History, being myopic and such things
This is an interesting little article, from ages ago now, by Daniel Lord Smail, author of On Deep History and the Brain, which certainly sounds like something I’d read. From the article, it seems like Smail is targeting that tendency of historians to ignore prehistory in accounts of human history – starting, instead, with Mesopotamia and agriculture, because that’s when you really get documents that can be used to examine history (this idea c/o Leopold von Ranke). The use of ‘prehistory’ to describe this period itself indicates this tendency, since it places undocumented times ‘before’ history proper – I really hope it’s something Smail addresses; if he doesn’t, he’ll have lost a bit of cred from me.
Couple of ideas that have been floating around in my head, thanks to reading the precis linked above:
1. I have never really understood the historian/archaeologist divide. I know, from the little bit of Sumerian/Assyian study I did in undergrad, that there is (or has been?) argy-bargy on both sides. I just don’t get it: it’s like animal handlers not cooperating with vets, or something. How can the two disciplines seriously expect to get the most out of their studies without talking to each other? It just seems daft.
2. An issue with the article itself: ” It is time we rectified our Christian-induced myopia, argues Daniel Lord Smail. … Before the 19th century, few doubted Genesis was historical truth.” Yo – if you want to argue for getting an Africa-centric beginning to history, being quite so Euro-centric probably isn’t the best way to go about it! Perhaps he is aiming his accusations primarily at European/American authors, from a Judeo-Christian society, but still… I think he’s also underestimating the amount of undermining of accepted Christian cosmology had gone on in the Enlightenment, and from then on too.
This is something that requires a bit more thought from me, and probably me actually buying the book and reading it. I can understand why historians have gone for the places with documents and so on to base their study on – and perhaps this reveals me falling into the Ranke trap that I was probably indoctrinated with in my undergrad days, and I am just so not post-modern enough to throw that off without a really good reason and several convincing arguments (with foototes).
Call yourself a space fan?
If you do, and haven’t either seen In the Shadow of the Moon or made plans to do so – hang your head in shame!
Seriously, one of the best things I’ve seen at the cinema in ages. Ages and ages.
Take as many of the Apollo astronauts as are still alive (as far as I can tell; except Armstrong, who has apparently been basically a recluse almost since we got back to terra cognita), and make them talk about what it was like becoming an astronaut, flying in space and to the moon, and being home again. Splice this with genuine, rarely-seen before footage, and you have a spellbinding nearly-two-hour movie.
There’s no interviewer shown, so it’s just the blokes in their own words (and it is, by its nature, very blokey – there’s maybe two women who speak in the whole thing, and they’re in interviews from the sixties). All the men are given identical, nondescript backgrounds behind them – and they’re all only shown from the torso up. It’s almost like they’re floating in space, or outside of real time – which sounds daft, but bear with me: they’re utterly divorced from now – they only exist with relation to the space programme; they don’t interact with anyone except the viewer; and there’s nothing to date the film, except their clothes which are utterly nondescript as well. It was a fascinating way of compiling them.
The footage shown… well, I had to watch until the end of the credits to make sure it was all genuine NASA footage, with no CGI, because I’ve got a bit cynical in my old age. But, apparently, it was all real – and it was awesome. And so much that I, at least, had never seen! Views looking out as the stages separate – the moon buggies – that Earth-rise… I got goosebumps at several points, it was all just so beautiful. And there’s real audio too – Armstrong’s famous bit, of course, but also stuff from inside the command module (footage from there, too): it was almost funny listening to Jim Lovell’s voice, because I could almost recite his words along with him c/o Apollo 13. And I really did get goosebumps when they showed the first men who went around the moon – Apollo 8 maybe? – and they read from Genesis: In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. God saw that the light was good, and He separated the light from the darkness. God called the light “day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning — the first day.[1]
Probably the person who was most interesting to listen to was Michael Collins – the poor sucker who got stuck in the Command Module, while Neil and Buzz went walking. He was fascinating, and a great speaker. Eugene Cernan, too, was also great… actually they all were, pretty much.
I cannot stress it enough: if you like this sort of thing, you really should try to see it on the big screen. Yes, it will be OK on DVD – but some of that footage just looks so much more impressive when it’s huge![2]
[1] And then to hear that some woman sued them, when they got back to Earth, for mixing church and state… hilarious!
[2] We sat in the second row, in a tiny little cinema… it was insane, but very cool.
We love Nazi symbolism, right?
… are you offended yet?
Two bits of symbolism I feel like commenting on:
1. The Swastika
Not, as some people insist on calling it, a “broken cross,” implying some link between Nazism and Christianity; Nazis persecuted Catholics for their religion, too, you know.[1] It’s become about the most enduring symbol of the regime, and if I see my students drawing one (has happened once or twice) I just about hit the roof. But, of course, the Nazis did not invent it: as a symbol it’s been around for centuries, mostly in non-European settings. So I think it’s sad that it got appropriated by the Nazis, and is basically beyond hope of redemption.
2. The Olympic torch relay
Not, as is sometimes presumed, an aspect of the long-dead Greek games that’s been reintroduced for the modern ones. No, instead this is something that was – you guessed it – invented for the Munich games, to look good in Leni Riefenstahl’s movie. Don’t believe me? Mary Beard wrote it, and she’s a Cambridge classics scholar. This, I think, is the most insidious of Hitler’s legacy – neoNazi skinheads are nutters, but everyone turns out for the torch relay, don’t they? (Well, except for objectionable people like me.) We might spout things like cultural appropriation here, as with the swastika, and hope that that makes it better – but we’ve also given the ceremony a pseudo-history to make it seem ok. As an historian, I find that objectionable; as a moral human bean, I find that whole situation repugnant.
[1] Please, please note: I am in no way implying that this was in any way commensurate with the Nazi persecution of the Jews. And I know there are some suggestion that the then-Pope didn’t do as much as he ought to, to help the Jews (and the current Pope, too, seems to have copped a bit of that flak). That’s not the point of this post, though![2]
[2] No, I’m not Catholic; I’m a set in stone, dyed in the wool, Protestant. Again, not the point.
City of Darkness, City of Light
Because I am teaching the French Rev this year, it was recommended that I read City of Darkness, City of Light by Marge Pearcy (I think). It takes six real figures of the rev and gives their perspectives on the events from mid 1780s until late 1790s. It’s a novel, though, so there is a bit of license with regard to motives etc, and dialogue of course – it reminded me of McCollough’s Rome series for that reason.
Anyway: it was good. I enjoyed it. It gives you a good sense of what France was like as a country at the time, as well as of some of the personalities (exaggerated as they may be). It was exciting to see the events unfold from different perspectives, and the characters are well-chosen for that: Pauline is a worker in Paris; Claire is an actress from the country who comes to Paris; Manon is rich and moves between the country and Paris (so it was great to have three women’s perspectives); Georges is an ambitious lawyer; Max is also a lawyer, idealistic and from the country but moves to Paris; and Nicholas is a noble, something of a philosopher and about my favourite character.
For anyone familiar with the revolution, you might spot the one thing that was distressing about this book: the men are Danton, Robespierre, and Condorcet – who, of course, all get killed by their beloved Revolution, as does Manon – surname Roland, responsible for a very influential salon. So four out of six, dead. And knowing that this is going to happen really didn’t help! It was like re-watching a Grand Prix (very loud in the background, here), and knowing that there’s a huge smash coming up just around that bend…
The Fisher King
So I’ve been listening to some BBC podcasts recently – the “In Our Time” series. I really enjoy them – the interplay between the three interlocutors, the broad range of topics they cover within the topic itself: it’s all glorious. What I do often find drives me nuts, though, is Melvyn Bragge himself. He so often seems to think he knows everything about the topic after his preliminary reading – I’m happy to admit that he probably spends a number of hours in doing so, but still, he’s talking to people who have spent large amount of their professional lives, at least, thinking about the stuff! He particularly annoyed me in this episode, but I’ll get to that.
I had a most exciting moment in listening to this episode, which has never happened before: I knew one of the people! Well, ‘knew’ in the loosest possible sense; I’ve read most of one of his books, when I was researching for an essay on Robin Hood; and I heard him speak once on the figure of Merlin – Stephen Knight. An Aussie, who teaches in Wales on Arthur-y type things, among other topics. Anyway, it was a very cool moment for me.
So, the episode itself: focussing on the Fisher King, which I think is very cool in and of itself, that you can talk for 40-odd minutes on a fairly obscure literary figure/convention. Awesome. They looked at when the Fisher King first appears – in connection with Arthurian stuff; what his figure represents, pagan and Christian; and what he came to mean, in the 19th and 20th centuries (and they did indeed mention, if only briefly, the movie – which I was waiting for!), in Eliot (I might have to re-read The Waste Land… scary thought) and others.
All up, it was a great deal of fun to read, as I pounded along the path….
You can even, as they say in the business, listen again!
Productive and critical
Watching four Roman DVDs, for school, and I think I’m going to send all four back. Three are a series – republic, empire, ‘building and empire’; the other is a stand-alone. The stand-alone was definitely for younger kids, which would be fine – since this is for yr7 kids – but the background music was appalling. The others… well, I think they’re just a bit boring. I’m sure I can find docos with more interesting narration, and less bad music. They also feel a bit dated, although I think they’re actually fairly recent; they’re just leaving me cold.
On the plus side, though, since they’re all 30-45 min long – being average, I’ve been skipping through the chapters a bit; has made it a lot faster than I expected! I’ve got a couple of French and Russian Rev (eek! They’ve just shown a clip of a picture from a brothel – one of the awfully explicit ones; really not sure if I can show this to my 7s!) DVDs to preview, too, and a couple of other Roman and ancient Greek ones – hopefully they’ll be better than these.
Indiana Jones
Well, to start with I am very excited that the fourth one has actually had a date set for release – mid this year. It’s been a long time coming!! With Cate Blanchett, hopefully it will be good – I really hope it’s realistic about Ford being ancient. One of the things I really enjoyed about Lethal Weapon 4 was Glover and Gibson going on about being too old for this shit. Anyway, I’m excited.
What has sparked this post, though, was a viewing of Last Crusade. Great movie. Great movie. I adore the opening, with young Indy: it is so very nicely set up – I realised that you don’t know whether Indy is a scout or in the cave for quite a long time; the main looter in the cave even looks a bit like Ford, and of course the hat is Indy’s. It made me sad to see River Phoenix – such a pity for him to die so damn young.
And the whole movie is great. Good chases – although the tank/horse scene gets a bit long; good baddies – especially Elsa, of course, and adding in Hitler is brilliant; I love the zeppelin scene; and heck – it’s Connery! “The schlime of humanity” – what a line.
Movies and books
So I went to see Elizabeth: The Golden Age the other day. I loved it, and will post more about it soon. For now, this has amused me:
Do I have a book about Walter Raleigh on my shelf?
Yes
Have I read said book yet?
No
Will I now always think of him as Clive Owen?
Hell yes!
Is this a problem?
Hell no!
Tee hee. I thought it was funny. It really is a bit like seeing the movie before reading the book.* I also have a bio of Elizabeth – the Alison Weir one, I think – which my darling bought for me on a whim once and who was subsequently devastated when I informed him that I was a bit over Elizabeth, because she had been done to death. I think I am also at the point where I can read that book, too.
*Which I have only successfully done once: I saw the BBC series of Pride and Prejudice before reading it, and it made reading it much easier, for me.
Assyria, and lectures
Went to another public lecture the other day, this one the eleventh Marion Adams Memorial Lecture, for the Arts Faculty at Melbourne Uni. It got me thinking that I would like to have a lecture named after me, or possibly a book-buying bequest… I might have to set aside some money right now for that to be possible.
Anyway, the lecture: was very interesting. I won’t describe the whole thing here, because if you are interested in hearing it you can – gasp! the technology! – actually download and listen to it. Actually, it wasn’t there when I checked today, but I am sure they’ll get it there. If the microphone was good enough you should be able to pick up Dr Andrew Jamieson* thumping the desk and getting very excited, which was quite worhtwhile. Of course, you won’t get the visuals – unless they upload those too, which I would have thought unlikely – they were really great. The gist of his talk, anyway, was that far from the Assyrian heartland being the sole arbitrator of taste and refinement in the Neo-Assyrian period, there definitely seems to have been toing and froing in cultural borrowings and acquisitions between the heartlands and the conquered periphery. Just makes sense to me, but I take it that this is a new idea in the field.
*Whom, if memory serves, I heard speaking at another lecture last year – this one in conjunction with his brother, who is a physics lecturer also at Melbourne Uni. The whole thing was very good, but Andrew was definitely outshone on that occasion by his brother. Maybe he was sick then, because this particular lecture was brilliant.
Revolutions
My darlings had their exam yesterday. I wasn’t as nervous before it as I had expected – which sounds weird, the teacher being nervous, but remember two things: a) this is my first Yr 12 class; b) before their first piece of school assessment, I felt really quite ill. Anyway, I got emails from two of them last night, and one this morning, saying they felt all right about it. Then I got hold of the paper today and did a little dance – one of the China questions was quite similar to a piece of school assessment we did (at which I did a little dance), and most of the other questions we had covered – I think – fairly well in class. So even the weaker students should have been able to write something… as long as they didn’t just completely flake, which I guess is always possible.
So… an acceptable end to the year, I think. Although it doesn’t actually end until Dec 17, when the results come out. Eek.
Randomly Yours, Alex 