Learning by Passion: The Literary Arts Tradition and the Mass Media

The question as to whether books and reading still have a future, is discussed in both the general press and by (literary) authors themselves. The impact of the modern mass media, especially television, is thought to be considerable in this context. Television and books appear as opposites, symbolizing irreconcilable cultural epochs. That opposition is shown here to be prejudiced, which clears the way for an understanding of the continuity within the literary arts and humanities of the West from ancient Greece to the present. Various forms, such as, the tragedy, the novel, the cinema, and television, play a part in that tradition, and as such they have a contribution to make to education. The educational significance of this tradition lies in its essential contribution to the development of the faculty of practical judgment: phronesis or prudence.