Intellectual Beauty Essays

  • Hymn to Intellectual Beauty

    1913 Words  | 4 Pages

    Let’s face it. In our complicated lives who really cares about nature and beauty? Marred by the pressures of responsibilities and expectations, most of us never stop and smell the roses nor do we stop and think about how simply wonderful the world is. However, Percy Shelley does. In his “Hymn to Intellectual Beauty,” Shelley reflects upon the awesome power of beauty and his relation to it as a humble servant, one who cherishes it and respects it but will never hoard and control it. Projected in a

  • Hymn To Intellectual Beauty by P. B. Shelley

    1189 Words  | 3 Pages

    In "Hymn to Intellectual Beauty", Shelley describes his realisation of the power of human intellect. In seven carefully-constructed stanzas, he outlines the qualities of this power and the e ect it has had on him, using the essential themes of Romantic poetry with references to nature and the self. In the first stanza, the concept of the "unseen Power" – the mind – is put forward, and Shelley states his position on the subject. Throughout the stanza, extensive use is made of

  • Othello – its Appeal

    2192 Words  | 5 Pages

    Othello would appear to have a beauty about it which is hard to match. Helen Gardner in “Othello: A Tragedy of Beauty and Fortune” touches on this beauty which enables this play to stand above the other tragedies of the Bard: Among the tragedies of Shakespeare Othello is supreme in one quality: beauty. Much of its poetry, in imagery, perfection of phrase, and steadiness of rhythm, soaring yet firm, enchants the sensuous imagination. This kind of beauty Othello shares with Romeo and Juliet

  • Shelley's Hymn to Intellectual Beauty and Mont Blanc

    1940 Words  | 4 Pages

    new realities and new emotions, the likes of which invalidate, if not eradicate, intimations of referential meaning. "Poetry," Shelley states in his Defense, "lifts the veil from the hidden beauty of the world, and makes familiar objects be as if they were not familiar" (961).[1] In "Hymn to Intellectual Beauty" and in "Mont Blanc," Shelley offers an intriguing, though perplexing, look at the functioning of the human mind under the influence of nature, inspiration, and poetic creativity. Composed

  • Knowledge of Good in Plato's The Republic

    973 Words  | 2 Pages

    An Intellectual Knowledge of Good in Plato’s Republic Socrates might be a wise philosopher but one of his ideas strikes me as particularly naive. In the allegory of the cave, he tells Glaucon that "in the world of knowledge the idea of good appears last of all, and is seen only with an effort [·] and that this is the power upon which he [the intellectual] would act rationally" (517b-c). In other words, he seems to be implying that knowledge of goodness is a sufficient condition for being good

  • Inspiration of Arundhati Roy to an Activist

    4288 Words  | 9 Pages

    down for her on a paper napkin. This is what I wrote: To love. To be loved. To never forget your own insignificance. To never get used to the unspeakable violence and vulgar disparity of life around you. To seek joy in the saddest places. To pursue beauty to its lair. To never simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple. To respect strength, never power. Above all, to watch. To try and understand. To never look away. And never, never to forget.1 When I think about it, the words are

  • Hidden Intellectualism, by Gerald Graff

    1378 Words  | 3 Pages

    In “Hidden Intellectualism,” Gerald Graff pens an impressive argument wrought from personal experience, wisdom and heart. In his essay, Graff argues that street smarts have intellectual potential. A simple gem of wisdom, yet one that remains hidden beneath a sea of academic tradition. However, Graff navigates the reader through this ponderous sea with near perfection. The journey begins at the heart of the matter, with a street smart kid failing in school. This is done to establish some common ground

  • Intellectual Property in the Age of the Internet

    1687 Words  | 4 Pages

    Intellectual Property in the Age of the Internet When Tim Berners-Lee created the Internet as a non-proprietor, not-for-profit information conduit, he could not have predicted how controversial digitized intellectual property would become. Prior to the Internet, intellectual property was a fairly straightforward issue. It was protected with copyright, trademark, and patent legislations, which granted exclusive rights to owners. Violations were not as abundant because distribution was constrained

  • Grant Penrod's Anti-Intellectualism: Why We Hate The Smart Kids

    709 Words  | 2 Pages

    “Anti-Intellectualism: Why We Hate the Smart Kids” he goes onto explain how as a society today we seem to have a built in hatred for those who are intellectuals. The main point I believe Penrod is trying to get across is that many people tend to overlook those who are intellectuals and tend single out and stop intellectuals. In Penrod’s essay he a great example of intellectuals being overshadowed by athletes by telling us how the Mountain View football team had won their state championship, it had been given

  • Rhetorical Analysis Of America Needs Its Nerds

    1021 Words  | 3 Pages

    reader. If even the highest point in America’s intellectual scene has been poisoned by this stigma then the implication is that nowhere is safe for those seeking unbridles

  • Leonid Fridman's Argument On Nerds And Geeks

    561 Words  | 2 Pages

    “intellectually curious and academically serious.” Leonid Fridman is able to construct a compelling argument by illustrating how children are dissuaded from being smart and hardworking at an early age, depicting intellectuals as the damsel in distress, and by illuminating the ostracization of intellectuals in the U.S. specifically. A recurring defense Firdman uses in his argument is the referral back to childhood behaviors. Talking

  • Mischief in Robert Frost's The Road Not Taken

    1521 Words  | 4 Pages

    catalogue. What the college was, or should be -what Meiklejohn hoped to make Amherst into - was a place to be thought of as "liberal," that is, "essentially intellectual": "The college is primarily not a place of the body, nor of the feelings, nor even of the will; it is, first of all, a place of the mind." Introducing "the boys" to the intellectual life led for its own sake, would save them from pettiness and dullness, would save them from being one of what Meiklejohn referred to as "the others":

  • Scoreboards vs Blackboards: The Myth of the Student-Athlete

    1187 Words  | 3 Pages

    In his essay, "The Myth of the ‘Student-Athlete", Gary Gutting argues that schools turn out more athletes than intellectuals, and that the word “intellectual” has become a swear word. I believe that this statement is very true and relevant to how mass media and education is shifting today. Take a look at how the school system is setup today, schools give out more financial aid and scholarships to students that are athletically gifted than intellectually gifted. Isn’t that backwards, shouldn't you

  • An Intellectual and Emotional Response to Oedipus the King

    1214 Words  | 3 Pages

    An Intellectual and Emotional Response to Oedipus the King While reading the play Oedipus the King, my response to the work became more and more clear as the play continued. When I finished the play, my reaction to the work and to two particular characters was startling and very different from my response while I was still reading. My initial response was to the text, and it was mostly an intellectual one. I felt cheated by the play because the challenge of solving the mystery of the plot was

  • The Importance Of Religion In Maurice Gee's In My Fathers Den

    1035 Words  | 3 Pages

    effect it has on their present characters, along with the influence of religion on them as well and the intellectual acceptance within their society. Religion is the catalyst of conflict between Paul and his brother Andrew, however anti-intellectual difference between the individuals becomes a key affect of the novel. Paul at a young age decides to abandon his Puritan beliefs, due to the intellectual character of his father Henry as well as the strict Puritan ways of his mother Edith. “Slowly I realised

  • Frankenstein Paper

    670 Words  | 2 Pages

    Science fiction writing began in the early 1800’s as a reaction to the growth in science and technology. The genre is characterized by its intellectual excitement, high adventure, and its making of the fantastic possible. Due to the nature of science fiction, film has become an essential piece to its popularity. Science fiction films have been popular since the earliest silent clips because of the outlandish visuals and creative fictional story lines that capture an audience’s attention. Under the

  • Mccarthyism V. Eisenhower's Anti-Intellectual Movement

    927 Words  | 2 Pages

    The 1950s-anti-intellectual was a national movement when non-intellectuals raised concerns outside of the intellectual community. During the time of Dwight Eisenhower considered regularly inarticulate. A part of that movement is McCarthyism “arousing the fear the critical mind was at ruinous discount” (Hofstadter). The 1852 primary election between Adlai Stevenson and Dwight Eisenhower further showed the contrast between intellectuals and anti-intellectuals. Steven appealed to intellectualist, and

  • Depictions of Beauty in the Victorian Era

    1417 Words  | 3 Pages

    Depictions of Beauty in the Victorian Era Missing Works Cited "What is beauty anyway? There's no such thing." (Pablo Picasso) The Victorians' obsession with physical appearance has been well documented by scholars. This was a society in which one's clothing was an immediate indication of what one did for a living (and by extension, one's station in life). It was a world, as John Reed puts it, "where things were as they seemed" (312). So it is not surprising to find that the Victorians

  • Class Classification in Arnold Wesker’s Roots

    1657 Words  | 4 Pages

    Arnold Wesker, an English playwright, a writer of international reputation, was born in Stephney (London) on 24 May,1932.He is the author of about Forty two plays mainly for the stage, four books of short stories, two collections of essays, a book for young people, three more of non-fiction and an autobiography. His works depict various themes, ideas, an obvious expression of deep sympathy, dreams, hopes and the humanism. Wesker is a dramatist with distinct social leanings. Roots is the second

  • America Needs Its Nerds

    852 Words  | 2 Pages

    American culture has evolved, and Society tends to ostracize people for their intelligence, and our culture has been giving these intellectuals derogatory names like nerd and geek. Leonid Fridman believes that these anti- intellectual values that pervade our society must be fought and should stop for the sake of America. The author supports this position in the passage “America Needs It’s Nerds” through the use of rhetoric by giving definitions of terms such as geek, offering comparisons through