Beauty译文

Sontag‟s View on Art
On the bohemian(放荡不羁的)New York scene of the early sixties, Sontag swiftly acquired a reputation as the radical-liberal American woman, who had not only deep knowledge of ancient and modern European culture, but could also reinterpret it from the American point of view. A selection of her writings appeared in AGAINST INTERPRETATION AND OTHER ESSAYS (1968), where she stated that the understanding of art starts from intuitive response and not from analysis or intellectual considerations. "A work of art is a thing in the world, not just text or commentary on the world."Rejecting interpretation, Sontag advocated what she called 'transparency', which means "experiencing the luminousness of thing in itself, of things being what they are". The 'meaning' of art lies in the experiencing both style and content together without analysis. "Interpretation is the revenge of the intellect upon art."
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Background of Christianity

基督教是总称，包括三个教派：天主教、新教和 东正教。 十一世纪中叶，基督教罗马教庭分裂成东、 西两个教庭，东派拜占廷教庭自称“正教”，即 现在的东正教，信仰的是以俄罗斯为主的东欧国 家。十六世纪以马丁· 路德为代表的宗教改革使原 来的罗马公教分裂为新与旧两派。习惯上将旧教 称为天主教，信仰的主要有意大利、法国等国家。 中国习惯将新教称为基督教，信仰的国家主要有 英美德等国家。
---Immanuel Kant (1724 - 1804), German philosopher.
It is amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness. ---Leo Tolstoy (1828 - 1910), Russian writer.
Beauty in things exists in the mind which contemplates them. ---David Hume (1711 - 1776), Scottish philosopher and historian. Beauty is altogether in the eye of the beholder. ---Margaret Wolfe Hungerford (1855? - 1897), Irish novelist.
Socrates (470? BC - 399? BC), Greek philosopher, 399? BC. “Beauty is truth, truth beauty,”—that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.
John Keats (1795 - 1821), British poet. Now I say: the beautiful is the symbol of the morally good.
Major Differences btw Catholicism and Protestantism

天主教与基督教的区别在于： （1）天主教以罗马教廷为自己的组织中心，承认教皇为最高领导（即承认在 普世教会中的首席权），具有浓厚的"普世"以及"一统"的色彩。基督教则反之， 不接受教皇的领导权威，认为教皇制是历史的、人为的产物。因此，基督教 没有自己的权力中心，教派之间的联系松散。另外，基督教废除天主教的教 阶制，主张教会生活多样化，认为教徒无需神职人员即可与神直接交通，教 徒就是司祭。而天主教则强调神职人员的中介作用，从而使神职人员享有一 个较崇高的地位。 （2）圣经中的十五卷次经基督教一律不收入，天主教则收入其中的十二篇。 另外，天主教还将不见之于《圣经》记载的、代代流传的"圣传"视为圭臬， 而基督教则不以为然。基督教与天主教在读经态度上亦有不同，基督教强调 个人的发挥，天主教讲究集体的注释。 （3）天主教对耶稣之母玛利亚特别恭敬，尊其为"天主之母"，而基督教则没 有此一礼拜。天主教非常恭敬圣徒、天神、圣像、圣物，基督教的教堂中则 见不到这些事物，在他们看来，这是偶像崇拜。 （4）天主教认为，圣事对于信徒的成圣、恩宠的赋予有着十分重大的意义， 是神人沟通的不可缺的渠道。基督教则认为，人是"因信称义"。因此，即使 在基督教保留着的两项礼仪，即洗礼和圣餐中，其意义与天主教也大不相同。 另外，天主教除承认"天堂"、"地狱"外，还承认"炼狱"的存在，基督教则只主 张前两者。 （5）天主教神职人员，按照教会传统过独身生活，不忌烟酒；而基督教的牧 师则可以结婚，但一般忌烟酒。
Beauty What is most beautiful in virile (有男子气概的) men is something feminine; what is most beautiful in feminine women is something masculine. （Against Interpretation, ―Notes on Camp‖） Truth The truth is always something that is told, not something that is known. If there were no speaking or writing there would be no truth about anything. （The Benefactor） Art Interpretation is the revenge of the intellect upon art.
Biographic Info. about Sontag

Born in 1933 in New York City Brought up by her grandparents when her parents had been in northern China doing fur business. Her father died of TB in China when she was 5. Devoted to literature in her childhood, she enabled herself go directly into the third grade of elementary school to begin her education and graduated from a senior high school at the age of 15.
Beauty alone makes all the world happy, and every being forgets its limitations as long as it experiences her enchantment. --- Friedrich von Schiller (1759 - 1805), German poet, playwright and historian.
Related sayings on Beauty
The good is the beautiful. ---Plato (428? BC - 347? BC), Greek philosopher.
Living well and beautifully and justly are all one thing.
Biographic Info. about Sontag

At 17, she met 28-year-old sociologist Philip Rieff when she was in the University of California, Burkley, and get married 10 days after. In 1950s, she attained her Bachelor‟s degree at the University of Chicago and Master‟s at Harvard University. In 1957, she went to England to become a doctoral candidate at Oxford University with the help of a scholarship.
Unit VII Text I
Beauty
by Susan Sontag
Susan Sontag and her works
Susan Sontag (1933-2004), American writer, known for her
philosophical writings on modern culture. During the 1960s and 1970s Sontag's essays and observations had a strong influence on the American counterculture. Her essay collections include Against Interpretation (反对阐释，1966), Styles of Radical Will (激进意志的风格，1969), and Under the Sign of Saturn (在土星的标志下，1980). She also wrote the novels The Benefactor (恩人，1963), Death Kit (死亡试剂盒，1967), The Volcano Lover (火山情人，1992), and In America (在美国，2000). Sontag‗s other works include the nonfiction books On Photography (论 摄影，1977), Illness as Metaphor (疾病的隐喻，1978), and AIDS and Its Metaphors (艾滋病及其隐喻，1989); and a collection of short stories.
Quotations from Sontag:
Aids AIDS obliges people to think of sex as having, possibly the direst of consequences: suicide. Or murder.
(AIDS and its Metaphors)
Biographic Info. about Sontag

In 1959, she got devorced and found a job as a faculty member of Columbia University and settled down in New York. In 1966, Against Interpretation was published, signaling the start of her professional writing. In 1978, she survived a cancer after a long-time treatment and published Illness as Metaphor. On December 27, she died in New York, leaving behind her a lot of great works and a contraversial figure.