Description

Immediate dispatch from Somerset. Book in excellent unread/unused condition. Softcover. English. See images for condition.

About the book >.>.> People who write books are often in the fortunate position of being able to let off steam in public which most people are not able to do. I have often been obliged to sit and smile politely while an authority in the field of Islamic art has made some comments which are in my view thoroughly misplaced. One might expect that those skilled at writing about art would be the right people to talk about the principles of beauty and sublimity which repose in that art but this would be naive. In fact an entirely different category of intellectual skills may be required to talk about the aesthetic properties of an object as compared with its composition historical context role of the artist and his audience its provenance and so on. There is a tendency to regard Islamic art as part of Islamic studies which is perhaps a shame since the rather historicist methodology of area studies then comes into play and tends to exclude alternative explanations and approaches. While I was writing this book I became aware that it was an extended part of a discussion which I had had with my father for many years. We both enjoyed visiting religious buildings such as churches and chapels and listen-ing to the music of Bach. He would often say that wonderful as he found such buildings and music had he been a Christian he would have found them even more wonderful and would have understood things about them which he missed as a non-Christian. I tended to argue the reverse that the aesthetic features of the buildings and the music are really abstractable from their main religious purpose and indeed being in tune with the latter would be a distraction not an aid to aesthetic appreciation and understanding. (LL)