William Wellman's Battleground
Whenever I say that the last century has been impoverished in the arts, the first objection I meet is that I've fallen for an illusion. The argument is thus: Most of the art in any period is trash. We sift through it, so that what is great endures, and we forget the rest. The art of our time is no different. We just haven't yet done the sifting.
My first reply is to deny the premise. Most of the art in any period is not trash. Most of it, like the handicrafts in any healthy culture, ranges from the workmanlike to the superb, before you get to the masterpieces.
But my second...
is a professor at Magdalen College of the Liberal Arts in Warner, New Hampshire, and the author of many books, including Life Under Compulsion (ISI Books), Real Music: A Guide to the Timeless Hymns of the Church (Tan, with a CD), Out of the Ashes: Rebuilding American Culture (Regnery), and The Hundredfold: Songs for the Lord (Ignatius Press, 2019). He has also translated Dante's Divine Comedy (Random House).
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