Wednesday 1 February 2017

SUMMARY of "From two cheers for Democracy. Art as evidence of order."by E.M Forster

E.M Forster

From two cheers for Democracy.
Art as evidence of order.

·         A believer of art for art's sake. He wants to dismiss the idea that only art matters. No one can spend his life appreciating masterpieces; man lives in a complex would full of conflicts which cannot be seen aesthetically. Art for art's sake can't be seen aesthetically. Art for art's sake does not mean only art matters and nothing else. It means that - art or a work of art is a self-contained entity with a life given by its creator. It has internal order and external form .E.g. Shakespeare's Macbeth &"la Grande jalte" of Seurat .they are works which relate to politics, surroundings etc. but still these works do have their internal life and order

·         Past is a series of disorders, it’s marked by increasing growth of human interference. He hopes that disorders will provide writers with fuller inspirations and better material conditions even these disorders won’t last. E.g. of past disorders- renaissance, 18th century France, china & Persia. A new league of nations was promised after WW1 but nothing like that happened and now Forster didn’t believe in any promises. The League of Nations was later formed in 1920.
·         Social and political stability can't be reached because we apply scientific discoveries and disregard elementary discoveries. If men were more interested in knowledge than power then mankind would be safer. A new order can be constructed on vital harmony. He is against science, he thinks it destroys mankind and gives terrible pains to social system. Science destroys new evolving social orders. He believes that our race is moving towards unpleasantness and the only way to preserve it is through uninventiveness.
·         He says under our present psychology, order in daily life, history, social and political category is unattainable.
·         Where is this order attainable? There is theological reference to heaven and earth being the same after Einstein and other scientologists.
2 orders which exist
    - Divine order- mystic harmony, it can be attained by believers and players. This can't be tested or disproved.
    - Aesthetic category- the order an artist creates with his work. A work of art is a unique product. It is unique because of internal harmony.
                                             

·         For Forster art is the only orderly thing in this muddling world. Artist will tend to be an outsider in society; 19th century society saw him as a bohemian which was inaccurate.
·         Art could be a full time job.
·         An artist with the help of words, sounds, paint, clay, marble etc. creates a work which has internal harmony and it presents order in a disarranged planet.
·         An artist does not care about his relations with the society, he is aware of the invitation to invent, create order and he believes he can do his work better through detachment.
·         Peacock feather in hand, lousy beard and hat pulled over his eyes was the typical image of an artist.
·         Forster compares poets to rats and the world to a sinking ship. Poet is a bohemian, outsider, parasitic rat, someone with no function in the world. He gives example of Shelly who said "poet are unacknowledged legislators of the world"
·         Poet legislates through creating and he creates through his sensitiveness and his power to impose form; without a form there is no sensitiveness. Form is not a tradition; it alters from generation to generation. Artist always seek a new technique but internal harmony and outward surface order will never change.
·         He says society can only represent a part of human spirit and the other part is represented by art. When he looks in past he finds grounds for discussion, lost individuality, a desire to create order and challenges. He believes people who don't care about art are concerned by art as well.


     
 Deepali Yadav
 Student at Kamala Nehru College (DU)
(deepaliyadav2896@gmail.com)


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