Too Cultured for His Own Good

About 25 years ago, the University of Utah Press brought out Reading and Writing, the transcripts of a couple of lectures Robertson Davies delivered as one (or two) in the series of  Tanner lectures on human values. A discussion about "guilty pleasures" over at Informal Inquiries brought a passage to mind:

How dull he is being, you may think, as I draw near to my conclusion. How like a Professor. He is simply parroting Matthew Arnold, with his tedious adjuration that "Culture is the acquainting ourselves with the best that has been known and said in the world, and thus with the history of the human spirit." But I assure you that I mean no such thing, and I have always had my reservations about Matthew Arnold, who was too cultured for his own good; he seems never to have listened to the voices which must, surely, have spoken to him in dreams or in moments when he was off his guard--voices that spoke of the human longing for what is ordinary, what is commonplace, vulgar, possibly obscene or smutty. Our grandparents used to say that we must eat a peck of dirt before we die, and they were right. And you must read a lot of rubbish before you die, as well, because an exclusive diet of masterpieces will give you spiritual dyspepsia. How can you know that a mountain peak is glorious if you have never scrambled through a dirty valley? How doe you know that your gourmet meal is perfect in its kind if you have never eaten a roadside hot dog? If you want to know what a masterpiece The Pilgrim's Progress is, read Bonfire of the Vanities, and if you have any taste--which of course may not be the case--you will quickly find out. So I advise you, as well as reading the great books that I have been talking about, read some current books and some periodicals. The will help you take the measure of the age in which you live.

I regret to say that the press seems to have put the volume out of print: the earliest volume of the Tanner lectures offered is 26, and Davies was printed as volume 13.