DOCSLIB.ORG

New Skin for the Old Ceremony: Ritual in Post-War American Existentialism

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
New Skin for the Old Ceremony: Ritual in Post-War American Existentialism NEW SKIN FOR THE OLD CEREMONY: RITUAL IN POST-WAR AMERICAN EXISTENTIALISM by MICHIAL FARMER (Under the Direction of Reginald McKnight) ABSTRACT This dissertation will examine the role of the religious impulse, belief, and ritual in American fiction—specifically that fiction heavily influenced by existentialist philosophy— in the decades following World War II. The six writers I examine—Saul Bellow, J.D. Salinger, Flannery O’Connor, John Updike, Walker Percy, and Frederick Buechner— typically follow one of two routes as regards ritual and belief: Either they present the ritual as an end unto itself, with belief as an unnecessary afterthought, or else their characters have a deep and personal faith in God that cannot be expressed through the potentially outdated rites of traditional Judaism and Christianity. In the former scenario, the ritual remains intact, even though belief has rotted away beneath it; in the latter, belief is as strong as ever, but the rituals have had to change to keep from destroying it. An examination of the ways fiction writers navigate these issues will tell us important things about human beings’ relationship to religion, ritual, and belief. INDEX WORDS: Existentialism, Judaism, Christianity, ritual, Saul Bellow, J.D. Salinger, Flannery O’Connor, John Updike, Walker Percy, Frederick Buechner NEW SKIN FOR THE OLD CEREMONY: RITUAL IN POST-WAR AMERICAN EXISTENTIALISM by MICHIAL FARMER B.A., Toccoa Falls College, 2004 M.A., University of Nebraska-Omaha, 2007 A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of The University of Georgia in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY ATHENS, GA 2013 © 2013 Michial Farmer All Rights Reserved NEW SKIN FOR THE OLD CEREMONY: RITUAL IN POSTWAR AMERICAN EXISTENTIALISM by MICHIAL FARMER Major Professor: Reginald McKnight Committee: Douglas Anderson Hugh Ruppersburg Electronic Version Approved: Maureen Grasso Dean of the Graduate School The University of Georgia May 2013 iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Dedicated to the memory of Russell Owens, who generously gave me his library and who demonstrated how a Christian existentialist lives in grace, dignity, and kindness. The world is a little colder for his absence from it. This project would not be possible without the support of my wife, Victoria Reynolds Farmer, who always believed that I would finish it eventually—and wouldn’t let me give up on it. I love you. Thanks also to my colleagues, former colleagues, students, and former students at Crown College, who knew when to ask me how it was coming along and when to keep their questions to themselves. I was foolish to try to take on this project while teaching a full course load—but I wouldn’t trade my experiences with you for anything. Thanks to my committee for their conversations and suggestions; especially thanks to Reginald McKnight, who provided the encouragement I needed to finish the project. Finally, thanks to my friends and partners at The Christian Humanist Podcast, who always push me in directions I don’t see coming and who have enriched my intellectual and spiritual lives simply by being who they are: models of Aristotelian friendship. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS…………………………………………………………………..iv CHAPTER 1 EXISTENTIALISM AND THE RELIGIOUS IMPULSE…………………...…….1 2 ‘LONG LIVE REGIMENTATION’: SAUL BELLOW’S MODERN RITUALS……………………………………………………………………... 14 Stalemate: Dangling Man……………………………………………………... 17 Checkmate: Henderson the Rain King………………………………………... 34 3 THE NEW AGNOSTICS AND J.D. SALINGER’S SPIRITUAL SPECIFICITY………………………………………………………………… 54 4 ‘NEVER THE RIGHT FOOD’: THE PHYSICAL AND SPIRITUAL WORLDS IN FLANNERY O’CONNOR’S ‘WISE BLOOD’ AND JOHN UPDIKE’S ‘RABBIT, RUN’…………………………………………………. 79 Wise Blood: Breaking the Spell………………………………………………. 82 Rabbit, Run: Remaking the Spell……………………………………………... 99 5 EROS IN WALKER PERCY’S ‘THE LAST GENTLEMAN’………………… 112 6 THE MOVE TO AGAPE IN ‘THE SECOND COMING’………………………148 7 ‘SEE ME! SEE ME!’: VIRGINITY, CURIOSITY, STASIS, AND ATHEISM IN FREDERICK BUECHNER’S ‘LION COUNTRY’……………………... 179 WORKS CITED……………………………………………………………………………210 1 CHAPTER 1 EXISTENTIALISM AND THE RELIGIOUS IMPULSE “Who in her lovely slip? Who by barbituate? Who in these realms of love? Who by something blunt? And who by avalanche? Who by powder? Who for his greed? Who for his hunger? And who shall I say is calling?” - Leonard Cohen, “Who by Fire” The religions of the book have practiced theodicy as long as they have existed. Job, the oldest book in the Hebrew Bible, attempts to reconcile a loving God with one man’s shattered world, and the conclusion it comes to amounts to a big question mark hanging over the issue. Job, having lost his children, his property, and his physical health, endures the unsatisfactory explanations his friends offer up for several dozen chapters and then demands—quite reasonably, in the eyes of the modern reader, if not the ancient Hebrews— an explanation from his God. The answer is not what he expected: God descends from heaven in a whirlwind and barrages Job with questions: Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without knowledge? Gird up now thy loins like a man; for I will demand of thee, and answer thou me. Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? declare, if thou hast understanding. Who hath laid the measures thereof, if thou knowest? or who hath stretched the line upon it? (Job 38:2-5, KJV) God continues in this fashion for 124 more verses, until Job can only apologize for questioning the One from Whom “no thought can be withholden” (42:2). The rather 2 unpleasant moral of the story seems to be that human beings have no business conducting theodicies, that instead they must put their faith in a God who could at any moment allow them to suffer atrocities they do not deserve to undergo. The twentieth century is rich with such atrocities, often on a staggeringly global stage, and religious believers are apt to feel like Job’s friends watching something like the Holocaust unfurl. What theodicy can survive something so horrible? What faith can survive? What explanation can possibly be given? Did God and Satan have a deal for the lives of every man, woman, and child at Auschwitz? Were the gas chambers and the mass graves part of a chess game on a cosmic scale? The pawns in the game recoiled at the thought: There is a story that one day at Auschwitz a group of Jews put God on trial. They charged him with cruelty and betrayal. Like Job they found no consolation in the usual answers to the problem of evil and suffering in the midst of this current obscenity. They could find no excuse for God, no extenuating circumstances, so they found him guilty and, presumably, worthy of death. (Armstrong, History 376) And why not? How many of the millions of Jews sent to Auschwitz would, after all, escape to tell the tale? Job may have received a new family and new wealth in return for his much- vaunted patience, but that did little to soothe the terror of his sons and daughters, torn to pieces by the whirlwind. God might be interested in building heaven on the tears of the destroyed, but one hardly faults Dostoevsky’s Ivan Karamazov for his refusal to countenance such a world. “It’s not God that I don’t accept,” he tells his saintly brother Alyosha, after a chapter full of description of the most horrible abuses ever committed. “Only I most respectfully return Him the ticket” (Brothers 226). Can an honest man do anything else? 3 So it is hard to blame the Auschwitz prisoners for convicting and sentencing God. But what happened after the trial is even more interesting: “The Rabbi pronounced the verdict. Then he looked up and said that the trial was over: it was time for the evening prayer” (Armstrong, History 376). At this point, we see clearly and dramatically that ritual and rite can exist separately from belief and faith. Immediately after God’s trial and execution at Auschwitz, the hangmen knelt and prayed the prayers written to God. Judaism, then, survived the Holocaust, even if God’s survival is up in the air. The Law of Moses made it to 1945, even if the Lawgiver suffocated in the clouds of Zyklon B. Judaism thus ends up being something beyond a religion, at least in as much as a religion involves faith in a higher power; the ritual itself defines a certain sort of Judaism after the Holocaust. This division is most visible in the largely American movement called Reconstructionist Judaism, which Rebecca T. Alpert and Jacob J. Staub call “Perhaps the only truly indigenous attempt to solve the problem of modernity for American Jewry” (2-3). The movement was spearheaded by Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan in the first third of the twentieth century but picked up a good deal of steam after World War II. Its central innovation comes in its definition of Judaism not as a religion or a culture but as a civilization; this definition encompasses religious faith, nationality, and ethnic identity but substantially broadens the traditional definition of what it means to be Jewish. As Alpert and Staub note, the “civilization” definition of Judaism suggests a cultural totality and includes “art, culture, philosophy, language, law, ethics, celebrations, patterns of eating and dressing, and sancta” (10). Under this schema, the specifics of doctrine become far less important, and Reconstructionist Jews are free to conceive of God in new ways: 4 Although religion is paramount in the Reconstructionist definition of Jewish civilization, conspicuously absent from our definition of Judaism is any mention of God. This is no accident. Reconstructionists believe that it is the Jewish people that is the constant which runs through all the various stages in the evolution of Jewish civilization.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Surpass Shelf List
    Beth Sholom B'Nai Israel Shelf List Barcode Call Author Title Cost 1001502 Daily prayer book = : Ha-Siddur $0.00 ha-shalem / translated and annotated with an introduction by Philip Birnbaum. 1000691 Documents on the Holocaust : $0.00 selected sources on the destruction of the Jews of Germany and Austria, Poland, and the Soviet Union / edited by Yitzhak Arad, Yisrael Gutman, Abraham Margaliot. 1001830 Explaining death to children / $0.00 Edited by Earl A. Grollman. 1003811 In the tradition : an anthology $0.00 of young Black writers / edited by Kevin Powell and Ras Baraka. 1003812 In the tradition : an anthology $0.00 of young Black writers / edited by Kevin Powell and Ras Baraka. 1002040 Jewish art and civilization / $0.00 editor-in-chief: Geoffrey Wigoder. 1001839 The Jews / edited by Louis $0.00 Finkelstein. 56 The last butterfly $0.00 [videorecording] / Boudjemaa Dahmane et Jacques Methe presentent ; Cinema et Communication and Film Studio Barrandov with Filmexport Czechoslovakia in association with HTV International Ltd. ; [The Blum Group and Action Media Group 41 The magician of Lublin $0.00 [videorecording] / Cannon Video. 1001486 My people's Passover Haggadah : $0.00 traditional texts, modern commentaries / edited by Lawrence A. Hoffman and David Arnow. 1001487 My people's Passover Haggadah : $0.00 traditional texts, modern commentaries / edited by Lawrence A. Hoffman and David Arnow. 1003430 The Prophets (Nevi'im) : a new $0.00 trans. of the Holy Scriptures according to the Masoretic text. Second section. 1001506 Seder K'riat Hatorah (the Torah $0.00 1/8/2019 Surpass Page 1 Beth Sholom B'Nai Israel Shelf List Barcode Call Author Title Cost service) / edited by Lawrence A.
    [Show full text]
  • Introduction Daniel Walden
    introduction Daniel Walden Chaim Potok was a world-class writer and scholar, a Conservative Jew who wrote from and about his tradition and the confl icts between observance and acculturation. With a plain, straightforward style, his novels were set against the moral, spiritual, and intellectual currents of the twentieth century. His characters thought about modernity and wrestled with the core-to-core cul- tural confrontations they experienced when modernity clashed with faith. Potok was able to communicate with millions of people of many religious beliefs all over the world, because, unlike his major predecessors, he wrote from the inside, inclusively. Beginning with Th e Chosen and continuing through Th e Promise, My Name Is Asher Lev, Th e Gift of Asher Lev, Th e Book of Lights, and Davita’s Harp, Potok wrote very American novels. Th ey were understandable and attractive to one and all. As Sheldon Grebstein put it, referring to Th e Chosen, a run- away best seller, the dream of success played out in an improbable but possi- ble “only in America” way, demonstrating that “people can still make good through hard work, . integrity, and dedication,” if also at the cost of occa- sional alienation. Refusing to ignore modern thought, Potok was led to a crisis of faith, which he resolved by embracing both modernity and observant Judaism. In his view, Judaism was a tradition integrating into the American culture, not opposed to it. He kept his focus on working out his characters’ identity as American. Th rough his novels, Potok was a major voice in American literature be cause he was the fi rst Jewish American novelist to open up the Jewish expe- rience to a mass audience, to make that world familiar and accessible as the outside world increasingly became willing to acknowledge that Jews are a multiethnic, multiracial, and multireligious people.
    [Show full text]
  • THE MEXICAN FILM BULLETIN Volume 21 Number 1 (Jan-Feb 2015) Tthhee Mmeexxiiccaann Ffiillmm Bbuulllleettiinn Volume 21 Number 1
    THE MEXICAN FILM BULLETIN Volume 21 Number 1 (Jan-Feb 2015) TThhee MMeexxiiccaann FFiillmm bbuulllleettiinn Volume 21 number 1 January-february 2015 21 years!! st Francisco curiel, 1950-2014 Yes, The Mexican Film Bulletin begins its 21 Francisco Curiel Defosse, a composer and the consecutive year of publication. Where did the time son of director Federico Curiel, died on 27 December go? Thanks to long-time readers and “welcome” to 2014 after suffering a heart attack. Curiel was born those who’ve just discovered us. in Mexico City in February 1950. He appeared in several films as a boy, most notably in Santo contra el rey del Ninón Sevilla, 1929-2015 crimen Dancer-actress Ninón Sevilla, one of the most (1961), popular stars of the rumbera era in Mexico, died in a directed by Mexico City hospital his father; in on 1 January 2015; this movie, she was 85 years old. Francisco Emilia Pérez (at left in Castellanos was born the photo, in Havana, Cuba in with November 1929. Augusto She performed in her Benedico and René Cardona Sr.) played “Roberto de native land as a la Llata,” who would grow up to become El Santo. chorus girl and In later years, Curiel became a songwriter, and his dancer, and came to music can be heard in several films, including the Mexico in the 1940s documentary about his father, entitled Pichirilo under the auspices of (2002). This movie was directed by Francisco Fernando Cortés. Curiel’s son Álvaro Curiel, a TV and film director. Sevilla made her screen debut in 1946, and within a short time was elevated to starring roles in films produced by Pedro fidel garriga, 1948-2014 A.
    [Show full text]
  • The Significance of Martin Buber´S Philosophy of Dialogue And
    The significance of Martin Buber’s philosophy of dialogue and suffering in the overcoming of ‘core-to-core confrontation’ in Chaim Potok’s The Chosen Gustavo SÁNCHEZ CANALES Universidad Complutense de Madrid [email protected] Recibido: 22/3/2010 Aceptado: 6/05/2010 ABSTRACT One of the central issues in Chaim Potok’s works is what he calls ‘core-to-core [culture] confrontation’, that is to say the clash between the core of an individual’s world and the core of another wider world. Specifically, in The Chosen (1967), this confrontation occurs when the core of Danny Saunder’s worldthe son of an ultra-conservative Hasidic leader called Reb Saunderscollides with the core of a more general world in which he livesWestern secular culture. This clash, which results in the confrontation of Reb Saunders and Danny, is largely due to the Reb’s opposition to his son’s wish to study psychoanalysis. In this article, I will focus on how Martin Buber’s philosophy of dialogue facilitates the mutual understanding between two opposing worlds in The Chosen. The conflict is finally resolved when, using Buber’s terms, the characters’ relationships move from an ‘I-It’ to an ‘I-Thou’ relationship. This process of coming to terms with each other inevitably brings about much suffering on Potok’s characters’ part. In the second part of the present article, I will try to show how suffering can transform them into more sympathetic human beings. Keywords: Chaim Potok, The Chosen, core-to-core [culture] confrontation, Martin Buber, I-Thou, I- It, suffering, Hasidism/Hasidic.
    [Show full text]
  • University of Southampton Research Repository Eprints Soton
    University of Southampton Research Repository ePrints Soton Copyright © and Moral Rights for this thesis are retained by the author and/or other copyright owners. A copy can be downloaded for personal non-commercial research or study, without prior permission or charge. This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the copyright holder/s. The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders. When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given e.g. AUTHOR (year of submission) "Full thesis title", University of Southampton, name of the University School or Department, PhD Thesis, pagination http://eprints.soton.ac.uk UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHAMPTON FACULTY OF HUMANITIES English Department Hasidic Judaism in American Literature by Eva van Loenen Thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy December 2015 UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHAMPTON ABSTRACT FACULTY OF YOUR HUMANITIES English Department Thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy HASIDIC JUDAISM IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Eva Maria van Loenen This thesis brings together literary texts that portray Hasidic Judaism in Jewish-American literature, predominantly of the 20th and 21st centuries. Although other scholars may have studied Rabbi Nachman, I.B. Singer, Chaim Potok and Pearl Abraham individually, no one has combined their works and examined the depiction of Hasidism through the codes and conventions of different literary genres. Additionally, my research on Judy Brown and Frieda Vizel raises urgent questions about the gendered foundations of Hasidism that are largely elided in the earlier texts.
    [Show full text]
  • Half Title>NEW TRANSNATIONALISMS in CONTEMPORARY LATIN AMERICAN
    <half title>NEW TRANSNATIONALISMS IN CONTEMPORARY LATIN AMERICAN CINEMAS</half title> i Traditions in World Cinema General Editors Linda Badley (Middle Tennessee State University) R. Barton Palmer (Clemson University) Founding Editor Steven Jay Schneider (New York University) Titles in the series include: Traditions in World Cinema Linda Badley, R. Barton Palmer, and Steven Jay Schneider (eds) Japanese Horror Cinema Jay McRoy (ed.) New Punk Cinema Nicholas Rombes (ed.) African Filmmaking Roy Armes Palestinian Cinema Nurith Gertz and George Khleifi Czech and Slovak Cinema Peter Hames The New Neapolitan Cinema Alex Marlow-Mann American Smart Cinema Claire Perkins The International Film Musical Corey Creekmur and Linda Mokdad (eds) Italian Neorealist Cinema Torunn Haaland Magic Realist Cinema in East Central Europe Aga Skrodzka Italian Post-Neorealist Cinema Luca Barattoni Spanish Horror Film Antonio Lázaro-Reboll Post-beur Cinema ii Will Higbee New Taiwanese Cinema in Focus Flannery Wilson International Noir Homer B. Pettey and R. Barton Palmer (eds) Films on Ice Scott MacKenzie and Anna Westerståhl Stenport (eds) Nordic Genre Film Tommy Gustafsson and Pietari Kääpä (eds) Contemporary Japanese Cinema Since Hana-Bi Adam Bingham Chinese Martial Arts Cinema (2nd edition) Stephen Teo Slow Cinema Tiago de Luca and Nuno Barradas Jorge Expressionism in Cinema Olaf Brill and Gary D. Rhodes (eds) French Language Road Cinema: Borders,Diasporas, Migration and ‘NewEurope’ Michael Gott Transnational Film Remakes Iain Robert Smith and Constantine Verevis Coming-of-age Cinema in New Zealand Alistair Fox New Transnationalisms in Contemporary Latin American Cinemas Dolores Tierney www.euppublishing.com/series/tiwc iii <title page>NEW TRANSNATIONALISMS IN CONTEMPORARY LATIN AMERICAN CINEMAS Dolores Tierney <EUP title page logo> </title page> iv <imprint page> Edinburgh University Press is one of the leading university presses in the UK.
    [Show full text]
  • Cyborgs in Latin America
    CYBORGS IN LATIN AMERICA 9780230103900_01_prexii.indd i 5/7/2010 12:14:52 PM This page intentionally left blank Cyborgs in Latin America J. Andrew Brown 9780230103900_01_prexii.indd iii 5/7/2010 12:14:52 PM CYBORGS IN LATIN AMERICA Copyright © J. Andrew Brown, 2010. All rights reserved. First published in 2010 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN® in the United States—a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010. Where this book is distributed in the UK, Europe and the rest of the world, this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world. Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries. ISBN: 978–0–230–10390–0 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Brown, J. Andrew, 1970– Cyborgs in Latin America / J. Andrew Brown. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 978–0–230–10390–0 (alk. paper) 1. Spanish American fiction—20th century—History and criticism. 2. Science fiction, Spanish American—History and criticism. 3. Cyborgs in literature. 4. Cyborgs in mass media. 5. Cyborgs in motion pictures. 6. Literature and technology—Latin America— History—20th century. 7. Mass media and technology—Latin America—History—20th century. 8. Human beings—Philosophy. I. Title. PQ7082.S34B76 2010 863Ј.087620998—dc22 2009047964 A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library.
    [Show full text]
  • Children of Israel: Jacob Figures and Themes in The
    CHILDREN OF ISRAEL: JACOB FIGURES AND THEMES IN THE NOVELS OF CHAIM POTOK by ALAN MORRIS COCHRUM Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of The University of Texas at Arlington in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of MASTER OF ARTS IN ENGLISH THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT ARLINGTON December 2010 Copyright © by Alan Morris Cochrum 2010 All Rights Reserved ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My thanks go to the faculty and my fellow students in the English Department at UT- Arlington, especially to my thesis committee members—Dr. Tim Morris, Dr. Tim Richardson, and Dr. Jim Warren—and to Dr. Margaret Lowry, director of the first-year English program, for their support and help during my studies and the writing of this thesis. I also would like to thank my family, relatives, and friends—and of course most especially my wife, Jennifer Cochrum. November 18, 2010 iii ABSTRACT CHILDREN OF ISRAEL: JACOB FIGURES AND THEMES IN THE NOVELS OF CHAIM POTOK Alan Morris Cochrum, M.A. The University of Texas at Arlington, 2010 Supervising Professor: Dr. Tim Morris The twentieth-century novelist Chaim Potok made central to his fiction what he called “culture war,” juxtaposing his Jewish-American characters’ inner spiritual lives with key elements of Western secularism. In five of his novels—The Promise (1969), My Name Is Asher Lev (1972), The Book of Lights (1981), Davita’s Harp (1985), and The Gift of Asher Lev (1990)—the protagonist comes under the influence of a character who can be styled “the Jacob figure.” This thesis argues that these characters not only echo various aspects of the biblical narratives about the Hebrew patriarch, thereby turning him into a meta-character in the novels, but also embody particular facets of the central culture clash in the individual books.
    [Show full text]
  • Katarina Graah-Hagelbäck
    School of Languages and Media Studies English Department Master Degree Thesis in Literature, 15 hp Course code: EN3053 Supervisor: Billy Gray The Description and Meaning of Faces in Selected Texts by Saul Bellow Katarina Graah-Hagelbäck Dalarna University English Department Degree Thesis Autumn 2011 Table of Contents 1. Introduction 1 2. A Few Words about Physiognomy 3 3. Faces as the “Reflection of the Soul”: What Faces Betray 5 4. How Bellow Depicts Faces 8 4.1. Descriptions of Some Individual Facial Features 9 4.1.1. Noses 9 4.1.2. Eyes 11 4.1.3. Mouths/Lips 13 4.1.4. Skin/Complexion 13 4.1.5. Teeth 15 4.2. Humorous Depictions 16 4.3. A Recurring Image and a Recurring Adjective 18 4.4 Ageing Faces 19 5. The Protagonists’ Relation to Their Own Faces 22 6. Faces as Representations of the Whole Character and of Humankind 24 6.1 Bellow and Levinas 29 7. Conclusion 31 Works Cited 33 1 1. Introduction “To see was delicious. Oh, of course. An extreme pleasure!” (Mr. Sammler’s Planet 147). Seeing, that is, visual impressions and renderings, appears to be an important element in the fiction of the American writer Saul Bellow (1915–2005): “the most basic activity of his fiction . is a matter of this very looking: the protagonist stares at the world” (Opdahl, “Strange Things” 14), and his prose could be said to work “through the acuteness and intensity of its seeing” (Clayton 293). Thus, although Bellow is in many respects “a novelist of intellect” (Fuchs 67), who often fairly wallows – or, rather, has his protagonists wallow – in intricate theoretical analyses and subtle reflections on everything human, he is also to a very high degree a sensual writer.
    [Show full text]
  • Cuál Será La Amenaza Letal Esta Vez? En La Sala, Pegado a Tu Asiento, La Víctima Eres Tú
    ROSTROS Los MITOS del MIEDO De noche, solo. ¿Cuál será la amenaza letal esta vez? En la sala, pegado a tu asiento, la víctima eres tú. El cine despertó los mitos más escalofriantes y acercó a nuestras puertas a personajes que nunca dejarán de perseguirnos. Las figuras del horror trascienden en el tiempo, pero la mutación ha sido un factor decisivo en su evolución. Hemos querido recopilar su historia, sobre todo reciente, y representaciones más notables. En este espacio los hombres lobo, los vampiros, los fantasmas o los serial killers están al acecho. 14 VENTANA INDISCRETA │N°6 │Universidad de Lima ROSTROS El gabinete del doc tor Ca ligar i. VENTANA INDISCRETA │N°6 │Universidad de Lima 15 ROSTROS Asesinos en serie (1984), por ejemplo, terminan por y el representante de los viajeros matar a un grupo de hippies en un cósmicos y de apariencia aberrante, Desde muy temprano, quizá con El caso, y jóvenes promiscuos en el otro, varados en una mina abandonada en gabinete del doctor Caligari (1920), como consecuencia de su “desorden Vinieron de otro mundo (1953); y la la figura del serial killer en el cine ha sexual”. repulsiva visión de la infiltración or - gozado siempre de una gran popula - gánica de Los usurpadores de cuer- Ya en los noventa, aparecen serial ridad. Ya sea utilizada como un sím - pos (1956), película cuyos rastros se killers en clave más posmoderna, bolo de la represión moderna norte - extienden a la igual de antológica con Seven (1995) y su asesino de los americana, o como un mero goce de ceremonia de alumbramiento de la pecados capitales, con El coleccio- la posmodernidad, o de cualquier criatura en Alien, el octavo pasajero nista de huesos (1999) y su psicópata otra forma posible, el asesino en serie (1979), la notable película de Ridley ha tenido y seguirá teniendo un lugar que imita los asesinatos de un libro, incluso con Tesis (1996) y su asesi- Scott, que por cierto terminó de in - privilegiado en las pantallas y en las dagar en ese constante coqueteo que retinas de cualquier espectador.
    [Show full text]
  • I WANTED I Orthodox Jewish Historians "Going Up" from "Down Under" the JEWISH QBSERVER
    KISLEV 5730 I DECEMBER 1969 VOLUME VI, NUMBER 4 THE FIFTY CENTS "He That Watches Over Israel Will Neither Slumber Nor Sleep" The Opening Address of Israel's New Knesset "The Promise" - A Novel-or a Polemic? The Yeshiva World's Outlook on Torah and Secular Studies I WANTED I Orthodox Jewish Historians "Going Up" from "Down Under" THE JEWISH QBSERVER In this issue ... "HE WHO WATCHES OVER !SRAEL WILL NEITHER SLUMBER NOR SLEEP," A MA.TOR STATEMENT OF PRINCIPLE. BY RABBI YITZCHOK MAIR LEVIN ................................ 3 "THE PROMISE"-A NOVEL7-0R A POLEMIC? Yaakov .facobs ........................................................................................ 8 THE YESHIVA WORLD'S OUTLOOK ON TORAH AND SECULAR THE JEWISH OBSERVER is published monthly, except July and August, STUDIES, Menachem Greenberg ............................................... 11 by the Agudath Israel of America, 5 Beekman Street, New York, New York 10038. Second class WANTED: ORTHODOX JEWISH HISTORIANS, Shmuel Singer 15 postage paid at New York, N. Y. Subscription: $5.00 per year; Two years, $8.50; Three years, $12.00: outside of the United States, $6.00 THE COMPLETE CYCLE, Verse by Leib ben Mordechai 18 per year. Single copy, fifty cents. Printed in the U.S.A. "GOING UP" FROM "DowN UNDER," Sh1nuel Gorr ..... 20 RABBI Y AAKOV JACOBS Editor ONE CANDLE FOR ONE NATION, Avrohom Chaim Feuer 23 Editorial Board DR. ERNEST L. BODENHEIMER Chairman SECOND LOOKS AT THE JEWISH SCENE: RABBI NATHAN BuLr-1AN PURIFYING JEWISH LAW ································································ 26 RABBI JOSEPH EI,IAS JOSEPH FRIEDENSON "RELEVANCE''-IN OR OUT? ..................................................... 27 RABBI MOSHE SHERER JEWISH DAY SCHOOLS: A POSTSCRIPT ........................... 28 MR. QtJINN AT THE KOSEL .......................................................... 29 THE JEWISH OBSERVER does not assume responsibility for the "JEWISH LEADER NUMBER ONE'' 30 Kashrus of any product or service advertised in its pages.
    [Show full text]
  • November 23, 2015 Wrestling Observer Newsletter
    1RYHPEHU:UHVWOLQJ2EVHUYHU1HZVOHWWHU+ROPGHIHDWV5RXVH\1LFN%RFNZLQNHOSDVVHVDZD\PRUH_:UHVWOLQJ2EVHUYHU)LJXUH)RXU2« RADIO ARCHIVE NEWSLETTER ARCHIVE THE BOARD NEWS NOVEMBER 23, 2015 WRESTLING OBSERVER NEWSLETTER: HOLM DEFEATS ROUSEY, NICK BOCKWINKEL PASSES AWAY, MORE BY OBSERVER STAFF | [email protected] | @WONF4W TWITTER FACEBOOK GOOGLE+ Wrestling Observer Newsletter PO Box 1228, Campbell, CA 95009-1228 ISSN10839593 November 23, 2015 UFC 193 PPV POLL RESULTS Thumbs up 149 (78.0%) Thumbs down 7 (03.7%) In the middle 35 (18.3%) BEST MATCH POLL Holly Holm vs. Ronda Rousey 131 Robert Whittaker vs. Urijah Hall 26 Jake Matthews vs. Akbarh Arreola 11 WORST MATCH POLL Jared Rosholt vs. Stefan Struve 137 Based on phone calls and e-mail to the Observer as of Tuesday, 11/17. The myth of the unbeatable fighter is just that, a myth. In what will go down as the single most memorable UFC fight in history, Ronda Rousey was not only defeated, but systematically destroyed by a fighter and a coaching staff that had spent years preparing for that night. On 2/28, Holly Holm and Ronda Rousey were the two co-headliners on a show at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. The idea was that Holm, a former world boxing champion, would impressively knock out Raquel Pennington, a .500 level fighter who was known for exchanging blows and not taking her down. Rousey was there to face Cat Zingano, a fight that was supposed to be the hardest one of her career. Holm looked unimpressive, barely squeaking by in a split decision. Rousey beat Zingano with an armbar in 14 seconds.
    [Show full text]