Scarry's "On Beauty and Being Just"

This text is the embodiment of it's title:  On Beauty and Being Just. The aesthetics of the physical book may better support Scarry's thesis than the her arguments themselves

Although published in paperback format, a typical indicator of "low-value" in both cost and content, the text features a smooth, stiff cardboard cover with a soft pastel sheen.  The text is protected by heavy-weight coloured flyleafs, two pages at the back, two at the front.  The cover graphic is a drawing of 25 assorted coloured and speckled small bird eggs, lined in a grid formation.  The eggs represent potential life waiting to burst 'out of its shell'.  These tiny eggs are a visual representation of Scarry's argument that beauty is natural, unique, and encourages us to create.

Inside, the text is centred, with large margins in which to take notes.  This is not meant to be a pulp novel to be read and discarded, but rather a collector's item to be read again and again.  Scarry's prose is elegant and her drawings are clear and delicate.

It is the universality of her arguments that fall somewhat short, although I admire her confidence in trying to sway her readership.  I think that beauty is at least somewhat subjective and culturally defined.  Scarry even contradicts herself in her own work as she claims that beauty is both based on symmetry and error.  So is she saying that we find beauty in everything?  Why then does it need to be defined? 

The first phrase that Roberta questioned jumped out at me as well:

 

"Beauty, as both Plato’s Symposium and everyday life confirm, prompts the begetting of children: when the eye sees someone beautiful, the whole body wants to reproduce the person." (4)"

 

That was  pretty bold statement to assert early on in the argument, and even though she attributes the sentiment to Plato, I think that she needed to build up to her claim.  Instead, she offers some evidence to support this theory, but, in my opinion, doesn't really sell it.  I agree that we try and duplicate beauty, but I also think that the essence of beauty is the interaction with a unique experience.  Sunsets speak to the sublime interaction with nature, but they are never exactly the same.  Cell phone photos snapped at concerts or parties are visual cues to remind us of the beauty of the moment, but they are rarely beautiful in and of themselves.

 

Works Cited:
Scarry, Elaine, On Beauty and Being Just. New York: Penguin. 1994. Print.