Re: Creativity, genius and the science/faith interface

From: D. F. Siemens, Jr. (dfsiemensjr@juno.com)
Date: Mon Aug 25 2003 - 15:59:29 EDT

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    =20
    >>> The point I'm trying to make is perhaps an extrapolation of what=20
    >>> D.M. Thomas
    >>> said above; that creative geniuses are maybe put there in order to=20
    >>> tell the
    >>> truth. =20

    >> This gets us into aesthetic theory. Music communicates something, but
    =
    >> I do not know how it can be truth.

    >Shostakovich once told the poet Yevtushenko that "God will forgive me, =
    >because I don't lie in music, only in words".
    >Reference is at http://www.gregsandow.com/shos13.htm . The 13th =
    >Symphony contains a setting of Yevtushenko's poem "Babiy Yar", a =
    >vehement protest against anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union. That seems
    =
    >to tell the truth to me; and it got the symphony banned after one =
    >performance.
    <snip>

    What is truth in music? A poem has semantic content, but there is a vast
    gap between a great poem and versified propaganda. I recall that someone
    told the would-be poets that, if they had a message to communicate, they
    shouldn't. Only what was done for love of language was poetry. But pure
    music does not have semantic content. so 'truth' must be something
    different for music. Unless the composer is imitating sounds (a Communist
    composition, "In a Steel Mill," comes to mind), it seems to me that even
    the 'true-to-life' of novels and short stories does not apply. So some
    different sense of 'truth' has to be supplied. This clearly applies to
    Thomas's claim.

    >Creative artists suffer in one way or another for their creativity, just
    =
    >as our Creator suffered immeasurably more over His creation. The =
    >"ratio" as you put it is immeasurably greater, but the pattern is the =
    >same.
    <snip>
    >Iain.

    I don't get it, beyond the truism that every choice eliminates
    alternatives. This cannot be avoided any more than the circumstances into
    which one is born or one's heredity. To go way back, if I had spent my
    nickel on a pack of gum, I couldn't also spend it on a Baby Ruth candy
    bar. So far as I can tell, every occupation one may choose has its
    unpleasant requirements. Did I somehow become Christlike by correcting
    exams and term papers? Is the prof who hires someone to do the onerous
    tasks devilish?

    Anyone who produced a work of art benefits some people--those with
    intelligence, sensitivity and leisure. Those who cook and clean and haul
    off garbage benefit a smaller number directly for a briefer time, but a
    broader swath of humanity. Those who follow science have a different
    benefit. On what grounds can one single out artists (especially a small
    subset) as special examples of Christlikeness? To pursue the matter
    intelligently, you have to produce a definition of 'truth' that fits the
    nonverbal and nonconventional, show that the suffering of musicians,
    especially, is special, even redemptive, as a minimum. Otherwise words
    are being batted around for feel-good purposes, like the soma of Huxley's
    /Brave New World/.
    Dave



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