This small but complicated book is an effort to explore the deepest questions confronting human creativity. Steiner begins by seeking to remove artistic expression from the domain of science and scientific impulses that are so evident in post-modern criticism. He concedes that language is under attack -- and from many different directions. The 20th century brought us many intellectual movements that sought to divorce us from the word -- psychology, which sought truth in dreams and fantasies; linguistic theory that sought to isolate signs from meaning; deconstructionism, which suggests that language, being so imprecise a tool of communication, is therefore not useful in an exploration for truth. Authors themselves, so this argument goes, cease to matter. Then there is the deterioration of language, so stock with cliches and predictable usage that rob it of its power and vitality. Of course, all of these claims are interesting, some even contain some truth, but Steiner contends that somewhere between nihilism and the dogmatic notion that texts are sacred and final (not open to disagreement and discussion), there is a common sense middle ground.

 

Human experience is complex and it can unfold in many ways, at different levels. Music is a common thread in human emotional life -- it is part of artistic expression. Words, while not always well used, still have the power to move us -- enabling us to give directions, buy groceries, build bridges or express feelings of deep love or loss. The masters of language and art shake us at our core, force us to examine more deeply our humanity, and reshape our reality even as we are unaware of their formative power.

 

Steiner then argues that it is the need to find meaning in existence, to explore the borderland between life and death, that literature and artistic expression are rooted in the transcendent. He is not so much saying that God infuses all art, but rather that the search for God and the need to create as God creates is the powerful moving force in human creation. (It is here that he makes the controversial claim that women, because they bring life into the world, are not as driven as men to express themselves creatively....)

 

This is not an easy read. Some sections had to be read several times. In this case, I would agree with Steiner that my reading is at best an educated glimpse at his argument. Steiner writes beautifully in places, but his style is thick with nuance and references that are often hard to follow. However, those interested in resisting post-modern forces that threaten to fragment the human could not ask for a more impressive thinker to guide them through the murky lower regions that make up the hell of modern criticism. He will then lead you, if not to the paradiso, at least to a place where art, literature and poetry still move the human heart.