On Art & Values

Thursday 23 May 2024

• Can great art and literature make us better people?

• And if so, can bad art corrupt us?

• Can a bad person produce good art and can we separate the bad man from the good art?

When religion started to decline in Victorian England some thinkers, such as Matthew Arnold, suggested that art might take the place of religion to provide inspiration, consolation and moral guidance. But does participation in the arts necessarily make us better people? And if good art can make us better, does bad art corrupt?

The critic George Steiner struggled with the fact that many Nazis in WW2 were highly cultivated people who enjoyed the arts but at the same time were capable of approving mass murder. So where does that leave the arts? What value do they have if they don't make us better people? 

How do we deal with art we love which has been produced by bad people?

Mark Kermode in a recent BBC radio podcast 'Screenshot' has been discussing the quality of the 1974 movie Chinatown in relation to his knowledge of the rape of a 13 year old girl by director Roman Polanski. He wants to say what a great film it is but at the same time condemn the man. Is it psychologically possible and is morally right anyway?

• Some notes on Art & Values

• The Ben John Case — A student convicted of downloading terrorist material is sentenced to read great literature.

Can art and literature make us better people?

• What Can We Expect From Great Works? by Zohar Atkins 

• Art as a means to moral improvement

• Can Good Art Make one a Better Person?

• Does Art Make You a Better Person?

• Does reading fiction make us better people?

• Art Makes Us Better Human Beings

• How Your Appreciation of the Arts Makes You a Better Person

• Study asks: do the arts make us better people

• Does reading a single passage of literary fiction really improve theory of mind?

• The Importance of Books

• Art doesn't make us better humans

• Against Art in Politics, and Politics in Art

• Do the humanities humanize by George Steiner

• To Civilise Our Gentlemen by George Steiner

• The Case Against Literature As Moral Education

• The Value of the Humanities by Chris Wright

Can bad art corrupt?

• The Lady Chatterley Trial 1960

Evaluating the Art of Bad People

• Good Art, Bad People

• What Do We Do with the Art of Monstrous Men

• Song: Tomorrow Belongs to Me from Cabaret

Theory of Mind and Art

• Men have an empathy problem

• Theory of mind