ABSTRACT
Art is a simple matter. Consider five objects, all familiar at least by proxy: Leonardo’s Mona Lisa, Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Beethoven’s Eroica, Dante’s Divine Comedy, Michelangelo’s David. Each of these is a work of art, if anything is; we would be more surprised if a history of the relevant art left them out than if it included them…. There is really no doubt about what these things are for … [T]hey are expected to provide worthwhile experiences merely in being listened to, looked at, or read. The less doubt we have that that is what a thing is for, the more confidently we take it to be a work of art.
