Dark Romanticism

Over the years, we've read quite a bit of nineteenth-century Romantic literature. While some of it doesn't seem too dark (think our poetry unit last year with Percy Bysshe Shelley, John Keats, and all those poems about love and nature), a subsect of the writing of the period was most certainly focused on corruption, death, and the evil aspects of human nature and life. Critics have called this part of the Romantic literary movement, "Dark Romanticism." Famous writers that we've read include Edgar Allen Poe ("The Raven"), Herman Melville ("Bartleby the Scrivener"), Nathaniel Hawthorne (The Scarlet Letter), Emily Dickinson, and Charles Baudelaire.

Romanticism as a whole emphasizes the irrationality of human nature--emotion over reason and premeditated decisions. Over time, it branched into two fields of thought: those who thought humans naturally gravitated towards good (the Transcendentalists) and the pessimists who believed humans were basically bad (the Dark Romantics). Dark Romanticism emphasized the corruption and sin of humanity--one of the darkest parts of it was Gothic literature (such as Mary Shelley's Frankenstein).

Source: https://americanliterature.com/dark-romanticism-study-guide 

Baudelaire Reference

I've written many posts about The Series of Unfortunate Events, but that's because there are many literary references made in the books and episodes; I think I may have found another. When discussing Charles Baudelaire and  his work in class, we noted his desire to shock the audience; he does so with strange imagery and surprising language, for example. In The Series of Unfortunate Events, the main characters' last name is Baudelaire, and their story is entirely meant to be appalling and strange to the reader. I also noticed that just as Charles Baudelaire was fascinated with dark themes and concepts, the whole story of the Baudelaire children is eerie and twisted; there's a combination of darkness and beauty that makes it hard to look away. This makes me think the children were named for Charles Baudelaire; it would make sense and would just be one of the many literary references made in the series!

Paintings! —> that you’ve def seen before

I saw Ritchie’s post and thought that I might give y’all a little sneak peak on my groups presentation on Monday. Our artist was Edvard Munch. The paining we analyzed in class was called “The Dance of Life.” While you’ll have to wait to see this painting and hear our opinions of it until class, here are some of his other painting to give you a taste of what you’ll be seeing in our presentation. I am sure almost all of you have seen “the Scream.” The one I find most interesting and disturbing is the one with the vampire woman biting the mans neck. Creeepy.

¿paintings?

I saw Farah's post about gold as a common theme in her group's artist's works, so I decided to share a few works by my group's artist, Jan Toorop. While looking at the paintings you can clearly distinguish some common elements to Toorop's work and his style, like the use of lines and the certain colors.

Here a few of his works, enjoy!

The Office and the Underground Man

So I was watching to office the other day (because when am I not watching it) and I had an epiphany. Michael Scott resembles the underground man in some crazy ways. Michael craves attention from his employees, and goes to great lengths to gain their friendship. When they reject him and his efforts, he then switches his demeanor and starts acting like he is better than all of his coworkers because he can’t get their attention. 

A Carcass - Mastery and Imagery

Baudelaire has rapidly become one of my favorite poets, in part due to the intense and striking images he is able to conjure up in the mind of the reader. It's almost manipulative and proves the ideas he's trying to convey on another level: by putting these obscene and deeply rattling thoughts into another's mind, he proves the fundamental vulnerability and capacity for darkness within people. I found "A Carcass" in particular to be intriguing and impactful (and definitely resonant with Poe) due to the strong, twisted images. Something that caught my attention was the use of the word "beautiful" to introduce the poem in the first stanza. The setting is peaceful; he is walking a gentle path with his love, only to come across what he compares to a "lecherous whore", the carcass. He continues to utilize these contrasts which give the reader a sense of shock and instability, speaking of flowers in bloom moments before elaborating on the stench of the body. He tells of the surroundings making a musical sound, then brings us into an abstract state by telling us that the world is reminiscent of a sketch, before throwing us back into the human condition and bringing us towards a "pitiful bitch" who hungrily eyes the carcass. These sharp turns which shake the reader define the poem and leave the last few stanzas as especially impactful as this vertigo caused leaves one unable to predict the conclusion. It's masterful and, as some artists have found, inspiring. Below is a piece done that was inspired by this poem. I find it to display the intense contrast between darkness and the world Baudelaire describes at moments.
  

How will you use your skills obtained by writing these blogs?

By the time we are done with high school, we would have made about seventy posts on this AP English blog and we will never look back except for perhaps a few nostalgic moments later in life. Although we might forget the contents posted, we should retain the skills learned by making these blog posts.

I know that I will need these skills starting in a few months because everyone on my future cross-country team shares training logs online. They post every run, workout, and race on this online training log and write a few sentences about how the run went, their feeling about it, etc. For whatever reason, this reminded me of the blogging that we do every week. I think that the blogging I do every week will help articulate my feelings on my training logs because I am gradually learning how to articulate my feelings about various elements of literature.

I know that the blogging skills I'm developing will benefit me in more aspects than commenting on my training logs but I am not exactly sure in what areas. As my title says, how will you use your skills obtained by writing these blogs?

"All That is Gold Does Not Glitter" - a Dive Deeper Into Gustav Klimt's Artwork

I was so fascinated by my group's art analysis of "Death and Life" by Gustav Klimt, I explored his artwork a bit more on my own. I don't know if you remember Anna Beth mentioning the background of "Death and Life" was originally gold however a gray tone showed in the final product. Upon looking at his other art pieces -- gold is a common theme among them.

Just to remind you what "Death and Life" looked like. (1900)

Here are a few more famous pieces of his.

The Kiss

Golden Tears 

Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer

I believe the reason behind this was due to his poverty growing up as his father's occupation was an unsuccessful gold engraver. Because of this, Gustav had to take on the majority of the financial roles within his family, which was only amplified when his father and brother both died within a close time period of each other. I think his gold incorporated-paintings pay respect to that aspect of his life that so greatly defined him.

A Response to Gabby's Post: Baudelaire and Poe (my computer's being weird)

My computer for whatever reason won't let me comment back on Gabby's post about Baudelaire and Poe so I'll just make a post about it.

I agree with you, Gabby, that these two poets have much in common in their contents and styles of writing. This intrigued me to look into what other ways the two men were similar and in which ways they differed.

First and foremost: they even look alike (in my opinion)


(Baudelaire)                  (Poe)

Secondly: Their early childhood and inspiration for their work.
Edgar Allan Poe's father abandoned his family, while his mother died a year later all at a very young age.  These occurrences affected the way Poe's poems were crafted, due to the trauma from his mother. This is similar to Charles Baudelaire's childhood in that his father passed away while he was a boy, and his mother re-married, taking the focus off of solely him. Many biographers saw this trauma as a motive for many of Baudelaire's poems.... similar to Poe.

Lastly: (besides their similarity in their writing--cause gabby covered that) Their deaths:
The way these two poets died was weirdly similar: both essentially from mental exhaustion and drinking.
For Baudelaire,  his illnesses, his long-term use of laudanum, his life of stress, and his poverty had taken a toll and Baudelaire had aged noticeably. He smoked opium, and began to drink to excess, causing a massive stroke and paralysis. After more than a year of aphasia (inability to comprehend or formulate language because of damage to specific brain regions) he died.
For Poe, he was found delirious on the streets of Baltimore, "in great distress, and… in need of immediate assistance".Newspapers at the time reported Poe's death as "congestion of the brain" or "cerebral inflammation", another way to say from alcohol.

pretty crazy, right?

Screw the NFL

I'm writing this on Monday morning, as a way to express my anger so I don't physically implode inside this Starbucks while everyone watches. As to when I'm posting this will be later in the week probably. Now I know every one of you either watched the game or at least knows the jist of what abomination took place Sunday evening in our most cherished Superdome. However, in case you for whatever reason don't know what happened: we were robbed. The Saint's were robbed, New orleans was robbed, the SuperBowl was robbed, the country was robbed, we were all robbed by some lousy (to say the least) referee who doesn't know the difference between a pass interference and a potato. You may be wondering what this has to do with the blog. Well I thought we could all take some psychological perspective from this ref. I think instead of calling him ignorant like the rest of the country (though he is), we could relate him to our dear Underground Man. UM was notorious for pushing people away and being his worst self in order to compensate for his insecurities as a person that went unnoticed.  Maybe our simple minded ref had a similar issue. I'll create a scenario for his life: he spent his days feeling unwanted and ostracized by everyone he crossed path with, his family, friends, coworkers and more. He lived his life in an isolated bubble and kept his self very close minded. He became a ref to compensate for the feeling of going unnoticed, after all he would be able to be so close to such big names and have thousands of  eyes on him every week. One day, a fateful Sunday January 20th of 2019, he woke up and realized his exposure as a ref wasn't doing much. Everyone was still focused on the big glorified football players. He wanted to be noticed. So, he took the most beloved and iconic teams of the world, The New Orleans Saints, and waited until the moment in their game that would create the most controversy and MILKED IT. He didn't make the call, he bamboozled the country, and now everyone knows his name.

Dostoevsky, Baudelaire, and the Irrational Human Experience

As we've discussed in class, both Fyodor Dostoevsky and Charles Baudelaire were nineteenth-century authors who fought back against the rigid, scientific view of the world presented by Enlightenment thinkers. Dostoevsky (through the voice of the Underground Man in Part I of Notes from Underground) says that rationalism doesn't get you everywhere in life. There will always be a nagging feeling of unsatisfaction with a perfect life and a perfect world, a desire to overcome realism and do irrational things. I also found it interesting that Dostoevsky himself was an avid gambler, a truly irrational human invention (Ian Johnston mentions this in "Notes on Notes from Underground"). What other animals would willingly give up something they have, knowing they will almost certainly lose it? Dostoevsky would probably say, "Because we can."

As we head into the poems of Baudelaire, I've noticed that he also emphasizes the irrational aspects of human life, if not in the same way as Dostoevsky. Baudelaire focuses on the darkness and mystery of the human psyche--corruption and sin. These aspects of humanity are not rational; they are the evil that fights the good in humans. Baudelaire emphasizes that humans aren't like the machines of the industrial revolution that work to perform a single, monotonous function; they are complex beings with irrational motivations.

Baudelaire and Poe: Kindred Spirits

After reading a single stanza of Baudelaire's work and one of Poe's, it is clear to anyone and everyone that the poets had similar styles. They both wrote with non-subtle, sometimes even violent, disturbing imagery. For example in Baudelaire's "To the Reader," his translation reads,"Gangs of demons are boozing in our brain- ranked, swarming, like a million warrior-ants." Poe, similarly depicts imagery in "The Raven:"What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt and ominous bird of yore, Meant in croaking 'Nevermore.'"

These comparable poems are clearly written by authors with a similar intent of impacting their reader through bold, ominous language. It may be guessed by readers that they had some sort of connection, and it can be verified by the fact that Baudelaire adored Poe, for he spent years translating his work from English to French to make it more accessible to his people, even over his own published array of poems. I guess it was the morbid nature of their work that brought the authors together in the unique, relatable themes of their work.

Unanswered Questions by Dostoevsky

In class on Tuesday, we had an important discussion on whether or not Dostoevsky's main character, the Underground Man, provides solutions to any of his previously proposed problems in the final chapter of Notes from Underground. We also discussed how there was a chapter in Notes dedicated to offering solutions to such problems that was taken out. Regardless of the deleted chapter, there are some remnants of Dostoevsky's thoughts that may have related directly to the deleted scene of his novella.

To elaborate on Dostoevsky's thoughts that translate through the Underground Man in the final chapter of the novella, it is clear that by the end of the narrative that Dostoevsky had deliberately created the Underground Man as the story's "anti-hero." This is clear since the Underground Man explains that this was in order to produce an impression that is incredibly displeasing to all readers so that they may understand that the fantastical, whimsical nature of books is not always promised to an audience in real life. In brief, the initial questions that the Underground Man posed to the reader were answered in a roundabout manner by the character's admittance to being an anti-hero. It verified for all readers that the Underground Man, from the beginning of the read, had been an unreliable narrator.

The Underground Men

My last post was also about The Twilight Zone, but I have another episode I think compares well to the Under Ground man himself. (I've been watching the show a lot recently, hehe.) There was a man who built an underground bunker and invited several people from his past to attend a dinner. One person was an old teacher, and another was an army officer who was above him, for example. He had wanted to exact revenge on all these people for things they saw as insignificant, but which he never forgot. His plan was to trick them into thinking the world was in danger from an atomic bomb (he went really far, just as the Underground man does with his plans for acknowledgement.) and that they had to stay in his underground shelter. They all refuse to stay regardless of the threat because they have people above they want to get to and other places they rather be; the man is left alone, and there is destruction, in the end, because its a kind of creepy in-between world and the bomb may or may not have really happened. (The Twilight Zone is meant to kind of trick your mind.) This man reminded me of the Underground Man; he holds serious grudges against old school peers even though they probably rarely ever think of him. He things the police man is intentionally refusing to acknowledge him when he's probably just focused on other things. Much of this comes from his own sense of unworthiness or accomplishment; just as the Twilight Zone man was left alone in the end, still not valued by anyone whom he had gone so far to try and provoke or get attention from, the Underground Man feels forgotten and isolated.

Twilight Zone Episode and Liza

I was watching "The Twilight Zone" on Netflix, and I came across an episode that I could connect to Liza's situation in Notes from the Underground. In this episode, there is a woman in a hospital who is having a reoccurring experience at night. She wakes up, reaches for her water, the cup breaks on the floor, then she walks down the hall to room 22, the morgue, and is told by a nurse there is room for one more down there. The doctor insists it is just a nightmare, but she says it is more than that; she believes it is real in some sense. This woman worked as a stripper, and the doctor made inappropriate remarks to her because of this. He liked to mess with her a bit and kind of tease her about her state, and then objectify her. In the end, her reoccurring experience saved her life; it kept her off a flight which exploded in midair. This reminded me of the underground man and Liza's interaction a bit; just as the underground man has a narcissistic view of himself above other people and insisted only his family beliefs, which he has gathered from books, are correct, the doctor felt superior over the woman in the hospital, not only because of the medical knowledge he trusted in, but also out of narcissism. The way the woman was sexualized reminded me of Liza and how the underground man said people would treat her if she continued down this path. The end of the episode shows that not everything is black and white; contrary to what the underground man tells Liza, family isn't only either perfect or awful, there are in-betweens, and situations are complex and have many causes.

¿crime and punishment?

This past semester I took philosophy with Father Millican and during the class one day he recommended "Crime and Punishment" by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. So I stopped by Barnes and Nobles and picked up the book. I haven't finished it yet, but I have noticed a common thread in Dostoyevsky's works. He seems to always be focused on the phycological effects of actions and how individuals think. In "Notes from the Underground," we see the mind of the underground man and we see how his past actions influence his thoughts. Well in "Crime and Punishment," the same thing happens. In the book, the main character commits a perfect murder because he believes he is of higher intelligence and thinks he can pull off the perfect crime. Well after the crime he gradually goes to madness from the phycological effects of murder. Same as from Notes, Crime and Punishment examines the mental effects of past actions, which is something I'm guessing Dostoyevsky was interested and curious about.

The Pitiful Underground Man

I think a lot of us can relate to the Underground Man. He is both self deprecating and narcissistic. He admits he has problems but is unwilling to seek out help for these problems. For example, he is entirely aware of his loneliness but does not attempt to seek true human connection. He wants human connection but simultaneously rejects it. He is a weird specimen to say the least. I get the sense that, like many people, he likes to wallow in his self pity instead of trying to fix his problems. Underground Man is one of those annoying people who plays depressing Adele music all night long and cries to it.

Continuation of the Discussion on Friday/Dostoyevsky

During the long period last week, we discussed many philosophical things, including the role of logic in separating us from animals. In a book I'm reading, the author cites a moment in The Brothers Karamazov where Dostoyevsky reveals his viewpoint on this topic. He states: "Love the animals: God has given them the rudiments of thought and joy untroubled. Do not trouble it, don't harass them, don't deprive them of their happiness, don't work against God's intent. Man, do not pride yourself on superiority to the animals; they are without sin, and you, with your greatness, defile the Earth by your appearance on it, and leave the traces of our foulness after you - alas, it is true of almost every one of us!" 

Here, we see that the author feels as though logic and ability has led to much destruction. On a separate note, I think this quote shows how the underground man is an outlet for which Dostoevsky can express his sometimes dark beliefs without accrediting all the blame to his own opinion. It's almost as though the he hides behind the underground man, relating deeply to this character he created. 

Pretty Dostoevsky

The other day in class we talked about the similarities between Pretty Woman and Notes from the Underground. The main similarity we discussed was the scene from the movie where after she is basically shunned from the high end boutique and later comes in with her new look to show off and be noticed and when the underground man tried to use a better and larger appearance to kind of validate his self worth to his peers. There in general are many similarities as well as differences between the movie and the book, the main one being the use and meanings of prostitutes. One difference between the two is the way prostitutes are portrayed in each. In Pretty woman, the movies main goal is to essentially humanize prostitues whereas in Notes from the Underground prostitutes are de-humanized. The underground man analyzes Liza and all she and her work stand for.  Tells her how she should be living will instead, and the ways she still has time to fix her mistakes. I personally don’t agree with the concept of prostitution, however it’s her body and her life and she should do as she pleases with it. What do you guys think of what UM says about her and her lifestyle?

Human psychology depicted through marathons?

A couple of days ago, we discussed one of the Underground Man's arguments that humans care more about the process and challenge associated with trying to achieve a goal than the end reward of the accomplishment. We contrasted humans to animals such as ants that actually reap the benefits of their achievement such as living in the ant hill that they built. I wrote about an example in class but never got to share it with everyone else until now.

In running, many people dedicate hours everyday to achieve a specific race time and after they accomplish their goal they enter a period of hopelessness and loss of purpose following their triumph from achieving their goal. For example, I talked to someone who wanted badly to qualify for the Boston Marathon. He worked very hard to achieve this ultimate goal, the pinnacle of recreational running, and finally did. However, after achieving a Boston qualifier, he admittedly gave up the healthy lifestyle associated with running because he did not feel like he had any direction or purpose in running. As a result, he ran much slower in the Boston Marathon that he cared so much about qualifying for.

For whatever reason, it appears that many people do not run as well at the Boston Marathon as the preceding race to qualify for Boston because although the Boston course is not very fast, the average finishing time is consistently slower than the minimum time to qualify (source: http://www.runtri.com/2012/01/boston-marathon-average-finish-times-by.html). There are many potential factors contributing to the slower times, but perhaps the experiences described by the person I talked to explain why most people run so much slower than their best at the Boston Marathon.

A New Era of Music: Romanticism

Over the years that I've been playing piano, I've played pieces from all four time periods of music (Baroque, Classical, Romantic, and Contemporary), each of which has different characteristics and rules that go along with it. In order to play the piece in the proper style, you have to know when it was written. The periods of music often go along with the different art and literary movements; sometimes they're even ahead of their time. 

Anyway, since we've transitioned from Kant's "What Is the Enlightenment?" to Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground, which refutes the ideas of the Enlightenment, I thought I would share some of the differences between Classical music (which spanned the late 17th and most of the 18th centuries) and Romantic music (which began in the late 18th century and ended around the turn of the 20th century). 

Classical music, which accompanied the Enlightenment movement, is pretty strict and based on musical rules. If a piece is written a certain way, as the pianist, you're obligated to follow all of the tempo and time signature directions the composer gives. In addition, Classical musicians created many new forms of piano pieces that had to written in a certain style. For example, the sonata, which became popular in the Classical period, had a very specific structure composers had to follow in order for their piece to be considered a proper sonata. Classical music matches up with the Rationalist and scientific-based Enlightenment era. 

Ludvig van Beethoven (1770-1827)

Around the late 18th century, musicians (with Beethoven as a major bridge figure) began to transition into a new period and style of music, Romanticism. Romantic music had far fewer rules than Classical music. Composers took more liberties with their music, abandoning many of the guidelines of the past and creating a whole new feel to music. For example, Classical-era waltzes had strict tempo and format restrictions, but the waltzes of Chopin, a major Romantic composer, take many liberties in regards to tempo and other stylistic choices. In short, along with the literary figures of the Romantic era, such as Dostoevsky, composers wished to create their own music, drawing more on their emotions and less on the rules of the past.

Frederic Chopin (1810-1839)

The most important figures of the Enlightenment

The Enlightenment, as we have learned, is a period full of prosperity, logical reasoning, and initiative to expand upon knowledge. With all these discussions about the Enlightenment we have been having, I thought it might be appropriate to discuss some important figures (four to be exact). of the enlightenment.

1. Rene Descartes - Rene Descartes was a philosopher and mathematician. During this period he made several important developments on calculus, geometry, and mathematics. He is most famous for the phrase “I think therefore I am” (or in Latin “Cogito Ergo Sum”). He is thought of as the father to modern philosophy and emphasized the idea of having doubt in order to prove something with logic  (he in fact was a Catholic and believed in God but he doubted his beliefs so that he could prove God’s existence to himself. This shows that he really focused more in reason than faith).


2. John Locke - Locke was seen as a leading philosopher in the enlightenment and even had a significant impact on political thought. Locke argued the importance of a government having the consent of the governed (that is, the people choose to have them as the government). He also believed strongly in the importance on the inalienable rights of man which are life, liberty, and the persuit of happiness.


3. Sir Isaac Newton - Newton was one of most important contributors to mathematics and science during the enlightenment. In 1647, he published his founds in what is called the “Mathematica Principia” which explains his founding of the Laws of Gravity and The Laws of Motion, laying the framework for modern physics . He even helped with developing the telescope.


4. Adam Smith - Adam Smith was a philosopher of classical economics. He is best known for his book, “The Wealth of Nations” which is the basic foundation of classical economics. He was also put a big emphasis on the productivity of labor. He also is known for his “invisible hand” theory. This theory states that the market will allocate its resources based on how individuals act on their own self interest. He is also responsible for developing the supply and demand model. 

Idea of Paradise

During class, I was thinking about the point we brought up regarding people never being satisfied with what they have. We said if we were given paradise, with roses and beautiful things, we would grow tired of it, and act out in order to change up the routine, which would become a cage. Maybe, then, a true paradise wouldn't be static. Paradise would be able to change based on our current desires and would thus keep us interested in life. Also, this kind of made me think of our world, where we have the power to change things and nothing is static. Not to say this world is paradise, but I just thought it was interesting. I also thought of examples of paradise portrayed in movies and other forms of media. In the TV show called "The Good Place", paradise is a neighborhood tailored to the specific desires and preferences of the people chosen to live there. This would probably not work out well, since it is kind of confined and routine. Its just one neighborhood, with the same people, forever. They do have the ability to ask "Janet" for anything they would like, but even this might get boring. Perhaps not for Chidi, one of the main characters, who could fill his time with learning about the world's endless pool of knowledge and ideas; that provides him with new material everyday.

Class Discussion Continued: Living Forever, Afterlives

I was thinking more about what we said in class regarding living forever and love; I think love would definitely evolve a different meaning than what we think of it as today. I wonder if people would begin to see themselves as different people, or kind of split themselves into different personalities as time changed them. Maybe love would be between two certain versions of two people. I do agree that limited time makes things more special; maybe people would try and erase their memories so they could start over like they were a new person. I wonder how limitless time would impact memory in terms of having the space to remember things. If we lived 1000 years, would we remember people we met in the beginning? In the TV show "The Good Place", everyone is assigned a soul mate. That is supposed to be the person they are best compatible with and will spend eternity with. I wonder if after so long you would just kind of see the other person as an extension of yourself, or maybe love them for different reasons than you did at first, or just grow apart. I was also thinking about the idea of living forever on earth and the idea of having an afterlife; having an afterlife is kind of like living forever, but just in a different world, I suppose. Maybe the kind of magical or spiritual element to an afterlife would be the piece that would allow humans to be happy and not desire more or change.

Long Period English Was Really Just a Giant TED Talk

So, TED talks have been a reoccurring topic of conversation for me this week and I have been really invested in the feeling of enlightenment that results from one watching it. During long period yesterday, I casually said to Ben in the midst of our philosophical debates "This is seriously a giant TED Talk that is happening..."

Unfortunately, upon extensive research, I could not find a specific TED Talk that met my standards and relayed my specific feelings on the different topics in conversation we had during class such as social media, logic vs. reason, and the topic of immortality. However, I did find an article that sparked an interesting question I never thought of. That is: what is the emotion behind logic?

I truly believe it is impossible for someone to think logically with zero emotion behind the decisions they make or priorities they choose to stand by. I think every action is the result of a choice and everyone choice is the result of an emotion, even if that choice is to think logically on something due to the AWARENESS of an emotion. Emotion is really tied into a lot.

So here is a link: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2014/09/18/emotion-is-not-the-enemy-of-reason/

The title is: "Emotion is not the Enemy of Reason" and I think that speaks volumes. Feel free to let me know what you think!

Works like the Classified Dictionary of the Sciences, Arts, and Trades and Encyclopedias are shining examples of the belief in the Enlightenment era that education should be attainable for all. Prior to this epoch, education and knowledge were mostly reserved for the upper class. The Enlightenment stressed the importance that knowledge is only useful if society has access to it.

If these forward thinkers of the Enlightenment could view today’s society, I’m not sure what they would think. While the internet has made seemingly endless information available to most people, attaining a great education at a top tier school is increasingly becoming reserved for the elite. Colleges, in an attempt to be deemed more “elite,” take pride in low acceptance rates. Should this be the point of education? The pursuit of status? It doesn’t seem right to me. Ideally, “elite private colleges” would adapt an Enlightenment-esque mindset and make their great educations available to more.

St. Petersburg

Notes from Underground is set in St. Petersburg, Russia. St. Petersburg is an iconic city in Russia, and has many popular places for tourists.

This is the State Heritage Museum is a museum of the art and culture of Russia.


This is the Savior on the Spilled Blood church in St. Petersburg. This is one of the most common things people think of when they think of Russia. It was completed in 1907.


This is the winter palace was the residence of the Russian monarchs from 1732 to 1917.



This is the peterhof. It is an group of palaces and gardens.


St. Isaac’s Cathedral is a cathedral that was built in 1858.

Rococo at Schönbrunn Palace!

If you remember our assigned reading in the Arts and Ideas book last week, we read a little bit about some of the art styles during the enlightenment period. One of them mentioned was Rococo. The style originated in Paris in the 18th century, but spread into Germany and Austria. The book gave an example of an elegant place where lots of Rococo styled art was located. That place was in the Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna, Austria. I actually went to that palace over the break and got to see all the amazing paintings and sculptures that decorated the interior of the palace. Very pretty! While I wasn’t allowed to take photos inside, here are some pics I took from the outside. I did get to make some apple streudal there which was amazing.

If You Don’t Agree You Lack Logic

This morning I was curious—curious about the similarities of emotions in (wo)man and of dog. I, being an inquisitive individual, acted on my curiosity. I was sitting downstairs on my couch in my living room as my sister walked in. I immediately got up, walked over to her, and (extremely gently of course) pinched her. Needless to say, she quickly angered and struck back several times. When her fit of rage finally culminated, I then headed over to Audobon Zoo, bought a VIP pass into the tiger’s cage and pinched the tiger. The tiger, though not as furiously as my sister, got pretty angry. I was able to make it to safety before the tiger harmed me.

Okay, obviously one of those was false: I obviously didn’t pinch my sister (ba dum tss 🥁). Regardless, even if both of these events had been entirely true, it’s much too small a sample size to draw any official conclusions about (wo)man or of animal, so I’ll just stick with the educated guess that, when randomly pinched, most humans and animals will grow quite angry. That checks off anger as an emotion both animals and humans feel. Let’s take a look at some other common emotions. Happiness? My plump little bundle of joy puggle named Puggs grows ecstatic whenever she eats, and  go to any Will Ferrell movie and you shall see plenty of smiling, happy human faces. Fear? You better bet both animals and humans fear. Depression? Check that off too. I could go on and on, but I think the simple fact is that both humans and animals can, and regularly do, exhibit the same emotions.

So if both animals and humans are emotionally capable, what is it that has made we humans the dominant species. What is it that distinguishes us so much as Homo Sapiens? The answer is both reasonable and logical: reason/logic.We are rational creatures. It is precisely this quality—the ability to address a problem and solve it through logic—that has elevated humans to our current state. “I can’t quite cut this tree with my hand,” says caveman 1in a linguistically andvaced language.

“Let’s build tool to cut tree,” says caveman 2 after logically pondering the problem.

Reason/logic is what has advanced our society to its current state and is what we all still exude on a daily basis. Like it or not, we’re in school eight hours a day, REASONING through that chemistry, calculus, or economics problem. We drive home in a car—a vehicle the result of engineering far more complex than any other species has discovered. We go home to a house—itself an architectural feat. Everything we do is the result of reason and logic. Feeling sad? So can the squirrel outside your window. Feeling a sense of bonding so strong while sitting around a campfire with your friends that it could only be unique to mankind? Tell that to the pack of gazelles as they run away from the lion.

If you are one to believe that humans are more emotionally capable than animals, this emotional capability is only made possible by developed languages—languages with hundreds of thousands of words that allow us to exactly describe what we are feeling, languages that developed quite logically. Besides that, we, as humans, are quite far from understanding the detailed emotional complexity of animals. Simply put, we don’t know the extent to which animals can emote. If their emotions are as complex as humans, this only further proves my point that logic is the sole factor that distinguishes us from animals. What we do know, though, is that that squirrel outside your window can’t reason through that physics or calculus problem..

Do you argue that humans are more sympathetic than animals? Do you think that business man is going to bypass the rational/logical decision of laying off those workers and go with the more sympathetic choice of keeping them? I’m glad you think it, but Jeff Bezos—the billionaire CEO of Amazon—certainly doesn’t and neither do the thousands upon thousands of Americans who have seen their jobs lost to robots. In this manner, I would actually argue that animals are more loyal to their fellow species than are humans.

Reason/logic is the only logical answer to what makes humans uniquely human. For a quality to make humans human, it has to be unique to us, meaning that the majority of other species can’t possess it. Emotions? Certainly we humans feel them, and I, as do many, like to believe that animals feel them as well. However, we can’t be certain if animals feel them. What we can be certain of, though, is that our reason and logic—I’m talking the ability to build, innovate, and advance—is thus far extremely better than any other species. *no, I’m not saying animals can’t reason, just that ours has proven to be exponentially better.*

Who Doesn't Love a Little Scandal?

Before we dive too far into Notes from Underground, I wanted to research Dostoyevsky's exile to Siberia. (It was briefly mentioned in Norton.)

As a struggling author, he joined the Betekov circle, a utopian socialist community, which helped him with his financial troubles. When the Betekov circle disappeared, he joined the Petrashevsky Circle, which was supposedly a harmless group which advocated for Russian social reform (like the abolition of serfdom, for example).

After the Revolutions of 1848 (if you don't know what these are, I recommend looking them up because they're very interesting!), Tsar Nicholas I wanted to rid the country of radicals (basically any major group capable of stirring up trouble). Resultantly, members of the Petrashevsky Circle were arrested and were (supposed to be) executed. While imprisoned initially, they stayed locked up in the "Peter and Paul Fortress," which was apparently for the "most dangerous convicts." Ooohhh...intellectuals who don't like serfdom and censorship. How terrifying!

As Dostoyevsky and his liberal intellectual buddies stood in front of a firing squad, about to be shot to death, a letter arrived from the Tsar...Luckily for the literary world (and for Dostoyevsky), they ended up being sent to a prison camp in Siberia. No biggie! Although Dostoyevsky was probably glad he didn't die, the next four years of his life were torturous, according to the prisoner himself. Here's his quote describing the conditions:

"In summer, intolerable closeness; in winter, unendurable cold. All the floors were rotten. Filth on the floors an inch thick; one could slip and fall […]. We were packed like herrings in a barrel […]. There was no room to turn around. From dusk to dawn it was impossible not to behave like pigs […]. Fleas, lice, and black beetles by the bushel […]."
Ouch! To make matters worse, he suffered from fever and hemorrhoids and lost weight.

Despite the brutal circumstances, he managed to make time to help other prisoners. He even talked Ivan Yastrzhembsky out of killing himself. Not all of the prisoners liked Dostoyevsky, though, because he was a bit of a xenophobe.

Oh, Fyodor Dostoyevsky. What a guy. It really does seem like some of the best literary pieces are written by people whose lives haven't been easy, to say the least. I guess you'd have a lot to write about! I prefer my life, though. What about you?

Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fyodor_Dostoevsky#Siberian_exile_(1849%E2%80%931854), http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Fyodor_Dostoevsky

Enlightenment-Era Art

Previous to the Enlightenment, Rococo was the main art style. Enlightenment artists found Rococo immoral and intended to reign in its arbitrary sensuality. The new art movement of the Enlightenment was called Neoclassicism, and its artists preferred definite lines and clear images over colors. As the name suggests, they took ideas from the classical era and applied them to modern times. Neoclassical art portrays its subjects realistically and attempts to mimic Roman and sometimes Greek elements. 

"Et in Arcadia Ergo" by Nicholas Poussin, c. 1630s



"Oath of the Horatii" by Jacques-Louis David, 1784



"Napoleon Crossing the Alps" by Jacques-Louis David, 1801
(This was used as positive propaganda for Bonaparte.)



Source: 
https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-arthistory/chapter/the-enlightenment/

Jeremy Bentham: father of Utilitarianism

As we discussed in class, Utilitarianism is the step after Enlightenment in the philosophical study of human morality. We briefly spoke about Jeremy Bentham, but after class, I thought it'd be interesting to talk about how exactly Bentham became inspired to create the idea of utilitarianism and the history of the idea itself.

Bentham first attained attention as a critic. He popularly critiqued English theorist, Sir William Blackstone, and from there, he went on to publicly voice his opinions on social and political reform to better support humanity and prove his morality.

He published Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation in 1789, and in it, the term utility was born, referring to the overall satisfaction of humans. His book kickstarted utilitarianism which has since been understood as the theory focusing on the overall tendency of a government to promote the greatest amount of happiness among the greatest possible amount of people.

Jeremy Bentham is pictured below:

source: https://www.utilitarianism.com/bentham.htm

Fun Facts about Kant!

Immanuel Kant was one of the most famous Enlightenment philosophers in the 1700s. His challenge to the public ("Dare to know!") sparked many on their quest to achieve enlightenment.

Here are some fun facts about Kant: 

• He thought that peace would be the eventual end of history.
• He believed that the "mind was the structure of human experience."
• No one really knows Kant's religious beliefs--theories have ranged from atheism to traditional Christianity. (He was raised in a strictly traditional Lutheran family).
• The King of Prussia banned him from writing or speaking publically about religion.
• His most famous work is The Critique of Pure Reason.
• When his father died, he had to drop out of university before his friend loaned him money to complete his education.
• Kant was roughly five feet tall and had a deformed shoulder and poor health for most of his life.
• He lived in East Prussia and never traveled more than 40 miles away from where he worked.

Source:
http://tonsoffacts.com/26-fun-and-interesting-facts-about-immanuel-kant/