What good are the arts?
Do the arts make us better people? Are they a sign of civilization? Why should 'high' art be thought higher than 'low'? Are judgements about art anything more than personal opinions? What are works of art anyway - do they belong to some special, sacred category? Can the brain-scientists who are investigating the arts tell us anything useful about them? In the first part of his new book John Carey returns startling answers to these and related questions. In the second part he makes out a self-confessedly personal and subjective case for the superiority of literature to all other arts
Print Book, English, 2010, ©2006
Oxford Univ Press, New York, 2010, ©2006
xii, 286 pages ; 21 cm
9780199735976, 0199735972
449868221
What is a work of art?
Is 'high' art superior?
Can science help?
Do the arts make us better?
Can art be a religion?
The case for literature
Literature and critical intelligence
Creative reading: literature and indistinctness