By Adam Sedia Classical and modern poetry are inarguably different. Indeed, modernism’s chief boast is its break with classicism and tradition more broadly. The difference is palpable in even the most cursory reading of a classical poem alongside a modernist one. Yet in what does the difference lie? It might be tempting to follow Justice…
Tag: Poetry
Clarity vs. Obscurity II: The Essences of Classicism and Modernism Compared
By Adam Sedia For Part I to this series click here. In my last essay, I discussed the difference between classical and modernist poetry as a difference of worldviews. Classicism views the art as a vehicle to reveal universal truths, while modernism denies such truths and instead views the primary purpose of poetry as inducing…
Spenser and Marlowe – God’s Spies
By Gerald Therrien “Come, let’s away to prison:We two alone will sing like birds i’ the cage:When thou dost ask me blessing, I’ll kneel down,And ask of thee forgiveness: so we’ll live,And pray, and sing, and tell old tales, and laughAt gilded butterflies, and hear poor roguesTalk of court news; and we’ll talk with them…
Art, Metaphor and Epiphany
By David Gosselin The experience of great art is similar to the experience of a great scientific discovery. There is a common sentiment of “epiphany”. It is the strangely familiar feeling of remembering something for the first time, or having our attention fall on something that had been there all along. In both the case…
The Poetic Principle as a Force of Universal History
In this Rising Tide Foundation lecture, Gerald Therrien addresses the question of morality’s relationship with creative genius and how this uniquely human power allows us to translate discoveries of human nature and the universe into new forms of action and artistry that both elevates our culture while extending the influence of a mortal life infinitely…
Casting the Good Spell: Is Christianity a Fairy Tale?
Recently Cynthia Chung had a very engaging conversation with the Unreliable Narrators on the subject of C.S. Lewis’s science-fiction trilogy. The podcast can be listened to here: Lewis himself was interested in exploring the idea of a ‘good spell’ vs. a ‘bad spell’ in the third installment to his science-fiction trilogy titled “That Hideous Strength,”…
To a Young Friend (As He Dedicates Himself to Philosophy)
By David Gosselin Fortunate child! To you the crib is still a boundless space!Become a man and see how small the boundless world becomes!—The Child in the Cradle, Friedrich Schiller In Schiller’s “To A Young Friend (As He Dedicates Himself to Philosophy)”, the poet recasts the Classical Greek ideal of honor, virtue and fortitude within…
Schiller, Shelley and Poe: The Manifestation of the Spiritual in the Material World
It is too often the case that the line separating the domain of the thing we call “matter” and “spirit” is far too firmly drawn in the sand, resulting in a schismed sense of reality- or “two opposing realities” having no commensurability to one another. But are these two worlds truly as disconnected as some…
Vicarious Explorations into Genius: Hymn to Intellectual Beauty Analyzed
It has become commonplace to assert that artistic beauty is relative existing only in the eye of the beholder. This abused statement has become almost a parody in our modern age, as everything becomes art, and everything- regardless of its ugliness becomes raised to a pedestal of beauty. This loss of any principled standards of…