. A nd if someone were
to assert that the work of the producer of couche s or of any other
manual artisan is completely being, he would run the risk of saying
what's not true." "Yes, " he said, "at least that would be the opinion
of those who
spend their time in arguments of this kind." . "Therefore, let's not be surprised if this too turns ou
t to be a dIm
thing compared to the truth." "No, let's not." "Do you," I said, "want us on the basis of these very things to
investigate who this imitator is?"
"If you want to," he said. "There turn out, then, to be these three kinds of co
uches: one that
is in nature, which we would say, I suppose, a god produced. Or who else?"
"No one else, I suppose." "And then one that the carpenter produced."
"Yes, " he said. "And one that the painter produced, isn't that so?"
"Let it be so."
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"Then painter, couchmaker, god-these three preside over three forms of couches."
"Yes, three. " "Now, the god, whether he didn't want to or whether some
necessity was laid upon him not to produce more than one couch in nature, made onlr one, that very one which is a couch. And two or more suc� weren t naturally engendered by the god nor will the be begotten.
y
"How's that?" he said. "Bec�use," I said, "if he should make only two, again one would
come to lIght the form of which they in turn would both possess and that, and not the two, would be the couch that is."
,
"Right, " he said. "Then, I suppose, the god, knowing this and wanting to be a real
m�ker of a couch that really is and not a certain couchmaker of a cer tam couch, begot it as one by nature."
"So it seems." "Do you want us to address him as its nature-begetter or some
thing of the kind?", "T�at's just at any rate," he said, "since by nature he has made
both thIS and everything else. " "And what about the carpenter? Isn't he a craftsman of a couch? " "Yes."
.
"And is the painter also a craftsman and maker of such a thI'ng? " "Not at all."
.
"But what of a couch will you say he is?"
. "!n my opinion, " he said, "he would most sensibly be addressed as
an ImItator of that of which these others are craftsmen."
. "All right, " I said, "do you, then, call the man at the third genera-
tIon from nature an imitator?" "Most certainly," he said. "Therefore this will also apply to the maker of tragedy if h . "
h ' e IS
an ImItator; e is naturally third from a king and the truth are all the other imitators."
, as
"Probably. " "Then we have agreed about the imitator. Now tell me this �b�ut the painter. In your opinion, does he in each case attempt to
ImIt��e the thing itself in nature, or the works of the craftsmen?" The works of the craftsmen " he said.
. "Such as they are or such a� they look? For you still have to make
thIs further distinction." "How do you mean?" he said.
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"Like this. Does a couch, if you observe it from the side, or from the front, or from anywhere else, differ' at all from itself? Or does it not differ at all but only look different, and similarly with the rest?"
"The latter is so," he said. "It looks different, but isn't." "Now consider this very point. Toward which is painting directed
in each case-toward imitation of the being as it is or toward its looking as it looks? Is it imitation of looks or of truth? "
"Of looks," he said. "Therefore, imitation is surely far from the truth; and, as it
seems, it is due to this that it produces everything-because it lays hold of a certain small part of each thing, and that part is itself only a phantom. For example, the painter, we say, will paint for us a shoe maker, a carpenter, and the other craftsmen, although he doesn't understand the arts of any one of them. But, nevertheless, if he is a good painter, by painting a oarpenter and displaying him from far off, he would deceive children and foolish human beings into think ing that it is truly a carpenter."
"Of course." "But, in any event, I suppose, my friend, that this is what
must be understood about all such things: when anyone reports to us about someone, saying that he has encountered a human being who knows all the crafts and everything else that single men several ly know, and there is nothing that he does not know more precisely than anyone else, it would have to be replied to such a one that he is an innocent human being and that, as it seems, he has encountered some wizard and imitator and been deceived. Because he himself is unable to put knowledge and lack of knowledge and imitation to the test, that man seemed all-wise to him."
"Very true," he said. "Then, next," I said, "tragedy and its leader, Homer, must be
considered, since we hear from some that these men know all arts and all things human that have to do with virtue and vice, and the divine things too. For it is necessary that the good poet, if he is go ing to make fair poems about the things his poetry concerns, be in possession of knowledge when he makes his poems or not be able to make them. Hence, we must consider whether those who tell us this have encountered these imitators and been deceived; and whether, therefore, seeing their works, they do not recognize that these works are third from what is and are easy to make for the man who doesn't know the truth-for such a man makes what look like beings but are not. Or, again, is there also something to what they
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say, and do the good poets really know about the things that, in the opinion of the many, they say well?"
"Most certainly," he said, "that must be tested." "�o
. you suppose that if a man were able to make both, the thing
to be ImItated and the phantom, he would permit himself to be serious about the crafting of the phantoms and set this at the head of his own life as the best thing he has?"
"No, I don't. " "B�t,
. I suppose, if he were in truth a knower of these things that
he also ImItates, he would be far more serious about the deeds than the imitations and would try to leave many fair deeds behind as memorials of himself and would be more eager to be the one who is lauded rather than the one who lauds."
"I suppose so," he said. "For the honor and the benefit coming from the two are hardly equal."
"Well, then, about the other things, let's not demand an account from Homer or any other of the poets by asking, if any one of them was a doctor and not only an imitator of medical speeches, who are the men ":hom any poet, old or new, is said to have made healthy, as Asclepius dId; or what students of medicine he left behind as Asclepius did his offspring. l Nor, again, will we ask them about the other arts but we'll let that go. But about the greatest and fairest things of �hich Homer attempts to speak-about wars and commands of armies and �overnanc�s of cities, and about the edu('ltion of a human being-it IS
. surely Just to ask him and inquire, 'Dear Homer, if you are not
thIrd from the truth about virtue, a craftsman of a phantom, just the o�e we defined as an imitator, but are also second and able to recog mze what sorts of practices make human beings better or worse in private and in public, tell us which of the cities was better governed thanks to you, as Lacedaemon was thanks to Lycurgus, and many o�ers
� both great and small, were thanks to many others? What
CIty gIves you credit for haVing proved a good lawgiver and ben efited them? Italy and Sicily do so for Charondas, and we for So lon;2 now who does it for you? ' Will he have any to mention?"
"I don't suppose so," said Glaucon. "At least, the Homeridae themselves do not tell of any. "
"Well, is any war in Homer's time remembered that was well fought with his ruling or advice?"
"None." "Well, th�n, as.
is appropriate to the deeds of a wise man, do they �ell of many mgemous devices for the arts or any other activities, Just as for Thales the Milesian or Anacharsis the Scythian?"3
"N ot at all; there's nothing of the sort. "
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"Well, then, if there is nothing in public, is it told that Homer, while he was himself alive, was in private a leader in education for certain men who cherished him for his intercourse and handed down a certain Homeric w a y of life to those who came after, just as Py thagoras himself was particularly cherished for this reason, and his successors even now still give Pythagoras' name to a way of life that makes them seem somehow outstanding among men. "
"Again," he said, "nothing of the sort is said. For Creophylos, Homer's comrade, would, Socrates, perhaps turn out to be even more ridiculous in his education than in his name,4 if the things said about Homer are true. For it is told that Homer suffered consid erable neglect in his own day, when he was alive."
"Yes, that is told," I said. "But, Glaucon, if Homer were really able to educate human beings and make them better because he is in
these things capable not of imitating but of knowing, do you suppose
that he wouldn't have made many comrades and been honored and
cherished b y them? But Protagoras, the Abderite, after all, and Pro:
dicus, the Cean, 5 and very many others are able, by private in
tercourse, to impress upon the men of their time the assurance that they
will be able to govern neither home nor city unless they themselves
supervise their education, and they are so intensely loved for this
wisdom that their comrades do everything but carry them about on
their heads. Then do you suppose that if he were able to help human
beings toward virtue, the men in Homer's time would have let him or
Hesiod go around being rhapsodes and wouldn't have clung to them
rather than to their gold? A n d wouldn't they have compelled these
teachers to stay with them at home; or, if they weren't persuaded, wouldn't they themselves have attended6 them wherever they went,
until they had g a ined an adequate education?"
"In my opinion, Socrates," he said, "what you say is entir ely
true." "Shouldn't we set down all those skilled in making, beginning
with Homer, as imitators of phantoms of virtue and of the other sub
jects of their making? They don't l a y hold of the truth; rather, as we
were just now saying, the painter will make what seems to b e a
shoemaker to those who understand as little about shoemaking as he
understands, but who observe only colors and shapes."
"Most certainly:' "Then, in this way, I suppose we'll claim the poetic man also
uses n ames and phrases to color each of the arts. He himself does n't
understand; but he imitates in such a way as to seem, to men who se
condition is like his own and who observe only speeches, to spe ak
very well. He seems to do so when he speaks using meter, rhy thm,
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and harmony, no matter whether the subject is shoemaking, general ship, or anything else. So great is the charm that these things by na ture possess. For when the things of the poets are stripped of the colors of the music and are said alone, by themselves, I suppose you know how they look. For you, surely, have seen."
"I have indeed," he said. "Don't they," I said, "resemble the faces of the boys who are
youthful but not fair in what happens to their looks when the bloom has forsaken them?"
"Exactly," he said. "Come now, reflect on this. The maker of the phantom, the
imitator, we say, understands nothing of what is but rather of what looks like it is. Isn't that so?"
"Yes." "Well, then, let's not leave it half-said, but let's see it adequately." "Speak," he said. "A painter, we say, will paint reins and a bit." "Yes." "But a shoemaker and a smith will make them." "Certainly." "Then does the painter understand how the reins and the bit must
be? Or does even the maker not understand-the smith and the leather cutter-but only he who knows how to use them, the horseman?"
"Very true." .
"And won't we say that it is so for everything?" "How?" "For each thing there are these three arts-one that will use one
that will make, one that will imitate." ,
"Yes." "Aren't the virtue, beauty, and rightness of each implement,
animal, and action related to nothing but the use for which each was made, or grew naturally?"
"That's so." "It's quite necessary, then, that the man who uses each thing be
most experienced and that he report to the maker what are the good or bad points, in actual use, of the instrument he uses. For example, about flutes, a flute player surely reports to the flute-maker which ones would serve him in playing, and he will prescribe how they must be made, and the other will serve him."
"Of course." "Doesn't the man who knows report about good and bad flutes,
and won't the other, trusting him, make· them?" "Yes."
Book X / 601a-602d SOCRATES!CLAUCC
"Therefore the maker of the same implement will have right trust concerning its beauty and its badness from being with the man who knows and from being compelled to listen to the man who knows, while the user will have knowledge."
"Certainly." "And will the imitator from using the things that he paints have
knowledge of whether they are fair and right or not, or right opinion due to the necessity of being with the man who knows and receiving prescriptions of how he must paint?"
"Neither." "Therefore, with respect to beauty and badness, the imitator will
neither know nor opine rightly about what he imitates." "It doesn't seem so." "The imitator, in his making, would be a charming chap, so far as
wisdom about what he makes goes." "Hardly." "But all the same, he will imitate, although he doesn't know in
what way each thing is bad or good. But as it seems, whatever looks to be fair to the many who don't know anything-that he will imitate."
"Of course he will." "Then it looks like we are pretty well agreed on these things: the
imitator knows nothing worth 'mentioning about what he imitates; imitation is a kind of play and not serious; and those who take up tragic poetry in iambics and in epics are all imitators in the highest possible degree."
"Most certainly." "In the name of Zeus," I said, "then, isn't this imitating con
cerned with something that is third from the truth? Isn't that so?" "Yes." "Now, then, on which one of the parts of the human being does it
have the power it has?" "What sort of part do you mean?" "This sort. The same magnitude surely doesn't look equal to our
Sight from near and from far." "No, it doesn't." "And the same things look bent and straight when seen in water
and out of it and also both concave and convex, due to the sight's being misled
' by the colors, and every sort of confusion of this kind is
plainly in our soul. And, then, it is because they take advantage of this affection in our nature that shadow painting, and puppeteering, and many other tricks of the kind fall nothing short of wizardry."
"True." "And haven't measuring, counting; and weighing come to light as
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most charming helpers in these cases? As a result of them, we are not ruled by a thing's looking bigger or smaller or more or heavier; rather we are ruled by that which has calculated, measured, or, if you please, weighed."
"u ndeniably." "But this surely must be the work of the calculating part in a
soul." "Yes, it is the work of that part." ".And to it, when it has measured and indicates that some things are bIgger or smaller than others, or equal, often contrary appearances
are presented at the same time about the same things." "Yes." "Didn't we say that it is impossible for the same thing to opine
contraries at the same time about the same things?" "And what we said is right." "Therefore, the part of the soul opining contrary to the measures
would not be the same as the part that does so in accordance with the measures."
"No, it wouldn't." "And, further, the part which trusts measure and calculation
would be the best part of the soul." "Of course." "Therefore, the part opposed to it would be one of the ordinary
things in us." "N ecessaril y." "Well, then, it was this I wanted agreed to when I said that paint
ing .and imitation as a whole are far from the truth when they produce �hell' work: and that, moreover, imitation keeps company with the part m us that IS far from prudence, and is not comrade and friend for any healthy or true purpose."
"Exactly," he said. "Therefore, imitation, an ordinary thing having intercourse with
what is ordinary, produces ordinary offspring." "It seems so." "Does this," I said, "apply only to the imitation connected with
the sight o� also to that connected with the hearing, which we name poetry?"
"It is likely," he said, "that it applies also to this." "Well, then," I said, "let's not just trust the likelihood based on
painting; but let's now go directly to the very part of thought with which.-poe�ry's imitation keeps company and see whether it is ordinary or senous.
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"We must." "Let's present it in this way. Imitation, we say, imitates human
beings pelfOlming forced or voluntary actions, and, as a result of the action, supposing themselves to have done well or badly, and in all of this experiencing pain or enjoyment. Was there anything else beyond this?"
"Nothing." "Then, in all this, is a human being of one mind? Or, just as with
respect to the Sight there was faction and he had contrary opinions in himself at the same time about the same things, is there also faction in him when it comes to deeds and does he do battle with himself? But I am reminded that there's no need for us to come to an agreement about this now. For in the previous arguments we came to sufficient agree ment about all this, asserting that our soul teems with ten thousand such oppositions arising at the same time."
"Rightly," he said. "Yes, it was right," I said. "But what we then left out, it is now
necessary to go through, in my opinion." "What was that?" he said. "A decent man," I said, "who gets as his share some such chance
as losing a son or something else for which he cares particularly, as we were surely also saying then, will bear it more easily than other men."
"Certainly." "Now let's consider whether he won't be grieved at all, or whether
this is impossible, but that he will somehow be sensible in the face of pain."
"The latter," he said, "is closer to the truth." "Now tell me this about him. Do you suppose he'll fight the pain
and hold out against it more when he is seen by his peers, or when he is alone by himself in a deserted place?"
"Surely," he said, "he will fight it far more when seen." "But when left alone, I suppose, he'll dare to utter many things of
which he would be ashamed if someone were to hear, and will do many things he would not choose to have anyone see him do."
"That's so," he said. "Isn't it argument and law that tell him to hold out, while the suf
fering itself is what draws him to the pain?" "True." "When a contradictory tendency arises in a human being about
the same thing at the same time, we say that there are necessarily two things in him."
"U ndeniably."
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. "Isn't the one ready to be persuaded in whatever direction the law leads?"
.
"How so?" "The law presumably says that it is finest to keep as quiet as possi
ble in misfortunes and not be irritated, since the good and bad in such things aren't plain, nor does taking it hard get one anywhere, nor are �ny o� the h�an things worthy of great seriousness; and being in pain IS an lffipedlffient to the coming of that thing the support of which we need as quickly as possible in these cases."
"What do you mean?" he said. "Deliberation," I said, "about what has happened. One must ac
cept !he fall of the dice and settle one's affairs accordingly-in whatever way argument declares would be best. One must not behave like children who have stumbled and who hold on to the hurt place and \ spend their time in crying out; rather one must always habituate the soul to tur� as quickl� as possible to curing and setting aright what has fallen and IS SlCk, domg away with lament by medicine."
"That," he said, "at all events, would be the most correct way for a man to face what chance brings." .
"And, we say, the best part is willing to follow this calculation-" "Plainly." "-whereas the part that leads to reminiscences of the suffering
�nd �o co�plaints and can't get enough of them, won't we say that it is IrratIOnal, Idle, and a friend of cowardice?"
"Certainly we'll say that." "Now then, the irritable disposition affords much and varied
imitation, while the prudent and quiet character, which is always ne�rly equal to itself, is neither easily imitated nor, when imitated, eaSIly understood, especially by a festive assembly where all sorts of human beings are gathered in a theater. For the imitation is of a condi tion that is surely alien to them."
"That's entirely certain." �n 1!lainly the imitative E.oet isn't natmally directed toward
C.any £ s�ch part o.!Jbe sCU!b and his wisdom isn't framed for satisfying It-l e s gomg to get a good reputation among the many-but rather �rd the irritable and vario�i�posjtion, becamg i� imitated." �
"Plainly." "Therefore it would at last be just for us to seize him and set him
beside the painter as his anti strophe. For he is like the painter in mak ing things that are ordinary by the standard of truth· and he is also similar in keeping company with a part of the soul th;t is on the same
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level and not with the best part. And thus, we should at last be justified 60� in not admitting him into a.city that is going to be under good laws, be- cause he awakens this part of the soul and nourishes it, and, by making it sTrong, destroys the calculating Pill:.t, just as in a city when someone, riv.� i) (... by making wicked men mighty, turns the city over to them and cor- fbf4-"..,.. rupts the superior ones. Simil�rly, we shall say the imitative poet pro� f�-(6t.. duces a bad regime in the soul of each pri"�an by making phan- toms that are very far removed from the tmth and by gratifying the soul's foolish ich doesn't distinguish big from little, but
e ieves the same thin s are at one time i an little." "Most certainly." "However, we haven't yet made the greatest accusation against
imitation. For the fact that it succeeds in maiming even the decent men, except for a certain rare few, is surely quite terrible."
"Certainly, if it does indeed do that." "Listen and consider. When even the best of us hear Homer or
any other of the tragic poets imitating one of the heroes in mourning and making quite an extended speech with lamentation, or, if you like, singing and beating his breast, you know that we enjoy it and that we give ourselves over to following the imitation; suffering along with the hero in all seriousness, we praise as a good poet the man who most puts us in this state."
"I know it, of course." "But when personal sorrow comes to one of us, you are aware
that, on the contrary, we pride ourselves if we are able to keep quiet and bear up, taking this to be the part of a man and what we then praised to be that of a woman."
"I do recognize it," he said. "Is that a fine way to praise?" I said. "We see a man whom we
would not condescend, but would rather blush, to resemble, and, instead of being disgusted, we enjoy it and praise it?"
"No, by Zeus," he said, "that doesn't seem reasonable." "Yes, it is," I said, "if you consider it in this way." 601 "In what way?" "If you are aware that what is then held down by force in our own
misfortunes and has hungered for tears and sufficient lament and satisfaction, since it is by nature such as to desire these things, is that which now gets satisfaction and enjoyment from the poets. What is by nature best in us, because it hasn't been adequately educated by argu ment or habit, relaxes its guard over this mournful part because it sees another's sufferings, and it isn't shameful for it, if some other man who claims to be good laments out of season, to praise and pity him; rather
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it believes that it gains the pleasure and wouldn't permit itself to be deprived of it by despising the whole poem. I suppose that only a cer tain few men are capable of calculating that the enjoyment of other people's sufferings has a necessary effect on one's Own. For the pitying part, fed strong on these examples, is not easily held down in one's own sufferings."
"Very true," he said. "Doesn't the same argument also apply to the laughing part? If
there are a�y jokes that you would be ashamed to make yourself, but that you enJoy very much hearing in comic imitation or in private imd y�u don't hat� them as bad, you do the same as with things that �voke pIty. For that m you which, wanting to make jokes, you then held down by argument, afraid of the reputation of buffoonery, you now release, and, having �ade it lusty there, have unawares been carried away in your own thmgs .so that you become a comic poet."
"Quite so," he said. .
"And as 'for sex, and spiritedness, too, and for all the desires, �a�ns, .and pleasures in the soul that we say follow all our action, poetic ImltatlOn produces similar results in us. For it fosters and waters them when they ought to be dried up, and sets them up as rulers in us when they ought to be ruled so that we may become better and happier in stead of worse and more wretched."
"I can't say otherwise," he said. "Then, Glaucon," I said, "when you meet praisers of Homer who
say th�t this poet educated Greece, and that in the management and educatlO� .of human aff�irs it i� worthwhile to take him up for study and for hvmg, by arrangmg one s whole life according to this poet, you must love and ,embrace them as being men who are the best they can be, and agree that Homer is the most poetic and first of the tragic poets; but you
. must know that only so much of poetry as is hymns to gods or
celebratlOn of good men should be admitted into a city. And if you ad mIt the sweetened muse in lyrics or epics, pleasure and pain will jointly be kmgs in your city instead of law and that argument which in each instance is best in the opinion of the community."
"Very true," he said. . "Well," I said, "since we brought up the subject of poetry again, let It
. be our apology that it was then fitting for us to send it away from
the CIty on account of its character. The argument determined us. Let us further say to it, lest it convict us for a certain harshness and rusticity" that there is an old quarrel between philosophy and poetry. For that yelpmg bItch shrieking at her master,' and 'great in the empty eloquence
. of fools,' 'the mob of overwise men holding sway,' and 'the
refined thmkers who are really poor'7 and countless others are signs of
Book X / 606b-608c SOCRATES/ GLA vca
this old opposition. All the same, let it be said that, if poetry directed to pleasure and imitation have any argument to give showing that they should be in a city with good laws, we should be delighted to receive them back from exile, since we are aware that we ourselves are charmed by them. But it isn't holy to betray what seems to be the truth. Aren't you, too, my friend, charmed by it, especially when you con template it through the medium of Homer?"
"Very much so." "Isn't it just for it to come back in this way-when it has made an
apology in lyrics or some other meter?" "Most certainly." "And surely we would also give its protectors, those who aren't
poets but lovers of poetry, occasion to speak an argument without meter on its behalf, showing that it's not only pleasant but also benefi cial to regimes and human life. And we shall listen benevolently. For surely we shall gain if it should turn out to be not only pleasant but also beneficia!."
"We would," he said, "undeniably gain." "But if not, my dear comrade, just like the men who have once
fallen in love with someone, and don't believe the love is beneficial, keep away from it even if they have to do violence to themselves; so we too-due to the inborn love of such poetry we owe to our rearing in these fine regimes-we'll be glad if it turns out that it is best and truest. But as long as it's not able to make its apology, when we listen to it, we'll chant this argument we are making to ourselves as a coun tercharm, taking care against falling back again into this love, which is childish and belongs to the many. We are, at all events, aware that such poetry mustn't be taken seriously as a serious thing laying hold of truth, but that the man who hears it must be careful, fearing for the regime in himself, and must hold what we have said about poetry."
"Entirely," he said. "I join you in saying that." "For the contest is great, my dear Glaucon," I said, "greater than
it seems-this contest that Concerns becoming good or bad-so we mustn't be tempted by honor or money or any ruling office or, for that matter, poetry, into thinking that it's worthwhile to neglect justice and the rest of virtue."
"I join you in saying that," he said, "on the basis of what we have gone through. And I suppose anyone else would too."
"And, yet," I said, "we haven't gone through the greatest rewards and prizes proposed for virtue."
"You are speaking of an inconceivable greatness," he said, "if there are others greater than those mentioned."
"What that is great could come to pass in a short time?" I said.
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"For surely, the whole of the time from childhood to old age would be short when compared with all time."
"Rather, it's nothing at all," he said. "What then? Do you suppose that an immortal thing ought to be
serious about so short a time and not about all time?" "I do suppose so," he said. "But what do you mean by this?" "Haven't you perceived," I said, "that our soul is immortal and is
never destroyed?" And he looked me in the face with wonder and said, "No, by
Zeus, I haven't. Can you say that?" "If I am not to do an injustice," I said. "And I suppose you can,
too, for it's nothing hard." "It is for me," he said. "But I would gladly hear from you this
thing that isn't hard." "You must hear it," I said. "J ust speak," he said. "Do you," I said, "call something good and something bad?" "I do." "Then do you have the same understanding of them as I do?" "What's that?" "What destroys and corrupts everything is the bad, and what saves
and benefits is the good." "I do," he said. "And what about this? Do you say there is something bad and
something good for each thing-for example, ophthalmia for the eyes, and sickness for the entire body, blight for grain, rot for wood, rust for iron and bronze, and, as I say, for nearly all things is there an evil and illness naturally connected with each?"
"I do," he said. "When one of these attaches itself to something, doesn't it make
the thing to which it attaches itself bad and, in the end, wholly dissolve and destroy it?"
"Undeniably." "Therefore the evil naturally connected with each thing and its
particular badness destroys it, or if this doesn't destroy it, surely there is nothing else that could still corrupt it. For surely the good would never destroy anything, nor, again, would what is neither bad nor good."
"How could they?" he said. "Therefore, if we find any existing thing that has an evil that
makes it bad but is, however, not able to dissolve and destroy it, then won't we know that for a thing that is naturally so there is no destruc tion?"
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"That's likely," he said. "What then?" I said. "Doesn't the soul have something that makes
it bad?" "Very much so," he said, "all the· things we were just going
through-injustice, licentiousness, cowardice, and lack of learning." "Does any one of them dissolve and destroy it? And reflect, so
that we won't be deceived into supposing that the unjust and foolish human being, when he is caught doing injustice, is then destroyed due to the injustice, which is a badness of soul. But do it this way: just as the badness of body, which is disease, melts and destroys a body and brings it to the point where it is not even a body, similarly all the things of which we were just speaking are corrupted by their own specific vice, which attaches itself to them and is present in them, and they finally come to the point where they are not. Isn't that so?"
"Yes." "Come, then, and consider soul in the same way. Do injustice
and the rest of vice, when they are present in it, by being present and attaching themselves, corrupt and wither it until, brought to the point of death, they separate it from the body?"
"That's not at all the way it is," he said. "But it is, on the contrary, unreasonable," I said, "that a thing be
destroyed by a badness that is alien and not by one that is its own." "It is unreasonable." "Reflect, Glaucon," I said, "that we don't suppose a body should
be destroyed by the badness of foods, whatever it may be-whether it is their oldness, rottenness, or anything else. But if the badness of the foods themselves introduces the badness of body into the body, we shall say that due to them it was destroyed by its own vice, which is disease. But we shall never admit that the body, which is one thing, is corrupted by the badness of food, which is another thing, if the alien evil does not introduce the evil that is naturally connected with the body."
"What you say," he said, "is quite right." "Well, then," I said, "according to the same argument, if badness
of body doesn't introduce badness of soul into a soul, we would never admit that a soul is destroyed by an alien evil that does not bring with it the specific badness of a soul-that is, we would not admit that one thing is destroyed by the evil of another."
"That's reasonable," he said. "Well then, either let's refute what we are saying and show that
it's not fine, or, as long as it's unrefuted, let's never assert that by fever, or by another illness, or, again, by slaughter-even if someone cuts the whole body up into the smallest pieces-a soul is ever closer to being destroyed as a result of these things, before someone proves that due to
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these sufferings of the body the soul itself becomes unjuster and unholier. But when an alien vice comes to be in something else and its own peculiar vice does not come to be in it, let's not permit anyone to assert that a soul or anything else is destroyed."
"On the contrary," he said, "no one will ever show that when men are dying their souls become unjust due to death."
"And," I said, "if someone dares to come to close quarters with the argument and say that the dying man becomes worse and unjuster, just so as not to be compelled to agree that souls are immortal, we shall surely insist that, if the man who says this says the truth, injustice is fatal to him who has it, even as disease is, and that, since by its nature it kills, those who get it die hom it-those who get most, more quickly, those who get less, in more leisurely fashion. They would be unlike the unjust men who, as things now stand, do indeed die from injustice, but at the hands of other men who administer the penalty."
"By Zeu�," he said, "then injustice won't look like such a very ter rible thing if it will be fatal to the one who gets it. For it would be a relief from evils. But I suppose rather that it will look, all to the con trary, like it kills other men, if it can, but makes its possessor very much alive and, in addition to alive, sleepless. So far surely, as it seems, does its camp lie from fatality."
"What you say is fine," I said. "For surely, whenever its own badness and its own evil are not sufficient to kill and destroy a soul, an evil assigned to the destruction of something else will hardly destroy a soul, or anything else except that to which it is aSSigned."
"Yes, hardly," he said, "at least as is likely." "Therefore, since it's not destroyed by a single evil-either its
own or an alien-it's plainly necessary that it be always and, if it is al ways, that it be immortal."
"That is necessary," he said. "Well, then," I said, "let this be so. And if it is, you recognize that
there would always be the same souls. For surely they could not be come fewer if none is destroyed, nor again more numerous. For if any of the immortal things should become more numerous, you know that they would come from the mortal, and everything would end up by being immortal."
"What you say is true." "But," I said, "let's not suppose this-for the argument won't per
mit it-nor that soul by its truest nature is such that it is full of much variety, dissimilarity, and quarrel with itself."
"How do you mean?" he said. "It's not easy," I said, "for a thing to be eternal that is both com-
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posed out of many things and whose composition is not of the finest, as the soul now looked to us."
"No; at least it's not likely." "Well then, that soul is immortal both the recent argument and
the others would compel us to accept. But it must be seen such as it is in truth, not maimed by community with body and other evils, as we now see it. But what it is like when it has become pure must be exam ined sufficiently by calculation. And one will find it far fairer and discern justice and injusticeS and everything we have now gone through more distinctly. Now we were telling the truth about it as it looks at present. However that is based only on the condition in which we saw it. Just as those who catch sight of the sea Glaucus9 would no longer easily see his original nature because some of the old parts of his body have been broken off and the others have been ground down and thoroughly maimed by the waves at the same time as other things have grown on him-shells, seaweed, and rocks-so that he resembles any beast rather than what he was by nature, so, too, we see the soul in such a condition because of countless evils. But, Glaucon, one must look elsewhere."
"Where?" he said. "To its love of wisdom, and recognize what it lays hold of and
with what sort of things it longs to keep company on the grounds that it is akin to the divine and immortal and what is always, and what it would become like if it were to give itself entirely to this longing and were brought by this impulse out of the deep ocean in which it now is, and the rocks and shells were hammered off-those which, because it feasts on earth, have grown around it in a wild, earthy, and rocky profu sion as a result of those feasts that are called happy. And then one would see its true nature-whether it is many-formed or Single-formed, or in what way it is and how. But now, as I suppose, we have fairly gone through its affections and forms in its human life."
"That's entirely certain," he said. "In the argument," I said, "haven't we both cleared away the
other parts of the criticism and also not brought in the wages and reputations connected with justice as you said Hesiod and Homer do? But we found that justice by itself is best for soul itself, and that the soul must do the just things, whether it has Gyges' ring or not, and, in addition to such a ring, Hades' cap."lO
"What you say is very true," he said. "Then, Glaucon," I said, "isn't it now, at last, unobjectionable, in
addition, also to give back to justice and the rest of virtue the wages-in their quantity and in their quality-that they procure for
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the soul from human beings and gods, both while the human being is still alive and when he is dead?"
"That's entirely certain," he said, "Then, will you give back to me what you borrowed in the argu
ment?" "What in particular?" "I gave you the just man's seeming to be unjust and the unjust
man just. You both asked for it; even if it weren't possible for this to escape gods and human beings, all the same, it had to be granted for the argument's sake so that justice itself could be judged as compared with injustice itself. Or don't you remember?"
"If I didn't," he said, "I should indeed be doing an injustice." "Well, then," I said, "since they have been judged, on justice's behalf I ask back again the reputation it in fact has among gods and among human beings; and I ask us to agree that it does enjoy such a reputation, so that justice may also carry off the prizes that it gains from seem ing and bestows on its possessors, since it has made clear that
it bestows the good things that come from being and does not deceive those who really take possession of it." "What you ask," he said, "is only just." "Then," I said, "won't you first give this back: that it doesn't
escape the notice of gods, at least, what each of the two men is?" "Yes," he said, "we shall give that back." "And if they don't escape notice, the one would be dear to the gods and the other hateful, as we also agreed at the beginning?" "That's so," "And won't we agree that everything that comes to the man dear to the godS-insofar as it comes from gods-is the best possible, except for any necessary evil that was due to him for former mistakes?" "Most certainly." "Thus, it must be assumed in the case of the just man that, if he falls into poverty, diseases, or any other of the things that seem bad, for him it will end in some good, either in life or even in death, For, surely, gods at least will never neglect the man who is eagerly willing to become just and, practicing virtue, likens himself, so far as is possible for a human being, to a god." "It's quite likely," he said, "that such a man isn't neglected by his like." "And, in the case of the unjust man, mustn't we think the opposite of these things?" "Very much so," "Then such would be some of the prizes from gods to the just man."
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"In my opinion, at least," he said. "And what does he get from human beings?" I said. "Or, if that
which is must be asserted, isn't it this way? Don't the clever unjust men do exactly as do all those in a race who run well from the lower end of the course but not from the upper?l l At the start they leap sharply away but end up by becoming ridiculous and, with their ears on their shoulders,12 run off uncrowned? But those who are truly run ners come to the end, take the prizes, and are crowned, Doesn't it also for the most part turn out that way with the just? Toward the end of every action, association, and life they get a good reputation and bear off the prizes from human beings."
'
"Quite so." "Will you, then, stand for my saying about them what you your
self said about the unjust? For I shall say that it's precisely the just, when they get older, who rule in their city if they wish ruling offices, and marry wherever they wish and give in marriage to whomever they want. And everything you said about the unjust, I now say about these men. And, again, about the unjust, I shall say that most of them, even if they get away unnoticed when they are young, are caught at the end of the race and ridiculed; and when they get old, they are insulted in their wretchedness by foreigners and townsmen. As for being whipped and the things that you, speaking truly, said are rustic-that they will be racked and burned-suppose that you have also heard from me that they suffer all these things. But, as I say, see if you'll stand for it."
"Very much so," he said. "For what you say is just." "Well, then," I said, "such would be the prizes, wages, and gifts
coming to the just man while alive from gods and human beings, in ad dition to those good things that justice itself procured."
"And they are," he said, "quite fair and sure ones." "Well," I said, "they are nothing in multitude or magnitude com
pared to those that await each when dead. And these things should be heard so that in hearing them each of these men will have gotten back the full measure of what the argument owed him."
"Do tell," he said, "since there aren't many other things that would be more pleasant to hear."
"I will not, however, tell you a story of Alcinous," I said, "but rather of a strong man, Er, son of Armenius, by race a Pam phylian.13 Once upon a time he died in war; and on the tenth day, when the corpses, already decayed, were picked up, he was picked up in a good state of preservation. Having been brought home, he was about to be buried on the twelfth day; as he was lying on the pyre, he came back to life, and, come back to life, he told what he saw in the other world. He said that when his soul departed, it made a journey in
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the company of many, and they came to a certain demonic place, where there were two openings in the earth next to one another, and, again, two in the heaven, above and opposite the others. Between them sat judges who, when they had passed judgment, told the just to continue their journey to the right and upward, through the heaven; and they at tached signs of the judgments in front of them. The unjust they told to continue their journey to the left and down, and they had behind them signs of everything they had done. And when he himself came forward they said that he had to become a messenger to human beings of th� things there, and they told him to listen and to look at everything in the place. He saw there, at one of the openings of both heaven and earth, the souls going away when judgment had been passed on them. As to the other two openings, souls out of the earth, full of dirt and dust, came up from one of them; and down from the other came other souls pure from heaven. And the souls that were ever arriving looked a� though they had come from a long journey: and they went away with delight to the meadow, as to a public festival, and set up camp there. All those who were acquaintances greeted one another; and the souls that came out of the earth inquired of the others about the things in the other place, and those from heaven about the things that had happened to those from the earth. And they told their stories to one another, the ones lamenting and crying, remembering how much and what sort of things they had suffered and seen in the journey under the earth-the journey lasts a thousand years-and those from heaven in their turn told of the inconceivable beauty of the experiences and the sights there: Now to go through the many things would take a long time, Glaucon. But the sum, he said, was this. For all the unjust deeds they had done anyone and all the men to whom they had done injustice, they had paid the penalty for every one in turn, ten times over for each. That is, they were punished for each injustice once every hundred years; taking this as the length of human life, in this way they could pay off the penalty for the injustice ten times over. Thus, for example, if some men were causes of the death of many, either by betraying cities or armies and had reduced men to slavery, or were involved in any other wrongdoing, they received for each of these things tenfold sufferings; and again, if they had done good deeds and had proved just and holy, in the same measure did they receive reward. And about those who were only just born and lived a short time, he said other things not worth mentioning. And he told of still greater wages for impiety and piety toward gods and parents and for murder. For he said he was there when one man was asked by another, 'Where is Ardiaeus the Great?' This Ardiaeus
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had been tyrant in a certain city of Pamphylia just a thousand years before that time; he had, as was said, killed his old father and elder brother and done many other unholy deeds.14 Now Er said that the man asked responded, 'He hasn't come. Nor will he come here,' he asserted. 'For this too, of course, was one of the terrible sights we saw. When we were near the mouth about to go up and had suffered every thing else, we suddenly saw him and others. Just about all of them were tyrants, but there were also some private men, of those who had com mitted great faults. They supposed they were ready to go up, but the mouth did not admit them; it roared when one of those whose badness is incurable or who had not paid a sufficient penalty attempted to go up. There were men at that place,' he said, 'fierce men, looking fiery through and through, standing by and observing the sound, who took hold of some and led them away, but who bound Ardiaeus and others hands, feet, and head, threw them down and stripped off their skin. They dragged them along the wayside, carding them like wool on thorns; and they indicated to those who came by for what reason this was done and that these men would be led away and thrown into Tar tams.' They had experienced many fears of all kinds, he said, but more extreme than any was the fear that each man experienced lest the sound come as he went up; and when it was silent, each went up with the greatest delight. Such then were the penalties and punishments; and, on the other hand, the bounties were the antistrophes of these.
"When each group had spent seven days in the plain, on the eighth they were made to depart from there and continue their journey. In four days they arrived at a place from which they could see a straight light, like a column, stretched from above through all of heaven and earth, most of all resembling the rainbow but brighter and purer. They came to it after having moved forward a day's journey. And there, at the middle of the light, they saw the extremities of its bonds stretched from heaven; for this light is that which binds heaven, like the undergirders of triremes, thus holding the entire revolution together. From the extremities stretched the spindle of Necessity, by which all the revolutions are turned. Its stem and hook are of adamant, and its whorl is a mixture of this and other kinds. The nature of the whorl is like this: its shape is like those we have here; but, from what he said, it must be conceived as if in one great hollow whorl, completely scooped out, lay another like it, but smaller, fitting into each other as bowls fit into each other' and there is a third one like these and a fourth, and four others. For
' there are eight whorls in all, lying in one another with
their rims showing as circles from above, while from the back they
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form one continuous whorl around the stem, which is driven right through the middle of the eighth.I5 Now the circle formed by the lip of the first and outelIDost whorl is the broadest; that of the sixth, sec ond; that of the fourth, third; that of the eighth, fourth; that of the sev enth, fifth; that of the fifth, sixth; that of the . third, seventh; and that of the second, eighth. And the lip of the largest whorl is multicolored; that of the seventh, brightest; that of the eighth gets its color from the sev enth's shining on it; that of the second and the fifth are like each other, yellower than these others; the third has the whitest color; the fourth is reddish; and the sixth is second in whiteness. The whole spindle is turned ih a circle with the same motion, but within the revolving whole the seven inner circles revolve gently in the opposite direction from the whole; of them, the eighth goes most quickly, second and together with one another are the seventh, sixth and fifth. Third in swiftness, as it looked to them, the fourth circled about; fOUlth, the third; and fifth, the second. And the spindle turned in the lap of Necessity. Above, on each of its circles, is perched a Siren, accompany ing its revolution, uttering a single sound, one note; from all eight is produced the accord of a single halIDony. Three others are seated round about at equal distances, each on a throne. Daughters of Necessity, Fates-Lachesis, Clotho, and Atropos1 6-clad in white with wreaths on their heads, they sing to the Sirens' harmony, Lachesis of what has been, Clotho of what is, and Atropos of what is going to be. And Clotho puts her right hand to the outer revolution of the spindle and joins in turning it, ceasing from time to time; and Atropos with her left hand does the same to the inner ones; but Lachesis puts one hand to one and the other hand to the other, each in tum.
"Now, when they arrived, they had to go straight to Lachesis. A certain spokesman first marshaled them at regular distances from each other; then, he took lots and patterns of lives from Lachesis' lap, and went up to a high platform and said, 'This is the speech of Necessity's maiden daughter, Lachesis. Souls that live a day, this is the beginning of another death bringing cycle for the mortal race. A demon will not select you, but you will choose a demon. Let him who gets the first lot make the first choice of a life to which he will be bound by necessity. Virtue is without a master; as he honors or dishonors her, each will have more or less of her. The blame belongs to him who chooses; god is blameless.'
. "When he had said this, he cast the lots among them all, and each
pl�ked up the one that fell next to him-except for Er who wasn't per mitted to do so. To the man who picked it up it was plain what number he had drawn. After this, in tum, he set the patterns of the lives on the
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ground before them; there were far more than there were souls present. There were all sorts; lives of all animals, and, in particular, all the varieties of human lives. There were tyrannies among them, some last ing to the end, others ruined midway, ending both in poverty and exile and in beggary. And there were lives of men of repute-some for their forms and beauty and for strength in general as well as capacity in contests' others for their birth and the virtues of their ancestors-and there w�re some for men without repute in these things; and the same was the case for women, too. An ordering of the soul was not in them, due to the necessity that a soul become different according to the life it chooses. But all other things were, mixed with each other and with wealth and poverty and with sickness and health, and also with the states intermediate to these.
"Now here, my dear Glaucon, is the whole risk for a human peing, as itSeem� And on this account each of us must, to the neglect of other studies, above all see to it that he is a seeker and student of that study by which he might be able to learn and find out who will give him the capacity and the knowledge to distinguish the good and the bad life, and so everywhere and always to choose the better from among those that are possible. He will take into account all the things we have just mentioned and how in combination and separately they affect the virtue of a life. Thus he may know the effects, bad and good, of beauty mixed with poverty or wealth and accompanied by this or that habit of soul; and the effects of any particular mixture with one another of good and bad birth, private station and ruling office, strength and weakness, facility and difficulty in learning, and all such things that are connected with a soul by nature or are acqUired: From all this he will be able to draw a conclusion and choose-in looking off toward the nature of the soul-between the worse and the better life, calling worsE' the one that leads it toward becoming more unjust, and better the one that leads it to becoming juster. He will let everything else go. For we have see,? that this is the most important choice for him in life and death. He must go to Hades adamantly holding to this opinion so that he won't be daunted by wealth and such evils there, and rush into tyrannies and other such deeds by which he would work many irreparable evils, and himself undergo still greater suffering; but rather tI�U:yiIl know hGw-al ways to choose the life between such extremes and flee the excesses in
either direction in this life, so far as is possible, and in all of the next life. For in this way a bpw:li'l eeiflg beeel1�eg lal1913ig�t
"And the messenger from that place then also reported that the spokesman said the following: 'Even for the man who comes forward last, if he chooses intelligently and lives earnestly, a life to content him
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6 1 9 b is laid up, not a bad one. Let me one who begins 'not be careless about his choice. Let not the one who is last be disheartened.'
"He said that when the spokesman had said this the man who had drawn the first lot came forward and immediately chose the greatest tyranny, and, due to folly and gluttony, chose without having con-
e sidered everything adequately; and it escaped his notice that eating his own children and other evils were fated to be a part of that life. When he considered it at his leisure, he beat his breast and lamented the choice, not abiding by the spokesman's forewarning. For he didn't blame himself for the evils but chance, demons, and anything rather than himself. He was one of those who had come from heaven, having lived in an orderly regime in his former life, participating in virtue by
d habit, without philosophy. And, it may be said, not the least number of those who were caught in such circumstances came from heaven, be cause they were unpracticed in labors. But most of those who came from the earth, because they themselves had labored and had seen the labors of others, weren't in a rush to make their choices. On just this account, and due to the chance of the lot, there was an exchange of evils and goods for most of the souls. However, if a man, when he comes to the life here, always philosophizes in a healthy way and the
e lot for his choice does not fall out among the last, it's likely, on the basis of what is reported from there, that he will not only be happy here but also that he will journey from this world to the other and back again not by the underground, rough road but by the smooth one, through the heavens.
"He said that this was a sight surely worth seeing: how each of the 620 a several souls chose a life. For it was pitiable, laughable, and wonderful
to see. For the most part the choice was made according to the habit ...v_ uation of their
, forme� life. He said he saw a soul that once belonged to
�_Orpheus choosmg a hfe ofa swan, out of hatred for womankind; due to his death at their hands, he wasn't willing to be born, generated in a woman. He saw Thamvras' soul choosing the life of a nightingale. And he also saw a swan changing to the choice of a human life; other musical animals did the same thing. The soul that got the twentieth lot
b chose the life of a lion; it was the soul of Ajax, son of Te� who shunned becoming a human being, remembering the Judgment of the arms. And after him was the soul of A amemnon' it too hated hu-t- mankind as a result of . ings and therefi han ed t life of an eagle. Atalanta's soul had drawn one of the middle lots; she saw the �great ho;;-rs of an athletic man and couldn't pass them by but took
e them. After this soul he saw that of Epeius, son of Panopeus, going into the nature of an artisan woman. And far out among the-hrst' he saw the
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soul of the buffoon Thersites, clothing itself as an ape.J7 And by chance Odys;eus' soul had drawn the last lot of all and went to choose; from memory of its former labors it had recovered from love of honor; it went around for a long time looking for the life of a private man who minds his own business; and with effort it found one lying somewhere, neglected by the others. It said when it saw this life that it would have done the same even if it had drawn the first lot, and was delighted to choose it. And from the other beasts, similarly some went into human lives and into one another-the unjust changing into savage ones, the just into tame ones, and there were all kinds of mixtures.
"When all the souls had chosen lives, in the same order as the lots they had drawn, they went forward to Lachesis. And she sent with each the demon he had chosen as a guardian of the life and a ful£ller of what was chosen. The demon first led the soul to Clotho-under her hand as it turned the whirling spindle-thus ratifying the fate it had drawn and chosen. After touching her, he next led it to the spinning of Atropos, thus making the threads irreversible.1 s And from there, without turning around, they went under Necessity's throne. And, having come out through it, when the others had also come through, all mad� thelr way through terrible stifling heat to the plain of Lethe.19 For It was barren of trees and all that naturally grows on earth. Then they made their camp, for evenin:g was coming on, by the river of Carelessness whose water no vessel can contain. Now it was a necessity for all to drink a certain measure of the water, but those who were not saved by prudence drank more than the measure. As he drank, each forgot everything. And when they had gone to sleep and it was midnight, there came thunder and an earthquake; and they were suddenly carried from there, each in a different way, up to their birth, shooting like stars.20 But he himself was prevented from drinking the water . However, in what way and how he came into his body, he did not know; but, all of a sudden, he recovered his sight and saw that it was morning and he was lying on the pyre.
"And thus, Glaucon, a tale was saved and not lost;21 'and it could save us, if we were persuaded by it, and we shall make a good crossing of the river of Lethe and not defile our soul. But if we are per suaded by me, holding that soul is immortal and capable of bearing all evils and all goods, we shall always keep to the upper road and practice justice with prudence in every way so that we shall be friends to our selves and the gods, both while we remain here and when we reap the rewards for it like the victors who go about gathering in the prizes. And so here and in the thousand year journey that we have described we shall fare well."22
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