These study questions are part of the study over Josef Pieper’s Only The Lover Sings. For a general introduction to this study you can go HERE. If you’d like to learn more about Study The Great Books or to find another text to study, you can go HERE to learn more.
Virtues/Vices/Great Ideas: (Find these in the Text and Note them in the Margins)
Myth, Art, Memory
Grammar Questions: (The Information of the Text)
According to Pieper, with what idea do all of the Muses have some “inner connection?”
According to Pindar’s account about the Muses, for what “task” were they created?
Pieper said that instead of thinking of the Muses “as beings who ‘remember,’” we should rather think of them as having what purpose?
What did Pieper say was an essential quality of the thing “one remembers” which is not “here and now?”
Though, as Christians, “we do not see the Muses as some sort of divine beings” what should we see them as according to Pieper?
To what other role did Pieper liken the artist’s position in society?
What are some dangers to which the artist is constantly exposed?
What “Far Eastern proverb” did Pieper share?
Logic Questions: (Interpreting, Comparing/Contrasting, Reasoning)
Why would “rememberance” be associated with the nine Muses?
If Pindar is correct and the Muses’ task is “to sing the praises of all creation” what should this infer about what is proper and improper in the artistic endeavor (be it drawing, painting, sculpting, writing poetry, music, etc.)?
What distinction is there between “to remember” and “to remind” and how are each of these related to the concept of creating art?
Pieper said that those who remember as well as those who are “helped to remember, though not perceiving things totally alien to him, nevertheless beholds a ‘different’ reality, ‘distinct’ from his daily and direct experience.” Why might it be beneficial to be reminded of things which are outside of our daily and direct experience?
After denying that we should think of the Muses as “some sort of divine beings” Pieper said we should “understand them as a real yet empirically and psychologically elusive potency that brings about inspiration.” What did he mean by that?
Speaking of the inspiration of the Muses and the “different” reality they call to remembrance, Pieper said this reality “can in no way be something accidental and inconsequential. It will rather be something that all too readily is ignored and ‘lost’ – precisely because it is ‘different’ – yet must not be forgotten if our existence is to remain truly human.” What was he trying to say here?
Pieper wrote “Here we somehow sense the artist’s inner relationship to the priest…” In what way are the artist and the priest similar in their respective roles?
What did Pieper mean by saying the artist “is by nature exposed to countless possibilities of losing direction and aim” and also “in danger of deceiving himself or…deceiving others?”
When Pieper spoke of the artist’s temptation once he has “acquired and mastered the ‘creative’ possibilities of his craft – to produce an opus decidedly ‘different’ from the accustomed and everyday experience of reality, yet in essence false, and in its banality a mere ruse.” What did he mean by this?
What does the proverb “Those who only look at themselves do ever radiate nothing” mean?
When Pieper praised the statue “Young Woman Reclining” by saying “it prompts those beholding it to recall their own remembrance of the primordial archetypes veiled in this same reality” what did he mean by that?
Rhetoric Questions: (The Analysis of Ideas in the Text)
Pieper contrasted the art “created with uncommon skill yet entirely without substance, thriving only on the surprise it elicits by being outrageously novel and therefore unable to radiate any deeper meaning” versus the “artist who, in contrast, seeks nothing for himself, who rather keeps the recesses of his soul in silence and simplicity, receptive to the breath of creative inspiration.” In light of this, and other things said in this short essay, what is true art versus false art? Why might mere “novelty” tend to get more popular praise than some pieces which are more deserving of the name “art?” How can we learn to better appreciate good art and despise that which is not worthy of the name?
Theological Analysis: (Sola Scriptura)
Read Exodus 25. What can we learn about the value and purpose of art from this passage of Scripture? How can we relate it back to what we have read in Pieper’s essay?