In this episode of New Ideal, Sam Weaver interviews Harry Binswanger and Shoshana Milgram about the Romantic movement in art and Ayn Rand’s unique account of it. They also discuss an upcoming conference, Resurrecting Romanticism, which will focus on Romanticism in music and the visual arts.

Among the topics covered:

The value of learning about Rand’s philosophy of art;

A brief summary of Rand’s account of why we need art;

The unique value of Romantic art’s portrayal of volition and values;

Terence Rattigan’s The Browning Version and the stories of O. Henry as examples of Romantic literature;

Why the Romantic movement started around the beginning of the nineteenth century;

Why it’s invalid to criticize Romantic art as unrealistic and “escapist”;

Why there is little to no new Romantic art, and what it would take to bring it back;

How Rand’s definition of Romanticism relates to the visual arts and music;

Topics in music and the visual arts that will be covered at the Resurrecting Romanticism conference.

Mentioned in the podcast and relevant to the discussion are the upcoming Resurrecting Romanticism conference (October 7-9 in Spartanburg, South Carolina), Ayn Rand’s book The Romantic Manifesto, and two chapters in A Companion to Ayn Rand, edited by Allan Gotthelf and Gregory Salmieri: Binswanger’s “The Objectivist Esthetics” and Tore Boeckmann’s “Rand’s Literary Romanticism.”

The podcast was recorded on August 8, 2023. Listen to the discussion below. Listen and subscribe from your mobile device on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify or Stitcher. Watch archived podcasts here.

https://youtu.be/7DJZ28_tzJA?si=UQUAJh5uxIpmcF9B

Podcast audio: