Those who study the nature of beauty are at once plagued by a
singular issue: what does it mean to say something is beautiful? On
the one hand, beauty is associated with erotic attraction; on the
other, it is the primary category in aesthetics, and it is widely
supposed that the proper response to a work of art is one of
disinterested contemplation. At its core, then, beauty is a
contested concept, and both sides feel comfortable appealing to the
authority of Plato, and via him, to the ancient Greeks generally.
So, who is right--if either?
Beauty offers an elegant investigation of ancient Greek notions of
beauty and, in the process, sheds light on modern aesthetics and
how we ought to appreciate the artistic achievements of the
classical world itself. The book begins by reexamining the commonly
held notion that the ancient Greeks possessed no term that can be
unambiguously defined as "beauty" or "beautiful." Author David
Konstan discusses a number of Greek approximations before
positioning the heretofore unexamined term kallos as the key to
bridging the gap between beauty and desire, and tracing its
evolution as applied to physical beauty, art, literature, and more.
Throughout, the discussion is enlivened with thought-provoking
stories taken from Homer, Plato, Xenophon, Plutarch, and others.
The book then examines corresponding terms in ancient Latin
literature to highlight the survival of Greek ideas in the Latin
West. The final chapter will compare the ancient Greek conception
of beauty with modern notions of beauty and aesthetics. In
particular, the book will focus on the reception of classical Greek
art in the Renaissance and how Vasari and his contemporaries
borrowed from Plato the sense that the beauty in art was
transcendental, but left out the erotic dimension of viewing. A
study of the ancient Greek idea of beauty shows that, even if
Greece was the inspiration for modern aesthetic ideals, the Greek
view of the relationship between beauty and desire was surprisingly
consistent--and different from our own. Through this magisterial
narrative, it is possible to identify how the Greeks thought of
beauty, and what it was that attracted them. Their perceptions
still have something important to tell us about art, love,
desire--and beauty."
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