Description | Texts | Objectives | Classroom Method & Daily Expectations
Requirements and Grading | Reading Schedule
John Keats� �Ode on a Grecian Urn� ends �Beauty is truth, truth beauty,�that
is all / Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.� But the history of the
relationship of beauty and truth is thornier that this enigmatic line would have
us believe. Ever since Socrates suggested in the Republic that perhaps
poets should be banned from the just city, for they specialize in fictions or
lies and virtue is concerned with truth, philosophy has debated the relationship
between beauty and truth, between art and virtue. In the modern age, Immanuel
Kant examined the function of judgment especially as exercised in judgments that
something is beautiful. How do we understand the seeming universality of a
judgment such as �This painting is beautiful� in distinction to judgments of
taste, �I like this painting�? And many thinkers have explored ways in which
beauty, especially literature, raises moral questions that transcend the
insights that might be distillable from more abstract philosophical puzzles.
The course will study the Western tradition of discourse about the nature of the
relationship between beauty and truth. All the above appear as key moments in a
long discussion in Western thought about the nature of this relationship. Our
method will be simple: to enter, through reading and discussion of these texts
and in the light of our own experiences of beauty and artistic creation, into
this tradition of dialogue ourselves and to become conversant with some of the
most powerful arguments in it. Our goal is to become competent participants in
this discussion, understanding what has been said before us, and venturing our
own thoughtful and critically-reflected-upon ideas about the relation between
truth and beauty.
 | Plato. Republic. Trans. Grube/Reeve. Second (revised) edition. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1992. |
| Plato, Ion. Jowett translation. Electronic text in public domain. |
| Plato. Symposium. Translated by Woodruff & Nehamas. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company., 1989. |
| Susan Sontag, �Against Interpretation.� (photocopy). New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1966. |
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Immanuel Kant. Critique of Judgment. Translated by Werner H. Pluhar.* Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1987. * Although a cheaper, earlier translation is available, this edition has important material not in the previous translation. |
| Immortal Poems of the English Language. Oscar Williams, editor. (If you have a good anthology of English literature, you probably can get by with it.) |
| Tim O�Brien, The Things They Carried (stories). New York: Broadway Books, 1999 (reprint). |
| Martin Heidegger, �The Origin of the Work of Art� in Poetry, Language, Thought. Trans. A. Hofstadter. San Francisco: Harper Perennial, 2001 (1985). |
| Possibly other photocopies. |
| We will also use, as appropriate, works of art, including reproductions of paintings and other visual art, poetry and other literature, music, etc. Students will sometimes be responsible for seeking out these artworks (reproductions of them!) and making them available for the class. |
| To become familiar and conversant with major strands of the philosophical tradition that speaks of the relationship between beauty and truth. The strands of this tradition we will emphasize will be: Plato, Immanuel Kant, the English Romantic Poets, and Martin Heidegger. |
| Learning and practice in philosophical thinking, which often questions backwards towards foundations and presuppositions and prior questions rather than forward to conclusions. This means that one of our goals is to appreciate the depth and complexity of the relationship between beauty and truth as it has been discussed by leading thinkers in the tradition. |
| Each of the primary thinkers we will study is a formidable thinker; they are people who wrote for not only other leading thinkers of their day, but in response to an ongoing history of discourse on the subject. Therefore, one of our primary goals must be to understand the arguments of each thinker on his or her own terms before we offer our own critical judgments. We will primarily seek to think with and not against the tradition. |
| Because we are attempting to become conversant with a tradition of discourse about a philosophical and aesthetic issue, it is important that we become fluent in the vocabulary and conceptual framework of this tradition. |
| We will also seek to enrich our own response to and appreciation of art and beauty. Although this course is decidedly a philosophy and not an art appreciation course, our goal will be to become competent and thoughtful thinkers who can continue and contribute to the philosophical discourse about beauty and truth. |
| We will also aim to develop further our general critical thinking,
speaking, writing, and listening skills, particularly as these relate to
discussions of aesthetics and philosophical notions of truth. |
As a method, we will often practice the skill of what one philosopher has
called �slow reading�: �This art does not so easily get anything done, it
teaches to read well, that is to say, to read slowly, deeply, looking cautiously
before and aft, with reservations, with doors left open, with delicate eyes and
fingers...� (Friedrich Nietzsche, Preface to Daybreak). Thus, another
objective we have is to learn to become slow readers, that is, to become
students who read well: who read slowly, think carefully, and question deeply.
You should come to class having read the assigned text carefully, with a
questioning and venturesome spirit, ready to contribute to our common
understanding. The sections assigned each day should not only be read but
studied and prepared, often with notes and questions. No serious philosophy
student reads any other way�always with a notebook and pencil in hand. Helpful,
intelligent questions only emerge from such careful, questioning reading. Such
study requires a spirit of generosity, both towards the writer and towards the
reader�one has to assume that the thinker saw deeply into the problem and tried
to illuminate it, and one also has to assume that this insight is accessible to
the reader with an active and open mind.
We will also sometimes do writing assignments of an exploratory nature to shape
our initial understanding of the texts we read. In this way we will deliberately
be using writing as a learning tool, not just as a means of communicating
something we think we already know. From time to time there will be opportunity
to revise these reflections and incorporate them into larger papers, but their
primary purpose will be to facilitate class discussion. They will be graded
primarily according to the quality of thought, even though it is exploratory,
that goes into them, but this does not mean you that can neglect writing
mechanics. With such explorations, concern for correctness of interpretation
will necessarily receive less emphasis than the quality of the thinking
that is at work in your writing.
I will expect you to communicate by e-mail, as I will send out various
assignment clarifications, study questions, review outlines, etc. this way. The
schedule of readings will be kept on the web:
http://employees.csbsju.edu/dbeach/beautytruth/reading.htm
The section on daily expectations outlines a good part of the requirements. I should add that one is expected to demonstrate the required preparation by active participation in class. The attendance policy is strict: I allow no real freebie misses, will question you after the first unexcused absence, will begin to harass you at the 2nd. Unexcused absences will . Absences may be excused if you contact me ahead of time, but normally only for illness or real family emergencies. Non-emergency medical appointments are unexcused, as are interviews: schedule them outside of class time. Finally, all absences, whether excused or not, should be communicated to me beforehand. You�d call in sick to a job; you should be able to do the same for class. Participation can either raise or lower your grade. Attendance without active participation will limit your grade to a �BC� at best.
Grading will be based as follows. You must pass each of the three parts to pass the course.
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Daily Work: 20%: Daily preparation and active, insightful participation |
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Exams: 40% (either average or weighted for progress) Tuesday, October 21, and Thursday, December 18, 5:00-7:00 PM (scheduled final exam period). |
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2-3 major papers |
Missing an exam results in an automatic grade of F/zero. This includes the final exam, which will NOT be given early.