Saturday, July 26, 2003
(10:25 AM) | Adam Kotsko:
The closing of the American mind
This article in the New York Times (requiring a free, one-time registration) highlights the collapsing audience for translated literature in America. The key quote, for me, is as follows:
"It is not an exaggeration to refer to this as a national crisis," said Cliff Becker, literature director at the National Endowment for the Arts. "I am a citizen of the most powerful country the world has known, a country that asks me to be part of its decision-making process on a whole range of things. If I'm not able to experience other cultures, not even from a place that is as easy to reach as the printed page, that is outright dangerous."
It doesn't seem as though the same crisis is affecting translations of theoretical or philosophical work, which may highlight a growing elitism in American literary culture. It has long been my contention that knowing how to read and write and being literate are two very different things. Anecdotal evidence suggests that most Americans are not very comfortable with the written word and view it as a kind of necessary evil to be avoided. Harry Potter might turn that around, but that seems suspiciously like another of those literary "black hole" phenomena, where people who enter the world of literature through Harry Potter will tend to stick with just Harry Potter. (Other black holes include Kurt Vonnegut, C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, the entire fantasy genre....)
I agree with the "national crisis" guy -- a powerful nation who approaches the world largely through television, with an increasingly narrow range of opportunities for learning, with most media outlets more focussed on profit and thus on pandering to consumers rather than trying to set standards is incredibly dangerous. It's like the world being ruled by a giant seven-year-old. My main concern, however, is not to educate America in the responsible use of its God-given power. Rather, it is that so many people in America end up living thoughtless, incurious lives. I know that literacy is not a cure-all for evil (witness the aesthetically sensitive Nazis), but it is still a great potential good.
It's wonderful to be able to pontificate instantly like this. Everyone should totally get a blog.
UPDATE: I just realized that the book The Closing of the American Mind was centered mainly on the ways in which the American mind was closed by putting too much emphasis on foreign thinkers. Those neoconservatives are fascinating people.
