LIBRARY
ART 330: Contemporary Humanities: 5: After the War: Existential Doubt, Artistic Triumph, and the Culture of Consumption
This course offers an introduction to the thought, values, and arts of Western culture through an exploration of the fine and performing arts in the twentieth century.
Culture and Context
Module 5 — World War II and its Aftermath: Existential Doubt, Artistic Triumph, and the Culture of Consumption
Literature
Night by ISBN: 9780553272536Publication Date: 1982-03-01Night-- A terrifying account of the Nazi death camp horror that turns a young Jewish boy into an agonized witness to the death of his family...the death of his innocence...and the death of his God. ,Night awakens the shocking memory of evil at its absolute and carries with it the unforgettable message that this horror must never be allowed to happen again.
- Ginsberg Reads His PoetryPoet Allen Ginsberg accompanies himself on a musical instrument while he sings "Do the Meditation Rock." Ginsberg reads from "Ballad of the Skeletons."
American Short Story Masterpieces by ISBN: 9780440204237Publication Date: 1989-04-02Includes James Baldwin's Sonny's Blues
Waiting for Godot by ISBN: 9780802130341Publication Date: 1994-01-18A seminal work of twentieth-century drama, Waiting for Godot was Samuel Beckett's first professionally produced play. The story line revolves around two seemingly homeless men waiting for someone--or something--named Godot. Vladimir and Estragon wait near a tree on a barren stretch of road, inhabiting a drama spun from their own consciousness. The result is a comical wordplay of poetry, dreamscapes, and nonsense, which has been interpreted as a somber summation of mankind's inexhaustible search for meaning. Beckett's language pioneered an expressionistic minimalism that captured the existentialism of post-World War II Europe. His play remains one of the most magical and beautiful allegories of our time.
- Inspiration for Waiting for GodotAt the start of WWII, Beckett joined the resistance movement in France and then retreated to a remote part of the country to hide from the war. Beckett wrote during WWII, gaining inspiration for "Waiting for Godot." He didn't discuss his efforts with the resistance. Beckett joined the Irish Red Cross to travel back to Paris and worked in a hospital at Normandy. That landscape of desolation became a recurring setting in his work.
Architecture
Visual Arts
- Article about artist Joan MitchellSandler, I. (2012). Mitchell paints a picture. ArtNews. "Originally published 1957"
Music
Performance Art, Dance, Theatre
- The Seventh Seal by Ingmar Bergen (1957)The plot, taken from a play Bergman had written some time earlier, concerns a disillusioned knight (Max von Sydow) and his unbelieving squire (Gunnar Bjornstrand) returning wearily from the crusades after many years.
While resting on the Swedish coastline one morning, the knight is approached by a figure cloaked from head to toe in black, revealing only a chalk white face. The forbidding stranger announces that he is none other than Death (Bengt Ekerot) and he has come for the knight.
The man is not afraid but does have things he feels he must do (such as reaching his wife and home) and successfully challenges Death to a game of chess to be played out over a period, with the knight’s life as prize. As he and Death fence with each other, the knight and squire travel the countryside towards home.
Along the way they find a cross-section of disparate characters representing various aspects of human suffering and faith. Chief among those met are a husband and wife team of travelling players, holy fool Jof (Nils Poppe), who sees religious visions, and his solidly loyal and loving wife Mia (Bibi Andersson), who, along with their infant son, provide a more joyously positive view of life.