Movies and the Middle Ages
Mike Cherepov
> banality, stupidity, and bad taste. Does the Sixteenth century have
> anything to compare to Ozzy Ozborne or daytime television? No. The idea
> of art which deliberately glorifies mediocrity and imbecility is *our*
> invention. *They* had beautiful polyphonic music, brilliant painting,
> wonderful poetry.
I would not get too exited. Their stuff (esp. beutiful polyphonic music)
was created on the order and for consumption of, say, 0.5% of the
population. The rest were too busy trying to feed themselves to feel
deprived.
> *We* have Auschwitz, Hiroshima, and Joseph Stalin. I
> suspect that the next millennium will be filled with people who will
> shudder at the thought of anyone living in such a revolting and barbaric
> century as this one.
The leading ideology of our age is much more enlightened. "Unalienable
rights" and such. Luther was an incredible antisemite - how's that
for a spiritual leager, Bacon was a proponent of war - it is for states
what exercise is for humans, you know. As for next millennium - who knows what
atrocities they can come up with...
Mike Cherepov
Robert H. Averack
>
>The leading ideology of our age is much more enlightened. "Unalienable
>rights" and such. Luther was an incredible antisemite - how's that
>for a spiritual leager, Bacon was a proponent of war - it is for states
>what exercise is for humans, you know. As for next millennium - who knows what
>atrocities they can come up with...
> Mike Cherepov
Wow! Are you sure about what you said about Martin Luther? If so, please
follow-up with some evidence. As a Jew married to a Methodist, I see this
assertion as being quite inflammatory. However, if you can substantiate
this, Mike, please do so.
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Steve Upstill
antsy when I hear such facile generalizations. First of all, when comparing
culture, are you talking maximum or mean? The point is well taken that
the Medieval audience for painting and music was firmly bourgeois. Probably
the common folk would have loved TV if they had had it.
The immediate dismissal of modern popular culture also makes me suspicious
of lurking elitism. Bourgeois disapproval does not mean that it really is
trash (remembering, of course, that 90% of everything is trash). The best
example of this I can think of is that Shakespeare was considered vulgar
(i.e. of the common folk) entertainment in its time. His plays were
carefully constructed for popularity, and have you ever looked at the design
of the Globe Theater? The wealthy were sealed in their boxes around the
perimeter, with the flat area around the stage an unseated free-for-all of
hecklers, vendors and general merry-makers. How unruly! How uncultured!
The point is not that "the people" were more sophisticated then, but that
"popular culture" was dismissed by the elite (if memory serves, Shakespeare
had no patrons, and depended on commercial success to eat) just because
it was enjoyed by people who couldn't possibly know the time of day.
Steve Upstill