Tracking the decline …

… Opinion | The Academic Apocalypse - The New York Times. (Hat tip, Tim Davis.)

A thousand different forces are killing student interest in the humanities and cultural interest in high culture, and both preservation and recovery depend on more than just a belief in truth and beauty, a belief that “the best that has been thought and said” is not an empty phrase. But they depend at least on that belief, at least on the ideas that certain books and arts and forms are superior, transcendent, at least on the belief that students should learn to value these texts and forms before attempting their critical dissection.

I was fortunate to have had teachers who persuaded me an intimate acquaintance that art, music, and literature would enrich  my life. It certainly seems to have.