I went to the cinema last this week, and hunkered down in my cheap seat trying to focus on the film while a bunch of people around me chattered with their friends  (The film was The Prestige and it wasn't half bad).

It makes me sad when people don't show respect to other people's work - even if it's a movie.  But then that is probably because I'm of an age when people dressed up to go the cinema.
I realised that it was no small wonder that most people are so stupid... if they pay their $12 to go see a movie and then talk all the way through it, then what chance does literature, or any other of the 'difficult' arts stand in permeating their consciousness.   I recently read that some school teachers had given up getting their charges to take their I-pods off completely while they are teaching and settle for just one ear being left free. These are no doubt the same students who will later sue for not getting the grades they need.

When music has become an unrelenting background noise of tunes, what chance does 'difficult' music stand?
How can people grapple with Proust's interminable sentences against a background blather of TV, friend's chatter, SMS messages and instant messages?

Great work demands your whole concentration.  The long, quiet spaces between conversations, between work and sleep are the vacuums which the work of great minds can rush in.   The endless pap of 'reality TV', celebrity gossip and bland pop are just ways society has of filling up your time so that you don't think too long and too hard about anything.