Chapter 1T's art is based on the reciprocity of reality and immagination. 14 Early on T fought with the idea that the space between the artists feelings and the world "out there" might be bridged by appealing to the reader's on imagination. 17 The question for T was to figure out how to make more than the educated man understand what he was trying to do in life and in art. This is part of the basis for his need to include only the art that infects all. 24 T distinhushes himself from Rouseau. R rejected all mankind and T only rejects the Christian. 33 T's feelings for R might be at the root of T;s infection theroy. he felt so strongly about what R wrote about that he felt that it was art and for anything else to be put on the same pedstal it must evoke in the receiver the same feeling. 35 T's need to find something for the non aristocratic, for the peasants in his art, began no later than in the Sebastople sketches when he discerns the difference between what the peasant soldier knows and the authories don't know about how to win the war. 36 There is a close connection bewteen T's religious revalaations and his aestthic ideas. 38
Chapter 2
T believed in the need for no education to understand true art and he got this in part from his work on Yasnaya Pol. where he worked with the children and they understood the beauty of nature, yet had not ed. 54 In order for someone to understand the art they too must live a certain quality of life and if they can then they will understand a certain quality of art - it is this quality of art that is the only true art 60 It is the 'wee bit' that t saw in the children's stories and he used himself when writing - the principle of the essential detail. 62 Thus in the writing where he used much more complex literary principles did he decide that they were worthless later in life. 62 For t change and continuity are a complex give and take that contiues in him forever. 67
Chapter 3
The third influence on t's arsthetics is the moral and phiosophical change he went through in 1880s. 68 that which kept him from killing himself is that which helped form his theory. 67 The same metaphysical despair T found himself in was what he wrote in Death of I.I. and in Levin's ending when he too wonders what he is going to do. 70 Instead of cosmic aloneness, T finds in writing the Confession the cosmic connectedness of it all and like Pierre in W and P he understands the world as he now needs to live it and how it all relates to it and him to it. 71 What T doesn't like in civilization is what t doesn't like in art - that it is constructed for and by the exploiters that have not held up their end of the bargain of civilization. 73 T also understood that which was simple as a very complex thing. the simplest art is the best, but it is in effect very complex. 76 T doesn't speak of Science and art in the same way that we understand them. He is talking about the great thrust of mankind toward greater moral and emotional force. 78 T's idea of art is not a thing, but a process, an act of communication, something that is happening. 81 The simplest feeling that creates art is like enstrangement - the act of making something conscious and strange something that is not because of its familiarity.Like Levin working the fields or Vronsky on the horse knowing inside him that somehting is wrong bewteen he and Anna. T's assessment of what is science is basically the same as it is for art - if it doesn't serve the needs of mankind then it is not science. 87 this is unfortunately not supportable by objective fact and is and ecoding of an attitude, not an assertion. 87 Unfortunately we don't really learn what is science or art from T because it doesn't allow for an analysis of itself. 87 The only three things that define beauty and art are based out of the life of christ - individuality, clarity and sicncerety. 96
Chapter 4
Art for him had to set a moral standard and serve the greater search for truth and could not regard it as an exercise in relativity. It also had to be found in the wisdom of the heart. 99 He sets out to defien art as it relates to our emotionss and develops it around our moral and universal responsibility. 101 The reason why we cannot use goodness, truth and beauty to define art is that they rest on the idea that what we see is based on something else or that they are defined by those in power. 103 T looks at art as an sctivity and thus is not what it is, but what it does/ 107 Because T used the theory that art must be immediately recognizable and the upper classes don't have this in them necessarily, but the peasants do, then it also becoemes a question of which class understands right and wrong better - religion becomes a question of class. 112 true art, like everything else deals with life itself and not with the recording of its traditions. 113 T's three most anit-sex works, Ressurection, KSonata and the Devil were all being completed at the time He was working on WHat is Art. 126 If you follow enough of T's arguments they all come around to describe T more than anything else. It is an intense and powerful statement of Self-realization and functions like his art. 133 He defends his own ancient morals against civilization.
Chapter 5
T is Simonson in Resurrection. He is alone and concentrated in purpose to convery they image of truth universally and sincerely and his commitment he calls love. 134 A pilgram listening for the simple people to the voice of god. 135 He sets himself as alone standing between god and Mother Earth. Silbadoris speaks of Olenin from Cossacks as looking at art. 137 T is this same pilgrim trying to figure out what his purpose displays this in Waht is Art. 138 Also in War and Peace when the soldiers break into spontaneous song. 139 And Three Deaths. 139 And Natasha's dance in W and P. 140 The opera and Ts; estrangement also. 141 Resurrection compared to Shakespeare and the disharmony of a play or non-play on words. 144 AK and her premonition compared to King Lear - T dispolays the heart of a person really in panic, not jsut a play. 145 Wagner and Levin as artiface. 147 KSonata and hate and music - it is false and engenders passions. 149 Society is the same ocnstruct of artiface as seen in WandP and AK. 150 AK as the end of human omunication. 151 Mikhailov in AK speaks as T on art and falsty. 152 In T there is little lit, but a lot of painting and music. In AK there is even a Vronsky to show what false art is. 153 Art in AK is used to show how much Vronsky maybe loved AK. 154 In W and P boris and Julie read Poor Liza, but it may just be any sad tale. 155 AK reading her English novel and the storm outside and she is tranported to another time - it is stupid. Her english happiness at Vronsky's estate show her heart and the bitter taste it left. 156 Her death is just living out an english novel. 157 AK's portait and her dying love are contrasted. 158 The paintings are there to show the lack of real heart. 158 Vronsky's painting shows how much he has her body, but doesn't know her soul. 159 Stiva and Pushkin and poetry. 160 T uses art to show what he thinks of people in his tales. 161 T was trying to dispell the idea that the world is us, and push that we are the world. 163 T works with metaphore not like other artists, but her infuses details to link up events where they will evoke the greatest emotional asssociations for ther reader and the character. 169 This is Levin in the grass and prince Andrei wehn he is injured and is similar to Pierrre's watery globe. 169
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Balestrini “Art and Marriage"
N hated the later period of Tolstoy, but loved AK. He thought that the same great man was speaking in both of these, but when he chose to be a simple philosopher he was neglecting and forsaking the great artist that he was. 63 N felt chagrin with T using literature as a didactic tool. 63 T got the inspiration for the story from a friend that was told the story on a train like in the story. T also was with him and heard the KS played and decided to combine the two in to one story. 64 T heard about othe writers' views on marriage and sexuality in marraige with childbirth. The need to be clebate during the pregnancy. All of these came into his work and influenced him. T wanted the work to be useful to people and hoped that it would be. Nabokov never had this aim. 66 Similarieties betewen T's and N's stories. 67 Pozdneshev echoes T belifs that music can bring about feelings that cannot be controlled and thus music should be controlled in certain cases by the authorities so that it doesn't have a harmfull affect on people. 71 It seems to be no more than a stimulous - response operation and people cannot help but react in a certain way. Nabokov gives people the chance to involve ethics with aestethics and not react in a proscribed way. 72
Monday, May 10, 2010
Wyspianski "The Wedding"
Lots of history and art is referenced in the play that is one of Poland's greatest drama's ever written. 9 He is considered to have been a part of yound Poland. 12 He oppossed new romanticism and the cult of the bards. 13 The play is a satire on society and the manners in the beginning. The wedding is only the frame for the play. it is really a play about Crakow and the cultural center of poland and the writers view of Poland. There are many allusions to Dante and the tale of a descent into a kind of Polish Hell where the tortures are the myths of history and literature. 14 The play also plays on the szopka - a Polish puppet show. The play also uses Mickeiwiecz' Dziady to a great degree.16 There is a Jew and talk of nationality and also a woman, rachel, the daughter of the Jew that is said to be a modern woman. 50 Many people at a wedding dancing and hitting on each other with poetry. A man Czeric fights with others. The young girls just want to dance with the groomsmen. the poet is trying to get with everyone. Scene 7 Journalist and Stanczyk talk rot about all kinds of things national and not. 99 The journalist then talks to the Poet and then the Poet to the Knight and at the end of it each want the other to hold his hand and the other comes out sad. The poet is now sad and thinks that his work is no good. 106 Then some ghosts come for the wedding and the beggar tries to scare them off. 112 Wernohora tells the host that he will have to set forth and mobilize the people and so the host decides to do this. the host had seen Wernyhora only in a dream the day before and now he stands in front of him. 133 The bride married a man outside her class - above her and now everyone is telling her that she will miss the country and her father. She doesn't have that much to talk about with her husband so she cannot even imagine what they will talk about or how their life will end up. 155 The poet asks the bride if she knows where and what Poland is and she answers that she doesn't know, but he tells her that it is in her heart. The revolt is rising, but the host, the man who headed the call from Warnyherna doesn't remember it from the night before. The men are gathered outside and Czerpiec is mad nothing is happening. The bride tries to get everyone to calm down, the groom doesn't understand what is happening. 180 They all gather and the host remember what happened the night before and what he needs to do, but he lost the horn and is left listening for the cock to crow. Janciek lost the horn, but the chochiol comes to him and tells him to take their scyths and guns and leave them dance while the chochiol plays the violin and mesmerizing them with music. 195 the cock crows, but no one hears it because of the music. 198
Sunday, May 9, 2010
Kasparek: “Two Micro-Stories by Prus”
Mold of the Earth
A man is shown spotches in the dirt by a botanist. The botanist explains that they are not visible to the eye, but they are tiny societies and wage war and move and conquer and live their lives. The man says that they are like human societies a bit. The botanist says no, they have no souls, art, communication, etc. Then years later the man sits down at the same spot and sees the spots agian and the botanist shows up. they are transported to a school room and the botanist shows the man the globe and the many splotches of life. The man asks "is it the history of mankind" the botanist nods and the man asks where the art, culture and souls are and the botanist laughs at him. The man asks who the botanist is and understands that who is by his melancholy and mockery - Satan? This is Prus' first dealings with writing from Spencer's ideas of "Society as Organism."
Shades
Lamplighters bustle about at twighlight lighting all the lamps in the city and then disappearing like shades. Where do they go? Where do they come from? The N tries to find out, but never sees his lamplighter and then only finds out after he dies that he is in the cemetrary, but he was too poor and no one can show him where the man's grave is. Is Prus the lamplighter that no one knows and wants to know? These were written during some of the more pessimistic years of Prus' life after his journal shut down and the general poor situation in Poland. 99
A man is shown spotches in the dirt by a botanist. The botanist explains that they are not visible to the eye, but they are tiny societies and wage war and move and conquer and live their lives. The man says that they are like human societies a bit. The botanist says no, they have no souls, art, communication, etc. Then years later the man sits down at the same spot and sees the spots agian and the botanist shows up. they are transported to a school room and the botanist shows the man the globe and the many splotches of life. The man asks "is it the history of mankind" the botanist nods and the man asks where the art, culture and souls are and the botanist laughs at him. The man asks who the botanist is and understands that who is by his melancholy and mockery - Satan? This is Prus' first dealings with writing from Spencer's ideas of "Society as Organism."
Shades
Lamplighters bustle about at twighlight lighting all the lamps in the city and then disappearing like shades. Where do they go? Where do they come from? The N tries to find out, but never sees his lamplighter and then only finds out after he dies that he is in the cemetrary, but he was too poor and no one can show him where the man's grave is. Is Prus the lamplighter that no one knows and wants to know? These were written during some of the more pessimistic years of Prus' life after his journal shut down and the general poor situation in Poland. 99
Reymont: "Wampir"
Zenon is a man that awakes in London in a hotel 3 days after he receives a letter with an inexplicable message to follow, but not ask. He wanders around and cannot remember anything from the last 3 days, but meets up with a friend Daisy. She calms him, but later when he begins to follow her around and she doesn't seem to be herself. He follows her to an abandoned house and follows her into it and gets lost in the dark. His mind is filled with images of the unknown until he finds himself in front of Satan and he is conducting some rite. Daisy seems to be sacrificing herself for him and so she is devoured by her own panther. Zenon ends up outside and has a great feel for nature and starts hugging trees.
Naimark: “Warsaw Postivism"
Some of the results of the failed uprising was increased legislation by the Russians to get the Polish Gentry to fall in line with russia. they emancipated the peasants, forbade Polish language and opened russian schools all to rob the gentry of any power they had. 328 Thsi caused the peasants and the ruined gentry to flood to the cities where industrialization was taking place.
"The Political ideology..." The historiography of the P and the Proletariat are often at odds, but they actually had more in common than they are given credit for. The differences tend to be about the insurectionist vs nationalist view points. 329 organic Work 331 Polish P were not philosophers, but journalists, economists and sociologists. they were looking for a better way to define they society and build it and became enanoured with Comte's empiricism and scientism. 332 swietochowski. 334 Prejected much, didn't build. 334 P called on the gentry to come together and for the intelligentsia to form better ties with the peasants and to work for and with them. 335 The P was not for equality of the classes as were the socialists. they wanted liberal economic growth ahead of political growth. 336 Prus called for greater education for the worker who were economically poor, but also illiterate. 337 The P were very interested in factory conditions for safety and insurance against injury and sanitation. They were staunch capitalists that were not for minimum wages, but sought out greater improvements for the worker through the increase in economic power overall in the state. 337 Thus the P were very passive in the lives of the workers and did not speak for them as would the socialists. 338 The question is raised about the patriotism of the P. they were for quiet patriotism, the kind that spoke for itself out of improved conditions, but did not wave it from a flag pole. 338 The P were for an end to dreaming and a beginning of working. They wanted to forget about the insurections and get people to be look for internal independence. 339 They were said to have worked agaisnt every evil in Poland except the political and the Tsar. 339 the year 1876 brought the beginning og the socialist movement to Warsaw. The marxist movement came from Russian Marxism, but it spread more quickly because of the existing liberal positivist movement that already called every facet of life into question. They also made great use of his name and wrote about socialism in unflattering ways, but gave it more of an audience all the same. 342 The P attacked the role that socialism would play in Poland and how it would incite anti-semitism. 344 The Polish intelligentsia was looking for something new to attach itself to and the articles explaining the tenets of socialsm by the positivists gave them the info they wanted. Anyone not interested in P would gravitate to Socialism from the P articles. 345
"The Political ideology..." The historiography of the P and the Proletariat are often at odds, but they actually had more in common than they are given credit for. The differences tend to be about the insurectionist vs nationalist view points. 329 organic Work 331 Polish P were not philosophers, but journalists, economists and sociologists. they were looking for a better way to define they society and build it and became enanoured with Comte's empiricism and scientism. 332 swietochowski. 334 Prejected much, didn't build. 334 P called on the gentry to come together and for the intelligentsia to form better ties with the peasants and to work for and with them. 335 The P was not for equality of the classes as were the socialists. they wanted liberal economic growth ahead of political growth. 336 Prus called for greater education for the worker who were economically poor, but also illiterate. 337 The P were very interested in factory conditions for safety and insurance against injury and sanitation. They were staunch capitalists that were not for minimum wages, but sought out greater improvements for the worker through the increase in economic power overall in the state. 337 Thus the P were very passive in the lives of the workers and did not speak for them as would the socialists. 338 The question is raised about the patriotism of the P. they were for quiet patriotism, the kind that spoke for itself out of improved conditions, but did not wave it from a flag pole. 338 The P were for an end to dreaming and a beginning of working. They wanted to forget about the insurections and get people to be look for internal independence. 339 They were said to have worked agaisnt every evil in Poland except the political and the Tsar. 339 the year 1876 brought the beginning og the socialist movement to Warsaw. The marxist movement came from Russian Marxism, but it spread more quickly because of the existing liberal positivist movement that already called every facet of life into question. They also made great use of his name and wrote about socialism in unflattering ways, but gave it more of an audience all the same. 342 The P attacked the role that socialism would play in Poland and how it would incite anti-semitism. 344 The Polish intelligentsia was looking for something new to attach itself to and the articles explaining the tenets of socialsm by the positivists gave them the info they wanted. Anyone not interested in P would gravitate to Socialism from the P articles. 345
Wampuszyc: “The Narrative of Noble Decline"
She writes about the noble decline and their relationship to money, so the peasants and the jews are not mentioned mostly as a part of the study. It is study of how a discourse on wealth became a discourse on money. 12 Polish money uses Polish and not Latin and they print paper money for the first time as need arose and as a sign of their legitimacy and nationalism. 23 Russian money in Poland after the uprising. 24 The 19th century Poland was still stuck in its Szlachta culture and even with the rise of the industrialization of the country it did not bring about a rise in new middle class, as it did in France, but just made the the nobles richer. 25 Religious thinking on money also influenced the lower classes especially, but Poland in general, from looking at money as a favorable thing. 27 Money didn't play a major part of literature in realism. It was shown that someone had it or needed it, but not in concrete terms. 30 With the death of Alex I and the reign of Alex II the loosening of laws agianst private organizations was met with the flood of organizations that started to meet with secret motives of independence. The combination of the tensions from arrests of poles and the drafting into the Russian armies of Poles caused the uprising. 98 The Russian response to the uprising was the stripping of the szlachti of their estates and with the loss of estates came the loss of economic independence, priviliges and prestige. 99 High taxes and the forced Russian language in the schools and business caused increased moves to the cities for the peasants and the gentry. 101 The peasants were freed in 1864 only after the uprising and showed the difference between the gentry and the peasants who were tied more to the land than they were to Polish nationalism. 102 The gentry were not compensated at the same rate as the Russian gentry and with the loss of land, workers and increased taxes the stress was even greater on the gentry. 103 The polish nation, that is the gentry relied on "language, literature and tradition" to support their nationalism - all of this was lost with the uprising. 108 The new press let go of the romanticism and traditionalism and moved toward positivism. The press was not overly Russian because of the lack of available materials in Poland and was thus able to continue in Polish. In the new press was written the new traditions of Poland after the insurection. 112 Defining the old tradtitions of the gentry. 112-119 Positivist response. 128 Work was a major goal of the P propigated in journalism and literture, but to get the gentry to work and the peasants to work in useful areas outside of agriculture was difficult. 129-135 P lit had a new hero - one that worked instead of the old gentry. 136-137 Prus wrote and believed in the P ideals as a "middle of the roader" and the need for all to work - not in the marxist sense, but for all to work in all spheres. 137 Society as an organism. 139 Prus as a novelist "emancipated" and defines his goals for poland. 151 Lalka as theory turned into action based on observation. 151-155 demise of the family after the uprising. 156 upholds capitalism 158 Emancipantki as the culmination of women's emancipation and the rise of the intelligentsia 160-167 Emancipantki Karolina Latter- genrty woman turned professional 168-175 Prus' Modern woman 175-187 Gentry to professional woman 187-191 The middle class in Emancipantki 191-198 Two faces of Usury. 198-202 Idealism and pragmatism. 202-210 Conclusions -Prus. 213-216
Saturday, May 8, 2010
Konopnicka: "Urbanowa"
Urbanowa is a drunk cook in a house and she is constantly breaking the clay cooking pots. She cries a lot every time she sees her son. Her son comes daily and speaks the the narrator-girl. He is a shoe maker's apprentice and is beaten for it. the girl sees it when Urbanowa bathes him. He plays the part of king herrod in a christmas play and Urbanowa sees this as the culmintaion of her life. She used to reference a poets name to gauge the date, but now references her son's play. She makes him put on his costume daily after the play and resite the lines. She dies eventually in front of her son wearing the costume and he is the one to cry now.
Orzeszkowa "Meir Ezofowicz'
Meir is a young man excommunicated because he does not follow the strict laws of the Jewish community in which he lives. He speaks out against the persecutions of other outlaw jews and for a more humanistic view. he also falls in love with a girl from the outlaw community. he is sent walking the world with the legendary book of teachings that his ancestor, the first to be ousted by the community, collected. The Jews is his community are not even vaguely assimilated into the greater country and culture in which their shtetle is situated and is shown when a nobleman comes to the rabbi and is not understood in his speech.
Blejwas "Realism in Polish politics"
Chapter 1
The question for Poland was whether to continue with the means that didn't work time and again, that is the armed insurection, or to start to work oranically to end the oppression. 4 Organic work had political overtones in the years after the third partition. 23 Many sought a new definition of independence in Poland.
Chapter 2
The first theories of organic work influenced the Warsaw positivist movement by Jozef Supinski. he was familiar with the writings of Auguste comte. 25 Had theories for a bloodless conquest by bringing the polish nation higher through liberalism. he wanted to free the peasants and to get the lazy gentry to work for agriculture and to come up with new ideas for the betterment of Poland. 26
Chapter 3
Romanticism and the other old policies that glorified nationalism and "the Christ of Nations" had to be rethought. affect on Jews in Warsaw and in the Pale. 59 Rejection of romanticism and the look to English liberalism to replace it. 68 Buckle as the beginning of the search for a new world idea to replace romanticism. 70 The beginnings of the term positivism used to describe the Polish movement. 71 Polish positivism. 72 Supinski's theories are revisted. 73 Literary journals for domestic growth - weekly review. 76 The journal against the gentry's habits. 79 Positivists agisnt romanticism. 83 Literature. 84 Swientochowski as Positivist. 85
Chapter 4
Peasants new emancipation at the heart of the early P movement. 89 Attempt to help the uneducated peasants through the clergy. 90 Turn to agrairian education first. 91 Attempts to get the gentry to work for the peasants, though they figured the peasants would always be peasants. 92 Work was at the heart of the Positivist movement. 94 need to keep the bourgiouse at the heart of the future of Poland. 96 Knowledge is power. 97 Education is key. 99 Jews were foreign, but should become a larger part of Poland. 99 female emancipation. 101 education for women. 102 Secularization of society. 104 A national idea. 105 Shortcoming of P. 107
Chapter 6
Prus began to satirize the ideas of the P. 109 Industrialization made the scions of business the leaders in the things wished for y the P. 112 This made the P less relavent, but merely supporters of the economic changes that had been taking place from the top down. 114 Literature. 122 Prus. 122 He combined P with realism and naturalism. 123 The Doll. 124 The realities of the changing world for the positivists. 125
Chapter 7
P as a political movement. 135 P as moving away from Comte. 138 Pravda polish newspaper as a step toward politics. 139 Emphasis of internal educational development in sujugation. 142 143 144 National survival first. 145
Chapter 8
The end begins for PP. 147 148 Socialism builds. 148 Socialism upholds the workers and rejects the bourgiouse and the harmonious world espoused by the P. 150 Swientochovski rejects socialism. 150 151 Positivists fight back agaisnt the internationalism and non-nationalism in Poland. 159 P find out their world is crumbling. 161 162 Literature by P for the workers. 164 Prus on P. 168 169 Socialist react to Prus. 169 Socialism and P alike. 172 P rejected because it rejected antagonizing the tsar. 174
Chapter 9
Positivism was given a new spin in the attempts to keep it alive and rejected the optimism of prus. Anti-semetism was also growing. 175 There also began a new growth of poeple looking to actively gain independence from Russia. 178 The growing problems that the working class faced and the growing nationalims did not help the P cause. 180 Glos and anti P journal began and although it agreed with P in many ways it was agianst it in others. P was pro capitalist, and didn't seek out the peasants. 183 P was a-political which didn't help it as the world changed and became embroiled in socialism. 185 Swientochovski started writing against capitalsm and gave up on organic work. 186 187
Conclusions
Comte's philosphy 189 Polish Positivism 190 191
Afterword
Why are the P relavent? 194 Why it failed? 206
The question for Poland was whether to continue with the means that didn't work time and again, that is the armed insurection, or to start to work oranically to end the oppression. 4 Organic work had political overtones in the years after the third partition. 23 Many sought a new definition of independence in Poland.
Chapter 2
The first theories of organic work influenced the Warsaw positivist movement by Jozef Supinski. he was familiar with the writings of Auguste comte. 25 Had theories for a bloodless conquest by bringing the polish nation higher through liberalism. he wanted to free the peasants and to get the lazy gentry to work for agriculture and to come up with new ideas for the betterment of Poland. 26
Chapter 3
Romanticism and the other old policies that glorified nationalism and "the Christ of Nations" had to be rethought. affect on Jews in Warsaw and in the Pale. 59 Rejection of romanticism and the look to English liberalism to replace it. 68 Buckle as the beginning of the search for a new world idea to replace romanticism. 70 The beginnings of the term positivism used to describe the Polish movement. 71 Polish positivism. 72 Supinski's theories are revisted. 73 Literary journals for domestic growth - weekly review. 76 The journal against the gentry's habits. 79 Positivists agisnt romanticism. 83 Literature. 84 Swientochowski as Positivist. 85
Chapter 4
Peasants new emancipation at the heart of the early P movement. 89 Attempt to help the uneducated peasants through the clergy. 90 Turn to agrairian education first. 91 Attempts to get the gentry to work for the peasants, though they figured the peasants would always be peasants. 92 Work was at the heart of the Positivist movement. 94 need to keep the bourgiouse at the heart of the future of Poland. 96 Knowledge is power. 97 Education is key. 99 Jews were foreign, but should become a larger part of Poland. 99 female emancipation. 101 education for women. 102 Secularization of society. 104 A national idea. 105 Shortcoming of P. 107
Chapter 6
Prus began to satirize the ideas of the P. 109 Industrialization made the scions of business the leaders in the things wished for y the P. 112 This made the P less relavent, but merely supporters of the economic changes that had been taking place from the top down. 114 Literature. 122 Prus. 122 He combined P with realism and naturalism. 123 The Doll. 124 The realities of the changing world for the positivists. 125
Chapter 7
P as a political movement. 135 P as moving away from Comte. 138 Pravda polish newspaper as a step toward politics. 139 Emphasis of internal educational development in sujugation. 142 143 144 National survival first. 145
Chapter 8
The end begins for PP. 147 148 Socialism builds. 148 Socialism upholds the workers and rejects the bourgiouse and the harmonious world espoused by the P. 150 Swientochovski rejects socialism. 150 151 Positivists fight back agaisnt the internationalism and non-nationalism in Poland. 159 P find out their world is crumbling. 161 162 Literature by P for the workers. 164 Prus on P. 168 169 Socialist react to Prus. 169 Socialism and P alike. 172 P rejected because it rejected antagonizing the tsar. 174
Chapter 9
Positivism was given a new spin in the attempts to keep it alive and rejected the optimism of prus. Anti-semetism was also growing. 175 There also began a new growth of poeple looking to actively gain independence from Russia. 178 The growing problems that the working class faced and the growing nationalims did not help the P cause. 180 Glos and anti P journal began and although it agreed with P in many ways it was agianst it in others. P was pro capitalist, and didn't seek out the peasants. 183 P was a-political which didn't help it as the world changed and became embroiled in socialism. 185 Swientochovski started writing against capitalsm and gave up on organic work. 186 187
Conclusions
Comte's philosphy 189 Polish Positivism 190 191
Afterword
Why are the P relavent? 194 Why it failed? 206
Friday, May 7, 2010
Friedrich "Prus and the Dryfus case"
Short history of the Dreyfus Affair. Espionage wrongfully accused and imprisoned. Later pardoned, but not officially. Anti-semetism. 272 Prus wrote a weekly column and spoke of the affair as one that upheld the possibility that he is innocent and should be pitied. Prus wrote about many things in his column - The woman question, The Jewish and the peasant question. 273 he first writes that only during moments of a clear head should one take on such matters, but then a year later writes in very assertive form that the case was not so bad and perhaps France was right. he seems to hold the state above moral considerations and has great support for France even though Emile Zola has been writing against its actions. 275 Prus attacks Zoila saying that the defense of the country and the moral and discipline in the army are worth a couple of innocent deaths. 277 Even after the results were in and the French gov and army stated their guilt he was simply silent. 279 Prus was a supporter of Jewish assimilation, but through this case clearly saw them as a foreign nation among the homelands of Europe. The author of the article thinks that that the case did note change Prus's ideas on Jews and assimilation, but it shows perhaps what his misgivings were, despite being one of the foremost positivists and writers on the Jewish Question. 281
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Morska, Irena. "Polish authors of today and yesterday"
In 1863 there was one final attempt to free the country from the tyrrany of occupation, but it failed and in it was lost the last of poland's aspirations to independence. In this defeat, literature came out as usual as the barometer of the people's will. In it was represented the acknowledgment that the people had material needs and wants and that only by attacking the very foundations of the evils in society could they hope to correct the wrongs. 10 Education, attacks against illiteracy, against ignorance and fanaticism were fought against by the new generation. It was called the positivist movement to separate it from the romanticism movement and sought to find out why poland was so miserable. Th movement sought to find out about the common man and found cultural ties that united all poles. The writers did not always give an answer to the problems they found, but they were good and displaying the problems. 10
A new social class was being formed at this time with the advent of greater industry. This coincided with the spread of socialist ideals. When the ideas of the west joined the revolutionary conditions in Russia they found action in Poland. The blood shed in Russia was also shed in Poland and the beginning of the 20th century brought about a new type of culture and literature called Young Poland.
Sienkiewicz is best known of the authors outside of Poland. He wrote his trilogy about the wars Poland fought against occupiers in the 17th century. Prus wrote about the Poland he knew and the people that were in it during his life. He was able to show the changing of the times and the weakening of the landed gentry. Oreszkowa wrote about the problems with women's emanicpation and the life of Jews in the country and the hatred they had to endure. She was a supported of education for the peasants. She wrote about the political collapse after the 1863 revolt and felt that literature must serve a political means. Zeromski wrote at the beginning of the 20th century and was the 'conscience of poland.' He felt and wrote about the misery of Poland and his heroes are lonely, persecuted by hypocrasy, thoughtless laziness and drowning of a sea of hopelessness in which the best ideas go to waste. His heroes are doomed. He wrote about the glory of the history of Poland's past. Reymont wrote much about lodz and the country.
A new social class was being formed at this time with the advent of greater industry. This coincided with the spread of socialist ideals. When the ideas of the west joined the revolutionary conditions in Russia they found action in Poland. The blood shed in Russia was also shed in Poland and the beginning of the 20th century brought about a new type of culture and literature called Young Poland.
Sienkiewicz is best known of the authors outside of Poland. He wrote his trilogy about the wars Poland fought against occupiers in the 17th century. Prus wrote about the Poland he knew and the people that were in it during his life. He was able to show the changing of the times and the weakening of the landed gentry. Oreszkowa wrote about the problems with women's emanicpation and the life of Jews in the country and the hatred they had to endure. She was a supported of education for the peasants. She wrote about the political collapse after the 1863 revolt and felt that literature must serve a political means. Zeromski wrote at the beginning of the 20th century and was the 'conscience of poland.' He felt and wrote about the misery of Poland and his heroes are lonely, persecuted by hypocrasy, thoughtless laziness and drowning of a sea of hopelessness in which the best ideas go to waste. His heroes are doomed. He wrote about the glory of the history of Poland's past. Reymont wrote much about lodz and the country.
Baranczyk "Positivism and neo romanticism"
The defeat of the january insurection generated a distrust of the romantic ideology and undermined the authority of the romantic bards. There was a general shift away from poetry and toward realistic and naturalist fiction and drama. maria Konopnicka was one of the most vocal proponants of the social reform in the spirit of positivism. she wrote in defense of the oppressed and used folklore and speakers from the lower classes. The last decade of the 19th century gave way to poetry again - sometimes called young poland, modernism or neo-romanticism and was influneced by the western symbolism and philosophy. 958
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Adamovich "Tolstoy as an artist"
George says that he was an artist and an enemy of art, the kind that justified itself for its own sake and was why T and Turgenev never got along. In his creative work he was essentially searching for pravda, translated as truth and justice. He tried to write without using a single word for adornment. He had a gift for detecting in others the desire to show off and it turned him off from others. 140 He felt an innate need to be truthful and to use the same basis with his characters. The motto of W and P is "there is no greatness with out simplicity , goodness and truth." he held the same view of literarure and even the idea of goodness is a prerequesite to beauty and perfection.
T never wrote "beautiful" or "musical" prose and if he ever did he would destoy it. He listened to the speech of simple folks who knew no grammar and found a freshness and expressiveness which he believed that educated people had lost. 141 T could turn trite literary devises into greatness. Anna's death symbolized with a candle is such and although old and tired sounds as if T were the first person to use it. 143 In What is Art, T treats all the other writes in it poorly and was unjust to those that could have been his allies. His search for truth made him short-sighted and his own mind full of his own impressions was not always open to others. 146
T never wrote "beautiful" or "musical" prose and if he ever did he would destoy it. He listened to the speech of simple folks who knew no grammar and found a freshness and expressiveness which he believed that educated people had lost. 141 T could turn trite literary devises into greatness. Anna's death symbolized with a candle is such and although old and tired sounds as if T were the first person to use it. 143 In What is Art, T treats all the other writes in it poorly and was unjust to those that could have been his allies. His search for truth made him short-sighted and his own mind full of his own impressions was not always open to others. 146
Baylen "A letter and K. Sonata"
K. Sonata is a work "exposing the conventional illusion of romantic love." T wanted to show how a marriage could be deprived of its "first condition" by "the substitution of romantic love, a fever born of carnal passion, for true Christian love, which is born of identity of sentiment, similarity of idea, and the friendship of the soul. "
Isabel Hapsgood was given permission to translate an abridged version of the sonata in April, 1890 - a year before it appeared in Russia. Despite the ban put on its publication there were endless copies of the novel circulated on lithograph. It was first published in Russia in 1891. Tolstaya reports that her father thought "the story is not at all fit to be read by young girls, although the chief idea of it is moral.
Isabel Hapsgood was given permission to translate an abridged version of the sonata in April, 1890 - a year before it appeared in Russia. Despite the ban put on its publication there were endless copies of the novel circulated on lithograph. It was first published in Russia in 1891. Tolstaya reports that her father thought "the story is not at all fit to be read by young girls, although the chief idea of it is moral.
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
Tolstoy's "Confessions"
Chapter 1
He starts of with an examination of his own falling out of the christain faith and describes how it happens in his class of people. 20 T replaced his beliefs with a quest for perfection. 23
Chapter 2
He talks about wanting to be good and moral as a child, but being praised for his bad habits. His aunt wanted him to have an affair with a married woman. T lived this way for 10 years. He then became a member of the writers groups and took on the role of teacher and moralizer like other writers, but didn't know the answers any more than they did and took on too much pride.
Chapter 3
He lived this way for six more years until he was married. he traveled and followed the belief in Progress above all else. While abroad he saw a man executed and his own brother died leaving him scarred. He came back and opened schools for the peasants. However he was constantly fighting the belief that he was teaching, but didn't know what he was teaching. He became a father and continued writing, but left off the questions of the meaning of life until five years before he wrote this. They kept coming back up and became like a disease with him until he could solve these questions.
Chapter 4
He continues to struggle with these thoughts and has suicidal thoughts if he cannot solve his problems.
Chapter 5
He struggles more and delves into other great minds, but finds nothing or is just not satisfied. He ends up understanding that one of his questions is what is to come of his life? He brings scientific thoughts about the meaning of life and still comes up with nothing.
Chapter 6
T continues to the same search with philosophy and science. He brings in Socrates and questions of death as a way to understand life. And Solomon and and Indian writer and Buddha. Death is better than life.
Chapter 7
Four ways for people of his type to deal with the problems of finding out the answers to life's questions. 1 ignorance - obviously no good. 2 epicureanism - all of T's circle live this way, but they don't understand that it is an accident of fate that they have and others do not. 3 strength and energy - suicide. 4 weakness - waiting for something better out of life, although there is none. T could not make sense of it all, so he must in some way be mistaken about his theories.
Chapter 8
T realizes that he has forgotten all the other people that make up humanity and that he does not even know them. He understood that he had to come to know them and understand why they were still living, despite the poor conditions. He realizes that he must reject his reason and logic in order to understand the full meaning of humanity and life.
Chapter 9
Because science does not answer all the questions in life with reason there must be something else. The something else is God. God is the irrational idea that gives life meaning.
Chapter 10
T started to spend time with the poor peasants and found that their faith and religion was based on many superstitions, but they were less dissatisfied than the rich people of T's circle. He cast off the life of the rich people and took up the life of the peasant and understood it as truth.
Chapter 11
He came to realize that he was looking at all of his theories through himself and not through mankind. His examples of an evil life were not the same as those for all of mankind. Instead of questioning why God wants us to do something we should do it and move closer to his plan. Like the peasant with the master.
Chapter 12
T starts to pray and search for God as he feels a power over himself that he doesn't understand.
Chapter 13
T understands that he must live according to God's plan - to live otherwise is not to live. According to God's plan we are to live to save our soul. He starts to take on the faith in whole, but cannot understand everything and why it is done, but sees that his faith and reason can choose what parts of the rituals of faith to hold on to and which to discard.
Chapter 14
He cannot understand everything and understands that there are somethings that he doesn't believe and won't and this causes him some torment when he goes to communion. When he spoke with the lower classes he began to understand what it all meant.
Chapter 15
He noticed the Orthodox and other religions insistence that they were the one and only true church and that all others were heretics. Thus theology was driving people apart instead of together, the very thing it should be doing.
Chapter 16
He now sees truth in the teachings of all the churches, but not all the teachings. What he once saw as completely false he now seeks to find the truth in each and weed out the false. He has a dream.
He starts of with an examination of his own falling out of the christain faith and describes how it happens in his class of people. 20 T replaced his beliefs with a quest for perfection. 23
Chapter 2
He talks about wanting to be good and moral as a child, but being praised for his bad habits. His aunt wanted him to have an affair with a married woman. T lived this way for 10 years. He then became a member of the writers groups and took on the role of teacher and moralizer like other writers, but didn't know the answers any more than they did and took on too much pride.
Chapter 3
He lived this way for six more years until he was married. he traveled and followed the belief in Progress above all else. While abroad he saw a man executed and his own brother died leaving him scarred. He came back and opened schools for the peasants. However he was constantly fighting the belief that he was teaching, but didn't know what he was teaching. He became a father and continued writing, but left off the questions of the meaning of life until five years before he wrote this. They kept coming back up and became like a disease with him until he could solve these questions.
Chapter 4
He continues to struggle with these thoughts and has suicidal thoughts if he cannot solve his problems.
Chapter 5
He struggles more and delves into other great minds, but finds nothing or is just not satisfied. He ends up understanding that one of his questions is what is to come of his life? He brings scientific thoughts about the meaning of life and still comes up with nothing.
Chapter 6
T continues to the same search with philosophy and science. He brings in Socrates and questions of death as a way to understand life. And Solomon and and Indian writer and Buddha. Death is better than life.
Chapter 7
Four ways for people of his type to deal with the problems of finding out the answers to life's questions. 1 ignorance - obviously no good. 2 epicureanism - all of T's circle live this way, but they don't understand that it is an accident of fate that they have and others do not. 3 strength and energy - suicide. 4 weakness - waiting for something better out of life, although there is none. T could not make sense of it all, so he must in some way be mistaken about his theories.
Chapter 8
T realizes that he has forgotten all the other people that make up humanity and that he does not even know them. He understood that he had to come to know them and understand why they were still living, despite the poor conditions. He realizes that he must reject his reason and logic in order to understand the full meaning of humanity and life.
Chapter 9
Because science does not answer all the questions in life with reason there must be something else. The something else is God. God is the irrational idea that gives life meaning.
Chapter 10
T started to spend time with the poor peasants and found that their faith and religion was based on many superstitions, but they were less dissatisfied than the rich people of T's circle. He cast off the life of the rich people and took up the life of the peasant and understood it as truth.
Chapter 11
He came to realize that he was looking at all of his theories through himself and not through mankind. His examples of an evil life were not the same as those for all of mankind. Instead of questioning why God wants us to do something we should do it and move closer to his plan. Like the peasant with the master.
Chapter 12
T starts to pray and search for God as he feels a power over himself that he doesn't understand.
Chapter 13
T understands that he must live according to God's plan - to live otherwise is not to live. According to God's plan we are to live to save our soul. He starts to take on the faith in whole, but cannot understand everything and why it is done, but sees that his faith and reason can choose what parts of the rituals of faith to hold on to and which to discard.
Chapter 14
He cannot understand everything and understands that there are somethings that he doesn't believe and won't and this causes him some torment when he goes to communion. When he spoke with the lower classes he began to understand what it all meant.
Chapter 15
He noticed the Orthodox and other religions insistence that they were the one and only true church and that all others were heretics. Thus theology was driving people apart instead of together, the very thing it should be doing.
Chapter 16
He now sees truth in the teachings of all the churches, but not all the teachings. What he once saw as completely false he now seeks to find the truth in each and weed out the false. He has a dream.
Monday, April 5, 2010
Tolstoy's "Kreutzer Sonata"
Depravity is freeing yourself from the restraint you have with women. 18 The man fell because he followed what he was told by the rest of society and that society felt that what he was doing with women was the natural thing to do. He did not even realize that he had had a fall. 21 A man shows he is a libertine by the way that he looks at a woman, and so he became a libertine. 22 had the man only been eating what he should have he would not have had all the impulses to act as he did with women. It is from a result of the extra calories and energy that he took in and could not use up that he needed to use it with women. 29 The problems in the world all stem from the dominant power of women in the world, despite their lack of formal rights. 31 The strongest passion in life is sexual. It serves as the safety valve. 39 The man with whom his wife had the affair was a musician, but not professional. 69 The man and his wife are in a series of arguements daily when the musician comes to them. The man plays the violin, but badly and the wife still plays and well. The musician and the wife began to talk of music and they made plans to play together. They started to flirt with each other and make as if all they wanted was music. 78 The man could have spoken so that the musician never would have come back again, but instead he made it look as if he was not afraid of the musicaian and invited him over the next day to play. 79 They play together and all this makes the man more jealous and petty becuase he knows the game they are playing because it is the fame he used to play when he was a bachelor. They cannot determine what music to play and so ask him. 82 Especially because of music and the proximity that people must be to each other, men and women, that there is the greatest adultery in the world. One must not be jealous of people when they stand that close to eahother, but...83 They get really mad at each other and he appologizes to her and he tells her that he is jeaolous of the musician, but she tells him that she is only interested in his music. The man sees through her and sees that she is putting on a show of being indignant at the thought and telling that he is nothing. He says that everything went against her including the music. 88 The musician and the wife got together for the show that they were to put on and they played Beethoven's Kreutzer Sonata. 89 He tells that people state that music elevates people, but he doesn't believe this. He states that music makes him do and be and feel unnaturally and that this is a bad thing. 90 Music of many kinds has a purpose, in church, miltary, etc., but Beethoven has no purpose and so you don't know what to do with it and the feelings that it brings up. 90 Music is too powerful to put in the hands of anyone, maybe immoral, that will wield it. 91 The man went away on business, but upon hearing that the musician dropped off some music with his wife while he was away, he became incensed and went back home. All the trip he was a rising anger and then when delayed he fortified himself with vodka. He knew what he was going to do and assumed that his wife was having an affair. 101 He comes home and finds that the musician is there and his wife is with him. He gives voice to all of his rage and feels relief from the knowledge that he will be free from her forever. 105 He runs through all possibilities. Are his kids his own? Is she doing it in sight of the children, have they been doing it all along? Is she trying to kill him? 107 He took off his shoes and grabbed a knife and when he caught them sitting close to each other, he gave vent to all his anger that had built up since the last fight they had. He attacked her, but the musician kept him off her, he ran for the M, but she kept him back. He would have run after the M if her were not in his socks - he didn't want to look ridiculous. 110 His madness was reaching a similar crescendo as a song. 111 He chocked, then stabbed her. 111 He went to his study to shoot himself, but fell asleep. Then her sister came and he almost went to her, but he felt foolish because of not having shoes on. 115 He still feels that she is to blame and that she will ask his forgiveness, but doesn't. He wants to ask her forgiveness, but is too cowardly, but does so in the end. Only at the funeral does he understand that he has killed her and that he is wrong. Not wrong to have killed her necessarily, but wrong in having married her or anyone. 118
Monday, March 29, 2010
Emerson "What Is Infection..."
Art must be infectious says Tolstoy. 102 It must be immediate and whole and cannot segregate based on intelligence and education. 103 The goal of art is brotherly union. Emerson goes through the aestheticians opinion on Tolstoy, then Bakhtinian, Dostoevskian. 103 She then goes into the problems people find with thoughts and feelings that T talks about. Then about the various other problems that scholars have come up with when refuting t. 103 Then about the questions that come up with T's three criteria for ideally infectious art: Individuality, clarity and sincerity. Some of these may not lead to brotherhood. 105 Emerson aims to add on to Silbajoris and Morson who have done some revisionist writing on Tolstoy to bring him back to his aesthetics. 106 She wants to focus on the interaction between expression and infection. 106 Infection takes place immediately. 107 T's ideas on expression are more vague. Where there is honest feelings then it should be able to be transmitted to the person receiving it without problem. Emotions that are not immediate or are hard to determine are not real in terms of art. 107 Practice and teachers and anything that delays the individual espression of the soul is not real art even if through the years of practice and teachers the individual creates something of the soul that has all more impact to the listener because of its perfection. It is fake. 108 What does it mean in the face of T that himself had to practice his craft to reach the best examples? Does it fly in the face of his other writing that exclaim that with prolonged attempts to be conscientious we may attain grace - just not in art? 108 For T, only the folk arts that are simply and small are real art 109 Emerson then goes on to discuss the previous versions of the same treatise and to compare how they allow for greater process. 110 T has a different set of three criteria for determining art in his earlier drafts. 110 He allows for the work of making art to play a role in the artistic interpretation. T also does not insist on the brotherhood of man to take over as strongly. 112 T rails against Wagner as the end of art in Europe. 112 T also comments on the art of teacher and pupil. 113 Why? T may have been trying to make himself like Mozart and to show the simplicity of beauty as if it came easily. 113 T had too much going on around him and could only do with renouncing to make the space calmer. 114
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Tolstoy's "What is Art"
Chapter 1
There is a lot of money spent by people just jumping and twisting and such and money could be used more usefully elsewhere. Who can all of this please and who is it for?
Chapter 2
Is art worth the cost and the sacrifice of so many people that have no access to art? Is art worth anything especially if it is harmful? What is art and what is good art? He looks at other authors that claim that all the senses are subject to art and aesthetics. What does beauty have to do with it and is it all? Beauty does not equal good.
Chapter 3
T goes through all philosophy on the subject author by author.
Chapter 4
From all the philosophy he shows that there are two definitions of beauty. 1 approaching perfection, 2 it pleases. However these two ideas are essentially the same thing. and there is no objective idea of beauty, so it is all moot. It makes it all very elite too. We like a certain type of art and thus create a definition to include it rather than the other way around. Thus pleasure cannot be a rule for beauty.
Chapter 5
The problem with all the precious definitions of art is that they attempt to answer incompletely the question of pleasure without looking at the question of purpose. Art is a part of life and as such must be looked at as a means of intercourse between men - the one who made it and the one that takes it in. In art he transmits his feelings, like with words he transmits thoughts. It is the capacity of man to receive the feelings that make something art. Infection of the feeling transmitted is the activity of art. Without the ability to convey and receive art we would be like beasts.
Chapter 6
He starts on good art and bad art. Art that elevates the soul is good art. Art that strengthens only the body's passions is bad art. Good and bad is defined by religion, thus religion decides what is good or bad art.
Chapter 7
Beauty and good are not equal. He brings the ancient Greeks into it.
Chapter 8
One of the problems with defining art is that every culture believes they have universal art and it is not true. The art we have now is genteel art and not universal. 2/3 of the world dies without knowing it and if they had it they wouldn't know what to do with it. It is not the ordering of society, it is the type of art. it is done by rich people as a hobby and not as work. If art is that important as religion, then it should be accessible to everyone.
Chapter 9
Art has been perverted and nearly destroyed. First it lost its religiousness proper to it. Then the small group of people for which it is made and by whom perverted its form and made it obscure then it became not-natural and brain-spun. A true work of art is that that transmits a new feeling, however small the feeling may be. Enjoyment is hackneyed, but religious feeling is always fresh because it has no boundaries. Art is made for and by the upper classes, but their lives are far less broad than the life of a worker. Pride, sexuality and weariness of life took over all art of the upper class.
Chapter 10
Art became more exclusive and obscure. all art forms are working in this fashion. It cannot be that T or the other people that do not enjoy it are simply not enlightened enough. The art must be bad. "Good art always pleases everyone." The bible, folk tales and parables are understood and are the best art. Art make sense of things that cannot be understood with words. To understand bad art one must habituate oneself to it, thus it is bad. "The aim of art is to infect people with the emotion of the artist has experienced how can one talk of not understanding?"
Chapter 11
Universal art exists when someone of the people has an emotion and seeks to transmit it to others. A work of art is not if it is simply poetic, realistic, striking or interesting. There are conditions for a man to produce a work of art. He should stand on the highest life-conception for his time, he should experience feeling and want to transmit it to others, and he should have a talent for one of the art forms.
Chapter 12
The counterfeiting of art happens all the time and is what separates the upper class art from the worker class. There are three things that ensure counterfeiting of art. 1 payment for this art. 2 art criticism. 3 art schools. Universal art has a must - religious perception. Criticism is for those that cannot write and they interpret wrongly. Art cannot be taught because it is the transmission of feeling. In order to infect music must do three things. Exact pitch, time and strength needed for the particular music. Art in all forms only exists when the artist finds the infinitely minute degrees where it is perfect. Impossible to teach, can only be felt.
Chapter 13
All art is mutually exclusive of others. If two or more are combined, then one submits to the other for art. In a musical play either the music or the drama will be art, but not both. Wagner is the worst of these. He is so successful because he is able to use all the methods of counterfeiting available to someone with unlimited resources.
Chapter 14
The trouble with non-art is that it cheats and perverts and tricks people into believing it is art. One problem is that externally non-art and art might be almost the same and the non-art might even be more convincing because it uses the tricks of counterfeiting.
Chapter 15
The degree of infection is also the measure of art's worth. The stronger the infection, the better the art. The degree depends on three conditions. 1 the individuality of the feeling transmitted. 2 the clearness of the transmission. 3 sincerity of the artist. The mental condition of the artist infects the receiver. sincerity is the most important.
Chapter 16
Art serves a similar function as speech and that is of progress. To replace the old with the new and evolve towards an ever better and kinder society. The more if fulfills this need the better the art and the less, the worse. The appraisal of this feeling is religion. Religion represents the highest level of understanding of the meaning of life in any society and so it is the arbiter of what is good and what is bad. If people do not see a religious perception in society today it is because they are not looking properly, not because it is not there. If people deny what they see as religion, because they say it is outdated, then that too acknowledges the existence of perception. We should reject anything that does not go with the perception. All art unites people, they unite with the feelings of the artist and with all others that feel the same feeling. Christian art is universal because it does not exclude. It must not exclude anyone and if it is good art it will not. There are two feelings that unite all men. 1 Our sonship with God and the brotherhood of man 2 simple feelings of common life. Art should exclude any art that does not unite. Even when the subject matter is good art often is filled with ornamentation and becomes exclusive to only a few people.
Chapter 17
The consequences of bad art: 1 Money wasted in working hours. Children spend too many hours doing these things and become physically and mentally deformed and morally and incapable of doing anything good for mankind. They get praised for contributing to and assessing counterfeit art and inflate their own vanity. 2 The wealthy that spend their lives with such distractions should realize the waste of their lives and do something good. A false life. 3 the minds of the weak, poor and young are perverted and confused with the hero worship of artists. 4 Beauty gets put before good by the upper classes. 5 European art makes people think of superstition, patriotism and sensuality.
Chapter 18
Art and society is starting to move in the right direction, but not yet. People just need to consciously acknowledge that religious art is the perception that moves their lives and thus should their art for it to replace the art made now.
Chapter 19
Art of the future will be good art from religious perception that infects all people, not just certain people from certain classes. It will not be taught in schools and will not be made by professional artists. Job security and wealth are injurious to artists because they take away his ability to struggle with nature for the maintenance of his life and others. Artists will work another menial jog and be paid in the pride of helping mankind.
Chapter 20
Science and art should work together better. Science finds truth and art transmits it to emotion.
There is a lot of money spent by people just jumping and twisting and such and money could be used more usefully elsewhere. Who can all of this please and who is it for?
Chapter 2
Is art worth the cost and the sacrifice of so many people that have no access to art? Is art worth anything especially if it is harmful? What is art and what is good art? He looks at other authors that claim that all the senses are subject to art and aesthetics. What does beauty have to do with it and is it all? Beauty does not equal good.
Chapter 3
T goes through all philosophy on the subject author by author.
Chapter 4
From all the philosophy he shows that there are two definitions of beauty. 1 approaching perfection, 2 it pleases. However these two ideas are essentially the same thing. and there is no objective idea of beauty, so it is all moot. It makes it all very elite too. We like a certain type of art and thus create a definition to include it rather than the other way around. Thus pleasure cannot be a rule for beauty.
Chapter 5
The problem with all the precious definitions of art is that they attempt to answer incompletely the question of pleasure without looking at the question of purpose. Art is a part of life and as such must be looked at as a means of intercourse between men - the one who made it and the one that takes it in. In art he transmits his feelings, like with words he transmits thoughts. It is the capacity of man to receive the feelings that make something art. Infection of the feeling transmitted is the activity of art. Without the ability to convey and receive art we would be like beasts.
Chapter 6
He starts on good art and bad art. Art that elevates the soul is good art. Art that strengthens only the body's passions is bad art. Good and bad is defined by religion, thus religion decides what is good or bad art.
Chapter 7
Beauty and good are not equal. He brings the ancient Greeks into it.
Chapter 8
One of the problems with defining art is that every culture believes they have universal art and it is not true. The art we have now is genteel art and not universal. 2/3 of the world dies without knowing it and if they had it they wouldn't know what to do with it. It is not the ordering of society, it is the type of art. it is done by rich people as a hobby and not as work. If art is that important as religion, then it should be accessible to everyone.
Chapter 9
Art has been perverted and nearly destroyed. First it lost its religiousness proper to it. Then the small group of people for which it is made and by whom perverted its form and made it obscure then it became not-natural and brain-spun. A true work of art is that that transmits a new feeling, however small the feeling may be. Enjoyment is hackneyed, but religious feeling is always fresh because it has no boundaries. Art is made for and by the upper classes, but their lives are far less broad than the life of a worker. Pride, sexuality and weariness of life took over all art of the upper class.
Chapter 10
Art became more exclusive and obscure. all art forms are working in this fashion. It cannot be that T or the other people that do not enjoy it are simply not enlightened enough. The art must be bad. "Good art always pleases everyone." The bible, folk tales and parables are understood and are the best art. Art make sense of things that cannot be understood with words. To understand bad art one must habituate oneself to it, thus it is bad. "The aim of art is to infect people with the emotion of the artist has experienced how can one talk of not understanding?"
Chapter 11
Universal art exists when someone of the people has an emotion and seeks to transmit it to others. A work of art is not if it is simply poetic, realistic, striking or interesting. There are conditions for a man to produce a work of art. He should stand on the highest life-conception for his time, he should experience feeling and want to transmit it to others, and he should have a talent for one of the art forms.
Chapter 12
The counterfeiting of art happens all the time and is what separates the upper class art from the worker class. There are three things that ensure counterfeiting of art. 1 payment for this art. 2 art criticism. 3 art schools. Universal art has a must - religious perception. Criticism is for those that cannot write and they interpret wrongly. Art cannot be taught because it is the transmission of feeling. In order to infect music must do three things. Exact pitch, time and strength needed for the particular music. Art in all forms only exists when the artist finds the infinitely minute degrees where it is perfect. Impossible to teach, can only be felt.
Chapter 13
All art is mutually exclusive of others. If two or more are combined, then one submits to the other for art. In a musical play either the music or the drama will be art, but not both. Wagner is the worst of these. He is so successful because he is able to use all the methods of counterfeiting available to someone with unlimited resources.
Chapter 14
The trouble with non-art is that it cheats and perverts and tricks people into believing it is art. One problem is that externally non-art and art might be almost the same and the non-art might even be more convincing because it uses the tricks of counterfeiting.
Chapter 15
The degree of infection is also the measure of art's worth. The stronger the infection, the better the art. The degree depends on three conditions. 1 the individuality of the feeling transmitted. 2 the clearness of the transmission. 3 sincerity of the artist. The mental condition of the artist infects the receiver. sincerity is the most important.
Chapter 16
Art serves a similar function as speech and that is of progress. To replace the old with the new and evolve towards an ever better and kinder society. The more if fulfills this need the better the art and the less, the worse. The appraisal of this feeling is religion. Religion represents the highest level of understanding of the meaning of life in any society and so it is the arbiter of what is good and what is bad. If people do not see a religious perception in society today it is because they are not looking properly, not because it is not there. If people deny what they see as religion, because they say it is outdated, then that too acknowledges the existence of perception. We should reject anything that does not go with the perception. All art unites people, they unite with the feelings of the artist and with all others that feel the same feeling. Christian art is universal because it does not exclude. It must not exclude anyone and if it is good art it will not. There are two feelings that unite all men. 1 Our sonship with God and the brotherhood of man 2 simple feelings of common life. Art should exclude any art that does not unite. Even when the subject matter is good art often is filled with ornamentation and becomes exclusive to only a few people.
Chapter 17
The consequences of bad art: 1 Money wasted in working hours. Children spend too many hours doing these things and become physically and mentally deformed and morally and incapable of doing anything good for mankind. They get praised for contributing to and assessing counterfeit art and inflate their own vanity. 2 The wealthy that spend their lives with such distractions should realize the waste of their lives and do something good. A false life. 3 the minds of the weak, poor and young are perverted and confused with the hero worship of artists. 4 Beauty gets put before good by the upper classes. 5 European art makes people think of superstition, patriotism and sensuality.
Chapter 18
Art and society is starting to move in the right direction, but not yet. People just need to consciously acknowledge that religious art is the perception that moves their lives and thus should their art for it to replace the art made now.
Chapter 19
Art of the future will be good art from religious perception that infects all people, not just certain people from certain classes. It will not be taught in schools and will not be made by professional artists. Job security and wealth are injurious to artists because they take away his ability to struggle with nature for the maintenance of his life and others. Artists will work another menial jog and be paid in the pride of helping mankind.
Chapter 20
Science and art should work together better. Science finds truth and art transmits it to emotion.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Rousseau "confessions"
Starts with intro about how he is great for offering this confession and that even god should feel that it is true. However we are meant to doubt this since no man can be entirely the condemned, judge and jury. He goes on to talk of how his parents met and how he was born in a poor family and with his birth came his mother's death. He started to read at an early age with his father and started with the romances that his mother loved. This started his love affair with Romanticism, but as they ran out of books they moved on to other religious and classic literature and history. He takes great pains to write out his transgressions on all topics mundane and serious. The most serious at this point is simply having been born and taking all the time and love from his father, which left little for his brother who grew up to be a libertine. 241
Father almost sent to prison gains banishment and so R is raised by uncle and stayed with cousin almost same age. became a very happy part of his childhood and he only wanted to do good for others, but says that he was not vain. 243 It appears that at the age of 8 he and his nurse miss lambercier age 30 had sexual relations of some sort and this was a great change in him. he didn't seek out other pleasures until he was an adult because everything reminded him of his nurse and he was sated with his memories. This stands as the most difficult part of his confessions and everything should come easier after. 245 He began to talk to girls and carry on romances with them, fight with his cousin against the kids in the town. Then he began to work as an apprentice in an engravers, but was given no liberty. He states that because the work was not bad, but the man was bad he too learned to lie and cheat and sites this as the moment when he became a degenerate. 253 he hates money because to use it means that you must exchange it and be cheated in the bargain. 257 When he became bored with his work because of the lack of freedom to do what he wanted even though he did as much as he could away from the eyes of his master he started to read again. 259 He states that his life was shaped by the master to whom he had to work. If chance had placed him with a better master he would have been contended to live his life as an engraver and probably been wealthy doing it, but alas he was not and so he suffered and lived a far more interesting life because of it. 262
BOOK II
He set off on foot away from the engraver and the town and somehow gained food and ended up in the salon of Madam de Warrens who told him to continue to do good works and to set off for Turin. 268 He had intended to take up a position as a minister and went there to be taught the ways of Catholocism. 270 However, he was not convinced he wanted to become a Catholic and tried to convert them to Protestantism. 271 In this he failed and they sent him into the streets after 2months. 273 He wandered until a pretty woman took him in. He fell something like in love with her and wanted to her with all his heart and body, but she found a place for him as a footman of an aristocrat. His trouble with women he states is that he loved them too well and this hindered his success. 276 When the woman died with whom he worked he stole a ribbon and was caught but lied and said another maid had given it to him. They were both sacked and his guilt from this is part of why he writes the story. there is no telling where she ended up, but perhaps not well since she was pretty and young. 281
BOOK III
He is given a position in a house as a footman, but is not treated like one and is given an education since he already knows a bit of somethings. He is also in a house that works for the King. He is abut 16 at this time. 283 He meets one of his old friends from the ministry, Bacle, and they take on the idea of going back to Geneva. R quits his favorable position with an insult and goes back to Geneva. He and Bacle separate. 287 He goes back to Madam de Warren and loves her like a mother, but sometimes he loves her like a woman. Because of his love for her he was chaste to loving anyone else and had no other relations. R ends up at the seminary to learn latin from the connections of the Madam. 294 He had no way to learn with a teacher and was forced to quit it, but was given a spot as a music student. 295 R was not a good music student and the teacher was drunk and he was sacked. R was sent to help him carry his stuff to Lyon. When they got there the music teacher had an epileptic fit and R ran away from the obligation and help the teacher needed. This is the third main confession he makes. 298 He sets out again for Madam De Warren, but she has left for Paris. R cannot think of anything happy that doesn't involve being near her. 298
BOOK IV
The music teacher lost his belongings and with it the work he had done since he was young and the ability to work to support himself in old age. R sets up with none of his acquaintances, but went to one of Madam's friends places. He was then set up to accompany one of their daughters to another town. They even slept in the same bed. 301 He is now 20, yet nothing happens between them. He is stuck in the town after his delivery and has no money. 303 R starts to live on a lie that he is a singer and a music teacher. 304 R moves towns and picks up with a wandering archimandrate from Jeruselum with whom he joins on a return trip to Jeruselum as his interpreter. 306 R is well received by some and taken in and so he quits the archimandrate. R is sent to Paris to do work and as he wishes to find Madam. He is as happy as he has ever been. 308 R quits paris when he finds that she had left as well. His imagination for what Paris should ahve been was too great and he was greatly dissapointed with Paris. He left on foot for Geneva or turin and found a friend of Madam's. She eventually wrote him. 312 She set him up under the employ of the king and had to work for the first real time in his life, but earned his pay. 314
BOOK V
He is now 21 years old. R soon gives up his government job and takes up music full time. he is still not very good, but all around him are bad. 320 R becomes enamoured with the stupid beauty of one of his students, but her mother loves him and see not his affair. R then comes into relations with Madam despite her relations with her footman Anet. 325 R passed 3 or 4 years this way until they moved. 330
BOOK VI
R takes ill, then reads a lot to is psychological worsening. He goes after his inheritance and finds little. 335 R goes to a cure, but finds only doctors that take money. 341 R comes back to Madam, but she now has another youth and R doesn't want to share Madam. She sets him up as a tutor with a wealthy family and he takes to it more or less. 346 It doesn't work out, so he goes back to Madam and his books. R takes up music again and comes up with a way to read that uses numbers and is bent on going to Paris to present it to the academy. 349
BOOK VII
He presented his treatise on music, but it was not taken well and so he worked on it alone. R was taken in by another woman and he became her pet for a while and made friends of others. 358 R takes on the office of attendant to the ambassador and does some gov. work. 364 He and a friend decide that they will buy a girl of 12 until she is old enough to be their concubine. They both end up loving her like a father, but the scandal gets out and he loses his job with the ambassador. 368 R focuses on his opera having no other occupation. he plays it to some people and at least one of these wants it played before the king. 374 Nothing happened with it and it was given up. he renewed his friendship with Diderot, but he was put in prison. 381
BOOK VIII
Diderot is out and R tries to help him. 383 R reads about the morality of man and how art might be involved in it and says that this treatise, which prompted him to write on the same subject ruined him. 384 He has an affair. 386 Theresa has her third child by R and they are all destitute and he leaves them to a public education. 387 He had 5 kids in all and they all went to the orphanage. 388 He writes and is well recieved 391. He takes on all of society and talks about dress. 394 He goes before the king after his first performance of his play and music. He is expected to get a stipend. 396 He refuses the stipend, but Diderot think he should take it to help others. 397 R writes with voltaire. 399
BOOK IX
He moves to the country and writes about the joys of being there although he was pulled back to the city. He also writes about the need to work, not create. 400 He retreats to the country for good and lives under the patronage of Madam d'Epinay. 404 R quits the house and moves into another supplied by a friend. R believes himself to be with few friends and is unhappy. 411
BOOK X
He is set against by some of his friends that feel that he has abandoned them and so he set himself to be a recluse, but is drawn back into the scene again. 412
BOOK XI
His book Eloise came out to some success, the best in Paris which he censured more than other places. 416 He talks of ailments and books published and that is about all. He is asked to serve again the parliament, but did it rudely and suffered. 419
BOOK XII
R writes of being hounded out of town and almost killed and being treated poorly because of what he wrote.
Father almost sent to prison gains banishment and so R is raised by uncle and stayed with cousin almost same age. became a very happy part of his childhood and he only wanted to do good for others, but says that he was not vain. 243 It appears that at the age of 8 he and his nurse miss lambercier age 30 had sexual relations of some sort and this was a great change in him. he didn't seek out other pleasures until he was an adult because everything reminded him of his nurse and he was sated with his memories. This stands as the most difficult part of his confessions and everything should come easier after. 245 He began to talk to girls and carry on romances with them, fight with his cousin against the kids in the town. Then he began to work as an apprentice in an engravers, but was given no liberty. He states that because the work was not bad, but the man was bad he too learned to lie and cheat and sites this as the moment when he became a degenerate. 253 he hates money because to use it means that you must exchange it and be cheated in the bargain. 257 When he became bored with his work because of the lack of freedom to do what he wanted even though he did as much as he could away from the eyes of his master he started to read again. 259 He states that his life was shaped by the master to whom he had to work. If chance had placed him with a better master he would have been contended to live his life as an engraver and probably been wealthy doing it, but alas he was not and so he suffered and lived a far more interesting life because of it. 262
BOOK II
He set off on foot away from the engraver and the town and somehow gained food and ended up in the salon of Madam de Warrens who told him to continue to do good works and to set off for Turin. 268 He had intended to take up a position as a minister and went there to be taught the ways of Catholocism. 270 However, he was not convinced he wanted to become a Catholic and tried to convert them to Protestantism. 271 In this he failed and they sent him into the streets after 2months. 273 He wandered until a pretty woman took him in. He fell something like in love with her and wanted to her with all his heart and body, but she found a place for him as a footman of an aristocrat. His trouble with women he states is that he loved them too well and this hindered his success. 276 When the woman died with whom he worked he stole a ribbon and was caught but lied and said another maid had given it to him. They were both sacked and his guilt from this is part of why he writes the story. there is no telling where she ended up, but perhaps not well since she was pretty and young. 281
BOOK III
He is given a position in a house as a footman, but is not treated like one and is given an education since he already knows a bit of somethings. He is also in a house that works for the King. He is abut 16 at this time. 283 He meets one of his old friends from the ministry, Bacle, and they take on the idea of going back to Geneva. R quits his favorable position with an insult and goes back to Geneva. He and Bacle separate. 287 He goes back to Madam de Warren and loves her like a mother, but sometimes he loves her like a woman. Because of his love for her he was chaste to loving anyone else and had no other relations. R ends up at the seminary to learn latin from the connections of the Madam. 294 He had no way to learn with a teacher and was forced to quit it, but was given a spot as a music student. 295 R was not a good music student and the teacher was drunk and he was sacked. R was sent to help him carry his stuff to Lyon. When they got there the music teacher had an epileptic fit and R ran away from the obligation and help the teacher needed. This is the third main confession he makes. 298 He sets out again for Madam De Warren, but she has left for Paris. R cannot think of anything happy that doesn't involve being near her. 298
BOOK IV
The music teacher lost his belongings and with it the work he had done since he was young and the ability to work to support himself in old age. R sets up with none of his acquaintances, but went to one of Madam's friends places. He was then set up to accompany one of their daughters to another town. They even slept in the same bed. 301 He is now 20, yet nothing happens between them. He is stuck in the town after his delivery and has no money. 303 R starts to live on a lie that he is a singer and a music teacher. 304 R moves towns and picks up with a wandering archimandrate from Jeruselum with whom he joins on a return trip to Jeruselum as his interpreter. 306 R is well received by some and taken in and so he quits the archimandrate. R is sent to Paris to do work and as he wishes to find Madam. He is as happy as he has ever been. 308 R quits paris when he finds that she had left as well. His imagination for what Paris should ahve been was too great and he was greatly dissapointed with Paris. He left on foot for Geneva or turin and found a friend of Madam's. She eventually wrote him. 312 She set him up under the employ of the king and had to work for the first real time in his life, but earned his pay. 314
BOOK V
He is now 21 years old. R soon gives up his government job and takes up music full time. he is still not very good, but all around him are bad. 320 R becomes enamoured with the stupid beauty of one of his students, but her mother loves him and see not his affair. R then comes into relations with Madam despite her relations with her footman Anet. 325 R passed 3 or 4 years this way until they moved. 330
BOOK VI
R takes ill, then reads a lot to is psychological worsening. He goes after his inheritance and finds little. 335 R goes to a cure, but finds only doctors that take money. 341 R comes back to Madam, but she now has another youth and R doesn't want to share Madam. She sets him up as a tutor with a wealthy family and he takes to it more or less. 346 It doesn't work out, so he goes back to Madam and his books. R takes up music again and comes up with a way to read that uses numbers and is bent on going to Paris to present it to the academy. 349
BOOK VII
He presented his treatise on music, but it was not taken well and so he worked on it alone. R was taken in by another woman and he became her pet for a while and made friends of others. 358 R takes on the office of attendant to the ambassador and does some gov. work. 364 He and a friend decide that they will buy a girl of 12 until she is old enough to be their concubine. They both end up loving her like a father, but the scandal gets out and he loses his job with the ambassador. 368 R focuses on his opera having no other occupation. he plays it to some people and at least one of these wants it played before the king. 374 Nothing happened with it and it was given up. he renewed his friendship with Diderot, but he was put in prison. 381
BOOK VIII
Diderot is out and R tries to help him. 383 R reads about the morality of man and how art might be involved in it and says that this treatise, which prompted him to write on the same subject ruined him. 384 He has an affair. 386 Theresa has her third child by R and they are all destitute and he leaves them to a public education. 387 He had 5 kids in all and they all went to the orphanage. 388 He writes and is well recieved 391. He takes on all of society and talks about dress. 394 He goes before the king after his first performance of his play and music. He is expected to get a stipend. 396 He refuses the stipend, but Diderot think he should take it to help others. 397 R writes with voltaire. 399
BOOK IX
He moves to the country and writes about the joys of being there although he was pulled back to the city. He also writes about the need to work, not create. 400 He retreats to the country for good and lives under the patronage of Madam d'Epinay. 404 R quits the house and moves into another supplied by a friend. R believes himself to be with few friends and is unhappy. 411
BOOK X
He is set against by some of his friends that feel that he has abandoned them and so he set himself to be a recluse, but is drawn back into the scene again. 412
BOOK XI
His book Eloise came out to some success, the best in Paris which he censured more than other places. 416 He talks of ailments and books published and that is about all. He is asked to serve again the parliament, but did it rudely and suffered. 419
BOOK XII
R writes of being hounded out of town and almost killed and being treated poorly because of what he wrote.
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