Jacques Barzun Is Dead

At 105, in case you haven't heard. This remarkable man released one of his greatest works at the age of 93! If you don't know of him, you should.

In the above review, we find:

"Modern civilization in the West, Barzun ascertained, has lost its way and its purpose, and has thus fallen into decadence. 'The culture,' he wrote, 'is old and unraveling.'"

Yes, that is just right. Barzun loved Western culture, but he realized its day is done. The progressives who think they are advancing it while they dismember its corpse and the traditionalists who want to prop the corpse back up and make it repeat the movements it undertook 100 or 200 or 500 years ago are equally deluded.

Comments

  1. I thought you became a traditionalist after leaving libertarianism!?

    Senyor

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. No. My most recent book contains a sustained technique of traditionalism.

      Delete
    2. Do you mean critique?

      Senyor

      Delete
    3. Anonymous8:38 PM

      Critique?

      Delete
    4. Yeah, must of had the phone spell checker on!

      Delete
  2. Counter example: minimalism in music.

    Western culture has I think an astonishing ability to absorb and internalize outside influences.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Did you know that Jacques Barzun said, regarding Ayn Rand, "...I admire a great part (not all) of her theory of art."

    Senyor

    ReplyDelete

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