Pomo, Hojo’s, and other cultural stuff

Hilton Kramer makes a good observation in his essay “Modernism & its institutions” in the current (October) issue of The New Criterion, that postmodernism has created no institutions of its own. One explanation for the situation—Mr. Kramer doesn’t go into this—is that postmodernism is basically a career strategy for functionaries trying to gain power within established institutions. Another is that modernity, like the liberalism that is its political aspect, is too rationalized to develop into anything. All that can come after the modern and liberal is irrational and corrupt versions of the same thing. No exit is possible absent a truly fundamental break.

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