Monday, March 26, 2007

Man’s Fate, Part I

“Anguish,” bewilderment,” revulsion,” and “nausea”: the emotional prescriptive for the terrorist. (To be continued).

Edith

Red Calvary: An Overview, Part III (pages 106-169)

“We went, limping with broken legs, waving our crippled arms, holding each other up” (152).

The young journalist is “overcome with self-pity and loneliness; and numb with despair.” As his narrative voice changes, Babel’s emotions and perspectives shift from warfare to loss and emotional attachments. The death of one’s steed produces uncharacteristic and candid sentiments from the regiment: ‘“A horse—that’s a friend,” Orlov answered.”’ ‘“A horse―that’s a father,”’ Bitsenko sighed. ‘“The horse saves your life more times than you can count. Bida is finished without his horse”’ (120). Babel places the reader in the epicenter of his emotions.

Edith

Red Calvary: An Overview, Part II (pages 66-105)

“Comrade,” she said, after a short silence. “All of this makes me want to hang myself?”

Babel maneuvers the reader towards his emotional center and aesthetic consciousness. His psychological subjugation is temporarily relieved: “Savitsky, the commander of the Sixth Division, rose when he saw me, and I was taken aback by the beauty of his gigantic body. […]. He smelled of perfume and the nauseating coolness of soap” (66). The young journalist illustrates the need for acceptance, and the necessity to diminish the ridicule by the Cossacks with disdain and aggression: when a village woman refuses his order to prepare him a meal, he arbitrarily kills a goose by stepping on its neck. Babel reveals to the reader that he is “oppressed” by the repetition of their criminal acts and fighting strategy: “hack to pieces.” And seeing wounded men eating in ditches, dead bodies covering the fields, and more importantly, lost friendship.

Edith

Red Calvary: An Overview, Part I (pages 1-65)

“The stench of yesterday’s blood and slaughtered horses drips into the evening chill” (39).

Isaac Babel’s diary of the 1917 war between Russia and Poland: the Cossacks and the Poles, is a perplexing and disturbing diary of exploitation, destruction, and carnage. At the onset, the reader is placed in Babel’s emotional periphery. His objective, abstract, and non-responsive reporting of the brutal and seemingly arbitrary slaughter of people, livestock, and religious artifacts, reveal a systemized method of dehumanizing, degrading, and annihilating resistors in Poland’s towns, communities, and villages. “The naked shine of the moon poured over the town with unquenchable strength” (59). Babel incorporates provocative imagery and poetic description of war and its aftermath.

Edith

Caesar’s Column and Communist Manifesto: In Response to Prof. Hanley

Technological progress reduces society into two classes: the bourgeois and the proletariat as defined and illustrated by Ignatius Donnelly, and Karl Marx and Frederick Engels. (To be continued)

Edith

Caesar’s Column: In Response to Prof. Hanley

Donnelly’s futuristic New York City illustrates societal declination (of Donnelly’s “present”) within a context of technological evolution. And Donnelly’s resolution, his ideal society, is a modification of his “past.” (To be continued)

Edith

On the Surface Part III: Caesar’s Column: A Story of the Twentieth Century

Donnelly extends his symbolic imagery within a romantic narrative. Beauty, virtue, benevolence, and, chastity are represented by the relationships between Gabriel and Estella; and Maximilian and Christina. Estella’s “fair complexion; long and flowing blond hair that enfolds her like a magnificent, shining garment; large blue eyes that are set far apart; a look of honesty and dignity (rarely witnessed in the countenance of a woman); and calm intelligence,” converges with Christina’s “youth, innocence, and a lyrical singing voice,” contained in a petite and diminutive frame, are symbolic images illustrating benevolence and honor of mankind (considering that Maximilian, is a member of the Brotherhood of Destruction), and reassuring Donnelly’s readers that man can live morally, ethically, and honorably.

Edith

On the Surface Part II: Caesar’s Column: A Story of the Twentieth Century

There are two global bodies of government in Donnelly’s futuristic society: the Brotherhood of Destruction, an organization that acts and speaks on the behalf of the proletariat. With a membership that encompasses the non-criminal element, that has the capacity to “endure harsh labor without resorting to crime.” And the Oligarchy, the plutocratic organization, headed by the novel’s antagonist Prince Cabano. His governmental body consists of “large middle-aged men with finely developed brows; clean cut, successful looking; showing signs of sensuality and dissipation; a hesitate manner; shrewd, and to the point; and with the power to crush, destroy, and bring about the downfall of mankind.”

The Brotherhood, anarchist determined to overthrow the Oligarchy, the plutocrats: the exploiters of the underclass, the labor force, the proletariats.

Edith

On the Surface Part I: Caesar’s Column: A Story of the Twentieth Century

"In this vast, over-crowed city, man is a drug,—a superfluity,―and I think many men and women end their lives out of an overwhelming sense of their own insignificance;—in other words, from a mere wariness of feeling that they are nothing, they become nothing” (17).

Donnelly’s futuristic New York City has declined socially, morally, and politically. The city’s social strata consist of the labor force (the proletariat) and the aristocracy (the wealthy).

Gabriel, the novel’s “primary” narrator describes New York’s aristocracy as “quiet, decorous and courteous.” The female population of androgynous military replicants is: “broad, square, and deep brows; firmly developed square jaws; penetrating, immodest looks; challenging and inviting fierce eyes penetrating the soul.” And the male population: “unattractive, incredulous, unbelieving, cunning, and observant; heartless, and non-sacrificing with powerful faces, high noses, resolute mouths, and fine brows characterizing their shrewdness and energy.”

Donnelly’s lengthy description of the labor force, the proletariat, the “underworld, the domain of the poor” is a disconcerting representation of poverty. In part, the poor are described as “stolid, hungry-looking, haggard, poorly clothed, and hopeless.” The faces of the children’s are “prematurely aged, hardened, joyless, and sullen.” This ethnically diverse and impoverished populace, form an endless “succession of mechanized and stooped silent toilers, consumed with disease, and eaten up by society.”
Donnelly shrewdly parallels social, political, and economic status to intellect, demeanor, and physical characteristics.

Edith

Tuesday, March 20, 2007

War Narratives

Caesar's Column, Red Calvary, and Man's Fate, provide the reader three distinct narratives characterizing the war. Babel's journalistic narrative; Donnelly's "manifesto" narrative; and thus far in my reading, Malraux's psychological narrative. I will begin with Malraux, because the central character, Ch'en Ta Erh is an intriguing and fragmented character, and for now, immediate in thought. (To be continued).

Sunday, March 18, 2007

Manifesto of the Communist Party

Part 1

One of the arguments in Marx’s manifesto is that the bourgeoisie (defined as “capitalists and owners of social production and employers of wage labor”), has “converted” society’s esteemed professionals, namely: physicians, lawyers, priests, poets and scientists into its “paid wage” labor force: a “mode of production.” Furthermore, no member of society is impervious to the “production” and “exchange” dyad. Additionally, economic greed exploits the bourgeoisie, and the bourgeoisie exploits the labor force (the proletariat), and the labor force exploits the bourgeoisie. Consequently, society will continue to operate within a cycle of agitation, alienation, and exploitation.

Part II

One of Marx’s many enticing arguments in Part II is: “in bourgeois society, living labor is but a means to increase accumulated labor. In communist society, accumulated labor is but a means to widen, to enrich, to promote the existence of the laborer.” The communist party’s objective is to act solely on the behalf of the laborer, giving voice to the proletariat. And transform the laborer to an “independent, an individual,” no longer subjugated to and by labor.

Edith

Liberty, Equality, Fraternity

Gracchus Babeuf states that the inequities and violation of human rights practiced by society’s leading institutions is the impetus for social revolution. The deceitful acts of these institutions give rise to the mental and physical forces that necessitate requisite change by community members. And by combining these forces (creating a collective force), says Jean-Jacques Rousseau in his Social Contract, men can achieve and maintain true morality within a continuum of self-governing laws.

Comparatively, Chapter 3 addresses human rights and individual liberty. By analyzing and incorporating the various ideologies and methodologies characterized by the Enlightenment period, the French revolutionaries believed that complete equality between men: politically, economically, and socially, apart from religion, tradition, and community is obtainable. While the political atmosphere in Chapter 4, identifies and characterizes the various opposing political and social factions: the Jacobins, who were responsive and decisive; and the Girondins, analytical and cautious, provides strength and force leading towards a reformed government.

Philippe-François Fabre d’Englantine chaired a committee that recognized the importance of and secular calendar for the agrarian community of Paris. By removing the “subjugating influences” characteristic of Christianity, as illustrated in the Gregorian calendar, d’Englantine designed a calendar depicting the four seasons of the year with images of crops and scenic views associated with the season, and its temperature within the calendar year; instilling a renewed appreciation and national pride among the farming community.

Edith

The Sabine Women (continued):

After reading Women and the Revolution, from “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity,” it was not surprising that women participated “in every aspect of the French Revolution.” Kiahini and Denise effectively captured the emotion and physicality of David’s painting. Although the role of the women was mainly confined to the home and domesticity, it was in the home where women gave voice to the prevailing social, political, and economical issues primary to the revolution. It was in the home where women created a consciousness for their husband regarding food shortages, inflation, and familial despair. It was the women who led and encouraged their men to join the many demonstrations protesting bread increases. It was the women, “acting collectively,” armed with guns, pikes, swords, who disrupted the National Convention by removing the officials from their “benches” in protest. It was the women who not only agitated, more importantly, served as mediators and conciliators for social equality and resolve.