Populism and ideology: nineteenth-century fiction and the cinema

Interventions ◽  
2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard J. Hand
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Vietnam War ◽  
Pride And Prejudice ◽  
Horror Genre ◽  
Cinematic Adaptation ◽  
Indian Context ◽  
Heart Of Darkness ◽  
Critical Issues ◽  
Adaptive Processes ◽  
Popular Texts

Richard J Hand in ‘Populism and Ideology: Nineteenth-Century Fiction and the Cinema’ explores the adaptation of nineteenth-century fiction into film. The focus of the chapter is on the cinematic adaptation of four extremely different yet continuingly popular texts at opposite ends of the nineteenth century: Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1816), Henry James’s Turn of the Screw (1898) and Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness (1899). After outlining the legacy of the selected examples of fiction on film, Hand explores the critical issues and the ideological ramifications that surface through these adaptive processes. The dramatization of each text brings out diverse issues relating to popularization and ideology. This is particularly pertinent with the processes of both inter-cultural adoption and inter-generic transposition, such as the relocating of Austen within a contemporary Indian context, the redeployment of Conrad’s narrative within the Vietnam War and the appropriation of Shelley and James into the populist contexts of the horror genre.

Apocalypse Now (1979)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rahul Sapra
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Vietnam War ◽  
Congo Basin ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
First Passage ◽  
Francis Ford Coppola ◽  
Heart Of Darkness ◽  
Late Nineteenth ◽  
The Vietnam War ◽  
European Colonialism

Apocalypse Now, produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola, is an adaptation of Joseph Conrad’s novella Heart of Darkness (1899) that deals with European colonialism in the Congo Basin in late nineteenth century. However, the scriptwriters Coppola and John Milius adapted Conrad’s text to convey the brutalities of the Vietnam War. The film charts the journey of the American Captain Willard (Martin Sheen) in Vietnam to find and terminate the rebellious and reportedly insane Colonel Walter E. Kurtz (Marlon Brando). Both the style and the content of the film are influenced by the modernism of Conrad and T.S. Eliot. Images of mutilation and dismemberment dominate Coppola’s film, since Kurtz is represented as a figure of mutilation, which is echoed by Eliot’s poetry. Coppola’s Kurtz reads the first passage of Eliot's "The Hollow Men" verbatim, and the photojournalist (Dennis Hopper) quotes from Eliot’s "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock." Margot Norris notes the film’s use of surrealism to express the irrationality, absurdity, futility, fragmentation, and incomprehensibility of the Vietnam War. The film won the Palme d’Or (1979) at Cannes, but it received mixed reviews, and is regarded by some as a flawed masterpiece.

Romantic Heroes and Colonial Bandits

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Máire ní Fhlathúin
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Literary Representations ◽  
Colonial State ◽  
Indian Context ◽  
British Colonial

This chapter argues that British literary representations of Indian practices (such as banditry) criminalized by the colonial state had the effect of transforming the eighteenth-century stereotype of the ‘mild Hindoo’ into a predatory Indian masculinity formed in opposition to a weak and victimized femininity. It presents an analysis of a series of representations of India developed through the appropriation of British metropolitan forms and texts, in which the potential for threat to the British colonial state implicit in depictions of Indian agency is disabled or negated by the distancing or alienation of Indian figures from British readers. The chapter examines British Indian adaptations of the most important of these nineteenth-century metropolitan models – the works of Byron and Scott – and the ways in which their depiction of the criminal bandit / hero is appropriated and transformed in the Indian context.

The Incomes of the Plutocrats in a Comparative Perspective

2021 ◽  
pp. 152-171
Author(s):  
Francis Teal
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Income Distribution ◽  
Comparative Perspective ◽  
Average Wage ◽  
Male Character ◽  
Pride And Prejudice ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Rich ◽  
The Uk

We now move to examine the top of the income distribution and begin by asking whether Mr Darcy, the central male character in Jane Austen’s novel Pride and Prejudice, would be regarded as a plutocrat today. If his income were converted to contemporary amounts it would be some £600,000. We show that Mr Darcy would need to earn some £8 million to be as rich as his nineteenth-century predecessor relative to the average wage. To understand how those super-high incomes arise, we introduce the Paretian distribution which we do first informally and then more formally. It is a distribution of this form which could produce what we see, a few very highly paid individuals whose incomes—up in the stratosphere of the super-rich—would still be very spread out. We use the Paretian distribution to estimate the number of plutocrats in the US, the UK, and China and show the incomes of the richest of the rich.

“THE MOST BEAUTIFUL MURDER”: THE TRANSGRESSIVE AESTHETICS OF MURDER IN VICTORIAN STREET BALLADS

2000 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 15-37
Author(s):  
Ellen L. O’Brien
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Working Class ◽  
Popular Press ◽  
Victorian England ◽  
Working Classes ◽  
Collective Resistance ◽  
Nineteenth Century France ◽  
Cultural Texts ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Popular Texts

To say that this common [criminal] fate was described in the popular press and commented on simply as a piece of police news is, indeed, to fall short of the facts. To say that it was sung and balladed would be more correct; it was expressed in a form quite other than that of the modern press, in a language which one could certainly describe as that of fiction rather than reality, once we have discovered that there is such a thing as a reality of fiction.—Louis Chevalier, Laboring Classes and Dangerous ClassesSPEAKING OF NINETEENTH-CENTURY FRANCE, Louis Chevalier traces the bourgeoisie’s elision of the working classes with the criminal classes, in which crime becomes either the representation of working class “failure” or “revenge” (396). Chevalier argues that working- class texts “recorded” their acquiescence to and acceptance of “a genuine fraternity of [criminal] fate” when they “described and celebrated [it] in verse” (397). Though a community of fate might inspire collective resistance, popular poetry and ballads, he confirms, reproduced metonymic connections between criminal and worker when “their pity went out to embrace dangerous classes and laboring classes alike. . . . One might almost say [they proclaimed these characteristics] in an identical poetic strain, so strongly was this community of feeling brought out in the relationship between the favorite subjects of working-class songs and the criminal themes of the street ballads, in almost the same words, meters, and tunes” (396) Acquiescence to or reiteration of worker/criminal equations established itself in workers’ views of themselves as “a different, alien and hostile society” (398) in literature that served as an “involuntary and ‘passive’ recording and communication of them” (395). Though I am investigating Victorian England, not nineteenth-century France, and though I regard the street ballads as popular texts which record resistance, not acquiescence, Chevalier’s work usefully articulates the predicament of class-based ideologies about worker and criminal which functioned similarly in Victorian England. More importantly, Chevalier acknowledges the complexity of street ballads as cultural texts..

"Who's Afraid of Arthur Schopenhauer?": A New Context for Conrad's Heart of Darkness

1994 ◽  
Vol 49 (1) ◽  
pp. 75-106 ◽  
Author(s):  
Owen Knowles
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Short Story ◽  
Critical Issue ◽  
Arthur Schopenhauer ◽  
Contextual Influences ◽  
Anxiety Of Influence ◽  
Heart Of Darkness ◽  
German Philosopher ◽  
Historically Situated ◽  
Dead Man

Conrad's relationship to Schopenhauer and the nineteenth-century traditions of pessimism sponsored by the German philosopher has long been a contentious critical issue. This paper discovers a new shaping context for Kurtz, the Promethean outlaw-philosopher and ubiquitous "voice" of Heart of Darkness, not in Schopenhauer's own writings but in the secondary myths, legends, and icons that endowed the great philosopher with a potent cultural afterlife during the period from 1870 to 1900. The numerous consonances between this body of later Schopenhauriana and Heart of Darkness point to ways in which powerful fin du globe anxieties and dark ancestral obsessions covertly inform both the tale's construction of Kurtz and its narrative practices-notably, its fashioning of a mythical narrative drawing upon established parallels between Schopenhauer and a monistic heart of darkness, its preoccupation with the problems of hearing and transmitting a ubiquitous legacy, and its climactic issue in the experiences of a disciple haunted by the spectral ghost of a dead ancestor. When placed against three varied examples from the period's Schopenhaueriana-Maupassant's short story "Beside a Dead Man" (1883), William Wallace's biography of the philosopher (1890), and Nietzsche's celebratory "Schopenhauer as Educator" from his Thoughts Out of Season (1874)-Heart of Darkness emerges as a work embroiled in an anxiety of influence whose invasive voices are both welcomed and resisted: its welcome most evident in cryptographic play with elements of the Schopenhauer legend, its resistance most marked in the skeptical rewriting of the celebratory mode employed by Nietzsche to welcome the heroic educator. A final coda views the tale's rhetorical excesses in the light of these contextual influences and suggests ways in which the substantially "Schopenhauerian world" of the story bears upon its concerns as a historically situated colonial fiction.

scholarly journals Les cartes de l'Afrique au XIXe siècle et Joseph Conrad: perceptions d'une révolution cartographique (Maps of Africa in the 19th century and Joseph Conrad: Perceptions of a Cartographic Revolution)

2015 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Isabelle Avila
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Twentieth Century ◽  
19Th Century ◽  
Joseph Conrad ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Literary Work ◽  
Heart Of Darkness ◽  
Complete Revolution ◽  
Xixe Siecle ◽  
The 19Th Century

La communication proposée aura pour but de s’interroger sur la notion de « carte mentale ». Qu’est-ce qu’une carte mentale ? Comment se construit-elle ? Comment et pourquoi faire des recherches sur les cartes mentales? Cette réflexion théorique sera accompagnée d’une étude sur les représentations cartographiques de l’empire britannique au tournant du vingtième siècle. Comment retrouver les cartes mentales de l’empire britannique au moment de son apogée à partir des discours des géographes et des cartes présentes dans les atlas, les manuels scolaires et les revues des sociétés de géographie? Tout d’abord, ces cartes présentent un empire relié au monde grâce à de nombreux liens de communication. C’est un empire qui est compris comme un véritable résumé du monde. Les cartes affirment aussi la puissance symbolique d’un empire associé à la couleur rouge, couleur qui confère une certaine homogénéité à cette construction impériale et qui suggère ainsi une identité impériale. Cependant, si de nombreuses cartes construisent l’image d’un empire unifié, certaines laissent entrevoir la diversité des statuts des différents territoires qui en font partie. D’autres encore tentent de représenter, aux côtés de l’empire formel en rouge, un empire informel commercial, c’est-à-dire la partie invisible de l’iceberg. Enfin, la plupart des cartes de l’empire britannique utilisent la projection de Mercator. Quelle image de l’empire est transmise par cette projection et quelles sont les tentatives entreprises par les géographes du début du vingtième siècle pour changer cette image? L’analyse de ces variations autour des portraits cartographiques de l’empire britannique permettra ainsi de voir comment les cartes influencent la perception d’un espace dont les territoires sont éparpillés sur les cinq continents. Cette étude conduira enfin à considérer les cartes comme des « lieux de mémoire », comme des images qui contribuent à inscrire des territoires dans les mémoires.At the end of the nineteenth century, the maps of Africa underwent a complete revolution. The blanks that they used to show were covered in a few years by the colours of the European powers colonizing the continent. The aim of this article is to study the perception of that cartographic revolution by mapreaders at the time, including one of the most famous: Joseph Conrad. In his work Heart of Darkness, published in 1899, at the close of a century of geographical progress, he dealt both with the blanks on the maps of Africa and the European colours that replaced them. His fascination for maps led him to create a very powerful literary map of Africa where the rainbow colours of the Europeans are surrounded by darkness. That oxymoronic image enables him not only to symbolically reflect a consciousness of space but also of time, summarizing the proud certainties of the imperialism and nationalism of European powers with their colours and announcing the uncertainties and the darkness of the first half of the twentieth century. Ultimately, this article aims at showing that it is necessary to replace the literary work of Joseph Conrad in its historical context in order to understand how much his inspiration was linked both to his own experience and to a zeitgeist shared by his contemporaries. 

scholarly journals The Binary Oppositions in Joseph Conrad's Novel Heart of Darkness

2021 ◽  
Vol 60 (4) ◽  
pp. 611-642
Author(s):  
Asst. Prof. Huda Kadhim Alwan
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Heart Of Darkness ◽  
The World ◽  
Highly Skilled ◽  
Unethical Behaviors ◽  
Binary Oppositions

The novel Heart of Darkness is regarded as one of Joseph Conrad's highly skilled works and seen as an important tale written between the years of 1898 - 1899, and also viewed as an assault on imperialism and unethical behaviors of the European colonizers in Africa in the nineteenth century. The novel displays the author's humanity towards the crimes of the colonists and imperialists throughout the world. In Heart of Darkness, Conrad shows the cruelty of colonialism in Africa through his major character, Charlie Marlow, who realizes the cruel manners of Belgian colonialism during his journey to the Congo looking for the European ivory agent, Kurtz. This novel is a combination of two opposite things. It exposes the author's viewpoint regarding the ethics of the Europeans and the Africans.        This research concentrates on the binary oppositions in Heart of Darkness through Marlow's journey to Africa and exposes Marlow's struggle between his human nature and his beliefs and replies whether his conflict will be effective and bring good results or negative.

scholarly journals Apocalypse Now, Vietnam, and the Rhetoric of Influence

2014 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 11-24
Author(s):  
Jeffrey Childs
Keyword(s):  
Vietnam War ◽  
Francis Ford Coppola ◽  
Heart Of Darkness ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Vietnam War

Readings of Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now (1979) often confront the difficulty of having to privilege either its aesthetic context (considering, for instance, its relation to Conrad's Heart of Darkness [1899] or to the history of cinema) or its value as a representation of the Vietnam War. In this paper, I will argue that viewing the film as a meditation on the nature and rhetoric of influence allows us to bridge this gap and provides us with valuable insights into both the film's aesthetic precursors and the circumstances of its historical setting.ResumoAs leituras do filme Apocalypse Now (1979) de Francis Ford Coppola são muitas vezes marcadas pelo imperativo de escolher entre uma abordagem ao seu contexto estético (referindo, por exemplo, a relação do filme com a obra Heart of Darkness [1899], de Conrad, ou com a história do cinema) e uma análise do seu valor enquanto representação da Guerra do Vietname. Neste ensaio, irei defender que uma aproximação ao filme enquanto meditação sobre a natureza e a retórica da influência permite preencher esta lacuna e realçar aspectos fundamentais quer acerca dos precursores estéticos da obra, quer sobre as circunstâncias específicas do seu contexto histórico. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.14195/2182-8830_1-2_1

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