From Dawn to Decadence: 500 Years of Western Cultural Lifeby Jacques Barzun. As the title indicates, a rather dyspeptic, but very well-informed big-picture piece that raises two items of particular interest.
First, the book, published in 2000, employs a variety of quasi-hypertextual linking devices, though it does not mention either hypertext or the Internet. The Zeitgeist at work ?
Second, Barzun refers to Bentham’s famous claim that,
given equal pleasure, pushpin is as good as poetry
. The dictionaries I’ve looked at merely say that pushpin is an obsolete children’s game, but Barzun asserts that pushpin is bowling (I assume some relative of skittles).
For me, at least, this sharpens up Bentham’s point a great deal. I have to confess that, if Barzun is right, I get a good deal more utility from pushpin than from poetry (of course, the invention of the automatic pinspotter and the decay of modern poetry are relevant factors). On the other hand, I (implicitly, given my general position) support the use of taxes on pushpin to subsidise the production of poetry and the retransmission of old poetry to new generations.
John Quiggin 
Jacques Barzun is still publishing? Why did I think he’d died years ago?
He was born in 1907, but is apparently still going strong.
I’ve just finished In Praise of Commercial Culture by economist Tyler Cowen.
http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog/COWPRA.html
Bit of a disappointment as it didn’t cover objectivity in art, but worth reading.
His critique of the later part of the 20C at the conclusion of From D2D is baffling to me. Whereas I view his data as evidence of a great emancipation, he clearly thinks it is the recurring pattern of the end of civilization. But then, I really really like the Sex Pistols, and he doesn’t. He must at bottom be a monarchist. (Lives in Tuscon AZ now, which doesn’t fit)
‘ …I get a good deal more utility from pushpin than poetry (of course the invention of the modern pinspotter and the decay of modern poetry are relevant factors)”
Hmm. See if you can get hold of a copy of the poetry journal, Blue Dog, John …. I think you’ll find some of the pomes therein less decayed than useful! Philip Hodgins
http://www.duffyandsnellgrove.com.au/titles/nsp_hodgins.htm
might provide a good (re?)-starting point, too.
oops, linkhere
I’ve read it. Barzun is an erudite tour guide through the centuries but he gets increasingly cranky as he nears the 20th.
Pushpin doesn’t seem to be skittles. ” A children’s gam where pins are pushed alternately”. Apparently referenced in Willy Shakespeare.