From the celebrated cultural historian and bestselling author, a provocative history of the evolution of our ideas about art since the early nineteenth century In this witty, provocative, and learned book, acclaimed cultural historian and writer Jacques Barzun traces our changing attitudes to the arts over the past 150 years, suggesting that we are living in a period of cultural liquidation, nothing less than the ending of the modern age that began with the Renaissance. He challenges our conceptions and misconceptions about art “in order to reach a conclusion about its value and its drawbacks for life at the present time.”

In this deep and engaging meditation on the usefulness and uselessness of reading in the digital age, Harvard English professor Marjorie Garber aims to reclaim “literature” from the periphery of our personal, educational, and professional lives and restore it to the center, as a radical way of thinking. But what is literature anyway, how has it been understood over time, and what is its relevance for us today? Who gets to decide what the word means? Why has literature been on the defensive since Plato? Does it have any use at all, other than serving as bourgeois or aristocratic accoutrements attesting to one’s worldly sophistication and refinement of spirit? What are the boundaries that separate it from its “commercial” instance and from other more mundane kinds of writing? Is it, as most of us assume, good to read, much less study—and what would that mean?

These essays discuss major questions that should arise in courses in bibliography, methodology, and historiography, once the survey courses are left behind.

"The body described in this book is a theoretical subject in which the connection between art and the categories of excess are explored. The author provides an analysis of the way the body has long been manipulated by its relationship with cultural, religious and political institutions, to the point of self-mutilation. What is being explored is the body as a construction of forms of discourse, obligations and mechanisms of control. The result is a mapping of the most significant iconographies of this special body that has always inhabited art. It is typically contemporary to choose a body that is at once subject and object of a multitude of events that suggest continual references to classical iconography, emphasising the numerous analogies and affinities between the experiences of contemporary artists and the most traditional Western iconography." "This thought-provoking volume presents a fierce and sophisticated vision, a remarkable sense of the spirit of the time, the representation of macrocosms which include methods, trends, acts of rebellion, mutations and images of humanity undergoing transformation."--BOOK JACKET.

An intimate reflection on culture and tradition, creativity and power, that draws on a lifetime’s commitment to aesthetic encounter The playwright, poet, essayist, novelist, and Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka is also a longtime art collector. This book of essays offers a glimpse into the motivations of the collector, as well as a highly personal look at the politics of aesthetics and collecting. Detailing moments of first encounter with objects that drew him in and continue to affect him, Soyinka describes a world of mortals, muses, and deities that imbue the artworks with history and meaning. Beyond Aesthetics is a passionate discussion of the role of identity, tradition, and originality in making, collecting, and exhibiting African art today. Soyinka considers objects that have stirred controversy, and he decries dogmatic efforts—whether colonial or religious—to suppress Africa’s artistic traditions. By turns poetic, provocative, and humorous, Soyinka affirms the power of collecting to reclaim tradition. He urges African artists, filmmakers, collectors, and curators to engage with their aesthetic and cultural histories.