DOCSLIB.ORG

Waiting for the Barbarians: Essays from the Classics to Pop Culture Free

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Waiting for the Barbarians: Essays from the Classics to Pop Culture Free FREE WAITING FOR THE BARBARIANS: ESSAYS FROM THE CLASSICS TO POP CULTURE PDF Lecturer in the Department of Classics Daniel Mendelsohn | 423 pages | 15 Mar 2014 | NEW YORK REVIEW OF BOOKS | 9781590177136 | English | United Kingdom TOP 17 QUOTES BY DANIEL MENDELSOHN | A-Z Quotes A Waiting for the Barbarians: Essays from the Classics to Pop Culture to The New Yorker and The New York Review of BooksMendelsohn just might be our most irresistible literary critic …Cheerfully pessimistic though he may be, he is never an alarmist…He practices a civilized, soothing form of criticism, his intellect an alembic that purifies, restores calm and historical context…This constitutional temperance gives his prose its legato rhythms, the languorous judgments; he might be a cat toying with his prey. And much of the fun of reading Mendelsohn is his sense of play, his irreverence and unpredictability, his frank emotional responses… He forces the [essay] form in directions Francis Bacon never imagined. Most impressively, he performs this deeper reading across many different art forms… It is a supremely entertaining book. To read it is to sit next a fabulous dinner guest whose comments contain a devastating truth. He is a scrumptious stylist …He writes better movie criticism than most movie critics, better theatre criticism than most theatre critics and better literary criticism than just about anyone… practically every sentence of this book [is] an eye-opener. In the book, his scope includes both the high- and middlebrow. Taken together, the collection offers a sort of defense of the modern age of culture. If a true-blue classicist can engage with the current zeitgeist Waiting for the Barbarians: Essays from the Classics to Pop Culture the full weight of his intellect and without an iota of demoralization, than the rest of us have no excuse. He is already both classicist and mensch. Mendelsohn is a critic who consistently takes his subjects seriously, be they TV shows Mad Men3-D blockbusters Avataror the poems of Rimbaud…Along with perceptive essays on Anne Carson, Jonathan Franzen, Susan Sontag, and more, the collection adds up to a wonderfully eclectic set of musings on the state of contemporary culture and the enduring riches of classical literature. Slider by webdesign. Previous Previous book: An Odyssey. Next Next book: C. Reviewers & Critics: Daniel Mendelsohn of the New York Review of Books | Poets & Writers Goodreads helps you keep track of books you want to read. Want to Read saving…. Want to Read Currently Reading Read. Other editions. Enlarge cover. Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Open Preview See a Problem? Details if other :. Thanks for telling us about the problem. Return to Book Page. Preview — Waiting for the Barbarians by Daniel Mendelsohn. Get A Copy. Hardcoverpages. More Details Other Editions 5. Friend Reviews. To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up. To ask other readers questions about Waiting for the Barbariansplease sign up. Is there violence in the book? Carla No - other than recapitulations of the violent scenes that occur in Greek tragedies and other classics. The essays are often covering quite serious, s …more No - other than recapitulations of the violent scenes that occur in Greek tragedies and other classics. The essays are often covering quite serious, sometimes awful aspects of history - It's a collection of essays on literature and other works of art; it is not a narrative with violent scenes. See 1 question about Waiting for the Barbarians…. Lists with This Book. Community Reviews. Showing Average rating 3. Rating details. More filters. Sort order. Sep 26, Terence rated it really liked it Recommends it for: Lovers of perceptive criticism. Shelves: essay-collectionsliterary- criticisme-books. Why are the streets and squares emptying so rapidly, everyone going home so lost in thought? And some who have just returned from the border say there are no barbarians any longer. They were, those people, a kind of solution. Below, I want to give an abstract of the reviews collected here. And what is that, if not drama? Taymor attempted to combine the classical transformation myth with the modern American version. Her failure was two-fold. First, the two conceptions are incompatible. Where, Waiting for the Barbarians: Essays from the Classics to Pop Culture ancient tales, metamorphosis is a punishment and a humiliation, in the American version, transformation is empowering. Worst of all … the show is melodramatic rather than dramatic …. In her defense, she went only because we were double-dating with her best friend, who was a fan. The film is really rather awful, an opinion shared by Mendelsohn. But he takes this piece of schlock as an opportunity to examine why the Titanic has become a modern myth. It comes down to two things. The second need the Titanic can fill is our perverse desire to see something beautiful destroyed. Never once have you taken courage in your heart to arm with Waiting for the Barbarians: Essays from the Classics to Pop Culture people. The clever games that the Odyssey plays are, in the end, games worth playing. It is this skill at delineating characters through dialogue … that creates the sense of intimacy that his novels have. He stopped writing at the age of 20 because he grew up, and the urgency of rebellion died. In his estimation, separately the two threads work. The difficulty comes when Littell attempts to combine them into one novel. In this way, a literary experience can lead to a profound life experience. He starts out with a beautifully simple subject and verb but then goes off on a tangent that occupies a clause or two before getting to the predicate many of the ellipses in the quotes above are reflections of this. And in his HelenEuripides dramatized a popular myth that claimed the real Helen spent the Trojan War in Egypt, remaining faithful to Menelaus; Paris spirited away a phantom. Ford to name some ST authors or Alan Dean Foster to name a SW author could write their own interpretations without being strait-jacketed. I want to see the phenomenon go mainstream, as they say. View 2 comments. Dec 24, Antigone rated it really liked it Shelves: essays-shorts. You will know Mr. Here are twenty-four of the more recent works split into four categories: Spectacles, Classica, Creative Writing and Private Lives. If you're of a mind to sample a collection of urbane, esoteric and pleasantly sophisticated considerations of culture at the cusp of the new millennium - here's a very agile mind at work. Jul 04, Hank Stuever rated it liked it. An immersive experience for people who try to write intelligent cultural criticism that includes me as well as those who enjoy reading it. For popular culture fans, there's plenty here to think about; the middle section of essays on classics will be a chore, but a worthy one. It's difficult to quibble, since Daniel Mendelsohn could write circles around most of us, but I'm not sure every piece here was meant to live between hardcovers. Some of the insights he lands on are eloquently demonstrate An immersive experience for people who try to write intelligent cultural criticism that includes me as well as those who enjoy reading it. Some of the insights he lands on are eloquently demonstrated, but also make him seem a little like Captain Obvious, explaining things for an audience that may not even own a television or ever darken the door of a cineplex, but, just as likely, have seen the movie or watched the show and are right there with him. I don't think he always has a handle on writing for both crowds, so there's a tone of lecturing that creeps in. It sometimes feels like he's writing mainly for himself. Which, in a way, we all are. Aug 24, Kyle Muntz rated it it was amazing. I never imagined I would read a collection of book reviews for pleasure, but Mendelsohn is such a good writer. The section on the classics in particular is amazing. Mar 06, Trish rated it really liked it Shelves: classicsessaysliteraturemythologynonfictionhistorycriticism. March 22, To say I enjoyed this book does not capture my experience with it. I struggled, I laughed, I ruminated, I was awakened. Mendelsohn wields a scalpel with care and precision. His essay on Franzen made me think of divorce: that is, I imagine! A writer must feel pain and pride in equal measure when their work comes to the attention Waiting for the Barbarians: Essays from the Classics to Pop Culture Mendelsohn. Mendelsohn might be an acquired taste, but there is something necessary here. Most of it went over my Waiting for the Barbarians: Essays from the Classics to Pop Culture, but if I really tried, sometimes a point would register. One gets some satisfaction from that. I am not qualified to Waiting for the Barbarians: Essays from the Classics to Pop Culture this Waiting for the Barbarians: Essays from the Classics to Pop Culture, but I drew pleasure from knowing there are people like Mendelsohn out there, who can make connections between artists, thinkers, and writers of the past and the things we do and think today. At least one thing I do owe Mendelsohn: on the first page of his Foreword, he introduces to me a poem written by Constantine Cavafy called "Waiting for the Barbarians. Orators cease speechmaking, senators stop legislating, the emperor sits his throne dressed in his silks and jewels, waiting. They wait and wait, dressed to the teeth and murmuring anxiously, until it becomes clear the "barbarians" won't be arriving as planned.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Affective Strategies in Novels of the Spanish
    Dr Stuart Davis, Girton College, Cambridge Reading beyond Cognitive Meaning: Affective Strategies in Novels of the Spanish “Memory Boom” The twenty-first century “memory boom” in Spain has resulted in a plethora of writing and fictions in which the civil war and the early years of Franco’s dictatorship feature prominently. Studies of these works have addressed representations of memory and trauma, recognizing how the authors reanimate the past and narrate stories of conflict and loss to a readership, distanced from the historical events. This essay explores four texts, identifying the strategies that have shaped their circulation in the current affective economy. Analysis pays particular attention to text, but also explores the image as formative in the reading experience. Durante el "boom de la memoria" del siglo XXI en España se han publicado una gran cantidad de libros y ficciones que han utilizado como fondo narrativo la guerra civil o los primeros años de la dictadura franquista. Los análisis de estas obras han abordado sus representaciones de las memorias y el trauma, reconociendo la tarea de los autores en recrear el pasado y en narrar a los lectores, lejanos de los acontecimientos históricos, historias del conflicto y de las pérdidas personales. Este trabajo examina cuatro textos, identificando las estrategias que han influido su circulación en una economía afectiva actual. El análisis presta atención al texto, pero también explora como la imagen informa la lectura de estas historias. During the recent “memory boom” of writing concerning the Spanish civil war and Francoist dictatorship many books have been sold and critical ink spilt as we examine the nature of the representation of the period, the recovery of memory and the ongoing need to engage with the trauma and repression of recent Spanish historical events.
    [Show full text]
  • Juan E. De Castro. Mario Vargas Llosa. Public Intellectual in Neoliberal Latin America
    Juan E. De Castro. Mario Vargas Llosa. Public Intellectual in Neoliberal Latin America. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2011. Print. 179 Pp. ──────────────────────────────── CARLOS AGUIRRE UNIVERSITY OF OREGON Mario Vargas Llosa, one of Latin America’s most important writers and intellectuals and the recipient of, among numerous other awards, the 2010 Nobel Prize in literature, is not only the author of an admirable corpus of novels, theater plays, and essays on literary criticism, but also somebody that has been at the center on countless political and literary controversies ever since he came into the literary and political spotlight in 1962 when he won the Biblioteca Breve award for his novel Time of the Hero at the age of twenty-six: the novel was received with great hostility in his home country, Peru, where prominent members of the military accused him of being a Communist and a traitor; in 1967, when he won the Rómulo Gallegos prize for his novel The Green House, he engaged in a dispute (at that time private) with Cuban officials such as Haydeé Santamaría who allegedly wanted him to make a fake donation of the cash prize to Che Guevara’s guerrilla movements; in 1971, he publicly and loudly denounced the Cuban government after the imprisonment and public recounting of Heberto Padilla and other writers accused of counter-revolutionary activities; in 1974, he criticized the confiscation of media in Peru by a military regime that he had hitherto supported and became the subject of a fierce polemic in his country; in 1976, he was
    [Show full text]
  • 2016 Fiction Longlist Release FINAL
    RELEASE: SEPTEMBER 15, 2016 Contact: Sherrie Young 9:30 a.m. EDT National Book Foundation (212) 685-0261 [email protected] 2016 NATIONAL BOOK AWARDS LONGLIST FOR FICTION The ten contenders for the National Book Award for Fiction. New York, NY (September 15, 2016) – The National Book Foundation today announced the Longlist for the 2016 National Book Award for Fiction. Finalists will be revealed on October 13. (Please note that this date was originally set for October 12, but has been changed to acknowledge Yom Kippur.) The Fiction Longlist includes a former National Book Award Winner for Young People’s Literature and two titles by former National Book Award Finalists for Fiction. The list also includes three Pulitzer Prize finalists. One title is currently shortlisted for the 2016 Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction and another was recently selected for Oprah’s Book Club. There is one debut novel on the list. The year’s Longlist is told from and about locations all around the world. Authors hail from and titles explore locations that range from Alaska, New Delhi, Bulgaria, and even a reimagined United States. Colson Whitehead’s Underground Railroad follows Cora, a fugitive slave, as she escapes the south on a literal underground railroad in a speculative historical fiction that reckons with the true legacy of liberation and escape. In a very different journey, former Pulitzer Prize finalist Lydia Millet’s Sweet Lamb of Heaven follows a mother as she traverses the country with her daughter, fleeing her powerful husband. What Belongs to You, a debut novel by Garth Greenwell, finds its American narrator in Sofia, Bulgaria attempting to reconcile the shame and desire bound up in his own sexuality.
    [Show full text]
  • Enthymema XXIII 2019 the Sentence Is Most Important: Styles of Engagement in William T. Vollmann's Fictions
    Enthymema XXIII 2019 The Sentence Is Most Important: Styles of Engagement in William T. Vollmann’s Fictions Christopher K. Coffman Boston University Abstract – William T. Vollmann frequently asserts that his ideal reader will appreci- ate the functionality and beauty of his sentences. This article begins by taking such claims seriously, and draws on both literary and rhetorical stylistics to explore some of the many ways that his texts answer to his intention to find “the right sentence for the right job.” In particular, this article argues that Vollmann’s stylistic decisions are most notable when they most directly satisfy his effort to produce texts that fos- ter empathetic knowledge, serve truth, resist abusive power, and encourage charita- ble action. Extended close analyses of passages from an early and from a mid-ca- reer text (The Rainbow Stories and Europe Central) illustrate Vollmann’s con- sistency across two decades of his career regarding choices in the areas of figura- tion (including schemes and tropes of comparison, repetition, balance, naming, and amplification), grammar, deixis, allusion, and other compositional strategies. Partic- ular attention is paid to passages that display the stylistic mechanisms underlying Vollmann’s negotiation of his texts’ moral qualities, including both the moral con- tent of the worlds represented in the texts, and the moral responsibility the texts bear with regard to their audience. The results of my analyses demonstrate that Vollmann typically prioritizes openness, critique, and dialogue not only in terms of incident and character, but also on the scale of the phrase, clause, and sentence. Ultimately, this article shows how Vollmann’s sentences serve his declared inten- tions and allow readers to recognize compatibilities between Vollmann’s works and the characteristic features of post-postmodernist writing in general.
    [Show full text]
  • Susan Sontag Papers, Circa 1907-2009 LSC.0612
    http://oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/kt2489n7qw No online items Susan Sontag papers, circa 1907-2009 LSC.0612 Finding aid prepared by Lorain Wang and Catherine Lee, 2002; revised by Lauren McDaniel, 2008; revised by Mitchell Erzinger and Lori Dedeyan, 2014; revised by Yvonne Eadon, Patricia Ciccone, and Cheryl Cordingley, 2018-2019. UCLA Library Special Collections Online finding aid last updated 2020 November 4. Room A1713, Charles E. Young Research Library Box 951575 Los Angeles, CA 90095-1575 [email protected] URL: https://www.library.ucla.edu/special-collections Susan Sontag papers, circa LSC.0612 1 1907-2009 LSC.0612 Contributing Institution: UCLA Library Special Collections Title: Susan Sontag papers Creator: Sontag, Susan, 1933-2004. Identifier/Call Number: LSC.0612 Physical Description: 180 Linear Feet(283 boxes, 68 oversize boxes, 1 oversize folder, 2 hard drives.) Physical Description: 7.7 Gigabytes(64,461 digital files.) Date (inclusive): circa 1907-2009 Date (bulk): circa 1933-2004 Abstract: Susan Sontag (1933-2004) was an American writer, director, and political activist. She authored numerous essays, short stories, novels, and non-fiction books, as well as films and plays that she also directed in the United States and abroad. The recipient of many honors and awards throughout her life, Sontag's works have been translated into over thirty languages. The contents of the Susan Sontag Papers reflect her intelligence, energy, and the seamless integration of her wide-ranging interests in her work and life. In addition to notes, research, and manuscript material related to her writing, theatre, and film projects, the collection includes the following: personal and professional correspondence; journals; schoolwork; teaching material; ephemera and correspondence related to her public appearances, institutional involvement, and political activism; publicity and press; highlights from her library; personal and professional photographs; personal materials including calendars and notes; along with digital materials.
    [Show full text]
  • 2021 Creative Writing Exam Reading Lists
    2021 Creative Writing Exam Reading Lists Fiction Kate Bernheimer, “Fairy Tale is Form, Form is Fairy Tale,” from The Writer’s Notebook: Craft Essays from Tin House Eudora Welty, The Eye of the Story Susan Sontag, “On Style” from Against Interpretation Donald Barthleme, “Not-Knowing” from Not Knowing: The Essays and Interviews of Donald Barthelme John C. Gardner, The Art of Fiction George Plimpton and Margaret Atwood, Women Writers at Work: The Paris Review Interviews, 3rd edition Francine Prose, Reading Like A Writer Jane Smiley, 13 Ways of Looking at the Novel James Baldwin, “The Art of Fiction Interview. No 78” In Paris Review Samuel Delany, About Writing Raymond Carver, ed. American Short Story Masterpieces Anthony Doerr and Heidi Pitlor, Best American Short Stories 2019 Laura Furman, The O. Henry PriZe Stories 100th Anniversary Edition (2019) Ben Marcus, ed. New American Stories Nonfiction/Memoir Adrienne Rich, “When We Dead Awaken”, in On Lies, Secrets, and Silence Jhumpa Laniri, In Other Words Claudia Rankine, CitiZen bell hooks, Remembered Rapture David Foster Wallace, “Consider the Lobster” Charles Johnson, “I Call Myself an Artist” in I Call Myself an Artist, edited by Rudolph P. Byrd Margot Singer and Nicole Walker, eds. Bending Genre “The Invention of Autobiography,” in Patricia Hampl, I Could Tell You Stories Karen Tei Yamashita, Letters to Memory Ta-Nehisi Coates, Between The World and Me Roland Barthes, RB RB Michael Downs, “Me, Myself, I: Idiosyncrasy and Structure in Nonfiction” in Triquarterly Jesmyn Ward, Men We Reaped Ander Monson, “The Designed Essay: Design as Essay” Jonathan Lethem, “The Ecstasy of Influence” Philip Lopate, editor, The Art of the Personal Essay John D’Agata, ed.
    [Show full text]
  • A NEW DIRECTION for CHICK LIT by Rachel
    ABSTRACT CONSCIOUSNESS-RAISING: A NEW DIRECTION FOR CHICK LIT by Rachel R. Rode Schaefer Focusing on novels published outside of the popular market, this thesis seeks to draw attention to work being published under the label of chick lit that subverts standard chick lit genre conventions. While much work has been and is being done that concentrates on popular market chick lit, such as Helen Fielding’s Bridget Jones’s Diary (1996) and Candace Bushnell’s Sex and the City (1996), only cursory attention is being given to transnational, minority, and religious chick lit. This thesis considers chick lit within the larger history of women’s writing in order to contextualize the genre. Since chick lit has been connected to both feminism and post-feminism in its origins, consideration of this genre as a feminist genre focuses attention on how chick lit functions as a consciousness-raising genre. CONSCIOUSNESS-RAISING: A NEW DIRECTION FOR CHICK LIT A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of Miami University In partial fulfillment of Master of Arts Department of English by Rachel R. Rode Schaefer Miami University Oxford, Ohio 2015 Advisor_________________________________ Dr. Madelyn Detloff Reader__________________________________ Dr. Mary Jean Corbett Reader__________________________________ Dr. Theresa Kulbaga © Rachel R. Rode Schaefer 2015 Table of Contents Introduction: Reading Chick Lit as Consciousness-Raising Novel ................................................ 1 Project Summary ........................................................................................................................
    [Show full text]
  • Addition to Summer Letter
    May 2020 Dear Student, You are enrolled in Advanced Placement English Literature and Composition for the coming school year. Bowling Green High School has offered this course since 1983. I thought that I would tell you a little bit about the course and what will be expected of you. Please share this letter with your parents or guardians. A.P. Literature and Composition is a year-long class that is taught on a college freshman level. This means that we will read college level texts—often from college anthologies—and we will deal with other materials generally taught in college. You should be advised that some of these texts are sophisticated and contain mature themes and/or advanced levels of difficulty. In this class we will concentrate on refining reading, writing, and critical analysis skills, as well as personal reactions to literature. A.P. Literature is not a survey course or a history of literature course so instead of studying English and world literature chronologically, we will be studying a mix of classic and contemporary pieces of fiction from all eras and from diverse cultures. This gives us an opportunity to develop more than a superficial understanding of literary works and their ideas. Writing is at the heart of this A.P. course, so you will write often in journals, in both personal and researched essays, and in creative responses. You will need to revise your writing. I have found that even good students—like you—need to refine, mature, and improve their writing skills. You will have to work diligently at revising major essays.
    [Show full text]
  • Form and Ideology in Jonathan Franzen's Fiction
    Universidad de Córdoba Departamento de Filología Inglesa y Alemana The Romance of Community: Form and Ideology in Jonathan Franzen’s Fiction Tesis doctoral presentada por Jesús Blanco Hidalga Dirigida por Dr. Julián Jiménez Heffernan Dra. Paula Martín Salván VºBº Directores de la Tesis Doctoral Fdo. El Doctorando Dr. Julián Jiménez Heffernan Jesús Blanco Hidalga Dra. Paula Martín Salván Córdoba, 2015 TITULO: The Romance of Community: Form and Ideology in Jonathan Frazen's Fiction AUTOR: Jesús Blanco Hidalga © Edita: Servicio de Publicaciones de la Universidad de Córdoba. 2015 Campus de Rabanales Ctra. Nacional IV, Km. 396 A 14071 Córdoba www.uco.es/publicaciones [email protected] Index: Description of contents: Aim, scope and structure of this work………………………...5 1. Introduction………………………………………………………………………….14 1.1. Justification of this work…………………………………………………...14 1.2. The narrative of conversion………………………………………………..15 1.3. Theoretical coordinates and critical procedures…………………………...24 1.3.1. Socially symbolic narratives……………………………….……..26 1.3.2. The question of realism: clarifying terms………………….……..33 1.3.3. Realism, contingency and the weight of inherited forms………...35 1.3.4. Realism, totality and late capitalism……………………….……..39 1.3.5. The problem of perspective………………………………………43 1.4. Community issues………………………………………………………….48 2. The critical reception of Jonathan Franzen’s novels………………………………...53 2.1. Introduction: a controversial novelist.……………………………………..53 2.2. Early fiction: The Twenty-Seventh City and Strong Motion……………….56 2.3. The Corrections and the Oprahgate……………………………………….60 2.4. Hybrid modes and postmodern uncertainties……………………...………66 2.5. The art of engagement…..………………………………………...……….75 2.6. Freedom as the latest Great American Novel?.............................................81 2.7. Latest critical references…………………………………………………...89 2.8.
    [Show full text]
  • Announcing a VIEW from the BRIDGE
    FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, PLEASE “One of the most powerful productions of a Miller play I have ever seen. By the end you feel both emotionally drained and unexpectedly elated — the classic hallmark of a great production.” - The Daily Telegraph “To say visionary director Ivo van Hove’s production is the best show in the West End is like saying Stonehenge is the current best rock arrangement in Wiltshire; it almost feels silly to compare this pure, primal, colossal thing with anything else on the West End. A guileless granite pillar of muscle and instinct, Mark Strong’s stupendous Eddie is a force of nature.” - Time Out “Intense and adventurous. One of the great theatrical productions of the decade.” -The London Times DIRECT FROM TWO SOLD-OUT ENGAGEMENTS IN LONDON YOUNG VIC’S OLIVIER AWARD-WINNING PRODUCTION OF ARTHUR MILLER’S “A VIEW FROM THE BRIDGE” Directed by IVO VAN HOVE STARRING MARK STRONG, NICOLA WALKER, PHOEBE FOX, EMUN ELLIOTT, MICHAEL GOULD IS COMING TO BROADWAY THIS FALL PREVIEWS BEGIN WEDNESDAY EVENING, OCTOBER 21 OPENING NIGHT IS THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 12 AT THE LYCEUM THEATRE Direct from two completely sold-out engagements in London, producers Scott Rudin and Lincoln Center Theater will bring the Young Vic’s critically-acclaimed production of Arthur Miller’s A VIEW FROM THE BRIDGE to Broadway this fall. The production, which swept the 2015 Olivier Awards — winning for Best Revival, Best Director, and Best Actor (Mark Strong) —will begin previews Wednesday evening, October 21 and open on Thursday, November 12 at the Lyceum Theatre, 149 West 45 Street.
    [Show full text]
  • The PEN International Stage & Screen Circle
    ‘PEN International has traditionally been a place where great artists of stage and screen -Thornton Wilder, Maurice Maeterlinck, Arthur Miller, Ronald Harwood, Octavio Paz and Harold Pinter- have fought for freedom of expression the world over. Today, as even a mobile phone can be a movie camera, we are able to bear witness to human rights violations as never before. In these times, more than ever, PEN defends playwrights, screenwriters and filmmakers who are censored, silenced and jailed’ – JENNIFER CLEMENT, PEN INTERNATIONAL PRESIDENT ‘I consider freedom of expression the most important cause that PEN supports. Without freedom of expression we are lost’ – RONALD HARWOOD, PEN INTERNATIONAL PRESIDENT EMERITUS ‘My respect for this organisation has no borders…PEN has been so fierce, so consistent and ferocious in its efforts that it is hard to ignore their worldwide impact.’ The PEN – TONI MORRISON, PEN INTERNATIONAL VICE PRESIDENT International For more information contact [email protected] Stage & Screen Cover image: PEN International President Emeritus Arthur Miller and Marilyn Monroe arrive in London for the premier of film The Prince and the Showgirl with Laurence Olivier. Photo by The Print Collector/Getty Images. PEN International is a registered UK charity under the name International P. E. N. Circle Our charity number is 1117088. Who Stage and We Are Screen Circle Although PEN’s membership has always included advocates from the stage and PEN International and the stage and screen worlds have been interwined for almost screen, we are also increasingly fighting for the freedom of playwrights, directors and one hundered years. One of PEN’s founding members, along with H.G Wells, was screenwriters: George Bernard Shaw.
    [Show full text]
  • Two Tendencies Beyond Realism in Arthur Miller's Dramatic Works
    Inês Evangelista Marques 2º Ciclo de Estudos em Estudos Anglo-Americanos, variante de Literaturas e Culturas The Intimate and the Epic: Two Tendencies beyond Realism in Arthur Miller’s Dramatic Works A critical study of Death of a Salesman, A View from the Bridge, After the Fall and The American Clock 2013 Orientador: Professor Doutor Rui Carvalho Homem Coorientador: Professor Doutor Carlos Azevedo Classificação: Ciclo de estudos: Dissertação/relatório/Projeto/IPP: Versão definitiva 2 Abstract Almost 65 years after the successful Broadway run of Death of a Salesman, Arthur Miller is still deemed one of the most consistent and influential playwrights of the American dramatic canon. Even if his later plays proved less popular than the early classics, Miller’s dramatic output has received regular critical attention, while his long and eventful life keeps arousing the biographers’ curiosity. However, most of the academic works on Miller’s dramatic texts are much too anchored on a thematic perspective: they study the plays as deconstructions of the American Dream, as a rebuke of McCarthyism or any kind of political persecution, as reflections on the concepts of collective guilt and denial in relation to traumatizing events, such as the Great Depression or the Holocaust. Especially within the Anglo-American critical tradition, Miller’s plays are rarely studied as dramatic objects whose performative nature implies a certain range of formal specificities. Neither are they seen as part of the 20th century dramatic and theatrical attempts to overcome the canons of Realism. In this dissertation, I intend, first of all, to frame Miller’s dramatic output within the American dramatic tradition.
    [Show full text]