"The High Culture of the West," the Classic, and the Simpsons

"Carry on the high culture of the West!" The esteemed headmaster of Veritas Prep explained it as something coherent, apprehensible and nobel, and as educators we have a moral obligation to pass it on to the younger generation. Also, lets not forget the presentation was given with a theatrical flair that reminiscent of this:

 "It is your inheritance," he went on, "and we should love it, never disregarding the bad of it of course, but with that love which resembles the love of one's home." I like that. Living in a culture today that praises individuality at the expense of tradition it's nice to have a cultural home- or perhaps better described as a home base- a place where my cultural identity is constant. 


It struck me like it has never struck me before how important the literature of a society and even a unique nation is. Like a two by four in a wall that makes a house, each piece of literature that adds to the cultural identity of a nation (a piece that we affectionately call "a classic") adds further nuance to imagination of the West. 


This reminded me a lot of what John Henry Newman, whose own writing is included by many into the unwritten canon of Western Classics, said about the nature of a Classic in a culture:


"The influence of a great classic upon the nation which he represents is two fold; on the one hand he advances his native language towards its perfection; but on the other hand he discourages in some measure any advance beyond his own. thus, in the parallel case of science, it is commonly said on the continent, that the very marvellousness of Newton's powers was the bane of English mathematics: inasmuch as those who succeeded him were content with his discoveries, bigoted to his methods of investigation, and averse to those new instruments which have carried on the French to such brilliant and successful results. In Literature, also, there is something oppressive in the authority of a great writer, and something of a tyranny in the use to which his admirers put his name. [...]


There is another impediment, as time goes on, to the rise of fresh classics in any nation; and that is the effect which foreigners, or foreign literature, will exert upon it. It may happen that a certain language, like Greek, is adopted and used familiarly by educated men in other countries; or again, that educated men, to whom it is native, may abandon it for some other language, as the Romans of the second and third centuries wrote in Greek instead of Latin. The consequence will be, that the language in question will tend to lose its nationality--that is, its distinctive character; it will cease to be idiomatic in the sense in which it once was so; and whatever grace or propriety it may retain, it will be comparatively tame and spiritless; or, on the other hand, it will be corrupted by the admixture of foreign elements. [...]


When I speak of the formation of a Catholic school of writers, I have respect principally to the matter of what is written, and to composition only so far forth as style is necessary to convey and to recommend the matter. I mean a  literature which resembles the literature of the day... Our writers write so well that there is little to choose between them. What they lack is that individuality, that earnestness, most personal yet most unconscious of self, which is the greatest charm of an author. The very form of the compositions of the day suggests to us their main deficiency. They are anonymous."


In this work, The Idea of a University, Newman articulates his thoughts on pedagogy and education, specifically Roman Catholic Education in Anglican England. Though the very culture that he is a part of remained hostile to his religious heritage (see the Oxford Movement), Newman still recognized the importance for Catholic Education to work within the Anglo culture. I wonder if the Great Hearts Academies share the same predicament. Today in "post-modern America" the tradition has become characterized by hostility to tradition, hierarchy and authority. Instead, the ideas of democracy and an egalitarian society remain suspicious of a timeless authority of literature- the idea that any book could warrant the further adjective "Classic" is absurd by the modern American judgement. How then, in light of the prudence of Newman, do we answer Mr. Ellison's speech? Do we interpret the modernist culture of today- one which openly declares to diverge from the Classics- as the hoard of barbarians? (or Orc hoard if you prefer) Or does the answer remain yet unseen? Perhaps some day. the plays of Samuel Beckett will stand on the shelves along side of Arthur Miller, Shakespeare and Aeschylus.