scholarly journals Quo Vadis, Homo Viator? / Journeys in Jože Hradil’s Faceless Pictures

2015 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 113-121
Author(s):  
Zsuzsa Tapodi
Keyword(s):  
The Novel ◽  
Identity Preservation ◽  
Quo Vadis ◽  
Identity Shifts

Abstract In Jože Hradil’s Faceless Pictures [Slike brez obrazov] the characters go astray or get into the attraction of adventures and set off for a journey. The spiritual and identity shifts can be interpreted along these eternal human desires as well. A patchwork of remembering and forgetting, the internal journeys of identity preservation, spontaneous or forced assimilation, tolerance and all kinds of politics-induced human deformations are depicted in the novel. The text traces the roles of the journey defined by Jean Chevalier and Alain Gheerbrant such as the search for justice, peace, immortality and finding the spiritual center. This study examines how the concrete physical journey changes into an internal road determining the evolution of personality.

Horror amid Sweetness

2020 ◽  
pp. 193-208
Author(s):  
Ewa Górecka
Keyword(s):  
Ancient Rome ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Contemporary Culture ◽  
Aesthetic Value ◽  
Oil Painting ◽  
European Culture ◽  
Semiotic Systems ◽  
Artistic Interpretation ◽  
Quo Vadis ◽  
Important Form

Postcards, once an important form of communication which has now been driven out of contemporary culture by emails and other instant messages, are the least known among the metatexts of Sienkiewicz’s novel. The time of the novel’s creation and the fact that it was quickly recognized as a bestseller contributed to the production of numerous postcards that presented scenes and characters from Quo vadis. They deserve attention not only for their artistic variety (style, technique, format, and so on), but also for their coexistence with kitsch. The presence of this aesthetic category in intersemiotic interpretations of Sienkiewicz’s work implies the need for determining which parts of the novel particularly encourage kitsch. Postcards referring directly to Quo vadis reveal the presence of different types of kitsch. Due to the novel’s subject matter, religious, erotic, and patriotic kitsch are observed most often, followed by the kitsch of death and suffering. In order to understand the connection between Sienkiewicz’s Quo vadis and kitsch, it is not enough to determine its types. Kitsch on postcards tends to be integrated into an intertextual and periphrastic strategy. Whether through the vehicle of a photograph, watercolour painting, oil painting, engraving, or sculpturography, the purpose of creators of illustrations was usually to put across the idea of the novel and its aesthetic value. Importance was also attached to the expectations of potential purchasers of postcards, both those who had and those who had not read Quo vadis. Thus, the postcards are valuable evidence not only of the artistic interpretation of the novel in different semiotic systems but also of the perception of ancient Rome in twentieth-century European culture.

Costumes in Henryk Sienkiewicz’s Quo vadis and their Literary and Painterly Sources

2020 ◽  
pp. 55-72
Author(s):  
Ewa Skwara
Keyword(s):  
Ancient Rome ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Classical Education ◽  
Roman Literature ◽  
The Poor ◽  
The World ◽  
Close Relationship ◽  
The Status ◽  
Quo Vadis ◽  
Colour Coding

Sienkiewicz had to dress the characters of Quo vadis in period garments. Their descriptions rarely appear, but they are highly suggestive of how the author understood ancient Rome and tried to recreate it in his work. Sienkiewicz gives detailed descriptions of costumes only when they concern the most important figures in his novel, or if clothing plays an important role in the plot. The rest of the protagonists are treated as collective characters whose clothing is identified only in terms of togas, stolae, or the robes of the poor. Beside the ubiquitous tunic, other Latin names of clothing primarily indicate the status of characters or are mentioned when Sienkiewicz uses clothes to disguise them. In those cases, the ubiquitous tunic receives an adjectival descriptor of colour or shade, which in the world of Quo vadis has a differentiating function. The names of the characters’ outfits have their origins in Roman literature. The terms introduced in the novel allow for an easy recreation of the author’s reading list, which consists of the basic works of a classical education—Cicero, Suetonius, Plutarch, Pliny, Horace, Propertius, Juvenal, Martial. Sometimes Sienkiewicz mixes his classical terminology with those of ecclesiastical Latin, creating an unintendedly humorous effect. However, the writer’s use of costume colour seems to have been inspired by the paintings of Lawrence Alma-Tadema and Henryk Siemiradzki. This chapter will explore the very close relationship between text and paintings, and utilizes Sienkiewicz’s colour coding to pinpoint some of the images on which he drew.

Quo vadis and Ancient Rome in the United States, 1896–1905

2020 ◽  
pp. 73-86
Author(s):  
Ruth Scodel
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Roman Empire ◽  
The United States ◽  
Personal Knowledge ◽  
Ancient Rome ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Historical Accuracy ◽  
Quo Vadis ◽  
Widespread Interest ◽  
Complex Influence

The immense success of Quo vadis in the United States prompted widespread interest in both its most interesting character, Petronius, and in its account of the reign of Nero. Although Sienkiewicz mentions the Satyricon only briefly, in the period following the novel’s appearance new translations of the Cena Trimalchionis were published, along with editions intended for students of Latin, despite the Satyricon’s earlier reputation as decadent and its association with pornography. Sienkiewicz’s sympathetic portrayal of Petronius was probably responsible for making this reception of the Cena possible. The general educated public was also concerned about the historical basis of Quo vadis. Readers who found the novel too sensational, as many did, not surprisingly also questioned its historical accuracy. Debates about the novel also show the complex influence of Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, which accepts Tacitus’s account of Nero’s persecution, but more generally argues that Christian accounts of persecutions are exaggerated. American critics of Quo vadis applied Gibbon’s arguments about Diocletian’s persecution to Nero’s. Academics who provided expert guidance seem uncritical compared to ancient historians today: while they point out that Tacitus did not have personal knowledge of Nero’s reign, they do not consider his sources or methods.

Illustrating Quo vadis in Italy (1900–1925)

2020 ◽  
pp. 165-192
Author(s):  
Raffaele De Berti ◽  
Elisabetta Gagetti
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Reference Point ◽  
Silent Film ◽  
Italian Society ◽  
The Novel ◽  
New Meanings ◽  
Large Audience ◽  
Quo Vadis

In Italy, from the beginning of the twentieth century, illustrated editions of Quo vadis multiply, starting from that of Treves with drawings by Minardi (1901), down to the popular edition by ‘Gloriosa’ (1921). Related paratexts from the novel and its two cinematic adaptations by Guazzoni (1913) and D’Annunzio–Jacoby (1924) flank these numerous illustrated editions, such as a series of photosculptures by Mastroianni and postcards displaying scenes from the films. Sienkiewicz’s novel itself works on several levels, each one involving a large audience: from a popular one to educated readers. The illustrated editions and postcard series will be dealt with as paratexts, analysed not in terms of their aesthetics or fidelity to the plot but as elements widening the interpretation of Quo vadis in the context of Italian society and culture of that time, and taking into consideration the expectations of an Italian audience. Placed in editions of the novel, the iconographic choices displayed in the illustrations play the role of glosses, or even act as the voices of readers/viewers. Thanks to these paratexts, the novel gains new meanings. Our inquiry has been limited to the period 1900 to 1930, to coincide with the end of the silent-film era and the fading of the echo caused by D’Annunzio and Jacoby’s film. The two films will be the constant iconographic reference point because of their accumulation of all the preceding illustration strategies for Quo vadis and their influence on the subsequent typology of illustrations in a continuous circulation of media.

Introduction

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-26
Author(s):  
Monika Woźniak ◽  
Maria Wyke
Keyword(s):  
Popular Culture ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Historical Novel ◽  
Classical Antiquity ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Elite Culture ◽  
Quo Vadis ◽  
National Boundaries ◽  
High Literature

The introduction to this edited collection on the historical novel Quo vadis: A Narrative of the Time of Nero explores the initial cultural context of the novel’s publication in 1896 and its reception in Poland as an astounding work of high literature. It also summarizes how the novel written by Henryk Sienkiewicz came to cross national boundaries, cultural categories, and media to gain a long and rich afterlife in the popular culture of Western Europe and the United States. The introduction considers the novel and its afterlife as an exceptional example of the reception of classical antiquity. The introduction explores how the historical novel provided a powerful discursive structure through which to explore Christian faith and resistance to tyranny. It also argues that analysis of Quo vadis and its multimedial transformations decentres the West and elite culture as sites of classical reception, reveals the particularities and the influence of the Polish classical tradition, and demonstrates how and why classics and popular culture converge.

Dangerous Liaisons: Quo vadis? (1913, dir. Enrico Guazzoni) and the Previous Theatrical Adaptations of Sienkiewicz’s Novel

2020 ◽  
pp. 123-142
Author(s):  
Stella Dagna
Keyword(s):  
Original Novel ◽  
Original Text ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Historical Accuracy ◽  
Important Quality ◽  
Important Trait ◽  
Quo Vadis ◽  
Popular Novel ◽  
Narrative Thread ◽  
Narrative Spaces

Quo vadis?, directed by Enrico Guazzoni in 1913, is still one of the most faithful film adaptations of the novel by Sienkiewicz. When the silent feature came to cinemas around the world, the story was already familiar to the majority of the audience, due to the popular success of the book and a proliferation of many derivative works, especially theatrical. In various ways, these adaptations developed audiences’ previous knowledge of the plot and the characters. Some of them were set in an openly illustrative relationship; others focused on a single narrative thread of the novel. The most complex examples, especially the 1909 opera by Jean Nouguès, offered a skilled concentration of the plot in a few scenes that were complex both in terms of narrative and staging. The director Guazzoni was quite familiar with the ‘horizons of expectation’ that adaptations of such a popular novel created, but he decided to use them differently. In his film, faithfulness to the original text became the most important trait of a new, ambitious staging strategy: the protection of the plot’s complexity and its spatial fragmentation. Performing a comparative analysis of the narrative spaces in Guazzoni’s film and in a few theatrical adaptations, this chapter delves into two different examples of interaction between the original novel, the adaptation, and viewer expectations: the centripetal model, in which the most important quality is the ability to synthesize, and the centrifugal one, based precisely on fidelity to the original text and to historical accuracy.

scholarly journals Польская драматургия рубежа XIX–XX веков на сцене грузинского театра

2021 ◽  
Vol 51 (2) ◽  
pp. 165-186
Author(s):  
Vera Occheli
Keyword(s):  
The State ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Periodical Press ◽  
Life Problems ◽  
Quo Vadis ◽  
Artistic Skill

The article presents findings based on the materials of the Archives of the State Theatre Museum of Georgia and theatrical reviews published in the Georgian periodical press of the designated time. The obtained data allowed to draw a conclusion about the wide popularity of Polish drama on the stages of Tiflis and Kutaisi theatres. Polish drama attracted the audience not only with its high artistic skill, but also with the desire to get acquainted with the Polish theatre system, its ability to pose and solve important life problems. Plays by Stanislaw Przybyszewski, Jerzy Żuławski, Gabriela Zapolska, Michał Bałucki and others were staged in Georgian theatres. The dramatization of the novel Quo vadis? by Henryk Sienkewicz was particularly recognized among the Georgian public. The article also points to the great interest of the Georgian audience in modern Polish drama, especially the plays of Sławomir Mrożek. 

scholarly journals Detecting Bridge Anaphora

2017 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 217
Author(s):  
Daniela Gîfu ◽  
Lucian-Ionel Cioca
Keyword(s):  
Natural Language Processing ◽  
Natural Language ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Semantic Relations ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Automated Recognition ◽  
Knowing That ◽  
Quo Vadis

The paper presents one of most important issues in natural language processing (NLP), namely the automated recognition of semantic relations (in this case, bridge anaphora). In this sense, we propose to recognize automatically, as accurately as possible, this type of relations in a literary corpus (the novel Quo Vadis), knowing that the diversity and complexity of relations between entities is impressive. Furthermore, we defined and classified the bridge anaphora type relations based on annotation conventions. In order to achieve the main goal, we developed a computational instrument, BAT (Bridge Anaphora Tool), currently still in a test (and implicitly an improvable) version. This study is intended to help especially specialists and researchers in the field of natural language processing, linguists, but not only.

The Paradoxes of Quo vadis

2020 ◽  
pp. 29-38
Author(s):  
Jerzy Axer
Keyword(s):  
Central Place ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Classical Antiquity ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
Ancient Rome ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Freedom Of Movement ◽  
Religious Vision ◽  
Late Nineteenth ◽  
Quo Vadis

Both the manner in which Sienkiewicz constructed his vision of ancient Rome and the way it affected contemporary readers appear paradoxical. This chapter presents four examples of these contradictions. The topographical vision of the Eternal City constructed in the novel reflects the perception of a pilgrim tourist visiting it in the late nineteenth century; nevertheless that vision restored the sense of connection held by native Italians with the tradition of Urbs Roma. The characters endowed in the novel with the greatest freedom of movement belong to Sienkiewicz’s world rather than to classical antiquity. As for the historical characters, they are passive and essentially form part of the novel’s mock-up of Neronian Rome. The book turned out to be very attractive to European readers, giving them an impression of genuine contact with their Roman heritage. Yet this effect was achieved by an author who drew upon the tradition of a Latinity imported into Poland and who, in addition, gave a central place to the motif of a Slavic martyr evangelizing her Roman oppressors. Readers who were completely unaware of the slogan ‘Poland, the Christ of Nations’, and understood nothing of the book’s patriotic codes, could nonetheless feel the authenticity of the author’s experience of something that can be called a ‘totalitarian system’. In this way, thanks to a Polish writer, European readers were given a vivid and impressive vision of Nero’s time, told from the point of view of the weak and oppressed. It was a historical and religious vision that seemed more believable than anything the writers of the West could offer them.

Quo vadis on the Stage

2020 ◽  
pp. 107-122
Author(s):  
David Mayer
Keyword(s):  
Motion Pictures ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Film Adaptations ◽  
The Novel ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
The Cross ◽  
Quo Vadis

In contrast to the applause and attendance figures generated by the several film adaptations which followed from 1913, theatrical renderings of Quo vadis were ridiculed, and stage runs were conspicuously brief. Theatre was not able to realise the strongly physical episodes the novelist had imagined and that motion pictures could supply. Although posters advertising the play depicted Lygia’s ordeal in the arena and her rescue by the strong-man Ursus grappling with a maddened aurochs, this crucial ‘sensation scene’ was never brought before theatre audiences. At best, stage versions of Quo vadis were disappointing, at worst they were dismal failures. On the English-speaking stage, three separate iterations of Quo vadis, not adapted until 1900, followed Wilson Barrett’s 1895 play The Sign of the Cross by five years and followed William Young’s theatrical version of Ben-Hur by a year. It wasn’t merely that these earlier plays had consumed the oxygen that might have given life to Quo vadis, it was also that stage versions of Quo vadis relied on similar configurations of characters found in The Sign of the Cross, of Christian-Pagan conflict, and of plots of martyrdom at the whims of despotic Roman emperors and their lubricious wives. Even Wilson Barrett’s adaptation failed to generate much enthusiasm and was readily replaced by his money-spinning biblical dramas and toga-plays. This study will consider adaptations by Jeanette L. Gilder, by Stanislav Stange, and Wilson Barrett. It will account for more successful stage versions of the novel performed in the Roman Catholic countries Italy and France.

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