So many thoughts about this, I don't know where to start. I'm very interested in that Ivan Morris quote, as well as "moral cultivation." I did piano, Japanese dance, tea ceremony, calligraphy, cooking, sewing...and was nagged at to read, read, read. I never thought of any of this as "moral cultivation" but I have to admit I get strange reactions from Japanese when I tell them that I'm very familiar with nagauta shamisen pieces because of dance, for example. It seems to telegraph something that I don't mean to telegraph, basically. But none of it was in a competitive vein, it was extremely laid-back and I was pretty terrible at calligraphy! I just took a refresher course and I am still bad!
I have very mixed feelings too.... I was going to post a follow-up to this post with a link regarding moral cultivation in terms of calligraphy in Genji. I don't think "aestho-ethical" is a made up word and it is something different from what Wittgenstein said about aesthetics and ethics being one, but in Heian times, there was a conflation of the good with the beautiful (beauty in these terms of human excellence, virtuosity and maybe the discipline itself)
In Japan, we started our son on violin at 4 but I think it was laid back in terms of accomplishment or results. My husband definitely thought of it as character cultivation since my son was now part of a group with expectations. I feel my tea lessons made me a kinder and more relaxed person. I also studied calligraphy but was horrible at it. I do think in the Japanese case, there is less of a focus on personal benefit and individual results as just sticking with things and being part of the group. The discipline of it rather than the personal benefit. Music in California though was not about any of this. Most kids outside of Suzuki method I met did it for university applications and getting ahead--this is completely anecdotal and just my own personal experience restricted to the affluent suburb where my mom lives. But I often wondered if the families even really loved classical music...How did you take a refresher course in calligraphy? Online? You still play piano don't you? I recall in one of your posts you mentioned it.
I do play the piano! I'm erratic, because I'm always so mean to myself about not being "good enough." It can be stressful and unpleasant, or it can be wonderful, and I never know which. I am trying to work through a book on music theory and piano, but only on days when I feel brave.
I have a weekly zoom Japanese class, and the lady who runs that school sometimes offers ikebana or shodō or cooking or other culture-related classes. Last summer one of my daughters and I did the shodō, which I hadn't done since grade school! She was much better than me, probably because she paints. But we agreed that my Japanese actually looked like a written language, whereas hers was prettier. :)
I feel like in Japan they do conflate the good and the beautiful, to this day. You get admiration for all the diligence you need to study music or dance or the arts, I suppose? It's a "gaman" thing, maybe. At least that's what all those anime try to tell you! I think "gaman" is a problematic concept....
I think I want to write a dedicated post to the idea of the good and the beautiful!! "Ganbaru" is so important to Japanese people I think and so the act of sticking with a discipline is something to admire--but what I am getting at more is this idea that a beautiful piece of handwriting must come from a good or beautiful human being, which is a notion no one today would be okay with it. But that is what I think Ivan Morris meant by a rule of beauty-based society. This is a great essay that I am still processing :) I had to read it twice... https://works.swarthmore.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1127&context=fac-art
This is fascinating. You are really helping me understand this book better, thank you so much! And I’ll be listening to this playlist as I write today!
I'm wondering if the strong aesthetic-ethical practice partially explains the wonder of Hagoromo, "Doubt is for mortals. In heaven there is no deceit." Aesthetic practice and training as a means of refining the tendency to cling (to ego, self, oneupmanship)so that the clarity learned through aesthetic practice is thus engaged with samadhi (grounded rather than transcended) and nirvana.
I agree with you and I have to say that particular line al ate really struck me and I can see that it did with you too and so of course I want to say great minds think a like! Lol
Thought-provoking! Picasso also comes to mind. Although I never read about his personal life with women, I have friends whose feelings about their appreciation of his work became as fractured after they learned of it as the portraits themselves show as fractured. An artist friend, a man (whose allegiance as a painter was to Titian), laughed off the whole thing, "Oh, Picasso's artistic value is as an animator." And that was that! Lol!
I am going to post again on this subject because I realized that I forgot to add a link and a few more thoughts on what is an aesthetic-ethical practice and culture. I was thinking that this is the opposite of what is happening now--though related. My allegiance is to Titian too but Picasso did pass the Academia training with flying colors so he really was a genius at traditional art. I was at a fancy restaurant once where the celebrity chef was making the rounds around the tables where (I kid you not) a patron was crying because he was so deeply moved by the food--and the chef said, Picasso is interesting not because he broke the rules but because he had mastered the rules and then broke them... which was precisely what my calligraphy teacher in Tokyo used to tell his students.
I agree. I thought the attribution as "animator" was hilarious, because of course my friend knew Picasso's training. Anyway . . . I actually come from an old-world household in which the daughter is certain to be trained in classical piano so that she is marriageable!
You and your brother are so accomplished. It’s something I think anyone who knows you would notice. It’s funny that they wanted to make you marriageable but what about Larry? . I guess these days people force musical instruments on their kids so it’ll look good on their college applications and they’ll win the rat race. I really noticed that in California in the orchestra is that my son played in when he was school-age it really was a kind of achievement based expectation. I can honestly say when I started my son on the violin when he was four years old it was in Japan and it was Suzuki method and it was part of a type of moral cultivation that people still did in Japan back then which is kind of like what is happening in the Tale.
You asked a question I never even thought of in the marriageability issue. Indeed, what training for my brother? It never crossed my mind. Don't you think you had a definite streak of aesthetic moral cultivation? Hence your profound disappointment about the ancestry testing results? (among other reasons for the disappointment). I really look forward to your future thoughts on aesthetic-ethical moral culture, Leanne.
Thank you,Sally! I don’t think I have much of that kind of training in childhood. Unfortunately. Maybe that’s why I notice it and others and admire that. My mom came to the violin later in life she played a little bit in junior high school and then after she retired she went back to it and around that time I started my son in it and he was only four. In Japan it doesn’t really look good on college applications and I think it was his father who had a really strong feeling that he should engage in this kind of moral cultivation and I suppose I was actually a little surprised at first to have music considered in that way. But of course now it makes sense to me. I think it’s not that far off from the marriage ability in the sense that you’re saying good people can appreciate the arts and definitely are accomplished in them? there was really quite a big difference in how music and childhood education was approach from a Japanese point of view as what I saw in California which was much more competitive and careerist. Which is weird since we are talking about little kids!
So many thoughts about this, I don't know where to start. I'm very interested in that Ivan Morris quote, as well as "moral cultivation." I did piano, Japanese dance, tea ceremony, calligraphy, cooking, sewing...and was nagged at to read, read, read. I never thought of any of this as "moral cultivation" but I have to admit I get strange reactions from Japanese when I tell them that I'm very familiar with nagauta shamisen pieces because of dance, for example. It seems to telegraph something that I don't mean to telegraph, basically. But none of it was in a competitive vein, it was extremely laid-back and I was pretty terrible at calligraphy! I just took a refresher course and I am still bad!
I have very mixed feelings too.... I was going to post a follow-up to this post with a link regarding moral cultivation in terms of calligraphy in Genji. I don't think "aestho-ethical" is a made up word and it is something different from what Wittgenstein said about aesthetics and ethics being one, but in Heian times, there was a conflation of the good with the beautiful (beauty in these terms of human excellence, virtuosity and maybe the discipline itself)
In Japan, we started our son on violin at 4 but I think it was laid back in terms of accomplishment or results. My husband definitely thought of it as character cultivation since my son was now part of a group with expectations. I feel my tea lessons made me a kinder and more relaxed person. I also studied calligraphy but was horrible at it. I do think in the Japanese case, there is less of a focus on personal benefit and individual results as just sticking with things and being part of the group. The discipline of it rather than the personal benefit. Music in California though was not about any of this. Most kids outside of Suzuki method I met did it for university applications and getting ahead--this is completely anecdotal and just my own personal experience restricted to the affluent suburb where my mom lives. But I often wondered if the families even really loved classical music...How did you take a refresher course in calligraphy? Online? You still play piano don't you? I recall in one of your posts you mentioned it.
I do play the piano! I'm erratic, because I'm always so mean to myself about not being "good enough." It can be stressful and unpleasant, or it can be wonderful, and I never know which. I am trying to work through a book on music theory and piano, but only on days when I feel brave.
I have a weekly zoom Japanese class, and the lady who runs that school sometimes offers ikebana or shodō or cooking or other culture-related classes. Last summer one of my daughters and I did the shodō, which I hadn't done since grade school! She was much better than me, probably because she paints. But we agreed that my Japanese actually looked like a written language, whereas hers was prettier. :)
I feel like in Japan they do conflate the good and the beautiful, to this day. You get admiration for all the diligence you need to study music or dance or the arts, I suppose? It's a "gaman" thing, maybe. At least that's what all those anime try to tell you! I think "gaman" is a problematic concept....
I think I want to write a dedicated post to the idea of the good and the beautiful!! "Ganbaru" is so important to Japanese people I think and so the act of sticking with a discipline is something to admire--but what I am getting at more is this idea that a beautiful piece of handwriting must come from a good or beautiful human being, which is a notion no one today would be okay with it. But that is what I think Ivan Morris meant by a rule of beauty-based society. This is a great essay that I am still processing :) I had to read it twice... https://works.swarthmore.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1127&context=fac-art
This is fascinating. You are really helping me understand this book better, thank you so much! And I’ll be listening to this playlist as I write today!
Thanks, Elle!! Let me know how you liked the playlist!! Some have compared it to whale song..
I thought I might share with you this new musical piece, with lyrics inspired by The Tale of Genji. https://paulbernstein.bandcamp.com/track/yona-nuki
It is beautiful!!!!!!
I'm wondering if the strong aesthetic-ethical practice partially explains the wonder of Hagoromo, "Doubt is for mortals. In heaven there is no deceit." Aesthetic practice and training as a means of refining the tendency to cling (to ego, self, oneupmanship)so that the clarity learned through aesthetic practice is thus engaged with samadhi (grounded rather than transcended) and nirvana.
I agree with you and I have to say that particular line al ate really struck me and I can see that it did with you too and so of course I want to say great minds think a like! Lol
Thought-provoking! Picasso also comes to mind. Although I never read about his personal life with women, I have friends whose feelings about their appreciation of his work became as fractured after they learned of it as the portraits themselves show as fractured. An artist friend, a man (whose allegiance as a painter was to Titian), laughed off the whole thing, "Oh, Picasso's artistic value is as an animator." And that was that! Lol!
I am going to post again on this subject because I realized that I forgot to add a link and a few more thoughts on what is an aesthetic-ethical practice and culture. I was thinking that this is the opposite of what is happening now--though related. My allegiance is to Titian too but Picasso did pass the Academia training with flying colors so he really was a genius at traditional art. I was at a fancy restaurant once where the celebrity chef was making the rounds around the tables where (I kid you not) a patron was crying because he was so deeply moved by the food--and the chef said, Picasso is interesting not because he broke the rules but because he had mastered the rules and then broke them... which was precisely what my calligraphy teacher in Tokyo used to tell his students.
I agree. I thought the attribution as "animator" was hilarious, because of course my friend knew Picasso's training. Anyway . . . I actually come from an old-world household in which the daughter is certain to be trained in classical piano so that she is marriageable!
You and your brother are so accomplished. It’s something I think anyone who knows you would notice. It’s funny that they wanted to make you marriageable but what about Larry? . I guess these days people force musical instruments on their kids so it’ll look good on their college applications and they’ll win the rat race. I really noticed that in California in the orchestra is that my son played in when he was school-age it really was a kind of achievement based expectation. I can honestly say when I started my son on the violin when he was four years old it was in Japan and it was Suzuki method and it was part of a type of moral cultivation that people still did in Japan back then which is kind of like what is happening in the Tale.
You asked a question I never even thought of in the marriageability issue. Indeed, what training for my brother? It never crossed my mind. Don't you think you had a definite streak of aesthetic moral cultivation? Hence your profound disappointment about the ancestry testing results? (among other reasons for the disappointment). I really look forward to your future thoughts on aesthetic-ethical moral culture, Leanne.
Thank you,Sally! I don’t think I have much of that kind of training in childhood. Unfortunately. Maybe that’s why I notice it and others and admire that. My mom came to the violin later in life she played a little bit in junior high school and then after she retired she went back to it and around that time I started my son in it and he was only four. In Japan it doesn’t really look good on college applications and I think it was his father who had a really strong feeling that he should engage in this kind of moral cultivation and I suppose I was actually a little surprised at first to have music considered in that way. But of course now it makes sense to me. I think it’s not that far off from the marriage ability in the sense that you’re saying good people can appreciate the arts and definitely are accomplished in them? there was really quite a big difference in how music and childhood education was approach from a Japanese point of view as what I saw in California which was much more competitive and careerist. Which is weird since we are talking about little kids!
Well, you definitely trained your ear somehow! (Didn't your mother cultivate your ear for language in a helter skelter kind of way?)