Classical art and discourse takes place in a network of symbols & ideas nearly completely lost to us. In art created less than 400 years ago, I'd say less than 5% of the content is accessible to your average university-educated person. Imagine in the case of archaic Greece.
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Is that fault of the student or the university education (probably both in most cases)?
Both, but this culture which I termed a network is ALMOST NEVER included in the artwork/philosophy itself and will mostly be felt/learned from continual exposure to contemporary material like correspondence or more private writing.
