version
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The 20th Century
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luka
Well-known member
If you reduce and keep reducing the time it takes for information and for goods to travel from one place to another (improved roads, railways, telegraph, cars, aeroplanes, telephone, fax, email) while at the same time increasing the volume of good and information transmitted, that alone would account for a great deal of acceleration.
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
Did you ever read the last bit of War and Peace by Tolstoy Luka?
Most critics say it ruins the novel, but I kept being reminded of it by our raging argument. His rejection of the Napoleon as Great Man narrative, his insistence that history is too complicated to be understood by historical narratives.
Most critics say it ruins the novel, but I kept being reminded of it by our raging argument. His rejection of the Napoleon as Great Man narrative, his insistence that history is too complicated to be understood by historical narratives.
version
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That Lovecraft quote about technological progress seems as though it could well come true.
version
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I'm sure it's come up on here a bunch of times, Tea will definitely have mentioned it at some point. It's the opening paragraph of The Call of Cthulhu.
"The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age."
"The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age."
Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
Good point, version. I think it's more about scientific discovery per se, although obviously the two are intimately related - the dawn of nuclear physics and extragalactic astronomy in Lovecraft's day; space telescopes, particle colliders, electron microscopes and DNA sequencing more recently.
version
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I've never seen this before; incredible photo.
Foetus 18 Weeks: the greatest photograph of the 20th century?
In April 1965, Life magazine put a photograph called Foetus 18 Weeks on its cover and caused a sensation. The issue was a spectacular success, the fastest-selling copy in Life’s entire history. In full colour and crystal clear detail, the picture showed a foetus in its amniotic sac, with its umbilical cord winding off to the placenta. The unborn child, floating in a seemingly cosmic backdrop, appears vulnerable yet serene. Its eyes are closed and its tiny, perfectly formed fists are clutched to its chest.
Capturing that most universal of subjects, our own creation, Foetus 18 Weeks was one of the 20th century’s great photographs, as emotive as it was technically impressive, even by today’s standards. And its impact was enormous, growing into something its creator struggled to control, as the image was hijacked by the fledgling anti-abortion movement.
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2019/nov/18/foetus-images-lennart-nilsson-photojournalist
Foetus 18 Weeks: the greatest photograph of the 20th century?
In April 1965, Life magazine put a photograph called Foetus 18 Weeks on its cover and caused a sensation. The issue was a spectacular success, the fastest-selling copy in Life’s entire history. In full colour and crystal clear detail, the picture showed a foetus in its amniotic sac, with its umbilical cord winding off to the placenta. The unborn child, floating in a seemingly cosmic backdrop, appears vulnerable yet serene. Its eyes are closed and its tiny, perfectly formed fists are clutched to its chest.
Capturing that most universal of subjects, our own creation, Foetus 18 Weeks was one of the 20th century’s great photographs, as emotive as it was technically impressive, even by today’s standards. And its impact was enormous, growing into something its creator struggled to control, as the image was hijacked by the fledgling anti-abortion movement.
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2019/nov/18/foetus-images-lennart-nilsson-photojournalist
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Corpsey
bandz ahoy
Lovecraft was really onto something, as terrible as his writing often is. I wonder if a better writer COULD have been so tapped in?
I've only read about 250 pages of war and peace. It was typical Tolstoy brilliance throughout but became exhausting as I was expected to read the whole thing in about a fortnight. I forced myself through Crime and Punishment in about three days I think, no wonder I ended up having a mental breakdown :crylarf:
I've only read about 250 pages of war and peace. It was typical Tolstoy brilliance throughout but became exhausting as I was expected to read the whole thing in about a fortnight. I forced myself through Crime and Punishment in about three days I think, no wonder I ended up having a mental breakdown :crylarf:
pattycakes_
Can turn naughty
C&P is worth it tho. What a ride.
Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
Yeah I was pretty blown away by it when I read it a few years back. Should definitely read some more Dosto.
I want to read some Tolstoy too, if for no other reason that to assess Spengler's verdict that "Dostoevsky is a prophet, Tolstoy merely a revolutionary".
pattycakes_
Can turn naughty
Yeah no other book ever got me so in tune with the emotions of the characters. I need to dig in further, too. Attempted Notes from the Underground years ago. Didn't make it very far. The two I really want to read are The Idiot and The Brothers Karamazov. The Brothers is supposed to be both Einstein and Freud's favourite book. Whatever that's worth. Einstein once said he learned more about humanity through reading Dosto than all of science combined. Or something to that effect.
version
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I've only read Notes from Underground and that was years ago. I remember enjoying it though.
Tea, this is a good short one of Tolstoy's.
Tea, this is a good short one of Tolstoy's.
Father Sergius by Leo Tolstoy. Search eText, Read Online, Study, Discuss.
Father Sergius by Leo Tolstoy. Searchable etext. Discuss with other readers.
www.online-literature.com
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version
Well-known member
From the Robert Anton Wilson list DannyL posted in the 'big books' thread.
"Nobody has really entered the 20th century if they haven’t digested Ulysses. And if they haven’t entered the 20th century, they’re going to fall pretty far behind pretty soon, as we enter the 21st. There’s a guy I correspond with occasionally who spends all his time fighting with Fundamentalists over Darwin. He’s living in the 19th century; nothing in the 20th century has affected him yet. He’s carrying on the brave battles of Thomas Henry Huxley a hundred years later. I know some people who are back in the 18th century – Burkian conservatives, trying to apply Burke’s principles to modern times. I sometimes do that myself – try to apply some of Burke’s principles. But not all of them! I don’t think he’s written in stone either. At any rate, everyone should read Ulysses to get into the 20th century."
"Nobody has really entered the 20th century if they haven’t digested Ulysses. And if they haven’t entered the 20th century, they’re going to fall pretty far behind pretty soon, as we enter the 21st. There’s a guy I correspond with occasionally who spends all his time fighting with Fundamentalists over Darwin. He’s living in the 19th century; nothing in the 20th century has affected him yet. He’s carrying on the brave battles of Thomas Henry Huxley a hundred years later. I know some people who are back in the 18th century – Burkian conservatives, trying to apply Burke’s principles to modern times. I sometimes do that myself – try to apply some of Burke’s principles. But not all of them! I don’t think he’s written in stone either. At any rate, everyone should read Ulysses to get into the 20th century."
Big Books
How do you feel about them? Do you see them lurking on the shelf and sigh or are you regularly tearing through 'em? Classic mistake with the big guns is to read their short works. They're all shit compared to the doorstops. Heed bolano. Go for moby dick, fuck Bartleby “Without turning, the...
www.dissensus.com
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Corpsey
bandz ahoy
That isn't true of Tolstoy's "Hajid Murat", though. Or "The Death of Ivan Ilyich".