Dana Reynolds - Tolstoy

“And therefore the question involuntarily asked by any man who is free from artistic activity and therefore not bound to existing art by any self-interest – the question I put at the beginning of this writing – whether it is just that such sacrifices be offered to what we call art, which belongs only to a small part of society, sacrifices in human labor and human lives – receives its natural answer: no, it is not just and it should not be so. This is the answer of common sense and of unperverted moral instinct. Not only should it not be so, not only should no sacrifices be offered to that which is recognized as art among us, but, on the contrary, all the efforts of people who wish to live a good life should be directed towards destroying this art, because it is one of the cruelest evils oppressing our mankind. So that if the question were put as to which would be better for our Christian world, to lose all that is now regarded as art, including all that is good in it, together with the false art, or to continue to encourage or allow the art that exists now, I think that any reasonable and moral person would again decide the question the way it was decided by Plato for his republic and by all Church Christian and Muhammadan teachers of mankind – that is, he would say: ‘Better that there be no art than that the depraved art, or simulacrum of it, which exists now should continue.’ Fortunately, no one is faced with this question, and no one has to decide it one way or the other. All that man can do, all that we so-called educated people, who are in a position to be able to understand the meaning of the phenomena of life, can and must do is understand the delusion we are in, and not persist in it, but seek to get out of it.”

This particular except from Tolstoy’s Essay What is art? falls after he has completed his logical argument of how to do define and rank art. I think it is absolutely absurd! I used Tolstoy’s theory of art for my final paper, but I only used the theory itself, not what Tolstoy suggests is the only logical moral option for action after you acknowledge the rest of his theory. I think that the world would be a terribly depressing place without any art whatsoever, as he suggests would be better for the soul than there being any art that stands against Christian ideals at all. And if you look through history, the Christian ideals have changed over time just like everything else in the world, so what might have passed for “Good Art” a thousand years ago might not still pass as “Good Art” today. So by his suggestion, would be we living in a constant cycle of creation and destruction of art as soon as an idea changes? I think that would be a terrible thing, and what precedents would the world have to learn from? Nothing, since all the previous examples would have been destroyed.