I personally found this reading to be a bit challenging. Arendt's writing is very dense and complex, and I do not personally like the way she write. To me, I feel that she adds a lot of of unnecessary commentary which I found to be quiet frustrating and confusing, thus, I had an easy time selecting sentence which I thought were bad.
"The term vita activa, comprehending all human activities defined from the viewpoint of the absolutely quiet of contemplation, there corresponds more closely to the Greek askholia ("unquiet"), with which Aristole designated all activity, than to the Greek bio politikos. As early as Aristotle the distinction between quiet and unquiet, between an almost breathless abstention from external physical movement and activity of every kind, is more decisive than the distinction between the physical and theoretical way of life…" (15).
Firstly, I had to read this very long, run on sentence a few times to try and grasp what Arendt was trying to convey. While does the reading, I found myself stuck on the question of what quiet and unquiet really mean. This was something that was particularly confusing to me within the reading. Secondly, in this sentence, as well as throughout the reading, I her repetitive use of Greek to be quiet confusing.
One sentence which I enjoyed reading and how particularly interesting was:
"But society equalizes under all circumstances, and the victory of equality in the modern world is only the political and legal recognition of the fact that society has conquered the public realm, and that distinction and different have become private matters of the individual" (41).
I agree with you that Arendt's writing is extremely dense, however, I do believe that she intended for the reader to be challenged, so that like her, the reader will question information presented to them and will not simply accept the information.
ReplyDeleteI also agree that her use of Greek references was challenging, mostly because I do not have any training in Greek nor Greek philosophy. While she does explain the terms she uses, I do not feel that Arendt gives enough background of why she is using Greek Philosophy, or any other philosophy in that matter, for me to fully understand the relevance or to remember in future pages. The specific sentence you chose as an example of bad writing, is an example I would have chosen as well The information she complies into two sentences could actually be five or six sentences and would be easier to understand because it would be more thoroughly explained. I also felt with this sentence that she left out essential words and transitions that a more complete sentence would have benefited from.
However, as I mentioned before, this very well could have been Arendt's intention, for all I know. This was also written over 50 years ago, therefore, the language and syntax used in that time may have been different than what we are used to today. However, I agree in that it would be beneficial if Arendt's writing were more direct and simple. However, if that were the case then we would not be challenged as a reader.