Allan Gotthelf wrote:

>Is it self-evident what "The Condition of Humanity" is? I'm not disputing,
>as others will, that there is a single overall truth here; I do believe
>there is.  I just don't share any of the common views of it -- the
>"modernistic", the Existentialist, the post-modern -- and resent people who
>dismiss works that express depths of happiness as superficial on grounds
>that to them success and happiness are *not* part of "the condition of
>humanity".

It is probably self-evident in ordinary language.  Only not for
philosophers whose job it is to question what is self-evident.  They
prefer to define the essence of art as the "setting-into-a-work of truth"
(Heidegger).  Since Nietzsche they also argue that artists like Wagner
who believe to be the creator of art are dramatizing themselves instead
of creating musical drama.  An artist is a medium and the more she or he
is so, the better the work of art.  And this may be another way of saying
that a true artist cannot but express the condition of humanity - since
she or he is human.  And the condition may sometimes be truth
"setting-into-Milhaud's-'Boeuf sur le toit'".  And sometimes be truth
setting into Bach's "Kunst der Fuge".

Regards, Henk