Heart of Darkness: useful links

A brief overview on the European colonisation of Africa.


A more extended documentary


A great lecture on Heart of Darkness.

Apocalypse Now: Heart of Darkness set in Vietnam...

Here's the full movie.


Often cited as one of the greatest films of all time. Certainly one of the great war movies. All star cast, ridiculous budget and based on Conrad's philosophically challenging book...


Watch on a big screen if you can.


And here, in the documentary of the making of Apocalypse Now, Director Francis Ford Coppola describes the 'anxiety of influence' of making a great movie... a good intro!

Modernism at a glance

Philosophical Foundations

Modernists reacted strongly against the belief that material progress always benefits humanity. The German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer did much to debunk 19th century optimism, and characterized the universe as inherently irrational. Modernists’ questioning of philosophical Rationalism, which took for granted creation's underlying logic, also found support in the writings of Friedrich Nietzsche, whose existentialist philosophy held that reality originated and ended in individual experience. Many Modernists took a dim view of religion, and cited the theories of Charles Darwin as the true natural order. Karl Marx’s theories inspired allegiance among modernists who saw capitalism as destructive and degrading to the human spirit.

Influences in Literature

Modernist literature sought to explode the confines of realism, and utilized strategies like stream of consciousness monologues. The theories of Sigmund Freud, with the emphasis on subconscious motivations, was influential to Modernist writers. The Russian Fyodor Dostoevsky explored his characters' mental travails and spiritual anguish, a focus that inspired Modernist writers such as Knut Hamsun, Marcel Proust and James Joyce. The American poet Walt Whitman revolutionized the concept of poetic form, and his “Leaves of Grass” served as a foundational text for Modernist poetry. French writer Arthur Rimbaud inspired Modernists with his symbolic poems and unconventional, obscene subject matter.

Influences in Art and Architecture

Modernism in the visual arts, often associated with post-World War II Abstract Expressionism, has an extensive pedigree that includes movements like Cubism, Surrealism, Impressionism and Fauvism. These movements can be traced to Edouard Manet, whose experiments in form and color built upon the Pre-Raphaelite’s refutation of realism. Modernist architecture, which includes the Bauhaus group and Brutalist style, sought to dispense with the extravagant indulgences of previous styles. Walter Gropius, the mastermind of the Bauhaus, studied the designs of William Morris, who sought to combine utility with a design aesthetic reflective of the proletarian struggle. Brutalism, embodied in the constructions of Le Corbusier, drew upon Utopian socialism in an effort to bring practical efficiency to urban planning.

Influences in Music

Schopenhauer's ideas had an influence on Richard Wagner and Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, the two composers most responsible for the development of Modernism in music. Rimsky-Korsakov served as the personal instructor of Igor Stravinky, whose “Rites of Spring” stands as one of the most recognizable Modernist compositions. Stravinsky also acknowledged the importance of Wagner, whose bombastic operas embodied the concept of the “total work of art” that Stravinsky himself would elaborate upon. Arnold Schoenberg, the Modernist composer who developed the concepts of atonality and musical minimalism, made his own first experiments in form through interpretations of Wagner’s work.

Prof Brian Cox on time travel - 5 min vid

Relativity and time travel, beautifully illustrated: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-O8lBIcHre0

Macbeth trailer

What do you notice about the portrayal of 1) Macbeth and 2) Lady Macbeth in this new, exciting version of Macbeth?


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RgH_OnrYlCk

Inexplicably cool Waste Land site

http://hedothepolice.org

Modernist Art/Dance/Music/Design/Architecture

Unlike much modernist literature, modernist design was often excited about the changes brought about by technology.


Find out more about what distinguished other types of modernism from literary modernism - and what they all had in common - right here...


Modernist design


Modernist architecture (links needed)


Modernist dance (links needed)


Modernist music (links needed)


Modernist theatre (links needed)


Overview

Modernism in Literature

Read through these sites and make a note of:
- the conventions of Modernist literature
- key modernist texts
- the goal(s) of modernist literature: what did it believe in, and what did it reject?


Modernism and the Modern Novel
Modernism and Rewriting
Modernist conventions in Literature
Modernist features, according to Cliff Notes.

Becket, Godot, Existence

Beckett directs Beckett:
Waiting for Godot Parts 1 and 2




Waiting for Godot, on film (part 1):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXmdTUfsfmI


What Ian McKellan and Patrick Stewart have to say about acting in it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dyKnLGT74TQ














Play (directed by Anthony Minghella):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2QJ0FYE3pw


Endgame:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ok7Vc3jczNg

Modernism context: Jazz

How Jazz made itself up as it went along - 'just like the country that gave it birth':
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=so9XM65vGn8


And this, while it's on iplayer:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b017nf05/gershwins-summertime-the-song-that-conquered-the-world

Why read?

Wonderful summary of the best bits of Susan Sontag's extensive essays on how and why to read, and write, seriously:


http://www.brainpickings.org/2015/03/30/susan-sontag-writing-storytelling-at-the-same-time/

Judi Dench as Lady Macbeth

Here's where she finds out about the witches' prophecy. What tricks does she use on her husband when he first comes home?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xHlngY6Bgk


Here's a bit later, where Macbeth says he's changed his mind. What tricks does she use on him NOW?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAAnAB3A3PQ

Shakespeare and the Metaphysical poets: A04

How Marvell's contemporaries made sense of both the tangible and intangible world around them.


http://crossref-it.info/articles/category/5/the-world-of-shakespeare-and-the-metaphysical-poets-1540-1660

Adam Curtis: The Century of the Self

MUST WATCH: Century of the Self, part 1:
https://vimeo.com/111346364


COULD WATCH: Parts 2, 3 and 4.


If you like this guy as much as I do, look up his other mind-blowing films:


The Power of Nightmares


All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace


Bitter Lake


The Trap: What Happened to our Dream of Freedom?




He's got a blog here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis

Wider reading on the Tempest

Lecture on the Tempest: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EoZClxzMjr4 - skip first few mins until introduction is over.


Full movie with Prospero as a woman: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOxYMKH_URI


Get hold of this: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Shakespeare-Very-Short-Introduction-Introductions/dp/0192802496 and read Germaine Greer's summary of the Tempest - very useful.
   


Also watch Prospero's books - Greenaway's bonkers adaptation - if you can find it.