Author: George Hutchinson Publisher: Columbia University Press ISBN: 0231545967 Category : Literary Criticism Languages : en Pages : 420
Book Description
Mythologized as the era of the “good war” and the “Greatest Generation,” the 1940s are frequently understood as a more heroic, uncomplicated time in American history. Yet just below the surface, a sense of dread, alienation, and the haunting specter of radical evil permeated American art and literature. Writers returned home from World War II and gave form to their disorienting experiences of violence and cruelty. They probed the darkness that the war opened up and confronted bigotry, existential guilt, ecological concerns, and fear about the nature and survival of the human race. In Facing the Abyss, George Hutchinson offers readings of individual works and the larger intellectual and cultural scene to reveal the 1940s as a period of profound and influential accomplishment. Facing the Abyss examines the relation of aesthetics to politics, the idea of universalism, and the connections among authors across racial, ethnic, and gender divisions. Modernist and avant-garde styles were absorbed into popular culture as writers and artists turned away from social realism to emphasize the process of artistic creation. Hutchinson explores a range of important writers, from Saul Bellow and Mary McCarthy to Richard Wright and James Baldwin. African American and Jewish novelists critiqued racism and anti-Semitism, women writers pushed back on the misogyny unleashed during the war, and authors such as Gore Vidal and Tennessee Williams reflected a new openness in the depiction of homosexuality. The decade also witnessed an awakening of American environmental and ecological consciousness. Hutchinson argues that despite the individualized experiences depicted in these works, a common belief in art’s ability to communicate the universal in particulars united the most important works of literature and art during the 1940s. Hutchinson’s capacious view of American literary and cultural history masterfully weaves together a wide range of creative and intellectual expression into a sweeping new narrative of this pivotal decade.
Author: Olaf Breidbach Publisher: National Geographic Books ISBN: 3791333275 Category : Art Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
At the nexus of art and science, this dazzling new edition of Ernst Haeckel's first work reintroduces the genius of an enigmatic scientist and passionate observer of the natural world. Although original editions of this book are extremely rare, it is now available for the first time in a paperback edition, beautifully reproducing his drawings and watercolours. While the variety and detail of Haeckel's drawings display an impressive understanding of biological structure, the skill with which Haeckel drew these tiny, aquatic protozoa renders them genuine works of art. This volume features commentary and descriptions of each of the radiolarians from Haeckel's work.
Author: Ron Brown Publisher: Reaktion Books ISBN: 1861896867 Category : Art Languages : en Pages : 448
Book Description
The Art of Suicide is a history of the visual representation of suicide from the ancient world to its decriminalization in the 20th century. After looking at instances of voluntary death in ancient Greece, Ron Brown discusses the contrast between the extraordinary absence of such events in early Christianity and the proliferation of images of biblical suicides in the late medieval era. He emphasizes how differing attitudes to suicide in the early modern world slowly merged, and pays particular attention to the one-time chasm between so-called heroic suicide and self-destruction as a "crying crime". Brown tracks the changes surrounding the perception of suicide into the pivotal Romantic era, with its notions of the "man of feeling", ready to hurl himself into the abyss over a woman or an unfinishable poem. After the First World War, the meaning of death and attitudes towards suicide changed radically, and in time this led to its decriminalization. The 20th century in fact witnessed a growing ambivalence towards suicidal acts, which today are widely regarded either as expressions of a death-wish or as cries for help. Brown concludes with Warhol's picture of Marilyn Monroe and the videos taken by the notorious Dr Kevorkian.
Author: Josh Waitzkin Publisher: Simon and Schuster ISBN: 0743277465 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 291
Book Description
An eight-time national chess champion and world champion martial artist shares the lessons he has learned from two very different competitive arenas, identifying key principles about learning and performance that readers can apply to their life goals. Reprint. 35,000 first printing.
Author: Ernst Haeckel Publisher: Echo Point Books & Media, LLC ISBN: 9781648371851 Category : Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
The exquisite color illustrations of Haeckel's Art Forms in Nature seamlessly blend scientific accuracy with a distinctive Art Nouveau aesthetic. These compelling images stimulate awe in artists, students, and scientists of all ages.
Author: John Paul II Publisher: LiturgyTrainingPublications ISBN: 9781568543383 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 32
Book Description
Meeting House Essays in a series of papers reflecting on the mystery, beauty and practicalities of the place of worship. This popular series was begun in 1991, and each resource focuses on a particular aspect of space, design or materials and how they relate to the liturgy.
Author: Marina Belozerskaya Publisher: Getty Publications ISBN: 0892367857 Category : Art Languages : en Pages : 292
Book Description
Today we associate the Renaissance with painting, sculpture, and architecture—the “major” arts. Yet contemporaries often held the “minor” arts—gem-studded goldwork, richly embellished armor, splendid tapestries and embroideries, music, and ephemeral multi-media spectacles—in much higher esteem. Isabella d’Este, Marchesa of Mantua, was typical of the Italian nobility: she bequeathed to her children precious stone vases mounted in gold, engraved gems, ivories, and antique bronzes and marbles; her favorite ladies-in-waiting, by contrast, received mere paintings. Renaissance patrons and observers extolled finely wrought luxury artifacts for their exquisite craftsmanship and the symbolic capital of their components; paintings and sculptures in modest materials, although discussed by some literati, were of lesser consequence. This book endeavors to return to the mainstream material long marginalized as a result of historical and ideological biases of the intervening centuries. The author analyzes how luxury arts went from being lofty markers of ascendancy and discernment in the Renaissance to being dismissed as “decorative” or “minor” arts—extravagant trinkets of the rich unworthy of the status of Art. Then, by re-examining the objects themselves and their uses in their day, she shows how sumptuous creations constructed the world and taste of Renaissance women and men.
Author: George Hutchinson
Author: Ernst Haeckel
Author: Olaf Breidbach
Author: Ron Brown
Author: Josh Waitzkin
Author: 
Author: Ernst Haeckel
Author: John Paul II
Author: Christian Wiman
Author: Marina Belozerskaya