Le Ballet Mécanique(1924)

Ladies and Gentlemen may I present you: Le Ballet Mécanique by Fernand Léger

 

Fernand Léger was a French artist. His work ranges from Cubism and abstractionism in the 1910s to realist imagery in the 1950s.

This film made in 1924 demonstrates the concern with the mechanical world.

 

source:  http://www.moma.org/collection/object.php?object_id=91484

The Shape of Things to Come

Hello!

I was going through the blog and I noticed that we haven’t really touched on one of the most interesting themes (by interesting I actually mean cool! But cool is too informal.) of the early 20^th century: SCIENCE FICTION! (cue 2001: A Space Odyssey score)

Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels is considered the first truly scientific work of literary fantasy, along with Voltaire’s Micromégas (1752) and Kepler’s Somnium (1620-30). In fact, authors (and also awesome brainiacs) Carl Sagan and Isaac Asimov call Kepler’s narrative the first work of science fiction.

In the 19^th century, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and The Last Man, along with Edgar A. Poe’s story about a trip to the moon helped define the form of the science fiction novel. In the second half of the century, Jules Verne (one of the gods in my pagan temple) earned the title of “Father of Science Fiction” (a title shared with H.G. Wells – yet another god in my temple – and Hugo Gernsback, founder of the pioneering sci-fi magazine Amazing Stories – the famous Hugo Awards, presented annually by the World Science Fiction Society (WSFS) have been named after this guy) with works like Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, Journey to the Centre of the Earth, From the Earth to the Moon and Around the Moon.

However, the early 20^th century was the period when sci-fi started to be recognized as an actual literary genre with two very important sci-fi authors: H.G.Wells and Edgar Rice Burroughs.

American author Edgar Rice Burroughs (September 1, 1875 – March 19, 1950) was the creator of a number of series depicting life on other planets, namely Venus (starting with Pirates of Venus in 1934) and Mars (who hasn’t heard of John Carter of Mars?), but also at the Earth’s core, such as the Pellucidar Series. His most famous series are the Barsoom Series (starting with Princess of Mars in 1912 and ending with John Carter in 1964) and the Tarzan Series (starting with Tarzan of the Apes in 1912 and ending with Tarzan and the Castaways in 1965). He was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame in 2003.

H.G. Wells (21 September 1866 – 13 August 1946) introduced a new perspective into sci-fi literature, weaving together technological advancement and socio-political views. His stories often come embedded with a kind of warning to the human perpetual hunger for progress and control over nature (The Island of Doctor Moreau being the most flagrant example in this particular case). Wells dubbed himself a socialist (for a while he was a member of the Fabian Society) and his views as such are reflected in the stories he wrote: class and inequality are present in The Time Machine, where humanity is divided into two groups, the rich, who have reverted back to a natural state as childlike adults (Eloi=leisured classes), and the ape-like troglodytes who live in darkness underground and surface only at night (Morlocks=working class).

Men Like Gods (1923) features a utopia located in a parallel universe, where Marxism is denounced and wireless internet is described. The Shape of Things to Come (1933) is set between 1933 and 2106; in this book, Wells predicts the WWII breaking out with a European conflagration from the flashpoint of a violent clash between Germans and Poles at Danzig in January 1940 and establishes a world state as the solution for mankind’s problems. Although Wells’ most famous works have been written prior to the 20^th century, he went on contributing to science fiction until 1941, not just with fiction but also with non-fictional books, thus earning a place in our class discussion.

H.G.Wells’ beliefs and their influence in his works is a very interesting subject for those who are (like me) die-hard sci-fi worshippers. Matters such as class, socialism, Zionism, Eugenics, world government, Darwinism and evolution, can be spotted throughout most of his stories. I should warn H.G.Wells’ beginners that his books are not an easy read: they are very descriptive and full of ideologies which may clash with common understanding. But they are worth poring over.

…And don’t think you can learn as much by watching Spielberg’s War of the Worlds. The only thing he managed to get right was the tripod-shaped aliens.

Now go play some board games.

Don’t forget to be awesome,

Sara Santos.

Boardwalk Empire

"Boardwalk Empire is an American television series from premium cable channel HBO, set in Atlantic City, New Jersey during the Prohibition era (1920s and 1930s). It stars Steve Buscemi as Nucky Thompson. The show was adapted by Emmy Award-winning screenwriter and producer Terence Winter (of The Sopranos) from a book about historical criminal kingpin Enoch L. Johnson by Nelson Johnson, titled Boardwalk Empire: The Birth, High Times, and Corruption of Atlantic City.

The pilot episode, directed by Martin Scorsese, was produced at a cost of $18 million. On September 1, 2009, HBO picked up the series for an additional 11 episodes. The series premièred on September 19, 2010. The series was renewed for a third season, which premièred on September 16, 2012. On October 2, 2012, HBO announced that the series was renewed for a fourth season.

Boardwalk Empire has received widespread critical acclaim, particularly for its visual style and basis on historical figures, as well as for Buscemi's lead performance. The series has won twelve Emmy Awards and has received 30 nominations, including two for Outstanding Drama Series. The series also won the Golden Globe Award for Best Television Series – Drama."

You can easily stream or download it from here (All episodes averaging 150Mb in size):

Boardwalk Empire Season 1 Episode 1

                                                                                                                                                                  ~ César ~

First Lady of the World

"Anna Eleanor Roosevelt (/ˈɛlɨnɔr ˈroʊzəvɛlt/; October 11, 1884 – November 7, 1962) was the longest-serving First Lady of the United States, holding the post from 1933 to 1945 during her husband Franklin D. Roosevelt's four terms in office. President Harry S. Truman later nicknamed her the "First Lady of the World" in tribute to her human rights achievements."

"Born into a wealthy and well-connected New York family, the Roosevelts, Eleanor had an unhappy childhood, suffering the deaths of both parents and one of her brothers at a young age. At 15, she attended Allenwood Academy in London, and was deeply influenced by feminist headmistress Marie Souvestre. Returning to the US, she married Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1905. The Roosevelts' marriage was complicated from the beginning by Franklin's controlling mother, and after discovering Franklin's affair with Lucy Mercer in 1918, Eleanor resolved to seek fulfillment in a public life of her own. She persuaded Franklin to stay in politics following his partial paralysis from polio, and began to give speeches and campaign in his place. After Franklin's election as Governor of New York, Eleanor regularly made public appearances on his behalf."

"Though widely respected in her later years, Roosevelt was a controversial First Lady for her outspokenness, particularly for her stands on racial issues. She was the first presidential spouse to hold press conferences, write a syndicated newspaper column, and speak at a national convention. On a few occasions, she publicly disagreed with her husband's policies. She launched an experimental community at Arthurdale, West Virginia for the families of unemployed miners, later widely regarded as a failure. She advocated for expanded roles for women in the workplace, the civil rights of African Americans and Japanese Americans, and the rights of World War II refugees."

"Following her husband's death, Eleanor remained active in politics for the rest of her life. She pressed the US to join and support the United Nations and became one of its first delegates. She served as the first chair of the UN Commission on Human Rights, and oversaw the drafting of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Later she chaired the John F. Kennedy administration's Presidential Commission on the Status of Women. By her death, she was regarded as "one of the most esteemed women in the world" and "the object of almost universal respect". In 1999, she was ranked in the top ten of Gallup's List of Most Widely Admired People of the 20th Century."

                                                                                                                                                                    ~ César ~

A Thought Provoking Woman

"Charlotte Perkins Gilman (July 3, 1860 – August 17, 1935) was a prominent American sociologist, novelist, writer of short stories, poetry, and nonfiction, and a lecturer for social reform. She was a utopian feminist during a time when her accomplishments were exceptional for women, and she served as a role model for future generations of feminists because of her unorthodox concepts and lifestyle. Her best remembered work today is her semi-autobiographical short story The Yellow Wallpaper which she wrote after a severe bout of postpartum psychosis."

"After moving to Pasadena, Charlotte became active in organizing social reform movements. As a delegate, she represented California in 1896 at both the Suffrage Convention in Washington, D.C. and the International Socialist and Labor Congress which was held in England. In 1890, she was introduced to Nationalism, a movement which worked to "end capitalism's greed and distinctions between classes while promoting a peaceful, ethical, and truly progressive human race." Published in the Nationalist magazine, her poem, Similar Cases was a satirical review of people who resisted social change and she received positive feedback from critics for it. Throughout that same year, 1890, she became inspired enough to write fifteen essays, poems, a novella, and the short story The Yellow Wallpaper. Her career was launched when she began lecturing on Nationalism and gained the public's eye with her first volume of poetry, In This Our World, published in 1893. As a successful lecturer who relied on giving speeches as a source of income, her fame grew along with her social circle of similar-minded activists and writers of the feminist movement."

Other quotations:

“The first duty of a human being is to assume the right functional relationship to society -- more briefly, to find your real job, and do it.”

“There was a time when Patience ceased to be a virtue. It was long ago.”

“To swallow and follow, whether old doctrine or new propaganda, is a weakness still dominating the human mind.”

"It is not that women are really smaller-minded, weaker-minded, more timid and vacillating, but that whosoever, man or woman, lives always in a small, dark place, is always guarded, protected, directed and restrained, will become inevitably narrowed and weakened by it."

"The softest, freest, most pliable and changeful living substance is the brain -- the hardest and most iron-bound as well."

"A house does not need a wife any more than it needs a husband."

                                                                                                                                                   ~ César ~

George Bernard Shaw

"George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950) was an Irish playwright and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama, and he wrote more than 60 plays. He was also an essayist, novelist and short story writer. Nearly all his writings address prevailing social problems, but have a vein of comedy which makes their stark themes more palatable. Issues which engaged Shaw's attention included education, marriage, religion, government, health care, and class privilege."

"He was most angered by what he perceived as the exploitation of the working class. An ardent socialist, Shaw wrote many brochures and speeches for the Fabian Society. He became an accomplished orator in the furtherance of its causes, which included gaining equal rights for men and women, alleviating abuses of the working class, rescinding private ownership of productive land, and promoting healthy lifestyles. For a short time he was active in local politics, serving on the London County Council. In 1898, Shaw married Charlotte Payne-Townshend, a fellow Fabian, whom he survived. They settled in Ayot St Lawrence in a house now called Shaw's Corner. Shaw died there, aged 94, from chronic problems exacerbated by injuries he incurred by falling from a ladder."

"He is the only person to have been awarded both a Nobel Prize in Literature (1925) and an Oscar (1938), for his contributions to literature and for his work on the film Pygmalion (adaptation of his play of the same name), respectively. Shaw wanted to refuse his Nobel Prize outright because he had no desire for public honours, but accepted it at his wife's behest: she considered it a tribute to Ireland. He did reject the monetary award, requesting it be used to finance translation of fellow playwright August Strindberg's works from Swedish to English."

                                                                                                                                                   ~ César ~

Maslow vs Freud

These two were not creators of art, but were two of the most successful in the field of Psychology, true interpreters of human behavior and personality.

It's impossible to actually quantify their influence in society and the arts, but you need only to grasp a bit of what their theories were all about to realize their influence has been massive.

"Sigmund Freud (German pronunciation: [ˈziːkmʊnt ˈfʁɔʏt]; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist who became known as the founding father of psychoanalysis." 

"In creating psychoanalysis, a clinical method for treating psychopathology through dialogue between a patient and a psychoanalyst, Freud developed therapeutic techniques such as the use of free association (in which patients report their thoughts without reservation and in whichever order they spontaneously occur) and discovered transference (the process in which patients displace on to their analysts feelings derived from the sexual experiences and fantasies of their childhood), establishing its central role in the analytic process. Freud’s analysis of his own and his patients dreams as wish-fulfilments provided him with models for the clinical analysis of symptom formation and the mechanisms of repression as well as for further elaboration of his theory of the unconscious as an agency disruptive of conscious states of mind. Freud postulated the existence of libido, an energy with which mental process and structures are invested and which generates erotic attachments, and a death drive, the source of repetition, hate, aggression and guilt. In his later work Freud drew on psychoanalytic theory to develop a wide-ranging interpretation and critique of religion and culture."

"Abraham Harold Maslow (April 1, 1908 – June 8, 1970) was an American psychologist who was best known for creating Maslow's hierarchy of needs, a theory of psychological health predicated on fulfilling innate human needs in priority, culminating in self-actualization. Maslow was a psychology professor at Brandeis University, Brooklyn College, New School for Social Research and Columbia University. He stressed the importance of focusing on the positive qualities in people, as opposed to treating them as a "bag of symptoms."

Maslow's hierarchy of needs

"Humanistic psychologists believe that every person has a strong desire to realize his or her full potential, to reach a level of "self-actualization". The main point of that new movement, that reached its peak in 1960s, was to emphasize the positive potential of human beings. Maslow positioned his work as a vital complement to that of Freud"

"It is as if Freud supplied us the sick half of psychology and we must now fill it out with the healthy half."

"To prove that humans are not simply blindly reacting to situations, but trying to accomplish something greater, Maslow studied mentally healthy individuals instead of people with serious psychological issues. He focused on self-actualising people. Self-actualizing people indicate a coherent personality syndrome and represent optimal psychological health and functioning."

"This informed his theory that a person enjoys "peak experiences", high points in life when the individual is in harmony with himself and his surroundings. In Maslow's view, self-actualized people can have many peak experiences throughout a day while others have those experiences less frequently."

"Maslow based his theory partially on his own assumptions about human potential and partially on his case studies of historical figures whom he believed to be self actualized, including Albert Einstein and Henry David Thoreau. Consequently, Maslow argued, the way in which essential needs are fulfilled is just as important as the needs themselves. Together, these define the human experience. To the extent a person finds cooperative social fulfillment, he establishes meaningful relationships with other people and the larger world. In other words, he establishes meaningful connections to an external reality—an essential component of self-actualization. In contrast, to the extent that vital needs find selfish and competitive fulfillment, a person acquires hostile emotions and limited external relationships—his awareness remains internal and limited."

                                                                                                                                                   ~ César ~