On Aug 5, 10:23 pm, mimus hotmail.com> wrote:

When can art have meaning without being propaganda?

That is the proper question to examine.

By art, we are looking primarily at narrative fiction. Music or
painting clearly does not depend on having "meaning" to be worthwhile.

By meaning, clearly this refers to a point or moral; a statement about
human nature.

And propaganda means that which simply tries to persuade one in favor
of a point of view, by fair means or foul.

Once we've settled on what we are talking about, then we can point
with satisfaction to a large body of great art. The novels which have
been acclaimed as masterworks were indeed those that stayed clear of
the two pitfalls...

of being disguised moral or political tracts, and

of being melodrama which simply entertains the reader by showing how
the good guys defeat the bad guys.

And how is that achieved?

Instead of being unconvincing, instead of simply making claims about
human nature and demonstrating them through a contrived situation,
great literature brings us to new insights because the charcters in it
seem real - so we can, through introspection, verify that what the
author has to say is genuine. You can do that, if you have the talent,
and if what you have to say is true.

John Savard