17/10/06 - English Literature - Wuthering Heights

Changing perception over years.

Bronte 1818-1847. Thornton, near Bradford which was the centre of literary attention. Years of theological scepticism and unbelief. Deaths of family members during early years. Emily psychologically unstable consequently? Toy soldiers obtained 1826, helped to create narratives. Widely read family: romantic, gothic, contemporary, poetry, Byron.

No Coward's Soul as Mine can be read as an angry unbeliever in God. In 1846 Wuthering Heights completed, coinciding with political unrest, strikes, machines broken and riots. Can be read as a political novel? Emily died a year after writing the novel. Charlotte published the novel posthumously for a pittance; it was originally unpopular.

First reviewers didn't know how to read the novel. The Examiner: "No narrative unity or focus, immoral, disjointed."
Douglas Jerrold's Weekly: "Baffling all regular criticism. Remarkable. Strange."

Charlotte's preface 1850, justifying sister's novel:
-Realism
-Verisimilitude of language
-Characterisation
She agrees it is immoral, but the Muses helped it, author had to write something and this is the result. No concession to conventionality as in Charlotte's own novel, Jane Eyre.

Wuthering Heights a hall of mirrors instead of a mirror held up to reality. Postmodernist novel? The epitomy of Open Text by Umberto Ecco.
Believes texts take a different perception with every reading.

Multivalence - many meanings, e.g. historicism, liberal humanism, psychoanalysis, deconstruction, feminism, Marxism, postcolonialism.

Liberal humanism - Lord David Cecil. World values. Emphasised Emily as a misunderstood outsider, should be read as cosmological drama, universal principles.

Historicism - biographical, social values, periodicity. (Elizabeth Gaskell's The Life of Charlotte Bronte 1857.)

Psychoanalysis - authorial biography (repression), dream imagery (Freud), collective conscious (Jung), mirroring/doubling (Lacan).

Feminism - sexuality, gender politics, female identity, ecriture feminine. Laugh of the Medusa Helene Cixous. Ecriture feminine. Hierarchical language.

Marxism - socio-economic structures, representation of race, revolutionary moment. Everyday life, class and race. Terry Eagleton Myths of Power - Heathcliff class outsider (Irish orphan), generational struggle for capital, etc.

Deconstruction/poststructuralism - problems of meaning, formalism/structure, textuality/word play, epistemological crisis. So knowledge is under criticism. 'Truth' is a Western philosophical construct, no trascendental signifier, all meaning is textual (Derrida: "there is nothing beyond the text.") (Barthes).
Chapter 2 to 3: narrative form is anti-hierarchical. Lockwood's search for meaning, limited readerly perspective, allusions to textuality, signifier/signified. Narrative form complicated 'Mise en abyme.' Event > Heathcliff > Nelly > Lockwood > Reader. Not first or third person, multilayers/dimensional. Characterisation - Nelly "true benevolence" and "homely fidelity." Lockwood "urbane, intelligent, civilised, metropolitan," gentleman of the time. But the text undermines the integrity of its characters.
Narrative ending is false. Implies struggle will continue, no narrative centre, 'open' text. Not about meaning.

16/10/06 - History of Art - Impressionism

Style labels. Impressionism - modernist painting. Dominant way of understanding modern art. Mid-twentieth century art considered a high point. Greenberg considered contemporaries (e.g. Jackson Pollock) significant.

Avant-garde movements at this time in quick succession. Hence style labels. 'Isms' given by artists themselves. But style labels too linear for precision. Not complete enough. 1) Too much emphasis on technique and not enough on content. 2) Fails to place movements historically. 3) Emphasis of abstraction tends to deny concept of figure painting.

Impressionism - was it a coherent movement? Assumed to encapsulate coherence, but loses validity. Was subject matter important?

First Impressionist exhibition in 1874. Not particularly revolutionary artists. Landscapes following naturalism.

Pontoise and Barbizon. Similar high viewpoint, landscape. Both try natural way of painting.

Boudin, The Pier at Trouville 1869.

Jongkind, Marine 1864.

En plein air. Out of doors painting completely. Artists did this. Less emphasis on finish of painting, clear brushstrokes. Artist's touch a metaphor for process of 'seeing'.

Monet, Mouth of the Seine at Honfleur 1865.

Visible brushstrokes. Technique, formal developments. What about subject matter? Renoir, La Grenouillere 1869- 'froggy place'.

Monet, La Grenouillere 1869.

Renoir Bather with a Griffon 1870.

Content - 'flowerpot', false island in lake. Desribed as "some bad sketches" by Monet. Criticised therefore the style label. Experimental pictures.

Impressionist exhibition set up because their pictures were rejected by Salon. Mixed reactions from critics.
"An Exhibition of an Anonymous Society of Painters, Engravers and Sculptures." "Impression" originally a landscape term for quickly sketching rapid movements in nature.

Bertha Morissot, The Cradle 1872.

Degas, The Dancing Lesson 1871.

Figure painters.

Cezanne, A Modern Olympia c.1873.

Monet, Impression, Sunrise 1872

Cezanne's crude, joking. Monet's unfinished. Name stuck. A 'negative' name, coined by caracaturist. Degas did not like it.

Monet, Luncheon c.1873.

Formal. Highly finished. Detail. Not impressionistic.
Pissarro.
These were criticised for political/contextual reasons. Three years after revolution. 'Civil war' of Paris. Also, level of finish was crude. Middle class didn't want "careless", "rushed" art. And composition a problem - unfocused, ambiguous focus, unusual. Daring for artists.

Monet Red Boats at Argenteuil 1875

and Vineyards in the Snow 1873.

Rapid touches, painting quickly, observing quickly. Overall effect. Eyes do not focus on things, but everything in general. Honest painting.

No fixed style. Pissarro, A Woman Carding Wool 1875.

Palette knife, thick, rough handling. Garden of the Mathurins, Pontoise 1876.

Degas, friends with Cassatt, Morissot, Renoir, who painted figures. Monet and Sisley were landscape painters.

Degas Rehearsal of the Ballet on Stage c.1874.

Professional dancers, drawings. He combined the elements to look like he'd been inside the theatre. Pictured a 'moment'. Looks real, but contrived from pictures.

Two Dancers c.1874.

Reuses same figures. Lots of blank space suggests movement and time.

Impressionism not a coherent movement, then.

Pissarro agriculture. Industrial harvest. Rural harvest.

Corot and Sisley Chemin de Sevres, Louveciennes 1873.

Increase of suburbs. 1870s. Sisley, Monet, Renoir interested in social change.

Monet Rue Montorgeuil Decked out with Flags c.1878.

National holiday of celebration.

Degas Edmond Duranty 1879.

Shows his friend Duranty. Subtle portrait. Shows face, body language, clothing (outdoor coat worn indoors), his occupation (scholar, in study), neat piles, facial expression.

Renoir La Grenouillere 1869.

Particular places of social identities - not merely landscapes, etc.

Daumier shows difficulty of seeing things on stage. Crowds. Private language of Daumier. Observes modern life. Daumier The Orchestra During a Performance of the Tragedy 1852.

Influence of Japanese prints. New ways of seeing.

Hiroshige Sudden Shower over Ohashi Bridge 1857.

Kuniyoshi Mount Euji seen through a Fishing Net on a Clear Day c.1843.

Monet painted accidental pictures from Japanese prints, foreground objects mashing focus of background. Banks of the Seine, Spring through Trees 1878.

Degas and Monet, opposite poles.
Impressionism - actuality of looking, particular instant of time, naturalism. Monet and Degas both.
But taken as landscapist term, the figurative artists Degas and Cassatt not included.

Therefore more than one definition.

16/10/06 - Classical Literature - Odyssey: Introduction

Value of life taken for granted in Odyssey.

Everyday life, not about heroes. Odysseus's tales of fantasy. So very different from Iliad.

Similar characters: Odysseus. Described as "polumetis" - "man of many tricks." Crafty. And "polutropos" - "man of many turns." Unpredictable.

Agamemnon, Menelaos, Nestor, Helen.

War is in background of Odyssey, like Iliad has everyday life in background. Nostos - story of memories. Nostoi - stories of war. How Menelaos got home from war.

Odysseus returns to Ithaka. Interpreted in various ways. Explains what war is, the effects of war. Transitional narrative about rebuilding of community after war. Generally, people start to cohere about war ten years afterwards, as Odysseus returns after an absence of a similar time. But also Odysseus's journey. Odysseus seen as Christian "fighting for good". A figure of religion and peace. During Enlightenment, figure of reason overcoming all else.

Ethical structure to contemporaries. "Xenia" - hospitality. Very important! Zeus is God of xenia. Greeks believed important then. Rules and conventions that govern the way two parties interact. How to behave when meeting/receiving a stranger. Symbolised how Greeks believed civilised communities should interact. No community in Greece without xenia, otherwise anarchy, war, chaos, etc. Note: Paris in Trojan story breaks rules of xenia.

Represented in Odyssey as tiny actions.

"Hubris" - breaking the rules of xenia and other rules. In Odyssey, set out in black and white. Hubris is any act of someone going beyond their limits; invokes punishment of Gods.

Clear divisions between beings; first Gods, then humans, then animals. Apollo: know yourself. Know your limits.

"Kleos" - fame. Reasons behind epic poetry (klea andron).
Odysseus's problem. Willing to sacrifice peace for kleos (an heroic death, renown, etc.)

Narrative structure.
Nostos.
Kleos.
Interrelated words in Odyssey. Must get back so you can tell your story! Or if you die someone must survive to tell your story! Kleos relies on nostos, and vice versa. Odysseus - how much kleos can he give up?

Odyssey - how stories should be read. What stories do.

In medias res. Iliad - re-enact previous parts of story.
Odyssey
- Book 1-4: Telemachos's journey
- Book 5-12: Ogygia to Phaiakia
- Book 9-12: Flashback to Odysseus's journey to Ogygia
- Book 13+: Odysseus tells narrative about past.

Odysseus's stories change through his retellings. Polumetis, polutropos.

Book 1.
Polumetis - both physical and mental.
Gods' debate looking back on war - what it meant to them.
Humans don't take enough responsibility, blame the Gods too much.
"Just a man" - how do they figure in the world?
Aegistus complains of being murdered by Orestes when he brought it on himself - hubris.
Klytemnestra - Agamemnon married, Odysseus takes place of Agamemnon.

Narrative. Telemachos taking action. He blames his mother Penelope for letting guests eat and drink all the food in the house. She does nothing because it would be an act of hubris to turn them out. She displays herself at intervals to provoke the suitors' interest in her. They could take over the palace but that would be wrong. One of them must take her before it ends.

Odyssey book 1 about responsibility. Telemachos can't remember his father, Odysseus, very well, so he can't remember who he (himself) is. Identity.

6/10/06 - English Literature - The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner

Limits of interpretation for reader and author.

Confessions has a double narrative structure. Problems of authorship and how it should be read.

Editor - prototext. Calvanist, incomplete.
Hogg is in his own book (editor asks the meaning of the text).
Robert - the 'author' ... Too many authors!
Reread first editor's narrative. Assumes objective view. So no interpretive force? Hogg asserts that any reading of a text rewrites it.

Robert deranged, religious. Different textual forms.

1687. Doubling, twin-like, double author. Edinburgh wide acclaim in news. Fight between brothers equates to fight between the theory of authorial intention versus subjective reading.

Narrative. "To tradition I must appeal", "All I can gather from the history of the family." Thinks he is a member of universal truth, reason, language. Normative authority. Enlightenment. But where does his evidence of family history come from? 'Limitable' history of families. When history runs out, tradition prevails - registers. All historical writing is narrative text. But how does one write about something that's in the past? Symbolic, grave digging is all historians do. Registers, folklore, gossip is all narrative. Can't clarify the ultimate truth of a text, whatever it is. See page 1.

Robert murders Blanchard who believes Bible should be flexible, dependent on reader.

Stylistic - Hogg's narrative paradoxically can be subjective to more than one interpretation.

Gil-Martin provides Hogg's view that when one becomes too rigid in religion, one may become in tandem with the devil (i.e. Gil-Martin).

See #1. Robert presented with shapeshifter - like a text with infinite meanings. Robert such a bad reader that when he is confronted with the shapeshifter he believes it is Peter of Russia, even though it could interpreted as the devil. Believing Robert is a bad judge makes the reader similar to him, because we have now made a definitive form for Robert.

All narrative is context-dependent.

#3. Editor breaks down. Must make generic decision so the writing must be subjective. Universal wisdom made to make generic judgement - allegory (which every narrative has some tendency towards, e.g. Robert - Calvanism, or Robert - mental breakdown). Spiritual parable? Diary? Dilemma couched explicitly. For universal wisdom, truth must be universal. Who are the witnesses? Are they reliable? What kind of people? Biographies? Subjective!

Desperation of author - led to grave rob. Corrupt text instead of objective truth. Hogg tells people looking for Robert's grave that they're looking in the wrong place. The point is, the meaning of the text is made by what the reader brings to bear. You can't ask the author how to read! (I.e. don't grave rob.)

There are better or worse interpretations depending on what you bring to bear on the text.

Paradox - book at first shunned then later thought genius, sophisticated. But then people thought Hogg was too colloquial to have written a masterpiece. Attributed to his friend J. Lockhart. Appears in book as graverobber.

13/10/06 - English Literature - The Nature of Language

Milton discusses language. Logos. Greek for 'word', logocentric. In Gospel, "In the beginning there was the Word." Genesis: "God speaks the name of things and it comes into being." "Let there be light," therefore no difference between the word and the thing.

Where there is a gap there are puns: "a b" or "a bee". The light has presence when God says it. Logos - logic, rationality, thought. A word has direct relationship with thing it describes. Or a word could bring attention to the absence of things.

Ideal language is that of God, language contains the things it describes. Finite number of things in the world, to find the name of. Samuel Johnson, e.g.

John Webster Academarium Examen, 1854.

How did Adam know what to call the elephants? Their internal/external natures and signatures must be bound up in the word. If Adam called an elephant an aardvark there would be an incongruity - "that way lies error and falsehood".

What was the language in the Garden of Eden like? Hebrew and Irish suggested.

Adam reads internal signatures of things.
God boring. Never any ambiguity because he is the logos. God is language (Gospel). Language that contains meaning of thing described.
Milton tells us what happens when God speaks, e.g. ambrosial fragrance, fulfilling justice.
Christ says what God says. Pure language. "All hast thou spoken as my thoughts are." God to Christ.

Communication like a pebble dropped in water. Pebble is thought, next circle words of thought, next circle written thoughts, most subjective.

Satan characterised by rhetorical language. Remember Webster. 9:655-781. Satan whittles at purity of language. Stylish arguments - ambiguity, disparity, incongruity... The meaning of two words "God" and "death". Satan asks Eve to say what "God" is. There should be no interpretation in Eden as there is no difference between word and object. Satan: "Hath God said?" Questions God's words. Milton describes Satan as orator. Free language to do with democracy? Milton asks reader to put themselves in Adam and Eve's place.

Satan realises Eve doesn't know what "dying" is. How do you know you will die? Difference between life and death. Puns; "virtue" - goodness or courage. Opposed to logos (God). "Whatever thing death be". Death has no physical being, therefore it must be interpreted. Satan suggests death may mean becoming God. Calls her "goddess humane", which is impossible with logos. Persuades her to think the tree is poisonous. False logic, she sees Satan is still alive after eating the fruit.

At first, Eve knew what death meant because God said it. Milton uses more puns as poem progresses, reminder that we use this fallen language.
"Cure" - remedy or duty. "Eve" contains the word "evil".

12/10/06 - History of Art - Periodisation

Such terms as Baroque, Romanticism, etc. used loosely. But can be misleading in understanding history of art.

Renaissance - revival of interest in natural and ancient world. Restoring the greatness of Greek and Roman classicism. Leonardo da Vinci, Titian, Michelangelo. E.g. da Vinci's The Last Supper, mural painting of Christ and disciples. Arranged in four groups of three, reaction to Jesus' prophecy that one of them will betray him.

Baroque has different visual qualities. Rubens knew Leonardo. Feast of Herod: sweeping forms, not defined space, curves and diagonals used. No symmetrical system. Sweeping clothes.

Ingres, neoclassical Ruggiero and Angelica 1839. Rigorous, restrained, linear, clear outlines. Detached, combed.

Delacroix, Romanticism. Nearer to Baroque. Perseus and Andromeda c. 1853. Softness, dramatic depth, curved lines.

Modern art. Mondrian Composition with Yellow and Double Lines. Abstraction, geometric purity, spiritual meaning.

Style labels - what are they? Not movements. Movement, a group of artists deliberately painting in a particular way, e.g. Surrealists, Pre-Raphaelites. Some periods (e.g. Renaissance and modern) there is some self-consciousness about the style of painting they adopt, breaking away from 'decline' of art. Giotto's Last Judgement, clear signs that Giotto was seen to be starting something new. Artistic progress (sixteenth century) - Vasari. In modern art, Mondrian's Still Life with Ginger Jar. Greenberg believed artists like Mondrian were moving towards abstraction, essential driving force behind modern style as autonomous themes without reference to outside world.

Baroque started as term of abuse for decline of Renaissance, not a meditated style. Applied to paintings after they were painted. 'Gothic' term of abuse (after group who opposed Romans) so meant 'destroyer' of Renaissance art.

Hegel notion of 'a spirit of the age' or 'zeitgeist'. Could be found in every period, as everything reflects the spirit of its age. Art believed to be free of practicalities so that it could better express zeitgeist, rather than, e.g. politics. So art a privileged insight into zeitgeist.

Hegel, difference between period paintings lies not in style but in reflection of zeitgeist. Lippi and Perugino Deposition 1506, potential of humanity, positivity versus Baroque, Catholic, church oppression.

By assuming Rubens a Baroque artist and that Baroque art reflects a view of oppression, we assume Rubens the individual felt this way, but it is not necessarily true.

Spirit? Shared attitude of the world, said some psychologists.

And when do these eras begin and end? Competing views of Renaissance, when it began. Who started it? Giotto? But Renaissance supposed to reflect rebirth of classical art, which Giotto does not show. Yet still considered Renaissance. So is it not true that Giotto was an early Renaissance artist? Finished 1520 or continuing in Italy and England (Shakespeare could be considered a Renaissance writer). Not clear cut for zeitgeist theorists.

What determines style that is 'characteristic' of its era? Channel 4, most people did not behave according to zeitgeist: too old, too young, in 1960s. Why pick out just one group of people to be 'typical' of their time? Ingres and Delacroix worked at same time but different styles. So Ingres just a survivor of neoclassicism, and should not have painted this way? But why isn't Delacroix in the wrong?

Marxism, thinking about social class.

How useful? Breaks up history in comprehensible periods. Problems arise when people take too simplistic and narrow an approach to this. One should expect diversity. Don't try to force art into a pattern, probably causing damage, and also misleading.

12/10/06 - Classical Literature - Iliad: Retrospective

Death of Hektor marks Achilleus's aristeia.

Our sympathies lie with Hektor here. He defends his city, family, he is fighting for his dignity. He is the most 'human' character while Achilleus is the closest character to a god.

Book 22 shows Achilleus's wrath at its peak, which makes him appear more godlike. Instead of calming down after Patroklus's death he becomes more furious.

Book 23 Patroklus's funeral. Human sacrifice, women's bodies. Achilleus's cruelty. Honours Patroklus as a hero. Games held in his honour, celebrating life. Achilleus is portrayed as magnanimate rather than savage. Homeric device for the Achaian heroes to make their final appearance in all their glory.

Magical touch, Hektor's body protected by Apollo. Apollo is a symbol of morality. Apollo speaks reason when Achilleus has gone too far; he sends a plague on the Achaians when Agamemnon kidnaps Chryseis.

Achilleus's case goes to king of gods through Thetis. The ransoming of Hektor's body. Thetis reminds Achilleus of his morality and his doom, as well as being his mother and a goddess.

Priam's behaviour is in a way a kind of aristeia. Heroic for an old man. Divine aid from Hermes, passes to Achilleus's house without being seen. 24:468-590. Homer reminds us that Achilleus is reconciled by letting us know he has eaten and had sex with his returned concubine. Priam and Achilleus have a moment of mutual respect. They share food; Achilleus becomes angry as Priam almost refuses to eat. Achilleus has not changed his temper. 24:599-620. Note, ring composition: a, b, c, c, b, a. Shield-like shaped argument.

Key themes: Supplication, Apollo, burying of dead, Thetis and Zeus, dispute, then again in reverse order until end.
Greeks invented geometry, links to Homer's structural technique.

Trojan cycle not encompassed in Iliad, but events before and after it are mentioned, e.g. Helen and Paris, death of Achilleus, fall of Troy.

Performance would take three 6 to 8 hour days.
E.g. book 1-9, 10-18, 18-24.
End of book 9, starry night, reflecting audience's tiredness at the end of the day?

10/10/06 - History of Art - Art and Gender

Europe in nineteenth century centred on male as provider/master. Woman had few rights, no vote. Doctrine of Separate Spheres, a male and female sphere. Males were considered public people, life, reputation, jobs. Female's role to bring up children and do housework.

In France, Manet painted Zola 1868. His wife, 1874. Zola critic, analyst. Supported Manet's painting, so Manet thanks him with portrait. Image of man as intellectual, public, perhaps controversial. His wife, Dutch pianist, reclining on sofa. No sign of interests. Middle class but powerless.

Degas 1860s. His sister and her husband (Italian). Separate spheres. Man closer, direct gaze, large size. Woman hand on face, shy, reassurance from husband, small, shrinking. But husband vacant gaze; he was unintelligent. Hand on shoulder could mean his intelligent wife steering or controlling him.

These roles reinforced, especially in England. Hicks Woman's Mission: Companion to Manhood. Two others: bringing up babies and looking after the elderly. Middle class interior. Man standing, terrible news, grieving, hand covers face. Woman stands up also, arm round him. Man forms vertical, woman forms triangle to give momentum to her speed to comfort husband. Looks up to him.

Paintings by women. Mary Cassatt, American, lived in Paris. Five O'Clock Breakfast 1880. Upper-middle class women drinking tea. A visit. Left, hostess, sits beside tea. Not outdoor clothes. Visitor bonnet and gloves, well-brought up. Etiquette. But painting represents more than two women. They look across the room at a woman who must be talking. Eye level. So artist must be another guest. Hence four women.
Painted her mother reading political newspaper. Depicts assertiveness. Woman in Black at the Opera. Feminist viewpoint. Day dress, matinee. Serious, intelligent, interested in performance. Man in background looks at her (showing single-mindedness?). But the woman could be pointing binoculars at a box at the other side of the theatre. So women and men alike?

Degas Carriage at the Races. Gender and class roles. Woman breastfeeding child, but she is a whetnurse. Mother holds parasol. Man driving.

Bouguereau The Elder Sister.
Renoir Motherhood.
Woman carer of male child. Iconic status.

Van Gogh Madame Roulain au Berceuse. Rocking a cradle.

Women lending body to allegory in painting. Daumier The Republic. Republic as woman: muscular, powerful, breastfeeding muscular children. Infant reads book. Republican as caring and educating force of the future.

Barrias Nature Unveiling Herself Before Science. Women oversensitive, irrational, but more natural, while men represent science.
Carriere La Nature. Artist's wife. Blurred. Image of woman's body as procreative force. At time of low birth rate in France. Between 1891 and 1895, three hundred more people died than were born. Image engages this debate.

Women were thought to need constraint, more so than men. Families protected from outside threats.
Martineau The Last Day in the Old Home. Father making toast with son with glass in hand. Mother has rebuking face. Sitting beside desk of papers. Removal men in background. Jacobean house, seventeenth century portrait. Painting of horse in background. Prosperous family, man blown money on drink and gambling.
Hunt An Awakening Conscience. Woman's conscience. Cat playing with sparrow, symbolic of man and woman.
Egg Past and Present [1]. Man discovers she has had an affair. Children's card tower falling. Family break up. [2] Two daughters looking out at moon waiting for mother. [3] Mother, same moon, prostitution.

Degas and Toulouse-Lautrec's The Medical Inspection.
Degas vulgar, naked (not true to life), bestial behaviour, posture.
Toulouse-Lautrec's positive side, frank and moving. Queueing. Haggard, blase faces.

Department stores made cheap dresses so prostitutes unidentifiable. Renoir Les Parapluis. Woman on left holds an ambiguous basket.

Explicit meaning in posters, e.g. Moulin Rouge.
Seurat Le Chahut.

Nude paintings represent gender roles. Nude has idealised body, doesn't exist. Naked is not perfect, temporary.
Ingres La Source. Nude, no imprefection.
Manet Olympia. Naked - slippers, jewellery, flower. On bed. Construction, bringing unwelcome issues of prostitution into insecure society of prostitution in the form of aesthetics.

Gerome Cockfight. Woman paler skin, frightened, no sign of bones.

Renoir Grande Beigners. Controversial artist.
Bouguereau Two Bathers. Scholarly artist.
Not represented as goddesses, simply naked women.

Gauguin's Loss of Virginity. Patronising, symbolist, harvest in background.

Beardsley Salome. Women pressing out of social sphere. Divorces, professions, etc.

Men painted women is their worst light. But women, femmes fatales, could be powerful and sexy.

Munch's Jealousy. Personal relationship universalised. Munch believed disaster relationships were always the woman's fault.

10/10/06 - Classical Literature - Iliad: Books 22-24

Iliad has poetic and dramatic excellence. Finely woven structure.

Patroklos's death treated as Achilleus's, even by Achilleus himself. Book takes parts of story from later Trojan cycle.

The death of Hektor and the fall of Troy are equated.

Agamemnon's apology, 19:55-73. Achilleus renounces his anger. Godlike, unwilling to consider the consequences of his actions on the community. Agamemnon's reply, 19:83-94. Gives mythological example and lists rewards at the end. It was his actions to blame, yet he was deluded so it must have been an action of the gods.

Achilleus's anger transferred to Hektor. Odysseus has to step up and remind Achilleus that the army have to eat; it shows how Achilleus has become indifferent to human matters, including eating, and shows how he has gone to the opposite extreme of not fighting.

Patroklos and Achilleus are not quite equal although this was expected between good friends. It was normal for a friendship of this intensity in a society where women could never be equal to their husbands and therefore could not be as close as a friend. 17:401-411, Achilleus blames himself; he got his wish but it wasn't what he bargained for.

After Patroklos's death, Achilleus becomes more godlike as he becomes careless for own life.

Achilleus's aristeia comes when he kills Hektor.

21:99-114. Achilleus is more godlike and cruel than before. Because he knwos his destiny, he is reckless.

The greatness of a hero depends on how worthy his opponents are.

Aristeia:
1) anger at wounded/killed friend.
2) arming.
3) wounded - gods.
4) helped by a god.
5) final duel with enemy and victory.

Contrasting Hektor and Achilleus. Both represent their side. Achilleus has no wife or children, father is absent. Hektor is heroic only when the gods will it. He has a wife and child. He is fighting reluctantly to save his city, unselfish. Hektor is ashamed, he is led to overconfidence which leads to his downfall. Regret. Soliloquy, 22:98-107. Shows he recognises his fate. 22:108-130, he decides to die because he can't face his people as he has let them down. He looks back on everyday life.

Hektor runs from Achilleus. Homer's way of retarding the scene. Simile of dreams of running. Three times round Troy - lucky number. Twice is lucky, three times not a coincidence. But four is impossible, gods decide this is enough.

Hektor's death takes normal pattern. Why didn't Homer make it stand out? Symbolic of Achilleus killing himself, as Hektor is wearing his armour.

10/10/06 - English Literature - Cloud Nine

How are readers supposed to interpret a play?

Cloud Nine complex, strange, non-conforming. Rewriting theatrical conventions.
'Alternative theatre movement of 1970s.'

Drama is presented as polyphonous, complex. Authorship - requires more than one person to make it. Must be transferred from page to stage. Deliberately engages in this transfer.

Read it as literature? Embodiment, physical, audience, building. Read it as play.

Double casting, cross-gender casting. May be seen as an artifact that challenges the principles of naturalistic theatre.

Aristotle dealt with the play as theatre, rather than a 'text'. Poetry as a theatrical event. Imitation, in the form of enacting something. The principle of pleasure is inherent in theatre, even in tragedies, and the audience innately enjoy imitation. Note how a play requires the audience to be physically present.

Pity and fear are instilled in the audience because they identify themselves in the characters. The audience are 'purged' of their own emotions and adopt the emotions of the play.
Pharmaeon - the poison and the cure (Plato), cathartic (Aristotle).

Brecht: Epic theatre. Estrangement rather than identification. Emotions can form without a sense of sameness, e.g. looking at a work of art. What is 'natural' must have the force of what is startling. Works of art should also present a possibility of change.
Dramatic theatre works on identification (a childlike reaction).

Actors do not try to 'become' a character but are asked only to 'represent' them. New idea, late 19th century.

Role of Betty is played by a man so you can't identify with her. Politics of gender and colonialism.

Written 1979, year that Thatcher came to power. Analogy of how history develops Brechtian theatre.

Set around 1956. Traditional piece of theatre, but themes are contemporary. Carol Churchill works with communism while also with traditional theatre. Revivial of home grown theatre in 1970s. Subsidies for theatre from London. Socialist, popular theatre and continental.

Local performing theatre with continental. Brechtian aesthetics. Music as an estrangement technique. Soliloquy character will start to sing, so as audience are about to identify with him, the music gives a different effect of alienation.

Why is Betty played by a man? Why does it change in Act 2? What impact on gender politics? The man is a wife, and is said to be everything a wife should be. Parallels with imperialism, gender, etc.

Joshua played by black actor. There was no black cast in 1979. Is this more problematic than cross-gendering? Why?

Lin identifies the problem of sex and politics. Act 2 especially deals with this.

Is there a political reception? Is it naturalist? How does it engage with the audience?

Significant feminist literature. Oppressions/politics of gender tied into historical context.

Carol Martin. Theory reader. Wrote plays on contemporary issues. Soft cops. One about schizophrenia.

Historicity of workings of gender alongside politics - hence cross-gendering.

9/10/06 - History of Art - Art and the Land

In the 19th century, the concept of landscape became more concerned with specific currents in society. Time of social transition, e.g. industrialism. Agriculture to industry, painting country to painting city. Growing population in cities. Manchester 1780-1820. 20,000-200,000 due to industry.

Early 19th century. An Ideal City, Agrigentum by Valenciennes. Koch Landscape with Apollo, 17th century. Similar formula, Italian landscape, ideal, gods. Poussin especially considered landscape painting as history painting. Structure is balanced and harmonious. Valenciennes's book - depth like theatre, dark foreground and light middle. Systematic treatment of landscape. Copied by Turner, Bay of Baiae with Apollo and the Sibyl. Sense of calm and control; idealisation.

Constable 1821. The Haywain. An image of rural Britain? Stillness, straightforward as if directly from nature; influenced by Italian landscape. Serenity. After Napoleonic wars, agricultural depression. Farmers unemployed. The Haywain leaves this out. Constable - "nature unadorned and unidealised", but a shift took place. Suddenly, nature as it is.

Rousseau's Forest in Winter. Millet's Carrefour de l'Epine, Fontainebleau. Rousseau depicted tiny women compared to vast trees. Romantic notion of the "sublime". Humans are puny while nature is grand and powerful.

Mid 19th century. Burial at Ornans, Courbet. Rural population. Chaos, who is who? Ambiguous. Are they subversive? Dangerous? Relations between city and country. Social control embedded in paintings - gleaning. A form of charity that poorest are allowed leftovers.

Millet's parents modest landowners. But painting depicts social order, manager on horseback, employees busy at work, gleaners bent over under horizon and don't get much hay. Breton's painting, however, The Recall of the Gleaners, depicts gleaners as pretty, clean and collecting lots of hay. The gleaners obey the man, so social control.

Millet Blessing the Corn 1857. Respect for order: church, law, mayor. Millet Peasant Family. Gender roles in peasant family. Child keeps them together. Father has dog and spade - manual labour. Mother spindle and hens. Idealised land in the paintings at this time.

Articulating meaning in paintings.
Holman Hunt Hireling Shepherd.
Hook Hearts of Oak.

Depicting morality. Neither of workers doing their jobs, lamb and sheep are in trouble. Death's head moth.
Hook's painting shows father carving ship for son and is with his wife. Correct morality. Secretly freighted with ideology.

Corot Sevres Road. Sisley Sevres Road. Twenty years' difference.
Corot tonal, not bright. Rural lane, trees, no buildings.
Sisley pavement, line of trees, suburban houses. Shows city expansion.

Madox Brown Work.
Herkomer Hard Times.

Madox Brown engages with city and country. Intellectuals watching workers, moral praise for worker. Urban, but rural people with herbs to sell. Positive.
Herkomer. 1880s agricultural collapse. Out of work in country. Gender roles, wife and children depressed. Man with tools determined.

Monet Railway Bridge at Argenteuil.
Pissarro The River near Pontoise.

Painted naturalistic? But they are edited to convey ideas about modernity. Bridge middle of river in country, with trains. From Paris , manmade presence in nature. Trains represent labour, boats leisure.
Pissarro's paint factory. Commerce in countryside. Harmonised, buildings integrated in landscape.

Lhermitte Payment of the Harvesters.
Van Gogh The Potato Eaters.

The artists didn't know each other, economic changes happening. Refrigeration meant food from exotic places. Large imported wheat. European prices down.
Lhermitte. Hard workers, paid. Getting along.
Van Gogh, knew weavers were going out of business due to factories. Sense of anxiety.

Pissarro Two Girls at the Well. Tired girl, fatigue, hard worked. Similar clothes suggest continuum - young girl will soon take on same job as the other.

Bastien-Lepage Pauvre Fauvetter, eastern France. Formula, close up, high horizon, intimacy. Clausen The Stone Pickers, same style.

Boudin's Beach at Trouville. Temporarily middle-upper classes visiting.
Trouville fishing village until developed as tourist resort.
Toulouse-Lautrec Rider with a Small Dog. Class. Alle, straight track in forest for huntsmen to travel. Aristocrat, property.

Pissarro 1890. Peasant Women Planting Pea-Sticks. Pissarro an anarchist, pro-rural living. Shows sunlit countryside, togetherness, equality, harmonious colours, unified by dots. Like dancing. Idealised.

Turpitudes Sociales. Pissarro. Crime in city. Dangerous. Survival of fittest.

Cezanne Chateau Noir.
Millstones of the Chateau Noir.
Ideas of death. Aged 60, medical problems. Abandoned castle, nature taking over. Millstones abandoned and taken over. Nature used as private meditation.

Van Gogh Landscape at Harvest.
Koninck View of the River Waal.

Van Gogh nostalgia, tradition. Avant-garde style. Traditions still carry values for the artist. Van Gogh was far from home, landscape reminded him of home. Reminded him of the Koninck painting.

Social class, tradition, gender differences. Rich, complex set of possibilities. Social values.

9/10/06 - Classical Literature - Iliad: Books 16-18

Book 16
- arming
- death of Sarpedon
- death of Patroklos.

Book 19
- character of Achilleus
- Agamemnon's apology.

Iliad gets more intense as the story progresses. After Patroklos's death Achilleus relents in his anger against Agamemnon. Transfers his anger onto the Trojans.

Book 16 Zeus has effected his plan. High pitched. 15:59-77. Zeus wakes up and puts the next stage of his plan into action - glory for Achilleus.

Achilleus did not know Patroklos would die, but reader does. God-like view given to reader.

See also 11:595-615.

Homeric simile from Achilleus 16:6-11.
Notice repetition from Nestor's speech.
Why does Achilleus let him? Patroklos imitates Achilleus and takes his armour, weapons and horses. Prophetic - Patrokos can't lift the spear, i.e. can't live up to Achilleus.

For a warrior to have glory he must have a worthy opponent, e.g. Patroklos kills Sarpedon, the son of Zeus. See 16:430-57. Sarpedon is carried by Death and Sleep to Elysia from Troy. Tradition was to take armour of fallen enemy and give the body back for decent burial.

Patroklos's flaw is to think he is immortal. But this is delusion - he is not experienced enough to succeed. See 16:684-91. He is not consumed by greed, but he is innocently "besotted" with his success. Consequnce of Patroklos pretending to be a great hero and he thus dies an undiginified death, 16:783-800.

Book 18, symbolism - Achilleus lending armour to Patroklos. Hektor takes the armour so a) it's as if Hektor has killed Achilleus, and b) Achilleus now has no armour. In this book Hephaistos makes him new armour. Shield, depicting everyday life. Ironically this is the life cycle that Achilleus is leaving behind when he inevitably dies.

18:23-31. Symbollically Achilleus dies. Armour laid out, women beat their breasts wailing. Thetis then leads out the threnody (mourning party) although Achilleus is not dead yet. Homeric convention - Achilleus's death from different part of story.

Achilleus consistent? How does he change?

5/10/06 - History of Art - The Patron

Patron - person, agent or institution who commissons a work of art.
Patronage also means collections, but this lecture is concerned with the former definition.

From middle ages to the 1800s. Religious orders, nobility, etc. Artists little known. Late thirteenth century artists and sculptors signed work and gave themselves higher status. Patrons began to be interested in individual artists. The artist-patron relationship began to develop.

Charles V and Titian almost equal in relationship. See Titian's portraits of Charles V. Restrain depicted in paintings of Titian's which became influential. Also painted mythological scenes. Charles V knighted Titian - new idea. Legend that Charles V bent to pick up Titian's fallen paintbrush (Udolphi).

This story related to another by Pellini. Alexander the Great and Apellus. Gave his own mistress to Apellus. Many artists aspired to this status, but few achieved it.

After 1579, Dutch provinces prominent. New situation changed patron and art relationship. Calvanist art, not Catholic. Only private, commemorative religious paintings. But they then had to change this, e.g. small cabinet pictures.

Industrialisation in Europe in the nineteenth century changed patronage, e.g. British institution provided exhibitions.

Why study patrons? Some should be regarded as artists? Not just the actual artist? If one understands the patron's ambitions, politics, etc. then one can unlock the 'meaning' of a piece of art. Monographical books on patron and artist available.

Gombrich: Causimo's artist merely acted as a mediator of Causimo's ideas.

Patronage studies rely on documentary evidence, e.g. diary, employment contracts. Sometimes evidence is not available.

Jill Burke, Changing Patrons.

It may be impossible to write accurately on patronage due to lack of evidence. So such studies may not be reliable.

Monastery of the Escoria. Philip II, outside Madrid. Thought he was a king by divine right. Catholic, counter-revolution. Philip wanted to reinstate use of religious paintings in churches. Should inspire devotion and be in accordance with historical texts. He was strict and censored some works.

St. Maurice wanted to die rather than worship Roman pagan gods. Philip replaced El Greco's painting for another depicting the same scene of martyrdom because it was much clearer.

Case study. Church of the Hospital, of the Charity in Saville. Organised 'dignified' burials for those left dead on the streets. Mariara founded four new charities for sick, old, etc. New infirmary for those refused admission elsewhere. Supervised building work of new church until his death. He commissioned paintings for the church. The Blink of an Eye depicts death and ecclesiastical power and there are books of history depicting knowledge. ...So no one escapes death. Corintheus. These images result from the patron's obsession with death (due to the untimely death of his family).

Johnathan Brown Themes and Ideas in Seventh Century Spanish Painting.

5/10/06 - English Literature - Death of the Author

Roland Barthes's Death of the Author significant.

Quote 6. Where does the voice come from? Barthes wants to know who is speaking? Universal wisdom? The author? Hero? Psychology? How should it be read? Writing is the destruction of every point of origin. Author cannot ultimately guarantee the meaning or truth of a literary persepective.

Assumes our notion of the author is historically determined. Oral stories are flexible, fluid and 'composite'; plural origin. Therefore texts cannot have a universal mode of meaning.

The problem of readership is that it generates a limited meaning. Readers bring gender, class, language, etc. perceptions to bear on the text.

Surrealism - psychoanalysis - a theory of the unconscious, therefore author cannot consciously know the true meaning of the text.

Readers are co-creators of textual meaning.

Problems of Barthes: evacuates historical privilege of authorship.
Doesn't historicise enough; overstates his case.

Why did he write it? Post war literature. After war, universities full with all classes because people wanted social security. Biographies emerged - the author's view of his/her literature. Regressive move, according to Barthes.

T. S. Eliot, 1917, Tradition and the Individual Talent. How does one read something? 1) When we read, we relate it to its genre. Historically categorised. After reading, the new work of art changes our perception/context of the genre. 2) New meaning conditions another new text. Does not involve authorial intention.

Barthes: text made of author's language. Context and newness.

Why is literary theory so important?

3/10/06 - History of Art - Art and Power

Nineteenth century art. Dynamic. 1800 Europe - ruled by monarchies and empires. Fastest travelling speed was of galloping horse. Canal systems. Gradual technology in Britain. Industrialisation in Manchester. Education not at all widespread.

But in 1900 France republic. Houses of Parliament, left. Democracy, labour force of industrialised economies. Germany, Belgium, quicker than France. Steam engine transformed life experience in Europe. Steamships and railways: efficient, important, reliable, fast. Frozen food transported from more exotic countries. Refrigeration. Tin can 1820s. Summer holidays mid-1800s. Motor cars. Telephone 1878, in London. Lift. Sewing machines. Instant camera. Nineteenth century sped up technological change as it progressed. Growth of education, e.g. every child in France educated up to age 11. Basic reading skills. Therefore newpapers; printers, photos. Learning. So shift in power. More people read and get new ideas for technologies.

Art involved in all these shifts. Engaged, not passively reflecting change. Art itself changed.

Delacroix, Liberty Leading the People 1830 versus Maclise, The Spirit of Justice 1847-9.

Delacroix - energy. Painted quickly. Particular place (Notre Dame). Barricade of corpses. Dynamic. People who want social/political change succeed. Young and socially various belong in this group. Marianne - allegory mixed with realism. Not contemporary clothing.

Maclise - at time of revolution. No change, however, of state. Stable picture, balanced. Allegory of justice - woman liberty holds scales. Needy come to her for advice. Architecture mixes Norman (round) arch with Gothic style (pointed arch). Political and social reading. Sense of continuity. Justice has been virtue for centuries in society. Maclise focuses on stability of society.

Courbet, Le Salut Public. Positive, taken style of Daumier. Republican. The Urban of the Tuilleries. Young boy urchin throned. Positive. Elevated. Lithograph, relatively new. Allowed multiple reproductions on cheap paper. Anyone could view it and read the texts. Propaganda through images and text.

Meissonier. Painting of June days, workers repressed by bourgeoisee. Delacroix: "It's an omelette of men." Image of counter-revolution, what happens when you revolt. Negative.

Gros Battle of Eylau, 1808 versus William Dyce Neptune Resigning to Britannia the Rule of the Sea, 1847 for house of Victoria on Isle of Wight. Gros commissioned by Napoleon. Bloodiest battle. Propaganda. Dyce's is allegorical: Neptune gives crown to Britannia. Power of Britain.

Solferino 1859. Napoleon III. Depicted leading battle but he never did - not a soldier. He is not seen to be "in control" of his men.

In 1857 Indian mutiny. British troops had to reassert power. O'Neil, Eastward Ho. O'Neil shows close up of ordinary soldiers. Brown depicted projection of power subtly. Madox Brown, The Last of England. Colonisation, going to Australia, although not to settle.

Orientalism. Gerome, The Call of the Faithful to Prayer. Power of Islam over its people. Religion and people. Allegory of Western power. Gerome, The Reception of the Siamese Ambassadors. Obeisance. Palace of Napoleon. Continuity of French powers, novelty of French power over colonised nations.

Maximilian, Emperor of Mexico. Mexicans revolted against him successfully. Maximilan shot. Foreign policy dissolved. Manet (republican supporter) painted versions of his execution. Changed it so that French gunners shot Maximilian instead of Mexicans.

Exposition Universelle. 1889 Eiffel Tower resulted. Showed power, daring. Avenue of the Opera. Modern culture. Controls spectator.

Millions of poor. Stevens Begging. Bouguereau. Cliquey, sentimental. Fildes, designed for a wood illustration. Then Fildes painted exhibition picture. Salvation Army hostel at night. Drop of social class. Powerless.

Class visible in pictures. Scale. Large pictures - palace, importance. Small pictures - middle classes. Normandy coast. Outin The Lookout. Monet The Cliff Walk. Outin - middle class family. Visitors. Holidayers. Tourists. Fisherwoman on edge of cliff. Contrast. Monet - on cliffs promenading ladies, parasols. Middle classes. Fishing boats. Dangerous.

The Terrace of St-Adresse and The Breakfast by Monet. Lived next to transatlantic port. Encapsulates this economy. Former, ships show how M. Monet got his money and in foreground how he spent it. Latter articulates power. Maid has laid table and retreats in background. Newspaper and bottle of wine on Monet's vacant chair. Female with child. Class, power, gender.

Redgrave's The Governers. Herman's At Dawn.
Former: attractive, intelligent, but melancholy for position. Children will grow up and marry wealthy.
Latter, ladies and gentlemen outside of restaurant. Working classes get up for work, meagre living.

Pissarro's drawings 1889, Exposition Universelle year. Could have been reproduced but were in fact private. Anarchist. He used them to try to persuade his niece to become an anarachist.
Assumes people are innately good but corrupted by society. Pissarro wanted people to go back to country life.
Turpitudes sociales, former man looking out on anarchy. Latter poor with no bread. Third, suggests violence will be used to convert society. Steinlen Les Petits Sous. Liberty, once again. Refer back to Delacroix.

3/10/06 - Classical Literature - Iliad: Books 10-15

a) The seesaw battle: (i) oral hypothesis, (ii) Books 10-15
b) Homeric warfare; similes and other recurrent patterns: (i) history? (ii) typical patterns.

Oral hypothesis. Why is there so much repetition? Homer uses standard epithets (adjective to describe people), e.g. swfit-footed Achilleus, Hera of the ox-eyes. On a wider scale, whole scenes of feasting 9:91-92, 1:460-470. No one questioned this until Wolf, who suggested it was due to the poem being spoken rather than read privately. Therefore the words had to fit into a metrical pattern. Iliad written in hexameter. This compares to Yugoslav bards who told stories to the beat of music. As well as for convenience, the epithets are used for dramatic effect.

So if the story was spoken, how come it was written down?

Least concentration of epithets is in speeches, and in similes. Homeric similes to be extended beyond what is neceessary. See 15:359-366. Used for vividness; to strike the imagination. See 6:506-514.

In book 8 the Achaians surge but Zeus interferes and makes the Trojans stronger due to his promise to honour Achilleus.

Some scholars believe book 10 (night raid) was added later. In book 11 the Greeks are more successful, heroes become wounded. In book 12 the Trojans advance.

The positions of the Achaian ships and their attackers.

Aias, then Odysseus, then Achilleus.

On the advancing side, Asios (crashes through gate), then possibly Paris, then Hektor, then Aeneias, then Sarpedon.

Notice how Aias and Achilleus take the most risky positions while crafty Odysseus takes the safest.

In book 13 Poseidon stabilises the battle. In book 14 Hera seduces Zeus and he falls asleep. Vulnerable Hektor is knocked out. In book 15 Zeus awakens and deals with Poseidon. The see-saw effect gives dramatic effect. Zeus is stable in his decision to favour the Trojans but he is persistently set back by the other gods.

Chariots were not a feature of Greek battles, neither were duels or the shields that Homer describes.

Aristeia - peak of the hero.
Pattern of battle scenes - arming, defeats several opponents in duel, rout (enemies retreat in fear), wounded (but not fatally), help from a god, final duel with worthy opponents, victory. Not each one has to be in place.

E.g. Diomedes, book 4-6; Agamemnon, book 11; Hektor, book 15 (?); Patroklos, book 16; Achilleus, book 18-22.

Problem of variety in action scenes:
Duels: A throws at B and misses, then B strikes A but does not wound, A kills B. Look at 11:230+ and 5:280+.
Two in chariot killed by dismounted warrior. Look at 5:13+ and 5:275+.
List of victories. Look at 7:7+ and 14:511+.
Friend is wounded, then other friend gets revenge.
Taunting speeches. Look at 13:374+ and 14:454+.
Gory wounds. Look at 16:345+.
Similes. Look at 4:482+
Obituaries. Look at 4:482+. These characters are not cannon fodder, they are given biographies, drama of death, not simply celebration of heroes.

3/10/06 - English Literature - Auden

• Authorship and interpretation: biographical reading
• Biographical reading and Auden
• Auden, English and American.

Biography gives a framework for interpretation of a piece of work, e.g. feminist literature, sexuality of literature.

Should Auden's work be interpreted in terms of his homosexuality? Does his work depict secrecy and other things associated with homosexuality?

Influential in 1930s, came to poetic maturity after modernist explosion. 'Auden generation'. His influence complicated in 1939, when he moved to America. Some believe it was cowardice of war, abandoning; some believe he was escaping merely constriction for freedom, liberty in New York. So should his work be categorised into 'English' and American' Auden? Detecting stylistic changes. Work reflecting life?

Writing about authorship 1:
Musee des Beaux Arts.
Human position - narrative and experience
Artist's eye: synoptic vision of human position
Rhythm, diction and meaning
Poet and artist: performing and describing, old and new masters.

Euphrastic poem - Musee des Beaux Arts. Art about art. About the capacities that are taken about events. 'Human position'. Brueghel's Icarus. Tragic events take place inc ontext, it may be important for those who are suffering but not to outsiders. Seen from different perspectives. Even important events take place in different perspectives. Instead of focusing on point of view of sufferer, the painting depicts the event from the point of view of a ploughman and ship crew. Concern with artist's eye: it is human, concerned, yet in the hands of the Old Masters, other people's point of view can be taken. So the artist is synoptic. Suffering belongs to person yet does not provoke universal sympathy. No one vision crowds out all others, or make others subordinate. Artist looks in on humans, separated from them. Poem endows paintings with capacity to invest in human condition.

Rhythm - 4th fourth. List. Indifferently unstressed. Goes 'dully along'. Indifference indicated metrically in the poem.

Diction. References to elevated language, theology. Mixed with ordinary language, "doggy life".

Suggests art's involvement in human interests. Art can offer a view beyond human, while humans stumble on with life too busy to think about this. So poem suggests author's life is separate from his art.

Writing about authorship 2:
In Memory of W. B. Yeats.
Section 1: poets and poetry: the relation of author and work.
Section 2: poetry and survival: who or what lives? How? What can it do?
Section 3: poetry and redemption: the affirmation of the negative.

Different stanza form, metric.

1) Focused on life and work. Invocation of world responding to an event. Opposes first poem, world not indifferent to death.

2) Poet's life resembles public world. "Provinces of body", "Squares of his mind."

But interrogates theory that world changes after a death. Focuses on insignificant rather than significant: poems not informed of author's death. As if poems and author had separate lives. "He becomes his admirers."

Poet becomes "scattered" across the world. All his paper given over. His words are all on paper, his entrance is on paper. "Guts", digested. Consumed by the living. His words are then "modified".

It is a meditation on the relationship of poet and work.

But also he survives in some way. He is a remnant, his work given over to readers. "Modified", i.e. survives, reworked. Not destroyed. What? How? "Poetry makes nothing happen." So poetry does make something happen... "nothing." Poetry creates something. Power, yet undermining. "It survives", but implies barely living, clinging, as well as triumph. It survives because it's not important, no one tampers with it, because it is disconnected, no one cares.

3) Ritualistic moment. Reciting over coffin? Incantation, prayer. Rhythm. Alternatively stress and unstress. Insistent. "Irish vessel ... emptied of its poetry." Possible other purpose for poetry. Poets live by their work? But language lives by poets, not vice versa. So writers merely vehicle for presence of language.

Further attempts to read poetry. Power, efficacy, involvement.

2/10/06 - History of Art - Gustave Courbet: The Art of Playing Politics

Painter of realism. "I will never paint an angel because I will never see one." Rejected neo-classicism and romanticism.

Eastern France, born in small agricultural town with farmers for parents.

Self-portraits. Desperate Man and Wounded Man. Light/dark contrasts. Extremity of mood, self-image - Romantic views. By 1850-51 considered brilliant artist/dangerous man.

1830-1848 Louis Philippe. French revolution, Philippe exiled.

France slow to industrialise, blame put on monarchy. Provoked by middle classes. Previous year bad harvest. High bread prices. Working people inclined to revolution. Middle classes wanted independence. Monarchy replaced by second republic. Counter revolution four months later - middle classes against working classes.

Courbet picked up by revolution. Met people with strong opinions, Baudelaire. Courbet had mixed interests for new impetus. Avant-garde identity. Bonrin, a painter. Images of ordinary people.

Courbet's self-image changed. Man with Pipe. Presents himself as the man of the people. Posing? In 1849 After Dinner shown at Salon. Bought by state. Life-size figures. His own life and family. Rural life. Genre painting. Critics said it was 'overblown', should use this size only in history paintings.

Next Salon, Courbet exhibited The Peasants of Ornans Returning from the Fair. Deliberately clumsy. Lumpen quality of foreground figure. Coarse palette. The Burial at Ornans. The Stone Breakers. Large paintings. Real life pictures. Autobiographical images. Courbet showed them several times. Equivocal reactions from different places.

Aesthetic factors? Canvas too large for genre painting. No moral in the picture. Treated as history painting. Rough style. Sombre colour. No clear structure or composition. Focal point?

Political factors? Social issues. No hierarchy. Shouldn't priest be more significant? Focal point? Social structure? It is ambiguous, suggesting social confusion. No class. In Paris reaction was hostile due to fear of social issues.

Aesthetic debate started by Courbet.

Myer. Rough, sensual. Admired paintings. The Sower was not accepted like The Willower due to state of politics being questioned. Depicts peasant, but powerful. Critics said "A vicious looking labourer." But his face is shadowed! Myer did not reject tradition as much as Courbet.

Pictures can be read in ways the artist does not intend, e.g. The Sower.

In 1851 second republic fell. Emperor Napoleon III.
Courbet Mademoiselles of the Village. Attacked by critics for country girls depicted instead of higher class.

Bonjour M. Courbet. Autobiography; pleased with himself. Bruyas friend of Courbet. He wanted to support artist interested in social change. Painter usually subservient to patron. But depicted in painting as equals.

Courbet refused exhibition of others, made his own. Artistic independence. Second empire wanted to diffuse Courbet.

1855 exhibition. The Artist's Studio: A Real Allegory of Seven Years of my Artistic Life. Himself, again! Child, innocent viewer. Nude woman, inspiration. Self-conscious. His friends, his subjects.

'Realism' loose term. Not a 'real' allegory. Courbet uses this for his purposes.

Monday, moral tales. Genre paintings, small-scale. Traditional.

The Fire. Picturesque. Dramatic.

Politics. His work more accepted, but he tamed his works also.
Political friends, Proudhon. "Property is theft."

The Oak. Anti-imperial.

Painted political paintings. Return from the Meeting. Drunken priests. Bought by Catholic, who burned it.

The Beggar's Arms.

Successful in Europe.

In 1870 second empire fell. Spring 1871, Paris commune.

Third republic until June 1940.

Courbet involved in Paris commune 1870, Vendome Column pulled down. Courbet supposedly to blame. He was arrested, fined, exiled.

Journalist cricitism.

Self-portrait in prison. Still life of trout - realism. Allegory of himself? Reeled in?

Courbet important, showed boundaries could be broken, had public image, leftist, anti-establishment, promoted his position. Artist of his time, no ties to commission, manipulated himself and art for art market. Political artist.

2/10/06 - Classical Literature - Iliad: Books 7-9

"Many through one." Homer presents many events from throughout the Troy story in his epic.

Zeus carries out promise to Thetis in book 8.

8:553+ cinematic description. Dramatic effect.

12: Breaking of wall. "Many for one." Even Gods took a long time to break the wall, giving emphasis to strength of Achaians.

Phoinix invented by Homer? Emotional leverage on Achilleus. Supposed to have trained Achilleus as a hero.

Achilleus left out, building suspense. Conspicuous absence from war.

Distinct personalities of the persuaders of Achilleus: Odysseus, Phoinix and Aias.

Homer uses repetition. Econonimcal and emphasising.

Achilleus has to learn to control his temper because of his ability to kill people.

Odysseus repeats Agamemnon's speech but omits the superiority that Agamemnon expresses. Odysseus crafty at forming argument. Achilleus refuses immediately, unreceptive. Knows Odysseus is simply cajoling with long words. Line 410+ he reveals he wants glory. He knows his fate.

Longest speech in Iliad. Phoinix persuading Achilleus. Biography - raised Achilleus. Own cursed relation. Relationship to Achilleus, adds depth. Appeals to heart. Fable of prayers - allegory (prayers of Zeus). Calydonian boar hunt - (loop pattern) dispute over spoils. Appeals as father. In the latter story Cleopatra succeeds in her appeal. Compare to PATROklos (literally 'father's glory') who persuades Achilleus successfully. Homer may have invented myths for his purposes.

Achilleus gets more glory from Zeus, refuses Agamemnon's gifts. He allows men to die because of his wrath. Feels hurt that Phoinix takes Agamemnon's side.

Aias (friend, cousin) says Achilleus is a bad host, brotherly appeal. Achilleus agrees at least to stay.