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[
"Guys and Dolls",
"1982 London revival",
"When did the London revival start",
"began rehearsals for a planned 1971 London revival of Guys and Dolls at his National Theatre Company's Old Vic theatre. However, due to poor health he had to stop,",
"What happened after he stopped",
"his revival never saw the light of day.",
"Was there another revival",
"In 1982, Richard Eyre directed a major revival",
"What happened with this revival",
"Eyre called it a \"re-thinking\" of the musical,"
]
| C_8659549f5ee64c21bb6952b1a4d7f882_1 | How did it get changed | 5 | How did Richard Eyre 1982 revival of the Guys and Dolls change the play? | Guys and Dolls | Laurence Olivier had wanted to play Nathan Detroit, and began rehearsals for a planned 1971 London revival of Guys and Dolls at his National Theatre Company's Old Vic theatre. However, due to poor health he had to stop, and his revival never saw the light of day. In 1982, Richard Eyre directed a major revival at London's National Theatre. Eyre called it a "re-thinking" of the musical, and his production featured an award-winning neon-lit set design inspired by Rudi Stern's 1979 book Let There Be Neon, and brassier orchestrations with vintage yet innovative harmonies. The show's choreography by David Toguri included a large-scale tap dance number of the "Guys and Dolls" finale, performed by the principals and entire cast. The revival opened March 9, 1982, and was an overnight sensation, running for nearly four years and breaking all box office records. The original cast featured Bob Hoskins as Nathan Detroit, Julia McKenzie as Adelaide, Ian Charleson as Sky and Julie Covington as Sarah. The production won five Olivier Awards, including for McKenzie and Eyre and for Best Musical. Eyre also won the Evening Standard Award, and Hoskins won the Critics' Circle Theatre Award. In October 1982, Hoskins was replaced by Trevor Peacock, Charleson by Paul Jones, and Covington by Belinda Sinclair; in the spring of 1983 McKenzie was replaced by Imelda Staunton and Fiona Hendley replaced Sinclair. This production closed in late 1983 to make way for a Broadway try-out of the ill-fated musical Jean Seberg, which following critical failure closed after four months. Eyre's Guys and Dolls returned to the National from April through September 1984, this time starring Lulu, Norman Rossington, Clarke Peters and Betsy Brantley. After a nationwide tour, this production transferred to the West End at the Prince of Wales Theatre, where it ran from June 1985 to April 1986. Following Ian Charleson's untimely death from AIDS at the age of 40, in November 1990 two reunion performances of Guys and Dolls, with almost all of the original 1982 cast and musicians, were given at the National Theatre as a tribute to Charleson. The tickets sold out immediately, and the dress rehearsal was also packed. The proceeds from the performances were donated to the new Ian Charleson Day Centre HIV clinic at the Royal Free Hospital, and to scholarships in Charleson's name at LAMDA. CANNOTANSWER | brassier orchestrations with vintage yet innovative harmonies. | Guys and Dolls is a musical with music and lyrics by Frank Loesser and book by Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows. It is based on "The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown" (1933) and "Blood Pressure", which are two short stories by Damon Runyon, and also borrows characters and plot elements from other Runyon stories, such as "Pick the Winner".
The show premiered on Broadway in 1950, where it ran for 1,200 performances and won the Tony Award for Best Musical. The musical has had several Broadway and London revivals, as well as a 1955 film adaptation starring Marlon Brando, Jean Simmons, Frank Sinatra and Vivian Blaine.
Guys and Dolls was selected as the winner of the 1951 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. However, because of writer Abe Burrows' communist sympathies as exposed by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), the Trustees of Columbia University vetoed the selection, and no Pulitzer for Drama was awarded that year.
In 1998, Vivian Blaine, Sam Levene, Robert Alda and Isabel Bigley, along with the original Broadway cast of the 1950 Decca cast album, were posthumously inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.
Background
Guys and Dolls was conceived by producers Cy Feuer and Ernest Martin as an adaptation of Damon Runyon's short stories. These stories, written in the 1920s and 1930s, concerned gangsters, gamblers, and other characters of the New York underworld. Runyon was known for the unique dialect he employed in his stories, mixing highly formal language and slang. Frank Loesser, who had spent most of his career as a lyricist for movie musicals, was hired as composer and lyricist. George S. Kaufman was hired as director. When the first version of the show's book, or dialogue, written by Jo Swerling was deemed unusable, Feuer and Martin asked radio comedy writer Abe Burrows to rewrite it.
Loesser had already written much of the score to correspond with the first version of the book. Burrows later recalled:
Frank Loesser's fourteen songs were all great, and the [new book] had to be written so that the story would lead into each of them. Later on, the critics spoke of the show as 'integrated'. The word integration usually means that the composer has written songs that follow the story line gracefully. Well, we accomplished that but we did it in reverse.
Abe Burrows specifically crafted the role of Nathan Detroit around Sam Levene who signed for the project long before Burrows wrote a single word of dialogue, a similar break Burrows said he had when he later wrote Cactus Flower for Lauren Bacall. In “Honest, Abe: Is There Really No Business Like Show Business?”, Burrows recalls "I had the sound of their voices in my head. I knew the rhythm of their speech and it helped make the dialogue sharper and more real". Although Broadway and movie veteran Sam Levene was not a singer, it was agreed he was otherwise perfect as Nathan Detroit; indeed, Levene was one of Runyon's favorite actors. Frank Loesser agreed it was easier adjusting the music to Levene's limitations than substituting a better singer who couldn't act. Levene's lack of singing ability is the reason the lead role of Nathan Detroit only has one song, the duet "Sue Me".
Composer and lyricist Frank Loesser specifically wrote "Sue Me" for Sam Levene, and structured the song so he and Vivian Blaine never sang their showstopping duet together. The son of a cantor, Sam Levene was fluent in Yiddish: "Alright, already, I'm just a no-goodnick; alright, already, it’s true, so nu? So sue me." Frank Loesser felt "Nathan Detroit should be played as a brassy Broadway tough guy who sang with more grits than gravy. Sam Levene sang “Sue Me” with such a wonderful Runyonesque flavor that his singing had been easy to forgive, in fact it had been quite charming in its ineptitude." "Musically, Sam Levene may have been tone-deaf, but he inhabited Frank Loesser's world as a character more than a caricature", says Larry Stempel, a music professor at Fordham University and the author of Showtime: A History of the Broadway Musical Theater.
The character of Miss Adelaide was created specifically to fit Vivian Blaine into the musical, after Loesser decided she was ill-suited to play the conservative Sarah. When Loesser suggested reprising some songs in the second act, Kaufman warned: "If you reprise the songs, we'll reprise the jokes."
Synopsis
Act I
A pantomime of never-ceasing activities depicts the hustle and bustle of New York City ("Runyonland"). Three small-time gamblers, Nicely-Nicely Johnson, Benny Southstreet, and Rusty Charlie, argue over which horse will win a big race ("Fugue for Tinhorns"). The band members of the Save-a-Soul Mission, led by the pious and beautiful Sergeant Sarah Brown, call for sinners to "Follow the Fold" and repent. Nicely and Benny's employer, Nathan Detroit, runs an illegal floating crap game. Due to local policeman Lt. Brannigan's strong-armed presence, he has found only one likely spot to hold the game: the "Biltmore garage". Its owner, Joey Biltmore, requires a $1,000 security deposit, and Nathan is broke ("The Oldest Established"). Nathan hopes to win a $1,000 bet against Sky Masterson, a gambler willing to bet on virtually anything. Nathan proposes a bet he believes he cannot lose: Sky must take a woman of Nathan's choice to dinner in Havana, Cuba. Sky agrees, and Nathan chooses Sarah Brown.
At the mission, Sky attempts to make a deal with Sarah; offering her "one dozen genuine sinners" in exchange for the date in Havana. Sarah refuses, and they argue over whom they will fall in love with ("I'll Know"). Sky kisses Sarah, and she slaps him. Nathan goes to watch his fiancée of 14 years, Adelaide, perform her nightclub act ("A Bushel and a Peck"). After her show, she asks him to marry her once again, telling him that she has been sending her mother letters for twelve years claiming that they have been married with five children. She finds out that Nathan is still running the crap game. After kicking him out, she reads a medical book telling her that her long-running cold may be due to Nathan's refusal to marry her ("Adelaide's Lament").
The next day, Nicely and Benny watch as Sky pursues Sarah, and Nathan tries to win back Adelaide's favor. They declare that guys will do anything for the dolls they love ("Guys and Dolls"). General Cartwright, the leader of Save-a-Soul, visits the mission and explains that she will be forced to close the branch unless they succeed in bringing some sinners to the upcoming revival meeting. Sarah, desperate to save the mission, promises the General "one dozen genuine sinners", implicitly accepting Sky's deal. Brannigan discovers a group of gamblers waiting for Nathan's crap game, and to convince him of their innocence, they tell Brannigan their gathering is Nathan's "surprise bachelor party". This satisfies Brannigan, and Nathan resigns himself to eloping with Adelaide. Adelaide goes home to pack, promising to meet him after her show the next afternoon. The Save-A-Soul Mission band passes by, and Nathan sees that Sarah is not in it; he realizes that he lost the bet and faints.
In a Havana nightclub, Sky buys a drink for himself and a "Cuban milkshake" for Sarah. She doesn't realize that the drink contains Bacardi rum, and she gets drunk and kisses Sky ("If I Were a Bell"). Sky realizes that he genuinely cares for Sarah, and he takes her back to New York. They return at around 4:00 a.m., and Sky tells Sarah how much he loves the early morning ("My Time of Day"). They both spontaneously admit that they're in love ("I've Never Been in Love Before"). A siren sounds and gamblers run out of the mission, where Nathan has been holding the crap game. Sarah assumes that Sky took her to Havana so Nathan could run the game in the mission, and she walks out on him.
Act II
The next evening, Adelaide performs her act ("Take Back Your Mink"). Nathan doesn't show up for the elopement because he's still running the crap game. She soon realizes that Nathan has stood her up again ("Adelaide's Second Lament").
Sarah admits to Arvide, her uncle and fellow mission worker, that she does love Sky, but she will not see him again. Arvide expresses his faith in Sky's inherent goodness and urges Sarah to follow her heart ("More I Cannot Wish You"). Sky tells Sarah he intends to deliver the dozen genuine sinners for the revival. She doesn't believe him and walks off, but Arvide subtly encourages him.
Nicely shows Sky to the crap game; now in the sewers ("Crapshooters Dance"). Big Jule, a gambler, has lost a large sum of money and refuses to end the game until he earns it back. Sky arrives and fails to convince the crapshooters to come to the mission. He gives Nathan $1,000 and claims that he lost the bet to protect Sarah. Sky makes a last-minute bet to get the sinners; if he loses, everyone gets $1,000, but if he wins, they go to the mission ("Luck Be a Lady"). He wins the bet. Nathan runs into Adelaide on his way there. She tries to get him to elope, but when he can't, she walks out on him. Nathan professes his love for her ("Sue Me"), then leaves.
Sarah is shocked to see that Sky carried through on his promise. The General asks the gamblers to confess their sins, and while some do, one of them admits the real reason they are even there. The General is thrilled that good can come from evil. Attempting to appear contrite, Nicely invents a dream that encouraged him to repent, and the gamblers join in with revivalist fervor ("Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat"). Brannigan arrives and threatens to arrest everyone for the crap game in the Mission, but Sarah clears them, saying that none of the gamblers were at the mission the previous night. After Brannigan leaves, Nathan confesses that they held the crap game in the mission. He also confesses to the bet he made with Sky about taking Sarah to Havana. He adds that he won the bet, to Sarah's shock, and she realizes that Sky wanted to protect her reputation and must genuinely care about her.
Sarah and Adelaide run into each other, and they commiserate and then resolve to marry their men anyway and reform them later ("Marry the Man Today"). A few weeks later, Nathan owns a newsstand and has officially closed the crap game. Sky, who is now married to Sarah, works at the mission band and has also stopped gambling. The characters celebrate as Nathan and Adelaide are married ("Guys and Dolls (Finale/Reprise)").
Musical numbers
Act I
"Runyonland" – Orchestra
"Fugue for Tinhorns" – Nicely, Benny, Rusty
"Follow the Fold" – Sarah, Mission Band
"The Oldest Established" – Nathan, Nicely, Benny, Guys
"I'll Know" – Sarah, Sky
"A Bushel and a Peck" – Adelaide, Hot Box Girls
"Adelaide's Lament" – Adelaide
"Guys and Dolls" – Nicely, Benny
"Havana" – Orchestra
"If I Were a Bell" – Sarah
"My Time of Day/I've Never Been in Love Before" – Sky, Sarah
Act II
"Take Back Your Mink" – Adelaide, Hot Box Girls
"Adelaide's Second Lament" – Adelaide
"More I Cannot Wish You" – Arvide
"Crapshooters Ballet" – Orchestra
"Luck Be a Lady" – Sky, Guys
"Sue Me" – Adelaide, Nathan
"Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat" – Nicely, Company
"Marry the Man Today" – Adelaide, Sarah
"Guys and Dolls (Reprise)" – Company
Productions
Original 1950 Broadway production
The show had its pre-Broadway try-out at the Shubert Theater in Philadelphia, opening Saturday, October 14, 1950. The musical premiered on Broadway at the 46th Street Theatre (now Richard Rodgers Theatre) on November 24, 1950. It was directed by George S. Kaufman, with dances and musical numbers by Michael Kidd, scenic and lighting design by Jo Mielziner, costumes by Alvin Colt, and orchestrations by George Bassman and Ted Royal, with vocal arrangements by Herbert Greene It starred Robert Alda (Sky Masterson), Sam Levene (Nathan Detroit), Isabel Bigley (Sarah) and Vivian Blaine (Miss Adelaide). Iva Withers was a replacement as Miss Adelaide. The musical ran for 1,200 performances, winning five 1951 Tony Awards, including the award for Best Musical. Decca Records issued the original cast recording on 78 rpm records, which was later expanded and re-issued on LP, and then transferred to CD in the 1980s.
1953 First UK production
The premiere West End production of Guys and Dolls opened at the London Coliseum on May 28, 1953, a few days before the 1953 Coronation and ran for 555 performances, including a Royal Command Variety Performance for Queen Elizabeth on November 2, 1953. Credited with above-the-title-billing the London cast co-starred Vivian Blaine as Miss Adelaide and Sam Levene as Nathan Detroit, each reprising their original Broadway performances; Jerry Wayne performed the role of Sky Masterson since Robert Alda did not reprise his Broadway role in the first UK production which co-starred Lizbeth Webb as Sarah Brown. Before opening at the Coliseum, Guys and Dolls had an eight performance run at the Bristol Hippodrome, where the show opened on May 19, 1953, and closed on May 25, 1953. Lizbeth Webb was the only major principal who was British and was chosen to play the part of Sarah Brown by Frank Loesser. The show has had numerous revivals and tours and has become a popular choice for school and community theatre productions.
1955 First Las Vegas production
Vivian Blaine as Miss Adelaide, Sam Levene as Nathan Detroit and Robert Alda as Sky Masterson recreated their original Broadway performances twice daily in a slightly reduced version of Guys and Dolls when the first Las Vegas production opened a six-month run at the Royal Nevada, September 7, 1955, the first time a Broadway musical was performed on the Las Vegas Strip.
1965 Fifteenth Anniversary production
In 1965 Vivian Blaine and Sam Levene reprised their original Broadway roles as Miss Adelaide and Nathan Detroit in a 15th anniversary revival of Guys and Dolls at the Mineola Theatre, Mineola, New York and Paramus Playhouse, New Jersey. Blaine and Levene performed the fifteenth anniversary production of Guys and Dolls for a limited run of 24 performances at each theatre.
New York City Center 1955, 1965 and 1966 revivals
New York City Center mounted short runs of the musical in 1955, 1965 and 1966. A production starring Walter Matthau as Nathan Detroit, Helen Gallagher as Adelaide, Ray Shaw as Sky and Leila Martin as Sarah had 31 performances, running from April 20 to May 1, and May 31 to June 12, 1955.
Another presentation at City Center, with Alan King as Nathan Detroit, Sheila MacRae as Adelaide, Jerry Orbach as Sky and Anita Gillette as Sarah, ran for 15 performances from April 28 to May 9, 1965. A 1966 production, starring Jan Murray as Nathan Detroit, Vivian Blaine reprising her role as Adelaide, Hugh O'Brian as Sky, and Barbara Meister as Sarah, ran for 23 performances, from June 8 to June 26, 1966.
1976 Broadway revival
An all-black cast staged the first Broadway revival of Guys and Dolls opened on July 10, 1976, in previews, officially on July 21, at The Broadway Theatre. It starred Robert Guillaume as Nathan Detroit, Norma Donaldson as Miss Adelaide, James Randolph as Sky and Ernestine Jackson as Sarah Brown. Guillaume and Jackson were nominated for Tony and Drama Desk Awards, and Ken Page as Nicely-Nicely won a Theatre World Award.
This production featured Motown-style musical arrangements by Danny Holgate and Horace Ott, and it was directed and choreographed by Billy Wilson. The entire production was under the supervision of Abe Burrows, and musical direction and choral arrangements were by Howard Roberts.
The show closed on February 13, 1977, after 12 previews and 239 performances. A cast recording was released subsequent to the show's opening.
1982 London revival
Laurence Olivier had wanted to play Nathan Detroit, and began rehearsals for a planned 1971 London revival of Guys and Dolls for the National Theatre Company then based at the Old Vic. However, due to poor health he had to stop, and his revival never happened.
In 1982, Richard Eyre directed a major revival at London's National Theatre. Eyre called it a "re-thinking" of the musical, and his production featured an award-winning neon-lit set design inspired by Rudi Stern's 1979 book Let There Be Neon, and brassier orchestrations with vintage yet innovative harmonies. The show's choreography by David Toguri included a large-scale tap dance number of the "Guys and Dolls" finale, performed by the principals and entire cast. The revival opened March 9, 1982, and was an overnight sensation, running for nearly four years and breaking all box office records. The original cast featured Bob Hoskins as Nathan Detroit, Julia McKenzie as Adelaide, Ian Charleson as Sky and Julie Covington as Sarah. The production won five Olivier Awards, including for McKenzie and Eyre and for Best Musical. Eyre also won an Evening Standard Theatre Award, and Hoskins won the Critics' Circle Theatre Award.
In October 1982, Hoskins was replaced by Trevor Peacock, Charleson by Paul Jones, and Covington by Belinda Sinclair; in the spring of 1983, McKenzie was replaced by Imelda Staunton and Fiona Hendley replaced Sinclair. This production closed in late 1983 to make way for a Broadway try-out of the ill-fated musical Jean Seberg, which following critical failure closed after four months. Eyre's Guys and Dolls returned to the National from April through September 1984, this time starring Lulu, Norman Rossington, Clarke Peters and Betsy Brantley. After a nationwide tour, this production transferred to the West End at the Prince of Wales Theatre, where it ran from June 1985 to April 1986.
Following Ian Charleson's death from AIDS at the age of 40, in November 1990 two reunion performances of Guys and Dolls, with almost all of the original 1982 cast and musicians, were given at the National Theatre as a tribute to Charleson. The tickets sold out immediately, and the dress rehearsal was also packed. The proceeds from the performances were donated to the new Ian Charleson Day Centre HIV clinic at the Royal Free Hospital, and to scholarships in Charleson's name at LAMDA.
1992 Broadway revival
The 1992 Broadway revival was the most successful American remounting of the show since the original Broadway production which ran for 1,200 performances. Directed by Jerry Zaks, it starred Nathan Lane as Nathan Detroit, Peter Gallagher as Sky, Faith Prince as Adelaide and Josie de Guzman as Sarah. This production played at the Martin Beck Theatre from April 14, 1992, to January 8, 1995, with 1,143 performances.
The production received a rave review from Frank Rich in The New York Times, stating "It's hard to know which genius, and I do mean genius, to celebrate first while cheering the entertainment at the Martin Beck." It received eight Tony Award nominations, and won four, including Best Revival, and the show also won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Revival. This revival featured various revisions to the show's score, including brand new music for the "Runyonland", "A Bushel and a Peck", "Take Back Your Mink" and "Havana". The orchestrations were redesigned by Michael Starobin, and there were new dance arrangements added to "A Bushel and a Peck" and "Take Back Your Mink".
A one-hour documentary film captured the recording sessions of the production's original cast album. Titled Guys and Dolls: Off the Record, the film aired on PBS's Great Performances series in December 1992, and was released on DVD in 2007. Complete takes of most of the show's songs are featured, as well as coaching from director Zaks, and commentary sessions by stars Gallagher, de Guzman, Lane and Prince on the production and their characters.
Lorna Luft auditioned for the role of Adelaide in this production. Faith Prince ultimately played the role, and Luft later played the role in the 1992 National Tour.
1996 London revival
Richard Eyre repeated his 1982 success with another National Theatre revival of the show, this time in a limited run. It starred Henry Goodman as Nathan Detroit, Imelda Staunton returning as Adelaide, Clarke Peters returning as Sky and Joanna Riding as Sarah. Clive Rowe played Nicely-Nicely Johnson, and David Toguri returned as choreographer. The production ran from December 17, 1996, through March 29, 1997 and from July 2, 1997, to November 22, 1997. It received three Olivier Award nominations, winning one: Best Supporting Performance in a Musical went to Clive Rowe. Richard Eyre won the Critics' Circle Theatre Award for Best Director, and the production won Best Musical.
2005 West End revival
The 2005 West End revival opened at London's Piccadilly Theatre in June 2005 and closed in April 2007. This revival, directed by Michael Grandage, starred Ewan McGregor as Sky, Jenna Russell as Sarah, Jane Krakowski as Adelaide, and Douglas Hodge as Nathan Detroit. During the run, Nigel Harman, Adam Cooper, Norman Bowman and Ben Richards took over as Sky; Kelly Price, Amy Nuttall and Lisa Stokke took over as Sarah; Sarah Lancashire, Sally Ann Triplett, Claire Sweeney, Lynsey Britton and Samantha Janus took over as Adelaide; and Nigel Lindsay, Neil Morrissey, Patrick Swayze, Alex Ferns and Don Johnson took over as Nathan Detroit. This production added the song "Adelaide" that Frank Loesser had written for the 1955 film adaptation. According to a September 2007 article in Playbill.com, this West End production had been scheduled to begin previews for a transfer to Broadway in February 2008, but this plan was dropped.
2009 Broadway revival
A Broadway revival of the show opened on March 1, 2009, at the Nederlander Theatre. The cast starred Oliver Platt as Nathan Detroit, Lauren Graham, in her Broadway debut, as Adelaide, Craig Bierko as Sky and Kate Jennings Grant as Sarah. Des McAnuff was the director, and the choreographer was Sergio Trujillo. The show opened to generally negative reviews. The New York Times called it "static" and "uninspired", the New York Post said, "How can something so zippy be so tedious?" and Time Out New York wrote, "Few things are more enervating than watching good material deflate." However, the show received a highly favorable review from The New Yorker, and the producers decided to keep the show open in hopes of positive audience response. The New York Post reported on March 4 that producer Howard Panter "[said] he'll give Guys and Dolls at least seven weeks to find an audience." The revival closed on June 14, 2009, after 28 previews and 113 performances.
2015–2016 West End revival and UK/Ireland tour
A revival opened at the 2015 Chichester Festival. This moved to Manchester and Birmingham before moving onto a West End opening at the Savoy Theatre on December 10, 2015, for previews with a full opening on January 6, 2016, until March 12, 2016. The production starred Sophie Thompson as Adelaide and Jamie Parker as Sky. The production then transferred to the Phoenix Theatre, with Oliver Tompsett as Sky, Samantha Spiro as Adelaide and Richard Kind as Nathan. On June 28, 2016, the role of Miss Adelaide was taken over by Rebel Wilson, and Nathan Detroit was played by Simon Lipkin. The tour continued around UK cities and Dublin.
2017–2018 UK all-black production
Talawa Theatre Company and Manchester's Royal Exchange Theatre produced the UK's first all-black Guys and Dolls in 2017. The production opened on December 2, 2017, and following an extension ran to February 27, 2018, at the Royal Exchange in Manchester. The cast included Ray Fearon as Nathan Detroit, Ashley Zhangazha as Sky Masterson, Abiona Omonua as Sarah Brown, and Lucy Vandi as Miss Adelaide.
In this production, the musical was relocated to Harlem, 1939, with the music referencing jazz, and gospel. Director Michael Buffong said, "Pre-war Harlem was all about the hustle. The creativity of that era was born from a unique collision of talent and circumstance as people escaped the agricultural and oppressive south via the 'underground railroad' into the highly urbanised and industrialised north. Much of our popular culture, from dance to music, has its roots in that period. Our Guys and Dolls brings all of this to the fore."
Reviews particularly praised the music, relocation to Harlem, and sense of spectacle. Lyn Gardner in The Guardian wrote that "the gamblers ... are a bunch of sharp-suited peacocks clad in rainbow hues." Ann Treneman in The Times commented, "Whoever had the idea of moving this classic musical from one part of New York to another bit, just up the road, needs to be congratulated. This version of Frank Loesser's musical, which swirls around the lives of the petty gangsters and their 'dolls' who inhabit New York's underbelly, moves the action to Harlem at its prewar height in 1939. It is a Talawa production with an all-black cast and it is terrific from the get-go." Clare Brennan in The Observer stated, "Relocated to Harlem, this fine new production of Frank Loesser's classic musical retains a threat of violence under a cartoon-bright exterior."
Other
In 1995, a Las Vegas production, performed without intermission, starred Jack Jones, Maureen McGovern and Frank Gorshin.
Charles Randolph-Wright directed a production at Washington's Arena Stage, starring Maurice Hines (Nathan Detroit) and Alexandra Foucard (Adelaide), opening on December 30, 1999. The production received six Helen Hayes Award nominations. With support from Jo Sullivan Loesser, the production began a national tour in August 2001. The cast recording from this production, released in November 2001, was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album.
An Australian remount of the Michael Grandage West End production of Guys and Dolls opened in Melbourne, Australia on April 5, 2008. The show starred Lisa McCune, Marina Prior, Garry McDonald, Ian Stenlake, Shane Jacobson, Wayne Scott Kermond, and Magda Szubanski, and ran at the Princess Theatre. The Melbourne season closed in August 2008 and transferred to Sydney from March 13, 2009, to May 31, 2009, at the Capitol Theatre, retaining the Melbourne cast.
In August 2009, a concert version ran at The Hollywood Bowl, Hollywood, California, starring Scott Bakula (Nathan Detroit), Brian Stokes Mitchell (Sky Masterson), Ellen Greene (Miss Adelaide), and Jessica Biel (Sarah Brown).
In February 2011, a co-production between Clwyd Theatr Cymru, the New Wolsey Theatre and the Salisbury Playhouse opened at Clwyd Theatr. Directed by Peter Rowe and with music direction by Greg Palmer and choreography by Francesca Jaynes, the show was performed by a cast of 22 actor-musicians, with all music played live on stage by the cast. The show also toured Cardiff, Swansea, and other Welsh cities as well as some English cities, receiving a positive review in The Guardian.
A concert performance ran at London's Cadogan Hall from 22 to 25 August 2012, featuring Dennis Waterman, Ruthie Henshall, Anna-Jane Casey, and Lance Ellington (Strictly Come Dancing), with musical director Richard Balcombe and the Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra and Choir.
In April 2014, a one-night-only performance took place at Carnegie Hall, starring Nathan Lane (reprising the role that made him a star), Megan Mullally, Patrick Wilson and Sierra Boggess. It was directed by Jack O'Brien and featured the Orchestra of St. Luke's playing the original orchestrations.
Reception
The original Broadway production of Guys and Dolls opened to unanimously positive reviews, which was a relief to the cast, who had had a 41-performance pre-Broadway tryout in Philadelphia in which each of the 41 performances was different. Critics praised the musical's faithfulness to Damon Runyon's style and characterizations. Richard Watts of the New York Post wrote "Guys and Dolls is just what it should be to celebrate the Runyon spirit...filled with the salty characters and richly original language sacred to the memory of the late Master". William Hawkins of the New York World-Telegram & Sun stated "It recaptures what [Runyon] knew about Broadway, that its wickedness is tinhorn, but its gallantry is as pure and young as Little Eva". Robert Coleman of the New York Daily Mirror wrote "We think Damon would have relished it as much as we did".
The book and score were greatly praised as well; John Chapman, then Chief Theatre Critic, of the New York Daily News wrote "The book is a work of easy and delightful humor. Its music and lyrics, by Frank Loesser, are so right for the show and so completely lacking in banality, that they amount to an artistic triumph". Coleman stated "Frank Loesser has written a score that will get a big play on the juke boxes, over the radio, and in bistros throughout the land. His lyrics are especially notable in that they help Burrows's topical gags to further the plot". In The New York Times, Brooks Atkinson wrote "Mr. Loesser's lyrics and songs have the same affectionate appreciation of the material as the book, which is funny without being self-conscious or mechanical".
Multiple critics asserted that the work was of great significance to musical theatre. John McClain of the New York Journal American proclaimed "it is the best and most exciting thing of its kind since Pal Joey. It is a triumph and a delight." Atkinson stated, "we might as well admit that Guys and Dolls is a work of art. It is spontaneous and has form, style, and spirit." Chapman asserted, "In all departments, Guys and Dolls is a perfect musical comedy".
Film adaptations
On November 3, 1955 the film version of the musical was released, starring Marlon Brando as Sky, Frank Sinatra as Nathan Detroit, and Jean Simmons as Sarah, with Vivian Blaine reprising her role as Adelaide. The film was directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz and produced by Samuel Goldwyn.
Levene lost the film role of Nathan Detroit to Frank Sinatra. "You can't have a Jew playing a Jew, it wouldn't work on screen", producer Samuel Goldwyn argued, when explaining that he wanted Sinatra, rather than Levene, who had originated the role, even though Guys and Dolls film director Joseph L. Mankiewicz wanted Levene, the original Broadway star. Frank Loesser felt Sinatra played the part like a "dapper Italian swinger". Mankiewicz said "if there could be one person in the world more miscast as Nathan Detroit than Frank Sinatra that would be Laurence Olivier and I am one of his greatest fans; the role had been written for Sam Levene who was divine in it". Sinatra did his best to give Nathan Detroit a few stereotyped Jewish gestures and inflections, but Frank Loesser hated "how Sinatra turned the rumpled Nathan Detroit into a smoothie. Sam Levene's husky untrained voice added to the song's charm, not to mention its believability". Frank Loesser died in 1969, still refusing to watch the film version released in 1955.
Around the time of the film's release, American composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim wrote film reviews for Films in Review. Sondheim (then aged 25) reviewed the film version of Guys and Dolls, and observed: "Sinatra ambles through his role as Nathan Detroit as though he were about to laugh at the jokes in the script. He has none of the sob in the voice, and the incipient ulcer in the stomach, that the part requires and Sam Levene supplied so hilariously on the stage. Sinatra sings on pitch, but colorlessly; Levene sang off pitch, but acted while he sang. Sinatra's lackadaisical performance, his careless and left handed attempt at characterization not only harm the picture immeasurably but indicate an alarming lack of professionally."
Three new songs, written by Frank Loesser, were added to the film: "Pet Me Poppa"; "A Woman in Love"; and "Adelaide", which was written specifically for Sinatra. Five songs from the stage musical were omitted from the movie: "A Bushel and a Peck", "My Time of Day", "I've Never Been In Love Before", "More I Cannot Wish You", and "Marry the Man Today", although "A Bushel and a Peck" was later restored to the video release version.
20th Century Fox acquired the film rights to the musical in early 2013, and was said to be planning a remake. In March 2019, TriStar Pictures acquired the remake rights, with Bill Condon hired as director a year later.
Casts of major productions
The following table shows the principal casts of the major productions of Guys and Dolls:
Awards and honors
Recordings
There are numerous recordings of the show's score on compact disc. The most notable include:
Original 1950 Broadway Cast
1955 Film Soundtrack
1963 Reprise Musical Repertory Theatre studio recording (Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, Debbie Reynolds, Dean Martin, Jo Stafford, The McGuire Sisters, Dinah Shore, Sammy Davis, Jr., Allan Sherman)
1976 Broadway Revival Cast
1982 London Revival Cast
1992 Broadway Revival Cast
1995 Complete Studio Recording (features the entire score for the first time on CD; with Frank Loesser's daughter Emily as Sarah Brown; conducted by John Owen Edwards)
Notes
References
Davis, Lee. "The Indestructible Icon". ShowMusic. Winter 2000–01: 17–24, 61–63.
Dietz, Dan. The Complete Book of 1950s Broadway Musicals (2014), Bowman & Littlefield, , p. 38.
Loesser, Susan (1993).: A Most Remarkable Fella: Frank Loesser and the Guys and Dolls in His Life. New York: Donald I. Fine. .
Stempel, Larry (2010). Showtime: A History of the Broadway Musical Theater. New York: W. W. Norton and Company. .
Suskin, Stephen (1990). Opening Night on Broadway: A Critical Quotebook of the Golden Era of the Musical Theatre. New York: Schrimmer Books. .
External links
Guys and Dolls at the Music Theatre International website
Guys and Dolls JR. at the Music Theatre International website
Guys and Dolls at the Guide to Musical Theatre
Guys and Dolls at StageAgent.com
1950 musicals
Broadway musicals
Grammy Hall of Fame Award recipients
Musicals based on short fiction
Musicals by Frank Loesser
Laurence Olivier Award-winning musicals
West End musicals
Plays set in New York City
United States National Recording Registry recordings
Tony Award-winning musicals | true | [
"How Did This Get Made? is a comedy podcast on the Earwolf network hosted by Paul Scheer, June Diane Raphael, and Jason Mantzoukas.\n\nGenerally, How Did This Get Made? is released every two weeks. During the show's off-week, a \".5\" episode is uploaded featuring Scheer announcing the next week's movie, as well as challenges for the fans. In addition to the shows and mini-shows, the How Did This Get Made? stream hosted the first three episodes of Bitch Sesh, the podcast of previous guests Casey Wilson and Danielle Schneider, in December 2015. It has also hosted episodes of its own spin-off podcast, the How Did This Get Made? Origin Stories, in which Blake Harris interviews people involved with the films covered by the main show. In December 2017, an episode was recorded for the Pee Cast Blast event, and released exclusively on Stitcher Premium.\n\nEvery episode has featured Paul Scheer as the host of the podcast. The only episode to date in which Scheer hosted remotely was The Smurfs, in which he Skyped in. Raphael has taken extended breaks from the podcast for both filming commitments and maternity leave. Mantzoukas has also missed episodes due to work, but has also Skyped in for various episodes. On the occasions that neither Raphael nor Mantzoukas are available for live appearances, Scheer calls in previous fan-favorite guests for what is known as a How Did This Get Made? All-Stars episode.\n\nList of episodes\n\nMini episodes\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n List of How Did This Get Made? episodes\n\nHow Did This Get Made\nHow Did This Get Made",
"How Did This Get Made? (HDTGM) is a podcast on the Earwolf network. It is hosted by Paul Scheer, June Diane Raphael and Jason Mantzoukas. Each episode, which typically has a different guest, features the deconstruction and mockery of outlandish and bad films.\n\nFormat\nThe hosts and guest make jokes about the films as well as attempt to unscramble plots. After discussing the film, Scheer reads \"second opinions\" in the form of five-star reviews posted online by Amazon.com users. The hosts also often make recommendations on if the film is worth watching. The show is released every two weeks.\n\nDuring the show's off week a \".5\" episode (also known as a \"minisode\") is uploaded. These episodes feature Scheer's \"explanation hopeline\" where he answers questions from fans who call in, the movie for the next week is announced, Scheer reads corrections and omissions from the message board regarding last week's episode, and he opens fan mail and provides his recommendations on books, movies, TV shows etc. that he is enjoying.\n\nSome full episodes are recorded in front of a live audience and include a question and answer session and original \"second opinion\" theme songs sung by fans. Not all content from the live shows is included in the final released episode - about 30 minutes of each live show is edited out.\n\nHistory\nHow Did This Get Made? began after Scheer and Raphael saw the movie Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps. Later, the pair talked to Mantzoukas about the movie and joked about the idea for starting a bad movie podcast. , Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps has never been covered on the podcast.\n\nAwards\nIn 2019, How Did This Get Made? won a Webby Award in the category of Podcasts – Television & Film.\n\nIn 2020, How Did This Get Made? won an iHeartRadio award in the category of Best TV & Film Podcast.\n\nIn 2022, How Did This Get Made? won an iHeartRadio award in the category of Best TV & Film Podcast.\n\nSpinoffs\n\nHow Did This Get Made?: Origin Stories\nBetween February and September 2017, a 17-episode spin-off series of the podcast was released. Entitled How Did This Get Made?: Origin Stories, author Blake J. Harris would interview people involved with the movies discussed on the podcast. Guests on the show included director Mel Brooks, who served as executive producer on Solarbabies, and screenwriter Dan Gordon, who wrote Surf Ninjas.\n\nUnspooled\nIn May 2018, Scheer began a new podcast with Amy Nicholson titled Unspooled that is also devoted to movies. Unlike HDTGM?, however, Unspooled looks at films deemed good enough for the updated 2007 edition of the AFI Top 100. This is often referenced in How Did This Get Made? by Mantzoukas and Raphael, who are comically annoyed at how they were not invited to host the podcast, instead being subjected to the bad films that HDTGM covers.\n\nHow Did This Get Played?\nIn June 2019, the Earwolf network launched the podcast How Did This Get Played?, hosted by Doughboys host Nick Wiger and former Saturday Night Live writer Heather Anne Campbell. The podcast is positioned as the video game equivalent of HDTGM?, where Wiger and Campbell review widely panned video games.\n\nEpisodes\n\nAdaptation\nThe program was adapted in France in 2014 under the title 2 heures de perdues (http://www.2hdp.fr/ and available on Spotify and iTunes), a podcast in which several friends meet to analyze bad films in the same style (mainly American, French, and British films). The show then ends with a reading of comments found on AlloCiné (biggest French-speaking cinema website) or Amazon.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n \n How Did This Get Made on Earwolf\n\nAudio podcasts\nEarwolf\nFilm and television podcasts\nComedy and humor podcasts\n2010 podcast debuts"
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| C_8659549f5ee64c21bb6952b1a4d7f882_1 | Was the revival popular | 6 | Was the 1982 Richard Eyre revival of the play Guys and Dolls popular? | Guys and Dolls | Laurence Olivier had wanted to play Nathan Detroit, and began rehearsals for a planned 1971 London revival of Guys and Dolls at his National Theatre Company's Old Vic theatre. However, due to poor health he had to stop, and his revival never saw the light of day. In 1982, Richard Eyre directed a major revival at London's National Theatre. Eyre called it a "re-thinking" of the musical, and his production featured an award-winning neon-lit set design inspired by Rudi Stern's 1979 book Let There Be Neon, and brassier orchestrations with vintage yet innovative harmonies. The show's choreography by David Toguri included a large-scale tap dance number of the "Guys and Dolls" finale, performed by the principals and entire cast. The revival opened March 9, 1982, and was an overnight sensation, running for nearly four years and breaking all box office records. The original cast featured Bob Hoskins as Nathan Detroit, Julia McKenzie as Adelaide, Ian Charleson as Sky and Julie Covington as Sarah. The production won five Olivier Awards, including for McKenzie and Eyre and for Best Musical. Eyre also won the Evening Standard Award, and Hoskins won the Critics' Circle Theatre Award. In October 1982, Hoskins was replaced by Trevor Peacock, Charleson by Paul Jones, and Covington by Belinda Sinclair; in the spring of 1983 McKenzie was replaced by Imelda Staunton and Fiona Hendley replaced Sinclair. This production closed in late 1983 to make way for a Broadway try-out of the ill-fated musical Jean Seberg, which following critical failure closed after four months. Eyre's Guys and Dolls returned to the National from April through September 1984, this time starring Lulu, Norman Rossington, Clarke Peters and Betsy Brantley. After a nationwide tour, this production transferred to the West End at the Prince of Wales Theatre, where it ran from June 1985 to April 1986. Following Ian Charleson's untimely death from AIDS at the age of 40, in November 1990 two reunion performances of Guys and Dolls, with almost all of the original 1982 cast and musicians, were given at the National Theatre as a tribute to Charleson. The tickets sold out immediately, and the dress rehearsal was also packed. The proceeds from the performances were donated to the new Ian Charleson Day Centre HIV clinic at the Royal Free Hospital, and to scholarships in Charleson's name at LAMDA. CANNOTANSWER | an overnight sensation, | Guys and Dolls is a musical with music and lyrics by Frank Loesser and book by Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows. It is based on "The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown" (1933) and "Blood Pressure", which are two short stories by Damon Runyon, and also borrows characters and plot elements from other Runyon stories, such as "Pick the Winner".
The show premiered on Broadway in 1950, where it ran for 1,200 performances and won the Tony Award for Best Musical. The musical has had several Broadway and London revivals, as well as a 1955 film adaptation starring Marlon Brando, Jean Simmons, Frank Sinatra and Vivian Blaine.
Guys and Dolls was selected as the winner of the 1951 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. However, because of writer Abe Burrows' communist sympathies as exposed by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), the Trustees of Columbia University vetoed the selection, and no Pulitzer for Drama was awarded that year.
In 1998, Vivian Blaine, Sam Levene, Robert Alda and Isabel Bigley, along with the original Broadway cast of the 1950 Decca cast album, were posthumously inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.
Background
Guys and Dolls was conceived by producers Cy Feuer and Ernest Martin as an adaptation of Damon Runyon's short stories. These stories, written in the 1920s and 1930s, concerned gangsters, gamblers, and other characters of the New York underworld. Runyon was known for the unique dialect he employed in his stories, mixing highly formal language and slang. Frank Loesser, who had spent most of his career as a lyricist for movie musicals, was hired as composer and lyricist. George S. Kaufman was hired as director. When the first version of the show's book, or dialogue, written by Jo Swerling was deemed unusable, Feuer and Martin asked radio comedy writer Abe Burrows to rewrite it.
Loesser had already written much of the score to correspond with the first version of the book. Burrows later recalled:
Frank Loesser's fourteen songs were all great, and the [new book] had to be written so that the story would lead into each of them. Later on, the critics spoke of the show as 'integrated'. The word integration usually means that the composer has written songs that follow the story line gracefully. Well, we accomplished that but we did it in reverse.
Abe Burrows specifically crafted the role of Nathan Detroit around Sam Levene who signed for the project long before Burrows wrote a single word of dialogue, a similar break Burrows said he had when he later wrote Cactus Flower for Lauren Bacall. In “Honest, Abe: Is There Really No Business Like Show Business?”, Burrows recalls "I had the sound of their voices in my head. I knew the rhythm of their speech and it helped make the dialogue sharper and more real". Although Broadway and movie veteran Sam Levene was not a singer, it was agreed he was otherwise perfect as Nathan Detroit; indeed, Levene was one of Runyon's favorite actors. Frank Loesser agreed it was easier adjusting the music to Levene's limitations than substituting a better singer who couldn't act. Levene's lack of singing ability is the reason the lead role of Nathan Detroit only has one song, the duet "Sue Me".
Composer and lyricist Frank Loesser specifically wrote "Sue Me" for Sam Levene, and structured the song so he and Vivian Blaine never sang their showstopping duet together. The son of a cantor, Sam Levene was fluent in Yiddish: "Alright, already, I'm just a no-goodnick; alright, already, it’s true, so nu? So sue me." Frank Loesser felt "Nathan Detroit should be played as a brassy Broadway tough guy who sang with more grits than gravy. Sam Levene sang “Sue Me” with such a wonderful Runyonesque flavor that his singing had been easy to forgive, in fact it had been quite charming in its ineptitude." "Musically, Sam Levene may have been tone-deaf, but he inhabited Frank Loesser's world as a character more than a caricature", says Larry Stempel, a music professor at Fordham University and the author of Showtime: A History of the Broadway Musical Theater.
The character of Miss Adelaide was created specifically to fit Vivian Blaine into the musical, after Loesser decided she was ill-suited to play the conservative Sarah. When Loesser suggested reprising some songs in the second act, Kaufman warned: "If you reprise the songs, we'll reprise the jokes."
Synopsis
Act I
A pantomime of never-ceasing activities depicts the hustle and bustle of New York City ("Runyonland"). Three small-time gamblers, Nicely-Nicely Johnson, Benny Southstreet, and Rusty Charlie, argue over which horse will win a big race ("Fugue for Tinhorns"). The band members of the Save-a-Soul Mission, led by the pious and beautiful Sergeant Sarah Brown, call for sinners to "Follow the Fold" and repent. Nicely and Benny's employer, Nathan Detroit, runs an illegal floating crap game. Due to local policeman Lt. Brannigan's strong-armed presence, he has found only one likely spot to hold the game: the "Biltmore garage". Its owner, Joey Biltmore, requires a $1,000 security deposit, and Nathan is broke ("The Oldest Established"). Nathan hopes to win a $1,000 bet against Sky Masterson, a gambler willing to bet on virtually anything. Nathan proposes a bet he believes he cannot lose: Sky must take a woman of Nathan's choice to dinner in Havana, Cuba. Sky agrees, and Nathan chooses Sarah Brown.
At the mission, Sky attempts to make a deal with Sarah; offering her "one dozen genuine sinners" in exchange for the date in Havana. Sarah refuses, and they argue over whom they will fall in love with ("I'll Know"). Sky kisses Sarah, and she slaps him. Nathan goes to watch his fiancée of 14 years, Adelaide, perform her nightclub act ("A Bushel and a Peck"). After her show, she asks him to marry her once again, telling him that she has been sending her mother letters for twelve years claiming that they have been married with five children. She finds out that Nathan is still running the crap game. After kicking him out, she reads a medical book telling her that her long-running cold may be due to Nathan's refusal to marry her ("Adelaide's Lament").
The next day, Nicely and Benny watch as Sky pursues Sarah, and Nathan tries to win back Adelaide's favor. They declare that guys will do anything for the dolls they love ("Guys and Dolls"). General Cartwright, the leader of Save-a-Soul, visits the mission and explains that she will be forced to close the branch unless they succeed in bringing some sinners to the upcoming revival meeting. Sarah, desperate to save the mission, promises the General "one dozen genuine sinners", implicitly accepting Sky's deal. Brannigan discovers a group of gamblers waiting for Nathan's crap game, and to convince him of their innocence, they tell Brannigan their gathering is Nathan's "surprise bachelor party". This satisfies Brannigan, and Nathan resigns himself to eloping with Adelaide. Adelaide goes home to pack, promising to meet him after her show the next afternoon. The Save-A-Soul Mission band passes by, and Nathan sees that Sarah is not in it; he realizes that he lost the bet and faints.
In a Havana nightclub, Sky buys a drink for himself and a "Cuban milkshake" for Sarah. She doesn't realize that the drink contains Bacardi rum, and she gets drunk and kisses Sky ("If I Were a Bell"). Sky realizes that he genuinely cares for Sarah, and he takes her back to New York. They return at around 4:00 a.m., and Sky tells Sarah how much he loves the early morning ("My Time of Day"). They both spontaneously admit that they're in love ("I've Never Been in Love Before"). A siren sounds and gamblers run out of the mission, where Nathan has been holding the crap game. Sarah assumes that Sky took her to Havana so Nathan could run the game in the mission, and she walks out on him.
Act II
The next evening, Adelaide performs her act ("Take Back Your Mink"). Nathan doesn't show up for the elopement because he's still running the crap game. She soon realizes that Nathan has stood her up again ("Adelaide's Second Lament").
Sarah admits to Arvide, her uncle and fellow mission worker, that she does love Sky, but she will not see him again. Arvide expresses his faith in Sky's inherent goodness and urges Sarah to follow her heart ("More I Cannot Wish You"). Sky tells Sarah he intends to deliver the dozen genuine sinners for the revival. She doesn't believe him and walks off, but Arvide subtly encourages him.
Nicely shows Sky to the crap game; now in the sewers ("Crapshooters Dance"). Big Jule, a gambler, has lost a large sum of money and refuses to end the game until he earns it back. Sky arrives and fails to convince the crapshooters to come to the mission. He gives Nathan $1,000 and claims that he lost the bet to protect Sarah. Sky makes a last-minute bet to get the sinners; if he loses, everyone gets $1,000, but if he wins, they go to the mission ("Luck Be a Lady"). He wins the bet. Nathan runs into Adelaide on his way there. She tries to get him to elope, but when he can't, she walks out on him. Nathan professes his love for her ("Sue Me"), then leaves.
Sarah is shocked to see that Sky carried through on his promise. The General asks the gamblers to confess their sins, and while some do, one of them admits the real reason they are even there. The General is thrilled that good can come from evil. Attempting to appear contrite, Nicely invents a dream that encouraged him to repent, and the gamblers join in with revivalist fervor ("Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat"). Brannigan arrives and threatens to arrest everyone for the crap game in the Mission, but Sarah clears them, saying that none of the gamblers were at the mission the previous night. After Brannigan leaves, Nathan confesses that they held the crap game in the mission. He also confesses to the bet he made with Sky about taking Sarah to Havana. He adds that he won the bet, to Sarah's shock, and she realizes that Sky wanted to protect her reputation and must genuinely care about her.
Sarah and Adelaide run into each other, and they commiserate and then resolve to marry their men anyway and reform them later ("Marry the Man Today"). A few weeks later, Nathan owns a newsstand and has officially closed the crap game. Sky, who is now married to Sarah, works at the mission band and has also stopped gambling. The characters celebrate as Nathan and Adelaide are married ("Guys and Dolls (Finale/Reprise)").
Musical numbers
Act I
"Runyonland" – Orchestra
"Fugue for Tinhorns" – Nicely, Benny, Rusty
"Follow the Fold" – Sarah, Mission Band
"The Oldest Established" – Nathan, Nicely, Benny, Guys
"I'll Know" – Sarah, Sky
"A Bushel and a Peck" – Adelaide, Hot Box Girls
"Adelaide's Lament" – Adelaide
"Guys and Dolls" – Nicely, Benny
"Havana" – Orchestra
"If I Were a Bell" – Sarah
"My Time of Day/I've Never Been in Love Before" – Sky, Sarah
Act II
"Take Back Your Mink" – Adelaide, Hot Box Girls
"Adelaide's Second Lament" – Adelaide
"More I Cannot Wish You" – Arvide
"Crapshooters Ballet" – Orchestra
"Luck Be a Lady" – Sky, Guys
"Sue Me" – Adelaide, Nathan
"Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat" – Nicely, Company
"Marry the Man Today" – Adelaide, Sarah
"Guys and Dolls (Reprise)" – Company
Productions
Original 1950 Broadway production
The show had its pre-Broadway try-out at the Shubert Theater in Philadelphia, opening Saturday, October 14, 1950. The musical premiered on Broadway at the 46th Street Theatre (now Richard Rodgers Theatre) on November 24, 1950. It was directed by George S. Kaufman, with dances and musical numbers by Michael Kidd, scenic and lighting design by Jo Mielziner, costumes by Alvin Colt, and orchestrations by George Bassman and Ted Royal, with vocal arrangements by Herbert Greene It starred Robert Alda (Sky Masterson), Sam Levene (Nathan Detroit), Isabel Bigley (Sarah) and Vivian Blaine (Miss Adelaide). Iva Withers was a replacement as Miss Adelaide. The musical ran for 1,200 performances, winning five 1951 Tony Awards, including the award for Best Musical. Decca Records issued the original cast recording on 78 rpm records, which was later expanded and re-issued on LP, and then transferred to CD in the 1980s.
1953 First UK production
The premiere West End production of Guys and Dolls opened at the London Coliseum on May 28, 1953, a few days before the 1953 Coronation and ran for 555 performances, including a Royal Command Variety Performance for Queen Elizabeth on November 2, 1953. Credited with above-the-title-billing the London cast co-starred Vivian Blaine as Miss Adelaide and Sam Levene as Nathan Detroit, each reprising their original Broadway performances; Jerry Wayne performed the role of Sky Masterson since Robert Alda did not reprise his Broadway role in the first UK production which co-starred Lizbeth Webb as Sarah Brown. Before opening at the Coliseum, Guys and Dolls had an eight performance run at the Bristol Hippodrome, where the show opened on May 19, 1953, and closed on May 25, 1953. Lizbeth Webb was the only major principal who was British and was chosen to play the part of Sarah Brown by Frank Loesser. The show has had numerous revivals and tours and has become a popular choice for school and community theatre productions.
1955 First Las Vegas production
Vivian Blaine as Miss Adelaide, Sam Levene as Nathan Detroit and Robert Alda as Sky Masterson recreated their original Broadway performances twice daily in a slightly reduced version of Guys and Dolls when the first Las Vegas production opened a six-month run at the Royal Nevada, September 7, 1955, the first time a Broadway musical was performed on the Las Vegas Strip.
1965 Fifteenth Anniversary production
In 1965 Vivian Blaine and Sam Levene reprised their original Broadway roles as Miss Adelaide and Nathan Detroit in a 15th anniversary revival of Guys and Dolls at the Mineola Theatre, Mineola, New York and Paramus Playhouse, New Jersey. Blaine and Levene performed the fifteenth anniversary production of Guys and Dolls for a limited run of 24 performances at each theatre.
New York City Center 1955, 1965 and 1966 revivals
New York City Center mounted short runs of the musical in 1955, 1965 and 1966. A production starring Walter Matthau as Nathan Detroit, Helen Gallagher as Adelaide, Ray Shaw as Sky and Leila Martin as Sarah had 31 performances, running from April 20 to May 1, and May 31 to June 12, 1955.
Another presentation at City Center, with Alan King as Nathan Detroit, Sheila MacRae as Adelaide, Jerry Orbach as Sky and Anita Gillette as Sarah, ran for 15 performances from April 28 to May 9, 1965. A 1966 production, starring Jan Murray as Nathan Detroit, Vivian Blaine reprising her role as Adelaide, Hugh O'Brian as Sky, and Barbara Meister as Sarah, ran for 23 performances, from June 8 to June 26, 1966.
1976 Broadway revival
An all-black cast staged the first Broadway revival of Guys and Dolls opened on July 10, 1976, in previews, officially on July 21, at The Broadway Theatre. It starred Robert Guillaume as Nathan Detroit, Norma Donaldson as Miss Adelaide, James Randolph as Sky and Ernestine Jackson as Sarah Brown. Guillaume and Jackson were nominated for Tony and Drama Desk Awards, and Ken Page as Nicely-Nicely won a Theatre World Award.
This production featured Motown-style musical arrangements by Danny Holgate and Horace Ott, and it was directed and choreographed by Billy Wilson. The entire production was under the supervision of Abe Burrows, and musical direction and choral arrangements were by Howard Roberts.
The show closed on February 13, 1977, after 12 previews and 239 performances. A cast recording was released subsequent to the show's opening.
1982 London revival
Laurence Olivier had wanted to play Nathan Detroit, and began rehearsals for a planned 1971 London revival of Guys and Dolls for the National Theatre Company then based at the Old Vic. However, due to poor health he had to stop, and his revival never happened.
In 1982, Richard Eyre directed a major revival at London's National Theatre. Eyre called it a "re-thinking" of the musical, and his production featured an award-winning neon-lit set design inspired by Rudi Stern's 1979 book Let There Be Neon, and brassier orchestrations with vintage yet innovative harmonies. The show's choreography by David Toguri included a large-scale tap dance number of the "Guys and Dolls" finale, performed by the principals and entire cast. The revival opened March 9, 1982, and was an overnight sensation, running for nearly four years and breaking all box office records. The original cast featured Bob Hoskins as Nathan Detroit, Julia McKenzie as Adelaide, Ian Charleson as Sky and Julie Covington as Sarah. The production won five Olivier Awards, including for McKenzie and Eyre and for Best Musical. Eyre also won an Evening Standard Theatre Award, and Hoskins won the Critics' Circle Theatre Award.
In October 1982, Hoskins was replaced by Trevor Peacock, Charleson by Paul Jones, and Covington by Belinda Sinclair; in the spring of 1983, McKenzie was replaced by Imelda Staunton and Fiona Hendley replaced Sinclair. This production closed in late 1983 to make way for a Broadway try-out of the ill-fated musical Jean Seberg, which following critical failure closed after four months. Eyre's Guys and Dolls returned to the National from April through September 1984, this time starring Lulu, Norman Rossington, Clarke Peters and Betsy Brantley. After a nationwide tour, this production transferred to the West End at the Prince of Wales Theatre, where it ran from June 1985 to April 1986.
Following Ian Charleson's death from AIDS at the age of 40, in November 1990 two reunion performances of Guys and Dolls, with almost all of the original 1982 cast and musicians, were given at the National Theatre as a tribute to Charleson. The tickets sold out immediately, and the dress rehearsal was also packed. The proceeds from the performances were donated to the new Ian Charleson Day Centre HIV clinic at the Royal Free Hospital, and to scholarships in Charleson's name at LAMDA.
1992 Broadway revival
The 1992 Broadway revival was the most successful American remounting of the show since the original Broadway production which ran for 1,200 performances. Directed by Jerry Zaks, it starred Nathan Lane as Nathan Detroit, Peter Gallagher as Sky, Faith Prince as Adelaide and Josie de Guzman as Sarah. This production played at the Martin Beck Theatre from April 14, 1992, to January 8, 1995, with 1,143 performances.
The production received a rave review from Frank Rich in The New York Times, stating "It's hard to know which genius, and I do mean genius, to celebrate first while cheering the entertainment at the Martin Beck." It received eight Tony Award nominations, and won four, including Best Revival, and the show also won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Revival. This revival featured various revisions to the show's score, including brand new music for the "Runyonland", "A Bushel and a Peck", "Take Back Your Mink" and "Havana". The orchestrations were redesigned by Michael Starobin, and there were new dance arrangements added to "A Bushel and a Peck" and "Take Back Your Mink".
A one-hour documentary film captured the recording sessions of the production's original cast album. Titled Guys and Dolls: Off the Record, the film aired on PBS's Great Performances series in December 1992, and was released on DVD in 2007. Complete takes of most of the show's songs are featured, as well as coaching from director Zaks, and commentary sessions by stars Gallagher, de Guzman, Lane and Prince on the production and their characters.
Lorna Luft auditioned for the role of Adelaide in this production. Faith Prince ultimately played the role, and Luft later played the role in the 1992 National Tour.
1996 London revival
Richard Eyre repeated his 1982 success with another National Theatre revival of the show, this time in a limited run. It starred Henry Goodman as Nathan Detroit, Imelda Staunton returning as Adelaide, Clarke Peters returning as Sky and Joanna Riding as Sarah. Clive Rowe played Nicely-Nicely Johnson, and David Toguri returned as choreographer. The production ran from December 17, 1996, through March 29, 1997 and from July 2, 1997, to November 22, 1997. It received three Olivier Award nominations, winning one: Best Supporting Performance in a Musical went to Clive Rowe. Richard Eyre won the Critics' Circle Theatre Award for Best Director, and the production won Best Musical.
2005 West End revival
The 2005 West End revival opened at London's Piccadilly Theatre in June 2005 and closed in April 2007. This revival, directed by Michael Grandage, starred Ewan McGregor as Sky, Jenna Russell as Sarah, Jane Krakowski as Adelaide, and Douglas Hodge as Nathan Detroit. During the run, Nigel Harman, Adam Cooper, Norman Bowman and Ben Richards took over as Sky; Kelly Price, Amy Nuttall and Lisa Stokke took over as Sarah; Sarah Lancashire, Sally Ann Triplett, Claire Sweeney, Lynsey Britton and Samantha Janus took over as Adelaide; and Nigel Lindsay, Neil Morrissey, Patrick Swayze, Alex Ferns and Don Johnson took over as Nathan Detroit. This production added the song "Adelaide" that Frank Loesser had written for the 1955 film adaptation. According to a September 2007 article in Playbill.com, this West End production had been scheduled to begin previews for a transfer to Broadway in February 2008, but this plan was dropped.
2009 Broadway revival
A Broadway revival of the show opened on March 1, 2009, at the Nederlander Theatre. The cast starred Oliver Platt as Nathan Detroit, Lauren Graham, in her Broadway debut, as Adelaide, Craig Bierko as Sky and Kate Jennings Grant as Sarah. Des McAnuff was the director, and the choreographer was Sergio Trujillo. The show opened to generally negative reviews. The New York Times called it "static" and "uninspired", the New York Post said, "How can something so zippy be so tedious?" and Time Out New York wrote, "Few things are more enervating than watching good material deflate." However, the show received a highly favorable review from The New Yorker, and the producers decided to keep the show open in hopes of positive audience response. The New York Post reported on March 4 that producer Howard Panter "[said] he'll give Guys and Dolls at least seven weeks to find an audience." The revival closed on June 14, 2009, after 28 previews and 113 performances.
2015–2016 West End revival and UK/Ireland tour
A revival opened at the 2015 Chichester Festival. This moved to Manchester and Birmingham before moving onto a West End opening at the Savoy Theatre on December 10, 2015, for previews with a full opening on January 6, 2016, until March 12, 2016. The production starred Sophie Thompson as Adelaide and Jamie Parker as Sky. The production then transferred to the Phoenix Theatre, with Oliver Tompsett as Sky, Samantha Spiro as Adelaide and Richard Kind as Nathan. On June 28, 2016, the role of Miss Adelaide was taken over by Rebel Wilson, and Nathan Detroit was played by Simon Lipkin. The tour continued around UK cities and Dublin.
2017–2018 UK all-black production
Talawa Theatre Company and Manchester's Royal Exchange Theatre produced the UK's first all-black Guys and Dolls in 2017. The production opened on December 2, 2017, and following an extension ran to February 27, 2018, at the Royal Exchange in Manchester. The cast included Ray Fearon as Nathan Detroit, Ashley Zhangazha as Sky Masterson, Abiona Omonua as Sarah Brown, and Lucy Vandi as Miss Adelaide.
In this production, the musical was relocated to Harlem, 1939, with the music referencing jazz, and gospel. Director Michael Buffong said, "Pre-war Harlem was all about the hustle. The creativity of that era was born from a unique collision of talent and circumstance as people escaped the agricultural and oppressive south via the 'underground railroad' into the highly urbanised and industrialised north. Much of our popular culture, from dance to music, has its roots in that period. Our Guys and Dolls brings all of this to the fore."
Reviews particularly praised the music, relocation to Harlem, and sense of spectacle. Lyn Gardner in The Guardian wrote that "the gamblers ... are a bunch of sharp-suited peacocks clad in rainbow hues." Ann Treneman in The Times commented, "Whoever had the idea of moving this classic musical from one part of New York to another bit, just up the road, needs to be congratulated. This version of Frank Loesser's musical, which swirls around the lives of the petty gangsters and their 'dolls' who inhabit New York's underbelly, moves the action to Harlem at its prewar height in 1939. It is a Talawa production with an all-black cast and it is terrific from the get-go." Clare Brennan in The Observer stated, "Relocated to Harlem, this fine new production of Frank Loesser's classic musical retains a threat of violence under a cartoon-bright exterior."
Other
In 1995, a Las Vegas production, performed without intermission, starred Jack Jones, Maureen McGovern and Frank Gorshin.
Charles Randolph-Wright directed a production at Washington's Arena Stage, starring Maurice Hines (Nathan Detroit) and Alexandra Foucard (Adelaide), opening on December 30, 1999. The production received six Helen Hayes Award nominations. With support from Jo Sullivan Loesser, the production began a national tour in August 2001. The cast recording from this production, released in November 2001, was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album.
An Australian remount of the Michael Grandage West End production of Guys and Dolls opened in Melbourne, Australia on April 5, 2008. The show starred Lisa McCune, Marina Prior, Garry McDonald, Ian Stenlake, Shane Jacobson, Wayne Scott Kermond, and Magda Szubanski, and ran at the Princess Theatre. The Melbourne season closed in August 2008 and transferred to Sydney from March 13, 2009, to May 31, 2009, at the Capitol Theatre, retaining the Melbourne cast.
In August 2009, a concert version ran at The Hollywood Bowl, Hollywood, California, starring Scott Bakula (Nathan Detroit), Brian Stokes Mitchell (Sky Masterson), Ellen Greene (Miss Adelaide), and Jessica Biel (Sarah Brown).
In February 2011, a co-production between Clwyd Theatr Cymru, the New Wolsey Theatre and the Salisbury Playhouse opened at Clwyd Theatr. Directed by Peter Rowe and with music direction by Greg Palmer and choreography by Francesca Jaynes, the show was performed by a cast of 22 actor-musicians, with all music played live on stage by the cast. The show also toured Cardiff, Swansea, and other Welsh cities as well as some English cities, receiving a positive review in The Guardian.
A concert performance ran at London's Cadogan Hall from 22 to 25 August 2012, featuring Dennis Waterman, Ruthie Henshall, Anna-Jane Casey, and Lance Ellington (Strictly Come Dancing), with musical director Richard Balcombe and the Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra and Choir.
In April 2014, a one-night-only performance took place at Carnegie Hall, starring Nathan Lane (reprising the role that made him a star), Megan Mullally, Patrick Wilson and Sierra Boggess. It was directed by Jack O'Brien and featured the Orchestra of St. Luke's playing the original orchestrations.
Reception
The original Broadway production of Guys and Dolls opened to unanimously positive reviews, which was a relief to the cast, who had had a 41-performance pre-Broadway tryout in Philadelphia in which each of the 41 performances was different. Critics praised the musical's faithfulness to Damon Runyon's style and characterizations. Richard Watts of the New York Post wrote "Guys and Dolls is just what it should be to celebrate the Runyon spirit...filled with the salty characters and richly original language sacred to the memory of the late Master". William Hawkins of the New York World-Telegram & Sun stated "It recaptures what [Runyon] knew about Broadway, that its wickedness is tinhorn, but its gallantry is as pure and young as Little Eva". Robert Coleman of the New York Daily Mirror wrote "We think Damon would have relished it as much as we did".
The book and score were greatly praised as well; John Chapman, then Chief Theatre Critic, of the New York Daily News wrote "The book is a work of easy and delightful humor. Its music and lyrics, by Frank Loesser, are so right for the show and so completely lacking in banality, that they amount to an artistic triumph". Coleman stated "Frank Loesser has written a score that will get a big play on the juke boxes, over the radio, and in bistros throughout the land. His lyrics are especially notable in that they help Burrows's topical gags to further the plot". In The New York Times, Brooks Atkinson wrote "Mr. Loesser's lyrics and songs have the same affectionate appreciation of the material as the book, which is funny without being self-conscious or mechanical".
Multiple critics asserted that the work was of great significance to musical theatre. John McClain of the New York Journal American proclaimed "it is the best and most exciting thing of its kind since Pal Joey. It is a triumph and a delight." Atkinson stated, "we might as well admit that Guys and Dolls is a work of art. It is spontaneous and has form, style, and spirit." Chapman asserted, "In all departments, Guys and Dolls is a perfect musical comedy".
Film adaptations
On November 3, 1955 the film version of the musical was released, starring Marlon Brando as Sky, Frank Sinatra as Nathan Detroit, and Jean Simmons as Sarah, with Vivian Blaine reprising her role as Adelaide. The film was directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz and produced by Samuel Goldwyn.
Levene lost the film role of Nathan Detroit to Frank Sinatra. "You can't have a Jew playing a Jew, it wouldn't work on screen", producer Samuel Goldwyn argued, when explaining that he wanted Sinatra, rather than Levene, who had originated the role, even though Guys and Dolls film director Joseph L. Mankiewicz wanted Levene, the original Broadway star. Frank Loesser felt Sinatra played the part like a "dapper Italian swinger". Mankiewicz said "if there could be one person in the world more miscast as Nathan Detroit than Frank Sinatra that would be Laurence Olivier and I am one of his greatest fans; the role had been written for Sam Levene who was divine in it". Sinatra did his best to give Nathan Detroit a few stereotyped Jewish gestures and inflections, but Frank Loesser hated "how Sinatra turned the rumpled Nathan Detroit into a smoothie. Sam Levene's husky untrained voice added to the song's charm, not to mention its believability". Frank Loesser died in 1969, still refusing to watch the film version released in 1955.
Around the time of the film's release, American composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim wrote film reviews for Films in Review. Sondheim (then aged 25) reviewed the film version of Guys and Dolls, and observed: "Sinatra ambles through his role as Nathan Detroit as though he were about to laugh at the jokes in the script. He has none of the sob in the voice, and the incipient ulcer in the stomach, that the part requires and Sam Levene supplied so hilariously on the stage. Sinatra sings on pitch, but colorlessly; Levene sang off pitch, but acted while he sang. Sinatra's lackadaisical performance, his careless and left handed attempt at characterization not only harm the picture immeasurably but indicate an alarming lack of professionally."
Three new songs, written by Frank Loesser, were added to the film: "Pet Me Poppa"; "A Woman in Love"; and "Adelaide", which was written specifically for Sinatra. Five songs from the stage musical were omitted from the movie: "A Bushel and a Peck", "My Time of Day", "I've Never Been In Love Before", "More I Cannot Wish You", and "Marry the Man Today", although "A Bushel and a Peck" was later restored to the video release version.
20th Century Fox acquired the film rights to the musical in early 2013, and was said to be planning a remake. In March 2019, TriStar Pictures acquired the remake rights, with Bill Condon hired as director a year later.
Casts of major productions
The following table shows the principal casts of the major productions of Guys and Dolls:
Awards and honors
Recordings
There are numerous recordings of the show's score on compact disc. The most notable include:
Original 1950 Broadway Cast
1955 Film Soundtrack
1963 Reprise Musical Repertory Theatre studio recording (Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, Debbie Reynolds, Dean Martin, Jo Stafford, The McGuire Sisters, Dinah Shore, Sammy Davis, Jr., Allan Sherman)
1976 Broadway Revival Cast
1982 London Revival Cast
1992 Broadway Revival Cast
1995 Complete Studio Recording (features the entire score for the first time on CD; with Frank Loesser's daughter Emily as Sarah Brown; conducted by John Owen Edwards)
Notes
References
Davis, Lee. "The Indestructible Icon". ShowMusic. Winter 2000–01: 17–24, 61–63.
Dietz, Dan. The Complete Book of 1950s Broadway Musicals (2014), Bowman & Littlefield, , p. 38.
Loesser, Susan (1993).: A Most Remarkable Fella: Frank Loesser and the Guys and Dolls in His Life. New York: Donald I. Fine. .
Stempel, Larry (2010). Showtime: A History of the Broadway Musical Theater. New York: W. W. Norton and Company. .
Suskin, Stephen (1990). Opening Night on Broadway: A Critical Quotebook of the Golden Era of the Musical Theatre. New York: Schrimmer Books. .
External links
Guys and Dolls at the Music Theatre International website
Guys and Dolls JR. at the Music Theatre International website
Guys and Dolls at the Guide to Musical Theatre
Guys and Dolls at StageAgent.com
1950 musicals
Broadway musicals
Grammy Hall of Fame Award recipients
Musicals based on short fiction
Musicals by Frank Loesser
Laurence Olivier Award-winning musicals
West End musicals
Plays set in New York City
United States National Recording Registry recordings
Tony Award-winning musicals | true | [
"The Elzy G. Burkam House is a historic house located in Sioux City, Iowa, United States. Built in 1894, it is an example of a transitional house between the revival styles popular in the 19th century and the Colonial Revival style that became popular in the early 20th century. The 2½-story brick and frame house was designed by Sioux City architect William D. McLaughlin. Its asymmetrical form was more common in the Colonial Revival style in the 1890s than it was after 1900. The house features round arch windows from the Romanesque Revival style, deep eaves with exposed rafters from the Stick Style, and it is capped with a hip roof with a dormer. The exterior of the first is covered with brick, while the second floor is covered with Clapboard. A conservatory dominates the south elevation.\n\nThe house was individually listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1998,. In 2005 it was included as a contributing property in the Rose Hill Historic District in 2005.\n\nReferences\n\nHouses completed in 1894\nColonial Revival architecture in Iowa\nHouses in Sioux City, Iowa\nHouses on the National Register of Historic Places in Iowa\nNational Register of Historic Places in Sioux City, Iowa\nIndividually listed contributing properties to historic districts on the National Register in Iowa",
"Fiddler on the Roof was one of the most successful musicals of the \"golden age of musicals\". Its original Broadway production in 1964 was the first run of a musical in history to surpass the 3,000 performance mark. Fiddler held the record for the longest-running Broadway musical for almost 10 years until Grease surpassed its run. The production was extraordinarily profitable and highly acclaimed. A successful 1971 film adaptation, and the show has enjoyed enduring international popularity, continuing to be a very popular choice for school and community productions.\n\nThe original production was nominated for ten Tony Awards, winning nine, including Best Musical, score, book, direction, and Robbins won for best direction and choreography. Zero Mostel and Maria Karnilova won as best leading actor and actress. In 1972, the show won a special Tony on becoming the longest-running musical in Broadway history. Its revivals have also been honored. At the 1981 Tony Awards, Bernardi was nominated as best actor. Ten years later, the 1991 revival won for best revival, and Topol was nominated as best actor. The 2004 revival was nominated for six Tony Awards and three Drama Desk Awards but won none. The 2007 West End revival was nominated for Olivier Awards for best revival, and Goodman was nominated as best actor.\n\nThe musical's major awards and nominations are listed below:\n\nOriginal Broadway production\n\n1981 Broadway revival\n\n1990 Broadway revival\n\n2004 Broadway revival\n\n2007 London revival\n\n2015 Broadway revival\n\n2018 Yiddish production\n\n2019 West End revival\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nFiddler on the Roof at Ovrtur\n Longest-running plays on Broadway, Off-Broadway, London, Toronto, Melbourne, Paris, Vienna, and Berlin \n List of longest-running Broadway productions from Playbill.com\n\n \n\nFiddler on the Roof\nFiddler on the Roof"
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| C_8659549f5ee64c21bb6952b1a4d7f882_1 | Did it win awards | 7 | Did the 1982 Richard Eyre revival of the play Guys and Dolls win any awards? | Guys and Dolls | Laurence Olivier had wanted to play Nathan Detroit, and began rehearsals for a planned 1971 London revival of Guys and Dolls at his National Theatre Company's Old Vic theatre. However, due to poor health he had to stop, and his revival never saw the light of day. In 1982, Richard Eyre directed a major revival at London's National Theatre. Eyre called it a "re-thinking" of the musical, and his production featured an award-winning neon-lit set design inspired by Rudi Stern's 1979 book Let There Be Neon, and brassier orchestrations with vintage yet innovative harmonies. The show's choreography by David Toguri included a large-scale tap dance number of the "Guys and Dolls" finale, performed by the principals and entire cast. The revival opened March 9, 1982, and was an overnight sensation, running for nearly four years and breaking all box office records. The original cast featured Bob Hoskins as Nathan Detroit, Julia McKenzie as Adelaide, Ian Charleson as Sky and Julie Covington as Sarah. The production won five Olivier Awards, including for McKenzie and Eyre and for Best Musical. Eyre also won the Evening Standard Award, and Hoskins won the Critics' Circle Theatre Award. In October 1982, Hoskins was replaced by Trevor Peacock, Charleson by Paul Jones, and Covington by Belinda Sinclair; in the spring of 1983 McKenzie was replaced by Imelda Staunton and Fiona Hendley replaced Sinclair. This production closed in late 1983 to make way for a Broadway try-out of the ill-fated musical Jean Seberg, which following critical failure closed after four months. Eyre's Guys and Dolls returned to the National from April through September 1984, this time starring Lulu, Norman Rossington, Clarke Peters and Betsy Brantley. After a nationwide tour, this production transferred to the West End at the Prince of Wales Theatre, where it ran from June 1985 to April 1986. Following Ian Charleson's untimely death from AIDS at the age of 40, in November 1990 two reunion performances of Guys and Dolls, with almost all of the original 1982 cast and musicians, were given at the National Theatre as a tribute to Charleson. The tickets sold out immediately, and the dress rehearsal was also packed. The proceeds from the performances were donated to the new Ian Charleson Day Centre HIV clinic at the Royal Free Hospital, and to scholarships in Charleson's name at LAMDA. CANNOTANSWER | The production won five Olivier Awards, | Guys and Dolls is a musical with music and lyrics by Frank Loesser and book by Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows. It is based on "The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown" (1933) and "Blood Pressure", which are two short stories by Damon Runyon, and also borrows characters and plot elements from other Runyon stories, such as "Pick the Winner".
The show premiered on Broadway in 1950, where it ran for 1,200 performances and won the Tony Award for Best Musical. The musical has had several Broadway and London revivals, as well as a 1955 film adaptation starring Marlon Brando, Jean Simmons, Frank Sinatra and Vivian Blaine.
Guys and Dolls was selected as the winner of the 1951 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. However, because of writer Abe Burrows' communist sympathies as exposed by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), the Trustees of Columbia University vetoed the selection, and no Pulitzer for Drama was awarded that year.
In 1998, Vivian Blaine, Sam Levene, Robert Alda and Isabel Bigley, along with the original Broadway cast of the 1950 Decca cast album, were posthumously inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.
Background
Guys and Dolls was conceived by producers Cy Feuer and Ernest Martin as an adaptation of Damon Runyon's short stories. These stories, written in the 1920s and 1930s, concerned gangsters, gamblers, and other characters of the New York underworld. Runyon was known for the unique dialect he employed in his stories, mixing highly formal language and slang. Frank Loesser, who had spent most of his career as a lyricist for movie musicals, was hired as composer and lyricist. George S. Kaufman was hired as director. When the first version of the show's book, or dialogue, written by Jo Swerling was deemed unusable, Feuer and Martin asked radio comedy writer Abe Burrows to rewrite it.
Loesser had already written much of the score to correspond with the first version of the book. Burrows later recalled:
Frank Loesser's fourteen songs were all great, and the [new book] had to be written so that the story would lead into each of them. Later on, the critics spoke of the show as 'integrated'. The word integration usually means that the composer has written songs that follow the story line gracefully. Well, we accomplished that but we did it in reverse.
Abe Burrows specifically crafted the role of Nathan Detroit around Sam Levene who signed for the project long before Burrows wrote a single word of dialogue, a similar break Burrows said he had when he later wrote Cactus Flower for Lauren Bacall. In “Honest, Abe: Is There Really No Business Like Show Business?”, Burrows recalls "I had the sound of their voices in my head. I knew the rhythm of their speech and it helped make the dialogue sharper and more real". Although Broadway and movie veteran Sam Levene was not a singer, it was agreed he was otherwise perfect as Nathan Detroit; indeed, Levene was one of Runyon's favorite actors. Frank Loesser agreed it was easier adjusting the music to Levene's limitations than substituting a better singer who couldn't act. Levene's lack of singing ability is the reason the lead role of Nathan Detroit only has one song, the duet "Sue Me".
Composer and lyricist Frank Loesser specifically wrote "Sue Me" for Sam Levene, and structured the song so he and Vivian Blaine never sang their showstopping duet together. The son of a cantor, Sam Levene was fluent in Yiddish: "Alright, already, I'm just a no-goodnick; alright, already, it’s true, so nu? So sue me." Frank Loesser felt "Nathan Detroit should be played as a brassy Broadway tough guy who sang with more grits than gravy. Sam Levene sang “Sue Me” with such a wonderful Runyonesque flavor that his singing had been easy to forgive, in fact it had been quite charming in its ineptitude." "Musically, Sam Levene may have been tone-deaf, but he inhabited Frank Loesser's world as a character more than a caricature", says Larry Stempel, a music professor at Fordham University and the author of Showtime: A History of the Broadway Musical Theater.
The character of Miss Adelaide was created specifically to fit Vivian Blaine into the musical, after Loesser decided she was ill-suited to play the conservative Sarah. When Loesser suggested reprising some songs in the second act, Kaufman warned: "If you reprise the songs, we'll reprise the jokes."
Synopsis
Act I
A pantomime of never-ceasing activities depicts the hustle and bustle of New York City ("Runyonland"). Three small-time gamblers, Nicely-Nicely Johnson, Benny Southstreet, and Rusty Charlie, argue over which horse will win a big race ("Fugue for Tinhorns"). The band members of the Save-a-Soul Mission, led by the pious and beautiful Sergeant Sarah Brown, call for sinners to "Follow the Fold" and repent. Nicely and Benny's employer, Nathan Detroit, runs an illegal floating crap game. Due to local policeman Lt. Brannigan's strong-armed presence, he has found only one likely spot to hold the game: the "Biltmore garage". Its owner, Joey Biltmore, requires a $1,000 security deposit, and Nathan is broke ("The Oldest Established"). Nathan hopes to win a $1,000 bet against Sky Masterson, a gambler willing to bet on virtually anything. Nathan proposes a bet he believes he cannot lose: Sky must take a woman of Nathan's choice to dinner in Havana, Cuba. Sky agrees, and Nathan chooses Sarah Brown.
At the mission, Sky attempts to make a deal with Sarah; offering her "one dozen genuine sinners" in exchange for the date in Havana. Sarah refuses, and they argue over whom they will fall in love with ("I'll Know"). Sky kisses Sarah, and she slaps him. Nathan goes to watch his fiancée of 14 years, Adelaide, perform her nightclub act ("A Bushel and a Peck"). After her show, she asks him to marry her once again, telling him that she has been sending her mother letters for twelve years claiming that they have been married with five children. She finds out that Nathan is still running the crap game. After kicking him out, she reads a medical book telling her that her long-running cold may be due to Nathan's refusal to marry her ("Adelaide's Lament").
The next day, Nicely and Benny watch as Sky pursues Sarah, and Nathan tries to win back Adelaide's favor. They declare that guys will do anything for the dolls they love ("Guys and Dolls"). General Cartwright, the leader of Save-a-Soul, visits the mission and explains that she will be forced to close the branch unless they succeed in bringing some sinners to the upcoming revival meeting. Sarah, desperate to save the mission, promises the General "one dozen genuine sinners", implicitly accepting Sky's deal. Brannigan discovers a group of gamblers waiting for Nathan's crap game, and to convince him of their innocence, they tell Brannigan their gathering is Nathan's "surprise bachelor party". This satisfies Brannigan, and Nathan resigns himself to eloping with Adelaide. Adelaide goes home to pack, promising to meet him after her show the next afternoon. The Save-A-Soul Mission band passes by, and Nathan sees that Sarah is not in it; he realizes that he lost the bet and faints.
In a Havana nightclub, Sky buys a drink for himself and a "Cuban milkshake" for Sarah. She doesn't realize that the drink contains Bacardi rum, and she gets drunk and kisses Sky ("If I Were a Bell"). Sky realizes that he genuinely cares for Sarah, and he takes her back to New York. They return at around 4:00 a.m., and Sky tells Sarah how much he loves the early morning ("My Time of Day"). They both spontaneously admit that they're in love ("I've Never Been in Love Before"). A siren sounds and gamblers run out of the mission, where Nathan has been holding the crap game. Sarah assumes that Sky took her to Havana so Nathan could run the game in the mission, and she walks out on him.
Act II
The next evening, Adelaide performs her act ("Take Back Your Mink"). Nathan doesn't show up for the elopement because he's still running the crap game. She soon realizes that Nathan has stood her up again ("Adelaide's Second Lament").
Sarah admits to Arvide, her uncle and fellow mission worker, that she does love Sky, but she will not see him again. Arvide expresses his faith in Sky's inherent goodness and urges Sarah to follow her heart ("More I Cannot Wish You"). Sky tells Sarah he intends to deliver the dozen genuine sinners for the revival. She doesn't believe him and walks off, but Arvide subtly encourages him.
Nicely shows Sky to the crap game; now in the sewers ("Crapshooters Dance"). Big Jule, a gambler, has lost a large sum of money and refuses to end the game until he earns it back. Sky arrives and fails to convince the crapshooters to come to the mission. He gives Nathan $1,000 and claims that he lost the bet to protect Sarah. Sky makes a last-minute bet to get the sinners; if he loses, everyone gets $1,000, but if he wins, they go to the mission ("Luck Be a Lady"). He wins the bet. Nathan runs into Adelaide on his way there. She tries to get him to elope, but when he can't, she walks out on him. Nathan professes his love for her ("Sue Me"), then leaves.
Sarah is shocked to see that Sky carried through on his promise. The General asks the gamblers to confess their sins, and while some do, one of them admits the real reason they are even there. The General is thrilled that good can come from evil. Attempting to appear contrite, Nicely invents a dream that encouraged him to repent, and the gamblers join in with revivalist fervor ("Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat"). Brannigan arrives and threatens to arrest everyone for the crap game in the Mission, but Sarah clears them, saying that none of the gamblers were at the mission the previous night. After Brannigan leaves, Nathan confesses that they held the crap game in the mission. He also confesses to the bet he made with Sky about taking Sarah to Havana. He adds that he won the bet, to Sarah's shock, and she realizes that Sky wanted to protect her reputation and must genuinely care about her.
Sarah and Adelaide run into each other, and they commiserate and then resolve to marry their men anyway and reform them later ("Marry the Man Today"). A few weeks later, Nathan owns a newsstand and has officially closed the crap game. Sky, who is now married to Sarah, works at the mission band and has also stopped gambling. The characters celebrate as Nathan and Adelaide are married ("Guys and Dolls (Finale/Reprise)").
Musical numbers
Act I
"Runyonland" – Orchestra
"Fugue for Tinhorns" – Nicely, Benny, Rusty
"Follow the Fold" – Sarah, Mission Band
"The Oldest Established" – Nathan, Nicely, Benny, Guys
"I'll Know" – Sarah, Sky
"A Bushel and a Peck" – Adelaide, Hot Box Girls
"Adelaide's Lament" – Adelaide
"Guys and Dolls" – Nicely, Benny
"Havana" – Orchestra
"If I Were a Bell" – Sarah
"My Time of Day/I've Never Been in Love Before" – Sky, Sarah
Act II
"Take Back Your Mink" – Adelaide, Hot Box Girls
"Adelaide's Second Lament" – Adelaide
"More I Cannot Wish You" – Arvide
"Crapshooters Ballet" – Orchestra
"Luck Be a Lady" – Sky, Guys
"Sue Me" – Adelaide, Nathan
"Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat" – Nicely, Company
"Marry the Man Today" – Adelaide, Sarah
"Guys and Dolls (Reprise)" – Company
Productions
Original 1950 Broadway production
The show had its pre-Broadway try-out at the Shubert Theater in Philadelphia, opening Saturday, October 14, 1950. The musical premiered on Broadway at the 46th Street Theatre (now Richard Rodgers Theatre) on November 24, 1950. It was directed by George S. Kaufman, with dances and musical numbers by Michael Kidd, scenic and lighting design by Jo Mielziner, costumes by Alvin Colt, and orchestrations by George Bassman and Ted Royal, with vocal arrangements by Herbert Greene It starred Robert Alda (Sky Masterson), Sam Levene (Nathan Detroit), Isabel Bigley (Sarah) and Vivian Blaine (Miss Adelaide). Iva Withers was a replacement as Miss Adelaide. The musical ran for 1,200 performances, winning five 1951 Tony Awards, including the award for Best Musical. Decca Records issued the original cast recording on 78 rpm records, which was later expanded and re-issued on LP, and then transferred to CD in the 1980s.
1953 First UK production
The premiere West End production of Guys and Dolls opened at the London Coliseum on May 28, 1953, a few days before the 1953 Coronation and ran for 555 performances, including a Royal Command Variety Performance for Queen Elizabeth on November 2, 1953. Credited with above-the-title-billing the London cast co-starred Vivian Blaine as Miss Adelaide and Sam Levene as Nathan Detroit, each reprising their original Broadway performances; Jerry Wayne performed the role of Sky Masterson since Robert Alda did not reprise his Broadway role in the first UK production which co-starred Lizbeth Webb as Sarah Brown. Before opening at the Coliseum, Guys and Dolls had an eight performance run at the Bristol Hippodrome, where the show opened on May 19, 1953, and closed on May 25, 1953. Lizbeth Webb was the only major principal who was British and was chosen to play the part of Sarah Brown by Frank Loesser. The show has had numerous revivals and tours and has become a popular choice for school and community theatre productions.
1955 First Las Vegas production
Vivian Blaine as Miss Adelaide, Sam Levene as Nathan Detroit and Robert Alda as Sky Masterson recreated their original Broadway performances twice daily in a slightly reduced version of Guys and Dolls when the first Las Vegas production opened a six-month run at the Royal Nevada, September 7, 1955, the first time a Broadway musical was performed on the Las Vegas Strip.
1965 Fifteenth Anniversary production
In 1965 Vivian Blaine and Sam Levene reprised their original Broadway roles as Miss Adelaide and Nathan Detroit in a 15th anniversary revival of Guys and Dolls at the Mineola Theatre, Mineola, New York and Paramus Playhouse, New Jersey. Blaine and Levene performed the fifteenth anniversary production of Guys and Dolls for a limited run of 24 performances at each theatre.
New York City Center 1955, 1965 and 1966 revivals
New York City Center mounted short runs of the musical in 1955, 1965 and 1966. A production starring Walter Matthau as Nathan Detroit, Helen Gallagher as Adelaide, Ray Shaw as Sky and Leila Martin as Sarah had 31 performances, running from April 20 to May 1, and May 31 to June 12, 1955.
Another presentation at City Center, with Alan King as Nathan Detroit, Sheila MacRae as Adelaide, Jerry Orbach as Sky and Anita Gillette as Sarah, ran for 15 performances from April 28 to May 9, 1965. A 1966 production, starring Jan Murray as Nathan Detroit, Vivian Blaine reprising her role as Adelaide, Hugh O'Brian as Sky, and Barbara Meister as Sarah, ran for 23 performances, from June 8 to June 26, 1966.
1976 Broadway revival
An all-black cast staged the first Broadway revival of Guys and Dolls opened on July 10, 1976, in previews, officially on July 21, at The Broadway Theatre. It starred Robert Guillaume as Nathan Detroit, Norma Donaldson as Miss Adelaide, James Randolph as Sky and Ernestine Jackson as Sarah Brown. Guillaume and Jackson were nominated for Tony and Drama Desk Awards, and Ken Page as Nicely-Nicely won a Theatre World Award.
This production featured Motown-style musical arrangements by Danny Holgate and Horace Ott, and it was directed and choreographed by Billy Wilson. The entire production was under the supervision of Abe Burrows, and musical direction and choral arrangements were by Howard Roberts.
The show closed on February 13, 1977, after 12 previews and 239 performances. A cast recording was released subsequent to the show's opening.
1982 London revival
Laurence Olivier had wanted to play Nathan Detroit, and began rehearsals for a planned 1971 London revival of Guys and Dolls for the National Theatre Company then based at the Old Vic. However, due to poor health he had to stop, and his revival never happened.
In 1982, Richard Eyre directed a major revival at London's National Theatre. Eyre called it a "re-thinking" of the musical, and his production featured an award-winning neon-lit set design inspired by Rudi Stern's 1979 book Let There Be Neon, and brassier orchestrations with vintage yet innovative harmonies. The show's choreography by David Toguri included a large-scale tap dance number of the "Guys and Dolls" finale, performed by the principals and entire cast. The revival opened March 9, 1982, and was an overnight sensation, running for nearly four years and breaking all box office records. The original cast featured Bob Hoskins as Nathan Detroit, Julia McKenzie as Adelaide, Ian Charleson as Sky and Julie Covington as Sarah. The production won five Olivier Awards, including for McKenzie and Eyre and for Best Musical. Eyre also won an Evening Standard Theatre Award, and Hoskins won the Critics' Circle Theatre Award.
In October 1982, Hoskins was replaced by Trevor Peacock, Charleson by Paul Jones, and Covington by Belinda Sinclair; in the spring of 1983, McKenzie was replaced by Imelda Staunton and Fiona Hendley replaced Sinclair. This production closed in late 1983 to make way for a Broadway try-out of the ill-fated musical Jean Seberg, which following critical failure closed after four months. Eyre's Guys and Dolls returned to the National from April through September 1984, this time starring Lulu, Norman Rossington, Clarke Peters and Betsy Brantley. After a nationwide tour, this production transferred to the West End at the Prince of Wales Theatre, where it ran from June 1985 to April 1986.
Following Ian Charleson's death from AIDS at the age of 40, in November 1990 two reunion performances of Guys and Dolls, with almost all of the original 1982 cast and musicians, were given at the National Theatre as a tribute to Charleson. The tickets sold out immediately, and the dress rehearsal was also packed. The proceeds from the performances were donated to the new Ian Charleson Day Centre HIV clinic at the Royal Free Hospital, and to scholarships in Charleson's name at LAMDA.
1992 Broadway revival
The 1992 Broadway revival was the most successful American remounting of the show since the original Broadway production which ran for 1,200 performances. Directed by Jerry Zaks, it starred Nathan Lane as Nathan Detroit, Peter Gallagher as Sky, Faith Prince as Adelaide and Josie de Guzman as Sarah. This production played at the Martin Beck Theatre from April 14, 1992, to January 8, 1995, with 1,143 performances.
The production received a rave review from Frank Rich in The New York Times, stating "It's hard to know which genius, and I do mean genius, to celebrate first while cheering the entertainment at the Martin Beck." It received eight Tony Award nominations, and won four, including Best Revival, and the show also won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Revival. This revival featured various revisions to the show's score, including brand new music for the "Runyonland", "A Bushel and a Peck", "Take Back Your Mink" and "Havana". The orchestrations were redesigned by Michael Starobin, and there were new dance arrangements added to "A Bushel and a Peck" and "Take Back Your Mink".
A one-hour documentary film captured the recording sessions of the production's original cast album. Titled Guys and Dolls: Off the Record, the film aired on PBS's Great Performances series in December 1992, and was released on DVD in 2007. Complete takes of most of the show's songs are featured, as well as coaching from director Zaks, and commentary sessions by stars Gallagher, de Guzman, Lane and Prince on the production and their characters.
Lorna Luft auditioned for the role of Adelaide in this production. Faith Prince ultimately played the role, and Luft later played the role in the 1992 National Tour.
1996 London revival
Richard Eyre repeated his 1982 success with another National Theatre revival of the show, this time in a limited run. It starred Henry Goodman as Nathan Detroit, Imelda Staunton returning as Adelaide, Clarke Peters returning as Sky and Joanna Riding as Sarah. Clive Rowe played Nicely-Nicely Johnson, and David Toguri returned as choreographer. The production ran from December 17, 1996, through March 29, 1997 and from July 2, 1997, to November 22, 1997. It received three Olivier Award nominations, winning one: Best Supporting Performance in a Musical went to Clive Rowe. Richard Eyre won the Critics' Circle Theatre Award for Best Director, and the production won Best Musical.
2005 West End revival
The 2005 West End revival opened at London's Piccadilly Theatre in June 2005 and closed in April 2007. This revival, directed by Michael Grandage, starred Ewan McGregor as Sky, Jenna Russell as Sarah, Jane Krakowski as Adelaide, and Douglas Hodge as Nathan Detroit. During the run, Nigel Harman, Adam Cooper, Norman Bowman and Ben Richards took over as Sky; Kelly Price, Amy Nuttall and Lisa Stokke took over as Sarah; Sarah Lancashire, Sally Ann Triplett, Claire Sweeney, Lynsey Britton and Samantha Janus took over as Adelaide; and Nigel Lindsay, Neil Morrissey, Patrick Swayze, Alex Ferns and Don Johnson took over as Nathan Detroit. This production added the song "Adelaide" that Frank Loesser had written for the 1955 film adaptation. According to a September 2007 article in Playbill.com, this West End production had been scheduled to begin previews for a transfer to Broadway in February 2008, but this plan was dropped.
2009 Broadway revival
A Broadway revival of the show opened on March 1, 2009, at the Nederlander Theatre. The cast starred Oliver Platt as Nathan Detroit, Lauren Graham, in her Broadway debut, as Adelaide, Craig Bierko as Sky and Kate Jennings Grant as Sarah. Des McAnuff was the director, and the choreographer was Sergio Trujillo. The show opened to generally negative reviews. The New York Times called it "static" and "uninspired", the New York Post said, "How can something so zippy be so tedious?" and Time Out New York wrote, "Few things are more enervating than watching good material deflate." However, the show received a highly favorable review from The New Yorker, and the producers decided to keep the show open in hopes of positive audience response. The New York Post reported on March 4 that producer Howard Panter "[said] he'll give Guys and Dolls at least seven weeks to find an audience." The revival closed on June 14, 2009, after 28 previews and 113 performances.
2015–2016 West End revival and UK/Ireland tour
A revival opened at the 2015 Chichester Festival. This moved to Manchester and Birmingham before moving onto a West End opening at the Savoy Theatre on December 10, 2015, for previews with a full opening on January 6, 2016, until March 12, 2016. The production starred Sophie Thompson as Adelaide and Jamie Parker as Sky. The production then transferred to the Phoenix Theatre, with Oliver Tompsett as Sky, Samantha Spiro as Adelaide and Richard Kind as Nathan. On June 28, 2016, the role of Miss Adelaide was taken over by Rebel Wilson, and Nathan Detroit was played by Simon Lipkin. The tour continued around UK cities and Dublin.
2017–2018 UK all-black production
Talawa Theatre Company and Manchester's Royal Exchange Theatre produced the UK's first all-black Guys and Dolls in 2017. The production opened on December 2, 2017, and following an extension ran to February 27, 2018, at the Royal Exchange in Manchester. The cast included Ray Fearon as Nathan Detroit, Ashley Zhangazha as Sky Masterson, Abiona Omonua as Sarah Brown, and Lucy Vandi as Miss Adelaide.
In this production, the musical was relocated to Harlem, 1939, with the music referencing jazz, and gospel. Director Michael Buffong said, "Pre-war Harlem was all about the hustle. The creativity of that era was born from a unique collision of talent and circumstance as people escaped the agricultural and oppressive south via the 'underground railroad' into the highly urbanised and industrialised north. Much of our popular culture, from dance to music, has its roots in that period. Our Guys and Dolls brings all of this to the fore."
Reviews particularly praised the music, relocation to Harlem, and sense of spectacle. Lyn Gardner in The Guardian wrote that "the gamblers ... are a bunch of sharp-suited peacocks clad in rainbow hues." Ann Treneman in The Times commented, "Whoever had the idea of moving this classic musical from one part of New York to another bit, just up the road, needs to be congratulated. This version of Frank Loesser's musical, which swirls around the lives of the petty gangsters and their 'dolls' who inhabit New York's underbelly, moves the action to Harlem at its prewar height in 1939. It is a Talawa production with an all-black cast and it is terrific from the get-go." Clare Brennan in The Observer stated, "Relocated to Harlem, this fine new production of Frank Loesser's classic musical retains a threat of violence under a cartoon-bright exterior."
Other
In 1995, a Las Vegas production, performed without intermission, starred Jack Jones, Maureen McGovern and Frank Gorshin.
Charles Randolph-Wright directed a production at Washington's Arena Stage, starring Maurice Hines (Nathan Detroit) and Alexandra Foucard (Adelaide), opening on December 30, 1999. The production received six Helen Hayes Award nominations. With support from Jo Sullivan Loesser, the production began a national tour in August 2001. The cast recording from this production, released in November 2001, was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album.
An Australian remount of the Michael Grandage West End production of Guys and Dolls opened in Melbourne, Australia on April 5, 2008. The show starred Lisa McCune, Marina Prior, Garry McDonald, Ian Stenlake, Shane Jacobson, Wayne Scott Kermond, and Magda Szubanski, and ran at the Princess Theatre. The Melbourne season closed in August 2008 and transferred to Sydney from March 13, 2009, to May 31, 2009, at the Capitol Theatre, retaining the Melbourne cast.
In August 2009, a concert version ran at The Hollywood Bowl, Hollywood, California, starring Scott Bakula (Nathan Detroit), Brian Stokes Mitchell (Sky Masterson), Ellen Greene (Miss Adelaide), and Jessica Biel (Sarah Brown).
In February 2011, a co-production between Clwyd Theatr Cymru, the New Wolsey Theatre and the Salisbury Playhouse opened at Clwyd Theatr. Directed by Peter Rowe and with music direction by Greg Palmer and choreography by Francesca Jaynes, the show was performed by a cast of 22 actor-musicians, with all music played live on stage by the cast. The show also toured Cardiff, Swansea, and other Welsh cities as well as some English cities, receiving a positive review in The Guardian.
A concert performance ran at London's Cadogan Hall from 22 to 25 August 2012, featuring Dennis Waterman, Ruthie Henshall, Anna-Jane Casey, and Lance Ellington (Strictly Come Dancing), with musical director Richard Balcombe and the Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra and Choir.
In April 2014, a one-night-only performance took place at Carnegie Hall, starring Nathan Lane (reprising the role that made him a star), Megan Mullally, Patrick Wilson and Sierra Boggess. It was directed by Jack O'Brien and featured the Orchestra of St. Luke's playing the original orchestrations.
Reception
The original Broadway production of Guys and Dolls opened to unanimously positive reviews, which was a relief to the cast, who had had a 41-performance pre-Broadway tryout in Philadelphia in which each of the 41 performances was different. Critics praised the musical's faithfulness to Damon Runyon's style and characterizations. Richard Watts of the New York Post wrote "Guys and Dolls is just what it should be to celebrate the Runyon spirit...filled with the salty characters and richly original language sacred to the memory of the late Master". William Hawkins of the New York World-Telegram & Sun stated "It recaptures what [Runyon] knew about Broadway, that its wickedness is tinhorn, but its gallantry is as pure and young as Little Eva". Robert Coleman of the New York Daily Mirror wrote "We think Damon would have relished it as much as we did".
The book and score were greatly praised as well; John Chapman, then Chief Theatre Critic, of the New York Daily News wrote "The book is a work of easy and delightful humor. Its music and lyrics, by Frank Loesser, are so right for the show and so completely lacking in banality, that they amount to an artistic triumph". Coleman stated "Frank Loesser has written a score that will get a big play on the juke boxes, over the radio, and in bistros throughout the land. His lyrics are especially notable in that they help Burrows's topical gags to further the plot". In The New York Times, Brooks Atkinson wrote "Mr. Loesser's lyrics and songs have the same affectionate appreciation of the material as the book, which is funny without being self-conscious or mechanical".
Multiple critics asserted that the work was of great significance to musical theatre. John McClain of the New York Journal American proclaimed "it is the best and most exciting thing of its kind since Pal Joey. It is a triumph and a delight." Atkinson stated, "we might as well admit that Guys and Dolls is a work of art. It is spontaneous and has form, style, and spirit." Chapman asserted, "In all departments, Guys and Dolls is a perfect musical comedy".
Film adaptations
On November 3, 1955 the film version of the musical was released, starring Marlon Brando as Sky, Frank Sinatra as Nathan Detroit, and Jean Simmons as Sarah, with Vivian Blaine reprising her role as Adelaide. The film was directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz and produced by Samuel Goldwyn.
Levene lost the film role of Nathan Detroit to Frank Sinatra. "You can't have a Jew playing a Jew, it wouldn't work on screen", producer Samuel Goldwyn argued, when explaining that he wanted Sinatra, rather than Levene, who had originated the role, even though Guys and Dolls film director Joseph L. Mankiewicz wanted Levene, the original Broadway star. Frank Loesser felt Sinatra played the part like a "dapper Italian swinger". Mankiewicz said "if there could be one person in the world more miscast as Nathan Detroit than Frank Sinatra that would be Laurence Olivier and I am one of his greatest fans; the role had been written for Sam Levene who was divine in it". Sinatra did his best to give Nathan Detroit a few stereotyped Jewish gestures and inflections, but Frank Loesser hated "how Sinatra turned the rumpled Nathan Detroit into a smoothie. Sam Levene's husky untrained voice added to the song's charm, not to mention its believability". Frank Loesser died in 1969, still refusing to watch the film version released in 1955.
Around the time of the film's release, American composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim wrote film reviews for Films in Review. Sondheim (then aged 25) reviewed the film version of Guys and Dolls, and observed: "Sinatra ambles through his role as Nathan Detroit as though he were about to laugh at the jokes in the script. He has none of the sob in the voice, and the incipient ulcer in the stomach, that the part requires and Sam Levene supplied so hilariously on the stage. Sinatra sings on pitch, but colorlessly; Levene sang off pitch, but acted while he sang. Sinatra's lackadaisical performance, his careless and left handed attempt at characterization not only harm the picture immeasurably but indicate an alarming lack of professionally."
Three new songs, written by Frank Loesser, were added to the film: "Pet Me Poppa"; "A Woman in Love"; and "Adelaide", which was written specifically for Sinatra. Five songs from the stage musical were omitted from the movie: "A Bushel and a Peck", "My Time of Day", "I've Never Been In Love Before", "More I Cannot Wish You", and "Marry the Man Today", although "A Bushel and a Peck" was later restored to the video release version.
20th Century Fox acquired the film rights to the musical in early 2013, and was said to be planning a remake. In March 2019, TriStar Pictures acquired the remake rights, with Bill Condon hired as director a year later.
Casts of major productions
The following table shows the principal casts of the major productions of Guys and Dolls:
Awards and honors
Recordings
There are numerous recordings of the show's score on compact disc. The most notable include:
Original 1950 Broadway Cast
1955 Film Soundtrack
1963 Reprise Musical Repertory Theatre studio recording (Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, Debbie Reynolds, Dean Martin, Jo Stafford, The McGuire Sisters, Dinah Shore, Sammy Davis, Jr., Allan Sherman)
1976 Broadway Revival Cast
1982 London Revival Cast
1992 Broadway Revival Cast
1995 Complete Studio Recording (features the entire score for the first time on CD; with Frank Loesser's daughter Emily as Sarah Brown; conducted by John Owen Edwards)
Notes
References
Davis, Lee. "The Indestructible Icon". ShowMusic. Winter 2000–01: 17–24, 61–63.
Dietz, Dan. The Complete Book of 1950s Broadway Musicals (2014), Bowman & Littlefield, , p. 38.
Loesser, Susan (1993).: A Most Remarkable Fella: Frank Loesser and the Guys and Dolls in His Life. New York: Donald I. Fine. .
Stempel, Larry (2010). Showtime: A History of the Broadway Musical Theater. New York: W. W. Norton and Company. .
Suskin, Stephen (1990). Opening Night on Broadway: A Critical Quotebook of the Golden Era of the Musical Theatre. New York: Schrimmer Books. .
External links
Guys and Dolls at the Music Theatre International website
Guys and Dolls JR. at the Music Theatre International website
Guys and Dolls at the Guide to Musical Theatre
Guys and Dolls at StageAgent.com
1950 musicals
Broadway musicals
Grammy Hall of Fame Award recipients
Musicals based on short fiction
Musicals by Frank Loesser
Laurence Olivier Award-winning musicals
West End musicals
Plays set in New York City
United States National Recording Registry recordings
Tony Award-winning musicals | true | [
"American-born Australian actress and producer Nicole Kidman has been honored with numerous accolades throughout her career. Among them, she has won an Academy Award, two Primetime Emmy Awards, six Golden Globe Awards, and a BAFTA Award. She is the first Australian to win the Academy Award for Best Actress. In 2003, Kidman received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for her contributions to the motion picture industry. In addition to her 2003 Academy Award for Best Actress, Kidman has received Best Actress awards from the following critics' associations or award-granting organisations: the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (Golden Globe Award), the Australian Film Institute, Blockbuster Entertainment Awards, Empire Awards, Satellite Awards, Hollywood Film Awards, London Film Critics' Circle, Russian Guild of Film Critics, and the Southeastern Film Critics Association. In 2003, Kidman was given the American Cinematheque Award. She also received recognition from the National Association of Theatre Owners at the ShoWest Convention in 1992 as the Female Star of Tomorrow, and in 2002 for a Distinguished Decade of Achievement in Film Award.\n\nMajor associations\n\nAcademy Awards \n1 win of 5 nominations\n\nBAFTA Awards \n1 win of 5 nominations\n\nGolden Globe Awards \n6 wins of 18 nominations\n\nPrimetime Emmy Awards \n2 wins of 3 nominations\n\nProducers Guild Awards \n0 wins of 3 nominations\n\nScreen Actors Guild Awards \n1 win of 15 nominations\n\nAudience awards\n\nGolden Schmoes awards \n2 wins of 6 nominations\n\nMTV Movie + TV awards \n2 wins of 7 nominations\n\nNickelodeon Kid's Choice awards \n0 wins of 3 nominations\n\nPeople's Choice awards \n0 wins of 3 nominations\n\nTeen Choice awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nCritic association awards\n\nAlliance of Women Film Journalists awards \n0 wins of 8 nominations\n\nAustralian Film Critics Association awards \n3 wins of 4 nominations\n\nAward Circuit Community awards \n2 wins of 10 nominations\n\nBoston Society of Film Critics awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nCentral Ohio Film Critics Association awards \n0 wins of 2 nominations\n\nChicago Film Critics Association awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nCritics' Choice Movie Awards \n1 win of 11 nominations\n\nCritics' Choice Television Awards \n2 wins of 4 nominations\n\nDallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association awards \n0 wins of 6 nominations\n\nDenver Film Critics Society awards \n0 wins of 2 nominations\n\nDetroit Film Critics Society awards \n0 wins of 2 nominations\n\nFilm Critics Circle of Australia awards \n0 wins of 5 nominations\n\nGay and Lesbian Entertainment Critics Association awards \n1 win of 2 nomination\n\nGeorgia Film Critics Association awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nGreater Western New York Film Critics Association awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nHawaii Film Critics Society \n0 wins of 2 nominations\n\nHollywood Critics Association awards \n0 wins of 2 nominations\n\nHouston Film Critics Society awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nKansas City Film Critics Circle awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nLas Vegas Film Critics Society awards \n1 win of 4 nominations\n\nLondon Critics Circle Film awards \n2 wins of 4 nominations\n\nLos Angeles Online Film Critics Society \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nNevada Film Critics Society \n1 wins of 1 nomination\n\nNew York Film Critics Circle awards \n0 wins of 2 nominations\n\nNorth Carolina Film Critics Association awards \n0 wins of 2 nomination\n\nNorth Texas Film Critics Association awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nOnline Film & Television Association awards \n1 wins of 10 nominations\n\nOnline Film Critics Society awards \n0 wins of 2 nominations\n\nPhoenix Critics Circle \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nPhoenix Film Critics Society awards \n0 wins of 3 nominations\n\nSan Diego Film Critics Society awards \n1 wins of 3 nomination\n\nSeattle Film Critics awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nSoutheastern Film Critics Association awards \n1 win of 2 nominations\n\nSt. Louis Film Critics Association awards \n0 wins of 3 nominations\n\nSunset Film Critics Circle \n0 wins of 2 nominations\n\nTelevision Critics Association awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nUtah Film Critics Association awards \n0 wins of 2 nominations\n\nVancouver Film Critics Circle awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nWashington D. C. Area Film Critics Association awards \n0 wins of 4 nominations\n\nWomen Film Critics Circle awards \n2 wins of 4 nominations\n\nWomen's Image Network awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nFilm festival awards\n\nBaja International Film Festival awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nBerlin International Film Festival awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nCannes Film Festival awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nCapri Hollywood International Film Festival \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nGlobal Non-Violent Film Festival Awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nHeartland Film Festival awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nHollywood Film Festival awards \n3 wins of 3 nominations\n\nMill Valley Film Festival awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nNew York Film Festival awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nNoir in Festival 2018 \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nPalm Springs International Film Festival awards \n3 wins of 3 nominations\n\nSanta Barbara International Film Festival awards \n2 win of 2 nominations\n\nSeattle International Film Festival awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nSESC Film Festival awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nShanghai International Film Festival awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nShoWest Convention awards \n2 wins of 2 nominations\n\nTaormina Film Festival \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nInternational awards\n\nAACTA International awards \n3 wins of 9 nominations\n\nAmerican Cinematheque Gala Tribute awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nAmerican Comedy awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nAACTA Australian Film Academy awards \n4 win of 8 nominations\n\nBodil Awards \n0 win of 1 nomination\n\nBritish Academy Film & Television awards \n1 win of 5 nominations\n\nChlotrudis Awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nCinEuphoria awards \n3 wins of 7 nominations\n\nCriticos de Cinema Online Portugueses awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nEmpire awards \n3 wins of 6 nominations\n\nGolden Camera awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nGoya Awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nHuading Awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nInternational Cinephile Society awards \n0 wins of 3 nominations\n\nInternational Online Cinema awards \n1 win of 7 nominations\n\nIrish Film and Television Awards \n0 win of 1 nomination\n\nItalian Online Movie awards \n1 win of 3 nominations\n\nJupiter awards \n2 wins of 2 nominations\n\nLogie awards \n3 wins of 3 nominations\n\nNational Movie awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nRussian Guild of Film Critics awards \n1 win of 2 nominations\n\nRussian National Movie awards \n0 wins of 2 nominations\n\nSant Jordi awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nYoga awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nMiscellaneous awards\n\nAARP Movies for Grown-Ups Awards \n0 wins of 6 nomination\n\nBlockbuster Entertainment awards \n2 wins of 3 nominations\n\nCinema Bloggers Awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nCinema Writers Circle awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nElle Women in Hollywood awards \n4 wins of 4 nominations\n\nFangoria Chainsaw awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nFright Meter awards \n1 win of 2 nominations\n\nGolden Raspberry awards \n1 win of 2 nominations\n\nGotham awards \n1 win of 2 nominations\n\nBritish GQ Awards \n1 win of 1 nominations\n\nHarper's BAZAAR Women of the Year awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nIF awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nIndependent Spirit awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nSatellite awards \n4 wins of 19 nominations\n\nSaturn awards \n1 win of 7 nominations\n\nSyFy Portal Genre awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nThe Stinkers Bad Movie awards\n0 wins of 3 nominations\n\nVillage Voice Film Poll awards \n0 wins of 1 nomination\n\nWalk of Fame \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nWomen in Film Crystal + Lucy awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nTheatre awards\n\nEvening Standard Theatre Awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nLaurence Olivier Awards \n0 wins of 2 nominations\n\nWhatsOnStage Awards \n1 win of 1 nomination\n\nReferences \n\nList of awards and nominations\nLists of awards received by actor",
"The following is a list of awards and nominations received by Welsh actor and director Anthony Hopkins. \n\nHe is an Oscar-winning actor, having received six Academy award nominations winning two of these for Best Actor for his performance as Hannibal Lecter in the Jonathan Demme thriller The Silence of the Lambs (1991) and for his performance as Anthony in Florian Zeller's drama The Father (2020). He also was nominated for his performances as in James Ivory's The Remains of the Day (1993), Richard Nixon in Oliver Stone's drama Nixon (1995), John Quincy Adams in Amistad (1997), and Pope Benedict XVI in the Fernando Meirelles drama The Two Popes (2019). \n\nFor his work on film and television, he has received eight Golden Globe award nominations. In 2006 he was honored with the Cecil B. DeMille award for his lifetime achievement in the entertainment industry. He has received six Primetime Emmy award nominations winning two—one in 1976 for his performance as Richard Hauptmann in The Lindbergh Kidnapping Case and the other in 1981 for his performance as Adolf Hitler in The Bunker, as well as seven Screen Actors Guild award nominations all of which have been respectively lost.\n\nMajor associations\n\nAcademy Awards \n2 wins out of 6 nominations\n\nBAFTA Awards \n4 wins (and one honorary award) out of 9 nominations\n\nEmmy Awards \n2 wins out of 6 nominations\n\nGolden Globe Awards \n0 wins (and one honorary award) out of 8 nominations\n\nOlivier Awards \n1 win out of 2 nominations\n\nScreen Actors Guild Awards \n0 wins out of 7 nominations\n\nAudience awards\n\nMTV Movie + TV awards \n0 wins out of 2 nominations\n\nPeople's Choice awards \n0 wins out of 1 nomination\n\nCritic and association awards\n\nAlliance of Women Film Journalists awards \n1 win out of 2 nominations\n\nBoston Society of Film Critics awards \n1 win out of 1 nomination\n\nCableACE awards \n1 win out of 2 nominations\n\nChicago Film Critics Association awards \n1 win out of 5 nominations\n\nCritics' Choice awards \n1 win out of 4 nominations\n\nDallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association awards \n2 wins out of 2 nominations\n\nKansas City Film Critics Circle awards \n2 wins out of 2 nominations\n\nLondon Critics Circle Film awards \n1 win out of 5 nominations\n\nLos Angeles Film Critics Association awards \n1 win out of 2 nominations\n\nNational Board of Review awards \n2 wins out of 2 nominations\n\nNational Society of Film Critics awards \n0 wins out of 1 nomination\n\nNew York Film Critics Circle awards \n1 win out of 3 nominations\n\nOnline Film & Television Association awards \n1 win out of 3 nominations\n\nOnline Film Critics Society awards \n0 wins out of 1 nomination\n\nPhoenix Film Critics Society awards \n0 wins out of 1 nomination\n\nSoutheastern Film Critics Association awards \n1 win out of 2 nominations\n\nSt. Louis Film Critics Association awards \n1 win out of 2 nomination\n\nWomen's Image Network awards \n0 wins out of 1 nomination\n\nFilm festival awards\n\nHollywood Film Festival awards \n2 wins out of 2 nominations\n\nLocarno International Film Festival awards \n1 win out of 2 nominations\n\nMethod Fest awards \n0 wins out of 1 nomination\n\nMoscow International Film Festival awards \n1 win out of 1 nomination\n\nSan Sebastian International Film Festival awards \n1 win out of 1 nomination\n\nSanta Barbara International Film Festival awards \n1 win out of 1 nomination\n\nShoWest Convention awards \n1 win out of 1 nomination\n\nSitges - Catalonian International Film Festival awards \n0 wins out of 1 nomination\n\nUSA Film Festival awards \n1 win out of 1 nomination\n\nVirginia Film Festival awards \n1 win out of 1 nomination\n\nInternational awards\n\nBAFTA/LA Britannia awards \n1 win out of 1 nominations\n\nDavid di Donatello awards \n1 win out of 2 nominations\n\nEuropean Film Awards \n1 win out of 1 nomination\n\nEvening Standard British Film awards \n1 win out of 1 nomination\n\nJupiter awards \n0 wins out of 1 nomination\n\nNew Zealand Screen awards \n1 win out of 1 nomination\n\nSant Jordi awards \n1 win out of 1 nomination\n\nYoga awards \n1 win out of 1 nomination\n\nMiscellaneous awards\n\n20/20 awards \n1 win out of 3 nominations\n\nAARP Movies for Grownups awards \n1 win out of 4 nominations\n\nFangoria Chainsaw awards \n3 wins out of 4 nominations\n\nGolden Raspberry awards \n0 wins out of 2 nominations\n\nHasty Pudding Theatricals awards \n1 win out of 1 nomination\n\nMovieGuide awards \n0 wins out of 1 nomination\n\nSatellite awards \n0 wins out of 1 nomination\n\nSaturn awards \n1 win out of 5 nominations\n\nWalk of Fame \n1 win out of 1 nomination\n\nWestern Heritage awards \n1 win out of 1 nomination\n\nReferences\n\nHopkins, Anthony"
]
|
[
"Guys and Dolls",
"1982 London revival",
"When did the London revival start",
"began rehearsals for a planned 1971 London revival of Guys and Dolls at his National Theatre Company's Old Vic theatre. However, due to poor health he had to stop,",
"What happened after he stopped",
"his revival never saw the light of day.",
"Was there another revival",
"In 1982, Richard Eyre directed a major revival",
"What happened with this revival",
"Eyre called it a \"re-thinking\" of the musical,",
"How did it get changed",
"brassier orchestrations with vintage yet innovative harmonies.",
"Was the revival popular",
"an overnight sensation,",
"Did it win awards",
"The production won five Olivier Awards,"
]
| C_8659549f5ee64c21bb6952b1a4d7f882_1 | What else did it win | 8 | Other than the five Olivier Awards, what other awards did the 1982 Richard Eyre revival of the play Guys and Dolls win? | Guys and Dolls | Laurence Olivier had wanted to play Nathan Detroit, and began rehearsals for a planned 1971 London revival of Guys and Dolls at his National Theatre Company's Old Vic theatre. However, due to poor health he had to stop, and his revival never saw the light of day. In 1982, Richard Eyre directed a major revival at London's National Theatre. Eyre called it a "re-thinking" of the musical, and his production featured an award-winning neon-lit set design inspired by Rudi Stern's 1979 book Let There Be Neon, and brassier orchestrations with vintage yet innovative harmonies. The show's choreography by David Toguri included a large-scale tap dance number of the "Guys and Dolls" finale, performed by the principals and entire cast. The revival opened March 9, 1982, and was an overnight sensation, running for nearly four years and breaking all box office records. The original cast featured Bob Hoskins as Nathan Detroit, Julia McKenzie as Adelaide, Ian Charleson as Sky and Julie Covington as Sarah. The production won five Olivier Awards, including for McKenzie and Eyre and for Best Musical. Eyre also won the Evening Standard Award, and Hoskins won the Critics' Circle Theatre Award. In October 1982, Hoskins was replaced by Trevor Peacock, Charleson by Paul Jones, and Covington by Belinda Sinclair; in the spring of 1983 McKenzie was replaced by Imelda Staunton and Fiona Hendley replaced Sinclair. This production closed in late 1983 to make way for a Broadway try-out of the ill-fated musical Jean Seberg, which following critical failure closed after four months. Eyre's Guys and Dolls returned to the National from April through September 1984, this time starring Lulu, Norman Rossington, Clarke Peters and Betsy Brantley. After a nationwide tour, this production transferred to the West End at the Prince of Wales Theatre, where it ran from June 1985 to April 1986. Following Ian Charleson's untimely death from AIDS at the age of 40, in November 1990 two reunion performances of Guys and Dolls, with almost all of the original 1982 cast and musicians, were given at the National Theatre as a tribute to Charleson. The tickets sold out immediately, and the dress rehearsal was also packed. The proceeds from the performances were donated to the new Ian Charleson Day Centre HIV clinic at the Royal Free Hospital, and to scholarships in Charleson's name at LAMDA. CANNOTANSWER | Eyre also won the Evening Standard Award, and Hoskins won the Critics' Circle Theatre Award. | Guys and Dolls is a musical with music and lyrics by Frank Loesser and book by Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows. It is based on "The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown" (1933) and "Blood Pressure", which are two short stories by Damon Runyon, and also borrows characters and plot elements from other Runyon stories, such as "Pick the Winner".
The show premiered on Broadway in 1950, where it ran for 1,200 performances and won the Tony Award for Best Musical. The musical has had several Broadway and London revivals, as well as a 1955 film adaptation starring Marlon Brando, Jean Simmons, Frank Sinatra and Vivian Blaine.
Guys and Dolls was selected as the winner of the 1951 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. However, because of writer Abe Burrows' communist sympathies as exposed by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), the Trustees of Columbia University vetoed the selection, and no Pulitzer for Drama was awarded that year.
In 1998, Vivian Blaine, Sam Levene, Robert Alda and Isabel Bigley, along with the original Broadway cast of the 1950 Decca cast album, were posthumously inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.
Background
Guys and Dolls was conceived by producers Cy Feuer and Ernest Martin as an adaptation of Damon Runyon's short stories. These stories, written in the 1920s and 1930s, concerned gangsters, gamblers, and other characters of the New York underworld. Runyon was known for the unique dialect he employed in his stories, mixing highly formal language and slang. Frank Loesser, who had spent most of his career as a lyricist for movie musicals, was hired as composer and lyricist. George S. Kaufman was hired as director. When the first version of the show's book, or dialogue, written by Jo Swerling was deemed unusable, Feuer and Martin asked radio comedy writer Abe Burrows to rewrite it.
Loesser had already written much of the score to correspond with the first version of the book. Burrows later recalled:
Frank Loesser's fourteen songs were all great, and the [new book] had to be written so that the story would lead into each of them. Later on, the critics spoke of the show as 'integrated'. The word integration usually means that the composer has written songs that follow the story line gracefully. Well, we accomplished that but we did it in reverse.
Abe Burrows specifically crafted the role of Nathan Detroit around Sam Levene who signed for the project long before Burrows wrote a single word of dialogue, a similar break Burrows said he had when he later wrote Cactus Flower for Lauren Bacall. In “Honest, Abe: Is There Really No Business Like Show Business?”, Burrows recalls "I had the sound of their voices in my head. I knew the rhythm of their speech and it helped make the dialogue sharper and more real". Although Broadway and movie veteran Sam Levene was not a singer, it was agreed he was otherwise perfect as Nathan Detroit; indeed, Levene was one of Runyon's favorite actors. Frank Loesser agreed it was easier adjusting the music to Levene's limitations than substituting a better singer who couldn't act. Levene's lack of singing ability is the reason the lead role of Nathan Detroit only has one song, the duet "Sue Me".
Composer and lyricist Frank Loesser specifically wrote "Sue Me" for Sam Levene, and structured the song so he and Vivian Blaine never sang their showstopping duet together. The son of a cantor, Sam Levene was fluent in Yiddish: "Alright, already, I'm just a no-goodnick; alright, already, it’s true, so nu? So sue me." Frank Loesser felt "Nathan Detroit should be played as a brassy Broadway tough guy who sang with more grits than gravy. Sam Levene sang “Sue Me” with such a wonderful Runyonesque flavor that his singing had been easy to forgive, in fact it had been quite charming in its ineptitude." "Musically, Sam Levene may have been tone-deaf, but he inhabited Frank Loesser's world as a character more than a caricature", says Larry Stempel, a music professor at Fordham University and the author of Showtime: A History of the Broadway Musical Theater.
The character of Miss Adelaide was created specifically to fit Vivian Blaine into the musical, after Loesser decided she was ill-suited to play the conservative Sarah. When Loesser suggested reprising some songs in the second act, Kaufman warned: "If you reprise the songs, we'll reprise the jokes."
Synopsis
Act I
A pantomime of never-ceasing activities depicts the hustle and bustle of New York City ("Runyonland"). Three small-time gamblers, Nicely-Nicely Johnson, Benny Southstreet, and Rusty Charlie, argue over which horse will win a big race ("Fugue for Tinhorns"). The band members of the Save-a-Soul Mission, led by the pious and beautiful Sergeant Sarah Brown, call for sinners to "Follow the Fold" and repent. Nicely and Benny's employer, Nathan Detroit, runs an illegal floating crap game. Due to local policeman Lt. Brannigan's strong-armed presence, he has found only one likely spot to hold the game: the "Biltmore garage". Its owner, Joey Biltmore, requires a $1,000 security deposit, and Nathan is broke ("The Oldest Established"). Nathan hopes to win a $1,000 bet against Sky Masterson, a gambler willing to bet on virtually anything. Nathan proposes a bet he believes he cannot lose: Sky must take a woman of Nathan's choice to dinner in Havana, Cuba. Sky agrees, and Nathan chooses Sarah Brown.
At the mission, Sky attempts to make a deal with Sarah; offering her "one dozen genuine sinners" in exchange for the date in Havana. Sarah refuses, and they argue over whom they will fall in love with ("I'll Know"). Sky kisses Sarah, and she slaps him. Nathan goes to watch his fiancée of 14 years, Adelaide, perform her nightclub act ("A Bushel and a Peck"). After her show, she asks him to marry her once again, telling him that she has been sending her mother letters for twelve years claiming that they have been married with five children. She finds out that Nathan is still running the crap game. After kicking him out, she reads a medical book telling her that her long-running cold may be due to Nathan's refusal to marry her ("Adelaide's Lament").
The next day, Nicely and Benny watch as Sky pursues Sarah, and Nathan tries to win back Adelaide's favor. They declare that guys will do anything for the dolls they love ("Guys and Dolls"). General Cartwright, the leader of Save-a-Soul, visits the mission and explains that she will be forced to close the branch unless they succeed in bringing some sinners to the upcoming revival meeting. Sarah, desperate to save the mission, promises the General "one dozen genuine sinners", implicitly accepting Sky's deal. Brannigan discovers a group of gamblers waiting for Nathan's crap game, and to convince him of their innocence, they tell Brannigan their gathering is Nathan's "surprise bachelor party". This satisfies Brannigan, and Nathan resigns himself to eloping with Adelaide. Adelaide goes home to pack, promising to meet him after her show the next afternoon. The Save-A-Soul Mission band passes by, and Nathan sees that Sarah is not in it; he realizes that he lost the bet and faints.
In a Havana nightclub, Sky buys a drink for himself and a "Cuban milkshake" for Sarah. She doesn't realize that the drink contains Bacardi rum, and she gets drunk and kisses Sky ("If I Were a Bell"). Sky realizes that he genuinely cares for Sarah, and he takes her back to New York. They return at around 4:00 a.m., and Sky tells Sarah how much he loves the early morning ("My Time of Day"). They both spontaneously admit that they're in love ("I've Never Been in Love Before"). A siren sounds and gamblers run out of the mission, where Nathan has been holding the crap game. Sarah assumes that Sky took her to Havana so Nathan could run the game in the mission, and she walks out on him.
Act II
The next evening, Adelaide performs her act ("Take Back Your Mink"). Nathan doesn't show up for the elopement because he's still running the crap game. She soon realizes that Nathan has stood her up again ("Adelaide's Second Lament").
Sarah admits to Arvide, her uncle and fellow mission worker, that she does love Sky, but she will not see him again. Arvide expresses his faith in Sky's inherent goodness and urges Sarah to follow her heart ("More I Cannot Wish You"). Sky tells Sarah he intends to deliver the dozen genuine sinners for the revival. She doesn't believe him and walks off, but Arvide subtly encourages him.
Nicely shows Sky to the crap game; now in the sewers ("Crapshooters Dance"). Big Jule, a gambler, has lost a large sum of money and refuses to end the game until he earns it back. Sky arrives and fails to convince the crapshooters to come to the mission. He gives Nathan $1,000 and claims that he lost the bet to protect Sarah. Sky makes a last-minute bet to get the sinners; if he loses, everyone gets $1,000, but if he wins, they go to the mission ("Luck Be a Lady"). He wins the bet. Nathan runs into Adelaide on his way there. She tries to get him to elope, but when he can't, she walks out on him. Nathan professes his love for her ("Sue Me"), then leaves.
Sarah is shocked to see that Sky carried through on his promise. The General asks the gamblers to confess their sins, and while some do, one of them admits the real reason they are even there. The General is thrilled that good can come from evil. Attempting to appear contrite, Nicely invents a dream that encouraged him to repent, and the gamblers join in with revivalist fervor ("Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat"). Brannigan arrives and threatens to arrest everyone for the crap game in the Mission, but Sarah clears them, saying that none of the gamblers were at the mission the previous night. After Brannigan leaves, Nathan confesses that they held the crap game in the mission. He also confesses to the bet he made with Sky about taking Sarah to Havana. He adds that he won the bet, to Sarah's shock, and she realizes that Sky wanted to protect her reputation and must genuinely care about her.
Sarah and Adelaide run into each other, and they commiserate and then resolve to marry their men anyway and reform them later ("Marry the Man Today"). A few weeks later, Nathan owns a newsstand and has officially closed the crap game. Sky, who is now married to Sarah, works at the mission band and has also stopped gambling. The characters celebrate as Nathan and Adelaide are married ("Guys and Dolls (Finale/Reprise)").
Musical numbers
Act I
"Runyonland" – Orchestra
"Fugue for Tinhorns" – Nicely, Benny, Rusty
"Follow the Fold" – Sarah, Mission Band
"The Oldest Established" – Nathan, Nicely, Benny, Guys
"I'll Know" – Sarah, Sky
"A Bushel and a Peck" – Adelaide, Hot Box Girls
"Adelaide's Lament" – Adelaide
"Guys and Dolls" – Nicely, Benny
"Havana" – Orchestra
"If I Were a Bell" – Sarah
"My Time of Day/I've Never Been in Love Before" – Sky, Sarah
Act II
"Take Back Your Mink" – Adelaide, Hot Box Girls
"Adelaide's Second Lament" – Adelaide
"More I Cannot Wish You" – Arvide
"Crapshooters Ballet" – Orchestra
"Luck Be a Lady" – Sky, Guys
"Sue Me" – Adelaide, Nathan
"Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat" – Nicely, Company
"Marry the Man Today" – Adelaide, Sarah
"Guys and Dolls (Reprise)" – Company
Productions
Original 1950 Broadway production
The show had its pre-Broadway try-out at the Shubert Theater in Philadelphia, opening Saturday, October 14, 1950. The musical premiered on Broadway at the 46th Street Theatre (now Richard Rodgers Theatre) on November 24, 1950. It was directed by George S. Kaufman, with dances and musical numbers by Michael Kidd, scenic and lighting design by Jo Mielziner, costumes by Alvin Colt, and orchestrations by George Bassman and Ted Royal, with vocal arrangements by Herbert Greene It starred Robert Alda (Sky Masterson), Sam Levene (Nathan Detroit), Isabel Bigley (Sarah) and Vivian Blaine (Miss Adelaide). Iva Withers was a replacement as Miss Adelaide. The musical ran for 1,200 performances, winning five 1951 Tony Awards, including the award for Best Musical. Decca Records issued the original cast recording on 78 rpm records, which was later expanded and re-issued on LP, and then transferred to CD in the 1980s.
1953 First UK production
The premiere West End production of Guys and Dolls opened at the London Coliseum on May 28, 1953, a few days before the 1953 Coronation and ran for 555 performances, including a Royal Command Variety Performance for Queen Elizabeth on November 2, 1953. Credited with above-the-title-billing the London cast co-starred Vivian Blaine as Miss Adelaide and Sam Levene as Nathan Detroit, each reprising their original Broadway performances; Jerry Wayne performed the role of Sky Masterson since Robert Alda did not reprise his Broadway role in the first UK production which co-starred Lizbeth Webb as Sarah Brown. Before opening at the Coliseum, Guys and Dolls had an eight performance run at the Bristol Hippodrome, where the show opened on May 19, 1953, and closed on May 25, 1953. Lizbeth Webb was the only major principal who was British and was chosen to play the part of Sarah Brown by Frank Loesser. The show has had numerous revivals and tours and has become a popular choice for school and community theatre productions.
1955 First Las Vegas production
Vivian Blaine as Miss Adelaide, Sam Levene as Nathan Detroit and Robert Alda as Sky Masterson recreated their original Broadway performances twice daily in a slightly reduced version of Guys and Dolls when the first Las Vegas production opened a six-month run at the Royal Nevada, September 7, 1955, the first time a Broadway musical was performed on the Las Vegas Strip.
1965 Fifteenth Anniversary production
In 1965 Vivian Blaine and Sam Levene reprised their original Broadway roles as Miss Adelaide and Nathan Detroit in a 15th anniversary revival of Guys and Dolls at the Mineola Theatre, Mineola, New York and Paramus Playhouse, New Jersey. Blaine and Levene performed the fifteenth anniversary production of Guys and Dolls for a limited run of 24 performances at each theatre.
New York City Center 1955, 1965 and 1966 revivals
New York City Center mounted short runs of the musical in 1955, 1965 and 1966. A production starring Walter Matthau as Nathan Detroit, Helen Gallagher as Adelaide, Ray Shaw as Sky and Leila Martin as Sarah had 31 performances, running from April 20 to May 1, and May 31 to June 12, 1955.
Another presentation at City Center, with Alan King as Nathan Detroit, Sheila MacRae as Adelaide, Jerry Orbach as Sky and Anita Gillette as Sarah, ran for 15 performances from April 28 to May 9, 1965. A 1966 production, starring Jan Murray as Nathan Detroit, Vivian Blaine reprising her role as Adelaide, Hugh O'Brian as Sky, and Barbara Meister as Sarah, ran for 23 performances, from June 8 to June 26, 1966.
1976 Broadway revival
An all-black cast staged the first Broadway revival of Guys and Dolls opened on July 10, 1976, in previews, officially on July 21, at The Broadway Theatre. It starred Robert Guillaume as Nathan Detroit, Norma Donaldson as Miss Adelaide, James Randolph as Sky and Ernestine Jackson as Sarah Brown. Guillaume and Jackson were nominated for Tony and Drama Desk Awards, and Ken Page as Nicely-Nicely won a Theatre World Award.
This production featured Motown-style musical arrangements by Danny Holgate and Horace Ott, and it was directed and choreographed by Billy Wilson. The entire production was under the supervision of Abe Burrows, and musical direction and choral arrangements were by Howard Roberts.
The show closed on February 13, 1977, after 12 previews and 239 performances. A cast recording was released subsequent to the show's opening.
1982 London revival
Laurence Olivier had wanted to play Nathan Detroit, and began rehearsals for a planned 1971 London revival of Guys and Dolls for the National Theatre Company then based at the Old Vic. However, due to poor health he had to stop, and his revival never happened.
In 1982, Richard Eyre directed a major revival at London's National Theatre. Eyre called it a "re-thinking" of the musical, and his production featured an award-winning neon-lit set design inspired by Rudi Stern's 1979 book Let There Be Neon, and brassier orchestrations with vintage yet innovative harmonies. The show's choreography by David Toguri included a large-scale tap dance number of the "Guys and Dolls" finale, performed by the principals and entire cast. The revival opened March 9, 1982, and was an overnight sensation, running for nearly four years and breaking all box office records. The original cast featured Bob Hoskins as Nathan Detroit, Julia McKenzie as Adelaide, Ian Charleson as Sky and Julie Covington as Sarah. The production won five Olivier Awards, including for McKenzie and Eyre and for Best Musical. Eyre also won an Evening Standard Theatre Award, and Hoskins won the Critics' Circle Theatre Award.
In October 1982, Hoskins was replaced by Trevor Peacock, Charleson by Paul Jones, and Covington by Belinda Sinclair; in the spring of 1983, McKenzie was replaced by Imelda Staunton and Fiona Hendley replaced Sinclair. This production closed in late 1983 to make way for a Broadway try-out of the ill-fated musical Jean Seberg, which following critical failure closed after four months. Eyre's Guys and Dolls returned to the National from April through September 1984, this time starring Lulu, Norman Rossington, Clarke Peters and Betsy Brantley. After a nationwide tour, this production transferred to the West End at the Prince of Wales Theatre, where it ran from June 1985 to April 1986.
Following Ian Charleson's death from AIDS at the age of 40, in November 1990 two reunion performances of Guys and Dolls, with almost all of the original 1982 cast and musicians, were given at the National Theatre as a tribute to Charleson. The tickets sold out immediately, and the dress rehearsal was also packed. The proceeds from the performances were donated to the new Ian Charleson Day Centre HIV clinic at the Royal Free Hospital, and to scholarships in Charleson's name at LAMDA.
1992 Broadway revival
The 1992 Broadway revival was the most successful American remounting of the show since the original Broadway production which ran for 1,200 performances. Directed by Jerry Zaks, it starred Nathan Lane as Nathan Detroit, Peter Gallagher as Sky, Faith Prince as Adelaide and Josie de Guzman as Sarah. This production played at the Martin Beck Theatre from April 14, 1992, to January 8, 1995, with 1,143 performances.
The production received a rave review from Frank Rich in The New York Times, stating "It's hard to know which genius, and I do mean genius, to celebrate first while cheering the entertainment at the Martin Beck." It received eight Tony Award nominations, and won four, including Best Revival, and the show also won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Revival. This revival featured various revisions to the show's score, including brand new music for the "Runyonland", "A Bushel and a Peck", "Take Back Your Mink" and "Havana". The orchestrations were redesigned by Michael Starobin, and there were new dance arrangements added to "A Bushel and a Peck" and "Take Back Your Mink".
A one-hour documentary film captured the recording sessions of the production's original cast album. Titled Guys and Dolls: Off the Record, the film aired on PBS's Great Performances series in December 1992, and was released on DVD in 2007. Complete takes of most of the show's songs are featured, as well as coaching from director Zaks, and commentary sessions by stars Gallagher, de Guzman, Lane and Prince on the production and their characters.
Lorna Luft auditioned for the role of Adelaide in this production. Faith Prince ultimately played the role, and Luft later played the role in the 1992 National Tour.
1996 London revival
Richard Eyre repeated his 1982 success with another National Theatre revival of the show, this time in a limited run. It starred Henry Goodman as Nathan Detroit, Imelda Staunton returning as Adelaide, Clarke Peters returning as Sky and Joanna Riding as Sarah. Clive Rowe played Nicely-Nicely Johnson, and David Toguri returned as choreographer. The production ran from December 17, 1996, through March 29, 1997 and from July 2, 1997, to November 22, 1997. It received three Olivier Award nominations, winning one: Best Supporting Performance in a Musical went to Clive Rowe. Richard Eyre won the Critics' Circle Theatre Award for Best Director, and the production won Best Musical.
2005 West End revival
The 2005 West End revival opened at London's Piccadilly Theatre in June 2005 and closed in April 2007. This revival, directed by Michael Grandage, starred Ewan McGregor as Sky, Jenna Russell as Sarah, Jane Krakowski as Adelaide, and Douglas Hodge as Nathan Detroit. During the run, Nigel Harman, Adam Cooper, Norman Bowman and Ben Richards took over as Sky; Kelly Price, Amy Nuttall and Lisa Stokke took over as Sarah; Sarah Lancashire, Sally Ann Triplett, Claire Sweeney, Lynsey Britton and Samantha Janus took over as Adelaide; and Nigel Lindsay, Neil Morrissey, Patrick Swayze, Alex Ferns and Don Johnson took over as Nathan Detroit. This production added the song "Adelaide" that Frank Loesser had written for the 1955 film adaptation. According to a September 2007 article in Playbill.com, this West End production had been scheduled to begin previews for a transfer to Broadway in February 2008, but this plan was dropped.
2009 Broadway revival
A Broadway revival of the show opened on March 1, 2009, at the Nederlander Theatre. The cast starred Oliver Platt as Nathan Detroit, Lauren Graham, in her Broadway debut, as Adelaide, Craig Bierko as Sky and Kate Jennings Grant as Sarah. Des McAnuff was the director, and the choreographer was Sergio Trujillo. The show opened to generally negative reviews. The New York Times called it "static" and "uninspired", the New York Post said, "How can something so zippy be so tedious?" and Time Out New York wrote, "Few things are more enervating than watching good material deflate." However, the show received a highly favorable review from The New Yorker, and the producers decided to keep the show open in hopes of positive audience response. The New York Post reported on March 4 that producer Howard Panter "[said] he'll give Guys and Dolls at least seven weeks to find an audience." The revival closed on June 14, 2009, after 28 previews and 113 performances.
2015–2016 West End revival and UK/Ireland tour
A revival opened at the 2015 Chichester Festival. This moved to Manchester and Birmingham before moving onto a West End opening at the Savoy Theatre on December 10, 2015, for previews with a full opening on January 6, 2016, until March 12, 2016. The production starred Sophie Thompson as Adelaide and Jamie Parker as Sky. The production then transferred to the Phoenix Theatre, with Oliver Tompsett as Sky, Samantha Spiro as Adelaide and Richard Kind as Nathan. On June 28, 2016, the role of Miss Adelaide was taken over by Rebel Wilson, and Nathan Detroit was played by Simon Lipkin. The tour continued around UK cities and Dublin.
2017–2018 UK all-black production
Talawa Theatre Company and Manchester's Royal Exchange Theatre produced the UK's first all-black Guys and Dolls in 2017. The production opened on December 2, 2017, and following an extension ran to February 27, 2018, at the Royal Exchange in Manchester. The cast included Ray Fearon as Nathan Detroit, Ashley Zhangazha as Sky Masterson, Abiona Omonua as Sarah Brown, and Lucy Vandi as Miss Adelaide.
In this production, the musical was relocated to Harlem, 1939, with the music referencing jazz, and gospel. Director Michael Buffong said, "Pre-war Harlem was all about the hustle. The creativity of that era was born from a unique collision of talent and circumstance as people escaped the agricultural and oppressive south via the 'underground railroad' into the highly urbanised and industrialised north. Much of our popular culture, from dance to music, has its roots in that period. Our Guys and Dolls brings all of this to the fore."
Reviews particularly praised the music, relocation to Harlem, and sense of spectacle. Lyn Gardner in The Guardian wrote that "the gamblers ... are a bunch of sharp-suited peacocks clad in rainbow hues." Ann Treneman in The Times commented, "Whoever had the idea of moving this classic musical from one part of New York to another bit, just up the road, needs to be congratulated. This version of Frank Loesser's musical, which swirls around the lives of the petty gangsters and their 'dolls' who inhabit New York's underbelly, moves the action to Harlem at its prewar height in 1939. It is a Talawa production with an all-black cast and it is terrific from the get-go." Clare Brennan in The Observer stated, "Relocated to Harlem, this fine new production of Frank Loesser's classic musical retains a threat of violence under a cartoon-bright exterior."
Other
In 1995, a Las Vegas production, performed without intermission, starred Jack Jones, Maureen McGovern and Frank Gorshin.
Charles Randolph-Wright directed a production at Washington's Arena Stage, starring Maurice Hines (Nathan Detroit) and Alexandra Foucard (Adelaide), opening on December 30, 1999. The production received six Helen Hayes Award nominations. With support from Jo Sullivan Loesser, the production began a national tour in August 2001. The cast recording from this production, released in November 2001, was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album.
An Australian remount of the Michael Grandage West End production of Guys and Dolls opened in Melbourne, Australia on April 5, 2008. The show starred Lisa McCune, Marina Prior, Garry McDonald, Ian Stenlake, Shane Jacobson, Wayne Scott Kermond, and Magda Szubanski, and ran at the Princess Theatre. The Melbourne season closed in August 2008 and transferred to Sydney from March 13, 2009, to May 31, 2009, at the Capitol Theatre, retaining the Melbourne cast.
In August 2009, a concert version ran at The Hollywood Bowl, Hollywood, California, starring Scott Bakula (Nathan Detroit), Brian Stokes Mitchell (Sky Masterson), Ellen Greene (Miss Adelaide), and Jessica Biel (Sarah Brown).
In February 2011, a co-production between Clwyd Theatr Cymru, the New Wolsey Theatre and the Salisbury Playhouse opened at Clwyd Theatr. Directed by Peter Rowe and with music direction by Greg Palmer and choreography by Francesca Jaynes, the show was performed by a cast of 22 actor-musicians, with all music played live on stage by the cast. The show also toured Cardiff, Swansea, and other Welsh cities as well as some English cities, receiving a positive review in The Guardian.
A concert performance ran at London's Cadogan Hall from 22 to 25 August 2012, featuring Dennis Waterman, Ruthie Henshall, Anna-Jane Casey, and Lance Ellington (Strictly Come Dancing), with musical director Richard Balcombe and the Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra and Choir.
In April 2014, a one-night-only performance took place at Carnegie Hall, starring Nathan Lane (reprising the role that made him a star), Megan Mullally, Patrick Wilson and Sierra Boggess. It was directed by Jack O'Brien and featured the Orchestra of St. Luke's playing the original orchestrations.
Reception
The original Broadway production of Guys and Dolls opened to unanimously positive reviews, which was a relief to the cast, who had had a 41-performance pre-Broadway tryout in Philadelphia in which each of the 41 performances was different. Critics praised the musical's faithfulness to Damon Runyon's style and characterizations. Richard Watts of the New York Post wrote "Guys and Dolls is just what it should be to celebrate the Runyon spirit...filled with the salty characters and richly original language sacred to the memory of the late Master". William Hawkins of the New York World-Telegram & Sun stated "It recaptures what [Runyon] knew about Broadway, that its wickedness is tinhorn, but its gallantry is as pure and young as Little Eva". Robert Coleman of the New York Daily Mirror wrote "We think Damon would have relished it as much as we did".
The book and score were greatly praised as well; John Chapman, then Chief Theatre Critic, of the New York Daily News wrote "The book is a work of easy and delightful humor. Its music and lyrics, by Frank Loesser, are so right for the show and so completely lacking in banality, that they amount to an artistic triumph". Coleman stated "Frank Loesser has written a score that will get a big play on the juke boxes, over the radio, and in bistros throughout the land. His lyrics are especially notable in that they help Burrows's topical gags to further the plot". In The New York Times, Brooks Atkinson wrote "Mr. Loesser's lyrics and songs have the same affectionate appreciation of the material as the book, which is funny without being self-conscious or mechanical".
Multiple critics asserted that the work was of great significance to musical theatre. John McClain of the New York Journal American proclaimed "it is the best and most exciting thing of its kind since Pal Joey. It is a triumph and a delight." Atkinson stated, "we might as well admit that Guys and Dolls is a work of art. It is spontaneous and has form, style, and spirit." Chapman asserted, "In all departments, Guys and Dolls is a perfect musical comedy".
Film adaptations
On November 3, 1955 the film version of the musical was released, starring Marlon Brando as Sky, Frank Sinatra as Nathan Detroit, and Jean Simmons as Sarah, with Vivian Blaine reprising her role as Adelaide. The film was directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz and produced by Samuel Goldwyn.
Levene lost the film role of Nathan Detroit to Frank Sinatra. "You can't have a Jew playing a Jew, it wouldn't work on screen", producer Samuel Goldwyn argued, when explaining that he wanted Sinatra, rather than Levene, who had originated the role, even though Guys and Dolls film director Joseph L. Mankiewicz wanted Levene, the original Broadway star. Frank Loesser felt Sinatra played the part like a "dapper Italian swinger". Mankiewicz said "if there could be one person in the world more miscast as Nathan Detroit than Frank Sinatra that would be Laurence Olivier and I am one of his greatest fans; the role had been written for Sam Levene who was divine in it". Sinatra did his best to give Nathan Detroit a few stereotyped Jewish gestures and inflections, but Frank Loesser hated "how Sinatra turned the rumpled Nathan Detroit into a smoothie. Sam Levene's husky untrained voice added to the song's charm, not to mention its believability". Frank Loesser died in 1969, still refusing to watch the film version released in 1955.
Around the time of the film's release, American composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim wrote film reviews for Films in Review. Sondheim (then aged 25) reviewed the film version of Guys and Dolls, and observed: "Sinatra ambles through his role as Nathan Detroit as though he were about to laugh at the jokes in the script. He has none of the sob in the voice, and the incipient ulcer in the stomach, that the part requires and Sam Levene supplied so hilariously on the stage. Sinatra sings on pitch, but colorlessly; Levene sang off pitch, but acted while he sang. Sinatra's lackadaisical performance, his careless and left handed attempt at characterization not only harm the picture immeasurably but indicate an alarming lack of professionally."
Three new songs, written by Frank Loesser, were added to the film: "Pet Me Poppa"; "A Woman in Love"; and "Adelaide", which was written specifically for Sinatra. Five songs from the stage musical were omitted from the movie: "A Bushel and a Peck", "My Time of Day", "I've Never Been In Love Before", "More I Cannot Wish You", and "Marry the Man Today", although "A Bushel and a Peck" was later restored to the video release version.
20th Century Fox acquired the film rights to the musical in early 2013, and was said to be planning a remake. In March 2019, TriStar Pictures acquired the remake rights, with Bill Condon hired as director a year later.
Casts of major productions
The following table shows the principal casts of the major productions of Guys and Dolls:
Awards and honors
Recordings
There are numerous recordings of the show's score on compact disc. The most notable include:
Original 1950 Broadway Cast
1955 Film Soundtrack
1963 Reprise Musical Repertory Theatre studio recording (Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, Debbie Reynolds, Dean Martin, Jo Stafford, The McGuire Sisters, Dinah Shore, Sammy Davis, Jr., Allan Sherman)
1976 Broadway Revival Cast
1982 London Revival Cast
1992 Broadway Revival Cast
1995 Complete Studio Recording (features the entire score for the first time on CD; with Frank Loesser's daughter Emily as Sarah Brown; conducted by John Owen Edwards)
Notes
References
Davis, Lee. "The Indestructible Icon". ShowMusic. Winter 2000–01: 17–24, 61–63.
Dietz, Dan. The Complete Book of 1950s Broadway Musicals (2014), Bowman & Littlefield, , p. 38.
Loesser, Susan (1993).: A Most Remarkable Fella: Frank Loesser and the Guys and Dolls in His Life. New York: Donald I. Fine. .
Stempel, Larry (2010). Showtime: A History of the Broadway Musical Theater. New York: W. W. Norton and Company. .
Suskin, Stephen (1990). Opening Night on Broadway: A Critical Quotebook of the Golden Era of the Musical Theatre. New York: Schrimmer Books. .
External links
Guys and Dolls at the Music Theatre International website
Guys and Dolls JR. at the Music Theatre International website
Guys and Dolls at the Guide to Musical Theatre
Guys and Dolls at StageAgent.com
1950 musicals
Broadway musicals
Grammy Hall of Fame Award recipients
Musicals based on short fiction
Musicals by Frank Loesser
Laurence Olivier Award-winning musicals
West End musicals
Plays set in New York City
United States National Recording Registry recordings
Tony Award-winning musicals | false | [
"\"What Else Is There?\" is the third single from the Norwegian duo Röyksopp's second album The Understanding. It features the vocals of Karin Dreijer from the Swedish electronica duo The Knife. The album was released in the UK with the help of Astralwerks.\n\nThe single was used in an O2 television advertisement in the Czech Republic and in Slovakia during 2008. It was also used in the 2006 film Cashback and the 2007 film, Meet Bill. Trentemøller's remix of \"What Else is There?\" was featured in an episode of the HBO show Entourage.\n\nThe song was covered by extreme metal band Enslaved as a bonus track for their album E.\n\nThe song was listed as the 375th best song of the 2000s by Pitchfork Media.\n\nOfficial versions\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Album Version) – 5:17\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Radio Edit) – 3:38\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Jacques Lu Cont Radio Mix) – 3:46\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Vocal Version) – 8:03\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Dub Version) – 7:51\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Mix) – 8:25\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Edit) – 4:50\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Remix) (Radio Edit) – 3:06\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Trentemøller Remix) – 7:42\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Vitalic Remix) – 5:14\n\nResponse\nThe single was officially released on 5 December 2005 in the UK. The single had a limited release on 21 November 2005 to promote the upcoming album. On the UK Singles Chart, it peaked at number 32, while on the UK Dance Chart, it reached number one.\n\nMusic video\nThe music video was directed by Martin de Thurah. It features Norwegian model Marianne Schröder who is shown lip-syncing Dreijer's voice. Schröder is depicted as a floating woman traveling across stormy landscapes and within empty houses. Dreijer makes a cameo appearance as a woman wearing an Elizabethan ruff while dining alone at a festive table.\n\nMovie spots\n\nThe song is also featured in the movie Meet Bill as characters played by Jessica Alba and Aaron Eckhart smoke marijuana while listening to it. It is also part of the end credits music of the film Cashback.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2005 singles\nRöyksopp songs\nAstralwerks singles\nSongs written by Svein Berge\nSongs written by Torbjørn Brundtland\n2004 songs\nSongs written by Roger Greenaway\nSongs written by Olof Dreijer\nSongs written by Karin Dreijer",
"Denmark competed at the 1980 Winter Paralympics in held in Geilo, Norway. Eight competitors (six men and two women) from Denmark did not win any medals and so finished last in the medal table.\n\nAll athletes competed in cross-country skiing.\n\nCross-country \n\nThe following athletes represented Denmark:\n\n Jens Bromann\n Arne Christensen\n Bent Christensen\n Jorn Clausen\n Else Hansen\n Michael Hansen\n Peder Hansen\n Helene Helledi\n\nNo medals were won.\n\nSee also \n\n Denmark at the Paralympics\n Denmark at the 1980 Summer Paralympics\n\nReferences \n\nDenmark at the Paralympics\n1980 in Danish sport\nNations at the 1980 Winter Paralympics"
]
|
[
"Departures (2008 film)",
"Casting"
]
| C_eb65e42fda3a4153b514fd8bed8563ea_0 | How was the film cast? | 1 | How was the film Departures cast? | Departures (2008 film) | Motoki, by then in his early 40s and having built a reputation as a realist, was cast as Daigo. Veteran actor Tsutomu Yamazaki was selected for the role of Sasaki; Takita had worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone (1993). Although the character of Mika was initially planned as being the same age as Daigo, the role went to pop singer Ryoko Hirosue, who had previously acted in Takita's Himitsu (Secret) in 1999. Takita explained that a younger actress would better represent the lead couple's growth out of naivety. In a 2009 interview, Takita stated that he had cast "everyone who was on my wish list". Motoki studied the art of encoffinment first-hand from a mortician, and assisted in an encoffining ceremony; he later stated that the experience imbued him with "a sense of mission ... to try to use as much human warmth as I could to restore [the deceased] to a lifelike presence for presentation to her family". Motoki then drilled himself by practising on his talent manager until he felt he had mastered the procedure, one whose intricate, delicate movements he compared to those of the Japanese tea ceremony. Takita attended funeral ceremonies to understand the feelings of bereaved families, while Yamazaki never participated in the encoffinment training. Motoki also learned how to play a cello for the earlier parts of the film. To provide realistic bodies while preventing the corpses from moving, after a lengthy casting process the crew chose extras who could lie as still as possible. For the bath house owner Tsuyako Yamashita, this was not possible owing to the need to see her alive first, and a search for a body double was unfruitful. Ultimately, the crew used digital effects to transplant a still image of the actor during the character's funeral scene, allowing for a realistic effect. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | is a 2008 Japanese drama film directed by Yōjirō Takita and starring Masahiro Motoki, Ryōko Hirosue, and Tsutomu Yamazaki. The film follows a young man who returns to his hometown after a failed career as a cellist and stumbles across work as a —a traditional Japanese ritual mortician. He is subjected to prejudice from those around him, including from his wife, because of strong social taboos against people who deal with death. Eventually he repairs these interpersonal connections through the beauty and dignity of his work.
The idea for Departures arose after Motoki, affected by having seen a funeral ceremony along the Ganges when travelling in India, read widely on the subject of death and came across Coffinman. He felt that the story would adapt well to film, and Departures was finished a decade later. Because of Japanese prejudices against those who handle the dead, distributors were reluctant to release it—until a surprise grand prize win at the Montreal World Film Festival in August 2008. The following month the film opened in Japan, where it went on to win the Academy Prize for Picture of the Year and become the year's highest-grossing domestic film. This success was topped in 2009, when it became the first Japanese production to win the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
Departures received positive reviews, with aggregator Rotten Tomatoes indicating an 80% approval rating from 108 reviews. Critics praised the film's humour, the beauty of the encoffining ceremony, and the quality of the acting, but some took issue with its predictability and overt sentimentality. Reviewers highlighted a variety of themes, but focused mainly on the humanity that death brings to the surface and how it strengthens family bonds. The success of Departures led to the establishment of tourist attractions at sites connected to the film and increased interest in encoffining ceremonies, as well as adaptation of the story for various media, including manga and a stage play.
Plot
Daigo Kobayashi (Masahiro Motoki) loses his job as a cellist when his orchestra is disbanded. He and his wife Mika (Ryōko Hirosue) move from Tokyo to his hometown in Yamagata, where they live in his childhood home that was left to him when his mother died two years earlier. It is fronted by a coffee shop that Daigo's father had operated before he ran off with a waitress when Daigo was six; since then the two have had no contact. Daigo feels hatred towards his father and guilt for not taking better care of his mother. He still keeps a "stone-letter"—a stone which is said to convey meaning through its texture—which his father had given him many years before.
Daigo finds an advertisement for a job "assisting departures". Assuming it to be a job in a travel agency, he goes to the interview at the NK Agent office and learns from the secretary, Yuriko Kamimura (Kimiko Yo), that he will be preparing bodies for cremation in a ceremony known as encoffinment. Though reluctant, Daigo is hired on the spot and receives a cash advance from his new boss, Sasaki (Tsutomu Yamazaki). Daigo is furtive about his duties and hides the true nature of the job from Mika.
His first assignment is to assist with the encoffinment of a woman who died at home and remained undiscovered for two weeks. He is beset with nausea and later humiliated when strangers on a bus detect an unsavoury scent on him. To clean himself, he visits a public bath which he had frequented as a child. It is owned by Tsuyako Yamashita (Kazuko Yoshiyuki), the mother of one of Daigo's former classmates.
Over time, Daigo becomes comfortable with his profession as he completes a number of assignments and experiences the gratitude of the families of the deceased. Though he faces social ostracism, Daigo refuses to quit, even after Mika discovers a training DVD in which he plays a corpse and leaves him to return to her parents' home in Tokyo. Daigo's former classmate Yamashita (Tetta Sugimoto) insists that the mortician find a more respectable line of work and, until then, avoids him and his family.
After a few months, Mika returns and announces that she is pregnant. She expresses hope that Daigo will find a job of which their child can be proud. During the ensuing argument, Daigo receives a call for an encoffinment for Mrs Yamashita. Daigo prepares her body in front of both the Yamashita family and Mika, who had known the public bath owner. The ritual earns him the respect of all present, and Mika stops insisting that Daigo change jobs.
Sometime later, they learn of the death of Daigo's father. Daigo experiences renewed feelings of anger and tells the others at the NK office that he refuses to deal with his father's body. Feeling ashamed of having abandoned her own son long ago, Yuriko tells this to Daigo in an effort to change his mind. Daigo berates Yuriko and storms out before collecting himself and turning around. He goes with Mika to another village to see the body. Daigo is at first unable to recognize him, but takes offence when local funeral workers are careless with the body. He insists on dressing it himself, and while doing so finds a stone-letter that he had given to his father, held tight in the dead man's hands. The childhood memory of his father's face returns to him, and after he finishes the ceremony, Daigo gently presses the stone-letter to Mika's pregnant belly.
Production
Cultural background
Japanese funerals are highly ritualized affairs which are generally—though not always—conducted in accordance with Buddhist rites. In preparation for the funeral, the body is washed and the orifices are blocked with cotton or gauze. The encoffining ritual (called nōkan), as depicted in Departures, is rarely performed, and even then only in rural areas. This ceremony is not standardized, but generally involves professional ritually preparing the body, dressing the dead in white, and sometimes applying make-up. The body is then put on dry ice in a casket, along with personal possessions and items deemed necessary for the trip to the afterlife.
Despite the importance of death rituals, in traditional Japanese culture the subject is considered unclean as everything related to death is thought to be a source of (defilement). After coming into contact with the dead, individuals must cleanse themselves through purifying rituals. People who work closely with the dead, such as morticians, are thus considered unclean, and during the feudal era those whose work was related to death became burakumin (untouchables), forced to live in their own hamlets and discriminated against by wider society. Despite a cultural shift since the Meiji Restoration of 1868, the stigma of death still has considerable force within Japanese society, and discrimination against the untouchables has continued.
Until 1972, most deaths were dealt with by families, funeral homes, or . , about 80% of deaths occur in hospitals, and preparation of the bodies is frequently done by hospital staff; in such cases, the family often does not see the body until the funeral. A 1998 survey found that 29.5% of the Japanese population believed in an afterlife, and a further 40% wanted to believe; belief was highest . Belief in the existence of a soul (54%) and a connection between the worlds of the living and the dead (64.9%) was likewise common.
Conception and preproduction
In the early 1990s, a 27-year-old Motoki and his friend travelled to India; just before going, at the friend's recommendation he read Shin'ya Fujiwara's Memento Mori (Latin for "remember that you will die"). While in India, he visited Varanasi, where he saw a ceremony in which the dead were cremated and their ashes floated down the Ganges. Witnessing this ceremony of death against a backdrop of bustling crowds going about their lives deeply affected Motoki. When he returned to Japan, he read numerous books on the subject of death, and in 1993 wrote a book on the relationship between life and death: Tenkuu Seiza—Hill Heaven. Among the books he read was Shinmon Aoki's autobiographical , which exposed Motoki to the world of the for the first time. Motoki said he found a sense of mystery and near-eroticism to the profession that he felt had an affinity with the film world.
Getting funding for the project was difficult because of the taboos against death, and the crew had to approach several companies before Departures was approved by Yasuhiro Mase and Toshiaki Nakazawa. According to the film's director, Yōjirō Takita, a consideration in taking on the film was the age of the crew: "we got to a certain point in our lives when death was creeping up to become a factor around us". Kundō Koyama was enlisted to provide the script, his first for a feature film; his previous experience had been in scripting for television and stage. Takita, who had begun his career in the pink film genre before entering mainstream filmmaking in 1986 with Comic Magazine, took on the director's role in 2006, after producer Toshiaki Nakazawa presented him with the first draft of the script. In a later interview he stated "I wanted to make a film from the perspective of a person who deals with something so universal and yet is looked down upon, and even discriminated against". Although he knew of the encoffining ceremony, he had never seen one performed.
Production of Departures took ten years, and the work was ultimately only loosely adapted from Coffinman; later revisions of the script were worked on collaboratively by the cast and crew. Although the religious aspects of funerals were important in the source work, the film did not include them. This, together with the fact that filming was completed in Yamagata and not Aoki's home prefecture of Toyama, led to tensions between the production staff and the author. Aoki expressed concern that the film was unable to address "the ultimate fate of the dead". The first edition of the book was broken into three parts; the third, "Light and Life", was an essay-like Buddhist musing on life and death, regarding the "light" seen when one perceived the integration of life and death, that is absent from the film. Aoki believed the film's humanistic approach did away with the religious aspects that were central to the book—the emphasis on maintaining connections between the living and the dead that he felt only religion could provide—and refused to allow his name and that of his book to be used. For the new title, Koyama coined the term as a euphemism for , derived from the words ("to send off") and ("person").
While the book and film share the same premise, the details differ considerably; Aoki attributed these changes to the studio making the story more commercial. Both feature a protagonist who endures uneasiness and prejudice because of his job as a , undergoes personal growth as a result of his experiences, and finds new meaning in life when confronted with death. In both, the main character deals with societal prejudices and misunderstandings over his profession. In Coffinman, the protagonist was the owner of a pub-café that had gone out of business; during a domestic squabble his wife threw a newspaper at him, in which he found an ad for the position. He finds pride in his work for the first time when dealing with the body of a former girlfriend. Koyama changed the protagonist from a bar owner to cellist as he wanted cello orchestration for the film score. Other differences included moving the setting from Toyoma to Yamagata for filming convenience, making the "letter-stone" a greater part of the plot, and an avoidance of heavier scenes, such as religious ones and one in which Aoki talks of seeing "light" in a swarm of maggots. Koyama also added the subplot in which Daigo is able to forgive his late father; taken from a novel he was writing, it was intended to close the story with "some sense of happiness".
Casting
Motoki, by then in his early 40s and having built a reputation as a realist, was cast as Daigo. Veteran actor Tsutomu Yamazaki was selected for the role of Sasaki; Takita had worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone (1993). Although the character of Mika was initially planned as being the same age as Daigo, the role went to pop singer Ryōko
Hirosue, who had previously acted in Takita's Himitsu (Secret) in 1999. Takita explained that a younger actress would better represent the lead couple's growth out of naivety. In a 2009 interview, Takita stated that he had cast "everyone who was on my wish list".
Motoki studied the art of encoffinment first-hand from a mortician, and assisted in an encoffining ceremony; he later stated that the experience imbued him with "a sense of mission ... to try to use as much human warmth as I could to restore [the deceased] to a lifelike presence for presentation to her family". Motoki then drilled himself by practising on his talent manager until he felt he had mastered the procedure, one whose intricate, delicate movements he compared to those of the Japanese tea ceremony. Takita attended funeral ceremonies to understand the feelings of bereaved families, while Yamazaki never participated in the encoffinment training. Motoki also learned how to play a cello for the earlier parts of the film.
To provide realistic bodies while preventing the corpses from moving, after a lengthy casting process the crew chose extras who could lie as still as possible. For the bath house owner Tsuyako Yamashita, this was not possible owing to the need to see her alive first, and a search for a body double was unfruitful. Ultimately, the crew used digital effects to transplant a still image of the actor during the character's funeral scene, allowing for a realistic effect.
Filming and post-production
The non-profit organization Sakata Location Box was established in December 2007 to handle on-location matters such as finding extras and negotiating locations. After deciding to shoot in Sakata, Location Box staff had two months to prepare for the eighty members of the film crew. Negotiations were slow, as many local property owners lost interest after learning that the filming would involve funeral scenes; those who agreed insisted that shooting take place outside of business hours.
Toyama was both the setting of Coffinman and Takita's home prefecture, but filming was done in Yamagata; this was largely because the national Nōkan Association, headquartered in Hokkaido, had a branch office in Sakata. Some preliminary scenes of snowy landscapes were shot in 2007, and primary filming began in April 2008, lasting 40 days. Locations included Kaminoyama, Sakata, Tsuruoka, Yuza, and Amarume. The NK Agent office was filmed in a three-storey, Western-style building in Sakata built between the mid-Meiji and Taishō periods (1880s–1920s). Originally a restaurant named Kappō Obata, it went out of business in 1998. The Kobayashis' café, called Concerto in the film, was located in Kaminoyama in a former beauty salon. From a hundred candidates, Takita chose it for its atmosphere as an aged building with a clear view of the nearby river and surrounding mountain range. The scene of the shooting of the training DVD took place in the Sakata Minato-za, Yamagata's first movie theatre, which had been closed since 2002.
The soundtrack to Departures was by Joe Hisaishi, a composer who had gained international recognition for his work with Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli. Before shooting began, Takita asked him to prepare a soundtrack which would represent the separation between Daigo and his father, as well as the mortician's love for his wife. Owing to the importance of cellos and cello music in the narrative, Hisaishi emphasized the instrument in his soundtrack; he described the challenge of centring a score around the cello as one of the most difficult things he had ever done. This score was played during shooting, which according to Takita "allowed [the crew] to visualize many of the emotions in the film" and thus contributed to the quality of the finished work.
Style
As they are the movie's "central dramatic piece", the encoffining ceremonies in Departures have received extensive commentary. Mike Scott, for instance, wrote in The Times-Picayune that these scenes were beautiful and heartbreaking, and Nicholas Barber of The Independent described them as "elegant and dignified". James Adams of The Globe and Mail wrote that they were a "dignified ritual of calming, hypnotic grace, with sleights of hand bordering on the magicianly". As the film continues, Paul Byrnes of The Sydney Morning Herald opined, the audience gains an improved knowledge of the ceremony and its importance. Viewers see that the ceremonies are not simply about preparing the body, but also about "bring[ing] dignity to death, respect to the deceased and solace to those who grieve", through which the encoffiners are able to help repair broken family ties and heal damage done to those left behind.
There is an idealization of the as presented in the film. In all but one case, the dead are either young or already made-up, such that "the viewer can easily tolerate these images on the screen". The one corpse that had not been found for several days is never shown on screen. No bodies show the gaunt figure of one who has died after a long illness, or the cuts and bruises of an accident victim. Japanologist Mark R. Mullins writes that the gratitude shown in Departures would probably not have occurred in real life; according to Coffinman, there "is nothing lower on the social scale than the mortician, and the truth of the matter is that [the Japanese people] fear the coffinman and the cremator just as much as death and the corpse".
In a montage, scenes of Daigo playing his childhood cello while sitting outdoors are interspersed with scenes of encoffining ceremonies. Byrnes believes that this scene was meant to increase the emotional charge of the film, and Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times considered it a "beautiful fantasy scene" through which the camera is "granted sudden freedom" from the generally standard shots. Yoshiko Okuyama of the University of Hawaii at Hilo found that Daigo's deft movements while playing the cello mirrored the high level of professionalism which he had reached. Several reviewers, such as Leigh Paatsch of the Herald Sun, questioned the need for the shot. Throughout the film's soundtrack, cello music remains dominant. Takita drew parallels between the instrument and the encoffining ceremony, stating that
Byrnes found that Departures used the symbol of the cherry blossom, a flower which blooms after the winter only to wither soon afterwards, to represent the transience of life; through this understanding, he wrote, Japanese people attempt to define their own existence. Natural symbols are further presented through the changing seasons, which "suggest delicate emotional changes" in the characters, as well as the letter-stones, which represent "love, communication, [and] the baton being passed from generation to generation". The film's settings are used to convey various sensations, including the solitude of the countryside and the intimacy of the public bath house. The colour white, manifested through snow, chrysanthemums, and other objects, is prominent in the film; Okuyama suggests that this, together with the classical music and ritualized hand gestures, represents the sacredness and purity of the death ceremonies.
Departures incorporates aspects of humour, an "unexpected" complement to the theme of death which Ebert suggested may be used to mask the audience's fears. Betsy Sharkey of the Los Angeles Times opines that, through this use of humour, the film avoids becoming too dark and instead acts as a "warmhearted blend" of whimsy and irony. This humour manifests in a variety of manners, such as a scene in which "a mortified Daigo, naked except for a pair of adult diapers, is the reluctant model" for an educational video regarding the encoffining process, as well as a scene in which Daigo discovers that the person he is preparing is a trans woman. Takita stated that the addition of humour was deliberate, as "humans are comical by nature", and that the humour did not conflict with the film's darker themes.
Themes
Several critics discussed the theme of death found in Departures. Scott highlighted the contrast between the taboo of death and the value of jobs related to it. He also noted the role of the encoffiner in showing "one last act of compassion" by presenting the dead in a way which preserved proud memories of their life. Initially, Daigo and his family are unable to overcome the taboos and their squeamishness when faced with death. Daigo is alienated from his wife and friends owing to traditional values. Ultimately it is through his work with the dead that Daigo finds fulfilment, and, as Peter Howell of the Toronto Star concluded, viewers realize that "death may be the termination of a life, but it's not the end of humanity". Okuyama writes that, in the end, the film (and the book on which it was based) serves as a "quiet yet persistent protest" against the discrimination which people who deal with death continue to face in modern Japan: death is a normal part of life, not something repulsive.
Along with this theme of death, Takita believed Departures was about life, about finding a lost sense of feeling human; Daigo gains a greater perspective on life and realises the diversity of people's lives only after encountering them in death. This life includes family bonds: Daigo's coming to terms with his father is a major motif, encoffinment scenes focus on the living family members rather than the dead, and even in the NK Agent office, conversation often revolves around family issues. Mika's pregnancy is the catalyst for her reconciliation with Daigo.
Ebert writes that, as with other Japanese films such as Tokyo Story (Yasujirō Ozu; 1953) and The Funeral (Juzo Itami; 1984), Departures focuses on the effect of death on the survivors; the afterlife is not given much discussion. He considered this indicative of a "deep and unsensational acceptance of death" in Japanese culture, one which is to be met not with extreme sorrow, but with contemplation. Takita stated that he intended to focus on the "dialogue between people who have passed away and the families that survive them". The film touches on the question of the afterlife: the cremator likens death to "a gateway", and Okuyama writes that in this sense the cremator is a gatekeeper and the encoffiners are guides.
Byrnes found that Departures leads one to question the extent of modernity's effect on Japanese culture, noting the undercurrent of "traditional attitudes and values" which permeated the film. Although the encoffining ceremony was traditionally completed by the dead person's family, a decreased interest in it opened a "niche market" for professional encoffiners. Okuyama wrote that, through this film, Takita was filling a "spiritual loss" caused by the departure from tradition in modern Japan. Tadao Sato connected this theme of modernity to that of death, explaining that the film's unusually non-bitter treatment of death demonstrated an evolution in Japanese feelings about life and death. He considered the film's treatment of as an artistic rather than religious ceremony to reflect the agnostic attitudes of modern Japan.
Release
The taboo subject of Departures made prospective distributors wary of taking on the film. Surveys conducted at pre-release screenings placed it at the bottom of the list of films audiences wanted to see. Ultimately, the film's debut at the Montreal World Film Festival in August 2008, which was rewarded with the festival's grand prize, provided the necessary incentive for distributors to select Departures; it finally received its domestic Japanese release on 13 September 2008. Even then, owing to the strong taboo against death, Takita was worried about the film's reception and did not anticipate commercial success, and others expressed concern that the film lacked a clear target audience.
This fear was misplaced; Departures debuted in Japan at fifth place, and during the fifth week of its run hit its peak position at third place. It sold 2.6 million tickets in Japan and generated 3.2 billion yen ($32 million) in box office revenue in the five months after its debut. The film was still showing in 31 theatres when its success at the Academy Awards in February 2009 renewed interest; the number of screens on which it was showing was increased to 188 and the film earned another ¥2.8 billion ($28 million), making a total of ¥6 billion ($60 million). This made Departures the highest-grossing domestic film and 15th top-grossing film overall for 2008. Executive producer Yasuhiro Mase credited this success to the effects of the Great Recession on Japan: viewers who were seeking employment after recently being downsized empathized with Daigo.
From the beginning an international release of the film was intended; as English is considered a key language in international film festivals, English subtitles were prepared. The translation was handled by Ian MacDougall. He believed that the workings of the mortician's world were as far from the experience of most Japanese as from that of a non-Japanese audience. As such he felt a faithful translation was best, without going far to accommodate foreign audiences to unfamiliar cross-cultural elements.
In September 2008, ContentFilm acquired the international rights to Departures, which by that time had been licensed for screening in countries such as Greece, Australia, and Malaysia; the film was ultimately screened in 36 countries. North American distribution was handled by Regent Releasing,
and Departures received a limited release in nine theatres beginning on 29 May 2009. Overall, the film earned almost $1.5 million during its North American run before closing on 24 June 2010. In the United Kingdom, Departures premiered on 4 December 2009 and was distributed by Arrow Film Distributors. The film attained a worldwide gross of nearly $70 million.
Adaptations and other media
Before Departures premiered, a manga adaptation by Akira Sasō was serialized in twelve instalments in the bi-weekly Big Comic Superior, from February to August 2008. Sasō agreed to take on the adaptation as he was impressed by the script. He had the opportunity to view the film before beginning the adaptation, and came to feel that a too-literal adaptation would not be appropriate. He made changes to the settings and physical appearances of the characters, and increased the focus on the role of music in the story. Later in 2008 the serial was compiled in a 280-page volume released by Shogakukan.
On 10 September 2008, three days before the Japanese premiere of Departures, a soundtrack album for the film—containing nineteen tracks from the film and featuring an orchestral performance by members of the Tokyo Metropolitan and NHK Symphony Orchestras—was released by Universal Music Japan. Pop singer Ai provided lyrics to music by Hisaishi for the image song "Okuribito"; performed by Ai with an arrangement for cellos and orchestra, the single was released by Universal Sigma and Island Records on 10 September 2008 along with a promotional video. Sheet music for the film's soundtrack was published by KMP in 2008 (for cello and piano) and Onkyō in 2009 (for cello, violin, and piano).
Shinobu Momose, a writer specializing in novelizations, adapted Departures as a novel. It was published by Shogakukan in 2008. That year the company also released Ishibumi (Letter-Stone), an illustrated book on the themes of the film told from the point of view of a talking stone; this book was written by Koyama and illustrated by Seitarō Kurota. The following year Shogakukan published an edition of Koyama's first draft of the screenplay. A stage version of the film, also titled Departures, was written by Koyama and directed by Takita. It debuted at the Akasaka ACT Theater on 29 May 2010, featuring kabuki actor Nakamura Kankurō as Daigo and Rena Tanaka as Mika. The story, set seven years after the close of the film, concerns the insecurities of the couple's son over Daigo's profession.
Home releases
A dual-layer DVD release, with special features including trailers, making-of documentaries, and a recorded encoffining ceremony, was released in Japan on 18 March 2009. A North American DVD edition of Departures, including an interview with the director, was released by Koch Vision on 12 January 2010; the film was not dubbed, but rather presented with Japanese audio and English subtitles. A Blu-ray edition followed in May. This home release received mixed reviews. Franck Tabouring of DVD Verdict was highly complimentary toward the film and the digital transfer, considering its visuals clean and sharp and the audio (particularly the music) "a pleasure to listen to". Thomas Spurlin, writing for DVD Talk, rated the release as "Highly Recommended", focusing on the "unexpected powerhouse" of the film's quality. Another writer for the website, Jeremy Mathews, advised readers to "Skip It", finding the DVD an apt presentation of the source material—which he considered to "reduce itself to clumsy, mug-filled attempts at broad comedy and awkward, repetitive tear-jerker scenes". Both DVD Talk reviews agreed that the audio and visual quality were less than perfect, and that the DVD's extra contents were poor; Mathews described the interview as the director answering "dull questions in a dull manner".
Reception
Reviews
Departures received generally positive reviews from critics. The review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes sampled 108 reviewers and judged an 80% approval rating, with an average score of 7.06 out of 10. The website's critical consensus states, "If slow and predictable, Departures is a quiet, life affirming story". The aggregator Metacritic gives the film 68 out of 100, based on 27 reviews.
Domestic reviews
Initial reviews in Japan were positive. In Kinema Junpo, Tokitoshi Shioda called Departures a turning point in Takita's career, a human drama capturing both laughter and tears, while in the same publication Masaaki Nomura described the film as a work of supple depth that perhaps indicated a move into Takita's mature period, praising the director for capturing a human feeling from Motoki's earnest encoffining performance. Writing in the Yomiuri Shimbun, Seichi Fukunaga complimented Takita for using a moving, emotive story laden with humour to reverse prejudice against a taboo subject. He commended the performances of Motoki and Yamazaki, particularly their playing the serious Daigo against the befuddled Sasaki.
In the Asahi Shimbun, Sadao Yamane found the film admirably constructed and extolled the actors' performances. Yamane was especially impressed by the delicate hand movements Motoki displayed when he performed the encoffinment ceremony. Tomomi Katsuta in the Mainichi Shimbun found Departures a meaningful story that made the viewer think about the different lives people live, and the significance of someone dying. Writing in the same newspaper, Takashi Suzuki thought the film memorable but predictable, and Yūji Takahashi opined that the film's ability to find nobility in a prejudiced subject was an excellent accomplishment. Shōko Watanabe gave Departures four out of five stars in The Nikkei newspaper, praising the actors' unforced performances.
Following the success of Departures at the Academy Awards, critic Saburō Kawamoto found the film to show a Japan that the Japanese could relate to, in that, in a nation whose customs put great weight on visits to ancestral graves, a death was always a family affair. He believed the film had a samurai beauty to it, with its many scenes of families sitting seiza. Critic gave the film a 90% rating, and credited the performances of the two leads for much of the film's success. He praised its emotional impact and its balance of seriousness and humour, but was more critical of the father–son relationship, which he considered overdone. Maeda attributed the film's international success, despite its heavily Japanese content, to its clear depiction of Japanese views on life and death. He found the film's conceptual scale to have an affinity to that of Hollywood (something he considered lacking in most Japanese films).
Reviewer Takurō Yamaguchi gave the film an 85% rating, and found the treatment of its subject charming. He praised its quiet emotional impact and humour, the interweaving of northern Japan scenery with Hisaishi's cello score, and the film's Japanese spirit. Media critic found a moving beauty in the dextrous hand movements Sasaki teaches Daigo for preparing bodies, and believed that a prior reading of the original script would deepen the viewer's understanding of the action. Mark Schilling of The Japan Times gave the film four stars out of five, praising the acting though criticizing the apparent idealization of the encoffiners. He concluded that the film "makes a good case for the Japanese way of death."
International reviews
Internationally, Departures has received mixed—mostly positive—reviews. Ebert gave the film a perfect four stars, describing it as "rock-solid in its fundamentals" and highlighting its cinematography, music, and the casting of Yamazaki as Sasaki. He found that the result "functions flawlessly" and is "excellent at achieving the universal ends of narrative". Derek Armstrong of AllMovie gave the film four stars out of five, describing it as "a film of lyrical beauty" which is "bursting with tiny pleasures". In a four-star review, Byrnes described the film as a "moving meditation on the transience of life" which showed "great humanity", concluding "it's a beautiful film but take two hankies." Howell gave the film three stars out of four, praising its acting and cinematography. He wrote that Departures "quietly subverts aesthetic and emotional expectations" without ever losing its "high-minded intent". In a three-and-a-half star review, Claudia Puig of USA Today described Departures as a "beautifully composed" film which, although predictable, was "emotional, poignant" and "profoundly affecting".
Philip French of The Observer considered Departures to be a "moving, gently amusing" film, which the director had "fastidiously composed". Sharkey found it an "emotionally wrenching trip with a quiet man", one which was well cast with "actors who move lightly, gracefully" in the various settings. In Entertainment Weekly, Owen Gleiberman gave the film a B−, considering it "tender and, at times, rather squishy", though certain to affect anyone who had lost a parent. Barber found Departures to be "heartfelt, unpretentious, [and] slyly funny", worth watching (though ultimately predictable). Mike Scott gave the film three and a half stars out of four, finding that it was "a surprisingly uplifting examination of life and loss", with humour which perfectly complemented the "moving and meaningful story", but lent itself to characters "mug[ging] for the camera".
Meanwhile, Kevin Maher of The Times described Departures as a "verklempt comedy" with wearisome "push-button crying", though he considered it saved by the quality of the acting, "stately" directing, and "dreamy" soundtrack. Another mixed review was published in The Daily Telegraph, which described the film as a "safe and emotionally generous crowd-pleaser" that was not worthy of its Academy Award. Philip Kennicott wrote in The Washington Post that the film was "as polished as it is heavy-handed", predictable yet ready to break taboos, immersed in death yet incapable of escaping "the maddening Japanese taste for sentimentality". In Variety, Eddie Cockrell wrote that the film offered "fascinating glimpses" of the encoffining ceremony but should have had a much shorter runtime. Paatsch gave Departures three stars out of five, describing it as a "quaintly mournful flick" that "unfolds with a delicacy and precision that slowly captivates the viewer" but considering some scenes, such as the montage, "needlessly showy flourishes". Edward Porter of The Sunday Times wrote that the film's success at the Academy Awards could be blamed on "a case of the Academy favouring bland sentimentality".
The A.V. Club Keith Phipps gave Departures a C−, writing that though it featured "handsome shots of provincial life" and encoffining scenes with a "poetic quality", ultimately the film "drips from one overstated emotion to the next". A. O. Scott wrote in The New York Times that the film was "perfectly mediocre", predictable, and banal in its combination of humour and melodrama. Despite its sometimes touching moments, he considered Departures "interesting mainly as an index of the Academy’s hopelessly timid and conventional tastes". Tony Rayns of Film Comment gave a scathing review in which he denounced the script as "embarrassingly clunky and obvious", the acting as merely "adequate", and the film as but a "paean to the good-looking corpse". Adams gave Departures two out of four stars, praising the emotionally and visually arresting scenes of encoffinments and "loving attention to the textures, tastes and behaviours of semi-rural Japan" but condemning the predictability of the plot; he wrote that "Forty-five minutes in, [viewers have] prepared a mental checklist of every turn that Daigo Kobayashi will face, then negotiate – and be danged if Takita doesn't deliver on every one".
Awards
At the 32nd Japan Academy Prize ceremony held in February 2009, Departures dominated the competition. It received a total of thirteen nominations, winning ten, including Picture of the Year, Screenplay of the Year (Koyama), Director of the Year (Takita), and Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role (Motoki). In the Outstanding Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role category, Hirosue lost to Tae Kimura of All Around Us, while in the Outstanding Achievement in Art Direction category Departures Tomio Ogawa lost to Paco and the Magical Book Towako Kuwashima. Hisaishi, nominated for two Outstanding Achievement in Music awards, won for his scoring of Studio Ghibli's animated film Ponyo. In response to the wins, Motoki said "It feels as if everything miraculously came together in balance this time with Okuribito".
Departures was submitted to the 81st Academy Awards as Japan's submission for the Best Foreign Language Film award. Although eleven previous Japanese films had won Academy Awards in other categories, such as Best Animated Feature or Best Costume Design, the as-yet unattained Best Foreign Language Film award was highly coveted in the Japanese film industry. Departures was not expected to win, owing to strong competition from the Israeli and French submissions (Ari Folman's Waltz with Bashir and Laurent Cantet's The Class, respectively), but was ultimately the victor at the February 2009 ceremony. This was considered a surprise by several film critics, and The New York Times David Itzkoff termed Departures "The Film That Lost Your Oscars Pool for You". Motoki, who was expecting the "wonderful" Israeli submission to win, was also surprised; he described himself as a "hanger-on who just observes the ceremony", and regretted "not walk[ing] with more confidence" upon his arrival.
Departures received recognition at a variety of film festivals, including the Audience Choice Award at the 28th Hawaii International Film Festival, the Audience Choice Award at the 15th Vilnius International Film Festival, the Grand Prix des Amériques at the 32nd Montreal World Film Festival, and Best Narrative Film at the 20th Palm Springs International Film Festival. Motoki was selected as best actor at several ceremonies, including at the Asian Film Awards, the Asia Pacific Screen Awards, and the Blue Ribbon Awards; he was also viewers' choice for best actor at the Golden Rooster Awards. At the 29th Hong Kong Film Awards, Departures was selected as Best Asian Film, beating three Chinese films and Ponyo. Following the 21st Nikkan Sports Film Award ceremony, in which Departures won Best Film and Best Director, Takita expressed surprise at the film's awards, saying "I did not know how well my work would be accepted." By December 2009 the film had won 98 awards.
Impact
After the film's success, Sakata Location Box set up a hospitality service called Mukaebito—a pun on the film's Japanese title indicating "one who greets or picks up" another, rather than "one who sends off". The service maintains shooting locations and provides maps of these locations for tourists. In 2009, Location Box opened the building that served as the NK Agent office to the public. For a fee, visitors could enter and view props from the film. Under a job creation program, between 2009 and 2013 the organization received ¥30 million from Yamagata Prefecture and ¥8 million from Sakata City for the building's maintenance and administration. The site attracted nearly 120,000 visitors in 2009, though numbers quickly fell; in 2013 there were fewer than 9,000 visitors. Safety fears due to the building's age led to the Sakata municipal government ending the organization's lease, and the building was closed again at the end of March 2014. At the time, the City Tourism division was considering options, such as limiting visits to the first two floors. The building used as the Concerto café has been open to the public since 2009 as the Kaminoyama Concerto Museum, and the Sakata Minato-za cinema has also been opened to tourists. Takita's hometown of Takaoka, Toyama, maintains a Film Resources Museum; staff have reported that at times over a hundred Takita fans visit per day.
The film's success generated greater interest in encoffining and the . Even the model of hearse driven in the film was merchandised: the Mitsuoka Limousine Type 2-04, a smaller, less expensive version of the film's vehicle, was put on the market on 24 February 2009. The manufacturer, Mitsuoka Motors, is located in Takita's home prefecture of Toyama. In 2013, Kouki Kimura, from a family of , founded the Okuribito Academy together with nurse and entrepreneur Kei Takamaru. It offers training in encoffining, embalming, and related practices.
Explanatory notes
References
Works cited
External links
(via the Internet Archive)
2008 films
2008 drama films
Japanese films
Japanese drama films
Japanese-language films
Best Film Kinema Junpo Award winners
Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award winners
2008 black comedy films
Films scored by Joe Hisaishi
Films about cellos and cellists
Films about death
Films about funerals
Films set in Tokyo
Films set in Yamagata Prefecture
Films shot in Japan
Films directed by Yōjirō Takita
Picture of the Year Japan Academy Prize winners
Films with screenplays by Kundō Koyama
Shochiku films
Dentsu films
Shogakukan franchises | false | [
"Halston Sage (born May 10, 1993) is an American actress. She is known for her roles as Grace on the Nickelodeon television series How to Rock (2012), Amber on the NBC television series Crisis (2014), Lacey in the film Paper Towns (2015), Lt. Alara Kitan on the Fox television series The Orville (2017–2019), and Ainsley Whitly on the Fox television series Prodigal Son (2019–2021).\n\nEarly life\nSage was born and raised in Los Angeles, California. She has a younger brother and a younger sister. Sage is Jewish. She rode horses competitively, and was the editor of her high school's newspaper.\n\nCareer\n\nTelevision\nSage's career was launched in 2011, when she was cast in the role of Grace on the Nickelodeon series How to Rock, which first aired on February 4, 2012, and ran for a single 25-episode season. She has also guest starred on Nickelodeon's Victorious and Bucket & Skinner's Epic Adventures. In February 2013, Sage was cast in the short-lived NBC television thriller series Crisis, playing Amber, the daughter of Gillian Anderson's character. In 2016 she was cast in a starring role as Alara Kitan on the science-fiction dramedy series The Orville, which premiered on Fox on September 10, 2017. It was reported in January 2019 that Sage had left the cast of The Orville after the episode \"Home\", though her departure was considered open-ended for a possible return in the future.\n\nFilm\nSage appeared as Brianna in the 2012 teen drama The First Time. In 2013, she appeared in the films The Bling Ring, Grown Ups 2 and Poker Night. She had a role in the 2014 film Neighbors, playing Zac Efron character's girlfriend Brooke Shy. Sage was a nominee for the MTV Movie Award \"Best Kiss\" for her onscreen kiss with Rose Byrne in Neighbors.\n\nIn 2015, Sage played Lacey Pemberton in the film Paper Towns. Also that year, she co-starred in Sony Pictures' Goosebumps, and was cast in the role of Kendall in Paramount's Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse which centers on a group of Boy Scouts who rise to the occasion as their small town is faced with a zombie outbreak. In 2017, she played another popular high school girl, Lindsay Edgecomb, in Before I Fall.\n\nIn 2016, Sage filmed her role in the dramatic comedy People You May Know, and was cast in the thriller film You Get Me. In 2018 she was cast in The Last Summer. She has a cameo appearance in the 2019 film Dark Phoenix playing the role of Dazzler. In 2021, Sage executive produced and starred in the independent comedy film The List.\n\nFilmography\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n \n\n1993 births\nActresses from Los Angeles\nAmerican child actresses\nAmerican child singers\nAmerican film actresses\nAmerican television actresses\nJewish American actresses\nLiving people\n21st-century American actresses\n21st-century American singers\n21st-century American women singers\n21st-century American Jews",
"How We Fought the Emden is a 1915 Australian silent film directed by Alfred Rolfe about the Battle of Cocos during World War I. It features footage shot on Cocos Island.\n\nPlot\nJack enlists in the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) and after training on the Tingira, joins the crew of . He takes part in the Battle of Cocos, where the Australian cruiser destroys the German light cruiser .\n\nCast\nCharles Villiers\n\nProduction\nThe film incorporates footage from the documentary How We Fought the Emden.\n\nIt was shot at the Rushcutters Bay studio.\n\nRelease\nThe film was popular at the box office. Actor C. Post Mason took a print with him to Canada in 1916 and screened the film over there. It was also known as How We Fought the Emden andy The Sydney-Emden Fight.\n\nThe Motion Picture News said the film was put on \"principally with the idea of drawing patrons from\" For Australia and was \"merely a succession of interest and topical subjects woven together, and a plot that does not reflect much credit on either the author or producers\".\n\nThe movie was later combined with another Australian war film, For Australia (1915) to create a new movie, For the Honour of Australia (1916).\n\nSee also\nThe Exploits of the Emden, a 1928 film by Ken G. Hall, also about the Battle of Cocos\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \nClip from film at Australian Screen Online\nHow We Beat the Emden at National Film and Sound Archive\nHow We Beat the Emden at AustLit\n\n1915 films\n1910s war films\nAustralian films\nAustralian black-and-white films\nAustralian silent films\nAustralian war films\nFilms directed by Alfred Rolfe\nWorld War I naval films\nWorld War I films based on actual events"
]
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]
| C_eb65e42fda3a4153b514fd8bed8563ea_0 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | 2 | Besides the casting of Departures, are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | Departures (2008 film) | Motoki, by then in his early 40s and having built a reputation as a realist, was cast as Daigo. Veteran actor Tsutomu Yamazaki was selected for the role of Sasaki; Takita had worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone (1993). Although the character of Mika was initially planned as being the same age as Daigo, the role went to pop singer Ryoko Hirosue, who had previously acted in Takita's Himitsu (Secret) in 1999. Takita explained that a younger actress would better represent the lead couple's growth out of naivety. In a 2009 interview, Takita stated that he had cast "everyone who was on my wish list". Motoki studied the art of encoffinment first-hand from a mortician, and assisted in an encoffining ceremony; he later stated that the experience imbued him with "a sense of mission ... to try to use as much human warmth as I could to restore [the deceased] to a lifelike presence for presentation to her family". Motoki then drilled himself by practising on his talent manager until he felt he had mastered the procedure, one whose intricate, delicate movements he compared to those of the Japanese tea ceremony. Takita attended funeral ceremonies to understand the feelings of bereaved families, while Yamazaki never participated in the encoffinment training. Motoki also learned how to play a cello for the earlier parts of the film. To provide realistic bodies while preventing the corpses from moving, after a lengthy casting process the crew chose extras who could lie as still as possible. For the bath house owner Tsuyako Yamashita, this was not possible owing to the need to see her alive first, and a search for a body double was unfruitful. Ultimately, the crew used digital effects to transplant a still image of the actor during the character's funeral scene, allowing for a realistic effect. CANNOTANSWER | worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone | is a 2008 Japanese drama film directed by Yōjirō Takita and starring Masahiro Motoki, Ryōko Hirosue, and Tsutomu Yamazaki. The film follows a young man who returns to his hometown after a failed career as a cellist and stumbles across work as a —a traditional Japanese ritual mortician. He is subjected to prejudice from those around him, including from his wife, because of strong social taboos against people who deal with death. Eventually he repairs these interpersonal connections through the beauty and dignity of his work.
The idea for Departures arose after Motoki, affected by having seen a funeral ceremony along the Ganges when travelling in India, read widely on the subject of death and came across Coffinman. He felt that the story would adapt well to film, and Departures was finished a decade later. Because of Japanese prejudices against those who handle the dead, distributors were reluctant to release it—until a surprise grand prize win at the Montreal World Film Festival in August 2008. The following month the film opened in Japan, where it went on to win the Academy Prize for Picture of the Year and become the year's highest-grossing domestic film. This success was topped in 2009, when it became the first Japanese production to win the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
Departures received positive reviews, with aggregator Rotten Tomatoes indicating an 80% approval rating from 108 reviews. Critics praised the film's humour, the beauty of the encoffining ceremony, and the quality of the acting, but some took issue with its predictability and overt sentimentality. Reviewers highlighted a variety of themes, but focused mainly on the humanity that death brings to the surface and how it strengthens family bonds. The success of Departures led to the establishment of tourist attractions at sites connected to the film and increased interest in encoffining ceremonies, as well as adaptation of the story for various media, including manga and a stage play.
Plot
Daigo Kobayashi (Masahiro Motoki) loses his job as a cellist when his orchestra is disbanded. He and his wife Mika (Ryōko Hirosue) move from Tokyo to his hometown in Yamagata, where they live in his childhood home that was left to him when his mother died two years earlier. It is fronted by a coffee shop that Daigo's father had operated before he ran off with a waitress when Daigo was six; since then the two have had no contact. Daigo feels hatred towards his father and guilt for not taking better care of his mother. He still keeps a "stone-letter"—a stone which is said to convey meaning through its texture—which his father had given him many years before.
Daigo finds an advertisement for a job "assisting departures". Assuming it to be a job in a travel agency, he goes to the interview at the NK Agent office and learns from the secretary, Yuriko Kamimura (Kimiko Yo), that he will be preparing bodies for cremation in a ceremony known as encoffinment. Though reluctant, Daigo is hired on the spot and receives a cash advance from his new boss, Sasaki (Tsutomu Yamazaki). Daigo is furtive about his duties and hides the true nature of the job from Mika.
His first assignment is to assist with the encoffinment of a woman who died at home and remained undiscovered for two weeks. He is beset with nausea and later humiliated when strangers on a bus detect an unsavoury scent on him. To clean himself, he visits a public bath which he had frequented as a child. It is owned by Tsuyako Yamashita (Kazuko Yoshiyuki), the mother of one of Daigo's former classmates.
Over time, Daigo becomes comfortable with his profession as he completes a number of assignments and experiences the gratitude of the families of the deceased. Though he faces social ostracism, Daigo refuses to quit, even after Mika discovers a training DVD in which he plays a corpse and leaves him to return to her parents' home in Tokyo. Daigo's former classmate Yamashita (Tetta Sugimoto) insists that the mortician find a more respectable line of work and, until then, avoids him and his family.
After a few months, Mika returns and announces that she is pregnant. She expresses hope that Daigo will find a job of which their child can be proud. During the ensuing argument, Daigo receives a call for an encoffinment for Mrs Yamashita. Daigo prepares her body in front of both the Yamashita family and Mika, who had known the public bath owner. The ritual earns him the respect of all present, and Mika stops insisting that Daigo change jobs.
Sometime later, they learn of the death of Daigo's father. Daigo experiences renewed feelings of anger and tells the others at the NK office that he refuses to deal with his father's body. Feeling ashamed of having abandoned her own son long ago, Yuriko tells this to Daigo in an effort to change his mind. Daigo berates Yuriko and storms out before collecting himself and turning around. He goes with Mika to another village to see the body. Daigo is at first unable to recognize him, but takes offence when local funeral workers are careless with the body. He insists on dressing it himself, and while doing so finds a stone-letter that he had given to his father, held tight in the dead man's hands. The childhood memory of his father's face returns to him, and after he finishes the ceremony, Daigo gently presses the stone-letter to Mika's pregnant belly.
Production
Cultural background
Japanese funerals are highly ritualized affairs which are generally—though not always—conducted in accordance with Buddhist rites. In preparation for the funeral, the body is washed and the orifices are blocked with cotton or gauze. The encoffining ritual (called nōkan), as depicted in Departures, is rarely performed, and even then only in rural areas. This ceremony is not standardized, but generally involves professional ritually preparing the body, dressing the dead in white, and sometimes applying make-up. The body is then put on dry ice in a casket, along with personal possessions and items deemed necessary for the trip to the afterlife.
Despite the importance of death rituals, in traditional Japanese culture the subject is considered unclean as everything related to death is thought to be a source of (defilement). After coming into contact with the dead, individuals must cleanse themselves through purifying rituals. People who work closely with the dead, such as morticians, are thus considered unclean, and during the feudal era those whose work was related to death became burakumin (untouchables), forced to live in their own hamlets and discriminated against by wider society. Despite a cultural shift since the Meiji Restoration of 1868, the stigma of death still has considerable force within Japanese society, and discrimination against the untouchables has continued.
Until 1972, most deaths were dealt with by families, funeral homes, or . , about 80% of deaths occur in hospitals, and preparation of the bodies is frequently done by hospital staff; in such cases, the family often does not see the body until the funeral. A 1998 survey found that 29.5% of the Japanese population believed in an afterlife, and a further 40% wanted to believe; belief was highest . Belief in the existence of a soul (54%) and a connection between the worlds of the living and the dead (64.9%) was likewise common.
Conception and preproduction
In the early 1990s, a 27-year-old Motoki and his friend travelled to India; just before going, at the friend's recommendation he read Shin'ya Fujiwara's Memento Mori (Latin for "remember that you will die"). While in India, he visited Varanasi, where he saw a ceremony in which the dead were cremated and their ashes floated down the Ganges. Witnessing this ceremony of death against a backdrop of bustling crowds going about their lives deeply affected Motoki. When he returned to Japan, he read numerous books on the subject of death, and in 1993 wrote a book on the relationship between life and death: Tenkuu Seiza—Hill Heaven. Among the books he read was Shinmon Aoki's autobiographical , which exposed Motoki to the world of the for the first time. Motoki said he found a sense of mystery and near-eroticism to the profession that he felt had an affinity with the film world.
Getting funding for the project was difficult because of the taboos against death, and the crew had to approach several companies before Departures was approved by Yasuhiro Mase and Toshiaki Nakazawa. According to the film's director, Yōjirō Takita, a consideration in taking on the film was the age of the crew: "we got to a certain point in our lives when death was creeping up to become a factor around us". Kundō Koyama was enlisted to provide the script, his first for a feature film; his previous experience had been in scripting for television and stage. Takita, who had begun his career in the pink film genre before entering mainstream filmmaking in 1986 with Comic Magazine, took on the director's role in 2006, after producer Toshiaki Nakazawa presented him with the first draft of the script. In a later interview he stated "I wanted to make a film from the perspective of a person who deals with something so universal and yet is looked down upon, and even discriminated against". Although he knew of the encoffining ceremony, he had never seen one performed.
Production of Departures took ten years, and the work was ultimately only loosely adapted from Coffinman; later revisions of the script were worked on collaboratively by the cast and crew. Although the religious aspects of funerals were important in the source work, the film did not include them. This, together with the fact that filming was completed in Yamagata and not Aoki's home prefecture of Toyama, led to tensions between the production staff and the author. Aoki expressed concern that the film was unable to address "the ultimate fate of the dead". The first edition of the book was broken into three parts; the third, "Light and Life", was an essay-like Buddhist musing on life and death, regarding the "light" seen when one perceived the integration of life and death, that is absent from the film. Aoki believed the film's humanistic approach did away with the religious aspects that were central to the book—the emphasis on maintaining connections between the living and the dead that he felt only religion could provide—and refused to allow his name and that of his book to be used. For the new title, Koyama coined the term as a euphemism for , derived from the words ("to send off") and ("person").
While the book and film share the same premise, the details differ considerably; Aoki attributed these changes to the studio making the story more commercial. Both feature a protagonist who endures uneasiness and prejudice because of his job as a , undergoes personal growth as a result of his experiences, and finds new meaning in life when confronted with death. In both, the main character deals with societal prejudices and misunderstandings over his profession. In Coffinman, the protagonist was the owner of a pub-café that had gone out of business; during a domestic squabble his wife threw a newspaper at him, in which he found an ad for the position. He finds pride in his work for the first time when dealing with the body of a former girlfriend. Koyama changed the protagonist from a bar owner to cellist as he wanted cello orchestration for the film score. Other differences included moving the setting from Toyoma to Yamagata for filming convenience, making the "letter-stone" a greater part of the plot, and an avoidance of heavier scenes, such as religious ones and one in which Aoki talks of seeing "light" in a swarm of maggots. Koyama also added the subplot in which Daigo is able to forgive his late father; taken from a novel he was writing, it was intended to close the story with "some sense of happiness".
Casting
Motoki, by then in his early 40s and having built a reputation as a realist, was cast as Daigo. Veteran actor Tsutomu Yamazaki was selected for the role of Sasaki; Takita had worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone (1993). Although the character of Mika was initially planned as being the same age as Daigo, the role went to pop singer Ryōko
Hirosue, who had previously acted in Takita's Himitsu (Secret) in 1999. Takita explained that a younger actress would better represent the lead couple's growth out of naivety. In a 2009 interview, Takita stated that he had cast "everyone who was on my wish list".
Motoki studied the art of encoffinment first-hand from a mortician, and assisted in an encoffining ceremony; he later stated that the experience imbued him with "a sense of mission ... to try to use as much human warmth as I could to restore [the deceased] to a lifelike presence for presentation to her family". Motoki then drilled himself by practising on his talent manager until he felt he had mastered the procedure, one whose intricate, delicate movements he compared to those of the Japanese tea ceremony. Takita attended funeral ceremonies to understand the feelings of bereaved families, while Yamazaki never participated in the encoffinment training. Motoki also learned how to play a cello for the earlier parts of the film.
To provide realistic bodies while preventing the corpses from moving, after a lengthy casting process the crew chose extras who could lie as still as possible. For the bath house owner Tsuyako Yamashita, this was not possible owing to the need to see her alive first, and a search for a body double was unfruitful. Ultimately, the crew used digital effects to transplant a still image of the actor during the character's funeral scene, allowing for a realistic effect.
Filming and post-production
The non-profit organization Sakata Location Box was established in December 2007 to handle on-location matters such as finding extras and negotiating locations. After deciding to shoot in Sakata, Location Box staff had two months to prepare for the eighty members of the film crew. Negotiations were slow, as many local property owners lost interest after learning that the filming would involve funeral scenes; those who agreed insisted that shooting take place outside of business hours.
Toyama was both the setting of Coffinman and Takita's home prefecture, but filming was done in Yamagata; this was largely because the national Nōkan Association, headquartered in Hokkaido, had a branch office in Sakata. Some preliminary scenes of snowy landscapes were shot in 2007, and primary filming began in April 2008, lasting 40 days. Locations included Kaminoyama, Sakata, Tsuruoka, Yuza, and Amarume. The NK Agent office was filmed in a three-storey, Western-style building in Sakata built between the mid-Meiji and Taishō periods (1880s–1920s). Originally a restaurant named Kappō Obata, it went out of business in 1998. The Kobayashis' café, called Concerto in the film, was located in Kaminoyama in a former beauty salon. From a hundred candidates, Takita chose it for its atmosphere as an aged building with a clear view of the nearby river and surrounding mountain range. The scene of the shooting of the training DVD took place in the Sakata Minato-za, Yamagata's first movie theatre, which had been closed since 2002.
The soundtrack to Departures was by Joe Hisaishi, a composer who had gained international recognition for his work with Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli. Before shooting began, Takita asked him to prepare a soundtrack which would represent the separation between Daigo and his father, as well as the mortician's love for his wife. Owing to the importance of cellos and cello music in the narrative, Hisaishi emphasized the instrument in his soundtrack; he described the challenge of centring a score around the cello as one of the most difficult things he had ever done. This score was played during shooting, which according to Takita "allowed [the crew] to visualize many of the emotions in the film" and thus contributed to the quality of the finished work.
Style
As they are the movie's "central dramatic piece", the encoffining ceremonies in Departures have received extensive commentary. Mike Scott, for instance, wrote in The Times-Picayune that these scenes were beautiful and heartbreaking, and Nicholas Barber of The Independent described them as "elegant and dignified". James Adams of The Globe and Mail wrote that they were a "dignified ritual of calming, hypnotic grace, with sleights of hand bordering on the magicianly". As the film continues, Paul Byrnes of The Sydney Morning Herald opined, the audience gains an improved knowledge of the ceremony and its importance. Viewers see that the ceremonies are not simply about preparing the body, but also about "bring[ing] dignity to death, respect to the deceased and solace to those who grieve", through which the encoffiners are able to help repair broken family ties and heal damage done to those left behind.
There is an idealization of the as presented in the film. In all but one case, the dead are either young or already made-up, such that "the viewer can easily tolerate these images on the screen". The one corpse that had not been found for several days is never shown on screen. No bodies show the gaunt figure of one who has died after a long illness, or the cuts and bruises of an accident victim. Japanologist Mark R. Mullins writes that the gratitude shown in Departures would probably not have occurred in real life; according to Coffinman, there "is nothing lower on the social scale than the mortician, and the truth of the matter is that [the Japanese people] fear the coffinman and the cremator just as much as death and the corpse".
In a montage, scenes of Daigo playing his childhood cello while sitting outdoors are interspersed with scenes of encoffining ceremonies. Byrnes believes that this scene was meant to increase the emotional charge of the film, and Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times considered it a "beautiful fantasy scene" through which the camera is "granted sudden freedom" from the generally standard shots. Yoshiko Okuyama of the University of Hawaii at Hilo found that Daigo's deft movements while playing the cello mirrored the high level of professionalism which he had reached. Several reviewers, such as Leigh Paatsch of the Herald Sun, questioned the need for the shot. Throughout the film's soundtrack, cello music remains dominant. Takita drew parallels between the instrument and the encoffining ceremony, stating that
Byrnes found that Departures used the symbol of the cherry blossom, a flower which blooms after the winter only to wither soon afterwards, to represent the transience of life; through this understanding, he wrote, Japanese people attempt to define their own existence. Natural symbols are further presented through the changing seasons, which "suggest delicate emotional changes" in the characters, as well as the letter-stones, which represent "love, communication, [and] the baton being passed from generation to generation". The film's settings are used to convey various sensations, including the solitude of the countryside and the intimacy of the public bath house. The colour white, manifested through snow, chrysanthemums, and other objects, is prominent in the film; Okuyama suggests that this, together with the classical music and ritualized hand gestures, represents the sacredness and purity of the death ceremonies.
Departures incorporates aspects of humour, an "unexpected" complement to the theme of death which Ebert suggested may be used to mask the audience's fears. Betsy Sharkey of the Los Angeles Times opines that, through this use of humour, the film avoids becoming too dark and instead acts as a "warmhearted blend" of whimsy and irony. This humour manifests in a variety of manners, such as a scene in which "a mortified Daigo, naked except for a pair of adult diapers, is the reluctant model" for an educational video regarding the encoffining process, as well as a scene in which Daigo discovers that the person he is preparing is a trans woman. Takita stated that the addition of humour was deliberate, as "humans are comical by nature", and that the humour did not conflict with the film's darker themes.
Themes
Several critics discussed the theme of death found in Departures. Scott highlighted the contrast between the taboo of death and the value of jobs related to it. He also noted the role of the encoffiner in showing "one last act of compassion" by presenting the dead in a way which preserved proud memories of their life. Initially, Daigo and his family are unable to overcome the taboos and their squeamishness when faced with death. Daigo is alienated from his wife and friends owing to traditional values. Ultimately it is through his work with the dead that Daigo finds fulfilment, and, as Peter Howell of the Toronto Star concluded, viewers realize that "death may be the termination of a life, but it's not the end of humanity". Okuyama writes that, in the end, the film (and the book on which it was based) serves as a "quiet yet persistent protest" against the discrimination which people who deal with death continue to face in modern Japan: death is a normal part of life, not something repulsive.
Along with this theme of death, Takita believed Departures was about life, about finding a lost sense of feeling human; Daigo gains a greater perspective on life and realises the diversity of people's lives only after encountering them in death. This life includes family bonds: Daigo's coming to terms with his father is a major motif, encoffinment scenes focus on the living family members rather than the dead, and even in the NK Agent office, conversation often revolves around family issues. Mika's pregnancy is the catalyst for her reconciliation with Daigo.
Ebert writes that, as with other Japanese films such as Tokyo Story (Yasujirō Ozu; 1953) and The Funeral (Juzo Itami; 1984), Departures focuses on the effect of death on the survivors; the afterlife is not given much discussion. He considered this indicative of a "deep and unsensational acceptance of death" in Japanese culture, one which is to be met not with extreme sorrow, but with contemplation. Takita stated that he intended to focus on the "dialogue between people who have passed away and the families that survive them". The film touches on the question of the afterlife: the cremator likens death to "a gateway", and Okuyama writes that in this sense the cremator is a gatekeeper and the encoffiners are guides.
Byrnes found that Departures leads one to question the extent of modernity's effect on Japanese culture, noting the undercurrent of "traditional attitudes and values" which permeated the film. Although the encoffining ceremony was traditionally completed by the dead person's family, a decreased interest in it opened a "niche market" for professional encoffiners. Okuyama wrote that, through this film, Takita was filling a "spiritual loss" caused by the departure from tradition in modern Japan. Tadao Sato connected this theme of modernity to that of death, explaining that the film's unusually non-bitter treatment of death demonstrated an evolution in Japanese feelings about life and death. He considered the film's treatment of as an artistic rather than religious ceremony to reflect the agnostic attitudes of modern Japan.
Release
The taboo subject of Departures made prospective distributors wary of taking on the film. Surveys conducted at pre-release screenings placed it at the bottom of the list of films audiences wanted to see. Ultimately, the film's debut at the Montreal World Film Festival in August 2008, which was rewarded with the festival's grand prize, provided the necessary incentive for distributors to select Departures; it finally received its domestic Japanese release on 13 September 2008. Even then, owing to the strong taboo against death, Takita was worried about the film's reception and did not anticipate commercial success, and others expressed concern that the film lacked a clear target audience.
This fear was misplaced; Departures debuted in Japan at fifth place, and during the fifth week of its run hit its peak position at third place. It sold 2.6 million tickets in Japan and generated 3.2 billion yen ($32 million) in box office revenue in the five months after its debut. The film was still showing in 31 theatres when its success at the Academy Awards in February 2009 renewed interest; the number of screens on which it was showing was increased to 188 and the film earned another ¥2.8 billion ($28 million), making a total of ¥6 billion ($60 million). This made Departures the highest-grossing domestic film and 15th top-grossing film overall for 2008. Executive producer Yasuhiro Mase credited this success to the effects of the Great Recession on Japan: viewers who were seeking employment after recently being downsized empathized with Daigo.
From the beginning an international release of the film was intended; as English is considered a key language in international film festivals, English subtitles were prepared. The translation was handled by Ian MacDougall. He believed that the workings of the mortician's world were as far from the experience of most Japanese as from that of a non-Japanese audience. As such he felt a faithful translation was best, without going far to accommodate foreign audiences to unfamiliar cross-cultural elements.
In September 2008, ContentFilm acquired the international rights to Departures, which by that time had been licensed for screening in countries such as Greece, Australia, and Malaysia; the film was ultimately screened in 36 countries. North American distribution was handled by Regent Releasing,
and Departures received a limited release in nine theatres beginning on 29 May 2009. Overall, the film earned almost $1.5 million during its North American run before closing on 24 June 2010. In the United Kingdom, Departures premiered on 4 December 2009 and was distributed by Arrow Film Distributors. The film attained a worldwide gross of nearly $70 million.
Adaptations and other media
Before Departures premiered, a manga adaptation by Akira Sasō was serialized in twelve instalments in the bi-weekly Big Comic Superior, from February to August 2008. Sasō agreed to take on the adaptation as he was impressed by the script. He had the opportunity to view the film before beginning the adaptation, and came to feel that a too-literal adaptation would not be appropriate. He made changes to the settings and physical appearances of the characters, and increased the focus on the role of music in the story. Later in 2008 the serial was compiled in a 280-page volume released by Shogakukan.
On 10 September 2008, three days before the Japanese premiere of Departures, a soundtrack album for the film—containing nineteen tracks from the film and featuring an orchestral performance by members of the Tokyo Metropolitan and NHK Symphony Orchestras—was released by Universal Music Japan. Pop singer Ai provided lyrics to music by Hisaishi for the image song "Okuribito"; performed by Ai with an arrangement for cellos and orchestra, the single was released by Universal Sigma and Island Records on 10 September 2008 along with a promotional video. Sheet music for the film's soundtrack was published by KMP in 2008 (for cello and piano) and Onkyō in 2009 (for cello, violin, and piano).
Shinobu Momose, a writer specializing in novelizations, adapted Departures as a novel. It was published by Shogakukan in 2008. That year the company also released Ishibumi (Letter-Stone), an illustrated book on the themes of the film told from the point of view of a talking stone; this book was written by Koyama and illustrated by Seitarō Kurota. The following year Shogakukan published an edition of Koyama's first draft of the screenplay. A stage version of the film, also titled Departures, was written by Koyama and directed by Takita. It debuted at the Akasaka ACT Theater on 29 May 2010, featuring kabuki actor Nakamura Kankurō as Daigo and Rena Tanaka as Mika. The story, set seven years after the close of the film, concerns the insecurities of the couple's son over Daigo's profession.
Home releases
A dual-layer DVD release, with special features including trailers, making-of documentaries, and a recorded encoffining ceremony, was released in Japan on 18 March 2009. A North American DVD edition of Departures, including an interview with the director, was released by Koch Vision on 12 January 2010; the film was not dubbed, but rather presented with Japanese audio and English subtitles. A Blu-ray edition followed in May. This home release received mixed reviews. Franck Tabouring of DVD Verdict was highly complimentary toward the film and the digital transfer, considering its visuals clean and sharp and the audio (particularly the music) "a pleasure to listen to". Thomas Spurlin, writing for DVD Talk, rated the release as "Highly Recommended", focusing on the "unexpected powerhouse" of the film's quality. Another writer for the website, Jeremy Mathews, advised readers to "Skip It", finding the DVD an apt presentation of the source material—which he considered to "reduce itself to clumsy, mug-filled attempts at broad comedy and awkward, repetitive tear-jerker scenes". Both DVD Talk reviews agreed that the audio and visual quality were less than perfect, and that the DVD's extra contents were poor; Mathews described the interview as the director answering "dull questions in a dull manner".
Reception
Reviews
Departures received generally positive reviews from critics. The review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes sampled 108 reviewers and judged an 80% approval rating, with an average score of 7.06 out of 10. The website's critical consensus states, "If slow and predictable, Departures is a quiet, life affirming story". The aggregator Metacritic gives the film 68 out of 100, based on 27 reviews.
Domestic reviews
Initial reviews in Japan were positive. In Kinema Junpo, Tokitoshi Shioda called Departures a turning point in Takita's career, a human drama capturing both laughter and tears, while in the same publication Masaaki Nomura described the film as a work of supple depth that perhaps indicated a move into Takita's mature period, praising the director for capturing a human feeling from Motoki's earnest encoffining performance. Writing in the Yomiuri Shimbun, Seichi Fukunaga complimented Takita for using a moving, emotive story laden with humour to reverse prejudice against a taboo subject. He commended the performances of Motoki and Yamazaki, particularly their playing the serious Daigo against the befuddled Sasaki.
In the Asahi Shimbun, Sadao Yamane found the film admirably constructed and extolled the actors' performances. Yamane was especially impressed by the delicate hand movements Motoki displayed when he performed the encoffinment ceremony. Tomomi Katsuta in the Mainichi Shimbun found Departures a meaningful story that made the viewer think about the different lives people live, and the significance of someone dying. Writing in the same newspaper, Takashi Suzuki thought the film memorable but predictable, and Yūji Takahashi opined that the film's ability to find nobility in a prejudiced subject was an excellent accomplishment. Shōko Watanabe gave Departures four out of five stars in The Nikkei newspaper, praising the actors' unforced performances.
Following the success of Departures at the Academy Awards, critic Saburō Kawamoto found the film to show a Japan that the Japanese could relate to, in that, in a nation whose customs put great weight on visits to ancestral graves, a death was always a family affair. He believed the film had a samurai beauty to it, with its many scenes of families sitting seiza. Critic gave the film a 90% rating, and credited the performances of the two leads for much of the film's success. He praised its emotional impact and its balance of seriousness and humour, but was more critical of the father–son relationship, which he considered overdone. Maeda attributed the film's international success, despite its heavily Japanese content, to its clear depiction of Japanese views on life and death. He found the film's conceptual scale to have an affinity to that of Hollywood (something he considered lacking in most Japanese films).
Reviewer Takurō Yamaguchi gave the film an 85% rating, and found the treatment of its subject charming. He praised its quiet emotional impact and humour, the interweaving of northern Japan scenery with Hisaishi's cello score, and the film's Japanese spirit. Media critic found a moving beauty in the dextrous hand movements Sasaki teaches Daigo for preparing bodies, and believed that a prior reading of the original script would deepen the viewer's understanding of the action. Mark Schilling of The Japan Times gave the film four stars out of five, praising the acting though criticizing the apparent idealization of the encoffiners. He concluded that the film "makes a good case for the Japanese way of death."
International reviews
Internationally, Departures has received mixed—mostly positive—reviews. Ebert gave the film a perfect four stars, describing it as "rock-solid in its fundamentals" and highlighting its cinematography, music, and the casting of Yamazaki as Sasaki. He found that the result "functions flawlessly" and is "excellent at achieving the universal ends of narrative". Derek Armstrong of AllMovie gave the film four stars out of five, describing it as "a film of lyrical beauty" which is "bursting with tiny pleasures". In a four-star review, Byrnes described the film as a "moving meditation on the transience of life" which showed "great humanity", concluding "it's a beautiful film but take two hankies." Howell gave the film three stars out of four, praising its acting and cinematography. He wrote that Departures "quietly subverts aesthetic and emotional expectations" without ever losing its "high-minded intent". In a three-and-a-half star review, Claudia Puig of USA Today described Departures as a "beautifully composed" film which, although predictable, was "emotional, poignant" and "profoundly affecting".
Philip French of The Observer considered Departures to be a "moving, gently amusing" film, which the director had "fastidiously composed". Sharkey found it an "emotionally wrenching trip with a quiet man", one which was well cast with "actors who move lightly, gracefully" in the various settings. In Entertainment Weekly, Owen Gleiberman gave the film a B−, considering it "tender and, at times, rather squishy", though certain to affect anyone who had lost a parent. Barber found Departures to be "heartfelt, unpretentious, [and] slyly funny", worth watching (though ultimately predictable). Mike Scott gave the film three and a half stars out of four, finding that it was "a surprisingly uplifting examination of life and loss", with humour which perfectly complemented the "moving and meaningful story", but lent itself to characters "mug[ging] for the camera".
Meanwhile, Kevin Maher of The Times described Departures as a "verklempt comedy" with wearisome "push-button crying", though he considered it saved by the quality of the acting, "stately" directing, and "dreamy" soundtrack. Another mixed review was published in The Daily Telegraph, which described the film as a "safe and emotionally generous crowd-pleaser" that was not worthy of its Academy Award. Philip Kennicott wrote in The Washington Post that the film was "as polished as it is heavy-handed", predictable yet ready to break taboos, immersed in death yet incapable of escaping "the maddening Japanese taste for sentimentality". In Variety, Eddie Cockrell wrote that the film offered "fascinating glimpses" of the encoffining ceremony but should have had a much shorter runtime. Paatsch gave Departures three stars out of five, describing it as a "quaintly mournful flick" that "unfolds with a delicacy and precision that slowly captivates the viewer" but considering some scenes, such as the montage, "needlessly showy flourishes". Edward Porter of The Sunday Times wrote that the film's success at the Academy Awards could be blamed on "a case of the Academy favouring bland sentimentality".
The A.V. Club Keith Phipps gave Departures a C−, writing that though it featured "handsome shots of provincial life" and encoffining scenes with a "poetic quality", ultimately the film "drips from one overstated emotion to the next". A. O. Scott wrote in The New York Times that the film was "perfectly mediocre", predictable, and banal in its combination of humour and melodrama. Despite its sometimes touching moments, he considered Departures "interesting mainly as an index of the Academy’s hopelessly timid and conventional tastes". Tony Rayns of Film Comment gave a scathing review in which he denounced the script as "embarrassingly clunky and obvious", the acting as merely "adequate", and the film as but a "paean to the good-looking corpse". Adams gave Departures two out of four stars, praising the emotionally and visually arresting scenes of encoffinments and "loving attention to the textures, tastes and behaviours of semi-rural Japan" but condemning the predictability of the plot; he wrote that "Forty-five minutes in, [viewers have] prepared a mental checklist of every turn that Daigo Kobayashi will face, then negotiate – and be danged if Takita doesn't deliver on every one".
Awards
At the 32nd Japan Academy Prize ceremony held in February 2009, Departures dominated the competition. It received a total of thirteen nominations, winning ten, including Picture of the Year, Screenplay of the Year (Koyama), Director of the Year (Takita), and Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role (Motoki). In the Outstanding Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role category, Hirosue lost to Tae Kimura of All Around Us, while in the Outstanding Achievement in Art Direction category Departures Tomio Ogawa lost to Paco and the Magical Book Towako Kuwashima. Hisaishi, nominated for two Outstanding Achievement in Music awards, won for his scoring of Studio Ghibli's animated film Ponyo. In response to the wins, Motoki said "It feels as if everything miraculously came together in balance this time with Okuribito".
Departures was submitted to the 81st Academy Awards as Japan's submission for the Best Foreign Language Film award. Although eleven previous Japanese films had won Academy Awards in other categories, such as Best Animated Feature or Best Costume Design, the as-yet unattained Best Foreign Language Film award was highly coveted in the Japanese film industry. Departures was not expected to win, owing to strong competition from the Israeli and French submissions (Ari Folman's Waltz with Bashir and Laurent Cantet's The Class, respectively), but was ultimately the victor at the February 2009 ceremony. This was considered a surprise by several film critics, and The New York Times David Itzkoff termed Departures "The Film That Lost Your Oscars Pool for You". Motoki, who was expecting the "wonderful" Israeli submission to win, was also surprised; he described himself as a "hanger-on who just observes the ceremony", and regretted "not walk[ing] with more confidence" upon his arrival.
Departures received recognition at a variety of film festivals, including the Audience Choice Award at the 28th Hawaii International Film Festival, the Audience Choice Award at the 15th Vilnius International Film Festival, the Grand Prix des Amériques at the 32nd Montreal World Film Festival, and Best Narrative Film at the 20th Palm Springs International Film Festival. Motoki was selected as best actor at several ceremonies, including at the Asian Film Awards, the Asia Pacific Screen Awards, and the Blue Ribbon Awards; he was also viewers' choice for best actor at the Golden Rooster Awards. At the 29th Hong Kong Film Awards, Departures was selected as Best Asian Film, beating three Chinese films and Ponyo. Following the 21st Nikkan Sports Film Award ceremony, in which Departures won Best Film and Best Director, Takita expressed surprise at the film's awards, saying "I did not know how well my work would be accepted." By December 2009 the film had won 98 awards.
Impact
After the film's success, Sakata Location Box set up a hospitality service called Mukaebito—a pun on the film's Japanese title indicating "one who greets or picks up" another, rather than "one who sends off". The service maintains shooting locations and provides maps of these locations for tourists. In 2009, Location Box opened the building that served as the NK Agent office to the public. For a fee, visitors could enter and view props from the film. Under a job creation program, between 2009 and 2013 the organization received ¥30 million from Yamagata Prefecture and ¥8 million from Sakata City for the building's maintenance and administration. The site attracted nearly 120,000 visitors in 2009, though numbers quickly fell; in 2013 there were fewer than 9,000 visitors. Safety fears due to the building's age led to the Sakata municipal government ending the organization's lease, and the building was closed again at the end of March 2014. At the time, the City Tourism division was considering options, such as limiting visits to the first two floors. The building used as the Concerto café has been open to the public since 2009 as the Kaminoyama Concerto Museum, and the Sakata Minato-za cinema has also been opened to tourists. Takita's hometown of Takaoka, Toyama, maintains a Film Resources Museum; staff have reported that at times over a hundred Takita fans visit per day.
The film's success generated greater interest in encoffining and the . Even the model of hearse driven in the film was merchandised: the Mitsuoka Limousine Type 2-04, a smaller, less expensive version of the film's vehicle, was put on the market on 24 February 2009. The manufacturer, Mitsuoka Motors, is located in Takita's home prefecture of Toyama. In 2013, Kouki Kimura, from a family of , founded the Okuribito Academy together with nurse and entrepreneur Kei Takamaru. It offers training in encoffining, embalming, and related practices.
Explanatory notes
References
Works cited
External links
(via the Internet Archive)
2008 films
2008 drama films
Japanese films
Japanese drama films
Japanese-language films
Best Film Kinema Junpo Award winners
Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award winners
2008 black comedy films
Films scored by Joe Hisaishi
Films about cellos and cellists
Films about death
Films about funerals
Films set in Tokyo
Films set in Yamagata Prefecture
Films shot in Japan
Films directed by Yōjirō Takita
Picture of the Year Japan Academy Prize winners
Films with screenplays by Kundō Koyama
Shochiku films
Dentsu films
Shogakukan franchises | true | [
"Přírodní park Třebíčsko (before Oblast klidu Třebíčsko) is a natural park near Třebíč in the Czech Republic. There are many interesting plants. The park was founded in 1983.\n\nKobylinec and Ptáčovský kopeček\n\nKobylinec is a natural monument situated ca 0,5 km from the village of Trnava.\nThe area of this monument is 0,44 ha. Pulsatilla grandis can be found here and in the Ptáčovský kopeček park near Ptáčov near Třebíč. Both monuments are very popular for tourists.\n\nPonds\n\nIn the natural park there are some interesting ponds such as Velký Bor, Malý Bor, Buršík near Přeckov and a brook Březinka. Dams on the brook are examples of European beaver activity.\n\nSyenitové skály near Pocoucov\n\nSyenitové skály (rocks of syenit) near Pocoucov is one of famed locations. There are interesting granite boulders. The area of the reservation is 0,77 ha.\n\nExternal links\nParts of this article or all article was translated from Czech. The original article is :cs:Přírodní park Třebíčsko.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nNature near the village Trnava which is there\n\nTřebíč\nParks in the Czech Republic\nTourist attractions in the Vysočina Region",
"Damn Interesting is an independent website founded by Alan Bellows in 2005. The website presents true stories from science, history, and psychology, primarily as long-form articles, often illustrated with original artwork. Works are written by various authors, and published at irregular intervals. The website openly rejects advertising, relying on reader and listener donations to cover operating costs.\n\nAs of October 2012, each article is also published as a podcast under the same name. In November 2019, a second podcast was launched under the title Damn Interesting Week, featuring unscripted commentary on an assortment of news articles featured on the website's \"Curated Links\" section that week. In mid-2020, a third podcast called Damn Interesting Curio Cabinet began highlighting the website's periodic short-form articles in the same radioplay format as the original podcast.\n\nIn July 2009, Damn Interesting published the print book Alien Hand Syndrome through Workman Publishing. It contains some favorites from the site and some exclusive content.\n\nAwards and recognition \nIn August 2007, PC Magazine named Damn Interesting one of the \"Top 100 Undiscovered Web Sites\".\nThe article \"The Zero-Armed Bandit\" by Alan Bellows won a 2015 Sidney Award from David Brooks in The New York Times.\nThe article \"Ghoulish Acts and Dastardly Deeds\" by Alan Bellows was cited as \"nonfiction journalism from 2017 that will stand the test of time\" by Conor Friedersdorf in The Atlantic.\nThe article \"Dupes and Duplicity\" by Jennifer Lee Noonan won a 2020 Sidney Award from David Brooks in the New York Times.\n\nAccusing The Dollop of plagiarism \n\nOn July 9, 2015, Bellows posted an open letter accusing The Dollop, a comedy podcast about history, of plagiarism due to their repeated use of verbatim text from Damn Interesting articles without permission or attribution. Dave Anthony, the writer of The Dollop, responded on reddit, admitting to using Damn Interesting content, but claiming that the use was protected by fair use, and that \"historical facts are not copyrightable.\" In an article about the controversy on Plagiarism Today, Jonathan Bailey concluded, \"Any way one looks at it, The Dollop failed its ethical obligations to all of the people, not just those writing for Damn Interesting, who put in the time, energy and expertise into writing the original content upon which their show is based.\"\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Official website\n\n2005 podcast debuts"
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"worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone"
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| C_eb65e42fda3a4153b514fd8bed8563ea_0 | Who worked with yamazaki? | 3 | Who worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone? | Departures (2008 film) | Motoki, by then in his early 40s and having built a reputation as a realist, was cast as Daigo. Veteran actor Tsutomu Yamazaki was selected for the role of Sasaki; Takita had worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone (1993). Although the character of Mika was initially planned as being the same age as Daigo, the role went to pop singer Ryoko Hirosue, who had previously acted in Takita's Himitsu (Secret) in 1999. Takita explained that a younger actress would better represent the lead couple's growth out of naivety. In a 2009 interview, Takita stated that he had cast "everyone who was on my wish list". Motoki studied the art of encoffinment first-hand from a mortician, and assisted in an encoffining ceremony; he later stated that the experience imbued him with "a sense of mission ... to try to use as much human warmth as I could to restore [the deceased] to a lifelike presence for presentation to her family". Motoki then drilled himself by practising on his talent manager until he felt he had mastered the procedure, one whose intricate, delicate movements he compared to those of the Japanese tea ceremony. Takita attended funeral ceremonies to understand the feelings of bereaved families, while Yamazaki never participated in the encoffinment training. Motoki also learned how to play a cello for the earlier parts of the film. To provide realistic bodies while preventing the corpses from moving, after a lengthy casting process the crew chose extras who could lie as still as possible. For the bath house owner Tsuyako Yamashita, this was not possible owing to the need to see her alive first, and a search for a body double was unfruitful. Ultimately, the crew used digital effects to transplant a still image of the actor during the character's funeral scene, allowing for a realistic effect. CANNOTANSWER | Takita | is a 2008 Japanese drama film directed by Yōjirō Takita and starring Masahiro Motoki, Ryōko Hirosue, and Tsutomu Yamazaki. The film follows a young man who returns to his hometown after a failed career as a cellist and stumbles across work as a —a traditional Japanese ritual mortician. He is subjected to prejudice from those around him, including from his wife, because of strong social taboos against people who deal with death. Eventually he repairs these interpersonal connections through the beauty and dignity of his work.
The idea for Departures arose after Motoki, affected by having seen a funeral ceremony along the Ganges when travelling in India, read widely on the subject of death and came across Coffinman. He felt that the story would adapt well to film, and Departures was finished a decade later. Because of Japanese prejudices against those who handle the dead, distributors were reluctant to release it—until a surprise grand prize win at the Montreal World Film Festival in August 2008. The following month the film opened in Japan, where it went on to win the Academy Prize for Picture of the Year and become the year's highest-grossing domestic film. This success was topped in 2009, when it became the first Japanese production to win the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
Departures received positive reviews, with aggregator Rotten Tomatoes indicating an 80% approval rating from 108 reviews. Critics praised the film's humour, the beauty of the encoffining ceremony, and the quality of the acting, but some took issue with its predictability and overt sentimentality. Reviewers highlighted a variety of themes, but focused mainly on the humanity that death brings to the surface and how it strengthens family bonds. The success of Departures led to the establishment of tourist attractions at sites connected to the film and increased interest in encoffining ceremonies, as well as adaptation of the story for various media, including manga and a stage play.
Plot
Daigo Kobayashi (Masahiro Motoki) loses his job as a cellist when his orchestra is disbanded. He and his wife Mika (Ryōko Hirosue) move from Tokyo to his hometown in Yamagata, where they live in his childhood home that was left to him when his mother died two years earlier. It is fronted by a coffee shop that Daigo's father had operated before he ran off with a waitress when Daigo was six; since then the two have had no contact. Daigo feels hatred towards his father and guilt for not taking better care of his mother. He still keeps a "stone-letter"—a stone which is said to convey meaning through its texture—which his father had given him many years before.
Daigo finds an advertisement for a job "assisting departures". Assuming it to be a job in a travel agency, he goes to the interview at the NK Agent office and learns from the secretary, Yuriko Kamimura (Kimiko Yo), that he will be preparing bodies for cremation in a ceremony known as encoffinment. Though reluctant, Daigo is hired on the spot and receives a cash advance from his new boss, Sasaki (Tsutomu Yamazaki). Daigo is furtive about his duties and hides the true nature of the job from Mika.
His first assignment is to assist with the encoffinment of a woman who died at home and remained undiscovered for two weeks. He is beset with nausea and later humiliated when strangers on a bus detect an unsavoury scent on him. To clean himself, he visits a public bath which he had frequented as a child. It is owned by Tsuyako Yamashita (Kazuko Yoshiyuki), the mother of one of Daigo's former classmates.
Over time, Daigo becomes comfortable with his profession as he completes a number of assignments and experiences the gratitude of the families of the deceased. Though he faces social ostracism, Daigo refuses to quit, even after Mika discovers a training DVD in which he plays a corpse and leaves him to return to her parents' home in Tokyo. Daigo's former classmate Yamashita (Tetta Sugimoto) insists that the mortician find a more respectable line of work and, until then, avoids him and his family.
After a few months, Mika returns and announces that she is pregnant. She expresses hope that Daigo will find a job of which their child can be proud. During the ensuing argument, Daigo receives a call for an encoffinment for Mrs Yamashita. Daigo prepares her body in front of both the Yamashita family and Mika, who had known the public bath owner. The ritual earns him the respect of all present, and Mika stops insisting that Daigo change jobs.
Sometime later, they learn of the death of Daigo's father. Daigo experiences renewed feelings of anger and tells the others at the NK office that he refuses to deal with his father's body. Feeling ashamed of having abandoned her own son long ago, Yuriko tells this to Daigo in an effort to change his mind. Daigo berates Yuriko and storms out before collecting himself and turning around. He goes with Mika to another village to see the body. Daigo is at first unable to recognize him, but takes offence when local funeral workers are careless with the body. He insists on dressing it himself, and while doing so finds a stone-letter that he had given to his father, held tight in the dead man's hands. The childhood memory of his father's face returns to him, and after he finishes the ceremony, Daigo gently presses the stone-letter to Mika's pregnant belly.
Production
Cultural background
Japanese funerals are highly ritualized affairs which are generally—though not always—conducted in accordance with Buddhist rites. In preparation for the funeral, the body is washed and the orifices are blocked with cotton or gauze. The encoffining ritual (called nōkan), as depicted in Departures, is rarely performed, and even then only in rural areas. This ceremony is not standardized, but generally involves professional ritually preparing the body, dressing the dead in white, and sometimes applying make-up. The body is then put on dry ice in a casket, along with personal possessions and items deemed necessary for the trip to the afterlife.
Despite the importance of death rituals, in traditional Japanese culture the subject is considered unclean as everything related to death is thought to be a source of (defilement). After coming into contact with the dead, individuals must cleanse themselves through purifying rituals. People who work closely with the dead, such as morticians, are thus considered unclean, and during the feudal era those whose work was related to death became burakumin (untouchables), forced to live in their own hamlets and discriminated against by wider society. Despite a cultural shift since the Meiji Restoration of 1868, the stigma of death still has considerable force within Japanese society, and discrimination against the untouchables has continued.
Until 1972, most deaths were dealt with by families, funeral homes, or . , about 80% of deaths occur in hospitals, and preparation of the bodies is frequently done by hospital staff; in such cases, the family often does not see the body until the funeral. A 1998 survey found that 29.5% of the Japanese population believed in an afterlife, and a further 40% wanted to believe; belief was highest . Belief in the existence of a soul (54%) and a connection between the worlds of the living and the dead (64.9%) was likewise common.
Conception and preproduction
In the early 1990s, a 27-year-old Motoki and his friend travelled to India; just before going, at the friend's recommendation he read Shin'ya Fujiwara's Memento Mori (Latin for "remember that you will die"). While in India, he visited Varanasi, where he saw a ceremony in which the dead were cremated and their ashes floated down the Ganges. Witnessing this ceremony of death against a backdrop of bustling crowds going about their lives deeply affected Motoki. When he returned to Japan, he read numerous books on the subject of death, and in 1993 wrote a book on the relationship between life and death: Tenkuu Seiza—Hill Heaven. Among the books he read was Shinmon Aoki's autobiographical , which exposed Motoki to the world of the for the first time. Motoki said he found a sense of mystery and near-eroticism to the profession that he felt had an affinity with the film world.
Getting funding for the project was difficult because of the taboos against death, and the crew had to approach several companies before Departures was approved by Yasuhiro Mase and Toshiaki Nakazawa. According to the film's director, Yōjirō Takita, a consideration in taking on the film was the age of the crew: "we got to a certain point in our lives when death was creeping up to become a factor around us". Kundō Koyama was enlisted to provide the script, his first for a feature film; his previous experience had been in scripting for television and stage. Takita, who had begun his career in the pink film genre before entering mainstream filmmaking in 1986 with Comic Magazine, took on the director's role in 2006, after producer Toshiaki Nakazawa presented him with the first draft of the script. In a later interview he stated "I wanted to make a film from the perspective of a person who deals with something so universal and yet is looked down upon, and even discriminated against". Although he knew of the encoffining ceremony, he had never seen one performed.
Production of Departures took ten years, and the work was ultimately only loosely adapted from Coffinman; later revisions of the script were worked on collaboratively by the cast and crew. Although the religious aspects of funerals were important in the source work, the film did not include them. This, together with the fact that filming was completed in Yamagata and not Aoki's home prefecture of Toyama, led to tensions between the production staff and the author. Aoki expressed concern that the film was unable to address "the ultimate fate of the dead". The first edition of the book was broken into three parts; the third, "Light and Life", was an essay-like Buddhist musing on life and death, regarding the "light" seen when one perceived the integration of life and death, that is absent from the film. Aoki believed the film's humanistic approach did away with the religious aspects that were central to the book—the emphasis on maintaining connections between the living and the dead that he felt only religion could provide—and refused to allow his name and that of his book to be used. For the new title, Koyama coined the term as a euphemism for , derived from the words ("to send off") and ("person").
While the book and film share the same premise, the details differ considerably; Aoki attributed these changes to the studio making the story more commercial. Both feature a protagonist who endures uneasiness and prejudice because of his job as a , undergoes personal growth as a result of his experiences, and finds new meaning in life when confronted with death. In both, the main character deals with societal prejudices and misunderstandings over his profession. In Coffinman, the protagonist was the owner of a pub-café that had gone out of business; during a domestic squabble his wife threw a newspaper at him, in which he found an ad for the position. He finds pride in his work for the first time when dealing with the body of a former girlfriend. Koyama changed the protagonist from a bar owner to cellist as he wanted cello orchestration for the film score. Other differences included moving the setting from Toyoma to Yamagata for filming convenience, making the "letter-stone" a greater part of the plot, and an avoidance of heavier scenes, such as religious ones and one in which Aoki talks of seeing "light" in a swarm of maggots. Koyama also added the subplot in which Daigo is able to forgive his late father; taken from a novel he was writing, it was intended to close the story with "some sense of happiness".
Casting
Motoki, by then in his early 40s and having built a reputation as a realist, was cast as Daigo. Veteran actor Tsutomu Yamazaki was selected for the role of Sasaki; Takita had worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone (1993). Although the character of Mika was initially planned as being the same age as Daigo, the role went to pop singer Ryōko
Hirosue, who had previously acted in Takita's Himitsu (Secret) in 1999. Takita explained that a younger actress would better represent the lead couple's growth out of naivety. In a 2009 interview, Takita stated that he had cast "everyone who was on my wish list".
Motoki studied the art of encoffinment first-hand from a mortician, and assisted in an encoffining ceremony; he later stated that the experience imbued him with "a sense of mission ... to try to use as much human warmth as I could to restore [the deceased] to a lifelike presence for presentation to her family". Motoki then drilled himself by practising on his talent manager until he felt he had mastered the procedure, one whose intricate, delicate movements he compared to those of the Japanese tea ceremony. Takita attended funeral ceremonies to understand the feelings of bereaved families, while Yamazaki never participated in the encoffinment training. Motoki also learned how to play a cello for the earlier parts of the film.
To provide realistic bodies while preventing the corpses from moving, after a lengthy casting process the crew chose extras who could lie as still as possible. For the bath house owner Tsuyako Yamashita, this was not possible owing to the need to see her alive first, and a search for a body double was unfruitful. Ultimately, the crew used digital effects to transplant a still image of the actor during the character's funeral scene, allowing for a realistic effect.
Filming and post-production
The non-profit organization Sakata Location Box was established in December 2007 to handle on-location matters such as finding extras and negotiating locations. After deciding to shoot in Sakata, Location Box staff had two months to prepare for the eighty members of the film crew. Negotiations were slow, as many local property owners lost interest after learning that the filming would involve funeral scenes; those who agreed insisted that shooting take place outside of business hours.
Toyama was both the setting of Coffinman and Takita's home prefecture, but filming was done in Yamagata; this was largely because the national Nōkan Association, headquartered in Hokkaido, had a branch office in Sakata. Some preliminary scenes of snowy landscapes were shot in 2007, and primary filming began in April 2008, lasting 40 days. Locations included Kaminoyama, Sakata, Tsuruoka, Yuza, and Amarume. The NK Agent office was filmed in a three-storey, Western-style building in Sakata built between the mid-Meiji and Taishō periods (1880s–1920s). Originally a restaurant named Kappō Obata, it went out of business in 1998. The Kobayashis' café, called Concerto in the film, was located in Kaminoyama in a former beauty salon. From a hundred candidates, Takita chose it for its atmosphere as an aged building with a clear view of the nearby river and surrounding mountain range. The scene of the shooting of the training DVD took place in the Sakata Minato-za, Yamagata's first movie theatre, which had been closed since 2002.
The soundtrack to Departures was by Joe Hisaishi, a composer who had gained international recognition for his work with Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli. Before shooting began, Takita asked him to prepare a soundtrack which would represent the separation between Daigo and his father, as well as the mortician's love for his wife. Owing to the importance of cellos and cello music in the narrative, Hisaishi emphasized the instrument in his soundtrack; he described the challenge of centring a score around the cello as one of the most difficult things he had ever done. This score was played during shooting, which according to Takita "allowed [the crew] to visualize many of the emotions in the film" and thus contributed to the quality of the finished work.
Style
As they are the movie's "central dramatic piece", the encoffining ceremonies in Departures have received extensive commentary. Mike Scott, for instance, wrote in The Times-Picayune that these scenes were beautiful and heartbreaking, and Nicholas Barber of The Independent described them as "elegant and dignified". James Adams of The Globe and Mail wrote that they were a "dignified ritual of calming, hypnotic grace, with sleights of hand bordering on the magicianly". As the film continues, Paul Byrnes of The Sydney Morning Herald opined, the audience gains an improved knowledge of the ceremony and its importance. Viewers see that the ceremonies are not simply about preparing the body, but also about "bring[ing] dignity to death, respect to the deceased and solace to those who grieve", through which the encoffiners are able to help repair broken family ties and heal damage done to those left behind.
There is an idealization of the as presented in the film. In all but one case, the dead are either young or already made-up, such that "the viewer can easily tolerate these images on the screen". The one corpse that had not been found for several days is never shown on screen. No bodies show the gaunt figure of one who has died after a long illness, or the cuts and bruises of an accident victim. Japanologist Mark R. Mullins writes that the gratitude shown in Departures would probably not have occurred in real life; according to Coffinman, there "is nothing lower on the social scale than the mortician, and the truth of the matter is that [the Japanese people] fear the coffinman and the cremator just as much as death and the corpse".
In a montage, scenes of Daigo playing his childhood cello while sitting outdoors are interspersed with scenes of encoffining ceremonies. Byrnes believes that this scene was meant to increase the emotional charge of the film, and Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times considered it a "beautiful fantasy scene" through which the camera is "granted sudden freedom" from the generally standard shots. Yoshiko Okuyama of the University of Hawaii at Hilo found that Daigo's deft movements while playing the cello mirrored the high level of professionalism which he had reached. Several reviewers, such as Leigh Paatsch of the Herald Sun, questioned the need for the shot. Throughout the film's soundtrack, cello music remains dominant. Takita drew parallels between the instrument and the encoffining ceremony, stating that
Byrnes found that Departures used the symbol of the cherry blossom, a flower which blooms after the winter only to wither soon afterwards, to represent the transience of life; through this understanding, he wrote, Japanese people attempt to define their own existence. Natural symbols are further presented through the changing seasons, which "suggest delicate emotional changes" in the characters, as well as the letter-stones, which represent "love, communication, [and] the baton being passed from generation to generation". The film's settings are used to convey various sensations, including the solitude of the countryside and the intimacy of the public bath house. The colour white, manifested through snow, chrysanthemums, and other objects, is prominent in the film; Okuyama suggests that this, together with the classical music and ritualized hand gestures, represents the sacredness and purity of the death ceremonies.
Departures incorporates aspects of humour, an "unexpected" complement to the theme of death which Ebert suggested may be used to mask the audience's fears. Betsy Sharkey of the Los Angeles Times opines that, through this use of humour, the film avoids becoming too dark and instead acts as a "warmhearted blend" of whimsy and irony. This humour manifests in a variety of manners, such as a scene in which "a mortified Daigo, naked except for a pair of adult diapers, is the reluctant model" for an educational video regarding the encoffining process, as well as a scene in which Daigo discovers that the person he is preparing is a trans woman. Takita stated that the addition of humour was deliberate, as "humans are comical by nature", and that the humour did not conflict with the film's darker themes.
Themes
Several critics discussed the theme of death found in Departures. Scott highlighted the contrast between the taboo of death and the value of jobs related to it. He also noted the role of the encoffiner in showing "one last act of compassion" by presenting the dead in a way which preserved proud memories of their life. Initially, Daigo and his family are unable to overcome the taboos and their squeamishness when faced with death. Daigo is alienated from his wife and friends owing to traditional values. Ultimately it is through his work with the dead that Daigo finds fulfilment, and, as Peter Howell of the Toronto Star concluded, viewers realize that "death may be the termination of a life, but it's not the end of humanity". Okuyama writes that, in the end, the film (and the book on which it was based) serves as a "quiet yet persistent protest" against the discrimination which people who deal with death continue to face in modern Japan: death is a normal part of life, not something repulsive.
Along with this theme of death, Takita believed Departures was about life, about finding a lost sense of feeling human; Daigo gains a greater perspective on life and realises the diversity of people's lives only after encountering them in death. This life includes family bonds: Daigo's coming to terms with his father is a major motif, encoffinment scenes focus on the living family members rather than the dead, and even in the NK Agent office, conversation often revolves around family issues. Mika's pregnancy is the catalyst for her reconciliation with Daigo.
Ebert writes that, as with other Japanese films such as Tokyo Story (Yasujirō Ozu; 1953) and The Funeral (Juzo Itami; 1984), Departures focuses on the effect of death on the survivors; the afterlife is not given much discussion. He considered this indicative of a "deep and unsensational acceptance of death" in Japanese culture, one which is to be met not with extreme sorrow, but with contemplation. Takita stated that he intended to focus on the "dialogue between people who have passed away and the families that survive them". The film touches on the question of the afterlife: the cremator likens death to "a gateway", and Okuyama writes that in this sense the cremator is a gatekeeper and the encoffiners are guides.
Byrnes found that Departures leads one to question the extent of modernity's effect on Japanese culture, noting the undercurrent of "traditional attitudes and values" which permeated the film. Although the encoffining ceremony was traditionally completed by the dead person's family, a decreased interest in it opened a "niche market" for professional encoffiners. Okuyama wrote that, through this film, Takita was filling a "spiritual loss" caused by the departure from tradition in modern Japan. Tadao Sato connected this theme of modernity to that of death, explaining that the film's unusually non-bitter treatment of death demonstrated an evolution in Japanese feelings about life and death. He considered the film's treatment of as an artistic rather than religious ceremony to reflect the agnostic attitudes of modern Japan.
Release
The taboo subject of Departures made prospective distributors wary of taking on the film. Surveys conducted at pre-release screenings placed it at the bottom of the list of films audiences wanted to see. Ultimately, the film's debut at the Montreal World Film Festival in August 2008, which was rewarded with the festival's grand prize, provided the necessary incentive for distributors to select Departures; it finally received its domestic Japanese release on 13 September 2008. Even then, owing to the strong taboo against death, Takita was worried about the film's reception and did not anticipate commercial success, and others expressed concern that the film lacked a clear target audience.
This fear was misplaced; Departures debuted in Japan at fifth place, and during the fifth week of its run hit its peak position at third place. It sold 2.6 million tickets in Japan and generated 3.2 billion yen ($32 million) in box office revenue in the five months after its debut. The film was still showing in 31 theatres when its success at the Academy Awards in February 2009 renewed interest; the number of screens on which it was showing was increased to 188 and the film earned another ¥2.8 billion ($28 million), making a total of ¥6 billion ($60 million). This made Departures the highest-grossing domestic film and 15th top-grossing film overall for 2008. Executive producer Yasuhiro Mase credited this success to the effects of the Great Recession on Japan: viewers who were seeking employment after recently being downsized empathized with Daigo.
From the beginning an international release of the film was intended; as English is considered a key language in international film festivals, English subtitles were prepared. The translation was handled by Ian MacDougall. He believed that the workings of the mortician's world were as far from the experience of most Japanese as from that of a non-Japanese audience. As such he felt a faithful translation was best, without going far to accommodate foreign audiences to unfamiliar cross-cultural elements.
In September 2008, ContentFilm acquired the international rights to Departures, which by that time had been licensed for screening in countries such as Greece, Australia, and Malaysia; the film was ultimately screened in 36 countries. North American distribution was handled by Regent Releasing,
and Departures received a limited release in nine theatres beginning on 29 May 2009. Overall, the film earned almost $1.5 million during its North American run before closing on 24 June 2010. In the United Kingdom, Departures premiered on 4 December 2009 and was distributed by Arrow Film Distributors. The film attained a worldwide gross of nearly $70 million.
Adaptations and other media
Before Departures premiered, a manga adaptation by Akira Sasō was serialized in twelve instalments in the bi-weekly Big Comic Superior, from February to August 2008. Sasō agreed to take on the adaptation as he was impressed by the script. He had the opportunity to view the film before beginning the adaptation, and came to feel that a too-literal adaptation would not be appropriate. He made changes to the settings and physical appearances of the characters, and increased the focus on the role of music in the story. Later in 2008 the serial was compiled in a 280-page volume released by Shogakukan.
On 10 September 2008, three days before the Japanese premiere of Departures, a soundtrack album for the film—containing nineteen tracks from the film and featuring an orchestral performance by members of the Tokyo Metropolitan and NHK Symphony Orchestras—was released by Universal Music Japan. Pop singer Ai provided lyrics to music by Hisaishi for the image song "Okuribito"; performed by Ai with an arrangement for cellos and orchestra, the single was released by Universal Sigma and Island Records on 10 September 2008 along with a promotional video. Sheet music for the film's soundtrack was published by KMP in 2008 (for cello and piano) and Onkyō in 2009 (for cello, violin, and piano).
Shinobu Momose, a writer specializing in novelizations, adapted Departures as a novel. It was published by Shogakukan in 2008. That year the company also released Ishibumi (Letter-Stone), an illustrated book on the themes of the film told from the point of view of a talking stone; this book was written by Koyama and illustrated by Seitarō Kurota. The following year Shogakukan published an edition of Koyama's first draft of the screenplay. A stage version of the film, also titled Departures, was written by Koyama and directed by Takita. It debuted at the Akasaka ACT Theater on 29 May 2010, featuring kabuki actor Nakamura Kankurō as Daigo and Rena Tanaka as Mika. The story, set seven years after the close of the film, concerns the insecurities of the couple's son over Daigo's profession.
Home releases
A dual-layer DVD release, with special features including trailers, making-of documentaries, and a recorded encoffining ceremony, was released in Japan on 18 March 2009. A North American DVD edition of Departures, including an interview with the director, was released by Koch Vision on 12 January 2010; the film was not dubbed, but rather presented with Japanese audio and English subtitles. A Blu-ray edition followed in May. This home release received mixed reviews. Franck Tabouring of DVD Verdict was highly complimentary toward the film and the digital transfer, considering its visuals clean and sharp and the audio (particularly the music) "a pleasure to listen to". Thomas Spurlin, writing for DVD Talk, rated the release as "Highly Recommended", focusing on the "unexpected powerhouse" of the film's quality. Another writer for the website, Jeremy Mathews, advised readers to "Skip It", finding the DVD an apt presentation of the source material—which he considered to "reduce itself to clumsy, mug-filled attempts at broad comedy and awkward, repetitive tear-jerker scenes". Both DVD Talk reviews agreed that the audio and visual quality were less than perfect, and that the DVD's extra contents were poor; Mathews described the interview as the director answering "dull questions in a dull manner".
Reception
Reviews
Departures received generally positive reviews from critics. The review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes sampled 108 reviewers and judged an 80% approval rating, with an average score of 7.06 out of 10. The website's critical consensus states, "If slow and predictable, Departures is a quiet, life affirming story". The aggregator Metacritic gives the film 68 out of 100, based on 27 reviews.
Domestic reviews
Initial reviews in Japan were positive. In Kinema Junpo, Tokitoshi Shioda called Departures a turning point in Takita's career, a human drama capturing both laughter and tears, while in the same publication Masaaki Nomura described the film as a work of supple depth that perhaps indicated a move into Takita's mature period, praising the director for capturing a human feeling from Motoki's earnest encoffining performance. Writing in the Yomiuri Shimbun, Seichi Fukunaga complimented Takita for using a moving, emotive story laden with humour to reverse prejudice against a taboo subject. He commended the performances of Motoki and Yamazaki, particularly their playing the serious Daigo against the befuddled Sasaki.
In the Asahi Shimbun, Sadao Yamane found the film admirably constructed and extolled the actors' performances. Yamane was especially impressed by the delicate hand movements Motoki displayed when he performed the encoffinment ceremony. Tomomi Katsuta in the Mainichi Shimbun found Departures a meaningful story that made the viewer think about the different lives people live, and the significance of someone dying. Writing in the same newspaper, Takashi Suzuki thought the film memorable but predictable, and Yūji Takahashi opined that the film's ability to find nobility in a prejudiced subject was an excellent accomplishment. Shōko Watanabe gave Departures four out of five stars in The Nikkei newspaper, praising the actors' unforced performances.
Following the success of Departures at the Academy Awards, critic Saburō Kawamoto found the film to show a Japan that the Japanese could relate to, in that, in a nation whose customs put great weight on visits to ancestral graves, a death was always a family affair. He believed the film had a samurai beauty to it, with its many scenes of families sitting seiza. Critic gave the film a 90% rating, and credited the performances of the two leads for much of the film's success. He praised its emotional impact and its balance of seriousness and humour, but was more critical of the father–son relationship, which he considered overdone. Maeda attributed the film's international success, despite its heavily Japanese content, to its clear depiction of Japanese views on life and death. He found the film's conceptual scale to have an affinity to that of Hollywood (something he considered lacking in most Japanese films).
Reviewer Takurō Yamaguchi gave the film an 85% rating, and found the treatment of its subject charming. He praised its quiet emotional impact and humour, the interweaving of northern Japan scenery with Hisaishi's cello score, and the film's Japanese spirit. Media critic found a moving beauty in the dextrous hand movements Sasaki teaches Daigo for preparing bodies, and believed that a prior reading of the original script would deepen the viewer's understanding of the action. Mark Schilling of The Japan Times gave the film four stars out of five, praising the acting though criticizing the apparent idealization of the encoffiners. He concluded that the film "makes a good case for the Japanese way of death."
International reviews
Internationally, Departures has received mixed—mostly positive—reviews. Ebert gave the film a perfect four stars, describing it as "rock-solid in its fundamentals" and highlighting its cinematography, music, and the casting of Yamazaki as Sasaki. He found that the result "functions flawlessly" and is "excellent at achieving the universal ends of narrative". Derek Armstrong of AllMovie gave the film four stars out of five, describing it as "a film of lyrical beauty" which is "bursting with tiny pleasures". In a four-star review, Byrnes described the film as a "moving meditation on the transience of life" which showed "great humanity", concluding "it's a beautiful film but take two hankies." Howell gave the film three stars out of four, praising its acting and cinematography. He wrote that Departures "quietly subverts aesthetic and emotional expectations" without ever losing its "high-minded intent". In a three-and-a-half star review, Claudia Puig of USA Today described Departures as a "beautifully composed" film which, although predictable, was "emotional, poignant" and "profoundly affecting".
Philip French of The Observer considered Departures to be a "moving, gently amusing" film, which the director had "fastidiously composed". Sharkey found it an "emotionally wrenching trip with a quiet man", one which was well cast with "actors who move lightly, gracefully" in the various settings. In Entertainment Weekly, Owen Gleiberman gave the film a B−, considering it "tender and, at times, rather squishy", though certain to affect anyone who had lost a parent. Barber found Departures to be "heartfelt, unpretentious, [and] slyly funny", worth watching (though ultimately predictable). Mike Scott gave the film three and a half stars out of four, finding that it was "a surprisingly uplifting examination of life and loss", with humour which perfectly complemented the "moving and meaningful story", but lent itself to characters "mug[ging] for the camera".
Meanwhile, Kevin Maher of The Times described Departures as a "verklempt comedy" with wearisome "push-button crying", though he considered it saved by the quality of the acting, "stately" directing, and "dreamy" soundtrack. Another mixed review was published in The Daily Telegraph, which described the film as a "safe and emotionally generous crowd-pleaser" that was not worthy of its Academy Award. Philip Kennicott wrote in The Washington Post that the film was "as polished as it is heavy-handed", predictable yet ready to break taboos, immersed in death yet incapable of escaping "the maddening Japanese taste for sentimentality". In Variety, Eddie Cockrell wrote that the film offered "fascinating glimpses" of the encoffining ceremony but should have had a much shorter runtime. Paatsch gave Departures three stars out of five, describing it as a "quaintly mournful flick" that "unfolds with a delicacy and precision that slowly captivates the viewer" but considering some scenes, such as the montage, "needlessly showy flourishes". Edward Porter of The Sunday Times wrote that the film's success at the Academy Awards could be blamed on "a case of the Academy favouring bland sentimentality".
The A.V. Club Keith Phipps gave Departures a C−, writing that though it featured "handsome shots of provincial life" and encoffining scenes with a "poetic quality", ultimately the film "drips from one overstated emotion to the next". A. O. Scott wrote in The New York Times that the film was "perfectly mediocre", predictable, and banal in its combination of humour and melodrama. Despite its sometimes touching moments, he considered Departures "interesting mainly as an index of the Academy’s hopelessly timid and conventional tastes". Tony Rayns of Film Comment gave a scathing review in which he denounced the script as "embarrassingly clunky and obvious", the acting as merely "adequate", and the film as but a "paean to the good-looking corpse". Adams gave Departures two out of four stars, praising the emotionally and visually arresting scenes of encoffinments and "loving attention to the textures, tastes and behaviours of semi-rural Japan" but condemning the predictability of the plot; he wrote that "Forty-five minutes in, [viewers have] prepared a mental checklist of every turn that Daigo Kobayashi will face, then negotiate – and be danged if Takita doesn't deliver on every one".
Awards
At the 32nd Japan Academy Prize ceremony held in February 2009, Departures dominated the competition. It received a total of thirteen nominations, winning ten, including Picture of the Year, Screenplay of the Year (Koyama), Director of the Year (Takita), and Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role (Motoki). In the Outstanding Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role category, Hirosue lost to Tae Kimura of All Around Us, while in the Outstanding Achievement in Art Direction category Departures Tomio Ogawa lost to Paco and the Magical Book Towako Kuwashima. Hisaishi, nominated for two Outstanding Achievement in Music awards, won for his scoring of Studio Ghibli's animated film Ponyo. In response to the wins, Motoki said "It feels as if everything miraculously came together in balance this time with Okuribito".
Departures was submitted to the 81st Academy Awards as Japan's submission for the Best Foreign Language Film award. Although eleven previous Japanese films had won Academy Awards in other categories, such as Best Animated Feature or Best Costume Design, the as-yet unattained Best Foreign Language Film award was highly coveted in the Japanese film industry. Departures was not expected to win, owing to strong competition from the Israeli and French submissions (Ari Folman's Waltz with Bashir and Laurent Cantet's The Class, respectively), but was ultimately the victor at the February 2009 ceremony. This was considered a surprise by several film critics, and The New York Times David Itzkoff termed Departures "The Film That Lost Your Oscars Pool for You". Motoki, who was expecting the "wonderful" Israeli submission to win, was also surprised; he described himself as a "hanger-on who just observes the ceremony", and regretted "not walk[ing] with more confidence" upon his arrival.
Departures received recognition at a variety of film festivals, including the Audience Choice Award at the 28th Hawaii International Film Festival, the Audience Choice Award at the 15th Vilnius International Film Festival, the Grand Prix des Amériques at the 32nd Montreal World Film Festival, and Best Narrative Film at the 20th Palm Springs International Film Festival. Motoki was selected as best actor at several ceremonies, including at the Asian Film Awards, the Asia Pacific Screen Awards, and the Blue Ribbon Awards; he was also viewers' choice for best actor at the Golden Rooster Awards. At the 29th Hong Kong Film Awards, Departures was selected as Best Asian Film, beating three Chinese films and Ponyo. Following the 21st Nikkan Sports Film Award ceremony, in which Departures won Best Film and Best Director, Takita expressed surprise at the film's awards, saying "I did not know how well my work would be accepted." By December 2009 the film had won 98 awards.
Impact
After the film's success, Sakata Location Box set up a hospitality service called Mukaebito—a pun on the film's Japanese title indicating "one who greets or picks up" another, rather than "one who sends off". The service maintains shooting locations and provides maps of these locations for tourists. In 2009, Location Box opened the building that served as the NK Agent office to the public. For a fee, visitors could enter and view props from the film. Under a job creation program, between 2009 and 2013 the organization received ¥30 million from Yamagata Prefecture and ¥8 million from Sakata City for the building's maintenance and administration. The site attracted nearly 120,000 visitors in 2009, though numbers quickly fell; in 2013 there were fewer than 9,000 visitors. Safety fears due to the building's age led to the Sakata municipal government ending the organization's lease, and the building was closed again at the end of March 2014. At the time, the City Tourism division was considering options, such as limiting visits to the first two floors. The building used as the Concerto café has been open to the public since 2009 as the Kaminoyama Concerto Museum, and the Sakata Minato-za cinema has also been opened to tourists. Takita's hometown of Takaoka, Toyama, maintains a Film Resources Museum; staff have reported that at times over a hundred Takita fans visit per day.
The film's success generated greater interest in encoffining and the . Even the model of hearse driven in the film was merchandised: the Mitsuoka Limousine Type 2-04, a smaller, less expensive version of the film's vehicle, was put on the market on 24 February 2009. The manufacturer, Mitsuoka Motors, is located in Takita's home prefecture of Toyama. In 2013, Kouki Kimura, from a family of , founded the Okuribito Academy together with nurse and entrepreneur Kei Takamaru. It offers training in encoffining, embalming, and related practices.
Explanatory notes
References
Works cited
External links
(via the Internet Archive)
2008 films
2008 drama films
Japanese films
Japanese drama films
Japanese-language films
Best Film Kinema Junpo Award winners
Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award winners
2008 black comedy films
Films scored by Joe Hisaishi
Films about cellos and cellists
Films about death
Films about funerals
Films set in Tokyo
Films set in Yamagata Prefecture
Films shot in Japan
Films directed by Yōjirō Takita
Picture of the Year Japan Academy Prize winners
Films with screenplays by Kundō Koyama
Shochiku films
Dentsu films
Shogakukan franchises | true | [
"Dr. Kunio Yamazaki was a biologist who worked at the Monell Chemical Senses Center from 1980 until his death. Yamazaki is most notable for his extensive work with the major histocompatibility complex. \n\nHe has worked with Dr. Gary Beauchamp, also of Monell, before.\n\nReferences\n\nJapanese biologists\n2013 deaths\nYear of birth missing\nUniversity of Tokyo alumni\nJapanese expatriates in the United States",
"is a Japanese engineer and former astronaut at JAXA. She was the second Japanese woman to fly in space. The first was Chiaki Mukai.\n\nEarly life\nYamazaki was born Naoko Sumino in Matsudo City. She spent two years of her childhood in Sapporo. After graduating from Ochanomizu University Senior High School in 1989, Yamazaki earned a Bachelor of Science degree with a major in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Tokyo in 1993 and a Master of Science degree with a major in Aerospace Engineering in 1996.\n\nJAXA career\nYamazaki joined the National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA) in 1996 and was part of the development team for the system integration of the Japanese Experiment Module (JEM). She also worked on the JEM failure analysis and creating initial operation procedures.\nFrom June 1998 to March 2000, she was part of the ISS Centrifuge team (life science experiment facility) conducting conceptual framework and preliminary design.\n\nYamazaki was selected as an astronaut candidate in February 1999 by the National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA, now JAXA), attended the ISS Astronaut Basic Training program beginning in April 1999, and was certified as an astronaut in September 2001. Since 2001, Yamazaki has participated in ISS Advanced Training and supported the development of the hardware and operation of the Japanese Experiment Module. In May 2004, Yamazaki completed Soyuz-TMA Flight Engineer training at the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonauts Training Center in Star City, Russia.\n\nNASA experience\n\nIn June 2004, Yamazaki arrived at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas to begin Astronaut Candidate Training school, where she was assigned to the Astronaut Office Robotics Branch. She was selected as a NASA mission specialist in 2006.\n\nIn November 2008, JAXA announced that Yamazaki would become the second Japanese woman to fly in space on STS-131, which launched on 5 April 2010. Since the space shuttle retired the following year in 2011, she was also the last Japanese astronaut to ever fly the space shuttle.\n\nOn April 5, 2010 Yamazaki entered space on the shuttle Discovery as part of mission STS-131. She returned to Earth on April 20, 2010.\n\nYamazaki retired from JAXA on August 31, 2011.\n\nPost JAXA\nAfter returning to Earth, after spending a total of 15.12 days in space, Yamazaki continued her studies and research University of Tokyo since December 2010.\n\nSince 2011, Yamazaki has been involved with promoting STEM activities as well as being a member of the Japanese government Space Policy Committee \n\nIn July 2018, Yamazaki co-founded the Space Port Japan Association, which is an organization to support efforts to open spaceports in Japan through collaboration with companies, groups and government institutions. She is an adviser to the Young Astronaut Club, and Chairman of the Women in Aerospace program of the Japan Rocket Society.\n\nAs of July 2019, Yamazaki was a PhD student at the Intelligent Space Systems Lab in the University of Tokyo.\n\nPersonal life\nYamazaki was married to Taichi Yamazaki and the couple have two children; they were divorced in February 2012. She enjoys scuba diving, snow skiing, flying and music.\n\nIn 2007, Yamazaki provided the voice as herself in episode 7 of the anime Rocket Girls.\n\nSee also\nWomen in space\nList of female astronauts\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n JAXA biography\n \n Spacefacts biography of Naoko Yamazaki\n JAXA TODAY No. 2\n Seeing Earth from Space Naoko Yamazaki at TEDxHaneda, August 2015\n\n1970 births\nWomen astronauts\nLiving people\nJapanese astronauts\nPeople from Chiba Prefecture\nUniversity of Tokyo alumni\nSpace Shuttle program astronauts"
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"worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone",
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]
| C_eb65e42fda3a4153b514fd8bed8563ea_0 | What did they do together? | 4 | What film did Takita and Yamazaki do together? | Departures (2008 film) | Motoki, by then in his early 40s and having built a reputation as a realist, was cast as Daigo. Veteran actor Tsutomu Yamazaki was selected for the role of Sasaki; Takita had worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone (1993). Although the character of Mika was initially planned as being the same age as Daigo, the role went to pop singer Ryoko Hirosue, who had previously acted in Takita's Himitsu (Secret) in 1999. Takita explained that a younger actress would better represent the lead couple's growth out of naivety. In a 2009 interview, Takita stated that he had cast "everyone who was on my wish list". Motoki studied the art of encoffinment first-hand from a mortician, and assisted in an encoffining ceremony; he later stated that the experience imbued him with "a sense of mission ... to try to use as much human warmth as I could to restore [the deceased] to a lifelike presence for presentation to her family". Motoki then drilled himself by practising on his talent manager until he felt he had mastered the procedure, one whose intricate, delicate movements he compared to those of the Japanese tea ceremony. Takita attended funeral ceremonies to understand the feelings of bereaved families, while Yamazaki never participated in the encoffinment training. Motoki also learned how to play a cello for the earlier parts of the film. To provide realistic bodies while preventing the corpses from moving, after a lengthy casting process the crew chose extras who could lie as still as possible. For the bath house owner Tsuyako Yamashita, this was not possible owing to the need to see her alive first, and a search for a body double was unfruitful. Ultimately, the crew used digital effects to transplant a still image of the actor during the character's funeral scene, allowing for a realistic effect. CANNOTANSWER | We Are Not Alone | is a 2008 Japanese drama film directed by Yōjirō Takita and starring Masahiro Motoki, Ryōko Hirosue, and Tsutomu Yamazaki. The film follows a young man who returns to his hometown after a failed career as a cellist and stumbles across work as a —a traditional Japanese ritual mortician. He is subjected to prejudice from those around him, including from his wife, because of strong social taboos against people who deal with death. Eventually he repairs these interpersonal connections through the beauty and dignity of his work.
The idea for Departures arose after Motoki, affected by having seen a funeral ceremony along the Ganges when travelling in India, read widely on the subject of death and came across Coffinman. He felt that the story would adapt well to film, and Departures was finished a decade later. Because of Japanese prejudices against those who handle the dead, distributors were reluctant to release it—until a surprise grand prize win at the Montreal World Film Festival in August 2008. The following month the film opened in Japan, where it went on to win the Academy Prize for Picture of the Year and become the year's highest-grossing domestic film. This success was topped in 2009, when it became the first Japanese production to win the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
Departures received positive reviews, with aggregator Rotten Tomatoes indicating an 80% approval rating from 108 reviews. Critics praised the film's humour, the beauty of the encoffining ceremony, and the quality of the acting, but some took issue with its predictability and overt sentimentality. Reviewers highlighted a variety of themes, but focused mainly on the humanity that death brings to the surface and how it strengthens family bonds. The success of Departures led to the establishment of tourist attractions at sites connected to the film and increased interest in encoffining ceremonies, as well as adaptation of the story for various media, including manga and a stage play.
Plot
Daigo Kobayashi (Masahiro Motoki) loses his job as a cellist when his orchestra is disbanded. He and his wife Mika (Ryōko Hirosue) move from Tokyo to his hometown in Yamagata, where they live in his childhood home that was left to him when his mother died two years earlier. It is fronted by a coffee shop that Daigo's father had operated before he ran off with a waitress when Daigo was six; since then the two have had no contact. Daigo feels hatred towards his father and guilt for not taking better care of his mother. He still keeps a "stone-letter"—a stone which is said to convey meaning through its texture—which his father had given him many years before.
Daigo finds an advertisement for a job "assisting departures". Assuming it to be a job in a travel agency, he goes to the interview at the NK Agent office and learns from the secretary, Yuriko Kamimura (Kimiko Yo), that he will be preparing bodies for cremation in a ceremony known as encoffinment. Though reluctant, Daigo is hired on the spot and receives a cash advance from his new boss, Sasaki (Tsutomu Yamazaki). Daigo is furtive about his duties and hides the true nature of the job from Mika.
His first assignment is to assist with the encoffinment of a woman who died at home and remained undiscovered for two weeks. He is beset with nausea and later humiliated when strangers on a bus detect an unsavoury scent on him. To clean himself, he visits a public bath which he had frequented as a child. It is owned by Tsuyako Yamashita (Kazuko Yoshiyuki), the mother of one of Daigo's former classmates.
Over time, Daigo becomes comfortable with his profession as he completes a number of assignments and experiences the gratitude of the families of the deceased. Though he faces social ostracism, Daigo refuses to quit, even after Mika discovers a training DVD in which he plays a corpse and leaves him to return to her parents' home in Tokyo. Daigo's former classmate Yamashita (Tetta Sugimoto) insists that the mortician find a more respectable line of work and, until then, avoids him and his family.
After a few months, Mika returns and announces that she is pregnant. She expresses hope that Daigo will find a job of which their child can be proud. During the ensuing argument, Daigo receives a call for an encoffinment for Mrs Yamashita. Daigo prepares her body in front of both the Yamashita family and Mika, who had known the public bath owner. The ritual earns him the respect of all present, and Mika stops insisting that Daigo change jobs.
Sometime later, they learn of the death of Daigo's father. Daigo experiences renewed feelings of anger and tells the others at the NK office that he refuses to deal with his father's body. Feeling ashamed of having abandoned her own son long ago, Yuriko tells this to Daigo in an effort to change his mind. Daigo berates Yuriko and storms out before collecting himself and turning around. He goes with Mika to another village to see the body. Daigo is at first unable to recognize him, but takes offence when local funeral workers are careless with the body. He insists on dressing it himself, and while doing so finds a stone-letter that he had given to his father, held tight in the dead man's hands. The childhood memory of his father's face returns to him, and after he finishes the ceremony, Daigo gently presses the stone-letter to Mika's pregnant belly.
Production
Cultural background
Japanese funerals are highly ritualized affairs which are generally—though not always—conducted in accordance with Buddhist rites. In preparation for the funeral, the body is washed and the orifices are blocked with cotton or gauze. The encoffining ritual (called nōkan), as depicted in Departures, is rarely performed, and even then only in rural areas. This ceremony is not standardized, but generally involves professional ritually preparing the body, dressing the dead in white, and sometimes applying make-up. The body is then put on dry ice in a casket, along with personal possessions and items deemed necessary for the trip to the afterlife.
Despite the importance of death rituals, in traditional Japanese culture the subject is considered unclean as everything related to death is thought to be a source of (defilement). After coming into contact with the dead, individuals must cleanse themselves through purifying rituals. People who work closely with the dead, such as morticians, are thus considered unclean, and during the feudal era those whose work was related to death became burakumin (untouchables), forced to live in their own hamlets and discriminated against by wider society. Despite a cultural shift since the Meiji Restoration of 1868, the stigma of death still has considerable force within Japanese society, and discrimination against the untouchables has continued.
Until 1972, most deaths were dealt with by families, funeral homes, or . , about 80% of deaths occur in hospitals, and preparation of the bodies is frequently done by hospital staff; in such cases, the family often does not see the body until the funeral. A 1998 survey found that 29.5% of the Japanese population believed in an afterlife, and a further 40% wanted to believe; belief was highest . Belief in the existence of a soul (54%) and a connection between the worlds of the living and the dead (64.9%) was likewise common.
Conception and preproduction
In the early 1990s, a 27-year-old Motoki and his friend travelled to India; just before going, at the friend's recommendation he read Shin'ya Fujiwara's Memento Mori (Latin for "remember that you will die"). While in India, he visited Varanasi, where he saw a ceremony in which the dead were cremated and their ashes floated down the Ganges. Witnessing this ceremony of death against a backdrop of bustling crowds going about their lives deeply affected Motoki. When he returned to Japan, he read numerous books on the subject of death, and in 1993 wrote a book on the relationship between life and death: Tenkuu Seiza—Hill Heaven. Among the books he read was Shinmon Aoki's autobiographical , which exposed Motoki to the world of the for the first time. Motoki said he found a sense of mystery and near-eroticism to the profession that he felt had an affinity with the film world.
Getting funding for the project was difficult because of the taboos against death, and the crew had to approach several companies before Departures was approved by Yasuhiro Mase and Toshiaki Nakazawa. According to the film's director, Yōjirō Takita, a consideration in taking on the film was the age of the crew: "we got to a certain point in our lives when death was creeping up to become a factor around us". Kundō Koyama was enlisted to provide the script, his first for a feature film; his previous experience had been in scripting for television and stage. Takita, who had begun his career in the pink film genre before entering mainstream filmmaking in 1986 with Comic Magazine, took on the director's role in 2006, after producer Toshiaki Nakazawa presented him with the first draft of the script. In a later interview he stated "I wanted to make a film from the perspective of a person who deals with something so universal and yet is looked down upon, and even discriminated against". Although he knew of the encoffining ceremony, he had never seen one performed.
Production of Departures took ten years, and the work was ultimately only loosely adapted from Coffinman; later revisions of the script were worked on collaboratively by the cast and crew. Although the religious aspects of funerals were important in the source work, the film did not include them. This, together with the fact that filming was completed in Yamagata and not Aoki's home prefecture of Toyama, led to tensions between the production staff and the author. Aoki expressed concern that the film was unable to address "the ultimate fate of the dead". The first edition of the book was broken into three parts; the third, "Light and Life", was an essay-like Buddhist musing on life and death, regarding the "light" seen when one perceived the integration of life and death, that is absent from the film. Aoki believed the film's humanistic approach did away with the religious aspects that were central to the book—the emphasis on maintaining connections between the living and the dead that he felt only religion could provide—and refused to allow his name and that of his book to be used. For the new title, Koyama coined the term as a euphemism for , derived from the words ("to send off") and ("person").
While the book and film share the same premise, the details differ considerably; Aoki attributed these changes to the studio making the story more commercial. Both feature a protagonist who endures uneasiness and prejudice because of his job as a , undergoes personal growth as a result of his experiences, and finds new meaning in life when confronted with death. In both, the main character deals with societal prejudices and misunderstandings over his profession. In Coffinman, the protagonist was the owner of a pub-café that had gone out of business; during a domestic squabble his wife threw a newspaper at him, in which he found an ad for the position. He finds pride in his work for the first time when dealing with the body of a former girlfriend. Koyama changed the protagonist from a bar owner to cellist as he wanted cello orchestration for the film score. Other differences included moving the setting from Toyoma to Yamagata for filming convenience, making the "letter-stone" a greater part of the plot, and an avoidance of heavier scenes, such as religious ones and one in which Aoki talks of seeing "light" in a swarm of maggots. Koyama also added the subplot in which Daigo is able to forgive his late father; taken from a novel he was writing, it was intended to close the story with "some sense of happiness".
Casting
Motoki, by then in his early 40s and having built a reputation as a realist, was cast as Daigo. Veteran actor Tsutomu Yamazaki was selected for the role of Sasaki; Takita had worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone (1993). Although the character of Mika was initially planned as being the same age as Daigo, the role went to pop singer Ryōko
Hirosue, who had previously acted in Takita's Himitsu (Secret) in 1999. Takita explained that a younger actress would better represent the lead couple's growth out of naivety. In a 2009 interview, Takita stated that he had cast "everyone who was on my wish list".
Motoki studied the art of encoffinment first-hand from a mortician, and assisted in an encoffining ceremony; he later stated that the experience imbued him with "a sense of mission ... to try to use as much human warmth as I could to restore [the deceased] to a lifelike presence for presentation to her family". Motoki then drilled himself by practising on his talent manager until he felt he had mastered the procedure, one whose intricate, delicate movements he compared to those of the Japanese tea ceremony. Takita attended funeral ceremonies to understand the feelings of bereaved families, while Yamazaki never participated in the encoffinment training. Motoki also learned how to play a cello for the earlier parts of the film.
To provide realistic bodies while preventing the corpses from moving, after a lengthy casting process the crew chose extras who could lie as still as possible. For the bath house owner Tsuyako Yamashita, this was not possible owing to the need to see her alive first, and a search for a body double was unfruitful. Ultimately, the crew used digital effects to transplant a still image of the actor during the character's funeral scene, allowing for a realistic effect.
Filming and post-production
The non-profit organization Sakata Location Box was established in December 2007 to handle on-location matters such as finding extras and negotiating locations. After deciding to shoot in Sakata, Location Box staff had two months to prepare for the eighty members of the film crew. Negotiations were slow, as many local property owners lost interest after learning that the filming would involve funeral scenes; those who agreed insisted that shooting take place outside of business hours.
Toyama was both the setting of Coffinman and Takita's home prefecture, but filming was done in Yamagata; this was largely because the national Nōkan Association, headquartered in Hokkaido, had a branch office in Sakata. Some preliminary scenes of snowy landscapes were shot in 2007, and primary filming began in April 2008, lasting 40 days. Locations included Kaminoyama, Sakata, Tsuruoka, Yuza, and Amarume. The NK Agent office was filmed in a three-storey, Western-style building in Sakata built between the mid-Meiji and Taishō periods (1880s–1920s). Originally a restaurant named Kappō Obata, it went out of business in 1998. The Kobayashis' café, called Concerto in the film, was located in Kaminoyama in a former beauty salon. From a hundred candidates, Takita chose it for its atmosphere as an aged building with a clear view of the nearby river and surrounding mountain range. The scene of the shooting of the training DVD took place in the Sakata Minato-za, Yamagata's first movie theatre, which had been closed since 2002.
The soundtrack to Departures was by Joe Hisaishi, a composer who had gained international recognition for his work with Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli. Before shooting began, Takita asked him to prepare a soundtrack which would represent the separation between Daigo and his father, as well as the mortician's love for his wife. Owing to the importance of cellos and cello music in the narrative, Hisaishi emphasized the instrument in his soundtrack; he described the challenge of centring a score around the cello as one of the most difficult things he had ever done. This score was played during shooting, which according to Takita "allowed [the crew] to visualize many of the emotions in the film" and thus contributed to the quality of the finished work.
Style
As they are the movie's "central dramatic piece", the encoffining ceremonies in Departures have received extensive commentary. Mike Scott, for instance, wrote in The Times-Picayune that these scenes were beautiful and heartbreaking, and Nicholas Barber of The Independent described them as "elegant and dignified". James Adams of The Globe and Mail wrote that they were a "dignified ritual of calming, hypnotic grace, with sleights of hand bordering on the magicianly". As the film continues, Paul Byrnes of The Sydney Morning Herald opined, the audience gains an improved knowledge of the ceremony and its importance. Viewers see that the ceremonies are not simply about preparing the body, but also about "bring[ing] dignity to death, respect to the deceased and solace to those who grieve", through which the encoffiners are able to help repair broken family ties and heal damage done to those left behind.
There is an idealization of the as presented in the film. In all but one case, the dead are either young or already made-up, such that "the viewer can easily tolerate these images on the screen". The one corpse that had not been found for several days is never shown on screen. No bodies show the gaunt figure of one who has died after a long illness, or the cuts and bruises of an accident victim. Japanologist Mark R. Mullins writes that the gratitude shown in Departures would probably not have occurred in real life; according to Coffinman, there "is nothing lower on the social scale than the mortician, and the truth of the matter is that [the Japanese people] fear the coffinman and the cremator just as much as death and the corpse".
In a montage, scenes of Daigo playing his childhood cello while sitting outdoors are interspersed with scenes of encoffining ceremonies. Byrnes believes that this scene was meant to increase the emotional charge of the film, and Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times considered it a "beautiful fantasy scene" through which the camera is "granted sudden freedom" from the generally standard shots. Yoshiko Okuyama of the University of Hawaii at Hilo found that Daigo's deft movements while playing the cello mirrored the high level of professionalism which he had reached. Several reviewers, such as Leigh Paatsch of the Herald Sun, questioned the need for the shot. Throughout the film's soundtrack, cello music remains dominant. Takita drew parallels between the instrument and the encoffining ceremony, stating that
Byrnes found that Departures used the symbol of the cherry blossom, a flower which blooms after the winter only to wither soon afterwards, to represent the transience of life; through this understanding, he wrote, Japanese people attempt to define their own existence. Natural symbols are further presented through the changing seasons, which "suggest delicate emotional changes" in the characters, as well as the letter-stones, which represent "love, communication, [and] the baton being passed from generation to generation". The film's settings are used to convey various sensations, including the solitude of the countryside and the intimacy of the public bath house. The colour white, manifested through snow, chrysanthemums, and other objects, is prominent in the film; Okuyama suggests that this, together with the classical music and ritualized hand gestures, represents the sacredness and purity of the death ceremonies.
Departures incorporates aspects of humour, an "unexpected" complement to the theme of death which Ebert suggested may be used to mask the audience's fears. Betsy Sharkey of the Los Angeles Times opines that, through this use of humour, the film avoids becoming too dark and instead acts as a "warmhearted blend" of whimsy and irony. This humour manifests in a variety of manners, such as a scene in which "a mortified Daigo, naked except for a pair of adult diapers, is the reluctant model" for an educational video regarding the encoffining process, as well as a scene in which Daigo discovers that the person he is preparing is a trans woman. Takita stated that the addition of humour was deliberate, as "humans are comical by nature", and that the humour did not conflict with the film's darker themes.
Themes
Several critics discussed the theme of death found in Departures. Scott highlighted the contrast between the taboo of death and the value of jobs related to it. He also noted the role of the encoffiner in showing "one last act of compassion" by presenting the dead in a way which preserved proud memories of their life. Initially, Daigo and his family are unable to overcome the taboos and their squeamishness when faced with death. Daigo is alienated from his wife and friends owing to traditional values. Ultimately it is through his work with the dead that Daigo finds fulfilment, and, as Peter Howell of the Toronto Star concluded, viewers realize that "death may be the termination of a life, but it's not the end of humanity". Okuyama writes that, in the end, the film (and the book on which it was based) serves as a "quiet yet persistent protest" against the discrimination which people who deal with death continue to face in modern Japan: death is a normal part of life, not something repulsive.
Along with this theme of death, Takita believed Departures was about life, about finding a lost sense of feeling human; Daigo gains a greater perspective on life and realises the diversity of people's lives only after encountering them in death. This life includes family bonds: Daigo's coming to terms with his father is a major motif, encoffinment scenes focus on the living family members rather than the dead, and even in the NK Agent office, conversation often revolves around family issues. Mika's pregnancy is the catalyst for her reconciliation with Daigo.
Ebert writes that, as with other Japanese films such as Tokyo Story (Yasujirō Ozu; 1953) and The Funeral (Juzo Itami; 1984), Departures focuses on the effect of death on the survivors; the afterlife is not given much discussion. He considered this indicative of a "deep and unsensational acceptance of death" in Japanese culture, one which is to be met not with extreme sorrow, but with contemplation. Takita stated that he intended to focus on the "dialogue between people who have passed away and the families that survive them". The film touches on the question of the afterlife: the cremator likens death to "a gateway", and Okuyama writes that in this sense the cremator is a gatekeeper and the encoffiners are guides.
Byrnes found that Departures leads one to question the extent of modernity's effect on Japanese culture, noting the undercurrent of "traditional attitudes and values" which permeated the film. Although the encoffining ceremony was traditionally completed by the dead person's family, a decreased interest in it opened a "niche market" for professional encoffiners. Okuyama wrote that, through this film, Takita was filling a "spiritual loss" caused by the departure from tradition in modern Japan. Tadao Sato connected this theme of modernity to that of death, explaining that the film's unusually non-bitter treatment of death demonstrated an evolution in Japanese feelings about life and death. He considered the film's treatment of as an artistic rather than religious ceremony to reflect the agnostic attitudes of modern Japan.
Release
The taboo subject of Departures made prospective distributors wary of taking on the film. Surveys conducted at pre-release screenings placed it at the bottom of the list of films audiences wanted to see. Ultimately, the film's debut at the Montreal World Film Festival in August 2008, which was rewarded with the festival's grand prize, provided the necessary incentive for distributors to select Departures; it finally received its domestic Japanese release on 13 September 2008. Even then, owing to the strong taboo against death, Takita was worried about the film's reception and did not anticipate commercial success, and others expressed concern that the film lacked a clear target audience.
This fear was misplaced; Departures debuted in Japan at fifth place, and during the fifth week of its run hit its peak position at third place. It sold 2.6 million tickets in Japan and generated 3.2 billion yen ($32 million) in box office revenue in the five months after its debut. The film was still showing in 31 theatres when its success at the Academy Awards in February 2009 renewed interest; the number of screens on which it was showing was increased to 188 and the film earned another ¥2.8 billion ($28 million), making a total of ¥6 billion ($60 million). This made Departures the highest-grossing domestic film and 15th top-grossing film overall for 2008. Executive producer Yasuhiro Mase credited this success to the effects of the Great Recession on Japan: viewers who were seeking employment after recently being downsized empathized with Daigo.
From the beginning an international release of the film was intended; as English is considered a key language in international film festivals, English subtitles were prepared. The translation was handled by Ian MacDougall. He believed that the workings of the mortician's world were as far from the experience of most Japanese as from that of a non-Japanese audience. As such he felt a faithful translation was best, without going far to accommodate foreign audiences to unfamiliar cross-cultural elements.
In September 2008, ContentFilm acquired the international rights to Departures, which by that time had been licensed for screening in countries such as Greece, Australia, and Malaysia; the film was ultimately screened in 36 countries. North American distribution was handled by Regent Releasing,
and Departures received a limited release in nine theatres beginning on 29 May 2009. Overall, the film earned almost $1.5 million during its North American run before closing on 24 June 2010. In the United Kingdom, Departures premiered on 4 December 2009 and was distributed by Arrow Film Distributors. The film attained a worldwide gross of nearly $70 million.
Adaptations and other media
Before Departures premiered, a manga adaptation by Akira Sasō was serialized in twelve instalments in the bi-weekly Big Comic Superior, from February to August 2008. Sasō agreed to take on the adaptation as he was impressed by the script. He had the opportunity to view the film before beginning the adaptation, and came to feel that a too-literal adaptation would not be appropriate. He made changes to the settings and physical appearances of the characters, and increased the focus on the role of music in the story. Later in 2008 the serial was compiled in a 280-page volume released by Shogakukan.
On 10 September 2008, three days before the Japanese premiere of Departures, a soundtrack album for the film—containing nineteen tracks from the film and featuring an orchestral performance by members of the Tokyo Metropolitan and NHK Symphony Orchestras—was released by Universal Music Japan. Pop singer Ai provided lyrics to music by Hisaishi for the image song "Okuribito"; performed by Ai with an arrangement for cellos and orchestra, the single was released by Universal Sigma and Island Records on 10 September 2008 along with a promotional video. Sheet music for the film's soundtrack was published by KMP in 2008 (for cello and piano) and Onkyō in 2009 (for cello, violin, and piano).
Shinobu Momose, a writer specializing in novelizations, adapted Departures as a novel. It was published by Shogakukan in 2008. That year the company also released Ishibumi (Letter-Stone), an illustrated book on the themes of the film told from the point of view of a talking stone; this book was written by Koyama and illustrated by Seitarō Kurota. The following year Shogakukan published an edition of Koyama's first draft of the screenplay. A stage version of the film, also titled Departures, was written by Koyama and directed by Takita. It debuted at the Akasaka ACT Theater on 29 May 2010, featuring kabuki actor Nakamura Kankurō as Daigo and Rena Tanaka as Mika. The story, set seven years after the close of the film, concerns the insecurities of the couple's son over Daigo's profession.
Home releases
A dual-layer DVD release, with special features including trailers, making-of documentaries, and a recorded encoffining ceremony, was released in Japan on 18 March 2009. A North American DVD edition of Departures, including an interview with the director, was released by Koch Vision on 12 January 2010; the film was not dubbed, but rather presented with Japanese audio and English subtitles. A Blu-ray edition followed in May. This home release received mixed reviews. Franck Tabouring of DVD Verdict was highly complimentary toward the film and the digital transfer, considering its visuals clean and sharp and the audio (particularly the music) "a pleasure to listen to". Thomas Spurlin, writing for DVD Talk, rated the release as "Highly Recommended", focusing on the "unexpected powerhouse" of the film's quality. Another writer for the website, Jeremy Mathews, advised readers to "Skip It", finding the DVD an apt presentation of the source material—which he considered to "reduce itself to clumsy, mug-filled attempts at broad comedy and awkward, repetitive tear-jerker scenes". Both DVD Talk reviews agreed that the audio and visual quality were less than perfect, and that the DVD's extra contents were poor; Mathews described the interview as the director answering "dull questions in a dull manner".
Reception
Reviews
Departures received generally positive reviews from critics. The review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes sampled 108 reviewers and judged an 80% approval rating, with an average score of 7.06 out of 10. The website's critical consensus states, "If slow and predictable, Departures is a quiet, life affirming story". The aggregator Metacritic gives the film 68 out of 100, based on 27 reviews.
Domestic reviews
Initial reviews in Japan were positive. In Kinema Junpo, Tokitoshi Shioda called Departures a turning point in Takita's career, a human drama capturing both laughter and tears, while in the same publication Masaaki Nomura described the film as a work of supple depth that perhaps indicated a move into Takita's mature period, praising the director for capturing a human feeling from Motoki's earnest encoffining performance. Writing in the Yomiuri Shimbun, Seichi Fukunaga complimented Takita for using a moving, emotive story laden with humour to reverse prejudice against a taboo subject. He commended the performances of Motoki and Yamazaki, particularly their playing the serious Daigo against the befuddled Sasaki.
In the Asahi Shimbun, Sadao Yamane found the film admirably constructed and extolled the actors' performances. Yamane was especially impressed by the delicate hand movements Motoki displayed when he performed the encoffinment ceremony. Tomomi Katsuta in the Mainichi Shimbun found Departures a meaningful story that made the viewer think about the different lives people live, and the significance of someone dying. Writing in the same newspaper, Takashi Suzuki thought the film memorable but predictable, and Yūji Takahashi opined that the film's ability to find nobility in a prejudiced subject was an excellent accomplishment. Shōko Watanabe gave Departures four out of five stars in The Nikkei newspaper, praising the actors' unforced performances.
Following the success of Departures at the Academy Awards, critic Saburō Kawamoto found the film to show a Japan that the Japanese could relate to, in that, in a nation whose customs put great weight on visits to ancestral graves, a death was always a family affair. He believed the film had a samurai beauty to it, with its many scenes of families sitting seiza. Critic gave the film a 90% rating, and credited the performances of the two leads for much of the film's success. He praised its emotional impact and its balance of seriousness and humour, but was more critical of the father–son relationship, which he considered overdone. Maeda attributed the film's international success, despite its heavily Japanese content, to its clear depiction of Japanese views on life and death. He found the film's conceptual scale to have an affinity to that of Hollywood (something he considered lacking in most Japanese films).
Reviewer Takurō Yamaguchi gave the film an 85% rating, and found the treatment of its subject charming. He praised its quiet emotional impact and humour, the interweaving of northern Japan scenery with Hisaishi's cello score, and the film's Japanese spirit. Media critic found a moving beauty in the dextrous hand movements Sasaki teaches Daigo for preparing bodies, and believed that a prior reading of the original script would deepen the viewer's understanding of the action. Mark Schilling of The Japan Times gave the film four stars out of five, praising the acting though criticizing the apparent idealization of the encoffiners. He concluded that the film "makes a good case for the Japanese way of death."
International reviews
Internationally, Departures has received mixed—mostly positive—reviews. Ebert gave the film a perfect four stars, describing it as "rock-solid in its fundamentals" and highlighting its cinematography, music, and the casting of Yamazaki as Sasaki. He found that the result "functions flawlessly" and is "excellent at achieving the universal ends of narrative". Derek Armstrong of AllMovie gave the film four stars out of five, describing it as "a film of lyrical beauty" which is "bursting with tiny pleasures". In a four-star review, Byrnes described the film as a "moving meditation on the transience of life" which showed "great humanity", concluding "it's a beautiful film but take two hankies." Howell gave the film three stars out of four, praising its acting and cinematography. He wrote that Departures "quietly subverts aesthetic and emotional expectations" without ever losing its "high-minded intent". In a three-and-a-half star review, Claudia Puig of USA Today described Departures as a "beautifully composed" film which, although predictable, was "emotional, poignant" and "profoundly affecting".
Philip French of The Observer considered Departures to be a "moving, gently amusing" film, which the director had "fastidiously composed". Sharkey found it an "emotionally wrenching trip with a quiet man", one which was well cast with "actors who move lightly, gracefully" in the various settings. In Entertainment Weekly, Owen Gleiberman gave the film a B−, considering it "tender and, at times, rather squishy", though certain to affect anyone who had lost a parent. Barber found Departures to be "heartfelt, unpretentious, [and] slyly funny", worth watching (though ultimately predictable). Mike Scott gave the film three and a half stars out of four, finding that it was "a surprisingly uplifting examination of life and loss", with humour which perfectly complemented the "moving and meaningful story", but lent itself to characters "mug[ging] for the camera".
Meanwhile, Kevin Maher of The Times described Departures as a "verklempt comedy" with wearisome "push-button crying", though he considered it saved by the quality of the acting, "stately" directing, and "dreamy" soundtrack. Another mixed review was published in The Daily Telegraph, which described the film as a "safe and emotionally generous crowd-pleaser" that was not worthy of its Academy Award. Philip Kennicott wrote in The Washington Post that the film was "as polished as it is heavy-handed", predictable yet ready to break taboos, immersed in death yet incapable of escaping "the maddening Japanese taste for sentimentality". In Variety, Eddie Cockrell wrote that the film offered "fascinating glimpses" of the encoffining ceremony but should have had a much shorter runtime. Paatsch gave Departures three stars out of five, describing it as a "quaintly mournful flick" that "unfolds with a delicacy and precision that slowly captivates the viewer" but considering some scenes, such as the montage, "needlessly showy flourishes". Edward Porter of The Sunday Times wrote that the film's success at the Academy Awards could be blamed on "a case of the Academy favouring bland sentimentality".
The A.V. Club Keith Phipps gave Departures a C−, writing that though it featured "handsome shots of provincial life" and encoffining scenes with a "poetic quality", ultimately the film "drips from one overstated emotion to the next". A. O. Scott wrote in The New York Times that the film was "perfectly mediocre", predictable, and banal in its combination of humour and melodrama. Despite its sometimes touching moments, he considered Departures "interesting mainly as an index of the Academy’s hopelessly timid and conventional tastes". Tony Rayns of Film Comment gave a scathing review in which he denounced the script as "embarrassingly clunky and obvious", the acting as merely "adequate", and the film as but a "paean to the good-looking corpse". Adams gave Departures two out of four stars, praising the emotionally and visually arresting scenes of encoffinments and "loving attention to the textures, tastes and behaviours of semi-rural Japan" but condemning the predictability of the plot; he wrote that "Forty-five minutes in, [viewers have] prepared a mental checklist of every turn that Daigo Kobayashi will face, then negotiate – and be danged if Takita doesn't deliver on every one".
Awards
At the 32nd Japan Academy Prize ceremony held in February 2009, Departures dominated the competition. It received a total of thirteen nominations, winning ten, including Picture of the Year, Screenplay of the Year (Koyama), Director of the Year (Takita), and Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role (Motoki). In the Outstanding Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role category, Hirosue lost to Tae Kimura of All Around Us, while in the Outstanding Achievement in Art Direction category Departures Tomio Ogawa lost to Paco and the Magical Book Towako Kuwashima. Hisaishi, nominated for two Outstanding Achievement in Music awards, won for his scoring of Studio Ghibli's animated film Ponyo. In response to the wins, Motoki said "It feels as if everything miraculously came together in balance this time with Okuribito".
Departures was submitted to the 81st Academy Awards as Japan's submission for the Best Foreign Language Film award. Although eleven previous Japanese films had won Academy Awards in other categories, such as Best Animated Feature or Best Costume Design, the as-yet unattained Best Foreign Language Film award was highly coveted in the Japanese film industry. Departures was not expected to win, owing to strong competition from the Israeli and French submissions (Ari Folman's Waltz with Bashir and Laurent Cantet's The Class, respectively), but was ultimately the victor at the February 2009 ceremony. This was considered a surprise by several film critics, and The New York Times David Itzkoff termed Departures "The Film That Lost Your Oscars Pool for You". Motoki, who was expecting the "wonderful" Israeli submission to win, was also surprised; he described himself as a "hanger-on who just observes the ceremony", and regretted "not walk[ing] with more confidence" upon his arrival.
Departures received recognition at a variety of film festivals, including the Audience Choice Award at the 28th Hawaii International Film Festival, the Audience Choice Award at the 15th Vilnius International Film Festival, the Grand Prix des Amériques at the 32nd Montreal World Film Festival, and Best Narrative Film at the 20th Palm Springs International Film Festival. Motoki was selected as best actor at several ceremonies, including at the Asian Film Awards, the Asia Pacific Screen Awards, and the Blue Ribbon Awards; he was also viewers' choice for best actor at the Golden Rooster Awards. At the 29th Hong Kong Film Awards, Departures was selected as Best Asian Film, beating three Chinese films and Ponyo. Following the 21st Nikkan Sports Film Award ceremony, in which Departures won Best Film and Best Director, Takita expressed surprise at the film's awards, saying "I did not know how well my work would be accepted." By December 2009 the film had won 98 awards.
Impact
After the film's success, Sakata Location Box set up a hospitality service called Mukaebito—a pun on the film's Japanese title indicating "one who greets or picks up" another, rather than "one who sends off". The service maintains shooting locations and provides maps of these locations for tourists. In 2009, Location Box opened the building that served as the NK Agent office to the public. For a fee, visitors could enter and view props from the film. Under a job creation program, between 2009 and 2013 the organization received ¥30 million from Yamagata Prefecture and ¥8 million from Sakata City for the building's maintenance and administration. The site attracted nearly 120,000 visitors in 2009, though numbers quickly fell; in 2013 there were fewer than 9,000 visitors. Safety fears due to the building's age led to the Sakata municipal government ending the organization's lease, and the building was closed again at the end of March 2014. At the time, the City Tourism division was considering options, such as limiting visits to the first two floors. The building used as the Concerto café has been open to the public since 2009 as the Kaminoyama Concerto Museum, and the Sakata Minato-za cinema has also been opened to tourists. Takita's hometown of Takaoka, Toyama, maintains a Film Resources Museum; staff have reported that at times over a hundred Takita fans visit per day.
The film's success generated greater interest in encoffining and the . Even the model of hearse driven in the film was merchandised: the Mitsuoka Limousine Type 2-04, a smaller, less expensive version of the film's vehicle, was put on the market on 24 February 2009. The manufacturer, Mitsuoka Motors, is located in Takita's home prefecture of Toyama. In 2013, Kouki Kimura, from a family of , founded the Okuribito Academy together with nurse and entrepreneur Kei Takamaru. It offers training in encoffining, embalming, and related practices.
Explanatory notes
References
Works cited
External links
(via the Internet Archive)
2008 films
2008 drama films
Japanese films
Japanese drama films
Japanese-language films
Best Film Kinema Junpo Award winners
Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award winners
2008 black comedy films
Films scored by Joe Hisaishi
Films about cellos and cellists
Films about death
Films about funerals
Films set in Tokyo
Films set in Yamagata Prefecture
Films shot in Japan
Films directed by Yōjirō Takita
Picture of the Year Japan Academy Prize winners
Films with screenplays by Kundō Koyama
Shochiku films
Dentsu films
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"\"What Did I Do to You?\" is a song recorded by British singer Lisa Stansfield for her 1989 album, Affection. It was written by Stansfield, Ian Devaney and Andy Morris, and produced by Devaney and Morris. The song was released as the fourth European single on 30 April 1990. It included three previously unreleased songs written by Stansfield, Devaney and Morris: \"My Apple Heart,\" \"Lay Me Down\" and \"Something's Happenin'.\" \"What Did I Do to You?\" was remixed by Mark Saunders and by the Grammy Award-winning American house music DJ and producer, David Morales. The single became a top forty hit in the European countries reaching number eighteen in Finland, number twenty in Ireland and number twenty-five in the United Kingdom. \"What Did I Do to You?\" was also released in Japan.\n\nIn 2014, the remixes of \"What Did I Do to You?\" were included on the deluxe 2CD + DVD re-release of Affection and on People Hold On ... The Remix Anthology. They were also featured on The Collection 1989–2003 box set (2014), including previously unreleased Red Zone Mix by David Morales.\n\nCritical reception\nThe song received positive reviews from music critics. Matthew Hocter from Albumism viewed it as a \"upbeat offering\". David Giles from Music Week said it is \"beautifully performed\" by Stansfield. A reviewer from Reading Eagle wrote that \"What Did I Do to You?\" \"would be right at home on the \"Saturday Night Fever\" soundtrack.\"\n\nMusic video\nA music video was produced to promote the single, directed by Philip Richardson, who had previously directed the videos for \"All Around the World\" and \"Live Together\". It features Stansfield with her kiss curls, dressed in a white outfit and performing with her band on a stage in front of a jumping audience. The video was later published on Stansfield's official YouTube channel in November 2009. It has amassed more than 1,6 million views as of October 2021.\n\nTrack listings\n\n European/UK 7\" single\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Mark Saunders Remix Edit) – 4:20\n\"Something's Happenin'\" – 3:59\n\n European/UK/Japanese CD single\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Mark Saunders Remix Edit) – 4:20\n\"My Apple Heart\" – 5:19\n\"Lay Me Down\" – 4:17\n\"Something's Happenin'\" – 3:59\n\n UK 10\" single\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Mark Saunders Remix) – 5:52\n\"My Apple Heart\" – 5:19\n\"Lay Me Down\" – 4:17\n\"Something's Happenin'\" – 3:59\n\n European/UK 12\" single\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Morales Mix) – 7:59\n\"My Apple Heart\" – 4:22\n\"Lay Me Down\" – 3:19\n\"Something's Happenin'\" – 3:15\n\n UK 12\" promotional single\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Morales Mix) – 7:59\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Anti Poll Tax Dub) – 6:31\n\n Other remixes\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Red Zone Mix) – 7:45\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\nLisa Stansfield songs\n1990 singles\nSongs written by Lisa Stansfield\n1989 songs\nArista Records singles\nSongs written by Ian Devaney\nSongs written by Andy Morris (musician)",
"\"What Would Steve Do?\" is the second single released by Mumm-Ra on Columbia Records, which was released on February 19, 2007. It is a re-recorded version of the self-release they did in April 2006. It reached #40 in the UK Singles Chart, making it their highest charting single.\n\nTrack listings\nAll songs written by Mumm-Ra.\n\nCD\n\"What Would Steve Do?\"\n\"Cute As\"\n\"Without You\"\n\n7\"\n\"What Would Steve Do?\"\n\"What Would Steve Do? (Floorboard Mix)\"\n\nGatefold 7\"\n\"What Would Steve Do?\"\n\"Cute As\"\n\nReferences\n\n2007 singles\nMumm-Ra (band) songs\n2006 songs\nColumbia Records singles"
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| C_eb65e42fda3a4153b514fd8bed8563ea_0 | Who else was cast in the film? | 5 | Besides Takita and Yamazaki, who else was cast in the film We Are Not Alone? | Departures (2008 film) | Motoki, by then in his early 40s and having built a reputation as a realist, was cast as Daigo. Veteran actor Tsutomu Yamazaki was selected for the role of Sasaki; Takita had worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone (1993). Although the character of Mika was initially planned as being the same age as Daigo, the role went to pop singer Ryoko Hirosue, who had previously acted in Takita's Himitsu (Secret) in 1999. Takita explained that a younger actress would better represent the lead couple's growth out of naivety. In a 2009 interview, Takita stated that he had cast "everyone who was on my wish list". Motoki studied the art of encoffinment first-hand from a mortician, and assisted in an encoffining ceremony; he later stated that the experience imbued him with "a sense of mission ... to try to use as much human warmth as I could to restore [the deceased] to a lifelike presence for presentation to her family". Motoki then drilled himself by practising on his talent manager until he felt he had mastered the procedure, one whose intricate, delicate movements he compared to those of the Japanese tea ceremony. Takita attended funeral ceremonies to understand the feelings of bereaved families, while Yamazaki never participated in the encoffinment training. Motoki also learned how to play a cello for the earlier parts of the film. To provide realistic bodies while preventing the corpses from moving, after a lengthy casting process the crew chose extras who could lie as still as possible. For the bath house owner Tsuyako Yamashita, this was not possible owing to the need to see her alive first, and a search for a body double was unfruitful. Ultimately, the crew used digital effects to transplant a still image of the actor during the character's funeral scene, allowing for a realistic effect. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | is a 2008 Japanese drama film directed by Yōjirō Takita and starring Masahiro Motoki, Ryōko Hirosue, and Tsutomu Yamazaki. The film follows a young man who returns to his hometown after a failed career as a cellist and stumbles across work as a —a traditional Japanese ritual mortician. He is subjected to prejudice from those around him, including from his wife, because of strong social taboos against people who deal with death. Eventually he repairs these interpersonal connections through the beauty and dignity of his work.
The idea for Departures arose after Motoki, affected by having seen a funeral ceremony along the Ganges when travelling in India, read widely on the subject of death and came across Coffinman. He felt that the story would adapt well to film, and Departures was finished a decade later. Because of Japanese prejudices against those who handle the dead, distributors were reluctant to release it—until a surprise grand prize win at the Montreal World Film Festival in August 2008. The following month the film opened in Japan, where it went on to win the Academy Prize for Picture of the Year and become the year's highest-grossing domestic film. This success was topped in 2009, when it became the first Japanese production to win the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
Departures received positive reviews, with aggregator Rotten Tomatoes indicating an 80% approval rating from 108 reviews. Critics praised the film's humour, the beauty of the encoffining ceremony, and the quality of the acting, but some took issue with its predictability and overt sentimentality. Reviewers highlighted a variety of themes, but focused mainly on the humanity that death brings to the surface and how it strengthens family bonds. The success of Departures led to the establishment of tourist attractions at sites connected to the film and increased interest in encoffining ceremonies, as well as adaptation of the story for various media, including manga and a stage play.
Plot
Daigo Kobayashi (Masahiro Motoki) loses his job as a cellist when his orchestra is disbanded. He and his wife Mika (Ryōko Hirosue) move from Tokyo to his hometown in Yamagata, where they live in his childhood home that was left to him when his mother died two years earlier. It is fronted by a coffee shop that Daigo's father had operated before he ran off with a waitress when Daigo was six; since then the two have had no contact. Daigo feels hatred towards his father and guilt for not taking better care of his mother. He still keeps a "stone-letter"—a stone which is said to convey meaning through its texture—which his father had given him many years before.
Daigo finds an advertisement for a job "assisting departures". Assuming it to be a job in a travel agency, he goes to the interview at the NK Agent office and learns from the secretary, Yuriko Kamimura (Kimiko Yo), that he will be preparing bodies for cremation in a ceremony known as encoffinment. Though reluctant, Daigo is hired on the spot and receives a cash advance from his new boss, Sasaki (Tsutomu Yamazaki). Daigo is furtive about his duties and hides the true nature of the job from Mika.
His first assignment is to assist with the encoffinment of a woman who died at home and remained undiscovered for two weeks. He is beset with nausea and later humiliated when strangers on a bus detect an unsavoury scent on him. To clean himself, he visits a public bath which he had frequented as a child. It is owned by Tsuyako Yamashita (Kazuko Yoshiyuki), the mother of one of Daigo's former classmates.
Over time, Daigo becomes comfortable with his profession as he completes a number of assignments and experiences the gratitude of the families of the deceased. Though he faces social ostracism, Daigo refuses to quit, even after Mika discovers a training DVD in which he plays a corpse and leaves him to return to her parents' home in Tokyo. Daigo's former classmate Yamashita (Tetta Sugimoto) insists that the mortician find a more respectable line of work and, until then, avoids him and his family.
After a few months, Mika returns and announces that she is pregnant. She expresses hope that Daigo will find a job of which their child can be proud. During the ensuing argument, Daigo receives a call for an encoffinment for Mrs Yamashita. Daigo prepares her body in front of both the Yamashita family and Mika, who had known the public bath owner. The ritual earns him the respect of all present, and Mika stops insisting that Daigo change jobs.
Sometime later, they learn of the death of Daigo's father. Daigo experiences renewed feelings of anger and tells the others at the NK office that he refuses to deal with his father's body. Feeling ashamed of having abandoned her own son long ago, Yuriko tells this to Daigo in an effort to change his mind. Daigo berates Yuriko and storms out before collecting himself and turning around. He goes with Mika to another village to see the body. Daigo is at first unable to recognize him, but takes offence when local funeral workers are careless with the body. He insists on dressing it himself, and while doing so finds a stone-letter that he had given to his father, held tight in the dead man's hands. The childhood memory of his father's face returns to him, and after he finishes the ceremony, Daigo gently presses the stone-letter to Mika's pregnant belly.
Production
Cultural background
Japanese funerals are highly ritualized affairs which are generally—though not always—conducted in accordance with Buddhist rites. In preparation for the funeral, the body is washed and the orifices are blocked with cotton or gauze. The encoffining ritual (called nōkan), as depicted in Departures, is rarely performed, and even then only in rural areas. This ceremony is not standardized, but generally involves professional ritually preparing the body, dressing the dead in white, and sometimes applying make-up. The body is then put on dry ice in a casket, along with personal possessions and items deemed necessary for the trip to the afterlife.
Despite the importance of death rituals, in traditional Japanese culture the subject is considered unclean as everything related to death is thought to be a source of (defilement). After coming into contact with the dead, individuals must cleanse themselves through purifying rituals. People who work closely with the dead, such as morticians, are thus considered unclean, and during the feudal era those whose work was related to death became burakumin (untouchables), forced to live in their own hamlets and discriminated against by wider society. Despite a cultural shift since the Meiji Restoration of 1868, the stigma of death still has considerable force within Japanese society, and discrimination against the untouchables has continued.
Until 1972, most deaths were dealt with by families, funeral homes, or . , about 80% of deaths occur in hospitals, and preparation of the bodies is frequently done by hospital staff; in such cases, the family often does not see the body until the funeral. A 1998 survey found that 29.5% of the Japanese population believed in an afterlife, and a further 40% wanted to believe; belief was highest . Belief in the existence of a soul (54%) and a connection between the worlds of the living and the dead (64.9%) was likewise common.
Conception and preproduction
In the early 1990s, a 27-year-old Motoki and his friend travelled to India; just before going, at the friend's recommendation he read Shin'ya Fujiwara's Memento Mori (Latin for "remember that you will die"). While in India, he visited Varanasi, where he saw a ceremony in which the dead were cremated and their ashes floated down the Ganges. Witnessing this ceremony of death against a backdrop of bustling crowds going about their lives deeply affected Motoki. When he returned to Japan, he read numerous books on the subject of death, and in 1993 wrote a book on the relationship between life and death: Tenkuu Seiza—Hill Heaven. Among the books he read was Shinmon Aoki's autobiographical , which exposed Motoki to the world of the for the first time. Motoki said he found a sense of mystery and near-eroticism to the profession that he felt had an affinity with the film world.
Getting funding for the project was difficult because of the taboos against death, and the crew had to approach several companies before Departures was approved by Yasuhiro Mase and Toshiaki Nakazawa. According to the film's director, Yōjirō Takita, a consideration in taking on the film was the age of the crew: "we got to a certain point in our lives when death was creeping up to become a factor around us". Kundō Koyama was enlisted to provide the script, his first for a feature film; his previous experience had been in scripting for television and stage. Takita, who had begun his career in the pink film genre before entering mainstream filmmaking in 1986 with Comic Magazine, took on the director's role in 2006, after producer Toshiaki Nakazawa presented him with the first draft of the script. In a later interview he stated "I wanted to make a film from the perspective of a person who deals with something so universal and yet is looked down upon, and even discriminated against". Although he knew of the encoffining ceremony, he had never seen one performed.
Production of Departures took ten years, and the work was ultimately only loosely adapted from Coffinman; later revisions of the script were worked on collaboratively by the cast and crew. Although the religious aspects of funerals were important in the source work, the film did not include them. This, together with the fact that filming was completed in Yamagata and not Aoki's home prefecture of Toyama, led to tensions between the production staff and the author. Aoki expressed concern that the film was unable to address "the ultimate fate of the dead". The first edition of the book was broken into three parts; the third, "Light and Life", was an essay-like Buddhist musing on life and death, regarding the "light" seen when one perceived the integration of life and death, that is absent from the film. Aoki believed the film's humanistic approach did away with the religious aspects that were central to the book—the emphasis on maintaining connections between the living and the dead that he felt only religion could provide—and refused to allow his name and that of his book to be used. For the new title, Koyama coined the term as a euphemism for , derived from the words ("to send off") and ("person").
While the book and film share the same premise, the details differ considerably; Aoki attributed these changes to the studio making the story more commercial. Both feature a protagonist who endures uneasiness and prejudice because of his job as a , undergoes personal growth as a result of his experiences, and finds new meaning in life when confronted with death. In both, the main character deals with societal prejudices and misunderstandings over his profession. In Coffinman, the protagonist was the owner of a pub-café that had gone out of business; during a domestic squabble his wife threw a newspaper at him, in which he found an ad for the position. He finds pride in his work for the first time when dealing with the body of a former girlfriend. Koyama changed the protagonist from a bar owner to cellist as he wanted cello orchestration for the film score. Other differences included moving the setting from Toyoma to Yamagata for filming convenience, making the "letter-stone" a greater part of the plot, and an avoidance of heavier scenes, such as religious ones and one in which Aoki talks of seeing "light" in a swarm of maggots. Koyama also added the subplot in which Daigo is able to forgive his late father; taken from a novel he was writing, it was intended to close the story with "some sense of happiness".
Casting
Motoki, by then in his early 40s and having built a reputation as a realist, was cast as Daigo. Veteran actor Tsutomu Yamazaki was selected for the role of Sasaki; Takita had worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone (1993). Although the character of Mika was initially planned as being the same age as Daigo, the role went to pop singer Ryōko
Hirosue, who had previously acted in Takita's Himitsu (Secret) in 1999. Takita explained that a younger actress would better represent the lead couple's growth out of naivety. In a 2009 interview, Takita stated that he had cast "everyone who was on my wish list".
Motoki studied the art of encoffinment first-hand from a mortician, and assisted in an encoffining ceremony; he later stated that the experience imbued him with "a sense of mission ... to try to use as much human warmth as I could to restore [the deceased] to a lifelike presence for presentation to her family". Motoki then drilled himself by practising on his talent manager until he felt he had mastered the procedure, one whose intricate, delicate movements he compared to those of the Japanese tea ceremony. Takita attended funeral ceremonies to understand the feelings of bereaved families, while Yamazaki never participated in the encoffinment training. Motoki also learned how to play a cello for the earlier parts of the film.
To provide realistic bodies while preventing the corpses from moving, after a lengthy casting process the crew chose extras who could lie as still as possible. For the bath house owner Tsuyako Yamashita, this was not possible owing to the need to see her alive first, and a search for a body double was unfruitful. Ultimately, the crew used digital effects to transplant a still image of the actor during the character's funeral scene, allowing for a realistic effect.
Filming and post-production
The non-profit organization Sakata Location Box was established in December 2007 to handle on-location matters such as finding extras and negotiating locations. After deciding to shoot in Sakata, Location Box staff had two months to prepare for the eighty members of the film crew. Negotiations were slow, as many local property owners lost interest after learning that the filming would involve funeral scenes; those who agreed insisted that shooting take place outside of business hours.
Toyama was both the setting of Coffinman and Takita's home prefecture, but filming was done in Yamagata; this was largely because the national Nōkan Association, headquartered in Hokkaido, had a branch office in Sakata. Some preliminary scenes of snowy landscapes were shot in 2007, and primary filming began in April 2008, lasting 40 days. Locations included Kaminoyama, Sakata, Tsuruoka, Yuza, and Amarume. The NK Agent office was filmed in a three-storey, Western-style building in Sakata built between the mid-Meiji and Taishō periods (1880s–1920s). Originally a restaurant named Kappō Obata, it went out of business in 1998. The Kobayashis' café, called Concerto in the film, was located in Kaminoyama in a former beauty salon. From a hundred candidates, Takita chose it for its atmosphere as an aged building with a clear view of the nearby river and surrounding mountain range. The scene of the shooting of the training DVD took place in the Sakata Minato-za, Yamagata's first movie theatre, which had been closed since 2002.
The soundtrack to Departures was by Joe Hisaishi, a composer who had gained international recognition for his work with Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli. Before shooting began, Takita asked him to prepare a soundtrack which would represent the separation between Daigo and his father, as well as the mortician's love for his wife. Owing to the importance of cellos and cello music in the narrative, Hisaishi emphasized the instrument in his soundtrack; he described the challenge of centring a score around the cello as one of the most difficult things he had ever done. This score was played during shooting, which according to Takita "allowed [the crew] to visualize many of the emotions in the film" and thus contributed to the quality of the finished work.
Style
As they are the movie's "central dramatic piece", the encoffining ceremonies in Departures have received extensive commentary. Mike Scott, for instance, wrote in The Times-Picayune that these scenes were beautiful and heartbreaking, and Nicholas Barber of The Independent described them as "elegant and dignified". James Adams of The Globe and Mail wrote that they were a "dignified ritual of calming, hypnotic grace, with sleights of hand bordering on the magicianly". As the film continues, Paul Byrnes of The Sydney Morning Herald opined, the audience gains an improved knowledge of the ceremony and its importance. Viewers see that the ceremonies are not simply about preparing the body, but also about "bring[ing] dignity to death, respect to the deceased and solace to those who grieve", through which the encoffiners are able to help repair broken family ties and heal damage done to those left behind.
There is an idealization of the as presented in the film. In all but one case, the dead are either young or already made-up, such that "the viewer can easily tolerate these images on the screen". The one corpse that had not been found for several days is never shown on screen. No bodies show the gaunt figure of one who has died after a long illness, or the cuts and bruises of an accident victim. Japanologist Mark R. Mullins writes that the gratitude shown in Departures would probably not have occurred in real life; according to Coffinman, there "is nothing lower on the social scale than the mortician, and the truth of the matter is that [the Japanese people] fear the coffinman and the cremator just as much as death and the corpse".
In a montage, scenes of Daigo playing his childhood cello while sitting outdoors are interspersed with scenes of encoffining ceremonies. Byrnes believes that this scene was meant to increase the emotional charge of the film, and Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times considered it a "beautiful fantasy scene" through which the camera is "granted sudden freedom" from the generally standard shots. Yoshiko Okuyama of the University of Hawaii at Hilo found that Daigo's deft movements while playing the cello mirrored the high level of professionalism which he had reached. Several reviewers, such as Leigh Paatsch of the Herald Sun, questioned the need for the shot. Throughout the film's soundtrack, cello music remains dominant. Takita drew parallels between the instrument and the encoffining ceremony, stating that
Byrnes found that Departures used the symbol of the cherry blossom, a flower which blooms after the winter only to wither soon afterwards, to represent the transience of life; through this understanding, he wrote, Japanese people attempt to define their own existence. Natural symbols are further presented through the changing seasons, which "suggest delicate emotional changes" in the characters, as well as the letter-stones, which represent "love, communication, [and] the baton being passed from generation to generation". The film's settings are used to convey various sensations, including the solitude of the countryside and the intimacy of the public bath house. The colour white, manifested through snow, chrysanthemums, and other objects, is prominent in the film; Okuyama suggests that this, together with the classical music and ritualized hand gestures, represents the sacredness and purity of the death ceremonies.
Departures incorporates aspects of humour, an "unexpected" complement to the theme of death which Ebert suggested may be used to mask the audience's fears. Betsy Sharkey of the Los Angeles Times opines that, through this use of humour, the film avoids becoming too dark and instead acts as a "warmhearted blend" of whimsy and irony. This humour manifests in a variety of manners, such as a scene in which "a mortified Daigo, naked except for a pair of adult diapers, is the reluctant model" for an educational video regarding the encoffining process, as well as a scene in which Daigo discovers that the person he is preparing is a trans woman. Takita stated that the addition of humour was deliberate, as "humans are comical by nature", and that the humour did not conflict with the film's darker themes.
Themes
Several critics discussed the theme of death found in Departures. Scott highlighted the contrast between the taboo of death and the value of jobs related to it. He also noted the role of the encoffiner in showing "one last act of compassion" by presenting the dead in a way which preserved proud memories of their life. Initially, Daigo and his family are unable to overcome the taboos and their squeamishness when faced with death. Daigo is alienated from his wife and friends owing to traditional values. Ultimately it is through his work with the dead that Daigo finds fulfilment, and, as Peter Howell of the Toronto Star concluded, viewers realize that "death may be the termination of a life, but it's not the end of humanity". Okuyama writes that, in the end, the film (and the book on which it was based) serves as a "quiet yet persistent protest" against the discrimination which people who deal with death continue to face in modern Japan: death is a normal part of life, not something repulsive.
Along with this theme of death, Takita believed Departures was about life, about finding a lost sense of feeling human; Daigo gains a greater perspective on life and realises the diversity of people's lives only after encountering them in death. This life includes family bonds: Daigo's coming to terms with his father is a major motif, encoffinment scenes focus on the living family members rather than the dead, and even in the NK Agent office, conversation often revolves around family issues. Mika's pregnancy is the catalyst for her reconciliation with Daigo.
Ebert writes that, as with other Japanese films such as Tokyo Story (Yasujirō Ozu; 1953) and The Funeral (Juzo Itami; 1984), Departures focuses on the effect of death on the survivors; the afterlife is not given much discussion. He considered this indicative of a "deep and unsensational acceptance of death" in Japanese culture, one which is to be met not with extreme sorrow, but with contemplation. Takita stated that he intended to focus on the "dialogue between people who have passed away and the families that survive them". The film touches on the question of the afterlife: the cremator likens death to "a gateway", and Okuyama writes that in this sense the cremator is a gatekeeper and the encoffiners are guides.
Byrnes found that Departures leads one to question the extent of modernity's effect on Japanese culture, noting the undercurrent of "traditional attitudes and values" which permeated the film. Although the encoffining ceremony was traditionally completed by the dead person's family, a decreased interest in it opened a "niche market" for professional encoffiners. Okuyama wrote that, through this film, Takita was filling a "spiritual loss" caused by the departure from tradition in modern Japan. Tadao Sato connected this theme of modernity to that of death, explaining that the film's unusually non-bitter treatment of death demonstrated an evolution in Japanese feelings about life and death. He considered the film's treatment of as an artistic rather than religious ceremony to reflect the agnostic attitudes of modern Japan.
Release
The taboo subject of Departures made prospective distributors wary of taking on the film. Surveys conducted at pre-release screenings placed it at the bottom of the list of films audiences wanted to see. Ultimately, the film's debut at the Montreal World Film Festival in August 2008, which was rewarded with the festival's grand prize, provided the necessary incentive for distributors to select Departures; it finally received its domestic Japanese release on 13 September 2008. Even then, owing to the strong taboo against death, Takita was worried about the film's reception and did not anticipate commercial success, and others expressed concern that the film lacked a clear target audience.
This fear was misplaced; Departures debuted in Japan at fifth place, and during the fifth week of its run hit its peak position at third place. It sold 2.6 million tickets in Japan and generated 3.2 billion yen ($32 million) in box office revenue in the five months after its debut. The film was still showing in 31 theatres when its success at the Academy Awards in February 2009 renewed interest; the number of screens on which it was showing was increased to 188 and the film earned another ¥2.8 billion ($28 million), making a total of ¥6 billion ($60 million). This made Departures the highest-grossing domestic film and 15th top-grossing film overall for 2008. Executive producer Yasuhiro Mase credited this success to the effects of the Great Recession on Japan: viewers who were seeking employment after recently being downsized empathized with Daigo.
From the beginning an international release of the film was intended; as English is considered a key language in international film festivals, English subtitles were prepared. The translation was handled by Ian MacDougall. He believed that the workings of the mortician's world were as far from the experience of most Japanese as from that of a non-Japanese audience. As such he felt a faithful translation was best, without going far to accommodate foreign audiences to unfamiliar cross-cultural elements.
In September 2008, ContentFilm acquired the international rights to Departures, which by that time had been licensed for screening in countries such as Greece, Australia, and Malaysia; the film was ultimately screened in 36 countries. North American distribution was handled by Regent Releasing,
and Departures received a limited release in nine theatres beginning on 29 May 2009. Overall, the film earned almost $1.5 million during its North American run before closing on 24 June 2010. In the United Kingdom, Departures premiered on 4 December 2009 and was distributed by Arrow Film Distributors. The film attained a worldwide gross of nearly $70 million.
Adaptations and other media
Before Departures premiered, a manga adaptation by Akira Sasō was serialized in twelve instalments in the bi-weekly Big Comic Superior, from February to August 2008. Sasō agreed to take on the adaptation as he was impressed by the script. He had the opportunity to view the film before beginning the adaptation, and came to feel that a too-literal adaptation would not be appropriate. He made changes to the settings and physical appearances of the characters, and increased the focus on the role of music in the story. Later in 2008 the serial was compiled in a 280-page volume released by Shogakukan.
On 10 September 2008, three days before the Japanese premiere of Departures, a soundtrack album for the film—containing nineteen tracks from the film and featuring an orchestral performance by members of the Tokyo Metropolitan and NHK Symphony Orchestras—was released by Universal Music Japan. Pop singer Ai provided lyrics to music by Hisaishi for the image song "Okuribito"; performed by Ai with an arrangement for cellos and orchestra, the single was released by Universal Sigma and Island Records on 10 September 2008 along with a promotional video. Sheet music for the film's soundtrack was published by KMP in 2008 (for cello and piano) and Onkyō in 2009 (for cello, violin, and piano).
Shinobu Momose, a writer specializing in novelizations, adapted Departures as a novel. It was published by Shogakukan in 2008. That year the company also released Ishibumi (Letter-Stone), an illustrated book on the themes of the film told from the point of view of a talking stone; this book was written by Koyama and illustrated by Seitarō Kurota. The following year Shogakukan published an edition of Koyama's first draft of the screenplay. A stage version of the film, also titled Departures, was written by Koyama and directed by Takita. It debuted at the Akasaka ACT Theater on 29 May 2010, featuring kabuki actor Nakamura Kankurō as Daigo and Rena Tanaka as Mika. The story, set seven years after the close of the film, concerns the insecurities of the couple's son over Daigo's profession.
Home releases
A dual-layer DVD release, with special features including trailers, making-of documentaries, and a recorded encoffining ceremony, was released in Japan on 18 March 2009. A North American DVD edition of Departures, including an interview with the director, was released by Koch Vision on 12 January 2010; the film was not dubbed, but rather presented with Japanese audio and English subtitles. A Blu-ray edition followed in May. This home release received mixed reviews. Franck Tabouring of DVD Verdict was highly complimentary toward the film and the digital transfer, considering its visuals clean and sharp and the audio (particularly the music) "a pleasure to listen to". Thomas Spurlin, writing for DVD Talk, rated the release as "Highly Recommended", focusing on the "unexpected powerhouse" of the film's quality. Another writer for the website, Jeremy Mathews, advised readers to "Skip It", finding the DVD an apt presentation of the source material—which he considered to "reduce itself to clumsy, mug-filled attempts at broad comedy and awkward, repetitive tear-jerker scenes". Both DVD Talk reviews agreed that the audio and visual quality were less than perfect, and that the DVD's extra contents were poor; Mathews described the interview as the director answering "dull questions in a dull manner".
Reception
Reviews
Departures received generally positive reviews from critics. The review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes sampled 108 reviewers and judged an 80% approval rating, with an average score of 7.06 out of 10. The website's critical consensus states, "If slow and predictable, Departures is a quiet, life affirming story". The aggregator Metacritic gives the film 68 out of 100, based on 27 reviews.
Domestic reviews
Initial reviews in Japan were positive. In Kinema Junpo, Tokitoshi Shioda called Departures a turning point in Takita's career, a human drama capturing both laughter and tears, while in the same publication Masaaki Nomura described the film as a work of supple depth that perhaps indicated a move into Takita's mature period, praising the director for capturing a human feeling from Motoki's earnest encoffining performance. Writing in the Yomiuri Shimbun, Seichi Fukunaga complimented Takita for using a moving, emotive story laden with humour to reverse prejudice against a taboo subject. He commended the performances of Motoki and Yamazaki, particularly their playing the serious Daigo against the befuddled Sasaki.
In the Asahi Shimbun, Sadao Yamane found the film admirably constructed and extolled the actors' performances. Yamane was especially impressed by the delicate hand movements Motoki displayed when he performed the encoffinment ceremony. Tomomi Katsuta in the Mainichi Shimbun found Departures a meaningful story that made the viewer think about the different lives people live, and the significance of someone dying. Writing in the same newspaper, Takashi Suzuki thought the film memorable but predictable, and Yūji Takahashi opined that the film's ability to find nobility in a prejudiced subject was an excellent accomplishment. Shōko Watanabe gave Departures four out of five stars in The Nikkei newspaper, praising the actors' unforced performances.
Following the success of Departures at the Academy Awards, critic Saburō Kawamoto found the film to show a Japan that the Japanese could relate to, in that, in a nation whose customs put great weight on visits to ancestral graves, a death was always a family affair. He believed the film had a samurai beauty to it, with its many scenes of families sitting seiza. Critic gave the film a 90% rating, and credited the performances of the two leads for much of the film's success. He praised its emotional impact and its balance of seriousness and humour, but was more critical of the father–son relationship, which he considered overdone. Maeda attributed the film's international success, despite its heavily Japanese content, to its clear depiction of Japanese views on life and death. He found the film's conceptual scale to have an affinity to that of Hollywood (something he considered lacking in most Japanese films).
Reviewer Takurō Yamaguchi gave the film an 85% rating, and found the treatment of its subject charming. He praised its quiet emotional impact and humour, the interweaving of northern Japan scenery with Hisaishi's cello score, and the film's Japanese spirit. Media critic found a moving beauty in the dextrous hand movements Sasaki teaches Daigo for preparing bodies, and believed that a prior reading of the original script would deepen the viewer's understanding of the action. Mark Schilling of The Japan Times gave the film four stars out of five, praising the acting though criticizing the apparent idealization of the encoffiners. He concluded that the film "makes a good case for the Japanese way of death."
International reviews
Internationally, Departures has received mixed—mostly positive—reviews. Ebert gave the film a perfect four stars, describing it as "rock-solid in its fundamentals" and highlighting its cinematography, music, and the casting of Yamazaki as Sasaki. He found that the result "functions flawlessly" and is "excellent at achieving the universal ends of narrative". Derek Armstrong of AllMovie gave the film four stars out of five, describing it as "a film of lyrical beauty" which is "bursting with tiny pleasures". In a four-star review, Byrnes described the film as a "moving meditation on the transience of life" which showed "great humanity", concluding "it's a beautiful film but take two hankies." Howell gave the film three stars out of four, praising its acting and cinematography. He wrote that Departures "quietly subverts aesthetic and emotional expectations" without ever losing its "high-minded intent". In a three-and-a-half star review, Claudia Puig of USA Today described Departures as a "beautifully composed" film which, although predictable, was "emotional, poignant" and "profoundly affecting".
Philip French of The Observer considered Departures to be a "moving, gently amusing" film, which the director had "fastidiously composed". Sharkey found it an "emotionally wrenching trip with a quiet man", one which was well cast with "actors who move lightly, gracefully" in the various settings. In Entertainment Weekly, Owen Gleiberman gave the film a B−, considering it "tender and, at times, rather squishy", though certain to affect anyone who had lost a parent. Barber found Departures to be "heartfelt, unpretentious, [and] slyly funny", worth watching (though ultimately predictable). Mike Scott gave the film three and a half stars out of four, finding that it was "a surprisingly uplifting examination of life and loss", with humour which perfectly complemented the "moving and meaningful story", but lent itself to characters "mug[ging] for the camera".
Meanwhile, Kevin Maher of The Times described Departures as a "verklempt comedy" with wearisome "push-button crying", though he considered it saved by the quality of the acting, "stately" directing, and "dreamy" soundtrack. Another mixed review was published in The Daily Telegraph, which described the film as a "safe and emotionally generous crowd-pleaser" that was not worthy of its Academy Award. Philip Kennicott wrote in The Washington Post that the film was "as polished as it is heavy-handed", predictable yet ready to break taboos, immersed in death yet incapable of escaping "the maddening Japanese taste for sentimentality". In Variety, Eddie Cockrell wrote that the film offered "fascinating glimpses" of the encoffining ceremony but should have had a much shorter runtime. Paatsch gave Departures three stars out of five, describing it as a "quaintly mournful flick" that "unfolds with a delicacy and precision that slowly captivates the viewer" but considering some scenes, such as the montage, "needlessly showy flourishes". Edward Porter of The Sunday Times wrote that the film's success at the Academy Awards could be blamed on "a case of the Academy favouring bland sentimentality".
The A.V. Club Keith Phipps gave Departures a C−, writing that though it featured "handsome shots of provincial life" and encoffining scenes with a "poetic quality", ultimately the film "drips from one overstated emotion to the next". A. O. Scott wrote in The New York Times that the film was "perfectly mediocre", predictable, and banal in its combination of humour and melodrama. Despite its sometimes touching moments, he considered Departures "interesting mainly as an index of the Academy’s hopelessly timid and conventional tastes". Tony Rayns of Film Comment gave a scathing review in which he denounced the script as "embarrassingly clunky and obvious", the acting as merely "adequate", and the film as but a "paean to the good-looking corpse". Adams gave Departures two out of four stars, praising the emotionally and visually arresting scenes of encoffinments and "loving attention to the textures, tastes and behaviours of semi-rural Japan" but condemning the predictability of the plot; he wrote that "Forty-five minutes in, [viewers have] prepared a mental checklist of every turn that Daigo Kobayashi will face, then negotiate – and be danged if Takita doesn't deliver on every one".
Awards
At the 32nd Japan Academy Prize ceremony held in February 2009, Departures dominated the competition. It received a total of thirteen nominations, winning ten, including Picture of the Year, Screenplay of the Year (Koyama), Director of the Year (Takita), and Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role (Motoki). In the Outstanding Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role category, Hirosue lost to Tae Kimura of All Around Us, while in the Outstanding Achievement in Art Direction category Departures Tomio Ogawa lost to Paco and the Magical Book Towako Kuwashima. Hisaishi, nominated for two Outstanding Achievement in Music awards, won for his scoring of Studio Ghibli's animated film Ponyo. In response to the wins, Motoki said "It feels as if everything miraculously came together in balance this time with Okuribito".
Departures was submitted to the 81st Academy Awards as Japan's submission for the Best Foreign Language Film award. Although eleven previous Japanese films had won Academy Awards in other categories, such as Best Animated Feature or Best Costume Design, the as-yet unattained Best Foreign Language Film award was highly coveted in the Japanese film industry. Departures was not expected to win, owing to strong competition from the Israeli and French submissions (Ari Folman's Waltz with Bashir and Laurent Cantet's The Class, respectively), but was ultimately the victor at the February 2009 ceremony. This was considered a surprise by several film critics, and The New York Times David Itzkoff termed Departures "The Film That Lost Your Oscars Pool for You". Motoki, who was expecting the "wonderful" Israeli submission to win, was also surprised; he described himself as a "hanger-on who just observes the ceremony", and regretted "not walk[ing] with more confidence" upon his arrival.
Departures received recognition at a variety of film festivals, including the Audience Choice Award at the 28th Hawaii International Film Festival, the Audience Choice Award at the 15th Vilnius International Film Festival, the Grand Prix des Amériques at the 32nd Montreal World Film Festival, and Best Narrative Film at the 20th Palm Springs International Film Festival. Motoki was selected as best actor at several ceremonies, including at the Asian Film Awards, the Asia Pacific Screen Awards, and the Blue Ribbon Awards; he was also viewers' choice for best actor at the Golden Rooster Awards. At the 29th Hong Kong Film Awards, Departures was selected as Best Asian Film, beating three Chinese films and Ponyo. Following the 21st Nikkan Sports Film Award ceremony, in which Departures won Best Film and Best Director, Takita expressed surprise at the film's awards, saying "I did not know how well my work would be accepted." By December 2009 the film had won 98 awards.
Impact
After the film's success, Sakata Location Box set up a hospitality service called Mukaebito—a pun on the film's Japanese title indicating "one who greets or picks up" another, rather than "one who sends off". The service maintains shooting locations and provides maps of these locations for tourists. In 2009, Location Box opened the building that served as the NK Agent office to the public. For a fee, visitors could enter and view props from the film. Under a job creation program, between 2009 and 2013 the organization received ¥30 million from Yamagata Prefecture and ¥8 million from Sakata City for the building's maintenance and administration. The site attracted nearly 120,000 visitors in 2009, though numbers quickly fell; in 2013 there were fewer than 9,000 visitors. Safety fears due to the building's age led to the Sakata municipal government ending the organization's lease, and the building was closed again at the end of March 2014. At the time, the City Tourism division was considering options, such as limiting visits to the first two floors. The building used as the Concerto café has been open to the public since 2009 as the Kaminoyama Concerto Museum, and the Sakata Minato-za cinema has also been opened to tourists. Takita's hometown of Takaoka, Toyama, maintains a Film Resources Museum; staff have reported that at times over a hundred Takita fans visit per day.
The film's success generated greater interest in encoffining and the . Even the model of hearse driven in the film was merchandised: the Mitsuoka Limousine Type 2-04, a smaller, less expensive version of the film's vehicle, was put on the market on 24 February 2009. The manufacturer, Mitsuoka Motors, is located in Takita's home prefecture of Toyama. In 2013, Kouki Kimura, from a family of , founded the Okuribito Academy together with nurse and entrepreneur Kei Takamaru. It offers training in encoffining, embalming, and related practices.
Explanatory notes
References
Works cited
External links
(via the Internet Archive)
2008 films
2008 drama films
Japanese films
Japanese drama films
Japanese-language films
Best Film Kinema Junpo Award winners
Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award winners
2008 black comedy films
Films scored by Joe Hisaishi
Films about cellos and cellists
Films about death
Films about funerals
Films set in Tokyo
Films set in Yamagata Prefecture
Films shot in Japan
Films directed by Yōjirō Takita
Picture of the Year Japan Academy Prize winners
Films with screenplays by Kundō Koyama
Shochiku films
Dentsu films
Shogakukan franchises | false | [
"Putting Things Straight (German title: “Ich räume auf”) is a 1979 film directed and written by Georg Brintrup. The director's first TV-release, it was shot in 16 mm film. The filmscript is based on a polemic printed in 1925 (\"Ich räume auf - Meine Anklage gegen meine Verleger\") by the Jewish German poet Else Lasker-Schüler, the principal woman representative of German Expressionism.\n\nPremise\nThe film describes a dispute between poetess Else Lasker-Schüler and her publishers. The film takes place in Berlin before, during and after World War I it deals with the rights of the author quoting from Karl Marx: \"A writer is judged as productive, not on the amount of ideas he produces, but on the amount of money his publisher is able to profit from his works.\"\n\nCast\n Gisela Stein – Else Lasker-Schüler\nFrank Burkner – Paul Cassirer\nHanns Zischler – Alfred Flechtheim\nUlrich Gregor – Kurt Wolff (publisher)\nHans Christoph Buch – Franz Werfel\nHarun Farocki – Friend of Flechtheim\n\nProduction\nThe film was first broadcast on December 23, 1979 by Westdeutscher Rundfunk. It was then shown at the 1980 International Film Festival Rotterdam\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\nGerman films\nFilms set in Berlin\n1970s historical drama films\nFilms based on poems\nFilms set in the 1910s\nGerman historical drama films\n1979 films\nEnglish-language films\nFilms about Jews and Judaism\nFilms set in the 1920s\nGerman-language films\n1979 drama films",
"Auden Thornton is an American actress.\n\nLife and career\nThornton was born and raised in Houston, Texas and began performing at a young age. At the age of nine, she was cast in the film Arlington Road starring Jeff Bridges and Joan Cusack. She attended Interlochen Center for the Arts in Michigan and later moved to New York City and graduated from the Juilliard School in 2011. In New York City, Thornton began performing in Off-Broadway plays, include Years of Sky and Three Sisters. She also guest-starred in a number of television series, include Blue Bloods, The Good Wife, Forever, and Elementary.\n\nIn 2017, Thornton played a leading role in the critically acclaimed independent drama film Beauty Mark. The film has 100% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Thornton received positive reviews and won Los Angeles Film Festival Award for Best Breakout Performance. In 2019, she was cast in a recurring role for the fourth season of the NBC family drama series, This Is Us. In 2020, Thornton was cast in the ABC pilot Thirtysomething(else), the sequel to critically acclaimed drama Thirtysomething, in which she will play Brittany Weston, the daughter of Elliot Weston (Timothy Busfield) and Nancy Weston (Patricia Wettig).\n\nFilmography\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\n21st-century American actresses\nLiving people\nAmerican television actresses\nAmerican film actresses\nActresses from Houston\nJuilliard School alumni\nYear of birth missing (living people)"
]
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]
| C_eb65e42fda3a4153b514fd8bed8563ea_0 | What does the article say about the films success? | 6 | What does the article say about the film We Are Not Alone's success? | Departures (2008 film) | Motoki, by then in his early 40s and having built a reputation as a realist, was cast as Daigo. Veteran actor Tsutomu Yamazaki was selected for the role of Sasaki; Takita had worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone (1993). Although the character of Mika was initially planned as being the same age as Daigo, the role went to pop singer Ryoko Hirosue, who had previously acted in Takita's Himitsu (Secret) in 1999. Takita explained that a younger actress would better represent the lead couple's growth out of naivety. In a 2009 interview, Takita stated that he had cast "everyone who was on my wish list". Motoki studied the art of encoffinment first-hand from a mortician, and assisted in an encoffining ceremony; he later stated that the experience imbued him with "a sense of mission ... to try to use as much human warmth as I could to restore [the deceased] to a lifelike presence for presentation to her family". Motoki then drilled himself by practising on his talent manager until he felt he had mastered the procedure, one whose intricate, delicate movements he compared to those of the Japanese tea ceremony. Takita attended funeral ceremonies to understand the feelings of bereaved families, while Yamazaki never participated in the encoffinment training. Motoki also learned how to play a cello for the earlier parts of the film. To provide realistic bodies while preventing the corpses from moving, after a lengthy casting process the crew chose extras who could lie as still as possible. For the bath house owner Tsuyako Yamashita, this was not possible owing to the need to see her alive first, and a search for a body double was unfruitful. Ultimately, the crew used digital effects to transplant a still image of the actor during the character's funeral scene, allowing for a realistic effect. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | is a 2008 Japanese drama film directed by Yōjirō Takita and starring Masahiro Motoki, Ryōko Hirosue, and Tsutomu Yamazaki. The film follows a young man who returns to his hometown after a failed career as a cellist and stumbles across work as a —a traditional Japanese ritual mortician. He is subjected to prejudice from those around him, including from his wife, because of strong social taboos against people who deal with death. Eventually he repairs these interpersonal connections through the beauty and dignity of his work.
The idea for Departures arose after Motoki, affected by having seen a funeral ceremony along the Ganges when travelling in India, read widely on the subject of death and came across Coffinman. He felt that the story would adapt well to film, and Departures was finished a decade later. Because of Japanese prejudices against those who handle the dead, distributors were reluctant to release it—until a surprise grand prize win at the Montreal World Film Festival in August 2008. The following month the film opened in Japan, where it went on to win the Academy Prize for Picture of the Year and become the year's highest-grossing domestic film. This success was topped in 2009, when it became the first Japanese production to win the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
Departures received positive reviews, with aggregator Rotten Tomatoes indicating an 80% approval rating from 108 reviews. Critics praised the film's humour, the beauty of the encoffining ceremony, and the quality of the acting, but some took issue with its predictability and overt sentimentality. Reviewers highlighted a variety of themes, but focused mainly on the humanity that death brings to the surface and how it strengthens family bonds. The success of Departures led to the establishment of tourist attractions at sites connected to the film and increased interest in encoffining ceremonies, as well as adaptation of the story for various media, including manga and a stage play.
Plot
Daigo Kobayashi (Masahiro Motoki) loses his job as a cellist when his orchestra is disbanded. He and his wife Mika (Ryōko Hirosue) move from Tokyo to his hometown in Yamagata, where they live in his childhood home that was left to him when his mother died two years earlier. It is fronted by a coffee shop that Daigo's father had operated before he ran off with a waitress when Daigo was six; since then the two have had no contact. Daigo feels hatred towards his father and guilt for not taking better care of his mother. He still keeps a "stone-letter"—a stone which is said to convey meaning through its texture—which his father had given him many years before.
Daigo finds an advertisement for a job "assisting departures". Assuming it to be a job in a travel agency, he goes to the interview at the NK Agent office and learns from the secretary, Yuriko Kamimura (Kimiko Yo), that he will be preparing bodies for cremation in a ceremony known as encoffinment. Though reluctant, Daigo is hired on the spot and receives a cash advance from his new boss, Sasaki (Tsutomu Yamazaki). Daigo is furtive about his duties and hides the true nature of the job from Mika.
His first assignment is to assist with the encoffinment of a woman who died at home and remained undiscovered for two weeks. He is beset with nausea and later humiliated when strangers on a bus detect an unsavoury scent on him. To clean himself, he visits a public bath which he had frequented as a child. It is owned by Tsuyako Yamashita (Kazuko Yoshiyuki), the mother of one of Daigo's former classmates.
Over time, Daigo becomes comfortable with his profession as he completes a number of assignments and experiences the gratitude of the families of the deceased. Though he faces social ostracism, Daigo refuses to quit, even after Mika discovers a training DVD in which he plays a corpse and leaves him to return to her parents' home in Tokyo. Daigo's former classmate Yamashita (Tetta Sugimoto) insists that the mortician find a more respectable line of work and, until then, avoids him and his family.
After a few months, Mika returns and announces that she is pregnant. She expresses hope that Daigo will find a job of which their child can be proud. During the ensuing argument, Daigo receives a call for an encoffinment for Mrs Yamashita. Daigo prepares her body in front of both the Yamashita family and Mika, who had known the public bath owner. The ritual earns him the respect of all present, and Mika stops insisting that Daigo change jobs.
Sometime later, they learn of the death of Daigo's father. Daigo experiences renewed feelings of anger and tells the others at the NK office that he refuses to deal with his father's body. Feeling ashamed of having abandoned her own son long ago, Yuriko tells this to Daigo in an effort to change his mind. Daigo berates Yuriko and storms out before collecting himself and turning around. He goes with Mika to another village to see the body. Daigo is at first unable to recognize him, but takes offence when local funeral workers are careless with the body. He insists on dressing it himself, and while doing so finds a stone-letter that he had given to his father, held tight in the dead man's hands. The childhood memory of his father's face returns to him, and after he finishes the ceremony, Daigo gently presses the stone-letter to Mika's pregnant belly.
Production
Cultural background
Japanese funerals are highly ritualized affairs which are generally—though not always—conducted in accordance with Buddhist rites. In preparation for the funeral, the body is washed and the orifices are blocked with cotton or gauze. The encoffining ritual (called nōkan), as depicted in Departures, is rarely performed, and even then only in rural areas. This ceremony is not standardized, but generally involves professional ritually preparing the body, dressing the dead in white, and sometimes applying make-up. The body is then put on dry ice in a casket, along with personal possessions and items deemed necessary for the trip to the afterlife.
Despite the importance of death rituals, in traditional Japanese culture the subject is considered unclean as everything related to death is thought to be a source of (defilement). After coming into contact with the dead, individuals must cleanse themselves through purifying rituals. People who work closely with the dead, such as morticians, are thus considered unclean, and during the feudal era those whose work was related to death became burakumin (untouchables), forced to live in their own hamlets and discriminated against by wider society. Despite a cultural shift since the Meiji Restoration of 1868, the stigma of death still has considerable force within Japanese society, and discrimination against the untouchables has continued.
Until 1972, most deaths were dealt with by families, funeral homes, or . , about 80% of deaths occur in hospitals, and preparation of the bodies is frequently done by hospital staff; in such cases, the family often does not see the body until the funeral. A 1998 survey found that 29.5% of the Japanese population believed in an afterlife, and a further 40% wanted to believe; belief was highest . Belief in the existence of a soul (54%) and a connection between the worlds of the living and the dead (64.9%) was likewise common.
Conception and preproduction
In the early 1990s, a 27-year-old Motoki and his friend travelled to India; just before going, at the friend's recommendation he read Shin'ya Fujiwara's Memento Mori (Latin for "remember that you will die"). While in India, he visited Varanasi, where he saw a ceremony in which the dead were cremated and their ashes floated down the Ganges. Witnessing this ceremony of death against a backdrop of bustling crowds going about their lives deeply affected Motoki. When he returned to Japan, he read numerous books on the subject of death, and in 1993 wrote a book on the relationship between life and death: Tenkuu Seiza—Hill Heaven. Among the books he read was Shinmon Aoki's autobiographical , which exposed Motoki to the world of the for the first time. Motoki said he found a sense of mystery and near-eroticism to the profession that he felt had an affinity with the film world.
Getting funding for the project was difficult because of the taboos against death, and the crew had to approach several companies before Departures was approved by Yasuhiro Mase and Toshiaki Nakazawa. According to the film's director, Yōjirō Takita, a consideration in taking on the film was the age of the crew: "we got to a certain point in our lives when death was creeping up to become a factor around us". Kundō Koyama was enlisted to provide the script, his first for a feature film; his previous experience had been in scripting for television and stage. Takita, who had begun his career in the pink film genre before entering mainstream filmmaking in 1986 with Comic Magazine, took on the director's role in 2006, after producer Toshiaki Nakazawa presented him with the first draft of the script. In a later interview he stated "I wanted to make a film from the perspective of a person who deals with something so universal and yet is looked down upon, and even discriminated against". Although he knew of the encoffining ceremony, he had never seen one performed.
Production of Departures took ten years, and the work was ultimately only loosely adapted from Coffinman; later revisions of the script were worked on collaboratively by the cast and crew. Although the religious aspects of funerals were important in the source work, the film did not include them. This, together with the fact that filming was completed in Yamagata and not Aoki's home prefecture of Toyama, led to tensions between the production staff and the author. Aoki expressed concern that the film was unable to address "the ultimate fate of the dead". The first edition of the book was broken into three parts; the third, "Light and Life", was an essay-like Buddhist musing on life and death, regarding the "light" seen when one perceived the integration of life and death, that is absent from the film. Aoki believed the film's humanistic approach did away with the religious aspects that were central to the book—the emphasis on maintaining connections between the living and the dead that he felt only religion could provide—and refused to allow his name and that of his book to be used. For the new title, Koyama coined the term as a euphemism for , derived from the words ("to send off") and ("person").
While the book and film share the same premise, the details differ considerably; Aoki attributed these changes to the studio making the story more commercial. Both feature a protagonist who endures uneasiness and prejudice because of his job as a , undergoes personal growth as a result of his experiences, and finds new meaning in life when confronted with death. In both, the main character deals with societal prejudices and misunderstandings over his profession. In Coffinman, the protagonist was the owner of a pub-café that had gone out of business; during a domestic squabble his wife threw a newspaper at him, in which he found an ad for the position. He finds pride in his work for the first time when dealing with the body of a former girlfriend. Koyama changed the protagonist from a bar owner to cellist as he wanted cello orchestration for the film score. Other differences included moving the setting from Toyoma to Yamagata for filming convenience, making the "letter-stone" a greater part of the plot, and an avoidance of heavier scenes, such as religious ones and one in which Aoki talks of seeing "light" in a swarm of maggots. Koyama also added the subplot in which Daigo is able to forgive his late father; taken from a novel he was writing, it was intended to close the story with "some sense of happiness".
Casting
Motoki, by then in his early 40s and having built a reputation as a realist, was cast as Daigo. Veteran actor Tsutomu Yamazaki was selected for the role of Sasaki; Takita had worked with Yamazaki on We Are Not Alone (1993). Although the character of Mika was initially planned as being the same age as Daigo, the role went to pop singer Ryōko
Hirosue, who had previously acted in Takita's Himitsu (Secret) in 1999. Takita explained that a younger actress would better represent the lead couple's growth out of naivety. In a 2009 interview, Takita stated that he had cast "everyone who was on my wish list".
Motoki studied the art of encoffinment first-hand from a mortician, and assisted in an encoffining ceremony; he later stated that the experience imbued him with "a sense of mission ... to try to use as much human warmth as I could to restore [the deceased] to a lifelike presence for presentation to her family". Motoki then drilled himself by practising on his talent manager until he felt he had mastered the procedure, one whose intricate, delicate movements he compared to those of the Japanese tea ceremony. Takita attended funeral ceremonies to understand the feelings of bereaved families, while Yamazaki never participated in the encoffinment training. Motoki also learned how to play a cello for the earlier parts of the film.
To provide realistic bodies while preventing the corpses from moving, after a lengthy casting process the crew chose extras who could lie as still as possible. For the bath house owner Tsuyako Yamashita, this was not possible owing to the need to see her alive first, and a search for a body double was unfruitful. Ultimately, the crew used digital effects to transplant a still image of the actor during the character's funeral scene, allowing for a realistic effect.
Filming and post-production
The non-profit organization Sakata Location Box was established in December 2007 to handle on-location matters such as finding extras and negotiating locations. After deciding to shoot in Sakata, Location Box staff had two months to prepare for the eighty members of the film crew. Negotiations were slow, as many local property owners lost interest after learning that the filming would involve funeral scenes; those who agreed insisted that shooting take place outside of business hours.
Toyama was both the setting of Coffinman and Takita's home prefecture, but filming was done in Yamagata; this was largely because the national Nōkan Association, headquartered in Hokkaido, had a branch office in Sakata. Some preliminary scenes of snowy landscapes were shot in 2007, and primary filming began in April 2008, lasting 40 days. Locations included Kaminoyama, Sakata, Tsuruoka, Yuza, and Amarume. The NK Agent office was filmed in a three-storey, Western-style building in Sakata built between the mid-Meiji and Taishō periods (1880s–1920s). Originally a restaurant named Kappō Obata, it went out of business in 1998. The Kobayashis' café, called Concerto in the film, was located in Kaminoyama in a former beauty salon. From a hundred candidates, Takita chose it for its atmosphere as an aged building with a clear view of the nearby river and surrounding mountain range. The scene of the shooting of the training DVD took place in the Sakata Minato-za, Yamagata's first movie theatre, which had been closed since 2002.
The soundtrack to Departures was by Joe Hisaishi, a composer who had gained international recognition for his work with Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli. Before shooting began, Takita asked him to prepare a soundtrack which would represent the separation between Daigo and his father, as well as the mortician's love for his wife. Owing to the importance of cellos and cello music in the narrative, Hisaishi emphasized the instrument in his soundtrack; he described the challenge of centring a score around the cello as one of the most difficult things he had ever done. This score was played during shooting, which according to Takita "allowed [the crew] to visualize many of the emotions in the film" and thus contributed to the quality of the finished work.
Style
As they are the movie's "central dramatic piece", the encoffining ceremonies in Departures have received extensive commentary. Mike Scott, for instance, wrote in The Times-Picayune that these scenes were beautiful and heartbreaking, and Nicholas Barber of The Independent described them as "elegant and dignified". James Adams of The Globe and Mail wrote that they were a "dignified ritual of calming, hypnotic grace, with sleights of hand bordering on the magicianly". As the film continues, Paul Byrnes of The Sydney Morning Herald opined, the audience gains an improved knowledge of the ceremony and its importance. Viewers see that the ceremonies are not simply about preparing the body, but also about "bring[ing] dignity to death, respect to the deceased and solace to those who grieve", through which the encoffiners are able to help repair broken family ties and heal damage done to those left behind.
There is an idealization of the as presented in the film. In all but one case, the dead are either young or already made-up, such that "the viewer can easily tolerate these images on the screen". The one corpse that had not been found for several days is never shown on screen. No bodies show the gaunt figure of one who has died after a long illness, or the cuts and bruises of an accident victim. Japanologist Mark R. Mullins writes that the gratitude shown in Departures would probably not have occurred in real life; according to Coffinman, there "is nothing lower on the social scale than the mortician, and the truth of the matter is that [the Japanese people] fear the coffinman and the cremator just as much as death and the corpse".
In a montage, scenes of Daigo playing his childhood cello while sitting outdoors are interspersed with scenes of encoffining ceremonies. Byrnes believes that this scene was meant to increase the emotional charge of the film, and Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times considered it a "beautiful fantasy scene" through which the camera is "granted sudden freedom" from the generally standard shots. Yoshiko Okuyama of the University of Hawaii at Hilo found that Daigo's deft movements while playing the cello mirrored the high level of professionalism which he had reached. Several reviewers, such as Leigh Paatsch of the Herald Sun, questioned the need for the shot. Throughout the film's soundtrack, cello music remains dominant. Takita drew parallels between the instrument and the encoffining ceremony, stating that
Byrnes found that Departures used the symbol of the cherry blossom, a flower which blooms after the winter only to wither soon afterwards, to represent the transience of life; through this understanding, he wrote, Japanese people attempt to define their own existence. Natural symbols are further presented through the changing seasons, which "suggest delicate emotional changes" in the characters, as well as the letter-stones, which represent "love, communication, [and] the baton being passed from generation to generation". The film's settings are used to convey various sensations, including the solitude of the countryside and the intimacy of the public bath house. The colour white, manifested through snow, chrysanthemums, and other objects, is prominent in the film; Okuyama suggests that this, together with the classical music and ritualized hand gestures, represents the sacredness and purity of the death ceremonies.
Departures incorporates aspects of humour, an "unexpected" complement to the theme of death which Ebert suggested may be used to mask the audience's fears. Betsy Sharkey of the Los Angeles Times opines that, through this use of humour, the film avoids becoming too dark and instead acts as a "warmhearted blend" of whimsy and irony. This humour manifests in a variety of manners, such as a scene in which "a mortified Daigo, naked except for a pair of adult diapers, is the reluctant model" for an educational video regarding the encoffining process, as well as a scene in which Daigo discovers that the person he is preparing is a trans woman. Takita stated that the addition of humour was deliberate, as "humans are comical by nature", and that the humour did not conflict with the film's darker themes.
Themes
Several critics discussed the theme of death found in Departures. Scott highlighted the contrast between the taboo of death and the value of jobs related to it. He also noted the role of the encoffiner in showing "one last act of compassion" by presenting the dead in a way which preserved proud memories of their life. Initially, Daigo and his family are unable to overcome the taboos and their squeamishness when faced with death. Daigo is alienated from his wife and friends owing to traditional values. Ultimately it is through his work with the dead that Daigo finds fulfilment, and, as Peter Howell of the Toronto Star concluded, viewers realize that "death may be the termination of a life, but it's not the end of humanity". Okuyama writes that, in the end, the film (and the book on which it was based) serves as a "quiet yet persistent protest" against the discrimination which people who deal with death continue to face in modern Japan: death is a normal part of life, not something repulsive.
Along with this theme of death, Takita believed Departures was about life, about finding a lost sense of feeling human; Daigo gains a greater perspective on life and realises the diversity of people's lives only after encountering them in death. This life includes family bonds: Daigo's coming to terms with his father is a major motif, encoffinment scenes focus on the living family members rather than the dead, and even in the NK Agent office, conversation often revolves around family issues. Mika's pregnancy is the catalyst for her reconciliation with Daigo.
Ebert writes that, as with other Japanese films such as Tokyo Story (Yasujirō Ozu; 1953) and The Funeral (Juzo Itami; 1984), Departures focuses on the effect of death on the survivors; the afterlife is not given much discussion. He considered this indicative of a "deep and unsensational acceptance of death" in Japanese culture, one which is to be met not with extreme sorrow, but with contemplation. Takita stated that he intended to focus on the "dialogue between people who have passed away and the families that survive them". The film touches on the question of the afterlife: the cremator likens death to "a gateway", and Okuyama writes that in this sense the cremator is a gatekeeper and the encoffiners are guides.
Byrnes found that Departures leads one to question the extent of modernity's effect on Japanese culture, noting the undercurrent of "traditional attitudes and values" which permeated the film. Although the encoffining ceremony was traditionally completed by the dead person's family, a decreased interest in it opened a "niche market" for professional encoffiners. Okuyama wrote that, through this film, Takita was filling a "spiritual loss" caused by the departure from tradition in modern Japan. Tadao Sato connected this theme of modernity to that of death, explaining that the film's unusually non-bitter treatment of death demonstrated an evolution in Japanese feelings about life and death. He considered the film's treatment of as an artistic rather than religious ceremony to reflect the agnostic attitudes of modern Japan.
Release
The taboo subject of Departures made prospective distributors wary of taking on the film. Surveys conducted at pre-release screenings placed it at the bottom of the list of films audiences wanted to see. Ultimately, the film's debut at the Montreal World Film Festival in August 2008, which was rewarded with the festival's grand prize, provided the necessary incentive for distributors to select Departures; it finally received its domestic Japanese release on 13 September 2008. Even then, owing to the strong taboo against death, Takita was worried about the film's reception and did not anticipate commercial success, and others expressed concern that the film lacked a clear target audience.
This fear was misplaced; Departures debuted in Japan at fifth place, and during the fifth week of its run hit its peak position at third place. It sold 2.6 million tickets in Japan and generated 3.2 billion yen ($32 million) in box office revenue in the five months after its debut. The film was still showing in 31 theatres when its success at the Academy Awards in February 2009 renewed interest; the number of screens on which it was showing was increased to 188 and the film earned another ¥2.8 billion ($28 million), making a total of ¥6 billion ($60 million). This made Departures the highest-grossing domestic film and 15th top-grossing film overall for 2008. Executive producer Yasuhiro Mase credited this success to the effects of the Great Recession on Japan: viewers who were seeking employment after recently being downsized empathized with Daigo.
From the beginning an international release of the film was intended; as English is considered a key language in international film festivals, English subtitles were prepared. The translation was handled by Ian MacDougall. He believed that the workings of the mortician's world were as far from the experience of most Japanese as from that of a non-Japanese audience. As such he felt a faithful translation was best, without going far to accommodate foreign audiences to unfamiliar cross-cultural elements.
In September 2008, ContentFilm acquired the international rights to Departures, which by that time had been licensed for screening in countries such as Greece, Australia, and Malaysia; the film was ultimately screened in 36 countries. North American distribution was handled by Regent Releasing,
and Departures received a limited release in nine theatres beginning on 29 May 2009. Overall, the film earned almost $1.5 million during its North American run before closing on 24 June 2010. In the United Kingdom, Departures premiered on 4 December 2009 and was distributed by Arrow Film Distributors. The film attained a worldwide gross of nearly $70 million.
Adaptations and other media
Before Departures premiered, a manga adaptation by Akira Sasō was serialized in twelve instalments in the bi-weekly Big Comic Superior, from February to August 2008. Sasō agreed to take on the adaptation as he was impressed by the script. He had the opportunity to view the film before beginning the adaptation, and came to feel that a too-literal adaptation would not be appropriate. He made changes to the settings and physical appearances of the characters, and increased the focus on the role of music in the story. Later in 2008 the serial was compiled in a 280-page volume released by Shogakukan.
On 10 September 2008, three days before the Japanese premiere of Departures, a soundtrack album for the film—containing nineteen tracks from the film and featuring an orchestral performance by members of the Tokyo Metropolitan and NHK Symphony Orchestras—was released by Universal Music Japan. Pop singer Ai provided lyrics to music by Hisaishi for the image song "Okuribito"; performed by Ai with an arrangement for cellos and orchestra, the single was released by Universal Sigma and Island Records on 10 September 2008 along with a promotional video. Sheet music for the film's soundtrack was published by KMP in 2008 (for cello and piano) and Onkyō in 2009 (for cello, violin, and piano).
Shinobu Momose, a writer specializing in novelizations, adapted Departures as a novel. It was published by Shogakukan in 2008. That year the company also released Ishibumi (Letter-Stone), an illustrated book on the themes of the film told from the point of view of a talking stone; this book was written by Koyama and illustrated by Seitarō Kurota. The following year Shogakukan published an edition of Koyama's first draft of the screenplay. A stage version of the film, also titled Departures, was written by Koyama and directed by Takita. It debuted at the Akasaka ACT Theater on 29 May 2010, featuring kabuki actor Nakamura Kankurō as Daigo and Rena Tanaka as Mika. The story, set seven years after the close of the film, concerns the insecurities of the couple's son over Daigo's profession.
Home releases
A dual-layer DVD release, with special features including trailers, making-of documentaries, and a recorded encoffining ceremony, was released in Japan on 18 March 2009. A North American DVD edition of Departures, including an interview with the director, was released by Koch Vision on 12 January 2010; the film was not dubbed, but rather presented with Japanese audio and English subtitles. A Blu-ray edition followed in May. This home release received mixed reviews. Franck Tabouring of DVD Verdict was highly complimentary toward the film and the digital transfer, considering its visuals clean and sharp and the audio (particularly the music) "a pleasure to listen to". Thomas Spurlin, writing for DVD Talk, rated the release as "Highly Recommended", focusing on the "unexpected powerhouse" of the film's quality. Another writer for the website, Jeremy Mathews, advised readers to "Skip It", finding the DVD an apt presentation of the source material—which he considered to "reduce itself to clumsy, mug-filled attempts at broad comedy and awkward, repetitive tear-jerker scenes". Both DVD Talk reviews agreed that the audio and visual quality were less than perfect, and that the DVD's extra contents were poor; Mathews described the interview as the director answering "dull questions in a dull manner".
Reception
Reviews
Departures received generally positive reviews from critics. The review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes sampled 108 reviewers and judged an 80% approval rating, with an average score of 7.06 out of 10. The website's critical consensus states, "If slow and predictable, Departures is a quiet, life affirming story". The aggregator Metacritic gives the film 68 out of 100, based on 27 reviews.
Domestic reviews
Initial reviews in Japan were positive. In Kinema Junpo, Tokitoshi Shioda called Departures a turning point in Takita's career, a human drama capturing both laughter and tears, while in the same publication Masaaki Nomura described the film as a work of supple depth that perhaps indicated a move into Takita's mature period, praising the director for capturing a human feeling from Motoki's earnest encoffining performance. Writing in the Yomiuri Shimbun, Seichi Fukunaga complimented Takita for using a moving, emotive story laden with humour to reverse prejudice against a taboo subject. He commended the performances of Motoki and Yamazaki, particularly their playing the serious Daigo against the befuddled Sasaki.
In the Asahi Shimbun, Sadao Yamane found the film admirably constructed and extolled the actors' performances. Yamane was especially impressed by the delicate hand movements Motoki displayed when he performed the encoffinment ceremony. Tomomi Katsuta in the Mainichi Shimbun found Departures a meaningful story that made the viewer think about the different lives people live, and the significance of someone dying. Writing in the same newspaper, Takashi Suzuki thought the film memorable but predictable, and Yūji Takahashi opined that the film's ability to find nobility in a prejudiced subject was an excellent accomplishment. Shōko Watanabe gave Departures four out of five stars in The Nikkei newspaper, praising the actors' unforced performances.
Following the success of Departures at the Academy Awards, critic Saburō Kawamoto found the film to show a Japan that the Japanese could relate to, in that, in a nation whose customs put great weight on visits to ancestral graves, a death was always a family affair. He believed the film had a samurai beauty to it, with its many scenes of families sitting seiza. Critic gave the film a 90% rating, and credited the performances of the two leads for much of the film's success. He praised its emotional impact and its balance of seriousness and humour, but was more critical of the father–son relationship, which he considered overdone. Maeda attributed the film's international success, despite its heavily Japanese content, to its clear depiction of Japanese views on life and death. He found the film's conceptual scale to have an affinity to that of Hollywood (something he considered lacking in most Japanese films).
Reviewer Takurō Yamaguchi gave the film an 85% rating, and found the treatment of its subject charming. He praised its quiet emotional impact and humour, the interweaving of northern Japan scenery with Hisaishi's cello score, and the film's Japanese spirit. Media critic found a moving beauty in the dextrous hand movements Sasaki teaches Daigo for preparing bodies, and believed that a prior reading of the original script would deepen the viewer's understanding of the action. Mark Schilling of The Japan Times gave the film four stars out of five, praising the acting though criticizing the apparent idealization of the encoffiners. He concluded that the film "makes a good case for the Japanese way of death."
International reviews
Internationally, Departures has received mixed—mostly positive—reviews. Ebert gave the film a perfect four stars, describing it as "rock-solid in its fundamentals" and highlighting its cinematography, music, and the casting of Yamazaki as Sasaki. He found that the result "functions flawlessly" and is "excellent at achieving the universal ends of narrative". Derek Armstrong of AllMovie gave the film four stars out of five, describing it as "a film of lyrical beauty" which is "bursting with tiny pleasures". In a four-star review, Byrnes described the film as a "moving meditation on the transience of life" which showed "great humanity", concluding "it's a beautiful film but take two hankies." Howell gave the film three stars out of four, praising its acting and cinematography. He wrote that Departures "quietly subverts aesthetic and emotional expectations" without ever losing its "high-minded intent". In a three-and-a-half star review, Claudia Puig of USA Today described Departures as a "beautifully composed" film which, although predictable, was "emotional, poignant" and "profoundly affecting".
Philip French of The Observer considered Departures to be a "moving, gently amusing" film, which the director had "fastidiously composed". Sharkey found it an "emotionally wrenching trip with a quiet man", one which was well cast with "actors who move lightly, gracefully" in the various settings. In Entertainment Weekly, Owen Gleiberman gave the film a B−, considering it "tender and, at times, rather squishy", though certain to affect anyone who had lost a parent. Barber found Departures to be "heartfelt, unpretentious, [and] slyly funny", worth watching (though ultimately predictable). Mike Scott gave the film three and a half stars out of four, finding that it was "a surprisingly uplifting examination of life and loss", with humour which perfectly complemented the "moving and meaningful story", but lent itself to characters "mug[ging] for the camera".
Meanwhile, Kevin Maher of The Times described Departures as a "verklempt comedy" with wearisome "push-button crying", though he considered it saved by the quality of the acting, "stately" directing, and "dreamy" soundtrack. Another mixed review was published in The Daily Telegraph, which described the film as a "safe and emotionally generous crowd-pleaser" that was not worthy of its Academy Award. Philip Kennicott wrote in The Washington Post that the film was "as polished as it is heavy-handed", predictable yet ready to break taboos, immersed in death yet incapable of escaping "the maddening Japanese taste for sentimentality". In Variety, Eddie Cockrell wrote that the film offered "fascinating glimpses" of the encoffining ceremony but should have had a much shorter runtime. Paatsch gave Departures three stars out of five, describing it as a "quaintly mournful flick" that "unfolds with a delicacy and precision that slowly captivates the viewer" but considering some scenes, such as the montage, "needlessly showy flourishes". Edward Porter of The Sunday Times wrote that the film's success at the Academy Awards could be blamed on "a case of the Academy favouring bland sentimentality".
The A.V. Club Keith Phipps gave Departures a C−, writing that though it featured "handsome shots of provincial life" and encoffining scenes with a "poetic quality", ultimately the film "drips from one overstated emotion to the next". A. O. Scott wrote in The New York Times that the film was "perfectly mediocre", predictable, and banal in its combination of humour and melodrama. Despite its sometimes touching moments, he considered Departures "interesting mainly as an index of the Academy’s hopelessly timid and conventional tastes". Tony Rayns of Film Comment gave a scathing review in which he denounced the script as "embarrassingly clunky and obvious", the acting as merely "adequate", and the film as but a "paean to the good-looking corpse". Adams gave Departures two out of four stars, praising the emotionally and visually arresting scenes of encoffinments and "loving attention to the textures, tastes and behaviours of semi-rural Japan" but condemning the predictability of the plot; he wrote that "Forty-five minutes in, [viewers have] prepared a mental checklist of every turn that Daigo Kobayashi will face, then negotiate – and be danged if Takita doesn't deliver on every one".
Awards
At the 32nd Japan Academy Prize ceremony held in February 2009, Departures dominated the competition. It received a total of thirteen nominations, winning ten, including Picture of the Year, Screenplay of the Year (Koyama), Director of the Year (Takita), and Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role (Motoki). In the Outstanding Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role category, Hirosue lost to Tae Kimura of All Around Us, while in the Outstanding Achievement in Art Direction category Departures Tomio Ogawa lost to Paco and the Magical Book Towako Kuwashima. Hisaishi, nominated for two Outstanding Achievement in Music awards, won for his scoring of Studio Ghibli's animated film Ponyo. In response to the wins, Motoki said "It feels as if everything miraculously came together in balance this time with Okuribito".
Departures was submitted to the 81st Academy Awards as Japan's submission for the Best Foreign Language Film award. Although eleven previous Japanese films had won Academy Awards in other categories, such as Best Animated Feature or Best Costume Design, the as-yet unattained Best Foreign Language Film award was highly coveted in the Japanese film industry. Departures was not expected to win, owing to strong competition from the Israeli and French submissions (Ari Folman's Waltz with Bashir and Laurent Cantet's The Class, respectively), but was ultimately the victor at the February 2009 ceremony. This was considered a surprise by several film critics, and The New York Times David Itzkoff termed Departures "The Film That Lost Your Oscars Pool for You". Motoki, who was expecting the "wonderful" Israeli submission to win, was also surprised; he described himself as a "hanger-on who just observes the ceremony", and regretted "not walk[ing] with more confidence" upon his arrival.
Departures received recognition at a variety of film festivals, including the Audience Choice Award at the 28th Hawaii International Film Festival, the Audience Choice Award at the 15th Vilnius International Film Festival, the Grand Prix des Amériques at the 32nd Montreal World Film Festival, and Best Narrative Film at the 20th Palm Springs International Film Festival. Motoki was selected as best actor at several ceremonies, including at the Asian Film Awards, the Asia Pacific Screen Awards, and the Blue Ribbon Awards; he was also viewers' choice for best actor at the Golden Rooster Awards. At the 29th Hong Kong Film Awards, Departures was selected as Best Asian Film, beating three Chinese films and Ponyo. Following the 21st Nikkan Sports Film Award ceremony, in which Departures won Best Film and Best Director, Takita expressed surprise at the film's awards, saying "I did not know how well my work would be accepted." By December 2009 the film had won 98 awards.
Impact
After the film's success, Sakata Location Box set up a hospitality service called Mukaebito—a pun on the film's Japanese title indicating "one who greets or picks up" another, rather than "one who sends off". The service maintains shooting locations and provides maps of these locations for tourists. In 2009, Location Box opened the building that served as the NK Agent office to the public. For a fee, visitors could enter and view props from the film. Under a job creation program, between 2009 and 2013 the organization received ¥30 million from Yamagata Prefecture and ¥8 million from Sakata City for the building's maintenance and administration. The site attracted nearly 120,000 visitors in 2009, though numbers quickly fell; in 2013 there were fewer than 9,000 visitors. Safety fears due to the building's age led to the Sakata municipal government ending the organization's lease, and the building was closed again at the end of March 2014. At the time, the City Tourism division was considering options, such as limiting visits to the first two floors. The building used as the Concerto café has been open to the public since 2009 as the Kaminoyama Concerto Museum, and the Sakata Minato-za cinema has also been opened to tourists. Takita's hometown of Takaoka, Toyama, maintains a Film Resources Museum; staff have reported that at times over a hundred Takita fans visit per day.
The film's success generated greater interest in encoffining and the . Even the model of hearse driven in the film was merchandised: the Mitsuoka Limousine Type 2-04, a smaller, less expensive version of the film's vehicle, was put on the market on 24 February 2009. The manufacturer, Mitsuoka Motors, is located in Takita's home prefecture of Toyama. In 2013, Kouki Kimura, from a family of , founded the Okuribito Academy together with nurse and entrepreneur Kei Takamaru. It offers training in encoffining, embalming, and related practices.
Explanatory notes
References
Works cited
External links
(via the Internet Archive)
2008 films
2008 drama films
Japanese films
Japanese drama films
Japanese-language films
Best Film Kinema Junpo Award winners
Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award winners
2008 black comedy films
Films scored by Joe Hisaishi
Films about cellos and cellists
Films about death
Films about funerals
Films set in Tokyo
Films set in Yamagata Prefecture
Films shot in Japan
Films directed by Yōjirō Takita
Picture of the Year Japan Academy Prize winners
Films with screenplays by Kundō Koyama
Shochiku films
Dentsu films
Shogakukan franchises | false | [
"And Thou Shalt Love (, translit. V'ahavta) is an Israeli short film. It was directed by Chaim Elbaum. The film examines the difficulties of being both an Orthodox Jew and gay. The story is based on Elbaum's experiences with being gay.\n\nIt won the best drama award at the 2008 Jerusalem Film Festival.\n\nPlot\nOhad, the protagonist, is serving in the Israel Defense Forces as a Hesder student. He has not told anyone that he is gay. He tries various ways of dealing with the conflict between his religious beliefs and his sexual orientation, including Atzat Nefesh. He is told to spend forty days fasting and repenting to help rid him of his homosexual inclinations. He does this and believes himself to be cured.\n\nAfter this, his best friend, Nir, returns from leave. Ohed is torn between his homosexuality and his religion. The film deals with the struggles Ohed faces when it comes to loving God and loving Nir.\n\nCast\n\nSee also\n Homosexuality and Judaism\n Trembling Before G-d (2001)\n Say Amen (2005) a documentary about a gay man coming out to his Orthodox family\n Paper Dolls (film)\n Yossi and Jagger (2002) an Israeli romantic drama film about two soldiers on the Israel – Lebanon border\n\nReferences\n\n Jerusalem Film Festival\n \n \nJerusalem Post article\nHaaretz article\n\nExternal links\n Official site \n \n\n2007 films\n2007 drama films\nGay-related films\nIsraeli films\nIsraeli LGBT-related films\nFilms about LGBT and Judaism\nLGBT and Judaism\nIsraeli short films\nLGBT-related drama films\nIsraeli drama films\nFilms about Orthodox and Hasidic Jews\n2007 LGBT-related films\nAnti-Orthodox Judaism sentiment",
"Undercover Kitty or Miss Minoes () is a 2001 Dutch film, based on the children's novel Minoes by Annie M.G. Schmidt. The film won the Golden Calves for Best Feature Film and Best Actress (Carice van Houten).\n\nPlot\nOne night, a cat named Minoes stumbles upon a can of chemical liquid that had been dropped by a truck, and after drinking it transforms into a human woman. As a human, she maintains her feline traits such as her fear of dogs, meowing on the roof with other cats, catching mice, purring, and eating raw fish. She soon meets a journalist named Tibbe, who works for the newspaper of the fictional town of Killendoorn.\n\nTibbe is very shy, and therefore he finds it quite hard to write good articles. At first, Tibbe does not believe she is a cat in human form, but Minoes happens to know all kinds of interesting news from the town cats, so it doesn't bother him. In exchange for food and shelter, Tibbe allows Minoes to help him with his journalist job by finding interesting news to write about. With the help of the Cat Press Service and all the news the cats bring in, Tibbe soon becomes the journalist with the best articles.\n\nHowever, there is one important article that Tibbe does not dare to write: an article on the rich Mr. Ellemeet, the chemical factory owner. All town members consider him a very respectable man, and a real animal lover. But all cats know that he is not what he seems. After Minoes finally convinces Tibbe to write and publish the article, the whole town turns their back on him. He loses his job and is almost evicted from his apartment. However, Minoes helps set up a sting in which Ellemeet is filmed shooting at cats and exposed as the cruel villain he is. In the end, although Minoes has a chance to turn back into a cat by eating a bullfinch (which supposedly eats herbs that can cure many conditions such as that of a cat turning into a human), she decides to remain human and stay with Tibbe, having fallen in love with him. The film's credits reveal that the two got married.\n\nCast\nCarice van Houten as Minoes\nTheo Maassen as Tibbe\nSarah Bannier as Bibi\nHans Kesting as Harrie de Haringman\nOlga Zuiderhoek as Mrs. Van Dam\nKees Hulst as Mr. Van Dam\nJack Wouterse as Mayor Van Weezel\nPierre Bokma as Mr. Ellemeet\n\nRelease\nThe film was a box office success grossing $4,227,362 in the Netherlands, $111,858 in Germany, $34,164 in Austria, and $389,200 in Norway. Under the title Miss Minoes, Music Box Films released a dubbed version on 23 December 2011 in New York City and Chicago.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n \n\n2000s Dutch-language films\nFilms based on works by Annie M.G. Schmidt\nFilms about cats\nFilms about shapeshifting\nFilms set in the Netherlands\n2001 comedy films\n2001 films\nDutch comedy films\nDutch films"
]
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"Sean Hannity",
"Career"
]
| C_d5d7c3407dd148389b1d80a63090fca4_1 | how did he get his start | 1 | How did Sean Hannity get his start? | Sean Hannity | Hannity hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible." Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year. This was after two shows featuring the book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS by Gene Antonio; among other remarks made during the broadcast, Hannity told a lesbian caller, "I feel sorry for your child." The university board that governed the station later reversed its decision due to a campaign conducted on Hannity's behalf by the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, which argued that the station had discriminated against Hannity's First Amendment rights. When the station refused to give him a public apology and more airtime, Hannity decided against returning to KCSB. After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America." Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996, Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes. Later that year, Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity was on WABC's afternoon time slot from January 1998 until the end of 2013. Since January 2014, Hannity has hosted the 3-6 p.m. time slot on WOR in New York City. In their 2007 book Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America, conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group." CANNOTANSWER | Hannity hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. | Sean Patrick Hannity (born December 30, 1961) is an American talk show host and conservative political commentator. He is the host of The Sean Hannity Show, a nationally syndicated talk radio show, and has also hosted a commentary program, Hannity, on Fox News, since 2009.
Hannity worked as a general contractor and volunteered as a talk show host at UC Santa Barbara in 1989. He later joined WVNN in Athens, Alabama and shortly afterward, WGST in Atlanta. After leaving WGST, he worked at WABC in New York until 2013. Since 2014, Hannity has worked at WOR.
In 1996, Hannity and Alan Colmes co-hosted Hannity & Colmes on Fox. After Colmes announced his departure in January 2008, Hannity merged the Hannity & Colmes show into Hannity.
Hannity has received several awards and honors, including an honorary degree from Liberty University. He has written three New York Times best-selling books: Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism; Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism; and Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, and released a fourth, Live Free or Die, in 2020.
Hannity has sometimes promoted conspiracy theories, such as "birtherism" (claims that then-President Barack Obama was not a legitimate U.S. citizen), claims regarding the murder of Seth Rich, and falsehoods about Hillary Clinton's health. Hannity was an early supporter of Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election. Hannity often acted as an unofficial spokesman for the president, criticizing the media and attacking Robert Mueller's inquiry into Russian interference in Trump's election. He reportedly spoke to Trump on the phone most weeknights. He spoke at the president's lectern during a Trump rally, and White House advisors characterized him as the "shadow" chief of staff. According to Forbes, by 2018 Hannity had become one of the most-watched hosts in cable news and most-listened-to hosts in talk radio, due in part to his closeness and access to Trump.
Early life and education
Hannity was born in New York City, New York, the son of Lillian (née Flynn) and Hugh Hannity. Lillian worked as a stenographer and a corrections officer at a county jail, while Hugh was a World War II veteran and family-court officer. He was the youngest of four siblings and the only boy. All his grandparents immigrated to the United States from Ireland. He grew up in Franklin Square, New York on Long Island.
In his youth, Hannity worked as a paperboy delivering issues of the New York Daily News and the Long Island Daily Press. His parents were initially supporters of President John F. Kennedy, eventually growing more Republican in their views as time went on, though they resisted being overtly political at home.
Hannity attended Sacred Heart Seminary in Hempstead, New York and St. Pius X Preparatory Seminary in Uniondale, New York. He attended New York University and Adelphi University, but did not graduate from either.
Career
In 1982, Hannity started a house-painting business and a few years later, worked as a building contractor in Santa Barbara, California. He hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible."
Radio
Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year after a controversy. During two shows, gay and lesbian rights were discussed in what was considered to be a contentious manner. (See LGBT issues below.) The university board that governed the station later reversed its decision after a campaign conducted on Hannity's behalf by the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union argued that the station had discriminated against Hannity's First Amendment rights. When the station refused to issue Hannity a public apology and more airtime, he did not return to KCSB.
After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications, presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America". Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville media market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996, Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes.
Later that year, Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late-night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive-time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity was on WABC's afternoon time slot from January 1998.
In their 2007 book Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America, conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group". The WABC slot continued until the end of 2013. Since January 2014, Hannity has hosted the 3:00–6:00p.m. time slot on WOR in New York City.
Hannity's radio program is a conservative political talk show that features Hannity's opinions and ideology related to current issues and politicians. The Sean Hannity Show began national syndication on September 10, 2001, on more than five hundred stations nationwide. In 2004, Hannity signed a $25million five-year contract extension with ABC Radio (now Citadel Media) to continue the show until 2009. The program was made available via Armed Forces Radio Network in 2006. In June 2007, ABC Radio was sold to Citadel Communications and in the summer of 2008, Hannity was signed for a $100million five-year contract. As of March 2018, the program is heard by more than 13.5 million listeners a week. Hannity was ranked No.2 in Talkers Magazine's 2017 Heavy Hundred and was listed as No.72 on Forbes' "Celebrity 100" list in 2013.
In January 2007, Clear Channel Communications signed a groupwide three-year extension with Hannity on more than eighty stations. The largest stations in the group deal included KTRH Houston, KFYI Phoenix, WPGB Pittsburgh, WKRC Cincinnati, WOOD Grand Rapids, WFLA Tampa, WOAI San Antonio, WLAC Nashville, and WREC Memphis.
Hannity signed a long-term contract to remain with Premiere Networks in September 2013.
At the beginning of 2014, Hannity signed contracts to air on several Salem Communications stations including WDTK Detroit, WIND Chicago, WWRC (now WQOF) Washington, D.C., and KSKY Dallas.
Television
Hannity was a co-host of Hannity & Colmes, an American political "point-counterpoint"-style television program on the Fox News Channel featuring Hannity and Alan Colmes as co-hosts. Hannity presented the conservative point of view with Colmes providing the liberal viewpoint.
While Hannity's views are typically politically and socially conservative, he has spoken supportively about birth control, which has led to on-air clashes with pro-life guests such as Rev. Thomas Euteneuer, president of Human Life International. Hannity said if the Catholic Church were to excommunicate him over his support for contraception, he would join Jerry Falwell's Thomas Road Baptist Church.
In January 2007, Hannity began a new Sunday night television show on Fox News, Hannity's America.
In November 2008, Colmes announced his departure from Hannity & Colmes. After the show's final broadcast on January 9, 2009, Hannity took over the time slot with his own new show, Hannity, which has a format similar to Hannity's America.
Books
Hannity is the author of four books. Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism was published in 2002, and Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism was published in 2004 through ReganBooks. Both these books reached the nonfiction New York Times bestseller list, the second of which stayed there for five weeks. Hannity has said he is too busy to write many books, and dictated a lot of his own two books into a tape recorder while driving in to do his radio show.
Hannity wrote his third book, Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, which was released by HarperCollins in March 2010. The book became Hannity's third New York Times Bestseller.
In 2020, Hannity released his fourth book, Live Free or Die.
Let Freedom Ring:Winning the War of Liberty Over Liberalism, William Morrow, August 1, 2002, .
Deliver Us From Evil:Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, William Morrow, February 17, 2004, .
Conservative Victory:Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, HarperCollins, March 30, 2010, .
Live Free or Die:America (and the World) on the Brink, Threshold Editions, August 4, 2020, .
Freedom Concerts
From 2003 until 2010, Hannity hosted country music-themed "Freedom Concerts" to raise money for charity. In 2010, conservative blogger Debbie Schlussel wrote that only a small percentage of the money raised by the concerts goes to the target charity, Freedom Alliance. The Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) filed complaints with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), also in 2010. The FTC complaint alleges that Hannity was "falsely promoting that all concert proceeds would be donated to a scholarship fund for the children of those killed or wounded in war". The complaint filed with the IRS claims that Freedom Alliance has violated its 501(c)3 charity status. The concerts stopped around the same year.
Awards and honors
Hannity received a Marconi Award in 2003 and 2007 as the Network Syndicated Personality of the Year from the National Association of Broadcasters.
In 2009, Talkers Magazine listed Hannity as No.2 on their list of the 100 most important radio talk show hosts in America (with Rush Limbaugh listed as No.1). The same magazine gave Hannity its Freedom of Speech Award in 2003.
In 2005, Jerry Falwell, chancellor of the evangelical Liberty University, awarded Hannity an honorary degree.
Hannity was inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame in November 2017.
Other activities
Hannity has had cameo appearances in film and television, having a brief voiceover in The Siege as an unseen reporter, and appearing in Atlas Shrugged: Part II and the second season of House of Cards as himself. He executive produced and appeared in the 2017 film Let There Be Light, which also stars Kevin Sorbo.
As of April 2018, Hannity owned at least 877 residential properties, which were bought for nearly $89million. He purchased some of the homes with the help of loans from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and most are in working-class neighborhoods. His property managers have taken an aggressive management approach with a much higher than average eviction rate. The Washington Post reported that his property management team has used eviction proceedings both to remove tenants and to generate revenue. His property managers have claimed that Hannity has no active role in the management of the more than 1,000 properties he has a stake in.
Controversies and criticism
According to The Washington Post, Hannity "repeatedly embraces storylines that prove to be inaccurate" and takes positions that change over time. In the opinion of The New York Times, Hannity is "barreling headfirst into the murky territory between opinion and out-and-out conspiracy theorism". Hannity often promotes conspiracy theories without explicitly endorsing them, unlike Alex Jones. The New York Times wrote that this "has the effect of nourishing the more wild-eyed beliefs of his fans while providing Hannity a degree of plausible deniability". The New Yorker wrote in 2019 that Hannity had "[spewed] baseless conspiracy theories with impunity".
During the Bush years, Hannity "loyally supported the president's policies". During the Obama administration, Hannity "leaned more heavily on stories he believed were being given short shrift by the 'liberal media'stories about where Obama was born, and who deserved blame for the attack on the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya". In 2017, The Washington Post wrote that "what Hannity has stood forat least for the past couple of yearsis Trump."
Birtherism
Although Hannity said he believed President Obama was born in the U.S., to answer queries on Obama's citizenship, he repeatedly called on Obama to release his birth certificate. Hannity described the circumstances regarding Obama's birth certificate as "odd". Hannity also defended and promoted those who questioned Obama's citizenship of the U.S., such as Donald Trump. Hannity invited Trump to his show while Trump was a leader in the birther movement; during an interview with Hannity, Trump said Obama "could have easily have come from Kenya, or someplace". Hannity said in response, "The issue could go away in a minute. Just show the certificate." Even after Obama produced his birth certificate in 2008, certified by the state of Hawaii, Hannity kept calling on Obama to release his birth certificate, asking why did he not "just produce it and we move on?" In October 2016, Hannity offered to purchase a one-way ticket to Kenya for Obama.
2016 presidential campaign
Candidacy of Donald Trump
Hannity is known for his pro-Trump coverage. According to The Washington Post, "Hannity's comeback coincided with his early, eager embrace of his fellow New Yorker... Trump attacked the Gold Star father, and Hannity stood by him. Trump went after a federal judge of Mexican descent, and Hannity backed him. After the Access Hollywood tape emerged of Trump making lewd comments about inappropriate sexual behaviour towards women, Hannity continued to defend him: 'King David had 500 concubines, for crying out loud.'" After the inauguration, the first interview the new president gave to a cable news channel was conducted by Hannity. Hannity additionally defended the Trump administration's false claim that Trump's inauguration crowd was the biggest ever.
Hannity has been criticized as being overly favorable to the candidacy of Donald Trump, and granting Trump more airtime than other presidential candidates during the 2016 primaries. Hannity, for instance, let Trump promote the false claim that Rafael Cruz, father of Trump's rival presidential candidate Ted Cruz, was involved in the John F. Kennedy assassination. He admitted to favoring Republican candidates, though without indicating a preference for Donald Trump over Ted Cruz. According to Dylan Byers of CNN, Hannity during interviews "frequently cites areas where he agrees with Trump, or where he thinks Trump was right about something, then asks him to expand on it", and "often ignores or defends Trump from criticism".
Tensions between Cruz and Hannity appeared to reach a boiling point during a contentious April 2016 radio interview, during which Cruz implied Hannity was a "hardcore Donald Trump supporter" and Hannity responded by accusing Cruz of "throw[ing] this in my face" every time he asked a "legitimate question". Jim Rutenberg commented in August 2016 that Hannity is "not only Mr. Trump's biggest media booster; he also veers into the role of adviser," citing sources who said Hannity spent months offering suggestions to Trump and his campaign on strategy and messaging. Hannity responded to the report by saying, "I'm not hiding the fact that I want Donald Trump to be the next President of the United States.... I never claimed to be a journalist." (In an article published in December 2017, Hannity said "I'm a journalist. But I'm an advocacy journalist, or an opinion journalist.") Hannity has feuded with several conservatives who oppose Trump, including National Reviews Jonah Goldberg, Wall Street Journal foreign affairs columnist Bret Stephens, and National Review editor Rich Lowry.
Conspiracy theories about Hillary Clinton
During the 2016 presidential election, Hannity periodically promoted conspiracy theories regarding Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party. Hannity repeatedly claimed that Clinton had very serious medical problems and that the media was covering them up. He misrepresented photos of Clinton to give the impression that she had secret medical problems. He shared a photo from the fringe news site Gateway Pundit and falsely claimed that it showed her Secret Service agent holding a diazepam pen intended to treat seizures, when he in fact was holding a small flashlight. He booked doctors on his show to discuss Clinton's health; although these people had never personally examined Clinton, they made alarmist statements about her state of health which turned out to be false. At one point, Hannity promoted an unsubstantiated report that Clinton had been drunk at a rally; at another point, he suggested that Clinton was drunk and that her campaign needed to "sober her up".
Murder of Seth Rich conspiracy theories
In May 2017, Hannity became a prominent promoter of the conspiracy theory that Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party had a DNC staffer killed. Shortly afterward, he faced backlash from both left- and right-wing sources and lost several advertisers, including Crowne Plaza Hotels, Cars.com, Leesa Mattress, USAA, Peloton and Casper Sleep deciding to pull their marketing from his program on Fox News. However, USAA decided to return to the show shortly after following a negative outcry against its decision to pull out. Conservative magazine National Review compared the story to a flat earth video, called it a "disgrace" that Hannity and other conspiracy theorists were hyping the story, and called for them to stop.
In March 2018, Seth Rich's parents filed a lawsuit against Fox News for pushing conspiracy theories about their son's death. The suit alleges that the network "intentionally exploited" the tragedy for political purposes. On Oct. 12, 2020, Fox News agreed to pay millions of dollars to the Rich family.
Claims about election fraud
Hannity came under criticism during the 2016 presidential election for false claims about election rigging during interviews. Hannity responded to this by citing Mitt Romney's failure in the 2012 United States presidential election to obtain any votes in 59 of 1,687 Philadelphia voting districts as proof of election rigging. However, Factcheck.org and PolitiFact found that it was not unusual at all for this to occur, as those electoral districts are heavily African-American. Philadelphia elections inspector Ryan Godfrey also refuted Hannity's claim.
After the 2020 election, Hannity amplified false claims of election fraud, including by hosting former Trump lawyer Sidney Powell on his Fox News show, where Powell made unsubstantiated allegations on the topic. Republican efforts to overturn the 2020 election results and install Donald Trump for a second term culminated in the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. In 2022, the U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack is investigating what Hannity may have known in advance. The committee discovered that, on December 31, 2020, Hannity texted White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, saying, "I do NOT see January 6 happening the way he [Trump] is being told." In December of 2020, a month after the election, Hannity called for Trump’s false claims of voter fraud to be investigated by a special prosecutor, despite there still being no credible evidence of them by the accusers. As of February of 2022, no credible evidence has been provided of these false claims that Hannity amplified.
WikiLeaks
In 2010, Hannity said WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was waging a "war" on the United States, and that Wikileaks put American lives in "jeopardy" and "danger" around the world. He also criticized the Obama administration for failing to apprehend Assange. In 2016, after Wikileaks published leaked emails from the Democratic National Committee, Hannity praised Assange for showing "how corrupt, dishonest and phony our government is". He told Assange in a September 2016 interview, "I do hope you get free one day. I wish you the best." The following month, Hannity claimed that WikiLeaks has revealed "everything that conspiracy theorists have said over the years" about Hillary Clinton is true.
In February 2017, Hannity retweeted a WikiLeaks tweet linking to an article by the conspiracy website Gateway Pundit, claiming that John McCain was a "globalist war criminal". McCain's spokeswoman called Hannity out on it, asking him to "correct the record". Hannity later deleted the tweet. In May 2017, Hannity made an offer to Assange to guest host his Fox News TV show.
Relationship with Donald Trump and Michael Cohen
Hannity developed a close relationship with Trump during the election and has become even closer during his presidency. The two men speak on the phone multiple times a week, discussing Hannity's weekday show, the special counsel investigation, even evaluating White House staff. Hannity shares, The Economist asserts, "Mr. Trump's love of conspiracy theories and hatred of snooty elites". They speak so often that one Trump adviser has said Hannity "basically has a desk in the place". On the air, Hannity echoes Trump's attacks on the media and Special Counsel investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. Trump sometimes quotes Hannity to others or promotes the show to his Twitter followers. Hannity has encouraged Trump to shut down the government to get funding for a border wall, as well as his declaration of a national emergency over the US–Mexico border.
According to reports by the Los Angeles Times and New York magazine, Hannity frequently talks to Trump by telephone after Hannity's weekday broadcasts, and Hannity is one of several dozen cleared callers whose calls to the White House public switchboard can be connected directly to the president.
Hannity stirred controversy in April 2018 when it was revealed that he shared a lawyer, Michael Cohen, with Trump. In a breach of journalistic ethics, Hannity had failed to disclose that Cohen was his lawyer while at the same time taking to the Fox airwaves to defend Cohen and criticize those who investigated him.
On April 9, 2018, federal agents from the U.S. Attorney's office served a search warrant on the office and residence of Michael Cohen, Trump's personal attorney. On the air, Hannity defended Cohen and criticized the federal action, calling it "highly questionable" and "an unprecedented abuse of power". On April 16, 2018, in a court hearing, Cohen's lawyers told the judge that Cohen had ten clients in 2017–2018 but did "traditional legal tasks" for only three: Trump, Elliott Broidy, and a "prominent person" who did not wish to be named for fear of being "embarrassed". The federal judge ordered the revelation of the third client, whom Cohen's lawyers named as Hannity. Although Hannity has covered Cohen on his show, he did not disclose that he had consulted with Cohen.
Fox News released a statement on April 16, 2018, attributed to Hannity: "Michael Cohen has never represented me in any matter. I never retained him, received an invoice, or paid legal fees. I have occasionally had brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective. I assumed those conversations were confidential, but to be absolutely clear they never involved any matter between me and a third party." Also, NBC News quoted Hannity as saying: "We definitely had attorney–client privilege because I asked him for that," while Hannity said on his radio show that he "might have handed him ten bucks" for the attorney-client privilege. Lastly, Hannity tweeted that his discussions with Cohen were "almost exclusively" about real estate.
The following day, news reports revealed that Hannity had shared another lawyer with Trump, Jay Sekulow. Sekulow had written a cease-and-desist letter to KFAQ on Hannity's behalf in May 2017, and later represented Trump in connection with the Mueller investigation.
In August 2018, Hannity allowed Sekulow and Rudy Giuliani, another personal lawyer for Trump, to host Hannity's radio show; the duo proceeded to defend Trump and promote arguments made by the Trump administration.
According to The New Yorker, Hannity has reversed on the issue of negotiations with North Korea: during Obama's presidency, Hannity called negotiations with North Korea "disturbing", whereas he called Trump's negotiations with North Korea a "huge foreign-policy win".
In June 2019, Hannity expressed outrage at Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's comment that she would like to see Trump "in prison". Hannity declared: "Based on no actual crimes, she wants a political opponent locked up in prison? That happens in banana republicsbeyond despicable behavior." Aaron Rupar of Vox criticized Hannity for "obvious hypocrisy", noting that Hannity himself had said in January 2018 regarding Hillary Clinton: "I think Hillary should be in jail. Lock her up." Aaron Blake of The Washington Post described Hannity's comment as "a pretty obvious bit of gaslighting", noting Hannity's loyalty to Trump, whose campaign rallies have featured chants of "Lock her up", and also Hannity's comments that Trump was free to investigate Clinton.
Hannity played the most important role in persuading Trump to pardon the convicted murderer and war criminal Clint Lorance.
Criticism of FBI, DOJ, and special counsel
During President Trump's administration, Hannity has repeatedly been highly critical of the FBI, DOJ, Special Counsel Robert Mueller, and others investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election. According to a review by Media Matters of all transcripts from the 254 episodes of Hannity's show from Mueller's appointment (May 17, 2017) to May 16, 2018, Hannity had 487 segments substantially devoted to Mueller (approximately two per episode), opened his program with Mueller 152 times (approximately three times per week), and the content of his show was highly critical of the probe and the media's coverage of the probe. He has called the Russia inquiry a "witch hunt", an "utter disgrace", and "a direct threat to you, the American people, and our American republic". Hannity has expressed skepticism of the U.S. intelligence community's view that Russia hacked the Democratic National Convention's emails during the 2016 election and has promoted various conspiracy theories. In March 2017 he publicized a theory, first proposed at the Wikileaks Twitter account, that the CIA could have done the hacking while making it look like Russia did it. In August he suggested that Seth Rich may have been the leaker.
Hannity has described the Mueller investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, as well as James Comey's tenure as FBI Director, as "one giant incestuous circle of corruption". In April 2018, Hannity ran a segment where he claimed there were "criminal" connections between Bill and Hillary Clinton, Mueller, and Comey. Hannity asserted that there were three connected "Deep State crime families" actively "trying to take down the president". A guest on the segment, attorney Joseph diGenova, called Mueller's team "legal terrorists" and referred to Comey as a "dirty cop".
Hannity also claimed that Mueller had been involved in the corrupt dealings of several FBI agents in connection with Boston, Massachusetts crime boss Whitey Bulger. The federal judge who presided over a lawsuit concerning the corrupt dealings said Hannity's claims were unsubstantiated and that Mueller was never accused of any wrongdoing nor even mentioned during the proceedings.
In June 2018, after reports that Mueller's probe had asked witnesses to turn their personal phones over to investigators for examination, Hannity sarcastically suggested on air to the witnesses that they "follow Hillary Clinton's lead" and destroy their personal phones so they cannot be examined.
In May 2019, after Mueller gave a statement saying the Special Counsel investigation did not exonerate Trump of crimes, Hannity said Mueller was "basically full of crap" and did not know the law.
Uranium One
From 2015 into 2018, Fox News broadcast extensive coverage of an alleged scandal surrounding the sale of Uranium One to Russian interests, which Hannity characterized as "one of the biggest scandals in American history". The Fox News coverage extended throughout the programming day, with particular emphasis by Hannity. The network promoted a narrative asserting that, as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton personally approved the Uranium One sale in exchange for $145million in bribes paid to the Clinton Foundation. Donald Trump repeated these allegations as a candidate and as president. No evidence of wrongdoing by Clinton had been found after three years of allegations, an FBI investigation, and the 2017 appointment of a Federal attorney to evaluate the investigation. In November 2017, Fox News host Shepard Smith concisely debunked the alleged scandal, including saying that Clinton did not personally approve the sale, infuriating viewers who suggested he should work for CNN or MSNBC. Hannity later called Smith "clueless", while Smith stated, "I get it, that some of our opinion programming is there strictly to be entertaining. I get that. I don't work there. I wouldn't work there."
A two-year Justice Department investigation initiated after Trump became president found no evidence to justify pursuing a criminal investigation.
Deep state
Hannity has advocated the QAnon and "deep state" conspiracy theories. The latter proposes a government officials network is working to hinder the Trump administration. He has described the deep state as a "Shadow Government" and "Deep state swamp of Obama holdovers and DC lifers". In March 2017, he called for a "purge" of Obama-era bureaucrats and appointees in government. In an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, conservative columnist Bret Stephens disputed Hannity's deep state allegations, saying they were an example of the "paranoid style in politics". Later that month, Hannity said NBC News was part of the deep state. In May 2017, he reiterated that deep state/intelligence operatives were trying to destroy the Trump presidency.
In March 2018, Hannity attacked Special Counsel Robert Mueller, saying his career was "anything but impeccable". Hannity said Mueller was friends with former FBI Director James Comey and former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, and that he "cannot be expected to honestly investigate scandals that his friends are directly involved in". He said these individuals were involved in "one massive, huge, deep-state conflict of interest after another. Now they're protecting themselves. They're trying to preserve their own power." Mueller and Comey are professional acquaintances but not known to be friends, while Trump attorney general Bill Barr said in 2019 that he and Mueller had been friends for thirty years.
Comments on sexual harassment
In 2016, Hannity vociferously defended Roger Ailes when he was accused by multiple women of sexual harassment. In May 2017, Hannity paid a tribute to Ailes after he died. Hannity called him "a second father" and said to Ailes' "enemies" that he was "preparing to kick your in the next life".
In April 2017, Hannity came to the defense of Fox News co-president Bill Shine after it was reported that Shine's job was at risk. At least four lawsuits alleged that Shine had ignored, enabled or concealed Ailes' alleged sexual harassment.
In September 2017, several months after Bill O'Reilly was fired from Fox News in the wake of a number of women's alleging that he had sexually harassed them, Hannity hosted O'Reilly on his show. Some Fox News employees criticized the decision. In the interview, O'Reilly attacked liberal media watchdog groups and said he should have fought harder when those groups targeted his advertisers. According to CNN, during the interview, Hannity found kinship with O'Reilly as he appeared "to feel that he and O'Reilly have both become victims of liberals looking to silence them".
Hannity came under criticism in October 2017 when he attacked Democrats after it became known that a large number of women had accused Harvey Weinstein, the Hollywood producer and donor to Democratic causes, of sexual harassment. Critics noted that Hannity had weeks earlier defended and hosted his coworker Bill O'Reilly who was fired following a number of sexual harassment allegations.
LGBT rights
In the radio show for KCSB, which was the subject of controversy in 1989, Hannity made anti-gay comments. He called AIDS a "gay disease" and said the media was hiding salient information from the public. Two editions featured anti-gay activist Gene Antonio, a Lutheran minister, discussing his book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS. In the book, Antonio claims that AIDS can be spread by people sneezing in close proximity to each other. Hannity encouraged Antonio when he said that AIDS spread when gay men consumed each other's feces, said that homosexuality was a "lower form of behavior", compared homosexual sex to "playing in a sewer" and gay people of being "filled with hatred and bigotry". When a lesbian, another broadcaster at the station, called into the show, Hannity said "I feel sorry for your child." Hannity was quoted at the time as having said "anyone listening to this show that believes homosexuality is a normal lifestyle has been brainwashed." The ACLU opposed his firing and petitioned the station to reverse their decision. Hannity demanded a formal apology and double the airtime. While the station did offer to allow Hannity to return, they would not meet Hannity's additional demands and he declined to return.
In 2017, Hannity said he regretted the comments and that they were "ignorant and embarrassing".
Immigration
Hannity opposed amnesty for undocumented immigrants; however, in 2012 he said he had evolved on the issue and favored a "pathway to citizenship". Later, he opposed that idea. By 2018, he was described as an immigration hardliner by CNN, The Washington Post, and New York magazine. In August 2018, Trump suggested that he might shut down the government to force Congress to fund his border wall, boasting that Hannity agreed with the action.
Islam
Hannity has warned of sharia law coming to the United States. Hannity opposed the building of Park51, a mosque two blocks from the World Trade Center site.
Hannity promoted the idea of "Islamic training camps right here in America", which were based on an unsubstantiated "documentary" by the Christian Action Network.
In 2006, Hannity was critical of Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to U.S. Congress, being sworn into office with an oath on a Quran. Hannity equated the Quran with Mein Kampf, asking a guest on his show whether he would have allowed Ellison "to choose, you know, Hitler's Mein Kampf, which is the Nazi bible?"
Torture
In 2009, Hannity said he supported enhanced interrogation, a euphemism for torture. He also volunteered to be waterboarded for charity. In response, Keith Olbermann pledged to donate $1,000 for every second of waterboarding Hannity underwent. In 2017, Hannity continued to advocate for waterboarding, raising the example of using it against a kidnapper. According to Media Matters, Hannity has not been waterboarded as of March 2018.
Climate change
Hannity rejects the scientific consensus on climate change. In 2001, he described it as "phony science from the left". In 2004, he falsely claimed that scientists couldn't agree on whether global warming was "scientific fact or fiction". In 2010, Hannity falsely stated that so-called "Climategate"the leaking of e-mails written by climate scientists that, according to climate change deniers, demonstrated scientific misconduct, but which all subsequent inquiries found to show no evidence of misconduct or wrongdoingwas a scandal that "exposed global warming as a myth cooked up by alarmists". Hannity frequently invites critics of climate science onto his shows.
Death panels
Hannity promoted the falsehood that the Affordable Care Act would create so-called "death panels". According to a study by Dartmouth College political scientist Brendan Nyhan, Hannity's show, along with the Laura Ingraham Show, were the first major conservative media personalities to latch onto the false claim of Betsy McCaughey, a former lieutenant governor of New York, that the Affordable Care Act contained death panels. When Sarah Palin stirred controversy by promoting the death panels myth, and argued her case in a Facebook post, Hannity defended her and said, "I agree with everything that she wrote." Hannity also claimed that he found the specific pages in the Affordable Care Act containing provisions on death panels.
A 2016 study found that Hannity promoted a number of falsehoods about the Affordable Care Act. For instance, Hannity falsely alleged several times that Democratic Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus had said Social Security could be "insolvent in two years" due to the Affordable Care Act. According to the study, Hannity, unlike other Fox News hosts such as Bill O'Reilly and Greta Van Susteren, "took a more direct approach, aggressively supporting Republicans and conservatives and attacking Democrats and liberals, endorsing the more spurious claims long after they were proven incorrect, and putting advocacy above accurate reporting, to further the network's themes opposing reform".
Jake Tapper
In November 2017, Fox News distorted a statement by Jake Tapper to make it appear as if he had said "Allahu Akbar" can be used under the most "beautiful circumstances" in the immediate aftermath of the 2017 New York City truck attack wherein a terrorist shouted "Allahu Akbar". Fox News omitted that Tapper had said the use of "Allahu Akbar" in the terrorist attack was not one of these circumstances. A headline on FoxNews.com was preceded by a tag reading "OUTRAGEOUS". The Fox News Twitter account distorted the statement even more, saying "Jake Tapper Says 'Allahu Akbar' Is 'Beautiful' Right After NYC Terror Attack" in a tweet that was later deleted.
Even after the Fox News Twitter account had deleted the tweet on Tapper's out-of-context comments, Hannity repeated the out-of-context comments to his viewers, calling Tapper "liberal fake news CNN's fake Jake Tapper" and mocking his ratings.
Appearance at November 2018 Trump rally
On November 4, 2018, Trump's website, DonaldJTrump.com, announced in a press release that Hannity would make a "special guest appearance" with Trump at a midterm campaign rally the following night in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. The following morning, Hannity tweeted "To be clear, I will not be on stage campaigning with the President." Hannity nevertheless spoke at Trump's lectern on stage at the rally, immediately mocking the "fake news" at the back of the auditorium, Fox News reporters among them. Several Fox News employees expressed outrage at Hannity's actions, with one stating, "a new line was crossed". Hannity later asserted that his action was not pre-planned, and Fox News stated it "does not condone any talent participating in campaign events". Fox News host Jeanine Pirro also appeared on stage with Trump at the rally. The Trump press release was later removed from Trump's website.
Foreign policy
In 2009, Hannity said of the Iraq War, "we were victorious in spite of the Democrats' efforts and attempts at preventing victory." During the 2016 election, Hannity vouched for Trump's claimed opposition to the Iraq War, "Mr. Trump and I disagreed about the Iraq war; I was for it and he was against it."
In June 2019, Hannity called on Trump to "bomb the hell of out Iran" after Iran shot down a U.S. drone. After the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, Hannity opened his show by saying, "tonight the world is safer as one of the most ruthless, evil war criminals on Earth has been brought to justice."
Ukraine
In February 2020, The Daily Beast acquired a leaked document entitled "Ukraine, Disinformation, & the Trump Administration" produced by a Fox News research team. The document warned of "disinformation" being pushed by frequent Hannity guests, including Rudy Giuliani, John Solomon, Victoria Toensing and Joe diGenova. Among other criticisms, the analysis noted that on his show Hannity discussed with Toensing and diGenova an affidavit from former Ukrainian prosecutor general Viktor Shokin that accused Joe Biden of getting him fired to end an investigation into Burisma Holdings, which employed Biden's son Hunter. The affidavit was drafted at the request of attorneys for Ukrainian oligarch Dmitry Firtash, but neither Hannity nor his guests disclosed to viewers that Toensing and diGenova were among Firtash's attorneys.
COVID-19 pandemic
In February 2020, amid the spread of COVID-19 to the United States, Hannity said "many on the left are now all rooting for corona to wreak havoc in the United States. Why? To score cheap, repulsive political points." In March 2020, he characterized the virus as a "hoax", and said it "may be true" that the outbreak was a "fraud" perpetrated by the "deep state". Later in March, as the disease spread into a global pandemic and Trump declared it a national emergency, Hannity started to take the virus more seriously, denying that he had referred to it as a hoax less than a month earlier. In July 2021, on live television, Hannity encouraged the audience to consider vaccination.
Personal life
Family and lifestyle
Hannity met Jill Rhodes in 1991 when he worked at WVNN in Huntsville, Alabama and she was a political columnist for the Huntsville Times. The two married in 1993. In June 2020, the couple announced that they had divorced the previous year but had separated years prior.
Hannity has since dated Fox News colleague Ainsley Earhardt. In August 2019, Hannity and Earhardt arrived together as guests for a wedding at Trump National Golf Course in Colt's Neck, New Jersey. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she has been hosting her Fox & Friends program from a remote studio in the basement of Hannity's Long Island mansion.
Hannity has two children from his marriage to Rhodes: a son, Patrick, born in 1998, and daughter, Merri, born in 2001. Both children graduated from Cold Spring Harbor High School. Patrick attended Wake Forest University where he played tennis. Merri attends The University of Michigan where she also plays tennis. In high school, Merri was the fourth highest ranked tennis player in New York State.
In 2018, Forbes estimated that Hannity's annual income was $36million, and the Guardian reported that he was believed to be the "hidden owner" of about $90 million in property that had been purchased by shell companies. In April 2021, he purchased a $5.3 million house several miles from Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago residence.
In 2014 he said he has carried a weapon "more than half my adult life". According to Hannity, he has a brown belt in martial arts and trains four days a week in the sport.
Religion
Hannity left the Catholic Church in 2019, citing "too much institutionalized corruption". However, he has said that as he has aged, his Christian faith has "gotten stronger" and that he needs and wants God in his life.
Bibliography
Hannity, Sean (2002). Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2004). Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2010). Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, New York: Harper Paperbacks, .
Hannity, Sean (2020). Live Free or Die: America (and the World) On the Brink, New York: Simon & Schuster, .
See also
Fox News controversies
New Yorkers in journalism
References
External links
1961 births
Living people
21st-century American male writers
21st-century American non-fiction writers
Adelphi University alumni
American broadcast news analysts
American conservative talk radio hosts
American male non-fiction writers
American people of Irish descent
American political commentators
American political writers
Christians from New York (state)
Conservative Party of New York State politicians
Former Roman Catholics
Fox News people
Male critics of feminism
New York (state) Independents
New York (state) Republicans
New York University alumni
People from Centre Island, New York
People from Franklin Square, New York
Radio personalities from New York City
Right-wing populism in the United States
University of California, Santa Barbara alumni
Writers from New York City | false | [
"How Did This Get Made? is a comedy podcast on the Earwolf network hosted by Paul Scheer, June Diane Raphael, and Jason Mantzoukas.\n\nGenerally, How Did This Get Made? is released every two weeks. During the show's off-week, a \".5\" episode is uploaded featuring Scheer announcing the next week's movie, as well as challenges for the fans. In addition to the shows and mini-shows, the How Did This Get Made? stream hosted the first three episodes of Bitch Sesh, the podcast of previous guests Casey Wilson and Danielle Schneider, in December 2015. It has also hosted episodes of its own spin-off podcast, the How Did This Get Made? Origin Stories, in which Blake Harris interviews people involved with the films covered by the main show. In December 2017, an episode was recorded for the Pee Cast Blast event, and released exclusively on Stitcher Premium.\n\nEvery episode has featured Paul Scheer as the host of the podcast. The only episode to date in which Scheer hosted remotely was The Smurfs, in which he Skyped in. Raphael has taken extended breaks from the podcast for both filming commitments and maternity leave. Mantzoukas has also missed episodes due to work, but has also Skyped in for various episodes. On the occasions that neither Raphael nor Mantzoukas are available for live appearances, Scheer calls in previous fan-favorite guests for what is known as a How Did This Get Made? All-Stars episode.\n\nList of episodes\n\nMini episodes\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n List of How Did This Get Made? episodes\n\nHow Did This Get Made\nHow Did This Get Made",
"How Did This Get Made? (HDTGM) is a podcast on the Earwolf network. It is hosted by Paul Scheer, June Diane Raphael and Jason Mantzoukas. Each episode, which typically has a different guest, features the deconstruction and mockery of outlandish and bad films.\n\nFormat\nThe hosts and guest make jokes about the films as well as attempt to unscramble plots. After discussing the film, Scheer reads \"second opinions\" in the form of five-star reviews posted online by Amazon.com users. The hosts also often make recommendations on if the film is worth watching. The show is released every two weeks.\n\nDuring the show's off week a \".5\" episode (also known as a \"minisode\") is uploaded. These episodes feature Scheer's \"explanation hopeline\" where he answers questions from fans who call in, the movie for the next week is announced, Scheer reads corrections and omissions from the message board regarding last week's episode, and he opens fan mail and provides his recommendations on books, movies, TV shows etc. that he is enjoying.\n\nSome full episodes are recorded in front of a live audience and include a question and answer session and original \"second opinion\" theme songs sung by fans. Not all content from the live shows is included in the final released episode - about 30 minutes of each live show is edited out.\n\nHistory\nHow Did This Get Made? began after Scheer and Raphael saw the movie Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps. Later, the pair talked to Mantzoukas about the movie and joked about the idea for starting a bad movie podcast. , Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps has never been covered on the podcast.\n\nAwards\nIn 2019, How Did This Get Made? won a Webby Award in the category of Podcasts – Television & Film.\n\nIn 2020, How Did This Get Made? won an iHeartRadio award in the category of Best TV & Film Podcast.\n\nIn 2022, How Did This Get Made? won an iHeartRadio award in the category of Best TV & Film Podcast.\n\nSpinoffs\n\nHow Did This Get Made?: Origin Stories\nBetween February and September 2017, a 17-episode spin-off series of the podcast was released. Entitled How Did This Get Made?: Origin Stories, author Blake J. Harris would interview people involved with the movies discussed on the podcast. Guests on the show included director Mel Brooks, who served as executive producer on Solarbabies, and screenwriter Dan Gordon, who wrote Surf Ninjas.\n\nUnspooled\nIn May 2018, Scheer began a new podcast with Amy Nicholson titled Unspooled that is also devoted to movies. Unlike HDTGM?, however, Unspooled looks at films deemed good enough for the updated 2007 edition of the AFI Top 100. This is often referenced in How Did This Get Made? by Mantzoukas and Raphael, who are comically annoyed at how they were not invited to host the podcast, instead being subjected to the bad films that HDTGM covers.\n\nHow Did This Get Played?\nIn June 2019, the Earwolf network launched the podcast How Did This Get Played?, hosted by Doughboys host Nick Wiger and former Saturday Night Live writer Heather Anne Campbell. The podcast is positioned as the video game equivalent of HDTGM?, where Wiger and Campbell review widely panned video games.\n\nEpisodes\n\nAdaptation\nThe program was adapted in France in 2014 under the title 2 heures de perdues (http://www.2hdp.fr/ and available on Spotify and iTunes), a podcast in which several friends meet to analyze bad films in the same style (mainly American, French, and British films). The show then ends with a reading of comments found on AlloCiné (biggest French-speaking cinema website) or Amazon.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n \n How Did This Get Made on Earwolf\n\nAudio podcasts\nEarwolf\nFilm and television podcasts\nComedy and humor podcasts\n2010 podcast debuts"
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"Hannity hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor."
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| C_d5d7c3407dd148389b1d80a63090fca4_1 | how did it go | 2 | How did Sean Hannity's first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM go? | Sean Hannity | Hannity hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible." Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year. This was after two shows featuring the book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS by Gene Antonio; among other remarks made during the broadcast, Hannity told a lesbian caller, "I feel sorry for your child." The university board that governed the station later reversed its decision due to a campaign conducted on Hannity's behalf by the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, which argued that the station had discriminated against Hannity's First Amendment rights. When the station refused to give him a public apology and more airtime, Hannity decided against returning to KCSB. After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America." Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996, Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes. Later that year, Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity was on WABC's afternoon time slot from January 1998 until the end of 2013. Since January 2014, Hannity has hosted the 3-6 p.m. time slot on WOR in New York City. In their 2007 book Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America, conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group." CANNOTANSWER | The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible." | Sean Patrick Hannity (born December 30, 1961) is an American talk show host and conservative political commentator. He is the host of The Sean Hannity Show, a nationally syndicated talk radio show, and has also hosted a commentary program, Hannity, on Fox News, since 2009.
Hannity worked as a general contractor and volunteered as a talk show host at UC Santa Barbara in 1989. He later joined WVNN in Athens, Alabama and shortly afterward, WGST in Atlanta. After leaving WGST, he worked at WABC in New York until 2013. Since 2014, Hannity has worked at WOR.
In 1996, Hannity and Alan Colmes co-hosted Hannity & Colmes on Fox. After Colmes announced his departure in January 2008, Hannity merged the Hannity & Colmes show into Hannity.
Hannity has received several awards and honors, including an honorary degree from Liberty University. He has written three New York Times best-selling books: Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism; Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism; and Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, and released a fourth, Live Free or Die, in 2020.
Hannity has sometimes promoted conspiracy theories, such as "birtherism" (claims that then-President Barack Obama was not a legitimate U.S. citizen), claims regarding the murder of Seth Rich, and falsehoods about Hillary Clinton's health. Hannity was an early supporter of Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election. Hannity often acted as an unofficial spokesman for the president, criticizing the media and attacking Robert Mueller's inquiry into Russian interference in Trump's election. He reportedly spoke to Trump on the phone most weeknights. He spoke at the president's lectern during a Trump rally, and White House advisors characterized him as the "shadow" chief of staff. According to Forbes, by 2018 Hannity had become one of the most-watched hosts in cable news and most-listened-to hosts in talk radio, due in part to his closeness and access to Trump.
Early life and education
Hannity was born in New York City, New York, the son of Lillian (née Flynn) and Hugh Hannity. Lillian worked as a stenographer and a corrections officer at a county jail, while Hugh was a World War II veteran and family-court officer. He was the youngest of four siblings and the only boy. All his grandparents immigrated to the United States from Ireland. He grew up in Franklin Square, New York on Long Island.
In his youth, Hannity worked as a paperboy delivering issues of the New York Daily News and the Long Island Daily Press. His parents were initially supporters of President John F. Kennedy, eventually growing more Republican in their views as time went on, though they resisted being overtly political at home.
Hannity attended Sacred Heart Seminary in Hempstead, New York and St. Pius X Preparatory Seminary in Uniondale, New York. He attended New York University and Adelphi University, but did not graduate from either.
Career
In 1982, Hannity started a house-painting business and a few years later, worked as a building contractor in Santa Barbara, California. He hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible."
Radio
Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year after a controversy. During two shows, gay and lesbian rights were discussed in what was considered to be a contentious manner. (See LGBT issues below.) The university board that governed the station later reversed its decision after a campaign conducted on Hannity's behalf by the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union argued that the station had discriminated against Hannity's First Amendment rights. When the station refused to issue Hannity a public apology and more airtime, he did not return to KCSB.
After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications, presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America". Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville media market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996, Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes.
Later that year, Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late-night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive-time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity was on WABC's afternoon time slot from January 1998.
In their 2007 book Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America, conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group". The WABC slot continued until the end of 2013. Since January 2014, Hannity has hosted the 3:00–6:00p.m. time slot on WOR in New York City.
Hannity's radio program is a conservative political talk show that features Hannity's opinions and ideology related to current issues and politicians. The Sean Hannity Show began national syndication on September 10, 2001, on more than five hundred stations nationwide. In 2004, Hannity signed a $25million five-year contract extension with ABC Radio (now Citadel Media) to continue the show until 2009. The program was made available via Armed Forces Radio Network in 2006. In June 2007, ABC Radio was sold to Citadel Communications and in the summer of 2008, Hannity was signed for a $100million five-year contract. As of March 2018, the program is heard by more than 13.5 million listeners a week. Hannity was ranked No.2 in Talkers Magazine's 2017 Heavy Hundred and was listed as No.72 on Forbes' "Celebrity 100" list in 2013.
In January 2007, Clear Channel Communications signed a groupwide three-year extension with Hannity on more than eighty stations. The largest stations in the group deal included KTRH Houston, KFYI Phoenix, WPGB Pittsburgh, WKRC Cincinnati, WOOD Grand Rapids, WFLA Tampa, WOAI San Antonio, WLAC Nashville, and WREC Memphis.
Hannity signed a long-term contract to remain with Premiere Networks in September 2013.
At the beginning of 2014, Hannity signed contracts to air on several Salem Communications stations including WDTK Detroit, WIND Chicago, WWRC (now WQOF) Washington, D.C., and KSKY Dallas.
Television
Hannity was a co-host of Hannity & Colmes, an American political "point-counterpoint"-style television program on the Fox News Channel featuring Hannity and Alan Colmes as co-hosts. Hannity presented the conservative point of view with Colmes providing the liberal viewpoint.
While Hannity's views are typically politically and socially conservative, he has spoken supportively about birth control, which has led to on-air clashes with pro-life guests such as Rev. Thomas Euteneuer, president of Human Life International. Hannity said if the Catholic Church were to excommunicate him over his support for contraception, he would join Jerry Falwell's Thomas Road Baptist Church.
In January 2007, Hannity began a new Sunday night television show on Fox News, Hannity's America.
In November 2008, Colmes announced his departure from Hannity & Colmes. After the show's final broadcast on January 9, 2009, Hannity took over the time slot with his own new show, Hannity, which has a format similar to Hannity's America.
Books
Hannity is the author of four books. Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism was published in 2002, and Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism was published in 2004 through ReganBooks. Both these books reached the nonfiction New York Times bestseller list, the second of which stayed there for five weeks. Hannity has said he is too busy to write many books, and dictated a lot of his own two books into a tape recorder while driving in to do his radio show.
Hannity wrote his third book, Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, which was released by HarperCollins in March 2010. The book became Hannity's third New York Times Bestseller.
In 2020, Hannity released his fourth book, Live Free or Die.
Let Freedom Ring:Winning the War of Liberty Over Liberalism, William Morrow, August 1, 2002, .
Deliver Us From Evil:Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, William Morrow, February 17, 2004, .
Conservative Victory:Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, HarperCollins, March 30, 2010, .
Live Free or Die:America (and the World) on the Brink, Threshold Editions, August 4, 2020, .
Freedom Concerts
From 2003 until 2010, Hannity hosted country music-themed "Freedom Concerts" to raise money for charity. In 2010, conservative blogger Debbie Schlussel wrote that only a small percentage of the money raised by the concerts goes to the target charity, Freedom Alliance. The Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) filed complaints with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), also in 2010. The FTC complaint alleges that Hannity was "falsely promoting that all concert proceeds would be donated to a scholarship fund for the children of those killed or wounded in war". The complaint filed with the IRS claims that Freedom Alliance has violated its 501(c)3 charity status. The concerts stopped around the same year.
Awards and honors
Hannity received a Marconi Award in 2003 and 2007 as the Network Syndicated Personality of the Year from the National Association of Broadcasters.
In 2009, Talkers Magazine listed Hannity as No.2 on their list of the 100 most important radio talk show hosts in America (with Rush Limbaugh listed as No.1). The same magazine gave Hannity its Freedom of Speech Award in 2003.
In 2005, Jerry Falwell, chancellor of the evangelical Liberty University, awarded Hannity an honorary degree.
Hannity was inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame in November 2017.
Other activities
Hannity has had cameo appearances in film and television, having a brief voiceover in The Siege as an unseen reporter, and appearing in Atlas Shrugged: Part II and the second season of House of Cards as himself. He executive produced and appeared in the 2017 film Let There Be Light, which also stars Kevin Sorbo.
As of April 2018, Hannity owned at least 877 residential properties, which were bought for nearly $89million. He purchased some of the homes with the help of loans from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and most are in working-class neighborhoods. His property managers have taken an aggressive management approach with a much higher than average eviction rate. The Washington Post reported that his property management team has used eviction proceedings both to remove tenants and to generate revenue. His property managers have claimed that Hannity has no active role in the management of the more than 1,000 properties he has a stake in.
Controversies and criticism
According to The Washington Post, Hannity "repeatedly embraces storylines that prove to be inaccurate" and takes positions that change over time. In the opinion of The New York Times, Hannity is "barreling headfirst into the murky territory between opinion and out-and-out conspiracy theorism". Hannity often promotes conspiracy theories without explicitly endorsing them, unlike Alex Jones. The New York Times wrote that this "has the effect of nourishing the more wild-eyed beliefs of his fans while providing Hannity a degree of plausible deniability". The New Yorker wrote in 2019 that Hannity had "[spewed] baseless conspiracy theories with impunity".
During the Bush years, Hannity "loyally supported the president's policies". During the Obama administration, Hannity "leaned more heavily on stories he believed were being given short shrift by the 'liberal media'stories about where Obama was born, and who deserved blame for the attack on the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya". In 2017, The Washington Post wrote that "what Hannity has stood forat least for the past couple of yearsis Trump."
Birtherism
Although Hannity said he believed President Obama was born in the U.S., to answer queries on Obama's citizenship, he repeatedly called on Obama to release his birth certificate. Hannity described the circumstances regarding Obama's birth certificate as "odd". Hannity also defended and promoted those who questioned Obama's citizenship of the U.S., such as Donald Trump. Hannity invited Trump to his show while Trump was a leader in the birther movement; during an interview with Hannity, Trump said Obama "could have easily have come from Kenya, or someplace". Hannity said in response, "The issue could go away in a minute. Just show the certificate." Even after Obama produced his birth certificate in 2008, certified by the state of Hawaii, Hannity kept calling on Obama to release his birth certificate, asking why did he not "just produce it and we move on?" In October 2016, Hannity offered to purchase a one-way ticket to Kenya for Obama.
2016 presidential campaign
Candidacy of Donald Trump
Hannity is known for his pro-Trump coverage. According to The Washington Post, "Hannity's comeback coincided with his early, eager embrace of his fellow New Yorker... Trump attacked the Gold Star father, and Hannity stood by him. Trump went after a federal judge of Mexican descent, and Hannity backed him. After the Access Hollywood tape emerged of Trump making lewd comments about inappropriate sexual behaviour towards women, Hannity continued to defend him: 'King David had 500 concubines, for crying out loud.'" After the inauguration, the first interview the new president gave to a cable news channel was conducted by Hannity. Hannity additionally defended the Trump administration's false claim that Trump's inauguration crowd was the biggest ever.
Hannity has been criticized as being overly favorable to the candidacy of Donald Trump, and granting Trump more airtime than other presidential candidates during the 2016 primaries. Hannity, for instance, let Trump promote the false claim that Rafael Cruz, father of Trump's rival presidential candidate Ted Cruz, was involved in the John F. Kennedy assassination. He admitted to favoring Republican candidates, though without indicating a preference for Donald Trump over Ted Cruz. According to Dylan Byers of CNN, Hannity during interviews "frequently cites areas where he agrees with Trump, or where he thinks Trump was right about something, then asks him to expand on it", and "often ignores or defends Trump from criticism".
Tensions between Cruz and Hannity appeared to reach a boiling point during a contentious April 2016 radio interview, during which Cruz implied Hannity was a "hardcore Donald Trump supporter" and Hannity responded by accusing Cruz of "throw[ing] this in my face" every time he asked a "legitimate question". Jim Rutenberg commented in August 2016 that Hannity is "not only Mr. Trump's biggest media booster; he also veers into the role of adviser," citing sources who said Hannity spent months offering suggestions to Trump and his campaign on strategy and messaging. Hannity responded to the report by saying, "I'm not hiding the fact that I want Donald Trump to be the next President of the United States.... I never claimed to be a journalist." (In an article published in December 2017, Hannity said "I'm a journalist. But I'm an advocacy journalist, or an opinion journalist.") Hannity has feuded with several conservatives who oppose Trump, including National Reviews Jonah Goldberg, Wall Street Journal foreign affairs columnist Bret Stephens, and National Review editor Rich Lowry.
Conspiracy theories about Hillary Clinton
During the 2016 presidential election, Hannity periodically promoted conspiracy theories regarding Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party. Hannity repeatedly claimed that Clinton had very serious medical problems and that the media was covering them up. He misrepresented photos of Clinton to give the impression that she had secret medical problems. He shared a photo from the fringe news site Gateway Pundit and falsely claimed that it showed her Secret Service agent holding a diazepam pen intended to treat seizures, when he in fact was holding a small flashlight. He booked doctors on his show to discuss Clinton's health; although these people had never personally examined Clinton, they made alarmist statements about her state of health which turned out to be false. At one point, Hannity promoted an unsubstantiated report that Clinton had been drunk at a rally; at another point, he suggested that Clinton was drunk and that her campaign needed to "sober her up".
Murder of Seth Rich conspiracy theories
In May 2017, Hannity became a prominent promoter of the conspiracy theory that Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party had a DNC staffer killed. Shortly afterward, he faced backlash from both left- and right-wing sources and lost several advertisers, including Crowne Plaza Hotels, Cars.com, Leesa Mattress, USAA, Peloton and Casper Sleep deciding to pull their marketing from his program on Fox News. However, USAA decided to return to the show shortly after following a negative outcry against its decision to pull out. Conservative magazine National Review compared the story to a flat earth video, called it a "disgrace" that Hannity and other conspiracy theorists were hyping the story, and called for them to stop.
In March 2018, Seth Rich's parents filed a lawsuit against Fox News for pushing conspiracy theories about their son's death. The suit alleges that the network "intentionally exploited" the tragedy for political purposes. On Oct. 12, 2020, Fox News agreed to pay millions of dollars to the Rich family.
Claims about election fraud
Hannity came under criticism during the 2016 presidential election for false claims about election rigging during interviews. Hannity responded to this by citing Mitt Romney's failure in the 2012 United States presidential election to obtain any votes in 59 of 1,687 Philadelphia voting districts as proof of election rigging. However, Factcheck.org and PolitiFact found that it was not unusual at all for this to occur, as those electoral districts are heavily African-American. Philadelphia elections inspector Ryan Godfrey also refuted Hannity's claim.
After the 2020 election, Hannity amplified false claims of election fraud, including by hosting former Trump lawyer Sidney Powell on his Fox News show, where Powell made unsubstantiated allegations on the topic. Republican efforts to overturn the 2020 election results and install Donald Trump for a second term culminated in the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. In 2022, the U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack is investigating what Hannity may have known in advance. The committee discovered that, on December 31, 2020, Hannity texted White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, saying, "I do NOT see January 6 happening the way he [Trump] is being told." In December of 2020, a month after the election, Hannity called for Trump’s false claims of voter fraud to be investigated by a special prosecutor, despite there still being no credible evidence of them by the accusers. As of February of 2022, no credible evidence has been provided of these false claims that Hannity amplified.
WikiLeaks
In 2010, Hannity said WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was waging a "war" on the United States, and that Wikileaks put American lives in "jeopardy" and "danger" around the world. He also criticized the Obama administration for failing to apprehend Assange. In 2016, after Wikileaks published leaked emails from the Democratic National Committee, Hannity praised Assange for showing "how corrupt, dishonest and phony our government is". He told Assange in a September 2016 interview, "I do hope you get free one day. I wish you the best." The following month, Hannity claimed that WikiLeaks has revealed "everything that conspiracy theorists have said over the years" about Hillary Clinton is true.
In February 2017, Hannity retweeted a WikiLeaks tweet linking to an article by the conspiracy website Gateway Pundit, claiming that John McCain was a "globalist war criminal". McCain's spokeswoman called Hannity out on it, asking him to "correct the record". Hannity later deleted the tweet. In May 2017, Hannity made an offer to Assange to guest host his Fox News TV show.
Relationship with Donald Trump and Michael Cohen
Hannity developed a close relationship with Trump during the election and has become even closer during his presidency. The two men speak on the phone multiple times a week, discussing Hannity's weekday show, the special counsel investigation, even evaluating White House staff. Hannity shares, The Economist asserts, "Mr. Trump's love of conspiracy theories and hatred of snooty elites". They speak so often that one Trump adviser has said Hannity "basically has a desk in the place". On the air, Hannity echoes Trump's attacks on the media and Special Counsel investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. Trump sometimes quotes Hannity to others or promotes the show to his Twitter followers. Hannity has encouraged Trump to shut down the government to get funding for a border wall, as well as his declaration of a national emergency over the US–Mexico border.
According to reports by the Los Angeles Times and New York magazine, Hannity frequently talks to Trump by telephone after Hannity's weekday broadcasts, and Hannity is one of several dozen cleared callers whose calls to the White House public switchboard can be connected directly to the president.
Hannity stirred controversy in April 2018 when it was revealed that he shared a lawyer, Michael Cohen, with Trump. In a breach of journalistic ethics, Hannity had failed to disclose that Cohen was his lawyer while at the same time taking to the Fox airwaves to defend Cohen and criticize those who investigated him.
On April 9, 2018, federal agents from the U.S. Attorney's office served a search warrant on the office and residence of Michael Cohen, Trump's personal attorney. On the air, Hannity defended Cohen and criticized the federal action, calling it "highly questionable" and "an unprecedented abuse of power". On April 16, 2018, in a court hearing, Cohen's lawyers told the judge that Cohen had ten clients in 2017–2018 but did "traditional legal tasks" for only three: Trump, Elliott Broidy, and a "prominent person" who did not wish to be named for fear of being "embarrassed". The federal judge ordered the revelation of the third client, whom Cohen's lawyers named as Hannity. Although Hannity has covered Cohen on his show, he did not disclose that he had consulted with Cohen.
Fox News released a statement on April 16, 2018, attributed to Hannity: "Michael Cohen has never represented me in any matter. I never retained him, received an invoice, or paid legal fees. I have occasionally had brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective. I assumed those conversations were confidential, but to be absolutely clear they never involved any matter between me and a third party." Also, NBC News quoted Hannity as saying: "We definitely had attorney–client privilege because I asked him for that," while Hannity said on his radio show that he "might have handed him ten bucks" for the attorney-client privilege. Lastly, Hannity tweeted that his discussions with Cohen were "almost exclusively" about real estate.
The following day, news reports revealed that Hannity had shared another lawyer with Trump, Jay Sekulow. Sekulow had written a cease-and-desist letter to KFAQ on Hannity's behalf in May 2017, and later represented Trump in connection with the Mueller investigation.
In August 2018, Hannity allowed Sekulow and Rudy Giuliani, another personal lawyer for Trump, to host Hannity's radio show; the duo proceeded to defend Trump and promote arguments made by the Trump administration.
According to The New Yorker, Hannity has reversed on the issue of negotiations with North Korea: during Obama's presidency, Hannity called negotiations with North Korea "disturbing", whereas he called Trump's negotiations with North Korea a "huge foreign-policy win".
In June 2019, Hannity expressed outrage at Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's comment that she would like to see Trump "in prison". Hannity declared: "Based on no actual crimes, she wants a political opponent locked up in prison? That happens in banana republicsbeyond despicable behavior." Aaron Rupar of Vox criticized Hannity for "obvious hypocrisy", noting that Hannity himself had said in January 2018 regarding Hillary Clinton: "I think Hillary should be in jail. Lock her up." Aaron Blake of The Washington Post described Hannity's comment as "a pretty obvious bit of gaslighting", noting Hannity's loyalty to Trump, whose campaign rallies have featured chants of "Lock her up", and also Hannity's comments that Trump was free to investigate Clinton.
Hannity played the most important role in persuading Trump to pardon the convicted murderer and war criminal Clint Lorance.
Criticism of FBI, DOJ, and special counsel
During President Trump's administration, Hannity has repeatedly been highly critical of the FBI, DOJ, Special Counsel Robert Mueller, and others investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election. According to a review by Media Matters of all transcripts from the 254 episodes of Hannity's show from Mueller's appointment (May 17, 2017) to May 16, 2018, Hannity had 487 segments substantially devoted to Mueller (approximately two per episode), opened his program with Mueller 152 times (approximately three times per week), and the content of his show was highly critical of the probe and the media's coverage of the probe. He has called the Russia inquiry a "witch hunt", an "utter disgrace", and "a direct threat to you, the American people, and our American republic". Hannity has expressed skepticism of the U.S. intelligence community's view that Russia hacked the Democratic National Convention's emails during the 2016 election and has promoted various conspiracy theories. In March 2017 he publicized a theory, first proposed at the Wikileaks Twitter account, that the CIA could have done the hacking while making it look like Russia did it. In August he suggested that Seth Rich may have been the leaker.
Hannity has described the Mueller investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, as well as James Comey's tenure as FBI Director, as "one giant incestuous circle of corruption". In April 2018, Hannity ran a segment where he claimed there were "criminal" connections between Bill and Hillary Clinton, Mueller, and Comey. Hannity asserted that there were three connected "Deep State crime families" actively "trying to take down the president". A guest on the segment, attorney Joseph diGenova, called Mueller's team "legal terrorists" and referred to Comey as a "dirty cop".
Hannity also claimed that Mueller had been involved in the corrupt dealings of several FBI agents in connection with Boston, Massachusetts crime boss Whitey Bulger. The federal judge who presided over a lawsuit concerning the corrupt dealings said Hannity's claims were unsubstantiated and that Mueller was never accused of any wrongdoing nor even mentioned during the proceedings.
In June 2018, after reports that Mueller's probe had asked witnesses to turn their personal phones over to investigators for examination, Hannity sarcastically suggested on air to the witnesses that they "follow Hillary Clinton's lead" and destroy their personal phones so they cannot be examined.
In May 2019, after Mueller gave a statement saying the Special Counsel investigation did not exonerate Trump of crimes, Hannity said Mueller was "basically full of crap" and did not know the law.
Uranium One
From 2015 into 2018, Fox News broadcast extensive coverage of an alleged scandal surrounding the sale of Uranium One to Russian interests, which Hannity characterized as "one of the biggest scandals in American history". The Fox News coverage extended throughout the programming day, with particular emphasis by Hannity. The network promoted a narrative asserting that, as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton personally approved the Uranium One sale in exchange for $145million in bribes paid to the Clinton Foundation. Donald Trump repeated these allegations as a candidate and as president. No evidence of wrongdoing by Clinton had been found after three years of allegations, an FBI investigation, and the 2017 appointment of a Federal attorney to evaluate the investigation. In November 2017, Fox News host Shepard Smith concisely debunked the alleged scandal, including saying that Clinton did not personally approve the sale, infuriating viewers who suggested he should work for CNN or MSNBC. Hannity later called Smith "clueless", while Smith stated, "I get it, that some of our opinion programming is there strictly to be entertaining. I get that. I don't work there. I wouldn't work there."
A two-year Justice Department investigation initiated after Trump became president found no evidence to justify pursuing a criminal investigation.
Deep state
Hannity has advocated the QAnon and "deep state" conspiracy theories. The latter proposes a government officials network is working to hinder the Trump administration. He has described the deep state as a "Shadow Government" and "Deep state swamp of Obama holdovers and DC lifers". In March 2017, he called for a "purge" of Obama-era bureaucrats and appointees in government. In an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, conservative columnist Bret Stephens disputed Hannity's deep state allegations, saying they were an example of the "paranoid style in politics". Later that month, Hannity said NBC News was part of the deep state. In May 2017, he reiterated that deep state/intelligence operatives were trying to destroy the Trump presidency.
In March 2018, Hannity attacked Special Counsel Robert Mueller, saying his career was "anything but impeccable". Hannity said Mueller was friends with former FBI Director James Comey and former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, and that he "cannot be expected to honestly investigate scandals that his friends are directly involved in". He said these individuals were involved in "one massive, huge, deep-state conflict of interest after another. Now they're protecting themselves. They're trying to preserve their own power." Mueller and Comey are professional acquaintances but not known to be friends, while Trump attorney general Bill Barr said in 2019 that he and Mueller had been friends for thirty years.
Comments on sexual harassment
In 2016, Hannity vociferously defended Roger Ailes when he was accused by multiple women of sexual harassment. In May 2017, Hannity paid a tribute to Ailes after he died. Hannity called him "a second father" and said to Ailes' "enemies" that he was "preparing to kick your in the next life".
In April 2017, Hannity came to the defense of Fox News co-president Bill Shine after it was reported that Shine's job was at risk. At least four lawsuits alleged that Shine had ignored, enabled or concealed Ailes' alleged sexual harassment.
In September 2017, several months after Bill O'Reilly was fired from Fox News in the wake of a number of women's alleging that he had sexually harassed them, Hannity hosted O'Reilly on his show. Some Fox News employees criticized the decision. In the interview, O'Reilly attacked liberal media watchdog groups and said he should have fought harder when those groups targeted his advertisers. According to CNN, during the interview, Hannity found kinship with O'Reilly as he appeared "to feel that he and O'Reilly have both become victims of liberals looking to silence them".
Hannity came under criticism in October 2017 when he attacked Democrats after it became known that a large number of women had accused Harvey Weinstein, the Hollywood producer and donor to Democratic causes, of sexual harassment. Critics noted that Hannity had weeks earlier defended and hosted his coworker Bill O'Reilly who was fired following a number of sexual harassment allegations.
LGBT rights
In the radio show for KCSB, which was the subject of controversy in 1989, Hannity made anti-gay comments. He called AIDS a "gay disease" and said the media was hiding salient information from the public. Two editions featured anti-gay activist Gene Antonio, a Lutheran minister, discussing his book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS. In the book, Antonio claims that AIDS can be spread by people sneezing in close proximity to each other. Hannity encouraged Antonio when he said that AIDS spread when gay men consumed each other's feces, said that homosexuality was a "lower form of behavior", compared homosexual sex to "playing in a sewer" and gay people of being "filled with hatred and bigotry". When a lesbian, another broadcaster at the station, called into the show, Hannity said "I feel sorry for your child." Hannity was quoted at the time as having said "anyone listening to this show that believes homosexuality is a normal lifestyle has been brainwashed." The ACLU opposed his firing and petitioned the station to reverse their decision. Hannity demanded a formal apology and double the airtime. While the station did offer to allow Hannity to return, they would not meet Hannity's additional demands and he declined to return.
In 2017, Hannity said he regretted the comments and that they were "ignorant and embarrassing".
Immigration
Hannity opposed amnesty for undocumented immigrants; however, in 2012 he said he had evolved on the issue and favored a "pathway to citizenship". Later, he opposed that idea. By 2018, he was described as an immigration hardliner by CNN, The Washington Post, and New York magazine. In August 2018, Trump suggested that he might shut down the government to force Congress to fund his border wall, boasting that Hannity agreed with the action.
Islam
Hannity has warned of sharia law coming to the United States. Hannity opposed the building of Park51, a mosque two blocks from the World Trade Center site.
Hannity promoted the idea of "Islamic training camps right here in America", which were based on an unsubstantiated "documentary" by the Christian Action Network.
In 2006, Hannity was critical of Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to U.S. Congress, being sworn into office with an oath on a Quran. Hannity equated the Quran with Mein Kampf, asking a guest on his show whether he would have allowed Ellison "to choose, you know, Hitler's Mein Kampf, which is the Nazi bible?"
Torture
In 2009, Hannity said he supported enhanced interrogation, a euphemism for torture. He also volunteered to be waterboarded for charity. In response, Keith Olbermann pledged to donate $1,000 for every second of waterboarding Hannity underwent. In 2017, Hannity continued to advocate for waterboarding, raising the example of using it against a kidnapper. According to Media Matters, Hannity has not been waterboarded as of March 2018.
Climate change
Hannity rejects the scientific consensus on climate change. In 2001, he described it as "phony science from the left". In 2004, he falsely claimed that scientists couldn't agree on whether global warming was "scientific fact or fiction". In 2010, Hannity falsely stated that so-called "Climategate"the leaking of e-mails written by climate scientists that, according to climate change deniers, demonstrated scientific misconduct, but which all subsequent inquiries found to show no evidence of misconduct or wrongdoingwas a scandal that "exposed global warming as a myth cooked up by alarmists". Hannity frequently invites critics of climate science onto his shows.
Death panels
Hannity promoted the falsehood that the Affordable Care Act would create so-called "death panels". According to a study by Dartmouth College political scientist Brendan Nyhan, Hannity's show, along with the Laura Ingraham Show, were the first major conservative media personalities to latch onto the false claim of Betsy McCaughey, a former lieutenant governor of New York, that the Affordable Care Act contained death panels. When Sarah Palin stirred controversy by promoting the death panels myth, and argued her case in a Facebook post, Hannity defended her and said, "I agree with everything that she wrote." Hannity also claimed that he found the specific pages in the Affordable Care Act containing provisions on death panels.
A 2016 study found that Hannity promoted a number of falsehoods about the Affordable Care Act. For instance, Hannity falsely alleged several times that Democratic Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus had said Social Security could be "insolvent in two years" due to the Affordable Care Act. According to the study, Hannity, unlike other Fox News hosts such as Bill O'Reilly and Greta Van Susteren, "took a more direct approach, aggressively supporting Republicans and conservatives and attacking Democrats and liberals, endorsing the more spurious claims long after they were proven incorrect, and putting advocacy above accurate reporting, to further the network's themes opposing reform".
Jake Tapper
In November 2017, Fox News distorted a statement by Jake Tapper to make it appear as if he had said "Allahu Akbar" can be used under the most "beautiful circumstances" in the immediate aftermath of the 2017 New York City truck attack wherein a terrorist shouted "Allahu Akbar". Fox News omitted that Tapper had said the use of "Allahu Akbar" in the terrorist attack was not one of these circumstances. A headline on FoxNews.com was preceded by a tag reading "OUTRAGEOUS". The Fox News Twitter account distorted the statement even more, saying "Jake Tapper Says 'Allahu Akbar' Is 'Beautiful' Right After NYC Terror Attack" in a tweet that was later deleted.
Even after the Fox News Twitter account had deleted the tweet on Tapper's out-of-context comments, Hannity repeated the out-of-context comments to his viewers, calling Tapper "liberal fake news CNN's fake Jake Tapper" and mocking his ratings.
Appearance at November 2018 Trump rally
On November 4, 2018, Trump's website, DonaldJTrump.com, announced in a press release that Hannity would make a "special guest appearance" with Trump at a midterm campaign rally the following night in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. The following morning, Hannity tweeted "To be clear, I will not be on stage campaigning with the President." Hannity nevertheless spoke at Trump's lectern on stage at the rally, immediately mocking the "fake news" at the back of the auditorium, Fox News reporters among them. Several Fox News employees expressed outrage at Hannity's actions, with one stating, "a new line was crossed". Hannity later asserted that his action was not pre-planned, and Fox News stated it "does not condone any talent participating in campaign events". Fox News host Jeanine Pirro also appeared on stage with Trump at the rally. The Trump press release was later removed from Trump's website.
Foreign policy
In 2009, Hannity said of the Iraq War, "we were victorious in spite of the Democrats' efforts and attempts at preventing victory." During the 2016 election, Hannity vouched for Trump's claimed opposition to the Iraq War, "Mr. Trump and I disagreed about the Iraq war; I was for it and he was against it."
In June 2019, Hannity called on Trump to "bomb the hell of out Iran" after Iran shot down a U.S. drone. After the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, Hannity opened his show by saying, "tonight the world is safer as one of the most ruthless, evil war criminals on Earth has been brought to justice."
Ukraine
In February 2020, The Daily Beast acquired a leaked document entitled "Ukraine, Disinformation, & the Trump Administration" produced by a Fox News research team. The document warned of "disinformation" being pushed by frequent Hannity guests, including Rudy Giuliani, John Solomon, Victoria Toensing and Joe diGenova. Among other criticisms, the analysis noted that on his show Hannity discussed with Toensing and diGenova an affidavit from former Ukrainian prosecutor general Viktor Shokin that accused Joe Biden of getting him fired to end an investigation into Burisma Holdings, which employed Biden's son Hunter. The affidavit was drafted at the request of attorneys for Ukrainian oligarch Dmitry Firtash, but neither Hannity nor his guests disclosed to viewers that Toensing and diGenova were among Firtash's attorneys.
COVID-19 pandemic
In February 2020, amid the spread of COVID-19 to the United States, Hannity said "many on the left are now all rooting for corona to wreak havoc in the United States. Why? To score cheap, repulsive political points." In March 2020, he characterized the virus as a "hoax", and said it "may be true" that the outbreak was a "fraud" perpetrated by the "deep state". Later in March, as the disease spread into a global pandemic and Trump declared it a national emergency, Hannity started to take the virus more seriously, denying that he had referred to it as a hoax less than a month earlier. In July 2021, on live television, Hannity encouraged the audience to consider vaccination.
Personal life
Family and lifestyle
Hannity met Jill Rhodes in 1991 when he worked at WVNN in Huntsville, Alabama and she was a political columnist for the Huntsville Times. The two married in 1993. In June 2020, the couple announced that they had divorced the previous year but had separated years prior.
Hannity has since dated Fox News colleague Ainsley Earhardt. In August 2019, Hannity and Earhardt arrived together as guests for a wedding at Trump National Golf Course in Colt's Neck, New Jersey. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she has been hosting her Fox & Friends program from a remote studio in the basement of Hannity's Long Island mansion.
Hannity has two children from his marriage to Rhodes: a son, Patrick, born in 1998, and daughter, Merri, born in 2001. Both children graduated from Cold Spring Harbor High School. Patrick attended Wake Forest University where he played tennis. Merri attends The University of Michigan where she also plays tennis. In high school, Merri was the fourth highest ranked tennis player in New York State.
In 2018, Forbes estimated that Hannity's annual income was $36million, and the Guardian reported that he was believed to be the "hidden owner" of about $90 million in property that had been purchased by shell companies. In April 2021, he purchased a $5.3 million house several miles from Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago residence.
In 2014 he said he has carried a weapon "more than half my adult life". According to Hannity, he has a brown belt in martial arts and trains four days a week in the sport.
Religion
Hannity left the Catholic Church in 2019, citing "too much institutionalized corruption". However, he has said that as he has aged, his Christian faith has "gotten stronger" and that he needs and wants God in his life.
Bibliography
Hannity, Sean (2002). Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2004). Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2010). Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, New York: Harper Paperbacks, .
Hannity, Sean (2020). Live Free or Die: America (and the World) On the Brink, New York: Simon & Schuster, .
See also
Fox News controversies
New Yorkers in journalism
References
External links
1961 births
Living people
21st-century American male writers
21st-century American non-fiction writers
Adelphi University alumni
American broadcast news analysts
American conservative talk radio hosts
American male non-fiction writers
American people of Irish descent
American political commentators
American political writers
Christians from New York (state)
Conservative Party of New York State politicians
Former Roman Catholics
Fox News people
Male critics of feminism
New York (state) Independents
New York (state) Republicans
New York University alumni
People from Centre Island, New York
People from Franklin Square, New York
Radio personalities from New York City
Right-wing populism in the United States
University of California, Santa Barbara alumni
Writers from New York City | true | [
"Mind how you go may refer to:\nMind How You Go (The Advisory Circle album), 2005\nMind How You Go (Skye Edwards album), 2006\n\"Mind How You Go\", a 1965 single by Barry St. John (Elizabeth Thompson)\n\"Mind How You Go\", a 1967 single by Allan Smethurst\n\"Mind How You Go\", a 1966 single by Mr. Lee Grant (Bogdan Kominowski)\n\"Mind how you go\", a phrase for good-bye",
"Are We Not Horses is an album by Rock Plaza Central. Despite being first released independently, the disc made many top ten lists for 2006, including #8 for CMJ Editor-in-Chief Kenny Herzog, Pitchfork staff writer Stephen Deusner and Americana-UK lead writer David Cowling. Because the album did not receive an official US release through Yep Roc Records until mid-2007, it made several of those year-end lists as well, including Magnet'''s \"10 Great Hidden Treasures of 2007\", calling it \"2007's finest folk/rock find\".\n\nThe album has also recently been taught in a graduate English course at the University of South Alabama, alongside frontman Chris Eaton's first novel, 2003's The Inactivist''.\n\nTrack listing \n \"I Am an Excellent Steel Horse\" – 3:12\n \"How Shall I to Heaven Aspire?\" – 2:02\n \"My Children, Be Joyful\" – 5:51\n \"Anthem for the Already Defeated\" – 2:03\n \"Fifteen Hands\" – 3:50\n \"Are We Not Horses?\" – 3:06\n \"When We Go, How We Go (Part 1)\" – 2:25\n \"Our Pasts, Like Lighthouses\" – 4:13\n \"8/14/03\" – 0:56\n \"Our Hearts Will Not Rust\" – 3:44\n \"When We Go, How We Go (Part II)\" – 3:25\n \"We've Got a Lot to Be Glad For\" – 3:58\n\nReferences \n\n2006 albums\nRock Plaza Central albums\nOutside Music albums\nYep Roc Records albums"
]
|
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"Hannity hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor.",
"how did it go",
"The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, \"I wasn't good at it. I was terrible.\""
]
| C_d5d7c3407dd148389b1d80a63090fca4_1 | what did others have to say | 3 | What did others have to say about Sean Hannity's first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM? | Sean Hannity | Hannity hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible." Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year. This was after two shows featuring the book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS by Gene Antonio; among other remarks made during the broadcast, Hannity told a lesbian caller, "I feel sorry for your child." The university board that governed the station later reversed its decision due to a campaign conducted on Hannity's behalf by the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, which argued that the station had discriminated against Hannity's First Amendment rights. When the station refused to give him a public apology and more airtime, Hannity decided against returning to KCSB. After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America." Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996, Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes. Later that year, Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity was on WABC's afternoon time slot from January 1998 until the end of 2013. Since January 2014, Hannity has hosted the 3-6 p.m. time slot on WOR in New York City. In their 2007 book Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America, conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group." CANNOTANSWER | Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year. | Sean Patrick Hannity (born December 30, 1961) is an American talk show host and conservative political commentator. He is the host of The Sean Hannity Show, a nationally syndicated talk radio show, and has also hosted a commentary program, Hannity, on Fox News, since 2009.
Hannity worked as a general contractor and volunteered as a talk show host at UC Santa Barbara in 1989. He later joined WVNN in Athens, Alabama and shortly afterward, WGST in Atlanta. After leaving WGST, he worked at WABC in New York until 2013. Since 2014, Hannity has worked at WOR.
In 1996, Hannity and Alan Colmes co-hosted Hannity & Colmes on Fox. After Colmes announced his departure in January 2008, Hannity merged the Hannity & Colmes show into Hannity.
Hannity has received several awards and honors, including an honorary degree from Liberty University. He has written three New York Times best-selling books: Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism; Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism; and Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, and released a fourth, Live Free or Die, in 2020.
Hannity has sometimes promoted conspiracy theories, such as "birtherism" (claims that then-President Barack Obama was not a legitimate U.S. citizen), claims regarding the murder of Seth Rich, and falsehoods about Hillary Clinton's health. Hannity was an early supporter of Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election. Hannity often acted as an unofficial spokesman for the president, criticizing the media and attacking Robert Mueller's inquiry into Russian interference in Trump's election. He reportedly spoke to Trump on the phone most weeknights. He spoke at the president's lectern during a Trump rally, and White House advisors characterized him as the "shadow" chief of staff. According to Forbes, by 2018 Hannity had become one of the most-watched hosts in cable news and most-listened-to hosts in talk radio, due in part to his closeness and access to Trump.
Early life and education
Hannity was born in New York City, New York, the son of Lillian (née Flynn) and Hugh Hannity. Lillian worked as a stenographer and a corrections officer at a county jail, while Hugh was a World War II veteran and family-court officer. He was the youngest of four siblings and the only boy. All his grandparents immigrated to the United States from Ireland. He grew up in Franklin Square, New York on Long Island.
In his youth, Hannity worked as a paperboy delivering issues of the New York Daily News and the Long Island Daily Press. His parents were initially supporters of President John F. Kennedy, eventually growing more Republican in their views as time went on, though they resisted being overtly political at home.
Hannity attended Sacred Heart Seminary in Hempstead, New York and St. Pius X Preparatory Seminary in Uniondale, New York. He attended New York University and Adelphi University, but did not graduate from either.
Career
In 1982, Hannity started a house-painting business and a few years later, worked as a building contractor in Santa Barbara, California. He hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible."
Radio
Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year after a controversy. During two shows, gay and lesbian rights were discussed in what was considered to be a contentious manner. (See LGBT issues below.) The university board that governed the station later reversed its decision after a campaign conducted on Hannity's behalf by the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union argued that the station had discriminated against Hannity's First Amendment rights. When the station refused to issue Hannity a public apology and more airtime, he did not return to KCSB.
After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications, presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America". Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville media market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996, Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes.
Later that year, Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late-night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive-time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity was on WABC's afternoon time slot from January 1998.
In their 2007 book Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America, conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group". The WABC slot continued until the end of 2013. Since January 2014, Hannity has hosted the 3:00–6:00p.m. time slot on WOR in New York City.
Hannity's radio program is a conservative political talk show that features Hannity's opinions and ideology related to current issues and politicians. The Sean Hannity Show began national syndication on September 10, 2001, on more than five hundred stations nationwide. In 2004, Hannity signed a $25million five-year contract extension with ABC Radio (now Citadel Media) to continue the show until 2009. The program was made available via Armed Forces Radio Network in 2006. In June 2007, ABC Radio was sold to Citadel Communications and in the summer of 2008, Hannity was signed for a $100million five-year contract. As of March 2018, the program is heard by more than 13.5 million listeners a week. Hannity was ranked No.2 in Talkers Magazine's 2017 Heavy Hundred and was listed as No.72 on Forbes' "Celebrity 100" list in 2013.
In January 2007, Clear Channel Communications signed a groupwide three-year extension with Hannity on more than eighty stations. The largest stations in the group deal included KTRH Houston, KFYI Phoenix, WPGB Pittsburgh, WKRC Cincinnati, WOOD Grand Rapids, WFLA Tampa, WOAI San Antonio, WLAC Nashville, and WREC Memphis.
Hannity signed a long-term contract to remain with Premiere Networks in September 2013.
At the beginning of 2014, Hannity signed contracts to air on several Salem Communications stations including WDTK Detroit, WIND Chicago, WWRC (now WQOF) Washington, D.C., and KSKY Dallas.
Television
Hannity was a co-host of Hannity & Colmes, an American political "point-counterpoint"-style television program on the Fox News Channel featuring Hannity and Alan Colmes as co-hosts. Hannity presented the conservative point of view with Colmes providing the liberal viewpoint.
While Hannity's views are typically politically and socially conservative, he has spoken supportively about birth control, which has led to on-air clashes with pro-life guests such as Rev. Thomas Euteneuer, president of Human Life International. Hannity said if the Catholic Church were to excommunicate him over his support for contraception, he would join Jerry Falwell's Thomas Road Baptist Church.
In January 2007, Hannity began a new Sunday night television show on Fox News, Hannity's America.
In November 2008, Colmes announced his departure from Hannity & Colmes. After the show's final broadcast on January 9, 2009, Hannity took over the time slot with his own new show, Hannity, which has a format similar to Hannity's America.
Books
Hannity is the author of four books. Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism was published in 2002, and Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism was published in 2004 through ReganBooks. Both these books reached the nonfiction New York Times bestseller list, the second of which stayed there for five weeks. Hannity has said he is too busy to write many books, and dictated a lot of his own two books into a tape recorder while driving in to do his radio show.
Hannity wrote his third book, Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, which was released by HarperCollins in March 2010. The book became Hannity's third New York Times Bestseller.
In 2020, Hannity released his fourth book, Live Free or Die.
Let Freedom Ring:Winning the War of Liberty Over Liberalism, William Morrow, August 1, 2002, .
Deliver Us From Evil:Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, William Morrow, February 17, 2004, .
Conservative Victory:Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, HarperCollins, March 30, 2010, .
Live Free or Die:America (and the World) on the Brink, Threshold Editions, August 4, 2020, .
Freedom Concerts
From 2003 until 2010, Hannity hosted country music-themed "Freedom Concerts" to raise money for charity. In 2010, conservative blogger Debbie Schlussel wrote that only a small percentage of the money raised by the concerts goes to the target charity, Freedom Alliance. The Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) filed complaints with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), also in 2010. The FTC complaint alleges that Hannity was "falsely promoting that all concert proceeds would be donated to a scholarship fund for the children of those killed or wounded in war". The complaint filed with the IRS claims that Freedom Alliance has violated its 501(c)3 charity status. The concerts stopped around the same year.
Awards and honors
Hannity received a Marconi Award in 2003 and 2007 as the Network Syndicated Personality of the Year from the National Association of Broadcasters.
In 2009, Talkers Magazine listed Hannity as No.2 on their list of the 100 most important radio talk show hosts in America (with Rush Limbaugh listed as No.1). The same magazine gave Hannity its Freedom of Speech Award in 2003.
In 2005, Jerry Falwell, chancellor of the evangelical Liberty University, awarded Hannity an honorary degree.
Hannity was inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame in November 2017.
Other activities
Hannity has had cameo appearances in film and television, having a brief voiceover in The Siege as an unseen reporter, and appearing in Atlas Shrugged: Part II and the second season of House of Cards as himself. He executive produced and appeared in the 2017 film Let There Be Light, which also stars Kevin Sorbo.
As of April 2018, Hannity owned at least 877 residential properties, which were bought for nearly $89million. He purchased some of the homes with the help of loans from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and most are in working-class neighborhoods. His property managers have taken an aggressive management approach with a much higher than average eviction rate. The Washington Post reported that his property management team has used eviction proceedings both to remove tenants and to generate revenue. His property managers have claimed that Hannity has no active role in the management of the more than 1,000 properties he has a stake in.
Controversies and criticism
According to The Washington Post, Hannity "repeatedly embraces storylines that prove to be inaccurate" and takes positions that change over time. In the opinion of The New York Times, Hannity is "barreling headfirst into the murky territory between opinion and out-and-out conspiracy theorism". Hannity often promotes conspiracy theories without explicitly endorsing them, unlike Alex Jones. The New York Times wrote that this "has the effect of nourishing the more wild-eyed beliefs of his fans while providing Hannity a degree of plausible deniability". The New Yorker wrote in 2019 that Hannity had "[spewed] baseless conspiracy theories with impunity".
During the Bush years, Hannity "loyally supported the president's policies". During the Obama administration, Hannity "leaned more heavily on stories he believed were being given short shrift by the 'liberal media'stories about where Obama was born, and who deserved blame for the attack on the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya". In 2017, The Washington Post wrote that "what Hannity has stood forat least for the past couple of yearsis Trump."
Birtherism
Although Hannity said he believed President Obama was born in the U.S., to answer queries on Obama's citizenship, he repeatedly called on Obama to release his birth certificate. Hannity described the circumstances regarding Obama's birth certificate as "odd". Hannity also defended and promoted those who questioned Obama's citizenship of the U.S., such as Donald Trump. Hannity invited Trump to his show while Trump was a leader in the birther movement; during an interview with Hannity, Trump said Obama "could have easily have come from Kenya, or someplace". Hannity said in response, "The issue could go away in a minute. Just show the certificate." Even after Obama produced his birth certificate in 2008, certified by the state of Hawaii, Hannity kept calling on Obama to release his birth certificate, asking why did he not "just produce it and we move on?" In October 2016, Hannity offered to purchase a one-way ticket to Kenya for Obama.
2016 presidential campaign
Candidacy of Donald Trump
Hannity is known for his pro-Trump coverage. According to The Washington Post, "Hannity's comeback coincided with his early, eager embrace of his fellow New Yorker... Trump attacked the Gold Star father, and Hannity stood by him. Trump went after a federal judge of Mexican descent, and Hannity backed him. After the Access Hollywood tape emerged of Trump making lewd comments about inappropriate sexual behaviour towards women, Hannity continued to defend him: 'King David had 500 concubines, for crying out loud.'" After the inauguration, the first interview the new president gave to a cable news channel was conducted by Hannity. Hannity additionally defended the Trump administration's false claim that Trump's inauguration crowd was the biggest ever.
Hannity has been criticized as being overly favorable to the candidacy of Donald Trump, and granting Trump more airtime than other presidential candidates during the 2016 primaries. Hannity, for instance, let Trump promote the false claim that Rafael Cruz, father of Trump's rival presidential candidate Ted Cruz, was involved in the John F. Kennedy assassination. He admitted to favoring Republican candidates, though without indicating a preference for Donald Trump over Ted Cruz. According to Dylan Byers of CNN, Hannity during interviews "frequently cites areas where he agrees with Trump, or where he thinks Trump was right about something, then asks him to expand on it", and "often ignores or defends Trump from criticism".
Tensions between Cruz and Hannity appeared to reach a boiling point during a contentious April 2016 radio interview, during which Cruz implied Hannity was a "hardcore Donald Trump supporter" and Hannity responded by accusing Cruz of "throw[ing] this in my face" every time he asked a "legitimate question". Jim Rutenberg commented in August 2016 that Hannity is "not only Mr. Trump's biggest media booster; he also veers into the role of adviser," citing sources who said Hannity spent months offering suggestions to Trump and his campaign on strategy and messaging. Hannity responded to the report by saying, "I'm not hiding the fact that I want Donald Trump to be the next President of the United States.... I never claimed to be a journalist." (In an article published in December 2017, Hannity said "I'm a journalist. But I'm an advocacy journalist, or an opinion journalist.") Hannity has feuded with several conservatives who oppose Trump, including National Reviews Jonah Goldberg, Wall Street Journal foreign affairs columnist Bret Stephens, and National Review editor Rich Lowry.
Conspiracy theories about Hillary Clinton
During the 2016 presidential election, Hannity periodically promoted conspiracy theories regarding Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party. Hannity repeatedly claimed that Clinton had very serious medical problems and that the media was covering them up. He misrepresented photos of Clinton to give the impression that she had secret medical problems. He shared a photo from the fringe news site Gateway Pundit and falsely claimed that it showed her Secret Service agent holding a diazepam pen intended to treat seizures, when he in fact was holding a small flashlight. He booked doctors on his show to discuss Clinton's health; although these people had never personally examined Clinton, they made alarmist statements about her state of health which turned out to be false. At one point, Hannity promoted an unsubstantiated report that Clinton had been drunk at a rally; at another point, he suggested that Clinton was drunk and that her campaign needed to "sober her up".
Murder of Seth Rich conspiracy theories
In May 2017, Hannity became a prominent promoter of the conspiracy theory that Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party had a DNC staffer killed. Shortly afterward, he faced backlash from both left- and right-wing sources and lost several advertisers, including Crowne Plaza Hotels, Cars.com, Leesa Mattress, USAA, Peloton and Casper Sleep deciding to pull their marketing from his program on Fox News. However, USAA decided to return to the show shortly after following a negative outcry against its decision to pull out. Conservative magazine National Review compared the story to a flat earth video, called it a "disgrace" that Hannity and other conspiracy theorists were hyping the story, and called for them to stop.
In March 2018, Seth Rich's parents filed a lawsuit against Fox News for pushing conspiracy theories about their son's death. The suit alleges that the network "intentionally exploited" the tragedy for political purposes. On Oct. 12, 2020, Fox News agreed to pay millions of dollars to the Rich family.
Claims about election fraud
Hannity came under criticism during the 2016 presidential election for false claims about election rigging during interviews. Hannity responded to this by citing Mitt Romney's failure in the 2012 United States presidential election to obtain any votes in 59 of 1,687 Philadelphia voting districts as proof of election rigging. However, Factcheck.org and PolitiFact found that it was not unusual at all for this to occur, as those electoral districts are heavily African-American. Philadelphia elections inspector Ryan Godfrey also refuted Hannity's claim.
After the 2020 election, Hannity amplified false claims of election fraud, including by hosting former Trump lawyer Sidney Powell on his Fox News show, where Powell made unsubstantiated allegations on the topic. Republican efforts to overturn the 2020 election results and install Donald Trump for a second term culminated in the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. In 2022, the U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack is investigating what Hannity may have known in advance. The committee discovered that, on December 31, 2020, Hannity texted White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, saying, "I do NOT see January 6 happening the way he [Trump] is being told." In December of 2020, a month after the election, Hannity called for Trump’s false claims of voter fraud to be investigated by a special prosecutor, despite there still being no credible evidence of them by the accusers. As of February of 2022, no credible evidence has been provided of these false claims that Hannity amplified.
WikiLeaks
In 2010, Hannity said WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was waging a "war" on the United States, and that Wikileaks put American lives in "jeopardy" and "danger" around the world. He also criticized the Obama administration for failing to apprehend Assange. In 2016, after Wikileaks published leaked emails from the Democratic National Committee, Hannity praised Assange for showing "how corrupt, dishonest and phony our government is". He told Assange in a September 2016 interview, "I do hope you get free one day. I wish you the best." The following month, Hannity claimed that WikiLeaks has revealed "everything that conspiracy theorists have said over the years" about Hillary Clinton is true.
In February 2017, Hannity retweeted a WikiLeaks tweet linking to an article by the conspiracy website Gateway Pundit, claiming that John McCain was a "globalist war criminal". McCain's spokeswoman called Hannity out on it, asking him to "correct the record". Hannity later deleted the tweet. In May 2017, Hannity made an offer to Assange to guest host his Fox News TV show.
Relationship with Donald Trump and Michael Cohen
Hannity developed a close relationship with Trump during the election and has become even closer during his presidency. The two men speak on the phone multiple times a week, discussing Hannity's weekday show, the special counsel investigation, even evaluating White House staff. Hannity shares, The Economist asserts, "Mr. Trump's love of conspiracy theories and hatred of snooty elites". They speak so often that one Trump adviser has said Hannity "basically has a desk in the place". On the air, Hannity echoes Trump's attacks on the media and Special Counsel investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. Trump sometimes quotes Hannity to others or promotes the show to his Twitter followers. Hannity has encouraged Trump to shut down the government to get funding for a border wall, as well as his declaration of a national emergency over the US–Mexico border.
According to reports by the Los Angeles Times and New York magazine, Hannity frequently talks to Trump by telephone after Hannity's weekday broadcasts, and Hannity is one of several dozen cleared callers whose calls to the White House public switchboard can be connected directly to the president.
Hannity stirred controversy in April 2018 when it was revealed that he shared a lawyer, Michael Cohen, with Trump. In a breach of journalistic ethics, Hannity had failed to disclose that Cohen was his lawyer while at the same time taking to the Fox airwaves to defend Cohen and criticize those who investigated him.
On April 9, 2018, federal agents from the U.S. Attorney's office served a search warrant on the office and residence of Michael Cohen, Trump's personal attorney. On the air, Hannity defended Cohen and criticized the federal action, calling it "highly questionable" and "an unprecedented abuse of power". On April 16, 2018, in a court hearing, Cohen's lawyers told the judge that Cohen had ten clients in 2017–2018 but did "traditional legal tasks" for only three: Trump, Elliott Broidy, and a "prominent person" who did not wish to be named for fear of being "embarrassed". The federal judge ordered the revelation of the third client, whom Cohen's lawyers named as Hannity. Although Hannity has covered Cohen on his show, he did not disclose that he had consulted with Cohen.
Fox News released a statement on April 16, 2018, attributed to Hannity: "Michael Cohen has never represented me in any matter. I never retained him, received an invoice, or paid legal fees. I have occasionally had brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective. I assumed those conversations were confidential, but to be absolutely clear they never involved any matter between me and a third party." Also, NBC News quoted Hannity as saying: "We definitely had attorney–client privilege because I asked him for that," while Hannity said on his radio show that he "might have handed him ten bucks" for the attorney-client privilege. Lastly, Hannity tweeted that his discussions with Cohen were "almost exclusively" about real estate.
The following day, news reports revealed that Hannity had shared another lawyer with Trump, Jay Sekulow. Sekulow had written a cease-and-desist letter to KFAQ on Hannity's behalf in May 2017, and later represented Trump in connection with the Mueller investigation.
In August 2018, Hannity allowed Sekulow and Rudy Giuliani, another personal lawyer for Trump, to host Hannity's radio show; the duo proceeded to defend Trump and promote arguments made by the Trump administration.
According to The New Yorker, Hannity has reversed on the issue of negotiations with North Korea: during Obama's presidency, Hannity called negotiations with North Korea "disturbing", whereas he called Trump's negotiations with North Korea a "huge foreign-policy win".
In June 2019, Hannity expressed outrage at Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's comment that she would like to see Trump "in prison". Hannity declared: "Based on no actual crimes, she wants a political opponent locked up in prison? That happens in banana republicsbeyond despicable behavior." Aaron Rupar of Vox criticized Hannity for "obvious hypocrisy", noting that Hannity himself had said in January 2018 regarding Hillary Clinton: "I think Hillary should be in jail. Lock her up." Aaron Blake of The Washington Post described Hannity's comment as "a pretty obvious bit of gaslighting", noting Hannity's loyalty to Trump, whose campaign rallies have featured chants of "Lock her up", and also Hannity's comments that Trump was free to investigate Clinton.
Hannity played the most important role in persuading Trump to pardon the convicted murderer and war criminal Clint Lorance.
Criticism of FBI, DOJ, and special counsel
During President Trump's administration, Hannity has repeatedly been highly critical of the FBI, DOJ, Special Counsel Robert Mueller, and others investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election. According to a review by Media Matters of all transcripts from the 254 episodes of Hannity's show from Mueller's appointment (May 17, 2017) to May 16, 2018, Hannity had 487 segments substantially devoted to Mueller (approximately two per episode), opened his program with Mueller 152 times (approximately three times per week), and the content of his show was highly critical of the probe and the media's coverage of the probe. He has called the Russia inquiry a "witch hunt", an "utter disgrace", and "a direct threat to you, the American people, and our American republic". Hannity has expressed skepticism of the U.S. intelligence community's view that Russia hacked the Democratic National Convention's emails during the 2016 election and has promoted various conspiracy theories. In March 2017 he publicized a theory, first proposed at the Wikileaks Twitter account, that the CIA could have done the hacking while making it look like Russia did it. In August he suggested that Seth Rich may have been the leaker.
Hannity has described the Mueller investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, as well as James Comey's tenure as FBI Director, as "one giant incestuous circle of corruption". In April 2018, Hannity ran a segment where he claimed there were "criminal" connections between Bill and Hillary Clinton, Mueller, and Comey. Hannity asserted that there were three connected "Deep State crime families" actively "trying to take down the president". A guest on the segment, attorney Joseph diGenova, called Mueller's team "legal terrorists" and referred to Comey as a "dirty cop".
Hannity also claimed that Mueller had been involved in the corrupt dealings of several FBI agents in connection with Boston, Massachusetts crime boss Whitey Bulger. The federal judge who presided over a lawsuit concerning the corrupt dealings said Hannity's claims were unsubstantiated and that Mueller was never accused of any wrongdoing nor even mentioned during the proceedings.
In June 2018, after reports that Mueller's probe had asked witnesses to turn their personal phones over to investigators for examination, Hannity sarcastically suggested on air to the witnesses that they "follow Hillary Clinton's lead" and destroy their personal phones so they cannot be examined.
In May 2019, after Mueller gave a statement saying the Special Counsel investigation did not exonerate Trump of crimes, Hannity said Mueller was "basically full of crap" and did not know the law.
Uranium One
From 2015 into 2018, Fox News broadcast extensive coverage of an alleged scandal surrounding the sale of Uranium One to Russian interests, which Hannity characterized as "one of the biggest scandals in American history". The Fox News coverage extended throughout the programming day, with particular emphasis by Hannity. The network promoted a narrative asserting that, as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton personally approved the Uranium One sale in exchange for $145million in bribes paid to the Clinton Foundation. Donald Trump repeated these allegations as a candidate and as president. No evidence of wrongdoing by Clinton had been found after three years of allegations, an FBI investigation, and the 2017 appointment of a Federal attorney to evaluate the investigation. In November 2017, Fox News host Shepard Smith concisely debunked the alleged scandal, including saying that Clinton did not personally approve the sale, infuriating viewers who suggested he should work for CNN or MSNBC. Hannity later called Smith "clueless", while Smith stated, "I get it, that some of our opinion programming is there strictly to be entertaining. I get that. I don't work there. I wouldn't work there."
A two-year Justice Department investigation initiated after Trump became president found no evidence to justify pursuing a criminal investigation.
Deep state
Hannity has advocated the QAnon and "deep state" conspiracy theories. The latter proposes a government officials network is working to hinder the Trump administration. He has described the deep state as a "Shadow Government" and "Deep state swamp of Obama holdovers and DC lifers". In March 2017, he called for a "purge" of Obama-era bureaucrats and appointees in government. In an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, conservative columnist Bret Stephens disputed Hannity's deep state allegations, saying they were an example of the "paranoid style in politics". Later that month, Hannity said NBC News was part of the deep state. In May 2017, he reiterated that deep state/intelligence operatives were trying to destroy the Trump presidency.
In March 2018, Hannity attacked Special Counsel Robert Mueller, saying his career was "anything but impeccable". Hannity said Mueller was friends with former FBI Director James Comey and former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, and that he "cannot be expected to honestly investigate scandals that his friends are directly involved in". He said these individuals were involved in "one massive, huge, deep-state conflict of interest after another. Now they're protecting themselves. They're trying to preserve their own power." Mueller and Comey are professional acquaintances but not known to be friends, while Trump attorney general Bill Barr said in 2019 that he and Mueller had been friends for thirty years.
Comments on sexual harassment
In 2016, Hannity vociferously defended Roger Ailes when he was accused by multiple women of sexual harassment. In May 2017, Hannity paid a tribute to Ailes after he died. Hannity called him "a second father" and said to Ailes' "enemies" that he was "preparing to kick your in the next life".
In April 2017, Hannity came to the defense of Fox News co-president Bill Shine after it was reported that Shine's job was at risk. At least four lawsuits alleged that Shine had ignored, enabled or concealed Ailes' alleged sexual harassment.
In September 2017, several months after Bill O'Reilly was fired from Fox News in the wake of a number of women's alleging that he had sexually harassed them, Hannity hosted O'Reilly on his show. Some Fox News employees criticized the decision. In the interview, O'Reilly attacked liberal media watchdog groups and said he should have fought harder when those groups targeted his advertisers. According to CNN, during the interview, Hannity found kinship with O'Reilly as he appeared "to feel that he and O'Reilly have both become victims of liberals looking to silence them".
Hannity came under criticism in October 2017 when he attacked Democrats after it became known that a large number of women had accused Harvey Weinstein, the Hollywood producer and donor to Democratic causes, of sexual harassment. Critics noted that Hannity had weeks earlier defended and hosted his coworker Bill O'Reilly who was fired following a number of sexual harassment allegations.
LGBT rights
In the radio show for KCSB, which was the subject of controversy in 1989, Hannity made anti-gay comments. He called AIDS a "gay disease" and said the media was hiding salient information from the public. Two editions featured anti-gay activist Gene Antonio, a Lutheran minister, discussing his book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS. In the book, Antonio claims that AIDS can be spread by people sneezing in close proximity to each other. Hannity encouraged Antonio when he said that AIDS spread when gay men consumed each other's feces, said that homosexuality was a "lower form of behavior", compared homosexual sex to "playing in a sewer" and gay people of being "filled with hatred and bigotry". When a lesbian, another broadcaster at the station, called into the show, Hannity said "I feel sorry for your child." Hannity was quoted at the time as having said "anyone listening to this show that believes homosexuality is a normal lifestyle has been brainwashed." The ACLU opposed his firing and petitioned the station to reverse their decision. Hannity demanded a formal apology and double the airtime. While the station did offer to allow Hannity to return, they would not meet Hannity's additional demands and he declined to return.
In 2017, Hannity said he regretted the comments and that they were "ignorant and embarrassing".
Immigration
Hannity opposed amnesty for undocumented immigrants; however, in 2012 he said he had evolved on the issue and favored a "pathway to citizenship". Later, he opposed that idea. By 2018, he was described as an immigration hardliner by CNN, The Washington Post, and New York magazine. In August 2018, Trump suggested that he might shut down the government to force Congress to fund his border wall, boasting that Hannity agreed with the action.
Islam
Hannity has warned of sharia law coming to the United States. Hannity opposed the building of Park51, a mosque two blocks from the World Trade Center site.
Hannity promoted the idea of "Islamic training camps right here in America", which were based on an unsubstantiated "documentary" by the Christian Action Network.
In 2006, Hannity was critical of Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to U.S. Congress, being sworn into office with an oath on a Quran. Hannity equated the Quran with Mein Kampf, asking a guest on his show whether he would have allowed Ellison "to choose, you know, Hitler's Mein Kampf, which is the Nazi bible?"
Torture
In 2009, Hannity said he supported enhanced interrogation, a euphemism for torture. He also volunteered to be waterboarded for charity. In response, Keith Olbermann pledged to donate $1,000 for every second of waterboarding Hannity underwent. In 2017, Hannity continued to advocate for waterboarding, raising the example of using it against a kidnapper. According to Media Matters, Hannity has not been waterboarded as of March 2018.
Climate change
Hannity rejects the scientific consensus on climate change. In 2001, he described it as "phony science from the left". In 2004, he falsely claimed that scientists couldn't agree on whether global warming was "scientific fact or fiction". In 2010, Hannity falsely stated that so-called "Climategate"the leaking of e-mails written by climate scientists that, according to climate change deniers, demonstrated scientific misconduct, but which all subsequent inquiries found to show no evidence of misconduct or wrongdoingwas a scandal that "exposed global warming as a myth cooked up by alarmists". Hannity frequently invites critics of climate science onto his shows.
Death panels
Hannity promoted the falsehood that the Affordable Care Act would create so-called "death panels". According to a study by Dartmouth College political scientist Brendan Nyhan, Hannity's show, along with the Laura Ingraham Show, were the first major conservative media personalities to latch onto the false claim of Betsy McCaughey, a former lieutenant governor of New York, that the Affordable Care Act contained death panels. When Sarah Palin stirred controversy by promoting the death panels myth, and argued her case in a Facebook post, Hannity defended her and said, "I agree with everything that she wrote." Hannity also claimed that he found the specific pages in the Affordable Care Act containing provisions on death panels.
A 2016 study found that Hannity promoted a number of falsehoods about the Affordable Care Act. For instance, Hannity falsely alleged several times that Democratic Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus had said Social Security could be "insolvent in two years" due to the Affordable Care Act. According to the study, Hannity, unlike other Fox News hosts such as Bill O'Reilly and Greta Van Susteren, "took a more direct approach, aggressively supporting Republicans and conservatives and attacking Democrats and liberals, endorsing the more spurious claims long after they were proven incorrect, and putting advocacy above accurate reporting, to further the network's themes opposing reform".
Jake Tapper
In November 2017, Fox News distorted a statement by Jake Tapper to make it appear as if he had said "Allahu Akbar" can be used under the most "beautiful circumstances" in the immediate aftermath of the 2017 New York City truck attack wherein a terrorist shouted "Allahu Akbar". Fox News omitted that Tapper had said the use of "Allahu Akbar" in the terrorist attack was not one of these circumstances. A headline on FoxNews.com was preceded by a tag reading "OUTRAGEOUS". The Fox News Twitter account distorted the statement even more, saying "Jake Tapper Says 'Allahu Akbar' Is 'Beautiful' Right After NYC Terror Attack" in a tweet that was later deleted.
Even after the Fox News Twitter account had deleted the tweet on Tapper's out-of-context comments, Hannity repeated the out-of-context comments to his viewers, calling Tapper "liberal fake news CNN's fake Jake Tapper" and mocking his ratings.
Appearance at November 2018 Trump rally
On November 4, 2018, Trump's website, DonaldJTrump.com, announced in a press release that Hannity would make a "special guest appearance" with Trump at a midterm campaign rally the following night in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. The following morning, Hannity tweeted "To be clear, I will not be on stage campaigning with the President." Hannity nevertheless spoke at Trump's lectern on stage at the rally, immediately mocking the "fake news" at the back of the auditorium, Fox News reporters among them. Several Fox News employees expressed outrage at Hannity's actions, with one stating, "a new line was crossed". Hannity later asserted that his action was not pre-planned, and Fox News stated it "does not condone any talent participating in campaign events". Fox News host Jeanine Pirro also appeared on stage with Trump at the rally. The Trump press release was later removed from Trump's website.
Foreign policy
In 2009, Hannity said of the Iraq War, "we were victorious in spite of the Democrats' efforts and attempts at preventing victory." During the 2016 election, Hannity vouched for Trump's claimed opposition to the Iraq War, "Mr. Trump and I disagreed about the Iraq war; I was for it and he was against it."
In June 2019, Hannity called on Trump to "bomb the hell of out Iran" after Iran shot down a U.S. drone. After the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, Hannity opened his show by saying, "tonight the world is safer as one of the most ruthless, evil war criminals on Earth has been brought to justice."
Ukraine
In February 2020, The Daily Beast acquired a leaked document entitled "Ukraine, Disinformation, & the Trump Administration" produced by a Fox News research team. The document warned of "disinformation" being pushed by frequent Hannity guests, including Rudy Giuliani, John Solomon, Victoria Toensing and Joe diGenova. Among other criticisms, the analysis noted that on his show Hannity discussed with Toensing and diGenova an affidavit from former Ukrainian prosecutor general Viktor Shokin that accused Joe Biden of getting him fired to end an investigation into Burisma Holdings, which employed Biden's son Hunter. The affidavit was drafted at the request of attorneys for Ukrainian oligarch Dmitry Firtash, but neither Hannity nor his guests disclosed to viewers that Toensing and diGenova were among Firtash's attorneys.
COVID-19 pandemic
In February 2020, amid the spread of COVID-19 to the United States, Hannity said "many on the left are now all rooting for corona to wreak havoc in the United States. Why? To score cheap, repulsive political points." In March 2020, he characterized the virus as a "hoax", and said it "may be true" that the outbreak was a "fraud" perpetrated by the "deep state". Later in March, as the disease spread into a global pandemic and Trump declared it a national emergency, Hannity started to take the virus more seriously, denying that he had referred to it as a hoax less than a month earlier. In July 2021, on live television, Hannity encouraged the audience to consider vaccination.
Personal life
Family and lifestyle
Hannity met Jill Rhodes in 1991 when he worked at WVNN in Huntsville, Alabama and she was a political columnist for the Huntsville Times. The two married in 1993. In June 2020, the couple announced that they had divorced the previous year but had separated years prior.
Hannity has since dated Fox News colleague Ainsley Earhardt. In August 2019, Hannity and Earhardt arrived together as guests for a wedding at Trump National Golf Course in Colt's Neck, New Jersey. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she has been hosting her Fox & Friends program from a remote studio in the basement of Hannity's Long Island mansion.
Hannity has two children from his marriage to Rhodes: a son, Patrick, born in 1998, and daughter, Merri, born in 2001. Both children graduated from Cold Spring Harbor High School. Patrick attended Wake Forest University where he played tennis. Merri attends The University of Michigan where she also plays tennis. In high school, Merri was the fourth highest ranked tennis player in New York State.
In 2018, Forbes estimated that Hannity's annual income was $36million, and the Guardian reported that he was believed to be the "hidden owner" of about $90 million in property that had been purchased by shell companies. In April 2021, he purchased a $5.3 million house several miles from Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago residence.
In 2014 he said he has carried a weapon "more than half my adult life". According to Hannity, he has a brown belt in martial arts and trains four days a week in the sport.
Religion
Hannity left the Catholic Church in 2019, citing "too much institutionalized corruption". However, he has said that as he has aged, his Christian faith has "gotten stronger" and that he needs and wants God in his life.
Bibliography
Hannity, Sean (2002). Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2004). Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2010). Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, New York: Harper Paperbacks, .
Hannity, Sean (2020). Live Free or Die: America (and the World) On the Brink, New York: Simon & Schuster, .
See also
Fox News controversies
New Yorkers in journalism
References
External links
1961 births
Living people
21st-century American male writers
21st-century American non-fiction writers
Adelphi University alumni
American broadcast news analysts
American conservative talk radio hosts
American male non-fiction writers
American people of Irish descent
American political commentators
American political writers
Christians from New York (state)
Conservative Party of New York State politicians
Former Roman Catholics
Fox News people
Male critics of feminism
New York (state) Independents
New York (state) Republicans
New York University alumni
People from Centre Island, New York
People from Franklin Square, New York
Radio personalities from New York City
Right-wing populism in the United States
University of California, Santa Barbara alumni
Writers from New York City | false | [
"What Can I Say may refer to:\n\n What Can I Say (Carrie Underwood song)\n What Can I Say (Dead by April song)\n \"What Can I Say\", a 1976 song by Boz Scaggs\n\nSee also\n \"(What Can I Say) To Make You Love Me\", a song by Alexander O'Neal",
"\n\nTrack listing\n Opening Overture\n \"I Get a Kick Out of You\" (Cole Porter)\n \"You Are the Sunshine of My Life\" (Stevie Wonder)\n \"You Will Be My Music\" (Joe Raposo)\n \"Don't Worry 'bout Me\" (Ted Koehler, Rube Bloom)\n \"If\" (David Gates)\n \"Bad, Bad Leroy Brown\" (Jim Croce)\n \"Ol' Man River\" (Jerome Kern, Oscar Hammerstein II)\n Famous Monologue\n Saloon Trilogy: \"Last Night When We Were Young\"/\"Violets for Your Furs\"/\"Here's That Rainy Day\" (Harold Arlen, E.Y. Harburg)/(Matt Dennis, Tom Adair)/(Jimmy Van Heusen, Johnny Burke)\n \"I've Got You Under My Skin\" (Porter)\n \"My Kind of Town\" (Sammy Cahn, Van Heusen)\n \"Let Me Try Again\" (Paul Anka, Cahn, Michel Jourdan)\n \"The Lady Is a Tramp\" (Richard Rodgers, Lorenz Hart)\n \"My Way\" (Anka, Claude Francois, Jacques Revaux, Gilles Thibaut)\n\nFrank Sinatra's Monologue About the Australian Press\nI do believe this is my interval, as we say... We've been having a marvelous time being chased around the country for three days. You know, I think it's worth mentioning because it's so idiotic, it's so ridiculous what's been happening. We came all the way to Australia because I chose to come here. I haven't been here for a long time and I wanted to come back for a few days. Wait now, wait. I'm not buttering anybody at all. I don't have to. I really don't have to. I like coming here. I like the people. I love your attitude. I like the booze and the beer and everything else that comes into the scene. I also like the way the country's growing and it's a swinging place.\n\nSo we come here and what happens? We gotta run all day long because of the parasites who chase us with automobiles. That's dangerous, too, on the road, you know. Might cause an accident. They won't quit. They wonder why I won't talk to them. I wouldn't drink their water, let alone talk to them. And if any of you folks in the press are in the audience, please quote me properly. Don't mix it up, do it exactly as I'm saying it, please. Write it down very clearly. One idiot called me up and he wanted to know what I had for breakfast. What the hell does he care what I had for breakfast? I was about to tell him what I did after breakfast. Oh, boy, they're murder! We have a name in the States for their counterparts: They're called parasites. Because they take and take and take and never give, absolutely, never give. I don't care what you think about any press in the world, I say they're bums and they'll always be bums, everyone of them. There are just a few exceptions to the rule. Some good editorial writers who don't go out in the street and chase people around. Critics don't bother me, because if I do badly, I know I'm bad before they even write it, and if I'm good, I know I'm good before they write it. It's true. I know best about myself. So, a critic is a critic. He doesn't anger me. It's the scandal man who bugs you, drives you crazy. It's the two-bit-type work that they do. They're pimps. They're just crazy, you know. And the broads who work in the press are the hookers of the press. Need I explain that to you? I might offer them a buck and a half... I'm not sure. I once gave a chick in Washington $2 and I overpaid her, I found out. She didn't even bathe. Imagine what that was like, ha, ha.\n\nNow, it's a good thing I'm not angry. Really. It's a good thing I'm not angry. I couldn't care less. The press of the world never made a person a star who was untalented, nor did they ever hurt any artist who was talented. So we, who have God-given talent, say, \"To hell with them.\" It doesn't make any difference, you know. And I want to say one more thing. From what I see what's happened since I was last here... what, 16 years ago? Twelve years ago. From what I've seen to happen with the type of news that they print in this town shocked me. And do you know what is devastating? It's old-fashioned. It was done in America and England twenty years ago. And they're catching up with it now, with the scandal sheet. They're rags, that's what they are. You use them to train your dog and your parrot. What else do I have to say? Oh, I guess that's it. That'll keep them talking to themselves for a while. I think most of them are a bunch of fags anyway. Never did a hard day's work in their life. I love when they say, \"What do you mean, you won't stand still when I take your picture?\" All of a sudden, they're God. We gotta do what they want us to do. It's incredible. A pox on them... Now, let's get down to some serious business here...\n\nSee also\nConcerts of Frank Sinatra\n\nFrank Sinatra"
]
|
[
"Sean Hannity",
"Career",
"how did he get his start",
"Hannity hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor.",
"how did it go",
"The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, \"I wasn't good at it. I was terrible.\"",
"what did others have to say",
"Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year."
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| C_d5d7c3407dd148389b1d80a63090fca4_1 | what did he do next | 4 | What did Hannity do next after his weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year.? | Sean Hannity | Hannity hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible." Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year. This was after two shows featuring the book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS by Gene Antonio; among other remarks made during the broadcast, Hannity told a lesbian caller, "I feel sorry for your child." The university board that governed the station later reversed its decision due to a campaign conducted on Hannity's behalf by the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, which argued that the station had discriminated against Hannity's First Amendment rights. When the station refused to give him a public apology and more airtime, Hannity decided against returning to KCSB. After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America." Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996, Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes. Later that year, Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity was on WABC's afternoon time slot from January 1998 until the end of 2013. Since January 2014, Hannity has hosted the 3-6 p.m. time slot on WOR in New York City. In their 2007 book Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America, conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group." CANNOTANSWER | After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America." | Sean Patrick Hannity (born December 30, 1961) is an American talk show host and conservative political commentator. He is the host of The Sean Hannity Show, a nationally syndicated talk radio show, and has also hosted a commentary program, Hannity, on Fox News, since 2009.
Hannity worked as a general contractor and volunteered as a talk show host at UC Santa Barbara in 1989. He later joined WVNN in Athens, Alabama and shortly afterward, WGST in Atlanta. After leaving WGST, he worked at WABC in New York until 2013. Since 2014, Hannity has worked at WOR.
In 1996, Hannity and Alan Colmes co-hosted Hannity & Colmes on Fox. After Colmes announced his departure in January 2008, Hannity merged the Hannity & Colmes show into Hannity.
Hannity has received several awards and honors, including an honorary degree from Liberty University. He has written three New York Times best-selling books: Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism; Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism; and Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, and released a fourth, Live Free or Die, in 2020.
Hannity has sometimes promoted conspiracy theories, such as "birtherism" (claims that then-President Barack Obama was not a legitimate U.S. citizen), claims regarding the murder of Seth Rich, and falsehoods about Hillary Clinton's health. Hannity was an early supporter of Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election. Hannity often acted as an unofficial spokesman for the president, criticizing the media and attacking Robert Mueller's inquiry into Russian interference in Trump's election. He reportedly spoke to Trump on the phone most weeknights. He spoke at the president's lectern during a Trump rally, and White House advisors characterized him as the "shadow" chief of staff. According to Forbes, by 2018 Hannity had become one of the most-watched hosts in cable news and most-listened-to hosts in talk radio, due in part to his closeness and access to Trump.
Early life and education
Hannity was born in New York City, New York, the son of Lillian (née Flynn) and Hugh Hannity. Lillian worked as a stenographer and a corrections officer at a county jail, while Hugh was a World War II veteran and family-court officer. He was the youngest of four siblings and the only boy. All his grandparents immigrated to the United States from Ireland. He grew up in Franklin Square, New York on Long Island.
In his youth, Hannity worked as a paperboy delivering issues of the New York Daily News and the Long Island Daily Press. His parents were initially supporters of President John F. Kennedy, eventually growing more Republican in their views as time went on, though they resisted being overtly political at home.
Hannity attended Sacred Heart Seminary in Hempstead, New York and St. Pius X Preparatory Seminary in Uniondale, New York. He attended New York University and Adelphi University, but did not graduate from either.
Career
In 1982, Hannity started a house-painting business and a few years later, worked as a building contractor in Santa Barbara, California. He hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible."
Radio
Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year after a controversy. During two shows, gay and lesbian rights were discussed in what was considered to be a contentious manner. (See LGBT issues below.) The university board that governed the station later reversed its decision after a campaign conducted on Hannity's behalf by the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union argued that the station had discriminated against Hannity's First Amendment rights. When the station refused to issue Hannity a public apology and more airtime, he did not return to KCSB.
After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications, presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America". Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville media market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996, Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes.
Later that year, Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late-night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive-time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity was on WABC's afternoon time slot from January 1998.
In their 2007 book Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America, conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group". The WABC slot continued until the end of 2013. Since January 2014, Hannity has hosted the 3:00–6:00p.m. time slot on WOR in New York City.
Hannity's radio program is a conservative political talk show that features Hannity's opinions and ideology related to current issues and politicians. The Sean Hannity Show began national syndication on September 10, 2001, on more than five hundred stations nationwide. In 2004, Hannity signed a $25million five-year contract extension with ABC Radio (now Citadel Media) to continue the show until 2009. The program was made available via Armed Forces Radio Network in 2006. In June 2007, ABC Radio was sold to Citadel Communications and in the summer of 2008, Hannity was signed for a $100million five-year contract. As of March 2018, the program is heard by more than 13.5 million listeners a week. Hannity was ranked No.2 in Talkers Magazine's 2017 Heavy Hundred and was listed as No.72 on Forbes' "Celebrity 100" list in 2013.
In January 2007, Clear Channel Communications signed a groupwide three-year extension with Hannity on more than eighty stations. The largest stations in the group deal included KTRH Houston, KFYI Phoenix, WPGB Pittsburgh, WKRC Cincinnati, WOOD Grand Rapids, WFLA Tampa, WOAI San Antonio, WLAC Nashville, and WREC Memphis.
Hannity signed a long-term contract to remain with Premiere Networks in September 2013.
At the beginning of 2014, Hannity signed contracts to air on several Salem Communications stations including WDTK Detroit, WIND Chicago, WWRC (now WQOF) Washington, D.C., and KSKY Dallas.
Television
Hannity was a co-host of Hannity & Colmes, an American political "point-counterpoint"-style television program on the Fox News Channel featuring Hannity and Alan Colmes as co-hosts. Hannity presented the conservative point of view with Colmes providing the liberal viewpoint.
While Hannity's views are typically politically and socially conservative, he has spoken supportively about birth control, which has led to on-air clashes with pro-life guests such as Rev. Thomas Euteneuer, president of Human Life International. Hannity said if the Catholic Church were to excommunicate him over his support for contraception, he would join Jerry Falwell's Thomas Road Baptist Church.
In January 2007, Hannity began a new Sunday night television show on Fox News, Hannity's America.
In November 2008, Colmes announced his departure from Hannity & Colmes. After the show's final broadcast on January 9, 2009, Hannity took over the time slot with his own new show, Hannity, which has a format similar to Hannity's America.
Books
Hannity is the author of four books. Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism was published in 2002, and Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism was published in 2004 through ReganBooks. Both these books reached the nonfiction New York Times bestseller list, the second of which stayed there for five weeks. Hannity has said he is too busy to write many books, and dictated a lot of his own two books into a tape recorder while driving in to do his radio show.
Hannity wrote his third book, Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, which was released by HarperCollins in March 2010. The book became Hannity's third New York Times Bestseller.
In 2020, Hannity released his fourth book, Live Free or Die.
Let Freedom Ring:Winning the War of Liberty Over Liberalism, William Morrow, August 1, 2002, .
Deliver Us From Evil:Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, William Morrow, February 17, 2004, .
Conservative Victory:Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, HarperCollins, March 30, 2010, .
Live Free or Die:America (and the World) on the Brink, Threshold Editions, August 4, 2020, .
Freedom Concerts
From 2003 until 2010, Hannity hosted country music-themed "Freedom Concerts" to raise money for charity. In 2010, conservative blogger Debbie Schlussel wrote that only a small percentage of the money raised by the concerts goes to the target charity, Freedom Alliance. The Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) filed complaints with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), also in 2010. The FTC complaint alleges that Hannity was "falsely promoting that all concert proceeds would be donated to a scholarship fund for the children of those killed or wounded in war". The complaint filed with the IRS claims that Freedom Alliance has violated its 501(c)3 charity status. The concerts stopped around the same year.
Awards and honors
Hannity received a Marconi Award in 2003 and 2007 as the Network Syndicated Personality of the Year from the National Association of Broadcasters.
In 2009, Talkers Magazine listed Hannity as No.2 on their list of the 100 most important radio talk show hosts in America (with Rush Limbaugh listed as No.1). The same magazine gave Hannity its Freedom of Speech Award in 2003.
In 2005, Jerry Falwell, chancellor of the evangelical Liberty University, awarded Hannity an honorary degree.
Hannity was inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame in November 2017.
Other activities
Hannity has had cameo appearances in film and television, having a brief voiceover in The Siege as an unseen reporter, and appearing in Atlas Shrugged: Part II and the second season of House of Cards as himself. He executive produced and appeared in the 2017 film Let There Be Light, which also stars Kevin Sorbo.
As of April 2018, Hannity owned at least 877 residential properties, which were bought for nearly $89million. He purchased some of the homes with the help of loans from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and most are in working-class neighborhoods. His property managers have taken an aggressive management approach with a much higher than average eviction rate. The Washington Post reported that his property management team has used eviction proceedings both to remove tenants and to generate revenue. His property managers have claimed that Hannity has no active role in the management of the more than 1,000 properties he has a stake in.
Controversies and criticism
According to The Washington Post, Hannity "repeatedly embraces storylines that prove to be inaccurate" and takes positions that change over time. In the opinion of The New York Times, Hannity is "barreling headfirst into the murky territory between opinion and out-and-out conspiracy theorism". Hannity often promotes conspiracy theories without explicitly endorsing them, unlike Alex Jones. The New York Times wrote that this "has the effect of nourishing the more wild-eyed beliefs of his fans while providing Hannity a degree of plausible deniability". The New Yorker wrote in 2019 that Hannity had "[spewed] baseless conspiracy theories with impunity".
During the Bush years, Hannity "loyally supported the president's policies". During the Obama administration, Hannity "leaned more heavily on stories he believed were being given short shrift by the 'liberal media'stories about where Obama was born, and who deserved blame for the attack on the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya". In 2017, The Washington Post wrote that "what Hannity has stood forat least for the past couple of yearsis Trump."
Birtherism
Although Hannity said he believed President Obama was born in the U.S., to answer queries on Obama's citizenship, he repeatedly called on Obama to release his birth certificate. Hannity described the circumstances regarding Obama's birth certificate as "odd". Hannity also defended and promoted those who questioned Obama's citizenship of the U.S., such as Donald Trump. Hannity invited Trump to his show while Trump was a leader in the birther movement; during an interview with Hannity, Trump said Obama "could have easily have come from Kenya, or someplace". Hannity said in response, "The issue could go away in a minute. Just show the certificate." Even after Obama produced his birth certificate in 2008, certified by the state of Hawaii, Hannity kept calling on Obama to release his birth certificate, asking why did he not "just produce it and we move on?" In October 2016, Hannity offered to purchase a one-way ticket to Kenya for Obama.
2016 presidential campaign
Candidacy of Donald Trump
Hannity is known for his pro-Trump coverage. According to The Washington Post, "Hannity's comeback coincided with his early, eager embrace of his fellow New Yorker... Trump attacked the Gold Star father, and Hannity stood by him. Trump went after a federal judge of Mexican descent, and Hannity backed him. After the Access Hollywood tape emerged of Trump making lewd comments about inappropriate sexual behaviour towards women, Hannity continued to defend him: 'King David had 500 concubines, for crying out loud.'" After the inauguration, the first interview the new president gave to a cable news channel was conducted by Hannity. Hannity additionally defended the Trump administration's false claim that Trump's inauguration crowd was the biggest ever.
Hannity has been criticized as being overly favorable to the candidacy of Donald Trump, and granting Trump more airtime than other presidential candidates during the 2016 primaries. Hannity, for instance, let Trump promote the false claim that Rafael Cruz, father of Trump's rival presidential candidate Ted Cruz, was involved in the John F. Kennedy assassination. He admitted to favoring Republican candidates, though without indicating a preference for Donald Trump over Ted Cruz. According to Dylan Byers of CNN, Hannity during interviews "frequently cites areas where he agrees with Trump, or where he thinks Trump was right about something, then asks him to expand on it", and "often ignores or defends Trump from criticism".
Tensions between Cruz and Hannity appeared to reach a boiling point during a contentious April 2016 radio interview, during which Cruz implied Hannity was a "hardcore Donald Trump supporter" and Hannity responded by accusing Cruz of "throw[ing] this in my face" every time he asked a "legitimate question". Jim Rutenberg commented in August 2016 that Hannity is "not only Mr. Trump's biggest media booster; he also veers into the role of adviser," citing sources who said Hannity spent months offering suggestions to Trump and his campaign on strategy and messaging. Hannity responded to the report by saying, "I'm not hiding the fact that I want Donald Trump to be the next President of the United States.... I never claimed to be a journalist." (In an article published in December 2017, Hannity said "I'm a journalist. But I'm an advocacy journalist, or an opinion journalist.") Hannity has feuded with several conservatives who oppose Trump, including National Reviews Jonah Goldberg, Wall Street Journal foreign affairs columnist Bret Stephens, and National Review editor Rich Lowry.
Conspiracy theories about Hillary Clinton
During the 2016 presidential election, Hannity periodically promoted conspiracy theories regarding Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party. Hannity repeatedly claimed that Clinton had very serious medical problems and that the media was covering them up. He misrepresented photos of Clinton to give the impression that she had secret medical problems. He shared a photo from the fringe news site Gateway Pundit and falsely claimed that it showed her Secret Service agent holding a diazepam pen intended to treat seizures, when he in fact was holding a small flashlight. He booked doctors on his show to discuss Clinton's health; although these people had never personally examined Clinton, they made alarmist statements about her state of health which turned out to be false. At one point, Hannity promoted an unsubstantiated report that Clinton had been drunk at a rally; at another point, he suggested that Clinton was drunk and that her campaign needed to "sober her up".
Murder of Seth Rich conspiracy theories
In May 2017, Hannity became a prominent promoter of the conspiracy theory that Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party had a DNC staffer killed. Shortly afterward, he faced backlash from both left- and right-wing sources and lost several advertisers, including Crowne Plaza Hotels, Cars.com, Leesa Mattress, USAA, Peloton and Casper Sleep deciding to pull their marketing from his program on Fox News. However, USAA decided to return to the show shortly after following a negative outcry against its decision to pull out. Conservative magazine National Review compared the story to a flat earth video, called it a "disgrace" that Hannity and other conspiracy theorists were hyping the story, and called for them to stop.
In March 2018, Seth Rich's parents filed a lawsuit against Fox News for pushing conspiracy theories about their son's death. The suit alleges that the network "intentionally exploited" the tragedy for political purposes. On Oct. 12, 2020, Fox News agreed to pay millions of dollars to the Rich family.
Claims about election fraud
Hannity came under criticism during the 2016 presidential election for false claims about election rigging during interviews. Hannity responded to this by citing Mitt Romney's failure in the 2012 United States presidential election to obtain any votes in 59 of 1,687 Philadelphia voting districts as proof of election rigging. However, Factcheck.org and PolitiFact found that it was not unusual at all for this to occur, as those electoral districts are heavily African-American. Philadelphia elections inspector Ryan Godfrey also refuted Hannity's claim.
After the 2020 election, Hannity amplified false claims of election fraud, including by hosting former Trump lawyer Sidney Powell on his Fox News show, where Powell made unsubstantiated allegations on the topic. Republican efforts to overturn the 2020 election results and install Donald Trump for a second term culminated in the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. In 2022, the U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack is investigating what Hannity may have known in advance. The committee discovered that, on December 31, 2020, Hannity texted White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, saying, "I do NOT see January 6 happening the way he [Trump] is being told." In December of 2020, a month after the election, Hannity called for Trump’s false claims of voter fraud to be investigated by a special prosecutor, despite there still being no credible evidence of them by the accusers. As of February of 2022, no credible evidence has been provided of these false claims that Hannity amplified.
WikiLeaks
In 2010, Hannity said WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was waging a "war" on the United States, and that Wikileaks put American lives in "jeopardy" and "danger" around the world. He also criticized the Obama administration for failing to apprehend Assange. In 2016, after Wikileaks published leaked emails from the Democratic National Committee, Hannity praised Assange for showing "how corrupt, dishonest and phony our government is". He told Assange in a September 2016 interview, "I do hope you get free one day. I wish you the best." The following month, Hannity claimed that WikiLeaks has revealed "everything that conspiracy theorists have said over the years" about Hillary Clinton is true.
In February 2017, Hannity retweeted a WikiLeaks tweet linking to an article by the conspiracy website Gateway Pundit, claiming that John McCain was a "globalist war criminal". McCain's spokeswoman called Hannity out on it, asking him to "correct the record". Hannity later deleted the tweet. In May 2017, Hannity made an offer to Assange to guest host his Fox News TV show.
Relationship with Donald Trump and Michael Cohen
Hannity developed a close relationship with Trump during the election and has become even closer during his presidency. The two men speak on the phone multiple times a week, discussing Hannity's weekday show, the special counsel investigation, even evaluating White House staff. Hannity shares, The Economist asserts, "Mr. Trump's love of conspiracy theories and hatred of snooty elites". They speak so often that one Trump adviser has said Hannity "basically has a desk in the place". On the air, Hannity echoes Trump's attacks on the media and Special Counsel investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. Trump sometimes quotes Hannity to others or promotes the show to his Twitter followers. Hannity has encouraged Trump to shut down the government to get funding for a border wall, as well as his declaration of a national emergency over the US–Mexico border.
According to reports by the Los Angeles Times and New York magazine, Hannity frequently talks to Trump by telephone after Hannity's weekday broadcasts, and Hannity is one of several dozen cleared callers whose calls to the White House public switchboard can be connected directly to the president.
Hannity stirred controversy in April 2018 when it was revealed that he shared a lawyer, Michael Cohen, with Trump. In a breach of journalistic ethics, Hannity had failed to disclose that Cohen was his lawyer while at the same time taking to the Fox airwaves to defend Cohen and criticize those who investigated him.
On April 9, 2018, federal agents from the U.S. Attorney's office served a search warrant on the office and residence of Michael Cohen, Trump's personal attorney. On the air, Hannity defended Cohen and criticized the federal action, calling it "highly questionable" and "an unprecedented abuse of power". On April 16, 2018, in a court hearing, Cohen's lawyers told the judge that Cohen had ten clients in 2017–2018 but did "traditional legal tasks" for only three: Trump, Elliott Broidy, and a "prominent person" who did not wish to be named for fear of being "embarrassed". The federal judge ordered the revelation of the third client, whom Cohen's lawyers named as Hannity. Although Hannity has covered Cohen on his show, he did not disclose that he had consulted with Cohen.
Fox News released a statement on April 16, 2018, attributed to Hannity: "Michael Cohen has never represented me in any matter. I never retained him, received an invoice, or paid legal fees. I have occasionally had brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective. I assumed those conversations were confidential, but to be absolutely clear they never involved any matter between me and a third party." Also, NBC News quoted Hannity as saying: "We definitely had attorney–client privilege because I asked him for that," while Hannity said on his radio show that he "might have handed him ten bucks" for the attorney-client privilege. Lastly, Hannity tweeted that his discussions with Cohen were "almost exclusively" about real estate.
The following day, news reports revealed that Hannity had shared another lawyer with Trump, Jay Sekulow. Sekulow had written a cease-and-desist letter to KFAQ on Hannity's behalf in May 2017, and later represented Trump in connection with the Mueller investigation.
In August 2018, Hannity allowed Sekulow and Rudy Giuliani, another personal lawyer for Trump, to host Hannity's radio show; the duo proceeded to defend Trump and promote arguments made by the Trump administration.
According to The New Yorker, Hannity has reversed on the issue of negotiations with North Korea: during Obama's presidency, Hannity called negotiations with North Korea "disturbing", whereas he called Trump's negotiations with North Korea a "huge foreign-policy win".
In June 2019, Hannity expressed outrage at Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's comment that she would like to see Trump "in prison". Hannity declared: "Based on no actual crimes, she wants a political opponent locked up in prison? That happens in banana republicsbeyond despicable behavior." Aaron Rupar of Vox criticized Hannity for "obvious hypocrisy", noting that Hannity himself had said in January 2018 regarding Hillary Clinton: "I think Hillary should be in jail. Lock her up." Aaron Blake of The Washington Post described Hannity's comment as "a pretty obvious bit of gaslighting", noting Hannity's loyalty to Trump, whose campaign rallies have featured chants of "Lock her up", and also Hannity's comments that Trump was free to investigate Clinton.
Hannity played the most important role in persuading Trump to pardon the convicted murderer and war criminal Clint Lorance.
Criticism of FBI, DOJ, and special counsel
During President Trump's administration, Hannity has repeatedly been highly critical of the FBI, DOJ, Special Counsel Robert Mueller, and others investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election. According to a review by Media Matters of all transcripts from the 254 episodes of Hannity's show from Mueller's appointment (May 17, 2017) to May 16, 2018, Hannity had 487 segments substantially devoted to Mueller (approximately two per episode), opened his program with Mueller 152 times (approximately three times per week), and the content of his show was highly critical of the probe and the media's coverage of the probe. He has called the Russia inquiry a "witch hunt", an "utter disgrace", and "a direct threat to you, the American people, and our American republic". Hannity has expressed skepticism of the U.S. intelligence community's view that Russia hacked the Democratic National Convention's emails during the 2016 election and has promoted various conspiracy theories. In March 2017 he publicized a theory, first proposed at the Wikileaks Twitter account, that the CIA could have done the hacking while making it look like Russia did it. In August he suggested that Seth Rich may have been the leaker.
Hannity has described the Mueller investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, as well as James Comey's tenure as FBI Director, as "one giant incestuous circle of corruption". In April 2018, Hannity ran a segment where he claimed there were "criminal" connections between Bill and Hillary Clinton, Mueller, and Comey. Hannity asserted that there were three connected "Deep State crime families" actively "trying to take down the president". A guest on the segment, attorney Joseph diGenova, called Mueller's team "legal terrorists" and referred to Comey as a "dirty cop".
Hannity also claimed that Mueller had been involved in the corrupt dealings of several FBI agents in connection with Boston, Massachusetts crime boss Whitey Bulger. The federal judge who presided over a lawsuit concerning the corrupt dealings said Hannity's claims were unsubstantiated and that Mueller was never accused of any wrongdoing nor even mentioned during the proceedings.
In June 2018, after reports that Mueller's probe had asked witnesses to turn their personal phones over to investigators for examination, Hannity sarcastically suggested on air to the witnesses that they "follow Hillary Clinton's lead" and destroy their personal phones so they cannot be examined.
In May 2019, after Mueller gave a statement saying the Special Counsel investigation did not exonerate Trump of crimes, Hannity said Mueller was "basically full of crap" and did not know the law.
Uranium One
From 2015 into 2018, Fox News broadcast extensive coverage of an alleged scandal surrounding the sale of Uranium One to Russian interests, which Hannity characterized as "one of the biggest scandals in American history". The Fox News coverage extended throughout the programming day, with particular emphasis by Hannity. The network promoted a narrative asserting that, as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton personally approved the Uranium One sale in exchange for $145million in bribes paid to the Clinton Foundation. Donald Trump repeated these allegations as a candidate and as president. No evidence of wrongdoing by Clinton had been found after three years of allegations, an FBI investigation, and the 2017 appointment of a Federal attorney to evaluate the investigation. In November 2017, Fox News host Shepard Smith concisely debunked the alleged scandal, including saying that Clinton did not personally approve the sale, infuriating viewers who suggested he should work for CNN or MSNBC. Hannity later called Smith "clueless", while Smith stated, "I get it, that some of our opinion programming is there strictly to be entertaining. I get that. I don't work there. I wouldn't work there."
A two-year Justice Department investigation initiated after Trump became president found no evidence to justify pursuing a criminal investigation.
Deep state
Hannity has advocated the QAnon and "deep state" conspiracy theories. The latter proposes a government officials network is working to hinder the Trump administration. He has described the deep state as a "Shadow Government" and "Deep state swamp of Obama holdovers and DC lifers". In March 2017, he called for a "purge" of Obama-era bureaucrats and appointees in government. In an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, conservative columnist Bret Stephens disputed Hannity's deep state allegations, saying they were an example of the "paranoid style in politics". Later that month, Hannity said NBC News was part of the deep state. In May 2017, he reiterated that deep state/intelligence operatives were trying to destroy the Trump presidency.
In March 2018, Hannity attacked Special Counsel Robert Mueller, saying his career was "anything but impeccable". Hannity said Mueller was friends with former FBI Director James Comey and former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, and that he "cannot be expected to honestly investigate scandals that his friends are directly involved in". He said these individuals were involved in "one massive, huge, deep-state conflict of interest after another. Now they're protecting themselves. They're trying to preserve their own power." Mueller and Comey are professional acquaintances but not known to be friends, while Trump attorney general Bill Barr said in 2019 that he and Mueller had been friends for thirty years.
Comments on sexual harassment
In 2016, Hannity vociferously defended Roger Ailes when he was accused by multiple women of sexual harassment. In May 2017, Hannity paid a tribute to Ailes after he died. Hannity called him "a second father" and said to Ailes' "enemies" that he was "preparing to kick your in the next life".
In April 2017, Hannity came to the defense of Fox News co-president Bill Shine after it was reported that Shine's job was at risk. At least four lawsuits alleged that Shine had ignored, enabled or concealed Ailes' alleged sexual harassment.
In September 2017, several months after Bill O'Reilly was fired from Fox News in the wake of a number of women's alleging that he had sexually harassed them, Hannity hosted O'Reilly on his show. Some Fox News employees criticized the decision. In the interview, O'Reilly attacked liberal media watchdog groups and said he should have fought harder when those groups targeted his advertisers. According to CNN, during the interview, Hannity found kinship with O'Reilly as he appeared "to feel that he and O'Reilly have both become victims of liberals looking to silence them".
Hannity came under criticism in October 2017 when he attacked Democrats after it became known that a large number of women had accused Harvey Weinstein, the Hollywood producer and donor to Democratic causes, of sexual harassment. Critics noted that Hannity had weeks earlier defended and hosted his coworker Bill O'Reilly who was fired following a number of sexual harassment allegations.
LGBT rights
In the radio show for KCSB, which was the subject of controversy in 1989, Hannity made anti-gay comments. He called AIDS a "gay disease" and said the media was hiding salient information from the public. Two editions featured anti-gay activist Gene Antonio, a Lutheran minister, discussing his book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS. In the book, Antonio claims that AIDS can be spread by people sneezing in close proximity to each other. Hannity encouraged Antonio when he said that AIDS spread when gay men consumed each other's feces, said that homosexuality was a "lower form of behavior", compared homosexual sex to "playing in a sewer" and gay people of being "filled with hatred and bigotry". When a lesbian, another broadcaster at the station, called into the show, Hannity said "I feel sorry for your child." Hannity was quoted at the time as having said "anyone listening to this show that believes homosexuality is a normal lifestyle has been brainwashed." The ACLU opposed his firing and petitioned the station to reverse their decision. Hannity demanded a formal apology and double the airtime. While the station did offer to allow Hannity to return, they would not meet Hannity's additional demands and he declined to return.
In 2017, Hannity said he regretted the comments and that they were "ignorant and embarrassing".
Immigration
Hannity opposed amnesty for undocumented immigrants; however, in 2012 he said he had evolved on the issue and favored a "pathway to citizenship". Later, he opposed that idea. By 2018, he was described as an immigration hardliner by CNN, The Washington Post, and New York magazine. In August 2018, Trump suggested that he might shut down the government to force Congress to fund his border wall, boasting that Hannity agreed with the action.
Islam
Hannity has warned of sharia law coming to the United States. Hannity opposed the building of Park51, a mosque two blocks from the World Trade Center site.
Hannity promoted the idea of "Islamic training camps right here in America", which were based on an unsubstantiated "documentary" by the Christian Action Network.
In 2006, Hannity was critical of Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to U.S. Congress, being sworn into office with an oath on a Quran. Hannity equated the Quran with Mein Kampf, asking a guest on his show whether he would have allowed Ellison "to choose, you know, Hitler's Mein Kampf, which is the Nazi bible?"
Torture
In 2009, Hannity said he supported enhanced interrogation, a euphemism for torture. He also volunteered to be waterboarded for charity. In response, Keith Olbermann pledged to donate $1,000 for every second of waterboarding Hannity underwent. In 2017, Hannity continued to advocate for waterboarding, raising the example of using it against a kidnapper. According to Media Matters, Hannity has not been waterboarded as of March 2018.
Climate change
Hannity rejects the scientific consensus on climate change. In 2001, he described it as "phony science from the left". In 2004, he falsely claimed that scientists couldn't agree on whether global warming was "scientific fact or fiction". In 2010, Hannity falsely stated that so-called "Climategate"the leaking of e-mails written by climate scientists that, according to climate change deniers, demonstrated scientific misconduct, but which all subsequent inquiries found to show no evidence of misconduct or wrongdoingwas a scandal that "exposed global warming as a myth cooked up by alarmists". Hannity frequently invites critics of climate science onto his shows.
Death panels
Hannity promoted the falsehood that the Affordable Care Act would create so-called "death panels". According to a study by Dartmouth College political scientist Brendan Nyhan, Hannity's show, along with the Laura Ingraham Show, were the first major conservative media personalities to latch onto the false claim of Betsy McCaughey, a former lieutenant governor of New York, that the Affordable Care Act contained death panels. When Sarah Palin stirred controversy by promoting the death panels myth, and argued her case in a Facebook post, Hannity defended her and said, "I agree with everything that she wrote." Hannity also claimed that he found the specific pages in the Affordable Care Act containing provisions on death panels.
A 2016 study found that Hannity promoted a number of falsehoods about the Affordable Care Act. For instance, Hannity falsely alleged several times that Democratic Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus had said Social Security could be "insolvent in two years" due to the Affordable Care Act. According to the study, Hannity, unlike other Fox News hosts such as Bill O'Reilly and Greta Van Susteren, "took a more direct approach, aggressively supporting Republicans and conservatives and attacking Democrats and liberals, endorsing the more spurious claims long after they were proven incorrect, and putting advocacy above accurate reporting, to further the network's themes opposing reform".
Jake Tapper
In November 2017, Fox News distorted a statement by Jake Tapper to make it appear as if he had said "Allahu Akbar" can be used under the most "beautiful circumstances" in the immediate aftermath of the 2017 New York City truck attack wherein a terrorist shouted "Allahu Akbar". Fox News omitted that Tapper had said the use of "Allahu Akbar" in the terrorist attack was not one of these circumstances. A headline on FoxNews.com was preceded by a tag reading "OUTRAGEOUS". The Fox News Twitter account distorted the statement even more, saying "Jake Tapper Says 'Allahu Akbar' Is 'Beautiful' Right After NYC Terror Attack" in a tweet that was later deleted.
Even after the Fox News Twitter account had deleted the tweet on Tapper's out-of-context comments, Hannity repeated the out-of-context comments to his viewers, calling Tapper "liberal fake news CNN's fake Jake Tapper" and mocking his ratings.
Appearance at November 2018 Trump rally
On November 4, 2018, Trump's website, DonaldJTrump.com, announced in a press release that Hannity would make a "special guest appearance" with Trump at a midterm campaign rally the following night in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. The following morning, Hannity tweeted "To be clear, I will not be on stage campaigning with the President." Hannity nevertheless spoke at Trump's lectern on stage at the rally, immediately mocking the "fake news" at the back of the auditorium, Fox News reporters among them. Several Fox News employees expressed outrage at Hannity's actions, with one stating, "a new line was crossed". Hannity later asserted that his action was not pre-planned, and Fox News stated it "does not condone any talent participating in campaign events". Fox News host Jeanine Pirro also appeared on stage with Trump at the rally. The Trump press release was later removed from Trump's website.
Foreign policy
In 2009, Hannity said of the Iraq War, "we were victorious in spite of the Democrats' efforts and attempts at preventing victory." During the 2016 election, Hannity vouched for Trump's claimed opposition to the Iraq War, "Mr. Trump and I disagreed about the Iraq war; I was for it and he was against it."
In June 2019, Hannity called on Trump to "bomb the hell of out Iran" after Iran shot down a U.S. drone. After the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, Hannity opened his show by saying, "tonight the world is safer as one of the most ruthless, evil war criminals on Earth has been brought to justice."
Ukraine
In February 2020, The Daily Beast acquired a leaked document entitled "Ukraine, Disinformation, & the Trump Administration" produced by a Fox News research team. The document warned of "disinformation" being pushed by frequent Hannity guests, including Rudy Giuliani, John Solomon, Victoria Toensing and Joe diGenova. Among other criticisms, the analysis noted that on his show Hannity discussed with Toensing and diGenova an affidavit from former Ukrainian prosecutor general Viktor Shokin that accused Joe Biden of getting him fired to end an investigation into Burisma Holdings, which employed Biden's son Hunter. The affidavit was drafted at the request of attorneys for Ukrainian oligarch Dmitry Firtash, but neither Hannity nor his guests disclosed to viewers that Toensing and diGenova were among Firtash's attorneys.
COVID-19 pandemic
In February 2020, amid the spread of COVID-19 to the United States, Hannity said "many on the left are now all rooting for corona to wreak havoc in the United States. Why? To score cheap, repulsive political points." In March 2020, he characterized the virus as a "hoax", and said it "may be true" that the outbreak was a "fraud" perpetrated by the "deep state". Later in March, as the disease spread into a global pandemic and Trump declared it a national emergency, Hannity started to take the virus more seriously, denying that he had referred to it as a hoax less than a month earlier. In July 2021, on live television, Hannity encouraged the audience to consider vaccination.
Personal life
Family and lifestyle
Hannity met Jill Rhodes in 1991 when he worked at WVNN in Huntsville, Alabama and she was a political columnist for the Huntsville Times. The two married in 1993. In June 2020, the couple announced that they had divorced the previous year but had separated years prior.
Hannity has since dated Fox News colleague Ainsley Earhardt. In August 2019, Hannity and Earhardt arrived together as guests for a wedding at Trump National Golf Course in Colt's Neck, New Jersey. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she has been hosting her Fox & Friends program from a remote studio in the basement of Hannity's Long Island mansion.
Hannity has two children from his marriage to Rhodes: a son, Patrick, born in 1998, and daughter, Merri, born in 2001. Both children graduated from Cold Spring Harbor High School. Patrick attended Wake Forest University where he played tennis. Merri attends The University of Michigan where she also plays tennis. In high school, Merri was the fourth highest ranked tennis player in New York State.
In 2018, Forbes estimated that Hannity's annual income was $36million, and the Guardian reported that he was believed to be the "hidden owner" of about $90 million in property that had been purchased by shell companies. In April 2021, he purchased a $5.3 million house several miles from Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago residence.
In 2014 he said he has carried a weapon "more than half my adult life". According to Hannity, he has a brown belt in martial arts and trains four days a week in the sport.
Religion
Hannity left the Catholic Church in 2019, citing "too much institutionalized corruption". However, he has said that as he has aged, his Christian faith has "gotten stronger" and that he needs and wants God in his life.
Bibliography
Hannity, Sean (2002). Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2004). Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2010). Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, New York: Harper Paperbacks, .
Hannity, Sean (2020). Live Free or Die: America (and the World) On the Brink, New York: Simon & Schuster, .
See also
Fox News controversies
New Yorkers in journalism
References
External links
1961 births
Living people
21st-century American male writers
21st-century American non-fiction writers
Adelphi University alumni
American broadcast news analysts
American conservative talk radio hosts
American male non-fiction writers
American people of Irish descent
American political commentators
American political writers
Christians from New York (state)
Conservative Party of New York State politicians
Former Roman Catholics
Fox News people
Male critics of feminism
New York (state) Independents
New York (state) Republicans
New York University alumni
People from Centre Island, New York
People from Franklin Square, New York
Radio personalities from New York City
Right-wing populism in the United States
University of California, Santa Barbara alumni
Writers from New York City | false | [
"Do You Know What I'm Going To Do Next Saturday? is a 1963 children's book published by Beginner Books and written by Helen Palmer Geisel, the first wife of Theodor Seuss Geisel (Dr. Seuss). Unlike most of the Beginner Books, Do You Know What I'm Going To Do Next Saturday? did not follow the format of text with inline drawings, being illustrated with black-and-white photographs by Lynn Fayman, featuring a boy named Rawli Davis. It is sometimes misattributed to Dr. Seuss himself. The book's cover features a photograph of a young boy sitting at a breakfast table with a huge pile of pancakes.\n\nActivities mentioned in the book include bowling, water skiing, marching, boxing, and shooting guns with the United States Marines, and eating more spaghetti \"than anyone else has eaten before.\n\nHelen Palmer's photograph-based children's books did not prove to be as popular as the more traditional text-and-illustrations format; however, Do You Know What I'm Going To Do Next Saturday received positive reviews and was listed by The New York Times as one of the best children's books of 1963. The book is currently out of print.\n\nReferences\n\n1963 children's books\nAmerican picture books",
"Daniel S. Burt is an American author and literary critic.\n\nCareer\n\nDaniel S. Burt, Ph.D. received his doctorate in English and American Literature with a specialization in Victorian fiction from New York University. He taught undergraduate- and graduate-level courses in writing and literature at New York University, Wesleyan University, Trinity College, Northeastern University, Wentworth Institute of Technology, and Cape Cod Community College. At Wentworth Institute of Technology, he served as a dean for almost a decade. During his time at New York University, he was director of the NYU in London program, wherein he traveled with students to Russia, Spain, Britain and Ireland. \n\nSince 2003, Burt has served as the Academic Director for the Irish Academic Enrichment Workshops, which are held in Ireland every summer.\n\nBibliography\n\nThe Literary 100: A Ranking Of The Most Influential Novelists, Playwrights, And Poets Of All Time. Checkmark Books. October 1, 1999.\nThe Biography Book: A Reader's Guide To Nonfiction, Fictional, And Film Biographies Of More Than 500 Of The Most Fascinating Individuals Of All Time. Oryx Press. February 1, 2001.\nThe Novel 100: A Ranking Of The Greatest Novels Of All Time. Checkmark Books. November 1, 2003.\nThe Chronology of American Literature: America's Literary Achievements from the Colonial Era to Modern Times. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. February 10, 2004.\nThe Drama 100: A Ranking of the Greatest Plays of All Time. Checkmark Books. December 1, 2007.\nThe Handy Literature Answer Book: An Engaging Guide to Unraveling Symbols, Signs and Meanings in Great Works with Deborah G. Felder. Visible Ink Press. July 1, 2018.\n\nWhat Do I Read Next? Series \n\n What Historical Novel Do I Read Next? Gale Cengage.1997.\nWhat Do I Read Next? 2000, Volume 1 with Neil Barron. Gale Cengage. June 1, 2000.\nWhat Fantastic Fiction Do I Read Next? 2001, Volume 1 with Neil Barron and Tom Barton. Gale Cengage. June 1, 2001. \nWhat Do I Read Next? 2003, Volume 2 with Neil Barron and Tom Barton. Gale Cengage. October 17, 20013.\nWhat Do I Read Next? 2005, Volume 1 with Neil Barron and Tom Barton. Thomson Gale. May 27, 2005.\nWhat Do I Read Next? 2005, Volume 2 with Neil Barron. Gale. October 21, 2005. \nWhat Do I Read Next? 2006, Volume 1 with Neil Barron and Tom Barton. Thomson Gale. May 25, 2006.\n What Do I Read Next? 2007, Volume 1 with Natalie Danford and Don D'Ammassa. Gale Cengage. June 8, 2007.\nWhat Do I Read Next? 2007, Volume 2: A Reader's Guide to Current Genre Fiction with Don D'Ammassa, Natalie Danford, Stefan R. Dziemianowicz, Jim Huang, and Melissa Hudak. Gale Cengage. October 19, 2007. \nWhat Do I Read Next? 2008, Volume 1 with Natalie Danford and Don D'Ammassa. Gale. May 23, 2008. \n What Do I Read Next? 2009. Volume 1 with Michelle Kazensky, Marie Toft, and Hazel Rumney. Gale Cengage. June 12, 2009.\nWhat Do I Read Next? 2010, Volume 1 with Neil Barron. Gale. 2010.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \nBibliography on GoodReads\n\nYear of birth missing (living people)\nLiving people\nAmerican male non-fiction writers\nAmerican literary critics\nNew York University alumni\nWesleyan University faculty"
]
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"Hannity hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor.",
"how did it go",
"The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, \"I wasn't good at it. I was terrible.\"",
"what did others have to say",
"Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year.",
"what did he do next",
"After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications presenting himself as \"the most talked about college radio host in America.\""
]
| C_d5d7c3407dd148389b1d80a63090fca4_1 | what did that get him | 5 | What did the ad that Hannity placed after leaving KCSB in radio publications presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America" get him? | Sean Hannity | Hannity hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible." Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year. This was after two shows featuring the book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS by Gene Antonio; among other remarks made during the broadcast, Hannity told a lesbian caller, "I feel sorry for your child." The university board that governed the station later reversed its decision due to a campaign conducted on Hannity's behalf by the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, which argued that the station had discriminated against Hannity's First Amendment rights. When the station refused to give him a public apology and more airtime, Hannity decided against returning to KCSB. After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America." Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996, Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes. Later that year, Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity was on WABC's afternoon time slot from January 1998 until the end of 2013. Since January 2014, Hannity has hosted the 3-6 p.m. time slot on WOR in New York City. In their 2007 book Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America, conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group." CANNOTANSWER | Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. | Sean Patrick Hannity (born December 30, 1961) is an American talk show host and conservative political commentator. He is the host of The Sean Hannity Show, a nationally syndicated talk radio show, and has also hosted a commentary program, Hannity, on Fox News, since 2009.
Hannity worked as a general contractor and volunteered as a talk show host at UC Santa Barbara in 1989. He later joined WVNN in Athens, Alabama and shortly afterward, WGST in Atlanta. After leaving WGST, he worked at WABC in New York until 2013. Since 2014, Hannity has worked at WOR.
In 1996, Hannity and Alan Colmes co-hosted Hannity & Colmes on Fox. After Colmes announced his departure in January 2008, Hannity merged the Hannity & Colmes show into Hannity.
Hannity has received several awards and honors, including an honorary degree from Liberty University. He has written three New York Times best-selling books: Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism; Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism; and Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, and released a fourth, Live Free or Die, in 2020.
Hannity has sometimes promoted conspiracy theories, such as "birtherism" (claims that then-President Barack Obama was not a legitimate U.S. citizen), claims regarding the murder of Seth Rich, and falsehoods about Hillary Clinton's health. Hannity was an early supporter of Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election. Hannity often acted as an unofficial spokesman for the president, criticizing the media and attacking Robert Mueller's inquiry into Russian interference in Trump's election. He reportedly spoke to Trump on the phone most weeknights. He spoke at the president's lectern during a Trump rally, and White House advisors characterized him as the "shadow" chief of staff. According to Forbes, by 2018 Hannity had become one of the most-watched hosts in cable news and most-listened-to hosts in talk radio, due in part to his closeness and access to Trump.
Early life and education
Hannity was born in New York City, New York, the son of Lillian (née Flynn) and Hugh Hannity. Lillian worked as a stenographer and a corrections officer at a county jail, while Hugh was a World War II veteran and family-court officer. He was the youngest of four siblings and the only boy. All his grandparents immigrated to the United States from Ireland. He grew up in Franklin Square, New York on Long Island.
In his youth, Hannity worked as a paperboy delivering issues of the New York Daily News and the Long Island Daily Press. His parents were initially supporters of President John F. Kennedy, eventually growing more Republican in their views as time went on, though they resisted being overtly political at home.
Hannity attended Sacred Heart Seminary in Hempstead, New York and St. Pius X Preparatory Seminary in Uniondale, New York. He attended New York University and Adelphi University, but did not graduate from either.
Career
In 1982, Hannity started a house-painting business and a few years later, worked as a building contractor in Santa Barbara, California. He hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible."
Radio
Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year after a controversy. During two shows, gay and lesbian rights were discussed in what was considered to be a contentious manner. (See LGBT issues below.) The university board that governed the station later reversed its decision after a campaign conducted on Hannity's behalf by the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union argued that the station had discriminated against Hannity's First Amendment rights. When the station refused to issue Hannity a public apology and more airtime, he did not return to KCSB.
After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications, presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America". Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville media market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996, Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes.
Later that year, Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late-night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive-time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity was on WABC's afternoon time slot from January 1998.
In their 2007 book Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America, conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group". The WABC slot continued until the end of 2013. Since January 2014, Hannity has hosted the 3:00–6:00p.m. time slot on WOR in New York City.
Hannity's radio program is a conservative political talk show that features Hannity's opinions and ideology related to current issues and politicians. The Sean Hannity Show began national syndication on September 10, 2001, on more than five hundred stations nationwide. In 2004, Hannity signed a $25million five-year contract extension with ABC Radio (now Citadel Media) to continue the show until 2009. The program was made available via Armed Forces Radio Network in 2006. In June 2007, ABC Radio was sold to Citadel Communications and in the summer of 2008, Hannity was signed for a $100million five-year contract. As of March 2018, the program is heard by more than 13.5 million listeners a week. Hannity was ranked No.2 in Talkers Magazine's 2017 Heavy Hundred and was listed as No.72 on Forbes' "Celebrity 100" list in 2013.
In January 2007, Clear Channel Communications signed a groupwide three-year extension with Hannity on more than eighty stations. The largest stations in the group deal included KTRH Houston, KFYI Phoenix, WPGB Pittsburgh, WKRC Cincinnati, WOOD Grand Rapids, WFLA Tampa, WOAI San Antonio, WLAC Nashville, and WREC Memphis.
Hannity signed a long-term contract to remain with Premiere Networks in September 2013.
At the beginning of 2014, Hannity signed contracts to air on several Salem Communications stations including WDTK Detroit, WIND Chicago, WWRC (now WQOF) Washington, D.C., and KSKY Dallas.
Television
Hannity was a co-host of Hannity & Colmes, an American political "point-counterpoint"-style television program on the Fox News Channel featuring Hannity and Alan Colmes as co-hosts. Hannity presented the conservative point of view with Colmes providing the liberal viewpoint.
While Hannity's views are typically politically and socially conservative, he has spoken supportively about birth control, which has led to on-air clashes with pro-life guests such as Rev. Thomas Euteneuer, president of Human Life International. Hannity said if the Catholic Church were to excommunicate him over his support for contraception, he would join Jerry Falwell's Thomas Road Baptist Church.
In January 2007, Hannity began a new Sunday night television show on Fox News, Hannity's America.
In November 2008, Colmes announced his departure from Hannity & Colmes. After the show's final broadcast on January 9, 2009, Hannity took over the time slot with his own new show, Hannity, which has a format similar to Hannity's America.
Books
Hannity is the author of four books. Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism was published in 2002, and Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism was published in 2004 through ReganBooks. Both these books reached the nonfiction New York Times bestseller list, the second of which stayed there for five weeks. Hannity has said he is too busy to write many books, and dictated a lot of his own two books into a tape recorder while driving in to do his radio show.
Hannity wrote his third book, Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, which was released by HarperCollins in March 2010. The book became Hannity's third New York Times Bestseller.
In 2020, Hannity released his fourth book, Live Free or Die.
Let Freedom Ring:Winning the War of Liberty Over Liberalism, William Morrow, August 1, 2002, .
Deliver Us From Evil:Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, William Morrow, February 17, 2004, .
Conservative Victory:Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, HarperCollins, March 30, 2010, .
Live Free or Die:America (and the World) on the Brink, Threshold Editions, August 4, 2020, .
Freedom Concerts
From 2003 until 2010, Hannity hosted country music-themed "Freedom Concerts" to raise money for charity. In 2010, conservative blogger Debbie Schlussel wrote that only a small percentage of the money raised by the concerts goes to the target charity, Freedom Alliance. The Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) filed complaints with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), also in 2010. The FTC complaint alleges that Hannity was "falsely promoting that all concert proceeds would be donated to a scholarship fund for the children of those killed or wounded in war". The complaint filed with the IRS claims that Freedom Alliance has violated its 501(c)3 charity status. The concerts stopped around the same year.
Awards and honors
Hannity received a Marconi Award in 2003 and 2007 as the Network Syndicated Personality of the Year from the National Association of Broadcasters.
In 2009, Talkers Magazine listed Hannity as No.2 on their list of the 100 most important radio talk show hosts in America (with Rush Limbaugh listed as No.1). The same magazine gave Hannity its Freedom of Speech Award in 2003.
In 2005, Jerry Falwell, chancellor of the evangelical Liberty University, awarded Hannity an honorary degree.
Hannity was inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame in November 2017.
Other activities
Hannity has had cameo appearances in film and television, having a brief voiceover in The Siege as an unseen reporter, and appearing in Atlas Shrugged: Part II and the second season of House of Cards as himself. He executive produced and appeared in the 2017 film Let There Be Light, which also stars Kevin Sorbo.
As of April 2018, Hannity owned at least 877 residential properties, which were bought for nearly $89million. He purchased some of the homes with the help of loans from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and most are in working-class neighborhoods. His property managers have taken an aggressive management approach with a much higher than average eviction rate. The Washington Post reported that his property management team has used eviction proceedings both to remove tenants and to generate revenue. His property managers have claimed that Hannity has no active role in the management of the more than 1,000 properties he has a stake in.
Controversies and criticism
According to The Washington Post, Hannity "repeatedly embraces storylines that prove to be inaccurate" and takes positions that change over time. In the opinion of The New York Times, Hannity is "barreling headfirst into the murky territory between opinion and out-and-out conspiracy theorism". Hannity often promotes conspiracy theories without explicitly endorsing them, unlike Alex Jones. The New York Times wrote that this "has the effect of nourishing the more wild-eyed beliefs of his fans while providing Hannity a degree of plausible deniability". The New Yorker wrote in 2019 that Hannity had "[spewed] baseless conspiracy theories with impunity".
During the Bush years, Hannity "loyally supported the president's policies". During the Obama administration, Hannity "leaned more heavily on stories he believed were being given short shrift by the 'liberal media'stories about where Obama was born, and who deserved blame for the attack on the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya". In 2017, The Washington Post wrote that "what Hannity has stood forat least for the past couple of yearsis Trump."
Birtherism
Although Hannity said he believed President Obama was born in the U.S., to answer queries on Obama's citizenship, he repeatedly called on Obama to release his birth certificate. Hannity described the circumstances regarding Obama's birth certificate as "odd". Hannity also defended and promoted those who questioned Obama's citizenship of the U.S., such as Donald Trump. Hannity invited Trump to his show while Trump was a leader in the birther movement; during an interview with Hannity, Trump said Obama "could have easily have come from Kenya, or someplace". Hannity said in response, "The issue could go away in a minute. Just show the certificate." Even after Obama produced his birth certificate in 2008, certified by the state of Hawaii, Hannity kept calling on Obama to release his birth certificate, asking why did he not "just produce it and we move on?" In October 2016, Hannity offered to purchase a one-way ticket to Kenya for Obama.
2016 presidential campaign
Candidacy of Donald Trump
Hannity is known for his pro-Trump coverage. According to The Washington Post, "Hannity's comeback coincided with his early, eager embrace of his fellow New Yorker... Trump attacked the Gold Star father, and Hannity stood by him. Trump went after a federal judge of Mexican descent, and Hannity backed him. After the Access Hollywood tape emerged of Trump making lewd comments about inappropriate sexual behaviour towards women, Hannity continued to defend him: 'King David had 500 concubines, for crying out loud.'" After the inauguration, the first interview the new president gave to a cable news channel was conducted by Hannity. Hannity additionally defended the Trump administration's false claim that Trump's inauguration crowd was the biggest ever.
Hannity has been criticized as being overly favorable to the candidacy of Donald Trump, and granting Trump more airtime than other presidential candidates during the 2016 primaries. Hannity, for instance, let Trump promote the false claim that Rafael Cruz, father of Trump's rival presidential candidate Ted Cruz, was involved in the John F. Kennedy assassination. He admitted to favoring Republican candidates, though without indicating a preference for Donald Trump over Ted Cruz. According to Dylan Byers of CNN, Hannity during interviews "frequently cites areas where he agrees with Trump, or where he thinks Trump was right about something, then asks him to expand on it", and "often ignores or defends Trump from criticism".
Tensions between Cruz and Hannity appeared to reach a boiling point during a contentious April 2016 radio interview, during which Cruz implied Hannity was a "hardcore Donald Trump supporter" and Hannity responded by accusing Cruz of "throw[ing] this in my face" every time he asked a "legitimate question". Jim Rutenberg commented in August 2016 that Hannity is "not only Mr. Trump's biggest media booster; he also veers into the role of adviser," citing sources who said Hannity spent months offering suggestions to Trump and his campaign on strategy and messaging. Hannity responded to the report by saying, "I'm not hiding the fact that I want Donald Trump to be the next President of the United States.... I never claimed to be a journalist." (In an article published in December 2017, Hannity said "I'm a journalist. But I'm an advocacy journalist, or an opinion journalist.") Hannity has feuded with several conservatives who oppose Trump, including National Reviews Jonah Goldberg, Wall Street Journal foreign affairs columnist Bret Stephens, and National Review editor Rich Lowry.
Conspiracy theories about Hillary Clinton
During the 2016 presidential election, Hannity periodically promoted conspiracy theories regarding Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party. Hannity repeatedly claimed that Clinton had very serious medical problems and that the media was covering them up. He misrepresented photos of Clinton to give the impression that she had secret medical problems. He shared a photo from the fringe news site Gateway Pundit and falsely claimed that it showed her Secret Service agent holding a diazepam pen intended to treat seizures, when he in fact was holding a small flashlight. He booked doctors on his show to discuss Clinton's health; although these people had never personally examined Clinton, they made alarmist statements about her state of health which turned out to be false. At one point, Hannity promoted an unsubstantiated report that Clinton had been drunk at a rally; at another point, he suggested that Clinton was drunk and that her campaign needed to "sober her up".
Murder of Seth Rich conspiracy theories
In May 2017, Hannity became a prominent promoter of the conspiracy theory that Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party had a DNC staffer killed. Shortly afterward, he faced backlash from both left- and right-wing sources and lost several advertisers, including Crowne Plaza Hotels, Cars.com, Leesa Mattress, USAA, Peloton and Casper Sleep deciding to pull their marketing from his program on Fox News. However, USAA decided to return to the show shortly after following a negative outcry against its decision to pull out. Conservative magazine National Review compared the story to a flat earth video, called it a "disgrace" that Hannity and other conspiracy theorists were hyping the story, and called for them to stop.
In March 2018, Seth Rich's parents filed a lawsuit against Fox News for pushing conspiracy theories about their son's death. The suit alleges that the network "intentionally exploited" the tragedy for political purposes. On Oct. 12, 2020, Fox News agreed to pay millions of dollars to the Rich family.
Claims about election fraud
Hannity came under criticism during the 2016 presidential election for false claims about election rigging during interviews. Hannity responded to this by citing Mitt Romney's failure in the 2012 United States presidential election to obtain any votes in 59 of 1,687 Philadelphia voting districts as proof of election rigging. However, Factcheck.org and PolitiFact found that it was not unusual at all for this to occur, as those electoral districts are heavily African-American. Philadelphia elections inspector Ryan Godfrey also refuted Hannity's claim.
After the 2020 election, Hannity amplified false claims of election fraud, including by hosting former Trump lawyer Sidney Powell on his Fox News show, where Powell made unsubstantiated allegations on the topic. Republican efforts to overturn the 2020 election results and install Donald Trump for a second term culminated in the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. In 2022, the U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack is investigating what Hannity may have known in advance. The committee discovered that, on December 31, 2020, Hannity texted White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, saying, "I do NOT see January 6 happening the way he [Trump] is being told." In December of 2020, a month after the election, Hannity called for Trump’s false claims of voter fraud to be investigated by a special prosecutor, despite there still being no credible evidence of them by the accusers. As of February of 2022, no credible evidence has been provided of these false claims that Hannity amplified.
WikiLeaks
In 2010, Hannity said WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was waging a "war" on the United States, and that Wikileaks put American lives in "jeopardy" and "danger" around the world. He also criticized the Obama administration for failing to apprehend Assange. In 2016, after Wikileaks published leaked emails from the Democratic National Committee, Hannity praised Assange for showing "how corrupt, dishonest and phony our government is". He told Assange in a September 2016 interview, "I do hope you get free one day. I wish you the best." The following month, Hannity claimed that WikiLeaks has revealed "everything that conspiracy theorists have said over the years" about Hillary Clinton is true.
In February 2017, Hannity retweeted a WikiLeaks tweet linking to an article by the conspiracy website Gateway Pundit, claiming that John McCain was a "globalist war criminal". McCain's spokeswoman called Hannity out on it, asking him to "correct the record". Hannity later deleted the tweet. In May 2017, Hannity made an offer to Assange to guest host his Fox News TV show.
Relationship with Donald Trump and Michael Cohen
Hannity developed a close relationship with Trump during the election and has become even closer during his presidency. The two men speak on the phone multiple times a week, discussing Hannity's weekday show, the special counsel investigation, even evaluating White House staff. Hannity shares, The Economist asserts, "Mr. Trump's love of conspiracy theories and hatred of snooty elites". They speak so often that one Trump adviser has said Hannity "basically has a desk in the place". On the air, Hannity echoes Trump's attacks on the media and Special Counsel investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. Trump sometimes quotes Hannity to others or promotes the show to his Twitter followers. Hannity has encouraged Trump to shut down the government to get funding for a border wall, as well as his declaration of a national emergency over the US–Mexico border.
According to reports by the Los Angeles Times and New York magazine, Hannity frequently talks to Trump by telephone after Hannity's weekday broadcasts, and Hannity is one of several dozen cleared callers whose calls to the White House public switchboard can be connected directly to the president.
Hannity stirred controversy in April 2018 when it was revealed that he shared a lawyer, Michael Cohen, with Trump. In a breach of journalistic ethics, Hannity had failed to disclose that Cohen was his lawyer while at the same time taking to the Fox airwaves to defend Cohen and criticize those who investigated him.
On April 9, 2018, federal agents from the U.S. Attorney's office served a search warrant on the office and residence of Michael Cohen, Trump's personal attorney. On the air, Hannity defended Cohen and criticized the federal action, calling it "highly questionable" and "an unprecedented abuse of power". On April 16, 2018, in a court hearing, Cohen's lawyers told the judge that Cohen had ten clients in 2017–2018 but did "traditional legal tasks" for only three: Trump, Elliott Broidy, and a "prominent person" who did not wish to be named for fear of being "embarrassed". The federal judge ordered the revelation of the third client, whom Cohen's lawyers named as Hannity. Although Hannity has covered Cohen on his show, he did not disclose that he had consulted with Cohen.
Fox News released a statement on April 16, 2018, attributed to Hannity: "Michael Cohen has never represented me in any matter. I never retained him, received an invoice, or paid legal fees. I have occasionally had brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective. I assumed those conversations were confidential, but to be absolutely clear they never involved any matter between me and a third party." Also, NBC News quoted Hannity as saying: "We definitely had attorney–client privilege because I asked him for that," while Hannity said on his radio show that he "might have handed him ten bucks" for the attorney-client privilege. Lastly, Hannity tweeted that his discussions with Cohen were "almost exclusively" about real estate.
The following day, news reports revealed that Hannity had shared another lawyer with Trump, Jay Sekulow. Sekulow had written a cease-and-desist letter to KFAQ on Hannity's behalf in May 2017, and later represented Trump in connection with the Mueller investigation.
In August 2018, Hannity allowed Sekulow and Rudy Giuliani, another personal lawyer for Trump, to host Hannity's radio show; the duo proceeded to defend Trump and promote arguments made by the Trump administration.
According to The New Yorker, Hannity has reversed on the issue of negotiations with North Korea: during Obama's presidency, Hannity called negotiations with North Korea "disturbing", whereas he called Trump's negotiations with North Korea a "huge foreign-policy win".
In June 2019, Hannity expressed outrage at Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's comment that she would like to see Trump "in prison". Hannity declared: "Based on no actual crimes, she wants a political opponent locked up in prison? That happens in banana republicsbeyond despicable behavior." Aaron Rupar of Vox criticized Hannity for "obvious hypocrisy", noting that Hannity himself had said in January 2018 regarding Hillary Clinton: "I think Hillary should be in jail. Lock her up." Aaron Blake of The Washington Post described Hannity's comment as "a pretty obvious bit of gaslighting", noting Hannity's loyalty to Trump, whose campaign rallies have featured chants of "Lock her up", and also Hannity's comments that Trump was free to investigate Clinton.
Hannity played the most important role in persuading Trump to pardon the convicted murderer and war criminal Clint Lorance.
Criticism of FBI, DOJ, and special counsel
During President Trump's administration, Hannity has repeatedly been highly critical of the FBI, DOJ, Special Counsel Robert Mueller, and others investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election. According to a review by Media Matters of all transcripts from the 254 episodes of Hannity's show from Mueller's appointment (May 17, 2017) to May 16, 2018, Hannity had 487 segments substantially devoted to Mueller (approximately two per episode), opened his program with Mueller 152 times (approximately three times per week), and the content of his show was highly critical of the probe and the media's coverage of the probe. He has called the Russia inquiry a "witch hunt", an "utter disgrace", and "a direct threat to you, the American people, and our American republic". Hannity has expressed skepticism of the U.S. intelligence community's view that Russia hacked the Democratic National Convention's emails during the 2016 election and has promoted various conspiracy theories. In March 2017 he publicized a theory, first proposed at the Wikileaks Twitter account, that the CIA could have done the hacking while making it look like Russia did it. In August he suggested that Seth Rich may have been the leaker.
Hannity has described the Mueller investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, as well as James Comey's tenure as FBI Director, as "one giant incestuous circle of corruption". In April 2018, Hannity ran a segment where he claimed there were "criminal" connections between Bill and Hillary Clinton, Mueller, and Comey. Hannity asserted that there were three connected "Deep State crime families" actively "trying to take down the president". A guest on the segment, attorney Joseph diGenova, called Mueller's team "legal terrorists" and referred to Comey as a "dirty cop".
Hannity also claimed that Mueller had been involved in the corrupt dealings of several FBI agents in connection with Boston, Massachusetts crime boss Whitey Bulger. The federal judge who presided over a lawsuit concerning the corrupt dealings said Hannity's claims were unsubstantiated and that Mueller was never accused of any wrongdoing nor even mentioned during the proceedings.
In June 2018, after reports that Mueller's probe had asked witnesses to turn their personal phones over to investigators for examination, Hannity sarcastically suggested on air to the witnesses that they "follow Hillary Clinton's lead" and destroy their personal phones so they cannot be examined.
In May 2019, after Mueller gave a statement saying the Special Counsel investigation did not exonerate Trump of crimes, Hannity said Mueller was "basically full of crap" and did not know the law.
Uranium One
From 2015 into 2018, Fox News broadcast extensive coverage of an alleged scandal surrounding the sale of Uranium One to Russian interests, which Hannity characterized as "one of the biggest scandals in American history". The Fox News coverage extended throughout the programming day, with particular emphasis by Hannity. The network promoted a narrative asserting that, as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton personally approved the Uranium One sale in exchange for $145million in bribes paid to the Clinton Foundation. Donald Trump repeated these allegations as a candidate and as president. No evidence of wrongdoing by Clinton had been found after three years of allegations, an FBI investigation, and the 2017 appointment of a Federal attorney to evaluate the investigation. In November 2017, Fox News host Shepard Smith concisely debunked the alleged scandal, including saying that Clinton did not personally approve the sale, infuriating viewers who suggested he should work for CNN or MSNBC. Hannity later called Smith "clueless", while Smith stated, "I get it, that some of our opinion programming is there strictly to be entertaining. I get that. I don't work there. I wouldn't work there."
A two-year Justice Department investigation initiated after Trump became president found no evidence to justify pursuing a criminal investigation.
Deep state
Hannity has advocated the QAnon and "deep state" conspiracy theories. The latter proposes a government officials network is working to hinder the Trump administration. He has described the deep state as a "Shadow Government" and "Deep state swamp of Obama holdovers and DC lifers". In March 2017, he called for a "purge" of Obama-era bureaucrats and appointees in government. In an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, conservative columnist Bret Stephens disputed Hannity's deep state allegations, saying they were an example of the "paranoid style in politics". Later that month, Hannity said NBC News was part of the deep state. In May 2017, he reiterated that deep state/intelligence operatives were trying to destroy the Trump presidency.
In March 2018, Hannity attacked Special Counsel Robert Mueller, saying his career was "anything but impeccable". Hannity said Mueller was friends with former FBI Director James Comey and former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, and that he "cannot be expected to honestly investigate scandals that his friends are directly involved in". He said these individuals were involved in "one massive, huge, deep-state conflict of interest after another. Now they're protecting themselves. They're trying to preserve their own power." Mueller and Comey are professional acquaintances but not known to be friends, while Trump attorney general Bill Barr said in 2019 that he and Mueller had been friends for thirty years.
Comments on sexual harassment
In 2016, Hannity vociferously defended Roger Ailes when he was accused by multiple women of sexual harassment. In May 2017, Hannity paid a tribute to Ailes after he died. Hannity called him "a second father" and said to Ailes' "enemies" that he was "preparing to kick your in the next life".
In April 2017, Hannity came to the defense of Fox News co-president Bill Shine after it was reported that Shine's job was at risk. At least four lawsuits alleged that Shine had ignored, enabled or concealed Ailes' alleged sexual harassment.
In September 2017, several months after Bill O'Reilly was fired from Fox News in the wake of a number of women's alleging that he had sexually harassed them, Hannity hosted O'Reilly on his show. Some Fox News employees criticized the decision. In the interview, O'Reilly attacked liberal media watchdog groups and said he should have fought harder when those groups targeted his advertisers. According to CNN, during the interview, Hannity found kinship with O'Reilly as he appeared "to feel that he and O'Reilly have both become victims of liberals looking to silence them".
Hannity came under criticism in October 2017 when he attacked Democrats after it became known that a large number of women had accused Harvey Weinstein, the Hollywood producer and donor to Democratic causes, of sexual harassment. Critics noted that Hannity had weeks earlier defended and hosted his coworker Bill O'Reilly who was fired following a number of sexual harassment allegations.
LGBT rights
In the radio show for KCSB, which was the subject of controversy in 1989, Hannity made anti-gay comments. He called AIDS a "gay disease" and said the media was hiding salient information from the public. Two editions featured anti-gay activist Gene Antonio, a Lutheran minister, discussing his book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS. In the book, Antonio claims that AIDS can be spread by people sneezing in close proximity to each other. Hannity encouraged Antonio when he said that AIDS spread when gay men consumed each other's feces, said that homosexuality was a "lower form of behavior", compared homosexual sex to "playing in a sewer" and gay people of being "filled with hatred and bigotry". When a lesbian, another broadcaster at the station, called into the show, Hannity said "I feel sorry for your child." Hannity was quoted at the time as having said "anyone listening to this show that believes homosexuality is a normal lifestyle has been brainwashed." The ACLU opposed his firing and petitioned the station to reverse their decision. Hannity demanded a formal apology and double the airtime. While the station did offer to allow Hannity to return, they would not meet Hannity's additional demands and he declined to return.
In 2017, Hannity said he regretted the comments and that they were "ignorant and embarrassing".
Immigration
Hannity opposed amnesty for undocumented immigrants; however, in 2012 he said he had evolved on the issue and favored a "pathway to citizenship". Later, he opposed that idea. By 2018, he was described as an immigration hardliner by CNN, The Washington Post, and New York magazine. In August 2018, Trump suggested that he might shut down the government to force Congress to fund his border wall, boasting that Hannity agreed with the action.
Islam
Hannity has warned of sharia law coming to the United States. Hannity opposed the building of Park51, a mosque two blocks from the World Trade Center site.
Hannity promoted the idea of "Islamic training camps right here in America", which were based on an unsubstantiated "documentary" by the Christian Action Network.
In 2006, Hannity was critical of Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to U.S. Congress, being sworn into office with an oath on a Quran. Hannity equated the Quran with Mein Kampf, asking a guest on his show whether he would have allowed Ellison "to choose, you know, Hitler's Mein Kampf, which is the Nazi bible?"
Torture
In 2009, Hannity said he supported enhanced interrogation, a euphemism for torture. He also volunteered to be waterboarded for charity. In response, Keith Olbermann pledged to donate $1,000 for every second of waterboarding Hannity underwent. In 2017, Hannity continued to advocate for waterboarding, raising the example of using it against a kidnapper. According to Media Matters, Hannity has not been waterboarded as of March 2018.
Climate change
Hannity rejects the scientific consensus on climate change. In 2001, he described it as "phony science from the left". In 2004, he falsely claimed that scientists couldn't agree on whether global warming was "scientific fact or fiction". In 2010, Hannity falsely stated that so-called "Climategate"the leaking of e-mails written by climate scientists that, according to climate change deniers, demonstrated scientific misconduct, but which all subsequent inquiries found to show no evidence of misconduct or wrongdoingwas a scandal that "exposed global warming as a myth cooked up by alarmists". Hannity frequently invites critics of climate science onto his shows.
Death panels
Hannity promoted the falsehood that the Affordable Care Act would create so-called "death panels". According to a study by Dartmouth College political scientist Brendan Nyhan, Hannity's show, along with the Laura Ingraham Show, were the first major conservative media personalities to latch onto the false claim of Betsy McCaughey, a former lieutenant governor of New York, that the Affordable Care Act contained death panels. When Sarah Palin stirred controversy by promoting the death panels myth, and argued her case in a Facebook post, Hannity defended her and said, "I agree with everything that she wrote." Hannity also claimed that he found the specific pages in the Affordable Care Act containing provisions on death panels.
A 2016 study found that Hannity promoted a number of falsehoods about the Affordable Care Act. For instance, Hannity falsely alleged several times that Democratic Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus had said Social Security could be "insolvent in two years" due to the Affordable Care Act. According to the study, Hannity, unlike other Fox News hosts such as Bill O'Reilly and Greta Van Susteren, "took a more direct approach, aggressively supporting Republicans and conservatives and attacking Democrats and liberals, endorsing the more spurious claims long after they were proven incorrect, and putting advocacy above accurate reporting, to further the network's themes opposing reform".
Jake Tapper
In November 2017, Fox News distorted a statement by Jake Tapper to make it appear as if he had said "Allahu Akbar" can be used under the most "beautiful circumstances" in the immediate aftermath of the 2017 New York City truck attack wherein a terrorist shouted "Allahu Akbar". Fox News omitted that Tapper had said the use of "Allahu Akbar" in the terrorist attack was not one of these circumstances. A headline on FoxNews.com was preceded by a tag reading "OUTRAGEOUS". The Fox News Twitter account distorted the statement even more, saying "Jake Tapper Says 'Allahu Akbar' Is 'Beautiful' Right After NYC Terror Attack" in a tweet that was later deleted.
Even after the Fox News Twitter account had deleted the tweet on Tapper's out-of-context comments, Hannity repeated the out-of-context comments to his viewers, calling Tapper "liberal fake news CNN's fake Jake Tapper" and mocking his ratings.
Appearance at November 2018 Trump rally
On November 4, 2018, Trump's website, DonaldJTrump.com, announced in a press release that Hannity would make a "special guest appearance" with Trump at a midterm campaign rally the following night in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. The following morning, Hannity tweeted "To be clear, I will not be on stage campaigning with the President." Hannity nevertheless spoke at Trump's lectern on stage at the rally, immediately mocking the "fake news" at the back of the auditorium, Fox News reporters among them. Several Fox News employees expressed outrage at Hannity's actions, with one stating, "a new line was crossed". Hannity later asserted that his action was not pre-planned, and Fox News stated it "does not condone any talent participating in campaign events". Fox News host Jeanine Pirro also appeared on stage with Trump at the rally. The Trump press release was later removed from Trump's website.
Foreign policy
In 2009, Hannity said of the Iraq War, "we were victorious in spite of the Democrats' efforts and attempts at preventing victory." During the 2016 election, Hannity vouched for Trump's claimed opposition to the Iraq War, "Mr. Trump and I disagreed about the Iraq war; I was for it and he was against it."
In June 2019, Hannity called on Trump to "bomb the hell of out Iran" after Iran shot down a U.S. drone. After the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, Hannity opened his show by saying, "tonight the world is safer as one of the most ruthless, evil war criminals on Earth has been brought to justice."
Ukraine
In February 2020, The Daily Beast acquired a leaked document entitled "Ukraine, Disinformation, & the Trump Administration" produced by a Fox News research team. The document warned of "disinformation" being pushed by frequent Hannity guests, including Rudy Giuliani, John Solomon, Victoria Toensing and Joe diGenova. Among other criticisms, the analysis noted that on his show Hannity discussed with Toensing and diGenova an affidavit from former Ukrainian prosecutor general Viktor Shokin that accused Joe Biden of getting him fired to end an investigation into Burisma Holdings, which employed Biden's son Hunter. The affidavit was drafted at the request of attorneys for Ukrainian oligarch Dmitry Firtash, but neither Hannity nor his guests disclosed to viewers that Toensing and diGenova were among Firtash's attorneys.
COVID-19 pandemic
In February 2020, amid the spread of COVID-19 to the United States, Hannity said "many on the left are now all rooting for corona to wreak havoc in the United States. Why? To score cheap, repulsive political points." In March 2020, he characterized the virus as a "hoax", and said it "may be true" that the outbreak was a "fraud" perpetrated by the "deep state". Later in March, as the disease spread into a global pandemic and Trump declared it a national emergency, Hannity started to take the virus more seriously, denying that he had referred to it as a hoax less than a month earlier. In July 2021, on live television, Hannity encouraged the audience to consider vaccination.
Personal life
Family and lifestyle
Hannity met Jill Rhodes in 1991 when he worked at WVNN in Huntsville, Alabama and she was a political columnist for the Huntsville Times. The two married in 1993. In June 2020, the couple announced that they had divorced the previous year but had separated years prior.
Hannity has since dated Fox News colleague Ainsley Earhardt. In August 2019, Hannity and Earhardt arrived together as guests for a wedding at Trump National Golf Course in Colt's Neck, New Jersey. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she has been hosting her Fox & Friends program from a remote studio in the basement of Hannity's Long Island mansion.
Hannity has two children from his marriage to Rhodes: a son, Patrick, born in 1998, and daughter, Merri, born in 2001. Both children graduated from Cold Spring Harbor High School. Patrick attended Wake Forest University where he played tennis. Merri attends The University of Michigan where she also plays tennis. In high school, Merri was the fourth highest ranked tennis player in New York State.
In 2018, Forbes estimated that Hannity's annual income was $36million, and the Guardian reported that he was believed to be the "hidden owner" of about $90 million in property that had been purchased by shell companies. In April 2021, he purchased a $5.3 million house several miles from Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago residence.
In 2014 he said he has carried a weapon "more than half my adult life". According to Hannity, he has a brown belt in martial arts and trains four days a week in the sport.
Religion
Hannity left the Catholic Church in 2019, citing "too much institutionalized corruption". However, he has said that as he has aged, his Christian faith has "gotten stronger" and that he needs and wants God in his life.
Bibliography
Hannity, Sean (2002). Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2004). Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2010). Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, New York: Harper Paperbacks, .
Hannity, Sean (2020). Live Free or Die: America (and the World) On the Brink, New York: Simon & Schuster, .
See also
Fox News controversies
New Yorkers in journalism
References
External links
1961 births
Living people
21st-century American male writers
21st-century American non-fiction writers
Adelphi University alumni
American broadcast news analysts
American conservative talk radio hosts
American male non-fiction writers
American people of Irish descent
American political commentators
American political writers
Christians from New York (state)
Conservative Party of New York State politicians
Former Roman Catholics
Fox News people
Male critics of feminism
New York (state) Independents
New York (state) Republicans
New York University alumni
People from Centre Island, New York
People from Franklin Square, New York
Radio personalities from New York City
Right-wing populism in the United States
University of California, Santa Barbara alumni
Writers from New York City | false | [
"What You See Is What You Get or WYSIWYG is where computer editing software allows content to be edited in a form that resembles its final appearance.\n\nWhat You See Is What You Get may also refer to:\n\nMusic\n What You See Is What You Get (EP), a 1998 EP by Pitchshifter\n What You See Is What You Get (Glen Goldsmith album), 1988\n What You See Is What You Get (Luke Combs album), 2019\n Whatcha See Is Whatcha Get (album), a 1971 debut album by the band The Dramatics\n\"Whatcha See Is Whatcha Get\" (song), title song from the above The Dramatics album\n \"What You See Is What You Get\" (song), a 1971 song by Stoney & Meatloaf\n \"What U See Is What U Get\", a 1998 song by rapper Xzibit\n \"What U See (Is What U Get)\", a song by Britney Spears from the 2000 album Oops!... I Did It Again\n\nOthers\n What you see is what you get, a term popularized by Geraldine Jones, a character from the television show The Flip Wilson Show\n What You See Is What You Get (book), a 2010 book written by Alan Sugar\n\nSee also\nWYSIWYG (disambiguation)\nWhatcha See Is Whatcha Get (disambiguation)\n\"What You Get Is What You See\", a song by Tina Turner from her 1987 album Break Every Rule\n Stand by Me (Whatcha See Is Whatcha Get), 1971 album by Pretty Purdie and The Playboys",
"Follow Me! is a series of television programmes produced by Bayerischer Rundfunk and the BBC in the late 1970s to provide a crash course in the English language. It became popular in many overseas countries as a first introduction to English; in 1983, one hundred million people watched the show in China alone, featuring Kathy Flower.\n\nThe British actor Francis Matthews hosted and narrated the series.\n\nThe course consists of sixty lessons. Each lesson lasts from 12 to 15 minutes and covers a specific lexis. The lessons follow a consistent group of actors, with the relationships between their characters developing during the course.\n\nFollow Me! actors\n Francis Matthews\n Raymond Mason\n David Savile\n Ian Bamforth\n Keith Alexander\n Diane Mercer\n Jane Argyle\n Diana King\n Veronica Leigh\n Elaine Wells\n Danielle Cohn\n Lashawnda Bell\n\nEpisodes \n \"What's your name\"\n \"How are you\"\n \"Can you help me\"\n \"Left, right, straight ahead\"\n \"Where are they\"\n \"What's the time\"\n \"What's this What's that\"\n \"I like it very much\"\n \"Have you got any wine\"\n \"What are they doing\"\n \"Can I have your name, please\"\n \"What does she look like\"\n \"No smoking\"\n \"It's on the first floor\"\n \"Where's he gone\"\n \"Going away\"\n \"Buying things\"\n \"Why do you like it\"\n \"What do you need\"\n \"I sometimes work late\"\n \"Welcome to Britain\"\n \"Who's that\"\n \"What would you like to do\"\n \"How can I get there?\"\n \"Where is it\"\n \"What's the date\"\n \"Whose is it\"\n \"I enjoy it\"\n \"How many and how much\"\n \"What have you done\"\n \"Haven't we met before\"\n \"What did you say\"\n \"Please stop\"\n \"How can I get to Brightly\"\n \"Where can I get it\"\n \"There's a concert on Wednesday\"\n \"What's it like\"\n \"What do you think of him\"\n \"I need someone\"\n \"What were you doing\"\n \"What do you do\"\n \"What do you know about him\"\n \"You shouldn't do that\"\n \"I hope you enjoy your holiday\"\n \"Where can I see a football match\"\n \"When will it be ready\"\n \"Where did you go\"\n \"I think it's awful\"\n \"A room with a view\"\n \"You'll be ill\"\n \"I don't believe in strikes\"\n \"They look tired\"\n \"Would you like to\"\n \"Holiday plans\"\n \"The second shelf on the left\"\n \"When you are ready\"\n \"Tell them about Britain\"\n \"I liked everything\"\n \"Classical or modern\"\n \"Finale\"\n\nReferences \n\n BBC article about the series in China\n\nExternal links \n Follow Me – Beginner level \n Follow Me – Elementary level\n Follow Me – Intermediate level\n Follow Me – Advanced level\n\nAdult education television series\nEnglish-language education television programming"
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"what did others have to say",
"Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year.",
"what did he do next",
"After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications presenting himself as \"the most talked about college radio host in America.\"",
"what did that get him",
"Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host."
]
| C_d5d7c3407dd148389b1d80a63090fca4_1 | what year was that | 6 | What year was Hannity hired at the radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama? | Sean Hannity | Hannity hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible." Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year. This was after two shows featuring the book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS by Gene Antonio; among other remarks made during the broadcast, Hannity told a lesbian caller, "I feel sorry for your child." The university board that governed the station later reversed its decision due to a campaign conducted on Hannity's behalf by the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, which argued that the station had discriminated against Hannity's First Amendment rights. When the station refused to give him a public apology and more airtime, Hannity decided against returning to KCSB. After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America." Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996, Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes. Later that year, Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity was on WABC's afternoon time slot from January 1998 until the end of 2013. Since January 2014, Hannity has hosted the 3-6 p.m. time slot on WOR in New York City. In their 2007 book Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America, conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group." CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Sean Patrick Hannity (born December 30, 1961) is an American talk show host and conservative political commentator. He is the host of The Sean Hannity Show, a nationally syndicated talk radio show, and has also hosted a commentary program, Hannity, on Fox News, since 2009.
Hannity worked as a general contractor and volunteered as a talk show host at UC Santa Barbara in 1989. He later joined WVNN in Athens, Alabama and shortly afterward, WGST in Atlanta. After leaving WGST, he worked at WABC in New York until 2013. Since 2014, Hannity has worked at WOR.
In 1996, Hannity and Alan Colmes co-hosted Hannity & Colmes on Fox. After Colmes announced his departure in January 2008, Hannity merged the Hannity & Colmes show into Hannity.
Hannity has received several awards and honors, including an honorary degree from Liberty University. He has written three New York Times best-selling books: Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism; Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism; and Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, and released a fourth, Live Free or Die, in 2020.
Hannity has sometimes promoted conspiracy theories, such as "birtherism" (claims that then-President Barack Obama was not a legitimate U.S. citizen), claims regarding the murder of Seth Rich, and falsehoods about Hillary Clinton's health. Hannity was an early supporter of Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election. Hannity often acted as an unofficial spokesman for the president, criticizing the media and attacking Robert Mueller's inquiry into Russian interference in Trump's election. He reportedly spoke to Trump on the phone most weeknights. He spoke at the president's lectern during a Trump rally, and White House advisors characterized him as the "shadow" chief of staff. According to Forbes, by 2018 Hannity had become one of the most-watched hosts in cable news and most-listened-to hosts in talk radio, due in part to his closeness and access to Trump.
Early life and education
Hannity was born in New York City, New York, the son of Lillian (née Flynn) and Hugh Hannity. Lillian worked as a stenographer and a corrections officer at a county jail, while Hugh was a World War II veteran and family-court officer. He was the youngest of four siblings and the only boy. All his grandparents immigrated to the United States from Ireland. He grew up in Franklin Square, New York on Long Island.
In his youth, Hannity worked as a paperboy delivering issues of the New York Daily News and the Long Island Daily Press. His parents were initially supporters of President John F. Kennedy, eventually growing more Republican in their views as time went on, though they resisted being overtly political at home.
Hannity attended Sacred Heart Seminary in Hempstead, New York and St. Pius X Preparatory Seminary in Uniondale, New York. He attended New York University and Adelphi University, but did not graduate from either.
Career
In 1982, Hannity started a house-painting business and a few years later, worked as a building contractor in Santa Barbara, California. He hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible."
Radio
Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year after a controversy. During two shows, gay and lesbian rights were discussed in what was considered to be a contentious manner. (See LGBT issues below.) The university board that governed the station later reversed its decision after a campaign conducted on Hannity's behalf by the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union argued that the station had discriminated against Hannity's First Amendment rights. When the station refused to issue Hannity a public apology and more airtime, he did not return to KCSB.
After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications, presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America". Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville media market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996, Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes.
Later that year, Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late-night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive-time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity was on WABC's afternoon time slot from January 1998.
In their 2007 book Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America, conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group". The WABC slot continued until the end of 2013. Since January 2014, Hannity has hosted the 3:00–6:00p.m. time slot on WOR in New York City.
Hannity's radio program is a conservative political talk show that features Hannity's opinions and ideology related to current issues and politicians. The Sean Hannity Show began national syndication on September 10, 2001, on more than five hundred stations nationwide. In 2004, Hannity signed a $25million five-year contract extension with ABC Radio (now Citadel Media) to continue the show until 2009. The program was made available via Armed Forces Radio Network in 2006. In June 2007, ABC Radio was sold to Citadel Communications and in the summer of 2008, Hannity was signed for a $100million five-year contract. As of March 2018, the program is heard by more than 13.5 million listeners a week. Hannity was ranked No.2 in Talkers Magazine's 2017 Heavy Hundred and was listed as No.72 on Forbes' "Celebrity 100" list in 2013.
In January 2007, Clear Channel Communications signed a groupwide three-year extension with Hannity on more than eighty stations. The largest stations in the group deal included KTRH Houston, KFYI Phoenix, WPGB Pittsburgh, WKRC Cincinnati, WOOD Grand Rapids, WFLA Tampa, WOAI San Antonio, WLAC Nashville, and WREC Memphis.
Hannity signed a long-term contract to remain with Premiere Networks in September 2013.
At the beginning of 2014, Hannity signed contracts to air on several Salem Communications stations including WDTK Detroit, WIND Chicago, WWRC (now WQOF) Washington, D.C., and KSKY Dallas.
Television
Hannity was a co-host of Hannity & Colmes, an American political "point-counterpoint"-style television program on the Fox News Channel featuring Hannity and Alan Colmes as co-hosts. Hannity presented the conservative point of view with Colmes providing the liberal viewpoint.
While Hannity's views are typically politically and socially conservative, he has spoken supportively about birth control, which has led to on-air clashes with pro-life guests such as Rev. Thomas Euteneuer, president of Human Life International. Hannity said if the Catholic Church were to excommunicate him over his support for contraception, he would join Jerry Falwell's Thomas Road Baptist Church.
In January 2007, Hannity began a new Sunday night television show on Fox News, Hannity's America.
In November 2008, Colmes announced his departure from Hannity & Colmes. After the show's final broadcast on January 9, 2009, Hannity took over the time slot with his own new show, Hannity, which has a format similar to Hannity's America.
Books
Hannity is the author of four books. Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism was published in 2002, and Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism was published in 2004 through ReganBooks. Both these books reached the nonfiction New York Times bestseller list, the second of which stayed there for five weeks. Hannity has said he is too busy to write many books, and dictated a lot of his own two books into a tape recorder while driving in to do his radio show.
Hannity wrote his third book, Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, which was released by HarperCollins in March 2010. The book became Hannity's third New York Times Bestseller.
In 2020, Hannity released his fourth book, Live Free or Die.
Let Freedom Ring:Winning the War of Liberty Over Liberalism, William Morrow, August 1, 2002, .
Deliver Us From Evil:Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, William Morrow, February 17, 2004, .
Conservative Victory:Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, HarperCollins, March 30, 2010, .
Live Free or Die:America (and the World) on the Brink, Threshold Editions, August 4, 2020, .
Freedom Concerts
From 2003 until 2010, Hannity hosted country music-themed "Freedom Concerts" to raise money for charity. In 2010, conservative blogger Debbie Schlussel wrote that only a small percentage of the money raised by the concerts goes to the target charity, Freedom Alliance. The Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) filed complaints with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), also in 2010. The FTC complaint alleges that Hannity was "falsely promoting that all concert proceeds would be donated to a scholarship fund for the children of those killed or wounded in war". The complaint filed with the IRS claims that Freedom Alliance has violated its 501(c)3 charity status. The concerts stopped around the same year.
Awards and honors
Hannity received a Marconi Award in 2003 and 2007 as the Network Syndicated Personality of the Year from the National Association of Broadcasters.
In 2009, Talkers Magazine listed Hannity as No.2 on their list of the 100 most important radio talk show hosts in America (with Rush Limbaugh listed as No.1). The same magazine gave Hannity its Freedom of Speech Award in 2003.
In 2005, Jerry Falwell, chancellor of the evangelical Liberty University, awarded Hannity an honorary degree.
Hannity was inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame in November 2017.
Other activities
Hannity has had cameo appearances in film and television, having a brief voiceover in The Siege as an unseen reporter, and appearing in Atlas Shrugged: Part II and the second season of House of Cards as himself. He executive produced and appeared in the 2017 film Let There Be Light, which also stars Kevin Sorbo.
As of April 2018, Hannity owned at least 877 residential properties, which were bought for nearly $89million. He purchased some of the homes with the help of loans from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and most are in working-class neighborhoods. His property managers have taken an aggressive management approach with a much higher than average eviction rate. The Washington Post reported that his property management team has used eviction proceedings both to remove tenants and to generate revenue. His property managers have claimed that Hannity has no active role in the management of the more than 1,000 properties he has a stake in.
Controversies and criticism
According to The Washington Post, Hannity "repeatedly embraces storylines that prove to be inaccurate" and takes positions that change over time. In the opinion of The New York Times, Hannity is "barreling headfirst into the murky territory between opinion and out-and-out conspiracy theorism". Hannity often promotes conspiracy theories without explicitly endorsing them, unlike Alex Jones. The New York Times wrote that this "has the effect of nourishing the more wild-eyed beliefs of his fans while providing Hannity a degree of plausible deniability". The New Yorker wrote in 2019 that Hannity had "[spewed] baseless conspiracy theories with impunity".
During the Bush years, Hannity "loyally supported the president's policies". During the Obama administration, Hannity "leaned more heavily on stories he believed were being given short shrift by the 'liberal media'stories about where Obama was born, and who deserved blame for the attack on the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya". In 2017, The Washington Post wrote that "what Hannity has stood forat least for the past couple of yearsis Trump."
Birtherism
Although Hannity said he believed President Obama was born in the U.S., to answer queries on Obama's citizenship, he repeatedly called on Obama to release his birth certificate. Hannity described the circumstances regarding Obama's birth certificate as "odd". Hannity also defended and promoted those who questioned Obama's citizenship of the U.S., such as Donald Trump. Hannity invited Trump to his show while Trump was a leader in the birther movement; during an interview with Hannity, Trump said Obama "could have easily have come from Kenya, or someplace". Hannity said in response, "The issue could go away in a minute. Just show the certificate." Even after Obama produced his birth certificate in 2008, certified by the state of Hawaii, Hannity kept calling on Obama to release his birth certificate, asking why did he not "just produce it and we move on?" In October 2016, Hannity offered to purchase a one-way ticket to Kenya for Obama.
2016 presidential campaign
Candidacy of Donald Trump
Hannity is known for his pro-Trump coverage. According to The Washington Post, "Hannity's comeback coincided with his early, eager embrace of his fellow New Yorker... Trump attacked the Gold Star father, and Hannity stood by him. Trump went after a federal judge of Mexican descent, and Hannity backed him. After the Access Hollywood tape emerged of Trump making lewd comments about inappropriate sexual behaviour towards women, Hannity continued to defend him: 'King David had 500 concubines, for crying out loud.'" After the inauguration, the first interview the new president gave to a cable news channel was conducted by Hannity. Hannity additionally defended the Trump administration's false claim that Trump's inauguration crowd was the biggest ever.
Hannity has been criticized as being overly favorable to the candidacy of Donald Trump, and granting Trump more airtime than other presidential candidates during the 2016 primaries. Hannity, for instance, let Trump promote the false claim that Rafael Cruz, father of Trump's rival presidential candidate Ted Cruz, was involved in the John F. Kennedy assassination. He admitted to favoring Republican candidates, though without indicating a preference for Donald Trump over Ted Cruz. According to Dylan Byers of CNN, Hannity during interviews "frequently cites areas where he agrees with Trump, or where he thinks Trump was right about something, then asks him to expand on it", and "often ignores or defends Trump from criticism".
Tensions between Cruz and Hannity appeared to reach a boiling point during a contentious April 2016 radio interview, during which Cruz implied Hannity was a "hardcore Donald Trump supporter" and Hannity responded by accusing Cruz of "throw[ing] this in my face" every time he asked a "legitimate question". Jim Rutenberg commented in August 2016 that Hannity is "not only Mr. Trump's biggest media booster; he also veers into the role of adviser," citing sources who said Hannity spent months offering suggestions to Trump and his campaign on strategy and messaging. Hannity responded to the report by saying, "I'm not hiding the fact that I want Donald Trump to be the next President of the United States.... I never claimed to be a journalist." (In an article published in December 2017, Hannity said "I'm a journalist. But I'm an advocacy journalist, or an opinion journalist.") Hannity has feuded with several conservatives who oppose Trump, including National Reviews Jonah Goldberg, Wall Street Journal foreign affairs columnist Bret Stephens, and National Review editor Rich Lowry.
Conspiracy theories about Hillary Clinton
During the 2016 presidential election, Hannity periodically promoted conspiracy theories regarding Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party. Hannity repeatedly claimed that Clinton had very serious medical problems and that the media was covering them up. He misrepresented photos of Clinton to give the impression that she had secret medical problems. He shared a photo from the fringe news site Gateway Pundit and falsely claimed that it showed her Secret Service agent holding a diazepam pen intended to treat seizures, when he in fact was holding a small flashlight. He booked doctors on his show to discuss Clinton's health; although these people had never personally examined Clinton, they made alarmist statements about her state of health which turned out to be false. At one point, Hannity promoted an unsubstantiated report that Clinton had been drunk at a rally; at another point, he suggested that Clinton was drunk and that her campaign needed to "sober her up".
Murder of Seth Rich conspiracy theories
In May 2017, Hannity became a prominent promoter of the conspiracy theory that Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party had a DNC staffer killed. Shortly afterward, he faced backlash from both left- and right-wing sources and lost several advertisers, including Crowne Plaza Hotels, Cars.com, Leesa Mattress, USAA, Peloton and Casper Sleep deciding to pull their marketing from his program on Fox News. However, USAA decided to return to the show shortly after following a negative outcry against its decision to pull out. Conservative magazine National Review compared the story to a flat earth video, called it a "disgrace" that Hannity and other conspiracy theorists were hyping the story, and called for them to stop.
In March 2018, Seth Rich's parents filed a lawsuit against Fox News for pushing conspiracy theories about their son's death. The suit alleges that the network "intentionally exploited" the tragedy for political purposes. On Oct. 12, 2020, Fox News agreed to pay millions of dollars to the Rich family.
Claims about election fraud
Hannity came under criticism during the 2016 presidential election for false claims about election rigging during interviews. Hannity responded to this by citing Mitt Romney's failure in the 2012 United States presidential election to obtain any votes in 59 of 1,687 Philadelphia voting districts as proof of election rigging. However, Factcheck.org and PolitiFact found that it was not unusual at all for this to occur, as those electoral districts are heavily African-American. Philadelphia elections inspector Ryan Godfrey also refuted Hannity's claim.
After the 2020 election, Hannity amplified false claims of election fraud, including by hosting former Trump lawyer Sidney Powell on his Fox News show, where Powell made unsubstantiated allegations on the topic. Republican efforts to overturn the 2020 election results and install Donald Trump for a second term culminated in the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. In 2022, the U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack is investigating what Hannity may have known in advance. The committee discovered that, on December 31, 2020, Hannity texted White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, saying, "I do NOT see January 6 happening the way he [Trump] is being told." In December of 2020, a month after the election, Hannity called for Trump’s false claims of voter fraud to be investigated by a special prosecutor, despite there still being no credible evidence of them by the accusers. As of February of 2022, no credible evidence has been provided of these false claims that Hannity amplified.
WikiLeaks
In 2010, Hannity said WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was waging a "war" on the United States, and that Wikileaks put American lives in "jeopardy" and "danger" around the world. He also criticized the Obama administration for failing to apprehend Assange. In 2016, after Wikileaks published leaked emails from the Democratic National Committee, Hannity praised Assange for showing "how corrupt, dishonest and phony our government is". He told Assange in a September 2016 interview, "I do hope you get free one day. I wish you the best." The following month, Hannity claimed that WikiLeaks has revealed "everything that conspiracy theorists have said over the years" about Hillary Clinton is true.
In February 2017, Hannity retweeted a WikiLeaks tweet linking to an article by the conspiracy website Gateway Pundit, claiming that John McCain was a "globalist war criminal". McCain's spokeswoman called Hannity out on it, asking him to "correct the record". Hannity later deleted the tweet. In May 2017, Hannity made an offer to Assange to guest host his Fox News TV show.
Relationship with Donald Trump and Michael Cohen
Hannity developed a close relationship with Trump during the election and has become even closer during his presidency. The two men speak on the phone multiple times a week, discussing Hannity's weekday show, the special counsel investigation, even evaluating White House staff. Hannity shares, The Economist asserts, "Mr. Trump's love of conspiracy theories and hatred of snooty elites". They speak so often that one Trump adviser has said Hannity "basically has a desk in the place". On the air, Hannity echoes Trump's attacks on the media and Special Counsel investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. Trump sometimes quotes Hannity to others or promotes the show to his Twitter followers. Hannity has encouraged Trump to shut down the government to get funding for a border wall, as well as his declaration of a national emergency over the US–Mexico border.
According to reports by the Los Angeles Times and New York magazine, Hannity frequently talks to Trump by telephone after Hannity's weekday broadcasts, and Hannity is one of several dozen cleared callers whose calls to the White House public switchboard can be connected directly to the president.
Hannity stirred controversy in April 2018 when it was revealed that he shared a lawyer, Michael Cohen, with Trump. In a breach of journalistic ethics, Hannity had failed to disclose that Cohen was his lawyer while at the same time taking to the Fox airwaves to defend Cohen and criticize those who investigated him.
On April 9, 2018, federal agents from the U.S. Attorney's office served a search warrant on the office and residence of Michael Cohen, Trump's personal attorney. On the air, Hannity defended Cohen and criticized the federal action, calling it "highly questionable" and "an unprecedented abuse of power". On April 16, 2018, in a court hearing, Cohen's lawyers told the judge that Cohen had ten clients in 2017–2018 but did "traditional legal tasks" for only three: Trump, Elliott Broidy, and a "prominent person" who did not wish to be named for fear of being "embarrassed". The federal judge ordered the revelation of the third client, whom Cohen's lawyers named as Hannity. Although Hannity has covered Cohen on his show, he did not disclose that he had consulted with Cohen.
Fox News released a statement on April 16, 2018, attributed to Hannity: "Michael Cohen has never represented me in any matter. I never retained him, received an invoice, or paid legal fees. I have occasionally had brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective. I assumed those conversations were confidential, but to be absolutely clear they never involved any matter between me and a third party." Also, NBC News quoted Hannity as saying: "We definitely had attorney–client privilege because I asked him for that," while Hannity said on his radio show that he "might have handed him ten bucks" for the attorney-client privilege. Lastly, Hannity tweeted that his discussions with Cohen were "almost exclusively" about real estate.
The following day, news reports revealed that Hannity had shared another lawyer with Trump, Jay Sekulow. Sekulow had written a cease-and-desist letter to KFAQ on Hannity's behalf in May 2017, and later represented Trump in connection with the Mueller investigation.
In August 2018, Hannity allowed Sekulow and Rudy Giuliani, another personal lawyer for Trump, to host Hannity's radio show; the duo proceeded to defend Trump and promote arguments made by the Trump administration.
According to The New Yorker, Hannity has reversed on the issue of negotiations with North Korea: during Obama's presidency, Hannity called negotiations with North Korea "disturbing", whereas he called Trump's negotiations with North Korea a "huge foreign-policy win".
In June 2019, Hannity expressed outrage at Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's comment that she would like to see Trump "in prison". Hannity declared: "Based on no actual crimes, she wants a political opponent locked up in prison? That happens in banana republicsbeyond despicable behavior." Aaron Rupar of Vox criticized Hannity for "obvious hypocrisy", noting that Hannity himself had said in January 2018 regarding Hillary Clinton: "I think Hillary should be in jail. Lock her up." Aaron Blake of The Washington Post described Hannity's comment as "a pretty obvious bit of gaslighting", noting Hannity's loyalty to Trump, whose campaign rallies have featured chants of "Lock her up", and also Hannity's comments that Trump was free to investigate Clinton.
Hannity played the most important role in persuading Trump to pardon the convicted murderer and war criminal Clint Lorance.
Criticism of FBI, DOJ, and special counsel
During President Trump's administration, Hannity has repeatedly been highly critical of the FBI, DOJ, Special Counsel Robert Mueller, and others investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election. According to a review by Media Matters of all transcripts from the 254 episodes of Hannity's show from Mueller's appointment (May 17, 2017) to May 16, 2018, Hannity had 487 segments substantially devoted to Mueller (approximately two per episode), opened his program with Mueller 152 times (approximately three times per week), and the content of his show was highly critical of the probe and the media's coverage of the probe. He has called the Russia inquiry a "witch hunt", an "utter disgrace", and "a direct threat to you, the American people, and our American republic". Hannity has expressed skepticism of the U.S. intelligence community's view that Russia hacked the Democratic National Convention's emails during the 2016 election and has promoted various conspiracy theories. In March 2017 he publicized a theory, first proposed at the Wikileaks Twitter account, that the CIA could have done the hacking while making it look like Russia did it. In August he suggested that Seth Rich may have been the leaker.
Hannity has described the Mueller investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, as well as James Comey's tenure as FBI Director, as "one giant incestuous circle of corruption". In April 2018, Hannity ran a segment where he claimed there were "criminal" connections between Bill and Hillary Clinton, Mueller, and Comey. Hannity asserted that there were three connected "Deep State crime families" actively "trying to take down the president". A guest on the segment, attorney Joseph diGenova, called Mueller's team "legal terrorists" and referred to Comey as a "dirty cop".
Hannity also claimed that Mueller had been involved in the corrupt dealings of several FBI agents in connection with Boston, Massachusetts crime boss Whitey Bulger. The federal judge who presided over a lawsuit concerning the corrupt dealings said Hannity's claims were unsubstantiated and that Mueller was never accused of any wrongdoing nor even mentioned during the proceedings.
In June 2018, after reports that Mueller's probe had asked witnesses to turn their personal phones over to investigators for examination, Hannity sarcastically suggested on air to the witnesses that they "follow Hillary Clinton's lead" and destroy their personal phones so they cannot be examined.
In May 2019, after Mueller gave a statement saying the Special Counsel investigation did not exonerate Trump of crimes, Hannity said Mueller was "basically full of crap" and did not know the law.
Uranium One
From 2015 into 2018, Fox News broadcast extensive coverage of an alleged scandal surrounding the sale of Uranium One to Russian interests, which Hannity characterized as "one of the biggest scandals in American history". The Fox News coverage extended throughout the programming day, with particular emphasis by Hannity. The network promoted a narrative asserting that, as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton personally approved the Uranium One sale in exchange for $145million in bribes paid to the Clinton Foundation. Donald Trump repeated these allegations as a candidate and as president. No evidence of wrongdoing by Clinton had been found after three years of allegations, an FBI investigation, and the 2017 appointment of a Federal attorney to evaluate the investigation. In November 2017, Fox News host Shepard Smith concisely debunked the alleged scandal, including saying that Clinton did not personally approve the sale, infuriating viewers who suggested he should work for CNN or MSNBC. Hannity later called Smith "clueless", while Smith stated, "I get it, that some of our opinion programming is there strictly to be entertaining. I get that. I don't work there. I wouldn't work there."
A two-year Justice Department investigation initiated after Trump became president found no evidence to justify pursuing a criminal investigation.
Deep state
Hannity has advocated the QAnon and "deep state" conspiracy theories. The latter proposes a government officials network is working to hinder the Trump administration. He has described the deep state as a "Shadow Government" and "Deep state swamp of Obama holdovers and DC lifers". In March 2017, he called for a "purge" of Obama-era bureaucrats and appointees in government. In an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, conservative columnist Bret Stephens disputed Hannity's deep state allegations, saying they were an example of the "paranoid style in politics". Later that month, Hannity said NBC News was part of the deep state. In May 2017, he reiterated that deep state/intelligence operatives were trying to destroy the Trump presidency.
In March 2018, Hannity attacked Special Counsel Robert Mueller, saying his career was "anything but impeccable". Hannity said Mueller was friends with former FBI Director James Comey and former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, and that he "cannot be expected to honestly investigate scandals that his friends are directly involved in". He said these individuals were involved in "one massive, huge, deep-state conflict of interest after another. Now they're protecting themselves. They're trying to preserve their own power." Mueller and Comey are professional acquaintances but not known to be friends, while Trump attorney general Bill Barr said in 2019 that he and Mueller had been friends for thirty years.
Comments on sexual harassment
In 2016, Hannity vociferously defended Roger Ailes when he was accused by multiple women of sexual harassment. In May 2017, Hannity paid a tribute to Ailes after he died. Hannity called him "a second father" and said to Ailes' "enemies" that he was "preparing to kick your in the next life".
In April 2017, Hannity came to the defense of Fox News co-president Bill Shine after it was reported that Shine's job was at risk. At least four lawsuits alleged that Shine had ignored, enabled or concealed Ailes' alleged sexual harassment.
In September 2017, several months after Bill O'Reilly was fired from Fox News in the wake of a number of women's alleging that he had sexually harassed them, Hannity hosted O'Reilly on his show. Some Fox News employees criticized the decision. In the interview, O'Reilly attacked liberal media watchdog groups and said he should have fought harder when those groups targeted his advertisers. According to CNN, during the interview, Hannity found kinship with O'Reilly as he appeared "to feel that he and O'Reilly have both become victims of liberals looking to silence them".
Hannity came under criticism in October 2017 when he attacked Democrats after it became known that a large number of women had accused Harvey Weinstein, the Hollywood producer and donor to Democratic causes, of sexual harassment. Critics noted that Hannity had weeks earlier defended and hosted his coworker Bill O'Reilly who was fired following a number of sexual harassment allegations.
LGBT rights
In the radio show for KCSB, which was the subject of controversy in 1989, Hannity made anti-gay comments. He called AIDS a "gay disease" and said the media was hiding salient information from the public. Two editions featured anti-gay activist Gene Antonio, a Lutheran minister, discussing his book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS. In the book, Antonio claims that AIDS can be spread by people sneezing in close proximity to each other. Hannity encouraged Antonio when he said that AIDS spread when gay men consumed each other's feces, said that homosexuality was a "lower form of behavior", compared homosexual sex to "playing in a sewer" and gay people of being "filled with hatred and bigotry". When a lesbian, another broadcaster at the station, called into the show, Hannity said "I feel sorry for your child." Hannity was quoted at the time as having said "anyone listening to this show that believes homosexuality is a normal lifestyle has been brainwashed." The ACLU opposed his firing and petitioned the station to reverse their decision. Hannity demanded a formal apology and double the airtime. While the station did offer to allow Hannity to return, they would not meet Hannity's additional demands and he declined to return.
In 2017, Hannity said he regretted the comments and that they were "ignorant and embarrassing".
Immigration
Hannity opposed amnesty for undocumented immigrants; however, in 2012 he said he had evolved on the issue and favored a "pathway to citizenship". Later, he opposed that idea. By 2018, he was described as an immigration hardliner by CNN, The Washington Post, and New York magazine. In August 2018, Trump suggested that he might shut down the government to force Congress to fund his border wall, boasting that Hannity agreed with the action.
Islam
Hannity has warned of sharia law coming to the United States. Hannity opposed the building of Park51, a mosque two blocks from the World Trade Center site.
Hannity promoted the idea of "Islamic training camps right here in America", which were based on an unsubstantiated "documentary" by the Christian Action Network.
In 2006, Hannity was critical of Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to U.S. Congress, being sworn into office with an oath on a Quran. Hannity equated the Quran with Mein Kampf, asking a guest on his show whether he would have allowed Ellison "to choose, you know, Hitler's Mein Kampf, which is the Nazi bible?"
Torture
In 2009, Hannity said he supported enhanced interrogation, a euphemism for torture. He also volunteered to be waterboarded for charity. In response, Keith Olbermann pledged to donate $1,000 for every second of waterboarding Hannity underwent. In 2017, Hannity continued to advocate for waterboarding, raising the example of using it against a kidnapper. According to Media Matters, Hannity has not been waterboarded as of March 2018.
Climate change
Hannity rejects the scientific consensus on climate change. In 2001, he described it as "phony science from the left". In 2004, he falsely claimed that scientists couldn't agree on whether global warming was "scientific fact or fiction". In 2010, Hannity falsely stated that so-called "Climategate"the leaking of e-mails written by climate scientists that, according to climate change deniers, demonstrated scientific misconduct, but which all subsequent inquiries found to show no evidence of misconduct or wrongdoingwas a scandal that "exposed global warming as a myth cooked up by alarmists". Hannity frequently invites critics of climate science onto his shows.
Death panels
Hannity promoted the falsehood that the Affordable Care Act would create so-called "death panels". According to a study by Dartmouth College political scientist Brendan Nyhan, Hannity's show, along with the Laura Ingraham Show, were the first major conservative media personalities to latch onto the false claim of Betsy McCaughey, a former lieutenant governor of New York, that the Affordable Care Act contained death panels. When Sarah Palin stirred controversy by promoting the death panels myth, and argued her case in a Facebook post, Hannity defended her and said, "I agree with everything that she wrote." Hannity also claimed that he found the specific pages in the Affordable Care Act containing provisions on death panels.
A 2016 study found that Hannity promoted a number of falsehoods about the Affordable Care Act. For instance, Hannity falsely alleged several times that Democratic Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus had said Social Security could be "insolvent in two years" due to the Affordable Care Act. According to the study, Hannity, unlike other Fox News hosts such as Bill O'Reilly and Greta Van Susteren, "took a more direct approach, aggressively supporting Republicans and conservatives and attacking Democrats and liberals, endorsing the more spurious claims long after they were proven incorrect, and putting advocacy above accurate reporting, to further the network's themes opposing reform".
Jake Tapper
In November 2017, Fox News distorted a statement by Jake Tapper to make it appear as if he had said "Allahu Akbar" can be used under the most "beautiful circumstances" in the immediate aftermath of the 2017 New York City truck attack wherein a terrorist shouted "Allahu Akbar". Fox News omitted that Tapper had said the use of "Allahu Akbar" in the terrorist attack was not one of these circumstances. A headline on FoxNews.com was preceded by a tag reading "OUTRAGEOUS". The Fox News Twitter account distorted the statement even more, saying "Jake Tapper Says 'Allahu Akbar' Is 'Beautiful' Right After NYC Terror Attack" in a tweet that was later deleted.
Even after the Fox News Twitter account had deleted the tweet on Tapper's out-of-context comments, Hannity repeated the out-of-context comments to his viewers, calling Tapper "liberal fake news CNN's fake Jake Tapper" and mocking his ratings.
Appearance at November 2018 Trump rally
On November 4, 2018, Trump's website, DonaldJTrump.com, announced in a press release that Hannity would make a "special guest appearance" with Trump at a midterm campaign rally the following night in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. The following morning, Hannity tweeted "To be clear, I will not be on stage campaigning with the President." Hannity nevertheless spoke at Trump's lectern on stage at the rally, immediately mocking the "fake news" at the back of the auditorium, Fox News reporters among them. Several Fox News employees expressed outrage at Hannity's actions, with one stating, "a new line was crossed". Hannity later asserted that his action was not pre-planned, and Fox News stated it "does not condone any talent participating in campaign events". Fox News host Jeanine Pirro also appeared on stage with Trump at the rally. The Trump press release was later removed from Trump's website.
Foreign policy
In 2009, Hannity said of the Iraq War, "we were victorious in spite of the Democrats' efforts and attempts at preventing victory." During the 2016 election, Hannity vouched for Trump's claimed opposition to the Iraq War, "Mr. Trump and I disagreed about the Iraq war; I was for it and he was against it."
In June 2019, Hannity called on Trump to "bomb the hell of out Iran" after Iran shot down a U.S. drone. After the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, Hannity opened his show by saying, "tonight the world is safer as one of the most ruthless, evil war criminals on Earth has been brought to justice."
Ukraine
In February 2020, The Daily Beast acquired a leaked document entitled "Ukraine, Disinformation, & the Trump Administration" produced by a Fox News research team. The document warned of "disinformation" being pushed by frequent Hannity guests, including Rudy Giuliani, John Solomon, Victoria Toensing and Joe diGenova. Among other criticisms, the analysis noted that on his show Hannity discussed with Toensing and diGenova an affidavit from former Ukrainian prosecutor general Viktor Shokin that accused Joe Biden of getting him fired to end an investigation into Burisma Holdings, which employed Biden's son Hunter. The affidavit was drafted at the request of attorneys for Ukrainian oligarch Dmitry Firtash, but neither Hannity nor his guests disclosed to viewers that Toensing and diGenova were among Firtash's attorneys.
COVID-19 pandemic
In February 2020, amid the spread of COVID-19 to the United States, Hannity said "many on the left are now all rooting for corona to wreak havoc in the United States. Why? To score cheap, repulsive political points." In March 2020, he characterized the virus as a "hoax", and said it "may be true" that the outbreak was a "fraud" perpetrated by the "deep state". Later in March, as the disease spread into a global pandemic and Trump declared it a national emergency, Hannity started to take the virus more seriously, denying that he had referred to it as a hoax less than a month earlier. In July 2021, on live television, Hannity encouraged the audience to consider vaccination.
Personal life
Family and lifestyle
Hannity met Jill Rhodes in 1991 when he worked at WVNN in Huntsville, Alabama and she was a political columnist for the Huntsville Times. The two married in 1993. In June 2020, the couple announced that they had divorced the previous year but had separated years prior.
Hannity has since dated Fox News colleague Ainsley Earhardt. In August 2019, Hannity and Earhardt arrived together as guests for a wedding at Trump National Golf Course in Colt's Neck, New Jersey. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she has been hosting her Fox & Friends program from a remote studio in the basement of Hannity's Long Island mansion.
Hannity has two children from his marriage to Rhodes: a son, Patrick, born in 1998, and daughter, Merri, born in 2001. Both children graduated from Cold Spring Harbor High School. Patrick attended Wake Forest University where he played tennis. Merri attends The University of Michigan where she also plays tennis. In high school, Merri was the fourth highest ranked tennis player in New York State.
In 2018, Forbes estimated that Hannity's annual income was $36million, and the Guardian reported that he was believed to be the "hidden owner" of about $90 million in property that had been purchased by shell companies. In April 2021, he purchased a $5.3 million house several miles from Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago residence.
In 2014 he said he has carried a weapon "more than half my adult life". According to Hannity, he has a brown belt in martial arts and trains four days a week in the sport.
Religion
Hannity left the Catholic Church in 2019, citing "too much institutionalized corruption". However, he has said that as he has aged, his Christian faith has "gotten stronger" and that he needs and wants God in his life.
Bibliography
Hannity, Sean (2002). Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2004). Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2010). Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, New York: Harper Paperbacks, .
Hannity, Sean (2020). Live Free or Die: America (and the World) On the Brink, New York: Simon & Schuster, .
See also
Fox News controversies
New Yorkers in journalism
References
External links
1961 births
Living people
21st-century American male writers
21st-century American non-fiction writers
Adelphi University alumni
American broadcast news analysts
American conservative talk radio hosts
American male non-fiction writers
American people of Irish descent
American political commentators
American political writers
Christians from New York (state)
Conservative Party of New York State politicians
Former Roman Catholics
Fox News people
Male critics of feminism
New York (state) Independents
New York (state) Republicans
New York University alumni
People from Centre Island, New York
People from Franklin Square, New York
Radio personalities from New York City
Right-wing populism in the United States
University of California, Santa Barbara alumni
Writers from New York City | false | [
"What A Summer (foal in 1973) was an American Thoroughbred Champion racehorse who defeated both male and female competitors. She was bred in Maryland by Milton Polinger. She was a gray out of the mare Summer Classic who was sired by Summer Tan. Her sire was What Luck, a multiple stakes winning son of U.S. Racing Hall of Fame inductee Bold Ruler. What A Summer is probably best remembered for her win in the Grade II $65,000 Black-Eyed Susan Stakes over stakes winners Dearly Precious and Artfully on May 14, 1976.\n\nTwo-year-old season \n\nWhat A Summer was trained very early in her career by Hall of Fame conditioner Bud Delp while racing for her breeder, Milton Polinger. She was bought by Mrs. Bertram Firestone following Polinger's death in the early fall of 1976. That death delayed her the first start of her career until late in the year. Mrs. Firestone turned the mare over to trainer LeRoy Jolley. What A Summer did not start racing until near the end of her two-year-old season, when she broke her maiden at Philadelphia Park. Near the end of the year, she won an allowance race. She ended the year with two wins in four starts.\n\nThree-year-old season \nIn January, What A Summer placed second in her first stakes race, the $25,000 Heirloom Stakes at the old Liberty Bell Race Track in Philadelphia. Two months later, she won her second allowance race over winners and convinced her connections that she was ready to step up in class and take on stakes winners in the Grade II $65,000 Black-Eyed Susan Stakes. In that race, she withstood a fast closing challenge down the stretch to hold off a late charge by 4:5 favorite Dearly Precious in a final time of 1:42.40 for the mile and one sixteenth on the dirt track at Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore, Maryland. Her jockey, Chris McCarron, was credited with a solid ride by conserving energy with moderate fractions in the middle portion of the race. Stakes winner Artfully held on for third in the field of ten three-year-old fillies. In December 1976, What A Summer won the $50,000 Anne Arundel Stakes at Laurel Park Racecourse, beating Turn the Guns and Avum in 1:38.20 for the mile under McCarron.\n\nFour-year-old season \n\nIn 1977, What A Summer won the $75,000 Fall Highweight Handicap twice, carrying the high weight of 134 pounds under jockey Jacinto Vásquez. The Fall Highweight is run in November of each year at Aqueduct Racetrack. In the 1977 race, she finished in a time of 1:09.4 and she broke the stakes record for six furlongs. That year, she also won the $40,000 Silver Spoon Handicap, the $50,000 Maskette Handicap and the $35,000 Distaff Handicap. She placed second in the grade one Beldame Stakes at Belmont Park and showed in both the $40,000 Grey Flight Handicap and the $25,000 Regret Stakes.\n\nFive-year-old season \n\nIn 1978 as a five-year-old, What A Summer repeated two of her victories from the year before in both the Fall Highweight Handicap, under Hall of Fame jockey Ángel Cordero Jr., and the $40,000 Silver Spoon Handicap. She also won the $40,000 First Flight Handicap. She placed second in the grade two Vosburgh Stakes, the grade three Vagrancy Handicap, the Sport Page Handicap, the Suwanee River Handicap and the Egret Handicap.\n\nHonors \n\nWhat A Summer was named Maryland-bred horse of the year in 1977 and twice was named champion older mare for the state of Maryland in both 1977 and 1978. She was retired in 1978 and as a broodmare she produced several graded stakes winners. After her retirement, Laurel Park Racecourse named a race in honor, the What A Summer Stakes. She was an Eclipse Award winner and was named American Champion Sprint Horse in 1977.\n\nWhat A Summer ended her career with a record of 18 wins out of 31 starts in her career. Her most memorable race was perhaps her dominating performance in the de facto second leg of the filly Triple Crown, the Black-Eyed Susan Stakes. In addition to her 18 wins, she placed nine times with earnings of $479,161. That record of 27 first or second finishes in 31 starts at 87% is among the best in history.\n\nReferences\n What A Summer's pedigree and partial racing stats\n\n1973 racehorse births\nRacehorses bred in Maryland\nRacehorses trained in the United States\nEclipse Award winners\nThoroughbred family 17-b",
"Now What (foaled 1937, in Kentucky) was an American Thoroughbred Champion racehorse. Her dam was That's That, and her sire was the 1927 American Horse of the Year and two-time Leading sire in North America, Chance Play.\n\nBred by Guy and E. Paul Waggoner's Three D's Stock Farm of Fort Worth, Texas, Now What was raced by Alfred G. Vanderbilt II. Trained by Bud Stotler, she earned National Champion honors at age two after winning four important stakes races and running second in the Pimlico Nursery Stakes, and Juvenile Stakes. As a three-year-old, her best result in a top-level race was a second place finish in the Molly Brant Handicap at Saratoga Race Course. \n\nNow What served as a broodmare for Vanderbilt. Her most successful foal to race was Next Move, the 1950 American Champion Three-Year-Old Filly and the 1952 American Co-Champion Older Female Horse.\n\nPedigree\n\nReferences\n\n1937 racehorse births\nRacehorses bred in Kentucky\nRacehorses trained in the United States\nAmerican Champion racehorses\nVanderbilt family\nThoroughbred family 20\nGodolphin Arabian sire line"
]
|
[
"Sean Hannity",
"Career",
"how did he get his start",
"Hannity hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor.",
"how did it go",
"The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, \"I wasn't good at it. I was terrible.\"",
"what did others have to say",
"Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year.",
"what did he do next",
"After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications presenting himself as \"the most talked about college radio host in America.\"",
"what did that get him",
"Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host.",
"what year was that",
"I don't know."
]
| C_d5d7c3407dd148389b1d80a63090fca4_1 | how was this show | 7 | How was Hannity's afternoon talk show at the radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama? | Sean Hannity | Hannity hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible." Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year. This was after two shows featuring the book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS by Gene Antonio; among other remarks made during the broadcast, Hannity told a lesbian caller, "I feel sorry for your child." The university board that governed the station later reversed its decision due to a campaign conducted on Hannity's behalf by the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, which argued that the station had discriminated against Hannity's First Amendment rights. When the station refused to give him a public apology and more airtime, Hannity decided against returning to KCSB. After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America." Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996, Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes. Later that year, Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity was on WABC's afternoon time slot from January 1998 until the end of 2013. Since January 2014, Hannity has hosted the 3-6 p.m. time slot on WOR in New York City. In their 2007 book Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America, conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group." CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Sean Patrick Hannity (born December 30, 1961) is an American talk show host and conservative political commentator. He is the host of The Sean Hannity Show, a nationally syndicated talk radio show, and has also hosted a commentary program, Hannity, on Fox News, since 2009.
Hannity worked as a general contractor and volunteered as a talk show host at UC Santa Barbara in 1989. He later joined WVNN in Athens, Alabama and shortly afterward, WGST in Atlanta. After leaving WGST, he worked at WABC in New York until 2013. Since 2014, Hannity has worked at WOR.
In 1996, Hannity and Alan Colmes co-hosted Hannity & Colmes on Fox. After Colmes announced his departure in January 2008, Hannity merged the Hannity & Colmes show into Hannity.
Hannity has received several awards and honors, including an honorary degree from Liberty University. He has written three New York Times best-selling books: Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism; Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism; and Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, and released a fourth, Live Free or Die, in 2020.
Hannity has sometimes promoted conspiracy theories, such as "birtherism" (claims that then-President Barack Obama was not a legitimate U.S. citizen), claims regarding the murder of Seth Rich, and falsehoods about Hillary Clinton's health. Hannity was an early supporter of Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election. Hannity often acted as an unofficial spokesman for the president, criticizing the media and attacking Robert Mueller's inquiry into Russian interference in Trump's election. He reportedly spoke to Trump on the phone most weeknights. He spoke at the president's lectern during a Trump rally, and White House advisors characterized him as the "shadow" chief of staff. According to Forbes, by 2018 Hannity had become one of the most-watched hosts in cable news and most-listened-to hosts in talk radio, due in part to his closeness and access to Trump.
Early life and education
Hannity was born in New York City, New York, the son of Lillian (née Flynn) and Hugh Hannity. Lillian worked as a stenographer and a corrections officer at a county jail, while Hugh was a World War II veteran and family-court officer. He was the youngest of four siblings and the only boy. All his grandparents immigrated to the United States from Ireland. He grew up in Franklin Square, New York on Long Island.
In his youth, Hannity worked as a paperboy delivering issues of the New York Daily News and the Long Island Daily Press. His parents were initially supporters of President John F. Kennedy, eventually growing more Republican in their views as time went on, though they resisted being overtly political at home.
Hannity attended Sacred Heart Seminary in Hempstead, New York and St. Pius X Preparatory Seminary in Uniondale, New York. He attended New York University and Adelphi University, but did not graduate from either.
Career
In 1982, Hannity started a house-painting business and a few years later, worked as a building contractor in Santa Barbara, California. He hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time. Regarding his first show, he said, "I wasn't good at it. I was terrible."
Radio
Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year after a controversy. During two shows, gay and lesbian rights were discussed in what was considered to be a contentious manner. (See LGBT issues below.) The university board that governed the station later reversed its decision after a campaign conducted on Hannity's behalf by the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union argued that the station had discriminated against Hannity's First Amendment rights. When the station refused to issue Hannity a public apology and more airtime, he did not return to KCSB.
After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications, presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America". Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville media market), then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996, Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes.
Later that year, Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late-night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive-time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity was on WABC's afternoon time slot from January 1998.
In their 2007 book Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That Is Destroying America, conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group". The WABC slot continued until the end of 2013. Since January 2014, Hannity has hosted the 3:00–6:00p.m. time slot on WOR in New York City.
Hannity's radio program is a conservative political talk show that features Hannity's opinions and ideology related to current issues and politicians. The Sean Hannity Show began national syndication on September 10, 2001, on more than five hundred stations nationwide. In 2004, Hannity signed a $25million five-year contract extension with ABC Radio (now Citadel Media) to continue the show until 2009. The program was made available via Armed Forces Radio Network in 2006. In June 2007, ABC Radio was sold to Citadel Communications and in the summer of 2008, Hannity was signed for a $100million five-year contract. As of March 2018, the program is heard by more than 13.5 million listeners a week. Hannity was ranked No.2 in Talkers Magazine's 2017 Heavy Hundred and was listed as No.72 on Forbes' "Celebrity 100" list in 2013.
In January 2007, Clear Channel Communications signed a groupwide three-year extension with Hannity on more than eighty stations. The largest stations in the group deal included KTRH Houston, KFYI Phoenix, WPGB Pittsburgh, WKRC Cincinnati, WOOD Grand Rapids, WFLA Tampa, WOAI San Antonio, WLAC Nashville, and WREC Memphis.
Hannity signed a long-term contract to remain with Premiere Networks in September 2013.
At the beginning of 2014, Hannity signed contracts to air on several Salem Communications stations including WDTK Detroit, WIND Chicago, WWRC (now WQOF) Washington, D.C., and KSKY Dallas.
Television
Hannity was a co-host of Hannity & Colmes, an American political "point-counterpoint"-style television program on the Fox News Channel featuring Hannity and Alan Colmes as co-hosts. Hannity presented the conservative point of view with Colmes providing the liberal viewpoint.
While Hannity's views are typically politically and socially conservative, he has spoken supportively about birth control, which has led to on-air clashes with pro-life guests such as Rev. Thomas Euteneuer, president of Human Life International. Hannity said if the Catholic Church were to excommunicate him over his support for contraception, he would join Jerry Falwell's Thomas Road Baptist Church.
In January 2007, Hannity began a new Sunday night television show on Fox News, Hannity's America.
In November 2008, Colmes announced his departure from Hannity & Colmes. After the show's final broadcast on January 9, 2009, Hannity took over the time slot with his own new show, Hannity, which has a format similar to Hannity's America.
Books
Hannity is the author of four books. Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism was published in 2002, and Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism was published in 2004 through ReganBooks. Both these books reached the nonfiction New York Times bestseller list, the second of which stayed there for five weeks. Hannity has said he is too busy to write many books, and dictated a lot of his own two books into a tape recorder while driving in to do his radio show.
Hannity wrote his third book, Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, which was released by HarperCollins in March 2010. The book became Hannity's third New York Times Bestseller.
In 2020, Hannity released his fourth book, Live Free or Die.
Let Freedom Ring:Winning the War of Liberty Over Liberalism, William Morrow, August 1, 2002, .
Deliver Us From Evil:Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, William Morrow, February 17, 2004, .
Conservative Victory:Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, HarperCollins, March 30, 2010, .
Live Free or Die:America (and the World) on the Brink, Threshold Editions, August 4, 2020, .
Freedom Concerts
From 2003 until 2010, Hannity hosted country music-themed "Freedom Concerts" to raise money for charity. In 2010, conservative blogger Debbie Schlussel wrote that only a small percentage of the money raised by the concerts goes to the target charity, Freedom Alliance. The Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) filed complaints with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), also in 2010. The FTC complaint alleges that Hannity was "falsely promoting that all concert proceeds would be donated to a scholarship fund for the children of those killed or wounded in war". The complaint filed with the IRS claims that Freedom Alliance has violated its 501(c)3 charity status. The concerts stopped around the same year.
Awards and honors
Hannity received a Marconi Award in 2003 and 2007 as the Network Syndicated Personality of the Year from the National Association of Broadcasters.
In 2009, Talkers Magazine listed Hannity as No.2 on their list of the 100 most important radio talk show hosts in America (with Rush Limbaugh listed as No.1). The same magazine gave Hannity its Freedom of Speech Award in 2003.
In 2005, Jerry Falwell, chancellor of the evangelical Liberty University, awarded Hannity an honorary degree.
Hannity was inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame in November 2017.
Other activities
Hannity has had cameo appearances in film and television, having a brief voiceover in The Siege as an unseen reporter, and appearing in Atlas Shrugged: Part II and the second season of House of Cards as himself. He executive produced and appeared in the 2017 film Let There Be Light, which also stars Kevin Sorbo.
As of April 2018, Hannity owned at least 877 residential properties, which were bought for nearly $89million. He purchased some of the homes with the help of loans from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and most are in working-class neighborhoods. His property managers have taken an aggressive management approach with a much higher than average eviction rate. The Washington Post reported that his property management team has used eviction proceedings both to remove tenants and to generate revenue. His property managers have claimed that Hannity has no active role in the management of the more than 1,000 properties he has a stake in.
Controversies and criticism
According to The Washington Post, Hannity "repeatedly embraces storylines that prove to be inaccurate" and takes positions that change over time. In the opinion of The New York Times, Hannity is "barreling headfirst into the murky territory between opinion and out-and-out conspiracy theorism". Hannity often promotes conspiracy theories without explicitly endorsing them, unlike Alex Jones. The New York Times wrote that this "has the effect of nourishing the more wild-eyed beliefs of his fans while providing Hannity a degree of plausible deniability". The New Yorker wrote in 2019 that Hannity had "[spewed] baseless conspiracy theories with impunity".
During the Bush years, Hannity "loyally supported the president's policies". During the Obama administration, Hannity "leaned more heavily on stories he believed were being given short shrift by the 'liberal media'stories about where Obama was born, and who deserved blame for the attack on the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya". In 2017, The Washington Post wrote that "what Hannity has stood forat least for the past couple of yearsis Trump."
Birtherism
Although Hannity said he believed President Obama was born in the U.S., to answer queries on Obama's citizenship, he repeatedly called on Obama to release his birth certificate. Hannity described the circumstances regarding Obama's birth certificate as "odd". Hannity also defended and promoted those who questioned Obama's citizenship of the U.S., such as Donald Trump. Hannity invited Trump to his show while Trump was a leader in the birther movement; during an interview with Hannity, Trump said Obama "could have easily have come from Kenya, or someplace". Hannity said in response, "The issue could go away in a minute. Just show the certificate." Even after Obama produced his birth certificate in 2008, certified by the state of Hawaii, Hannity kept calling on Obama to release his birth certificate, asking why did he not "just produce it and we move on?" In October 2016, Hannity offered to purchase a one-way ticket to Kenya for Obama.
2016 presidential campaign
Candidacy of Donald Trump
Hannity is known for his pro-Trump coverage. According to The Washington Post, "Hannity's comeback coincided with his early, eager embrace of his fellow New Yorker... Trump attacked the Gold Star father, and Hannity stood by him. Trump went after a federal judge of Mexican descent, and Hannity backed him. After the Access Hollywood tape emerged of Trump making lewd comments about inappropriate sexual behaviour towards women, Hannity continued to defend him: 'King David had 500 concubines, for crying out loud.'" After the inauguration, the first interview the new president gave to a cable news channel was conducted by Hannity. Hannity additionally defended the Trump administration's false claim that Trump's inauguration crowd was the biggest ever.
Hannity has been criticized as being overly favorable to the candidacy of Donald Trump, and granting Trump more airtime than other presidential candidates during the 2016 primaries. Hannity, for instance, let Trump promote the false claim that Rafael Cruz, father of Trump's rival presidential candidate Ted Cruz, was involved in the John F. Kennedy assassination. He admitted to favoring Republican candidates, though without indicating a preference for Donald Trump over Ted Cruz. According to Dylan Byers of CNN, Hannity during interviews "frequently cites areas where he agrees with Trump, or where he thinks Trump was right about something, then asks him to expand on it", and "often ignores or defends Trump from criticism".
Tensions between Cruz and Hannity appeared to reach a boiling point during a contentious April 2016 radio interview, during which Cruz implied Hannity was a "hardcore Donald Trump supporter" and Hannity responded by accusing Cruz of "throw[ing] this in my face" every time he asked a "legitimate question". Jim Rutenberg commented in August 2016 that Hannity is "not only Mr. Trump's biggest media booster; he also veers into the role of adviser," citing sources who said Hannity spent months offering suggestions to Trump and his campaign on strategy and messaging. Hannity responded to the report by saying, "I'm not hiding the fact that I want Donald Trump to be the next President of the United States.... I never claimed to be a journalist." (In an article published in December 2017, Hannity said "I'm a journalist. But I'm an advocacy journalist, or an opinion journalist.") Hannity has feuded with several conservatives who oppose Trump, including National Reviews Jonah Goldberg, Wall Street Journal foreign affairs columnist Bret Stephens, and National Review editor Rich Lowry.
Conspiracy theories about Hillary Clinton
During the 2016 presidential election, Hannity periodically promoted conspiracy theories regarding Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party. Hannity repeatedly claimed that Clinton had very serious medical problems and that the media was covering them up. He misrepresented photos of Clinton to give the impression that she had secret medical problems. He shared a photo from the fringe news site Gateway Pundit and falsely claimed that it showed her Secret Service agent holding a diazepam pen intended to treat seizures, when he in fact was holding a small flashlight. He booked doctors on his show to discuss Clinton's health; although these people had never personally examined Clinton, they made alarmist statements about her state of health which turned out to be false. At one point, Hannity promoted an unsubstantiated report that Clinton had been drunk at a rally; at another point, he suggested that Clinton was drunk and that her campaign needed to "sober her up".
Murder of Seth Rich conspiracy theories
In May 2017, Hannity became a prominent promoter of the conspiracy theory that Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party had a DNC staffer killed. Shortly afterward, he faced backlash from both left- and right-wing sources and lost several advertisers, including Crowne Plaza Hotels, Cars.com, Leesa Mattress, USAA, Peloton and Casper Sleep deciding to pull their marketing from his program on Fox News. However, USAA decided to return to the show shortly after following a negative outcry against its decision to pull out. Conservative magazine National Review compared the story to a flat earth video, called it a "disgrace" that Hannity and other conspiracy theorists were hyping the story, and called for them to stop.
In March 2018, Seth Rich's parents filed a lawsuit against Fox News for pushing conspiracy theories about their son's death. The suit alleges that the network "intentionally exploited" the tragedy for political purposes. On Oct. 12, 2020, Fox News agreed to pay millions of dollars to the Rich family.
Claims about election fraud
Hannity came under criticism during the 2016 presidential election for false claims about election rigging during interviews. Hannity responded to this by citing Mitt Romney's failure in the 2012 United States presidential election to obtain any votes in 59 of 1,687 Philadelphia voting districts as proof of election rigging. However, Factcheck.org and PolitiFact found that it was not unusual at all for this to occur, as those electoral districts are heavily African-American. Philadelphia elections inspector Ryan Godfrey also refuted Hannity's claim.
After the 2020 election, Hannity amplified false claims of election fraud, including by hosting former Trump lawyer Sidney Powell on his Fox News show, where Powell made unsubstantiated allegations on the topic. Republican efforts to overturn the 2020 election results and install Donald Trump for a second term culminated in the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. In 2022, the U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack is investigating what Hannity may have known in advance. The committee discovered that, on December 31, 2020, Hannity texted White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, saying, "I do NOT see January 6 happening the way he [Trump] is being told." In December of 2020, a month after the election, Hannity called for Trump’s false claims of voter fraud to be investigated by a special prosecutor, despite there still being no credible evidence of them by the accusers. As of February of 2022, no credible evidence has been provided of these false claims that Hannity amplified.
WikiLeaks
In 2010, Hannity said WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was waging a "war" on the United States, and that Wikileaks put American lives in "jeopardy" and "danger" around the world. He also criticized the Obama administration for failing to apprehend Assange. In 2016, after Wikileaks published leaked emails from the Democratic National Committee, Hannity praised Assange for showing "how corrupt, dishonest and phony our government is". He told Assange in a September 2016 interview, "I do hope you get free one day. I wish you the best." The following month, Hannity claimed that WikiLeaks has revealed "everything that conspiracy theorists have said over the years" about Hillary Clinton is true.
In February 2017, Hannity retweeted a WikiLeaks tweet linking to an article by the conspiracy website Gateway Pundit, claiming that John McCain was a "globalist war criminal". McCain's spokeswoman called Hannity out on it, asking him to "correct the record". Hannity later deleted the tweet. In May 2017, Hannity made an offer to Assange to guest host his Fox News TV show.
Relationship with Donald Trump and Michael Cohen
Hannity developed a close relationship with Trump during the election and has become even closer during his presidency. The two men speak on the phone multiple times a week, discussing Hannity's weekday show, the special counsel investigation, even evaluating White House staff. Hannity shares, The Economist asserts, "Mr. Trump's love of conspiracy theories and hatred of snooty elites". They speak so often that one Trump adviser has said Hannity "basically has a desk in the place". On the air, Hannity echoes Trump's attacks on the media and Special Counsel investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. Trump sometimes quotes Hannity to others or promotes the show to his Twitter followers. Hannity has encouraged Trump to shut down the government to get funding for a border wall, as well as his declaration of a national emergency over the US–Mexico border.
According to reports by the Los Angeles Times and New York magazine, Hannity frequently talks to Trump by telephone after Hannity's weekday broadcasts, and Hannity is one of several dozen cleared callers whose calls to the White House public switchboard can be connected directly to the president.
Hannity stirred controversy in April 2018 when it was revealed that he shared a lawyer, Michael Cohen, with Trump. In a breach of journalistic ethics, Hannity had failed to disclose that Cohen was his lawyer while at the same time taking to the Fox airwaves to defend Cohen and criticize those who investigated him.
On April 9, 2018, federal agents from the U.S. Attorney's office served a search warrant on the office and residence of Michael Cohen, Trump's personal attorney. On the air, Hannity defended Cohen and criticized the federal action, calling it "highly questionable" and "an unprecedented abuse of power". On April 16, 2018, in a court hearing, Cohen's lawyers told the judge that Cohen had ten clients in 2017–2018 but did "traditional legal tasks" for only three: Trump, Elliott Broidy, and a "prominent person" who did not wish to be named for fear of being "embarrassed". The federal judge ordered the revelation of the third client, whom Cohen's lawyers named as Hannity. Although Hannity has covered Cohen on his show, he did not disclose that he had consulted with Cohen.
Fox News released a statement on April 16, 2018, attributed to Hannity: "Michael Cohen has never represented me in any matter. I never retained him, received an invoice, or paid legal fees. I have occasionally had brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective. I assumed those conversations were confidential, but to be absolutely clear they never involved any matter between me and a third party." Also, NBC News quoted Hannity as saying: "We definitely had attorney–client privilege because I asked him for that," while Hannity said on his radio show that he "might have handed him ten bucks" for the attorney-client privilege. Lastly, Hannity tweeted that his discussions with Cohen were "almost exclusively" about real estate.
The following day, news reports revealed that Hannity had shared another lawyer with Trump, Jay Sekulow. Sekulow had written a cease-and-desist letter to KFAQ on Hannity's behalf in May 2017, and later represented Trump in connection with the Mueller investigation.
In August 2018, Hannity allowed Sekulow and Rudy Giuliani, another personal lawyer for Trump, to host Hannity's radio show; the duo proceeded to defend Trump and promote arguments made by the Trump administration.
According to The New Yorker, Hannity has reversed on the issue of negotiations with North Korea: during Obama's presidency, Hannity called negotiations with North Korea "disturbing", whereas he called Trump's negotiations with North Korea a "huge foreign-policy win".
In June 2019, Hannity expressed outrage at Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's comment that she would like to see Trump "in prison". Hannity declared: "Based on no actual crimes, she wants a political opponent locked up in prison? That happens in banana republicsbeyond despicable behavior." Aaron Rupar of Vox criticized Hannity for "obvious hypocrisy", noting that Hannity himself had said in January 2018 regarding Hillary Clinton: "I think Hillary should be in jail. Lock her up." Aaron Blake of The Washington Post described Hannity's comment as "a pretty obvious bit of gaslighting", noting Hannity's loyalty to Trump, whose campaign rallies have featured chants of "Lock her up", and also Hannity's comments that Trump was free to investigate Clinton.
Hannity played the most important role in persuading Trump to pardon the convicted murderer and war criminal Clint Lorance.
Criticism of FBI, DOJ, and special counsel
During President Trump's administration, Hannity has repeatedly been highly critical of the FBI, DOJ, Special Counsel Robert Mueller, and others investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election. According to a review by Media Matters of all transcripts from the 254 episodes of Hannity's show from Mueller's appointment (May 17, 2017) to May 16, 2018, Hannity had 487 segments substantially devoted to Mueller (approximately two per episode), opened his program with Mueller 152 times (approximately three times per week), and the content of his show was highly critical of the probe and the media's coverage of the probe. He has called the Russia inquiry a "witch hunt", an "utter disgrace", and "a direct threat to you, the American people, and our American republic". Hannity has expressed skepticism of the U.S. intelligence community's view that Russia hacked the Democratic National Convention's emails during the 2016 election and has promoted various conspiracy theories. In March 2017 he publicized a theory, first proposed at the Wikileaks Twitter account, that the CIA could have done the hacking while making it look like Russia did it. In August he suggested that Seth Rich may have been the leaker.
Hannity has described the Mueller investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, as well as James Comey's tenure as FBI Director, as "one giant incestuous circle of corruption". In April 2018, Hannity ran a segment where he claimed there were "criminal" connections between Bill and Hillary Clinton, Mueller, and Comey. Hannity asserted that there were three connected "Deep State crime families" actively "trying to take down the president". A guest on the segment, attorney Joseph diGenova, called Mueller's team "legal terrorists" and referred to Comey as a "dirty cop".
Hannity also claimed that Mueller had been involved in the corrupt dealings of several FBI agents in connection with Boston, Massachusetts crime boss Whitey Bulger. The federal judge who presided over a lawsuit concerning the corrupt dealings said Hannity's claims were unsubstantiated and that Mueller was never accused of any wrongdoing nor even mentioned during the proceedings.
In June 2018, after reports that Mueller's probe had asked witnesses to turn their personal phones over to investigators for examination, Hannity sarcastically suggested on air to the witnesses that they "follow Hillary Clinton's lead" and destroy their personal phones so they cannot be examined.
In May 2019, after Mueller gave a statement saying the Special Counsel investigation did not exonerate Trump of crimes, Hannity said Mueller was "basically full of crap" and did not know the law.
Uranium One
From 2015 into 2018, Fox News broadcast extensive coverage of an alleged scandal surrounding the sale of Uranium One to Russian interests, which Hannity characterized as "one of the biggest scandals in American history". The Fox News coverage extended throughout the programming day, with particular emphasis by Hannity. The network promoted a narrative asserting that, as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton personally approved the Uranium One sale in exchange for $145million in bribes paid to the Clinton Foundation. Donald Trump repeated these allegations as a candidate and as president. No evidence of wrongdoing by Clinton had been found after three years of allegations, an FBI investigation, and the 2017 appointment of a Federal attorney to evaluate the investigation. In November 2017, Fox News host Shepard Smith concisely debunked the alleged scandal, including saying that Clinton did not personally approve the sale, infuriating viewers who suggested he should work for CNN or MSNBC. Hannity later called Smith "clueless", while Smith stated, "I get it, that some of our opinion programming is there strictly to be entertaining. I get that. I don't work there. I wouldn't work there."
A two-year Justice Department investigation initiated after Trump became president found no evidence to justify pursuing a criminal investigation.
Deep state
Hannity has advocated the QAnon and "deep state" conspiracy theories. The latter proposes a government officials network is working to hinder the Trump administration. He has described the deep state as a "Shadow Government" and "Deep state swamp of Obama holdovers and DC lifers". In March 2017, he called for a "purge" of Obama-era bureaucrats and appointees in government. In an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, conservative columnist Bret Stephens disputed Hannity's deep state allegations, saying they were an example of the "paranoid style in politics". Later that month, Hannity said NBC News was part of the deep state. In May 2017, he reiterated that deep state/intelligence operatives were trying to destroy the Trump presidency.
In March 2018, Hannity attacked Special Counsel Robert Mueller, saying his career was "anything but impeccable". Hannity said Mueller was friends with former FBI Director James Comey and former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, and that he "cannot be expected to honestly investigate scandals that his friends are directly involved in". He said these individuals were involved in "one massive, huge, deep-state conflict of interest after another. Now they're protecting themselves. They're trying to preserve their own power." Mueller and Comey are professional acquaintances but not known to be friends, while Trump attorney general Bill Barr said in 2019 that he and Mueller had been friends for thirty years.
Comments on sexual harassment
In 2016, Hannity vociferously defended Roger Ailes when he was accused by multiple women of sexual harassment. In May 2017, Hannity paid a tribute to Ailes after he died. Hannity called him "a second father" and said to Ailes' "enemies" that he was "preparing to kick your in the next life".
In April 2017, Hannity came to the defense of Fox News co-president Bill Shine after it was reported that Shine's job was at risk. At least four lawsuits alleged that Shine had ignored, enabled or concealed Ailes' alleged sexual harassment.
In September 2017, several months after Bill O'Reilly was fired from Fox News in the wake of a number of women's alleging that he had sexually harassed them, Hannity hosted O'Reilly on his show. Some Fox News employees criticized the decision. In the interview, O'Reilly attacked liberal media watchdog groups and said he should have fought harder when those groups targeted his advertisers. According to CNN, during the interview, Hannity found kinship with O'Reilly as he appeared "to feel that he and O'Reilly have both become victims of liberals looking to silence them".
Hannity came under criticism in October 2017 when he attacked Democrats after it became known that a large number of women had accused Harvey Weinstein, the Hollywood producer and donor to Democratic causes, of sexual harassment. Critics noted that Hannity had weeks earlier defended and hosted his coworker Bill O'Reilly who was fired following a number of sexual harassment allegations.
LGBT rights
In the radio show for KCSB, which was the subject of controversy in 1989, Hannity made anti-gay comments. He called AIDS a "gay disease" and said the media was hiding salient information from the public. Two editions featured anti-gay activist Gene Antonio, a Lutheran minister, discussing his book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS. In the book, Antonio claims that AIDS can be spread by people sneezing in close proximity to each other. Hannity encouraged Antonio when he said that AIDS spread when gay men consumed each other's feces, said that homosexuality was a "lower form of behavior", compared homosexual sex to "playing in a sewer" and gay people of being "filled with hatred and bigotry". When a lesbian, another broadcaster at the station, called into the show, Hannity said "I feel sorry for your child." Hannity was quoted at the time as having said "anyone listening to this show that believes homosexuality is a normal lifestyle has been brainwashed." The ACLU opposed his firing and petitioned the station to reverse their decision. Hannity demanded a formal apology and double the airtime. While the station did offer to allow Hannity to return, they would not meet Hannity's additional demands and he declined to return.
In 2017, Hannity said he regretted the comments and that they were "ignorant and embarrassing".
Immigration
Hannity opposed amnesty for undocumented immigrants; however, in 2012 he said he had evolved on the issue and favored a "pathway to citizenship". Later, he opposed that idea. By 2018, he was described as an immigration hardliner by CNN, The Washington Post, and New York magazine. In August 2018, Trump suggested that he might shut down the government to force Congress to fund his border wall, boasting that Hannity agreed with the action.
Islam
Hannity has warned of sharia law coming to the United States. Hannity opposed the building of Park51, a mosque two blocks from the World Trade Center site.
Hannity promoted the idea of "Islamic training camps right here in America", which were based on an unsubstantiated "documentary" by the Christian Action Network.
In 2006, Hannity was critical of Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to U.S. Congress, being sworn into office with an oath on a Quran. Hannity equated the Quran with Mein Kampf, asking a guest on his show whether he would have allowed Ellison "to choose, you know, Hitler's Mein Kampf, which is the Nazi bible?"
Torture
In 2009, Hannity said he supported enhanced interrogation, a euphemism for torture. He also volunteered to be waterboarded for charity. In response, Keith Olbermann pledged to donate $1,000 for every second of waterboarding Hannity underwent. In 2017, Hannity continued to advocate for waterboarding, raising the example of using it against a kidnapper. According to Media Matters, Hannity has not been waterboarded as of March 2018.
Climate change
Hannity rejects the scientific consensus on climate change. In 2001, he described it as "phony science from the left". In 2004, he falsely claimed that scientists couldn't agree on whether global warming was "scientific fact or fiction". In 2010, Hannity falsely stated that so-called "Climategate"the leaking of e-mails written by climate scientists that, according to climate change deniers, demonstrated scientific misconduct, but which all subsequent inquiries found to show no evidence of misconduct or wrongdoingwas a scandal that "exposed global warming as a myth cooked up by alarmists". Hannity frequently invites critics of climate science onto his shows.
Death panels
Hannity promoted the falsehood that the Affordable Care Act would create so-called "death panels". According to a study by Dartmouth College political scientist Brendan Nyhan, Hannity's show, along with the Laura Ingraham Show, were the first major conservative media personalities to latch onto the false claim of Betsy McCaughey, a former lieutenant governor of New York, that the Affordable Care Act contained death panels. When Sarah Palin stirred controversy by promoting the death panels myth, and argued her case in a Facebook post, Hannity defended her and said, "I agree with everything that she wrote." Hannity also claimed that he found the specific pages in the Affordable Care Act containing provisions on death panels.
A 2016 study found that Hannity promoted a number of falsehoods about the Affordable Care Act. For instance, Hannity falsely alleged several times that Democratic Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus had said Social Security could be "insolvent in two years" due to the Affordable Care Act. According to the study, Hannity, unlike other Fox News hosts such as Bill O'Reilly and Greta Van Susteren, "took a more direct approach, aggressively supporting Republicans and conservatives and attacking Democrats and liberals, endorsing the more spurious claims long after they were proven incorrect, and putting advocacy above accurate reporting, to further the network's themes opposing reform".
Jake Tapper
In November 2017, Fox News distorted a statement by Jake Tapper to make it appear as if he had said "Allahu Akbar" can be used under the most "beautiful circumstances" in the immediate aftermath of the 2017 New York City truck attack wherein a terrorist shouted "Allahu Akbar". Fox News omitted that Tapper had said the use of "Allahu Akbar" in the terrorist attack was not one of these circumstances. A headline on FoxNews.com was preceded by a tag reading "OUTRAGEOUS". The Fox News Twitter account distorted the statement even more, saying "Jake Tapper Says 'Allahu Akbar' Is 'Beautiful' Right After NYC Terror Attack" in a tweet that was later deleted.
Even after the Fox News Twitter account had deleted the tweet on Tapper's out-of-context comments, Hannity repeated the out-of-context comments to his viewers, calling Tapper "liberal fake news CNN's fake Jake Tapper" and mocking his ratings.
Appearance at November 2018 Trump rally
On November 4, 2018, Trump's website, DonaldJTrump.com, announced in a press release that Hannity would make a "special guest appearance" with Trump at a midterm campaign rally the following night in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. The following morning, Hannity tweeted "To be clear, I will not be on stage campaigning with the President." Hannity nevertheless spoke at Trump's lectern on stage at the rally, immediately mocking the "fake news" at the back of the auditorium, Fox News reporters among them. Several Fox News employees expressed outrage at Hannity's actions, with one stating, "a new line was crossed". Hannity later asserted that his action was not pre-planned, and Fox News stated it "does not condone any talent participating in campaign events". Fox News host Jeanine Pirro also appeared on stage with Trump at the rally. The Trump press release was later removed from Trump's website.
Foreign policy
In 2009, Hannity said of the Iraq War, "we were victorious in spite of the Democrats' efforts and attempts at preventing victory." During the 2016 election, Hannity vouched for Trump's claimed opposition to the Iraq War, "Mr. Trump and I disagreed about the Iraq war; I was for it and he was against it."
In June 2019, Hannity called on Trump to "bomb the hell of out Iran" after Iran shot down a U.S. drone. After the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, Hannity opened his show by saying, "tonight the world is safer as one of the most ruthless, evil war criminals on Earth has been brought to justice."
Ukraine
In February 2020, The Daily Beast acquired a leaked document entitled "Ukraine, Disinformation, & the Trump Administration" produced by a Fox News research team. The document warned of "disinformation" being pushed by frequent Hannity guests, including Rudy Giuliani, John Solomon, Victoria Toensing and Joe diGenova. Among other criticisms, the analysis noted that on his show Hannity discussed with Toensing and diGenova an affidavit from former Ukrainian prosecutor general Viktor Shokin that accused Joe Biden of getting him fired to end an investigation into Burisma Holdings, which employed Biden's son Hunter. The affidavit was drafted at the request of attorneys for Ukrainian oligarch Dmitry Firtash, but neither Hannity nor his guests disclosed to viewers that Toensing and diGenova were among Firtash's attorneys.
COVID-19 pandemic
In February 2020, amid the spread of COVID-19 to the United States, Hannity said "many on the left are now all rooting for corona to wreak havoc in the United States. Why? To score cheap, repulsive political points." In March 2020, he characterized the virus as a "hoax", and said it "may be true" that the outbreak was a "fraud" perpetrated by the "deep state". Later in March, as the disease spread into a global pandemic and Trump declared it a national emergency, Hannity started to take the virus more seriously, denying that he had referred to it as a hoax less than a month earlier. In July 2021, on live television, Hannity encouraged the audience to consider vaccination.
Personal life
Family and lifestyle
Hannity met Jill Rhodes in 1991 when he worked at WVNN in Huntsville, Alabama and she was a political columnist for the Huntsville Times. The two married in 1993. In June 2020, the couple announced that they had divorced the previous year but had separated years prior.
Hannity has since dated Fox News colleague Ainsley Earhardt. In August 2019, Hannity and Earhardt arrived together as guests for a wedding at Trump National Golf Course in Colt's Neck, New Jersey. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she has been hosting her Fox & Friends program from a remote studio in the basement of Hannity's Long Island mansion.
Hannity has two children from his marriage to Rhodes: a son, Patrick, born in 1998, and daughter, Merri, born in 2001. Both children graduated from Cold Spring Harbor High School. Patrick attended Wake Forest University where he played tennis. Merri attends The University of Michigan where she also plays tennis. In high school, Merri was the fourth highest ranked tennis player in New York State.
In 2018, Forbes estimated that Hannity's annual income was $36million, and the Guardian reported that he was believed to be the "hidden owner" of about $90 million in property that had been purchased by shell companies. In April 2021, he purchased a $5.3 million house several miles from Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago residence.
In 2014 he said he has carried a weapon "more than half my adult life". According to Hannity, he has a brown belt in martial arts and trains four days a week in the sport.
Religion
Hannity left the Catholic Church in 2019, citing "too much institutionalized corruption". However, he has said that as he has aged, his Christian faith has "gotten stronger" and that he needs and wants God in his life.
Bibliography
Hannity, Sean (2002). Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2004). Deliver Us from Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism, New York: ReganBooks, .
Hannity, Sean (2010). Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda, New York: Harper Paperbacks, .
Hannity, Sean (2020). Live Free or Die: America (and the World) On the Brink, New York: Simon & Schuster, .
See also
Fox News controversies
New Yorkers in journalism
References
External links
1961 births
Living people
21st-century American male writers
21st-century American non-fiction writers
Adelphi University alumni
American broadcast news analysts
American conservative talk radio hosts
American male non-fiction writers
American people of Irish descent
American political commentators
American political writers
Christians from New York (state)
Conservative Party of New York State politicians
Former Roman Catholics
Fox News people
Male critics of feminism
New York (state) Independents
New York (state) Republicans
New York University alumni
People from Centre Island, New York
People from Franklin Square, New York
Radio personalities from New York City
Right-wing populism in the United States
University of California, Santa Barbara alumni
Writers from New York City | false | [
"\"Show Me How\" is a song recorded by R&B group the Emotions for their 1971 album Untouched. It was released as the album's first single in September 1971 by Volt Records and reached No. 11 on the Cashbox Top R&B Singles chart and No. 13 on the Billboard Hot R&B Singles chart.\n\nOverview\n\"Show Me How\" was produced and arranged by Isaac Hayes who composed the song along with David Porter. With a duration of 3 minutes and 4 seconds the song was also arranged by Hayes and Dale Warren.\n\nCritical reception\nCashbox described Show Me How as an \"enticing ballad\".\n\nSamples\n\"Show Me How\" was sampled by Awon on the track Undefeated off his 2013 album For the Grimy (Searching for Soulville).\n\nAppearances in other media\nDuring November 1971 The Emotions performed Show Me How on an episode of Soul Train.\n\nReferences\n\n1971 songs\n1971 singles\nThe Emotions songs\nStax Records singles\nSongs written by Isaac Hayes\nSongs written by David Porter (musician)",
"55 North Maple was a Canadian afternoon television series which aired on CBC Television in the 1970-1971 television season. The programme was a fusion of talk show, how-to and situation comedy.\n\nPremise\nA magazine author (Max Ferguson) lives in a house at 55 North Maple with his sister (Joan Drewery) and her husband who was not cast but whose presence is implied. This premise provides a pretext to host various guests to demonstrate food preparation, redecoration or other how-to topics. In one episode, Ferguson described how to make carrot whiskey for guest Harry Freedman, while Drewery hosted other guests to illustrate interior decoration and fashion. A CBC statement described the production as \"an information show in semi-dramatic form.\"\n\nProduction\n55 North Maple was produced by Elsa Franklin in Toronto at the studios of Robert Lawrence Productions. John Ross was the programme's executive producer who allowed Ferguson \"full scope for his inventive genius\" and intended that the episodes would be unscripted. This marked a rare television production for Ferguson.\n\nThe 1973 Canadian series The Real Magees was a subsequent attempt to produce another talk show which was structured around storyline elements.\n\nScheduling\nThe half-hour programme aired weekday afternoons at 1:30 p.m. (Eastern).\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n \n\nCBC Television original programming\n1970 Canadian television series debuts\n1971 Canadian television series endings\nTelevision shows filmed in Toronto"
]
|
[
"Julius Evola",
"Racism and mystical Aryanism"
]
| C_64b521f2f9cc4df09098f27ba0a07a51_0 | What were his views on racism? | 1 | What were Julius Evola's views on racism? | Julius Evola | Evola's dissent from standard biological concepts of race had roots in his aristocratic elitism, since Nazi Volkisch ideology inadequately separated aristocracy from "commoners." According to Furlong, Evola developed "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes--sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves". Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies." Prior to the end of War, Evola had frequently used the term "Aryan" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman 'super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men'...no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights of the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta." Evola spoke of "inferior non-European races". Peter Merkl wrote that "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote: "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanatiscm [are] all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West." While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957, Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of "negroes" and the opposition to segregation. Furlong noted that this article is "among the most extreme in phraseology of any he wrote, and exhibits a degree of intolerance that leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people." CANNOTANSWER | Evola spoke of "inferior non-European races". Peter Merkl wrote that "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". | Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola (; 19 May 1898 11 June 1974), better known as Julius Evola, was an Italian philosopher, poet, and painter whose esoteric worldview featured antisemitic conspiracy theories and the occult. He has been described as a "fascist intellectual", a "radical traditionalist", "antiegalitarian, antiliberal, antidemocratic, and antipopular", and as "the leading philosopher of Europe's neofascist movement".
Evola is popular in fringe circles, largely because of his metaphysical, magical, and supernatural beliefs – including belief in ghosts, telepathy, and alchemyand his traditionalism. He termed his philosophy "magical idealism". Many of Evola's theories and writings were centered on his hostility toward Christianity and his idiosyncratic mysticism, occultism, and esoteric religious studies, and this aspect of his work has influenced occultists and esotericists. Evola also justified male domination over women as part of a purely patriarchal society, an outlook stemming from his traditionalist views on gender, which demanded women stay in or revert to what he saw as their traditional gender roles, where they were completely subordinate to male authority.
According to the scholar Franco Ferraresi, "Evola's thought can be considered one of the most radical and consistent anti-egalitarian, anti-liberal, anti-democratic, and anti-popular systems in the 20th century". It is a singular, though not necessarily original, blend of several schools and traditions, including German idealism, Eastern doctrines, traditionalism, and the all-embracing Weltanschauung of the interwar conservative revolutionary movement with which Evola had a deep personal involvement. Historian Aaron Gillette described Evola as "one of the most influential fascist racists in Italian history".
Evola admired SS head Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler, whom he once met. Autobiographical remarks by Evola allude to his having worked for the Sicherheitsdienst, or SD, the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party. During his trial in 1951, Evola denied being a fascist and instead referred to himself as "" (). Concerning this statement, historian Elisabetta Cassina Wolff wrote that "It is unclear whether this meant that Evola was placing himself above or beyond Fascism".
Evola has been called the "chief ideologue" of Italy's radical right after World War II. He continues to influence contemporary traditionalist and neo-fascist movements.
Life
Giulio Cesare Evola was born in Rome, the son of Vincenzo Evola (born 1854) and Concetta Mangiapane (born 1865). Both his parents had been born in Cinisi, a small town in the Province of Palermo on the north-western coast of Sicily. The paternal grandparents of Giulio Cesare Evola were Giuseppe Evola and Maria Cusumano. Giuseppe Evola is reported as being a joiner in Vincenzo's birth record. The maternal grandparents of Giulio Cesare Evola were Cesare Mangiapane, reported as being a shopkeeper in Concetta's birth record, and his wife Caterina Munacó. Vincenzo Evola and Concetta Mangiapane were married in Cinisi on 25 November 1892. Vincenzo Evola is reported as being a telegraphic mechanic chief, while Concetta Mangiapane is reported as being a landowner.
Giulio Cesare Evola had an elder brother, Giuseppe Gaspare Dinamo Evola, born in 1895 in Rome. Following a slight variation on the Sicilian naming convention of the era, as the second son, Giulio Cesare Evola was partly named after his maternal grandfather.
Evola has been often been reported as being a baron, probably in reference to a purported distant relationship with a minor aristocratic family, the Evoli, who were the barons of Castropignano in the Kingdom of Sicily in the late Middle Ages.
Little is known about Evola's early upbringing except that he considered it irrelevant. He studied engineering at the Istituto Tecnico Leonardo da Vinci in Rome, but did not complete his course, later claiming this was because he "did not want to be associated in any way with bourgeois academic recognition and titles such as doctor and engineer."
In his teenage years, Evola immersed himself in painting—which he considered one of his natural talents—and literature, including Oscar Wilde and Gabriele d'Annunzio. He was introduced to philosophers such as Friedrich Nietzsche and Otto Weininger. Other early philosophical influences included Carlo Michelstaedter and Max Stirner.
In the First World War, Evola served as an artillery officer on the Asiago plateau. He was attracted to the avant-garde, and after the war he briefly associated with Filippo Tommaso Marinetti's Futurist movement. Through his painting and poetry, and through work on the short-lived journal Revue Bleue, he became a prominent representative of Dadaism in Italy. In 1922, after concluding that avant-garde art was becoming commercialized and stiffened by academic conventions, he reduced his focus on artistic expression such as painting and poetry.
Evola was arrested in April 1951 by the Political Office of the Rome Police Headquarters and charged on suspicion that he was an ideologist of the militant neofascist organization Fasci di Azione Rivoluzionaria (FAR). Evola was defended by Prof. Francesco Carnelutti. On November 20, 1951, Evola was acquitted of all charges.
Evola died on 11 June 1974 in Rome from congestive heart failure.
Writing career
Christianity
In 1928, Evola wrote an attack on Christianity titled Pagan Imperialism, which proposed transforming fascism into a system consistent with ancient Roman values and Western esotericism. Evola proposed that fascism should be a vehicle for reinstating the caste system and aristocracy of antiquity. Although he invoked the term "fascism" in this text, his diatribe against the Catholic Church was criticized by both Mussolini's fascist regime and the Vatican itself. A. James Gregor argued that the text was an attack on fascism as it stood at the time of writing, but noted that Mussolini made use of it to threaten the Vatican with the possibility of an "anti-clerical fascism". On account of Evola's anti-Christian proposals, in April 1928 the Vatican-backed right wing Catholic journal Revue Internationale des Sociétés Secrètes published an article entitled "Un Sataniste Italien: Julius Evola", accusing him of satanism.
In his The Mystery of the Grail (1937), Evola discarded Christian interpretations of the Holy Grail and wrote that it symbolizes the principle of an immortalizing and transcendent force connected to the primordial state ... The mystery of the Grail is a mystery of a warrior initiation.He held that the Ghibellines, who had fought the Guelph for control of Northern and Central Italy in the thirteenth century, had within them the residual influences of pre-Christian Celtic and Nordic traditions that represented his conception of the Grail myth. He also held that the Guelph victory against the Ghibellines represented a regression of the castes, since the merchant caste took over from the warrior caste. In the epilogue to this book, Evola argued that the fictitious The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, regardless of whether it was authentic or not, was a cogent representation of modernity. The historian Richard Barber said, Evola mixes rhetoric, prejudice, scholarship, and politics into a strange version of the present and future, but in the process he brings together for the first time interest in the esoteric and in conspiracy theory which characterize much of the later Grail literature.
Buddhism
In his The Doctrine of Awakening (1943), Evola argued that the Pāli Canon could be held to represent true Buddhism. His interpretation of Buddhism is that it was intended to be anti-democratic. He believed that Buddhism revealed the essence of an "Aryan" tradition that had become corrupted and lost in the West. He believed it could be interpreted to reveal the superiority of a warrior caste. Harry Oldmeadow described Evola's work on Buddhism as exhibiting a Nietzschean influence, but Evola criticized Nietzsche's purported anti-ascetic prejudice. Evola claimed that the book "received the official approbation of the Pāli [Text] Society", and was published by a reputable Orientalist publisher. Evola's interpretation of Buddhism, as put forth in his article "Spiritual Virility in Buddhism", is in conflict with the post-WWII scholarship of the Orientalist Giuseppe Tucci, who argues that the viewpoint that Buddhism advocates universal benevolence is legitimate. Arthur Versluis stated that Evola's writing on Buddhism was a vehicle for his own theories, but was a far from accurate rendition of the subject, and he held that much the same could be said of Evola's writing on Hermeticism. Ñāṇavīra Thera was inspired to become a bhikkhu from reading Evola's text The Doctrine of Awakening in 1945 while hospitalized in Sorrento.
Modernity
Evola's Revolt Against the Modern World (1934) promotes the mythology of an ancient Golden Age which gradually declined into modern decadence. In this work, Evola described the features of his idealized traditional society in which religious and temporal power were created and united not by priests, but by warriors expressing spiritual power. In mythology, he saw evidence of the West's superiority over the East. Moreover, he claimed that the traditional elite had the ability to access power and knowledge through a hierarchical magic which differed from the lower "superstitious and fraudulent" forms of magic. Evola insists that only "nonmodern forms, institutions, and knowledge" could produce a "real renewal ... in those who are still capable of receiving it." The text was "immediately recognized by Mircea Eliade and other intellectuals who allegedly advanced ideas associated with Tradition." Eliade was one of the most influential twentieth-century historians of religion, a fascist sympathizer associated with the Romanian Christian right wing movement Iron Guard. Evola was aware of the importance of myth from his readings of Georges Sorel, one of the key intellectual influences on fascism. Hermann Hesse described Revolt Against the Modern World as "really dangerous."
During the 1960s Evola thought the right could no longer reverse the corruption of modern civilization. E. C. Wolff noted that this is why Evola wrote Ride the Tiger, choosing to distance himself completely from active political engagement, without excluding the possibility of action in the future. He argued that one should stay firm and ready to intervene when the tiger of modernity "is tired of running." Goodrick-Clarke notes that, "Evola sets up the ideal of the 'active nihilist' who is prepared to act with violence against modern decadence."
Other writings
In the posthumously published collection of writings, Metaphysics of War, Evola, in line with the conservative revolutionary Ernst Jünger, explored the viewpoint that war could be a spiritually fulfilling experience. He proposed the necessity of a transcendental orientation in a warrior.
From 1934 to 1943 Evola was also responsible for 'Diorama Filosofico', the cultural page of Il Regime Fascista, a daily newspaper owned by Roberto Farinacci. He would also contribute during the same period to Giovanni Preziosi magazine La vita italiana.
Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke has written that Evola's 1945 essay "American 'Civilization'" described the United States as "the final stage of European decline into the 'interior formlessness' of vacuous individualism, conformity and vulgarity under the universal aegis of money-making." According to Goodrick-Clarke, Evola argued that the U.S. "mechanistic and rational philosophy of progress combined with a mundane horizon of prosperity to transform the world into an enormous suburban shopping mall."
Evola translated some works of Oswald Spengler and Ortega y Gasset to Italian.
Occultism and esotericism
Around 1920, Evola's interests led him into spiritual, transcendental, and "supra-rational" studies. He began reading various esoteric texts and gradually delved deeper into the occult, alchemy, magic, and Oriental studies, particularly Tibetan Tantric yoga. A keen mountaineer, Evola described the experience as a source of revelatory spiritual experiences. After his return from the war, Evola experimented with hallucinogens and magic.
When he was about 23 years old, Evola considered suicide. He claimed that he avoided suicide thanks to a revelation he had while reading an early Buddhist text that dealt with shedding all forms of identity other than absolute transcendence. Evola would later publish the text The Doctrine of Awakening, which he regarded as a repayment of his debt to Buddhism for saving him from suicide.
Evola wrote prodigiously on Eastern mysticism, Tantra, hermeticism, the myth of the Holy Grail and Western esotericism. German Egyptologist and esoteric scholar Florian Ebeling has noted that Evola's The Hermetic Tradition is viewed as an "extremely important work on Hermeticism" in the eyes of esotericists. Evola gave particular focus to Cesare della Riviera's text Il Mondo Magico degli Heroi, which he later republished in modern Italian. He held that Riviera's text was consonant with the goals of "high magic"the reshaping of the earthly human into a transcendental 'god man'. According to Evola, the alleged "timeless" Traditional science was able to come to lucid expression through this text, in spite of the "coverings" added to it to prevent accusations from the church. Though Evola rejected Carl Jung's interpretation of alchemy, Jung described Evola's The Hermetic Tradition as a "magisterial account of Hermetic philosophy". In Hegel and the Hermetic Tradition, the philosopher Glenn Alexander Magee favored Evola's interpretation over that of Jung's. In 1988, a journal devoted to Hermetic thought published a section of Evola's book and described it as "Luciferian."
Evola later confessed that he was not a Buddhist, and that his text on Buddhism was meant to balance his earlier work on the Hindu tantras. Evola's interest in tantra was spurred on by correspondence with John Woodroffe. Evola was attracted to the active aspect of tantra, and its claim to provide a practical means to spiritual experience, over the more "passive" approaches in other forms of Eastern spirituality. In Tantric Buddhism in East Asia, Richard K. Payne, Dean of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, argued that Evola manipulated Tantra in the service of right wing violence, and that the emphasis on "power" in The Yoga of Power gave insight into his mentality.
Evola advocated that "differentiated individuals" following the Left-Hand Path use dark violent sexual powers against the modern world. For Evola, these "virile heroes" are both generous and cruel, possess the ability to rule, and commit "Dionysian" acts that might be seen as conventionally immoral. For Evola, the Left Hand path embraces violence as a means of transgression.
According to A. James Gregor Evola's definition of spirituality can be found in Meditations on the Peaks: "what has been successfully actualized and translated into a sense of superiority which is experienced inside by the soul, and a noble demeanor, which is expressed in the body." Goodrick-Clarke wrote that Evola's "rigorous New Age spirituality speaks directly to those who reject absolutely the leveling world of democracy, capitalism, multi-racialism and technology at the outset of the twenty-first century. Their acute sense of cultural chaos can find powerful relief in his ideal of total renewal." Thomas Sheehan wrote that to "read Evola is to take a trip through a weird and fascinating jungle of ancient mythologies, pseudo-ethnology, and transcendental mysticism that is enough to make any southern California consciousness-tripper feel quite at home."
Magical idealism
Thomas Sheehan wrote that "Evola's first philosophical works from the 'twenties were dedicated to reshaping neo-idealism from a philosophy of Absolute Spirit and Mind into a philosophy of the "absolute individual" and action." Accordingly, Evola developed the doctrine of "magical idealism", which held that "the Ego must understand that everything that seems to have a reality independent of it is nothing but an illusion, caused by its own deficiency." For Evola, this ever-increasing unity with the "absolute individual" was consistent with unconstrained liberty, and therefore unconditional power. In his 1925 work Essays on Magical Idealism, Evola declared that "God does not exist. The Ego must create him by making itself divine."
According to Sheehan, Evola discovered the power of metaphysical mythology while developing his theories. This led to his advocacy of supra-rational intellectual intuition over discursive knowledge. In Evola's view, discursive knowledge separates man from Being. Sheehan stated that this position is a theme in certain interpretations of Western philosophers such as Plato, Thomas Aquinas, and Martin Heidegger that was exaggerated by Evola. Evola would later write:
Evola developed a doctrine of the "two natures": the natural world and the primordial "world of 'Being'". He believed that these "two natures" impose form and quality on lower matter and create a hierarchical "great chain of Being." He understood "spiritual virility" as signifying orientation towards this postulated transcendent principle. He held that the State should reflect this "ordering from above" and the consequent hierarchical differentiation of individuals according to their "organic preformation". By "organic preformation" he meant that which "gathers, preserves, and refines one's talents and qualifications for determinate functions."
Ur Group
Evola was introduced to esotericism by Arturo Reghini, who was an early supporter of fascism. Reghini sought to promote a "cultured magic" opposed to Christianity and introduced Evola to the traditionalist René Guénon. In 1927, Reghini and Evola, along with other Italian esotericists, founded the Gruppo di Ur ("Ur Group"). The purpose of this group was to attempt to bring the members' individual identities into such a superhuman state of power and awareness that they would be able to exert a magical influence on the world. The group employed techniques from Buddhist, Tantric, and rare Hermetic texts. They aimed to provide a "soul" to the burgeoning Fascist movement of the time through the revival of ancient Roman religion, and to influence the fascist regime through esotericism.
Articles on occultism from the Ur Group were later published in Introduction to Magic. Reghini's support of Freemasonry would however prove a bone of contention for Evola; accordingly, Evola broke with Reghini in 1928. Reghini himself broke from Evola, accusing Evola of plagiarizing his thoughts in the book Pagan Imperialism. Evola, on the other hand, blamed Reghini for the premature publication of Pagan Imperialism. Evola's later work owed a considerable debt to René Guénon's text Crisis of the Modern World, though he diverged from Guénon on the issue of the relationship between warriors and priests.
Views on sex and gender roles
Julius Evola believed that the alleged higher qualities expected of a man of a particular race were not those expected of a woman of the same race. He held that "just relations between the sexes" involved women acknowledging their "inequality" with men. In 1925, he wrote an article titled "La donna come cosa" ("Woman as Thing"). Evola later quoted Joseph de Maistre's statement that "Woman cannot be superior except as woman, but from the moment in which she desires to emulate man she is nothing but a monkey." Evola believed that women's liberation was "the renunciation by woman of her right to be a woman". A woman "could traditionally participate in the sacred hierarchical order only in a mediated fashion through her relationship with a man." He held, as a feature of his idealized gender relations, the Hindu sati, which for him was a form of sacrifice indicating women's respect for patriarchal traditions. For the "pure, feminine" woman, "man is not perceived by her as a mere husband or lover, but as her lord." Women would find their true identity in total subjugation to men.
Evola regarded matriarchy and goddess religions as a symptom of decadence, and preferred a hyper-masculine, warrior ethos.
Evola was influenced by Hans Blüher; he was a proponent of the Männerbund concept as a model for his proposed ultra-fascist "Order". Goodrick-Clarke noted the fundamental influence of Otto Weininger's book Sex and Character on Evola's dualism of male-female spirituality. According to Goodrich-Clarke, "Evola's celebration of virile spirituality was rooted in Weininger's work, which was widely translated by the end of the First World War." Unlike Weininger, Evola believed that women needed to be conquered, not ignored. Evola denounced homosexuality as "useless" for his purposes. He did not neglect sadomasochism, so long as sadism and masochism "are magnifications of an element potentially present in the deepest essence of eros." Then, it would be possible to "extend, in a transcendental and perhaps ecstatic way, the possibilities of sex."
Evola held that women "played" with men, threatened their masculinity, and lured them into a "constrictive" grasp with their sexuality. He wrote that "It should not be expected of women that they return to what they really are ... when men themselves retain only the semblance of true virility", and lamented that "men instead of being in control of sex are controlled by it and wander about like drunkards". He believed that in Tantra and in sex magic, in which he saw a strategy for aggression, he found the means to counter the "emasculated" West. According to Annalisa Merelli, Evola "went so far as to justify rape" because he saw it "as a natural expression of male desire". Evola also said that the "ritual violation of virgins", and "whipping women" were a means of "consciousness raising", so long as these practices were done to the intensity required to produce the proper "liminal psychic climate". He wrote that "as a rule, nothing stirs a man more than feeling the woman utterly exhausted beneath his own hostile rapture."
Evola translated Weininger's Sex and Character into Italian. Dissatisfied with simply translating Weininger's work, he wrote the text Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), where his views on sexuality were dealt with at length. Arthur Versluis described this text as Evola's "most interesting" work aside from Revolt Against the Modern World. This book remains popular among many 'New Age' adherents.
Views on race
Evola's dissent from standard biological concepts of race had roots in his aristocratic elitism, since Nazi völkisch ideology inadequately separated aristocracy from "commoners." According to European studies professor Paul Furlong, Evola developed "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes—sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves". Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies."
In 1941, Evola's book Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race (Italian: Sintesi di Dottrina della Razza) was published by Hoepli. It provides an overview of his ideas concerning race and eugenics, introducing the concept of "spiritual racism", and "esoteric-traditionalist racism".
Prior to the end of the War, Evola had frequently used the term "Aryan" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men' ... no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights of the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta."
Evola spoke of "inferior non-European races". Peter Merkl wrote that "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote: "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanaticism [are] all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West." While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957 Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of "negroes" and the opposition to segregation. Furlong noted that this article is "among the most extreme in phraseology of any he wrote, and exhibits a degree of intolerance that leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people."
National mysticism
For his spiritual interpretation of the different racial psychologies, Evola found the work of German race theorist Ludwig Ferdinand Clauss invaluable. Like Evola, Clauss believed that physical race and spiritual race could diverge as a consequence of miscegenation. Evola's racism included racism of the body, soul, and spirit, giving primacy to the latter factor, writing that "races only declined when their spirit failed."
Like René Guénon, Evola believed that mankind is living in the Kali Yuga of the Hindu tradition—the Dark Age of unleashed materialistic appetites. He argued that both Italian fascism and Nazism represented hope that the "celestial" Aryan race would be reconstituted. He drew on mythological accounts of super-races and their decline, particularly the Hyperboreans, and maintained that traces of Hyperborean influence could be felt in Indo-European man. He felt that Indo-European men had devolved from these higher mythological races. Gregor noted that several contemporary criticisms of Evola's theory were published: "In one of Fascism's most important theoretical journals, Evola's critic pointed out that many Nordic-Aryans, not to speak of Mediterranean Aryans, fail to demonstrate any Hyperborean properties. Instead, they make obvious their materialism, their sensuality, their indifference to loyalty and sacrifice, together with their consuming greed. How do they differ from 'inferior' races, and why should anyone wish, in any way, to favor them?"
Concerning the relationship between "spiritual racism" and biological racism, Evola put forth the following viewpoint, which Furlong described as pseudo-scientific:
Views on Jews
Evola endorsed Otto Weininger's views on the Jews. Though Evola viewed Jews as corrosive and anti-traditional, he described Adolf Hitler's more fanatical antisemitism as a paranoid idée fixe that damaged the reputation of the Third Reich. Evola's conception did not emphasize the Nazi racial conception of Jews as "representatives of a biological race"—in Evola's view the Jews were "the carriers of a world view ... a spirit [that] corresponded to the 'worst' and 'most decadent' features of modernity: democracy, egalitarianism and materialism." Evola rejected the views of chief Nazi theorist Alfred Rosenberg and others on biological racism as being reductionist and materialistic. Jewry was for Evola, as for Weininger, only a symbol for the rule of money and individualism. Otto Weininger desbribed Jewishness as "intellectual tendency".
Evola argued that the fabricated antisemitic text The Protocols of the Elders of Zion—whether or not a forgery—accurately reflect the conditions of modernity. He believed that the Protocols "contain the plan for an occult war, whose objective is the utter destruction, in the non-Jewish peoples, of all tradition, class, aristocracy, and hierarchy, and of all moral, religious, and spiritual values." He wrote the foreword to the second Italian edition of the Protocols, which was published by the Fascist Giovanni Preziosi in 1938.
Following the murder of his friend Corneliu Zelea Codreanu, the leader of the Fascist Romanian Iron Guard, Evola expressed anticipation of a "Talmudic, Israelite tyranny." However, Evola believed that Jews had this "power" only because of European "decadence" in modernity. He also believed that one could be "Aryan", but have a "Jewish" soul, just as one could be "Jewish", but have an "Aryan" soul. In Evola's view, Otto Weininger and Carlo Michelstaedter were Jews of "sufficiently heroic, ascetic, and sacral" character to fit the latter category.
Views on "caste" and class
Julius Evola believe that society develops a "regression of castes" where classes he viewed as superior were replaced by those he viewed as inferior.
He believed that the rule of spiritual leaders (the highest class) was replaced by that of warriors (the second highest) then by merchants and finally by the proletariat (whom he described as "spiritual eunuchs", quoting another philosopher).
He believed that each aspect of society was effected by the dominant "caste", for example, war in the first type was "holy war" and in the second type "defending the honour of one's lord". In addition, bourgeois rule makes "usury" socially acceptable.
Fascism
Evola developed a line of argument, closely related to the spiritual orientation of Traditionalist writers such as René Guénon and the political concerns of the European authoritarian right. Evola's first published political work was an anti-fascist piece in 1925. In this work, Evola called Italy's fascist movement a "laughable revolution," based on empty sentiment and materialistic concerns. He applauded Mussolini's anti-bourgeois orientation and his goal of making Italian citizens into hardened warriors, but criticized Fascist populism, party politics, and elements of leftism that he saw in the fascist regime. Evola saw Mussolini's Fascist Party as possessing no cultural or spiritual foundation. He was passionate about infusing it with these elements in order to make it suitable for his ideal conception of Übermensch culture which, in Evola's view, characterized the imperial grandeur of pre-Christian Europe. He expressed anti-nationalist sentiment, stating that to become "truly human," one would have to "overcome brotherly contamination" and "purge oneself" of the feeling that one is united with others "because of blood, affections, country or human destiny." He also opposed the futurism that Italian fascism was aligned with, along with the "plebeian" nature of the movement. Accordingly, Evola launched the journal La Torre (The Tower), to voice his concerns and advocate for a more elitist fascism. Evola's ideas were poorly received by the fascist mainstream as it stood at the time of his writing.
Mussolini
Scholars disagree about why Benito Mussolini embraced racist ideology in 1938—some scholars have written that Mussolini was more motivated by political considerations than ideology when he introduced antisemitic legislation in Italy. Other scholars have rejected the argument that the racial ideology of Italian fascism could be attributed solely to Nazi influence. A more recent interpretation is that Mussolini was frustrated by the slow pace of fascist transformation and, by 1938, had adopted increasingly radical measures including a racial ideology. Aaron Gillette has written that "Racism would become the key driving force behind the creation of the new fascist man, the uomo fascista."
Mussolini read Evola's Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race in August 1941, and met with Evola to offer him his praise. Evola later recounted that Mussolini had found in his work a uniquely Roman form of Fascist racism distinct from that found in Nazi Germany. With Mussolini's backing, Evola started preparing the launch of a minor journal Sangue e Spirito (Blood and Spirit) which never appeared. While not always in agreement with German racial theorists, Evola traveled to Germany in February 1942 and obtained support for German collaboration on Sangue e Spirito from "key figures in the German racial hierarchy." Fascists appreciated the palingenetic value of Evola's "proof" "that the true representatives of the state and the culture of ancient Rome were people of the Nordic race." Evola eventually became Italy's leading racial philosopher.
Evola blended Sorelianism with Mussolini's eugenics agenda. Evola has written that "The theory of the Aryo-Roman race and its corresponding myth could integrate the Roman idea proposed, in general, by fascism, as well as give a foundation to Mussolini's plan to use his state as a means to elevate the average Italian and to enucleate in him a new man."
In May, 1951, Evola was arrested and charged with promoting the revival of the Fascist Party, and of glorifying Fascism. Defending himself at trial, Evola stated that his work belonged to a long tradition of anti-democratic writers who certainly could be linked to fascism—at least fascism interpreted according to certain Evolian criteria—but who certainly could not be identified with the Fascist regime under Mussolini. Evola then declared that he was not a Fascist but was instead "" (). He was acquitted.
Third Reich
Finding Italian fascism too compromising, Evola began to seek recognition in Nazi Germany. Evola spent a considerable amount of time in Germany in 1937 and 1938, and gave a series of lectures to the German–Italian Society in 1938. Evola took issue with Nazi populism and biological materialism. SS authorities initially rejected Evola's ideas as supranational and aristocratic though he was better received by members of the conservative revolutionary movement. The Nazi Ahnenerbe reported that many considered his ideas to be pure "fantasy" which ignored "historical facts.". Evola admired Heinrich Himmler, whom he knew personally, but he had reservations about Adolf Hitler because of Hitler's reliance on völkisch nationalism. Himmler's Schutzstaffel ("SS") kept a dossier on Evola—dossier document AR-126 described his plans for a "Roman-Germanic Imperium" as "utopian" and described him as a "reactionary Roman," whose goal was an "insurrection of the old aristocracy against the modern world." The document recommended that the SS "stop his effectiveness in Germany" and provide him with no support, particularly because of his desire to create a "secret international order".
Despite this opposition, Evola was able to establish political connections with pan-Europeanist elements inside the Reich Security Main Office. Evola subsequently ascended to the inner circles of Nazism as the influence of pan-European advocates overtook that of Völkisch proponents, due to military contingencies. Evola wrote the article Reich and Imperium as Elements in the New European Order for the Nazi-backed journal European Review. He spent World War II working for the Sicherheitsdienst. The Sicherheitsdienst bureau Amt VII, a Reich Security Main Office research library, helped Evola acquire arcane occult and Masonic texts.
Italian Fascism went into decline when, in 1943, Mussolini was deposed and imprisoned. At this point, Evola fled to Germany with the help of the Sicherheitsdienst. Although not a member of the National Fascist Party, and despite his apparent problems with the Fascist regime, Evola was one of the first people to greet Mussolini when the latter was broken out of prison by Otto Skorzeny in September, 1943. Subsequently, Evola helped welcome Mussolini to Adolf Hitler's Wolf's Lair. Following this, Evola involved himself in Mussolini's Italian Social Republic. It was Evola's custom to walk around the city of Vienna during bombing raids in order to better "ponder his destiny". During one such raid, 1945, a shell fragment damaged his spinal cord and he became paralyzed from the waist down, remaining so for the rest of his life.
Post-World War II
About the alliance during World War II between Allies and the Soviet Union, Evola wrote:The democratic powers repeated the error of those who think they can use the forces of subversion for their own ends without cost. They do not know that, by a fatal logic, when exponents of two different grades of subversion meet or cross paths, the one representing the more developed grade will take over in the end.The political model Evola selected after 1945 was neither Mussolini nor Hitler. Evola cited and encouraged the youth to read Plato (with reference in particular to The Republic), Dante (with reference in particular to De Monarchia), Joseph de Maistre, Donoso Cortés, Bismarck, Metternich, Gaetano Mosca, Pareto and Michels.
After World War II, Evola continued his work in esotericism. He wrote a number of books and articles on sex magic and various other esoteric studies, including The Yoga of Power: Tantra, Shakti, and the Secret Way (1949), Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), and Meditations on the Peaks: Mountain Climbing as Metaphor for the Spiritual Quest (1974). He also wrote his two explicitly political books Men Among the Ruins: Post-War Reflections of a Radical Traditionalist (1953), Ride the Tiger: A Survival Manual for the Aristocrats of the Soul (1961), and his autobiography, The Path of Cinnabar (1963). He also expanded upon critiques of American civilization and materialism, as well as increasing American influence in Europe, collected in the posthumous anthology Civiltà Americana.
While trying to distance himself from Nazism, Evola wrote in 1955 that the Nuremberg trials were a farce. This indicates that despite being rejected by the SS before the war, he never stopped admiring their criminal activities.
Evola's occult ontology exerted influence over post-war neo-fascism. In the post-war period, Evola's writing evoked interest among the neo-fascist right. After 1945, Evola was considered the most important Italian theoretician of the conservative revolutionary movement and the "chief ideologue" of Italy's post-war radical right. According to Egil Asprem and Kennet Granholm, Evola's most significant post-war political texts are Orientamenti and Men Among the Ruins. In the opening phrase in the first edition of Men Among the Ruins, Evola said: Our adversaries would undoubtedly want us, in a Christian spirit, under the banner of progress or reform, having been struck on one cheek to turn the other. Our principle is different: "Do to others what they would like to do to you: but do it to them first.Orientamenti was a text against "national fascism"—instead, it advocated for a European Community modeled on the principles of the Waffen-SS. The Italian neo-fascist group Ordine Nuovo adopted Orientamenti as a guide for action in postwar Italy. The European Liberation Front, who were affiliated with Francis Parker Yockey, called Evola "Italy's greatest living authoritarian philosopher" in the April 1951 issue of their publication Frontfighter.
During the post-war period, Evola disassociated himself from totalitarianism, preferring the concept of the "organic" state, which he put forth in his text Men Among the Ruins, as well as in his autodifesa. Evola sought to develop a strategy for the implementation of a "conservative revolution" in post-World War II Europe. He rejected nationalism, advocating instead for a European Imperium, which could take various forms according to local conditions, but should be "organic, hierarchical, anti-democratic, and anti-individual." Evola endorsed Francis Parker Yockey's neo-fascist manifesto Imperium, but disagreed with it because he believed that Yockey had a "superficial" understanding of what was immediately possible. Evola believed that his conception of neo-fascist Europe could best be implemented by an elite of "superior" men who operated outside normal politics.
In Men Among the Ruins, Evola defines the Fourth Estate as being the last stage in the cyclical development of the social elite, the first beginning with the monarchy. Expanding the concept in an essay in 1950, the Fourth State according to Evola would be characterized by "the collectivist civilization... the communist society of the faceless-massman".
Giuliano Salierni was an activist in the neo-Fascist Italian Social Movement during the early 1950s. He later recalled Evola's calls to violence. Roberto Fiore and his colleagues in the early 1980s helped the National Fronts "Political Soldiers" forge a militant elitist philosophy based on Evola's "most militant tract", The Aryan Doctrine of Battle and Victory. The Aryan Doctrine called for a "Great Holy War" that would be fought for spiritual renewal and fought in parallel to the physical "Little Holy War" against perceived enemies. Wolff attributes extreme-right terrorist actions in Italy in the 1970s and 1980s to the influence of Julius Evola.
Thomas Sheehan has argued that Evola's work is essential reading for those seeking to understand European neo-fascism, in the same way that knowledge of the writings of Karl Marx is necessary for those seeking to understand Communist actions.
Political influence
At one time Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini, the Nazi Grail seeker Otto Rahn, and the Romanian fascist sympathizer and religious historian Mircea Eliade admired Julius Evola. After World War II, Evola's writings continued to influence many European far-right political, racist and neo-fascist movements. He is widely translated in French, Spanish, partly in German, and mostly in Hungarian (the largest number of his translated works).
Umberto Eco referred to Evola as the "most influential theoretical source of the theories of the new Italian right", and as "one of the most respected fascist gurus".
Giorgio Almirante referred to him as "our Marcuse—only better." According to one leader of the neofascist "black terrorist" Ordine Nuovo, "Our work since 1953 has been to transpose Evola's teachings into direct political action."
The now defunct French fascist group Troisième Voie was also inspired by Evola.
Jonathan Bowden, English political activist and chairman of the far right, spoke highly of Evola and his ideas and gave lectures on his philosophy.
Evola has influenced Russian political analyst and fascist Aleksander Dugin.
The Greek neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn includes his works on its suggested reading list, and the leader of Jobbik, the Hungarian nationalist party, admires Evola and wrote an introduction to his works.
Donald Trump's former chief adviser Steve Bannon has pointed to Evola's influence on the Eurasianism movement; According to Joshua Green's book Devil's Bargain, Evola's Revolt Against the Modern World had initially drawn Bannon's interest to the ideas of the Traditionalist School. Alt-right leader and white nationalist Richard Spencer said that Bannon's awareness of Evola "means a tremendous amount". Some members of the alt-right expressed hope that Bannon might have been open to Evola's ideas, and that through Bannon, Evola's ideas could become influential. According to multiple historians cited by The Atlantic, this is contradictory, as Bannon cited Evola in defense of the "Judeo-Christian west", while Evola hated and opposed Judaism and Jews, Christianity in general, Anglo-Saxon Protestantism specifically, and the culture of the United States. In a leaked email sent by Bannon in March 2016, he told Milo Yiannopoulos, "I do appreciate any piece that mentions Evola." Evola has also influenced the alt-right movement.
Works
Books
L'individuo e il divenire del mondo (1926; The Individual and the Becoming of the World).
L'uomo come potenza (1927; Man as Potency).
Teoria dell'individuo assoluto (1927; The Theory of the Absolute Individual).
Imperialismo pagano (1928; second edition 1932)English translation:
Fenomenologia dell'individuo assoluto (1930; The Phenomenology of the Absolute Individual).
La tradizione ermetica (1931; second edition 1971)English translation:
Maschera e volto dello spiritualismo contemporaneo: Analisi critica delle principali correnti moderne verso il sovrasensibile (1932)English translation: And:
Heidnischer Imperialismus (1933)English translation:
Rivolta contro il mondo moderno (1934; second edition 1951; third edition 1970)English translation:
Il Mistero del Graal e la Tradizione Ghibellina dell'Impero (1937)English translation:
Il mito del sangue. Genesi del Razzismo (1937; second edition 1942)English translation:
Sintesi di dottrina della razza (1941)English translation:
Indirizzi per una educazione razziale (1941)English translation:
La dottrina del risveglio (1943)English translation:
Lo Yoga della potenza (1949; second edition 1968)English translation:
Gli uomini e le rovine (1953; second edition 1972)English translation:
(1958; second edition 1969)English translations: 1983–1991:
L'operaio nel pensiero di Ernst Jünger (1960; The Worker in the Thought of Ernst Jünger). Excerpts in English
Cavalcare la tigre (1961)English translation:
Il cammino del cinabro (1963; second edition 1970)English translation:
Il Fascismo. Saggio di una analisi critica dal punto di vista della Destra (1964; second edition 1970)English translation: And:
Collections
Saggi sull'idealismo magico (1925; Essays on Magical Idealism).
Introduzione alla magia (1927–1929; 1971)English translation: And: And:
L'arco e la clava (1968)English translation:
Ricognizioni. Uomini e problemi (1974)English translation:
Meditazioni delle vette (1974)English translation:
Metafisica della Guerra (1996)English translation:
Jobboldali fiatalok kézikönyve (2012, collection of Hungarian translations of periodicals by Evola, published by Kvintesszencia Kiadó)English translation:
Articles and pamphlets
L'Homme et son devenir selon le Vedânta. (1925; Review of Guenon's work published in 1925 in L'Idealismo Realistico).
Tre aspetti del problema ebraico (1936)English translation:
La tragedia della 'Guardia di Ferro - (1938) English translation: The Tragedy of the Iron Guard. Originally published in La vita italiana 309, Dec, 1938.
On the Secret of Decay (1938)Originally written in German and published by the Deutsches Volkstum magazine n. 14.
Orientamenti, undici punti (1950)English translation:
Il vampirismo ed i vampiri (1973) English: Vampirism and Vampires. Written for journal Roma in September 1973.
Works edited and/or translated by Evola
Tao Tê Ching: Il libro della via e della virtù (1923; The Book of the Way and Virtue). Second edition: Il libro del principio e della sua azione (1959; The Book of the Primary Principle and of Its Action).
La guerra occulta: armi e fasi dell'attacco ebraico-massonico alla tradizione europea by Emmanuel Malynski and Léon de Poncins (1939)English translation:
See also
Occultism and the far right
Traditionalist School
References
Notes
Bibliography
(:)
Aprile, Mario (1984), "Julius Evola: An Introduction to His Life and Work," The Scorpion No. 6 (Winter/Spring): 20–21.
Coletti, Guillermo (1996), "Against the Modern World: An Introduction to the Work of Julius Evola," Ohm Clock No. 4 (Spring): 29–31.
Coogan, Kevin (1999), Dreamer of the Day: Francis Parker Yockey and the Postwar Fascist International Brooklyn, New York:Autonomedia ).
De Benoist, Alain. "Julius Evola, réactionnaire radical et métaphysicien engagé. Analyse critique de la pensée politique de Julius Evola," Nouvelle Ecole, No. 53–54 (2003), pp. 147–69.
Drake, Richard H. (1986), "Julius Evola and the Ideological Origins of the Radical Right in Contemporary Italy," in Peter H. Merkl (ed.), Political Violence and Terror: Motifs and Motivations (University of California Press, ) 61–89.
Drake, Richard H. (1988), "Julius Evola, Radical Fascism and the Lateran Accords," The Catholic Historical Review 74: 403–419.
Drake, Richard H. (1989), "The Children of the Sun," in The Revolutionary Mystique and Terrorism in Contemporary Italy (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, ), 114–134.
Faerraresi, Franco (1987), "Julius Evola: Tradition, Reaction, and the Radical Right," European Journal of Sociology 28: 107–151.
Gelli, Frank (2012), Julius Evola: The Sufi of Rome
Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas (2001), Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity (New York: New York University Press, , , ), 52–71.
Griffin, Roger (1985), "Revolts against the Modern World: The Blend of Literary and Historical Fantasy in the Italian New Right," Literature and History 11 (Spring): 101–123.
Griffin, Roger (1995) (ed.), Fascism (Oxford University Press, ), 317–318.
Hans Thomas Hakl, "La questione dei rapporti fra Julius Evola e Aleister Crowley", in: Arthos 13, Pontremoli, Centro Studi Evoliani, 2006, pp. 269–289.
Hansen, H. T. (1994), "A Short Introduction to Julius Evola," Theosophical History 5 (January): 11–22; reprinted as introduction to Evola, Revolt Against the Modern World, (Vermont: Inner Traditions, 1995).
Hansen, H. T. (2002), "Julius Evola's Political Endeavors," introduction to Evola, Men Among the Ruins, (Vermont: Inner Traditions).
Moynihan, Michael (2003), "Julius Evola's Combat Manuals for a Revolt Against the Modern World," in Richard Metzger (ed.), Book of Lies: The Disinformation Guide to Magick and the Occult (The Disinformation Company, ) 313–320.
Rees, Philip (1991), Biographical Dictionary of the Extreme Right Since 1890 (New York: Simon & Schuster, ), 118–120.
Sedgwick, Mark (2004) Against the Modern World: Traditionalism and the Secret Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century (Oxford University Press, ).
Sheehan, Thomas (1981) "Myth and Violence: The Fascism of Julius Evola and Alain de Benoist," Social Research, 48 (Spring): 45–83.
Staudenmaier, P. (2019). "Racial Ideology between Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany: Julius Evola and the Aryan Myth, 1933–43." Journal of Contemporary History.
Stucco, Guido (1992), "Translator's Introduction," in Evola, The Yoga of Power (Vermont: Inner Traditions), ix–xv.
Stucco, Guido (1994), "Introduction," in Evola, The Path of Enlightenment According to the Mithraic Mysteries, Zen: The Religion of the Samurai, Rene Guenon: A Teacher for Modern Times, and Taoism: The Magic, the Mysticism (Edmonds, WA: Holmes Publishing Group)
Stucco, Guido (2002). "The Legacy of a European Traditionalist: Julius Evola in Perspective". The Occidental Quarterly 3 (2), pp. 21–44.
Wasserstrom, Steven M. (1995), "The Lives of Baron Evola," Alphabet City 4 + 5 (December): 84–89.
Waterfield, Robin (1990), 'Baron Julius Evola and the Hermetic Tradition', Gnosis 14, (Winter): 12–17.
External links
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1974 deaths
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Italian Dadaist | true | [
"Racist rhetoric is distributed through computer-mediated means and includes some or all of the following characteristics: ideas of racial uniqueness, racist attitudes towards specific social categories, racist stereotypes, hate-speech, nationalism and common destiny, racial supremacy, superiority and separation, conceptions of racial otherness, and anti-establishment world-view. Racism online can have the same effects as offensive remarks not online.\n\nDefinitions \nThe term \"cyber racism\" was coined by Les Back in 2002. Cyber racism has been interpreted to be more than a phenomenon featuring racist acts displayed online. According to the Australian Human Rights Commission, Cyber-Racism involves online activity that can include \"jokes or comments that cause offence or hurt; name-calling or verbal abuse; harassment or intimidation, or public commentary that inflames hostility towards certain groups\".\n\nRoots and enabling factors\n\nInstitutional racism \nThough there have been studies and strategies for thwarting and confronting cyber racism on the individual level there have not been many studies that expand on how cyber racism's roots in institutional racism can be combated. An increase in literature on cyber racism's relationship with institutional racism will provide new avenues for research on combatting cyber racism on a systemic level. For example, cyber racism's connections to institutional racism have been noted in the work of Jessie Daniels, a professor of sociology at Hunter College.\n\nAlthough some tech companies have taken steps to combat cyber racism on their sites, most tech companies are hesitant to take action over fears of limiting free speech. A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace, a document that declares the internet as a place free from control by \"governments of the industrial world\", continues to influence and reflect the views of Silicon Valley.\n\nOnline stereotypes \nOnline stereotypes can cause racist prejudice and lead to cyber racism. For example, scientists and activists have warned that the use of the stereotype \"Nigerian Prince\" for referring to advance-fee scammers is racist, i.e. \"reducing Nigeria to a nation of scammers and fraudulent princes, as some people still do online, is a stereotype that needs to be called out\".\n\nOnline anonymity \nRacist views are common and often more extreme on the Internet due to a level of anonymity offered by the Internet. In a 2009 book about \"common misconceptions about white supremacy online, [its] threats to today's youth; and possible solutions on navigating through the Internet, a large space where so much information is easily accessible (including hate-speech and other offensive content)\", City University of New York associate professor Jessie Daniels claimed that the number of white supremacy sites online was then rising; especially in the United States after the 2008 presidential elections.\n\nOnline alt-right communities \nThe popularity of sites used by alt-right communities has allowed cyber racism to garner attention from mainstream media. For instance, the alt-right claimed the \"Pepe the frog\" meme as a hate symbol after mixing \"Pepe in with Nazi propaganda\" on 4chan. This gained major attention on Twitter after a journalist tweeted about the association. Alt-right users considered this a \"victory\" because it caused the public to discuss their ideology.\n\nAlgorithmic bias \nIn her article \"Rise of the Alt-Right\", Daniels explains how algorithms \"speed up the spread of White supremacist ideology\" by producing search results that reinforce cyber racism. Daniels posits that algorithms direct alt-right users to sites that echo their views. This allows users to connect and build communities on platforms that place little to no restrictions on speech, such as Reddit and 4chan. Daniels points to the internet searches of Dylann Roof, a white supremacist, as an example of how algorithms perpetuate cyber racism. She claims that his internet search for \"black on white crime\" directed him to racist sites that reinforced and strengthened his racist views. Moreover, Latanya Sweeney, a Harvard professor, has found that online advertisements generated by algorithms tend to display more advertisements for arrest records with African American-sounding names than Caucasian-sounding names.\n\nDiscriminatory design \nDaniels writes in her 2009 book Cyber Racism that \"white supremacy has entered the digital era\" further confronting the idea of technology's \"inherently democratizing\" nature. Yet, according to Ruha Benjamin, researchers have concentrated on cyber racism's focus on \"how the Internet perpetuates or mediates racial prejudice at the individual level rather than analyze how racism shapes infrastructure and design.\" Benjamin continues by stating the importance of investigating \"how algorithms perpetuate or disrupt racism…in any study of discriminatory design.\"\n\nLaws\n\nAustralia\n\nIn Australia, cyber-racism is unlawful under S 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 (Cth). As it involves a misuse of telecommunications equipment, it may also be criminal under S 474.17 of the Criminal Code Act 1995 (Cth). State laws in each Australian State make racial vilification unlawful, and in most states serious racial vilification is a criminal offense. These laws also generally apply to cyber-racism, for example S 7 \"Racial vilification unlawful\" and S 24 \"Offence of serious racial vilification\" of the Racial and Religious Tolerance Act 2001 (Vic) both explicitly state that the conduct being referred to may include the use of the Internet.\n\nLegal cases\n\nYahoo! case\n\nIn May 2000, the League Against Racism and Anti-Semitism (la Ligue Internationale Contre le Racisme et I'Antisemitisme-LICRA) and the Union of French Jewish Students (UEJF) brought an action against Yahoo! Inc., which hosted an auction website to sell items of Nazi paraphernalia and Yahoo! France provided the link accessed to the content.\n\nSee also\n\n Cyberbullying\n Cybercrime\n Online hate speech\n Aversive racism\n Online disinhibition effect\n\nReferences\n\nWhite supremacy\nInternet culture\nAlt-right\nInternet trolling\nWhite nationalism\nRacism",
"Eduardo Bonilla-Silva (born February 6, 1962 in Bellefonte, Pennsylvania) is an Afro Puerto Rican political sociologist and professor of sociology at Duke University. He was the 2018 president of the American Sociological Association.\n\nEarly influences \n\nBonilla-Silva was educated in Puerto Rico where he double majored in Sociology and Economics. In his work White Supremacy and Racism in the Post-civil Rights Era, he says that \"Myriam Muniz, Arturo Torrecillas, Carlos Buitrago, Juan Jose Baldrich, Carlos Ramos [...] shaped my sociological imagination.\" Bonilla-Silva has stated that Jose A. Padin and Charles Camic were two mentors that influenced his development as a sociologist.\n\nAs an early sociologist, Bonilla-Silva was focused on Marxist ideas. He learned this from his mentor, Arturo Torrecillas. Torrecillas served as a professor of the Sociology and Anthropology Department at Bonilla-Silva's undergraduate university.\n\nFamily and early life \nBorn in Pennsylvania, Silva grew up in a family of intellectuals. His father, Jacinto Silva, was a university lecturer and his mother, Ruth Maria Silva, was a sociologist like her son.\n\nBonilla-Silva married Mary Hovsepian He has a son named Omar Francisco Bonilla from a previous marriage.\n\nEducation and career\nBonilla-Silva received his BA in sociology and economics from the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus in 1984, and his MA and PhD from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1987 and 1993, respectively. He taught at the University of Michigan from 1993–1998 and at Texas A&M University from 1998–2005, after which he joined the Duke faculty.\n\nWork and views\nBonilla-Silva is known for researching the role of race in public life. In 2003, he published the book Racism Without Racists: Colorblind Racism and the Persistence of Racial Inequality in the United States, which discusses his view that systemic racism is a major problem in the United States, despite the fact that Americans do not do or say something overtly racist on a regular basis. As of 2014, it was his best-selling book. He has said that systemic racism in the United States did not disappear in the 1970s, as many Americans believe, but merely became less overt and harder to identify. He has also blamed the fact that formerly all-white colleges in the United States did not change their curriculum or culture after integrating for racist incidents re-occurring on the campuses of these colleges. He has described these colleges as \"historically white\", and has said that this problem is not one of bad apples, but that it may be one of the entire apple tree.\n\nIn October 2017, Bonilla-Silva criticized Supreme Court Justice John Roberts for referring to social science as \"sociological gobbledygook.\"\n\nPublications and evolution of sociological views \n\nIn both his personal life and as a student, Bonilla-Silva encountered many influences. His professors, friends, coworkers, and eventually his own students all impacted his growth and development as a sociologist. As a student, he was influenced by Marxist teachings. However, he changed his focus soon as he learned and encountered racial prejudice and felt a calling to deal with the racism in the United States. This is evidenced by the explosion of published literature centering the structure of race in society and its influence on people.\n\nIn one of his earliest literature, Bonilla-Silva suggested a \"structural\" understanding of racism, a relatively unexplored and revolutionary way of approaching this idea. This was shown in his work Rethinking racism: Toward a structural interpretation. This work was done near the end of his time while the scholar was at the University of Michigan, before he started working at Texas A&M University.\n\nAs Bonilla-Silva continued to expand the boundaries of the understanding of racism, his literature reflected these new findings. Examples include:\n Racism Without Racists (4th Ed)\n In this book published in 2014, Bonilla-Silva delves into a discussion regarding race relationships in modern America. Despite the political correctness that has permeated society, racism still exists on a broad scale. The stereotyping and categorization of people by their skin color or heritage continues to be a big role in society. The author bring this issue to light, considering a broad range of perspectives. Moreover, he also takes a historical view on this issue since the past has a really big influence on how modern society thinks and functions.\n What We Were, What We Are, and What We Should Be: The Racial Problem of American Sociology \n This journal publication comes in light of Bonilla-Silva's new position as president of the American Sociological Association. He considers this new position along with the problems that sociologists like him are trying to solve in the realm of race relationships and racism. In a way, this publication serves as a public statement of his mission, his values as the new president.\n Other works also include:\n The new racism: The racial regime of post-civil rights America\n Introduction: Examining, debating, and ranting about the Obama phenomenon\n The Sweet Enchantment of Color Blindness in Black Face: Explaining the “Miracle,” Debating the Politics, and Suggesting a Way for Hope to be “For Real” in America\n The invisible weight of whiteness: the racial grammar of everyday life in contemporary America\n The last shall be first: Best Books in the Race Field Since 2000\n The 2008 Elections and the Future of Anti-racism in 21st Century America Or How We Got Drunk with Obama's Hope Liquor and Failed to See Reality\n\nFrom all of these works, it is evident that Bonilla-Silva has been an active scholar in the sociological topic of race. He has taken several angles at the topic, investigating it from a historical lens, a political lens such as with the recent political administration run by President Obama, and from his perspective looking at modern society. His seminal works have largely contributed to new ideas and new ways of envisioning the influence of racism in society.\n\nAwards\nBonilla-Silva received the 2011 Cox-Johnson-Frazier Award from the American Sociological Association (ASA). In 2009, he and Tukufu Zuberi both received the Oliver C. Cox Award from the ASA's Section on Racial and Ethnic Minorities for their book White Logic, White Methods: Racism and Methodology.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nFaculty page\n\nLiving people\nAmerican sociologists\n1962 births\nPeople from Bellefonte, Pennsylvania\nDuke University faculty\nUniversity of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus alumni\nUniversity of Wisconsin–Madison alumni\nUniversity of Michigan faculty\nTexas A&M University faculty\nPresidents of the American Sociological Association"
]
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[
"Julius Evola",
"Racism and mystical Aryanism",
"What were his views on racism?",
"Evola spoke of \"inferior non-European races\". Peter Merkl wrote that \"Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether\"."
]
| C_64b521f2f9cc4df09098f27ba0a07a51_0 | What is mystical Aryanism? | 2 | What is mystical Aryanism? | Julius Evola | Evola's dissent from standard biological concepts of race had roots in his aristocratic elitism, since Nazi Volkisch ideology inadequately separated aristocracy from "commoners." According to Furlong, Evola developed "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes--sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves". Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies." Prior to the end of War, Evola had frequently used the term "Aryan" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman 'super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men'...no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights of the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta." Evola spoke of "inferior non-European races". Peter Merkl wrote that "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote: "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanatiscm [are] all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West." While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957, Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of "negroes" and the opposition to segregation. Furlong noted that this article is "among the most extreme in phraseology of any he wrote, and exhibits a degree of intolerance that leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people." CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola (; 19 May 1898 11 June 1974), better known as Julius Evola, was an Italian philosopher, poet, and painter whose esoteric worldview featured antisemitic conspiracy theories and the occult. He has been described as a "fascist intellectual", a "radical traditionalist", "antiegalitarian, antiliberal, antidemocratic, and antipopular", and as "the leading philosopher of Europe's neofascist movement".
Evola is popular in fringe circles, largely because of his metaphysical, magical, and supernatural beliefs – including belief in ghosts, telepathy, and alchemyand his traditionalism. He termed his philosophy "magical idealism". Many of Evola's theories and writings were centered on his hostility toward Christianity and his idiosyncratic mysticism, occultism, and esoteric religious studies, and this aspect of his work has influenced occultists and esotericists. Evola also justified male domination over women as part of a purely patriarchal society, an outlook stemming from his traditionalist views on gender, which demanded women stay in or revert to what he saw as their traditional gender roles, where they were completely subordinate to male authority.
According to the scholar Franco Ferraresi, "Evola's thought can be considered one of the most radical and consistent anti-egalitarian, anti-liberal, anti-democratic, and anti-popular systems in the 20th century". It is a singular, though not necessarily original, blend of several schools and traditions, including German idealism, Eastern doctrines, traditionalism, and the all-embracing Weltanschauung of the interwar conservative revolutionary movement with which Evola had a deep personal involvement. Historian Aaron Gillette described Evola as "one of the most influential fascist racists in Italian history".
Evola admired SS head Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler, whom he once met. Autobiographical remarks by Evola allude to his having worked for the Sicherheitsdienst, or SD, the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party. During his trial in 1951, Evola denied being a fascist and instead referred to himself as "" (). Concerning this statement, historian Elisabetta Cassina Wolff wrote that "It is unclear whether this meant that Evola was placing himself above or beyond Fascism".
Evola has been called the "chief ideologue" of Italy's radical right after World War II. He continues to influence contemporary traditionalist and neo-fascist movements.
Life
Giulio Cesare Evola was born in Rome, the son of Vincenzo Evola (born 1854) and Concetta Mangiapane (born 1865). Both his parents had been born in Cinisi, a small town in the Province of Palermo on the north-western coast of Sicily. The paternal grandparents of Giulio Cesare Evola were Giuseppe Evola and Maria Cusumano. Giuseppe Evola is reported as being a joiner in Vincenzo's birth record. The maternal grandparents of Giulio Cesare Evola were Cesare Mangiapane, reported as being a shopkeeper in Concetta's birth record, and his wife Caterina Munacó. Vincenzo Evola and Concetta Mangiapane were married in Cinisi on 25 November 1892. Vincenzo Evola is reported as being a telegraphic mechanic chief, while Concetta Mangiapane is reported as being a landowner.
Giulio Cesare Evola had an elder brother, Giuseppe Gaspare Dinamo Evola, born in 1895 in Rome. Following a slight variation on the Sicilian naming convention of the era, as the second son, Giulio Cesare Evola was partly named after his maternal grandfather.
Evola has been often been reported as being a baron, probably in reference to a purported distant relationship with a minor aristocratic family, the Evoli, who were the barons of Castropignano in the Kingdom of Sicily in the late Middle Ages.
Little is known about Evola's early upbringing except that he considered it irrelevant. He studied engineering at the Istituto Tecnico Leonardo da Vinci in Rome, but did not complete his course, later claiming this was because he "did not want to be associated in any way with bourgeois academic recognition and titles such as doctor and engineer."
In his teenage years, Evola immersed himself in painting—which he considered one of his natural talents—and literature, including Oscar Wilde and Gabriele d'Annunzio. He was introduced to philosophers such as Friedrich Nietzsche and Otto Weininger. Other early philosophical influences included Carlo Michelstaedter and Max Stirner.
In the First World War, Evola served as an artillery officer on the Asiago plateau. He was attracted to the avant-garde, and after the war he briefly associated with Filippo Tommaso Marinetti's Futurist movement. Through his painting and poetry, and through work on the short-lived journal Revue Bleue, he became a prominent representative of Dadaism in Italy. In 1922, after concluding that avant-garde art was becoming commercialized and stiffened by academic conventions, he reduced his focus on artistic expression such as painting and poetry.
Evola was arrested in April 1951 by the Political Office of the Rome Police Headquarters and charged on suspicion that he was an ideologist of the militant neofascist organization Fasci di Azione Rivoluzionaria (FAR). Evola was defended by Prof. Francesco Carnelutti. On November 20, 1951, Evola was acquitted of all charges.
Evola died on 11 June 1974 in Rome from congestive heart failure.
Writing career
Christianity
In 1928, Evola wrote an attack on Christianity titled Pagan Imperialism, which proposed transforming fascism into a system consistent with ancient Roman values and Western esotericism. Evola proposed that fascism should be a vehicle for reinstating the caste system and aristocracy of antiquity. Although he invoked the term "fascism" in this text, his diatribe against the Catholic Church was criticized by both Mussolini's fascist regime and the Vatican itself. A. James Gregor argued that the text was an attack on fascism as it stood at the time of writing, but noted that Mussolini made use of it to threaten the Vatican with the possibility of an "anti-clerical fascism". On account of Evola's anti-Christian proposals, in April 1928 the Vatican-backed right wing Catholic journal Revue Internationale des Sociétés Secrètes published an article entitled "Un Sataniste Italien: Julius Evola", accusing him of satanism.
In his The Mystery of the Grail (1937), Evola discarded Christian interpretations of the Holy Grail and wrote that it symbolizes the principle of an immortalizing and transcendent force connected to the primordial state ... The mystery of the Grail is a mystery of a warrior initiation.He held that the Ghibellines, who had fought the Guelph for control of Northern and Central Italy in the thirteenth century, had within them the residual influences of pre-Christian Celtic and Nordic traditions that represented his conception of the Grail myth. He also held that the Guelph victory against the Ghibellines represented a regression of the castes, since the merchant caste took over from the warrior caste. In the epilogue to this book, Evola argued that the fictitious The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, regardless of whether it was authentic or not, was a cogent representation of modernity. The historian Richard Barber said, Evola mixes rhetoric, prejudice, scholarship, and politics into a strange version of the present and future, but in the process he brings together for the first time interest in the esoteric and in conspiracy theory which characterize much of the later Grail literature.
Buddhism
In his The Doctrine of Awakening (1943), Evola argued that the Pāli Canon could be held to represent true Buddhism. His interpretation of Buddhism is that it was intended to be anti-democratic. He believed that Buddhism revealed the essence of an "Aryan" tradition that had become corrupted and lost in the West. He believed it could be interpreted to reveal the superiority of a warrior caste. Harry Oldmeadow described Evola's work on Buddhism as exhibiting a Nietzschean influence, but Evola criticized Nietzsche's purported anti-ascetic prejudice. Evola claimed that the book "received the official approbation of the Pāli [Text] Society", and was published by a reputable Orientalist publisher. Evola's interpretation of Buddhism, as put forth in his article "Spiritual Virility in Buddhism", is in conflict with the post-WWII scholarship of the Orientalist Giuseppe Tucci, who argues that the viewpoint that Buddhism advocates universal benevolence is legitimate. Arthur Versluis stated that Evola's writing on Buddhism was a vehicle for his own theories, but was a far from accurate rendition of the subject, and he held that much the same could be said of Evola's writing on Hermeticism. Ñāṇavīra Thera was inspired to become a bhikkhu from reading Evola's text The Doctrine of Awakening in 1945 while hospitalized in Sorrento.
Modernity
Evola's Revolt Against the Modern World (1934) promotes the mythology of an ancient Golden Age which gradually declined into modern decadence. In this work, Evola described the features of his idealized traditional society in which religious and temporal power were created and united not by priests, but by warriors expressing spiritual power. In mythology, he saw evidence of the West's superiority over the East. Moreover, he claimed that the traditional elite had the ability to access power and knowledge through a hierarchical magic which differed from the lower "superstitious and fraudulent" forms of magic. Evola insists that only "nonmodern forms, institutions, and knowledge" could produce a "real renewal ... in those who are still capable of receiving it." The text was "immediately recognized by Mircea Eliade and other intellectuals who allegedly advanced ideas associated with Tradition." Eliade was one of the most influential twentieth-century historians of religion, a fascist sympathizer associated with the Romanian Christian right wing movement Iron Guard. Evola was aware of the importance of myth from his readings of Georges Sorel, one of the key intellectual influences on fascism. Hermann Hesse described Revolt Against the Modern World as "really dangerous."
During the 1960s Evola thought the right could no longer reverse the corruption of modern civilization. E. C. Wolff noted that this is why Evola wrote Ride the Tiger, choosing to distance himself completely from active political engagement, without excluding the possibility of action in the future. He argued that one should stay firm and ready to intervene when the tiger of modernity "is tired of running." Goodrick-Clarke notes that, "Evola sets up the ideal of the 'active nihilist' who is prepared to act with violence against modern decadence."
Other writings
In the posthumously published collection of writings, Metaphysics of War, Evola, in line with the conservative revolutionary Ernst Jünger, explored the viewpoint that war could be a spiritually fulfilling experience. He proposed the necessity of a transcendental orientation in a warrior.
From 1934 to 1943 Evola was also responsible for 'Diorama Filosofico', the cultural page of Il Regime Fascista, a daily newspaper owned by Roberto Farinacci. He would also contribute during the same period to Giovanni Preziosi magazine La vita italiana.
Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke has written that Evola's 1945 essay "American 'Civilization'" described the United States as "the final stage of European decline into the 'interior formlessness' of vacuous individualism, conformity and vulgarity under the universal aegis of money-making." According to Goodrick-Clarke, Evola argued that the U.S. "mechanistic and rational philosophy of progress combined with a mundane horizon of prosperity to transform the world into an enormous suburban shopping mall."
Evola translated some works of Oswald Spengler and Ortega y Gasset to Italian.
Occultism and esotericism
Around 1920, Evola's interests led him into spiritual, transcendental, and "supra-rational" studies. He began reading various esoteric texts and gradually delved deeper into the occult, alchemy, magic, and Oriental studies, particularly Tibetan Tantric yoga. A keen mountaineer, Evola described the experience as a source of revelatory spiritual experiences. After his return from the war, Evola experimented with hallucinogens and magic.
When he was about 23 years old, Evola considered suicide. He claimed that he avoided suicide thanks to a revelation he had while reading an early Buddhist text that dealt with shedding all forms of identity other than absolute transcendence. Evola would later publish the text The Doctrine of Awakening, which he regarded as a repayment of his debt to Buddhism for saving him from suicide.
Evola wrote prodigiously on Eastern mysticism, Tantra, hermeticism, the myth of the Holy Grail and Western esotericism. German Egyptologist and esoteric scholar Florian Ebeling has noted that Evola's The Hermetic Tradition is viewed as an "extremely important work on Hermeticism" in the eyes of esotericists. Evola gave particular focus to Cesare della Riviera's text Il Mondo Magico degli Heroi, which he later republished in modern Italian. He held that Riviera's text was consonant with the goals of "high magic"the reshaping of the earthly human into a transcendental 'god man'. According to Evola, the alleged "timeless" Traditional science was able to come to lucid expression through this text, in spite of the "coverings" added to it to prevent accusations from the church. Though Evola rejected Carl Jung's interpretation of alchemy, Jung described Evola's The Hermetic Tradition as a "magisterial account of Hermetic philosophy". In Hegel and the Hermetic Tradition, the philosopher Glenn Alexander Magee favored Evola's interpretation over that of Jung's. In 1988, a journal devoted to Hermetic thought published a section of Evola's book and described it as "Luciferian."
Evola later confessed that he was not a Buddhist, and that his text on Buddhism was meant to balance his earlier work on the Hindu tantras. Evola's interest in tantra was spurred on by correspondence with John Woodroffe. Evola was attracted to the active aspect of tantra, and its claim to provide a practical means to spiritual experience, over the more "passive" approaches in other forms of Eastern spirituality. In Tantric Buddhism in East Asia, Richard K. Payne, Dean of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, argued that Evola manipulated Tantra in the service of right wing violence, and that the emphasis on "power" in The Yoga of Power gave insight into his mentality.
Evola advocated that "differentiated individuals" following the Left-Hand Path use dark violent sexual powers against the modern world. For Evola, these "virile heroes" are both generous and cruel, possess the ability to rule, and commit "Dionysian" acts that might be seen as conventionally immoral. For Evola, the Left Hand path embraces violence as a means of transgression.
According to A. James Gregor Evola's definition of spirituality can be found in Meditations on the Peaks: "what has been successfully actualized and translated into a sense of superiority which is experienced inside by the soul, and a noble demeanor, which is expressed in the body." Goodrick-Clarke wrote that Evola's "rigorous New Age spirituality speaks directly to those who reject absolutely the leveling world of democracy, capitalism, multi-racialism and technology at the outset of the twenty-first century. Their acute sense of cultural chaos can find powerful relief in his ideal of total renewal." Thomas Sheehan wrote that to "read Evola is to take a trip through a weird and fascinating jungle of ancient mythologies, pseudo-ethnology, and transcendental mysticism that is enough to make any southern California consciousness-tripper feel quite at home."
Magical idealism
Thomas Sheehan wrote that "Evola's first philosophical works from the 'twenties were dedicated to reshaping neo-idealism from a philosophy of Absolute Spirit and Mind into a philosophy of the "absolute individual" and action." Accordingly, Evola developed the doctrine of "magical idealism", which held that "the Ego must understand that everything that seems to have a reality independent of it is nothing but an illusion, caused by its own deficiency." For Evola, this ever-increasing unity with the "absolute individual" was consistent with unconstrained liberty, and therefore unconditional power. In his 1925 work Essays on Magical Idealism, Evola declared that "God does not exist. The Ego must create him by making itself divine."
According to Sheehan, Evola discovered the power of metaphysical mythology while developing his theories. This led to his advocacy of supra-rational intellectual intuition over discursive knowledge. In Evola's view, discursive knowledge separates man from Being. Sheehan stated that this position is a theme in certain interpretations of Western philosophers such as Plato, Thomas Aquinas, and Martin Heidegger that was exaggerated by Evola. Evola would later write:
Evola developed a doctrine of the "two natures": the natural world and the primordial "world of 'Being'". He believed that these "two natures" impose form and quality on lower matter and create a hierarchical "great chain of Being." He understood "spiritual virility" as signifying orientation towards this postulated transcendent principle. He held that the State should reflect this "ordering from above" and the consequent hierarchical differentiation of individuals according to their "organic preformation". By "organic preformation" he meant that which "gathers, preserves, and refines one's talents and qualifications for determinate functions."
Ur Group
Evola was introduced to esotericism by Arturo Reghini, who was an early supporter of fascism. Reghini sought to promote a "cultured magic" opposed to Christianity and introduced Evola to the traditionalist René Guénon. In 1927, Reghini and Evola, along with other Italian esotericists, founded the Gruppo di Ur ("Ur Group"). The purpose of this group was to attempt to bring the members' individual identities into such a superhuman state of power and awareness that they would be able to exert a magical influence on the world. The group employed techniques from Buddhist, Tantric, and rare Hermetic texts. They aimed to provide a "soul" to the burgeoning Fascist movement of the time through the revival of ancient Roman religion, and to influence the fascist regime through esotericism.
Articles on occultism from the Ur Group were later published in Introduction to Magic. Reghini's support of Freemasonry would however prove a bone of contention for Evola; accordingly, Evola broke with Reghini in 1928. Reghini himself broke from Evola, accusing Evola of plagiarizing his thoughts in the book Pagan Imperialism. Evola, on the other hand, blamed Reghini for the premature publication of Pagan Imperialism. Evola's later work owed a considerable debt to René Guénon's text Crisis of the Modern World, though he diverged from Guénon on the issue of the relationship between warriors and priests.
Views on sex and gender roles
Julius Evola believed that the alleged higher qualities expected of a man of a particular race were not those expected of a woman of the same race. He held that "just relations between the sexes" involved women acknowledging their "inequality" with men. In 1925, he wrote an article titled "La donna come cosa" ("Woman as Thing"). Evola later quoted Joseph de Maistre's statement that "Woman cannot be superior except as woman, but from the moment in which she desires to emulate man she is nothing but a monkey." Evola believed that women's liberation was "the renunciation by woman of her right to be a woman". A woman "could traditionally participate in the sacred hierarchical order only in a mediated fashion through her relationship with a man." He held, as a feature of his idealized gender relations, the Hindu sati, which for him was a form of sacrifice indicating women's respect for patriarchal traditions. For the "pure, feminine" woman, "man is not perceived by her as a mere husband or lover, but as her lord." Women would find their true identity in total subjugation to men.
Evola regarded matriarchy and goddess religions as a symptom of decadence, and preferred a hyper-masculine, warrior ethos.
Evola was influenced by Hans Blüher; he was a proponent of the Männerbund concept as a model for his proposed ultra-fascist "Order". Goodrick-Clarke noted the fundamental influence of Otto Weininger's book Sex and Character on Evola's dualism of male-female spirituality. According to Goodrich-Clarke, "Evola's celebration of virile spirituality was rooted in Weininger's work, which was widely translated by the end of the First World War." Unlike Weininger, Evola believed that women needed to be conquered, not ignored. Evola denounced homosexuality as "useless" for his purposes. He did not neglect sadomasochism, so long as sadism and masochism "are magnifications of an element potentially present in the deepest essence of eros." Then, it would be possible to "extend, in a transcendental and perhaps ecstatic way, the possibilities of sex."
Evola held that women "played" with men, threatened their masculinity, and lured them into a "constrictive" grasp with their sexuality. He wrote that "It should not be expected of women that they return to what they really are ... when men themselves retain only the semblance of true virility", and lamented that "men instead of being in control of sex are controlled by it and wander about like drunkards". He believed that in Tantra and in sex magic, in which he saw a strategy for aggression, he found the means to counter the "emasculated" West. According to Annalisa Merelli, Evola "went so far as to justify rape" because he saw it "as a natural expression of male desire". Evola also said that the "ritual violation of virgins", and "whipping women" were a means of "consciousness raising", so long as these practices were done to the intensity required to produce the proper "liminal psychic climate". He wrote that "as a rule, nothing stirs a man more than feeling the woman utterly exhausted beneath his own hostile rapture."
Evola translated Weininger's Sex and Character into Italian. Dissatisfied with simply translating Weininger's work, he wrote the text Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), where his views on sexuality were dealt with at length. Arthur Versluis described this text as Evola's "most interesting" work aside from Revolt Against the Modern World. This book remains popular among many 'New Age' adherents.
Views on race
Evola's dissent from standard biological concepts of race had roots in his aristocratic elitism, since Nazi völkisch ideology inadequately separated aristocracy from "commoners." According to European studies professor Paul Furlong, Evola developed "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes—sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves". Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies."
In 1941, Evola's book Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race (Italian: Sintesi di Dottrina della Razza) was published by Hoepli. It provides an overview of his ideas concerning race and eugenics, introducing the concept of "spiritual racism", and "esoteric-traditionalist racism".
Prior to the end of the War, Evola had frequently used the term "Aryan" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men' ... no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights of the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta."
Evola spoke of "inferior non-European races". Peter Merkl wrote that "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote: "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanaticism [are] all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West." While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957 Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of "negroes" and the opposition to segregation. Furlong noted that this article is "among the most extreme in phraseology of any he wrote, and exhibits a degree of intolerance that leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people."
National mysticism
For his spiritual interpretation of the different racial psychologies, Evola found the work of German race theorist Ludwig Ferdinand Clauss invaluable. Like Evola, Clauss believed that physical race and spiritual race could diverge as a consequence of miscegenation. Evola's racism included racism of the body, soul, and spirit, giving primacy to the latter factor, writing that "races only declined when their spirit failed."
Like René Guénon, Evola believed that mankind is living in the Kali Yuga of the Hindu tradition—the Dark Age of unleashed materialistic appetites. He argued that both Italian fascism and Nazism represented hope that the "celestial" Aryan race would be reconstituted. He drew on mythological accounts of super-races and their decline, particularly the Hyperboreans, and maintained that traces of Hyperborean influence could be felt in Indo-European man. He felt that Indo-European men had devolved from these higher mythological races. Gregor noted that several contemporary criticisms of Evola's theory were published: "In one of Fascism's most important theoretical journals, Evola's critic pointed out that many Nordic-Aryans, not to speak of Mediterranean Aryans, fail to demonstrate any Hyperborean properties. Instead, they make obvious their materialism, their sensuality, their indifference to loyalty and sacrifice, together with their consuming greed. How do they differ from 'inferior' races, and why should anyone wish, in any way, to favor them?"
Concerning the relationship between "spiritual racism" and biological racism, Evola put forth the following viewpoint, which Furlong described as pseudo-scientific:
Views on Jews
Evola endorsed Otto Weininger's views on the Jews. Though Evola viewed Jews as corrosive and anti-traditional, he described Adolf Hitler's more fanatical antisemitism as a paranoid idée fixe that damaged the reputation of the Third Reich. Evola's conception did not emphasize the Nazi racial conception of Jews as "representatives of a biological race"—in Evola's view the Jews were "the carriers of a world view ... a spirit [that] corresponded to the 'worst' and 'most decadent' features of modernity: democracy, egalitarianism and materialism." Evola rejected the views of chief Nazi theorist Alfred Rosenberg and others on biological racism as being reductionist and materialistic. Jewry was for Evola, as for Weininger, only a symbol for the rule of money and individualism. Otto Weininger desbribed Jewishness as "intellectual tendency".
Evola argued that the fabricated antisemitic text The Protocols of the Elders of Zion—whether or not a forgery—accurately reflect the conditions of modernity. He believed that the Protocols "contain the plan for an occult war, whose objective is the utter destruction, in the non-Jewish peoples, of all tradition, class, aristocracy, and hierarchy, and of all moral, religious, and spiritual values." He wrote the foreword to the second Italian edition of the Protocols, which was published by the Fascist Giovanni Preziosi in 1938.
Following the murder of his friend Corneliu Zelea Codreanu, the leader of the Fascist Romanian Iron Guard, Evola expressed anticipation of a "Talmudic, Israelite tyranny." However, Evola believed that Jews had this "power" only because of European "decadence" in modernity. He also believed that one could be "Aryan", but have a "Jewish" soul, just as one could be "Jewish", but have an "Aryan" soul. In Evola's view, Otto Weininger and Carlo Michelstaedter were Jews of "sufficiently heroic, ascetic, and sacral" character to fit the latter category.
Views on "caste" and class
Julius Evola believe that society develops a "regression of castes" where classes he viewed as superior were replaced by those he viewed as inferior.
He believed that the rule of spiritual leaders (the highest class) was replaced by that of warriors (the second highest) then by merchants and finally by the proletariat (whom he described as "spiritual eunuchs", quoting another philosopher).
He believed that each aspect of society was effected by the dominant "caste", for example, war in the first type was "holy war" and in the second type "defending the honour of one's lord". In addition, bourgeois rule makes "usury" socially acceptable.
Fascism
Evola developed a line of argument, closely related to the spiritual orientation of Traditionalist writers such as René Guénon and the political concerns of the European authoritarian right. Evola's first published political work was an anti-fascist piece in 1925. In this work, Evola called Italy's fascist movement a "laughable revolution," based on empty sentiment and materialistic concerns. He applauded Mussolini's anti-bourgeois orientation and his goal of making Italian citizens into hardened warriors, but criticized Fascist populism, party politics, and elements of leftism that he saw in the fascist regime. Evola saw Mussolini's Fascist Party as possessing no cultural or spiritual foundation. He was passionate about infusing it with these elements in order to make it suitable for his ideal conception of Übermensch culture which, in Evola's view, characterized the imperial grandeur of pre-Christian Europe. He expressed anti-nationalist sentiment, stating that to become "truly human," one would have to "overcome brotherly contamination" and "purge oneself" of the feeling that one is united with others "because of blood, affections, country or human destiny." He also opposed the futurism that Italian fascism was aligned with, along with the "plebeian" nature of the movement. Accordingly, Evola launched the journal La Torre (The Tower), to voice his concerns and advocate for a more elitist fascism. Evola's ideas were poorly received by the fascist mainstream as it stood at the time of his writing.
Mussolini
Scholars disagree about why Benito Mussolini embraced racist ideology in 1938—some scholars have written that Mussolini was more motivated by political considerations than ideology when he introduced antisemitic legislation in Italy. Other scholars have rejected the argument that the racial ideology of Italian fascism could be attributed solely to Nazi influence. A more recent interpretation is that Mussolini was frustrated by the slow pace of fascist transformation and, by 1938, had adopted increasingly radical measures including a racial ideology. Aaron Gillette has written that "Racism would become the key driving force behind the creation of the new fascist man, the uomo fascista."
Mussolini read Evola's Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race in August 1941, and met with Evola to offer him his praise. Evola later recounted that Mussolini had found in his work a uniquely Roman form of Fascist racism distinct from that found in Nazi Germany. With Mussolini's backing, Evola started preparing the launch of a minor journal Sangue e Spirito (Blood and Spirit) which never appeared. While not always in agreement with German racial theorists, Evola traveled to Germany in February 1942 and obtained support for German collaboration on Sangue e Spirito from "key figures in the German racial hierarchy." Fascists appreciated the palingenetic value of Evola's "proof" "that the true representatives of the state and the culture of ancient Rome were people of the Nordic race." Evola eventually became Italy's leading racial philosopher.
Evola blended Sorelianism with Mussolini's eugenics agenda. Evola has written that "The theory of the Aryo-Roman race and its corresponding myth could integrate the Roman idea proposed, in general, by fascism, as well as give a foundation to Mussolini's plan to use his state as a means to elevate the average Italian and to enucleate in him a new man."
In May, 1951, Evola was arrested and charged with promoting the revival of the Fascist Party, and of glorifying Fascism. Defending himself at trial, Evola stated that his work belonged to a long tradition of anti-democratic writers who certainly could be linked to fascism—at least fascism interpreted according to certain Evolian criteria—but who certainly could not be identified with the Fascist regime under Mussolini. Evola then declared that he was not a Fascist but was instead "" (). He was acquitted.
Third Reich
Finding Italian fascism too compromising, Evola began to seek recognition in Nazi Germany. Evola spent a considerable amount of time in Germany in 1937 and 1938, and gave a series of lectures to the German–Italian Society in 1938. Evola took issue with Nazi populism and biological materialism. SS authorities initially rejected Evola's ideas as supranational and aristocratic though he was better received by members of the conservative revolutionary movement. The Nazi Ahnenerbe reported that many considered his ideas to be pure "fantasy" which ignored "historical facts.". Evola admired Heinrich Himmler, whom he knew personally, but he had reservations about Adolf Hitler because of Hitler's reliance on völkisch nationalism. Himmler's Schutzstaffel ("SS") kept a dossier on Evola—dossier document AR-126 described his plans for a "Roman-Germanic Imperium" as "utopian" and described him as a "reactionary Roman," whose goal was an "insurrection of the old aristocracy against the modern world." The document recommended that the SS "stop his effectiveness in Germany" and provide him with no support, particularly because of his desire to create a "secret international order".
Despite this opposition, Evola was able to establish political connections with pan-Europeanist elements inside the Reich Security Main Office. Evola subsequently ascended to the inner circles of Nazism as the influence of pan-European advocates overtook that of Völkisch proponents, due to military contingencies. Evola wrote the article Reich and Imperium as Elements in the New European Order for the Nazi-backed journal European Review. He spent World War II working for the Sicherheitsdienst. The Sicherheitsdienst bureau Amt VII, a Reich Security Main Office research library, helped Evola acquire arcane occult and Masonic texts.
Italian Fascism went into decline when, in 1943, Mussolini was deposed and imprisoned. At this point, Evola fled to Germany with the help of the Sicherheitsdienst. Although not a member of the National Fascist Party, and despite his apparent problems with the Fascist regime, Evola was one of the first people to greet Mussolini when the latter was broken out of prison by Otto Skorzeny in September, 1943. Subsequently, Evola helped welcome Mussolini to Adolf Hitler's Wolf's Lair. Following this, Evola involved himself in Mussolini's Italian Social Republic. It was Evola's custom to walk around the city of Vienna during bombing raids in order to better "ponder his destiny". During one such raid, 1945, a shell fragment damaged his spinal cord and he became paralyzed from the waist down, remaining so for the rest of his life.
Post-World War II
About the alliance during World War II between Allies and the Soviet Union, Evola wrote:The democratic powers repeated the error of those who think they can use the forces of subversion for their own ends without cost. They do not know that, by a fatal logic, when exponents of two different grades of subversion meet or cross paths, the one representing the more developed grade will take over in the end.The political model Evola selected after 1945 was neither Mussolini nor Hitler. Evola cited and encouraged the youth to read Plato (with reference in particular to The Republic), Dante (with reference in particular to De Monarchia), Joseph de Maistre, Donoso Cortés, Bismarck, Metternich, Gaetano Mosca, Pareto and Michels.
After World War II, Evola continued his work in esotericism. He wrote a number of books and articles on sex magic and various other esoteric studies, including The Yoga of Power: Tantra, Shakti, and the Secret Way (1949), Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), and Meditations on the Peaks: Mountain Climbing as Metaphor for the Spiritual Quest (1974). He also wrote his two explicitly political books Men Among the Ruins: Post-War Reflections of a Radical Traditionalist (1953), Ride the Tiger: A Survival Manual for the Aristocrats of the Soul (1961), and his autobiography, The Path of Cinnabar (1963). He also expanded upon critiques of American civilization and materialism, as well as increasing American influence in Europe, collected in the posthumous anthology Civiltà Americana.
While trying to distance himself from Nazism, Evola wrote in 1955 that the Nuremberg trials were a farce. This indicates that despite being rejected by the SS before the war, he never stopped admiring their criminal activities.
Evola's occult ontology exerted influence over post-war neo-fascism. In the post-war period, Evola's writing evoked interest among the neo-fascist right. After 1945, Evola was considered the most important Italian theoretician of the conservative revolutionary movement and the "chief ideologue" of Italy's post-war radical right. According to Egil Asprem and Kennet Granholm, Evola's most significant post-war political texts are Orientamenti and Men Among the Ruins. In the opening phrase in the first edition of Men Among the Ruins, Evola said: Our adversaries would undoubtedly want us, in a Christian spirit, under the banner of progress or reform, having been struck on one cheek to turn the other. Our principle is different: "Do to others what they would like to do to you: but do it to them first.Orientamenti was a text against "national fascism"—instead, it advocated for a European Community modeled on the principles of the Waffen-SS. The Italian neo-fascist group Ordine Nuovo adopted Orientamenti as a guide for action in postwar Italy. The European Liberation Front, who were affiliated with Francis Parker Yockey, called Evola "Italy's greatest living authoritarian philosopher" in the April 1951 issue of their publication Frontfighter.
During the post-war period, Evola disassociated himself from totalitarianism, preferring the concept of the "organic" state, which he put forth in his text Men Among the Ruins, as well as in his autodifesa. Evola sought to develop a strategy for the implementation of a "conservative revolution" in post-World War II Europe. He rejected nationalism, advocating instead for a European Imperium, which could take various forms according to local conditions, but should be "organic, hierarchical, anti-democratic, and anti-individual." Evola endorsed Francis Parker Yockey's neo-fascist manifesto Imperium, but disagreed with it because he believed that Yockey had a "superficial" understanding of what was immediately possible. Evola believed that his conception of neo-fascist Europe could best be implemented by an elite of "superior" men who operated outside normal politics.
In Men Among the Ruins, Evola defines the Fourth Estate as being the last stage in the cyclical development of the social elite, the first beginning with the monarchy. Expanding the concept in an essay in 1950, the Fourth State according to Evola would be characterized by "the collectivist civilization... the communist society of the faceless-massman".
Giuliano Salierni was an activist in the neo-Fascist Italian Social Movement during the early 1950s. He later recalled Evola's calls to violence. Roberto Fiore and his colleagues in the early 1980s helped the National Fronts "Political Soldiers" forge a militant elitist philosophy based on Evola's "most militant tract", The Aryan Doctrine of Battle and Victory. The Aryan Doctrine called for a "Great Holy War" that would be fought for spiritual renewal and fought in parallel to the physical "Little Holy War" against perceived enemies. Wolff attributes extreme-right terrorist actions in Italy in the 1970s and 1980s to the influence of Julius Evola.
Thomas Sheehan has argued that Evola's work is essential reading for those seeking to understand European neo-fascism, in the same way that knowledge of the writings of Karl Marx is necessary for those seeking to understand Communist actions.
Political influence
At one time Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini, the Nazi Grail seeker Otto Rahn, and the Romanian fascist sympathizer and religious historian Mircea Eliade admired Julius Evola. After World War II, Evola's writings continued to influence many European far-right political, racist and neo-fascist movements. He is widely translated in French, Spanish, partly in German, and mostly in Hungarian (the largest number of his translated works).
Umberto Eco referred to Evola as the "most influential theoretical source of the theories of the new Italian right", and as "one of the most respected fascist gurus".
Giorgio Almirante referred to him as "our Marcuse—only better." According to one leader of the neofascist "black terrorist" Ordine Nuovo, "Our work since 1953 has been to transpose Evola's teachings into direct political action."
The now defunct French fascist group Troisième Voie was also inspired by Evola.
Jonathan Bowden, English political activist and chairman of the far right, spoke highly of Evola and his ideas and gave lectures on his philosophy.
Evola has influenced Russian political analyst and fascist Aleksander Dugin.
The Greek neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn includes his works on its suggested reading list, and the leader of Jobbik, the Hungarian nationalist party, admires Evola and wrote an introduction to his works.
Donald Trump's former chief adviser Steve Bannon has pointed to Evola's influence on the Eurasianism movement; According to Joshua Green's book Devil's Bargain, Evola's Revolt Against the Modern World had initially drawn Bannon's interest to the ideas of the Traditionalist School. Alt-right leader and white nationalist Richard Spencer said that Bannon's awareness of Evola "means a tremendous amount". Some members of the alt-right expressed hope that Bannon might have been open to Evola's ideas, and that through Bannon, Evola's ideas could become influential. According to multiple historians cited by The Atlantic, this is contradictory, as Bannon cited Evola in defense of the "Judeo-Christian west", while Evola hated and opposed Judaism and Jews, Christianity in general, Anglo-Saxon Protestantism specifically, and the culture of the United States. In a leaked email sent by Bannon in March 2016, he told Milo Yiannopoulos, "I do appreciate any piece that mentions Evola." Evola has also influenced the alt-right movement.
Works
Books
L'individuo e il divenire del mondo (1926; The Individual and the Becoming of the World).
L'uomo come potenza (1927; Man as Potency).
Teoria dell'individuo assoluto (1927; The Theory of the Absolute Individual).
Imperialismo pagano (1928; second edition 1932)English translation:
Fenomenologia dell'individuo assoluto (1930; The Phenomenology of the Absolute Individual).
La tradizione ermetica (1931; second edition 1971)English translation:
Maschera e volto dello spiritualismo contemporaneo: Analisi critica delle principali correnti moderne verso il sovrasensibile (1932)English translation: And:
Heidnischer Imperialismus (1933)English translation:
Rivolta contro il mondo moderno (1934; second edition 1951; third edition 1970)English translation:
Il Mistero del Graal e la Tradizione Ghibellina dell'Impero (1937)English translation:
Il mito del sangue. Genesi del Razzismo (1937; second edition 1942)English translation:
Sintesi di dottrina della razza (1941)English translation:
Indirizzi per una educazione razziale (1941)English translation:
La dottrina del risveglio (1943)English translation:
Lo Yoga della potenza (1949; second edition 1968)English translation:
Gli uomini e le rovine (1953; second edition 1972)English translation:
(1958; second edition 1969)English translations: 1983–1991:
L'operaio nel pensiero di Ernst Jünger (1960; The Worker in the Thought of Ernst Jünger). Excerpts in English
Cavalcare la tigre (1961)English translation:
Il cammino del cinabro (1963; second edition 1970)English translation:
Il Fascismo. Saggio di una analisi critica dal punto di vista della Destra (1964; second edition 1970)English translation: And:
Collections
Saggi sull'idealismo magico (1925; Essays on Magical Idealism).
Introduzione alla magia (1927–1929; 1971)English translation: And: And:
L'arco e la clava (1968)English translation:
Ricognizioni. Uomini e problemi (1974)English translation:
Meditazioni delle vette (1974)English translation:
Metafisica della Guerra (1996)English translation:
Jobboldali fiatalok kézikönyve (2012, collection of Hungarian translations of periodicals by Evola, published by Kvintesszencia Kiadó)English translation:
Articles and pamphlets
L'Homme et son devenir selon le Vedânta. (1925; Review of Guenon's work published in 1925 in L'Idealismo Realistico).
Tre aspetti del problema ebraico (1936)English translation:
La tragedia della 'Guardia di Ferro - (1938) English translation: The Tragedy of the Iron Guard. Originally published in La vita italiana 309, Dec, 1938.
On the Secret of Decay (1938)Originally written in German and published by the Deutsches Volkstum magazine n. 14.
Orientamenti, undici punti (1950)English translation:
Il vampirismo ed i vampiri (1973) English: Vampirism and Vampires. Written for journal Roma in September 1973.
Works edited and/or translated by Evola
Tao Tê Ching: Il libro della via e della virtù (1923; The Book of the Way and Virtue). Second edition: Il libro del principio e della sua azione (1959; The Book of the Primary Principle and of Its Action).
La guerra occulta: armi e fasi dell'attacco ebraico-massonico alla tradizione europea by Emmanuel Malynski and Léon de Poncins (1939)English translation:
See also
Occultism and the far right
Traditionalist School
References
Notes
Bibliography
(:)
Aprile, Mario (1984), "Julius Evola: An Introduction to His Life and Work," The Scorpion No. 6 (Winter/Spring): 20–21.
Coletti, Guillermo (1996), "Against the Modern World: An Introduction to the Work of Julius Evola," Ohm Clock No. 4 (Spring): 29–31.
Coogan, Kevin (1999), Dreamer of the Day: Francis Parker Yockey and the Postwar Fascist International Brooklyn, New York:Autonomedia ).
De Benoist, Alain. "Julius Evola, réactionnaire radical et métaphysicien engagé. Analyse critique de la pensée politique de Julius Evola," Nouvelle Ecole, No. 53–54 (2003), pp. 147–69.
Drake, Richard H. (1986), "Julius Evola and the Ideological Origins of the Radical Right in Contemporary Italy," in Peter H. Merkl (ed.), Political Violence and Terror: Motifs and Motivations (University of California Press, ) 61–89.
Drake, Richard H. (1988), "Julius Evola, Radical Fascism and the Lateran Accords," The Catholic Historical Review 74: 403–419.
Drake, Richard H. (1989), "The Children of the Sun," in The Revolutionary Mystique and Terrorism in Contemporary Italy (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, ), 114–134.
Faerraresi, Franco (1987), "Julius Evola: Tradition, Reaction, and the Radical Right," European Journal of Sociology 28: 107–151.
Gelli, Frank (2012), Julius Evola: The Sufi of Rome
Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas (2001), Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity (New York: New York University Press, , , ), 52–71.
Griffin, Roger (1985), "Revolts against the Modern World: The Blend of Literary and Historical Fantasy in the Italian New Right," Literature and History 11 (Spring): 101–123.
Griffin, Roger (1995) (ed.), Fascism (Oxford University Press, ), 317–318.
Hans Thomas Hakl, "La questione dei rapporti fra Julius Evola e Aleister Crowley", in: Arthos 13, Pontremoli, Centro Studi Evoliani, 2006, pp. 269–289.
Hansen, H. T. (1994), "A Short Introduction to Julius Evola," Theosophical History 5 (January): 11–22; reprinted as introduction to Evola, Revolt Against the Modern World, (Vermont: Inner Traditions, 1995).
Hansen, H. T. (2002), "Julius Evola's Political Endeavors," introduction to Evola, Men Among the Ruins, (Vermont: Inner Traditions).
Moynihan, Michael (2003), "Julius Evola's Combat Manuals for a Revolt Against the Modern World," in Richard Metzger (ed.), Book of Lies: The Disinformation Guide to Magick and the Occult (The Disinformation Company, ) 313–320.
Rees, Philip (1991), Biographical Dictionary of the Extreme Right Since 1890 (New York: Simon & Schuster, ), 118–120.
Sedgwick, Mark (2004) Against the Modern World: Traditionalism and the Secret Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century (Oxford University Press, ).
Sheehan, Thomas (1981) "Myth and Violence: The Fascism of Julius Evola and Alain de Benoist," Social Research, 48 (Spring): 45–83.
Staudenmaier, P. (2019). "Racial Ideology between Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany: Julius Evola and the Aryan Myth, 1933–43." Journal of Contemporary History.
Stucco, Guido (1992), "Translator's Introduction," in Evola, The Yoga of Power (Vermont: Inner Traditions), ix–xv.
Stucco, Guido (1994), "Introduction," in Evola, The Path of Enlightenment According to the Mithraic Mysteries, Zen: The Religion of the Samurai, Rene Guenon: A Teacher for Modern Times, and Taoism: The Magic, the Mysticism (Edmonds, WA: Holmes Publishing Group)
Stucco, Guido (2002). "The Legacy of a European Traditionalist: Julius Evola in Perspective". The Occidental Quarterly 3 (2), pp. 21–44.
Wasserstrom, Steven M. (1995), "The Lives of Baron Evola," Alphabet City 4 + 5 (December): 84–89.
Waterfield, Robin (1990), 'Baron Julius Evola and the Hermetic Tradition', Gnosis 14, (Winter): 12–17.
External links
1898 births
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Italian Dadaist | false | [
"Mystical psychosis is a term coined by Arthur J. Deikman in the early 1970s to characterize first-person accounts of psychotic experiences that are strikingly similar to reports of mystical experiences. According to Deikman, and authors from a number of disciplines, psychotic experience need not be considered pathological, especially if consideration is given to the values and beliefs of the individual concerned. Deikman thought the mystical experience was brought about through a \"deautomatization\" or undoing of habitual psychological structures that organize, limit, select, and interpret perceptual stimuli. There may be several causes of deautomatization—exposure to severe stress, substance abuse or withdrawal, and mood disorders.\n\nA closely related category is mystical experience with psychotic features, proposed by David Lukoff in 1985.\n\nA first episode of mystical psychosis is often very frightening, confusing and distressing, particularly because it is an unfamiliar experience. For example, researchers have found that people experiencing paranormal and mystical phenomena report many of the symptoms of panic attacks.\n\nOn the basis of comparison of mystical experience and psychotic experience Deikman came to a conclusion that mystical experience can be caused by \"deautomatization\" or transformation of habitual psychological structures which organize, limit, select and interpret perceptional incentives that is interfaced to heavy stresses and emotional shocks. He described usual symptoms of mystical psychosis which consist in strengthening of a receptive mode and weakening of a mode of action.\n\nPeople susceptible to mystical psychosis become much more impressible. They feel a unification with society, with the world, God, and also feel washing out the perceptive and conceptual borders. Similarity of mystical psychosis to mystical experience is expressed in sudden, distinct and very strong transition to a receptive mode. It is characterized with easing the subject—object distinction, sensitivity increase and nonverbal, lateral, intuitive thought processes.\n\nDeikman's opinion that experience of mystical experience in itself can't be a sign to psychopathology, even in case of this experience at the persons susceptible to neurophysiological and psychiatric frustration, in many respects defined the relation to mystical experiences in modern psychology and psychiatry.\n\nDeikman considered that all-encompassing unity opened in mysticism can be all-encompassing unity of reality.\n\nSee also\n\n Altered state of consciousness\n Depersonalization and Derealization\n Existential crisis\n Dhyāna in Buddhism\n Dhyāna in Hinduism\n Jerusalem syndrome\n Mental health\n Moksha\n Mirror neurons\n Mysticism\n Monomyth\n Near-death experience\n Posttraumatic stress disorder\n Religious experience\n Spiritualism\n Spirituality\n Spiritual crisis\n Wujud\n\nReferences\n\nPsychosis\nPsychosis",
"The Problem of Aryan Origins is a book by K.D. Sethna. The first edition was published in 1980. A second enlarged version (with five supplements) was published in 1992. (Delhi: Aditya Prakashan, 1992.)\n\nThe book questions the validity of the Aryan Invasion Theory. \n\nThe first supplement contains a criticism of the first edition of the book and Sethna's reply. The fifth supplement is a detailed survey in over 200 pages of Asko Parpola's study \"The Coming of the Aryans to Iran and India and the Cultural and Ethnic Identity of the Dasas\".\n\nThe book had a considerable influence on later writers on this subject. A particularity of the book is that Sethna often refers to Sri Aurobindo's interpretation of the Rig Veda.\n\nExternal links \n\nReview by Pradip Bhattacharya\nReview by N.S. Rajaram\nProblem of Aryan Origins\nIndigenous Aryanism"
]
|
[
"Julius Evola",
"Racism and mystical Aryanism",
"What were his views on racism?",
"Evola spoke of \"inferior non-European races\". Peter Merkl wrote that \"Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether\".",
"What is mystical Aryanism?",
"I don't know."
]
| C_64b521f2f9cc4df09098f27ba0a07a51_0 | Did he consider himself Aryan? | 3 | Did Julius Evola consider himself Aryan? | Julius Evola | Evola's dissent from standard biological concepts of race had roots in his aristocratic elitism, since Nazi Volkisch ideology inadequately separated aristocracy from "commoners." According to Furlong, Evola developed "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes--sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves". Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies." Prior to the end of War, Evola had frequently used the term "Aryan" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman 'super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men'...no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights of the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta." Evola spoke of "inferior non-European races". Peter Merkl wrote that "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote: "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanatiscm [are] all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West." While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957, Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of "negroes" and the opposition to segregation. Furlong noted that this article is "among the most extreme in phraseology of any he wrote, and exhibits a degree of intolerance that leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people." CANNOTANSWER | Prior to the end of War, Evola had frequently used the term "Aryan" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. | Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola (; 19 May 1898 11 June 1974), better known as Julius Evola, was an Italian philosopher, poet, and painter whose esoteric worldview featured antisemitic conspiracy theories and the occult. He has been described as a "fascist intellectual", a "radical traditionalist", "antiegalitarian, antiliberal, antidemocratic, and antipopular", and as "the leading philosopher of Europe's neofascist movement".
Evola is popular in fringe circles, largely because of his metaphysical, magical, and supernatural beliefs – including belief in ghosts, telepathy, and alchemyand his traditionalism. He termed his philosophy "magical idealism". Many of Evola's theories and writings were centered on his hostility toward Christianity and his idiosyncratic mysticism, occultism, and esoteric religious studies, and this aspect of his work has influenced occultists and esotericists. Evola also justified male domination over women as part of a purely patriarchal society, an outlook stemming from his traditionalist views on gender, which demanded women stay in or revert to what he saw as their traditional gender roles, where they were completely subordinate to male authority.
According to the scholar Franco Ferraresi, "Evola's thought can be considered one of the most radical and consistent anti-egalitarian, anti-liberal, anti-democratic, and anti-popular systems in the 20th century". It is a singular, though not necessarily original, blend of several schools and traditions, including German idealism, Eastern doctrines, traditionalism, and the all-embracing Weltanschauung of the interwar conservative revolutionary movement with which Evola had a deep personal involvement. Historian Aaron Gillette described Evola as "one of the most influential fascist racists in Italian history".
Evola admired SS head Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler, whom he once met. Autobiographical remarks by Evola allude to his having worked for the Sicherheitsdienst, or SD, the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party. During his trial in 1951, Evola denied being a fascist and instead referred to himself as "" (). Concerning this statement, historian Elisabetta Cassina Wolff wrote that "It is unclear whether this meant that Evola was placing himself above or beyond Fascism".
Evola has been called the "chief ideologue" of Italy's radical right after World War II. He continues to influence contemporary traditionalist and neo-fascist movements.
Life
Giulio Cesare Evola was born in Rome, the son of Vincenzo Evola (born 1854) and Concetta Mangiapane (born 1865). Both his parents had been born in Cinisi, a small town in the Province of Palermo on the north-western coast of Sicily. The paternal grandparents of Giulio Cesare Evola were Giuseppe Evola and Maria Cusumano. Giuseppe Evola is reported as being a joiner in Vincenzo's birth record. The maternal grandparents of Giulio Cesare Evola were Cesare Mangiapane, reported as being a shopkeeper in Concetta's birth record, and his wife Caterina Munacó. Vincenzo Evola and Concetta Mangiapane were married in Cinisi on 25 November 1892. Vincenzo Evola is reported as being a telegraphic mechanic chief, while Concetta Mangiapane is reported as being a landowner.
Giulio Cesare Evola had an elder brother, Giuseppe Gaspare Dinamo Evola, born in 1895 in Rome. Following a slight variation on the Sicilian naming convention of the era, as the second son, Giulio Cesare Evola was partly named after his maternal grandfather.
Evola has been often been reported as being a baron, probably in reference to a purported distant relationship with a minor aristocratic family, the Evoli, who were the barons of Castropignano in the Kingdom of Sicily in the late Middle Ages.
Little is known about Evola's early upbringing except that he considered it irrelevant. He studied engineering at the Istituto Tecnico Leonardo da Vinci in Rome, but did not complete his course, later claiming this was because he "did not want to be associated in any way with bourgeois academic recognition and titles such as doctor and engineer."
In his teenage years, Evola immersed himself in painting—which he considered one of his natural talents—and literature, including Oscar Wilde and Gabriele d'Annunzio. He was introduced to philosophers such as Friedrich Nietzsche and Otto Weininger. Other early philosophical influences included Carlo Michelstaedter and Max Stirner.
In the First World War, Evola served as an artillery officer on the Asiago plateau. He was attracted to the avant-garde, and after the war he briefly associated with Filippo Tommaso Marinetti's Futurist movement. Through his painting and poetry, and through work on the short-lived journal Revue Bleue, he became a prominent representative of Dadaism in Italy. In 1922, after concluding that avant-garde art was becoming commercialized and stiffened by academic conventions, he reduced his focus on artistic expression such as painting and poetry.
Evola was arrested in April 1951 by the Political Office of the Rome Police Headquarters and charged on suspicion that he was an ideologist of the militant neofascist organization Fasci di Azione Rivoluzionaria (FAR). Evola was defended by Prof. Francesco Carnelutti. On November 20, 1951, Evola was acquitted of all charges.
Evola died on 11 June 1974 in Rome from congestive heart failure.
Writing career
Christianity
In 1928, Evola wrote an attack on Christianity titled Pagan Imperialism, which proposed transforming fascism into a system consistent with ancient Roman values and Western esotericism. Evola proposed that fascism should be a vehicle for reinstating the caste system and aristocracy of antiquity. Although he invoked the term "fascism" in this text, his diatribe against the Catholic Church was criticized by both Mussolini's fascist regime and the Vatican itself. A. James Gregor argued that the text was an attack on fascism as it stood at the time of writing, but noted that Mussolini made use of it to threaten the Vatican with the possibility of an "anti-clerical fascism". On account of Evola's anti-Christian proposals, in April 1928 the Vatican-backed right wing Catholic journal Revue Internationale des Sociétés Secrètes published an article entitled "Un Sataniste Italien: Julius Evola", accusing him of satanism.
In his The Mystery of the Grail (1937), Evola discarded Christian interpretations of the Holy Grail and wrote that it symbolizes the principle of an immortalizing and transcendent force connected to the primordial state ... The mystery of the Grail is a mystery of a warrior initiation.He held that the Ghibellines, who had fought the Guelph for control of Northern and Central Italy in the thirteenth century, had within them the residual influences of pre-Christian Celtic and Nordic traditions that represented his conception of the Grail myth. He also held that the Guelph victory against the Ghibellines represented a regression of the castes, since the merchant caste took over from the warrior caste. In the epilogue to this book, Evola argued that the fictitious The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, regardless of whether it was authentic or not, was a cogent representation of modernity. The historian Richard Barber said, Evola mixes rhetoric, prejudice, scholarship, and politics into a strange version of the present and future, but in the process he brings together for the first time interest in the esoteric and in conspiracy theory which characterize much of the later Grail literature.
Buddhism
In his The Doctrine of Awakening (1943), Evola argued that the Pāli Canon could be held to represent true Buddhism. His interpretation of Buddhism is that it was intended to be anti-democratic. He believed that Buddhism revealed the essence of an "Aryan" tradition that had become corrupted and lost in the West. He believed it could be interpreted to reveal the superiority of a warrior caste. Harry Oldmeadow described Evola's work on Buddhism as exhibiting a Nietzschean influence, but Evola criticized Nietzsche's purported anti-ascetic prejudice. Evola claimed that the book "received the official approbation of the Pāli [Text] Society", and was published by a reputable Orientalist publisher. Evola's interpretation of Buddhism, as put forth in his article "Spiritual Virility in Buddhism", is in conflict with the post-WWII scholarship of the Orientalist Giuseppe Tucci, who argues that the viewpoint that Buddhism advocates universal benevolence is legitimate. Arthur Versluis stated that Evola's writing on Buddhism was a vehicle for his own theories, but was a far from accurate rendition of the subject, and he held that much the same could be said of Evola's writing on Hermeticism. Ñāṇavīra Thera was inspired to become a bhikkhu from reading Evola's text The Doctrine of Awakening in 1945 while hospitalized in Sorrento.
Modernity
Evola's Revolt Against the Modern World (1934) promotes the mythology of an ancient Golden Age which gradually declined into modern decadence. In this work, Evola described the features of his idealized traditional society in which religious and temporal power were created and united not by priests, but by warriors expressing spiritual power. In mythology, he saw evidence of the West's superiority over the East. Moreover, he claimed that the traditional elite had the ability to access power and knowledge through a hierarchical magic which differed from the lower "superstitious and fraudulent" forms of magic. Evola insists that only "nonmodern forms, institutions, and knowledge" could produce a "real renewal ... in those who are still capable of receiving it." The text was "immediately recognized by Mircea Eliade and other intellectuals who allegedly advanced ideas associated with Tradition." Eliade was one of the most influential twentieth-century historians of religion, a fascist sympathizer associated with the Romanian Christian right wing movement Iron Guard. Evola was aware of the importance of myth from his readings of Georges Sorel, one of the key intellectual influences on fascism. Hermann Hesse described Revolt Against the Modern World as "really dangerous."
During the 1960s Evola thought the right could no longer reverse the corruption of modern civilization. E. C. Wolff noted that this is why Evola wrote Ride the Tiger, choosing to distance himself completely from active political engagement, without excluding the possibility of action in the future. He argued that one should stay firm and ready to intervene when the tiger of modernity "is tired of running." Goodrick-Clarke notes that, "Evola sets up the ideal of the 'active nihilist' who is prepared to act with violence against modern decadence."
Other writings
In the posthumously published collection of writings, Metaphysics of War, Evola, in line with the conservative revolutionary Ernst Jünger, explored the viewpoint that war could be a spiritually fulfilling experience. He proposed the necessity of a transcendental orientation in a warrior.
From 1934 to 1943 Evola was also responsible for 'Diorama Filosofico', the cultural page of Il Regime Fascista, a daily newspaper owned by Roberto Farinacci. He would also contribute during the same period to Giovanni Preziosi magazine La vita italiana.
Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke has written that Evola's 1945 essay "American 'Civilization'" described the United States as "the final stage of European decline into the 'interior formlessness' of vacuous individualism, conformity and vulgarity under the universal aegis of money-making." According to Goodrick-Clarke, Evola argued that the U.S. "mechanistic and rational philosophy of progress combined with a mundane horizon of prosperity to transform the world into an enormous suburban shopping mall."
Evola translated some works of Oswald Spengler and Ortega y Gasset to Italian.
Occultism and esotericism
Around 1920, Evola's interests led him into spiritual, transcendental, and "supra-rational" studies. He began reading various esoteric texts and gradually delved deeper into the occult, alchemy, magic, and Oriental studies, particularly Tibetan Tantric yoga. A keen mountaineer, Evola described the experience as a source of revelatory spiritual experiences. After his return from the war, Evola experimented with hallucinogens and magic.
When he was about 23 years old, Evola considered suicide. He claimed that he avoided suicide thanks to a revelation he had while reading an early Buddhist text that dealt with shedding all forms of identity other than absolute transcendence. Evola would later publish the text The Doctrine of Awakening, which he regarded as a repayment of his debt to Buddhism for saving him from suicide.
Evola wrote prodigiously on Eastern mysticism, Tantra, hermeticism, the myth of the Holy Grail and Western esotericism. German Egyptologist and esoteric scholar Florian Ebeling has noted that Evola's The Hermetic Tradition is viewed as an "extremely important work on Hermeticism" in the eyes of esotericists. Evola gave particular focus to Cesare della Riviera's text Il Mondo Magico degli Heroi, which he later republished in modern Italian. He held that Riviera's text was consonant with the goals of "high magic"the reshaping of the earthly human into a transcendental 'god man'. According to Evola, the alleged "timeless" Traditional science was able to come to lucid expression through this text, in spite of the "coverings" added to it to prevent accusations from the church. Though Evola rejected Carl Jung's interpretation of alchemy, Jung described Evola's The Hermetic Tradition as a "magisterial account of Hermetic philosophy". In Hegel and the Hermetic Tradition, the philosopher Glenn Alexander Magee favored Evola's interpretation over that of Jung's. In 1988, a journal devoted to Hermetic thought published a section of Evola's book and described it as "Luciferian."
Evola later confessed that he was not a Buddhist, and that his text on Buddhism was meant to balance his earlier work on the Hindu tantras. Evola's interest in tantra was spurred on by correspondence with John Woodroffe. Evola was attracted to the active aspect of tantra, and its claim to provide a practical means to spiritual experience, over the more "passive" approaches in other forms of Eastern spirituality. In Tantric Buddhism in East Asia, Richard K. Payne, Dean of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, argued that Evola manipulated Tantra in the service of right wing violence, and that the emphasis on "power" in The Yoga of Power gave insight into his mentality.
Evola advocated that "differentiated individuals" following the Left-Hand Path use dark violent sexual powers against the modern world. For Evola, these "virile heroes" are both generous and cruel, possess the ability to rule, and commit "Dionysian" acts that might be seen as conventionally immoral. For Evola, the Left Hand path embraces violence as a means of transgression.
According to A. James Gregor Evola's definition of spirituality can be found in Meditations on the Peaks: "what has been successfully actualized and translated into a sense of superiority which is experienced inside by the soul, and a noble demeanor, which is expressed in the body." Goodrick-Clarke wrote that Evola's "rigorous New Age spirituality speaks directly to those who reject absolutely the leveling world of democracy, capitalism, multi-racialism and technology at the outset of the twenty-first century. Their acute sense of cultural chaos can find powerful relief in his ideal of total renewal." Thomas Sheehan wrote that to "read Evola is to take a trip through a weird and fascinating jungle of ancient mythologies, pseudo-ethnology, and transcendental mysticism that is enough to make any southern California consciousness-tripper feel quite at home."
Magical idealism
Thomas Sheehan wrote that "Evola's first philosophical works from the 'twenties were dedicated to reshaping neo-idealism from a philosophy of Absolute Spirit and Mind into a philosophy of the "absolute individual" and action." Accordingly, Evola developed the doctrine of "magical idealism", which held that "the Ego must understand that everything that seems to have a reality independent of it is nothing but an illusion, caused by its own deficiency." For Evola, this ever-increasing unity with the "absolute individual" was consistent with unconstrained liberty, and therefore unconditional power. In his 1925 work Essays on Magical Idealism, Evola declared that "God does not exist. The Ego must create him by making itself divine."
According to Sheehan, Evola discovered the power of metaphysical mythology while developing his theories. This led to his advocacy of supra-rational intellectual intuition over discursive knowledge. In Evola's view, discursive knowledge separates man from Being. Sheehan stated that this position is a theme in certain interpretations of Western philosophers such as Plato, Thomas Aquinas, and Martin Heidegger that was exaggerated by Evola. Evola would later write:
Evola developed a doctrine of the "two natures": the natural world and the primordial "world of 'Being'". He believed that these "two natures" impose form and quality on lower matter and create a hierarchical "great chain of Being." He understood "spiritual virility" as signifying orientation towards this postulated transcendent principle. He held that the State should reflect this "ordering from above" and the consequent hierarchical differentiation of individuals according to their "organic preformation". By "organic preformation" he meant that which "gathers, preserves, and refines one's talents and qualifications for determinate functions."
Ur Group
Evola was introduced to esotericism by Arturo Reghini, who was an early supporter of fascism. Reghini sought to promote a "cultured magic" opposed to Christianity and introduced Evola to the traditionalist René Guénon. In 1927, Reghini and Evola, along with other Italian esotericists, founded the Gruppo di Ur ("Ur Group"). The purpose of this group was to attempt to bring the members' individual identities into such a superhuman state of power and awareness that they would be able to exert a magical influence on the world. The group employed techniques from Buddhist, Tantric, and rare Hermetic texts. They aimed to provide a "soul" to the burgeoning Fascist movement of the time through the revival of ancient Roman religion, and to influence the fascist regime through esotericism.
Articles on occultism from the Ur Group were later published in Introduction to Magic. Reghini's support of Freemasonry would however prove a bone of contention for Evola; accordingly, Evola broke with Reghini in 1928. Reghini himself broke from Evola, accusing Evola of plagiarizing his thoughts in the book Pagan Imperialism. Evola, on the other hand, blamed Reghini for the premature publication of Pagan Imperialism. Evola's later work owed a considerable debt to René Guénon's text Crisis of the Modern World, though he diverged from Guénon on the issue of the relationship between warriors and priests.
Views on sex and gender roles
Julius Evola believed that the alleged higher qualities expected of a man of a particular race were not those expected of a woman of the same race. He held that "just relations between the sexes" involved women acknowledging their "inequality" with men. In 1925, he wrote an article titled "La donna come cosa" ("Woman as Thing"). Evola later quoted Joseph de Maistre's statement that "Woman cannot be superior except as woman, but from the moment in which she desires to emulate man she is nothing but a monkey." Evola believed that women's liberation was "the renunciation by woman of her right to be a woman". A woman "could traditionally participate in the sacred hierarchical order only in a mediated fashion through her relationship with a man." He held, as a feature of his idealized gender relations, the Hindu sati, which for him was a form of sacrifice indicating women's respect for patriarchal traditions. For the "pure, feminine" woman, "man is not perceived by her as a mere husband or lover, but as her lord." Women would find their true identity in total subjugation to men.
Evola regarded matriarchy and goddess religions as a symptom of decadence, and preferred a hyper-masculine, warrior ethos.
Evola was influenced by Hans Blüher; he was a proponent of the Männerbund concept as a model for his proposed ultra-fascist "Order". Goodrick-Clarke noted the fundamental influence of Otto Weininger's book Sex and Character on Evola's dualism of male-female spirituality. According to Goodrich-Clarke, "Evola's celebration of virile spirituality was rooted in Weininger's work, which was widely translated by the end of the First World War." Unlike Weininger, Evola believed that women needed to be conquered, not ignored. Evola denounced homosexuality as "useless" for his purposes. He did not neglect sadomasochism, so long as sadism and masochism "are magnifications of an element potentially present in the deepest essence of eros." Then, it would be possible to "extend, in a transcendental and perhaps ecstatic way, the possibilities of sex."
Evola held that women "played" with men, threatened their masculinity, and lured them into a "constrictive" grasp with their sexuality. He wrote that "It should not be expected of women that they return to what they really are ... when men themselves retain only the semblance of true virility", and lamented that "men instead of being in control of sex are controlled by it and wander about like drunkards". He believed that in Tantra and in sex magic, in which he saw a strategy for aggression, he found the means to counter the "emasculated" West. According to Annalisa Merelli, Evola "went so far as to justify rape" because he saw it "as a natural expression of male desire". Evola also said that the "ritual violation of virgins", and "whipping women" were a means of "consciousness raising", so long as these practices were done to the intensity required to produce the proper "liminal psychic climate". He wrote that "as a rule, nothing stirs a man more than feeling the woman utterly exhausted beneath his own hostile rapture."
Evola translated Weininger's Sex and Character into Italian. Dissatisfied with simply translating Weininger's work, he wrote the text Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), where his views on sexuality were dealt with at length. Arthur Versluis described this text as Evola's "most interesting" work aside from Revolt Against the Modern World. This book remains popular among many 'New Age' adherents.
Views on race
Evola's dissent from standard biological concepts of race had roots in his aristocratic elitism, since Nazi völkisch ideology inadequately separated aristocracy from "commoners." According to European studies professor Paul Furlong, Evola developed "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes—sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves". Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies."
In 1941, Evola's book Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race (Italian: Sintesi di Dottrina della Razza) was published by Hoepli. It provides an overview of his ideas concerning race and eugenics, introducing the concept of "spiritual racism", and "esoteric-traditionalist racism".
Prior to the end of the War, Evola had frequently used the term "Aryan" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men' ... no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights of the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta."
Evola spoke of "inferior non-European races". Peter Merkl wrote that "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote: "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanaticism [are] all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West." While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957 Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of "negroes" and the opposition to segregation. Furlong noted that this article is "among the most extreme in phraseology of any he wrote, and exhibits a degree of intolerance that leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people."
National mysticism
For his spiritual interpretation of the different racial psychologies, Evola found the work of German race theorist Ludwig Ferdinand Clauss invaluable. Like Evola, Clauss believed that physical race and spiritual race could diverge as a consequence of miscegenation. Evola's racism included racism of the body, soul, and spirit, giving primacy to the latter factor, writing that "races only declined when their spirit failed."
Like René Guénon, Evola believed that mankind is living in the Kali Yuga of the Hindu tradition—the Dark Age of unleashed materialistic appetites. He argued that both Italian fascism and Nazism represented hope that the "celestial" Aryan race would be reconstituted. He drew on mythological accounts of super-races and their decline, particularly the Hyperboreans, and maintained that traces of Hyperborean influence could be felt in Indo-European man. He felt that Indo-European men had devolved from these higher mythological races. Gregor noted that several contemporary criticisms of Evola's theory were published: "In one of Fascism's most important theoretical journals, Evola's critic pointed out that many Nordic-Aryans, not to speak of Mediterranean Aryans, fail to demonstrate any Hyperborean properties. Instead, they make obvious their materialism, their sensuality, their indifference to loyalty and sacrifice, together with their consuming greed. How do they differ from 'inferior' races, and why should anyone wish, in any way, to favor them?"
Concerning the relationship between "spiritual racism" and biological racism, Evola put forth the following viewpoint, which Furlong described as pseudo-scientific:
Views on Jews
Evola endorsed Otto Weininger's views on the Jews. Though Evola viewed Jews as corrosive and anti-traditional, he described Adolf Hitler's more fanatical antisemitism as a paranoid idée fixe that damaged the reputation of the Third Reich. Evola's conception did not emphasize the Nazi racial conception of Jews as "representatives of a biological race"—in Evola's view the Jews were "the carriers of a world view ... a spirit [that] corresponded to the 'worst' and 'most decadent' features of modernity: democracy, egalitarianism and materialism." Evola rejected the views of chief Nazi theorist Alfred Rosenberg and others on biological racism as being reductionist and materialistic. Jewry was for Evola, as for Weininger, only a symbol for the rule of money and individualism. Otto Weininger desbribed Jewishness as "intellectual tendency".
Evola argued that the fabricated antisemitic text The Protocols of the Elders of Zion—whether or not a forgery—accurately reflect the conditions of modernity. He believed that the Protocols "contain the plan for an occult war, whose objective is the utter destruction, in the non-Jewish peoples, of all tradition, class, aristocracy, and hierarchy, and of all moral, religious, and spiritual values." He wrote the foreword to the second Italian edition of the Protocols, which was published by the Fascist Giovanni Preziosi in 1938.
Following the murder of his friend Corneliu Zelea Codreanu, the leader of the Fascist Romanian Iron Guard, Evola expressed anticipation of a "Talmudic, Israelite tyranny." However, Evola believed that Jews had this "power" only because of European "decadence" in modernity. He also believed that one could be "Aryan", but have a "Jewish" soul, just as one could be "Jewish", but have an "Aryan" soul. In Evola's view, Otto Weininger and Carlo Michelstaedter were Jews of "sufficiently heroic, ascetic, and sacral" character to fit the latter category.
Views on "caste" and class
Julius Evola believe that society develops a "regression of castes" where classes he viewed as superior were replaced by those he viewed as inferior.
He believed that the rule of spiritual leaders (the highest class) was replaced by that of warriors (the second highest) then by merchants and finally by the proletariat (whom he described as "spiritual eunuchs", quoting another philosopher).
He believed that each aspect of society was effected by the dominant "caste", for example, war in the first type was "holy war" and in the second type "defending the honour of one's lord". In addition, bourgeois rule makes "usury" socially acceptable.
Fascism
Evola developed a line of argument, closely related to the spiritual orientation of Traditionalist writers such as René Guénon and the political concerns of the European authoritarian right. Evola's first published political work was an anti-fascist piece in 1925. In this work, Evola called Italy's fascist movement a "laughable revolution," based on empty sentiment and materialistic concerns. He applauded Mussolini's anti-bourgeois orientation and his goal of making Italian citizens into hardened warriors, but criticized Fascist populism, party politics, and elements of leftism that he saw in the fascist regime. Evola saw Mussolini's Fascist Party as possessing no cultural or spiritual foundation. He was passionate about infusing it with these elements in order to make it suitable for his ideal conception of Übermensch culture which, in Evola's view, characterized the imperial grandeur of pre-Christian Europe. He expressed anti-nationalist sentiment, stating that to become "truly human," one would have to "overcome brotherly contamination" and "purge oneself" of the feeling that one is united with others "because of blood, affections, country or human destiny." He also opposed the futurism that Italian fascism was aligned with, along with the "plebeian" nature of the movement. Accordingly, Evola launched the journal La Torre (The Tower), to voice his concerns and advocate for a more elitist fascism. Evola's ideas were poorly received by the fascist mainstream as it stood at the time of his writing.
Mussolini
Scholars disagree about why Benito Mussolini embraced racist ideology in 1938—some scholars have written that Mussolini was more motivated by political considerations than ideology when he introduced antisemitic legislation in Italy. Other scholars have rejected the argument that the racial ideology of Italian fascism could be attributed solely to Nazi influence. A more recent interpretation is that Mussolini was frustrated by the slow pace of fascist transformation and, by 1938, had adopted increasingly radical measures including a racial ideology. Aaron Gillette has written that "Racism would become the key driving force behind the creation of the new fascist man, the uomo fascista."
Mussolini read Evola's Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race in August 1941, and met with Evola to offer him his praise. Evola later recounted that Mussolini had found in his work a uniquely Roman form of Fascist racism distinct from that found in Nazi Germany. With Mussolini's backing, Evola started preparing the launch of a minor journal Sangue e Spirito (Blood and Spirit) which never appeared. While not always in agreement with German racial theorists, Evola traveled to Germany in February 1942 and obtained support for German collaboration on Sangue e Spirito from "key figures in the German racial hierarchy." Fascists appreciated the palingenetic value of Evola's "proof" "that the true representatives of the state and the culture of ancient Rome were people of the Nordic race." Evola eventually became Italy's leading racial philosopher.
Evola blended Sorelianism with Mussolini's eugenics agenda. Evola has written that "The theory of the Aryo-Roman race and its corresponding myth could integrate the Roman idea proposed, in general, by fascism, as well as give a foundation to Mussolini's plan to use his state as a means to elevate the average Italian and to enucleate in him a new man."
In May, 1951, Evola was arrested and charged with promoting the revival of the Fascist Party, and of glorifying Fascism. Defending himself at trial, Evola stated that his work belonged to a long tradition of anti-democratic writers who certainly could be linked to fascism—at least fascism interpreted according to certain Evolian criteria—but who certainly could not be identified with the Fascist regime under Mussolini. Evola then declared that he was not a Fascist but was instead "" (). He was acquitted.
Third Reich
Finding Italian fascism too compromising, Evola began to seek recognition in Nazi Germany. Evola spent a considerable amount of time in Germany in 1937 and 1938, and gave a series of lectures to the German–Italian Society in 1938. Evola took issue with Nazi populism and biological materialism. SS authorities initially rejected Evola's ideas as supranational and aristocratic though he was better received by members of the conservative revolutionary movement. The Nazi Ahnenerbe reported that many considered his ideas to be pure "fantasy" which ignored "historical facts.". Evola admired Heinrich Himmler, whom he knew personally, but he had reservations about Adolf Hitler because of Hitler's reliance on völkisch nationalism. Himmler's Schutzstaffel ("SS") kept a dossier on Evola—dossier document AR-126 described his plans for a "Roman-Germanic Imperium" as "utopian" and described him as a "reactionary Roman," whose goal was an "insurrection of the old aristocracy against the modern world." The document recommended that the SS "stop his effectiveness in Germany" and provide him with no support, particularly because of his desire to create a "secret international order".
Despite this opposition, Evola was able to establish political connections with pan-Europeanist elements inside the Reich Security Main Office. Evola subsequently ascended to the inner circles of Nazism as the influence of pan-European advocates overtook that of Völkisch proponents, due to military contingencies. Evola wrote the article Reich and Imperium as Elements in the New European Order for the Nazi-backed journal European Review. He spent World War II working for the Sicherheitsdienst. The Sicherheitsdienst bureau Amt VII, a Reich Security Main Office research library, helped Evola acquire arcane occult and Masonic texts.
Italian Fascism went into decline when, in 1943, Mussolini was deposed and imprisoned. At this point, Evola fled to Germany with the help of the Sicherheitsdienst. Although not a member of the National Fascist Party, and despite his apparent problems with the Fascist regime, Evola was one of the first people to greet Mussolini when the latter was broken out of prison by Otto Skorzeny in September, 1943. Subsequently, Evola helped welcome Mussolini to Adolf Hitler's Wolf's Lair. Following this, Evola involved himself in Mussolini's Italian Social Republic. It was Evola's custom to walk around the city of Vienna during bombing raids in order to better "ponder his destiny". During one such raid, 1945, a shell fragment damaged his spinal cord and he became paralyzed from the waist down, remaining so for the rest of his life.
Post-World War II
About the alliance during World War II between Allies and the Soviet Union, Evola wrote:The democratic powers repeated the error of those who think they can use the forces of subversion for their own ends without cost. They do not know that, by a fatal logic, when exponents of two different grades of subversion meet or cross paths, the one representing the more developed grade will take over in the end.The political model Evola selected after 1945 was neither Mussolini nor Hitler. Evola cited and encouraged the youth to read Plato (with reference in particular to The Republic), Dante (with reference in particular to De Monarchia), Joseph de Maistre, Donoso Cortés, Bismarck, Metternich, Gaetano Mosca, Pareto and Michels.
After World War II, Evola continued his work in esotericism. He wrote a number of books and articles on sex magic and various other esoteric studies, including The Yoga of Power: Tantra, Shakti, and the Secret Way (1949), Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), and Meditations on the Peaks: Mountain Climbing as Metaphor for the Spiritual Quest (1974). He also wrote his two explicitly political books Men Among the Ruins: Post-War Reflections of a Radical Traditionalist (1953), Ride the Tiger: A Survival Manual for the Aristocrats of the Soul (1961), and his autobiography, The Path of Cinnabar (1963). He also expanded upon critiques of American civilization and materialism, as well as increasing American influence in Europe, collected in the posthumous anthology Civiltà Americana.
While trying to distance himself from Nazism, Evola wrote in 1955 that the Nuremberg trials were a farce. This indicates that despite being rejected by the SS before the war, he never stopped admiring their criminal activities.
Evola's occult ontology exerted influence over post-war neo-fascism. In the post-war period, Evola's writing evoked interest among the neo-fascist right. After 1945, Evola was considered the most important Italian theoretician of the conservative revolutionary movement and the "chief ideologue" of Italy's post-war radical right. According to Egil Asprem and Kennet Granholm, Evola's most significant post-war political texts are Orientamenti and Men Among the Ruins. In the opening phrase in the first edition of Men Among the Ruins, Evola said: Our adversaries would undoubtedly want us, in a Christian spirit, under the banner of progress or reform, having been struck on one cheek to turn the other. Our principle is different: "Do to others what they would like to do to you: but do it to them first.Orientamenti was a text against "national fascism"—instead, it advocated for a European Community modeled on the principles of the Waffen-SS. The Italian neo-fascist group Ordine Nuovo adopted Orientamenti as a guide for action in postwar Italy. The European Liberation Front, who were affiliated with Francis Parker Yockey, called Evola "Italy's greatest living authoritarian philosopher" in the April 1951 issue of their publication Frontfighter.
During the post-war period, Evola disassociated himself from totalitarianism, preferring the concept of the "organic" state, which he put forth in his text Men Among the Ruins, as well as in his autodifesa. Evola sought to develop a strategy for the implementation of a "conservative revolution" in post-World War II Europe. He rejected nationalism, advocating instead for a European Imperium, which could take various forms according to local conditions, but should be "organic, hierarchical, anti-democratic, and anti-individual." Evola endorsed Francis Parker Yockey's neo-fascist manifesto Imperium, but disagreed with it because he believed that Yockey had a "superficial" understanding of what was immediately possible. Evola believed that his conception of neo-fascist Europe could best be implemented by an elite of "superior" men who operated outside normal politics.
In Men Among the Ruins, Evola defines the Fourth Estate as being the last stage in the cyclical development of the social elite, the first beginning with the monarchy. Expanding the concept in an essay in 1950, the Fourth State according to Evola would be characterized by "the collectivist civilization... the communist society of the faceless-massman".
Giuliano Salierni was an activist in the neo-Fascist Italian Social Movement during the early 1950s. He later recalled Evola's calls to violence. Roberto Fiore and his colleagues in the early 1980s helped the National Fronts "Political Soldiers" forge a militant elitist philosophy based on Evola's "most militant tract", The Aryan Doctrine of Battle and Victory. The Aryan Doctrine called for a "Great Holy War" that would be fought for spiritual renewal and fought in parallel to the physical "Little Holy War" against perceived enemies. Wolff attributes extreme-right terrorist actions in Italy in the 1970s and 1980s to the influence of Julius Evola.
Thomas Sheehan has argued that Evola's work is essential reading for those seeking to understand European neo-fascism, in the same way that knowledge of the writings of Karl Marx is necessary for those seeking to understand Communist actions.
Political influence
At one time Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini, the Nazi Grail seeker Otto Rahn, and the Romanian fascist sympathizer and religious historian Mircea Eliade admired Julius Evola. After World War II, Evola's writings continued to influence many European far-right political, racist and neo-fascist movements. He is widely translated in French, Spanish, partly in German, and mostly in Hungarian (the largest number of his translated works).
Umberto Eco referred to Evola as the "most influential theoretical source of the theories of the new Italian right", and as "one of the most respected fascist gurus".
Giorgio Almirante referred to him as "our Marcuse—only better." According to one leader of the neofascist "black terrorist" Ordine Nuovo, "Our work since 1953 has been to transpose Evola's teachings into direct political action."
The now defunct French fascist group Troisième Voie was also inspired by Evola.
Jonathan Bowden, English political activist and chairman of the far right, spoke highly of Evola and his ideas and gave lectures on his philosophy.
Evola has influenced Russian political analyst and fascist Aleksander Dugin.
The Greek neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn includes his works on its suggested reading list, and the leader of Jobbik, the Hungarian nationalist party, admires Evola and wrote an introduction to his works.
Donald Trump's former chief adviser Steve Bannon has pointed to Evola's influence on the Eurasianism movement; According to Joshua Green's book Devil's Bargain, Evola's Revolt Against the Modern World had initially drawn Bannon's interest to the ideas of the Traditionalist School. Alt-right leader and white nationalist Richard Spencer said that Bannon's awareness of Evola "means a tremendous amount". Some members of the alt-right expressed hope that Bannon might have been open to Evola's ideas, and that through Bannon, Evola's ideas could become influential. According to multiple historians cited by The Atlantic, this is contradictory, as Bannon cited Evola in defense of the "Judeo-Christian west", while Evola hated and opposed Judaism and Jews, Christianity in general, Anglo-Saxon Protestantism specifically, and the culture of the United States. In a leaked email sent by Bannon in March 2016, he told Milo Yiannopoulos, "I do appreciate any piece that mentions Evola." Evola has also influenced the alt-right movement.
Works
Books
L'individuo e il divenire del mondo (1926; The Individual and the Becoming of the World).
L'uomo come potenza (1927; Man as Potency).
Teoria dell'individuo assoluto (1927; The Theory of the Absolute Individual).
Imperialismo pagano (1928; second edition 1932)English translation:
Fenomenologia dell'individuo assoluto (1930; The Phenomenology of the Absolute Individual).
La tradizione ermetica (1931; second edition 1971)English translation:
Maschera e volto dello spiritualismo contemporaneo: Analisi critica delle principali correnti moderne verso il sovrasensibile (1932)English translation: And:
Heidnischer Imperialismus (1933)English translation:
Rivolta contro il mondo moderno (1934; second edition 1951; third edition 1970)English translation:
Il Mistero del Graal e la Tradizione Ghibellina dell'Impero (1937)English translation:
Il mito del sangue. Genesi del Razzismo (1937; second edition 1942)English translation:
Sintesi di dottrina della razza (1941)English translation:
Indirizzi per una educazione razziale (1941)English translation:
La dottrina del risveglio (1943)English translation:
Lo Yoga della potenza (1949; second edition 1968)English translation:
Gli uomini e le rovine (1953; second edition 1972)English translation:
(1958; second edition 1969)English translations: 1983–1991:
L'operaio nel pensiero di Ernst Jünger (1960; The Worker in the Thought of Ernst Jünger). Excerpts in English
Cavalcare la tigre (1961)English translation:
Il cammino del cinabro (1963; second edition 1970)English translation:
Il Fascismo. Saggio di una analisi critica dal punto di vista della Destra (1964; second edition 1970)English translation: And:
Collections
Saggi sull'idealismo magico (1925; Essays on Magical Idealism).
Introduzione alla magia (1927–1929; 1971)English translation: And: And:
L'arco e la clava (1968)English translation:
Ricognizioni. Uomini e problemi (1974)English translation:
Meditazioni delle vette (1974)English translation:
Metafisica della Guerra (1996)English translation:
Jobboldali fiatalok kézikönyve (2012, collection of Hungarian translations of periodicals by Evola, published by Kvintesszencia Kiadó)English translation:
Articles and pamphlets
L'Homme et son devenir selon le Vedânta. (1925; Review of Guenon's work published in 1925 in L'Idealismo Realistico).
Tre aspetti del problema ebraico (1936)English translation:
La tragedia della 'Guardia di Ferro - (1938) English translation: The Tragedy of the Iron Guard. Originally published in La vita italiana 309, Dec, 1938.
On the Secret of Decay (1938)Originally written in German and published by the Deutsches Volkstum magazine n. 14.
Orientamenti, undici punti (1950)English translation:
Il vampirismo ed i vampiri (1973) English: Vampirism and Vampires. Written for journal Roma in September 1973.
Works edited and/or translated by Evola
Tao Tê Ching: Il libro della via e della virtù (1923; The Book of the Way and Virtue). Second edition: Il libro del principio e della sua azione (1959; The Book of the Primary Principle and of Its Action).
La guerra occulta: armi e fasi dell'attacco ebraico-massonico alla tradizione europea by Emmanuel Malynski and Léon de Poncins (1939)English translation:
See also
Occultism and the far right
Traditionalist School
References
Notes
Bibliography
(:)
Aprile, Mario (1984), "Julius Evola: An Introduction to His Life and Work," The Scorpion No. 6 (Winter/Spring): 20–21.
Coletti, Guillermo (1996), "Against the Modern World: An Introduction to the Work of Julius Evola," Ohm Clock No. 4 (Spring): 29–31.
Coogan, Kevin (1999), Dreamer of the Day: Francis Parker Yockey and the Postwar Fascist International Brooklyn, New York:Autonomedia ).
De Benoist, Alain. "Julius Evola, réactionnaire radical et métaphysicien engagé. Analyse critique de la pensée politique de Julius Evola," Nouvelle Ecole, No. 53–54 (2003), pp. 147–69.
Drake, Richard H. (1986), "Julius Evola and the Ideological Origins of the Radical Right in Contemporary Italy," in Peter H. Merkl (ed.), Political Violence and Terror: Motifs and Motivations (University of California Press, ) 61–89.
Drake, Richard H. (1988), "Julius Evola, Radical Fascism and the Lateran Accords," The Catholic Historical Review 74: 403–419.
Drake, Richard H. (1989), "The Children of the Sun," in The Revolutionary Mystique and Terrorism in Contemporary Italy (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, ), 114–134.
Faerraresi, Franco (1987), "Julius Evola: Tradition, Reaction, and the Radical Right," European Journal of Sociology 28: 107–151.
Gelli, Frank (2012), Julius Evola: The Sufi of Rome
Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas (2001), Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity (New York: New York University Press, , , ), 52–71.
Griffin, Roger (1985), "Revolts against the Modern World: The Blend of Literary and Historical Fantasy in the Italian New Right," Literature and History 11 (Spring): 101–123.
Griffin, Roger (1995) (ed.), Fascism (Oxford University Press, ), 317–318.
Hans Thomas Hakl, "La questione dei rapporti fra Julius Evola e Aleister Crowley", in: Arthos 13, Pontremoli, Centro Studi Evoliani, 2006, pp. 269–289.
Hansen, H. T. (1994), "A Short Introduction to Julius Evola," Theosophical History 5 (January): 11–22; reprinted as introduction to Evola, Revolt Against the Modern World, (Vermont: Inner Traditions, 1995).
Hansen, H. T. (2002), "Julius Evola's Political Endeavors," introduction to Evola, Men Among the Ruins, (Vermont: Inner Traditions).
Moynihan, Michael (2003), "Julius Evola's Combat Manuals for a Revolt Against the Modern World," in Richard Metzger (ed.), Book of Lies: The Disinformation Guide to Magick and the Occult (The Disinformation Company, ) 313–320.
Rees, Philip (1991), Biographical Dictionary of the Extreme Right Since 1890 (New York: Simon & Schuster, ), 118–120.
Sedgwick, Mark (2004) Against the Modern World: Traditionalism and the Secret Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century (Oxford University Press, ).
Sheehan, Thomas (1981) "Myth and Violence: The Fascism of Julius Evola and Alain de Benoist," Social Research, 48 (Spring): 45–83.
Staudenmaier, P. (2019). "Racial Ideology between Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany: Julius Evola and the Aryan Myth, 1933–43." Journal of Contemporary History.
Stucco, Guido (1992), "Translator's Introduction," in Evola, The Yoga of Power (Vermont: Inner Traditions), ix–xv.
Stucco, Guido (1994), "Introduction," in Evola, The Path of Enlightenment According to the Mithraic Mysteries, Zen: The Religion of the Samurai, Rene Guenon: A Teacher for Modern Times, and Taoism: The Magic, the Mysticism (Edmonds, WA: Holmes Publishing Group)
Stucco, Guido (2002). "The Legacy of a European Traditionalist: Julius Evola in Perspective". The Occidental Quarterly 3 (2), pp. 21–44.
Wasserstrom, Steven M. (1995), "The Lives of Baron Evola," Alphabet City 4 + 5 (December): 84–89.
Waterfield, Robin (1990), 'Baron Julius Evola and the Hermetic Tradition', Gnosis 14, (Winter): 12–17.
External links
1898 births
1974 deaths
20th-century Italian philosophers
20th-century Italian politicians
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Historians of fascism
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Italian Dadaist | false | [
"Karar: The Deal () is a 2014 Indian Hindi-language thriller film directed by Sabbir Khan and produced by Shashikiran B. Wadia under the banner of Shree Cine Arts. Though the Censor Board 'A' certificate is dated 09-05-2007, the film was released on 21 February 2014 for reasons not known.\n\nCast\nTarun Arora as Dr. Aryan \nMahek Chahal as Nikita\nJyothi Rana as Annie, nurse\nShashi Vadia as Nikita's Dadaji\nSalim Khan as Inspector Kadar Khan\n\nPlot\nIn the film, a doctor (Aryan) and a nurse (Annie), who is employed to look after a rich old man on wheel-chair, plan to usurp his property and wealth. The old Dadaji incidentally wishes to get his granddaughter (Nikita) married to Dr Aryan as he likes him. Dadaji is on medical treatment by Dr Aryan due to his heart ailment. He manages to convince Nikita to marry Dr Aryan. But even after marriage, Aryan continues his sexual acts with Annie. Nikita has a hole in her heart and cannot sustain shock and pressure. Aryan knows about this and takes advantage of her handicap. Nikita catches Aryan in his misdemeanour with Annie but he blatantly continues with his shameless acts threatening her that if Dadaji learnt about the affair, he will die of shock. Dadaji gets his will prepared naming Nikita as the heiress and Aryan is shocked since he is interested in coveting the property and wealth; so he hatches a plan with Annie so that Nikita will die of shock naturally and Dadaji will also die due to shock of Nikita's death. Aryan asks Annie to confide with Nikita and come close to her so that they can eliminate Aryan. In the process Aryan smothers Annie and convinces Nikita that Annie is dead. They take the body in a suitcase and dump it in the sea. When Dadaji asks them about missing Annie, Aryan tells him that she has left the job and gone to her home-town. Later Nikita feels that Annie's ghost comes to haunt her. Aryan convinces her that she is imagining things. She repeatedly tells Aryan to come clean and reveal the truth to the police but he manages to silence her. One day, Nikita sees a dead woman's body and screams out when she sees the face. It is not Annie. Inspector (Kadar Khan), who is investigating the death suspects Nikita's behaviour. On his probing, Nikita informs him that the nurse Annie is missing since nearly a week but she did not file missing report since she thought that the nurse had gone to her hometown and Nikita did not know her contact no. One day, the Inspector comes to meet Aryan and Nikita and shows them the suitcase which was found from the sea. He found out that it belonged to them with the help of a card inside. On his asking to open the suitcase, Nikita does so and they find it empty. Nikita is terrified and now she is convinced that Annie is alive. When Aryan is away, she gets a call from Annie that she is on her way to Nikita's mansion. Annie's arrival shocks Nikita and when Aryan also arrives, the suspense builds up. With the non-challant attitude of Aryan while talking to them, Annie realizes that he is crook and a selfish man who is not interested in her and is using har like a pawn to achieve his goal. She joins Nikita to overpower Aryan but in the process, he grabs their throats to strangulate them to death together. He is shot from behind by Dadaji and the girls are saved. Dadaji shoots him repeatedly till he dies. The film ends with both girls dancing and enjoying together and Dadaji too joining them in the fun on his wheel-chair.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n \n\n2014 films\nIndian films\n2010s Hindi-language films\nFilms shot in Mumbai",
"Aryan is a 2006 Indian Hindi-language sports drama film written and directed by Abhishek Kapoor and produced by Poonam Khubani and Vipin Anand. The film stars Sohail Khan and Sneha Ullal with Puneet Issar, Satish Shah, Supriya Karnik and Inder Kumar in supporting roles.\n\nPlot\nAryan is the college boxing champion. He is training under Ranveer Singh Bagga with another student Ranjeet , in order to achieve his dream: winning the national championship. His girlfriend Neha supports him unconditionally, and he relies heavily upon her. However, after his life turns unexpectedly into another direction, he gives up boxing and marries instead. He becomes a father and takes up a job as sports' commentator. Despite this, his life suffers severe ups and downs in the process. Aryan also learns that Ranjeet got kicked out of the college boxing team by coach Ranveer for taking steroids in the locker room, and the former suspects Aryan had informed him, leaving Aryan confused and frustrated. Aryan's frustration further leads him to suspect Neha of having an affair with her boss and director Sameer. Because of his temper, Neha and Ranveer separate from him shortly after that. In order to win his self-esteem back, Aryan accepts the proposal for making a comeback in boxing. Ranjeet challenges Aryan in the national boxing championship in order to exact his revenge from the latter. Aryan undergoes rigorous training and faces Ranjeet in the finals. A fight ensues in the ring where Ranjeet almost defeats Aryan after severely injuring him. But at the last minute, Neha, who forgives Aryan, goes to the stadium to support him. After witnessing Neha, Aryan subsequently defeats Ranjeet and becomes the national boxing champion, and reconciles with his family.\n\nCast\n Sohail Khan as Aryan Verma\n Sneha Ullal as Neha Verma\n Inder Kumar as Ranjeet Singh\n Puneet Issar as Ranveer Singh Bagga (Aryan's coach)\n Farida Jalal as Mrs. Braganza (Aryan's neighbour)\n Satish Shah as Kiran (Neha's father)\n Supriya Karnik as Devika (Neha's mother)\n Kapil Dev as himself\n Ahsaas Channa as Ranveer Verma (Aryan's son)\n Fardeen Khan as Sameer (cameo)\n Suved Lohia as Jaideep Malhotra (Aryan's friend)\n\nSoundtrack\nAccording to the Indian trade website Box Office India, with around 11,00,000 units sold, this film's soundtrack album was the year's thirteenth highest-selling.\nEk Look Ek Look (Dhol Mix) - Anand Raj Anand, Poonam Khubani\nEk Look Ek Look Pyar - Anand Raj Anand, Poonam Khubani\nChhuna Hai Aasman Ko - Bianca Gomes, Ranjit Barot\nEk Look Ek Look Pyar Wali Sajna (Remix) - Anand Raj Anand, Poonam Khubani\nSajan Ghar Aana Tha (Janeman) - Shreya Ghoshal, Sonu Nigam \nIts Beautiful Day - Hamza Faruqui, Shreya Ghoshal\nLamha Lamha - Anand Raj Anand\nRab Ne Mere - Kunal Ganjawala, Shreya Ghoshal\nTeri Te Me - Pamela Jain, Anand Raj Anand\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\nIndian films\n2000s Hindi-language films\n2006 films\nIndian boxing films\nFilms scored by Anand Raj Anand\nIndian action drama films\nIndian sports drama films\n2006 directorial debut films\nFilms directed by Abhishek Kapoor\n2000s action drama films\n2000s sports drama films"
]
|
[
"Julius Evola",
"Racism and mystical Aryanism",
"What were his views on racism?",
"Evola spoke of \"inferior non-European races\". Peter Merkl wrote that \"Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether\".",
"What is mystical Aryanism?",
"I don't know.",
"Did he consider himself Aryan?",
"Prior to the end of War, Evola had frequently used the term \"Aryan\" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality."
]
| C_64b521f2f9cc4df09098f27ba0a07a51_0 | What important things did he do? | 4 | What important things did Julius Evola do? | Julius Evola | Evola's dissent from standard biological concepts of race had roots in his aristocratic elitism, since Nazi Volkisch ideology inadequately separated aristocracy from "commoners." According to Furlong, Evola developed "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes--sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves". Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies." Prior to the end of War, Evola had frequently used the term "Aryan" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman 'super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men'...no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights of the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta." Evola spoke of "inferior non-European races". Peter Merkl wrote that "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote: "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanatiscm [are] all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West." While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957, Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of "negroes" and the opposition to segregation. Furlong noted that this article is "among the most extreme in phraseology of any he wrote, and exhibits a degree of intolerance that leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people." CANNOTANSWER | According to Furlong, Evola developed "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II | Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola (; 19 May 1898 11 June 1974), better known as Julius Evola, was an Italian philosopher, poet, and painter whose esoteric worldview featured antisemitic conspiracy theories and the occult. He has been described as a "fascist intellectual", a "radical traditionalist", "antiegalitarian, antiliberal, antidemocratic, and antipopular", and as "the leading philosopher of Europe's neofascist movement".
Evola is popular in fringe circles, largely because of his metaphysical, magical, and supernatural beliefs – including belief in ghosts, telepathy, and alchemyand his traditionalism. He termed his philosophy "magical idealism". Many of Evola's theories and writings were centered on his hostility toward Christianity and his idiosyncratic mysticism, occultism, and esoteric religious studies, and this aspect of his work has influenced occultists and esotericists. Evola also justified male domination over women as part of a purely patriarchal society, an outlook stemming from his traditionalist views on gender, which demanded women stay in or revert to what he saw as their traditional gender roles, where they were completely subordinate to male authority.
According to the scholar Franco Ferraresi, "Evola's thought can be considered one of the most radical and consistent anti-egalitarian, anti-liberal, anti-democratic, and anti-popular systems in the 20th century". It is a singular, though not necessarily original, blend of several schools and traditions, including German idealism, Eastern doctrines, traditionalism, and the all-embracing Weltanschauung of the interwar conservative revolutionary movement with which Evola had a deep personal involvement. Historian Aaron Gillette described Evola as "one of the most influential fascist racists in Italian history".
Evola admired SS head Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler, whom he once met. Autobiographical remarks by Evola allude to his having worked for the Sicherheitsdienst, or SD, the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party. During his trial in 1951, Evola denied being a fascist and instead referred to himself as "" (). Concerning this statement, historian Elisabetta Cassina Wolff wrote that "It is unclear whether this meant that Evola was placing himself above or beyond Fascism".
Evola has been called the "chief ideologue" of Italy's radical right after World War II. He continues to influence contemporary traditionalist and neo-fascist movements.
Life
Giulio Cesare Evola was born in Rome, the son of Vincenzo Evola (born 1854) and Concetta Mangiapane (born 1865). Both his parents had been born in Cinisi, a small town in the Province of Palermo on the north-western coast of Sicily. The paternal grandparents of Giulio Cesare Evola were Giuseppe Evola and Maria Cusumano. Giuseppe Evola is reported as being a joiner in Vincenzo's birth record. The maternal grandparents of Giulio Cesare Evola were Cesare Mangiapane, reported as being a shopkeeper in Concetta's birth record, and his wife Caterina Munacó. Vincenzo Evola and Concetta Mangiapane were married in Cinisi on 25 November 1892. Vincenzo Evola is reported as being a telegraphic mechanic chief, while Concetta Mangiapane is reported as being a landowner.
Giulio Cesare Evola had an elder brother, Giuseppe Gaspare Dinamo Evola, born in 1895 in Rome. Following a slight variation on the Sicilian naming convention of the era, as the second son, Giulio Cesare Evola was partly named after his maternal grandfather.
Evola has been often been reported as being a baron, probably in reference to a purported distant relationship with a minor aristocratic family, the Evoli, who were the barons of Castropignano in the Kingdom of Sicily in the late Middle Ages.
Little is known about Evola's early upbringing except that he considered it irrelevant. He studied engineering at the Istituto Tecnico Leonardo da Vinci in Rome, but did not complete his course, later claiming this was because he "did not want to be associated in any way with bourgeois academic recognition and titles such as doctor and engineer."
In his teenage years, Evola immersed himself in painting—which he considered one of his natural talents—and literature, including Oscar Wilde and Gabriele d'Annunzio. He was introduced to philosophers such as Friedrich Nietzsche and Otto Weininger. Other early philosophical influences included Carlo Michelstaedter and Max Stirner.
In the First World War, Evola served as an artillery officer on the Asiago plateau. He was attracted to the avant-garde, and after the war he briefly associated with Filippo Tommaso Marinetti's Futurist movement. Through his painting and poetry, and through work on the short-lived journal Revue Bleue, he became a prominent representative of Dadaism in Italy. In 1922, after concluding that avant-garde art was becoming commercialized and stiffened by academic conventions, he reduced his focus on artistic expression such as painting and poetry.
Evola was arrested in April 1951 by the Political Office of the Rome Police Headquarters and charged on suspicion that he was an ideologist of the militant neofascist organization Fasci di Azione Rivoluzionaria (FAR). Evola was defended by Prof. Francesco Carnelutti. On November 20, 1951, Evola was acquitted of all charges.
Evola died on 11 June 1974 in Rome from congestive heart failure.
Writing career
Christianity
In 1928, Evola wrote an attack on Christianity titled Pagan Imperialism, which proposed transforming fascism into a system consistent with ancient Roman values and Western esotericism. Evola proposed that fascism should be a vehicle for reinstating the caste system and aristocracy of antiquity. Although he invoked the term "fascism" in this text, his diatribe against the Catholic Church was criticized by both Mussolini's fascist regime and the Vatican itself. A. James Gregor argued that the text was an attack on fascism as it stood at the time of writing, but noted that Mussolini made use of it to threaten the Vatican with the possibility of an "anti-clerical fascism". On account of Evola's anti-Christian proposals, in April 1928 the Vatican-backed right wing Catholic journal Revue Internationale des Sociétés Secrètes published an article entitled "Un Sataniste Italien: Julius Evola", accusing him of satanism.
In his The Mystery of the Grail (1937), Evola discarded Christian interpretations of the Holy Grail and wrote that it symbolizes the principle of an immortalizing and transcendent force connected to the primordial state ... The mystery of the Grail is a mystery of a warrior initiation.He held that the Ghibellines, who had fought the Guelph for control of Northern and Central Italy in the thirteenth century, had within them the residual influences of pre-Christian Celtic and Nordic traditions that represented his conception of the Grail myth. He also held that the Guelph victory against the Ghibellines represented a regression of the castes, since the merchant caste took over from the warrior caste. In the epilogue to this book, Evola argued that the fictitious The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, regardless of whether it was authentic or not, was a cogent representation of modernity. The historian Richard Barber said, Evola mixes rhetoric, prejudice, scholarship, and politics into a strange version of the present and future, but in the process he brings together for the first time interest in the esoteric and in conspiracy theory which characterize much of the later Grail literature.
Buddhism
In his The Doctrine of Awakening (1943), Evola argued that the Pāli Canon could be held to represent true Buddhism. His interpretation of Buddhism is that it was intended to be anti-democratic. He believed that Buddhism revealed the essence of an "Aryan" tradition that had become corrupted and lost in the West. He believed it could be interpreted to reveal the superiority of a warrior caste. Harry Oldmeadow described Evola's work on Buddhism as exhibiting a Nietzschean influence, but Evola criticized Nietzsche's purported anti-ascetic prejudice. Evola claimed that the book "received the official approbation of the Pāli [Text] Society", and was published by a reputable Orientalist publisher. Evola's interpretation of Buddhism, as put forth in his article "Spiritual Virility in Buddhism", is in conflict with the post-WWII scholarship of the Orientalist Giuseppe Tucci, who argues that the viewpoint that Buddhism advocates universal benevolence is legitimate. Arthur Versluis stated that Evola's writing on Buddhism was a vehicle for his own theories, but was a far from accurate rendition of the subject, and he held that much the same could be said of Evola's writing on Hermeticism. Ñāṇavīra Thera was inspired to become a bhikkhu from reading Evola's text The Doctrine of Awakening in 1945 while hospitalized in Sorrento.
Modernity
Evola's Revolt Against the Modern World (1934) promotes the mythology of an ancient Golden Age which gradually declined into modern decadence. In this work, Evola described the features of his idealized traditional society in which religious and temporal power were created and united not by priests, but by warriors expressing spiritual power. In mythology, he saw evidence of the West's superiority over the East. Moreover, he claimed that the traditional elite had the ability to access power and knowledge through a hierarchical magic which differed from the lower "superstitious and fraudulent" forms of magic. Evola insists that only "nonmodern forms, institutions, and knowledge" could produce a "real renewal ... in those who are still capable of receiving it." The text was "immediately recognized by Mircea Eliade and other intellectuals who allegedly advanced ideas associated with Tradition." Eliade was one of the most influential twentieth-century historians of religion, a fascist sympathizer associated with the Romanian Christian right wing movement Iron Guard. Evola was aware of the importance of myth from his readings of Georges Sorel, one of the key intellectual influences on fascism. Hermann Hesse described Revolt Against the Modern World as "really dangerous."
During the 1960s Evola thought the right could no longer reverse the corruption of modern civilization. E. C. Wolff noted that this is why Evola wrote Ride the Tiger, choosing to distance himself completely from active political engagement, without excluding the possibility of action in the future. He argued that one should stay firm and ready to intervene when the tiger of modernity "is tired of running." Goodrick-Clarke notes that, "Evola sets up the ideal of the 'active nihilist' who is prepared to act with violence against modern decadence."
Other writings
In the posthumously published collection of writings, Metaphysics of War, Evola, in line with the conservative revolutionary Ernst Jünger, explored the viewpoint that war could be a spiritually fulfilling experience. He proposed the necessity of a transcendental orientation in a warrior.
From 1934 to 1943 Evola was also responsible for 'Diorama Filosofico', the cultural page of Il Regime Fascista, a daily newspaper owned by Roberto Farinacci. He would also contribute during the same period to Giovanni Preziosi magazine La vita italiana.
Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke has written that Evola's 1945 essay "American 'Civilization'" described the United States as "the final stage of European decline into the 'interior formlessness' of vacuous individualism, conformity and vulgarity under the universal aegis of money-making." According to Goodrick-Clarke, Evola argued that the U.S. "mechanistic and rational philosophy of progress combined with a mundane horizon of prosperity to transform the world into an enormous suburban shopping mall."
Evola translated some works of Oswald Spengler and Ortega y Gasset to Italian.
Occultism and esotericism
Around 1920, Evola's interests led him into spiritual, transcendental, and "supra-rational" studies. He began reading various esoteric texts and gradually delved deeper into the occult, alchemy, magic, and Oriental studies, particularly Tibetan Tantric yoga. A keen mountaineer, Evola described the experience as a source of revelatory spiritual experiences. After his return from the war, Evola experimented with hallucinogens and magic.
When he was about 23 years old, Evola considered suicide. He claimed that he avoided suicide thanks to a revelation he had while reading an early Buddhist text that dealt with shedding all forms of identity other than absolute transcendence. Evola would later publish the text The Doctrine of Awakening, which he regarded as a repayment of his debt to Buddhism for saving him from suicide.
Evola wrote prodigiously on Eastern mysticism, Tantra, hermeticism, the myth of the Holy Grail and Western esotericism. German Egyptologist and esoteric scholar Florian Ebeling has noted that Evola's The Hermetic Tradition is viewed as an "extremely important work on Hermeticism" in the eyes of esotericists. Evola gave particular focus to Cesare della Riviera's text Il Mondo Magico degli Heroi, which he later republished in modern Italian. He held that Riviera's text was consonant with the goals of "high magic"the reshaping of the earthly human into a transcendental 'god man'. According to Evola, the alleged "timeless" Traditional science was able to come to lucid expression through this text, in spite of the "coverings" added to it to prevent accusations from the church. Though Evola rejected Carl Jung's interpretation of alchemy, Jung described Evola's The Hermetic Tradition as a "magisterial account of Hermetic philosophy". In Hegel and the Hermetic Tradition, the philosopher Glenn Alexander Magee favored Evola's interpretation over that of Jung's. In 1988, a journal devoted to Hermetic thought published a section of Evola's book and described it as "Luciferian."
Evola later confessed that he was not a Buddhist, and that his text on Buddhism was meant to balance his earlier work on the Hindu tantras. Evola's interest in tantra was spurred on by correspondence with John Woodroffe. Evola was attracted to the active aspect of tantra, and its claim to provide a practical means to spiritual experience, over the more "passive" approaches in other forms of Eastern spirituality. In Tantric Buddhism in East Asia, Richard K. Payne, Dean of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, argued that Evola manipulated Tantra in the service of right wing violence, and that the emphasis on "power" in The Yoga of Power gave insight into his mentality.
Evola advocated that "differentiated individuals" following the Left-Hand Path use dark violent sexual powers against the modern world. For Evola, these "virile heroes" are both generous and cruel, possess the ability to rule, and commit "Dionysian" acts that might be seen as conventionally immoral. For Evola, the Left Hand path embraces violence as a means of transgression.
According to A. James Gregor Evola's definition of spirituality can be found in Meditations on the Peaks: "what has been successfully actualized and translated into a sense of superiority which is experienced inside by the soul, and a noble demeanor, which is expressed in the body." Goodrick-Clarke wrote that Evola's "rigorous New Age spirituality speaks directly to those who reject absolutely the leveling world of democracy, capitalism, multi-racialism and technology at the outset of the twenty-first century. Their acute sense of cultural chaos can find powerful relief in his ideal of total renewal." Thomas Sheehan wrote that to "read Evola is to take a trip through a weird and fascinating jungle of ancient mythologies, pseudo-ethnology, and transcendental mysticism that is enough to make any southern California consciousness-tripper feel quite at home."
Magical idealism
Thomas Sheehan wrote that "Evola's first philosophical works from the 'twenties were dedicated to reshaping neo-idealism from a philosophy of Absolute Spirit and Mind into a philosophy of the "absolute individual" and action." Accordingly, Evola developed the doctrine of "magical idealism", which held that "the Ego must understand that everything that seems to have a reality independent of it is nothing but an illusion, caused by its own deficiency." For Evola, this ever-increasing unity with the "absolute individual" was consistent with unconstrained liberty, and therefore unconditional power. In his 1925 work Essays on Magical Idealism, Evola declared that "God does not exist. The Ego must create him by making itself divine."
According to Sheehan, Evola discovered the power of metaphysical mythology while developing his theories. This led to his advocacy of supra-rational intellectual intuition over discursive knowledge. In Evola's view, discursive knowledge separates man from Being. Sheehan stated that this position is a theme in certain interpretations of Western philosophers such as Plato, Thomas Aquinas, and Martin Heidegger that was exaggerated by Evola. Evola would later write:
Evola developed a doctrine of the "two natures": the natural world and the primordial "world of 'Being'". He believed that these "two natures" impose form and quality on lower matter and create a hierarchical "great chain of Being." He understood "spiritual virility" as signifying orientation towards this postulated transcendent principle. He held that the State should reflect this "ordering from above" and the consequent hierarchical differentiation of individuals according to their "organic preformation". By "organic preformation" he meant that which "gathers, preserves, and refines one's talents and qualifications for determinate functions."
Ur Group
Evola was introduced to esotericism by Arturo Reghini, who was an early supporter of fascism. Reghini sought to promote a "cultured magic" opposed to Christianity and introduced Evola to the traditionalist René Guénon. In 1927, Reghini and Evola, along with other Italian esotericists, founded the Gruppo di Ur ("Ur Group"). The purpose of this group was to attempt to bring the members' individual identities into such a superhuman state of power and awareness that they would be able to exert a magical influence on the world. The group employed techniques from Buddhist, Tantric, and rare Hermetic texts. They aimed to provide a "soul" to the burgeoning Fascist movement of the time through the revival of ancient Roman religion, and to influence the fascist regime through esotericism.
Articles on occultism from the Ur Group were later published in Introduction to Magic. Reghini's support of Freemasonry would however prove a bone of contention for Evola; accordingly, Evola broke with Reghini in 1928. Reghini himself broke from Evola, accusing Evola of plagiarizing his thoughts in the book Pagan Imperialism. Evola, on the other hand, blamed Reghini for the premature publication of Pagan Imperialism. Evola's later work owed a considerable debt to René Guénon's text Crisis of the Modern World, though he diverged from Guénon on the issue of the relationship between warriors and priests.
Views on sex and gender roles
Julius Evola believed that the alleged higher qualities expected of a man of a particular race were not those expected of a woman of the same race. He held that "just relations between the sexes" involved women acknowledging their "inequality" with men. In 1925, he wrote an article titled "La donna come cosa" ("Woman as Thing"). Evola later quoted Joseph de Maistre's statement that "Woman cannot be superior except as woman, but from the moment in which she desires to emulate man she is nothing but a monkey." Evola believed that women's liberation was "the renunciation by woman of her right to be a woman". A woman "could traditionally participate in the sacred hierarchical order only in a mediated fashion through her relationship with a man." He held, as a feature of his idealized gender relations, the Hindu sati, which for him was a form of sacrifice indicating women's respect for patriarchal traditions. For the "pure, feminine" woman, "man is not perceived by her as a mere husband or lover, but as her lord." Women would find their true identity in total subjugation to men.
Evola regarded matriarchy and goddess religions as a symptom of decadence, and preferred a hyper-masculine, warrior ethos.
Evola was influenced by Hans Blüher; he was a proponent of the Männerbund concept as a model for his proposed ultra-fascist "Order". Goodrick-Clarke noted the fundamental influence of Otto Weininger's book Sex and Character on Evola's dualism of male-female spirituality. According to Goodrich-Clarke, "Evola's celebration of virile spirituality was rooted in Weininger's work, which was widely translated by the end of the First World War." Unlike Weininger, Evola believed that women needed to be conquered, not ignored. Evola denounced homosexuality as "useless" for his purposes. He did not neglect sadomasochism, so long as sadism and masochism "are magnifications of an element potentially present in the deepest essence of eros." Then, it would be possible to "extend, in a transcendental and perhaps ecstatic way, the possibilities of sex."
Evola held that women "played" with men, threatened their masculinity, and lured them into a "constrictive" grasp with their sexuality. He wrote that "It should not be expected of women that they return to what they really are ... when men themselves retain only the semblance of true virility", and lamented that "men instead of being in control of sex are controlled by it and wander about like drunkards". He believed that in Tantra and in sex magic, in which he saw a strategy for aggression, he found the means to counter the "emasculated" West. According to Annalisa Merelli, Evola "went so far as to justify rape" because he saw it "as a natural expression of male desire". Evola also said that the "ritual violation of virgins", and "whipping women" were a means of "consciousness raising", so long as these practices were done to the intensity required to produce the proper "liminal psychic climate". He wrote that "as a rule, nothing stirs a man more than feeling the woman utterly exhausted beneath his own hostile rapture."
Evola translated Weininger's Sex and Character into Italian. Dissatisfied with simply translating Weininger's work, he wrote the text Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), where his views on sexuality were dealt with at length. Arthur Versluis described this text as Evola's "most interesting" work aside from Revolt Against the Modern World. This book remains popular among many 'New Age' adherents.
Views on race
Evola's dissent from standard biological concepts of race had roots in his aristocratic elitism, since Nazi völkisch ideology inadequately separated aristocracy from "commoners." According to European studies professor Paul Furlong, Evola developed "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes—sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves". Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies."
In 1941, Evola's book Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race (Italian: Sintesi di Dottrina della Razza) was published by Hoepli. It provides an overview of his ideas concerning race and eugenics, introducing the concept of "spiritual racism", and "esoteric-traditionalist racism".
Prior to the end of the War, Evola had frequently used the term "Aryan" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men' ... no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights of the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta."
Evola spoke of "inferior non-European races". Peter Merkl wrote that "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote: "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanaticism [are] all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West." While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957 Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of "negroes" and the opposition to segregation. Furlong noted that this article is "among the most extreme in phraseology of any he wrote, and exhibits a degree of intolerance that leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people."
National mysticism
For his spiritual interpretation of the different racial psychologies, Evola found the work of German race theorist Ludwig Ferdinand Clauss invaluable. Like Evola, Clauss believed that physical race and spiritual race could diverge as a consequence of miscegenation. Evola's racism included racism of the body, soul, and spirit, giving primacy to the latter factor, writing that "races only declined when their spirit failed."
Like René Guénon, Evola believed that mankind is living in the Kali Yuga of the Hindu tradition—the Dark Age of unleashed materialistic appetites. He argued that both Italian fascism and Nazism represented hope that the "celestial" Aryan race would be reconstituted. He drew on mythological accounts of super-races and their decline, particularly the Hyperboreans, and maintained that traces of Hyperborean influence could be felt in Indo-European man. He felt that Indo-European men had devolved from these higher mythological races. Gregor noted that several contemporary criticisms of Evola's theory were published: "In one of Fascism's most important theoretical journals, Evola's critic pointed out that many Nordic-Aryans, not to speak of Mediterranean Aryans, fail to demonstrate any Hyperborean properties. Instead, they make obvious their materialism, their sensuality, their indifference to loyalty and sacrifice, together with their consuming greed. How do they differ from 'inferior' races, and why should anyone wish, in any way, to favor them?"
Concerning the relationship between "spiritual racism" and biological racism, Evola put forth the following viewpoint, which Furlong described as pseudo-scientific:
Views on Jews
Evola endorsed Otto Weininger's views on the Jews. Though Evola viewed Jews as corrosive and anti-traditional, he described Adolf Hitler's more fanatical antisemitism as a paranoid idée fixe that damaged the reputation of the Third Reich. Evola's conception did not emphasize the Nazi racial conception of Jews as "representatives of a biological race"—in Evola's view the Jews were "the carriers of a world view ... a spirit [that] corresponded to the 'worst' and 'most decadent' features of modernity: democracy, egalitarianism and materialism." Evola rejected the views of chief Nazi theorist Alfred Rosenberg and others on biological racism as being reductionist and materialistic. Jewry was for Evola, as for Weininger, only a symbol for the rule of money and individualism. Otto Weininger desbribed Jewishness as "intellectual tendency".
Evola argued that the fabricated antisemitic text The Protocols of the Elders of Zion—whether or not a forgery—accurately reflect the conditions of modernity. He believed that the Protocols "contain the plan for an occult war, whose objective is the utter destruction, in the non-Jewish peoples, of all tradition, class, aristocracy, and hierarchy, and of all moral, religious, and spiritual values." He wrote the foreword to the second Italian edition of the Protocols, which was published by the Fascist Giovanni Preziosi in 1938.
Following the murder of his friend Corneliu Zelea Codreanu, the leader of the Fascist Romanian Iron Guard, Evola expressed anticipation of a "Talmudic, Israelite tyranny." However, Evola believed that Jews had this "power" only because of European "decadence" in modernity. He also believed that one could be "Aryan", but have a "Jewish" soul, just as one could be "Jewish", but have an "Aryan" soul. In Evola's view, Otto Weininger and Carlo Michelstaedter were Jews of "sufficiently heroic, ascetic, and sacral" character to fit the latter category.
Views on "caste" and class
Julius Evola believe that society develops a "regression of castes" where classes he viewed as superior were replaced by those he viewed as inferior.
He believed that the rule of spiritual leaders (the highest class) was replaced by that of warriors (the second highest) then by merchants and finally by the proletariat (whom he described as "spiritual eunuchs", quoting another philosopher).
He believed that each aspect of society was effected by the dominant "caste", for example, war in the first type was "holy war" and in the second type "defending the honour of one's lord". In addition, bourgeois rule makes "usury" socially acceptable.
Fascism
Evola developed a line of argument, closely related to the spiritual orientation of Traditionalist writers such as René Guénon and the political concerns of the European authoritarian right. Evola's first published political work was an anti-fascist piece in 1925. In this work, Evola called Italy's fascist movement a "laughable revolution," based on empty sentiment and materialistic concerns. He applauded Mussolini's anti-bourgeois orientation and his goal of making Italian citizens into hardened warriors, but criticized Fascist populism, party politics, and elements of leftism that he saw in the fascist regime. Evola saw Mussolini's Fascist Party as possessing no cultural or spiritual foundation. He was passionate about infusing it with these elements in order to make it suitable for his ideal conception of Übermensch culture which, in Evola's view, characterized the imperial grandeur of pre-Christian Europe. He expressed anti-nationalist sentiment, stating that to become "truly human," one would have to "overcome brotherly contamination" and "purge oneself" of the feeling that one is united with others "because of blood, affections, country or human destiny." He also opposed the futurism that Italian fascism was aligned with, along with the "plebeian" nature of the movement. Accordingly, Evola launched the journal La Torre (The Tower), to voice his concerns and advocate for a more elitist fascism. Evola's ideas were poorly received by the fascist mainstream as it stood at the time of his writing.
Mussolini
Scholars disagree about why Benito Mussolini embraced racist ideology in 1938—some scholars have written that Mussolini was more motivated by political considerations than ideology when he introduced antisemitic legislation in Italy. Other scholars have rejected the argument that the racial ideology of Italian fascism could be attributed solely to Nazi influence. A more recent interpretation is that Mussolini was frustrated by the slow pace of fascist transformation and, by 1938, had adopted increasingly radical measures including a racial ideology. Aaron Gillette has written that "Racism would become the key driving force behind the creation of the new fascist man, the uomo fascista."
Mussolini read Evola's Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race in August 1941, and met with Evola to offer him his praise. Evola later recounted that Mussolini had found in his work a uniquely Roman form of Fascist racism distinct from that found in Nazi Germany. With Mussolini's backing, Evola started preparing the launch of a minor journal Sangue e Spirito (Blood and Spirit) which never appeared. While not always in agreement with German racial theorists, Evola traveled to Germany in February 1942 and obtained support for German collaboration on Sangue e Spirito from "key figures in the German racial hierarchy." Fascists appreciated the palingenetic value of Evola's "proof" "that the true representatives of the state and the culture of ancient Rome were people of the Nordic race." Evola eventually became Italy's leading racial philosopher.
Evola blended Sorelianism with Mussolini's eugenics agenda. Evola has written that "The theory of the Aryo-Roman race and its corresponding myth could integrate the Roman idea proposed, in general, by fascism, as well as give a foundation to Mussolini's plan to use his state as a means to elevate the average Italian and to enucleate in him a new man."
In May, 1951, Evola was arrested and charged with promoting the revival of the Fascist Party, and of glorifying Fascism. Defending himself at trial, Evola stated that his work belonged to a long tradition of anti-democratic writers who certainly could be linked to fascism—at least fascism interpreted according to certain Evolian criteria—but who certainly could not be identified with the Fascist regime under Mussolini. Evola then declared that he was not a Fascist but was instead "" (). He was acquitted.
Third Reich
Finding Italian fascism too compromising, Evola began to seek recognition in Nazi Germany. Evola spent a considerable amount of time in Germany in 1937 and 1938, and gave a series of lectures to the German–Italian Society in 1938. Evola took issue with Nazi populism and biological materialism. SS authorities initially rejected Evola's ideas as supranational and aristocratic though he was better received by members of the conservative revolutionary movement. The Nazi Ahnenerbe reported that many considered his ideas to be pure "fantasy" which ignored "historical facts.". Evola admired Heinrich Himmler, whom he knew personally, but he had reservations about Adolf Hitler because of Hitler's reliance on völkisch nationalism. Himmler's Schutzstaffel ("SS") kept a dossier on Evola—dossier document AR-126 described his plans for a "Roman-Germanic Imperium" as "utopian" and described him as a "reactionary Roman," whose goal was an "insurrection of the old aristocracy against the modern world." The document recommended that the SS "stop his effectiveness in Germany" and provide him with no support, particularly because of his desire to create a "secret international order".
Despite this opposition, Evola was able to establish political connections with pan-Europeanist elements inside the Reich Security Main Office. Evola subsequently ascended to the inner circles of Nazism as the influence of pan-European advocates overtook that of Völkisch proponents, due to military contingencies. Evola wrote the article Reich and Imperium as Elements in the New European Order for the Nazi-backed journal European Review. He spent World War II working for the Sicherheitsdienst. The Sicherheitsdienst bureau Amt VII, a Reich Security Main Office research library, helped Evola acquire arcane occult and Masonic texts.
Italian Fascism went into decline when, in 1943, Mussolini was deposed and imprisoned. At this point, Evola fled to Germany with the help of the Sicherheitsdienst. Although not a member of the National Fascist Party, and despite his apparent problems with the Fascist regime, Evola was one of the first people to greet Mussolini when the latter was broken out of prison by Otto Skorzeny in September, 1943. Subsequently, Evola helped welcome Mussolini to Adolf Hitler's Wolf's Lair. Following this, Evola involved himself in Mussolini's Italian Social Republic. It was Evola's custom to walk around the city of Vienna during bombing raids in order to better "ponder his destiny". During one such raid, 1945, a shell fragment damaged his spinal cord and he became paralyzed from the waist down, remaining so for the rest of his life.
Post-World War II
About the alliance during World War II between Allies and the Soviet Union, Evola wrote:The democratic powers repeated the error of those who think they can use the forces of subversion for their own ends without cost. They do not know that, by a fatal logic, when exponents of two different grades of subversion meet or cross paths, the one representing the more developed grade will take over in the end.The political model Evola selected after 1945 was neither Mussolini nor Hitler. Evola cited and encouraged the youth to read Plato (with reference in particular to The Republic), Dante (with reference in particular to De Monarchia), Joseph de Maistre, Donoso Cortés, Bismarck, Metternich, Gaetano Mosca, Pareto and Michels.
After World War II, Evola continued his work in esotericism. He wrote a number of books and articles on sex magic and various other esoteric studies, including The Yoga of Power: Tantra, Shakti, and the Secret Way (1949), Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), and Meditations on the Peaks: Mountain Climbing as Metaphor for the Spiritual Quest (1974). He also wrote his two explicitly political books Men Among the Ruins: Post-War Reflections of a Radical Traditionalist (1953), Ride the Tiger: A Survival Manual for the Aristocrats of the Soul (1961), and his autobiography, The Path of Cinnabar (1963). He also expanded upon critiques of American civilization and materialism, as well as increasing American influence in Europe, collected in the posthumous anthology Civiltà Americana.
While trying to distance himself from Nazism, Evola wrote in 1955 that the Nuremberg trials were a farce. This indicates that despite being rejected by the SS before the war, he never stopped admiring their criminal activities.
Evola's occult ontology exerted influence over post-war neo-fascism. In the post-war period, Evola's writing evoked interest among the neo-fascist right. After 1945, Evola was considered the most important Italian theoretician of the conservative revolutionary movement and the "chief ideologue" of Italy's post-war radical right. According to Egil Asprem and Kennet Granholm, Evola's most significant post-war political texts are Orientamenti and Men Among the Ruins. In the opening phrase in the first edition of Men Among the Ruins, Evola said: Our adversaries would undoubtedly want us, in a Christian spirit, under the banner of progress or reform, having been struck on one cheek to turn the other. Our principle is different: "Do to others what they would like to do to you: but do it to them first.Orientamenti was a text against "national fascism"—instead, it advocated for a European Community modeled on the principles of the Waffen-SS. The Italian neo-fascist group Ordine Nuovo adopted Orientamenti as a guide for action in postwar Italy. The European Liberation Front, who were affiliated with Francis Parker Yockey, called Evola "Italy's greatest living authoritarian philosopher" in the April 1951 issue of their publication Frontfighter.
During the post-war period, Evola disassociated himself from totalitarianism, preferring the concept of the "organic" state, which he put forth in his text Men Among the Ruins, as well as in his autodifesa. Evola sought to develop a strategy for the implementation of a "conservative revolution" in post-World War II Europe. He rejected nationalism, advocating instead for a European Imperium, which could take various forms according to local conditions, but should be "organic, hierarchical, anti-democratic, and anti-individual." Evola endorsed Francis Parker Yockey's neo-fascist manifesto Imperium, but disagreed with it because he believed that Yockey had a "superficial" understanding of what was immediately possible. Evola believed that his conception of neo-fascist Europe could best be implemented by an elite of "superior" men who operated outside normal politics.
In Men Among the Ruins, Evola defines the Fourth Estate as being the last stage in the cyclical development of the social elite, the first beginning with the monarchy. Expanding the concept in an essay in 1950, the Fourth State according to Evola would be characterized by "the collectivist civilization... the communist society of the faceless-massman".
Giuliano Salierni was an activist in the neo-Fascist Italian Social Movement during the early 1950s. He later recalled Evola's calls to violence. Roberto Fiore and his colleagues in the early 1980s helped the National Fronts "Political Soldiers" forge a militant elitist philosophy based on Evola's "most militant tract", The Aryan Doctrine of Battle and Victory. The Aryan Doctrine called for a "Great Holy War" that would be fought for spiritual renewal and fought in parallel to the physical "Little Holy War" against perceived enemies. Wolff attributes extreme-right terrorist actions in Italy in the 1970s and 1980s to the influence of Julius Evola.
Thomas Sheehan has argued that Evola's work is essential reading for those seeking to understand European neo-fascism, in the same way that knowledge of the writings of Karl Marx is necessary for those seeking to understand Communist actions.
Political influence
At one time Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini, the Nazi Grail seeker Otto Rahn, and the Romanian fascist sympathizer and religious historian Mircea Eliade admired Julius Evola. After World War II, Evola's writings continued to influence many European far-right political, racist and neo-fascist movements. He is widely translated in French, Spanish, partly in German, and mostly in Hungarian (the largest number of his translated works).
Umberto Eco referred to Evola as the "most influential theoretical source of the theories of the new Italian right", and as "one of the most respected fascist gurus".
Giorgio Almirante referred to him as "our Marcuse—only better." According to one leader of the neofascist "black terrorist" Ordine Nuovo, "Our work since 1953 has been to transpose Evola's teachings into direct political action."
The now defunct French fascist group Troisième Voie was also inspired by Evola.
Jonathan Bowden, English political activist and chairman of the far right, spoke highly of Evola and his ideas and gave lectures on his philosophy.
Evola has influenced Russian political analyst and fascist Aleksander Dugin.
The Greek neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn includes his works on its suggested reading list, and the leader of Jobbik, the Hungarian nationalist party, admires Evola and wrote an introduction to his works.
Donald Trump's former chief adviser Steve Bannon has pointed to Evola's influence on the Eurasianism movement; According to Joshua Green's book Devil's Bargain, Evola's Revolt Against the Modern World had initially drawn Bannon's interest to the ideas of the Traditionalist School. Alt-right leader and white nationalist Richard Spencer said that Bannon's awareness of Evola "means a tremendous amount". Some members of the alt-right expressed hope that Bannon might have been open to Evola's ideas, and that through Bannon, Evola's ideas could become influential. According to multiple historians cited by The Atlantic, this is contradictory, as Bannon cited Evola in defense of the "Judeo-Christian west", while Evola hated and opposed Judaism and Jews, Christianity in general, Anglo-Saxon Protestantism specifically, and the culture of the United States. In a leaked email sent by Bannon in March 2016, he told Milo Yiannopoulos, "I do appreciate any piece that mentions Evola." Evola has also influenced the alt-right movement.
Works
Books
L'individuo e il divenire del mondo (1926; The Individual and the Becoming of the World).
L'uomo come potenza (1927; Man as Potency).
Teoria dell'individuo assoluto (1927; The Theory of the Absolute Individual).
Imperialismo pagano (1928; second edition 1932)English translation:
Fenomenologia dell'individuo assoluto (1930; The Phenomenology of the Absolute Individual).
La tradizione ermetica (1931; second edition 1971)English translation:
Maschera e volto dello spiritualismo contemporaneo: Analisi critica delle principali correnti moderne verso il sovrasensibile (1932)English translation: And:
Heidnischer Imperialismus (1933)English translation:
Rivolta contro il mondo moderno (1934; second edition 1951; third edition 1970)English translation:
Il Mistero del Graal e la Tradizione Ghibellina dell'Impero (1937)English translation:
Il mito del sangue. Genesi del Razzismo (1937; second edition 1942)English translation:
Sintesi di dottrina della razza (1941)English translation:
Indirizzi per una educazione razziale (1941)English translation:
La dottrina del risveglio (1943)English translation:
Lo Yoga della potenza (1949; second edition 1968)English translation:
Gli uomini e le rovine (1953; second edition 1972)English translation:
(1958; second edition 1969)English translations: 1983–1991:
L'operaio nel pensiero di Ernst Jünger (1960; The Worker in the Thought of Ernst Jünger). Excerpts in English
Cavalcare la tigre (1961)English translation:
Il cammino del cinabro (1963; second edition 1970)English translation:
Il Fascismo. Saggio di una analisi critica dal punto di vista della Destra (1964; second edition 1970)English translation: And:
Collections
Saggi sull'idealismo magico (1925; Essays on Magical Idealism).
Introduzione alla magia (1927–1929; 1971)English translation: And: And:
L'arco e la clava (1968)English translation:
Ricognizioni. Uomini e problemi (1974)English translation:
Meditazioni delle vette (1974)English translation:
Metafisica della Guerra (1996)English translation:
Jobboldali fiatalok kézikönyve (2012, collection of Hungarian translations of periodicals by Evola, published by Kvintesszencia Kiadó)English translation:
Articles and pamphlets
L'Homme et son devenir selon le Vedânta. (1925; Review of Guenon's work published in 1925 in L'Idealismo Realistico).
Tre aspetti del problema ebraico (1936)English translation:
La tragedia della 'Guardia di Ferro - (1938) English translation: The Tragedy of the Iron Guard. Originally published in La vita italiana 309, Dec, 1938.
On the Secret of Decay (1938)Originally written in German and published by the Deutsches Volkstum magazine n. 14.
Orientamenti, undici punti (1950)English translation:
Il vampirismo ed i vampiri (1973) English: Vampirism and Vampires. Written for journal Roma in September 1973.
Works edited and/or translated by Evola
Tao Tê Ching: Il libro della via e della virtù (1923; The Book of the Way and Virtue). Second edition: Il libro del principio e della sua azione (1959; The Book of the Primary Principle and of Its Action).
La guerra occulta: armi e fasi dell'attacco ebraico-massonico alla tradizione europea by Emmanuel Malynski and Léon de Poncins (1939)English translation:
See also
Occultism and the far right
Traditionalist School
References
Notes
Bibliography
(:)
Aprile, Mario (1984), "Julius Evola: An Introduction to His Life and Work," The Scorpion No. 6 (Winter/Spring): 20–21.
Coletti, Guillermo (1996), "Against the Modern World: An Introduction to the Work of Julius Evola," Ohm Clock No. 4 (Spring): 29–31.
Coogan, Kevin (1999), Dreamer of the Day: Francis Parker Yockey and the Postwar Fascist International Brooklyn, New York:Autonomedia ).
De Benoist, Alain. "Julius Evola, réactionnaire radical et métaphysicien engagé. Analyse critique de la pensée politique de Julius Evola," Nouvelle Ecole, No. 53–54 (2003), pp. 147–69.
Drake, Richard H. (1986), "Julius Evola and the Ideological Origins of the Radical Right in Contemporary Italy," in Peter H. Merkl (ed.), Political Violence and Terror: Motifs and Motivations (University of California Press, ) 61–89.
Drake, Richard H. (1988), "Julius Evola, Radical Fascism and the Lateran Accords," The Catholic Historical Review 74: 403–419.
Drake, Richard H. (1989), "The Children of the Sun," in The Revolutionary Mystique and Terrorism in Contemporary Italy (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, ), 114–134.
Faerraresi, Franco (1987), "Julius Evola: Tradition, Reaction, and the Radical Right," European Journal of Sociology 28: 107–151.
Gelli, Frank (2012), Julius Evola: The Sufi of Rome
Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas (2001), Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity (New York: New York University Press, , , ), 52–71.
Griffin, Roger (1985), "Revolts against the Modern World: The Blend of Literary and Historical Fantasy in the Italian New Right," Literature and History 11 (Spring): 101–123.
Griffin, Roger (1995) (ed.), Fascism (Oxford University Press, ), 317–318.
Hans Thomas Hakl, "La questione dei rapporti fra Julius Evola e Aleister Crowley", in: Arthos 13, Pontremoli, Centro Studi Evoliani, 2006, pp. 269–289.
Hansen, H. T. (1994), "A Short Introduction to Julius Evola," Theosophical History 5 (January): 11–22; reprinted as introduction to Evola, Revolt Against the Modern World, (Vermont: Inner Traditions, 1995).
Hansen, H. T. (2002), "Julius Evola's Political Endeavors," introduction to Evola, Men Among the Ruins, (Vermont: Inner Traditions).
Moynihan, Michael (2003), "Julius Evola's Combat Manuals for a Revolt Against the Modern World," in Richard Metzger (ed.), Book of Lies: The Disinformation Guide to Magick and the Occult (The Disinformation Company, ) 313–320.
Rees, Philip (1991), Biographical Dictionary of the Extreme Right Since 1890 (New York: Simon & Schuster, ), 118–120.
Sedgwick, Mark (2004) Against the Modern World: Traditionalism and the Secret Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century (Oxford University Press, ).
Sheehan, Thomas (1981) "Myth and Violence: The Fascism of Julius Evola and Alain de Benoist," Social Research, 48 (Spring): 45–83.
Staudenmaier, P. (2019). "Racial Ideology between Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany: Julius Evola and the Aryan Myth, 1933–43." Journal of Contemporary History.
Stucco, Guido (1992), "Translator's Introduction," in Evola, The Yoga of Power (Vermont: Inner Traditions), ix–xv.
Stucco, Guido (1994), "Introduction," in Evola, The Path of Enlightenment According to the Mithraic Mysteries, Zen: The Religion of the Samurai, Rene Guenon: A Teacher for Modern Times, and Taoism: The Magic, the Mysticism (Edmonds, WA: Holmes Publishing Group)
Stucco, Guido (2002). "The Legacy of a European Traditionalist: Julius Evola in Perspective". The Occidental Quarterly 3 (2), pp. 21–44.
Wasserstrom, Steven M. (1995), "The Lives of Baron Evola," Alphabet City 4 + 5 (December): 84–89.
Waterfield, Robin (1990), 'Baron Julius Evola and the Hermetic Tradition', Gnosis 14, (Winter): 12–17.
External links
1898 births
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20th-century Italian politicians
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Italian Dadaist | false | [
"Steal Like an Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative is a book on coming up with creative ideas written by Austin Kleon and published in 2012 from Workman Publishing. The book, has since then become a New York Times Bestseller. Kleon presents himself as a young writer and artist emphasizing that creativity is everywhere and is for everyone. In his own words, \"You don’t need to be a genius, you just need to be yourself\".\n\nBackdrop\nWhen Mr. Kleon was asked to address college students at Broome Community College in upstate New York in 2011, he shaped his speech around a simple list of ten things he wished someone had told him when he was starting out at their age. They were: 'Steal like an artist; Don't wait until you know who you are to start making things; Write the book you want to read; Use your hands; Side projects are important; Do good work and put it where people can see it; Geography is no longer our master; Be nice (the world is a small town.); Be boring (it's the only way to get work done.); and, Creativity is subtraction.\nAfter giving the speech, he posted the text and slides of the talk to his popular blog.\nThe talk went viral, and Kleon dug deeper and expanded to create the book, for anyone attempting to make things - art, a career, a life - in the digital age.\n\nThe Book\nKleon describes ten basic principles to boost your creativity. He lists them on the back cover of the book so that they're easily referenced. The book is small, full of illustrations and several poems in the style of his newspaper cutouts by Kleon.\n\nKleon responds by writing, “the reason to copy your heroes and their style is so that you might somehow get a glimpse into their minds\". Kleon reminds throughout his book that “nothing is original… all creative work builds on what came before.” This sentiment is also a foundation for effective ELA teaching: From our past experiences as readers and writers, we can design better learning conditions for our students.\n\nEach chapter is dedicated to one of the ten principles, which are represented by the following:\n\n1. Steal like an artist:\nThe author cautions that he does not mean ‘steal’ as in plagiarise, skim or rip off — but study, credit, remix, mash up and transform. Creative work builds on what came before, and thus nothing is completely original.\n\n2. Don't wait until you know who you are to start making things:\nYou have to start doing the work you want to be doing, you have to immerse, internalise and even dress like the person you aspire to be. “You don’t have to look like your heroes, you want to see like your heroes,” Kleon urges. Go beyond imitation to emulation.\n\n3. Write the book you want to read:\nIt is important to do what you want to do, and insert your take on things of art.\n\n4. Use your hands:\nIt is important to step away from the screen and immerse in actual physical work. “Computers have robbed us of the feeling that we’re actually making things,” Kleon cautions. \"Involve your full body, and not just your brains.\"\n\n5. Side projects are important:\nHobbies are important because they keep you happy. “A hobby is something that gives but doesn’t take,” Kleon says.\n\n6. Do good work and put it where people can see it:\nSharing your work and even your thoughts about what you like help you get good feedback and more ideas.\n\n7. Geography is no longer our master:\n“Travel makes the world look new, and when the world looks new, our brains work harder,” Kleon explains. Constraints can also act favorably – bad winters or summers can force you to be indoors and work on your projects.\n\n8. Be nice (the world is a small town.):\nStop fighting and channel your rage into a creative pursuit. Show appreciation for the good things you see around you.\n\n9. Be boring (it's the only way to get work done.):\nYou can’t be creative all the time, so set a routine – for example, with a regular day job which sets a fixed schedule and exposes you to new people and skills.\n\n10. Creativity is subtraction\":\nIn an age of information overload and abundance, focus is important. Choose what you want to leave out of your key work. “Nothing is more paralysing than the idea of limitless possibilities. The best way to get over creative block is to simply place some constraints on yourself,” Kleon says.\n\nReferences\n\n2012 non-fiction books\nAmerican non-fiction books\nBooks about creativity",
"The authority of Jesus is questioned whilst he is teaching in the Temple in Jerusalem, as reported in all three synoptic gospels: , and .\n\nAccording to the Gospel of Matthew:\n \nJesus entered the temple courts, and, while he was teaching, the chief priests and the elders of the people came to him. \"By what authority are you doing these things?\" they asked. \"And who gave you this authority?\" \n\nJesus replied, \"I will also ask you one question. If you answer me, I will tell you by what authority I am doing these things. John's baptism — where did it come from? Was it from heaven, or of human origin?\"\n\nThey discussed it among themselves and said, \"If we say, 'From heaven', he will ask, 'Then why didn’t you believe him?' But if we say, 'Of human origin' - we are afraid of the people, for they all hold that John was a prophet\". So they answered Jesus, \"We don’t know\".\n\nThen he said, \"Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things\". \n\nIn all three synoptic gospels, this episode takes place shortly after the cleansing of the Temple reported after Jesus' triumphal entry into the city. The word \"authority\" (, exousia) is frequently used in relation to Jesus in the New Testament.\n\nA similar episode is described in the Gospel of John at ) as part of the Cleansing of the Temple narrative. In John's account, after expelling the merchants and the money changers from the Temple, Jesus is confronted:\n \nThen the Jews said to Him, “What sign do You show us, seeing that You do these things?”\n\nSee also\n Gospel harmony\n\nNotes\n\nPassion of Jesus"
]
|
[
"Julius Evola",
"Racism and mystical Aryanism",
"What were his views on racism?",
"Evola spoke of \"inferior non-European races\". Peter Merkl wrote that \"Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether\".",
"What is mystical Aryanism?",
"I don't know.",
"Did he consider himself Aryan?",
"Prior to the end of War, Evola had frequently used the term \"Aryan\" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality.",
"What important things did he do?",
"According to Furlong, Evola developed \"the law of the regression of castes\" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II"
]
| C_64b521f2f9cc4df09098f27ba0a07a51_0 | What impact has he made? | 5 | What impact has Julius Evola made? | Julius Evola | Evola's dissent from standard biological concepts of race had roots in his aristocratic elitism, since Nazi Volkisch ideology inadequately separated aristocracy from "commoners." According to Furlong, Evola developed "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes--sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves". Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies." Prior to the end of War, Evola had frequently used the term "Aryan" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman 'super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men'...no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights of the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta." Evola spoke of "inferior non-European races". Peter Merkl wrote that "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote: "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanatiscm [are] all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West." While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957, Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of "negroes" and the opposition to segregation. Furlong noted that this article is "among the most extreme in phraseology of any he wrote, and exhibits a degree of intolerance that leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people." CANNOTANSWER | " While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957, Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of "negroes | Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola (; 19 May 1898 11 June 1974), better known as Julius Evola, was an Italian philosopher, poet, and painter whose esoteric worldview featured antisemitic conspiracy theories and the occult. He has been described as a "fascist intellectual", a "radical traditionalist", "antiegalitarian, antiliberal, antidemocratic, and antipopular", and as "the leading philosopher of Europe's neofascist movement".
Evola is popular in fringe circles, largely because of his metaphysical, magical, and supernatural beliefs – including belief in ghosts, telepathy, and alchemyand his traditionalism. He termed his philosophy "magical idealism". Many of Evola's theories and writings were centered on his hostility toward Christianity and his idiosyncratic mysticism, occultism, and esoteric religious studies, and this aspect of his work has influenced occultists and esotericists. Evola also justified male domination over women as part of a purely patriarchal society, an outlook stemming from his traditionalist views on gender, which demanded women stay in or revert to what he saw as their traditional gender roles, where they were completely subordinate to male authority.
According to the scholar Franco Ferraresi, "Evola's thought can be considered one of the most radical and consistent anti-egalitarian, anti-liberal, anti-democratic, and anti-popular systems in the 20th century". It is a singular, though not necessarily original, blend of several schools and traditions, including German idealism, Eastern doctrines, traditionalism, and the all-embracing Weltanschauung of the interwar conservative revolutionary movement with which Evola had a deep personal involvement. Historian Aaron Gillette described Evola as "one of the most influential fascist racists in Italian history".
Evola admired SS head Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler, whom he once met. Autobiographical remarks by Evola allude to his having worked for the Sicherheitsdienst, or SD, the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party. During his trial in 1951, Evola denied being a fascist and instead referred to himself as "" (). Concerning this statement, historian Elisabetta Cassina Wolff wrote that "It is unclear whether this meant that Evola was placing himself above or beyond Fascism".
Evola has been called the "chief ideologue" of Italy's radical right after World War II. He continues to influence contemporary traditionalist and neo-fascist movements.
Life
Giulio Cesare Evola was born in Rome, the son of Vincenzo Evola (born 1854) and Concetta Mangiapane (born 1865). Both his parents had been born in Cinisi, a small town in the Province of Palermo on the north-western coast of Sicily. The paternal grandparents of Giulio Cesare Evola were Giuseppe Evola and Maria Cusumano. Giuseppe Evola is reported as being a joiner in Vincenzo's birth record. The maternal grandparents of Giulio Cesare Evola were Cesare Mangiapane, reported as being a shopkeeper in Concetta's birth record, and his wife Caterina Munacó. Vincenzo Evola and Concetta Mangiapane were married in Cinisi on 25 November 1892. Vincenzo Evola is reported as being a telegraphic mechanic chief, while Concetta Mangiapane is reported as being a landowner.
Giulio Cesare Evola had an elder brother, Giuseppe Gaspare Dinamo Evola, born in 1895 in Rome. Following a slight variation on the Sicilian naming convention of the era, as the second son, Giulio Cesare Evola was partly named after his maternal grandfather.
Evola has been often been reported as being a baron, probably in reference to a purported distant relationship with a minor aristocratic family, the Evoli, who were the barons of Castropignano in the Kingdom of Sicily in the late Middle Ages.
Little is known about Evola's early upbringing except that he considered it irrelevant. He studied engineering at the Istituto Tecnico Leonardo da Vinci in Rome, but did not complete his course, later claiming this was because he "did not want to be associated in any way with bourgeois academic recognition and titles such as doctor and engineer."
In his teenage years, Evola immersed himself in painting—which he considered one of his natural talents—and literature, including Oscar Wilde and Gabriele d'Annunzio. He was introduced to philosophers such as Friedrich Nietzsche and Otto Weininger. Other early philosophical influences included Carlo Michelstaedter and Max Stirner.
In the First World War, Evola served as an artillery officer on the Asiago plateau. He was attracted to the avant-garde, and after the war he briefly associated with Filippo Tommaso Marinetti's Futurist movement. Through his painting and poetry, and through work on the short-lived journal Revue Bleue, he became a prominent representative of Dadaism in Italy. In 1922, after concluding that avant-garde art was becoming commercialized and stiffened by academic conventions, he reduced his focus on artistic expression such as painting and poetry.
Evola was arrested in April 1951 by the Political Office of the Rome Police Headquarters and charged on suspicion that he was an ideologist of the militant neofascist organization Fasci di Azione Rivoluzionaria (FAR). Evola was defended by Prof. Francesco Carnelutti. On November 20, 1951, Evola was acquitted of all charges.
Evola died on 11 June 1974 in Rome from congestive heart failure.
Writing career
Christianity
In 1928, Evola wrote an attack on Christianity titled Pagan Imperialism, which proposed transforming fascism into a system consistent with ancient Roman values and Western esotericism. Evola proposed that fascism should be a vehicle for reinstating the caste system and aristocracy of antiquity. Although he invoked the term "fascism" in this text, his diatribe against the Catholic Church was criticized by both Mussolini's fascist regime and the Vatican itself. A. James Gregor argued that the text was an attack on fascism as it stood at the time of writing, but noted that Mussolini made use of it to threaten the Vatican with the possibility of an "anti-clerical fascism". On account of Evola's anti-Christian proposals, in April 1928 the Vatican-backed right wing Catholic journal Revue Internationale des Sociétés Secrètes published an article entitled "Un Sataniste Italien: Julius Evola", accusing him of satanism.
In his The Mystery of the Grail (1937), Evola discarded Christian interpretations of the Holy Grail and wrote that it symbolizes the principle of an immortalizing and transcendent force connected to the primordial state ... The mystery of the Grail is a mystery of a warrior initiation.He held that the Ghibellines, who had fought the Guelph for control of Northern and Central Italy in the thirteenth century, had within them the residual influences of pre-Christian Celtic and Nordic traditions that represented his conception of the Grail myth. He also held that the Guelph victory against the Ghibellines represented a regression of the castes, since the merchant caste took over from the warrior caste. In the epilogue to this book, Evola argued that the fictitious The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, regardless of whether it was authentic or not, was a cogent representation of modernity. The historian Richard Barber said, Evola mixes rhetoric, prejudice, scholarship, and politics into a strange version of the present and future, but in the process he brings together for the first time interest in the esoteric and in conspiracy theory which characterize much of the later Grail literature.
Buddhism
In his The Doctrine of Awakening (1943), Evola argued that the Pāli Canon could be held to represent true Buddhism. His interpretation of Buddhism is that it was intended to be anti-democratic. He believed that Buddhism revealed the essence of an "Aryan" tradition that had become corrupted and lost in the West. He believed it could be interpreted to reveal the superiority of a warrior caste. Harry Oldmeadow described Evola's work on Buddhism as exhibiting a Nietzschean influence, but Evola criticized Nietzsche's purported anti-ascetic prejudice. Evola claimed that the book "received the official approbation of the Pāli [Text] Society", and was published by a reputable Orientalist publisher. Evola's interpretation of Buddhism, as put forth in his article "Spiritual Virility in Buddhism", is in conflict with the post-WWII scholarship of the Orientalist Giuseppe Tucci, who argues that the viewpoint that Buddhism advocates universal benevolence is legitimate. Arthur Versluis stated that Evola's writing on Buddhism was a vehicle for his own theories, but was a far from accurate rendition of the subject, and he held that much the same could be said of Evola's writing on Hermeticism. Ñāṇavīra Thera was inspired to become a bhikkhu from reading Evola's text The Doctrine of Awakening in 1945 while hospitalized in Sorrento.
Modernity
Evola's Revolt Against the Modern World (1934) promotes the mythology of an ancient Golden Age which gradually declined into modern decadence. In this work, Evola described the features of his idealized traditional society in which religious and temporal power were created and united not by priests, but by warriors expressing spiritual power. In mythology, he saw evidence of the West's superiority over the East. Moreover, he claimed that the traditional elite had the ability to access power and knowledge through a hierarchical magic which differed from the lower "superstitious and fraudulent" forms of magic. Evola insists that only "nonmodern forms, institutions, and knowledge" could produce a "real renewal ... in those who are still capable of receiving it." The text was "immediately recognized by Mircea Eliade and other intellectuals who allegedly advanced ideas associated with Tradition." Eliade was one of the most influential twentieth-century historians of religion, a fascist sympathizer associated with the Romanian Christian right wing movement Iron Guard. Evola was aware of the importance of myth from his readings of Georges Sorel, one of the key intellectual influences on fascism. Hermann Hesse described Revolt Against the Modern World as "really dangerous."
During the 1960s Evola thought the right could no longer reverse the corruption of modern civilization. E. C. Wolff noted that this is why Evola wrote Ride the Tiger, choosing to distance himself completely from active political engagement, without excluding the possibility of action in the future. He argued that one should stay firm and ready to intervene when the tiger of modernity "is tired of running." Goodrick-Clarke notes that, "Evola sets up the ideal of the 'active nihilist' who is prepared to act with violence against modern decadence."
Other writings
In the posthumously published collection of writings, Metaphysics of War, Evola, in line with the conservative revolutionary Ernst Jünger, explored the viewpoint that war could be a spiritually fulfilling experience. He proposed the necessity of a transcendental orientation in a warrior.
From 1934 to 1943 Evola was also responsible for 'Diorama Filosofico', the cultural page of Il Regime Fascista, a daily newspaper owned by Roberto Farinacci. He would also contribute during the same period to Giovanni Preziosi magazine La vita italiana.
Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke has written that Evola's 1945 essay "American 'Civilization'" described the United States as "the final stage of European decline into the 'interior formlessness' of vacuous individualism, conformity and vulgarity under the universal aegis of money-making." According to Goodrick-Clarke, Evola argued that the U.S. "mechanistic and rational philosophy of progress combined with a mundane horizon of prosperity to transform the world into an enormous suburban shopping mall."
Evola translated some works of Oswald Spengler and Ortega y Gasset to Italian.
Occultism and esotericism
Around 1920, Evola's interests led him into spiritual, transcendental, and "supra-rational" studies. He began reading various esoteric texts and gradually delved deeper into the occult, alchemy, magic, and Oriental studies, particularly Tibetan Tantric yoga. A keen mountaineer, Evola described the experience as a source of revelatory spiritual experiences. After his return from the war, Evola experimented with hallucinogens and magic.
When he was about 23 years old, Evola considered suicide. He claimed that he avoided suicide thanks to a revelation he had while reading an early Buddhist text that dealt with shedding all forms of identity other than absolute transcendence. Evola would later publish the text The Doctrine of Awakening, which he regarded as a repayment of his debt to Buddhism for saving him from suicide.
Evola wrote prodigiously on Eastern mysticism, Tantra, hermeticism, the myth of the Holy Grail and Western esotericism. German Egyptologist and esoteric scholar Florian Ebeling has noted that Evola's The Hermetic Tradition is viewed as an "extremely important work on Hermeticism" in the eyes of esotericists. Evola gave particular focus to Cesare della Riviera's text Il Mondo Magico degli Heroi, which he later republished in modern Italian. He held that Riviera's text was consonant with the goals of "high magic"the reshaping of the earthly human into a transcendental 'god man'. According to Evola, the alleged "timeless" Traditional science was able to come to lucid expression through this text, in spite of the "coverings" added to it to prevent accusations from the church. Though Evola rejected Carl Jung's interpretation of alchemy, Jung described Evola's The Hermetic Tradition as a "magisterial account of Hermetic philosophy". In Hegel and the Hermetic Tradition, the philosopher Glenn Alexander Magee favored Evola's interpretation over that of Jung's. In 1988, a journal devoted to Hermetic thought published a section of Evola's book and described it as "Luciferian."
Evola later confessed that he was not a Buddhist, and that his text on Buddhism was meant to balance his earlier work on the Hindu tantras. Evola's interest in tantra was spurred on by correspondence with John Woodroffe. Evola was attracted to the active aspect of tantra, and its claim to provide a practical means to spiritual experience, over the more "passive" approaches in other forms of Eastern spirituality. In Tantric Buddhism in East Asia, Richard K. Payne, Dean of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, argued that Evola manipulated Tantra in the service of right wing violence, and that the emphasis on "power" in The Yoga of Power gave insight into his mentality.
Evola advocated that "differentiated individuals" following the Left-Hand Path use dark violent sexual powers against the modern world. For Evola, these "virile heroes" are both generous and cruel, possess the ability to rule, and commit "Dionysian" acts that might be seen as conventionally immoral. For Evola, the Left Hand path embraces violence as a means of transgression.
According to A. James Gregor Evola's definition of spirituality can be found in Meditations on the Peaks: "what has been successfully actualized and translated into a sense of superiority which is experienced inside by the soul, and a noble demeanor, which is expressed in the body." Goodrick-Clarke wrote that Evola's "rigorous New Age spirituality speaks directly to those who reject absolutely the leveling world of democracy, capitalism, multi-racialism and technology at the outset of the twenty-first century. Their acute sense of cultural chaos can find powerful relief in his ideal of total renewal." Thomas Sheehan wrote that to "read Evola is to take a trip through a weird and fascinating jungle of ancient mythologies, pseudo-ethnology, and transcendental mysticism that is enough to make any southern California consciousness-tripper feel quite at home."
Magical idealism
Thomas Sheehan wrote that "Evola's first philosophical works from the 'twenties were dedicated to reshaping neo-idealism from a philosophy of Absolute Spirit and Mind into a philosophy of the "absolute individual" and action." Accordingly, Evola developed the doctrine of "magical idealism", which held that "the Ego must understand that everything that seems to have a reality independent of it is nothing but an illusion, caused by its own deficiency." For Evola, this ever-increasing unity with the "absolute individual" was consistent with unconstrained liberty, and therefore unconditional power. In his 1925 work Essays on Magical Idealism, Evola declared that "God does not exist. The Ego must create him by making itself divine."
According to Sheehan, Evola discovered the power of metaphysical mythology while developing his theories. This led to his advocacy of supra-rational intellectual intuition over discursive knowledge. In Evola's view, discursive knowledge separates man from Being. Sheehan stated that this position is a theme in certain interpretations of Western philosophers such as Plato, Thomas Aquinas, and Martin Heidegger that was exaggerated by Evola. Evola would later write:
Evola developed a doctrine of the "two natures": the natural world and the primordial "world of 'Being'". He believed that these "two natures" impose form and quality on lower matter and create a hierarchical "great chain of Being." He understood "spiritual virility" as signifying orientation towards this postulated transcendent principle. He held that the State should reflect this "ordering from above" and the consequent hierarchical differentiation of individuals according to their "organic preformation". By "organic preformation" he meant that which "gathers, preserves, and refines one's talents and qualifications for determinate functions."
Ur Group
Evola was introduced to esotericism by Arturo Reghini, who was an early supporter of fascism. Reghini sought to promote a "cultured magic" opposed to Christianity and introduced Evola to the traditionalist René Guénon. In 1927, Reghini and Evola, along with other Italian esotericists, founded the Gruppo di Ur ("Ur Group"). The purpose of this group was to attempt to bring the members' individual identities into such a superhuman state of power and awareness that they would be able to exert a magical influence on the world. The group employed techniques from Buddhist, Tantric, and rare Hermetic texts. They aimed to provide a "soul" to the burgeoning Fascist movement of the time through the revival of ancient Roman religion, and to influence the fascist regime through esotericism.
Articles on occultism from the Ur Group were later published in Introduction to Magic. Reghini's support of Freemasonry would however prove a bone of contention for Evola; accordingly, Evola broke with Reghini in 1928. Reghini himself broke from Evola, accusing Evola of plagiarizing his thoughts in the book Pagan Imperialism. Evola, on the other hand, blamed Reghini for the premature publication of Pagan Imperialism. Evola's later work owed a considerable debt to René Guénon's text Crisis of the Modern World, though he diverged from Guénon on the issue of the relationship between warriors and priests.
Views on sex and gender roles
Julius Evola believed that the alleged higher qualities expected of a man of a particular race were not those expected of a woman of the same race. He held that "just relations between the sexes" involved women acknowledging their "inequality" with men. In 1925, he wrote an article titled "La donna come cosa" ("Woman as Thing"). Evola later quoted Joseph de Maistre's statement that "Woman cannot be superior except as woman, but from the moment in which she desires to emulate man she is nothing but a monkey." Evola believed that women's liberation was "the renunciation by woman of her right to be a woman". A woman "could traditionally participate in the sacred hierarchical order only in a mediated fashion through her relationship with a man." He held, as a feature of his idealized gender relations, the Hindu sati, which for him was a form of sacrifice indicating women's respect for patriarchal traditions. For the "pure, feminine" woman, "man is not perceived by her as a mere husband or lover, but as her lord." Women would find their true identity in total subjugation to men.
Evola regarded matriarchy and goddess religions as a symptom of decadence, and preferred a hyper-masculine, warrior ethos.
Evola was influenced by Hans Blüher; he was a proponent of the Männerbund concept as a model for his proposed ultra-fascist "Order". Goodrick-Clarke noted the fundamental influence of Otto Weininger's book Sex and Character on Evola's dualism of male-female spirituality. According to Goodrich-Clarke, "Evola's celebration of virile spirituality was rooted in Weininger's work, which was widely translated by the end of the First World War." Unlike Weininger, Evola believed that women needed to be conquered, not ignored. Evola denounced homosexuality as "useless" for his purposes. He did not neglect sadomasochism, so long as sadism and masochism "are magnifications of an element potentially present in the deepest essence of eros." Then, it would be possible to "extend, in a transcendental and perhaps ecstatic way, the possibilities of sex."
Evola held that women "played" with men, threatened their masculinity, and lured them into a "constrictive" grasp with their sexuality. He wrote that "It should not be expected of women that they return to what they really are ... when men themselves retain only the semblance of true virility", and lamented that "men instead of being in control of sex are controlled by it and wander about like drunkards". He believed that in Tantra and in sex magic, in which he saw a strategy for aggression, he found the means to counter the "emasculated" West. According to Annalisa Merelli, Evola "went so far as to justify rape" because he saw it "as a natural expression of male desire". Evola also said that the "ritual violation of virgins", and "whipping women" were a means of "consciousness raising", so long as these practices were done to the intensity required to produce the proper "liminal psychic climate". He wrote that "as a rule, nothing stirs a man more than feeling the woman utterly exhausted beneath his own hostile rapture."
Evola translated Weininger's Sex and Character into Italian. Dissatisfied with simply translating Weininger's work, he wrote the text Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), where his views on sexuality were dealt with at length. Arthur Versluis described this text as Evola's "most interesting" work aside from Revolt Against the Modern World. This book remains popular among many 'New Age' adherents.
Views on race
Evola's dissent from standard biological concepts of race had roots in his aristocratic elitism, since Nazi völkisch ideology inadequately separated aristocracy from "commoners." According to European studies professor Paul Furlong, Evola developed "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes—sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves". Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies."
In 1941, Evola's book Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race (Italian: Sintesi di Dottrina della Razza) was published by Hoepli. It provides an overview of his ideas concerning race and eugenics, introducing the concept of "spiritual racism", and "esoteric-traditionalist racism".
Prior to the end of the War, Evola had frequently used the term "Aryan" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men' ... no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights of the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta."
Evola spoke of "inferior non-European races". Peter Merkl wrote that "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote: "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanaticism [are] all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West." While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957 Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of "negroes" and the opposition to segregation. Furlong noted that this article is "among the most extreme in phraseology of any he wrote, and exhibits a degree of intolerance that leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people."
National mysticism
For his spiritual interpretation of the different racial psychologies, Evola found the work of German race theorist Ludwig Ferdinand Clauss invaluable. Like Evola, Clauss believed that physical race and spiritual race could diverge as a consequence of miscegenation. Evola's racism included racism of the body, soul, and spirit, giving primacy to the latter factor, writing that "races only declined when their spirit failed."
Like René Guénon, Evola believed that mankind is living in the Kali Yuga of the Hindu tradition—the Dark Age of unleashed materialistic appetites. He argued that both Italian fascism and Nazism represented hope that the "celestial" Aryan race would be reconstituted. He drew on mythological accounts of super-races and their decline, particularly the Hyperboreans, and maintained that traces of Hyperborean influence could be felt in Indo-European man. He felt that Indo-European men had devolved from these higher mythological races. Gregor noted that several contemporary criticisms of Evola's theory were published: "In one of Fascism's most important theoretical journals, Evola's critic pointed out that many Nordic-Aryans, not to speak of Mediterranean Aryans, fail to demonstrate any Hyperborean properties. Instead, they make obvious their materialism, their sensuality, their indifference to loyalty and sacrifice, together with their consuming greed. How do they differ from 'inferior' races, and why should anyone wish, in any way, to favor them?"
Concerning the relationship between "spiritual racism" and biological racism, Evola put forth the following viewpoint, which Furlong described as pseudo-scientific:
Views on Jews
Evola endorsed Otto Weininger's views on the Jews. Though Evola viewed Jews as corrosive and anti-traditional, he described Adolf Hitler's more fanatical antisemitism as a paranoid idée fixe that damaged the reputation of the Third Reich. Evola's conception did not emphasize the Nazi racial conception of Jews as "representatives of a biological race"—in Evola's view the Jews were "the carriers of a world view ... a spirit [that] corresponded to the 'worst' and 'most decadent' features of modernity: democracy, egalitarianism and materialism." Evola rejected the views of chief Nazi theorist Alfred Rosenberg and others on biological racism as being reductionist and materialistic. Jewry was for Evola, as for Weininger, only a symbol for the rule of money and individualism. Otto Weininger desbribed Jewishness as "intellectual tendency".
Evola argued that the fabricated antisemitic text The Protocols of the Elders of Zion—whether or not a forgery—accurately reflect the conditions of modernity. He believed that the Protocols "contain the plan for an occult war, whose objective is the utter destruction, in the non-Jewish peoples, of all tradition, class, aristocracy, and hierarchy, and of all moral, religious, and spiritual values." He wrote the foreword to the second Italian edition of the Protocols, which was published by the Fascist Giovanni Preziosi in 1938.
Following the murder of his friend Corneliu Zelea Codreanu, the leader of the Fascist Romanian Iron Guard, Evola expressed anticipation of a "Talmudic, Israelite tyranny." However, Evola believed that Jews had this "power" only because of European "decadence" in modernity. He also believed that one could be "Aryan", but have a "Jewish" soul, just as one could be "Jewish", but have an "Aryan" soul. In Evola's view, Otto Weininger and Carlo Michelstaedter were Jews of "sufficiently heroic, ascetic, and sacral" character to fit the latter category.
Views on "caste" and class
Julius Evola believe that society develops a "regression of castes" where classes he viewed as superior were replaced by those he viewed as inferior.
He believed that the rule of spiritual leaders (the highest class) was replaced by that of warriors (the second highest) then by merchants and finally by the proletariat (whom he described as "spiritual eunuchs", quoting another philosopher).
He believed that each aspect of society was effected by the dominant "caste", for example, war in the first type was "holy war" and in the second type "defending the honour of one's lord". In addition, bourgeois rule makes "usury" socially acceptable.
Fascism
Evola developed a line of argument, closely related to the spiritual orientation of Traditionalist writers such as René Guénon and the political concerns of the European authoritarian right. Evola's first published political work was an anti-fascist piece in 1925. In this work, Evola called Italy's fascist movement a "laughable revolution," based on empty sentiment and materialistic concerns. He applauded Mussolini's anti-bourgeois orientation and his goal of making Italian citizens into hardened warriors, but criticized Fascist populism, party politics, and elements of leftism that he saw in the fascist regime. Evola saw Mussolini's Fascist Party as possessing no cultural or spiritual foundation. He was passionate about infusing it with these elements in order to make it suitable for his ideal conception of Übermensch culture which, in Evola's view, characterized the imperial grandeur of pre-Christian Europe. He expressed anti-nationalist sentiment, stating that to become "truly human," one would have to "overcome brotherly contamination" and "purge oneself" of the feeling that one is united with others "because of blood, affections, country or human destiny." He also opposed the futurism that Italian fascism was aligned with, along with the "plebeian" nature of the movement. Accordingly, Evola launched the journal La Torre (The Tower), to voice his concerns and advocate for a more elitist fascism. Evola's ideas were poorly received by the fascist mainstream as it stood at the time of his writing.
Mussolini
Scholars disagree about why Benito Mussolini embraced racist ideology in 1938—some scholars have written that Mussolini was more motivated by political considerations than ideology when he introduced antisemitic legislation in Italy. Other scholars have rejected the argument that the racial ideology of Italian fascism could be attributed solely to Nazi influence. A more recent interpretation is that Mussolini was frustrated by the slow pace of fascist transformation and, by 1938, had adopted increasingly radical measures including a racial ideology. Aaron Gillette has written that "Racism would become the key driving force behind the creation of the new fascist man, the uomo fascista."
Mussolini read Evola's Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race in August 1941, and met with Evola to offer him his praise. Evola later recounted that Mussolini had found in his work a uniquely Roman form of Fascist racism distinct from that found in Nazi Germany. With Mussolini's backing, Evola started preparing the launch of a minor journal Sangue e Spirito (Blood and Spirit) which never appeared. While not always in agreement with German racial theorists, Evola traveled to Germany in February 1942 and obtained support for German collaboration on Sangue e Spirito from "key figures in the German racial hierarchy." Fascists appreciated the palingenetic value of Evola's "proof" "that the true representatives of the state and the culture of ancient Rome were people of the Nordic race." Evola eventually became Italy's leading racial philosopher.
Evola blended Sorelianism with Mussolini's eugenics agenda. Evola has written that "The theory of the Aryo-Roman race and its corresponding myth could integrate the Roman idea proposed, in general, by fascism, as well as give a foundation to Mussolini's plan to use his state as a means to elevate the average Italian and to enucleate in him a new man."
In May, 1951, Evola was arrested and charged with promoting the revival of the Fascist Party, and of glorifying Fascism. Defending himself at trial, Evola stated that his work belonged to a long tradition of anti-democratic writers who certainly could be linked to fascism—at least fascism interpreted according to certain Evolian criteria—but who certainly could not be identified with the Fascist regime under Mussolini. Evola then declared that he was not a Fascist but was instead "" (). He was acquitted.
Third Reich
Finding Italian fascism too compromising, Evola began to seek recognition in Nazi Germany. Evola spent a considerable amount of time in Germany in 1937 and 1938, and gave a series of lectures to the German–Italian Society in 1938. Evola took issue with Nazi populism and biological materialism. SS authorities initially rejected Evola's ideas as supranational and aristocratic though he was better received by members of the conservative revolutionary movement. The Nazi Ahnenerbe reported that many considered his ideas to be pure "fantasy" which ignored "historical facts.". Evola admired Heinrich Himmler, whom he knew personally, but he had reservations about Adolf Hitler because of Hitler's reliance on völkisch nationalism. Himmler's Schutzstaffel ("SS") kept a dossier on Evola—dossier document AR-126 described his plans for a "Roman-Germanic Imperium" as "utopian" and described him as a "reactionary Roman," whose goal was an "insurrection of the old aristocracy against the modern world." The document recommended that the SS "stop his effectiveness in Germany" and provide him with no support, particularly because of his desire to create a "secret international order".
Despite this opposition, Evola was able to establish political connections with pan-Europeanist elements inside the Reich Security Main Office. Evola subsequently ascended to the inner circles of Nazism as the influence of pan-European advocates overtook that of Völkisch proponents, due to military contingencies. Evola wrote the article Reich and Imperium as Elements in the New European Order for the Nazi-backed journal European Review. He spent World War II working for the Sicherheitsdienst. The Sicherheitsdienst bureau Amt VII, a Reich Security Main Office research library, helped Evola acquire arcane occult and Masonic texts.
Italian Fascism went into decline when, in 1943, Mussolini was deposed and imprisoned. At this point, Evola fled to Germany with the help of the Sicherheitsdienst. Although not a member of the National Fascist Party, and despite his apparent problems with the Fascist regime, Evola was one of the first people to greet Mussolini when the latter was broken out of prison by Otto Skorzeny in September, 1943. Subsequently, Evola helped welcome Mussolini to Adolf Hitler's Wolf's Lair. Following this, Evola involved himself in Mussolini's Italian Social Republic. It was Evola's custom to walk around the city of Vienna during bombing raids in order to better "ponder his destiny". During one such raid, 1945, a shell fragment damaged his spinal cord and he became paralyzed from the waist down, remaining so for the rest of his life.
Post-World War II
About the alliance during World War II between Allies and the Soviet Union, Evola wrote:The democratic powers repeated the error of those who think they can use the forces of subversion for their own ends without cost. They do not know that, by a fatal logic, when exponents of two different grades of subversion meet or cross paths, the one representing the more developed grade will take over in the end.The political model Evola selected after 1945 was neither Mussolini nor Hitler. Evola cited and encouraged the youth to read Plato (with reference in particular to The Republic), Dante (with reference in particular to De Monarchia), Joseph de Maistre, Donoso Cortés, Bismarck, Metternich, Gaetano Mosca, Pareto and Michels.
After World War II, Evola continued his work in esotericism. He wrote a number of books and articles on sex magic and various other esoteric studies, including The Yoga of Power: Tantra, Shakti, and the Secret Way (1949), Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), and Meditations on the Peaks: Mountain Climbing as Metaphor for the Spiritual Quest (1974). He also wrote his two explicitly political books Men Among the Ruins: Post-War Reflections of a Radical Traditionalist (1953), Ride the Tiger: A Survival Manual for the Aristocrats of the Soul (1961), and his autobiography, The Path of Cinnabar (1963). He also expanded upon critiques of American civilization and materialism, as well as increasing American influence in Europe, collected in the posthumous anthology Civiltà Americana.
While trying to distance himself from Nazism, Evola wrote in 1955 that the Nuremberg trials were a farce. This indicates that despite being rejected by the SS before the war, he never stopped admiring their criminal activities.
Evola's occult ontology exerted influence over post-war neo-fascism. In the post-war period, Evola's writing evoked interest among the neo-fascist right. After 1945, Evola was considered the most important Italian theoretician of the conservative revolutionary movement and the "chief ideologue" of Italy's post-war radical right. According to Egil Asprem and Kennet Granholm, Evola's most significant post-war political texts are Orientamenti and Men Among the Ruins. In the opening phrase in the first edition of Men Among the Ruins, Evola said: Our adversaries would undoubtedly want us, in a Christian spirit, under the banner of progress or reform, having been struck on one cheek to turn the other. Our principle is different: "Do to others what they would like to do to you: but do it to them first.Orientamenti was a text against "national fascism"—instead, it advocated for a European Community modeled on the principles of the Waffen-SS. The Italian neo-fascist group Ordine Nuovo adopted Orientamenti as a guide for action in postwar Italy. The European Liberation Front, who were affiliated with Francis Parker Yockey, called Evola "Italy's greatest living authoritarian philosopher" in the April 1951 issue of their publication Frontfighter.
During the post-war period, Evola disassociated himself from totalitarianism, preferring the concept of the "organic" state, which he put forth in his text Men Among the Ruins, as well as in his autodifesa. Evola sought to develop a strategy for the implementation of a "conservative revolution" in post-World War II Europe. He rejected nationalism, advocating instead for a European Imperium, which could take various forms according to local conditions, but should be "organic, hierarchical, anti-democratic, and anti-individual." Evola endorsed Francis Parker Yockey's neo-fascist manifesto Imperium, but disagreed with it because he believed that Yockey had a "superficial" understanding of what was immediately possible. Evola believed that his conception of neo-fascist Europe could best be implemented by an elite of "superior" men who operated outside normal politics.
In Men Among the Ruins, Evola defines the Fourth Estate as being the last stage in the cyclical development of the social elite, the first beginning with the monarchy. Expanding the concept in an essay in 1950, the Fourth State according to Evola would be characterized by "the collectivist civilization... the communist society of the faceless-massman".
Giuliano Salierni was an activist in the neo-Fascist Italian Social Movement during the early 1950s. He later recalled Evola's calls to violence. Roberto Fiore and his colleagues in the early 1980s helped the National Fronts "Political Soldiers" forge a militant elitist philosophy based on Evola's "most militant tract", The Aryan Doctrine of Battle and Victory. The Aryan Doctrine called for a "Great Holy War" that would be fought for spiritual renewal and fought in parallel to the physical "Little Holy War" against perceived enemies. Wolff attributes extreme-right terrorist actions in Italy in the 1970s and 1980s to the influence of Julius Evola.
Thomas Sheehan has argued that Evola's work is essential reading for those seeking to understand European neo-fascism, in the same way that knowledge of the writings of Karl Marx is necessary for those seeking to understand Communist actions.
Political influence
At one time Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini, the Nazi Grail seeker Otto Rahn, and the Romanian fascist sympathizer and religious historian Mircea Eliade admired Julius Evola. After World War II, Evola's writings continued to influence many European far-right political, racist and neo-fascist movements. He is widely translated in French, Spanish, partly in German, and mostly in Hungarian (the largest number of his translated works).
Umberto Eco referred to Evola as the "most influential theoretical source of the theories of the new Italian right", and as "one of the most respected fascist gurus".
Giorgio Almirante referred to him as "our Marcuse—only better." According to one leader of the neofascist "black terrorist" Ordine Nuovo, "Our work since 1953 has been to transpose Evola's teachings into direct political action."
The now defunct French fascist group Troisième Voie was also inspired by Evola.
Jonathan Bowden, English political activist and chairman of the far right, spoke highly of Evola and his ideas and gave lectures on his philosophy.
Evola has influenced Russian political analyst and fascist Aleksander Dugin.
The Greek neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn includes his works on its suggested reading list, and the leader of Jobbik, the Hungarian nationalist party, admires Evola and wrote an introduction to his works.
Donald Trump's former chief adviser Steve Bannon has pointed to Evola's influence on the Eurasianism movement; According to Joshua Green's book Devil's Bargain, Evola's Revolt Against the Modern World had initially drawn Bannon's interest to the ideas of the Traditionalist School. Alt-right leader and white nationalist Richard Spencer said that Bannon's awareness of Evola "means a tremendous amount". Some members of the alt-right expressed hope that Bannon might have been open to Evola's ideas, and that through Bannon, Evola's ideas could become influential. According to multiple historians cited by The Atlantic, this is contradictory, as Bannon cited Evola in defense of the "Judeo-Christian west", while Evola hated and opposed Judaism and Jews, Christianity in general, Anglo-Saxon Protestantism specifically, and the culture of the United States. In a leaked email sent by Bannon in March 2016, he told Milo Yiannopoulos, "I do appreciate any piece that mentions Evola." Evola has also influenced the alt-right movement.
Works
Books
L'individuo e il divenire del mondo (1926; The Individual and the Becoming of the World).
L'uomo come potenza (1927; Man as Potency).
Teoria dell'individuo assoluto (1927; The Theory of the Absolute Individual).
Imperialismo pagano (1928; second edition 1932)English translation:
Fenomenologia dell'individuo assoluto (1930; The Phenomenology of the Absolute Individual).
La tradizione ermetica (1931; second edition 1971)English translation:
Maschera e volto dello spiritualismo contemporaneo: Analisi critica delle principali correnti moderne verso il sovrasensibile (1932)English translation: And:
Heidnischer Imperialismus (1933)English translation:
Rivolta contro il mondo moderno (1934; second edition 1951; third edition 1970)English translation:
Il Mistero del Graal e la Tradizione Ghibellina dell'Impero (1937)English translation:
Il mito del sangue. Genesi del Razzismo (1937; second edition 1942)English translation:
Sintesi di dottrina della razza (1941)English translation:
Indirizzi per una educazione razziale (1941)English translation:
La dottrina del risveglio (1943)English translation:
Lo Yoga della potenza (1949; second edition 1968)English translation:
Gli uomini e le rovine (1953; second edition 1972)English translation:
(1958; second edition 1969)English translations: 1983–1991:
L'operaio nel pensiero di Ernst Jünger (1960; The Worker in the Thought of Ernst Jünger). Excerpts in English
Cavalcare la tigre (1961)English translation:
Il cammino del cinabro (1963; second edition 1970)English translation:
Il Fascismo. Saggio di una analisi critica dal punto di vista della Destra (1964; second edition 1970)English translation: And:
Collections
Saggi sull'idealismo magico (1925; Essays on Magical Idealism).
Introduzione alla magia (1927–1929; 1971)English translation: And: And:
L'arco e la clava (1968)English translation:
Ricognizioni. Uomini e problemi (1974)English translation:
Meditazioni delle vette (1974)English translation:
Metafisica della Guerra (1996)English translation:
Jobboldali fiatalok kézikönyve (2012, collection of Hungarian translations of periodicals by Evola, published by Kvintesszencia Kiadó)English translation:
Articles and pamphlets
L'Homme et son devenir selon le Vedânta. (1925; Review of Guenon's work published in 1925 in L'Idealismo Realistico).
Tre aspetti del problema ebraico (1936)English translation:
La tragedia della 'Guardia di Ferro - (1938) English translation: The Tragedy of the Iron Guard. Originally published in La vita italiana 309, Dec, 1938.
On the Secret of Decay (1938)Originally written in German and published by the Deutsches Volkstum magazine n. 14.
Orientamenti, undici punti (1950)English translation:
Il vampirismo ed i vampiri (1973) English: Vampirism and Vampires. Written for journal Roma in September 1973.
Works edited and/or translated by Evola
Tao Tê Ching: Il libro della via e della virtù (1923; The Book of the Way and Virtue). Second edition: Il libro del principio e della sua azione (1959; The Book of the Primary Principle and of Its Action).
La guerra occulta: armi e fasi dell'attacco ebraico-massonico alla tradizione europea by Emmanuel Malynski and Léon de Poncins (1939)English translation:
See also
Occultism and the far right
Traditionalist School
References
Notes
Bibliography
(:)
Aprile, Mario (1984), "Julius Evola: An Introduction to His Life and Work," The Scorpion No. 6 (Winter/Spring): 20–21.
Coletti, Guillermo (1996), "Against the Modern World: An Introduction to the Work of Julius Evola," Ohm Clock No. 4 (Spring): 29–31.
Coogan, Kevin (1999), Dreamer of the Day: Francis Parker Yockey and the Postwar Fascist International Brooklyn, New York:Autonomedia ).
De Benoist, Alain. "Julius Evola, réactionnaire radical et métaphysicien engagé. Analyse critique de la pensée politique de Julius Evola," Nouvelle Ecole, No. 53–54 (2003), pp. 147–69.
Drake, Richard H. (1986), "Julius Evola and the Ideological Origins of the Radical Right in Contemporary Italy," in Peter H. Merkl (ed.), Political Violence and Terror: Motifs and Motivations (University of California Press, ) 61–89.
Drake, Richard H. (1988), "Julius Evola, Radical Fascism and the Lateran Accords," The Catholic Historical Review 74: 403–419.
Drake, Richard H. (1989), "The Children of the Sun," in The Revolutionary Mystique and Terrorism in Contemporary Italy (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, ), 114–134.
Faerraresi, Franco (1987), "Julius Evola: Tradition, Reaction, and the Radical Right," European Journal of Sociology 28: 107–151.
Gelli, Frank (2012), Julius Evola: The Sufi of Rome
Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas (2001), Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity (New York: New York University Press, , , ), 52–71.
Griffin, Roger (1985), "Revolts against the Modern World: The Blend of Literary and Historical Fantasy in the Italian New Right," Literature and History 11 (Spring): 101–123.
Griffin, Roger (1995) (ed.), Fascism (Oxford University Press, ), 317–318.
Hans Thomas Hakl, "La questione dei rapporti fra Julius Evola e Aleister Crowley", in: Arthos 13, Pontremoli, Centro Studi Evoliani, 2006, pp. 269–289.
Hansen, H. T. (1994), "A Short Introduction to Julius Evola," Theosophical History 5 (January): 11–22; reprinted as introduction to Evola, Revolt Against the Modern World, (Vermont: Inner Traditions, 1995).
Hansen, H. T. (2002), "Julius Evola's Political Endeavors," introduction to Evola, Men Among the Ruins, (Vermont: Inner Traditions).
Moynihan, Michael (2003), "Julius Evola's Combat Manuals for a Revolt Against the Modern World," in Richard Metzger (ed.), Book of Lies: The Disinformation Guide to Magick and the Occult (The Disinformation Company, ) 313–320.
Rees, Philip (1991), Biographical Dictionary of the Extreme Right Since 1890 (New York: Simon & Schuster, ), 118–120.
Sedgwick, Mark (2004) Against the Modern World: Traditionalism and the Secret Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century (Oxford University Press, ).
Sheehan, Thomas (1981) "Myth and Violence: The Fascism of Julius Evola and Alain de Benoist," Social Research, 48 (Spring): 45–83.
Staudenmaier, P. (2019). "Racial Ideology between Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany: Julius Evola and the Aryan Myth, 1933–43." Journal of Contemporary History.
Stucco, Guido (1992), "Translator's Introduction," in Evola, The Yoga of Power (Vermont: Inner Traditions), ix–xv.
Stucco, Guido (1994), "Introduction," in Evola, The Path of Enlightenment According to the Mithraic Mysteries, Zen: The Religion of the Samurai, Rene Guenon: A Teacher for Modern Times, and Taoism: The Magic, the Mysticism (Edmonds, WA: Holmes Publishing Group)
Stucco, Guido (2002). "The Legacy of a European Traditionalist: Julius Evola in Perspective". The Occidental Quarterly 3 (2), pp. 21–44.
Wasserstrom, Steven M. (1995), "The Lives of Baron Evola," Alphabet City 4 + 5 (December): 84–89.
Waterfield, Robin (1990), 'Baron Julius Evola and the Hermetic Tradition', Gnosis 14, (Winter): 12–17.
External links
1898 births
1974 deaths
20th-century Italian philosophers
20th-century Italian politicians
20th-century occultists
20th-century Italian historians
20th-century Italian writers
Anti-Americanism
Conservative Revolutionary movement
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Historians of fascism
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Italian Dadaist | false | [
"Global Impact is a non-profit organization that works with international charities based in the United States and administers four of the largest Combined Federal Campaigns (CFC), including the Combined Federal Campaign of the National Capital Area, and the Combined Federal Campaign-Overseas. The CFC is a program to raise money from federal employees for local, national, and international charities. Global Impact affiliated charities include CARE, Doctors Without Borders, Heifer International, Save the Children, the U.S. Fund for UNICEF and World Vision. In 2016, Global Impact launched a counterpart organization in the United Kingdom—Global Impact UK.\n\nGlobal Impact raised more than $1.8 B since inception. In FY2018 Global Impact raised more than $73 million in total contributions, generating nearly $22 million in employee giving pledges for more than 100 charity alliance partners, and helping more than 45 corporate and nonprofit partners accomplish their philanthropic goals by providing advisory and backbone services.\n\nSpending controversy, 2011-2012 \n\nAn audit published by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management in 2012 concluded that Global Impact had received $764,069 in reimbursements from the federal government that \"could have been put to better use\" for the CFC. Global Impact had received funds for neck massages, hotel room service, and movie rentals. Renee Acosta, then Global Impact's chief executive, received a $150,000 bonus following the audit.\n\nPrograms \nGlobal Impact provides partner-specific advisory and backbone services; workplace fundraising and representation; campaign design, marketing and implementation for workplace and signature fundraising campaigns; and fiscal sponsorship and technology services.\n\nGlobal Impact has been involved with the Combined Federal Campaign (CFC), an annual workplace charity campaign for federal employees, since its inception, first as a participating charity and then administering campaigns for more than 20 years. Global Impact was previously known as International Service Agencies when it began administering CFCs. As of 2017 Global Impact administered four CFCs: National Capital Area, Overseas, New York City, and Central Virginia.\n\nSince Global Impact began managing the Combined Federal Campaign of the National Capital Area, the largest CFC, its revenues grew from $47 million in the fall 2003 campaign to nearly $66 million in the fall 2011 campaign. Additionally, Global Impact has been awarded 13 Office of Personnel CFC Innovator Awards for implementing innovative strategies in the National Capital Area and Overseas campaigns that led to increased participation and/or contributions.\n\nResearch \n\nIn 2011 Global Impact published \"Moving Beyond Boundaries,\" a report that analyzed trends in donations to international charities. The report concluded that such giving had increased at an annual rate of 10.4% since 1987, that 22% of U.S. corporations made donations to international causes, and that 37% of major U.S. companies planned to focus more on such causes. The report concluded that corporate fundraising efforts were having a positive impact on quality of life around the world.\n\nIn 2013, Global Impact released \"Giving Beyond Borders: A Study of Global Giving by U.S. Corporations.\" The study, researched and written by the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, explores the scope and depth of international giving by U.S. corporations and examines what makes corporate-nonprofit partnerships successful. It found that 86 percent of companies that gave internationally said they plan to increase or maintain the size of their foreign giving budget in their next fiscal year. Furthermore, the two major determining factors that propel U.S. corporations to make foreign social investments are the local community needs and the company's local financial performance. The study concluded that the main attribute companies look for when selecting a nonprofit partner is a demonstrated record of producing effective and efficient results.\n\nIn 2014, Global Impact released \"The Corporate Signature Program: A Custom Approach to Philanthropy,\" a white paper examining the growing practice of signature programs in corporate social investments. The white paper looked at why corporations invest in signature programs, what companies seek to achieve through their giving, what steps to take to create a signature program, and what types of models can be used for program management. It also provided examples of how some U.S. corporations have built their own successful signature programs.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \nGlobal Impact website\n\nDevelopment charities based in the United States\nCharities based in Virginia\nNon-profit organizations based in Alexandria, Virginia\nOrganizations established in 1956\n1956 establishments in Virginia",
"Space Impact is a mobile game series that was published by Nokia and its games usually came bundled with several Nokia devices.\n\nThe first Space Impact appeared on the Nokia 3310 in 2000 and later included in other models released throughout 2001-2004, including Nokia 3410, 5510, Nokia 5210, Nokia 2100 and 6310. The Nokia 3310's WAP enhanced versions (3330 and 3350) and the Nokia 3410 versions gave the possibility to download extra Space Impact chapters via the phone's WAP connection (the service called Nokia Club).\n\nA Space Impact-themed Xpress-on cover was released for devices including Nokia 3410.\n\nGameplay\nSpace Impact is a shoot 'em up game and the player has the ability to freely move horizontally and vertically (with a few exceptions on some platform-like levels in Space Impact+) but cannot increase the speed of the screen's auto-scrolling feature. The player can collect power-ups throughout the levels, which award extra lives or special weapons.\n\nSeries\nSequels for the original game later appeared:\nSpace Impact II, which debuted on Nokia 3510 and later appeared in Nokia's CDMA models - Identical gameplay to the original, with new levels and enemies\nSpace Impact+ included in Nokia 1100 and Nokia 2300 - Features platform-style levels\nSpace Impact 303, available as a downloadable J2ME app for certain devices, starting with Nokia 7210 - redesigned gameplay layout for color screen.\nSpace Impact Evolution, specifically made for the Symbian S60 1st Edition platform, which first appeared on Nokia 7650\nSpace Impact Evolution X, the sequel, which had two versions: one bundled exclusively with the N-Gage Classic and the N-Gage QD (on the \"Extras\" folder of the Support CD) and another made for Symbian S60 2nd Edition devices.\nSpace Impact Light, released for Symbian S60 3rd Edition. Its demo came bundled with the Nokia N81 8GB released in October 2007.\nSpace Impact: Kappa Base, released on the N-Gage 2.0 platform in 2008.\nSpace Impact: Meteor Shield, developed by Rovio and released first for Nokia N97 in 2010, and the first game in the series to feature 3D graphics.\n\nMore recently, various clones and remakes of the game have been made for the PC and platforms like Android, many of which offers an accurate emulation of the original game.\n\nReception\nThe original Space Impact is well remembered as one of the games of the popular Nokia 3310 handset. In 2010, CNET put it in its top 10 'greatest mobile games of all time', and said that it pushed the boundaries in what was possible on a mobile device.\n\nSee also\n\nSnake\nBounce\nN-Gage\n\nReferences \n\n2000 video games\nNokia games\nMobile games\nVideo games developed in Finland\nVideo game franchises introduced in 2000\nN-Gage games\nN-Gage service games\nJava platform games\nShoot 'em ups\nVideo games set in outer space\nSymbian games"
]
|
[
"Julius Evola",
"Racism and mystical Aryanism",
"What were his views on racism?",
"Evola spoke of \"inferior non-European races\". Peter Merkl wrote that \"Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether\".",
"What is mystical Aryanism?",
"I don't know.",
"Did he consider himself Aryan?",
"Prior to the end of War, Evola had frequently used the term \"Aryan\" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality.",
"What important things did he do?",
"According to Furlong, Evola developed \"the law of the regression of castes\" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II",
"What impact has he made?",
"\" While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957, Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of \"negroes"
]
| C_64b521f2f9cc4df09098f27ba0a07a51_0 | Was there any backlash to what he was saying? | 6 | Was there any backlash to what Julius Evola was saying? | Julius Evola | Evola's dissent from standard biological concepts of race had roots in his aristocratic elitism, since Nazi Volkisch ideology inadequately separated aristocracy from "commoners." According to Furlong, Evola developed "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes--sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves". Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies." Prior to the end of War, Evola had frequently used the term "Aryan" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman 'super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men'...no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights of the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta." Evola spoke of "inferior non-European races". Peter Merkl wrote that "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote: "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanatiscm [are] all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West." While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957, Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of "negroes" and the opposition to segregation. Furlong noted that this article is "among the most extreme in phraseology of any he wrote, and exhibits a degree of intolerance that leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people." CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola (; 19 May 1898 11 June 1974), better known as Julius Evola, was an Italian philosopher, poet, and painter whose esoteric worldview featured antisemitic conspiracy theories and the occult. He has been described as a "fascist intellectual", a "radical traditionalist", "antiegalitarian, antiliberal, antidemocratic, and antipopular", and as "the leading philosopher of Europe's neofascist movement".
Evola is popular in fringe circles, largely because of his metaphysical, magical, and supernatural beliefs – including belief in ghosts, telepathy, and alchemyand his traditionalism. He termed his philosophy "magical idealism". Many of Evola's theories and writings were centered on his hostility toward Christianity and his idiosyncratic mysticism, occultism, and esoteric religious studies, and this aspect of his work has influenced occultists and esotericists. Evola also justified male domination over women as part of a purely patriarchal society, an outlook stemming from his traditionalist views on gender, which demanded women stay in or revert to what he saw as their traditional gender roles, where they were completely subordinate to male authority.
According to the scholar Franco Ferraresi, "Evola's thought can be considered one of the most radical and consistent anti-egalitarian, anti-liberal, anti-democratic, and anti-popular systems in the 20th century". It is a singular, though not necessarily original, blend of several schools and traditions, including German idealism, Eastern doctrines, traditionalism, and the all-embracing Weltanschauung of the interwar conservative revolutionary movement with which Evola had a deep personal involvement. Historian Aaron Gillette described Evola as "one of the most influential fascist racists in Italian history".
Evola admired SS head Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler, whom he once met. Autobiographical remarks by Evola allude to his having worked for the Sicherheitsdienst, or SD, the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party. During his trial in 1951, Evola denied being a fascist and instead referred to himself as "" (). Concerning this statement, historian Elisabetta Cassina Wolff wrote that "It is unclear whether this meant that Evola was placing himself above or beyond Fascism".
Evola has been called the "chief ideologue" of Italy's radical right after World War II. He continues to influence contemporary traditionalist and neo-fascist movements.
Life
Giulio Cesare Evola was born in Rome, the son of Vincenzo Evola (born 1854) and Concetta Mangiapane (born 1865). Both his parents had been born in Cinisi, a small town in the Province of Palermo on the north-western coast of Sicily. The paternal grandparents of Giulio Cesare Evola were Giuseppe Evola and Maria Cusumano. Giuseppe Evola is reported as being a joiner in Vincenzo's birth record. The maternal grandparents of Giulio Cesare Evola were Cesare Mangiapane, reported as being a shopkeeper in Concetta's birth record, and his wife Caterina Munacó. Vincenzo Evola and Concetta Mangiapane were married in Cinisi on 25 November 1892. Vincenzo Evola is reported as being a telegraphic mechanic chief, while Concetta Mangiapane is reported as being a landowner.
Giulio Cesare Evola had an elder brother, Giuseppe Gaspare Dinamo Evola, born in 1895 in Rome. Following a slight variation on the Sicilian naming convention of the era, as the second son, Giulio Cesare Evola was partly named after his maternal grandfather.
Evola has been often been reported as being a baron, probably in reference to a purported distant relationship with a minor aristocratic family, the Evoli, who were the barons of Castropignano in the Kingdom of Sicily in the late Middle Ages.
Little is known about Evola's early upbringing except that he considered it irrelevant. He studied engineering at the Istituto Tecnico Leonardo da Vinci in Rome, but did not complete his course, later claiming this was because he "did not want to be associated in any way with bourgeois academic recognition and titles such as doctor and engineer."
In his teenage years, Evola immersed himself in painting—which he considered one of his natural talents—and literature, including Oscar Wilde and Gabriele d'Annunzio. He was introduced to philosophers such as Friedrich Nietzsche and Otto Weininger. Other early philosophical influences included Carlo Michelstaedter and Max Stirner.
In the First World War, Evola served as an artillery officer on the Asiago plateau. He was attracted to the avant-garde, and after the war he briefly associated with Filippo Tommaso Marinetti's Futurist movement. Through his painting and poetry, and through work on the short-lived journal Revue Bleue, he became a prominent representative of Dadaism in Italy. In 1922, after concluding that avant-garde art was becoming commercialized and stiffened by academic conventions, he reduced his focus on artistic expression such as painting and poetry.
Evola was arrested in April 1951 by the Political Office of the Rome Police Headquarters and charged on suspicion that he was an ideologist of the militant neofascist organization Fasci di Azione Rivoluzionaria (FAR). Evola was defended by Prof. Francesco Carnelutti. On November 20, 1951, Evola was acquitted of all charges.
Evola died on 11 June 1974 in Rome from congestive heart failure.
Writing career
Christianity
In 1928, Evola wrote an attack on Christianity titled Pagan Imperialism, which proposed transforming fascism into a system consistent with ancient Roman values and Western esotericism. Evola proposed that fascism should be a vehicle for reinstating the caste system and aristocracy of antiquity. Although he invoked the term "fascism" in this text, his diatribe against the Catholic Church was criticized by both Mussolini's fascist regime and the Vatican itself. A. James Gregor argued that the text was an attack on fascism as it stood at the time of writing, but noted that Mussolini made use of it to threaten the Vatican with the possibility of an "anti-clerical fascism". On account of Evola's anti-Christian proposals, in April 1928 the Vatican-backed right wing Catholic journal Revue Internationale des Sociétés Secrètes published an article entitled "Un Sataniste Italien: Julius Evola", accusing him of satanism.
In his The Mystery of the Grail (1937), Evola discarded Christian interpretations of the Holy Grail and wrote that it symbolizes the principle of an immortalizing and transcendent force connected to the primordial state ... The mystery of the Grail is a mystery of a warrior initiation.He held that the Ghibellines, who had fought the Guelph for control of Northern and Central Italy in the thirteenth century, had within them the residual influences of pre-Christian Celtic and Nordic traditions that represented his conception of the Grail myth. He also held that the Guelph victory against the Ghibellines represented a regression of the castes, since the merchant caste took over from the warrior caste. In the epilogue to this book, Evola argued that the fictitious The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, regardless of whether it was authentic or not, was a cogent representation of modernity. The historian Richard Barber said, Evola mixes rhetoric, prejudice, scholarship, and politics into a strange version of the present and future, but in the process he brings together for the first time interest in the esoteric and in conspiracy theory which characterize much of the later Grail literature.
Buddhism
In his The Doctrine of Awakening (1943), Evola argued that the Pāli Canon could be held to represent true Buddhism. His interpretation of Buddhism is that it was intended to be anti-democratic. He believed that Buddhism revealed the essence of an "Aryan" tradition that had become corrupted and lost in the West. He believed it could be interpreted to reveal the superiority of a warrior caste. Harry Oldmeadow described Evola's work on Buddhism as exhibiting a Nietzschean influence, but Evola criticized Nietzsche's purported anti-ascetic prejudice. Evola claimed that the book "received the official approbation of the Pāli [Text] Society", and was published by a reputable Orientalist publisher. Evola's interpretation of Buddhism, as put forth in his article "Spiritual Virility in Buddhism", is in conflict with the post-WWII scholarship of the Orientalist Giuseppe Tucci, who argues that the viewpoint that Buddhism advocates universal benevolence is legitimate. Arthur Versluis stated that Evola's writing on Buddhism was a vehicle for his own theories, but was a far from accurate rendition of the subject, and he held that much the same could be said of Evola's writing on Hermeticism. Ñāṇavīra Thera was inspired to become a bhikkhu from reading Evola's text The Doctrine of Awakening in 1945 while hospitalized in Sorrento.
Modernity
Evola's Revolt Against the Modern World (1934) promotes the mythology of an ancient Golden Age which gradually declined into modern decadence. In this work, Evola described the features of his idealized traditional society in which religious and temporal power were created and united not by priests, but by warriors expressing spiritual power. In mythology, he saw evidence of the West's superiority over the East. Moreover, he claimed that the traditional elite had the ability to access power and knowledge through a hierarchical magic which differed from the lower "superstitious and fraudulent" forms of magic. Evola insists that only "nonmodern forms, institutions, and knowledge" could produce a "real renewal ... in those who are still capable of receiving it." The text was "immediately recognized by Mircea Eliade and other intellectuals who allegedly advanced ideas associated with Tradition." Eliade was one of the most influential twentieth-century historians of religion, a fascist sympathizer associated with the Romanian Christian right wing movement Iron Guard. Evola was aware of the importance of myth from his readings of Georges Sorel, one of the key intellectual influences on fascism. Hermann Hesse described Revolt Against the Modern World as "really dangerous."
During the 1960s Evola thought the right could no longer reverse the corruption of modern civilization. E. C. Wolff noted that this is why Evola wrote Ride the Tiger, choosing to distance himself completely from active political engagement, without excluding the possibility of action in the future. He argued that one should stay firm and ready to intervene when the tiger of modernity "is tired of running." Goodrick-Clarke notes that, "Evola sets up the ideal of the 'active nihilist' who is prepared to act with violence against modern decadence."
Other writings
In the posthumously published collection of writings, Metaphysics of War, Evola, in line with the conservative revolutionary Ernst Jünger, explored the viewpoint that war could be a spiritually fulfilling experience. He proposed the necessity of a transcendental orientation in a warrior.
From 1934 to 1943 Evola was also responsible for 'Diorama Filosofico', the cultural page of Il Regime Fascista, a daily newspaper owned by Roberto Farinacci. He would also contribute during the same period to Giovanni Preziosi magazine La vita italiana.
Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke has written that Evola's 1945 essay "American 'Civilization'" described the United States as "the final stage of European decline into the 'interior formlessness' of vacuous individualism, conformity and vulgarity under the universal aegis of money-making." According to Goodrick-Clarke, Evola argued that the U.S. "mechanistic and rational philosophy of progress combined with a mundane horizon of prosperity to transform the world into an enormous suburban shopping mall."
Evola translated some works of Oswald Spengler and Ortega y Gasset to Italian.
Occultism and esotericism
Around 1920, Evola's interests led him into spiritual, transcendental, and "supra-rational" studies. He began reading various esoteric texts and gradually delved deeper into the occult, alchemy, magic, and Oriental studies, particularly Tibetan Tantric yoga. A keen mountaineer, Evola described the experience as a source of revelatory spiritual experiences. After his return from the war, Evola experimented with hallucinogens and magic.
When he was about 23 years old, Evola considered suicide. He claimed that he avoided suicide thanks to a revelation he had while reading an early Buddhist text that dealt with shedding all forms of identity other than absolute transcendence. Evola would later publish the text The Doctrine of Awakening, which he regarded as a repayment of his debt to Buddhism for saving him from suicide.
Evola wrote prodigiously on Eastern mysticism, Tantra, hermeticism, the myth of the Holy Grail and Western esotericism. German Egyptologist and esoteric scholar Florian Ebeling has noted that Evola's The Hermetic Tradition is viewed as an "extremely important work on Hermeticism" in the eyes of esotericists. Evola gave particular focus to Cesare della Riviera's text Il Mondo Magico degli Heroi, which he later republished in modern Italian. He held that Riviera's text was consonant with the goals of "high magic"the reshaping of the earthly human into a transcendental 'god man'. According to Evola, the alleged "timeless" Traditional science was able to come to lucid expression through this text, in spite of the "coverings" added to it to prevent accusations from the church. Though Evola rejected Carl Jung's interpretation of alchemy, Jung described Evola's The Hermetic Tradition as a "magisterial account of Hermetic philosophy". In Hegel and the Hermetic Tradition, the philosopher Glenn Alexander Magee favored Evola's interpretation over that of Jung's. In 1988, a journal devoted to Hermetic thought published a section of Evola's book and described it as "Luciferian."
Evola later confessed that he was not a Buddhist, and that his text on Buddhism was meant to balance his earlier work on the Hindu tantras. Evola's interest in tantra was spurred on by correspondence with John Woodroffe. Evola was attracted to the active aspect of tantra, and its claim to provide a practical means to spiritual experience, over the more "passive" approaches in other forms of Eastern spirituality. In Tantric Buddhism in East Asia, Richard K. Payne, Dean of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, argued that Evola manipulated Tantra in the service of right wing violence, and that the emphasis on "power" in The Yoga of Power gave insight into his mentality.
Evola advocated that "differentiated individuals" following the Left-Hand Path use dark violent sexual powers against the modern world. For Evola, these "virile heroes" are both generous and cruel, possess the ability to rule, and commit "Dionysian" acts that might be seen as conventionally immoral. For Evola, the Left Hand path embraces violence as a means of transgression.
According to A. James Gregor Evola's definition of spirituality can be found in Meditations on the Peaks: "what has been successfully actualized and translated into a sense of superiority which is experienced inside by the soul, and a noble demeanor, which is expressed in the body." Goodrick-Clarke wrote that Evola's "rigorous New Age spirituality speaks directly to those who reject absolutely the leveling world of democracy, capitalism, multi-racialism and technology at the outset of the twenty-first century. Their acute sense of cultural chaos can find powerful relief in his ideal of total renewal." Thomas Sheehan wrote that to "read Evola is to take a trip through a weird and fascinating jungle of ancient mythologies, pseudo-ethnology, and transcendental mysticism that is enough to make any southern California consciousness-tripper feel quite at home."
Magical idealism
Thomas Sheehan wrote that "Evola's first philosophical works from the 'twenties were dedicated to reshaping neo-idealism from a philosophy of Absolute Spirit and Mind into a philosophy of the "absolute individual" and action." Accordingly, Evola developed the doctrine of "magical idealism", which held that "the Ego must understand that everything that seems to have a reality independent of it is nothing but an illusion, caused by its own deficiency." For Evola, this ever-increasing unity with the "absolute individual" was consistent with unconstrained liberty, and therefore unconditional power. In his 1925 work Essays on Magical Idealism, Evola declared that "God does not exist. The Ego must create him by making itself divine."
According to Sheehan, Evola discovered the power of metaphysical mythology while developing his theories. This led to his advocacy of supra-rational intellectual intuition over discursive knowledge. In Evola's view, discursive knowledge separates man from Being. Sheehan stated that this position is a theme in certain interpretations of Western philosophers such as Plato, Thomas Aquinas, and Martin Heidegger that was exaggerated by Evola. Evola would later write:
Evola developed a doctrine of the "two natures": the natural world and the primordial "world of 'Being'". He believed that these "two natures" impose form and quality on lower matter and create a hierarchical "great chain of Being." He understood "spiritual virility" as signifying orientation towards this postulated transcendent principle. He held that the State should reflect this "ordering from above" and the consequent hierarchical differentiation of individuals according to their "organic preformation". By "organic preformation" he meant that which "gathers, preserves, and refines one's talents and qualifications for determinate functions."
Ur Group
Evola was introduced to esotericism by Arturo Reghini, who was an early supporter of fascism. Reghini sought to promote a "cultured magic" opposed to Christianity and introduced Evola to the traditionalist René Guénon. In 1927, Reghini and Evola, along with other Italian esotericists, founded the Gruppo di Ur ("Ur Group"). The purpose of this group was to attempt to bring the members' individual identities into such a superhuman state of power and awareness that they would be able to exert a magical influence on the world. The group employed techniques from Buddhist, Tantric, and rare Hermetic texts. They aimed to provide a "soul" to the burgeoning Fascist movement of the time through the revival of ancient Roman religion, and to influence the fascist regime through esotericism.
Articles on occultism from the Ur Group were later published in Introduction to Magic. Reghini's support of Freemasonry would however prove a bone of contention for Evola; accordingly, Evola broke with Reghini in 1928. Reghini himself broke from Evola, accusing Evola of plagiarizing his thoughts in the book Pagan Imperialism. Evola, on the other hand, blamed Reghini for the premature publication of Pagan Imperialism. Evola's later work owed a considerable debt to René Guénon's text Crisis of the Modern World, though he diverged from Guénon on the issue of the relationship between warriors and priests.
Views on sex and gender roles
Julius Evola believed that the alleged higher qualities expected of a man of a particular race were not those expected of a woman of the same race. He held that "just relations between the sexes" involved women acknowledging their "inequality" with men. In 1925, he wrote an article titled "La donna come cosa" ("Woman as Thing"). Evola later quoted Joseph de Maistre's statement that "Woman cannot be superior except as woman, but from the moment in which she desires to emulate man she is nothing but a monkey." Evola believed that women's liberation was "the renunciation by woman of her right to be a woman". A woman "could traditionally participate in the sacred hierarchical order only in a mediated fashion through her relationship with a man." He held, as a feature of his idealized gender relations, the Hindu sati, which for him was a form of sacrifice indicating women's respect for patriarchal traditions. For the "pure, feminine" woman, "man is not perceived by her as a mere husband or lover, but as her lord." Women would find their true identity in total subjugation to men.
Evola regarded matriarchy and goddess religions as a symptom of decadence, and preferred a hyper-masculine, warrior ethos.
Evola was influenced by Hans Blüher; he was a proponent of the Männerbund concept as a model for his proposed ultra-fascist "Order". Goodrick-Clarke noted the fundamental influence of Otto Weininger's book Sex and Character on Evola's dualism of male-female spirituality. According to Goodrich-Clarke, "Evola's celebration of virile spirituality was rooted in Weininger's work, which was widely translated by the end of the First World War." Unlike Weininger, Evola believed that women needed to be conquered, not ignored. Evola denounced homosexuality as "useless" for his purposes. He did not neglect sadomasochism, so long as sadism and masochism "are magnifications of an element potentially present in the deepest essence of eros." Then, it would be possible to "extend, in a transcendental and perhaps ecstatic way, the possibilities of sex."
Evola held that women "played" with men, threatened their masculinity, and lured them into a "constrictive" grasp with their sexuality. He wrote that "It should not be expected of women that they return to what they really are ... when men themselves retain only the semblance of true virility", and lamented that "men instead of being in control of sex are controlled by it and wander about like drunkards". He believed that in Tantra and in sex magic, in which he saw a strategy for aggression, he found the means to counter the "emasculated" West. According to Annalisa Merelli, Evola "went so far as to justify rape" because he saw it "as a natural expression of male desire". Evola also said that the "ritual violation of virgins", and "whipping women" were a means of "consciousness raising", so long as these practices were done to the intensity required to produce the proper "liminal psychic climate". He wrote that "as a rule, nothing stirs a man more than feeling the woman utterly exhausted beneath his own hostile rapture."
Evola translated Weininger's Sex and Character into Italian. Dissatisfied with simply translating Weininger's work, he wrote the text Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), where his views on sexuality were dealt with at length. Arthur Versluis described this text as Evola's "most interesting" work aside from Revolt Against the Modern World. This book remains popular among many 'New Age' adherents.
Views on race
Evola's dissent from standard biological concepts of race had roots in his aristocratic elitism, since Nazi völkisch ideology inadequately separated aristocracy from "commoners." According to European studies professor Paul Furlong, Evola developed "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes—sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves". Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies."
In 1941, Evola's book Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race (Italian: Sintesi di Dottrina della Razza) was published by Hoepli. It provides an overview of his ideas concerning race and eugenics, introducing the concept of "spiritual racism", and "esoteric-traditionalist racism".
Prior to the end of the War, Evola had frequently used the term "Aryan" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men' ... no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights of the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta."
Evola spoke of "inferior non-European races". Peter Merkl wrote that "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote: "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanaticism [are] all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West." While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957 Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of "negroes" and the opposition to segregation. Furlong noted that this article is "among the most extreme in phraseology of any he wrote, and exhibits a degree of intolerance that leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people."
National mysticism
For his spiritual interpretation of the different racial psychologies, Evola found the work of German race theorist Ludwig Ferdinand Clauss invaluable. Like Evola, Clauss believed that physical race and spiritual race could diverge as a consequence of miscegenation. Evola's racism included racism of the body, soul, and spirit, giving primacy to the latter factor, writing that "races only declined when their spirit failed."
Like René Guénon, Evola believed that mankind is living in the Kali Yuga of the Hindu tradition—the Dark Age of unleashed materialistic appetites. He argued that both Italian fascism and Nazism represented hope that the "celestial" Aryan race would be reconstituted. He drew on mythological accounts of super-races and their decline, particularly the Hyperboreans, and maintained that traces of Hyperborean influence could be felt in Indo-European man. He felt that Indo-European men had devolved from these higher mythological races. Gregor noted that several contemporary criticisms of Evola's theory were published: "In one of Fascism's most important theoretical journals, Evola's critic pointed out that many Nordic-Aryans, not to speak of Mediterranean Aryans, fail to demonstrate any Hyperborean properties. Instead, they make obvious their materialism, their sensuality, their indifference to loyalty and sacrifice, together with their consuming greed. How do they differ from 'inferior' races, and why should anyone wish, in any way, to favor them?"
Concerning the relationship between "spiritual racism" and biological racism, Evola put forth the following viewpoint, which Furlong described as pseudo-scientific:
Views on Jews
Evola endorsed Otto Weininger's views on the Jews. Though Evola viewed Jews as corrosive and anti-traditional, he described Adolf Hitler's more fanatical antisemitism as a paranoid idée fixe that damaged the reputation of the Third Reich. Evola's conception did not emphasize the Nazi racial conception of Jews as "representatives of a biological race"—in Evola's view the Jews were "the carriers of a world view ... a spirit [that] corresponded to the 'worst' and 'most decadent' features of modernity: democracy, egalitarianism and materialism." Evola rejected the views of chief Nazi theorist Alfred Rosenberg and others on biological racism as being reductionist and materialistic. Jewry was for Evola, as for Weininger, only a symbol for the rule of money and individualism. Otto Weininger desbribed Jewishness as "intellectual tendency".
Evola argued that the fabricated antisemitic text The Protocols of the Elders of Zion—whether or not a forgery—accurately reflect the conditions of modernity. He believed that the Protocols "contain the plan for an occult war, whose objective is the utter destruction, in the non-Jewish peoples, of all tradition, class, aristocracy, and hierarchy, and of all moral, religious, and spiritual values." He wrote the foreword to the second Italian edition of the Protocols, which was published by the Fascist Giovanni Preziosi in 1938.
Following the murder of his friend Corneliu Zelea Codreanu, the leader of the Fascist Romanian Iron Guard, Evola expressed anticipation of a "Talmudic, Israelite tyranny." However, Evola believed that Jews had this "power" only because of European "decadence" in modernity. He also believed that one could be "Aryan", but have a "Jewish" soul, just as one could be "Jewish", but have an "Aryan" soul. In Evola's view, Otto Weininger and Carlo Michelstaedter were Jews of "sufficiently heroic, ascetic, and sacral" character to fit the latter category.
Views on "caste" and class
Julius Evola believe that society develops a "regression of castes" where classes he viewed as superior were replaced by those he viewed as inferior.
He believed that the rule of spiritual leaders (the highest class) was replaced by that of warriors (the second highest) then by merchants and finally by the proletariat (whom he described as "spiritual eunuchs", quoting another philosopher).
He believed that each aspect of society was effected by the dominant "caste", for example, war in the first type was "holy war" and in the second type "defending the honour of one's lord". In addition, bourgeois rule makes "usury" socially acceptable.
Fascism
Evola developed a line of argument, closely related to the spiritual orientation of Traditionalist writers such as René Guénon and the political concerns of the European authoritarian right. Evola's first published political work was an anti-fascist piece in 1925. In this work, Evola called Italy's fascist movement a "laughable revolution," based on empty sentiment and materialistic concerns. He applauded Mussolini's anti-bourgeois orientation and his goal of making Italian citizens into hardened warriors, but criticized Fascist populism, party politics, and elements of leftism that he saw in the fascist regime. Evola saw Mussolini's Fascist Party as possessing no cultural or spiritual foundation. He was passionate about infusing it with these elements in order to make it suitable for his ideal conception of Übermensch culture which, in Evola's view, characterized the imperial grandeur of pre-Christian Europe. He expressed anti-nationalist sentiment, stating that to become "truly human," one would have to "overcome brotherly contamination" and "purge oneself" of the feeling that one is united with others "because of blood, affections, country or human destiny." He also opposed the futurism that Italian fascism was aligned with, along with the "plebeian" nature of the movement. Accordingly, Evola launched the journal La Torre (The Tower), to voice his concerns and advocate for a more elitist fascism. Evola's ideas were poorly received by the fascist mainstream as it stood at the time of his writing.
Mussolini
Scholars disagree about why Benito Mussolini embraced racist ideology in 1938—some scholars have written that Mussolini was more motivated by political considerations than ideology when he introduced antisemitic legislation in Italy. Other scholars have rejected the argument that the racial ideology of Italian fascism could be attributed solely to Nazi influence. A more recent interpretation is that Mussolini was frustrated by the slow pace of fascist transformation and, by 1938, had adopted increasingly radical measures including a racial ideology. Aaron Gillette has written that "Racism would become the key driving force behind the creation of the new fascist man, the uomo fascista."
Mussolini read Evola's Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race in August 1941, and met with Evola to offer him his praise. Evola later recounted that Mussolini had found in his work a uniquely Roman form of Fascist racism distinct from that found in Nazi Germany. With Mussolini's backing, Evola started preparing the launch of a minor journal Sangue e Spirito (Blood and Spirit) which never appeared. While not always in agreement with German racial theorists, Evola traveled to Germany in February 1942 and obtained support for German collaboration on Sangue e Spirito from "key figures in the German racial hierarchy." Fascists appreciated the palingenetic value of Evola's "proof" "that the true representatives of the state and the culture of ancient Rome were people of the Nordic race." Evola eventually became Italy's leading racial philosopher.
Evola blended Sorelianism with Mussolini's eugenics agenda. Evola has written that "The theory of the Aryo-Roman race and its corresponding myth could integrate the Roman idea proposed, in general, by fascism, as well as give a foundation to Mussolini's plan to use his state as a means to elevate the average Italian and to enucleate in him a new man."
In May, 1951, Evola was arrested and charged with promoting the revival of the Fascist Party, and of glorifying Fascism. Defending himself at trial, Evola stated that his work belonged to a long tradition of anti-democratic writers who certainly could be linked to fascism—at least fascism interpreted according to certain Evolian criteria—but who certainly could not be identified with the Fascist regime under Mussolini. Evola then declared that he was not a Fascist but was instead "" (). He was acquitted.
Third Reich
Finding Italian fascism too compromising, Evola began to seek recognition in Nazi Germany. Evola spent a considerable amount of time in Germany in 1937 and 1938, and gave a series of lectures to the German–Italian Society in 1938. Evola took issue with Nazi populism and biological materialism. SS authorities initially rejected Evola's ideas as supranational and aristocratic though he was better received by members of the conservative revolutionary movement. The Nazi Ahnenerbe reported that many considered his ideas to be pure "fantasy" which ignored "historical facts.". Evola admired Heinrich Himmler, whom he knew personally, but he had reservations about Adolf Hitler because of Hitler's reliance on völkisch nationalism. Himmler's Schutzstaffel ("SS") kept a dossier on Evola—dossier document AR-126 described his plans for a "Roman-Germanic Imperium" as "utopian" and described him as a "reactionary Roman," whose goal was an "insurrection of the old aristocracy against the modern world." The document recommended that the SS "stop his effectiveness in Germany" and provide him with no support, particularly because of his desire to create a "secret international order".
Despite this opposition, Evola was able to establish political connections with pan-Europeanist elements inside the Reich Security Main Office. Evola subsequently ascended to the inner circles of Nazism as the influence of pan-European advocates overtook that of Völkisch proponents, due to military contingencies. Evola wrote the article Reich and Imperium as Elements in the New European Order for the Nazi-backed journal European Review. He spent World War II working for the Sicherheitsdienst. The Sicherheitsdienst bureau Amt VII, a Reich Security Main Office research library, helped Evola acquire arcane occult and Masonic texts.
Italian Fascism went into decline when, in 1943, Mussolini was deposed and imprisoned. At this point, Evola fled to Germany with the help of the Sicherheitsdienst. Although not a member of the National Fascist Party, and despite his apparent problems with the Fascist regime, Evola was one of the first people to greet Mussolini when the latter was broken out of prison by Otto Skorzeny in September, 1943. Subsequently, Evola helped welcome Mussolini to Adolf Hitler's Wolf's Lair. Following this, Evola involved himself in Mussolini's Italian Social Republic. It was Evola's custom to walk around the city of Vienna during bombing raids in order to better "ponder his destiny". During one such raid, 1945, a shell fragment damaged his spinal cord and he became paralyzed from the waist down, remaining so for the rest of his life.
Post-World War II
About the alliance during World War II between Allies and the Soviet Union, Evola wrote:The democratic powers repeated the error of those who think they can use the forces of subversion for their own ends without cost. They do not know that, by a fatal logic, when exponents of two different grades of subversion meet or cross paths, the one representing the more developed grade will take over in the end.The political model Evola selected after 1945 was neither Mussolini nor Hitler. Evola cited and encouraged the youth to read Plato (with reference in particular to The Republic), Dante (with reference in particular to De Monarchia), Joseph de Maistre, Donoso Cortés, Bismarck, Metternich, Gaetano Mosca, Pareto and Michels.
After World War II, Evola continued his work in esotericism. He wrote a number of books and articles on sex magic and various other esoteric studies, including The Yoga of Power: Tantra, Shakti, and the Secret Way (1949), Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), and Meditations on the Peaks: Mountain Climbing as Metaphor for the Spiritual Quest (1974). He also wrote his two explicitly political books Men Among the Ruins: Post-War Reflections of a Radical Traditionalist (1953), Ride the Tiger: A Survival Manual for the Aristocrats of the Soul (1961), and his autobiography, The Path of Cinnabar (1963). He also expanded upon critiques of American civilization and materialism, as well as increasing American influence in Europe, collected in the posthumous anthology Civiltà Americana.
While trying to distance himself from Nazism, Evola wrote in 1955 that the Nuremberg trials were a farce. This indicates that despite being rejected by the SS before the war, he never stopped admiring their criminal activities.
Evola's occult ontology exerted influence over post-war neo-fascism. In the post-war period, Evola's writing evoked interest among the neo-fascist right. After 1945, Evola was considered the most important Italian theoretician of the conservative revolutionary movement and the "chief ideologue" of Italy's post-war radical right. According to Egil Asprem and Kennet Granholm, Evola's most significant post-war political texts are Orientamenti and Men Among the Ruins. In the opening phrase in the first edition of Men Among the Ruins, Evola said: Our adversaries would undoubtedly want us, in a Christian spirit, under the banner of progress or reform, having been struck on one cheek to turn the other. Our principle is different: "Do to others what they would like to do to you: but do it to them first.Orientamenti was a text against "national fascism"—instead, it advocated for a European Community modeled on the principles of the Waffen-SS. The Italian neo-fascist group Ordine Nuovo adopted Orientamenti as a guide for action in postwar Italy. The European Liberation Front, who were affiliated with Francis Parker Yockey, called Evola "Italy's greatest living authoritarian philosopher" in the April 1951 issue of their publication Frontfighter.
During the post-war period, Evola disassociated himself from totalitarianism, preferring the concept of the "organic" state, which he put forth in his text Men Among the Ruins, as well as in his autodifesa. Evola sought to develop a strategy for the implementation of a "conservative revolution" in post-World War II Europe. He rejected nationalism, advocating instead for a European Imperium, which could take various forms according to local conditions, but should be "organic, hierarchical, anti-democratic, and anti-individual." Evola endorsed Francis Parker Yockey's neo-fascist manifesto Imperium, but disagreed with it because he believed that Yockey had a "superficial" understanding of what was immediately possible. Evola believed that his conception of neo-fascist Europe could best be implemented by an elite of "superior" men who operated outside normal politics.
In Men Among the Ruins, Evola defines the Fourth Estate as being the last stage in the cyclical development of the social elite, the first beginning with the monarchy. Expanding the concept in an essay in 1950, the Fourth State according to Evola would be characterized by "the collectivist civilization... the communist society of the faceless-massman".
Giuliano Salierni was an activist in the neo-Fascist Italian Social Movement during the early 1950s. He later recalled Evola's calls to violence. Roberto Fiore and his colleagues in the early 1980s helped the National Fronts "Political Soldiers" forge a militant elitist philosophy based on Evola's "most militant tract", The Aryan Doctrine of Battle and Victory. The Aryan Doctrine called for a "Great Holy War" that would be fought for spiritual renewal and fought in parallel to the physical "Little Holy War" against perceived enemies. Wolff attributes extreme-right terrorist actions in Italy in the 1970s and 1980s to the influence of Julius Evola.
Thomas Sheehan has argued that Evola's work is essential reading for those seeking to understand European neo-fascism, in the same way that knowledge of the writings of Karl Marx is necessary for those seeking to understand Communist actions.
Political influence
At one time Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini, the Nazi Grail seeker Otto Rahn, and the Romanian fascist sympathizer and religious historian Mircea Eliade admired Julius Evola. After World War II, Evola's writings continued to influence many European far-right political, racist and neo-fascist movements. He is widely translated in French, Spanish, partly in German, and mostly in Hungarian (the largest number of his translated works).
Umberto Eco referred to Evola as the "most influential theoretical source of the theories of the new Italian right", and as "one of the most respected fascist gurus".
Giorgio Almirante referred to him as "our Marcuse—only better." According to one leader of the neofascist "black terrorist" Ordine Nuovo, "Our work since 1953 has been to transpose Evola's teachings into direct political action."
The now defunct French fascist group Troisième Voie was also inspired by Evola.
Jonathan Bowden, English political activist and chairman of the far right, spoke highly of Evola and his ideas and gave lectures on his philosophy.
Evola has influenced Russian political analyst and fascist Aleksander Dugin.
The Greek neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn includes his works on its suggested reading list, and the leader of Jobbik, the Hungarian nationalist party, admires Evola and wrote an introduction to his works.
Donald Trump's former chief adviser Steve Bannon has pointed to Evola's influence on the Eurasianism movement; According to Joshua Green's book Devil's Bargain, Evola's Revolt Against the Modern World had initially drawn Bannon's interest to the ideas of the Traditionalist School. Alt-right leader and white nationalist Richard Spencer said that Bannon's awareness of Evola "means a tremendous amount". Some members of the alt-right expressed hope that Bannon might have been open to Evola's ideas, and that through Bannon, Evola's ideas could become influential. According to multiple historians cited by The Atlantic, this is contradictory, as Bannon cited Evola in defense of the "Judeo-Christian west", while Evola hated and opposed Judaism and Jews, Christianity in general, Anglo-Saxon Protestantism specifically, and the culture of the United States. In a leaked email sent by Bannon in March 2016, he told Milo Yiannopoulos, "I do appreciate any piece that mentions Evola." Evola has also influenced the alt-right movement.
Works
Books
L'individuo e il divenire del mondo (1926; The Individual and the Becoming of the World).
L'uomo come potenza (1927; Man as Potency).
Teoria dell'individuo assoluto (1927; The Theory of the Absolute Individual).
Imperialismo pagano (1928; second edition 1932)English translation:
Fenomenologia dell'individuo assoluto (1930; The Phenomenology of the Absolute Individual).
La tradizione ermetica (1931; second edition 1971)English translation:
Maschera e volto dello spiritualismo contemporaneo: Analisi critica delle principali correnti moderne verso il sovrasensibile (1932)English translation: And:
Heidnischer Imperialismus (1933)English translation:
Rivolta contro il mondo moderno (1934; second edition 1951; third edition 1970)English translation:
Il Mistero del Graal e la Tradizione Ghibellina dell'Impero (1937)English translation:
Il mito del sangue. Genesi del Razzismo (1937; second edition 1942)English translation:
Sintesi di dottrina della razza (1941)English translation:
Indirizzi per una educazione razziale (1941)English translation:
La dottrina del risveglio (1943)English translation:
Lo Yoga della potenza (1949; second edition 1968)English translation:
Gli uomini e le rovine (1953; second edition 1972)English translation:
(1958; second edition 1969)English translations: 1983–1991:
L'operaio nel pensiero di Ernst Jünger (1960; The Worker in the Thought of Ernst Jünger). Excerpts in English
Cavalcare la tigre (1961)English translation:
Il cammino del cinabro (1963; second edition 1970)English translation:
Il Fascismo. Saggio di una analisi critica dal punto di vista della Destra (1964; second edition 1970)English translation: And:
Collections
Saggi sull'idealismo magico (1925; Essays on Magical Idealism).
Introduzione alla magia (1927–1929; 1971)English translation: And: And:
L'arco e la clava (1968)English translation:
Ricognizioni. Uomini e problemi (1974)English translation:
Meditazioni delle vette (1974)English translation:
Metafisica della Guerra (1996)English translation:
Jobboldali fiatalok kézikönyve (2012, collection of Hungarian translations of periodicals by Evola, published by Kvintesszencia Kiadó)English translation:
Articles and pamphlets
L'Homme et son devenir selon le Vedânta. (1925; Review of Guenon's work published in 1925 in L'Idealismo Realistico).
Tre aspetti del problema ebraico (1936)English translation:
La tragedia della 'Guardia di Ferro - (1938) English translation: The Tragedy of the Iron Guard. Originally published in La vita italiana 309, Dec, 1938.
On the Secret of Decay (1938)Originally written in German and published by the Deutsches Volkstum magazine n. 14.
Orientamenti, undici punti (1950)English translation:
Il vampirismo ed i vampiri (1973) English: Vampirism and Vampires. Written for journal Roma in September 1973.
Works edited and/or translated by Evola
Tao Tê Ching: Il libro della via e della virtù (1923; The Book of the Way and Virtue). Second edition: Il libro del principio e della sua azione (1959; The Book of the Primary Principle and of Its Action).
La guerra occulta: armi e fasi dell'attacco ebraico-massonico alla tradizione europea by Emmanuel Malynski and Léon de Poncins (1939)English translation:
See also
Occultism and the far right
Traditionalist School
References
Notes
Bibliography
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Aprile, Mario (1984), "Julius Evola: An Introduction to His Life and Work," The Scorpion No. 6 (Winter/Spring): 20–21.
Coletti, Guillermo (1996), "Against the Modern World: An Introduction to the Work of Julius Evola," Ohm Clock No. 4 (Spring): 29–31.
Coogan, Kevin (1999), Dreamer of the Day: Francis Parker Yockey and the Postwar Fascist International Brooklyn, New York:Autonomedia ).
De Benoist, Alain. "Julius Evola, réactionnaire radical et métaphysicien engagé. Analyse critique de la pensée politique de Julius Evola," Nouvelle Ecole, No. 53–54 (2003), pp. 147–69.
Drake, Richard H. (1986), "Julius Evola and the Ideological Origins of the Radical Right in Contemporary Italy," in Peter H. Merkl (ed.), Political Violence and Terror: Motifs and Motivations (University of California Press, ) 61–89.
Drake, Richard H. (1988), "Julius Evola, Radical Fascism and the Lateran Accords," The Catholic Historical Review 74: 403–419.
Drake, Richard H. (1989), "The Children of the Sun," in The Revolutionary Mystique and Terrorism in Contemporary Italy (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, ), 114–134.
Faerraresi, Franco (1987), "Julius Evola: Tradition, Reaction, and the Radical Right," European Journal of Sociology 28: 107–151.
Gelli, Frank (2012), Julius Evola: The Sufi of Rome
Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas (2001), Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity (New York: New York University Press, , , ), 52–71.
Griffin, Roger (1985), "Revolts against the Modern World: The Blend of Literary and Historical Fantasy in the Italian New Right," Literature and History 11 (Spring): 101–123.
Griffin, Roger (1995) (ed.), Fascism (Oxford University Press, ), 317–318.
Hans Thomas Hakl, "La questione dei rapporti fra Julius Evola e Aleister Crowley", in: Arthos 13, Pontremoli, Centro Studi Evoliani, 2006, pp. 269–289.
Hansen, H. T. (1994), "A Short Introduction to Julius Evola," Theosophical History 5 (January): 11–22; reprinted as introduction to Evola, Revolt Against the Modern World, (Vermont: Inner Traditions, 1995).
Hansen, H. T. (2002), "Julius Evola's Political Endeavors," introduction to Evola, Men Among the Ruins, (Vermont: Inner Traditions).
Moynihan, Michael (2003), "Julius Evola's Combat Manuals for a Revolt Against the Modern World," in Richard Metzger (ed.), Book of Lies: The Disinformation Guide to Magick and the Occult (The Disinformation Company, ) 313–320.
Rees, Philip (1991), Biographical Dictionary of the Extreme Right Since 1890 (New York: Simon & Schuster, ), 118–120.
Sedgwick, Mark (2004) Against the Modern World: Traditionalism and the Secret Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century (Oxford University Press, ).
Sheehan, Thomas (1981) "Myth and Violence: The Fascism of Julius Evola and Alain de Benoist," Social Research, 48 (Spring): 45–83.
Staudenmaier, P. (2019). "Racial Ideology between Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany: Julius Evola and the Aryan Myth, 1933–43." Journal of Contemporary History.
Stucco, Guido (1992), "Translator's Introduction," in Evola, The Yoga of Power (Vermont: Inner Traditions), ix–xv.
Stucco, Guido (1994), "Introduction," in Evola, The Path of Enlightenment According to the Mithraic Mysteries, Zen: The Religion of the Samurai, Rene Guenon: A Teacher for Modern Times, and Taoism: The Magic, the Mysticism (Edmonds, WA: Holmes Publishing Group)
Stucco, Guido (2002). "The Legacy of a European Traditionalist: Julius Evola in Perspective". The Occidental Quarterly 3 (2), pp. 21–44.
Wasserstrom, Steven M. (1995), "The Lives of Baron Evola," Alphabet City 4 + 5 (December): 84–89.
Waterfield, Robin (1990), 'Baron Julius Evola and the Hermetic Tradition', Gnosis 14, (Winter): 12–17.
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Italian Dadaist | false | [
"Wildstorm Rising was a crossover event published by Image Comics/WildStorm that involved the entire line of titles published by WildStorm in 1995.\n\nPublication history\nThe 10-part crossover was published as a two-issue comic book limited series Wildstorm Rising that served as bookends of the story arc (cover dated May 1995-June 1995) while also running through these specific WildStorm titles. The chapters are as following:\n\nPrologue: Team 7: Objective: Hell (Team 7 vol. 2) #1\nChapter 1: Wildstorm Rising #1\nChapter 2: WildC.A.T.s vol.1, #20\nChapter 3: Union vol.2, #4\nChapter 4: Gen¹³ vol.2, #2\nChapter 5: Grifter vol.1, #1\nChapter 6: Deathblow vol.1, #16\nChapter 7: Wetworks #8\nChapter 8: Backlash #8\nChapter 9: Stormwatch vol.1, #22\nChapter 10: Wildstorm Rising #2\n\nCreators\nVarious comic book writers and artists who worked on this crossover event included: Jim Lee, Travis Charest, Ron Marz, Kevin Maguire and Barry Windsor-Smith (who co-wrote & illustrated Wildstorm Rising # 1, and illustrated all of the covers to tie-in issues).\n\nWindsor-Smith later said that he was talked into illustrating Wildstorm Rising, and regretted participating it. He related that in reading the story and illustrating it, he could not understand the motivations of any of the characters, even when he read earlier Wildstorm books featuring the characters. He says he \"mucked with the plot awfully\" in order to improve it and his enthusiasm for it, saying, \"After intense thinking, I realized what I was doing wrong: I was looking for characters! I know this sounds really glib as if I'm trying to build up to a funny line. But I’m really not. That was my problem: I was looking for characterization, and there was none. 'There is no characterization! That's what you’re doing wrong here, Barry!' They’re all ciphers!\" Windsor-Smith later learned that writer James Robinson was not pleased with Windsor-Smith's alterations to the plot.\n\nPlot\nStormwatch and WildC.A.T.S teams end up at odds but have to stop fighting long enough to stop Helspont and Defile from collecting all the keys to unlock the Daemonite ship which could destroy Earth, ship buried on Earth since centuries.\n\nCollection\nThis crossover was later collected as the trade paperback Wildstorm Rising (272 pages, Image Comics, June 1996, , WildStorm, December 1998, )\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links",
"Just a Stranger is a 2019 Filipino erotic romantic drama film by Viva Films written and directed by Jason Paul Laxamana, starring Anne Curtis and Marco Gumabao. It was filmed in Lisbon, Portugal and it was released in the Philippines on August 21, 2019.\n\nPlot \nA story of a woman and a man, half of her age being in love with each other despite the fact that they are both tied with someone else.\n\nCast\n\nControversy\nAnne Curtis received backlash from netizens after posting the movie poster on Instagram last August 20, a day before the premiere of the film. The poster featured a daring image of Curtis and Gumabao. People began commenting how inappropriate it was for a married lady and that she should no longer accept such sexy roles. Her husband, Erwan Heussaff, came to the actress' defense, saying that there is \"no need to throw around words like disrespect or dictate what a person should or shouldn’t do after getting married.” He added that the \"hilarious comments\" are sexist. \"If this was a married guy actor doing love scenes, no one would have any issue with it,” he said.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nOfficial Movie Soundtrack, Katrina Velarde, Magkaibang Mundo on YouTube\n\nPhilippine films\nViva Films films"
]
|
[
"Julius Evola",
"Racism and mystical Aryanism",
"What were his views on racism?",
"Evola spoke of \"inferior non-European races\". Peter Merkl wrote that \"Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether\".",
"What is mystical Aryanism?",
"I don't know.",
"Did he consider himself Aryan?",
"Prior to the end of War, Evola had frequently used the term \"Aryan\" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality.",
"What important things did he do?",
"According to Furlong, Evola developed \"the law of the regression of castes\" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II",
"What impact has he made?",
"\" While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957, Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of \"negroes",
"Was there any backlash to what he was saying?",
"I don't know."
]
| C_64b521f2f9cc4df09098f27ba0a07a51_0 | Did he have any accomplishments? | 7 | Did Julius Evola have any accomplishments? | Julius Evola | Evola's dissent from standard biological concepts of race had roots in his aristocratic elitism, since Nazi Volkisch ideology inadequately separated aristocracy from "commoners." According to Furlong, Evola developed "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes--sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves". Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies." Prior to the end of War, Evola had frequently used the term "Aryan" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman 'super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men'...no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights of the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta." Evola spoke of "inferior non-European races". Peter Merkl wrote that "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote: "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanatiscm [are] all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West." While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957, Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of "negroes" and the opposition to segregation. Furlong noted that this article is "among the most extreme in phraseology of any he wrote, and exhibits a degree of intolerance that leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people." CANNOTANSWER | Furlong noted that this article is "among the most extreme in phraseology of any he wrote, | Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola (; 19 May 1898 11 June 1974), better known as Julius Evola, was an Italian philosopher, poet, and painter whose esoteric worldview featured antisemitic conspiracy theories and the occult. He has been described as a "fascist intellectual", a "radical traditionalist", "antiegalitarian, antiliberal, antidemocratic, and antipopular", and as "the leading philosopher of Europe's neofascist movement".
Evola is popular in fringe circles, largely because of his metaphysical, magical, and supernatural beliefs – including belief in ghosts, telepathy, and alchemyand his traditionalism. He termed his philosophy "magical idealism". Many of Evola's theories and writings were centered on his hostility toward Christianity and his idiosyncratic mysticism, occultism, and esoteric religious studies, and this aspect of his work has influenced occultists and esotericists. Evola also justified male domination over women as part of a purely patriarchal society, an outlook stemming from his traditionalist views on gender, which demanded women stay in or revert to what he saw as their traditional gender roles, where they were completely subordinate to male authority.
According to the scholar Franco Ferraresi, "Evola's thought can be considered one of the most radical and consistent anti-egalitarian, anti-liberal, anti-democratic, and anti-popular systems in the 20th century". It is a singular, though not necessarily original, blend of several schools and traditions, including German idealism, Eastern doctrines, traditionalism, and the all-embracing Weltanschauung of the interwar conservative revolutionary movement with which Evola had a deep personal involvement. Historian Aaron Gillette described Evola as "one of the most influential fascist racists in Italian history".
Evola admired SS head Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler, whom he once met. Autobiographical remarks by Evola allude to his having worked for the Sicherheitsdienst, or SD, the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party. During his trial in 1951, Evola denied being a fascist and instead referred to himself as "" (). Concerning this statement, historian Elisabetta Cassina Wolff wrote that "It is unclear whether this meant that Evola was placing himself above or beyond Fascism".
Evola has been called the "chief ideologue" of Italy's radical right after World War II. He continues to influence contemporary traditionalist and neo-fascist movements.
Life
Giulio Cesare Evola was born in Rome, the son of Vincenzo Evola (born 1854) and Concetta Mangiapane (born 1865). Both his parents had been born in Cinisi, a small town in the Province of Palermo on the north-western coast of Sicily. The paternal grandparents of Giulio Cesare Evola were Giuseppe Evola and Maria Cusumano. Giuseppe Evola is reported as being a joiner in Vincenzo's birth record. The maternal grandparents of Giulio Cesare Evola were Cesare Mangiapane, reported as being a shopkeeper in Concetta's birth record, and his wife Caterina Munacó. Vincenzo Evola and Concetta Mangiapane were married in Cinisi on 25 November 1892. Vincenzo Evola is reported as being a telegraphic mechanic chief, while Concetta Mangiapane is reported as being a landowner.
Giulio Cesare Evola had an elder brother, Giuseppe Gaspare Dinamo Evola, born in 1895 in Rome. Following a slight variation on the Sicilian naming convention of the era, as the second son, Giulio Cesare Evola was partly named after his maternal grandfather.
Evola has been often been reported as being a baron, probably in reference to a purported distant relationship with a minor aristocratic family, the Evoli, who were the barons of Castropignano in the Kingdom of Sicily in the late Middle Ages.
Little is known about Evola's early upbringing except that he considered it irrelevant. He studied engineering at the Istituto Tecnico Leonardo da Vinci in Rome, but did not complete his course, later claiming this was because he "did not want to be associated in any way with bourgeois academic recognition and titles such as doctor and engineer."
In his teenage years, Evola immersed himself in painting—which he considered one of his natural talents—and literature, including Oscar Wilde and Gabriele d'Annunzio. He was introduced to philosophers such as Friedrich Nietzsche and Otto Weininger. Other early philosophical influences included Carlo Michelstaedter and Max Stirner.
In the First World War, Evola served as an artillery officer on the Asiago plateau. He was attracted to the avant-garde, and after the war he briefly associated with Filippo Tommaso Marinetti's Futurist movement. Through his painting and poetry, and through work on the short-lived journal Revue Bleue, he became a prominent representative of Dadaism in Italy. In 1922, after concluding that avant-garde art was becoming commercialized and stiffened by academic conventions, he reduced his focus on artistic expression such as painting and poetry.
Evola was arrested in April 1951 by the Political Office of the Rome Police Headquarters and charged on suspicion that he was an ideologist of the militant neofascist organization Fasci di Azione Rivoluzionaria (FAR). Evola was defended by Prof. Francesco Carnelutti. On November 20, 1951, Evola was acquitted of all charges.
Evola died on 11 June 1974 in Rome from congestive heart failure.
Writing career
Christianity
In 1928, Evola wrote an attack on Christianity titled Pagan Imperialism, which proposed transforming fascism into a system consistent with ancient Roman values and Western esotericism. Evola proposed that fascism should be a vehicle for reinstating the caste system and aristocracy of antiquity. Although he invoked the term "fascism" in this text, his diatribe against the Catholic Church was criticized by both Mussolini's fascist regime and the Vatican itself. A. James Gregor argued that the text was an attack on fascism as it stood at the time of writing, but noted that Mussolini made use of it to threaten the Vatican with the possibility of an "anti-clerical fascism". On account of Evola's anti-Christian proposals, in April 1928 the Vatican-backed right wing Catholic journal Revue Internationale des Sociétés Secrètes published an article entitled "Un Sataniste Italien: Julius Evola", accusing him of satanism.
In his The Mystery of the Grail (1937), Evola discarded Christian interpretations of the Holy Grail and wrote that it symbolizes the principle of an immortalizing and transcendent force connected to the primordial state ... The mystery of the Grail is a mystery of a warrior initiation.He held that the Ghibellines, who had fought the Guelph for control of Northern and Central Italy in the thirteenth century, had within them the residual influences of pre-Christian Celtic and Nordic traditions that represented his conception of the Grail myth. He also held that the Guelph victory against the Ghibellines represented a regression of the castes, since the merchant caste took over from the warrior caste. In the epilogue to this book, Evola argued that the fictitious The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, regardless of whether it was authentic or not, was a cogent representation of modernity. The historian Richard Barber said, Evola mixes rhetoric, prejudice, scholarship, and politics into a strange version of the present and future, but in the process he brings together for the first time interest in the esoteric and in conspiracy theory which characterize much of the later Grail literature.
Buddhism
In his The Doctrine of Awakening (1943), Evola argued that the Pāli Canon could be held to represent true Buddhism. His interpretation of Buddhism is that it was intended to be anti-democratic. He believed that Buddhism revealed the essence of an "Aryan" tradition that had become corrupted and lost in the West. He believed it could be interpreted to reveal the superiority of a warrior caste. Harry Oldmeadow described Evola's work on Buddhism as exhibiting a Nietzschean influence, but Evola criticized Nietzsche's purported anti-ascetic prejudice. Evola claimed that the book "received the official approbation of the Pāli [Text] Society", and was published by a reputable Orientalist publisher. Evola's interpretation of Buddhism, as put forth in his article "Spiritual Virility in Buddhism", is in conflict with the post-WWII scholarship of the Orientalist Giuseppe Tucci, who argues that the viewpoint that Buddhism advocates universal benevolence is legitimate. Arthur Versluis stated that Evola's writing on Buddhism was a vehicle for his own theories, but was a far from accurate rendition of the subject, and he held that much the same could be said of Evola's writing on Hermeticism. Ñāṇavīra Thera was inspired to become a bhikkhu from reading Evola's text The Doctrine of Awakening in 1945 while hospitalized in Sorrento.
Modernity
Evola's Revolt Against the Modern World (1934) promotes the mythology of an ancient Golden Age which gradually declined into modern decadence. In this work, Evola described the features of his idealized traditional society in which religious and temporal power were created and united not by priests, but by warriors expressing spiritual power. In mythology, he saw evidence of the West's superiority over the East. Moreover, he claimed that the traditional elite had the ability to access power and knowledge through a hierarchical magic which differed from the lower "superstitious and fraudulent" forms of magic. Evola insists that only "nonmodern forms, institutions, and knowledge" could produce a "real renewal ... in those who are still capable of receiving it." The text was "immediately recognized by Mircea Eliade and other intellectuals who allegedly advanced ideas associated with Tradition." Eliade was one of the most influential twentieth-century historians of religion, a fascist sympathizer associated with the Romanian Christian right wing movement Iron Guard. Evola was aware of the importance of myth from his readings of Georges Sorel, one of the key intellectual influences on fascism. Hermann Hesse described Revolt Against the Modern World as "really dangerous."
During the 1960s Evola thought the right could no longer reverse the corruption of modern civilization. E. C. Wolff noted that this is why Evola wrote Ride the Tiger, choosing to distance himself completely from active political engagement, without excluding the possibility of action in the future. He argued that one should stay firm and ready to intervene when the tiger of modernity "is tired of running." Goodrick-Clarke notes that, "Evola sets up the ideal of the 'active nihilist' who is prepared to act with violence against modern decadence."
Other writings
In the posthumously published collection of writings, Metaphysics of War, Evola, in line with the conservative revolutionary Ernst Jünger, explored the viewpoint that war could be a spiritually fulfilling experience. He proposed the necessity of a transcendental orientation in a warrior.
From 1934 to 1943 Evola was also responsible for 'Diorama Filosofico', the cultural page of Il Regime Fascista, a daily newspaper owned by Roberto Farinacci. He would also contribute during the same period to Giovanni Preziosi magazine La vita italiana.
Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke has written that Evola's 1945 essay "American 'Civilization'" described the United States as "the final stage of European decline into the 'interior formlessness' of vacuous individualism, conformity and vulgarity under the universal aegis of money-making." According to Goodrick-Clarke, Evola argued that the U.S. "mechanistic and rational philosophy of progress combined with a mundane horizon of prosperity to transform the world into an enormous suburban shopping mall."
Evola translated some works of Oswald Spengler and Ortega y Gasset to Italian.
Occultism and esotericism
Around 1920, Evola's interests led him into spiritual, transcendental, and "supra-rational" studies. He began reading various esoteric texts and gradually delved deeper into the occult, alchemy, magic, and Oriental studies, particularly Tibetan Tantric yoga. A keen mountaineer, Evola described the experience as a source of revelatory spiritual experiences. After his return from the war, Evola experimented with hallucinogens and magic.
When he was about 23 years old, Evola considered suicide. He claimed that he avoided suicide thanks to a revelation he had while reading an early Buddhist text that dealt with shedding all forms of identity other than absolute transcendence. Evola would later publish the text The Doctrine of Awakening, which he regarded as a repayment of his debt to Buddhism for saving him from suicide.
Evola wrote prodigiously on Eastern mysticism, Tantra, hermeticism, the myth of the Holy Grail and Western esotericism. German Egyptologist and esoteric scholar Florian Ebeling has noted that Evola's The Hermetic Tradition is viewed as an "extremely important work on Hermeticism" in the eyes of esotericists. Evola gave particular focus to Cesare della Riviera's text Il Mondo Magico degli Heroi, which he later republished in modern Italian. He held that Riviera's text was consonant with the goals of "high magic"the reshaping of the earthly human into a transcendental 'god man'. According to Evola, the alleged "timeless" Traditional science was able to come to lucid expression through this text, in spite of the "coverings" added to it to prevent accusations from the church. Though Evola rejected Carl Jung's interpretation of alchemy, Jung described Evola's The Hermetic Tradition as a "magisterial account of Hermetic philosophy". In Hegel and the Hermetic Tradition, the philosopher Glenn Alexander Magee favored Evola's interpretation over that of Jung's. In 1988, a journal devoted to Hermetic thought published a section of Evola's book and described it as "Luciferian."
Evola later confessed that he was not a Buddhist, and that his text on Buddhism was meant to balance his earlier work on the Hindu tantras. Evola's interest in tantra was spurred on by correspondence with John Woodroffe. Evola was attracted to the active aspect of tantra, and its claim to provide a practical means to spiritual experience, over the more "passive" approaches in other forms of Eastern spirituality. In Tantric Buddhism in East Asia, Richard K. Payne, Dean of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, argued that Evola manipulated Tantra in the service of right wing violence, and that the emphasis on "power" in The Yoga of Power gave insight into his mentality.
Evola advocated that "differentiated individuals" following the Left-Hand Path use dark violent sexual powers against the modern world. For Evola, these "virile heroes" are both generous and cruel, possess the ability to rule, and commit "Dionysian" acts that might be seen as conventionally immoral. For Evola, the Left Hand path embraces violence as a means of transgression.
According to A. James Gregor Evola's definition of spirituality can be found in Meditations on the Peaks: "what has been successfully actualized and translated into a sense of superiority which is experienced inside by the soul, and a noble demeanor, which is expressed in the body." Goodrick-Clarke wrote that Evola's "rigorous New Age spirituality speaks directly to those who reject absolutely the leveling world of democracy, capitalism, multi-racialism and technology at the outset of the twenty-first century. Their acute sense of cultural chaos can find powerful relief in his ideal of total renewal." Thomas Sheehan wrote that to "read Evola is to take a trip through a weird and fascinating jungle of ancient mythologies, pseudo-ethnology, and transcendental mysticism that is enough to make any southern California consciousness-tripper feel quite at home."
Magical idealism
Thomas Sheehan wrote that "Evola's first philosophical works from the 'twenties were dedicated to reshaping neo-idealism from a philosophy of Absolute Spirit and Mind into a philosophy of the "absolute individual" and action." Accordingly, Evola developed the doctrine of "magical idealism", which held that "the Ego must understand that everything that seems to have a reality independent of it is nothing but an illusion, caused by its own deficiency." For Evola, this ever-increasing unity with the "absolute individual" was consistent with unconstrained liberty, and therefore unconditional power. In his 1925 work Essays on Magical Idealism, Evola declared that "God does not exist. The Ego must create him by making itself divine."
According to Sheehan, Evola discovered the power of metaphysical mythology while developing his theories. This led to his advocacy of supra-rational intellectual intuition over discursive knowledge. In Evola's view, discursive knowledge separates man from Being. Sheehan stated that this position is a theme in certain interpretations of Western philosophers such as Plato, Thomas Aquinas, and Martin Heidegger that was exaggerated by Evola. Evola would later write:
Evola developed a doctrine of the "two natures": the natural world and the primordial "world of 'Being'". He believed that these "two natures" impose form and quality on lower matter and create a hierarchical "great chain of Being." He understood "spiritual virility" as signifying orientation towards this postulated transcendent principle. He held that the State should reflect this "ordering from above" and the consequent hierarchical differentiation of individuals according to their "organic preformation". By "organic preformation" he meant that which "gathers, preserves, and refines one's talents and qualifications for determinate functions."
Ur Group
Evola was introduced to esotericism by Arturo Reghini, who was an early supporter of fascism. Reghini sought to promote a "cultured magic" opposed to Christianity and introduced Evola to the traditionalist René Guénon. In 1927, Reghini and Evola, along with other Italian esotericists, founded the Gruppo di Ur ("Ur Group"). The purpose of this group was to attempt to bring the members' individual identities into such a superhuman state of power and awareness that they would be able to exert a magical influence on the world. The group employed techniques from Buddhist, Tantric, and rare Hermetic texts. They aimed to provide a "soul" to the burgeoning Fascist movement of the time through the revival of ancient Roman religion, and to influence the fascist regime through esotericism.
Articles on occultism from the Ur Group were later published in Introduction to Magic. Reghini's support of Freemasonry would however prove a bone of contention for Evola; accordingly, Evola broke with Reghini in 1928. Reghini himself broke from Evola, accusing Evola of plagiarizing his thoughts in the book Pagan Imperialism. Evola, on the other hand, blamed Reghini for the premature publication of Pagan Imperialism. Evola's later work owed a considerable debt to René Guénon's text Crisis of the Modern World, though he diverged from Guénon on the issue of the relationship between warriors and priests.
Views on sex and gender roles
Julius Evola believed that the alleged higher qualities expected of a man of a particular race were not those expected of a woman of the same race. He held that "just relations between the sexes" involved women acknowledging their "inequality" with men. In 1925, he wrote an article titled "La donna come cosa" ("Woman as Thing"). Evola later quoted Joseph de Maistre's statement that "Woman cannot be superior except as woman, but from the moment in which she desires to emulate man she is nothing but a monkey." Evola believed that women's liberation was "the renunciation by woman of her right to be a woman". A woman "could traditionally participate in the sacred hierarchical order only in a mediated fashion through her relationship with a man." He held, as a feature of his idealized gender relations, the Hindu sati, which for him was a form of sacrifice indicating women's respect for patriarchal traditions. For the "pure, feminine" woman, "man is not perceived by her as a mere husband or lover, but as her lord." Women would find their true identity in total subjugation to men.
Evola regarded matriarchy and goddess religions as a symptom of decadence, and preferred a hyper-masculine, warrior ethos.
Evola was influenced by Hans Blüher; he was a proponent of the Männerbund concept as a model for his proposed ultra-fascist "Order". Goodrick-Clarke noted the fundamental influence of Otto Weininger's book Sex and Character on Evola's dualism of male-female spirituality. According to Goodrich-Clarke, "Evola's celebration of virile spirituality was rooted in Weininger's work, which was widely translated by the end of the First World War." Unlike Weininger, Evola believed that women needed to be conquered, not ignored. Evola denounced homosexuality as "useless" for his purposes. He did not neglect sadomasochism, so long as sadism and masochism "are magnifications of an element potentially present in the deepest essence of eros." Then, it would be possible to "extend, in a transcendental and perhaps ecstatic way, the possibilities of sex."
Evola held that women "played" with men, threatened their masculinity, and lured them into a "constrictive" grasp with their sexuality. He wrote that "It should not be expected of women that they return to what they really are ... when men themselves retain only the semblance of true virility", and lamented that "men instead of being in control of sex are controlled by it and wander about like drunkards". He believed that in Tantra and in sex magic, in which he saw a strategy for aggression, he found the means to counter the "emasculated" West. According to Annalisa Merelli, Evola "went so far as to justify rape" because he saw it "as a natural expression of male desire". Evola also said that the "ritual violation of virgins", and "whipping women" were a means of "consciousness raising", so long as these practices were done to the intensity required to produce the proper "liminal psychic climate". He wrote that "as a rule, nothing stirs a man more than feeling the woman utterly exhausted beneath his own hostile rapture."
Evola translated Weininger's Sex and Character into Italian. Dissatisfied with simply translating Weininger's work, he wrote the text Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), where his views on sexuality were dealt with at length. Arthur Versluis described this text as Evola's "most interesting" work aside from Revolt Against the Modern World. This book remains popular among many 'New Age' adherents.
Views on race
Evola's dissent from standard biological concepts of race had roots in his aristocratic elitism, since Nazi völkisch ideology inadequately separated aristocracy from "commoners." According to European studies professor Paul Furlong, Evola developed "the law of the regression of castes" in Revolt Against the Modern World and other writings on racism from the 1930s and World War II period. In Evola's view "power and civilization have progressed from one to another of the four castes—sacred leaders, warrior nobility, bourgeoisie (economy, 'merchants') and slaves". Furlong explains: "for Evola, the core of racial superiority lay in the spiritual qualities of the higher castes, which expressed themselves in physical as well as in cultural features, but were not determined by them. The law of the regression of castes places racism at the core of Evola's philosophy, since he sees an increasing predominance of lower races as directly expressed through modern mass democracies."
In 1941, Evola's book Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race (Italian: Sintesi di Dottrina della Razza) was published by Hoepli. It provides an overview of his ideas concerning race and eugenics, introducing the concept of "spiritual racism", and "esoteric-traditionalist racism".
Prior to the end of the War, Evola had frequently used the term "Aryan" to mean the nobility, who in his view were imbued with traditional spirituality. Wolff notes that Evola seems to have stopped writing about race in 1945, but adds that the intellectual themes of Evola's writings were otherwise unchanged. Evola continued to write about elitism and his contempt for the weak. His "doctrine of the Aryan-Roman super-race was simply restated as a doctrine of the 'leaders of men' ... no longer with reference to the SS, but to the mediaeval Teutonic knights of the Knights Templar, already mentioned in Rivolta."
Evola spoke of "inferior non-European races". Peter Merkl wrote that "Evola was never prepared to discount the value of blood altogether". Evola wrote: "a certain balanced consciousness and dignity of race can be considered healthy" in a time where "the exaltation of the negro and all the rest, anticolonialist psychosis and integrationist fanaticism [are] all parallel phenomena in the decline of Europe and the West." While not totally against race-mixing, in 1957 Evola wrote an article attributing the perceived acceleration of American decadence to the influence of "negroes" and the opposition to segregation. Furlong noted that this article is "among the most extreme in phraseology of any he wrote, and exhibits a degree of intolerance that leaves no doubt as to his deep prejudice against black people."
National mysticism
For his spiritual interpretation of the different racial psychologies, Evola found the work of German race theorist Ludwig Ferdinand Clauss invaluable. Like Evola, Clauss believed that physical race and spiritual race could diverge as a consequence of miscegenation. Evola's racism included racism of the body, soul, and spirit, giving primacy to the latter factor, writing that "races only declined when their spirit failed."
Like René Guénon, Evola believed that mankind is living in the Kali Yuga of the Hindu tradition—the Dark Age of unleashed materialistic appetites. He argued that both Italian fascism and Nazism represented hope that the "celestial" Aryan race would be reconstituted. He drew on mythological accounts of super-races and their decline, particularly the Hyperboreans, and maintained that traces of Hyperborean influence could be felt in Indo-European man. He felt that Indo-European men had devolved from these higher mythological races. Gregor noted that several contemporary criticisms of Evola's theory were published: "In one of Fascism's most important theoretical journals, Evola's critic pointed out that many Nordic-Aryans, not to speak of Mediterranean Aryans, fail to demonstrate any Hyperborean properties. Instead, they make obvious their materialism, their sensuality, their indifference to loyalty and sacrifice, together with their consuming greed. How do they differ from 'inferior' races, and why should anyone wish, in any way, to favor them?"
Concerning the relationship between "spiritual racism" and biological racism, Evola put forth the following viewpoint, which Furlong described as pseudo-scientific:
Views on Jews
Evola endorsed Otto Weininger's views on the Jews. Though Evola viewed Jews as corrosive and anti-traditional, he described Adolf Hitler's more fanatical antisemitism as a paranoid idée fixe that damaged the reputation of the Third Reich. Evola's conception did not emphasize the Nazi racial conception of Jews as "representatives of a biological race"—in Evola's view the Jews were "the carriers of a world view ... a spirit [that] corresponded to the 'worst' and 'most decadent' features of modernity: democracy, egalitarianism and materialism." Evola rejected the views of chief Nazi theorist Alfred Rosenberg and others on biological racism as being reductionist and materialistic. Jewry was for Evola, as for Weininger, only a symbol for the rule of money and individualism. Otto Weininger desbribed Jewishness as "intellectual tendency".
Evola argued that the fabricated antisemitic text The Protocols of the Elders of Zion—whether or not a forgery—accurately reflect the conditions of modernity. He believed that the Protocols "contain the plan for an occult war, whose objective is the utter destruction, in the non-Jewish peoples, of all tradition, class, aristocracy, and hierarchy, and of all moral, religious, and spiritual values." He wrote the foreword to the second Italian edition of the Protocols, which was published by the Fascist Giovanni Preziosi in 1938.
Following the murder of his friend Corneliu Zelea Codreanu, the leader of the Fascist Romanian Iron Guard, Evola expressed anticipation of a "Talmudic, Israelite tyranny." However, Evola believed that Jews had this "power" only because of European "decadence" in modernity. He also believed that one could be "Aryan", but have a "Jewish" soul, just as one could be "Jewish", but have an "Aryan" soul. In Evola's view, Otto Weininger and Carlo Michelstaedter were Jews of "sufficiently heroic, ascetic, and sacral" character to fit the latter category.
Views on "caste" and class
Julius Evola believe that society develops a "regression of castes" where classes he viewed as superior were replaced by those he viewed as inferior.
He believed that the rule of spiritual leaders (the highest class) was replaced by that of warriors (the second highest) then by merchants and finally by the proletariat (whom he described as "spiritual eunuchs", quoting another philosopher).
He believed that each aspect of society was effected by the dominant "caste", for example, war in the first type was "holy war" and in the second type "defending the honour of one's lord". In addition, bourgeois rule makes "usury" socially acceptable.
Fascism
Evola developed a line of argument, closely related to the spiritual orientation of Traditionalist writers such as René Guénon and the political concerns of the European authoritarian right. Evola's first published political work was an anti-fascist piece in 1925. In this work, Evola called Italy's fascist movement a "laughable revolution," based on empty sentiment and materialistic concerns. He applauded Mussolini's anti-bourgeois orientation and his goal of making Italian citizens into hardened warriors, but criticized Fascist populism, party politics, and elements of leftism that he saw in the fascist regime. Evola saw Mussolini's Fascist Party as possessing no cultural or spiritual foundation. He was passionate about infusing it with these elements in order to make it suitable for his ideal conception of Übermensch culture which, in Evola's view, characterized the imperial grandeur of pre-Christian Europe. He expressed anti-nationalist sentiment, stating that to become "truly human," one would have to "overcome brotherly contamination" and "purge oneself" of the feeling that one is united with others "because of blood, affections, country or human destiny." He also opposed the futurism that Italian fascism was aligned with, along with the "plebeian" nature of the movement. Accordingly, Evola launched the journal La Torre (The Tower), to voice his concerns and advocate for a more elitist fascism. Evola's ideas were poorly received by the fascist mainstream as it stood at the time of his writing.
Mussolini
Scholars disagree about why Benito Mussolini embraced racist ideology in 1938—some scholars have written that Mussolini was more motivated by political considerations than ideology when he introduced antisemitic legislation in Italy. Other scholars have rejected the argument that the racial ideology of Italian fascism could be attributed solely to Nazi influence. A more recent interpretation is that Mussolini was frustrated by the slow pace of fascist transformation and, by 1938, had adopted increasingly radical measures including a racial ideology. Aaron Gillette has written that "Racism would become the key driving force behind the creation of the new fascist man, the uomo fascista."
Mussolini read Evola's Synthesis of the Doctrine of Race in August 1941, and met with Evola to offer him his praise. Evola later recounted that Mussolini had found in his work a uniquely Roman form of Fascist racism distinct from that found in Nazi Germany. With Mussolini's backing, Evola started preparing the launch of a minor journal Sangue e Spirito (Blood and Spirit) which never appeared. While not always in agreement with German racial theorists, Evola traveled to Germany in February 1942 and obtained support for German collaboration on Sangue e Spirito from "key figures in the German racial hierarchy." Fascists appreciated the palingenetic value of Evola's "proof" "that the true representatives of the state and the culture of ancient Rome were people of the Nordic race." Evola eventually became Italy's leading racial philosopher.
Evola blended Sorelianism with Mussolini's eugenics agenda. Evola has written that "The theory of the Aryo-Roman race and its corresponding myth could integrate the Roman idea proposed, in general, by fascism, as well as give a foundation to Mussolini's plan to use his state as a means to elevate the average Italian and to enucleate in him a new man."
In May, 1951, Evola was arrested and charged with promoting the revival of the Fascist Party, and of glorifying Fascism. Defending himself at trial, Evola stated that his work belonged to a long tradition of anti-democratic writers who certainly could be linked to fascism—at least fascism interpreted according to certain Evolian criteria—but who certainly could not be identified with the Fascist regime under Mussolini. Evola then declared that he was not a Fascist but was instead "" (). He was acquitted.
Third Reich
Finding Italian fascism too compromising, Evola began to seek recognition in Nazi Germany. Evola spent a considerable amount of time in Germany in 1937 and 1938, and gave a series of lectures to the German–Italian Society in 1938. Evola took issue with Nazi populism and biological materialism. SS authorities initially rejected Evola's ideas as supranational and aristocratic though he was better received by members of the conservative revolutionary movement. The Nazi Ahnenerbe reported that many considered his ideas to be pure "fantasy" which ignored "historical facts.". Evola admired Heinrich Himmler, whom he knew personally, but he had reservations about Adolf Hitler because of Hitler's reliance on völkisch nationalism. Himmler's Schutzstaffel ("SS") kept a dossier on Evola—dossier document AR-126 described his plans for a "Roman-Germanic Imperium" as "utopian" and described him as a "reactionary Roman," whose goal was an "insurrection of the old aristocracy against the modern world." The document recommended that the SS "stop his effectiveness in Germany" and provide him with no support, particularly because of his desire to create a "secret international order".
Despite this opposition, Evola was able to establish political connections with pan-Europeanist elements inside the Reich Security Main Office. Evola subsequently ascended to the inner circles of Nazism as the influence of pan-European advocates overtook that of Völkisch proponents, due to military contingencies. Evola wrote the article Reich and Imperium as Elements in the New European Order for the Nazi-backed journal European Review. He spent World War II working for the Sicherheitsdienst. The Sicherheitsdienst bureau Amt VII, a Reich Security Main Office research library, helped Evola acquire arcane occult and Masonic texts.
Italian Fascism went into decline when, in 1943, Mussolini was deposed and imprisoned. At this point, Evola fled to Germany with the help of the Sicherheitsdienst. Although not a member of the National Fascist Party, and despite his apparent problems with the Fascist regime, Evola was one of the first people to greet Mussolini when the latter was broken out of prison by Otto Skorzeny in September, 1943. Subsequently, Evola helped welcome Mussolini to Adolf Hitler's Wolf's Lair. Following this, Evola involved himself in Mussolini's Italian Social Republic. It was Evola's custom to walk around the city of Vienna during bombing raids in order to better "ponder his destiny". During one such raid, 1945, a shell fragment damaged his spinal cord and he became paralyzed from the waist down, remaining so for the rest of his life.
Post-World War II
About the alliance during World War II between Allies and the Soviet Union, Evola wrote:The democratic powers repeated the error of those who think they can use the forces of subversion for their own ends without cost. They do not know that, by a fatal logic, when exponents of two different grades of subversion meet or cross paths, the one representing the more developed grade will take over in the end.The political model Evola selected after 1945 was neither Mussolini nor Hitler. Evola cited and encouraged the youth to read Plato (with reference in particular to The Republic), Dante (with reference in particular to De Monarchia), Joseph de Maistre, Donoso Cortés, Bismarck, Metternich, Gaetano Mosca, Pareto and Michels.
After World War II, Evola continued his work in esotericism. He wrote a number of books and articles on sex magic and various other esoteric studies, including The Yoga of Power: Tantra, Shakti, and the Secret Way (1949), Eros and the Mysteries of Love: The Metaphysics of Sex (1958), and Meditations on the Peaks: Mountain Climbing as Metaphor for the Spiritual Quest (1974). He also wrote his two explicitly political books Men Among the Ruins: Post-War Reflections of a Radical Traditionalist (1953), Ride the Tiger: A Survival Manual for the Aristocrats of the Soul (1961), and his autobiography, The Path of Cinnabar (1963). He also expanded upon critiques of American civilization and materialism, as well as increasing American influence in Europe, collected in the posthumous anthology Civiltà Americana.
While trying to distance himself from Nazism, Evola wrote in 1955 that the Nuremberg trials were a farce. This indicates that despite being rejected by the SS before the war, he never stopped admiring their criminal activities.
Evola's occult ontology exerted influence over post-war neo-fascism. In the post-war period, Evola's writing evoked interest among the neo-fascist right. After 1945, Evola was considered the most important Italian theoretician of the conservative revolutionary movement and the "chief ideologue" of Italy's post-war radical right. According to Egil Asprem and Kennet Granholm, Evola's most significant post-war political texts are Orientamenti and Men Among the Ruins. In the opening phrase in the first edition of Men Among the Ruins, Evola said: Our adversaries would undoubtedly want us, in a Christian spirit, under the banner of progress or reform, having been struck on one cheek to turn the other. Our principle is different: "Do to others what they would like to do to you: but do it to them first.Orientamenti was a text against "national fascism"—instead, it advocated for a European Community modeled on the principles of the Waffen-SS. The Italian neo-fascist group Ordine Nuovo adopted Orientamenti as a guide for action in postwar Italy. The European Liberation Front, who were affiliated with Francis Parker Yockey, called Evola "Italy's greatest living authoritarian philosopher" in the April 1951 issue of their publication Frontfighter.
During the post-war period, Evola disassociated himself from totalitarianism, preferring the concept of the "organic" state, which he put forth in his text Men Among the Ruins, as well as in his autodifesa. Evola sought to develop a strategy for the implementation of a "conservative revolution" in post-World War II Europe. He rejected nationalism, advocating instead for a European Imperium, which could take various forms according to local conditions, but should be "organic, hierarchical, anti-democratic, and anti-individual." Evola endorsed Francis Parker Yockey's neo-fascist manifesto Imperium, but disagreed with it because he believed that Yockey had a "superficial" understanding of what was immediately possible. Evola believed that his conception of neo-fascist Europe could best be implemented by an elite of "superior" men who operated outside normal politics.
In Men Among the Ruins, Evola defines the Fourth Estate as being the last stage in the cyclical development of the social elite, the first beginning with the monarchy. Expanding the concept in an essay in 1950, the Fourth State according to Evola would be characterized by "the collectivist civilization... the communist society of the faceless-massman".
Giuliano Salierni was an activist in the neo-Fascist Italian Social Movement during the early 1950s. He later recalled Evola's calls to violence. Roberto Fiore and his colleagues in the early 1980s helped the National Fronts "Political Soldiers" forge a militant elitist philosophy based on Evola's "most militant tract", The Aryan Doctrine of Battle and Victory. The Aryan Doctrine called for a "Great Holy War" that would be fought for spiritual renewal and fought in parallel to the physical "Little Holy War" against perceived enemies. Wolff attributes extreme-right terrorist actions in Italy in the 1970s and 1980s to the influence of Julius Evola.
Thomas Sheehan has argued that Evola's work is essential reading for those seeking to understand European neo-fascism, in the same way that knowledge of the writings of Karl Marx is necessary for those seeking to understand Communist actions.
Political influence
At one time Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini, the Nazi Grail seeker Otto Rahn, and the Romanian fascist sympathizer and religious historian Mircea Eliade admired Julius Evola. After World War II, Evola's writings continued to influence many European far-right political, racist and neo-fascist movements. He is widely translated in French, Spanish, partly in German, and mostly in Hungarian (the largest number of his translated works).
Umberto Eco referred to Evola as the "most influential theoretical source of the theories of the new Italian right", and as "one of the most respected fascist gurus".
Giorgio Almirante referred to him as "our Marcuse—only better." According to one leader of the neofascist "black terrorist" Ordine Nuovo, "Our work since 1953 has been to transpose Evola's teachings into direct political action."
The now defunct French fascist group Troisième Voie was also inspired by Evola.
Jonathan Bowden, English political activist and chairman of the far right, spoke highly of Evola and his ideas and gave lectures on his philosophy.
Evola has influenced Russian political analyst and fascist Aleksander Dugin.
The Greek neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn includes his works on its suggested reading list, and the leader of Jobbik, the Hungarian nationalist party, admires Evola and wrote an introduction to his works.
Donald Trump's former chief adviser Steve Bannon has pointed to Evola's influence on the Eurasianism movement; According to Joshua Green's book Devil's Bargain, Evola's Revolt Against the Modern World had initially drawn Bannon's interest to the ideas of the Traditionalist School. Alt-right leader and white nationalist Richard Spencer said that Bannon's awareness of Evola "means a tremendous amount". Some members of the alt-right expressed hope that Bannon might have been open to Evola's ideas, and that through Bannon, Evola's ideas could become influential. According to multiple historians cited by The Atlantic, this is contradictory, as Bannon cited Evola in defense of the "Judeo-Christian west", while Evola hated and opposed Judaism and Jews, Christianity in general, Anglo-Saxon Protestantism specifically, and the culture of the United States. In a leaked email sent by Bannon in March 2016, he told Milo Yiannopoulos, "I do appreciate any piece that mentions Evola." Evola has also influenced the alt-right movement.
Works
Books
L'individuo e il divenire del mondo (1926; The Individual and the Becoming of the World).
L'uomo come potenza (1927; Man as Potency).
Teoria dell'individuo assoluto (1927; The Theory of the Absolute Individual).
Imperialismo pagano (1928; second edition 1932)English translation:
Fenomenologia dell'individuo assoluto (1930; The Phenomenology of the Absolute Individual).
La tradizione ermetica (1931; second edition 1971)English translation:
Maschera e volto dello spiritualismo contemporaneo: Analisi critica delle principali correnti moderne verso il sovrasensibile (1932)English translation: And:
Heidnischer Imperialismus (1933)English translation:
Rivolta contro il mondo moderno (1934; second edition 1951; third edition 1970)English translation:
Il Mistero del Graal e la Tradizione Ghibellina dell'Impero (1937)English translation:
Il mito del sangue. Genesi del Razzismo (1937; second edition 1942)English translation:
Sintesi di dottrina della razza (1941)English translation:
Indirizzi per una educazione razziale (1941)English translation:
La dottrina del risveglio (1943)English translation:
Lo Yoga della potenza (1949; second edition 1968)English translation:
Gli uomini e le rovine (1953; second edition 1972)English translation:
(1958; second edition 1969)English translations: 1983–1991:
L'operaio nel pensiero di Ernst Jünger (1960; The Worker in the Thought of Ernst Jünger). Excerpts in English
Cavalcare la tigre (1961)English translation:
Il cammino del cinabro (1963; second edition 1970)English translation:
Il Fascismo. Saggio di una analisi critica dal punto di vista della Destra (1964; second edition 1970)English translation: And:
Collections
Saggi sull'idealismo magico (1925; Essays on Magical Idealism).
Introduzione alla magia (1927–1929; 1971)English translation: And: And:
L'arco e la clava (1968)English translation:
Ricognizioni. Uomini e problemi (1974)English translation:
Meditazioni delle vette (1974)English translation:
Metafisica della Guerra (1996)English translation:
Jobboldali fiatalok kézikönyve (2012, collection of Hungarian translations of periodicals by Evola, published by Kvintesszencia Kiadó)English translation:
Articles and pamphlets
L'Homme et son devenir selon le Vedânta. (1925; Review of Guenon's work published in 1925 in L'Idealismo Realistico).
Tre aspetti del problema ebraico (1936)English translation:
La tragedia della 'Guardia di Ferro - (1938) English translation: The Tragedy of the Iron Guard. Originally published in La vita italiana 309, Dec, 1938.
On the Secret of Decay (1938)Originally written in German and published by the Deutsches Volkstum magazine n. 14.
Orientamenti, undici punti (1950)English translation:
Il vampirismo ed i vampiri (1973) English: Vampirism and Vampires. Written for journal Roma in September 1973.
Works edited and/or translated by Evola
Tao Tê Ching: Il libro della via e della virtù (1923; The Book of the Way and Virtue). Second edition: Il libro del principio e della sua azione (1959; The Book of the Primary Principle and of Its Action).
La guerra occulta: armi e fasi dell'attacco ebraico-massonico alla tradizione europea by Emmanuel Malynski and Léon de Poncins (1939)English translation:
See also
Occultism and the far right
Traditionalist School
References
Notes
Bibliography
(:)
Aprile, Mario (1984), "Julius Evola: An Introduction to His Life and Work," The Scorpion No. 6 (Winter/Spring): 20–21.
Coletti, Guillermo (1996), "Against the Modern World: An Introduction to the Work of Julius Evola," Ohm Clock No. 4 (Spring): 29–31.
Coogan, Kevin (1999), Dreamer of the Day: Francis Parker Yockey and the Postwar Fascist International Brooklyn, New York:Autonomedia ).
De Benoist, Alain. "Julius Evola, réactionnaire radical et métaphysicien engagé. Analyse critique de la pensée politique de Julius Evola," Nouvelle Ecole, No. 53–54 (2003), pp. 147–69.
Drake, Richard H. (1986), "Julius Evola and the Ideological Origins of the Radical Right in Contemporary Italy," in Peter H. Merkl (ed.), Political Violence and Terror: Motifs and Motivations (University of California Press, ) 61–89.
Drake, Richard H. (1988), "Julius Evola, Radical Fascism and the Lateran Accords," The Catholic Historical Review 74: 403–419.
Drake, Richard H. (1989), "The Children of the Sun," in The Revolutionary Mystique and Terrorism in Contemporary Italy (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, ), 114–134.
Faerraresi, Franco (1987), "Julius Evola: Tradition, Reaction, and the Radical Right," European Journal of Sociology 28: 107–151.
Gelli, Frank (2012), Julius Evola: The Sufi of Rome
Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas (2001), Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity (New York: New York University Press, , , ), 52–71.
Griffin, Roger (1985), "Revolts against the Modern World: The Blend of Literary and Historical Fantasy in the Italian New Right," Literature and History 11 (Spring): 101–123.
Griffin, Roger (1995) (ed.), Fascism (Oxford University Press, ), 317–318.
Hans Thomas Hakl, "La questione dei rapporti fra Julius Evola e Aleister Crowley", in: Arthos 13, Pontremoli, Centro Studi Evoliani, 2006, pp. 269–289.
Hansen, H. T. (1994), "A Short Introduction to Julius Evola," Theosophical History 5 (January): 11–22; reprinted as introduction to Evola, Revolt Against the Modern World, (Vermont: Inner Traditions, 1995).
Hansen, H. T. (2002), "Julius Evola's Political Endeavors," introduction to Evola, Men Among the Ruins, (Vermont: Inner Traditions).
Moynihan, Michael (2003), "Julius Evola's Combat Manuals for a Revolt Against the Modern World," in Richard Metzger (ed.), Book of Lies: The Disinformation Guide to Magick and the Occult (The Disinformation Company, ) 313–320.
Rees, Philip (1991), Biographical Dictionary of the Extreme Right Since 1890 (New York: Simon & Schuster, ), 118–120.
Sedgwick, Mark (2004) Against the Modern World: Traditionalism and the Secret Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century (Oxford University Press, ).
Sheehan, Thomas (1981) "Myth and Violence: The Fascism of Julius Evola and Alain de Benoist," Social Research, 48 (Spring): 45–83.
Staudenmaier, P. (2019). "Racial Ideology between Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany: Julius Evola and the Aryan Myth, 1933–43." Journal of Contemporary History.
Stucco, Guido (1992), "Translator's Introduction," in Evola, The Yoga of Power (Vermont: Inner Traditions), ix–xv.
Stucco, Guido (1994), "Introduction," in Evola, The Path of Enlightenment According to the Mithraic Mysteries, Zen: The Religion of the Samurai, Rene Guenon: A Teacher for Modern Times, and Taoism: The Magic, the Mysticism (Edmonds, WA: Holmes Publishing Group)
Stucco, Guido (2002). "The Legacy of a European Traditionalist: Julius Evola in Perspective". The Occidental Quarterly 3 (2), pp. 21–44.
Wasserstrom, Steven M. (1995), "The Lives of Baron Evola," Alphabet City 4 + 5 (December): 84–89.
Waterfield, Robin (1990), 'Baron Julius Evola and the Hermetic Tradition', Gnosis 14, (Winter): 12–17.
External links
1898 births
1974 deaths
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Ata married wrestler Rocky Johnson, and the couple became the parents of Dwayne Johnson, who wrestled as \"Rocky Maivia\" and \"The Rock\" before establishing himself as an actor. Peter's first cousin Joseph Fanene was the father of Savelina Fanene, who was formerly known in WWE as Nia Jax.\n\nAnoa'i Family tree\n\nOther members \nHollywood stuntman Tanoai Reed (known as Toa on the new American Gladiators) is the great nephew of wrestling promoter Lia Maivia (Peter Maivia's wife), while professional wrestler Lina Fanene (Nia Jax) is Dwayne Johnson's cousin. Sean Maluta, nephew of Afa Anoa'i, was a participant in WWE's first Cruiserweight Classic tournament.\n\nTag teams and stables\n\nThe Wild Samoans\n\nThe Headshrinkers\n\n3-Minute Warning\n\nSamoan Gangstas \n\nSamoan Gangstas was a tag team in the independent promotion World Xtreme Wrestling (WXW). The tag team consisted of members from the Anoa'i family.\n\nSamoan Gangstas was a tag team made up of brothers from another mothers Matt E. Smalls and Sweet Sammy Silk (Matt and Samu Anoa'i). Their tag team was formed in 1997 in WXW, the promotion of one half of The Wild Samoans, Samu's father and Matt's uncle Afa Anoa'i. The duo received success in WXW in the tag team division. On June 24, they won their first WXW Tag Team Championship by beating Love Connection (Sweet Daddy Jay Love and Georgie Love). However, they were temporarily suspended and the title was declared vacant. Matt was repackaged as Matty Smalls. They returned in the summer of 1997 and defeated Siberian Express (The Mad Russian and Russian Eliminator), on September 17 to win their second WXW Tag Team Championship.\n\nProblems began between Smalls and Smooth. The two partners began feuding with each other and could not focus properly on their tag title. On March 27, 1998, Smooth defeated Smalls in a Loser Leaves Town match. As a result of losing this match, Smalls was forced to leave the promotion. He left WXW while Smooth focused on a singles career. After a short while, Smalls returned to WXW and the two partners reunited again as Samoan Gangstas and began teaming in the tag team division. They feuded with several tag teams in WXW and focused to regain the WXW Tag Team Championship. However, due to their family disputes and problems with each other, they did not take part in the tournament for the vacated tag title, and instead feuded with each other. Samoan Gangstas feuded with each other after their splitting until Smalls left WXW and began wrestling as Kimo. He began teaming with Ekmo (Eddie Fatu) as The Island Boyz and the duo worked in Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling (FMW) before signing with World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) and working in its developmental territories.\n\nThe Sons of Samoa \nThe Sons of Samoa are a tag team currently wrestling in the Puerto Rican wrestling promotion World Wrestling Council and WXW. The team consists of Afa Jr. and L.A. Smooth.\n\nThe team was formed at WXW in 1998, briefly as a stable with Samu. The team reformed in April 2009 at a WXW show with Afa Jr. and L.A. Smooth. In 2013, they began wrestling at the WWC promotion in Puerto Rico. At Euphoria 2013, they lost to Thunder and Lightning. They won the WWC World Tag Team Championship from Thunder and Lightning on February 9, before losing the titles back to Thunder and Lightning on March 30 at Camino a la Gloria. However, they won the titles on June 29, 2013, at Summer Madness.\n\nThe Usos \n\nThe Usos (born August 22, 1985) are a Samoan American professional wrestling tag team consisting of twin brothers Jimmy Uso and Jey Uso, who appear in WWE where they are former two-time WWE Tag Team Champions. They are also former five-time WWE SmackDown Tag Team Champions. The pair were previously managed by Tamina Snuka and are one-time FCW Florida Tag Team Champions.\n\nThe Bloodline \n\nThe Bloodline is a professional wrestling stable currently performing in WWE on the SmackDown brand. The group is led by Roman Reigns, who is the current WWE Universal Champion, and is also composed of The Usos, and Paul Heyman, who acts as Reigns' on-screen \"special counsel\".\n\nChampionship and accomplishments \n Afa Anoa'i\nChampionships and accomplishments\n Sika Anoa'i\nChampionships and accomplishments\n Lloyd Anoa'i\nChampionships and accomplishments\n Rikishi\n Championships and accomplishments\n Sam Fatu\n Championships and accomplishments\n Umaga\n Championships and accomplishments\n Yokozuna\n Championships and accomplishments\n Rosey\n Championships and accomplishments\n Roman Reigns\n Championships and accomplishments\n The Usos\n Championships and accomplishments\n Dwayne Johnson\n Championships and accomplishments\n Peter Maivia\n Championships and accomplishments\n Jacob Fatu\n Championships and accomplishments\n Lance Anoa'i\n Championships and accomplishments\nNia Jax\n Championships and accomplishments\n\nSee also \nList of family relations in professional wrestling\n\nReferences\n\nFurther reading\n\nExternal links \n Samoan Dynasty\n\n \nProfessional wrestling families\nAmerican families"
]
|
[
"Rex Harrison",
"Youth and stage career"
]
| C_a6bbfd0732884c53a6ca05f08d6696e6_1 | where did he grow up | 1 | Where did Rex Harrison grow up? | Rex Harrison | Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (nee Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. He first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. Harrison's acting career was interrupted during World War II while serving in the Royal Air Force, reaching the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He acted in the West End of London when he was young, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role. He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews. Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple. CANNOTANSWER | Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, | Sir Reginald Carey "Rex" Harrison (5 March 1908 – 2 June 1990) was an English actor. Harrison began his career on the stage in 1924. He made his West End debut in 1936 appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, in what was his breakthrough role. He won his first Tony Award for his performance as Henry VIII in the play Anne of the Thousand Days in 1949. He won his second Tony for the role of Professor Henry Higgins in the stage production of My Fair Lady in 1957.
In addition to his stage career, Harrison also appeared in numerous films. His first starring role was opposite Vivien Leigh in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937). Receiving critical acclaim for his performance in Major Barbara (1941), which was shot in London during the Blitz, his roles since then included Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), Cleopatra (1963), My Fair Lady (1964), reprising his role as Henry Higgins which earned him the Academy Award for Best Actor, and the titular character in Doctor Dolittle (1967).
In 1975, Harrison released his first autobiography. In June 1989, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II. He was married six times and had two sons: Noel and Carey Harrison. He continued working in stage productions until shortly before his death from pancreatic cancer in June 1990 at the age of 82. His second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy, was published posthumously in 1991.
Early life
Reginald Carey Harrison was born on 5 March, 1908 at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (née Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was the youngest of three children and had two older sisters, Edith Marjorie Harrison (1900-1976) and Sylvia Margaret Sackville (née Harrison), Countess De La Warr, DBE (1903 or 1904-1992). He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. To lift Harrison’s spirits up after undergoing this challenge, his mother took him to the theater. Harrison became determined to pursue a career in acting after seeing a production at a local theater when he was a child. He refused to take acting lessons and he never took an acting lesson during his six decade long career. Despite his refusal to take acting lessons, he managed to land his very first acting gig when he was 16 years old. Harrison supported Everton FC. He gave himself the stage name “Rex” when he was a child after learning that the name meant “king” in Latin.
Stage career
Harrison first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. His acting career was interrupted by World War II, during
which he served in the Royal Air Force and reached the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He made his West End debut in 1936, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role, and established him as a leading light comedian of the English stage.
He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the stage musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews.
Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple.
Cinema appearances
Harrison's film debut was in The Great Game (1930). His first starring role was in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937), opposite Vivien Leigh. Other notable early films include The Citadel (1938), Night Train to Munich (1940), Major Barbara (1941)—filmed in London during The Blitz of 1940, a role for which he received critical acclaim, Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), and The Foxes of Harrow (1947). He is best known for his portrayal of Professor Henry Higgins in the 1964 film version of My Fair Lady, based on the 1956 Broadway production (which in turn was based on George Bernard Shaw's 1913 play Pygmalion), for which Harrison won an Oscar for Best Actor.
He also starred in 1967's Doctor Dolittle. At the height of his box office clout after the success of My Fair Lady, Harrison proved a temperamental force during production, demanding auditions for prospective composers after musical playwright Leslie Bricusse was contracted and demanding to have his singing recorded live during shooting, only to agree to have it re-recorded in post-production. He also disrupted production with incidents with his wife, Rachel Roberts and deliberate misbehavior, such as when he intentionally moved his yacht in front of cameras during shooting in St. Lucia and refused to move it out of sight due to contract disputes. Harrison was at one point temporarily replaced by Christopher Plummer, until he agreed to be more cooperative.
He starred in the 1968 comedy The Honey Pot, a modern adaptation of Ben Jonson's play Volpone. Two of his co-stars, Maggie Smith and Cliff Robertson, were to become lifelong friends. Both spoke at his New York City memorial at the Little Church Around the Corner when Harrison died in 1990.
Harrison was not by any objective standards a singer (the talking on pitch style he used in My Fair Lady was adopted by many other classically trained actors with limited vocal ranges); the music was written to allow for long periods of recitative, or "speaking to the music". Nevertheless, "Talk to the Animals", which Harrison performed in Doctor Dolittle, won the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1967.
Despite excelling in comedy (Noël Coward described him as "The best light comedy actor in the world—except for me."), he attracted favorable notices in dramatic roles such as his portrayal of Julius Caesar in Cleopatra (1963) and as Pope Julius II in The Agony and the Ecstasy (1965), opposite Charlton Heston as Michelangelo. He also acted in a Hindi film Shalimar alongside Indian Bollywood stars Dharmendra and Zeenat Aman as well as appearing opposite Richard Burton as one of two aging homosexuals in Staircase (1969).
Personal life
Alexander Walker wrote: "in looks and temperament, Rex went back to the Elizabethans. They would have called him 'a man of passionate parts'. His physique and looks were far more striking once middle age had literally stretched too smooth and callow a youthful face into a long, saturnine physiognomy, whose hooded eyes and wide mouth had satyr-like associations for some people."
Harrison was married six times. In 1942, he divorced his first wife, Noel Margery Colette-Thomas, and married actress Lilli Palmer the next year; they later appeared together in numerous plays and films, including The Four Poster. Whilst married to Palmer, he built a villa at Portofino, San Genesio, where over the years he hosted showbiz royalty including Laurence Olivier and John Gielgud and real ex-royalty in the Duke of Windsor and his wife.
In 1947, while married to Palmer, Harrison began an affair with actress Carole Landis. Landis took her own life in 1948 after spending the evening with Harrison. Harrison's involvement in the scandal by waiting several hours before calling a doctor and police briefly damaged his career and his contract with Fox was ended by mutual consent. Harrison and Palmer divorced in 1957.
In 1957, Harrison married the actress Kay Kendall. Kendall died of myeloid leukaemia in 1959. Terence Rattigan's 1973 play In Praise of Love was written about the end of this marriage, and Harrison appeared in the New York production playing the character based on himself. Rattigan was said to be "intensely disappointed and frustrated" by Harrison's performance, as "Harrison refused to play the outwardly boorish parts of the character and instead played him as charming throughout, signalling to the audience from the start that he knew the truth about [the] illness." Critics however were quite pleased with the performance and although it did not have a long run, it was yet another of Harrison's well-plotted naturalistic performances.
He was subsequently married to Welsh actress Rachel Roberts from 1962 to 1971. In 1980, despite his having married twice since their divorce, Roberts made a final attempt to win Harrison back, which proved to be futile; she took her own life that same year.
Harrison then married Elizabeth Rees-Williams, divorcing in 1975; finally, in 1978, he married Mercia Tinker, his sixth and final wife. Harrison's eldest son Noel Harrison became an Olympic skier, singer and occasional actor; he toured in several productions including My Fair Lady in his father's award-winning role; Noel died suddenly of a heart attack on 19 October 2013 at age 79. Rex's younger son Carey Harrison is a playwright and social activist.
Harrison's sister Sylvia was married to David Maxwell Fyfe, a lawyer, Conservative politician and judge who was successively the lead British prosecutor at Nuremberg, Home Secretary and Lord Chancellor (head of the English judiciary); after his death she married another Cabinet minister, Lord de la Warr.
Chronology of Harrison's six marriages:
Noel M Colette-Thomas, 1934–1942 (divorced); one son, the actor/singer Noel Harrison, (29 January 1934 – 19 October 2013)
Lilli Palmer, 1943–1957 (divorced); one son, the novelist/playwright Carey Harrison
Kay Kendall, 1957–1959 (her death)
Rachel Roberts, 1962–1971 (divorced)
Elizabeth Harris, 1971–1975 (divorced); three stepsons, Damian Harris, Jared Harris, and Jamie Harris
Mercia Tinker, 1978–1990 (his death)
Grandchildren:
Granddaughters: Cathryn, Harriott, Chloe, Chiara, Rosie, Faith
Grandsons: Will, Simon, Sam
Harrison owned properties in London, New York City and Portofino, Italy. His villa in Portofino was named San Genesio after the patron saint of actors.
Later career
Having retired from films after A Time to Die, Harrison continued to act on Broadway and the West End until the end of his life, despite suffering from glaucoma, painful teeth, and a failing memory. He was nominated for a third Tony Award in 1984 for his performance as Captain Shotover in the revival of George Bernard Shaw's Heartbreak House. He followed with two successful pairings with Claudette Colbert, The Kingfisher in 1985 and Aren't We All? in 1986. In 1989, he appeared with Edward Fox in The Admirable Crichton in London. In 1989/90, he appeared on Broadway in The Circle by W. Somerset Maugham, opposite Glynis Johns, Stewart Granger, and Roma Downey. The production opened at Duke University for a three-week run followed by performances in Baltimore and Boston before opening 14 November 1989 on Broadway.
Death
Harrison died from the effects of pancreatic cancer at his home in Manhattan, New York City, on 2 June 1990 at the age of 82. He had only been diagnosed with the disease a short time before. The stage production in which he was appearing at the time, The Circle, came to an end upon his death.
His body was cremated, some of his ashes being subsequently scattered in Portofino, and the rest being scattered at his second wife Lilli Palmer's grave at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California, in the Commemoration section, Map 1, Lot 4066, Space 2.
Harrison's second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy (), was published posthumously in 1991.
Honours and legacy
On 17 June 1989, Harrison was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace.
Rex Harrison has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one at 6906 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to films, and the other at 6380 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to television. Harrison is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
Due to his association with the checked wool hat which he wore both in the Broadway and film versions of My Fair Lady, the style of headwear was often named "The Rex Harrison."
Seth MacFarlane, creator of the animated series Family Guy, modelled the voice of the character Stewie Griffin after Harrison after seeing him in the film adaptation of My Fair Lady.
Rex Harrison mask used by CIA
Ex-CIA chief of disguise Jonna Mendez stated in 2019 that a mask of Harrison was used by multiple CIA agents for covert work. The moulds of his face were larger and so could fit over a smaller agents face. The molds were made from aluminium and bought from Hollywood film facilities. She mentioned that his likeness was "taking part in a lot of operations".
According to Mendez, Rex Harrison's aluminium facial props mold was used as a baseline for over-the-head masks that the agency would create and use operationally. The masks came in small, medium and large sizes, with Rex's mold becoming the agency's standard 'large' size. Subsequently, many undercover operatives' real identities were disguised by masks bearing Rex's facial features.
Filmography
Film
Television
Radio
Stage
Radio appearances
References
Sources
Further reading
Harrison, Rex (1991). A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy.
Garland, Patrick (1998). The Incomparable Rex. (1998)
Roberts, David (2006). British Hit Singles & Albums (19th ed.). London: Guinness World Records Limited.
(Includes an interview with Harrison's son, Carey)
External links
Selected performances in Theatre Archive University of Bristol
Rex Harrison interview on BBC Radio 4 Desert Island Discs, 26 October 1979
1908 births
1990 deaths
20th-century English male actors
20th Century Fox contract players
Actors awarded knighthoods
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Musical or Comedy Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
British expatriate male actors in the United States
Burials at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Glendale)
Deaths from cancer in New York (state)
David di Donatello winners
Deaths from pancreatic cancer
Drama Desk Award winners
English expatriates in the United States
English male film actors
English male stage actors
English male television actors
English memoirists
Knights Bachelor
Male actors from Merseyside
People educated at Liverpool College
People from Huyton
Royal Air Force officers
Royal Air Force personnel of World War II
Special Tony Award recipients
Tony Award winners | false | [
"Grow Up may refer to:\nAdvance in age\nProgress toward psychological maturity\nGrow Up (book), a 2007 book by Keith Allen\nGrow Up (video game), 2016 video game\n\nMusic\nGrow Up (Desperate Journalist album), 2017\nGrow Up (The Queers album), 1990\nGrow Up (Svoy album), 2011\nGrow Up, a 2015 EP by HALO\n\"Grow Up\" (Olly Murs song)\n\"Grow Up\" (Paramore song)\n\"Grow Up\" (Simple Plan song)\n\"Grow Up\", a song by Rockwell\n\"Grow Up\", a song from the Bratz album Rock Angelz\n\"Grow Up\", a song by Cher Lloyd from Sticks and Stones\n\nSee also\nGrowing Up (disambiguation)\nGrow Up, Tony Phillips, a 2013 film by Emily Hagins",
"\"When I Grow Up\" is the second single from Swedish recording artist Fever Ray's self-titled debut album, Fever Ray (2009).\n\nCritical reception\nPitchfork Media placed \"When I Grow Up\" at number 36 on the website's list of The Top 100 Tracks of 2009.\n\nMusic video\nThe music video for \"When I Grow Up\" was directed by Martin de Thurah. He said of the video's visual statement:\n\n\"That initial idea was something about something coming out of water—something which was about to take form – a state turning into something new. And a double headed creature not deciding which to turn. But the idea had to take a simpler form, to let the song grow by itself. I remembered a photo I took in Croatia two years ago, a swimming pool with its shining blue color in a grey foggy autumn landscape.\"\n\nThe video premiered on Fever Ray's YouTube channel on 19 February 2009. It has received over 12 million views as of March 2016.\n\n\"When I Grow Up\" was placed at number three on Spins list of The 20 Best Videos of 2009.\n\nTrack listings\niTunes single\n\"When I Grow Up\" – 4:31\n\"When I Grow Up\" (Håkan Lidbo's Encephalitis Remix) – 5:59\n\"When I Grow Up\" (D. Lissvik) – 4:28\n\"Memories from When I Grew Up (Remembered by The Subliminal Kid)\" – 16:41\n\"When I Grow Up\" (Van Rivers Dark Sails on the Horizon Mix) – 9:16\n\"When I Grow Up\" (We Grow Apart Vocal Version by Pär Grindvik) – 6:02\n\"When I Grow Up\" (We Grow Apart Inspiration - Take 2 - By Pär Grindvik) – 7:59\n\"When I Grow Up\" (Scuba's High Up Mix) – 6:17\n\"When I Grow Up\" (Scuba's Straight Down Mix) – 5:54\n\"When I Grow Up\" (Video) – 4:04\n\nSwedish 12\" single \nA1. \"When I Grow Up\" (Van Rivers Dark Sails on the Horizon Mix) – 9:10\nA2. \"When I Grow Up\" (D. Lissvik) – 4:28\nB1. \"Memories from When I Grew Up (Remembered by The Subliminal Kid)\" – 16:41\n\nUK promo CD single \n\"When I Grow Up\" (Edit) – 3:42\n\"When I Grow Up\" (D. Lissvik Radio Edit) – 3:19\n\nNominations\n\nAppearances in other media\nThe song was used as part of the soundtrack for the video game Pro Evolution Soccer 2011.\n\nReferences\n\n2009 singles\n2009 songs\nFever Ray songs\nSongs written by Karin Dreijer"
]
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[
"Rex Harrison",
"Youth and stage career",
"where did he grow up",
"Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire,"
]
| C_a6bbfd0732884c53a6ca05f08d6696e6_1 | what year was he born | 2 | What year was Rex Harrison born? | Rex Harrison | Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (nee Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. He first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. Harrison's acting career was interrupted during World War II while serving in the Royal Air Force, reaching the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He acted in the West End of London when he was young, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role. He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews. Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Sir Reginald Carey "Rex" Harrison (5 March 1908 – 2 June 1990) was an English actor. Harrison began his career on the stage in 1924. He made his West End debut in 1936 appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, in what was his breakthrough role. He won his first Tony Award for his performance as Henry VIII in the play Anne of the Thousand Days in 1949. He won his second Tony for the role of Professor Henry Higgins in the stage production of My Fair Lady in 1957.
In addition to his stage career, Harrison also appeared in numerous films. His first starring role was opposite Vivien Leigh in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937). Receiving critical acclaim for his performance in Major Barbara (1941), which was shot in London during the Blitz, his roles since then included Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), Cleopatra (1963), My Fair Lady (1964), reprising his role as Henry Higgins which earned him the Academy Award for Best Actor, and the titular character in Doctor Dolittle (1967).
In 1975, Harrison released his first autobiography. In June 1989, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II. He was married six times and had two sons: Noel and Carey Harrison. He continued working in stage productions until shortly before his death from pancreatic cancer in June 1990 at the age of 82. His second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy, was published posthumously in 1991.
Early life
Reginald Carey Harrison was born on 5 March, 1908 at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (née Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was the youngest of three children and had two older sisters, Edith Marjorie Harrison (1900-1976) and Sylvia Margaret Sackville (née Harrison), Countess De La Warr, DBE (1903 or 1904-1992). He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. To lift Harrison’s spirits up after undergoing this challenge, his mother took him to the theater. Harrison became determined to pursue a career in acting after seeing a production at a local theater when he was a child. He refused to take acting lessons and he never took an acting lesson during his six decade long career. Despite his refusal to take acting lessons, he managed to land his very first acting gig when he was 16 years old. Harrison supported Everton FC. He gave himself the stage name “Rex” when he was a child after learning that the name meant “king” in Latin.
Stage career
Harrison first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. His acting career was interrupted by World War II, during
which he served in the Royal Air Force and reached the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He made his West End debut in 1936, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role, and established him as a leading light comedian of the English stage.
He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the stage musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews.
Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple.
Cinema appearances
Harrison's film debut was in The Great Game (1930). His first starring role was in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937), opposite Vivien Leigh. Other notable early films include The Citadel (1938), Night Train to Munich (1940), Major Barbara (1941)—filmed in London during The Blitz of 1940, a role for which he received critical acclaim, Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), and The Foxes of Harrow (1947). He is best known for his portrayal of Professor Henry Higgins in the 1964 film version of My Fair Lady, based on the 1956 Broadway production (which in turn was based on George Bernard Shaw's 1913 play Pygmalion), for which Harrison won an Oscar for Best Actor.
He also starred in 1967's Doctor Dolittle. At the height of his box office clout after the success of My Fair Lady, Harrison proved a temperamental force during production, demanding auditions for prospective composers after musical playwright Leslie Bricusse was contracted and demanding to have his singing recorded live during shooting, only to agree to have it re-recorded in post-production. He also disrupted production with incidents with his wife, Rachel Roberts and deliberate misbehavior, such as when he intentionally moved his yacht in front of cameras during shooting in St. Lucia and refused to move it out of sight due to contract disputes. Harrison was at one point temporarily replaced by Christopher Plummer, until he agreed to be more cooperative.
He starred in the 1968 comedy The Honey Pot, a modern adaptation of Ben Jonson's play Volpone. Two of his co-stars, Maggie Smith and Cliff Robertson, were to become lifelong friends. Both spoke at his New York City memorial at the Little Church Around the Corner when Harrison died in 1990.
Harrison was not by any objective standards a singer (the talking on pitch style he used in My Fair Lady was adopted by many other classically trained actors with limited vocal ranges); the music was written to allow for long periods of recitative, or "speaking to the music". Nevertheless, "Talk to the Animals", which Harrison performed in Doctor Dolittle, won the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1967.
Despite excelling in comedy (Noël Coward described him as "The best light comedy actor in the world—except for me."), he attracted favorable notices in dramatic roles such as his portrayal of Julius Caesar in Cleopatra (1963) and as Pope Julius II in The Agony and the Ecstasy (1965), opposite Charlton Heston as Michelangelo. He also acted in a Hindi film Shalimar alongside Indian Bollywood stars Dharmendra and Zeenat Aman as well as appearing opposite Richard Burton as one of two aging homosexuals in Staircase (1969).
Personal life
Alexander Walker wrote: "in looks and temperament, Rex went back to the Elizabethans. They would have called him 'a man of passionate parts'. His physique and looks were far more striking once middle age had literally stretched too smooth and callow a youthful face into a long, saturnine physiognomy, whose hooded eyes and wide mouth had satyr-like associations for some people."
Harrison was married six times. In 1942, he divorced his first wife, Noel Margery Colette-Thomas, and married actress Lilli Palmer the next year; they later appeared together in numerous plays and films, including The Four Poster. Whilst married to Palmer, he built a villa at Portofino, San Genesio, where over the years he hosted showbiz royalty including Laurence Olivier and John Gielgud and real ex-royalty in the Duke of Windsor and his wife.
In 1947, while married to Palmer, Harrison began an affair with actress Carole Landis. Landis took her own life in 1948 after spending the evening with Harrison. Harrison's involvement in the scandal by waiting several hours before calling a doctor and police briefly damaged his career and his contract with Fox was ended by mutual consent. Harrison and Palmer divorced in 1957.
In 1957, Harrison married the actress Kay Kendall. Kendall died of myeloid leukaemia in 1959. Terence Rattigan's 1973 play In Praise of Love was written about the end of this marriage, and Harrison appeared in the New York production playing the character based on himself. Rattigan was said to be "intensely disappointed and frustrated" by Harrison's performance, as "Harrison refused to play the outwardly boorish parts of the character and instead played him as charming throughout, signalling to the audience from the start that he knew the truth about [the] illness." Critics however were quite pleased with the performance and although it did not have a long run, it was yet another of Harrison's well-plotted naturalistic performances.
He was subsequently married to Welsh actress Rachel Roberts from 1962 to 1971. In 1980, despite his having married twice since their divorce, Roberts made a final attempt to win Harrison back, which proved to be futile; she took her own life that same year.
Harrison then married Elizabeth Rees-Williams, divorcing in 1975; finally, in 1978, he married Mercia Tinker, his sixth and final wife. Harrison's eldest son Noel Harrison became an Olympic skier, singer and occasional actor; he toured in several productions including My Fair Lady in his father's award-winning role; Noel died suddenly of a heart attack on 19 October 2013 at age 79. Rex's younger son Carey Harrison is a playwright and social activist.
Harrison's sister Sylvia was married to David Maxwell Fyfe, a lawyer, Conservative politician and judge who was successively the lead British prosecutor at Nuremberg, Home Secretary and Lord Chancellor (head of the English judiciary); after his death she married another Cabinet minister, Lord de la Warr.
Chronology of Harrison's six marriages:
Noel M Colette-Thomas, 1934–1942 (divorced); one son, the actor/singer Noel Harrison, (29 January 1934 – 19 October 2013)
Lilli Palmer, 1943–1957 (divorced); one son, the novelist/playwright Carey Harrison
Kay Kendall, 1957–1959 (her death)
Rachel Roberts, 1962–1971 (divorced)
Elizabeth Harris, 1971–1975 (divorced); three stepsons, Damian Harris, Jared Harris, and Jamie Harris
Mercia Tinker, 1978–1990 (his death)
Grandchildren:
Granddaughters: Cathryn, Harriott, Chloe, Chiara, Rosie, Faith
Grandsons: Will, Simon, Sam
Harrison owned properties in London, New York City and Portofino, Italy. His villa in Portofino was named San Genesio after the patron saint of actors.
Later career
Having retired from films after A Time to Die, Harrison continued to act on Broadway and the West End until the end of his life, despite suffering from glaucoma, painful teeth, and a failing memory. He was nominated for a third Tony Award in 1984 for his performance as Captain Shotover in the revival of George Bernard Shaw's Heartbreak House. He followed with two successful pairings with Claudette Colbert, The Kingfisher in 1985 and Aren't We All? in 1986. In 1989, he appeared with Edward Fox in The Admirable Crichton in London. In 1989/90, he appeared on Broadway in The Circle by W. Somerset Maugham, opposite Glynis Johns, Stewart Granger, and Roma Downey. The production opened at Duke University for a three-week run followed by performances in Baltimore and Boston before opening 14 November 1989 on Broadway.
Death
Harrison died from the effects of pancreatic cancer at his home in Manhattan, New York City, on 2 June 1990 at the age of 82. He had only been diagnosed with the disease a short time before. The stage production in which he was appearing at the time, The Circle, came to an end upon his death.
His body was cremated, some of his ashes being subsequently scattered in Portofino, and the rest being scattered at his second wife Lilli Palmer's grave at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California, in the Commemoration section, Map 1, Lot 4066, Space 2.
Harrison's second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy (), was published posthumously in 1991.
Honours and legacy
On 17 June 1989, Harrison was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace.
Rex Harrison has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one at 6906 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to films, and the other at 6380 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to television. Harrison is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
Due to his association with the checked wool hat which he wore both in the Broadway and film versions of My Fair Lady, the style of headwear was often named "The Rex Harrison."
Seth MacFarlane, creator of the animated series Family Guy, modelled the voice of the character Stewie Griffin after Harrison after seeing him in the film adaptation of My Fair Lady.
Rex Harrison mask used by CIA
Ex-CIA chief of disguise Jonna Mendez stated in 2019 that a mask of Harrison was used by multiple CIA agents for covert work. The moulds of his face were larger and so could fit over a smaller agents face. The molds were made from aluminium and bought from Hollywood film facilities. She mentioned that his likeness was "taking part in a lot of operations".
According to Mendez, Rex Harrison's aluminium facial props mold was used as a baseline for over-the-head masks that the agency would create and use operationally. The masks came in small, medium and large sizes, with Rex's mold becoming the agency's standard 'large' size. Subsequently, many undercover operatives' real identities were disguised by masks bearing Rex's facial features.
Filmography
Film
Television
Radio
Stage
Radio appearances
References
Sources
Further reading
Harrison, Rex (1991). A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy.
Garland, Patrick (1998). The Incomparable Rex. (1998)
Roberts, David (2006). British Hit Singles & Albums (19th ed.). London: Guinness World Records Limited.
(Includes an interview with Harrison's son, Carey)
External links
Selected performances in Theatre Archive University of Bristol
Rex Harrison interview on BBC Radio 4 Desert Island Discs, 26 October 1979
1908 births
1990 deaths
20th-century English male actors
20th Century Fox contract players
Actors awarded knighthoods
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Musical or Comedy Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
British expatriate male actors in the United States
Burials at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Glendale)
Deaths from cancer in New York (state)
David di Donatello winners
Deaths from pancreatic cancer
Drama Desk Award winners
English expatriates in the United States
English male film actors
English male stage actors
English male television actors
English memoirists
Knights Bachelor
Male actors from Merseyside
People educated at Liverpool College
People from Huyton
Royal Air Force officers
Royal Air Force personnel of World War II
Special Tony Award recipients
Tony Award winners | false | [
"William Zeiman was a Democratic member of the Wisconsin State Assembly. Zeiman was a member during the 1877 session from the 1st District of Dodge County, Wisconsin. He was born on March 31, 1846, in what is now North Prairie, Wisconsin in what is now Waukesha County, Wisconsin.\n\nReferences\n\nPeople from North Prairie, Wisconsin\nPeople from Dodge County, Wisconsin\nWisconsin Democrats\nMembers of the Wisconsin State Assembly\n1846 births\nYear of death missing",
"John R. Hofstatter was a member of the Assembly during the 1911 session. Additionally, he was a Baraboo, Wisconsin alderman (similar to city councilman). He was a Democrat. Hofstatter was born in what is now Sumpter, Wisconsin in 1858.\n\nReferences\n\nPeople from Baraboo, Wisconsin\nPeople from Sumpter, Wisconsin\nMembers of the Wisconsin State Assembly\nWisconsin city council members\nWisconsin Democrats\n1858 births\nYear of death missing"
]
|
[
"Rex Harrison",
"Youth and stage career",
"where did he grow up",
"Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire,",
"what year was he born",
"I don't know."
]
| C_a6bbfd0732884c53a6ca05f08d6696e6_1 | when did his stage career start | 3 | When did Rex Harrison's stage career start? | Rex Harrison | Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (nee Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. He first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. Harrison's acting career was interrupted during World War II while serving in the Royal Air Force, reaching the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He acted in the West End of London when he was young, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role. He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews. Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple. CANNOTANSWER | He first appeared on the stage in 1924 | Sir Reginald Carey "Rex" Harrison (5 March 1908 – 2 June 1990) was an English actor. Harrison began his career on the stage in 1924. He made his West End debut in 1936 appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, in what was his breakthrough role. He won his first Tony Award for his performance as Henry VIII in the play Anne of the Thousand Days in 1949. He won his second Tony for the role of Professor Henry Higgins in the stage production of My Fair Lady in 1957.
In addition to his stage career, Harrison also appeared in numerous films. His first starring role was opposite Vivien Leigh in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937). Receiving critical acclaim for his performance in Major Barbara (1941), which was shot in London during the Blitz, his roles since then included Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), Cleopatra (1963), My Fair Lady (1964), reprising his role as Henry Higgins which earned him the Academy Award for Best Actor, and the titular character in Doctor Dolittle (1967).
In 1975, Harrison released his first autobiography. In June 1989, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II. He was married six times and had two sons: Noel and Carey Harrison. He continued working in stage productions until shortly before his death from pancreatic cancer in June 1990 at the age of 82. His second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy, was published posthumously in 1991.
Early life
Reginald Carey Harrison was born on 5 March, 1908 at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (née Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was the youngest of three children and had two older sisters, Edith Marjorie Harrison (1900-1976) and Sylvia Margaret Sackville (née Harrison), Countess De La Warr, DBE (1903 or 1904-1992). He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. To lift Harrison’s spirits up after undergoing this challenge, his mother took him to the theater. Harrison became determined to pursue a career in acting after seeing a production at a local theater when he was a child. He refused to take acting lessons and he never took an acting lesson during his six decade long career. Despite his refusal to take acting lessons, he managed to land his very first acting gig when he was 16 years old. Harrison supported Everton FC. He gave himself the stage name “Rex” when he was a child after learning that the name meant “king” in Latin.
Stage career
Harrison first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. His acting career was interrupted by World War II, during
which he served in the Royal Air Force and reached the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He made his West End debut in 1936, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role, and established him as a leading light comedian of the English stage.
He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the stage musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews.
Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple.
Cinema appearances
Harrison's film debut was in The Great Game (1930). His first starring role was in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937), opposite Vivien Leigh. Other notable early films include The Citadel (1938), Night Train to Munich (1940), Major Barbara (1941)—filmed in London during The Blitz of 1940, a role for which he received critical acclaim, Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), and The Foxes of Harrow (1947). He is best known for his portrayal of Professor Henry Higgins in the 1964 film version of My Fair Lady, based on the 1956 Broadway production (which in turn was based on George Bernard Shaw's 1913 play Pygmalion), for which Harrison won an Oscar for Best Actor.
He also starred in 1967's Doctor Dolittle. At the height of his box office clout after the success of My Fair Lady, Harrison proved a temperamental force during production, demanding auditions for prospective composers after musical playwright Leslie Bricusse was contracted and demanding to have his singing recorded live during shooting, only to agree to have it re-recorded in post-production. He also disrupted production with incidents with his wife, Rachel Roberts and deliberate misbehavior, such as when he intentionally moved his yacht in front of cameras during shooting in St. Lucia and refused to move it out of sight due to contract disputes. Harrison was at one point temporarily replaced by Christopher Plummer, until he agreed to be more cooperative.
He starred in the 1968 comedy The Honey Pot, a modern adaptation of Ben Jonson's play Volpone. Two of his co-stars, Maggie Smith and Cliff Robertson, were to become lifelong friends. Both spoke at his New York City memorial at the Little Church Around the Corner when Harrison died in 1990.
Harrison was not by any objective standards a singer (the talking on pitch style he used in My Fair Lady was adopted by many other classically trained actors with limited vocal ranges); the music was written to allow for long periods of recitative, or "speaking to the music". Nevertheless, "Talk to the Animals", which Harrison performed in Doctor Dolittle, won the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1967.
Despite excelling in comedy (Noël Coward described him as "The best light comedy actor in the world—except for me."), he attracted favorable notices in dramatic roles such as his portrayal of Julius Caesar in Cleopatra (1963) and as Pope Julius II in The Agony and the Ecstasy (1965), opposite Charlton Heston as Michelangelo. He also acted in a Hindi film Shalimar alongside Indian Bollywood stars Dharmendra and Zeenat Aman as well as appearing opposite Richard Burton as one of two aging homosexuals in Staircase (1969).
Personal life
Alexander Walker wrote: "in looks and temperament, Rex went back to the Elizabethans. They would have called him 'a man of passionate parts'. His physique and looks were far more striking once middle age had literally stretched too smooth and callow a youthful face into a long, saturnine physiognomy, whose hooded eyes and wide mouth had satyr-like associations for some people."
Harrison was married six times. In 1942, he divorced his first wife, Noel Margery Colette-Thomas, and married actress Lilli Palmer the next year; they later appeared together in numerous plays and films, including The Four Poster. Whilst married to Palmer, he built a villa at Portofino, San Genesio, where over the years he hosted showbiz royalty including Laurence Olivier and John Gielgud and real ex-royalty in the Duke of Windsor and his wife.
In 1947, while married to Palmer, Harrison began an affair with actress Carole Landis. Landis took her own life in 1948 after spending the evening with Harrison. Harrison's involvement in the scandal by waiting several hours before calling a doctor and police briefly damaged his career and his contract with Fox was ended by mutual consent. Harrison and Palmer divorced in 1957.
In 1957, Harrison married the actress Kay Kendall. Kendall died of myeloid leukaemia in 1959. Terence Rattigan's 1973 play In Praise of Love was written about the end of this marriage, and Harrison appeared in the New York production playing the character based on himself. Rattigan was said to be "intensely disappointed and frustrated" by Harrison's performance, as "Harrison refused to play the outwardly boorish parts of the character and instead played him as charming throughout, signalling to the audience from the start that he knew the truth about [the] illness." Critics however were quite pleased with the performance and although it did not have a long run, it was yet another of Harrison's well-plotted naturalistic performances.
He was subsequently married to Welsh actress Rachel Roberts from 1962 to 1971. In 1980, despite his having married twice since their divorce, Roberts made a final attempt to win Harrison back, which proved to be futile; she took her own life that same year.
Harrison then married Elizabeth Rees-Williams, divorcing in 1975; finally, in 1978, he married Mercia Tinker, his sixth and final wife. Harrison's eldest son Noel Harrison became an Olympic skier, singer and occasional actor; he toured in several productions including My Fair Lady in his father's award-winning role; Noel died suddenly of a heart attack on 19 October 2013 at age 79. Rex's younger son Carey Harrison is a playwright and social activist.
Harrison's sister Sylvia was married to David Maxwell Fyfe, a lawyer, Conservative politician and judge who was successively the lead British prosecutor at Nuremberg, Home Secretary and Lord Chancellor (head of the English judiciary); after his death she married another Cabinet minister, Lord de la Warr.
Chronology of Harrison's six marriages:
Noel M Colette-Thomas, 1934–1942 (divorced); one son, the actor/singer Noel Harrison, (29 January 1934 – 19 October 2013)
Lilli Palmer, 1943–1957 (divorced); one son, the novelist/playwright Carey Harrison
Kay Kendall, 1957–1959 (her death)
Rachel Roberts, 1962–1971 (divorced)
Elizabeth Harris, 1971–1975 (divorced); three stepsons, Damian Harris, Jared Harris, and Jamie Harris
Mercia Tinker, 1978–1990 (his death)
Grandchildren:
Granddaughters: Cathryn, Harriott, Chloe, Chiara, Rosie, Faith
Grandsons: Will, Simon, Sam
Harrison owned properties in London, New York City and Portofino, Italy. His villa in Portofino was named San Genesio after the patron saint of actors.
Later career
Having retired from films after A Time to Die, Harrison continued to act on Broadway and the West End until the end of his life, despite suffering from glaucoma, painful teeth, and a failing memory. He was nominated for a third Tony Award in 1984 for his performance as Captain Shotover in the revival of George Bernard Shaw's Heartbreak House. He followed with two successful pairings with Claudette Colbert, The Kingfisher in 1985 and Aren't We All? in 1986. In 1989, he appeared with Edward Fox in The Admirable Crichton in London. In 1989/90, he appeared on Broadway in The Circle by W. Somerset Maugham, opposite Glynis Johns, Stewart Granger, and Roma Downey. The production opened at Duke University for a three-week run followed by performances in Baltimore and Boston before opening 14 November 1989 on Broadway.
Death
Harrison died from the effects of pancreatic cancer at his home in Manhattan, New York City, on 2 June 1990 at the age of 82. He had only been diagnosed with the disease a short time before. The stage production in which he was appearing at the time, The Circle, came to an end upon his death.
His body was cremated, some of his ashes being subsequently scattered in Portofino, and the rest being scattered at his second wife Lilli Palmer's grave at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California, in the Commemoration section, Map 1, Lot 4066, Space 2.
Harrison's second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy (), was published posthumously in 1991.
Honours and legacy
On 17 June 1989, Harrison was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace.
Rex Harrison has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one at 6906 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to films, and the other at 6380 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to television. Harrison is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
Due to his association with the checked wool hat which he wore both in the Broadway and film versions of My Fair Lady, the style of headwear was often named "The Rex Harrison."
Seth MacFarlane, creator of the animated series Family Guy, modelled the voice of the character Stewie Griffin after Harrison after seeing him in the film adaptation of My Fair Lady.
Rex Harrison mask used by CIA
Ex-CIA chief of disguise Jonna Mendez stated in 2019 that a mask of Harrison was used by multiple CIA agents for covert work. The moulds of his face were larger and so could fit over a smaller agents face. The molds were made from aluminium and bought from Hollywood film facilities. She mentioned that his likeness was "taking part in a lot of operations".
According to Mendez, Rex Harrison's aluminium facial props mold was used as a baseline for over-the-head masks that the agency would create and use operationally. The masks came in small, medium and large sizes, with Rex's mold becoming the agency's standard 'large' size. Subsequently, many undercover operatives' real identities were disguised by masks bearing Rex's facial features.
Filmography
Film
Television
Radio
Stage
Radio appearances
References
Sources
Further reading
Harrison, Rex (1991). A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy.
Garland, Patrick (1998). The Incomparable Rex. (1998)
Roberts, David (2006). British Hit Singles & Albums (19th ed.). London: Guinness World Records Limited.
(Includes an interview with Harrison's son, Carey)
External links
Selected performances in Theatre Archive University of Bristol
Rex Harrison interview on BBC Radio 4 Desert Island Discs, 26 October 1979
1908 births
1990 deaths
20th-century English male actors
20th Century Fox contract players
Actors awarded knighthoods
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Musical or Comedy Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
British expatriate male actors in the United States
Burials at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Glendale)
Deaths from cancer in New York (state)
David di Donatello winners
Deaths from pancreatic cancer
Drama Desk Award winners
English expatriates in the United States
English male film actors
English male stage actors
English male television actors
English memoirists
Knights Bachelor
Male actors from Merseyside
People educated at Liverpool College
People from Huyton
Royal Air Force officers
Royal Air Force personnel of World War II
Special Tony Award recipients
Tony Award winners | false | [
"Brendha Prata Haddad (April 12, 1986 in Rio Branco, Acre) is a Brazilian actress.\n\nAt 3 years, she was paraded in the capital of Acre. At 12, she won the Miss Brazil Child, Paraná. Although now want to pursue an acting career at an early age, his father, a doctor Eduardo Haddad, caused her to postpone the start of his career. In 2006, now studying at the Faculty of Law, Brendha did the tests in his hometown for the miniseries Amazônia, de Galvez a Chico Mendes, shown in 2007. And that's when she got her first role, Ritinha.\n\nCareer\n\nTelevision\n\nFilms\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n\n1986 births\nLiving people\nPeople from Rio Branco\nBrazilian telenovela actresses\nBrazilian stage actresses",
"Paul Jesson (born 14 January 1955) is a retired New Zealand professional racing cyclist. Jesson became the first New Zealander to win a stage at a grand tour when he won Stage 10 of the 1980 Vuelta a España. \n\nJesson's first professional race for Splendor was the 1979 Tour de France. This occurred because his team did not have enough riders to start.\n\nIn the prologue of the 1980 Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré Jesson hit a parked car resulting in a serious crash. He was admitted to hospital where he was unconscious for a week and had his leg amputated below the knee. Although the injury ended his professional racing career he did go on to win medals at the Paralympics\n\nMajor results\nSources:\n1976\n 1st Overall Tour of Southland\n 1st Overall Ster Van Henegouwen\n1st Stage 7\n1977\n 2nd Overall Tour of Southland\n1978\n 1st Overall Tour of Southland\n 2nd Overall Tour de Wallonie\n 2nd Overall Tour de Liège\n1979\n 4th Omloop van de Vlaamse Scheldeboorden\n1980\n 1st Stage 10 Vuelta a España\n 2nd \n 3rd Nokere Koerse\n1998\n 1st 4000m Paralympic Pursuit World Championship\n 1st 18km Time trial Paralympic World Championship\n2004\n 3rd Summer Paralympics Road race/Time trial\n\nGrand Tour results\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1955 births\nLiving people\nNew Zealand male cyclists\nNew Zealand Vuelta a España stage winners\nCyclists at the 2004 Summer Paralympics\nMedalists at the 2004 Summer Paralympics\nParalympic medalists in cycling\nParalympic bronze medalists for New Zealand\nParalympic cyclists of New Zealand"
]
|
[
"Rex Harrison",
"Youth and stage career",
"where did he grow up",
"Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire,",
"what year was he born",
"I don't know.",
"when did his stage career start",
"He first appeared on the stage in 1924"
]
| C_a6bbfd0732884c53a6ca05f08d6696e6_1 | what was his first performance | 4 | What was Rex Harrison's first performance? | Rex Harrison | Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (nee Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. He first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. Harrison's acting career was interrupted during World War II while serving in the Royal Air Force, reaching the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He acted in the West End of London when he was young, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role. He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews. Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple. CANNOTANSWER | He acted in the West End of London | Sir Reginald Carey "Rex" Harrison (5 March 1908 – 2 June 1990) was an English actor. Harrison began his career on the stage in 1924. He made his West End debut in 1936 appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, in what was his breakthrough role. He won his first Tony Award for his performance as Henry VIII in the play Anne of the Thousand Days in 1949. He won his second Tony for the role of Professor Henry Higgins in the stage production of My Fair Lady in 1957.
In addition to his stage career, Harrison also appeared in numerous films. His first starring role was opposite Vivien Leigh in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937). Receiving critical acclaim for his performance in Major Barbara (1941), which was shot in London during the Blitz, his roles since then included Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), Cleopatra (1963), My Fair Lady (1964), reprising his role as Henry Higgins which earned him the Academy Award for Best Actor, and the titular character in Doctor Dolittle (1967).
In 1975, Harrison released his first autobiography. In June 1989, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II. He was married six times and had two sons: Noel and Carey Harrison. He continued working in stage productions until shortly before his death from pancreatic cancer in June 1990 at the age of 82. His second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy, was published posthumously in 1991.
Early life
Reginald Carey Harrison was born on 5 March, 1908 at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (née Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was the youngest of three children and had two older sisters, Edith Marjorie Harrison (1900-1976) and Sylvia Margaret Sackville (née Harrison), Countess De La Warr, DBE (1903 or 1904-1992). He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. To lift Harrison’s spirits up after undergoing this challenge, his mother took him to the theater. Harrison became determined to pursue a career in acting after seeing a production at a local theater when he was a child. He refused to take acting lessons and he never took an acting lesson during his six decade long career. Despite his refusal to take acting lessons, he managed to land his very first acting gig when he was 16 years old. Harrison supported Everton FC. He gave himself the stage name “Rex” when he was a child after learning that the name meant “king” in Latin.
Stage career
Harrison first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. His acting career was interrupted by World War II, during
which he served in the Royal Air Force and reached the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He made his West End debut in 1936, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role, and established him as a leading light comedian of the English stage.
He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the stage musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews.
Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple.
Cinema appearances
Harrison's film debut was in The Great Game (1930). His first starring role was in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937), opposite Vivien Leigh. Other notable early films include The Citadel (1938), Night Train to Munich (1940), Major Barbara (1941)—filmed in London during The Blitz of 1940, a role for which he received critical acclaim, Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), and The Foxes of Harrow (1947). He is best known for his portrayal of Professor Henry Higgins in the 1964 film version of My Fair Lady, based on the 1956 Broadway production (which in turn was based on George Bernard Shaw's 1913 play Pygmalion), for which Harrison won an Oscar for Best Actor.
He also starred in 1967's Doctor Dolittle. At the height of his box office clout after the success of My Fair Lady, Harrison proved a temperamental force during production, demanding auditions for prospective composers after musical playwright Leslie Bricusse was contracted and demanding to have his singing recorded live during shooting, only to agree to have it re-recorded in post-production. He also disrupted production with incidents with his wife, Rachel Roberts and deliberate misbehavior, such as when he intentionally moved his yacht in front of cameras during shooting in St. Lucia and refused to move it out of sight due to contract disputes. Harrison was at one point temporarily replaced by Christopher Plummer, until he agreed to be more cooperative.
He starred in the 1968 comedy The Honey Pot, a modern adaptation of Ben Jonson's play Volpone. Two of his co-stars, Maggie Smith and Cliff Robertson, were to become lifelong friends. Both spoke at his New York City memorial at the Little Church Around the Corner when Harrison died in 1990.
Harrison was not by any objective standards a singer (the talking on pitch style he used in My Fair Lady was adopted by many other classically trained actors with limited vocal ranges); the music was written to allow for long periods of recitative, or "speaking to the music". Nevertheless, "Talk to the Animals", which Harrison performed in Doctor Dolittle, won the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1967.
Despite excelling in comedy (Noël Coward described him as "The best light comedy actor in the world—except for me."), he attracted favorable notices in dramatic roles such as his portrayal of Julius Caesar in Cleopatra (1963) and as Pope Julius II in The Agony and the Ecstasy (1965), opposite Charlton Heston as Michelangelo. He also acted in a Hindi film Shalimar alongside Indian Bollywood stars Dharmendra and Zeenat Aman as well as appearing opposite Richard Burton as one of two aging homosexuals in Staircase (1969).
Personal life
Alexander Walker wrote: "in looks and temperament, Rex went back to the Elizabethans. They would have called him 'a man of passionate parts'. His physique and looks were far more striking once middle age had literally stretched too smooth and callow a youthful face into a long, saturnine physiognomy, whose hooded eyes and wide mouth had satyr-like associations for some people."
Harrison was married six times. In 1942, he divorced his first wife, Noel Margery Colette-Thomas, and married actress Lilli Palmer the next year; they later appeared together in numerous plays and films, including The Four Poster. Whilst married to Palmer, he built a villa at Portofino, San Genesio, where over the years he hosted showbiz royalty including Laurence Olivier and John Gielgud and real ex-royalty in the Duke of Windsor and his wife.
In 1947, while married to Palmer, Harrison began an affair with actress Carole Landis. Landis took her own life in 1948 after spending the evening with Harrison. Harrison's involvement in the scandal by waiting several hours before calling a doctor and police briefly damaged his career and his contract with Fox was ended by mutual consent. Harrison and Palmer divorced in 1957.
In 1957, Harrison married the actress Kay Kendall. Kendall died of myeloid leukaemia in 1959. Terence Rattigan's 1973 play In Praise of Love was written about the end of this marriage, and Harrison appeared in the New York production playing the character based on himself. Rattigan was said to be "intensely disappointed and frustrated" by Harrison's performance, as "Harrison refused to play the outwardly boorish parts of the character and instead played him as charming throughout, signalling to the audience from the start that he knew the truth about [the] illness." Critics however were quite pleased with the performance and although it did not have a long run, it was yet another of Harrison's well-plotted naturalistic performances.
He was subsequently married to Welsh actress Rachel Roberts from 1962 to 1971. In 1980, despite his having married twice since their divorce, Roberts made a final attempt to win Harrison back, which proved to be futile; she took her own life that same year.
Harrison then married Elizabeth Rees-Williams, divorcing in 1975; finally, in 1978, he married Mercia Tinker, his sixth and final wife. Harrison's eldest son Noel Harrison became an Olympic skier, singer and occasional actor; he toured in several productions including My Fair Lady in his father's award-winning role; Noel died suddenly of a heart attack on 19 October 2013 at age 79. Rex's younger son Carey Harrison is a playwright and social activist.
Harrison's sister Sylvia was married to David Maxwell Fyfe, a lawyer, Conservative politician and judge who was successively the lead British prosecutor at Nuremberg, Home Secretary and Lord Chancellor (head of the English judiciary); after his death she married another Cabinet minister, Lord de la Warr.
Chronology of Harrison's six marriages:
Noel M Colette-Thomas, 1934–1942 (divorced); one son, the actor/singer Noel Harrison, (29 January 1934 – 19 October 2013)
Lilli Palmer, 1943–1957 (divorced); one son, the novelist/playwright Carey Harrison
Kay Kendall, 1957–1959 (her death)
Rachel Roberts, 1962–1971 (divorced)
Elizabeth Harris, 1971–1975 (divorced); three stepsons, Damian Harris, Jared Harris, and Jamie Harris
Mercia Tinker, 1978–1990 (his death)
Grandchildren:
Granddaughters: Cathryn, Harriott, Chloe, Chiara, Rosie, Faith
Grandsons: Will, Simon, Sam
Harrison owned properties in London, New York City and Portofino, Italy. His villa in Portofino was named San Genesio after the patron saint of actors.
Later career
Having retired from films after A Time to Die, Harrison continued to act on Broadway and the West End until the end of his life, despite suffering from glaucoma, painful teeth, and a failing memory. He was nominated for a third Tony Award in 1984 for his performance as Captain Shotover in the revival of George Bernard Shaw's Heartbreak House. He followed with two successful pairings with Claudette Colbert, The Kingfisher in 1985 and Aren't We All? in 1986. In 1989, he appeared with Edward Fox in The Admirable Crichton in London. In 1989/90, he appeared on Broadway in The Circle by W. Somerset Maugham, opposite Glynis Johns, Stewart Granger, and Roma Downey. The production opened at Duke University for a three-week run followed by performances in Baltimore and Boston before opening 14 November 1989 on Broadway.
Death
Harrison died from the effects of pancreatic cancer at his home in Manhattan, New York City, on 2 June 1990 at the age of 82. He had only been diagnosed with the disease a short time before. The stage production in which he was appearing at the time, The Circle, came to an end upon his death.
His body was cremated, some of his ashes being subsequently scattered in Portofino, and the rest being scattered at his second wife Lilli Palmer's grave at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California, in the Commemoration section, Map 1, Lot 4066, Space 2.
Harrison's second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy (), was published posthumously in 1991.
Honours and legacy
On 17 June 1989, Harrison was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace.
Rex Harrison has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one at 6906 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to films, and the other at 6380 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to television. Harrison is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
Due to his association with the checked wool hat which he wore both in the Broadway and film versions of My Fair Lady, the style of headwear was often named "The Rex Harrison."
Seth MacFarlane, creator of the animated series Family Guy, modelled the voice of the character Stewie Griffin after Harrison after seeing him in the film adaptation of My Fair Lady.
Rex Harrison mask used by CIA
Ex-CIA chief of disguise Jonna Mendez stated in 2019 that a mask of Harrison was used by multiple CIA agents for covert work. The moulds of his face were larger and so could fit over a smaller agents face. The molds were made from aluminium and bought from Hollywood film facilities. She mentioned that his likeness was "taking part in a lot of operations".
According to Mendez, Rex Harrison's aluminium facial props mold was used as a baseline for over-the-head masks that the agency would create and use operationally. The masks came in small, medium and large sizes, with Rex's mold becoming the agency's standard 'large' size. Subsequently, many undercover operatives' real identities were disguised by masks bearing Rex's facial features.
Filmography
Film
Television
Radio
Stage
Radio appearances
References
Sources
Further reading
Harrison, Rex (1991). A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy.
Garland, Patrick (1998). The Incomparable Rex. (1998)
Roberts, David (2006). British Hit Singles & Albums (19th ed.). London: Guinness World Records Limited.
(Includes an interview with Harrison's son, Carey)
External links
Selected performances in Theatre Archive University of Bristol
Rex Harrison interview on BBC Radio 4 Desert Island Discs, 26 October 1979
1908 births
1990 deaths
20th-century English male actors
20th Century Fox contract players
Actors awarded knighthoods
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Musical or Comedy Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
British expatriate male actors in the United States
Burials at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Glendale)
Deaths from cancer in New York (state)
David di Donatello winners
Deaths from pancreatic cancer
Drama Desk Award winners
English expatriates in the United States
English male film actors
English male stage actors
English male television actors
English memoirists
Knights Bachelor
Male actors from Merseyside
People educated at Liverpool College
People from Huyton
Royal Air Force officers
Royal Air Force personnel of World War II
Special Tony Award recipients
Tony Award winners | false | [
"\"That's What It's Like to Be Lonesome\" is a song written and recorded by American country singer-songwriter Bill Anderson. It was released as a single in December 1958 via Decca Records and became a major hit. A similar version was released by American country artist Ray Price the same year via Columbia Records.\n\nBill Anderson version\n\"That's What It's Like to Be Lonesome\" was recorded at the Bradley Studio, located in Nashville, Tennessee. The sessions were produced by Owen Bradley, who would serve as Anderson's producer through most of years with Decca Records.\n\n\"That's What It's Like to Be Lonesome\" was released as a single by Decca Records in December 1958. It spent a total of 17 weeks on the Billboard Hot Country and Western Sides chart before reaching number 12 in February 1959. It became Anderson's first major hit as a music artist and his first charting record. It was not first released on a proper album. However, seven years later, it appeared on his compilation From This Pen.\n\nTrack listings\n7\" vinyl single<ref>{{cite web |title=Bill Anderson -- That's What It's Like to Be Lonesome\" (1958, Vinyl) |url=https://www.discogs.com/Bill-Anderson-Thats-What-Its-Like-To-Be-Lonesome-The-Thrill-Of-My-Life/release/14241289 |website=Discogs |accessdate=21 July 2020}}</ref>\n \"That's What It's Like to Be Lonesome\" – 2:30\n \"The Thrill of My Life\" – 2:25\n\nChart performance\n\nRay Price version\n\n\"That's What It's Like to Be Lonesome\" was recorded at the Columbia Studio, located in Nashville, Tennessee. The sessions were produced by Don Law.\n\n\"That's What It's Like to Be Lonesome\" was released as a single by Columbia Records in December 1958. It spent a total of 19 weeks on the Billboard'' Hot Country and Western Sides chart before reaching number 7 in February 1959. It was one of many top ten hits for Price on the Columbia label and was followed by several number one hits as well. It was not first released on a proper album.\n\nTrack listings\n7\" vinyl single\n \"That's What It's Like to Be Lonesome\" – 2:44\n \"Kissing Your Picture Is So Cold\" – 2:39\n\nChart performance\n\nReferences\n\n1958 singles\n1958 songs\nBill Anderson (singer) songs\nDecca Records singles\nColumbia Records singles\nSong recordings produced by Owen Bradley\nSongs written by Bill Anderson (singer)\nRay Price (musician) songs",
"TG Now is an album by English industrial band Throbbing Gristle. It was released in 2004 through the band's own record label Industrial Records and was their first album of original material since 1982's Journey Through a Body.\n\nRelease \n\nThe album's 12\" vinyl version was limited to 500 copies and the CD version was limited to 3,000 copies.\n\nCritical reception\nPopMatters called the album \"an appetizing return from a band that had toyed significantly with the idea of what an artistically valid record release might be.\"\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel \n Throbbing Gristle\n\n Genesis P-Orridge – uncredited performance, recording\n Cosey Fanni Tutti – uncredited performance, recording\n Peter Christopherson – uncredited performance, recording\n Chris Carter – uncredited performance, recording\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n\n \n\nThrobbing Gristle albums\n2004 albums"
]
|
[
"Rex Harrison",
"Youth and stage career",
"where did he grow up",
"Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire,",
"what year was he born",
"I don't know.",
"when did his stage career start",
"He first appeared on the stage in 1924",
"what was his first performance",
"He acted in the West End of London"
]
| C_a6bbfd0732884c53a6ca05f08d6696e6_1 | was it well recieved | 5 | Was Rex Harrison well received? | Rex Harrison | Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (nee Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. He first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. Harrison's acting career was interrupted during World War II while serving in the Royal Air Force, reaching the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He acted in the West End of London when he was young, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role. He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews. Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple. CANNOTANSWER | appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role. | Sir Reginald Carey "Rex" Harrison (5 March 1908 – 2 June 1990) was an English actor. Harrison began his career on the stage in 1924. He made his West End debut in 1936 appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, in what was his breakthrough role. He won his first Tony Award for his performance as Henry VIII in the play Anne of the Thousand Days in 1949. He won his second Tony for the role of Professor Henry Higgins in the stage production of My Fair Lady in 1957.
In addition to his stage career, Harrison also appeared in numerous films. His first starring role was opposite Vivien Leigh in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937). Receiving critical acclaim for his performance in Major Barbara (1941), which was shot in London during the Blitz, his roles since then included Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), Cleopatra (1963), My Fair Lady (1964), reprising his role as Henry Higgins which earned him the Academy Award for Best Actor, and the titular character in Doctor Dolittle (1967).
In 1975, Harrison released his first autobiography. In June 1989, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II. He was married six times and had two sons: Noel and Carey Harrison. He continued working in stage productions until shortly before his death from pancreatic cancer in June 1990 at the age of 82. His second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy, was published posthumously in 1991.
Early life
Reginald Carey Harrison was born on 5 March, 1908 at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (née Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was the youngest of three children and had two older sisters, Edith Marjorie Harrison (1900-1976) and Sylvia Margaret Sackville (née Harrison), Countess De La Warr, DBE (1903 or 1904-1992). He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. To lift Harrison’s spirits up after undergoing this challenge, his mother took him to the theater. Harrison became determined to pursue a career in acting after seeing a production at a local theater when he was a child. He refused to take acting lessons and he never took an acting lesson during his six decade long career. Despite his refusal to take acting lessons, he managed to land his very first acting gig when he was 16 years old. Harrison supported Everton FC. He gave himself the stage name “Rex” when he was a child after learning that the name meant “king” in Latin.
Stage career
Harrison first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. His acting career was interrupted by World War II, during
which he served in the Royal Air Force and reached the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He made his West End debut in 1936, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role, and established him as a leading light comedian of the English stage.
He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the stage musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews.
Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple.
Cinema appearances
Harrison's film debut was in The Great Game (1930). His first starring role was in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937), opposite Vivien Leigh. Other notable early films include The Citadel (1938), Night Train to Munich (1940), Major Barbara (1941)—filmed in London during The Blitz of 1940, a role for which he received critical acclaim, Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), and The Foxes of Harrow (1947). He is best known for his portrayal of Professor Henry Higgins in the 1964 film version of My Fair Lady, based on the 1956 Broadway production (which in turn was based on George Bernard Shaw's 1913 play Pygmalion), for which Harrison won an Oscar for Best Actor.
He also starred in 1967's Doctor Dolittle. At the height of his box office clout after the success of My Fair Lady, Harrison proved a temperamental force during production, demanding auditions for prospective composers after musical playwright Leslie Bricusse was contracted and demanding to have his singing recorded live during shooting, only to agree to have it re-recorded in post-production. He also disrupted production with incidents with his wife, Rachel Roberts and deliberate misbehavior, such as when he intentionally moved his yacht in front of cameras during shooting in St. Lucia and refused to move it out of sight due to contract disputes. Harrison was at one point temporarily replaced by Christopher Plummer, until he agreed to be more cooperative.
He starred in the 1968 comedy The Honey Pot, a modern adaptation of Ben Jonson's play Volpone. Two of his co-stars, Maggie Smith and Cliff Robertson, were to become lifelong friends. Both spoke at his New York City memorial at the Little Church Around the Corner when Harrison died in 1990.
Harrison was not by any objective standards a singer (the talking on pitch style he used in My Fair Lady was adopted by many other classically trained actors with limited vocal ranges); the music was written to allow for long periods of recitative, or "speaking to the music". Nevertheless, "Talk to the Animals", which Harrison performed in Doctor Dolittle, won the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1967.
Despite excelling in comedy (Noël Coward described him as "The best light comedy actor in the world—except for me."), he attracted favorable notices in dramatic roles such as his portrayal of Julius Caesar in Cleopatra (1963) and as Pope Julius II in The Agony and the Ecstasy (1965), opposite Charlton Heston as Michelangelo. He also acted in a Hindi film Shalimar alongside Indian Bollywood stars Dharmendra and Zeenat Aman as well as appearing opposite Richard Burton as one of two aging homosexuals in Staircase (1969).
Personal life
Alexander Walker wrote: "in looks and temperament, Rex went back to the Elizabethans. They would have called him 'a man of passionate parts'. His physique and looks were far more striking once middle age had literally stretched too smooth and callow a youthful face into a long, saturnine physiognomy, whose hooded eyes and wide mouth had satyr-like associations for some people."
Harrison was married six times. In 1942, he divorced his first wife, Noel Margery Colette-Thomas, and married actress Lilli Palmer the next year; they later appeared together in numerous plays and films, including The Four Poster. Whilst married to Palmer, he built a villa at Portofino, San Genesio, where over the years he hosted showbiz royalty including Laurence Olivier and John Gielgud and real ex-royalty in the Duke of Windsor and his wife.
In 1947, while married to Palmer, Harrison began an affair with actress Carole Landis. Landis took her own life in 1948 after spending the evening with Harrison. Harrison's involvement in the scandal by waiting several hours before calling a doctor and police briefly damaged his career and his contract with Fox was ended by mutual consent. Harrison and Palmer divorced in 1957.
In 1957, Harrison married the actress Kay Kendall. Kendall died of myeloid leukaemia in 1959. Terence Rattigan's 1973 play In Praise of Love was written about the end of this marriage, and Harrison appeared in the New York production playing the character based on himself. Rattigan was said to be "intensely disappointed and frustrated" by Harrison's performance, as "Harrison refused to play the outwardly boorish parts of the character and instead played him as charming throughout, signalling to the audience from the start that he knew the truth about [the] illness." Critics however were quite pleased with the performance and although it did not have a long run, it was yet another of Harrison's well-plotted naturalistic performances.
He was subsequently married to Welsh actress Rachel Roberts from 1962 to 1971. In 1980, despite his having married twice since their divorce, Roberts made a final attempt to win Harrison back, which proved to be futile; she took her own life that same year.
Harrison then married Elizabeth Rees-Williams, divorcing in 1975; finally, in 1978, he married Mercia Tinker, his sixth and final wife. Harrison's eldest son Noel Harrison became an Olympic skier, singer and occasional actor; he toured in several productions including My Fair Lady in his father's award-winning role; Noel died suddenly of a heart attack on 19 October 2013 at age 79. Rex's younger son Carey Harrison is a playwright and social activist.
Harrison's sister Sylvia was married to David Maxwell Fyfe, a lawyer, Conservative politician and judge who was successively the lead British prosecutor at Nuremberg, Home Secretary and Lord Chancellor (head of the English judiciary); after his death she married another Cabinet minister, Lord de la Warr.
Chronology of Harrison's six marriages:
Noel M Colette-Thomas, 1934–1942 (divorced); one son, the actor/singer Noel Harrison, (29 January 1934 – 19 October 2013)
Lilli Palmer, 1943–1957 (divorced); one son, the novelist/playwright Carey Harrison
Kay Kendall, 1957–1959 (her death)
Rachel Roberts, 1962–1971 (divorced)
Elizabeth Harris, 1971–1975 (divorced); three stepsons, Damian Harris, Jared Harris, and Jamie Harris
Mercia Tinker, 1978–1990 (his death)
Grandchildren:
Granddaughters: Cathryn, Harriott, Chloe, Chiara, Rosie, Faith
Grandsons: Will, Simon, Sam
Harrison owned properties in London, New York City and Portofino, Italy. His villa in Portofino was named San Genesio after the patron saint of actors.
Later career
Having retired from films after A Time to Die, Harrison continued to act on Broadway and the West End until the end of his life, despite suffering from glaucoma, painful teeth, and a failing memory. He was nominated for a third Tony Award in 1984 for his performance as Captain Shotover in the revival of George Bernard Shaw's Heartbreak House. He followed with two successful pairings with Claudette Colbert, The Kingfisher in 1985 and Aren't We All? in 1986. In 1989, he appeared with Edward Fox in The Admirable Crichton in London. In 1989/90, he appeared on Broadway in The Circle by W. Somerset Maugham, opposite Glynis Johns, Stewart Granger, and Roma Downey. The production opened at Duke University for a three-week run followed by performances in Baltimore and Boston before opening 14 November 1989 on Broadway.
Death
Harrison died from the effects of pancreatic cancer at his home in Manhattan, New York City, on 2 June 1990 at the age of 82. He had only been diagnosed with the disease a short time before. The stage production in which he was appearing at the time, The Circle, came to an end upon his death.
His body was cremated, some of his ashes being subsequently scattered in Portofino, and the rest being scattered at his second wife Lilli Palmer's grave at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California, in the Commemoration section, Map 1, Lot 4066, Space 2.
Harrison's second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy (), was published posthumously in 1991.
Honours and legacy
On 17 June 1989, Harrison was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace.
Rex Harrison has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one at 6906 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to films, and the other at 6380 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to television. Harrison is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
Due to his association with the checked wool hat which he wore both in the Broadway and film versions of My Fair Lady, the style of headwear was often named "The Rex Harrison."
Seth MacFarlane, creator of the animated series Family Guy, modelled the voice of the character Stewie Griffin after Harrison after seeing him in the film adaptation of My Fair Lady.
Rex Harrison mask used by CIA
Ex-CIA chief of disguise Jonna Mendez stated in 2019 that a mask of Harrison was used by multiple CIA agents for covert work. The moulds of his face were larger and so could fit over a smaller agents face. The molds were made from aluminium and bought from Hollywood film facilities. She mentioned that his likeness was "taking part in a lot of operations".
According to Mendez, Rex Harrison's aluminium facial props mold was used as a baseline for over-the-head masks that the agency would create and use operationally. The masks came in small, medium and large sizes, with Rex's mold becoming the agency's standard 'large' size. Subsequently, many undercover operatives' real identities were disguised by masks bearing Rex's facial features.
Filmography
Film
Television
Radio
Stage
Radio appearances
References
Sources
Further reading
Harrison, Rex (1991). A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy.
Garland, Patrick (1998). The Incomparable Rex. (1998)
Roberts, David (2006). British Hit Singles & Albums (19th ed.). London: Guinness World Records Limited.
(Includes an interview with Harrison's son, Carey)
External links
Selected performances in Theatre Archive University of Bristol
Rex Harrison interview on BBC Radio 4 Desert Island Discs, 26 October 1979
1908 births
1990 deaths
20th-century English male actors
20th Century Fox contract players
Actors awarded knighthoods
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Musical or Comedy Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
British expatriate male actors in the United States
Burials at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Glendale)
Deaths from cancer in New York (state)
David di Donatello winners
Deaths from pancreatic cancer
Drama Desk Award winners
English expatriates in the United States
English male film actors
English male stage actors
English male television actors
English memoirists
Knights Bachelor
Male actors from Merseyside
People educated at Liverpool College
People from Huyton
Royal Air Force officers
Royal Air Force personnel of World War II
Special Tony Award recipients
Tony Award winners | false | [
"Robin Hood's Well is a historic building beside the A1(M) motorway in Skellow, South Yorkshire, England. It was originally built in 1710 as a well house over a spring alongside the old Great North Road, but the structure was moved to its present location alongside the Doncaster By-Pass in what is known as Barnsdale (sometimes Barnsdale Forest).\n\nNaming\nThe ballad \"Robin Hood and the Curtal Friar\" gives the figure of Robin Hood a connection to fountains, which may account for the original naming of the spring where the well was established. The well itself was given the name \"Robin Hood's Well\" by Charles Howard, 3rd Earl of Carlisle, who had the well named after the figure in an attempt to solidify the area's identity as the home of the legends.\n\nDescription\nRobin Hood's Well is an ornamental well cover that was designed by Sir John Vanbrugh in 1710 for the 3rd Earl of Carlisle. The stone that makes up the well cover is finely cut, ashlar Magnesian Limestone. Three of its sides are made up of arched entrances with pendant keystones. Originally the well was built as a stepwell sourced from a spring alongside a park wall, with the spring lying at the base of some steps under the structure. The spring was buried in 1960 during the construction of the Doncaster By-Pass and the well was relocated away from its original location, being placed alongside the highway on a concrete foundation. After its relocation the structure was rehabilitated in 1993 with a stainless-steel frame to ensure its prolonged survival.\n\nHistory\nThe stone structure known today as Robin Hood's Well was designed by Sir John Vanbrugh in 1710. It was erected to the east of the Great North Road. Barnsdale Forest had been associated with the legend of Robin Hood for centuries at the time of its construction, so Charles Howard, 3rd Earl of Carlisle had the well named after the figure in an attempt to solidify the area's identity as the home of the myths. The well house was moved from its original location during the construction of the Doncaster By-Pass in 1960. Hence it is no longer a real well, and now rests upon a solid concrete base. After its relocation it was listed as a Grade II building on 5 June 1968, affording it protections due to its historic value.\n\nSee also\n Little John's Well\n Listed buildings in Burghwallis\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n Robin Hood's Well, Skellow\n Robin Hood's Well on an OS map\n\nGrade II listed buildings in South Yorkshire\nRobin Hood\nDoncaster\nWater wells in England",
"The Jackson Barnett No. 11 Oil Well was the most productive oil well in the Cushing Oil Field of northeastern Oklahoma, USA, to the south of Drumright. The well was drilled in 1916 in the Shamrock Dome section of the Cushing field by the Gypsy Oil Company, striking oil on February 17. The well was on the land of Jackson Barnett, a Creek landowner who subsequently became known as the \"world's richest Indian\".\n\nBarnett owned in trust Creek County, which began producing oil in 1912. Jackson's 12.5 percent royalty on the oil from his land earned him between $3 million and $4 million during his lifetime, but he only received a few hundred dollars per year at first. Until 1920, his fortune was managed as a trust by Creek County courts and the Department of the Interior, on the pretext that Jackson was illiterate and legally incompetent due to a head injury. Barnett's money became the subject of extensive litigation and eventual Congressional hearings. In 1920, he was pursued by Anna Laura Lowe, whom he married after one meeting. When a court gave part of the trust's money to Anna to administer, the couple moved to Los Angeles and bought a mansion.\n\nThe well was drilled into the Tucker sand layer at a depth between and . Production on the well's first day was 4,000 barrels, rising to 10,000 barrels a day and peaking at 18,000 barrels per day. Average production was 10,000 barrels a day for most of its life. It was the first well in the Cushing field to produce 1 million barrels of oil and established the Oklahoma record for production from a single well. The well was capped in the mid-1960s. The site includes concrete foundations, the capped well casing, and a sign. In 1980, eight neighboring wells continued to produce oil.\n\nThe Jackson Barnett well was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on July 27, 1982.\n\nReferences\n\nIndustrial buildings and structures on the National Register of Historic Places in Oklahoma\nBuildings and structures completed in 1916\nBuildings and structures in Creek County, Oklahoma\nOil wells in Oklahoma\nNational Register of Historic Places in Creek County, Oklahoma"
]
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"Youth and stage career",
"where did he grow up",
"Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire,",
"what year was he born",
"I don't know.",
"when did his stage career start",
"He first appeared on the stage in 1924",
"what was his first performance",
"He acted in the West End of London",
"was it well recieved",
"appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role."
]
| C_a6bbfd0732884c53a6ca05f08d6696e6_1 | what was he most well known for early on | 6 | What was Rex Harrison most well known for early on? | Rex Harrison | Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (nee Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. He first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. Harrison's acting career was interrupted during World War II while serving in the Royal Air Force, reaching the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He acted in the West End of London when he was young, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role. He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews. Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple. CANNOTANSWER | He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII | Sir Reginald Carey "Rex" Harrison (5 March 1908 – 2 June 1990) was an English actor. Harrison began his career on the stage in 1924. He made his West End debut in 1936 appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, in what was his breakthrough role. He won his first Tony Award for his performance as Henry VIII in the play Anne of the Thousand Days in 1949. He won his second Tony for the role of Professor Henry Higgins in the stage production of My Fair Lady in 1957.
In addition to his stage career, Harrison also appeared in numerous films. His first starring role was opposite Vivien Leigh in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937). Receiving critical acclaim for his performance in Major Barbara (1941), which was shot in London during the Blitz, his roles since then included Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), Cleopatra (1963), My Fair Lady (1964), reprising his role as Henry Higgins which earned him the Academy Award for Best Actor, and the titular character in Doctor Dolittle (1967).
In 1975, Harrison released his first autobiography. In June 1989, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II. He was married six times and had two sons: Noel and Carey Harrison. He continued working in stage productions until shortly before his death from pancreatic cancer in June 1990 at the age of 82. His second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy, was published posthumously in 1991.
Early life
Reginald Carey Harrison was born on 5 March, 1908 at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (née Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was the youngest of three children and had two older sisters, Edith Marjorie Harrison (1900-1976) and Sylvia Margaret Sackville (née Harrison), Countess De La Warr, DBE (1903 or 1904-1992). He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. To lift Harrison’s spirits up after undergoing this challenge, his mother took him to the theater. Harrison became determined to pursue a career in acting after seeing a production at a local theater when he was a child. He refused to take acting lessons and he never took an acting lesson during his six decade long career. Despite his refusal to take acting lessons, he managed to land his very first acting gig when he was 16 years old. Harrison supported Everton FC. He gave himself the stage name “Rex” when he was a child after learning that the name meant “king” in Latin.
Stage career
Harrison first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. His acting career was interrupted by World War II, during
which he served in the Royal Air Force and reached the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He made his West End debut in 1936, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role, and established him as a leading light comedian of the English stage.
He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the stage musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews.
Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple.
Cinema appearances
Harrison's film debut was in The Great Game (1930). His first starring role was in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937), opposite Vivien Leigh. Other notable early films include The Citadel (1938), Night Train to Munich (1940), Major Barbara (1941)—filmed in London during The Blitz of 1940, a role for which he received critical acclaim, Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), and The Foxes of Harrow (1947). He is best known for his portrayal of Professor Henry Higgins in the 1964 film version of My Fair Lady, based on the 1956 Broadway production (which in turn was based on George Bernard Shaw's 1913 play Pygmalion), for which Harrison won an Oscar for Best Actor.
He also starred in 1967's Doctor Dolittle. At the height of his box office clout after the success of My Fair Lady, Harrison proved a temperamental force during production, demanding auditions for prospective composers after musical playwright Leslie Bricusse was contracted and demanding to have his singing recorded live during shooting, only to agree to have it re-recorded in post-production. He also disrupted production with incidents with his wife, Rachel Roberts and deliberate misbehavior, such as when he intentionally moved his yacht in front of cameras during shooting in St. Lucia and refused to move it out of sight due to contract disputes. Harrison was at one point temporarily replaced by Christopher Plummer, until he agreed to be more cooperative.
He starred in the 1968 comedy The Honey Pot, a modern adaptation of Ben Jonson's play Volpone. Two of his co-stars, Maggie Smith and Cliff Robertson, were to become lifelong friends. Both spoke at his New York City memorial at the Little Church Around the Corner when Harrison died in 1990.
Harrison was not by any objective standards a singer (the talking on pitch style he used in My Fair Lady was adopted by many other classically trained actors with limited vocal ranges); the music was written to allow for long periods of recitative, or "speaking to the music". Nevertheless, "Talk to the Animals", which Harrison performed in Doctor Dolittle, won the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1967.
Despite excelling in comedy (Noël Coward described him as "The best light comedy actor in the world—except for me."), he attracted favorable notices in dramatic roles such as his portrayal of Julius Caesar in Cleopatra (1963) and as Pope Julius II in The Agony and the Ecstasy (1965), opposite Charlton Heston as Michelangelo. He also acted in a Hindi film Shalimar alongside Indian Bollywood stars Dharmendra and Zeenat Aman as well as appearing opposite Richard Burton as one of two aging homosexuals in Staircase (1969).
Personal life
Alexander Walker wrote: "in looks and temperament, Rex went back to the Elizabethans. They would have called him 'a man of passionate parts'. His physique and looks were far more striking once middle age had literally stretched too smooth and callow a youthful face into a long, saturnine physiognomy, whose hooded eyes and wide mouth had satyr-like associations for some people."
Harrison was married six times. In 1942, he divorced his first wife, Noel Margery Colette-Thomas, and married actress Lilli Palmer the next year; they later appeared together in numerous plays and films, including The Four Poster. Whilst married to Palmer, he built a villa at Portofino, San Genesio, where over the years he hosted showbiz royalty including Laurence Olivier and John Gielgud and real ex-royalty in the Duke of Windsor and his wife.
In 1947, while married to Palmer, Harrison began an affair with actress Carole Landis. Landis took her own life in 1948 after spending the evening with Harrison. Harrison's involvement in the scandal by waiting several hours before calling a doctor and police briefly damaged his career and his contract with Fox was ended by mutual consent. Harrison and Palmer divorced in 1957.
In 1957, Harrison married the actress Kay Kendall. Kendall died of myeloid leukaemia in 1959. Terence Rattigan's 1973 play In Praise of Love was written about the end of this marriage, and Harrison appeared in the New York production playing the character based on himself. Rattigan was said to be "intensely disappointed and frustrated" by Harrison's performance, as "Harrison refused to play the outwardly boorish parts of the character and instead played him as charming throughout, signalling to the audience from the start that he knew the truth about [the] illness." Critics however were quite pleased with the performance and although it did not have a long run, it was yet another of Harrison's well-plotted naturalistic performances.
He was subsequently married to Welsh actress Rachel Roberts from 1962 to 1971. In 1980, despite his having married twice since their divorce, Roberts made a final attempt to win Harrison back, which proved to be futile; she took her own life that same year.
Harrison then married Elizabeth Rees-Williams, divorcing in 1975; finally, in 1978, he married Mercia Tinker, his sixth and final wife. Harrison's eldest son Noel Harrison became an Olympic skier, singer and occasional actor; he toured in several productions including My Fair Lady in his father's award-winning role; Noel died suddenly of a heart attack on 19 October 2013 at age 79. Rex's younger son Carey Harrison is a playwright and social activist.
Harrison's sister Sylvia was married to David Maxwell Fyfe, a lawyer, Conservative politician and judge who was successively the lead British prosecutor at Nuremberg, Home Secretary and Lord Chancellor (head of the English judiciary); after his death she married another Cabinet minister, Lord de la Warr.
Chronology of Harrison's six marriages:
Noel M Colette-Thomas, 1934–1942 (divorced); one son, the actor/singer Noel Harrison, (29 January 1934 – 19 October 2013)
Lilli Palmer, 1943–1957 (divorced); one son, the novelist/playwright Carey Harrison
Kay Kendall, 1957–1959 (her death)
Rachel Roberts, 1962–1971 (divorced)
Elizabeth Harris, 1971–1975 (divorced); three stepsons, Damian Harris, Jared Harris, and Jamie Harris
Mercia Tinker, 1978–1990 (his death)
Grandchildren:
Granddaughters: Cathryn, Harriott, Chloe, Chiara, Rosie, Faith
Grandsons: Will, Simon, Sam
Harrison owned properties in London, New York City and Portofino, Italy. His villa in Portofino was named San Genesio after the patron saint of actors.
Later career
Having retired from films after A Time to Die, Harrison continued to act on Broadway and the West End until the end of his life, despite suffering from glaucoma, painful teeth, and a failing memory. He was nominated for a third Tony Award in 1984 for his performance as Captain Shotover in the revival of George Bernard Shaw's Heartbreak House. He followed with two successful pairings with Claudette Colbert, The Kingfisher in 1985 and Aren't We All? in 1986. In 1989, he appeared with Edward Fox in The Admirable Crichton in London. In 1989/90, he appeared on Broadway in The Circle by W. Somerset Maugham, opposite Glynis Johns, Stewart Granger, and Roma Downey. The production opened at Duke University for a three-week run followed by performances in Baltimore and Boston before opening 14 November 1989 on Broadway.
Death
Harrison died from the effects of pancreatic cancer at his home in Manhattan, New York City, on 2 June 1990 at the age of 82. He had only been diagnosed with the disease a short time before. The stage production in which he was appearing at the time, The Circle, came to an end upon his death.
His body was cremated, some of his ashes being subsequently scattered in Portofino, and the rest being scattered at his second wife Lilli Palmer's grave at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California, in the Commemoration section, Map 1, Lot 4066, Space 2.
Harrison's second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy (), was published posthumously in 1991.
Honours and legacy
On 17 June 1989, Harrison was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace.
Rex Harrison has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one at 6906 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to films, and the other at 6380 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to television. Harrison is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
Due to his association with the checked wool hat which he wore both in the Broadway and film versions of My Fair Lady, the style of headwear was often named "The Rex Harrison."
Seth MacFarlane, creator of the animated series Family Guy, modelled the voice of the character Stewie Griffin after Harrison after seeing him in the film adaptation of My Fair Lady.
Rex Harrison mask used by CIA
Ex-CIA chief of disguise Jonna Mendez stated in 2019 that a mask of Harrison was used by multiple CIA agents for covert work. The moulds of his face were larger and so could fit over a smaller agents face. The molds were made from aluminium and bought from Hollywood film facilities. She mentioned that his likeness was "taking part in a lot of operations".
According to Mendez, Rex Harrison's aluminium facial props mold was used as a baseline for over-the-head masks that the agency would create and use operationally. The masks came in small, medium and large sizes, with Rex's mold becoming the agency's standard 'large' size. Subsequently, many undercover operatives' real identities were disguised by masks bearing Rex's facial features.
Filmography
Film
Television
Radio
Stage
Radio appearances
References
Sources
Further reading
Harrison, Rex (1991). A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy.
Garland, Patrick (1998). The Incomparable Rex. (1998)
Roberts, David (2006). British Hit Singles & Albums (19th ed.). London: Guinness World Records Limited.
(Includes an interview with Harrison's son, Carey)
External links
Selected performances in Theatre Archive University of Bristol
Rex Harrison interview on BBC Radio 4 Desert Island Discs, 26 October 1979
1908 births
1990 deaths
20th-century English male actors
20th Century Fox contract players
Actors awarded knighthoods
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Musical or Comedy Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
British expatriate male actors in the United States
Burials at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Glendale)
Deaths from cancer in New York (state)
David di Donatello winners
Deaths from pancreatic cancer
Drama Desk Award winners
English expatriates in the United States
English male film actors
English male stage actors
English male television actors
English memoirists
Knights Bachelor
Male actors from Merseyside
People educated at Liverpool College
People from Huyton
Royal Air Force officers
Royal Air Force personnel of World War II
Special Tony Award recipients
Tony Award winners | true | [
"Eric Rogers (born Eric Gaukroger; 25 September 1921 – 8 April 1981) was an English-born composer, conductor and arranger, best known for composing the scores for twenty-two Carry On films.\n\nEarly life\nRogers moved with his parents from Halifax, England, to Morriston, Wales, when he was three. Rogers was interested in music from an early age, and during his attendance at church as a child, he was taught to play the church organ. His musical apprenticeship was generally untutored and he found himself playing the piano during the Second World War for free beer.\n\nCareer\nAfter the Second World War, he set up his own orchestra, playing in the Orchid Room at London's Trocadero. He orchestrated the original stage production of Oliver!, first performed at the New Theatre, London on 30 June 1960.\n\nAs his reputation grew, he was offered many conducting jobs for films. Most notably, he composed the music for 22 Carry On films. He also conducted the music for the first James Bond film Dr. No under the name Eric Rogers. He would later go on to compose many film scores himself, most notably Carry On Cabby in 1963, Carry On Matron in 1972 and a hoard of other Carry On films. His final Carry On score was for Carry On Emmannuelle in 1978.\n\nRogers emigrated to America in 1975, after working intermittently in the UK and America from 1970, and became in demand for composing various film and TV series. By this point he had struck up an alliance with DePatie and Freleng productions, who were at the time making a number of animated series for children, such as Return to the Planet of the Apes and What's New Mr. Magoo?. He worked for the company for four years, conducting scores for What's New Mr. Magoo? and Pink Panther in a Pink Christmas, and providing scores for Return to the Planet of the Apes and Spider-Woman (TV series), for which he composed and conducted the theme and all the incidental music. He also conducted Dean Elliott's score for The New Fantastic Four animated series in 1978. In 1981, he conducted the music for Dennis the Menace in Mayday for Mother.\n\nPersonal life\nRogers was married to a Bluebell girl, Enid Merrigan, from Swansea, with whom he had two sons. On the day of the wedding, the bride's father was indisposed, and the bride was given away by Max Bygraves.\n\nEric's brother, Alan Rogers, was also a musician and songwriter and has a lyric credit on the 1965 film, Carry on Cowboy.\n\nDeath\nHe died on 8 April 1981 in Chalfont St. Peter, Buckinghamshire, aged 59. His death was registered under the name Eric Gauk-Roger.\n\nFilm and TV music\n\nFilm \n\nMeet Mr. Lucifer (1953)\nThe Iron Maiden (1962)\n Nurse on Wheels (1963)\n Carry On Cabby (1963)\nCarry On Jack (1963)\nThis Is My Street (1964)\nCarry On Spying (1964)\nCarry On Cleo (1964)\nThe Big Job (1965)\nThree Hats for Lisa (1965)\nCarry On Cowboy (1965)\n Carry On Screaming! (1966)\nDon't Lose Your Head (1966)\nFollow That Camel (1967)\nCarry On Doctor (1967)\nCarry On... Up the Khyber (1968)\n Carry On Camping (1969)\nCarry On Again Doctor (1969)\nDoctor in Trouble (1970)\nCarry On Up the Jungle (1970)\nCarry On Loving (1970)\nCarry On Henry (1971)\nCarry on at Your Convenience (1971)\nRevenge (1971)\nAssault (1971)\nQuest for Love (1971)\nCarry On Matron (1972)\nCarry On Abroad (1972)\nBless This House (1972)\n All Coppers Are... (1972)\n No Sex Please, We're British (1973)\nCarry On Girls (1973)\nCarry On Dick (1974)\nCarry On Behind (1975)\n Carry On Emmannuelle (1978)\n\nTelevision \n Sunday Night at the London Palladium (1950s)\n Carry On Laughing (1975)\n The Chiffy Kids (1976)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n Eric Rogers on What A Carry On\n\n1921 births\n1981 deaths\nEnglish film score composers\nEnglish male film score composers\n20th-century classical musicians\n20th-century English composers\n20th-century British male musicians",
"Franz Šedivý (2 December 1864 – 20 April 1945) was a Danish illustrator most known for his detailed bird's-eye view prospects. He worked for many of the leading newspapers and magazines of his time. His work was also featured on postcards, advertisements and in schoolbooks.\n\nEarly life and education\nŠedivý was born on 2 December 1864 in Prague, the son of xylographer Franz Joseph Sedivý and Therese Josephine Sadlo. He was educated as a lithographer and draughtsman from Hoffenberg & Trap in 1883. He was also following classes in drawing at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in 1882.\n\nCareer\nŠedivý worked for Illustreret Tidende from 1884. He became known for his large and extremely detailed bird's-eye view panoramas of Danish towns, districts and other localities.\n\nHe worked for Familie-Journalen in 1895-1911 and as a freelancer for the magazines Nutiden, Nordstjernen and Hjemmet as well as for the newspapers Politiken and Berlingske Tidende.\n\nHe was also active as an illustrator of school books through thefirm Alfred Jacobsens Litografiske Etablissement. He was also creating scenografy for puppet theatre and. His work was also popular as motids on postcards and Christmas cards, for instance from Stenders Kunstforlag.\n\nPersonal life\nŠedivý married twice, first with Anna Kæmmer on 3 May 1889 and second time with Doris Anna Poulsen on 2 August 1919. He lived in Frederiksberg.\n\nGallery\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Franz Šedivý at Kunstindeks Danmark\n\nDanish illustrators\n1864 births\n1945 deaths"
]
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"Rex Harrison",
"Youth and stage career",
"where did he grow up",
"Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire,",
"what year was he born",
"I don't know.",
"when did his stage career start",
"He first appeared on the stage in 1924",
"what was his first performance",
"He acted in the West End of London",
"was it well recieved",
"appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role.",
"what was he most well known for early on",
"He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII"
]
| C_a6bbfd0732884c53a6ca05f08d6696e6_1 | did he win any other awards | 7 | Other than the Tony award did Rex Harrison win any other awards? | Rex Harrison | Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (nee Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. He first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. Harrison's acting career was interrupted during World War II while serving in the Royal Air Force, reaching the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He acted in the West End of London when he was young, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role. He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews. Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple. CANNOTANSWER | (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the musical My Fair Lady, | Sir Reginald Carey "Rex" Harrison (5 March 1908 – 2 June 1990) was an English actor. Harrison began his career on the stage in 1924. He made his West End debut in 1936 appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, in what was his breakthrough role. He won his first Tony Award for his performance as Henry VIII in the play Anne of the Thousand Days in 1949. He won his second Tony for the role of Professor Henry Higgins in the stage production of My Fair Lady in 1957.
In addition to his stage career, Harrison also appeared in numerous films. His first starring role was opposite Vivien Leigh in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937). Receiving critical acclaim for his performance in Major Barbara (1941), which was shot in London during the Blitz, his roles since then included Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), Cleopatra (1963), My Fair Lady (1964), reprising his role as Henry Higgins which earned him the Academy Award for Best Actor, and the titular character in Doctor Dolittle (1967).
In 1975, Harrison released his first autobiography. In June 1989, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II. He was married six times and had two sons: Noel and Carey Harrison. He continued working in stage productions until shortly before his death from pancreatic cancer in June 1990 at the age of 82. His second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy, was published posthumously in 1991.
Early life
Reginald Carey Harrison was born on 5 March, 1908 at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (née Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was the youngest of three children and had two older sisters, Edith Marjorie Harrison (1900-1976) and Sylvia Margaret Sackville (née Harrison), Countess De La Warr, DBE (1903 or 1904-1992). He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. To lift Harrison’s spirits up after undergoing this challenge, his mother took him to the theater. Harrison became determined to pursue a career in acting after seeing a production at a local theater when he was a child. He refused to take acting lessons and he never took an acting lesson during his six decade long career. Despite his refusal to take acting lessons, he managed to land his very first acting gig when he was 16 years old. Harrison supported Everton FC. He gave himself the stage name “Rex” when he was a child after learning that the name meant “king” in Latin.
Stage career
Harrison first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. His acting career was interrupted by World War II, during
which he served in the Royal Air Force and reached the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He made his West End debut in 1936, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role, and established him as a leading light comedian of the English stage.
He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the stage musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews.
Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple.
Cinema appearances
Harrison's film debut was in The Great Game (1930). His first starring role was in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937), opposite Vivien Leigh. Other notable early films include The Citadel (1938), Night Train to Munich (1940), Major Barbara (1941)—filmed in London during The Blitz of 1940, a role for which he received critical acclaim, Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), and The Foxes of Harrow (1947). He is best known for his portrayal of Professor Henry Higgins in the 1964 film version of My Fair Lady, based on the 1956 Broadway production (which in turn was based on George Bernard Shaw's 1913 play Pygmalion), for which Harrison won an Oscar for Best Actor.
He also starred in 1967's Doctor Dolittle. At the height of his box office clout after the success of My Fair Lady, Harrison proved a temperamental force during production, demanding auditions for prospective composers after musical playwright Leslie Bricusse was contracted and demanding to have his singing recorded live during shooting, only to agree to have it re-recorded in post-production. He also disrupted production with incidents with his wife, Rachel Roberts and deliberate misbehavior, such as when he intentionally moved his yacht in front of cameras during shooting in St. Lucia and refused to move it out of sight due to contract disputes. Harrison was at one point temporarily replaced by Christopher Plummer, until he agreed to be more cooperative.
He starred in the 1968 comedy The Honey Pot, a modern adaptation of Ben Jonson's play Volpone. Two of his co-stars, Maggie Smith and Cliff Robertson, were to become lifelong friends. Both spoke at his New York City memorial at the Little Church Around the Corner when Harrison died in 1990.
Harrison was not by any objective standards a singer (the talking on pitch style he used in My Fair Lady was adopted by many other classically trained actors with limited vocal ranges); the music was written to allow for long periods of recitative, or "speaking to the music". Nevertheless, "Talk to the Animals", which Harrison performed in Doctor Dolittle, won the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1967.
Despite excelling in comedy (Noël Coward described him as "The best light comedy actor in the world—except for me."), he attracted favorable notices in dramatic roles such as his portrayal of Julius Caesar in Cleopatra (1963) and as Pope Julius II in The Agony and the Ecstasy (1965), opposite Charlton Heston as Michelangelo. He also acted in a Hindi film Shalimar alongside Indian Bollywood stars Dharmendra and Zeenat Aman as well as appearing opposite Richard Burton as one of two aging homosexuals in Staircase (1969).
Personal life
Alexander Walker wrote: "in looks and temperament, Rex went back to the Elizabethans. They would have called him 'a man of passionate parts'. His physique and looks were far more striking once middle age had literally stretched too smooth and callow a youthful face into a long, saturnine physiognomy, whose hooded eyes and wide mouth had satyr-like associations for some people."
Harrison was married six times. In 1942, he divorced his first wife, Noel Margery Colette-Thomas, and married actress Lilli Palmer the next year; they later appeared together in numerous plays and films, including The Four Poster. Whilst married to Palmer, he built a villa at Portofino, San Genesio, where over the years he hosted showbiz royalty including Laurence Olivier and John Gielgud and real ex-royalty in the Duke of Windsor and his wife.
In 1947, while married to Palmer, Harrison began an affair with actress Carole Landis. Landis took her own life in 1948 after spending the evening with Harrison. Harrison's involvement in the scandal by waiting several hours before calling a doctor and police briefly damaged his career and his contract with Fox was ended by mutual consent. Harrison and Palmer divorced in 1957.
In 1957, Harrison married the actress Kay Kendall. Kendall died of myeloid leukaemia in 1959. Terence Rattigan's 1973 play In Praise of Love was written about the end of this marriage, and Harrison appeared in the New York production playing the character based on himself. Rattigan was said to be "intensely disappointed and frustrated" by Harrison's performance, as "Harrison refused to play the outwardly boorish parts of the character and instead played him as charming throughout, signalling to the audience from the start that he knew the truth about [the] illness." Critics however were quite pleased with the performance and although it did not have a long run, it was yet another of Harrison's well-plotted naturalistic performances.
He was subsequently married to Welsh actress Rachel Roberts from 1962 to 1971. In 1980, despite his having married twice since their divorce, Roberts made a final attempt to win Harrison back, which proved to be futile; she took her own life that same year.
Harrison then married Elizabeth Rees-Williams, divorcing in 1975; finally, in 1978, he married Mercia Tinker, his sixth and final wife. Harrison's eldest son Noel Harrison became an Olympic skier, singer and occasional actor; he toured in several productions including My Fair Lady in his father's award-winning role; Noel died suddenly of a heart attack on 19 October 2013 at age 79. Rex's younger son Carey Harrison is a playwright and social activist.
Harrison's sister Sylvia was married to David Maxwell Fyfe, a lawyer, Conservative politician and judge who was successively the lead British prosecutor at Nuremberg, Home Secretary and Lord Chancellor (head of the English judiciary); after his death she married another Cabinet minister, Lord de la Warr.
Chronology of Harrison's six marriages:
Noel M Colette-Thomas, 1934–1942 (divorced); one son, the actor/singer Noel Harrison, (29 January 1934 – 19 October 2013)
Lilli Palmer, 1943–1957 (divorced); one son, the novelist/playwright Carey Harrison
Kay Kendall, 1957–1959 (her death)
Rachel Roberts, 1962–1971 (divorced)
Elizabeth Harris, 1971–1975 (divorced); three stepsons, Damian Harris, Jared Harris, and Jamie Harris
Mercia Tinker, 1978–1990 (his death)
Grandchildren:
Granddaughters: Cathryn, Harriott, Chloe, Chiara, Rosie, Faith
Grandsons: Will, Simon, Sam
Harrison owned properties in London, New York City and Portofino, Italy. His villa in Portofino was named San Genesio after the patron saint of actors.
Later career
Having retired from films after A Time to Die, Harrison continued to act on Broadway and the West End until the end of his life, despite suffering from glaucoma, painful teeth, and a failing memory. He was nominated for a third Tony Award in 1984 for his performance as Captain Shotover in the revival of George Bernard Shaw's Heartbreak House. He followed with two successful pairings with Claudette Colbert, The Kingfisher in 1985 and Aren't We All? in 1986. In 1989, he appeared with Edward Fox in The Admirable Crichton in London. In 1989/90, he appeared on Broadway in The Circle by W. Somerset Maugham, opposite Glynis Johns, Stewart Granger, and Roma Downey. The production opened at Duke University for a three-week run followed by performances in Baltimore and Boston before opening 14 November 1989 on Broadway.
Death
Harrison died from the effects of pancreatic cancer at his home in Manhattan, New York City, on 2 June 1990 at the age of 82. He had only been diagnosed with the disease a short time before. The stage production in which he was appearing at the time, The Circle, came to an end upon his death.
His body was cremated, some of his ashes being subsequently scattered in Portofino, and the rest being scattered at his second wife Lilli Palmer's grave at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California, in the Commemoration section, Map 1, Lot 4066, Space 2.
Harrison's second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy (), was published posthumously in 1991.
Honours and legacy
On 17 June 1989, Harrison was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace.
Rex Harrison has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one at 6906 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to films, and the other at 6380 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to television. Harrison is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
Due to his association with the checked wool hat which he wore both in the Broadway and film versions of My Fair Lady, the style of headwear was often named "The Rex Harrison."
Seth MacFarlane, creator of the animated series Family Guy, modelled the voice of the character Stewie Griffin after Harrison after seeing him in the film adaptation of My Fair Lady.
Rex Harrison mask used by CIA
Ex-CIA chief of disguise Jonna Mendez stated in 2019 that a mask of Harrison was used by multiple CIA agents for covert work. The moulds of his face were larger and so could fit over a smaller agents face. The molds were made from aluminium and bought from Hollywood film facilities. She mentioned that his likeness was "taking part in a lot of operations".
According to Mendez, Rex Harrison's aluminium facial props mold was used as a baseline for over-the-head masks that the agency would create and use operationally. The masks came in small, medium and large sizes, with Rex's mold becoming the agency's standard 'large' size. Subsequently, many undercover operatives' real identities were disguised by masks bearing Rex's facial features.
Filmography
Film
Television
Radio
Stage
Radio appearances
References
Sources
Further reading
Harrison, Rex (1991). A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy.
Garland, Patrick (1998). The Incomparable Rex. (1998)
Roberts, David (2006). British Hit Singles & Albums (19th ed.). London: Guinness World Records Limited.
(Includes an interview with Harrison's son, Carey)
External links
Selected performances in Theatre Archive University of Bristol
Rex Harrison interview on BBC Radio 4 Desert Island Discs, 26 October 1979
1908 births
1990 deaths
20th-century English male actors
20th Century Fox contract players
Actors awarded knighthoods
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Musical or Comedy Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
British expatriate male actors in the United States
Burials at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Glendale)
Deaths from cancer in New York (state)
David di Donatello winners
Deaths from pancreatic cancer
Drama Desk Award winners
English expatriates in the United States
English male film actors
English male stage actors
English male television actors
English memoirists
Knights Bachelor
Male actors from Merseyside
People educated at Liverpool College
People from Huyton
Royal Air Force officers
Royal Air Force personnel of World War II
Special Tony Award recipients
Tony Award winners | false | [
"The 9th annual Genie Awards were held March 22, 1988, and honoured Canadian films released in 1987. The ceremony was held at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre and was co-hosted by Megan Follows and Gordon Pinsent.\n\nThe awards were dominated by Night Zoo (Un zoo la nuit), which won a still unmatched thirteen awards. The film garnered 14 nominations overall; the film's only nomination that failed to translate into a win was Gilles Maheu's nod for Best Actor, as he lost to the film's other Best Actor nominee, Roger Lebel. The female acting awards were won by Sheila McCarthy and Paule Baillargeon for the film I've Heard the Mermaids Singing, the only other narrative feature film to win any Genie awards that year; only the Documentary and Short Film awards, in which neither Night Zoo nor I've Heard the Mermaids Singing were even eligible for consideration, were won by any other film.\n\nWinners and nominees\n\nReferences\n\n09\nGenie\nGenie\nGenie",
"Le Cousin is a 1997 French film directed by Alain Corneau.\n\nPlot \nThe film deals with the relationship of the police and an informant in the drug scene.\n\nAwards and nominations\nLe Cousin was nominated for 5 César Awards but did not win in any category.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1997 films\n1997 crime films\nFilms about drugs\nFilms directed by Alain Corneau\nFrench crime films\nFrench films\nFrench-language films"
]
|
[
"Rex Harrison",
"Youth and stage career",
"where did he grow up",
"Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire,",
"what year was he born",
"I don't know.",
"when did his stage career start",
"He first appeared on the stage in 1924",
"what was his first performance",
"He acted in the West End of London",
"was it well recieved",
"appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role.",
"what was he most well known for early on",
"He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII",
"did he win any other awards",
"(and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the musical My Fair Lady,"
]
| C_a6bbfd0732884c53a6ca05f08d6696e6_1 | what did the critics have to say about any of his work | 8 | What did the critics have to say about any of Rex Harrison's work? | Rex Harrison | Harrison was born at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (nee Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. He first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. Harrison's acting career was interrupted during World War II while serving in the Royal Air Force, reaching the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He acted in the West End of London when he was young, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role. He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews. Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple. CANNOTANSWER | Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, | Sir Reginald Carey "Rex" Harrison (5 March 1908 – 2 June 1990) was an English actor. Harrison began his career on the stage in 1924. He made his West End debut in 1936 appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, in what was his breakthrough role. He won his first Tony Award for his performance as Henry VIII in the play Anne of the Thousand Days in 1949. He won his second Tony for the role of Professor Henry Higgins in the stage production of My Fair Lady in 1957.
In addition to his stage career, Harrison also appeared in numerous films. His first starring role was opposite Vivien Leigh in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937). Receiving critical acclaim for his performance in Major Barbara (1941), which was shot in London during the Blitz, his roles since then included Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), Cleopatra (1963), My Fair Lady (1964), reprising his role as Henry Higgins which earned him the Academy Award for Best Actor, and the titular character in Doctor Dolittle (1967).
In 1975, Harrison released his first autobiography. In June 1989, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II. He was married six times and had two sons: Noel and Carey Harrison. He continued working in stage productions until shortly before his death from pancreatic cancer in June 1990 at the age of 82. His second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy, was published posthumously in 1991.
Early life
Reginald Carey Harrison was born on 5 March, 1908 at Derry House in Huyton, Lancashire, the son of Edith Mary (née Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He was the youngest of three children and had two older sisters, Edith Marjorie Harrison (1900-1976) and Sylvia Margaret Sackville (née Harrison), Countess De La Warr, DBE (1903 or 1904-1992). He was educated at Liverpool College. After a bout of childhood measles, Harrison lost most of the sight in his left eye, which on one occasion caused some on-stage difficulty. To lift Harrison’s spirits up after undergoing this challenge, his mother took him to the theater. Harrison became determined to pursue a career in acting after seeing a production at a local theater when he was a child. He refused to take acting lessons and he never took an acting lesson during his six decade long career. Despite his refusal to take acting lessons, he managed to land his very first acting gig when he was 16 years old. Harrison supported Everton FC. He gave himself the stage name “Rex” when he was a child after learning that the name meant “king” in Latin.
Stage career
Harrison first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. His acting career was interrupted by World War II, during
which he served in the Royal Air Force and reached the rank of Flight Lieutenant. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He made his West End debut in 1936, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role, and established him as a leading light comedian of the English stage.
He alternated appearances in London and New York in such plays as Bell, Book and Candle (1950), Venus Observed, The Cocktail Party, The Kingfisher and The Love of Four Colonels, which he also directed. He won his first Tony Award for his appearance at the Shubert Theatre as Henry VIII in Maxwell Anderson's play Anne of the Thousand Days and international superstardom (and a second Tony) for his portrayal of Henry Higgins in the stage musical My Fair Lady, where he appeared opposite Julie Andrews.
Later appearances included Pirandello's Henry IV, a 1984 appearance at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?, and one on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre presented by Douglas Urbanski, at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox. He returned as Henry Higgins in the revival of My Fair Lady directed by Patrick Garland in 1981, cementing his association with the plays of George Bernard Shaw, which included a Tony nominated performance as Shotover in Heartbreak House, Julius Caesar in Caesar and Cleopatra, and General Burgoyne in a Los Angeles production of The Devil's Disciple.
Cinema appearances
Harrison's film debut was in The Great Game (1930). His first starring role was in the romantic comedy Storm in a Teacup (1937), opposite Vivien Leigh. Other notable early films include The Citadel (1938), Night Train to Munich (1940), Major Barbara (1941)—filmed in London during The Blitz of 1940, a role for which he received critical acclaim, Blithe Spirit (1945), Anna and the King of Siam (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), and The Foxes of Harrow (1947). He is best known for his portrayal of Professor Henry Higgins in the 1964 film version of My Fair Lady, based on the 1956 Broadway production (which in turn was based on George Bernard Shaw's 1913 play Pygmalion), for which Harrison won an Oscar for Best Actor.
He also starred in 1967's Doctor Dolittle. At the height of his box office clout after the success of My Fair Lady, Harrison proved a temperamental force during production, demanding auditions for prospective composers after musical playwright Leslie Bricusse was contracted and demanding to have his singing recorded live during shooting, only to agree to have it re-recorded in post-production. He also disrupted production with incidents with his wife, Rachel Roberts and deliberate misbehavior, such as when he intentionally moved his yacht in front of cameras during shooting in St. Lucia and refused to move it out of sight due to contract disputes. Harrison was at one point temporarily replaced by Christopher Plummer, until he agreed to be more cooperative.
He starred in the 1968 comedy The Honey Pot, a modern adaptation of Ben Jonson's play Volpone. Two of his co-stars, Maggie Smith and Cliff Robertson, were to become lifelong friends. Both spoke at his New York City memorial at the Little Church Around the Corner when Harrison died in 1990.
Harrison was not by any objective standards a singer (the talking on pitch style he used in My Fair Lady was adopted by many other classically trained actors with limited vocal ranges); the music was written to allow for long periods of recitative, or "speaking to the music". Nevertheless, "Talk to the Animals", which Harrison performed in Doctor Dolittle, won the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1967.
Despite excelling in comedy (Noël Coward described him as "The best light comedy actor in the world—except for me."), he attracted favorable notices in dramatic roles such as his portrayal of Julius Caesar in Cleopatra (1963) and as Pope Julius II in The Agony and the Ecstasy (1965), opposite Charlton Heston as Michelangelo. He also acted in a Hindi film Shalimar alongside Indian Bollywood stars Dharmendra and Zeenat Aman as well as appearing opposite Richard Burton as one of two aging homosexuals in Staircase (1969).
Personal life
Alexander Walker wrote: "in looks and temperament, Rex went back to the Elizabethans. They would have called him 'a man of passionate parts'. His physique and looks were far more striking once middle age had literally stretched too smooth and callow a youthful face into a long, saturnine physiognomy, whose hooded eyes and wide mouth had satyr-like associations for some people."
Harrison was married six times. In 1942, he divorced his first wife, Noel Margery Colette-Thomas, and married actress Lilli Palmer the next year; they later appeared together in numerous plays and films, including The Four Poster. Whilst married to Palmer, he built a villa at Portofino, San Genesio, where over the years he hosted showbiz royalty including Laurence Olivier and John Gielgud and real ex-royalty in the Duke of Windsor and his wife.
In 1947, while married to Palmer, Harrison began an affair with actress Carole Landis. Landis took her own life in 1948 after spending the evening with Harrison. Harrison's involvement in the scandal by waiting several hours before calling a doctor and police briefly damaged his career and his contract with Fox was ended by mutual consent. Harrison and Palmer divorced in 1957.
In 1957, Harrison married the actress Kay Kendall. Kendall died of myeloid leukaemia in 1959. Terence Rattigan's 1973 play In Praise of Love was written about the end of this marriage, and Harrison appeared in the New York production playing the character based on himself. Rattigan was said to be "intensely disappointed and frustrated" by Harrison's performance, as "Harrison refused to play the outwardly boorish parts of the character and instead played him as charming throughout, signalling to the audience from the start that he knew the truth about [the] illness." Critics however were quite pleased with the performance and although it did not have a long run, it was yet another of Harrison's well-plotted naturalistic performances.
He was subsequently married to Welsh actress Rachel Roberts from 1962 to 1971. In 1980, despite his having married twice since their divorce, Roberts made a final attempt to win Harrison back, which proved to be futile; she took her own life that same year.
Harrison then married Elizabeth Rees-Williams, divorcing in 1975; finally, in 1978, he married Mercia Tinker, his sixth and final wife. Harrison's eldest son Noel Harrison became an Olympic skier, singer and occasional actor; he toured in several productions including My Fair Lady in his father's award-winning role; Noel died suddenly of a heart attack on 19 October 2013 at age 79. Rex's younger son Carey Harrison is a playwright and social activist.
Harrison's sister Sylvia was married to David Maxwell Fyfe, a lawyer, Conservative politician and judge who was successively the lead British prosecutor at Nuremberg, Home Secretary and Lord Chancellor (head of the English judiciary); after his death she married another Cabinet minister, Lord de la Warr.
Chronology of Harrison's six marriages:
Noel M Colette-Thomas, 1934–1942 (divorced); one son, the actor/singer Noel Harrison, (29 January 1934 – 19 October 2013)
Lilli Palmer, 1943–1957 (divorced); one son, the novelist/playwright Carey Harrison
Kay Kendall, 1957–1959 (her death)
Rachel Roberts, 1962–1971 (divorced)
Elizabeth Harris, 1971–1975 (divorced); three stepsons, Damian Harris, Jared Harris, and Jamie Harris
Mercia Tinker, 1978–1990 (his death)
Grandchildren:
Granddaughters: Cathryn, Harriott, Chloe, Chiara, Rosie, Faith
Grandsons: Will, Simon, Sam
Harrison owned properties in London, New York City and Portofino, Italy. His villa in Portofino was named San Genesio after the patron saint of actors.
Later career
Having retired from films after A Time to Die, Harrison continued to act on Broadway and the West End until the end of his life, despite suffering from glaucoma, painful teeth, and a failing memory. He was nominated for a third Tony Award in 1984 for his performance as Captain Shotover in the revival of George Bernard Shaw's Heartbreak House. He followed with two successful pairings with Claudette Colbert, The Kingfisher in 1985 and Aren't We All? in 1986. In 1989, he appeared with Edward Fox in The Admirable Crichton in London. In 1989/90, he appeared on Broadway in The Circle by W. Somerset Maugham, opposite Glynis Johns, Stewart Granger, and Roma Downey. The production opened at Duke University for a three-week run followed by performances in Baltimore and Boston before opening 14 November 1989 on Broadway.
Death
Harrison died from the effects of pancreatic cancer at his home in Manhattan, New York City, on 2 June 1990 at the age of 82. He had only been diagnosed with the disease a short time before. The stage production in which he was appearing at the time, The Circle, came to an end upon his death.
His body was cremated, some of his ashes being subsequently scattered in Portofino, and the rest being scattered at his second wife Lilli Palmer's grave at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California, in the Commemoration section, Map 1, Lot 4066, Space 2.
Harrison's second autobiography, A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy (), was published posthumously in 1991.
Honours and legacy
On 17 June 1989, Harrison was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace.
Rex Harrison has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one at 6906 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to films, and the other at 6380 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to television. Harrison is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
Due to his association with the checked wool hat which he wore both in the Broadway and film versions of My Fair Lady, the style of headwear was often named "The Rex Harrison."
Seth MacFarlane, creator of the animated series Family Guy, modelled the voice of the character Stewie Griffin after Harrison after seeing him in the film adaptation of My Fair Lady.
Rex Harrison mask used by CIA
Ex-CIA chief of disguise Jonna Mendez stated in 2019 that a mask of Harrison was used by multiple CIA agents for covert work. The moulds of his face were larger and so could fit over a smaller agents face. The molds were made from aluminium and bought from Hollywood film facilities. She mentioned that his likeness was "taking part in a lot of operations".
According to Mendez, Rex Harrison's aluminium facial props mold was used as a baseline for over-the-head masks that the agency would create and use operationally. The masks came in small, medium and large sizes, with Rex's mold becoming the agency's standard 'large' size. Subsequently, many undercover operatives' real identities were disguised by masks bearing Rex's facial features.
Filmography
Film
Television
Radio
Stage
Radio appearances
References
Sources
Further reading
Harrison, Rex (1991). A Damned Serious Business: My Life in Comedy.
Garland, Patrick (1998). The Incomparable Rex. (1998)
Roberts, David (2006). British Hit Singles & Albums (19th ed.). London: Guinness World Records Limited.
(Includes an interview with Harrison's son, Carey)
External links
Selected performances in Theatre Archive University of Bristol
Rex Harrison interview on BBC Radio 4 Desert Island Discs, 26 October 1979
1908 births
1990 deaths
20th-century English male actors
20th Century Fox contract players
Actors awarded knighthoods
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Musical or Comedy Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
British expatriate male actors in the United States
Burials at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Glendale)
Deaths from cancer in New York (state)
David di Donatello winners
Deaths from pancreatic cancer
Drama Desk Award winners
English expatriates in the United States
English male film actors
English male stage actors
English male television actors
English memoirists
Knights Bachelor
Male actors from Merseyside
People educated at Liverpool College
People from Huyton
Royal Air Force officers
Royal Air Force personnel of World War II
Special Tony Award recipients
Tony Award winners | true | [
"The Book on Adler (subtitle: The Religious Confusion of the Present Age, Illustrated by Magister Adler as a Phenomenon, A Mimical Monograph) is a work by the Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, written during his second authorship, and was published posthumously in 1872. The work is partly about pastor Adolph Peter Adler who claimed to have received a revelation. After some questionable acts, Adler was subsequently dismissed from his pastor duties. Adler later claimed it was work of genius, and not of revelation. \n\nThe rest of the work focuses on the concept of authority and how it relates to Adler's situation. Kierkegaard was against claims of received revelation without due consideration.\n\nReception\nThe American philosopher Stanley Cavell helped to re-introduce the book to modern philosophical readers in his collection Must We Mean What We Say? (1969).\n\nJohannes Hohlenberg, a student of Kierkegaard's writings, said of the work: \"The book is extraordinarily revealing, because it shows the working of Kierkegaard's mind better than any of the other books. If we want to get an idea of what qualitative dialectics has to say when turned upon a very definite question, we ought to study the book about Adler\".\n\nReferences \n\nBook on Adler\nBook on Adler",
"\n\nTrack listing\n Opening Overture\n \"I Get a Kick Out of You\" (Cole Porter)\n \"You Are the Sunshine of My Life\" (Stevie Wonder)\n \"You Will Be My Music\" (Joe Raposo)\n \"Don't Worry 'bout Me\" (Ted Koehler, Rube Bloom)\n \"If\" (David Gates)\n \"Bad, Bad Leroy Brown\" (Jim Croce)\n \"Ol' Man River\" (Jerome Kern, Oscar Hammerstein II)\n Famous Monologue\n Saloon Trilogy: \"Last Night When We Were Young\"/\"Violets for Your Furs\"/\"Here's That Rainy Day\" (Harold Arlen, E.Y. Harburg)/(Matt Dennis, Tom Adair)/(Jimmy Van Heusen, Johnny Burke)\n \"I've Got You Under My Skin\" (Porter)\n \"My Kind of Town\" (Sammy Cahn, Van Heusen)\n \"Let Me Try Again\" (Paul Anka, Cahn, Michel Jourdan)\n \"The Lady Is a Tramp\" (Richard Rodgers, Lorenz Hart)\n \"My Way\" (Anka, Claude Francois, Jacques Revaux, Gilles Thibaut)\n\nFrank Sinatra's Monologue About the Australian Press\nI do believe this is my interval, as we say... We've been having a marvelous time being chased around the country for three days. You know, I think it's worth mentioning because it's so idiotic, it's so ridiculous what's been happening. We came all the way to Australia because I chose to come here. I haven't been here for a long time and I wanted to come back for a few days. Wait now, wait. I'm not buttering anybody at all. I don't have to. I really don't have to. I like coming here. I like the people. I love your attitude. I like the booze and the beer and everything else that comes into the scene. I also like the way the country's growing and it's a swinging place.\n\nSo we come here and what happens? We gotta run all day long because of the parasites who chase us with automobiles. That's dangerous, too, on the road, you know. Might cause an accident. They won't quit. They wonder why I won't talk to them. I wouldn't drink their water, let alone talk to them. And if any of you folks in the press are in the audience, please quote me properly. Don't mix it up, do it exactly as I'm saying it, please. Write it down very clearly. One idiot called me up and he wanted to know what I had for breakfast. What the hell does he care what I had for breakfast? I was about to tell him what I did after breakfast. Oh, boy, they're murder! We have a name in the States for their counterparts: They're called parasites. Because they take and take and take and never give, absolutely, never give. I don't care what you think about any press in the world, I say they're bums and they'll always be bums, everyone of them. There are just a few exceptions to the rule. Some good editorial writers who don't go out in the street and chase people around. Critics don't bother me, because if I do badly, I know I'm bad before they even write it, and if I'm good, I know I'm good before they write it. It's true. I know best about myself. So, a critic is a critic. He doesn't anger me. It's the scandal man who bugs you, drives you crazy. It's the two-bit-type work that they do. They're pimps. They're just crazy, you know. And the broads who work in the press are the hookers of the press. Need I explain that to you? I might offer them a buck and a half... I'm not sure. I once gave a chick in Washington $2 and I overpaid her, I found out. She didn't even bathe. Imagine what that was like, ha, ha.\n\nNow, it's a good thing I'm not angry. Really. It's a good thing I'm not angry. I couldn't care less. The press of the world never made a person a star who was untalented, nor did they ever hurt any artist who was talented. So we, who have God-given talent, say, \"To hell with them.\" It doesn't make any difference, you know. And I want to say one more thing. From what I see what's happened since I was last here... what, 16 years ago? Twelve years ago. From what I've seen to happen with the type of news that they print in this town shocked me. And do you know what is devastating? It's old-fashioned. It was done in America and England twenty years ago. And they're catching up with it now, with the scandal sheet. They're rags, that's what they are. You use them to train your dog and your parrot. What else do I have to say? Oh, I guess that's it. That'll keep them talking to themselves for a while. I think most of them are a bunch of fags anyway. Never did a hard day's work in their life. I love when they say, \"What do you mean, you won't stand still when I take your picture?\" All of a sudden, they're God. We gotta do what they want us to do. It's incredible. A pox on them... Now, let's get down to some serious business here...\n\nSee also\nConcerts of Frank Sinatra\n\nFrank Sinatra"
]
|
[
"Atsuko Maeda",
"Solo career"
]
| C_43a49646497d4b2aa67d27f849ae4d47_0 | What was maeda's solo career like? | 1 | What was maeda's solo career like? | Atsuko Maeda | On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut with her debut single "Flower", released on June 22. It was met with commercial success in Japan, debuting at number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies. The follow-up single "Kimi wa Boku Da", released in June 2012, was Maeda's last solo single while still a member of AKB48. It debuted at number two on the Oricon charts and reached number one on the Billboard Japan Hot 100. On June 15, 2013, at AKB48's handshake event held at Makuhari Messe, AKB48 announced that Maeda would appear as a special guest at the group's summer concert series at the Sapporo Dome on July 31. There], she performed her third single, "Time Machine Nante Iranai" (taimumashinnanteiranai, I don't need a time machine), which was later released on September 18. It was selected to be the theme song for the live-action adaptation of Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (Yamada and the Seven Witches). Maeda described the song as "cheerful and fun" and hoped it would liven up the show. "Time Machine Nante Iranai" eventually peaked at number one on the Oricon Daily charts, and number two on the Oricon Weekly chart. On Billboard's Japan Hot 100, it debuted at number one and stayed there for just the week of September 30. Maeda's 4th single "Seventh Code" was released on March 5, 2014. It was used as the theme song of the movie "Seventh Code" in which Maeda herself starred in. It debuted at number 4 on the Oricon charts and reached number three on the Billboard Japan Hot 100. On December 12, 2015, it was announced that Maeda's first album will be released later the next year. Eventually, the album is set to be released on June 22, 2016. CANNOTANSWER | It was met with commercial success in Japan, | is a Japanese actress and singer. She is a former member of the idol girl group AKB48, and was one of the most prominent members in the group at the time, regarded as the group's "absolute ace", "immovable center", and the "Face of AKB." After graduating from AKB48 on August 27, 2012, Maeda has since then continued with a solo singing and acting career.
Career
AKB48
Maeda was born in Ichikawa, Chiba. At age 14, she became a member of AKB48's first group, Team A, which was composed of 24 girls and debuted on December 8, 2005.
In 2009, Maeda won the first edition of AKB48's annual general elections, which are described as a popularity contest. As a result, she was the headlined performer for the group's 13th single, "Iiwake Maybe". The following year, she placed second overall, but still had a significant choreography position in the lineup for "Heavy Rotation". Later that year, AKB48 employed a rock-paper-scissors tournament to determine the top spot of AKB48's 19th major single "Chance no Junban". Maeda placed 15th, which secured her a spot on title track. Maeda also won the group's third general election held in 2011.
Maeda was one of the members who sang on every AKB48 title track since the group's inception. Her streak of A-side appearances ended in 2011, when she lost to Team K captain Sayaka Akimoto at a rock-paper-scissors tournament which determined the featured members for the group's 24th single "Ue kara Mariko".
On March 25, 2012, during an AKB48 Concert at the Saitama Super Arena, Maeda announced that she would leave the group. This caused a large buzz in the Japanese news, and spawned a rumor (later proved false) that a student from University of Tokyo had committed suicide over the announcement. AKB48 later announced that Maeda would leave after the Tokyo Dome concerts; For her final performance, there were 229,096 requests filed for seat tickets. Her farewell performance and ceremony occurred on August 27 at the AKB48 theater, and was streamed live on YouTube.
Solo career
On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut with her debut single "Flower", released on June 22. It was met with commercial success in Japan, debuting at number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies.
The follow-up single "Kimi wa Boku Da", released in June 2012, was Maeda's last solo single while still a member of AKB48. It debuted at number two on the Oricon charts and reached number one on the Billboard Japan Hot 100.
On June 15, 2013, at AKB48's handshake event held at Makuhari Messe, AKB48 announced that Maeda would appear as a special guest at the group's summer concert series at the Sapporo Dome on July 31. There], she performed her third single, , which was later released on September 18. It was selected to be the theme song for the live-action adaptation of Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (Yamada and the Seven Witches). Maeda described the song as "cheerful and fun" and hoped it would liven up the show. "Time Machine Nante Iranai" eventually peaked at number one on the Oricon Daily charts, and number two on the Oricon Weekly chart. On Billboard's Japan Hot 100, it debuted at number one and stayed there for just the week of September 30.
Maeda's 4th single "Seventh Code" was released on March 5, 2014. It was used as the theme song of the movie "Seventh Code" in which Maeda herself starred. It debuted at number 4 on the Oricon charts and reached number three on the Billboard Japan Hot 100.
On December 12, 2015, it was announced that Maeda's first album would be released later the next year. Eventually, the album was set to be released on June 22, 2016.
Acting career
In 2007, Maeda played a supporting role in the film Ashita no Watashi no Tsukurikata, which was her debut as an actress. She starred in the 2011 film Moshidora and appeared in Nobuhiro Yamashita's 2012 film Kueki Ressha. She also starred in Hideo Nakata's 2013 horror film The Complex. It was announced that she would co-star with Tony Leung Chiu-wai in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's film 1905.
In 2013, Maeda starred in a series of 30-second station ID videos for Music On! TV where she played Tamako, a Tokyo University graduate who does not find a job and lives at home where she just eats and sleeps, over the course of the four seasons. This became a TV drama special, and was developed into a full-fledged film, Tamako in Moratorium, the last of which was planned for a theater release in November 2013.
Maeda starred in the film Seventh Code, in which she plays a Japanese woman in Russia who is trying to track down a guy she previously met. The film was shown at the Rome Film Festival in November 2013, and was released for a short theater run in January 2014. She released a single of the same name on March 5.
In May 2015, it was announced that Maeda had been cast in the role of Kyoko Yoshizawa, the female lead of the anime and manga series Dokonjō Gaeru (The Gutsy Frog), in a live-action version of the story set to air on Nippon TV in July.
In 2016, she took the lead role of the drama "Busujima Yuriko no Sekirara Nikki" on TBS. The first episode is set to air on April 20, 2016.
In 2019, she appeared in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's To the Ends of the Earth (旅のおわり世界のはじまり), playing Yoko, a television host and would-be singer who goes to Uzbekistan with a small crew to shoot a travel documentary. In the film, she twice sings the classic Édith Piaf anthem, Hymne à l'amour (with Japanese lyrics], including in the finale.
Personal life
Maeda married actor Ryo Katsuji; they registered their marriage on July 30, 2018. She gave birth to their first child, a son in 2019. On April 23, 2021, she announced that they have amicably divorced.
Stage credits
A listing of Maeda's participation in AKB48's theatre programs, called stages:
2005-2006: Team A 1st Stage:
small group songs: "Skirt, Hirari" (1st + 2nd units) and "Hoshi no Ondo" (2nd unit)
2006: Team A 2nd Stage:
small group songs: ""Nageki no Figure", "Nagisa no Cherry", "Senaka kara Dakishimete", "Rio no Kakumei"
2006-2007: Team A 3rd Stage:
small group songs: "Nage Kiss de Uchi Otose!" and "Seifuku ga Jama o Suru"
2007, 2008: Team A 4th Stage:
small group songs: "7ji 12fun no Hatsukoi"
2007: Himawari-gumi 1st Stage:
small group songs: "Idol Nante Yobanaide" (1st unit)
2007-2008: Himawari-gumi 2nd Stage:
small group songs " Hajimete no Jelly Beans" (1st unit)
2008-2010: Team A 5th Stage:
small group songs: "Kuroi Tenshi"
2010-2012: Team A 6th Stage:
small group songs "Ude o Kunde"
Discography
Solo singles
AKB48
DVDs
Mubōbi (2011)
Filmography
Films
Television dramas
Swan no Baka!: Sanmanen no Koi (2007)
Shiori to Shimiko no Kaiki Jikenbo (2008)
Taiyo to Umi no Kyoshitsu (2008)
Majisuka Gakuen (2010)
Ryōmaden (2010)
Q10 (2010)
Sakura Kara no Tegami (2011)
Hanazakari no Kimitachi e (2011)
Majisuka Gakuen 2 (2011)
Saikou no Jinsei (2012)
Kasuka na Kanojo (2013)
Nobunaga Concerto Episode 3 (2014)
Leaders (2014) - Misuzu Shimabara
Kageri Yuku Natsu (2015) – Yu Kahara (witness of infant kidnapping case)
Dokonjō Gaeru (2015)
Majisuka Gakuen 5 (2015)
Busujima Yuriko no Sekirara Nikki (2016) - Yuriko Busujima
Gou Gou, The Cat 2 - Iida (2016)
Shuukatsu Kazoku(2017)
Inspector Zenigata - Detective Natsuki Sakuraba (2017)
Leaders 2 (2017) - Misuzu Shimabara
The Legendary Mother (2020)
Television shows
AKBingo! (2008–2012)
Shukan AKB (2009–2012)
AKB48 Nemōsu TV (2008–2012)
Gachi Gase (2012)
Documentaries
Documentary of AKB48: The Future 1 mm Ahead (2011)
Documentary of AKB48: To Be Continued (2011)
Documentary of AKB48: Show Must Go On (2012)
Documentary of AKB48: No Flower Without Rain (2013)
Radio shows
Atsuko Maeda's Heart Songs (2010–2013)
Bibliography
Hai (2009)
Acchan in Hawaii (2010)
Maeda Atsuko in Tokyo (2010)
Atsuko in NY (2010)
Bukiyō (2012)
AKB48 Sotsugyo Kinen Photobook "Acchan" (2012)
Awards and nominations
Notes
References
External links
Official agency profile at Ohta Pro
1991 births
Living people
AKB48 members
Japanese idols
Japanese women pop singers
Sony Music Entertainment Japan artists
Japanese child actresses
People from Ichikawa, Chiba
King Records (Japan) artists
Musicians from Chiba Prefecture
Japanese film actresses
21st-century Japanese actresses
21st-century Japanese women singers
21st-century Japanese singers | true | [
"was a Japanese samurai clan who occupied most of the Hokuriku region of central Honshū from the end of the Sengoku period through the Meiji restoration of 1868. The Maeda claimed descent from the Sugawara clan of Sugawara no Kiyotomo and Sugawara no Michizane in the eighth and ninth centuries; however, the line of descent is uncertain. The Maeda rose to prominence as daimyō of Kaga Domain under the Edo period Tokugawa shogunate, which was second only to the Tokugawa clan in kokudaka.\n\nOrigins\n\"Maeda\" is a place name in Kaitō District of western Owari Province, and was the seat of the senior branch of the Maeda clan in the Azuchi-Momoyama period. Maeda Nagatane (1550-1631) entered into the service of Maeda Toshiie, and his descendants became hereditary retainers of the Maeda clan of Kaga Domain. This branch received the kazoku peerage title of danshaku (baron) after the Meiji restoration.\n\nA cadet branch of the Owari Maeda were given the castle of Arako in what is now part of Nakagawa-ku, Nagoya. Maeda Toshimasa (d.1560) entered the service of Oda Nobuhide, who nominally ruled Owari Province from his seat at Kiyosu Castle. His son, Maeda Toshihisa (d.1587) also served the Oda clan, and was ordered to retire in favour of his brother, Maeda Toshiie.\n\nAnother notable member of the family was Maeda Toshimasu, commonly known as Maeda Keiji. Though he was biologically the son of Takigawa Kazumasu, he was adopted by Maeda Toshihisa, the older brother of Maeda Toshiie. He was recognized as a renowned warrior. According to legend, he broke the front line of the Mogami clan leading a group of just eight riders during a battle in which he fought for the Uesugi clan.\n\nSengoku and Edo period \nMaeda Toshiie was one of the leading generals under Oda Nobunaga. He began his career as a page, rising through the ranks a member of the akahoro-shū (赤母衣衆), under Nobunaga's personal command and later became an infantry captain (ashigaru taishō 足軽大将). From his youth, he was a close confidant of Nobunaga and a friend of Toyotomi Hideyoshi. After defeating the Asakura clan, he fought under Shibata Katsuie in the Hokuriku region in the suppression of the Ikkō-ikki, and participated in the 1570 Battle of Anegawa and the 1577 Battle of Tedorigawa. He was eventually granted the fief of Fuchu in Etchū Province (30,000 koku), and in 1581 was given Noto Province (230,000 koku), to which he added his other territories in Kaga Province to form Kaga Domain. After Nobunaga's death, he pledged fealty to Toyotomi Hideyoshi, and his territories were expanded to cover all of the three provinces of Noto, Kaga and Etchū, with a kokudaka of well over a million koku. Toshiie divided his fief among his sons. His eldest son Maeda Toshinaga participated in the Battle of Sekigahara and built Kanazawa Castle; he also was recognised as daimyō of Kaga Domain under the Tokugawa shogunate.\n\nThe Maeda clan attempted to maintain good relations with the Tokugawa clan through marriage ties, and, although a tozama clan, were permitted to use the \"Matsudaira\" name as an honorific patronym. \n \nThe Maeda clan continued to rule Kaga Domain from their headquarters in Kanazawa from 1583 until the Meiji restoration in 1868. Maeda Toshitsune established two cadet branches of the clan at Toyama and Daishōji. Another cadet branch of the clan was established by Maeda Toshitaka, the fifth son of Maeda Toshiie, at Nanokaichi Domain in Kōzuke Province. All of these cadet branches also continued to be ruled by the Maeda clan until the Meiji restoration. However, the Maeda clan was often beset by O-Ie Sōdō incidents, and many of the clan heads died young, or without heir. The clan did not play a prominent role in the Meiji restoration. After the start of the Meiji period, the former heads of the various branches of the Maeda clan were made peers under the kazoku peerage system.\n\nHead Family\n\nOwari-Arako\n Maeda Toshitaka\n Maeda Toshimasa\n Maeda Toshihisa (d.1587)\n Maeda Toshiie\n Maeda Hidetsugu (d. 1586)\n\nMino\n\n Maeda Nagatane (1550-1631)\n Maeda Naotomo (1586-1630)\n Maeda Naomasa (1605-1631)\n Maeda Takasada (1628-1707)\n Maeda Takayuki (1663-1721)\n Maeda Takasuke (1683-1753)\n Maeda Takamasa (1723-1777)\n Maeda Takatomo (1759-1832)\n Maeda Takamoto (1808-1856)\n Maeda Takanaka (1840-1857)\n Maeda Takanori (1847-1888)\n Maeda Ko\n Maeda Takayuki\n Maeda Takaya\n\nKaga\n\n Maeda Toshitaka\n Maeda Toshimasa\n Maeda Toshiie\n Maeda Toshinaga\n Maeda Toshitsune\n Maeda Mitsutaka\n Maeda Tsunanori\n Maeda Yoshinori\n Maeda Munetoki\n Maeda Shigehiro\n Maeda Shigenobu\n Maeda Shigemichi\n Maeda Harunaga\n Maeda Narinaga\n Maeda Nariyasu\n Maeda Yoshiyasu\n Maeda Toshitsugu (1858-1900)\n Toshinari Maeda\n Toshitatsu Maeda (1908-1989)\n Toshiyasu Maeda (b.1935)\n Toshinori Maeda (b.1963, Heir)\n Toshiyuki Maeda (2nd generation heir)\n\nToyama\n Maeda Toshitsugu (1617 – 1674)\n Maeda Masatoshi (1649 – 1706) \n Maeda Toshioki (1678 – 1733) \n Maeda Toshitaka (1690 – 1745)\n Maeda Toshiyuki (1730 – 1762) \n Maeda Toshitomo (1737 – 1794) \n Maeda Toshihisa (1762 – 1787) \n Maeda Toshinori (1768 – 1801)\n Maeda Toshitsuyo (1772 – 1836)\n Maeda Toshiyasu (Toyama)\n Maeda Toshitomo (1834 – 1854)\n Maeda Toshikata (1835 – 1904) \n Maeda Toshiatsu (1856 – 1921) \n Maeda Toshio (1886 – 1966)\n Maeda Toshinobu\n Maeda Akitoshi\n\nDaishoji\n Maeda Toshiharu (1618 – 1660)\n Maeda Toshiaki I (1638 – 1692)\n Maeda Toshinao (1672 – 1711) \n Maeda Toshiakira (1691 – 1737)\n Maeda Toshimichi I (1733 – 1781)\n Maeda Toshiaki II (1758 – 1791)\n Maeda Toshitane (1760 – 1788)\n Maeda Toshiyasu (1779 – 1806) \n Maeda Toshikore (1785 – 1837) \n Maeda Toshinaka (1812 – 1838) \n Maeda Toshihira (1824 – 1849) \n Maeda Toshinori (1833 – 1855) \n Maeda Toshimichi II (1835 – 1855)\n Maeda Toshika (1841 – 1920) \n Maeda Toshimitsu (1905-?)\n Maeda Toshihiro (b.1929)\n\nDaishōjishinden\n Maeda Toshimasa (Toshiharu) (1684-1709)\n\nNanokaichi\n Maeda Toshitaka\n Maeda Toshimoto (1625-1685)\n Maeda Toshihiro (1645-1693)\n Maeda Toshiyoshi (1670-1695)\n Maeda Toshifuda (1689-1708)\n Maeda Toshitada (1699-1756)\n Maeda Toshihisa (1762 – 1787)\n Maeda Toshiakira (1691 – 1737)\n Maeda Toshimochi (1768-1828)\n Maeda Toshiyoshi (1791-1839)\n Maeda Toshiakira (1823-1877)\n Maeda Toshikaki (1850-1896)\n Maeda Toshisada\n Maeda Toshitami\n Maeda Fumisada\n\nSee also\n\n Kaga Domain\n Toyama Domain\n Daishōji Domain\n Nanokaichi Domain\n\nReferences\n Iwao, Seiichi. (1978). Biographical dictionary of Japanese history. Berkeley: University of California.\n Papinot, Jacques Edmund Joseph. (1906) Dictionnaire d'histoire et de géographie du japon. Tokyo: Librarie Sansaisha. Nobiliaire du japon (2003, abridged online text of 1906 book).\n\n \nJapanese clans\nDaimyo",
"was one of the leading generals of Oda Nobunaga following the Sengoku period of the 16th century extending to the Azuchi–Momoyama period. His preferred weapon was a yari and he was known as \"Yari no Mataza\" (槍の又左), Matazaemon (又左衛門) being his common name. He was the husband of Maeda Matsu. The highest rank from the court that he received is the Great Counselor Dainagon (大納言).\n\nEarly life\n\nHis father was Maeda Toshimasa and his wife was Maeda Matsu. His childhood name was \"Inuchiyo\" (犬千代).\nToshiie was born in the village of Arako (present-day Nakagawa-ku, Nagoya), He was the fourth of seven brothers, of Maeda Toshimasa, who held Arako Castle. Toshiie served Oda Nobunaga from childhood (first as a page) and his loyalty was rewarded by being allowed to be the head of the Maeda clan, very unusual for a fourth son with no apparent failures among his elder brothers. Just like Nobunaga, Toshiie was also a delinquent, usually dressed in the outlandish style of a kabukimono. It is believed he also became a friend to Kinoshita Tokichiro (later Toyotomi Hideyoshi) in their youth. Just as Hideyoshi was known as Saru, 猴 or \"monkey,\" it is believed that Toshiie was called Inu, 犬 or \"dog\" by Nobunaga. Due to a long-standing belief that dogs and monkeys are never friendly to each other, Toshiie is often depicted as reserved and stern, in contrast to Hideyoshi's talkative and easy-going nature.\n\nMilitary life\n\nToshiie began his career as a member of the akahoro-shū (赤母衣衆), the unit under Oda Nobunaga's personal command. He later became an infantry captain (ashigaru taishō 足軽大将) in the Oda army. During his military career, Toshiie made the acquaintance of many important figures, such as Hashiba Hideyoshi, Sassa Narimasa, Niwa Nagahide, Ikeda Tsuneoki, and others. Toshiie also was a lifelong rival of Tokugawa Ieyasu. After defeating the Asakura clan, Maeda fought under Shibata Katsuie in the Hokuriku area.\n\nHe participated in the 1560 Battle of Okehazama, the 1567 Siege of Inabayama, the 1570 Battle of Anegawa, the 1575 Battle of Nagashino, the 1577 Battle of Tedorigawa. He was eventually granted the fief of Fuchu, and a han (Kaga Domain) spanning Noto and Kaga Provinces. Despite its small size, Kaga was a highly productive province which would eventually develop into the wealthiest han in Edo period Japan, with a net worth of 1 million koku (百万石); thus, it was nicknamed Kaga Hyaku-man-goku (加賀百万石).\n\nToshiie benefited from a core group of very capable senior vassals. Some, like Murai Nagayori and Okumura Nagatomi, were retainers of long standing with the Maeda.\n\nAfter Nobunaga's assassination at Honnō-ji (本能寺) by Akechi Mitsuhide and Mitsuhide's subsequent defeat by Hideyoshi, he battled Hideyoshi under Shibata's command in the Battle of Shizugatake 1583. After Shibata's defeat, Toshiie worked for Hideyoshi and became one of his leading generals. Somewhere during this time he was forced to fight another of his friends, Sassa Narimasa. Narimasa was greatly outnumbered and felled by Toshiie, following the major Maeda victory at the Battle of Suemori Castle 1584. Later, he fought in the Odawara Campaign 1590.\n\nDeath\n\nBefore dying in 1598, Hideyoshi named Toshiie to the council of Five Elders to support Toyotomi Hideyori until he was old enough to take control on his own. However, Toshiie himself was ailing, and could manage to support Hideyori for only a year before he died as well in 1599. \nToshiie was succeeded by his son Toshinaga.\n\nFamily\n\nFather: Maeda Toshimasa\nMother: Nagayowai-in (d.1573)\nSiblings:\n Maeda Toshihisa (d. 1583)\n Maeda Toshifusa\n Sawaki Yoshiyuki (d. 1572)\nHalf-Siblings:\n Maeda Yasukatsu (d. 1594)\n Maeda Hidetsugu (d. 1585)\n Maeda Masa (given in marriage to Takabatake Sadayoshi)\n\nToshiie's wife, Maeda Matsu, was famous in her own right. Strong-willed from childhood, she was well-versed in the martial arts and was instrumental in Toshiie's rise to success. After her husband died, Matsu, then known by her Buddhist nun name of Hoshun-in, assured the safety of the Maeda clan after the year 1600 by voluntarily going as a hostage to Edo, capital of the new shōgun, Tokugawa Ieyasu, whom she loathed throughout her life as she watched him, her husband, and Hideyoshi compete for power.\nWives, concubines, children:\n Wife: Maeda Matsu (1547-1617)\n First Daughter: Kohime (1559–1616) married Maeda Nagatane\n First Son: Maeda Toshinaga (1562-1614)\n Second daughter: Shohime married Nakagawa Mitsushige\n Third daughter: Maahime (1572–1605) become Toyotomi Hideyoshi’s concubine later Madenokoji Atsufusa’s concubine\n Fourth daughter: Gohime (1574–1634) married Ukita Hideie, Toyotomi Hideyoshi's adopted daughter\n Fifth Daughter: Yome, Asano Yoshinaga's fiancée\n Second Son: Maeda Toshimasa (1578-1633)\n Seventh Daughter: Chisehime (1580–1641) married Hosokawa Tadataka later married Murai Nagatsugu\n Concubine: Chiyobo (1570-1631) later Kinse-in\n Fourth son: Maeda Toshitsune (1594-1658)\n Concubine: Oiwa, later Ryujo-in\n Sixth daughter: Maeda Kikuhime (1578–1584)\n Ninth daughter: Yoshi, Takeda Nobuyoshi's fiancée, later married Shinohara Sadahide\n 3 boys (early life)\n Concubine: Ozai, later Kinse-in\n Eighth daughter: Fuku, married Cho Yoshitsura, later married Nakagawa Mitsutada\n Third son: Maeda Tomoyoshi (1591-1628)\n Concubine: Jufuku-in\n Fifth son: Maeda Toshitaka (1594–1637)\n Concubine: Kaishoin\n Sixth son: Maeda Toshisada (1598-1620)\n unknown\n girl (early life)\n Nephew: Maeda Toshimasu (1543-1612)\nTheir sons all became daimyōs in their own right. Their daughters married into prestigious families; the eldest, Kō, married Maeda Nagatane, a distant relative of Toshiie who became a senior Kaga retainer; Ma'a, was a concubine of Toyotomi Hideyoshi later Married Marikouji Mitsurubo, Gō was adopted by Hideyoshi and became the wife of Ukita Hideie, and Chise, who was first wedded to Hosokawa Tadaoki's son Tadataka, later married Murai Nagayori's son Nagatsugu. Sho married Nakagawa Mitsushige. Toshi married Shinohara Sadahide. Fuku married Nakagawa Mitsutada.\n\nŌdenta sword\n\"Ōdenta\" or \"Great Denta\" or \"The Best among Swords Forged by Denta\". Along with \"Onimaru\" and \"Futatsu-mei\", the sword was considered to be one of the three regalia swords of the shoguns of the Ashikaga clan. Later passed down to Maeda Toshiie. A legend says the sword healed a daughter of Toshiie and another legend says birds never try to approach to a warehouse where this sword is stored.\n\nIn popular culture\nHe is a playable character in video game Sengoku Basara 2 (PS2) and an unplayable character in video game Sengoku Basara 4 (PS3). He wields a large Nodachi and fire-based attacks. In anime, they were initially servants of Oda Nobunaga, later turned to Toyotomi Hideyoshi.\nHe is a playable character in the video game \"Samurai warriors 2 Extreme legends\" (PS2) and appears in every major samurai warriors title following his first appearance . He wields a single sword and twin spears.\n\nHonours\nJunior First Rank (24 March 1599; posthumously)\n\nSee also\n Battle of Nagashino\n People of the Sengoku period in popular culture\n\nFurther reading\nHanagasaki Moriaki 花ケ前盛明, ed. Maeda Toshiie no Subete 前田利家のすべて. Tokyo: Shin Jinbutsu Ōraisha 新人物往来社, 2001.\nIwasawa Yoshihiko 岩沢愿彥. Maeda Toshiie 前田利家. Tokyo: Yoshikawa Kōbunkan 吉川弘文館, 1966.\nKitamura Saburō 北村三郎. Maeda Toshiie monogatari: Kaga hyakumangoku no so 前田利家物語:加賀百万石の祖. Kanazawa: Hokkoku Shuppansha 北国出版社, 1978.\nMaeda Toshiyasu 前田利祐. Omatsu to Toshiie: Kaga hyakumangoku wo tsukutta hitobito おまつと利家:加賀百万石を創った人びと. Tokyo: Shūeisha 集英社, 2001.\nTsumoto Yō 津本陽. Maeda Toshiie 前田利家. Tokyo: Kōdansha 講談社, 1994.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nBuke-kaden page on the Maeda clan (in Japanese)\nMaeda Genealogy (in Japanese)\nGenealogy of Kanazawa-han daimyo, including Toshiie (in Japanese)\nBiography (in Japanese)\n\n1539 births\n1599 deaths\nDaimyo\nTairō\nMaeda clan\nJapanese pages\nPeople from Nagoya\nOda retainers\nToyotomi retainers\nDeified Japanese people"
]
|
[
"Atsuko Maeda",
"Solo career",
"What was maeda's solo career like?",
"It was met with commercial success in Japan,"
]
| C_43a49646497d4b2aa67d27f849ae4d47_0 | When did Maeda get his big break? | 2 | When did Maeda gets big break? | Atsuko Maeda | On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut with her debut single "Flower", released on June 22. It was met with commercial success in Japan, debuting at number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies. The follow-up single "Kimi wa Boku Da", released in June 2012, was Maeda's last solo single while still a member of AKB48. It debuted at number two on the Oricon charts and reached number one on the Billboard Japan Hot 100. On June 15, 2013, at AKB48's handshake event held at Makuhari Messe, AKB48 announced that Maeda would appear as a special guest at the group's summer concert series at the Sapporo Dome on July 31. There], she performed her third single, "Time Machine Nante Iranai" (taimumashinnanteiranai, I don't need a time machine), which was later released on September 18. It was selected to be the theme song for the live-action adaptation of Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (Yamada and the Seven Witches). Maeda described the song as "cheerful and fun" and hoped it would liven up the show. "Time Machine Nante Iranai" eventually peaked at number one on the Oricon Daily charts, and number two on the Oricon Weekly chart. On Billboard's Japan Hot 100, it debuted at number one and stayed there for just the week of September 30. Maeda's 4th single "Seventh Code" was released on March 5, 2014. It was used as the theme song of the movie "Seventh Code" in which Maeda herself starred in. It debuted at number 4 on the Oricon charts and reached number three on the Billboard Japan Hot 100. On December 12, 2015, it was announced that Maeda's first album will be released later the next year. Eventually, the album is set to be released on June 22, 2016. CANNOTANSWER | On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut | is a Japanese actress and singer. She is a former member of the idol girl group AKB48, and was one of the most prominent members in the group at the time, regarded as the group's "absolute ace", "immovable center", and the "Face of AKB." After graduating from AKB48 on August 27, 2012, Maeda has since then continued with a solo singing and acting career.
Career
AKB48
Maeda was born in Ichikawa, Chiba. At age 14, she became a member of AKB48's first group, Team A, which was composed of 24 girls and debuted on December 8, 2005.
In 2009, Maeda won the first edition of AKB48's annual general elections, which are described as a popularity contest. As a result, she was the headlined performer for the group's 13th single, "Iiwake Maybe". The following year, she placed second overall, but still had a significant choreography position in the lineup for "Heavy Rotation". Later that year, AKB48 employed a rock-paper-scissors tournament to determine the top spot of AKB48's 19th major single "Chance no Junban". Maeda placed 15th, which secured her a spot on title track. Maeda also won the group's third general election held in 2011.
Maeda was one of the members who sang on every AKB48 title track since the group's inception. Her streak of A-side appearances ended in 2011, when she lost to Team K captain Sayaka Akimoto at a rock-paper-scissors tournament which determined the featured members for the group's 24th single "Ue kara Mariko".
On March 25, 2012, during an AKB48 Concert at the Saitama Super Arena, Maeda announced that she would leave the group. This caused a large buzz in the Japanese news, and spawned a rumor (later proved false) that a student from University of Tokyo had committed suicide over the announcement. AKB48 later announced that Maeda would leave after the Tokyo Dome concerts; For her final performance, there were 229,096 requests filed for seat tickets. Her farewell performance and ceremony occurred on August 27 at the AKB48 theater, and was streamed live on YouTube.
Solo career
On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut with her debut single "Flower", released on June 22. It was met with commercial success in Japan, debuting at number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies.
The follow-up single "Kimi wa Boku Da", released in June 2012, was Maeda's last solo single while still a member of AKB48. It debuted at number two on the Oricon charts and reached number one on the Billboard Japan Hot 100.
On June 15, 2013, at AKB48's handshake event held at Makuhari Messe, AKB48 announced that Maeda would appear as a special guest at the group's summer concert series at the Sapporo Dome on July 31. There], she performed her third single, , which was later released on September 18. It was selected to be the theme song for the live-action adaptation of Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (Yamada and the Seven Witches). Maeda described the song as "cheerful and fun" and hoped it would liven up the show. "Time Machine Nante Iranai" eventually peaked at number one on the Oricon Daily charts, and number two on the Oricon Weekly chart. On Billboard's Japan Hot 100, it debuted at number one and stayed there for just the week of September 30.
Maeda's 4th single "Seventh Code" was released on March 5, 2014. It was used as the theme song of the movie "Seventh Code" in which Maeda herself starred. It debuted at number 4 on the Oricon charts and reached number three on the Billboard Japan Hot 100.
On December 12, 2015, it was announced that Maeda's first album would be released later the next year. Eventually, the album was set to be released on June 22, 2016.
Acting career
In 2007, Maeda played a supporting role in the film Ashita no Watashi no Tsukurikata, which was her debut as an actress. She starred in the 2011 film Moshidora and appeared in Nobuhiro Yamashita's 2012 film Kueki Ressha. She also starred in Hideo Nakata's 2013 horror film The Complex. It was announced that she would co-star with Tony Leung Chiu-wai in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's film 1905.
In 2013, Maeda starred in a series of 30-second station ID videos for Music On! TV where she played Tamako, a Tokyo University graduate who does not find a job and lives at home where she just eats and sleeps, over the course of the four seasons. This became a TV drama special, and was developed into a full-fledged film, Tamako in Moratorium, the last of which was planned for a theater release in November 2013.
Maeda starred in the film Seventh Code, in which she plays a Japanese woman in Russia who is trying to track down a guy she previously met. The film was shown at the Rome Film Festival in November 2013, and was released for a short theater run in January 2014. She released a single of the same name on March 5.
In May 2015, it was announced that Maeda had been cast in the role of Kyoko Yoshizawa, the female lead of the anime and manga series Dokonjō Gaeru (The Gutsy Frog), in a live-action version of the story set to air on Nippon TV in July.
In 2016, she took the lead role of the drama "Busujima Yuriko no Sekirara Nikki" on TBS. The first episode is set to air on April 20, 2016.
In 2019, she appeared in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's To the Ends of the Earth (旅のおわり世界のはじまり), playing Yoko, a television host and would-be singer who goes to Uzbekistan with a small crew to shoot a travel documentary. In the film, she twice sings the classic Édith Piaf anthem, Hymne à l'amour (with Japanese lyrics], including in the finale.
Personal life
Maeda married actor Ryo Katsuji; they registered their marriage on July 30, 2018. She gave birth to their first child, a son in 2019. On April 23, 2021, she announced that they have amicably divorced.
Stage credits
A listing of Maeda's participation in AKB48's theatre programs, called stages:
2005-2006: Team A 1st Stage:
small group songs: "Skirt, Hirari" (1st + 2nd units) and "Hoshi no Ondo" (2nd unit)
2006: Team A 2nd Stage:
small group songs: ""Nageki no Figure", "Nagisa no Cherry", "Senaka kara Dakishimete", "Rio no Kakumei"
2006-2007: Team A 3rd Stage:
small group songs: "Nage Kiss de Uchi Otose!" and "Seifuku ga Jama o Suru"
2007, 2008: Team A 4th Stage:
small group songs: "7ji 12fun no Hatsukoi"
2007: Himawari-gumi 1st Stage:
small group songs: "Idol Nante Yobanaide" (1st unit)
2007-2008: Himawari-gumi 2nd Stage:
small group songs " Hajimete no Jelly Beans" (1st unit)
2008-2010: Team A 5th Stage:
small group songs: "Kuroi Tenshi"
2010-2012: Team A 6th Stage:
small group songs "Ude o Kunde"
Discography
Solo singles
AKB48
DVDs
Mubōbi (2011)
Filmography
Films
Television dramas
Swan no Baka!: Sanmanen no Koi (2007)
Shiori to Shimiko no Kaiki Jikenbo (2008)
Taiyo to Umi no Kyoshitsu (2008)
Majisuka Gakuen (2010)
Ryōmaden (2010)
Q10 (2010)
Sakura Kara no Tegami (2011)
Hanazakari no Kimitachi e (2011)
Majisuka Gakuen 2 (2011)
Saikou no Jinsei (2012)
Kasuka na Kanojo (2013)
Nobunaga Concerto Episode 3 (2014)
Leaders (2014) - Misuzu Shimabara
Kageri Yuku Natsu (2015) – Yu Kahara (witness of infant kidnapping case)
Dokonjō Gaeru (2015)
Majisuka Gakuen 5 (2015)
Busujima Yuriko no Sekirara Nikki (2016) - Yuriko Busujima
Gou Gou, The Cat 2 - Iida (2016)
Shuukatsu Kazoku(2017)
Inspector Zenigata - Detective Natsuki Sakuraba (2017)
Leaders 2 (2017) - Misuzu Shimabara
The Legendary Mother (2020)
Television shows
AKBingo! (2008–2012)
Shukan AKB (2009–2012)
AKB48 Nemōsu TV (2008–2012)
Gachi Gase (2012)
Documentaries
Documentary of AKB48: The Future 1 mm Ahead (2011)
Documentary of AKB48: To Be Continued (2011)
Documentary of AKB48: Show Must Go On (2012)
Documentary of AKB48: No Flower Without Rain (2013)
Radio shows
Atsuko Maeda's Heart Songs (2010–2013)
Bibliography
Hai (2009)
Acchan in Hawaii (2010)
Maeda Atsuko in Tokyo (2010)
Atsuko in NY (2010)
Bukiyō (2012)
AKB48 Sotsugyo Kinen Photobook "Acchan" (2012)
Awards and nominations
Notes
References
External links
Official agency profile at Ohta Pro
1991 births
Living people
AKB48 members
Japanese idols
Japanese women pop singers
Sony Music Entertainment Japan artists
Japanese child actresses
People from Ichikawa, Chiba
King Records (Japan) artists
Musicians from Chiba Prefecture
Japanese film actresses
21st-century Japanese actresses
21st-century Japanese women singers
21st-century Japanese singers | true | [
"is a Japanese writer and co-founder of the visual novel brand Key under Visual Arts. He is considered a pioneer of nakige visual novels, and has mainly contributed as a scenario writer, lyricist, and musical composer for the games the company produces. His style was originally inspired by James Herbert Brennan, and is influenced by Haruki Murakami's novel Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World.\n\nOriginally from Mie, Japan, Maeda graduated from Mie high school and later went on to graduate from Chukyo University with a major in psychology. Before forming Key, Maeda worked for the company Tactics where he had a hand in the creation of two games for that company, Moon and One: Kagayaku Kisetsu e. After forming Key, Maeda has put much work into such titles as Kanon, Air, Clannad, Little Busters!, Angel Beats!, Charlotte, Summer Pockets, and The Day I Became a God. He is also the author of a manga series titled Hibiki's Magic.\n\nEarly life\nJun Maeda started writing at a young age; while attending elementary school, Maeda wrote his first amateur gamebook. Maeda was initially inspired by the Grailquest series of gamebooks by J.H. Brennan, especially the first two books in the series The Castle of Darkness and The Den of Dragons which he found to be especially interesting. Through junior-high school, Maeda worked on the school newspaper and even had some short stories published in the paper. Once attending Mie high school, he started to write lyrics and compose music. It was at this time that he became immersed in the fantasy genre of fiction. While attending Chukyo University, Maeda managed to get some short stories published in Kadokawa Shoten's seinen light novel magazine The Sneaker. Finally, when he was writing his graduation thesis, he started listening to techno music.\n\nCareer\nWhile still attending university, Maeda sought to begin working as a musical composer for video games, and desired to work at big-name companies like Nihon Falcom Corporation, Namco, and Capcom, but he was unsuccessful. He eventually was able to be granted an interview with the video game developer TGL, but was unable to supply correct documentation, and did not get the job. As he was unable to get a job working with music, Maeda decided to change his occupational choice to that of a scenario writer for a video game company. At the time in the mid-1990s, scenario writers for consumer video games were inexperienced, so Maeda decided to shoot for adult games instead. During a period of one month, Maeda wrote a long, 300-page erotic story, intending to sell it to an adult game developer. He first tried with AliceSoft, makers of the popular Rance series, but finally ended up working for the company Scoop. At Scoop in 1997, he contributed as the main scenario writer for the company's first game, Chaos Queen Ryōko; however, Maeda was not happy with the work environment and promptly filed his resignation with the company shortly after finishing his work on the scenario.\n\nAround this time, Jun Maeda was inspired by Hiroyuki Kanno's pioneering 1996 visual novel YU-NO: A Girl Who Chants Love at the Bound of this World. It demonstrated the storytelling potential of the visual novel medium, and influenced Maeda's later works. After leaving Scoop in 1997, Maeda went to work for the newly formed company Tactics under the publisher Nexton. There, he went to work on the scenario and musical composition of Tactics' second game Moon, followed by his work on the scenario for their third game One: Kagayaku Kisetsu e in 1998. After realizing the positive reception received for both titles, Maeda and much of the staff who made both Moon and One, including Itaru Hinoue, Shinji Orito, Naoki Hisaya, and OdiakeS, left Tactics to work under the video game publishing company VisualArt's where they formed the company Key.\n\nAfter forming Key, Maeda worked on the music and scenario for their first title Kanon released in 1999, which proved to be very popular in the adult game market in Japan. Beside Maeda, the majority of Kanon scenario was written by Naoki Hisaya, but he quit Key shortly after Kanon was produced. Following this, Maeda wrote most of the scenario for Key's next title Air, along with again working as the lyricist and one of the composers for the music featured in the game. After a period of four years in 2004, Key released their third and longest game Clannad where Maeda did a vast amount of the writing for the game; in all, Maeda put in around 75% of the work that went into the creation of Clannad. Also in 2004, Maeda began writing his first manga entitled Hibiki's Magic, which was first conceived as a short story he wrote as a student. In 2005, Maeda worked on the scenario and music for Key's fifth game Tomoyo After: It's a Wonderful Life, followed by Key's sixth title Little Busters! released in July 2007 which he also worked on in regards to the scenario and music.\n\nMaeda was reported to say in the February 2007 issue of Comptiq that after the completion of Little Busters!, he would not be working on the scenario staff for Key any longer. However, in an interview in the December 2007 issue of Dengeki G's Magazine, Maeda said that he would still be working on the music for Key's next game. In 2007, Maeda also composed the ending theme for the game Himawari no Chapel de Kimi to for the company Marron, and he was on the music staff for Ram's game 5 released in July 2008. Maeda worked in collaboration with Na-Ga and ASCII Media Works' Dengeki G's Magazine to the anime series and mixed media project Angel Beats! as the planner and writer, as well as composing the anime's music. Maeda worked on Key's ninth game Rewrite with the composition of the game's music and as the quality checker.\n\nIn 2015, Maeda designed and co-wrote the scenario for the Angel Beats! visual novel, as well as composing some of the game's music. Maeda once again collaborated with Na-Ga, Dengeki G's Magazine, P.A. Works, and Aniplex to produce his second anime series Charlotte in 2015, contributing as the planner, writer, and composing the anime's music. In 2016, Maeda revealed that he is suffering from dilated cardiomyopathy. To recover from this condition, he will need a heart transplant. Maeda is credited for the original concept and the composition of the music for Key's visual novel Summer Pockets. Maeda collaborated with Na-Ga, P.A. Works, and Aniplex for a third time to produce the anime series The Day I Became a God in 2020, contributing as the planner and writer.\n\nWriting themes\nAs is prevalent in the scenarios Maeda has written for visual novels, there are recurring themes related to the concept of a family and the bonds that hold it together. Most prevalent are the maternal bonds felt between a mother and daughter relationship, as can be seen strongly in Kanon, Air, and Clannad. However, in one of his earliest works, Moon, there was a conflict between the female protagonist and her late mother. On the other hand, Maeda rarely includes detailed descriptions of a paternal relationship in his works, and only in Clannad did he explore such a relationship in any depth. Another recurring theme is that of magical realism, or adding fantastical elements into a story that would appear otherwise to be normal, such as with the concept of the illusionary world in Clannad, or the use of magic in Air and supernatural elements in Charlotte. Similarly, the concept of the switching between a real-life setting and the mystical Eternal World from One: Kagayaku Kisetsu e has been compared to Haruki Murakami's novel Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, which uses a similar dichotomy between reality and fantasy.\n\nAfter the production of Moon with its melancholic storylines, Maeda decided to shoot for what has later become known as a \"crying game\", starting with One: Kagayaku Kisetsu e. A crying game in this sense is a type of bishōjo game which can make the player cry for the characters, and thus give a more profound impact on the players. When working on Kanon with a similar goal, Maeda worked in depressing elements to the two heroines' stories he wrote for: Makoto Sawatari, and Mai Kawasumi.\n\nMusical involvement\nJun Maeda composes and writes lyrics for songs and background music featured in games he works on. At Tactics, he composed a single piece of music for Moon, but did not contribute to the music in One: Kagayaku Kisetsu e. At Key, Maeda has worked on the music for all of Key's titles except for Planetarian: The Reverie of a Little Planet and Rewrite Harvest festa!. He also composed and wrote the lyrics to the ending theme song for the Clannad anime series, and similarly for the opening theme song for the Clannad After Story anime series. Music that Maeda composes for Key titles is published on Key's record label Key Sounds Label. On the label, Maeda produced three singles and one album where he wrote and composed all the songs which include: \"Natsukage / Nostalgia\", \"Birthday Song,Requiem\", \"Spica/Hanabi/Moon\", and Love Song; the songs on the first three were sung by Lia and the fourth was sung by Riya.\n\nMaeda wrote and composed the two songs \"Doll\", performed separately by Lia and Aoi Tada, and \"Human\", performed by Lia; both versions of \"Doll\" were used as the main ending theme songs for the second season of the anime series Gunslinger Girl in 2008, while \"Human\" was used for the final episode. Maeda's first involvement as a main composer was with the 2008 visual novel 5 by Ram where he composed about twenty background music tracks. Maeda also wrote and composed the opening and ending themes used in 5. Maeda formed his own record label named Flaming June in 2011, and the first release on the label is the single \"Killer Song\" by Nagi Yanagi released in December 2011. Flaming June released an original concept album with Yanagi on April 25, 2012 titled Owari no Hoshi no Love Song. Maeda released the concept album Long Long Love Song featuring Anri Kumaki on July 26, 2017. In 2021, Maeda wrote and composed one song for The Idolmaster Cinderella Girls: Starlight Stage titled \"Beat of the Night\", performed by Kaoru Sakura.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n Key's official website \n Key Sounds Label official website \n Flaming June official website \n \n \n\n1975 births\nAnime composers\nHentai creators\nInteractive fiction writers\nJapanese composers\nJapanese film score composers\nJapanese male composers\nJapanese male film score composers\nJapanese songwriters\nJapanese video game designers\nJapanese writers\nKey (company)\nLiving people\nVideo game composers\nWriters from Mie Prefecture",
"is a 1958 black and white Japanese horror film directed by Kenji Misumi for Daiei Films.\n\nPlot\t\nWhen Lord Maeda loses his wife Lady Maeda, his retainer Tadokoro and lady-in-waiting Satsuki try to get him interested in their protege Natsue. But Maeda has taken an interest in Shino, the woman who cares for his little son Nobuchiyo, and protects his dead wife's black cat. Shino confides in her brother Takeuchi, a fencing teacher, that Maeda has asked her to marry him. He advises her to marry Maeda. When she objects, he tells her she must then be honest. Shino and the man she is in love with, Atsumi, meet secretly in a mausoleum and decide to tell Lord Maeda they wish to marry. Men led by Tadokoro and Satsuki attack them there, and Shino is killed. When they emtomb her in a wall of the mausoleum, they also bury the black cat behind the wall with her body. A cat's shadow begins to appear on the mausoleum wall, catlike noises are heard, and Satsuki falls ill. Painting over the wall has no effect; the cat's shadow just reappears. Maeda sleeps with Natsue. The ghost cat attacks her. The conspirators persuade Maeda to bring in a priest to exorcise the ghost, but they actually want him to cast a spell on Nobuchiyo to make him die, ensuring the succession of the child Natsue is going to have. Shino's ghost in human guise seduces Satsuki. The ghost cat chases Gendo across the roof. Tadokoro accidentally kills Satsuki while trying to escape. He and the chief steward try to kill Maeda again, but Takeuchi saves him. At last Maeda understands they are after him and he asks Takeuchi if he can bury his sister's body in the Maeda family crypt.\n\nCast \n Shintaro Katsu\n Yōko Uraji\n Mieko Kondo\n Chieko Murata\n Yōichi Funaki\n Akio Kobori\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n \n \n\nJapanese horror films\n1958 horror films\n1958 films\nFilms directed by Kenji Misumi\nJapanese films\nDaiei Film films\n1950s fantasy films\n1950s ghost films\nFilms about cats"
]
|
[
"Atsuko Maeda",
"Solo career",
"What was maeda's solo career like?",
"It was met with commercial success in Japan,",
"When did Maeda get his big break?",
"On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut"
]
| C_43a49646497d4b2aa67d27f849ae4d47_0 | How did fans react? | 3 | How did fans react on hearing Maeda announcement about her Solo debut? | Atsuko Maeda | On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut with her debut single "Flower", released on June 22. It was met with commercial success in Japan, debuting at number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies. The follow-up single "Kimi wa Boku Da", released in June 2012, was Maeda's last solo single while still a member of AKB48. It debuted at number two on the Oricon charts and reached number one on the Billboard Japan Hot 100. On June 15, 2013, at AKB48's handshake event held at Makuhari Messe, AKB48 announced that Maeda would appear as a special guest at the group's summer concert series at the Sapporo Dome on July 31. There], she performed her third single, "Time Machine Nante Iranai" (taimumashinnanteiranai, I don't need a time machine), which was later released on September 18. It was selected to be the theme song for the live-action adaptation of Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (Yamada and the Seven Witches). Maeda described the song as "cheerful and fun" and hoped it would liven up the show. "Time Machine Nante Iranai" eventually peaked at number one on the Oricon Daily charts, and number two on the Oricon Weekly chart. On Billboard's Japan Hot 100, it debuted at number one and stayed there for just the week of September 30. Maeda's 4th single "Seventh Code" was released on March 5, 2014. It was used as the theme song of the movie "Seventh Code" in which Maeda herself starred in. It debuted at number 4 on the Oricon charts and reached number three on the Billboard Japan Hot 100. On December 12, 2015, it was announced that Maeda's first album will be released later the next year. Eventually, the album is set to be released on June 22, 2016. CANNOTANSWER | number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies. | is a Japanese actress and singer. She is a former member of the idol girl group AKB48, and was one of the most prominent members in the group at the time, regarded as the group's "absolute ace", "immovable center", and the "Face of AKB." After graduating from AKB48 on August 27, 2012, Maeda has since then continued with a solo singing and acting career.
Career
AKB48
Maeda was born in Ichikawa, Chiba. At age 14, she became a member of AKB48's first group, Team A, which was composed of 24 girls and debuted on December 8, 2005.
In 2009, Maeda won the first edition of AKB48's annual general elections, which are described as a popularity contest. As a result, she was the headlined performer for the group's 13th single, "Iiwake Maybe". The following year, she placed second overall, but still had a significant choreography position in the lineup for "Heavy Rotation". Later that year, AKB48 employed a rock-paper-scissors tournament to determine the top spot of AKB48's 19th major single "Chance no Junban". Maeda placed 15th, which secured her a spot on title track. Maeda also won the group's third general election held in 2011.
Maeda was one of the members who sang on every AKB48 title track since the group's inception. Her streak of A-side appearances ended in 2011, when she lost to Team K captain Sayaka Akimoto at a rock-paper-scissors tournament which determined the featured members for the group's 24th single "Ue kara Mariko".
On March 25, 2012, during an AKB48 Concert at the Saitama Super Arena, Maeda announced that she would leave the group. This caused a large buzz in the Japanese news, and spawned a rumor (later proved false) that a student from University of Tokyo had committed suicide over the announcement. AKB48 later announced that Maeda would leave after the Tokyo Dome concerts; For her final performance, there were 229,096 requests filed for seat tickets. Her farewell performance and ceremony occurred on August 27 at the AKB48 theater, and was streamed live on YouTube.
Solo career
On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut with her debut single "Flower", released on June 22. It was met with commercial success in Japan, debuting at number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies.
The follow-up single "Kimi wa Boku Da", released in June 2012, was Maeda's last solo single while still a member of AKB48. It debuted at number two on the Oricon charts and reached number one on the Billboard Japan Hot 100.
On June 15, 2013, at AKB48's handshake event held at Makuhari Messe, AKB48 announced that Maeda would appear as a special guest at the group's summer concert series at the Sapporo Dome on July 31. There], she performed her third single, , which was later released on September 18. It was selected to be the theme song for the live-action adaptation of Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (Yamada and the Seven Witches). Maeda described the song as "cheerful and fun" and hoped it would liven up the show. "Time Machine Nante Iranai" eventually peaked at number one on the Oricon Daily charts, and number two on the Oricon Weekly chart. On Billboard's Japan Hot 100, it debuted at number one and stayed there for just the week of September 30.
Maeda's 4th single "Seventh Code" was released on March 5, 2014. It was used as the theme song of the movie "Seventh Code" in which Maeda herself starred. It debuted at number 4 on the Oricon charts and reached number three on the Billboard Japan Hot 100.
On December 12, 2015, it was announced that Maeda's first album would be released later the next year. Eventually, the album was set to be released on June 22, 2016.
Acting career
In 2007, Maeda played a supporting role in the film Ashita no Watashi no Tsukurikata, which was her debut as an actress. She starred in the 2011 film Moshidora and appeared in Nobuhiro Yamashita's 2012 film Kueki Ressha. She also starred in Hideo Nakata's 2013 horror film The Complex. It was announced that she would co-star with Tony Leung Chiu-wai in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's film 1905.
In 2013, Maeda starred in a series of 30-second station ID videos for Music On! TV where she played Tamako, a Tokyo University graduate who does not find a job and lives at home where she just eats and sleeps, over the course of the four seasons. This became a TV drama special, and was developed into a full-fledged film, Tamako in Moratorium, the last of which was planned for a theater release in November 2013.
Maeda starred in the film Seventh Code, in which she plays a Japanese woman in Russia who is trying to track down a guy she previously met. The film was shown at the Rome Film Festival in November 2013, and was released for a short theater run in January 2014. She released a single of the same name on March 5.
In May 2015, it was announced that Maeda had been cast in the role of Kyoko Yoshizawa, the female lead of the anime and manga series Dokonjō Gaeru (The Gutsy Frog), in a live-action version of the story set to air on Nippon TV in July.
In 2016, she took the lead role of the drama "Busujima Yuriko no Sekirara Nikki" on TBS. The first episode is set to air on April 20, 2016.
In 2019, she appeared in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's To the Ends of the Earth (旅のおわり世界のはじまり), playing Yoko, a television host and would-be singer who goes to Uzbekistan with a small crew to shoot a travel documentary. In the film, she twice sings the classic Édith Piaf anthem, Hymne à l'amour (with Japanese lyrics], including in the finale.
Personal life
Maeda married actor Ryo Katsuji; they registered their marriage on July 30, 2018. She gave birth to their first child, a son in 2019. On April 23, 2021, she announced that they have amicably divorced.
Stage credits
A listing of Maeda's participation in AKB48's theatre programs, called stages:
2005-2006: Team A 1st Stage:
small group songs: "Skirt, Hirari" (1st + 2nd units) and "Hoshi no Ondo" (2nd unit)
2006: Team A 2nd Stage:
small group songs: ""Nageki no Figure", "Nagisa no Cherry", "Senaka kara Dakishimete", "Rio no Kakumei"
2006-2007: Team A 3rd Stage:
small group songs: "Nage Kiss de Uchi Otose!" and "Seifuku ga Jama o Suru"
2007, 2008: Team A 4th Stage:
small group songs: "7ji 12fun no Hatsukoi"
2007: Himawari-gumi 1st Stage:
small group songs: "Idol Nante Yobanaide" (1st unit)
2007-2008: Himawari-gumi 2nd Stage:
small group songs " Hajimete no Jelly Beans" (1st unit)
2008-2010: Team A 5th Stage:
small group songs: "Kuroi Tenshi"
2010-2012: Team A 6th Stage:
small group songs "Ude o Kunde"
Discography
Solo singles
AKB48
DVDs
Mubōbi (2011)
Filmography
Films
Television dramas
Swan no Baka!: Sanmanen no Koi (2007)
Shiori to Shimiko no Kaiki Jikenbo (2008)
Taiyo to Umi no Kyoshitsu (2008)
Majisuka Gakuen (2010)
Ryōmaden (2010)
Q10 (2010)
Sakura Kara no Tegami (2011)
Hanazakari no Kimitachi e (2011)
Majisuka Gakuen 2 (2011)
Saikou no Jinsei (2012)
Kasuka na Kanojo (2013)
Nobunaga Concerto Episode 3 (2014)
Leaders (2014) - Misuzu Shimabara
Kageri Yuku Natsu (2015) – Yu Kahara (witness of infant kidnapping case)
Dokonjō Gaeru (2015)
Majisuka Gakuen 5 (2015)
Busujima Yuriko no Sekirara Nikki (2016) - Yuriko Busujima
Gou Gou, The Cat 2 - Iida (2016)
Shuukatsu Kazoku(2017)
Inspector Zenigata - Detective Natsuki Sakuraba (2017)
Leaders 2 (2017) - Misuzu Shimabara
The Legendary Mother (2020)
Television shows
AKBingo! (2008–2012)
Shukan AKB (2009–2012)
AKB48 Nemōsu TV (2008–2012)
Gachi Gase (2012)
Documentaries
Documentary of AKB48: The Future 1 mm Ahead (2011)
Documentary of AKB48: To Be Continued (2011)
Documentary of AKB48: Show Must Go On (2012)
Documentary of AKB48: No Flower Without Rain (2013)
Radio shows
Atsuko Maeda's Heart Songs (2010–2013)
Bibliography
Hai (2009)
Acchan in Hawaii (2010)
Maeda Atsuko in Tokyo (2010)
Atsuko in NY (2010)
Bukiyō (2012)
AKB48 Sotsugyo Kinen Photobook "Acchan" (2012)
Awards and nominations
Notes
References
External links
Official agency profile at Ohta Pro
1991 births
Living people
AKB48 members
Japanese idols
Japanese women pop singers
Sony Music Entertainment Japan artists
Japanese child actresses
People from Ichikawa, Chiba
King Records (Japan) artists
Musicians from Chiba Prefecture
Japanese film actresses
21st-century Japanese actresses
21st-century Japanese women singers
21st-century Japanese singers | true | [
"React is a media franchise used by the Fine Brothers consisting of several online series centering on a group of individuals reacting to viral videos, trends, video games, film trailers, or music videos. The franchise was launched with the YouTube debut of Kids React in October 2010, and then grew to encompass four more series uploaded on the Fine Brothers' primary YouTube channel, a separate YouTube channel with various reaction-related content, as well as a television series titled React to That.\n\nIn 2016, the duo announced React World, a program and channel in which they would license the format of their React shows to creators, which led to widespread negative reception from viewers and fellow content creators, as well as confusion about what their format is. This eventually lead to the Fine Brothers removing all videos related to React World, essentially pulling the plug on the React World program.\n\nYouTube series\n\nKids React\nBenny and Rafi Fine launched a series titled Kids React on October 16, 2010, the first video being \"Kids React to Viral Videos (Double Rainbow, Obama Fail, Twin Rabbits, Snickers Halloween)\". The Kids React series features The Fine Brothers (and one of the staff members since 2016), off-camera, showing kids ages 4–14 (7-13 as of September 2016, 7-11 as of October 2016) several viral videos or popular YouTubers and having the kids react to the videos.\n\nThe most popular Kids React episode to date is “Kids React to Gay Marriage\", with over 40.2 million views as of September 2, 2018. The popularity of Kids React made it possible for the online series to win a special Emmy Award at the 39th Daytime Emmy Awards in 2012. The Emmy Award, that was given in cooperation with AOL, was awarded to the Fine Brothers for \"Best Viral Video Series\". After their Emmy win, the brothers explained, \"Not a lot has changed [after winning the Emmy] other than realizing that there are shows on YouTube like React that can get similar if not better viewership than mainstream entertainment can.\"\n\nVideos and YouTube stars that have been reacted to by the kids include Smosh (who later reacted to the kids' reactions), planking and President Obama addressing the death of Osama bin Laden, among several other topics. Kids React has been compared to Kids Say the Darndest Things. In October 2012, the kids of the show were shown videos of the 2012 U.S. Presidential debates. Kids React won the Streamy Award for Best Non-Fiction or Reality Series in 2013.\n\nTeens React\nDue to the popularity of Kids React, The Fine Brothers spawned a spin-off dubbed Teens React on November 17, 2011 with \"TEENS REACT TO TWILIGHT\". The show has a similar premise to Kids React, however the younger stars are replaced with high school teenagers aged 14-18, some of whom have aged out of the Kids React series. Due to this, the Fine Brothers are able to show more mature and less \"kid-friendly\" videos such as videos on topics like Toddlers & Tiaras, Rick Perry's Strong commercial, Amanda Todd's death, and the 2012 U.S. Presidential debates. Other viral videos and YouTube stars that have been reacted to include Salad Fingers, the Overly Attached Girlfriend, \"Gangnam Style\", The Hunger Games trailer, Shane Dawson, and One Direction, among other topics. Later on, The Fine Brothers launched a series titled Teens React: Gaming consisting videos of teenagers reacting to popular games such as Mario Kart 64, Flappy Bird, Rocket League, and Five Nights at Freddy’s. Teens React launched the career of Lia Marie Johnson, it also featured some \"famous\" 'reactors' as guest stars, including Lisa Cimorelli, Amy Cimorelli, Lucas Cruikshank (who later appears in YouTubers React), Alex Steele, Jake Short, and Maisie Williams.\n\nElders React\nElders React was debuted in 2012 and it included seniors over the age of 55. In 2021, it became a subseries for Adults React.\n\nYouTubers React\nYouTubers React was debuted in 2012 and it included famous YouTubers. On November 2020, it is retitled Creators React due to the success of other social medias and is currently airing its one-off episodes as of June 2021.\n\nAdults React\nOn May 30, 2015, the Fine Brothers announced Adults React, which premiered on July 16 later that year. It consists of people ages 20 to 55, including former stars of Teens React that have aged out of the series. Depending on the video or topic, Adults React will be specific of which type of adults are going to be reacting, such as parents or college kids.\n\nParents React\n\nThe first episode of Parents React premiered on August 6, 2015 with “Parents React to Don’t Stay At School”. This series involves parents reacting to stuff that kids were getting into.\n\nCollege Kids React\nThe first episode of College Kids React premiered on June 23, 2016 with \"College Kids React to The 1975\". This series includes stars who have aged out of Teens React along with new stars, as well as stars that have not yet aged out of Teens React but have begun college. The content of College Kids React is similar to the content found in Teens React but more mature.\n\nOne-off episodes\nIn April 2014, as an April Fools joke, the Fine Brothers teamed up with Friskies and released Cats React, which went viral. In July 2016 they released another part of Cats React.\n\nIn August 2014, they released Celebrities React to Viral Videos, and now re-released yearly.\n\nIn April 2018, in another April Fools joke, they released \"Teens React to Nothing\" where they showed the teenagers on a blank screen. The following year, they released a sequel, \"nothing reacts to teens react to nothing.\", which featured the original video being played in an empty studio.\n\nReact YouTube channel\nAfter creating four individual successful React series on their primary YouTube channel, the Fine Brothers launched a separate YouTube channel in 2014, for reaction-related content, simply dubbed \"React\". With the intent of running programming five days a week, the channel launched with five series: React Gaming (a Let's Play-style series with real youths from their primary React series), Advice (a series featuring real youths respond to questions from viewers), React Remix (musical remixes of past React footage), People Vs. Foods (originally Kids Vs. Food until 2016) (a series featuring Reactors taste-test \"Weird\" or international foods), and Lyric Breakdown (a series in which Reactors break down the meaning of various songs). The channel launched with a teenage-focused playthrough of Goat Simulator.\nFrom September 18th 2020 to May 31st 2021, the React YouTube channel was retitled to \"REPLAY\", following the renaming of the main FBE channel to \"REACT\" in the wake of FBE's distancing from Benny and Rafi Fine as a consequence of the scandal in Summer 2020 that led to many reactors leaving the channel.\nOn June 1st 2021, REPLAY is retitled \"PEOPLE VS FOOD\" and moved all the non-food videos to REACT.\n\nReact to That\nIn early 2014, it was announced that the Fine Brothers made a deal with NCredible Entertainment, a production studio founded by Nick Cannon to develop a television series for Nickelodeon. The series, dubbed React to That, was \"entirely re-envisioned for television,\" as the reactors \"not only watch and respond to viral videos, but pop out of the reaction room and into showdowns where the clips come to life as each reactor is confronted with a challenge based on the video they just watched.\" Following the announcement of the series, Benny Fine explained, \"All these viewers now watching are also pioneering what it is to be a viewer of content. They follow us through all of our different endeavors, all our different series, and now will have the opportunity to follow us to another medium.\" Nickelodeon ordered 13 episodes to be produced, but only 12 were made and aired.\n\nReact World\n\nBackground\nIn July 2015, the Fine Brothers filed for trademark protection on \"React\" with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). The trademark was filed for \"Entertainment services, namely, providing an ongoing series of programs and webisodes via the internet in the field of observing and interviewing various groups of people.\" The USPTO approved for a 30-day opposition period which was set to begin on February 2, 2016; if no parties filed an opposition to the Fines' trademark request, it would have proceeded through the process. The brothers had recently filed for and been granted trademark registrations for \"Elders React\" and \"Teens React\" in 2013 as well as \"Kids React\" in 2012.\n\nAnnouncement details\nOn January 26, 2016, the Fines announced that they would be launching React World, a way to grant content creators the license to create their own versions of the React shows. Specifically, the Fine Brothers explained they were going to license the format of their React shows. A Variety report detailed that React World would \"aggregate videos in a channel to launch later this year to promote, support and feature fan-produced programming based on their shows.\" The brothers' company, Fine Brothers Entertainment (FBE) explained they would be working with YouTube and ChannelMeter on the launch of React World. FBE also expressed they would be able to monetize React-style videos uploaded under their license. On monetization, Digital Trends detailed \"Although licenses are free, React World creators must agree to share 20 percent of AdSense revenue and 30 percent of premium brand deals with FBE.\" Additionally, the Fines explained they would provide ongoing production guidance, creative guidelines, format bibles, and other resources, as well as promotional and technical support to those creators who participated with the brothers on React World.\n\nReception\nAlthough YouTube's VP on content partnerships, Kelly Merryman, originally proclaimed \"This is brand-building in the YouTube age — rising media companies building their brands through collaborations with creators around the world,\" the Fine Brothers were met with overwhelmingly negative reception to their React World announcement. BBC News reported that \"critics of the Fine Brothers have expressed concern they may use the trademarks to stifle competition,\" and quoted one YouTuber who detailed \"People don't trust them because a few years ago when Ellen DeGeneres did a similar video—not that similar, it didn't have the same format or branding—they claimed it was their format.\" Viewers and fellow content creators alike condemned the Fines for their announcement, with The Daily Dot reporting, \"Backlash poured in on Reddit and social media, and other YouTubers posted their own reactions and parodies of the enthusiastically corporate React World announcement video.\" The backlash led to a dramatic drop in subscribers, with upwards of 675,000 accounts collectively unsubscribing from the React and Fine Bros Entertainment channels as well as recent videos getting many dislikes in protest as of February 22, 2016. Mashable described that one Reddit post \"ignited a thread of haters, defenders and overall discussion about whether what Fine Brothers Entertainment is doing is fair.\" Ryan Morrison, a gamer, lawyer and Reddit user, declared that he would file a legal challenge to the Fine Brothers' trademark request on \"React\", writing \"These guys didn’t come up with the idea of filming funny reactions from kids. And they certainly don’t own an entire genre of YouTube videos. It wasn’t their idea, and it’s not theirs to own or police.\"\n\nThough there was an overwhelmingly negative response to the React World announcement, other personalities expressed milder opinions; Internet personality Hank Green wrote \"This could actually be a very cool project if it could be divorced from the idea of two very powerful creators attempting to control a very popular YouTube video format. Franchising one of YouTube's biggest shows? Yeah, I’d love to see how that goes.\" New York reporter Jay Hathaway wrote \"The trademark and React World are dead. And that's a shame, because it was an interesting idea that suffered from tone-deaf execution.\"\n\nResponses and discontinuation by the Fine Brothers\nAfter seeing the initial backlash from their announcement, The Fine Brothers posted comments on various social media websites including Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, and the comment section of their YouTube announcement video. On Facebook the Fines wrote, \"We do not own the idea or copyright for reaction videos overall, nor did we ever say we did. You don’t need anyone’s permission to make these kinds of videos, and we’re not coming after anyone\", adding \"We are in no way claiming reaction content in general is our intellectual property. This is purely a voluntary program for people wanting direct support from us, and we continue to be so excited to work with all of you who may want to participate\". They additionally tweeted \"We're not saying we hold a copyright on reaction videos overall, no one can. We're licensing our specific shows, like TV has done for years\". The brothers also explained they would \"not be trying to take revenue from other types of reaction videos, and will not be copyright-striking\". However, other YouTubers have reported multiple copyright related video takedowns. The Guardian also reported that unrelated channels featuring diverse groups of people reacting to videos were also removed after takedown requests from the Fine Brothers; the \"Seniors React\" video was noted to be released prior to the Fines launching their Elders React series. The Fines also posted an update video in response to what they described as \"confusion and negative response\" to React World, in which they try to clear up confusion on what their format encompasses, as well as inviting viewers to e-mail them about any further questions.\n\nUltimately, the Fine Brothers removed all React World videos, and posted a statement on Medium, declaring they have filed the paperwork to rescind all their \"React\" trademarks and applications, will discontinue the React World program, and will release all past Content ID claims. In their post, the brothers expressed \"It makes perfect sense for people to distrust our motives here, but we are confident that our actions will speak louder than these words moving forward\". Reaction to this Medium post was negative on Reddit, where users were reported commenting they would not forgive the Fine Brothers.\n\nAccolades\n\nReferences\n\nCitations\n\nSources\n\nFootnotes\n\nSee also \n Reaction video\n\n2010 web series debuts\nFullscreen (company) channels\nFullscreen Media franchises\nYouTube original programming",
"\"React\" is a song by American hip hop group Onyx. It was released on June 2, 1998 by JMJ Records, Rush Associated Labels and Def Jam as the third single from Onyx's third album, Shut 'Em Down. The song featured Onyx affiliates X1, Bonifucco and Still Livin' and a then unknown 50 Cent in his first official appearance on a song.\n\nProduced by Bud'da, React was successful on the R&B and rap charts, peaking at 62 on the US Billboard's Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks and 44 on the US Hot Rap Singles.\n\nAllmusic highlighted the song itself when they reviewed the album.\n\nBackground\n50 Cent mentioned Jam Master Jay as the man who put him on a song, during his book From Pieces to Weight: Once Upon a Time in Southside, Queens:\n\"...Jam Master Jay got me on a song called \"React\". At the time we did a song, no one expected it to be a single. They just put me on the song as a favor to Jay because I was the new nigga in his camp.\n\nMusic video\n\"React\" was the first music video directed by Director X; and it premiered on \"Rap City\" aired on BET on June 13, 1998. The video concept called for rappers to be hockey players. 50 Cent spoke on his appearance in the video \"React\" when asked about the last time he went ice-skating.\"...It actually was the Onyx video. I had to learn for the video. I didn't know why. I was like 'What the—?' I asked them to put me in the box. Like an actual [penalty box]\".\n\nThe video can be found on the 2008's DVD Onyx: 15 Years Of Videos, History And Violence.\n\nControversy\nThe beef between Onyx and 50 Cent started on Def Jam's \"Survival Of The Illest\" concert at the legendary world-famous Apollo Theater. The concert was held on July 18, 1998. During performing the song \"React\" rapper Scarred 4 Life (also known as Clay Da Raider) performed 50 Cent's verse. Later, 50 would diss Sticky Fingaz on a number of mixtapes, including 50's underground hit \"How To Rob\". Then he would fight with Fredro at the rehearsal for the 2003 VIBE Awards. In a 2008 interview for AllHipHop Fredro Starr made a comment about 50 Cent:\"...50 is a smart businessman and at the end of the day we gave him respect. We put him on records when we was at the top of the game. He didn't even have a car. We gave him respect on the strength of Jam Master Jay. What did we get in return? Someone talking slick on mixtapes? Swinging on n****s?\"\n\nReleases\n\n12\" vinyl single track listing\nA-Side:\n\"React\" (Radio Edit) - 4:25 (Featuring 50 Cent, Bonifucco, Still Livin, X1 [Uncredited])\n\"Broke Willies\" (Radio Edit) - 4:08 (Featuring X1 [Uncredited])\n\"Shut 'Em Down\" (Remix)- 4:07 (Featuring Big Pun, Noreaga)\n\nB-Side:\n\"React\" (TV track)- 4:26\n\"Broke Willies\" (TV Track) - 4:09\n\"Shut 'Em Down\" (Remix) (TV Track) - 4:07\n\nCD promo single track listing\n\"React\" (Radio Edit)- 4:26 (Featuring 50 Cent, Bonifucco, Still Livin, X1 [Uncredited])\n\"Broke Willies\" (Radio Edit)- 4:11 (Featuring X1 [Uncredited])\n\"Shut 'Em Down (Remix)\" (Radio Edit)- 4:02 (Featuring Big Pun, Noreaga)\n\nNotes\n The single version of \"Broke Willies\" is very different in music from the album version.\n\nSamples\n\"Eastside Connection\" by Frisco Disco\n\nNotes\n LL Cool J is the first rap artist who used the same sample in his 1985 song \"You'll Rock\" (Remix) produced by Rick Rubin.\n\nPersonnel \n Onyx - performer, vocals, co-producer (\"Broke Willies\")\n Fredro Starr - performer, vocals\n Sticky Fingaz - performer, vocals\n Sonny Seeza - performer, vocals\n Bud'da - producer (\"React\")\n Keith Horne - producer (\"Broke Willies\")\n Don Elliot - engineer (\"Broke Willies\")\n Self - producer (\"Shut 'Em Down (Remix)\")\n Ken \"DURO\" Ifill - engineer, mixing\n DJ LS One - engineer, mixing, scratches\n Patrick Viala - remixing (\"Shut 'Em Down (Remix)\")\n Tony Black - mixing, remixing (\"Shut 'Em Down (Remix)\")\n Tom Coyne - mastering\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nReact at Discogs\nReact at RapGenius\n\n1998 singles\nJMJ Records singles\n50 Cent songs\nOnyx (group) songs\nSongs written by 50 Cent\nMusic videos directed by Director X\nPosse cuts"
]
|
[
"Atsuko Maeda",
"Solo career",
"What was maeda's solo career like?",
"It was met with commercial success in Japan,",
"When did Maeda get his big break?",
"On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut",
"How did fans react?",
"number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies."
]
| C_43a49646497d4b2aa67d27f849ae4d47_0 | Did she do any live performances | 4 | Did Maeda do any live performances? | Atsuko Maeda | On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut with her debut single "Flower", released on June 22. It was met with commercial success in Japan, debuting at number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies. The follow-up single "Kimi wa Boku Da", released in June 2012, was Maeda's last solo single while still a member of AKB48. It debuted at number two on the Oricon charts and reached number one on the Billboard Japan Hot 100. On June 15, 2013, at AKB48's handshake event held at Makuhari Messe, AKB48 announced that Maeda would appear as a special guest at the group's summer concert series at the Sapporo Dome on July 31. There], she performed her third single, "Time Machine Nante Iranai" (taimumashinnanteiranai, I don't need a time machine), which was later released on September 18. It was selected to be the theme song for the live-action adaptation of Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (Yamada and the Seven Witches). Maeda described the song as "cheerful and fun" and hoped it would liven up the show. "Time Machine Nante Iranai" eventually peaked at number one on the Oricon Daily charts, and number two on the Oricon Weekly chart. On Billboard's Japan Hot 100, it debuted at number one and stayed there for just the week of September 30. Maeda's 4th single "Seventh Code" was released on March 5, 2014. It was used as the theme song of the movie "Seventh Code" in which Maeda herself starred in. It debuted at number 4 on the Oricon charts and reached number three on the Billboard Japan Hot 100. On December 12, 2015, it was announced that Maeda's first album will be released later the next year. Eventually, the album is set to be released on June 22, 2016. CANNOTANSWER | AKB48 announced that Maeda would appear as a special guest at the group's summer concert series | is a Japanese actress and singer. She is a former member of the idol girl group AKB48, and was one of the most prominent members in the group at the time, regarded as the group's "absolute ace", "immovable center", and the "Face of AKB." After graduating from AKB48 on August 27, 2012, Maeda has since then continued with a solo singing and acting career.
Career
AKB48
Maeda was born in Ichikawa, Chiba. At age 14, she became a member of AKB48's first group, Team A, which was composed of 24 girls and debuted on December 8, 2005.
In 2009, Maeda won the first edition of AKB48's annual general elections, which are described as a popularity contest. As a result, she was the headlined performer for the group's 13th single, "Iiwake Maybe". The following year, she placed second overall, but still had a significant choreography position in the lineup for "Heavy Rotation". Later that year, AKB48 employed a rock-paper-scissors tournament to determine the top spot of AKB48's 19th major single "Chance no Junban". Maeda placed 15th, which secured her a spot on title track. Maeda also won the group's third general election held in 2011.
Maeda was one of the members who sang on every AKB48 title track since the group's inception. Her streak of A-side appearances ended in 2011, when she lost to Team K captain Sayaka Akimoto at a rock-paper-scissors tournament which determined the featured members for the group's 24th single "Ue kara Mariko".
On March 25, 2012, during an AKB48 Concert at the Saitama Super Arena, Maeda announced that she would leave the group. This caused a large buzz in the Japanese news, and spawned a rumor (later proved false) that a student from University of Tokyo had committed suicide over the announcement. AKB48 later announced that Maeda would leave after the Tokyo Dome concerts; For her final performance, there were 229,096 requests filed for seat tickets. Her farewell performance and ceremony occurred on August 27 at the AKB48 theater, and was streamed live on YouTube.
Solo career
On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut with her debut single "Flower", released on June 22. It was met with commercial success in Japan, debuting at number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies.
The follow-up single "Kimi wa Boku Da", released in June 2012, was Maeda's last solo single while still a member of AKB48. It debuted at number two on the Oricon charts and reached number one on the Billboard Japan Hot 100.
On June 15, 2013, at AKB48's handshake event held at Makuhari Messe, AKB48 announced that Maeda would appear as a special guest at the group's summer concert series at the Sapporo Dome on July 31. There], she performed her third single, , which was later released on September 18. It was selected to be the theme song for the live-action adaptation of Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (Yamada and the Seven Witches). Maeda described the song as "cheerful and fun" and hoped it would liven up the show. "Time Machine Nante Iranai" eventually peaked at number one on the Oricon Daily charts, and number two on the Oricon Weekly chart. On Billboard's Japan Hot 100, it debuted at number one and stayed there for just the week of September 30.
Maeda's 4th single "Seventh Code" was released on March 5, 2014. It was used as the theme song of the movie "Seventh Code" in which Maeda herself starred. It debuted at number 4 on the Oricon charts and reached number three on the Billboard Japan Hot 100.
On December 12, 2015, it was announced that Maeda's first album would be released later the next year. Eventually, the album was set to be released on June 22, 2016.
Acting career
In 2007, Maeda played a supporting role in the film Ashita no Watashi no Tsukurikata, which was her debut as an actress. She starred in the 2011 film Moshidora and appeared in Nobuhiro Yamashita's 2012 film Kueki Ressha. She also starred in Hideo Nakata's 2013 horror film The Complex. It was announced that she would co-star with Tony Leung Chiu-wai in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's film 1905.
In 2013, Maeda starred in a series of 30-second station ID videos for Music On! TV where she played Tamako, a Tokyo University graduate who does not find a job and lives at home where she just eats and sleeps, over the course of the four seasons. This became a TV drama special, and was developed into a full-fledged film, Tamako in Moratorium, the last of which was planned for a theater release in November 2013.
Maeda starred in the film Seventh Code, in which she plays a Japanese woman in Russia who is trying to track down a guy she previously met. The film was shown at the Rome Film Festival in November 2013, and was released for a short theater run in January 2014. She released a single of the same name on March 5.
In May 2015, it was announced that Maeda had been cast in the role of Kyoko Yoshizawa, the female lead of the anime and manga series Dokonjō Gaeru (The Gutsy Frog), in a live-action version of the story set to air on Nippon TV in July.
In 2016, she took the lead role of the drama "Busujima Yuriko no Sekirara Nikki" on TBS. The first episode is set to air on April 20, 2016.
In 2019, she appeared in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's To the Ends of the Earth (旅のおわり世界のはじまり), playing Yoko, a television host and would-be singer who goes to Uzbekistan with a small crew to shoot a travel documentary. In the film, she twice sings the classic Édith Piaf anthem, Hymne à l'amour (with Japanese lyrics], including in the finale.
Personal life
Maeda married actor Ryo Katsuji; they registered their marriage on July 30, 2018. She gave birth to their first child, a son in 2019. On April 23, 2021, she announced that they have amicably divorced.
Stage credits
A listing of Maeda's participation in AKB48's theatre programs, called stages:
2005-2006: Team A 1st Stage:
small group songs: "Skirt, Hirari" (1st + 2nd units) and "Hoshi no Ondo" (2nd unit)
2006: Team A 2nd Stage:
small group songs: ""Nageki no Figure", "Nagisa no Cherry", "Senaka kara Dakishimete", "Rio no Kakumei"
2006-2007: Team A 3rd Stage:
small group songs: "Nage Kiss de Uchi Otose!" and "Seifuku ga Jama o Suru"
2007, 2008: Team A 4th Stage:
small group songs: "7ji 12fun no Hatsukoi"
2007: Himawari-gumi 1st Stage:
small group songs: "Idol Nante Yobanaide" (1st unit)
2007-2008: Himawari-gumi 2nd Stage:
small group songs " Hajimete no Jelly Beans" (1st unit)
2008-2010: Team A 5th Stage:
small group songs: "Kuroi Tenshi"
2010-2012: Team A 6th Stage:
small group songs "Ude o Kunde"
Discography
Solo singles
AKB48
DVDs
Mubōbi (2011)
Filmography
Films
Television dramas
Swan no Baka!: Sanmanen no Koi (2007)
Shiori to Shimiko no Kaiki Jikenbo (2008)
Taiyo to Umi no Kyoshitsu (2008)
Majisuka Gakuen (2010)
Ryōmaden (2010)
Q10 (2010)
Sakura Kara no Tegami (2011)
Hanazakari no Kimitachi e (2011)
Majisuka Gakuen 2 (2011)
Saikou no Jinsei (2012)
Kasuka na Kanojo (2013)
Nobunaga Concerto Episode 3 (2014)
Leaders (2014) - Misuzu Shimabara
Kageri Yuku Natsu (2015) – Yu Kahara (witness of infant kidnapping case)
Dokonjō Gaeru (2015)
Majisuka Gakuen 5 (2015)
Busujima Yuriko no Sekirara Nikki (2016) - Yuriko Busujima
Gou Gou, The Cat 2 - Iida (2016)
Shuukatsu Kazoku(2017)
Inspector Zenigata - Detective Natsuki Sakuraba (2017)
Leaders 2 (2017) - Misuzu Shimabara
The Legendary Mother (2020)
Television shows
AKBingo! (2008–2012)
Shukan AKB (2009–2012)
AKB48 Nemōsu TV (2008–2012)
Gachi Gase (2012)
Documentaries
Documentary of AKB48: The Future 1 mm Ahead (2011)
Documentary of AKB48: To Be Continued (2011)
Documentary of AKB48: Show Must Go On (2012)
Documentary of AKB48: No Flower Without Rain (2013)
Radio shows
Atsuko Maeda's Heart Songs (2010–2013)
Bibliography
Hai (2009)
Acchan in Hawaii (2010)
Maeda Atsuko in Tokyo (2010)
Atsuko in NY (2010)
Bukiyō (2012)
AKB48 Sotsugyo Kinen Photobook "Acchan" (2012)
Awards and nominations
Notes
References
External links
Official agency profile at Ohta Pro
1991 births
Living people
AKB48 members
Japanese idols
Japanese women pop singers
Sony Music Entertainment Japan artists
Japanese child actresses
People from Ichikawa, Chiba
King Records (Japan) artists
Musicians from Chiba Prefecture
Japanese film actresses
21st-century Japanese actresses
21st-century Japanese women singers
21st-century Japanese singers | true | [
"Whitney Houston Live: Her Greatest Performances is a posthumous live album by American recording artist Whitney Houston. It was released on November 10, 2014 by Legacy Recordings, a division of Sony Music Entertainment.\n\nContent and release\nFollowing the week of the album's release on November 10, Whitney Houston Live: Her Greatest Performances made Billboard chart debuts, Whitney Houston Live: Her Greatest Performances sold 22,000 copies in the week ending Nov. 16, according to Nielsen SoundScan, by debuting at #1 on the Billboard Top R&B Albums chart, #2 on the R&B/Hip Hop chart, and #19 on the Billboard 200. 30% of the album sales were digital, the first time Houston has achieved that.\n\nCritical reception\nUpon its release, Whitney Houston Live: Her Greatest Performances garnered enormous critical acclaim and praise. Giving it 5 stars, Jim Farber of NYDAILYNEWS, praised the album saying, 'The recordings here—with their odd echoes, imperfect playing, and wavering ambiences—show that Houston performed even better without a net than with one. The performances also work wonders in disproving the image of her, in her shiniest years, as a too-perfect wax figure of a star.' He further added, 'Only in concert did Houston, who died in 2012, show the full range of her talent. Shorn of the studio’s confining arrangements and gauzy production, the Newark native had the freedom to display those hairpin turns of phrase, last-second switches in key and playful improvisations that rank her among the greatest singers of all time.' Glenn Gamboa of Newsday gave it Grade A and wrote, 'Houston was an extraordinary singer, an artist who rarely delivered a song the same way twice. Early on, her improvised inflections, her runs, her stops and starts—they all seemed brilliantly planned and elegantly executed. \"Whitney Houston Live\" documents how great the singer was before her death in 2012 and builds a strong case that her talent should outlast her tabloid exploits.'\n\nJeff Simon of BuffaloNews, gave the album 4 stars and wrote, 'While three quarters of the female singers on TV singing contests seem to want to be Houston, what she does on this disc makes them all seem like kindergarten kids wiping their noses on their sleeves.' He further stated, 'She wasn’t long for this world. But when it came to stuff like this, find me anyone in her time that did it better. Maybe, if we’re lucky no one again will ever try.'\n\nThe Slant Magazine review noted that the song list, apart from a few obvious inclusions, was inexplicable and did little to showcase the range of Whitney Houston's live talent. Andrew Chan closes with the insight that \"the myth of her perfection may make her studio work definitive, but at the height of her powers, Whitney was an artist born for the stage, where her voice could pour forth unrestrained by the limits of a booth.\"\n\nTrack listing\n\nCD\n\nDVD\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nWhitney Houston Live: Her Greatest Performances at Amazon\nWhitney Houston Live: Her Greatest Performances\nLive: Her Greatest Performances at Apple Music\n\n2014 live albums\nLive albums published posthumously\nWhitney Houston albums",
"Homogenic Live is a live album by Icelandic singer Björk, collecting her favorite performances from her 1997-99 Homogenic Tour. It was Björk’s first tour to have soundboard recordings and thus the first of her live CDs to feature a wide variety of performances taken from different dates and venues throughout a single tour. Originally released in the 5 disc Live Box set in 2003, Homogenic Live was later released separately on 1 June 2004 by One Little Indian records.\n\nBackground\n\nBjörk did not have soundboard recordings for her first two concert tours. When compiling material for those tours’ corresponding live albums, she had to use audio taken from pre-mixed videotaped performances.\n\nBeginning with the Homogenic Tour, she began collecting soundboard recordings with each section of her touring band mixed separately. During the Homogenic Tour, several microphones captured the Icelandic String Octet (as evidenced on the concert film, Live in Cambridge) while Mark Bell’s electronic equipment was fed directly into the mixer. This recording technique allows for a greater clarity of sound and a certain deal of control in the mixing process, allowing the audio technician to raise or lower the different elements, be they the performer’s vocals, the different sections of the touring band or even the crowd. Homogenic Live is Björk’s first live album to be mixed in such a way.\n\nReception\n\nCritics praised Homogenic Live. Comparing it to Björk’s previous live albums, Scott Plagenhoef for Pitchfork complimented the stripped down strings and electronics setting, saying it “could have left (Björk) potentially vulnerable, but she fills the empty space with the full force of her voice… In the end, the renditions seem more assured and well-conceived…” than on both Debut and Post Live. AllMusic wrote that “the relatively spare instrumentation allows Björk to take her songs down slightly different paths while retaining the heart of the studio recordings” and that “Björk’s voice shines throughout.” PopMatters criticized the slew of releases Björk was putting out at the time but agreed that the live album was a historical record \"of the beauty and majesty of Björk’s voice and her compositions,\" while ultimately concluding that as a companion project to its \"landmark\" parent album Homogenic, it \"failed to offer any new insights into the inner workings of Björk and her live experience.\"\n\nTrack list\n\nReferences\n\n2004 live albums\nBjörk albums\nOne Little Independent Records albums\nAlbums produced by Björk"
]
|
[
"Atsuko Maeda",
"Solo career",
"What was maeda's solo career like?",
"It was met with commercial success in Japan,",
"When did Maeda get his big break?",
"On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut",
"How did fans react?",
"number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies.",
"Did she do any live performances",
"AKB48 announced that Maeda would appear as a special guest at the group's summer concert series"
]
| C_43a49646497d4b2aa67d27f849ae4d47_0 | What other appearances did she make? | 5 | What other appearances did Maeda make aside from her special guest apperance in summer concert series? | Atsuko Maeda | On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut with her debut single "Flower", released on June 22. It was met with commercial success in Japan, debuting at number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies. The follow-up single "Kimi wa Boku Da", released in June 2012, was Maeda's last solo single while still a member of AKB48. It debuted at number two on the Oricon charts and reached number one on the Billboard Japan Hot 100. On June 15, 2013, at AKB48's handshake event held at Makuhari Messe, AKB48 announced that Maeda would appear as a special guest at the group's summer concert series at the Sapporo Dome on July 31. There], she performed her third single, "Time Machine Nante Iranai" (taimumashinnanteiranai, I don't need a time machine), which was later released on September 18. It was selected to be the theme song for the live-action adaptation of Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (Yamada and the Seven Witches). Maeda described the song as "cheerful and fun" and hoped it would liven up the show. "Time Machine Nante Iranai" eventually peaked at number one on the Oricon Daily charts, and number two on the Oricon Weekly chart. On Billboard's Japan Hot 100, it debuted at number one and stayed there for just the week of September 30. Maeda's 4th single "Seventh Code" was released on March 5, 2014. It was used as the theme song of the movie "Seventh Code" in which Maeda herself starred in. It debuted at number 4 on the Oricon charts and reached number three on the Billboard Japan Hot 100. On December 12, 2015, it was announced that Maeda's first album will be released later the next year. Eventually, the album is set to be released on June 22, 2016. CANNOTANSWER | the live-action adaptation of Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo | is a Japanese actress and singer. She is a former member of the idol girl group AKB48, and was one of the most prominent members in the group at the time, regarded as the group's "absolute ace", "immovable center", and the "Face of AKB." After graduating from AKB48 on August 27, 2012, Maeda has since then continued with a solo singing and acting career.
Career
AKB48
Maeda was born in Ichikawa, Chiba. At age 14, she became a member of AKB48's first group, Team A, which was composed of 24 girls and debuted on December 8, 2005.
In 2009, Maeda won the first edition of AKB48's annual general elections, which are described as a popularity contest. As a result, she was the headlined performer for the group's 13th single, "Iiwake Maybe". The following year, she placed second overall, but still had a significant choreography position in the lineup for "Heavy Rotation". Later that year, AKB48 employed a rock-paper-scissors tournament to determine the top spot of AKB48's 19th major single "Chance no Junban". Maeda placed 15th, which secured her a spot on title track. Maeda also won the group's third general election held in 2011.
Maeda was one of the members who sang on every AKB48 title track since the group's inception. Her streak of A-side appearances ended in 2011, when she lost to Team K captain Sayaka Akimoto at a rock-paper-scissors tournament which determined the featured members for the group's 24th single "Ue kara Mariko".
On March 25, 2012, during an AKB48 Concert at the Saitama Super Arena, Maeda announced that she would leave the group. This caused a large buzz in the Japanese news, and spawned a rumor (later proved false) that a student from University of Tokyo had committed suicide over the announcement. AKB48 later announced that Maeda would leave after the Tokyo Dome concerts; For her final performance, there were 229,096 requests filed for seat tickets. Her farewell performance and ceremony occurred on August 27 at the AKB48 theater, and was streamed live on YouTube.
Solo career
On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut with her debut single "Flower", released on June 22. It was met with commercial success in Japan, debuting at number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies.
The follow-up single "Kimi wa Boku Da", released in June 2012, was Maeda's last solo single while still a member of AKB48. It debuted at number two on the Oricon charts and reached number one on the Billboard Japan Hot 100.
On June 15, 2013, at AKB48's handshake event held at Makuhari Messe, AKB48 announced that Maeda would appear as a special guest at the group's summer concert series at the Sapporo Dome on July 31. There], she performed her third single, , which was later released on September 18. It was selected to be the theme song for the live-action adaptation of Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (Yamada and the Seven Witches). Maeda described the song as "cheerful and fun" and hoped it would liven up the show. "Time Machine Nante Iranai" eventually peaked at number one on the Oricon Daily charts, and number two on the Oricon Weekly chart. On Billboard's Japan Hot 100, it debuted at number one and stayed there for just the week of September 30.
Maeda's 4th single "Seventh Code" was released on March 5, 2014. It was used as the theme song of the movie "Seventh Code" in which Maeda herself starred. It debuted at number 4 on the Oricon charts and reached number three on the Billboard Japan Hot 100.
On December 12, 2015, it was announced that Maeda's first album would be released later the next year. Eventually, the album was set to be released on June 22, 2016.
Acting career
In 2007, Maeda played a supporting role in the film Ashita no Watashi no Tsukurikata, which was her debut as an actress. She starred in the 2011 film Moshidora and appeared in Nobuhiro Yamashita's 2012 film Kueki Ressha. She also starred in Hideo Nakata's 2013 horror film The Complex. It was announced that she would co-star with Tony Leung Chiu-wai in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's film 1905.
In 2013, Maeda starred in a series of 30-second station ID videos for Music On! TV where she played Tamako, a Tokyo University graduate who does not find a job and lives at home where she just eats and sleeps, over the course of the four seasons. This became a TV drama special, and was developed into a full-fledged film, Tamako in Moratorium, the last of which was planned for a theater release in November 2013.
Maeda starred in the film Seventh Code, in which she plays a Japanese woman in Russia who is trying to track down a guy she previously met. The film was shown at the Rome Film Festival in November 2013, and was released for a short theater run in January 2014. She released a single of the same name on March 5.
In May 2015, it was announced that Maeda had been cast in the role of Kyoko Yoshizawa, the female lead of the anime and manga series Dokonjō Gaeru (The Gutsy Frog), in a live-action version of the story set to air on Nippon TV in July.
In 2016, she took the lead role of the drama "Busujima Yuriko no Sekirara Nikki" on TBS. The first episode is set to air on April 20, 2016.
In 2019, she appeared in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's To the Ends of the Earth (旅のおわり世界のはじまり), playing Yoko, a television host and would-be singer who goes to Uzbekistan with a small crew to shoot a travel documentary. In the film, she twice sings the classic Édith Piaf anthem, Hymne à l'amour (with Japanese lyrics], including in the finale.
Personal life
Maeda married actor Ryo Katsuji; they registered their marriage on July 30, 2018. She gave birth to their first child, a son in 2019. On April 23, 2021, she announced that they have amicably divorced.
Stage credits
A listing of Maeda's participation in AKB48's theatre programs, called stages:
2005-2006: Team A 1st Stage:
small group songs: "Skirt, Hirari" (1st + 2nd units) and "Hoshi no Ondo" (2nd unit)
2006: Team A 2nd Stage:
small group songs: ""Nageki no Figure", "Nagisa no Cherry", "Senaka kara Dakishimete", "Rio no Kakumei"
2006-2007: Team A 3rd Stage:
small group songs: "Nage Kiss de Uchi Otose!" and "Seifuku ga Jama o Suru"
2007, 2008: Team A 4th Stage:
small group songs: "7ji 12fun no Hatsukoi"
2007: Himawari-gumi 1st Stage:
small group songs: "Idol Nante Yobanaide" (1st unit)
2007-2008: Himawari-gumi 2nd Stage:
small group songs " Hajimete no Jelly Beans" (1st unit)
2008-2010: Team A 5th Stage:
small group songs: "Kuroi Tenshi"
2010-2012: Team A 6th Stage:
small group songs "Ude o Kunde"
Discography
Solo singles
AKB48
DVDs
Mubōbi (2011)
Filmography
Films
Television dramas
Swan no Baka!: Sanmanen no Koi (2007)
Shiori to Shimiko no Kaiki Jikenbo (2008)
Taiyo to Umi no Kyoshitsu (2008)
Majisuka Gakuen (2010)
Ryōmaden (2010)
Q10 (2010)
Sakura Kara no Tegami (2011)
Hanazakari no Kimitachi e (2011)
Majisuka Gakuen 2 (2011)
Saikou no Jinsei (2012)
Kasuka na Kanojo (2013)
Nobunaga Concerto Episode 3 (2014)
Leaders (2014) - Misuzu Shimabara
Kageri Yuku Natsu (2015) – Yu Kahara (witness of infant kidnapping case)
Dokonjō Gaeru (2015)
Majisuka Gakuen 5 (2015)
Busujima Yuriko no Sekirara Nikki (2016) - Yuriko Busujima
Gou Gou, The Cat 2 - Iida (2016)
Shuukatsu Kazoku(2017)
Inspector Zenigata - Detective Natsuki Sakuraba (2017)
Leaders 2 (2017) - Misuzu Shimabara
The Legendary Mother (2020)
Television shows
AKBingo! (2008–2012)
Shukan AKB (2009–2012)
AKB48 Nemōsu TV (2008–2012)
Gachi Gase (2012)
Documentaries
Documentary of AKB48: The Future 1 mm Ahead (2011)
Documentary of AKB48: To Be Continued (2011)
Documentary of AKB48: Show Must Go On (2012)
Documentary of AKB48: No Flower Without Rain (2013)
Radio shows
Atsuko Maeda's Heart Songs (2010–2013)
Bibliography
Hai (2009)
Acchan in Hawaii (2010)
Maeda Atsuko in Tokyo (2010)
Atsuko in NY (2010)
Bukiyō (2012)
AKB48 Sotsugyo Kinen Photobook "Acchan" (2012)
Awards and nominations
Notes
References
External links
Official agency profile at Ohta Pro
1991 births
Living people
AKB48 members
Japanese idols
Japanese women pop singers
Sony Music Entertainment Japan artists
Japanese child actresses
People from Ichikawa, Chiba
King Records (Japan) artists
Musicians from Chiba Prefecture
Japanese film actresses
21st-century Japanese actresses
21st-century Japanese women singers
21st-century Japanese singers | true | [
"The discography of Akiko Shikata, a Japanese singer-songwriter and game music composer, consists of a variety of releases. She has released five original vocal albums, three under major labels, and myriad soundtrack releases.\n\nAlbums\n\nStudio albums\n\nCompilation albums\n\nSoundtrack albums\n\nInstrumental albums\n\nAll instrumental albums have been independently released and did not chart on Oricon albums charts.\n\nSingles\n\nOther appearances\n\nSoundtrack appearances\n\nMiscellaneous appearances\n\nReferences\n\nPop music discographies\nDiscographies of Japanese artists",
"Stephanie Ann Verdoia (born January 2, 1993) is an American soccer player who last played for Vålerenga in the Toppserien.\n\nClub career\nAfter playing four years at Seattle University, Verdoia was drafted by the Boston Breakers with the 29th pick in the 2015 NWSL College Draft. She signed with the Breakers for the 2015 Season and made eight appearances for the club. In 2016, she made 10 appearances. She was waived by the Breakers on January 27, 2017.\n\nVerdoia signed with Vålerenga in the Toppserien for the 2017 season.\n\nShe attended training camp with the Seattle Reign in 2018, but she did not make the final roster.\n\nInternational career\nVerdoia received a call-up for the United States U-23 team for the Six Nations Tournament in 2015. This was her debut in a United States jersey.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n \n\n1993 births\nLiving people\nAmerican women's soccer players\nNational Women's Soccer League players\nBoston Breakers (NWSL) players\nSoccer players from Salt Lake City\nWomen's association football midfielders\nSeattle Redhawks women's soccer players\nBoston Breakers (NWSL) draft picks\nVålerenga Fotball Damer players"
]
|
[
"Atsuko Maeda",
"Solo career",
"What was maeda's solo career like?",
"It was met with commercial success in Japan,",
"When did Maeda get his big break?",
"On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut",
"How did fans react?",
"number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies.",
"Did she do any live performances",
"AKB48 announced that Maeda would appear as a special guest at the group's summer concert series",
"What other appearances did she make?",
"the live-action adaptation of Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo"
]
| C_43a49646497d4b2aa67d27f849ae4d47_0 | What are some other interesting aspects of this article? | 6 | What are some other interesting aspects of this article inadditional to Maeda's Solo debut and Special Guest appearances? | Atsuko Maeda | On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut with her debut single "Flower", released on June 22. It was met with commercial success in Japan, debuting at number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies. The follow-up single "Kimi wa Boku Da", released in June 2012, was Maeda's last solo single while still a member of AKB48. It debuted at number two on the Oricon charts and reached number one on the Billboard Japan Hot 100. On June 15, 2013, at AKB48's handshake event held at Makuhari Messe, AKB48 announced that Maeda would appear as a special guest at the group's summer concert series at the Sapporo Dome on July 31. There], she performed her third single, "Time Machine Nante Iranai" (taimumashinnanteiranai, I don't need a time machine), which was later released on September 18. It was selected to be the theme song for the live-action adaptation of Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (Yamada and the Seven Witches). Maeda described the song as "cheerful and fun" and hoped it would liven up the show. "Time Machine Nante Iranai" eventually peaked at number one on the Oricon Daily charts, and number two on the Oricon Weekly chart. On Billboard's Japan Hot 100, it debuted at number one and stayed there for just the week of September 30. Maeda's 4th single "Seventh Code" was released on March 5, 2014. It was used as the theme song of the movie "Seventh Code" in which Maeda herself starred in. It debuted at number 4 on the Oricon charts and reached number three on the Billboard Japan Hot 100. On December 12, 2015, it was announced that Maeda's first album will be released later the next year. Eventually, the album is set to be released on June 22, 2016. CANNOTANSWER | "Seventh Code" was released on March 5, 2014. It was used as the theme song of the movie "Seventh Code" in which Maeda herself starred in. | is a Japanese actress and singer. She is a former member of the idol girl group AKB48, and was one of the most prominent members in the group at the time, regarded as the group's "absolute ace", "immovable center", and the "Face of AKB." After graduating from AKB48 on August 27, 2012, Maeda has since then continued with a solo singing and acting career.
Career
AKB48
Maeda was born in Ichikawa, Chiba. At age 14, she became a member of AKB48's first group, Team A, which was composed of 24 girls and debuted on December 8, 2005.
In 2009, Maeda won the first edition of AKB48's annual general elections, which are described as a popularity contest. As a result, she was the headlined performer for the group's 13th single, "Iiwake Maybe". The following year, she placed second overall, but still had a significant choreography position in the lineup for "Heavy Rotation". Later that year, AKB48 employed a rock-paper-scissors tournament to determine the top spot of AKB48's 19th major single "Chance no Junban". Maeda placed 15th, which secured her a spot on title track. Maeda also won the group's third general election held in 2011.
Maeda was one of the members who sang on every AKB48 title track since the group's inception. Her streak of A-side appearances ended in 2011, when she lost to Team K captain Sayaka Akimoto at a rock-paper-scissors tournament which determined the featured members for the group's 24th single "Ue kara Mariko".
On March 25, 2012, during an AKB48 Concert at the Saitama Super Arena, Maeda announced that she would leave the group. This caused a large buzz in the Japanese news, and spawned a rumor (later proved false) that a student from University of Tokyo had committed suicide over the announcement. AKB48 later announced that Maeda would leave after the Tokyo Dome concerts; For her final performance, there were 229,096 requests filed for seat tickets. Her farewell performance and ceremony occurred on August 27 at the AKB48 theater, and was streamed live on YouTube.
Solo career
On April 23, 2011, Maeda announced that she would make her solo debut with her debut single "Flower", released on June 22. It was met with commercial success in Japan, debuting at number 1 on the Oricon Charts with first week sales of 176,967 copies.
The follow-up single "Kimi wa Boku Da", released in June 2012, was Maeda's last solo single while still a member of AKB48. It debuted at number two on the Oricon charts and reached number one on the Billboard Japan Hot 100.
On June 15, 2013, at AKB48's handshake event held at Makuhari Messe, AKB48 announced that Maeda would appear as a special guest at the group's summer concert series at the Sapporo Dome on July 31. There], she performed her third single, , which was later released on September 18. It was selected to be the theme song for the live-action adaptation of Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (Yamada and the Seven Witches). Maeda described the song as "cheerful and fun" and hoped it would liven up the show. "Time Machine Nante Iranai" eventually peaked at number one on the Oricon Daily charts, and number two on the Oricon Weekly chart. On Billboard's Japan Hot 100, it debuted at number one and stayed there for just the week of September 30.
Maeda's 4th single "Seventh Code" was released on March 5, 2014. It was used as the theme song of the movie "Seventh Code" in which Maeda herself starred. It debuted at number 4 on the Oricon charts and reached number three on the Billboard Japan Hot 100.
On December 12, 2015, it was announced that Maeda's first album would be released later the next year. Eventually, the album was set to be released on June 22, 2016.
Acting career
In 2007, Maeda played a supporting role in the film Ashita no Watashi no Tsukurikata, which was her debut as an actress. She starred in the 2011 film Moshidora and appeared in Nobuhiro Yamashita's 2012 film Kueki Ressha. She also starred in Hideo Nakata's 2013 horror film The Complex. It was announced that she would co-star with Tony Leung Chiu-wai in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's film 1905.
In 2013, Maeda starred in a series of 30-second station ID videos for Music On! TV where she played Tamako, a Tokyo University graduate who does not find a job and lives at home where she just eats and sleeps, over the course of the four seasons. This became a TV drama special, and was developed into a full-fledged film, Tamako in Moratorium, the last of which was planned for a theater release in November 2013.
Maeda starred in the film Seventh Code, in which she plays a Japanese woman in Russia who is trying to track down a guy she previously met. The film was shown at the Rome Film Festival in November 2013, and was released for a short theater run in January 2014. She released a single of the same name on March 5.
In May 2015, it was announced that Maeda had been cast in the role of Kyoko Yoshizawa, the female lead of the anime and manga series Dokonjō Gaeru (The Gutsy Frog), in a live-action version of the story set to air on Nippon TV in July.
In 2016, she took the lead role of the drama "Busujima Yuriko no Sekirara Nikki" on TBS. The first episode is set to air on April 20, 2016.
In 2019, she appeared in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's To the Ends of the Earth (旅のおわり世界のはじまり), playing Yoko, a television host and would-be singer who goes to Uzbekistan with a small crew to shoot a travel documentary. In the film, she twice sings the classic Édith Piaf anthem, Hymne à l'amour (with Japanese lyrics], including in the finale.
Personal life
Maeda married actor Ryo Katsuji; they registered their marriage on July 30, 2018. She gave birth to their first child, a son in 2019. On April 23, 2021, she announced that they have amicably divorced.
Stage credits
A listing of Maeda's participation in AKB48's theatre programs, called stages:
2005-2006: Team A 1st Stage:
small group songs: "Skirt, Hirari" (1st + 2nd units) and "Hoshi no Ondo" (2nd unit)
2006: Team A 2nd Stage:
small group songs: ""Nageki no Figure", "Nagisa no Cherry", "Senaka kara Dakishimete", "Rio no Kakumei"
2006-2007: Team A 3rd Stage:
small group songs: "Nage Kiss de Uchi Otose!" and "Seifuku ga Jama o Suru"
2007, 2008: Team A 4th Stage:
small group songs: "7ji 12fun no Hatsukoi"
2007: Himawari-gumi 1st Stage:
small group songs: "Idol Nante Yobanaide" (1st unit)
2007-2008: Himawari-gumi 2nd Stage:
small group songs " Hajimete no Jelly Beans" (1st unit)
2008-2010: Team A 5th Stage:
small group songs: "Kuroi Tenshi"
2010-2012: Team A 6th Stage:
small group songs "Ude o Kunde"
Discography
Solo singles
AKB48
DVDs
Mubōbi (2011)
Filmography
Films
Television dramas
Swan no Baka!: Sanmanen no Koi (2007)
Shiori to Shimiko no Kaiki Jikenbo (2008)
Taiyo to Umi no Kyoshitsu (2008)
Majisuka Gakuen (2010)
Ryōmaden (2010)
Q10 (2010)
Sakura Kara no Tegami (2011)
Hanazakari no Kimitachi e (2011)
Majisuka Gakuen 2 (2011)
Saikou no Jinsei (2012)
Kasuka na Kanojo (2013)
Nobunaga Concerto Episode 3 (2014)
Leaders (2014) - Misuzu Shimabara
Kageri Yuku Natsu (2015) – Yu Kahara (witness of infant kidnapping case)
Dokonjō Gaeru (2015)
Majisuka Gakuen 5 (2015)
Busujima Yuriko no Sekirara Nikki (2016) - Yuriko Busujima
Gou Gou, The Cat 2 - Iida (2016)
Shuukatsu Kazoku(2017)
Inspector Zenigata - Detective Natsuki Sakuraba (2017)
Leaders 2 (2017) - Misuzu Shimabara
The Legendary Mother (2020)
Television shows
AKBingo! (2008–2012)
Shukan AKB (2009–2012)
AKB48 Nemōsu TV (2008–2012)
Gachi Gase (2012)
Documentaries
Documentary of AKB48: The Future 1 mm Ahead (2011)
Documentary of AKB48: To Be Continued (2011)
Documentary of AKB48: Show Must Go On (2012)
Documentary of AKB48: No Flower Without Rain (2013)
Radio shows
Atsuko Maeda's Heart Songs (2010–2013)
Bibliography
Hai (2009)
Acchan in Hawaii (2010)
Maeda Atsuko in Tokyo (2010)
Atsuko in NY (2010)
Bukiyō (2012)
AKB48 Sotsugyo Kinen Photobook "Acchan" (2012)
Awards and nominations
Notes
References
External links
Official agency profile at Ohta Pro
1991 births
Living people
AKB48 members
Japanese idols
Japanese women pop singers
Sony Music Entertainment Japan artists
Japanese child actresses
People from Ichikawa, Chiba
King Records (Japan) artists
Musicians from Chiba Prefecture
Japanese film actresses
21st-century Japanese actresses
21st-century Japanese women singers
21st-century Japanese singers | false | [
"Přírodní park Třebíčsko (before Oblast klidu Třebíčsko) is a natural park near Třebíč in the Czech Republic. There are many interesting plants. The park was founded in 1983.\n\nKobylinec and Ptáčovský kopeček\n\nKobylinec is a natural monument situated ca 0,5 km from the village of Trnava.\nThe area of this monument is 0,44 ha. Pulsatilla grandis can be found here and in the Ptáčovský kopeček park near Ptáčov near Třebíč. Both monuments are very popular for tourists.\n\nPonds\n\nIn the natural park there are some interesting ponds such as Velký Bor, Malý Bor, Buršík near Přeckov and a brook Březinka. Dams on the brook are examples of European beaver activity.\n\nSyenitové skály near Pocoucov\n\nSyenitové skály (rocks of syenit) near Pocoucov is one of famed locations. There are interesting granite boulders. The area of the reservation is 0,77 ha.\n\nExternal links\nParts of this article or all article was translated from Czech. The original article is :cs:Přírodní park Třebíčsko.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nNature near the village Trnava which is there\n\nTřebíč\nParks in the Czech Republic\nTourist attractions in the Vysočina Region",
"Towards Artsakh () is an Armenian Entertainment television program. The series premiered on Armenia 1 on September 21, 2014.\nEach series of the TV program presents some area of life of today's hospitable Artsakh and reveals its most interesting aspects. What is Artsakh famous for? What has remained in the shadow up today? The program covers these questions as well as refers to the interests of young people and concerns of the older generation. \nArtsakh's legends and true stories are presented through the eyes of eyewitnesses.\n\nExternal links\n\n \n Towards Artsakh on Armenia 1\n\nArmenian-language television shows\nNonlinear narrative television series\nArmenia 1 television shows\nNagorno-Karabakh\n2010s Armenian television series"
]
|
[
"David Rockefeller",
"Political connections"
]
| C_4cdf638f899142318da9a416630f4496_1 | What is CFR? | 1 | What is the CFR in relation to David Rockefeller? | David Rockefeller | Rockefeller traveled widely and met with both foreign rulers and U.S. presidents, beginning with Dwight D. Eisenhower. At times he served as an unofficial emissary on high-level business. Among the foreign leaders he met were Saddam Hussein, Fidel Castro, Nikita Khrushchev, and Mikhail Gorbachev. In 1968, he declined an offer from his brother Nelson Rockefeller, then governor of New York, to appoint him to Robert F. Kennedy's Senate seat after Kennedy was assassinated in June 1968, a post Nelson also offered to their nephew John Davison "Jay" Rockefeller IV. President Jimmy Carter offered him the position of United States Secretary of the Treasury but he declined. Rockefeller was criticized for befriending foreign autocrats in order to expand Chase interests in their countries. The New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote in 2002 that Rockefeller "spent his life in the club of the ruling class and was loyal to members of the club, no matter what they did." He noted that Rockefeller had cut profitable deals with "oil-rich dictators", "Soviet party bosses" and "Chinese perpetrators of the Cultural Revolution". Rockefeller met Henry Kissinger in 1954, when Kissinger was appointed a director of a seminal Council on Foreign Relations study group on nuclear weapons, of which David Rockefeller was a member. He named Kissinger to the board of trustees of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, and consulted with him frequently, with the subjects including the Chase Bank's interests in Chile and the possibility of the election of Salvador Allende in 1970. Rockefeller supported his "opening of China" initiative in 1971 as it afforded banking opportunities for the Chase Bank. Though a lifelong Republican and party contributor, he was a member of the moderate "Rockefeller Republicans" that arose out of the political ambitions and public policy stance of his brother Nelson. In 2006 he teamed up with former Goldman Sachs executives and others to form a fund-raising group based in Washington, Republicans Who Care, that supported moderate Republican candidates over more ideological contenders. CANNOTANSWER | Council on Foreign Relations study group on nuclear weapons, | David Rockefeller (June 12, 1915 – March 20, 2017) was an American investment banker who served as chairman and chief executive of Chase Manhattan Corporation. He was the oldest living member of the third generation of the Rockefeller family, and family patriarch from July 2004 until his death in March 2017. Rockefeller was the fifth son and youngest child of John D. Rockefeller Jr. and Abby Aldrich Rockefeller, and a grandson of John D. Rockefeller and Laura Spelman Rockefeller.
He was noted for his wide-ranging political connections and foreign travel, in which he met with many foreign leaders. His fortune was estimated at $3.3 billion at the time of his death in March 2017.
Early life
Rockefeller was born in New York City, New York. He grew up in an eight-story house at 10 West 54th Street, the tallest private residence ever built in the city. Rockefeller was the youngest of six children born to financier John Davison Rockefeller Jr. and socialite Abigail Greene "Abby" Aldrich. John Jr. was the only son of Standard Oil co-founder John Davison Rockefeller Sr. and schoolteacher Laura Celestia "Cettie" Spelman. Abby was a daughter of Rhode Island U.S. Senator Nelson Wilmarth Aldrich and Abigail Pearce Truman "Abby" Chapman. David's five elder siblings were Abby, John III, Nelson, Laurance, and Winthrop.
Rockefeller attended the experimental Lincoln School at 123rd Street in Harlem.
Education
In 1936, Rockefeller graduated cum laude from Harvard University, where he worked as an editor on The Harvard Crimson. He also studied economics for a year at Harvard and then a year at the London School of Economics (LSE). At LSE he first met the future President John F. Kennedy (although he had earlier been his contemporary at Harvard) and once dated Kennedy's sister Kathleen.
During his time abroad, Rockefeller briefly worked in the London branch of what was to become the Chase Manhattan Bank.
After returning to the U.S. to complete his graduate studies, he received a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1940.
Career
Government service
After completing his studies in Chicago, he became secretary to New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia for eighteen months in a "dollar a year" public service position. Although the mayor pointed out to the press that Rockefeller was only one of 60 interns in the city government, his working space was, in fact, the vacant office of the deputy mayor. From 1941 to 1942, Rockefeller was assistant regional director of the United States Office of Defense, Health and Welfare Services.
Military
Rockefeller enlisted in the U.S. Army and entered Officer Candidate School in 1943; he was ultimately promoted to Captain in 1945. During World War II he served in North Africa and France (he spoke fluent French) for military intelligence setting up political and economic intelligence units. He served as a "Ritchie Boy" secret unit specially trained at Fort Ritchie, Maryland. For seven months he also served as an assistant military attaché at the American Embassy in Paris. During this period, he called on family contacts and Standard Oil executives for assistance.
Banking
In 1946, Rockefeller joined the staff of the longtime family-associated Chase National Bank. The chairman at that time was Rockefeller's uncle Winthrop W. Aldrich. The Chase Bank was primarily a wholesale bank, dealing with other prominent financial institutions and major corporate clients such as General Electric (which had, through its RCA affiliate, leased prominent space and become a crucial first tenant of Rockefeller Center in 1930). The bank also is closely associated with and has financed the oil industry, having longstanding connections with its board of directors to the successor companies of Standard Oil, especially Exxon Mobil. Chase National became the Chase Manhattan Bank in 1955 and shifted significantly into consumer banking. It is now called JPMorgan Chase.
Rockefeller started as an assistant manager in the foreign department. There he financed international trade in a number of commodities, such as coffee, sugar and metals. This position also maintained relationships with more than 1,000 correspondent banks throughout the world. He served in other positions and became president in 1960. He was both chairman and chief executive of Chase Manhattan from 1969 to 1980 and remained chairman until 1981. He was also, as recently as 1980, the single largest individual shareholder of the bank, holding 1.7% of its shares.
During his term as CEO, Chase spread internationally and became a central component of the world's financial system due to its global network of correspondent banks, the largest in the world. In 1973, Chase established the first branch of an American bank in Moscow, in the then Soviet Union. That year Rockefeller traveled to China, resulting in his bank becoming the National Bank of China's first correspondent bank in the U.S.
Also during this period, Chase Manhattan expanded its influence over many non-financial corporations. A 1979 study titled "The Significance of Bank Control over Large Corporations" provided an estimate for which large U.S.-based financial institutions had the most control over other corporations. The study finds that: "The Rockefeller-controlled Chase Manhattan Bank tops the list, controlling 16 companies."He was faulted for spending excessive amounts of time abroad, and during his tenure as CEO the bank had more troubled loans than any other major bank. Chase owned more New York City securities in the mid-1970s, when the city was nearing bankruptcy. A scandal erupted in 1974 when an audit found that losses from bond trading had been understated, and in 1975 the bank was branded a "problem bank" by the Federal Reserve.
From 1974 to 1976, Chase earnings fell 36 percent while those of its biggest rivals rose 12 to 31 percent. The bank's earnings more than doubled between 1976 and 1980, far outpacing its rival Citibank in return on assets. By 1981 the bank's finances were restored to full health.
In November 1979, while chairman of the Chase Bank, Rockefeller became embroiled in an international incident when he and Henry Kissinger, along with John J. McCloy and Rockefeller aides, persuaded President Jimmy Carter through the United States Department of State to admit the Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, into the United States for hospital treatment for lymphoma. This action directly precipitated what is known as the Iran hostage crisis and placed Rockefeller under intense media scrutiny (particularly from The New York Times) for the first time in his public life.
Rockefeller retired from active management of the bank in 1981, succeeded by his protégé Willard C. Butcher. Former Chase chairman John J. McCloy said at the time that he believed Rockefeller would not go down in history as a great banker but rather as a "real personality, as a distinguished and loyal member of the community".
Political connections
Rockefeller traveled widely and met with both foreign rulers and U.S. presidents, beginning with Dwight D. Eisenhower. At times he served as an unofficial emissary on high-level business. Among the foreign leaders he met were Saddam Hussein, Fidel Castro, Nikita Khrushchev, and Mikhail Gorbachev.
In 1968, he declined an offer from his brother Nelson Rockefeller, then governor of New York, to appoint him to Robert F. Kennedy's Senate seat after Kennedy was assassinated in June 1968, a post Nelson also offered to their nephew John Davison "Jay" Rockefeller IV. President Jimmy Carter offered him the position of United States Secretary of the Treasury but he declined.
Rockefeller was criticized for befriending foreign autocrats in order to expand Chase interests in their countries. The New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote in 2002 that Rockefeller "spent his life in the club of the ruling class and was loyal to members of the club, no matter what they did." He noted that Rockefeller had cut profitable deals with "oil-rich dictators", "Soviet party bosses" and "Chinese perpetrators of the Cultural Revolution".
Rockefeller met Henry Kissinger in 1954, when Kissinger was appointed a director of a seminal Council on Foreign Relations study group on nuclear weapons, of which David Rockefeller was a member. He named Kissinger to the board of trustees of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, and consulted with him frequently, with the subjects including the Chase Bank's interests in Chile and the possibility of the election of Salvador Allende in 1970. Rockefeller supported his "opening of China" initiative in 1971 as it afforded banking opportunities for the Chase Bank.
Though a lifelong Republican and party contributor, he was a member of the moderate "Rockefeller Republicans" that arose out of the political ambitions and public policy stance of his brother Nelson. In 2006, he teamed up with former Goldman Sachs executives and others to form a fund-raising group based in Washington, Republicans Who Care, that supported moderate Republican candidates over more ideological contenders.
Central Intelligence Agency ties
Rockefeller was acquainted with Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director Allen Dulles and his brother, Eisenhower administration Secretary of State John Foster Dulles—who was an in-law of the family—since his college years. It was in Rockefeller Center that Allen Dulles had set up his WWII operational center after Pearl Harbor, liaising closely with MI6, which also had their principal U.S. operation in the Center. He also knew and associated with the former CIA director Richard Helms as well as Archibald Bulloch Roosevelt Jr., a Chase Bank employee and former CIA agent whose first cousin, CIA agent Kermit Roosevelt Jr., was involved in the Iran coup of 1953. Also in 1953, he had befriended William Bundy, a pivotal CIA analyst for nine years in the 1950s, who became the Agency liaison to the National Security Council, and a subsequent lifelong friend. Moreover, in Cary Reich's biography of his brother Nelson, a former CIA agent states that David was extensively briefed on covert intelligence operations by himself and other Agency division chiefs, under the direction of David's "friend and confidant", CIA Director Allen Dulles.
Policy groups
In 1964, along with other American business figures such as Sol Linowitz, Rockefeller founded the non-profit International Executive Service Corps which encourages developing nations to promote private enterprise. In 1979, he formed the Partnership for New York City, a not-for-profit membership organization of New York businessmen. In 1992, he was selected as a leading member of the Russian-American Bankers Forum, an advisory group set up by the head of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to advise Russia on the modernization of its banking system, with the full endorsement of President Boris Yeltsin.
Rockefeller had a lifelong association with the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) when he joined as a director in 1949. In 1965, Rockefeller and other businessmen formed the Council of the Americas to stimulate and support economic integration in the Americas. In 1992, at a Council sponsored forum, Rockefeller proposed a "Western Hemisphere free trade area", which became the Free Trade Area of the Americas in a Miami summit in 1994. His and the Council's chief liaison to President Bill Clinton in order to garner support for this initiative was through Clinton's chief of staff, Mack McLarty, whose consultancy firm Kissinger McLarty Associates is a corporate member of the Council, while McLarty himself is on the board of directors. He was also a trustee of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, including 1948, when Alger Hiss was president.
Displeased with the refusal of Bilderberg Group meetings to include Japan, Rockefeller helped found the Trilateral Commission in July 1973.
Later career
After the war and alongside his work at Chase, Rockefeller took a more active role in his family's business dealings. Working with his brothers in the two floors of Rockefeller Center known as Room 5600, he reorganized the family's myriad business and philanthropic ventures. The men kept regular "brothers' meetings" where they made decisions on matters of common interest and reported on noteworthy events in each of their lives. Rockefeller served as secretary to the group, making notes of each meeting. The notes are now in the family archive and will be released in the future. Following the deaths of his brothers, Winthrop (1973), John III (1978), Nelson (1979), and Laurance (2004), David became sole head of the family (with the important involvement of his elder son, David Jr.).
Rockefeller ensured that selected members of the fourth generation, known generically as the cousins, became directly involved in the family's institutions. This involved inviting them to be more active in the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, the principal foundation established in 1940 by the five brothers and their one sister. The extended family also became involved in their own philanthropic organization, formed in 1967 and primarily established by third-generation members, called the Rockefeller Family Fund.
In the 1980s, Rockefeller became embroiled in controversy over the mortgaging and sale of Rockefeller Center to Japanese interests. In 1985, the Rockefeller family mortgaged the property for $1.3 billion, with $300 million of that going to the family. In 1989, 51 percent of the property, later increased to 80 percent, was sold to Mitsubishi Estate Company of Japan. This action was criticized for surrendering a major U.S. landmark to foreign interests. In 2000, Rockefeller presided over the final sale of Rockefeller Center to Tishman Speyer Properties, along with the Crown family of Chicago, which ended the more than 70 years of direct family financial association with Rockefeller Center.
In 2005, he gave $100 million to the Museum of Modern Art and $100 million to Rockefeller University, two of the most prominent family institutions; as well as $10 million to Harvard and $5 million to Colonial Williamsburg. In 2006, he pledged $225 million to the Rockefeller Brothers Fund upon his death, the largest gift in the Fund's history. The money will be used to create the David Rockefeller Global Development Fund, to support projects that improve access to health care, conduct research on international finance and trade, fight poverty, and support sustainable development, as well as to a program that fosters dialogue between Muslim and Western nations. Rockefeller donated $100 million to Harvard University in 2008. The New York Times estimated in November 2006 that his total charitable donations amount to $900 million over his lifetime, a figure that was substantiated by a monograph on the family's overall benefactions, entitled The Chronicle of Philanthropy.
He published Memoirs in 2002, the only time a member of the Rockefeller family has written an autobiography.
Rockefeller was a noted internationalist.
Rockefeller's will requires his estate, once assets are liquidated, to donate over $700 million to various non-profits, including Rockefeller University, the Museum of Modern Art and Harvard. The largest donation will be either $250 million or the remaining balance of the estate that will fund the launch of the David Rockefeller Global Development Fund.
Personal life
In 1940, Rockefeller married Margaret "Peggy" McGrath, who died in 1996. They had six children:
David Rockefeller Jr. (born July 24, 1941) – vice chairman, Rockefeller Family & Associates (the family office, Room 5600); chairman of Rockefeller Financial Services; Trustee of the Rockefeller Foundation; former chairman of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and Rockefeller & Co., Inc., among many other family institutions.
Abigail Aldrich "Abby" Rockefeller (born 1943) – economist and feminist. Eldest and most rebellious daughter, she was drawn to Marxism and was an ardent admirer of Fidel Castro and a late 1960s/early 1970s radical feminist who belonged to the organization Female Liberation, later forming a splinter group called Cell 16. An environmentalist and ecologist, she was an active supporter of the women's liberation movement.
Neva Rockefeller (born 1944) – economist and philanthropist. She is director of the Global Development and Environment Institute; trustee and vice chair of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and Director of the Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors.
Margaret Dulany "Peggy" Rockefeller (born 1947) – founder of the Synergos Institute in 1986; Board member of the Council on Foreign Relations; serves on the Advisory Committee of the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies at Harvard University.
Richard Gilder Rockefeller (1949–2014) – physician and philanthropist; chairman of the United States advisory board of the international aid group Doctors Without Borders; trustee and chair of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund.
Eileen Rockefeller (born February 26, 1952) – venture philanthropist; Founding Chair of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, established in New York City in 2002.
Death
Rockefeller died in his sleep from congestive heart failure on March 20, 2017, at his home in Pocantico Hills, New York. He was 101 years old.
Wealth
At the time of his death, Forbes estimated Rockefeller's net worth was $3.3 billion. Initially, most of his wealth had come to him via the family trusts created by his father, which were administered by Room 5600 and the Chase Bank. In turn, most of these trusts were held as shares in the successor companies of Standard Oil, as well as diverse real estate investment partnerships, such as the expansive Embarcadero Center in San Francisco, which he later sold for considerable profit, retaining only an indirect stake. In addition, he was or had been a partner in various properties such as Caneel Bay, a resort development in the Virgin Islands; a cattle ranch in Argentina; and a sheep ranch in Australia.
Another major source of asset wealth was his art collection, ranging from impressionist to postmodern, which he developed through the influence upon him of his mother Abby and her establishment, with two associates, of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City in 1929. The collection, valued at several hundred million dollars, was auctioned in the spring of 2018, with proceeds going to several designated nonprofit organizations, including Rockefeller University, Harvard University, the Museum of Modern Art, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the Maine Coast Heritage Trust.
Residences
Rockefeller's principal residence was at "Hudson Pines", on the family estate in Pocantico Hills, New York. He also had a Manhattan residence at 146 East 65th Street, as well as a country residence (known as "Four Winds") at a farm in Livingston, New York (Columbia County), where his wife raised Simmenthal beef cattle. He also maintained a summer home, "Ringing Point," at Seal Harbor on Mount Desert Island off the Maine coast. In May 2015, he donated one thousand acres of land in Seal Harbor to the Mount Desert Land and Garden Preserve. He also owned a large estate on the French island of St. Barth, and along with the Rothschild family, was one of the earliest developers and tourists on the island in the 1950s. The home was very modern and was located in the Colombier district, known to many as the most beautiful section of the island. It has changed hands several times over the years, and is the single largest private parcel on the island, encompassing the entire Baie de Colombier. Many years ago, the Rockefeller family donated the land in the initial creation of the Saint-Barth "Zone Verte," or Green Zone, which is an area which cannot be developed. The property also includes a private dock in the port of Gustavia as at the time the estate was developed, there were no roads to the property and the only way to get there was by boat; David Rockefeller would moor his yacht at his private dock in Gustavia before transferring to the Colombier estate in a smaller boat as the bay could not accommodate his yacht. The property was recently listed for over $100 million, but is not currently used as a residence and the main house has fallen into disrepair. There is also a dock in the Baie de Colombier. It is not known what the current owners' intentions are.
The Kykuit section of the Rockefeller family compound is the location of The Pocantico Conference Center of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund established by David and his four brothers in 1940 which was created when the Fund leased the area from the National Trust for Historic Preservation in 1991.
Non-governmental leadership positions
Council on Foreign Relations – Honorary Chairman
Americas Society – Founder and Honorary Chairman
Trilateral Commission – Founder and Honorary North American Chairman
Bilderberg Meetings – Only member of the Member Advisory Group
The New York Young Republican Club – Board Member
Awards
Presidential Medal of Freedom (1998);
U.S. Legion of Merit (1945);
French Legion of Honor (1945);
U.S. Army Commendation Ribbon (1945);
Commander of the Brazilian Order of the Southern Cross (1956);
Charles Evans Hughes award NCCJ, (1974);
George C. Marshall Foundation Award (1999);
Andrew Carnegie Medal of Philanthropy (2001);
Synergos Bridging Leadership Award (2003);
The Grand Croix of the Légion d'honneur (2000);
C. Walter Nichols Award, New York University (1970);
World Brotherhood Award, Jewish Theological Seminary of America (1953);
Award of Merit from the American Institute of Architects (1965);
Medal of Honor for City Planning, American Institute of Architects (1968);
World Monuments Fund's Hadrian Award (for preservation of art and architecture) (1994);
National Institute of Social Sciences Gold Medal Award (1967 – awarded to all 5 brothers);
United States Council for International Business (USCIB) International Leadership Award (1983);
The Hundred Year Association of New York's Gold Medal Award (1965).
References
Sources
Further reading
The Rockefeller File, Gary Allen, ´76 Press, Seal Beach California, 1976.
The Rockefeller Century: Three Generations of America's Greatest Family, John Ensor Harr and Peter J. Johnson. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1988.
The Rockefeller Conscience: An American Family in Public and in Private, John Ensor Harr and Peter J. Johnson, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1992.
The Life of Nelson A. Rockefeller: Worlds to Conquer 1908–1958, Cary Reich, New York: Doubleday, 1996.
Abby Aldrich Rockefeller: The Woman in the Family, Bernice Kert, New York: Random House, 1993.
Those Rockefeller Brothers: An Informal Biography of Five Extraordinary Young Men, Joe Alex Morris, New York: Harper & Brothers, 1953.
The Rockefellers: An American Dynasty, Peter Collier and David Horowitz, New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1976.
The American Establishment, Leonard Silk and Mark Silk, New York: Basic Books, Inc., 1980.
American Hegemony and the Trilateral Commission, Stephen Gill, Boston: Cambridge University Press, Reprint Edition, 1991.
The Chase: The Chase Manhattan Bank, N.A., 1945–1985, John Donald Wilson, Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 1986.
Wriston: Walter Wriston, Citibank, and the Rise and Fall of American Financial Supremacy, Phillip L. Zweig, New York: Crown Publishers, 1995.
Paul Volcker: The Making of a Financial Legend, Joseph B. Treaster, New York: Wiley, 2004.
Financier: The Biography of André Meyer; A Story of Money, Power, and the Reshaping of American Business, Cary Reich, New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1983.
Continuing the Inquiry: The Council on Foreign Relations from 1921 to 1996, Peter Grose, New York: Council on Foreign Relations: 1996.
Imperial Brain Trust: The Council on Foreign Relations and United States Foreign Policy, Laurence H. Shoup, and William Minter, New York: Authors Choice Press, (Reprint), 2004.
Cloak of Green: The Links between Key Environmental Groups, Government and Big Business, Elaine Dewar, New York: Lorimer, 1995.
The Shah's Last Ride, William Shawcross, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1989.
Divided We Stand: A Biography of New York City's World Trade Center, Eric Darton, New York: Basic Books, 1999.
The Rich and the Super-Rich: A Study in the Power of Money Today, Ferdinand Lundberg, New York: Lyle Stuart; Reprint Edition, 1988.
Interlock: The untold story of American banks, oil interests, the Shah's money, debts, and the astounding connections between them, Mark Hulbert, New York: Richardson & Snyder; 1st edition, 1982.
The Money Lenders: Bankers and a World in Turmoil, Anthony Sampson, New York: Viking Press, 1982.
The Chairman: John J. McCloy – The Making of the American Establishment, Kai Bird, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992.
External links
The Rockefeller Archive Center (RAC): Selected Biography
Rockefeller Brothers Fund Official Web site
1915 births
2017 deaths
Alumni of the London School of Economics
American art collectors
American autobiographers
American bankers
American billionaires
American centenarians
American chief executives of financial services companies
American memoirists
United States Army personnel of World War II
Philanthropists from New York (state)
Giving Pledgers
21st-century philanthropists
Grand Croix of the Légion d'honneur
Harvard University alumni
JPMorgan Chase employees
Members of the New York Yacht Club
Members of the Steering Committee of the Bilderberg Group
Men centenarians
Military personnel from New York City
New York (state) Republicans
People associated with the Museum of Modern Art (New York City)
Writers from Manhattan
Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients
Recipients of the Legion of Merit
Knights Commander of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
Rockefeller Center
Rockefeller family
Winthrop family
Rockefeller Foundation people
University of Chicago alumni
Honorary Fellows of the London School of Economics
United States Army officers
Chairs of the Council on Foreign Relations
Members of the Council on Foreign Relations
Ritchie Boys
World Trade Center | true | [
"In epidemiology, case fatality rate (CFR) – or sometimes more accurately case-fatality risk – is the proportion of people diagnosed with a certain disease, who end up dying of it. Unlike a disease's mortality rate, the CFR does not take into account the time period between disease onset and death. A CFR is generally expressed as a percentage. It represents a measure of disease lethality and may change with different treatments. CFRs are most often used for diseases with discrete, limited-time courses, such as acute infections.\n\nTerminology\nThe mortality rate – often confused with the CFR – is a measure of the relative number of deaths (either in general, or due to a specific cause) within the entire population per unit of time. A CFR, in contrast, is the number of deaths among the number of diagnosed cases only, regardless of time or total population.\n\nFrom a mathematical point of view, by taking values between 0 and 1 or 0% and 100%, CFRs are actually a measure of risk (case fatality risk) – that is, they are a proportion of incidence, although they don't reflect a disease's incidence. They are neither rates, incidence rates, nor ratios (none of which are limited to the range 0–1). They do not take into account time from disease onset to death.\n\nSometimes the term case fatality ratio is used interchangeably with case fatality rate, but they are not the same. A case fatality ratio is a comparison between two different case fatality rates, expressed as a ratio. It is used to compare the severity of different diseases or to assess the impact of interventions.\n\nBecause the CFR is not an incidence rate by not measuring frequency, some authors note that a more appropriate term is case fatality proportion.\n\nExample calculation\nIf 100 people in a community are diagnosed with the same disease, and 9 of them subsequently die from the effects of the disease, the CFR would be 9%. If some of the cases have not yet resolved (neither died nor fully recovered) at the time of analysis, a later analysis might take into account additional deaths and arrive at a higher estimate of the CFR, if the unresolved cases were included as recovered in the earlier analysis. Alternatively, it might later be established that a higher number of people were subclinically infected with the pathogen, resulting in an IFR below the CFR.\n\nA CFR may only be calculated from cases that have been resolved through either death or recovery. The preliminary CFR, for example, of a newly occurring disease with a high daily increase and long resolution time would be substantially lower than the final CFR, if unresolved cases were not excluded from the calculation, but added to the denominator only.\n\nInfection fatality rate\nLike the case fatality rate, the term infection fatality rate (IFR) also applies to infectious diseases, but represents the proportion of deaths among all infected individuals, including all asymptomatic and undiagnosed subjects. It is closely related to the CFR, but attempts to additionally account for inapparent infections among healthy people. The IFR differs from the CFR in that it aims to estimate the fatality rate in both sick and healthy infected: the detected disease (cases) and those with an undetected disease (asymptomatic and not tested group). Individuals who are infected, but show no symptoms, are said to have inapparent, silent or subclinical infections and may inadvertently infect others. By definition, the IFR cannot exceed the CFR, because the former adds asymptomatic cases to its denominator.\n\nExamples\n\nA half dozen examples will suggest the range of possible CFRs for diseases in the real world:\n The CFR for the Spanish (1918) flu was >2.5%, about 0.1% for the Asian (1956-58) and Hong Kong (1968-69) flus, and <0.1% for other influenza pandemics.\n Legionnaires' disease has a CFR of about 15%.\n The CFR for yellow fever, even with good treatment, ranges from 20 to 50%.\n Bubonic plague, left untreated, will have a CFR of as much as 60%. With antibiotic treatment, the CFR for septicaemic plague is 45%, pneumonic 29% and bubonic 17%.\n Zaïre Ebola virus is among the deadliest viruses with a CFR as high as 90%.\n Naegleriasis (also known as primary amoebic meningoencephalitis), caused by the unicellular Naegleria fowleri, has a case fatality rate greater than 95%.\n Rabies virus has a CFR of almost 100% in unvaccinated individuals.\n\nSee also\n\n List of human disease case fatality rates\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Definitions of case fatality for coronary events in the WHO MONICA Project\n Swine flu: what do CFR, virulence and mortality rate mean?\n\nEpidemiology\nRates\nArticles containing video clips\nDeath",
"CFR Title 34 - Education is one of fifty titles comprising the United States Code of Federal Regulations (CFR). Title 34 is the principal set of rules and regulations issued by federal agencies of the United States regarding education. It is available in digital and printed form, and can be referenced online using the Electronic Code of Federal Regulations (e-CFR).\n\nStructure \nThe table of contents, as reflected in the e-CFR updated February 28, 2014, is as follows:\n\nCode of Federal Regulations"
]
|
[
"David Rockefeller",
"Political connections",
"What is CFR?",
"Council on Foreign Relations study group on nuclear weapons,"
]
| C_4cdf638f899142318da9a416630f4496_1 | Did he found more than one non-profit? | 2 | Did David Rockefeller found more than one non-profit? | David Rockefeller | Rockefeller traveled widely and met with both foreign rulers and U.S. presidents, beginning with Dwight D. Eisenhower. At times he served as an unofficial emissary on high-level business. Among the foreign leaders he met were Saddam Hussein, Fidel Castro, Nikita Khrushchev, and Mikhail Gorbachev. In 1968, he declined an offer from his brother Nelson Rockefeller, then governor of New York, to appoint him to Robert F. Kennedy's Senate seat after Kennedy was assassinated in June 1968, a post Nelson also offered to their nephew John Davison "Jay" Rockefeller IV. President Jimmy Carter offered him the position of United States Secretary of the Treasury but he declined. Rockefeller was criticized for befriending foreign autocrats in order to expand Chase interests in their countries. The New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote in 2002 that Rockefeller "spent his life in the club of the ruling class and was loyal to members of the club, no matter what they did." He noted that Rockefeller had cut profitable deals with "oil-rich dictators", "Soviet party bosses" and "Chinese perpetrators of the Cultural Revolution". Rockefeller met Henry Kissinger in 1954, when Kissinger was appointed a director of a seminal Council on Foreign Relations study group on nuclear weapons, of which David Rockefeller was a member. He named Kissinger to the board of trustees of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, and consulted with him frequently, with the subjects including the Chase Bank's interests in Chile and the possibility of the election of Salvador Allende in 1970. Rockefeller supported his "opening of China" initiative in 1971 as it afforded banking opportunities for the Chase Bank. Though a lifelong Republican and party contributor, he was a member of the moderate "Rockefeller Republicans" that arose out of the political ambitions and public policy stance of his brother Nelson. In 2006 he teamed up with former Goldman Sachs executives and others to form a fund-raising group based in Washington, Republicans Who Care, that supported moderate Republican candidates over more ideological contenders. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | David Rockefeller (June 12, 1915 – March 20, 2017) was an American investment banker who served as chairman and chief executive of Chase Manhattan Corporation. He was the oldest living member of the third generation of the Rockefeller family, and family patriarch from July 2004 until his death in March 2017. Rockefeller was the fifth son and youngest child of John D. Rockefeller Jr. and Abby Aldrich Rockefeller, and a grandson of John D. Rockefeller and Laura Spelman Rockefeller.
He was noted for his wide-ranging political connections and foreign travel, in which he met with many foreign leaders. His fortune was estimated at $3.3 billion at the time of his death in March 2017.
Early life
Rockefeller was born in New York City, New York. He grew up in an eight-story house at 10 West 54th Street, the tallest private residence ever built in the city. Rockefeller was the youngest of six children born to financier John Davison Rockefeller Jr. and socialite Abigail Greene "Abby" Aldrich. John Jr. was the only son of Standard Oil co-founder John Davison Rockefeller Sr. and schoolteacher Laura Celestia "Cettie" Spelman. Abby was a daughter of Rhode Island U.S. Senator Nelson Wilmarth Aldrich and Abigail Pearce Truman "Abby" Chapman. David's five elder siblings were Abby, John III, Nelson, Laurance, and Winthrop.
Rockefeller attended the experimental Lincoln School at 123rd Street in Harlem.
Education
In 1936, Rockefeller graduated cum laude from Harvard University, where he worked as an editor on The Harvard Crimson. He also studied economics for a year at Harvard and then a year at the London School of Economics (LSE). At LSE he first met the future President John F. Kennedy (although he had earlier been his contemporary at Harvard) and once dated Kennedy's sister Kathleen.
During his time abroad, Rockefeller briefly worked in the London branch of what was to become the Chase Manhattan Bank.
After returning to the U.S. to complete his graduate studies, he received a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1940.
Career
Government service
After completing his studies in Chicago, he became secretary to New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia for eighteen months in a "dollar a year" public service position. Although the mayor pointed out to the press that Rockefeller was only one of 60 interns in the city government, his working space was, in fact, the vacant office of the deputy mayor. From 1941 to 1942, Rockefeller was assistant regional director of the United States Office of Defense, Health and Welfare Services.
Military
Rockefeller enlisted in the U.S. Army and entered Officer Candidate School in 1943; he was ultimately promoted to Captain in 1945. During World War II he served in North Africa and France (he spoke fluent French) for military intelligence setting up political and economic intelligence units. He served as a "Ritchie Boy" secret unit specially trained at Fort Ritchie, Maryland. For seven months he also served as an assistant military attaché at the American Embassy in Paris. During this period, he called on family contacts and Standard Oil executives for assistance.
Banking
In 1946, Rockefeller joined the staff of the longtime family-associated Chase National Bank. The chairman at that time was Rockefeller's uncle Winthrop W. Aldrich. The Chase Bank was primarily a wholesale bank, dealing with other prominent financial institutions and major corporate clients such as General Electric (which had, through its RCA affiliate, leased prominent space and become a crucial first tenant of Rockefeller Center in 1930). The bank also is closely associated with and has financed the oil industry, having longstanding connections with its board of directors to the successor companies of Standard Oil, especially Exxon Mobil. Chase National became the Chase Manhattan Bank in 1955 and shifted significantly into consumer banking. It is now called JPMorgan Chase.
Rockefeller started as an assistant manager in the foreign department. There he financed international trade in a number of commodities, such as coffee, sugar and metals. This position also maintained relationships with more than 1,000 correspondent banks throughout the world. He served in other positions and became president in 1960. He was both chairman and chief executive of Chase Manhattan from 1969 to 1980 and remained chairman until 1981. He was also, as recently as 1980, the single largest individual shareholder of the bank, holding 1.7% of its shares.
During his term as CEO, Chase spread internationally and became a central component of the world's financial system due to its global network of correspondent banks, the largest in the world. In 1973, Chase established the first branch of an American bank in Moscow, in the then Soviet Union. That year Rockefeller traveled to China, resulting in his bank becoming the National Bank of China's first correspondent bank in the U.S.
Also during this period, Chase Manhattan expanded its influence over many non-financial corporations. A 1979 study titled "The Significance of Bank Control over Large Corporations" provided an estimate for which large U.S.-based financial institutions had the most control over other corporations. The study finds that: "The Rockefeller-controlled Chase Manhattan Bank tops the list, controlling 16 companies."He was faulted for spending excessive amounts of time abroad, and during his tenure as CEO the bank had more troubled loans than any other major bank. Chase owned more New York City securities in the mid-1970s, when the city was nearing bankruptcy. A scandal erupted in 1974 when an audit found that losses from bond trading had been understated, and in 1975 the bank was branded a "problem bank" by the Federal Reserve.
From 1974 to 1976, Chase earnings fell 36 percent while those of its biggest rivals rose 12 to 31 percent. The bank's earnings more than doubled between 1976 and 1980, far outpacing its rival Citibank in return on assets. By 1981 the bank's finances were restored to full health.
In November 1979, while chairman of the Chase Bank, Rockefeller became embroiled in an international incident when he and Henry Kissinger, along with John J. McCloy and Rockefeller aides, persuaded President Jimmy Carter through the United States Department of State to admit the Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, into the United States for hospital treatment for lymphoma. This action directly precipitated what is known as the Iran hostage crisis and placed Rockefeller under intense media scrutiny (particularly from The New York Times) for the first time in his public life.
Rockefeller retired from active management of the bank in 1981, succeeded by his protégé Willard C. Butcher. Former Chase chairman John J. McCloy said at the time that he believed Rockefeller would not go down in history as a great banker but rather as a "real personality, as a distinguished and loyal member of the community".
Political connections
Rockefeller traveled widely and met with both foreign rulers and U.S. presidents, beginning with Dwight D. Eisenhower. At times he served as an unofficial emissary on high-level business. Among the foreign leaders he met were Saddam Hussein, Fidel Castro, Nikita Khrushchev, and Mikhail Gorbachev.
In 1968, he declined an offer from his brother Nelson Rockefeller, then governor of New York, to appoint him to Robert F. Kennedy's Senate seat after Kennedy was assassinated in June 1968, a post Nelson also offered to their nephew John Davison "Jay" Rockefeller IV. President Jimmy Carter offered him the position of United States Secretary of the Treasury but he declined.
Rockefeller was criticized for befriending foreign autocrats in order to expand Chase interests in their countries. The New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote in 2002 that Rockefeller "spent his life in the club of the ruling class and was loyal to members of the club, no matter what they did." He noted that Rockefeller had cut profitable deals with "oil-rich dictators", "Soviet party bosses" and "Chinese perpetrators of the Cultural Revolution".
Rockefeller met Henry Kissinger in 1954, when Kissinger was appointed a director of a seminal Council on Foreign Relations study group on nuclear weapons, of which David Rockefeller was a member. He named Kissinger to the board of trustees of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, and consulted with him frequently, with the subjects including the Chase Bank's interests in Chile and the possibility of the election of Salvador Allende in 1970. Rockefeller supported his "opening of China" initiative in 1971 as it afforded banking opportunities for the Chase Bank.
Though a lifelong Republican and party contributor, he was a member of the moderate "Rockefeller Republicans" that arose out of the political ambitions and public policy stance of his brother Nelson. In 2006, he teamed up with former Goldman Sachs executives and others to form a fund-raising group based in Washington, Republicans Who Care, that supported moderate Republican candidates over more ideological contenders.
Central Intelligence Agency ties
Rockefeller was acquainted with Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director Allen Dulles and his brother, Eisenhower administration Secretary of State John Foster Dulles—who was an in-law of the family—since his college years. It was in Rockefeller Center that Allen Dulles had set up his WWII operational center after Pearl Harbor, liaising closely with MI6, which also had their principal U.S. operation in the Center. He also knew and associated with the former CIA director Richard Helms as well as Archibald Bulloch Roosevelt Jr., a Chase Bank employee and former CIA agent whose first cousin, CIA agent Kermit Roosevelt Jr., was involved in the Iran coup of 1953. Also in 1953, he had befriended William Bundy, a pivotal CIA analyst for nine years in the 1950s, who became the Agency liaison to the National Security Council, and a subsequent lifelong friend. Moreover, in Cary Reich's biography of his brother Nelson, a former CIA agent states that David was extensively briefed on covert intelligence operations by himself and other Agency division chiefs, under the direction of David's "friend and confidant", CIA Director Allen Dulles.
Policy groups
In 1964, along with other American business figures such as Sol Linowitz, Rockefeller founded the non-profit International Executive Service Corps which encourages developing nations to promote private enterprise. In 1979, he formed the Partnership for New York City, a not-for-profit membership organization of New York businessmen. In 1992, he was selected as a leading member of the Russian-American Bankers Forum, an advisory group set up by the head of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to advise Russia on the modernization of its banking system, with the full endorsement of President Boris Yeltsin.
Rockefeller had a lifelong association with the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) when he joined as a director in 1949. In 1965, Rockefeller and other businessmen formed the Council of the Americas to stimulate and support economic integration in the Americas. In 1992, at a Council sponsored forum, Rockefeller proposed a "Western Hemisphere free trade area", which became the Free Trade Area of the Americas in a Miami summit in 1994. His and the Council's chief liaison to President Bill Clinton in order to garner support for this initiative was through Clinton's chief of staff, Mack McLarty, whose consultancy firm Kissinger McLarty Associates is a corporate member of the Council, while McLarty himself is on the board of directors. He was also a trustee of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, including 1948, when Alger Hiss was president.
Displeased with the refusal of Bilderberg Group meetings to include Japan, Rockefeller helped found the Trilateral Commission in July 1973.
Later career
After the war and alongside his work at Chase, Rockefeller took a more active role in his family's business dealings. Working with his brothers in the two floors of Rockefeller Center known as Room 5600, he reorganized the family's myriad business and philanthropic ventures. The men kept regular "brothers' meetings" where they made decisions on matters of common interest and reported on noteworthy events in each of their lives. Rockefeller served as secretary to the group, making notes of each meeting. The notes are now in the family archive and will be released in the future. Following the deaths of his brothers, Winthrop (1973), John III (1978), Nelson (1979), and Laurance (2004), David became sole head of the family (with the important involvement of his elder son, David Jr.).
Rockefeller ensured that selected members of the fourth generation, known generically as the cousins, became directly involved in the family's institutions. This involved inviting them to be more active in the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, the principal foundation established in 1940 by the five brothers and their one sister. The extended family also became involved in their own philanthropic organization, formed in 1967 and primarily established by third-generation members, called the Rockefeller Family Fund.
In the 1980s, Rockefeller became embroiled in controversy over the mortgaging and sale of Rockefeller Center to Japanese interests. In 1985, the Rockefeller family mortgaged the property for $1.3 billion, with $300 million of that going to the family. In 1989, 51 percent of the property, later increased to 80 percent, was sold to Mitsubishi Estate Company of Japan. This action was criticized for surrendering a major U.S. landmark to foreign interests. In 2000, Rockefeller presided over the final sale of Rockefeller Center to Tishman Speyer Properties, along with the Crown family of Chicago, which ended the more than 70 years of direct family financial association with Rockefeller Center.
In 2005, he gave $100 million to the Museum of Modern Art and $100 million to Rockefeller University, two of the most prominent family institutions; as well as $10 million to Harvard and $5 million to Colonial Williamsburg. In 2006, he pledged $225 million to the Rockefeller Brothers Fund upon his death, the largest gift in the Fund's history. The money will be used to create the David Rockefeller Global Development Fund, to support projects that improve access to health care, conduct research on international finance and trade, fight poverty, and support sustainable development, as well as to a program that fosters dialogue between Muslim and Western nations. Rockefeller donated $100 million to Harvard University in 2008. The New York Times estimated in November 2006 that his total charitable donations amount to $900 million over his lifetime, a figure that was substantiated by a monograph on the family's overall benefactions, entitled The Chronicle of Philanthropy.
He published Memoirs in 2002, the only time a member of the Rockefeller family has written an autobiography.
Rockefeller was a noted internationalist.
Rockefeller's will requires his estate, once assets are liquidated, to donate over $700 million to various non-profits, including Rockefeller University, the Museum of Modern Art and Harvard. The largest donation will be either $250 million or the remaining balance of the estate that will fund the launch of the David Rockefeller Global Development Fund.
Personal life
In 1940, Rockefeller married Margaret "Peggy" McGrath, who died in 1996. They had six children:
David Rockefeller Jr. (born July 24, 1941) – vice chairman, Rockefeller Family & Associates (the family office, Room 5600); chairman of Rockefeller Financial Services; Trustee of the Rockefeller Foundation; former chairman of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and Rockefeller & Co., Inc., among many other family institutions.
Abigail Aldrich "Abby" Rockefeller (born 1943) – economist and feminist. Eldest and most rebellious daughter, she was drawn to Marxism and was an ardent admirer of Fidel Castro and a late 1960s/early 1970s radical feminist who belonged to the organization Female Liberation, later forming a splinter group called Cell 16. An environmentalist and ecologist, she was an active supporter of the women's liberation movement.
Neva Rockefeller (born 1944) – economist and philanthropist. She is director of the Global Development and Environment Institute; trustee and vice chair of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and Director of the Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors.
Margaret Dulany "Peggy" Rockefeller (born 1947) – founder of the Synergos Institute in 1986; Board member of the Council on Foreign Relations; serves on the Advisory Committee of the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies at Harvard University.
Richard Gilder Rockefeller (1949–2014) – physician and philanthropist; chairman of the United States advisory board of the international aid group Doctors Without Borders; trustee and chair of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund.
Eileen Rockefeller (born February 26, 1952) – venture philanthropist; Founding Chair of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, established in New York City in 2002.
Death
Rockefeller died in his sleep from congestive heart failure on March 20, 2017, at his home in Pocantico Hills, New York. He was 101 years old.
Wealth
At the time of his death, Forbes estimated Rockefeller's net worth was $3.3 billion. Initially, most of his wealth had come to him via the family trusts created by his father, which were administered by Room 5600 and the Chase Bank. In turn, most of these trusts were held as shares in the successor companies of Standard Oil, as well as diverse real estate investment partnerships, such as the expansive Embarcadero Center in San Francisco, which he later sold for considerable profit, retaining only an indirect stake. In addition, he was or had been a partner in various properties such as Caneel Bay, a resort development in the Virgin Islands; a cattle ranch in Argentina; and a sheep ranch in Australia.
Another major source of asset wealth was his art collection, ranging from impressionist to postmodern, which he developed through the influence upon him of his mother Abby and her establishment, with two associates, of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City in 1929. The collection, valued at several hundred million dollars, was auctioned in the spring of 2018, with proceeds going to several designated nonprofit organizations, including Rockefeller University, Harvard University, the Museum of Modern Art, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the Maine Coast Heritage Trust.
Residences
Rockefeller's principal residence was at "Hudson Pines", on the family estate in Pocantico Hills, New York. He also had a Manhattan residence at 146 East 65th Street, as well as a country residence (known as "Four Winds") at a farm in Livingston, New York (Columbia County), where his wife raised Simmenthal beef cattle. He also maintained a summer home, "Ringing Point," at Seal Harbor on Mount Desert Island off the Maine coast. In May 2015, he donated one thousand acres of land in Seal Harbor to the Mount Desert Land and Garden Preserve. He also owned a large estate on the French island of St. Barth, and along with the Rothschild family, was one of the earliest developers and tourists on the island in the 1950s. The home was very modern and was located in the Colombier district, known to many as the most beautiful section of the island. It has changed hands several times over the years, and is the single largest private parcel on the island, encompassing the entire Baie de Colombier. Many years ago, the Rockefeller family donated the land in the initial creation of the Saint-Barth "Zone Verte," or Green Zone, which is an area which cannot be developed. The property also includes a private dock in the port of Gustavia as at the time the estate was developed, there were no roads to the property and the only way to get there was by boat; David Rockefeller would moor his yacht at his private dock in Gustavia before transferring to the Colombier estate in a smaller boat as the bay could not accommodate his yacht. The property was recently listed for over $100 million, but is not currently used as a residence and the main house has fallen into disrepair. There is also a dock in the Baie de Colombier. It is not known what the current owners' intentions are.
The Kykuit section of the Rockefeller family compound is the location of The Pocantico Conference Center of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund established by David and his four brothers in 1940 which was created when the Fund leased the area from the National Trust for Historic Preservation in 1991.
Non-governmental leadership positions
Council on Foreign Relations – Honorary Chairman
Americas Society – Founder and Honorary Chairman
Trilateral Commission – Founder and Honorary North American Chairman
Bilderberg Meetings – Only member of the Member Advisory Group
The New York Young Republican Club – Board Member
Awards
Presidential Medal of Freedom (1998);
U.S. Legion of Merit (1945);
French Legion of Honor (1945);
U.S. Army Commendation Ribbon (1945);
Commander of the Brazilian Order of the Southern Cross (1956);
Charles Evans Hughes award NCCJ, (1974);
George C. Marshall Foundation Award (1999);
Andrew Carnegie Medal of Philanthropy (2001);
Synergos Bridging Leadership Award (2003);
The Grand Croix of the Légion d'honneur (2000);
C. Walter Nichols Award, New York University (1970);
World Brotherhood Award, Jewish Theological Seminary of America (1953);
Award of Merit from the American Institute of Architects (1965);
Medal of Honor for City Planning, American Institute of Architects (1968);
World Monuments Fund's Hadrian Award (for preservation of art and architecture) (1994);
National Institute of Social Sciences Gold Medal Award (1967 – awarded to all 5 brothers);
United States Council for International Business (USCIB) International Leadership Award (1983);
The Hundred Year Association of New York's Gold Medal Award (1965).
References
Sources
Further reading
The Rockefeller File, Gary Allen, ´76 Press, Seal Beach California, 1976.
The Rockefeller Century: Three Generations of America's Greatest Family, John Ensor Harr and Peter J. Johnson. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1988.
The Rockefeller Conscience: An American Family in Public and in Private, John Ensor Harr and Peter J. Johnson, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1992.
The Life of Nelson A. Rockefeller: Worlds to Conquer 1908–1958, Cary Reich, New York: Doubleday, 1996.
Abby Aldrich Rockefeller: The Woman in the Family, Bernice Kert, New York: Random House, 1993.
Those Rockefeller Brothers: An Informal Biography of Five Extraordinary Young Men, Joe Alex Morris, New York: Harper & Brothers, 1953.
The Rockefellers: An American Dynasty, Peter Collier and David Horowitz, New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1976.
The American Establishment, Leonard Silk and Mark Silk, New York: Basic Books, Inc., 1980.
American Hegemony and the Trilateral Commission, Stephen Gill, Boston: Cambridge University Press, Reprint Edition, 1991.
The Chase: The Chase Manhattan Bank, N.A., 1945–1985, John Donald Wilson, Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 1986.
Wriston: Walter Wriston, Citibank, and the Rise and Fall of American Financial Supremacy, Phillip L. Zweig, New York: Crown Publishers, 1995.
Paul Volcker: The Making of a Financial Legend, Joseph B. Treaster, New York: Wiley, 2004.
Financier: The Biography of André Meyer; A Story of Money, Power, and the Reshaping of American Business, Cary Reich, New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1983.
Continuing the Inquiry: The Council on Foreign Relations from 1921 to 1996, Peter Grose, New York: Council on Foreign Relations: 1996.
Imperial Brain Trust: The Council on Foreign Relations and United States Foreign Policy, Laurence H. Shoup, and William Minter, New York: Authors Choice Press, (Reprint), 2004.
Cloak of Green: The Links between Key Environmental Groups, Government and Big Business, Elaine Dewar, New York: Lorimer, 1995.
The Shah's Last Ride, William Shawcross, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1989.
Divided We Stand: A Biography of New York City's World Trade Center, Eric Darton, New York: Basic Books, 1999.
The Rich and the Super-Rich: A Study in the Power of Money Today, Ferdinand Lundberg, New York: Lyle Stuart; Reprint Edition, 1988.
Interlock: The untold story of American banks, oil interests, the Shah's money, debts, and the astounding connections between them, Mark Hulbert, New York: Richardson & Snyder; 1st edition, 1982.
The Money Lenders: Bankers and a World in Turmoil, Anthony Sampson, New York: Viking Press, 1982.
The Chairman: John J. McCloy – The Making of the American Establishment, Kai Bird, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992.
External links
The Rockefeller Archive Center (RAC): Selected Biography
Rockefeller Brothers Fund Official Web site
1915 births
2017 deaths
Alumni of the London School of Economics
American art collectors
American autobiographers
American bankers
American billionaires
American centenarians
American chief executives of financial services companies
American memoirists
United States Army personnel of World War II
Philanthropists from New York (state)
Giving Pledgers
21st-century philanthropists
Grand Croix of the Légion d'honneur
Harvard University alumni
JPMorgan Chase employees
Members of the New York Yacht Club
Members of the Steering Committee of the Bilderberg Group
Men centenarians
Military personnel from New York City
New York (state) Republicans
People associated with the Museum of Modern Art (New York City)
Writers from Manhattan
Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients
Recipients of the Legion of Merit
Knights Commander of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
Rockefeller Center
Rockefeller family
Winthrop family
Rockefeller Foundation people
University of Chicago alumni
Honorary Fellows of the London School of Economics
United States Army officers
Chairs of the Council on Foreign Relations
Members of the Council on Foreign Relations
Ritchie Boys
World Trade Center | false | [
"Non-profit journalism (abbreviated as NPJ, also known as a not-for-profit journalism or think tank journalism) is the practice of journalism as a non-profit organization instead of a for-profit business. NPJ groups are able to operate and serve the public good without the concern of debt, dividends and the need to make a profit. Just like all non-profit organizations, NPJ outfits depend on private donations and or foundation grants to pay for operational expenses.\n\nNon-profit journalism history\n\nThe recent emergence of non-profit journalism may lead some to believe that this is a new trend in a struggling industry. However, journalism non-profits have been operating since the beginning of the newspaper age. In 1846, five New York newspapers united to share incoming reports from the Mexican–American War. That experiment in journalism became the Associated Press, which to this day is still a non-profit cooperative.\n\nNew Internationalist magazine – published since 1973 in the UK and since 1979 as a separate company in Australia – represents one of the world's longest-lasting independent non-profit publications. In the United States, two local non-profit journalism organizations, The Chicago Reporter and City Limits Magazine, were established in 1974 and 1976, respectively, to cover social and economic urban policy issues. The Center for Investigative Reporting (founded in 1977) is the nation's oldest non-profit investigative news organization. The second oldest is the Center for Public Integrity (CPI), founded in 1989 by Charles Lewis, a former producer for ABC News and CBS News. CPI's international arm, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), was founded in 1997. ICIJ works through a global network of 175 investigative reporters in more than 60 countries.\n\nIn 2013, a Pew Research Center study found that there were 172 nonprofit news outlets based in the United States founded between 1987 and April 2012. The study included in its count only those outlets that were active; primarily published online; and produced original reporting (i.e., not news aggregation or only opinion content).\n\nThe study found that:\n\nThe study found that about \"two-thirds of the 172 nonprofit news outlets studied are sponsored or published by another organization; just one third are independent.\" Sponsors were most often a nonprofit think tank, another news organization, or a university. Most non-profit news outlets were small, with 78% reporting five or fewer full-time paid staffers.\n\nExamples\n Center for Investigative Reporting (The Bay Citizen merged with CIR in 2012)\n InsideClimate News\n The Marshall Project\n Mother Jones\n ProPublica\n The Texas Tribune\n Global Reporting Centre\n Center for Public Integrity\n The Trace\n\nSee also\n\n Citizen journalism\n Creative nonfiction\n History of journalism\n History of American newspapers\n Journalism genres\n Philanthrojournalism\n\nReferences\n\nTypes of journalism\nInvestigative journalism\nProfit",
"\"More Than Words\" is a 1991 ballad written and originally performed by the rock band Extreme.\n\nMore Than Words may also refer to:\n\n More Than Words (EP), the first EP by the new members of Menudo\n More Than Words (Mark 'Oh album), 2004\n More Than Words: The Best of Kevin Kern, an album by Kevin Kern\n More Than Words (non-profit organization), a non profit organization in Massachusetts\n More Than Words (Brian McKnight album), 2013\n More Than Words (TV series), a 2014 Philippine TV series\n\nSee also\n\"More Than Words Can Say\", a 1990 song by Alias\nMore Than Words Can Say (album), a 2006 album by Stevie Holland"
]
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"David Rockefeller",
"Political connections",
"What is CFR?",
"Council on Foreign Relations study group on nuclear weapons,",
"Did he found more than one non-profit?",
"I don't know."
]
| C_4cdf638f899142318da9a416630f4496_1 | When did he become the director of CFR? | 3 | When did David Rockefeller become the director of CFR? | David Rockefeller | Rockefeller traveled widely and met with both foreign rulers and U.S. presidents, beginning with Dwight D. Eisenhower. At times he served as an unofficial emissary on high-level business. Among the foreign leaders he met were Saddam Hussein, Fidel Castro, Nikita Khrushchev, and Mikhail Gorbachev. In 1968, he declined an offer from his brother Nelson Rockefeller, then governor of New York, to appoint him to Robert F. Kennedy's Senate seat after Kennedy was assassinated in June 1968, a post Nelson also offered to their nephew John Davison "Jay" Rockefeller IV. President Jimmy Carter offered him the position of United States Secretary of the Treasury but he declined. Rockefeller was criticized for befriending foreign autocrats in order to expand Chase interests in their countries. The New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote in 2002 that Rockefeller "spent his life in the club of the ruling class and was loyal to members of the club, no matter what they did." He noted that Rockefeller had cut profitable deals with "oil-rich dictators", "Soviet party bosses" and "Chinese perpetrators of the Cultural Revolution". Rockefeller met Henry Kissinger in 1954, when Kissinger was appointed a director of a seminal Council on Foreign Relations study group on nuclear weapons, of which David Rockefeller was a member. He named Kissinger to the board of trustees of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, and consulted with him frequently, with the subjects including the Chase Bank's interests in Chile and the possibility of the election of Salvador Allende in 1970. Rockefeller supported his "opening of China" initiative in 1971 as it afforded banking opportunities for the Chase Bank. Though a lifelong Republican and party contributor, he was a member of the moderate "Rockefeller Republicans" that arose out of the political ambitions and public policy stance of his brother Nelson. In 2006 he teamed up with former Goldman Sachs executives and others to form a fund-raising group based in Washington, Republicans Who Care, that supported moderate Republican candidates over more ideological contenders. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | David Rockefeller (June 12, 1915 – March 20, 2017) was an American investment banker who served as chairman and chief executive of Chase Manhattan Corporation. He was the oldest living member of the third generation of the Rockefeller family, and family patriarch from July 2004 until his death in March 2017. Rockefeller was the fifth son and youngest child of John D. Rockefeller Jr. and Abby Aldrich Rockefeller, and a grandson of John D. Rockefeller and Laura Spelman Rockefeller.
He was noted for his wide-ranging political connections and foreign travel, in which he met with many foreign leaders. His fortune was estimated at $3.3 billion at the time of his death in March 2017.
Early life
Rockefeller was born in New York City, New York. He grew up in an eight-story house at 10 West 54th Street, the tallest private residence ever built in the city. Rockefeller was the youngest of six children born to financier John Davison Rockefeller Jr. and socialite Abigail Greene "Abby" Aldrich. John Jr. was the only son of Standard Oil co-founder John Davison Rockefeller Sr. and schoolteacher Laura Celestia "Cettie" Spelman. Abby was a daughter of Rhode Island U.S. Senator Nelson Wilmarth Aldrich and Abigail Pearce Truman "Abby" Chapman. David's five elder siblings were Abby, John III, Nelson, Laurance, and Winthrop.
Rockefeller attended the experimental Lincoln School at 123rd Street in Harlem.
Education
In 1936, Rockefeller graduated cum laude from Harvard University, where he worked as an editor on The Harvard Crimson. He also studied economics for a year at Harvard and then a year at the London School of Economics (LSE). At LSE he first met the future President John F. Kennedy (although he had earlier been his contemporary at Harvard) and once dated Kennedy's sister Kathleen.
During his time abroad, Rockefeller briefly worked in the London branch of what was to become the Chase Manhattan Bank.
After returning to the U.S. to complete his graduate studies, he received a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1940.
Career
Government service
After completing his studies in Chicago, he became secretary to New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia for eighteen months in a "dollar a year" public service position. Although the mayor pointed out to the press that Rockefeller was only one of 60 interns in the city government, his working space was, in fact, the vacant office of the deputy mayor. From 1941 to 1942, Rockefeller was assistant regional director of the United States Office of Defense, Health and Welfare Services.
Military
Rockefeller enlisted in the U.S. Army and entered Officer Candidate School in 1943; he was ultimately promoted to Captain in 1945. During World War II he served in North Africa and France (he spoke fluent French) for military intelligence setting up political and economic intelligence units. He served as a "Ritchie Boy" secret unit specially trained at Fort Ritchie, Maryland. For seven months he also served as an assistant military attaché at the American Embassy in Paris. During this period, he called on family contacts and Standard Oil executives for assistance.
Banking
In 1946, Rockefeller joined the staff of the longtime family-associated Chase National Bank. The chairman at that time was Rockefeller's uncle Winthrop W. Aldrich. The Chase Bank was primarily a wholesale bank, dealing with other prominent financial institutions and major corporate clients such as General Electric (which had, through its RCA affiliate, leased prominent space and become a crucial first tenant of Rockefeller Center in 1930). The bank also is closely associated with and has financed the oil industry, having longstanding connections with its board of directors to the successor companies of Standard Oil, especially Exxon Mobil. Chase National became the Chase Manhattan Bank in 1955 and shifted significantly into consumer banking. It is now called JPMorgan Chase.
Rockefeller started as an assistant manager in the foreign department. There he financed international trade in a number of commodities, such as coffee, sugar and metals. This position also maintained relationships with more than 1,000 correspondent banks throughout the world. He served in other positions and became president in 1960. He was both chairman and chief executive of Chase Manhattan from 1969 to 1980 and remained chairman until 1981. He was also, as recently as 1980, the single largest individual shareholder of the bank, holding 1.7% of its shares.
During his term as CEO, Chase spread internationally and became a central component of the world's financial system due to its global network of correspondent banks, the largest in the world. In 1973, Chase established the first branch of an American bank in Moscow, in the then Soviet Union. That year Rockefeller traveled to China, resulting in his bank becoming the National Bank of China's first correspondent bank in the U.S.
Also during this period, Chase Manhattan expanded its influence over many non-financial corporations. A 1979 study titled "The Significance of Bank Control over Large Corporations" provided an estimate for which large U.S.-based financial institutions had the most control over other corporations. The study finds that: "The Rockefeller-controlled Chase Manhattan Bank tops the list, controlling 16 companies."He was faulted for spending excessive amounts of time abroad, and during his tenure as CEO the bank had more troubled loans than any other major bank. Chase owned more New York City securities in the mid-1970s, when the city was nearing bankruptcy. A scandal erupted in 1974 when an audit found that losses from bond trading had been understated, and in 1975 the bank was branded a "problem bank" by the Federal Reserve.
From 1974 to 1976, Chase earnings fell 36 percent while those of its biggest rivals rose 12 to 31 percent. The bank's earnings more than doubled between 1976 and 1980, far outpacing its rival Citibank in return on assets. By 1981 the bank's finances were restored to full health.
In November 1979, while chairman of the Chase Bank, Rockefeller became embroiled in an international incident when he and Henry Kissinger, along with John J. McCloy and Rockefeller aides, persuaded President Jimmy Carter through the United States Department of State to admit the Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, into the United States for hospital treatment for lymphoma. This action directly precipitated what is known as the Iran hostage crisis and placed Rockefeller under intense media scrutiny (particularly from The New York Times) for the first time in his public life.
Rockefeller retired from active management of the bank in 1981, succeeded by his protégé Willard C. Butcher. Former Chase chairman John J. McCloy said at the time that he believed Rockefeller would not go down in history as a great banker but rather as a "real personality, as a distinguished and loyal member of the community".
Political connections
Rockefeller traveled widely and met with both foreign rulers and U.S. presidents, beginning with Dwight D. Eisenhower. At times he served as an unofficial emissary on high-level business. Among the foreign leaders he met were Saddam Hussein, Fidel Castro, Nikita Khrushchev, and Mikhail Gorbachev.
In 1968, he declined an offer from his brother Nelson Rockefeller, then governor of New York, to appoint him to Robert F. Kennedy's Senate seat after Kennedy was assassinated in June 1968, a post Nelson also offered to their nephew John Davison "Jay" Rockefeller IV. President Jimmy Carter offered him the position of United States Secretary of the Treasury but he declined.
Rockefeller was criticized for befriending foreign autocrats in order to expand Chase interests in their countries. The New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote in 2002 that Rockefeller "spent his life in the club of the ruling class and was loyal to members of the club, no matter what they did." He noted that Rockefeller had cut profitable deals with "oil-rich dictators", "Soviet party bosses" and "Chinese perpetrators of the Cultural Revolution".
Rockefeller met Henry Kissinger in 1954, when Kissinger was appointed a director of a seminal Council on Foreign Relations study group on nuclear weapons, of which David Rockefeller was a member. He named Kissinger to the board of trustees of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, and consulted with him frequently, with the subjects including the Chase Bank's interests in Chile and the possibility of the election of Salvador Allende in 1970. Rockefeller supported his "opening of China" initiative in 1971 as it afforded banking opportunities for the Chase Bank.
Though a lifelong Republican and party contributor, he was a member of the moderate "Rockefeller Republicans" that arose out of the political ambitions and public policy stance of his brother Nelson. In 2006, he teamed up with former Goldman Sachs executives and others to form a fund-raising group based in Washington, Republicans Who Care, that supported moderate Republican candidates over more ideological contenders.
Central Intelligence Agency ties
Rockefeller was acquainted with Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director Allen Dulles and his brother, Eisenhower administration Secretary of State John Foster Dulles—who was an in-law of the family—since his college years. It was in Rockefeller Center that Allen Dulles had set up his WWII operational center after Pearl Harbor, liaising closely with MI6, which also had their principal U.S. operation in the Center. He also knew and associated with the former CIA director Richard Helms as well as Archibald Bulloch Roosevelt Jr., a Chase Bank employee and former CIA agent whose first cousin, CIA agent Kermit Roosevelt Jr., was involved in the Iran coup of 1953. Also in 1953, he had befriended William Bundy, a pivotal CIA analyst for nine years in the 1950s, who became the Agency liaison to the National Security Council, and a subsequent lifelong friend. Moreover, in Cary Reich's biography of his brother Nelson, a former CIA agent states that David was extensively briefed on covert intelligence operations by himself and other Agency division chiefs, under the direction of David's "friend and confidant", CIA Director Allen Dulles.
Policy groups
In 1964, along with other American business figures such as Sol Linowitz, Rockefeller founded the non-profit International Executive Service Corps which encourages developing nations to promote private enterprise. In 1979, he formed the Partnership for New York City, a not-for-profit membership organization of New York businessmen. In 1992, he was selected as a leading member of the Russian-American Bankers Forum, an advisory group set up by the head of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to advise Russia on the modernization of its banking system, with the full endorsement of President Boris Yeltsin.
Rockefeller had a lifelong association with the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) when he joined as a director in 1949. In 1965, Rockefeller and other businessmen formed the Council of the Americas to stimulate and support economic integration in the Americas. In 1992, at a Council sponsored forum, Rockefeller proposed a "Western Hemisphere free trade area", which became the Free Trade Area of the Americas in a Miami summit in 1994. His and the Council's chief liaison to President Bill Clinton in order to garner support for this initiative was through Clinton's chief of staff, Mack McLarty, whose consultancy firm Kissinger McLarty Associates is a corporate member of the Council, while McLarty himself is on the board of directors. He was also a trustee of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, including 1948, when Alger Hiss was president.
Displeased with the refusal of Bilderberg Group meetings to include Japan, Rockefeller helped found the Trilateral Commission in July 1973.
Later career
After the war and alongside his work at Chase, Rockefeller took a more active role in his family's business dealings. Working with his brothers in the two floors of Rockefeller Center known as Room 5600, he reorganized the family's myriad business and philanthropic ventures. The men kept regular "brothers' meetings" where they made decisions on matters of common interest and reported on noteworthy events in each of their lives. Rockefeller served as secretary to the group, making notes of each meeting. The notes are now in the family archive and will be released in the future. Following the deaths of his brothers, Winthrop (1973), John III (1978), Nelson (1979), and Laurance (2004), David became sole head of the family (with the important involvement of his elder son, David Jr.).
Rockefeller ensured that selected members of the fourth generation, known generically as the cousins, became directly involved in the family's institutions. This involved inviting them to be more active in the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, the principal foundation established in 1940 by the five brothers and their one sister. The extended family also became involved in their own philanthropic organization, formed in 1967 and primarily established by third-generation members, called the Rockefeller Family Fund.
In the 1980s, Rockefeller became embroiled in controversy over the mortgaging and sale of Rockefeller Center to Japanese interests. In 1985, the Rockefeller family mortgaged the property for $1.3 billion, with $300 million of that going to the family. In 1989, 51 percent of the property, later increased to 80 percent, was sold to Mitsubishi Estate Company of Japan. This action was criticized for surrendering a major U.S. landmark to foreign interests. In 2000, Rockefeller presided over the final sale of Rockefeller Center to Tishman Speyer Properties, along with the Crown family of Chicago, which ended the more than 70 years of direct family financial association with Rockefeller Center.
In 2005, he gave $100 million to the Museum of Modern Art and $100 million to Rockefeller University, two of the most prominent family institutions; as well as $10 million to Harvard and $5 million to Colonial Williamsburg. In 2006, he pledged $225 million to the Rockefeller Brothers Fund upon his death, the largest gift in the Fund's history. The money will be used to create the David Rockefeller Global Development Fund, to support projects that improve access to health care, conduct research on international finance and trade, fight poverty, and support sustainable development, as well as to a program that fosters dialogue between Muslim and Western nations. Rockefeller donated $100 million to Harvard University in 2008. The New York Times estimated in November 2006 that his total charitable donations amount to $900 million over his lifetime, a figure that was substantiated by a monograph on the family's overall benefactions, entitled The Chronicle of Philanthropy.
He published Memoirs in 2002, the only time a member of the Rockefeller family has written an autobiography.
Rockefeller was a noted internationalist.
Rockefeller's will requires his estate, once assets are liquidated, to donate over $700 million to various non-profits, including Rockefeller University, the Museum of Modern Art and Harvard. The largest donation will be either $250 million or the remaining balance of the estate that will fund the launch of the David Rockefeller Global Development Fund.
Personal life
In 1940, Rockefeller married Margaret "Peggy" McGrath, who died in 1996. They had six children:
David Rockefeller Jr. (born July 24, 1941) – vice chairman, Rockefeller Family & Associates (the family office, Room 5600); chairman of Rockefeller Financial Services; Trustee of the Rockefeller Foundation; former chairman of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and Rockefeller & Co., Inc., among many other family institutions.
Abigail Aldrich "Abby" Rockefeller (born 1943) – economist and feminist. Eldest and most rebellious daughter, she was drawn to Marxism and was an ardent admirer of Fidel Castro and a late 1960s/early 1970s radical feminist who belonged to the organization Female Liberation, later forming a splinter group called Cell 16. An environmentalist and ecologist, she was an active supporter of the women's liberation movement.
Neva Rockefeller (born 1944) – economist and philanthropist. She is director of the Global Development and Environment Institute; trustee and vice chair of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and Director of the Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors.
Margaret Dulany "Peggy" Rockefeller (born 1947) – founder of the Synergos Institute in 1986; Board member of the Council on Foreign Relations; serves on the Advisory Committee of the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies at Harvard University.
Richard Gilder Rockefeller (1949–2014) – physician and philanthropist; chairman of the United States advisory board of the international aid group Doctors Without Borders; trustee and chair of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund.
Eileen Rockefeller (born February 26, 1952) – venture philanthropist; Founding Chair of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, established in New York City in 2002.
Death
Rockefeller died in his sleep from congestive heart failure on March 20, 2017, at his home in Pocantico Hills, New York. He was 101 years old.
Wealth
At the time of his death, Forbes estimated Rockefeller's net worth was $3.3 billion. Initially, most of his wealth had come to him via the family trusts created by his father, which were administered by Room 5600 and the Chase Bank. In turn, most of these trusts were held as shares in the successor companies of Standard Oil, as well as diverse real estate investment partnerships, such as the expansive Embarcadero Center in San Francisco, which he later sold for considerable profit, retaining only an indirect stake. In addition, he was or had been a partner in various properties such as Caneel Bay, a resort development in the Virgin Islands; a cattle ranch in Argentina; and a sheep ranch in Australia.
Another major source of asset wealth was his art collection, ranging from impressionist to postmodern, which he developed through the influence upon him of his mother Abby and her establishment, with two associates, of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City in 1929. The collection, valued at several hundred million dollars, was auctioned in the spring of 2018, with proceeds going to several designated nonprofit organizations, including Rockefeller University, Harvard University, the Museum of Modern Art, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the Maine Coast Heritage Trust.
Residences
Rockefeller's principal residence was at "Hudson Pines", on the family estate in Pocantico Hills, New York. He also had a Manhattan residence at 146 East 65th Street, as well as a country residence (known as "Four Winds") at a farm in Livingston, New York (Columbia County), where his wife raised Simmenthal beef cattle. He also maintained a summer home, "Ringing Point," at Seal Harbor on Mount Desert Island off the Maine coast. In May 2015, he donated one thousand acres of land in Seal Harbor to the Mount Desert Land and Garden Preserve. He also owned a large estate on the French island of St. Barth, and along with the Rothschild family, was one of the earliest developers and tourists on the island in the 1950s. The home was very modern and was located in the Colombier district, known to many as the most beautiful section of the island. It has changed hands several times over the years, and is the single largest private parcel on the island, encompassing the entire Baie de Colombier. Many years ago, the Rockefeller family donated the land in the initial creation of the Saint-Barth "Zone Verte," or Green Zone, which is an area which cannot be developed. The property also includes a private dock in the port of Gustavia as at the time the estate was developed, there were no roads to the property and the only way to get there was by boat; David Rockefeller would moor his yacht at his private dock in Gustavia before transferring to the Colombier estate in a smaller boat as the bay could not accommodate his yacht. The property was recently listed for over $100 million, but is not currently used as a residence and the main house has fallen into disrepair. There is also a dock in the Baie de Colombier. It is not known what the current owners' intentions are.
The Kykuit section of the Rockefeller family compound is the location of The Pocantico Conference Center of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund established by David and his four brothers in 1940 which was created when the Fund leased the area from the National Trust for Historic Preservation in 1991.
Non-governmental leadership positions
Council on Foreign Relations – Honorary Chairman
Americas Society – Founder and Honorary Chairman
Trilateral Commission – Founder and Honorary North American Chairman
Bilderberg Meetings – Only member of the Member Advisory Group
The New York Young Republican Club – Board Member
Awards
Presidential Medal of Freedom (1998);
U.S. Legion of Merit (1945);
French Legion of Honor (1945);
U.S. Army Commendation Ribbon (1945);
Commander of the Brazilian Order of the Southern Cross (1956);
Charles Evans Hughes award NCCJ, (1974);
George C. Marshall Foundation Award (1999);
Andrew Carnegie Medal of Philanthropy (2001);
Synergos Bridging Leadership Award (2003);
The Grand Croix of the Légion d'honneur (2000);
C. Walter Nichols Award, New York University (1970);
World Brotherhood Award, Jewish Theological Seminary of America (1953);
Award of Merit from the American Institute of Architects (1965);
Medal of Honor for City Planning, American Institute of Architects (1968);
World Monuments Fund's Hadrian Award (for preservation of art and architecture) (1994);
National Institute of Social Sciences Gold Medal Award (1967 – awarded to all 5 brothers);
United States Council for International Business (USCIB) International Leadership Award (1983);
The Hundred Year Association of New York's Gold Medal Award (1965).
References
Sources
Further reading
The Rockefeller File, Gary Allen, ´76 Press, Seal Beach California, 1976.
The Rockefeller Century: Three Generations of America's Greatest Family, John Ensor Harr and Peter J. Johnson. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1988.
The Rockefeller Conscience: An American Family in Public and in Private, John Ensor Harr and Peter J. Johnson, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1992.
The Life of Nelson A. Rockefeller: Worlds to Conquer 1908–1958, Cary Reich, New York: Doubleday, 1996.
Abby Aldrich Rockefeller: The Woman in the Family, Bernice Kert, New York: Random House, 1993.
Those Rockefeller Brothers: An Informal Biography of Five Extraordinary Young Men, Joe Alex Morris, New York: Harper & Brothers, 1953.
The Rockefellers: An American Dynasty, Peter Collier and David Horowitz, New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1976.
The American Establishment, Leonard Silk and Mark Silk, New York: Basic Books, Inc., 1980.
American Hegemony and the Trilateral Commission, Stephen Gill, Boston: Cambridge University Press, Reprint Edition, 1991.
The Chase: The Chase Manhattan Bank, N.A., 1945–1985, John Donald Wilson, Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 1986.
Wriston: Walter Wriston, Citibank, and the Rise and Fall of American Financial Supremacy, Phillip L. Zweig, New York: Crown Publishers, 1995.
Paul Volcker: The Making of a Financial Legend, Joseph B. Treaster, New York: Wiley, 2004.
Financier: The Biography of André Meyer; A Story of Money, Power, and the Reshaping of American Business, Cary Reich, New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1983.
Continuing the Inquiry: The Council on Foreign Relations from 1921 to 1996, Peter Grose, New York: Council on Foreign Relations: 1996.
Imperial Brain Trust: The Council on Foreign Relations and United States Foreign Policy, Laurence H. Shoup, and William Minter, New York: Authors Choice Press, (Reprint), 2004.
Cloak of Green: The Links between Key Environmental Groups, Government and Big Business, Elaine Dewar, New York: Lorimer, 1995.
The Shah's Last Ride, William Shawcross, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1989.
Divided We Stand: A Biography of New York City's World Trade Center, Eric Darton, New York: Basic Books, 1999.
The Rich and the Super-Rich: A Study in the Power of Money Today, Ferdinand Lundberg, New York: Lyle Stuart; Reprint Edition, 1988.
Interlock: The untold story of American banks, oil interests, the Shah's money, debts, and the astounding connections between them, Mark Hulbert, New York: Richardson & Snyder; 1st edition, 1982.
The Money Lenders: Bankers and a World in Turmoil, Anthony Sampson, New York: Viking Press, 1982.
The Chairman: John J. McCloy – The Making of the American Establishment, Kai Bird, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992.
External links
The Rockefeller Archive Center (RAC): Selected Biography
Rockefeller Brothers Fund Official Web site
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American memoirists
United States Army personnel of World War II
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"Constantin \"Jumate\" Rădulescu (30 May 1924 – 1 January 2001), commonly known as Dr. Constantin Rădulescu, was a Romanian doctor, footballer and manager. As a footballer he played mainly as a midfielder.\n\nIn 2005, as a tribute to the work done in building and rising the club, CFR Cluj renamed its stadium as Stadionul Dr. Constantin Rădulescu.\n\nClub career\n\nEarly years of football (Olympia and Sportul)\nBorn in Bucharest, Rădulescu started his career at Olympia București then moved to Sportul Studențesc in 1942, for which he played in 8 matches in the Divizia A.\n\nUniversitatea Cluj\nIn 1943 the doctor signed with Universitatea Cluj, team that played at Sibiu in that period as a consequence of the territorial agreement known as the Second Vienna Award, by which Northern Transylvania became part of the Kingdom of Hungary as a result of World War II events. That team would be known as a symbol of the Romanian resistance in Transylvania. In 1949 he left \"U\" as a result of some misunderstandings and would declare later in his book, O viaţă închinată fotbalului (A life dedicated to football): Honestly, I split hard and regretfully from this wonderful team, which deserves any superlatives.\n\nCFR Cluj\nAfter leaving \"U\", Constantin Rădulescu chose to continue his career at the rival CFR, known at the time as Locomotiva, a small team that still did not seem to become the Universitatea's bitter rival. For CFR he played 6 years and retired in 1956, at only 31 years old due to a serious injury.\n\nManager career\n\nEarly years\nAfter retirement the doctor started immediately his football manager career at CFR and after some seasons in the Divizia B and Divizia C he signed with his first love, Universitatea Cluj, known at that time as Știința, but only resisting one season in this position.\n\nThe Creator of CFR Cluj\nIn the summer of 1963 he went back to CFR Cluj, known at that time as CSM Cluj, and would begin the building of the team that later would become the bitter rival of Universitatea. In 1969 he succeeded the first Divizia A promotion in the history of CFR, managing to maintain the team on the first stage of the Romanian football until 1976 and at the end of 1972–73 season, a 5th place, the best ranking in history of the club until 2006. These performances are all the more incredible as the team has inadequate training, organizational and financial conditions, Rădulescu was telling in his book: No finances and players, no headquarters, secretary or organizer. So we started in the first league in 1969.\n\nAfter relegation he moved back to \"U\" for one season, then reaching lower league teams such as CUG Cluj or Sticla Arieșul Turda.\n\nIn 1992 at 68 years old the doctor returned to his creation, CFR, and managed the team for 3 years in Liga III, helping at the creation of the team that would promote a year later.\n\nPlaying and Managing style\nAs a player, Rădulescu turned throw-ins into real corner kicks.\n\nAs a manager he is considered a real Alex Ferguson of CFR Cluj by former player Marius Bretan and former player Romică Petrescu said: Ajax and CFR used the same training methods. The training cycle was taken from Ajax, with two training sessions on Tuesday, two on Thursday, free on Wednesday. Everything was done counter-clockwise, after pulse, after tension.\n\nAugustin Ţegean, a CFR legend described him: A distinct character from all points of view: tough, severe, does not give up his principles. He always told us that he was only allowed to make fun because he was from Bucharest. He was a strong personality, we all respected him. We were afraid of him. [..] I can say he was using new methods for those times. He explained the game schemes on the board. The marks were made man-to-man. Everyone knew exactly what area to cover on the pitch. His methods were the most modern.\n\nTrivia\nHe refused the national team so that he would not lose his doctor's position, told the doctor's daughter, Ioana Stanca Gidro. In 1972, the Minister of Transport asked him to take over Rapid București, but he refused again, this time using a tertip, demanding that Rică Răducanu, a legend of Rapid, to be kicked out.\n\nPersonal life\nRădulescu's daughter, Stanca Ioana Gidro is a lawyer and former dean of the Cluj-Napoca Bar, among other.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Constantin Rădulescu at labtof.ro\n\n1924 births\n2001 deaths\nSportspeople from Bucharest\n20th-century Romanian physicians\nRomanian footballers\nAssociation football midfielders\nLiga I players\nOlympia București players\nFC Sportul Studențesc București players\nFC Universitatea Cluj players\nLiga II players\nCFR Cluj players\nRomanian football managers\nCFR Cluj managers\nFC Universitatea Cluj managers",
"Fotbal Club CFR 1907 Cluj, commonly known as CFR Cluj ( or ), is a Romanian professional football club based in the city of Cluj-Napoca, Cluj County, which competes in the Liga I. It was founded in 1907 as Kolozsvári Vasutas Sport Club, when Transylvania was part of Austria-Hungary, and the current name CFR is the acronym for Căile Ferate Române (i.e. \"Romanian Railways\").\n\nBefore its latest promotion to the Liga I in 2004, the club had spent most of its existence in the lower divisions. CFR Cluj has since relied increasingly on foreign players for its success, and in the 2005–06 season participated in its first European competition, the Intertoto Cup, where it finished as runner-up. With significant financial support from previous owner Árpád Pászkány, CFR took the national title away from capital-based teams after seventeen years and became national champion for the first time in the 2007–08 campaign.\n\nThe team has risen to become an esteemed figure in Romanian football, as well as securing three qualifications each to the UEFA Champions League and Europa League group stages. Between 2017 and 2021, \"the White and Burgundies\" won four successive championships. In total, CFR has amassed fifteen domestic trophies, all of them in the 21st century—seven Liga I, four Cupa României and four Supercupa României.\n\nCFR has a fierce rivalry with neighbouring Universitatea Cluj, with matches between the two being known as Derbiul Clujului. Several, but minor rivalries also developed in the recent period against teams with which CFR contended for the league title.\n\nHistory\n\nEstablishment and early years (1907–1969)\n\nCFR was founded in 1907, when the city of Cluj-Napoca (then Kolozsvár) was part of Austria-Hungary, under the name Kolozsvári Vasutas Sport Club (\"Kolozsvár Railway Sports Club\"). From 1907 to 1910, the team played in the municipal championship. However, the club did not have any notable achievements during this time. In 1911, the team won the newly organized Championship of Transylvania. The club consistently finished in second place in that competition between 1911 and 1914, a competition that was interrupted because of World War I. After the war, in 1920, Transylvania was given to Romania and the club accordingly changed its name to CFR Cluj, maintaining its links with the national rail organisation, this time the Romanian state railway carrier, Căile Ferate Române, hence the acronym. They went on to win two regional titles, in 1918–19 and 1919–20.\n\nBetween 1920 and 1934 the club did not have any notable achievements. Between 1934 and 1936, CFR played for two seasons in the Divizia B, ranking sixth in the 1934–35 season and eighth in the 1935–36 season. In 1936, CFR was relegated to the Divizia C, where the team played for two seasons, finishing second and 4th, respectively. After World War II, CFR played for one season in the Divizia C, earning the promotion to the Divizia B. Before the start of the 1947–48 season, the team merged with another local club, Ferar Cluj, and played in the Divizia A for the very first time in history. Unfortunately, the team lasted only two years in the first league and would not play there again for another 20 years. In 1960, another merger, this time with Rapid Cluj resulted in CSM Cluj. In 1964, the team's name was changed to Clujeana. In that same year, the club's junior team won the national championship. Three years later, the team's name was reversed yet again to CFR Cluj.\n\nReturn to the top flight (1969–1976)\n\nIn 1969, CFR finished first in Divizia B with 40 points, five more than their rival, Politehnica Timișoara. The conclusive game of that season was a 1–1 draw with Politehnica. Politehnica had a 1–0 lead at half-time, but CFR came back with a fine header.\n\nDuring the summer of 1969, CFR Cluj advanced to Divizia A under the leadership of coach Constantin Rădulescu. Rădulescu was originally from southern Romania, but he grew to manhood in the atmosphere of Transylvania. Before coaching, he had played for CFR and another well-known local team, Universitatea Cluj (or U Cluj), during the 1940s. In the 1969–70 first league championship, CFR made its debut with a 2–0 victory over ASA Târgu Mureș. The next few games did not go as well; although there was a 1–0 win to Politehnica Iași, there were 2 losses to Steaua București (1–3) and Dinamo București (0–2). These and other drefeats were a factor in the team's supposed downhill slide. However, the following spring CFR bounced back with a win over ASA Târgu Mureș (1–0), after a goal from Octavian Ionescu, and averted relegation.\n\nAt the beginning of CFR's second season in Divizia A, Rădulescu was replaced by Eugen Iordache as head coach. During his tenure, CFR did not do well, and Rădulescu was swiftly brought back. Even so, CFR Cluj found itself again at the bottom of the table before the winter break. The spring of 1971 was somewhat better, although CFR struggled again to avoid relegation. CFR's last game of that season, against UTA Arad, was a memorable one. CFR led 1–0 at half-time. UTA Arad, however, overturned the match after scoring twice. Nonetheless, the persistence of the players from Cluj was rewarded with a late goal, tying the game at 2–2. UTA went on to play in the European Cups, but, most importantly, CFR avoided relegation.\n\nThe 1971–72 season started off badly for CFR. Losses to Dinamo București (1–3); Crișul Oradea (0–1, after a last-minute penalty kick), and Jiul Petroșani (1–2 after two regrettable own-goals) meant CFR's demise after the first round of the championship – the team finished at the bottom, with only seven points. CFR's return was dramatic, although inconsistent at times. The team won some important games, such as a 1–0 with Universitatea Craiova and a 3–0 with Petrolul Ploiești. By the end of the season, however, CFR was again struggling to stay in Divizia A. CFR was tied at half-time after having led with 2–0 in their game against Politehnica Iași. In the second half, two late goals from Ionescu and Petrescu saved the team from relegation. When Rădulescu and his players got back home to Cluj, 3,000 fans turned out to celebrate their performance.\n\nDuring the summer of 1972, CFR made an important transfer. Mihai Adam, from Universitatea Cluj, was traded for Soos. Adam had been twice Romania's top scorer, and was considered one of the best Romanian players of his generation. He and the rest of the team would make the 1972–73 season the most successful in CFR's history. The team achieved its highest ranking ever in Romanian football, fifth in Divizia A. Several important results concluded a great season, including a 2–0 victory against Rapid București, a 2–2 draw against Sportul Studențesc București, and another draw, 1–1, with Steaua București. Additionally, the stadium that CFR continues to use even today was built in 1973. To celebrate the completion of the stadium, CFR Cluj played a friendly game against Cuba. The game ended in a 2–1 victory for CFR.\n\nThe 1973–74 season was a rather bad one for CFR, as it barely saved itself from relegation, ranking 14th at the end of the season. The only notable achievement of that season was Mihai Adam's third title as Romania's top goal-scorer who, even though he was 33 years old, scored 23 goals. The 1974–75 season was much like the one before: CFR struggled to avoid relegation, achieving its objectives all the while. The 1975–76 season marked CFR's relegation and its last season in Divizia A during the 20th century. A contributing negative factor was the age of the team, with most of its players in their 30s.\n\nLower leagues (1976–2002)\nDuring the 1977–78 season, CFR attempted to make a comeback. However, the team finished only second in Divizia B, after Baia Mare. Four years later, CFR slid further down, into the third division, Divizia C. From then on, the team would alternate between the second and third leagues. In 1983, CFR played in Divizia B under its longstanding coach, Dr. Constantin Rădulescu. In the 1990s, CFR struggled financially and found itself more than once on the brink of bankruptcy. Nevertheless, several very talented players were raised, including Cristian Dulca, Attila Piroska, Cristian Coroian, and Alin Minteuan.\n\nPászkány takeover and first national titles (2002–2012)\nIn January 2002, a new sponsor, Árpád Pászkány, head of S.C. ECOMAX M.G., founded a new commercial sport society, with ECOMAX M.G. as the primary shareholder. By the end of the 2001–02 season in Divizia C, CFR had been promoted back to Divizia B (later on Liga II).\n\nThe summer of 2003 was very important for CFR as many new talented players were transferred including Cătălin Bozdog, Adrian Anca, Cristian Turcu, and Sabin Pîglișan. With these players and others, CFR entered the first league after a successful season in Divizia B. CFR began the season strongly, holding first place for a while. Then the club's main sponsor, Árpád Pászkány, became involved in a public scandal during which Pászkány accused several referees of corruption. The affair plagued the team and resulted in the dismissal of head coach GH. Cioceri. \n\nCFR lost several consecutive games before the scandal subsided. After the winter break, Cioceri was replaced by Aurel Șunda. In the spring of 2004, Sunda's team had a nearly perfect run, winning 14 out of 15 games, with only one draw. One round before the season's end, CFR was in second place, one point behind the Jiul Petroșani in first. But when Jiul was held to a draw by Gaz Metan Mediaș, and CFR won their last match 3–0, CFR advanced to the top of the league for the first time in 28 years. In the summer of 2004, CFR acquired many new valuable Romanian players, including Vasile Jula and Radu Marginean.\n\nCFR Cluj's first year back in Divizia A was strong, yet inconsistent. CFR finished sixth after the first half of the 2004–05 championship. It was during this time that CFR played one of its most popular games ever, defeating, Dinamo București at home. The final score was 4–2, after two goals each by Adrian Anca and Sorin Oncică. However, the second half of the championship proved disappointing for CFR, as it gathered only 12 points after 15 games. The team finished 11th, avoiding relegation.\n\nThe summer of 2005 brought significant change to CFR Cluj. The club's executives signed the team up for the UEFA Intertoto Cup, being CFR's first European adventure. CFR began well, qualifying for the second round after two victories against FK Vetra (3–2 and 4–1).\n\nAlso, the Romanian international Dorinel Munteanu came to CFR from Steaua București. Munteanu would have the dual role of player-coach. His first game produced one of CFR's greatest successes. CFR defeated Athletic Bilbao of Spain 1–0 (although almost all players from Bilbao's side were from the reserve squad) during the second round of the 2005 UEFA Intertoto Cup. The only goal of the match was scored by Cosmin Tilincă with a header. CFR then lost in Bilbao (1–0) but still qualified to the next round after a penalty shootout.\n\nMunteanu's team played the next game at Cluj, against French club Saint-Étienne. Adrian Anca played one of the greatest games in his career, even though the match ended in a 1–1 draw. Anca hit the crossbar with a header early in the game, and Tilincă pushed the ball into the net from the rebound. Anca then went on to earn a penalty, but did not score. He then hit the crossbar a second time in the second half. The away game, in France, was also an eventful game for CFR Cluj. The game began well for CFR, as Cristian Coroian scored from a penalty kick, earned by Adrian Anca. The second half went less smoothly for CFR; Julien Sablé scored for Saint-Étienne, tying the game at 1–1. This was followed by CFR player László Balint's elimination. However, a Cosmin Tilincă goal gave the team the ability to tie with the French at the last minute. The game ended in a 2–2 draw, so CFR went on to the next qualifying stage due to its away goals. In the next round CFR easily disposed of Zalgiris Vilnius, 2–1 in Lithuania and 5–1 at home.\n\nFor the final match of the 2005 UEFA Interoto Cup, CFR Cluj's opponent was another French franchise, RC Lens. The first game, at Cluj, ended in a 1–1 draw with both sides having scored from free kicks. Cristian Turcu scored for CFR. The second game was played at Lens in front of 30,000 French fans. The Romanian players showed signs of exhaustion and conceded three goals. Player-coach Dorinel Munteanu scored a goal from a free kick in the 89th minute. Thus ended CFR Cluj's Intertoto journey. CFR then finished fifth at the end of the 2005–06 domestic season. During the 2006–07 season, major changes at the club started to occur. Dorinel Munteanu resigned as player-coach, and was replaced by Cristiano Bergodi. Foreign players from Western Europe and South America were transferred. A partnership with Portuguese club Benfica was signed. On 22 July 2007, CFR Cluj celebrated its centenary year by playing a friendly game against Benfica and inaugurating the new illumination system at its stadium.\n\nThe team's new coach, Romanian Ioan Andone, formerly of Omonia Nicosia and Dinamo București, started the 2007–08 season well, with CFR Cluj leading the league by eight points halfway through the season and remaining undefeated. Their form was not as good in the second half of the season, and they were overtaken by Steaua București with two games remaining. Even though Steaua crushed Gloria Buzau 5–0 in the last matchday, it was not enough to bring the title to Ghencea, since CFR won the derby against Universitatea Cluj and won the title, becoming the first team outside Bucharest to win the title in nearly two decades. Three days later, CFR Cluj completed a league and cup double, beating Unirea Urziceni in the Romanian Cup final.\n\nBy winning the league, CFR Cluj qualified for the group stage of the 2008–09 UEFA Champions League season. They were drawn in Group A against Chelsea of England, A.S. Roma of Italy, and Bordeaux of France and given little chance of progressing, with odds of 300–1 being given on them winning the competition. In their opening game, CFR caused a shock by beating Roma in the Italian capital, 2–1, with Argentine Juan Culio scoring the brace. Expectations were further exceeded by holding the previous season's finalists, Chelsea, to a 0–0 draw.\n\nThe end of the 2008–09 season saw CFR finish fourth; the team had two coaching staff changes in the second part of the competition and did not manage to secure a second title. The Romanian Cup was kept for a consecutive year at Cluj, and thus they played against Unirea Urziceni (the Liga I champions that season) in the Supercupa României. CFR became the first club not from Bucharest to claim the trophy in 2009.\n\nIn the 2009–10 season, the team won the league title for the second time in its history, exhibiting the heavy investments in the club's infrastructure, management, and squad transfers. Managed by coach Andrea Mandorlini, CFR Cluj also kept the Romanian Cup and qualified for the UEFA Champions League group stage. As a premier, the 2009–2010 CFR Fans' Trophy was awarded to Cristian Panin as voted by supporters and football reviewers. The trophy is to be awarded every year by the CFR Cluj fans associations to the player that receives the highest aggregate number of votes online and highest per match rating respectively. The 2010–11 CFR Fans' Trophy was awarded to captain Ricardo Cadú and the 2011–2012 CFR Fans' Trophy was awarded to goalkeeper Beto Pimparel.\n\nThe 2011–12 season brought the league title to Cluj for the third time. Starting under Jorge Costa's supervision, the team maintained a spot in the top three. After a few major defeats close to the end of the season, Costa was replaced by Ioan Andone. Under Andone, CFR won all the remaining matches except for one draw, and finished first. Later that year, FC Dinamo București defeated CFR Cluj in the Romanian Supercup with 6–4 after penalties, handing them their first defeat in a final.\n\nFinancial difficulties and bounceback (2012–2017)\nAfter 2012, poor management saw the club go through a sharp decline, finishing 9th in the 2012-13 season, though in the Champions League they performed admirably, finishing 3rd on goal difference in a group with Manchester United, Galatasaray and SC Braga with 10 points, a record still standing for a Romanian team. Their Champions League campaign culminated in a 1-0 away win at Old Trafford against Manchester United, with a long shot from Luis Alberto. They were drawn against Inter Milan in Europa League, where they were eliminated 5-0 on aggregate.\n\nCFR had a quiet 2013-14 season, finishing 5th and earning an Europa League berth, mainly due to the fact that 4th placed Dinamo filed for insolvency and thus were ineligible for European competitions. During this time owner Pászkány faced legal charges and neglected the team, which lead to serious financial difficulties that would culminate in the following seasons. \n\nCFR Cluj began the 2014–15 season well, but financial difficulties led to insolvency which subsequently started a period of poor performances. After failing to fully remunerate five former club players, the Romanian Football Federation decided to deduct 24 points from CFR, which placed them in the last position in Liga I. Many players left the club as a result, and Ceferiștii challenged the Federation's decision to the Court of Arbitration for Sport. In May 2015 the Court ruled in their favour, restoring the deducted points, which helped the team secure a third-place finish in the league championship. CFR Cluj won the 2016 Cupa României final played against Dinamo București after penalty shootouts, being their first trophy since 2012.\n\nNational dominance and return to European competitions (2017–present)\n\nDuring early 2017, it was reported that businessman Marian Băgăcean purchased 62% stake in the club. On 30 May that year, after finishing the 2016–17 Liga I campaign on the 4th place, CFR Cluj finally got out of insolvency and was again able to participate in European competitions starting with the 2018–19 season. In June 2017, Dan Petrescu replaced Vasile Miriuță as the head coach of the team, with the goal of a European cup return and an ambitious transfer campaign to support it.\n\nOn 20 May 2018, \"the Railwaymen\" won 1–0 over defending champions Viitorul Constanța and clinched their fourth Liga I title as they finished one point above FCSB in the table. CFR also came victorious in the subsequent 2018 Supercupa României played against Universitatea Craiova, this time under the management of coach Edward Iordănescu. However, Iordănescu was replaced after just three games and Toni Conceição was brought back for his third term as a manager. The club's European campaign was cut short after Luxembourgish side F91 Dudelange won the UEFA Europa League play-off round 5–2 on aggregate; due to Dudelange's underdog status, daily newspaper Gazeta Sporturilor regarded CFR's elimination as \"the biggest shame in the history of Romanian football\".\n\nIn May 2019, again under the management of Dan Petrescu, \"The Railwaymen\" earned their fifth Liga I title. Unlike the previous year, the club had a fruitful run in European competitions. After getting past Astana and Maccabi Tel Aviv, CFR Cluj defeated Scottish team Celtic in the Champions League third qualifying round. In the play-off they met Slavia Prague, but lost both matches 0–1 and were sent to the Europa League group stages. There, CFR were drawn against Lazio, Rennes and again Celtic. They finished second behind the latter and earned a total of twelve points in the group, a Romanian record in European competitions. In the round of 32, CFR was eliminated by Sevilla on the away goals rule after two draws—The Spaniards went on to win the final 3–2 against Inter Milan, on 21 August 2020. On 3 August, CFR Cluj won the third consecutive title and sixth overall, after a final fixture win over rivals Universitatea Craiova.\n\nCFR started the 2020–21 UEFA Champions League season by beating Maltese side Floriana. They were then eliminated by Croatian side Dinamo Zagreb at home in a penalty shoot-out. Dropping down to the Europa League, they made it to the group stage after defeating Nordic sides Djurgårdens IF and Kuopion Palloseura. Drawn with AS Roma, BSC Young Boys, and CSKA Sofia in Group A, they eventually finished third and were eliminated from the competition from the group stage. During late 2020, Edward Iordănescu became once again coach of the club after the departure of Dan Petrescu. On 18 May 2021, Iordănescu Jr. managed to win the league title of the 2020–21 Liga I season. This was Iordănescu Jr.'s first national title as head coach. In addition, winning the title with CFR thereby allowed the club to play the final of the 2021 Supercupa României (i.e. the Romanian supercup) against Universitatea Craiova, the winners of the 2020–21 Cupa României (i.e. the Romanian cup), which they eventually lost after 2–4 on penalty shoot-out. \n\nFollowing the end of the season Iordănescu left the club and was replaced by Marius Șumudică. The latter failed to qualify the club for the group stage of either the UEFA Champions League or UEFA Europa League, being consequently dismissed and replaced by the returning Dan Petrescu. Under Petrescu, CFR qualified for the group stage of the inaugural UEFA Europa Conference League, competing in Group D with Dutch side Alkmaar, Czech side Jablonec, and Danish side Randers. The club debuted with an away 1–0 loss at Jablonec nad Nisou in the Czech Republic against FK Jablonec on 16 September 2021 and consequently on the 4th place in the group after the first fixture. Although Petrescu stated that he wishes to have a longer as possible path with CFR Cluj in UEFA Europa Conference League, it is very unlikely that they will progress from Group D to the Round of 16 or, let alone, other subsequent knockout stages. On the occasion of the second fixture however, the club managed to draw 1–1 over Randers FC and thereby gained its first group point in UEFA Europa Conference League.\n\nAfter their away match with Randers FC, which they lost 1–2, CFR got mathematically eliminated from advancing to the Round of 16 and finished Group D of the first UEFA Europa Conference League season on the 4th place, regardless of the last home match with FK Jablonec which they eventually won 2–0, thereby gaining their first 3 points in the competition and accumulating a grand total of 4.\n\nStadium\n\nCFR Cluj plays nearly all of its home games at the Dr. Constantin Rădulescu Stadium, which was expanded in 2008 to seat a maximum capacity of 23,500. It meets all of UEFA's regulations and can also host Champions League matches. In 2006–07, with an investment of €30 million, the club upgraded the field with higher quality turf, built a state of the art lighting system, and updated its infrastructure. All the work was completed for the club's 100th anniversary in 2007, when a friendly game was played against Portuguese side Benfica.\n\nSupport\n\nA 2011 survey has shown that CFR Cluj has the fourth-largest number of supporters in Romania. They have many fans in Cluj-Napoca, but also in some other parts of the country. Since the 2014 withdraw of important groups such as \"Patriots\" and \"Commando Gruia\", the fans have a single big group called \"Peluza Vișinie\", which consists of former members of older groups such as \"Romaniacs\", \"Juvenes\", \"Gruppo Gara\", \"Valacchi\", \"Pride 1907\", \"Nostra Famiglia\", and \"1907\". There is another group of supporters which consists of ethnic Hungarians who currently sit in the Tribuna 1 sector of the stadium.Their group is named KVSK, wich is the hungarian name of CFR.They had such major conflicts with the romanians ultras group 'Peluza Vișinie' and decided to go to matches alone. Their support is less vocal and visible, but they are a consistent part of the active fans.\n\nRivalries\n \n\nCFR Cluj has a fierce rivalry with their local opponents Universitatea Cluj. According to journalist Răzvan Toma, the first match between the two teams was played on 13 October 1920, when CFR thrashed Universitatea 8–0 on a field based in the Central Park. History and statistics website Romanian Soccer regards a 1–3 loss by CFR (which had just merged with Ferar Cluj on 7 December 1947) as the first Liga I meeting between the two teams.\n\nIn 2019, Liga Profesionistă de Fotbal's website referred to a match between FCSB—formerly FC Steaua București—and CFR Cluj as \"the Romanian Derby\", a name generally used for the meetings between the former club and their cross-town rivals Dinamo București. This stems from the fact that after the 2000s CFR and FCSB were often some of the main contenders for the national title, and during the late 2010s the rivalry exacerbated further as Dinamo lost its power status. CFR and FCSB have met each other over 50 times in the first division.\n\nCeferiștii also hold milder rivalries with Dinamo București, Rapid București, Universitatea Craiova, and Politehnica Timișoara.\n\nPopular culture\nCFR Cluj was the subject of a long documentary film directed by Laviniu Lazăr on their 2012–13 UEFA Champions League season and the historical victory over Manchester United on Old Trafford, titled \"The Theatre of Dreams\" () which was presented at the Film Transilvania (TIFF) festival in 2013.\n\nHonours\n\nDomestic\n\nLeagues\nLiga I\nWinners (7): 2007–08, 2009–10, 2011–12, 2017–18, 2018–19, 2019–20, 2020–21\n\nLiga II\nWinners (2): 1968–69, 2003–04\nRunners-up (1): 1977–78\n\nLiga III\nWinners (7): 1946–47, 1982–83, 1985–86, 1988–89, 1990–91, 1995–96, 2001–02 \nRunners-up (1): 1987–88\n\nCups\nCupa României\nWinners (4): 2007–08, 2008–09, 2009–10, 2015–16\nRunners-up (1): 2012–13\n\nSupercupa României\nWinners (4): 2009, 2010, 2018, 2020\nRunners-up (4): 2012, 2016, 2019, 2021\n\nEuropean\nUEFA Intertoto Cup\nRunners-up (1): 2005 (joint runners-up)\n\nPlayers\n\nFirst team squad\n\nOther players under contract\n\nOut on loan\n\nClub officials\n\nBoard of directors\n\n Last updated: 25 June 2021\n Source:\n\nCurrent technical staff\n\n Last updated: 27 July 2021\n Source:\n\nRecords and statistics\n\nEuropean cups all-time statistics\n\nTotal statistics\n\nRecords\n Biggest victory: CFR Cluj – Minaur Zlatna 10–0 (4 October 2003)\n Biggest defeat: CFR București – CFR Cluj 12–2 (20 April 1949)\n Player with most caps in Liga I: Camora (319)\n Player with most goals in Liga I: Ciprian Deac (62)\n Biggest European home win: CFR Cluj 5–0 Alashkert (16 August 2018, UEFA Europa League Third qualifying round second leg)\n Biggest European away win: Vėtra 1–4 CFR Cluj (26 June 2005, UEFA Intertoto Cup First round second leg)\n Biggest European home defeat: CFR Cluj 0–4 Bayern Munich (19 October 2010, UEFA Champions League group stage)\n Biggest European away defeat: A.S. Roma 5–0 CFR Cluj (5 November 2020, UEFA Europa League group stage)\n\nOther records\n\n Since the 2012–13 season, CFR Cluj holds the record for the most points obtained by any Romanian club in the UEFA Champions League group stages, with 10 points, having recorded 3 wins, 1 draw, and 2 losses.\n CFR Cluj also holds the record for most points scored by any Romanian club in the UEFA Europa League group stages, with 12 points, having recorded 4 wins and 2 losses in the 2019–20 season\n\nHistory by season\n\nThe players in bold were the top goalscorers in the division.\n\nNotable former players\n\nThe footballers enlisted below have had international cap(s) for their respective countries at junior and/or senior level. Players whose name is listed in bold represented their countries at junior and/or senior level while they played for the club. Additionally, these players have also had a significant number of caps and goals accumulated throughout a certain number of seasons for the club itself as well.\n\nRomania\n Mihai Adam\n Vasile Alexandru\n Adrian Anca \n Ștefan Balint\n Cristian Bud\n Sergiu Buș\n Sever Coracu\n Cristian Coroian\n Florin Costea\n Florin Dan\n Nicolae Dică\n Cristian Dulca\n Cristian Fedor\n Anton Fernbach-Ferenczi\n Ioan Hora\n Octavian Ionescu\n Vasile Jula\n Ștefan Kovács\n Ionuț Larie\n Bogdan Mara \n Alin Minteuan\n Dorinel Munteanu \n Gabriel Mureșan\n Viorel Nicoară\n Sorin Oncică\n\n Cristian Panin \n Emil Petru\n Ionuț Rada\n Gheorghe Rășinaru\n László Sepsi\n Eduard Stăncioiu\n Romeo Surdu\n Ion Suru\n Cosmin Tilincă\n Dorin Toma\n Eugen Trică\n Cosmin Văsîie \n Viorel Vișan \nArgentina\n Emmanuel Culio\n Sebastián Dubarbier\n Cristian Fabbiani\n Sixto Peralta \n Diego Ruiz\nBrazil\n Edimar\n Hugo Alcântara \n Rafael Bastos\n Renan Garcia\n Ronny \n Weldon\n Paulo Vinícius\n\nBosnia and Herzegovina\n Mateo Sušić \n Stojan Vranješ \nBurkina Faso\n Yssouf Koné\nCôte d'Ivoire\n Emmanuel Koné \n Ousmane Viera\n Lacina Traoré\nCroatia\n Saša Bjelanović\nFrance\n Tony \nGeorgia\n Giorgi Chanturia \nGreece\n Pantelis Kapetanos\n Ioannis Matzourakis \nItaly\n Roberto De Zerbi\n Felice Piccolo\nLithuania\n Giedrius Arlauskis \n\nMoldova\n Cătălin Carp\nPortugal\n André Leão\n António Semedo\n Beto\n Dani \n Ivo Pinto\n Manuel José\n Mário Felgueiras\n Ricardo Cadú\n Rui Pedro\n Tiago Lopes\nSenegal\n Ibrahima Baldé \n Modou Sougou\nSpain \n Cristian López \nSweden\n Mikael Dorsin \nUruguay\n Álvaro Pereira \n Matías Aguirregaray\n\nNotable former managers\n\n Ioan Andone\n Sorin Cârțu \n Petre Grigoraș\n Ștefan Kovács\n Dorinel Munteanu\n Constantin Rădulescu \n Toni Conceição \n Paulo Sérgio\n Jorge Costa\n Cristiano Bergodi\n Andrea Mandorlini \n Dušan Uhrin Jr. \n Dan Petrescu\n Edward Iordănescu\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n Official website\n Club profile on UEFA's official website\n Club profile on LPF's official website ()\n\n \nSport in Cluj-Napoca\nFootball clubs in Romania\nFootball clubs in Cluj County\nAssociation football clubs established in 1907\nLiga I clubs\nLiga II clubs\nLiga III clubs\n1907 establishments in Austria-Hungary\nRailway association football clubs in Romania"
]
|
[
"David Rockefeller",
"Political connections",
"What is CFR?",
"Council on Foreign Relations study group on nuclear weapons,",
"Did he found more than one non-profit?",
"I don't know.",
"When did he become the director of CFR?",
"I don't know."
]
| C_4cdf638f899142318da9a416630f4496_1 | What was his relationship to Sol? | 4 | What was David Rockefeller's relationship to Sol? | David Rockefeller | Rockefeller traveled widely and met with both foreign rulers and U.S. presidents, beginning with Dwight D. Eisenhower. At times he served as an unofficial emissary on high-level business. Among the foreign leaders he met were Saddam Hussein, Fidel Castro, Nikita Khrushchev, and Mikhail Gorbachev. In 1968, he declined an offer from his brother Nelson Rockefeller, then governor of New York, to appoint him to Robert F. Kennedy's Senate seat after Kennedy was assassinated in June 1968, a post Nelson also offered to their nephew John Davison "Jay" Rockefeller IV. President Jimmy Carter offered him the position of United States Secretary of the Treasury but he declined. Rockefeller was criticized for befriending foreign autocrats in order to expand Chase interests in their countries. The New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote in 2002 that Rockefeller "spent his life in the club of the ruling class and was loyal to members of the club, no matter what they did." He noted that Rockefeller had cut profitable deals with "oil-rich dictators", "Soviet party bosses" and "Chinese perpetrators of the Cultural Revolution". Rockefeller met Henry Kissinger in 1954, when Kissinger was appointed a director of a seminal Council on Foreign Relations study group on nuclear weapons, of which David Rockefeller was a member. He named Kissinger to the board of trustees of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, and consulted with him frequently, with the subjects including the Chase Bank's interests in Chile and the possibility of the election of Salvador Allende in 1970. Rockefeller supported his "opening of China" initiative in 1971 as it afforded banking opportunities for the Chase Bank. Though a lifelong Republican and party contributor, he was a member of the moderate "Rockefeller Republicans" that arose out of the political ambitions and public policy stance of his brother Nelson. In 2006 he teamed up with former Goldman Sachs executives and others to form a fund-raising group based in Washington, Republicans Who Care, that supported moderate Republican candidates over more ideological contenders. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | David Rockefeller (June 12, 1915 – March 20, 2017) was an American investment banker who served as chairman and chief executive of Chase Manhattan Corporation. He was the oldest living member of the third generation of the Rockefeller family, and family patriarch from July 2004 until his death in March 2017. Rockefeller was the fifth son and youngest child of John D. Rockefeller Jr. and Abby Aldrich Rockefeller, and a grandson of John D. Rockefeller and Laura Spelman Rockefeller.
He was noted for his wide-ranging political connections and foreign travel, in which he met with many foreign leaders. His fortune was estimated at $3.3 billion at the time of his death in March 2017.
Early life
Rockefeller was born in New York City, New York. He grew up in an eight-story house at 10 West 54th Street, the tallest private residence ever built in the city. Rockefeller was the youngest of six children born to financier John Davison Rockefeller Jr. and socialite Abigail Greene "Abby" Aldrich. John Jr. was the only son of Standard Oil co-founder John Davison Rockefeller Sr. and schoolteacher Laura Celestia "Cettie" Spelman. Abby was a daughter of Rhode Island U.S. Senator Nelson Wilmarth Aldrich and Abigail Pearce Truman "Abby" Chapman. David's five elder siblings were Abby, John III, Nelson, Laurance, and Winthrop.
Rockefeller attended the experimental Lincoln School at 123rd Street in Harlem.
Education
In 1936, Rockefeller graduated cum laude from Harvard University, where he worked as an editor on The Harvard Crimson. He also studied economics for a year at Harvard and then a year at the London School of Economics (LSE). At LSE he first met the future President John F. Kennedy (although he had earlier been his contemporary at Harvard) and once dated Kennedy's sister Kathleen.
During his time abroad, Rockefeller briefly worked in the London branch of what was to become the Chase Manhattan Bank.
After returning to the U.S. to complete his graduate studies, he received a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1940.
Career
Government service
After completing his studies in Chicago, he became secretary to New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia for eighteen months in a "dollar a year" public service position. Although the mayor pointed out to the press that Rockefeller was only one of 60 interns in the city government, his working space was, in fact, the vacant office of the deputy mayor. From 1941 to 1942, Rockefeller was assistant regional director of the United States Office of Defense, Health and Welfare Services.
Military
Rockefeller enlisted in the U.S. Army and entered Officer Candidate School in 1943; he was ultimately promoted to Captain in 1945. During World War II he served in North Africa and France (he spoke fluent French) for military intelligence setting up political and economic intelligence units. He served as a "Ritchie Boy" secret unit specially trained at Fort Ritchie, Maryland. For seven months he also served as an assistant military attaché at the American Embassy in Paris. During this period, he called on family contacts and Standard Oil executives for assistance.
Banking
In 1946, Rockefeller joined the staff of the longtime family-associated Chase National Bank. The chairman at that time was Rockefeller's uncle Winthrop W. Aldrich. The Chase Bank was primarily a wholesale bank, dealing with other prominent financial institutions and major corporate clients such as General Electric (which had, through its RCA affiliate, leased prominent space and become a crucial first tenant of Rockefeller Center in 1930). The bank also is closely associated with and has financed the oil industry, having longstanding connections with its board of directors to the successor companies of Standard Oil, especially Exxon Mobil. Chase National became the Chase Manhattan Bank in 1955 and shifted significantly into consumer banking. It is now called JPMorgan Chase.
Rockefeller started as an assistant manager in the foreign department. There he financed international trade in a number of commodities, such as coffee, sugar and metals. This position also maintained relationships with more than 1,000 correspondent banks throughout the world. He served in other positions and became president in 1960. He was both chairman and chief executive of Chase Manhattan from 1969 to 1980 and remained chairman until 1981. He was also, as recently as 1980, the single largest individual shareholder of the bank, holding 1.7% of its shares.
During his term as CEO, Chase spread internationally and became a central component of the world's financial system due to its global network of correspondent banks, the largest in the world. In 1973, Chase established the first branch of an American bank in Moscow, in the then Soviet Union. That year Rockefeller traveled to China, resulting in his bank becoming the National Bank of China's first correspondent bank in the U.S.
Also during this period, Chase Manhattan expanded its influence over many non-financial corporations. A 1979 study titled "The Significance of Bank Control over Large Corporations" provided an estimate for which large U.S.-based financial institutions had the most control over other corporations. The study finds that: "The Rockefeller-controlled Chase Manhattan Bank tops the list, controlling 16 companies."He was faulted for spending excessive amounts of time abroad, and during his tenure as CEO the bank had more troubled loans than any other major bank. Chase owned more New York City securities in the mid-1970s, when the city was nearing bankruptcy. A scandal erupted in 1974 when an audit found that losses from bond trading had been understated, and in 1975 the bank was branded a "problem bank" by the Federal Reserve.
From 1974 to 1976, Chase earnings fell 36 percent while those of its biggest rivals rose 12 to 31 percent. The bank's earnings more than doubled between 1976 and 1980, far outpacing its rival Citibank in return on assets. By 1981 the bank's finances were restored to full health.
In November 1979, while chairman of the Chase Bank, Rockefeller became embroiled in an international incident when he and Henry Kissinger, along with John J. McCloy and Rockefeller aides, persuaded President Jimmy Carter through the United States Department of State to admit the Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, into the United States for hospital treatment for lymphoma. This action directly precipitated what is known as the Iran hostage crisis and placed Rockefeller under intense media scrutiny (particularly from The New York Times) for the first time in his public life.
Rockefeller retired from active management of the bank in 1981, succeeded by his protégé Willard C. Butcher. Former Chase chairman John J. McCloy said at the time that he believed Rockefeller would not go down in history as a great banker but rather as a "real personality, as a distinguished and loyal member of the community".
Political connections
Rockefeller traveled widely and met with both foreign rulers and U.S. presidents, beginning with Dwight D. Eisenhower. At times he served as an unofficial emissary on high-level business. Among the foreign leaders he met were Saddam Hussein, Fidel Castro, Nikita Khrushchev, and Mikhail Gorbachev.
In 1968, he declined an offer from his brother Nelson Rockefeller, then governor of New York, to appoint him to Robert F. Kennedy's Senate seat after Kennedy was assassinated in June 1968, a post Nelson also offered to their nephew John Davison "Jay" Rockefeller IV. President Jimmy Carter offered him the position of United States Secretary of the Treasury but he declined.
Rockefeller was criticized for befriending foreign autocrats in order to expand Chase interests in their countries. The New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote in 2002 that Rockefeller "spent his life in the club of the ruling class and was loyal to members of the club, no matter what they did." He noted that Rockefeller had cut profitable deals with "oil-rich dictators", "Soviet party bosses" and "Chinese perpetrators of the Cultural Revolution".
Rockefeller met Henry Kissinger in 1954, when Kissinger was appointed a director of a seminal Council on Foreign Relations study group on nuclear weapons, of which David Rockefeller was a member. He named Kissinger to the board of trustees of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, and consulted with him frequently, with the subjects including the Chase Bank's interests in Chile and the possibility of the election of Salvador Allende in 1970. Rockefeller supported his "opening of China" initiative in 1971 as it afforded banking opportunities for the Chase Bank.
Though a lifelong Republican and party contributor, he was a member of the moderate "Rockefeller Republicans" that arose out of the political ambitions and public policy stance of his brother Nelson. In 2006, he teamed up with former Goldman Sachs executives and others to form a fund-raising group based in Washington, Republicans Who Care, that supported moderate Republican candidates over more ideological contenders.
Central Intelligence Agency ties
Rockefeller was acquainted with Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director Allen Dulles and his brother, Eisenhower administration Secretary of State John Foster Dulles—who was an in-law of the family—since his college years. It was in Rockefeller Center that Allen Dulles had set up his WWII operational center after Pearl Harbor, liaising closely with MI6, which also had their principal U.S. operation in the Center. He also knew and associated with the former CIA director Richard Helms as well as Archibald Bulloch Roosevelt Jr., a Chase Bank employee and former CIA agent whose first cousin, CIA agent Kermit Roosevelt Jr., was involved in the Iran coup of 1953. Also in 1953, he had befriended William Bundy, a pivotal CIA analyst for nine years in the 1950s, who became the Agency liaison to the National Security Council, and a subsequent lifelong friend. Moreover, in Cary Reich's biography of his brother Nelson, a former CIA agent states that David was extensively briefed on covert intelligence operations by himself and other Agency division chiefs, under the direction of David's "friend and confidant", CIA Director Allen Dulles.
Policy groups
In 1964, along with other American business figures such as Sol Linowitz, Rockefeller founded the non-profit International Executive Service Corps which encourages developing nations to promote private enterprise. In 1979, he formed the Partnership for New York City, a not-for-profit membership organization of New York businessmen. In 1992, he was selected as a leading member of the Russian-American Bankers Forum, an advisory group set up by the head of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to advise Russia on the modernization of its banking system, with the full endorsement of President Boris Yeltsin.
Rockefeller had a lifelong association with the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) when he joined as a director in 1949. In 1965, Rockefeller and other businessmen formed the Council of the Americas to stimulate and support economic integration in the Americas. In 1992, at a Council sponsored forum, Rockefeller proposed a "Western Hemisphere free trade area", which became the Free Trade Area of the Americas in a Miami summit in 1994. His and the Council's chief liaison to President Bill Clinton in order to garner support for this initiative was through Clinton's chief of staff, Mack McLarty, whose consultancy firm Kissinger McLarty Associates is a corporate member of the Council, while McLarty himself is on the board of directors. He was also a trustee of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, including 1948, when Alger Hiss was president.
Displeased with the refusal of Bilderberg Group meetings to include Japan, Rockefeller helped found the Trilateral Commission in July 1973.
Later career
After the war and alongside his work at Chase, Rockefeller took a more active role in his family's business dealings. Working with his brothers in the two floors of Rockefeller Center known as Room 5600, he reorganized the family's myriad business and philanthropic ventures. The men kept regular "brothers' meetings" where they made decisions on matters of common interest and reported on noteworthy events in each of their lives. Rockefeller served as secretary to the group, making notes of each meeting. The notes are now in the family archive and will be released in the future. Following the deaths of his brothers, Winthrop (1973), John III (1978), Nelson (1979), and Laurance (2004), David became sole head of the family (with the important involvement of his elder son, David Jr.).
Rockefeller ensured that selected members of the fourth generation, known generically as the cousins, became directly involved in the family's institutions. This involved inviting them to be more active in the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, the principal foundation established in 1940 by the five brothers and their one sister. The extended family also became involved in their own philanthropic organization, formed in 1967 and primarily established by third-generation members, called the Rockefeller Family Fund.
In the 1980s, Rockefeller became embroiled in controversy over the mortgaging and sale of Rockefeller Center to Japanese interests. In 1985, the Rockefeller family mortgaged the property for $1.3 billion, with $300 million of that going to the family. In 1989, 51 percent of the property, later increased to 80 percent, was sold to Mitsubishi Estate Company of Japan. This action was criticized for surrendering a major U.S. landmark to foreign interests. In 2000, Rockefeller presided over the final sale of Rockefeller Center to Tishman Speyer Properties, along with the Crown family of Chicago, which ended the more than 70 years of direct family financial association with Rockefeller Center.
In 2005, he gave $100 million to the Museum of Modern Art and $100 million to Rockefeller University, two of the most prominent family institutions; as well as $10 million to Harvard and $5 million to Colonial Williamsburg. In 2006, he pledged $225 million to the Rockefeller Brothers Fund upon his death, the largest gift in the Fund's history. The money will be used to create the David Rockefeller Global Development Fund, to support projects that improve access to health care, conduct research on international finance and trade, fight poverty, and support sustainable development, as well as to a program that fosters dialogue between Muslim and Western nations. Rockefeller donated $100 million to Harvard University in 2008. The New York Times estimated in November 2006 that his total charitable donations amount to $900 million over his lifetime, a figure that was substantiated by a monograph on the family's overall benefactions, entitled The Chronicle of Philanthropy.
He published Memoirs in 2002, the only time a member of the Rockefeller family has written an autobiography.
Rockefeller was a noted internationalist.
Rockefeller's will requires his estate, once assets are liquidated, to donate over $700 million to various non-profits, including Rockefeller University, the Museum of Modern Art and Harvard. The largest donation will be either $250 million or the remaining balance of the estate that will fund the launch of the David Rockefeller Global Development Fund.
Personal life
In 1940, Rockefeller married Margaret "Peggy" McGrath, who died in 1996. They had six children:
David Rockefeller Jr. (born July 24, 1941) – vice chairman, Rockefeller Family & Associates (the family office, Room 5600); chairman of Rockefeller Financial Services; Trustee of the Rockefeller Foundation; former chairman of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and Rockefeller & Co., Inc., among many other family institutions.
Abigail Aldrich "Abby" Rockefeller (born 1943) – economist and feminist. Eldest and most rebellious daughter, she was drawn to Marxism and was an ardent admirer of Fidel Castro and a late 1960s/early 1970s radical feminist who belonged to the organization Female Liberation, later forming a splinter group called Cell 16. An environmentalist and ecologist, she was an active supporter of the women's liberation movement.
Neva Rockefeller (born 1944) – economist and philanthropist. She is director of the Global Development and Environment Institute; trustee and vice chair of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and Director of the Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors.
Margaret Dulany "Peggy" Rockefeller (born 1947) – founder of the Synergos Institute in 1986; Board member of the Council on Foreign Relations; serves on the Advisory Committee of the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies at Harvard University.
Richard Gilder Rockefeller (1949–2014) – physician and philanthropist; chairman of the United States advisory board of the international aid group Doctors Without Borders; trustee and chair of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund.
Eileen Rockefeller (born February 26, 1952) – venture philanthropist; Founding Chair of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, established in New York City in 2002.
Death
Rockefeller died in his sleep from congestive heart failure on March 20, 2017, at his home in Pocantico Hills, New York. He was 101 years old.
Wealth
At the time of his death, Forbes estimated Rockefeller's net worth was $3.3 billion. Initially, most of his wealth had come to him via the family trusts created by his father, which were administered by Room 5600 and the Chase Bank. In turn, most of these trusts were held as shares in the successor companies of Standard Oil, as well as diverse real estate investment partnerships, such as the expansive Embarcadero Center in San Francisco, which he later sold for considerable profit, retaining only an indirect stake. In addition, he was or had been a partner in various properties such as Caneel Bay, a resort development in the Virgin Islands; a cattle ranch in Argentina; and a sheep ranch in Australia.
Another major source of asset wealth was his art collection, ranging from impressionist to postmodern, which he developed through the influence upon him of his mother Abby and her establishment, with two associates, of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City in 1929. The collection, valued at several hundred million dollars, was auctioned in the spring of 2018, with proceeds going to several designated nonprofit organizations, including Rockefeller University, Harvard University, the Museum of Modern Art, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the Maine Coast Heritage Trust.
Residences
Rockefeller's principal residence was at "Hudson Pines", on the family estate in Pocantico Hills, New York. He also had a Manhattan residence at 146 East 65th Street, as well as a country residence (known as "Four Winds") at a farm in Livingston, New York (Columbia County), where his wife raised Simmenthal beef cattle. He also maintained a summer home, "Ringing Point," at Seal Harbor on Mount Desert Island off the Maine coast. In May 2015, he donated one thousand acres of land in Seal Harbor to the Mount Desert Land and Garden Preserve. He also owned a large estate on the French island of St. Barth, and along with the Rothschild family, was one of the earliest developers and tourists on the island in the 1950s. The home was very modern and was located in the Colombier district, known to many as the most beautiful section of the island. It has changed hands several times over the years, and is the single largest private parcel on the island, encompassing the entire Baie de Colombier. Many years ago, the Rockefeller family donated the land in the initial creation of the Saint-Barth "Zone Verte," or Green Zone, which is an area which cannot be developed. The property also includes a private dock in the port of Gustavia as at the time the estate was developed, there were no roads to the property and the only way to get there was by boat; David Rockefeller would moor his yacht at his private dock in Gustavia before transferring to the Colombier estate in a smaller boat as the bay could not accommodate his yacht. The property was recently listed for over $100 million, but is not currently used as a residence and the main house has fallen into disrepair. There is also a dock in the Baie de Colombier. It is not known what the current owners' intentions are.
The Kykuit section of the Rockefeller family compound is the location of The Pocantico Conference Center of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund established by David and his four brothers in 1940 which was created when the Fund leased the area from the National Trust for Historic Preservation in 1991.
Non-governmental leadership positions
Council on Foreign Relations – Honorary Chairman
Americas Society – Founder and Honorary Chairman
Trilateral Commission – Founder and Honorary North American Chairman
Bilderberg Meetings – Only member of the Member Advisory Group
The New York Young Republican Club – Board Member
Awards
Presidential Medal of Freedom (1998);
U.S. Legion of Merit (1945);
French Legion of Honor (1945);
U.S. Army Commendation Ribbon (1945);
Commander of the Brazilian Order of the Southern Cross (1956);
Charles Evans Hughes award NCCJ, (1974);
George C. Marshall Foundation Award (1999);
Andrew Carnegie Medal of Philanthropy (2001);
Synergos Bridging Leadership Award (2003);
The Grand Croix of the Légion d'honneur (2000);
C. Walter Nichols Award, New York University (1970);
World Brotherhood Award, Jewish Theological Seminary of America (1953);
Award of Merit from the American Institute of Architects (1965);
Medal of Honor for City Planning, American Institute of Architects (1968);
World Monuments Fund's Hadrian Award (for preservation of art and architecture) (1994);
National Institute of Social Sciences Gold Medal Award (1967 – awarded to all 5 brothers);
United States Council for International Business (USCIB) International Leadership Award (1983);
The Hundred Year Association of New York's Gold Medal Award (1965).
References
Sources
Further reading
The Rockefeller File, Gary Allen, ´76 Press, Seal Beach California, 1976.
The Rockefeller Century: Three Generations of America's Greatest Family, John Ensor Harr and Peter J. Johnson. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1988.
The Rockefeller Conscience: An American Family in Public and in Private, John Ensor Harr and Peter J. Johnson, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1992.
The Life of Nelson A. Rockefeller: Worlds to Conquer 1908–1958, Cary Reich, New York: Doubleday, 1996.
Abby Aldrich Rockefeller: The Woman in the Family, Bernice Kert, New York: Random House, 1993.
Those Rockefeller Brothers: An Informal Biography of Five Extraordinary Young Men, Joe Alex Morris, New York: Harper & Brothers, 1953.
The Rockefellers: An American Dynasty, Peter Collier and David Horowitz, New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1976.
The American Establishment, Leonard Silk and Mark Silk, New York: Basic Books, Inc., 1980.
American Hegemony and the Trilateral Commission, Stephen Gill, Boston: Cambridge University Press, Reprint Edition, 1991.
The Chase: The Chase Manhattan Bank, N.A., 1945–1985, John Donald Wilson, Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 1986.
Wriston: Walter Wriston, Citibank, and the Rise and Fall of American Financial Supremacy, Phillip L. Zweig, New York: Crown Publishers, 1995.
Paul Volcker: The Making of a Financial Legend, Joseph B. Treaster, New York: Wiley, 2004.
Financier: The Biography of André Meyer; A Story of Money, Power, and the Reshaping of American Business, Cary Reich, New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1983.
Continuing the Inquiry: The Council on Foreign Relations from 1921 to 1996, Peter Grose, New York: Council on Foreign Relations: 1996.
Imperial Brain Trust: The Council on Foreign Relations and United States Foreign Policy, Laurence H. Shoup, and William Minter, New York: Authors Choice Press, (Reprint), 2004.
Cloak of Green: The Links between Key Environmental Groups, Government and Big Business, Elaine Dewar, New York: Lorimer, 1995.
The Shah's Last Ride, William Shawcross, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1989.
Divided We Stand: A Biography of New York City's World Trade Center, Eric Darton, New York: Basic Books, 1999.
The Rich and the Super-Rich: A Study in the Power of Money Today, Ferdinand Lundberg, New York: Lyle Stuart; Reprint Edition, 1988.
Interlock: The untold story of American banks, oil interests, the Shah's money, debts, and the astounding connections between them, Mark Hulbert, New York: Richardson & Snyder; 1st edition, 1982.
The Money Lenders: Bankers and a World in Turmoil, Anthony Sampson, New York: Viking Press, 1982.
The Chairman: John J. McCloy – The Making of the American Establishment, Kai Bird, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992.
External links
The Rockefeller Archive Center (RAC): Selected Biography
Rockefeller Brothers Fund Official Web site
1915 births
2017 deaths
Alumni of the London School of Economics
American art collectors
American autobiographers
American bankers
American billionaires
American centenarians
American chief executives of financial services companies
American memoirists
United States Army personnel of World War II
Philanthropists from New York (state)
Giving Pledgers
21st-century philanthropists
Grand Croix of the Légion d'honneur
Harvard University alumni
JPMorgan Chase employees
Members of the New York Yacht Club
Members of the Steering Committee of the Bilderberg Group
Men centenarians
Military personnel from New York City
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People associated with the Museum of Modern Art (New York City)
Writers from Manhattan
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Recipients of the Legion of Merit
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University of Chicago alumni
Honorary Fellows of the London School of Economics
United States Army officers
Chairs of the Council on Foreign Relations
Members of the Council on Foreign Relations
Ritchie Boys
World Trade Center | false | [
"The following is a list of characters that first appeared in the Channel 4 soap opera Hollyoaks in 1997, by order of first appearance.\n\nHelen Cunningham\n\nDennis Richardson\n\nDennis Richardson is a fictional character on the long-running Channel 4 British television soap opera Hollyoaks. He was played by actor David McAlister between 1997 and 2003, when Dennis was killed off. He arrived as part of the Richardson family and was the father of Lewis Richardson and Mandy Richardson and the husband of their mother Helen Cunningham.\n\nDennis was first introduced as a teacher at Hollyoaks Comprehensive School. He was married to Helen and was Lewis and Mandy's father.\n\nAn abusive alcoholic, he beat up Helen and Lewis and molested Mandy. When he finds out that Mandy is dating Sol Patrick, he flew into a rage and raped her. Mandy briefly ran away, and then told the police what Dennis had done to her. He was arrested and eventually found guilty of rape, for which he was sentenced to seven years' imprisonment. During his imprisonment, Lewis committed suicide.\n\nDennis was released from prison five years later, and returned to Hollyoaks. He tried to explain himself to Mandy, but she refused to listen. Dennis then tried to mend his relationship with Helen when she took him to where Lewis's ashes had been scattered. She forgives him for what he has done. Mandy arrived with Tony Hutchinson, Helen's husband Gordon Cunningham and his son Max Cunningham to get rid of Dennis, and a fight broke out between Max and Dennis.\n\nDennis was last seen telling Mandy that he is dying of cancer, hoping she might forgive him. She bought him some alcohol to quicken his death, telling him she could never forgive him. He would die of liver disease. He is cremated, and Helen pours his ashes down the drain.\n\nGina Patrick\n\nJill Patrick\n\nJill Osborne (also Patrick), played by Lynda Rooke, made her first appearance on 30 October 1997. She begins working at The Dog in the Pond as a barmaid, and is soon joined by her children Kate, Gina and Sol Patrick. She and Jack Osborne, her boss, begin a relationship, eventually getting married. The marriage goes well, despite a feud between the Patrick children and Jack's children Ruth and Darren Osborne. Sol and Gina discover that they are not Jill's biological children. Gina goes missing and Sol and Jill go looking for her in a car he has stolen. He crashes it, almost killing Jill. He spends time in a Young Offenders Institute, and eventually forgives Jill for hiding the truth from him for so long. Jill is devastated to find out she has a brain tumour and later informs her family. She makes Jack agree to look after her children when she dies. Jill dies of her illness and Jack keeps his promise and cares for her children, helping Sol flee from the police abroad. Gina later leaves Hollyoaks to live in China and work at an orphanage to make Jill proud.\n\nIn 2017, Jack mentioned this to his late wife Frankie (Helen Pearson) about his marriage with Jill and her death, she spoke to Nancy saying it was his second time losing his wife since Jill and mentioned how he was devastated by her death.\n\nThe Daily Record commented on the character's death saying \"When there's a problem with a character in Hollyoaks, they just kill them off.\"\n\nSol Patrick\n\nKate Patrick\n\nHolly Cunningham\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n, Hollyoaks\n1997",
"Sol is the personification of the Sun and a god in ancient Roman religion. It was long thought that Rome actually had two different, consecutive sun gods: The first, Sol Indiges (), was thought to have been unimportant, disappearing altogether at an early period. Only in the late Roman Empire, scholars argued, did the solar cult re-appear with the arrival in Rome of the Syrian Sol Invictus (), perhaps under the influence of the Mithraic mysteries. Recent publications have challenged the notion of two different sun gods in Rome, pointing to the abundant evidence for the continuity of the cult of Sol, and the lack of any clear differentiation – either in name or depiction – between the \"early\" and \"late\" Roman sun god.\n\nEtymology\n\nThe Latin sol for \"Sun\" is believed to originate in the Proto-Indo-European language, as a continuation of the heteroclitic *Seh2ul- / *Sh2-en-, and thus cognate to other solar deities in other Indo-European languages: Germanic Sol, Sanskrit Surya, Greek Helios, Lithuanian Saulė. Also compare Latin sol to Etruscan usil. Today, Romance languages still use reflexes of sol (e.g., Italian sole and French soleil) as the main word for \"sun\".\n\nIn the Roman Republic\nAccording to Roman sources, the worship of Sol was introduced by Titus Tatius shortly after the foundation of Rome. In Virgil he is the grandfather of Latinus, the son of Sol's daughter Circe who lived not far from Rome at Monte Circeo. A shrine to Sol stood on the banks of the Numicius, near many important shrines of early Latin religion.\n\nIn Rome Sol had an \"old\" temple in the Circus Maximus according to Tacitus (56–117 CE), and this temple remained important in the first three centuries CE. There was also an old shrine for Sol on the Quirinal, where an annual sacrifice was offered to Sol Indiges on August 9 to commemorate Caesar's victory at Pharsala (48 BCE). The Roman ritual calendars or fasti also mention a feast for Sol Indiges on December 11, and a sacrifice for Sol and Luna on August 28. Traditionally, scholars have considered Sol Indiges to represent an earlier, more agrarian form in which the Roman god Sol was worshipped, and considered him to be very different from the late Roman Sol Invictus, who they believed was a predominantly Syrian deity. Neither the epithet \"indiges\" (which fell out of use sometime after Caesar) nor the epithet \"invictus\" are used with any consistency however, making it impossible to differentiate between the two.\n\nSol Invictus\n\nSol Invictus (English translated as \"Unconquered Sun\") was long thought to have been a foreign state-supported sun god introduced from either Emesa or Palmyra in Syria by the emperor Aurelian in 274 and overshadowing other Eastern cults in importance, until the abolition of classical Roman religion under Theodosius I. However the evidence for this is meager at best, and the notion that Aurelian introduced a new cult of the sun ignores the abundant evidence on coins, in images, in inscriptions, and in other sources for a strong presence of the sun god in Rome throughout the imperial period. Tertullian (died 220 CE) writes that the Circus Maximus was dedicated primarily to Sol. During the reign of Aurelian, a new college of pontiffs for Sol was established.\n\nThere is some debate over the significance of the date December 21 for the cult of Sol. According to a single, late source, the Romans held a festival on December 21 of Dies Natalis Invicti, \"the birthday of the unconquered one.\" Most scholars assume Sol Invictus was meant, although our source for this festival does not state so explicitly. December 25 was commonly indicated as the date of the winter solstice, with the first detectable lengthening of daylight hours. There were also festivals on other days in December, including the 11th (mentioned above), as well as August. Gordon points out that none of these other festivals are linked to astronomical events. When the festival on December 25 was instituted is not clear, which makes it hard to assess what impact (if any) it had on the establishment of Christmas.\n\nThroughout the 4th century the cult of Sol continued to be maintained by high-ranking pontiffs, including the renowned Vettius Agorius Praetextatus.\n\nConnection to Emperors \n\nAccording to the Historia Augusta, Elagabalus, the teenaged Severan heir, adopted the name of his deity and brought his cult image from Emesa to Rome. Once installed as emperor, he neglected Rome's traditional State deities and promoted his own as Rome's most powerful deity. This ended with his murder in 222. The Historia Augusta equates the deity Elagabalus with Jupiter and Sol: fuit autem Heliogabali vel Iovis vel Solis sacerdos, \"He was also a priest of Heliogabalus, or Jove, or Sol\". While this has been seen as an attempt to import the Syrian sun god to Rome, the Roman cult of Sol had existed in Rome at least since the early Republic.\n\nAs the Cult of Sol grew and Sol took on attributes of other deities, Sol began to be used as a way to display imperial power. The radiate crown shown on some emperor's portraits on coins minted in the 3rd Century was associated with Sol, and may have been influenced by earlier depictions of Alexander the Great. Some coins minted in the 4th Century depict Sol on one side. Constantine I wore the \"radiate crown\" though some argue that it was intended to represent the \"Holy Nails\" and not Sol.\n\nIdentification with other deities \nThe Greek assimilation of Apollo and Helios was already established in Rome by the end of the republic.\n\nVarious Roman philosophers speculated on the nature of the sun, without arriving at any consensus. A typical example is Nigidius, a scholar of the 1st century BCE. His works have not survived, but writing five centuries later, Macrobius reports that Nigidius argued that Sol was to be identified with Janus and that he had a counterpart, Jana, who was Luna. As such, they were to be regarded as the highest of the gods, receiving their sacrifices before all the others. Such speculations appear to have been restricted to an erudite elite and had no impact on the well-attested cult of Sol as independent deity: No ancient source aside from Macrobius mentions the equation of Sol with Janus.\n\nConnection to Mithras \nSol appears many times in depictions of Mithras, such as the Tauroctony of Mithras killing the bull, and looking at Sol over his shoulder. They appear in other scenes together from Mithras ascending behind Sol's chariot, shaking hands and some depictions of Sol kneeling to Mithras. Mithras was known as Sol Invictus even though Sol is a separate deity, a paradoxical relationship where they are each other but separate. They are separate deities but due to some similarities a connection between them can be created which can lead to one over taking the other.\n\nSee also\nAmshuman\nBlack Sun (alchemy)\nGuaraci\nList of solar deities\nPiltzintecuhtli\nInti\n\nFootnotes\n\nReferences\n\nSolar gods\nRoman gods\nHelios\nSol Invictus"
]
|
[
"Albrecht Dürer",
"Nuremberg and the masterworks (1507-1520)"
]
| C_4a4a9362ff664bba86e8c74ead6078c0_0 | What are some of his masterworks? | 1 | What are some of Dürer's masterworks? | Albrecht Dürer | Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Durer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini and--mainly through Lorenzo di Credi--Leonardo da Vinci. Between 1507 and 1511 Durer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Durer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted. Other works from this period include the thirty-seven woodcut subjects of the Little Passion, published first in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Indeed, complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. However, in 1513 and 1514 Durer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death, and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's treatise Enchiridion militis Christiani), St. Jerome in his Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Durer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Willibald Prickheimer. These drafts were later used to design the famous chandeliers lusterweibchen. In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. CANNOTANSWER | Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin ( | Albrecht Dürer (; ; ; 21 May 1471 – 6 April 1528), sometimes spelled in English as Durer (without an umlaut) or Duerer, was a German painter, printmaker, and theorist of the German Renaissance. Born in Nuremberg, Dürer established his reputation and influence across Europe in his twenties due to his high-quality woodcut prints. He was in contact with the major Italian artists of his time, including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini, and Leonardo da Vinci, and from 1512 was patronized by Emperor Maximilian I.
Dürer's vast body of work includes engravings, his preferred technique in his later prints, altarpieces, portraits and self-portraits, watercolours and books. The woodcuts series are more Gothic than the rest of his work. His well-known engravings include the three Meisterstiche (master prints) Knight, Death and the Devil (1513), Saint Jerome in his Study (1514), and Melencolia I (1514). His watercolours mark him as one of the first European landscape artists, while his woodcuts revolutionised the potential of that medium.
Dürer's introduction of classical motifs into Northern art, through his knowledge of Italian artists and German humanists, has secured his reputation as one of the most important figures of the Northern Renaissance. This is reinforced by his theoretical treatises, which involve principles of mathematics, perspective, and ideal proportions.
Biography
Early life (1471–1490)
Dürer was born on 21 May 1471, the third child and second son of Albrecht Dürer the Elder and Barbara Holper, who married in 1467 and had eighteen children together. Albrecht Dürer the Elder (originally Albrecht Ajtósi), was a successful goldsmith who by 1455 had moved to Nuremberg from Ajtós, near Gyula in Hungary. He married Holper, his master's daughter, when he himself qualified as a master. One of Albrecht's brothers, Hans Dürer, was also a painter and trained under him. Another of Albrecht's brothers, Endres Dürer, took over their father's business and was a master goldsmith. The German name "Dürer" is a translation from the Hungarian, "Ajtósi". Initially, it was "Türer", meaning doormaker, which is "ajtós" in Hungarian (from "ajtó", meaning door). A door is featured in the coat-of-arms the family acquired. Albrecht Dürer the Younger later changed "Türer", his father's diction of the family's surname, to "Dürer", to adapt to the local Nuremberg dialect.
Dürer's godfather Anton Koberger left goldsmithing to become a printer and publisher in the year of Dürer's birth. He became the most successful publisher in Germany, eventually owning twenty-four printing-presses and a number of offices in Germany and abroad. Koberger's most famous publication was the Nuremberg Chronicle, published in 1493 in German and Latin editions. It contained an unprecedented 1,809 woodcut illustrations (albeit with many repeated uses of the same block) by the Wolgemut workshop. Dürer may have worked on some of these, as the work on the project began while he was with Wolgemut.
Because Dürer left autobiographical writings and was widely known by his mid-twenties, his life is well documented in several sources. After a few years of school, Dürer learned the basics of goldsmithing and drawing from his father. Though his father wanted him to continue his training as a goldsmith, he showed such a precocious talent in drawing that he started as an apprentice to Michael Wolgemut at the age of fifteen in 1486. A self-portrait, a drawing in silverpoint, is dated 1484 (Albertina, Vienna) "when I was a child", as his later inscription says. The drawing is one of the earliest surviving children's drawings of any kind, and, as Dürer's Opus One, has helped define his oeuvre as deriving from, and always linked to, himself. Wolgemut was the leading artist in Nuremberg at the time, with a large workshop producing a variety of works of art, in particular woodcuts for books. Nuremberg was then an important and prosperous city, a centre for publishing and many luxury trades. It had strong links with Italy, especially Venice, a relatively short distance across the Alps.
Wanderjahre and marriage (1490–1494)
After completing his apprenticeship, Dürer followed the common German custom of taking Wanderjahre—in effect gap years—in which the apprentice learned skills from artists in other areas; Dürer was to spend about four years away. He left in 1490, possibly to work under Martin Schongauer, the leading engraver of Northern Europe, but who died shortly before Dürer's arrival at Colmar in 1492. It is unclear where Dürer travelled in the intervening period, though it is likely that he went to Frankfurt and the Netherlands. In Colmar, Dürer was welcomed by Schongauer's brothers, the goldsmiths Caspar and Paul and the painter Ludwig. In 1493 Dürer went to Strasbourg, where he would have experienced the sculpture of Nikolaus Gerhaert. Dürer's first painted self-portrait (now in the Louvre) was painted at this time, probably to be sent back to his fiancée in Nuremberg.
In early 1492 Dürer travelled to Basel to stay with another brother of Martin Schongauer, the goldsmith Georg. Very soon after his return to Nuremberg, on 7 July 1494, at the age of 23, Dürer was married to Agnes Frey following an arrangement made during his absence. Agnes was the daughter of a prominent brass worker (and amateur harpist) in the city. However, no children resulted from the marriage, and with Albrecht the Dürer name died out. The marriage between Agnes and Albrecht was not a generally happy one, as indicated by the letters of Dürer in which he quipped to Willibald Pirckheimer in an extremely rough tone about his wife. He called her an "old crow" and made other vulgar remarks. Pirckheimer also made no secret of his antipathy towards Agnes, describing her as a miserly shrew with a bitter tongue, who helped cause Dürer's death at a young age. One author speculates that Albrecht was bisexual, if not homosexual, due to several of his works containing themes of homosexual desire, as well as the intimate nature of his correspondence with certain very close male friends.
First journey to Italy (1494–1495)
Within three months of his marriage, Dürer left for Italy, alone, perhaps stimulated by an outbreak of plague in Nuremberg. He made watercolour sketches as he traveled over the Alps. Some have survived and others may be deduced from accurate landscapes of real places in his later work, for example his engraving Nemesis.
In Italy, he went to Venice to study its more advanced artistic world. Through Wolgemut's tutelage, Dürer had learned how to make prints in drypoint and design woodcuts in the German style, based on the works of Schongauer and the Housebook Master. He also would have had access to some Italian works in Germany, but the two visits he made to Italy had an enormous influence on him. He wrote that Giovanni Bellini was the oldest and still the best of the artists in Venice. His drawings and engravings show the influence of others, notably Antonio Pollaiuolo, with his interest in the proportions of the body; Lorenzo di Credi; and Andrea Mantegna, whose work he produced copies of while training. Dürer probably also visited Padua and Mantua on this trip.
Return to Nuremberg (1495–1505)
On his return to Nuremberg in 1495, Dürer opened his own workshop (being married was a requirement for this). Over the next five years, his style increasingly integrated Italian influences into underlying Northern forms. Arguably his best works in the first years of the workshop were his woodcut prints, mostly religious, but including secular scenes such as The Men's Bath House (ca. 1496). These were larger and more finely cut than the great majority of German woodcuts hitherto, and far more complex and balanced in composition.
It is now thought unlikely that Dürer cut any of the woodblocks himself; this task would have been performed by a specialist craftsman. However, his training in Wolgemut's studio, which made many carved and painted altarpieces and both designed and cut woodblocks for woodcut, evidently gave him great understanding of what the technique could be made to produce, and how to work with block cutters. Dürer either drew his design directly onto the woodblock itself, or glued a paper drawing to the block. Either way, his drawings were destroyed during the cutting of the block.
His series of sixteen designs for the Apocalypse is dated 1498, as is his engraving of St. Michael Fighting the Dragon. He made the first seven scenes of the Great Passion in the same year, and a little later, a series of eleven on the Holy Family and saints. The Seven Sorrows Polyptych, commissioned by Frederick III of Saxony in 1496, was executed by Dürer and his assistants c. 1500. In 1502, Dürer's father died. Around 1503–1505 Dürer produced the first 17 of a set illustrating the Life of the Virgin, which he did not finish for some years. Neither these nor the Great Passion were published as sets until several years later, but prints were sold individually in considerable numbers.
During the same period Dürer trained himself in the difficult art of using the burin to make engravings. It is possible he had begun learning this skill during his early training with his father, as it was also an essential skill of the goldsmith. In 1496 he executed the Prodigal Son, which the Italian Renaissance art historian Giorgio Vasari singled out for praise some decades later, noting its Germanic quality. He was soon producing some spectacular and original images, notably Nemesis (1502), The Sea Monster (1498), and Saint Eustace (c. 1501), with a highly detailed landscape background and animals. His landscapes of this period, such as Pond in the Woods and Willow Mill, are quite different from his earlier watercolours. There is a much greater emphasis on capturing atmosphere, rather than depicting topography. He made a number of Madonnas, single religious figures, and small scenes with comic peasant figures. Prints are highly portable and these works made Dürer famous throughout the main artistic centres of Europe within a very few years.
The Venetian artist Jacopo de' Barbari, whom Dürer had met in Venice, visited Nuremberg in 1500, and Dürer said that he learned much about the new developments in perspective, anatomy, and proportion from him. De' Barbari was unwilling to explain everything he knew, so Dürer began his own studies, which would become a lifelong preoccupation. A series of extant drawings show Dürer's experiments in human proportion, leading to the famous engraving of Adam and Eve (1504), which shows his subtlety while using the burin in the texturing of flesh surfaces. This is the only existing engraving signed with his full name.
Dürer created large numbers of preparatory drawings, especially for his paintings and engravings, and many survive, most famously the Betende Hände (Praying Hands) from circa 1508, a study for an apostle in the Heller altarpiece. He continued to make images in watercolour and bodycolour (usually combined), including a number of still lifes of meadow sections or animals, including his Young Hare (1502) and the Great Piece of Turf (1503).
Second journey to Italy (1505–1507)
In Italy, he returned to painting, at first producing a series of works executed in tempera on linen. These include portraits and altarpieces, notably, the Paumgartner altarpiece and the Adoration of the Magi. In early 1506, he returned to Venice and stayed there until the spring of 1507. By this time Dürer's engravings had attained great popularity and were being copied. In Venice he was given a valuable commission from the emigrant German community for the church of San Bartolomeo. This was the altar-piece known as the Adoration of the Virgin or the Feast of Rose Garlands. It includes portraits of members of Venice's German community, but shows a strong Italian influence. It was later acquired by the Emperor Rudolf II and taken to Prague.
Nuremberg and the masterworks (1507–1520)
Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Dürer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael.
Between 1507 and 1511 Dürer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Dürer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted.
Other works from this period include the thirty-seven Little Passion woodcuts, first published in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. In 1513 and 1514 Dürer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's Handbook of a Christian Knight), St. Jerome in His Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514, the year Dürer's mother died). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Dürer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Pirckheimer. These drafts were later used to design Lusterweibchen chandeliers, combining an antler with a wooden sculpture.
In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. His only experiments with etching came in this period, producing five between 1515–1516 and a sixth in 1518; a technique he may have abandoned as unsuited to his aesthetic of methodical, classical form.
Patronage of Maximilian I
From 1512, Maximilian I became Dürer's major patron. He commissioned The Triumphal Arch, a vast work printed from 192 separate blocks, the symbolism of which is partly informed by Pirckheimer's translation of Horapollo's Hieroglyphica. The design program and explanations were devised by Johannes Stabius, the architectural design by the master builder and court-painter Jörg Kölderer and the woodcutting itself by Hieronymous Andreae, with Dürer as designer-in-chief. The Arch was followed by The Triumphal Procession, the program of which was worked out in 1512 by Marx Treitz-Saurwein and includes woodcuts by Albrecht Altdorfer and Hans Springinklee, as well as Dürer.
Dürer worked with pen on the marginal images for an edition of the Emperor's printed Prayer-Book; these were quite unknown until facsimiles were published in 1808 as part of the first book published in lithography. Dürer's work on the book was halted for an unknown reason, and the decoration was continued by artists including Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Baldung. Dürer also made several portraits of the Emperor, including one shortly before Maximilian's death in 1519.
Maximilian was a very cash-strapped prince who sometimes failed to pay, yet turned out to be Dürer's most important patron. In his court, artists and learned men were respected, which was not common at that time (later, Dürer commented that in Germany, as a non-noble, he was treated a parasite). Pirckheimer (who he met in 1495, before entering the service of Maximilian) was also an important personage in the court and great cultural patron, who had a strong influence on Dürer as his tutor in classical knowledge and humanistic critical methodology, as well as collaborator.
In Maximilian's court, Dürer also collaborated with a great number of other brilliant artists and scholars of the time who became his friends, like Johannes Stabius, Konrad Peutinger, Conrad Celtes, and Hans Tscherte (an imperial architect).
Dürer manifested a strong pride in his ability, as a prince of his profession. One day, the emperor, trying to show Dürer an idea, tried to sketch with the charcoal himself, but always broke it. Dürer took the charcoal from Maximilian's hand, finished the drawing and told him: "This is my scepter."
In another occasion, Maximilian noticed that the ladder Dürer used was too short and unstable, thus told a noble to hold it for him. The noble refused, saying that it was beneath him to serve a non-noble. Maximilian then came to hold the ladder himself, and told the noble that he could make a noble out of a peasant any day, but he could not make an artist like Dürer out of a noble.
Cartographic and astronomical works
Dürer's exploration of space led to a relationship and cooperation with the court astronomer Johannes Stabius. Stabius also often acted as Dürer's and Maximilian's go-between for their financial problems.
In 1515 Dürer and Stabius created the first world map projected on a solid geometric sphere. Also in 1515, Stabius, Dürer and the astronomer Konrad Heinfogel produced the first planispheres of both southern and northerns hemispheres, as well as the first printed celestial maps, which prompted the revival of interest in the field of uranometry throughout Europe.
Journey to the Netherlands (1520–1521)
Maximilian's death came at a time when Dürer was concerned he was losing "my sight and freedom of hand" (perhaps caused by arthritis) and increasingly affected by the writings of Martin Luther. In July 1520 Dürer made his fourth and last major journey, to renew the Imperial pension Maximilian had given him and to secure the patronage of the new emperor, Charles V, who was to be crowned at Aachen. Dürer journeyed with his wife and her maid via the Rhine to Cologne and then to Antwerp, where he was well received and produced numerous drawings in silverpoint, chalk and charcoal. In addition to attending the coronation, he visited Cologne (where he admired the painting of Stefan Lochner), Nijmegen, 's-Hertogenbosch, Bruges (where he saw Michelangelo's Madonna of Bruges), Ghent (where he admired van Eyck's Ghent altarpiece), and Zeeland.
Dürer took a large stock of prints with him and wrote in his diary to whom he gave, exchanged or sold them, and for how much. This provides rare information of the monetary value placed on prints at this time. Unlike paintings, their sale was very rarely documented. While providing valuable documentary evidence, Dürer's Netherlandish diary also reveals that the trip was not a profitable one. For example, Dürer offered his last portrait of Maximilian to his daughter, Margaret of Austria, but eventually traded the picture for some white cloth after Margaret disliked the portrait and declined to accept it. During this trip he also met Bernard van Orley, Jan Provoost, Gerard Horenbout, Jean Mone, Joachim Patinir and Tommaso Vincidor, though he did not, it seems, meet Quentin Matsys.
Having secured his pension, Dürer returned home in July 1521, having caught an undetermined illness, which afflicted him for the rest of his life, and greatly reduced his rate of work.
Final years, Nuremberg (1521–1528)
On his return to Nuremberg, Dürer worked on a number of grand projects with religious themes, including a crucifixion scene and a Sacra conversazione, though neither was completed. This may have been due in part to his declining health, but perhaps also because of the time he gave to the preparation of his theoretical works on geometry and perspective, the proportions of men and horses, and fortification.
However, one consequence of this shift in emphasis was that during the last years of his life, Dürer produced comparatively little as an artist. In painting, there was only a portrait of Hieronymus Holtzschuher, a Madonna and Child (1526), Salvator Mundi (1526), and two panels showing St. John with St. Peter in background and St. Paul with St. Mark in the background. This last great work, the Four Apostles, was given by Dürer to the City of Nuremberg—although he was given 100 guilders in return.
As for engravings, Dürer's work was restricted to portraits and illustrations for his treatise. The portraits include Cardinal-Elector Albert of Mainz; Frederick the Wise, elector of Saxony; the humanist scholar Willibald Pirckheimer; Philipp Melanchthon, and Erasmus of Rotterdam. For those of the Cardinal, Melanchthon, and Dürer's final major work, a drawn portrait of the Nuremberg patrician Ulrich Starck, Dürer depicted the sitters in profile.
Despite complaining of his lack of a formal classical education, Dürer was greatly interested in intellectual matters and learned much from his boyhood friend Willibald Pirckheimer, whom he no doubt consulted on the content of many of his images. He also derived great satisfaction from his friendships and correspondence with Erasmus and other scholars. Dürer succeeded in producing two books during his lifetime. "The Four Books on Measurement" were published at Nuremberg in 1525 and was the first book for adults on mathematics in German, as well as being cited later by Galileo and Kepler. The other, a work on city fortifications, was published in 1527. "The Four Books on Human Proportion" were published posthumously, shortly after his death in 1528.
Dürer died in Nuremberg at the age of 56, leaving an estate valued at 6,874 florins – a considerable sum. He is buried in the Johannisfriedhof cemetery. His large house (purchased in 1509 from the heirs of the astronomer Bernhard Walther), where his workshop was located and where his widow lived until her death in 1539, remains a prominent Nuremberg landmark.
Dürer and the Reformation
Dürer's writings suggest that he may have been sympathetic to Luther's ideas, though it is unclear if he ever left the Catholic Church. Dürer wrote of his desire to draw Luther in his diary in 1520: "And God help me that I may go to Dr. Martin Luther; thus I intend to make a portrait of him with great care and engrave him on a copper plate to create a lasting memorial of the Christian man who helped me overcome so many difficulties." In a letter to Nicholas Kratzer in 1524, Dürer wrote, "because of our Christian faith we have to stand in scorn and danger, for we are reviled and called heretics". Most tellingly, Pirckheimer wrote in a letter to Johann Tscherte in 1530: "I confess that in the beginning I believed in Luther, like our Albert of blessed memory ... but as anyone can see, the situation has become worse." Dürer may even have contributed to the Nuremberg City Council's mandating Lutheran sermons and services in March 1525. Notably, Dürer had contacts with various reformers, such as Zwingli, Andreas Karlstadt, Melanchthon, Erasmus and Cornelius Grapheus from whom Dürer received Luther's Babylonian Captivity in 1520. Yet Erasmus and C. Grapheus are better said to be Catholic change agents. Also, from 1525, "the year that saw the peak and collapse of the Peasants' War, the artist can be seen to distance himself somewhat from the [Lutheran] movement..."
Dürer's later works have also been claimed to show Protestant sympathies. His 1523 The Last Supper woodcut has often been understood to have an evangelical theme, focusing as it does on Christ espousing the Gospel, as well as the inclusion of the Eucharistic cup, an expression of Protestant utraquism, although this interpretation has been questioned. The delaying of the engraving of St Philip, completed in 1523 but not distributed until 1526, may have been due to Dürer's uneasiness with images of saints; even if Dürer was not an iconoclast, in his last years he evaluated and questioned the role of art in religion.
Legacy and influence
Dürer exerted a huge influence on the artists of succeeding generations, especially in printmaking, the medium through which his contemporaries mostly experienced his art, as his paintings were predominantly in private collections located in only a few cities. His success in spreading his reputation across Europe through prints was undoubtedly an inspiration for major artists such as Raphael, Titian, and Parmigianino, all of whom collaborated with printmakers to promote and distribute their work.
His engravings seem to have had an intimidating effect upon his German successors; the "Little Masters" who attempted few large engravings but continued Dürer's themes in small, rather cramped compositions. Lucas van Leyden was the only Northern European engraver to successfully continue to produce large engravings in the first third of the 16th century. The generation of Italian engravers who trained in the shadow of Dürer all either directly copied parts of his landscape backgrounds (Giulio Campagnola, Giovanni Battista Palumba, Benedetto Montagna and Cristofano Robetta), or whole prints (Marcantonio Raimondi and Agostino Veneziano). However, Dürer's influence became less dominant after 1515, when Marcantonio perfected his new engraving style, which in turn travelled over the Alps to also dominate Northern engraving.
In painting, Dürer had relatively little influence in Italy, where probably only his altarpiece in Venice was seen, and his German successors were less effective in blending German and Italian styles. His intense and self-dramatizing self-portraits have continued to have a strong influence up to the present, especially on painters in the 19th and 20th century who desired a more dramatic portrait style. Dürer has never fallen from critical favour, and there have been significant revivals of interest in his works in Germany in the Dürer Renaissance of about 1570 to 1630, in the early nineteenth century, and in German nationalism from 1870 to 1945.
The Lutheran Church commemorates Dürer annually on 6 April, along with Michelangelo, Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Burgkmair. The liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (United States) remembers him, Cranach and Matthias Grünewald on 5 August.
Theoretical works
In all his theoretical works, in order to communicate his theories in the German language rather than in Latin, Dürer used graphic expressions based on a vernacular, craftsmen's language. For example, "Schneckenlinie" ("snail-line") was his term for a spiral form. Thus, Dürer contributed to the expansion in German prose which Luther had begun with his translation of the Bible.
Four Books on Measurement
Dürer's work on geometry is called the Four Books on Measurement (Underweysung der Messung mit dem Zirckel und Richtscheyt or Instructions for Measuring with Compass and Ruler). The first book focuses on linear geometry. Dürer's geometric constructions include helices, conchoids and epicycloids. He also draws on Apollonius, and Johannes Werner's 'Libellus super viginti duobus elementis conicis' of 1522.
The second book moves onto two-dimensional geometry, i.e. the construction of regular polygons. Here Dürer favours the methods of Ptolemy over Euclid. The third book applies these principles of geometry to architecture, engineering and typography.
In architecture Dürer cites Vitruvius but elaborates his own classical designs and columns. In typography, Dürer depicts the geometric construction of the Latin alphabet, relying on Italian precedent. However, his
construction of the Gothic alphabet is based upon an entirely different modular system. The fourth book completes the progression of the first and second by moving to three-dimensional forms and the construction of polyhedra. Here Dürer discusses the five Platonic solids, as well as seven Archimedean semi-regular solids, as well as several of his own invention.
In all these, Dürer shows the objects as nets. Finally, Dürer discusses the Delian Problem and moves on to the 'construzione legittima', a method of depicting a cube in two dimensions through linear perspective. He is thought to be the first to describe a visualization technique used in modern computers, ray tracing. It was in Bologna that Dürer was taught (possibly by Luca Pacioli or Bramante) the principles of linear perspective, and evidently became familiar with the 'costruzione legittima' in a written description of these principles found only, at this time, in the unpublished treatise of Piero della Francesca. He was also familiar with the 'abbreviated construction' as described by Alberti and the geometrical construction of shadows, a technique of Leonardo da Vinci. Although Dürer made no innovations in these areas, he is notable as the first Northern European to treat matters of visual representation in a scientific way, and with understanding of Euclidean principles. In addition to these geometrical constructions, Dürer discusses in this last book of Underweysung der Messung an assortment of mechanisms for drawing in perspective from models and provides woodcut illustrations of these methods that are often reproduced in discussions of perspective.
Four Books on Human Proportion
Dürer's work on human proportions is called the Four Books on Human Proportion (Vier Bücher von Menschlicher Proportion) of 1528. The first book was mainly composed by 1512/13 and completed by 1523, showing five differently constructed types of both male and female figures, all parts of the body expressed in fractions of the total height. Dürer based these constructions on both Vitruvius and empirical observations of "two to three hundred living persons", in his own words. The second book includes eight further types, broken down not into fractions but an Albertian system, which Dürer probably learned from Francesco di Giorgio's 'De harmonica mundi totius' of 1525. In the third book, Dürer gives principles by which the proportions of the figures can be modified, including the mathematical simulation of convex and concave mirrors; here Dürer also deals with human physiognomy. The fourth book is devoted to the theory of movement.
Appended to the last book, however, is a self-contained essay on aesthetics, which Dürer worked on between 1512 and 1528, and it is here that we learn of his theories concerning 'ideal beauty'. Dürer rejected Alberti's concept of an objective beauty, proposing a relativist notion of beauty based on variety. Nonetheless, Dürer still believed that truth was hidden within nature, and that there were rules which ordered beauty, even though he found it difficult to define the criteria for such a code. In 1512/13 his three criteria were function ('Nutz'), naïve approval ('Wohlgefallen') and the happy medium ('Mittelmass'). However, unlike Alberti and Leonardo, Dürer was most troubled by understanding not just the abstract notions of beauty but also as to how an artist can create beautiful images. Between 1512 and the final draft in 1528, Dürer's belief developed from an understanding of human creativity as spontaneous or inspired to a concept of 'selective inward synthesis'. In other words, that an artist builds on a wealth of visual experiences in order to imagine beautiful things. Dürer's belief in the abilities of a single artist over inspiration prompted him to assert that "one man may sketch something with his pen on half a sheet of paper in one day, or may cut it into a tiny piece of wood with his little iron, and it turns out to be better and more artistic than another's work at which its author labours with the utmost diligence for a whole year".
Book on Fortification
In 1527, Dürer also published Various Lessons on the Fortification of Cities, Castles, and Localities (Etliche Underricht zu Befestigung der Stett, Schloss und Flecken). It was printed in Nuremberg, probably by Hieronymus Andreae and reprinted in 1603 by Johan Janssenn in Arnhem. In 1535 it was also translated into Latin as On Cities, Forts, and Castles, Designed and Strengthened by Several Manners: Presented for the Most Necessary Accommodation of War (De vrbibus, arcibus, castellisque condendis, ac muniendis rationes aliquot : praesenti bellorum necessitati accommodatissimae), published by Christian Wechel (Wecheli/Wechelus) in Paris.
The work is less proscriptively theoretical than his other works, and was soon overshadowed by the Italian theory of polygonal fortification (the trace italienne – see Bastion fort), though his designs seem to have had some influence in the eastern German lands and up into the Baltic States.
Fencing
Dürer created many sketches and woodcuts of soldiers and knights over the course of his life. His most significant martial works, however, were made in 1512 as part of his efforts to secure the patronage of Maximilian I. Using existing manuscripts from the Nuremberg Group as his reference, his workshop produced the extensive Οπλοδιδασκαλια sive Armorvm Tractandorvm Meditatio Alberti Dvreri ("Weapon Training, or Albrecht Dürer's Meditation on the Handling of Weapons", MS 26-232). Another manuscript based on the Nuremberg texts as well as one of Hans Talhoffer's works, the untitled Berlin Picture Book (Libr.Pict.A.83), is also thought to have originated in his workshop around this time. These sketches and watercolors show the same careful attention to detail and human proportion as Dürer's other work, and his illustrations of grappling, long sword, dagger, and messer are among the highest-quality in any fencing manual.
Gallery
List of works
List of paintings by Albrecht Dürer
List of engravings by Albrecht Dürer
List of woodcuts by Albrecht Dürer
References
Notes
Citations
Sources
Bartrum, Giulia. Albrecht Dürer and his Legacy. London: British Museum Press, 2002.
Brand Philip, Lotte; Anzelewsky, Fedja. "The Portrait Diptych of Dürer's parents". Simiolus: Netherlands Quarterly for the History of Art, Volume 10, No. 1, 1978–79. 5–18
Brion, Marcel. Dürer. London: Thames and Hudson, 1960
Harbison, Craig. "Dürer and the Reformation: The Problem of the Re-dating of the St. Philip Engraving". The Art Bulletin, Vol. 58, No. 3, 368–373. September 1976
Koerner, Joseph Leo. The Moment of Self-Portraiture in German Renaissance Art. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 1993.
Landau David; Parshall, Peter. The Renaissance Print. Yale, 1996.
Panofsky, Erwin. The Life and Art of Albrecht Dürer. NJ: Princeton, 1945.
Price, David Hotchkiss. Albrecht Dürer's Renaissance: Humanism, Reformation and the Art of Faith. Michigan, 2003. .
Strauss, Walter L. (ed.). The Complete Engravings, Etchings and Drypoints of Albrecht Durer. Mineola NY: Dover Publications, 1973.
Borchert, Till-Holger. Van Eyck to Dürer: The Influence of Early Netherlandish painting on European Art, 1430–1530. London: Thames & Hudson, 2011.
Wolf, Norbert. Albrecht Dürer. Taschen, 2010.
Hoffmann, Rainer. Im Paradies - Adam und Eva und der Sündenfall - Albrecht Dürers Darstellungen, Böhlau-Verlag, 2021, ISBN 9783412523852
Further reading
Campbell Hutchison, Jane. Albrecht Dürer: A Biography. Princeton University Press, 1990.
Demele, Christine. Dürers Nacktheit – Das Weimarer Selbstbildnis. Rhema Verlag, Münster 2012,
Dürer, Albrecht (translated by R.T. Nichol from the Latin text), Of the Just Shaping of Letters, Dover Publications.
Hart, Vaughan. 'Navel Gazing. On Albrecht Dürer's Adam and Eve (1504)', The International Journal of Arts Theory and History, 2016, vol.12.1 pp. 1–10 https://doi.org/10.18848/2326-9960/CGP/v12i01/1-10
Korolija Fontana-Giusti, Gordana. "The Unconscious and Space: Venice and the work of Albrecht Dürer", in Architecture and the Unconscious, eds. J. Hendrix and L.Holm, Farnham Surrey: Ashgate, 2016. pp. 27–44, .
Wilhelm, Kurth (ed.). The Complete Woodcuts of Albrecht Durer, Dover Publications, 2000.
External links
The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Dürer Prints Close-up. Made to accompany The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Albrecht Dürer: Vier Bücher von menschlicher Proportion (Nuremberg, 1528). Selected pages scanned from the original work. Historical Anatomies on the Web. US National Library of Medicine.
"Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528)". In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Albrecht Durer, Exhibition, Albertina, Vienna. 20 September 2019 – 6 January 2020
1471 births
1528 deaths
15th-century engravers
15th-century German painters
16th-century engravers
16th-century German painters
Animal artists
Artist authors
Artists from Nuremberg
Catholic decorative artists
Catholic draughtsmen
Catholic engravers
Catholic painters
German draughtsmen
German engravers
German Lutherans
German male painters
German people of Hungarian descent
German printmakers
German Renaissance painters
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People celebrated in the Lutheran liturgical calendar
Renaissance engravers
Woodcut designers | false | [
"Fantasy Masterworks is a series of British paperbacks intended to comprise \"some of the greatest, most original, and most influential fantasy ever written\", and claimed by its publisher Millennium (an imprint of Victor Gollancz) to be \"the books which, along with Tolkien, Peake and others, shaped modern fantasy.\"\n\nIt has a companion series in the SF Masterworks line. A separate Future Classics line has also started featuring eight science fiction novels from the last few decades.\n\nThe books were numbered only through No. 50; in the 2013 reboot of the series, the books are unnumbered, have a uniform look, and feature introductions by well-known writers and critics.\n\nNumbered paperback series (2000-2007)\n\nNew design \n\n* Also published in the Fantasy Masterworks numbered series.\n\nSee also\nSF Masterworks\n\nExternal links \n List of Fantasy Masterworks in order of publication with extensive reviews.\n Fantasy Masterworks overview and reviews — List of Fantasy Masterworks numbered series in reverse order of publication with shorter reviews at The SF Site.\n The Fantasy Masterworks List — A graphical presentation of the Fantasy Masterworks.\n\nReferences\n\nFantasy books by series\nLists of fantasy books",
"Edward George Power Biggs (March 29, 1906 – March 10, 1977) was a British-born American concert organist and recording artist.\n\nBiography\nBiggs was born in Westcliff-on-Sea, Essex, England; a year later, the family moved to the Isle of Wight. Biggs was trained in London at the Royal Academy of Music, where he studied with G. D. Cunningham. Biggs immigrated to the United States in 1930. In 1932, he took up a post at Christ Church in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the community where he lived for the rest of his life.\n\nBiggs did much to bring the classical pipe organ back to prominence, and was in the forefront of the mid-20th-century resurgence of interest in the organ music of pre-Romantic composers. On his first concert tour of Europe, in 1954, Biggs performed and recorded works of Johann Sebastian Bach, Sweelinck, Dieterich Buxtehude, and Pachelbel on historic organs associated with those composers. Thereafter, he believed that such music should ideally be performed on instruments representative of that period and that organ music of that epoch should be played by using (as closely as possible) the styles and registrations of that era. Thus, he gave significant impetus to the American revival of organ building in the style of European Baroque instruments, seen especially in the increasing popularity of tracker organs—analogous to Europe's Orgelbewegung.\n\nAmong other instruments, Biggs championed G. Donald Harrison's Baroque-style unenclosed, unencased instrument with 24 stops and electric action (produced by Aeolian-Skinner in 1937 and installed in Harvard's Busch-Reisinger Museum, Cambridge, Massachusetts) and the three-manual Flentrop tracker organ subsequently installed there in 1958. Many of his CBS radio broadcasts and Columbia recordings were made in the museum. Another remarkable instrument used by Biggs was the John Challis pedal harpsichord; Biggs made recordings of the music of J. S. Bach and Scott Joplin on this instrument.\n\nBiggs' critics of the time included rival concert organist Virgil Fox, who was known for a more flamboyant and colorful style of performance. Fox decried Biggs' insistence on historical accuracy, claiming that it was \"relegating the organ to a museum piece\". Artistic rivalries aside, many observers agree that Biggs \"should be given great credit for his innovative ideas as far as the musical material he recorded, and for making the organs he recorded even more famous.\" Despite different approaches, both artists enjoyed hugely successful careers and Biggs rose to the top of his profession. In addition to concerts and recording, Biggs taught at the Longy School of Music in Cambridge, Massachusetts, at various times in his career and edited a large body of organ music.\n\nBiggs was elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1950. For his contribution to the recording industry, Biggs has a star on California's Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6522 Hollywood Boulevard.\n\nSelected discography\nBiggs recorded extensively for the Columbia Masterworks Records and RCA Victor labels for more than three decades. Between 1942 and 1958, he also hosted a weekly radio program of organ music (carried throughout the United States on the CBS Radio Network) that introduced audiences to the pipe organ and its literature.\n\n Works for Organ: Essential Classics (1961)\n Bach: Organ Favorites recorded on the Flentrop Organ in the Busch-Reisinger Museum of Harvard University, MS 6261 (1961) \n The Golden Age of the Organ, Columbia Masterworks M2S 697 (A tribute to German organ builder Arp Schnitger), organs in Germany and the Netherlands (1963)\n Bach Organ Favorites, Vol. 2, Columbia Masterworks MS 6748 (1965)\n Mozart: The Music for Solo Organ—Played on the \"Mozart\" organ at Haarlem, Columbia Masterworks MS 6856 (1966)\n Bach Organ Favorites, Vol. 3, Columbia Masterworks MS 7108 (1968)\n E. Power Biggs' Greatest Hits, Columbia Masterworks MS 7269 (1969)\n Bach Organ Favorites, Vol. 4, Columbia Masterworks MS 7424 (1970)\n Plays Bach in the Thomaskirche, Columbia Masterworks M30648 (1971)\n Bach Organ Favorites, Vol. 5, Columbia Masterworks M 31424 (1972)\n Bach Organ Favorites, Vol. 6, Columbia Masterworks M 32791 (1974)\n Bach: Four Great Toccatas & Fugues (Cathedral of Freiburg), Columbia Masterworks M 32933 (1974)\n Bach Eight Little Preludes and Concerto in D after Vivaldi, Columbia Masterworks M 33975 (1975)\n Stars and Stripes Forever: Two Centuries of Heroic Music in America, Columbia Masterworks 81507 (1976)\n Variations on Popular Songs, Columbia Masterworks AMS 6337\n A Festival of French Organ Music, Columbia Masterworks MS 6307\n Buxtehude at Lüneburg, Columbia Masterworks MS 6944\n The Organ in America, Columbia Masterworks MS 6161\n Historic Organs of England, Columbia Masterworks M 30445\n Historic Organs of France, Columbia Masterworks MS 7438\n Historic Organs of Italy, Columbia Masterworks MS 7379\n Historic Organs of Spain, Columbia Masterworks MS 7109\n Historic Organs of Switzerland, Columbia Masterworks MS 6855\n The Four Antiphonal Organs of the Cathedral of Freiburg, Columbia Masterworks M 33514 (music of Handel, Purcell, Mozart, Buxtehude, et al.)\n Bach on the Pedal Harpsichord, Columbia Masterworks MS 6804\n Bach: The Six Trio Sonatas (Pedal Harpsichord), Columbia Masterworks M2S 764\n Holiday for Harpsichord, Columbia Masterworks ML 6728\n A Mozart Organ Tour, Columbia Masterworks K3L 231\n Bach: The Little Organ Book, Columbia Masterworks KSL 227\n The Art of the Organ, Columbia Masterworks KSL 219\n Heroic Music for Organ, Brass, and Percussion, Columbia Masterworks MS 6354\n Mozart: Festival Sonatas for Organ and Orchestra, Columbia Masterworks MS 6857\n Haydn: The Three Organ Concertos, Columbia Masterworks MS 6682\n The Magnificent Mr. Handel, Columbia Masterworks M 30058\n The Organ in Sight and Sound, Columbia Masterworks KS 7263 (A technical discussion of the organ and its history)\n The Organ Concertos of Handel, Nos. 1–6, Columbia Masterworks K2S 602 (with Sir Adrian Boult)\n The Organ Concertos of Handel, Nos. 7–12, Columbia Masterworks K2S 604 (with Sir Adrian Boult)\n The Organ Concertos of Handel, Nos. 13–16, Columbia Masterworks K2S 611 (with Sir Adrian Boult)\n The Organ, Columbia Masterworks DL 5288\n Bach at Zwolle, Columbia Masterworks KS-6005\n Hindemith: Three Sonatas For Organ, Columbia Masterworks MS 6234\n Famous Organs of Holland and North Germany, Columbia Masterworks M31961\n Music of Jubilee, Columbia Masterworks ML 6015 (Bach Sinfonias, with Zoltan Rozsnyai)\n Soler: Six Concerti for Two Organs, Columbia Masterworks ML 5608 (with Daniel Pinkham)\n Plays Scott Joplin on the Pedal Harpsichord, Columbia Masterworks M32495\n Heroic Music for Organ, Brass & Percussion, Columbia Masterworks MS 6354 (with the New England Brass Ensemble)\n Music for Organ and Brass: Canzonas of Gabrieli and Frescobaldi, Columbia Masterworks MS 6117\n Music for Organ, Brass and Percussion: Music of Gigout, Dupré, Campra, Widor, Strauss, Purcell, Clarke, and Karg-Elert, Columbia Masterworks M31193 (with the Columbia Brass and Percussion Ensemble, Maurice Peress, conductor)\n Mendelssohn in St. Paul's Cathedral, Columbia Masterworks MS 6087\n The Glory of Gabrieli Columbia Masterworks MS-7071\n What Child Is This? Traditional Christmas Music, Columbia Masterworks MS 7164\n Bach: Toccata in D Minor, Bach's Toccata in D Minor recorded on 14 of Europe's finest organs, Columbia Masterworks ML 5032\n Rheinberger: Two Concertos For Organ and Orchestra, Columbia Masterworks M32297\n\nAwards and recognition\nGrammy Award for Best Chamber Music Performance:\n Vittorio Negri (conductor), E. Power Biggs & the Edward Tarr Ensemble, for Glory of Gabrieli Vol. II: Canzonas for Brass, Winds, Strings and Organ (1969)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n \n\n1906 births\n1977 deaths\nAlumni of the Royal Academy of Music\nAmerican classical organists\nBritish male organists\nBach musicians\nCulture of Boston\nEnglish classical organists\nEnglish emigrants to the United States\nFellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences\nGrammy Award winners\nMusicians from Cambridge, Massachusetts\nPeople from Westcliff-on-Sea\nBurials at Mount Auburn Cemetery\n20th-century classical musicians\n20th-century American composers\n20th-century English musicians\n20th-century conductors (music)\n20th-century American male musicians"
]
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[
"Albrecht Dürer",
"Nuremberg and the masterworks (1507-1520)",
"What are some of his masterworks?",
"Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin ("
]
| C_4a4a9362ff664bba86e8c74ead6078c0_0 | Does he have more? | 2 | Does Dürer have more works of art in addition to Adam and Eve, The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand, Virgin with the Iris, and the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin? | Albrecht Dürer | Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Durer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini and--mainly through Lorenzo di Credi--Leonardo da Vinci. Between 1507 and 1511 Durer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Durer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted. Other works from this period include the thirty-seven woodcut subjects of the Little Passion, published first in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Indeed, complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. However, in 1513 and 1514 Durer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death, and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's treatise Enchiridion militis Christiani), St. Jerome in his Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Durer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Willibald Prickheimer. These drafts were later used to design the famous chandeliers lusterweibchen. In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. CANNOTANSWER | Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, | Albrecht Dürer (; ; ; 21 May 1471 – 6 April 1528), sometimes spelled in English as Durer (without an umlaut) or Duerer, was a German painter, printmaker, and theorist of the German Renaissance. Born in Nuremberg, Dürer established his reputation and influence across Europe in his twenties due to his high-quality woodcut prints. He was in contact with the major Italian artists of his time, including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini, and Leonardo da Vinci, and from 1512 was patronized by Emperor Maximilian I.
Dürer's vast body of work includes engravings, his preferred technique in his later prints, altarpieces, portraits and self-portraits, watercolours and books. The woodcuts series are more Gothic than the rest of his work. His well-known engravings include the three Meisterstiche (master prints) Knight, Death and the Devil (1513), Saint Jerome in his Study (1514), and Melencolia I (1514). His watercolours mark him as one of the first European landscape artists, while his woodcuts revolutionised the potential of that medium.
Dürer's introduction of classical motifs into Northern art, through his knowledge of Italian artists and German humanists, has secured his reputation as one of the most important figures of the Northern Renaissance. This is reinforced by his theoretical treatises, which involve principles of mathematics, perspective, and ideal proportions.
Biography
Early life (1471–1490)
Dürer was born on 21 May 1471, the third child and second son of Albrecht Dürer the Elder and Barbara Holper, who married in 1467 and had eighteen children together. Albrecht Dürer the Elder (originally Albrecht Ajtósi), was a successful goldsmith who by 1455 had moved to Nuremberg from Ajtós, near Gyula in Hungary. He married Holper, his master's daughter, when he himself qualified as a master. One of Albrecht's brothers, Hans Dürer, was also a painter and trained under him. Another of Albrecht's brothers, Endres Dürer, took over their father's business and was a master goldsmith. The German name "Dürer" is a translation from the Hungarian, "Ajtósi". Initially, it was "Türer", meaning doormaker, which is "ajtós" in Hungarian (from "ajtó", meaning door). A door is featured in the coat-of-arms the family acquired. Albrecht Dürer the Younger later changed "Türer", his father's diction of the family's surname, to "Dürer", to adapt to the local Nuremberg dialect.
Dürer's godfather Anton Koberger left goldsmithing to become a printer and publisher in the year of Dürer's birth. He became the most successful publisher in Germany, eventually owning twenty-four printing-presses and a number of offices in Germany and abroad. Koberger's most famous publication was the Nuremberg Chronicle, published in 1493 in German and Latin editions. It contained an unprecedented 1,809 woodcut illustrations (albeit with many repeated uses of the same block) by the Wolgemut workshop. Dürer may have worked on some of these, as the work on the project began while he was with Wolgemut.
Because Dürer left autobiographical writings and was widely known by his mid-twenties, his life is well documented in several sources. After a few years of school, Dürer learned the basics of goldsmithing and drawing from his father. Though his father wanted him to continue his training as a goldsmith, he showed such a precocious talent in drawing that he started as an apprentice to Michael Wolgemut at the age of fifteen in 1486. A self-portrait, a drawing in silverpoint, is dated 1484 (Albertina, Vienna) "when I was a child", as his later inscription says. The drawing is one of the earliest surviving children's drawings of any kind, and, as Dürer's Opus One, has helped define his oeuvre as deriving from, and always linked to, himself. Wolgemut was the leading artist in Nuremberg at the time, with a large workshop producing a variety of works of art, in particular woodcuts for books. Nuremberg was then an important and prosperous city, a centre for publishing and many luxury trades. It had strong links with Italy, especially Venice, a relatively short distance across the Alps.
Wanderjahre and marriage (1490–1494)
After completing his apprenticeship, Dürer followed the common German custom of taking Wanderjahre—in effect gap years—in which the apprentice learned skills from artists in other areas; Dürer was to spend about four years away. He left in 1490, possibly to work under Martin Schongauer, the leading engraver of Northern Europe, but who died shortly before Dürer's arrival at Colmar in 1492. It is unclear where Dürer travelled in the intervening period, though it is likely that he went to Frankfurt and the Netherlands. In Colmar, Dürer was welcomed by Schongauer's brothers, the goldsmiths Caspar and Paul and the painter Ludwig. In 1493 Dürer went to Strasbourg, where he would have experienced the sculpture of Nikolaus Gerhaert. Dürer's first painted self-portrait (now in the Louvre) was painted at this time, probably to be sent back to his fiancée in Nuremberg.
In early 1492 Dürer travelled to Basel to stay with another brother of Martin Schongauer, the goldsmith Georg. Very soon after his return to Nuremberg, on 7 July 1494, at the age of 23, Dürer was married to Agnes Frey following an arrangement made during his absence. Agnes was the daughter of a prominent brass worker (and amateur harpist) in the city. However, no children resulted from the marriage, and with Albrecht the Dürer name died out. The marriage between Agnes and Albrecht was not a generally happy one, as indicated by the letters of Dürer in which he quipped to Willibald Pirckheimer in an extremely rough tone about his wife. He called her an "old crow" and made other vulgar remarks. Pirckheimer also made no secret of his antipathy towards Agnes, describing her as a miserly shrew with a bitter tongue, who helped cause Dürer's death at a young age. One author speculates that Albrecht was bisexual, if not homosexual, due to several of his works containing themes of homosexual desire, as well as the intimate nature of his correspondence with certain very close male friends.
First journey to Italy (1494–1495)
Within three months of his marriage, Dürer left for Italy, alone, perhaps stimulated by an outbreak of plague in Nuremberg. He made watercolour sketches as he traveled over the Alps. Some have survived and others may be deduced from accurate landscapes of real places in his later work, for example his engraving Nemesis.
In Italy, he went to Venice to study its more advanced artistic world. Through Wolgemut's tutelage, Dürer had learned how to make prints in drypoint and design woodcuts in the German style, based on the works of Schongauer and the Housebook Master. He also would have had access to some Italian works in Germany, but the two visits he made to Italy had an enormous influence on him. He wrote that Giovanni Bellini was the oldest and still the best of the artists in Venice. His drawings and engravings show the influence of others, notably Antonio Pollaiuolo, with his interest in the proportions of the body; Lorenzo di Credi; and Andrea Mantegna, whose work he produced copies of while training. Dürer probably also visited Padua and Mantua on this trip.
Return to Nuremberg (1495–1505)
On his return to Nuremberg in 1495, Dürer opened his own workshop (being married was a requirement for this). Over the next five years, his style increasingly integrated Italian influences into underlying Northern forms. Arguably his best works in the first years of the workshop were his woodcut prints, mostly religious, but including secular scenes such as The Men's Bath House (ca. 1496). These were larger and more finely cut than the great majority of German woodcuts hitherto, and far more complex and balanced in composition.
It is now thought unlikely that Dürer cut any of the woodblocks himself; this task would have been performed by a specialist craftsman. However, his training in Wolgemut's studio, which made many carved and painted altarpieces and both designed and cut woodblocks for woodcut, evidently gave him great understanding of what the technique could be made to produce, and how to work with block cutters. Dürer either drew his design directly onto the woodblock itself, or glued a paper drawing to the block. Either way, his drawings were destroyed during the cutting of the block.
His series of sixteen designs for the Apocalypse is dated 1498, as is his engraving of St. Michael Fighting the Dragon. He made the first seven scenes of the Great Passion in the same year, and a little later, a series of eleven on the Holy Family and saints. The Seven Sorrows Polyptych, commissioned by Frederick III of Saxony in 1496, was executed by Dürer and his assistants c. 1500. In 1502, Dürer's father died. Around 1503–1505 Dürer produced the first 17 of a set illustrating the Life of the Virgin, which he did not finish for some years. Neither these nor the Great Passion were published as sets until several years later, but prints were sold individually in considerable numbers.
During the same period Dürer trained himself in the difficult art of using the burin to make engravings. It is possible he had begun learning this skill during his early training with his father, as it was also an essential skill of the goldsmith. In 1496 he executed the Prodigal Son, which the Italian Renaissance art historian Giorgio Vasari singled out for praise some decades later, noting its Germanic quality. He was soon producing some spectacular and original images, notably Nemesis (1502), The Sea Monster (1498), and Saint Eustace (c. 1501), with a highly detailed landscape background and animals. His landscapes of this period, such as Pond in the Woods and Willow Mill, are quite different from his earlier watercolours. There is a much greater emphasis on capturing atmosphere, rather than depicting topography. He made a number of Madonnas, single religious figures, and small scenes with comic peasant figures. Prints are highly portable and these works made Dürer famous throughout the main artistic centres of Europe within a very few years.
The Venetian artist Jacopo de' Barbari, whom Dürer had met in Venice, visited Nuremberg in 1500, and Dürer said that he learned much about the new developments in perspective, anatomy, and proportion from him. De' Barbari was unwilling to explain everything he knew, so Dürer began his own studies, which would become a lifelong preoccupation. A series of extant drawings show Dürer's experiments in human proportion, leading to the famous engraving of Adam and Eve (1504), which shows his subtlety while using the burin in the texturing of flesh surfaces. This is the only existing engraving signed with his full name.
Dürer created large numbers of preparatory drawings, especially for his paintings and engravings, and many survive, most famously the Betende Hände (Praying Hands) from circa 1508, a study for an apostle in the Heller altarpiece. He continued to make images in watercolour and bodycolour (usually combined), including a number of still lifes of meadow sections or animals, including his Young Hare (1502) and the Great Piece of Turf (1503).
Second journey to Italy (1505–1507)
In Italy, he returned to painting, at first producing a series of works executed in tempera on linen. These include portraits and altarpieces, notably, the Paumgartner altarpiece and the Adoration of the Magi. In early 1506, he returned to Venice and stayed there until the spring of 1507. By this time Dürer's engravings had attained great popularity and were being copied. In Venice he was given a valuable commission from the emigrant German community for the church of San Bartolomeo. This was the altar-piece known as the Adoration of the Virgin or the Feast of Rose Garlands. It includes portraits of members of Venice's German community, but shows a strong Italian influence. It was later acquired by the Emperor Rudolf II and taken to Prague.
Nuremberg and the masterworks (1507–1520)
Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Dürer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael.
Between 1507 and 1511 Dürer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Dürer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted.
Other works from this period include the thirty-seven Little Passion woodcuts, first published in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. In 1513 and 1514 Dürer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's Handbook of a Christian Knight), St. Jerome in His Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514, the year Dürer's mother died). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Dürer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Pirckheimer. These drafts were later used to design Lusterweibchen chandeliers, combining an antler with a wooden sculpture.
In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. His only experiments with etching came in this period, producing five between 1515–1516 and a sixth in 1518; a technique he may have abandoned as unsuited to his aesthetic of methodical, classical form.
Patronage of Maximilian I
From 1512, Maximilian I became Dürer's major patron. He commissioned The Triumphal Arch, a vast work printed from 192 separate blocks, the symbolism of which is partly informed by Pirckheimer's translation of Horapollo's Hieroglyphica. The design program and explanations were devised by Johannes Stabius, the architectural design by the master builder and court-painter Jörg Kölderer and the woodcutting itself by Hieronymous Andreae, with Dürer as designer-in-chief. The Arch was followed by The Triumphal Procession, the program of which was worked out in 1512 by Marx Treitz-Saurwein and includes woodcuts by Albrecht Altdorfer and Hans Springinklee, as well as Dürer.
Dürer worked with pen on the marginal images for an edition of the Emperor's printed Prayer-Book; these were quite unknown until facsimiles were published in 1808 as part of the first book published in lithography. Dürer's work on the book was halted for an unknown reason, and the decoration was continued by artists including Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Baldung. Dürer also made several portraits of the Emperor, including one shortly before Maximilian's death in 1519.
Maximilian was a very cash-strapped prince who sometimes failed to pay, yet turned out to be Dürer's most important patron. In his court, artists and learned men were respected, which was not common at that time (later, Dürer commented that in Germany, as a non-noble, he was treated a parasite). Pirckheimer (who he met in 1495, before entering the service of Maximilian) was also an important personage in the court and great cultural patron, who had a strong influence on Dürer as his tutor in classical knowledge and humanistic critical methodology, as well as collaborator.
In Maximilian's court, Dürer also collaborated with a great number of other brilliant artists and scholars of the time who became his friends, like Johannes Stabius, Konrad Peutinger, Conrad Celtes, and Hans Tscherte (an imperial architect).
Dürer manifested a strong pride in his ability, as a prince of his profession. One day, the emperor, trying to show Dürer an idea, tried to sketch with the charcoal himself, but always broke it. Dürer took the charcoal from Maximilian's hand, finished the drawing and told him: "This is my scepter."
In another occasion, Maximilian noticed that the ladder Dürer used was too short and unstable, thus told a noble to hold it for him. The noble refused, saying that it was beneath him to serve a non-noble. Maximilian then came to hold the ladder himself, and told the noble that he could make a noble out of a peasant any day, but he could not make an artist like Dürer out of a noble.
Cartographic and astronomical works
Dürer's exploration of space led to a relationship and cooperation with the court astronomer Johannes Stabius. Stabius also often acted as Dürer's and Maximilian's go-between for their financial problems.
In 1515 Dürer and Stabius created the first world map projected on a solid geometric sphere. Also in 1515, Stabius, Dürer and the astronomer Konrad Heinfogel produced the first planispheres of both southern and northerns hemispheres, as well as the first printed celestial maps, which prompted the revival of interest in the field of uranometry throughout Europe.
Journey to the Netherlands (1520–1521)
Maximilian's death came at a time when Dürer was concerned he was losing "my sight and freedom of hand" (perhaps caused by arthritis) and increasingly affected by the writings of Martin Luther. In July 1520 Dürer made his fourth and last major journey, to renew the Imperial pension Maximilian had given him and to secure the patronage of the new emperor, Charles V, who was to be crowned at Aachen. Dürer journeyed with his wife and her maid via the Rhine to Cologne and then to Antwerp, where he was well received and produced numerous drawings in silverpoint, chalk and charcoal. In addition to attending the coronation, he visited Cologne (where he admired the painting of Stefan Lochner), Nijmegen, 's-Hertogenbosch, Bruges (where he saw Michelangelo's Madonna of Bruges), Ghent (where he admired van Eyck's Ghent altarpiece), and Zeeland.
Dürer took a large stock of prints with him and wrote in his diary to whom he gave, exchanged or sold them, and for how much. This provides rare information of the monetary value placed on prints at this time. Unlike paintings, their sale was very rarely documented. While providing valuable documentary evidence, Dürer's Netherlandish diary also reveals that the trip was not a profitable one. For example, Dürer offered his last portrait of Maximilian to his daughter, Margaret of Austria, but eventually traded the picture for some white cloth after Margaret disliked the portrait and declined to accept it. During this trip he also met Bernard van Orley, Jan Provoost, Gerard Horenbout, Jean Mone, Joachim Patinir and Tommaso Vincidor, though he did not, it seems, meet Quentin Matsys.
Having secured his pension, Dürer returned home in July 1521, having caught an undetermined illness, which afflicted him for the rest of his life, and greatly reduced his rate of work.
Final years, Nuremberg (1521–1528)
On his return to Nuremberg, Dürer worked on a number of grand projects with religious themes, including a crucifixion scene and a Sacra conversazione, though neither was completed. This may have been due in part to his declining health, but perhaps also because of the time he gave to the preparation of his theoretical works on geometry and perspective, the proportions of men and horses, and fortification.
However, one consequence of this shift in emphasis was that during the last years of his life, Dürer produced comparatively little as an artist. In painting, there was only a portrait of Hieronymus Holtzschuher, a Madonna and Child (1526), Salvator Mundi (1526), and two panels showing St. John with St. Peter in background and St. Paul with St. Mark in the background. This last great work, the Four Apostles, was given by Dürer to the City of Nuremberg—although he was given 100 guilders in return.
As for engravings, Dürer's work was restricted to portraits and illustrations for his treatise. The portraits include Cardinal-Elector Albert of Mainz; Frederick the Wise, elector of Saxony; the humanist scholar Willibald Pirckheimer; Philipp Melanchthon, and Erasmus of Rotterdam. For those of the Cardinal, Melanchthon, and Dürer's final major work, a drawn portrait of the Nuremberg patrician Ulrich Starck, Dürer depicted the sitters in profile.
Despite complaining of his lack of a formal classical education, Dürer was greatly interested in intellectual matters and learned much from his boyhood friend Willibald Pirckheimer, whom he no doubt consulted on the content of many of his images. He also derived great satisfaction from his friendships and correspondence with Erasmus and other scholars. Dürer succeeded in producing two books during his lifetime. "The Four Books on Measurement" were published at Nuremberg in 1525 and was the first book for adults on mathematics in German, as well as being cited later by Galileo and Kepler. The other, a work on city fortifications, was published in 1527. "The Four Books on Human Proportion" were published posthumously, shortly after his death in 1528.
Dürer died in Nuremberg at the age of 56, leaving an estate valued at 6,874 florins – a considerable sum. He is buried in the Johannisfriedhof cemetery. His large house (purchased in 1509 from the heirs of the astronomer Bernhard Walther), where his workshop was located and where his widow lived until her death in 1539, remains a prominent Nuremberg landmark.
Dürer and the Reformation
Dürer's writings suggest that he may have been sympathetic to Luther's ideas, though it is unclear if he ever left the Catholic Church. Dürer wrote of his desire to draw Luther in his diary in 1520: "And God help me that I may go to Dr. Martin Luther; thus I intend to make a portrait of him with great care and engrave him on a copper plate to create a lasting memorial of the Christian man who helped me overcome so many difficulties." In a letter to Nicholas Kratzer in 1524, Dürer wrote, "because of our Christian faith we have to stand in scorn and danger, for we are reviled and called heretics". Most tellingly, Pirckheimer wrote in a letter to Johann Tscherte in 1530: "I confess that in the beginning I believed in Luther, like our Albert of blessed memory ... but as anyone can see, the situation has become worse." Dürer may even have contributed to the Nuremberg City Council's mandating Lutheran sermons and services in March 1525. Notably, Dürer had contacts with various reformers, such as Zwingli, Andreas Karlstadt, Melanchthon, Erasmus and Cornelius Grapheus from whom Dürer received Luther's Babylonian Captivity in 1520. Yet Erasmus and C. Grapheus are better said to be Catholic change agents. Also, from 1525, "the year that saw the peak and collapse of the Peasants' War, the artist can be seen to distance himself somewhat from the [Lutheran] movement..."
Dürer's later works have also been claimed to show Protestant sympathies. His 1523 The Last Supper woodcut has often been understood to have an evangelical theme, focusing as it does on Christ espousing the Gospel, as well as the inclusion of the Eucharistic cup, an expression of Protestant utraquism, although this interpretation has been questioned. The delaying of the engraving of St Philip, completed in 1523 but not distributed until 1526, may have been due to Dürer's uneasiness with images of saints; even if Dürer was not an iconoclast, in his last years he evaluated and questioned the role of art in religion.
Legacy and influence
Dürer exerted a huge influence on the artists of succeeding generations, especially in printmaking, the medium through which his contemporaries mostly experienced his art, as his paintings were predominantly in private collections located in only a few cities. His success in spreading his reputation across Europe through prints was undoubtedly an inspiration for major artists such as Raphael, Titian, and Parmigianino, all of whom collaborated with printmakers to promote and distribute their work.
His engravings seem to have had an intimidating effect upon his German successors; the "Little Masters" who attempted few large engravings but continued Dürer's themes in small, rather cramped compositions. Lucas van Leyden was the only Northern European engraver to successfully continue to produce large engravings in the first third of the 16th century. The generation of Italian engravers who trained in the shadow of Dürer all either directly copied parts of his landscape backgrounds (Giulio Campagnola, Giovanni Battista Palumba, Benedetto Montagna and Cristofano Robetta), or whole prints (Marcantonio Raimondi and Agostino Veneziano). However, Dürer's influence became less dominant after 1515, when Marcantonio perfected his new engraving style, which in turn travelled over the Alps to also dominate Northern engraving.
In painting, Dürer had relatively little influence in Italy, where probably only his altarpiece in Venice was seen, and his German successors were less effective in blending German and Italian styles. His intense and self-dramatizing self-portraits have continued to have a strong influence up to the present, especially on painters in the 19th and 20th century who desired a more dramatic portrait style. Dürer has never fallen from critical favour, and there have been significant revivals of interest in his works in Germany in the Dürer Renaissance of about 1570 to 1630, in the early nineteenth century, and in German nationalism from 1870 to 1945.
The Lutheran Church commemorates Dürer annually on 6 April, along with Michelangelo, Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Burgkmair. The liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (United States) remembers him, Cranach and Matthias Grünewald on 5 August.
Theoretical works
In all his theoretical works, in order to communicate his theories in the German language rather than in Latin, Dürer used graphic expressions based on a vernacular, craftsmen's language. For example, "Schneckenlinie" ("snail-line") was his term for a spiral form. Thus, Dürer contributed to the expansion in German prose which Luther had begun with his translation of the Bible.
Four Books on Measurement
Dürer's work on geometry is called the Four Books on Measurement (Underweysung der Messung mit dem Zirckel und Richtscheyt or Instructions for Measuring with Compass and Ruler). The first book focuses on linear geometry. Dürer's geometric constructions include helices, conchoids and epicycloids. He also draws on Apollonius, and Johannes Werner's 'Libellus super viginti duobus elementis conicis' of 1522.
The second book moves onto two-dimensional geometry, i.e. the construction of regular polygons. Here Dürer favours the methods of Ptolemy over Euclid. The third book applies these principles of geometry to architecture, engineering and typography.
In architecture Dürer cites Vitruvius but elaborates his own classical designs and columns. In typography, Dürer depicts the geometric construction of the Latin alphabet, relying on Italian precedent. However, his
construction of the Gothic alphabet is based upon an entirely different modular system. The fourth book completes the progression of the first and second by moving to three-dimensional forms and the construction of polyhedra. Here Dürer discusses the five Platonic solids, as well as seven Archimedean semi-regular solids, as well as several of his own invention.
In all these, Dürer shows the objects as nets. Finally, Dürer discusses the Delian Problem and moves on to the 'construzione legittima', a method of depicting a cube in two dimensions through linear perspective. He is thought to be the first to describe a visualization technique used in modern computers, ray tracing. It was in Bologna that Dürer was taught (possibly by Luca Pacioli or Bramante) the principles of linear perspective, and evidently became familiar with the 'costruzione legittima' in a written description of these principles found only, at this time, in the unpublished treatise of Piero della Francesca. He was also familiar with the 'abbreviated construction' as described by Alberti and the geometrical construction of shadows, a technique of Leonardo da Vinci. Although Dürer made no innovations in these areas, he is notable as the first Northern European to treat matters of visual representation in a scientific way, and with understanding of Euclidean principles. In addition to these geometrical constructions, Dürer discusses in this last book of Underweysung der Messung an assortment of mechanisms for drawing in perspective from models and provides woodcut illustrations of these methods that are often reproduced in discussions of perspective.
Four Books on Human Proportion
Dürer's work on human proportions is called the Four Books on Human Proportion (Vier Bücher von Menschlicher Proportion) of 1528. The first book was mainly composed by 1512/13 and completed by 1523, showing five differently constructed types of both male and female figures, all parts of the body expressed in fractions of the total height. Dürer based these constructions on both Vitruvius and empirical observations of "two to three hundred living persons", in his own words. The second book includes eight further types, broken down not into fractions but an Albertian system, which Dürer probably learned from Francesco di Giorgio's 'De harmonica mundi totius' of 1525. In the third book, Dürer gives principles by which the proportions of the figures can be modified, including the mathematical simulation of convex and concave mirrors; here Dürer also deals with human physiognomy. The fourth book is devoted to the theory of movement.
Appended to the last book, however, is a self-contained essay on aesthetics, which Dürer worked on between 1512 and 1528, and it is here that we learn of his theories concerning 'ideal beauty'. Dürer rejected Alberti's concept of an objective beauty, proposing a relativist notion of beauty based on variety. Nonetheless, Dürer still believed that truth was hidden within nature, and that there were rules which ordered beauty, even though he found it difficult to define the criteria for such a code. In 1512/13 his three criteria were function ('Nutz'), naïve approval ('Wohlgefallen') and the happy medium ('Mittelmass'). However, unlike Alberti and Leonardo, Dürer was most troubled by understanding not just the abstract notions of beauty but also as to how an artist can create beautiful images. Between 1512 and the final draft in 1528, Dürer's belief developed from an understanding of human creativity as spontaneous or inspired to a concept of 'selective inward synthesis'. In other words, that an artist builds on a wealth of visual experiences in order to imagine beautiful things. Dürer's belief in the abilities of a single artist over inspiration prompted him to assert that "one man may sketch something with his pen on half a sheet of paper in one day, or may cut it into a tiny piece of wood with his little iron, and it turns out to be better and more artistic than another's work at which its author labours with the utmost diligence for a whole year".
Book on Fortification
In 1527, Dürer also published Various Lessons on the Fortification of Cities, Castles, and Localities (Etliche Underricht zu Befestigung der Stett, Schloss und Flecken). It was printed in Nuremberg, probably by Hieronymus Andreae and reprinted in 1603 by Johan Janssenn in Arnhem. In 1535 it was also translated into Latin as On Cities, Forts, and Castles, Designed and Strengthened by Several Manners: Presented for the Most Necessary Accommodation of War (De vrbibus, arcibus, castellisque condendis, ac muniendis rationes aliquot : praesenti bellorum necessitati accommodatissimae), published by Christian Wechel (Wecheli/Wechelus) in Paris.
The work is less proscriptively theoretical than his other works, and was soon overshadowed by the Italian theory of polygonal fortification (the trace italienne – see Bastion fort), though his designs seem to have had some influence in the eastern German lands and up into the Baltic States.
Fencing
Dürer created many sketches and woodcuts of soldiers and knights over the course of his life. His most significant martial works, however, were made in 1512 as part of his efforts to secure the patronage of Maximilian I. Using existing manuscripts from the Nuremberg Group as his reference, his workshop produced the extensive Οπλοδιδασκαλια sive Armorvm Tractandorvm Meditatio Alberti Dvreri ("Weapon Training, or Albrecht Dürer's Meditation on the Handling of Weapons", MS 26-232). Another manuscript based on the Nuremberg texts as well as one of Hans Talhoffer's works, the untitled Berlin Picture Book (Libr.Pict.A.83), is also thought to have originated in his workshop around this time. These sketches and watercolors show the same careful attention to detail and human proportion as Dürer's other work, and his illustrations of grappling, long sword, dagger, and messer are among the highest-quality in any fencing manual.
Gallery
List of works
List of paintings by Albrecht Dürer
List of engravings by Albrecht Dürer
List of woodcuts by Albrecht Dürer
References
Notes
Citations
Sources
Bartrum, Giulia. Albrecht Dürer and his Legacy. London: British Museum Press, 2002.
Brand Philip, Lotte; Anzelewsky, Fedja. "The Portrait Diptych of Dürer's parents". Simiolus: Netherlands Quarterly for the History of Art, Volume 10, No. 1, 1978–79. 5–18
Brion, Marcel. Dürer. London: Thames and Hudson, 1960
Harbison, Craig. "Dürer and the Reformation: The Problem of the Re-dating of the St. Philip Engraving". The Art Bulletin, Vol. 58, No. 3, 368–373. September 1976
Koerner, Joseph Leo. The Moment of Self-Portraiture in German Renaissance Art. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 1993.
Landau David; Parshall, Peter. The Renaissance Print. Yale, 1996.
Panofsky, Erwin. The Life and Art of Albrecht Dürer. NJ: Princeton, 1945.
Price, David Hotchkiss. Albrecht Dürer's Renaissance: Humanism, Reformation and the Art of Faith. Michigan, 2003. .
Strauss, Walter L. (ed.). The Complete Engravings, Etchings and Drypoints of Albrecht Durer. Mineola NY: Dover Publications, 1973.
Borchert, Till-Holger. Van Eyck to Dürer: The Influence of Early Netherlandish painting on European Art, 1430–1530. London: Thames & Hudson, 2011.
Wolf, Norbert. Albrecht Dürer. Taschen, 2010.
Hoffmann, Rainer. Im Paradies - Adam und Eva und der Sündenfall - Albrecht Dürers Darstellungen, Böhlau-Verlag, 2021, ISBN 9783412523852
Further reading
Campbell Hutchison, Jane. Albrecht Dürer: A Biography. Princeton University Press, 1990.
Demele, Christine. Dürers Nacktheit – Das Weimarer Selbstbildnis. Rhema Verlag, Münster 2012,
Dürer, Albrecht (translated by R.T. Nichol from the Latin text), Of the Just Shaping of Letters, Dover Publications.
Hart, Vaughan. 'Navel Gazing. On Albrecht Dürer's Adam and Eve (1504)', The International Journal of Arts Theory and History, 2016, vol.12.1 pp. 1–10 https://doi.org/10.18848/2326-9960/CGP/v12i01/1-10
Korolija Fontana-Giusti, Gordana. "The Unconscious and Space: Venice and the work of Albrecht Dürer", in Architecture and the Unconscious, eds. J. Hendrix and L.Holm, Farnham Surrey: Ashgate, 2016. pp. 27–44, .
Wilhelm, Kurth (ed.). The Complete Woodcuts of Albrecht Durer, Dover Publications, 2000.
External links
The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Dürer Prints Close-up. Made to accompany The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Albrecht Dürer: Vier Bücher von menschlicher Proportion (Nuremberg, 1528). Selected pages scanned from the original work. Historical Anatomies on the Web. US National Library of Medicine.
"Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528)". In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Albrecht Durer, Exhibition, Albertina, Vienna. 20 September 2019 – 6 January 2020
1471 births
1528 deaths
15th-century engravers
15th-century German painters
16th-century engravers
16th-century German painters
Animal artists
Artist authors
Artists from Nuremberg
Catholic decorative artists
Catholic draughtsmen
Catholic engravers
Catholic painters
German draughtsmen
German engravers
German Lutherans
German male painters
German people of Hungarian descent
German printmakers
German Renaissance painters
German Roman Catholics
Heraldic artists
Manuscript illuminators
Mathematical artists
People celebrated in the Lutheran liturgical calendar
Renaissance engravers
Woodcut designers | true | [
"This is a list of buildings with 100 floors or more above ground. Dubai, New York City and Chicago have three buildings with at least 100 floors. New York's Central Park Tower labels itself as having 136 stories, but in reality, it has 98. Therefore, it does not appear on this list.\n\nCompleted buildings \nThis list includes buildings whose construction is complete, or are topped-out.\n\nBuildings under construction \nThis is a list of buildings under construction that are planned to have 100 floors or more. It does not include proposed, approved and topped-out buildings.\n\nBuildings cancelled \nThe following list is of those buildings that were planned to have 100 floors or more, for which the project did start but is now officially cancelled.\n\nProposed buildings \nThe list includes buildings that were proposed or envisioned to have 100 floors or more, yet have advanced to the construction stage. It does not include never built, under construction buildings.\n\nDestroyed buildings \nThis list comprises the two buildings that used to have over 100 floors but are no longer in existence.\n\nTimeline \nThis is a timeline of the building with the most floors out of buildings with 100 floors or more.\n\nSee also \n List of tallest buildings in the world\n List of tallest buildings by height to roof\n Skyscraper design and construction\n\nReferences \n\n Structures\nLists of construction records",
"Salamah Ibn Dinar al-Madani (died c. 757 or 781), also known as Abu Hazim Al-A'raj, was a Persian Muslim ascetic, jurist and narrator of hadith from the taba'een generation who became an important figure for the early Sufis. He is often mentioned in works dealing with spirituality and the Islamic practice of zuhd, or rejection of material comforts to pursue personal contemplation and meditation.\n\nBiography\nIt is said that he narrated ahadith on the authority of a group of people which included Sahl ibn Sa'd al-Sā'idi, Abi 'Umāma ibn Sahl, Sa'id ibn al-Musayyab, Ibn 'Amrū, and others. He was also the father of Hammad ibn Salamah.\n\nLegacy\n\nQuotes\nMany of Salamah ibn Dinar's words of wisdom and advice for spiritual development have been recorded and contemplated by later generations of Muslims. For example, he is recorded as saying:\n\nEverything which does not bring you to Allah can only bring you to destruction.\n\n If you are satisfied from the life of this world (dunya) with what is sufficient for you, then the minimum is sufficient, But if you are not satisfied with what is sufficient, then nothing can satisfy you.\n\n The goods of the Hereafter are a dead stock now, you should buy as much as you can of them because on the day when they are saleable you can't have anything of them.\n\n Indeed, the servant does good that gladdens him when he does it, and nothing Allāh creates for him of ill is more harmful for him than that. And the servant does ill that ails him when he does it, and nothing Allāh creates for him of good is more beneficial for him than that. That is because the servant, when he does the good that gladdens him, has high expectations through it, and he sees that he has abundance beyond others apart from him; and it may be that Allāh will pull it down, and pull down many actions along with it. And indeed, the servant does an act of ill that ails him when he does it, and Allāh may bring about in him a dread and shame (wajal) until he meets Allāh most high, all the while the fear of it is in his awe, down in his very gut.\n\nSunni view\nAhmed, Abū Hātam, al-'Ajali and, al-Nisā'i regarded him as trustworthy. Ibn Khuzayma said: \"He (Salamah) was reliable and none in his time was like him.\" Ibn Sa'd said: \"While he (Salamah) was giving legal decisions in the Mosque of Medina, (the caliph) Sulayman ibn Abd al-Malik sent Ibn Shihab al-Zuhri to summon him, but he said to al-Zuhri: 'As he (Sulaymān) has a need with me, let him come to me. As for me, I have no need with him.'\"\n\nShi'a view\nShaykh al-Tūsi numbered him as one of the companions of the fourth Shia Imam, Zayn al-'Ābidin.\n\nNotes\n\nSufi religious leaders\nTabi‘un\n8th-century deaths\nYear of birth unknown\nMedieval Persian people\n8th-century Iranian people"
]
|
[
"Albrecht Dürer",
"Nuremberg and the masterworks (1507-1520)",
"What are some of his masterworks?",
"Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (",
"Does he have more?",
"Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin,"
]
| C_4a4a9362ff664bba86e8c74ead6078c0_0 | Are these well known? | 3 | Are Dürer's woodcut series well known? | Albrecht Dürer | Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Durer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini and--mainly through Lorenzo di Credi--Leonardo da Vinci. Between 1507 and 1511 Durer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Durer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted. Other works from this period include the thirty-seven woodcut subjects of the Little Passion, published first in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Indeed, complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. However, in 1513 and 1514 Durer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death, and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's treatise Enchiridion militis Christiani), St. Jerome in his Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Durer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Willibald Prickheimer. These drafts were later used to design the famous chandeliers lusterweibchen. In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. CANNOTANSWER | Between 1507 and 1511 Durer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: | Albrecht Dürer (; ; ; 21 May 1471 – 6 April 1528), sometimes spelled in English as Durer (without an umlaut) or Duerer, was a German painter, printmaker, and theorist of the German Renaissance. Born in Nuremberg, Dürer established his reputation and influence across Europe in his twenties due to his high-quality woodcut prints. He was in contact with the major Italian artists of his time, including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini, and Leonardo da Vinci, and from 1512 was patronized by Emperor Maximilian I.
Dürer's vast body of work includes engravings, his preferred technique in his later prints, altarpieces, portraits and self-portraits, watercolours and books. The woodcuts series are more Gothic than the rest of his work. His well-known engravings include the three Meisterstiche (master prints) Knight, Death and the Devil (1513), Saint Jerome in his Study (1514), and Melencolia I (1514). His watercolours mark him as one of the first European landscape artists, while his woodcuts revolutionised the potential of that medium.
Dürer's introduction of classical motifs into Northern art, through his knowledge of Italian artists and German humanists, has secured his reputation as one of the most important figures of the Northern Renaissance. This is reinforced by his theoretical treatises, which involve principles of mathematics, perspective, and ideal proportions.
Biography
Early life (1471–1490)
Dürer was born on 21 May 1471, the third child and second son of Albrecht Dürer the Elder and Barbara Holper, who married in 1467 and had eighteen children together. Albrecht Dürer the Elder (originally Albrecht Ajtósi), was a successful goldsmith who by 1455 had moved to Nuremberg from Ajtós, near Gyula in Hungary. He married Holper, his master's daughter, when he himself qualified as a master. One of Albrecht's brothers, Hans Dürer, was also a painter and trained under him. Another of Albrecht's brothers, Endres Dürer, took over their father's business and was a master goldsmith. The German name "Dürer" is a translation from the Hungarian, "Ajtósi". Initially, it was "Türer", meaning doormaker, which is "ajtós" in Hungarian (from "ajtó", meaning door). A door is featured in the coat-of-arms the family acquired. Albrecht Dürer the Younger later changed "Türer", his father's diction of the family's surname, to "Dürer", to adapt to the local Nuremberg dialect.
Dürer's godfather Anton Koberger left goldsmithing to become a printer and publisher in the year of Dürer's birth. He became the most successful publisher in Germany, eventually owning twenty-four printing-presses and a number of offices in Germany and abroad. Koberger's most famous publication was the Nuremberg Chronicle, published in 1493 in German and Latin editions. It contained an unprecedented 1,809 woodcut illustrations (albeit with many repeated uses of the same block) by the Wolgemut workshop. Dürer may have worked on some of these, as the work on the project began while he was with Wolgemut.
Because Dürer left autobiographical writings and was widely known by his mid-twenties, his life is well documented in several sources. After a few years of school, Dürer learned the basics of goldsmithing and drawing from his father. Though his father wanted him to continue his training as a goldsmith, he showed such a precocious talent in drawing that he started as an apprentice to Michael Wolgemut at the age of fifteen in 1486. A self-portrait, a drawing in silverpoint, is dated 1484 (Albertina, Vienna) "when I was a child", as his later inscription says. The drawing is one of the earliest surviving children's drawings of any kind, and, as Dürer's Opus One, has helped define his oeuvre as deriving from, and always linked to, himself. Wolgemut was the leading artist in Nuremberg at the time, with a large workshop producing a variety of works of art, in particular woodcuts for books. Nuremberg was then an important and prosperous city, a centre for publishing and many luxury trades. It had strong links with Italy, especially Venice, a relatively short distance across the Alps.
Wanderjahre and marriage (1490–1494)
After completing his apprenticeship, Dürer followed the common German custom of taking Wanderjahre—in effect gap years—in which the apprentice learned skills from artists in other areas; Dürer was to spend about four years away. He left in 1490, possibly to work under Martin Schongauer, the leading engraver of Northern Europe, but who died shortly before Dürer's arrival at Colmar in 1492. It is unclear where Dürer travelled in the intervening period, though it is likely that he went to Frankfurt and the Netherlands. In Colmar, Dürer was welcomed by Schongauer's brothers, the goldsmiths Caspar and Paul and the painter Ludwig. In 1493 Dürer went to Strasbourg, where he would have experienced the sculpture of Nikolaus Gerhaert. Dürer's first painted self-portrait (now in the Louvre) was painted at this time, probably to be sent back to his fiancée in Nuremberg.
In early 1492 Dürer travelled to Basel to stay with another brother of Martin Schongauer, the goldsmith Georg. Very soon after his return to Nuremberg, on 7 July 1494, at the age of 23, Dürer was married to Agnes Frey following an arrangement made during his absence. Agnes was the daughter of a prominent brass worker (and amateur harpist) in the city. However, no children resulted from the marriage, and with Albrecht the Dürer name died out. The marriage between Agnes and Albrecht was not a generally happy one, as indicated by the letters of Dürer in which he quipped to Willibald Pirckheimer in an extremely rough tone about his wife. He called her an "old crow" and made other vulgar remarks. Pirckheimer also made no secret of his antipathy towards Agnes, describing her as a miserly shrew with a bitter tongue, who helped cause Dürer's death at a young age. One author speculates that Albrecht was bisexual, if not homosexual, due to several of his works containing themes of homosexual desire, as well as the intimate nature of his correspondence with certain very close male friends.
First journey to Italy (1494–1495)
Within three months of his marriage, Dürer left for Italy, alone, perhaps stimulated by an outbreak of plague in Nuremberg. He made watercolour sketches as he traveled over the Alps. Some have survived and others may be deduced from accurate landscapes of real places in his later work, for example his engraving Nemesis.
In Italy, he went to Venice to study its more advanced artistic world. Through Wolgemut's tutelage, Dürer had learned how to make prints in drypoint and design woodcuts in the German style, based on the works of Schongauer and the Housebook Master. He also would have had access to some Italian works in Germany, but the two visits he made to Italy had an enormous influence on him. He wrote that Giovanni Bellini was the oldest and still the best of the artists in Venice. His drawings and engravings show the influence of others, notably Antonio Pollaiuolo, with his interest in the proportions of the body; Lorenzo di Credi; and Andrea Mantegna, whose work he produced copies of while training. Dürer probably also visited Padua and Mantua on this trip.
Return to Nuremberg (1495–1505)
On his return to Nuremberg in 1495, Dürer opened his own workshop (being married was a requirement for this). Over the next five years, his style increasingly integrated Italian influences into underlying Northern forms. Arguably his best works in the first years of the workshop were his woodcut prints, mostly religious, but including secular scenes such as The Men's Bath House (ca. 1496). These were larger and more finely cut than the great majority of German woodcuts hitherto, and far more complex and balanced in composition.
It is now thought unlikely that Dürer cut any of the woodblocks himself; this task would have been performed by a specialist craftsman. However, his training in Wolgemut's studio, which made many carved and painted altarpieces and both designed and cut woodblocks for woodcut, evidently gave him great understanding of what the technique could be made to produce, and how to work with block cutters. Dürer either drew his design directly onto the woodblock itself, or glued a paper drawing to the block. Either way, his drawings were destroyed during the cutting of the block.
His series of sixteen designs for the Apocalypse is dated 1498, as is his engraving of St. Michael Fighting the Dragon. He made the first seven scenes of the Great Passion in the same year, and a little later, a series of eleven on the Holy Family and saints. The Seven Sorrows Polyptych, commissioned by Frederick III of Saxony in 1496, was executed by Dürer and his assistants c. 1500. In 1502, Dürer's father died. Around 1503–1505 Dürer produced the first 17 of a set illustrating the Life of the Virgin, which he did not finish for some years. Neither these nor the Great Passion were published as sets until several years later, but prints were sold individually in considerable numbers.
During the same period Dürer trained himself in the difficult art of using the burin to make engravings. It is possible he had begun learning this skill during his early training with his father, as it was also an essential skill of the goldsmith. In 1496 he executed the Prodigal Son, which the Italian Renaissance art historian Giorgio Vasari singled out for praise some decades later, noting its Germanic quality. He was soon producing some spectacular and original images, notably Nemesis (1502), The Sea Monster (1498), and Saint Eustace (c. 1501), with a highly detailed landscape background and animals. His landscapes of this period, such as Pond in the Woods and Willow Mill, are quite different from his earlier watercolours. There is a much greater emphasis on capturing atmosphere, rather than depicting topography. He made a number of Madonnas, single religious figures, and small scenes with comic peasant figures. Prints are highly portable and these works made Dürer famous throughout the main artistic centres of Europe within a very few years.
The Venetian artist Jacopo de' Barbari, whom Dürer had met in Venice, visited Nuremberg in 1500, and Dürer said that he learned much about the new developments in perspective, anatomy, and proportion from him. De' Barbari was unwilling to explain everything he knew, so Dürer began his own studies, which would become a lifelong preoccupation. A series of extant drawings show Dürer's experiments in human proportion, leading to the famous engraving of Adam and Eve (1504), which shows his subtlety while using the burin in the texturing of flesh surfaces. This is the only existing engraving signed with his full name.
Dürer created large numbers of preparatory drawings, especially for his paintings and engravings, and many survive, most famously the Betende Hände (Praying Hands) from circa 1508, a study for an apostle in the Heller altarpiece. He continued to make images in watercolour and bodycolour (usually combined), including a number of still lifes of meadow sections or animals, including his Young Hare (1502) and the Great Piece of Turf (1503).
Second journey to Italy (1505–1507)
In Italy, he returned to painting, at first producing a series of works executed in tempera on linen. These include portraits and altarpieces, notably, the Paumgartner altarpiece and the Adoration of the Magi. In early 1506, he returned to Venice and stayed there until the spring of 1507. By this time Dürer's engravings had attained great popularity and were being copied. In Venice he was given a valuable commission from the emigrant German community for the church of San Bartolomeo. This was the altar-piece known as the Adoration of the Virgin or the Feast of Rose Garlands. It includes portraits of members of Venice's German community, but shows a strong Italian influence. It was later acquired by the Emperor Rudolf II and taken to Prague.
Nuremberg and the masterworks (1507–1520)
Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Dürer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael.
Between 1507 and 1511 Dürer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Dürer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted.
Other works from this period include the thirty-seven Little Passion woodcuts, first published in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. In 1513 and 1514 Dürer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's Handbook of a Christian Knight), St. Jerome in His Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514, the year Dürer's mother died). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Dürer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Pirckheimer. These drafts were later used to design Lusterweibchen chandeliers, combining an antler with a wooden sculpture.
In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. His only experiments with etching came in this period, producing five between 1515–1516 and a sixth in 1518; a technique he may have abandoned as unsuited to his aesthetic of methodical, classical form.
Patronage of Maximilian I
From 1512, Maximilian I became Dürer's major patron. He commissioned The Triumphal Arch, a vast work printed from 192 separate blocks, the symbolism of which is partly informed by Pirckheimer's translation of Horapollo's Hieroglyphica. The design program and explanations were devised by Johannes Stabius, the architectural design by the master builder and court-painter Jörg Kölderer and the woodcutting itself by Hieronymous Andreae, with Dürer as designer-in-chief. The Arch was followed by The Triumphal Procession, the program of which was worked out in 1512 by Marx Treitz-Saurwein and includes woodcuts by Albrecht Altdorfer and Hans Springinklee, as well as Dürer.
Dürer worked with pen on the marginal images for an edition of the Emperor's printed Prayer-Book; these were quite unknown until facsimiles were published in 1808 as part of the first book published in lithography. Dürer's work on the book was halted for an unknown reason, and the decoration was continued by artists including Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Baldung. Dürer also made several portraits of the Emperor, including one shortly before Maximilian's death in 1519.
Maximilian was a very cash-strapped prince who sometimes failed to pay, yet turned out to be Dürer's most important patron. In his court, artists and learned men were respected, which was not common at that time (later, Dürer commented that in Germany, as a non-noble, he was treated a parasite). Pirckheimer (who he met in 1495, before entering the service of Maximilian) was also an important personage in the court and great cultural patron, who had a strong influence on Dürer as his tutor in classical knowledge and humanistic critical methodology, as well as collaborator.
In Maximilian's court, Dürer also collaborated with a great number of other brilliant artists and scholars of the time who became his friends, like Johannes Stabius, Konrad Peutinger, Conrad Celtes, and Hans Tscherte (an imperial architect).
Dürer manifested a strong pride in his ability, as a prince of his profession. One day, the emperor, trying to show Dürer an idea, tried to sketch with the charcoal himself, but always broke it. Dürer took the charcoal from Maximilian's hand, finished the drawing and told him: "This is my scepter."
In another occasion, Maximilian noticed that the ladder Dürer used was too short and unstable, thus told a noble to hold it for him. The noble refused, saying that it was beneath him to serve a non-noble. Maximilian then came to hold the ladder himself, and told the noble that he could make a noble out of a peasant any day, but he could not make an artist like Dürer out of a noble.
Cartographic and astronomical works
Dürer's exploration of space led to a relationship and cooperation with the court astronomer Johannes Stabius. Stabius also often acted as Dürer's and Maximilian's go-between for their financial problems.
In 1515 Dürer and Stabius created the first world map projected on a solid geometric sphere. Also in 1515, Stabius, Dürer and the astronomer Konrad Heinfogel produced the first planispheres of both southern and northerns hemispheres, as well as the first printed celestial maps, which prompted the revival of interest in the field of uranometry throughout Europe.
Journey to the Netherlands (1520–1521)
Maximilian's death came at a time when Dürer was concerned he was losing "my sight and freedom of hand" (perhaps caused by arthritis) and increasingly affected by the writings of Martin Luther. In July 1520 Dürer made his fourth and last major journey, to renew the Imperial pension Maximilian had given him and to secure the patronage of the new emperor, Charles V, who was to be crowned at Aachen. Dürer journeyed with his wife and her maid via the Rhine to Cologne and then to Antwerp, where he was well received and produced numerous drawings in silverpoint, chalk and charcoal. In addition to attending the coronation, he visited Cologne (where he admired the painting of Stefan Lochner), Nijmegen, 's-Hertogenbosch, Bruges (where he saw Michelangelo's Madonna of Bruges), Ghent (where he admired van Eyck's Ghent altarpiece), and Zeeland.
Dürer took a large stock of prints with him and wrote in his diary to whom he gave, exchanged or sold them, and for how much. This provides rare information of the monetary value placed on prints at this time. Unlike paintings, their sale was very rarely documented. While providing valuable documentary evidence, Dürer's Netherlandish diary also reveals that the trip was not a profitable one. For example, Dürer offered his last portrait of Maximilian to his daughter, Margaret of Austria, but eventually traded the picture for some white cloth after Margaret disliked the portrait and declined to accept it. During this trip he also met Bernard van Orley, Jan Provoost, Gerard Horenbout, Jean Mone, Joachim Patinir and Tommaso Vincidor, though he did not, it seems, meet Quentin Matsys.
Having secured his pension, Dürer returned home in July 1521, having caught an undetermined illness, which afflicted him for the rest of his life, and greatly reduced his rate of work.
Final years, Nuremberg (1521–1528)
On his return to Nuremberg, Dürer worked on a number of grand projects with religious themes, including a crucifixion scene and a Sacra conversazione, though neither was completed. This may have been due in part to his declining health, but perhaps also because of the time he gave to the preparation of his theoretical works on geometry and perspective, the proportions of men and horses, and fortification.
However, one consequence of this shift in emphasis was that during the last years of his life, Dürer produced comparatively little as an artist. In painting, there was only a portrait of Hieronymus Holtzschuher, a Madonna and Child (1526), Salvator Mundi (1526), and two panels showing St. John with St. Peter in background and St. Paul with St. Mark in the background. This last great work, the Four Apostles, was given by Dürer to the City of Nuremberg—although he was given 100 guilders in return.
As for engravings, Dürer's work was restricted to portraits and illustrations for his treatise. The portraits include Cardinal-Elector Albert of Mainz; Frederick the Wise, elector of Saxony; the humanist scholar Willibald Pirckheimer; Philipp Melanchthon, and Erasmus of Rotterdam. For those of the Cardinal, Melanchthon, and Dürer's final major work, a drawn portrait of the Nuremberg patrician Ulrich Starck, Dürer depicted the sitters in profile.
Despite complaining of his lack of a formal classical education, Dürer was greatly interested in intellectual matters and learned much from his boyhood friend Willibald Pirckheimer, whom he no doubt consulted on the content of many of his images. He also derived great satisfaction from his friendships and correspondence with Erasmus and other scholars. Dürer succeeded in producing two books during his lifetime. "The Four Books on Measurement" were published at Nuremberg in 1525 and was the first book for adults on mathematics in German, as well as being cited later by Galileo and Kepler. The other, a work on city fortifications, was published in 1527. "The Four Books on Human Proportion" were published posthumously, shortly after his death in 1528.
Dürer died in Nuremberg at the age of 56, leaving an estate valued at 6,874 florins – a considerable sum. He is buried in the Johannisfriedhof cemetery. His large house (purchased in 1509 from the heirs of the astronomer Bernhard Walther), where his workshop was located and where his widow lived until her death in 1539, remains a prominent Nuremberg landmark.
Dürer and the Reformation
Dürer's writings suggest that he may have been sympathetic to Luther's ideas, though it is unclear if he ever left the Catholic Church. Dürer wrote of his desire to draw Luther in his diary in 1520: "And God help me that I may go to Dr. Martin Luther; thus I intend to make a portrait of him with great care and engrave him on a copper plate to create a lasting memorial of the Christian man who helped me overcome so many difficulties." In a letter to Nicholas Kratzer in 1524, Dürer wrote, "because of our Christian faith we have to stand in scorn and danger, for we are reviled and called heretics". Most tellingly, Pirckheimer wrote in a letter to Johann Tscherte in 1530: "I confess that in the beginning I believed in Luther, like our Albert of blessed memory ... but as anyone can see, the situation has become worse." Dürer may even have contributed to the Nuremberg City Council's mandating Lutheran sermons and services in March 1525. Notably, Dürer had contacts with various reformers, such as Zwingli, Andreas Karlstadt, Melanchthon, Erasmus and Cornelius Grapheus from whom Dürer received Luther's Babylonian Captivity in 1520. Yet Erasmus and C. Grapheus are better said to be Catholic change agents. Also, from 1525, "the year that saw the peak and collapse of the Peasants' War, the artist can be seen to distance himself somewhat from the [Lutheran] movement..."
Dürer's later works have also been claimed to show Protestant sympathies. His 1523 The Last Supper woodcut has often been understood to have an evangelical theme, focusing as it does on Christ espousing the Gospel, as well as the inclusion of the Eucharistic cup, an expression of Protestant utraquism, although this interpretation has been questioned. The delaying of the engraving of St Philip, completed in 1523 but not distributed until 1526, may have been due to Dürer's uneasiness with images of saints; even if Dürer was not an iconoclast, in his last years he evaluated and questioned the role of art in religion.
Legacy and influence
Dürer exerted a huge influence on the artists of succeeding generations, especially in printmaking, the medium through which his contemporaries mostly experienced his art, as his paintings were predominantly in private collections located in only a few cities. His success in spreading his reputation across Europe through prints was undoubtedly an inspiration for major artists such as Raphael, Titian, and Parmigianino, all of whom collaborated with printmakers to promote and distribute their work.
His engravings seem to have had an intimidating effect upon his German successors; the "Little Masters" who attempted few large engravings but continued Dürer's themes in small, rather cramped compositions. Lucas van Leyden was the only Northern European engraver to successfully continue to produce large engravings in the first third of the 16th century. The generation of Italian engravers who trained in the shadow of Dürer all either directly copied parts of his landscape backgrounds (Giulio Campagnola, Giovanni Battista Palumba, Benedetto Montagna and Cristofano Robetta), or whole prints (Marcantonio Raimondi and Agostino Veneziano). However, Dürer's influence became less dominant after 1515, when Marcantonio perfected his new engraving style, which in turn travelled over the Alps to also dominate Northern engraving.
In painting, Dürer had relatively little influence in Italy, where probably only his altarpiece in Venice was seen, and his German successors were less effective in blending German and Italian styles. His intense and self-dramatizing self-portraits have continued to have a strong influence up to the present, especially on painters in the 19th and 20th century who desired a more dramatic portrait style. Dürer has never fallen from critical favour, and there have been significant revivals of interest in his works in Germany in the Dürer Renaissance of about 1570 to 1630, in the early nineteenth century, and in German nationalism from 1870 to 1945.
The Lutheran Church commemorates Dürer annually on 6 April, along with Michelangelo, Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Burgkmair. The liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (United States) remembers him, Cranach and Matthias Grünewald on 5 August.
Theoretical works
In all his theoretical works, in order to communicate his theories in the German language rather than in Latin, Dürer used graphic expressions based on a vernacular, craftsmen's language. For example, "Schneckenlinie" ("snail-line") was his term for a spiral form. Thus, Dürer contributed to the expansion in German prose which Luther had begun with his translation of the Bible.
Four Books on Measurement
Dürer's work on geometry is called the Four Books on Measurement (Underweysung der Messung mit dem Zirckel und Richtscheyt or Instructions for Measuring with Compass and Ruler). The first book focuses on linear geometry. Dürer's geometric constructions include helices, conchoids and epicycloids. He also draws on Apollonius, and Johannes Werner's 'Libellus super viginti duobus elementis conicis' of 1522.
The second book moves onto two-dimensional geometry, i.e. the construction of regular polygons. Here Dürer favours the methods of Ptolemy over Euclid. The third book applies these principles of geometry to architecture, engineering and typography.
In architecture Dürer cites Vitruvius but elaborates his own classical designs and columns. In typography, Dürer depicts the geometric construction of the Latin alphabet, relying on Italian precedent. However, his
construction of the Gothic alphabet is based upon an entirely different modular system. The fourth book completes the progression of the first and second by moving to three-dimensional forms and the construction of polyhedra. Here Dürer discusses the five Platonic solids, as well as seven Archimedean semi-regular solids, as well as several of his own invention.
In all these, Dürer shows the objects as nets. Finally, Dürer discusses the Delian Problem and moves on to the 'construzione legittima', a method of depicting a cube in two dimensions through linear perspective. He is thought to be the first to describe a visualization technique used in modern computers, ray tracing. It was in Bologna that Dürer was taught (possibly by Luca Pacioli or Bramante) the principles of linear perspective, and evidently became familiar with the 'costruzione legittima' in a written description of these principles found only, at this time, in the unpublished treatise of Piero della Francesca. He was also familiar with the 'abbreviated construction' as described by Alberti and the geometrical construction of shadows, a technique of Leonardo da Vinci. Although Dürer made no innovations in these areas, he is notable as the first Northern European to treat matters of visual representation in a scientific way, and with understanding of Euclidean principles. In addition to these geometrical constructions, Dürer discusses in this last book of Underweysung der Messung an assortment of mechanisms for drawing in perspective from models and provides woodcut illustrations of these methods that are often reproduced in discussions of perspective.
Four Books on Human Proportion
Dürer's work on human proportions is called the Four Books on Human Proportion (Vier Bücher von Menschlicher Proportion) of 1528. The first book was mainly composed by 1512/13 and completed by 1523, showing five differently constructed types of both male and female figures, all parts of the body expressed in fractions of the total height. Dürer based these constructions on both Vitruvius and empirical observations of "two to three hundred living persons", in his own words. The second book includes eight further types, broken down not into fractions but an Albertian system, which Dürer probably learned from Francesco di Giorgio's 'De harmonica mundi totius' of 1525. In the third book, Dürer gives principles by which the proportions of the figures can be modified, including the mathematical simulation of convex and concave mirrors; here Dürer also deals with human physiognomy. The fourth book is devoted to the theory of movement.
Appended to the last book, however, is a self-contained essay on aesthetics, which Dürer worked on between 1512 and 1528, and it is here that we learn of his theories concerning 'ideal beauty'. Dürer rejected Alberti's concept of an objective beauty, proposing a relativist notion of beauty based on variety. Nonetheless, Dürer still believed that truth was hidden within nature, and that there were rules which ordered beauty, even though he found it difficult to define the criteria for such a code. In 1512/13 his three criteria were function ('Nutz'), naïve approval ('Wohlgefallen') and the happy medium ('Mittelmass'). However, unlike Alberti and Leonardo, Dürer was most troubled by understanding not just the abstract notions of beauty but also as to how an artist can create beautiful images. Between 1512 and the final draft in 1528, Dürer's belief developed from an understanding of human creativity as spontaneous or inspired to a concept of 'selective inward synthesis'. In other words, that an artist builds on a wealth of visual experiences in order to imagine beautiful things. Dürer's belief in the abilities of a single artist over inspiration prompted him to assert that "one man may sketch something with his pen on half a sheet of paper in one day, or may cut it into a tiny piece of wood with his little iron, and it turns out to be better and more artistic than another's work at which its author labours with the utmost diligence for a whole year".
Book on Fortification
In 1527, Dürer also published Various Lessons on the Fortification of Cities, Castles, and Localities (Etliche Underricht zu Befestigung der Stett, Schloss und Flecken). It was printed in Nuremberg, probably by Hieronymus Andreae and reprinted in 1603 by Johan Janssenn in Arnhem. In 1535 it was also translated into Latin as On Cities, Forts, and Castles, Designed and Strengthened by Several Manners: Presented for the Most Necessary Accommodation of War (De vrbibus, arcibus, castellisque condendis, ac muniendis rationes aliquot : praesenti bellorum necessitati accommodatissimae), published by Christian Wechel (Wecheli/Wechelus) in Paris.
The work is less proscriptively theoretical than his other works, and was soon overshadowed by the Italian theory of polygonal fortification (the trace italienne – see Bastion fort), though his designs seem to have had some influence in the eastern German lands and up into the Baltic States.
Fencing
Dürer created many sketches and woodcuts of soldiers and knights over the course of his life. His most significant martial works, however, were made in 1512 as part of his efforts to secure the patronage of Maximilian I. Using existing manuscripts from the Nuremberg Group as his reference, his workshop produced the extensive Οπλοδιδασκαλια sive Armorvm Tractandorvm Meditatio Alberti Dvreri ("Weapon Training, or Albrecht Dürer's Meditation on the Handling of Weapons", MS 26-232). Another manuscript based on the Nuremberg texts as well as one of Hans Talhoffer's works, the untitled Berlin Picture Book (Libr.Pict.A.83), is also thought to have originated in his workshop around this time. These sketches and watercolors show the same careful attention to detail and human proportion as Dürer's other work, and his illustrations of grappling, long sword, dagger, and messer are among the highest-quality in any fencing manual.
Gallery
List of works
List of paintings by Albrecht Dürer
List of engravings by Albrecht Dürer
List of woodcuts by Albrecht Dürer
References
Notes
Citations
Sources
Bartrum, Giulia. Albrecht Dürer and his Legacy. London: British Museum Press, 2002.
Brand Philip, Lotte; Anzelewsky, Fedja. "The Portrait Diptych of Dürer's parents". Simiolus: Netherlands Quarterly for the History of Art, Volume 10, No. 1, 1978–79. 5–18
Brion, Marcel. Dürer. London: Thames and Hudson, 1960
Harbison, Craig. "Dürer and the Reformation: The Problem of the Re-dating of the St. Philip Engraving". The Art Bulletin, Vol. 58, No. 3, 368–373. September 1976
Koerner, Joseph Leo. The Moment of Self-Portraiture in German Renaissance Art. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 1993.
Landau David; Parshall, Peter. The Renaissance Print. Yale, 1996.
Panofsky, Erwin. The Life and Art of Albrecht Dürer. NJ: Princeton, 1945.
Price, David Hotchkiss. Albrecht Dürer's Renaissance: Humanism, Reformation and the Art of Faith. Michigan, 2003. .
Strauss, Walter L. (ed.). The Complete Engravings, Etchings and Drypoints of Albrecht Durer. Mineola NY: Dover Publications, 1973.
Borchert, Till-Holger. Van Eyck to Dürer: The Influence of Early Netherlandish painting on European Art, 1430–1530. London: Thames & Hudson, 2011.
Wolf, Norbert. Albrecht Dürer. Taschen, 2010.
Hoffmann, Rainer. Im Paradies - Adam und Eva und der Sündenfall - Albrecht Dürers Darstellungen, Böhlau-Verlag, 2021, ISBN 9783412523852
Further reading
Campbell Hutchison, Jane. Albrecht Dürer: A Biography. Princeton University Press, 1990.
Demele, Christine. Dürers Nacktheit – Das Weimarer Selbstbildnis. Rhema Verlag, Münster 2012,
Dürer, Albrecht (translated by R.T. Nichol from the Latin text), Of the Just Shaping of Letters, Dover Publications.
Hart, Vaughan. 'Navel Gazing. On Albrecht Dürer's Adam and Eve (1504)', The International Journal of Arts Theory and History, 2016, vol.12.1 pp. 1–10 https://doi.org/10.18848/2326-9960/CGP/v12i01/1-10
Korolija Fontana-Giusti, Gordana. "The Unconscious and Space: Venice and the work of Albrecht Dürer", in Architecture and the Unconscious, eds. J. Hendrix and L.Holm, Farnham Surrey: Ashgate, 2016. pp. 27–44, .
Wilhelm, Kurth (ed.). The Complete Woodcuts of Albrecht Durer, Dover Publications, 2000.
External links
The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Dürer Prints Close-up. Made to accompany The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Albrecht Dürer: Vier Bücher von menschlicher Proportion (Nuremberg, 1528). Selected pages scanned from the original work. Historical Anatomies on the Web. US National Library of Medicine.
"Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528)". In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Albrecht Durer, Exhibition, Albertina, Vienna. 20 September 2019 – 6 January 2020
1471 births
1528 deaths
15th-century engravers
15th-century German painters
16th-century engravers
16th-century German painters
Animal artists
Artist authors
Artists from Nuremberg
Catholic decorative artists
Catholic draughtsmen
Catholic engravers
Catholic painters
German draughtsmen
German engravers
German Lutherans
German male painters
German people of Hungarian descent
German printmakers
German Renaissance painters
German Roman Catholics
Heraldic artists
Manuscript illuminators
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People celebrated in the Lutheran liturgical calendar
Renaissance engravers
Woodcut designers | false | [
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"Macerated oils are vegetable oils to which other matter, such as herbs, has been added. Commercially available macerated oils include all these, and others. Herbalists and aromatherapists use not only these pure macerated oils, but blends of these oils, as well, and may macerate virtually any known herb. Base oils commonly used for maceration include almond oil, sunflower oil, and olive oil as well as other food-grade triglyceride vegetable oils, but other oils undoubtedly are used as well.\n\nReferences \n\nVegetable oils"
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"What are some of his masterworks?",
"Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (",
"Does he have more?",
"Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin,",
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| C_4a4a9362ff664bba86e8c74ead6078c0_0 | What is significant about Nuremberg? | 4 | What is significant about Nuremberg in regard to Dürer? | Albrecht Dürer | Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Durer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini and--mainly through Lorenzo di Credi--Leonardo da Vinci. Between 1507 and 1511 Durer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Durer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted. Other works from this period include the thirty-seven woodcut subjects of the Little Passion, published first in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Indeed, complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. However, in 1513 and 1514 Durer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death, and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's treatise Enchiridion militis Christiani), St. Jerome in his Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Durer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Willibald Prickheimer. These drafts were later used to design the famous chandeliers lusterweibchen. In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. CANNOTANSWER | Durer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. | Albrecht Dürer (; ; ; 21 May 1471 – 6 April 1528), sometimes spelled in English as Durer (without an umlaut) or Duerer, was a German painter, printmaker, and theorist of the German Renaissance. Born in Nuremberg, Dürer established his reputation and influence across Europe in his twenties due to his high-quality woodcut prints. He was in contact with the major Italian artists of his time, including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini, and Leonardo da Vinci, and from 1512 was patronized by Emperor Maximilian I.
Dürer's vast body of work includes engravings, his preferred technique in his later prints, altarpieces, portraits and self-portraits, watercolours and books. The woodcuts series are more Gothic than the rest of his work. His well-known engravings include the three Meisterstiche (master prints) Knight, Death and the Devil (1513), Saint Jerome in his Study (1514), and Melencolia I (1514). His watercolours mark him as one of the first European landscape artists, while his woodcuts revolutionised the potential of that medium.
Dürer's introduction of classical motifs into Northern art, through his knowledge of Italian artists and German humanists, has secured his reputation as one of the most important figures of the Northern Renaissance. This is reinforced by his theoretical treatises, which involve principles of mathematics, perspective, and ideal proportions.
Biography
Early life (1471–1490)
Dürer was born on 21 May 1471, the third child and second son of Albrecht Dürer the Elder and Barbara Holper, who married in 1467 and had eighteen children together. Albrecht Dürer the Elder (originally Albrecht Ajtósi), was a successful goldsmith who by 1455 had moved to Nuremberg from Ajtós, near Gyula in Hungary. He married Holper, his master's daughter, when he himself qualified as a master. One of Albrecht's brothers, Hans Dürer, was also a painter and trained under him. Another of Albrecht's brothers, Endres Dürer, took over their father's business and was a master goldsmith. The German name "Dürer" is a translation from the Hungarian, "Ajtósi". Initially, it was "Türer", meaning doormaker, which is "ajtós" in Hungarian (from "ajtó", meaning door). A door is featured in the coat-of-arms the family acquired. Albrecht Dürer the Younger later changed "Türer", his father's diction of the family's surname, to "Dürer", to adapt to the local Nuremberg dialect.
Dürer's godfather Anton Koberger left goldsmithing to become a printer and publisher in the year of Dürer's birth. He became the most successful publisher in Germany, eventually owning twenty-four printing-presses and a number of offices in Germany and abroad. Koberger's most famous publication was the Nuremberg Chronicle, published in 1493 in German and Latin editions. It contained an unprecedented 1,809 woodcut illustrations (albeit with many repeated uses of the same block) by the Wolgemut workshop. Dürer may have worked on some of these, as the work on the project began while he was with Wolgemut.
Because Dürer left autobiographical writings and was widely known by his mid-twenties, his life is well documented in several sources. After a few years of school, Dürer learned the basics of goldsmithing and drawing from his father. Though his father wanted him to continue his training as a goldsmith, he showed such a precocious talent in drawing that he started as an apprentice to Michael Wolgemut at the age of fifteen in 1486. A self-portrait, a drawing in silverpoint, is dated 1484 (Albertina, Vienna) "when I was a child", as his later inscription says. The drawing is one of the earliest surviving children's drawings of any kind, and, as Dürer's Opus One, has helped define his oeuvre as deriving from, and always linked to, himself. Wolgemut was the leading artist in Nuremberg at the time, with a large workshop producing a variety of works of art, in particular woodcuts for books. Nuremberg was then an important and prosperous city, a centre for publishing and many luxury trades. It had strong links with Italy, especially Venice, a relatively short distance across the Alps.
Wanderjahre and marriage (1490–1494)
After completing his apprenticeship, Dürer followed the common German custom of taking Wanderjahre—in effect gap years—in which the apprentice learned skills from artists in other areas; Dürer was to spend about four years away. He left in 1490, possibly to work under Martin Schongauer, the leading engraver of Northern Europe, but who died shortly before Dürer's arrival at Colmar in 1492. It is unclear where Dürer travelled in the intervening period, though it is likely that he went to Frankfurt and the Netherlands. In Colmar, Dürer was welcomed by Schongauer's brothers, the goldsmiths Caspar and Paul and the painter Ludwig. In 1493 Dürer went to Strasbourg, where he would have experienced the sculpture of Nikolaus Gerhaert. Dürer's first painted self-portrait (now in the Louvre) was painted at this time, probably to be sent back to his fiancée in Nuremberg.
In early 1492 Dürer travelled to Basel to stay with another brother of Martin Schongauer, the goldsmith Georg. Very soon after his return to Nuremberg, on 7 July 1494, at the age of 23, Dürer was married to Agnes Frey following an arrangement made during his absence. Agnes was the daughter of a prominent brass worker (and amateur harpist) in the city. However, no children resulted from the marriage, and with Albrecht the Dürer name died out. The marriage between Agnes and Albrecht was not a generally happy one, as indicated by the letters of Dürer in which he quipped to Willibald Pirckheimer in an extremely rough tone about his wife. He called her an "old crow" and made other vulgar remarks. Pirckheimer also made no secret of his antipathy towards Agnes, describing her as a miserly shrew with a bitter tongue, who helped cause Dürer's death at a young age. One author speculates that Albrecht was bisexual, if not homosexual, due to several of his works containing themes of homosexual desire, as well as the intimate nature of his correspondence with certain very close male friends.
First journey to Italy (1494–1495)
Within three months of his marriage, Dürer left for Italy, alone, perhaps stimulated by an outbreak of plague in Nuremberg. He made watercolour sketches as he traveled over the Alps. Some have survived and others may be deduced from accurate landscapes of real places in his later work, for example his engraving Nemesis.
In Italy, he went to Venice to study its more advanced artistic world. Through Wolgemut's tutelage, Dürer had learned how to make prints in drypoint and design woodcuts in the German style, based on the works of Schongauer and the Housebook Master. He also would have had access to some Italian works in Germany, but the two visits he made to Italy had an enormous influence on him. He wrote that Giovanni Bellini was the oldest and still the best of the artists in Venice. His drawings and engravings show the influence of others, notably Antonio Pollaiuolo, with his interest in the proportions of the body; Lorenzo di Credi; and Andrea Mantegna, whose work he produced copies of while training. Dürer probably also visited Padua and Mantua on this trip.
Return to Nuremberg (1495–1505)
On his return to Nuremberg in 1495, Dürer opened his own workshop (being married was a requirement for this). Over the next five years, his style increasingly integrated Italian influences into underlying Northern forms. Arguably his best works in the first years of the workshop were his woodcut prints, mostly religious, but including secular scenes such as The Men's Bath House (ca. 1496). These were larger and more finely cut than the great majority of German woodcuts hitherto, and far more complex and balanced in composition.
It is now thought unlikely that Dürer cut any of the woodblocks himself; this task would have been performed by a specialist craftsman. However, his training in Wolgemut's studio, which made many carved and painted altarpieces and both designed and cut woodblocks for woodcut, evidently gave him great understanding of what the technique could be made to produce, and how to work with block cutters. Dürer either drew his design directly onto the woodblock itself, or glued a paper drawing to the block. Either way, his drawings were destroyed during the cutting of the block.
His series of sixteen designs for the Apocalypse is dated 1498, as is his engraving of St. Michael Fighting the Dragon. He made the first seven scenes of the Great Passion in the same year, and a little later, a series of eleven on the Holy Family and saints. The Seven Sorrows Polyptych, commissioned by Frederick III of Saxony in 1496, was executed by Dürer and his assistants c. 1500. In 1502, Dürer's father died. Around 1503–1505 Dürer produced the first 17 of a set illustrating the Life of the Virgin, which he did not finish for some years. Neither these nor the Great Passion were published as sets until several years later, but prints were sold individually in considerable numbers.
During the same period Dürer trained himself in the difficult art of using the burin to make engravings. It is possible he had begun learning this skill during his early training with his father, as it was also an essential skill of the goldsmith. In 1496 he executed the Prodigal Son, which the Italian Renaissance art historian Giorgio Vasari singled out for praise some decades later, noting its Germanic quality. He was soon producing some spectacular and original images, notably Nemesis (1502), The Sea Monster (1498), and Saint Eustace (c. 1501), with a highly detailed landscape background and animals. His landscapes of this period, such as Pond in the Woods and Willow Mill, are quite different from his earlier watercolours. There is a much greater emphasis on capturing atmosphere, rather than depicting topography. He made a number of Madonnas, single religious figures, and small scenes with comic peasant figures. Prints are highly portable and these works made Dürer famous throughout the main artistic centres of Europe within a very few years.
The Venetian artist Jacopo de' Barbari, whom Dürer had met in Venice, visited Nuremberg in 1500, and Dürer said that he learned much about the new developments in perspective, anatomy, and proportion from him. De' Barbari was unwilling to explain everything he knew, so Dürer began his own studies, which would become a lifelong preoccupation. A series of extant drawings show Dürer's experiments in human proportion, leading to the famous engraving of Adam and Eve (1504), which shows his subtlety while using the burin in the texturing of flesh surfaces. This is the only existing engraving signed with his full name.
Dürer created large numbers of preparatory drawings, especially for his paintings and engravings, and many survive, most famously the Betende Hände (Praying Hands) from circa 1508, a study for an apostle in the Heller altarpiece. He continued to make images in watercolour and bodycolour (usually combined), including a number of still lifes of meadow sections or animals, including his Young Hare (1502) and the Great Piece of Turf (1503).
Second journey to Italy (1505–1507)
In Italy, he returned to painting, at first producing a series of works executed in tempera on linen. These include portraits and altarpieces, notably, the Paumgartner altarpiece and the Adoration of the Magi. In early 1506, he returned to Venice and stayed there until the spring of 1507. By this time Dürer's engravings had attained great popularity and were being copied. In Venice he was given a valuable commission from the emigrant German community for the church of San Bartolomeo. This was the altar-piece known as the Adoration of the Virgin or the Feast of Rose Garlands. It includes portraits of members of Venice's German community, but shows a strong Italian influence. It was later acquired by the Emperor Rudolf II and taken to Prague.
Nuremberg and the masterworks (1507–1520)
Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Dürer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael.
Between 1507 and 1511 Dürer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Dürer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted.
Other works from this period include the thirty-seven Little Passion woodcuts, first published in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. In 1513 and 1514 Dürer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's Handbook of a Christian Knight), St. Jerome in His Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514, the year Dürer's mother died). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Dürer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Pirckheimer. These drafts were later used to design Lusterweibchen chandeliers, combining an antler with a wooden sculpture.
In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. His only experiments with etching came in this period, producing five between 1515–1516 and a sixth in 1518; a technique he may have abandoned as unsuited to his aesthetic of methodical, classical form.
Patronage of Maximilian I
From 1512, Maximilian I became Dürer's major patron. He commissioned The Triumphal Arch, a vast work printed from 192 separate blocks, the symbolism of which is partly informed by Pirckheimer's translation of Horapollo's Hieroglyphica. The design program and explanations were devised by Johannes Stabius, the architectural design by the master builder and court-painter Jörg Kölderer and the woodcutting itself by Hieronymous Andreae, with Dürer as designer-in-chief. The Arch was followed by The Triumphal Procession, the program of which was worked out in 1512 by Marx Treitz-Saurwein and includes woodcuts by Albrecht Altdorfer and Hans Springinklee, as well as Dürer.
Dürer worked with pen on the marginal images for an edition of the Emperor's printed Prayer-Book; these were quite unknown until facsimiles were published in 1808 as part of the first book published in lithography. Dürer's work on the book was halted for an unknown reason, and the decoration was continued by artists including Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Baldung. Dürer also made several portraits of the Emperor, including one shortly before Maximilian's death in 1519.
Maximilian was a very cash-strapped prince who sometimes failed to pay, yet turned out to be Dürer's most important patron. In his court, artists and learned men were respected, which was not common at that time (later, Dürer commented that in Germany, as a non-noble, he was treated a parasite). Pirckheimer (who he met in 1495, before entering the service of Maximilian) was also an important personage in the court and great cultural patron, who had a strong influence on Dürer as his tutor in classical knowledge and humanistic critical methodology, as well as collaborator.
In Maximilian's court, Dürer also collaborated with a great number of other brilliant artists and scholars of the time who became his friends, like Johannes Stabius, Konrad Peutinger, Conrad Celtes, and Hans Tscherte (an imperial architect).
Dürer manifested a strong pride in his ability, as a prince of his profession. One day, the emperor, trying to show Dürer an idea, tried to sketch with the charcoal himself, but always broke it. Dürer took the charcoal from Maximilian's hand, finished the drawing and told him: "This is my scepter."
In another occasion, Maximilian noticed that the ladder Dürer used was too short and unstable, thus told a noble to hold it for him. The noble refused, saying that it was beneath him to serve a non-noble. Maximilian then came to hold the ladder himself, and told the noble that he could make a noble out of a peasant any day, but he could not make an artist like Dürer out of a noble.
Cartographic and astronomical works
Dürer's exploration of space led to a relationship and cooperation with the court astronomer Johannes Stabius. Stabius also often acted as Dürer's and Maximilian's go-between for their financial problems.
In 1515 Dürer and Stabius created the first world map projected on a solid geometric sphere. Also in 1515, Stabius, Dürer and the astronomer Konrad Heinfogel produced the first planispheres of both southern and northerns hemispheres, as well as the first printed celestial maps, which prompted the revival of interest in the field of uranometry throughout Europe.
Journey to the Netherlands (1520–1521)
Maximilian's death came at a time when Dürer was concerned he was losing "my sight and freedom of hand" (perhaps caused by arthritis) and increasingly affected by the writings of Martin Luther. In July 1520 Dürer made his fourth and last major journey, to renew the Imperial pension Maximilian had given him and to secure the patronage of the new emperor, Charles V, who was to be crowned at Aachen. Dürer journeyed with his wife and her maid via the Rhine to Cologne and then to Antwerp, where he was well received and produced numerous drawings in silverpoint, chalk and charcoal. In addition to attending the coronation, he visited Cologne (where he admired the painting of Stefan Lochner), Nijmegen, 's-Hertogenbosch, Bruges (where he saw Michelangelo's Madonna of Bruges), Ghent (where he admired van Eyck's Ghent altarpiece), and Zeeland.
Dürer took a large stock of prints with him and wrote in his diary to whom he gave, exchanged or sold them, and for how much. This provides rare information of the monetary value placed on prints at this time. Unlike paintings, their sale was very rarely documented. While providing valuable documentary evidence, Dürer's Netherlandish diary also reveals that the trip was not a profitable one. For example, Dürer offered his last portrait of Maximilian to his daughter, Margaret of Austria, but eventually traded the picture for some white cloth after Margaret disliked the portrait and declined to accept it. During this trip he also met Bernard van Orley, Jan Provoost, Gerard Horenbout, Jean Mone, Joachim Patinir and Tommaso Vincidor, though he did not, it seems, meet Quentin Matsys.
Having secured his pension, Dürer returned home in July 1521, having caught an undetermined illness, which afflicted him for the rest of his life, and greatly reduced his rate of work.
Final years, Nuremberg (1521–1528)
On his return to Nuremberg, Dürer worked on a number of grand projects with religious themes, including a crucifixion scene and a Sacra conversazione, though neither was completed. This may have been due in part to his declining health, but perhaps also because of the time he gave to the preparation of his theoretical works on geometry and perspective, the proportions of men and horses, and fortification.
However, one consequence of this shift in emphasis was that during the last years of his life, Dürer produced comparatively little as an artist. In painting, there was only a portrait of Hieronymus Holtzschuher, a Madonna and Child (1526), Salvator Mundi (1526), and two panels showing St. John with St. Peter in background and St. Paul with St. Mark in the background. This last great work, the Four Apostles, was given by Dürer to the City of Nuremberg—although he was given 100 guilders in return.
As for engravings, Dürer's work was restricted to portraits and illustrations for his treatise. The portraits include Cardinal-Elector Albert of Mainz; Frederick the Wise, elector of Saxony; the humanist scholar Willibald Pirckheimer; Philipp Melanchthon, and Erasmus of Rotterdam. For those of the Cardinal, Melanchthon, and Dürer's final major work, a drawn portrait of the Nuremberg patrician Ulrich Starck, Dürer depicted the sitters in profile.
Despite complaining of his lack of a formal classical education, Dürer was greatly interested in intellectual matters and learned much from his boyhood friend Willibald Pirckheimer, whom he no doubt consulted on the content of many of his images. He also derived great satisfaction from his friendships and correspondence with Erasmus and other scholars. Dürer succeeded in producing two books during his lifetime. "The Four Books on Measurement" were published at Nuremberg in 1525 and was the first book for adults on mathematics in German, as well as being cited later by Galileo and Kepler. The other, a work on city fortifications, was published in 1527. "The Four Books on Human Proportion" were published posthumously, shortly after his death in 1528.
Dürer died in Nuremberg at the age of 56, leaving an estate valued at 6,874 florins – a considerable sum. He is buried in the Johannisfriedhof cemetery. His large house (purchased in 1509 from the heirs of the astronomer Bernhard Walther), where his workshop was located and where his widow lived until her death in 1539, remains a prominent Nuremberg landmark.
Dürer and the Reformation
Dürer's writings suggest that he may have been sympathetic to Luther's ideas, though it is unclear if he ever left the Catholic Church. Dürer wrote of his desire to draw Luther in his diary in 1520: "And God help me that I may go to Dr. Martin Luther; thus I intend to make a portrait of him with great care and engrave him on a copper plate to create a lasting memorial of the Christian man who helped me overcome so many difficulties." In a letter to Nicholas Kratzer in 1524, Dürer wrote, "because of our Christian faith we have to stand in scorn and danger, for we are reviled and called heretics". Most tellingly, Pirckheimer wrote in a letter to Johann Tscherte in 1530: "I confess that in the beginning I believed in Luther, like our Albert of blessed memory ... but as anyone can see, the situation has become worse." Dürer may even have contributed to the Nuremberg City Council's mandating Lutheran sermons and services in March 1525. Notably, Dürer had contacts with various reformers, such as Zwingli, Andreas Karlstadt, Melanchthon, Erasmus and Cornelius Grapheus from whom Dürer received Luther's Babylonian Captivity in 1520. Yet Erasmus and C. Grapheus are better said to be Catholic change agents. Also, from 1525, "the year that saw the peak and collapse of the Peasants' War, the artist can be seen to distance himself somewhat from the [Lutheran] movement..."
Dürer's later works have also been claimed to show Protestant sympathies. His 1523 The Last Supper woodcut has often been understood to have an evangelical theme, focusing as it does on Christ espousing the Gospel, as well as the inclusion of the Eucharistic cup, an expression of Protestant utraquism, although this interpretation has been questioned. The delaying of the engraving of St Philip, completed in 1523 but not distributed until 1526, may have been due to Dürer's uneasiness with images of saints; even if Dürer was not an iconoclast, in his last years he evaluated and questioned the role of art in religion.
Legacy and influence
Dürer exerted a huge influence on the artists of succeeding generations, especially in printmaking, the medium through which his contemporaries mostly experienced his art, as his paintings were predominantly in private collections located in only a few cities. His success in spreading his reputation across Europe through prints was undoubtedly an inspiration for major artists such as Raphael, Titian, and Parmigianino, all of whom collaborated with printmakers to promote and distribute their work.
His engravings seem to have had an intimidating effect upon his German successors; the "Little Masters" who attempted few large engravings but continued Dürer's themes in small, rather cramped compositions. Lucas van Leyden was the only Northern European engraver to successfully continue to produce large engravings in the first third of the 16th century. The generation of Italian engravers who trained in the shadow of Dürer all either directly copied parts of his landscape backgrounds (Giulio Campagnola, Giovanni Battista Palumba, Benedetto Montagna and Cristofano Robetta), or whole prints (Marcantonio Raimondi and Agostino Veneziano). However, Dürer's influence became less dominant after 1515, when Marcantonio perfected his new engraving style, which in turn travelled over the Alps to also dominate Northern engraving.
In painting, Dürer had relatively little influence in Italy, where probably only his altarpiece in Venice was seen, and his German successors were less effective in blending German and Italian styles. His intense and self-dramatizing self-portraits have continued to have a strong influence up to the present, especially on painters in the 19th and 20th century who desired a more dramatic portrait style. Dürer has never fallen from critical favour, and there have been significant revivals of interest in his works in Germany in the Dürer Renaissance of about 1570 to 1630, in the early nineteenth century, and in German nationalism from 1870 to 1945.
The Lutheran Church commemorates Dürer annually on 6 April, along with Michelangelo, Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Burgkmair. The liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (United States) remembers him, Cranach and Matthias Grünewald on 5 August.
Theoretical works
In all his theoretical works, in order to communicate his theories in the German language rather than in Latin, Dürer used graphic expressions based on a vernacular, craftsmen's language. For example, "Schneckenlinie" ("snail-line") was his term for a spiral form. Thus, Dürer contributed to the expansion in German prose which Luther had begun with his translation of the Bible.
Four Books on Measurement
Dürer's work on geometry is called the Four Books on Measurement (Underweysung der Messung mit dem Zirckel und Richtscheyt or Instructions for Measuring with Compass and Ruler). The first book focuses on linear geometry. Dürer's geometric constructions include helices, conchoids and epicycloids. He also draws on Apollonius, and Johannes Werner's 'Libellus super viginti duobus elementis conicis' of 1522.
The second book moves onto two-dimensional geometry, i.e. the construction of regular polygons. Here Dürer favours the methods of Ptolemy over Euclid. The third book applies these principles of geometry to architecture, engineering and typography.
In architecture Dürer cites Vitruvius but elaborates his own classical designs and columns. In typography, Dürer depicts the geometric construction of the Latin alphabet, relying on Italian precedent. However, his
construction of the Gothic alphabet is based upon an entirely different modular system. The fourth book completes the progression of the first and second by moving to three-dimensional forms and the construction of polyhedra. Here Dürer discusses the five Platonic solids, as well as seven Archimedean semi-regular solids, as well as several of his own invention.
In all these, Dürer shows the objects as nets. Finally, Dürer discusses the Delian Problem and moves on to the 'construzione legittima', a method of depicting a cube in two dimensions through linear perspective. He is thought to be the first to describe a visualization technique used in modern computers, ray tracing. It was in Bologna that Dürer was taught (possibly by Luca Pacioli or Bramante) the principles of linear perspective, and evidently became familiar with the 'costruzione legittima' in a written description of these principles found only, at this time, in the unpublished treatise of Piero della Francesca. He was also familiar with the 'abbreviated construction' as described by Alberti and the geometrical construction of shadows, a technique of Leonardo da Vinci. Although Dürer made no innovations in these areas, he is notable as the first Northern European to treat matters of visual representation in a scientific way, and with understanding of Euclidean principles. In addition to these geometrical constructions, Dürer discusses in this last book of Underweysung der Messung an assortment of mechanisms for drawing in perspective from models and provides woodcut illustrations of these methods that are often reproduced in discussions of perspective.
Four Books on Human Proportion
Dürer's work on human proportions is called the Four Books on Human Proportion (Vier Bücher von Menschlicher Proportion) of 1528. The first book was mainly composed by 1512/13 and completed by 1523, showing five differently constructed types of both male and female figures, all parts of the body expressed in fractions of the total height. Dürer based these constructions on both Vitruvius and empirical observations of "two to three hundred living persons", in his own words. The second book includes eight further types, broken down not into fractions but an Albertian system, which Dürer probably learned from Francesco di Giorgio's 'De harmonica mundi totius' of 1525. In the third book, Dürer gives principles by which the proportions of the figures can be modified, including the mathematical simulation of convex and concave mirrors; here Dürer also deals with human physiognomy. The fourth book is devoted to the theory of movement.
Appended to the last book, however, is a self-contained essay on aesthetics, which Dürer worked on between 1512 and 1528, and it is here that we learn of his theories concerning 'ideal beauty'. Dürer rejected Alberti's concept of an objective beauty, proposing a relativist notion of beauty based on variety. Nonetheless, Dürer still believed that truth was hidden within nature, and that there were rules which ordered beauty, even though he found it difficult to define the criteria for such a code. In 1512/13 his three criteria were function ('Nutz'), naïve approval ('Wohlgefallen') and the happy medium ('Mittelmass'). However, unlike Alberti and Leonardo, Dürer was most troubled by understanding not just the abstract notions of beauty but also as to how an artist can create beautiful images. Between 1512 and the final draft in 1528, Dürer's belief developed from an understanding of human creativity as spontaneous or inspired to a concept of 'selective inward synthesis'. In other words, that an artist builds on a wealth of visual experiences in order to imagine beautiful things. Dürer's belief in the abilities of a single artist over inspiration prompted him to assert that "one man may sketch something with his pen on half a sheet of paper in one day, or may cut it into a tiny piece of wood with his little iron, and it turns out to be better and more artistic than another's work at which its author labours with the utmost diligence for a whole year".
Book on Fortification
In 1527, Dürer also published Various Lessons on the Fortification of Cities, Castles, and Localities (Etliche Underricht zu Befestigung der Stett, Schloss und Flecken). It was printed in Nuremberg, probably by Hieronymus Andreae and reprinted in 1603 by Johan Janssenn in Arnhem. In 1535 it was also translated into Latin as On Cities, Forts, and Castles, Designed and Strengthened by Several Manners: Presented for the Most Necessary Accommodation of War (De vrbibus, arcibus, castellisque condendis, ac muniendis rationes aliquot : praesenti bellorum necessitati accommodatissimae), published by Christian Wechel (Wecheli/Wechelus) in Paris.
The work is less proscriptively theoretical than his other works, and was soon overshadowed by the Italian theory of polygonal fortification (the trace italienne – see Bastion fort), though his designs seem to have had some influence in the eastern German lands and up into the Baltic States.
Fencing
Dürer created many sketches and woodcuts of soldiers and knights over the course of his life. His most significant martial works, however, were made in 1512 as part of his efforts to secure the patronage of Maximilian I. Using existing manuscripts from the Nuremberg Group as his reference, his workshop produced the extensive Οπλοδιδασκαλια sive Armorvm Tractandorvm Meditatio Alberti Dvreri ("Weapon Training, or Albrecht Dürer's Meditation on the Handling of Weapons", MS 26-232). Another manuscript based on the Nuremberg texts as well as one of Hans Talhoffer's works, the untitled Berlin Picture Book (Libr.Pict.A.83), is also thought to have originated in his workshop around this time. These sketches and watercolors show the same careful attention to detail and human proportion as Dürer's other work, and his illustrations of grappling, long sword, dagger, and messer are among the highest-quality in any fencing manual.
Gallery
List of works
List of paintings by Albrecht Dürer
List of engravings by Albrecht Dürer
List of woodcuts by Albrecht Dürer
References
Notes
Citations
Sources
Bartrum, Giulia. Albrecht Dürer and his Legacy. London: British Museum Press, 2002.
Brand Philip, Lotte; Anzelewsky, Fedja. "The Portrait Diptych of Dürer's parents". Simiolus: Netherlands Quarterly for the History of Art, Volume 10, No. 1, 1978–79. 5–18
Brion, Marcel. Dürer. London: Thames and Hudson, 1960
Harbison, Craig. "Dürer and the Reformation: The Problem of the Re-dating of the St. Philip Engraving". The Art Bulletin, Vol. 58, No. 3, 368–373. September 1976
Koerner, Joseph Leo. The Moment of Self-Portraiture in German Renaissance Art. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 1993.
Landau David; Parshall, Peter. The Renaissance Print. Yale, 1996.
Panofsky, Erwin. The Life and Art of Albrecht Dürer. NJ: Princeton, 1945.
Price, David Hotchkiss. Albrecht Dürer's Renaissance: Humanism, Reformation and the Art of Faith. Michigan, 2003. .
Strauss, Walter L. (ed.). The Complete Engravings, Etchings and Drypoints of Albrecht Durer. Mineola NY: Dover Publications, 1973.
Borchert, Till-Holger. Van Eyck to Dürer: The Influence of Early Netherlandish painting on European Art, 1430–1530. London: Thames & Hudson, 2011.
Wolf, Norbert. Albrecht Dürer. Taschen, 2010.
Hoffmann, Rainer. Im Paradies - Adam und Eva und der Sündenfall - Albrecht Dürers Darstellungen, Böhlau-Verlag, 2021, ISBN 9783412523852
Further reading
Campbell Hutchison, Jane. Albrecht Dürer: A Biography. Princeton University Press, 1990.
Demele, Christine. Dürers Nacktheit – Das Weimarer Selbstbildnis. Rhema Verlag, Münster 2012,
Dürer, Albrecht (translated by R.T. Nichol from the Latin text), Of the Just Shaping of Letters, Dover Publications.
Hart, Vaughan. 'Navel Gazing. On Albrecht Dürer's Adam and Eve (1504)', The International Journal of Arts Theory and History, 2016, vol.12.1 pp. 1–10 https://doi.org/10.18848/2326-9960/CGP/v12i01/1-10
Korolija Fontana-Giusti, Gordana. "The Unconscious and Space: Venice and the work of Albrecht Dürer", in Architecture and the Unconscious, eds. J. Hendrix and L.Holm, Farnham Surrey: Ashgate, 2016. pp. 27–44, .
Wilhelm, Kurth (ed.). The Complete Woodcuts of Albrecht Durer, Dover Publications, 2000.
External links
The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Dürer Prints Close-up. Made to accompany The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Albrecht Dürer: Vier Bücher von menschlicher Proportion (Nuremberg, 1528). Selected pages scanned from the original work. Historical Anatomies on the Web. US National Library of Medicine.
"Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528)". In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Albrecht Durer, Exhibition, Albertina, Vienna. 20 September 2019 – 6 January 2020
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"The Nuremberg International Human Rights Award is a German award founded on September 17, 1995. The date chosen is significant; 60 years earlier, the Nuremberg Race Laws were adopted. Also, on September 17, 1939, Poland was invaded by the Soviet Union, soon after the German invasion that marked the beginning of World War II\n\nThe winner is endowed with 15,000 euros (20,235 USD).\n\nPrevious Winners\n\nExternal links\n Nuremberg International Human Right's Award Official Website (German)\n\nHuman rights awards\nPeace awards\nNuremberg",
"Nuremberg: The Nazis Facing their Crimes (French title: Nuremberg - Les nazis face à leurs crimes) is a 2006 documentary about the Nuremberg Trials made by French historian and director and coproduced by and ARTE France. The English version, narrated by Christopher Plummer, premiered at the Lincoln Center in 2007.\n\nBackground\nThe film is a condensation of the 1945 Nuremberg Trials based on restored courtroom footage and interviews with four participants in the trial: prosecutor Benjamin B. Ferencz, Auschwitz survivor Ernst Michel, who, remarkably, became a reporter at the trial, Budd Schulberg, a member of John Ford's film unit, and chief interpreter Richard Sonnenfeldt.\n\nThe prosecution team submitted three films as evidence against the high Nazi officials charged with crimes against peace, war crimes and crimes against humanity. Two of these films, Nazi Concentration Camps and The Nazi Plan, were produced by Ford; the third, The Atrocities Committed by the German-Fascists in the USSR, was a Soviet production directed by Roman Karmen. Excerpts from the sessions in which these films were shown during the trial are significant sequences in the documentary.\n\nAlso significant is the \"chilling testimony\" of prosecution witness Otto Ohlendorf, commanding officer of Einsatzgruppe D and responsible for carrying out mass executions in Eastern Europe, and the description of camp conditions by French resistance fighter Marie-Claude Vaillant-Couturier, a survivor of both Auschwitz-Birkenau and Ravensbrück.\n\nDelange's film also examines how the medium, in this case the original film and sound recordings, and how they came about, affects the writing of history which Delange has examined further. \"As a historian,\" says reviewer Ronnie Scheib, \"Delage is obsessed with the growing role of reproduced images in shaping history.\"\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nNuremberg trials\nDocumentary films about the Holocaust\n2006 films\n2006 documentary films\nFrench documentary films\nFrench films"
]
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"Albrecht Dürer",
"Nuremberg and the masterworks (1507-1520)",
"What are some of his masterworks?",
"Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (",
"Does he have more?",
"Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin,",
"Are these well known?",
"Between 1507 and 1511 Durer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings:",
"What is significant about Nuremberg?",
"Durer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520."
]
| C_4a4a9362ff664bba86e8c74ead6078c0_0 | Why did he return? | 5 | Why did Dürer return to Nuremberg? | Albrecht Dürer | Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Durer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini and--mainly through Lorenzo di Credi--Leonardo da Vinci. Between 1507 and 1511 Durer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Durer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted. Other works from this period include the thirty-seven woodcut subjects of the Little Passion, published first in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Indeed, complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. However, in 1513 and 1514 Durer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death, and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's treatise Enchiridion militis Christiani), St. Jerome in his Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Durer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Willibald Prickheimer. These drafts were later used to design the famous chandeliers lusterweibchen. In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. CANNOTANSWER | His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists | Albrecht Dürer (; ; ; 21 May 1471 – 6 April 1528), sometimes spelled in English as Durer (without an umlaut) or Duerer, was a German painter, printmaker, and theorist of the German Renaissance. Born in Nuremberg, Dürer established his reputation and influence across Europe in his twenties due to his high-quality woodcut prints. He was in contact with the major Italian artists of his time, including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini, and Leonardo da Vinci, and from 1512 was patronized by Emperor Maximilian I.
Dürer's vast body of work includes engravings, his preferred technique in his later prints, altarpieces, portraits and self-portraits, watercolours and books. The woodcuts series are more Gothic than the rest of his work. His well-known engravings include the three Meisterstiche (master prints) Knight, Death and the Devil (1513), Saint Jerome in his Study (1514), and Melencolia I (1514). His watercolours mark him as one of the first European landscape artists, while his woodcuts revolutionised the potential of that medium.
Dürer's introduction of classical motifs into Northern art, through his knowledge of Italian artists and German humanists, has secured his reputation as one of the most important figures of the Northern Renaissance. This is reinforced by his theoretical treatises, which involve principles of mathematics, perspective, and ideal proportions.
Biography
Early life (1471–1490)
Dürer was born on 21 May 1471, the third child and second son of Albrecht Dürer the Elder and Barbara Holper, who married in 1467 and had eighteen children together. Albrecht Dürer the Elder (originally Albrecht Ajtósi), was a successful goldsmith who by 1455 had moved to Nuremberg from Ajtós, near Gyula in Hungary. He married Holper, his master's daughter, when he himself qualified as a master. One of Albrecht's brothers, Hans Dürer, was also a painter and trained under him. Another of Albrecht's brothers, Endres Dürer, took over their father's business and was a master goldsmith. The German name "Dürer" is a translation from the Hungarian, "Ajtósi". Initially, it was "Türer", meaning doormaker, which is "ajtós" in Hungarian (from "ajtó", meaning door). A door is featured in the coat-of-arms the family acquired. Albrecht Dürer the Younger later changed "Türer", his father's diction of the family's surname, to "Dürer", to adapt to the local Nuremberg dialect.
Dürer's godfather Anton Koberger left goldsmithing to become a printer and publisher in the year of Dürer's birth. He became the most successful publisher in Germany, eventually owning twenty-four printing-presses and a number of offices in Germany and abroad. Koberger's most famous publication was the Nuremberg Chronicle, published in 1493 in German and Latin editions. It contained an unprecedented 1,809 woodcut illustrations (albeit with many repeated uses of the same block) by the Wolgemut workshop. Dürer may have worked on some of these, as the work on the project began while he was with Wolgemut.
Because Dürer left autobiographical writings and was widely known by his mid-twenties, his life is well documented in several sources. After a few years of school, Dürer learned the basics of goldsmithing and drawing from his father. Though his father wanted him to continue his training as a goldsmith, he showed such a precocious talent in drawing that he started as an apprentice to Michael Wolgemut at the age of fifteen in 1486. A self-portrait, a drawing in silverpoint, is dated 1484 (Albertina, Vienna) "when I was a child", as his later inscription says. The drawing is one of the earliest surviving children's drawings of any kind, and, as Dürer's Opus One, has helped define his oeuvre as deriving from, and always linked to, himself. Wolgemut was the leading artist in Nuremberg at the time, with a large workshop producing a variety of works of art, in particular woodcuts for books. Nuremberg was then an important and prosperous city, a centre for publishing and many luxury trades. It had strong links with Italy, especially Venice, a relatively short distance across the Alps.
Wanderjahre and marriage (1490–1494)
After completing his apprenticeship, Dürer followed the common German custom of taking Wanderjahre—in effect gap years—in which the apprentice learned skills from artists in other areas; Dürer was to spend about four years away. He left in 1490, possibly to work under Martin Schongauer, the leading engraver of Northern Europe, but who died shortly before Dürer's arrival at Colmar in 1492. It is unclear where Dürer travelled in the intervening period, though it is likely that he went to Frankfurt and the Netherlands. In Colmar, Dürer was welcomed by Schongauer's brothers, the goldsmiths Caspar and Paul and the painter Ludwig. In 1493 Dürer went to Strasbourg, where he would have experienced the sculpture of Nikolaus Gerhaert. Dürer's first painted self-portrait (now in the Louvre) was painted at this time, probably to be sent back to his fiancée in Nuremberg.
In early 1492 Dürer travelled to Basel to stay with another brother of Martin Schongauer, the goldsmith Georg. Very soon after his return to Nuremberg, on 7 July 1494, at the age of 23, Dürer was married to Agnes Frey following an arrangement made during his absence. Agnes was the daughter of a prominent brass worker (and amateur harpist) in the city. However, no children resulted from the marriage, and with Albrecht the Dürer name died out. The marriage between Agnes and Albrecht was not a generally happy one, as indicated by the letters of Dürer in which he quipped to Willibald Pirckheimer in an extremely rough tone about his wife. He called her an "old crow" and made other vulgar remarks. Pirckheimer also made no secret of his antipathy towards Agnes, describing her as a miserly shrew with a bitter tongue, who helped cause Dürer's death at a young age. One author speculates that Albrecht was bisexual, if not homosexual, due to several of his works containing themes of homosexual desire, as well as the intimate nature of his correspondence with certain very close male friends.
First journey to Italy (1494–1495)
Within three months of his marriage, Dürer left for Italy, alone, perhaps stimulated by an outbreak of plague in Nuremberg. He made watercolour sketches as he traveled over the Alps. Some have survived and others may be deduced from accurate landscapes of real places in his later work, for example his engraving Nemesis.
In Italy, he went to Venice to study its more advanced artistic world. Through Wolgemut's tutelage, Dürer had learned how to make prints in drypoint and design woodcuts in the German style, based on the works of Schongauer and the Housebook Master. He also would have had access to some Italian works in Germany, but the two visits he made to Italy had an enormous influence on him. He wrote that Giovanni Bellini was the oldest and still the best of the artists in Venice. His drawings and engravings show the influence of others, notably Antonio Pollaiuolo, with his interest in the proportions of the body; Lorenzo di Credi; and Andrea Mantegna, whose work he produced copies of while training. Dürer probably also visited Padua and Mantua on this trip.
Return to Nuremberg (1495–1505)
On his return to Nuremberg in 1495, Dürer opened his own workshop (being married was a requirement for this). Over the next five years, his style increasingly integrated Italian influences into underlying Northern forms. Arguably his best works in the first years of the workshop were his woodcut prints, mostly religious, but including secular scenes such as The Men's Bath House (ca. 1496). These were larger and more finely cut than the great majority of German woodcuts hitherto, and far more complex and balanced in composition.
It is now thought unlikely that Dürer cut any of the woodblocks himself; this task would have been performed by a specialist craftsman. However, his training in Wolgemut's studio, which made many carved and painted altarpieces and both designed and cut woodblocks for woodcut, evidently gave him great understanding of what the technique could be made to produce, and how to work with block cutters. Dürer either drew his design directly onto the woodblock itself, or glued a paper drawing to the block. Either way, his drawings were destroyed during the cutting of the block.
His series of sixteen designs for the Apocalypse is dated 1498, as is his engraving of St. Michael Fighting the Dragon. He made the first seven scenes of the Great Passion in the same year, and a little later, a series of eleven on the Holy Family and saints. The Seven Sorrows Polyptych, commissioned by Frederick III of Saxony in 1496, was executed by Dürer and his assistants c. 1500. In 1502, Dürer's father died. Around 1503–1505 Dürer produced the first 17 of a set illustrating the Life of the Virgin, which he did not finish for some years. Neither these nor the Great Passion were published as sets until several years later, but prints were sold individually in considerable numbers.
During the same period Dürer trained himself in the difficult art of using the burin to make engravings. It is possible he had begun learning this skill during his early training with his father, as it was also an essential skill of the goldsmith. In 1496 he executed the Prodigal Son, which the Italian Renaissance art historian Giorgio Vasari singled out for praise some decades later, noting its Germanic quality. He was soon producing some spectacular and original images, notably Nemesis (1502), The Sea Monster (1498), and Saint Eustace (c. 1501), with a highly detailed landscape background and animals. His landscapes of this period, such as Pond in the Woods and Willow Mill, are quite different from his earlier watercolours. There is a much greater emphasis on capturing atmosphere, rather than depicting topography. He made a number of Madonnas, single religious figures, and small scenes with comic peasant figures. Prints are highly portable and these works made Dürer famous throughout the main artistic centres of Europe within a very few years.
The Venetian artist Jacopo de' Barbari, whom Dürer had met in Venice, visited Nuremberg in 1500, and Dürer said that he learned much about the new developments in perspective, anatomy, and proportion from him. De' Barbari was unwilling to explain everything he knew, so Dürer began his own studies, which would become a lifelong preoccupation. A series of extant drawings show Dürer's experiments in human proportion, leading to the famous engraving of Adam and Eve (1504), which shows his subtlety while using the burin in the texturing of flesh surfaces. This is the only existing engraving signed with his full name.
Dürer created large numbers of preparatory drawings, especially for his paintings and engravings, and many survive, most famously the Betende Hände (Praying Hands) from circa 1508, a study for an apostle in the Heller altarpiece. He continued to make images in watercolour and bodycolour (usually combined), including a number of still lifes of meadow sections or animals, including his Young Hare (1502) and the Great Piece of Turf (1503).
Second journey to Italy (1505–1507)
In Italy, he returned to painting, at first producing a series of works executed in tempera on linen. These include portraits and altarpieces, notably, the Paumgartner altarpiece and the Adoration of the Magi. In early 1506, he returned to Venice and stayed there until the spring of 1507. By this time Dürer's engravings had attained great popularity and were being copied. In Venice he was given a valuable commission from the emigrant German community for the church of San Bartolomeo. This was the altar-piece known as the Adoration of the Virgin or the Feast of Rose Garlands. It includes portraits of members of Venice's German community, but shows a strong Italian influence. It was later acquired by the Emperor Rudolf II and taken to Prague.
Nuremberg and the masterworks (1507–1520)
Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Dürer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael.
Between 1507 and 1511 Dürer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Dürer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted.
Other works from this period include the thirty-seven Little Passion woodcuts, first published in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. In 1513 and 1514 Dürer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's Handbook of a Christian Knight), St. Jerome in His Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514, the year Dürer's mother died). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Dürer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Pirckheimer. These drafts were later used to design Lusterweibchen chandeliers, combining an antler with a wooden sculpture.
In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. His only experiments with etching came in this period, producing five between 1515–1516 and a sixth in 1518; a technique he may have abandoned as unsuited to his aesthetic of methodical, classical form.
Patronage of Maximilian I
From 1512, Maximilian I became Dürer's major patron. He commissioned The Triumphal Arch, a vast work printed from 192 separate blocks, the symbolism of which is partly informed by Pirckheimer's translation of Horapollo's Hieroglyphica. The design program and explanations were devised by Johannes Stabius, the architectural design by the master builder and court-painter Jörg Kölderer and the woodcutting itself by Hieronymous Andreae, with Dürer as designer-in-chief. The Arch was followed by The Triumphal Procession, the program of which was worked out in 1512 by Marx Treitz-Saurwein and includes woodcuts by Albrecht Altdorfer and Hans Springinklee, as well as Dürer.
Dürer worked with pen on the marginal images for an edition of the Emperor's printed Prayer-Book; these were quite unknown until facsimiles were published in 1808 as part of the first book published in lithography. Dürer's work on the book was halted for an unknown reason, and the decoration was continued by artists including Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Baldung. Dürer also made several portraits of the Emperor, including one shortly before Maximilian's death in 1519.
Maximilian was a very cash-strapped prince who sometimes failed to pay, yet turned out to be Dürer's most important patron. In his court, artists and learned men were respected, which was not common at that time (later, Dürer commented that in Germany, as a non-noble, he was treated a parasite). Pirckheimer (who he met in 1495, before entering the service of Maximilian) was also an important personage in the court and great cultural patron, who had a strong influence on Dürer as his tutor in classical knowledge and humanistic critical methodology, as well as collaborator.
In Maximilian's court, Dürer also collaborated with a great number of other brilliant artists and scholars of the time who became his friends, like Johannes Stabius, Konrad Peutinger, Conrad Celtes, and Hans Tscherte (an imperial architect).
Dürer manifested a strong pride in his ability, as a prince of his profession. One day, the emperor, trying to show Dürer an idea, tried to sketch with the charcoal himself, but always broke it. Dürer took the charcoal from Maximilian's hand, finished the drawing and told him: "This is my scepter."
In another occasion, Maximilian noticed that the ladder Dürer used was too short and unstable, thus told a noble to hold it for him. The noble refused, saying that it was beneath him to serve a non-noble. Maximilian then came to hold the ladder himself, and told the noble that he could make a noble out of a peasant any day, but he could not make an artist like Dürer out of a noble.
Cartographic and astronomical works
Dürer's exploration of space led to a relationship and cooperation with the court astronomer Johannes Stabius. Stabius also often acted as Dürer's and Maximilian's go-between for their financial problems.
In 1515 Dürer and Stabius created the first world map projected on a solid geometric sphere. Also in 1515, Stabius, Dürer and the astronomer Konrad Heinfogel produced the first planispheres of both southern and northerns hemispheres, as well as the first printed celestial maps, which prompted the revival of interest in the field of uranometry throughout Europe.
Journey to the Netherlands (1520–1521)
Maximilian's death came at a time when Dürer was concerned he was losing "my sight and freedom of hand" (perhaps caused by arthritis) and increasingly affected by the writings of Martin Luther. In July 1520 Dürer made his fourth and last major journey, to renew the Imperial pension Maximilian had given him and to secure the patronage of the new emperor, Charles V, who was to be crowned at Aachen. Dürer journeyed with his wife and her maid via the Rhine to Cologne and then to Antwerp, where he was well received and produced numerous drawings in silverpoint, chalk and charcoal. In addition to attending the coronation, he visited Cologne (where he admired the painting of Stefan Lochner), Nijmegen, 's-Hertogenbosch, Bruges (where he saw Michelangelo's Madonna of Bruges), Ghent (where he admired van Eyck's Ghent altarpiece), and Zeeland.
Dürer took a large stock of prints with him and wrote in his diary to whom he gave, exchanged or sold them, and for how much. This provides rare information of the monetary value placed on prints at this time. Unlike paintings, their sale was very rarely documented. While providing valuable documentary evidence, Dürer's Netherlandish diary also reveals that the trip was not a profitable one. For example, Dürer offered his last portrait of Maximilian to his daughter, Margaret of Austria, but eventually traded the picture for some white cloth after Margaret disliked the portrait and declined to accept it. During this trip he also met Bernard van Orley, Jan Provoost, Gerard Horenbout, Jean Mone, Joachim Patinir and Tommaso Vincidor, though he did not, it seems, meet Quentin Matsys.
Having secured his pension, Dürer returned home in July 1521, having caught an undetermined illness, which afflicted him for the rest of his life, and greatly reduced his rate of work.
Final years, Nuremberg (1521–1528)
On his return to Nuremberg, Dürer worked on a number of grand projects with religious themes, including a crucifixion scene and a Sacra conversazione, though neither was completed. This may have been due in part to his declining health, but perhaps also because of the time he gave to the preparation of his theoretical works on geometry and perspective, the proportions of men and horses, and fortification.
However, one consequence of this shift in emphasis was that during the last years of his life, Dürer produced comparatively little as an artist. In painting, there was only a portrait of Hieronymus Holtzschuher, a Madonna and Child (1526), Salvator Mundi (1526), and two panels showing St. John with St. Peter in background and St. Paul with St. Mark in the background. This last great work, the Four Apostles, was given by Dürer to the City of Nuremberg—although he was given 100 guilders in return.
As for engravings, Dürer's work was restricted to portraits and illustrations for his treatise. The portraits include Cardinal-Elector Albert of Mainz; Frederick the Wise, elector of Saxony; the humanist scholar Willibald Pirckheimer; Philipp Melanchthon, and Erasmus of Rotterdam. For those of the Cardinal, Melanchthon, and Dürer's final major work, a drawn portrait of the Nuremberg patrician Ulrich Starck, Dürer depicted the sitters in profile.
Despite complaining of his lack of a formal classical education, Dürer was greatly interested in intellectual matters and learned much from his boyhood friend Willibald Pirckheimer, whom he no doubt consulted on the content of many of his images. He also derived great satisfaction from his friendships and correspondence with Erasmus and other scholars. Dürer succeeded in producing two books during his lifetime. "The Four Books on Measurement" were published at Nuremberg in 1525 and was the first book for adults on mathematics in German, as well as being cited later by Galileo and Kepler. The other, a work on city fortifications, was published in 1527. "The Four Books on Human Proportion" were published posthumously, shortly after his death in 1528.
Dürer died in Nuremberg at the age of 56, leaving an estate valued at 6,874 florins – a considerable sum. He is buried in the Johannisfriedhof cemetery. His large house (purchased in 1509 from the heirs of the astronomer Bernhard Walther), where his workshop was located and where his widow lived until her death in 1539, remains a prominent Nuremberg landmark.
Dürer and the Reformation
Dürer's writings suggest that he may have been sympathetic to Luther's ideas, though it is unclear if he ever left the Catholic Church. Dürer wrote of his desire to draw Luther in his diary in 1520: "And God help me that I may go to Dr. Martin Luther; thus I intend to make a portrait of him with great care and engrave him on a copper plate to create a lasting memorial of the Christian man who helped me overcome so many difficulties." In a letter to Nicholas Kratzer in 1524, Dürer wrote, "because of our Christian faith we have to stand in scorn and danger, for we are reviled and called heretics". Most tellingly, Pirckheimer wrote in a letter to Johann Tscherte in 1530: "I confess that in the beginning I believed in Luther, like our Albert of blessed memory ... but as anyone can see, the situation has become worse." Dürer may even have contributed to the Nuremberg City Council's mandating Lutheran sermons and services in March 1525. Notably, Dürer had contacts with various reformers, such as Zwingli, Andreas Karlstadt, Melanchthon, Erasmus and Cornelius Grapheus from whom Dürer received Luther's Babylonian Captivity in 1520. Yet Erasmus and C. Grapheus are better said to be Catholic change agents. Also, from 1525, "the year that saw the peak and collapse of the Peasants' War, the artist can be seen to distance himself somewhat from the [Lutheran] movement..."
Dürer's later works have also been claimed to show Protestant sympathies. His 1523 The Last Supper woodcut has often been understood to have an evangelical theme, focusing as it does on Christ espousing the Gospel, as well as the inclusion of the Eucharistic cup, an expression of Protestant utraquism, although this interpretation has been questioned. The delaying of the engraving of St Philip, completed in 1523 but not distributed until 1526, may have been due to Dürer's uneasiness with images of saints; even if Dürer was not an iconoclast, in his last years he evaluated and questioned the role of art in religion.
Legacy and influence
Dürer exerted a huge influence on the artists of succeeding generations, especially in printmaking, the medium through which his contemporaries mostly experienced his art, as his paintings were predominantly in private collections located in only a few cities. His success in spreading his reputation across Europe through prints was undoubtedly an inspiration for major artists such as Raphael, Titian, and Parmigianino, all of whom collaborated with printmakers to promote and distribute their work.
His engravings seem to have had an intimidating effect upon his German successors; the "Little Masters" who attempted few large engravings but continued Dürer's themes in small, rather cramped compositions. Lucas van Leyden was the only Northern European engraver to successfully continue to produce large engravings in the first third of the 16th century. The generation of Italian engravers who trained in the shadow of Dürer all either directly copied parts of his landscape backgrounds (Giulio Campagnola, Giovanni Battista Palumba, Benedetto Montagna and Cristofano Robetta), or whole prints (Marcantonio Raimondi and Agostino Veneziano). However, Dürer's influence became less dominant after 1515, when Marcantonio perfected his new engraving style, which in turn travelled over the Alps to also dominate Northern engraving.
In painting, Dürer had relatively little influence in Italy, where probably only his altarpiece in Venice was seen, and his German successors were less effective in blending German and Italian styles. His intense and self-dramatizing self-portraits have continued to have a strong influence up to the present, especially on painters in the 19th and 20th century who desired a more dramatic portrait style. Dürer has never fallen from critical favour, and there have been significant revivals of interest in his works in Germany in the Dürer Renaissance of about 1570 to 1630, in the early nineteenth century, and in German nationalism from 1870 to 1945.
The Lutheran Church commemorates Dürer annually on 6 April, along with Michelangelo, Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Burgkmair. The liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (United States) remembers him, Cranach and Matthias Grünewald on 5 August.
Theoretical works
In all his theoretical works, in order to communicate his theories in the German language rather than in Latin, Dürer used graphic expressions based on a vernacular, craftsmen's language. For example, "Schneckenlinie" ("snail-line") was his term for a spiral form. Thus, Dürer contributed to the expansion in German prose which Luther had begun with his translation of the Bible.
Four Books on Measurement
Dürer's work on geometry is called the Four Books on Measurement (Underweysung der Messung mit dem Zirckel und Richtscheyt or Instructions for Measuring with Compass and Ruler). The first book focuses on linear geometry. Dürer's geometric constructions include helices, conchoids and epicycloids. He also draws on Apollonius, and Johannes Werner's 'Libellus super viginti duobus elementis conicis' of 1522.
The second book moves onto two-dimensional geometry, i.e. the construction of regular polygons. Here Dürer favours the methods of Ptolemy over Euclid. The third book applies these principles of geometry to architecture, engineering and typography.
In architecture Dürer cites Vitruvius but elaborates his own classical designs and columns. In typography, Dürer depicts the geometric construction of the Latin alphabet, relying on Italian precedent. However, his
construction of the Gothic alphabet is based upon an entirely different modular system. The fourth book completes the progression of the first and second by moving to three-dimensional forms and the construction of polyhedra. Here Dürer discusses the five Platonic solids, as well as seven Archimedean semi-regular solids, as well as several of his own invention.
In all these, Dürer shows the objects as nets. Finally, Dürer discusses the Delian Problem and moves on to the 'construzione legittima', a method of depicting a cube in two dimensions through linear perspective. He is thought to be the first to describe a visualization technique used in modern computers, ray tracing. It was in Bologna that Dürer was taught (possibly by Luca Pacioli or Bramante) the principles of linear perspective, and evidently became familiar with the 'costruzione legittima' in a written description of these principles found only, at this time, in the unpublished treatise of Piero della Francesca. He was also familiar with the 'abbreviated construction' as described by Alberti and the geometrical construction of shadows, a technique of Leonardo da Vinci. Although Dürer made no innovations in these areas, he is notable as the first Northern European to treat matters of visual representation in a scientific way, and with understanding of Euclidean principles. In addition to these geometrical constructions, Dürer discusses in this last book of Underweysung der Messung an assortment of mechanisms for drawing in perspective from models and provides woodcut illustrations of these methods that are often reproduced in discussions of perspective.
Four Books on Human Proportion
Dürer's work on human proportions is called the Four Books on Human Proportion (Vier Bücher von Menschlicher Proportion) of 1528. The first book was mainly composed by 1512/13 and completed by 1523, showing five differently constructed types of both male and female figures, all parts of the body expressed in fractions of the total height. Dürer based these constructions on both Vitruvius and empirical observations of "two to three hundred living persons", in his own words. The second book includes eight further types, broken down not into fractions but an Albertian system, which Dürer probably learned from Francesco di Giorgio's 'De harmonica mundi totius' of 1525. In the third book, Dürer gives principles by which the proportions of the figures can be modified, including the mathematical simulation of convex and concave mirrors; here Dürer also deals with human physiognomy. The fourth book is devoted to the theory of movement.
Appended to the last book, however, is a self-contained essay on aesthetics, which Dürer worked on between 1512 and 1528, and it is here that we learn of his theories concerning 'ideal beauty'. Dürer rejected Alberti's concept of an objective beauty, proposing a relativist notion of beauty based on variety. Nonetheless, Dürer still believed that truth was hidden within nature, and that there were rules which ordered beauty, even though he found it difficult to define the criteria for such a code. In 1512/13 his three criteria were function ('Nutz'), naïve approval ('Wohlgefallen') and the happy medium ('Mittelmass'). However, unlike Alberti and Leonardo, Dürer was most troubled by understanding not just the abstract notions of beauty but also as to how an artist can create beautiful images. Between 1512 and the final draft in 1528, Dürer's belief developed from an understanding of human creativity as spontaneous or inspired to a concept of 'selective inward synthesis'. In other words, that an artist builds on a wealth of visual experiences in order to imagine beautiful things. Dürer's belief in the abilities of a single artist over inspiration prompted him to assert that "one man may sketch something with his pen on half a sheet of paper in one day, or may cut it into a tiny piece of wood with his little iron, and it turns out to be better and more artistic than another's work at which its author labours with the utmost diligence for a whole year".
Book on Fortification
In 1527, Dürer also published Various Lessons on the Fortification of Cities, Castles, and Localities (Etliche Underricht zu Befestigung der Stett, Schloss und Flecken). It was printed in Nuremberg, probably by Hieronymus Andreae and reprinted in 1603 by Johan Janssenn in Arnhem. In 1535 it was also translated into Latin as On Cities, Forts, and Castles, Designed and Strengthened by Several Manners: Presented for the Most Necessary Accommodation of War (De vrbibus, arcibus, castellisque condendis, ac muniendis rationes aliquot : praesenti bellorum necessitati accommodatissimae), published by Christian Wechel (Wecheli/Wechelus) in Paris.
The work is less proscriptively theoretical than his other works, and was soon overshadowed by the Italian theory of polygonal fortification (the trace italienne – see Bastion fort), though his designs seem to have had some influence in the eastern German lands and up into the Baltic States.
Fencing
Dürer created many sketches and woodcuts of soldiers and knights over the course of his life. His most significant martial works, however, were made in 1512 as part of his efforts to secure the patronage of Maximilian I. Using existing manuscripts from the Nuremberg Group as his reference, his workshop produced the extensive Οπλοδιδασκαλια sive Armorvm Tractandorvm Meditatio Alberti Dvreri ("Weapon Training, or Albrecht Dürer's Meditation on the Handling of Weapons", MS 26-232). Another manuscript based on the Nuremberg texts as well as one of Hans Talhoffer's works, the untitled Berlin Picture Book (Libr.Pict.A.83), is also thought to have originated in his workshop around this time. These sketches and watercolors show the same careful attention to detail and human proportion as Dürer's other work, and his illustrations of grappling, long sword, dagger, and messer are among the highest-quality in any fencing manual.
Gallery
List of works
List of paintings by Albrecht Dürer
List of engravings by Albrecht Dürer
List of woodcuts by Albrecht Dürer
References
Notes
Citations
Sources
Bartrum, Giulia. Albrecht Dürer and his Legacy. London: British Museum Press, 2002.
Brand Philip, Lotte; Anzelewsky, Fedja. "The Portrait Diptych of Dürer's parents". Simiolus: Netherlands Quarterly for the History of Art, Volume 10, No. 1, 1978–79. 5–18
Brion, Marcel. Dürer. London: Thames and Hudson, 1960
Harbison, Craig. "Dürer and the Reformation: The Problem of the Re-dating of the St. Philip Engraving". The Art Bulletin, Vol. 58, No. 3, 368–373. September 1976
Koerner, Joseph Leo. The Moment of Self-Portraiture in German Renaissance Art. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 1993.
Landau David; Parshall, Peter. The Renaissance Print. Yale, 1996.
Panofsky, Erwin. The Life and Art of Albrecht Dürer. NJ: Princeton, 1945.
Price, David Hotchkiss. Albrecht Dürer's Renaissance: Humanism, Reformation and the Art of Faith. Michigan, 2003. .
Strauss, Walter L. (ed.). The Complete Engravings, Etchings and Drypoints of Albrecht Durer. Mineola NY: Dover Publications, 1973.
Borchert, Till-Holger. Van Eyck to Dürer: The Influence of Early Netherlandish painting on European Art, 1430–1530. London: Thames & Hudson, 2011.
Wolf, Norbert. Albrecht Dürer. Taschen, 2010.
Hoffmann, Rainer. Im Paradies - Adam und Eva und der Sündenfall - Albrecht Dürers Darstellungen, Böhlau-Verlag, 2021, ISBN 9783412523852
Further reading
Campbell Hutchison, Jane. Albrecht Dürer: A Biography. Princeton University Press, 1990.
Demele, Christine. Dürers Nacktheit – Das Weimarer Selbstbildnis. Rhema Verlag, Münster 2012,
Dürer, Albrecht (translated by R.T. Nichol from the Latin text), Of the Just Shaping of Letters, Dover Publications.
Hart, Vaughan. 'Navel Gazing. On Albrecht Dürer's Adam and Eve (1504)', The International Journal of Arts Theory and History, 2016, vol.12.1 pp. 1–10 https://doi.org/10.18848/2326-9960/CGP/v12i01/1-10
Korolija Fontana-Giusti, Gordana. "The Unconscious and Space: Venice and the work of Albrecht Dürer", in Architecture and the Unconscious, eds. J. Hendrix and L.Holm, Farnham Surrey: Ashgate, 2016. pp. 27–44, .
Wilhelm, Kurth (ed.). The Complete Woodcuts of Albrecht Durer, Dover Publications, 2000.
External links
The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Dürer Prints Close-up. Made to accompany The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Albrecht Dürer: Vier Bücher von menschlicher Proportion (Nuremberg, 1528). Selected pages scanned from the original work. Historical Anatomies on the Web. US National Library of Medicine.
"Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528)". In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Albrecht Durer, Exhibition, Albertina, Vienna. 20 September 2019 – 6 January 2020
1471 births
1528 deaths
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15th-century German painters
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German Lutherans
German male painters
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German printmakers
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Woodcut designers | true | [
"Why Bother? is the third studio album from the Detroit band ADULT. All tracks are written and produced by Adam Lee Miller and Nicola Kuperus. Sam Consiglio, a contributor to the band's previous album, Gimmie Trouble, did not return to record this album for undisclosed reasons.\n\nTrack listing\n\"Red Herring\"\n\"The Mythology of Psychosis\"\n\"Good Deeds\"\n\"I Feel Worse When I'm With You\"\n\"The Importance of Being Folk Part I\"\n\"Inclined to Vomit\"\n\"You Don't Worry Enough\"\n\"Cultivation\"\n\"Herd Me\"\n\"R.S.x\"\n\"Plagued by Fear\"\n\"I Should Care\"\n\"The Importance of Being Folk Part II\"\n\"Harvest\"\n\nExternal links\nWhy Bother? at Official ADULT. Site\n\n2007 albums\nAdult (band) albums\nThrill Jockey albums",
"\"Llangollen Market\" is a song from early 19th century Wales. It is known to have been performed at an eisteddfod at Llangollen in 1858.\n\nThe text of the song survives in a manuscript held by the National Museum of Wales, which came into the possession of singer Mary Davies, a co-founder of the Welsh Folk-Song Society.\n\nThe song tells the tale of a young man from the Llangollen area going off to war and leaving behind his broken-hearted girlfriend. Originally written in English, the song has been translated into Welsh and recorded by several artists such as Siân James, Siobhan Owen, Calennig and Siwsann George.\n\nLyrics\nIt’s far beyond the mountains that look so distant here,\nTo fight his country’s battles, last Mayday went my dear;\nAh, well shall I remember with bitter sighs the day,\nWhy, Owen, did you leave me? At home why did I stay?\n\nAh, cruel was my father that did my flight restrain,\nAnd I was cruel-hearted that did at home remain,\nWith you, my love, contented, I’d journey far away;\nWhy, Owen, did you leave me? At home why did I stay?\n\nWhile thinking of my Owen, my eyes with tears do fill,\nAnd then my mother chides me because my wheel stands still,\nBut how can I think of spinning when my Owen’s far away;\nWhy, Owen, did you leave me? At home why did I stay?\n\nTo market at Llangollen each morning do I go,\nBut how to strike a bargain no longer do I know;\nMy father chides at evening, my mother all the day;\nWhy, Owen, did you leave me, at home why did I stay?\n\nOh, would it please kind heaven to shield my love from harm,\nTo clasp him to my bosom would every care disarm,\nBut alas, I fear, 'tis distant - that happy, happy day;\nWhy, Owen, did you leave me, at home why did stay?\n\nReferences\n\nWelsh folk songs"
]
|
[
"Albrecht Dürer",
"Nuremberg and the masterworks (1507-1520)",
"What are some of his masterworks?",
"Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (",
"Does he have more?",
"Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin,",
"Are these well known?",
"Between 1507 and 1511 Durer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings:",
"What is significant about Nuremberg?",
"Durer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520.",
"Why did he return?",
"His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists"
]
| C_4a4a9362ff664bba86e8c74ead6078c0_0 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | 6 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article aside from Dürer's artwork and return to Nuremberg? | Albrecht Dürer | Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Durer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini and--mainly through Lorenzo di Credi--Leonardo da Vinci. Between 1507 and 1511 Durer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Durer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted. Other works from this period include the thirty-seven woodcut subjects of the Little Passion, published first in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Indeed, complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. However, in 1513 and 1514 Durer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death, and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's treatise Enchiridion militis Christiani), St. Jerome in his Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Durer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Willibald Prickheimer. These drafts were later used to design the famous chandeliers lusterweibchen. In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. CANNOTANSWER | he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. | Albrecht Dürer (; ; ; 21 May 1471 – 6 April 1528), sometimes spelled in English as Durer (without an umlaut) or Duerer, was a German painter, printmaker, and theorist of the German Renaissance. Born in Nuremberg, Dürer established his reputation and influence across Europe in his twenties due to his high-quality woodcut prints. He was in contact with the major Italian artists of his time, including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini, and Leonardo da Vinci, and from 1512 was patronized by Emperor Maximilian I.
Dürer's vast body of work includes engravings, his preferred technique in his later prints, altarpieces, portraits and self-portraits, watercolours and books. The woodcuts series are more Gothic than the rest of his work. His well-known engravings include the three Meisterstiche (master prints) Knight, Death and the Devil (1513), Saint Jerome in his Study (1514), and Melencolia I (1514). His watercolours mark him as one of the first European landscape artists, while his woodcuts revolutionised the potential of that medium.
Dürer's introduction of classical motifs into Northern art, through his knowledge of Italian artists and German humanists, has secured his reputation as one of the most important figures of the Northern Renaissance. This is reinforced by his theoretical treatises, which involve principles of mathematics, perspective, and ideal proportions.
Biography
Early life (1471–1490)
Dürer was born on 21 May 1471, the third child and second son of Albrecht Dürer the Elder and Barbara Holper, who married in 1467 and had eighteen children together. Albrecht Dürer the Elder (originally Albrecht Ajtósi), was a successful goldsmith who by 1455 had moved to Nuremberg from Ajtós, near Gyula in Hungary. He married Holper, his master's daughter, when he himself qualified as a master. One of Albrecht's brothers, Hans Dürer, was also a painter and trained under him. Another of Albrecht's brothers, Endres Dürer, took over their father's business and was a master goldsmith. The German name "Dürer" is a translation from the Hungarian, "Ajtósi". Initially, it was "Türer", meaning doormaker, which is "ajtós" in Hungarian (from "ajtó", meaning door). A door is featured in the coat-of-arms the family acquired. Albrecht Dürer the Younger later changed "Türer", his father's diction of the family's surname, to "Dürer", to adapt to the local Nuremberg dialect.
Dürer's godfather Anton Koberger left goldsmithing to become a printer and publisher in the year of Dürer's birth. He became the most successful publisher in Germany, eventually owning twenty-four printing-presses and a number of offices in Germany and abroad. Koberger's most famous publication was the Nuremberg Chronicle, published in 1493 in German and Latin editions. It contained an unprecedented 1,809 woodcut illustrations (albeit with many repeated uses of the same block) by the Wolgemut workshop. Dürer may have worked on some of these, as the work on the project began while he was with Wolgemut.
Because Dürer left autobiographical writings and was widely known by his mid-twenties, his life is well documented in several sources. After a few years of school, Dürer learned the basics of goldsmithing and drawing from his father. Though his father wanted him to continue his training as a goldsmith, he showed such a precocious talent in drawing that he started as an apprentice to Michael Wolgemut at the age of fifteen in 1486. A self-portrait, a drawing in silverpoint, is dated 1484 (Albertina, Vienna) "when I was a child", as his later inscription says. The drawing is one of the earliest surviving children's drawings of any kind, and, as Dürer's Opus One, has helped define his oeuvre as deriving from, and always linked to, himself. Wolgemut was the leading artist in Nuremberg at the time, with a large workshop producing a variety of works of art, in particular woodcuts for books. Nuremberg was then an important and prosperous city, a centre for publishing and many luxury trades. It had strong links with Italy, especially Venice, a relatively short distance across the Alps.
Wanderjahre and marriage (1490–1494)
After completing his apprenticeship, Dürer followed the common German custom of taking Wanderjahre—in effect gap years—in which the apprentice learned skills from artists in other areas; Dürer was to spend about four years away. He left in 1490, possibly to work under Martin Schongauer, the leading engraver of Northern Europe, but who died shortly before Dürer's arrival at Colmar in 1492. It is unclear where Dürer travelled in the intervening period, though it is likely that he went to Frankfurt and the Netherlands. In Colmar, Dürer was welcomed by Schongauer's brothers, the goldsmiths Caspar and Paul and the painter Ludwig. In 1493 Dürer went to Strasbourg, where he would have experienced the sculpture of Nikolaus Gerhaert. Dürer's first painted self-portrait (now in the Louvre) was painted at this time, probably to be sent back to his fiancée in Nuremberg.
In early 1492 Dürer travelled to Basel to stay with another brother of Martin Schongauer, the goldsmith Georg. Very soon after his return to Nuremberg, on 7 July 1494, at the age of 23, Dürer was married to Agnes Frey following an arrangement made during his absence. Agnes was the daughter of a prominent brass worker (and amateur harpist) in the city. However, no children resulted from the marriage, and with Albrecht the Dürer name died out. The marriage between Agnes and Albrecht was not a generally happy one, as indicated by the letters of Dürer in which he quipped to Willibald Pirckheimer in an extremely rough tone about his wife. He called her an "old crow" and made other vulgar remarks. Pirckheimer also made no secret of his antipathy towards Agnes, describing her as a miserly shrew with a bitter tongue, who helped cause Dürer's death at a young age. One author speculates that Albrecht was bisexual, if not homosexual, due to several of his works containing themes of homosexual desire, as well as the intimate nature of his correspondence with certain very close male friends.
First journey to Italy (1494–1495)
Within three months of his marriage, Dürer left for Italy, alone, perhaps stimulated by an outbreak of plague in Nuremberg. He made watercolour sketches as he traveled over the Alps. Some have survived and others may be deduced from accurate landscapes of real places in his later work, for example his engraving Nemesis.
In Italy, he went to Venice to study its more advanced artistic world. Through Wolgemut's tutelage, Dürer had learned how to make prints in drypoint and design woodcuts in the German style, based on the works of Schongauer and the Housebook Master. He also would have had access to some Italian works in Germany, but the two visits he made to Italy had an enormous influence on him. He wrote that Giovanni Bellini was the oldest and still the best of the artists in Venice. His drawings and engravings show the influence of others, notably Antonio Pollaiuolo, with his interest in the proportions of the body; Lorenzo di Credi; and Andrea Mantegna, whose work he produced copies of while training. Dürer probably also visited Padua and Mantua on this trip.
Return to Nuremberg (1495–1505)
On his return to Nuremberg in 1495, Dürer opened his own workshop (being married was a requirement for this). Over the next five years, his style increasingly integrated Italian influences into underlying Northern forms. Arguably his best works in the first years of the workshop were his woodcut prints, mostly religious, but including secular scenes such as The Men's Bath House (ca. 1496). These were larger and more finely cut than the great majority of German woodcuts hitherto, and far more complex and balanced in composition.
It is now thought unlikely that Dürer cut any of the woodblocks himself; this task would have been performed by a specialist craftsman. However, his training in Wolgemut's studio, which made many carved and painted altarpieces and both designed and cut woodblocks for woodcut, evidently gave him great understanding of what the technique could be made to produce, and how to work with block cutters. Dürer either drew his design directly onto the woodblock itself, or glued a paper drawing to the block. Either way, his drawings were destroyed during the cutting of the block.
His series of sixteen designs for the Apocalypse is dated 1498, as is his engraving of St. Michael Fighting the Dragon. He made the first seven scenes of the Great Passion in the same year, and a little later, a series of eleven on the Holy Family and saints. The Seven Sorrows Polyptych, commissioned by Frederick III of Saxony in 1496, was executed by Dürer and his assistants c. 1500. In 1502, Dürer's father died. Around 1503–1505 Dürer produced the first 17 of a set illustrating the Life of the Virgin, which he did not finish for some years. Neither these nor the Great Passion were published as sets until several years later, but prints were sold individually in considerable numbers.
During the same period Dürer trained himself in the difficult art of using the burin to make engravings. It is possible he had begun learning this skill during his early training with his father, as it was also an essential skill of the goldsmith. In 1496 he executed the Prodigal Son, which the Italian Renaissance art historian Giorgio Vasari singled out for praise some decades later, noting its Germanic quality. He was soon producing some spectacular and original images, notably Nemesis (1502), The Sea Monster (1498), and Saint Eustace (c. 1501), with a highly detailed landscape background and animals. His landscapes of this period, such as Pond in the Woods and Willow Mill, are quite different from his earlier watercolours. There is a much greater emphasis on capturing atmosphere, rather than depicting topography. He made a number of Madonnas, single religious figures, and small scenes with comic peasant figures. Prints are highly portable and these works made Dürer famous throughout the main artistic centres of Europe within a very few years.
The Venetian artist Jacopo de' Barbari, whom Dürer had met in Venice, visited Nuremberg in 1500, and Dürer said that he learned much about the new developments in perspective, anatomy, and proportion from him. De' Barbari was unwilling to explain everything he knew, so Dürer began his own studies, which would become a lifelong preoccupation. A series of extant drawings show Dürer's experiments in human proportion, leading to the famous engraving of Adam and Eve (1504), which shows his subtlety while using the burin in the texturing of flesh surfaces. This is the only existing engraving signed with his full name.
Dürer created large numbers of preparatory drawings, especially for his paintings and engravings, and many survive, most famously the Betende Hände (Praying Hands) from circa 1508, a study for an apostle in the Heller altarpiece. He continued to make images in watercolour and bodycolour (usually combined), including a number of still lifes of meadow sections or animals, including his Young Hare (1502) and the Great Piece of Turf (1503).
Second journey to Italy (1505–1507)
In Italy, he returned to painting, at first producing a series of works executed in tempera on linen. These include portraits and altarpieces, notably, the Paumgartner altarpiece and the Adoration of the Magi. In early 1506, he returned to Venice and stayed there until the spring of 1507. By this time Dürer's engravings had attained great popularity and were being copied. In Venice he was given a valuable commission from the emigrant German community for the church of San Bartolomeo. This was the altar-piece known as the Adoration of the Virgin or the Feast of Rose Garlands. It includes portraits of members of Venice's German community, but shows a strong Italian influence. It was later acquired by the Emperor Rudolf II and taken to Prague.
Nuremberg and the masterworks (1507–1520)
Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Dürer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael.
Between 1507 and 1511 Dürer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Dürer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted.
Other works from this period include the thirty-seven Little Passion woodcuts, first published in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. In 1513 and 1514 Dürer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's Handbook of a Christian Knight), St. Jerome in His Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514, the year Dürer's mother died). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Dürer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Pirckheimer. These drafts were later used to design Lusterweibchen chandeliers, combining an antler with a wooden sculpture.
In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. His only experiments with etching came in this period, producing five between 1515–1516 and a sixth in 1518; a technique he may have abandoned as unsuited to his aesthetic of methodical, classical form.
Patronage of Maximilian I
From 1512, Maximilian I became Dürer's major patron. He commissioned The Triumphal Arch, a vast work printed from 192 separate blocks, the symbolism of which is partly informed by Pirckheimer's translation of Horapollo's Hieroglyphica. The design program and explanations were devised by Johannes Stabius, the architectural design by the master builder and court-painter Jörg Kölderer and the woodcutting itself by Hieronymous Andreae, with Dürer as designer-in-chief. The Arch was followed by The Triumphal Procession, the program of which was worked out in 1512 by Marx Treitz-Saurwein and includes woodcuts by Albrecht Altdorfer and Hans Springinklee, as well as Dürer.
Dürer worked with pen on the marginal images for an edition of the Emperor's printed Prayer-Book; these were quite unknown until facsimiles were published in 1808 as part of the first book published in lithography. Dürer's work on the book was halted for an unknown reason, and the decoration was continued by artists including Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Baldung. Dürer also made several portraits of the Emperor, including one shortly before Maximilian's death in 1519.
Maximilian was a very cash-strapped prince who sometimes failed to pay, yet turned out to be Dürer's most important patron. In his court, artists and learned men were respected, which was not common at that time (later, Dürer commented that in Germany, as a non-noble, he was treated a parasite). Pirckheimer (who he met in 1495, before entering the service of Maximilian) was also an important personage in the court and great cultural patron, who had a strong influence on Dürer as his tutor in classical knowledge and humanistic critical methodology, as well as collaborator.
In Maximilian's court, Dürer also collaborated with a great number of other brilliant artists and scholars of the time who became his friends, like Johannes Stabius, Konrad Peutinger, Conrad Celtes, and Hans Tscherte (an imperial architect).
Dürer manifested a strong pride in his ability, as a prince of his profession. One day, the emperor, trying to show Dürer an idea, tried to sketch with the charcoal himself, but always broke it. Dürer took the charcoal from Maximilian's hand, finished the drawing and told him: "This is my scepter."
In another occasion, Maximilian noticed that the ladder Dürer used was too short and unstable, thus told a noble to hold it for him. The noble refused, saying that it was beneath him to serve a non-noble. Maximilian then came to hold the ladder himself, and told the noble that he could make a noble out of a peasant any day, but he could not make an artist like Dürer out of a noble.
Cartographic and astronomical works
Dürer's exploration of space led to a relationship and cooperation with the court astronomer Johannes Stabius. Stabius also often acted as Dürer's and Maximilian's go-between for their financial problems.
In 1515 Dürer and Stabius created the first world map projected on a solid geometric sphere. Also in 1515, Stabius, Dürer and the astronomer Konrad Heinfogel produced the first planispheres of both southern and northerns hemispheres, as well as the first printed celestial maps, which prompted the revival of interest in the field of uranometry throughout Europe.
Journey to the Netherlands (1520–1521)
Maximilian's death came at a time when Dürer was concerned he was losing "my sight and freedom of hand" (perhaps caused by arthritis) and increasingly affected by the writings of Martin Luther. In July 1520 Dürer made his fourth and last major journey, to renew the Imperial pension Maximilian had given him and to secure the patronage of the new emperor, Charles V, who was to be crowned at Aachen. Dürer journeyed with his wife and her maid via the Rhine to Cologne and then to Antwerp, where he was well received and produced numerous drawings in silverpoint, chalk and charcoal. In addition to attending the coronation, he visited Cologne (where he admired the painting of Stefan Lochner), Nijmegen, 's-Hertogenbosch, Bruges (where he saw Michelangelo's Madonna of Bruges), Ghent (where he admired van Eyck's Ghent altarpiece), and Zeeland.
Dürer took a large stock of prints with him and wrote in his diary to whom he gave, exchanged or sold them, and for how much. This provides rare information of the monetary value placed on prints at this time. Unlike paintings, their sale was very rarely documented. While providing valuable documentary evidence, Dürer's Netherlandish diary also reveals that the trip was not a profitable one. For example, Dürer offered his last portrait of Maximilian to his daughter, Margaret of Austria, but eventually traded the picture for some white cloth after Margaret disliked the portrait and declined to accept it. During this trip he also met Bernard van Orley, Jan Provoost, Gerard Horenbout, Jean Mone, Joachim Patinir and Tommaso Vincidor, though he did not, it seems, meet Quentin Matsys.
Having secured his pension, Dürer returned home in July 1521, having caught an undetermined illness, which afflicted him for the rest of his life, and greatly reduced his rate of work.
Final years, Nuremberg (1521–1528)
On his return to Nuremberg, Dürer worked on a number of grand projects with religious themes, including a crucifixion scene and a Sacra conversazione, though neither was completed. This may have been due in part to his declining health, but perhaps also because of the time he gave to the preparation of his theoretical works on geometry and perspective, the proportions of men and horses, and fortification.
However, one consequence of this shift in emphasis was that during the last years of his life, Dürer produced comparatively little as an artist. In painting, there was only a portrait of Hieronymus Holtzschuher, a Madonna and Child (1526), Salvator Mundi (1526), and two panels showing St. John with St. Peter in background and St. Paul with St. Mark in the background. This last great work, the Four Apostles, was given by Dürer to the City of Nuremberg—although he was given 100 guilders in return.
As for engravings, Dürer's work was restricted to portraits and illustrations for his treatise. The portraits include Cardinal-Elector Albert of Mainz; Frederick the Wise, elector of Saxony; the humanist scholar Willibald Pirckheimer; Philipp Melanchthon, and Erasmus of Rotterdam. For those of the Cardinal, Melanchthon, and Dürer's final major work, a drawn portrait of the Nuremberg patrician Ulrich Starck, Dürer depicted the sitters in profile.
Despite complaining of his lack of a formal classical education, Dürer was greatly interested in intellectual matters and learned much from his boyhood friend Willibald Pirckheimer, whom he no doubt consulted on the content of many of his images. He also derived great satisfaction from his friendships and correspondence with Erasmus and other scholars. Dürer succeeded in producing two books during his lifetime. "The Four Books on Measurement" were published at Nuremberg in 1525 and was the first book for adults on mathematics in German, as well as being cited later by Galileo and Kepler. The other, a work on city fortifications, was published in 1527. "The Four Books on Human Proportion" were published posthumously, shortly after his death in 1528.
Dürer died in Nuremberg at the age of 56, leaving an estate valued at 6,874 florins – a considerable sum. He is buried in the Johannisfriedhof cemetery. His large house (purchased in 1509 from the heirs of the astronomer Bernhard Walther), where his workshop was located and where his widow lived until her death in 1539, remains a prominent Nuremberg landmark.
Dürer and the Reformation
Dürer's writings suggest that he may have been sympathetic to Luther's ideas, though it is unclear if he ever left the Catholic Church. Dürer wrote of his desire to draw Luther in his diary in 1520: "And God help me that I may go to Dr. Martin Luther; thus I intend to make a portrait of him with great care and engrave him on a copper plate to create a lasting memorial of the Christian man who helped me overcome so many difficulties." In a letter to Nicholas Kratzer in 1524, Dürer wrote, "because of our Christian faith we have to stand in scorn and danger, for we are reviled and called heretics". Most tellingly, Pirckheimer wrote in a letter to Johann Tscherte in 1530: "I confess that in the beginning I believed in Luther, like our Albert of blessed memory ... but as anyone can see, the situation has become worse." Dürer may even have contributed to the Nuremberg City Council's mandating Lutheran sermons and services in March 1525. Notably, Dürer had contacts with various reformers, such as Zwingli, Andreas Karlstadt, Melanchthon, Erasmus and Cornelius Grapheus from whom Dürer received Luther's Babylonian Captivity in 1520. Yet Erasmus and C. Grapheus are better said to be Catholic change agents. Also, from 1525, "the year that saw the peak and collapse of the Peasants' War, the artist can be seen to distance himself somewhat from the [Lutheran] movement..."
Dürer's later works have also been claimed to show Protestant sympathies. His 1523 The Last Supper woodcut has often been understood to have an evangelical theme, focusing as it does on Christ espousing the Gospel, as well as the inclusion of the Eucharistic cup, an expression of Protestant utraquism, although this interpretation has been questioned. The delaying of the engraving of St Philip, completed in 1523 but not distributed until 1526, may have been due to Dürer's uneasiness with images of saints; even if Dürer was not an iconoclast, in his last years he evaluated and questioned the role of art in religion.
Legacy and influence
Dürer exerted a huge influence on the artists of succeeding generations, especially in printmaking, the medium through which his contemporaries mostly experienced his art, as his paintings were predominantly in private collections located in only a few cities. His success in spreading his reputation across Europe through prints was undoubtedly an inspiration for major artists such as Raphael, Titian, and Parmigianino, all of whom collaborated with printmakers to promote and distribute their work.
His engravings seem to have had an intimidating effect upon his German successors; the "Little Masters" who attempted few large engravings but continued Dürer's themes in small, rather cramped compositions. Lucas van Leyden was the only Northern European engraver to successfully continue to produce large engravings in the first third of the 16th century. The generation of Italian engravers who trained in the shadow of Dürer all either directly copied parts of his landscape backgrounds (Giulio Campagnola, Giovanni Battista Palumba, Benedetto Montagna and Cristofano Robetta), or whole prints (Marcantonio Raimondi and Agostino Veneziano). However, Dürer's influence became less dominant after 1515, when Marcantonio perfected his new engraving style, which in turn travelled over the Alps to also dominate Northern engraving.
In painting, Dürer had relatively little influence in Italy, where probably only his altarpiece in Venice was seen, and his German successors were less effective in blending German and Italian styles. His intense and self-dramatizing self-portraits have continued to have a strong influence up to the present, especially on painters in the 19th and 20th century who desired a more dramatic portrait style. Dürer has never fallen from critical favour, and there have been significant revivals of interest in his works in Germany in the Dürer Renaissance of about 1570 to 1630, in the early nineteenth century, and in German nationalism from 1870 to 1945.
The Lutheran Church commemorates Dürer annually on 6 April, along with Michelangelo, Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Burgkmair. The liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (United States) remembers him, Cranach and Matthias Grünewald on 5 August.
Theoretical works
In all his theoretical works, in order to communicate his theories in the German language rather than in Latin, Dürer used graphic expressions based on a vernacular, craftsmen's language. For example, "Schneckenlinie" ("snail-line") was his term for a spiral form. Thus, Dürer contributed to the expansion in German prose which Luther had begun with his translation of the Bible.
Four Books on Measurement
Dürer's work on geometry is called the Four Books on Measurement (Underweysung der Messung mit dem Zirckel und Richtscheyt or Instructions for Measuring with Compass and Ruler). The first book focuses on linear geometry. Dürer's geometric constructions include helices, conchoids and epicycloids. He also draws on Apollonius, and Johannes Werner's 'Libellus super viginti duobus elementis conicis' of 1522.
The second book moves onto two-dimensional geometry, i.e. the construction of regular polygons. Here Dürer favours the methods of Ptolemy over Euclid. The third book applies these principles of geometry to architecture, engineering and typography.
In architecture Dürer cites Vitruvius but elaborates his own classical designs and columns. In typography, Dürer depicts the geometric construction of the Latin alphabet, relying on Italian precedent. However, his
construction of the Gothic alphabet is based upon an entirely different modular system. The fourth book completes the progression of the first and second by moving to three-dimensional forms and the construction of polyhedra. Here Dürer discusses the five Platonic solids, as well as seven Archimedean semi-regular solids, as well as several of his own invention.
In all these, Dürer shows the objects as nets. Finally, Dürer discusses the Delian Problem and moves on to the 'construzione legittima', a method of depicting a cube in two dimensions through linear perspective. He is thought to be the first to describe a visualization technique used in modern computers, ray tracing. It was in Bologna that Dürer was taught (possibly by Luca Pacioli or Bramante) the principles of linear perspective, and evidently became familiar with the 'costruzione legittima' in a written description of these principles found only, at this time, in the unpublished treatise of Piero della Francesca. He was also familiar with the 'abbreviated construction' as described by Alberti and the geometrical construction of shadows, a technique of Leonardo da Vinci. Although Dürer made no innovations in these areas, he is notable as the first Northern European to treat matters of visual representation in a scientific way, and with understanding of Euclidean principles. In addition to these geometrical constructions, Dürer discusses in this last book of Underweysung der Messung an assortment of mechanisms for drawing in perspective from models and provides woodcut illustrations of these methods that are often reproduced in discussions of perspective.
Four Books on Human Proportion
Dürer's work on human proportions is called the Four Books on Human Proportion (Vier Bücher von Menschlicher Proportion) of 1528. The first book was mainly composed by 1512/13 and completed by 1523, showing five differently constructed types of both male and female figures, all parts of the body expressed in fractions of the total height. Dürer based these constructions on both Vitruvius and empirical observations of "two to three hundred living persons", in his own words. The second book includes eight further types, broken down not into fractions but an Albertian system, which Dürer probably learned from Francesco di Giorgio's 'De harmonica mundi totius' of 1525. In the third book, Dürer gives principles by which the proportions of the figures can be modified, including the mathematical simulation of convex and concave mirrors; here Dürer also deals with human physiognomy. The fourth book is devoted to the theory of movement.
Appended to the last book, however, is a self-contained essay on aesthetics, which Dürer worked on between 1512 and 1528, and it is here that we learn of his theories concerning 'ideal beauty'. Dürer rejected Alberti's concept of an objective beauty, proposing a relativist notion of beauty based on variety. Nonetheless, Dürer still believed that truth was hidden within nature, and that there were rules which ordered beauty, even though he found it difficult to define the criteria for such a code. In 1512/13 his three criteria were function ('Nutz'), naïve approval ('Wohlgefallen') and the happy medium ('Mittelmass'). However, unlike Alberti and Leonardo, Dürer was most troubled by understanding not just the abstract notions of beauty but also as to how an artist can create beautiful images. Between 1512 and the final draft in 1528, Dürer's belief developed from an understanding of human creativity as spontaneous or inspired to a concept of 'selective inward synthesis'. In other words, that an artist builds on a wealth of visual experiences in order to imagine beautiful things. Dürer's belief in the abilities of a single artist over inspiration prompted him to assert that "one man may sketch something with his pen on half a sheet of paper in one day, or may cut it into a tiny piece of wood with his little iron, and it turns out to be better and more artistic than another's work at which its author labours with the utmost diligence for a whole year".
Book on Fortification
In 1527, Dürer also published Various Lessons on the Fortification of Cities, Castles, and Localities (Etliche Underricht zu Befestigung der Stett, Schloss und Flecken). It was printed in Nuremberg, probably by Hieronymus Andreae and reprinted in 1603 by Johan Janssenn in Arnhem. In 1535 it was also translated into Latin as On Cities, Forts, and Castles, Designed and Strengthened by Several Manners: Presented for the Most Necessary Accommodation of War (De vrbibus, arcibus, castellisque condendis, ac muniendis rationes aliquot : praesenti bellorum necessitati accommodatissimae), published by Christian Wechel (Wecheli/Wechelus) in Paris.
The work is less proscriptively theoretical than his other works, and was soon overshadowed by the Italian theory of polygonal fortification (the trace italienne – see Bastion fort), though his designs seem to have had some influence in the eastern German lands and up into the Baltic States.
Fencing
Dürer created many sketches and woodcuts of soldiers and knights over the course of his life. His most significant martial works, however, were made in 1512 as part of his efforts to secure the patronage of Maximilian I. Using existing manuscripts from the Nuremberg Group as his reference, his workshop produced the extensive Οπλοδιδασκαλια sive Armorvm Tractandorvm Meditatio Alberti Dvreri ("Weapon Training, or Albrecht Dürer's Meditation on the Handling of Weapons", MS 26-232). Another manuscript based on the Nuremberg texts as well as one of Hans Talhoffer's works, the untitled Berlin Picture Book (Libr.Pict.A.83), is also thought to have originated in his workshop around this time. These sketches and watercolors show the same careful attention to detail and human proportion as Dürer's other work, and his illustrations of grappling, long sword, dagger, and messer are among the highest-quality in any fencing manual.
Gallery
List of works
List of paintings by Albrecht Dürer
List of engravings by Albrecht Dürer
List of woodcuts by Albrecht Dürer
References
Notes
Citations
Sources
Bartrum, Giulia. Albrecht Dürer and his Legacy. London: British Museum Press, 2002.
Brand Philip, Lotte; Anzelewsky, Fedja. "The Portrait Diptych of Dürer's parents". Simiolus: Netherlands Quarterly for the History of Art, Volume 10, No. 1, 1978–79. 5–18
Brion, Marcel. Dürer. London: Thames and Hudson, 1960
Harbison, Craig. "Dürer and the Reformation: The Problem of the Re-dating of the St. Philip Engraving". The Art Bulletin, Vol. 58, No. 3, 368–373. September 1976
Koerner, Joseph Leo. The Moment of Self-Portraiture in German Renaissance Art. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 1993.
Landau David; Parshall, Peter. The Renaissance Print. Yale, 1996.
Panofsky, Erwin. The Life and Art of Albrecht Dürer. NJ: Princeton, 1945.
Price, David Hotchkiss. Albrecht Dürer's Renaissance: Humanism, Reformation and the Art of Faith. Michigan, 2003. .
Strauss, Walter L. (ed.). The Complete Engravings, Etchings and Drypoints of Albrecht Durer. Mineola NY: Dover Publications, 1973.
Borchert, Till-Holger. Van Eyck to Dürer: The Influence of Early Netherlandish painting on European Art, 1430–1530. London: Thames & Hudson, 2011.
Wolf, Norbert. Albrecht Dürer. Taschen, 2010.
Hoffmann, Rainer. Im Paradies - Adam und Eva und der Sündenfall - Albrecht Dürers Darstellungen, Böhlau-Verlag, 2021, ISBN 9783412523852
Further reading
Campbell Hutchison, Jane. Albrecht Dürer: A Biography. Princeton University Press, 1990.
Demele, Christine. Dürers Nacktheit – Das Weimarer Selbstbildnis. Rhema Verlag, Münster 2012,
Dürer, Albrecht (translated by R.T. Nichol from the Latin text), Of the Just Shaping of Letters, Dover Publications.
Hart, Vaughan. 'Navel Gazing. On Albrecht Dürer's Adam and Eve (1504)', The International Journal of Arts Theory and History, 2016, vol.12.1 pp. 1–10 https://doi.org/10.18848/2326-9960/CGP/v12i01/1-10
Korolija Fontana-Giusti, Gordana. "The Unconscious and Space: Venice and the work of Albrecht Dürer", in Architecture and the Unconscious, eds. J. Hendrix and L.Holm, Farnham Surrey: Ashgate, 2016. pp. 27–44, .
Wilhelm, Kurth (ed.). The Complete Woodcuts of Albrecht Durer, Dover Publications, 2000.
External links
The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Dürer Prints Close-up. Made to accompany The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Albrecht Dürer: Vier Bücher von menschlicher Proportion (Nuremberg, 1528). Selected pages scanned from the original work. Historical Anatomies on the Web. US National Library of Medicine.
"Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528)". In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Albrecht Durer, Exhibition, Albertina, Vienna. 20 September 2019 – 6 January 2020
1471 births
1528 deaths
15th-century engravers
15th-century German painters
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Artists from Nuremberg
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German Lutherans
German male painters
German people of Hungarian descent
German printmakers
German Renaissance painters
German Roman Catholics
Heraldic artists
Manuscript illuminators
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People celebrated in the Lutheran liturgical calendar
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Woodcut designers | true | [
"Přírodní park Třebíčsko (before Oblast klidu Třebíčsko) is a natural park near Třebíč in the Czech Republic. There are many interesting plants. The park was founded in 1983.\n\nKobylinec and Ptáčovský kopeček\n\nKobylinec is a natural monument situated ca 0,5 km from the village of Trnava.\nThe area of this monument is 0,44 ha. Pulsatilla grandis can be found here and in the Ptáčovský kopeček park near Ptáčov near Třebíč. Both monuments are very popular for tourists.\n\nPonds\n\nIn the natural park there are some interesting ponds such as Velký Bor, Malý Bor, Buršík near Přeckov and a brook Březinka. Dams on the brook are examples of European beaver activity.\n\nSyenitové skály near Pocoucov\n\nSyenitové skály (rocks of syenit) near Pocoucov is one of famed locations. There are interesting granite boulders. The area of the reservation is 0,77 ha.\n\nExternal links\nParts of this article or all article was translated from Czech. The original article is :cs:Přírodní park Třebíčsko.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nNature near the village Trnava which is there\n\nTřebíč\nParks in the Czech Republic\nTourist attractions in the Vysočina Region",
"Damn Interesting is an independent website founded by Alan Bellows in 2005. The website presents true stories from science, history, and psychology, primarily as long-form articles, often illustrated with original artwork. Works are written by various authors, and published at irregular intervals. The website openly rejects advertising, relying on reader and listener donations to cover operating costs.\n\nAs of October 2012, each article is also published as a podcast under the same name. In November 2019, a second podcast was launched under the title Damn Interesting Week, featuring unscripted commentary on an assortment of news articles featured on the website's \"Curated Links\" section that week. In mid-2020, a third podcast called Damn Interesting Curio Cabinet began highlighting the website's periodic short-form articles in the same radioplay format as the original podcast.\n\nIn July 2009, Damn Interesting published the print book Alien Hand Syndrome through Workman Publishing. It contains some favorites from the site and some exclusive content.\n\nAwards and recognition \nIn August 2007, PC Magazine named Damn Interesting one of the \"Top 100 Undiscovered Web Sites\".\nThe article \"The Zero-Armed Bandit\" by Alan Bellows won a 2015 Sidney Award from David Brooks in The New York Times.\nThe article \"Ghoulish Acts and Dastardly Deeds\" by Alan Bellows was cited as \"nonfiction journalism from 2017 that will stand the test of time\" by Conor Friedersdorf in The Atlantic.\nThe article \"Dupes and Duplicity\" by Jennifer Lee Noonan won a 2020 Sidney Award from David Brooks in the New York Times.\n\nAccusing The Dollop of plagiarism \n\nOn July 9, 2015, Bellows posted an open letter accusing The Dollop, a comedy podcast about history, of plagiarism due to their repeated use of verbatim text from Damn Interesting articles without permission or attribution. Dave Anthony, the writer of The Dollop, responded on reddit, admitting to using Damn Interesting content, but claiming that the use was protected by fair use, and that \"historical facts are not copyrightable.\" In an article about the controversy on Plagiarism Today, Jonathan Bailey concluded, \"Any way one looks at it, The Dollop failed its ethical obligations to all of the people, not just those writing for Damn Interesting, who put in the time, energy and expertise into writing the original content upon which their show is based.\"\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Official website\n\n2005 podcast debuts"
]
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[
"Albrecht Dürer",
"Nuremberg and the masterworks (1507-1520)",
"What are some of his masterworks?",
"Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (",
"Does he have more?",
"Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin,",
"Are these well known?",
"Between 1507 and 1511 Durer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings:",
"What is significant about Nuremberg?",
"Durer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520.",
"Why did he return?",
"His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself."
]
| C_4a4a9362ff664bba86e8c74ead6078c0_0 | Did he receive any special tributes or recognition? | 7 | Did Dürer receive any special tributes or recognition? | Albrecht Dürer | Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Durer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini and--mainly through Lorenzo di Credi--Leonardo da Vinci. Between 1507 and 1511 Durer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Durer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted. Other works from this period include the thirty-seven woodcut subjects of the Little Passion, published first in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Indeed, complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. However, in 1513 and 1514 Durer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death, and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's treatise Enchiridion militis Christiani), St. Jerome in his Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Durer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Willibald Prickheimer. These drafts were later used to design the famous chandeliers lusterweibchen. In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Albrecht Dürer (; ; ; 21 May 1471 – 6 April 1528), sometimes spelled in English as Durer (without an umlaut) or Duerer, was a German painter, printmaker, and theorist of the German Renaissance. Born in Nuremberg, Dürer established his reputation and influence across Europe in his twenties due to his high-quality woodcut prints. He was in contact with the major Italian artists of his time, including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini, and Leonardo da Vinci, and from 1512 was patronized by Emperor Maximilian I.
Dürer's vast body of work includes engravings, his preferred technique in his later prints, altarpieces, portraits and self-portraits, watercolours and books. The woodcuts series are more Gothic than the rest of his work. His well-known engravings include the three Meisterstiche (master prints) Knight, Death and the Devil (1513), Saint Jerome in his Study (1514), and Melencolia I (1514). His watercolours mark him as one of the first European landscape artists, while his woodcuts revolutionised the potential of that medium.
Dürer's introduction of classical motifs into Northern art, through his knowledge of Italian artists and German humanists, has secured his reputation as one of the most important figures of the Northern Renaissance. This is reinforced by his theoretical treatises, which involve principles of mathematics, perspective, and ideal proportions.
Biography
Early life (1471–1490)
Dürer was born on 21 May 1471, the third child and second son of Albrecht Dürer the Elder and Barbara Holper, who married in 1467 and had eighteen children together. Albrecht Dürer the Elder (originally Albrecht Ajtósi), was a successful goldsmith who by 1455 had moved to Nuremberg from Ajtós, near Gyula in Hungary. He married Holper, his master's daughter, when he himself qualified as a master. One of Albrecht's brothers, Hans Dürer, was also a painter and trained under him. Another of Albrecht's brothers, Endres Dürer, took over their father's business and was a master goldsmith. The German name "Dürer" is a translation from the Hungarian, "Ajtósi". Initially, it was "Türer", meaning doormaker, which is "ajtós" in Hungarian (from "ajtó", meaning door). A door is featured in the coat-of-arms the family acquired. Albrecht Dürer the Younger later changed "Türer", his father's diction of the family's surname, to "Dürer", to adapt to the local Nuremberg dialect.
Dürer's godfather Anton Koberger left goldsmithing to become a printer and publisher in the year of Dürer's birth. He became the most successful publisher in Germany, eventually owning twenty-four printing-presses and a number of offices in Germany and abroad. Koberger's most famous publication was the Nuremberg Chronicle, published in 1493 in German and Latin editions. It contained an unprecedented 1,809 woodcut illustrations (albeit with many repeated uses of the same block) by the Wolgemut workshop. Dürer may have worked on some of these, as the work on the project began while he was with Wolgemut.
Because Dürer left autobiographical writings and was widely known by his mid-twenties, his life is well documented in several sources. After a few years of school, Dürer learned the basics of goldsmithing and drawing from his father. Though his father wanted him to continue his training as a goldsmith, he showed such a precocious talent in drawing that he started as an apprentice to Michael Wolgemut at the age of fifteen in 1486. A self-portrait, a drawing in silverpoint, is dated 1484 (Albertina, Vienna) "when I was a child", as his later inscription says. The drawing is one of the earliest surviving children's drawings of any kind, and, as Dürer's Opus One, has helped define his oeuvre as deriving from, and always linked to, himself. Wolgemut was the leading artist in Nuremberg at the time, with a large workshop producing a variety of works of art, in particular woodcuts for books. Nuremberg was then an important and prosperous city, a centre for publishing and many luxury trades. It had strong links with Italy, especially Venice, a relatively short distance across the Alps.
Wanderjahre and marriage (1490–1494)
After completing his apprenticeship, Dürer followed the common German custom of taking Wanderjahre—in effect gap years—in which the apprentice learned skills from artists in other areas; Dürer was to spend about four years away. He left in 1490, possibly to work under Martin Schongauer, the leading engraver of Northern Europe, but who died shortly before Dürer's arrival at Colmar in 1492. It is unclear where Dürer travelled in the intervening period, though it is likely that he went to Frankfurt and the Netherlands. In Colmar, Dürer was welcomed by Schongauer's brothers, the goldsmiths Caspar and Paul and the painter Ludwig. In 1493 Dürer went to Strasbourg, where he would have experienced the sculpture of Nikolaus Gerhaert. Dürer's first painted self-portrait (now in the Louvre) was painted at this time, probably to be sent back to his fiancée in Nuremberg.
In early 1492 Dürer travelled to Basel to stay with another brother of Martin Schongauer, the goldsmith Georg. Very soon after his return to Nuremberg, on 7 July 1494, at the age of 23, Dürer was married to Agnes Frey following an arrangement made during his absence. Agnes was the daughter of a prominent brass worker (and amateur harpist) in the city. However, no children resulted from the marriage, and with Albrecht the Dürer name died out. The marriage between Agnes and Albrecht was not a generally happy one, as indicated by the letters of Dürer in which he quipped to Willibald Pirckheimer in an extremely rough tone about his wife. He called her an "old crow" and made other vulgar remarks. Pirckheimer also made no secret of his antipathy towards Agnes, describing her as a miserly shrew with a bitter tongue, who helped cause Dürer's death at a young age. One author speculates that Albrecht was bisexual, if not homosexual, due to several of his works containing themes of homosexual desire, as well as the intimate nature of his correspondence with certain very close male friends.
First journey to Italy (1494–1495)
Within three months of his marriage, Dürer left for Italy, alone, perhaps stimulated by an outbreak of plague in Nuremberg. He made watercolour sketches as he traveled over the Alps. Some have survived and others may be deduced from accurate landscapes of real places in his later work, for example his engraving Nemesis.
In Italy, he went to Venice to study its more advanced artistic world. Through Wolgemut's tutelage, Dürer had learned how to make prints in drypoint and design woodcuts in the German style, based on the works of Schongauer and the Housebook Master. He also would have had access to some Italian works in Germany, but the two visits he made to Italy had an enormous influence on him. He wrote that Giovanni Bellini was the oldest and still the best of the artists in Venice. His drawings and engravings show the influence of others, notably Antonio Pollaiuolo, with his interest in the proportions of the body; Lorenzo di Credi; and Andrea Mantegna, whose work he produced copies of while training. Dürer probably also visited Padua and Mantua on this trip.
Return to Nuremberg (1495–1505)
On his return to Nuremberg in 1495, Dürer opened his own workshop (being married was a requirement for this). Over the next five years, his style increasingly integrated Italian influences into underlying Northern forms. Arguably his best works in the first years of the workshop were his woodcut prints, mostly religious, but including secular scenes such as The Men's Bath House (ca. 1496). These were larger and more finely cut than the great majority of German woodcuts hitherto, and far more complex and balanced in composition.
It is now thought unlikely that Dürer cut any of the woodblocks himself; this task would have been performed by a specialist craftsman. However, his training in Wolgemut's studio, which made many carved and painted altarpieces and both designed and cut woodblocks for woodcut, evidently gave him great understanding of what the technique could be made to produce, and how to work with block cutters. Dürer either drew his design directly onto the woodblock itself, or glued a paper drawing to the block. Either way, his drawings were destroyed during the cutting of the block.
His series of sixteen designs for the Apocalypse is dated 1498, as is his engraving of St. Michael Fighting the Dragon. He made the first seven scenes of the Great Passion in the same year, and a little later, a series of eleven on the Holy Family and saints. The Seven Sorrows Polyptych, commissioned by Frederick III of Saxony in 1496, was executed by Dürer and his assistants c. 1500. In 1502, Dürer's father died. Around 1503–1505 Dürer produced the first 17 of a set illustrating the Life of the Virgin, which he did not finish for some years. Neither these nor the Great Passion were published as sets until several years later, but prints were sold individually in considerable numbers.
During the same period Dürer trained himself in the difficult art of using the burin to make engravings. It is possible he had begun learning this skill during his early training with his father, as it was also an essential skill of the goldsmith. In 1496 he executed the Prodigal Son, which the Italian Renaissance art historian Giorgio Vasari singled out for praise some decades later, noting its Germanic quality. He was soon producing some spectacular and original images, notably Nemesis (1502), The Sea Monster (1498), and Saint Eustace (c. 1501), with a highly detailed landscape background and animals. His landscapes of this period, such as Pond in the Woods and Willow Mill, are quite different from his earlier watercolours. There is a much greater emphasis on capturing atmosphere, rather than depicting topography. He made a number of Madonnas, single religious figures, and small scenes with comic peasant figures. Prints are highly portable and these works made Dürer famous throughout the main artistic centres of Europe within a very few years.
The Venetian artist Jacopo de' Barbari, whom Dürer had met in Venice, visited Nuremberg in 1500, and Dürer said that he learned much about the new developments in perspective, anatomy, and proportion from him. De' Barbari was unwilling to explain everything he knew, so Dürer began his own studies, which would become a lifelong preoccupation. A series of extant drawings show Dürer's experiments in human proportion, leading to the famous engraving of Adam and Eve (1504), which shows his subtlety while using the burin in the texturing of flesh surfaces. This is the only existing engraving signed with his full name.
Dürer created large numbers of preparatory drawings, especially for his paintings and engravings, and many survive, most famously the Betende Hände (Praying Hands) from circa 1508, a study for an apostle in the Heller altarpiece. He continued to make images in watercolour and bodycolour (usually combined), including a number of still lifes of meadow sections or animals, including his Young Hare (1502) and the Great Piece of Turf (1503).
Second journey to Italy (1505–1507)
In Italy, he returned to painting, at first producing a series of works executed in tempera on linen. These include portraits and altarpieces, notably, the Paumgartner altarpiece and the Adoration of the Magi. In early 1506, he returned to Venice and stayed there until the spring of 1507. By this time Dürer's engravings had attained great popularity and were being copied. In Venice he was given a valuable commission from the emigrant German community for the church of San Bartolomeo. This was the altar-piece known as the Adoration of the Virgin or the Feast of Rose Garlands. It includes portraits of members of Venice's German community, but shows a strong Italian influence. It was later acquired by the Emperor Rudolf II and taken to Prague.
Nuremberg and the masterworks (1507–1520)
Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Dürer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael.
Between 1507 and 1511 Dürer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Dürer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted.
Other works from this period include the thirty-seven Little Passion woodcuts, first published in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. In 1513 and 1514 Dürer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's Handbook of a Christian Knight), St. Jerome in His Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514, the year Dürer's mother died). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Dürer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Pirckheimer. These drafts were later used to design Lusterweibchen chandeliers, combining an antler with a wooden sculpture.
In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. His only experiments with etching came in this period, producing five between 1515–1516 and a sixth in 1518; a technique he may have abandoned as unsuited to his aesthetic of methodical, classical form.
Patronage of Maximilian I
From 1512, Maximilian I became Dürer's major patron. He commissioned The Triumphal Arch, a vast work printed from 192 separate blocks, the symbolism of which is partly informed by Pirckheimer's translation of Horapollo's Hieroglyphica. The design program and explanations were devised by Johannes Stabius, the architectural design by the master builder and court-painter Jörg Kölderer and the woodcutting itself by Hieronymous Andreae, with Dürer as designer-in-chief. The Arch was followed by The Triumphal Procession, the program of which was worked out in 1512 by Marx Treitz-Saurwein and includes woodcuts by Albrecht Altdorfer and Hans Springinklee, as well as Dürer.
Dürer worked with pen on the marginal images for an edition of the Emperor's printed Prayer-Book; these were quite unknown until facsimiles were published in 1808 as part of the first book published in lithography. Dürer's work on the book was halted for an unknown reason, and the decoration was continued by artists including Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Baldung. Dürer also made several portraits of the Emperor, including one shortly before Maximilian's death in 1519.
Maximilian was a very cash-strapped prince who sometimes failed to pay, yet turned out to be Dürer's most important patron. In his court, artists and learned men were respected, which was not common at that time (later, Dürer commented that in Germany, as a non-noble, he was treated a parasite). Pirckheimer (who he met in 1495, before entering the service of Maximilian) was also an important personage in the court and great cultural patron, who had a strong influence on Dürer as his tutor in classical knowledge and humanistic critical methodology, as well as collaborator.
In Maximilian's court, Dürer also collaborated with a great number of other brilliant artists and scholars of the time who became his friends, like Johannes Stabius, Konrad Peutinger, Conrad Celtes, and Hans Tscherte (an imperial architect).
Dürer manifested a strong pride in his ability, as a prince of his profession. One day, the emperor, trying to show Dürer an idea, tried to sketch with the charcoal himself, but always broke it. Dürer took the charcoal from Maximilian's hand, finished the drawing and told him: "This is my scepter."
In another occasion, Maximilian noticed that the ladder Dürer used was too short and unstable, thus told a noble to hold it for him. The noble refused, saying that it was beneath him to serve a non-noble. Maximilian then came to hold the ladder himself, and told the noble that he could make a noble out of a peasant any day, but he could not make an artist like Dürer out of a noble.
Cartographic and astronomical works
Dürer's exploration of space led to a relationship and cooperation with the court astronomer Johannes Stabius. Stabius also often acted as Dürer's and Maximilian's go-between for their financial problems.
In 1515 Dürer and Stabius created the first world map projected on a solid geometric sphere. Also in 1515, Stabius, Dürer and the astronomer Konrad Heinfogel produced the first planispheres of both southern and northerns hemispheres, as well as the first printed celestial maps, which prompted the revival of interest in the field of uranometry throughout Europe.
Journey to the Netherlands (1520–1521)
Maximilian's death came at a time when Dürer was concerned he was losing "my sight and freedom of hand" (perhaps caused by arthritis) and increasingly affected by the writings of Martin Luther. In July 1520 Dürer made his fourth and last major journey, to renew the Imperial pension Maximilian had given him and to secure the patronage of the new emperor, Charles V, who was to be crowned at Aachen. Dürer journeyed with his wife and her maid via the Rhine to Cologne and then to Antwerp, where he was well received and produced numerous drawings in silverpoint, chalk and charcoal. In addition to attending the coronation, he visited Cologne (where he admired the painting of Stefan Lochner), Nijmegen, 's-Hertogenbosch, Bruges (where he saw Michelangelo's Madonna of Bruges), Ghent (where he admired van Eyck's Ghent altarpiece), and Zeeland.
Dürer took a large stock of prints with him and wrote in his diary to whom he gave, exchanged or sold them, and for how much. This provides rare information of the monetary value placed on prints at this time. Unlike paintings, their sale was very rarely documented. While providing valuable documentary evidence, Dürer's Netherlandish diary also reveals that the trip was not a profitable one. For example, Dürer offered his last portrait of Maximilian to his daughter, Margaret of Austria, but eventually traded the picture for some white cloth after Margaret disliked the portrait and declined to accept it. During this trip he also met Bernard van Orley, Jan Provoost, Gerard Horenbout, Jean Mone, Joachim Patinir and Tommaso Vincidor, though he did not, it seems, meet Quentin Matsys.
Having secured his pension, Dürer returned home in July 1521, having caught an undetermined illness, which afflicted him for the rest of his life, and greatly reduced his rate of work.
Final years, Nuremberg (1521–1528)
On his return to Nuremberg, Dürer worked on a number of grand projects with religious themes, including a crucifixion scene and a Sacra conversazione, though neither was completed. This may have been due in part to his declining health, but perhaps also because of the time he gave to the preparation of his theoretical works on geometry and perspective, the proportions of men and horses, and fortification.
However, one consequence of this shift in emphasis was that during the last years of his life, Dürer produced comparatively little as an artist. In painting, there was only a portrait of Hieronymus Holtzschuher, a Madonna and Child (1526), Salvator Mundi (1526), and two panels showing St. John with St. Peter in background and St. Paul with St. Mark in the background. This last great work, the Four Apostles, was given by Dürer to the City of Nuremberg—although he was given 100 guilders in return.
As for engravings, Dürer's work was restricted to portraits and illustrations for his treatise. The portraits include Cardinal-Elector Albert of Mainz; Frederick the Wise, elector of Saxony; the humanist scholar Willibald Pirckheimer; Philipp Melanchthon, and Erasmus of Rotterdam. For those of the Cardinal, Melanchthon, and Dürer's final major work, a drawn portrait of the Nuremberg patrician Ulrich Starck, Dürer depicted the sitters in profile.
Despite complaining of his lack of a formal classical education, Dürer was greatly interested in intellectual matters and learned much from his boyhood friend Willibald Pirckheimer, whom he no doubt consulted on the content of many of his images. He also derived great satisfaction from his friendships and correspondence with Erasmus and other scholars. Dürer succeeded in producing two books during his lifetime. "The Four Books on Measurement" were published at Nuremberg in 1525 and was the first book for adults on mathematics in German, as well as being cited later by Galileo and Kepler. The other, a work on city fortifications, was published in 1527. "The Four Books on Human Proportion" were published posthumously, shortly after his death in 1528.
Dürer died in Nuremberg at the age of 56, leaving an estate valued at 6,874 florins – a considerable sum. He is buried in the Johannisfriedhof cemetery. His large house (purchased in 1509 from the heirs of the astronomer Bernhard Walther), where his workshop was located and where his widow lived until her death in 1539, remains a prominent Nuremberg landmark.
Dürer and the Reformation
Dürer's writings suggest that he may have been sympathetic to Luther's ideas, though it is unclear if he ever left the Catholic Church. Dürer wrote of his desire to draw Luther in his diary in 1520: "And God help me that I may go to Dr. Martin Luther; thus I intend to make a portrait of him with great care and engrave him on a copper plate to create a lasting memorial of the Christian man who helped me overcome so many difficulties." In a letter to Nicholas Kratzer in 1524, Dürer wrote, "because of our Christian faith we have to stand in scorn and danger, for we are reviled and called heretics". Most tellingly, Pirckheimer wrote in a letter to Johann Tscherte in 1530: "I confess that in the beginning I believed in Luther, like our Albert of blessed memory ... but as anyone can see, the situation has become worse." Dürer may even have contributed to the Nuremberg City Council's mandating Lutheran sermons and services in March 1525. Notably, Dürer had contacts with various reformers, such as Zwingli, Andreas Karlstadt, Melanchthon, Erasmus and Cornelius Grapheus from whom Dürer received Luther's Babylonian Captivity in 1520. Yet Erasmus and C. Grapheus are better said to be Catholic change agents. Also, from 1525, "the year that saw the peak and collapse of the Peasants' War, the artist can be seen to distance himself somewhat from the [Lutheran] movement..."
Dürer's later works have also been claimed to show Protestant sympathies. His 1523 The Last Supper woodcut has often been understood to have an evangelical theme, focusing as it does on Christ espousing the Gospel, as well as the inclusion of the Eucharistic cup, an expression of Protestant utraquism, although this interpretation has been questioned. The delaying of the engraving of St Philip, completed in 1523 but not distributed until 1526, may have been due to Dürer's uneasiness with images of saints; even if Dürer was not an iconoclast, in his last years he evaluated and questioned the role of art in religion.
Legacy and influence
Dürer exerted a huge influence on the artists of succeeding generations, especially in printmaking, the medium through which his contemporaries mostly experienced his art, as his paintings were predominantly in private collections located in only a few cities. His success in spreading his reputation across Europe through prints was undoubtedly an inspiration for major artists such as Raphael, Titian, and Parmigianino, all of whom collaborated with printmakers to promote and distribute their work.
His engravings seem to have had an intimidating effect upon his German successors; the "Little Masters" who attempted few large engravings but continued Dürer's themes in small, rather cramped compositions. Lucas van Leyden was the only Northern European engraver to successfully continue to produce large engravings in the first third of the 16th century. The generation of Italian engravers who trained in the shadow of Dürer all either directly copied parts of his landscape backgrounds (Giulio Campagnola, Giovanni Battista Palumba, Benedetto Montagna and Cristofano Robetta), or whole prints (Marcantonio Raimondi and Agostino Veneziano). However, Dürer's influence became less dominant after 1515, when Marcantonio perfected his new engraving style, which in turn travelled over the Alps to also dominate Northern engraving.
In painting, Dürer had relatively little influence in Italy, where probably only his altarpiece in Venice was seen, and his German successors were less effective in blending German and Italian styles. His intense and self-dramatizing self-portraits have continued to have a strong influence up to the present, especially on painters in the 19th and 20th century who desired a more dramatic portrait style. Dürer has never fallen from critical favour, and there have been significant revivals of interest in his works in Germany in the Dürer Renaissance of about 1570 to 1630, in the early nineteenth century, and in German nationalism from 1870 to 1945.
The Lutheran Church commemorates Dürer annually on 6 April, along with Michelangelo, Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Burgkmair. The liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (United States) remembers him, Cranach and Matthias Grünewald on 5 August.
Theoretical works
In all his theoretical works, in order to communicate his theories in the German language rather than in Latin, Dürer used graphic expressions based on a vernacular, craftsmen's language. For example, "Schneckenlinie" ("snail-line") was his term for a spiral form. Thus, Dürer contributed to the expansion in German prose which Luther had begun with his translation of the Bible.
Four Books on Measurement
Dürer's work on geometry is called the Four Books on Measurement (Underweysung der Messung mit dem Zirckel und Richtscheyt or Instructions for Measuring with Compass and Ruler). The first book focuses on linear geometry. Dürer's geometric constructions include helices, conchoids and epicycloids. He also draws on Apollonius, and Johannes Werner's 'Libellus super viginti duobus elementis conicis' of 1522.
The second book moves onto two-dimensional geometry, i.e. the construction of regular polygons. Here Dürer favours the methods of Ptolemy over Euclid. The third book applies these principles of geometry to architecture, engineering and typography.
In architecture Dürer cites Vitruvius but elaborates his own classical designs and columns. In typography, Dürer depicts the geometric construction of the Latin alphabet, relying on Italian precedent. However, his
construction of the Gothic alphabet is based upon an entirely different modular system. The fourth book completes the progression of the first and second by moving to three-dimensional forms and the construction of polyhedra. Here Dürer discusses the five Platonic solids, as well as seven Archimedean semi-regular solids, as well as several of his own invention.
In all these, Dürer shows the objects as nets. Finally, Dürer discusses the Delian Problem and moves on to the 'construzione legittima', a method of depicting a cube in two dimensions through linear perspective. He is thought to be the first to describe a visualization technique used in modern computers, ray tracing. It was in Bologna that Dürer was taught (possibly by Luca Pacioli or Bramante) the principles of linear perspective, and evidently became familiar with the 'costruzione legittima' in a written description of these principles found only, at this time, in the unpublished treatise of Piero della Francesca. He was also familiar with the 'abbreviated construction' as described by Alberti and the geometrical construction of shadows, a technique of Leonardo da Vinci. Although Dürer made no innovations in these areas, he is notable as the first Northern European to treat matters of visual representation in a scientific way, and with understanding of Euclidean principles. In addition to these geometrical constructions, Dürer discusses in this last book of Underweysung der Messung an assortment of mechanisms for drawing in perspective from models and provides woodcut illustrations of these methods that are often reproduced in discussions of perspective.
Four Books on Human Proportion
Dürer's work on human proportions is called the Four Books on Human Proportion (Vier Bücher von Menschlicher Proportion) of 1528. The first book was mainly composed by 1512/13 and completed by 1523, showing five differently constructed types of both male and female figures, all parts of the body expressed in fractions of the total height. Dürer based these constructions on both Vitruvius and empirical observations of "two to three hundred living persons", in his own words. The second book includes eight further types, broken down not into fractions but an Albertian system, which Dürer probably learned from Francesco di Giorgio's 'De harmonica mundi totius' of 1525. In the third book, Dürer gives principles by which the proportions of the figures can be modified, including the mathematical simulation of convex and concave mirrors; here Dürer also deals with human physiognomy. The fourth book is devoted to the theory of movement.
Appended to the last book, however, is a self-contained essay on aesthetics, which Dürer worked on between 1512 and 1528, and it is here that we learn of his theories concerning 'ideal beauty'. Dürer rejected Alberti's concept of an objective beauty, proposing a relativist notion of beauty based on variety. Nonetheless, Dürer still believed that truth was hidden within nature, and that there were rules which ordered beauty, even though he found it difficult to define the criteria for such a code. In 1512/13 his three criteria were function ('Nutz'), naïve approval ('Wohlgefallen') and the happy medium ('Mittelmass'). However, unlike Alberti and Leonardo, Dürer was most troubled by understanding not just the abstract notions of beauty but also as to how an artist can create beautiful images. Between 1512 and the final draft in 1528, Dürer's belief developed from an understanding of human creativity as spontaneous or inspired to a concept of 'selective inward synthesis'. In other words, that an artist builds on a wealth of visual experiences in order to imagine beautiful things. Dürer's belief in the abilities of a single artist over inspiration prompted him to assert that "one man may sketch something with his pen on half a sheet of paper in one day, or may cut it into a tiny piece of wood with his little iron, and it turns out to be better and more artistic than another's work at which its author labours with the utmost diligence for a whole year".
Book on Fortification
In 1527, Dürer also published Various Lessons on the Fortification of Cities, Castles, and Localities (Etliche Underricht zu Befestigung der Stett, Schloss und Flecken). It was printed in Nuremberg, probably by Hieronymus Andreae and reprinted in 1603 by Johan Janssenn in Arnhem. In 1535 it was also translated into Latin as On Cities, Forts, and Castles, Designed and Strengthened by Several Manners: Presented for the Most Necessary Accommodation of War (De vrbibus, arcibus, castellisque condendis, ac muniendis rationes aliquot : praesenti bellorum necessitati accommodatissimae), published by Christian Wechel (Wecheli/Wechelus) in Paris.
The work is less proscriptively theoretical than his other works, and was soon overshadowed by the Italian theory of polygonal fortification (the trace italienne – see Bastion fort), though his designs seem to have had some influence in the eastern German lands and up into the Baltic States.
Fencing
Dürer created many sketches and woodcuts of soldiers and knights over the course of his life. His most significant martial works, however, were made in 1512 as part of his efforts to secure the patronage of Maximilian I. Using existing manuscripts from the Nuremberg Group as his reference, his workshop produced the extensive Οπλοδιδασκαλια sive Armorvm Tractandorvm Meditatio Alberti Dvreri ("Weapon Training, or Albrecht Dürer's Meditation on the Handling of Weapons", MS 26-232). Another manuscript based on the Nuremberg texts as well as one of Hans Talhoffer's works, the untitled Berlin Picture Book (Libr.Pict.A.83), is also thought to have originated in his workshop around this time. These sketches and watercolors show the same careful attention to detail and human proportion as Dürer's other work, and his illustrations of grappling, long sword, dagger, and messer are among the highest-quality in any fencing manual.
Gallery
List of works
List of paintings by Albrecht Dürer
List of engravings by Albrecht Dürer
List of woodcuts by Albrecht Dürer
References
Notes
Citations
Sources
Bartrum, Giulia. Albrecht Dürer and his Legacy. London: British Museum Press, 2002.
Brand Philip, Lotte; Anzelewsky, Fedja. "The Portrait Diptych of Dürer's parents". Simiolus: Netherlands Quarterly for the History of Art, Volume 10, No. 1, 1978–79. 5–18
Brion, Marcel. Dürer. London: Thames and Hudson, 1960
Harbison, Craig. "Dürer and the Reformation: The Problem of the Re-dating of the St. Philip Engraving". The Art Bulletin, Vol. 58, No. 3, 368–373. September 1976
Koerner, Joseph Leo. The Moment of Self-Portraiture in German Renaissance Art. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 1993.
Landau David; Parshall, Peter. The Renaissance Print. Yale, 1996.
Panofsky, Erwin. The Life and Art of Albrecht Dürer. NJ: Princeton, 1945.
Price, David Hotchkiss. Albrecht Dürer's Renaissance: Humanism, Reformation and the Art of Faith. Michigan, 2003. .
Strauss, Walter L. (ed.). The Complete Engravings, Etchings and Drypoints of Albrecht Durer. Mineola NY: Dover Publications, 1973.
Borchert, Till-Holger. Van Eyck to Dürer: The Influence of Early Netherlandish painting on European Art, 1430–1530. London: Thames & Hudson, 2011.
Wolf, Norbert. Albrecht Dürer. Taschen, 2010.
Hoffmann, Rainer. Im Paradies - Adam und Eva und der Sündenfall - Albrecht Dürers Darstellungen, Böhlau-Verlag, 2021, ISBN 9783412523852
Further reading
Campbell Hutchison, Jane. Albrecht Dürer: A Biography. Princeton University Press, 1990.
Demele, Christine. Dürers Nacktheit – Das Weimarer Selbstbildnis. Rhema Verlag, Münster 2012,
Dürer, Albrecht (translated by R.T. Nichol from the Latin text), Of the Just Shaping of Letters, Dover Publications.
Hart, Vaughan. 'Navel Gazing. On Albrecht Dürer's Adam and Eve (1504)', The International Journal of Arts Theory and History, 2016, vol.12.1 pp. 1–10 https://doi.org/10.18848/2326-9960/CGP/v12i01/1-10
Korolija Fontana-Giusti, Gordana. "The Unconscious and Space: Venice and the work of Albrecht Dürer", in Architecture and the Unconscious, eds. J. Hendrix and L.Holm, Farnham Surrey: Ashgate, 2016. pp. 27–44, .
Wilhelm, Kurth (ed.). The Complete Woodcuts of Albrecht Durer, Dover Publications, 2000.
External links
The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Dürer Prints Close-up. Made to accompany The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Albrecht Dürer: Vier Bücher von menschlicher Proportion (Nuremberg, 1528). Selected pages scanned from the original work. Historical Anatomies on the Web. US National Library of Medicine.
"Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528)". In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Albrecht Durer, Exhibition, Albertina, Vienna. 20 September 2019 – 6 January 2020
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Renaissance engravers
Woodcut designers | false | [
"The Writers Guild of America Award for Best Television Writing in a Comedy/Variety Specials is an award presented by the Writers Guild of America to the best written television comedy or variety specials. During the 70s, different categories were presented to recognize writing in comedy or variety specials until 1987, when the category Variety – Musical, Award, Tribute, Special Event started to be awarded, later being renamed to its current name, Comedy/Variety Special.\n\nWinners and nominees\nThe winners are indicated in gold and in bold.\n\n1970s\nBest Written Variety Script\n\nBest Variety Series or Special – Musical or Comedy\n\n1980s\n Best Variety, Musical or Comedy\n\nVariety – Musical, Award, Tribute, Special Event\n\nVariety – Musical\n\n1990s\nVariety - Musical, Award, Tribute, Special Event\n\nComedy/Variety - Music, Awards, Tributes - Specials - Any Length\n\n2000s\nComedy/Variety (Music, Awards, Tributes) – Specials\n\n2010s\n\n2020s\n\nReferences\n\nWriters Guild of America Awards",
"This article lists the diplomatic missions of Transnistria. Transnistria is a state with limited recognition, that broke away from Moldova after the War of Transnistria in 1992. Transnistria did not receive recognition from any UN member states. It has been recognized as an independent state by Abkhazia, Nagorno-Karabakh and South Ossetia only. At present, Transnistria has three representative offices abroad.\n\nEurope\n \n Sukhumi (Representative office)\n\n Moscow (Official Diplomatic Bureau)\n \n Tskhinvali (Representative office)\n\nSee also \nForeign relations of Transnistria\nList of diplomatic missions in Transnistria\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic\n\nDiplomatic missions of\nTransnistria\nDiplomatic missions of Transnistria"
]
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[
"Albrecht Dürer",
"Nuremberg and the masterworks (1507-1520)",
"What are some of his masterworks?",
"Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (",
"Does he have more?",
"Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin,",
"Are these well known?",
"Between 1507 and 1511 Durer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings:",
"What is significant about Nuremberg?",
"Durer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520.",
"Why did he return?",
"His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself.",
"Did he receive any special tributes or recognition?",
"I don't know."
]
| C_4a4a9362ff664bba86e8c74ead6078c0_0 | Who were his influences in his art? | 8 | Who were Dürer's influences in his art? | Albrecht Dürer | Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Durer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini and--mainly through Lorenzo di Credi--Leonardo da Vinci. Between 1507 and 1511 Durer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Durer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted. Other works from this period include the thirty-seven woodcut subjects of the Little Passion, published first in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Indeed, complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. However, in 1513 and 1514 Durer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death, and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's treatise Enchiridion militis Christiani), St. Jerome in his Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Durer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Willibald Prickheimer. These drafts were later used to design the famous chandeliers lusterweibchen. In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Albrecht Dürer (; ; ; 21 May 1471 – 6 April 1528), sometimes spelled in English as Durer (without an umlaut) or Duerer, was a German painter, printmaker, and theorist of the German Renaissance. Born in Nuremberg, Dürer established his reputation and influence across Europe in his twenties due to his high-quality woodcut prints. He was in contact with the major Italian artists of his time, including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini, and Leonardo da Vinci, and from 1512 was patronized by Emperor Maximilian I.
Dürer's vast body of work includes engravings, his preferred technique in his later prints, altarpieces, portraits and self-portraits, watercolours and books. The woodcuts series are more Gothic than the rest of his work. His well-known engravings include the three Meisterstiche (master prints) Knight, Death and the Devil (1513), Saint Jerome in his Study (1514), and Melencolia I (1514). His watercolours mark him as one of the first European landscape artists, while his woodcuts revolutionised the potential of that medium.
Dürer's introduction of classical motifs into Northern art, through his knowledge of Italian artists and German humanists, has secured his reputation as one of the most important figures of the Northern Renaissance. This is reinforced by his theoretical treatises, which involve principles of mathematics, perspective, and ideal proportions.
Biography
Early life (1471–1490)
Dürer was born on 21 May 1471, the third child and second son of Albrecht Dürer the Elder and Barbara Holper, who married in 1467 and had eighteen children together. Albrecht Dürer the Elder (originally Albrecht Ajtósi), was a successful goldsmith who by 1455 had moved to Nuremberg from Ajtós, near Gyula in Hungary. He married Holper, his master's daughter, when he himself qualified as a master. One of Albrecht's brothers, Hans Dürer, was also a painter and trained under him. Another of Albrecht's brothers, Endres Dürer, took over their father's business and was a master goldsmith. The German name "Dürer" is a translation from the Hungarian, "Ajtósi". Initially, it was "Türer", meaning doormaker, which is "ajtós" in Hungarian (from "ajtó", meaning door). A door is featured in the coat-of-arms the family acquired. Albrecht Dürer the Younger later changed "Türer", his father's diction of the family's surname, to "Dürer", to adapt to the local Nuremberg dialect.
Dürer's godfather Anton Koberger left goldsmithing to become a printer and publisher in the year of Dürer's birth. He became the most successful publisher in Germany, eventually owning twenty-four printing-presses and a number of offices in Germany and abroad. Koberger's most famous publication was the Nuremberg Chronicle, published in 1493 in German and Latin editions. It contained an unprecedented 1,809 woodcut illustrations (albeit with many repeated uses of the same block) by the Wolgemut workshop. Dürer may have worked on some of these, as the work on the project began while he was with Wolgemut.
Because Dürer left autobiographical writings and was widely known by his mid-twenties, his life is well documented in several sources. After a few years of school, Dürer learned the basics of goldsmithing and drawing from his father. Though his father wanted him to continue his training as a goldsmith, he showed such a precocious talent in drawing that he started as an apprentice to Michael Wolgemut at the age of fifteen in 1486. A self-portrait, a drawing in silverpoint, is dated 1484 (Albertina, Vienna) "when I was a child", as his later inscription says. The drawing is one of the earliest surviving children's drawings of any kind, and, as Dürer's Opus One, has helped define his oeuvre as deriving from, and always linked to, himself. Wolgemut was the leading artist in Nuremberg at the time, with a large workshop producing a variety of works of art, in particular woodcuts for books. Nuremberg was then an important and prosperous city, a centre for publishing and many luxury trades. It had strong links with Italy, especially Venice, a relatively short distance across the Alps.
Wanderjahre and marriage (1490–1494)
After completing his apprenticeship, Dürer followed the common German custom of taking Wanderjahre—in effect gap years—in which the apprentice learned skills from artists in other areas; Dürer was to spend about four years away. He left in 1490, possibly to work under Martin Schongauer, the leading engraver of Northern Europe, but who died shortly before Dürer's arrival at Colmar in 1492. It is unclear where Dürer travelled in the intervening period, though it is likely that he went to Frankfurt and the Netherlands. In Colmar, Dürer was welcomed by Schongauer's brothers, the goldsmiths Caspar and Paul and the painter Ludwig. In 1493 Dürer went to Strasbourg, where he would have experienced the sculpture of Nikolaus Gerhaert. Dürer's first painted self-portrait (now in the Louvre) was painted at this time, probably to be sent back to his fiancée in Nuremberg.
In early 1492 Dürer travelled to Basel to stay with another brother of Martin Schongauer, the goldsmith Georg. Very soon after his return to Nuremberg, on 7 July 1494, at the age of 23, Dürer was married to Agnes Frey following an arrangement made during his absence. Agnes was the daughter of a prominent brass worker (and amateur harpist) in the city. However, no children resulted from the marriage, and with Albrecht the Dürer name died out. The marriage between Agnes and Albrecht was not a generally happy one, as indicated by the letters of Dürer in which he quipped to Willibald Pirckheimer in an extremely rough tone about his wife. He called her an "old crow" and made other vulgar remarks. Pirckheimer also made no secret of his antipathy towards Agnes, describing her as a miserly shrew with a bitter tongue, who helped cause Dürer's death at a young age. One author speculates that Albrecht was bisexual, if not homosexual, due to several of his works containing themes of homosexual desire, as well as the intimate nature of his correspondence with certain very close male friends.
First journey to Italy (1494–1495)
Within three months of his marriage, Dürer left for Italy, alone, perhaps stimulated by an outbreak of plague in Nuremberg. He made watercolour sketches as he traveled over the Alps. Some have survived and others may be deduced from accurate landscapes of real places in his later work, for example his engraving Nemesis.
In Italy, he went to Venice to study its more advanced artistic world. Through Wolgemut's tutelage, Dürer had learned how to make prints in drypoint and design woodcuts in the German style, based on the works of Schongauer and the Housebook Master. He also would have had access to some Italian works in Germany, but the two visits he made to Italy had an enormous influence on him. He wrote that Giovanni Bellini was the oldest and still the best of the artists in Venice. His drawings and engravings show the influence of others, notably Antonio Pollaiuolo, with his interest in the proportions of the body; Lorenzo di Credi; and Andrea Mantegna, whose work he produced copies of while training. Dürer probably also visited Padua and Mantua on this trip.
Return to Nuremberg (1495–1505)
On his return to Nuremberg in 1495, Dürer opened his own workshop (being married was a requirement for this). Over the next five years, his style increasingly integrated Italian influences into underlying Northern forms. Arguably his best works in the first years of the workshop were his woodcut prints, mostly religious, but including secular scenes such as The Men's Bath House (ca. 1496). These were larger and more finely cut than the great majority of German woodcuts hitherto, and far more complex and balanced in composition.
It is now thought unlikely that Dürer cut any of the woodblocks himself; this task would have been performed by a specialist craftsman. However, his training in Wolgemut's studio, which made many carved and painted altarpieces and both designed and cut woodblocks for woodcut, evidently gave him great understanding of what the technique could be made to produce, and how to work with block cutters. Dürer either drew his design directly onto the woodblock itself, or glued a paper drawing to the block. Either way, his drawings were destroyed during the cutting of the block.
His series of sixteen designs for the Apocalypse is dated 1498, as is his engraving of St. Michael Fighting the Dragon. He made the first seven scenes of the Great Passion in the same year, and a little later, a series of eleven on the Holy Family and saints. The Seven Sorrows Polyptych, commissioned by Frederick III of Saxony in 1496, was executed by Dürer and his assistants c. 1500. In 1502, Dürer's father died. Around 1503–1505 Dürer produced the first 17 of a set illustrating the Life of the Virgin, which he did not finish for some years. Neither these nor the Great Passion were published as sets until several years later, but prints were sold individually in considerable numbers.
During the same period Dürer trained himself in the difficult art of using the burin to make engravings. It is possible he had begun learning this skill during his early training with his father, as it was also an essential skill of the goldsmith. In 1496 he executed the Prodigal Son, which the Italian Renaissance art historian Giorgio Vasari singled out for praise some decades later, noting its Germanic quality. He was soon producing some spectacular and original images, notably Nemesis (1502), The Sea Monster (1498), and Saint Eustace (c. 1501), with a highly detailed landscape background and animals. His landscapes of this period, such as Pond in the Woods and Willow Mill, are quite different from his earlier watercolours. There is a much greater emphasis on capturing atmosphere, rather than depicting topography. He made a number of Madonnas, single religious figures, and small scenes with comic peasant figures. Prints are highly portable and these works made Dürer famous throughout the main artistic centres of Europe within a very few years.
The Venetian artist Jacopo de' Barbari, whom Dürer had met in Venice, visited Nuremberg in 1500, and Dürer said that he learned much about the new developments in perspective, anatomy, and proportion from him. De' Barbari was unwilling to explain everything he knew, so Dürer began his own studies, which would become a lifelong preoccupation. A series of extant drawings show Dürer's experiments in human proportion, leading to the famous engraving of Adam and Eve (1504), which shows his subtlety while using the burin in the texturing of flesh surfaces. This is the only existing engraving signed with his full name.
Dürer created large numbers of preparatory drawings, especially for his paintings and engravings, and many survive, most famously the Betende Hände (Praying Hands) from circa 1508, a study for an apostle in the Heller altarpiece. He continued to make images in watercolour and bodycolour (usually combined), including a number of still lifes of meadow sections or animals, including his Young Hare (1502) and the Great Piece of Turf (1503).
Second journey to Italy (1505–1507)
In Italy, he returned to painting, at first producing a series of works executed in tempera on linen. These include portraits and altarpieces, notably, the Paumgartner altarpiece and the Adoration of the Magi. In early 1506, he returned to Venice and stayed there until the spring of 1507. By this time Dürer's engravings had attained great popularity and were being copied. In Venice he was given a valuable commission from the emigrant German community for the church of San Bartolomeo. This was the altar-piece known as the Adoration of the Virgin or the Feast of Rose Garlands. It includes portraits of members of Venice's German community, but shows a strong Italian influence. It was later acquired by the Emperor Rudolf II and taken to Prague.
Nuremberg and the masterworks (1507–1520)
Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Dürer returned to Nuremberg by mid-1507, remaining in Germany until 1520. His reputation had spread throughout Europe and he was on friendly terms and in communication with most of the major artists including Raphael.
Between 1507 and 1511 Dürer worked on some of his most celebrated paintings: Adam and Eve (1507), Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand (1508, for Frederick of Saxony), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece Assumption of the Virgin (1509, for Jacob Heller of Frankfurt), and Adoration of the Trinity (1511, for Matthaeus Landauer). During this period he also completed two woodcut series, the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. The post-Venetian woodcuts show Dürer's development of chiaroscuro modelling effects, creating a mid-tone throughout the print to which the highlights and shadows can be contrasted.
Other works from this period include the thirty-seven Little Passion woodcuts, first published in 1511, and a set of fifteen small engravings on the same theme in 1512. Complaining that painting did not make enough money to justify the time spent when compared to his prints, he produced no paintings from 1513 to 1516. In 1513 and 1514 Dürer created his three most famous engravings: Knight, Death and the Devil (1513, probably based on Erasmus's Handbook of a Christian Knight), St. Jerome in His Study, and the much-debated Melencolia I (both 1514, the year Dürer's mother died). Further outstanding pen and ink drawings of Dürer's period of art work of 1513 were drafts for his friend Pirckheimer. These drafts were later used to design Lusterweibchen chandeliers, combining an antler with a wooden sculpture.
In 1515, he created his woodcut of a Rhinoceros which had arrived in Lisbon from a written description and sketch by another artist, without ever seeing the animal himself. An image of the Indian rhinoceros, the image has such force that it remains one of his best-known and was still used in some German school science text-books as late as last century. In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works, including the woodblocks for the first western printed star charts in 1515 and portraits in tempera on linen in 1516. His only experiments with etching came in this period, producing five between 1515–1516 and a sixth in 1518; a technique he may have abandoned as unsuited to his aesthetic of methodical, classical form.
Patronage of Maximilian I
From 1512, Maximilian I became Dürer's major patron. He commissioned The Triumphal Arch, a vast work printed from 192 separate blocks, the symbolism of which is partly informed by Pirckheimer's translation of Horapollo's Hieroglyphica. The design program and explanations were devised by Johannes Stabius, the architectural design by the master builder and court-painter Jörg Kölderer and the woodcutting itself by Hieronymous Andreae, with Dürer as designer-in-chief. The Arch was followed by The Triumphal Procession, the program of which was worked out in 1512 by Marx Treitz-Saurwein and includes woodcuts by Albrecht Altdorfer and Hans Springinklee, as well as Dürer.
Dürer worked with pen on the marginal images for an edition of the Emperor's printed Prayer-Book; these were quite unknown until facsimiles were published in 1808 as part of the first book published in lithography. Dürer's work on the book was halted for an unknown reason, and the decoration was continued by artists including Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Baldung. Dürer also made several portraits of the Emperor, including one shortly before Maximilian's death in 1519.
Maximilian was a very cash-strapped prince who sometimes failed to pay, yet turned out to be Dürer's most important patron. In his court, artists and learned men were respected, which was not common at that time (later, Dürer commented that in Germany, as a non-noble, he was treated a parasite). Pirckheimer (who he met in 1495, before entering the service of Maximilian) was also an important personage in the court and great cultural patron, who had a strong influence on Dürer as his tutor in classical knowledge and humanistic critical methodology, as well as collaborator.
In Maximilian's court, Dürer also collaborated with a great number of other brilliant artists and scholars of the time who became his friends, like Johannes Stabius, Konrad Peutinger, Conrad Celtes, and Hans Tscherte (an imperial architect).
Dürer manifested a strong pride in his ability, as a prince of his profession. One day, the emperor, trying to show Dürer an idea, tried to sketch with the charcoal himself, but always broke it. Dürer took the charcoal from Maximilian's hand, finished the drawing and told him: "This is my scepter."
In another occasion, Maximilian noticed that the ladder Dürer used was too short and unstable, thus told a noble to hold it for him. The noble refused, saying that it was beneath him to serve a non-noble. Maximilian then came to hold the ladder himself, and told the noble that he could make a noble out of a peasant any day, but he could not make an artist like Dürer out of a noble.
Cartographic and astronomical works
Dürer's exploration of space led to a relationship and cooperation with the court astronomer Johannes Stabius. Stabius also often acted as Dürer's and Maximilian's go-between for their financial problems.
In 1515 Dürer and Stabius created the first world map projected on a solid geometric sphere. Also in 1515, Stabius, Dürer and the astronomer Konrad Heinfogel produced the first planispheres of both southern and northerns hemispheres, as well as the first printed celestial maps, which prompted the revival of interest in the field of uranometry throughout Europe.
Journey to the Netherlands (1520–1521)
Maximilian's death came at a time when Dürer was concerned he was losing "my sight and freedom of hand" (perhaps caused by arthritis) and increasingly affected by the writings of Martin Luther. In July 1520 Dürer made his fourth and last major journey, to renew the Imperial pension Maximilian had given him and to secure the patronage of the new emperor, Charles V, who was to be crowned at Aachen. Dürer journeyed with his wife and her maid via the Rhine to Cologne and then to Antwerp, where he was well received and produced numerous drawings in silverpoint, chalk and charcoal. In addition to attending the coronation, he visited Cologne (where he admired the painting of Stefan Lochner), Nijmegen, 's-Hertogenbosch, Bruges (where he saw Michelangelo's Madonna of Bruges), Ghent (where he admired van Eyck's Ghent altarpiece), and Zeeland.
Dürer took a large stock of prints with him and wrote in his diary to whom he gave, exchanged or sold them, and for how much. This provides rare information of the monetary value placed on prints at this time. Unlike paintings, their sale was very rarely documented. While providing valuable documentary evidence, Dürer's Netherlandish diary also reveals that the trip was not a profitable one. For example, Dürer offered his last portrait of Maximilian to his daughter, Margaret of Austria, but eventually traded the picture for some white cloth after Margaret disliked the portrait and declined to accept it. During this trip he also met Bernard van Orley, Jan Provoost, Gerard Horenbout, Jean Mone, Joachim Patinir and Tommaso Vincidor, though he did not, it seems, meet Quentin Matsys.
Having secured his pension, Dürer returned home in July 1521, having caught an undetermined illness, which afflicted him for the rest of his life, and greatly reduced his rate of work.
Final years, Nuremberg (1521–1528)
On his return to Nuremberg, Dürer worked on a number of grand projects with religious themes, including a crucifixion scene and a Sacra conversazione, though neither was completed. This may have been due in part to his declining health, but perhaps also because of the time he gave to the preparation of his theoretical works on geometry and perspective, the proportions of men and horses, and fortification.
However, one consequence of this shift in emphasis was that during the last years of his life, Dürer produced comparatively little as an artist. In painting, there was only a portrait of Hieronymus Holtzschuher, a Madonna and Child (1526), Salvator Mundi (1526), and two panels showing St. John with St. Peter in background and St. Paul with St. Mark in the background. This last great work, the Four Apostles, was given by Dürer to the City of Nuremberg—although he was given 100 guilders in return.
As for engravings, Dürer's work was restricted to portraits and illustrations for his treatise. The portraits include Cardinal-Elector Albert of Mainz; Frederick the Wise, elector of Saxony; the humanist scholar Willibald Pirckheimer; Philipp Melanchthon, and Erasmus of Rotterdam. For those of the Cardinal, Melanchthon, and Dürer's final major work, a drawn portrait of the Nuremberg patrician Ulrich Starck, Dürer depicted the sitters in profile.
Despite complaining of his lack of a formal classical education, Dürer was greatly interested in intellectual matters and learned much from his boyhood friend Willibald Pirckheimer, whom he no doubt consulted on the content of many of his images. He also derived great satisfaction from his friendships and correspondence with Erasmus and other scholars. Dürer succeeded in producing two books during his lifetime. "The Four Books on Measurement" were published at Nuremberg in 1525 and was the first book for adults on mathematics in German, as well as being cited later by Galileo and Kepler. The other, a work on city fortifications, was published in 1527. "The Four Books on Human Proportion" were published posthumously, shortly after his death in 1528.
Dürer died in Nuremberg at the age of 56, leaving an estate valued at 6,874 florins – a considerable sum. He is buried in the Johannisfriedhof cemetery. His large house (purchased in 1509 from the heirs of the astronomer Bernhard Walther), where his workshop was located and where his widow lived until her death in 1539, remains a prominent Nuremberg landmark.
Dürer and the Reformation
Dürer's writings suggest that he may have been sympathetic to Luther's ideas, though it is unclear if he ever left the Catholic Church. Dürer wrote of his desire to draw Luther in his diary in 1520: "And God help me that I may go to Dr. Martin Luther; thus I intend to make a portrait of him with great care and engrave him on a copper plate to create a lasting memorial of the Christian man who helped me overcome so many difficulties." In a letter to Nicholas Kratzer in 1524, Dürer wrote, "because of our Christian faith we have to stand in scorn and danger, for we are reviled and called heretics". Most tellingly, Pirckheimer wrote in a letter to Johann Tscherte in 1530: "I confess that in the beginning I believed in Luther, like our Albert of blessed memory ... but as anyone can see, the situation has become worse." Dürer may even have contributed to the Nuremberg City Council's mandating Lutheran sermons and services in March 1525. Notably, Dürer had contacts with various reformers, such as Zwingli, Andreas Karlstadt, Melanchthon, Erasmus and Cornelius Grapheus from whom Dürer received Luther's Babylonian Captivity in 1520. Yet Erasmus and C. Grapheus are better said to be Catholic change agents. Also, from 1525, "the year that saw the peak and collapse of the Peasants' War, the artist can be seen to distance himself somewhat from the [Lutheran] movement..."
Dürer's later works have also been claimed to show Protestant sympathies. His 1523 The Last Supper woodcut has often been understood to have an evangelical theme, focusing as it does on Christ espousing the Gospel, as well as the inclusion of the Eucharistic cup, an expression of Protestant utraquism, although this interpretation has been questioned. The delaying of the engraving of St Philip, completed in 1523 but not distributed until 1526, may have been due to Dürer's uneasiness with images of saints; even if Dürer was not an iconoclast, in his last years he evaluated and questioned the role of art in religion.
Legacy and influence
Dürer exerted a huge influence on the artists of succeeding generations, especially in printmaking, the medium through which his contemporaries mostly experienced his art, as his paintings were predominantly in private collections located in only a few cities. His success in spreading his reputation across Europe through prints was undoubtedly an inspiration for major artists such as Raphael, Titian, and Parmigianino, all of whom collaborated with printmakers to promote and distribute their work.
His engravings seem to have had an intimidating effect upon his German successors; the "Little Masters" who attempted few large engravings but continued Dürer's themes in small, rather cramped compositions. Lucas van Leyden was the only Northern European engraver to successfully continue to produce large engravings in the first third of the 16th century. The generation of Italian engravers who trained in the shadow of Dürer all either directly copied parts of his landscape backgrounds (Giulio Campagnola, Giovanni Battista Palumba, Benedetto Montagna and Cristofano Robetta), or whole prints (Marcantonio Raimondi and Agostino Veneziano). However, Dürer's influence became less dominant after 1515, when Marcantonio perfected his new engraving style, which in turn travelled over the Alps to also dominate Northern engraving.
In painting, Dürer had relatively little influence in Italy, where probably only his altarpiece in Venice was seen, and his German successors were less effective in blending German and Italian styles. His intense and self-dramatizing self-portraits have continued to have a strong influence up to the present, especially on painters in the 19th and 20th century who desired a more dramatic portrait style. Dürer has never fallen from critical favour, and there have been significant revivals of interest in his works in Germany in the Dürer Renaissance of about 1570 to 1630, in the early nineteenth century, and in German nationalism from 1870 to 1945.
The Lutheran Church commemorates Dürer annually on 6 April, along with Michelangelo, Lucas Cranach the Elder and Hans Burgkmair. The liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (United States) remembers him, Cranach and Matthias Grünewald on 5 August.
Theoretical works
In all his theoretical works, in order to communicate his theories in the German language rather than in Latin, Dürer used graphic expressions based on a vernacular, craftsmen's language. For example, "Schneckenlinie" ("snail-line") was his term for a spiral form. Thus, Dürer contributed to the expansion in German prose which Luther had begun with his translation of the Bible.
Four Books on Measurement
Dürer's work on geometry is called the Four Books on Measurement (Underweysung der Messung mit dem Zirckel und Richtscheyt or Instructions for Measuring with Compass and Ruler). The first book focuses on linear geometry. Dürer's geometric constructions include helices, conchoids and epicycloids. He also draws on Apollonius, and Johannes Werner's 'Libellus super viginti duobus elementis conicis' of 1522.
The second book moves onto two-dimensional geometry, i.e. the construction of regular polygons. Here Dürer favours the methods of Ptolemy over Euclid. The third book applies these principles of geometry to architecture, engineering and typography.
In architecture Dürer cites Vitruvius but elaborates his own classical designs and columns. In typography, Dürer depicts the geometric construction of the Latin alphabet, relying on Italian precedent. However, his
construction of the Gothic alphabet is based upon an entirely different modular system. The fourth book completes the progression of the first and second by moving to three-dimensional forms and the construction of polyhedra. Here Dürer discusses the five Platonic solids, as well as seven Archimedean semi-regular solids, as well as several of his own invention.
In all these, Dürer shows the objects as nets. Finally, Dürer discusses the Delian Problem and moves on to the 'construzione legittima', a method of depicting a cube in two dimensions through linear perspective. He is thought to be the first to describe a visualization technique used in modern computers, ray tracing. It was in Bologna that Dürer was taught (possibly by Luca Pacioli or Bramante) the principles of linear perspective, and evidently became familiar with the 'costruzione legittima' in a written description of these principles found only, at this time, in the unpublished treatise of Piero della Francesca. He was also familiar with the 'abbreviated construction' as described by Alberti and the geometrical construction of shadows, a technique of Leonardo da Vinci. Although Dürer made no innovations in these areas, he is notable as the first Northern European to treat matters of visual representation in a scientific way, and with understanding of Euclidean principles. In addition to these geometrical constructions, Dürer discusses in this last book of Underweysung der Messung an assortment of mechanisms for drawing in perspective from models and provides woodcut illustrations of these methods that are often reproduced in discussions of perspective.
Four Books on Human Proportion
Dürer's work on human proportions is called the Four Books on Human Proportion (Vier Bücher von Menschlicher Proportion) of 1528. The first book was mainly composed by 1512/13 and completed by 1523, showing five differently constructed types of both male and female figures, all parts of the body expressed in fractions of the total height. Dürer based these constructions on both Vitruvius and empirical observations of "two to three hundred living persons", in his own words. The second book includes eight further types, broken down not into fractions but an Albertian system, which Dürer probably learned from Francesco di Giorgio's 'De harmonica mundi totius' of 1525. In the third book, Dürer gives principles by which the proportions of the figures can be modified, including the mathematical simulation of convex and concave mirrors; here Dürer also deals with human physiognomy. The fourth book is devoted to the theory of movement.
Appended to the last book, however, is a self-contained essay on aesthetics, which Dürer worked on between 1512 and 1528, and it is here that we learn of his theories concerning 'ideal beauty'. Dürer rejected Alberti's concept of an objective beauty, proposing a relativist notion of beauty based on variety. Nonetheless, Dürer still believed that truth was hidden within nature, and that there were rules which ordered beauty, even though he found it difficult to define the criteria for such a code. In 1512/13 his three criteria were function ('Nutz'), naïve approval ('Wohlgefallen') and the happy medium ('Mittelmass'). However, unlike Alberti and Leonardo, Dürer was most troubled by understanding not just the abstract notions of beauty but also as to how an artist can create beautiful images. Between 1512 and the final draft in 1528, Dürer's belief developed from an understanding of human creativity as spontaneous or inspired to a concept of 'selective inward synthesis'. In other words, that an artist builds on a wealth of visual experiences in order to imagine beautiful things. Dürer's belief in the abilities of a single artist over inspiration prompted him to assert that "one man may sketch something with his pen on half a sheet of paper in one day, or may cut it into a tiny piece of wood with his little iron, and it turns out to be better and more artistic than another's work at which its author labours with the utmost diligence for a whole year".
Book on Fortification
In 1527, Dürer also published Various Lessons on the Fortification of Cities, Castles, and Localities (Etliche Underricht zu Befestigung der Stett, Schloss und Flecken). It was printed in Nuremberg, probably by Hieronymus Andreae and reprinted in 1603 by Johan Janssenn in Arnhem. In 1535 it was also translated into Latin as On Cities, Forts, and Castles, Designed and Strengthened by Several Manners: Presented for the Most Necessary Accommodation of War (De vrbibus, arcibus, castellisque condendis, ac muniendis rationes aliquot : praesenti bellorum necessitati accommodatissimae), published by Christian Wechel (Wecheli/Wechelus) in Paris.
The work is less proscriptively theoretical than his other works, and was soon overshadowed by the Italian theory of polygonal fortification (the trace italienne – see Bastion fort), though his designs seem to have had some influence in the eastern German lands and up into the Baltic States.
Fencing
Dürer created many sketches and woodcuts of soldiers and knights over the course of his life. His most significant martial works, however, were made in 1512 as part of his efforts to secure the patronage of Maximilian I. Using existing manuscripts from the Nuremberg Group as his reference, his workshop produced the extensive Οπλοδιδασκαλια sive Armorvm Tractandorvm Meditatio Alberti Dvreri ("Weapon Training, or Albrecht Dürer's Meditation on the Handling of Weapons", MS 26-232). Another manuscript based on the Nuremberg texts as well as one of Hans Talhoffer's works, the untitled Berlin Picture Book (Libr.Pict.A.83), is also thought to have originated in his workshop around this time. These sketches and watercolors show the same careful attention to detail and human proportion as Dürer's other work, and his illustrations of grappling, long sword, dagger, and messer are among the highest-quality in any fencing manual.
Gallery
List of works
List of paintings by Albrecht Dürer
List of engravings by Albrecht Dürer
List of woodcuts by Albrecht Dürer
References
Notes
Citations
Sources
Bartrum, Giulia. Albrecht Dürer and his Legacy. London: British Museum Press, 2002.
Brand Philip, Lotte; Anzelewsky, Fedja. "The Portrait Diptych of Dürer's parents". Simiolus: Netherlands Quarterly for the History of Art, Volume 10, No. 1, 1978–79. 5–18
Brion, Marcel. Dürer. London: Thames and Hudson, 1960
Harbison, Craig. "Dürer and the Reformation: The Problem of the Re-dating of the St. Philip Engraving". The Art Bulletin, Vol. 58, No. 3, 368–373. September 1976
Koerner, Joseph Leo. The Moment of Self-Portraiture in German Renaissance Art. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 1993.
Landau David; Parshall, Peter. The Renaissance Print. Yale, 1996.
Panofsky, Erwin. The Life and Art of Albrecht Dürer. NJ: Princeton, 1945.
Price, David Hotchkiss. Albrecht Dürer's Renaissance: Humanism, Reformation and the Art of Faith. Michigan, 2003. .
Strauss, Walter L. (ed.). The Complete Engravings, Etchings and Drypoints of Albrecht Durer. Mineola NY: Dover Publications, 1973.
Borchert, Till-Holger. Van Eyck to Dürer: The Influence of Early Netherlandish painting on European Art, 1430–1530. London: Thames & Hudson, 2011.
Wolf, Norbert. Albrecht Dürer. Taschen, 2010.
Hoffmann, Rainer. Im Paradies - Adam und Eva und der Sündenfall - Albrecht Dürers Darstellungen, Böhlau-Verlag, 2021, ISBN 9783412523852
Further reading
Campbell Hutchison, Jane. Albrecht Dürer: A Biography. Princeton University Press, 1990.
Demele, Christine. Dürers Nacktheit – Das Weimarer Selbstbildnis. Rhema Verlag, Münster 2012,
Dürer, Albrecht (translated by R.T. Nichol from the Latin text), Of the Just Shaping of Letters, Dover Publications.
Hart, Vaughan. 'Navel Gazing. On Albrecht Dürer's Adam and Eve (1504)', The International Journal of Arts Theory and History, 2016, vol.12.1 pp. 1–10 https://doi.org/10.18848/2326-9960/CGP/v12i01/1-10
Korolija Fontana-Giusti, Gordana. "The Unconscious and Space: Venice and the work of Albrecht Dürer", in Architecture and the Unconscious, eds. J. Hendrix and L.Holm, Farnham Surrey: Ashgate, 2016. pp. 27–44, .
Wilhelm, Kurth (ed.). The Complete Woodcuts of Albrecht Durer, Dover Publications, 2000.
External links
The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Dürer Prints Close-up. Made to accompany The Strange World of Albrecht Dürer at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 14 November 2010 – 13 March 2011
Albrecht Dürer: Vier Bücher von menschlicher Proportion (Nuremberg, 1528). Selected pages scanned from the original work. Historical Anatomies on the Web. US National Library of Medicine.
"Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528)". In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Albrecht Durer, Exhibition, Albertina, Vienna. 20 September 2019 – 6 January 2020
1471 births
1528 deaths
15th-century engravers
15th-century German painters
16th-century engravers
16th-century German painters
Animal artists
Artist authors
Artists from Nuremberg
Catholic decorative artists
Catholic draughtsmen
Catholic engravers
Catholic painters
German draughtsmen
German engravers
German Lutherans
German male painters
German people of Hungarian descent
German printmakers
German Renaissance painters
German Roman Catholics
Heraldic artists
Manuscript illuminators
Mathematical artists
People celebrated in the Lutheran liturgical calendar
Renaissance engravers
Woodcut designers | false | [
"Art Nouveau in Strasbourg developed and was cultivated as a mixture of French influences, especially from the École de Nancy, and Germanic influences, particularly Darmstadt Artists' Colony and Vienna Secession, with some influences of Brussels Art Nouveau added. That synthesis reflected both the position of Strasbourg as a crossroads of European cultures, and the search for a specific identity of the locals, who had been incorporated into the German Empire some 30 years prior, after two centuries of French domination.\n\nArchitecture \n\nArt Nouveau houses (multi-story buildings and villas), department stores, and other public buildings such as a concert hall, and a church, were built in the years 1898–1910 in the Neustadt district, the Neudorf district, the historic city center, and in the Krutenau district. Most of these have survived World War II and the changes of taste, and many are classified as Monuments historiques. The most notable architects were the associates Franz Lütke (1860–1929) and Heinrich Backes (1866–1931); Jules (Julius) Berninger (1856–1926) and Gustave (Gustav) Krafft (1861–1927); Joseph Müller (1863–??) and ; David Falk (1875–1949) and Émile Wolf (1874–??); Auguste Mossler (1873–1947) and Auguste Müller (1863–1936), as well as the unaffiliated Fritz Beblo, Auguste Brion (1861–1940), Samuel Landshut (1860–1919), , and Aloys Walter (1869–1926).\n\nThe following Art Nouveau buildings have been classified as Monuments historiques:\nAllée de la Robertsau: No. 56, No. 76\nAvenue des Vosges: No. 46\nPlace Broglie: No. 1\nPlace Sainte-Madeleine: Église Sainte-Madeleine\nRue Erckmann-Chatrian: No. 4\nRue du Faubourg-de-Saverne: No. 15\nRue des Grandes-Arcades: Nos. 33, 35, 37 (former department store)\nRue du Général-de-Castelnau: No. 22\nRue de Phalsbourg: Palais des Fêtes\nRue Sleidan: No. 22\nRue Twinger: No. 24\n\nFine and decorative arts \n\nThe artists Charles Spindler, Jean-Désiré Ringel d'Illzach, Joseph Sattler, , , Joseph Ehrismann, , Anton Seder were all active in and around Strasbourg in the Art Nouveau period, and shaped many of its local traits. These artists, as well several others who were not drawn to Art Nouveau/Jugendstil (Alfred Marzolff, Léo Schnug, Lothar von Seebach, Gustave Stoskopf...), were members of the Cercle de Saint-Léonard, a francophile circle of painters, playwrights, sculptors, and designers, established in 1897 and strongly attached to redefining and reinventing Alsatian regionalist art. François-Rupert Carabin, born in Saverne and buried in Strasbourg, did not spend the Art Nouveau years in Alsace-Lorraine; nevertheless, due to his having become the director of the École des arts décoratifs de Strasbourg after World War I, the Strasbourg Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art owns a large and representative collection of his works in all domains.\n\nGallery\n\nReferences\n\nBibliography \nSchnitzler, Bernadette (ed.): Strasbourg 1900 – Naissance d’une capitale, Musées de Strasbourg/Somogy Éditions d'art 2000, \nBefort, Paul-André; Daul, Léon; Kontzler, Chantal; Lery, Pierre: Strasbourg 1900 : Carrefour des arts nouveaux, Éditions Place Stanislas 2010, \nDoucet, Hervé; Haegel, Olivier; Pottecher, Marie; et al.: La Neustadt de Strasbourg : un laboratoire urbain (1871-1930), Éditions Lieux Dits 2017,\n\nExternal links \n\nStrasbourg on Art Nouveau World",
"Francisco Bores (Madrid, May 6, 1898 - Paris, May 10, 1972) was an important figure of twentieth-century European art. His presence was fundamental in the second wave of Spanish artists who arrived in Paris in the 1920s, in which he included Pablo Picasso, Ginés Parra, Pedro Flores, Antoni Clavé; although in his own country he was not really recognized until well into the 1970s when aspects of Art that did not fit in with the dominant informalism and social realism were finally valued. \n\nThe style of Bores was forged following his close contact with the greatest painters of the first Vanguard: Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse. He admired his manner of constructing forms, his classicism, and later his cubist explosion. Bores harmonizes both of these influences in his work, and goes beyond them. His artworks are showcased at the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo in Madrid.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Bores in the Telefonica Collection\n Francisco Bores, a master of contemporary art\n\n1898 births\n1972 deaths\nSpanish artists"
]
|
[
"Emiliano Zapata",
"Zapata under pressure"
]
| C_7f0315f77260442b8ce138603be6223f_1 | When did he first begin to feel pressure? | 1 | When did Emiliano Zapata first begin to feel pressure? | Emiliano Zapata | Meanwhile, the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas. As General Arenas had turned over to the constitutionalists, he had secured peace for his region and he remained in control there. This suggested to many revolutionaries that perhaps the time had come to seek a peaceful conclusion to the struggle. A movement within the Zapatista ranks led by former General Vazquez and Zapata's erstwhile adviser and inspiration Otilio Montano moved against the Tlaltizapan headquarters demanding surrender to the Carrancistas. Reluctantly, Zapata had Montano tried for treason and executed (Womack 1983-86). Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Diaz. He sent Gildardo Magana as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support. In the fall of 1917 a force led by Gonzalez and the ex-Zapatista Sidronio Camacho, who had killed Zapata's brother Eufemio, moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec. Zapata continued his work to try to unite with the national anti-Carrancista movement through the next year, and the constitutionalists did not make further advances. In the winter of 1918 a harsh cold and the onset of the Spanish flu decimated the population of Morelos, causing the loss of a quarter of the total population of the state, almost as many as had been lost to Huerta in 1914. (Womack 311). Furthermore, Zapata began to worry that by the end of the World War, the US would turn its attention to Mexico forcing the Zapatistas to either join the Carrancistas in a national defense or to acquiesce to foreign domination of Mexico. In December 1918 Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat. The main Zapatista headquarters were moved to Tochimilco, Puebla, although Tlaltizapan also continued to be under Zapatista control. Through Castro, Carranza issued offers to the main Zapatista generals to join the nationalist cause, with pardon. But apart from Manuel Palafox, who having fallen in disgrace among the Zapatistas had joined the Arenistas, none of the major generals did (Womack 313-14). Zapata emitted statements accusing Carranza of being secretly sympathetic to the Germans (Womack 315). In March Zapata finally emitted an open letter to Carranza urging him for the good of the fatherland to resign his leadership to Vazquez Gomez, by now the rallying point of the anti-constitutionalist movement (Womack 319-20). Having posed this formidable moral challenge to Carranza prior to the upcoming 1920 presidential elections, the Zapatista generals at Tochimilco, Magana and Ayaquica, urged Zapata not to take any risks and to lay low. But Zapata declined, considering that the respect of his troops depended on his active presence at the front (Womack 320-22). CANNOTANSWER | the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas. | Emiliano Zapata Salazar (; 8 August 1879 – 10 April 1919) was a Mexican revolutionary. He was a leading figure in the Mexican Revolution of 1910–1920, the main leader of the people's revolution in the Mexican state of Morelos, and the inspiration of the agrarian movement called Zapatismo.
Zapata was born in the rural village of Anenecuilco in Morelos State, in an era when peasant communities came under increasing pressure from the small-landowning class who monopolized land and water resources for sugar-cane production with the support of dictator Porfirio Díaz (President 1877-1880 and 1884–1911). Zapata early on participated in political movements against Díaz and the landowning hacendados, and when the Revolution broke out in 1910 he was thus positioned as a central leader of the peasant revolt in Morelos. Cooperating with a number of other peasant leaders, he formed the Liberation Army of the South, of which he soon became the undisputed leader. Zapata's forces contributed to the fall of Díaz, defeating the Federal Army in the Battle of Cuautla (May 1911), but when the revolutionary leader Francisco I. Madero became president he disavowed the role of the Zapatistas, denouncing them as simple bandits.
In November 1911 Zapata promulgated the Plan de Ayala, which called for substantial land reforms, redistributing lands to the peasants. Madero sent the Federal Army to root out the Zapatistas in Morelos. Madero's generals employed a scorched-earth policy, burning villages and forcibly removing their inhabitants, and drafting many men into the Army or sending them to forced-labor camps in southern Mexico. Such actions strengthened Zapata's standing among the peasants, and Zapata succeeded in driving the forces of Madero (led by Victoriano Huerta) out of Morelos. In a coup against Madero in February 1913, Huerta took power in Mexico, but a coalition of Constitutionalist forces in northern Mexico led by Venustiano Carranza, Álvaro Obregón and Francisco "Pancho" Villa ousted him in July 1914 with the support of Zapata's troops. Zapata did not recognize the authority that Carranza asserted as leader of the revolutionary movement, continuing his adherence to the Plan de Ayala.
In the aftermath of the revolutionaries' victory over Huerta, they attempted to sort out power relations in the Convention of Aguascalientes (October to November 1914). Zapata and Villa broke with Carranza, and Mexico descended into a civil war among the winners. Dismayed with the alliance with Villa, Zapata focused his energies on rebuilding society in Morelos (which he now controlled), instituting the land reforms of the Plan de Ayala. As Carranza consolidated his power and defeated Villa in 1915, Zapata initiated guerrilla warfare against the Carrancistas, who in turn invaded Morelos, employing once again scorched-earth tactics to oust the Zapatista rebels. Zapata once again re-took Morelos in 1917 and held most of the state against Carranza's troops until he was killed in an ambush in April 1919.
Article 27 of the 1917 Mexican Constitution was drafted in response to Zapata's agrarian demands.
After his death, Zapatista generals aligned with Obregón against Carranza and helped drive Carranza from power (1920). In 1920 Zapatistas managed to obtain powerful posts in the government of Morelos after Carranza's fall. They instituted many of the land reforms envisioned by Zapata in Morelos.
Zapata remains an iconic figure in Mexico, used both as a nationalist symbol as well as a symbol of the neo-Zapatista movement.
Early years before the Revolution
Emiliano Zapata was born to Gabriel Zapata and Cleofas Jertrudiz Salazar of Anenecuilco, Morelos, a well-known local family; Emiliano's godfather was the manager of a large local hacienda, and his godmother was the manager's wife. Zapata's family were likely mestizos, Mexicans of both Spanish and Nahua heritage. Emiliano was the ninth of ten children; he had six sisters: Celsa, Ramona, María de Jesús, María de la Luz, Jovita and Matilde. And three brothers: Pedro, Eufemio Zapata and Loreto. The Zapata family were descended from the Zapata of Mapaztlán. His maternal grandfather, José Salazar, served in the army of José María Morelos y Pavón during the siege of Cuautla; his paternal uncles Cristino and José Zapata fought in the Reform War and the French Intervention. From a family of farmers, Emiliano Zapata had insight into the severe difficulties of the countryside and his village's long struggle to regain land taken by expanding haciendas. Although he is commonly portrayed as "indigenous" or a member of the landless peasantry in Mexican iconography, Zapata's was racially indigenous but neither landless nor is known to have spoken the Nahuatl language. They were reasonably well-off and never suffered poverty, enjoying such activities as bullfights, cock-fighting and jaripeos.
He received a limited education from his teacher, Emilio Vara, but it included "the rudiments of bookkeeping". At the age of 16 or 17, Zapata had to care for his family following his father's death. Emiliano was entrepreneurial, buying a team of mules to haul maize from farms to town, as well as bricks to the Hacienda of Chinameca; he was also a successful farmer, growing watermelons as a cash crop. He was a skilled horseman and competed in rodeos and races, as well as bullfighting from horseback. These skills as a horseman brought him work as a horse trainer for Porfirio Díaz's son-in-law, Ignacio de la Torre y Mier who had a large sugar hacienda nearby, and served Zapata well as a revolutionary leader. He had a striking appearance, with a large mustache in which he took pride, and good quality clothing described by his loyal secretary: "General Zapata's dress until his death was a charro outfit: tight-fitting black cashmere pants with silver buttons, a broad charro hat, a fine linen shirt or jacket, a scarf around his neck, boots of a single piece, Amozoqueña-style spurs, and a pistol at his belt." In an undated studio photo, Zapata is dressed in a standard business suit and tie, projecting an image of a man of means.
Around the turn of the 20th century, Anenecuilco was a mixed Spanish-speaking mestizo and indigenous Nahuatl-speaking pueblo. It had a long history of protesting the local haciendas taking community members' land, and its leaders gathered colonial-era documentation of their land titles to prove their claims. Some of the colonial documentation was in Nahuatl, with contemporary translations to Spanish for use in legal cases in the Spanish courts. One eyewitness account by Luz Jiménez of Milpa Alta states that Emiliano Zapata spoke Nahuatl fluently when his forces arrived in her community.
Community members in Anenecuilco, including Zapata, sought redress against land seizures. In 1892, a delegation had an audience with Díaz, who with the intervention of a lawyer, agreed to hear them. Although promising them to deal favorably with their petition, Díaz had them arrested and Zapata was conscripted into the Federal Army. Under Díaz, conscription into the Federal Army was much feared by ordinary Mexican men and their families. Zapata was one of many rebel leaders who were conscripted at some point.
In 1909, an important meeting was called by the elders of Anenecuilco, whose chief elder was José Merino. He announced "my intention to resign from my position due to my old age and limited abilities to continue the fight for the land rights of the village." The meeting was used as a time for discussion and nomination of individuals as a replacement for Merino as the president of the village council. The elders on the council were so well respected by the village men that no one would dare to override their nominations or vote for an individual against the advice of the current council at that time. The nominations made were Modesto González, Bartolo Parral, and Emiliano Zapata. After the nominations were closed, a vote was taken and Zapata became the new council president without contest.
Although Zapata had turned 30 only a month before, voters knew that it was necessary to elect someone respected by the community who would be responsible for the village. Even though he was relatively young, Anenecuilco was ready to hand over the leadership to him without any worry of failure. Before he was elected he had shown the village his nature by helping to head up a campaign in opposition to the candidate Díaz had chosen governor. Even though Zapata's efforts failed, he was able to create and cultivate relationships with political authority figures that would prove useful for him.
Zapata became a leading figure in the village of Anenecuilco, where his family had lived for many generations, though he did not take the title of Don, as was custom for someone of his status. Instead, the Anenecuilcans referred to Zapata affectionately as "Miliano" and later as pobrecito (poor little thing) after his death.
The 1910 Revolution
The flawed 1910 elections were a major reason for the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution in 1910. Porfirio Díaz was being threatened by the candidacy of Francisco I. Madero. Zapata, seeing an opportunity to promote land reform in Mexico, joined with Madero and his Constitutionalists, who included Pascual Orozco and Pancho Villa, whom he perceived to be the best chance for genuine change in the country. Although he was wary about Madero, Zapata cooperated with him when Madero made vague promises about land reform in his Plan of San Luis Potosí. Land reform was the central feature of Zapata's political vision.
Zapata joined Madero's campaign against President Díaz. The first military campaign of Zapata was the capture of the Hacienda of Chinameca. When Zapata's army captured Cuautla after a six-day battle on May 19, 1911, it became clear that Díaz would not hold on to power for long.
During his interim presidency, Francisco León de la Barra tasked General Victoriano Huerta to suppress revolutionaries in Morelos. Huerta was to disarm revolutionaries peacefully if possible, but could use force. In August 1911, Huerta led 1,000 Federal troops to Cuernavaca, which Madero saw as provocative. Writing the Minister of the Interior, Zapata demanded the Federal troops withdraw from Morelos, saying "I won't be responsible for the blood that is going to flow if the Federal forces remain."
Although Madero's Plan of San Luis Potosí specified the return of village land and won the support of peasants seeking land reform, he was not ready to implement radical change. Madero simply demanded that "Public servants act 'morally' in enforcing the law ...". Upon seeing the response by villagers, Madero offered formal justice in courts to individuals who had been wronged by others with regard to agrarian politics. Zapata decided that on the surface it seemed as though Madero was doing good things for the people of Mexico, but Zapata did not know the level of sincerity in Madero's actions and thus did not know if he should support him completely.
Plan of Ayala and rebellion against Madero
Compromises between the Madero and Zapata failed in November 1911, days after Madero was elected president. Zapata and Otilio Montaño Sánchez, a former school teacher, fled to the mountains of southwest Puebla. There they promulgated the most radical reform plan in Mexico, the Plan de Ayala (Plan of Ayala). The plan declared Madero a traitor, named as head of the revolution Pascual Orozco, the victorious general who captured Ciudad Juárez in 1911 forcing the resignation of Díaz. He outlined a plan for true land reform.
Zapata had supported the ouster of Díaz and had the expectation that Madero would fulfill the promises made in the Plan of San Luis Potosí to return village lands. He did not share Madero's vision of democracy built on particular freedoms and guarantees that were meaningless to peasants:
Freedom of the press for those who cannot read; free elections for those who do not know the candidates; proper legal for those who have anything to do with an attorney. All those democratic principles, all those great words that gave such joy to our fathers and grandfathers have lost their magic for the people... With or without elections, with or without an effective law, with the Porfirian dictatorship or with Madero's democracy with a controlled or free press, its fate remains the same.
The 1911 Plan of Ayala called for all lands stolen under Díaz to be immediately returned; there had been considerable land fraud under the old dictator, so a great deal of territory was involved. It also stated that large plantations owned by a single person or family should have one-third of their land nationalized, which would then be required to be given to poor farmers. It also argued that if any large plantation owner resisted this action, they should have the other two-thirds confiscated as well. The Plan of Ayala also invoked the name of President Benito Juárez, one of Mexico's great liberal leaders, and compared the taking of land from the wealthy to Juarez's actions when land was expropriated from the Catholic church during the Liberal Reform. Another part of the plan stated that rural cooperatives and other measurements should be put in place to prevent the land from being seized or stolen in the future.
In the following weeks, the development of military operations "betray(ed) good evidence of clear and intelligent planning." During Orozco's rebellion, Zapata fought Mexican troops in the south near Mexico City. In the original design of the armed force, Zapata was a mere colonel among several others; however, the true plan that came about through this organization lent itself to Zapata. Zapata believed that the best route of attack would be to center the fighting and action in Cuautla. If this political location could be overthrown, the army would have enough power to "veto anyone else's control of the state, negotiate for Cuernavaca or attack it directly, and maintain independent access to Mexico City as well as escape routes to the southern hills." However, in order to gain this great success, Zapata realized that his men needed to be better armed and trained.
The first line of action demanded that Zapata and his men "control the area behind and below a line from Jojutla to Yecapixtla." When this was accomplished it gave the army the ability to complete raids as well as wait. As the opposition of the Federal Army and police detachments slowly dissipated, the army would be able to eventually gain powerful control over key locations on the Interoceanic Railway from Puebla City to Cuautla. If these feats could be completed, it would gain access to Cuautla directly and the city would fall.
The plan of action was carried out successfully in Jojutla. However, Pablo Torres Burgos, the commander of the operation, was disappointed that the army disobeyed his orders against looting and ransacking. The army took complete control of the area, and it seemed as though Torres Burgos had lost control over his forces prior to this event. Shortly after, Torres Burgos called a meeting and resigned from his position. Upon leaving Jojutla with his two sons, he was surprised by a federal police patrol who subsequently shot all three of the men on the spot. This seemed to some to be an ending blow to the movement, because Torres Burgos had not selected a successor for his position; however, Zapata was ready to take up where Torres Burgos had left off.
Shortly after Torres Burgos's death, a party of rebels elected Zapata as "Supreme Chief of the Revolutionary Movement of the South". This seemed to be the fix to all of the problems that had just arisen, but other individuals wanted to replace Zapata as well. Due to this new conflict, the individual who would come out on top would have to do so by "convincing his peers he deserved their backing."
Zapata finally gained the support necessary by his peers and was considered a "singularly qualified candidate". This decision to make Zapata the leader of the revolution in Morelos did not occur all at once, nor did it ever reach a true definitive level of recognition. In order to succeed, Zapata needed a strong financial backing for the battles to come. This came in the form of 10,000 pesos delivered by Rodolfo from the Tacubayans. Due to this amount of money Zapata's group of rebels became one of the strongest in the state financially.
After a period Zapata became the leader of his "strategic zone", which gave him power and control over the actions of many more individual rebel groups and thus greatly increased his margin of success. "Among revolutionaries in other districts of the state, however, Zapata's authority was more tenuous." After a meeting between Zapata and Ambrosio Figueroa in Jolalpan, it was decided that Zapata would have joint power with Figueroa with regard to operations in Morelos. This was a turning point in the level of authority and influence that Zapata had gained and proved useful in the direct overthrow of Morelos.
Rebellion against Huerta, the Zapata-Villa alliance
If there was anyone that Zapata hated more than Díaz and Madero, it was Victoriano Huerta, the bitter, violent alcoholic who had been responsible for many atrocities in southern Mexico while trying to end the rebellion. Zapata was not alone: in the north, Pancho Villa, who had supported Madero, immediately took to the field against Huerta. Zapata revised the Plan of Ayala and named himself the leader of his revolution. He was joined by two newcomers to the Revolution, Venustiano Carranza and Alvaro Obregón, who raised large armies in Coahuila and Sonora respectively. Together they made short work of Huerta, who resigned and fled in June 1914 after repeated military losses.
On April 21, 1914, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson sent a contingent of troops to occupy the port city of Veracruz. This sudden threat caused Huerta to withdraw his troops from Morelos and Puebla, leaving only Jojutla and Cuernavaca under federal control. Zapatistas quickly assumed control of eastern Morelos, taking Cuautla and Jonacatepec with no resistance. In spite of being faced with a possible foreign invasion, Zapata refused to unite with Huerta in defense of the nation. He stated that if need be he would defend Mexico alone as chief of the Ayalan forces. In May the Zapatistas took Jojutla from the Federal Army, many of whom joined the rebels, and captured guns and ammunition. They also laid siege to Cuernavaca where a small contingent of federal troops were holed up. By the summer of 1915 Zapata's forces had taken the southern edge of the Federal District, occupying Milpa Alta and Xochimilco, and was poised to move into the capital. In mid July, Huerta was forced to flee as a Constitutionalist force under Carranza, Obregón and Villa took the Federal District. The Constitutionalists established a peace treaty inserting Carranza as First Authority of the nation. Carranza, an aristocrat with politically relevant connections, then gained the backing of the U.S., who passed over Villa and Zapata due to their lower status backgrounds and more progressive ideologies. In spite of having contributed decisively to the fall of Huerta, the Zapatistas were left out of the peace treaties, probably because of Carranza's intense dislike for the Zapatistas whom he saw as uncultured savages. Through 1915 there was a tentative peace in Morelos and the rest of the country.
As the Constitutionalist forces began to split, with Francisco "Pancho" Villa creating a popular front against Carranza's Constitutionalists, Carranza worked diplomatically to get the Zapatistas to recognize his rule, sending Dr. Atl as an envoy to propose a compromise with Zapata. For Carranza, an agreement with Zapata would mean that he did not need to worry about his force's southern flank and could concentrate on defeating Villa. Zapata demanded veto power over Carranza's decisions, which Carranza rejected and negotiations broke off. Zapata issued a statement, perhaps drafted by his advisor, Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama. "The country wishes to destroy feudalism once and for all [while Carranza offers] administrative reform...complete honesty in the handling of public monies...freedom of the press for those who cannot read; free elections for those who do not know the candidates; proper legal proceedings for those who have never had anything to do with an attorney. All those beautiful democratic principles, all those great words that give such joy to our fathers and grandfathers have lost their magic...The people continue to suffer from poverty and endless disappointments."
Unable to reach an agreement, the Constitutionalists divided along ideological lines, with Zapata and Villa leading a progressive rebellion and the conservative faction of the remaining Constituitionalists being headed Carranza and Obregón. Villa and the other anti-Carrancista leaders of the North established the Convention of Aguascalientes against Carranza. Zapata and his envoys got the convention to adopt some of the agrarian principles of the Plan de Ayala. Zapata and Villa met in Xochimilco to negotiate an alliance and divide the responsibility for ridding Mexico of the remaining Carrancistas. The meeting was awkward but amiable, and was widely publicized. It was decided that Zapata should work on securing the area east of Morelos from Puebla towards Veracruz. Nonetheless, during the ensuing campaign in Puebla, Zapata was disappointed by Villa's lack of support. Villa did not initially provide the Zapatistas with the weaponry they had agreed on and, when he did, he did not provide adequate transportation. There were also a series of abuses by Villistas against Zapatista soldiers and chiefs. These experiences led Zapata to grow unsatisfied with the alliance, turning instead his efforts to reorganizing the state of Morelos that had been left in shambles by the onslaught of Huerta and Robles. Having taken Puebla, Zapata left a couple of garrisons there but did not support Villa further against Obregón and Carranza. The Carrancistas saw that the convention was divided and decided to concentrate on beating Villa, which left the Zapatistas to their own devices for a while.
Zapata rebuilds Morelos
Through 1915, Zapata began reshaping Morelos after the Plan de Ayala, redistributing hacienda lands to the peasants, and largely letting village councils run their own local affairs. Most peasants did not turn to cash crops, instead growing subsistence crops such as corn, beans, and vegetables. The result was that as the capital was starving, Morelos peasants had more to eat than they had had in 1910 and at lower prices. The only official event in Morelos during this entire year was a bullfight in which Zapata himself and his nephew Amador Salazar participated. 1915 was a short period of peace and prosperity for the farmers of Morelos, in between the massacres of the Huerta era and the civil war of the winners to come.
Guerrilla warfare against Carranza
Even when Villa was retreating, having lost the Battle of Celaya in 1915, and when Obregón took the capital from the Conventionists who retreated to Toluca, Zapata did not open a second front.
When Carranza's forces were poised to move into Morelos, Zapata took action. He attacked Carrancista positions with large forces trying to harry the Carrancistas in the rear as they were occupied with routing Villa throughout the Northwest. Though Zapata managed to take many important sites such as the Necaxa power plant that supplied Mexico City, he was unable to hold them. The convention was finally routed from Toluca, and Carranza was recognized by US President Woodrow Wilson as the head of state of Mexico in October.
Through 1916 Zapata raided federal forces from Hidalgo to Oaxaca, and Genovevo de la O fought the Carrancistas in Guerrero. The Zapatistas attempted to amass support for their cause by promulgating new manifestos against the hacendados, but this had little effect since the hacendados had already lost power throughout the country.
Carranza consolidates power
Having been put in charge of the efforts to root out Zapatismo in Morelos, Pablo González Garza was humiliated by Zapata's counterattacks and enforced increasingly draconian measures against the locals. He received no reinforcements, as Obregón, the Minister of War, needed all his forces against Villa in the north and against Felix Díaz in Oaxaca. Through low-scale attacks on Gonzalez's positions, Zapata had driven Gonzalez out of Morelos by the end of 1916.
Nonetheless, outside of Morelos the revolutionary forces started disbanding. Some joined the constitutionalists such as Domingo Arena, or lapsed into banditry. In Morelos, Zapata once more reorganized the Zapatista state, continuing with democratic reforms and legislation meant to keep the civil population safe from abuses by soldiers. Though his advisers urged him to mount a concerted campaign against the Carrancistas across southern Mexico, again he concentrated entirely on stabilizing Morelos and making life tolerable for the peasants. Meanwhile, Carranza mounted national elections in all state capitals except Cuernavaca, and promulgated the 1917 Constitution which incorporated elements of the Plan de Ayala.
Zapata under pressure
Meanwhile, the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas. As General Arenas turned over to the constitutionalists, he secured peace for his region and remained in control there. This suggested to many revolutionaries that perhaps the time had come to seek a peaceful conclusion to the struggle. A movement within the Zapatista ranks led by former General Vazquez and Zapata's erstwhile adviser and inspiration Otilio Montaño moved against the Tlaltizapan headquarters demanding surrender to the Carrancistas. Reluctantly, Zapata had Montaño tried for treason and executed.
Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Díaz. He sent Gildardo Magaña as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support. In the fall of 1917 a force led by Gonzalez and the ex-Zapatista Sidronio Camacho, who had killed Zapata's brother Eufemio, moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec.
Zapata continued his work to try to unite with the national anti-Carrancista movement through the next year, and the constitutionalists did not make further advances. In the winter of 1918 a harsh cold and the onset of the Spanish flu decimated the population of Morelos, causing the loss of a quarter of the total population of the state, almost as many as had been lost to Huerta in 1914. Furthermore, Zapata began to worry that by the end of the World War, the United States would turn its attention to Mexico, forcing the Zapatistas to either join the Carrancistas in a national defense or to acquiesce to foreign domination of Mexico.
In December 1918 Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat. The main Zapatista headquarters were moved to Tochimilco, Puebla, although Tlaltizapan also continued to be under Zapatista control. Through Castro, Carranza issued offers to the main Zapatista generals to join the nationalist cause, with pardon. But apart from Manuel Palafox, who having fallen in disgrace among the Zapatistas had joined the Arenistas, none of the major generals did.
Zapata released statements accusing Carranza of being secretly sympathetic to the Germans. In March Zapata finally sent an open letter to Carranza urging him for the good of the fatherland to resign his leadership to Vazquez Gómez, by now the rallying point of the anti-constitutionalist movement. Having posed this formidable moral challenge to Carranza prior to the upcoming 1920 presidential elections, the Zapatista generals at Tochimilco, Magaña and Ayaquica, urged Zapata not to take any risks and to lie low. But Zapata declined, considering that the respect of his troops depended on his active presence at the front.
Assassination
Eliminating Zapata was a top priority for President Carranza. Carranza was unwilling to compromise with domestic foes and wanted to demonstrate to Mexican elites and to American interests that Carranza was the "only viable alternative to both anarchy and radicalism." In mid-March 1919, General Pablo González ordered his subordinate Jesús Guajardo to begin operations against the Zapatistas in the mountains around Huautla. But when González later discovered Guajardo carousing in a cantina, he had him arrested, and a public scandal ensued. On March 21, Zapata attempted to smuggle in a note to Guajardo, inviting him to switch sides. The note, however, never reached Guajardo but instead wound up on González's desk. González devised a plan to use this note to his advantage. He accused Guajardo of not only being a drunk, but of being a traitor. After reducing Guajardo to tears, González explained to him that he could recover from this disgrace if he feigned a defection to Zapata. So Guajardo wrote to Zapata telling him that he would bring over his men and supplies if certain guarantees were promised. Zapata answered Guajardo's letter on April 1, 1919, agreeing to all of Guajardo's terms. Zapata suggested a mutiny on April 4. Guajardo replied that his defection should wait until a new shipment of arms and ammunition arrived sometime between the 6th and the 10th. By the 7th, the plans were set: Zapata ordered Guajardo to attack the Federal garrison at Jonacatepec because the garrison included troops who had defected from Zapata. Pablo González and Guajardo notified the Jonacatepec garrison ahead of time, and a mock battle was staged on April 9. At the conclusion of the mock battle, the former Zapatistas were arrested and shot. Convinced that Guajardo was sincere, Zapata agreed to a final meeting where Guajardo would defect.
On April 10, 1919, Guajardo invited Zapata to a meeting, intimating that he intended to defect to the revolutionaries. However, when Zapata arrived at the Hacienda de San Juan, in Chinameca, Ayala municipality, Guajardo's men riddled him with bullets.
Zapata's body was photographed, displayed for 24 hours, and then buried in Cuautla. Pablo González wanted the body photographed, so that there would be no doubt that Zapata was dead: "it was an actual fact that the famous jefe of the southern region had died." Although Mexico City newspapers had called for Zapata's body to be brought to the capital, Carranza did not do so. However, Zapata's clothing was displayed outside a newspaper's office across from the Alameda Park in the capital.
Immediate aftermath
Although Zapata's assassination weakened his forces in Morelos, the Zapatistas continued the fight against Carranza. For Carranza the death of Zapata was the removal of an ongoing threat, for many Zapata's assassination undermined "worker and peasant support for Carranza and [Pablo] González." Obregón seized on the opportunity to attack Carranza and González, Obregón's rival candidate for the presidency, by saying "this crime reveals a lack of ethics in some members of the government and also of political sense, since peasant votes in the upcoming election will now go to whoever runs against Pablo González." In spite of González's attempts to sully the name of Zapata and the Plan de Ayala during his 1920 campaign for the presidency, the people of Morelos continued to support Zapatista generals, providing them with weapons, supplies and protection. Carranza was wary of the threat of a U.S. intervention, and Zapatista generals decided to take a conciliatory approach. Bands of Zapatistas started surrendering in exchange for amnesties, and many Zapatista generals went on to become local authorities, such as Fortino Ayaquica who became municipal president of Tochimilco. Other generals such as Genovevo de la O remained active in small-scale guerrilla warfare.
As Venustiano Carranza moved to curb his former allies and now rivals in 1920 to impose a civilian, Ignacio Bonillas, as his successor in the presidency, Obregón sought to align himself with the Zapatista movement against that of Carranza. Genovevo de la O and Magaña supported him in the coup by former Constitutionalists, fighting in Morelos against Carranza and helping prompt Carranza to flee Mexico City toward Veracruz in May 1920. "Obregón and Genovevo de la O entered Mexico City in triumph." Zapatistas were given important posts in the interim government of Adolfo de la Huerta and the administration of Álvaro Obregón, following his election to the presidency after the coup. Zapatistas had almost total control of the state of Morelos, where they carried out a program of agrarian reform and land redistribution based on the provisions of the Plan de Ayala and with the support of the government.
According to "La Demócrata", after Zapata's assassination, "in the consciousness of the natives", Zapata "had taken on the proportions of a myth" because he had "given them a formula of vindication against old offenses." Mythmaking would continue for decades after Zapata was gunned down.
Legacy
Zapata's influence continues to this day, particularly in revolutionary tendencies in southern Mexico. In the long run, he has done more for his ideals in death than he did in life. Like many charismatic idealists, Zapata became a martyr after his murder. Even though Mexico still has not implemented the sort of land reform he wanted, he is remembered as a visionary who fought for his countrymen.
Zapata's Plan of Ayala influenced Article 27 of the progressive 1917 Constitution of Mexico that codified an agrarian reform program. Even though the Mexican Revolution did restore some land that had been taken under Díaz, the land reform on the scale imagined by Zapata was never enacted. However, a great deal of the significant land distribution which Zapata sought would later be enacted after Mexican President Lázaro Cárdenas took office in 1934. Cárdenas would fulfill not only the land distribution policies written in Article 27, but other reforms written in the Mexican Constitution as well.
There are controversies about the portrayal of Emiliano Zapata and his followers, whether they were bandits or revolutionaries. At the outbreak of the Revolution, "Zapata's agrarian revolt was soon construed as a 'caste war' [race war], in which members of an 'inferior race' were captained by a 'modern Attila'".
Zapata is now one of the most revered national heroes of Mexico. To many Mexicans, especially the peasant and indigenous citizens, Zapata was a practical revolutionary who sought the implementation of liberties and agrarian rights outlined in the Plan of Ayala. He was a realist with the goal of achieving political and economic emancipation of the peasants in southern Mexico and leading them out of severe poverty.
Many popular organizations take their name from Zapata, most notably the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional or EZLN in Spanish), the Neozapatismo group that emerged in the state of Chiapas in 1983 and precipitated the 1994 indigenous Zapatista uprising which still continues in Chiapas. Towns, streets, and housing developments called "Emiliano Zapata" are common across the country and he has, at times, been depicted on Mexican banknotes.
Modern activists in Mexico frequently make reference to Zapata in their campaigns; his image is commonly seen on banners, and many chants invoke his name: Si Zapata viviera con nosotros anduviera ("If Zapata lived, he would walk with us"), and Zapata vive, la lucha sigue ("Zapata lives; the struggle continues").
His daughter by Petra Portillo Torres, Paulina Ana María Zapata Portillo, was aware of her father's legacy from a very early age. She continued his work of dedication to agrarian rights, serving as treasurer of the ejido of Cuautla, as ejidataria of Cuautla, as municipal councilor and municipal trustee.
In popular culture
Zapata has been depicted in movies, comics, books, music, and clothing. For example, there is a Zapata (1980), stage musical written by Harry Nilsson and Perry Botkin, libretto by Allan Katz, which ran for 16 weeks at the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam, Connecticut. A movie called Zapata: El sueño de un héroe (Zapata: A Hero's Dream) was produced in 2004, starring Mexican actors Alejandro Fernandez, Jaime Camil, and Lucero. There is also a sub-genre of the Spaghetti Western called the Zapata Western, which features stories set during the Mexican Revolution.
Marlon Brando played Emiliano Zapata in the award-winning movie based on his life, Viva Zapata! in 1952. The film co-starred Anthony Quinn, who won best supporting actor. The director was Elia Kazan and the writer was John Steinbeck.
Emiliano Zapata is a major character in The Friends of Pancho Villa (1996), by James Carlos Blake
Emiliano Zapata is referenced in the song "Calm Like a Bomb" by American rock band Rage Against the Machine from their album "The Battle of Los Angeles."
In the 2011 Mexican TV series "El Encanto del
Aguila" Zapata is played by the Mexican actor Tenoch Huerta.
In December 2019, an arts show commemorating the 100 year anniversary of his death was held at the Palacio de Bellas Artes. The show featured 141 works. A painting called La Revolución depicted Zapata as intentionally effeminate, riding an erect horse, nude except for high heels and a pink hat. According to the artist, he created the painting to combat machismo. The painting caused protests from the farmer's union and admirers of Zapata. His grandson Jorge Zapata González threatened to sue if the painting was not removed. There was a clash between supporters of the painting and detractors at the museum. A compromised was reached with some of Zapata's family, a label was placed next to the painting outlining their disagreement with the painting.
Sobriquets
"Calpuleque (náhuatl)" – leader, chief
"El Tigre del Sur" – Tiger of the South
"El Tigre" – The Tiger
"El Tigrillo" – Little Tiger
"El Caudillo del Sur" – Caudillo of the South
"El Atila del Sur" – The Attila of the South (pejorative)
Gallery
References
Cited sources
Further reading
Brunk, Samuel, ¡Emiliano Zapata! Revolution and Betrayal in Mexico. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1995.
Caballero, Raymond. Lynching Pascual Orozco, Mexican Revolutionary Hero and Paradox. Create Space 2015.
Lucas, Jeffrey Kent. The Rightward Drift of Mexico's Former Revolutionaries: The Case of Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2010.
Mclynn, Frank. Villa and Zapata: A history of the Mexican Revolution. New York : Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2001.
McNeely, John H. "Origins of the Zapata revolt in Morelos." Hispanic American Historical Review (1966): 153–169.
Historiography
Golland, David Hamilton. "Recent Works on the Mexican Revolution." Estudios Interdisciplinarios de América Latina y el Caribe 16.1 (2014). online
McNamara, Patrick J. "Rewriting Zapata: Generational Conflict on the Eve of the Mexican Revolution." Mexican Studies-Estudios Mexicanos 30.1 (2014): 122–149.
In Spanish
Horcasitas, Fernando. De Porfirio Díaz a Zapata, memoria náhuatl de Milpa Alta, UNAM, México DF.,1968 (eye and ear-witness account of Zapata speaking Nahuatl)
Krauze, Enrique. Zapata: El amor a la tierra, in the Biographies of Power'' series.
Media
"Emiliano Zapata", BBC Mundo.com
External links
Emiliano Zapata Quotes, Facts, Books and Movies
Full text html version of Zapata's "Plan de Ayala" in Spanish
Emiliano Zapata videos
Bicentenario del inicio del movimiento de Independencia Nacional y del Centenario del inicio de la Revolución Mexicana
Miguel Angel Mancera Espinosa
1879 births
1919 deaths
19th-century Mexican people
20th-century Mexican people
Assassinated Mexican people
Deaths by firearm in Mexico
Mexican agrarianists
Mexican generals
Mexican guerrillas
Mexican rebels
Mexican revolutionaries
Mexican Roman Catholics
Military assassinations
Military history of Mexico
Nahua people
People from Ciudad Ayala, Morelos
People murdered in Mexico
People of the Mexican Revolution | true | [
"On a bowed string instrument, a bow stroke is the movement of the bow back and forth perpendicularly across the string, from the frog to the tip and from the tip to the frog, producing sound. Multiple notes in one bow stroke are indicated by the use of slurs.\n\nDown bow\nA down-bow is a type of stroke used when bowing a musical instrument, most often a string instrument. The player performs the indicated note by drawing the bow downward or to the right across the instrument, moving its point of contact from the frog toward the tip of the bow. This technique is indicated by a notated symbol resembling a small bracket over the note.\n\nInstruments\n\nHow the down-bow is achieved varies depending on the shape and orientation of the instrument.\n\nUses\n\nString players can exert stronger pressure when bowing near the frog than when bowing near the tip, due to the bowing hand's proximity to the bow's contact point with the string. Down-bows, which begin near the frog, are therefore often used to play the downbeat (strong beat) within musical phrases. Notes that begin loudly and diminuendo are ideally down-bowed — from frog to tip — allowing pressure on the string to decrease naturally.\n\nUp bow\nAn up-bow is a type of stroke used when bowing a musical instrument, most often a string instrument. The player draws the bow upward or to the left across the instrument, moving the point of contact from the bow's tip toward the frog (the end of the bow held by the player).\n\nInstruments\n\nHow the up-bow is achieved varies depending on the shape and orientation of the instrument.\n\nUses\n\nString players can exert stronger pressure on the string when bowing near the frog than when bowing near the tip, due to the bowing hand's proximity to the bow's contact point with the string. Up-bows, which begin near the tip, are therefore often used to play the upbeats (weaker beats) within a musical phrase. Notes that begin quietly and crescendo are also ideally up-bowed — from tip to frog — allowing pressure on the string to increase naturally.\n\nReferences\n\nString performance techniques",
"A hydrostatic seal is a non-contacting mechanical seal that operates under an equilibrium of forces. Unlike traditional hydrodynamic seals, Hydrostatic seals have two different pressure zones that are used to establish a balanced pressure zone between two seal faces. The two pressure system makes the seal unique because typical mechanical seals have one pressure zone that created causes a buildup of pressure that will eventually cause the seal to malfunction. After pressure has come to an equilibrium at the seal face, an incompressible fluid is then released between the two seal faces. The fluid creates a film around the seal face that acts as a lubricant and as a medium for the substance flowing through the seal. Hydrostatic seals have been used in the aircraft industry; however they have seen very little commercial use because there is minimal research about the seals.\n\nPressure and Operation \nOnce pressure is applied and the seal comes together, a viscous liquid is released between the two seal faces and a thin film is formed to help create an airtight seal. If the amount of pressure inside of the seal is increased and there is an excess of pressure between the face plates, the two faces move apart and the seal begins to open. On the contrary, if the pressure is dropped and there is not enough pressure within the seal, the two seal faces come together and the hydrostatic seal begins to form. The flow rate of the system can also be controlled with great accuracy by limiting the amount of pressure within the seal. Pressure zones can be changed to create an equilibrium within the system that would allow less leakage in the overall system.\n\nSeal Face \nThe seals dual pressure zone helps maintain a constant pressure zone within the system. The constant pressure stabilizes the seal and does not allow the two seal faces to come in contact. There are face control grooves on both of seal faces that stabilize each face in the axial direction. The slightest axial movement will cause the two seal faces to touch and erosion of the seal will begin to occur.\n\nThe rear face plate consists of a small opening that houses the injection system, which feeds the incompressible fluids through the system. Once the fluid is inside the seal, it forms a thin film around the entire inner system. After creating the film, the fluids then flow out of the seal and on to the rear face plate, which cools the system and prevents any excess heat from building up. This fluid cycle is continuously repeated while the seal is in operation.\n\nApplications \nHydrostatic seals were first developed in the early 1960s to control the sealing of compressor air in the aircraft industry. Recently hydrostatic seals have only been used in the compressor industry because hydrodynamic seals have much greater application. The hydrostatic seal also has great potential in the chemical industry since it can be used to transport and seal chemicals. However, the chemical industry has set very strict regulations and the seal cannot be used for certain chemicals because of the constant seal leakage.\n\nGenerations of hydrostatic seals\n\nFirst generation \nThe first hydrostatic seal was developed to replace current hydrodynamic seals; previous hydrodynamic seals were costly to manufacture and were tedious to assemble. First generation hydrostatic seals used a two pressure system to establish equilibrium at the seal face. The seal face was developed to work under high pressure conditions, however the seal face began to warp and deteriorate during stress tests. Once ammonia ( the liquid used in the first hydrostatic seal ) was added, the two seal faces would make contact with each other and begin the erosion process. Cold water was then tested as the incompressible fluid, it has double the viscosity as ammonia, which showed favorable results. Since cold water had double the viscosity of ammonia, the water prevented the seals from making contact with each other, thus causing the system to run properly.\n\nFirst Generation: Issues \n- High pressure conditions\n\n- recycles fluid in a continuous cycle, may have stagnant fluids which cause blockage\n\n- Seal faces began to erode under certain circumstances\n\nSecond Generation \nThe second hydrostatic seal was an attempt to resolve first generation hydrostatic seal problems: erosion of seals, high pressure build up, and stagnant fluids. Second generation hydrostatic seals had a redesigned seal face; new face control grooves were added to help stabilize the seals while under extreme conditions. Prior to the face control grooves, the seal faces were not balanced and would begin to move under high pressure conditions. Due to the movement, the seal faces would become misaligned when the seals moved, and that caused the seal faces to deteriorate, resulting in an unusable seal.\n\nSecond generation: Upgrades \n- attempt to fix warping caused by system error\n\n- added face control grooves to prevent any erosion of seal faces\n\n- resolved any areas where fluid remains stagnant and cause blockage\n\nArising Problems \nHydrostatic seals should last multiple years without any deterioration to its components due to its overall structure. There should not be any contact between the two seal faces or else the condition of the seal will begin to deteriorate. Current Hydrodynamic seals begin to deteriorate over time because the two faces are always in contact with each other.\n\nIn addition, any misalignment of the seal faces will cause them to rub which will begin to morph the seal faces and eventually cause the entire seal to become structurally unstable. Izchak Etsion, a researcher at the Lewis Research Center, conducted an experiment to test what happens to a hydrostatic seal when its faces are misaligned. Etsion discovered that high pressures directed towards the outer face of the seal would cause static instability, while high pressure on the inner face of the seal would cause the seal to become more stable. In addition, axial misalignment would also cause the horizontal shaft to shift in the vertical direction; this misalignment would result in a faulty seal if the restoring force is not great enough to correct the shift in components.\n\nLeakage \nThe structure of the seal brings up the problem of leakage within the system. Since there is always a minuscule gap between two parts, there is always the problem of leakage, however the system’s structure allows leakage to be controlled to a very precise level.\n\nAnother problem that arises about hydrostatic seals is that excess leakage may eventually lead to erosion of the seal’s structure. Due to the axially rotating face seal, any excess leakage will have a high fluid velocity which can erode away at the face plates, eventually leading to a faulty seal.\n\nReferences\n\nSeals (mechanical)"
]
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[
"Emiliano Zapata",
"Zapata under pressure",
"When did he first begin to feel pressure?",
"the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas."
]
| C_7f0315f77260442b8ce138603be6223f_1 | Was he the leader of the group? | 2 | Was Emiliano Zapata the leader of the Zapatistas? | Emiliano Zapata | Meanwhile, the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas. As General Arenas had turned over to the constitutionalists, he had secured peace for his region and he remained in control there. This suggested to many revolutionaries that perhaps the time had come to seek a peaceful conclusion to the struggle. A movement within the Zapatista ranks led by former General Vazquez and Zapata's erstwhile adviser and inspiration Otilio Montano moved against the Tlaltizapan headquarters demanding surrender to the Carrancistas. Reluctantly, Zapata had Montano tried for treason and executed (Womack 1983-86). Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Diaz. He sent Gildardo Magana as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support. In the fall of 1917 a force led by Gonzalez and the ex-Zapatista Sidronio Camacho, who had killed Zapata's brother Eufemio, moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec. Zapata continued his work to try to unite with the national anti-Carrancista movement through the next year, and the constitutionalists did not make further advances. In the winter of 1918 a harsh cold and the onset of the Spanish flu decimated the population of Morelos, causing the loss of a quarter of the total population of the state, almost as many as had been lost to Huerta in 1914. (Womack 311). Furthermore, Zapata began to worry that by the end of the World War, the US would turn its attention to Mexico forcing the Zapatistas to either join the Carrancistas in a national defense or to acquiesce to foreign domination of Mexico. In December 1918 Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat. The main Zapatista headquarters were moved to Tochimilco, Puebla, although Tlaltizapan also continued to be under Zapatista control. Through Castro, Carranza issued offers to the main Zapatista generals to join the nationalist cause, with pardon. But apart from Manuel Palafox, who having fallen in disgrace among the Zapatistas had joined the Arenistas, none of the major generals did (Womack 313-14). Zapata emitted statements accusing Carranza of being secretly sympathetic to the Germans (Womack 315). In March Zapata finally emitted an open letter to Carranza urging him for the good of the fatherland to resign his leadership to Vazquez Gomez, by now the rallying point of the anti-constitutionalist movement (Womack 319-20). Having posed this formidable moral challenge to Carranza prior to the upcoming 1920 presidential elections, the Zapatista generals at Tochimilco, Magana and Ayaquica, urged Zapata not to take any risks and to lay low. But Zapata declined, considering that the respect of his troops depended on his active presence at the front (Womack 320-22). CANNOTANSWER | As General Arenas had turned over to the constitutionalists, he had secured peace for his region and he remained in control there. | Emiliano Zapata Salazar (; 8 August 1879 – 10 April 1919) was a Mexican revolutionary. He was a leading figure in the Mexican Revolution of 1910–1920, the main leader of the people's revolution in the Mexican state of Morelos, and the inspiration of the agrarian movement called Zapatismo.
Zapata was born in the rural village of Anenecuilco in Morelos State, in an era when peasant communities came under increasing pressure from the small-landowning class who monopolized land and water resources for sugar-cane production with the support of dictator Porfirio Díaz (President 1877-1880 and 1884–1911). Zapata early on participated in political movements against Díaz and the landowning hacendados, and when the Revolution broke out in 1910 he was thus positioned as a central leader of the peasant revolt in Morelos. Cooperating with a number of other peasant leaders, he formed the Liberation Army of the South, of which he soon became the undisputed leader. Zapata's forces contributed to the fall of Díaz, defeating the Federal Army in the Battle of Cuautla (May 1911), but when the revolutionary leader Francisco I. Madero became president he disavowed the role of the Zapatistas, denouncing them as simple bandits.
In November 1911 Zapata promulgated the Plan de Ayala, which called for substantial land reforms, redistributing lands to the peasants. Madero sent the Federal Army to root out the Zapatistas in Morelos. Madero's generals employed a scorched-earth policy, burning villages and forcibly removing their inhabitants, and drafting many men into the Army or sending them to forced-labor camps in southern Mexico. Such actions strengthened Zapata's standing among the peasants, and Zapata succeeded in driving the forces of Madero (led by Victoriano Huerta) out of Morelos. In a coup against Madero in February 1913, Huerta took power in Mexico, but a coalition of Constitutionalist forces in northern Mexico led by Venustiano Carranza, Álvaro Obregón and Francisco "Pancho" Villa ousted him in July 1914 with the support of Zapata's troops. Zapata did not recognize the authority that Carranza asserted as leader of the revolutionary movement, continuing his adherence to the Plan de Ayala.
In the aftermath of the revolutionaries' victory over Huerta, they attempted to sort out power relations in the Convention of Aguascalientes (October to November 1914). Zapata and Villa broke with Carranza, and Mexico descended into a civil war among the winners. Dismayed with the alliance with Villa, Zapata focused his energies on rebuilding society in Morelos (which he now controlled), instituting the land reforms of the Plan de Ayala. As Carranza consolidated his power and defeated Villa in 1915, Zapata initiated guerrilla warfare against the Carrancistas, who in turn invaded Morelos, employing once again scorched-earth tactics to oust the Zapatista rebels. Zapata once again re-took Morelos in 1917 and held most of the state against Carranza's troops until he was killed in an ambush in April 1919.
Article 27 of the 1917 Mexican Constitution was drafted in response to Zapata's agrarian demands.
After his death, Zapatista generals aligned with Obregón against Carranza and helped drive Carranza from power (1920). In 1920 Zapatistas managed to obtain powerful posts in the government of Morelos after Carranza's fall. They instituted many of the land reforms envisioned by Zapata in Morelos.
Zapata remains an iconic figure in Mexico, used both as a nationalist symbol as well as a symbol of the neo-Zapatista movement.
Early years before the Revolution
Emiliano Zapata was born to Gabriel Zapata and Cleofas Jertrudiz Salazar of Anenecuilco, Morelos, a well-known local family; Emiliano's godfather was the manager of a large local hacienda, and his godmother was the manager's wife. Zapata's family were likely mestizos, Mexicans of both Spanish and Nahua heritage. Emiliano was the ninth of ten children; he had six sisters: Celsa, Ramona, María de Jesús, María de la Luz, Jovita and Matilde. And three brothers: Pedro, Eufemio Zapata and Loreto. The Zapata family were descended from the Zapata of Mapaztlán. His maternal grandfather, José Salazar, served in the army of José María Morelos y Pavón during the siege of Cuautla; his paternal uncles Cristino and José Zapata fought in the Reform War and the French Intervention. From a family of farmers, Emiliano Zapata had insight into the severe difficulties of the countryside and his village's long struggle to regain land taken by expanding haciendas. Although he is commonly portrayed as "indigenous" or a member of the landless peasantry in Mexican iconography, Zapata's was racially indigenous but neither landless nor is known to have spoken the Nahuatl language. They were reasonably well-off and never suffered poverty, enjoying such activities as bullfights, cock-fighting and jaripeos.
He received a limited education from his teacher, Emilio Vara, but it included "the rudiments of bookkeeping". At the age of 16 or 17, Zapata had to care for his family following his father's death. Emiliano was entrepreneurial, buying a team of mules to haul maize from farms to town, as well as bricks to the Hacienda of Chinameca; he was also a successful farmer, growing watermelons as a cash crop. He was a skilled horseman and competed in rodeos and races, as well as bullfighting from horseback. These skills as a horseman brought him work as a horse trainer for Porfirio Díaz's son-in-law, Ignacio de la Torre y Mier who had a large sugar hacienda nearby, and served Zapata well as a revolutionary leader. He had a striking appearance, with a large mustache in which he took pride, and good quality clothing described by his loyal secretary: "General Zapata's dress until his death was a charro outfit: tight-fitting black cashmere pants with silver buttons, a broad charro hat, a fine linen shirt or jacket, a scarf around his neck, boots of a single piece, Amozoqueña-style spurs, and a pistol at his belt." In an undated studio photo, Zapata is dressed in a standard business suit and tie, projecting an image of a man of means.
Around the turn of the 20th century, Anenecuilco was a mixed Spanish-speaking mestizo and indigenous Nahuatl-speaking pueblo. It had a long history of protesting the local haciendas taking community members' land, and its leaders gathered colonial-era documentation of their land titles to prove their claims. Some of the colonial documentation was in Nahuatl, with contemporary translations to Spanish for use in legal cases in the Spanish courts. One eyewitness account by Luz Jiménez of Milpa Alta states that Emiliano Zapata spoke Nahuatl fluently when his forces arrived in her community.
Community members in Anenecuilco, including Zapata, sought redress against land seizures. In 1892, a delegation had an audience with Díaz, who with the intervention of a lawyer, agreed to hear them. Although promising them to deal favorably with their petition, Díaz had them arrested and Zapata was conscripted into the Federal Army. Under Díaz, conscription into the Federal Army was much feared by ordinary Mexican men and their families. Zapata was one of many rebel leaders who were conscripted at some point.
In 1909, an important meeting was called by the elders of Anenecuilco, whose chief elder was José Merino. He announced "my intention to resign from my position due to my old age and limited abilities to continue the fight for the land rights of the village." The meeting was used as a time for discussion and nomination of individuals as a replacement for Merino as the president of the village council. The elders on the council were so well respected by the village men that no one would dare to override their nominations or vote for an individual against the advice of the current council at that time. The nominations made were Modesto González, Bartolo Parral, and Emiliano Zapata. After the nominations were closed, a vote was taken and Zapata became the new council president without contest.
Although Zapata had turned 30 only a month before, voters knew that it was necessary to elect someone respected by the community who would be responsible for the village. Even though he was relatively young, Anenecuilco was ready to hand over the leadership to him without any worry of failure. Before he was elected he had shown the village his nature by helping to head up a campaign in opposition to the candidate Díaz had chosen governor. Even though Zapata's efforts failed, he was able to create and cultivate relationships with political authority figures that would prove useful for him.
Zapata became a leading figure in the village of Anenecuilco, where his family had lived for many generations, though he did not take the title of Don, as was custom for someone of his status. Instead, the Anenecuilcans referred to Zapata affectionately as "Miliano" and later as pobrecito (poor little thing) after his death.
The 1910 Revolution
The flawed 1910 elections were a major reason for the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution in 1910. Porfirio Díaz was being threatened by the candidacy of Francisco I. Madero. Zapata, seeing an opportunity to promote land reform in Mexico, joined with Madero and his Constitutionalists, who included Pascual Orozco and Pancho Villa, whom he perceived to be the best chance for genuine change in the country. Although he was wary about Madero, Zapata cooperated with him when Madero made vague promises about land reform in his Plan of San Luis Potosí. Land reform was the central feature of Zapata's political vision.
Zapata joined Madero's campaign against President Díaz. The first military campaign of Zapata was the capture of the Hacienda of Chinameca. When Zapata's army captured Cuautla after a six-day battle on May 19, 1911, it became clear that Díaz would not hold on to power for long.
During his interim presidency, Francisco León de la Barra tasked General Victoriano Huerta to suppress revolutionaries in Morelos. Huerta was to disarm revolutionaries peacefully if possible, but could use force. In August 1911, Huerta led 1,000 Federal troops to Cuernavaca, which Madero saw as provocative. Writing the Minister of the Interior, Zapata demanded the Federal troops withdraw from Morelos, saying "I won't be responsible for the blood that is going to flow if the Federal forces remain."
Although Madero's Plan of San Luis Potosí specified the return of village land and won the support of peasants seeking land reform, he was not ready to implement radical change. Madero simply demanded that "Public servants act 'morally' in enforcing the law ...". Upon seeing the response by villagers, Madero offered formal justice in courts to individuals who had been wronged by others with regard to agrarian politics. Zapata decided that on the surface it seemed as though Madero was doing good things for the people of Mexico, but Zapata did not know the level of sincerity in Madero's actions and thus did not know if he should support him completely.
Plan of Ayala and rebellion against Madero
Compromises between the Madero and Zapata failed in November 1911, days after Madero was elected president. Zapata and Otilio Montaño Sánchez, a former school teacher, fled to the mountains of southwest Puebla. There they promulgated the most radical reform plan in Mexico, the Plan de Ayala (Plan of Ayala). The plan declared Madero a traitor, named as head of the revolution Pascual Orozco, the victorious general who captured Ciudad Juárez in 1911 forcing the resignation of Díaz. He outlined a plan for true land reform.
Zapata had supported the ouster of Díaz and had the expectation that Madero would fulfill the promises made in the Plan of San Luis Potosí to return village lands. He did not share Madero's vision of democracy built on particular freedoms and guarantees that were meaningless to peasants:
Freedom of the press for those who cannot read; free elections for those who do not know the candidates; proper legal for those who have anything to do with an attorney. All those democratic principles, all those great words that gave such joy to our fathers and grandfathers have lost their magic for the people... With or without elections, with or without an effective law, with the Porfirian dictatorship or with Madero's democracy with a controlled or free press, its fate remains the same.
The 1911 Plan of Ayala called for all lands stolen under Díaz to be immediately returned; there had been considerable land fraud under the old dictator, so a great deal of territory was involved. It also stated that large plantations owned by a single person or family should have one-third of their land nationalized, which would then be required to be given to poor farmers. It also argued that if any large plantation owner resisted this action, they should have the other two-thirds confiscated as well. The Plan of Ayala also invoked the name of President Benito Juárez, one of Mexico's great liberal leaders, and compared the taking of land from the wealthy to Juarez's actions when land was expropriated from the Catholic church during the Liberal Reform. Another part of the plan stated that rural cooperatives and other measurements should be put in place to prevent the land from being seized or stolen in the future.
In the following weeks, the development of military operations "betray(ed) good evidence of clear and intelligent planning." During Orozco's rebellion, Zapata fought Mexican troops in the south near Mexico City. In the original design of the armed force, Zapata was a mere colonel among several others; however, the true plan that came about through this organization lent itself to Zapata. Zapata believed that the best route of attack would be to center the fighting and action in Cuautla. If this political location could be overthrown, the army would have enough power to "veto anyone else's control of the state, negotiate for Cuernavaca or attack it directly, and maintain independent access to Mexico City as well as escape routes to the southern hills." However, in order to gain this great success, Zapata realized that his men needed to be better armed and trained.
The first line of action demanded that Zapata and his men "control the area behind and below a line from Jojutla to Yecapixtla." When this was accomplished it gave the army the ability to complete raids as well as wait. As the opposition of the Federal Army and police detachments slowly dissipated, the army would be able to eventually gain powerful control over key locations on the Interoceanic Railway from Puebla City to Cuautla. If these feats could be completed, it would gain access to Cuautla directly and the city would fall.
The plan of action was carried out successfully in Jojutla. However, Pablo Torres Burgos, the commander of the operation, was disappointed that the army disobeyed his orders against looting and ransacking. The army took complete control of the area, and it seemed as though Torres Burgos had lost control over his forces prior to this event. Shortly after, Torres Burgos called a meeting and resigned from his position. Upon leaving Jojutla with his two sons, he was surprised by a federal police patrol who subsequently shot all three of the men on the spot. This seemed to some to be an ending blow to the movement, because Torres Burgos had not selected a successor for his position; however, Zapata was ready to take up where Torres Burgos had left off.
Shortly after Torres Burgos's death, a party of rebels elected Zapata as "Supreme Chief of the Revolutionary Movement of the South". This seemed to be the fix to all of the problems that had just arisen, but other individuals wanted to replace Zapata as well. Due to this new conflict, the individual who would come out on top would have to do so by "convincing his peers he deserved their backing."
Zapata finally gained the support necessary by his peers and was considered a "singularly qualified candidate". This decision to make Zapata the leader of the revolution in Morelos did not occur all at once, nor did it ever reach a true definitive level of recognition. In order to succeed, Zapata needed a strong financial backing for the battles to come. This came in the form of 10,000 pesos delivered by Rodolfo from the Tacubayans. Due to this amount of money Zapata's group of rebels became one of the strongest in the state financially.
After a period Zapata became the leader of his "strategic zone", which gave him power and control over the actions of many more individual rebel groups and thus greatly increased his margin of success. "Among revolutionaries in other districts of the state, however, Zapata's authority was more tenuous." After a meeting between Zapata and Ambrosio Figueroa in Jolalpan, it was decided that Zapata would have joint power with Figueroa with regard to operations in Morelos. This was a turning point in the level of authority and influence that Zapata had gained and proved useful in the direct overthrow of Morelos.
Rebellion against Huerta, the Zapata-Villa alliance
If there was anyone that Zapata hated more than Díaz and Madero, it was Victoriano Huerta, the bitter, violent alcoholic who had been responsible for many atrocities in southern Mexico while trying to end the rebellion. Zapata was not alone: in the north, Pancho Villa, who had supported Madero, immediately took to the field against Huerta. Zapata revised the Plan of Ayala and named himself the leader of his revolution. He was joined by two newcomers to the Revolution, Venustiano Carranza and Alvaro Obregón, who raised large armies in Coahuila and Sonora respectively. Together they made short work of Huerta, who resigned and fled in June 1914 after repeated military losses.
On April 21, 1914, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson sent a contingent of troops to occupy the port city of Veracruz. This sudden threat caused Huerta to withdraw his troops from Morelos and Puebla, leaving only Jojutla and Cuernavaca under federal control. Zapatistas quickly assumed control of eastern Morelos, taking Cuautla and Jonacatepec with no resistance. In spite of being faced with a possible foreign invasion, Zapata refused to unite with Huerta in defense of the nation. He stated that if need be he would defend Mexico alone as chief of the Ayalan forces. In May the Zapatistas took Jojutla from the Federal Army, many of whom joined the rebels, and captured guns and ammunition. They also laid siege to Cuernavaca where a small contingent of federal troops were holed up. By the summer of 1915 Zapata's forces had taken the southern edge of the Federal District, occupying Milpa Alta and Xochimilco, and was poised to move into the capital. In mid July, Huerta was forced to flee as a Constitutionalist force under Carranza, Obregón and Villa took the Federal District. The Constitutionalists established a peace treaty inserting Carranza as First Authority of the nation. Carranza, an aristocrat with politically relevant connections, then gained the backing of the U.S., who passed over Villa and Zapata due to their lower status backgrounds and more progressive ideologies. In spite of having contributed decisively to the fall of Huerta, the Zapatistas were left out of the peace treaties, probably because of Carranza's intense dislike for the Zapatistas whom he saw as uncultured savages. Through 1915 there was a tentative peace in Morelos and the rest of the country.
As the Constitutionalist forces began to split, with Francisco "Pancho" Villa creating a popular front against Carranza's Constitutionalists, Carranza worked diplomatically to get the Zapatistas to recognize his rule, sending Dr. Atl as an envoy to propose a compromise with Zapata. For Carranza, an agreement with Zapata would mean that he did not need to worry about his force's southern flank and could concentrate on defeating Villa. Zapata demanded veto power over Carranza's decisions, which Carranza rejected and negotiations broke off. Zapata issued a statement, perhaps drafted by his advisor, Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama. "The country wishes to destroy feudalism once and for all [while Carranza offers] administrative reform...complete honesty in the handling of public monies...freedom of the press for those who cannot read; free elections for those who do not know the candidates; proper legal proceedings for those who have never had anything to do with an attorney. All those beautiful democratic principles, all those great words that give such joy to our fathers and grandfathers have lost their magic...The people continue to suffer from poverty and endless disappointments."
Unable to reach an agreement, the Constitutionalists divided along ideological lines, with Zapata and Villa leading a progressive rebellion and the conservative faction of the remaining Constituitionalists being headed Carranza and Obregón. Villa and the other anti-Carrancista leaders of the North established the Convention of Aguascalientes against Carranza. Zapata and his envoys got the convention to adopt some of the agrarian principles of the Plan de Ayala. Zapata and Villa met in Xochimilco to negotiate an alliance and divide the responsibility for ridding Mexico of the remaining Carrancistas. The meeting was awkward but amiable, and was widely publicized. It was decided that Zapata should work on securing the area east of Morelos from Puebla towards Veracruz. Nonetheless, during the ensuing campaign in Puebla, Zapata was disappointed by Villa's lack of support. Villa did not initially provide the Zapatistas with the weaponry they had agreed on and, when he did, he did not provide adequate transportation. There were also a series of abuses by Villistas against Zapatista soldiers and chiefs. These experiences led Zapata to grow unsatisfied with the alliance, turning instead his efforts to reorganizing the state of Morelos that had been left in shambles by the onslaught of Huerta and Robles. Having taken Puebla, Zapata left a couple of garrisons there but did not support Villa further against Obregón and Carranza. The Carrancistas saw that the convention was divided and decided to concentrate on beating Villa, which left the Zapatistas to their own devices for a while.
Zapata rebuilds Morelos
Through 1915, Zapata began reshaping Morelos after the Plan de Ayala, redistributing hacienda lands to the peasants, and largely letting village councils run their own local affairs. Most peasants did not turn to cash crops, instead growing subsistence crops such as corn, beans, and vegetables. The result was that as the capital was starving, Morelos peasants had more to eat than they had had in 1910 and at lower prices. The only official event in Morelos during this entire year was a bullfight in which Zapata himself and his nephew Amador Salazar participated. 1915 was a short period of peace and prosperity for the farmers of Morelos, in between the massacres of the Huerta era and the civil war of the winners to come.
Guerrilla warfare against Carranza
Even when Villa was retreating, having lost the Battle of Celaya in 1915, and when Obregón took the capital from the Conventionists who retreated to Toluca, Zapata did not open a second front.
When Carranza's forces were poised to move into Morelos, Zapata took action. He attacked Carrancista positions with large forces trying to harry the Carrancistas in the rear as they were occupied with routing Villa throughout the Northwest. Though Zapata managed to take many important sites such as the Necaxa power plant that supplied Mexico City, he was unable to hold them. The convention was finally routed from Toluca, and Carranza was recognized by US President Woodrow Wilson as the head of state of Mexico in October.
Through 1916 Zapata raided federal forces from Hidalgo to Oaxaca, and Genovevo de la O fought the Carrancistas in Guerrero. The Zapatistas attempted to amass support for their cause by promulgating new manifestos against the hacendados, but this had little effect since the hacendados had already lost power throughout the country.
Carranza consolidates power
Having been put in charge of the efforts to root out Zapatismo in Morelos, Pablo González Garza was humiliated by Zapata's counterattacks and enforced increasingly draconian measures against the locals. He received no reinforcements, as Obregón, the Minister of War, needed all his forces against Villa in the north and against Felix Díaz in Oaxaca. Through low-scale attacks on Gonzalez's positions, Zapata had driven Gonzalez out of Morelos by the end of 1916.
Nonetheless, outside of Morelos the revolutionary forces started disbanding. Some joined the constitutionalists such as Domingo Arena, or lapsed into banditry. In Morelos, Zapata once more reorganized the Zapatista state, continuing with democratic reforms and legislation meant to keep the civil population safe from abuses by soldiers. Though his advisers urged him to mount a concerted campaign against the Carrancistas across southern Mexico, again he concentrated entirely on stabilizing Morelos and making life tolerable for the peasants. Meanwhile, Carranza mounted national elections in all state capitals except Cuernavaca, and promulgated the 1917 Constitution which incorporated elements of the Plan de Ayala.
Zapata under pressure
Meanwhile, the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas. As General Arenas turned over to the constitutionalists, he secured peace for his region and remained in control there. This suggested to many revolutionaries that perhaps the time had come to seek a peaceful conclusion to the struggle. A movement within the Zapatista ranks led by former General Vazquez and Zapata's erstwhile adviser and inspiration Otilio Montaño moved against the Tlaltizapan headquarters demanding surrender to the Carrancistas. Reluctantly, Zapata had Montaño tried for treason and executed.
Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Díaz. He sent Gildardo Magaña as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support. In the fall of 1917 a force led by Gonzalez and the ex-Zapatista Sidronio Camacho, who had killed Zapata's brother Eufemio, moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec.
Zapata continued his work to try to unite with the national anti-Carrancista movement through the next year, and the constitutionalists did not make further advances. In the winter of 1918 a harsh cold and the onset of the Spanish flu decimated the population of Morelos, causing the loss of a quarter of the total population of the state, almost as many as had been lost to Huerta in 1914. Furthermore, Zapata began to worry that by the end of the World War, the United States would turn its attention to Mexico, forcing the Zapatistas to either join the Carrancistas in a national defense or to acquiesce to foreign domination of Mexico.
In December 1918 Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat. The main Zapatista headquarters were moved to Tochimilco, Puebla, although Tlaltizapan also continued to be under Zapatista control. Through Castro, Carranza issued offers to the main Zapatista generals to join the nationalist cause, with pardon. But apart from Manuel Palafox, who having fallen in disgrace among the Zapatistas had joined the Arenistas, none of the major generals did.
Zapata released statements accusing Carranza of being secretly sympathetic to the Germans. In March Zapata finally sent an open letter to Carranza urging him for the good of the fatherland to resign his leadership to Vazquez Gómez, by now the rallying point of the anti-constitutionalist movement. Having posed this formidable moral challenge to Carranza prior to the upcoming 1920 presidential elections, the Zapatista generals at Tochimilco, Magaña and Ayaquica, urged Zapata not to take any risks and to lie low. But Zapata declined, considering that the respect of his troops depended on his active presence at the front.
Assassination
Eliminating Zapata was a top priority for President Carranza. Carranza was unwilling to compromise with domestic foes and wanted to demonstrate to Mexican elites and to American interests that Carranza was the "only viable alternative to both anarchy and radicalism." In mid-March 1919, General Pablo González ordered his subordinate Jesús Guajardo to begin operations against the Zapatistas in the mountains around Huautla. But when González later discovered Guajardo carousing in a cantina, he had him arrested, and a public scandal ensued. On March 21, Zapata attempted to smuggle in a note to Guajardo, inviting him to switch sides. The note, however, never reached Guajardo but instead wound up on González's desk. González devised a plan to use this note to his advantage. He accused Guajardo of not only being a drunk, but of being a traitor. After reducing Guajardo to tears, González explained to him that he could recover from this disgrace if he feigned a defection to Zapata. So Guajardo wrote to Zapata telling him that he would bring over his men and supplies if certain guarantees were promised. Zapata answered Guajardo's letter on April 1, 1919, agreeing to all of Guajardo's terms. Zapata suggested a mutiny on April 4. Guajardo replied that his defection should wait until a new shipment of arms and ammunition arrived sometime between the 6th and the 10th. By the 7th, the plans were set: Zapata ordered Guajardo to attack the Federal garrison at Jonacatepec because the garrison included troops who had defected from Zapata. Pablo González and Guajardo notified the Jonacatepec garrison ahead of time, and a mock battle was staged on April 9. At the conclusion of the mock battle, the former Zapatistas were arrested and shot. Convinced that Guajardo was sincere, Zapata agreed to a final meeting where Guajardo would defect.
On April 10, 1919, Guajardo invited Zapata to a meeting, intimating that he intended to defect to the revolutionaries. However, when Zapata arrived at the Hacienda de San Juan, in Chinameca, Ayala municipality, Guajardo's men riddled him with bullets.
Zapata's body was photographed, displayed for 24 hours, and then buried in Cuautla. Pablo González wanted the body photographed, so that there would be no doubt that Zapata was dead: "it was an actual fact that the famous jefe of the southern region had died." Although Mexico City newspapers had called for Zapata's body to be brought to the capital, Carranza did not do so. However, Zapata's clothing was displayed outside a newspaper's office across from the Alameda Park in the capital.
Immediate aftermath
Although Zapata's assassination weakened his forces in Morelos, the Zapatistas continued the fight against Carranza. For Carranza the death of Zapata was the removal of an ongoing threat, for many Zapata's assassination undermined "worker and peasant support for Carranza and [Pablo] González." Obregón seized on the opportunity to attack Carranza and González, Obregón's rival candidate for the presidency, by saying "this crime reveals a lack of ethics in some members of the government and also of political sense, since peasant votes in the upcoming election will now go to whoever runs against Pablo González." In spite of González's attempts to sully the name of Zapata and the Plan de Ayala during his 1920 campaign for the presidency, the people of Morelos continued to support Zapatista generals, providing them with weapons, supplies and protection. Carranza was wary of the threat of a U.S. intervention, and Zapatista generals decided to take a conciliatory approach. Bands of Zapatistas started surrendering in exchange for amnesties, and many Zapatista generals went on to become local authorities, such as Fortino Ayaquica who became municipal president of Tochimilco. Other generals such as Genovevo de la O remained active in small-scale guerrilla warfare.
As Venustiano Carranza moved to curb his former allies and now rivals in 1920 to impose a civilian, Ignacio Bonillas, as his successor in the presidency, Obregón sought to align himself with the Zapatista movement against that of Carranza. Genovevo de la O and Magaña supported him in the coup by former Constitutionalists, fighting in Morelos against Carranza and helping prompt Carranza to flee Mexico City toward Veracruz in May 1920. "Obregón and Genovevo de la O entered Mexico City in triumph." Zapatistas were given important posts in the interim government of Adolfo de la Huerta and the administration of Álvaro Obregón, following his election to the presidency after the coup. Zapatistas had almost total control of the state of Morelos, where they carried out a program of agrarian reform and land redistribution based on the provisions of the Plan de Ayala and with the support of the government.
According to "La Demócrata", after Zapata's assassination, "in the consciousness of the natives", Zapata "had taken on the proportions of a myth" because he had "given them a formula of vindication against old offenses." Mythmaking would continue for decades after Zapata was gunned down.
Legacy
Zapata's influence continues to this day, particularly in revolutionary tendencies in southern Mexico. In the long run, he has done more for his ideals in death than he did in life. Like many charismatic idealists, Zapata became a martyr after his murder. Even though Mexico still has not implemented the sort of land reform he wanted, he is remembered as a visionary who fought for his countrymen.
Zapata's Plan of Ayala influenced Article 27 of the progressive 1917 Constitution of Mexico that codified an agrarian reform program. Even though the Mexican Revolution did restore some land that had been taken under Díaz, the land reform on the scale imagined by Zapata was never enacted. However, a great deal of the significant land distribution which Zapata sought would later be enacted after Mexican President Lázaro Cárdenas took office in 1934. Cárdenas would fulfill not only the land distribution policies written in Article 27, but other reforms written in the Mexican Constitution as well.
There are controversies about the portrayal of Emiliano Zapata and his followers, whether they were bandits or revolutionaries. At the outbreak of the Revolution, "Zapata's agrarian revolt was soon construed as a 'caste war' [race war], in which members of an 'inferior race' were captained by a 'modern Attila'".
Zapata is now one of the most revered national heroes of Mexico. To many Mexicans, especially the peasant and indigenous citizens, Zapata was a practical revolutionary who sought the implementation of liberties and agrarian rights outlined in the Plan of Ayala. He was a realist with the goal of achieving political and economic emancipation of the peasants in southern Mexico and leading them out of severe poverty.
Many popular organizations take their name from Zapata, most notably the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional or EZLN in Spanish), the Neozapatismo group that emerged in the state of Chiapas in 1983 and precipitated the 1994 indigenous Zapatista uprising which still continues in Chiapas. Towns, streets, and housing developments called "Emiliano Zapata" are common across the country and he has, at times, been depicted on Mexican banknotes.
Modern activists in Mexico frequently make reference to Zapata in their campaigns; his image is commonly seen on banners, and many chants invoke his name: Si Zapata viviera con nosotros anduviera ("If Zapata lived, he would walk with us"), and Zapata vive, la lucha sigue ("Zapata lives; the struggle continues").
His daughter by Petra Portillo Torres, Paulina Ana María Zapata Portillo, was aware of her father's legacy from a very early age. She continued his work of dedication to agrarian rights, serving as treasurer of the ejido of Cuautla, as ejidataria of Cuautla, as municipal councilor and municipal trustee.
In popular culture
Zapata has been depicted in movies, comics, books, music, and clothing. For example, there is a Zapata (1980), stage musical written by Harry Nilsson and Perry Botkin, libretto by Allan Katz, which ran for 16 weeks at the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam, Connecticut. A movie called Zapata: El sueño de un héroe (Zapata: A Hero's Dream) was produced in 2004, starring Mexican actors Alejandro Fernandez, Jaime Camil, and Lucero. There is also a sub-genre of the Spaghetti Western called the Zapata Western, which features stories set during the Mexican Revolution.
Marlon Brando played Emiliano Zapata in the award-winning movie based on his life, Viva Zapata! in 1952. The film co-starred Anthony Quinn, who won best supporting actor. The director was Elia Kazan and the writer was John Steinbeck.
Emiliano Zapata is a major character in The Friends of Pancho Villa (1996), by James Carlos Blake
Emiliano Zapata is referenced in the song "Calm Like a Bomb" by American rock band Rage Against the Machine from their album "The Battle of Los Angeles."
In the 2011 Mexican TV series "El Encanto del
Aguila" Zapata is played by the Mexican actor Tenoch Huerta.
In December 2019, an arts show commemorating the 100 year anniversary of his death was held at the Palacio de Bellas Artes. The show featured 141 works. A painting called La Revolución depicted Zapata as intentionally effeminate, riding an erect horse, nude except for high heels and a pink hat. According to the artist, he created the painting to combat machismo. The painting caused protests from the farmer's union and admirers of Zapata. His grandson Jorge Zapata González threatened to sue if the painting was not removed. There was a clash between supporters of the painting and detractors at the museum. A compromised was reached with some of Zapata's family, a label was placed next to the painting outlining their disagreement with the painting.
Sobriquets
"Calpuleque (náhuatl)" – leader, chief
"El Tigre del Sur" – Tiger of the South
"El Tigre" – The Tiger
"El Tigrillo" – Little Tiger
"El Caudillo del Sur" – Caudillo of the South
"El Atila del Sur" – The Attila of the South (pejorative)
Gallery
References
Cited sources
Further reading
Brunk, Samuel, ¡Emiliano Zapata! Revolution and Betrayal in Mexico. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1995.
Caballero, Raymond. Lynching Pascual Orozco, Mexican Revolutionary Hero and Paradox. Create Space 2015.
Lucas, Jeffrey Kent. The Rightward Drift of Mexico's Former Revolutionaries: The Case of Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2010.
Mclynn, Frank. Villa and Zapata: A history of the Mexican Revolution. New York : Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2001.
McNeely, John H. "Origins of the Zapata revolt in Morelos." Hispanic American Historical Review (1966): 153–169.
Historiography
Golland, David Hamilton. "Recent Works on the Mexican Revolution." Estudios Interdisciplinarios de América Latina y el Caribe 16.1 (2014). online
McNamara, Patrick J. "Rewriting Zapata: Generational Conflict on the Eve of the Mexican Revolution." Mexican Studies-Estudios Mexicanos 30.1 (2014): 122–149.
In Spanish
Horcasitas, Fernando. De Porfirio Díaz a Zapata, memoria náhuatl de Milpa Alta, UNAM, México DF.,1968 (eye and ear-witness account of Zapata speaking Nahuatl)
Krauze, Enrique. Zapata: El amor a la tierra, in the Biographies of Power'' series.
Media
"Emiliano Zapata", BBC Mundo.com
External links
Emiliano Zapata Quotes, Facts, Books and Movies
Full text html version of Zapata's "Plan de Ayala" in Spanish
Emiliano Zapata videos
Bicentenario del inicio del movimiento de Independencia Nacional y del Centenario del inicio de la Revolución Mexicana
Miguel Angel Mancera Espinosa
1879 births
1919 deaths
19th-century Mexican people
20th-century Mexican people
Assassinated Mexican people
Deaths by firearm in Mexico
Mexican agrarianists
Mexican generals
Mexican guerrillas
Mexican rebels
Mexican revolutionaries
Mexican Roman Catholics
Military assassinations
Military history of Mexico
Nahua people
People from Ciudad Ayala, Morelos
People murdered in Mexico
People of the Mexican Revolution | false | [
"Ilyas (Ilias) Gorchkhanov (1967 – 13 October 2005) was the first leader of the Ingush Jamaat, which later became part of the Caucasus Front's Ingushetian Sector in Ingushetia of the Second Chechen War. \n\nGorchkhanov, an ethnic Ingush, allegedly started his military career as a volunteer fighting in Chechnya. When the Ingush Jamaat started getting shape, he became the leader of the Nazran unit and was later often cited as the leader of the entire Jamaat. He was closely associated with the Yarmuk Jamaat in Kabardino-Balkaria and, together with Anzor Astemirov, was one of the first persons wanting to realize the Caucasus Emirate during the First and Second Chechen Wars.\n\nIn October 2005 Gorchkhanov was one of the commanders of the 2005 Nalchik raid, an attack by a large group of militants on Nalchik, the capital of Kabardino-Balkaria, during which he was killed in action; some media reports dubbed him as the leader of the raid. After Gorchkhanov's death, Akhmed Yevloyev succeeded him as the leader of the Ingush Jamaat.\n\nReferences\n\n1967 births\n2005 deaths\nCaucasian Front (militant group)\nIngush people\nPeople of the Chechen wars\nRussian rebels\nLeaders of Islamic terror groups",
"Zhāng Yùtái (; born September 1945) is a politician of the People's Republic of China. He currently serves as the director and leader of Party group of Development Research Center of the State Council of PRC.\n\nBorn in Tancheng County, Shandong, Zhang graduated from the department of computer science at the Beijing Institute of Aeronautics in 1968. He was then sent to work at a farm in the Shenyang Military Region. From 1970, he conducted research at the Institute of Semiconductors at the Chinese Academy of Sciences. In 1980, he began to serve in the National Commission of Science and Technology, and was the vice director of general office of the Commission. In 1985, he became the vice director of Science and Technology Leading Group Office of the State Council. From 1988, he served in Chinese Academy of Sciences, and was the vice secretary-general and director of associated office, president and editor-in-chief of the newspaper agency \"Chinese Science\". In January 1995, Zhang served in China Association of Science and Technology, and was the leader of Party group, vice president and the first secretary of the secretariat. In October 2004, Zhang was appointed as vice director and leader of Party group of Development Research Center of the State Council. Since June, 2007, Zhang has served as director and leader of Party group of the Center.\n\nZhang was a member of 16th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, and is a current member of 17th Central Committee of CPC. He was also a standing committee member of 9th National People's Congress, and a member of law committee.\n\nReferences\n\nPeople's Republic of China politicians from Shandong\n1945 births\nLiving people\nChinese Communist Party politicians from Shandong\nPoliticians from Linyi"
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"the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas.",
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"As General Arenas had turned over to the constitutionalists, he had secured peace for his region and he remained in control there."
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| C_7f0315f77260442b8ce138603be6223f_1 | How did he handle the pressure beyond this? What were his plans? | 3 | How did Emiliano Zapata handle the pressure beyond remaining in control of the region? What were Zapata's plans? | Emiliano Zapata | Meanwhile, the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas. As General Arenas had turned over to the constitutionalists, he had secured peace for his region and he remained in control there. This suggested to many revolutionaries that perhaps the time had come to seek a peaceful conclusion to the struggle. A movement within the Zapatista ranks led by former General Vazquez and Zapata's erstwhile adviser and inspiration Otilio Montano moved against the Tlaltizapan headquarters demanding surrender to the Carrancistas. Reluctantly, Zapata had Montano tried for treason and executed (Womack 1983-86). Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Diaz. He sent Gildardo Magana as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support. In the fall of 1917 a force led by Gonzalez and the ex-Zapatista Sidronio Camacho, who had killed Zapata's brother Eufemio, moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec. Zapata continued his work to try to unite with the national anti-Carrancista movement through the next year, and the constitutionalists did not make further advances. In the winter of 1918 a harsh cold and the onset of the Spanish flu decimated the population of Morelos, causing the loss of a quarter of the total population of the state, almost as many as had been lost to Huerta in 1914. (Womack 311). Furthermore, Zapata began to worry that by the end of the World War, the US would turn its attention to Mexico forcing the Zapatistas to either join the Carrancistas in a national defense or to acquiesce to foreign domination of Mexico. In December 1918 Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat. The main Zapatista headquarters were moved to Tochimilco, Puebla, although Tlaltizapan also continued to be under Zapatista control. Through Castro, Carranza issued offers to the main Zapatista generals to join the nationalist cause, with pardon. But apart from Manuel Palafox, who having fallen in disgrace among the Zapatistas had joined the Arenistas, none of the major generals did (Womack 313-14). Zapata emitted statements accusing Carranza of being secretly sympathetic to the Germans (Womack 315). In March Zapata finally emitted an open letter to Carranza urging him for the good of the fatherland to resign his leadership to Vazquez Gomez, by now the rallying point of the anti-constitutionalist movement (Womack 319-20). Having posed this formidable moral challenge to Carranza prior to the upcoming 1920 presidential elections, the Zapatista generals at Tochimilco, Magana and Ayaquica, urged Zapata not to take any risks and to lay low. But Zapata declined, considering that the respect of his troops depended on his active presence at the front (Womack 320-22). CANNOTANSWER | Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Diaz. | Emiliano Zapata Salazar (; 8 August 1879 – 10 April 1919) was a Mexican revolutionary. He was a leading figure in the Mexican Revolution of 1910–1920, the main leader of the people's revolution in the Mexican state of Morelos, and the inspiration of the agrarian movement called Zapatismo.
Zapata was born in the rural village of Anenecuilco in Morelos State, in an era when peasant communities came under increasing pressure from the small-landowning class who monopolized land and water resources for sugar-cane production with the support of dictator Porfirio Díaz (President 1877-1880 and 1884–1911). Zapata early on participated in political movements against Díaz and the landowning hacendados, and when the Revolution broke out in 1910 he was thus positioned as a central leader of the peasant revolt in Morelos. Cooperating with a number of other peasant leaders, he formed the Liberation Army of the South, of which he soon became the undisputed leader. Zapata's forces contributed to the fall of Díaz, defeating the Federal Army in the Battle of Cuautla (May 1911), but when the revolutionary leader Francisco I. Madero became president he disavowed the role of the Zapatistas, denouncing them as simple bandits.
In November 1911 Zapata promulgated the Plan de Ayala, which called for substantial land reforms, redistributing lands to the peasants. Madero sent the Federal Army to root out the Zapatistas in Morelos. Madero's generals employed a scorched-earth policy, burning villages and forcibly removing their inhabitants, and drafting many men into the Army or sending them to forced-labor camps in southern Mexico. Such actions strengthened Zapata's standing among the peasants, and Zapata succeeded in driving the forces of Madero (led by Victoriano Huerta) out of Morelos. In a coup against Madero in February 1913, Huerta took power in Mexico, but a coalition of Constitutionalist forces in northern Mexico led by Venustiano Carranza, Álvaro Obregón and Francisco "Pancho" Villa ousted him in July 1914 with the support of Zapata's troops. Zapata did not recognize the authority that Carranza asserted as leader of the revolutionary movement, continuing his adherence to the Plan de Ayala.
In the aftermath of the revolutionaries' victory over Huerta, they attempted to sort out power relations in the Convention of Aguascalientes (October to November 1914). Zapata and Villa broke with Carranza, and Mexico descended into a civil war among the winners. Dismayed with the alliance with Villa, Zapata focused his energies on rebuilding society in Morelos (which he now controlled), instituting the land reforms of the Plan de Ayala. As Carranza consolidated his power and defeated Villa in 1915, Zapata initiated guerrilla warfare against the Carrancistas, who in turn invaded Morelos, employing once again scorched-earth tactics to oust the Zapatista rebels. Zapata once again re-took Morelos in 1917 and held most of the state against Carranza's troops until he was killed in an ambush in April 1919.
Article 27 of the 1917 Mexican Constitution was drafted in response to Zapata's agrarian demands.
After his death, Zapatista generals aligned with Obregón against Carranza and helped drive Carranza from power (1920). In 1920 Zapatistas managed to obtain powerful posts in the government of Morelos after Carranza's fall. They instituted many of the land reforms envisioned by Zapata in Morelos.
Zapata remains an iconic figure in Mexico, used both as a nationalist symbol as well as a symbol of the neo-Zapatista movement.
Early years before the Revolution
Emiliano Zapata was born to Gabriel Zapata and Cleofas Jertrudiz Salazar of Anenecuilco, Morelos, a well-known local family; Emiliano's godfather was the manager of a large local hacienda, and his godmother was the manager's wife. Zapata's family were likely mestizos, Mexicans of both Spanish and Nahua heritage. Emiliano was the ninth of ten children; he had six sisters: Celsa, Ramona, María de Jesús, María de la Luz, Jovita and Matilde. And three brothers: Pedro, Eufemio Zapata and Loreto. The Zapata family were descended from the Zapata of Mapaztlán. His maternal grandfather, José Salazar, served in the army of José María Morelos y Pavón during the siege of Cuautla; his paternal uncles Cristino and José Zapata fought in the Reform War and the French Intervention. From a family of farmers, Emiliano Zapata had insight into the severe difficulties of the countryside and his village's long struggle to regain land taken by expanding haciendas. Although he is commonly portrayed as "indigenous" or a member of the landless peasantry in Mexican iconography, Zapata's was racially indigenous but neither landless nor is known to have spoken the Nahuatl language. They were reasonably well-off and never suffered poverty, enjoying such activities as bullfights, cock-fighting and jaripeos.
He received a limited education from his teacher, Emilio Vara, but it included "the rudiments of bookkeeping". At the age of 16 or 17, Zapata had to care for his family following his father's death. Emiliano was entrepreneurial, buying a team of mules to haul maize from farms to town, as well as bricks to the Hacienda of Chinameca; he was also a successful farmer, growing watermelons as a cash crop. He was a skilled horseman and competed in rodeos and races, as well as bullfighting from horseback. These skills as a horseman brought him work as a horse trainer for Porfirio Díaz's son-in-law, Ignacio de la Torre y Mier who had a large sugar hacienda nearby, and served Zapata well as a revolutionary leader. He had a striking appearance, with a large mustache in which he took pride, and good quality clothing described by his loyal secretary: "General Zapata's dress until his death was a charro outfit: tight-fitting black cashmere pants with silver buttons, a broad charro hat, a fine linen shirt or jacket, a scarf around his neck, boots of a single piece, Amozoqueña-style spurs, and a pistol at his belt." In an undated studio photo, Zapata is dressed in a standard business suit and tie, projecting an image of a man of means.
Around the turn of the 20th century, Anenecuilco was a mixed Spanish-speaking mestizo and indigenous Nahuatl-speaking pueblo. It had a long history of protesting the local haciendas taking community members' land, and its leaders gathered colonial-era documentation of their land titles to prove their claims. Some of the colonial documentation was in Nahuatl, with contemporary translations to Spanish for use in legal cases in the Spanish courts. One eyewitness account by Luz Jiménez of Milpa Alta states that Emiliano Zapata spoke Nahuatl fluently when his forces arrived in her community.
Community members in Anenecuilco, including Zapata, sought redress against land seizures. In 1892, a delegation had an audience with Díaz, who with the intervention of a lawyer, agreed to hear them. Although promising them to deal favorably with their petition, Díaz had them arrested and Zapata was conscripted into the Federal Army. Under Díaz, conscription into the Federal Army was much feared by ordinary Mexican men and their families. Zapata was one of many rebel leaders who were conscripted at some point.
In 1909, an important meeting was called by the elders of Anenecuilco, whose chief elder was José Merino. He announced "my intention to resign from my position due to my old age and limited abilities to continue the fight for the land rights of the village." The meeting was used as a time for discussion and nomination of individuals as a replacement for Merino as the president of the village council. The elders on the council were so well respected by the village men that no one would dare to override their nominations or vote for an individual against the advice of the current council at that time. The nominations made were Modesto González, Bartolo Parral, and Emiliano Zapata. After the nominations were closed, a vote was taken and Zapata became the new council president without contest.
Although Zapata had turned 30 only a month before, voters knew that it was necessary to elect someone respected by the community who would be responsible for the village. Even though he was relatively young, Anenecuilco was ready to hand over the leadership to him without any worry of failure. Before he was elected he had shown the village his nature by helping to head up a campaign in opposition to the candidate Díaz had chosen governor. Even though Zapata's efforts failed, he was able to create and cultivate relationships with political authority figures that would prove useful for him.
Zapata became a leading figure in the village of Anenecuilco, where his family had lived for many generations, though he did not take the title of Don, as was custom for someone of his status. Instead, the Anenecuilcans referred to Zapata affectionately as "Miliano" and later as pobrecito (poor little thing) after his death.
The 1910 Revolution
The flawed 1910 elections were a major reason for the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution in 1910. Porfirio Díaz was being threatened by the candidacy of Francisco I. Madero. Zapata, seeing an opportunity to promote land reform in Mexico, joined with Madero and his Constitutionalists, who included Pascual Orozco and Pancho Villa, whom he perceived to be the best chance for genuine change in the country. Although he was wary about Madero, Zapata cooperated with him when Madero made vague promises about land reform in his Plan of San Luis Potosí. Land reform was the central feature of Zapata's political vision.
Zapata joined Madero's campaign against President Díaz. The first military campaign of Zapata was the capture of the Hacienda of Chinameca. When Zapata's army captured Cuautla after a six-day battle on May 19, 1911, it became clear that Díaz would not hold on to power for long.
During his interim presidency, Francisco León de la Barra tasked General Victoriano Huerta to suppress revolutionaries in Morelos. Huerta was to disarm revolutionaries peacefully if possible, but could use force. In August 1911, Huerta led 1,000 Federal troops to Cuernavaca, which Madero saw as provocative. Writing the Minister of the Interior, Zapata demanded the Federal troops withdraw from Morelos, saying "I won't be responsible for the blood that is going to flow if the Federal forces remain."
Although Madero's Plan of San Luis Potosí specified the return of village land and won the support of peasants seeking land reform, he was not ready to implement radical change. Madero simply demanded that "Public servants act 'morally' in enforcing the law ...". Upon seeing the response by villagers, Madero offered formal justice in courts to individuals who had been wronged by others with regard to agrarian politics. Zapata decided that on the surface it seemed as though Madero was doing good things for the people of Mexico, but Zapata did not know the level of sincerity in Madero's actions and thus did not know if he should support him completely.
Plan of Ayala and rebellion against Madero
Compromises between the Madero and Zapata failed in November 1911, days after Madero was elected president. Zapata and Otilio Montaño Sánchez, a former school teacher, fled to the mountains of southwest Puebla. There they promulgated the most radical reform plan in Mexico, the Plan de Ayala (Plan of Ayala). The plan declared Madero a traitor, named as head of the revolution Pascual Orozco, the victorious general who captured Ciudad Juárez in 1911 forcing the resignation of Díaz. He outlined a plan for true land reform.
Zapata had supported the ouster of Díaz and had the expectation that Madero would fulfill the promises made in the Plan of San Luis Potosí to return village lands. He did not share Madero's vision of democracy built on particular freedoms and guarantees that were meaningless to peasants:
Freedom of the press for those who cannot read; free elections for those who do not know the candidates; proper legal for those who have anything to do with an attorney. All those democratic principles, all those great words that gave such joy to our fathers and grandfathers have lost their magic for the people... With or without elections, with or without an effective law, with the Porfirian dictatorship or with Madero's democracy with a controlled or free press, its fate remains the same.
The 1911 Plan of Ayala called for all lands stolen under Díaz to be immediately returned; there had been considerable land fraud under the old dictator, so a great deal of territory was involved. It also stated that large plantations owned by a single person or family should have one-third of their land nationalized, which would then be required to be given to poor farmers. It also argued that if any large plantation owner resisted this action, they should have the other two-thirds confiscated as well. The Plan of Ayala also invoked the name of President Benito Juárez, one of Mexico's great liberal leaders, and compared the taking of land from the wealthy to Juarez's actions when land was expropriated from the Catholic church during the Liberal Reform. Another part of the plan stated that rural cooperatives and other measurements should be put in place to prevent the land from being seized or stolen in the future.
In the following weeks, the development of military operations "betray(ed) good evidence of clear and intelligent planning." During Orozco's rebellion, Zapata fought Mexican troops in the south near Mexico City. In the original design of the armed force, Zapata was a mere colonel among several others; however, the true plan that came about through this organization lent itself to Zapata. Zapata believed that the best route of attack would be to center the fighting and action in Cuautla. If this political location could be overthrown, the army would have enough power to "veto anyone else's control of the state, negotiate for Cuernavaca or attack it directly, and maintain independent access to Mexico City as well as escape routes to the southern hills." However, in order to gain this great success, Zapata realized that his men needed to be better armed and trained.
The first line of action demanded that Zapata and his men "control the area behind and below a line from Jojutla to Yecapixtla." When this was accomplished it gave the army the ability to complete raids as well as wait. As the opposition of the Federal Army and police detachments slowly dissipated, the army would be able to eventually gain powerful control over key locations on the Interoceanic Railway from Puebla City to Cuautla. If these feats could be completed, it would gain access to Cuautla directly and the city would fall.
The plan of action was carried out successfully in Jojutla. However, Pablo Torres Burgos, the commander of the operation, was disappointed that the army disobeyed his orders against looting and ransacking. The army took complete control of the area, and it seemed as though Torres Burgos had lost control over his forces prior to this event. Shortly after, Torres Burgos called a meeting and resigned from his position. Upon leaving Jojutla with his two sons, he was surprised by a federal police patrol who subsequently shot all three of the men on the spot. This seemed to some to be an ending blow to the movement, because Torres Burgos had not selected a successor for his position; however, Zapata was ready to take up where Torres Burgos had left off.
Shortly after Torres Burgos's death, a party of rebels elected Zapata as "Supreme Chief of the Revolutionary Movement of the South". This seemed to be the fix to all of the problems that had just arisen, but other individuals wanted to replace Zapata as well. Due to this new conflict, the individual who would come out on top would have to do so by "convincing his peers he deserved their backing."
Zapata finally gained the support necessary by his peers and was considered a "singularly qualified candidate". This decision to make Zapata the leader of the revolution in Morelos did not occur all at once, nor did it ever reach a true definitive level of recognition. In order to succeed, Zapata needed a strong financial backing for the battles to come. This came in the form of 10,000 pesos delivered by Rodolfo from the Tacubayans. Due to this amount of money Zapata's group of rebels became one of the strongest in the state financially.
After a period Zapata became the leader of his "strategic zone", which gave him power and control over the actions of many more individual rebel groups and thus greatly increased his margin of success. "Among revolutionaries in other districts of the state, however, Zapata's authority was more tenuous." After a meeting between Zapata and Ambrosio Figueroa in Jolalpan, it was decided that Zapata would have joint power with Figueroa with regard to operations in Morelos. This was a turning point in the level of authority and influence that Zapata had gained and proved useful in the direct overthrow of Morelos.
Rebellion against Huerta, the Zapata-Villa alliance
If there was anyone that Zapata hated more than Díaz and Madero, it was Victoriano Huerta, the bitter, violent alcoholic who had been responsible for many atrocities in southern Mexico while trying to end the rebellion. Zapata was not alone: in the north, Pancho Villa, who had supported Madero, immediately took to the field against Huerta. Zapata revised the Plan of Ayala and named himself the leader of his revolution. He was joined by two newcomers to the Revolution, Venustiano Carranza and Alvaro Obregón, who raised large armies in Coahuila and Sonora respectively. Together they made short work of Huerta, who resigned and fled in June 1914 after repeated military losses.
On April 21, 1914, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson sent a contingent of troops to occupy the port city of Veracruz. This sudden threat caused Huerta to withdraw his troops from Morelos and Puebla, leaving only Jojutla and Cuernavaca under federal control. Zapatistas quickly assumed control of eastern Morelos, taking Cuautla and Jonacatepec with no resistance. In spite of being faced with a possible foreign invasion, Zapata refused to unite with Huerta in defense of the nation. He stated that if need be he would defend Mexico alone as chief of the Ayalan forces. In May the Zapatistas took Jojutla from the Federal Army, many of whom joined the rebels, and captured guns and ammunition. They also laid siege to Cuernavaca where a small contingent of federal troops were holed up. By the summer of 1915 Zapata's forces had taken the southern edge of the Federal District, occupying Milpa Alta and Xochimilco, and was poised to move into the capital. In mid July, Huerta was forced to flee as a Constitutionalist force under Carranza, Obregón and Villa took the Federal District. The Constitutionalists established a peace treaty inserting Carranza as First Authority of the nation. Carranza, an aristocrat with politically relevant connections, then gained the backing of the U.S., who passed over Villa and Zapata due to their lower status backgrounds and more progressive ideologies. In spite of having contributed decisively to the fall of Huerta, the Zapatistas were left out of the peace treaties, probably because of Carranza's intense dislike for the Zapatistas whom he saw as uncultured savages. Through 1915 there was a tentative peace in Morelos and the rest of the country.
As the Constitutionalist forces began to split, with Francisco "Pancho" Villa creating a popular front against Carranza's Constitutionalists, Carranza worked diplomatically to get the Zapatistas to recognize his rule, sending Dr. Atl as an envoy to propose a compromise with Zapata. For Carranza, an agreement with Zapata would mean that he did not need to worry about his force's southern flank and could concentrate on defeating Villa. Zapata demanded veto power over Carranza's decisions, which Carranza rejected and negotiations broke off. Zapata issued a statement, perhaps drafted by his advisor, Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama. "The country wishes to destroy feudalism once and for all [while Carranza offers] administrative reform...complete honesty in the handling of public monies...freedom of the press for those who cannot read; free elections for those who do not know the candidates; proper legal proceedings for those who have never had anything to do with an attorney. All those beautiful democratic principles, all those great words that give such joy to our fathers and grandfathers have lost their magic...The people continue to suffer from poverty and endless disappointments."
Unable to reach an agreement, the Constitutionalists divided along ideological lines, with Zapata and Villa leading a progressive rebellion and the conservative faction of the remaining Constituitionalists being headed Carranza and Obregón. Villa and the other anti-Carrancista leaders of the North established the Convention of Aguascalientes against Carranza. Zapata and his envoys got the convention to adopt some of the agrarian principles of the Plan de Ayala. Zapata and Villa met in Xochimilco to negotiate an alliance and divide the responsibility for ridding Mexico of the remaining Carrancistas. The meeting was awkward but amiable, and was widely publicized. It was decided that Zapata should work on securing the area east of Morelos from Puebla towards Veracruz. Nonetheless, during the ensuing campaign in Puebla, Zapata was disappointed by Villa's lack of support. Villa did not initially provide the Zapatistas with the weaponry they had agreed on and, when he did, he did not provide adequate transportation. There were also a series of abuses by Villistas against Zapatista soldiers and chiefs. These experiences led Zapata to grow unsatisfied with the alliance, turning instead his efforts to reorganizing the state of Morelos that had been left in shambles by the onslaught of Huerta and Robles. Having taken Puebla, Zapata left a couple of garrisons there but did not support Villa further against Obregón and Carranza. The Carrancistas saw that the convention was divided and decided to concentrate on beating Villa, which left the Zapatistas to their own devices for a while.
Zapata rebuilds Morelos
Through 1915, Zapata began reshaping Morelos after the Plan de Ayala, redistributing hacienda lands to the peasants, and largely letting village councils run their own local affairs. Most peasants did not turn to cash crops, instead growing subsistence crops such as corn, beans, and vegetables. The result was that as the capital was starving, Morelos peasants had more to eat than they had had in 1910 and at lower prices. The only official event in Morelos during this entire year was a bullfight in which Zapata himself and his nephew Amador Salazar participated. 1915 was a short period of peace and prosperity for the farmers of Morelos, in between the massacres of the Huerta era and the civil war of the winners to come.
Guerrilla warfare against Carranza
Even when Villa was retreating, having lost the Battle of Celaya in 1915, and when Obregón took the capital from the Conventionists who retreated to Toluca, Zapata did not open a second front.
When Carranza's forces were poised to move into Morelos, Zapata took action. He attacked Carrancista positions with large forces trying to harry the Carrancistas in the rear as they were occupied with routing Villa throughout the Northwest. Though Zapata managed to take many important sites such as the Necaxa power plant that supplied Mexico City, he was unable to hold them. The convention was finally routed from Toluca, and Carranza was recognized by US President Woodrow Wilson as the head of state of Mexico in October.
Through 1916 Zapata raided federal forces from Hidalgo to Oaxaca, and Genovevo de la O fought the Carrancistas in Guerrero. The Zapatistas attempted to amass support for their cause by promulgating new manifestos against the hacendados, but this had little effect since the hacendados had already lost power throughout the country.
Carranza consolidates power
Having been put in charge of the efforts to root out Zapatismo in Morelos, Pablo González Garza was humiliated by Zapata's counterattacks and enforced increasingly draconian measures against the locals. He received no reinforcements, as Obregón, the Minister of War, needed all his forces against Villa in the north and against Felix Díaz in Oaxaca. Through low-scale attacks on Gonzalez's positions, Zapata had driven Gonzalez out of Morelos by the end of 1916.
Nonetheless, outside of Morelos the revolutionary forces started disbanding. Some joined the constitutionalists such as Domingo Arena, or lapsed into banditry. In Morelos, Zapata once more reorganized the Zapatista state, continuing with democratic reforms and legislation meant to keep the civil population safe from abuses by soldiers. Though his advisers urged him to mount a concerted campaign against the Carrancistas across southern Mexico, again he concentrated entirely on stabilizing Morelos and making life tolerable for the peasants. Meanwhile, Carranza mounted national elections in all state capitals except Cuernavaca, and promulgated the 1917 Constitution which incorporated elements of the Plan de Ayala.
Zapata under pressure
Meanwhile, the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas. As General Arenas turned over to the constitutionalists, he secured peace for his region and remained in control there. This suggested to many revolutionaries that perhaps the time had come to seek a peaceful conclusion to the struggle. A movement within the Zapatista ranks led by former General Vazquez and Zapata's erstwhile adviser and inspiration Otilio Montaño moved against the Tlaltizapan headquarters demanding surrender to the Carrancistas. Reluctantly, Zapata had Montaño tried for treason and executed.
Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Díaz. He sent Gildardo Magaña as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support. In the fall of 1917 a force led by Gonzalez and the ex-Zapatista Sidronio Camacho, who had killed Zapata's brother Eufemio, moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec.
Zapata continued his work to try to unite with the national anti-Carrancista movement through the next year, and the constitutionalists did not make further advances. In the winter of 1918 a harsh cold and the onset of the Spanish flu decimated the population of Morelos, causing the loss of a quarter of the total population of the state, almost as many as had been lost to Huerta in 1914. Furthermore, Zapata began to worry that by the end of the World War, the United States would turn its attention to Mexico, forcing the Zapatistas to either join the Carrancistas in a national defense or to acquiesce to foreign domination of Mexico.
In December 1918 Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat. The main Zapatista headquarters were moved to Tochimilco, Puebla, although Tlaltizapan also continued to be under Zapatista control. Through Castro, Carranza issued offers to the main Zapatista generals to join the nationalist cause, with pardon. But apart from Manuel Palafox, who having fallen in disgrace among the Zapatistas had joined the Arenistas, none of the major generals did.
Zapata released statements accusing Carranza of being secretly sympathetic to the Germans. In March Zapata finally sent an open letter to Carranza urging him for the good of the fatherland to resign his leadership to Vazquez Gómez, by now the rallying point of the anti-constitutionalist movement. Having posed this formidable moral challenge to Carranza prior to the upcoming 1920 presidential elections, the Zapatista generals at Tochimilco, Magaña and Ayaquica, urged Zapata not to take any risks and to lie low. But Zapata declined, considering that the respect of his troops depended on his active presence at the front.
Assassination
Eliminating Zapata was a top priority for President Carranza. Carranza was unwilling to compromise with domestic foes and wanted to demonstrate to Mexican elites and to American interests that Carranza was the "only viable alternative to both anarchy and radicalism." In mid-March 1919, General Pablo González ordered his subordinate Jesús Guajardo to begin operations against the Zapatistas in the mountains around Huautla. But when González later discovered Guajardo carousing in a cantina, he had him arrested, and a public scandal ensued. On March 21, Zapata attempted to smuggle in a note to Guajardo, inviting him to switch sides. The note, however, never reached Guajardo but instead wound up on González's desk. González devised a plan to use this note to his advantage. He accused Guajardo of not only being a drunk, but of being a traitor. After reducing Guajardo to tears, González explained to him that he could recover from this disgrace if he feigned a defection to Zapata. So Guajardo wrote to Zapata telling him that he would bring over his men and supplies if certain guarantees were promised. Zapata answered Guajardo's letter on April 1, 1919, agreeing to all of Guajardo's terms. Zapata suggested a mutiny on April 4. Guajardo replied that his defection should wait until a new shipment of arms and ammunition arrived sometime between the 6th and the 10th. By the 7th, the plans were set: Zapata ordered Guajardo to attack the Federal garrison at Jonacatepec because the garrison included troops who had defected from Zapata. Pablo González and Guajardo notified the Jonacatepec garrison ahead of time, and a mock battle was staged on April 9. At the conclusion of the mock battle, the former Zapatistas were arrested and shot. Convinced that Guajardo was sincere, Zapata agreed to a final meeting where Guajardo would defect.
On April 10, 1919, Guajardo invited Zapata to a meeting, intimating that he intended to defect to the revolutionaries. However, when Zapata arrived at the Hacienda de San Juan, in Chinameca, Ayala municipality, Guajardo's men riddled him with bullets.
Zapata's body was photographed, displayed for 24 hours, and then buried in Cuautla. Pablo González wanted the body photographed, so that there would be no doubt that Zapata was dead: "it was an actual fact that the famous jefe of the southern region had died." Although Mexico City newspapers had called for Zapata's body to be brought to the capital, Carranza did not do so. However, Zapata's clothing was displayed outside a newspaper's office across from the Alameda Park in the capital.
Immediate aftermath
Although Zapata's assassination weakened his forces in Morelos, the Zapatistas continued the fight against Carranza. For Carranza the death of Zapata was the removal of an ongoing threat, for many Zapata's assassination undermined "worker and peasant support for Carranza and [Pablo] González." Obregón seized on the opportunity to attack Carranza and González, Obregón's rival candidate for the presidency, by saying "this crime reveals a lack of ethics in some members of the government and also of political sense, since peasant votes in the upcoming election will now go to whoever runs against Pablo González." In spite of González's attempts to sully the name of Zapata and the Plan de Ayala during his 1920 campaign for the presidency, the people of Morelos continued to support Zapatista generals, providing them with weapons, supplies and protection. Carranza was wary of the threat of a U.S. intervention, and Zapatista generals decided to take a conciliatory approach. Bands of Zapatistas started surrendering in exchange for amnesties, and many Zapatista generals went on to become local authorities, such as Fortino Ayaquica who became municipal president of Tochimilco. Other generals such as Genovevo de la O remained active in small-scale guerrilla warfare.
As Venustiano Carranza moved to curb his former allies and now rivals in 1920 to impose a civilian, Ignacio Bonillas, as his successor in the presidency, Obregón sought to align himself with the Zapatista movement against that of Carranza. Genovevo de la O and Magaña supported him in the coup by former Constitutionalists, fighting in Morelos against Carranza and helping prompt Carranza to flee Mexico City toward Veracruz in May 1920. "Obregón and Genovevo de la O entered Mexico City in triumph." Zapatistas were given important posts in the interim government of Adolfo de la Huerta and the administration of Álvaro Obregón, following his election to the presidency after the coup. Zapatistas had almost total control of the state of Morelos, where they carried out a program of agrarian reform and land redistribution based on the provisions of the Plan de Ayala and with the support of the government.
According to "La Demócrata", after Zapata's assassination, "in the consciousness of the natives", Zapata "had taken on the proportions of a myth" because he had "given them a formula of vindication against old offenses." Mythmaking would continue for decades after Zapata was gunned down.
Legacy
Zapata's influence continues to this day, particularly in revolutionary tendencies in southern Mexico. In the long run, he has done more for his ideals in death than he did in life. Like many charismatic idealists, Zapata became a martyr after his murder. Even though Mexico still has not implemented the sort of land reform he wanted, he is remembered as a visionary who fought for his countrymen.
Zapata's Plan of Ayala influenced Article 27 of the progressive 1917 Constitution of Mexico that codified an agrarian reform program. Even though the Mexican Revolution did restore some land that had been taken under Díaz, the land reform on the scale imagined by Zapata was never enacted. However, a great deal of the significant land distribution which Zapata sought would later be enacted after Mexican President Lázaro Cárdenas took office in 1934. Cárdenas would fulfill not only the land distribution policies written in Article 27, but other reforms written in the Mexican Constitution as well.
There are controversies about the portrayal of Emiliano Zapata and his followers, whether they were bandits or revolutionaries. At the outbreak of the Revolution, "Zapata's agrarian revolt was soon construed as a 'caste war' [race war], in which members of an 'inferior race' were captained by a 'modern Attila'".
Zapata is now one of the most revered national heroes of Mexico. To many Mexicans, especially the peasant and indigenous citizens, Zapata was a practical revolutionary who sought the implementation of liberties and agrarian rights outlined in the Plan of Ayala. He was a realist with the goal of achieving political and economic emancipation of the peasants in southern Mexico and leading them out of severe poverty.
Many popular organizations take their name from Zapata, most notably the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional or EZLN in Spanish), the Neozapatismo group that emerged in the state of Chiapas in 1983 and precipitated the 1994 indigenous Zapatista uprising which still continues in Chiapas. Towns, streets, and housing developments called "Emiliano Zapata" are common across the country and he has, at times, been depicted on Mexican banknotes.
Modern activists in Mexico frequently make reference to Zapata in their campaigns; his image is commonly seen on banners, and many chants invoke his name: Si Zapata viviera con nosotros anduviera ("If Zapata lived, he would walk with us"), and Zapata vive, la lucha sigue ("Zapata lives; the struggle continues").
His daughter by Petra Portillo Torres, Paulina Ana María Zapata Portillo, was aware of her father's legacy from a very early age. She continued his work of dedication to agrarian rights, serving as treasurer of the ejido of Cuautla, as ejidataria of Cuautla, as municipal councilor and municipal trustee.
In popular culture
Zapata has been depicted in movies, comics, books, music, and clothing. For example, there is a Zapata (1980), stage musical written by Harry Nilsson and Perry Botkin, libretto by Allan Katz, which ran for 16 weeks at the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam, Connecticut. A movie called Zapata: El sueño de un héroe (Zapata: A Hero's Dream) was produced in 2004, starring Mexican actors Alejandro Fernandez, Jaime Camil, and Lucero. There is also a sub-genre of the Spaghetti Western called the Zapata Western, which features stories set during the Mexican Revolution.
Marlon Brando played Emiliano Zapata in the award-winning movie based on his life, Viva Zapata! in 1952. The film co-starred Anthony Quinn, who won best supporting actor. The director was Elia Kazan and the writer was John Steinbeck.
Emiliano Zapata is a major character in The Friends of Pancho Villa (1996), by James Carlos Blake
Emiliano Zapata is referenced in the song "Calm Like a Bomb" by American rock band Rage Against the Machine from their album "The Battle of Los Angeles."
In the 2011 Mexican TV series "El Encanto del
Aguila" Zapata is played by the Mexican actor Tenoch Huerta.
In December 2019, an arts show commemorating the 100 year anniversary of his death was held at the Palacio de Bellas Artes. The show featured 141 works. A painting called La Revolución depicted Zapata as intentionally effeminate, riding an erect horse, nude except for high heels and a pink hat. According to the artist, he created the painting to combat machismo. The painting caused protests from the farmer's union and admirers of Zapata. His grandson Jorge Zapata González threatened to sue if the painting was not removed. There was a clash between supporters of the painting and detractors at the museum. A compromised was reached with some of Zapata's family, a label was placed next to the painting outlining their disagreement with the painting.
Sobriquets
"Calpuleque (náhuatl)" – leader, chief
"El Tigre del Sur" – Tiger of the South
"El Tigre" – The Tiger
"El Tigrillo" – Little Tiger
"El Caudillo del Sur" – Caudillo of the South
"El Atila del Sur" – The Attila of the South (pejorative)
Gallery
References
Cited sources
Further reading
Brunk, Samuel, ¡Emiliano Zapata! Revolution and Betrayal in Mexico. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1995.
Caballero, Raymond. Lynching Pascual Orozco, Mexican Revolutionary Hero and Paradox. Create Space 2015.
Lucas, Jeffrey Kent. The Rightward Drift of Mexico's Former Revolutionaries: The Case of Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2010.
Mclynn, Frank. Villa and Zapata: A history of the Mexican Revolution. New York : Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2001.
McNeely, John H. "Origins of the Zapata revolt in Morelos." Hispanic American Historical Review (1966): 153–169.
Historiography
Golland, David Hamilton. "Recent Works on the Mexican Revolution." Estudios Interdisciplinarios de América Latina y el Caribe 16.1 (2014). online
McNamara, Patrick J. "Rewriting Zapata: Generational Conflict on the Eve of the Mexican Revolution." Mexican Studies-Estudios Mexicanos 30.1 (2014): 122–149.
In Spanish
Horcasitas, Fernando. De Porfirio Díaz a Zapata, memoria náhuatl de Milpa Alta, UNAM, México DF.,1968 (eye and ear-witness account of Zapata speaking Nahuatl)
Krauze, Enrique. Zapata: El amor a la tierra, in the Biographies of Power'' series.
Media
"Emiliano Zapata", BBC Mundo.com
External links
Emiliano Zapata Quotes, Facts, Books and Movies
Full text html version of Zapata's "Plan de Ayala" in Spanish
Emiliano Zapata videos
Bicentenario del inicio del movimiento de Independencia Nacional y del Centenario del inicio de la Revolución Mexicana
Miguel Angel Mancera Espinosa
1879 births
1919 deaths
19th-century Mexican people
20th-century Mexican people
Assassinated Mexican people
Deaths by firearm in Mexico
Mexican agrarianists
Mexican generals
Mexican guerrillas
Mexican rebels
Mexican revolutionaries
Mexican Roman Catholics
Military assassinations
Military history of Mexico
Nahua people
People from Ciudad Ayala, Morelos
People murdered in Mexico
People of the Mexican Revolution | false | [
"A creep-testing machine measures the alteration of a material after it has undergone stresses. \n\nEngineers use Creep machines to determine the stability and behaviour of a material when put through ordinary stresses. They determine how much strain (load) an object can handle under pressure, so engineers and researchers are able to determine what materials to use. \n\nThe device generates a creep time-dependent curve by calculating the steady rate of creep in reference to the time it takes for the material to change.\n\nCreep \nCreep is the tendency of a material to change form over time after facing high temperature and stress. Creep increases with temperature and it is more common when a material is exposed to high temperatures for a long time or at the melting point of the material. \n\nCreep machines are used to understand the creep of materials and determine which type can do the job better, which is important when making and designing materials for everyday uses. They most commonly test the creep of alloys and plastics for the understanding of their properties and advantages of one material's use over another.\n\nBackground\n\nThe first creep testing machines were created in 1948 in Britain to test materials for aircraft to see how they would stand in high altitudes, temperature and pressure. The machines were first developed to further calculate and understand the steady rate of creep in materials.\n\nDesign\nResearchers look to test objects with a creep machine to understand the process of metallurgy and the physical mechanical properties of a metal, test the development of alloys, receive data from the loads that are derived and to find out whether a sample or material is within the boundary of what they are testing. The basic design of a creep machine is the furnace, loading device and support structure.\n\nThe main type of creep testing machine is a constant load creep testing machine. The constant load creep machine consists of a loading platform, foundation, fixture devices and furnace. The fixture devices are the grips and pull rods.\n\nLoad platform or load hanger is where the object will endure pressure at a constant rate.\nGrips hold the material in a certain position. Position is important because if the alignment is off, the machine will deliver inaccurate creep readings.\nDial Gauge is used to measure the strain. It is the object that captures the movement of the object in the machine. The load beam transfers the movement from the grip to the dial gauge.\nHeating Chamber is what surrounds the object and maintain the temperature.\n\nApplications\nCreep machines are most commonly used in experiments to determine how efficient and stable a material is. The machine is used by students and companies to create a creep curve on how much pressure and stress a material can handle. The machine is able to calculate the stress rate, time and pressure.\n\nCreep testing has three different applications in the industry:\nDisplacement-Limited applications : the size must be precise and there must be little errors or tendency to change. This is most commonly found in turbine rotors in jet engines.\n Rupture Limited applications: in this application the break cannot occur to the material but there can be various dimensions as the material goes through creep. High pressure tubes are examples of them.\nStress relaxation limited application : the tension at the beginning becomes more relaxed and the tension will continue to relax as the time goes by, such as cable wires and bolts.\n\nGraphing of creep\nCreep is dependent on time so the curve that the machine generates is a time vs. strain graph. The slope of a creep curve is the creep rate dε/dt The trend of the curve is an upward slope. The graphs are important to learn the trends of the alloys or materials used and by the production of the creep-time graph, it is easier to determine the better material for a specific application.\n\nStages of creep\nThere are three stages of creep: \nPrimary Creep: the initial creep stage where the slope is rising rapidly at first in a short amount of time. After a certain amount of time has elapsed, the slope will begin to slowly decrease from its initial rise.\nSteady State Creep: the creep rate is constant so the line on the curve shows a straight line that is a steady rate.\nTertiary Creep: the last stage of creep when the object that is being subjected to pressure is going to reach its breaking point. In this stage, the object's creep continuously increases until the object breaks. The slope of this stage is very steep for most materials.\nBy examining the three stages above, scientists are able to determine the temperature and interval in which an object will be disturbed once exposed to the load. Some materials have a very small secondary creep state and may go straight from the primary creep to the tertiary creep state. This is dependent on the properties of the material that is being tested. This is important to note because going straight to the tertiary state causes the material to break faster from its form.\n\nA linear graph denotes that the material under stress is gradually deforming, and this would be harder to track at what level of stress an object can handle. This would also mean that the material would not have distinct stages, which would make an object's breaking point less predictable. This is a disadvantage to scientists and engineers when trying to determine the level of creep the object can handle.\n\nReferences \n\nMeasuring instruments",
"Locking pliers (also called Vise-Grips, a vice grip, or a Mole wrench) are pliers that can be locked into position, using an \"over-center\" cam action. Locking pliers are available with many different jaw styles, such as needle-nose pliers, wrenches, clamps and various shapes to fix metal parts for welding. They also come in many sizes.\n\nHistory \n\nThe first locking pliers, with the trade name Vise-Grip, were invented by William S. Petersen in De Witt, Nebraska, United States in 1924.\n\nLater, in 1955, in the United Kingdom, M K Mole and Son, a hand tool manufacturing company, under the managing direction of Thomas Coughtrie, began making a nearly identical pliers.\n\nEtymology\nIn the United States, the brand name \"Vise Grips\" is nearly a generic name for this type of pliers. In the United Kingdom, the brand name \"Mole Wrench\" is nearly a generic name for this type of pliers.\n\nThe spelling of \"vise\" is the older spelling as attested in Samuel Johnson's 1755 dictionary. This spelling has been retained in the United States.\n\nThe spelling of \"vice\" can be traced back to 1584 for the clamping use of the word. This is the current spelling in the English speaking world except for the United States.\n\nMechanism \nLocking pliers remain clamped to an object without requiring continuous pressure on the handles based on the \"over-center\" principle. After being properly adjusted using a threaded screw, the pliers are brought to bear by cam action. In the process of being closed on an object the mechanism passes through a point of maximum tightest clamping and as the handle levers are closed further, the jaws release slightly. This means that to open the jaws have to be tightened, thus maintaining the clamping pressure. The inherent flexibility of the pliers maintains a spring pressure on the jaws such that the handle needs to be pulled open to release the clamping pressure. In many modern versions an additional inner lever aids release.\n\nOperation \n\nThe bolt is used to set the jaws to a size slightly smaller than what is to be gripped.\nThe jaws are then closed on the gripped object.\n\nBecause of the lever action the jaws move only slightly but with much force.\nLocking pliers have four advantages:\n Their lever action is stronger than that of ordinary pliers, so they can apply much more force;\n Even though they can apply more force, they do so in a very controlled manner; this is because the jaws will never close beyond the set point;\n The closing point and with it the force that is applied on the gripped object can be finely controlled;\n When they are closed they remain closed on their own until manually released, in many modern versions using a supplementary lever on the lower handle.\n\nA typical use would be to hold metal parts in place for welding. Other uses include holding a nut or bolt that has been 'rounded', helping pull out nails, holding pipes without squeezing them, and acting as temporary substitute levers or knobs on equipment and machinery.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n\n History of the Vise-Grip\n \"New Tool Is Both Pliers and Wrench\" Popular Science, December 1935, page 42\n \"Wrench with Vise Like Grip Keeps Work from Slipping\", Popular Mechanics, September 1935, page 326\n Last Day Cover Newport Mon The Home Of The Mole Wrench at newportpast.com\n\nPliers\nProducts introduced in 1924\nAmerican inventions"
]
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[
"Emiliano Zapata",
"Zapata under pressure",
"When did he first begin to feel pressure?",
"the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas.",
"Was he the leader of the group?",
"As General Arenas had turned over to the constitutionalists, he had secured peace for his region and he remained in control there.",
"How did he handle the pressure beyond this? What were his plans?",
"Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Diaz."
]
| C_7f0315f77260442b8ce138603be6223f_1 | DId those groups agree to fight on his side? | 4 | DId the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas agree to fight on Emiliano Zapata's side? | Emiliano Zapata | Meanwhile, the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas. As General Arenas had turned over to the constitutionalists, he had secured peace for his region and he remained in control there. This suggested to many revolutionaries that perhaps the time had come to seek a peaceful conclusion to the struggle. A movement within the Zapatista ranks led by former General Vazquez and Zapata's erstwhile adviser and inspiration Otilio Montano moved against the Tlaltizapan headquarters demanding surrender to the Carrancistas. Reluctantly, Zapata had Montano tried for treason and executed (Womack 1983-86). Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Diaz. He sent Gildardo Magana as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support. In the fall of 1917 a force led by Gonzalez and the ex-Zapatista Sidronio Camacho, who had killed Zapata's brother Eufemio, moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec. Zapata continued his work to try to unite with the national anti-Carrancista movement through the next year, and the constitutionalists did not make further advances. In the winter of 1918 a harsh cold and the onset of the Spanish flu decimated the population of Morelos, causing the loss of a quarter of the total population of the state, almost as many as had been lost to Huerta in 1914. (Womack 311). Furthermore, Zapata began to worry that by the end of the World War, the US would turn its attention to Mexico forcing the Zapatistas to either join the Carrancistas in a national defense or to acquiesce to foreign domination of Mexico. In December 1918 Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat. The main Zapatista headquarters were moved to Tochimilco, Puebla, although Tlaltizapan also continued to be under Zapatista control. Through Castro, Carranza issued offers to the main Zapatista generals to join the nationalist cause, with pardon. But apart from Manuel Palafox, who having fallen in disgrace among the Zapatistas had joined the Arenistas, none of the major generals did (Womack 313-14). Zapata emitted statements accusing Carranza of being secretly sympathetic to the Germans (Womack 315). In March Zapata finally emitted an open letter to Carranza urging him for the good of the fatherland to resign his leadership to Vazquez Gomez, by now the rallying point of the anti-constitutionalist movement (Womack 319-20). Having posed this formidable moral challenge to Carranza prior to the upcoming 1920 presidential elections, the Zapatista generals at Tochimilco, Magana and Ayaquica, urged Zapata not to take any risks and to lay low. But Zapata declined, considering that the respect of his troops depended on his active presence at the front (Womack 320-22). CANNOTANSWER | He sent Gildardo Magana as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support. | Emiliano Zapata Salazar (; 8 August 1879 – 10 April 1919) was a Mexican revolutionary. He was a leading figure in the Mexican Revolution of 1910–1920, the main leader of the people's revolution in the Mexican state of Morelos, and the inspiration of the agrarian movement called Zapatismo.
Zapata was born in the rural village of Anenecuilco in Morelos State, in an era when peasant communities came under increasing pressure from the small-landowning class who monopolized land and water resources for sugar-cane production with the support of dictator Porfirio Díaz (President 1877-1880 and 1884–1911). Zapata early on participated in political movements against Díaz and the landowning hacendados, and when the Revolution broke out in 1910 he was thus positioned as a central leader of the peasant revolt in Morelos. Cooperating with a number of other peasant leaders, he formed the Liberation Army of the South, of which he soon became the undisputed leader. Zapata's forces contributed to the fall of Díaz, defeating the Federal Army in the Battle of Cuautla (May 1911), but when the revolutionary leader Francisco I. Madero became president he disavowed the role of the Zapatistas, denouncing them as simple bandits.
In November 1911 Zapata promulgated the Plan de Ayala, which called for substantial land reforms, redistributing lands to the peasants. Madero sent the Federal Army to root out the Zapatistas in Morelos. Madero's generals employed a scorched-earth policy, burning villages and forcibly removing their inhabitants, and drafting many men into the Army or sending them to forced-labor camps in southern Mexico. Such actions strengthened Zapata's standing among the peasants, and Zapata succeeded in driving the forces of Madero (led by Victoriano Huerta) out of Morelos. In a coup against Madero in February 1913, Huerta took power in Mexico, but a coalition of Constitutionalist forces in northern Mexico led by Venustiano Carranza, Álvaro Obregón and Francisco "Pancho" Villa ousted him in July 1914 with the support of Zapata's troops. Zapata did not recognize the authority that Carranza asserted as leader of the revolutionary movement, continuing his adherence to the Plan de Ayala.
In the aftermath of the revolutionaries' victory over Huerta, they attempted to sort out power relations in the Convention of Aguascalientes (October to November 1914). Zapata and Villa broke with Carranza, and Mexico descended into a civil war among the winners. Dismayed with the alliance with Villa, Zapata focused his energies on rebuilding society in Morelos (which he now controlled), instituting the land reforms of the Plan de Ayala. As Carranza consolidated his power and defeated Villa in 1915, Zapata initiated guerrilla warfare against the Carrancistas, who in turn invaded Morelos, employing once again scorched-earth tactics to oust the Zapatista rebels. Zapata once again re-took Morelos in 1917 and held most of the state against Carranza's troops until he was killed in an ambush in April 1919.
Article 27 of the 1917 Mexican Constitution was drafted in response to Zapata's agrarian demands.
After his death, Zapatista generals aligned with Obregón against Carranza and helped drive Carranza from power (1920). In 1920 Zapatistas managed to obtain powerful posts in the government of Morelos after Carranza's fall. They instituted many of the land reforms envisioned by Zapata in Morelos.
Zapata remains an iconic figure in Mexico, used both as a nationalist symbol as well as a symbol of the neo-Zapatista movement.
Early years before the Revolution
Emiliano Zapata was born to Gabriel Zapata and Cleofas Jertrudiz Salazar of Anenecuilco, Morelos, a well-known local family; Emiliano's godfather was the manager of a large local hacienda, and his godmother was the manager's wife. Zapata's family were likely mestizos, Mexicans of both Spanish and Nahua heritage. Emiliano was the ninth of ten children; he had six sisters: Celsa, Ramona, María de Jesús, María de la Luz, Jovita and Matilde. And three brothers: Pedro, Eufemio Zapata and Loreto. The Zapata family were descended from the Zapata of Mapaztlán. His maternal grandfather, José Salazar, served in the army of José María Morelos y Pavón during the siege of Cuautla; his paternal uncles Cristino and José Zapata fought in the Reform War and the French Intervention. From a family of farmers, Emiliano Zapata had insight into the severe difficulties of the countryside and his village's long struggle to regain land taken by expanding haciendas. Although he is commonly portrayed as "indigenous" or a member of the landless peasantry in Mexican iconography, Zapata's was racially indigenous but neither landless nor is known to have spoken the Nahuatl language. They were reasonably well-off and never suffered poverty, enjoying such activities as bullfights, cock-fighting and jaripeos.
He received a limited education from his teacher, Emilio Vara, but it included "the rudiments of bookkeeping". At the age of 16 or 17, Zapata had to care for his family following his father's death. Emiliano was entrepreneurial, buying a team of mules to haul maize from farms to town, as well as bricks to the Hacienda of Chinameca; he was also a successful farmer, growing watermelons as a cash crop. He was a skilled horseman and competed in rodeos and races, as well as bullfighting from horseback. These skills as a horseman brought him work as a horse trainer for Porfirio Díaz's son-in-law, Ignacio de la Torre y Mier who had a large sugar hacienda nearby, and served Zapata well as a revolutionary leader. He had a striking appearance, with a large mustache in which he took pride, and good quality clothing described by his loyal secretary: "General Zapata's dress until his death was a charro outfit: tight-fitting black cashmere pants with silver buttons, a broad charro hat, a fine linen shirt or jacket, a scarf around his neck, boots of a single piece, Amozoqueña-style spurs, and a pistol at his belt." In an undated studio photo, Zapata is dressed in a standard business suit and tie, projecting an image of a man of means.
Around the turn of the 20th century, Anenecuilco was a mixed Spanish-speaking mestizo and indigenous Nahuatl-speaking pueblo. It had a long history of protesting the local haciendas taking community members' land, and its leaders gathered colonial-era documentation of their land titles to prove their claims. Some of the colonial documentation was in Nahuatl, with contemporary translations to Spanish for use in legal cases in the Spanish courts. One eyewitness account by Luz Jiménez of Milpa Alta states that Emiliano Zapata spoke Nahuatl fluently when his forces arrived in her community.
Community members in Anenecuilco, including Zapata, sought redress against land seizures. In 1892, a delegation had an audience with Díaz, who with the intervention of a lawyer, agreed to hear them. Although promising them to deal favorably with their petition, Díaz had them arrested and Zapata was conscripted into the Federal Army. Under Díaz, conscription into the Federal Army was much feared by ordinary Mexican men and their families. Zapata was one of many rebel leaders who were conscripted at some point.
In 1909, an important meeting was called by the elders of Anenecuilco, whose chief elder was José Merino. He announced "my intention to resign from my position due to my old age and limited abilities to continue the fight for the land rights of the village." The meeting was used as a time for discussion and nomination of individuals as a replacement for Merino as the president of the village council. The elders on the council were so well respected by the village men that no one would dare to override their nominations or vote for an individual against the advice of the current council at that time. The nominations made were Modesto González, Bartolo Parral, and Emiliano Zapata. After the nominations were closed, a vote was taken and Zapata became the new council president without contest.
Although Zapata had turned 30 only a month before, voters knew that it was necessary to elect someone respected by the community who would be responsible for the village. Even though he was relatively young, Anenecuilco was ready to hand over the leadership to him without any worry of failure. Before he was elected he had shown the village his nature by helping to head up a campaign in opposition to the candidate Díaz had chosen governor. Even though Zapata's efforts failed, he was able to create and cultivate relationships with political authority figures that would prove useful for him.
Zapata became a leading figure in the village of Anenecuilco, where his family had lived for many generations, though he did not take the title of Don, as was custom for someone of his status. Instead, the Anenecuilcans referred to Zapata affectionately as "Miliano" and later as pobrecito (poor little thing) after his death.
The 1910 Revolution
The flawed 1910 elections were a major reason for the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution in 1910. Porfirio Díaz was being threatened by the candidacy of Francisco I. Madero. Zapata, seeing an opportunity to promote land reform in Mexico, joined with Madero and his Constitutionalists, who included Pascual Orozco and Pancho Villa, whom he perceived to be the best chance for genuine change in the country. Although he was wary about Madero, Zapata cooperated with him when Madero made vague promises about land reform in his Plan of San Luis Potosí. Land reform was the central feature of Zapata's political vision.
Zapata joined Madero's campaign against President Díaz. The first military campaign of Zapata was the capture of the Hacienda of Chinameca. When Zapata's army captured Cuautla after a six-day battle on May 19, 1911, it became clear that Díaz would not hold on to power for long.
During his interim presidency, Francisco León de la Barra tasked General Victoriano Huerta to suppress revolutionaries in Morelos. Huerta was to disarm revolutionaries peacefully if possible, but could use force. In August 1911, Huerta led 1,000 Federal troops to Cuernavaca, which Madero saw as provocative. Writing the Minister of the Interior, Zapata demanded the Federal troops withdraw from Morelos, saying "I won't be responsible for the blood that is going to flow if the Federal forces remain."
Although Madero's Plan of San Luis Potosí specified the return of village land and won the support of peasants seeking land reform, he was not ready to implement radical change. Madero simply demanded that "Public servants act 'morally' in enforcing the law ...". Upon seeing the response by villagers, Madero offered formal justice in courts to individuals who had been wronged by others with regard to agrarian politics. Zapata decided that on the surface it seemed as though Madero was doing good things for the people of Mexico, but Zapata did not know the level of sincerity in Madero's actions and thus did not know if he should support him completely.
Plan of Ayala and rebellion against Madero
Compromises between the Madero and Zapata failed in November 1911, days after Madero was elected president. Zapata and Otilio Montaño Sánchez, a former school teacher, fled to the mountains of southwest Puebla. There they promulgated the most radical reform plan in Mexico, the Plan de Ayala (Plan of Ayala). The plan declared Madero a traitor, named as head of the revolution Pascual Orozco, the victorious general who captured Ciudad Juárez in 1911 forcing the resignation of Díaz. He outlined a plan for true land reform.
Zapata had supported the ouster of Díaz and had the expectation that Madero would fulfill the promises made in the Plan of San Luis Potosí to return village lands. He did not share Madero's vision of democracy built on particular freedoms and guarantees that were meaningless to peasants:
Freedom of the press for those who cannot read; free elections for those who do not know the candidates; proper legal for those who have anything to do with an attorney. All those democratic principles, all those great words that gave such joy to our fathers and grandfathers have lost their magic for the people... With or without elections, with or without an effective law, with the Porfirian dictatorship or with Madero's democracy with a controlled or free press, its fate remains the same.
The 1911 Plan of Ayala called for all lands stolen under Díaz to be immediately returned; there had been considerable land fraud under the old dictator, so a great deal of territory was involved. It also stated that large plantations owned by a single person or family should have one-third of their land nationalized, which would then be required to be given to poor farmers. It also argued that if any large plantation owner resisted this action, they should have the other two-thirds confiscated as well. The Plan of Ayala also invoked the name of President Benito Juárez, one of Mexico's great liberal leaders, and compared the taking of land from the wealthy to Juarez's actions when land was expropriated from the Catholic church during the Liberal Reform. Another part of the plan stated that rural cooperatives and other measurements should be put in place to prevent the land from being seized or stolen in the future.
In the following weeks, the development of military operations "betray(ed) good evidence of clear and intelligent planning." During Orozco's rebellion, Zapata fought Mexican troops in the south near Mexico City. In the original design of the armed force, Zapata was a mere colonel among several others; however, the true plan that came about through this organization lent itself to Zapata. Zapata believed that the best route of attack would be to center the fighting and action in Cuautla. If this political location could be overthrown, the army would have enough power to "veto anyone else's control of the state, negotiate for Cuernavaca or attack it directly, and maintain independent access to Mexico City as well as escape routes to the southern hills." However, in order to gain this great success, Zapata realized that his men needed to be better armed and trained.
The first line of action demanded that Zapata and his men "control the area behind and below a line from Jojutla to Yecapixtla." When this was accomplished it gave the army the ability to complete raids as well as wait. As the opposition of the Federal Army and police detachments slowly dissipated, the army would be able to eventually gain powerful control over key locations on the Interoceanic Railway from Puebla City to Cuautla. If these feats could be completed, it would gain access to Cuautla directly and the city would fall.
The plan of action was carried out successfully in Jojutla. However, Pablo Torres Burgos, the commander of the operation, was disappointed that the army disobeyed his orders against looting and ransacking. The army took complete control of the area, and it seemed as though Torres Burgos had lost control over his forces prior to this event. Shortly after, Torres Burgos called a meeting and resigned from his position. Upon leaving Jojutla with his two sons, he was surprised by a federal police patrol who subsequently shot all three of the men on the spot. This seemed to some to be an ending blow to the movement, because Torres Burgos had not selected a successor for his position; however, Zapata was ready to take up where Torres Burgos had left off.
Shortly after Torres Burgos's death, a party of rebels elected Zapata as "Supreme Chief of the Revolutionary Movement of the South". This seemed to be the fix to all of the problems that had just arisen, but other individuals wanted to replace Zapata as well. Due to this new conflict, the individual who would come out on top would have to do so by "convincing his peers he deserved their backing."
Zapata finally gained the support necessary by his peers and was considered a "singularly qualified candidate". This decision to make Zapata the leader of the revolution in Morelos did not occur all at once, nor did it ever reach a true definitive level of recognition. In order to succeed, Zapata needed a strong financial backing for the battles to come. This came in the form of 10,000 pesos delivered by Rodolfo from the Tacubayans. Due to this amount of money Zapata's group of rebels became one of the strongest in the state financially.
After a period Zapata became the leader of his "strategic zone", which gave him power and control over the actions of many more individual rebel groups and thus greatly increased his margin of success. "Among revolutionaries in other districts of the state, however, Zapata's authority was more tenuous." After a meeting between Zapata and Ambrosio Figueroa in Jolalpan, it was decided that Zapata would have joint power with Figueroa with regard to operations in Morelos. This was a turning point in the level of authority and influence that Zapata had gained and proved useful in the direct overthrow of Morelos.
Rebellion against Huerta, the Zapata-Villa alliance
If there was anyone that Zapata hated more than Díaz and Madero, it was Victoriano Huerta, the bitter, violent alcoholic who had been responsible for many atrocities in southern Mexico while trying to end the rebellion. Zapata was not alone: in the north, Pancho Villa, who had supported Madero, immediately took to the field against Huerta. Zapata revised the Plan of Ayala and named himself the leader of his revolution. He was joined by two newcomers to the Revolution, Venustiano Carranza and Alvaro Obregón, who raised large armies in Coahuila and Sonora respectively. Together they made short work of Huerta, who resigned and fled in June 1914 after repeated military losses.
On April 21, 1914, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson sent a contingent of troops to occupy the port city of Veracruz. This sudden threat caused Huerta to withdraw his troops from Morelos and Puebla, leaving only Jojutla and Cuernavaca under federal control. Zapatistas quickly assumed control of eastern Morelos, taking Cuautla and Jonacatepec with no resistance. In spite of being faced with a possible foreign invasion, Zapata refused to unite with Huerta in defense of the nation. He stated that if need be he would defend Mexico alone as chief of the Ayalan forces. In May the Zapatistas took Jojutla from the Federal Army, many of whom joined the rebels, and captured guns and ammunition. They also laid siege to Cuernavaca where a small contingent of federal troops were holed up. By the summer of 1915 Zapata's forces had taken the southern edge of the Federal District, occupying Milpa Alta and Xochimilco, and was poised to move into the capital. In mid July, Huerta was forced to flee as a Constitutionalist force under Carranza, Obregón and Villa took the Federal District. The Constitutionalists established a peace treaty inserting Carranza as First Authority of the nation. Carranza, an aristocrat with politically relevant connections, then gained the backing of the U.S., who passed over Villa and Zapata due to their lower status backgrounds and more progressive ideologies. In spite of having contributed decisively to the fall of Huerta, the Zapatistas were left out of the peace treaties, probably because of Carranza's intense dislike for the Zapatistas whom he saw as uncultured savages. Through 1915 there was a tentative peace in Morelos and the rest of the country.
As the Constitutionalist forces began to split, with Francisco "Pancho" Villa creating a popular front against Carranza's Constitutionalists, Carranza worked diplomatically to get the Zapatistas to recognize his rule, sending Dr. Atl as an envoy to propose a compromise with Zapata. For Carranza, an agreement with Zapata would mean that he did not need to worry about his force's southern flank and could concentrate on defeating Villa. Zapata demanded veto power over Carranza's decisions, which Carranza rejected and negotiations broke off. Zapata issued a statement, perhaps drafted by his advisor, Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama. "The country wishes to destroy feudalism once and for all [while Carranza offers] administrative reform...complete honesty in the handling of public monies...freedom of the press for those who cannot read; free elections for those who do not know the candidates; proper legal proceedings for those who have never had anything to do with an attorney. All those beautiful democratic principles, all those great words that give such joy to our fathers and grandfathers have lost their magic...The people continue to suffer from poverty and endless disappointments."
Unable to reach an agreement, the Constitutionalists divided along ideological lines, with Zapata and Villa leading a progressive rebellion and the conservative faction of the remaining Constituitionalists being headed Carranza and Obregón. Villa and the other anti-Carrancista leaders of the North established the Convention of Aguascalientes against Carranza. Zapata and his envoys got the convention to adopt some of the agrarian principles of the Plan de Ayala. Zapata and Villa met in Xochimilco to negotiate an alliance and divide the responsibility for ridding Mexico of the remaining Carrancistas. The meeting was awkward but amiable, and was widely publicized. It was decided that Zapata should work on securing the area east of Morelos from Puebla towards Veracruz. Nonetheless, during the ensuing campaign in Puebla, Zapata was disappointed by Villa's lack of support. Villa did not initially provide the Zapatistas with the weaponry they had agreed on and, when he did, he did not provide adequate transportation. There were also a series of abuses by Villistas against Zapatista soldiers and chiefs. These experiences led Zapata to grow unsatisfied with the alliance, turning instead his efforts to reorganizing the state of Morelos that had been left in shambles by the onslaught of Huerta and Robles. Having taken Puebla, Zapata left a couple of garrisons there but did not support Villa further against Obregón and Carranza. The Carrancistas saw that the convention was divided and decided to concentrate on beating Villa, which left the Zapatistas to their own devices for a while.
Zapata rebuilds Morelos
Through 1915, Zapata began reshaping Morelos after the Plan de Ayala, redistributing hacienda lands to the peasants, and largely letting village councils run their own local affairs. Most peasants did not turn to cash crops, instead growing subsistence crops such as corn, beans, and vegetables. The result was that as the capital was starving, Morelos peasants had more to eat than they had had in 1910 and at lower prices. The only official event in Morelos during this entire year was a bullfight in which Zapata himself and his nephew Amador Salazar participated. 1915 was a short period of peace and prosperity for the farmers of Morelos, in between the massacres of the Huerta era and the civil war of the winners to come.
Guerrilla warfare against Carranza
Even when Villa was retreating, having lost the Battle of Celaya in 1915, and when Obregón took the capital from the Conventionists who retreated to Toluca, Zapata did not open a second front.
When Carranza's forces were poised to move into Morelos, Zapata took action. He attacked Carrancista positions with large forces trying to harry the Carrancistas in the rear as they were occupied with routing Villa throughout the Northwest. Though Zapata managed to take many important sites such as the Necaxa power plant that supplied Mexico City, he was unable to hold them. The convention was finally routed from Toluca, and Carranza was recognized by US President Woodrow Wilson as the head of state of Mexico in October.
Through 1916 Zapata raided federal forces from Hidalgo to Oaxaca, and Genovevo de la O fought the Carrancistas in Guerrero. The Zapatistas attempted to amass support for their cause by promulgating new manifestos against the hacendados, but this had little effect since the hacendados had already lost power throughout the country.
Carranza consolidates power
Having been put in charge of the efforts to root out Zapatismo in Morelos, Pablo González Garza was humiliated by Zapata's counterattacks and enforced increasingly draconian measures against the locals. He received no reinforcements, as Obregón, the Minister of War, needed all his forces against Villa in the north and against Felix Díaz in Oaxaca. Through low-scale attacks on Gonzalez's positions, Zapata had driven Gonzalez out of Morelos by the end of 1916.
Nonetheless, outside of Morelos the revolutionary forces started disbanding. Some joined the constitutionalists such as Domingo Arena, or lapsed into banditry. In Morelos, Zapata once more reorganized the Zapatista state, continuing with democratic reforms and legislation meant to keep the civil population safe from abuses by soldiers. Though his advisers urged him to mount a concerted campaign against the Carrancistas across southern Mexico, again he concentrated entirely on stabilizing Morelos and making life tolerable for the peasants. Meanwhile, Carranza mounted national elections in all state capitals except Cuernavaca, and promulgated the 1917 Constitution which incorporated elements of the Plan de Ayala.
Zapata under pressure
Meanwhile, the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas. As General Arenas turned over to the constitutionalists, he secured peace for his region and remained in control there. This suggested to many revolutionaries that perhaps the time had come to seek a peaceful conclusion to the struggle. A movement within the Zapatista ranks led by former General Vazquez and Zapata's erstwhile adviser and inspiration Otilio Montaño moved against the Tlaltizapan headquarters demanding surrender to the Carrancistas. Reluctantly, Zapata had Montaño tried for treason and executed.
Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Díaz. He sent Gildardo Magaña as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support. In the fall of 1917 a force led by Gonzalez and the ex-Zapatista Sidronio Camacho, who had killed Zapata's brother Eufemio, moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec.
Zapata continued his work to try to unite with the national anti-Carrancista movement through the next year, and the constitutionalists did not make further advances. In the winter of 1918 a harsh cold and the onset of the Spanish flu decimated the population of Morelos, causing the loss of a quarter of the total population of the state, almost as many as had been lost to Huerta in 1914. Furthermore, Zapata began to worry that by the end of the World War, the United States would turn its attention to Mexico, forcing the Zapatistas to either join the Carrancistas in a national defense or to acquiesce to foreign domination of Mexico.
In December 1918 Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat. The main Zapatista headquarters were moved to Tochimilco, Puebla, although Tlaltizapan also continued to be under Zapatista control. Through Castro, Carranza issued offers to the main Zapatista generals to join the nationalist cause, with pardon. But apart from Manuel Palafox, who having fallen in disgrace among the Zapatistas had joined the Arenistas, none of the major generals did.
Zapata released statements accusing Carranza of being secretly sympathetic to the Germans. In March Zapata finally sent an open letter to Carranza urging him for the good of the fatherland to resign his leadership to Vazquez Gómez, by now the rallying point of the anti-constitutionalist movement. Having posed this formidable moral challenge to Carranza prior to the upcoming 1920 presidential elections, the Zapatista generals at Tochimilco, Magaña and Ayaquica, urged Zapata not to take any risks and to lie low. But Zapata declined, considering that the respect of his troops depended on his active presence at the front.
Assassination
Eliminating Zapata was a top priority for President Carranza. Carranza was unwilling to compromise with domestic foes and wanted to demonstrate to Mexican elites and to American interests that Carranza was the "only viable alternative to both anarchy and radicalism." In mid-March 1919, General Pablo González ordered his subordinate Jesús Guajardo to begin operations against the Zapatistas in the mountains around Huautla. But when González later discovered Guajardo carousing in a cantina, he had him arrested, and a public scandal ensued. On March 21, Zapata attempted to smuggle in a note to Guajardo, inviting him to switch sides. The note, however, never reached Guajardo but instead wound up on González's desk. González devised a plan to use this note to his advantage. He accused Guajardo of not only being a drunk, but of being a traitor. After reducing Guajardo to tears, González explained to him that he could recover from this disgrace if he feigned a defection to Zapata. So Guajardo wrote to Zapata telling him that he would bring over his men and supplies if certain guarantees were promised. Zapata answered Guajardo's letter on April 1, 1919, agreeing to all of Guajardo's terms. Zapata suggested a mutiny on April 4. Guajardo replied that his defection should wait until a new shipment of arms and ammunition arrived sometime between the 6th and the 10th. By the 7th, the plans were set: Zapata ordered Guajardo to attack the Federal garrison at Jonacatepec because the garrison included troops who had defected from Zapata. Pablo González and Guajardo notified the Jonacatepec garrison ahead of time, and a mock battle was staged on April 9. At the conclusion of the mock battle, the former Zapatistas were arrested and shot. Convinced that Guajardo was sincere, Zapata agreed to a final meeting where Guajardo would defect.
On April 10, 1919, Guajardo invited Zapata to a meeting, intimating that he intended to defect to the revolutionaries. However, when Zapata arrived at the Hacienda de San Juan, in Chinameca, Ayala municipality, Guajardo's men riddled him with bullets.
Zapata's body was photographed, displayed for 24 hours, and then buried in Cuautla. Pablo González wanted the body photographed, so that there would be no doubt that Zapata was dead: "it was an actual fact that the famous jefe of the southern region had died." Although Mexico City newspapers had called for Zapata's body to be brought to the capital, Carranza did not do so. However, Zapata's clothing was displayed outside a newspaper's office across from the Alameda Park in the capital.
Immediate aftermath
Although Zapata's assassination weakened his forces in Morelos, the Zapatistas continued the fight against Carranza. For Carranza the death of Zapata was the removal of an ongoing threat, for many Zapata's assassination undermined "worker and peasant support for Carranza and [Pablo] González." Obregón seized on the opportunity to attack Carranza and González, Obregón's rival candidate for the presidency, by saying "this crime reveals a lack of ethics in some members of the government and also of political sense, since peasant votes in the upcoming election will now go to whoever runs against Pablo González." In spite of González's attempts to sully the name of Zapata and the Plan de Ayala during his 1920 campaign for the presidency, the people of Morelos continued to support Zapatista generals, providing them with weapons, supplies and protection. Carranza was wary of the threat of a U.S. intervention, and Zapatista generals decided to take a conciliatory approach. Bands of Zapatistas started surrendering in exchange for amnesties, and many Zapatista generals went on to become local authorities, such as Fortino Ayaquica who became municipal president of Tochimilco. Other generals such as Genovevo de la O remained active in small-scale guerrilla warfare.
As Venustiano Carranza moved to curb his former allies and now rivals in 1920 to impose a civilian, Ignacio Bonillas, as his successor in the presidency, Obregón sought to align himself with the Zapatista movement against that of Carranza. Genovevo de la O and Magaña supported him in the coup by former Constitutionalists, fighting in Morelos against Carranza and helping prompt Carranza to flee Mexico City toward Veracruz in May 1920. "Obregón and Genovevo de la O entered Mexico City in triumph." Zapatistas were given important posts in the interim government of Adolfo de la Huerta and the administration of Álvaro Obregón, following his election to the presidency after the coup. Zapatistas had almost total control of the state of Morelos, where they carried out a program of agrarian reform and land redistribution based on the provisions of the Plan de Ayala and with the support of the government.
According to "La Demócrata", after Zapata's assassination, "in the consciousness of the natives", Zapata "had taken on the proportions of a myth" because he had "given them a formula of vindication against old offenses." Mythmaking would continue for decades after Zapata was gunned down.
Legacy
Zapata's influence continues to this day, particularly in revolutionary tendencies in southern Mexico. In the long run, he has done more for his ideals in death than he did in life. Like many charismatic idealists, Zapata became a martyr after his murder. Even though Mexico still has not implemented the sort of land reform he wanted, he is remembered as a visionary who fought for his countrymen.
Zapata's Plan of Ayala influenced Article 27 of the progressive 1917 Constitution of Mexico that codified an agrarian reform program. Even though the Mexican Revolution did restore some land that had been taken under Díaz, the land reform on the scale imagined by Zapata was never enacted. However, a great deal of the significant land distribution which Zapata sought would later be enacted after Mexican President Lázaro Cárdenas took office in 1934. Cárdenas would fulfill not only the land distribution policies written in Article 27, but other reforms written in the Mexican Constitution as well.
There are controversies about the portrayal of Emiliano Zapata and his followers, whether they were bandits or revolutionaries. At the outbreak of the Revolution, "Zapata's agrarian revolt was soon construed as a 'caste war' [race war], in which members of an 'inferior race' were captained by a 'modern Attila'".
Zapata is now one of the most revered national heroes of Mexico. To many Mexicans, especially the peasant and indigenous citizens, Zapata was a practical revolutionary who sought the implementation of liberties and agrarian rights outlined in the Plan of Ayala. He was a realist with the goal of achieving political and economic emancipation of the peasants in southern Mexico and leading them out of severe poverty.
Many popular organizations take their name from Zapata, most notably the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional or EZLN in Spanish), the Neozapatismo group that emerged in the state of Chiapas in 1983 and precipitated the 1994 indigenous Zapatista uprising which still continues in Chiapas. Towns, streets, and housing developments called "Emiliano Zapata" are common across the country and he has, at times, been depicted on Mexican banknotes.
Modern activists in Mexico frequently make reference to Zapata in their campaigns; his image is commonly seen on banners, and many chants invoke his name: Si Zapata viviera con nosotros anduviera ("If Zapata lived, he would walk with us"), and Zapata vive, la lucha sigue ("Zapata lives; the struggle continues").
His daughter by Petra Portillo Torres, Paulina Ana María Zapata Portillo, was aware of her father's legacy from a very early age. She continued his work of dedication to agrarian rights, serving as treasurer of the ejido of Cuautla, as ejidataria of Cuautla, as municipal councilor and municipal trustee.
In popular culture
Zapata has been depicted in movies, comics, books, music, and clothing. For example, there is a Zapata (1980), stage musical written by Harry Nilsson and Perry Botkin, libretto by Allan Katz, which ran for 16 weeks at the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam, Connecticut. A movie called Zapata: El sueño de un héroe (Zapata: A Hero's Dream) was produced in 2004, starring Mexican actors Alejandro Fernandez, Jaime Camil, and Lucero. There is also a sub-genre of the Spaghetti Western called the Zapata Western, which features stories set during the Mexican Revolution.
Marlon Brando played Emiliano Zapata in the award-winning movie based on his life, Viva Zapata! in 1952. The film co-starred Anthony Quinn, who won best supporting actor. The director was Elia Kazan and the writer was John Steinbeck.
Emiliano Zapata is a major character in The Friends of Pancho Villa (1996), by James Carlos Blake
Emiliano Zapata is referenced in the song "Calm Like a Bomb" by American rock band Rage Against the Machine from their album "The Battle of Los Angeles."
In the 2011 Mexican TV series "El Encanto del
Aguila" Zapata is played by the Mexican actor Tenoch Huerta.
In December 2019, an arts show commemorating the 100 year anniversary of his death was held at the Palacio de Bellas Artes. The show featured 141 works. A painting called La Revolución depicted Zapata as intentionally effeminate, riding an erect horse, nude except for high heels and a pink hat. According to the artist, he created the painting to combat machismo. The painting caused protests from the farmer's union and admirers of Zapata. His grandson Jorge Zapata González threatened to sue if the painting was not removed. There was a clash between supporters of the painting and detractors at the museum. A compromised was reached with some of Zapata's family, a label was placed next to the painting outlining their disagreement with the painting.
Sobriquets
"Calpuleque (náhuatl)" – leader, chief
"El Tigre del Sur" – Tiger of the South
"El Tigre" – The Tiger
"El Tigrillo" – Little Tiger
"El Caudillo del Sur" – Caudillo of the South
"El Atila del Sur" – The Attila of the South (pejorative)
Gallery
References
Cited sources
Further reading
Brunk, Samuel, ¡Emiliano Zapata! Revolution and Betrayal in Mexico. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1995.
Caballero, Raymond. Lynching Pascual Orozco, Mexican Revolutionary Hero and Paradox. Create Space 2015.
Lucas, Jeffrey Kent. The Rightward Drift of Mexico's Former Revolutionaries: The Case of Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2010.
Mclynn, Frank. Villa and Zapata: A history of the Mexican Revolution. New York : Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2001.
McNeely, John H. "Origins of the Zapata revolt in Morelos." Hispanic American Historical Review (1966): 153–169.
Historiography
Golland, David Hamilton. "Recent Works on the Mexican Revolution." Estudios Interdisciplinarios de América Latina y el Caribe 16.1 (2014). online
McNamara, Patrick J. "Rewriting Zapata: Generational Conflict on the Eve of the Mexican Revolution." Mexican Studies-Estudios Mexicanos 30.1 (2014): 122–149.
In Spanish
Horcasitas, Fernando. De Porfirio Díaz a Zapata, memoria náhuatl de Milpa Alta, UNAM, México DF.,1968 (eye and ear-witness account of Zapata speaking Nahuatl)
Krauze, Enrique. Zapata: El amor a la tierra, in the Biographies of Power'' series.
Media
"Emiliano Zapata", BBC Mundo.com
External links
Emiliano Zapata Quotes, Facts, Books and Movies
Full text html version of Zapata's "Plan de Ayala" in Spanish
Emiliano Zapata videos
Bicentenario del inicio del movimiento de Independencia Nacional y del Centenario del inicio de la Revolución Mexicana
Miguel Angel Mancera Espinosa
1879 births
1919 deaths
19th-century Mexican people
20th-century Mexican people
Assassinated Mexican people
Deaths by firearm in Mexico
Mexican agrarianists
Mexican generals
Mexican guerrillas
Mexican rebels
Mexican revolutionaries
Mexican Roman Catholics
Military assassinations
Military history of Mexico
Nahua people
People from Ciudad Ayala, Morelos
People murdered in Mexico
People of the Mexican Revolution | false | [
"Bittereinderdag (Bitter-ender Day) is celebrated annually on May 31 by the Afrikaner people, commemorating the Boer guerilla fighters known as bittereinders.\n\nOrigin \nOn May 31, 1902 the Treaty of Vereeniging was signed by the British Empire, Transvaal, and the Orange Free State, ending the Second Boer War. \n\nDue to the British forces' reliance on scorched earth tactics and concentration camps, many of the Boer forces were unwilling to concede.\n\nBittereinders are those who did not agree to the British Empire's preliminary peace talks in 1901, as well as those who refused to sign the Treaty of Vereeniging or acknowledge its legitimacy. Those who continued to fight after the signing of the treaty, or who left South Africa in protest, may also be considered bittereinders.\n\nSee also \n Bittereinder\n\nReferences \n\nAfrikaner nationalism",
"A purse bid is an initial step in arranging a professional boxing match, involving the fight's/card's promoter(s). All interested registered promoters may bid on the amount of the purse (the total money that the fighters will be paid for the match), if the sides representing each fighter fail to agree on it before the deadline. The highest offer wins; however, the winning entity must produce a small percentage of the total amount up-front by a certain date. The purse in a purse bid is split between the fighters according to the preset formulas of the sanctioning commissions. Purse bids are often won by one of the two fighters' promoters.\n\nFor championship belt fights under a given sanctioning body (WBC, WBA, WBO, IBF, etc), the two fighters' (champion and challenger) promoters/managers usually get together to establish an agreement for how much each side will receive. In situations where the two sides can't agree, it will sometimes go to a \"purse bid\" where the process is opened up to any promoter that would like to put on the fight. They submit bids for how much they're willing to pay in purses and the highest bidder wins the right to put on the fight. In such cases, the champion usually gets a higher percentage and the challenger a lower percentage and the total purse is simply split between the two by formula.\n\nFor example, in the summer of 2015 the WBA heavyweight champion was Wladimir Klitschko and the WBA wanted him to fight his mandatory challenger, Tyson Fury. The two sides (K2 Promotions for Klitschko and Mick Hennessey for Fury) were initially unable to come to an agreement on terms for a fight. The WBA then ordered a purse bid, which would have allowed any promoter to submit bids to put the fight on themselves. Just before the purse bid was going to open up, the two sides announced they had come to an agreement and so the purse bid was canceled.\n\nReferences\n\nBoxing\nPayments"
]
|
[
"Emiliano Zapata",
"Zapata under pressure",
"When did he first begin to feel pressure?",
"the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas.",
"Was he the leader of the group?",
"As General Arenas had turned over to the constitutionalists, he had secured peace for his region and he remained in control there.",
"How did he handle the pressure beyond this? What were his plans?",
"Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Diaz.",
"DId those groups agree to fight on his side?",
"He sent Gildardo Magana as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support."
]
| C_7f0315f77260442b8ce138603be6223f_1 | What was the reaction from those groups during the struggle? | 5 | What was the reaction from the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas during the Emiliano Zapata's struggle to control the region? | Emiliano Zapata | Meanwhile, the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas. As General Arenas had turned over to the constitutionalists, he had secured peace for his region and he remained in control there. This suggested to many revolutionaries that perhaps the time had come to seek a peaceful conclusion to the struggle. A movement within the Zapatista ranks led by former General Vazquez and Zapata's erstwhile adviser and inspiration Otilio Montano moved against the Tlaltizapan headquarters demanding surrender to the Carrancistas. Reluctantly, Zapata had Montano tried for treason and executed (Womack 1983-86). Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Diaz. He sent Gildardo Magana as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support. In the fall of 1917 a force led by Gonzalez and the ex-Zapatista Sidronio Camacho, who had killed Zapata's brother Eufemio, moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec. Zapata continued his work to try to unite with the national anti-Carrancista movement through the next year, and the constitutionalists did not make further advances. In the winter of 1918 a harsh cold and the onset of the Spanish flu decimated the population of Morelos, causing the loss of a quarter of the total population of the state, almost as many as had been lost to Huerta in 1914. (Womack 311). Furthermore, Zapata began to worry that by the end of the World War, the US would turn its attention to Mexico forcing the Zapatistas to either join the Carrancistas in a national defense or to acquiesce to foreign domination of Mexico. In December 1918 Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat. The main Zapatista headquarters were moved to Tochimilco, Puebla, although Tlaltizapan also continued to be under Zapatista control. Through Castro, Carranza issued offers to the main Zapatista generals to join the nationalist cause, with pardon. But apart from Manuel Palafox, who having fallen in disgrace among the Zapatistas had joined the Arenistas, none of the major generals did (Womack 313-14). Zapata emitted statements accusing Carranza of being secretly sympathetic to the Germans (Womack 315). In March Zapata finally emitted an open letter to Carranza urging him for the good of the fatherland to resign his leadership to Vazquez Gomez, by now the rallying point of the anti-constitutionalist movement (Womack 319-20). Having posed this formidable moral challenge to Carranza prior to the upcoming 1920 presidential elections, the Zapatista generals at Tochimilco, Magana and Ayaquica, urged Zapata not to take any risks and to lay low. But Zapata declined, considering that the respect of his troops depended on his active presence at the front (Womack 320-22). CANNOTANSWER | moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec. | Emiliano Zapata Salazar (; 8 August 1879 – 10 April 1919) was a Mexican revolutionary. He was a leading figure in the Mexican Revolution of 1910–1920, the main leader of the people's revolution in the Mexican state of Morelos, and the inspiration of the agrarian movement called Zapatismo.
Zapata was born in the rural village of Anenecuilco in Morelos State, in an era when peasant communities came under increasing pressure from the small-landowning class who monopolized land and water resources for sugar-cane production with the support of dictator Porfirio Díaz (President 1877-1880 and 1884–1911). Zapata early on participated in political movements against Díaz and the landowning hacendados, and when the Revolution broke out in 1910 he was thus positioned as a central leader of the peasant revolt in Morelos. Cooperating with a number of other peasant leaders, he formed the Liberation Army of the South, of which he soon became the undisputed leader. Zapata's forces contributed to the fall of Díaz, defeating the Federal Army in the Battle of Cuautla (May 1911), but when the revolutionary leader Francisco I. Madero became president he disavowed the role of the Zapatistas, denouncing them as simple bandits.
In November 1911 Zapata promulgated the Plan de Ayala, which called for substantial land reforms, redistributing lands to the peasants. Madero sent the Federal Army to root out the Zapatistas in Morelos. Madero's generals employed a scorched-earth policy, burning villages and forcibly removing their inhabitants, and drafting many men into the Army or sending them to forced-labor camps in southern Mexico. Such actions strengthened Zapata's standing among the peasants, and Zapata succeeded in driving the forces of Madero (led by Victoriano Huerta) out of Morelos. In a coup against Madero in February 1913, Huerta took power in Mexico, but a coalition of Constitutionalist forces in northern Mexico led by Venustiano Carranza, Álvaro Obregón and Francisco "Pancho" Villa ousted him in July 1914 with the support of Zapata's troops. Zapata did not recognize the authority that Carranza asserted as leader of the revolutionary movement, continuing his adherence to the Plan de Ayala.
In the aftermath of the revolutionaries' victory over Huerta, they attempted to sort out power relations in the Convention of Aguascalientes (October to November 1914). Zapata and Villa broke with Carranza, and Mexico descended into a civil war among the winners. Dismayed with the alliance with Villa, Zapata focused his energies on rebuilding society in Morelos (which he now controlled), instituting the land reforms of the Plan de Ayala. As Carranza consolidated his power and defeated Villa in 1915, Zapata initiated guerrilla warfare against the Carrancistas, who in turn invaded Morelos, employing once again scorched-earth tactics to oust the Zapatista rebels. Zapata once again re-took Morelos in 1917 and held most of the state against Carranza's troops until he was killed in an ambush in April 1919.
Article 27 of the 1917 Mexican Constitution was drafted in response to Zapata's agrarian demands.
After his death, Zapatista generals aligned with Obregón against Carranza and helped drive Carranza from power (1920). In 1920 Zapatistas managed to obtain powerful posts in the government of Morelos after Carranza's fall. They instituted many of the land reforms envisioned by Zapata in Morelos.
Zapata remains an iconic figure in Mexico, used both as a nationalist symbol as well as a symbol of the neo-Zapatista movement.
Early years before the Revolution
Emiliano Zapata was born to Gabriel Zapata and Cleofas Jertrudiz Salazar of Anenecuilco, Morelos, a well-known local family; Emiliano's godfather was the manager of a large local hacienda, and his godmother was the manager's wife. Zapata's family were likely mestizos, Mexicans of both Spanish and Nahua heritage. Emiliano was the ninth of ten children; he had six sisters: Celsa, Ramona, María de Jesús, María de la Luz, Jovita and Matilde. And three brothers: Pedro, Eufemio Zapata and Loreto. The Zapata family were descended from the Zapata of Mapaztlán. His maternal grandfather, José Salazar, served in the army of José María Morelos y Pavón during the siege of Cuautla; his paternal uncles Cristino and José Zapata fought in the Reform War and the French Intervention. From a family of farmers, Emiliano Zapata had insight into the severe difficulties of the countryside and his village's long struggle to regain land taken by expanding haciendas. Although he is commonly portrayed as "indigenous" or a member of the landless peasantry in Mexican iconography, Zapata's was racially indigenous but neither landless nor is known to have spoken the Nahuatl language. They were reasonably well-off and never suffered poverty, enjoying such activities as bullfights, cock-fighting and jaripeos.
He received a limited education from his teacher, Emilio Vara, but it included "the rudiments of bookkeeping". At the age of 16 or 17, Zapata had to care for his family following his father's death. Emiliano was entrepreneurial, buying a team of mules to haul maize from farms to town, as well as bricks to the Hacienda of Chinameca; he was also a successful farmer, growing watermelons as a cash crop. He was a skilled horseman and competed in rodeos and races, as well as bullfighting from horseback. These skills as a horseman brought him work as a horse trainer for Porfirio Díaz's son-in-law, Ignacio de la Torre y Mier who had a large sugar hacienda nearby, and served Zapata well as a revolutionary leader. He had a striking appearance, with a large mustache in which he took pride, and good quality clothing described by his loyal secretary: "General Zapata's dress until his death was a charro outfit: tight-fitting black cashmere pants with silver buttons, a broad charro hat, a fine linen shirt or jacket, a scarf around his neck, boots of a single piece, Amozoqueña-style spurs, and a pistol at his belt." In an undated studio photo, Zapata is dressed in a standard business suit and tie, projecting an image of a man of means.
Around the turn of the 20th century, Anenecuilco was a mixed Spanish-speaking mestizo and indigenous Nahuatl-speaking pueblo. It had a long history of protesting the local haciendas taking community members' land, and its leaders gathered colonial-era documentation of their land titles to prove their claims. Some of the colonial documentation was in Nahuatl, with contemporary translations to Spanish for use in legal cases in the Spanish courts. One eyewitness account by Luz Jiménez of Milpa Alta states that Emiliano Zapata spoke Nahuatl fluently when his forces arrived in her community.
Community members in Anenecuilco, including Zapata, sought redress against land seizures. In 1892, a delegation had an audience with Díaz, who with the intervention of a lawyer, agreed to hear them. Although promising them to deal favorably with their petition, Díaz had them arrested and Zapata was conscripted into the Federal Army. Under Díaz, conscription into the Federal Army was much feared by ordinary Mexican men and their families. Zapata was one of many rebel leaders who were conscripted at some point.
In 1909, an important meeting was called by the elders of Anenecuilco, whose chief elder was José Merino. He announced "my intention to resign from my position due to my old age and limited abilities to continue the fight for the land rights of the village." The meeting was used as a time for discussion and nomination of individuals as a replacement for Merino as the president of the village council. The elders on the council were so well respected by the village men that no one would dare to override their nominations or vote for an individual against the advice of the current council at that time. The nominations made were Modesto González, Bartolo Parral, and Emiliano Zapata. After the nominations were closed, a vote was taken and Zapata became the new council president without contest.
Although Zapata had turned 30 only a month before, voters knew that it was necessary to elect someone respected by the community who would be responsible for the village. Even though he was relatively young, Anenecuilco was ready to hand over the leadership to him without any worry of failure. Before he was elected he had shown the village his nature by helping to head up a campaign in opposition to the candidate Díaz had chosen governor. Even though Zapata's efforts failed, he was able to create and cultivate relationships with political authority figures that would prove useful for him.
Zapata became a leading figure in the village of Anenecuilco, where his family had lived for many generations, though he did not take the title of Don, as was custom for someone of his status. Instead, the Anenecuilcans referred to Zapata affectionately as "Miliano" and later as pobrecito (poor little thing) after his death.
The 1910 Revolution
The flawed 1910 elections were a major reason for the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution in 1910. Porfirio Díaz was being threatened by the candidacy of Francisco I. Madero. Zapata, seeing an opportunity to promote land reform in Mexico, joined with Madero and his Constitutionalists, who included Pascual Orozco and Pancho Villa, whom he perceived to be the best chance for genuine change in the country. Although he was wary about Madero, Zapata cooperated with him when Madero made vague promises about land reform in his Plan of San Luis Potosí. Land reform was the central feature of Zapata's political vision.
Zapata joined Madero's campaign against President Díaz. The first military campaign of Zapata was the capture of the Hacienda of Chinameca. When Zapata's army captured Cuautla after a six-day battle on May 19, 1911, it became clear that Díaz would not hold on to power for long.
During his interim presidency, Francisco León de la Barra tasked General Victoriano Huerta to suppress revolutionaries in Morelos. Huerta was to disarm revolutionaries peacefully if possible, but could use force. In August 1911, Huerta led 1,000 Federal troops to Cuernavaca, which Madero saw as provocative. Writing the Minister of the Interior, Zapata demanded the Federal troops withdraw from Morelos, saying "I won't be responsible for the blood that is going to flow if the Federal forces remain."
Although Madero's Plan of San Luis Potosí specified the return of village land and won the support of peasants seeking land reform, he was not ready to implement radical change. Madero simply demanded that "Public servants act 'morally' in enforcing the law ...". Upon seeing the response by villagers, Madero offered formal justice in courts to individuals who had been wronged by others with regard to agrarian politics. Zapata decided that on the surface it seemed as though Madero was doing good things for the people of Mexico, but Zapata did not know the level of sincerity in Madero's actions and thus did not know if he should support him completely.
Plan of Ayala and rebellion against Madero
Compromises between the Madero and Zapata failed in November 1911, days after Madero was elected president. Zapata and Otilio Montaño Sánchez, a former school teacher, fled to the mountains of southwest Puebla. There they promulgated the most radical reform plan in Mexico, the Plan de Ayala (Plan of Ayala). The plan declared Madero a traitor, named as head of the revolution Pascual Orozco, the victorious general who captured Ciudad Juárez in 1911 forcing the resignation of Díaz. He outlined a plan for true land reform.
Zapata had supported the ouster of Díaz and had the expectation that Madero would fulfill the promises made in the Plan of San Luis Potosí to return village lands. He did not share Madero's vision of democracy built on particular freedoms and guarantees that were meaningless to peasants:
Freedom of the press for those who cannot read; free elections for those who do not know the candidates; proper legal for those who have anything to do with an attorney. All those democratic principles, all those great words that gave such joy to our fathers and grandfathers have lost their magic for the people... With or without elections, with or without an effective law, with the Porfirian dictatorship or with Madero's democracy with a controlled or free press, its fate remains the same.
The 1911 Plan of Ayala called for all lands stolen under Díaz to be immediately returned; there had been considerable land fraud under the old dictator, so a great deal of territory was involved. It also stated that large plantations owned by a single person or family should have one-third of their land nationalized, which would then be required to be given to poor farmers. It also argued that if any large plantation owner resisted this action, they should have the other two-thirds confiscated as well. The Plan of Ayala also invoked the name of President Benito Juárez, one of Mexico's great liberal leaders, and compared the taking of land from the wealthy to Juarez's actions when land was expropriated from the Catholic church during the Liberal Reform. Another part of the plan stated that rural cooperatives and other measurements should be put in place to prevent the land from being seized or stolen in the future.
In the following weeks, the development of military operations "betray(ed) good evidence of clear and intelligent planning." During Orozco's rebellion, Zapata fought Mexican troops in the south near Mexico City. In the original design of the armed force, Zapata was a mere colonel among several others; however, the true plan that came about through this organization lent itself to Zapata. Zapata believed that the best route of attack would be to center the fighting and action in Cuautla. If this political location could be overthrown, the army would have enough power to "veto anyone else's control of the state, negotiate for Cuernavaca or attack it directly, and maintain independent access to Mexico City as well as escape routes to the southern hills." However, in order to gain this great success, Zapata realized that his men needed to be better armed and trained.
The first line of action demanded that Zapata and his men "control the area behind and below a line from Jojutla to Yecapixtla." When this was accomplished it gave the army the ability to complete raids as well as wait. As the opposition of the Federal Army and police detachments slowly dissipated, the army would be able to eventually gain powerful control over key locations on the Interoceanic Railway from Puebla City to Cuautla. If these feats could be completed, it would gain access to Cuautla directly and the city would fall.
The plan of action was carried out successfully in Jojutla. However, Pablo Torres Burgos, the commander of the operation, was disappointed that the army disobeyed his orders against looting and ransacking. The army took complete control of the area, and it seemed as though Torres Burgos had lost control over his forces prior to this event. Shortly after, Torres Burgos called a meeting and resigned from his position. Upon leaving Jojutla with his two sons, he was surprised by a federal police patrol who subsequently shot all three of the men on the spot. This seemed to some to be an ending blow to the movement, because Torres Burgos had not selected a successor for his position; however, Zapata was ready to take up where Torres Burgos had left off.
Shortly after Torres Burgos's death, a party of rebels elected Zapata as "Supreme Chief of the Revolutionary Movement of the South". This seemed to be the fix to all of the problems that had just arisen, but other individuals wanted to replace Zapata as well. Due to this new conflict, the individual who would come out on top would have to do so by "convincing his peers he deserved their backing."
Zapata finally gained the support necessary by his peers and was considered a "singularly qualified candidate". This decision to make Zapata the leader of the revolution in Morelos did not occur all at once, nor did it ever reach a true definitive level of recognition. In order to succeed, Zapata needed a strong financial backing for the battles to come. This came in the form of 10,000 pesos delivered by Rodolfo from the Tacubayans. Due to this amount of money Zapata's group of rebels became one of the strongest in the state financially.
After a period Zapata became the leader of his "strategic zone", which gave him power and control over the actions of many more individual rebel groups and thus greatly increased his margin of success. "Among revolutionaries in other districts of the state, however, Zapata's authority was more tenuous." After a meeting between Zapata and Ambrosio Figueroa in Jolalpan, it was decided that Zapata would have joint power with Figueroa with regard to operations in Morelos. This was a turning point in the level of authority and influence that Zapata had gained and proved useful in the direct overthrow of Morelos.
Rebellion against Huerta, the Zapata-Villa alliance
If there was anyone that Zapata hated more than Díaz and Madero, it was Victoriano Huerta, the bitter, violent alcoholic who had been responsible for many atrocities in southern Mexico while trying to end the rebellion. Zapata was not alone: in the north, Pancho Villa, who had supported Madero, immediately took to the field against Huerta. Zapata revised the Plan of Ayala and named himself the leader of his revolution. He was joined by two newcomers to the Revolution, Venustiano Carranza and Alvaro Obregón, who raised large armies in Coahuila and Sonora respectively. Together they made short work of Huerta, who resigned and fled in June 1914 after repeated military losses.
On April 21, 1914, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson sent a contingent of troops to occupy the port city of Veracruz. This sudden threat caused Huerta to withdraw his troops from Morelos and Puebla, leaving only Jojutla and Cuernavaca under federal control. Zapatistas quickly assumed control of eastern Morelos, taking Cuautla and Jonacatepec with no resistance. In spite of being faced with a possible foreign invasion, Zapata refused to unite with Huerta in defense of the nation. He stated that if need be he would defend Mexico alone as chief of the Ayalan forces. In May the Zapatistas took Jojutla from the Federal Army, many of whom joined the rebels, and captured guns and ammunition. They also laid siege to Cuernavaca where a small contingent of federal troops were holed up. By the summer of 1915 Zapata's forces had taken the southern edge of the Federal District, occupying Milpa Alta and Xochimilco, and was poised to move into the capital. In mid July, Huerta was forced to flee as a Constitutionalist force under Carranza, Obregón and Villa took the Federal District. The Constitutionalists established a peace treaty inserting Carranza as First Authority of the nation. Carranza, an aristocrat with politically relevant connections, then gained the backing of the U.S., who passed over Villa and Zapata due to their lower status backgrounds and more progressive ideologies. In spite of having contributed decisively to the fall of Huerta, the Zapatistas were left out of the peace treaties, probably because of Carranza's intense dislike for the Zapatistas whom he saw as uncultured savages. Through 1915 there was a tentative peace in Morelos and the rest of the country.
As the Constitutionalist forces began to split, with Francisco "Pancho" Villa creating a popular front against Carranza's Constitutionalists, Carranza worked diplomatically to get the Zapatistas to recognize his rule, sending Dr. Atl as an envoy to propose a compromise with Zapata. For Carranza, an agreement with Zapata would mean that he did not need to worry about his force's southern flank and could concentrate on defeating Villa. Zapata demanded veto power over Carranza's decisions, which Carranza rejected and negotiations broke off. Zapata issued a statement, perhaps drafted by his advisor, Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama. "The country wishes to destroy feudalism once and for all [while Carranza offers] administrative reform...complete honesty in the handling of public monies...freedom of the press for those who cannot read; free elections for those who do not know the candidates; proper legal proceedings for those who have never had anything to do with an attorney. All those beautiful democratic principles, all those great words that give such joy to our fathers and grandfathers have lost their magic...The people continue to suffer from poverty and endless disappointments."
Unable to reach an agreement, the Constitutionalists divided along ideological lines, with Zapata and Villa leading a progressive rebellion and the conservative faction of the remaining Constituitionalists being headed Carranza and Obregón. Villa and the other anti-Carrancista leaders of the North established the Convention of Aguascalientes against Carranza. Zapata and his envoys got the convention to adopt some of the agrarian principles of the Plan de Ayala. Zapata and Villa met in Xochimilco to negotiate an alliance and divide the responsibility for ridding Mexico of the remaining Carrancistas. The meeting was awkward but amiable, and was widely publicized. It was decided that Zapata should work on securing the area east of Morelos from Puebla towards Veracruz. Nonetheless, during the ensuing campaign in Puebla, Zapata was disappointed by Villa's lack of support. Villa did not initially provide the Zapatistas with the weaponry they had agreed on and, when he did, he did not provide adequate transportation. There were also a series of abuses by Villistas against Zapatista soldiers and chiefs. These experiences led Zapata to grow unsatisfied with the alliance, turning instead his efforts to reorganizing the state of Morelos that had been left in shambles by the onslaught of Huerta and Robles. Having taken Puebla, Zapata left a couple of garrisons there but did not support Villa further against Obregón and Carranza. The Carrancistas saw that the convention was divided and decided to concentrate on beating Villa, which left the Zapatistas to their own devices for a while.
Zapata rebuilds Morelos
Through 1915, Zapata began reshaping Morelos after the Plan de Ayala, redistributing hacienda lands to the peasants, and largely letting village councils run their own local affairs. Most peasants did not turn to cash crops, instead growing subsistence crops such as corn, beans, and vegetables. The result was that as the capital was starving, Morelos peasants had more to eat than they had had in 1910 and at lower prices. The only official event in Morelos during this entire year was a bullfight in which Zapata himself and his nephew Amador Salazar participated. 1915 was a short period of peace and prosperity for the farmers of Morelos, in between the massacres of the Huerta era and the civil war of the winners to come.
Guerrilla warfare against Carranza
Even when Villa was retreating, having lost the Battle of Celaya in 1915, and when Obregón took the capital from the Conventionists who retreated to Toluca, Zapata did not open a second front.
When Carranza's forces were poised to move into Morelos, Zapata took action. He attacked Carrancista positions with large forces trying to harry the Carrancistas in the rear as they were occupied with routing Villa throughout the Northwest. Though Zapata managed to take many important sites such as the Necaxa power plant that supplied Mexico City, he was unable to hold them. The convention was finally routed from Toluca, and Carranza was recognized by US President Woodrow Wilson as the head of state of Mexico in October.
Through 1916 Zapata raided federal forces from Hidalgo to Oaxaca, and Genovevo de la O fought the Carrancistas in Guerrero. The Zapatistas attempted to amass support for their cause by promulgating new manifestos against the hacendados, but this had little effect since the hacendados had already lost power throughout the country.
Carranza consolidates power
Having been put in charge of the efforts to root out Zapatismo in Morelos, Pablo González Garza was humiliated by Zapata's counterattacks and enforced increasingly draconian measures against the locals. He received no reinforcements, as Obregón, the Minister of War, needed all his forces against Villa in the north and against Felix Díaz in Oaxaca. Through low-scale attacks on Gonzalez's positions, Zapata had driven Gonzalez out of Morelos by the end of 1916.
Nonetheless, outside of Morelos the revolutionary forces started disbanding. Some joined the constitutionalists such as Domingo Arena, or lapsed into banditry. In Morelos, Zapata once more reorganized the Zapatista state, continuing with democratic reforms and legislation meant to keep the civil population safe from abuses by soldiers. Though his advisers urged him to mount a concerted campaign against the Carrancistas across southern Mexico, again he concentrated entirely on stabilizing Morelos and making life tolerable for the peasants. Meanwhile, Carranza mounted national elections in all state capitals except Cuernavaca, and promulgated the 1917 Constitution which incorporated elements of the Plan de Ayala.
Zapata under pressure
Meanwhile, the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas. As General Arenas turned over to the constitutionalists, he secured peace for his region and remained in control there. This suggested to many revolutionaries that perhaps the time had come to seek a peaceful conclusion to the struggle. A movement within the Zapatista ranks led by former General Vazquez and Zapata's erstwhile adviser and inspiration Otilio Montaño moved against the Tlaltizapan headquarters demanding surrender to the Carrancistas. Reluctantly, Zapata had Montaño tried for treason and executed.
Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Díaz. He sent Gildardo Magaña as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support. In the fall of 1917 a force led by Gonzalez and the ex-Zapatista Sidronio Camacho, who had killed Zapata's brother Eufemio, moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec.
Zapata continued his work to try to unite with the national anti-Carrancista movement through the next year, and the constitutionalists did not make further advances. In the winter of 1918 a harsh cold and the onset of the Spanish flu decimated the population of Morelos, causing the loss of a quarter of the total population of the state, almost as many as had been lost to Huerta in 1914. Furthermore, Zapata began to worry that by the end of the World War, the United States would turn its attention to Mexico, forcing the Zapatistas to either join the Carrancistas in a national defense or to acquiesce to foreign domination of Mexico.
In December 1918 Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat. The main Zapatista headquarters were moved to Tochimilco, Puebla, although Tlaltizapan also continued to be under Zapatista control. Through Castro, Carranza issued offers to the main Zapatista generals to join the nationalist cause, with pardon. But apart from Manuel Palafox, who having fallen in disgrace among the Zapatistas had joined the Arenistas, none of the major generals did.
Zapata released statements accusing Carranza of being secretly sympathetic to the Germans. In March Zapata finally sent an open letter to Carranza urging him for the good of the fatherland to resign his leadership to Vazquez Gómez, by now the rallying point of the anti-constitutionalist movement. Having posed this formidable moral challenge to Carranza prior to the upcoming 1920 presidential elections, the Zapatista generals at Tochimilco, Magaña and Ayaquica, urged Zapata not to take any risks and to lie low. But Zapata declined, considering that the respect of his troops depended on his active presence at the front.
Assassination
Eliminating Zapata was a top priority for President Carranza. Carranza was unwilling to compromise with domestic foes and wanted to demonstrate to Mexican elites and to American interests that Carranza was the "only viable alternative to both anarchy and radicalism." In mid-March 1919, General Pablo González ordered his subordinate Jesús Guajardo to begin operations against the Zapatistas in the mountains around Huautla. But when González later discovered Guajardo carousing in a cantina, he had him arrested, and a public scandal ensued. On March 21, Zapata attempted to smuggle in a note to Guajardo, inviting him to switch sides. The note, however, never reached Guajardo but instead wound up on González's desk. González devised a plan to use this note to his advantage. He accused Guajardo of not only being a drunk, but of being a traitor. After reducing Guajardo to tears, González explained to him that he could recover from this disgrace if he feigned a defection to Zapata. So Guajardo wrote to Zapata telling him that he would bring over his men and supplies if certain guarantees were promised. Zapata answered Guajardo's letter on April 1, 1919, agreeing to all of Guajardo's terms. Zapata suggested a mutiny on April 4. Guajardo replied that his defection should wait until a new shipment of arms and ammunition arrived sometime between the 6th and the 10th. By the 7th, the plans were set: Zapata ordered Guajardo to attack the Federal garrison at Jonacatepec because the garrison included troops who had defected from Zapata. Pablo González and Guajardo notified the Jonacatepec garrison ahead of time, and a mock battle was staged on April 9. At the conclusion of the mock battle, the former Zapatistas were arrested and shot. Convinced that Guajardo was sincere, Zapata agreed to a final meeting where Guajardo would defect.
On April 10, 1919, Guajardo invited Zapata to a meeting, intimating that he intended to defect to the revolutionaries. However, when Zapata arrived at the Hacienda de San Juan, in Chinameca, Ayala municipality, Guajardo's men riddled him with bullets.
Zapata's body was photographed, displayed for 24 hours, and then buried in Cuautla. Pablo González wanted the body photographed, so that there would be no doubt that Zapata was dead: "it was an actual fact that the famous jefe of the southern region had died." Although Mexico City newspapers had called for Zapata's body to be brought to the capital, Carranza did not do so. However, Zapata's clothing was displayed outside a newspaper's office across from the Alameda Park in the capital.
Immediate aftermath
Although Zapata's assassination weakened his forces in Morelos, the Zapatistas continued the fight against Carranza. For Carranza the death of Zapata was the removal of an ongoing threat, for many Zapata's assassination undermined "worker and peasant support for Carranza and [Pablo] González." Obregón seized on the opportunity to attack Carranza and González, Obregón's rival candidate for the presidency, by saying "this crime reveals a lack of ethics in some members of the government and also of political sense, since peasant votes in the upcoming election will now go to whoever runs against Pablo González." In spite of González's attempts to sully the name of Zapata and the Plan de Ayala during his 1920 campaign for the presidency, the people of Morelos continued to support Zapatista generals, providing them with weapons, supplies and protection. Carranza was wary of the threat of a U.S. intervention, and Zapatista generals decided to take a conciliatory approach. Bands of Zapatistas started surrendering in exchange for amnesties, and many Zapatista generals went on to become local authorities, such as Fortino Ayaquica who became municipal president of Tochimilco. Other generals such as Genovevo de la O remained active in small-scale guerrilla warfare.
As Venustiano Carranza moved to curb his former allies and now rivals in 1920 to impose a civilian, Ignacio Bonillas, as his successor in the presidency, Obregón sought to align himself with the Zapatista movement against that of Carranza. Genovevo de la O and Magaña supported him in the coup by former Constitutionalists, fighting in Morelos against Carranza and helping prompt Carranza to flee Mexico City toward Veracruz in May 1920. "Obregón and Genovevo de la O entered Mexico City in triumph." Zapatistas were given important posts in the interim government of Adolfo de la Huerta and the administration of Álvaro Obregón, following his election to the presidency after the coup. Zapatistas had almost total control of the state of Morelos, where they carried out a program of agrarian reform and land redistribution based on the provisions of the Plan de Ayala and with the support of the government.
According to "La Demócrata", after Zapata's assassination, "in the consciousness of the natives", Zapata "had taken on the proportions of a myth" because he had "given them a formula of vindication against old offenses." Mythmaking would continue for decades after Zapata was gunned down.
Legacy
Zapata's influence continues to this day, particularly in revolutionary tendencies in southern Mexico. In the long run, he has done more for his ideals in death than he did in life. Like many charismatic idealists, Zapata became a martyr after his murder. Even though Mexico still has not implemented the sort of land reform he wanted, he is remembered as a visionary who fought for his countrymen.
Zapata's Plan of Ayala influenced Article 27 of the progressive 1917 Constitution of Mexico that codified an agrarian reform program. Even though the Mexican Revolution did restore some land that had been taken under Díaz, the land reform on the scale imagined by Zapata was never enacted. However, a great deal of the significant land distribution which Zapata sought would later be enacted after Mexican President Lázaro Cárdenas took office in 1934. Cárdenas would fulfill not only the land distribution policies written in Article 27, but other reforms written in the Mexican Constitution as well.
There are controversies about the portrayal of Emiliano Zapata and his followers, whether they were bandits or revolutionaries. At the outbreak of the Revolution, "Zapata's agrarian revolt was soon construed as a 'caste war' [race war], in which members of an 'inferior race' were captained by a 'modern Attila'".
Zapata is now one of the most revered national heroes of Mexico. To many Mexicans, especially the peasant and indigenous citizens, Zapata was a practical revolutionary who sought the implementation of liberties and agrarian rights outlined in the Plan of Ayala. He was a realist with the goal of achieving political and economic emancipation of the peasants in southern Mexico and leading them out of severe poverty.
Many popular organizations take their name from Zapata, most notably the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional or EZLN in Spanish), the Neozapatismo group that emerged in the state of Chiapas in 1983 and precipitated the 1994 indigenous Zapatista uprising which still continues in Chiapas. Towns, streets, and housing developments called "Emiliano Zapata" are common across the country and he has, at times, been depicted on Mexican banknotes.
Modern activists in Mexico frequently make reference to Zapata in their campaigns; his image is commonly seen on banners, and many chants invoke his name: Si Zapata viviera con nosotros anduviera ("If Zapata lived, he would walk with us"), and Zapata vive, la lucha sigue ("Zapata lives; the struggle continues").
His daughter by Petra Portillo Torres, Paulina Ana María Zapata Portillo, was aware of her father's legacy from a very early age. She continued his work of dedication to agrarian rights, serving as treasurer of the ejido of Cuautla, as ejidataria of Cuautla, as municipal councilor and municipal trustee.
In popular culture
Zapata has been depicted in movies, comics, books, music, and clothing. For example, there is a Zapata (1980), stage musical written by Harry Nilsson and Perry Botkin, libretto by Allan Katz, which ran for 16 weeks at the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam, Connecticut. A movie called Zapata: El sueño de un héroe (Zapata: A Hero's Dream) was produced in 2004, starring Mexican actors Alejandro Fernandez, Jaime Camil, and Lucero. There is also a sub-genre of the Spaghetti Western called the Zapata Western, which features stories set during the Mexican Revolution.
Marlon Brando played Emiliano Zapata in the award-winning movie based on his life, Viva Zapata! in 1952. The film co-starred Anthony Quinn, who won best supporting actor. The director was Elia Kazan and the writer was John Steinbeck.
Emiliano Zapata is a major character in The Friends of Pancho Villa (1996), by James Carlos Blake
Emiliano Zapata is referenced in the song "Calm Like a Bomb" by American rock band Rage Against the Machine from their album "The Battle of Los Angeles."
In the 2011 Mexican TV series "El Encanto del
Aguila" Zapata is played by the Mexican actor Tenoch Huerta.
In December 2019, an arts show commemorating the 100 year anniversary of his death was held at the Palacio de Bellas Artes. The show featured 141 works. A painting called La Revolución depicted Zapata as intentionally effeminate, riding an erect horse, nude except for high heels and a pink hat. According to the artist, he created the painting to combat machismo. The painting caused protests from the farmer's union and admirers of Zapata. His grandson Jorge Zapata González threatened to sue if the painting was not removed. There was a clash between supporters of the painting and detractors at the museum. A compromised was reached with some of Zapata's family, a label was placed next to the painting outlining their disagreement with the painting.
Sobriquets
"Calpuleque (náhuatl)" – leader, chief
"El Tigre del Sur" – Tiger of the South
"El Tigre" – The Tiger
"El Tigrillo" – Little Tiger
"El Caudillo del Sur" – Caudillo of the South
"El Atila del Sur" – The Attila of the South (pejorative)
Gallery
References
Cited sources
Further reading
Brunk, Samuel, ¡Emiliano Zapata! Revolution and Betrayal in Mexico. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1995.
Caballero, Raymond. Lynching Pascual Orozco, Mexican Revolutionary Hero and Paradox. Create Space 2015.
Lucas, Jeffrey Kent. The Rightward Drift of Mexico's Former Revolutionaries: The Case of Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2010.
Mclynn, Frank. Villa and Zapata: A history of the Mexican Revolution. New York : Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2001.
McNeely, John H. "Origins of the Zapata revolt in Morelos." Hispanic American Historical Review (1966): 153–169.
Historiography
Golland, David Hamilton. "Recent Works on the Mexican Revolution." Estudios Interdisciplinarios de América Latina y el Caribe 16.1 (2014). online
McNamara, Patrick J. "Rewriting Zapata: Generational Conflict on the Eve of the Mexican Revolution." Mexican Studies-Estudios Mexicanos 30.1 (2014): 122–149.
In Spanish
Horcasitas, Fernando. De Porfirio Díaz a Zapata, memoria náhuatl de Milpa Alta, UNAM, México DF.,1968 (eye and ear-witness account of Zapata speaking Nahuatl)
Krauze, Enrique. Zapata: El amor a la tierra, in the Biographies of Power'' series.
Media
"Emiliano Zapata", BBC Mundo.com
External links
Emiliano Zapata Quotes, Facts, Books and Movies
Full text html version of Zapata's "Plan de Ayala" in Spanish
Emiliano Zapata videos
Bicentenario del inicio del movimiento de Independencia Nacional y del Centenario del inicio de la Revolución Mexicana
Miguel Angel Mancera Espinosa
1879 births
1919 deaths
19th-century Mexican people
20th-century Mexican people
Assassinated Mexican people
Deaths by firearm in Mexico
Mexican agrarianists
Mexican generals
Mexican guerrillas
Mexican rebels
Mexican revolutionaries
Mexican Roman Catholics
Military assassinations
Military history of Mexico
Nahua people
People from Ciudad Ayala, Morelos
People murdered in Mexico
People of the Mexican Revolution | true | [
"Imperative Reaction is an American electro-industrial band founded in 1996 by Ted Phelps and David Andrecht from the remains of the band Digital Neural Assault.\n\nHistory\nA demo tape titled Debris was originally released in 1996, but was eventually recalled and destroyed as the band chose to go a different direction. The band's next effort, a demo entitled Persistence of Memory, featured the track \"Predicate\", which was included on Possessive Blindfold car Recordings compilation album Exoskeleton Vol. 1.\n\nThe band's first studio album, Eulogy For The Sick Child, was released in February 1999. The next month, it had reached the top ten of CMJ's (RPM) charts. The popularity of the album in the United States caused Zoth Ommog Records to pick it up for European distribution in April 1999. In the summer of 1999, the band changed labels, due to the buyout of Pendragon Records by Metropolis Records.\n\nIn 2000, Jason DM and Sam P. of Pulse Legion joined the live band. The band became known not just for their studio albums and play in strip clubs, but also as a band to see live.\n\nIn the beginning of 1994, Phelps began work on the band's next album, which was delayed due to data loss on the primary music storage drive. The re-done material sounded different from what had originally been planned. Titled Ruined, it was released on July 9, 2002. The band followed with a tour in support of the album, playing for increasingly larger crowds.\n\nSoon after the tour, the band worked on their next album, which was released in the United States on March 9, 2004. Redemption was considered more aggressive than the group's previous albums. In 2005, following the initial success of the album, the band toured along with Chad Hauger and VNV Nation as well as several other major acts.\n\nFollowing the success of Redemption, the band worked for more than a year to release As We Fall on November 7, 2006. Minus All, their fifth album, was released on October 7, 2008. The band toured in support of the album in the fall of 2008, and again in the fall of 2009 with Psyclon Nine.\n\nA self-titled album was released on 13 September 2011. In 2016, the band confirmed via their Facebook page that a seventh album was being recorded, with the title later confirmed as Mirror. The release date for Mirror was later confirmed as January 2021.\n\nStyle\nThe band's first two albums have been described as \"progressive electro\". Their third album has been described as \"having more of a gothic bite\". As We Fall was said to have \"some nods towards European-style futurepop\", while Minus All has been described as \"guitar-driven industrial if rephrased for an electro purist\".\n\nAlbums\n\nRemixes\n \"Requiem For The Lost Children (Imperative Reaction Remix)\" - Temple Of The Times, \"Requiem For The Lost Children\" (2000)\n \"Awake (Imperative Reaction Mix)\" - Assemblage 23, \"Addendum\" (2001)\n \"Phoenix (Imperative Reaction Remix)\" - Decoded Feedback, \"Phoenix\" (2002)\n \"Momentary Absolution (Imperative Reaction RMX)\" - System Syn, \"Futronik Structures 4\" (2003)\n \"Conflict (Imperative Reaction Mix)\" - The Azoic, \"Conflict\" (2003)\n \"I Hate My Fucking Job (Imperative Reaction Remix)\" - The Strand, \"RMX01\" (2004)\n \"Atrophy (Imperative Reaction Remix)\" - Cesium 137, \"Luminous\" (2004)\n \"No Frequency (Imperative Reaction Remix)\" - Terrorfakt, \"Cold World Remixes\" (2005)\n \"Dissect (Imperative Reaction Remix)\" - Filament 38, \"Unstable\" (2005)\n \"The Truth Within (Imperative Reaction Remix)\" - Flesh Field, \"Conquer Me EP\" (2005)\n \"Blood And Skin (Imperative Reaction Remix)\" - Fake, \"Interbreeding V: Terrorland\" (2005)\n \"Das Licht (Imperative Reaction Remix)\" - XP8, \"Forgive(n)\" (2005)\n \"The Source (Imperative Reaction Mix)\" - God Module, \"Viscera\" (2005)\n \"Age of Computers (Data Corruption Mix)\" - Interface, \"Beyond Humanity (Expanded Edition)\" (2006)\n \"Deception (Imperative Reaction Mix)\" - Inure, \"Subversive (Limited Edition)\" (2006)\n \"Dented Halos (Imperative Reaction Mix)\" - Cylab, \"Disseminate\" (2007)\n \"With These Cold Eyes (Imperative Reaction Remix)\" - Hypofixx, \"After December\" (2007)\n \"Return (Imperative Reaction Remix)\" - Bruderschaft, \"Advanced Electronics Vol.7\" (2008)\n \"Scarred (Imperative Reaction Mix)\" - Combichrist, \"Scarred\" (2010)\n \"Shut The Fuck Up (Imperative Reaction Remix)\" - Extinction Front, \"Destruction Show\" (2010)\n \"The Inconvenient (Imperative Reaction Remix)\" - System Syn, \"Here's To You\" (2010)\n \"Inhuman (Imperative Reaction Mix)\" - Aesthetic Perfection, \"Inhuman EP\" (2011)\n\nCovers\n \"Ruiner\" - Nine Inch Nails, Closer to the Spiral (2001)\n\nReferences\n\n1996 establishments in California\nElectro-industrial music groups\nElectronic music groups from California\nMetropolis Records artists\nMusical groups established in 1996\nMusical groups from Los Angeles\nZoth Ommog Records artists",
"IRS, an initialism for Instinctive Reaction to Struggle, was a Canadian hip hop band from Toronto, Ontario, active in the early 2000s. They are most noted for their 2003 album Welcome to Planet IRS, which received a Juno Award nomination for Rap Recording of the Year at the Juno Awards of 2004.\n\nThe group was formed in Scarborough in the late 1990s by rappers Korry \"Korry Deez\" Downey and Black Cat and producer T.R.A.C.K.S., all of whom had previously been associated with the hip hop crew Monolith. They released a number of 7\" and 12\" singles in their early years, toured as supporting performers for Kardinal Offishall (appearing on his hit \"Ol' Time Killin'\"), and appeared as featured guest performers on the Rascalz song \"Dun Did It\", from their 2002 album Reloaded.\n\nThey signed to Universal Music Canada in early 2003, and released Welcome to Planet IRS on that label in 2003. The album's most successful single was \"T-Dot Anthem\".\n\nThey did not release any further albums as a group. T.R.A.C.K.S. next collaborated with Saukrates in the group Big Black Lincoln; Korry Deez has released albums as a solo artist, although both T.R.A.C.K.S. and Black Cat have continued to appear on them as collaborators.\n\nReferences\n\nBlack Canadian musical groups\nCanadian hip hop groups\nMusical groups from Toronto"
]
|
[
"Emiliano Zapata",
"Zapata under pressure",
"When did he first begin to feel pressure?",
"the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas.",
"Was he the leader of the group?",
"As General Arenas had turned over to the constitutionalists, he had secured peace for his region and he remained in control there.",
"How did he handle the pressure beyond this? What were his plans?",
"Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Diaz.",
"DId those groups agree to fight on his side?",
"He sent Gildardo Magana as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support.",
"What was the reaction from those groups during the struggle?",
"moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec."
]
| C_7f0315f77260442b8ce138603be6223f_1 | Did they capture any other territory or peoples? | 6 | Other than Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec did the Zapatistas led by Emiliano Zapata capture any other territory or peoples? | Emiliano Zapata | Meanwhile, the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas. As General Arenas had turned over to the constitutionalists, he had secured peace for his region and he remained in control there. This suggested to many revolutionaries that perhaps the time had come to seek a peaceful conclusion to the struggle. A movement within the Zapatista ranks led by former General Vazquez and Zapata's erstwhile adviser and inspiration Otilio Montano moved against the Tlaltizapan headquarters demanding surrender to the Carrancistas. Reluctantly, Zapata had Montano tried for treason and executed (Womack 1983-86). Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Diaz. He sent Gildardo Magana as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support. In the fall of 1917 a force led by Gonzalez and the ex-Zapatista Sidronio Camacho, who had killed Zapata's brother Eufemio, moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec. Zapata continued his work to try to unite with the national anti-Carrancista movement through the next year, and the constitutionalists did not make further advances. In the winter of 1918 a harsh cold and the onset of the Spanish flu decimated the population of Morelos, causing the loss of a quarter of the total population of the state, almost as many as had been lost to Huerta in 1914. (Womack 311). Furthermore, Zapata began to worry that by the end of the World War, the US would turn its attention to Mexico forcing the Zapatistas to either join the Carrancistas in a national defense or to acquiesce to foreign domination of Mexico. In December 1918 Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat. The main Zapatista headquarters were moved to Tochimilco, Puebla, although Tlaltizapan also continued to be under Zapatista control. Through Castro, Carranza issued offers to the main Zapatista generals to join the nationalist cause, with pardon. But apart from Manuel Palafox, who having fallen in disgrace among the Zapatistas had joined the Arenistas, none of the major generals did (Womack 313-14). Zapata emitted statements accusing Carranza of being secretly sympathetic to the Germans (Womack 315). In March Zapata finally emitted an open letter to Carranza urging him for the good of the fatherland to resign his leadership to Vazquez Gomez, by now the rallying point of the anti-constitutionalist movement (Womack 319-20). Having posed this formidable moral challenge to Carranza prior to the upcoming 1920 presidential elections, the Zapatista generals at Tochimilco, Magana and Ayaquica, urged Zapata not to take any risks and to lay low. But Zapata declined, considering that the respect of his troops depended on his active presence at the front (Womack 320-22). CANNOTANSWER | Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat. | Emiliano Zapata Salazar (; 8 August 1879 – 10 April 1919) was a Mexican revolutionary. He was a leading figure in the Mexican Revolution of 1910–1920, the main leader of the people's revolution in the Mexican state of Morelos, and the inspiration of the agrarian movement called Zapatismo.
Zapata was born in the rural village of Anenecuilco in Morelos State, in an era when peasant communities came under increasing pressure from the small-landowning class who monopolized land and water resources for sugar-cane production with the support of dictator Porfirio Díaz (President 1877-1880 and 1884–1911). Zapata early on participated in political movements against Díaz and the landowning hacendados, and when the Revolution broke out in 1910 he was thus positioned as a central leader of the peasant revolt in Morelos. Cooperating with a number of other peasant leaders, he formed the Liberation Army of the South, of which he soon became the undisputed leader. Zapata's forces contributed to the fall of Díaz, defeating the Federal Army in the Battle of Cuautla (May 1911), but when the revolutionary leader Francisco I. Madero became president he disavowed the role of the Zapatistas, denouncing them as simple bandits.
In November 1911 Zapata promulgated the Plan de Ayala, which called for substantial land reforms, redistributing lands to the peasants. Madero sent the Federal Army to root out the Zapatistas in Morelos. Madero's generals employed a scorched-earth policy, burning villages and forcibly removing their inhabitants, and drafting many men into the Army or sending them to forced-labor camps in southern Mexico. Such actions strengthened Zapata's standing among the peasants, and Zapata succeeded in driving the forces of Madero (led by Victoriano Huerta) out of Morelos. In a coup against Madero in February 1913, Huerta took power in Mexico, but a coalition of Constitutionalist forces in northern Mexico led by Venustiano Carranza, Álvaro Obregón and Francisco "Pancho" Villa ousted him in July 1914 with the support of Zapata's troops. Zapata did not recognize the authority that Carranza asserted as leader of the revolutionary movement, continuing his adherence to the Plan de Ayala.
In the aftermath of the revolutionaries' victory over Huerta, they attempted to sort out power relations in the Convention of Aguascalientes (October to November 1914). Zapata and Villa broke with Carranza, and Mexico descended into a civil war among the winners. Dismayed with the alliance with Villa, Zapata focused his energies on rebuilding society in Morelos (which he now controlled), instituting the land reforms of the Plan de Ayala. As Carranza consolidated his power and defeated Villa in 1915, Zapata initiated guerrilla warfare against the Carrancistas, who in turn invaded Morelos, employing once again scorched-earth tactics to oust the Zapatista rebels. Zapata once again re-took Morelos in 1917 and held most of the state against Carranza's troops until he was killed in an ambush in April 1919.
Article 27 of the 1917 Mexican Constitution was drafted in response to Zapata's agrarian demands.
After his death, Zapatista generals aligned with Obregón against Carranza and helped drive Carranza from power (1920). In 1920 Zapatistas managed to obtain powerful posts in the government of Morelos after Carranza's fall. They instituted many of the land reforms envisioned by Zapata in Morelos.
Zapata remains an iconic figure in Mexico, used both as a nationalist symbol as well as a symbol of the neo-Zapatista movement.
Early years before the Revolution
Emiliano Zapata was born to Gabriel Zapata and Cleofas Jertrudiz Salazar of Anenecuilco, Morelos, a well-known local family; Emiliano's godfather was the manager of a large local hacienda, and his godmother was the manager's wife. Zapata's family were likely mestizos, Mexicans of both Spanish and Nahua heritage. Emiliano was the ninth of ten children; he had six sisters: Celsa, Ramona, María de Jesús, María de la Luz, Jovita and Matilde. And three brothers: Pedro, Eufemio Zapata and Loreto. The Zapata family were descended from the Zapata of Mapaztlán. His maternal grandfather, José Salazar, served in the army of José María Morelos y Pavón during the siege of Cuautla; his paternal uncles Cristino and José Zapata fought in the Reform War and the French Intervention. From a family of farmers, Emiliano Zapata had insight into the severe difficulties of the countryside and his village's long struggle to regain land taken by expanding haciendas. Although he is commonly portrayed as "indigenous" or a member of the landless peasantry in Mexican iconography, Zapata's was racially indigenous but neither landless nor is known to have spoken the Nahuatl language. They were reasonably well-off and never suffered poverty, enjoying such activities as bullfights, cock-fighting and jaripeos.
He received a limited education from his teacher, Emilio Vara, but it included "the rudiments of bookkeeping". At the age of 16 or 17, Zapata had to care for his family following his father's death. Emiliano was entrepreneurial, buying a team of mules to haul maize from farms to town, as well as bricks to the Hacienda of Chinameca; he was also a successful farmer, growing watermelons as a cash crop. He was a skilled horseman and competed in rodeos and races, as well as bullfighting from horseback. These skills as a horseman brought him work as a horse trainer for Porfirio Díaz's son-in-law, Ignacio de la Torre y Mier who had a large sugar hacienda nearby, and served Zapata well as a revolutionary leader. He had a striking appearance, with a large mustache in which he took pride, and good quality clothing described by his loyal secretary: "General Zapata's dress until his death was a charro outfit: tight-fitting black cashmere pants with silver buttons, a broad charro hat, a fine linen shirt or jacket, a scarf around his neck, boots of a single piece, Amozoqueña-style spurs, and a pistol at his belt." In an undated studio photo, Zapata is dressed in a standard business suit and tie, projecting an image of a man of means.
Around the turn of the 20th century, Anenecuilco was a mixed Spanish-speaking mestizo and indigenous Nahuatl-speaking pueblo. It had a long history of protesting the local haciendas taking community members' land, and its leaders gathered colonial-era documentation of their land titles to prove their claims. Some of the colonial documentation was in Nahuatl, with contemporary translations to Spanish for use in legal cases in the Spanish courts. One eyewitness account by Luz Jiménez of Milpa Alta states that Emiliano Zapata spoke Nahuatl fluently when his forces arrived in her community.
Community members in Anenecuilco, including Zapata, sought redress against land seizures. In 1892, a delegation had an audience with Díaz, who with the intervention of a lawyer, agreed to hear them. Although promising them to deal favorably with their petition, Díaz had them arrested and Zapata was conscripted into the Federal Army. Under Díaz, conscription into the Federal Army was much feared by ordinary Mexican men and their families. Zapata was one of many rebel leaders who were conscripted at some point.
In 1909, an important meeting was called by the elders of Anenecuilco, whose chief elder was José Merino. He announced "my intention to resign from my position due to my old age and limited abilities to continue the fight for the land rights of the village." The meeting was used as a time for discussion and nomination of individuals as a replacement for Merino as the president of the village council. The elders on the council were so well respected by the village men that no one would dare to override their nominations or vote for an individual against the advice of the current council at that time. The nominations made were Modesto González, Bartolo Parral, and Emiliano Zapata. After the nominations were closed, a vote was taken and Zapata became the new council president without contest.
Although Zapata had turned 30 only a month before, voters knew that it was necessary to elect someone respected by the community who would be responsible for the village. Even though he was relatively young, Anenecuilco was ready to hand over the leadership to him without any worry of failure. Before he was elected he had shown the village his nature by helping to head up a campaign in opposition to the candidate Díaz had chosen governor. Even though Zapata's efforts failed, he was able to create and cultivate relationships with political authority figures that would prove useful for him.
Zapata became a leading figure in the village of Anenecuilco, where his family had lived for many generations, though he did not take the title of Don, as was custom for someone of his status. Instead, the Anenecuilcans referred to Zapata affectionately as "Miliano" and later as pobrecito (poor little thing) after his death.
The 1910 Revolution
The flawed 1910 elections were a major reason for the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution in 1910. Porfirio Díaz was being threatened by the candidacy of Francisco I. Madero. Zapata, seeing an opportunity to promote land reform in Mexico, joined with Madero and his Constitutionalists, who included Pascual Orozco and Pancho Villa, whom he perceived to be the best chance for genuine change in the country. Although he was wary about Madero, Zapata cooperated with him when Madero made vague promises about land reform in his Plan of San Luis Potosí. Land reform was the central feature of Zapata's political vision.
Zapata joined Madero's campaign against President Díaz. The first military campaign of Zapata was the capture of the Hacienda of Chinameca. When Zapata's army captured Cuautla after a six-day battle on May 19, 1911, it became clear that Díaz would not hold on to power for long.
During his interim presidency, Francisco León de la Barra tasked General Victoriano Huerta to suppress revolutionaries in Morelos. Huerta was to disarm revolutionaries peacefully if possible, but could use force. In August 1911, Huerta led 1,000 Federal troops to Cuernavaca, which Madero saw as provocative. Writing the Minister of the Interior, Zapata demanded the Federal troops withdraw from Morelos, saying "I won't be responsible for the blood that is going to flow if the Federal forces remain."
Although Madero's Plan of San Luis Potosí specified the return of village land and won the support of peasants seeking land reform, he was not ready to implement radical change. Madero simply demanded that "Public servants act 'morally' in enforcing the law ...". Upon seeing the response by villagers, Madero offered formal justice in courts to individuals who had been wronged by others with regard to agrarian politics. Zapata decided that on the surface it seemed as though Madero was doing good things for the people of Mexico, but Zapata did not know the level of sincerity in Madero's actions and thus did not know if he should support him completely.
Plan of Ayala and rebellion against Madero
Compromises between the Madero and Zapata failed in November 1911, days after Madero was elected president. Zapata and Otilio Montaño Sánchez, a former school teacher, fled to the mountains of southwest Puebla. There they promulgated the most radical reform plan in Mexico, the Plan de Ayala (Plan of Ayala). The plan declared Madero a traitor, named as head of the revolution Pascual Orozco, the victorious general who captured Ciudad Juárez in 1911 forcing the resignation of Díaz. He outlined a plan for true land reform.
Zapata had supported the ouster of Díaz and had the expectation that Madero would fulfill the promises made in the Plan of San Luis Potosí to return village lands. He did not share Madero's vision of democracy built on particular freedoms and guarantees that were meaningless to peasants:
Freedom of the press for those who cannot read; free elections for those who do not know the candidates; proper legal for those who have anything to do with an attorney. All those democratic principles, all those great words that gave such joy to our fathers and grandfathers have lost their magic for the people... With or without elections, with or without an effective law, with the Porfirian dictatorship or with Madero's democracy with a controlled or free press, its fate remains the same.
The 1911 Plan of Ayala called for all lands stolen under Díaz to be immediately returned; there had been considerable land fraud under the old dictator, so a great deal of territory was involved. It also stated that large plantations owned by a single person or family should have one-third of their land nationalized, which would then be required to be given to poor farmers. It also argued that if any large plantation owner resisted this action, they should have the other two-thirds confiscated as well. The Plan of Ayala also invoked the name of President Benito Juárez, one of Mexico's great liberal leaders, and compared the taking of land from the wealthy to Juarez's actions when land was expropriated from the Catholic church during the Liberal Reform. Another part of the plan stated that rural cooperatives and other measurements should be put in place to prevent the land from being seized or stolen in the future.
In the following weeks, the development of military operations "betray(ed) good evidence of clear and intelligent planning." During Orozco's rebellion, Zapata fought Mexican troops in the south near Mexico City. In the original design of the armed force, Zapata was a mere colonel among several others; however, the true plan that came about through this organization lent itself to Zapata. Zapata believed that the best route of attack would be to center the fighting and action in Cuautla. If this political location could be overthrown, the army would have enough power to "veto anyone else's control of the state, negotiate for Cuernavaca or attack it directly, and maintain independent access to Mexico City as well as escape routes to the southern hills." However, in order to gain this great success, Zapata realized that his men needed to be better armed and trained.
The first line of action demanded that Zapata and his men "control the area behind and below a line from Jojutla to Yecapixtla." When this was accomplished it gave the army the ability to complete raids as well as wait. As the opposition of the Federal Army and police detachments slowly dissipated, the army would be able to eventually gain powerful control over key locations on the Interoceanic Railway from Puebla City to Cuautla. If these feats could be completed, it would gain access to Cuautla directly and the city would fall.
The plan of action was carried out successfully in Jojutla. However, Pablo Torres Burgos, the commander of the operation, was disappointed that the army disobeyed his orders against looting and ransacking. The army took complete control of the area, and it seemed as though Torres Burgos had lost control over his forces prior to this event. Shortly after, Torres Burgos called a meeting and resigned from his position. Upon leaving Jojutla with his two sons, he was surprised by a federal police patrol who subsequently shot all three of the men on the spot. This seemed to some to be an ending blow to the movement, because Torres Burgos had not selected a successor for his position; however, Zapata was ready to take up where Torres Burgos had left off.
Shortly after Torres Burgos's death, a party of rebels elected Zapata as "Supreme Chief of the Revolutionary Movement of the South". This seemed to be the fix to all of the problems that had just arisen, but other individuals wanted to replace Zapata as well. Due to this new conflict, the individual who would come out on top would have to do so by "convincing his peers he deserved their backing."
Zapata finally gained the support necessary by his peers and was considered a "singularly qualified candidate". This decision to make Zapata the leader of the revolution in Morelos did not occur all at once, nor did it ever reach a true definitive level of recognition. In order to succeed, Zapata needed a strong financial backing for the battles to come. This came in the form of 10,000 pesos delivered by Rodolfo from the Tacubayans. Due to this amount of money Zapata's group of rebels became one of the strongest in the state financially.
After a period Zapata became the leader of his "strategic zone", which gave him power and control over the actions of many more individual rebel groups and thus greatly increased his margin of success. "Among revolutionaries in other districts of the state, however, Zapata's authority was more tenuous." After a meeting between Zapata and Ambrosio Figueroa in Jolalpan, it was decided that Zapata would have joint power with Figueroa with regard to operations in Morelos. This was a turning point in the level of authority and influence that Zapata had gained and proved useful in the direct overthrow of Morelos.
Rebellion against Huerta, the Zapata-Villa alliance
If there was anyone that Zapata hated more than Díaz and Madero, it was Victoriano Huerta, the bitter, violent alcoholic who had been responsible for many atrocities in southern Mexico while trying to end the rebellion. Zapata was not alone: in the north, Pancho Villa, who had supported Madero, immediately took to the field against Huerta. Zapata revised the Plan of Ayala and named himself the leader of his revolution. He was joined by two newcomers to the Revolution, Venustiano Carranza and Alvaro Obregón, who raised large armies in Coahuila and Sonora respectively. Together they made short work of Huerta, who resigned and fled in June 1914 after repeated military losses.
On April 21, 1914, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson sent a contingent of troops to occupy the port city of Veracruz. This sudden threat caused Huerta to withdraw his troops from Morelos and Puebla, leaving only Jojutla and Cuernavaca under federal control. Zapatistas quickly assumed control of eastern Morelos, taking Cuautla and Jonacatepec with no resistance. In spite of being faced with a possible foreign invasion, Zapata refused to unite with Huerta in defense of the nation. He stated that if need be he would defend Mexico alone as chief of the Ayalan forces. In May the Zapatistas took Jojutla from the Federal Army, many of whom joined the rebels, and captured guns and ammunition. They also laid siege to Cuernavaca where a small contingent of federal troops were holed up. By the summer of 1915 Zapata's forces had taken the southern edge of the Federal District, occupying Milpa Alta and Xochimilco, and was poised to move into the capital. In mid July, Huerta was forced to flee as a Constitutionalist force under Carranza, Obregón and Villa took the Federal District. The Constitutionalists established a peace treaty inserting Carranza as First Authority of the nation. Carranza, an aristocrat with politically relevant connections, then gained the backing of the U.S., who passed over Villa and Zapata due to their lower status backgrounds and more progressive ideologies. In spite of having contributed decisively to the fall of Huerta, the Zapatistas were left out of the peace treaties, probably because of Carranza's intense dislike for the Zapatistas whom he saw as uncultured savages. Through 1915 there was a tentative peace in Morelos and the rest of the country.
As the Constitutionalist forces began to split, with Francisco "Pancho" Villa creating a popular front against Carranza's Constitutionalists, Carranza worked diplomatically to get the Zapatistas to recognize his rule, sending Dr. Atl as an envoy to propose a compromise with Zapata. For Carranza, an agreement with Zapata would mean that he did not need to worry about his force's southern flank and could concentrate on defeating Villa. Zapata demanded veto power over Carranza's decisions, which Carranza rejected and negotiations broke off. Zapata issued a statement, perhaps drafted by his advisor, Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama. "The country wishes to destroy feudalism once and for all [while Carranza offers] administrative reform...complete honesty in the handling of public monies...freedom of the press for those who cannot read; free elections for those who do not know the candidates; proper legal proceedings for those who have never had anything to do with an attorney. All those beautiful democratic principles, all those great words that give such joy to our fathers and grandfathers have lost their magic...The people continue to suffer from poverty and endless disappointments."
Unable to reach an agreement, the Constitutionalists divided along ideological lines, with Zapata and Villa leading a progressive rebellion and the conservative faction of the remaining Constituitionalists being headed Carranza and Obregón. Villa and the other anti-Carrancista leaders of the North established the Convention of Aguascalientes against Carranza. Zapata and his envoys got the convention to adopt some of the agrarian principles of the Plan de Ayala. Zapata and Villa met in Xochimilco to negotiate an alliance and divide the responsibility for ridding Mexico of the remaining Carrancistas. The meeting was awkward but amiable, and was widely publicized. It was decided that Zapata should work on securing the area east of Morelos from Puebla towards Veracruz. Nonetheless, during the ensuing campaign in Puebla, Zapata was disappointed by Villa's lack of support. Villa did not initially provide the Zapatistas with the weaponry they had agreed on and, when he did, he did not provide adequate transportation. There were also a series of abuses by Villistas against Zapatista soldiers and chiefs. These experiences led Zapata to grow unsatisfied with the alliance, turning instead his efforts to reorganizing the state of Morelos that had been left in shambles by the onslaught of Huerta and Robles. Having taken Puebla, Zapata left a couple of garrisons there but did not support Villa further against Obregón and Carranza. The Carrancistas saw that the convention was divided and decided to concentrate on beating Villa, which left the Zapatistas to their own devices for a while.
Zapata rebuilds Morelos
Through 1915, Zapata began reshaping Morelos after the Plan de Ayala, redistributing hacienda lands to the peasants, and largely letting village councils run their own local affairs. Most peasants did not turn to cash crops, instead growing subsistence crops such as corn, beans, and vegetables. The result was that as the capital was starving, Morelos peasants had more to eat than they had had in 1910 and at lower prices. The only official event in Morelos during this entire year was a bullfight in which Zapata himself and his nephew Amador Salazar participated. 1915 was a short period of peace and prosperity for the farmers of Morelos, in between the massacres of the Huerta era and the civil war of the winners to come.
Guerrilla warfare against Carranza
Even when Villa was retreating, having lost the Battle of Celaya in 1915, and when Obregón took the capital from the Conventionists who retreated to Toluca, Zapata did not open a second front.
When Carranza's forces were poised to move into Morelos, Zapata took action. He attacked Carrancista positions with large forces trying to harry the Carrancistas in the rear as they were occupied with routing Villa throughout the Northwest. Though Zapata managed to take many important sites such as the Necaxa power plant that supplied Mexico City, he was unable to hold them. The convention was finally routed from Toluca, and Carranza was recognized by US President Woodrow Wilson as the head of state of Mexico in October.
Through 1916 Zapata raided federal forces from Hidalgo to Oaxaca, and Genovevo de la O fought the Carrancistas in Guerrero. The Zapatistas attempted to amass support for their cause by promulgating new manifestos against the hacendados, but this had little effect since the hacendados had already lost power throughout the country.
Carranza consolidates power
Having been put in charge of the efforts to root out Zapatismo in Morelos, Pablo González Garza was humiliated by Zapata's counterattacks and enforced increasingly draconian measures against the locals. He received no reinforcements, as Obregón, the Minister of War, needed all his forces against Villa in the north and against Felix Díaz in Oaxaca. Through low-scale attacks on Gonzalez's positions, Zapata had driven Gonzalez out of Morelos by the end of 1916.
Nonetheless, outside of Morelos the revolutionary forces started disbanding. Some joined the constitutionalists such as Domingo Arena, or lapsed into banditry. In Morelos, Zapata once more reorganized the Zapatista state, continuing with democratic reforms and legislation meant to keep the civil population safe from abuses by soldiers. Though his advisers urged him to mount a concerted campaign against the Carrancistas across southern Mexico, again he concentrated entirely on stabilizing Morelos and making life tolerable for the peasants. Meanwhile, Carranza mounted national elections in all state capitals except Cuernavaca, and promulgated the 1917 Constitution which incorporated elements of the Plan de Ayala.
Zapata under pressure
Meanwhile, the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas. As General Arenas turned over to the constitutionalists, he secured peace for his region and remained in control there. This suggested to many revolutionaries that perhaps the time had come to seek a peaceful conclusion to the struggle. A movement within the Zapatista ranks led by former General Vazquez and Zapata's erstwhile adviser and inspiration Otilio Montaño moved against the Tlaltizapan headquarters demanding surrender to the Carrancistas. Reluctantly, Zapata had Montaño tried for treason and executed.
Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Díaz. He sent Gildardo Magaña as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support. In the fall of 1917 a force led by Gonzalez and the ex-Zapatista Sidronio Camacho, who had killed Zapata's brother Eufemio, moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec.
Zapata continued his work to try to unite with the national anti-Carrancista movement through the next year, and the constitutionalists did not make further advances. In the winter of 1918 a harsh cold and the onset of the Spanish flu decimated the population of Morelos, causing the loss of a quarter of the total population of the state, almost as many as had been lost to Huerta in 1914. Furthermore, Zapata began to worry that by the end of the World War, the United States would turn its attention to Mexico, forcing the Zapatistas to either join the Carrancistas in a national defense or to acquiesce to foreign domination of Mexico.
In December 1918 Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat. The main Zapatista headquarters were moved to Tochimilco, Puebla, although Tlaltizapan also continued to be under Zapatista control. Through Castro, Carranza issued offers to the main Zapatista generals to join the nationalist cause, with pardon. But apart from Manuel Palafox, who having fallen in disgrace among the Zapatistas had joined the Arenistas, none of the major generals did.
Zapata released statements accusing Carranza of being secretly sympathetic to the Germans. In March Zapata finally sent an open letter to Carranza urging him for the good of the fatherland to resign his leadership to Vazquez Gómez, by now the rallying point of the anti-constitutionalist movement. Having posed this formidable moral challenge to Carranza prior to the upcoming 1920 presidential elections, the Zapatista generals at Tochimilco, Magaña and Ayaquica, urged Zapata not to take any risks and to lie low. But Zapata declined, considering that the respect of his troops depended on his active presence at the front.
Assassination
Eliminating Zapata was a top priority for President Carranza. Carranza was unwilling to compromise with domestic foes and wanted to demonstrate to Mexican elites and to American interests that Carranza was the "only viable alternative to both anarchy and radicalism." In mid-March 1919, General Pablo González ordered his subordinate Jesús Guajardo to begin operations against the Zapatistas in the mountains around Huautla. But when González later discovered Guajardo carousing in a cantina, he had him arrested, and a public scandal ensued. On March 21, Zapata attempted to smuggle in a note to Guajardo, inviting him to switch sides. The note, however, never reached Guajardo but instead wound up on González's desk. González devised a plan to use this note to his advantage. He accused Guajardo of not only being a drunk, but of being a traitor. After reducing Guajardo to tears, González explained to him that he could recover from this disgrace if he feigned a defection to Zapata. So Guajardo wrote to Zapata telling him that he would bring over his men and supplies if certain guarantees were promised. Zapata answered Guajardo's letter on April 1, 1919, agreeing to all of Guajardo's terms. Zapata suggested a mutiny on April 4. Guajardo replied that his defection should wait until a new shipment of arms and ammunition arrived sometime between the 6th and the 10th. By the 7th, the plans were set: Zapata ordered Guajardo to attack the Federal garrison at Jonacatepec because the garrison included troops who had defected from Zapata. Pablo González and Guajardo notified the Jonacatepec garrison ahead of time, and a mock battle was staged on April 9. At the conclusion of the mock battle, the former Zapatistas were arrested and shot. Convinced that Guajardo was sincere, Zapata agreed to a final meeting where Guajardo would defect.
On April 10, 1919, Guajardo invited Zapata to a meeting, intimating that he intended to defect to the revolutionaries. However, when Zapata arrived at the Hacienda de San Juan, in Chinameca, Ayala municipality, Guajardo's men riddled him with bullets.
Zapata's body was photographed, displayed for 24 hours, and then buried in Cuautla. Pablo González wanted the body photographed, so that there would be no doubt that Zapata was dead: "it was an actual fact that the famous jefe of the southern region had died." Although Mexico City newspapers had called for Zapata's body to be brought to the capital, Carranza did not do so. However, Zapata's clothing was displayed outside a newspaper's office across from the Alameda Park in the capital.
Immediate aftermath
Although Zapata's assassination weakened his forces in Morelos, the Zapatistas continued the fight against Carranza. For Carranza the death of Zapata was the removal of an ongoing threat, for many Zapata's assassination undermined "worker and peasant support for Carranza and [Pablo] González." Obregón seized on the opportunity to attack Carranza and González, Obregón's rival candidate for the presidency, by saying "this crime reveals a lack of ethics in some members of the government and also of political sense, since peasant votes in the upcoming election will now go to whoever runs against Pablo González." In spite of González's attempts to sully the name of Zapata and the Plan de Ayala during his 1920 campaign for the presidency, the people of Morelos continued to support Zapatista generals, providing them with weapons, supplies and protection. Carranza was wary of the threat of a U.S. intervention, and Zapatista generals decided to take a conciliatory approach. Bands of Zapatistas started surrendering in exchange for amnesties, and many Zapatista generals went on to become local authorities, such as Fortino Ayaquica who became municipal president of Tochimilco. Other generals such as Genovevo de la O remained active in small-scale guerrilla warfare.
As Venustiano Carranza moved to curb his former allies and now rivals in 1920 to impose a civilian, Ignacio Bonillas, as his successor in the presidency, Obregón sought to align himself with the Zapatista movement against that of Carranza. Genovevo de la O and Magaña supported him in the coup by former Constitutionalists, fighting in Morelos against Carranza and helping prompt Carranza to flee Mexico City toward Veracruz in May 1920. "Obregón and Genovevo de la O entered Mexico City in triumph." Zapatistas were given important posts in the interim government of Adolfo de la Huerta and the administration of Álvaro Obregón, following his election to the presidency after the coup. Zapatistas had almost total control of the state of Morelos, where they carried out a program of agrarian reform and land redistribution based on the provisions of the Plan de Ayala and with the support of the government.
According to "La Demócrata", after Zapata's assassination, "in the consciousness of the natives", Zapata "had taken on the proportions of a myth" because he had "given them a formula of vindication against old offenses." Mythmaking would continue for decades after Zapata was gunned down.
Legacy
Zapata's influence continues to this day, particularly in revolutionary tendencies in southern Mexico. In the long run, he has done more for his ideals in death than he did in life. Like many charismatic idealists, Zapata became a martyr after his murder. Even though Mexico still has not implemented the sort of land reform he wanted, he is remembered as a visionary who fought for his countrymen.
Zapata's Plan of Ayala influenced Article 27 of the progressive 1917 Constitution of Mexico that codified an agrarian reform program. Even though the Mexican Revolution did restore some land that had been taken under Díaz, the land reform on the scale imagined by Zapata was never enacted. However, a great deal of the significant land distribution which Zapata sought would later be enacted after Mexican President Lázaro Cárdenas took office in 1934. Cárdenas would fulfill not only the land distribution policies written in Article 27, but other reforms written in the Mexican Constitution as well.
There are controversies about the portrayal of Emiliano Zapata and his followers, whether they were bandits or revolutionaries. At the outbreak of the Revolution, "Zapata's agrarian revolt was soon construed as a 'caste war' [race war], in which members of an 'inferior race' were captained by a 'modern Attila'".
Zapata is now one of the most revered national heroes of Mexico. To many Mexicans, especially the peasant and indigenous citizens, Zapata was a practical revolutionary who sought the implementation of liberties and agrarian rights outlined in the Plan of Ayala. He was a realist with the goal of achieving political and economic emancipation of the peasants in southern Mexico and leading them out of severe poverty.
Many popular organizations take their name from Zapata, most notably the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional or EZLN in Spanish), the Neozapatismo group that emerged in the state of Chiapas in 1983 and precipitated the 1994 indigenous Zapatista uprising which still continues in Chiapas. Towns, streets, and housing developments called "Emiliano Zapata" are common across the country and he has, at times, been depicted on Mexican banknotes.
Modern activists in Mexico frequently make reference to Zapata in their campaigns; his image is commonly seen on banners, and many chants invoke his name: Si Zapata viviera con nosotros anduviera ("If Zapata lived, he would walk with us"), and Zapata vive, la lucha sigue ("Zapata lives; the struggle continues").
His daughter by Petra Portillo Torres, Paulina Ana María Zapata Portillo, was aware of her father's legacy from a very early age. She continued his work of dedication to agrarian rights, serving as treasurer of the ejido of Cuautla, as ejidataria of Cuautla, as municipal councilor and municipal trustee.
In popular culture
Zapata has been depicted in movies, comics, books, music, and clothing. For example, there is a Zapata (1980), stage musical written by Harry Nilsson and Perry Botkin, libretto by Allan Katz, which ran for 16 weeks at the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam, Connecticut. A movie called Zapata: El sueño de un héroe (Zapata: A Hero's Dream) was produced in 2004, starring Mexican actors Alejandro Fernandez, Jaime Camil, and Lucero. There is also a sub-genre of the Spaghetti Western called the Zapata Western, which features stories set during the Mexican Revolution.
Marlon Brando played Emiliano Zapata in the award-winning movie based on his life, Viva Zapata! in 1952. The film co-starred Anthony Quinn, who won best supporting actor. The director was Elia Kazan and the writer was John Steinbeck.
Emiliano Zapata is a major character in The Friends of Pancho Villa (1996), by James Carlos Blake
Emiliano Zapata is referenced in the song "Calm Like a Bomb" by American rock band Rage Against the Machine from their album "The Battle of Los Angeles."
In the 2011 Mexican TV series "El Encanto del
Aguila" Zapata is played by the Mexican actor Tenoch Huerta.
In December 2019, an arts show commemorating the 100 year anniversary of his death was held at the Palacio de Bellas Artes. The show featured 141 works. A painting called La Revolución depicted Zapata as intentionally effeminate, riding an erect horse, nude except for high heels and a pink hat. According to the artist, he created the painting to combat machismo. The painting caused protests from the farmer's union and admirers of Zapata. His grandson Jorge Zapata González threatened to sue if the painting was not removed. There was a clash between supporters of the painting and detractors at the museum. A compromised was reached with some of Zapata's family, a label was placed next to the painting outlining their disagreement with the painting.
Sobriquets
"Calpuleque (náhuatl)" – leader, chief
"El Tigre del Sur" – Tiger of the South
"El Tigre" – The Tiger
"El Tigrillo" – Little Tiger
"El Caudillo del Sur" – Caudillo of the South
"El Atila del Sur" – The Attila of the South (pejorative)
Gallery
References
Cited sources
Further reading
Brunk, Samuel, ¡Emiliano Zapata! Revolution and Betrayal in Mexico. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1995.
Caballero, Raymond. Lynching Pascual Orozco, Mexican Revolutionary Hero and Paradox. Create Space 2015.
Lucas, Jeffrey Kent. The Rightward Drift of Mexico's Former Revolutionaries: The Case of Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2010.
Mclynn, Frank. Villa and Zapata: A history of the Mexican Revolution. New York : Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2001.
McNeely, John H. "Origins of the Zapata revolt in Morelos." Hispanic American Historical Review (1966): 153–169.
Historiography
Golland, David Hamilton. "Recent Works on the Mexican Revolution." Estudios Interdisciplinarios de América Latina y el Caribe 16.1 (2014). online
McNamara, Patrick J. "Rewriting Zapata: Generational Conflict on the Eve of the Mexican Revolution." Mexican Studies-Estudios Mexicanos 30.1 (2014): 122–149.
In Spanish
Horcasitas, Fernando. De Porfirio Díaz a Zapata, memoria náhuatl de Milpa Alta, UNAM, México DF.,1968 (eye and ear-witness account of Zapata speaking Nahuatl)
Krauze, Enrique. Zapata: El amor a la tierra, in the Biographies of Power'' series.
Media
"Emiliano Zapata", BBC Mundo.com
External links
Emiliano Zapata Quotes, Facts, Books and Movies
Full text html version of Zapata's "Plan de Ayala" in Spanish
Emiliano Zapata videos
Bicentenario del inicio del movimiento de Independencia Nacional y del Centenario del inicio de la Revolución Mexicana
Miguel Angel Mancera Espinosa
1879 births
1919 deaths
19th-century Mexican people
20th-century Mexican people
Assassinated Mexican people
Deaths by firearm in Mexico
Mexican agrarianists
Mexican generals
Mexican guerrillas
Mexican rebels
Mexican revolutionaries
Mexican Roman Catholics
Military assassinations
Military history of Mexico
Nahua people
People from Ciudad Ayala, Morelos
People murdered in Mexico
People of the Mexican Revolution | true | [
"The Marimanindji are an indigenous Australian tribe of the Northern territory. Little is known of them.\n\nName\nThe anthropologist \"Bill\" Stanner thought that other attested tribal names, Maritjamiri and Mangikurungu, properly belonged to the Marinmanindji. Norman Tindale noted a similarity between their name and that of the Nanggikorongo also identified in this area, but did not draw any conclusion, since adequate material to clarify the overlap was not available.\n\nLanguage\nMarimanindji was a dialect within the Marrithiyel language cluster and is now virtually extinct.\n\nCountry\nMarimanindji ranged to the south of Hermit Hill, in the central Daly River area. Later work indicated that they lived south of both the Daly and Darwin rivers, to the west, and near the headwaters of the Muldiva river.\n\nPeople\nThey are generally grouped as one of the Marrithiyal\n\nAlternative names\n Maramanandji.\n Maramarandji.\n Marimanindu.\n Marramaninjsji.\n Marramaninyshi.\n Murinmanindji.\n\nNotes\n\nCitations\n\nSources\n\nAboriginal peoples of the Northern Territory",
"The Atikum, also known as Huamuê or Uamué, are an indigenous people of Brazil that live in Bahia and Pernambuco.\n\nTerritory\nThey have 20 villages within the Atikum Indigenous Land, and their territory is near Carnaubeira da Penha.\n\nHistory\nKnown as the \"civilized Indians of the Umã Hills,\" the Arikum sought federal recognition from the Brazilian government beginning in the 1940s.\n\nLanguage\nToday Atikum people speak Portuguese. Formerly they spoke the Atikum language, a linguistic isolate.\n\nReferences\n\nIndigenous peoples in Brazil\nIndigenous peoples of Eastern Brazil"
]
|
[
"Emiliano Zapata",
"Zapata under pressure",
"When did he first begin to feel pressure?",
"the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas.",
"Was he the leader of the group?",
"As General Arenas had turned over to the constitutionalists, he had secured peace for his region and he remained in control there.",
"How did he handle the pressure beyond this? What were his plans?",
"Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Diaz.",
"DId those groups agree to fight on his side?",
"He sent Gildardo Magana as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support.",
"What was the reaction from those groups during the struggle?",
"moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec.",
"Did they capture any other territory or peoples?",
"Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat."
]
| C_7f0315f77260442b8ce138603be6223f_1 | Did he ever recover from this defeat? | 7 | Did Emiliano Zapata ever recover from the defeat of the state of Morelos? | Emiliano Zapata | Meanwhile, the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas. As General Arenas had turned over to the constitutionalists, he had secured peace for his region and he remained in control there. This suggested to many revolutionaries that perhaps the time had come to seek a peaceful conclusion to the struggle. A movement within the Zapatista ranks led by former General Vazquez and Zapata's erstwhile adviser and inspiration Otilio Montano moved against the Tlaltizapan headquarters demanding surrender to the Carrancistas. Reluctantly, Zapata had Montano tried for treason and executed (Womack 1983-86). Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Diaz. He sent Gildardo Magana as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support. In the fall of 1917 a force led by Gonzalez and the ex-Zapatista Sidronio Camacho, who had killed Zapata's brother Eufemio, moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec. Zapata continued his work to try to unite with the national anti-Carrancista movement through the next year, and the constitutionalists did not make further advances. In the winter of 1918 a harsh cold and the onset of the Spanish flu decimated the population of Morelos, causing the loss of a quarter of the total population of the state, almost as many as had been lost to Huerta in 1914. (Womack 311). Furthermore, Zapata began to worry that by the end of the World War, the US would turn its attention to Mexico forcing the Zapatistas to either join the Carrancistas in a national defense or to acquiesce to foreign domination of Mexico. In December 1918 Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat. The main Zapatista headquarters were moved to Tochimilco, Puebla, although Tlaltizapan also continued to be under Zapatista control. Through Castro, Carranza issued offers to the main Zapatista generals to join the nationalist cause, with pardon. But apart from Manuel Palafox, who having fallen in disgrace among the Zapatistas had joined the Arenistas, none of the major generals did (Womack 313-14). Zapata emitted statements accusing Carranza of being secretly sympathetic to the Germans (Womack 315). In March Zapata finally emitted an open letter to Carranza urging him for the good of the fatherland to resign his leadership to Vazquez Gomez, by now the rallying point of the anti-constitutionalist movement (Womack 319-20). Having posed this formidable moral challenge to Carranza prior to the upcoming 1920 presidential elections, the Zapatista generals at Tochimilco, Magana and Ayaquica, urged Zapata not to take any risks and to lay low. But Zapata declined, considering that the respect of his troops depended on his active presence at the front (Womack 320-22). CANNOTANSWER | In March Zapata finally emitted an open letter to Carranza urging him for the good of the fatherland to resign his leadership | Emiliano Zapata Salazar (; 8 August 1879 – 10 April 1919) was a Mexican revolutionary. He was a leading figure in the Mexican Revolution of 1910–1920, the main leader of the people's revolution in the Mexican state of Morelos, and the inspiration of the agrarian movement called Zapatismo.
Zapata was born in the rural village of Anenecuilco in Morelos State, in an era when peasant communities came under increasing pressure from the small-landowning class who monopolized land and water resources for sugar-cane production with the support of dictator Porfirio Díaz (President 1877-1880 and 1884–1911). Zapata early on participated in political movements against Díaz and the landowning hacendados, and when the Revolution broke out in 1910 he was thus positioned as a central leader of the peasant revolt in Morelos. Cooperating with a number of other peasant leaders, he formed the Liberation Army of the South, of which he soon became the undisputed leader. Zapata's forces contributed to the fall of Díaz, defeating the Federal Army in the Battle of Cuautla (May 1911), but when the revolutionary leader Francisco I. Madero became president he disavowed the role of the Zapatistas, denouncing them as simple bandits.
In November 1911 Zapata promulgated the Plan de Ayala, which called for substantial land reforms, redistributing lands to the peasants. Madero sent the Federal Army to root out the Zapatistas in Morelos. Madero's generals employed a scorched-earth policy, burning villages and forcibly removing their inhabitants, and drafting many men into the Army or sending them to forced-labor camps in southern Mexico. Such actions strengthened Zapata's standing among the peasants, and Zapata succeeded in driving the forces of Madero (led by Victoriano Huerta) out of Morelos. In a coup against Madero in February 1913, Huerta took power in Mexico, but a coalition of Constitutionalist forces in northern Mexico led by Venustiano Carranza, Álvaro Obregón and Francisco "Pancho" Villa ousted him in July 1914 with the support of Zapata's troops. Zapata did not recognize the authority that Carranza asserted as leader of the revolutionary movement, continuing his adherence to the Plan de Ayala.
In the aftermath of the revolutionaries' victory over Huerta, they attempted to sort out power relations in the Convention of Aguascalientes (October to November 1914). Zapata and Villa broke with Carranza, and Mexico descended into a civil war among the winners. Dismayed with the alliance with Villa, Zapata focused his energies on rebuilding society in Morelos (which he now controlled), instituting the land reforms of the Plan de Ayala. As Carranza consolidated his power and defeated Villa in 1915, Zapata initiated guerrilla warfare against the Carrancistas, who in turn invaded Morelos, employing once again scorched-earth tactics to oust the Zapatista rebels. Zapata once again re-took Morelos in 1917 and held most of the state against Carranza's troops until he was killed in an ambush in April 1919.
Article 27 of the 1917 Mexican Constitution was drafted in response to Zapata's agrarian demands.
After his death, Zapatista generals aligned with Obregón against Carranza and helped drive Carranza from power (1920). In 1920 Zapatistas managed to obtain powerful posts in the government of Morelos after Carranza's fall. They instituted many of the land reforms envisioned by Zapata in Morelos.
Zapata remains an iconic figure in Mexico, used both as a nationalist symbol as well as a symbol of the neo-Zapatista movement.
Early years before the Revolution
Emiliano Zapata was born to Gabriel Zapata and Cleofas Jertrudiz Salazar of Anenecuilco, Morelos, a well-known local family; Emiliano's godfather was the manager of a large local hacienda, and his godmother was the manager's wife. Zapata's family were likely mestizos, Mexicans of both Spanish and Nahua heritage. Emiliano was the ninth of ten children; he had six sisters: Celsa, Ramona, María de Jesús, María de la Luz, Jovita and Matilde. And three brothers: Pedro, Eufemio Zapata and Loreto. The Zapata family were descended from the Zapata of Mapaztlán. His maternal grandfather, José Salazar, served in the army of José María Morelos y Pavón during the siege of Cuautla; his paternal uncles Cristino and José Zapata fought in the Reform War and the French Intervention. From a family of farmers, Emiliano Zapata had insight into the severe difficulties of the countryside and his village's long struggle to regain land taken by expanding haciendas. Although he is commonly portrayed as "indigenous" or a member of the landless peasantry in Mexican iconography, Zapata's was racially indigenous but neither landless nor is known to have spoken the Nahuatl language. They were reasonably well-off and never suffered poverty, enjoying such activities as bullfights, cock-fighting and jaripeos.
He received a limited education from his teacher, Emilio Vara, but it included "the rudiments of bookkeeping". At the age of 16 or 17, Zapata had to care for his family following his father's death. Emiliano was entrepreneurial, buying a team of mules to haul maize from farms to town, as well as bricks to the Hacienda of Chinameca; he was also a successful farmer, growing watermelons as a cash crop. He was a skilled horseman and competed in rodeos and races, as well as bullfighting from horseback. These skills as a horseman brought him work as a horse trainer for Porfirio Díaz's son-in-law, Ignacio de la Torre y Mier who had a large sugar hacienda nearby, and served Zapata well as a revolutionary leader. He had a striking appearance, with a large mustache in which he took pride, and good quality clothing described by his loyal secretary: "General Zapata's dress until his death was a charro outfit: tight-fitting black cashmere pants with silver buttons, a broad charro hat, a fine linen shirt or jacket, a scarf around his neck, boots of a single piece, Amozoqueña-style spurs, and a pistol at his belt." In an undated studio photo, Zapata is dressed in a standard business suit and tie, projecting an image of a man of means.
Around the turn of the 20th century, Anenecuilco was a mixed Spanish-speaking mestizo and indigenous Nahuatl-speaking pueblo. It had a long history of protesting the local haciendas taking community members' land, and its leaders gathered colonial-era documentation of their land titles to prove their claims. Some of the colonial documentation was in Nahuatl, with contemporary translations to Spanish for use in legal cases in the Spanish courts. One eyewitness account by Luz Jiménez of Milpa Alta states that Emiliano Zapata spoke Nahuatl fluently when his forces arrived in her community.
Community members in Anenecuilco, including Zapata, sought redress against land seizures. In 1892, a delegation had an audience with Díaz, who with the intervention of a lawyer, agreed to hear them. Although promising them to deal favorably with their petition, Díaz had them arrested and Zapata was conscripted into the Federal Army. Under Díaz, conscription into the Federal Army was much feared by ordinary Mexican men and their families. Zapata was one of many rebel leaders who were conscripted at some point.
In 1909, an important meeting was called by the elders of Anenecuilco, whose chief elder was José Merino. He announced "my intention to resign from my position due to my old age and limited abilities to continue the fight for the land rights of the village." The meeting was used as a time for discussion and nomination of individuals as a replacement for Merino as the president of the village council. The elders on the council were so well respected by the village men that no one would dare to override their nominations or vote for an individual against the advice of the current council at that time. The nominations made were Modesto González, Bartolo Parral, and Emiliano Zapata. After the nominations were closed, a vote was taken and Zapata became the new council president without contest.
Although Zapata had turned 30 only a month before, voters knew that it was necessary to elect someone respected by the community who would be responsible for the village. Even though he was relatively young, Anenecuilco was ready to hand over the leadership to him without any worry of failure. Before he was elected he had shown the village his nature by helping to head up a campaign in opposition to the candidate Díaz had chosen governor. Even though Zapata's efforts failed, he was able to create and cultivate relationships with political authority figures that would prove useful for him.
Zapata became a leading figure in the village of Anenecuilco, where his family had lived for many generations, though he did not take the title of Don, as was custom for someone of his status. Instead, the Anenecuilcans referred to Zapata affectionately as "Miliano" and later as pobrecito (poor little thing) after his death.
The 1910 Revolution
The flawed 1910 elections were a major reason for the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution in 1910. Porfirio Díaz was being threatened by the candidacy of Francisco I. Madero. Zapata, seeing an opportunity to promote land reform in Mexico, joined with Madero and his Constitutionalists, who included Pascual Orozco and Pancho Villa, whom he perceived to be the best chance for genuine change in the country. Although he was wary about Madero, Zapata cooperated with him when Madero made vague promises about land reform in his Plan of San Luis Potosí. Land reform was the central feature of Zapata's political vision.
Zapata joined Madero's campaign against President Díaz. The first military campaign of Zapata was the capture of the Hacienda of Chinameca. When Zapata's army captured Cuautla after a six-day battle on May 19, 1911, it became clear that Díaz would not hold on to power for long.
During his interim presidency, Francisco León de la Barra tasked General Victoriano Huerta to suppress revolutionaries in Morelos. Huerta was to disarm revolutionaries peacefully if possible, but could use force. In August 1911, Huerta led 1,000 Federal troops to Cuernavaca, which Madero saw as provocative. Writing the Minister of the Interior, Zapata demanded the Federal troops withdraw from Morelos, saying "I won't be responsible for the blood that is going to flow if the Federal forces remain."
Although Madero's Plan of San Luis Potosí specified the return of village land and won the support of peasants seeking land reform, he was not ready to implement radical change. Madero simply demanded that "Public servants act 'morally' in enforcing the law ...". Upon seeing the response by villagers, Madero offered formal justice in courts to individuals who had been wronged by others with regard to agrarian politics. Zapata decided that on the surface it seemed as though Madero was doing good things for the people of Mexico, but Zapata did not know the level of sincerity in Madero's actions and thus did not know if he should support him completely.
Plan of Ayala and rebellion against Madero
Compromises between the Madero and Zapata failed in November 1911, days after Madero was elected president. Zapata and Otilio Montaño Sánchez, a former school teacher, fled to the mountains of southwest Puebla. There they promulgated the most radical reform plan in Mexico, the Plan de Ayala (Plan of Ayala). The plan declared Madero a traitor, named as head of the revolution Pascual Orozco, the victorious general who captured Ciudad Juárez in 1911 forcing the resignation of Díaz. He outlined a plan for true land reform.
Zapata had supported the ouster of Díaz and had the expectation that Madero would fulfill the promises made in the Plan of San Luis Potosí to return village lands. He did not share Madero's vision of democracy built on particular freedoms and guarantees that were meaningless to peasants:
Freedom of the press for those who cannot read; free elections for those who do not know the candidates; proper legal for those who have anything to do with an attorney. All those democratic principles, all those great words that gave such joy to our fathers and grandfathers have lost their magic for the people... With or without elections, with or without an effective law, with the Porfirian dictatorship or with Madero's democracy with a controlled or free press, its fate remains the same.
The 1911 Plan of Ayala called for all lands stolen under Díaz to be immediately returned; there had been considerable land fraud under the old dictator, so a great deal of territory was involved. It also stated that large plantations owned by a single person or family should have one-third of their land nationalized, which would then be required to be given to poor farmers. It also argued that if any large plantation owner resisted this action, they should have the other two-thirds confiscated as well. The Plan of Ayala also invoked the name of President Benito Juárez, one of Mexico's great liberal leaders, and compared the taking of land from the wealthy to Juarez's actions when land was expropriated from the Catholic church during the Liberal Reform. Another part of the plan stated that rural cooperatives and other measurements should be put in place to prevent the land from being seized or stolen in the future.
In the following weeks, the development of military operations "betray(ed) good evidence of clear and intelligent planning." During Orozco's rebellion, Zapata fought Mexican troops in the south near Mexico City. In the original design of the armed force, Zapata was a mere colonel among several others; however, the true plan that came about through this organization lent itself to Zapata. Zapata believed that the best route of attack would be to center the fighting and action in Cuautla. If this political location could be overthrown, the army would have enough power to "veto anyone else's control of the state, negotiate for Cuernavaca or attack it directly, and maintain independent access to Mexico City as well as escape routes to the southern hills." However, in order to gain this great success, Zapata realized that his men needed to be better armed and trained.
The first line of action demanded that Zapata and his men "control the area behind and below a line from Jojutla to Yecapixtla." When this was accomplished it gave the army the ability to complete raids as well as wait. As the opposition of the Federal Army and police detachments slowly dissipated, the army would be able to eventually gain powerful control over key locations on the Interoceanic Railway from Puebla City to Cuautla. If these feats could be completed, it would gain access to Cuautla directly and the city would fall.
The plan of action was carried out successfully in Jojutla. However, Pablo Torres Burgos, the commander of the operation, was disappointed that the army disobeyed his orders against looting and ransacking. The army took complete control of the area, and it seemed as though Torres Burgos had lost control over his forces prior to this event. Shortly after, Torres Burgos called a meeting and resigned from his position. Upon leaving Jojutla with his two sons, he was surprised by a federal police patrol who subsequently shot all three of the men on the spot. This seemed to some to be an ending blow to the movement, because Torres Burgos had not selected a successor for his position; however, Zapata was ready to take up where Torres Burgos had left off.
Shortly after Torres Burgos's death, a party of rebels elected Zapata as "Supreme Chief of the Revolutionary Movement of the South". This seemed to be the fix to all of the problems that had just arisen, but other individuals wanted to replace Zapata as well. Due to this new conflict, the individual who would come out on top would have to do so by "convincing his peers he deserved their backing."
Zapata finally gained the support necessary by his peers and was considered a "singularly qualified candidate". This decision to make Zapata the leader of the revolution in Morelos did not occur all at once, nor did it ever reach a true definitive level of recognition. In order to succeed, Zapata needed a strong financial backing for the battles to come. This came in the form of 10,000 pesos delivered by Rodolfo from the Tacubayans. Due to this amount of money Zapata's group of rebels became one of the strongest in the state financially.
After a period Zapata became the leader of his "strategic zone", which gave him power and control over the actions of many more individual rebel groups and thus greatly increased his margin of success. "Among revolutionaries in other districts of the state, however, Zapata's authority was more tenuous." After a meeting between Zapata and Ambrosio Figueroa in Jolalpan, it was decided that Zapata would have joint power with Figueroa with regard to operations in Morelos. This was a turning point in the level of authority and influence that Zapata had gained and proved useful in the direct overthrow of Morelos.
Rebellion against Huerta, the Zapata-Villa alliance
If there was anyone that Zapata hated more than Díaz and Madero, it was Victoriano Huerta, the bitter, violent alcoholic who had been responsible for many atrocities in southern Mexico while trying to end the rebellion. Zapata was not alone: in the north, Pancho Villa, who had supported Madero, immediately took to the field against Huerta. Zapata revised the Plan of Ayala and named himself the leader of his revolution. He was joined by two newcomers to the Revolution, Venustiano Carranza and Alvaro Obregón, who raised large armies in Coahuila and Sonora respectively. Together they made short work of Huerta, who resigned and fled in June 1914 after repeated military losses.
On April 21, 1914, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson sent a contingent of troops to occupy the port city of Veracruz. This sudden threat caused Huerta to withdraw his troops from Morelos and Puebla, leaving only Jojutla and Cuernavaca under federal control. Zapatistas quickly assumed control of eastern Morelos, taking Cuautla and Jonacatepec with no resistance. In spite of being faced with a possible foreign invasion, Zapata refused to unite with Huerta in defense of the nation. He stated that if need be he would defend Mexico alone as chief of the Ayalan forces. In May the Zapatistas took Jojutla from the Federal Army, many of whom joined the rebels, and captured guns and ammunition. They also laid siege to Cuernavaca where a small contingent of federal troops were holed up. By the summer of 1915 Zapata's forces had taken the southern edge of the Federal District, occupying Milpa Alta and Xochimilco, and was poised to move into the capital. In mid July, Huerta was forced to flee as a Constitutionalist force under Carranza, Obregón and Villa took the Federal District. The Constitutionalists established a peace treaty inserting Carranza as First Authority of the nation. Carranza, an aristocrat with politically relevant connections, then gained the backing of the U.S., who passed over Villa and Zapata due to their lower status backgrounds and more progressive ideologies. In spite of having contributed decisively to the fall of Huerta, the Zapatistas were left out of the peace treaties, probably because of Carranza's intense dislike for the Zapatistas whom he saw as uncultured savages. Through 1915 there was a tentative peace in Morelos and the rest of the country.
As the Constitutionalist forces began to split, with Francisco "Pancho" Villa creating a popular front against Carranza's Constitutionalists, Carranza worked diplomatically to get the Zapatistas to recognize his rule, sending Dr. Atl as an envoy to propose a compromise with Zapata. For Carranza, an agreement with Zapata would mean that he did not need to worry about his force's southern flank and could concentrate on defeating Villa. Zapata demanded veto power over Carranza's decisions, which Carranza rejected and negotiations broke off. Zapata issued a statement, perhaps drafted by his advisor, Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama. "The country wishes to destroy feudalism once and for all [while Carranza offers] administrative reform...complete honesty in the handling of public monies...freedom of the press for those who cannot read; free elections for those who do not know the candidates; proper legal proceedings for those who have never had anything to do with an attorney. All those beautiful democratic principles, all those great words that give such joy to our fathers and grandfathers have lost their magic...The people continue to suffer from poverty and endless disappointments."
Unable to reach an agreement, the Constitutionalists divided along ideological lines, with Zapata and Villa leading a progressive rebellion and the conservative faction of the remaining Constituitionalists being headed Carranza and Obregón. Villa and the other anti-Carrancista leaders of the North established the Convention of Aguascalientes against Carranza. Zapata and his envoys got the convention to adopt some of the agrarian principles of the Plan de Ayala. Zapata and Villa met in Xochimilco to negotiate an alliance and divide the responsibility for ridding Mexico of the remaining Carrancistas. The meeting was awkward but amiable, and was widely publicized. It was decided that Zapata should work on securing the area east of Morelos from Puebla towards Veracruz. Nonetheless, during the ensuing campaign in Puebla, Zapata was disappointed by Villa's lack of support. Villa did not initially provide the Zapatistas with the weaponry they had agreed on and, when he did, he did not provide adequate transportation. There were also a series of abuses by Villistas against Zapatista soldiers and chiefs. These experiences led Zapata to grow unsatisfied with the alliance, turning instead his efforts to reorganizing the state of Morelos that had been left in shambles by the onslaught of Huerta and Robles. Having taken Puebla, Zapata left a couple of garrisons there but did not support Villa further against Obregón and Carranza. The Carrancistas saw that the convention was divided and decided to concentrate on beating Villa, which left the Zapatistas to their own devices for a while.
Zapata rebuilds Morelos
Through 1915, Zapata began reshaping Morelos after the Plan de Ayala, redistributing hacienda lands to the peasants, and largely letting village councils run their own local affairs. Most peasants did not turn to cash crops, instead growing subsistence crops such as corn, beans, and vegetables. The result was that as the capital was starving, Morelos peasants had more to eat than they had had in 1910 and at lower prices. The only official event in Morelos during this entire year was a bullfight in which Zapata himself and his nephew Amador Salazar participated. 1915 was a short period of peace and prosperity for the farmers of Morelos, in between the massacres of the Huerta era and the civil war of the winners to come.
Guerrilla warfare against Carranza
Even when Villa was retreating, having lost the Battle of Celaya in 1915, and when Obregón took the capital from the Conventionists who retreated to Toluca, Zapata did not open a second front.
When Carranza's forces were poised to move into Morelos, Zapata took action. He attacked Carrancista positions with large forces trying to harry the Carrancistas in the rear as they were occupied with routing Villa throughout the Northwest. Though Zapata managed to take many important sites such as the Necaxa power plant that supplied Mexico City, he was unable to hold them. The convention was finally routed from Toluca, and Carranza was recognized by US President Woodrow Wilson as the head of state of Mexico in October.
Through 1916 Zapata raided federal forces from Hidalgo to Oaxaca, and Genovevo de la O fought the Carrancistas in Guerrero. The Zapatistas attempted to amass support for their cause by promulgating new manifestos against the hacendados, but this had little effect since the hacendados had already lost power throughout the country.
Carranza consolidates power
Having been put in charge of the efforts to root out Zapatismo in Morelos, Pablo González Garza was humiliated by Zapata's counterattacks and enforced increasingly draconian measures against the locals. He received no reinforcements, as Obregón, the Minister of War, needed all his forces against Villa in the north and against Felix Díaz in Oaxaca. Through low-scale attacks on Gonzalez's positions, Zapata had driven Gonzalez out of Morelos by the end of 1916.
Nonetheless, outside of Morelos the revolutionary forces started disbanding. Some joined the constitutionalists such as Domingo Arena, or lapsed into banditry. In Morelos, Zapata once more reorganized the Zapatista state, continuing with democratic reforms and legislation meant to keep the civil population safe from abuses by soldiers. Though his advisers urged him to mount a concerted campaign against the Carrancistas across southern Mexico, again he concentrated entirely on stabilizing Morelos and making life tolerable for the peasants. Meanwhile, Carranza mounted national elections in all state capitals except Cuernavaca, and promulgated the 1917 Constitution which incorporated elements of the Plan de Ayala.
Zapata under pressure
Meanwhile, the disintegration of the revolution outside of Morelos put pressure on the Zapatistas. As General Arenas turned over to the constitutionalists, he secured peace for his region and remained in control there. This suggested to many revolutionaries that perhaps the time had come to seek a peaceful conclusion to the struggle. A movement within the Zapatista ranks led by former General Vazquez and Zapata's erstwhile adviser and inspiration Otilio Montaño moved against the Tlaltizapan headquarters demanding surrender to the Carrancistas. Reluctantly, Zapata had Montaño tried for treason and executed.
Zapata began looking for allies among the northern revolutionaries and the southern Felicistas, followers of the Liberalist Felix Díaz. He sent Gildardo Magaña as an envoy to communicate with the Americans and other possible sources of support. In the fall of 1917 a force led by Gonzalez and the ex-Zapatista Sidronio Camacho, who had killed Zapata's brother Eufemio, moved into the eastern part of Morelos taking Cuautla, Zacualpan and Jonacatepec.
Zapata continued his work to try to unite with the national anti-Carrancista movement through the next year, and the constitutionalists did not make further advances. In the winter of 1918 a harsh cold and the onset of the Spanish flu decimated the population of Morelos, causing the loss of a quarter of the total population of the state, almost as many as had been lost to Huerta in 1914. Furthermore, Zapata began to worry that by the end of the World War, the United States would turn its attention to Mexico, forcing the Zapatistas to either join the Carrancistas in a national defense or to acquiesce to foreign domination of Mexico.
In December 1918 Carrancistas under Gonzalez undertook an offensive campaign taking most of the state of Morelos, and pushing Zapata to retreat. The main Zapatista headquarters were moved to Tochimilco, Puebla, although Tlaltizapan also continued to be under Zapatista control. Through Castro, Carranza issued offers to the main Zapatista generals to join the nationalist cause, with pardon. But apart from Manuel Palafox, who having fallen in disgrace among the Zapatistas had joined the Arenistas, none of the major generals did.
Zapata released statements accusing Carranza of being secretly sympathetic to the Germans. In March Zapata finally sent an open letter to Carranza urging him for the good of the fatherland to resign his leadership to Vazquez Gómez, by now the rallying point of the anti-constitutionalist movement. Having posed this formidable moral challenge to Carranza prior to the upcoming 1920 presidential elections, the Zapatista generals at Tochimilco, Magaña and Ayaquica, urged Zapata not to take any risks and to lie low. But Zapata declined, considering that the respect of his troops depended on his active presence at the front.
Assassination
Eliminating Zapata was a top priority for President Carranza. Carranza was unwilling to compromise with domestic foes and wanted to demonstrate to Mexican elites and to American interests that Carranza was the "only viable alternative to both anarchy and radicalism." In mid-March 1919, General Pablo González ordered his subordinate Jesús Guajardo to begin operations against the Zapatistas in the mountains around Huautla. But when González later discovered Guajardo carousing in a cantina, he had him arrested, and a public scandal ensued. On March 21, Zapata attempted to smuggle in a note to Guajardo, inviting him to switch sides. The note, however, never reached Guajardo but instead wound up on González's desk. González devised a plan to use this note to his advantage. He accused Guajardo of not only being a drunk, but of being a traitor. After reducing Guajardo to tears, González explained to him that he could recover from this disgrace if he feigned a defection to Zapata. So Guajardo wrote to Zapata telling him that he would bring over his men and supplies if certain guarantees were promised. Zapata answered Guajardo's letter on April 1, 1919, agreeing to all of Guajardo's terms. Zapata suggested a mutiny on April 4. Guajardo replied that his defection should wait until a new shipment of arms and ammunition arrived sometime between the 6th and the 10th. By the 7th, the plans were set: Zapata ordered Guajardo to attack the Federal garrison at Jonacatepec because the garrison included troops who had defected from Zapata. Pablo González and Guajardo notified the Jonacatepec garrison ahead of time, and a mock battle was staged on April 9. At the conclusion of the mock battle, the former Zapatistas were arrested and shot. Convinced that Guajardo was sincere, Zapata agreed to a final meeting where Guajardo would defect.
On April 10, 1919, Guajardo invited Zapata to a meeting, intimating that he intended to defect to the revolutionaries. However, when Zapata arrived at the Hacienda de San Juan, in Chinameca, Ayala municipality, Guajardo's men riddled him with bullets.
Zapata's body was photographed, displayed for 24 hours, and then buried in Cuautla. Pablo González wanted the body photographed, so that there would be no doubt that Zapata was dead: "it was an actual fact that the famous jefe of the southern region had died." Although Mexico City newspapers had called for Zapata's body to be brought to the capital, Carranza did not do so. However, Zapata's clothing was displayed outside a newspaper's office across from the Alameda Park in the capital.
Immediate aftermath
Although Zapata's assassination weakened his forces in Morelos, the Zapatistas continued the fight against Carranza. For Carranza the death of Zapata was the removal of an ongoing threat, for many Zapata's assassination undermined "worker and peasant support for Carranza and [Pablo] González." Obregón seized on the opportunity to attack Carranza and González, Obregón's rival candidate for the presidency, by saying "this crime reveals a lack of ethics in some members of the government and also of political sense, since peasant votes in the upcoming election will now go to whoever runs against Pablo González." In spite of González's attempts to sully the name of Zapata and the Plan de Ayala during his 1920 campaign for the presidency, the people of Morelos continued to support Zapatista generals, providing them with weapons, supplies and protection. Carranza was wary of the threat of a U.S. intervention, and Zapatista generals decided to take a conciliatory approach. Bands of Zapatistas started surrendering in exchange for amnesties, and many Zapatista generals went on to become local authorities, such as Fortino Ayaquica who became municipal president of Tochimilco. Other generals such as Genovevo de la O remained active in small-scale guerrilla warfare.
As Venustiano Carranza moved to curb his former allies and now rivals in 1920 to impose a civilian, Ignacio Bonillas, as his successor in the presidency, Obregón sought to align himself with the Zapatista movement against that of Carranza. Genovevo de la O and Magaña supported him in the coup by former Constitutionalists, fighting in Morelos against Carranza and helping prompt Carranza to flee Mexico City toward Veracruz in May 1920. "Obregón and Genovevo de la O entered Mexico City in triumph." Zapatistas were given important posts in the interim government of Adolfo de la Huerta and the administration of Álvaro Obregón, following his election to the presidency after the coup. Zapatistas had almost total control of the state of Morelos, where they carried out a program of agrarian reform and land redistribution based on the provisions of the Plan de Ayala and with the support of the government.
According to "La Demócrata", after Zapata's assassination, "in the consciousness of the natives", Zapata "had taken on the proportions of a myth" because he had "given them a formula of vindication against old offenses." Mythmaking would continue for decades after Zapata was gunned down.
Legacy
Zapata's influence continues to this day, particularly in revolutionary tendencies in southern Mexico. In the long run, he has done more for his ideals in death than he did in life. Like many charismatic idealists, Zapata became a martyr after his murder. Even though Mexico still has not implemented the sort of land reform he wanted, he is remembered as a visionary who fought for his countrymen.
Zapata's Plan of Ayala influenced Article 27 of the progressive 1917 Constitution of Mexico that codified an agrarian reform program. Even though the Mexican Revolution did restore some land that had been taken under Díaz, the land reform on the scale imagined by Zapata was never enacted. However, a great deal of the significant land distribution which Zapata sought would later be enacted after Mexican President Lázaro Cárdenas took office in 1934. Cárdenas would fulfill not only the land distribution policies written in Article 27, but other reforms written in the Mexican Constitution as well.
There are controversies about the portrayal of Emiliano Zapata and his followers, whether they were bandits or revolutionaries. At the outbreak of the Revolution, "Zapata's agrarian revolt was soon construed as a 'caste war' [race war], in which members of an 'inferior race' were captained by a 'modern Attila'".
Zapata is now one of the most revered national heroes of Mexico. To many Mexicans, especially the peasant and indigenous citizens, Zapata was a practical revolutionary who sought the implementation of liberties and agrarian rights outlined in the Plan of Ayala. He was a realist with the goal of achieving political and economic emancipation of the peasants in southern Mexico and leading them out of severe poverty.
Many popular organizations take their name from Zapata, most notably the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional or EZLN in Spanish), the Neozapatismo group that emerged in the state of Chiapas in 1983 and precipitated the 1994 indigenous Zapatista uprising which still continues in Chiapas. Towns, streets, and housing developments called "Emiliano Zapata" are common across the country and he has, at times, been depicted on Mexican banknotes.
Modern activists in Mexico frequently make reference to Zapata in their campaigns; his image is commonly seen on banners, and many chants invoke his name: Si Zapata viviera con nosotros anduviera ("If Zapata lived, he would walk with us"), and Zapata vive, la lucha sigue ("Zapata lives; the struggle continues").
His daughter by Petra Portillo Torres, Paulina Ana María Zapata Portillo, was aware of her father's legacy from a very early age. She continued his work of dedication to agrarian rights, serving as treasurer of the ejido of Cuautla, as ejidataria of Cuautla, as municipal councilor and municipal trustee.
In popular culture
Zapata has been depicted in movies, comics, books, music, and clothing. For example, there is a Zapata (1980), stage musical written by Harry Nilsson and Perry Botkin, libretto by Allan Katz, which ran for 16 weeks at the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam, Connecticut. A movie called Zapata: El sueño de un héroe (Zapata: A Hero's Dream) was produced in 2004, starring Mexican actors Alejandro Fernandez, Jaime Camil, and Lucero. There is also a sub-genre of the Spaghetti Western called the Zapata Western, which features stories set during the Mexican Revolution.
Marlon Brando played Emiliano Zapata in the award-winning movie based on his life, Viva Zapata! in 1952. The film co-starred Anthony Quinn, who won best supporting actor. The director was Elia Kazan and the writer was John Steinbeck.
Emiliano Zapata is a major character in The Friends of Pancho Villa (1996), by James Carlos Blake
Emiliano Zapata is referenced in the song "Calm Like a Bomb" by American rock band Rage Against the Machine from their album "The Battle of Los Angeles."
In the 2011 Mexican TV series "El Encanto del
Aguila" Zapata is played by the Mexican actor Tenoch Huerta.
In December 2019, an arts show commemorating the 100 year anniversary of his death was held at the Palacio de Bellas Artes. The show featured 141 works. A painting called La Revolución depicted Zapata as intentionally effeminate, riding an erect horse, nude except for high heels and a pink hat. According to the artist, he created the painting to combat machismo. The painting caused protests from the farmer's union and admirers of Zapata. His grandson Jorge Zapata González threatened to sue if the painting was not removed. There was a clash between supporters of the painting and detractors at the museum. A compromised was reached with some of Zapata's family, a label was placed next to the painting outlining their disagreement with the painting.
Sobriquets
"Calpuleque (náhuatl)" – leader, chief
"El Tigre del Sur" – Tiger of the South
"El Tigre" – The Tiger
"El Tigrillo" – Little Tiger
"El Caudillo del Sur" – Caudillo of the South
"El Atila del Sur" – The Attila of the South (pejorative)
Gallery
References
Cited sources
Further reading
Brunk, Samuel, ¡Emiliano Zapata! Revolution and Betrayal in Mexico. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1995.
Caballero, Raymond. Lynching Pascual Orozco, Mexican Revolutionary Hero and Paradox. Create Space 2015.
Lucas, Jeffrey Kent. The Rightward Drift of Mexico's Former Revolutionaries: The Case of Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2010.
Mclynn, Frank. Villa and Zapata: A history of the Mexican Revolution. New York : Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2001.
McNeely, John H. "Origins of the Zapata revolt in Morelos." Hispanic American Historical Review (1966): 153–169.
Historiography
Golland, David Hamilton. "Recent Works on the Mexican Revolution." Estudios Interdisciplinarios de América Latina y el Caribe 16.1 (2014). online
McNamara, Patrick J. "Rewriting Zapata: Generational Conflict on the Eve of the Mexican Revolution." Mexican Studies-Estudios Mexicanos 30.1 (2014): 122–149.
In Spanish
Horcasitas, Fernando. De Porfirio Díaz a Zapata, memoria náhuatl de Milpa Alta, UNAM, México DF.,1968 (eye and ear-witness account of Zapata speaking Nahuatl)
Krauze, Enrique. Zapata: El amor a la tierra, in the Biographies of Power'' series.
Media
"Emiliano Zapata", BBC Mundo.com
External links
Emiliano Zapata Quotes, Facts, Books and Movies
Full text html version of Zapata's "Plan de Ayala" in Spanish
Emiliano Zapata videos
Bicentenario del inicio del movimiento de Independencia Nacional y del Centenario del inicio de la Revolución Mexicana
Miguel Angel Mancera Espinosa
1879 births
1919 deaths
19th-century Mexican people
20th-century Mexican people
Assassinated Mexican people
Deaths by firearm in Mexico
Mexican agrarianists
Mexican generals
Mexican guerrillas
Mexican rebels
Mexican revolutionaries
Mexican Roman Catholics
Military assassinations
Military history of Mexico
Nahua people
People from Ciudad Ayala, Morelos
People murdered in Mexico
People of the Mexican Revolution | false | [
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| C_8d6e244468744c74ab1d3825f5f2c651_0 | what was george's career? | 1 | what was George Steiner's career? | George Steiner | In 1956 Steiner returned to the United States, where for two years he was a scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. He also held a Fulbright professorship in Innsbruck, Austria from 1958 to 1959. In 1959, he was appointed Gauss Lecturer at Princeton, where he lectured for another two years. He then became a founding fellow of Churchill College at the University of Cambridge in 1961. Steiner was initially not well received at Cambridge by the English faculty. Many disapproved of this charismatic "firebrand with a foreign accent" and questioned the relevance of the Holocaust he constantly referred to in his lectures. Bryan Cheyette, professor of 20th-century literature at the University of Southampton said that at the time, "Britain [...] didn't think it had a relationship to the Holocaust; its mythology of the war was rooted in the Blitz, Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain." While Steiner received a professorial salary, he was never made a full professor at Cambridge with the right to examine. He had the option of leaving for professorships in the United States, but Steiner's father objected, saying that Hitler, who said no one bearing their name would be left in Europe, would then have won. Steiner remained in England because "I'd do anything rather than face such contempt from my father." He was elected an Extraordinary Fellow at Cambridge in 1969. After several years as a freelance writer and occasional lecturer, Steiner accepted the post of Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Geneva in 1974; he held this post for 20 years, teaching in four languages. He lived by Goethe's maxim that "no monoglot truly knows his own language." He became Professor Emeritus at Geneva University on his retirement in 1994, and an Honorary Fellow at Balliol College at Oxford University in 1995. He has since held the positions of the first Lord Weidenfeld Professor of Comparative European Literature and Fellow of St Anne's College at Oxford University from 1994 to 1995, and Norton Professor of Poetry at Harvard University from 2001 to 2002. Steiner has been called "an intelligent and intellectual critic and essayist." He was active on undergraduate publications while at the University of Chicago and later become a regular contributor of reviews and articles to many journals and newspapers including the Times Literary Supplement and The Guardian. He has written for The New Yorker for over thirty years, contributing over two hundred reviews. While Steiner generally takes things very seriously, he also reveals an unexpected deadpan humor: when he was once asked if he had ever read anything trivial as a child, he replied, Moby-Dick. CANNOTANSWER | for two years he was a scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. | Francis George Steiner, FBA (April 23, 1929 – February 3, 2020) was a Franco-American literary critic, essayist, philosopher, novelist, and educator. He wrote extensively about the relationship between language, literature and society, and the impact of the Holocaust. An article in The Guardian described Steiner as a "polyglot and polymath".
Among his admirers, Steiner is ranked "among the great minds in today's literary world". English novelist A. S. Byatt described him as a "late, late, late Renaissance man ... a European metaphysician with an instinct for the driving ideas of our time". Harriet Harvey-Wood, a former literature director of the British Council, described him as a "magnificent lecturer – prophetic and doom-laden [who would] turn up with half a page of scribbled notes, and never refer to them".
Steiner was Professor of English and Comparative Literature in the University of Geneva (1974–94), Professor of Comparative Literature and Fellow in the University of Oxford (1994–95), Professor of Poetry in Harvard University (2001–02) and an Extraordinary Fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge.
Personal life
George Steiner was born in 1929 in Paris, to Viennese Jewish parents Else (née Franzos) and Frederick Georg Steiner. He had an elder sister, Ruth Lilian, who was born in Vienna in 1922. Frederick Steiner was a senior lawyer at Austria's central bank Oesterreichische Nationalbank, and Else Steiner was a Viennese grande dame.
Five years before Steiner's birth, his father had moved his family from Austria to France to escape the growing threat of anti-Semitism. He believed that Jews were "endangered guests wherever they went" and equipped his children with languages. Steiner grew up with three mother tongues: German, English, and French; his mother was multilingual and would often "begin a sentence in one language and end it in another".
When he was six years old, his father who believed in the importance of classical education taught him to read the Iliad in the original Greek. His mother, for whom "self-pity was nauseating", helped Steiner overcome a handicap he had been born with, a withered right arm. Instead of allowing him to become left-handed, she insisted he use his right hand as an able-bodied person would.
Steiner's first formal education took place at the Lycée Janson-de-Sailly in Paris. In 1940, during World War II, Steiner's father once again relocated his family, this time to New York City. Within a month of their move, the Nazis occupied Paris, and of the many Jewish children in Steiner's class at school, he was one of only two who survived the war. Again his father's insight had saved his family, and this made Steiner feel like a survivor, which profoundly influenced his later writings. "My whole life has been about death, remembering and the Holocaust." Steiner became a "grateful wanderer", saying that "Trees have roots and I have legs; I owe my life to that." He spent the rest of his school years at the Lycée Français de New York in Manhattan, and became a United States citizen in 1944.
After high school, Steiner went to the University of Chicago, where he studied literature as well as mathematics and physics, and obtained a BA degree in 1948. This was followed by an MA degree from Harvard University in 1950. He thence attended Balliol College, Oxford on a Rhodes Scholarship.
After his doctoral thesis at Oxford, a draft of The Death of Tragedy (later published by Faber and Faber), was rejected, Steiner took time off from his studies to teach English at Williams College and to work as leader writer for the London-based weekly publication The Economist between 1952 and 1956. It was during this time that he met Zara Shakow, a New Yorker of Lithuanian descent. She had also studied at Harvard and they met in London at the suggestion of their former professors. "The professors had had a bet ... that we would get married if we ever met." They married in 1955, the year he received his DPhil from Oxford University. They have a son, David Steiner (who served as New York State's Commissioner of Education from 2009 to 2011) and a daughter, Deborah Steiner (Professor of Classics at Columbia University). He last lived in Cambridge, England. Zara Steiner died on 13 February 2020, ten days after her husband.
Career
In 1956 Steiner returned to the United States, where for two years he was a scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. He also held a Fulbright professorship in Innsbruck, Austria, from 1958 to 1959. In 1959, he was appointed Gauss Lecturer at Princeton, where he lectured for another two years. He then became a founding fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge in 1961. Steiner was initially not well received at Cambridge by the English faculty. Some disapproved of this charismatic "firebrand with a foreign accent" and questioned the relevance of the Holocaust he constantly referred to in his lectures. Bryan Cheyette, professor of 20th-century literature at the University of Southampton said that at the time, "Britain [...] didn't think it had a relationship to the Holocaust; its mythology of the war was rooted in the Blitz, Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain." While Steiner received a professorial salary, he was never made a full professor at Cambridge with the right to examine. He had the option of leaving for professorships in the United States, but Steiner's father objected, saying that Hitler, who said no one bearing their name would be left in Europe, would then have won. Steiner remained in England because "I'd do anything rather than face such contempt from my father." He was elected an Extraordinary Fellow of Churchill College in 1969.
After several years as a freelance writer and occasional lecturer, Steiner accepted the post of Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Geneva in 1974; he held this post for 20 years, teaching in four languages. He lived by Goethe's maxim that "no monoglot truly knows his own language." He became Professor Emeritus in the University of Geneva upon his retirement in 1994 and an Honorary Fellow of Balliol College, Oxford, in 1995. He also held the positions of the first Lord Weidenfeld Professor of Comparative European Literature and Fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford, from 1994 to 1995, and Norton Professor of Poetry at Harvard University from 2001 to 2002.
Steiner was called "an intelligent and intellectual critic and essayist." He was active on undergraduate publications while at the University of Chicago and later became a regular contributor of reviews and articles to many journals and newspapers including The Times Literary Supplement and The Guardian. He wrote for The New Yorker for over thirty years, contributing over two hundred reviews.
While Steiner generally took things very seriously, he also revealed an unexpected deadpan humor: when he was once asked if he had ever read anything trivial as a child, he replied, Moby-Dick.
Views
Steiner was regarded as a polymath and is often credited with having recast the role of the critic by having explored art and thought unbounded by national frontiers or academic disciplines. He advocated generalisation over specialisation, and insisted that the notion of being literate must encompass knowledge of both arts and sciences. Steiner believed that nationalism is too inherently violent to satisfy the moral prerogative of Judaism, having said "that because of what we are, there are things we can't do."
Among Steiner's non-traditional views, in his autobiography titled Errata (1997), Steiner related his sympathetic stance towards the use of brothels since his college years at the University of Chicago. As Steiner stated, "My virginity offended Alfie (his college room-mate). He found it ostentatious and vaguely corrupt in a nineteen-year-old... He sniffed the fear in me with disdain. And marched me off to Cicero, Illinois, a town justly ill famed but, by virtue of its name, reassuring to me. There he organized, with casual authority, an initiation as thorough as it was gentle. It is this unlikely gentleness, the caring under circumstances so outwardly crass, that blesses me still."
Central to Steiner's thinking, he stated, "is my astonishment, naïve as it seems to people, that you can use human speech both to love, to build, to forgive, and also to torture, to hate, to destroy and to annihilate."
Steiner received criticism and support for his views that racism is inherent in everyone and that tolerance is only skin deep. He is reported to have said: "It's very easy to sit here, in this room, and say 'racism is horrible'. But ask me the same thing if a Jamaican family moved next door with six children and they play reggae and rock music all day. Or if an estate agent comes to my house and tells me that because a Jamaican family has moved next door the value of my property has fallen through the floor. Ask me then!"
Works
Steiner's literary career spanned half a century. He published original essays and books that address the anomalies of contemporary Western culture, issues of language and its "debasement" in the post-Holocaust age. His field was primarily comparative literature, and his work as a critic tended toward exploring cultural and philosophical issues, particularly dealing with translation and the nature of language and literature.
Steiner's first published book was Tolstoy or Dostoevsky: An Essay in Contrast (1960), which was a study of the different ideas and ideologies of the Russian writers Leo Tolstoy and Fyodor Dostoevsky. The Death of Tragedy (1961) originated as his doctoral thesis at the University of Oxford and examined literature from the ancient Greeks to the mid-20th century. His best-known book, After Babel (1975), was an early and influential contribution to the field of translation studies. It was adapted for television as The Tongues of Men (1977), and was the inspiration behind the creation in 1983 of the English avant-rock group News from Babel.
Works of literary fiction by Steiner include four short story collections, Anno Domini: Three Stories (1964), Proofs and Three Parables (1992), The Deeps of the Sea (1996), and A cinq heures de l'après-midi (2008); and his controversial novella, The Portage to San Cristobal of A.H. (1981). Portage to San Cristobal, in which Jewish Nazi hunters find Adolf Hitler (the "A.H." of the novella's title) alive in the Amazon jungle thirty years after the end of World War II, explored ideas about the origins of European anti-semitism first expounded by Steiner in his critical work In Bluebeard's Castle (1971). Steiner has suggested that Nazism was Europe's revenge on the Jews for inventing conscience. Cheyette sees Steiner's fiction as "an exploratory space where he can think against himself." It "contrasts its humility and openness with his increasingly closed and orthodox critical work." Central to it is the survivor's "terrible, masochistic envy about not being there – having missed the rendezvous with hell".
No Passion Spent (1996) is a collection of essays on topics as diverse as Kierkegaard, Homer in translation, Biblical texts, and Freud's dream theory. Errata: An Examined Life (1997) is a semi-autobiography, and Grammars of Creation (2001), based on Steiner's 1990 Gifford Lectures delivered at the University of Glasgow, explores a range of subjects from cosmology to poetry.
Awards and honors
George Steiner received many honors, including:
A Rhodes Scholarship (1950)
A Guggenheim Fellowship (1970/1971)
Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur by the French Government (1984)
The Morton Dauwen Zabel Prize from The American Academy of Arts and Letters (1989)
The King Albert Medal by the Belgian Academy Council of Applied Sciences
An honorary fellow of Balliol College, Oxford (1995)
The Truman Capote Lifetime Achievement Award by Stanford University (1998)
The Prince of Asturias Award for Communication and Humanities (2001)
Fellowship of the British Academy (1998)
Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Arts
Honorary Doctorate of Literature degrees from:
University of East Anglia (1976)
University of Leuven (1980)
Mount Holyoke College (1983)
Bristol University (1989)
University of Glasgow (1990)
University of Liège (1990)
University of Ulster (1993)
Durham University (1995)
University of Salamanca (2002)
Queen Mary University of London (2006)
Alma Mater Studiorum – Università di Bologna (2006)
Honoris Causa – Faculty of Letters – University of Lisbon (2009)
He has also won numerous awards for his fiction and poetry, including:
Remembrance Award (1974) for Language and Silence: Essays 1958–1966.
PEN/Macmillan Silver Pen Award (1992) for Proofs and Three Parables.
PEN/Macmillan Fiction Prize (1993) for Proofs and Three Parables.
JQ Wingate Prize for Non-Fiction (joint winner with Louise Kehoe and Silvia Rodgers) (1997) for No Passion Spent.
Bibliography
References
Sources
Averil Condren, Papers of George Steiner, Churchill Archives Centre, 2001
The Harvard Gazette (27.09.01)
External links
George Steiner at ContemporaryWriters.com.
George and his dragons. The Guardian, March 17, 2001.
A traveller in the realm of the mind. Interview with George Steiner, The Times, September 22, 1997.
Grammars of Creation. Full text of Steiner's 2001 lecture.
"Between Repulsion and Attraction: George Steiner's Post-Holocaust Fiction". Jewish Social Studies, 1999.
"George Steiner's Jewish Problem". Azure: Ideas for the Jewish Nation.
About George Steiner, by Juan Asensio, L'Harmattan, 2001
George Steiner bibliography. Fantastic Fiction
George Steiner in Literal – features an essay by Steiner
Interviewed by Alan Macfarlane 23rd July 2007 (video)
Audio: George Steiner in conversation on the BBC World Service discussion show The Forum.
Biography and summary of Gifford Lectures by Dr Brannon Hancock
The Rest is Silence: On George Steiner,1929–2020. Ben Hutchinson, Times Literary Supplement, 2020
The Papers of George Steiner held at Churchill Archives Centre
1929 births
2020 deaths
20th-century American novelists
21st-century American novelists
Alumni of Balliol College, Oxford
American academics of English literature
American essayists
American expatriate academics
American expatriates in the United Kingdom
American literary critics
American male novelists
American people of Austrian-Jewish descent
American philosophers
American Rhodes Scholars
American short story writers
Chevaliers of the Légion d'honneur
Fellows of Churchill College, Cambridge
Fellows of St Anne's College, Oxford
Fellows of the British Academy
Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature
French emigrants to the United States
French expatriates in England
20th-century French Jews
French people of Austrian-Jewish descent
French male short story writers
French short story writers
Harvard University alumni
Harvard University faculty
Holocaust survivors
Jewish American academics
Jewish American novelists
Jewish American social scientists
Jewish anti-Zionism in the United States
Jewish philosophers
Jewish scholars
Lycée Français de New York alumni
Jews who emigrated to escape Nazism
Princeton University faculty
Translation scholars
University of Chicago alumni
University of Geneva faculty
Williams College faculty
Writers from New York City
Writers from Paris
American male essayists
American male short story writers
PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction winners
Novelists from New York (state)
Novelists from New Jersey
Novelists from Massachusetts
People from Neuilly-sur-Seine
20th-century American essayists
21st-century American essayists
20th-century American male writers
21st-century American male writers | true | [
"Raymond C. Johnson (August 20, 1936 - October 8, 1979) was a member of the Wisconsin State Senate.\n\nBiography\nJohnson was born on August 20, 1936. He would graduate from what is now the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire and George Washington University and serve in the United States Navy.\n\nPolitical career\nJohnson was first elected to the Senate in 1966. Later, he would become Majority Leader. He was a Republican.\n\nReferences\n\nWisconsin state senators\nWisconsin Republicans\nMilitary personnel from Wisconsin\nUnited States Navy sailors\nUniversity of Wisconsin–Eau Claire alumni\nGeorge Washington University alumni\n1936 births\n1979 deaths\n\n20th-century American politicians",
"Timo Kojo (born 9 May 1953, in Helsinki) is a Finnish pop rock singer. He started his recording career in 1977 when his band, Madame George, released their only album, Madame George: What's Happening?.\n\nKojo's first solo album, So Mean, was a hit in Finland. The second sold equally well, though it was not considered quite as good. In 1981, however, his third solo album was a flop.\n\nIn the Eurovision Song Contest of 1982 he represented his country with the entry Nuku pommiin (Oversleep!), a rock song with music by Jim Pembroke and lyrics by Juice Leskinen; the conductor was Ossi Runne. The song performed in Finnish was a protest against nuclear bombs and the danger of a nuclear war in Europe (the Cold War was still under way in 1982). The song received no points (nul points). Despite this poor result, Kojo continued his career in his native country.\n\nKojo's music declined in popularity in Finland after 1982; however, he remains well known on the strength of his Eurovision career.\n\nDiscography \n Madame George: What's Happening (1977)\n So Mean (1979)\n Lucky Street (1980)\n Go All the Way (1981)\n Hitparade (1982)\n Nuku pommiin or Bomb Out (1982)\n Time Won't Wait (1983)\n Bee tai bop (1985)\n Rommia sateessa (1986)\n Kaksi alkuperäistä: So Mean / Lucky Street (1990)\n Pyöri maa pyöri kuu (1990)\n Kojo and the Great Boogie Band (1993)\n Suloinen Maria (1997)\n 20 suosikkia – So Mean (1998)\n\nSources \nWikipedia in Finnish in:\n Finnish page about Kojo\n\nExternal links \n Lyrics of the entry Nuku pommiin in Finnish and English\n\n1953 births\nLiving people\nEurovision Song Contest entrants of 1982\n20th-century Finnish male singers\nEurovision Song Contest entrants for Finland\nSingers from Helsinki"
]
|
[
"George Steiner",
"Career",
"what was george's career?",
"for two years he was a scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey."
]
| C_8d6e244468744c74ab1d3825f5f2c651_0 | what did he do after being a scholar? | 2 | what did George Steiner do after being a scholar? | George Steiner | In 1956 Steiner returned to the United States, where for two years he was a scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. He also held a Fulbright professorship in Innsbruck, Austria from 1958 to 1959. In 1959, he was appointed Gauss Lecturer at Princeton, where he lectured for another two years. He then became a founding fellow of Churchill College at the University of Cambridge in 1961. Steiner was initially not well received at Cambridge by the English faculty. Many disapproved of this charismatic "firebrand with a foreign accent" and questioned the relevance of the Holocaust he constantly referred to in his lectures. Bryan Cheyette, professor of 20th-century literature at the University of Southampton said that at the time, "Britain [...] didn't think it had a relationship to the Holocaust; its mythology of the war was rooted in the Blitz, Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain." While Steiner received a professorial salary, he was never made a full professor at Cambridge with the right to examine. He had the option of leaving for professorships in the United States, but Steiner's father objected, saying that Hitler, who said no one bearing their name would be left in Europe, would then have won. Steiner remained in England because "I'd do anything rather than face such contempt from my father." He was elected an Extraordinary Fellow at Cambridge in 1969. After several years as a freelance writer and occasional lecturer, Steiner accepted the post of Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Geneva in 1974; he held this post for 20 years, teaching in four languages. He lived by Goethe's maxim that "no monoglot truly knows his own language." He became Professor Emeritus at Geneva University on his retirement in 1994, and an Honorary Fellow at Balliol College at Oxford University in 1995. He has since held the positions of the first Lord Weidenfeld Professor of Comparative European Literature and Fellow of St Anne's College at Oxford University from 1994 to 1995, and Norton Professor of Poetry at Harvard University from 2001 to 2002. Steiner has been called "an intelligent and intellectual critic and essayist." He was active on undergraduate publications while at the University of Chicago and later become a regular contributor of reviews and articles to many journals and newspapers including the Times Literary Supplement and The Guardian. He has written for The New Yorker for over thirty years, contributing over two hundred reviews. While Steiner generally takes things very seriously, he also reveals an unexpected deadpan humor: when he was once asked if he had ever read anything trivial as a child, he replied, Moby-Dick. CANNOTANSWER | He also held a Fulbright professorship in Innsbruck, Austria | Francis George Steiner, FBA (April 23, 1929 – February 3, 2020) was a Franco-American literary critic, essayist, philosopher, novelist, and educator. He wrote extensively about the relationship between language, literature and society, and the impact of the Holocaust. An article in The Guardian described Steiner as a "polyglot and polymath".
Among his admirers, Steiner is ranked "among the great minds in today's literary world". English novelist A. S. Byatt described him as a "late, late, late Renaissance man ... a European metaphysician with an instinct for the driving ideas of our time". Harriet Harvey-Wood, a former literature director of the British Council, described him as a "magnificent lecturer – prophetic and doom-laden [who would] turn up with half a page of scribbled notes, and never refer to them".
Steiner was Professor of English and Comparative Literature in the University of Geneva (1974–94), Professor of Comparative Literature and Fellow in the University of Oxford (1994–95), Professor of Poetry in Harvard University (2001–02) and an Extraordinary Fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge.
Personal life
George Steiner was born in 1929 in Paris, to Viennese Jewish parents Else (née Franzos) and Frederick Georg Steiner. He had an elder sister, Ruth Lilian, who was born in Vienna in 1922. Frederick Steiner was a senior lawyer at Austria's central bank Oesterreichische Nationalbank, and Else Steiner was a Viennese grande dame.
Five years before Steiner's birth, his father had moved his family from Austria to France to escape the growing threat of anti-Semitism. He believed that Jews were "endangered guests wherever they went" and equipped his children with languages. Steiner grew up with three mother tongues: German, English, and French; his mother was multilingual and would often "begin a sentence in one language and end it in another".
When he was six years old, his father who believed in the importance of classical education taught him to read the Iliad in the original Greek. His mother, for whom "self-pity was nauseating", helped Steiner overcome a handicap he had been born with, a withered right arm. Instead of allowing him to become left-handed, she insisted he use his right hand as an able-bodied person would.
Steiner's first formal education took place at the Lycée Janson-de-Sailly in Paris. In 1940, during World War II, Steiner's father once again relocated his family, this time to New York City. Within a month of their move, the Nazis occupied Paris, and of the many Jewish children in Steiner's class at school, he was one of only two who survived the war. Again his father's insight had saved his family, and this made Steiner feel like a survivor, which profoundly influenced his later writings. "My whole life has been about death, remembering and the Holocaust." Steiner became a "grateful wanderer", saying that "Trees have roots and I have legs; I owe my life to that." He spent the rest of his school years at the Lycée Français de New York in Manhattan, and became a United States citizen in 1944.
After high school, Steiner went to the University of Chicago, where he studied literature as well as mathematics and physics, and obtained a BA degree in 1948. This was followed by an MA degree from Harvard University in 1950. He thence attended Balliol College, Oxford on a Rhodes Scholarship.
After his doctoral thesis at Oxford, a draft of The Death of Tragedy (later published by Faber and Faber), was rejected, Steiner took time off from his studies to teach English at Williams College and to work as leader writer for the London-based weekly publication The Economist between 1952 and 1956. It was during this time that he met Zara Shakow, a New Yorker of Lithuanian descent. She had also studied at Harvard and they met in London at the suggestion of their former professors. "The professors had had a bet ... that we would get married if we ever met." They married in 1955, the year he received his DPhil from Oxford University. They have a son, David Steiner (who served as New York State's Commissioner of Education from 2009 to 2011) and a daughter, Deborah Steiner (Professor of Classics at Columbia University). He last lived in Cambridge, England. Zara Steiner died on 13 February 2020, ten days after her husband.
Career
In 1956 Steiner returned to the United States, where for two years he was a scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. He also held a Fulbright professorship in Innsbruck, Austria, from 1958 to 1959. In 1959, he was appointed Gauss Lecturer at Princeton, where he lectured for another two years. He then became a founding fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge in 1961. Steiner was initially not well received at Cambridge by the English faculty. Some disapproved of this charismatic "firebrand with a foreign accent" and questioned the relevance of the Holocaust he constantly referred to in his lectures. Bryan Cheyette, professor of 20th-century literature at the University of Southampton said that at the time, "Britain [...] didn't think it had a relationship to the Holocaust; its mythology of the war was rooted in the Blitz, Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain." While Steiner received a professorial salary, he was never made a full professor at Cambridge with the right to examine. He had the option of leaving for professorships in the United States, but Steiner's father objected, saying that Hitler, who said no one bearing their name would be left in Europe, would then have won. Steiner remained in England because "I'd do anything rather than face such contempt from my father." He was elected an Extraordinary Fellow of Churchill College in 1969.
After several years as a freelance writer and occasional lecturer, Steiner accepted the post of Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Geneva in 1974; he held this post for 20 years, teaching in four languages. He lived by Goethe's maxim that "no monoglot truly knows his own language." He became Professor Emeritus in the University of Geneva upon his retirement in 1994 and an Honorary Fellow of Balliol College, Oxford, in 1995. He also held the positions of the first Lord Weidenfeld Professor of Comparative European Literature and Fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford, from 1994 to 1995, and Norton Professor of Poetry at Harvard University from 2001 to 2002.
Steiner was called "an intelligent and intellectual critic and essayist." He was active on undergraduate publications while at the University of Chicago and later became a regular contributor of reviews and articles to many journals and newspapers including The Times Literary Supplement and The Guardian. He wrote for The New Yorker for over thirty years, contributing over two hundred reviews.
While Steiner generally took things very seriously, he also revealed an unexpected deadpan humor: when he was once asked if he had ever read anything trivial as a child, he replied, Moby-Dick.
Views
Steiner was regarded as a polymath and is often credited with having recast the role of the critic by having explored art and thought unbounded by national frontiers or academic disciplines. He advocated generalisation over specialisation, and insisted that the notion of being literate must encompass knowledge of both arts and sciences. Steiner believed that nationalism is too inherently violent to satisfy the moral prerogative of Judaism, having said "that because of what we are, there are things we can't do."
Among Steiner's non-traditional views, in his autobiography titled Errata (1997), Steiner related his sympathetic stance towards the use of brothels since his college years at the University of Chicago. As Steiner stated, "My virginity offended Alfie (his college room-mate). He found it ostentatious and vaguely corrupt in a nineteen-year-old... He sniffed the fear in me with disdain. And marched me off to Cicero, Illinois, a town justly ill famed but, by virtue of its name, reassuring to me. There he organized, with casual authority, an initiation as thorough as it was gentle. It is this unlikely gentleness, the caring under circumstances so outwardly crass, that blesses me still."
Central to Steiner's thinking, he stated, "is my astonishment, naïve as it seems to people, that you can use human speech both to love, to build, to forgive, and also to torture, to hate, to destroy and to annihilate."
Steiner received criticism and support for his views that racism is inherent in everyone and that tolerance is only skin deep. He is reported to have said: "It's very easy to sit here, in this room, and say 'racism is horrible'. But ask me the same thing if a Jamaican family moved next door with six children and they play reggae and rock music all day. Or if an estate agent comes to my house and tells me that because a Jamaican family has moved next door the value of my property has fallen through the floor. Ask me then!"
Works
Steiner's literary career spanned half a century. He published original essays and books that address the anomalies of contemporary Western culture, issues of language and its "debasement" in the post-Holocaust age. His field was primarily comparative literature, and his work as a critic tended toward exploring cultural and philosophical issues, particularly dealing with translation and the nature of language and literature.
Steiner's first published book was Tolstoy or Dostoevsky: An Essay in Contrast (1960), which was a study of the different ideas and ideologies of the Russian writers Leo Tolstoy and Fyodor Dostoevsky. The Death of Tragedy (1961) originated as his doctoral thesis at the University of Oxford and examined literature from the ancient Greeks to the mid-20th century. His best-known book, After Babel (1975), was an early and influential contribution to the field of translation studies. It was adapted for television as The Tongues of Men (1977), and was the inspiration behind the creation in 1983 of the English avant-rock group News from Babel.
Works of literary fiction by Steiner include four short story collections, Anno Domini: Three Stories (1964), Proofs and Three Parables (1992), The Deeps of the Sea (1996), and A cinq heures de l'après-midi (2008); and his controversial novella, The Portage to San Cristobal of A.H. (1981). Portage to San Cristobal, in which Jewish Nazi hunters find Adolf Hitler (the "A.H." of the novella's title) alive in the Amazon jungle thirty years after the end of World War II, explored ideas about the origins of European anti-semitism first expounded by Steiner in his critical work In Bluebeard's Castle (1971). Steiner has suggested that Nazism was Europe's revenge on the Jews for inventing conscience. Cheyette sees Steiner's fiction as "an exploratory space where he can think against himself." It "contrasts its humility and openness with his increasingly closed and orthodox critical work." Central to it is the survivor's "terrible, masochistic envy about not being there – having missed the rendezvous with hell".
No Passion Spent (1996) is a collection of essays on topics as diverse as Kierkegaard, Homer in translation, Biblical texts, and Freud's dream theory. Errata: An Examined Life (1997) is a semi-autobiography, and Grammars of Creation (2001), based on Steiner's 1990 Gifford Lectures delivered at the University of Glasgow, explores a range of subjects from cosmology to poetry.
Awards and honors
George Steiner received many honors, including:
A Rhodes Scholarship (1950)
A Guggenheim Fellowship (1970/1971)
Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur by the French Government (1984)
The Morton Dauwen Zabel Prize from The American Academy of Arts and Letters (1989)
The King Albert Medal by the Belgian Academy Council of Applied Sciences
An honorary fellow of Balliol College, Oxford (1995)
The Truman Capote Lifetime Achievement Award by Stanford University (1998)
The Prince of Asturias Award for Communication and Humanities (2001)
Fellowship of the British Academy (1998)
Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Arts
Honorary Doctorate of Literature degrees from:
University of East Anglia (1976)
University of Leuven (1980)
Mount Holyoke College (1983)
Bristol University (1989)
University of Glasgow (1990)
University of Liège (1990)
University of Ulster (1993)
Durham University (1995)
University of Salamanca (2002)
Queen Mary University of London (2006)
Alma Mater Studiorum – Università di Bologna (2006)
Honoris Causa – Faculty of Letters – University of Lisbon (2009)
He has also won numerous awards for his fiction and poetry, including:
Remembrance Award (1974) for Language and Silence: Essays 1958–1966.
PEN/Macmillan Silver Pen Award (1992) for Proofs and Three Parables.
PEN/Macmillan Fiction Prize (1993) for Proofs and Three Parables.
JQ Wingate Prize for Non-Fiction (joint winner with Louise Kehoe and Silvia Rodgers) (1997) for No Passion Spent.
Bibliography
References
Sources
Averil Condren, Papers of George Steiner, Churchill Archives Centre, 2001
The Harvard Gazette (27.09.01)
External links
George Steiner at ContemporaryWriters.com.
George and his dragons. The Guardian, March 17, 2001.
A traveller in the realm of the mind. Interview with George Steiner, The Times, September 22, 1997.
Grammars of Creation. Full text of Steiner's 2001 lecture.
"Between Repulsion and Attraction: George Steiner's Post-Holocaust Fiction". Jewish Social Studies, 1999.
"George Steiner's Jewish Problem". Azure: Ideas for the Jewish Nation.
About George Steiner, by Juan Asensio, L'Harmattan, 2001
George Steiner bibliography. Fantastic Fiction
George Steiner in Literal – features an essay by Steiner
Interviewed by Alan Macfarlane 23rd July 2007 (video)
Audio: George Steiner in conversation on the BBC World Service discussion show The Forum.
Biography and summary of Gifford Lectures by Dr Brannon Hancock
The Rest is Silence: On George Steiner,1929–2020. Ben Hutchinson, Times Literary Supplement, 2020
The Papers of George Steiner held at Churchill Archives Centre
1929 births
2020 deaths
20th-century American novelists
21st-century American novelists
Alumni of Balliol College, Oxford
American academics of English literature
American essayists
American expatriate academics
American expatriates in the United Kingdom
American literary critics
American male novelists
American people of Austrian-Jewish descent
American philosophers
American Rhodes Scholars
American short story writers
Chevaliers of the Légion d'honneur
Fellows of Churchill College, Cambridge
Fellows of St Anne's College, Oxford
Fellows of the British Academy
Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature
French emigrants to the United States
French expatriates in England
20th-century French Jews
French people of Austrian-Jewish descent
French male short story writers
French short story writers
Harvard University alumni
Harvard University faculty
Holocaust survivors
Jewish American academics
Jewish American novelists
Jewish American social scientists
Jewish anti-Zionism in the United States
Jewish philosophers
Jewish scholars
Lycée Français de New York alumni
Jews who emigrated to escape Nazism
Princeton University faculty
Translation scholars
University of Chicago alumni
University of Geneva faculty
Williams College faculty
Writers from New York City
Writers from Paris
American male essayists
American male short story writers
PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction winners
Novelists from New York (state)
Novelists from New Jersey
Novelists from Massachusetts
People from Neuilly-sur-Seine
20th-century American essayists
21st-century American essayists
20th-century American male writers
21st-century American male writers | true | [
"Max van Manen (born 1942) is a Dutch-born Canadian scholar who specializes in phenomenological research methods and pedagogy. There are several interesting publications to conduct phenomenology of practice. He is an emeritus professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Alberta, where he is also a Distinguished Scholar at the International Institute for Qualitative Methodology.\n\nBooks \n\n Tone of Teaching (1986)\n Researching Lived Experiences: Human Science for an Action Sensitive Pedagogy (1990)\n The Tact of Teaching: The Meaning of Pedagogical Thoughtfulness (1991)\n Childhood’s Secrets: Intimacy, Privacy, and the Self Reconsidered (1996), with Bas Levering\n Writing in the Dark: Phenomenological Studies in Interpretive Inquiry (2003)\n Phenomenology of Practice: Meaning-Giving Methods in Phenomenological Research and Writing (2014)\n Pedagogical Tact: Knowing What to Do When You Don’t Know What to Do (2015)\n\nReferences\n\n1942 births\nLiving people\nCanadian philosophers\nManen, Max van\nHermeneutists\nManen, Max van\nPhenomenologists\nUniversity of Alberta alumni\nUniversity of Alberta faculty",
"\"What Did I Do to You?\" is a song recorded by British singer Lisa Stansfield for her 1989 album, Affection. It was written by Stansfield, Ian Devaney and Andy Morris, and produced by Devaney and Morris. The song was released as the fourth European single on 30 April 1990. It included three previously unreleased songs written by Stansfield, Devaney and Morris: \"My Apple Heart,\" \"Lay Me Down\" and \"Something's Happenin'.\" \"What Did I Do to You?\" was remixed by Mark Saunders and by the Grammy Award-winning American house music DJ and producer, David Morales. The single became a top forty hit in the European countries reaching number eighteen in Finland, number twenty in Ireland and number twenty-five in the United Kingdom. \"What Did I Do to You?\" was also released in Japan.\n\nIn 2014, the remixes of \"What Did I Do to You?\" were included on the deluxe 2CD + DVD re-release of Affection and on People Hold On ... The Remix Anthology. They were also featured on The Collection 1989–2003 box set (2014), including previously unreleased Red Zone Mix by David Morales.\n\nCritical reception\nThe song received positive reviews from music critics. Matthew Hocter from Albumism viewed it as a \"upbeat offering\". David Giles from Music Week said it is \"beautifully performed\" by Stansfield. A reviewer from Reading Eagle wrote that \"What Did I Do to You?\" \"would be right at home on the \"Saturday Night Fever\" soundtrack.\"\n\nMusic video\nA music video was produced to promote the single, directed by Philip Richardson, who had previously directed the videos for \"All Around the World\" and \"Live Together\". It features Stansfield with her kiss curls, dressed in a white outfit and performing with her band on a stage in front of a jumping audience. The video was later published on Stansfield's official YouTube channel in November 2009. It has amassed more than 1,6 million views as of October 2021.\n\nTrack listings\n\n European/UK 7\" single\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Mark Saunders Remix Edit) – 4:20\n\"Something's Happenin'\" – 3:59\n\n European/UK/Japanese CD single\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Mark Saunders Remix Edit) – 4:20\n\"My Apple Heart\" – 5:19\n\"Lay Me Down\" – 4:17\n\"Something's Happenin'\" – 3:59\n\n UK 10\" single\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Mark Saunders Remix) – 5:52\n\"My Apple Heart\" – 5:19\n\"Lay Me Down\" – 4:17\n\"Something's Happenin'\" – 3:59\n\n European/UK 12\" single\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Morales Mix) – 7:59\n\"My Apple Heart\" – 4:22\n\"Lay Me Down\" – 3:19\n\"Something's Happenin'\" – 3:15\n\n UK 12\" promotional single\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Morales Mix) – 7:59\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Anti Poll Tax Dub) – 6:31\n\n Other remixes\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Red Zone Mix) – 7:45\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\nLisa Stansfield songs\n1990 singles\nSongs written by Lisa Stansfield\n1989 songs\nArista Records singles\nSongs written by Ian Devaney\nSongs written by Andy Morris (musician)"
]
|
[
"George Steiner",
"Career",
"what was george's career?",
"for two years he was a scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey.",
"what did he do after being a scholar?",
"He also held a Fulbright professorship in Innsbruck, Austria"
]
| C_8d6e244468744c74ab1d3825f5f2c651_0 | what was his greatest accomplishment? | 3 | what was George Steiner's greatest accomplishment along with being a scholar? | George Steiner | In 1956 Steiner returned to the United States, where for two years he was a scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. He also held a Fulbright professorship in Innsbruck, Austria from 1958 to 1959. In 1959, he was appointed Gauss Lecturer at Princeton, where he lectured for another two years. He then became a founding fellow of Churchill College at the University of Cambridge in 1961. Steiner was initially not well received at Cambridge by the English faculty. Many disapproved of this charismatic "firebrand with a foreign accent" and questioned the relevance of the Holocaust he constantly referred to in his lectures. Bryan Cheyette, professor of 20th-century literature at the University of Southampton said that at the time, "Britain [...] didn't think it had a relationship to the Holocaust; its mythology of the war was rooted in the Blitz, Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain." While Steiner received a professorial salary, he was never made a full professor at Cambridge with the right to examine. He had the option of leaving for professorships in the United States, but Steiner's father objected, saying that Hitler, who said no one bearing their name would be left in Europe, would then have won. Steiner remained in England because "I'd do anything rather than face such contempt from my father." He was elected an Extraordinary Fellow at Cambridge in 1969. After several years as a freelance writer and occasional lecturer, Steiner accepted the post of Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Geneva in 1974; he held this post for 20 years, teaching in four languages. He lived by Goethe's maxim that "no monoglot truly knows his own language." He became Professor Emeritus at Geneva University on his retirement in 1994, and an Honorary Fellow at Balliol College at Oxford University in 1995. He has since held the positions of the first Lord Weidenfeld Professor of Comparative European Literature and Fellow of St Anne's College at Oxford University from 1994 to 1995, and Norton Professor of Poetry at Harvard University from 2001 to 2002. Steiner has been called "an intelligent and intellectual critic and essayist." He was active on undergraduate publications while at the University of Chicago and later become a regular contributor of reviews and articles to many journals and newspapers including the Times Literary Supplement and The Guardian. He has written for The New Yorker for over thirty years, contributing over two hundred reviews. While Steiner generally takes things very seriously, he also reveals an unexpected deadpan humor: when he was once asked if he had ever read anything trivial as a child, he replied, Moby-Dick. CANNOTANSWER | He has since held the positions of the first Lord Weidenfeld Professor of Comparative European Literature and Fellow of St Anne's College at Oxford University | Francis George Steiner, FBA (April 23, 1929 – February 3, 2020) was a Franco-American literary critic, essayist, philosopher, novelist, and educator. He wrote extensively about the relationship between language, literature and society, and the impact of the Holocaust. An article in The Guardian described Steiner as a "polyglot and polymath".
Among his admirers, Steiner is ranked "among the great minds in today's literary world". English novelist A. S. Byatt described him as a "late, late, late Renaissance man ... a European metaphysician with an instinct for the driving ideas of our time". Harriet Harvey-Wood, a former literature director of the British Council, described him as a "magnificent lecturer – prophetic and doom-laden [who would] turn up with half a page of scribbled notes, and never refer to them".
Steiner was Professor of English and Comparative Literature in the University of Geneva (1974–94), Professor of Comparative Literature and Fellow in the University of Oxford (1994–95), Professor of Poetry in Harvard University (2001–02) and an Extraordinary Fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge.
Personal life
George Steiner was born in 1929 in Paris, to Viennese Jewish parents Else (née Franzos) and Frederick Georg Steiner. He had an elder sister, Ruth Lilian, who was born in Vienna in 1922. Frederick Steiner was a senior lawyer at Austria's central bank Oesterreichische Nationalbank, and Else Steiner was a Viennese grande dame.
Five years before Steiner's birth, his father had moved his family from Austria to France to escape the growing threat of anti-Semitism. He believed that Jews were "endangered guests wherever they went" and equipped his children with languages. Steiner grew up with three mother tongues: German, English, and French; his mother was multilingual and would often "begin a sentence in one language and end it in another".
When he was six years old, his father who believed in the importance of classical education taught him to read the Iliad in the original Greek. His mother, for whom "self-pity was nauseating", helped Steiner overcome a handicap he had been born with, a withered right arm. Instead of allowing him to become left-handed, she insisted he use his right hand as an able-bodied person would.
Steiner's first formal education took place at the Lycée Janson-de-Sailly in Paris. In 1940, during World War II, Steiner's father once again relocated his family, this time to New York City. Within a month of their move, the Nazis occupied Paris, and of the many Jewish children in Steiner's class at school, he was one of only two who survived the war. Again his father's insight had saved his family, and this made Steiner feel like a survivor, which profoundly influenced his later writings. "My whole life has been about death, remembering and the Holocaust." Steiner became a "grateful wanderer", saying that "Trees have roots and I have legs; I owe my life to that." He spent the rest of his school years at the Lycée Français de New York in Manhattan, and became a United States citizen in 1944.
After high school, Steiner went to the University of Chicago, where he studied literature as well as mathematics and physics, and obtained a BA degree in 1948. This was followed by an MA degree from Harvard University in 1950. He thence attended Balliol College, Oxford on a Rhodes Scholarship.
After his doctoral thesis at Oxford, a draft of The Death of Tragedy (later published by Faber and Faber), was rejected, Steiner took time off from his studies to teach English at Williams College and to work as leader writer for the London-based weekly publication The Economist between 1952 and 1956. It was during this time that he met Zara Shakow, a New Yorker of Lithuanian descent. She had also studied at Harvard and they met in London at the suggestion of their former professors. "The professors had had a bet ... that we would get married if we ever met." They married in 1955, the year he received his DPhil from Oxford University. They have a son, David Steiner (who served as New York State's Commissioner of Education from 2009 to 2011) and a daughter, Deborah Steiner (Professor of Classics at Columbia University). He last lived in Cambridge, England. Zara Steiner died on 13 February 2020, ten days after her husband.
Career
In 1956 Steiner returned to the United States, where for two years he was a scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. He also held a Fulbright professorship in Innsbruck, Austria, from 1958 to 1959. In 1959, he was appointed Gauss Lecturer at Princeton, where he lectured for another two years. He then became a founding fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge in 1961. Steiner was initially not well received at Cambridge by the English faculty. Some disapproved of this charismatic "firebrand with a foreign accent" and questioned the relevance of the Holocaust he constantly referred to in his lectures. Bryan Cheyette, professor of 20th-century literature at the University of Southampton said that at the time, "Britain [...] didn't think it had a relationship to the Holocaust; its mythology of the war was rooted in the Blitz, Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain." While Steiner received a professorial salary, he was never made a full professor at Cambridge with the right to examine. He had the option of leaving for professorships in the United States, but Steiner's father objected, saying that Hitler, who said no one bearing their name would be left in Europe, would then have won. Steiner remained in England because "I'd do anything rather than face such contempt from my father." He was elected an Extraordinary Fellow of Churchill College in 1969.
After several years as a freelance writer and occasional lecturer, Steiner accepted the post of Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Geneva in 1974; he held this post for 20 years, teaching in four languages. He lived by Goethe's maxim that "no monoglot truly knows his own language." He became Professor Emeritus in the University of Geneva upon his retirement in 1994 and an Honorary Fellow of Balliol College, Oxford, in 1995. He also held the positions of the first Lord Weidenfeld Professor of Comparative European Literature and Fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford, from 1994 to 1995, and Norton Professor of Poetry at Harvard University from 2001 to 2002.
Steiner was called "an intelligent and intellectual critic and essayist." He was active on undergraduate publications while at the University of Chicago and later became a regular contributor of reviews and articles to many journals and newspapers including The Times Literary Supplement and The Guardian. He wrote for The New Yorker for over thirty years, contributing over two hundred reviews.
While Steiner generally took things very seriously, he also revealed an unexpected deadpan humor: when he was once asked if he had ever read anything trivial as a child, he replied, Moby-Dick.
Views
Steiner was regarded as a polymath and is often credited with having recast the role of the critic by having explored art and thought unbounded by national frontiers or academic disciplines. He advocated generalisation over specialisation, and insisted that the notion of being literate must encompass knowledge of both arts and sciences. Steiner believed that nationalism is too inherently violent to satisfy the moral prerogative of Judaism, having said "that because of what we are, there are things we can't do."
Among Steiner's non-traditional views, in his autobiography titled Errata (1997), Steiner related his sympathetic stance towards the use of brothels since his college years at the University of Chicago. As Steiner stated, "My virginity offended Alfie (his college room-mate). He found it ostentatious and vaguely corrupt in a nineteen-year-old... He sniffed the fear in me with disdain. And marched me off to Cicero, Illinois, a town justly ill famed but, by virtue of its name, reassuring to me. There he organized, with casual authority, an initiation as thorough as it was gentle. It is this unlikely gentleness, the caring under circumstances so outwardly crass, that blesses me still."
Central to Steiner's thinking, he stated, "is my astonishment, naïve as it seems to people, that you can use human speech both to love, to build, to forgive, and also to torture, to hate, to destroy and to annihilate."
Steiner received criticism and support for his views that racism is inherent in everyone and that tolerance is only skin deep. He is reported to have said: "It's very easy to sit here, in this room, and say 'racism is horrible'. But ask me the same thing if a Jamaican family moved next door with six children and they play reggae and rock music all day. Or if an estate agent comes to my house and tells me that because a Jamaican family has moved next door the value of my property has fallen through the floor. Ask me then!"
Works
Steiner's literary career spanned half a century. He published original essays and books that address the anomalies of contemporary Western culture, issues of language and its "debasement" in the post-Holocaust age. His field was primarily comparative literature, and his work as a critic tended toward exploring cultural and philosophical issues, particularly dealing with translation and the nature of language and literature.
Steiner's first published book was Tolstoy or Dostoevsky: An Essay in Contrast (1960), which was a study of the different ideas and ideologies of the Russian writers Leo Tolstoy and Fyodor Dostoevsky. The Death of Tragedy (1961) originated as his doctoral thesis at the University of Oxford and examined literature from the ancient Greeks to the mid-20th century. His best-known book, After Babel (1975), was an early and influential contribution to the field of translation studies. It was adapted for television as The Tongues of Men (1977), and was the inspiration behind the creation in 1983 of the English avant-rock group News from Babel.
Works of literary fiction by Steiner include four short story collections, Anno Domini: Three Stories (1964), Proofs and Three Parables (1992), The Deeps of the Sea (1996), and A cinq heures de l'après-midi (2008); and his controversial novella, The Portage to San Cristobal of A.H. (1981). Portage to San Cristobal, in which Jewish Nazi hunters find Adolf Hitler (the "A.H." of the novella's title) alive in the Amazon jungle thirty years after the end of World War II, explored ideas about the origins of European anti-semitism first expounded by Steiner in his critical work In Bluebeard's Castle (1971). Steiner has suggested that Nazism was Europe's revenge on the Jews for inventing conscience. Cheyette sees Steiner's fiction as "an exploratory space where he can think against himself." It "contrasts its humility and openness with his increasingly closed and orthodox critical work." Central to it is the survivor's "terrible, masochistic envy about not being there – having missed the rendezvous with hell".
No Passion Spent (1996) is a collection of essays on topics as diverse as Kierkegaard, Homer in translation, Biblical texts, and Freud's dream theory. Errata: An Examined Life (1997) is a semi-autobiography, and Grammars of Creation (2001), based on Steiner's 1990 Gifford Lectures delivered at the University of Glasgow, explores a range of subjects from cosmology to poetry.
Awards and honors
George Steiner received many honors, including:
A Rhodes Scholarship (1950)
A Guggenheim Fellowship (1970/1971)
Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur by the French Government (1984)
The Morton Dauwen Zabel Prize from The American Academy of Arts and Letters (1989)
The King Albert Medal by the Belgian Academy Council of Applied Sciences
An honorary fellow of Balliol College, Oxford (1995)
The Truman Capote Lifetime Achievement Award by Stanford University (1998)
The Prince of Asturias Award for Communication and Humanities (2001)
Fellowship of the British Academy (1998)
Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Arts
Honorary Doctorate of Literature degrees from:
University of East Anglia (1976)
University of Leuven (1980)
Mount Holyoke College (1983)
Bristol University (1989)
University of Glasgow (1990)
University of Liège (1990)
University of Ulster (1993)
Durham University (1995)
University of Salamanca (2002)
Queen Mary University of London (2006)
Alma Mater Studiorum – Università di Bologna (2006)
Honoris Causa – Faculty of Letters – University of Lisbon (2009)
He has also won numerous awards for his fiction and poetry, including:
Remembrance Award (1974) for Language and Silence: Essays 1958–1966.
PEN/Macmillan Silver Pen Award (1992) for Proofs and Three Parables.
PEN/Macmillan Fiction Prize (1993) for Proofs and Three Parables.
JQ Wingate Prize for Non-Fiction (joint winner with Louise Kehoe and Silvia Rodgers) (1997) for No Passion Spent.
Bibliography
References
Sources
Averil Condren, Papers of George Steiner, Churchill Archives Centre, 2001
The Harvard Gazette (27.09.01)
External links
George Steiner at ContemporaryWriters.com.
George and his dragons. The Guardian, March 17, 2001.
A traveller in the realm of the mind. Interview with George Steiner, The Times, September 22, 1997.
Grammars of Creation. Full text of Steiner's 2001 lecture.
"Between Repulsion and Attraction: George Steiner's Post-Holocaust Fiction". Jewish Social Studies, 1999.
"George Steiner's Jewish Problem". Azure: Ideas for the Jewish Nation.
About George Steiner, by Juan Asensio, L'Harmattan, 2001
George Steiner bibliography. Fantastic Fiction
George Steiner in Literal – features an essay by Steiner
Interviewed by Alan Macfarlane 23rd July 2007 (video)
Audio: George Steiner in conversation on the BBC World Service discussion show The Forum.
Biography and summary of Gifford Lectures by Dr Brannon Hancock
The Rest is Silence: On George Steiner,1929–2020. Ben Hutchinson, Times Literary Supplement, 2020
The Papers of George Steiner held at Churchill Archives Centre
1929 births
2020 deaths
20th-century American novelists
21st-century American novelists
Alumni of Balliol College, Oxford
American academics of English literature
American essayists
American expatriate academics
American expatriates in the United Kingdom
American literary critics
American male novelists
American people of Austrian-Jewish descent
American philosophers
American Rhodes Scholars
American short story writers
Chevaliers of the Légion d'honneur
Fellows of Churchill College, Cambridge
Fellows of St Anne's College, Oxford
Fellows of the British Academy
Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature
French emigrants to the United States
French expatriates in England
20th-century French Jews
French people of Austrian-Jewish descent
French male short story writers
French short story writers
Harvard University alumni
Harvard University faculty
Holocaust survivors
Jewish American academics
Jewish American novelists
Jewish American social scientists
Jewish anti-Zionism in the United States
Jewish philosophers
Jewish scholars
Lycée Français de New York alumni
Jews who emigrated to escape Nazism
Princeton University faculty
Translation scholars
University of Chicago alumni
University of Geneva faculty
Williams College faculty
Writers from New York City
Writers from Paris
American male essayists
American male short story writers
PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction winners
Novelists from New York (state)
Novelists from New Jersey
Novelists from Massachusetts
People from Neuilly-sur-Seine
20th-century American essayists
21st-century American essayists
20th-century American male writers
21st-century American male writers | false | [
"was a professional Go player.\n\nHe is well known in the Western go world for his book Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go.\n\nBiography \nKageyama was born in Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan. In 1948, he won the biggest amateur Go tournament in Japan, the All-Amateur Honinbo. The year after that, he passed the pro exam. \n\nFor two years straight, Kageyama was runner up for the Prime Minister Cup. First, against Otake Hideo, then Hoshino Toshi. His style was a very calm one with deep calculations, similar to what Ishida Yoshio would use later on. The greatest accomplishment of his life, in his own opinion, was beating Rin Kaiho in the Prime Minister Cup semi-finals. At the time, Rin was the Meijin, the top player in Japan. Kageyama gave a commentary on this game in his book \"Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go\", where he wrote\n\nPromotion record\n\nRunners-up\n\nAwards\nTakamatsu-no-miya Prize once (1967)\n\nBibliography \nLessons in the Fundamentals of Go \nKage's Secret Chronicles of Handicap Go\n\nReferences\n\n1926 births\n1990 deaths\nJapanese Go players\nGo writers",
"Hans Christian Harald Tegner, known as Hans Tegner (30 November 1853 – 2 April 1932), was a Danish artist and illustrator. He is primarily known for his illustrations of literary works by Hans Christian Andersen and Ludvig Holberg and for his work for the Bing & Grøndahl porcelain factory.\n\nEarly life and education\nSon of lithographer Isac Wilhelm Tegner, Hans studied at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts from 1869 to 1878.\n\nCareer\nHis first art exhibition was in 1882, featuring watercolour illustrations of Hans Christian Andersen's story The Tinderbox. His second, and last, exhibition in 1889 was a watercolour painting celebrating the 50-year jubilee of the Constitution of Denmark, and was bought by king Christian IX of Denmark. From 1883 to 1888, Tegner painted a series of illustrations for the works of Ludvig Holberg, his greatest artistic accomplishment. The second great accomplishment of Tegner, was his exquisite illustrations produced for the so-called international selection () of Andersen's fairy tales, finished in 1901.\n\nTegner was made professor at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in 1897. He illustrated a number of other books, as well as postal stamps, and the first 5-Danish krone note in 1898. He was the leader of Kunsthåndværkerskolen (a part of what is now Danmarks Designskole) from 1901 to 1917, and chief designer at porcelain manufacturer Bing & Grøndahl from 1907 to 1932. He died on April 2, 1932, in Fredensborg.\n\npersonal life\n\nTegner married Helga Byberg (13 January 1862 - 26 February 1945), a daughter of merchant Ole Strib Hansen Byberg (1812–82) and Karen Møller (1821–89), on 24 November 1896 in Sundby.\n\nHe died on 2 April 1932 and is buried in Asminderød Cemetery\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1853 births\n1932 deaths\nDanish artists\nRoyal Danish Academy of Fine Arts faculty\nRoyal Danish Academy of Fine Arts alumni\n19th-century illustrators of fairy tales\n20th-century illustrators of fairy tales"
]
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"for two years he was a scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey.",
"what did he do after being a scholar?",
"He also held a Fulbright professorship in Innsbruck, Austria",
"what was his greatest accomplishment?",
"He has since held the positions of the first Lord Weidenfeld Professor of Comparative European Literature and Fellow of St Anne's College at Oxford University"
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| C_8d6e244468744c74ab1d3825f5f2c651_0 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | 4 | Besides being the first Lord Weidenfeld Professor and a Fellow of St Anne's College at Oxford University, Are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | George Steiner | In 1956 Steiner returned to the United States, where for two years he was a scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. He also held a Fulbright professorship in Innsbruck, Austria from 1958 to 1959. In 1959, he was appointed Gauss Lecturer at Princeton, where he lectured for another two years. He then became a founding fellow of Churchill College at the University of Cambridge in 1961. Steiner was initially not well received at Cambridge by the English faculty. Many disapproved of this charismatic "firebrand with a foreign accent" and questioned the relevance of the Holocaust he constantly referred to in his lectures. Bryan Cheyette, professor of 20th-century literature at the University of Southampton said that at the time, "Britain [...] didn't think it had a relationship to the Holocaust; its mythology of the war was rooted in the Blitz, Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain." While Steiner received a professorial salary, he was never made a full professor at Cambridge with the right to examine. He had the option of leaving for professorships in the United States, but Steiner's father objected, saying that Hitler, who said no one bearing their name would be left in Europe, would then have won. Steiner remained in England because "I'd do anything rather than face such contempt from my father." He was elected an Extraordinary Fellow at Cambridge in 1969. After several years as a freelance writer and occasional lecturer, Steiner accepted the post of Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Geneva in 1974; he held this post for 20 years, teaching in four languages. He lived by Goethe's maxim that "no monoglot truly knows his own language." He became Professor Emeritus at Geneva University on his retirement in 1994, and an Honorary Fellow at Balliol College at Oxford University in 1995. He has since held the positions of the first Lord Weidenfeld Professor of Comparative European Literature and Fellow of St Anne's College at Oxford University from 1994 to 1995, and Norton Professor of Poetry at Harvard University from 2001 to 2002. Steiner has been called "an intelligent and intellectual critic and essayist." He was active on undergraduate publications while at the University of Chicago and later become a regular contributor of reviews and articles to many journals and newspapers including the Times Literary Supplement and The Guardian. He has written for The New Yorker for over thirty years, contributing over two hundred reviews. While Steiner generally takes things very seriously, he also reveals an unexpected deadpan humor: when he was once asked if he had ever read anything trivial as a child, he replied, Moby-Dick. CANNOTANSWER | Steiner has been called "an intelligent and intellectual critic and essayist." | Francis George Steiner, FBA (April 23, 1929 – February 3, 2020) was a Franco-American literary critic, essayist, philosopher, novelist, and educator. He wrote extensively about the relationship between language, literature and society, and the impact of the Holocaust. An article in The Guardian described Steiner as a "polyglot and polymath".
Among his admirers, Steiner is ranked "among the great minds in today's literary world". English novelist A. S. Byatt described him as a "late, late, late Renaissance man ... a European metaphysician with an instinct for the driving ideas of our time". Harriet Harvey-Wood, a former literature director of the British Council, described him as a "magnificent lecturer – prophetic and doom-laden [who would] turn up with half a page of scribbled notes, and never refer to them".
Steiner was Professor of English and Comparative Literature in the University of Geneva (1974–94), Professor of Comparative Literature and Fellow in the University of Oxford (1994–95), Professor of Poetry in Harvard University (2001–02) and an Extraordinary Fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge.
Personal life
George Steiner was born in 1929 in Paris, to Viennese Jewish parents Else (née Franzos) and Frederick Georg Steiner. He had an elder sister, Ruth Lilian, who was born in Vienna in 1922. Frederick Steiner was a senior lawyer at Austria's central bank Oesterreichische Nationalbank, and Else Steiner was a Viennese grande dame.
Five years before Steiner's birth, his father had moved his family from Austria to France to escape the growing threat of anti-Semitism. He believed that Jews were "endangered guests wherever they went" and equipped his children with languages. Steiner grew up with three mother tongues: German, English, and French; his mother was multilingual and would often "begin a sentence in one language and end it in another".
When he was six years old, his father who believed in the importance of classical education taught him to read the Iliad in the original Greek. His mother, for whom "self-pity was nauseating", helped Steiner overcome a handicap he had been born with, a withered right arm. Instead of allowing him to become left-handed, she insisted he use his right hand as an able-bodied person would.
Steiner's first formal education took place at the Lycée Janson-de-Sailly in Paris. In 1940, during World War II, Steiner's father once again relocated his family, this time to New York City. Within a month of their move, the Nazis occupied Paris, and of the many Jewish children in Steiner's class at school, he was one of only two who survived the war. Again his father's insight had saved his family, and this made Steiner feel like a survivor, which profoundly influenced his later writings. "My whole life has been about death, remembering and the Holocaust." Steiner became a "grateful wanderer", saying that "Trees have roots and I have legs; I owe my life to that." He spent the rest of his school years at the Lycée Français de New York in Manhattan, and became a United States citizen in 1944.
After high school, Steiner went to the University of Chicago, where he studied literature as well as mathematics and physics, and obtained a BA degree in 1948. This was followed by an MA degree from Harvard University in 1950. He thence attended Balliol College, Oxford on a Rhodes Scholarship.
After his doctoral thesis at Oxford, a draft of The Death of Tragedy (later published by Faber and Faber), was rejected, Steiner took time off from his studies to teach English at Williams College and to work as leader writer for the London-based weekly publication The Economist between 1952 and 1956. It was during this time that he met Zara Shakow, a New Yorker of Lithuanian descent. She had also studied at Harvard and they met in London at the suggestion of their former professors. "The professors had had a bet ... that we would get married if we ever met." They married in 1955, the year he received his DPhil from Oxford University. They have a son, David Steiner (who served as New York State's Commissioner of Education from 2009 to 2011) and a daughter, Deborah Steiner (Professor of Classics at Columbia University). He last lived in Cambridge, England. Zara Steiner died on 13 February 2020, ten days after her husband.
Career
In 1956 Steiner returned to the United States, where for two years he was a scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. He also held a Fulbright professorship in Innsbruck, Austria, from 1958 to 1959. In 1959, he was appointed Gauss Lecturer at Princeton, where he lectured for another two years. He then became a founding fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge in 1961. Steiner was initially not well received at Cambridge by the English faculty. Some disapproved of this charismatic "firebrand with a foreign accent" and questioned the relevance of the Holocaust he constantly referred to in his lectures. Bryan Cheyette, professor of 20th-century literature at the University of Southampton said that at the time, "Britain [...] didn't think it had a relationship to the Holocaust; its mythology of the war was rooted in the Blitz, Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain." While Steiner received a professorial salary, he was never made a full professor at Cambridge with the right to examine. He had the option of leaving for professorships in the United States, but Steiner's father objected, saying that Hitler, who said no one bearing their name would be left in Europe, would then have won. Steiner remained in England because "I'd do anything rather than face such contempt from my father." He was elected an Extraordinary Fellow of Churchill College in 1969.
After several years as a freelance writer and occasional lecturer, Steiner accepted the post of Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Geneva in 1974; he held this post for 20 years, teaching in four languages. He lived by Goethe's maxim that "no monoglot truly knows his own language." He became Professor Emeritus in the University of Geneva upon his retirement in 1994 and an Honorary Fellow of Balliol College, Oxford, in 1995. He also held the positions of the first Lord Weidenfeld Professor of Comparative European Literature and Fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford, from 1994 to 1995, and Norton Professor of Poetry at Harvard University from 2001 to 2002.
Steiner was called "an intelligent and intellectual critic and essayist." He was active on undergraduate publications while at the University of Chicago and later became a regular contributor of reviews and articles to many journals and newspapers including The Times Literary Supplement and The Guardian. He wrote for The New Yorker for over thirty years, contributing over two hundred reviews.
While Steiner generally took things very seriously, he also revealed an unexpected deadpan humor: when he was once asked if he had ever read anything trivial as a child, he replied, Moby-Dick.
Views
Steiner was regarded as a polymath and is often credited with having recast the role of the critic by having explored art and thought unbounded by national frontiers or academic disciplines. He advocated generalisation over specialisation, and insisted that the notion of being literate must encompass knowledge of both arts and sciences. Steiner believed that nationalism is too inherently violent to satisfy the moral prerogative of Judaism, having said "that because of what we are, there are things we can't do."
Among Steiner's non-traditional views, in his autobiography titled Errata (1997), Steiner related his sympathetic stance towards the use of brothels since his college years at the University of Chicago. As Steiner stated, "My virginity offended Alfie (his college room-mate). He found it ostentatious and vaguely corrupt in a nineteen-year-old... He sniffed the fear in me with disdain. And marched me off to Cicero, Illinois, a town justly ill famed but, by virtue of its name, reassuring to me. There he organized, with casual authority, an initiation as thorough as it was gentle. It is this unlikely gentleness, the caring under circumstances so outwardly crass, that blesses me still."
Central to Steiner's thinking, he stated, "is my astonishment, naïve as it seems to people, that you can use human speech both to love, to build, to forgive, and also to torture, to hate, to destroy and to annihilate."
Steiner received criticism and support for his views that racism is inherent in everyone and that tolerance is only skin deep. He is reported to have said: "It's very easy to sit here, in this room, and say 'racism is horrible'. But ask me the same thing if a Jamaican family moved next door with six children and they play reggae and rock music all day. Or if an estate agent comes to my house and tells me that because a Jamaican family has moved next door the value of my property has fallen through the floor. Ask me then!"
Works
Steiner's literary career spanned half a century. He published original essays and books that address the anomalies of contemporary Western culture, issues of language and its "debasement" in the post-Holocaust age. His field was primarily comparative literature, and his work as a critic tended toward exploring cultural and philosophical issues, particularly dealing with translation and the nature of language and literature.
Steiner's first published book was Tolstoy or Dostoevsky: An Essay in Contrast (1960), which was a study of the different ideas and ideologies of the Russian writers Leo Tolstoy and Fyodor Dostoevsky. The Death of Tragedy (1961) originated as his doctoral thesis at the University of Oxford and examined literature from the ancient Greeks to the mid-20th century. His best-known book, After Babel (1975), was an early and influential contribution to the field of translation studies. It was adapted for television as The Tongues of Men (1977), and was the inspiration behind the creation in 1983 of the English avant-rock group News from Babel.
Works of literary fiction by Steiner include four short story collections, Anno Domini: Three Stories (1964), Proofs and Three Parables (1992), The Deeps of the Sea (1996), and A cinq heures de l'après-midi (2008); and his controversial novella, The Portage to San Cristobal of A.H. (1981). Portage to San Cristobal, in which Jewish Nazi hunters find Adolf Hitler (the "A.H." of the novella's title) alive in the Amazon jungle thirty years after the end of World War II, explored ideas about the origins of European anti-semitism first expounded by Steiner in his critical work In Bluebeard's Castle (1971). Steiner has suggested that Nazism was Europe's revenge on the Jews for inventing conscience. Cheyette sees Steiner's fiction as "an exploratory space where he can think against himself." It "contrasts its humility and openness with his increasingly closed and orthodox critical work." Central to it is the survivor's "terrible, masochistic envy about not being there – having missed the rendezvous with hell".
No Passion Spent (1996) is a collection of essays on topics as diverse as Kierkegaard, Homer in translation, Biblical texts, and Freud's dream theory. Errata: An Examined Life (1997) is a semi-autobiography, and Grammars of Creation (2001), based on Steiner's 1990 Gifford Lectures delivered at the University of Glasgow, explores a range of subjects from cosmology to poetry.
Awards and honors
George Steiner received many honors, including:
A Rhodes Scholarship (1950)
A Guggenheim Fellowship (1970/1971)
Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur by the French Government (1984)
The Morton Dauwen Zabel Prize from The American Academy of Arts and Letters (1989)
The King Albert Medal by the Belgian Academy Council of Applied Sciences
An honorary fellow of Balliol College, Oxford (1995)
The Truman Capote Lifetime Achievement Award by Stanford University (1998)
The Prince of Asturias Award for Communication and Humanities (2001)
Fellowship of the British Academy (1998)
Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Arts
Honorary Doctorate of Literature degrees from:
University of East Anglia (1976)
University of Leuven (1980)
Mount Holyoke College (1983)
Bristol University (1989)
University of Glasgow (1990)
University of Liège (1990)
University of Ulster (1993)
Durham University (1995)
University of Salamanca (2002)
Queen Mary University of London (2006)
Alma Mater Studiorum – Università di Bologna (2006)
Honoris Causa – Faculty of Letters – University of Lisbon (2009)
He has also won numerous awards for his fiction and poetry, including:
Remembrance Award (1974) for Language and Silence: Essays 1958–1966.
PEN/Macmillan Silver Pen Award (1992) for Proofs and Three Parables.
PEN/Macmillan Fiction Prize (1993) for Proofs and Three Parables.
JQ Wingate Prize for Non-Fiction (joint winner with Louise Kehoe and Silvia Rodgers) (1997) for No Passion Spent.
Bibliography
References
Sources
Averil Condren, Papers of George Steiner, Churchill Archives Centre, 2001
The Harvard Gazette (27.09.01)
External links
George Steiner at ContemporaryWriters.com.
George and his dragons. The Guardian, March 17, 2001.
A traveller in the realm of the mind. Interview with George Steiner, The Times, September 22, 1997.
Grammars of Creation. Full text of Steiner's 2001 lecture.
"Between Repulsion and Attraction: George Steiner's Post-Holocaust Fiction". Jewish Social Studies, 1999.
"George Steiner's Jewish Problem". Azure: Ideas for the Jewish Nation.
About George Steiner, by Juan Asensio, L'Harmattan, 2001
George Steiner bibliography. Fantastic Fiction
George Steiner in Literal – features an essay by Steiner
Interviewed by Alan Macfarlane 23rd July 2007 (video)
Audio: George Steiner in conversation on the BBC World Service discussion show The Forum.
Biography and summary of Gifford Lectures by Dr Brannon Hancock
The Rest is Silence: On George Steiner,1929–2020. Ben Hutchinson, Times Literary Supplement, 2020
The Papers of George Steiner held at Churchill Archives Centre
1929 births
2020 deaths
20th-century American novelists
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Alumni of Balliol College, Oxford
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American essayists
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21st-century American male writers | false | [
"Přírodní park Třebíčsko (before Oblast klidu Třebíčsko) is a natural park near Třebíč in the Czech Republic. There are many interesting plants. The park was founded in 1983.\n\nKobylinec and Ptáčovský kopeček\n\nKobylinec is a natural monument situated ca 0,5 km from the village of Trnava.\nThe area of this monument is 0,44 ha. Pulsatilla grandis can be found here and in the Ptáčovský kopeček park near Ptáčov near Třebíč. Both monuments are very popular for tourists.\n\nPonds\n\nIn the natural park there are some interesting ponds such as Velký Bor, Malý Bor, Buršík near Přeckov and a brook Březinka. Dams on the brook are examples of European beaver activity.\n\nSyenitové skály near Pocoucov\n\nSyenitové skály (rocks of syenit) near Pocoucov is one of famed locations. There are interesting granite boulders. The area of the reservation is 0,77 ha.\n\nExternal links\nParts of this article or all article was translated from Czech. The original article is :cs:Přírodní park Třebíčsko.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nNature near the village Trnava which is there\n\nTřebíč\nParks in the Czech Republic\nTourist attractions in the Vysočina Region",
"Damn Interesting is an independent website founded by Alan Bellows in 2005. The website presents true stories from science, history, and psychology, primarily as long-form articles, often illustrated with original artwork. Works are written by various authors, and published at irregular intervals. The website openly rejects advertising, relying on reader and listener donations to cover operating costs.\n\nAs of October 2012, each article is also published as a podcast under the same name. In November 2019, a second podcast was launched under the title Damn Interesting Week, featuring unscripted commentary on an assortment of news articles featured on the website's \"Curated Links\" section that week. In mid-2020, a third podcast called Damn Interesting Curio Cabinet began highlighting the website's periodic short-form articles in the same radioplay format as the original podcast.\n\nIn July 2009, Damn Interesting published the print book Alien Hand Syndrome through Workman Publishing. It contains some favorites from the site and some exclusive content.\n\nAwards and recognition \nIn August 2007, PC Magazine named Damn Interesting one of the \"Top 100 Undiscovered Web Sites\".\nThe article \"The Zero-Armed Bandit\" by Alan Bellows won a 2015 Sidney Award from David Brooks in The New York Times.\nThe article \"Ghoulish Acts and Dastardly Deeds\" by Alan Bellows was cited as \"nonfiction journalism from 2017 that will stand the test of time\" by Conor Friedersdorf in The Atlantic.\nThe article \"Dupes and Duplicity\" by Jennifer Lee Noonan won a 2020 Sidney Award from David Brooks in the New York Times.\n\nAccusing The Dollop of plagiarism \n\nOn July 9, 2015, Bellows posted an open letter accusing The Dollop, a comedy podcast about history, of plagiarism due to their repeated use of verbatim text from Damn Interesting articles without permission or attribution. Dave Anthony, the writer of The Dollop, responded on reddit, admitting to using Damn Interesting content, but claiming that the use was protected by fair use, and that \"historical facts are not copyrightable.\" In an article about the controversy on Plagiarism Today, Jonathan Bailey concluded, \"Any way one looks at it, The Dollop failed its ethical obligations to all of the people, not just those writing for Damn Interesting, who put in the time, energy and expertise into writing the original content upon which their show is based.\"\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Official website\n\n2005 podcast debuts"
]
|
[
"George M. Cohan",
"Early life and education"
]
| C_7e2b8b9772ed4661af2694b700a03d8d_1 | What happened in George M. Cohan's early life? | 1 | What happened in George M. Cohan's early life? | George M. Cohan | Cohan was born in 1878 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Irish Catholic parents. A baptismal certificate from St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church (which gave the wrong first name for his mother) indicated that he was born on July 3, but Cohan and his family always insisted that George had been "born on the Fourth of July!" George's parents were traveling vaudeville performers, and he joined them on stage while still an infant, first as a prop, learning to dance and sing soon after he could walk and talk. Cohan started as a child performer at age 8, first on the violin and then as a dancer. He was the fourth member of the family vaudeville act called The Four Cohans, which included his father Jeremiah "Jere" (Keohane) Cohan (1848-1917), mother Helen "Nellie" Costigan Cohan (1854-1928) and sister Josephine "Josie" Cohan Niblo (1876-1916). In 1890, he toured as the star of a show called Peck's Bad Boy and then joined the family act; The Four Cohans mostly toured together from 1890 to 1901. He and his sister made their Broadway debut in 1893 in a sketch called The Lively Bootblack. Temperamental in his early years, Cohan later learned to control his frustrations. During these years, Cohan originated his famous curtain speech: "My mother thanks you, my father thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I thank you." As a child, Cohan and his family toured most of the year and spent summer vacations from the vaudeville circuit at his grandmother's home in North Brookfield, Massachusetts, where Cohan befriended baseball player Connie Mack. The family generally gave a performance at the town hall there each summer, and Cohan had a chance to gain some more normal childhood experiences, like riding his bike and playing sandlot baseball. Cohan's memories of those happy summers inspired his 1907 musical 50 Miles from Boston, which is set in North Brookfield and contains one of his most famous songs, "Harrigan". As Cohan matured through his teens, he used the quiet summers there to write. When he returned to the town in the cast of Ah, Wilderness! in 1934, he told a reporter, "I've knocked around everywhere, but there's no place like North Brookfield." CANNOTANSWER | Cohan was born in 1878 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Irish Catholic parents. | George Michael Cohan (July 3, 1878November 5, 1942) was an American entertainer, playwright, composer, lyricist, actor, singer, dancer and theatrical producer.
Cohan began his career as a child, performing with his parents and sister in a vaudeville act known as "The Four Cohans". Beginning with Little Johnny Jones in 1904, he wrote, composed, produced, and appeared in more than three dozen Broadway musicals. Cohan wrote more than 50 shows and published more than 300 songs during his lifetime, including the standards "Over There", "Give My Regards to Broadway", "The Yankee Doodle Boy" and "You're a Grand Old Flag". As a composer, he was one of the early members of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP). He displayed remarkable theatrical longevity, appearing in films until the 1930s and continuing to perform as a headline artist until 1940.
Known in the decade before World War I as "the man who owned Broadway", he is considered the father of American musical comedy. His life and music were depicted in the Oscar-winning film Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) and the 1968 musical George M! A statue of Cohan in Times Square, New York City commemorates his contributions to American musical theatre.
Early life
Cohan was born in 1878 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Irish Catholic parents. A baptismal certificate from St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church (which gave the wrong first name for his mother) indicated that Cohan was born on July 3, but he and his family always insisted that he had been "born on the Fourth of July!" His parents were traveling vaudeville performers, and he joined them on stage while still an infant, first as a prop, learning to dance and sing soon after he could walk and talk.
Cohan started as a child performer at age 8, first on the violin and then as a dancer. He was the fourth member of the family vaudeville act called The Four Cohans, which included his father Jeremiah "Jere" (Keohane) Cohan (1848–1917), mother Helen "Nellie" Costigan Cohan (1854–1928) and sister Josephine "Josie" Cohan Niblo (1876–1916). In 1890, he toured as the star of a show called Peck's Bad Boy and then joined the family act. The Four Cohans mostly toured together from 1890 to 1901. Cohan and his sister made their Broadway debuts in 1893 in a sketch called The Lively Bootblack. Temperamental in his early years, he later learned to control his frustrations. During these years, he originated his famous curtain speech: "My mother thanks you, my father thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I thank you."
As a child, Cohan and his family toured most of the year and spent summer vacations from the vaudeville circuit at his grandmother's home in North Brookfield, Massachusetts, where he befriended baseball player Connie Mack. The family generally gave a performance at the town hall there each summer, and Cohan had a chance to gain some more normal childhood experiences, like riding his bike and playing sandlot baseball. His memories of those happy summers inspired his 1907 musical 50 Miles from Boston, which is set in North Brookfield and contains one of his most famous songs, "Harrigan". As he matured through his teens, he used the quiet summers there to write. When he returned to the town in the cast of Ah, Wilderness! in 1934, he told a reporter "I've knocked around everywhere, but there's no place like North Brookfield."
Career
Early career
Cohan began writing original skits (over 150 of them) and songs for the family act in both vaudeville and minstrel shows while in his teens. Soon he was writing professionally, selling his first songs to a national publisher in 1893. In 1901 he wrote, directed and produced his first Broadway musical, The Governor's Son, for The Four Cohans. His first big Broadway hit in 1904 was the show Little Johnny Jones, which introduced his tunes "Give My Regards to Broadway" and "The Yankee Doodle Boy".
Cohan became one of the leading Tin Pan Alley songwriters, publishing upwards of 300 original songs noted for their catchy melodies and clever lyrics. His major hit songs included "You're a Grand Old Flag," "Forty-Five Minutes from Broadway," "Mary Is a Grand Old Name," "The Warmest Baby in the Bunch," "Life's a Funny Proposition After All," "I Want To Hear a Yankee Doodle Tune," "You Won't Do Any Business if You Haven't Got a Band," "The Small Town Gal," "I'm Mighty Glad I'm Living, That's All," "That Haunting Melody," "Always Leave Them Laughing When You Say Goodbye", and America's most popular World War I song "Over There", recorded by Nora Bayes and by Enrico Caruso, and others. The latter song reached such currency among troops and shipyard workers that a ship was named "Costigan" after Cohan's grandfather, Dennis Costigan. During the christening, "Over There" was played.
From 1904 to 1920, Cohan created and produced over 50 musicals, plays and revues on Broadway together with his friend Sam H. Harris, including Give My Regards to Broadway and the successful Going Up in 1917, which became a smash hit in London the following year. His shows ran simultaneously in as many as five theatres. One of Cohan's most innovative plays was a dramatization of the mystery Seven Keys to Baldpate in 1913, which baffled some audiences and critics but became a hit. Cohan further adapted it as a film in 1917, and it was adapted for film six more times, as well as for TV and radio. He dropped out of acting for some years after his 1919 dispute with Actors' Equity Association.
In 1925, he published his autobiography Twenty Years on Broadway and the Years It Took to Get There.
Later career
Cohan appeared in 1930 in The Song and Dance Man, a revival of his tribute to vaudeville and his father. In 1932, he starred in a dual role as a cold, corrupt politician and his charming, idealistic campaign double in the Hollywood musical film The Phantom President. The film co-starred Claudette Colbert and Jimmy Durante, with songs by Rodgers and Hart, and was released by Paramount Pictures. He appeared in some earlier silent films but he disliked Hollywood production methods and only made one other sound film, Gambling (1934), based on his own 1929 play and shot in New York City. A critic called Gambling a "stodgy adaptation of a definitely dated play directed in obsolete theatrical technique". It is considered a lost film.
Cohan earned acclaim as a serious actor in Eugene O'Neill's only comedy Ah, Wilderness! (1933) and in the role of a song-and-dance President Franklin D. Roosevelt in Rodgers and Hart's musical I'd Rather Be Right (1937). The same year, he reunited with Harris to produce a play titled Fulton of Oak Falls, starring Cohan. His final play, The Return of the Vagabond (1940), featured a young Celeste Holm in the cast.
In 1940, Judy Garland played the title role in a film version of his 1922 musical Little Nellie Kelly. Cohan's mystery play Seven Keys to Baldpate was first filmed in 1916 and has been remade seven times, most recently as House of the Long Shadows (1983), starring Vincent Price. In 1942, a musical biopic of Cohan, Yankee Doodle Dandy, was released, and James Cagney's performance in the title role earned the Best Actor Academy Award. The film was privately screened for Cohan as he battled the last stages of abdominal cancer, and he commented on Cagney's performance: "My God, what an act to follow!" Cohan's 1920 play The Meanest Man in the World was filmed in 1943 with Jack Benny.
Legacy
Although Cohan mainly is remembered for his songs, he became an early pioneer in the development of the "book musical", using his engaging libretti to bridge the gaps between drama and music. More than three decades before Agnes de Mille choreographed Oklahoma!, Cohan used dance not merely as razzle-dazzle, but to advance the plot. Cohan's main characters were "average Joes and Janes" who appealed to a wide American audience.
In 1914, Cohan became one of the founding members of ASCAP. Although Cohan was known as generous to his fellow actors in need, in 1919, he unsuccessfully opposed a historic strike by Actors' Equity Association, for which many in the theatrical professions never forgave him. Cohan opposed the strike because in addition to being an actor in his productions, he was also the producer of the musical that set the terms and conditions of the actors' employment. During the strike, he donated $100,000 to finance the Actors' Retirement Fund in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey. After Actors' Equity was recognized, Cohan refused to join the union as an actor, which hampered his ability to appear in his own productions. Cohan sought a waiver from Equity allowing him to act in any theatrical production. In 1930, Cohan won a law case against the Internal Revenue Service that allowed the deduction, for federal income tax purposes, of his business travel and entertainment expenses, even though he was not able to document them with certainty. This became known as the "Cohan rule" and frequently is cited in tax cases.
Cohan wrote numerous Broadway musicals and straight plays in addition to contributing material to shows written by others—more than 50 in all. Cohan shows included Little Johnny Jones (1904), Forty-five Minutes from Broadway (1905), George Washington, Jr. (1906), The Talk of New York and The Honeymooners (1907), Fifty Miles from Boston and The Yankee Prince (1908), Broadway Jones (1912), Seven Keys to Baldpate (1913), The American Idea, Get Rich Quick Wallingford, The Man Who Owns Broadway, Little Nellie Kelly, The Cohan Revue of 1916 (and 1918; co-written with Irving Berlin), The Tavern (1920), The Rise of Rosie O'Reilly (1923, featuring a 13-year-old Ruby Keeler among the chorus girls), The Song and Dance Man (1923), Molly Malone, The Miracle Man, Hello Broadway, American Born (1925), The Baby Cyclone (1927, one of Spencer Tracy's early breaks), Elmer the Great (1928, co-written with Ring Lardner), and Pigeons and People (1933). At this point in his life, he walked in and out of retirement.
Cohan was called "the greatest single figure the American theatre ever produced – as a player, playwright, actor, composer and producer". On May 1, 1940, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt presented him with the Congressional Gold Medal for his contributions to World War I morale, in particular with the songs "You're a Grand Old Flag" and "Over There". Cohan was the first person in any artistic field selected for this honor, which previously had gone only to military and political leaders, philanthropists, scientists, inventors, and explorers.
In 1959, at the behest of lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II, a $100,000 bronze statue of Cohan was dedicated in Times Square at Broadway and 46th Street in Manhattan. The 8-foot bronze remains the only statue of an actor on Broadway. He was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970, and into the American Folklore Hall of Fame in 2003. His star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame is located at 6734 Hollywood Boulevard. Cohan was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame on October 15, 2006.
The United States Postal Service issued a 15-cent commemorative stamp honoring Cohan on the anniversary of his centenary, July 3, 1978. The stamp depicts both the older Cohan and his younger self as a dancer, with the tag line "Yankee Doodle Dandy". It was designed by Jim Sharpe. On July 3, 2009, a bronze bust of Cohan, by artist Robert Shure, was unveiled at the corner of Wickenden and Governor Streets in Fox Point, Providence, a few blocks from his birthplace. The city renamed the corner the George M. Cohan Plaza and announced an annual George M. Cohan Award for Excellence in Art & Culture. The first award went to Curt Columbus, the artistic director of Trinity Repertory Company.
Personal life and death
From 1899 to 1907, Cohan was married to Ethel Levey (1881–1955; born Grace Ethelia Fowler), a musical comedy actress and dancer. Levey and Cohan had a daughter, actress Georgette Cohan Souther Rowse (1900–1988). Levey joined the Four Cohans when Josie married, and she starred in Little Johnny Jones and other Cohan works. In 1907, Levey divorced Cohan on grounds of adultery.
In 1908, Cohan married Agnes Mary Nolan (1883–1972), who had been a dancer in his early shows; they remained married until his death. They had two daughters and a son. The eldest was Mary Cohan Ronkin, a cabaret singer in the 1930s, who composed incidental music for her father's play The Tavern. In 1968, Mary supervised musical and lyric revisions for the musical George M! Their second daughter was Helen Cohan Carola, a film actress, who performed on Broadway with her father in Friendship in 1931. Their youngest child was George Michael Cohan, Jr. (1914–2000), who graduated from Georgetown University and served in the entertainment corps during World War II. In the 1950s, George Jr. reinterpreted his father's songs on recordings, in a nightclub act, and in television appearances on the Ed Sullivan and Milton Berle shows. George Jr.'s only child, Michaela Marie Cohan (1943–1999), was the last descendant named Cohan. She graduated with a theater degree from Marywood College in Pennsylvania in 1965. From 1966 to 1968, she served in a civilian Special Services unit in Vietnam and Korea. In 1996, she stood in for her ailing father at the ceremony marking her grandfather's induction into the Musical Theatre Hall of Fame at New York University. Cohan was a devoted baseball fan, regularly attending games of the former New York Giants.
He died of cancer at the age of 64 on November 5, 1942, at his Manhattan apartment on Fifth Avenue, surrounded by family and friends. His funeral was held at St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York, and was attended by thousands of people, including five governors of New York, two mayors of New York City and the Postmaster General. The honorary pallbearers included Irving Berlin, Eddie Cantor, Frank Crowninshield, Sol Bloom, Brooks Atkinson, Rube Goldberg, Walter Huston, George Jessel, Connie Mack, Joseph McCarthy, Eugene O'Neill, Sigmund Romberg, Lee Shubert and Fred Waring. Cohan was interred at Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx, New York City, in a private family mausoleum he had erected a quarter century earlier for his sister and parents.
In popular culture
James Cagney played Cohan in the 1942 biopic Yankee Doodle Dandy and in the 1955 film The Seven Little Foys. Cagney won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance in Dandy.
Mickey Rooney played Cohan in Mr. Broadway, a television special broadcast on May 11, 1957. The same month, Rooney released a 78 RPM record featuring Rooney singing Cohan's best-known songs on the A-side.
Joel Grey starred on Broadway as Cohan in the musical George M! (1968), which was adapted into a television special in 1970.
Allan Sherman sang a parody-medley of three Cohan tunes on an early album: "Barry (That'll Be the Baby's Name)"; "H-o-r-o-w-i-t-z"; and "Get on the Garden Freeway" to the tune of "Mary's a Grand Old Name", "Harrigan" and "Give My Regards to Broadway", respectively.
Chip Deffaa created a one-man show about the life of Cohan called George M. Cohan Tonight!, which first ran Off-Broadway at the Irish Repertory Theatre in 2006 with Jon Peterson as Cohan. Deffaa has written and directed five other plays about Cohan.
Filmography
Cohan acted in the following films:
Gallery
Notes
References
McCabe, John: George M. Cohan. The Man Who Owned Broadway (New York: Doubleday & Co., 1973)
Further reading
Cohan, George M.: Twenty Years on Broadway (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1924)
Gilbert, Douglas: American Vaudeville. Its Life and Times (New York: Dover Publications, 1963)
Jones, John Bush: Our Musicals, Ourselves. A Social History of the American Musical Theatre (Lebanon, NH: Brandeis University Press, 2003)
Morehouse, Ward: George M. Cohan. Prince of the American Theater (Philadelphia & New York: J. B. Lippincott Co., 1943)
External links
George M. Cohan at Internet off-Broadway Database
George M. Cohan In America's Theater
George M. Cohan on musicals101.com
F. Gwynplaine MacIntyre, "Dancing after retirement: Cohan plays Roosevelt, 1937", New York Daily News, March 20, 2004.
Chip Deffaa's extensive George M. Cohan site
George M. Cohan; PeriodPaper.com c. 1910
Finding aid for the Edward B. Marks Music Co. Collection on George M. Cohan, 1901–1968 at the Museum of the City of New York
George M. Cohan recordings at the Discography of American Historical Recordings
1878 births
1942 deaths
19th-century American dramatists and playwrights
19th-century American male actors
19th-century American male writers
19th-century American singers
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American male actors
20th-century American male writers
20th-century American singers
Actors from Providence, Rhode Island
American male child actors
American male dancers
American male dramatists and playwrights
American male film actors
American male musical theatre actors
American male silent film actors
American male singers
American male songwriters
American male stage actors
American musical theatre composers
American musical theatre directors
American people of Irish descent
American tap dancers
American theatre directors
Broadway composers and lyricists
Broadway theatre directors
Broadway theatre producers
Burials at Woodlawn Cemetery (Bronx, New York)
Catholics from Massachusetts
Catholics from Rhode Island
George M.
Congressional Gold Medal recipients
Deaths from cancer in New York (state)
Eccentric dancers
Male actors from Rhode Island
Male musical theatre composers
Musicians from Providence, Rhode Island
People from North Brookfield, Massachusetts
Vaudeville performers
Writers from Providence, Rhode Island
Members of The Lambs Club | true | [
"Mary Cohan (1909–1983), aka Mary Cohan Ronkin, was an American Broadway composer and lyricist, and the middle daughter of vaudeville and Broadway legend George M. Cohan. George's mother's middle name was Mary, and it is believed that his daughter was named after her. (Mary's mother was named Agnes Mary Nolan.)\n\nFollowing a brief career as a cabaret singer, Mary Cohan established herself as a Broadway talent in 1930, when she composed a score for her father's non-musical play The Tavern.\n\nWorking with writers John Pascal, Francine Pascal, and Michael Stewart, Mary Cohan supervised the musical and lyrical revisions of her father's songs for the hit 1968 Broadway musical, George M!.\n\nPersonal life\nLike most of the Cohans, Mary was guarded about her private life. She married Neil Litt, an orchestra leader, in September 1927; they had one daughter and were later divorced. In 1940, she shocked her family by eloping with accordion player George Ronkin (aka Ranken). Not much more is known about her personal life.\n\nWhat is known is that Mary Cohan was adored by her larger-than-life father. The song \"Mary's a Grand Old Name,\" written by George M. Cohan for the Broadway musical Only 45 Minutes from Broadway and featured in the 1942 film Yankee Doodle Dandy, was reportedly written by Cohan for his daughter, Mary.\n\nMary Cohan Ronkin died in 1983.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nAmerican musical theatre composers\nAmerican musical theatre lyricists\n1909 births\n1983 deaths\nPlace of birth missing\nPlace of death missing\nMary\n20th-century American composers",
"George M! is a Broadway musical based on the life of George M. Cohan, the biggest Broadway star of his day who was known as \"The Man Who Owned Broadway.\" The book for the musical was written by Michael Stewart, John Pascal, and Francine Pascal. Music and lyrics were by George M. Cohan himself, with revisions for the musical by Cohan's daughter, Mary Cohan.\n\nThe story covers the period from the late 1880s until 1937 and focuses on Cohan's life and show business career from his early days in vaudeville with his parents and sister to his later success as a Broadway singer, dancer, composer, lyricist, theatre director and producer. The show includes such Cohan hit songs as \"Give My Regards To Broadway\", \"You're a Grand Old Flag\", and \"Yankee Doodle Dandy.\"\n\nProductions\nThe musical opened on Broadway at the Palace Theatre on April 10, 1968 and closed on April 26, 1969 after 433 performances and 8 previews. The show was produced by David Black and directed and choreographed by Joe Layton. The cast featured Joel Grey as George M. Cohan, Bernadette Peters, Jill O'Hara, Jamie Donnelly, and Betty Ann Grove.\n\nThe play was profiled in the William Goldman book The Season: A Candid Look at Broadway.\n\nA television adaptation, presented as a staged reading of the musical with the performers discussing Cohan's life and work between rehearsal-style song-and-dance routines, was broadcast by NBC on September 12, 1970. Grey and Peters were joined by Jack Cassidy, Nanette Fabray, Anita Gillette, and Blythe Danner.\n\nSynopsis\nAct I\n\nJerry and Nellie Cohan waste no time adding their young son to their travelling vaudeville act, \"The Four Cohans\", with sister Josie. By the time George is 20, they are playing the Columbia Theatre in Cedar Rapids, and George has landed an audition for the family with impresario E. F. Albee. But Albee doesn't make a good enough offer, and George books the act into the Adams Street Theatre in New York. There they meet singer Ethel Levey, and soon George and Ethel get married. Now George is determined to move \"The Five Cohans\" from vaudeville to musical comedy, and so he writes his first full-length show, The Governor's Son. The musical is a flop, but George is undeterred and opens his next show, Little Johnny Jones. After a momentary crisis of confidence, the company is on stage as George begins the song \"Give My Regards to Broadway\". By the time the song is over, the Yankee Doodle Kid is a hit.\n\nAct II\n\nGeorge's career soars higher and higher. He is now a producer, and he and his partner, Sam H. Harris sign Fay Templeton to appear in their show, and we hear some of Cohan's most famous songs, \"Mary\", \"Forty-Five Minutes from Broadway\", and \"So Long Mary\". Ethel feels neglected by her high-flying husband, and the two are divorced. George is crushed, but later meets Agnes Nolan from the cast of Little Johnny Jones. Soon they are married and, together with Agnes, George writes some of his most enduring work, including the songs \"Yankee Doodle Dandy\", \"Harrigan\", \"Over There\", and \"You're a Grand Old Flag.\" But George loses family members, and Broadway is changing – actors are unionizing, and Actors Equity is making demands. George first resists evolving and then retreats from the stage for many years. Eventually, though, Harris offers him a role in I'd Rather Be Right, and, lonely for the stage, he accepts. But his old style is no longer right for 1937, and George is used to being the boss, not just another actor. On stage, alone, George remembers his former glory, singing \"Give My Regards to Broadway.\" He can still tap, after all, and his wife Agnes joins him to reprise \"Yankee Doodle Dandy\" before he leaves the theatre – at least he's on Broadway.\n\nSongs\n\nAct I\n Musical Moon—Jerry Cohan and Nellie Cohan\n Oh, You Wonderful Boy—Josie Cohan\n All Aboard for Broadway—George M. Cohan and Four Cohans\n Musical Comedy Man—Four Cohans and Full Company\n All Aboard for Broadway (Reprise) – Four Cohans and Full Company\n I Was Born in Virginia—Ethel Levey\n Twentieth Century Love—Four Cohans and Ethel Levey\n My Town—George M. Cohan\n Billie—Agnes Nolan\n Push Me Along in My Pushcart—Ethel Levey and Pushcart Girls\n Ring to the Name of Rose—Josie Cohan and Bell Ringers\n Popularity—Willie and Full Company\n Give My Regards to Broadway—George M. Cohan and Full Company\n\nAct II\n Forty-five Minutes from Broadway—George M. Cohan and Rose\n So Long, Mary—George M. Cohan, Sam Harris, Rose, Freddie and Ma Templeton\n Down by the Erie—Secretary, Politicians, Little Girl in Templeton scene and Full Company\n Mary Is a Grand Old Name—Fay Templeteon\n All Our Friends—Sam Harris and Full Company\n Yankee Doodle Dandy—George M. Cohan and Full Company\n Nellie Kelly I Love You—George M. Cohan and Full Company\n Harrigan—George M. Cohan and Full Company\n Over There—George M. Cohan and Full Company\n You're a Grand Old Flag—George M. Cohan and Full Company\n The City—Full Company\n I'd Rather Be Right—George M. Cohan and Company\n Give My Regards to Broadway (Reprise) – George M. Cohan\n Dancing Our Worries Away—Full Company\n The Great Easter Sunday Parade—Full Company\n Hannah's a Hummer—Full Company\n Barnum and Bailey Rag—Full Company\n The Belle of the Barber's Ball—Full Company\n The American Ragtime—Full Company\n All in the Wearing—Full Company\n I Want to Hear a Yankee Doodle Tune—Full Company\n\nCharacters and original cast\nGeorge M. Cohan – Joel Grey\nJerry Cohan (George's father) – Jerry Dodge\nEthel Levey (George's first wife) – Jamie Donnelly\nNellie Cohan (George's mother) – Betty Ann Grove\nAgnes Nolan (George's second wife) – Jill O'Hara\nJosie Cohan (George's sister) – Bernadette Peters\nFay Templeton – Jacqueline Alloway\nSam Harris (producer) – Harvey Evans\n\nCritical response\nWilliam Goldman wrote about this production in his 1968 book The Season: \"Everybody knew how bad George M! was, in spite of Joe Layton's directing work. The show had its troubles on the road...the problem all along was to try to warm up the central figure. George M! was one of the two most painful productions of the season...\"\n\nClive Barnes reviewed for The New York Times. He wrote that while the musical \"has a lot going for it\", it was \"burdended\" by its book. \"The musical is a scrappy, ill-prepared mediocrely written account of George M. Cohan...\" He praised the use of many of Cohan's songs, and praised Joel Grey's performance: \"Sharp as a whiplash, either with his derby tilted down to his nose, ... or his arms thrown out...he danced with a frenetic passion, and a God-given sense of timing...\" He also praised Joe Layton's choreography: \"the dancing is as good, if not better as any in town.\"\n\nAwards and nominations\nSource: Playbill\n\n 1969 Tony Award Winner for Best Choreography, Winner, Joe Layton\n 1969 Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical, nominee, Joel Grey\n 1968 Theatre World Award Winner, Bernadette Peters\n 1968 Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Musical, Winner\n 1968 Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Performance, Winner, Joel Grey\n 1971 Emmy Award Nomination for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Comedy, Variety or Music (TV adaptation: Walter C. Miller & Martin Charnin)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n (1970 TV adaptation)\nTams-Witmark plot details\nInformation guidetomusicaltheatre.com\nProfile of the show from BroadwayMusicalHome.com\nPlaybill from 1968 production\n\n1968 musicals\nBroadway musicals\nMusicals inspired by real-life events\n1970s American television specials\n1970 television specials\n1970 in American television\nMusicals by Michael Stewart (playwright)\nMusical television films\nMusical television specials\nGeorge M. Cohan\nTony Award-winning musicals"
]
|
[
"George M. Cohan",
"Early life and education",
"What happened in George M. Cohan's early life?",
"Cohan was born in 1878 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Irish Catholic parents."
]
| C_7e2b8b9772ed4661af2694b700a03d8d_1 | Where did he attend high school? | 2 | Where did George M. Cohan attend high school? | George M. Cohan | Cohan was born in 1878 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Irish Catholic parents. A baptismal certificate from St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church (which gave the wrong first name for his mother) indicated that he was born on July 3, but Cohan and his family always insisted that George had been "born on the Fourth of July!" George's parents were traveling vaudeville performers, and he joined them on stage while still an infant, first as a prop, learning to dance and sing soon after he could walk and talk. Cohan started as a child performer at age 8, first on the violin and then as a dancer. He was the fourth member of the family vaudeville act called The Four Cohans, which included his father Jeremiah "Jere" (Keohane) Cohan (1848-1917), mother Helen "Nellie" Costigan Cohan (1854-1928) and sister Josephine "Josie" Cohan Niblo (1876-1916). In 1890, he toured as the star of a show called Peck's Bad Boy and then joined the family act; The Four Cohans mostly toured together from 1890 to 1901. He and his sister made their Broadway debut in 1893 in a sketch called The Lively Bootblack. Temperamental in his early years, Cohan later learned to control his frustrations. During these years, Cohan originated his famous curtain speech: "My mother thanks you, my father thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I thank you." As a child, Cohan and his family toured most of the year and spent summer vacations from the vaudeville circuit at his grandmother's home in North Brookfield, Massachusetts, where Cohan befriended baseball player Connie Mack. The family generally gave a performance at the town hall there each summer, and Cohan had a chance to gain some more normal childhood experiences, like riding his bike and playing sandlot baseball. Cohan's memories of those happy summers inspired his 1907 musical 50 Miles from Boston, which is set in North Brookfield and contains one of his most famous songs, "Harrigan". As Cohan matured through his teens, he used the quiet summers there to write. When he returned to the town in the cast of Ah, Wilderness! in 1934, he told a reporter, "I've knocked around everywhere, but there's no place like North Brookfield." CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | George Michael Cohan (July 3, 1878November 5, 1942) was an American entertainer, playwright, composer, lyricist, actor, singer, dancer and theatrical producer.
Cohan began his career as a child, performing with his parents and sister in a vaudeville act known as "The Four Cohans". Beginning with Little Johnny Jones in 1904, he wrote, composed, produced, and appeared in more than three dozen Broadway musicals. Cohan wrote more than 50 shows and published more than 300 songs during his lifetime, including the standards "Over There", "Give My Regards to Broadway", "The Yankee Doodle Boy" and "You're a Grand Old Flag". As a composer, he was one of the early members of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP). He displayed remarkable theatrical longevity, appearing in films until the 1930s and continuing to perform as a headline artist until 1940.
Known in the decade before World War I as "the man who owned Broadway", he is considered the father of American musical comedy. His life and music were depicted in the Oscar-winning film Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) and the 1968 musical George M! A statue of Cohan in Times Square, New York City commemorates his contributions to American musical theatre.
Early life
Cohan was born in 1878 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Irish Catholic parents. A baptismal certificate from St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church (which gave the wrong first name for his mother) indicated that Cohan was born on July 3, but he and his family always insisted that he had been "born on the Fourth of July!" His parents were traveling vaudeville performers, and he joined them on stage while still an infant, first as a prop, learning to dance and sing soon after he could walk and talk.
Cohan started as a child performer at age 8, first on the violin and then as a dancer. He was the fourth member of the family vaudeville act called The Four Cohans, which included his father Jeremiah "Jere" (Keohane) Cohan (1848–1917), mother Helen "Nellie" Costigan Cohan (1854–1928) and sister Josephine "Josie" Cohan Niblo (1876–1916). In 1890, he toured as the star of a show called Peck's Bad Boy and then joined the family act. The Four Cohans mostly toured together from 1890 to 1901. Cohan and his sister made their Broadway debuts in 1893 in a sketch called The Lively Bootblack. Temperamental in his early years, he later learned to control his frustrations. During these years, he originated his famous curtain speech: "My mother thanks you, my father thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I thank you."
As a child, Cohan and his family toured most of the year and spent summer vacations from the vaudeville circuit at his grandmother's home in North Brookfield, Massachusetts, where he befriended baseball player Connie Mack. The family generally gave a performance at the town hall there each summer, and Cohan had a chance to gain some more normal childhood experiences, like riding his bike and playing sandlot baseball. His memories of those happy summers inspired his 1907 musical 50 Miles from Boston, which is set in North Brookfield and contains one of his most famous songs, "Harrigan". As he matured through his teens, he used the quiet summers there to write. When he returned to the town in the cast of Ah, Wilderness! in 1934, he told a reporter "I've knocked around everywhere, but there's no place like North Brookfield."
Career
Early career
Cohan began writing original skits (over 150 of them) and songs for the family act in both vaudeville and minstrel shows while in his teens. Soon he was writing professionally, selling his first songs to a national publisher in 1893. In 1901 he wrote, directed and produced his first Broadway musical, The Governor's Son, for The Four Cohans. His first big Broadway hit in 1904 was the show Little Johnny Jones, which introduced his tunes "Give My Regards to Broadway" and "The Yankee Doodle Boy".
Cohan became one of the leading Tin Pan Alley songwriters, publishing upwards of 300 original songs noted for their catchy melodies and clever lyrics. His major hit songs included "You're a Grand Old Flag," "Forty-Five Minutes from Broadway," "Mary Is a Grand Old Name," "The Warmest Baby in the Bunch," "Life's a Funny Proposition After All," "I Want To Hear a Yankee Doodle Tune," "You Won't Do Any Business if You Haven't Got a Band," "The Small Town Gal," "I'm Mighty Glad I'm Living, That's All," "That Haunting Melody," "Always Leave Them Laughing When You Say Goodbye", and America's most popular World War I song "Over There", recorded by Nora Bayes and by Enrico Caruso, and others. The latter song reached such currency among troops and shipyard workers that a ship was named "Costigan" after Cohan's grandfather, Dennis Costigan. During the christening, "Over There" was played.
From 1904 to 1920, Cohan created and produced over 50 musicals, plays and revues on Broadway together with his friend Sam H. Harris, including Give My Regards to Broadway and the successful Going Up in 1917, which became a smash hit in London the following year. His shows ran simultaneously in as many as five theatres. One of Cohan's most innovative plays was a dramatization of the mystery Seven Keys to Baldpate in 1913, which baffled some audiences and critics but became a hit. Cohan further adapted it as a film in 1917, and it was adapted for film six more times, as well as for TV and radio. He dropped out of acting for some years after his 1919 dispute with Actors' Equity Association.
In 1925, he published his autobiography Twenty Years on Broadway and the Years It Took to Get There.
Later career
Cohan appeared in 1930 in The Song and Dance Man, a revival of his tribute to vaudeville and his father. In 1932, he starred in a dual role as a cold, corrupt politician and his charming, idealistic campaign double in the Hollywood musical film The Phantom President. The film co-starred Claudette Colbert and Jimmy Durante, with songs by Rodgers and Hart, and was released by Paramount Pictures. He appeared in some earlier silent films but he disliked Hollywood production methods and only made one other sound film, Gambling (1934), based on his own 1929 play and shot in New York City. A critic called Gambling a "stodgy adaptation of a definitely dated play directed in obsolete theatrical technique". It is considered a lost film.
Cohan earned acclaim as a serious actor in Eugene O'Neill's only comedy Ah, Wilderness! (1933) and in the role of a song-and-dance President Franklin D. Roosevelt in Rodgers and Hart's musical I'd Rather Be Right (1937). The same year, he reunited with Harris to produce a play titled Fulton of Oak Falls, starring Cohan. His final play, The Return of the Vagabond (1940), featured a young Celeste Holm in the cast.
In 1940, Judy Garland played the title role in a film version of his 1922 musical Little Nellie Kelly. Cohan's mystery play Seven Keys to Baldpate was first filmed in 1916 and has been remade seven times, most recently as House of the Long Shadows (1983), starring Vincent Price. In 1942, a musical biopic of Cohan, Yankee Doodle Dandy, was released, and James Cagney's performance in the title role earned the Best Actor Academy Award. The film was privately screened for Cohan as he battled the last stages of abdominal cancer, and he commented on Cagney's performance: "My God, what an act to follow!" Cohan's 1920 play The Meanest Man in the World was filmed in 1943 with Jack Benny.
Legacy
Although Cohan mainly is remembered for his songs, he became an early pioneer in the development of the "book musical", using his engaging libretti to bridge the gaps between drama and music. More than three decades before Agnes de Mille choreographed Oklahoma!, Cohan used dance not merely as razzle-dazzle, but to advance the plot. Cohan's main characters were "average Joes and Janes" who appealed to a wide American audience.
In 1914, Cohan became one of the founding members of ASCAP. Although Cohan was known as generous to his fellow actors in need, in 1919, he unsuccessfully opposed a historic strike by Actors' Equity Association, for which many in the theatrical professions never forgave him. Cohan opposed the strike because in addition to being an actor in his productions, he was also the producer of the musical that set the terms and conditions of the actors' employment. During the strike, he donated $100,000 to finance the Actors' Retirement Fund in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey. After Actors' Equity was recognized, Cohan refused to join the union as an actor, which hampered his ability to appear in his own productions. Cohan sought a waiver from Equity allowing him to act in any theatrical production. In 1930, Cohan won a law case against the Internal Revenue Service that allowed the deduction, for federal income tax purposes, of his business travel and entertainment expenses, even though he was not able to document them with certainty. This became known as the "Cohan rule" and frequently is cited in tax cases.
Cohan wrote numerous Broadway musicals and straight plays in addition to contributing material to shows written by others—more than 50 in all. Cohan shows included Little Johnny Jones (1904), Forty-five Minutes from Broadway (1905), George Washington, Jr. (1906), The Talk of New York and The Honeymooners (1907), Fifty Miles from Boston and The Yankee Prince (1908), Broadway Jones (1912), Seven Keys to Baldpate (1913), The American Idea, Get Rich Quick Wallingford, The Man Who Owns Broadway, Little Nellie Kelly, The Cohan Revue of 1916 (and 1918; co-written with Irving Berlin), The Tavern (1920), The Rise of Rosie O'Reilly (1923, featuring a 13-year-old Ruby Keeler among the chorus girls), The Song and Dance Man (1923), Molly Malone, The Miracle Man, Hello Broadway, American Born (1925), The Baby Cyclone (1927, one of Spencer Tracy's early breaks), Elmer the Great (1928, co-written with Ring Lardner), and Pigeons and People (1933). At this point in his life, he walked in and out of retirement.
Cohan was called "the greatest single figure the American theatre ever produced – as a player, playwright, actor, composer and producer". On May 1, 1940, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt presented him with the Congressional Gold Medal for his contributions to World War I morale, in particular with the songs "You're a Grand Old Flag" and "Over There". Cohan was the first person in any artistic field selected for this honor, which previously had gone only to military and political leaders, philanthropists, scientists, inventors, and explorers.
In 1959, at the behest of lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II, a $100,000 bronze statue of Cohan was dedicated in Times Square at Broadway and 46th Street in Manhattan. The 8-foot bronze remains the only statue of an actor on Broadway. He was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970, and into the American Folklore Hall of Fame in 2003. His star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame is located at 6734 Hollywood Boulevard. Cohan was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame on October 15, 2006.
The United States Postal Service issued a 15-cent commemorative stamp honoring Cohan on the anniversary of his centenary, July 3, 1978. The stamp depicts both the older Cohan and his younger self as a dancer, with the tag line "Yankee Doodle Dandy". It was designed by Jim Sharpe. On July 3, 2009, a bronze bust of Cohan, by artist Robert Shure, was unveiled at the corner of Wickenden and Governor Streets in Fox Point, Providence, a few blocks from his birthplace. The city renamed the corner the George M. Cohan Plaza and announced an annual George M. Cohan Award for Excellence in Art & Culture. The first award went to Curt Columbus, the artistic director of Trinity Repertory Company.
Personal life and death
From 1899 to 1907, Cohan was married to Ethel Levey (1881–1955; born Grace Ethelia Fowler), a musical comedy actress and dancer. Levey and Cohan had a daughter, actress Georgette Cohan Souther Rowse (1900–1988). Levey joined the Four Cohans when Josie married, and she starred in Little Johnny Jones and other Cohan works. In 1907, Levey divorced Cohan on grounds of adultery.
In 1908, Cohan married Agnes Mary Nolan (1883–1972), who had been a dancer in his early shows; they remained married until his death. They had two daughters and a son. The eldest was Mary Cohan Ronkin, a cabaret singer in the 1930s, who composed incidental music for her father's play The Tavern. In 1968, Mary supervised musical and lyric revisions for the musical George M! Their second daughter was Helen Cohan Carola, a film actress, who performed on Broadway with her father in Friendship in 1931. Their youngest child was George Michael Cohan, Jr. (1914–2000), who graduated from Georgetown University and served in the entertainment corps during World War II. In the 1950s, George Jr. reinterpreted his father's songs on recordings, in a nightclub act, and in television appearances on the Ed Sullivan and Milton Berle shows. George Jr.'s only child, Michaela Marie Cohan (1943–1999), was the last descendant named Cohan. She graduated with a theater degree from Marywood College in Pennsylvania in 1965. From 1966 to 1968, she served in a civilian Special Services unit in Vietnam and Korea. In 1996, she stood in for her ailing father at the ceremony marking her grandfather's induction into the Musical Theatre Hall of Fame at New York University. Cohan was a devoted baseball fan, regularly attending games of the former New York Giants.
He died of cancer at the age of 64 on November 5, 1942, at his Manhattan apartment on Fifth Avenue, surrounded by family and friends. His funeral was held at St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York, and was attended by thousands of people, including five governors of New York, two mayors of New York City and the Postmaster General. The honorary pallbearers included Irving Berlin, Eddie Cantor, Frank Crowninshield, Sol Bloom, Brooks Atkinson, Rube Goldberg, Walter Huston, George Jessel, Connie Mack, Joseph McCarthy, Eugene O'Neill, Sigmund Romberg, Lee Shubert and Fred Waring. Cohan was interred at Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx, New York City, in a private family mausoleum he had erected a quarter century earlier for his sister and parents.
In popular culture
James Cagney played Cohan in the 1942 biopic Yankee Doodle Dandy and in the 1955 film The Seven Little Foys. Cagney won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance in Dandy.
Mickey Rooney played Cohan in Mr. Broadway, a television special broadcast on May 11, 1957. The same month, Rooney released a 78 RPM record featuring Rooney singing Cohan's best-known songs on the A-side.
Joel Grey starred on Broadway as Cohan in the musical George M! (1968), which was adapted into a television special in 1970.
Allan Sherman sang a parody-medley of three Cohan tunes on an early album: "Barry (That'll Be the Baby's Name)"; "H-o-r-o-w-i-t-z"; and "Get on the Garden Freeway" to the tune of "Mary's a Grand Old Name", "Harrigan" and "Give My Regards to Broadway", respectively.
Chip Deffaa created a one-man show about the life of Cohan called George M. Cohan Tonight!, which first ran Off-Broadway at the Irish Repertory Theatre in 2006 with Jon Peterson as Cohan. Deffaa has written and directed five other plays about Cohan.
Filmography
Cohan acted in the following films:
Gallery
Notes
References
McCabe, John: George M. Cohan. The Man Who Owned Broadway (New York: Doubleday & Co., 1973)
Further reading
Cohan, George M.: Twenty Years on Broadway (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1924)
Gilbert, Douglas: American Vaudeville. Its Life and Times (New York: Dover Publications, 1963)
Jones, John Bush: Our Musicals, Ourselves. A Social History of the American Musical Theatre (Lebanon, NH: Brandeis University Press, 2003)
Morehouse, Ward: George M. Cohan. Prince of the American Theater (Philadelphia & New York: J. B. Lippincott Co., 1943)
External links
George M. Cohan at Internet off-Broadway Database
George M. Cohan In America's Theater
George M. Cohan on musicals101.com
F. Gwynplaine MacIntyre, "Dancing after retirement: Cohan plays Roosevelt, 1937", New York Daily News, March 20, 2004.
Chip Deffaa's extensive George M. Cohan site
George M. Cohan; PeriodPaper.com c. 1910
Finding aid for the Edward B. Marks Music Co. Collection on George M. Cohan, 1901–1968 at the Museum of the City of New York
George M. Cohan recordings at the Discography of American Historical Recordings
1878 births
1942 deaths
19th-century American dramatists and playwrights
19th-century American male actors
19th-century American male writers
19th-century American singers
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American male actors
20th-century American male writers
20th-century American singers
Actors from Providence, Rhode Island
American male child actors
American male dancers
American male dramatists and playwrights
American male film actors
American male musical theatre actors
American male silent film actors
American male singers
American male songwriters
American male stage actors
American musical theatre composers
American musical theatre directors
American people of Irish descent
American tap dancers
American theatre directors
Broadway composers and lyricists
Broadway theatre directors
Broadway theatre producers
Burials at Woodlawn Cemetery (Bronx, New York)
Catholics from Massachusetts
Catholics from Rhode Island
George M.
Congressional Gold Medal recipients
Deaths from cancer in New York (state)
Eccentric dancers
Male actors from Rhode Island
Male musical theatre composers
Musicians from Providence, Rhode Island
People from North Brookfield, Massachusetts
Vaudeville performers
Writers from Providence, Rhode Island
Members of The Lambs Club | false | [
"Ben Ivery Wilson (born March 9, 1939) is a former professional American football fullback in the National Football League.\n\nHigh school\nWilson attended Aldine Carver High School where he played football and was also the state champ in the shot put. While at Carver, he was a Jones scholar who was offered an academic scholarship to attend the University of Cincinnati, but he wanted to play football. Although he was an exceptional football player, he did not receive a scholarship offer from any white college in Texas because of segregation.\n\nCollege career\nThe superintendent of Wilson's high school had contacts at USC and Wilson received a scholarship to attend USC. While at USC, Wilson became the starting fullback and team captain of USC's 1962 national championship team.\n\nProfessional career\nWilson played running back for five seasons in the NFL. He was traded from the Los Angeles Rams to the Green Bay Packers prior to the 1967 season. Wilson started at fullback in Super Bowl II for Green Bay and led both teams in rushing with 62 yards in 17 carries. Late in the game he lost a contact lens on the sidelines after being tackled, and missed the rest of the game.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n NFL.com player page\n\n1939 births\nLiving people\nAmerican football running backs\nGreen Bay Packers players\nLos Angeles Rams players\nUSC Trojans football players\nPlayers of American football from Houston",
"Rio Rancho High School is a public high school located in Rio Rancho, New Mexico, United States. It is part of the Rio Rancho Public Schools.\n\nHistory\nIt opened in 1997. Previously students in the school district at the high school level attended Albuquerque Public Schools. In April 1997 Rio Rancho High officials stated they had not yet finished development of programs for students with special needs.\n\nIn 2008, due to overcrowding, Rio Rancho Public Schools built the new V. Sue Cleveland High School, which opened in August 2009. In 2009, incoming 9th through 11th grade students who resided south of Northern Blvd began attend Rio Rancho High School and all residing north of Northern Blvd began to attend V. Sue Cleveland High School. The class of 2010 continued to attend Rio Rancho High School regardless of where they resided in Rio Rancho.\n\nPresident Barack Obama hosted a Town Hall meeting at the high school on May 14, 2009 regarding credit card reform.\n\nIn popular culture\n\nRio Rancho High School was used as filming location for the TV series Breaking Bad, being portrayed in the show as J. P. Wynne High School.\n\nThe campus was also used as a film location in the 2011 movie Fright Night.\n\nNotable alumni\nChris Williams - professional football player\n\nFootnotes\n\nExternal links \n Rio Rancho High School\n\nPublic high schools in New Mexico\nRio Rancho, New Mexico\nSchools in Sandoval County, New Mexico"
]
|
[
"George M. Cohan",
"Early life and education",
"What happened in George M. Cohan's early life?",
"Cohan was born in 1878 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Irish Catholic parents.",
"Where did he attend high school?",
"I don't know."
]
| C_7e2b8b9772ed4661af2694b700a03d8d_1 | Did he attend college? | 3 | Did George M. Cohan attend college? | George M. Cohan | Cohan was born in 1878 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Irish Catholic parents. A baptismal certificate from St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church (which gave the wrong first name for his mother) indicated that he was born on July 3, but Cohan and his family always insisted that George had been "born on the Fourth of July!" George's parents were traveling vaudeville performers, and he joined them on stage while still an infant, first as a prop, learning to dance and sing soon after he could walk and talk. Cohan started as a child performer at age 8, first on the violin and then as a dancer. He was the fourth member of the family vaudeville act called The Four Cohans, which included his father Jeremiah "Jere" (Keohane) Cohan (1848-1917), mother Helen "Nellie" Costigan Cohan (1854-1928) and sister Josephine "Josie" Cohan Niblo (1876-1916). In 1890, he toured as the star of a show called Peck's Bad Boy and then joined the family act; The Four Cohans mostly toured together from 1890 to 1901. He and his sister made their Broadway debut in 1893 in a sketch called The Lively Bootblack. Temperamental in his early years, Cohan later learned to control his frustrations. During these years, Cohan originated his famous curtain speech: "My mother thanks you, my father thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I thank you." As a child, Cohan and his family toured most of the year and spent summer vacations from the vaudeville circuit at his grandmother's home in North Brookfield, Massachusetts, where Cohan befriended baseball player Connie Mack. The family generally gave a performance at the town hall there each summer, and Cohan had a chance to gain some more normal childhood experiences, like riding his bike and playing sandlot baseball. Cohan's memories of those happy summers inspired his 1907 musical 50 Miles from Boston, which is set in North Brookfield and contains one of his most famous songs, "Harrigan". As Cohan matured through his teens, he used the quiet summers there to write. When he returned to the town in the cast of Ah, Wilderness! in 1934, he told a reporter, "I've knocked around everywhere, but there's no place like North Brookfield." CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | George Michael Cohan (July 3, 1878November 5, 1942) was an American entertainer, playwright, composer, lyricist, actor, singer, dancer and theatrical producer.
Cohan began his career as a child, performing with his parents and sister in a vaudeville act known as "The Four Cohans". Beginning with Little Johnny Jones in 1904, he wrote, composed, produced, and appeared in more than three dozen Broadway musicals. Cohan wrote more than 50 shows and published more than 300 songs during his lifetime, including the standards "Over There", "Give My Regards to Broadway", "The Yankee Doodle Boy" and "You're a Grand Old Flag". As a composer, he was one of the early members of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP). He displayed remarkable theatrical longevity, appearing in films until the 1930s and continuing to perform as a headline artist until 1940.
Known in the decade before World War I as "the man who owned Broadway", he is considered the father of American musical comedy. His life and music were depicted in the Oscar-winning film Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) and the 1968 musical George M! A statue of Cohan in Times Square, New York City commemorates his contributions to American musical theatre.
Early life
Cohan was born in 1878 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Irish Catholic parents. A baptismal certificate from St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church (which gave the wrong first name for his mother) indicated that Cohan was born on July 3, but he and his family always insisted that he had been "born on the Fourth of July!" His parents were traveling vaudeville performers, and he joined them on stage while still an infant, first as a prop, learning to dance and sing soon after he could walk and talk.
Cohan started as a child performer at age 8, first on the violin and then as a dancer. He was the fourth member of the family vaudeville act called The Four Cohans, which included his father Jeremiah "Jere" (Keohane) Cohan (1848–1917), mother Helen "Nellie" Costigan Cohan (1854–1928) and sister Josephine "Josie" Cohan Niblo (1876–1916). In 1890, he toured as the star of a show called Peck's Bad Boy and then joined the family act. The Four Cohans mostly toured together from 1890 to 1901. Cohan and his sister made their Broadway debuts in 1893 in a sketch called The Lively Bootblack. Temperamental in his early years, he later learned to control his frustrations. During these years, he originated his famous curtain speech: "My mother thanks you, my father thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I thank you."
As a child, Cohan and his family toured most of the year and spent summer vacations from the vaudeville circuit at his grandmother's home in North Brookfield, Massachusetts, where he befriended baseball player Connie Mack. The family generally gave a performance at the town hall there each summer, and Cohan had a chance to gain some more normal childhood experiences, like riding his bike and playing sandlot baseball. His memories of those happy summers inspired his 1907 musical 50 Miles from Boston, which is set in North Brookfield and contains one of his most famous songs, "Harrigan". As he matured through his teens, he used the quiet summers there to write. When he returned to the town in the cast of Ah, Wilderness! in 1934, he told a reporter "I've knocked around everywhere, but there's no place like North Brookfield."
Career
Early career
Cohan began writing original skits (over 150 of them) and songs for the family act in both vaudeville and minstrel shows while in his teens. Soon he was writing professionally, selling his first songs to a national publisher in 1893. In 1901 he wrote, directed and produced his first Broadway musical, The Governor's Son, for The Four Cohans. His first big Broadway hit in 1904 was the show Little Johnny Jones, which introduced his tunes "Give My Regards to Broadway" and "The Yankee Doodle Boy".
Cohan became one of the leading Tin Pan Alley songwriters, publishing upwards of 300 original songs noted for their catchy melodies and clever lyrics. His major hit songs included "You're a Grand Old Flag," "Forty-Five Minutes from Broadway," "Mary Is a Grand Old Name," "The Warmest Baby in the Bunch," "Life's a Funny Proposition After All," "I Want To Hear a Yankee Doodle Tune," "You Won't Do Any Business if You Haven't Got a Band," "The Small Town Gal," "I'm Mighty Glad I'm Living, That's All," "That Haunting Melody," "Always Leave Them Laughing When You Say Goodbye", and America's most popular World War I song "Over There", recorded by Nora Bayes and by Enrico Caruso, and others. The latter song reached such currency among troops and shipyard workers that a ship was named "Costigan" after Cohan's grandfather, Dennis Costigan. During the christening, "Over There" was played.
From 1904 to 1920, Cohan created and produced over 50 musicals, plays and revues on Broadway together with his friend Sam H. Harris, including Give My Regards to Broadway and the successful Going Up in 1917, which became a smash hit in London the following year. His shows ran simultaneously in as many as five theatres. One of Cohan's most innovative plays was a dramatization of the mystery Seven Keys to Baldpate in 1913, which baffled some audiences and critics but became a hit. Cohan further adapted it as a film in 1917, and it was adapted for film six more times, as well as for TV and radio. He dropped out of acting for some years after his 1919 dispute with Actors' Equity Association.
In 1925, he published his autobiography Twenty Years on Broadway and the Years It Took to Get There.
Later career
Cohan appeared in 1930 in The Song and Dance Man, a revival of his tribute to vaudeville and his father. In 1932, he starred in a dual role as a cold, corrupt politician and his charming, idealistic campaign double in the Hollywood musical film The Phantom President. The film co-starred Claudette Colbert and Jimmy Durante, with songs by Rodgers and Hart, and was released by Paramount Pictures. He appeared in some earlier silent films but he disliked Hollywood production methods and only made one other sound film, Gambling (1934), based on his own 1929 play and shot in New York City. A critic called Gambling a "stodgy adaptation of a definitely dated play directed in obsolete theatrical technique". It is considered a lost film.
Cohan earned acclaim as a serious actor in Eugene O'Neill's only comedy Ah, Wilderness! (1933) and in the role of a song-and-dance President Franklin D. Roosevelt in Rodgers and Hart's musical I'd Rather Be Right (1937). The same year, he reunited with Harris to produce a play titled Fulton of Oak Falls, starring Cohan. His final play, The Return of the Vagabond (1940), featured a young Celeste Holm in the cast.
In 1940, Judy Garland played the title role in a film version of his 1922 musical Little Nellie Kelly. Cohan's mystery play Seven Keys to Baldpate was first filmed in 1916 and has been remade seven times, most recently as House of the Long Shadows (1983), starring Vincent Price. In 1942, a musical biopic of Cohan, Yankee Doodle Dandy, was released, and James Cagney's performance in the title role earned the Best Actor Academy Award. The film was privately screened for Cohan as he battled the last stages of abdominal cancer, and he commented on Cagney's performance: "My God, what an act to follow!" Cohan's 1920 play The Meanest Man in the World was filmed in 1943 with Jack Benny.
Legacy
Although Cohan mainly is remembered for his songs, he became an early pioneer in the development of the "book musical", using his engaging libretti to bridge the gaps between drama and music. More than three decades before Agnes de Mille choreographed Oklahoma!, Cohan used dance not merely as razzle-dazzle, but to advance the plot. Cohan's main characters were "average Joes and Janes" who appealed to a wide American audience.
In 1914, Cohan became one of the founding members of ASCAP. Although Cohan was known as generous to his fellow actors in need, in 1919, he unsuccessfully opposed a historic strike by Actors' Equity Association, for which many in the theatrical professions never forgave him. Cohan opposed the strike because in addition to being an actor in his productions, he was also the producer of the musical that set the terms and conditions of the actors' employment. During the strike, he donated $100,000 to finance the Actors' Retirement Fund in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey. After Actors' Equity was recognized, Cohan refused to join the union as an actor, which hampered his ability to appear in his own productions. Cohan sought a waiver from Equity allowing him to act in any theatrical production. In 1930, Cohan won a law case against the Internal Revenue Service that allowed the deduction, for federal income tax purposes, of his business travel and entertainment expenses, even though he was not able to document them with certainty. This became known as the "Cohan rule" and frequently is cited in tax cases.
Cohan wrote numerous Broadway musicals and straight plays in addition to contributing material to shows written by others—more than 50 in all. Cohan shows included Little Johnny Jones (1904), Forty-five Minutes from Broadway (1905), George Washington, Jr. (1906), The Talk of New York and The Honeymooners (1907), Fifty Miles from Boston and The Yankee Prince (1908), Broadway Jones (1912), Seven Keys to Baldpate (1913), The American Idea, Get Rich Quick Wallingford, The Man Who Owns Broadway, Little Nellie Kelly, The Cohan Revue of 1916 (and 1918; co-written with Irving Berlin), The Tavern (1920), The Rise of Rosie O'Reilly (1923, featuring a 13-year-old Ruby Keeler among the chorus girls), The Song and Dance Man (1923), Molly Malone, The Miracle Man, Hello Broadway, American Born (1925), The Baby Cyclone (1927, one of Spencer Tracy's early breaks), Elmer the Great (1928, co-written with Ring Lardner), and Pigeons and People (1933). At this point in his life, he walked in and out of retirement.
Cohan was called "the greatest single figure the American theatre ever produced – as a player, playwright, actor, composer and producer". On May 1, 1940, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt presented him with the Congressional Gold Medal for his contributions to World War I morale, in particular with the songs "You're a Grand Old Flag" and "Over There". Cohan was the first person in any artistic field selected for this honor, which previously had gone only to military and political leaders, philanthropists, scientists, inventors, and explorers.
In 1959, at the behest of lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II, a $100,000 bronze statue of Cohan was dedicated in Times Square at Broadway and 46th Street in Manhattan. The 8-foot bronze remains the only statue of an actor on Broadway. He was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970, and into the American Folklore Hall of Fame in 2003. His star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame is located at 6734 Hollywood Boulevard. Cohan was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame on October 15, 2006.
The United States Postal Service issued a 15-cent commemorative stamp honoring Cohan on the anniversary of his centenary, July 3, 1978. The stamp depicts both the older Cohan and his younger self as a dancer, with the tag line "Yankee Doodle Dandy". It was designed by Jim Sharpe. On July 3, 2009, a bronze bust of Cohan, by artist Robert Shure, was unveiled at the corner of Wickenden and Governor Streets in Fox Point, Providence, a few blocks from his birthplace. The city renamed the corner the George M. Cohan Plaza and announced an annual George M. Cohan Award for Excellence in Art & Culture. The first award went to Curt Columbus, the artistic director of Trinity Repertory Company.
Personal life and death
From 1899 to 1907, Cohan was married to Ethel Levey (1881–1955; born Grace Ethelia Fowler), a musical comedy actress and dancer. Levey and Cohan had a daughter, actress Georgette Cohan Souther Rowse (1900–1988). Levey joined the Four Cohans when Josie married, and she starred in Little Johnny Jones and other Cohan works. In 1907, Levey divorced Cohan on grounds of adultery.
In 1908, Cohan married Agnes Mary Nolan (1883–1972), who had been a dancer in his early shows; they remained married until his death. They had two daughters and a son. The eldest was Mary Cohan Ronkin, a cabaret singer in the 1930s, who composed incidental music for her father's play The Tavern. In 1968, Mary supervised musical and lyric revisions for the musical George M! Their second daughter was Helen Cohan Carola, a film actress, who performed on Broadway with her father in Friendship in 1931. Their youngest child was George Michael Cohan, Jr. (1914–2000), who graduated from Georgetown University and served in the entertainment corps during World War II. In the 1950s, George Jr. reinterpreted his father's songs on recordings, in a nightclub act, and in television appearances on the Ed Sullivan and Milton Berle shows. George Jr.'s only child, Michaela Marie Cohan (1943–1999), was the last descendant named Cohan. She graduated with a theater degree from Marywood College in Pennsylvania in 1965. From 1966 to 1968, she served in a civilian Special Services unit in Vietnam and Korea. In 1996, she stood in for her ailing father at the ceremony marking her grandfather's induction into the Musical Theatre Hall of Fame at New York University. Cohan was a devoted baseball fan, regularly attending games of the former New York Giants.
He died of cancer at the age of 64 on November 5, 1942, at his Manhattan apartment on Fifth Avenue, surrounded by family and friends. His funeral was held at St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York, and was attended by thousands of people, including five governors of New York, two mayors of New York City and the Postmaster General. The honorary pallbearers included Irving Berlin, Eddie Cantor, Frank Crowninshield, Sol Bloom, Brooks Atkinson, Rube Goldberg, Walter Huston, George Jessel, Connie Mack, Joseph McCarthy, Eugene O'Neill, Sigmund Romberg, Lee Shubert and Fred Waring. Cohan was interred at Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx, New York City, in a private family mausoleum he had erected a quarter century earlier for his sister and parents.
In popular culture
James Cagney played Cohan in the 1942 biopic Yankee Doodle Dandy and in the 1955 film The Seven Little Foys. Cagney won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance in Dandy.
Mickey Rooney played Cohan in Mr. Broadway, a television special broadcast on May 11, 1957. The same month, Rooney released a 78 RPM record featuring Rooney singing Cohan's best-known songs on the A-side.
Joel Grey starred on Broadway as Cohan in the musical George M! (1968), which was adapted into a television special in 1970.
Allan Sherman sang a parody-medley of three Cohan tunes on an early album: "Barry (That'll Be the Baby's Name)"; "H-o-r-o-w-i-t-z"; and "Get on the Garden Freeway" to the tune of "Mary's a Grand Old Name", "Harrigan" and "Give My Regards to Broadway", respectively.
Chip Deffaa created a one-man show about the life of Cohan called George M. Cohan Tonight!, which first ran Off-Broadway at the Irish Repertory Theatre in 2006 with Jon Peterson as Cohan. Deffaa has written and directed five other plays about Cohan.
Filmography
Cohan acted in the following films:
Gallery
Notes
References
McCabe, John: George M. Cohan. The Man Who Owned Broadway (New York: Doubleday & Co., 1973)
Further reading
Cohan, George M.: Twenty Years on Broadway (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1924)
Gilbert, Douglas: American Vaudeville. Its Life and Times (New York: Dover Publications, 1963)
Jones, John Bush: Our Musicals, Ourselves. A Social History of the American Musical Theatre (Lebanon, NH: Brandeis University Press, 2003)
Morehouse, Ward: George M. Cohan. Prince of the American Theater (Philadelphia & New York: J. B. Lippincott Co., 1943)
External links
George M. Cohan at Internet off-Broadway Database
George M. Cohan In America's Theater
George M. Cohan on musicals101.com
F. Gwynplaine MacIntyre, "Dancing after retirement: Cohan plays Roosevelt, 1937", New York Daily News, March 20, 2004.
Chip Deffaa's extensive George M. Cohan site
George M. Cohan; PeriodPaper.com c. 1910
Finding aid for the Edward B. Marks Music Co. Collection on George M. Cohan, 1901–1968 at the Museum of the City of New York
George M. Cohan recordings at the Discography of American Historical Recordings
1878 births
1942 deaths
19th-century American dramatists and playwrights
19th-century American male actors
19th-century American male writers
19th-century American singers
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American male actors
20th-century American male writers
20th-century American singers
Actors from Providence, Rhode Island
American male child actors
American male dancers
American male dramatists and playwrights
American male film actors
American male musical theatre actors
American male silent film actors
American male singers
American male songwriters
American male stage actors
American musical theatre composers
American musical theatre directors
American people of Irish descent
American tap dancers
American theatre directors
Broadway composers and lyricists
Broadway theatre directors
Broadway theatre producers
Burials at Woodlawn Cemetery (Bronx, New York)
Catholics from Massachusetts
Catholics from Rhode Island
George M.
Congressional Gold Medal recipients
Deaths from cancer in New York (state)
Eccentric dancers
Male actors from Rhode Island
Male musical theatre composers
Musicians from Providence, Rhode Island
People from North Brookfield, Massachusetts
Vaudeville performers
Writers from Providence, Rhode Island
Members of The Lambs Club | false | [
"Walter Drumstead (born Dremstadt; September 4, 1898 – May 18, 1946) was an American football guard who played one game in the National Football League (NFL) for the Hammond Pros. He did not attend college, and also played independent ball with the Hammond Scatenas, Boosters, and Colonials.\n\nHe was born Walter Dremstadt on September 4, 1898, in Hammond, Indiana. He did not attend college, and a 1923 article called him, \"from the college of hard knocks.\"\n\nIn 1921, Drumstead started a football career with the independent Hammond Scatenas. He joined the Hammond Boosters in 1924 after three seasons played with the Scatenas, and scored a touchdown in one of his first appearances with the team.\n\nAfter playing most of the 1925 season with the Boosters, Drumstead left the team for one game to play in the National Football League (NFL) with the Hammond Pros. He was a starter in their 0–13 loss against the Chicago Cardinals, and returned to the Boosters afterwards. The Times reported him as a \"fan favorite\". He played for the Boosters again in 1926.\n\nDrumstead played the left guard position for the Hammond Colonials in 1929.\n\nHe died in on May 18, 1946, at the age of 47.\n\nReferences\n\n1898 births\n1946 deaths\nPlayers of American football from Indiana\nPeople from Hammond, Indiana\nAmerican football guards\nHammond Pros players",
"James Thomas Norman (born January 2, 1934 in Fortress Monroe, Virginia) is a former American football offensive lineman in the National Football League for the Washington Redskins. He did not attend college.\n\n1934 births\nLiving people\nSportspeople from Hampton, Virginia\nAmerican football offensive tackles\nWashington Redskins players\nHamilton Tiger-Cats players"
]
|
[
"George M. Cohan",
"Early life and education",
"What happened in George M. Cohan's early life?",
"Cohan was born in 1878 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Irish Catholic parents.",
"Where did he attend high school?",
"I don't know.",
"Did he attend college?",
"I don't know."
]
| C_7e2b8b9772ed4661af2694b700a03d8d_1 | What are some important things to know about his education? | 4 | What are some important things to know about George M. Cohan's education? | George M. Cohan | Cohan was born in 1878 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Irish Catholic parents. A baptismal certificate from St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church (which gave the wrong first name for his mother) indicated that he was born on July 3, but Cohan and his family always insisted that George had been "born on the Fourth of July!" George's parents were traveling vaudeville performers, and he joined them on stage while still an infant, first as a prop, learning to dance and sing soon after he could walk and talk. Cohan started as a child performer at age 8, first on the violin and then as a dancer. He was the fourth member of the family vaudeville act called The Four Cohans, which included his father Jeremiah "Jere" (Keohane) Cohan (1848-1917), mother Helen "Nellie" Costigan Cohan (1854-1928) and sister Josephine "Josie" Cohan Niblo (1876-1916). In 1890, he toured as the star of a show called Peck's Bad Boy and then joined the family act; The Four Cohans mostly toured together from 1890 to 1901. He and his sister made their Broadway debut in 1893 in a sketch called The Lively Bootblack. Temperamental in his early years, Cohan later learned to control his frustrations. During these years, Cohan originated his famous curtain speech: "My mother thanks you, my father thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I thank you." As a child, Cohan and his family toured most of the year and spent summer vacations from the vaudeville circuit at his grandmother's home in North Brookfield, Massachusetts, where Cohan befriended baseball player Connie Mack. The family generally gave a performance at the town hall there each summer, and Cohan had a chance to gain some more normal childhood experiences, like riding his bike and playing sandlot baseball. Cohan's memories of those happy summers inspired his 1907 musical 50 Miles from Boston, which is set in North Brookfield and contains one of his most famous songs, "Harrigan". As Cohan matured through his teens, he used the quiet summers there to write. When he returned to the town in the cast of Ah, Wilderness! in 1934, he told a reporter, "I've knocked around everywhere, but there's no place like North Brookfield." CANNOTANSWER | Cohan started as a child performer at age 8, first on the violin and then as a dancer. | George Michael Cohan (July 3, 1878November 5, 1942) was an American entertainer, playwright, composer, lyricist, actor, singer, dancer and theatrical producer.
Cohan began his career as a child, performing with his parents and sister in a vaudeville act known as "The Four Cohans". Beginning with Little Johnny Jones in 1904, he wrote, composed, produced, and appeared in more than three dozen Broadway musicals. Cohan wrote more than 50 shows and published more than 300 songs during his lifetime, including the standards "Over There", "Give My Regards to Broadway", "The Yankee Doodle Boy" and "You're a Grand Old Flag". As a composer, he was one of the early members of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP). He displayed remarkable theatrical longevity, appearing in films until the 1930s and continuing to perform as a headline artist until 1940.
Known in the decade before World War I as "the man who owned Broadway", he is considered the father of American musical comedy. His life and music were depicted in the Oscar-winning film Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) and the 1968 musical George M! A statue of Cohan in Times Square, New York City commemorates his contributions to American musical theatre.
Early life
Cohan was born in 1878 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Irish Catholic parents. A baptismal certificate from St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church (which gave the wrong first name for his mother) indicated that Cohan was born on July 3, but he and his family always insisted that he had been "born on the Fourth of July!" His parents were traveling vaudeville performers, and he joined them on stage while still an infant, first as a prop, learning to dance and sing soon after he could walk and talk.
Cohan started as a child performer at age 8, first on the violin and then as a dancer. He was the fourth member of the family vaudeville act called The Four Cohans, which included his father Jeremiah "Jere" (Keohane) Cohan (1848–1917), mother Helen "Nellie" Costigan Cohan (1854–1928) and sister Josephine "Josie" Cohan Niblo (1876–1916). In 1890, he toured as the star of a show called Peck's Bad Boy and then joined the family act. The Four Cohans mostly toured together from 1890 to 1901. Cohan and his sister made their Broadway debuts in 1893 in a sketch called The Lively Bootblack. Temperamental in his early years, he later learned to control his frustrations. During these years, he originated his famous curtain speech: "My mother thanks you, my father thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I thank you."
As a child, Cohan and his family toured most of the year and spent summer vacations from the vaudeville circuit at his grandmother's home in North Brookfield, Massachusetts, where he befriended baseball player Connie Mack. The family generally gave a performance at the town hall there each summer, and Cohan had a chance to gain some more normal childhood experiences, like riding his bike and playing sandlot baseball. His memories of those happy summers inspired his 1907 musical 50 Miles from Boston, which is set in North Brookfield and contains one of his most famous songs, "Harrigan". As he matured through his teens, he used the quiet summers there to write. When he returned to the town in the cast of Ah, Wilderness! in 1934, he told a reporter "I've knocked around everywhere, but there's no place like North Brookfield."
Career
Early career
Cohan began writing original skits (over 150 of them) and songs for the family act in both vaudeville and minstrel shows while in his teens. Soon he was writing professionally, selling his first songs to a national publisher in 1893. In 1901 he wrote, directed and produced his first Broadway musical, The Governor's Son, for The Four Cohans. His first big Broadway hit in 1904 was the show Little Johnny Jones, which introduced his tunes "Give My Regards to Broadway" and "The Yankee Doodle Boy".
Cohan became one of the leading Tin Pan Alley songwriters, publishing upwards of 300 original songs noted for their catchy melodies and clever lyrics. His major hit songs included "You're a Grand Old Flag," "Forty-Five Minutes from Broadway," "Mary Is a Grand Old Name," "The Warmest Baby in the Bunch," "Life's a Funny Proposition After All," "I Want To Hear a Yankee Doodle Tune," "You Won't Do Any Business if You Haven't Got a Band," "The Small Town Gal," "I'm Mighty Glad I'm Living, That's All," "That Haunting Melody," "Always Leave Them Laughing When You Say Goodbye", and America's most popular World War I song "Over There", recorded by Nora Bayes and by Enrico Caruso, and others. The latter song reached such currency among troops and shipyard workers that a ship was named "Costigan" after Cohan's grandfather, Dennis Costigan. During the christening, "Over There" was played.
From 1904 to 1920, Cohan created and produced over 50 musicals, plays and revues on Broadway together with his friend Sam H. Harris, including Give My Regards to Broadway and the successful Going Up in 1917, which became a smash hit in London the following year. His shows ran simultaneously in as many as five theatres. One of Cohan's most innovative plays was a dramatization of the mystery Seven Keys to Baldpate in 1913, which baffled some audiences and critics but became a hit. Cohan further adapted it as a film in 1917, and it was adapted for film six more times, as well as for TV and radio. He dropped out of acting for some years after his 1919 dispute with Actors' Equity Association.
In 1925, he published his autobiography Twenty Years on Broadway and the Years It Took to Get There.
Later career
Cohan appeared in 1930 in The Song and Dance Man, a revival of his tribute to vaudeville and his father. In 1932, he starred in a dual role as a cold, corrupt politician and his charming, idealistic campaign double in the Hollywood musical film The Phantom President. The film co-starred Claudette Colbert and Jimmy Durante, with songs by Rodgers and Hart, and was released by Paramount Pictures. He appeared in some earlier silent films but he disliked Hollywood production methods and only made one other sound film, Gambling (1934), based on his own 1929 play and shot in New York City. A critic called Gambling a "stodgy adaptation of a definitely dated play directed in obsolete theatrical technique". It is considered a lost film.
Cohan earned acclaim as a serious actor in Eugene O'Neill's only comedy Ah, Wilderness! (1933) and in the role of a song-and-dance President Franklin D. Roosevelt in Rodgers and Hart's musical I'd Rather Be Right (1937). The same year, he reunited with Harris to produce a play titled Fulton of Oak Falls, starring Cohan. His final play, The Return of the Vagabond (1940), featured a young Celeste Holm in the cast.
In 1940, Judy Garland played the title role in a film version of his 1922 musical Little Nellie Kelly. Cohan's mystery play Seven Keys to Baldpate was first filmed in 1916 and has been remade seven times, most recently as House of the Long Shadows (1983), starring Vincent Price. In 1942, a musical biopic of Cohan, Yankee Doodle Dandy, was released, and James Cagney's performance in the title role earned the Best Actor Academy Award. The film was privately screened for Cohan as he battled the last stages of abdominal cancer, and he commented on Cagney's performance: "My God, what an act to follow!" Cohan's 1920 play The Meanest Man in the World was filmed in 1943 with Jack Benny.
Legacy
Although Cohan mainly is remembered for his songs, he became an early pioneer in the development of the "book musical", using his engaging libretti to bridge the gaps between drama and music. More than three decades before Agnes de Mille choreographed Oklahoma!, Cohan used dance not merely as razzle-dazzle, but to advance the plot. Cohan's main characters were "average Joes and Janes" who appealed to a wide American audience.
In 1914, Cohan became one of the founding members of ASCAP. Although Cohan was known as generous to his fellow actors in need, in 1919, he unsuccessfully opposed a historic strike by Actors' Equity Association, for which many in the theatrical professions never forgave him. Cohan opposed the strike because in addition to being an actor in his productions, he was also the producer of the musical that set the terms and conditions of the actors' employment. During the strike, he donated $100,000 to finance the Actors' Retirement Fund in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey. After Actors' Equity was recognized, Cohan refused to join the union as an actor, which hampered his ability to appear in his own productions. Cohan sought a waiver from Equity allowing him to act in any theatrical production. In 1930, Cohan won a law case against the Internal Revenue Service that allowed the deduction, for federal income tax purposes, of his business travel and entertainment expenses, even though he was not able to document them with certainty. This became known as the "Cohan rule" and frequently is cited in tax cases.
Cohan wrote numerous Broadway musicals and straight plays in addition to contributing material to shows written by others—more than 50 in all. Cohan shows included Little Johnny Jones (1904), Forty-five Minutes from Broadway (1905), George Washington, Jr. (1906), The Talk of New York and The Honeymooners (1907), Fifty Miles from Boston and The Yankee Prince (1908), Broadway Jones (1912), Seven Keys to Baldpate (1913), The American Idea, Get Rich Quick Wallingford, The Man Who Owns Broadway, Little Nellie Kelly, The Cohan Revue of 1916 (and 1918; co-written with Irving Berlin), The Tavern (1920), The Rise of Rosie O'Reilly (1923, featuring a 13-year-old Ruby Keeler among the chorus girls), The Song and Dance Man (1923), Molly Malone, The Miracle Man, Hello Broadway, American Born (1925), The Baby Cyclone (1927, one of Spencer Tracy's early breaks), Elmer the Great (1928, co-written with Ring Lardner), and Pigeons and People (1933). At this point in his life, he walked in and out of retirement.
Cohan was called "the greatest single figure the American theatre ever produced – as a player, playwright, actor, composer and producer". On May 1, 1940, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt presented him with the Congressional Gold Medal for his contributions to World War I morale, in particular with the songs "You're a Grand Old Flag" and "Over There". Cohan was the first person in any artistic field selected for this honor, which previously had gone only to military and political leaders, philanthropists, scientists, inventors, and explorers.
In 1959, at the behest of lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II, a $100,000 bronze statue of Cohan was dedicated in Times Square at Broadway and 46th Street in Manhattan. The 8-foot bronze remains the only statue of an actor on Broadway. He was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970, and into the American Folklore Hall of Fame in 2003. His star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame is located at 6734 Hollywood Boulevard. Cohan was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame on October 15, 2006.
The United States Postal Service issued a 15-cent commemorative stamp honoring Cohan on the anniversary of his centenary, July 3, 1978. The stamp depicts both the older Cohan and his younger self as a dancer, with the tag line "Yankee Doodle Dandy". It was designed by Jim Sharpe. On July 3, 2009, a bronze bust of Cohan, by artist Robert Shure, was unveiled at the corner of Wickenden and Governor Streets in Fox Point, Providence, a few blocks from his birthplace. The city renamed the corner the George M. Cohan Plaza and announced an annual George M. Cohan Award for Excellence in Art & Culture. The first award went to Curt Columbus, the artistic director of Trinity Repertory Company.
Personal life and death
From 1899 to 1907, Cohan was married to Ethel Levey (1881–1955; born Grace Ethelia Fowler), a musical comedy actress and dancer. Levey and Cohan had a daughter, actress Georgette Cohan Souther Rowse (1900–1988). Levey joined the Four Cohans when Josie married, and she starred in Little Johnny Jones and other Cohan works. In 1907, Levey divorced Cohan on grounds of adultery.
In 1908, Cohan married Agnes Mary Nolan (1883–1972), who had been a dancer in his early shows; they remained married until his death. They had two daughters and a son. The eldest was Mary Cohan Ronkin, a cabaret singer in the 1930s, who composed incidental music for her father's play The Tavern. In 1968, Mary supervised musical and lyric revisions for the musical George M! Their second daughter was Helen Cohan Carola, a film actress, who performed on Broadway with her father in Friendship in 1931. Their youngest child was George Michael Cohan, Jr. (1914–2000), who graduated from Georgetown University and served in the entertainment corps during World War II. In the 1950s, George Jr. reinterpreted his father's songs on recordings, in a nightclub act, and in television appearances on the Ed Sullivan and Milton Berle shows. George Jr.'s only child, Michaela Marie Cohan (1943–1999), was the last descendant named Cohan. She graduated with a theater degree from Marywood College in Pennsylvania in 1965. From 1966 to 1968, she served in a civilian Special Services unit in Vietnam and Korea. In 1996, she stood in for her ailing father at the ceremony marking her grandfather's induction into the Musical Theatre Hall of Fame at New York University. Cohan was a devoted baseball fan, regularly attending games of the former New York Giants.
He died of cancer at the age of 64 on November 5, 1942, at his Manhattan apartment on Fifth Avenue, surrounded by family and friends. His funeral was held at St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York, and was attended by thousands of people, including five governors of New York, two mayors of New York City and the Postmaster General. The honorary pallbearers included Irving Berlin, Eddie Cantor, Frank Crowninshield, Sol Bloom, Brooks Atkinson, Rube Goldberg, Walter Huston, George Jessel, Connie Mack, Joseph McCarthy, Eugene O'Neill, Sigmund Romberg, Lee Shubert and Fred Waring. Cohan was interred at Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx, New York City, in a private family mausoleum he had erected a quarter century earlier for his sister and parents.
In popular culture
James Cagney played Cohan in the 1942 biopic Yankee Doodle Dandy and in the 1955 film The Seven Little Foys. Cagney won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance in Dandy.
Mickey Rooney played Cohan in Mr. Broadway, a television special broadcast on May 11, 1957. The same month, Rooney released a 78 RPM record featuring Rooney singing Cohan's best-known songs on the A-side.
Joel Grey starred on Broadway as Cohan in the musical George M! (1968), which was adapted into a television special in 1970.
Allan Sherman sang a parody-medley of three Cohan tunes on an early album: "Barry (That'll Be the Baby's Name)"; "H-o-r-o-w-i-t-z"; and "Get on the Garden Freeway" to the tune of "Mary's a Grand Old Name", "Harrigan" and "Give My Regards to Broadway", respectively.
Chip Deffaa created a one-man show about the life of Cohan called George M. Cohan Tonight!, which first ran Off-Broadway at the Irish Repertory Theatre in 2006 with Jon Peterson as Cohan. Deffaa has written and directed five other plays about Cohan.
Filmography
Cohan acted in the following films:
Gallery
Notes
References
McCabe, John: George M. Cohan. The Man Who Owned Broadway (New York: Doubleday & Co., 1973)
Further reading
Cohan, George M.: Twenty Years on Broadway (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1924)
Gilbert, Douglas: American Vaudeville. Its Life and Times (New York: Dover Publications, 1963)
Jones, John Bush: Our Musicals, Ourselves. A Social History of the American Musical Theatre (Lebanon, NH: Brandeis University Press, 2003)
Morehouse, Ward: George M. Cohan. Prince of the American Theater (Philadelphia & New York: J. B. Lippincott Co., 1943)
External links
George M. Cohan at Internet off-Broadway Database
George M. Cohan In America's Theater
George M. Cohan on musicals101.com
F. Gwynplaine MacIntyre, "Dancing after retirement: Cohan plays Roosevelt, 1937", New York Daily News, March 20, 2004.
Chip Deffaa's extensive George M. Cohan site
George M. Cohan; PeriodPaper.com c. 1910
Finding aid for the Edward B. Marks Music Co. Collection on George M. Cohan, 1901–1968 at the Museum of the City of New York
George M. Cohan recordings at the Discography of American Historical Recordings
1878 births
1942 deaths
19th-century American dramatists and playwrights
19th-century American male actors
19th-century American male writers
19th-century American singers
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American male actors
20th-century American male writers
20th-century American singers
Actors from Providence, Rhode Island
American male child actors
American male dancers
American male dramatists and playwrights
American male film actors
American male musical theatre actors
American male silent film actors
American male singers
American male songwriters
American male stage actors
American musical theatre composers
American musical theatre directors
American people of Irish descent
American tap dancers
American theatre directors
Broadway composers and lyricists
Broadway theatre directors
Broadway theatre producers
Burials at Woodlawn Cemetery (Bronx, New York)
Catholics from Massachusetts
Catholics from Rhode Island
George M.
Congressional Gold Medal recipients
Deaths from cancer in New York (state)
Eccentric dancers
Male actors from Rhode Island
Male musical theatre composers
Musicians from Providence, Rhode Island
People from North Brookfield, Massachusetts
Vaudeville performers
Writers from Providence, Rhode Island
Members of The Lambs Club | true | [
"Roa rumsfeldi is a species of marine ray-finned fish, a butterflyfish belonging to the family Chaetodontidae. It is the fifth known species of the genus Roa and was discovered in Anilao, Philippines in 2016. This species has vertical white and brown stripes and has a black spine on the ventral fin contrary to the other Roa specimens. The specific name honours the former US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, because his quote “there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns – the ones we don’t know we don’t know” applies to the describers view on what is known about mesophotic fish species.\n\nReferences\n\nMarine fish of Southeast Asia\nChaetodontidae\nFish described in 2016\nFish of the Philippines\n\nTaxa named by Luiz A. Rocha",
"Steal Like an Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative is a book on coming up with creative ideas written by Austin Kleon and published in 2012 from Workman Publishing. The book, has since then become a New York Times Bestseller. Kleon presents himself as a young writer and artist emphasizing that creativity is everywhere and is for everyone. In his own words, \"You don’t need to be a genius, you just need to be yourself\".\n\nBackdrop\nWhen Mr. Kleon was asked to address college students at Broome Community College in upstate New York in 2011, he shaped his speech around a simple list of ten things he wished someone had told him when he was starting out at their age. They were: 'Steal like an artist; Don't wait until you know who you are to start making things; Write the book you want to read; Use your hands; Side projects are important; Do good work and put it where people can see it; Geography is no longer our master; Be nice (the world is a small town.); Be boring (it's the only way to get work done.); and, Creativity is subtraction.\nAfter giving the speech, he posted the text and slides of the talk to his popular blog.\nThe talk went viral, and Kleon dug deeper and expanded to create the book, for anyone attempting to make things - art, a career, a life - in the digital age.\n\nThe Book\nKleon describes ten basic principles to boost your creativity. He lists them on the back cover of the book so that they're easily referenced. The book is small, full of illustrations and several poems in the style of his newspaper cutouts by Kleon.\n\nKleon responds by writing, “the reason to copy your heroes and their style is so that you might somehow get a glimpse into their minds\". Kleon reminds throughout his book that “nothing is original… all creative work builds on what came before.” This sentiment is also a foundation for effective ELA teaching: From our past experiences as readers and writers, we can design better learning conditions for our students.\n\nEach chapter is dedicated to one of the ten principles, which are represented by the following:\n\n1. Steal like an artist:\nThe author cautions that he does not mean ‘steal’ as in plagiarise, skim or rip off — but study, credit, remix, mash up and transform. Creative work builds on what came before, and thus nothing is completely original.\n\n2. Don't wait until you know who you are to start making things:\nYou have to start doing the work you want to be doing, you have to immerse, internalise and even dress like the person you aspire to be. “You don’t have to look like your heroes, you want to see like your heroes,” Kleon urges. Go beyond imitation to emulation.\n\n3. Write the book you want to read:\nIt is important to do what you want to do, and insert your take on things of art.\n\n4. Use your hands:\nIt is important to step away from the screen and immerse in actual physical work. “Computers have robbed us of the feeling that we’re actually making things,” Kleon cautions. \"Involve your full body, and not just your brains.\"\n\n5. Side projects are important:\nHobbies are important because they keep you happy. “A hobby is something that gives but doesn’t take,” Kleon says.\n\n6. Do good work and put it where people can see it:\nSharing your work and even your thoughts about what you like help you get good feedback and more ideas.\n\n7. Geography is no longer our master:\n“Travel makes the world look new, and when the world looks new, our brains work harder,” Kleon explains. Constraints can also act favorably – bad winters or summers can force you to be indoors and work on your projects.\n\n8. Be nice (the world is a small town.):\nStop fighting and channel your rage into a creative pursuit. Show appreciation for the good things you see around you.\n\n9. Be boring (it's the only way to get work done.):\nYou can’t be creative all the time, so set a routine – for example, with a regular day job which sets a fixed schedule and exposes you to new people and skills.\n\n10. Creativity is subtraction\":\nIn an age of information overload and abundance, focus is important. Choose what you want to leave out of your key work. “Nothing is more paralysing than the idea of limitless possibilities. The best way to get over creative block is to simply place some constraints on yourself,” Kleon says.\n\nReferences\n\n2012 non-fiction books\nAmerican non-fiction books\nBooks about creativity"
]
|
[
"George M. Cohan",
"Early life and education",
"What happened in George M. Cohan's early life?",
"Cohan was born in 1878 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Irish Catholic parents.",
"Where did he attend high school?",
"I don't know.",
"Did he attend college?",
"I don't know.",
"What are some important things to know about his education?",
"Cohan started as a child performer at age 8, first on the violin and then as a dancer."
]
| C_7e2b8b9772ed4661af2694b700a03d8d_1 | Did he attend any special schools at all? | 5 | Did George M. Cohan attend any special schools at all? | George M. Cohan | Cohan was born in 1878 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Irish Catholic parents. A baptismal certificate from St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church (which gave the wrong first name for his mother) indicated that he was born on July 3, but Cohan and his family always insisted that George had been "born on the Fourth of July!" George's parents were traveling vaudeville performers, and he joined them on stage while still an infant, first as a prop, learning to dance and sing soon after he could walk and talk. Cohan started as a child performer at age 8, first on the violin and then as a dancer. He was the fourth member of the family vaudeville act called The Four Cohans, which included his father Jeremiah "Jere" (Keohane) Cohan (1848-1917), mother Helen "Nellie" Costigan Cohan (1854-1928) and sister Josephine "Josie" Cohan Niblo (1876-1916). In 1890, he toured as the star of a show called Peck's Bad Boy and then joined the family act; The Four Cohans mostly toured together from 1890 to 1901. He and his sister made their Broadway debut in 1893 in a sketch called The Lively Bootblack. Temperamental in his early years, Cohan later learned to control his frustrations. During these years, Cohan originated his famous curtain speech: "My mother thanks you, my father thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I thank you." As a child, Cohan and his family toured most of the year and spent summer vacations from the vaudeville circuit at his grandmother's home in North Brookfield, Massachusetts, where Cohan befriended baseball player Connie Mack. The family generally gave a performance at the town hall there each summer, and Cohan had a chance to gain some more normal childhood experiences, like riding his bike and playing sandlot baseball. Cohan's memories of those happy summers inspired his 1907 musical 50 Miles from Boston, which is set in North Brookfield and contains one of his most famous songs, "Harrigan". As Cohan matured through his teens, he used the quiet summers there to write. When he returned to the town in the cast of Ah, Wilderness! in 1934, he told a reporter, "I've knocked around everywhere, but there's no place like North Brookfield." CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | George Michael Cohan (July 3, 1878November 5, 1942) was an American entertainer, playwright, composer, lyricist, actor, singer, dancer and theatrical producer.
Cohan began his career as a child, performing with his parents and sister in a vaudeville act known as "The Four Cohans". Beginning with Little Johnny Jones in 1904, he wrote, composed, produced, and appeared in more than three dozen Broadway musicals. Cohan wrote more than 50 shows and published more than 300 songs during his lifetime, including the standards "Over There", "Give My Regards to Broadway", "The Yankee Doodle Boy" and "You're a Grand Old Flag". As a composer, he was one of the early members of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP). He displayed remarkable theatrical longevity, appearing in films until the 1930s and continuing to perform as a headline artist until 1940.
Known in the decade before World War I as "the man who owned Broadway", he is considered the father of American musical comedy. His life and music were depicted in the Oscar-winning film Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) and the 1968 musical George M! A statue of Cohan in Times Square, New York City commemorates his contributions to American musical theatre.
Early life
Cohan was born in 1878 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Irish Catholic parents. A baptismal certificate from St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church (which gave the wrong first name for his mother) indicated that Cohan was born on July 3, but he and his family always insisted that he had been "born on the Fourth of July!" His parents were traveling vaudeville performers, and he joined them on stage while still an infant, first as a prop, learning to dance and sing soon after he could walk and talk.
Cohan started as a child performer at age 8, first on the violin and then as a dancer. He was the fourth member of the family vaudeville act called The Four Cohans, which included his father Jeremiah "Jere" (Keohane) Cohan (1848–1917), mother Helen "Nellie" Costigan Cohan (1854–1928) and sister Josephine "Josie" Cohan Niblo (1876–1916). In 1890, he toured as the star of a show called Peck's Bad Boy and then joined the family act. The Four Cohans mostly toured together from 1890 to 1901. Cohan and his sister made their Broadway debuts in 1893 in a sketch called The Lively Bootblack. Temperamental in his early years, he later learned to control his frustrations. During these years, he originated his famous curtain speech: "My mother thanks you, my father thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I thank you."
As a child, Cohan and his family toured most of the year and spent summer vacations from the vaudeville circuit at his grandmother's home in North Brookfield, Massachusetts, where he befriended baseball player Connie Mack. The family generally gave a performance at the town hall there each summer, and Cohan had a chance to gain some more normal childhood experiences, like riding his bike and playing sandlot baseball. His memories of those happy summers inspired his 1907 musical 50 Miles from Boston, which is set in North Brookfield and contains one of his most famous songs, "Harrigan". As he matured through his teens, he used the quiet summers there to write. When he returned to the town in the cast of Ah, Wilderness! in 1934, he told a reporter "I've knocked around everywhere, but there's no place like North Brookfield."
Career
Early career
Cohan began writing original skits (over 150 of them) and songs for the family act in both vaudeville and minstrel shows while in his teens. Soon he was writing professionally, selling his first songs to a national publisher in 1893. In 1901 he wrote, directed and produced his first Broadway musical, The Governor's Son, for The Four Cohans. His first big Broadway hit in 1904 was the show Little Johnny Jones, which introduced his tunes "Give My Regards to Broadway" and "The Yankee Doodle Boy".
Cohan became one of the leading Tin Pan Alley songwriters, publishing upwards of 300 original songs noted for their catchy melodies and clever lyrics. His major hit songs included "You're a Grand Old Flag," "Forty-Five Minutes from Broadway," "Mary Is a Grand Old Name," "The Warmest Baby in the Bunch," "Life's a Funny Proposition After All," "I Want To Hear a Yankee Doodle Tune," "You Won't Do Any Business if You Haven't Got a Band," "The Small Town Gal," "I'm Mighty Glad I'm Living, That's All," "That Haunting Melody," "Always Leave Them Laughing When You Say Goodbye", and America's most popular World War I song "Over There", recorded by Nora Bayes and by Enrico Caruso, and others. The latter song reached such currency among troops and shipyard workers that a ship was named "Costigan" after Cohan's grandfather, Dennis Costigan. During the christening, "Over There" was played.
From 1904 to 1920, Cohan created and produced over 50 musicals, plays and revues on Broadway together with his friend Sam H. Harris, including Give My Regards to Broadway and the successful Going Up in 1917, which became a smash hit in London the following year. His shows ran simultaneously in as many as five theatres. One of Cohan's most innovative plays was a dramatization of the mystery Seven Keys to Baldpate in 1913, which baffled some audiences and critics but became a hit. Cohan further adapted it as a film in 1917, and it was adapted for film six more times, as well as for TV and radio. He dropped out of acting for some years after his 1919 dispute with Actors' Equity Association.
In 1925, he published his autobiography Twenty Years on Broadway and the Years It Took to Get There.
Later career
Cohan appeared in 1930 in The Song and Dance Man, a revival of his tribute to vaudeville and his father. In 1932, he starred in a dual role as a cold, corrupt politician and his charming, idealistic campaign double in the Hollywood musical film The Phantom President. The film co-starred Claudette Colbert and Jimmy Durante, with songs by Rodgers and Hart, and was released by Paramount Pictures. He appeared in some earlier silent films but he disliked Hollywood production methods and only made one other sound film, Gambling (1934), based on his own 1929 play and shot in New York City. A critic called Gambling a "stodgy adaptation of a definitely dated play directed in obsolete theatrical technique". It is considered a lost film.
Cohan earned acclaim as a serious actor in Eugene O'Neill's only comedy Ah, Wilderness! (1933) and in the role of a song-and-dance President Franklin D. Roosevelt in Rodgers and Hart's musical I'd Rather Be Right (1937). The same year, he reunited with Harris to produce a play titled Fulton of Oak Falls, starring Cohan. His final play, The Return of the Vagabond (1940), featured a young Celeste Holm in the cast.
In 1940, Judy Garland played the title role in a film version of his 1922 musical Little Nellie Kelly. Cohan's mystery play Seven Keys to Baldpate was first filmed in 1916 and has been remade seven times, most recently as House of the Long Shadows (1983), starring Vincent Price. In 1942, a musical biopic of Cohan, Yankee Doodle Dandy, was released, and James Cagney's performance in the title role earned the Best Actor Academy Award. The film was privately screened for Cohan as he battled the last stages of abdominal cancer, and he commented on Cagney's performance: "My God, what an act to follow!" Cohan's 1920 play The Meanest Man in the World was filmed in 1943 with Jack Benny.
Legacy
Although Cohan mainly is remembered for his songs, he became an early pioneer in the development of the "book musical", using his engaging libretti to bridge the gaps between drama and music. More than three decades before Agnes de Mille choreographed Oklahoma!, Cohan used dance not merely as razzle-dazzle, but to advance the plot. Cohan's main characters were "average Joes and Janes" who appealed to a wide American audience.
In 1914, Cohan became one of the founding members of ASCAP. Although Cohan was known as generous to his fellow actors in need, in 1919, he unsuccessfully opposed a historic strike by Actors' Equity Association, for which many in the theatrical professions never forgave him. Cohan opposed the strike because in addition to being an actor in his productions, he was also the producer of the musical that set the terms and conditions of the actors' employment. During the strike, he donated $100,000 to finance the Actors' Retirement Fund in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey. After Actors' Equity was recognized, Cohan refused to join the union as an actor, which hampered his ability to appear in his own productions. Cohan sought a waiver from Equity allowing him to act in any theatrical production. In 1930, Cohan won a law case against the Internal Revenue Service that allowed the deduction, for federal income tax purposes, of his business travel and entertainment expenses, even though he was not able to document them with certainty. This became known as the "Cohan rule" and frequently is cited in tax cases.
Cohan wrote numerous Broadway musicals and straight plays in addition to contributing material to shows written by others—more than 50 in all. Cohan shows included Little Johnny Jones (1904), Forty-five Minutes from Broadway (1905), George Washington, Jr. (1906), The Talk of New York and The Honeymooners (1907), Fifty Miles from Boston and The Yankee Prince (1908), Broadway Jones (1912), Seven Keys to Baldpate (1913), The American Idea, Get Rich Quick Wallingford, The Man Who Owns Broadway, Little Nellie Kelly, The Cohan Revue of 1916 (and 1918; co-written with Irving Berlin), The Tavern (1920), The Rise of Rosie O'Reilly (1923, featuring a 13-year-old Ruby Keeler among the chorus girls), The Song and Dance Man (1923), Molly Malone, The Miracle Man, Hello Broadway, American Born (1925), The Baby Cyclone (1927, one of Spencer Tracy's early breaks), Elmer the Great (1928, co-written with Ring Lardner), and Pigeons and People (1933). At this point in his life, he walked in and out of retirement.
Cohan was called "the greatest single figure the American theatre ever produced – as a player, playwright, actor, composer and producer". On May 1, 1940, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt presented him with the Congressional Gold Medal for his contributions to World War I morale, in particular with the songs "You're a Grand Old Flag" and "Over There". Cohan was the first person in any artistic field selected for this honor, which previously had gone only to military and political leaders, philanthropists, scientists, inventors, and explorers.
In 1959, at the behest of lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II, a $100,000 bronze statue of Cohan was dedicated in Times Square at Broadway and 46th Street in Manhattan. The 8-foot bronze remains the only statue of an actor on Broadway. He was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970, and into the American Folklore Hall of Fame in 2003. His star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame is located at 6734 Hollywood Boulevard. Cohan was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame on October 15, 2006.
The United States Postal Service issued a 15-cent commemorative stamp honoring Cohan on the anniversary of his centenary, July 3, 1978. The stamp depicts both the older Cohan and his younger self as a dancer, with the tag line "Yankee Doodle Dandy". It was designed by Jim Sharpe. On July 3, 2009, a bronze bust of Cohan, by artist Robert Shure, was unveiled at the corner of Wickenden and Governor Streets in Fox Point, Providence, a few blocks from his birthplace. The city renamed the corner the George M. Cohan Plaza and announced an annual George M. Cohan Award for Excellence in Art & Culture. The first award went to Curt Columbus, the artistic director of Trinity Repertory Company.
Personal life and death
From 1899 to 1907, Cohan was married to Ethel Levey (1881–1955; born Grace Ethelia Fowler), a musical comedy actress and dancer. Levey and Cohan had a daughter, actress Georgette Cohan Souther Rowse (1900–1988). Levey joined the Four Cohans when Josie married, and she starred in Little Johnny Jones and other Cohan works. In 1907, Levey divorced Cohan on grounds of adultery.
In 1908, Cohan married Agnes Mary Nolan (1883–1972), who had been a dancer in his early shows; they remained married until his death. They had two daughters and a son. The eldest was Mary Cohan Ronkin, a cabaret singer in the 1930s, who composed incidental music for her father's play The Tavern. In 1968, Mary supervised musical and lyric revisions for the musical George M! Their second daughter was Helen Cohan Carola, a film actress, who performed on Broadway with her father in Friendship in 1931. Their youngest child was George Michael Cohan, Jr. (1914–2000), who graduated from Georgetown University and served in the entertainment corps during World War II. In the 1950s, George Jr. reinterpreted his father's songs on recordings, in a nightclub act, and in television appearances on the Ed Sullivan and Milton Berle shows. George Jr.'s only child, Michaela Marie Cohan (1943–1999), was the last descendant named Cohan. She graduated with a theater degree from Marywood College in Pennsylvania in 1965. From 1966 to 1968, she served in a civilian Special Services unit in Vietnam and Korea. In 1996, she stood in for her ailing father at the ceremony marking her grandfather's induction into the Musical Theatre Hall of Fame at New York University. Cohan was a devoted baseball fan, regularly attending games of the former New York Giants.
He died of cancer at the age of 64 on November 5, 1942, at his Manhattan apartment on Fifth Avenue, surrounded by family and friends. His funeral was held at St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York, and was attended by thousands of people, including five governors of New York, two mayors of New York City and the Postmaster General. The honorary pallbearers included Irving Berlin, Eddie Cantor, Frank Crowninshield, Sol Bloom, Brooks Atkinson, Rube Goldberg, Walter Huston, George Jessel, Connie Mack, Joseph McCarthy, Eugene O'Neill, Sigmund Romberg, Lee Shubert and Fred Waring. Cohan was interred at Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx, New York City, in a private family mausoleum he had erected a quarter century earlier for his sister and parents.
In popular culture
James Cagney played Cohan in the 1942 biopic Yankee Doodle Dandy and in the 1955 film The Seven Little Foys. Cagney won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance in Dandy.
Mickey Rooney played Cohan in Mr. Broadway, a television special broadcast on May 11, 1957. The same month, Rooney released a 78 RPM record featuring Rooney singing Cohan's best-known songs on the A-side.
Joel Grey starred on Broadway as Cohan in the musical George M! (1968), which was adapted into a television special in 1970.
Allan Sherman sang a parody-medley of three Cohan tunes on an early album: "Barry (That'll Be the Baby's Name)"; "H-o-r-o-w-i-t-z"; and "Get on the Garden Freeway" to the tune of "Mary's a Grand Old Name", "Harrigan" and "Give My Regards to Broadway", respectively.
Chip Deffaa created a one-man show about the life of Cohan called George M. Cohan Tonight!, which first ran Off-Broadway at the Irish Repertory Theatre in 2006 with Jon Peterson as Cohan. Deffaa has written and directed five other plays about Cohan.
Filmography
Cohan acted in the following films:
Gallery
Notes
References
McCabe, John: George M. Cohan. The Man Who Owned Broadway (New York: Doubleday & Co., 1973)
Further reading
Cohan, George M.: Twenty Years on Broadway (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1924)
Gilbert, Douglas: American Vaudeville. Its Life and Times (New York: Dover Publications, 1963)
Jones, John Bush: Our Musicals, Ourselves. A Social History of the American Musical Theatre (Lebanon, NH: Brandeis University Press, 2003)
Morehouse, Ward: George M. Cohan. Prince of the American Theater (Philadelphia & New York: J. B. Lippincott Co., 1943)
External links
George M. Cohan at Internet off-Broadway Database
George M. Cohan In America's Theater
George M. Cohan on musicals101.com
F. Gwynplaine MacIntyre, "Dancing after retirement: Cohan plays Roosevelt, 1937", New York Daily News, March 20, 2004.
Chip Deffaa's extensive George M. Cohan site
George M. Cohan; PeriodPaper.com c. 1910
Finding aid for the Edward B. Marks Music Co. Collection on George M. Cohan, 1901–1968 at the Museum of the City of New York
George M. Cohan recordings at the Discography of American Historical Recordings
1878 births
1942 deaths
19th-century American dramatists and playwrights
19th-century American male actors
19th-century American male writers
19th-century American singers
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American male actors
20th-century American male writers
20th-century American singers
Actors from Providence, Rhode Island
American male child actors
American male dancers
American male dramatists and playwrights
American male film actors
American male musical theatre actors
American male silent film actors
American male singers
American male songwriters
American male stage actors
American musical theatre composers
American musical theatre directors
American people of Irish descent
American tap dancers
American theatre directors
Broadway composers and lyricists
Broadway theatre directors
Broadway theatre producers
Burials at Woodlawn Cemetery (Bronx, New York)
Catholics from Massachusetts
Catholics from Rhode Island
George M.
Congressional Gold Medal recipients
Deaths from cancer in New York (state)
Eccentric dancers
Male actors from Rhode Island
Male musical theatre composers
Musicians from Providence, Rhode Island
People from North Brookfield, Massachusetts
Vaudeville performers
Writers from Providence, Rhode Island
Members of The Lambs Club | false | [
"The Monroe County Intermediate School District (commonly abbreviated as the Monroe County ISD or MCISD) is an intermediate school district that provides educational services throughout Monroe County, Michigan. The ISD provides numerous services to all nine of Monroe County's public schools, as well as two public charter schools and 15 private schools. The ISD also provides educational services for juvenile delinquents and works with other government agencies, charitable organizations (such as United Way), Monroe County Community College, and the county's library system.\n\nWhile the Monroe County ISD serves all schools in Monroe County, its boundary is not conterminous with Monroe County and follows the district lines drawn by the county's public schools. Certain portions of Monroe County, especially those in the northern portions near Milan, Flat Rock, and South Rockwood, are within the boundaries of schools in Wayne County and are incorporated into the Wayne County RESA. Not all students in Monroe County attend a school in Monroe County and therefore are not under the ISD's jurisdiction. At the same time, the ISD provides services for those out-of-county students who attend schools in Monroe County — most notably Whiteford Agricultural Schools and Airport Community Schools, who have boundaries extending into neighboring counties.\n\nMain campus\nWhile the Monroe County Intermediate School District works through numerous other schools, their main campus is located in Monroe Charter Township on South Raisinville Road just south of M-50 and down the street from Monroe County Community College. The campus provides numerous educational services, though the only students who regularly attend school on the main campus are those with severe impairments who require specialized assistance. The ISD also employs numerous staff and teachers who work in other schools. These employees include special education teachers, special education aides, paraprofessional educators (such as speech and language pathologists and social workers), and substitute teachers. While employed through the ISD, these workers may work in any of the schools in which the ISD provides services. Many teachers and other employees throughout the county often meet at the ISD's main campus for conferencing and professional development. The Monroe County Intermediate School District runs independently of other districts in the county, and the ISD itself receives its funding through the government. The ISD consists of its own Board of Directors, led by superintendent Stephen McNew and assistant superintendents Joshua Dyer, Lisa Montrief, Elizabeth Taylor, and Michelle Brahaney.\n\nMany distant learning classes are taught from the main campus. This is done primarily for classes at individual schools that do not have enough participating students to warrant a teacher. One such example is Japanese, which is taught by one teacher from Dundee and broadcast live to students at a number of other schools. Many other technology programs and supplies are provided by the ISD.\n\nSpecial education\nAs a special school, the main campus of the Monroe County Intermediate School District is most well known for its special education services. The main campus contains three special education buildings: the Educational Center, main Special Education building, and Transition Center. The Educational Center provides services for students with severe impairments ranging from ages 3–26. The main Special Education building houses administrative offices and the Youth Opportunity Program, which provides education opportunities for low-income students who are looking for jobs or attempting to get their GED. The Transition Center is the smallest building on the main campus and serves to provide assistance to students who have difficulties transitioning into adulthood.\n\nWhile only students with severe impairments attend classes on the main campus, other special education students with less required assistance attend self-contained classrooms in the public school system, where they are able to partake in general education to the best of their abilities. These students are technically enrolled through the ISD but may be placed in any of the nine public school districts, where they may earn their high school diploma from the school they attend. The ISD provides services to these students and also employs the special education teachers and aides. The ISD leases classrooms from other schools to use for special education students. All ISD classrooms are required to have a certified aide who assists the teacher and the classroom, and the number of students in each class is very low compared to other classes. The ISD also oversees classrooms and teachers at the Monroe County Youth Center.\n\nThe ISD has its own buses and provides transportation for special education students, especially those who attend a school while living outside of that school district's boundaries. For the most part, an ISD classroom operates independently from the rest of the school in which they are located. The number of ISD classrooms a school has depends on the number of special education students within that school. Most special education students do not leave their ISD classroom during the school day, except for lunch and to attend \"out\" classes, such as physical education, art, music, etc. They may also go to a resource room for certain subjects in which the student is semi-proficient. These classes are taught by special education teachers but are not run by the ISD.\n\nMonroe County Middle College\nStarting the 2009–10 school year in September 2009, the Monroe County Intermediate School District — in collaboration with Monroe County Community College and the Mercy Memorial Hospital System — formed the Monroe County Middle College (MCMC) for student in grades 9–13. The program, which has selective enrollment, is designed for students who desire early entry into mainly health care professions. Upon graduation from MCMC, student receive their high school diploma and may have earned up to 60 college credits — the equivalent to an associate degree upon graduating from high school. These students are on a College Campus taking their classes.\n\nSchools served\n\nPublic school districts\n\nAirport Community Schools\nBedford Public Schools\nDundee Community Schools\nIda Public Schools\nJefferson Schools\nMason Consolidated Schools\nMonroe Public Schools\nSummerfield Schools\nWhiteford Agricultural Schools\n\nCharter schools\nNew Bedford Academy (Lambertville)\nTriumph Academy (Frenchtown)\n\nPrivate schools\n\nHoly Ghost Lutheran School (Frenchtown)\nLutheran High School South (Newport)\nMeadow Montessori School (Monroe Township)\nSt. Charles School (Newport)\nSt. John School (Monroe)\nSt. Joseph School (Erie)\nSt. Mary Catholic Central (Monroe)\nSt. Mary Parish School (Monroe)\nSt. Michael School (Monroe)\nSt. Patrick School (Carleton)\nState Line Christian School (Temperance)\nTrinity Lutheran School (Monroe)\nZion Lutheran School (Frenchtown)\n\nJuvenile detention schools\nMonroe County Youth Center (Monroe Township)\nMoreau Center (Frenchtown)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nMonroe County Intermediate School District\nMonroe County Educational Directory\nMonroe County ISD Boundary Map\n\nIntermediate school districts in Michigan\nSchool districts in Michigan\nEducation in Monroe County, Michigan",
"TreeHouse School is a non-maintained special school and sixth form for children aged 4 to 19 that are diagnosed with autism. The school is located in the London Borough of Haringey, England, and is operated by the charity Ambitious about Autism. Children from 17 local authority areas attend the school.\n\nFounded in 1997, by a group of parents including writer Nick Hornby, it was instituted to educate children using Applied Behavior Analysis outside of a home schooling context, and was originally based in a room at Swiss Cottage Library. It is currently located in Muswell Hill, where roughly 90 pupils attend. The school enrols pupils that have a diagnosis of autism or a related communication disorder, and have a Statement of Special Educational Needs.\n\nThe school has links with local mainstream schools, and some pupils take part in a range of classes at these schools including subjects such as music or sports. TreeHouse School also runs a programme of 'Reverse Inclusion', where children from Muswell Hill Primary School visit TreeHouse once a week to learn and play with children at the primary department of the school.\n\nThe school was rated as 'Outstanding' by Ofsted in 2012. The school is also accredited by the National Autistic Society.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n TreeHouse School official website\n\n1997 establishments in England\nAutism-related organisations in the United Kingdom\nEducational institutions established in 1997\nIndependent co-educational schools in London\nIndependent schools in the London Borough of Haringey\nMuswell Hill\nSpecial schools in the London Borough of Haringey"
]
|
[
"Simone de Beauvoir",
"Education"
]
| C_5ed7bcbf9b4d438faac7388fd5948edc_1 | Where did de Beauvoir go to college and study? | 1 | Where did Simone de Beauvoir go to college and study? | Simone de Beauvoir | De Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fuelled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, de Beauvoir could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. De Beauvoir took this opportunity to do what she always wanted to do while also taking steps to earn a living for herself. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the Institut Sainte-Marie. She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, she wrote her diplome d'etudes superieures (roughly equivalent to an MA thesis) on Leibniz for Leon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). De Beauvoir was only the ninth woman to have received a degree from the Sorbonne at the time, due to the fact that French women had only recently been allowed to join higher education. De Beauvoir first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Levi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the Ecole Normale Superieure in preparation for the agregation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for the agregation that she met Ecole Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and Rene Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or beaver). The jury for the agregation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of de Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam. Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said: "...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual." CANNOTANSWER | she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris | Simone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir (, ; ; 9 January 1908 – 14 April 1986) was a French existentialist philosopher, writer, social theorist and feminist activist. Though she did not consider herself a philosopher, and even though she was not considered one at the time of her death, she had a significant influence on both feminist existentialism and feminist theory.
Beauvoir wrote novels, essays, biographies, autobiographies and monographs on philosophy, politics, and social issues. She was known for her 1949 treatise The Second Sex, a detailed analysis of women's oppression and a foundational tract of contemporary feminism; and for her novels, including She Came to Stay and The Mandarins. Her most enduring contribution to literature is her memoirs, notably the first volume, "Mémoires d'une jeune fille rangée" (1958), which have a warmth and descriptive power. She won the 1954 Prix Goncourt, the 1975 Jerusalem Prize, and the 1978 Austrian State Prize for European Literature. She was also known for her open, lifelong relationship with French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre.
Early years
Beauvoir was born on 9 January 1908 into a bourgeois Parisian family in the 6th arrondissement. Her parents were Georges Bertrand de Beauvoir, a lawyer, who once aspired to be an actor, and Françoise Beauvoir (née Brasseur), a wealthy banker's daughter and devout Catholic. Simone's sister, Hélène, was born two years later. The family struggled to maintain their bourgeois status after losing much of their fortune shortly after World War I, and Françoise insisted the two daughters be sent to a prestigious convent school.
Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fueled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, she could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. She took this opportunity to take steps towards earning a living for herself.
She first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Lévi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the École Normale Supérieure in preparation for the agrégation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for it that she met École Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and René Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or "beaver"). The jury for the agrégation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam.
Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said:
"...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual."
Secondary and post-secondary education
Beauvoir pursued post-secondary education after completing her high school years at Lycée Fenelon. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the . She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, wrote her (roughly equivalent to an M.A. thesis) on Leibniz for Léon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). Her studies of political philosophy through university influenced her to start thinking of societal concerns rather than her own individual issues.
Religious upbringing
Beauvoir was raised in a strict Catholic household. She had been sent to convent schools as a youth. She was deeply religious as a child, at one point intending to become a nun. At age 14, Beauvoir questioned her faith as she saw many changes in the world after witnessing tragedies throughout her life. She abandoned her faith in her early teens and remained an atheist for the rest of her life. Beauvoir quotes "Faith allows an evasion of those difficulties which the atheist confronts honestly. And to crown all, the believer derives a sense of great superiority from this very cowardice itself."
Middle years
From 1929 until 1943, Beauvoir taught at the lycée level until she could support herself solely on the earnings of her writings. She taught at the (Marseille), the , and the (1936–39).
Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre met during her college years. Intrigued by her determination as an educator, he sought out to make their relationship romantic. However, she had no interest in doing so. During October 1929, Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir became a couple and, after they were confronted by her father, Sartre asked her to marry him on a provisional basis: One day while they were sitting on a bench outside the Louvre, he said, "Let's sign a two-year lease". Though Beauvoir wrote, "Marriage was impossible. I had no dowry", scholars point out that her ideal relationships described in The Second Sex and elsewhere bore little resemblances to the marriage standards of the day. Instead, she and Sartre entered into a lifelong "soul partnership", which was sexual but not exclusive, nor did it involve living together.
Sartre and Beauvoir always read each other's work. Debate continues about the extent to which they influenced each other in their existentialist works, such as Sartre's Being and Nothingness and Beauvoir's She Came to Stay and "Phenomenology and Intent". However, recent studies of Beauvoir's work focus on influences other than Sartre, including Hegel and Leibniz. The Neo-Hegelian revival led by Alexandre Kojève and Jean Hyppolite in the 1930s inspired a whole generation of French thinkers, including Sartre, to discover Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit. However, Beauvoir, reading Hegel in German during the war, produced an original critique of his dialectic of consciousness.
Personal life
Beauvoir's prominent open relationships at times overshadowed her substantial academic reputation. A scholar lecturing with her chastised their "distinguished [Harvard] audience [because] every question asked about Sartre concerned his work, while all those asked about Beauvoir concerned her personal life." Beginning in 1929, Beauvoir and Sartre were partners and remained so for 51 years, until his death in 1980. She chose never to marry and never had children. This gave her the time to advance her education and engage in political causes, write and teach, and take lovers. She lived with Claude Lanzmann from 1952 to 1959.
Perhaps her most famous lover was American author Nelson Algren, whom she met in Chicago in 1947, and to whom she wrote across the Atlantic as "my beloved husband." Algren won the National Book Award for The Man with the Golden Arm in 1950, and in 1954, Beauvoir won France's most prestigious literary prize for The Mandarins, in which Algren is the character Lewis Brogan. Algren vociferously objected to their intimacy becoming public. Years after they separated, she was buried wearing his gift of a silver ring.
Beauvoir was bisexual, and her relationships with young women were controversial. French author Bianca Lamblin (originally Bianca Bienenfeld) wrote in her book Mémoires d'une Jeune Fille Dérangée (published in English under the title A Disgraceful Affair) that, while a student at Lycée Molière, she was sexually exploited by her teacher Beauvoir, who was in her 30s. Lamblin had affairs with both Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir. In 1943, Beauvoir was suspended from her teaching position when she was accused of seducing her 17-year-old lycée pupil Natalie Sorokine in 1939. Sorokine's parents laid formal charges against Beauvoir for debauching a minor (the age of consent in France at the time was 15), and Beauvoir's license to teach in France was revoked, although it was subsequently reinstated.
In 1977, Beauvoir, Sartre, Roland Barthes, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida and much of the era's intelligentsia signed a petition seeking to completely remove the age of consent in France.
Notable works
She Came to Stay
Beauvoir published her first novel She Came to Stay in 1943. It has been assumed that it is inspired by her and Sartre's sexual relationship with Olga Kosakiewicz and Wanda Kosakiewicz. Olga was one of her students in the Rouen secondary school where Beauvoir taught during the early 1930s. She grew fond of Olga. Sartre tried to pursue Olga but she rejected him, so he began a relationship with her sister Wanda. Upon his death, Sartre was still supporting Wanda. He also supported Olga for years, until she met and married Jacques-Laurent Bost, a lover of Beauvoir. However, the main thrust of the novel is philosophical, a scene in which to situate Beauvoir's abiding philosophical pre-occupation - the relationship between the self and the other.
In the novel, set just before the outbreak of World War II, Beauvoir creates one character from the complex relationships of Olga and Wanda. The fictionalised versions of Beauvoir and Sartre have a ménage à trois with the young woman. The novel also delves into Beauvoir and Sartre's complex relationship and how it was affected by the ménage à trois.
She Came to Stay was followed by many others, including The Blood of Others, which explores the nature of individual responsibility, telling a love story between two young French students participating in the Resistance in World War II.
Existentialist ethics
In 1944, Beauvoir wrote her first philosophical essay, Pyrrhus et Cinéas, a discussion on existentialist ethics. She continued her exploration of existentialism through her second essay The Ethics of Ambiguity (1947); it is perhaps the most accessible entry into French existentialism. In the essay, Beauvoir clears up some inconsistencies that many, Sartre included, have found in major existentialist works such as Being and Nothingness. In The Ethics of Ambiguity, Beauvoir confronts the existentialist dilemma of absolute freedom vs. the constraints of circumstance.
Les Temps modernes
At the end of World War II, Beauvoir and Sartre edited Les Temps modernes, a political journal which Sartre founded along with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and others. Beauvoir used Les Temps Modernes to promote her own work and explore her ideas on a small scale before fashioning essays and books. Beauvoir remained an editor until her death.
Sexuality, existentialist feminism and The Second Sex
The Second Sex, first published in 1949 in French as Le Deuxième Sexe, turns the existentialist mantra that existence precedes essence into a feminist one: "One is not born but becomes a woman" (French: "On ne naît pas femme, on le devient"). With this famous phrase, Beauvoir first articulated what has come to be known as the sex-gender distinction, that is, the distinction between biological sex and the social and historical construction of gender and its attendant stereotypes. Beauvoir argues that "the fundamental source of women's oppression is its [femininity's] historical and social construction as the quintessential".
Beauvoir defines women as the "second sex" because women are defined in relation to men. She pointed out that Aristotle argued women are "female by virtue of a certain lack of qualities", while Thomas Aquinas referred to woman as "imperfect man" and the "incidental" being. She quotes "In itself, homosexuality is as limiting as heterosexuality: the ideal should be to be capable of loving a woman or a man; either, a human being, without feeling fear, restraint, or obligation."
Beauvoir asserted that women are as capable of choice as men, and thus can choose to elevate themselves, moving beyond the "immanence" to which they were previously resigned and reaching "transcendence", a position in which one takes responsibility for oneself and the world, where one chooses one's freedom.
Chapters of The Second Sex were originally published in Les Temps modernes, in June 1949. The second volume came a few months after the first in France. It was published soon after in America due to the quick translation by Howard Parshley, as prompted by Blanche Knopf, wife of publisher Alfred A. Knopf. Because Parshley had only a basic familiarity with the French language, and a minimal understanding of philosophy (he was a professor of biology at Smith College), much of Beauvoir's book was mistranslated or inappropriately cut, distorting her intended message. For years, Knopf prevented the introduction of a more accurate retranslation of Beauvoir's work, declining all proposals despite the efforts of existentialist scholars.
Only in 2009 was there a second translation, to mark the 60th anniversary of the original publication. Constance Borde and Sheila Malovany-Chevallier produced the first integral translation in 2010, reinstating a third of the original work.
In the chapter "Woman: Myth and Reality" of The Second Sex, Beauvoir argued that men had made women the "Other" in society by application of a false aura of "mystery" around them. She argued that men used this as an excuse not to understand women or their problems and not to help them, and that this stereotyping was always done in societies by the group higher in the hierarchy to the group lower in the hierarchy. She wrote that a similar kind of oppression by hierarchy also happened in other categories of identity, such as race, class, and religion, but she claimed that it was nowhere more true than with gender in which men stereotyped women and used it as an excuse to organize society into a patriarchy.
Despite her contributions to the feminist movement, especially the French women's liberation movement, and her beliefs in women's economic independence and equal education, Beauvoir was initially reluctant to call herself a feminist. However, after observing the resurgence of the feminist movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Beauvoir stated she no longer believed a socialist revolution to be enough to bring about women's liberation. She publicly declared herself a feminist in 1972 in an interview with Le Nouvel Observateur.
In 2018 the manuscript pages of Le Deuxième Sexe were published. At the time her adopted daughter, Sylvie Le Bon-Beauvoir, a philosophy professor, described her mother's writing process: Beauvoir wrote every page of her books longhand first and only after that would hire typists.
The Mandarins
Published in 1954, The Mandarins won her France's highest literary prize, the Prix Goncourt. The book is set after the end of World War II and follows the personal lives of philosophers and friends among Sartre's and Beauvoir's intimate circle, including her relationship with American writer Nelson Algren, to whom the book was dedicated.
Algren was outraged by the frank way Beauvoir described their sexual experiences in both The Mandarins and her autobiographies. Algren vented his outrage when reviewing American translations of Beauvoir's work. Much material bearing on this episode in Beauvoir's life, including her love letters to Algren, entered the public domain only after her death.
Les Inséparables
Beauvoir's early novel Les Inséparables, long suppressed, was published in French in 2020 and in two different English translations in 2021.<ref>Reviewed 23 Aug. 2021 by Merve Emre in The New Yorker" https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/08/30/simone-de-beauvoirs-lost-novel-of-early-love</ref> Written in 1954, the book describes her first love, a classmate named Elisabeth Lacoin ("Zaza") who died before age 22, and had as a teenager a "passionate and tragic" relationship with Beauvoir and Merleau-Ponty, then teaching at the same school. Disapproved by Sartre, the novel was deemed "too intimate" to be published during Beauvoir's lifetime.
Later years
Beauvoir wrote popular travel diaries about time spent in the United States and China and published essays and fiction rigorously, especially throughout the 1950s and 1960s. She published several volumes of short stories, including The Woman Destroyed, which, like some of her other later work, deals with aging.
1980 saw the publication of When Things of the Spirit Come First, a set of short stories centred around and based upon women important to her earlier years. Though written long before the novel She Came to Stay, Beauvoir did not at the time consider the stories worth publishing, allowing some forty years to pass before doing so.
Sartre and Merleau-Ponty had a longstanding feud, which led Merleau-Ponty to leave Les Temps Modernes. Beauvoir sided with Sartre and ceased to associate with Merleau-Ponty. In Beauvoir's later years, she hosted the journal's editorial meetings in her flat and contributed more than Sartre, whom she often had to force to offer his opinions.
Beauvoir also wrote a four-volume autobiography, consisting of: Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter; The Prime of Life; Force of Circumstance (sometimes published in two volumes in English translation: After the War and Hard Times); and All Said and Done. In 1964 Beauvoir published a novella-length autobiography, A Very Easy Death, covering the time she spent visiting her ageing mother, who was dying of cancer. The novella brings up questions of ethical concerns with truth-telling in doctor-patient relationships.
Her 1970 long essay La Vieillesse (The Coming of Age) is a rare instance of an intellectual meditation on the decline and solitude all humans experience if they do not die before about the age of 60.
In the 1970s Beauvoir became active in France's women's liberation movement. She wrote and signed the Manifesto of the 343 in 1971, a manifesto that included a list of famous women who claimed to have had an abortion, then illegal in France. Some argue most of the women had not had abortions, including Beauvoir. Signatories were diverse as Catherine Deneuve, Delphine Seyrig, and Beauvoir's sister Poupette. In 1974, abortion was legalised in France.
In a 1975 interview with Betty Friedan Beauvoir said "No woman should be authorized to stay at home and raise her children. Society should be totally different. Women should not have that choice, precisely because if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one."
In about 1976 Beauvoir and Sylvie Le Bon made a trip to New York City in the United States to visit Kate Millett on her farm.
In 1981 she wrote La Cérémonie Des Adieux (A Farewell to Sartre), a painful account of Sartre's last years. In the opening of Adieux, Beauvoir notes that it is the only major published work of hers which Sartre did not read before its publication.
She contributed the piece "Feminism – alive, well, and in constant danger" to the 1984 anthology Sisterhood Is Global: The International Women's Movement Anthology, edited by Robin Morgan.
After Sartre died in 1980, Beauvoir published his letters to her with edits to spare the feelings of people in their circle who were still living. After Beauvoir's death, Sartre's adopted daughter and literary heir Arlette Elkaïm would not let many of Sartre's letters be published in unedited form. Most of Sartre's letters available today have Beauvoir's edits, which include a few omissions but mostly the use of pseudonyms. Beauvoir's adopted daughter and literary heir Sylvie Le Bon, unlike Elkaïm, published Beauvoir's unedited letters to both Sartre and Algren.
Beauvoir died of pneumonia on 14 April 1986 in Paris, aged 78. She is buried next to Sartre at the Montparnasse Cemetery in Paris. She was honored as a figure at the forefront of the struggle for women's rights around the time of her passing.
Impact
Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex is considered a foundational work in the history of feminism. Beauvoir had denied being a feminist multiple times but ultimately admitted that she was one after the influential Second Sex became crucial in the world of feminism. The work has had a profound influence, opening the way for second wave feminism in the United States, Canada, Australia, and around the world. Despite the fact that Beauvoir has been quoted as saying "There is a certain unreasonable demand that I find a little stupid because it would enclose me, immobilize me completely in a sort of feminist concrete block." Her works on feminism have paved the way for all future feminists. Founders of the second wave read The Second Sex in translation, including Kate Millett, Shulamith Firestone, Juliet Mitchell, Ann Oakley and Germaine Greer. All acknowledged their profound debt to Beauvoir, including visiting her in France, consulting with her at crucial moments, and dedicating works to her. Betty Friedan, whose 1963 book The Feminine Mystique is often regarded as the opening salvo of second wave feminism in the United States, later said that reading The Second Sex in the early 1950s "led me to whatever original analysis of women's existence I have been able to contribute to the Women's movement and to its unique politics. I looked to Simone de Beauvoir for a philosophical and intellectual authority."
At one point in the early seventies, Beauvoir also aligned herself with the League for Woman's rights as a means to campaign and fight against sexism in the French society. Beauvoir's influence goes beyond just her impact on second wave founders, and extends to numerous aspects of feminism, including literary criticism, history, philosophy, theology, criticism of scientific discourse, and psychotherapy. When Beauvoir first became involved with the feminism movement, one of her first objectives was that of legalizing abortion.Donna Haraway wrote that, "despite important differences, all the modern feminist meanings of gender have roots in Simone de Beauvoir's claim that 'one is not born a woman [one becomes one]'". This "most famous feminist sentence ever written" is echoed in the title of Monique Wittig's 1981 essay One Is Not Born a Woman. Judith Butler took the concept a step further, arguing that Beauvoir's choice of the verb to become suggests that gender is a process, constantly being renewed in an ongoing interaction between the surrounding culture and individual choice.
Prizes
Prix Goncourt, 1954
Jerusalem Prize, 1975
Austrian State Prize for European Literature, 1978
Works
List of publications (non-exhaustive)
L'Invitée (1943) (English – She Came to Stay) [novel]
Pyrrhus et Cinéas (1944) [nonfiction]
Le Sang des autres (1945) (English – The Blood of Others) [novel]
Les Bouches inutiles (1945) (English - Who Shall Die?) [drama]
Tous les hommes sont mortels (1946) (English – All Men Are Mortal) [novel]
Pour une morale de l'ambiguïté (1947) (English – The Ethics of Ambiguity) [nonfiction]
"America Day by Day" (1948) (English – 1999 – Carol Cosman (Translator and Douglas Brinkley (Foreword) [nonfiction]
Le Deuxième Sexe (1949) (English – The Second Sex) [nonfiction]
L'Amérique au jour le jour (1954) (English – America Day by Day)
Les Mandarins (1954) (English – The Mandarins) [novel]
Must We Burn Sade? (1955)
The Long March (1957) [nonfiction]
Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter (1958)
The Prime of Life (1960)
Force of Circumstance (1963)
A Very Easy Death (1964)
Les Belles Images (1966) [novel]
The Woman Destroyed (1967) [short stories]
The Coming of Age (1970) [nonfiction]
All Said and Done (1972)
Old Age (1972) [nonfiction]
When Things of the Spirit Come First (1979) [novel]
Adieux: A Farewell to Sartre (1981)
Letters to Sartre (1990)
Journal de guerre, Sept 1939 – Jan 1941 (1990); English – Wartime Diary (2009)
A Transatlantic Love Affair: Letters to Nelson Algren (1998)
Diary of a Philosophy Student, 1926–27 (2006)
Cahiers de jeunesse, 1926–1930 (2008)
Selected translations
Patrick O'Brian was Beauvoir's principal English translator, until he attained commercial success as a novelist.
Philosophical Writings (Urbana : University of Illinois Press, 2004, edited by Margaret A. Simons et al.) contains a selection of essays by Beauvoir translated for the first time into English. Among those are: Pyrrhus and Cineas, discussing the futility or utility of action, two previously unpublished chapters from her novel She Came to Stay and an introduction to Ethics of Ambiguity.
See also
Art Shay
Roman à clef
Simone Weil
List of women's rights activists
Place Jean-Paul-Sartre-et-Simone-de-Beauvoir
References
Sources
Appignanesi, Lisa, 2005, Simone de Beauvoir, London: Haus,
Bair, Deirdre, 1990. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books,
Rowley, Hazel, 2005. Tête-a-Tête: Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre. New York: HarperCollins.
Suzanne Lilar, 1969. Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe (with collaboration of Prof. Dreyfus). Paris, University Presses of France (Presses Universitaires de France).
Fraser, M., 1999. Identity Without Selfhood: Simone de Beauvoir and Bisexuality, Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press.
Axel Madsen, Hearts and Minds: The Common Journey of Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre, William Morrow & Co, 1977.
Hélène Rouch, 2001–2002, Trois conceptions du sexe: Simone de Beauvoir entre Adrienne Sahuqué et Suzanne Lilar, Simone de Beauvoir Studies, n° 18, pp. 49–60.
Simone de Beauvoir, Marguerite Yourcenar, Nathalie Sarraute, 2002. Conférence Élisabeth Badinter, Jacques Lassalle & Lucette Finas, .
Further reading
Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe by Suzanne Lilar, 1969.
Feminist Theory and Simone de Beauvoir by Toril Moi, 1990.
Appignanesi, Lisa. Simone de Beauvoir. London: Penguin. 1988. .
Bair, Deirdre. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books. 1990. .
Francis, Claude. Simone de Beauvoir: A Life, A Love Story. Lisa Nesselson (Translator). New York: St. Martin's, 1987. .
Okely, Judith. Simone de Beauvoir. New York: Pantheon. 1986. .
External links
Guardian Books "Author Page", with profile and links to further articles.
Victoria Brittain et al discuss Simone de Beauvoir's lasting influence, ICA 1989
"Simone de Beauvoir", Great Lives, BBC Radio 4, 22 April 2011
Kate Kirkpatrick. (6 November 2017) "What is authentic love? A View from Simone de Beauvoir" . IAI News''.
1908 births
1986 deaths
20th-century French non-fiction writers
20th-century French novelists
20th-century French philosophers
20th-century French women writers
Atheist feminists
Atheist philosophers
Bisexual feminists
Bisexual women
Bisexual writers
Burials at Montparnasse Cemetery
Communist women writers
Continental philosophers
Critical theorists
Cultural critics
Deaths from pneumonia in France
Epistemologists
Existentialists
Feminist philosophers
Feminist studies scholars
Feminist theorists
Former Roman Catholics
French abortion-rights activists
French anti-war activists
French atheists
French communists
French socialists
French ethicists
French feminist writers
French literary critics
Women literary critics
French Marxists
French political philosophers
French women non-fiction writers
French women novelists
French women philosophers
Jerusalem Prize recipients
Légion d'honneur refusals
LGBT memoirists
French LGBT novelists
Marxist feminists
French Marxist writers
Materialist feminists
Metaphysicians
Moral philosophers
Ontologists
Phenomenologists
Philosophers of art
Philosophers of culture
Philosophers of education
Philosophers of ethics and morality
Philosophers of literature
Philosophers of nihilism
Philosophers of sexuality
Political philosophers
Prix Goncourt winners
French social commentators
Social critics
Social philosophers
French socialist feminists
University of Paris alumni
French women memoirists
Writers from Paris
20th-century French memoirists
French magazine founders
LGBT philosophers | true | [
"Olga Kosakiewicz (; 6 November 1915 – 1983) was a French theater actress.\n\nBiography\nShe and her sister Wanda Kosakiewicz were born in Kiev as daughters of the Frenchwoman Marthe Kosakiewicz and the Belarusian emigrant from Kiev Victor Kosakiewicz. After the October Revolution, the family migrated to L'Aigle, where the father acquired and operated a saw mill.\n\nOlga Kosakiewicz visited the Lycée Joan of Arc in Rouen, where she was taught by Colette Audry and in 1932 presented to Simone de Beauvoir, in 1934 when Jean-Paul Sartre returned from a study visit from the German Reich she was also presented to him. At the end of the school year 1934 she passed her Baccalauréat as best. From autumn 1934 to 1936 she studied medicine at the University of Rouen, then lived in Paris. From 1934 to 1935 Beauvoir and from 1935 to 1937 Sartre had an affair with her. Her irrepressible, rebellious character, characterized by emotional high and low, her authenticity and spontaneity charmed Sartre and Beauvoir.\n\nShe joined the circle of de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre. \nIn de Beauvoir's first novel L'Invitée, she and her sister, Wanda, were fused together to make the character of the younger friend Xavière, to form with the actress Françoise and the actor, director Pierre a ménage à trois.\n\nOlga, along with Bianca Lamblin and Natalie Sorokin, later stated that their \"trio\" relationships with Sartre and de Beauvoir damaged them psychologically.\n\nA motivation of Sartre to write the play The Flies was to give Kosakiewicz an opportunity for a debut as a theater actress. The Flies should have premiered at the Comédie-Française, but the intendant Jean-Louis Barrault did not agree to Sartre's condition that Olga Kosakiewicz should assume the role of Electra. So it was premiered on June 3, 1943 at the (aka Théâtre Sarah Bernhardt).\n\nIn 1946 in Simone de Beauvoir's unique Drama Les Bouches inutiles she played Clarice the daughter of Catherine and Louis d'Avesnes the main characters.\n\nIn Sartre's trilogy of novels, Les Chemins de la Liberté (The Roads to Freedom), the character of Ivich is considered a representation of Olga. Deirdre Bair's biography of Simone de Beauvoir examines this relationship. Hazel Rowley also discusses it at length in her book about the relationship between Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre.\n\nIn 1946 Olga married Jacques-Laurent Bost, a long-time lover of de Beauvoir. She died of tuberculosis in 1983.\n\nSee also\n Bianca Lamblin\n Natalie Sorokin\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\nFrench film actresses\n1915 births\nDate of death unknown\n1983 deaths\n20th-century French actresses\nWhite Russian emigrants to France",
"Nancy Bauer is an American philosopher specializing in feminist philosophy, existentialism and phenomenology, and the work of Simone de Beauvoir. She was recently Chair of the Philosophy Department at Tufts University and is currently Dean of Academic Affairs and Professor of Philosophy as well as the Dean of the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts. Her interests include methodology in philosophy, feminism, metaphysics, social/political/moral philosophy, philosophy of language, phenomenology, and philosophy in film.\n\nEducation and career\nBauer earned an A. B. in Social Studies, magna cum laude, from Harvard and Radcliffe Colleges in 1982. She earned a Master of Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School in 1986, and was a Ph.D. candidate in the Study of Religion, 1986–1988. She earned a Ph.D. in philosophy from Harvard University in 1997, studying under Stanley Cavell. Prior to her position as a professor, she was a journalist, holding a position on the Metro Desk at the Boston Globe, where she also served as the paper's first full-time Cape Cod beat reporter. She has also worked for Boston Children's Hospital and contributed to the New Child Health Encyclopedia.\n\nResearch and publications\nBauer's first book was \"Simone de Beauvoir, Philosophy, and Feminism,\" New York: Columbia University Press, 2001. She has also published on pornography, objectification, and philosophy of film.\n\nIn a June 20, 2010 New York Times opinion piece, she wrote:\nThe goal of \"The Second Sex\" is to get women, and men, to crave freedom — social, political and psychological — more than the precarious kind of happiness that an unjust world intermittently begrudges to the people who play by its rules. Beauvoir warned that you can't just will yourself to be free, that is, to abjure relentlessly the temptations to want only what the world wants you to want. For her the job of the philosopher, at least as much as the fiction writer, is to re-describe how things are in a way that competes with the status quo story and leaves us craving social justice and the truly wide berth for self-expression that only it can provide.\nShe is a member of the Society for Interdisciplinary Feminist Phenomenology.\n\nAwards\n\n Joseph A. and Lillian Leibner Award for Distinguished Advising and Teaching, 2005\n Radcliffe Institute Fellowship, 2002–2003\n\nPublications\n\n \"Simone de Beauvoir, Philosophy, and Feminism,\" New York: Columbia University Press, 2001.\n \"Hegel and Feminist Politics: A Symposium,\" with Kimberley Hutchings, Tuija Pulkkinen, and Alison Stone, Feminist Engagements With Hegel, Columbia University Press, forthcoming.\n \"Beauvoir on the Allure of Self-Objectification,\" (Re)découvrir l'oeuvre de Simone de Beauvoir: Du Deuxième Sexe à La Cérémonie des adieux, edited by Pascale Fautrier, Pierre-Louis Fort, and Anne Strasser (Paris: Le Bord de L'Eau, 2008): 249 – 256.\n \"The Second Feminism,\" Symposia on Gender, Race, and Philosophy, October 2007.\n \"The N-Word,\" Fringe 10 (June 2007).\n \"Pornutopia,\" n+1 5 (Winter 2007): 63 – 73.\n \"How to Do Things With Pornography,\" Reading Cavell, edited by Sanford Shieh and Alice Crary (New York: Routledge, 2006).\n \"On Human Understanding,\" Wittgensteinian Fideism, edited by Kai Nielsen and D. Z. Phillips (Norwich, England: SCM Press, 2006).\n \"Beauvoir's Heideggerian Ontology,\" The Philosophy of Simone de Beauvoir: Critical Essays, edited by Margaret A. Simons (Indiana University Press, 2006).\n \"Cogito Ergo Film: Plato, Descartes, and Fight Club,\" Film as Philosophy: Essays on Cinema After Wittgenstein and Cavell, edited by Rupert Read (Florence, KY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005).\n \"Must We Read Simone de Beauvoir?\" The Legacy of Simone de Beauvoir, edited by Emily Grosholz (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004).\n \"Is Feminist Philosophy a Contradiction in Terms?\" Twenty Questions: An Introduction to Philosophy, 5th ed., edited by G. Lee Bowie, Robert C. Solomon, Meredith W. Michaels (Florence, KY: Wadsworth, 2003). An abridgement of chapter 1 of Simone de Beauvoir, Philosophy, and Feminism.\n \"Being-with as Being-against: Heidegger Meets Hegel in The Second Sex,\" Continental Philosophy Review, Vol. 34, No. 2 (June 2001).\n \"First Philosophy, The Second Sex, and the Third Wave,\" Labyrinth, Vol. 1, No. 1 (Winter 1999). Reprinted in Simone de Beauvoir: 50 Jahre nach Dem Anderen Geschlecht, edited by Yvanka B. Raynova and Susanne Moser (Vienna: Institute for Axiological Research, 1999). A different version of chapter 2 of Simone de Beauvoir, Philosophy, and Feminism.\n \"Sum Femina Inde Cogito: Das andere Geschleht und Die Meditationen,\" Die Philosophin 20 (October 1999): 41 – 61.\n\nReferences\n\nFeminist philosophers\nLiving people\nAmerican women philosophers\n21st-century American philosophers\nHarvard Divinity School alumni\nPhilosophers from Massachusetts\nContinental philosophers\nYear of birth missing (living people)\n21st-century American women"
]
|
[
"Simone de Beauvoir",
"Education",
"Where did de Beauvoir go to college and study?",
"she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris"
]
| C_5ed7bcbf9b4d438faac7388fd5948edc_1 | did she get advanced degrees? | 2 | did Simone de Beauvoir get advanced degrees? | Simone de Beauvoir | De Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fuelled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, de Beauvoir could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. De Beauvoir took this opportunity to do what she always wanted to do while also taking steps to earn a living for herself. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the Institut Sainte-Marie. She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, she wrote her diplome d'etudes superieures (roughly equivalent to an MA thesis) on Leibniz for Leon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). De Beauvoir was only the ninth woman to have received a degree from the Sorbonne at the time, due to the fact that French women had only recently been allowed to join higher education. De Beauvoir first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Levi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the Ecole Normale Superieure in preparation for the agregation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for the agregation that she met Ecole Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and Rene Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or beaver). The jury for the agregation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of de Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam. Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said: "...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual." CANNOTANSWER | De Beauvoir was only the ninth woman to have received a degree from the Sorbonne at the time, | Simone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir (, ; ; 9 January 1908 – 14 April 1986) was a French existentialist philosopher, writer, social theorist and feminist activist. Though she did not consider herself a philosopher, and even though she was not considered one at the time of her death, she had a significant influence on both feminist existentialism and feminist theory.
Beauvoir wrote novels, essays, biographies, autobiographies and monographs on philosophy, politics, and social issues. She was known for her 1949 treatise The Second Sex, a detailed analysis of women's oppression and a foundational tract of contemporary feminism; and for her novels, including She Came to Stay and The Mandarins. Her most enduring contribution to literature is her memoirs, notably the first volume, "Mémoires d'une jeune fille rangée" (1958), which have a warmth and descriptive power. She won the 1954 Prix Goncourt, the 1975 Jerusalem Prize, and the 1978 Austrian State Prize for European Literature. She was also known for her open, lifelong relationship with French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre.
Early years
Beauvoir was born on 9 January 1908 into a bourgeois Parisian family in the 6th arrondissement. Her parents were Georges Bertrand de Beauvoir, a lawyer, who once aspired to be an actor, and Françoise Beauvoir (née Brasseur), a wealthy banker's daughter and devout Catholic. Simone's sister, Hélène, was born two years later. The family struggled to maintain their bourgeois status after losing much of their fortune shortly after World War I, and Françoise insisted the two daughters be sent to a prestigious convent school.
Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fueled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, she could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. She took this opportunity to take steps towards earning a living for herself.
She first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Lévi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the École Normale Supérieure in preparation for the agrégation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for it that she met École Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and René Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or "beaver"). The jury for the agrégation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam.
Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said:
"...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual."
Secondary and post-secondary education
Beauvoir pursued post-secondary education after completing her high school years at Lycée Fenelon. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the . She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, wrote her (roughly equivalent to an M.A. thesis) on Leibniz for Léon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). Her studies of political philosophy through university influenced her to start thinking of societal concerns rather than her own individual issues.
Religious upbringing
Beauvoir was raised in a strict Catholic household. She had been sent to convent schools as a youth. She was deeply religious as a child, at one point intending to become a nun. At age 14, Beauvoir questioned her faith as she saw many changes in the world after witnessing tragedies throughout her life. She abandoned her faith in her early teens and remained an atheist for the rest of her life. Beauvoir quotes "Faith allows an evasion of those difficulties which the atheist confronts honestly. And to crown all, the believer derives a sense of great superiority from this very cowardice itself."
Middle years
From 1929 until 1943, Beauvoir taught at the lycée level until she could support herself solely on the earnings of her writings. She taught at the (Marseille), the , and the (1936–39).
Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre met during her college years. Intrigued by her determination as an educator, he sought out to make their relationship romantic. However, she had no interest in doing so. During October 1929, Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir became a couple and, after they were confronted by her father, Sartre asked her to marry him on a provisional basis: One day while they were sitting on a bench outside the Louvre, he said, "Let's sign a two-year lease". Though Beauvoir wrote, "Marriage was impossible. I had no dowry", scholars point out that her ideal relationships described in The Second Sex and elsewhere bore little resemblances to the marriage standards of the day. Instead, she and Sartre entered into a lifelong "soul partnership", which was sexual but not exclusive, nor did it involve living together.
Sartre and Beauvoir always read each other's work. Debate continues about the extent to which they influenced each other in their existentialist works, such as Sartre's Being and Nothingness and Beauvoir's She Came to Stay and "Phenomenology and Intent". However, recent studies of Beauvoir's work focus on influences other than Sartre, including Hegel and Leibniz. The Neo-Hegelian revival led by Alexandre Kojève and Jean Hyppolite in the 1930s inspired a whole generation of French thinkers, including Sartre, to discover Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit. However, Beauvoir, reading Hegel in German during the war, produced an original critique of his dialectic of consciousness.
Personal life
Beauvoir's prominent open relationships at times overshadowed her substantial academic reputation. A scholar lecturing with her chastised their "distinguished [Harvard] audience [because] every question asked about Sartre concerned his work, while all those asked about Beauvoir concerned her personal life." Beginning in 1929, Beauvoir and Sartre were partners and remained so for 51 years, until his death in 1980. She chose never to marry and never had children. This gave her the time to advance her education and engage in political causes, write and teach, and take lovers. She lived with Claude Lanzmann from 1952 to 1959.
Perhaps her most famous lover was American author Nelson Algren, whom she met in Chicago in 1947, and to whom she wrote across the Atlantic as "my beloved husband." Algren won the National Book Award for The Man with the Golden Arm in 1950, and in 1954, Beauvoir won France's most prestigious literary prize for The Mandarins, in which Algren is the character Lewis Brogan. Algren vociferously objected to their intimacy becoming public. Years after they separated, she was buried wearing his gift of a silver ring.
Beauvoir was bisexual, and her relationships with young women were controversial. French author Bianca Lamblin (originally Bianca Bienenfeld) wrote in her book Mémoires d'une Jeune Fille Dérangée (published in English under the title A Disgraceful Affair) that, while a student at Lycée Molière, she was sexually exploited by her teacher Beauvoir, who was in her 30s. Lamblin had affairs with both Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir. In 1943, Beauvoir was suspended from her teaching position when she was accused of seducing her 17-year-old lycée pupil Natalie Sorokine in 1939. Sorokine's parents laid formal charges against Beauvoir for debauching a minor (the age of consent in France at the time was 15), and Beauvoir's license to teach in France was revoked, although it was subsequently reinstated.
In 1977, Beauvoir, Sartre, Roland Barthes, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida and much of the era's intelligentsia signed a petition seeking to completely remove the age of consent in France.
Notable works
She Came to Stay
Beauvoir published her first novel She Came to Stay in 1943. It has been assumed that it is inspired by her and Sartre's sexual relationship with Olga Kosakiewicz and Wanda Kosakiewicz. Olga was one of her students in the Rouen secondary school where Beauvoir taught during the early 1930s. She grew fond of Olga. Sartre tried to pursue Olga but she rejected him, so he began a relationship with her sister Wanda. Upon his death, Sartre was still supporting Wanda. He also supported Olga for years, until she met and married Jacques-Laurent Bost, a lover of Beauvoir. However, the main thrust of the novel is philosophical, a scene in which to situate Beauvoir's abiding philosophical pre-occupation - the relationship between the self and the other.
In the novel, set just before the outbreak of World War II, Beauvoir creates one character from the complex relationships of Olga and Wanda. The fictionalised versions of Beauvoir and Sartre have a ménage à trois with the young woman. The novel also delves into Beauvoir and Sartre's complex relationship and how it was affected by the ménage à trois.
She Came to Stay was followed by many others, including The Blood of Others, which explores the nature of individual responsibility, telling a love story between two young French students participating in the Resistance in World War II.
Existentialist ethics
In 1944, Beauvoir wrote her first philosophical essay, Pyrrhus et Cinéas, a discussion on existentialist ethics. She continued her exploration of existentialism through her second essay The Ethics of Ambiguity (1947); it is perhaps the most accessible entry into French existentialism. In the essay, Beauvoir clears up some inconsistencies that many, Sartre included, have found in major existentialist works such as Being and Nothingness. In The Ethics of Ambiguity, Beauvoir confronts the existentialist dilemma of absolute freedom vs. the constraints of circumstance.
Les Temps modernes
At the end of World War II, Beauvoir and Sartre edited Les Temps modernes, a political journal which Sartre founded along with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and others. Beauvoir used Les Temps Modernes to promote her own work and explore her ideas on a small scale before fashioning essays and books. Beauvoir remained an editor until her death.
Sexuality, existentialist feminism and The Second Sex
The Second Sex, first published in 1949 in French as Le Deuxième Sexe, turns the existentialist mantra that existence precedes essence into a feminist one: "One is not born but becomes a woman" (French: "On ne naît pas femme, on le devient"). With this famous phrase, Beauvoir first articulated what has come to be known as the sex-gender distinction, that is, the distinction between biological sex and the social and historical construction of gender and its attendant stereotypes. Beauvoir argues that "the fundamental source of women's oppression is its [femininity's] historical and social construction as the quintessential".
Beauvoir defines women as the "second sex" because women are defined in relation to men. She pointed out that Aristotle argued women are "female by virtue of a certain lack of qualities", while Thomas Aquinas referred to woman as "imperfect man" and the "incidental" being. She quotes "In itself, homosexuality is as limiting as heterosexuality: the ideal should be to be capable of loving a woman or a man; either, a human being, without feeling fear, restraint, or obligation."
Beauvoir asserted that women are as capable of choice as men, and thus can choose to elevate themselves, moving beyond the "immanence" to which they were previously resigned and reaching "transcendence", a position in which one takes responsibility for oneself and the world, where one chooses one's freedom.
Chapters of The Second Sex were originally published in Les Temps modernes, in June 1949. The second volume came a few months after the first in France. It was published soon after in America due to the quick translation by Howard Parshley, as prompted by Blanche Knopf, wife of publisher Alfred A. Knopf. Because Parshley had only a basic familiarity with the French language, and a minimal understanding of philosophy (he was a professor of biology at Smith College), much of Beauvoir's book was mistranslated or inappropriately cut, distorting her intended message. For years, Knopf prevented the introduction of a more accurate retranslation of Beauvoir's work, declining all proposals despite the efforts of existentialist scholars.
Only in 2009 was there a second translation, to mark the 60th anniversary of the original publication. Constance Borde and Sheila Malovany-Chevallier produced the first integral translation in 2010, reinstating a third of the original work.
In the chapter "Woman: Myth and Reality" of The Second Sex, Beauvoir argued that men had made women the "Other" in society by application of a false aura of "mystery" around them. She argued that men used this as an excuse not to understand women or their problems and not to help them, and that this stereotyping was always done in societies by the group higher in the hierarchy to the group lower in the hierarchy. She wrote that a similar kind of oppression by hierarchy also happened in other categories of identity, such as race, class, and religion, but she claimed that it was nowhere more true than with gender in which men stereotyped women and used it as an excuse to organize society into a patriarchy.
Despite her contributions to the feminist movement, especially the French women's liberation movement, and her beliefs in women's economic independence and equal education, Beauvoir was initially reluctant to call herself a feminist. However, after observing the resurgence of the feminist movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Beauvoir stated she no longer believed a socialist revolution to be enough to bring about women's liberation. She publicly declared herself a feminist in 1972 in an interview with Le Nouvel Observateur.
In 2018 the manuscript pages of Le Deuxième Sexe were published. At the time her adopted daughter, Sylvie Le Bon-Beauvoir, a philosophy professor, described her mother's writing process: Beauvoir wrote every page of her books longhand first and only after that would hire typists.
The Mandarins
Published in 1954, The Mandarins won her France's highest literary prize, the Prix Goncourt. The book is set after the end of World War II and follows the personal lives of philosophers and friends among Sartre's and Beauvoir's intimate circle, including her relationship with American writer Nelson Algren, to whom the book was dedicated.
Algren was outraged by the frank way Beauvoir described their sexual experiences in both The Mandarins and her autobiographies. Algren vented his outrage when reviewing American translations of Beauvoir's work. Much material bearing on this episode in Beauvoir's life, including her love letters to Algren, entered the public domain only after her death.
Les Inséparables
Beauvoir's early novel Les Inséparables, long suppressed, was published in French in 2020 and in two different English translations in 2021.<ref>Reviewed 23 Aug. 2021 by Merve Emre in The New Yorker" https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/08/30/simone-de-beauvoirs-lost-novel-of-early-love</ref> Written in 1954, the book describes her first love, a classmate named Elisabeth Lacoin ("Zaza") who died before age 22, and had as a teenager a "passionate and tragic" relationship with Beauvoir and Merleau-Ponty, then teaching at the same school. Disapproved by Sartre, the novel was deemed "too intimate" to be published during Beauvoir's lifetime.
Later years
Beauvoir wrote popular travel diaries about time spent in the United States and China and published essays and fiction rigorously, especially throughout the 1950s and 1960s. She published several volumes of short stories, including The Woman Destroyed, which, like some of her other later work, deals with aging.
1980 saw the publication of When Things of the Spirit Come First, a set of short stories centred around and based upon women important to her earlier years. Though written long before the novel She Came to Stay, Beauvoir did not at the time consider the stories worth publishing, allowing some forty years to pass before doing so.
Sartre and Merleau-Ponty had a longstanding feud, which led Merleau-Ponty to leave Les Temps Modernes. Beauvoir sided with Sartre and ceased to associate with Merleau-Ponty. In Beauvoir's later years, she hosted the journal's editorial meetings in her flat and contributed more than Sartre, whom she often had to force to offer his opinions.
Beauvoir also wrote a four-volume autobiography, consisting of: Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter; The Prime of Life; Force of Circumstance (sometimes published in two volumes in English translation: After the War and Hard Times); and All Said and Done. In 1964 Beauvoir published a novella-length autobiography, A Very Easy Death, covering the time she spent visiting her ageing mother, who was dying of cancer. The novella brings up questions of ethical concerns with truth-telling in doctor-patient relationships.
Her 1970 long essay La Vieillesse (The Coming of Age) is a rare instance of an intellectual meditation on the decline and solitude all humans experience if they do not die before about the age of 60.
In the 1970s Beauvoir became active in France's women's liberation movement. She wrote and signed the Manifesto of the 343 in 1971, a manifesto that included a list of famous women who claimed to have had an abortion, then illegal in France. Some argue most of the women had not had abortions, including Beauvoir. Signatories were diverse as Catherine Deneuve, Delphine Seyrig, and Beauvoir's sister Poupette. In 1974, abortion was legalised in France.
In a 1975 interview with Betty Friedan Beauvoir said "No woman should be authorized to stay at home and raise her children. Society should be totally different. Women should not have that choice, precisely because if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one."
In about 1976 Beauvoir and Sylvie Le Bon made a trip to New York City in the United States to visit Kate Millett on her farm.
In 1981 she wrote La Cérémonie Des Adieux (A Farewell to Sartre), a painful account of Sartre's last years. In the opening of Adieux, Beauvoir notes that it is the only major published work of hers which Sartre did not read before its publication.
She contributed the piece "Feminism – alive, well, and in constant danger" to the 1984 anthology Sisterhood Is Global: The International Women's Movement Anthology, edited by Robin Morgan.
After Sartre died in 1980, Beauvoir published his letters to her with edits to spare the feelings of people in their circle who were still living. After Beauvoir's death, Sartre's adopted daughter and literary heir Arlette Elkaïm would not let many of Sartre's letters be published in unedited form. Most of Sartre's letters available today have Beauvoir's edits, which include a few omissions but mostly the use of pseudonyms. Beauvoir's adopted daughter and literary heir Sylvie Le Bon, unlike Elkaïm, published Beauvoir's unedited letters to both Sartre and Algren.
Beauvoir died of pneumonia on 14 April 1986 in Paris, aged 78. She is buried next to Sartre at the Montparnasse Cemetery in Paris. She was honored as a figure at the forefront of the struggle for women's rights around the time of her passing.
Impact
Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex is considered a foundational work in the history of feminism. Beauvoir had denied being a feminist multiple times but ultimately admitted that she was one after the influential Second Sex became crucial in the world of feminism. The work has had a profound influence, opening the way for second wave feminism in the United States, Canada, Australia, and around the world. Despite the fact that Beauvoir has been quoted as saying "There is a certain unreasonable demand that I find a little stupid because it would enclose me, immobilize me completely in a sort of feminist concrete block." Her works on feminism have paved the way for all future feminists. Founders of the second wave read The Second Sex in translation, including Kate Millett, Shulamith Firestone, Juliet Mitchell, Ann Oakley and Germaine Greer. All acknowledged their profound debt to Beauvoir, including visiting her in France, consulting with her at crucial moments, and dedicating works to her. Betty Friedan, whose 1963 book The Feminine Mystique is often regarded as the opening salvo of second wave feminism in the United States, later said that reading The Second Sex in the early 1950s "led me to whatever original analysis of women's existence I have been able to contribute to the Women's movement and to its unique politics. I looked to Simone de Beauvoir for a philosophical and intellectual authority."
At one point in the early seventies, Beauvoir also aligned herself with the League for Woman's rights as a means to campaign and fight against sexism in the French society. Beauvoir's influence goes beyond just her impact on second wave founders, and extends to numerous aspects of feminism, including literary criticism, history, philosophy, theology, criticism of scientific discourse, and psychotherapy. When Beauvoir first became involved with the feminism movement, one of her first objectives was that of legalizing abortion.Donna Haraway wrote that, "despite important differences, all the modern feminist meanings of gender have roots in Simone de Beauvoir's claim that 'one is not born a woman [one becomes one]'". This "most famous feminist sentence ever written" is echoed in the title of Monique Wittig's 1981 essay One Is Not Born a Woman. Judith Butler took the concept a step further, arguing that Beauvoir's choice of the verb to become suggests that gender is a process, constantly being renewed in an ongoing interaction between the surrounding culture and individual choice.
Prizes
Prix Goncourt, 1954
Jerusalem Prize, 1975
Austrian State Prize for European Literature, 1978
Works
List of publications (non-exhaustive)
L'Invitée (1943) (English – She Came to Stay) [novel]
Pyrrhus et Cinéas (1944) [nonfiction]
Le Sang des autres (1945) (English – The Blood of Others) [novel]
Les Bouches inutiles (1945) (English - Who Shall Die?) [drama]
Tous les hommes sont mortels (1946) (English – All Men Are Mortal) [novel]
Pour une morale de l'ambiguïté (1947) (English – The Ethics of Ambiguity) [nonfiction]
"America Day by Day" (1948) (English – 1999 – Carol Cosman (Translator and Douglas Brinkley (Foreword) [nonfiction]
Le Deuxième Sexe (1949) (English – The Second Sex) [nonfiction]
L'Amérique au jour le jour (1954) (English – America Day by Day)
Les Mandarins (1954) (English – The Mandarins) [novel]
Must We Burn Sade? (1955)
The Long March (1957) [nonfiction]
Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter (1958)
The Prime of Life (1960)
Force of Circumstance (1963)
A Very Easy Death (1964)
Les Belles Images (1966) [novel]
The Woman Destroyed (1967) [short stories]
The Coming of Age (1970) [nonfiction]
All Said and Done (1972)
Old Age (1972) [nonfiction]
When Things of the Spirit Come First (1979) [novel]
Adieux: A Farewell to Sartre (1981)
Letters to Sartre (1990)
Journal de guerre, Sept 1939 – Jan 1941 (1990); English – Wartime Diary (2009)
A Transatlantic Love Affair: Letters to Nelson Algren (1998)
Diary of a Philosophy Student, 1926–27 (2006)
Cahiers de jeunesse, 1926–1930 (2008)
Selected translations
Patrick O'Brian was Beauvoir's principal English translator, until he attained commercial success as a novelist.
Philosophical Writings (Urbana : University of Illinois Press, 2004, edited by Margaret A. Simons et al.) contains a selection of essays by Beauvoir translated for the first time into English. Among those are: Pyrrhus and Cineas, discussing the futility or utility of action, two previously unpublished chapters from her novel She Came to Stay and an introduction to Ethics of Ambiguity.
See also
Art Shay
Roman à clef
Simone Weil
List of women's rights activists
Place Jean-Paul-Sartre-et-Simone-de-Beauvoir
References
Sources
Appignanesi, Lisa, 2005, Simone de Beauvoir, London: Haus,
Bair, Deirdre, 1990. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books,
Rowley, Hazel, 2005. Tête-a-Tête: Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre. New York: HarperCollins.
Suzanne Lilar, 1969. Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe (with collaboration of Prof. Dreyfus). Paris, University Presses of France (Presses Universitaires de France).
Fraser, M., 1999. Identity Without Selfhood: Simone de Beauvoir and Bisexuality, Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press.
Axel Madsen, Hearts and Minds: The Common Journey of Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre, William Morrow & Co, 1977.
Hélène Rouch, 2001–2002, Trois conceptions du sexe: Simone de Beauvoir entre Adrienne Sahuqué et Suzanne Lilar, Simone de Beauvoir Studies, n° 18, pp. 49–60.
Simone de Beauvoir, Marguerite Yourcenar, Nathalie Sarraute, 2002. Conférence Élisabeth Badinter, Jacques Lassalle & Lucette Finas, .
Further reading
Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe by Suzanne Lilar, 1969.
Feminist Theory and Simone de Beauvoir by Toril Moi, 1990.
Appignanesi, Lisa. Simone de Beauvoir. London: Penguin. 1988. .
Bair, Deirdre. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books. 1990. .
Francis, Claude. Simone de Beauvoir: A Life, A Love Story. Lisa Nesselson (Translator). New York: St. Martin's, 1987. .
Okely, Judith. Simone de Beauvoir. New York: Pantheon. 1986. .
External links
Guardian Books "Author Page", with profile and links to further articles.
Victoria Brittain et al discuss Simone de Beauvoir's lasting influence, ICA 1989
"Simone de Beauvoir", Great Lives, BBC Radio 4, 22 April 2011
Kate Kirkpatrick. (6 November 2017) "What is authentic love? A View from Simone de Beauvoir" . IAI News''.
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| C_5ed7bcbf9b4d438faac7388fd5948edc_1 | Did she become a doctor? | 3 | Did Simone de Beauvoir become a doctor? | Simone de Beauvoir | De Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fuelled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, de Beauvoir could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. De Beauvoir took this opportunity to do what she always wanted to do while also taking steps to earn a living for herself. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the Institut Sainte-Marie. She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, she wrote her diplome d'etudes superieures (roughly equivalent to an MA thesis) on Leibniz for Leon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). De Beauvoir was only the ninth woman to have received a degree from the Sorbonne at the time, due to the fact that French women had only recently been allowed to join higher education. De Beauvoir first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Levi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the Ecole Normale Superieure in preparation for the agregation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for the agregation that she met Ecole Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and Rene Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or beaver). The jury for the agregation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of de Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam. Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said: "...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual." CANNOTANSWER | De Beauvoir first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Levi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. | Simone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir (, ; ; 9 January 1908 – 14 April 1986) was a French existentialist philosopher, writer, social theorist and feminist activist. Though she did not consider herself a philosopher, and even though she was not considered one at the time of her death, she had a significant influence on both feminist existentialism and feminist theory.
Beauvoir wrote novels, essays, biographies, autobiographies and monographs on philosophy, politics, and social issues. She was known for her 1949 treatise The Second Sex, a detailed analysis of women's oppression and a foundational tract of contemporary feminism; and for her novels, including She Came to Stay and The Mandarins. Her most enduring contribution to literature is her memoirs, notably the first volume, "Mémoires d'une jeune fille rangée" (1958), which have a warmth and descriptive power. She won the 1954 Prix Goncourt, the 1975 Jerusalem Prize, and the 1978 Austrian State Prize for European Literature. She was also known for her open, lifelong relationship with French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre.
Early years
Beauvoir was born on 9 January 1908 into a bourgeois Parisian family in the 6th arrondissement. Her parents were Georges Bertrand de Beauvoir, a lawyer, who once aspired to be an actor, and Françoise Beauvoir (née Brasseur), a wealthy banker's daughter and devout Catholic. Simone's sister, Hélène, was born two years later. The family struggled to maintain their bourgeois status after losing much of their fortune shortly after World War I, and Françoise insisted the two daughters be sent to a prestigious convent school.
Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fueled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, she could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. She took this opportunity to take steps towards earning a living for herself.
She first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Lévi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the École Normale Supérieure in preparation for the agrégation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for it that she met École Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and René Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or "beaver"). The jury for the agrégation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam.
Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said:
"...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual."
Secondary and post-secondary education
Beauvoir pursued post-secondary education after completing her high school years at Lycée Fenelon. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the . She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, wrote her (roughly equivalent to an M.A. thesis) on Leibniz for Léon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). Her studies of political philosophy through university influenced her to start thinking of societal concerns rather than her own individual issues.
Religious upbringing
Beauvoir was raised in a strict Catholic household. She had been sent to convent schools as a youth. She was deeply religious as a child, at one point intending to become a nun. At age 14, Beauvoir questioned her faith as she saw many changes in the world after witnessing tragedies throughout her life. She abandoned her faith in her early teens and remained an atheist for the rest of her life. Beauvoir quotes "Faith allows an evasion of those difficulties which the atheist confronts honestly. And to crown all, the believer derives a sense of great superiority from this very cowardice itself."
Middle years
From 1929 until 1943, Beauvoir taught at the lycée level until she could support herself solely on the earnings of her writings. She taught at the (Marseille), the , and the (1936–39).
Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre met during her college years. Intrigued by her determination as an educator, he sought out to make their relationship romantic. However, she had no interest in doing so. During October 1929, Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir became a couple and, after they were confronted by her father, Sartre asked her to marry him on a provisional basis: One day while they were sitting on a bench outside the Louvre, he said, "Let's sign a two-year lease". Though Beauvoir wrote, "Marriage was impossible. I had no dowry", scholars point out that her ideal relationships described in The Second Sex and elsewhere bore little resemblances to the marriage standards of the day. Instead, she and Sartre entered into a lifelong "soul partnership", which was sexual but not exclusive, nor did it involve living together.
Sartre and Beauvoir always read each other's work. Debate continues about the extent to which they influenced each other in their existentialist works, such as Sartre's Being and Nothingness and Beauvoir's She Came to Stay and "Phenomenology and Intent". However, recent studies of Beauvoir's work focus on influences other than Sartre, including Hegel and Leibniz. The Neo-Hegelian revival led by Alexandre Kojève and Jean Hyppolite in the 1930s inspired a whole generation of French thinkers, including Sartre, to discover Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit. However, Beauvoir, reading Hegel in German during the war, produced an original critique of his dialectic of consciousness.
Personal life
Beauvoir's prominent open relationships at times overshadowed her substantial academic reputation. A scholar lecturing with her chastised their "distinguished [Harvard] audience [because] every question asked about Sartre concerned his work, while all those asked about Beauvoir concerned her personal life." Beginning in 1929, Beauvoir and Sartre were partners and remained so for 51 years, until his death in 1980. She chose never to marry and never had children. This gave her the time to advance her education and engage in political causes, write and teach, and take lovers. She lived with Claude Lanzmann from 1952 to 1959.
Perhaps her most famous lover was American author Nelson Algren, whom she met in Chicago in 1947, and to whom she wrote across the Atlantic as "my beloved husband." Algren won the National Book Award for The Man with the Golden Arm in 1950, and in 1954, Beauvoir won France's most prestigious literary prize for The Mandarins, in which Algren is the character Lewis Brogan. Algren vociferously objected to their intimacy becoming public. Years after they separated, she was buried wearing his gift of a silver ring.
Beauvoir was bisexual, and her relationships with young women were controversial. French author Bianca Lamblin (originally Bianca Bienenfeld) wrote in her book Mémoires d'une Jeune Fille Dérangée (published in English under the title A Disgraceful Affair) that, while a student at Lycée Molière, she was sexually exploited by her teacher Beauvoir, who was in her 30s. Lamblin had affairs with both Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir. In 1943, Beauvoir was suspended from her teaching position when she was accused of seducing her 17-year-old lycée pupil Natalie Sorokine in 1939. Sorokine's parents laid formal charges against Beauvoir for debauching a minor (the age of consent in France at the time was 15), and Beauvoir's license to teach in France was revoked, although it was subsequently reinstated.
In 1977, Beauvoir, Sartre, Roland Barthes, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida and much of the era's intelligentsia signed a petition seeking to completely remove the age of consent in France.
Notable works
She Came to Stay
Beauvoir published her first novel She Came to Stay in 1943. It has been assumed that it is inspired by her and Sartre's sexual relationship with Olga Kosakiewicz and Wanda Kosakiewicz. Olga was one of her students in the Rouen secondary school where Beauvoir taught during the early 1930s. She grew fond of Olga. Sartre tried to pursue Olga but she rejected him, so he began a relationship with her sister Wanda. Upon his death, Sartre was still supporting Wanda. He also supported Olga for years, until she met and married Jacques-Laurent Bost, a lover of Beauvoir. However, the main thrust of the novel is philosophical, a scene in which to situate Beauvoir's abiding philosophical pre-occupation - the relationship between the self and the other.
In the novel, set just before the outbreak of World War II, Beauvoir creates one character from the complex relationships of Olga and Wanda. The fictionalised versions of Beauvoir and Sartre have a ménage à trois with the young woman. The novel also delves into Beauvoir and Sartre's complex relationship and how it was affected by the ménage à trois.
She Came to Stay was followed by many others, including The Blood of Others, which explores the nature of individual responsibility, telling a love story between two young French students participating in the Resistance in World War II.
Existentialist ethics
In 1944, Beauvoir wrote her first philosophical essay, Pyrrhus et Cinéas, a discussion on existentialist ethics. She continued her exploration of existentialism through her second essay The Ethics of Ambiguity (1947); it is perhaps the most accessible entry into French existentialism. In the essay, Beauvoir clears up some inconsistencies that many, Sartre included, have found in major existentialist works such as Being and Nothingness. In The Ethics of Ambiguity, Beauvoir confronts the existentialist dilemma of absolute freedom vs. the constraints of circumstance.
Les Temps modernes
At the end of World War II, Beauvoir and Sartre edited Les Temps modernes, a political journal which Sartre founded along with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and others. Beauvoir used Les Temps Modernes to promote her own work and explore her ideas on a small scale before fashioning essays and books. Beauvoir remained an editor until her death.
Sexuality, existentialist feminism and The Second Sex
The Second Sex, first published in 1949 in French as Le Deuxième Sexe, turns the existentialist mantra that existence precedes essence into a feminist one: "One is not born but becomes a woman" (French: "On ne naît pas femme, on le devient"). With this famous phrase, Beauvoir first articulated what has come to be known as the sex-gender distinction, that is, the distinction between biological sex and the social and historical construction of gender and its attendant stereotypes. Beauvoir argues that "the fundamental source of women's oppression is its [femininity's] historical and social construction as the quintessential".
Beauvoir defines women as the "second sex" because women are defined in relation to men. She pointed out that Aristotle argued women are "female by virtue of a certain lack of qualities", while Thomas Aquinas referred to woman as "imperfect man" and the "incidental" being. She quotes "In itself, homosexuality is as limiting as heterosexuality: the ideal should be to be capable of loving a woman or a man; either, a human being, without feeling fear, restraint, or obligation."
Beauvoir asserted that women are as capable of choice as men, and thus can choose to elevate themselves, moving beyond the "immanence" to which they were previously resigned and reaching "transcendence", a position in which one takes responsibility for oneself and the world, where one chooses one's freedom.
Chapters of The Second Sex were originally published in Les Temps modernes, in June 1949. The second volume came a few months after the first in France. It was published soon after in America due to the quick translation by Howard Parshley, as prompted by Blanche Knopf, wife of publisher Alfred A. Knopf. Because Parshley had only a basic familiarity with the French language, and a minimal understanding of philosophy (he was a professor of biology at Smith College), much of Beauvoir's book was mistranslated or inappropriately cut, distorting her intended message. For years, Knopf prevented the introduction of a more accurate retranslation of Beauvoir's work, declining all proposals despite the efforts of existentialist scholars.
Only in 2009 was there a second translation, to mark the 60th anniversary of the original publication. Constance Borde and Sheila Malovany-Chevallier produced the first integral translation in 2010, reinstating a third of the original work.
In the chapter "Woman: Myth and Reality" of The Second Sex, Beauvoir argued that men had made women the "Other" in society by application of a false aura of "mystery" around them. She argued that men used this as an excuse not to understand women or their problems and not to help them, and that this stereotyping was always done in societies by the group higher in the hierarchy to the group lower in the hierarchy. She wrote that a similar kind of oppression by hierarchy also happened in other categories of identity, such as race, class, and religion, but she claimed that it was nowhere more true than with gender in which men stereotyped women and used it as an excuse to organize society into a patriarchy.
Despite her contributions to the feminist movement, especially the French women's liberation movement, and her beliefs in women's economic independence and equal education, Beauvoir was initially reluctant to call herself a feminist. However, after observing the resurgence of the feminist movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Beauvoir stated she no longer believed a socialist revolution to be enough to bring about women's liberation. She publicly declared herself a feminist in 1972 in an interview with Le Nouvel Observateur.
In 2018 the manuscript pages of Le Deuxième Sexe were published. At the time her adopted daughter, Sylvie Le Bon-Beauvoir, a philosophy professor, described her mother's writing process: Beauvoir wrote every page of her books longhand first and only after that would hire typists.
The Mandarins
Published in 1954, The Mandarins won her France's highest literary prize, the Prix Goncourt. The book is set after the end of World War II and follows the personal lives of philosophers and friends among Sartre's and Beauvoir's intimate circle, including her relationship with American writer Nelson Algren, to whom the book was dedicated.
Algren was outraged by the frank way Beauvoir described their sexual experiences in both The Mandarins and her autobiographies. Algren vented his outrage when reviewing American translations of Beauvoir's work. Much material bearing on this episode in Beauvoir's life, including her love letters to Algren, entered the public domain only after her death.
Les Inséparables
Beauvoir's early novel Les Inséparables, long suppressed, was published in French in 2020 and in two different English translations in 2021.<ref>Reviewed 23 Aug. 2021 by Merve Emre in The New Yorker" https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/08/30/simone-de-beauvoirs-lost-novel-of-early-love</ref> Written in 1954, the book describes her first love, a classmate named Elisabeth Lacoin ("Zaza") who died before age 22, and had as a teenager a "passionate and tragic" relationship with Beauvoir and Merleau-Ponty, then teaching at the same school. Disapproved by Sartre, the novel was deemed "too intimate" to be published during Beauvoir's lifetime.
Later years
Beauvoir wrote popular travel diaries about time spent in the United States and China and published essays and fiction rigorously, especially throughout the 1950s and 1960s. She published several volumes of short stories, including The Woman Destroyed, which, like some of her other later work, deals with aging.
1980 saw the publication of When Things of the Spirit Come First, a set of short stories centred around and based upon women important to her earlier years. Though written long before the novel She Came to Stay, Beauvoir did not at the time consider the stories worth publishing, allowing some forty years to pass before doing so.
Sartre and Merleau-Ponty had a longstanding feud, which led Merleau-Ponty to leave Les Temps Modernes. Beauvoir sided with Sartre and ceased to associate with Merleau-Ponty. In Beauvoir's later years, she hosted the journal's editorial meetings in her flat and contributed more than Sartre, whom she often had to force to offer his opinions.
Beauvoir also wrote a four-volume autobiography, consisting of: Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter; The Prime of Life; Force of Circumstance (sometimes published in two volumes in English translation: After the War and Hard Times); and All Said and Done. In 1964 Beauvoir published a novella-length autobiography, A Very Easy Death, covering the time she spent visiting her ageing mother, who was dying of cancer. The novella brings up questions of ethical concerns with truth-telling in doctor-patient relationships.
Her 1970 long essay La Vieillesse (The Coming of Age) is a rare instance of an intellectual meditation on the decline and solitude all humans experience if they do not die before about the age of 60.
In the 1970s Beauvoir became active in France's women's liberation movement. She wrote and signed the Manifesto of the 343 in 1971, a manifesto that included a list of famous women who claimed to have had an abortion, then illegal in France. Some argue most of the women had not had abortions, including Beauvoir. Signatories were diverse as Catherine Deneuve, Delphine Seyrig, and Beauvoir's sister Poupette. In 1974, abortion was legalised in France.
In a 1975 interview with Betty Friedan Beauvoir said "No woman should be authorized to stay at home and raise her children. Society should be totally different. Women should not have that choice, precisely because if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one."
In about 1976 Beauvoir and Sylvie Le Bon made a trip to New York City in the United States to visit Kate Millett on her farm.
In 1981 she wrote La Cérémonie Des Adieux (A Farewell to Sartre), a painful account of Sartre's last years. In the opening of Adieux, Beauvoir notes that it is the only major published work of hers which Sartre did not read before its publication.
She contributed the piece "Feminism – alive, well, and in constant danger" to the 1984 anthology Sisterhood Is Global: The International Women's Movement Anthology, edited by Robin Morgan.
After Sartre died in 1980, Beauvoir published his letters to her with edits to spare the feelings of people in their circle who were still living. After Beauvoir's death, Sartre's adopted daughter and literary heir Arlette Elkaïm would not let many of Sartre's letters be published in unedited form. Most of Sartre's letters available today have Beauvoir's edits, which include a few omissions but mostly the use of pseudonyms. Beauvoir's adopted daughter and literary heir Sylvie Le Bon, unlike Elkaïm, published Beauvoir's unedited letters to both Sartre and Algren.
Beauvoir died of pneumonia on 14 April 1986 in Paris, aged 78. She is buried next to Sartre at the Montparnasse Cemetery in Paris. She was honored as a figure at the forefront of the struggle for women's rights around the time of her passing.
Impact
Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex is considered a foundational work in the history of feminism. Beauvoir had denied being a feminist multiple times but ultimately admitted that she was one after the influential Second Sex became crucial in the world of feminism. The work has had a profound influence, opening the way for second wave feminism in the United States, Canada, Australia, and around the world. Despite the fact that Beauvoir has been quoted as saying "There is a certain unreasonable demand that I find a little stupid because it would enclose me, immobilize me completely in a sort of feminist concrete block." Her works on feminism have paved the way for all future feminists. Founders of the second wave read The Second Sex in translation, including Kate Millett, Shulamith Firestone, Juliet Mitchell, Ann Oakley and Germaine Greer. All acknowledged their profound debt to Beauvoir, including visiting her in France, consulting with her at crucial moments, and dedicating works to her. Betty Friedan, whose 1963 book The Feminine Mystique is often regarded as the opening salvo of second wave feminism in the United States, later said that reading The Second Sex in the early 1950s "led me to whatever original analysis of women's existence I have been able to contribute to the Women's movement and to its unique politics. I looked to Simone de Beauvoir for a philosophical and intellectual authority."
At one point in the early seventies, Beauvoir also aligned herself with the League for Woman's rights as a means to campaign and fight against sexism in the French society. Beauvoir's influence goes beyond just her impact on second wave founders, and extends to numerous aspects of feminism, including literary criticism, history, philosophy, theology, criticism of scientific discourse, and psychotherapy. When Beauvoir first became involved with the feminism movement, one of her first objectives was that of legalizing abortion.Donna Haraway wrote that, "despite important differences, all the modern feminist meanings of gender have roots in Simone de Beauvoir's claim that 'one is not born a woman [one becomes one]'". This "most famous feminist sentence ever written" is echoed in the title of Monique Wittig's 1981 essay One Is Not Born a Woman. Judith Butler took the concept a step further, arguing that Beauvoir's choice of the verb to become suggests that gender is a process, constantly being renewed in an ongoing interaction between the surrounding culture and individual choice.
Prizes
Prix Goncourt, 1954
Jerusalem Prize, 1975
Austrian State Prize for European Literature, 1978
Works
List of publications (non-exhaustive)
L'Invitée (1943) (English – She Came to Stay) [novel]
Pyrrhus et Cinéas (1944) [nonfiction]
Le Sang des autres (1945) (English – The Blood of Others) [novel]
Les Bouches inutiles (1945) (English - Who Shall Die?) [drama]
Tous les hommes sont mortels (1946) (English – All Men Are Mortal) [novel]
Pour une morale de l'ambiguïté (1947) (English – The Ethics of Ambiguity) [nonfiction]
"America Day by Day" (1948) (English – 1999 – Carol Cosman (Translator and Douglas Brinkley (Foreword) [nonfiction]
Le Deuxième Sexe (1949) (English – The Second Sex) [nonfiction]
L'Amérique au jour le jour (1954) (English – America Day by Day)
Les Mandarins (1954) (English – The Mandarins) [novel]
Must We Burn Sade? (1955)
The Long March (1957) [nonfiction]
Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter (1958)
The Prime of Life (1960)
Force of Circumstance (1963)
A Very Easy Death (1964)
Les Belles Images (1966) [novel]
The Woman Destroyed (1967) [short stories]
The Coming of Age (1970) [nonfiction]
All Said and Done (1972)
Old Age (1972) [nonfiction]
When Things of the Spirit Come First (1979) [novel]
Adieux: A Farewell to Sartre (1981)
Letters to Sartre (1990)
Journal de guerre, Sept 1939 – Jan 1941 (1990); English – Wartime Diary (2009)
A Transatlantic Love Affair: Letters to Nelson Algren (1998)
Diary of a Philosophy Student, 1926–27 (2006)
Cahiers de jeunesse, 1926–1930 (2008)
Selected translations
Patrick O'Brian was Beauvoir's principal English translator, until he attained commercial success as a novelist.
Philosophical Writings (Urbana : University of Illinois Press, 2004, edited by Margaret A. Simons et al.) contains a selection of essays by Beauvoir translated for the first time into English. Among those are: Pyrrhus and Cineas, discussing the futility or utility of action, two previously unpublished chapters from her novel She Came to Stay and an introduction to Ethics of Ambiguity.
See also
Art Shay
Roman à clef
Simone Weil
List of women's rights activists
Place Jean-Paul-Sartre-et-Simone-de-Beauvoir
References
Sources
Appignanesi, Lisa, 2005, Simone de Beauvoir, London: Haus,
Bair, Deirdre, 1990. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books,
Rowley, Hazel, 2005. Tête-a-Tête: Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre. New York: HarperCollins.
Suzanne Lilar, 1969. Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe (with collaboration of Prof. Dreyfus). Paris, University Presses of France (Presses Universitaires de France).
Fraser, M., 1999. Identity Without Selfhood: Simone de Beauvoir and Bisexuality, Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press.
Axel Madsen, Hearts and Minds: The Common Journey of Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre, William Morrow & Co, 1977.
Hélène Rouch, 2001–2002, Trois conceptions du sexe: Simone de Beauvoir entre Adrienne Sahuqué et Suzanne Lilar, Simone de Beauvoir Studies, n° 18, pp. 49–60.
Simone de Beauvoir, Marguerite Yourcenar, Nathalie Sarraute, 2002. Conférence Élisabeth Badinter, Jacques Lassalle & Lucette Finas, .
Further reading
Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe by Suzanne Lilar, 1969.
Feminist Theory and Simone de Beauvoir by Toril Moi, 1990.
Appignanesi, Lisa. Simone de Beauvoir. London: Penguin. 1988. .
Bair, Deirdre. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books. 1990. .
Francis, Claude. Simone de Beauvoir: A Life, A Love Story. Lisa Nesselson (Translator). New York: St. Martin's, 1987. .
Okely, Judith. Simone de Beauvoir. New York: Pantheon. 1986. .
External links
Guardian Books "Author Page", with profile and links to further articles.
Victoria Brittain et al discuss Simone de Beauvoir's lasting influence, ICA 1989
"Simone de Beauvoir", Great Lives, BBC Radio 4, 22 April 2011
Kate Kirkpatrick. (6 November 2017) "What is authentic love? A View from Simone de Beauvoir" . IAI News''.
1908 births
1986 deaths
20th-century French non-fiction writers
20th-century French novelists
20th-century French philosophers
20th-century French women writers
Atheist feminists
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Burials at Montparnasse Cemetery
Communist women writers
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Critical theorists
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Deaths from pneumonia in France
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French abortion-rights activists
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20th-century French memoirists
French magazine founders
LGBT philosophers | false | [
"Zareen Panna, also known as Panna or Zarrin (Urdu; زرین; born 1947) is a Pakistani actress and former classical dancer. She acted in both Urdu and Punjabi films.\n\nEarly life\nZareen was born on 1947 in Shimla, India. She along with her family migrated to Pakistan in Karachi. Zareen was interested in arts and dancing from a young age. Comdeian Sultan Khoosat father of actor Irfan Khoosat was a friend of her family, he introduced her to Ghulam Hussain (Patiala Gharana) and stad Shado Maharaj (Dehli Gharana). They trained her in classical dancing and later Sabiha Khanum sister of Farida Khanum helped her in dancing and at that time she was taught by Rafi Anwar, Siddique Samrat and Madam Azuri. \n\nShe attended a school to become a doctor to help her family her mother supported her decision to become a doctor because she wanted her to become an doctor but she also took dancing classes as she loved dancing and decided to become an dancer. Later Zareen attended Islamia Girs College in Karachi from there she completed her studies.\n\nZareen's father Nawab Khalil was an adviser in the court of Maharaja of Patiala and her mother was a housewife.\n\nCareer\nZareen started as an child actress. She first did advertisements for leading brands of that time. After she learned Bharatanatyam, Khattak and Katha Kali dancing. She achieving national and international recognition at a very young age and in 1958 she was awarded Sitara-i-Imtiaz by the President of Pakistan Ayub Khan. In 1960 she made her debut as an actress in 1960 in film Gharib and had a successful career, she worked in multiple films Insaan Badalta Hai, Lakhon Fasanay, Sukh Ka Sapna, Insaan Badalta Hai and Taj Aur Talwar. She also performed in front of Pakistan President Iskander Mirza, he appreciated her and she also did live performances in front of former prime ministers Feroz Khan Noon and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. In 1959, she also did a performance for President of United States Dwight D. Eisenhower during his visit to Pakistan at The Palace Hotel.\n\nIn 1961, she also did a classical performance for Queen Elizabeth II when she visited Pakistan with her husband Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.\n\nShe was invited by former prime minister Feroz Khan Noon to perform in front of King of Afghanistan Mohammed Zahir Shah. When president Sukarno visited Pakistan in 1963, she performed a live dance show for him. \n\nShe also went to China, she performed in the Palace of Mao Zedong and she went to Russia participated in a cultural festival at Moscow.\n\nIn 2018 she a did a live dance performance for prince Aga Khan IV when he visited Pakistan. For her contributions towards the television and film industry, she was honored by the Government of Pakistan with the Pride of Performance in 2018.\n\nPersonal life\nIn 1960s Zareen married actor and director S. Suleman brother of actors Santosh Kumar, Mansoor and Darpan. She was a close relative of actresses Sabiha Khanum, Farida Khanum and Nayyar Sultana. She has three children one daughter and two sons. After 25 years she and S. Suleman separated but they did not divorced and she took the custody of her children.\n\nFilmography\n\nFilm\n\nAwards and recognition\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\n1947 births\nLiving people\n20th-century Pakistani actresses\nPakistani film actresses\n21st-century Pakistani actresses\nPakistani television actresses\nRecipients of the Pride of Performance",
"Carrie Jane Sutton Brooks (January 15, 1899 – January 12, 1964) was a pioneering black woman doctor who trained as a surgeon at Howard University College of Medicine.\n\nBrooks was born Carrie Jane Sutton in San Antonio, Texas, and was class valedictorian of Riverside High School. She then did undergraduate work at Howard University and the University of Pennsylvania, before attending Howard University's medical school. She graduated there in the early 1920s and turned down a research fellowship to become one of the first black interns at the Freedman's Hospital in Washington, D.C.\n\nShe returned to San Antonio to practice medicine and helped establish the first YWCA for black people in her home town. She later married a fellow doctor, Joseph Hunter Brooks, and moved with him to Montclair, N.J., where they both practiced medicine. She died after a long illness and is buried in San Antonio.\n\nReferences\n\n1899 births\n1964 deaths\nHoward University College of Medicine alumni\nPeople from San Antonio"
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| C_5ed7bcbf9b4d438faac7388fd5948edc_1 | Did she ever become a teacher with Merleau-Ponty and Levi- Strauss? | 4 | Did Simone de Beauvoir ever become a teacher with Merleau-Ponty and Levi- Strauss? | Simone de Beauvoir | De Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fuelled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, de Beauvoir could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. De Beauvoir took this opportunity to do what she always wanted to do while also taking steps to earn a living for herself. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the Institut Sainte-Marie. She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, she wrote her diplome d'etudes superieures (roughly equivalent to an MA thesis) on Leibniz for Leon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). De Beauvoir was only the ninth woman to have received a degree from the Sorbonne at the time, due to the fact that French women had only recently been allowed to join higher education. De Beauvoir first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Levi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the Ecole Normale Superieure in preparation for the agregation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for the agregation that she met Ecole Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and Rene Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or beaver). The jury for the agregation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of de Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam. Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said: "...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual." CANNOTANSWER | Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the Ecole Normale Superieure in preparation for the agregation in philosophy, | Simone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir (, ; ; 9 January 1908 – 14 April 1986) was a French existentialist philosopher, writer, social theorist and feminist activist. Though she did not consider herself a philosopher, and even though she was not considered one at the time of her death, she had a significant influence on both feminist existentialism and feminist theory.
Beauvoir wrote novels, essays, biographies, autobiographies and monographs on philosophy, politics, and social issues. She was known for her 1949 treatise The Second Sex, a detailed analysis of women's oppression and a foundational tract of contemporary feminism; and for her novels, including She Came to Stay and The Mandarins. Her most enduring contribution to literature is her memoirs, notably the first volume, "Mémoires d'une jeune fille rangée" (1958), which have a warmth and descriptive power. She won the 1954 Prix Goncourt, the 1975 Jerusalem Prize, and the 1978 Austrian State Prize for European Literature. She was also known for her open, lifelong relationship with French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre.
Early years
Beauvoir was born on 9 January 1908 into a bourgeois Parisian family in the 6th arrondissement. Her parents were Georges Bertrand de Beauvoir, a lawyer, who once aspired to be an actor, and Françoise Beauvoir (née Brasseur), a wealthy banker's daughter and devout Catholic. Simone's sister, Hélène, was born two years later. The family struggled to maintain their bourgeois status after losing much of their fortune shortly after World War I, and Françoise insisted the two daughters be sent to a prestigious convent school.
Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fueled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, she could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. She took this opportunity to take steps towards earning a living for herself.
She first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Lévi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the École Normale Supérieure in preparation for the agrégation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for it that she met École Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and René Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or "beaver"). The jury for the agrégation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam.
Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said:
"...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual."
Secondary and post-secondary education
Beauvoir pursued post-secondary education after completing her high school years at Lycée Fenelon. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the . She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, wrote her (roughly equivalent to an M.A. thesis) on Leibniz for Léon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). Her studies of political philosophy through university influenced her to start thinking of societal concerns rather than her own individual issues.
Religious upbringing
Beauvoir was raised in a strict Catholic household. She had been sent to convent schools as a youth. She was deeply religious as a child, at one point intending to become a nun. At age 14, Beauvoir questioned her faith as she saw many changes in the world after witnessing tragedies throughout her life. She abandoned her faith in her early teens and remained an atheist for the rest of her life. Beauvoir quotes "Faith allows an evasion of those difficulties which the atheist confronts honestly. And to crown all, the believer derives a sense of great superiority from this very cowardice itself."
Middle years
From 1929 until 1943, Beauvoir taught at the lycée level until she could support herself solely on the earnings of her writings. She taught at the (Marseille), the , and the (1936–39).
Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre met during her college years. Intrigued by her determination as an educator, he sought out to make their relationship romantic. However, she had no interest in doing so. During October 1929, Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir became a couple and, after they were confronted by her father, Sartre asked her to marry him on a provisional basis: One day while they were sitting on a bench outside the Louvre, he said, "Let's sign a two-year lease". Though Beauvoir wrote, "Marriage was impossible. I had no dowry", scholars point out that her ideal relationships described in The Second Sex and elsewhere bore little resemblances to the marriage standards of the day. Instead, she and Sartre entered into a lifelong "soul partnership", which was sexual but not exclusive, nor did it involve living together.
Sartre and Beauvoir always read each other's work. Debate continues about the extent to which they influenced each other in their existentialist works, such as Sartre's Being and Nothingness and Beauvoir's She Came to Stay and "Phenomenology and Intent". However, recent studies of Beauvoir's work focus on influences other than Sartre, including Hegel and Leibniz. The Neo-Hegelian revival led by Alexandre Kojève and Jean Hyppolite in the 1930s inspired a whole generation of French thinkers, including Sartre, to discover Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit. However, Beauvoir, reading Hegel in German during the war, produced an original critique of his dialectic of consciousness.
Personal life
Beauvoir's prominent open relationships at times overshadowed her substantial academic reputation. A scholar lecturing with her chastised their "distinguished [Harvard] audience [because] every question asked about Sartre concerned his work, while all those asked about Beauvoir concerned her personal life." Beginning in 1929, Beauvoir and Sartre were partners and remained so for 51 years, until his death in 1980. She chose never to marry and never had children. This gave her the time to advance her education and engage in political causes, write and teach, and take lovers. She lived with Claude Lanzmann from 1952 to 1959.
Perhaps her most famous lover was American author Nelson Algren, whom she met in Chicago in 1947, and to whom she wrote across the Atlantic as "my beloved husband." Algren won the National Book Award for The Man with the Golden Arm in 1950, and in 1954, Beauvoir won France's most prestigious literary prize for The Mandarins, in which Algren is the character Lewis Brogan. Algren vociferously objected to their intimacy becoming public. Years after they separated, she was buried wearing his gift of a silver ring.
Beauvoir was bisexual, and her relationships with young women were controversial. French author Bianca Lamblin (originally Bianca Bienenfeld) wrote in her book Mémoires d'une Jeune Fille Dérangée (published in English under the title A Disgraceful Affair) that, while a student at Lycée Molière, she was sexually exploited by her teacher Beauvoir, who was in her 30s. Lamblin had affairs with both Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir. In 1943, Beauvoir was suspended from her teaching position when she was accused of seducing her 17-year-old lycée pupil Natalie Sorokine in 1939. Sorokine's parents laid formal charges against Beauvoir for debauching a minor (the age of consent in France at the time was 15), and Beauvoir's license to teach in France was revoked, although it was subsequently reinstated.
In 1977, Beauvoir, Sartre, Roland Barthes, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida and much of the era's intelligentsia signed a petition seeking to completely remove the age of consent in France.
Notable works
She Came to Stay
Beauvoir published her first novel She Came to Stay in 1943. It has been assumed that it is inspired by her and Sartre's sexual relationship with Olga Kosakiewicz and Wanda Kosakiewicz. Olga was one of her students in the Rouen secondary school where Beauvoir taught during the early 1930s. She grew fond of Olga. Sartre tried to pursue Olga but she rejected him, so he began a relationship with her sister Wanda. Upon his death, Sartre was still supporting Wanda. He also supported Olga for years, until she met and married Jacques-Laurent Bost, a lover of Beauvoir. However, the main thrust of the novel is philosophical, a scene in which to situate Beauvoir's abiding philosophical pre-occupation - the relationship between the self and the other.
In the novel, set just before the outbreak of World War II, Beauvoir creates one character from the complex relationships of Olga and Wanda. The fictionalised versions of Beauvoir and Sartre have a ménage à trois with the young woman. The novel also delves into Beauvoir and Sartre's complex relationship and how it was affected by the ménage à trois.
She Came to Stay was followed by many others, including The Blood of Others, which explores the nature of individual responsibility, telling a love story between two young French students participating in the Resistance in World War II.
Existentialist ethics
In 1944, Beauvoir wrote her first philosophical essay, Pyrrhus et Cinéas, a discussion on existentialist ethics. She continued her exploration of existentialism through her second essay The Ethics of Ambiguity (1947); it is perhaps the most accessible entry into French existentialism. In the essay, Beauvoir clears up some inconsistencies that many, Sartre included, have found in major existentialist works such as Being and Nothingness. In The Ethics of Ambiguity, Beauvoir confronts the existentialist dilemma of absolute freedom vs. the constraints of circumstance.
Les Temps modernes
At the end of World War II, Beauvoir and Sartre edited Les Temps modernes, a political journal which Sartre founded along with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and others. Beauvoir used Les Temps Modernes to promote her own work and explore her ideas on a small scale before fashioning essays and books. Beauvoir remained an editor until her death.
Sexuality, existentialist feminism and The Second Sex
The Second Sex, first published in 1949 in French as Le Deuxième Sexe, turns the existentialist mantra that existence precedes essence into a feminist one: "One is not born but becomes a woman" (French: "On ne naît pas femme, on le devient"). With this famous phrase, Beauvoir first articulated what has come to be known as the sex-gender distinction, that is, the distinction between biological sex and the social and historical construction of gender and its attendant stereotypes. Beauvoir argues that "the fundamental source of women's oppression is its [femininity's] historical and social construction as the quintessential".
Beauvoir defines women as the "second sex" because women are defined in relation to men. She pointed out that Aristotle argued women are "female by virtue of a certain lack of qualities", while Thomas Aquinas referred to woman as "imperfect man" and the "incidental" being. She quotes "In itself, homosexuality is as limiting as heterosexuality: the ideal should be to be capable of loving a woman or a man; either, a human being, without feeling fear, restraint, or obligation."
Beauvoir asserted that women are as capable of choice as men, and thus can choose to elevate themselves, moving beyond the "immanence" to which they were previously resigned and reaching "transcendence", a position in which one takes responsibility for oneself and the world, where one chooses one's freedom.
Chapters of The Second Sex were originally published in Les Temps modernes, in June 1949. The second volume came a few months after the first in France. It was published soon after in America due to the quick translation by Howard Parshley, as prompted by Blanche Knopf, wife of publisher Alfred A. Knopf. Because Parshley had only a basic familiarity with the French language, and a minimal understanding of philosophy (he was a professor of biology at Smith College), much of Beauvoir's book was mistranslated or inappropriately cut, distorting her intended message. For years, Knopf prevented the introduction of a more accurate retranslation of Beauvoir's work, declining all proposals despite the efforts of existentialist scholars.
Only in 2009 was there a second translation, to mark the 60th anniversary of the original publication. Constance Borde and Sheila Malovany-Chevallier produced the first integral translation in 2010, reinstating a third of the original work.
In the chapter "Woman: Myth and Reality" of The Second Sex, Beauvoir argued that men had made women the "Other" in society by application of a false aura of "mystery" around them. She argued that men used this as an excuse not to understand women or their problems and not to help them, and that this stereotyping was always done in societies by the group higher in the hierarchy to the group lower in the hierarchy. She wrote that a similar kind of oppression by hierarchy also happened in other categories of identity, such as race, class, and religion, but she claimed that it was nowhere more true than with gender in which men stereotyped women and used it as an excuse to organize society into a patriarchy.
Despite her contributions to the feminist movement, especially the French women's liberation movement, and her beliefs in women's economic independence and equal education, Beauvoir was initially reluctant to call herself a feminist. However, after observing the resurgence of the feminist movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Beauvoir stated she no longer believed a socialist revolution to be enough to bring about women's liberation. She publicly declared herself a feminist in 1972 in an interview with Le Nouvel Observateur.
In 2018 the manuscript pages of Le Deuxième Sexe were published. At the time her adopted daughter, Sylvie Le Bon-Beauvoir, a philosophy professor, described her mother's writing process: Beauvoir wrote every page of her books longhand first and only after that would hire typists.
The Mandarins
Published in 1954, The Mandarins won her France's highest literary prize, the Prix Goncourt. The book is set after the end of World War II and follows the personal lives of philosophers and friends among Sartre's and Beauvoir's intimate circle, including her relationship with American writer Nelson Algren, to whom the book was dedicated.
Algren was outraged by the frank way Beauvoir described their sexual experiences in both The Mandarins and her autobiographies. Algren vented his outrage when reviewing American translations of Beauvoir's work. Much material bearing on this episode in Beauvoir's life, including her love letters to Algren, entered the public domain only after her death.
Les Inséparables
Beauvoir's early novel Les Inséparables, long suppressed, was published in French in 2020 and in two different English translations in 2021.<ref>Reviewed 23 Aug. 2021 by Merve Emre in The New Yorker" https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/08/30/simone-de-beauvoirs-lost-novel-of-early-love</ref> Written in 1954, the book describes her first love, a classmate named Elisabeth Lacoin ("Zaza") who died before age 22, and had as a teenager a "passionate and tragic" relationship with Beauvoir and Merleau-Ponty, then teaching at the same school. Disapproved by Sartre, the novel was deemed "too intimate" to be published during Beauvoir's lifetime.
Later years
Beauvoir wrote popular travel diaries about time spent in the United States and China and published essays and fiction rigorously, especially throughout the 1950s and 1960s. She published several volumes of short stories, including The Woman Destroyed, which, like some of her other later work, deals with aging.
1980 saw the publication of When Things of the Spirit Come First, a set of short stories centred around and based upon women important to her earlier years. Though written long before the novel She Came to Stay, Beauvoir did not at the time consider the stories worth publishing, allowing some forty years to pass before doing so.
Sartre and Merleau-Ponty had a longstanding feud, which led Merleau-Ponty to leave Les Temps Modernes. Beauvoir sided with Sartre and ceased to associate with Merleau-Ponty. In Beauvoir's later years, she hosted the journal's editorial meetings in her flat and contributed more than Sartre, whom she often had to force to offer his opinions.
Beauvoir also wrote a four-volume autobiography, consisting of: Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter; The Prime of Life; Force of Circumstance (sometimes published in two volumes in English translation: After the War and Hard Times); and All Said and Done. In 1964 Beauvoir published a novella-length autobiography, A Very Easy Death, covering the time she spent visiting her ageing mother, who was dying of cancer. The novella brings up questions of ethical concerns with truth-telling in doctor-patient relationships.
Her 1970 long essay La Vieillesse (The Coming of Age) is a rare instance of an intellectual meditation on the decline and solitude all humans experience if they do not die before about the age of 60.
In the 1970s Beauvoir became active in France's women's liberation movement. She wrote and signed the Manifesto of the 343 in 1971, a manifesto that included a list of famous women who claimed to have had an abortion, then illegal in France. Some argue most of the women had not had abortions, including Beauvoir. Signatories were diverse as Catherine Deneuve, Delphine Seyrig, and Beauvoir's sister Poupette. In 1974, abortion was legalised in France.
In a 1975 interview with Betty Friedan Beauvoir said "No woman should be authorized to stay at home and raise her children. Society should be totally different. Women should not have that choice, precisely because if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one."
In about 1976 Beauvoir and Sylvie Le Bon made a trip to New York City in the United States to visit Kate Millett on her farm.
In 1981 she wrote La Cérémonie Des Adieux (A Farewell to Sartre), a painful account of Sartre's last years. In the opening of Adieux, Beauvoir notes that it is the only major published work of hers which Sartre did not read before its publication.
She contributed the piece "Feminism – alive, well, and in constant danger" to the 1984 anthology Sisterhood Is Global: The International Women's Movement Anthology, edited by Robin Morgan.
After Sartre died in 1980, Beauvoir published his letters to her with edits to spare the feelings of people in their circle who were still living. After Beauvoir's death, Sartre's adopted daughter and literary heir Arlette Elkaïm would not let many of Sartre's letters be published in unedited form. Most of Sartre's letters available today have Beauvoir's edits, which include a few omissions but mostly the use of pseudonyms. Beauvoir's adopted daughter and literary heir Sylvie Le Bon, unlike Elkaïm, published Beauvoir's unedited letters to both Sartre and Algren.
Beauvoir died of pneumonia on 14 April 1986 in Paris, aged 78. She is buried next to Sartre at the Montparnasse Cemetery in Paris. She was honored as a figure at the forefront of the struggle for women's rights around the time of her passing.
Impact
Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex is considered a foundational work in the history of feminism. Beauvoir had denied being a feminist multiple times but ultimately admitted that she was one after the influential Second Sex became crucial in the world of feminism. The work has had a profound influence, opening the way for second wave feminism in the United States, Canada, Australia, and around the world. Despite the fact that Beauvoir has been quoted as saying "There is a certain unreasonable demand that I find a little stupid because it would enclose me, immobilize me completely in a sort of feminist concrete block." Her works on feminism have paved the way for all future feminists. Founders of the second wave read The Second Sex in translation, including Kate Millett, Shulamith Firestone, Juliet Mitchell, Ann Oakley and Germaine Greer. All acknowledged their profound debt to Beauvoir, including visiting her in France, consulting with her at crucial moments, and dedicating works to her. Betty Friedan, whose 1963 book The Feminine Mystique is often regarded as the opening salvo of second wave feminism in the United States, later said that reading The Second Sex in the early 1950s "led me to whatever original analysis of women's existence I have been able to contribute to the Women's movement and to its unique politics. I looked to Simone de Beauvoir for a philosophical and intellectual authority."
At one point in the early seventies, Beauvoir also aligned herself with the League for Woman's rights as a means to campaign and fight against sexism in the French society. Beauvoir's influence goes beyond just her impact on second wave founders, and extends to numerous aspects of feminism, including literary criticism, history, philosophy, theology, criticism of scientific discourse, and psychotherapy. When Beauvoir first became involved with the feminism movement, one of her first objectives was that of legalizing abortion.Donna Haraway wrote that, "despite important differences, all the modern feminist meanings of gender have roots in Simone de Beauvoir's claim that 'one is not born a woman [one becomes one]'". This "most famous feminist sentence ever written" is echoed in the title of Monique Wittig's 1981 essay One Is Not Born a Woman. Judith Butler took the concept a step further, arguing that Beauvoir's choice of the verb to become suggests that gender is a process, constantly being renewed in an ongoing interaction between the surrounding culture and individual choice.
Prizes
Prix Goncourt, 1954
Jerusalem Prize, 1975
Austrian State Prize for European Literature, 1978
Works
List of publications (non-exhaustive)
L'Invitée (1943) (English – She Came to Stay) [novel]
Pyrrhus et Cinéas (1944) [nonfiction]
Le Sang des autres (1945) (English – The Blood of Others) [novel]
Les Bouches inutiles (1945) (English - Who Shall Die?) [drama]
Tous les hommes sont mortels (1946) (English – All Men Are Mortal) [novel]
Pour une morale de l'ambiguïté (1947) (English – The Ethics of Ambiguity) [nonfiction]
"America Day by Day" (1948) (English – 1999 – Carol Cosman (Translator and Douglas Brinkley (Foreword) [nonfiction]
Le Deuxième Sexe (1949) (English – The Second Sex) [nonfiction]
L'Amérique au jour le jour (1954) (English – America Day by Day)
Les Mandarins (1954) (English – The Mandarins) [novel]
Must We Burn Sade? (1955)
The Long March (1957) [nonfiction]
Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter (1958)
The Prime of Life (1960)
Force of Circumstance (1963)
A Very Easy Death (1964)
Les Belles Images (1966) [novel]
The Woman Destroyed (1967) [short stories]
The Coming of Age (1970) [nonfiction]
All Said and Done (1972)
Old Age (1972) [nonfiction]
When Things of the Spirit Come First (1979) [novel]
Adieux: A Farewell to Sartre (1981)
Letters to Sartre (1990)
Journal de guerre, Sept 1939 – Jan 1941 (1990); English – Wartime Diary (2009)
A Transatlantic Love Affair: Letters to Nelson Algren (1998)
Diary of a Philosophy Student, 1926–27 (2006)
Cahiers de jeunesse, 1926–1930 (2008)
Selected translations
Patrick O'Brian was Beauvoir's principal English translator, until he attained commercial success as a novelist.
Philosophical Writings (Urbana : University of Illinois Press, 2004, edited by Margaret A. Simons et al.) contains a selection of essays by Beauvoir translated for the first time into English. Among those are: Pyrrhus and Cineas, discussing the futility or utility of action, two previously unpublished chapters from her novel She Came to Stay and an introduction to Ethics of Ambiguity.
See also
Art Shay
Roman à clef
Simone Weil
List of women's rights activists
Place Jean-Paul-Sartre-et-Simone-de-Beauvoir
References
Sources
Appignanesi, Lisa, 2005, Simone de Beauvoir, London: Haus,
Bair, Deirdre, 1990. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books,
Rowley, Hazel, 2005. Tête-a-Tête: Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre. New York: HarperCollins.
Suzanne Lilar, 1969. Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe (with collaboration of Prof. Dreyfus). Paris, University Presses of France (Presses Universitaires de France).
Fraser, M., 1999. Identity Without Selfhood: Simone de Beauvoir and Bisexuality, Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press.
Axel Madsen, Hearts and Minds: The Common Journey of Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre, William Morrow & Co, 1977.
Hélène Rouch, 2001–2002, Trois conceptions du sexe: Simone de Beauvoir entre Adrienne Sahuqué et Suzanne Lilar, Simone de Beauvoir Studies, n° 18, pp. 49–60.
Simone de Beauvoir, Marguerite Yourcenar, Nathalie Sarraute, 2002. Conférence Élisabeth Badinter, Jacques Lassalle & Lucette Finas, .
Further reading
Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe by Suzanne Lilar, 1969.
Feminist Theory and Simone de Beauvoir by Toril Moi, 1990.
Appignanesi, Lisa. Simone de Beauvoir. London: Penguin. 1988. .
Bair, Deirdre. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books. 1990. .
Francis, Claude. Simone de Beauvoir: A Life, A Love Story. Lisa Nesselson (Translator). New York: St. Martin's, 1987. .
Okely, Judith. Simone de Beauvoir. New York: Pantheon. 1986. .
External links
Guardian Books "Author Page", with profile and links to further articles.
Victoria Brittain et al discuss Simone de Beauvoir's lasting influence, ICA 1989
"Simone de Beauvoir", Great Lives, BBC Radio 4, 22 April 2011
Kate Kirkpatrick. (6 November 2017) "What is authentic love? A View from Simone de Beauvoir" . IAI News''.
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"Maurice Jean Jacques Merleau-Ponty (; 14 March 1908 – 3 May 1961) was a French phenomenological philosopher, strongly influenced by Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger. The constitution of meaning in human experience was his main interest and he wrote on perception, art, politics, religion, biology, psychology, psychoanalysis, language, nature, and history. He was the lead editor of Les Temps modernes, the leftist magazine he established with Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir in 1945.\n\nAt the core of Merleau-Ponty's philosophy is a sustained argument for the foundational role perception plays in our experience of the world. Merleau-Ponty understands perception to be an ongoing dialogue between one's lived body and the world which it perceives, in which perceivers passively and actively strive to express the perceived world in concert with others. He was the only major phenomenologist of the first half of the twentieth century to engage extensively with the sciences and especially with Gestalt psychology. It is through this engagement that his writings became influential in the project of naturalizing phenomenology, in which phenomenologists use the results of psychology and cognitive science.\n\nMerleau-Ponty emphasized the body as the primary site of knowing the world, a corrective to the long philosophical tradition of placing consciousness as the source of knowledge, and maintained that the body and that which it perceived could not be disentangled from each other. The articulation of the primacy of embodiment (corporéité) led him away from phenomenology towards what he was to call “indirect ontology” or the ontology of “the flesh of the world” (la chair du monde), seen in his final and incomplete work, The Visible and Invisible, and his last published essay, “Eye and Mind”.\n\nMerleau-Ponty engaged with Marxism throughout his career. His 1947 book, Humanism and Terror, has been widely (mis)understood as a defence of the Soviet show trials. In fact, this text avoids the definitive endorsement of a view on the Soviet Union, but instead engages with the Marxist theory of history as a critique of liberalism, in order to reveal an unresolved antinomy in modern politics, between humanism and terror: if human values can only be achieved through violent force, and if liberal ideas hide illiberal realities, how is just political action to be decided? Merleau-Ponty maintained an engaged though critical relationship to the Marxist left until the end of his life, particularly during his time as the political editor of the journal Les Temps Modernes.\n\nLife\n\nMaurice Merleau-Ponty was born in 1908 in Rochefort-sur-Mer, Charente-Inférieure (now Charente-Maritime), France. His father died in 1913 when Merleau-Ponty was five years old. After secondary schooling at the lycée Louis-le-Grand in Paris, Merleau-Ponty became a student at the École Normale Supérieure, where he studied alongside Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Simone Weil, Jean Hyppolite, and Jean Wahl. As Beauvoir recounts in her autobiography, she developed a close friendship with Merleau-Ponty and became smitten with him, but ultimately found him too well-adjusted to bourgeois life and values for her taste. He attended Edmund Husserl's \"Paris Lectures\" in February 1929. In 1929, Merleau-Ponty received his DES degree (, roughly equivalent to an MA thesis) from the University of Paris, on the basis of the (now-lost) thesis La Notion de multiple intelligible chez Plotin (\"Plotinus's Notion of the Intelligible Many\"), directed by Émile Bréhier. He passed the agrégation in philosophy in 1930.\n\nMerleau-Ponty was raised as a Catholic. He was friends with the Christian existentialist Gabriel Marcel, and he wrote articles for the Christian leftist journal Esprit, but he left the Church in 1937 because he felt his socialist politics were not compatible with the social and political teaching of the Catholic Church.\n\nAn article published in French newspaper Le Monde in October 2014 makes the case of recent discoveries about Merleau-Ponty's likely authorship of the novel Nord. Récit de l'arctique (Grasset, 1928). Convergent sources from close friends (Beauvoir, Elisabeth \"Zaza\" Lacoin) seem to leave little doubt that Jacques Heller was a pseudonym of the 20-year-old Merleau-Ponty.\n\nMerleau-Ponty taught first at the Lycée de Beauvais (1931–33) and then got a fellowship to do research from the . From 1934 to 1935 he taught at the Lycée de Chartres. He then in 1935 became a tutor at the École Normale Supérieure, where he tutored a young Michel Foucault and Trần Đức Thảo and was awarded his doctorate on the basis of two important books: La structure du comportement (1942) and Phénoménologie de la Perception (1945). During this time, he attended Alexandre Kojeve's influential seminars on Hegel and Aron Gurwitsch's lectures on Gestalt psychology.\n\nIn the spring of 1939, he was the first foreign visitor to the newly established Husserl Archives, where he consulted Husserl's unpublished manuscripts and met Eugen Fink and Father Hermann Van Breda. In the summer of 1939, as France entered war against Germany, he served on the frontlines in the French army, where he was wounded in battle in June 1940. Upon returning to Paris in the fall of 1940, he married Suzanne Jolibois, a Lacanian psychoanalyst, and founded an underground resistance group with Jean-Paul Sartre called \"Under the Boot\". He participated in an armed demonstration against the Nazis during the Liberation of Paris.\n\nAfter teaching at the University of Lyon from 1945 to 1948, Merleau-Ponty lectured on child psychology and education at the Sorbonne from 1949 to 1952. \nHe was awarded the Chair of Philosophy at the Collège de France from 1952 until his death in 1961, making him the youngest person to have been elected to a chair.\n\nBesides his teaching, Merleau-Ponty was also political editor for the leftist Les Temps modernes from the founding of the journal in October 1945 until December 1952. In his youth he had read Karl Marx's writings and Sartre even claimed that Merleau-Ponty converted him to Marxism. While he was not a member of the French Communist Party and did not identify as a Communist, he laid out an argument justifying the Soviet show trials and violence for progressive ends in general in the work Humanism and Terror in 1947. However, about three years later, he renounced his earlier support for political violence, and he rejected Marxism and advocated a liberal left position in Adventures of the Dialectic (1955). His friendship with Sartre and work with Les Temps modernes ended because of that, since Sartre still had a more favourable attitude towards Soviet communism. Merleau-Ponty was subsequently active in the French non-communist left and in particular in the Union of the Democratic Forces.\n\nMerleau-Ponty died suddenly of a stroke in 1961 at age 53, apparently while preparing for a class on René Descartes, leaving an unfinished manuscript which was posthumously published in 1964, along with a selection of Merleau-Ponty's working notes, by Claude Lefort as The Visible and the Invisible. He is buried in Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris with his mother Louise, his wife Suzanne and their daughter Marianne.\n\nThought\n\nConsciousness\nIn his Phenomenology of Perception (first published in French in 1945), Merleau-Ponty develops the concept of the body-subject (le corps propre) as an alternative to the Cartesian \"cogito\". This distinction is especially important in that Merleau-Ponty perceives the essences of the world existentially. Consciousness, the world, and the human body as a perceiving thing are intricately intertwined and mutually \"engaged\". The phenomenal thing is not the unchanging object of the natural sciences, but a correlate of our body and its sensory-motor functions. Taking up and \"communing with\" (Merleau-Ponty's phrase) the sensible qualities it encounters, the body as incarnated subjectivity intentionally elaborates things within an ever-present world frame, through use of its pre-conscious, pre-predicative understanding of the world's makeup. The elaboration, however, is \"inexhaustible\" (the hallmark of any perception according to Merleau-Ponty). Things are that upon which our body has a \"grip\" (prise), while the grip itself is a function of our connaturality with the world's things. The world and the sense of self are emergent phenomena in an ongoing \"becoming\".\n\nThe essential partiality of our view of things, their being given only in a certain perspective and at a certain moment in time does not diminish their reality, but on the contrary establishes it, as there is no other way for things to be copresent with us and with other things than through such \"Abschattungen\" (sketches, faint outlines, adumbrations). The thing transcends our view, but is manifest precisely by presenting itself to a range of possible views. The object of perception is immanently tied to its background—to the nexus of meaningful relations among objects within the world. Because the object is inextricably within the world of meaningful relations, each object reflects the other (much in the style of Leibniz's monads). Through involvement in the world – being-in-the-world – the perceiver tacitly experiences all the perspectives upon that object coming from all the surrounding things of its environment, as well as the potential perspectives that that object has upon the beings around it.\n\nEach object is a \"mirror of all others\". Our perception of the object through all perspectives is not that of a propositional, or clearly delineated, perception; rather, it is an ambiguous perception founded upon the body's primordial involvement and understanding of the world and of the meanings that constitute the landscape's perceptual Gestalt. Only after we have been integrated within the environment so as to perceive objects as such can we turn our attention toward particular objects within the landscape so as to define them more clearly. This attention, however, does not operate by clarifying what is already seen, but by constructing a new Gestalt oriented toward a particular object. Because our bodily involvement with things is always provisional and indeterminate, we encounter meaningful things in a unified though ever open-ended world.\n\nThe primacy of perception\nFrom the time of writing Structure of Behavior and Phenomenology of Perception, Merleau-Ponty wanted to show, in opposition to the idea that drove the tradition beginning with John Locke, that perception was not the causal product of atomic sensations. This atomist-causal conception was being perpetuated in certain psychological currents of the time, particularly in behaviourism. According to Merleau-Ponty, perception has an active dimension, in that it is a primordial openness to the lifeworld (the \"Lebenswelt\").\n\nThis primordial openness is at the heart of his thesis of the primacy of perception. The slogan of Husserl's phenomenology is \"all consciousness is consciousness of something\", which implies a distinction between \"acts of thought\" (the noesis) and \"intentional objects of thought\" (the noema). Thus, the correlation between noesis and noema becomes the first step in the constitution of analyses of consciousness. However, in studying the posthumous manuscripts of Husserl, who remained one of his major influences, Merleau-Ponty remarked that, in their evolution, Husserl's work brings to light phenomena which are not assimilable to noesis–noema correlation. This is particularly the case when one attends to the phenomena of the body (which is at once body-subject and body-object), subjective time (the consciousness of time is neither an act of consciousness nor an object of thought) and the other (the first considerations of the other in Husserl led to solipsism).\n\nThe distinction between \"acts of thought\" (noesis) and \"intentional objects of thought\" (noema) does not seem, therefore, to constitute an irreducible ground. It appears rather at a higher level of analysis. Thus, Merleau-Ponty does not postulate that \"all consciousness is consciousness of something\", which supposes at the outset a noetic-noematic ground. Instead, he develops the thesis according to which \"all consciousness is perceptual consciousness\". In doing so, he establishes a significant turn in the development of phenomenology, indicating that its conceptualisations should be re-examined in the light of the primacy of perception, in weighing up the philosophical consequences of this thesis.\n\nCorporeity\n\nTaking the study of perception as his point of departure, Merleau-Ponty was led to recognize that one's own body (le corps propre) is not only a thing, a potential object of study for science, but is also a permanent condition of experience, a constituent of the perceptual openness to the world. He therefore underlines the fact that there is an inherence of consciousness and of the body of which the analysis of perception should take account. The primacy of perception signifies a primacy of experience, so to speak, insofar as perception becomes an active and constitutive dimension.\n\nMerleau-Ponty demonstrates a corporeity of consciousness as much as an intentionality of the body, and so stands in contrast with the dualist ontology of mind and body in Descartes, a philosopher to whom Merleau-Ponty continually returned, despite the important differences that separate them. In the Phenomenology of Perception Merleau-Ponty wrote: “Insofar as I have hands, feet, a body, I sustain around me intentions which are not dependent on my decisions and which affect my surroundings in a way that I do not choose” (1962, p. 440).\n\nSpatiality\nThe question concerning corporeity connects also with Merleau-Ponty's reflections on space (l'espace) and the primacy of the dimension of depth (la profondeur) as implied in the notion of being in the world (être au monde; to echo Heidegger's In-der-Welt-sein) and of one's own body (le corps propre). Reflections on spatiality in phenomenology are also central to the advanced philosophical deliberations in architectural theory.\n\nLanguage\nThe highlighting of the fact that corporeity intrinsically has a dimension of expressivity which proves to be fundamental to the constitution of the ego is one of the conclusions of The Structure of Behavior that is constantly reiterated in Merleau-Ponty's later works. Following this theme of expressivity, he goes on to examine how an incarnate subject is in a position to undertake actions that transcend the organic level of the body, such as in intellectual operations and the products of one's cultural life.\n\nHe carefully considers language, then, as the core of culture, by examining in particular the connections between the unfolding of thought and sense—enriching his perspective not only by an analysis of the acquisition of language and the expressivity of the body, but also by taking into account pathologies of language, painting, cinema, literature, poetry and song.\n\nThis work deals mainly with language, beginning with the reflection on artistic expression in The Structure of Behavior—which contains a passage on El Greco (p. 203ff) that prefigures the remarks that he develops in \"Cézanne's Doubt\" (1945) and follows the discussion in Phenomenology of Perception. The work, undertaken while serving as the Chair of Child Psychology and Pedagogy at the University of the Sorbonne, is not a departure from his philosophical and phenomenological works, but rather an important continuation in the development of his thought.\n\nAs the course outlines of his Sorbonne lectures indicate, during this period he continues a dialogue between phenomenology and the diverse work carried out in psychology, all in order to return to the study of the acquisition of language in children, as well as to broadly take advantage of the contribution of Ferdinand de Saussure to linguistics, and to work on the notion of structure through a discussion of work in psychology, linguistics and social anthropology.\n\nArt\nMerleau-Ponty distinguishes between primary and secondary modes of expression. This distinction appears in Phenomenology of Perception (p. 207, 2nd note [Fr. ed.]) and is sometimes repeated in terms of spoken and speaking language () (The Prose of the World, p. 10). Spoken language (), or secondary expression, returns to our linguistic baggage, to the cultural heritage that we have acquired, as well as the brute mass of relationships between signs and significations. Speaking language (), or primary expression, such as it is, is language in the production of a sense, language at the advent of a thought, at the moment where it makes itself an advent of sense.\n\nIt is speaking language, that is to say, primary expression, that interests Merleau-Ponty and which keeps his attention through his treatment of the nature of production and the reception of expressions, a subject which also overlaps with an analysis of action, of intentionality, of perception, as well as the links between freedom and external conditions.\n\nThe notion of style occupies an important place in \"Indirect Language and the Voices of Silence\". In spite of certain similarities with André Malraux, Merleau-Ponty distinguishes himself from Malraux in respect to three conceptions of style, the last of which is employed in Malraux's The Voices of Silence. Merleau-Ponty remarks that in this work \"style\" is sometimes used by Malraux in a highly subjective sense, understood as a projection of the artist's individuality. Sometimes it is used, on the contrary, in a very metaphysical sense (in Merleau-Ponty's opinion, a mystical sense), in which style is connected with a conception of an \"über-artist\" expressing \"the Spirit of Painting\". Finally, it sometimes is reduced to simply designating a categorization of an artistic school or movement. (However, this account of Malraux's notion of style—a key element in his thinking—is open to serious question.)\n\nFor Merleau-Ponty, it is these uses of the notion of style that lead Malraux to postulate a cleavage between the objectivity of Italian Renaissance painting and the subjectivity of painting in his own time, a conclusion that Merleau-Ponty disputes. According to Merleau-Ponty, it is important to consider the heart of this problematic, by recognizing that style is first of all a demand owed to the primacy of perception, which also implies taking into consideration the dimensions of historicity and intersubjectivity. (However, Merleau-Ponty's reading of Malraux has been questioned in a recent major study of Malraux's theory of art which argues that Merleau-Ponty seriously misunderstood Malraux.) For Merleau-Ponty, style is born of the interaction between two or more fields of being. Rather than being exclusive to individual human consciousness, consciousness is born of the pre-conscious style of the world, of Nature.\n\nScience\nIn his essay \"Cézanne's Doubt\", in which he identifies Paul Cézanne's impressionistic theory of painting as analogous to his own concept of radical reflection, the attempt to return to, and reflect on, prereflective consciousness, Merleau-Ponty identifies science as the opposite of art. In Merleau-Ponty's account, whereas art is an attempt to capture an individual's perception, science is anti-individualistic. In the preface to his Phenomenology of Perception, Merleau-Ponty presents a phenomenological objection to positivism: that it can tell us nothing about human subjectivity. All that a scientific text can explain is the particular individual experience of that scientist, which cannot be transcended. For Merleau-Ponty, science neglects the depth and profundity of the phenomena that it endeavors to explain.\n\nMerleau-Ponty understood science to be an ex post facto abstraction. Causal and physiological accounts of perception, for example, explain perception in terms that are arrived at only after abstracting from the phenomenon itself. Merleau-Ponty chastised science for taking itself to be the area in which a complete account of nature may be given. The subjective depth of phenomena cannot be given in science as it is. This characterizes Merleau-Ponty's attempt to ground science in phenomenological objectivity and, in essence, to institute a \"return to the phenomena\".\n\nInfluence\n\nAnticognitivist cognitive science\nMerleau-Ponty's critical position with respect to science was stated in his Preface to the Phenomenology: he described scientific points of view as \"always both naive and at the same time dishonest\". Despite, or perhaps because of, this view, his work influenced and anticipated the strands of modern psychology known as post-cognitivism. Hubert Dreyfus has been instrumental in emphasising the relevance of Merleau-Ponty's work to current post-cognitive research, and its criticism of the traditional view of cognitive science.\n\nDreyfus's seminal critique of cognitivism (or the computational account of the mind), What Computers Can't Do, consciously replays Merleau-Ponty's critique of intellectualist psychology to argue for the irreducibility of corporeal know-how to discrete, syntactic processes. Through the influence of Dreyfus's critique and neurophysiological alternative, Merleau-Ponty became associated with neurophysiological, connectionist accounts of cognition.\n\nWith the publication in 1991 of The Embodied Mind by Francisco Varela, Evan Thompson, and Eleanor Rosch, this association was extended, if only partially, to another strand of \"anti-cognitivist\" or post-representationalist cognitive science: embodied or enactive cognitive science, and later in the decade, to neurophenomenology. In addition, Merleau-Ponty's work has also influenced researchers trying to integrate neuroscience with the principles of chaos theory.\n\nIt was through this relationship with Merleau-Ponty's work that cognitive science's affair with phenomenology was born, which is represented by a growing number of works, including\n Ron McClamrock's Existential Cognition: Computational Minds in the World (1995),\n Andy Clark's Being There (1997),\n Naturalizing Phenomenology edited by Petitot et al. (1999),\n Alva Noë's Action in Perception (2004),\n Shaun Gallagher's How the Body Shapes the Mind (2005),\n Grammont, Franck Dorothée Legrand, and Pierre Livet (eds.) 2010, Naturalizing Intention in Action, MIT Press 2010 .\n The journal Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences.\n\nFeminist philosophy\nMerleau-Ponty has also been picked up by Australian and Nordic philosophers inspired by the French feminist tradition, including Rosalyn Diprose and .\n\nHeinämaa has argued for a rereading of Merleau-Ponty's influence on Simone de Beauvoir. (She has also challenged Dreyfus's reading of Merleau-Ponty as behaviorist, and as neglecting the importance of the phenomenological reduction to Merleau-Ponty's thought.)\n\nMerleau-Ponty's phenomenology of the body has also been taken up by Iris Young in her essay \"Throwing Like a Girl,\" and its follow-up, \"'Throwing Like a Girl': Twenty Years Later\". Young analyzes the particular modalities of feminine bodily comportment as they differ from that of men. Young observes that while a man who throws a ball puts his whole body into the motion, a woman throwing a ball generally restricts her own movements as she makes them, and that, generally, in sports, women move in a more tentative, reactive way. Merleau-Ponty argues that we experience the world in terms of the \"I can\" – that is, oriented towards certain projects based on our capacity and habituality. Young's thesis is that in women, this intentionality is inhibited and ambivalent, rather than confident, experienced as an \"I cannot\".\n\nEcophenomenology\nEcophenomenology can be described as the pursuit of the relationalities of worldly engagement, both human and those of other creatures (Brown & Toadvine 2003).\n\nThis engagement is situated in a kind of middle ground of relationality, a space that is neither purely objective, because it is reciprocally constituted by a diversity of lived experiences motivating the movements of countless organisms, nor purely subjective, because it is nonetheless a field of material relationships between bodies. It is governed exclusively neither by causality, nor by intentionality. In this space of in-betweenness, phenomenology can overcome its inaugural opposition to naturalism.\n\nDavid Abram explains Merleau-Ponty's concept of \"flesh\" (chair) as \"the mysterious tissue or matrix that underlies and gives rise to both the perceiver and the perceived as interdependent aspects of its spontaneous activity\", and he identifies this elemental matrix with the interdependent web of earthly life. This concept unites subject and object dialectically as determinations within a more primordial reality, which Merleau-Ponty calls \"the flesh\" and which Abram refers to variously as \"the animate earth\", \"the breathing biosphere\" or \"the more-than-human natural world\". Yet this is not nature or the biosphere conceived as a complex set of objects and objective processes, but rather \"the biosphere as it is experienced and lived from within by the intelligent body — by the attentive human animal who is entirely a part of the world that he or she experiences. Merleau-Ponty's ecophenemonology with its emphasis on holistic dialog within the larger-than-human world also has implications for the ontogenesis and phylogenesis of language; indeed he states that \"language is the very voice of the trees, the waves and the forest\".\n\nMerleau-Ponty himself refers to \"that primordial being which is not yet the subject-being nor the object-being and which in every respect baffles reflection. From this primordial being to us, there is no derivation, nor any break...\" Among the many working notes found on his desk at the time of his death, and published with the half-complete manuscript of The Visible and the Invisible, several make it evident that Merleau-Ponty himself recognized a deep affinity between his notion of a primordial \"flesh\" and a radically transformed understanding of \"nature\". Hence, in November 1960 he writes: \"Do a psychoanalysis of Nature: it is the flesh, the mother.\" And in the last published working note, written in March 1961, he writes: \"Nature as the other side of humanity (as flesh, nowise as 'matter').\" This resonates with the conception of space, place, dwelling, and embodiment (in the flesh and physical, vs. virtual and cybernetic), especially as they are addressed against the background of the unfolding of the essence of modern technology. Such analytics figure in a Heideggerian take on “econtology” as an extension of Heidegger's consideration of the question of being (Seinsfrage) by way of the fourfold (Das Geviert) of earth-sky-mortals-divinities (Erde und Himmel, Sterblichen und Göttlichen). In this strand of “ecophenomenology”, ecology is co-entangled with ontology, whereby the worldly existential analytics are grounded in earthiness, and environmentalism is orientated by ontological thinking.\n\nBibliography\nThe following table gives a selection of Merleau-Ponty's works in French and English translation.\n\nSee also\nGestalt psychology\nProcess philosophy\nEmbodied cognition\nEnactivism\nDifference (philosophy)\nVirtuality (philosophy)\nField (physics)\nHylomorphism\nAutopoiesis\nEmergence\nUmwelt\nHabit\nBody schema\nAffordance\nPerspectivism\nReflexivity\nInvagination (philosophy)\nIncarnation\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n Abram, D. (1988). \"Merleau-Ponty and the Voice of the Earth\" Environmental Ethics 10, no. 2 (Summer 1988): 101–20.\n Alloa, E. (2017) Resistance of the Sensible World. An Introduction to Merleau-Ponty, New York: Fordham University Press.\n Alloa,E., F. Chouraqui & R. Kaushik, (2019) (eds.) Merleau-Ponty and Contemporary Philosophy, Albany: SUNY Press.\n Barbaras, R. (2004) The Being of the Phenomenon. Merleau-Ponty's Ontology Bloomington: Indiana University Press.\n Carbone, M. (2004) The Thinking of the Sensible. Merleau-Ponty's A-Philosophy, Evanston: Northwestern University Press.\n Clark, A. (1997) Being There: Putting Brain, Body, and World Together Again. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.\n Dillon, M. C. (1997) Merleau-Ponty's Ontology. Evanston: Northwestern University Press.\n Gallagher, S. (2003) How the Body Shapes the Mind. Oxford: Oxford University Press.\n Guilherme, Alexandre and Morgan, W. John, 'Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908-1961)-dialogue as being present to the other'. Chapter 6 in Philosophy, Dialogue, and Education: Nine modern European philosophers, Routledge, London and New York, pp. 89–108, .\n Johnson, G., Smith, M. B. (eds.) (1993) The Merleau-Ponty Aesthetics Reader: Philosophy and Painting, Chicago: Northwestern UP 1993.\n Landes, D. (2013) Merleau-Ponty and the Paradoxes of Expression, New York-London: Bloomsbury.\n Lawlor, L., Evans, F. (eds.) (2000) Chiasms: Merleau-Ponty's Notion of Flesh, Albany: SUNY Press.\n Petitot, J., Varela, F., Pachoud, B. and Roy, J-M. (eds.) (1999) Naturalizing Phenomenology: Issues in Contemporary Phenomenology and Cognitive Science. Stanford: Stanford University Press.\n Toadvine, T. (2009) Merleau-Ponty's Philosophy of Nature. Evanston: Northwestern University Press.\n Tilliette, X. (1970) Maurice Merleau-Ponty ou la mesure de l'homme, Seghers, 1970.\n Varela, F. J., Thompson, E. and Rosch, E. (1991) The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience. Cambridge: MIT Press.\n\nExternal links\n\n \n Maurice Merleau-Ponty at 18 from the French Government website\n English Translations of Merleau-Ponty's Work\n Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Maurice Merleau-Ponty by Jack Reynolds\n Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Maurice Merleau-Ponty by Ted Toadvine\n The Merleau-Ponty Circle — Association of scholars interested in the works of Merleau-Ponty\n Maurice Merleau-Ponty page at Mythos & Logos\n Chiasmi International — Studies Concerning the Thought of Maurice Merleau-Ponty in English, French and Italian\n O’Loughlin, Marjorie, 1995, \"Intelligent Bodies and Ecological Subjectivities: Merleau-Ponty’s Corrective to Postmodernism’s “Subjects” of Education.\"\n Popen, Shari, 1995, \"Merleau-Ponty Confronts Postmodernism: A Reply to O’Loughlin.\"\n Merleau-Ponty: Reckoning with the Possibility of an 'Other.'\n The Journal of French Philosophy — the online home of the Bulletin de la Société Américaine de Philosophie de Langue Française\n Online Merleau-Ponty Bibliography at PhilPapers.org\n\n1908 births\n1961 deaths\n20th-century French non-fiction writers\n20th-century French philosophers\nAction theorists\nBurials at Père Lachaise Cemetery\nCollège de France faculty\nConsciousness researchers and theorists\nContinental philosophers\nCultural critics\nÉcole Normale Supérieure alumni\nEcophenomenologists\nEnactive cognition\nEnvironmental philosophers\nEpistemologists\nExistentialists\nFrench communists\nFrench socialists\nFrench humanists\nFrench male non-fiction writers\nFrench male writers\nLycée Carnot teachers\nLycée Louis-le-Grand alumni\nMarxist theorists\nMoral philosophers\nOntologists\nPeople from Rochefort, Charente-Maritime\nPhenomenologists\nPhilosophers of art\nPhilosophers of culture\nPhilosophers of education\nPhilosophers of ethics and morality\nPhilosophers of language\nPhilosophers of mind\nPhilosophers of psychology\nPhilosophers of science\nPhilosophy writers\nPolitical philosophers\nSocial critics\nSocial philosophers\nUniversity of Lyon faculty\nUniversity of Paris faculty\nFrench magazine founders",
"Phenomenology of Perception () is a 1945 book about perception by the French philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty, in which the author expounds his thesis of \"the primacy of perception\". The work established Merleau-Ponty as the pre-eminent philosopher of the body, and is considered a major statement of French existentialism.\n\nSummary\nMerleau-Ponty attempts to define phenomenology, which according to him has not yet received a proper definition. He asserts that phenomenology contains a series of apparent contradictions, which include the fact that it attempts to create a philosophy that would be a rigorous science while also offering an account of space, time and the world as people experience them. Merleau-Ponty denies that such contradictions can be resolved by distinguishing between the views of the philosopher Edmund Husserl and those of the philosopher Martin Heidegger, commenting that Heidegger's Being and Time (1927) \"springs from an indication given by Husserl and amounts to no more than an explicit account of the 'natürlicher Weltbegriff' or the 'Lebenswelt' which Husserl, toward the end of his life, identified as the central theme of phenomenology, with the result that the contradiction appears in Husserl's own philosophy\".\n\nFollowing Husserl, Merleau-Ponty attempts to reveal the phenomenological structure of perception. He writes that while the \"notion of sensation ... seems immediate and obvious\", it is in fact confused. Merleau-Ponty asserts that because \"traditional analyses\" have accepted it, they have \"missed the phenomenon of perception.\" Merleau-Ponty argues that while sensation could be understood to mean \"the way in which I am affected and the experiencing of a state of myself\", there is nothing in experience corresponding to \"pure sensation\" or \"an atom of feeling\". He writes that, \"The alleged self-evidence of sensation is not based on any testimony of consciousness, but on widely held prejudice.\" Merleau-Ponty's central thesis is that of the \"primacy of perception.\" He critiques the Cartesian stance of \"cogito ergo sum\" and expounds a different conception of consciousness. Cartesian dualism of mind and body is called into question as the primary way of existing in the world, and is ultimately rejected in favor of an intersubjective conception or dialectical and intentional concept of consciousness. The body is central to Merleau-Ponty's account of perception. In his view, the ability to reflect comes from a pre-reflective ground that serves as the foundation for reflecting on actions.\n\nMerleau-Ponty's account of the body helps him undermine what had been a long-standing conception of consciousness, which hinges on the distinction between the for-itself (subject) and in-itself (object), which plays a central role in the philosophy of Jean-Paul Sartre, whose Being and Nothingness was released in 1943. The body stands between this fundamental distinction between subject and object, ambiguously existing as both. In Merleau-Ponty's discussion of human sexuality, he discusses psychoanalysis. Merleau-Ponty suggests that the body \"can symbolize existence because it brings it into being and actualizes it.\"\n\nPublication history\nPhenomenology of Perception was first published in 1945 by Éditions Gallimard. In 1962, an English translation by Colin Smith was published by Routledge & Kegan Paul. In 2013, Routledge published an English translation by Donald Landes.\n\nReception\nThe philosopher A. J. Ayer criticized Merleau-Ponty's arguments against the sense datum theory of perception, finding them inconclusive. He considered Merleau-Ponty's inclusion of a chapter on sexuality surprising, suggesting that Merleau-Ponty included it to give him an opportunity to revisit the Hegelian dialectic of the master and the slave. He compared Merleau-Ponty's views on sex to those of Sartre in Being and Nothingness. The sociologist Murray S. Davis observed that Merleau-Ponty's view that aspects of psychoanalysis, such as its attribution of meaning to all human actions and the diffusing of sexuality throughout the whole of human existence, are similar to phenomenology is controversial, and that other authors would view psychoanalysis as \"materialistic and mechanical\".\n\nHelmut R. Wagner described Phenomenology of Perception as an important contribution to phenomenology. Rhiannon Goldthorpe called the book Merleau-Ponty's major work, noting that its discussion of subjects such as the relationship of the body to spatial experience, and sexuality, went beyond \"the nominal range of his title.\" The philosopher David Abram observed that while \"the sensible thing\" is \"commonly considered by our philosophical tradition to be passive and inert\", Merleau-Ponty consistently describes it in the active voice in Phenomenology of Perception. He rejected the idea that Merleau-Ponty's \"animistic\" language was the result of poetic license, arguing that he \"writes of the perceived things as entities, of sensible qualities as powers, and of the sensible itself as a field of animate presences, in order to acknowledge and underscore their active, dynamic contribution to perceptual experience.\"\n\nAmerican vice president Al Gore, in a 1999 interview with the critic Louis Menand in The New Yorker, mentioned Phenomenology of Perception as an inspiration. The philosopher Stephen Priest commented that, following the book's publication, Merleau-Ponty decided that in it he had taken \"subject-object dualism as phenomenologically primitive\" and \"made use of a comparatively superficial psychologistic vocabulary\" that he wished to replace. The philosopher Robert Bernasconi observed that the book established Merleau-Ponty as the pre-eminent philosopher of the body, and along with Merleau-Ponty's other writings, found a more receptive audience among analytic philosophers than the works of other phenomenologists.\n\nG. B. Madison observed that the book was recognized as a major statement of French existentialism, and is best known for Merleau-Ponty's central thesis of \"the primacy of perception\". According to Madison, Merleau-Ponty sought to respond in his later work to the charge that by grounding all intellectual and cultural acquisitions in the prereflective and prepersonal life of the body, he was promoting reductionism and anti-intellectualism and undermining the ideals of reason and truth. Madison further stated that some commentators believed that Merleau-Ponty's thought had taken a significantly different direction in his late, unfinished work The Visible and the Invisible, edited by the philosopher Claude Lefort, while others emphasized the continuity of his work, with the issue receiving \"much scholarly discussion\".\n\nReferences\n\nBibliography\nBooks\n\nExternal links\n Excerpts can be found at Google Books: \n Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy listing\n\n1945 non-fiction books\nBooks about perception\nBooks by Maurice Merleau-Ponty\nÉditions Gallimard books\nExistentialist books\nFrench non-fiction books\nPhenomenology literature\nRoutledge books"
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"she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris",
"did she get advanced degrees?",
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"Did she become a doctor?",
"De Beauvoir first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Levi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school.",
"Did she ever become a teacher with Merleau-Ponty and Levi- Strauss?",
"Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the Ecole Normale Superieure in preparation for the agregation in philosophy,"
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| C_5ed7bcbf9b4d438faac7388fd5948edc_1 | Did she stop taking classes and end up teaching the rest of her career? | 5 | Did Simone de Beauvoir stop taking classes and end up teaching the rest of her career? | Simone de Beauvoir | De Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fuelled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, de Beauvoir could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. De Beauvoir took this opportunity to do what she always wanted to do while also taking steps to earn a living for herself. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the Institut Sainte-Marie. She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, she wrote her diplome d'etudes superieures (roughly equivalent to an MA thesis) on Leibniz for Leon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). De Beauvoir was only the ninth woman to have received a degree from the Sorbonne at the time, due to the fact that French women had only recently been allowed to join higher education. De Beauvoir first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Levi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the Ecole Normale Superieure in preparation for the agregation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for the agregation that she met Ecole Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and Rene Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or beaver). The jury for the agregation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of de Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam. Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said: "...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual." CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Simone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir (, ; ; 9 January 1908 – 14 April 1986) was a French existentialist philosopher, writer, social theorist and feminist activist. Though she did not consider herself a philosopher, and even though she was not considered one at the time of her death, she had a significant influence on both feminist existentialism and feminist theory.
Beauvoir wrote novels, essays, biographies, autobiographies and monographs on philosophy, politics, and social issues. She was known for her 1949 treatise The Second Sex, a detailed analysis of women's oppression and a foundational tract of contemporary feminism; and for her novels, including She Came to Stay and The Mandarins. Her most enduring contribution to literature is her memoirs, notably the first volume, "Mémoires d'une jeune fille rangée" (1958), which have a warmth and descriptive power. She won the 1954 Prix Goncourt, the 1975 Jerusalem Prize, and the 1978 Austrian State Prize for European Literature. She was also known for her open, lifelong relationship with French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre.
Early years
Beauvoir was born on 9 January 1908 into a bourgeois Parisian family in the 6th arrondissement. Her parents were Georges Bertrand de Beauvoir, a lawyer, who once aspired to be an actor, and Françoise Beauvoir (née Brasseur), a wealthy banker's daughter and devout Catholic. Simone's sister, Hélène, was born two years later. The family struggled to maintain their bourgeois status after losing much of their fortune shortly after World War I, and Françoise insisted the two daughters be sent to a prestigious convent school.
Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fueled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, she could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. She took this opportunity to take steps towards earning a living for herself.
She first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Lévi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the École Normale Supérieure in preparation for the agrégation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for it that she met École Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and René Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or "beaver"). The jury for the agrégation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam.
Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said:
"...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual."
Secondary and post-secondary education
Beauvoir pursued post-secondary education after completing her high school years at Lycée Fenelon. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the . She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, wrote her (roughly equivalent to an M.A. thesis) on Leibniz for Léon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). Her studies of political philosophy through university influenced her to start thinking of societal concerns rather than her own individual issues.
Religious upbringing
Beauvoir was raised in a strict Catholic household. She had been sent to convent schools as a youth. She was deeply religious as a child, at one point intending to become a nun. At age 14, Beauvoir questioned her faith as she saw many changes in the world after witnessing tragedies throughout her life. She abandoned her faith in her early teens and remained an atheist for the rest of her life. Beauvoir quotes "Faith allows an evasion of those difficulties which the atheist confronts honestly. And to crown all, the believer derives a sense of great superiority from this very cowardice itself."
Middle years
From 1929 until 1943, Beauvoir taught at the lycée level until she could support herself solely on the earnings of her writings. She taught at the (Marseille), the , and the (1936–39).
Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre met during her college years. Intrigued by her determination as an educator, he sought out to make their relationship romantic. However, she had no interest in doing so. During October 1929, Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir became a couple and, after they were confronted by her father, Sartre asked her to marry him on a provisional basis: One day while they were sitting on a bench outside the Louvre, he said, "Let's sign a two-year lease". Though Beauvoir wrote, "Marriage was impossible. I had no dowry", scholars point out that her ideal relationships described in The Second Sex and elsewhere bore little resemblances to the marriage standards of the day. Instead, she and Sartre entered into a lifelong "soul partnership", which was sexual but not exclusive, nor did it involve living together.
Sartre and Beauvoir always read each other's work. Debate continues about the extent to which they influenced each other in their existentialist works, such as Sartre's Being and Nothingness and Beauvoir's She Came to Stay and "Phenomenology and Intent". However, recent studies of Beauvoir's work focus on influences other than Sartre, including Hegel and Leibniz. The Neo-Hegelian revival led by Alexandre Kojève and Jean Hyppolite in the 1930s inspired a whole generation of French thinkers, including Sartre, to discover Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit. However, Beauvoir, reading Hegel in German during the war, produced an original critique of his dialectic of consciousness.
Personal life
Beauvoir's prominent open relationships at times overshadowed her substantial academic reputation. A scholar lecturing with her chastised their "distinguished [Harvard] audience [because] every question asked about Sartre concerned his work, while all those asked about Beauvoir concerned her personal life." Beginning in 1929, Beauvoir and Sartre were partners and remained so for 51 years, until his death in 1980. She chose never to marry and never had children. This gave her the time to advance her education and engage in political causes, write and teach, and take lovers. She lived with Claude Lanzmann from 1952 to 1959.
Perhaps her most famous lover was American author Nelson Algren, whom she met in Chicago in 1947, and to whom she wrote across the Atlantic as "my beloved husband." Algren won the National Book Award for The Man with the Golden Arm in 1950, and in 1954, Beauvoir won France's most prestigious literary prize for The Mandarins, in which Algren is the character Lewis Brogan. Algren vociferously objected to their intimacy becoming public. Years after they separated, she was buried wearing his gift of a silver ring.
Beauvoir was bisexual, and her relationships with young women were controversial. French author Bianca Lamblin (originally Bianca Bienenfeld) wrote in her book Mémoires d'une Jeune Fille Dérangée (published in English under the title A Disgraceful Affair) that, while a student at Lycée Molière, she was sexually exploited by her teacher Beauvoir, who was in her 30s. Lamblin had affairs with both Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir. In 1943, Beauvoir was suspended from her teaching position when she was accused of seducing her 17-year-old lycée pupil Natalie Sorokine in 1939. Sorokine's parents laid formal charges against Beauvoir for debauching a minor (the age of consent in France at the time was 15), and Beauvoir's license to teach in France was revoked, although it was subsequently reinstated.
In 1977, Beauvoir, Sartre, Roland Barthes, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida and much of the era's intelligentsia signed a petition seeking to completely remove the age of consent in France.
Notable works
She Came to Stay
Beauvoir published her first novel She Came to Stay in 1943. It has been assumed that it is inspired by her and Sartre's sexual relationship with Olga Kosakiewicz and Wanda Kosakiewicz. Olga was one of her students in the Rouen secondary school where Beauvoir taught during the early 1930s. She grew fond of Olga. Sartre tried to pursue Olga but she rejected him, so he began a relationship with her sister Wanda. Upon his death, Sartre was still supporting Wanda. He also supported Olga for years, until she met and married Jacques-Laurent Bost, a lover of Beauvoir. However, the main thrust of the novel is philosophical, a scene in which to situate Beauvoir's abiding philosophical pre-occupation - the relationship between the self and the other.
In the novel, set just before the outbreak of World War II, Beauvoir creates one character from the complex relationships of Olga and Wanda. The fictionalised versions of Beauvoir and Sartre have a ménage à trois with the young woman. The novel also delves into Beauvoir and Sartre's complex relationship and how it was affected by the ménage à trois.
She Came to Stay was followed by many others, including The Blood of Others, which explores the nature of individual responsibility, telling a love story between two young French students participating in the Resistance in World War II.
Existentialist ethics
In 1944, Beauvoir wrote her first philosophical essay, Pyrrhus et Cinéas, a discussion on existentialist ethics. She continued her exploration of existentialism through her second essay The Ethics of Ambiguity (1947); it is perhaps the most accessible entry into French existentialism. In the essay, Beauvoir clears up some inconsistencies that many, Sartre included, have found in major existentialist works such as Being and Nothingness. In The Ethics of Ambiguity, Beauvoir confronts the existentialist dilemma of absolute freedom vs. the constraints of circumstance.
Les Temps modernes
At the end of World War II, Beauvoir and Sartre edited Les Temps modernes, a political journal which Sartre founded along with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and others. Beauvoir used Les Temps Modernes to promote her own work and explore her ideas on a small scale before fashioning essays and books. Beauvoir remained an editor until her death.
Sexuality, existentialist feminism and The Second Sex
The Second Sex, first published in 1949 in French as Le Deuxième Sexe, turns the existentialist mantra that existence precedes essence into a feminist one: "One is not born but becomes a woman" (French: "On ne naît pas femme, on le devient"). With this famous phrase, Beauvoir first articulated what has come to be known as the sex-gender distinction, that is, the distinction between biological sex and the social and historical construction of gender and its attendant stereotypes. Beauvoir argues that "the fundamental source of women's oppression is its [femininity's] historical and social construction as the quintessential".
Beauvoir defines women as the "second sex" because women are defined in relation to men. She pointed out that Aristotle argued women are "female by virtue of a certain lack of qualities", while Thomas Aquinas referred to woman as "imperfect man" and the "incidental" being. She quotes "In itself, homosexuality is as limiting as heterosexuality: the ideal should be to be capable of loving a woman or a man; either, a human being, without feeling fear, restraint, or obligation."
Beauvoir asserted that women are as capable of choice as men, and thus can choose to elevate themselves, moving beyond the "immanence" to which they were previously resigned and reaching "transcendence", a position in which one takes responsibility for oneself and the world, where one chooses one's freedom.
Chapters of The Second Sex were originally published in Les Temps modernes, in June 1949. The second volume came a few months after the first in France. It was published soon after in America due to the quick translation by Howard Parshley, as prompted by Blanche Knopf, wife of publisher Alfred A. Knopf. Because Parshley had only a basic familiarity with the French language, and a minimal understanding of philosophy (he was a professor of biology at Smith College), much of Beauvoir's book was mistranslated or inappropriately cut, distorting her intended message. For years, Knopf prevented the introduction of a more accurate retranslation of Beauvoir's work, declining all proposals despite the efforts of existentialist scholars.
Only in 2009 was there a second translation, to mark the 60th anniversary of the original publication. Constance Borde and Sheila Malovany-Chevallier produced the first integral translation in 2010, reinstating a third of the original work.
In the chapter "Woman: Myth and Reality" of The Second Sex, Beauvoir argued that men had made women the "Other" in society by application of a false aura of "mystery" around them. She argued that men used this as an excuse not to understand women or their problems and not to help them, and that this stereotyping was always done in societies by the group higher in the hierarchy to the group lower in the hierarchy. She wrote that a similar kind of oppression by hierarchy also happened in other categories of identity, such as race, class, and religion, but she claimed that it was nowhere more true than with gender in which men stereotyped women and used it as an excuse to organize society into a patriarchy.
Despite her contributions to the feminist movement, especially the French women's liberation movement, and her beliefs in women's economic independence and equal education, Beauvoir was initially reluctant to call herself a feminist. However, after observing the resurgence of the feminist movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Beauvoir stated she no longer believed a socialist revolution to be enough to bring about women's liberation. She publicly declared herself a feminist in 1972 in an interview with Le Nouvel Observateur.
In 2018 the manuscript pages of Le Deuxième Sexe were published. At the time her adopted daughter, Sylvie Le Bon-Beauvoir, a philosophy professor, described her mother's writing process: Beauvoir wrote every page of her books longhand first and only after that would hire typists.
The Mandarins
Published in 1954, The Mandarins won her France's highest literary prize, the Prix Goncourt. The book is set after the end of World War II and follows the personal lives of philosophers and friends among Sartre's and Beauvoir's intimate circle, including her relationship with American writer Nelson Algren, to whom the book was dedicated.
Algren was outraged by the frank way Beauvoir described their sexual experiences in both The Mandarins and her autobiographies. Algren vented his outrage when reviewing American translations of Beauvoir's work. Much material bearing on this episode in Beauvoir's life, including her love letters to Algren, entered the public domain only after her death.
Les Inséparables
Beauvoir's early novel Les Inséparables, long suppressed, was published in French in 2020 and in two different English translations in 2021.<ref>Reviewed 23 Aug. 2021 by Merve Emre in The New Yorker" https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/08/30/simone-de-beauvoirs-lost-novel-of-early-love</ref> Written in 1954, the book describes her first love, a classmate named Elisabeth Lacoin ("Zaza") who died before age 22, and had as a teenager a "passionate and tragic" relationship with Beauvoir and Merleau-Ponty, then teaching at the same school. Disapproved by Sartre, the novel was deemed "too intimate" to be published during Beauvoir's lifetime.
Later years
Beauvoir wrote popular travel diaries about time spent in the United States and China and published essays and fiction rigorously, especially throughout the 1950s and 1960s. She published several volumes of short stories, including The Woman Destroyed, which, like some of her other later work, deals with aging.
1980 saw the publication of When Things of the Spirit Come First, a set of short stories centred around and based upon women important to her earlier years. Though written long before the novel She Came to Stay, Beauvoir did not at the time consider the stories worth publishing, allowing some forty years to pass before doing so.
Sartre and Merleau-Ponty had a longstanding feud, which led Merleau-Ponty to leave Les Temps Modernes. Beauvoir sided with Sartre and ceased to associate with Merleau-Ponty. In Beauvoir's later years, she hosted the journal's editorial meetings in her flat and contributed more than Sartre, whom she often had to force to offer his opinions.
Beauvoir also wrote a four-volume autobiography, consisting of: Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter; The Prime of Life; Force of Circumstance (sometimes published in two volumes in English translation: After the War and Hard Times); and All Said and Done. In 1964 Beauvoir published a novella-length autobiography, A Very Easy Death, covering the time she spent visiting her ageing mother, who was dying of cancer. The novella brings up questions of ethical concerns with truth-telling in doctor-patient relationships.
Her 1970 long essay La Vieillesse (The Coming of Age) is a rare instance of an intellectual meditation on the decline and solitude all humans experience if they do not die before about the age of 60.
In the 1970s Beauvoir became active in France's women's liberation movement. She wrote and signed the Manifesto of the 343 in 1971, a manifesto that included a list of famous women who claimed to have had an abortion, then illegal in France. Some argue most of the women had not had abortions, including Beauvoir. Signatories were diverse as Catherine Deneuve, Delphine Seyrig, and Beauvoir's sister Poupette. In 1974, abortion was legalised in France.
In a 1975 interview with Betty Friedan Beauvoir said "No woman should be authorized to stay at home and raise her children. Society should be totally different. Women should not have that choice, precisely because if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one."
In about 1976 Beauvoir and Sylvie Le Bon made a trip to New York City in the United States to visit Kate Millett on her farm.
In 1981 she wrote La Cérémonie Des Adieux (A Farewell to Sartre), a painful account of Sartre's last years. In the opening of Adieux, Beauvoir notes that it is the only major published work of hers which Sartre did not read before its publication.
She contributed the piece "Feminism – alive, well, and in constant danger" to the 1984 anthology Sisterhood Is Global: The International Women's Movement Anthology, edited by Robin Morgan.
After Sartre died in 1980, Beauvoir published his letters to her with edits to spare the feelings of people in their circle who were still living. After Beauvoir's death, Sartre's adopted daughter and literary heir Arlette Elkaïm would not let many of Sartre's letters be published in unedited form. Most of Sartre's letters available today have Beauvoir's edits, which include a few omissions but mostly the use of pseudonyms. Beauvoir's adopted daughter and literary heir Sylvie Le Bon, unlike Elkaïm, published Beauvoir's unedited letters to both Sartre and Algren.
Beauvoir died of pneumonia on 14 April 1986 in Paris, aged 78. She is buried next to Sartre at the Montparnasse Cemetery in Paris. She was honored as a figure at the forefront of the struggle for women's rights around the time of her passing.
Impact
Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex is considered a foundational work in the history of feminism. Beauvoir had denied being a feminist multiple times but ultimately admitted that she was one after the influential Second Sex became crucial in the world of feminism. The work has had a profound influence, opening the way for second wave feminism in the United States, Canada, Australia, and around the world. Despite the fact that Beauvoir has been quoted as saying "There is a certain unreasonable demand that I find a little stupid because it would enclose me, immobilize me completely in a sort of feminist concrete block." Her works on feminism have paved the way for all future feminists. Founders of the second wave read The Second Sex in translation, including Kate Millett, Shulamith Firestone, Juliet Mitchell, Ann Oakley and Germaine Greer. All acknowledged their profound debt to Beauvoir, including visiting her in France, consulting with her at crucial moments, and dedicating works to her. Betty Friedan, whose 1963 book The Feminine Mystique is often regarded as the opening salvo of second wave feminism in the United States, later said that reading The Second Sex in the early 1950s "led me to whatever original analysis of women's existence I have been able to contribute to the Women's movement and to its unique politics. I looked to Simone de Beauvoir for a philosophical and intellectual authority."
At one point in the early seventies, Beauvoir also aligned herself with the League for Woman's rights as a means to campaign and fight against sexism in the French society. Beauvoir's influence goes beyond just her impact on second wave founders, and extends to numerous aspects of feminism, including literary criticism, history, philosophy, theology, criticism of scientific discourse, and psychotherapy. When Beauvoir first became involved with the feminism movement, one of her first objectives was that of legalizing abortion.Donna Haraway wrote that, "despite important differences, all the modern feminist meanings of gender have roots in Simone de Beauvoir's claim that 'one is not born a woman [one becomes one]'". This "most famous feminist sentence ever written" is echoed in the title of Monique Wittig's 1981 essay One Is Not Born a Woman. Judith Butler took the concept a step further, arguing that Beauvoir's choice of the verb to become suggests that gender is a process, constantly being renewed in an ongoing interaction between the surrounding culture and individual choice.
Prizes
Prix Goncourt, 1954
Jerusalem Prize, 1975
Austrian State Prize for European Literature, 1978
Works
List of publications (non-exhaustive)
L'Invitée (1943) (English – She Came to Stay) [novel]
Pyrrhus et Cinéas (1944) [nonfiction]
Le Sang des autres (1945) (English – The Blood of Others) [novel]
Les Bouches inutiles (1945) (English - Who Shall Die?) [drama]
Tous les hommes sont mortels (1946) (English – All Men Are Mortal) [novel]
Pour une morale de l'ambiguïté (1947) (English – The Ethics of Ambiguity) [nonfiction]
"America Day by Day" (1948) (English – 1999 – Carol Cosman (Translator and Douglas Brinkley (Foreword) [nonfiction]
Le Deuxième Sexe (1949) (English – The Second Sex) [nonfiction]
L'Amérique au jour le jour (1954) (English – America Day by Day)
Les Mandarins (1954) (English – The Mandarins) [novel]
Must We Burn Sade? (1955)
The Long March (1957) [nonfiction]
Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter (1958)
The Prime of Life (1960)
Force of Circumstance (1963)
A Very Easy Death (1964)
Les Belles Images (1966) [novel]
The Woman Destroyed (1967) [short stories]
The Coming of Age (1970) [nonfiction]
All Said and Done (1972)
Old Age (1972) [nonfiction]
When Things of the Spirit Come First (1979) [novel]
Adieux: A Farewell to Sartre (1981)
Letters to Sartre (1990)
Journal de guerre, Sept 1939 – Jan 1941 (1990); English – Wartime Diary (2009)
A Transatlantic Love Affair: Letters to Nelson Algren (1998)
Diary of a Philosophy Student, 1926–27 (2006)
Cahiers de jeunesse, 1926–1930 (2008)
Selected translations
Patrick O'Brian was Beauvoir's principal English translator, until he attained commercial success as a novelist.
Philosophical Writings (Urbana : University of Illinois Press, 2004, edited by Margaret A. Simons et al.) contains a selection of essays by Beauvoir translated for the first time into English. Among those are: Pyrrhus and Cineas, discussing the futility or utility of action, two previously unpublished chapters from her novel She Came to Stay and an introduction to Ethics of Ambiguity.
See also
Art Shay
Roman à clef
Simone Weil
List of women's rights activists
Place Jean-Paul-Sartre-et-Simone-de-Beauvoir
References
Sources
Appignanesi, Lisa, 2005, Simone de Beauvoir, London: Haus,
Bair, Deirdre, 1990. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books,
Rowley, Hazel, 2005. Tête-a-Tête: Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre. New York: HarperCollins.
Suzanne Lilar, 1969. Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe (with collaboration of Prof. Dreyfus). Paris, University Presses of France (Presses Universitaires de France).
Fraser, M., 1999. Identity Without Selfhood: Simone de Beauvoir and Bisexuality, Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press.
Axel Madsen, Hearts and Minds: The Common Journey of Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre, William Morrow & Co, 1977.
Hélène Rouch, 2001–2002, Trois conceptions du sexe: Simone de Beauvoir entre Adrienne Sahuqué et Suzanne Lilar, Simone de Beauvoir Studies, n° 18, pp. 49–60.
Simone de Beauvoir, Marguerite Yourcenar, Nathalie Sarraute, 2002. Conférence Élisabeth Badinter, Jacques Lassalle & Lucette Finas, .
Further reading
Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe by Suzanne Lilar, 1969.
Feminist Theory and Simone de Beauvoir by Toril Moi, 1990.
Appignanesi, Lisa. Simone de Beauvoir. London: Penguin. 1988. .
Bair, Deirdre. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books. 1990. .
Francis, Claude. Simone de Beauvoir: A Life, A Love Story. Lisa Nesselson (Translator). New York: St. Martin's, 1987. .
Okely, Judith. Simone de Beauvoir. New York: Pantheon. 1986. .
External links
Guardian Books "Author Page", with profile and links to further articles.
Victoria Brittain et al discuss Simone de Beauvoir's lasting influence, ICA 1989
"Simone de Beauvoir", Great Lives, BBC Radio 4, 22 April 2011
Kate Kirkpatrick. (6 November 2017) "What is authentic love? A View from Simone de Beauvoir" . IAI News''.
1908 births
1986 deaths
20th-century French non-fiction writers
20th-century French novelists
20th-century French philosophers
20th-century French women writers
Atheist feminists
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Burials at Montparnasse Cemetery
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Critical theorists
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French social commentators
Social critics
Social philosophers
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University of Paris alumni
French women memoirists
Writers from Paris
20th-century French memoirists
French magazine founders
LGBT philosophers | false | [
"Olive Clio Hazlett (October 27, 1890 – March 8, 1974) was an American mathematician who spent most of her career working for the University of Illinois. She mainly researched algebra, and wrote seventeen research papers on subjects such as nilpotent algebras, division algebras, modular invariants, and the arithmetic of algebras.\n\nBackground\nHazlett was born in Cincinnati, Ohio but grew up in Boston, Massachusetts where she attended public school. In 1912 she received her bachelor's degree from Radcliffe College. She then attended the University of Chicago for her master's degree (1913) and Ph.D. (1915), for which she wrote a thesis titled On the Classification and Invariantive Characterization of Nilpotent Algebras with L. E. Dickson as thesis advisor. After receiving her doctoral degree Hazlett was awarded an Alice Freeman Palmer Fellowship by Harvard, which allowed her to research invariants of nilpotent algebras at Wellesley College for the next year.\n\nCareer\nIn 1916 she was appointed to Bryn Mawr College, where she worked for two years before accepting an appointment as assistant professor at Mount Holyoke College. She was promoted to associate professor in 1924, the same year she gave a talk on The Arithmetic of a General Associative Algebra at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Toronto, but in 1925 she left Mount Holyoke because she felt she was not given enough time or resources to pursue her research in algebra. It was then that she took a job as assistant professor at the University of Illinois, where she would spend the rest of her career.\n\nIn 1928 Hazlett received a Guggenheim Fellowship that allowed her to spend a year visiting Italy, Germany, and Switzerland. While in Italy she presented a paper called Integers as Matrices to the International Congress of Mathematicians in Bologna. Near the end of her visits she requested an extension of her Guggenheim Fellowship, which was granted and allowed her to spend another year in Europe. When she finally returned to the University of Illinois in 1930, she was promoted to associate professor and received a pay raise. However, her teaching schedule was rigorous and required her to teach service courses to large classes of non-math-majors, and after 1930 she did not publish any more research papers. In 1935 she wrote to the chair of the mathematics department complaining that the service courses left her no time for research, but her teaching schedule was not changed and by December 1936 she took a sick leave after having a mental breakdown from the stress of her job. The sick leave was supposed to end in August 1937, but her health had not improved enough by this time and she took another year off. She was, however, able to return to teaching by the end of 1938.\n\nIn 1940, she was appointed a member of the American Mathematical Society's Cryptanalysis Committee, for which she worked until the end of World War II. She maintained her teaching job for most of this period, though, (except for taking leave in 1944-45) and went to great lengths to keep her Cryptanalysis Committee work secret. Her health, however, continued to deteriorate, and in 1946 the University of Illinois placed her on permanent disability leave.\n\nIn 1959 she officially retired from the University of Illinois as an Associate Professor Emerita. She lived the rest of her life at her home in Peterborough, New Hampshire.\n\nSelected works\n\nExternal links \n \nBiographies of Women Mathematicians: Olive Clio Hazlett\nMacTutor History of Mathematics Archive: Olive Clio Hazlett\n Biography on p. 251-258 of the Supplementary Material at AMS\n\n1890 births\n1974 deaths\n20th-century American mathematicians\nAmerican women mathematicians\nRadcliffe College alumni\nUniversity of Chicago alumni\nMount Holyoke College faculty\nPeople from Cincinnati\nPeople from Boston\nBryn Mawr College faculty\nUniversity of Illinois faculty\nPeople from Peterborough, New Hampshire\n20th-century women mathematicians\n20th-century American women\nMathematicians from Ohio\nMathematicians from Massachusetts\nMathematicians from New Hampshire",
"Marie Anne Meyer (April 7, 1897 – 1969) was an American linguist and spy who worked for the National Security Agency from 1943 to 1960. She was assigned to the Venona project and is credited with making some of the first recoveries of the Venona codebook. She studied eight foreign languages and was the first person to receive the NSA's Meritorious Civilian Service Award.\n\nBiography\n\nEarly life and education \nMeyer was born on April 7, 1897 and raised in Bloomington, Illinois. She attended Illinois Normal State University in Normal, Illinois and graduated with a bachelor's degree in education in 1919. She began teaching at schools after graduation and continued her education through summer sessions at the University of Chicago, studying French and Latin. In August 1930, she received a master's degree in Latin. In the 1930s and 1940s, she continued to study languages, taking summer classes in Sanskrit, Greek, and German.\n\nCareer \nIn 1943, Meyer was hired by the Signal Security Agency, most likely as a German linguist. In the summer of 1946, she took a University of Chicago course in Russian and was assigned to the Venona project by the National Security Agency. She is credited with making some of the first recoveries of the Venona codebook. For the rest of her career, Meyer worked on other facets of the Russian problem and taught Russian classes at the NSA training school. A 1950 NSA memorandum described Meyer as a \"highly professional Russian linguist holding the highest level of competency.\"\n\nLater life \nMeyer retired in 1960 and was the first person to receive the Meritorious Civilian Service Award. She spent her retirement years engaging in research at Catholic University in Celtic languages. She died in Illinois in December 1969.\n\nReferences \n\nLinguists from the United States\nWomen linguists\n1897 births\nYear of death missing\nFemale wartime spies\nAmerican spies against the Soviet Union\nUniversity of Chicago alumni\nPeople from Bloomington, Illinois\nNational Security Agency people"
]
|
[
"Simone de Beauvoir",
"Education",
"Where did de Beauvoir go to college and study?",
"she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris",
"did she get advanced degrees?",
"De Beauvoir was only the ninth woman to have received a degree from the Sorbonne at the time,",
"Did she become a doctor?",
"De Beauvoir first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Levi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school.",
"Did she ever become a teacher with Merleau-Ponty and Levi- Strauss?",
"Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the Ecole Normale Superieure in preparation for the agregation in philosophy,",
"Did she stop taking classes and end up teaching the rest of her career?",
"I don't know."
]
| C_5ed7bcbf9b4d438faac7388fd5948edc_1 | Did she ever regret what she chose to study? | 6 | Did Simone de Beauvoir ever regret what she chose to study? | Simone de Beauvoir | De Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fuelled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, de Beauvoir could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. De Beauvoir took this opportunity to do what she always wanted to do while also taking steps to earn a living for herself. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the Institut Sainte-Marie. She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, she wrote her diplome d'etudes superieures (roughly equivalent to an MA thesis) on Leibniz for Leon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). De Beauvoir was only the ninth woman to have received a degree from the Sorbonne at the time, due to the fact that French women had only recently been allowed to join higher education. De Beauvoir first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Levi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the Ecole Normale Superieure in preparation for the agregation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for the agregation that she met Ecole Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and Rene Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or beaver). The jury for the agregation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of de Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam. Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said: "...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual." CANNOTANSWER | This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual." | Simone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir (, ; ; 9 January 1908 – 14 April 1986) was a French existentialist philosopher, writer, social theorist and feminist activist. Though she did not consider herself a philosopher, and even though she was not considered one at the time of her death, she had a significant influence on both feminist existentialism and feminist theory.
Beauvoir wrote novels, essays, biographies, autobiographies and monographs on philosophy, politics, and social issues. She was known for her 1949 treatise The Second Sex, a detailed analysis of women's oppression and a foundational tract of contemporary feminism; and for her novels, including She Came to Stay and The Mandarins. Her most enduring contribution to literature is her memoirs, notably the first volume, "Mémoires d'une jeune fille rangée" (1958), which have a warmth and descriptive power. She won the 1954 Prix Goncourt, the 1975 Jerusalem Prize, and the 1978 Austrian State Prize for European Literature. She was also known for her open, lifelong relationship with French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre.
Early years
Beauvoir was born on 9 January 1908 into a bourgeois Parisian family in the 6th arrondissement. Her parents were Georges Bertrand de Beauvoir, a lawyer, who once aspired to be an actor, and Françoise Beauvoir (née Brasseur), a wealthy banker's daughter and devout Catholic. Simone's sister, Hélène, was born two years later. The family struggled to maintain their bourgeois status after losing much of their fortune shortly after World War I, and Françoise insisted the two daughters be sent to a prestigious convent school.
Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fueled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, she could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. She took this opportunity to take steps towards earning a living for herself.
She first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Lévi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the École Normale Supérieure in preparation for the agrégation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for it that she met École Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and René Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or "beaver"). The jury for the agrégation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam.
Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said:
"...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual."
Secondary and post-secondary education
Beauvoir pursued post-secondary education after completing her high school years at Lycée Fenelon. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the . She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, wrote her (roughly equivalent to an M.A. thesis) on Leibniz for Léon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). Her studies of political philosophy through university influenced her to start thinking of societal concerns rather than her own individual issues.
Religious upbringing
Beauvoir was raised in a strict Catholic household. She had been sent to convent schools as a youth. She was deeply religious as a child, at one point intending to become a nun. At age 14, Beauvoir questioned her faith as she saw many changes in the world after witnessing tragedies throughout her life. She abandoned her faith in her early teens and remained an atheist for the rest of her life. Beauvoir quotes "Faith allows an evasion of those difficulties which the atheist confronts honestly. And to crown all, the believer derives a sense of great superiority from this very cowardice itself."
Middle years
From 1929 until 1943, Beauvoir taught at the lycée level until she could support herself solely on the earnings of her writings. She taught at the (Marseille), the , and the (1936–39).
Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre met during her college years. Intrigued by her determination as an educator, he sought out to make their relationship romantic. However, she had no interest in doing so. During October 1929, Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir became a couple and, after they were confronted by her father, Sartre asked her to marry him on a provisional basis: One day while they were sitting on a bench outside the Louvre, he said, "Let's sign a two-year lease". Though Beauvoir wrote, "Marriage was impossible. I had no dowry", scholars point out that her ideal relationships described in The Second Sex and elsewhere bore little resemblances to the marriage standards of the day. Instead, she and Sartre entered into a lifelong "soul partnership", which was sexual but not exclusive, nor did it involve living together.
Sartre and Beauvoir always read each other's work. Debate continues about the extent to which they influenced each other in their existentialist works, such as Sartre's Being and Nothingness and Beauvoir's She Came to Stay and "Phenomenology and Intent". However, recent studies of Beauvoir's work focus on influences other than Sartre, including Hegel and Leibniz. The Neo-Hegelian revival led by Alexandre Kojève and Jean Hyppolite in the 1930s inspired a whole generation of French thinkers, including Sartre, to discover Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit. However, Beauvoir, reading Hegel in German during the war, produced an original critique of his dialectic of consciousness.
Personal life
Beauvoir's prominent open relationships at times overshadowed her substantial academic reputation. A scholar lecturing with her chastised their "distinguished [Harvard] audience [because] every question asked about Sartre concerned his work, while all those asked about Beauvoir concerned her personal life." Beginning in 1929, Beauvoir and Sartre were partners and remained so for 51 years, until his death in 1980. She chose never to marry and never had children. This gave her the time to advance her education and engage in political causes, write and teach, and take lovers. She lived with Claude Lanzmann from 1952 to 1959.
Perhaps her most famous lover was American author Nelson Algren, whom she met in Chicago in 1947, and to whom she wrote across the Atlantic as "my beloved husband." Algren won the National Book Award for The Man with the Golden Arm in 1950, and in 1954, Beauvoir won France's most prestigious literary prize for The Mandarins, in which Algren is the character Lewis Brogan. Algren vociferously objected to their intimacy becoming public. Years after they separated, she was buried wearing his gift of a silver ring.
Beauvoir was bisexual, and her relationships with young women were controversial. French author Bianca Lamblin (originally Bianca Bienenfeld) wrote in her book Mémoires d'une Jeune Fille Dérangée (published in English under the title A Disgraceful Affair) that, while a student at Lycée Molière, she was sexually exploited by her teacher Beauvoir, who was in her 30s. Lamblin had affairs with both Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir. In 1943, Beauvoir was suspended from her teaching position when she was accused of seducing her 17-year-old lycée pupil Natalie Sorokine in 1939. Sorokine's parents laid formal charges against Beauvoir for debauching a minor (the age of consent in France at the time was 15), and Beauvoir's license to teach in France was revoked, although it was subsequently reinstated.
In 1977, Beauvoir, Sartre, Roland Barthes, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida and much of the era's intelligentsia signed a petition seeking to completely remove the age of consent in France.
Notable works
She Came to Stay
Beauvoir published her first novel She Came to Stay in 1943. It has been assumed that it is inspired by her and Sartre's sexual relationship with Olga Kosakiewicz and Wanda Kosakiewicz. Olga was one of her students in the Rouen secondary school where Beauvoir taught during the early 1930s. She grew fond of Olga. Sartre tried to pursue Olga but she rejected him, so he began a relationship with her sister Wanda. Upon his death, Sartre was still supporting Wanda. He also supported Olga for years, until she met and married Jacques-Laurent Bost, a lover of Beauvoir. However, the main thrust of the novel is philosophical, a scene in which to situate Beauvoir's abiding philosophical pre-occupation - the relationship between the self and the other.
In the novel, set just before the outbreak of World War II, Beauvoir creates one character from the complex relationships of Olga and Wanda. The fictionalised versions of Beauvoir and Sartre have a ménage à trois with the young woman. The novel also delves into Beauvoir and Sartre's complex relationship and how it was affected by the ménage à trois.
She Came to Stay was followed by many others, including The Blood of Others, which explores the nature of individual responsibility, telling a love story between two young French students participating in the Resistance in World War II.
Existentialist ethics
In 1944, Beauvoir wrote her first philosophical essay, Pyrrhus et Cinéas, a discussion on existentialist ethics. She continued her exploration of existentialism through her second essay The Ethics of Ambiguity (1947); it is perhaps the most accessible entry into French existentialism. In the essay, Beauvoir clears up some inconsistencies that many, Sartre included, have found in major existentialist works such as Being and Nothingness. In The Ethics of Ambiguity, Beauvoir confronts the existentialist dilemma of absolute freedom vs. the constraints of circumstance.
Les Temps modernes
At the end of World War II, Beauvoir and Sartre edited Les Temps modernes, a political journal which Sartre founded along with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and others. Beauvoir used Les Temps Modernes to promote her own work and explore her ideas on a small scale before fashioning essays and books. Beauvoir remained an editor until her death.
Sexuality, existentialist feminism and The Second Sex
The Second Sex, first published in 1949 in French as Le Deuxième Sexe, turns the existentialist mantra that existence precedes essence into a feminist one: "One is not born but becomes a woman" (French: "On ne naît pas femme, on le devient"). With this famous phrase, Beauvoir first articulated what has come to be known as the sex-gender distinction, that is, the distinction between biological sex and the social and historical construction of gender and its attendant stereotypes. Beauvoir argues that "the fundamental source of women's oppression is its [femininity's] historical and social construction as the quintessential".
Beauvoir defines women as the "second sex" because women are defined in relation to men. She pointed out that Aristotle argued women are "female by virtue of a certain lack of qualities", while Thomas Aquinas referred to woman as "imperfect man" and the "incidental" being. She quotes "In itself, homosexuality is as limiting as heterosexuality: the ideal should be to be capable of loving a woman or a man; either, a human being, without feeling fear, restraint, or obligation."
Beauvoir asserted that women are as capable of choice as men, and thus can choose to elevate themselves, moving beyond the "immanence" to which they were previously resigned and reaching "transcendence", a position in which one takes responsibility for oneself and the world, where one chooses one's freedom.
Chapters of The Second Sex were originally published in Les Temps modernes, in June 1949. The second volume came a few months after the first in France. It was published soon after in America due to the quick translation by Howard Parshley, as prompted by Blanche Knopf, wife of publisher Alfred A. Knopf. Because Parshley had only a basic familiarity with the French language, and a minimal understanding of philosophy (he was a professor of biology at Smith College), much of Beauvoir's book was mistranslated or inappropriately cut, distorting her intended message. For years, Knopf prevented the introduction of a more accurate retranslation of Beauvoir's work, declining all proposals despite the efforts of existentialist scholars.
Only in 2009 was there a second translation, to mark the 60th anniversary of the original publication. Constance Borde and Sheila Malovany-Chevallier produced the first integral translation in 2010, reinstating a third of the original work.
In the chapter "Woman: Myth and Reality" of The Second Sex, Beauvoir argued that men had made women the "Other" in society by application of a false aura of "mystery" around them. She argued that men used this as an excuse not to understand women or their problems and not to help them, and that this stereotyping was always done in societies by the group higher in the hierarchy to the group lower in the hierarchy. She wrote that a similar kind of oppression by hierarchy also happened in other categories of identity, such as race, class, and religion, but she claimed that it was nowhere more true than with gender in which men stereotyped women and used it as an excuse to organize society into a patriarchy.
Despite her contributions to the feminist movement, especially the French women's liberation movement, and her beliefs in women's economic independence and equal education, Beauvoir was initially reluctant to call herself a feminist. However, after observing the resurgence of the feminist movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Beauvoir stated she no longer believed a socialist revolution to be enough to bring about women's liberation. She publicly declared herself a feminist in 1972 in an interview with Le Nouvel Observateur.
In 2018 the manuscript pages of Le Deuxième Sexe were published. At the time her adopted daughter, Sylvie Le Bon-Beauvoir, a philosophy professor, described her mother's writing process: Beauvoir wrote every page of her books longhand first and only after that would hire typists.
The Mandarins
Published in 1954, The Mandarins won her France's highest literary prize, the Prix Goncourt. The book is set after the end of World War II and follows the personal lives of philosophers and friends among Sartre's and Beauvoir's intimate circle, including her relationship with American writer Nelson Algren, to whom the book was dedicated.
Algren was outraged by the frank way Beauvoir described their sexual experiences in both The Mandarins and her autobiographies. Algren vented his outrage when reviewing American translations of Beauvoir's work. Much material bearing on this episode in Beauvoir's life, including her love letters to Algren, entered the public domain only after her death.
Les Inséparables
Beauvoir's early novel Les Inséparables, long suppressed, was published in French in 2020 and in two different English translations in 2021.<ref>Reviewed 23 Aug. 2021 by Merve Emre in The New Yorker" https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/08/30/simone-de-beauvoirs-lost-novel-of-early-love</ref> Written in 1954, the book describes her first love, a classmate named Elisabeth Lacoin ("Zaza") who died before age 22, and had as a teenager a "passionate and tragic" relationship with Beauvoir and Merleau-Ponty, then teaching at the same school. Disapproved by Sartre, the novel was deemed "too intimate" to be published during Beauvoir's lifetime.
Later years
Beauvoir wrote popular travel diaries about time spent in the United States and China and published essays and fiction rigorously, especially throughout the 1950s and 1960s. She published several volumes of short stories, including The Woman Destroyed, which, like some of her other later work, deals with aging.
1980 saw the publication of When Things of the Spirit Come First, a set of short stories centred around and based upon women important to her earlier years. Though written long before the novel She Came to Stay, Beauvoir did not at the time consider the stories worth publishing, allowing some forty years to pass before doing so.
Sartre and Merleau-Ponty had a longstanding feud, which led Merleau-Ponty to leave Les Temps Modernes. Beauvoir sided with Sartre and ceased to associate with Merleau-Ponty. In Beauvoir's later years, she hosted the journal's editorial meetings in her flat and contributed more than Sartre, whom she often had to force to offer his opinions.
Beauvoir also wrote a four-volume autobiography, consisting of: Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter; The Prime of Life; Force of Circumstance (sometimes published in two volumes in English translation: After the War and Hard Times); and All Said and Done. In 1964 Beauvoir published a novella-length autobiography, A Very Easy Death, covering the time she spent visiting her ageing mother, who was dying of cancer. The novella brings up questions of ethical concerns with truth-telling in doctor-patient relationships.
Her 1970 long essay La Vieillesse (The Coming of Age) is a rare instance of an intellectual meditation on the decline and solitude all humans experience if they do not die before about the age of 60.
In the 1970s Beauvoir became active in France's women's liberation movement. She wrote and signed the Manifesto of the 343 in 1971, a manifesto that included a list of famous women who claimed to have had an abortion, then illegal in France. Some argue most of the women had not had abortions, including Beauvoir. Signatories were diverse as Catherine Deneuve, Delphine Seyrig, and Beauvoir's sister Poupette. In 1974, abortion was legalised in France.
In a 1975 interview with Betty Friedan Beauvoir said "No woman should be authorized to stay at home and raise her children. Society should be totally different. Women should not have that choice, precisely because if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one."
In about 1976 Beauvoir and Sylvie Le Bon made a trip to New York City in the United States to visit Kate Millett on her farm.
In 1981 she wrote La Cérémonie Des Adieux (A Farewell to Sartre), a painful account of Sartre's last years. In the opening of Adieux, Beauvoir notes that it is the only major published work of hers which Sartre did not read before its publication.
She contributed the piece "Feminism – alive, well, and in constant danger" to the 1984 anthology Sisterhood Is Global: The International Women's Movement Anthology, edited by Robin Morgan.
After Sartre died in 1980, Beauvoir published his letters to her with edits to spare the feelings of people in their circle who were still living. After Beauvoir's death, Sartre's adopted daughter and literary heir Arlette Elkaïm would not let many of Sartre's letters be published in unedited form. Most of Sartre's letters available today have Beauvoir's edits, which include a few omissions but mostly the use of pseudonyms. Beauvoir's adopted daughter and literary heir Sylvie Le Bon, unlike Elkaïm, published Beauvoir's unedited letters to both Sartre and Algren.
Beauvoir died of pneumonia on 14 April 1986 in Paris, aged 78. She is buried next to Sartre at the Montparnasse Cemetery in Paris. She was honored as a figure at the forefront of the struggle for women's rights around the time of her passing.
Impact
Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex is considered a foundational work in the history of feminism. Beauvoir had denied being a feminist multiple times but ultimately admitted that she was one after the influential Second Sex became crucial in the world of feminism. The work has had a profound influence, opening the way for second wave feminism in the United States, Canada, Australia, and around the world. Despite the fact that Beauvoir has been quoted as saying "There is a certain unreasonable demand that I find a little stupid because it would enclose me, immobilize me completely in a sort of feminist concrete block." Her works on feminism have paved the way for all future feminists. Founders of the second wave read The Second Sex in translation, including Kate Millett, Shulamith Firestone, Juliet Mitchell, Ann Oakley and Germaine Greer. All acknowledged their profound debt to Beauvoir, including visiting her in France, consulting with her at crucial moments, and dedicating works to her. Betty Friedan, whose 1963 book The Feminine Mystique is often regarded as the opening salvo of second wave feminism in the United States, later said that reading The Second Sex in the early 1950s "led me to whatever original analysis of women's existence I have been able to contribute to the Women's movement and to its unique politics. I looked to Simone de Beauvoir for a philosophical and intellectual authority."
At one point in the early seventies, Beauvoir also aligned herself with the League for Woman's rights as a means to campaign and fight against sexism in the French society. Beauvoir's influence goes beyond just her impact on second wave founders, and extends to numerous aspects of feminism, including literary criticism, history, philosophy, theology, criticism of scientific discourse, and psychotherapy. When Beauvoir first became involved with the feminism movement, one of her first objectives was that of legalizing abortion.Donna Haraway wrote that, "despite important differences, all the modern feminist meanings of gender have roots in Simone de Beauvoir's claim that 'one is not born a woman [one becomes one]'". This "most famous feminist sentence ever written" is echoed in the title of Monique Wittig's 1981 essay One Is Not Born a Woman. Judith Butler took the concept a step further, arguing that Beauvoir's choice of the verb to become suggests that gender is a process, constantly being renewed in an ongoing interaction between the surrounding culture and individual choice.
Prizes
Prix Goncourt, 1954
Jerusalem Prize, 1975
Austrian State Prize for European Literature, 1978
Works
List of publications (non-exhaustive)
L'Invitée (1943) (English – She Came to Stay) [novel]
Pyrrhus et Cinéas (1944) [nonfiction]
Le Sang des autres (1945) (English – The Blood of Others) [novel]
Les Bouches inutiles (1945) (English - Who Shall Die?) [drama]
Tous les hommes sont mortels (1946) (English – All Men Are Mortal) [novel]
Pour une morale de l'ambiguïté (1947) (English – The Ethics of Ambiguity) [nonfiction]
"America Day by Day" (1948) (English – 1999 – Carol Cosman (Translator and Douglas Brinkley (Foreword) [nonfiction]
Le Deuxième Sexe (1949) (English – The Second Sex) [nonfiction]
L'Amérique au jour le jour (1954) (English – America Day by Day)
Les Mandarins (1954) (English – The Mandarins) [novel]
Must We Burn Sade? (1955)
The Long March (1957) [nonfiction]
Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter (1958)
The Prime of Life (1960)
Force of Circumstance (1963)
A Very Easy Death (1964)
Les Belles Images (1966) [novel]
The Woman Destroyed (1967) [short stories]
The Coming of Age (1970) [nonfiction]
All Said and Done (1972)
Old Age (1972) [nonfiction]
When Things of the Spirit Come First (1979) [novel]
Adieux: A Farewell to Sartre (1981)
Letters to Sartre (1990)
Journal de guerre, Sept 1939 – Jan 1941 (1990); English – Wartime Diary (2009)
A Transatlantic Love Affair: Letters to Nelson Algren (1998)
Diary of a Philosophy Student, 1926–27 (2006)
Cahiers de jeunesse, 1926–1930 (2008)
Selected translations
Patrick O'Brian was Beauvoir's principal English translator, until he attained commercial success as a novelist.
Philosophical Writings (Urbana : University of Illinois Press, 2004, edited by Margaret A. Simons et al.) contains a selection of essays by Beauvoir translated for the first time into English. Among those are: Pyrrhus and Cineas, discussing the futility or utility of action, two previously unpublished chapters from her novel She Came to Stay and an introduction to Ethics of Ambiguity.
See also
Art Shay
Roman à clef
Simone Weil
List of women's rights activists
Place Jean-Paul-Sartre-et-Simone-de-Beauvoir
References
Sources
Appignanesi, Lisa, 2005, Simone de Beauvoir, London: Haus,
Bair, Deirdre, 1990. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books,
Rowley, Hazel, 2005. Tête-a-Tête: Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre. New York: HarperCollins.
Suzanne Lilar, 1969. Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe (with collaboration of Prof. Dreyfus). Paris, University Presses of France (Presses Universitaires de France).
Fraser, M., 1999. Identity Without Selfhood: Simone de Beauvoir and Bisexuality, Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press.
Axel Madsen, Hearts and Minds: The Common Journey of Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre, William Morrow & Co, 1977.
Hélène Rouch, 2001–2002, Trois conceptions du sexe: Simone de Beauvoir entre Adrienne Sahuqué et Suzanne Lilar, Simone de Beauvoir Studies, n° 18, pp. 49–60.
Simone de Beauvoir, Marguerite Yourcenar, Nathalie Sarraute, 2002. Conférence Élisabeth Badinter, Jacques Lassalle & Lucette Finas, .
Further reading
Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe by Suzanne Lilar, 1969.
Feminist Theory and Simone de Beauvoir by Toril Moi, 1990.
Appignanesi, Lisa. Simone de Beauvoir. London: Penguin. 1988. .
Bair, Deirdre. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books. 1990. .
Francis, Claude. Simone de Beauvoir: A Life, A Love Story. Lisa Nesselson (Translator). New York: St. Martin's, 1987. .
Okely, Judith. Simone de Beauvoir. New York: Pantheon. 1986. .
External links
Guardian Books "Author Page", with profile and links to further articles.
Victoria Brittain et al discuss Simone de Beauvoir's lasting influence, ICA 1989
"Simone de Beauvoir", Great Lives, BBC Radio 4, 22 April 2011
Kate Kirkpatrick. (6 November 2017) "What is authentic love? A View from Simone de Beauvoir" . IAI News''.
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"Regret is the emotion of wishing one had made a different decision in the past, because the consequences of the decision were unfavorable.\n\nRegret is related to perceived opportunity. Its intensity varies over time after the decision, in regard to action versus inaction, and in regard to self-control at a particular age. The self-recrimination which comes with regret is thought to spur corrective action and adaptation. \n\nIn Western societies adults have the highest regrets regarding choices of their education.\n\nDefinition\nRegret has been defined by psychologists in the late 1990s as a \"negative emotion predicated on an upward, self-focused, counterfactual inference\". Another definition is \"an aversive emotional state elicited by a discrepancy in the outcome values of chosen vs. unchosen actions\".\n\nRegret differs from remorse in that people can regret things beyond their control, but remorse indicates a sense of responsibility for the situation. For example, a person can feel regret that people die during natural disasters, but cannot feel remorse for that situation. However, a person who intentionally harms someone should feel remorse for those actions. Agent regret is the idea that a person could be involved in a situation, and regret their involvement even if those actions were innocent, unintentional, or involuntary. For example, if someone decides to die by stepping in front of a moving vehicle, the death is not the fault of the driver, but the driver may still regret that the person died.\n\nRegret is distinct from disappointment. Both are negative emotional experiences relating to a loss outcome, and both have similar neuronal correlates. However, they differ in regard to feedback about the outcome, comparing the difference between outcomes for the chosen vs. unchosen action; In regret, full feedback occurs and with disappointment partial feedback. They also differ in regard to agency (self in regret versus external in disappointment).\n\nModels\nThere are conceptual models of regret in regret (decision theory) mostly in theoretical economics and finance under a field called behavioral economics. \nAnticipated regret, or how much regret one thinks one will feel in the future, appears to be overestimated for actions and choices. This appears to be, in part, due to a tendency to underestimate the extent to which people attribute bad outcomes to external factors rather than to internal factors (i.e., themselves). It can lead to inaction or inertia and omission bias.\n\nExistential regret has been specifically defined as \"a profound desire to go back and change a past experience in which one has failed to choose consciously or has made a choice that did not follow one’s beliefs, values, or growth needs\".\n\nInstruments to measure regret in people having to make medical decisions have failed to address current concepts of regret and failed to differentiate regret from disappointment. They have also not looked for positive impacts of regret. Process regret may occur, if a person does not consider information about all available choices before making a decision.\n\nLife domains\nA 2005 meta-analysis of 9 studies (7 US, one Germany, one Finland) about what adults regret most concluded, that overall adults regret choices regarding their education the most. Subsequent rankings included decisions about career, romance, and parenting. Education has been the forerunner of regret in the U.S. per Gallup surveys in 1949, 1953, and 1965. Education was the forerunner of regret because it is seen as something where circumstances could be changed: \"In contemporary society, education is open to continual modification throughout life. With the rise of community colleges and student aid programs in recent decades, education of some sort is accessible to nearly all socioeconomic groups.\"This finding can be attributed to the principle of perceived opportunity. \"People´s biggest regrets are a reflection of where in life they see their largest opportunities; that is, where they see tangible prospects for change, growth, and renewal.\n\nIn other cultures, regrets may be ranked differently depending on the perceived opportunity in a particular society.\n\nIn health care decisions\nA 2016 review of past studies found risk factors for people to develop \"decision regret\" regarding their health care were: higher decisional conflict, lower satisfaction with the decision, adverse outcomes in physical health, and greater anxiety levels.\n\nDeathbed regrets\nA 2018 study found that people were more likely to express \"ideal-related regrets\", such as failing to follow their dreams and live up to their full potential. This was found to correlate with the anecdotal accounts of palliative care nurse Bronnie Ware about the most common regrets she had heard expressed by those nearing death, which included:\n \"I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.\"\n \"I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.\"\n \"I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.\"\n \"I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.\"\n \"I wish that I had let myself be happier.\"\n\nDeterminants of intensity\n\nAction versus inaction\nThere is an interplay between action versus inaction and time. Regrets of an action are more intense in the short term, whereas regrets of inaction are more intense over the long term.\n\nAge\n\nIn a 2001 study, high intensity of regret and intrusive thoughts in older adults was related to self-control, and low internal control was expected to be self-protective and help to decrease regret. In younger adults, internal-control facilitated active change and was associated with low intensity of regret.\n\nOpportunity\nPeople's biggest regrets occur where they perceive the greatest and most important opportunity for corrective action. When no opportunity exists to improve conditions, thought processes mitigate the cognitive dissonance caused by regret, e.g. by rationalization, and reconstrual. Regret pushes people toward revised decision making and corrective action as part of learning that may bring improvement in life circumstances. A 1999 study measured regret in accordance to negative reviews with service providers. Regret was an accurate predictor of who switched providers. As more intense regret is experienced, the likelihood of initiating change is increased. Consequently, the more opportunity of corrective action available, the larger the regret felt and the more likely corrective action is achieved. Feeling regret spurs future action to make sure other opportunities are taken so that regret will not be experienced again. People learn from their mistakes.\n\nLost opportunity principle\nWith a lost opportunity regret should intensify, not diminish, when people feel that they could have made better choices in the past but now perceive limited opportunities to take corrective action in the future. \"People who habitually consider future consequences (and how they may avoid future negative outcomes) experience less, rather than more, intense regret after a negative outcome.\" This principle offers another reason as to why education is the most regretted aspect in life. Education becomes a more limited opportunity as time passes. Aspects such as making friends, becoming more spiritual, and community involvement tend to be less regrettable which makes sense because these are also aspects in life that do not become limited opportunities. As the opportunity to remedy a situation passes, feelings of hopelessness may increase. An explanation of the lost opportunity principle can be seen as a lack of closure: Low closure makes past occurrences feel unresolved. Low closure is associated with \"reductions in self-esteem and persistent negative affect over time\" and with the realization and regret of lost opportunity. High closure is associated with acceptance of lost opportunity.\n\nThe lost opportunity principle suggests, that regret does not serve as a corrective motive (which the opportunity principle suggests). Instead, regret serves as a more general reminder to seize the day. \n\nRegret lingers where opportunity existed, with the self-blame of remorse being a core element to ultimately spur corrective action in decision-making.\n\nNeuroscience\nResearch upon brain injury and fMRI have linked the orbitofrontal cortex to the processing of regret.\n\nCompleteness of feedback about the outcomes after making a decision determined whether persons experienced regret (outcomes from both the choice and the alternative) vs. disappointment (partial-feedback, seeing only the outcome from the choice) in a magnetoencephalography study. Another factor was the type of agency: With personal decision making the neural correlates of regret could be seen, with external agency (computer choice) those of disappointment. Feedback regret showed greater brain activity in the right anterior and posterior regions, with agency regret producing greater activity in the left anterior region. Both regret and disappointment activated anterior insula and dorsomedial prefrontal cortex but only with regret the lateral orbitofrontal cortex was activated.\n\nPsychopathic individuals do not show regret or remorse. This was thought to be due to an inability to generate this emotion in response to negative outcomes. However, in 2016, people with antisocial personality disorder (also known as dissocial personality disorder) were found to experience regret, but did not use the regret to guide their choice in behavior. There was no lack of regret but a problem to think through a range of potential actions and estimating the outcome values.\n\nIn other species\nA study published in 2014 by neuroscientists based at the University of Minnesota suggested that rats are capable of feeling regret about their actions. This emotion had never previously been found in any other mammals apart from humans. Researchers set up situations to induce regret, and rats expressed regret through both their behavior and specific neural patterns in brain activity.\n\nSee also\n Regret (decision theory)\nApology\n\nReferences \n\nEmotions",
"Regret (April 2, 1912 – April 11, 1934) was a famous American thoroughbred racemare and the first of three female horses to ever win the Kentucky Derby.\n\nBackground\nShe was foaled at Harry Payne Whitney's Brookdale Farm in Lincroft, New Jersey. The filly was sired by Broomstick, the 1913-1915 leading sire inducted into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame (son of Ben Brush, also inducted into the Hall of Fame). She was out of Jersey Lightning, who goes back to Longfellow through his Kentucky Derby-winning son, Riley. Regret was bred by owner Harry Payne Whitney.\n\nRacing career\nTrained by James G. Rowe, Sr., in 1914 Regret became the first of only four horses to ever win all three Saratoga Race Course events for two-year-olds: the Saratoga Special Stakes, Sanford Stakes and Hopeful Stakes. Joining her would be Campfire (1916), Dehere (1993), and City Zip (2000). The following year, campaigning as a three-year-old, she won the 1915 Kentucky Derby, her first race as a three-year-old, and became the first filly of three to do so. Regret was also the first undefeated horse to win the Kentucky Derby, and had only three starts prior to the race (matched by Big Brown in 2008). Regret was retrospectively named American Horse of the Year.\n\n1915 was the year of the Triple Crown fillies, as Rhine Maiden won the Preakness Stakes. Regret's owner had not entered her in that race. Not since 1915 has more than one Triple Crown race a year been won by a filly.\n\nRetirement\nAfter the 1917 racing season, Regret was retired for breeding to the new Whitney farm in Lexington, Kentucky. In this last season, she raced in the Brooklyn Handicap against the best of her generation: Old Rosebud, Roamer, Omar Khayyam (winner of the 1917 Kentucky Derby), Boots, Ormsdale and Chiclet. In the final strides, she was defeated by a nose by her stablemate, Borrow, giving away 5 pounds.\n\nOut of 11 starts in four seasons (1914–1917), Regret won nine, and placed second in one. The only race she was not placed in was the 1916 Saratoga Handicap. Throughout her career, she was never beaten by a female horse.\n\nAs a broodmare, she produced only one major stakes winner, Revenge, out of eleven foals. She died in 1934, aged 22, and was buried at the Whitney farm in Lexington.\n\nAssessment and honors\nRegret was inducted into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame in 1957. In the Blood-Horse magazine ranking of the top 100 U.S. thoroughbred champions of the 20th Century, she was #71. (Roamer ranks 99th, Old Rosebud, 88th.)\n\nIn a poll among members of the American Trainers Association, conducted in 1955 by Delaware Park Racetrack, Regret was voted the third-greatest filly in American racing history. Gallorette was voted first.\n\nPedigree\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n Regret's pedigree, Pedigree Query\n Regret's Derby, Kentucky Derby Website\n \"Regret\", U.S. Hall of Fame\n \"James G. Rowe\", U.S. Hall of Fame\n Staff and Correspondents of The Blood-Horse magazine, Women of the Year - Ten Fillies Who Achieved Horse Racing's Highest Honor, (2004) Eclipse Press\n\nExternal links\n \n\n1912 racehorse births\n1934 racehorse deaths\nRacehorses trained in the United States\nRacehorses bred in New Jersey\nAmerican Champion racehorses\nUnited States Thoroughbred Racing Hall of Fame inductees\nKentucky Derby winners\nWhitney racehorses\nThoroughbred family A1"
]
|
[
"Simone de Beauvoir",
"Education",
"Where did de Beauvoir go to college and study?",
"she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris",
"did she get advanced degrees?",
"De Beauvoir was only the ninth woman to have received a degree from the Sorbonne at the time,",
"Did she become a doctor?",
"De Beauvoir first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Levi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school.",
"Did she ever become a teacher with Merleau-Ponty and Levi- Strauss?",
"Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the Ecole Normale Superieure in preparation for the agregation in philosophy,",
"Did she stop taking classes and end up teaching the rest of her career?",
"I don't know.",
"Did she ever regret what she chose to study?",
"This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual.\""
]
| C_5ed7bcbf9b4d438faac7388fd5948edc_1 | Did she ever tutor or teach famous people? | 7 | Did Simone de Beauvoir ever tutor or teach famous people? | Simone de Beauvoir | De Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fuelled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, de Beauvoir could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. De Beauvoir took this opportunity to do what she always wanted to do while also taking steps to earn a living for herself. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the Institut Sainte-Marie. She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, she wrote her diplome d'etudes superieures (roughly equivalent to an MA thesis) on Leibniz for Leon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). De Beauvoir was only the ninth woman to have received a degree from the Sorbonne at the time, due to the fact that French women had only recently been allowed to join higher education. De Beauvoir first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Levi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the Ecole Normale Superieure in preparation for the agregation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for the agregation that she met Ecole Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and Rene Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or beaver). The jury for the agregation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of de Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam. Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said: "...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual." CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Simone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir (, ; ; 9 January 1908 – 14 April 1986) was a French existentialist philosopher, writer, social theorist and feminist activist. Though she did not consider herself a philosopher, and even though she was not considered one at the time of her death, she had a significant influence on both feminist existentialism and feminist theory.
Beauvoir wrote novels, essays, biographies, autobiographies and monographs on philosophy, politics, and social issues. She was known for her 1949 treatise The Second Sex, a detailed analysis of women's oppression and a foundational tract of contemporary feminism; and for her novels, including She Came to Stay and The Mandarins. Her most enduring contribution to literature is her memoirs, notably the first volume, "Mémoires d'une jeune fille rangée" (1958), which have a warmth and descriptive power. She won the 1954 Prix Goncourt, the 1975 Jerusalem Prize, and the 1978 Austrian State Prize for European Literature. She was also known for her open, lifelong relationship with French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre.
Early years
Beauvoir was born on 9 January 1908 into a bourgeois Parisian family in the 6th arrondissement. Her parents were Georges Bertrand de Beauvoir, a lawyer, who once aspired to be an actor, and Françoise Beauvoir (née Brasseur), a wealthy banker's daughter and devout Catholic. Simone's sister, Hélène, was born two years later. The family struggled to maintain their bourgeois status after losing much of their fortune shortly after World War I, and Françoise insisted the two daughters be sent to a prestigious convent school.
Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fueled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, she could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. She took this opportunity to take steps towards earning a living for herself.
She first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Lévi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the École Normale Supérieure in preparation for the agrégation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for it that she met École Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and René Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or "beaver"). The jury for the agrégation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam.
Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said:
"...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual."
Secondary and post-secondary education
Beauvoir pursued post-secondary education after completing her high school years at Lycée Fenelon. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the . She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, wrote her (roughly equivalent to an M.A. thesis) on Leibniz for Léon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). Her studies of political philosophy through university influenced her to start thinking of societal concerns rather than her own individual issues.
Religious upbringing
Beauvoir was raised in a strict Catholic household. She had been sent to convent schools as a youth. She was deeply religious as a child, at one point intending to become a nun. At age 14, Beauvoir questioned her faith as she saw many changes in the world after witnessing tragedies throughout her life. She abandoned her faith in her early teens and remained an atheist for the rest of her life. Beauvoir quotes "Faith allows an evasion of those difficulties which the atheist confronts honestly. And to crown all, the believer derives a sense of great superiority from this very cowardice itself."
Middle years
From 1929 until 1943, Beauvoir taught at the lycée level until she could support herself solely on the earnings of her writings. She taught at the (Marseille), the , and the (1936–39).
Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre met during her college years. Intrigued by her determination as an educator, he sought out to make their relationship romantic. However, she had no interest in doing so. During October 1929, Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir became a couple and, after they were confronted by her father, Sartre asked her to marry him on a provisional basis: One day while they were sitting on a bench outside the Louvre, he said, "Let's sign a two-year lease". Though Beauvoir wrote, "Marriage was impossible. I had no dowry", scholars point out that her ideal relationships described in The Second Sex and elsewhere bore little resemblances to the marriage standards of the day. Instead, she and Sartre entered into a lifelong "soul partnership", which was sexual but not exclusive, nor did it involve living together.
Sartre and Beauvoir always read each other's work. Debate continues about the extent to which they influenced each other in their existentialist works, such as Sartre's Being and Nothingness and Beauvoir's She Came to Stay and "Phenomenology and Intent". However, recent studies of Beauvoir's work focus on influences other than Sartre, including Hegel and Leibniz. The Neo-Hegelian revival led by Alexandre Kojève and Jean Hyppolite in the 1930s inspired a whole generation of French thinkers, including Sartre, to discover Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit. However, Beauvoir, reading Hegel in German during the war, produced an original critique of his dialectic of consciousness.
Personal life
Beauvoir's prominent open relationships at times overshadowed her substantial academic reputation. A scholar lecturing with her chastised their "distinguished [Harvard] audience [because] every question asked about Sartre concerned his work, while all those asked about Beauvoir concerned her personal life." Beginning in 1929, Beauvoir and Sartre were partners and remained so for 51 years, until his death in 1980. She chose never to marry and never had children. This gave her the time to advance her education and engage in political causes, write and teach, and take lovers. She lived with Claude Lanzmann from 1952 to 1959.
Perhaps her most famous lover was American author Nelson Algren, whom she met in Chicago in 1947, and to whom she wrote across the Atlantic as "my beloved husband." Algren won the National Book Award for The Man with the Golden Arm in 1950, and in 1954, Beauvoir won France's most prestigious literary prize for The Mandarins, in which Algren is the character Lewis Brogan. Algren vociferously objected to their intimacy becoming public. Years after they separated, she was buried wearing his gift of a silver ring.
Beauvoir was bisexual, and her relationships with young women were controversial. French author Bianca Lamblin (originally Bianca Bienenfeld) wrote in her book Mémoires d'une Jeune Fille Dérangée (published in English under the title A Disgraceful Affair) that, while a student at Lycée Molière, she was sexually exploited by her teacher Beauvoir, who was in her 30s. Lamblin had affairs with both Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir. In 1943, Beauvoir was suspended from her teaching position when she was accused of seducing her 17-year-old lycée pupil Natalie Sorokine in 1939. Sorokine's parents laid formal charges against Beauvoir for debauching a minor (the age of consent in France at the time was 15), and Beauvoir's license to teach in France was revoked, although it was subsequently reinstated.
In 1977, Beauvoir, Sartre, Roland Barthes, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida and much of the era's intelligentsia signed a petition seeking to completely remove the age of consent in France.
Notable works
She Came to Stay
Beauvoir published her first novel She Came to Stay in 1943. It has been assumed that it is inspired by her and Sartre's sexual relationship with Olga Kosakiewicz and Wanda Kosakiewicz. Olga was one of her students in the Rouen secondary school where Beauvoir taught during the early 1930s. She grew fond of Olga. Sartre tried to pursue Olga but she rejected him, so he began a relationship with her sister Wanda. Upon his death, Sartre was still supporting Wanda. He also supported Olga for years, until she met and married Jacques-Laurent Bost, a lover of Beauvoir. However, the main thrust of the novel is philosophical, a scene in which to situate Beauvoir's abiding philosophical pre-occupation - the relationship between the self and the other.
In the novel, set just before the outbreak of World War II, Beauvoir creates one character from the complex relationships of Olga and Wanda. The fictionalised versions of Beauvoir and Sartre have a ménage à trois with the young woman. The novel also delves into Beauvoir and Sartre's complex relationship and how it was affected by the ménage à trois.
She Came to Stay was followed by many others, including The Blood of Others, which explores the nature of individual responsibility, telling a love story between two young French students participating in the Resistance in World War II.
Existentialist ethics
In 1944, Beauvoir wrote her first philosophical essay, Pyrrhus et Cinéas, a discussion on existentialist ethics. She continued her exploration of existentialism through her second essay The Ethics of Ambiguity (1947); it is perhaps the most accessible entry into French existentialism. In the essay, Beauvoir clears up some inconsistencies that many, Sartre included, have found in major existentialist works such as Being and Nothingness. In The Ethics of Ambiguity, Beauvoir confronts the existentialist dilemma of absolute freedom vs. the constraints of circumstance.
Les Temps modernes
At the end of World War II, Beauvoir and Sartre edited Les Temps modernes, a political journal which Sartre founded along with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and others. Beauvoir used Les Temps Modernes to promote her own work and explore her ideas on a small scale before fashioning essays and books. Beauvoir remained an editor until her death.
Sexuality, existentialist feminism and The Second Sex
The Second Sex, first published in 1949 in French as Le Deuxième Sexe, turns the existentialist mantra that existence precedes essence into a feminist one: "One is not born but becomes a woman" (French: "On ne naît pas femme, on le devient"). With this famous phrase, Beauvoir first articulated what has come to be known as the sex-gender distinction, that is, the distinction between biological sex and the social and historical construction of gender and its attendant stereotypes. Beauvoir argues that "the fundamental source of women's oppression is its [femininity's] historical and social construction as the quintessential".
Beauvoir defines women as the "second sex" because women are defined in relation to men. She pointed out that Aristotle argued women are "female by virtue of a certain lack of qualities", while Thomas Aquinas referred to woman as "imperfect man" and the "incidental" being. She quotes "In itself, homosexuality is as limiting as heterosexuality: the ideal should be to be capable of loving a woman or a man; either, a human being, without feeling fear, restraint, or obligation."
Beauvoir asserted that women are as capable of choice as men, and thus can choose to elevate themselves, moving beyond the "immanence" to which they were previously resigned and reaching "transcendence", a position in which one takes responsibility for oneself and the world, where one chooses one's freedom.
Chapters of The Second Sex were originally published in Les Temps modernes, in June 1949. The second volume came a few months after the first in France. It was published soon after in America due to the quick translation by Howard Parshley, as prompted by Blanche Knopf, wife of publisher Alfred A. Knopf. Because Parshley had only a basic familiarity with the French language, and a minimal understanding of philosophy (he was a professor of biology at Smith College), much of Beauvoir's book was mistranslated or inappropriately cut, distorting her intended message. For years, Knopf prevented the introduction of a more accurate retranslation of Beauvoir's work, declining all proposals despite the efforts of existentialist scholars.
Only in 2009 was there a second translation, to mark the 60th anniversary of the original publication. Constance Borde and Sheila Malovany-Chevallier produced the first integral translation in 2010, reinstating a third of the original work.
In the chapter "Woman: Myth and Reality" of The Second Sex, Beauvoir argued that men had made women the "Other" in society by application of a false aura of "mystery" around them. She argued that men used this as an excuse not to understand women or their problems and not to help them, and that this stereotyping was always done in societies by the group higher in the hierarchy to the group lower in the hierarchy. She wrote that a similar kind of oppression by hierarchy also happened in other categories of identity, such as race, class, and religion, but she claimed that it was nowhere more true than with gender in which men stereotyped women and used it as an excuse to organize society into a patriarchy.
Despite her contributions to the feminist movement, especially the French women's liberation movement, and her beliefs in women's economic independence and equal education, Beauvoir was initially reluctant to call herself a feminist. However, after observing the resurgence of the feminist movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Beauvoir stated she no longer believed a socialist revolution to be enough to bring about women's liberation. She publicly declared herself a feminist in 1972 in an interview with Le Nouvel Observateur.
In 2018 the manuscript pages of Le Deuxième Sexe were published. At the time her adopted daughter, Sylvie Le Bon-Beauvoir, a philosophy professor, described her mother's writing process: Beauvoir wrote every page of her books longhand first and only after that would hire typists.
The Mandarins
Published in 1954, The Mandarins won her France's highest literary prize, the Prix Goncourt. The book is set after the end of World War II and follows the personal lives of philosophers and friends among Sartre's and Beauvoir's intimate circle, including her relationship with American writer Nelson Algren, to whom the book was dedicated.
Algren was outraged by the frank way Beauvoir described their sexual experiences in both The Mandarins and her autobiographies. Algren vented his outrage when reviewing American translations of Beauvoir's work. Much material bearing on this episode in Beauvoir's life, including her love letters to Algren, entered the public domain only after her death.
Les Inséparables
Beauvoir's early novel Les Inséparables, long suppressed, was published in French in 2020 and in two different English translations in 2021.<ref>Reviewed 23 Aug. 2021 by Merve Emre in The New Yorker" https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/08/30/simone-de-beauvoirs-lost-novel-of-early-love</ref> Written in 1954, the book describes her first love, a classmate named Elisabeth Lacoin ("Zaza") who died before age 22, and had as a teenager a "passionate and tragic" relationship with Beauvoir and Merleau-Ponty, then teaching at the same school. Disapproved by Sartre, the novel was deemed "too intimate" to be published during Beauvoir's lifetime.
Later years
Beauvoir wrote popular travel diaries about time spent in the United States and China and published essays and fiction rigorously, especially throughout the 1950s and 1960s. She published several volumes of short stories, including The Woman Destroyed, which, like some of her other later work, deals with aging.
1980 saw the publication of When Things of the Spirit Come First, a set of short stories centred around and based upon women important to her earlier years. Though written long before the novel She Came to Stay, Beauvoir did not at the time consider the stories worth publishing, allowing some forty years to pass before doing so.
Sartre and Merleau-Ponty had a longstanding feud, which led Merleau-Ponty to leave Les Temps Modernes. Beauvoir sided with Sartre and ceased to associate with Merleau-Ponty. In Beauvoir's later years, she hosted the journal's editorial meetings in her flat and contributed more than Sartre, whom she often had to force to offer his opinions.
Beauvoir also wrote a four-volume autobiography, consisting of: Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter; The Prime of Life; Force of Circumstance (sometimes published in two volumes in English translation: After the War and Hard Times); and All Said and Done. In 1964 Beauvoir published a novella-length autobiography, A Very Easy Death, covering the time she spent visiting her ageing mother, who was dying of cancer. The novella brings up questions of ethical concerns with truth-telling in doctor-patient relationships.
Her 1970 long essay La Vieillesse (The Coming of Age) is a rare instance of an intellectual meditation on the decline and solitude all humans experience if they do not die before about the age of 60.
In the 1970s Beauvoir became active in France's women's liberation movement. She wrote and signed the Manifesto of the 343 in 1971, a manifesto that included a list of famous women who claimed to have had an abortion, then illegal in France. Some argue most of the women had not had abortions, including Beauvoir. Signatories were diverse as Catherine Deneuve, Delphine Seyrig, and Beauvoir's sister Poupette. In 1974, abortion was legalised in France.
In a 1975 interview with Betty Friedan Beauvoir said "No woman should be authorized to stay at home and raise her children. Society should be totally different. Women should not have that choice, precisely because if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one."
In about 1976 Beauvoir and Sylvie Le Bon made a trip to New York City in the United States to visit Kate Millett on her farm.
In 1981 she wrote La Cérémonie Des Adieux (A Farewell to Sartre), a painful account of Sartre's last years. In the opening of Adieux, Beauvoir notes that it is the only major published work of hers which Sartre did not read before its publication.
She contributed the piece "Feminism – alive, well, and in constant danger" to the 1984 anthology Sisterhood Is Global: The International Women's Movement Anthology, edited by Robin Morgan.
After Sartre died in 1980, Beauvoir published his letters to her with edits to spare the feelings of people in their circle who were still living. After Beauvoir's death, Sartre's adopted daughter and literary heir Arlette Elkaïm would not let many of Sartre's letters be published in unedited form. Most of Sartre's letters available today have Beauvoir's edits, which include a few omissions but mostly the use of pseudonyms. Beauvoir's adopted daughter and literary heir Sylvie Le Bon, unlike Elkaïm, published Beauvoir's unedited letters to both Sartre and Algren.
Beauvoir died of pneumonia on 14 April 1986 in Paris, aged 78. She is buried next to Sartre at the Montparnasse Cemetery in Paris. She was honored as a figure at the forefront of the struggle for women's rights around the time of her passing.
Impact
Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex is considered a foundational work in the history of feminism. Beauvoir had denied being a feminist multiple times but ultimately admitted that she was one after the influential Second Sex became crucial in the world of feminism. The work has had a profound influence, opening the way for second wave feminism in the United States, Canada, Australia, and around the world. Despite the fact that Beauvoir has been quoted as saying "There is a certain unreasonable demand that I find a little stupid because it would enclose me, immobilize me completely in a sort of feminist concrete block." Her works on feminism have paved the way for all future feminists. Founders of the second wave read The Second Sex in translation, including Kate Millett, Shulamith Firestone, Juliet Mitchell, Ann Oakley and Germaine Greer. All acknowledged their profound debt to Beauvoir, including visiting her in France, consulting with her at crucial moments, and dedicating works to her. Betty Friedan, whose 1963 book The Feminine Mystique is often regarded as the opening salvo of second wave feminism in the United States, later said that reading The Second Sex in the early 1950s "led me to whatever original analysis of women's existence I have been able to contribute to the Women's movement and to its unique politics. I looked to Simone de Beauvoir for a philosophical and intellectual authority."
At one point in the early seventies, Beauvoir also aligned herself with the League for Woman's rights as a means to campaign and fight against sexism in the French society. Beauvoir's influence goes beyond just her impact on second wave founders, and extends to numerous aspects of feminism, including literary criticism, history, philosophy, theology, criticism of scientific discourse, and psychotherapy. When Beauvoir first became involved with the feminism movement, one of her first objectives was that of legalizing abortion.Donna Haraway wrote that, "despite important differences, all the modern feminist meanings of gender have roots in Simone de Beauvoir's claim that 'one is not born a woman [one becomes one]'". This "most famous feminist sentence ever written" is echoed in the title of Monique Wittig's 1981 essay One Is Not Born a Woman. Judith Butler took the concept a step further, arguing that Beauvoir's choice of the verb to become suggests that gender is a process, constantly being renewed in an ongoing interaction between the surrounding culture and individual choice.
Prizes
Prix Goncourt, 1954
Jerusalem Prize, 1975
Austrian State Prize for European Literature, 1978
Works
List of publications (non-exhaustive)
L'Invitée (1943) (English – She Came to Stay) [novel]
Pyrrhus et Cinéas (1944) [nonfiction]
Le Sang des autres (1945) (English – The Blood of Others) [novel]
Les Bouches inutiles (1945) (English - Who Shall Die?) [drama]
Tous les hommes sont mortels (1946) (English – All Men Are Mortal) [novel]
Pour une morale de l'ambiguïté (1947) (English – The Ethics of Ambiguity) [nonfiction]
"America Day by Day" (1948) (English – 1999 – Carol Cosman (Translator and Douglas Brinkley (Foreword) [nonfiction]
Le Deuxième Sexe (1949) (English – The Second Sex) [nonfiction]
L'Amérique au jour le jour (1954) (English – America Day by Day)
Les Mandarins (1954) (English – The Mandarins) [novel]
Must We Burn Sade? (1955)
The Long March (1957) [nonfiction]
Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter (1958)
The Prime of Life (1960)
Force of Circumstance (1963)
A Very Easy Death (1964)
Les Belles Images (1966) [novel]
The Woman Destroyed (1967) [short stories]
The Coming of Age (1970) [nonfiction]
All Said and Done (1972)
Old Age (1972) [nonfiction]
When Things of the Spirit Come First (1979) [novel]
Adieux: A Farewell to Sartre (1981)
Letters to Sartre (1990)
Journal de guerre, Sept 1939 – Jan 1941 (1990); English – Wartime Diary (2009)
A Transatlantic Love Affair: Letters to Nelson Algren (1998)
Diary of a Philosophy Student, 1926–27 (2006)
Cahiers de jeunesse, 1926–1930 (2008)
Selected translations
Patrick O'Brian was Beauvoir's principal English translator, until he attained commercial success as a novelist.
Philosophical Writings (Urbana : University of Illinois Press, 2004, edited by Margaret A. Simons et al.) contains a selection of essays by Beauvoir translated for the first time into English. Among those are: Pyrrhus and Cineas, discussing the futility or utility of action, two previously unpublished chapters from her novel She Came to Stay and an introduction to Ethics of Ambiguity.
See also
Art Shay
Roman à clef
Simone Weil
List of women's rights activists
Place Jean-Paul-Sartre-et-Simone-de-Beauvoir
References
Sources
Appignanesi, Lisa, 2005, Simone de Beauvoir, London: Haus,
Bair, Deirdre, 1990. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books,
Rowley, Hazel, 2005. Tête-a-Tête: Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre. New York: HarperCollins.
Suzanne Lilar, 1969. Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe (with collaboration of Prof. Dreyfus). Paris, University Presses of France (Presses Universitaires de France).
Fraser, M., 1999. Identity Without Selfhood: Simone de Beauvoir and Bisexuality, Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press.
Axel Madsen, Hearts and Minds: The Common Journey of Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre, William Morrow & Co, 1977.
Hélène Rouch, 2001–2002, Trois conceptions du sexe: Simone de Beauvoir entre Adrienne Sahuqué et Suzanne Lilar, Simone de Beauvoir Studies, n° 18, pp. 49–60.
Simone de Beauvoir, Marguerite Yourcenar, Nathalie Sarraute, 2002. Conférence Élisabeth Badinter, Jacques Lassalle & Lucette Finas, .
Further reading
Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe by Suzanne Lilar, 1969.
Feminist Theory and Simone de Beauvoir by Toril Moi, 1990.
Appignanesi, Lisa. Simone de Beauvoir. London: Penguin. 1988. .
Bair, Deirdre. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books. 1990. .
Francis, Claude. Simone de Beauvoir: A Life, A Love Story. Lisa Nesselson (Translator). New York: St. Martin's, 1987. .
Okely, Judith. Simone de Beauvoir. New York: Pantheon. 1986. .
External links
Guardian Books "Author Page", with profile and links to further articles.
Victoria Brittain et al discuss Simone de Beauvoir's lasting influence, ICA 1989
"Simone de Beauvoir", Great Lives, BBC Radio 4, 22 April 2011
Kate Kirkpatrick. (6 November 2017) "What is authentic love? A View from Simone de Beauvoir" . IAI News''.
1908 births
1986 deaths
20th-century French non-fiction writers
20th-century French novelists
20th-century French philosophers
20th-century French women writers
Atheist feminists
Atheist philosophers
Bisexual feminists
Bisexual women
Bisexual writers
Burials at Montparnasse Cemetery
Communist women writers
Continental philosophers
Critical theorists
Cultural critics
Deaths from pneumonia in France
Epistemologists
Existentialists
Feminist philosophers
Feminist studies scholars
Feminist theorists
Former Roman Catholics
French abortion-rights activists
French anti-war activists
French atheists
French communists
French socialists
French ethicists
French feminist writers
French literary critics
Women literary critics
French Marxists
French political philosophers
French women non-fiction writers
French women novelists
French women philosophers
Jerusalem Prize recipients
Légion d'honneur refusals
LGBT memoirists
French LGBT novelists
Marxist feminists
French Marxist writers
Materialist feminists
Metaphysicians
Moral philosophers
Ontologists
Phenomenologists
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Philosophers of culture
Philosophers of education
Philosophers of ethics and morality
Philosophers of literature
Philosophers of nihilism
Philosophers of sexuality
Political philosophers
Prix Goncourt winners
French social commentators
Social critics
Social philosophers
French socialist feminists
University of Paris alumni
French women memoirists
Writers from Paris
20th-century French memoirists
French magazine founders
LGBT philosophers | false | [
"A tutor is somebody who helps teach another.\n\nTutor or TUTOR may also refer to:\n\nAviation\n Avro Tutor\n Canadair CT-114 Tutor\n Slingsby Kirby Tutor\n Slingsby Motor Tutor\n Timm N2T Tutor\n\nComputing\n TUTOR, a programming language\n Tomy Tutor, a home computer\n COLREG Tutor, a computer application\n\nLiterature\n The Tutor, a play by Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz\n The Tutor (Brecht), an adaptation of that play by Bertolt Brecht\n\nPeople\n Gaius Vellaeus Tutor, ancient Roman senator\n Glennray Tutor (born 1950), American painter\n Ronald Tutor (born 1940/1941), American businessman\n\nOther uses\n Tutor (education), an officer in the British university system\n Tutor.com, an online tutoring company\n Tutor Systems, an educational game\n\nSee also\n\n Tudor (disambiguation)",
"Adelyn Noda (born 5 October 1950) was a teacher from Kosrae in the Federated States of Micronesia. In 1983 she became the youngest women from Kosrae to be ordained as a deaconess.\n\nBiography \nAdelyn Benjamin was born on 5 October 1950 in Malem, but grew up in Utwe. Her father was Reverend Benjamin Benjamin. She attended Utwe Elementary School and Bethania High School in Belau from 1965 to 1969. She graduated in 1972 from Micronesia Community College. She married mechanic Henry Noda and returned to Utwe Elementary School to teach. In 1974 she moved to teach English at Kosrae High School and from 1978 to 1985 was head of the department. As of 2006 she was a tutor in Kosraean Culture and at the College of Micronesia.\n\nIn 1983 she was ordained as a deaconess and was the youngest woman to be ordained to the position in the history of Kosrae.\n\nAwards \n\n Kosrae Teacher of the Year (1982)\n\nReferences \n\nLiving people\nKosrae\nFederated States of Micronesia Christians\nFederated States of Micronesia women\nFederated States of Micronesia educators\nDeaconesses\n1950 births"
]
|
[
"Simone de Beauvoir",
"Education",
"Where did de Beauvoir go to college and study?",
"she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris",
"did she get advanced degrees?",
"De Beauvoir was only the ninth woman to have received a degree from the Sorbonne at the time,",
"Did she become a doctor?",
"De Beauvoir first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Levi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school.",
"Did she ever become a teacher with Merleau-Ponty and Levi- Strauss?",
"Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the Ecole Normale Superieure in preparation for the agregation in philosophy,",
"Did she stop taking classes and end up teaching the rest of her career?",
"I don't know.",
"Did she ever regret what she chose to study?",
"This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual.\"",
"Did she ever tutor or teach famous people?",
"I don't know."
]
| C_5ed7bcbf9b4d438faac7388fd5948edc_1 | How long did she teach? | 8 | How long did Simone de Beauvoir teach? | Simone de Beauvoir | De Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fuelled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, de Beauvoir could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. De Beauvoir took this opportunity to do what she always wanted to do while also taking steps to earn a living for herself. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the Institut Sainte-Marie. She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, she wrote her diplome d'etudes superieures (roughly equivalent to an MA thesis) on Leibniz for Leon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). De Beauvoir was only the ninth woman to have received a degree from the Sorbonne at the time, due to the fact that French women had only recently been allowed to join higher education. De Beauvoir first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Levi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the Ecole Normale Superieure in preparation for the agregation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for the agregation that she met Ecole Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and Rene Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or beaver). The jury for the agregation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of de Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam. Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said: "...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual." CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Simone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir (, ; ; 9 January 1908 – 14 April 1986) was a French existentialist philosopher, writer, social theorist and feminist activist. Though she did not consider herself a philosopher, and even though she was not considered one at the time of her death, she had a significant influence on both feminist existentialism and feminist theory.
Beauvoir wrote novels, essays, biographies, autobiographies and monographs on philosophy, politics, and social issues. She was known for her 1949 treatise The Second Sex, a detailed analysis of women's oppression and a foundational tract of contemporary feminism; and for her novels, including She Came to Stay and The Mandarins. Her most enduring contribution to literature is her memoirs, notably the first volume, "Mémoires d'une jeune fille rangée" (1958), which have a warmth and descriptive power. She won the 1954 Prix Goncourt, the 1975 Jerusalem Prize, and the 1978 Austrian State Prize for European Literature. She was also known for her open, lifelong relationship with French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre.
Early years
Beauvoir was born on 9 January 1908 into a bourgeois Parisian family in the 6th arrondissement. Her parents were Georges Bertrand de Beauvoir, a lawyer, who once aspired to be an actor, and Françoise Beauvoir (née Brasseur), a wealthy banker's daughter and devout Catholic. Simone's sister, Hélène, was born two years later. The family struggled to maintain their bourgeois status after losing much of their fortune shortly after World War I, and Françoise insisted the two daughters be sent to a prestigious convent school.
Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fueled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" Because of her family's straitened circumstances, she could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. She took this opportunity to take steps towards earning a living for herself.
She first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Lévi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the École Normale Supérieure in preparation for the agrégation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination which serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for it that she met École Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and René Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or "beaver"). The jury for the agrégation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam.
Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said:
"...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual."
Secondary and post-secondary education
Beauvoir pursued post-secondary education after completing her high school years at Lycée Fenelon. After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the . She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, wrote her (roughly equivalent to an M.A. thesis) on Leibniz for Léon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]). Her studies of political philosophy through university influenced her to start thinking of societal concerns rather than her own individual issues.
Religious upbringing
Beauvoir was raised in a strict Catholic household. She had been sent to convent schools as a youth. She was deeply religious as a child, at one point intending to become a nun. At age 14, Beauvoir questioned her faith as she saw many changes in the world after witnessing tragedies throughout her life. She abandoned her faith in her early teens and remained an atheist for the rest of her life. Beauvoir quotes "Faith allows an evasion of those difficulties which the atheist confronts honestly. And to crown all, the believer derives a sense of great superiority from this very cowardice itself."
Middle years
From 1929 until 1943, Beauvoir taught at the lycée level until she could support herself solely on the earnings of her writings. She taught at the (Marseille), the , and the (1936–39).
Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre met during her college years. Intrigued by her determination as an educator, he sought out to make their relationship romantic. However, she had no interest in doing so. During October 1929, Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir became a couple and, after they were confronted by her father, Sartre asked her to marry him on a provisional basis: One day while they were sitting on a bench outside the Louvre, he said, "Let's sign a two-year lease". Though Beauvoir wrote, "Marriage was impossible. I had no dowry", scholars point out that her ideal relationships described in The Second Sex and elsewhere bore little resemblances to the marriage standards of the day. Instead, she and Sartre entered into a lifelong "soul partnership", which was sexual but not exclusive, nor did it involve living together.
Sartre and Beauvoir always read each other's work. Debate continues about the extent to which they influenced each other in their existentialist works, such as Sartre's Being and Nothingness and Beauvoir's She Came to Stay and "Phenomenology and Intent". However, recent studies of Beauvoir's work focus on influences other than Sartre, including Hegel and Leibniz. The Neo-Hegelian revival led by Alexandre Kojève and Jean Hyppolite in the 1930s inspired a whole generation of French thinkers, including Sartre, to discover Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit. However, Beauvoir, reading Hegel in German during the war, produced an original critique of his dialectic of consciousness.
Personal life
Beauvoir's prominent open relationships at times overshadowed her substantial academic reputation. A scholar lecturing with her chastised their "distinguished [Harvard] audience [because] every question asked about Sartre concerned his work, while all those asked about Beauvoir concerned her personal life." Beginning in 1929, Beauvoir and Sartre were partners and remained so for 51 years, until his death in 1980. She chose never to marry and never had children. This gave her the time to advance her education and engage in political causes, write and teach, and take lovers. She lived with Claude Lanzmann from 1952 to 1959.
Perhaps her most famous lover was American author Nelson Algren, whom she met in Chicago in 1947, and to whom she wrote across the Atlantic as "my beloved husband." Algren won the National Book Award for The Man with the Golden Arm in 1950, and in 1954, Beauvoir won France's most prestigious literary prize for The Mandarins, in which Algren is the character Lewis Brogan. Algren vociferously objected to their intimacy becoming public. Years after they separated, she was buried wearing his gift of a silver ring.
Beauvoir was bisexual, and her relationships with young women were controversial. French author Bianca Lamblin (originally Bianca Bienenfeld) wrote in her book Mémoires d'une Jeune Fille Dérangée (published in English under the title A Disgraceful Affair) that, while a student at Lycée Molière, she was sexually exploited by her teacher Beauvoir, who was in her 30s. Lamblin had affairs with both Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir. In 1943, Beauvoir was suspended from her teaching position when she was accused of seducing her 17-year-old lycée pupil Natalie Sorokine in 1939. Sorokine's parents laid formal charges against Beauvoir for debauching a minor (the age of consent in France at the time was 15), and Beauvoir's license to teach in France was revoked, although it was subsequently reinstated.
In 1977, Beauvoir, Sartre, Roland Barthes, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida and much of the era's intelligentsia signed a petition seeking to completely remove the age of consent in France.
Notable works
She Came to Stay
Beauvoir published her first novel She Came to Stay in 1943. It has been assumed that it is inspired by her and Sartre's sexual relationship with Olga Kosakiewicz and Wanda Kosakiewicz. Olga was one of her students in the Rouen secondary school where Beauvoir taught during the early 1930s. She grew fond of Olga. Sartre tried to pursue Olga but she rejected him, so he began a relationship with her sister Wanda. Upon his death, Sartre was still supporting Wanda. He also supported Olga for years, until she met and married Jacques-Laurent Bost, a lover of Beauvoir. However, the main thrust of the novel is philosophical, a scene in which to situate Beauvoir's abiding philosophical pre-occupation - the relationship between the self and the other.
In the novel, set just before the outbreak of World War II, Beauvoir creates one character from the complex relationships of Olga and Wanda. The fictionalised versions of Beauvoir and Sartre have a ménage à trois with the young woman. The novel also delves into Beauvoir and Sartre's complex relationship and how it was affected by the ménage à trois.
She Came to Stay was followed by many others, including The Blood of Others, which explores the nature of individual responsibility, telling a love story between two young French students participating in the Resistance in World War II.
Existentialist ethics
In 1944, Beauvoir wrote her first philosophical essay, Pyrrhus et Cinéas, a discussion on existentialist ethics. She continued her exploration of existentialism through her second essay The Ethics of Ambiguity (1947); it is perhaps the most accessible entry into French existentialism. In the essay, Beauvoir clears up some inconsistencies that many, Sartre included, have found in major existentialist works such as Being and Nothingness. In The Ethics of Ambiguity, Beauvoir confronts the existentialist dilemma of absolute freedom vs. the constraints of circumstance.
Les Temps modernes
At the end of World War II, Beauvoir and Sartre edited Les Temps modernes, a political journal which Sartre founded along with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and others. Beauvoir used Les Temps Modernes to promote her own work and explore her ideas on a small scale before fashioning essays and books. Beauvoir remained an editor until her death.
Sexuality, existentialist feminism and The Second Sex
The Second Sex, first published in 1949 in French as Le Deuxième Sexe, turns the existentialist mantra that existence precedes essence into a feminist one: "One is not born but becomes a woman" (French: "On ne naît pas femme, on le devient"). With this famous phrase, Beauvoir first articulated what has come to be known as the sex-gender distinction, that is, the distinction between biological sex and the social and historical construction of gender and its attendant stereotypes. Beauvoir argues that "the fundamental source of women's oppression is its [femininity's] historical and social construction as the quintessential".
Beauvoir defines women as the "second sex" because women are defined in relation to men. She pointed out that Aristotle argued women are "female by virtue of a certain lack of qualities", while Thomas Aquinas referred to woman as "imperfect man" and the "incidental" being. She quotes "In itself, homosexuality is as limiting as heterosexuality: the ideal should be to be capable of loving a woman or a man; either, a human being, without feeling fear, restraint, or obligation."
Beauvoir asserted that women are as capable of choice as men, and thus can choose to elevate themselves, moving beyond the "immanence" to which they were previously resigned and reaching "transcendence", a position in which one takes responsibility for oneself and the world, where one chooses one's freedom.
Chapters of The Second Sex were originally published in Les Temps modernes, in June 1949. The second volume came a few months after the first in France. It was published soon after in America due to the quick translation by Howard Parshley, as prompted by Blanche Knopf, wife of publisher Alfred A. Knopf. Because Parshley had only a basic familiarity with the French language, and a minimal understanding of philosophy (he was a professor of biology at Smith College), much of Beauvoir's book was mistranslated or inappropriately cut, distorting her intended message. For years, Knopf prevented the introduction of a more accurate retranslation of Beauvoir's work, declining all proposals despite the efforts of existentialist scholars.
Only in 2009 was there a second translation, to mark the 60th anniversary of the original publication. Constance Borde and Sheila Malovany-Chevallier produced the first integral translation in 2010, reinstating a third of the original work.
In the chapter "Woman: Myth and Reality" of The Second Sex, Beauvoir argued that men had made women the "Other" in society by application of a false aura of "mystery" around them. She argued that men used this as an excuse not to understand women or their problems and not to help them, and that this stereotyping was always done in societies by the group higher in the hierarchy to the group lower in the hierarchy. She wrote that a similar kind of oppression by hierarchy also happened in other categories of identity, such as race, class, and religion, but she claimed that it was nowhere more true than with gender in which men stereotyped women and used it as an excuse to organize society into a patriarchy.
Despite her contributions to the feminist movement, especially the French women's liberation movement, and her beliefs in women's economic independence and equal education, Beauvoir was initially reluctant to call herself a feminist. However, after observing the resurgence of the feminist movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Beauvoir stated she no longer believed a socialist revolution to be enough to bring about women's liberation. She publicly declared herself a feminist in 1972 in an interview with Le Nouvel Observateur.
In 2018 the manuscript pages of Le Deuxième Sexe were published. At the time her adopted daughter, Sylvie Le Bon-Beauvoir, a philosophy professor, described her mother's writing process: Beauvoir wrote every page of her books longhand first and only after that would hire typists.
The Mandarins
Published in 1954, The Mandarins won her France's highest literary prize, the Prix Goncourt. The book is set after the end of World War II and follows the personal lives of philosophers and friends among Sartre's and Beauvoir's intimate circle, including her relationship with American writer Nelson Algren, to whom the book was dedicated.
Algren was outraged by the frank way Beauvoir described their sexual experiences in both The Mandarins and her autobiographies. Algren vented his outrage when reviewing American translations of Beauvoir's work. Much material bearing on this episode in Beauvoir's life, including her love letters to Algren, entered the public domain only after her death.
Les Inséparables
Beauvoir's early novel Les Inséparables, long suppressed, was published in French in 2020 and in two different English translations in 2021.<ref>Reviewed 23 Aug. 2021 by Merve Emre in The New Yorker" https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/08/30/simone-de-beauvoirs-lost-novel-of-early-love</ref> Written in 1954, the book describes her first love, a classmate named Elisabeth Lacoin ("Zaza") who died before age 22, and had as a teenager a "passionate and tragic" relationship with Beauvoir and Merleau-Ponty, then teaching at the same school. Disapproved by Sartre, the novel was deemed "too intimate" to be published during Beauvoir's lifetime.
Later years
Beauvoir wrote popular travel diaries about time spent in the United States and China and published essays and fiction rigorously, especially throughout the 1950s and 1960s. She published several volumes of short stories, including The Woman Destroyed, which, like some of her other later work, deals with aging.
1980 saw the publication of When Things of the Spirit Come First, a set of short stories centred around and based upon women important to her earlier years. Though written long before the novel She Came to Stay, Beauvoir did not at the time consider the stories worth publishing, allowing some forty years to pass before doing so.
Sartre and Merleau-Ponty had a longstanding feud, which led Merleau-Ponty to leave Les Temps Modernes. Beauvoir sided with Sartre and ceased to associate with Merleau-Ponty. In Beauvoir's later years, she hosted the journal's editorial meetings in her flat and contributed more than Sartre, whom she often had to force to offer his opinions.
Beauvoir also wrote a four-volume autobiography, consisting of: Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter; The Prime of Life; Force of Circumstance (sometimes published in two volumes in English translation: After the War and Hard Times); and All Said and Done. In 1964 Beauvoir published a novella-length autobiography, A Very Easy Death, covering the time she spent visiting her ageing mother, who was dying of cancer. The novella brings up questions of ethical concerns with truth-telling in doctor-patient relationships.
Her 1970 long essay La Vieillesse (The Coming of Age) is a rare instance of an intellectual meditation on the decline and solitude all humans experience if they do not die before about the age of 60.
In the 1970s Beauvoir became active in France's women's liberation movement. She wrote and signed the Manifesto of the 343 in 1971, a manifesto that included a list of famous women who claimed to have had an abortion, then illegal in France. Some argue most of the women had not had abortions, including Beauvoir. Signatories were diverse as Catherine Deneuve, Delphine Seyrig, and Beauvoir's sister Poupette. In 1974, abortion was legalised in France.
In a 1975 interview with Betty Friedan Beauvoir said "No woman should be authorized to stay at home and raise her children. Society should be totally different. Women should not have that choice, precisely because if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one."
In about 1976 Beauvoir and Sylvie Le Bon made a trip to New York City in the United States to visit Kate Millett on her farm.
In 1981 she wrote La Cérémonie Des Adieux (A Farewell to Sartre), a painful account of Sartre's last years. In the opening of Adieux, Beauvoir notes that it is the only major published work of hers which Sartre did not read before its publication.
She contributed the piece "Feminism – alive, well, and in constant danger" to the 1984 anthology Sisterhood Is Global: The International Women's Movement Anthology, edited by Robin Morgan.
After Sartre died in 1980, Beauvoir published his letters to her with edits to spare the feelings of people in their circle who were still living. After Beauvoir's death, Sartre's adopted daughter and literary heir Arlette Elkaïm would not let many of Sartre's letters be published in unedited form. Most of Sartre's letters available today have Beauvoir's edits, which include a few omissions but mostly the use of pseudonyms. Beauvoir's adopted daughter and literary heir Sylvie Le Bon, unlike Elkaïm, published Beauvoir's unedited letters to both Sartre and Algren.
Beauvoir died of pneumonia on 14 April 1986 in Paris, aged 78. She is buried next to Sartre at the Montparnasse Cemetery in Paris. She was honored as a figure at the forefront of the struggle for women's rights around the time of her passing.
Impact
Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex is considered a foundational work in the history of feminism. Beauvoir had denied being a feminist multiple times but ultimately admitted that she was one after the influential Second Sex became crucial in the world of feminism. The work has had a profound influence, opening the way for second wave feminism in the United States, Canada, Australia, and around the world. Despite the fact that Beauvoir has been quoted as saying "There is a certain unreasonable demand that I find a little stupid because it would enclose me, immobilize me completely in a sort of feminist concrete block." Her works on feminism have paved the way for all future feminists. Founders of the second wave read The Second Sex in translation, including Kate Millett, Shulamith Firestone, Juliet Mitchell, Ann Oakley and Germaine Greer. All acknowledged their profound debt to Beauvoir, including visiting her in France, consulting with her at crucial moments, and dedicating works to her. Betty Friedan, whose 1963 book The Feminine Mystique is often regarded as the opening salvo of second wave feminism in the United States, later said that reading The Second Sex in the early 1950s "led me to whatever original analysis of women's existence I have been able to contribute to the Women's movement and to its unique politics. I looked to Simone de Beauvoir for a philosophical and intellectual authority."
At one point in the early seventies, Beauvoir also aligned herself with the League for Woman's rights as a means to campaign and fight against sexism in the French society. Beauvoir's influence goes beyond just her impact on second wave founders, and extends to numerous aspects of feminism, including literary criticism, history, philosophy, theology, criticism of scientific discourse, and psychotherapy. When Beauvoir first became involved with the feminism movement, one of her first objectives was that of legalizing abortion.Donna Haraway wrote that, "despite important differences, all the modern feminist meanings of gender have roots in Simone de Beauvoir's claim that 'one is not born a woman [one becomes one]'". This "most famous feminist sentence ever written" is echoed in the title of Monique Wittig's 1981 essay One Is Not Born a Woman. Judith Butler took the concept a step further, arguing that Beauvoir's choice of the verb to become suggests that gender is a process, constantly being renewed in an ongoing interaction between the surrounding culture and individual choice.
Prizes
Prix Goncourt, 1954
Jerusalem Prize, 1975
Austrian State Prize for European Literature, 1978
Works
List of publications (non-exhaustive)
L'Invitée (1943) (English – She Came to Stay) [novel]
Pyrrhus et Cinéas (1944) [nonfiction]
Le Sang des autres (1945) (English – The Blood of Others) [novel]
Les Bouches inutiles (1945) (English - Who Shall Die?) [drama]
Tous les hommes sont mortels (1946) (English – All Men Are Mortal) [novel]
Pour une morale de l'ambiguïté (1947) (English – The Ethics of Ambiguity) [nonfiction]
"America Day by Day" (1948) (English – 1999 – Carol Cosman (Translator and Douglas Brinkley (Foreword) [nonfiction]
Le Deuxième Sexe (1949) (English – The Second Sex) [nonfiction]
L'Amérique au jour le jour (1954) (English – America Day by Day)
Les Mandarins (1954) (English – The Mandarins) [novel]
Must We Burn Sade? (1955)
The Long March (1957) [nonfiction]
Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter (1958)
The Prime of Life (1960)
Force of Circumstance (1963)
A Very Easy Death (1964)
Les Belles Images (1966) [novel]
The Woman Destroyed (1967) [short stories]
The Coming of Age (1970) [nonfiction]
All Said and Done (1972)
Old Age (1972) [nonfiction]
When Things of the Spirit Come First (1979) [novel]
Adieux: A Farewell to Sartre (1981)
Letters to Sartre (1990)
Journal de guerre, Sept 1939 – Jan 1941 (1990); English – Wartime Diary (2009)
A Transatlantic Love Affair: Letters to Nelson Algren (1998)
Diary of a Philosophy Student, 1926–27 (2006)
Cahiers de jeunesse, 1926–1930 (2008)
Selected translations
Patrick O'Brian was Beauvoir's principal English translator, until he attained commercial success as a novelist.
Philosophical Writings (Urbana : University of Illinois Press, 2004, edited by Margaret A. Simons et al.) contains a selection of essays by Beauvoir translated for the first time into English. Among those are: Pyrrhus and Cineas, discussing the futility or utility of action, two previously unpublished chapters from her novel She Came to Stay and an introduction to Ethics of Ambiguity.
See also
Art Shay
Roman à clef
Simone Weil
List of women's rights activists
Place Jean-Paul-Sartre-et-Simone-de-Beauvoir
References
Sources
Appignanesi, Lisa, 2005, Simone de Beauvoir, London: Haus,
Bair, Deirdre, 1990. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books,
Rowley, Hazel, 2005. Tête-a-Tête: Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre. New York: HarperCollins.
Suzanne Lilar, 1969. Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe (with collaboration of Prof. Dreyfus). Paris, University Presses of France (Presses Universitaires de France).
Fraser, M., 1999. Identity Without Selfhood: Simone de Beauvoir and Bisexuality, Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press.
Axel Madsen, Hearts and Minds: The Common Journey of Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre, William Morrow & Co, 1977.
Hélène Rouch, 2001–2002, Trois conceptions du sexe: Simone de Beauvoir entre Adrienne Sahuqué et Suzanne Lilar, Simone de Beauvoir Studies, n° 18, pp. 49–60.
Simone de Beauvoir, Marguerite Yourcenar, Nathalie Sarraute, 2002. Conférence Élisabeth Badinter, Jacques Lassalle & Lucette Finas, .
Further reading
Le Malentendu du Deuxième Sexe by Suzanne Lilar, 1969.
Feminist Theory and Simone de Beauvoir by Toril Moi, 1990.
Appignanesi, Lisa. Simone de Beauvoir. London: Penguin. 1988. .
Bair, Deirdre. Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography. New York: Summit Books. 1990. .
Francis, Claude. Simone de Beauvoir: A Life, A Love Story. Lisa Nesselson (Translator). New York: St. Martin's, 1987. .
Okely, Judith. Simone de Beauvoir. New York: Pantheon. 1986. .
External links
Guardian Books "Author Page", with profile and links to further articles.
Victoria Brittain et al discuss Simone de Beauvoir's lasting influence, ICA 1989
"Simone de Beauvoir", Great Lives, BBC Radio 4, 22 April 2011
Kate Kirkpatrick. (6 November 2017) "What is authentic love? A View from Simone de Beauvoir" . IAI News''.
1908 births
1986 deaths
20th-century French non-fiction writers
20th-century French novelists
20th-century French philosophers
20th-century French women writers
Atheist feminists
Atheist philosophers
Bisexual feminists
Bisexual women
Bisexual writers
Burials at Montparnasse Cemetery
Communist women writers
Continental philosophers
Critical theorists
Cultural critics
Deaths from pneumonia in France
Epistemologists
Existentialists
Feminist philosophers
Feminist studies scholars
Feminist theorists
Former Roman Catholics
French abortion-rights activists
French anti-war activists
French atheists
French communists
French socialists
French ethicists
French feminist writers
French literary critics
Women literary critics
French Marxists
French political philosophers
French women non-fiction writers
French women novelists
French women philosophers
Jerusalem Prize recipients
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LGBT memoirists
French LGBT novelists
Marxist feminists
French Marxist writers
Materialist feminists
Metaphysicians
Moral philosophers
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LGBT philosophers | false | [
"The Magpie's Nest is an English fairy tale collected by Joseph Jacobs in English Fairy Tales.\n\nSynopsis\nAll the birds came to the magpie, because it was the wisest, and asked it to teach them how to build nests. The magpie started to demonstrate, but each time she did something, another bird concluded that was all there was to it. By the time she was done, only the turtle-dove was left, and it had been paying no attention, but singing \"Take two\". The magpie said that one was enough but looked up and saw that every bird had left. She became angry and would not teach any more.\n\nThat is why birds build their nests differently.\n\nExternal links\nThe Magpie's Nest\n\nEnglish fairy tales",
"\"I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You\" is a song by American indie rock band Black Kids from their debut album, Partie Traumatic (2008). It was released as the band's debut single by Almost Gold Recordings on April 7, 2008, in the United Kingdom, and on May 27, 2008, in North America. The song peaked at number 11 on the UK Singles Chart but did not chart in the United States. The demo version from the band's 2007 EP Wizard of Ahhhs placed at number 68 on Pitchfork Media's Top 100 Tracks of 2007.\n\nBackground\nAccording to lead singer Reggie Youngblood, the track was inspired by Jacksonville's dance party scene: he realized that usually, he would end up with girls who couldn't dance. The line \"You are the girl, that I've been dreaming of, ever since I was a little girl\" is based on an inside joke between Reggie and his sister Ali Youngblood where they would refer to wanting something as \"Ever since I was a little girl\".\n\nReception\nIn a review of Partie Traumatic on AllMusic, Tim Sendra called \"I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You\" one of the best songs on the album, writing that it \"kick[s] you in the gut with [its] energy and verve.\" Commercially, the single performed well in the United Kingdom, debuting at number 84 on April 6, 2008, and rising to its peak of number 11 the following week. It became a minor hit in the Flanders region of Belgium, reaching number 10 on the Ultratip listing.\n\nTrack listings\nAll songs were written by Black Kids except where noted.\n\n7-inch single (pink vinyl)\nA. \"I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You\" – 3:39\nB. \"Damn I Wish I Was Your Lover\" – 2:26\n\nUK 12-inch single (white vinyl)\nA1. \"I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You\" – 3:39\nB1. \"I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You\" (The Twelves Remix) – 3:46\nB2. \"I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You\" (The Twelves Remix – Dub Version) – 3:46\n\nCD single and EP\n \"I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You\" – 3:39\n \"You Turn Me On\" – 2:50\n \"Damn I Wish I Was Your Lover\" – 2:26\n\nUS and Canadian digital download\n \"I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You\" – 3:40\n \"I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You\" (The Twelves Remix) – 3:44\n\nUK digital download EP\n \"I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You\" – 3:39\n \"You Turn Me On\" – 2:50\n \"Damn I Wish I Was Your Lover\" – 2:26\n \"I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You\" (The Twelves Remix) – 3:46\n\nPersonnel\n Owen Holmes – bass guitar\n Kevin Snow – drums\n Dawn Watley – keyboards and vocals\n Ali Youngblood – keyboards and vocals\n Reggie Youngblood – guitar and vocals\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Official Black Kids website\n\n2008 debut singles\n2008 songs\nBlack Kids songs\nSongs about dancing"
]
|
[
"Don Bradman",
"Reluctant hero"
]
| C_ef88bed7f74d4322a1040eb8bdce83a2_1 | What is the relation between Don Bradman and reluctant Hero? | 1 | What is the relationship between Don Bradman and the Reluctant Hero? | Don Bradman | In 1930-31, against the first West Indian side to visit Australia, Bradman's scoring was more sedate than in England--although he did make 223 in 297 minutes in the Third Test at Brisbane and 152 in 154 minutes in the following Test at Melbourne. However, he scored quickly in a very successful sequence of innings against the South Africans in the Australian summer of 1931-32. For NSW against the tourists, he made 30, 135 and 219. In the Test matches, he scored 226 (277 minutes), 112 (155 minutes), 2 and 167 (183 minutes); his 299 not out in the Fourth Test, at Adelaide, set a new record for the highest score in a Test in Australia. Australia won nine of the ten Tests played over the two series. At this point, Bradman had played 15 Test matches since the beginning of 1930, scoring 2,227 runs at an average of 131. He had played 18 innings, scoring 10 centuries, six of which had extended beyond 200. His overall scoring rate was 42 runs per hour, with 856 (or 38.5% of his tally) scored in boundaries. Significantly, he had not hit a six, which typified Bradman's attitude: if he hit the ball along the ground, then it could not be caught. During this phase of his career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a "machine-like" approach to batting. The South African fast bowler Sandy Bell described bowling to him as, "heart-breaking ... with his sort of cynical grin, which rather reminds one of the Sphinx ... he never seems to perspire". Between these two seasons, Bradman seriously contemplated playing professional cricket in England with the Lancashire League club Accrington, a move that, according to the rules of the day, would have ended his Test career. A consortium of three Sydney businesses offered an alternative. They devised a two-year contract whereby Bradman wrote for Associated Newspapers, broadcast on Radio 2UE and promoted the menswear retailing chain FJ Palmer and Son. However, the contract increased Bradman's dependence on his public profile, making it more difficult to maintain the privacy that he ardently desired. Bradman's chaotic wedding to Jessie Menzies in April 1932 epitomised these new and unwelcome intrusions into his private life. The church "was under siege all throughout the day ... uninvited guests stood on chairs and pews to get a better view"; police erected barriers that were broken down and many of those invited could not get a seat. Just weeks later, Bradman joined a private team organised by Arthur Mailey to tour the United States and Canada. He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. Playing 51 games in 75 days, Bradman scored 3,779 runs at 102.1, with 18 centuries. Although the standard of play was not high, the effects of the amount of cricket Bradman had played in the three previous years, together with the strains of his celebrity status, began to show on his return home. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Sir Donald George Bradman, AC (27 August 1908 – 25 February 2001), nicknamed "The Don", was an Australian international cricketer, widely acknowledged as the greatest batsman of all time. Bradman's career Test batting average of 99.94 has been cited as the greatest achievement by any sportsman in any major sport.
The story that the young Bradman practised alone with a cricket stump and a golf ball is part of Australian folklore. Bradman's meteoric rise from bush cricket to the Australian Test team took just over two years. Before his 22nd birthday, he had set many records for top scoring, some of which still stand, and became Australia's sporting idol at the height of the Great Depression.
During a 20-year playing career, Bradman consistently scored at a level that made him, in the words of former Australia captain Bill Woodfull, "worth three batsmen to Australia". A controversial set of tactics, known as Bodyline, was specially devised by the England team to curb his scoring. As a captain and administrator, Bradman was committed to attacking, entertaining cricket; he drew spectators in record numbers. He hated the constant adulation, however, and it affected how he dealt with others. The focus of attention on his individual performances strained relationships with some teammates, administrators and journalists, who thought him aloof and wary. Following an enforced hiatus due to the Second World War, he made a dramatic comeback, captaining an Australian team known as "The Invincibles" on a record-breaking unbeaten tour of England.
A complex, highly driven man, not given to close personal relationships,
Bradman retained a pre-eminent position in the game by acting as an administrator, selector and writer for three decades following his retirement. Even after he became reclusive in his declining years, his opinion was highly sought, and his status as a national icon was still recognised. Almost 50 years after his retirement as a Test player, in 1997, Prime Minister John Howard of Australia called him the "greatest living Australian". Bradman's image has appeared on postage stamps and coins, and a museum dedicated to his life was opened while he was still living. On the centenary of his birth, 27 August 2008, the Royal Australian Mint issued a $5 commemorative gold coin with Bradman's image. In 2009, he was inducted posthumously into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame.
Early years
Donald George Bradman was the youngest son of George and Emily (née Whatman) Bradman, and was born on 27 August 1908 at Cootamundra, New South Wales (NSW). He had a brother, Victor, and three sisters—Islet, Lilian and Elizabeth May. Bradman was of English heritage on both sides of his family. His grandfather Charles Andrew Bradman left Withersfield, Suffolk, for Australia. When Bradman played at Cambridge in 1930 as a 21 year old on his first tour of England, he took the opportunity to trace his forebears in the region. Also, one of his great-grandfathers was one of the first Italians to migrate to Australia in 1826. Bradman's parents lived in the hamlet of Yeo Yeo, near Stockinbingal. His mother, Emily, gave birth to him at the Cootamundra home of Granny Scholz, a midwife. That house is now the Bradman Birthplace Museum. Emily had hailed from Mittagong in the NSW Southern Highlands, and in 1911, when Don Bradman was about two-and-a-half years old, his parents decided to relocate to Bowral, close to Mittagong, to be closer to Emily's family and friends, as life at Yeo Yeo was proving difficult.
Bradman practised batting incessantly during his youth. He invented his own solo cricket game, using a cricket stump for a bat, and a golf ball. A water tank, mounted on a curved brick stand, stood on a paved area behind the family home. When hit into the curved brick facing of the stand, the ball rebounded at high speed and varying angles—and Bradman would attempt to hit it again. This form of practice developed his timing and reactions to a high degree. In more formal cricket, he hit his first century at the age of 12, with an undefeated 115 playing for Bowral Public School against Mittagong High School.
Bush cricketer
During the 1920–21 season, Bradman acted as scorer for the local Bowral team, captained by his uncle George Whatman. In October 1920, he filled in when the team was one man short, scoring 37* and 29* on debut. During the season, Bradman's father took him to the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) to watch the fifth Ashes Test match. On that day, Bradman formed an ambition. "I shall never be satisfied", he told his father, "until I play on this ground". Bradman left school in 1922 and went to work for a local real estate agent who encouraged his sporting pursuits by giving him time off when necessary. He gave up cricket in favour of tennis for two years, but resumed playing cricket in 1925–26.
Bradman became a regular selection for the Bowral team; several outstanding performances earned him the attention of the Sydney daily press. Competing on matting-over-concrete pitches, Bowral played other rural towns in the Berrima District competition. Against Wingello, a team that included the future Test bowler Bill O'Reilly, Bradman made 234. In the competition final against Moss Vale, which extended over five consecutive Saturdays, Bradman scored 320 not out. During the following Australian winter (1926), an ageing Australian team lost The Ashes in England, and a number of Test players retired. The New South Wales Cricket Association began a hunt for new talent. Mindful of Bradman's big scores for Bowral, the association wrote to him, requesting his attendance at a practice session in Sydney. He was subsequently chosen for the "Country Week" tournaments at both cricket and tennis, to be played during separate weeks. His boss presented him with an ultimatum: he could have only one week away from work, and therefore had to choose between the two sports. He chose cricket.
Bradman's performances during Country Week resulted in an invitation to play grade cricket in Sydney for St George in the 1926–27 season. He scored 110 on his debut, making his first century on a turf pitch. On 1 January 1927, he turned out for the NSW second team. For the remainder of the season, Bradman travelled the from Bowral to Sydney every Saturday to play for St George.
First-class debut
The next season continued the rapid rise of the "Boy from Bowral". Selected to replace the unfit Archie Jackson in the NSW team, Bradman made his first-class debut at the Adelaide Oval, aged 19. He secured the achievement of a hundred on debut, with an innings of 118 featuring what soon became his trademarks—fast footwork, calm confidence and rapid scoring. In the final match of the season, he made his first century at the SCG, against the Sheffield Shield champions Victoria. Despite his potential, Bradman was not chosen for the Australian second team to tour New Zealand.
Bradman decided that his chances for Test selection would be improved by moving to Sydney for the 1928–29 season, when England were to tour in defence of the Ashes. Initially, he continued working in real estate, but later took a promotions job with the sporting goods retailer Mick Simmons Ltd. In the first match of the Sheffield Shield season, he scored a century in each innings against Queensland. He followed this with scores of 87 and 132 not out against the England touring team, and was rewarded with selection for the first Test, to be played at Brisbane.
Test career
Playing in only his tenth first-class match, Bradman, nicknamed "Braddles" by his teammates, found his initial Test a harsh learning experience. Caught on a sticky wicket, Australia were all out for 66 in the second innings and lost by 675 runs (still a Test record). Following scores of 18 and 1, the selectors dropped Bradman to twelfth man for the Second Test. An injury to Bill Ponsford early in the match required Bradman to field as substitute while England amassed 636, following their 863 runs in the First Test. RS "Dick" Whitington wrote, "... he had scored only nineteen himself and these experiences appear to have provided him with food for thought". Recalled for the Third Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, Bradman scored 79 and 112 to become the youngest player to make a Test century, although the match was still lost. Another loss followed in the Fourth Test. Bradman reached 58 in the second innings and appeared set to guide the team to victory when he was run out. It was to be the only run out of his Test career. The losing margin was just 12 runs.
The improving Australians did manage to win the Fifth and final Test. Bradman top-scored with 123 in the first innings, and was at the wicket in the second innings when his captain Jack Ryder hit the winning runs. Bradman completed the season with 1,690 first-class runs, averaging 93.88, and his first multiple century in a Sheffield Shield match, 340 not out against Victoria, set a new ground record for the SCG. Bradman averaged 113.28 in 1929–30. In a trial match to select the team that would tour England, he was last man out in the first innings for 124. As his team followed on, the skipper Bill Woodfull asked Bradman to keep the pads on and open the second innings. By the end of play, he was 205 not out, on his way to 225. Against Queensland at the SCG, Bradman set a then world record for first-class cricket by scoring 452 not out; he made his runs in only 415 minutes. Not long after the feat, he recalled:
Although he was an obvious selection to tour England, Bradman's unorthodox style raised doubts that he could succeed on the slower English pitches. Percy Fender wrote:
The encomiums were not confined to his batting gifts; nor did the criticism extend to his character. "Australia has unearthed a champion", said former Australian Test great Clem Hill, "self-taught, with natural ability. But most important of all, with his heart in the right place." Selector Dick Jones weighed in with the observation that it was "good to watch him talking to an old player, listening attentively to everything that is said and then replying with a modest 'thank you'."
1930 tour of England
England were favourites to win the 1930 Ashes series, and if the Australians were to exceed expectations, their young batsmen, Bradman and Jackson, needed to prosper. With his elegant batting technique, Jackson appeared the brighter prospect of the pair. However, Bradman began the tour with 236 at Worcester and went on to score 1,000 first-class runs by the end of May, the fifth player (and first Australian) to achieve this rare feat. In his first Test appearance in England, Bradman hit 131 in the second innings but England won the match. His batting reached a new level in the Second Test at Lord's where he scored 254 as Australia won and levelled the series. Later in life, Bradman rated this the best innings of his career as, "practically without exception every ball went where it was intended to go". Wisden noted his fast footwork and how he hit the ball "all round the wicket with power and accuracy", as well as faultless concentration in keeping the ball on the ground.
In terms of runs scored, this performance was soon surpassed. In the Third Test, at Headingley, Bradman scored a century before lunch on 11 July, the first day of the Test match to equal the performances of Victor Trumper and Charlie Macartney. In the afternoon, Bradman added another century between lunch and tea, before finishing the day on 309 not out. He remains the only Test player to pass 300 in one day's play. His eventual score of 334 was a world-record, exceeding the previous mark of 325 by Andy Sandham. Bradman dominated the Australian innings; the second-highest tally was 77 by Alan Kippax. Businessman Arthur Whitelaw later presented Bradman with a cheque for £1,000 in appreciation of his achievement. The match ended in anti-climax as poor weather prevented a result, as it also did in the Fourth Test.
In the deciding Test at The Oval, England made 405. During an innings stretching over three days due to intermittent rain, Bradman made yet another multiple century, this time 232, which helped give Australia a big lead of 290 runs. In a crucial partnership with Archie Jackson, Bradman battled through a difficult session when England fast bowler Harold Larwood bowled short on a pitch enlivened by the rain. Wisden gave this period of play only a passing mention:
A number of English players and commentators noted Bradman's discomfort in playing the short, rising delivery. The revelation came too late for this particular match, but was to have immense significance in the next Ashes series. Australia won the match by an innings and regained the Ashes. The victory made an impact in Australia. With the economy sliding toward depression and unemployment rapidly rising, the country found solace in sporting triumph. The story of a self-taught 22-year-old from the bush who set a series of records against the old rival made Bradman a national hero. The statistics Bradman achieved on the tour, especially in the Test matches, broke records for the day and some have stood the test of time. In all, Bradman scored 974 runs at an average of 139.14 during the Test series, with four centuries, including two double hundreds and a triple. As of 2018, no-one has matched or exceeded 974 runs or three double centuries in one Test series; the record of 974 runs exceeds the second-best performance by 69 runs and was achieved in two fewer innings. Bradman's first-class tally, 2,960 runs (at an average of 98.66 with 10 centuries), was another enduring record: the most by any overseas batsman on a tour of England.
On the tour, the dynamic nature of Bradman's batting contrasted sharply with his quiet, solitary off-field demeanour. He was described as aloof from his teammates and he did not offer to buy them a round of drinks, let alone share the money given to him by Whitelaw. Bradman spent a lot of his free time alone, writing, as he had sold the rights to a book. On his return to Australia, Bradman was surprised by the intensity of his reception; he became a "reluctant hero". Mick Simmons wanted to cash in on their employee's newly won fame. They asked Bradman to leave his teammates and attend official receptions they organised in Adelaide, Melbourne, Goulburn, his hometown Bowral and Sydney, where he received a brand new custom-built Chevrolet. At each stop, Bradman received a level of adulation that "embarrassed" him. This focus on individual accomplishment, in a team game, "... permanently damaged relationships with his contemporaries". Commenting on Australia's victory, the team's vice-captain Vic Richardson said, "... we could have played any team without Bradman, but we could not have played the blind school without Clarrie Grimmett". A modest Bradman can be heard in a 1930 recording saying "I have always endeavoured to do my best for the side, and the few centuries that have come my way have been achieved in the hope of winning matches. My one idea when going into bat was to make runs for Australia."
Reluctant hero
In 1930–31, against the first West Indian side to visit Australia, Bradman's scoring was more sedate than in England—although he did make 223 in 297 minutes in the Third Test at Brisbane and 152 in 154 minutes in the following Test at Melbourne. However, he scored quickly in a very successful sequence of innings against the South Africans in the Australian summer of 1931–32. For NSW against the tourists, he made 30, 135 and 219. In the Test matches, he scored , , 2 and ; his 299 not out in the Fourth Test, at Adelaide, set a new record for the highest score in a Test in Australia. Australia won nine of the ten Tests played over the two series.
At this point, Bradman had played 15 Test matches since the beginning of 1930, scoring 2,227 runs at an average of 131. He had played 18 innings, scoring 10 centuries, six of which had extended beyond 200. His overall scoring rate was 42 runs per hour, with 856 (or 38.5% of his tally) scored in boundaries. Significantly, he had not hit a six, which typified Bradman's attitude: if he hit the ball along the ground, then it could not be caught. During this phase of his career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a "machine-like" approach to batting. The South African fast bowler Sandy Bell described bowling to him as, "heart-breaking ... with his sort of cynical grin, which rather reminds one of the Sphinx ... he never seems to perspire".
Between these two seasons, Bradman seriously contemplated playing professional cricket in England with the Lancashire League club Accrington, a move that, according to the rules of the day, would have ended his Test career. A consortium of three Sydney businesses offered an alternative. They devised a two-year contract whereby Bradman wrote for Associated Newspapers, broadcast on Radio 2UE and promoted the menswear retailing chain FJ Palmer and Son. However, the contract increased Bradman's dependence on his public profile, making it more difficult to maintain the privacy that he ardently desired.
Bradman's chaotic wedding to Jessie Menzies in April 1932 epitomised these new and unwelcome intrusions into his private life. The church "was under siege all throughout the day ... uninvited guests stood on chairs and pews to get a better view"; police erected barriers that were broken down and many of those invited could not get a seat. Just weeks later, Bradman joined a private team organised by Arthur Mailey to tour the United States and Canada. He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. Playing 51 games in 75 days, Bradman scored 3,779 runs at 102.1, with 18 centuries. Although the standard of play was not high, the effects of the amount of cricket Bradman had played in the three previous years, together with the strains of his celebrity status, began to show on his return home.
Bodyline
Within the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), which administered English cricket at the time, few voices were more influential than "Plum" Warner's, who, when considering England's response to Bradman, wrote that it "must evolve a new type of bowler and develop fresh ideas and strange tactics to curb his almost uncanny skill". To that end, Warner orchestrated the appointment of Douglas Jardine as England captain in 1931, as a prelude to Jardine leading the 1932–33 tour to Australia, with Warner as team manager. Remembering that Bradman had struggled against bouncers during his 232 at The Oval in 1930, Jardine decided to combine traditional leg theory with short-pitched bowling to combat Bradman. He settled on the Nottinghamshire fast bowlers Harold Larwood and Bill Voce as the spearheads for his tactics. In support, the England selectors chose another three pacemen for the squad. The unusually high number of fast bowlers caused a lot of comment in both countries and roused Bradman's own suspicions.
Bradman had other problems to deal with at this time; among these were bouts of illness from an undiagnosed malaise which had begun during the tour of North America, and that the Australian Board of Control had initially refused permission for him to write a column for the Sydney Sun. Bradman, who had signed a two-year contract with the newspaper, threatened to withdraw from cricket to honour his contract when the board denied him permission to write; eventually, the paper released Bradman from the contract, in a victory for the board. In three first-class games against England before the Tests, Bradman averaged just 17.16 in 6 innings. Jardine decided to give the new tactics a trial in only one game, a fixture against an Australian XI at Melbourne. In this match, Bradman faced the leg theory and later warned local administrators that trouble was brewing if it continued. He withdrew from the First Test at the Sydney Cricket Ground amid rumours that he had suffered a nervous breakdown. Despite his absence, England employed what were already becoming known as the Bodyline tactics against the Australian batsmen and won an ill-tempered match.
The public clamoured for the return of Bradman to defeat Bodyline: "he was the batsman who could conquer this cankerous bowling ... 'Bradmania', amounting almost to religious fervour, demanded his return". Recovered from his indisposition, Bradman returned to the side in Alan Kippax's position. A world record crowd of 63,993 at the MCG saw Bradman come to the crease on the first day of the Second Test with the score at 2/67. A standing ovation ensued that delayed play for several minutes. Bradman anticipated receiving a bouncer as his first ball and, as the bowler delivered, he moved across his stumps to play the hook shot. The ball failed to rise and Bradman dragged it onto his stumps; the first-ball duck was his first in a Test. The crowd fell into stunned silence as he walked off. However, Australia took a first innings lead in the match, and another record crowd on 2 January 1933 watched Bradman hit a counter-attacking second innings century. His unbeaten 103 (from 146 balls) in a team total of 191 helped set England a target of 251 to win. Bill O'Reilly and Bert Ironmonger bowled Australia to a series-levelling victory amid hopes that Bodyline was beaten.
The Third Test at the Adelaide Oval proved pivotal. There were angry crowd scenes after the Australian captain Bill Woodfull and wicket-keeper Bert Oldfield were hit by bouncers. An apologetic Plum Warner entered the Australian dressing room and was rebuked by Woodfull. Woodfull's remarks (that "...there are two teams out there and only one of them is playing cricket") were leaked to the press, and Warner and others attributed this to Australian opening batsman Jack Fingleton, however for many years (even after Fingleton's death) a bitter war of accusation passed between Fingleton and Bradman as to who was the real source of the leak. In a cable to the MCC, the Australian Board of Control repeated the allegation of poor sportsmanship directed at Warner by Woodfull. With the support of the MCC, England continued with Bodyline despite Australian protests. The tourists won the last three Tests convincingly and regained the Ashes. Bradman caused controversy with his own tactics. Always seeking to score, and with the leg side packed with fielders, he often backed away and hit the ball into the vacant half of the outfield with unorthodox shots reminiscent of tennis or golf. This brought him 396 runs (at 56.57) for the series and plaudits for attempting to find a solution to Bodyline, although his series average was just 57% of his career mean. Jack Fingleton was in no doubt that Bradman's game altered irrevocably as a consequence of Bodyline, writing:
The constant glare of celebrity and the tribulations of the season forced Bradman to reappraise his life outside the game and to seek a career away from his cricketing fame. Harry Hodgetts, a South Australian delegate to the Board of Control, offered Bradman work as a stockbroker if he would relocate to Adelaide and captain South Australia (SA). Unknown to the public, the SA Cricket Association (SACA) instigated Hodgetts' approach and subsidised Bradman's wage. Although his wife was hesitant about moving, Bradman eventually agreed to the deal in February 1934.
Declining health and a brush with death
In his farewell season for NSW, Bradman averaged 132.44, his best yet. He was appointed vice-captain for the 1934 tour of England. However, "he was unwell for much of the [English] summer, and reports in newspapers hinted that he was suffering from heart trouble". Although he again started with a double century at Worcester, his famed concentration soon deserted him. Wisden wrote:
At one stage, Bradman went 13 first-class innings without a century, the longest such spell of his career, prompting suggestions that Bodyline had eroded his confidence and altered his technique. After three Tests, the series was one–one and Bradman had scored 133 runs in five innings. The Australians travelled to Sheffield and played a warm up game before the Fourth Test. Bradman started slowly and then, "... the old Bradman [was] back with us, in the twinkling of an eye, almost". He went on to make 140, with the last 90 runs coming in just 45 minutes. On the opening day of the Fourth Test at Headingley (Leeds), England were out for 200, but Australia slumped to 3/39, losing the third wicket from the last ball of the day. Listed to bat at number five, Bradman would start his innings the next day.
That evening, Bradman declined an invitation to dinner from Neville Cardus, telling the journalist that he wanted an early night because the team needed him to make a double century the next day. Cardus pointed out that his previous innings on the ground was 334, and the law of averages was against another such score. Bradman told Cardus, "I don't believe in the law of averages". In the event, Bradman batted all of the second day and into the third, putting on a then world record partnership of 388 with Bill Ponsford. When he was finally out for 304 (473 balls, 43 fours and 2 sixes), Australia had a lead of 350 runs, but rain prevented them from forcing a victory. The effort of the lengthy innings stretched Bradman's reserves of energy, and he did not play again until the Fifth Test at The Oval, the match that would decide the Ashes.
In the first innings at The Oval, Bradman and Ponsford recorded an even more massive partnership, this time 451 runs. It had taken them less than a month to break the record they had set at Headingley; this new world record was to last 57 years. Bradman's share of the stand was 244 from 271 balls, and the Australian total of 701 set up victory by 562 runs. For the fourth time in five series, the Ashes changed hands. England would not recover them again until after Bradman's retirement.
Seemingly restored to full health, Bradman blazed two centuries in the last two games of the tour. However, when he returned to London to prepare for the trip home, he experienced severe abdominal pain. It took a doctor more than 24 hours to diagnose acute appendicitis and a surgeon operated immediately. Bradman lost a lot of blood during the four-hour procedure and peritonitis set in. Penicillin and sulphonamides were still experimental treatments at this time; peritonitis was usually a fatal condition. On 25 September, the hospital issued a statement that Bradman was struggling for his life and that blood donors were needed urgently.
"The effect of the announcement was little short of spectacular". The hospital could not deal with the number of donors, and closed its switchboard in the face of the avalanche of telephone calls generated by the news. Journalists were asked by their editors to prepare obituaries. Teammate Bill O'Reilly took a call from King George V's secretary asking that the King be kept informed of the situation. Jessie Bradman started the month-long journey to London as soon as she received the news. En route, she heard a rumour that her husband had died. A telephone call clarified the situation and by the time she reached London, Bradman had begun a slow recovery. He followed medical advice to convalesce, taking several months to return to Australia and missing the 1934–35 Australian season.
Internal politics and the Test captaincy
There was off-field intrigue in Australian cricket during the antipodean winter of 1935. Australia, scheduled to make a tour of South Africa at the end of the year, needed to replace the retired Bill Woodfull as captain. The Board of Control wanted Bradman to lead the team, yet, on 8 August, the board announced Bradman's withdrawal from the team due to a lack of fitness. Surprisingly, in the light of this announcement, Bradman led the South Australian team in a full programme of matches that season.
The captaincy was given to Vic Richardson, Bradman's predecessor as South Australian captain. Cricket author Chris Harte's analysis of the situation is that a prior (unspecified) commercial agreement forced Bradman to remain in Australia. Harte attributed an ulterior motive to his relocation: the off-field behaviour of Richardson and other South Australian players had displeased the South Australia Cricket Association (SACA), which was looking for new leadership. To help improve discipline, Bradman became a committeeman of the SACA, and a selector of the South Australian and Australian teams. He took his adopted state to its first Sheffield Shield title for 10 years, Bradman weighing in with personal contributions of 233 against Queensland and 357 against Victoria. He finished the season with 369 (in 233 minutes), a South Australian record, made against Tasmania. The bowler who dismissed him, Reginald Townley, would later become leader of the Tasmanian Liberal Party.
Australia defeated South Africa 4–0 and senior players such as Bill O'Reilly were pointed in their comments about the enjoyment of playing under Richardson's captaincy. A group of players who were openly hostile toward Bradman formed during the tour. For some, the prospect of playing under Bradman was daunting, as was the knowledge that he would additionally be sitting in judgement of their abilities in his role as a selector.
To start the new season, the Test side played a "Rest of Australia" team, captained by Bradman, at Sydney in early October 1936. The Test XI suffered a big defeat, due to Bradman's 212 and a haul of 12 wickets taken by leg-spinner Frank Ward. Bradman let the members of the Test team know that despite their recent success, the team still required improvement. Shortly afterwards, Bradman's first child was born on 28 October, but died the next day. He took time out of cricket for two weeks and on his return made 192 in three hours against Victoria in the last match before the beginning of the Ashes series.
The Test selectors made five changes to the team who had played in the previous Test match. Significantly, Australia's most successful bowler Clarrie Grimmett was replaced by Ward, one of four players making their debut. Bradman's role in Grimmett's omission from the team was controversial and it became a theme that dogged Bradman as Grimmett continued to be prolific in domestic cricket while his successors were ineffective—he was regarded as having finished the veteran bowler's Test career in a political purge.
Australia fell to successive defeats in the opening two Tests, Bradman making two ducks in his four innings, and it seemed that the captaincy was affecting his form. The selectors made another four changes to the team for the Third Test at Melbourne.
Bradman won the toss on New Year's Day 1937, but again failed with the bat, scoring just 13. The Australians could not take advantage of a pitch that favoured batting, and finished the day at 6/181. On the second day, rain dramatically altered the course of the game. With the sun drying the pitch (in those days, covers could not be used during matches) Bradman declared to get England in to bat while the pitch was "sticky"; England also declared to get Australia back in, conceding a lead of 124. Bradman countered by reversing his batting order to protect his run-makers while conditions improved. The ploy worked and Bradman went in at number seven. In an innings spread over three days, he battled influenza while scoring 270 off 375 balls, sharing a record partnership of 346 with Jack Fingleton, and Australia went on to victory. In 2001, Wisden rated this performance as the best Test match innings of all time.
The next Test, at the Adelaide Oval, was fairly even until Bradman played another patient second innings, making 212 from 395 balls. Australia levelled the series when the erratic left-arm spinner "Chuck" Fleetwood-Smith bowled Australia to victory. In the series-deciding Fifth Test, Bradman returned to a more aggressive style in top-scoring with 169 (off 191 balls) in Australia's 604 and Australia won by an innings. Australia's achievement of winning a Test series after outright losses in the first two matches has never been repeated in Test cricket.
End of an era
During the 1938 tour of England, Bradman played the most consistent cricket of his career.
He needed to score heavily as England had a strengthened batting line-up, while the Australian bowling was over-reliant on O'Reilly. Grimmett was overlooked, but Jack Fingleton made the team, so the clique of anti-Bradman players remained. Playing 26 innings on tour, Bradman recorded 13 centuries (a new Australian record) and again made 1,000 first-class runs before the end of May, becoming the only player to do so twice. In scoring 2,429 runs, Bradman achieved the highest average ever recorded in an English season: 115.66.
In the First Test, England amassed a big first innings score and looked likely to win, but Stan McCabe made 232 for Australia, a performance Bradman rated as the best he had ever seen. With Australia forced to follow-on, Bradman fought hard to ensure McCabe's effort was not in vain, and he secured the draw with 144 not out. It was the slowest Test hundred of his career and he played a similar innings of 102 not out in the next Test as Australia struggled to another draw. Rain completely washed out the Third Test at Old Trafford.
Australia's opportunity came at Headingley, a Test described by Bradman as the best he ever played in. England batted first and made 223. During the Australian innings, Bradman backed himself by opting to bat on in poor light conditions, reasoning that Australia could score more runs in bad light on a good pitch than on a rain affected pitch in good light, when he had the option to go off. He scored 103 out of a total of 242 and the gamble paid off, as it meant there was sufficient time to push for victory when an England collapse left them a target of only 107 to win. Australia slumped to 4/61, with Bradman out for 16. An approaching storm threatened to wash the game out, but the poor weather held off and Australia managed to secure the win, a victory that retained the Ashes. For the only time in his life, the tension of the occasion got to Bradman and he could not watch the closing stages of play, a reflection of the pressure that he felt all tour: he described the captaincy as "exhausting" and said he "found it difficult to keep going".
The euphoria of securing the Ashes preceded Australia's heaviest defeat. At The Oval, England amassed a world record of 7/903 and their opening batsman Len Hutton scored an individual world record, by making 364. In an attempt to relieve the burden on his bowlers, Bradman took a rare turn at bowling. During his third over, he fractured his ankle and teammates carried him from the ground. With Bradman injured and Fingleton unable to bat because of a leg muscle strain, Australia were thrashed by an innings and 579 runs, which remains the largest margin in Test cricket history. Unfit to complete the tour, Bradman left the team in the hands of vice-captain Stan McCabe. At this point, Bradman felt that the burden of captaincy would prevent him from touring England again, although he did not make his doubts public.
Despite the pressure of captaincy, Bradman's batting form remained supreme. An experienced, mature player now commonly called "The Don" had replaced the blitzing style of his early days as the "Boy from Bowral". In 1938–39, he led South Australia to the Sheffield Shield and made a century in six consecutive innings to equal CB Fry's world record. Bradman totalled 21 first-class centuries in 34 innings, from the beginning of the 1938 tour of England (including preliminary games in Australia) until early 1939.
The next season, Bradman made an abortive bid to join the Victoria state side. The Melbourne Cricket Club advertised the position of club secretary and he was led to believe that if he applied, he would get the job. The position, which had been held by Hugh Trumble until his death in August 1938, was one of the most prestigious jobs in Australian cricket. The annual salary of £1,000 would make Bradman financially secure while allowing him to retain a connection with the game. On 18 January 1939, the club's committee, on the casting vote of the chairman, chose former Test batsman Vernon Ransford over Bradman.
The 1939–40 season was Bradman's most productive ever for SA: 1,448 runs at an average of 144.8. He made three double centuries, including 251 not out against NSW, the innings that he rated the best he ever played in the Sheffield Shield, as he tamed Bill O'Reilly at the height of his form. However, it was the end of an era. The outbreak of World War II led to the indefinite postponement of all cricket tours, and the suspension of the Sheffield Shield competition.
Troubled war years
Bradman joined the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) on 28 June 1940 and was passed fit for air crew duty. The RAAF had more recruits than it could equip and train and Bradman spent four months in Adelaide before the Governor-General of Australia, Lord Gowrie, persuaded Bradman to transfer to the army, a move that was criticised as a safer option for him. Given the rank of lieutenant, he was posted to the Army School of Physical Training at Frankston, Victoria, to act as a divisional supervisor of physical training. The exertion of the job aggravated his chronic muscular problems, diagnosed as fibrositis. Surprisingly, in light of his batting prowess, a routine army test revealed that Bradman had poor eyesight.
Invalided out of service in June 1941, Bradman spent months recuperating, unable even to shave himself or comb his hair due to the extent of the muscular pain he suffered. He resumed stockbroking during 1942. In his biography of Bradman, Charles Williams expounded the theory that the physical problems were psychosomatic, induced by stress and possibly depression; Bradman read the book's manuscript and did not disagree. Had any cricket been played at this time, he would not have been available. Although he found some relief in 1945 when referred to the Melbourne masseur Ern Saunders, Bradman permanently lost the feeling in the thumb and index finger of his (dominant) right hand.
In June 1945, Bradman faced a financial crisis when the firm of Harry Hodgetts collapsed due to fraud and embezzlement. Bradman moved quickly to set up his own business, utilising Hodgetts' client list and his old office in Grenfell Street, Adelaide. The fallout led to a prison term for Hodgetts, and left a stigma attached to Bradman's name in the city's business community for many years.
However, the SA Cricket Association had no hesitation in appointing Bradman as their delegate to the Board of Control in place of Hodgetts. Now working alongside some of the men he had battled in the 1930s, Bradman quickly became a leading light in the administration of the game. With the resumption of international cricket, he was once more appointed a Test selector, and played a major role in planning for post-war cricket.
"The ghost of a once great cricketer"
In 1945–46, Bradman suffered regular bouts of fibrositis while coming to terms with increased administrative duties and the establishment of his business. He played for South Australia in two matches to help with the re-establishment of first-class cricket and later described his batting as "painstaking". Batting against the Australian Services cricket team, Bradman scored 112 in less than two hours, yet Dick Whitington (playing for the Services) wrote, "I have seen today the ghost of a once great cricketer". Bradman declined a tour of New Zealand and spent the winter of 1946 wondering whether he had played his last match. "With the English team due to arrive for the 1946–47 Ashes series, the media and the public were anxious to know if Bradman would lead Australia." His doctor recommended against a return to the game.
Encouraged by his wife, Bradman agreed to play in lead-up fixtures to the Test series. After hitting two centuries, Bradman made himself available for the First Test at The Gabba.
Controversy emerged on the first day of the First Test at Brisbane. After compiling an uneasy 28 runs, Bradman hit a ball to the gully fieldsman, Jack Ikin. "An appeal for a catch was denied in the umpire's contentious ruling that it was a bump ball". At the end of the over, England captain Wally Hammond spoke with Bradman and criticised him for not "walking"; "from then on the series was a cricketing war just when most people desired peace", Whitington wrote. Bradman regained his finest pre-war form in making 187, followed by 234 during the Second Test at Sydney (Sid Barnes also scored 234 during the innings, many in a still standing record 405 run 5th Wicket partnership with Bradman. Barnes later recalled that he purposely got out on 234 because "it wouldn't be right for someone to make more runs than Bradman"). Australia won both matches by an innings. Jack Fingleton speculated that had the decision at Brisbane gone against him, Bradman would have retired, such were his fitness problems. In the remainder of the series, Bradman made three half-centuries in six innings, but was unable to make another century; nevertheless, his team won handsomely, 3–0. He was the leading batsman on either side, with an average of 97.14. Nearly 850,000 spectators watched the Tests, which helped lift public spirits after the war.
Century of centuries and "The Invincibles"
India made its first tour of Australia in the 1947–48 season. On 15 November, Bradman made 172 against them for an Australian XI at Sydney, his 100th first-class century. The first non-Englishman to achieve the milestone, Bradman remains the only Australian to have done so. In five Tests, he scored 715 runs (at 178.75 average). His last double century (201) came at Adelaide, and he scored a century in each innings of the Melbourne Test. On the eve of the Fifth Test, he announced that the match would be his last in Australia, although he would tour England as a farewell.
Australia had assembled one of the great teams of cricket history. Bradman made it known that he wanted to go through the tour unbeaten, a feat never before accomplished. English spectators were drawn to the matches knowing that it would be their last opportunity to see Bradman in action. RC Robertson-Glasgow observed of Bradman that:
Despite his waning powers, Bradman compiled 11 centuries on the tour, amassing 2,428 runs (average 89.92). His highest score of the tour (187) came against Essex, when Australia compiled a world record of 721 runs in a day. In the Tests, he scored a century at Trent Bridge, but the performance most like his pre-war exploits came in the Fourth Test at Headingley. England declared on the last morning of the game, setting Australia a world record 404 runs to win in only 345 minutes on a heavily worn pitch. In partnership with Arthur Morris (182), Bradman reeled off 173 not out and the match was won with 15 minutes to spare. The journalist Ray Robinson called the victory "the 'finest ever' in its conquest of seemingly insuperable odds".
In the final Test at The Oval, Bradman walked out to bat in Australia's first innings. He received a standing ovation from the crowd and three cheers from the opposition. His Test batting average stood at 101.39. Facing the wrist-spin of Eric Hollies, Bradman pushed forward to the second ball that he faced, was deceived by a googly, and bowled between bat and pad for a duck. An England batting collapse resulted in an innings defeat, denying Bradman the opportunity to bat again and so his career average finished at 99.94; if he had scored just four runs in his last innings, it would have been 100. A story developed over the years that claimed Bradman missed the ball because of tears in his eyes, a claim Bradman denied for the rest of his life.
The Australian team won the Ashes 4–0, completed the tour unbeaten, and entered history as "The Invincibles". Just as Bradman's legend grew, rather than diminished, over the years, so too has the reputation of the 1948 team. For Bradman, it was the most personally fulfilling period of his playing days, as the divisiveness of the 1930s had passed. He wrote:
With Bradman now retired from professional cricket, RC Robertson-Glasgow wrote of the English reaction "... a miracle has been removed from among us. So must ancient Italy have felt when she heard of the death of Hannibal".
Statistical summary
Test match performance
First-class performance
Test records
Bradman still holds the following significant records for Test match cricket:
Batting average
Highest career batting average (minimum 20 innings): 99.94
Highest series batting average (minimum 4-Test series): 201.50 (1931–32); also second-highest: 178.75 (1947–48)
Conversion rate
Highest percentage of centuries per innings played: 36.25% (29 centuries from 80 innings)
Highest percentage of double centuries per innings played: 15% (12 double centuries from 80 innings)
Highest 50/100 conversion rate (minimum 2000 runs): 69.05% (29 centuries converted from 42 innings of ≥ 50 runs)
Highest 100/200 conversion rate (minimum 2000 runs): 41.38% (12 double centuries converted from 29 innings of ≥ 100 runs)
Multiples of 100 runs
Most double centuries: 12
Most double centuries in a series: 3 (1930); also 2 (1931–32, 1934, 1936–37)
Most triple centuries: 2 (equal with Chris Gayle, Brian Lara and Virender Sehwag) Note: Bradman was stranded on 299* in the 4th Test against South Africa in 1932.
Scoring rate
Most centuries accumulated within single sessions of play: 6 (1 pre lunch, 2 lunch-tea, 3 tea-stumps)
Most runs in one day's play: 309 (1930)
Fastest to multiples of 1000 runs
Fewest matches required to reach 1000 (7 matches), 2000 (15 matches), 3000 (23 matches), 4000 (31 matches), 5000 (36 matches) and 6000 (45 matches) Test runs.
Fewest innings required to reach 2000 (22 innings), 3000 (33 innings), 4000 (48 innings), 5000 (56 innings) and 6000 (68 innings) Test runs.
Other
Highest peak Test batting rating: 961
Highest percentage of team runs over career: 24.28%
Highest 5th wicket partnership: 405 (with Sid Barnes, 1946–47)
Highest score by a number 7 batsman: 270 (1936–37)
Most runs against one opponent: 5,028 (England)
Most hundreds against one opponent: 19 (England)
Most runs in one series: 974 (1930)
Most consecutive matches in which he made a century: 6 (the last three Tests in 1936–37, and the first three Tests in 1938)
Cricket context
Bradman's Test batting average of 99.94 has become one of cricket's most famous, iconic statistics. No other player who has played more than 20 Test match innings has finished their career with a Test average of more than 62. Bradman scored centuries at a rate better than one every three innings—in 80 Test innings, Bradman scored 29 centuries. Only 11 players have since surpassed his total, all at a much slower rate: the next fastest player to reach 29 centuries, Sachin Tendulkar, required nearly twice as long (148 innings) to do so.
In addition, Bradman's total of 12 Test double hundreds—comprising 15% of his innings—remains the most achieved by any Test batsman and was accumulated faster than any other total.
For comparison, the next highest totals of Test double hundreds are Kumar Sangakkara's 11 in 223 innings (4.9%), Brian Lara's 9 in 232 innings (3.9%), and Wally Hammond's 7 in 140 innings (5%); the next highest rate of scoring Test double centuries was achieved by Vinod Kambli, whose 21 innings included 2 double centuries (9.5%).
World sport context
Wisden hailed Bradman as, "the greatest phenomenon in the history of cricket, indeed in the history of all ball games". Statistician Charles Davis analysed the statistics for several prominent sportsmen by comparing the number of standard deviations that they stand above the mean for their sport. The top performers in his selected sports are:
The statistics show that "no other athlete dominates an international sport to the extent that Bradman does cricket". In order to post a similarly dominant career statistic as Bradman, a baseball batter would need a career batting average of .392, while a basketball player would need to score an average of 43.0 points per game over their career. The respective records are .366 and 30.1.
When Bradman died, Time allocated a space in its "Milestones" column for an obituary:
Playing style
Bradman's early development was shaped by the high bounce of the ball on matting-over-concrete pitches. He favoured "horizontal-bat" shots (such as the hook, pull and cut) to deal with the bounce and devised a unique grip on the bat handle that would accommodate these strokes without compromising his ability to defend. Employing a side-on stance at the wicket, Bradman kept perfectly still as the bowler ran in. His backswing had a "crooked" look that troubled his early critics, but he resisted entreaties to change. His backswing kept his hands in close to the body, leaving him perfectly balanced and able to change his stroke mid-swing, if need be. Another telling factor was the decisiveness of Bradman's footwork. He "used the crease" by either coming metres down the pitch to drive, or playing so far back that his feet ended up level with the stumps when playing the cut, hook or pull.
Bradman's game evolved with experience. He temporarily adapted his technique during the Bodyline series, deliberately moving around the crease in an attempt to score from the short-pitched deliveries. At his peak, in the mid-1930s, he had the ability to switch between a defensive and attacking approach as the occasion demanded. After the Second World War, he adjusted to bat within the limitations set by his age, becoming a steady "accumulator" of runs. However, Bradman never truly mastered batting on sticky wickets. Wisden commented, "[i]f there really is a blemish on his amazing record it is ... the absence of a significant innings on one of those 'sticky dogs' of old".
After cricket
After his return to Australia, Bradman played in his own Testimonial match at Melbourne, scoring his 117th and last century, and receiving £9,342 in proceeds. In the 1949 New Year Honours, he was appointed Knight Bachelor for his services to the game, becoming the only Australian cricketer ever to be knighted. He commented that he "would have preferred to remain just Mister". The following year he published a memoir, Farewell to Cricket. Bradman accepted offers from the Daily Mail to travel with, and write about, the 1953 and 1956 Australian teams in England. The Art of Cricket, his final book published in 1958, is an instructional manual.
Bradman retired from his stockbroking business in June 1954, depending on the "comfortable" income earned as a board member of 16 publicly listed companies. His highest profile affiliation was with Argo Investments Limited, where he was chairman for a number of years. Charles Williams commented that, "[b]usiness was excluded on medical grounds, [so] the only sensible alternative was a career in the administration of the game which he loved and to which he had given most of his active life".
Bradman was honoured at a number of cricket grounds, notably when his portrait was hung in the Long Room at Lord's; until Shane Warne's portrait was added in 2005, Bradman was one of just three Australians to be honoured in this way. Bradman inaugurated a "Bradman Stand" at the Sydney Cricket Ground in January 1974; the Adelaide Oval also opened a Bradman Stand in 1990, which housed new media and corporate facilities. The Oval's Bradman Stand was demolished in 2013 as the stadium underwent an extensive re-development. Later in 1974, he attended a Lord's Taverners function in London where he experienced heart problems, which forced him to limit his public appearances to select occasions only. With his wife, Bradman returned to Bowral in 1976, where the new cricket ground was named in his honour. He gave the keynote speech at the historic Centenary Test at Melbourne in 1977.
On 16 June 1979, the Australian government awarded Bradman the nation's second-highest civilian honour at that time, Companion of the Order of Australia (AC), "in recognition of service to the sport of cricket and cricket administration". In 1980, he resigned from the ACB, to lead a more secluded life.
Administrative career
In addition to acting as one of South Australia's delegates to the Board of Control from 1945 to 1980, Bradman was a committee member of the SACA between 1935 and 1986. It is estimated that he attended 1,713 SACA meetings during this half century of service. Aside from two years in the early 1950s, he filled a selector's berth for the Test team between 1936 and 1971.
Cricket saw an increase in defensive play during the 1950s. As a selector, Bradman favoured attacking, positive cricketers who entertained the paying public. He formed an alliance with Australian captain Richie Benaud, seeking more attractive play, with some success. He served two high-profile periods as chairman of the board of Control, in 1960–63 and 1969–72. During the first, he dealt with the growing prevalence of illegal bowling actions in the game, a problem that he adjudged "the most complex I have known in cricket, because it is not a matter of fact but of opinion". The major controversy of his second stint was a proposed tour of Australia by South Africa in 1971–72. On Bradman's recommendation, the series was cancelled. Cricket journalist Michael Coward said of Bradman as an administrator:
In the late 1970s, Bradman played an important role during the World Series Cricket schism as a member of a special Australian Cricket Board committee formed to handle the crisis. He was criticised for not airing an opinion, but he dealt with World Series Cricket far more pragmatically than other administrators. Richie Benaud described Bradman as "a brilliant administrator and businessman", warning that he was not to be underestimated. As Australian captain, Ian Chappell fought with Bradman over the issue of player remuneration in the early 1970s and has suggested that Bradman was parsimonious:
Later years and death
After his wife's death in 1997, Bradman suffered "a discernible and not unexpected wilting of spirit". The next year, on his 90th birthday, he hosted a meeting with his two favourite modern players, Shane Warne and Sachin Tendulkar, but he was not seen in his familiar place at the Adelaide Oval again.
Hospitalised with pneumonia in December 2000, he returned home in the New Year and died there on 25 February 2001, aged 92.
A memorial service to mark Bradman's life was held on 25 March 2001 at St Peter's Anglican Cathedral, Adelaide. The service was attended by a host of former and current Test cricketers, as well as Australia's then prime minister, John Howard, leader of the opposition Kim Beazley and former prime minister Bob Hawke. Eulogies were given by Richie Benaud and Governor-General Sir William Deane. The service was broadcast live on ABC Television to a viewing audience of 1.45 million. A private service for family and friends was earlier held at the Centennial Park Cemetery in the suburb of Pasadena, with many people lining both Greenhill and Goodwood Roads to pay their respects as his funeral motorcade passed by.
Legacy
Cricket writer David Frith summed up the paradox of the continuing fascination with Bradman:
As early as 1939, Bradman had a Royal Navy ship named after him. Built as a fishing trawler in 1936, was taken over by the Admiralty in 1939, but was sunk by German aircraft the following year.
In the 1963 edition of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack, Bradman was selected by Neville Cardus as one of the Six Giants of the Wisden Century. This was a special commemorative selection requested by Wisden for its 100th edition. The other five players chosen were: Sydney Barnes, W. G. Grace, Jack Hobbs, Tom Richardson and Victor Trumper.
On 10 December 1985, Bradman was the first of 120 inaugural inductees into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame. He spoke of his philosophy for considering the stature of athletes:
Although modest about his own abilities and generous in his praise of other cricketers, Bradman was fully aware of the talents he possessed as a player; there is some evidence that he sought to influence his legacy. During the 1980s and 1990s, Bradman carefully selected the people to whom he gave interviews, assisting Michael Page, Roland Perry and Charles Williams, who all produced biographical works about him. Bradman also agreed to an extensive interview for ABC radio, broadcast as Bradman: The Don Declares in eight 55-minute episodes during 1988.
The most significant of these legacy projects was the Bradman Museum, opened in 1989 at the Bradman Oval in Bowral. This organisation was reformed in 1993 as a non-profit charitable Trust, called the Bradman Foundation. In 2010, it was expanded and rebranded as the International Cricket Hall of Fame.
When the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame was created in Melbourne in 1996, Bradman was made one of its 10 inaugural members. In 2000, Bradman was selected by cricket experts as one of five Wisden Cricketers of the Century. Each of the 100 members of the panel were able to select five cricketers: all 100 voted for Bradman. The ICC Cricket Hall of Fame inducted him on 19 November 2009.
Bradman's life and achievements were recognised in Australia with two notable issues. Three years before he died, he became the first living Australian to be featured on an Australian postage stamp. After his death, the Australian Government produced a 20-cent coin to commemorate his life. On 27 August 2018, to celebrate 110 years since his birth, Bradman was commemorated with a Google Doodle. To mark 150 years of the Cricketers' Almanack, Wisden named him as captain of an all-time Test World XI.
In 1999, Bradman was named in the six man shortlist for BBC Sports Personality of the Century. Asteroid 2472 Bradman discovered by Luboš Kohoutek is named in his honour.
Family life
Bradman first met Jessie Martha Menzies in 1920 when she boarded with the Bradman family, to be closer to school in Bowral. The couple married at St Paul's Anglican Church at Burwood, Sydney on 30 April 1932. The two had an impeccable marriage and were devoted to each other. During their 65-year marriage, Jessie was "shrewd, reliable, selfless, and above all, uncomplicated...she was the perfect foil to his concentrated, and occasionally mercurial character". Bradman paid tribute to his wife numerous times, once saying succinctly, "I would never have achieved what I achieved without Jessie".
The Bradmans lived in the same modest, suburban house in Holden Street, Kensington Park in Adelaide for all but the first three years of their married life. They experienced personal tragedy in raising their children: their first-born son died as an infant in 1936, their second son, John (born in 1939) contracted polio, and their daughter, Shirley, born in 1941, had cerebral palsy from birth. His family name proved a burden for John Bradman; he legally changed his last name to Bradsen in 1972. Although claims were made that he became estranged from his father, it was more a matter of "the pair inhabit[ing] different worlds", and the two remained in contact through the years. After the cricketer's death, a collection of personal letters written by Bradman to his close friend Rohan Rivett between 1953 and 1977 was released and gave researchers new insights into Bradman's family life, including the strain between father and son.
Bradman's reclusiveness in later life is partly attributable to the ongoing health problems of his wife, particularly following the open-heart surgery Jessie underwent in her 60s. Lady Bradman died in 1997, aged 88, from cancer. This had a dispiriting effect on Bradman, but the relationship with his son improved, to the extent that John resolved to change his name back to Bradman. Since his father's death, John Bradman has become the spokesperson for the family and has been involved in defending the Bradman legacy in a number of disputes. The relationship between Bradman and his wider family is less clear, although nine months after Bradman's death, his nephew Paul Bradman criticised him as a "snob" and a "loner" who forgot his connections in Bowral and who failed to attend the funerals of Paul's mother and father.
The operatic soprano Greta Bradman is his granddaughter.
In popular culture
Bradman's name has become an archetypal name for outstanding excellence, both within cricket and in the wider world. The term Bradmanesque has been coined and is used both within and outside cricketing circles. Steve Waugh described Sri Lankan Muttiah Muralitharan as "the Don Bradman of bowling".
Bradman has been the subject of more biographies than any other Australian, apart from the bushranger Ned Kelly. Bradman himself wrote four books: Don Bradman's Book–The Story of My Cricketing Life with Hints on Batting, Bowling and Fielding (1930), My Cricketing Life (1938), Farewell to Cricket (1950) and The Art of Cricket (1958). The story of the Bodyline series was retold in a 1984 television mini-series, with Gary Sweet portraying Bradman.
Bradman is immortalised in three popular songs from different eras, "Our Don Bradman" (1930s, by Jack O'Hagan), "Bradman" (1980s, by Paul Kelly), and "Sir Don", (a tribute by John Williamson performed at Bradman's memorial service). Bradman recorded several songs accompanying himself and others on piano in the early 1930s, including "Every Day Is A Rainbow Day For Me", with Jack Lumsdaine. In 2000, the Australian Government made it illegal for the names of corporations to suggest a link to "Sir Donald Bradman", if such a link does not in fact exist. Other entities with similar protection are the Australian and foreign governments, Saint Mary MacKillop, the Royal Family and the Returned and Services League of Australia.
Bibliography
How to Play Cricket (2013) by Don Bradman, Orient Paperbacks,
See also
List of Test cricket records
ICC Player Rankings
References
Sources
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Davis, Charles (2000): The Best Of the Best: A New Look at the Great Cricketers and Changing Times, ABC Books. .
Dunstan, Keith (1988, rev. ed.): The Paddock That Grew, Hutchinson Australia. .
Eason, Alan (2004): The A-Z of Bradman, ABC Books. .
Fingleton, Jack (1949): Brightly Fades the Don, 1985 Pavilion Library reprint. .
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Harte, Chris (1993): A History of Australian Cricket, André Deutsch. .
Haigh, Gideon. "Sir Donald Bradman at 100." The Monthly, August 2008.
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Hutchins, Brett (2002): Don Bradman: Challenging the Myth, Cambridge University Press. .
O'Reilly, Bill (1985): Tiger – 60 Years of Cricket, William Collins. .
McGilvray, Alan & Tasker, Norman (1985): The Game Is Not the Same, ABC Books. .
Page, Michael (1983): Bradman – The Illustrated Biography, Macmillan Australia. .
Perry, Roland (1995): The Don – A Biography of Sir Donald Bradman, Macmillan. .
Robinson, Ray (1981 rev. ed.): On Top Down Under, Cassell Australia. .
Rosenwater, Irving (1978): Sir Donald Bradman – A Biography, Batsford. .
Wallace, Christine (2004): The Private Don, Allen & Unwin. .
Whitington, RS (1974): The Book of Australian Test Cricket 1877–1974, Wren Publishing. .
Williams, Charles (1996): Bradman: An Australian Hero, 2001 Abacus reprint. .
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack: various editions, accessed via ESPN Cricinfo
External links
Bradman Museum and Bradman Oval
Bradman Digital Library—State Library of South Australia
The Bradman Trail
Don Bradman on Picture Australia
Interview with Bradman 1930
Don Bradman — TV documentary — Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Some images of Don Bradman, including some showing Don Bradman's batting technique
Listen to a young Don Bradman speaking after the 1930 Ashes tour on australianscreen online
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Burials in South Australia
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D. G. Bradman's XI cricketers | false | [
"The appearances of former Australian cricketer Don Bradman in popular culture are many and varied. As a player, he first came to prominence during the 1928/29 season. His record-breaking performances on the 1930 tour of England made him a national hero in Australia. Bradman was a private person who did not enjoy the adulation associated with his fame. In cricket, a batsman who enjoys an exceptional run of form over an extended period is sometimes called Bradmanesque.\n\nBradman's name has become a generic term for outstanding excellence, both within cricket and in the wider world.\n\nCoins and stamps\nIn 1997, Australia Post issued two stamps depicting Bradman, the first living Australian to be so featured. The issue was part of a series entitled \"Australian Legends\". Another stamp featuring Bradman was issued in March 2001, after his death.\n\nIn 2001, the platypus was replaced by an image of Bradman on the obverse side of the Australia's common 20 cent coin, the first such change since the decimalisation of Australian currency in 1966. The Commonwealth Treasury issued three limited edition legal-tender coins in 2001 as a posthumous tribute to Bradman's career.\n\nFilm\nThe story of the Bodyline series was retold in the 1984 television miniseries Bodyline, in which Hugo Weaving played Douglas Jardine and Gary Sweet played Don Bradman.\n\nBradman appeared as himself in the 1936 film The Flying Doctor.\n\nIn 1996, journalist Ray Martin interviewed Bradman in a Channel 9 programme called Bradman: 87 Not Out, so named because Bradman was 87 at the time. It included his wife Lady Jessie Bradman and Sachin Tendulkar, and was later released on video.\n\nLandmarks\nThe Bradman Stand at the Sydney Cricket Ground was dedicated in 1974.\nThe Bradman Oval in Bowral was opened in 1976.\nThe Bradman Stand at the Adelaide Oval was dedicated in 1990. It was subsequently demolished as part of a redevelopment before 2014. The section of the Western Stand containing the cricket changerooms was then renamed as the \"Sir Donald Bradman Pavilion\".\nThe Bradman Gate in the Great Southern Stand at the Melbourne Cricket Ground was opened in 1992.\nBurbridge Road, a main thoroughfare in the city of Adelaide, was renamed Sir Donald Bradman Drive in 2001.\n\nLiterature\n\nAlan Eason stated that Bradman has been the subject of more biographies than any other Australian, apart from the outlaw Ned Kelly. Bradman authored four books himself:\nDon Bradman's Book: The Story of My Cricketing Life with Hints on Batting, Bowling and Fielding, published in 1930.\nMy Cricketing Life in 1938.\nFarewell to Cricket in 1950.\nThe Art of Cricket in 1958.\n\nThe following is a list of books that encompasses biographies, pictorial essays, artworks and anthologies that have been written about Bradman and his cricketing career:\nBradman by AG Moyes, Harrap 1948.\nBradman: An Australian Hero by Charles Williams, Little, Brown 1996.\nBradman and the Bodyline Series by Ted Docker, Angus & Robertson (UK) 1978.\nBradman the Great by BJ Wakley, Nicholas Kaye of London, 1959.\nBradman: The Illustrated Biography by Michael Page, Macmillan 1983.\nBradman Revisited – The Legacy of Sir Donald Bradman by AL Shillinglaw and Brian Hale, The Parrs Wood Press 2003.\nBradman's Band by Ashley Mallett, UQP 2000.\nBradman; What They Said About Him edited by Barry Morris, ABC Books 1995.\nDon Bradman by Philip Lindsay, Phoenix House 1951.\nFarewell to Bradman: A Final Tribute edited by Peter Allen, Pan Macmillan Australia 2001.\nImages of Bradman by Peter Allen and James Kemsley, Allen Kemsley Publishing 1994.\nOur Don Bradman edited by Philip Derriman, Macmillan Australia 1987.\nRemembering Bradman edited by Margaret Geddes, Penguin Group (Australia) 2002.\nSir Donald Bradman: A Biography by Irving Rosenwater, Batsford 1978.\nThe Bradman Albums drawn from the collection held by the State Library of South Australia, Rigby 1987.\nThe A–Z of Bradman by Alan Eason, ABC Books 2004.\nThe Don: A Biography of Sir Donald Bradman by Roland Perry, Macmillan 1995.\nThe Don – A Photographic Essay of a Legendary Life by Michael Page and Des Fregan, Sun-Macmillan 1988.\nThe Private Don by Christine Wallace, Allen & Unwin 2004.\nWisden on Bradman edited by Graeme Wright, Hardie Grant Books 1998.\nThe Art of Bradman text by Richard Mulvaney, Artwork by Brian Clinton, Funtastic Ltd. 2003.\n\nMuseum\nIn 1987, the Bradman museum opened at the Bradman Oval in Bowral.\n\nPlants\nThe Sir Donald Bradman Rose, a hybrid tea rose bred by Meilland International, was released in June 2002.\n\nSporting Awards\nThe Sport Australia Hall of Fame Awards was inaugurated in 1985 with Bradman as its first inductee.\n\"The Don\" award is made annually and was first awarded in 1998 to, \"honour a current Australian athlete who, by their achievements and example over the last 12 months, are considered to have had the capacity to most inspire the nation.\" Award-winners do not receive immediate induction into the Hall of Fame, they become eligible for nomination after retirement, the same rule that applies to all athletes. So far, 12 winners have been named.\nThe South Australian Cricket Association presents the Bradman Medal every season to the best player in Adelaide's Grade cricket competition.\nCricket Australia presents the Bradman Young Cricketer of the Year award at the annual Allan Border Medal night.\n\nSong\nBradman is immortalised in some popular songs of very different styles and eras.\n\"Our Don Bradman\", a jaunty ditty written by Jack O'Hagan and performed by Art Leonard, was recorded during 1930.\n\"Bradman\" written and performed by Paul Kelly, appeared on the CD release of Kelly's 1987 album Under the Sun.\n\"The Tiger And The Don\", written and performed by Ted Egan (~1990)\n\"Sir Don\", a 1996 tribute written by John Williamson, who performed it at Bradman's Memorial Service.\nHe was also featured in the famous \"Eulogy Song\" written by Chris Taylor of The Chaser, in which his bad temper and overall crankiness was outlined.\n\nOther \nIn the Italian campaign of the Second World War, \"Bradman will be batting tomorrow\" were the code words used by allied forces to signal their attack on the Monte Cassino monastery.\n\nA popular story is that Sir Charles Moses, General Manager of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and personal friend of Bradman asked that Bradman's Test batting average be immortalised as the post office box number of the ABC. The ABC's mailing address in every capital city of Australia is PO Box 9994. There is some debate about whether the story is true, but ABC sports host Karen Tighe confirms that the number was in fact chosen in honour of Bradman, and the claim is also supported by Alan Eason in his book The A–Z of Bradman. However, the broadcaster was not assigned the box number until after Moses's successor, Sir Talbot Duckmanton, had retired. The ABC's national toll-free telephone number is 13 9994.\n\nIn 2000, the Australian Government made it illegal for the names of corporations to suggest a link to \"Sir Donald Bradman\", if such a link does not in fact exist. Other entities with similar protection are the Australian and foreign governments, the Royal Family, and ex-service men's organisations.\n\nDon Bradman Cricket 14, a video game for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Microsoft Windows was released in 2014.\n\nReferences\n\nCultural depictions of Don Bradman",
"Sir Don is a song written and recorded by Australian country singer John Williamson. The song is a tribute to Australian cricketer, Donald Bradman and $1 from each sale went towards the Bradman Museum. The song was released in June 1996 as the lead single from Williamson's thirteenth studio album Pipe Dream and peaked at number 72 on the ARIA Charts.\n\nFollowing Bradman's death in February 2001, Williamson performed the track at Bradman's Memorial Service at St Peter's Cathedral, Adelaide. The original scraps of paper this song was written on have been framed and hang in the Bradman Museum at Bowral.\n\nTrack listing\n\nWeekly charts\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences \n\nJohn Williamson (singer) songs\nSongs about Don Bradman\nCricket music\nCultural depictions of Don Bradman\n1996 songs\n1996 singles"
]
|
[
"Don Bradman",
"Reluctant hero",
"What is the relation between Don Bradman and reluctant Hero?",
"I don't know."
]
| C_ef88bed7f74d4322a1040eb8bdce83a2_1 | What is the Reluctant hero about? | 2 | What is the Reluctant hero about? | Don Bradman | In 1930-31, against the first West Indian side to visit Australia, Bradman's scoring was more sedate than in England--although he did make 223 in 297 minutes in the Third Test at Brisbane and 152 in 154 minutes in the following Test at Melbourne. However, he scored quickly in a very successful sequence of innings against the South Africans in the Australian summer of 1931-32. For NSW against the tourists, he made 30, 135 and 219. In the Test matches, he scored 226 (277 minutes), 112 (155 minutes), 2 and 167 (183 minutes); his 299 not out in the Fourth Test, at Adelaide, set a new record for the highest score in a Test in Australia. Australia won nine of the ten Tests played over the two series. At this point, Bradman had played 15 Test matches since the beginning of 1930, scoring 2,227 runs at an average of 131. He had played 18 innings, scoring 10 centuries, six of which had extended beyond 200. His overall scoring rate was 42 runs per hour, with 856 (or 38.5% of his tally) scored in boundaries. Significantly, he had not hit a six, which typified Bradman's attitude: if he hit the ball along the ground, then it could not be caught. During this phase of his career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a "machine-like" approach to batting. The South African fast bowler Sandy Bell described bowling to him as, "heart-breaking ... with his sort of cynical grin, which rather reminds one of the Sphinx ... he never seems to perspire". Between these two seasons, Bradman seriously contemplated playing professional cricket in England with the Lancashire League club Accrington, a move that, according to the rules of the day, would have ended his Test career. A consortium of three Sydney businesses offered an alternative. They devised a two-year contract whereby Bradman wrote for Associated Newspapers, broadcast on Radio 2UE and promoted the menswear retailing chain FJ Palmer and Son. However, the contract increased Bradman's dependence on his public profile, making it more difficult to maintain the privacy that he ardently desired. Bradman's chaotic wedding to Jessie Menzies in April 1932 epitomised these new and unwelcome intrusions into his private life. The church "was under siege all throughout the day ... uninvited guests stood on chairs and pews to get a better view"; police erected barriers that were broken down and many of those invited could not get a seat. Just weeks later, Bradman joined a private team organised by Arthur Mailey to tour the United States and Canada. He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. Playing 51 games in 75 days, Bradman scored 3,779 runs at 102.1, with 18 centuries. Although the standard of play was not high, the effects of the amount of cricket Bradman had played in the three previous years, together with the strains of his celebrity status, began to show on his return home. CANNOTANSWER | making it more difficult to maintain the privacy | Sir Donald George Bradman, AC (27 August 1908 – 25 February 2001), nicknamed "The Don", was an Australian international cricketer, widely acknowledged as the greatest batsman of all time. Bradman's career Test batting average of 99.94 has been cited as the greatest achievement by any sportsman in any major sport.
The story that the young Bradman practised alone with a cricket stump and a golf ball is part of Australian folklore. Bradman's meteoric rise from bush cricket to the Australian Test team took just over two years. Before his 22nd birthday, he had set many records for top scoring, some of which still stand, and became Australia's sporting idol at the height of the Great Depression.
During a 20-year playing career, Bradman consistently scored at a level that made him, in the words of former Australia captain Bill Woodfull, "worth three batsmen to Australia". A controversial set of tactics, known as Bodyline, was specially devised by the England team to curb his scoring. As a captain and administrator, Bradman was committed to attacking, entertaining cricket; he drew spectators in record numbers. He hated the constant adulation, however, and it affected how he dealt with others. The focus of attention on his individual performances strained relationships with some teammates, administrators and journalists, who thought him aloof and wary. Following an enforced hiatus due to the Second World War, he made a dramatic comeback, captaining an Australian team known as "The Invincibles" on a record-breaking unbeaten tour of England.
A complex, highly driven man, not given to close personal relationships,
Bradman retained a pre-eminent position in the game by acting as an administrator, selector and writer for three decades following his retirement. Even after he became reclusive in his declining years, his opinion was highly sought, and his status as a national icon was still recognised. Almost 50 years after his retirement as a Test player, in 1997, Prime Minister John Howard of Australia called him the "greatest living Australian". Bradman's image has appeared on postage stamps and coins, and a museum dedicated to his life was opened while he was still living. On the centenary of his birth, 27 August 2008, the Royal Australian Mint issued a $5 commemorative gold coin with Bradman's image. In 2009, he was inducted posthumously into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame.
Early years
Donald George Bradman was the youngest son of George and Emily (née Whatman) Bradman, and was born on 27 August 1908 at Cootamundra, New South Wales (NSW). He had a brother, Victor, and three sisters—Islet, Lilian and Elizabeth May. Bradman was of English heritage on both sides of his family. His grandfather Charles Andrew Bradman left Withersfield, Suffolk, for Australia. When Bradman played at Cambridge in 1930 as a 21 year old on his first tour of England, he took the opportunity to trace his forebears in the region. Also, one of his great-grandfathers was one of the first Italians to migrate to Australia in 1826. Bradman's parents lived in the hamlet of Yeo Yeo, near Stockinbingal. His mother, Emily, gave birth to him at the Cootamundra home of Granny Scholz, a midwife. That house is now the Bradman Birthplace Museum. Emily had hailed from Mittagong in the NSW Southern Highlands, and in 1911, when Don Bradman was about two-and-a-half years old, his parents decided to relocate to Bowral, close to Mittagong, to be closer to Emily's family and friends, as life at Yeo Yeo was proving difficult.
Bradman practised batting incessantly during his youth. He invented his own solo cricket game, using a cricket stump for a bat, and a golf ball. A water tank, mounted on a curved brick stand, stood on a paved area behind the family home. When hit into the curved brick facing of the stand, the ball rebounded at high speed and varying angles—and Bradman would attempt to hit it again. This form of practice developed his timing and reactions to a high degree. In more formal cricket, he hit his first century at the age of 12, with an undefeated 115 playing for Bowral Public School against Mittagong High School.
Bush cricketer
During the 1920–21 season, Bradman acted as scorer for the local Bowral team, captained by his uncle George Whatman. In October 1920, he filled in when the team was one man short, scoring 37* and 29* on debut. During the season, Bradman's father took him to the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) to watch the fifth Ashes Test match. On that day, Bradman formed an ambition. "I shall never be satisfied", he told his father, "until I play on this ground". Bradman left school in 1922 and went to work for a local real estate agent who encouraged his sporting pursuits by giving him time off when necessary. He gave up cricket in favour of tennis for two years, but resumed playing cricket in 1925–26.
Bradman became a regular selection for the Bowral team; several outstanding performances earned him the attention of the Sydney daily press. Competing on matting-over-concrete pitches, Bowral played other rural towns in the Berrima District competition. Against Wingello, a team that included the future Test bowler Bill O'Reilly, Bradman made 234. In the competition final against Moss Vale, which extended over five consecutive Saturdays, Bradman scored 320 not out. During the following Australian winter (1926), an ageing Australian team lost The Ashes in England, and a number of Test players retired. The New South Wales Cricket Association began a hunt for new talent. Mindful of Bradman's big scores for Bowral, the association wrote to him, requesting his attendance at a practice session in Sydney. He was subsequently chosen for the "Country Week" tournaments at both cricket and tennis, to be played during separate weeks. His boss presented him with an ultimatum: he could have only one week away from work, and therefore had to choose between the two sports. He chose cricket.
Bradman's performances during Country Week resulted in an invitation to play grade cricket in Sydney for St George in the 1926–27 season. He scored 110 on his debut, making his first century on a turf pitch. On 1 January 1927, he turned out for the NSW second team. For the remainder of the season, Bradman travelled the from Bowral to Sydney every Saturday to play for St George.
First-class debut
The next season continued the rapid rise of the "Boy from Bowral". Selected to replace the unfit Archie Jackson in the NSW team, Bradman made his first-class debut at the Adelaide Oval, aged 19. He secured the achievement of a hundred on debut, with an innings of 118 featuring what soon became his trademarks—fast footwork, calm confidence and rapid scoring. In the final match of the season, he made his first century at the SCG, against the Sheffield Shield champions Victoria. Despite his potential, Bradman was not chosen for the Australian second team to tour New Zealand.
Bradman decided that his chances for Test selection would be improved by moving to Sydney for the 1928–29 season, when England were to tour in defence of the Ashes. Initially, he continued working in real estate, but later took a promotions job with the sporting goods retailer Mick Simmons Ltd. In the first match of the Sheffield Shield season, he scored a century in each innings against Queensland. He followed this with scores of 87 and 132 not out against the England touring team, and was rewarded with selection for the first Test, to be played at Brisbane.
Test career
Playing in only his tenth first-class match, Bradman, nicknamed "Braddles" by his teammates, found his initial Test a harsh learning experience. Caught on a sticky wicket, Australia were all out for 66 in the second innings and lost by 675 runs (still a Test record). Following scores of 18 and 1, the selectors dropped Bradman to twelfth man for the Second Test. An injury to Bill Ponsford early in the match required Bradman to field as substitute while England amassed 636, following their 863 runs in the First Test. RS "Dick" Whitington wrote, "... he had scored only nineteen himself and these experiences appear to have provided him with food for thought". Recalled for the Third Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, Bradman scored 79 and 112 to become the youngest player to make a Test century, although the match was still lost. Another loss followed in the Fourth Test. Bradman reached 58 in the second innings and appeared set to guide the team to victory when he was run out. It was to be the only run out of his Test career. The losing margin was just 12 runs.
The improving Australians did manage to win the Fifth and final Test. Bradman top-scored with 123 in the first innings, and was at the wicket in the second innings when his captain Jack Ryder hit the winning runs. Bradman completed the season with 1,690 first-class runs, averaging 93.88, and his first multiple century in a Sheffield Shield match, 340 not out against Victoria, set a new ground record for the SCG. Bradman averaged 113.28 in 1929–30. In a trial match to select the team that would tour England, he was last man out in the first innings for 124. As his team followed on, the skipper Bill Woodfull asked Bradman to keep the pads on and open the second innings. By the end of play, he was 205 not out, on his way to 225. Against Queensland at the SCG, Bradman set a then world record for first-class cricket by scoring 452 not out; he made his runs in only 415 minutes. Not long after the feat, he recalled:
Although he was an obvious selection to tour England, Bradman's unorthodox style raised doubts that he could succeed on the slower English pitches. Percy Fender wrote:
The encomiums were not confined to his batting gifts; nor did the criticism extend to his character. "Australia has unearthed a champion", said former Australian Test great Clem Hill, "self-taught, with natural ability. But most important of all, with his heart in the right place." Selector Dick Jones weighed in with the observation that it was "good to watch him talking to an old player, listening attentively to everything that is said and then replying with a modest 'thank you'."
1930 tour of England
England were favourites to win the 1930 Ashes series, and if the Australians were to exceed expectations, their young batsmen, Bradman and Jackson, needed to prosper. With his elegant batting technique, Jackson appeared the brighter prospect of the pair. However, Bradman began the tour with 236 at Worcester and went on to score 1,000 first-class runs by the end of May, the fifth player (and first Australian) to achieve this rare feat. In his first Test appearance in England, Bradman hit 131 in the second innings but England won the match. His batting reached a new level in the Second Test at Lord's where he scored 254 as Australia won and levelled the series. Later in life, Bradman rated this the best innings of his career as, "practically without exception every ball went where it was intended to go". Wisden noted his fast footwork and how he hit the ball "all round the wicket with power and accuracy", as well as faultless concentration in keeping the ball on the ground.
In terms of runs scored, this performance was soon surpassed. In the Third Test, at Headingley, Bradman scored a century before lunch on 11 July, the first day of the Test match to equal the performances of Victor Trumper and Charlie Macartney. In the afternoon, Bradman added another century between lunch and tea, before finishing the day on 309 not out. He remains the only Test player to pass 300 in one day's play. His eventual score of 334 was a world-record, exceeding the previous mark of 325 by Andy Sandham. Bradman dominated the Australian innings; the second-highest tally was 77 by Alan Kippax. Businessman Arthur Whitelaw later presented Bradman with a cheque for £1,000 in appreciation of his achievement. The match ended in anti-climax as poor weather prevented a result, as it also did in the Fourth Test.
In the deciding Test at The Oval, England made 405. During an innings stretching over three days due to intermittent rain, Bradman made yet another multiple century, this time 232, which helped give Australia a big lead of 290 runs. In a crucial partnership with Archie Jackson, Bradman battled through a difficult session when England fast bowler Harold Larwood bowled short on a pitch enlivened by the rain. Wisden gave this period of play only a passing mention:
A number of English players and commentators noted Bradman's discomfort in playing the short, rising delivery. The revelation came too late for this particular match, but was to have immense significance in the next Ashes series. Australia won the match by an innings and regained the Ashes. The victory made an impact in Australia. With the economy sliding toward depression and unemployment rapidly rising, the country found solace in sporting triumph. The story of a self-taught 22-year-old from the bush who set a series of records against the old rival made Bradman a national hero. The statistics Bradman achieved on the tour, especially in the Test matches, broke records for the day and some have stood the test of time. In all, Bradman scored 974 runs at an average of 139.14 during the Test series, with four centuries, including two double hundreds and a triple. As of 2018, no-one has matched or exceeded 974 runs or three double centuries in one Test series; the record of 974 runs exceeds the second-best performance by 69 runs and was achieved in two fewer innings. Bradman's first-class tally, 2,960 runs (at an average of 98.66 with 10 centuries), was another enduring record: the most by any overseas batsman on a tour of England.
On the tour, the dynamic nature of Bradman's batting contrasted sharply with his quiet, solitary off-field demeanour. He was described as aloof from his teammates and he did not offer to buy them a round of drinks, let alone share the money given to him by Whitelaw. Bradman spent a lot of his free time alone, writing, as he had sold the rights to a book. On his return to Australia, Bradman was surprised by the intensity of his reception; he became a "reluctant hero". Mick Simmons wanted to cash in on their employee's newly won fame. They asked Bradman to leave his teammates and attend official receptions they organised in Adelaide, Melbourne, Goulburn, his hometown Bowral and Sydney, where he received a brand new custom-built Chevrolet. At each stop, Bradman received a level of adulation that "embarrassed" him. This focus on individual accomplishment, in a team game, "... permanently damaged relationships with his contemporaries". Commenting on Australia's victory, the team's vice-captain Vic Richardson said, "... we could have played any team without Bradman, but we could not have played the blind school without Clarrie Grimmett". A modest Bradman can be heard in a 1930 recording saying "I have always endeavoured to do my best for the side, and the few centuries that have come my way have been achieved in the hope of winning matches. My one idea when going into bat was to make runs for Australia."
Reluctant hero
In 1930–31, against the first West Indian side to visit Australia, Bradman's scoring was more sedate than in England—although he did make 223 in 297 minutes in the Third Test at Brisbane and 152 in 154 minutes in the following Test at Melbourne. However, he scored quickly in a very successful sequence of innings against the South Africans in the Australian summer of 1931–32. For NSW against the tourists, he made 30, 135 and 219. In the Test matches, he scored , , 2 and ; his 299 not out in the Fourth Test, at Adelaide, set a new record for the highest score in a Test in Australia. Australia won nine of the ten Tests played over the two series.
At this point, Bradman had played 15 Test matches since the beginning of 1930, scoring 2,227 runs at an average of 131. He had played 18 innings, scoring 10 centuries, six of which had extended beyond 200. His overall scoring rate was 42 runs per hour, with 856 (or 38.5% of his tally) scored in boundaries. Significantly, he had not hit a six, which typified Bradman's attitude: if he hit the ball along the ground, then it could not be caught. During this phase of his career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a "machine-like" approach to batting. The South African fast bowler Sandy Bell described bowling to him as, "heart-breaking ... with his sort of cynical grin, which rather reminds one of the Sphinx ... he never seems to perspire".
Between these two seasons, Bradman seriously contemplated playing professional cricket in England with the Lancashire League club Accrington, a move that, according to the rules of the day, would have ended his Test career. A consortium of three Sydney businesses offered an alternative. They devised a two-year contract whereby Bradman wrote for Associated Newspapers, broadcast on Radio 2UE and promoted the menswear retailing chain FJ Palmer and Son. However, the contract increased Bradman's dependence on his public profile, making it more difficult to maintain the privacy that he ardently desired.
Bradman's chaotic wedding to Jessie Menzies in April 1932 epitomised these new and unwelcome intrusions into his private life. The church "was under siege all throughout the day ... uninvited guests stood on chairs and pews to get a better view"; police erected barriers that were broken down and many of those invited could not get a seat. Just weeks later, Bradman joined a private team organised by Arthur Mailey to tour the United States and Canada. He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. Playing 51 games in 75 days, Bradman scored 3,779 runs at 102.1, with 18 centuries. Although the standard of play was not high, the effects of the amount of cricket Bradman had played in the three previous years, together with the strains of his celebrity status, began to show on his return home.
Bodyline
Within the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), which administered English cricket at the time, few voices were more influential than "Plum" Warner's, who, when considering England's response to Bradman, wrote that it "must evolve a new type of bowler and develop fresh ideas and strange tactics to curb his almost uncanny skill". To that end, Warner orchestrated the appointment of Douglas Jardine as England captain in 1931, as a prelude to Jardine leading the 1932–33 tour to Australia, with Warner as team manager. Remembering that Bradman had struggled against bouncers during his 232 at The Oval in 1930, Jardine decided to combine traditional leg theory with short-pitched bowling to combat Bradman. He settled on the Nottinghamshire fast bowlers Harold Larwood and Bill Voce as the spearheads for his tactics. In support, the England selectors chose another three pacemen for the squad. The unusually high number of fast bowlers caused a lot of comment in both countries and roused Bradman's own suspicions.
Bradman had other problems to deal with at this time; among these were bouts of illness from an undiagnosed malaise which had begun during the tour of North America, and that the Australian Board of Control had initially refused permission for him to write a column for the Sydney Sun. Bradman, who had signed a two-year contract with the newspaper, threatened to withdraw from cricket to honour his contract when the board denied him permission to write; eventually, the paper released Bradman from the contract, in a victory for the board. In three first-class games against England before the Tests, Bradman averaged just 17.16 in 6 innings. Jardine decided to give the new tactics a trial in only one game, a fixture against an Australian XI at Melbourne. In this match, Bradman faced the leg theory and later warned local administrators that trouble was brewing if it continued. He withdrew from the First Test at the Sydney Cricket Ground amid rumours that he had suffered a nervous breakdown. Despite his absence, England employed what were already becoming known as the Bodyline tactics against the Australian batsmen and won an ill-tempered match.
The public clamoured for the return of Bradman to defeat Bodyline: "he was the batsman who could conquer this cankerous bowling ... 'Bradmania', amounting almost to religious fervour, demanded his return". Recovered from his indisposition, Bradman returned to the side in Alan Kippax's position. A world record crowd of 63,993 at the MCG saw Bradman come to the crease on the first day of the Second Test with the score at 2/67. A standing ovation ensued that delayed play for several minutes. Bradman anticipated receiving a bouncer as his first ball and, as the bowler delivered, he moved across his stumps to play the hook shot. The ball failed to rise and Bradman dragged it onto his stumps; the first-ball duck was his first in a Test. The crowd fell into stunned silence as he walked off. However, Australia took a first innings lead in the match, and another record crowd on 2 January 1933 watched Bradman hit a counter-attacking second innings century. His unbeaten 103 (from 146 balls) in a team total of 191 helped set England a target of 251 to win. Bill O'Reilly and Bert Ironmonger bowled Australia to a series-levelling victory amid hopes that Bodyline was beaten.
The Third Test at the Adelaide Oval proved pivotal. There were angry crowd scenes after the Australian captain Bill Woodfull and wicket-keeper Bert Oldfield were hit by bouncers. An apologetic Plum Warner entered the Australian dressing room and was rebuked by Woodfull. Woodfull's remarks (that "...there are two teams out there and only one of them is playing cricket") were leaked to the press, and Warner and others attributed this to Australian opening batsman Jack Fingleton, however for many years (even after Fingleton's death) a bitter war of accusation passed between Fingleton and Bradman as to who was the real source of the leak. In a cable to the MCC, the Australian Board of Control repeated the allegation of poor sportsmanship directed at Warner by Woodfull. With the support of the MCC, England continued with Bodyline despite Australian protests. The tourists won the last three Tests convincingly and regained the Ashes. Bradman caused controversy with his own tactics. Always seeking to score, and with the leg side packed with fielders, he often backed away and hit the ball into the vacant half of the outfield with unorthodox shots reminiscent of tennis or golf. This brought him 396 runs (at 56.57) for the series and plaudits for attempting to find a solution to Bodyline, although his series average was just 57% of his career mean. Jack Fingleton was in no doubt that Bradman's game altered irrevocably as a consequence of Bodyline, writing:
The constant glare of celebrity and the tribulations of the season forced Bradman to reappraise his life outside the game and to seek a career away from his cricketing fame. Harry Hodgetts, a South Australian delegate to the Board of Control, offered Bradman work as a stockbroker if he would relocate to Adelaide and captain South Australia (SA). Unknown to the public, the SA Cricket Association (SACA) instigated Hodgetts' approach and subsidised Bradman's wage. Although his wife was hesitant about moving, Bradman eventually agreed to the deal in February 1934.
Declining health and a brush with death
In his farewell season for NSW, Bradman averaged 132.44, his best yet. He was appointed vice-captain for the 1934 tour of England. However, "he was unwell for much of the [English] summer, and reports in newspapers hinted that he was suffering from heart trouble". Although he again started with a double century at Worcester, his famed concentration soon deserted him. Wisden wrote:
At one stage, Bradman went 13 first-class innings without a century, the longest such spell of his career, prompting suggestions that Bodyline had eroded his confidence and altered his technique. After three Tests, the series was one–one and Bradman had scored 133 runs in five innings. The Australians travelled to Sheffield and played a warm up game before the Fourth Test. Bradman started slowly and then, "... the old Bradman [was] back with us, in the twinkling of an eye, almost". He went on to make 140, with the last 90 runs coming in just 45 minutes. On the opening day of the Fourth Test at Headingley (Leeds), England were out for 200, but Australia slumped to 3/39, losing the third wicket from the last ball of the day. Listed to bat at number five, Bradman would start his innings the next day.
That evening, Bradman declined an invitation to dinner from Neville Cardus, telling the journalist that he wanted an early night because the team needed him to make a double century the next day. Cardus pointed out that his previous innings on the ground was 334, and the law of averages was against another such score. Bradman told Cardus, "I don't believe in the law of averages". In the event, Bradman batted all of the second day and into the third, putting on a then world record partnership of 388 with Bill Ponsford. When he was finally out for 304 (473 balls, 43 fours and 2 sixes), Australia had a lead of 350 runs, but rain prevented them from forcing a victory. The effort of the lengthy innings stretched Bradman's reserves of energy, and he did not play again until the Fifth Test at The Oval, the match that would decide the Ashes.
In the first innings at The Oval, Bradman and Ponsford recorded an even more massive partnership, this time 451 runs. It had taken them less than a month to break the record they had set at Headingley; this new world record was to last 57 years. Bradman's share of the stand was 244 from 271 balls, and the Australian total of 701 set up victory by 562 runs. For the fourth time in five series, the Ashes changed hands. England would not recover them again until after Bradman's retirement.
Seemingly restored to full health, Bradman blazed two centuries in the last two games of the tour. However, when he returned to London to prepare for the trip home, he experienced severe abdominal pain. It took a doctor more than 24 hours to diagnose acute appendicitis and a surgeon operated immediately. Bradman lost a lot of blood during the four-hour procedure and peritonitis set in. Penicillin and sulphonamides were still experimental treatments at this time; peritonitis was usually a fatal condition. On 25 September, the hospital issued a statement that Bradman was struggling for his life and that blood donors were needed urgently.
"The effect of the announcement was little short of spectacular". The hospital could not deal with the number of donors, and closed its switchboard in the face of the avalanche of telephone calls generated by the news. Journalists were asked by their editors to prepare obituaries. Teammate Bill O'Reilly took a call from King George V's secretary asking that the King be kept informed of the situation. Jessie Bradman started the month-long journey to London as soon as she received the news. En route, she heard a rumour that her husband had died. A telephone call clarified the situation and by the time she reached London, Bradman had begun a slow recovery. He followed medical advice to convalesce, taking several months to return to Australia and missing the 1934–35 Australian season.
Internal politics and the Test captaincy
There was off-field intrigue in Australian cricket during the antipodean winter of 1935. Australia, scheduled to make a tour of South Africa at the end of the year, needed to replace the retired Bill Woodfull as captain. The Board of Control wanted Bradman to lead the team, yet, on 8 August, the board announced Bradman's withdrawal from the team due to a lack of fitness. Surprisingly, in the light of this announcement, Bradman led the South Australian team in a full programme of matches that season.
The captaincy was given to Vic Richardson, Bradman's predecessor as South Australian captain. Cricket author Chris Harte's analysis of the situation is that a prior (unspecified) commercial agreement forced Bradman to remain in Australia. Harte attributed an ulterior motive to his relocation: the off-field behaviour of Richardson and other South Australian players had displeased the South Australia Cricket Association (SACA), which was looking for new leadership. To help improve discipline, Bradman became a committeeman of the SACA, and a selector of the South Australian and Australian teams. He took his adopted state to its first Sheffield Shield title for 10 years, Bradman weighing in with personal contributions of 233 against Queensland and 357 against Victoria. He finished the season with 369 (in 233 minutes), a South Australian record, made against Tasmania. The bowler who dismissed him, Reginald Townley, would later become leader of the Tasmanian Liberal Party.
Australia defeated South Africa 4–0 and senior players such as Bill O'Reilly were pointed in their comments about the enjoyment of playing under Richardson's captaincy. A group of players who were openly hostile toward Bradman formed during the tour. For some, the prospect of playing under Bradman was daunting, as was the knowledge that he would additionally be sitting in judgement of their abilities in his role as a selector.
To start the new season, the Test side played a "Rest of Australia" team, captained by Bradman, at Sydney in early October 1936. The Test XI suffered a big defeat, due to Bradman's 212 and a haul of 12 wickets taken by leg-spinner Frank Ward. Bradman let the members of the Test team know that despite their recent success, the team still required improvement. Shortly afterwards, Bradman's first child was born on 28 October, but died the next day. He took time out of cricket for two weeks and on his return made 192 in three hours against Victoria in the last match before the beginning of the Ashes series.
The Test selectors made five changes to the team who had played in the previous Test match. Significantly, Australia's most successful bowler Clarrie Grimmett was replaced by Ward, one of four players making their debut. Bradman's role in Grimmett's omission from the team was controversial and it became a theme that dogged Bradman as Grimmett continued to be prolific in domestic cricket while his successors were ineffective—he was regarded as having finished the veteran bowler's Test career in a political purge.
Australia fell to successive defeats in the opening two Tests, Bradman making two ducks in his four innings, and it seemed that the captaincy was affecting his form. The selectors made another four changes to the team for the Third Test at Melbourne.
Bradman won the toss on New Year's Day 1937, but again failed with the bat, scoring just 13. The Australians could not take advantage of a pitch that favoured batting, and finished the day at 6/181. On the second day, rain dramatically altered the course of the game. With the sun drying the pitch (in those days, covers could not be used during matches) Bradman declared to get England in to bat while the pitch was "sticky"; England also declared to get Australia back in, conceding a lead of 124. Bradman countered by reversing his batting order to protect his run-makers while conditions improved. The ploy worked and Bradman went in at number seven. In an innings spread over three days, he battled influenza while scoring 270 off 375 balls, sharing a record partnership of 346 with Jack Fingleton, and Australia went on to victory. In 2001, Wisden rated this performance as the best Test match innings of all time.
The next Test, at the Adelaide Oval, was fairly even until Bradman played another patient second innings, making 212 from 395 balls. Australia levelled the series when the erratic left-arm spinner "Chuck" Fleetwood-Smith bowled Australia to victory. In the series-deciding Fifth Test, Bradman returned to a more aggressive style in top-scoring with 169 (off 191 balls) in Australia's 604 and Australia won by an innings. Australia's achievement of winning a Test series after outright losses in the first two matches has never been repeated in Test cricket.
End of an era
During the 1938 tour of England, Bradman played the most consistent cricket of his career.
He needed to score heavily as England had a strengthened batting line-up, while the Australian bowling was over-reliant on O'Reilly. Grimmett was overlooked, but Jack Fingleton made the team, so the clique of anti-Bradman players remained. Playing 26 innings on tour, Bradman recorded 13 centuries (a new Australian record) and again made 1,000 first-class runs before the end of May, becoming the only player to do so twice. In scoring 2,429 runs, Bradman achieved the highest average ever recorded in an English season: 115.66.
In the First Test, England amassed a big first innings score and looked likely to win, but Stan McCabe made 232 for Australia, a performance Bradman rated as the best he had ever seen. With Australia forced to follow-on, Bradman fought hard to ensure McCabe's effort was not in vain, and he secured the draw with 144 not out. It was the slowest Test hundred of his career and he played a similar innings of 102 not out in the next Test as Australia struggled to another draw. Rain completely washed out the Third Test at Old Trafford.
Australia's opportunity came at Headingley, a Test described by Bradman as the best he ever played in. England batted first and made 223. During the Australian innings, Bradman backed himself by opting to bat on in poor light conditions, reasoning that Australia could score more runs in bad light on a good pitch than on a rain affected pitch in good light, when he had the option to go off. He scored 103 out of a total of 242 and the gamble paid off, as it meant there was sufficient time to push for victory when an England collapse left them a target of only 107 to win. Australia slumped to 4/61, with Bradman out for 16. An approaching storm threatened to wash the game out, but the poor weather held off and Australia managed to secure the win, a victory that retained the Ashes. For the only time in his life, the tension of the occasion got to Bradman and he could not watch the closing stages of play, a reflection of the pressure that he felt all tour: he described the captaincy as "exhausting" and said he "found it difficult to keep going".
The euphoria of securing the Ashes preceded Australia's heaviest defeat. At The Oval, England amassed a world record of 7/903 and their opening batsman Len Hutton scored an individual world record, by making 364. In an attempt to relieve the burden on his bowlers, Bradman took a rare turn at bowling. During his third over, he fractured his ankle and teammates carried him from the ground. With Bradman injured and Fingleton unable to bat because of a leg muscle strain, Australia were thrashed by an innings and 579 runs, which remains the largest margin in Test cricket history. Unfit to complete the tour, Bradman left the team in the hands of vice-captain Stan McCabe. At this point, Bradman felt that the burden of captaincy would prevent him from touring England again, although he did not make his doubts public.
Despite the pressure of captaincy, Bradman's batting form remained supreme. An experienced, mature player now commonly called "The Don" had replaced the blitzing style of his early days as the "Boy from Bowral". In 1938–39, he led South Australia to the Sheffield Shield and made a century in six consecutive innings to equal CB Fry's world record. Bradman totalled 21 first-class centuries in 34 innings, from the beginning of the 1938 tour of England (including preliminary games in Australia) until early 1939.
The next season, Bradman made an abortive bid to join the Victoria state side. The Melbourne Cricket Club advertised the position of club secretary and he was led to believe that if he applied, he would get the job. The position, which had been held by Hugh Trumble until his death in August 1938, was one of the most prestigious jobs in Australian cricket. The annual salary of £1,000 would make Bradman financially secure while allowing him to retain a connection with the game. On 18 January 1939, the club's committee, on the casting vote of the chairman, chose former Test batsman Vernon Ransford over Bradman.
The 1939–40 season was Bradman's most productive ever for SA: 1,448 runs at an average of 144.8. He made three double centuries, including 251 not out against NSW, the innings that he rated the best he ever played in the Sheffield Shield, as he tamed Bill O'Reilly at the height of his form. However, it was the end of an era. The outbreak of World War II led to the indefinite postponement of all cricket tours, and the suspension of the Sheffield Shield competition.
Troubled war years
Bradman joined the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) on 28 June 1940 and was passed fit for air crew duty. The RAAF had more recruits than it could equip and train and Bradman spent four months in Adelaide before the Governor-General of Australia, Lord Gowrie, persuaded Bradman to transfer to the army, a move that was criticised as a safer option for him. Given the rank of lieutenant, he was posted to the Army School of Physical Training at Frankston, Victoria, to act as a divisional supervisor of physical training. The exertion of the job aggravated his chronic muscular problems, diagnosed as fibrositis. Surprisingly, in light of his batting prowess, a routine army test revealed that Bradman had poor eyesight.
Invalided out of service in June 1941, Bradman spent months recuperating, unable even to shave himself or comb his hair due to the extent of the muscular pain he suffered. He resumed stockbroking during 1942. In his biography of Bradman, Charles Williams expounded the theory that the physical problems were psychosomatic, induced by stress and possibly depression; Bradman read the book's manuscript and did not disagree. Had any cricket been played at this time, he would not have been available. Although he found some relief in 1945 when referred to the Melbourne masseur Ern Saunders, Bradman permanently lost the feeling in the thumb and index finger of his (dominant) right hand.
In June 1945, Bradman faced a financial crisis when the firm of Harry Hodgetts collapsed due to fraud and embezzlement. Bradman moved quickly to set up his own business, utilising Hodgetts' client list and his old office in Grenfell Street, Adelaide. The fallout led to a prison term for Hodgetts, and left a stigma attached to Bradman's name in the city's business community for many years.
However, the SA Cricket Association had no hesitation in appointing Bradman as their delegate to the Board of Control in place of Hodgetts. Now working alongside some of the men he had battled in the 1930s, Bradman quickly became a leading light in the administration of the game. With the resumption of international cricket, he was once more appointed a Test selector, and played a major role in planning for post-war cricket.
"The ghost of a once great cricketer"
In 1945–46, Bradman suffered regular bouts of fibrositis while coming to terms with increased administrative duties and the establishment of his business. He played for South Australia in two matches to help with the re-establishment of first-class cricket and later described his batting as "painstaking". Batting against the Australian Services cricket team, Bradman scored 112 in less than two hours, yet Dick Whitington (playing for the Services) wrote, "I have seen today the ghost of a once great cricketer". Bradman declined a tour of New Zealand and spent the winter of 1946 wondering whether he had played his last match. "With the English team due to arrive for the 1946–47 Ashes series, the media and the public were anxious to know if Bradman would lead Australia." His doctor recommended against a return to the game.
Encouraged by his wife, Bradman agreed to play in lead-up fixtures to the Test series. After hitting two centuries, Bradman made himself available for the First Test at The Gabba.
Controversy emerged on the first day of the First Test at Brisbane. After compiling an uneasy 28 runs, Bradman hit a ball to the gully fieldsman, Jack Ikin. "An appeal for a catch was denied in the umpire's contentious ruling that it was a bump ball". At the end of the over, England captain Wally Hammond spoke with Bradman and criticised him for not "walking"; "from then on the series was a cricketing war just when most people desired peace", Whitington wrote. Bradman regained his finest pre-war form in making 187, followed by 234 during the Second Test at Sydney (Sid Barnes also scored 234 during the innings, many in a still standing record 405 run 5th Wicket partnership with Bradman. Barnes later recalled that he purposely got out on 234 because "it wouldn't be right for someone to make more runs than Bradman"). Australia won both matches by an innings. Jack Fingleton speculated that had the decision at Brisbane gone against him, Bradman would have retired, such were his fitness problems. In the remainder of the series, Bradman made three half-centuries in six innings, but was unable to make another century; nevertheless, his team won handsomely, 3–0. He was the leading batsman on either side, with an average of 97.14. Nearly 850,000 spectators watched the Tests, which helped lift public spirits after the war.
Century of centuries and "The Invincibles"
India made its first tour of Australia in the 1947–48 season. On 15 November, Bradman made 172 against them for an Australian XI at Sydney, his 100th first-class century. The first non-Englishman to achieve the milestone, Bradman remains the only Australian to have done so. In five Tests, he scored 715 runs (at 178.75 average). His last double century (201) came at Adelaide, and he scored a century in each innings of the Melbourne Test. On the eve of the Fifth Test, he announced that the match would be his last in Australia, although he would tour England as a farewell.
Australia had assembled one of the great teams of cricket history. Bradman made it known that he wanted to go through the tour unbeaten, a feat never before accomplished. English spectators were drawn to the matches knowing that it would be their last opportunity to see Bradman in action. RC Robertson-Glasgow observed of Bradman that:
Despite his waning powers, Bradman compiled 11 centuries on the tour, amassing 2,428 runs (average 89.92). His highest score of the tour (187) came against Essex, when Australia compiled a world record of 721 runs in a day. In the Tests, he scored a century at Trent Bridge, but the performance most like his pre-war exploits came in the Fourth Test at Headingley. England declared on the last morning of the game, setting Australia a world record 404 runs to win in only 345 minutes on a heavily worn pitch. In partnership with Arthur Morris (182), Bradman reeled off 173 not out and the match was won with 15 minutes to spare. The journalist Ray Robinson called the victory "the 'finest ever' in its conquest of seemingly insuperable odds".
In the final Test at The Oval, Bradman walked out to bat in Australia's first innings. He received a standing ovation from the crowd and three cheers from the opposition. His Test batting average stood at 101.39. Facing the wrist-spin of Eric Hollies, Bradman pushed forward to the second ball that he faced, was deceived by a googly, and bowled between bat and pad for a duck. An England batting collapse resulted in an innings defeat, denying Bradman the opportunity to bat again and so his career average finished at 99.94; if he had scored just four runs in his last innings, it would have been 100. A story developed over the years that claimed Bradman missed the ball because of tears in his eyes, a claim Bradman denied for the rest of his life.
The Australian team won the Ashes 4–0, completed the tour unbeaten, and entered history as "The Invincibles". Just as Bradman's legend grew, rather than diminished, over the years, so too has the reputation of the 1948 team. For Bradman, it was the most personally fulfilling period of his playing days, as the divisiveness of the 1930s had passed. He wrote:
With Bradman now retired from professional cricket, RC Robertson-Glasgow wrote of the English reaction "... a miracle has been removed from among us. So must ancient Italy have felt when she heard of the death of Hannibal".
Statistical summary
Test match performance
First-class performance
Test records
Bradman still holds the following significant records for Test match cricket:
Batting average
Highest career batting average (minimum 20 innings): 99.94
Highest series batting average (minimum 4-Test series): 201.50 (1931–32); also second-highest: 178.75 (1947–48)
Conversion rate
Highest percentage of centuries per innings played: 36.25% (29 centuries from 80 innings)
Highest percentage of double centuries per innings played: 15% (12 double centuries from 80 innings)
Highest 50/100 conversion rate (minimum 2000 runs): 69.05% (29 centuries converted from 42 innings of ≥ 50 runs)
Highest 100/200 conversion rate (minimum 2000 runs): 41.38% (12 double centuries converted from 29 innings of ≥ 100 runs)
Multiples of 100 runs
Most double centuries: 12
Most double centuries in a series: 3 (1930); also 2 (1931–32, 1934, 1936–37)
Most triple centuries: 2 (equal with Chris Gayle, Brian Lara and Virender Sehwag) Note: Bradman was stranded on 299* in the 4th Test against South Africa in 1932.
Scoring rate
Most centuries accumulated within single sessions of play: 6 (1 pre lunch, 2 lunch-tea, 3 tea-stumps)
Most runs in one day's play: 309 (1930)
Fastest to multiples of 1000 runs
Fewest matches required to reach 1000 (7 matches), 2000 (15 matches), 3000 (23 matches), 4000 (31 matches), 5000 (36 matches) and 6000 (45 matches) Test runs.
Fewest innings required to reach 2000 (22 innings), 3000 (33 innings), 4000 (48 innings), 5000 (56 innings) and 6000 (68 innings) Test runs.
Other
Highest peak Test batting rating: 961
Highest percentage of team runs over career: 24.28%
Highest 5th wicket partnership: 405 (with Sid Barnes, 1946–47)
Highest score by a number 7 batsman: 270 (1936–37)
Most runs against one opponent: 5,028 (England)
Most hundreds against one opponent: 19 (England)
Most runs in one series: 974 (1930)
Most consecutive matches in which he made a century: 6 (the last three Tests in 1936–37, and the first three Tests in 1938)
Cricket context
Bradman's Test batting average of 99.94 has become one of cricket's most famous, iconic statistics. No other player who has played more than 20 Test match innings has finished their career with a Test average of more than 62. Bradman scored centuries at a rate better than one every three innings—in 80 Test innings, Bradman scored 29 centuries. Only 11 players have since surpassed his total, all at a much slower rate: the next fastest player to reach 29 centuries, Sachin Tendulkar, required nearly twice as long (148 innings) to do so.
In addition, Bradman's total of 12 Test double hundreds—comprising 15% of his innings—remains the most achieved by any Test batsman and was accumulated faster than any other total.
For comparison, the next highest totals of Test double hundreds are Kumar Sangakkara's 11 in 223 innings (4.9%), Brian Lara's 9 in 232 innings (3.9%), and Wally Hammond's 7 in 140 innings (5%); the next highest rate of scoring Test double centuries was achieved by Vinod Kambli, whose 21 innings included 2 double centuries (9.5%).
World sport context
Wisden hailed Bradman as, "the greatest phenomenon in the history of cricket, indeed in the history of all ball games". Statistician Charles Davis analysed the statistics for several prominent sportsmen by comparing the number of standard deviations that they stand above the mean for their sport. The top performers in his selected sports are:
The statistics show that "no other athlete dominates an international sport to the extent that Bradman does cricket". In order to post a similarly dominant career statistic as Bradman, a baseball batter would need a career batting average of .392, while a basketball player would need to score an average of 43.0 points per game over their career. The respective records are .366 and 30.1.
When Bradman died, Time allocated a space in its "Milestones" column for an obituary:
Playing style
Bradman's early development was shaped by the high bounce of the ball on matting-over-concrete pitches. He favoured "horizontal-bat" shots (such as the hook, pull and cut) to deal with the bounce and devised a unique grip on the bat handle that would accommodate these strokes without compromising his ability to defend. Employing a side-on stance at the wicket, Bradman kept perfectly still as the bowler ran in. His backswing had a "crooked" look that troubled his early critics, but he resisted entreaties to change. His backswing kept his hands in close to the body, leaving him perfectly balanced and able to change his stroke mid-swing, if need be. Another telling factor was the decisiveness of Bradman's footwork. He "used the crease" by either coming metres down the pitch to drive, or playing so far back that his feet ended up level with the stumps when playing the cut, hook or pull.
Bradman's game evolved with experience. He temporarily adapted his technique during the Bodyline series, deliberately moving around the crease in an attempt to score from the short-pitched deliveries. At his peak, in the mid-1930s, he had the ability to switch between a defensive and attacking approach as the occasion demanded. After the Second World War, he adjusted to bat within the limitations set by his age, becoming a steady "accumulator" of runs. However, Bradman never truly mastered batting on sticky wickets. Wisden commented, "[i]f there really is a blemish on his amazing record it is ... the absence of a significant innings on one of those 'sticky dogs' of old".
After cricket
After his return to Australia, Bradman played in his own Testimonial match at Melbourne, scoring his 117th and last century, and receiving £9,342 in proceeds. In the 1949 New Year Honours, he was appointed Knight Bachelor for his services to the game, becoming the only Australian cricketer ever to be knighted. He commented that he "would have preferred to remain just Mister". The following year he published a memoir, Farewell to Cricket. Bradman accepted offers from the Daily Mail to travel with, and write about, the 1953 and 1956 Australian teams in England. The Art of Cricket, his final book published in 1958, is an instructional manual.
Bradman retired from his stockbroking business in June 1954, depending on the "comfortable" income earned as a board member of 16 publicly listed companies. His highest profile affiliation was with Argo Investments Limited, where he was chairman for a number of years. Charles Williams commented that, "[b]usiness was excluded on medical grounds, [so] the only sensible alternative was a career in the administration of the game which he loved and to which he had given most of his active life".
Bradman was honoured at a number of cricket grounds, notably when his portrait was hung in the Long Room at Lord's; until Shane Warne's portrait was added in 2005, Bradman was one of just three Australians to be honoured in this way. Bradman inaugurated a "Bradman Stand" at the Sydney Cricket Ground in January 1974; the Adelaide Oval also opened a Bradman Stand in 1990, which housed new media and corporate facilities. The Oval's Bradman Stand was demolished in 2013 as the stadium underwent an extensive re-development. Later in 1974, he attended a Lord's Taverners function in London where he experienced heart problems, which forced him to limit his public appearances to select occasions only. With his wife, Bradman returned to Bowral in 1976, where the new cricket ground was named in his honour. He gave the keynote speech at the historic Centenary Test at Melbourne in 1977.
On 16 June 1979, the Australian government awarded Bradman the nation's second-highest civilian honour at that time, Companion of the Order of Australia (AC), "in recognition of service to the sport of cricket and cricket administration". In 1980, he resigned from the ACB, to lead a more secluded life.
Administrative career
In addition to acting as one of South Australia's delegates to the Board of Control from 1945 to 1980, Bradman was a committee member of the SACA between 1935 and 1986. It is estimated that he attended 1,713 SACA meetings during this half century of service. Aside from two years in the early 1950s, he filled a selector's berth for the Test team between 1936 and 1971.
Cricket saw an increase in defensive play during the 1950s. As a selector, Bradman favoured attacking, positive cricketers who entertained the paying public. He formed an alliance with Australian captain Richie Benaud, seeking more attractive play, with some success. He served two high-profile periods as chairman of the board of Control, in 1960–63 and 1969–72. During the first, he dealt with the growing prevalence of illegal bowling actions in the game, a problem that he adjudged "the most complex I have known in cricket, because it is not a matter of fact but of opinion". The major controversy of his second stint was a proposed tour of Australia by South Africa in 1971–72. On Bradman's recommendation, the series was cancelled. Cricket journalist Michael Coward said of Bradman as an administrator:
In the late 1970s, Bradman played an important role during the World Series Cricket schism as a member of a special Australian Cricket Board committee formed to handle the crisis. He was criticised for not airing an opinion, but he dealt with World Series Cricket far more pragmatically than other administrators. Richie Benaud described Bradman as "a brilliant administrator and businessman", warning that he was not to be underestimated. As Australian captain, Ian Chappell fought with Bradman over the issue of player remuneration in the early 1970s and has suggested that Bradman was parsimonious:
Later years and death
After his wife's death in 1997, Bradman suffered "a discernible and not unexpected wilting of spirit". The next year, on his 90th birthday, he hosted a meeting with his two favourite modern players, Shane Warne and Sachin Tendulkar, but he was not seen in his familiar place at the Adelaide Oval again.
Hospitalised with pneumonia in December 2000, he returned home in the New Year and died there on 25 February 2001, aged 92.
A memorial service to mark Bradman's life was held on 25 March 2001 at St Peter's Anglican Cathedral, Adelaide. The service was attended by a host of former and current Test cricketers, as well as Australia's then prime minister, John Howard, leader of the opposition Kim Beazley and former prime minister Bob Hawke. Eulogies were given by Richie Benaud and Governor-General Sir William Deane. The service was broadcast live on ABC Television to a viewing audience of 1.45 million. A private service for family and friends was earlier held at the Centennial Park Cemetery in the suburb of Pasadena, with many people lining both Greenhill and Goodwood Roads to pay their respects as his funeral motorcade passed by.
Legacy
Cricket writer David Frith summed up the paradox of the continuing fascination with Bradman:
As early as 1939, Bradman had a Royal Navy ship named after him. Built as a fishing trawler in 1936, was taken over by the Admiralty in 1939, but was sunk by German aircraft the following year.
In the 1963 edition of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack, Bradman was selected by Neville Cardus as one of the Six Giants of the Wisden Century. This was a special commemorative selection requested by Wisden for its 100th edition. The other five players chosen were: Sydney Barnes, W. G. Grace, Jack Hobbs, Tom Richardson and Victor Trumper.
On 10 December 1985, Bradman was the first of 120 inaugural inductees into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame. He spoke of his philosophy for considering the stature of athletes:
Although modest about his own abilities and generous in his praise of other cricketers, Bradman was fully aware of the talents he possessed as a player; there is some evidence that he sought to influence his legacy. During the 1980s and 1990s, Bradman carefully selected the people to whom he gave interviews, assisting Michael Page, Roland Perry and Charles Williams, who all produced biographical works about him. Bradman also agreed to an extensive interview for ABC radio, broadcast as Bradman: The Don Declares in eight 55-minute episodes during 1988.
The most significant of these legacy projects was the Bradman Museum, opened in 1989 at the Bradman Oval in Bowral. This organisation was reformed in 1993 as a non-profit charitable Trust, called the Bradman Foundation. In 2010, it was expanded and rebranded as the International Cricket Hall of Fame.
When the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame was created in Melbourne in 1996, Bradman was made one of its 10 inaugural members. In 2000, Bradman was selected by cricket experts as one of five Wisden Cricketers of the Century. Each of the 100 members of the panel were able to select five cricketers: all 100 voted for Bradman. The ICC Cricket Hall of Fame inducted him on 19 November 2009.
Bradman's life and achievements were recognised in Australia with two notable issues. Three years before he died, he became the first living Australian to be featured on an Australian postage stamp. After his death, the Australian Government produced a 20-cent coin to commemorate his life. On 27 August 2018, to celebrate 110 years since his birth, Bradman was commemorated with a Google Doodle. To mark 150 years of the Cricketers' Almanack, Wisden named him as captain of an all-time Test World XI.
In 1999, Bradman was named in the six man shortlist for BBC Sports Personality of the Century. Asteroid 2472 Bradman discovered by Luboš Kohoutek is named in his honour.
Family life
Bradman first met Jessie Martha Menzies in 1920 when she boarded with the Bradman family, to be closer to school in Bowral. The couple married at St Paul's Anglican Church at Burwood, Sydney on 30 April 1932. The two had an impeccable marriage and were devoted to each other. During their 65-year marriage, Jessie was "shrewd, reliable, selfless, and above all, uncomplicated...she was the perfect foil to his concentrated, and occasionally mercurial character". Bradman paid tribute to his wife numerous times, once saying succinctly, "I would never have achieved what I achieved without Jessie".
The Bradmans lived in the same modest, suburban house in Holden Street, Kensington Park in Adelaide for all but the first three years of their married life. They experienced personal tragedy in raising their children: their first-born son died as an infant in 1936, their second son, John (born in 1939) contracted polio, and their daughter, Shirley, born in 1941, had cerebral palsy from birth. His family name proved a burden for John Bradman; he legally changed his last name to Bradsen in 1972. Although claims were made that he became estranged from his father, it was more a matter of "the pair inhabit[ing] different worlds", and the two remained in contact through the years. After the cricketer's death, a collection of personal letters written by Bradman to his close friend Rohan Rivett between 1953 and 1977 was released and gave researchers new insights into Bradman's family life, including the strain between father and son.
Bradman's reclusiveness in later life is partly attributable to the ongoing health problems of his wife, particularly following the open-heart surgery Jessie underwent in her 60s. Lady Bradman died in 1997, aged 88, from cancer. This had a dispiriting effect on Bradman, but the relationship with his son improved, to the extent that John resolved to change his name back to Bradman. Since his father's death, John Bradman has become the spokesperson for the family and has been involved in defending the Bradman legacy in a number of disputes. The relationship between Bradman and his wider family is less clear, although nine months after Bradman's death, his nephew Paul Bradman criticised him as a "snob" and a "loner" who forgot his connections in Bowral and who failed to attend the funerals of Paul's mother and father.
The operatic soprano Greta Bradman is his granddaughter.
In popular culture
Bradman's name has become an archetypal name for outstanding excellence, both within cricket and in the wider world. The term Bradmanesque has been coined and is used both within and outside cricketing circles. Steve Waugh described Sri Lankan Muttiah Muralitharan as "the Don Bradman of bowling".
Bradman has been the subject of more biographies than any other Australian, apart from the bushranger Ned Kelly. Bradman himself wrote four books: Don Bradman's Book–The Story of My Cricketing Life with Hints on Batting, Bowling and Fielding (1930), My Cricketing Life (1938), Farewell to Cricket (1950) and The Art of Cricket (1958). The story of the Bodyline series was retold in a 1984 television mini-series, with Gary Sweet portraying Bradman.
Bradman is immortalised in three popular songs from different eras, "Our Don Bradman" (1930s, by Jack O'Hagan), "Bradman" (1980s, by Paul Kelly), and "Sir Don", (a tribute by John Williamson performed at Bradman's memorial service). Bradman recorded several songs accompanying himself and others on piano in the early 1930s, including "Every Day Is A Rainbow Day For Me", with Jack Lumsdaine. In 2000, the Australian Government made it illegal for the names of corporations to suggest a link to "Sir Donald Bradman", if such a link does not in fact exist. Other entities with similar protection are the Australian and foreign governments, Saint Mary MacKillop, the Royal Family and the Returned and Services League of Australia.
Bibliography
How to Play Cricket (2013) by Don Bradman, Orient Paperbacks,
See also
List of Test cricket records
ICC Player Rankings
References
Sources
Baldwin, Mark (2005): The Ashes' Strangest Moments: Extraordinary But True Tales from Over a Century of the Ashes, Franz Steiner Verlag. .
Bradman, Don (1950): Farewell to Cricket, 1988 Pavilion Library reprint. .
Cashman, Richard et al. – editors (1996): The Oxford Companion to Australian Cricket, Oxford University Press. .
Coleman, Robert (1993): Seasons in the Sun: the Story of the Victorian Cricket Association, Hargreen Publishing Company. .
Davis, Charles (2000): The Best Of the Best: A New Look at the Great Cricketers and Changing Times, ABC Books. .
Dunstan, Keith (1988, rev. ed.): The Paddock That Grew, Hutchinson Australia. .
Eason, Alan (2004): The A-Z of Bradman, ABC Books. .
Fingleton, Jack (1949): Brightly Fades the Don, 1985 Pavilion Library reprint. .
Frith, David (2002): Bodyline Autopsy, ABC Books. .
Gibbs, Barry (2001): My Cricket Journey, Wakefield Press. .
Harte, Chris (1993): A History of Australian Cricket, André Deutsch. .
Haigh, Gideon. "Sir Donald Bradman at 100." The Monthly, August 2008.
Haigh, Gideon (1993): The Cricket War – the Inside Story of Kerry Packer's World Series Cricket, Text Publishing Company. .
Hutchins, Brett (2002): Don Bradman: Challenging the Myth, Cambridge University Press. .
O'Reilly, Bill (1985): Tiger – 60 Years of Cricket, William Collins. .
McGilvray, Alan & Tasker, Norman (1985): The Game Is Not the Same, ABC Books. .
Page, Michael (1983): Bradman – The Illustrated Biography, Macmillan Australia. .
Perry, Roland (1995): The Don – A Biography of Sir Donald Bradman, Macmillan. .
Robinson, Ray (1981 rev. ed.): On Top Down Under, Cassell Australia. .
Rosenwater, Irving (1978): Sir Donald Bradman – A Biography, Batsford. .
Wallace, Christine (2004): The Private Don, Allen & Unwin. .
Whitington, RS (1974): The Book of Australian Test Cricket 1877–1974, Wren Publishing. .
Williams, Charles (1996): Bradman: An Australian Hero, 2001 Abacus reprint. .
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack: various editions, accessed via ESPN Cricinfo
External links
Bradman Museum and Bradman Oval
Bradman Digital Library—State Library of South Australia
The Bradman Trail
Don Bradman on Picture Australia
Interview with Bradman 1930
Don Bradman — TV documentary — Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Some images of Don Bradman, including some showing Don Bradman's batting technique
Listen to a young Don Bradman speaking after the 1930 Ashes tour on australianscreen online
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D. G. Bradman's XI cricketers | true | [
"The reluctant hero is a heroic archetype typically found in fiction. The reluctant hero is typically portrayed either as an everyman forced into surreal situations which require him to rise to heroism and its acts, or as a person with special abilities who nonetheless reveals a desire to avoid using those abilities for selfless benefit. In either case, the reluctant hero does not initially seek adventure or the opportunity to do good, and their apparent selfishness may induct them into the category of antiheroes. The reluctant hero differs from the antihero in that the story arc of the former inevitably results in their becoming a true hero.\n\nIn many stories, the reluctant hero is portrayed as having a period of doubt after their initial venture into heroism. This may arise from the negative consequences of their own heroic actions, or by the achievement of some position of personal safety leaving the audience to wonder whether the reluctant hero will return to heroism at the moment when they are needed the most (typically the climax). In real life, there are cases in history and popular culture where people have been perceived as reluctant heroes.\n\nQuotes\nA summary of the archetype:\n\nAnother commentator notes, with respect to game design:\n\nExamples\n\nIn fiction\n In the movie Die Hard, Officer John McClane of the NYPD became a reluctant hero, when on Christmas Eve, East German terrorist Hans Gruber took over the Nakatomi Plaza, Los Angeles in an attempt to steal millions of bearer bonds. McClane, who was at Nakatomi Plaza, where his wife, Holly Gennaro was an employee, for the Christmas Party, was able to remain hidden from the group of terrorists, and was able to cause chaos, eventually spoiling Gruber's Christmas celebrations. Sgt. Al Powell of the LAPD who did not like using a gun after accidentally killing a young boy at a crime scene, also becomes a reluctant hero when he shoots and kills, the enraged terrorist known only as 'Karl'.\n Robert A. Segal characterizes Arjuna from the Hindu epic The Mahabharata as a reluctant hero. Arjuna casts aside his weapons, fearful at the prospect of killing his kinsman during a civil war. Krishna then relates to Arjuna a series of arguments that convince Arjuna to go to war nonetheless.\n In Star Wars, Han Solo is portrayed as a reluctant hero. He is hesitant to join the Alliance to Restore the Republic due to being an outlaw. In the Expanded Universe novel Balance Point his son Jacen fit the characteristics of reluctant hero. He is unwilling to fight out of fear that the galaxy will tumble into darkness. In the end, he saves his mother's life and wounds the Yuuzhan Vong Warmaster Tsavong Lah.\n Spider-Man also fits the criteria of reluctant hero as throughout his career, Peter Parker constantly questions his decision to become a superhero. One of the most famous examples would be The Amazing Spider-Man issue 50, titled Spider-Man No More!.\n Eddie Valiant from Who Framed Roger Rabbit fits into this category, being forced out of a depressive funk in order to solve a murder and prove the innocence of Roger Rabbit. \n Captain Mainwaring, of Dad's Army, shows traits of a reluctant hero as he casts aside his self-important personality to protect his platoon and country.\n Max Rockatansky\n Aang from Avatar: The Last Airbender is the current incarnation of the Avatar who controls four elements to maintain the peace. Though reluctant, he must fight to end a war which has gone for 100 years.\n The Doctor from Doctor Who played the reluctant hero, preferring to solve things with peace instead of war. This was shown during his third, fourth, fifth, eighth, tenth, eleventh, and thirteenth incarnations.\n Nathan Lind from Godzilla vs. Kong, a geologist and cartographer who helps Kong.\n\nIn real life\n\n Alvin York, a World War I draftee who was a conscientious objector, but who as a soldier defeated a large contingent of German troops as a sniper. York's achievement was then fictionalized in several movies, in which his stature as a reluctant hero was expanded.\n Neil Armstrong has been described as \"a reluctant American hero\".\n\nReferences\n\nHeroes",
"\"I Don't Want to Be a Hero\" is a 1987 song by the British band Johnny Hates Jazz. It reached #11 in the UK top 40 in August 1987 spending 10 weeks on the chart. It is taken from their #1 album Turn Back the Clock.\n\nWriting and inspiration\nThe song was written by the band's lead singer and main songwriter, Clark Datchler. It has a strong anti-war sentiment and is written from the perspective of a soldier who is questioning their participation in what they consider an unjust war. The band's American record company were reluctant to release the single in the U.S. because of its anti-war stance. The song makes references to conscription and propaganda.\n\nMusic video\n\nThe international music video for the song was directed by Andy Morahan.\n\nCharts\n\nCovers\nIn 1988, Japanese singer Yōko Nagayama covered the song, \"反逆のヒーロー\".\n\nIn 2017, Luis Grayeb covered the song as \"I don't want to be a hero\".\n\nSee also\nList of anti-war songs\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nJohnny Hates Jazz Official Website\n\nSongs about soldiers\nSongs about the military\n1986 songs\n1987 singles\nAnti-war songs\nJohnny Hates Jazz songs\nMusic videos directed by Andy Morahan\nSongs written by Clark Datchler\nVirgin Records singles"
]
|
[
"Don Bradman",
"Reluctant hero",
"What is the relation between Don Bradman and reluctant Hero?",
"I don't know.",
"What is the Reluctant hero about?",
"making it more difficult to maintain the privacy"
]
| C_ef88bed7f74d4322a1040eb8bdce83a2_1 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | 3 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article on the Reluctant hero besides his relation to Don Bradman?? | Don Bradman | In 1930-31, against the first West Indian side to visit Australia, Bradman's scoring was more sedate than in England--although he did make 223 in 297 minutes in the Third Test at Brisbane and 152 in 154 minutes in the following Test at Melbourne. However, he scored quickly in a very successful sequence of innings against the South Africans in the Australian summer of 1931-32. For NSW against the tourists, he made 30, 135 and 219. In the Test matches, he scored 226 (277 minutes), 112 (155 minutes), 2 and 167 (183 minutes); his 299 not out in the Fourth Test, at Adelaide, set a new record for the highest score in a Test in Australia. Australia won nine of the ten Tests played over the two series. At this point, Bradman had played 15 Test matches since the beginning of 1930, scoring 2,227 runs at an average of 131. He had played 18 innings, scoring 10 centuries, six of which had extended beyond 200. His overall scoring rate was 42 runs per hour, with 856 (or 38.5% of his tally) scored in boundaries. Significantly, he had not hit a six, which typified Bradman's attitude: if he hit the ball along the ground, then it could not be caught. During this phase of his career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a "machine-like" approach to batting. The South African fast bowler Sandy Bell described bowling to him as, "heart-breaking ... with his sort of cynical grin, which rather reminds one of the Sphinx ... he never seems to perspire". Between these two seasons, Bradman seriously contemplated playing professional cricket in England with the Lancashire League club Accrington, a move that, according to the rules of the day, would have ended his Test career. A consortium of three Sydney businesses offered an alternative. They devised a two-year contract whereby Bradman wrote for Associated Newspapers, broadcast on Radio 2UE and promoted the menswear retailing chain FJ Palmer and Son. However, the contract increased Bradman's dependence on his public profile, making it more difficult to maintain the privacy that he ardently desired. Bradman's chaotic wedding to Jessie Menzies in April 1932 epitomised these new and unwelcome intrusions into his private life. The church "was under siege all throughout the day ... uninvited guests stood on chairs and pews to get a better view"; police erected barriers that were broken down and many of those invited could not get a seat. Just weeks later, Bradman joined a private team organised by Arthur Mailey to tour the United States and Canada. He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. Playing 51 games in 75 days, Bradman scored 3,779 runs at 102.1, with 18 centuries. Although the standard of play was not high, the effects of the amount of cricket Bradman had played in the three previous years, together with the strains of his celebrity status, began to show on his return home. CANNOTANSWER | career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a "machine-like" approach to batting. | Sir Donald George Bradman, AC (27 August 1908 – 25 February 2001), nicknamed "The Don", was an Australian international cricketer, widely acknowledged as the greatest batsman of all time. Bradman's career Test batting average of 99.94 has been cited as the greatest achievement by any sportsman in any major sport.
The story that the young Bradman practised alone with a cricket stump and a golf ball is part of Australian folklore. Bradman's meteoric rise from bush cricket to the Australian Test team took just over two years. Before his 22nd birthday, he had set many records for top scoring, some of which still stand, and became Australia's sporting idol at the height of the Great Depression.
During a 20-year playing career, Bradman consistently scored at a level that made him, in the words of former Australia captain Bill Woodfull, "worth three batsmen to Australia". A controversial set of tactics, known as Bodyline, was specially devised by the England team to curb his scoring. As a captain and administrator, Bradman was committed to attacking, entertaining cricket; he drew spectators in record numbers. He hated the constant adulation, however, and it affected how he dealt with others. The focus of attention on his individual performances strained relationships with some teammates, administrators and journalists, who thought him aloof and wary. Following an enforced hiatus due to the Second World War, he made a dramatic comeback, captaining an Australian team known as "The Invincibles" on a record-breaking unbeaten tour of England.
A complex, highly driven man, not given to close personal relationships,
Bradman retained a pre-eminent position in the game by acting as an administrator, selector and writer for three decades following his retirement. Even after he became reclusive in his declining years, his opinion was highly sought, and his status as a national icon was still recognised. Almost 50 years after his retirement as a Test player, in 1997, Prime Minister John Howard of Australia called him the "greatest living Australian". Bradman's image has appeared on postage stamps and coins, and a museum dedicated to his life was opened while he was still living. On the centenary of his birth, 27 August 2008, the Royal Australian Mint issued a $5 commemorative gold coin with Bradman's image. In 2009, he was inducted posthumously into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame.
Early years
Donald George Bradman was the youngest son of George and Emily (née Whatman) Bradman, and was born on 27 August 1908 at Cootamundra, New South Wales (NSW). He had a brother, Victor, and three sisters—Islet, Lilian and Elizabeth May. Bradman was of English heritage on both sides of his family. His grandfather Charles Andrew Bradman left Withersfield, Suffolk, for Australia. When Bradman played at Cambridge in 1930 as a 21 year old on his first tour of England, he took the opportunity to trace his forebears in the region. Also, one of his great-grandfathers was one of the first Italians to migrate to Australia in 1826. Bradman's parents lived in the hamlet of Yeo Yeo, near Stockinbingal. His mother, Emily, gave birth to him at the Cootamundra home of Granny Scholz, a midwife. That house is now the Bradman Birthplace Museum. Emily had hailed from Mittagong in the NSW Southern Highlands, and in 1911, when Don Bradman was about two-and-a-half years old, his parents decided to relocate to Bowral, close to Mittagong, to be closer to Emily's family and friends, as life at Yeo Yeo was proving difficult.
Bradman practised batting incessantly during his youth. He invented his own solo cricket game, using a cricket stump for a bat, and a golf ball. A water tank, mounted on a curved brick stand, stood on a paved area behind the family home. When hit into the curved brick facing of the stand, the ball rebounded at high speed and varying angles—and Bradman would attempt to hit it again. This form of practice developed his timing and reactions to a high degree. In more formal cricket, he hit his first century at the age of 12, with an undefeated 115 playing for Bowral Public School against Mittagong High School.
Bush cricketer
During the 1920–21 season, Bradman acted as scorer for the local Bowral team, captained by his uncle George Whatman. In October 1920, he filled in when the team was one man short, scoring 37* and 29* on debut. During the season, Bradman's father took him to the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) to watch the fifth Ashes Test match. On that day, Bradman formed an ambition. "I shall never be satisfied", he told his father, "until I play on this ground". Bradman left school in 1922 and went to work for a local real estate agent who encouraged his sporting pursuits by giving him time off when necessary. He gave up cricket in favour of tennis for two years, but resumed playing cricket in 1925–26.
Bradman became a regular selection for the Bowral team; several outstanding performances earned him the attention of the Sydney daily press. Competing on matting-over-concrete pitches, Bowral played other rural towns in the Berrima District competition. Against Wingello, a team that included the future Test bowler Bill O'Reilly, Bradman made 234. In the competition final against Moss Vale, which extended over five consecutive Saturdays, Bradman scored 320 not out. During the following Australian winter (1926), an ageing Australian team lost The Ashes in England, and a number of Test players retired. The New South Wales Cricket Association began a hunt for new talent. Mindful of Bradman's big scores for Bowral, the association wrote to him, requesting his attendance at a practice session in Sydney. He was subsequently chosen for the "Country Week" tournaments at both cricket and tennis, to be played during separate weeks. His boss presented him with an ultimatum: he could have only one week away from work, and therefore had to choose between the two sports. He chose cricket.
Bradman's performances during Country Week resulted in an invitation to play grade cricket in Sydney for St George in the 1926–27 season. He scored 110 on his debut, making his first century on a turf pitch. On 1 January 1927, he turned out for the NSW second team. For the remainder of the season, Bradman travelled the from Bowral to Sydney every Saturday to play for St George.
First-class debut
The next season continued the rapid rise of the "Boy from Bowral". Selected to replace the unfit Archie Jackson in the NSW team, Bradman made his first-class debut at the Adelaide Oval, aged 19. He secured the achievement of a hundred on debut, with an innings of 118 featuring what soon became his trademarks—fast footwork, calm confidence and rapid scoring. In the final match of the season, he made his first century at the SCG, against the Sheffield Shield champions Victoria. Despite his potential, Bradman was not chosen for the Australian second team to tour New Zealand.
Bradman decided that his chances for Test selection would be improved by moving to Sydney for the 1928–29 season, when England were to tour in defence of the Ashes. Initially, he continued working in real estate, but later took a promotions job with the sporting goods retailer Mick Simmons Ltd. In the first match of the Sheffield Shield season, he scored a century in each innings against Queensland. He followed this with scores of 87 and 132 not out against the England touring team, and was rewarded with selection for the first Test, to be played at Brisbane.
Test career
Playing in only his tenth first-class match, Bradman, nicknamed "Braddles" by his teammates, found his initial Test a harsh learning experience. Caught on a sticky wicket, Australia were all out for 66 in the second innings and lost by 675 runs (still a Test record). Following scores of 18 and 1, the selectors dropped Bradman to twelfth man for the Second Test. An injury to Bill Ponsford early in the match required Bradman to field as substitute while England amassed 636, following their 863 runs in the First Test. RS "Dick" Whitington wrote, "... he had scored only nineteen himself and these experiences appear to have provided him with food for thought". Recalled for the Third Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, Bradman scored 79 and 112 to become the youngest player to make a Test century, although the match was still lost. Another loss followed in the Fourth Test. Bradman reached 58 in the second innings and appeared set to guide the team to victory when he was run out. It was to be the only run out of his Test career. The losing margin was just 12 runs.
The improving Australians did manage to win the Fifth and final Test. Bradman top-scored with 123 in the first innings, and was at the wicket in the second innings when his captain Jack Ryder hit the winning runs. Bradman completed the season with 1,690 first-class runs, averaging 93.88, and his first multiple century in a Sheffield Shield match, 340 not out against Victoria, set a new ground record for the SCG. Bradman averaged 113.28 in 1929–30. In a trial match to select the team that would tour England, he was last man out in the first innings for 124. As his team followed on, the skipper Bill Woodfull asked Bradman to keep the pads on and open the second innings. By the end of play, he was 205 not out, on his way to 225. Against Queensland at the SCG, Bradman set a then world record for first-class cricket by scoring 452 not out; he made his runs in only 415 minutes. Not long after the feat, he recalled:
Although he was an obvious selection to tour England, Bradman's unorthodox style raised doubts that he could succeed on the slower English pitches. Percy Fender wrote:
The encomiums were not confined to his batting gifts; nor did the criticism extend to his character. "Australia has unearthed a champion", said former Australian Test great Clem Hill, "self-taught, with natural ability. But most important of all, with his heart in the right place." Selector Dick Jones weighed in with the observation that it was "good to watch him talking to an old player, listening attentively to everything that is said and then replying with a modest 'thank you'."
1930 tour of England
England were favourites to win the 1930 Ashes series, and if the Australians were to exceed expectations, their young batsmen, Bradman and Jackson, needed to prosper. With his elegant batting technique, Jackson appeared the brighter prospect of the pair. However, Bradman began the tour with 236 at Worcester and went on to score 1,000 first-class runs by the end of May, the fifth player (and first Australian) to achieve this rare feat. In his first Test appearance in England, Bradman hit 131 in the second innings but England won the match. His batting reached a new level in the Second Test at Lord's where he scored 254 as Australia won and levelled the series. Later in life, Bradman rated this the best innings of his career as, "practically without exception every ball went where it was intended to go". Wisden noted his fast footwork and how he hit the ball "all round the wicket with power and accuracy", as well as faultless concentration in keeping the ball on the ground.
In terms of runs scored, this performance was soon surpassed. In the Third Test, at Headingley, Bradman scored a century before lunch on 11 July, the first day of the Test match to equal the performances of Victor Trumper and Charlie Macartney. In the afternoon, Bradman added another century between lunch and tea, before finishing the day on 309 not out. He remains the only Test player to pass 300 in one day's play. His eventual score of 334 was a world-record, exceeding the previous mark of 325 by Andy Sandham. Bradman dominated the Australian innings; the second-highest tally was 77 by Alan Kippax. Businessman Arthur Whitelaw later presented Bradman with a cheque for £1,000 in appreciation of his achievement. The match ended in anti-climax as poor weather prevented a result, as it also did in the Fourth Test.
In the deciding Test at The Oval, England made 405. During an innings stretching over three days due to intermittent rain, Bradman made yet another multiple century, this time 232, which helped give Australia a big lead of 290 runs. In a crucial partnership with Archie Jackson, Bradman battled through a difficult session when England fast bowler Harold Larwood bowled short on a pitch enlivened by the rain. Wisden gave this period of play only a passing mention:
A number of English players and commentators noted Bradman's discomfort in playing the short, rising delivery. The revelation came too late for this particular match, but was to have immense significance in the next Ashes series. Australia won the match by an innings and regained the Ashes. The victory made an impact in Australia. With the economy sliding toward depression and unemployment rapidly rising, the country found solace in sporting triumph. The story of a self-taught 22-year-old from the bush who set a series of records against the old rival made Bradman a national hero. The statistics Bradman achieved on the tour, especially in the Test matches, broke records for the day and some have stood the test of time. In all, Bradman scored 974 runs at an average of 139.14 during the Test series, with four centuries, including two double hundreds and a triple. As of 2018, no-one has matched or exceeded 974 runs or three double centuries in one Test series; the record of 974 runs exceeds the second-best performance by 69 runs and was achieved in two fewer innings. Bradman's first-class tally, 2,960 runs (at an average of 98.66 with 10 centuries), was another enduring record: the most by any overseas batsman on a tour of England.
On the tour, the dynamic nature of Bradman's batting contrasted sharply with his quiet, solitary off-field demeanour. He was described as aloof from his teammates and he did not offer to buy them a round of drinks, let alone share the money given to him by Whitelaw. Bradman spent a lot of his free time alone, writing, as he had sold the rights to a book. On his return to Australia, Bradman was surprised by the intensity of his reception; he became a "reluctant hero". Mick Simmons wanted to cash in on their employee's newly won fame. They asked Bradman to leave his teammates and attend official receptions they organised in Adelaide, Melbourne, Goulburn, his hometown Bowral and Sydney, where he received a brand new custom-built Chevrolet. At each stop, Bradman received a level of adulation that "embarrassed" him. This focus on individual accomplishment, in a team game, "... permanently damaged relationships with his contemporaries". Commenting on Australia's victory, the team's vice-captain Vic Richardson said, "... we could have played any team without Bradman, but we could not have played the blind school without Clarrie Grimmett". A modest Bradman can be heard in a 1930 recording saying "I have always endeavoured to do my best for the side, and the few centuries that have come my way have been achieved in the hope of winning matches. My one idea when going into bat was to make runs for Australia."
Reluctant hero
In 1930–31, against the first West Indian side to visit Australia, Bradman's scoring was more sedate than in England—although he did make 223 in 297 minutes in the Third Test at Brisbane and 152 in 154 minutes in the following Test at Melbourne. However, he scored quickly in a very successful sequence of innings against the South Africans in the Australian summer of 1931–32. For NSW against the tourists, he made 30, 135 and 219. In the Test matches, he scored , , 2 and ; his 299 not out in the Fourth Test, at Adelaide, set a new record for the highest score in a Test in Australia. Australia won nine of the ten Tests played over the two series.
At this point, Bradman had played 15 Test matches since the beginning of 1930, scoring 2,227 runs at an average of 131. He had played 18 innings, scoring 10 centuries, six of which had extended beyond 200. His overall scoring rate was 42 runs per hour, with 856 (or 38.5% of his tally) scored in boundaries. Significantly, he had not hit a six, which typified Bradman's attitude: if he hit the ball along the ground, then it could not be caught. During this phase of his career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a "machine-like" approach to batting. The South African fast bowler Sandy Bell described bowling to him as, "heart-breaking ... with his sort of cynical grin, which rather reminds one of the Sphinx ... he never seems to perspire".
Between these two seasons, Bradman seriously contemplated playing professional cricket in England with the Lancashire League club Accrington, a move that, according to the rules of the day, would have ended his Test career. A consortium of three Sydney businesses offered an alternative. They devised a two-year contract whereby Bradman wrote for Associated Newspapers, broadcast on Radio 2UE and promoted the menswear retailing chain FJ Palmer and Son. However, the contract increased Bradman's dependence on his public profile, making it more difficult to maintain the privacy that he ardently desired.
Bradman's chaotic wedding to Jessie Menzies in April 1932 epitomised these new and unwelcome intrusions into his private life. The church "was under siege all throughout the day ... uninvited guests stood on chairs and pews to get a better view"; police erected barriers that were broken down and many of those invited could not get a seat. Just weeks later, Bradman joined a private team organised by Arthur Mailey to tour the United States and Canada. He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. Playing 51 games in 75 days, Bradman scored 3,779 runs at 102.1, with 18 centuries. Although the standard of play was not high, the effects of the amount of cricket Bradman had played in the three previous years, together with the strains of his celebrity status, began to show on his return home.
Bodyline
Within the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), which administered English cricket at the time, few voices were more influential than "Plum" Warner's, who, when considering England's response to Bradman, wrote that it "must evolve a new type of bowler and develop fresh ideas and strange tactics to curb his almost uncanny skill". To that end, Warner orchestrated the appointment of Douglas Jardine as England captain in 1931, as a prelude to Jardine leading the 1932–33 tour to Australia, with Warner as team manager. Remembering that Bradman had struggled against bouncers during his 232 at The Oval in 1930, Jardine decided to combine traditional leg theory with short-pitched bowling to combat Bradman. He settled on the Nottinghamshire fast bowlers Harold Larwood and Bill Voce as the spearheads for his tactics. In support, the England selectors chose another three pacemen for the squad. The unusually high number of fast bowlers caused a lot of comment in both countries and roused Bradman's own suspicions.
Bradman had other problems to deal with at this time; among these were bouts of illness from an undiagnosed malaise which had begun during the tour of North America, and that the Australian Board of Control had initially refused permission for him to write a column for the Sydney Sun. Bradman, who had signed a two-year contract with the newspaper, threatened to withdraw from cricket to honour his contract when the board denied him permission to write; eventually, the paper released Bradman from the contract, in a victory for the board. In three first-class games against England before the Tests, Bradman averaged just 17.16 in 6 innings. Jardine decided to give the new tactics a trial in only one game, a fixture against an Australian XI at Melbourne. In this match, Bradman faced the leg theory and later warned local administrators that trouble was brewing if it continued. He withdrew from the First Test at the Sydney Cricket Ground amid rumours that he had suffered a nervous breakdown. Despite his absence, England employed what were already becoming known as the Bodyline tactics against the Australian batsmen and won an ill-tempered match.
The public clamoured for the return of Bradman to defeat Bodyline: "he was the batsman who could conquer this cankerous bowling ... 'Bradmania', amounting almost to religious fervour, demanded his return". Recovered from his indisposition, Bradman returned to the side in Alan Kippax's position. A world record crowd of 63,993 at the MCG saw Bradman come to the crease on the first day of the Second Test with the score at 2/67. A standing ovation ensued that delayed play for several minutes. Bradman anticipated receiving a bouncer as his first ball and, as the bowler delivered, he moved across his stumps to play the hook shot. The ball failed to rise and Bradman dragged it onto his stumps; the first-ball duck was his first in a Test. The crowd fell into stunned silence as he walked off. However, Australia took a first innings lead in the match, and another record crowd on 2 January 1933 watched Bradman hit a counter-attacking second innings century. His unbeaten 103 (from 146 balls) in a team total of 191 helped set England a target of 251 to win. Bill O'Reilly and Bert Ironmonger bowled Australia to a series-levelling victory amid hopes that Bodyline was beaten.
The Third Test at the Adelaide Oval proved pivotal. There were angry crowd scenes after the Australian captain Bill Woodfull and wicket-keeper Bert Oldfield were hit by bouncers. An apologetic Plum Warner entered the Australian dressing room and was rebuked by Woodfull. Woodfull's remarks (that "...there are two teams out there and only one of them is playing cricket") were leaked to the press, and Warner and others attributed this to Australian opening batsman Jack Fingleton, however for many years (even after Fingleton's death) a bitter war of accusation passed between Fingleton and Bradman as to who was the real source of the leak. In a cable to the MCC, the Australian Board of Control repeated the allegation of poor sportsmanship directed at Warner by Woodfull. With the support of the MCC, England continued with Bodyline despite Australian protests. The tourists won the last three Tests convincingly and regained the Ashes. Bradman caused controversy with his own tactics. Always seeking to score, and with the leg side packed with fielders, he often backed away and hit the ball into the vacant half of the outfield with unorthodox shots reminiscent of tennis or golf. This brought him 396 runs (at 56.57) for the series and plaudits for attempting to find a solution to Bodyline, although his series average was just 57% of his career mean. Jack Fingleton was in no doubt that Bradman's game altered irrevocably as a consequence of Bodyline, writing:
The constant glare of celebrity and the tribulations of the season forced Bradman to reappraise his life outside the game and to seek a career away from his cricketing fame. Harry Hodgetts, a South Australian delegate to the Board of Control, offered Bradman work as a stockbroker if he would relocate to Adelaide and captain South Australia (SA). Unknown to the public, the SA Cricket Association (SACA) instigated Hodgetts' approach and subsidised Bradman's wage. Although his wife was hesitant about moving, Bradman eventually agreed to the deal in February 1934.
Declining health and a brush with death
In his farewell season for NSW, Bradman averaged 132.44, his best yet. He was appointed vice-captain for the 1934 tour of England. However, "he was unwell for much of the [English] summer, and reports in newspapers hinted that he was suffering from heart trouble". Although he again started with a double century at Worcester, his famed concentration soon deserted him. Wisden wrote:
At one stage, Bradman went 13 first-class innings without a century, the longest such spell of his career, prompting suggestions that Bodyline had eroded his confidence and altered his technique. After three Tests, the series was one–one and Bradman had scored 133 runs in five innings. The Australians travelled to Sheffield and played a warm up game before the Fourth Test. Bradman started slowly and then, "... the old Bradman [was] back with us, in the twinkling of an eye, almost". He went on to make 140, with the last 90 runs coming in just 45 minutes. On the opening day of the Fourth Test at Headingley (Leeds), England were out for 200, but Australia slumped to 3/39, losing the third wicket from the last ball of the day. Listed to bat at number five, Bradman would start his innings the next day.
That evening, Bradman declined an invitation to dinner from Neville Cardus, telling the journalist that he wanted an early night because the team needed him to make a double century the next day. Cardus pointed out that his previous innings on the ground was 334, and the law of averages was against another such score. Bradman told Cardus, "I don't believe in the law of averages". In the event, Bradman batted all of the second day and into the third, putting on a then world record partnership of 388 with Bill Ponsford. When he was finally out for 304 (473 balls, 43 fours and 2 sixes), Australia had a lead of 350 runs, but rain prevented them from forcing a victory. The effort of the lengthy innings stretched Bradman's reserves of energy, and he did not play again until the Fifth Test at The Oval, the match that would decide the Ashes.
In the first innings at The Oval, Bradman and Ponsford recorded an even more massive partnership, this time 451 runs. It had taken them less than a month to break the record they had set at Headingley; this new world record was to last 57 years. Bradman's share of the stand was 244 from 271 balls, and the Australian total of 701 set up victory by 562 runs. For the fourth time in five series, the Ashes changed hands. England would not recover them again until after Bradman's retirement.
Seemingly restored to full health, Bradman blazed two centuries in the last two games of the tour. However, when he returned to London to prepare for the trip home, he experienced severe abdominal pain. It took a doctor more than 24 hours to diagnose acute appendicitis and a surgeon operated immediately. Bradman lost a lot of blood during the four-hour procedure and peritonitis set in. Penicillin and sulphonamides were still experimental treatments at this time; peritonitis was usually a fatal condition. On 25 September, the hospital issued a statement that Bradman was struggling for his life and that blood donors were needed urgently.
"The effect of the announcement was little short of spectacular". The hospital could not deal with the number of donors, and closed its switchboard in the face of the avalanche of telephone calls generated by the news. Journalists were asked by their editors to prepare obituaries. Teammate Bill O'Reilly took a call from King George V's secretary asking that the King be kept informed of the situation. Jessie Bradman started the month-long journey to London as soon as she received the news. En route, she heard a rumour that her husband had died. A telephone call clarified the situation and by the time she reached London, Bradman had begun a slow recovery. He followed medical advice to convalesce, taking several months to return to Australia and missing the 1934–35 Australian season.
Internal politics and the Test captaincy
There was off-field intrigue in Australian cricket during the antipodean winter of 1935. Australia, scheduled to make a tour of South Africa at the end of the year, needed to replace the retired Bill Woodfull as captain. The Board of Control wanted Bradman to lead the team, yet, on 8 August, the board announced Bradman's withdrawal from the team due to a lack of fitness. Surprisingly, in the light of this announcement, Bradman led the South Australian team in a full programme of matches that season.
The captaincy was given to Vic Richardson, Bradman's predecessor as South Australian captain. Cricket author Chris Harte's analysis of the situation is that a prior (unspecified) commercial agreement forced Bradman to remain in Australia. Harte attributed an ulterior motive to his relocation: the off-field behaviour of Richardson and other South Australian players had displeased the South Australia Cricket Association (SACA), which was looking for new leadership. To help improve discipline, Bradman became a committeeman of the SACA, and a selector of the South Australian and Australian teams. He took his adopted state to its first Sheffield Shield title for 10 years, Bradman weighing in with personal contributions of 233 against Queensland and 357 against Victoria. He finished the season with 369 (in 233 minutes), a South Australian record, made against Tasmania. The bowler who dismissed him, Reginald Townley, would later become leader of the Tasmanian Liberal Party.
Australia defeated South Africa 4–0 and senior players such as Bill O'Reilly were pointed in their comments about the enjoyment of playing under Richardson's captaincy. A group of players who were openly hostile toward Bradman formed during the tour. For some, the prospect of playing under Bradman was daunting, as was the knowledge that he would additionally be sitting in judgement of their abilities in his role as a selector.
To start the new season, the Test side played a "Rest of Australia" team, captained by Bradman, at Sydney in early October 1936. The Test XI suffered a big defeat, due to Bradman's 212 and a haul of 12 wickets taken by leg-spinner Frank Ward. Bradman let the members of the Test team know that despite their recent success, the team still required improvement. Shortly afterwards, Bradman's first child was born on 28 October, but died the next day. He took time out of cricket for two weeks and on his return made 192 in three hours against Victoria in the last match before the beginning of the Ashes series.
The Test selectors made five changes to the team who had played in the previous Test match. Significantly, Australia's most successful bowler Clarrie Grimmett was replaced by Ward, one of four players making their debut. Bradman's role in Grimmett's omission from the team was controversial and it became a theme that dogged Bradman as Grimmett continued to be prolific in domestic cricket while his successors were ineffective—he was regarded as having finished the veteran bowler's Test career in a political purge.
Australia fell to successive defeats in the opening two Tests, Bradman making two ducks in his four innings, and it seemed that the captaincy was affecting his form. The selectors made another four changes to the team for the Third Test at Melbourne.
Bradman won the toss on New Year's Day 1937, but again failed with the bat, scoring just 13. The Australians could not take advantage of a pitch that favoured batting, and finished the day at 6/181. On the second day, rain dramatically altered the course of the game. With the sun drying the pitch (in those days, covers could not be used during matches) Bradman declared to get England in to bat while the pitch was "sticky"; England also declared to get Australia back in, conceding a lead of 124. Bradman countered by reversing his batting order to protect his run-makers while conditions improved. The ploy worked and Bradman went in at number seven. In an innings spread over three days, he battled influenza while scoring 270 off 375 balls, sharing a record partnership of 346 with Jack Fingleton, and Australia went on to victory. In 2001, Wisden rated this performance as the best Test match innings of all time.
The next Test, at the Adelaide Oval, was fairly even until Bradman played another patient second innings, making 212 from 395 balls. Australia levelled the series when the erratic left-arm spinner "Chuck" Fleetwood-Smith bowled Australia to victory. In the series-deciding Fifth Test, Bradman returned to a more aggressive style in top-scoring with 169 (off 191 balls) in Australia's 604 and Australia won by an innings. Australia's achievement of winning a Test series after outright losses in the first two matches has never been repeated in Test cricket.
End of an era
During the 1938 tour of England, Bradman played the most consistent cricket of his career.
He needed to score heavily as England had a strengthened batting line-up, while the Australian bowling was over-reliant on O'Reilly. Grimmett was overlooked, but Jack Fingleton made the team, so the clique of anti-Bradman players remained. Playing 26 innings on tour, Bradman recorded 13 centuries (a new Australian record) and again made 1,000 first-class runs before the end of May, becoming the only player to do so twice. In scoring 2,429 runs, Bradman achieved the highest average ever recorded in an English season: 115.66.
In the First Test, England amassed a big first innings score and looked likely to win, but Stan McCabe made 232 for Australia, a performance Bradman rated as the best he had ever seen. With Australia forced to follow-on, Bradman fought hard to ensure McCabe's effort was not in vain, and he secured the draw with 144 not out. It was the slowest Test hundred of his career and he played a similar innings of 102 not out in the next Test as Australia struggled to another draw. Rain completely washed out the Third Test at Old Trafford.
Australia's opportunity came at Headingley, a Test described by Bradman as the best he ever played in. England batted first and made 223. During the Australian innings, Bradman backed himself by opting to bat on in poor light conditions, reasoning that Australia could score more runs in bad light on a good pitch than on a rain affected pitch in good light, when he had the option to go off. He scored 103 out of a total of 242 and the gamble paid off, as it meant there was sufficient time to push for victory when an England collapse left them a target of only 107 to win. Australia slumped to 4/61, with Bradman out for 16. An approaching storm threatened to wash the game out, but the poor weather held off and Australia managed to secure the win, a victory that retained the Ashes. For the only time in his life, the tension of the occasion got to Bradman and he could not watch the closing stages of play, a reflection of the pressure that he felt all tour: he described the captaincy as "exhausting" and said he "found it difficult to keep going".
The euphoria of securing the Ashes preceded Australia's heaviest defeat. At The Oval, England amassed a world record of 7/903 and their opening batsman Len Hutton scored an individual world record, by making 364. In an attempt to relieve the burden on his bowlers, Bradman took a rare turn at bowling. During his third over, he fractured his ankle and teammates carried him from the ground. With Bradman injured and Fingleton unable to bat because of a leg muscle strain, Australia were thrashed by an innings and 579 runs, which remains the largest margin in Test cricket history. Unfit to complete the tour, Bradman left the team in the hands of vice-captain Stan McCabe. At this point, Bradman felt that the burden of captaincy would prevent him from touring England again, although he did not make his doubts public.
Despite the pressure of captaincy, Bradman's batting form remained supreme. An experienced, mature player now commonly called "The Don" had replaced the blitzing style of his early days as the "Boy from Bowral". In 1938–39, he led South Australia to the Sheffield Shield and made a century in six consecutive innings to equal CB Fry's world record. Bradman totalled 21 first-class centuries in 34 innings, from the beginning of the 1938 tour of England (including preliminary games in Australia) until early 1939.
The next season, Bradman made an abortive bid to join the Victoria state side. The Melbourne Cricket Club advertised the position of club secretary and he was led to believe that if he applied, he would get the job. The position, which had been held by Hugh Trumble until his death in August 1938, was one of the most prestigious jobs in Australian cricket. The annual salary of £1,000 would make Bradman financially secure while allowing him to retain a connection with the game. On 18 January 1939, the club's committee, on the casting vote of the chairman, chose former Test batsman Vernon Ransford over Bradman.
The 1939–40 season was Bradman's most productive ever for SA: 1,448 runs at an average of 144.8. He made three double centuries, including 251 not out against NSW, the innings that he rated the best he ever played in the Sheffield Shield, as he tamed Bill O'Reilly at the height of his form. However, it was the end of an era. The outbreak of World War II led to the indefinite postponement of all cricket tours, and the suspension of the Sheffield Shield competition.
Troubled war years
Bradman joined the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) on 28 June 1940 and was passed fit for air crew duty. The RAAF had more recruits than it could equip and train and Bradman spent four months in Adelaide before the Governor-General of Australia, Lord Gowrie, persuaded Bradman to transfer to the army, a move that was criticised as a safer option for him. Given the rank of lieutenant, he was posted to the Army School of Physical Training at Frankston, Victoria, to act as a divisional supervisor of physical training. The exertion of the job aggravated his chronic muscular problems, diagnosed as fibrositis. Surprisingly, in light of his batting prowess, a routine army test revealed that Bradman had poor eyesight.
Invalided out of service in June 1941, Bradman spent months recuperating, unable even to shave himself or comb his hair due to the extent of the muscular pain he suffered. He resumed stockbroking during 1942. In his biography of Bradman, Charles Williams expounded the theory that the physical problems were psychosomatic, induced by stress and possibly depression; Bradman read the book's manuscript and did not disagree. Had any cricket been played at this time, he would not have been available. Although he found some relief in 1945 when referred to the Melbourne masseur Ern Saunders, Bradman permanently lost the feeling in the thumb and index finger of his (dominant) right hand.
In June 1945, Bradman faced a financial crisis when the firm of Harry Hodgetts collapsed due to fraud and embezzlement. Bradman moved quickly to set up his own business, utilising Hodgetts' client list and his old office in Grenfell Street, Adelaide. The fallout led to a prison term for Hodgetts, and left a stigma attached to Bradman's name in the city's business community for many years.
However, the SA Cricket Association had no hesitation in appointing Bradman as their delegate to the Board of Control in place of Hodgetts. Now working alongside some of the men he had battled in the 1930s, Bradman quickly became a leading light in the administration of the game. With the resumption of international cricket, he was once more appointed a Test selector, and played a major role in planning for post-war cricket.
"The ghost of a once great cricketer"
In 1945–46, Bradman suffered regular bouts of fibrositis while coming to terms with increased administrative duties and the establishment of his business. He played for South Australia in two matches to help with the re-establishment of first-class cricket and later described his batting as "painstaking". Batting against the Australian Services cricket team, Bradman scored 112 in less than two hours, yet Dick Whitington (playing for the Services) wrote, "I have seen today the ghost of a once great cricketer". Bradman declined a tour of New Zealand and spent the winter of 1946 wondering whether he had played his last match. "With the English team due to arrive for the 1946–47 Ashes series, the media and the public were anxious to know if Bradman would lead Australia." His doctor recommended against a return to the game.
Encouraged by his wife, Bradman agreed to play in lead-up fixtures to the Test series. After hitting two centuries, Bradman made himself available for the First Test at The Gabba.
Controversy emerged on the first day of the First Test at Brisbane. After compiling an uneasy 28 runs, Bradman hit a ball to the gully fieldsman, Jack Ikin. "An appeal for a catch was denied in the umpire's contentious ruling that it was a bump ball". At the end of the over, England captain Wally Hammond spoke with Bradman and criticised him for not "walking"; "from then on the series was a cricketing war just when most people desired peace", Whitington wrote. Bradman regained his finest pre-war form in making 187, followed by 234 during the Second Test at Sydney (Sid Barnes also scored 234 during the innings, many in a still standing record 405 run 5th Wicket partnership with Bradman. Barnes later recalled that he purposely got out on 234 because "it wouldn't be right for someone to make more runs than Bradman"). Australia won both matches by an innings. Jack Fingleton speculated that had the decision at Brisbane gone against him, Bradman would have retired, such were his fitness problems. In the remainder of the series, Bradman made three half-centuries in six innings, but was unable to make another century; nevertheless, his team won handsomely, 3–0. He was the leading batsman on either side, with an average of 97.14. Nearly 850,000 spectators watched the Tests, which helped lift public spirits after the war.
Century of centuries and "The Invincibles"
India made its first tour of Australia in the 1947–48 season. On 15 November, Bradman made 172 against them for an Australian XI at Sydney, his 100th first-class century. The first non-Englishman to achieve the milestone, Bradman remains the only Australian to have done so. In five Tests, he scored 715 runs (at 178.75 average). His last double century (201) came at Adelaide, and he scored a century in each innings of the Melbourne Test. On the eve of the Fifth Test, he announced that the match would be his last in Australia, although he would tour England as a farewell.
Australia had assembled one of the great teams of cricket history. Bradman made it known that he wanted to go through the tour unbeaten, a feat never before accomplished. English spectators were drawn to the matches knowing that it would be their last opportunity to see Bradman in action. RC Robertson-Glasgow observed of Bradman that:
Despite his waning powers, Bradman compiled 11 centuries on the tour, amassing 2,428 runs (average 89.92). His highest score of the tour (187) came against Essex, when Australia compiled a world record of 721 runs in a day. In the Tests, he scored a century at Trent Bridge, but the performance most like his pre-war exploits came in the Fourth Test at Headingley. England declared on the last morning of the game, setting Australia a world record 404 runs to win in only 345 minutes on a heavily worn pitch. In partnership with Arthur Morris (182), Bradman reeled off 173 not out and the match was won with 15 minutes to spare. The journalist Ray Robinson called the victory "the 'finest ever' in its conquest of seemingly insuperable odds".
In the final Test at The Oval, Bradman walked out to bat in Australia's first innings. He received a standing ovation from the crowd and three cheers from the opposition. His Test batting average stood at 101.39. Facing the wrist-spin of Eric Hollies, Bradman pushed forward to the second ball that he faced, was deceived by a googly, and bowled between bat and pad for a duck. An England batting collapse resulted in an innings defeat, denying Bradman the opportunity to bat again and so his career average finished at 99.94; if he had scored just four runs in his last innings, it would have been 100. A story developed over the years that claimed Bradman missed the ball because of tears in his eyes, a claim Bradman denied for the rest of his life.
The Australian team won the Ashes 4–0, completed the tour unbeaten, and entered history as "The Invincibles". Just as Bradman's legend grew, rather than diminished, over the years, so too has the reputation of the 1948 team. For Bradman, it was the most personally fulfilling period of his playing days, as the divisiveness of the 1930s had passed. He wrote:
With Bradman now retired from professional cricket, RC Robertson-Glasgow wrote of the English reaction "... a miracle has been removed from among us. So must ancient Italy have felt when she heard of the death of Hannibal".
Statistical summary
Test match performance
First-class performance
Test records
Bradman still holds the following significant records for Test match cricket:
Batting average
Highest career batting average (minimum 20 innings): 99.94
Highest series batting average (minimum 4-Test series): 201.50 (1931–32); also second-highest: 178.75 (1947–48)
Conversion rate
Highest percentage of centuries per innings played: 36.25% (29 centuries from 80 innings)
Highest percentage of double centuries per innings played: 15% (12 double centuries from 80 innings)
Highest 50/100 conversion rate (minimum 2000 runs): 69.05% (29 centuries converted from 42 innings of ≥ 50 runs)
Highest 100/200 conversion rate (minimum 2000 runs): 41.38% (12 double centuries converted from 29 innings of ≥ 100 runs)
Multiples of 100 runs
Most double centuries: 12
Most double centuries in a series: 3 (1930); also 2 (1931–32, 1934, 1936–37)
Most triple centuries: 2 (equal with Chris Gayle, Brian Lara and Virender Sehwag) Note: Bradman was stranded on 299* in the 4th Test against South Africa in 1932.
Scoring rate
Most centuries accumulated within single sessions of play: 6 (1 pre lunch, 2 lunch-tea, 3 tea-stumps)
Most runs in one day's play: 309 (1930)
Fastest to multiples of 1000 runs
Fewest matches required to reach 1000 (7 matches), 2000 (15 matches), 3000 (23 matches), 4000 (31 matches), 5000 (36 matches) and 6000 (45 matches) Test runs.
Fewest innings required to reach 2000 (22 innings), 3000 (33 innings), 4000 (48 innings), 5000 (56 innings) and 6000 (68 innings) Test runs.
Other
Highest peak Test batting rating: 961
Highest percentage of team runs over career: 24.28%
Highest 5th wicket partnership: 405 (with Sid Barnes, 1946–47)
Highest score by a number 7 batsman: 270 (1936–37)
Most runs against one opponent: 5,028 (England)
Most hundreds against one opponent: 19 (England)
Most runs in one series: 974 (1930)
Most consecutive matches in which he made a century: 6 (the last three Tests in 1936–37, and the first three Tests in 1938)
Cricket context
Bradman's Test batting average of 99.94 has become one of cricket's most famous, iconic statistics. No other player who has played more than 20 Test match innings has finished their career with a Test average of more than 62. Bradman scored centuries at a rate better than one every three innings—in 80 Test innings, Bradman scored 29 centuries. Only 11 players have since surpassed his total, all at a much slower rate: the next fastest player to reach 29 centuries, Sachin Tendulkar, required nearly twice as long (148 innings) to do so.
In addition, Bradman's total of 12 Test double hundreds—comprising 15% of his innings—remains the most achieved by any Test batsman and was accumulated faster than any other total.
For comparison, the next highest totals of Test double hundreds are Kumar Sangakkara's 11 in 223 innings (4.9%), Brian Lara's 9 in 232 innings (3.9%), and Wally Hammond's 7 in 140 innings (5%); the next highest rate of scoring Test double centuries was achieved by Vinod Kambli, whose 21 innings included 2 double centuries (9.5%).
World sport context
Wisden hailed Bradman as, "the greatest phenomenon in the history of cricket, indeed in the history of all ball games". Statistician Charles Davis analysed the statistics for several prominent sportsmen by comparing the number of standard deviations that they stand above the mean for their sport. The top performers in his selected sports are:
The statistics show that "no other athlete dominates an international sport to the extent that Bradman does cricket". In order to post a similarly dominant career statistic as Bradman, a baseball batter would need a career batting average of .392, while a basketball player would need to score an average of 43.0 points per game over their career. The respective records are .366 and 30.1.
When Bradman died, Time allocated a space in its "Milestones" column for an obituary:
Playing style
Bradman's early development was shaped by the high bounce of the ball on matting-over-concrete pitches. He favoured "horizontal-bat" shots (such as the hook, pull and cut) to deal with the bounce and devised a unique grip on the bat handle that would accommodate these strokes without compromising his ability to defend. Employing a side-on stance at the wicket, Bradman kept perfectly still as the bowler ran in. His backswing had a "crooked" look that troubled his early critics, but he resisted entreaties to change. His backswing kept his hands in close to the body, leaving him perfectly balanced and able to change his stroke mid-swing, if need be. Another telling factor was the decisiveness of Bradman's footwork. He "used the crease" by either coming metres down the pitch to drive, or playing so far back that his feet ended up level with the stumps when playing the cut, hook or pull.
Bradman's game evolved with experience. He temporarily adapted his technique during the Bodyline series, deliberately moving around the crease in an attempt to score from the short-pitched deliveries. At his peak, in the mid-1930s, he had the ability to switch between a defensive and attacking approach as the occasion demanded. After the Second World War, he adjusted to bat within the limitations set by his age, becoming a steady "accumulator" of runs. However, Bradman never truly mastered batting on sticky wickets. Wisden commented, "[i]f there really is a blemish on his amazing record it is ... the absence of a significant innings on one of those 'sticky dogs' of old".
After cricket
After his return to Australia, Bradman played in his own Testimonial match at Melbourne, scoring his 117th and last century, and receiving £9,342 in proceeds. In the 1949 New Year Honours, he was appointed Knight Bachelor for his services to the game, becoming the only Australian cricketer ever to be knighted. He commented that he "would have preferred to remain just Mister". The following year he published a memoir, Farewell to Cricket. Bradman accepted offers from the Daily Mail to travel with, and write about, the 1953 and 1956 Australian teams in England. The Art of Cricket, his final book published in 1958, is an instructional manual.
Bradman retired from his stockbroking business in June 1954, depending on the "comfortable" income earned as a board member of 16 publicly listed companies. His highest profile affiliation was with Argo Investments Limited, where he was chairman for a number of years. Charles Williams commented that, "[b]usiness was excluded on medical grounds, [so] the only sensible alternative was a career in the administration of the game which he loved and to which he had given most of his active life".
Bradman was honoured at a number of cricket grounds, notably when his portrait was hung in the Long Room at Lord's; until Shane Warne's portrait was added in 2005, Bradman was one of just three Australians to be honoured in this way. Bradman inaugurated a "Bradman Stand" at the Sydney Cricket Ground in January 1974; the Adelaide Oval also opened a Bradman Stand in 1990, which housed new media and corporate facilities. The Oval's Bradman Stand was demolished in 2013 as the stadium underwent an extensive re-development. Later in 1974, he attended a Lord's Taverners function in London where he experienced heart problems, which forced him to limit his public appearances to select occasions only. With his wife, Bradman returned to Bowral in 1976, where the new cricket ground was named in his honour. He gave the keynote speech at the historic Centenary Test at Melbourne in 1977.
On 16 June 1979, the Australian government awarded Bradman the nation's second-highest civilian honour at that time, Companion of the Order of Australia (AC), "in recognition of service to the sport of cricket and cricket administration". In 1980, he resigned from the ACB, to lead a more secluded life.
Administrative career
In addition to acting as one of South Australia's delegates to the Board of Control from 1945 to 1980, Bradman was a committee member of the SACA between 1935 and 1986. It is estimated that he attended 1,713 SACA meetings during this half century of service. Aside from two years in the early 1950s, he filled a selector's berth for the Test team between 1936 and 1971.
Cricket saw an increase in defensive play during the 1950s. As a selector, Bradman favoured attacking, positive cricketers who entertained the paying public. He formed an alliance with Australian captain Richie Benaud, seeking more attractive play, with some success. He served two high-profile periods as chairman of the board of Control, in 1960–63 and 1969–72. During the first, he dealt with the growing prevalence of illegal bowling actions in the game, a problem that he adjudged "the most complex I have known in cricket, because it is not a matter of fact but of opinion". The major controversy of his second stint was a proposed tour of Australia by South Africa in 1971–72. On Bradman's recommendation, the series was cancelled. Cricket journalist Michael Coward said of Bradman as an administrator:
In the late 1970s, Bradman played an important role during the World Series Cricket schism as a member of a special Australian Cricket Board committee formed to handle the crisis. He was criticised for not airing an opinion, but he dealt with World Series Cricket far more pragmatically than other administrators. Richie Benaud described Bradman as "a brilliant administrator and businessman", warning that he was not to be underestimated. As Australian captain, Ian Chappell fought with Bradman over the issue of player remuneration in the early 1970s and has suggested that Bradman was parsimonious:
Later years and death
After his wife's death in 1997, Bradman suffered "a discernible and not unexpected wilting of spirit". The next year, on his 90th birthday, he hosted a meeting with his two favourite modern players, Shane Warne and Sachin Tendulkar, but he was not seen in his familiar place at the Adelaide Oval again.
Hospitalised with pneumonia in December 2000, he returned home in the New Year and died there on 25 February 2001, aged 92.
A memorial service to mark Bradman's life was held on 25 March 2001 at St Peter's Anglican Cathedral, Adelaide. The service was attended by a host of former and current Test cricketers, as well as Australia's then prime minister, John Howard, leader of the opposition Kim Beazley and former prime minister Bob Hawke. Eulogies were given by Richie Benaud and Governor-General Sir William Deane. The service was broadcast live on ABC Television to a viewing audience of 1.45 million. A private service for family and friends was earlier held at the Centennial Park Cemetery in the suburb of Pasadena, with many people lining both Greenhill and Goodwood Roads to pay their respects as his funeral motorcade passed by.
Legacy
Cricket writer David Frith summed up the paradox of the continuing fascination with Bradman:
As early as 1939, Bradman had a Royal Navy ship named after him. Built as a fishing trawler in 1936, was taken over by the Admiralty in 1939, but was sunk by German aircraft the following year.
In the 1963 edition of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack, Bradman was selected by Neville Cardus as one of the Six Giants of the Wisden Century. This was a special commemorative selection requested by Wisden for its 100th edition. The other five players chosen were: Sydney Barnes, W. G. Grace, Jack Hobbs, Tom Richardson and Victor Trumper.
On 10 December 1985, Bradman was the first of 120 inaugural inductees into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame. He spoke of his philosophy for considering the stature of athletes:
Although modest about his own abilities and generous in his praise of other cricketers, Bradman was fully aware of the talents he possessed as a player; there is some evidence that he sought to influence his legacy. During the 1980s and 1990s, Bradman carefully selected the people to whom he gave interviews, assisting Michael Page, Roland Perry and Charles Williams, who all produced biographical works about him. Bradman also agreed to an extensive interview for ABC radio, broadcast as Bradman: The Don Declares in eight 55-minute episodes during 1988.
The most significant of these legacy projects was the Bradman Museum, opened in 1989 at the Bradman Oval in Bowral. This organisation was reformed in 1993 as a non-profit charitable Trust, called the Bradman Foundation. In 2010, it was expanded and rebranded as the International Cricket Hall of Fame.
When the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame was created in Melbourne in 1996, Bradman was made one of its 10 inaugural members. In 2000, Bradman was selected by cricket experts as one of five Wisden Cricketers of the Century. Each of the 100 members of the panel were able to select five cricketers: all 100 voted for Bradman. The ICC Cricket Hall of Fame inducted him on 19 November 2009.
Bradman's life and achievements were recognised in Australia with two notable issues. Three years before he died, he became the first living Australian to be featured on an Australian postage stamp. After his death, the Australian Government produced a 20-cent coin to commemorate his life. On 27 August 2018, to celebrate 110 years since his birth, Bradman was commemorated with a Google Doodle. To mark 150 years of the Cricketers' Almanack, Wisden named him as captain of an all-time Test World XI.
In 1999, Bradman was named in the six man shortlist for BBC Sports Personality of the Century. Asteroid 2472 Bradman discovered by Luboš Kohoutek is named in his honour.
Family life
Bradman first met Jessie Martha Menzies in 1920 when she boarded with the Bradman family, to be closer to school in Bowral. The couple married at St Paul's Anglican Church at Burwood, Sydney on 30 April 1932. The two had an impeccable marriage and were devoted to each other. During their 65-year marriage, Jessie was "shrewd, reliable, selfless, and above all, uncomplicated...she was the perfect foil to his concentrated, and occasionally mercurial character". Bradman paid tribute to his wife numerous times, once saying succinctly, "I would never have achieved what I achieved without Jessie".
The Bradmans lived in the same modest, suburban house in Holden Street, Kensington Park in Adelaide for all but the first three years of their married life. They experienced personal tragedy in raising their children: their first-born son died as an infant in 1936, their second son, John (born in 1939) contracted polio, and their daughter, Shirley, born in 1941, had cerebral palsy from birth. His family name proved a burden for John Bradman; he legally changed his last name to Bradsen in 1972. Although claims were made that he became estranged from his father, it was more a matter of "the pair inhabit[ing] different worlds", and the two remained in contact through the years. After the cricketer's death, a collection of personal letters written by Bradman to his close friend Rohan Rivett between 1953 and 1977 was released and gave researchers new insights into Bradman's family life, including the strain between father and son.
Bradman's reclusiveness in later life is partly attributable to the ongoing health problems of his wife, particularly following the open-heart surgery Jessie underwent in her 60s. Lady Bradman died in 1997, aged 88, from cancer. This had a dispiriting effect on Bradman, but the relationship with his son improved, to the extent that John resolved to change his name back to Bradman. Since his father's death, John Bradman has become the spokesperson for the family and has been involved in defending the Bradman legacy in a number of disputes. The relationship between Bradman and his wider family is less clear, although nine months after Bradman's death, his nephew Paul Bradman criticised him as a "snob" and a "loner" who forgot his connections in Bowral and who failed to attend the funerals of Paul's mother and father.
The operatic soprano Greta Bradman is his granddaughter.
In popular culture
Bradman's name has become an archetypal name for outstanding excellence, both within cricket and in the wider world. The term Bradmanesque has been coined and is used both within and outside cricketing circles. Steve Waugh described Sri Lankan Muttiah Muralitharan as "the Don Bradman of bowling".
Bradman has been the subject of more biographies than any other Australian, apart from the bushranger Ned Kelly. Bradman himself wrote four books: Don Bradman's Book–The Story of My Cricketing Life with Hints on Batting, Bowling and Fielding (1930), My Cricketing Life (1938), Farewell to Cricket (1950) and The Art of Cricket (1958). The story of the Bodyline series was retold in a 1984 television mini-series, with Gary Sweet portraying Bradman.
Bradman is immortalised in three popular songs from different eras, "Our Don Bradman" (1930s, by Jack O'Hagan), "Bradman" (1980s, by Paul Kelly), and "Sir Don", (a tribute by John Williamson performed at Bradman's memorial service). Bradman recorded several songs accompanying himself and others on piano in the early 1930s, including "Every Day Is A Rainbow Day For Me", with Jack Lumsdaine. In 2000, the Australian Government made it illegal for the names of corporations to suggest a link to "Sir Donald Bradman", if such a link does not in fact exist. Other entities with similar protection are the Australian and foreign governments, Saint Mary MacKillop, the Royal Family and the Returned and Services League of Australia.
Bibliography
How to Play Cricket (2013) by Don Bradman, Orient Paperbacks,
See also
List of Test cricket records
ICC Player Rankings
References
Sources
Baldwin, Mark (2005): The Ashes' Strangest Moments: Extraordinary But True Tales from Over a Century of the Ashes, Franz Steiner Verlag. .
Bradman, Don (1950): Farewell to Cricket, 1988 Pavilion Library reprint. .
Cashman, Richard et al. – editors (1996): The Oxford Companion to Australian Cricket, Oxford University Press. .
Coleman, Robert (1993): Seasons in the Sun: the Story of the Victorian Cricket Association, Hargreen Publishing Company. .
Davis, Charles (2000): The Best Of the Best: A New Look at the Great Cricketers and Changing Times, ABC Books. .
Dunstan, Keith (1988, rev. ed.): The Paddock That Grew, Hutchinson Australia. .
Eason, Alan (2004): The A-Z of Bradman, ABC Books. .
Fingleton, Jack (1949): Brightly Fades the Don, 1985 Pavilion Library reprint. .
Frith, David (2002): Bodyline Autopsy, ABC Books. .
Gibbs, Barry (2001): My Cricket Journey, Wakefield Press. .
Harte, Chris (1993): A History of Australian Cricket, André Deutsch. .
Haigh, Gideon. "Sir Donald Bradman at 100." The Monthly, August 2008.
Haigh, Gideon (1993): The Cricket War – the Inside Story of Kerry Packer's World Series Cricket, Text Publishing Company. .
Hutchins, Brett (2002): Don Bradman: Challenging the Myth, Cambridge University Press. .
O'Reilly, Bill (1985): Tiger – 60 Years of Cricket, William Collins. .
McGilvray, Alan & Tasker, Norman (1985): The Game Is Not the Same, ABC Books. .
Page, Michael (1983): Bradman – The Illustrated Biography, Macmillan Australia. .
Perry, Roland (1995): The Don – A Biography of Sir Donald Bradman, Macmillan. .
Robinson, Ray (1981 rev. ed.): On Top Down Under, Cassell Australia. .
Rosenwater, Irving (1978): Sir Donald Bradman – A Biography, Batsford. .
Wallace, Christine (2004): The Private Don, Allen & Unwin. .
Whitington, RS (1974): The Book of Australian Test Cricket 1877–1974, Wren Publishing. .
Williams, Charles (1996): Bradman: An Australian Hero, 2001 Abacus reprint. .
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack: various editions, accessed via ESPN Cricinfo
External links
Bradman Museum and Bradman Oval
Bradman Digital Library—State Library of South Australia
The Bradman Trail
Don Bradman on Picture Australia
Interview with Bradman 1930
Don Bradman — TV documentary — Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Some images of Don Bradman, including some showing Don Bradman's batting technique
Listen to a young Don Bradman speaking after the 1930 Ashes tour on australianscreen online
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D. G. Bradman's XI cricketers | true | [
"Přírodní park Třebíčsko (before Oblast klidu Třebíčsko) is a natural park near Třebíč in the Czech Republic. There are many interesting plants. The park was founded in 1983.\n\nKobylinec and Ptáčovský kopeček\n\nKobylinec is a natural monument situated ca 0,5 km from the village of Trnava.\nThe area of this monument is 0,44 ha. Pulsatilla grandis can be found here and in the Ptáčovský kopeček park near Ptáčov near Třebíč. Both monuments are very popular for tourists.\n\nPonds\n\nIn the natural park there are some interesting ponds such as Velký Bor, Malý Bor, Buršík near Přeckov and a brook Březinka. Dams on the brook are examples of European beaver activity.\n\nSyenitové skály near Pocoucov\n\nSyenitové skály (rocks of syenit) near Pocoucov is one of famed locations. There are interesting granite boulders. The area of the reservation is 0,77 ha.\n\nExternal links\nParts of this article or all article was translated from Czech. The original article is :cs:Přírodní park Třebíčsko.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nNature near the village Trnava which is there\n\nTřebíč\nParks in the Czech Republic\nTourist attractions in the Vysočina Region",
"Damn Interesting is an independent website founded by Alan Bellows in 2005. The website presents true stories from science, history, and psychology, primarily as long-form articles, often illustrated with original artwork. Works are written by various authors, and published at irregular intervals. The website openly rejects advertising, relying on reader and listener donations to cover operating costs.\n\nAs of October 2012, each article is also published as a podcast under the same name. In November 2019, a second podcast was launched under the title Damn Interesting Week, featuring unscripted commentary on an assortment of news articles featured on the website's \"Curated Links\" section that week. In mid-2020, a third podcast called Damn Interesting Curio Cabinet began highlighting the website's periodic short-form articles in the same radioplay format as the original podcast.\n\nIn July 2009, Damn Interesting published the print book Alien Hand Syndrome through Workman Publishing. It contains some favorites from the site and some exclusive content.\n\nAwards and recognition \nIn August 2007, PC Magazine named Damn Interesting one of the \"Top 100 Undiscovered Web Sites\".\nThe article \"The Zero-Armed Bandit\" by Alan Bellows won a 2015 Sidney Award from David Brooks in The New York Times.\nThe article \"Ghoulish Acts and Dastardly Deeds\" by Alan Bellows was cited as \"nonfiction journalism from 2017 that will stand the test of time\" by Conor Friedersdorf in The Atlantic.\nThe article \"Dupes and Duplicity\" by Jennifer Lee Noonan won a 2020 Sidney Award from David Brooks in the New York Times.\n\nAccusing The Dollop of plagiarism \n\nOn July 9, 2015, Bellows posted an open letter accusing The Dollop, a comedy podcast about history, of plagiarism due to their repeated use of verbatim text from Damn Interesting articles without permission or attribution. Dave Anthony, the writer of The Dollop, responded on reddit, admitting to using Damn Interesting content, but claiming that the use was protected by fair use, and that \"historical facts are not copyrightable.\" In an article about the controversy on Plagiarism Today, Jonathan Bailey concluded, \"Any way one looks at it, The Dollop failed its ethical obligations to all of the people, not just those writing for Damn Interesting, who put in the time, energy and expertise into writing the original content upon which their show is based.\"\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Official website\n\n2005 podcast debuts"
]
|
[
"Don Bradman",
"Reluctant hero",
"What is the relation between Don Bradman and reluctant Hero?",
"I don't know.",
"What is the Reluctant hero about?",
"making it more difficult to maintain the privacy",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a \"machine-like\" approach to batting."
]
| C_ef88bed7f74d4322a1040eb8bdce83a2_1 | Does he have any help living? | 4 | Does Don Bradman have any help living? | Don Bradman | In 1930-31, against the first West Indian side to visit Australia, Bradman's scoring was more sedate than in England--although he did make 223 in 297 minutes in the Third Test at Brisbane and 152 in 154 minutes in the following Test at Melbourne. However, he scored quickly in a very successful sequence of innings against the South Africans in the Australian summer of 1931-32. For NSW against the tourists, he made 30, 135 and 219. In the Test matches, he scored 226 (277 minutes), 112 (155 minutes), 2 and 167 (183 minutes); his 299 not out in the Fourth Test, at Adelaide, set a new record for the highest score in a Test in Australia. Australia won nine of the ten Tests played over the two series. At this point, Bradman had played 15 Test matches since the beginning of 1930, scoring 2,227 runs at an average of 131. He had played 18 innings, scoring 10 centuries, six of which had extended beyond 200. His overall scoring rate was 42 runs per hour, with 856 (or 38.5% of his tally) scored in boundaries. Significantly, he had not hit a six, which typified Bradman's attitude: if he hit the ball along the ground, then it could not be caught. During this phase of his career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a "machine-like" approach to batting. The South African fast bowler Sandy Bell described bowling to him as, "heart-breaking ... with his sort of cynical grin, which rather reminds one of the Sphinx ... he never seems to perspire". Between these two seasons, Bradman seriously contemplated playing professional cricket in England with the Lancashire League club Accrington, a move that, according to the rules of the day, would have ended his Test career. A consortium of three Sydney businesses offered an alternative. They devised a two-year contract whereby Bradman wrote for Associated Newspapers, broadcast on Radio 2UE and promoted the menswear retailing chain FJ Palmer and Son. However, the contract increased Bradman's dependence on his public profile, making it more difficult to maintain the privacy that he ardently desired. Bradman's chaotic wedding to Jessie Menzies in April 1932 epitomised these new and unwelcome intrusions into his private life. The church "was under siege all throughout the day ... uninvited guests stood on chairs and pews to get a better view"; police erected barriers that were broken down and many of those invited could not get a seat. Just weeks later, Bradman joined a private team organised by Arthur Mailey to tour the United States and Canada. He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. Playing 51 games in 75 days, Bradman scored 3,779 runs at 102.1, with 18 centuries. Although the standard of play was not high, the effects of the amount of cricket Bradman had played in the three previous years, together with the strains of his celebrity status, began to show on his return home. CANNOTANSWER | He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. | Sir Donald George Bradman, AC (27 August 1908 – 25 February 2001), nicknamed "The Don", was an Australian international cricketer, widely acknowledged as the greatest batsman of all time. Bradman's career Test batting average of 99.94 has been cited as the greatest achievement by any sportsman in any major sport.
The story that the young Bradman practised alone with a cricket stump and a golf ball is part of Australian folklore. Bradman's meteoric rise from bush cricket to the Australian Test team took just over two years. Before his 22nd birthday, he had set many records for top scoring, some of which still stand, and became Australia's sporting idol at the height of the Great Depression.
During a 20-year playing career, Bradman consistently scored at a level that made him, in the words of former Australia captain Bill Woodfull, "worth three batsmen to Australia". A controversial set of tactics, known as Bodyline, was specially devised by the England team to curb his scoring. As a captain and administrator, Bradman was committed to attacking, entertaining cricket; he drew spectators in record numbers. He hated the constant adulation, however, and it affected how he dealt with others. The focus of attention on his individual performances strained relationships with some teammates, administrators and journalists, who thought him aloof and wary. Following an enforced hiatus due to the Second World War, he made a dramatic comeback, captaining an Australian team known as "The Invincibles" on a record-breaking unbeaten tour of England.
A complex, highly driven man, not given to close personal relationships,
Bradman retained a pre-eminent position in the game by acting as an administrator, selector and writer for three decades following his retirement. Even after he became reclusive in his declining years, his opinion was highly sought, and his status as a national icon was still recognised. Almost 50 years after his retirement as a Test player, in 1997, Prime Minister John Howard of Australia called him the "greatest living Australian". Bradman's image has appeared on postage stamps and coins, and a museum dedicated to his life was opened while he was still living. On the centenary of his birth, 27 August 2008, the Royal Australian Mint issued a $5 commemorative gold coin with Bradman's image. In 2009, he was inducted posthumously into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame.
Early years
Donald George Bradman was the youngest son of George and Emily (née Whatman) Bradman, and was born on 27 August 1908 at Cootamundra, New South Wales (NSW). He had a brother, Victor, and three sisters—Islet, Lilian and Elizabeth May. Bradman was of English heritage on both sides of his family. His grandfather Charles Andrew Bradman left Withersfield, Suffolk, for Australia. When Bradman played at Cambridge in 1930 as a 21 year old on his first tour of England, he took the opportunity to trace his forebears in the region. Also, one of his great-grandfathers was one of the first Italians to migrate to Australia in 1826. Bradman's parents lived in the hamlet of Yeo Yeo, near Stockinbingal. His mother, Emily, gave birth to him at the Cootamundra home of Granny Scholz, a midwife. That house is now the Bradman Birthplace Museum. Emily had hailed from Mittagong in the NSW Southern Highlands, and in 1911, when Don Bradman was about two-and-a-half years old, his parents decided to relocate to Bowral, close to Mittagong, to be closer to Emily's family and friends, as life at Yeo Yeo was proving difficult.
Bradman practised batting incessantly during his youth. He invented his own solo cricket game, using a cricket stump for a bat, and a golf ball. A water tank, mounted on a curved brick stand, stood on a paved area behind the family home. When hit into the curved brick facing of the stand, the ball rebounded at high speed and varying angles—and Bradman would attempt to hit it again. This form of practice developed his timing and reactions to a high degree. In more formal cricket, he hit his first century at the age of 12, with an undefeated 115 playing for Bowral Public School against Mittagong High School.
Bush cricketer
During the 1920–21 season, Bradman acted as scorer for the local Bowral team, captained by his uncle George Whatman. In October 1920, he filled in when the team was one man short, scoring 37* and 29* on debut. During the season, Bradman's father took him to the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) to watch the fifth Ashes Test match. On that day, Bradman formed an ambition. "I shall never be satisfied", he told his father, "until I play on this ground". Bradman left school in 1922 and went to work for a local real estate agent who encouraged his sporting pursuits by giving him time off when necessary. He gave up cricket in favour of tennis for two years, but resumed playing cricket in 1925–26.
Bradman became a regular selection for the Bowral team; several outstanding performances earned him the attention of the Sydney daily press. Competing on matting-over-concrete pitches, Bowral played other rural towns in the Berrima District competition. Against Wingello, a team that included the future Test bowler Bill O'Reilly, Bradman made 234. In the competition final against Moss Vale, which extended over five consecutive Saturdays, Bradman scored 320 not out. During the following Australian winter (1926), an ageing Australian team lost The Ashes in England, and a number of Test players retired. The New South Wales Cricket Association began a hunt for new talent. Mindful of Bradman's big scores for Bowral, the association wrote to him, requesting his attendance at a practice session in Sydney. He was subsequently chosen for the "Country Week" tournaments at both cricket and tennis, to be played during separate weeks. His boss presented him with an ultimatum: he could have only one week away from work, and therefore had to choose between the two sports. He chose cricket.
Bradman's performances during Country Week resulted in an invitation to play grade cricket in Sydney for St George in the 1926–27 season. He scored 110 on his debut, making his first century on a turf pitch. On 1 January 1927, he turned out for the NSW second team. For the remainder of the season, Bradman travelled the from Bowral to Sydney every Saturday to play for St George.
First-class debut
The next season continued the rapid rise of the "Boy from Bowral". Selected to replace the unfit Archie Jackson in the NSW team, Bradman made his first-class debut at the Adelaide Oval, aged 19. He secured the achievement of a hundred on debut, with an innings of 118 featuring what soon became his trademarks—fast footwork, calm confidence and rapid scoring. In the final match of the season, he made his first century at the SCG, against the Sheffield Shield champions Victoria. Despite his potential, Bradman was not chosen for the Australian second team to tour New Zealand.
Bradman decided that his chances for Test selection would be improved by moving to Sydney for the 1928–29 season, when England were to tour in defence of the Ashes. Initially, he continued working in real estate, but later took a promotions job with the sporting goods retailer Mick Simmons Ltd. In the first match of the Sheffield Shield season, he scored a century in each innings against Queensland. He followed this with scores of 87 and 132 not out against the England touring team, and was rewarded with selection for the first Test, to be played at Brisbane.
Test career
Playing in only his tenth first-class match, Bradman, nicknamed "Braddles" by his teammates, found his initial Test a harsh learning experience. Caught on a sticky wicket, Australia were all out for 66 in the second innings and lost by 675 runs (still a Test record). Following scores of 18 and 1, the selectors dropped Bradman to twelfth man for the Second Test. An injury to Bill Ponsford early in the match required Bradman to field as substitute while England amassed 636, following their 863 runs in the First Test. RS "Dick" Whitington wrote, "... he had scored only nineteen himself and these experiences appear to have provided him with food for thought". Recalled for the Third Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, Bradman scored 79 and 112 to become the youngest player to make a Test century, although the match was still lost. Another loss followed in the Fourth Test. Bradman reached 58 in the second innings and appeared set to guide the team to victory when he was run out. It was to be the only run out of his Test career. The losing margin was just 12 runs.
The improving Australians did manage to win the Fifth and final Test. Bradman top-scored with 123 in the first innings, and was at the wicket in the second innings when his captain Jack Ryder hit the winning runs. Bradman completed the season with 1,690 first-class runs, averaging 93.88, and his first multiple century in a Sheffield Shield match, 340 not out against Victoria, set a new ground record for the SCG. Bradman averaged 113.28 in 1929–30. In a trial match to select the team that would tour England, he was last man out in the first innings for 124. As his team followed on, the skipper Bill Woodfull asked Bradman to keep the pads on and open the second innings. By the end of play, he was 205 not out, on his way to 225. Against Queensland at the SCG, Bradman set a then world record for first-class cricket by scoring 452 not out; he made his runs in only 415 minutes. Not long after the feat, he recalled:
Although he was an obvious selection to tour England, Bradman's unorthodox style raised doubts that he could succeed on the slower English pitches. Percy Fender wrote:
The encomiums were not confined to his batting gifts; nor did the criticism extend to his character. "Australia has unearthed a champion", said former Australian Test great Clem Hill, "self-taught, with natural ability. But most important of all, with his heart in the right place." Selector Dick Jones weighed in with the observation that it was "good to watch him talking to an old player, listening attentively to everything that is said and then replying with a modest 'thank you'."
1930 tour of England
England were favourites to win the 1930 Ashes series, and if the Australians were to exceed expectations, their young batsmen, Bradman and Jackson, needed to prosper. With his elegant batting technique, Jackson appeared the brighter prospect of the pair. However, Bradman began the tour with 236 at Worcester and went on to score 1,000 first-class runs by the end of May, the fifth player (and first Australian) to achieve this rare feat. In his first Test appearance in England, Bradman hit 131 in the second innings but England won the match. His batting reached a new level in the Second Test at Lord's where he scored 254 as Australia won and levelled the series. Later in life, Bradman rated this the best innings of his career as, "practically without exception every ball went where it was intended to go". Wisden noted his fast footwork and how he hit the ball "all round the wicket with power and accuracy", as well as faultless concentration in keeping the ball on the ground.
In terms of runs scored, this performance was soon surpassed. In the Third Test, at Headingley, Bradman scored a century before lunch on 11 July, the first day of the Test match to equal the performances of Victor Trumper and Charlie Macartney. In the afternoon, Bradman added another century between lunch and tea, before finishing the day on 309 not out. He remains the only Test player to pass 300 in one day's play. His eventual score of 334 was a world-record, exceeding the previous mark of 325 by Andy Sandham. Bradman dominated the Australian innings; the second-highest tally was 77 by Alan Kippax. Businessman Arthur Whitelaw later presented Bradman with a cheque for £1,000 in appreciation of his achievement. The match ended in anti-climax as poor weather prevented a result, as it also did in the Fourth Test.
In the deciding Test at The Oval, England made 405. During an innings stretching over three days due to intermittent rain, Bradman made yet another multiple century, this time 232, which helped give Australia a big lead of 290 runs. In a crucial partnership with Archie Jackson, Bradman battled through a difficult session when England fast bowler Harold Larwood bowled short on a pitch enlivened by the rain. Wisden gave this period of play only a passing mention:
A number of English players and commentators noted Bradman's discomfort in playing the short, rising delivery. The revelation came too late for this particular match, but was to have immense significance in the next Ashes series. Australia won the match by an innings and regained the Ashes. The victory made an impact in Australia. With the economy sliding toward depression and unemployment rapidly rising, the country found solace in sporting triumph. The story of a self-taught 22-year-old from the bush who set a series of records against the old rival made Bradman a national hero. The statistics Bradman achieved on the tour, especially in the Test matches, broke records for the day and some have stood the test of time. In all, Bradman scored 974 runs at an average of 139.14 during the Test series, with four centuries, including two double hundreds and a triple. As of 2018, no-one has matched or exceeded 974 runs or three double centuries in one Test series; the record of 974 runs exceeds the second-best performance by 69 runs and was achieved in two fewer innings. Bradman's first-class tally, 2,960 runs (at an average of 98.66 with 10 centuries), was another enduring record: the most by any overseas batsman on a tour of England.
On the tour, the dynamic nature of Bradman's batting contrasted sharply with his quiet, solitary off-field demeanour. He was described as aloof from his teammates and he did not offer to buy them a round of drinks, let alone share the money given to him by Whitelaw. Bradman spent a lot of his free time alone, writing, as he had sold the rights to a book. On his return to Australia, Bradman was surprised by the intensity of his reception; he became a "reluctant hero". Mick Simmons wanted to cash in on their employee's newly won fame. They asked Bradman to leave his teammates and attend official receptions they organised in Adelaide, Melbourne, Goulburn, his hometown Bowral and Sydney, where he received a brand new custom-built Chevrolet. At each stop, Bradman received a level of adulation that "embarrassed" him. This focus on individual accomplishment, in a team game, "... permanently damaged relationships with his contemporaries". Commenting on Australia's victory, the team's vice-captain Vic Richardson said, "... we could have played any team without Bradman, but we could not have played the blind school without Clarrie Grimmett". A modest Bradman can be heard in a 1930 recording saying "I have always endeavoured to do my best for the side, and the few centuries that have come my way have been achieved in the hope of winning matches. My one idea when going into bat was to make runs for Australia."
Reluctant hero
In 1930–31, against the first West Indian side to visit Australia, Bradman's scoring was more sedate than in England—although he did make 223 in 297 minutes in the Third Test at Brisbane and 152 in 154 minutes in the following Test at Melbourne. However, he scored quickly in a very successful sequence of innings against the South Africans in the Australian summer of 1931–32. For NSW against the tourists, he made 30, 135 and 219. In the Test matches, he scored , , 2 and ; his 299 not out in the Fourth Test, at Adelaide, set a new record for the highest score in a Test in Australia. Australia won nine of the ten Tests played over the two series.
At this point, Bradman had played 15 Test matches since the beginning of 1930, scoring 2,227 runs at an average of 131. He had played 18 innings, scoring 10 centuries, six of which had extended beyond 200. His overall scoring rate was 42 runs per hour, with 856 (or 38.5% of his tally) scored in boundaries. Significantly, he had not hit a six, which typified Bradman's attitude: if he hit the ball along the ground, then it could not be caught. During this phase of his career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a "machine-like" approach to batting. The South African fast bowler Sandy Bell described bowling to him as, "heart-breaking ... with his sort of cynical grin, which rather reminds one of the Sphinx ... he never seems to perspire".
Between these two seasons, Bradman seriously contemplated playing professional cricket in England with the Lancashire League club Accrington, a move that, according to the rules of the day, would have ended his Test career. A consortium of three Sydney businesses offered an alternative. They devised a two-year contract whereby Bradman wrote for Associated Newspapers, broadcast on Radio 2UE and promoted the menswear retailing chain FJ Palmer and Son. However, the contract increased Bradman's dependence on his public profile, making it more difficult to maintain the privacy that he ardently desired.
Bradman's chaotic wedding to Jessie Menzies in April 1932 epitomised these new and unwelcome intrusions into his private life. The church "was under siege all throughout the day ... uninvited guests stood on chairs and pews to get a better view"; police erected barriers that were broken down and many of those invited could not get a seat. Just weeks later, Bradman joined a private team organised by Arthur Mailey to tour the United States and Canada. He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. Playing 51 games in 75 days, Bradman scored 3,779 runs at 102.1, with 18 centuries. Although the standard of play was not high, the effects of the amount of cricket Bradman had played in the three previous years, together with the strains of his celebrity status, began to show on his return home.
Bodyline
Within the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), which administered English cricket at the time, few voices were more influential than "Plum" Warner's, who, when considering England's response to Bradman, wrote that it "must evolve a new type of bowler and develop fresh ideas and strange tactics to curb his almost uncanny skill". To that end, Warner orchestrated the appointment of Douglas Jardine as England captain in 1931, as a prelude to Jardine leading the 1932–33 tour to Australia, with Warner as team manager. Remembering that Bradman had struggled against bouncers during his 232 at The Oval in 1930, Jardine decided to combine traditional leg theory with short-pitched bowling to combat Bradman. He settled on the Nottinghamshire fast bowlers Harold Larwood and Bill Voce as the spearheads for his tactics. In support, the England selectors chose another three pacemen for the squad. The unusually high number of fast bowlers caused a lot of comment in both countries and roused Bradman's own suspicions.
Bradman had other problems to deal with at this time; among these were bouts of illness from an undiagnosed malaise which had begun during the tour of North America, and that the Australian Board of Control had initially refused permission for him to write a column for the Sydney Sun. Bradman, who had signed a two-year contract with the newspaper, threatened to withdraw from cricket to honour his contract when the board denied him permission to write; eventually, the paper released Bradman from the contract, in a victory for the board. In three first-class games against England before the Tests, Bradman averaged just 17.16 in 6 innings. Jardine decided to give the new tactics a trial in only one game, a fixture against an Australian XI at Melbourne. In this match, Bradman faced the leg theory and later warned local administrators that trouble was brewing if it continued. He withdrew from the First Test at the Sydney Cricket Ground amid rumours that he had suffered a nervous breakdown. Despite his absence, England employed what were already becoming known as the Bodyline tactics against the Australian batsmen and won an ill-tempered match.
The public clamoured for the return of Bradman to defeat Bodyline: "he was the batsman who could conquer this cankerous bowling ... 'Bradmania', amounting almost to religious fervour, demanded his return". Recovered from his indisposition, Bradman returned to the side in Alan Kippax's position. A world record crowd of 63,993 at the MCG saw Bradman come to the crease on the first day of the Second Test with the score at 2/67. A standing ovation ensued that delayed play for several minutes. Bradman anticipated receiving a bouncer as his first ball and, as the bowler delivered, he moved across his stumps to play the hook shot. The ball failed to rise and Bradman dragged it onto his stumps; the first-ball duck was his first in a Test. The crowd fell into stunned silence as he walked off. However, Australia took a first innings lead in the match, and another record crowd on 2 January 1933 watched Bradman hit a counter-attacking second innings century. His unbeaten 103 (from 146 balls) in a team total of 191 helped set England a target of 251 to win. Bill O'Reilly and Bert Ironmonger bowled Australia to a series-levelling victory amid hopes that Bodyline was beaten.
The Third Test at the Adelaide Oval proved pivotal. There were angry crowd scenes after the Australian captain Bill Woodfull and wicket-keeper Bert Oldfield were hit by bouncers. An apologetic Plum Warner entered the Australian dressing room and was rebuked by Woodfull. Woodfull's remarks (that "...there are two teams out there and only one of them is playing cricket") were leaked to the press, and Warner and others attributed this to Australian opening batsman Jack Fingleton, however for many years (even after Fingleton's death) a bitter war of accusation passed between Fingleton and Bradman as to who was the real source of the leak. In a cable to the MCC, the Australian Board of Control repeated the allegation of poor sportsmanship directed at Warner by Woodfull. With the support of the MCC, England continued with Bodyline despite Australian protests. The tourists won the last three Tests convincingly and regained the Ashes. Bradman caused controversy with his own tactics. Always seeking to score, and with the leg side packed with fielders, he often backed away and hit the ball into the vacant half of the outfield with unorthodox shots reminiscent of tennis or golf. This brought him 396 runs (at 56.57) for the series and plaudits for attempting to find a solution to Bodyline, although his series average was just 57% of his career mean. Jack Fingleton was in no doubt that Bradman's game altered irrevocably as a consequence of Bodyline, writing:
The constant glare of celebrity and the tribulations of the season forced Bradman to reappraise his life outside the game and to seek a career away from his cricketing fame. Harry Hodgetts, a South Australian delegate to the Board of Control, offered Bradman work as a stockbroker if he would relocate to Adelaide and captain South Australia (SA). Unknown to the public, the SA Cricket Association (SACA) instigated Hodgetts' approach and subsidised Bradman's wage. Although his wife was hesitant about moving, Bradman eventually agreed to the deal in February 1934.
Declining health and a brush with death
In his farewell season for NSW, Bradman averaged 132.44, his best yet. He was appointed vice-captain for the 1934 tour of England. However, "he was unwell for much of the [English] summer, and reports in newspapers hinted that he was suffering from heart trouble". Although he again started with a double century at Worcester, his famed concentration soon deserted him. Wisden wrote:
At one stage, Bradman went 13 first-class innings without a century, the longest such spell of his career, prompting suggestions that Bodyline had eroded his confidence and altered his technique. After three Tests, the series was one–one and Bradman had scored 133 runs in five innings. The Australians travelled to Sheffield and played a warm up game before the Fourth Test. Bradman started slowly and then, "... the old Bradman [was] back with us, in the twinkling of an eye, almost". He went on to make 140, with the last 90 runs coming in just 45 minutes. On the opening day of the Fourth Test at Headingley (Leeds), England were out for 200, but Australia slumped to 3/39, losing the third wicket from the last ball of the day. Listed to bat at number five, Bradman would start his innings the next day.
That evening, Bradman declined an invitation to dinner from Neville Cardus, telling the journalist that he wanted an early night because the team needed him to make a double century the next day. Cardus pointed out that his previous innings on the ground was 334, and the law of averages was against another such score. Bradman told Cardus, "I don't believe in the law of averages". In the event, Bradman batted all of the second day and into the third, putting on a then world record partnership of 388 with Bill Ponsford. When he was finally out for 304 (473 balls, 43 fours and 2 sixes), Australia had a lead of 350 runs, but rain prevented them from forcing a victory. The effort of the lengthy innings stretched Bradman's reserves of energy, and he did not play again until the Fifth Test at The Oval, the match that would decide the Ashes.
In the first innings at The Oval, Bradman and Ponsford recorded an even more massive partnership, this time 451 runs. It had taken them less than a month to break the record they had set at Headingley; this new world record was to last 57 years. Bradman's share of the stand was 244 from 271 balls, and the Australian total of 701 set up victory by 562 runs. For the fourth time in five series, the Ashes changed hands. England would not recover them again until after Bradman's retirement.
Seemingly restored to full health, Bradman blazed two centuries in the last two games of the tour. However, when he returned to London to prepare for the trip home, he experienced severe abdominal pain. It took a doctor more than 24 hours to diagnose acute appendicitis and a surgeon operated immediately. Bradman lost a lot of blood during the four-hour procedure and peritonitis set in. Penicillin and sulphonamides were still experimental treatments at this time; peritonitis was usually a fatal condition. On 25 September, the hospital issued a statement that Bradman was struggling for his life and that blood donors were needed urgently.
"The effect of the announcement was little short of spectacular". The hospital could not deal with the number of donors, and closed its switchboard in the face of the avalanche of telephone calls generated by the news. Journalists were asked by their editors to prepare obituaries. Teammate Bill O'Reilly took a call from King George V's secretary asking that the King be kept informed of the situation. Jessie Bradman started the month-long journey to London as soon as she received the news. En route, she heard a rumour that her husband had died. A telephone call clarified the situation and by the time she reached London, Bradman had begun a slow recovery. He followed medical advice to convalesce, taking several months to return to Australia and missing the 1934–35 Australian season.
Internal politics and the Test captaincy
There was off-field intrigue in Australian cricket during the antipodean winter of 1935. Australia, scheduled to make a tour of South Africa at the end of the year, needed to replace the retired Bill Woodfull as captain. The Board of Control wanted Bradman to lead the team, yet, on 8 August, the board announced Bradman's withdrawal from the team due to a lack of fitness. Surprisingly, in the light of this announcement, Bradman led the South Australian team in a full programme of matches that season.
The captaincy was given to Vic Richardson, Bradman's predecessor as South Australian captain. Cricket author Chris Harte's analysis of the situation is that a prior (unspecified) commercial agreement forced Bradman to remain in Australia. Harte attributed an ulterior motive to his relocation: the off-field behaviour of Richardson and other South Australian players had displeased the South Australia Cricket Association (SACA), which was looking for new leadership. To help improve discipline, Bradman became a committeeman of the SACA, and a selector of the South Australian and Australian teams. He took his adopted state to its first Sheffield Shield title for 10 years, Bradman weighing in with personal contributions of 233 against Queensland and 357 against Victoria. He finished the season with 369 (in 233 minutes), a South Australian record, made against Tasmania. The bowler who dismissed him, Reginald Townley, would later become leader of the Tasmanian Liberal Party.
Australia defeated South Africa 4–0 and senior players such as Bill O'Reilly were pointed in their comments about the enjoyment of playing under Richardson's captaincy. A group of players who were openly hostile toward Bradman formed during the tour. For some, the prospect of playing under Bradman was daunting, as was the knowledge that he would additionally be sitting in judgement of their abilities in his role as a selector.
To start the new season, the Test side played a "Rest of Australia" team, captained by Bradman, at Sydney in early October 1936. The Test XI suffered a big defeat, due to Bradman's 212 and a haul of 12 wickets taken by leg-spinner Frank Ward. Bradman let the members of the Test team know that despite their recent success, the team still required improvement. Shortly afterwards, Bradman's first child was born on 28 October, but died the next day. He took time out of cricket for two weeks and on his return made 192 in three hours against Victoria in the last match before the beginning of the Ashes series.
The Test selectors made five changes to the team who had played in the previous Test match. Significantly, Australia's most successful bowler Clarrie Grimmett was replaced by Ward, one of four players making their debut. Bradman's role in Grimmett's omission from the team was controversial and it became a theme that dogged Bradman as Grimmett continued to be prolific in domestic cricket while his successors were ineffective—he was regarded as having finished the veteran bowler's Test career in a political purge.
Australia fell to successive defeats in the opening two Tests, Bradman making two ducks in his four innings, and it seemed that the captaincy was affecting his form. The selectors made another four changes to the team for the Third Test at Melbourne.
Bradman won the toss on New Year's Day 1937, but again failed with the bat, scoring just 13. The Australians could not take advantage of a pitch that favoured batting, and finished the day at 6/181. On the second day, rain dramatically altered the course of the game. With the sun drying the pitch (in those days, covers could not be used during matches) Bradman declared to get England in to bat while the pitch was "sticky"; England also declared to get Australia back in, conceding a lead of 124. Bradman countered by reversing his batting order to protect his run-makers while conditions improved. The ploy worked and Bradman went in at number seven. In an innings spread over three days, he battled influenza while scoring 270 off 375 balls, sharing a record partnership of 346 with Jack Fingleton, and Australia went on to victory. In 2001, Wisden rated this performance as the best Test match innings of all time.
The next Test, at the Adelaide Oval, was fairly even until Bradman played another patient second innings, making 212 from 395 balls. Australia levelled the series when the erratic left-arm spinner "Chuck" Fleetwood-Smith bowled Australia to victory. In the series-deciding Fifth Test, Bradman returned to a more aggressive style in top-scoring with 169 (off 191 balls) in Australia's 604 and Australia won by an innings. Australia's achievement of winning a Test series after outright losses in the first two matches has never been repeated in Test cricket.
End of an era
During the 1938 tour of England, Bradman played the most consistent cricket of his career.
He needed to score heavily as England had a strengthened batting line-up, while the Australian bowling was over-reliant on O'Reilly. Grimmett was overlooked, but Jack Fingleton made the team, so the clique of anti-Bradman players remained. Playing 26 innings on tour, Bradman recorded 13 centuries (a new Australian record) and again made 1,000 first-class runs before the end of May, becoming the only player to do so twice. In scoring 2,429 runs, Bradman achieved the highest average ever recorded in an English season: 115.66.
In the First Test, England amassed a big first innings score and looked likely to win, but Stan McCabe made 232 for Australia, a performance Bradman rated as the best he had ever seen. With Australia forced to follow-on, Bradman fought hard to ensure McCabe's effort was not in vain, and he secured the draw with 144 not out. It was the slowest Test hundred of his career and he played a similar innings of 102 not out in the next Test as Australia struggled to another draw. Rain completely washed out the Third Test at Old Trafford.
Australia's opportunity came at Headingley, a Test described by Bradman as the best he ever played in. England batted first and made 223. During the Australian innings, Bradman backed himself by opting to bat on in poor light conditions, reasoning that Australia could score more runs in bad light on a good pitch than on a rain affected pitch in good light, when he had the option to go off. He scored 103 out of a total of 242 and the gamble paid off, as it meant there was sufficient time to push for victory when an England collapse left them a target of only 107 to win. Australia slumped to 4/61, with Bradman out for 16. An approaching storm threatened to wash the game out, but the poor weather held off and Australia managed to secure the win, a victory that retained the Ashes. For the only time in his life, the tension of the occasion got to Bradman and he could not watch the closing stages of play, a reflection of the pressure that he felt all tour: he described the captaincy as "exhausting" and said he "found it difficult to keep going".
The euphoria of securing the Ashes preceded Australia's heaviest defeat. At The Oval, England amassed a world record of 7/903 and their opening batsman Len Hutton scored an individual world record, by making 364. In an attempt to relieve the burden on his bowlers, Bradman took a rare turn at bowling. During his third over, he fractured his ankle and teammates carried him from the ground. With Bradman injured and Fingleton unable to bat because of a leg muscle strain, Australia were thrashed by an innings and 579 runs, which remains the largest margin in Test cricket history. Unfit to complete the tour, Bradman left the team in the hands of vice-captain Stan McCabe. At this point, Bradman felt that the burden of captaincy would prevent him from touring England again, although he did not make his doubts public.
Despite the pressure of captaincy, Bradman's batting form remained supreme. An experienced, mature player now commonly called "The Don" had replaced the blitzing style of his early days as the "Boy from Bowral". In 1938–39, he led South Australia to the Sheffield Shield and made a century in six consecutive innings to equal CB Fry's world record. Bradman totalled 21 first-class centuries in 34 innings, from the beginning of the 1938 tour of England (including preliminary games in Australia) until early 1939.
The next season, Bradman made an abortive bid to join the Victoria state side. The Melbourne Cricket Club advertised the position of club secretary and he was led to believe that if he applied, he would get the job. The position, which had been held by Hugh Trumble until his death in August 1938, was one of the most prestigious jobs in Australian cricket. The annual salary of £1,000 would make Bradman financially secure while allowing him to retain a connection with the game. On 18 January 1939, the club's committee, on the casting vote of the chairman, chose former Test batsman Vernon Ransford over Bradman.
The 1939–40 season was Bradman's most productive ever for SA: 1,448 runs at an average of 144.8. He made three double centuries, including 251 not out against NSW, the innings that he rated the best he ever played in the Sheffield Shield, as he tamed Bill O'Reilly at the height of his form. However, it was the end of an era. The outbreak of World War II led to the indefinite postponement of all cricket tours, and the suspension of the Sheffield Shield competition.
Troubled war years
Bradman joined the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) on 28 June 1940 and was passed fit for air crew duty. The RAAF had more recruits than it could equip and train and Bradman spent four months in Adelaide before the Governor-General of Australia, Lord Gowrie, persuaded Bradman to transfer to the army, a move that was criticised as a safer option for him. Given the rank of lieutenant, he was posted to the Army School of Physical Training at Frankston, Victoria, to act as a divisional supervisor of physical training. The exertion of the job aggravated his chronic muscular problems, diagnosed as fibrositis. Surprisingly, in light of his batting prowess, a routine army test revealed that Bradman had poor eyesight.
Invalided out of service in June 1941, Bradman spent months recuperating, unable even to shave himself or comb his hair due to the extent of the muscular pain he suffered. He resumed stockbroking during 1942. In his biography of Bradman, Charles Williams expounded the theory that the physical problems were psychosomatic, induced by stress and possibly depression; Bradman read the book's manuscript and did not disagree. Had any cricket been played at this time, he would not have been available. Although he found some relief in 1945 when referred to the Melbourne masseur Ern Saunders, Bradman permanently lost the feeling in the thumb and index finger of his (dominant) right hand.
In June 1945, Bradman faced a financial crisis when the firm of Harry Hodgetts collapsed due to fraud and embezzlement. Bradman moved quickly to set up his own business, utilising Hodgetts' client list and his old office in Grenfell Street, Adelaide. The fallout led to a prison term for Hodgetts, and left a stigma attached to Bradman's name in the city's business community for many years.
However, the SA Cricket Association had no hesitation in appointing Bradman as their delegate to the Board of Control in place of Hodgetts. Now working alongside some of the men he had battled in the 1930s, Bradman quickly became a leading light in the administration of the game. With the resumption of international cricket, he was once more appointed a Test selector, and played a major role in planning for post-war cricket.
"The ghost of a once great cricketer"
In 1945–46, Bradman suffered regular bouts of fibrositis while coming to terms with increased administrative duties and the establishment of his business. He played for South Australia in two matches to help with the re-establishment of first-class cricket and later described his batting as "painstaking". Batting against the Australian Services cricket team, Bradman scored 112 in less than two hours, yet Dick Whitington (playing for the Services) wrote, "I have seen today the ghost of a once great cricketer". Bradman declined a tour of New Zealand and spent the winter of 1946 wondering whether he had played his last match. "With the English team due to arrive for the 1946–47 Ashes series, the media and the public were anxious to know if Bradman would lead Australia." His doctor recommended against a return to the game.
Encouraged by his wife, Bradman agreed to play in lead-up fixtures to the Test series. After hitting two centuries, Bradman made himself available for the First Test at The Gabba.
Controversy emerged on the first day of the First Test at Brisbane. After compiling an uneasy 28 runs, Bradman hit a ball to the gully fieldsman, Jack Ikin. "An appeal for a catch was denied in the umpire's contentious ruling that it was a bump ball". At the end of the over, England captain Wally Hammond spoke with Bradman and criticised him for not "walking"; "from then on the series was a cricketing war just when most people desired peace", Whitington wrote. Bradman regained his finest pre-war form in making 187, followed by 234 during the Second Test at Sydney (Sid Barnes also scored 234 during the innings, many in a still standing record 405 run 5th Wicket partnership with Bradman. Barnes later recalled that he purposely got out on 234 because "it wouldn't be right for someone to make more runs than Bradman"). Australia won both matches by an innings. Jack Fingleton speculated that had the decision at Brisbane gone against him, Bradman would have retired, such were his fitness problems. In the remainder of the series, Bradman made three half-centuries in six innings, but was unable to make another century; nevertheless, his team won handsomely, 3–0. He was the leading batsman on either side, with an average of 97.14. Nearly 850,000 spectators watched the Tests, which helped lift public spirits after the war.
Century of centuries and "The Invincibles"
India made its first tour of Australia in the 1947–48 season. On 15 November, Bradman made 172 against them for an Australian XI at Sydney, his 100th first-class century. The first non-Englishman to achieve the milestone, Bradman remains the only Australian to have done so. In five Tests, he scored 715 runs (at 178.75 average). His last double century (201) came at Adelaide, and he scored a century in each innings of the Melbourne Test. On the eve of the Fifth Test, he announced that the match would be his last in Australia, although he would tour England as a farewell.
Australia had assembled one of the great teams of cricket history. Bradman made it known that he wanted to go through the tour unbeaten, a feat never before accomplished. English spectators were drawn to the matches knowing that it would be their last opportunity to see Bradman in action. RC Robertson-Glasgow observed of Bradman that:
Despite his waning powers, Bradman compiled 11 centuries on the tour, amassing 2,428 runs (average 89.92). His highest score of the tour (187) came against Essex, when Australia compiled a world record of 721 runs in a day. In the Tests, he scored a century at Trent Bridge, but the performance most like his pre-war exploits came in the Fourth Test at Headingley. England declared on the last morning of the game, setting Australia a world record 404 runs to win in only 345 minutes on a heavily worn pitch. In partnership with Arthur Morris (182), Bradman reeled off 173 not out and the match was won with 15 minutes to spare. The journalist Ray Robinson called the victory "the 'finest ever' in its conquest of seemingly insuperable odds".
In the final Test at The Oval, Bradman walked out to bat in Australia's first innings. He received a standing ovation from the crowd and three cheers from the opposition. His Test batting average stood at 101.39. Facing the wrist-spin of Eric Hollies, Bradman pushed forward to the second ball that he faced, was deceived by a googly, and bowled between bat and pad for a duck. An England batting collapse resulted in an innings defeat, denying Bradman the opportunity to bat again and so his career average finished at 99.94; if he had scored just four runs in his last innings, it would have been 100. A story developed over the years that claimed Bradman missed the ball because of tears in his eyes, a claim Bradman denied for the rest of his life.
The Australian team won the Ashes 4–0, completed the tour unbeaten, and entered history as "The Invincibles". Just as Bradman's legend grew, rather than diminished, over the years, so too has the reputation of the 1948 team. For Bradman, it was the most personally fulfilling period of his playing days, as the divisiveness of the 1930s had passed. He wrote:
With Bradman now retired from professional cricket, RC Robertson-Glasgow wrote of the English reaction "... a miracle has been removed from among us. So must ancient Italy have felt when she heard of the death of Hannibal".
Statistical summary
Test match performance
First-class performance
Test records
Bradman still holds the following significant records for Test match cricket:
Batting average
Highest career batting average (minimum 20 innings): 99.94
Highest series batting average (minimum 4-Test series): 201.50 (1931–32); also second-highest: 178.75 (1947–48)
Conversion rate
Highest percentage of centuries per innings played: 36.25% (29 centuries from 80 innings)
Highest percentage of double centuries per innings played: 15% (12 double centuries from 80 innings)
Highest 50/100 conversion rate (minimum 2000 runs): 69.05% (29 centuries converted from 42 innings of ≥ 50 runs)
Highest 100/200 conversion rate (minimum 2000 runs): 41.38% (12 double centuries converted from 29 innings of ≥ 100 runs)
Multiples of 100 runs
Most double centuries: 12
Most double centuries in a series: 3 (1930); also 2 (1931–32, 1934, 1936–37)
Most triple centuries: 2 (equal with Chris Gayle, Brian Lara and Virender Sehwag) Note: Bradman was stranded on 299* in the 4th Test against South Africa in 1932.
Scoring rate
Most centuries accumulated within single sessions of play: 6 (1 pre lunch, 2 lunch-tea, 3 tea-stumps)
Most runs in one day's play: 309 (1930)
Fastest to multiples of 1000 runs
Fewest matches required to reach 1000 (7 matches), 2000 (15 matches), 3000 (23 matches), 4000 (31 matches), 5000 (36 matches) and 6000 (45 matches) Test runs.
Fewest innings required to reach 2000 (22 innings), 3000 (33 innings), 4000 (48 innings), 5000 (56 innings) and 6000 (68 innings) Test runs.
Other
Highest peak Test batting rating: 961
Highest percentage of team runs over career: 24.28%
Highest 5th wicket partnership: 405 (with Sid Barnes, 1946–47)
Highest score by a number 7 batsman: 270 (1936–37)
Most runs against one opponent: 5,028 (England)
Most hundreds against one opponent: 19 (England)
Most runs in one series: 974 (1930)
Most consecutive matches in which he made a century: 6 (the last three Tests in 1936–37, and the first three Tests in 1938)
Cricket context
Bradman's Test batting average of 99.94 has become one of cricket's most famous, iconic statistics. No other player who has played more than 20 Test match innings has finished their career with a Test average of more than 62. Bradman scored centuries at a rate better than one every three innings—in 80 Test innings, Bradman scored 29 centuries. Only 11 players have since surpassed his total, all at a much slower rate: the next fastest player to reach 29 centuries, Sachin Tendulkar, required nearly twice as long (148 innings) to do so.
In addition, Bradman's total of 12 Test double hundreds—comprising 15% of his innings—remains the most achieved by any Test batsman and was accumulated faster than any other total.
For comparison, the next highest totals of Test double hundreds are Kumar Sangakkara's 11 in 223 innings (4.9%), Brian Lara's 9 in 232 innings (3.9%), and Wally Hammond's 7 in 140 innings (5%); the next highest rate of scoring Test double centuries was achieved by Vinod Kambli, whose 21 innings included 2 double centuries (9.5%).
World sport context
Wisden hailed Bradman as, "the greatest phenomenon in the history of cricket, indeed in the history of all ball games". Statistician Charles Davis analysed the statistics for several prominent sportsmen by comparing the number of standard deviations that they stand above the mean for their sport. The top performers in his selected sports are:
The statistics show that "no other athlete dominates an international sport to the extent that Bradman does cricket". In order to post a similarly dominant career statistic as Bradman, a baseball batter would need a career batting average of .392, while a basketball player would need to score an average of 43.0 points per game over their career. The respective records are .366 and 30.1.
When Bradman died, Time allocated a space in its "Milestones" column for an obituary:
Playing style
Bradman's early development was shaped by the high bounce of the ball on matting-over-concrete pitches. He favoured "horizontal-bat" shots (such as the hook, pull and cut) to deal with the bounce and devised a unique grip on the bat handle that would accommodate these strokes without compromising his ability to defend. Employing a side-on stance at the wicket, Bradman kept perfectly still as the bowler ran in. His backswing had a "crooked" look that troubled his early critics, but he resisted entreaties to change. His backswing kept his hands in close to the body, leaving him perfectly balanced and able to change his stroke mid-swing, if need be. Another telling factor was the decisiveness of Bradman's footwork. He "used the crease" by either coming metres down the pitch to drive, or playing so far back that his feet ended up level with the stumps when playing the cut, hook or pull.
Bradman's game evolved with experience. He temporarily adapted his technique during the Bodyline series, deliberately moving around the crease in an attempt to score from the short-pitched deliveries. At his peak, in the mid-1930s, he had the ability to switch between a defensive and attacking approach as the occasion demanded. After the Second World War, he adjusted to bat within the limitations set by his age, becoming a steady "accumulator" of runs. However, Bradman never truly mastered batting on sticky wickets. Wisden commented, "[i]f there really is a blemish on his amazing record it is ... the absence of a significant innings on one of those 'sticky dogs' of old".
After cricket
After his return to Australia, Bradman played in his own Testimonial match at Melbourne, scoring his 117th and last century, and receiving £9,342 in proceeds. In the 1949 New Year Honours, he was appointed Knight Bachelor for his services to the game, becoming the only Australian cricketer ever to be knighted. He commented that he "would have preferred to remain just Mister". The following year he published a memoir, Farewell to Cricket. Bradman accepted offers from the Daily Mail to travel with, and write about, the 1953 and 1956 Australian teams in England. The Art of Cricket, his final book published in 1958, is an instructional manual.
Bradman retired from his stockbroking business in June 1954, depending on the "comfortable" income earned as a board member of 16 publicly listed companies. His highest profile affiliation was with Argo Investments Limited, where he was chairman for a number of years. Charles Williams commented that, "[b]usiness was excluded on medical grounds, [so] the only sensible alternative was a career in the administration of the game which he loved and to which he had given most of his active life".
Bradman was honoured at a number of cricket grounds, notably when his portrait was hung in the Long Room at Lord's; until Shane Warne's portrait was added in 2005, Bradman was one of just three Australians to be honoured in this way. Bradman inaugurated a "Bradman Stand" at the Sydney Cricket Ground in January 1974; the Adelaide Oval also opened a Bradman Stand in 1990, which housed new media and corporate facilities. The Oval's Bradman Stand was demolished in 2013 as the stadium underwent an extensive re-development. Later in 1974, he attended a Lord's Taverners function in London where he experienced heart problems, which forced him to limit his public appearances to select occasions only. With his wife, Bradman returned to Bowral in 1976, where the new cricket ground was named in his honour. He gave the keynote speech at the historic Centenary Test at Melbourne in 1977.
On 16 June 1979, the Australian government awarded Bradman the nation's second-highest civilian honour at that time, Companion of the Order of Australia (AC), "in recognition of service to the sport of cricket and cricket administration". In 1980, he resigned from the ACB, to lead a more secluded life.
Administrative career
In addition to acting as one of South Australia's delegates to the Board of Control from 1945 to 1980, Bradman was a committee member of the SACA between 1935 and 1986. It is estimated that he attended 1,713 SACA meetings during this half century of service. Aside from two years in the early 1950s, he filled a selector's berth for the Test team between 1936 and 1971.
Cricket saw an increase in defensive play during the 1950s. As a selector, Bradman favoured attacking, positive cricketers who entertained the paying public. He formed an alliance with Australian captain Richie Benaud, seeking more attractive play, with some success. He served two high-profile periods as chairman of the board of Control, in 1960–63 and 1969–72. During the first, he dealt with the growing prevalence of illegal bowling actions in the game, a problem that he adjudged "the most complex I have known in cricket, because it is not a matter of fact but of opinion". The major controversy of his second stint was a proposed tour of Australia by South Africa in 1971–72. On Bradman's recommendation, the series was cancelled. Cricket journalist Michael Coward said of Bradman as an administrator:
In the late 1970s, Bradman played an important role during the World Series Cricket schism as a member of a special Australian Cricket Board committee formed to handle the crisis. He was criticised for not airing an opinion, but he dealt with World Series Cricket far more pragmatically than other administrators. Richie Benaud described Bradman as "a brilliant administrator and businessman", warning that he was not to be underestimated. As Australian captain, Ian Chappell fought with Bradman over the issue of player remuneration in the early 1970s and has suggested that Bradman was parsimonious:
Later years and death
After his wife's death in 1997, Bradman suffered "a discernible and not unexpected wilting of spirit". The next year, on his 90th birthday, he hosted a meeting with his two favourite modern players, Shane Warne and Sachin Tendulkar, but he was not seen in his familiar place at the Adelaide Oval again.
Hospitalised with pneumonia in December 2000, he returned home in the New Year and died there on 25 February 2001, aged 92.
A memorial service to mark Bradman's life was held on 25 March 2001 at St Peter's Anglican Cathedral, Adelaide. The service was attended by a host of former and current Test cricketers, as well as Australia's then prime minister, John Howard, leader of the opposition Kim Beazley and former prime minister Bob Hawke. Eulogies were given by Richie Benaud and Governor-General Sir William Deane. The service was broadcast live on ABC Television to a viewing audience of 1.45 million. A private service for family and friends was earlier held at the Centennial Park Cemetery in the suburb of Pasadena, with many people lining both Greenhill and Goodwood Roads to pay their respects as his funeral motorcade passed by.
Legacy
Cricket writer David Frith summed up the paradox of the continuing fascination with Bradman:
As early as 1939, Bradman had a Royal Navy ship named after him. Built as a fishing trawler in 1936, was taken over by the Admiralty in 1939, but was sunk by German aircraft the following year.
In the 1963 edition of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack, Bradman was selected by Neville Cardus as one of the Six Giants of the Wisden Century. This was a special commemorative selection requested by Wisden for its 100th edition. The other five players chosen were: Sydney Barnes, W. G. Grace, Jack Hobbs, Tom Richardson and Victor Trumper.
On 10 December 1985, Bradman was the first of 120 inaugural inductees into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame. He spoke of his philosophy for considering the stature of athletes:
Although modest about his own abilities and generous in his praise of other cricketers, Bradman was fully aware of the talents he possessed as a player; there is some evidence that he sought to influence his legacy. During the 1980s and 1990s, Bradman carefully selected the people to whom he gave interviews, assisting Michael Page, Roland Perry and Charles Williams, who all produced biographical works about him. Bradman also agreed to an extensive interview for ABC radio, broadcast as Bradman: The Don Declares in eight 55-minute episodes during 1988.
The most significant of these legacy projects was the Bradman Museum, opened in 1989 at the Bradman Oval in Bowral. This organisation was reformed in 1993 as a non-profit charitable Trust, called the Bradman Foundation. In 2010, it was expanded and rebranded as the International Cricket Hall of Fame.
When the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame was created in Melbourne in 1996, Bradman was made one of its 10 inaugural members. In 2000, Bradman was selected by cricket experts as one of five Wisden Cricketers of the Century. Each of the 100 members of the panel were able to select five cricketers: all 100 voted for Bradman. The ICC Cricket Hall of Fame inducted him on 19 November 2009.
Bradman's life and achievements were recognised in Australia with two notable issues. Three years before he died, he became the first living Australian to be featured on an Australian postage stamp. After his death, the Australian Government produced a 20-cent coin to commemorate his life. On 27 August 2018, to celebrate 110 years since his birth, Bradman was commemorated with a Google Doodle. To mark 150 years of the Cricketers' Almanack, Wisden named him as captain of an all-time Test World XI.
In 1999, Bradman was named in the six man shortlist for BBC Sports Personality of the Century. Asteroid 2472 Bradman discovered by Luboš Kohoutek is named in his honour.
Family life
Bradman first met Jessie Martha Menzies in 1920 when she boarded with the Bradman family, to be closer to school in Bowral. The couple married at St Paul's Anglican Church at Burwood, Sydney on 30 April 1932. The two had an impeccable marriage and were devoted to each other. During their 65-year marriage, Jessie was "shrewd, reliable, selfless, and above all, uncomplicated...she was the perfect foil to his concentrated, and occasionally mercurial character". Bradman paid tribute to his wife numerous times, once saying succinctly, "I would never have achieved what I achieved without Jessie".
The Bradmans lived in the same modest, suburban house in Holden Street, Kensington Park in Adelaide for all but the first three years of their married life. They experienced personal tragedy in raising their children: their first-born son died as an infant in 1936, their second son, John (born in 1939) contracted polio, and their daughter, Shirley, born in 1941, had cerebral palsy from birth. His family name proved a burden for John Bradman; he legally changed his last name to Bradsen in 1972. Although claims were made that he became estranged from his father, it was more a matter of "the pair inhabit[ing] different worlds", and the two remained in contact through the years. After the cricketer's death, a collection of personal letters written by Bradman to his close friend Rohan Rivett between 1953 and 1977 was released and gave researchers new insights into Bradman's family life, including the strain between father and son.
Bradman's reclusiveness in later life is partly attributable to the ongoing health problems of his wife, particularly following the open-heart surgery Jessie underwent in her 60s. Lady Bradman died in 1997, aged 88, from cancer. This had a dispiriting effect on Bradman, but the relationship with his son improved, to the extent that John resolved to change his name back to Bradman. Since his father's death, John Bradman has become the spokesperson for the family and has been involved in defending the Bradman legacy in a number of disputes. The relationship between Bradman and his wider family is less clear, although nine months after Bradman's death, his nephew Paul Bradman criticised him as a "snob" and a "loner" who forgot his connections in Bowral and who failed to attend the funerals of Paul's mother and father.
The operatic soprano Greta Bradman is his granddaughter.
In popular culture
Bradman's name has become an archetypal name for outstanding excellence, both within cricket and in the wider world. The term Bradmanesque has been coined and is used both within and outside cricketing circles. Steve Waugh described Sri Lankan Muttiah Muralitharan as "the Don Bradman of bowling".
Bradman has been the subject of more biographies than any other Australian, apart from the bushranger Ned Kelly. Bradman himself wrote four books: Don Bradman's Book–The Story of My Cricketing Life with Hints on Batting, Bowling and Fielding (1930), My Cricketing Life (1938), Farewell to Cricket (1950) and The Art of Cricket (1958). The story of the Bodyline series was retold in a 1984 television mini-series, with Gary Sweet portraying Bradman.
Bradman is immortalised in three popular songs from different eras, "Our Don Bradman" (1930s, by Jack O'Hagan), "Bradman" (1980s, by Paul Kelly), and "Sir Don", (a tribute by John Williamson performed at Bradman's memorial service). Bradman recorded several songs accompanying himself and others on piano in the early 1930s, including "Every Day Is A Rainbow Day For Me", with Jack Lumsdaine. In 2000, the Australian Government made it illegal for the names of corporations to suggest a link to "Sir Donald Bradman", if such a link does not in fact exist. Other entities with similar protection are the Australian and foreign governments, Saint Mary MacKillop, the Royal Family and the Returned and Services League of Australia.
Bibliography
How to Play Cricket (2013) by Don Bradman, Orient Paperbacks,
See also
List of Test cricket records
ICC Player Rankings
References
Sources
Baldwin, Mark (2005): The Ashes' Strangest Moments: Extraordinary But True Tales from Over a Century of the Ashes, Franz Steiner Verlag. .
Bradman, Don (1950): Farewell to Cricket, 1988 Pavilion Library reprint. .
Cashman, Richard et al. – editors (1996): The Oxford Companion to Australian Cricket, Oxford University Press. .
Coleman, Robert (1993): Seasons in the Sun: the Story of the Victorian Cricket Association, Hargreen Publishing Company. .
Davis, Charles (2000): The Best Of the Best: A New Look at the Great Cricketers and Changing Times, ABC Books. .
Dunstan, Keith (1988, rev. ed.): The Paddock That Grew, Hutchinson Australia. .
Eason, Alan (2004): The A-Z of Bradman, ABC Books. .
Fingleton, Jack (1949): Brightly Fades the Don, 1985 Pavilion Library reprint. .
Frith, David (2002): Bodyline Autopsy, ABC Books. .
Gibbs, Barry (2001): My Cricket Journey, Wakefield Press. .
Harte, Chris (1993): A History of Australian Cricket, André Deutsch. .
Haigh, Gideon. "Sir Donald Bradman at 100." The Monthly, August 2008.
Haigh, Gideon (1993): The Cricket War – the Inside Story of Kerry Packer's World Series Cricket, Text Publishing Company. .
Hutchins, Brett (2002): Don Bradman: Challenging the Myth, Cambridge University Press. .
O'Reilly, Bill (1985): Tiger – 60 Years of Cricket, William Collins. .
McGilvray, Alan & Tasker, Norman (1985): The Game Is Not the Same, ABC Books. .
Page, Michael (1983): Bradman – The Illustrated Biography, Macmillan Australia. .
Perry, Roland (1995): The Don – A Biography of Sir Donald Bradman, Macmillan. .
Robinson, Ray (1981 rev. ed.): On Top Down Under, Cassell Australia. .
Rosenwater, Irving (1978): Sir Donald Bradman – A Biography, Batsford. .
Wallace, Christine (2004): The Private Don, Allen & Unwin. .
Whitington, RS (1974): The Book of Australian Test Cricket 1877–1974, Wren Publishing. .
Williams, Charles (1996): Bradman: An Australian Hero, 2001 Abacus reprint. .
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack: various editions, accessed via ESPN Cricinfo
External links
Bradman Museum and Bradman Oval
Bradman Digital Library—State Library of South Australia
The Bradman Trail
Don Bradman on Picture Australia
Interview with Bradman 1930
Don Bradman — TV documentary — Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Some images of Don Bradman, including some showing Don Bradman's batting technique
Listen to a young Don Bradman speaking after the 1930 Ashes tour on australianscreen online
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D. G. Bradman's XI cricketers | true | [
"Lezare is a 2009 Ethiopian film. It won the prize for the best short film at the 2010 Amakula International Film Festival and the young jury award for best short film at the 2010 African Film Festival of Cordoba.\n\nSynopsis \nA small homeless boy, Abush, wakes up hungry early in the morning in a small village. Right in front of where he is sleeping, there is a bakery. Abush can smell the bread, but he does not have any money. He starts to beg to buy bread but no one pays him any attention. The villagers are busy preparing for the tree-planting event that afternoon. Finally, an elderly man gives Abush some money, but asks him to help with the tree-planting first. But the day is long and getting food is hard.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n\n2009 films\nEthiopian films",
"In phylogenetics, a plesiomorphy (“near form”) and symplesiomorphy are synonyms for an ancestral character shared by all members of a clade, which does not distinguish the clade from other clades.\n\nPlesiomorphy, symplesiomorphy, apomorphy, and synapomorphy, all mean a trait shared between species because they share an ancestral species. \n\nApomorphic and synapomorphic characteristics convey much information about evolutionary clades and can be used to define taxa. However, plesiomorphic and symplesiomorphic characteristics cannot. \n\nThe term symplesiomorphy was introduced in 1950 by German entomologist Willi Hennig.\n\nExamples\nA backbone is a plesiomorphic trait shared by birds and mammals, and does not help in placing an animal in one or the other of these two clades. Birds and mammals share this trait because both clades are descended from the same far distant ancestor. Other clades, e.g. snakes, lizards, turtles, fish, frogs, all have backbones and none are either birds nor mammals.\n\nBeing a hexapod is plesiomorphic trait shared by ants and beetles, and does not help in placing an animal in one or the other of these two clades. Ants and beetles share this trait because both clades are descended from the same far distant ancestor. Other clades, e.g. bugs, flies, bees, aphids, and many more clades, all are hexapods and none are either ants nor beetles.\n\nFeathers are a synapomorphy for placing any living species into the bird clade, hair is a synapomorphy for placing any living species into the mammal clade, elytra are a synapomorphy for placing any living species into the beetle clade, and the metapleural gland is a synapomorphy for placing any living species into the ant clade. \n\nElytra are plesiomorphic between clades of beetles, e.g. the do not distinguish the dung beetles from the horned beetles.\n\nNote that some mammal species have lost their hair, so the absence of hair does not exclude a species from being a mammal. Another mammalian synapomorphy is milk. All mammals produce milk and no other clade contains animals which produce milk. Feathers, and milk are also apomorphies.\n\nDiscussion\nAll of these terms are by definition relative, in that a trait can be a plesiomorphy in one context and an apomorphy in another. E.g. having a backbone is plesiomorphic between birds and mammals, but is apomorphic between them and insects. That is birds and mammals are vertebrates for which the backbone is a defining synapomorphic characteristic, while insects are invertebrates for which the absence of a backbone is a defining characteristic.\n\nSpecies should not be grouped purely by morphologic or genetic similarity. Because a plesiomorphic character inherited from a common ancestor can appear anywhere in a phylogenetic tree, its presence does not reveal anything about the relationships within the tree. Thus grouping species requires distinguishing ancestral from derived character states.\n\nAn example is thermo-regulation in Sauropsida which is the clade containing the lizards, turtles, crocodiles, and birds. Lizards, turtles, and crocodiles are ectothermic (coldblooded), while birds are endothermic (warmblooded). Being coldblooded is symplesiomorphic for lizards, turtles, and crocodiles, but they do not form a clade, as crocodiles are more related to birds than to lizards and turtles. Thus using coldbloodedness as an apomorphic trait to group crocodiles with lizards, and turtles, would be an error, and thus it is a plesiomorphic trait shared by these three clades due to their distant common ancestry.\n\nSee also\n Synapomorphy\nApomorphy\n Autapomorphy\nCladistics\n\nReferences\n\nPhylogenetics\n\nca:Plesiomorfia\nde:Plesiomorphie\npt:Plesiomorfia"
]
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[
"Don Bradman",
"Reluctant hero",
"What is the relation between Don Bradman and reluctant Hero?",
"I don't know.",
"What is the Reluctant hero about?",
"making it more difficult to maintain the privacy",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a \"machine-like\" approach to batting.",
"Does he have any help living?",
"He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon."
]
| C_ef88bed7f74d4322a1040eb8bdce83a2_1 | Does he undergo any surgery or in an hospital for a long time? | 5 | Does Don Bradman undergo any surgery or in an hospital for a long time? | Don Bradman | In 1930-31, against the first West Indian side to visit Australia, Bradman's scoring was more sedate than in England--although he did make 223 in 297 minutes in the Third Test at Brisbane and 152 in 154 minutes in the following Test at Melbourne. However, he scored quickly in a very successful sequence of innings against the South Africans in the Australian summer of 1931-32. For NSW against the tourists, he made 30, 135 and 219. In the Test matches, he scored 226 (277 minutes), 112 (155 minutes), 2 and 167 (183 minutes); his 299 not out in the Fourth Test, at Adelaide, set a new record for the highest score in a Test in Australia. Australia won nine of the ten Tests played over the two series. At this point, Bradman had played 15 Test matches since the beginning of 1930, scoring 2,227 runs at an average of 131. He had played 18 innings, scoring 10 centuries, six of which had extended beyond 200. His overall scoring rate was 42 runs per hour, with 856 (or 38.5% of his tally) scored in boundaries. Significantly, he had not hit a six, which typified Bradman's attitude: if he hit the ball along the ground, then it could not be caught. During this phase of his career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a "machine-like" approach to batting. The South African fast bowler Sandy Bell described bowling to him as, "heart-breaking ... with his sort of cynical grin, which rather reminds one of the Sphinx ... he never seems to perspire". Between these two seasons, Bradman seriously contemplated playing professional cricket in England with the Lancashire League club Accrington, a move that, according to the rules of the day, would have ended his Test career. A consortium of three Sydney businesses offered an alternative. They devised a two-year contract whereby Bradman wrote for Associated Newspapers, broadcast on Radio 2UE and promoted the menswear retailing chain FJ Palmer and Son. However, the contract increased Bradman's dependence on his public profile, making it more difficult to maintain the privacy that he ardently desired. Bradman's chaotic wedding to Jessie Menzies in April 1932 epitomised these new and unwelcome intrusions into his private life. The church "was under siege all throughout the day ... uninvited guests stood on chairs and pews to get a better view"; police erected barriers that were broken down and many of those invited could not get a seat. Just weeks later, Bradman joined a private team organised by Arthur Mailey to tour the United States and Canada. He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. Playing 51 games in 75 days, Bradman scored 3,779 runs at 102.1, with 18 centuries. Although the standard of play was not high, the effects of the amount of cricket Bradman had played in the three previous years, together with the strains of his celebrity status, began to show on his return home. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Sir Donald George Bradman, AC (27 August 1908 – 25 February 2001), nicknamed "The Don", was an Australian international cricketer, widely acknowledged as the greatest batsman of all time. Bradman's career Test batting average of 99.94 has been cited as the greatest achievement by any sportsman in any major sport.
The story that the young Bradman practised alone with a cricket stump and a golf ball is part of Australian folklore. Bradman's meteoric rise from bush cricket to the Australian Test team took just over two years. Before his 22nd birthday, he had set many records for top scoring, some of which still stand, and became Australia's sporting idol at the height of the Great Depression.
During a 20-year playing career, Bradman consistently scored at a level that made him, in the words of former Australia captain Bill Woodfull, "worth three batsmen to Australia". A controversial set of tactics, known as Bodyline, was specially devised by the England team to curb his scoring. As a captain and administrator, Bradman was committed to attacking, entertaining cricket; he drew spectators in record numbers. He hated the constant adulation, however, and it affected how he dealt with others. The focus of attention on his individual performances strained relationships with some teammates, administrators and journalists, who thought him aloof and wary. Following an enforced hiatus due to the Second World War, he made a dramatic comeback, captaining an Australian team known as "The Invincibles" on a record-breaking unbeaten tour of England.
A complex, highly driven man, not given to close personal relationships,
Bradman retained a pre-eminent position in the game by acting as an administrator, selector and writer for three decades following his retirement. Even after he became reclusive in his declining years, his opinion was highly sought, and his status as a national icon was still recognised. Almost 50 years after his retirement as a Test player, in 1997, Prime Minister John Howard of Australia called him the "greatest living Australian". Bradman's image has appeared on postage stamps and coins, and a museum dedicated to his life was opened while he was still living. On the centenary of his birth, 27 August 2008, the Royal Australian Mint issued a $5 commemorative gold coin with Bradman's image. In 2009, he was inducted posthumously into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame.
Early years
Donald George Bradman was the youngest son of George and Emily (née Whatman) Bradman, and was born on 27 August 1908 at Cootamundra, New South Wales (NSW). He had a brother, Victor, and three sisters—Islet, Lilian and Elizabeth May. Bradman was of English heritage on both sides of his family. His grandfather Charles Andrew Bradman left Withersfield, Suffolk, for Australia. When Bradman played at Cambridge in 1930 as a 21 year old on his first tour of England, he took the opportunity to trace his forebears in the region. Also, one of his great-grandfathers was one of the first Italians to migrate to Australia in 1826. Bradman's parents lived in the hamlet of Yeo Yeo, near Stockinbingal. His mother, Emily, gave birth to him at the Cootamundra home of Granny Scholz, a midwife. That house is now the Bradman Birthplace Museum. Emily had hailed from Mittagong in the NSW Southern Highlands, and in 1911, when Don Bradman was about two-and-a-half years old, his parents decided to relocate to Bowral, close to Mittagong, to be closer to Emily's family and friends, as life at Yeo Yeo was proving difficult.
Bradman practised batting incessantly during his youth. He invented his own solo cricket game, using a cricket stump for a bat, and a golf ball. A water tank, mounted on a curved brick stand, stood on a paved area behind the family home. When hit into the curved brick facing of the stand, the ball rebounded at high speed and varying angles—and Bradman would attempt to hit it again. This form of practice developed his timing and reactions to a high degree. In more formal cricket, he hit his first century at the age of 12, with an undefeated 115 playing for Bowral Public School against Mittagong High School.
Bush cricketer
During the 1920–21 season, Bradman acted as scorer for the local Bowral team, captained by his uncle George Whatman. In October 1920, he filled in when the team was one man short, scoring 37* and 29* on debut. During the season, Bradman's father took him to the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) to watch the fifth Ashes Test match. On that day, Bradman formed an ambition. "I shall never be satisfied", he told his father, "until I play on this ground". Bradman left school in 1922 and went to work for a local real estate agent who encouraged his sporting pursuits by giving him time off when necessary. He gave up cricket in favour of tennis for two years, but resumed playing cricket in 1925–26.
Bradman became a regular selection for the Bowral team; several outstanding performances earned him the attention of the Sydney daily press. Competing on matting-over-concrete pitches, Bowral played other rural towns in the Berrima District competition. Against Wingello, a team that included the future Test bowler Bill O'Reilly, Bradman made 234. In the competition final against Moss Vale, which extended over five consecutive Saturdays, Bradman scored 320 not out. During the following Australian winter (1926), an ageing Australian team lost The Ashes in England, and a number of Test players retired. The New South Wales Cricket Association began a hunt for new talent. Mindful of Bradman's big scores for Bowral, the association wrote to him, requesting his attendance at a practice session in Sydney. He was subsequently chosen for the "Country Week" tournaments at both cricket and tennis, to be played during separate weeks. His boss presented him with an ultimatum: he could have only one week away from work, and therefore had to choose between the two sports. He chose cricket.
Bradman's performances during Country Week resulted in an invitation to play grade cricket in Sydney for St George in the 1926–27 season. He scored 110 on his debut, making his first century on a turf pitch. On 1 January 1927, he turned out for the NSW second team. For the remainder of the season, Bradman travelled the from Bowral to Sydney every Saturday to play for St George.
First-class debut
The next season continued the rapid rise of the "Boy from Bowral". Selected to replace the unfit Archie Jackson in the NSW team, Bradman made his first-class debut at the Adelaide Oval, aged 19. He secured the achievement of a hundred on debut, with an innings of 118 featuring what soon became his trademarks—fast footwork, calm confidence and rapid scoring. In the final match of the season, he made his first century at the SCG, against the Sheffield Shield champions Victoria. Despite his potential, Bradman was not chosen for the Australian second team to tour New Zealand.
Bradman decided that his chances for Test selection would be improved by moving to Sydney for the 1928–29 season, when England were to tour in defence of the Ashes. Initially, he continued working in real estate, but later took a promotions job with the sporting goods retailer Mick Simmons Ltd. In the first match of the Sheffield Shield season, he scored a century in each innings against Queensland. He followed this with scores of 87 and 132 not out against the England touring team, and was rewarded with selection for the first Test, to be played at Brisbane.
Test career
Playing in only his tenth first-class match, Bradman, nicknamed "Braddles" by his teammates, found his initial Test a harsh learning experience. Caught on a sticky wicket, Australia were all out for 66 in the second innings and lost by 675 runs (still a Test record). Following scores of 18 and 1, the selectors dropped Bradman to twelfth man for the Second Test. An injury to Bill Ponsford early in the match required Bradman to field as substitute while England amassed 636, following their 863 runs in the First Test. RS "Dick" Whitington wrote, "... he had scored only nineteen himself and these experiences appear to have provided him with food for thought". Recalled for the Third Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, Bradman scored 79 and 112 to become the youngest player to make a Test century, although the match was still lost. Another loss followed in the Fourth Test. Bradman reached 58 in the second innings and appeared set to guide the team to victory when he was run out. It was to be the only run out of his Test career. The losing margin was just 12 runs.
The improving Australians did manage to win the Fifth and final Test. Bradman top-scored with 123 in the first innings, and was at the wicket in the second innings when his captain Jack Ryder hit the winning runs. Bradman completed the season with 1,690 first-class runs, averaging 93.88, and his first multiple century in a Sheffield Shield match, 340 not out against Victoria, set a new ground record for the SCG. Bradman averaged 113.28 in 1929–30. In a trial match to select the team that would tour England, he was last man out in the first innings for 124. As his team followed on, the skipper Bill Woodfull asked Bradman to keep the pads on and open the second innings. By the end of play, he was 205 not out, on his way to 225. Against Queensland at the SCG, Bradman set a then world record for first-class cricket by scoring 452 not out; he made his runs in only 415 minutes. Not long after the feat, he recalled:
Although he was an obvious selection to tour England, Bradman's unorthodox style raised doubts that he could succeed on the slower English pitches. Percy Fender wrote:
The encomiums were not confined to his batting gifts; nor did the criticism extend to his character. "Australia has unearthed a champion", said former Australian Test great Clem Hill, "self-taught, with natural ability. But most important of all, with his heart in the right place." Selector Dick Jones weighed in with the observation that it was "good to watch him talking to an old player, listening attentively to everything that is said and then replying with a modest 'thank you'."
1930 tour of England
England were favourites to win the 1930 Ashes series, and if the Australians were to exceed expectations, their young batsmen, Bradman and Jackson, needed to prosper. With his elegant batting technique, Jackson appeared the brighter prospect of the pair. However, Bradman began the tour with 236 at Worcester and went on to score 1,000 first-class runs by the end of May, the fifth player (and first Australian) to achieve this rare feat. In his first Test appearance in England, Bradman hit 131 in the second innings but England won the match. His batting reached a new level in the Second Test at Lord's where he scored 254 as Australia won and levelled the series. Later in life, Bradman rated this the best innings of his career as, "practically without exception every ball went where it was intended to go". Wisden noted his fast footwork and how he hit the ball "all round the wicket with power and accuracy", as well as faultless concentration in keeping the ball on the ground.
In terms of runs scored, this performance was soon surpassed. In the Third Test, at Headingley, Bradman scored a century before lunch on 11 July, the first day of the Test match to equal the performances of Victor Trumper and Charlie Macartney. In the afternoon, Bradman added another century between lunch and tea, before finishing the day on 309 not out. He remains the only Test player to pass 300 in one day's play. His eventual score of 334 was a world-record, exceeding the previous mark of 325 by Andy Sandham. Bradman dominated the Australian innings; the second-highest tally was 77 by Alan Kippax. Businessman Arthur Whitelaw later presented Bradman with a cheque for £1,000 in appreciation of his achievement. The match ended in anti-climax as poor weather prevented a result, as it also did in the Fourth Test.
In the deciding Test at The Oval, England made 405. During an innings stretching over three days due to intermittent rain, Bradman made yet another multiple century, this time 232, which helped give Australia a big lead of 290 runs. In a crucial partnership with Archie Jackson, Bradman battled through a difficult session when England fast bowler Harold Larwood bowled short on a pitch enlivened by the rain. Wisden gave this period of play only a passing mention:
A number of English players and commentators noted Bradman's discomfort in playing the short, rising delivery. The revelation came too late for this particular match, but was to have immense significance in the next Ashes series. Australia won the match by an innings and regained the Ashes. The victory made an impact in Australia. With the economy sliding toward depression and unemployment rapidly rising, the country found solace in sporting triumph. The story of a self-taught 22-year-old from the bush who set a series of records against the old rival made Bradman a national hero. The statistics Bradman achieved on the tour, especially in the Test matches, broke records for the day and some have stood the test of time. In all, Bradman scored 974 runs at an average of 139.14 during the Test series, with four centuries, including two double hundreds and a triple. As of 2018, no-one has matched or exceeded 974 runs or three double centuries in one Test series; the record of 974 runs exceeds the second-best performance by 69 runs and was achieved in two fewer innings. Bradman's first-class tally, 2,960 runs (at an average of 98.66 with 10 centuries), was another enduring record: the most by any overseas batsman on a tour of England.
On the tour, the dynamic nature of Bradman's batting contrasted sharply with his quiet, solitary off-field demeanour. He was described as aloof from his teammates and he did not offer to buy them a round of drinks, let alone share the money given to him by Whitelaw. Bradman spent a lot of his free time alone, writing, as he had sold the rights to a book. On his return to Australia, Bradman was surprised by the intensity of his reception; he became a "reluctant hero". Mick Simmons wanted to cash in on their employee's newly won fame. They asked Bradman to leave his teammates and attend official receptions they organised in Adelaide, Melbourne, Goulburn, his hometown Bowral and Sydney, where he received a brand new custom-built Chevrolet. At each stop, Bradman received a level of adulation that "embarrassed" him. This focus on individual accomplishment, in a team game, "... permanently damaged relationships with his contemporaries". Commenting on Australia's victory, the team's vice-captain Vic Richardson said, "... we could have played any team without Bradman, but we could not have played the blind school without Clarrie Grimmett". A modest Bradman can be heard in a 1930 recording saying "I have always endeavoured to do my best for the side, and the few centuries that have come my way have been achieved in the hope of winning matches. My one idea when going into bat was to make runs for Australia."
Reluctant hero
In 1930–31, against the first West Indian side to visit Australia, Bradman's scoring was more sedate than in England—although he did make 223 in 297 minutes in the Third Test at Brisbane and 152 in 154 minutes in the following Test at Melbourne. However, he scored quickly in a very successful sequence of innings against the South Africans in the Australian summer of 1931–32. For NSW against the tourists, he made 30, 135 and 219. In the Test matches, he scored , , 2 and ; his 299 not out in the Fourth Test, at Adelaide, set a new record for the highest score in a Test in Australia. Australia won nine of the ten Tests played over the two series.
At this point, Bradman had played 15 Test matches since the beginning of 1930, scoring 2,227 runs at an average of 131. He had played 18 innings, scoring 10 centuries, six of which had extended beyond 200. His overall scoring rate was 42 runs per hour, with 856 (or 38.5% of his tally) scored in boundaries. Significantly, he had not hit a six, which typified Bradman's attitude: if he hit the ball along the ground, then it could not be caught. During this phase of his career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a "machine-like" approach to batting. The South African fast bowler Sandy Bell described bowling to him as, "heart-breaking ... with his sort of cynical grin, which rather reminds one of the Sphinx ... he never seems to perspire".
Between these two seasons, Bradman seriously contemplated playing professional cricket in England with the Lancashire League club Accrington, a move that, according to the rules of the day, would have ended his Test career. A consortium of three Sydney businesses offered an alternative. They devised a two-year contract whereby Bradman wrote for Associated Newspapers, broadcast on Radio 2UE and promoted the menswear retailing chain FJ Palmer and Son. However, the contract increased Bradman's dependence on his public profile, making it more difficult to maintain the privacy that he ardently desired.
Bradman's chaotic wedding to Jessie Menzies in April 1932 epitomised these new and unwelcome intrusions into his private life. The church "was under siege all throughout the day ... uninvited guests stood on chairs and pews to get a better view"; police erected barriers that were broken down and many of those invited could not get a seat. Just weeks later, Bradman joined a private team organised by Arthur Mailey to tour the United States and Canada. He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. Playing 51 games in 75 days, Bradman scored 3,779 runs at 102.1, with 18 centuries. Although the standard of play was not high, the effects of the amount of cricket Bradman had played in the three previous years, together with the strains of his celebrity status, began to show on his return home.
Bodyline
Within the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), which administered English cricket at the time, few voices were more influential than "Plum" Warner's, who, when considering England's response to Bradman, wrote that it "must evolve a new type of bowler and develop fresh ideas and strange tactics to curb his almost uncanny skill". To that end, Warner orchestrated the appointment of Douglas Jardine as England captain in 1931, as a prelude to Jardine leading the 1932–33 tour to Australia, with Warner as team manager. Remembering that Bradman had struggled against bouncers during his 232 at The Oval in 1930, Jardine decided to combine traditional leg theory with short-pitched bowling to combat Bradman. He settled on the Nottinghamshire fast bowlers Harold Larwood and Bill Voce as the spearheads for his tactics. In support, the England selectors chose another three pacemen for the squad. The unusually high number of fast bowlers caused a lot of comment in both countries and roused Bradman's own suspicions.
Bradman had other problems to deal with at this time; among these were bouts of illness from an undiagnosed malaise which had begun during the tour of North America, and that the Australian Board of Control had initially refused permission for him to write a column for the Sydney Sun. Bradman, who had signed a two-year contract with the newspaper, threatened to withdraw from cricket to honour his contract when the board denied him permission to write; eventually, the paper released Bradman from the contract, in a victory for the board. In three first-class games against England before the Tests, Bradman averaged just 17.16 in 6 innings. Jardine decided to give the new tactics a trial in only one game, a fixture against an Australian XI at Melbourne. In this match, Bradman faced the leg theory and later warned local administrators that trouble was brewing if it continued. He withdrew from the First Test at the Sydney Cricket Ground amid rumours that he had suffered a nervous breakdown. Despite his absence, England employed what were already becoming known as the Bodyline tactics against the Australian batsmen and won an ill-tempered match.
The public clamoured for the return of Bradman to defeat Bodyline: "he was the batsman who could conquer this cankerous bowling ... 'Bradmania', amounting almost to religious fervour, demanded his return". Recovered from his indisposition, Bradman returned to the side in Alan Kippax's position. A world record crowd of 63,993 at the MCG saw Bradman come to the crease on the first day of the Second Test with the score at 2/67. A standing ovation ensued that delayed play for several minutes. Bradman anticipated receiving a bouncer as his first ball and, as the bowler delivered, he moved across his stumps to play the hook shot. The ball failed to rise and Bradman dragged it onto his stumps; the first-ball duck was his first in a Test. The crowd fell into stunned silence as he walked off. However, Australia took a first innings lead in the match, and another record crowd on 2 January 1933 watched Bradman hit a counter-attacking second innings century. His unbeaten 103 (from 146 balls) in a team total of 191 helped set England a target of 251 to win. Bill O'Reilly and Bert Ironmonger bowled Australia to a series-levelling victory amid hopes that Bodyline was beaten.
The Third Test at the Adelaide Oval proved pivotal. There were angry crowd scenes after the Australian captain Bill Woodfull and wicket-keeper Bert Oldfield were hit by bouncers. An apologetic Plum Warner entered the Australian dressing room and was rebuked by Woodfull. Woodfull's remarks (that "...there are two teams out there and only one of them is playing cricket") were leaked to the press, and Warner and others attributed this to Australian opening batsman Jack Fingleton, however for many years (even after Fingleton's death) a bitter war of accusation passed between Fingleton and Bradman as to who was the real source of the leak. In a cable to the MCC, the Australian Board of Control repeated the allegation of poor sportsmanship directed at Warner by Woodfull. With the support of the MCC, England continued with Bodyline despite Australian protests. The tourists won the last three Tests convincingly and regained the Ashes. Bradman caused controversy with his own tactics. Always seeking to score, and with the leg side packed with fielders, he often backed away and hit the ball into the vacant half of the outfield with unorthodox shots reminiscent of tennis or golf. This brought him 396 runs (at 56.57) for the series and plaudits for attempting to find a solution to Bodyline, although his series average was just 57% of his career mean. Jack Fingleton was in no doubt that Bradman's game altered irrevocably as a consequence of Bodyline, writing:
The constant glare of celebrity and the tribulations of the season forced Bradman to reappraise his life outside the game and to seek a career away from his cricketing fame. Harry Hodgetts, a South Australian delegate to the Board of Control, offered Bradman work as a stockbroker if he would relocate to Adelaide and captain South Australia (SA). Unknown to the public, the SA Cricket Association (SACA) instigated Hodgetts' approach and subsidised Bradman's wage. Although his wife was hesitant about moving, Bradman eventually agreed to the deal in February 1934.
Declining health and a brush with death
In his farewell season for NSW, Bradman averaged 132.44, his best yet. He was appointed vice-captain for the 1934 tour of England. However, "he was unwell for much of the [English] summer, and reports in newspapers hinted that he was suffering from heart trouble". Although he again started with a double century at Worcester, his famed concentration soon deserted him. Wisden wrote:
At one stage, Bradman went 13 first-class innings without a century, the longest such spell of his career, prompting suggestions that Bodyline had eroded his confidence and altered his technique. After three Tests, the series was one–one and Bradman had scored 133 runs in five innings. The Australians travelled to Sheffield and played a warm up game before the Fourth Test. Bradman started slowly and then, "... the old Bradman [was] back with us, in the twinkling of an eye, almost". He went on to make 140, with the last 90 runs coming in just 45 minutes. On the opening day of the Fourth Test at Headingley (Leeds), England were out for 200, but Australia slumped to 3/39, losing the third wicket from the last ball of the day. Listed to bat at number five, Bradman would start his innings the next day.
That evening, Bradman declined an invitation to dinner from Neville Cardus, telling the journalist that he wanted an early night because the team needed him to make a double century the next day. Cardus pointed out that his previous innings on the ground was 334, and the law of averages was against another such score. Bradman told Cardus, "I don't believe in the law of averages". In the event, Bradman batted all of the second day and into the third, putting on a then world record partnership of 388 with Bill Ponsford. When he was finally out for 304 (473 balls, 43 fours and 2 sixes), Australia had a lead of 350 runs, but rain prevented them from forcing a victory. The effort of the lengthy innings stretched Bradman's reserves of energy, and he did not play again until the Fifth Test at The Oval, the match that would decide the Ashes.
In the first innings at The Oval, Bradman and Ponsford recorded an even more massive partnership, this time 451 runs. It had taken them less than a month to break the record they had set at Headingley; this new world record was to last 57 years. Bradman's share of the stand was 244 from 271 balls, and the Australian total of 701 set up victory by 562 runs. For the fourth time in five series, the Ashes changed hands. England would not recover them again until after Bradman's retirement.
Seemingly restored to full health, Bradman blazed two centuries in the last two games of the tour. However, when he returned to London to prepare for the trip home, he experienced severe abdominal pain. It took a doctor more than 24 hours to diagnose acute appendicitis and a surgeon operated immediately. Bradman lost a lot of blood during the four-hour procedure and peritonitis set in. Penicillin and sulphonamides were still experimental treatments at this time; peritonitis was usually a fatal condition. On 25 September, the hospital issued a statement that Bradman was struggling for his life and that blood donors were needed urgently.
"The effect of the announcement was little short of spectacular". The hospital could not deal with the number of donors, and closed its switchboard in the face of the avalanche of telephone calls generated by the news. Journalists were asked by their editors to prepare obituaries. Teammate Bill O'Reilly took a call from King George V's secretary asking that the King be kept informed of the situation. Jessie Bradman started the month-long journey to London as soon as she received the news. En route, she heard a rumour that her husband had died. A telephone call clarified the situation and by the time she reached London, Bradman had begun a slow recovery. He followed medical advice to convalesce, taking several months to return to Australia and missing the 1934–35 Australian season.
Internal politics and the Test captaincy
There was off-field intrigue in Australian cricket during the antipodean winter of 1935. Australia, scheduled to make a tour of South Africa at the end of the year, needed to replace the retired Bill Woodfull as captain. The Board of Control wanted Bradman to lead the team, yet, on 8 August, the board announced Bradman's withdrawal from the team due to a lack of fitness. Surprisingly, in the light of this announcement, Bradman led the South Australian team in a full programme of matches that season.
The captaincy was given to Vic Richardson, Bradman's predecessor as South Australian captain. Cricket author Chris Harte's analysis of the situation is that a prior (unspecified) commercial agreement forced Bradman to remain in Australia. Harte attributed an ulterior motive to his relocation: the off-field behaviour of Richardson and other South Australian players had displeased the South Australia Cricket Association (SACA), which was looking for new leadership. To help improve discipline, Bradman became a committeeman of the SACA, and a selector of the South Australian and Australian teams. He took his adopted state to its first Sheffield Shield title for 10 years, Bradman weighing in with personal contributions of 233 against Queensland and 357 against Victoria. He finished the season with 369 (in 233 minutes), a South Australian record, made against Tasmania. The bowler who dismissed him, Reginald Townley, would later become leader of the Tasmanian Liberal Party.
Australia defeated South Africa 4–0 and senior players such as Bill O'Reilly were pointed in their comments about the enjoyment of playing under Richardson's captaincy. A group of players who were openly hostile toward Bradman formed during the tour. For some, the prospect of playing under Bradman was daunting, as was the knowledge that he would additionally be sitting in judgement of their abilities in his role as a selector.
To start the new season, the Test side played a "Rest of Australia" team, captained by Bradman, at Sydney in early October 1936. The Test XI suffered a big defeat, due to Bradman's 212 and a haul of 12 wickets taken by leg-spinner Frank Ward. Bradman let the members of the Test team know that despite their recent success, the team still required improvement. Shortly afterwards, Bradman's first child was born on 28 October, but died the next day. He took time out of cricket for two weeks and on his return made 192 in three hours against Victoria in the last match before the beginning of the Ashes series.
The Test selectors made five changes to the team who had played in the previous Test match. Significantly, Australia's most successful bowler Clarrie Grimmett was replaced by Ward, one of four players making their debut. Bradman's role in Grimmett's omission from the team was controversial and it became a theme that dogged Bradman as Grimmett continued to be prolific in domestic cricket while his successors were ineffective—he was regarded as having finished the veteran bowler's Test career in a political purge.
Australia fell to successive defeats in the opening two Tests, Bradman making two ducks in his four innings, and it seemed that the captaincy was affecting his form. The selectors made another four changes to the team for the Third Test at Melbourne.
Bradman won the toss on New Year's Day 1937, but again failed with the bat, scoring just 13. The Australians could not take advantage of a pitch that favoured batting, and finished the day at 6/181. On the second day, rain dramatically altered the course of the game. With the sun drying the pitch (in those days, covers could not be used during matches) Bradman declared to get England in to bat while the pitch was "sticky"; England also declared to get Australia back in, conceding a lead of 124. Bradman countered by reversing his batting order to protect his run-makers while conditions improved. The ploy worked and Bradman went in at number seven. In an innings spread over three days, he battled influenza while scoring 270 off 375 balls, sharing a record partnership of 346 with Jack Fingleton, and Australia went on to victory. In 2001, Wisden rated this performance as the best Test match innings of all time.
The next Test, at the Adelaide Oval, was fairly even until Bradman played another patient second innings, making 212 from 395 balls. Australia levelled the series when the erratic left-arm spinner "Chuck" Fleetwood-Smith bowled Australia to victory. In the series-deciding Fifth Test, Bradman returned to a more aggressive style in top-scoring with 169 (off 191 balls) in Australia's 604 and Australia won by an innings. Australia's achievement of winning a Test series after outright losses in the first two matches has never been repeated in Test cricket.
End of an era
During the 1938 tour of England, Bradman played the most consistent cricket of his career.
He needed to score heavily as England had a strengthened batting line-up, while the Australian bowling was over-reliant on O'Reilly. Grimmett was overlooked, but Jack Fingleton made the team, so the clique of anti-Bradman players remained. Playing 26 innings on tour, Bradman recorded 13 centuries (a new Australian record) and again made 1,000 first-class runs before the end of May, becoming the only player to do so twice. In scoring 2,429 runs, Bradman achieved the highest average ever recorded in an English season: 115.66.
In the First Test, England amassed a big first innings score and looked likely to win, but Stan McCabe made 232 for Australia, a performance Bradman rated as the best he had ever seen. With Australia forced to follow-on, Bradman fought hard to ensure McCabe's effort was not in vain, and he secured the draw with 144 not out. It was the slowest Test hundred of his career and he played a similar innings of 102 not out in the next Test as Australia struggled to another draw. Rain completely washed out the Third Test at Old Trafford.
Australia's opportunity came at Headingley, a Test described by Bradman as the best he ever played in. England batted first and made 223. During the Australian innings, Bradman backed himself by opting to bat on in poor light conditions, reasoning that Australia could score more runs in bad light on a good pitch than on a rain affected pitch in good light, when he had the option to go off. He scored 103 out of a total of 242 and the gamble paid off, as it meant there was sufficient time to push for victory when an England collapse left them a target of only 107 to win. Australia slumped to 4/61, with Bradman out for 16. An approaching storm threatened to wash the game out, but the poor weather held off and Australia managed to secure the win, a victory that retained the Ashes. For the only time in his life, the tension of the occasion got to Bradman and he could not watch the closing stages of play, a reflection of the pressure that he felt all tour: he described the captaincy as "exhausting" and said he "found it difficult to keep going".
The euphoria of securing the Ashes preceded Australia's heaviest defeat. At The Oval, England amassed a world record of 7/903 and their opening batsman Len Hutton scored an individual world record, by making 364. In an attempt to relieve the burden on his bowlers, Bradman took a rare turn at bowling. During his third over, he fractured his ankle and teammates carried him from the ground. With Bradman injured and Fingleton unable to bat because of a leg muscle strain, Australia were thrashed by an innings and 579 runs, which remains the largest margin in Test cricket history. Unfit to complete the tour, Bradman left the team in the hands of vice-captain Stan McCabe. At this point, Bradman felt that the burden of captaincy would prevent him from touring England again, although he did not make his doubts public.
Despite the pressure of captaincy, Bradman's batting form remained supreme. An experienced, mature player now commonly called "The Don" had replaced the blitzing style of his early days as the "Boy from Bowral". In 1938–39, he led South Australia to the Sheffield Shield and made a century in six consecutive innings to equal CB Fry's world record. Bradman totalled 21 first-class centuries in 34 innings, from the beginning of the 1938 tour of England (including preliminary games in Australia) until early 1939.
The next season, Bradman made an abortive bid to join the Victoria state side. The Melbourne Cricket Club advertised the position of club secretary and he was led to believe that if he applied, he would get the job. The position, which had been held by Hugh Trumble until his death in August 1938, was one of the most prestigious jobs in Australian cricket. The annual salary of £1,000 would make Bradman financially secure while allowing him to retain a connection with the game. On 18 January 1939, the club's committee, on the casting vote of the chairman, chose former Test batsman Vernon Ransford over Bradman.
The 1939–40 season was Bradman's most productive ever for SA: 1,448 runs at an average of 144.8. He made three double centuries, including 251 not out against NSW, the innings that he rated the best he ever played in the Sheffield Shield, as he tamed Bill O'Reilly at the height of his form. However, it was the end of an era. The outbreak of World War II led to the indefinite postponement of all cricket tours, and the suspension of the Sheffield Shield competition.
Troubled war years
Bradman joined the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) on 28 June 1940 and was passed fit for air crew duty. The RAAF had more recruits than it could equip and train and Bradman spent four months in Adelaide before the Governor-General of Australia, Lord Gowrie, persuaded Bradman to transfer to the army, a move that was criticised as a safer option for him. Given the rank of lieutenant, he was posted to the Army School of Physical Training at Frankston, Victoria, to act as a divisional supervisor of physical training. The exertion of the job aggravated his chronic muscular problems, diagnosed as fibrositis. Surprisingly, in light of his batting prowess, a routine army test revealed that Bradman had poor eyesight.
Invalided out of service in June 1941, Bradman spent months recuperating, unable even to shave himself or comb his hair due to the extent of the muscular pain he suffered. He resumed stockbroking during 1942. In his biography of Bradman, Charles Williams expounded the theory that the physical problems were psychosomatic, induced by stress and possibly depression; Bradman read the book's manuscript and did not disagree. Had any cricket been played at this time, he would not have been available. Although he found some relief in 1945 when referred to the Melbourne masseur Ern Saunders, Bradman permanently lost the feeling in the thumb and index finger of his (dominant) right hand.
In June 1945, Bradman faced a financial crisis when the firm of Harry Hodgetts collapsed due to fraud and embezzlement. Bradman moved quickly to set up his own business, utilising Hodgetts' client list and his old office in Grenfell Street, Adelaide. The fallout led to a prison term for Hodgetts, and left a stigma attached to Bradman's name in the city's business community for many years.
However, the SA Cricket Association had no hesitation in appointing Bradman as their delegate to the Board of Control in place of Hodgetts. Now working alongside some of the men he had battled in the 1930s, Bradman quickly became a leading light in the administration of the game. With the resumption of international cricket, he was once more appointed a Test selector, and played a major role in planning for post-war cricket.
"The ghost of a once great cricketer"
In 1945–46, Bradman suffered regular bouts of fibrositis while coming to terms with increased administrative duties and the establishment of his business. He played for South Australia in two matches to help with the re-establishment of first-class cricket and later described his batting as "painstaking". Batting against the Australian Services cricket team, Bradman scored 112 in less than two hours, yet Dick Whitington (playing for the Services) wrote, "I have seen today the ghost of a once great cricketer". Bradman declined a tour of New Zealand and spent the winter of 1946 wondering whether he had played his last match. "With the English team due to arrive for the 1946–47 Ashes series, the media and the public were anxious to know if Bradman would lead Australia." His doctor recommended against a return to the game.
Encouraged by his wife, Bradman agreed to play in lead-up fixtures to the Test series. After hitting two centuries, Bradman made himself available for the First Test at The Gabba.
Controversy emerged on the first day of the First Test at Brisbane. After compiling an uneasy 28 runs, Bradman hit a ball to the gully fieldsman, Jack Ikin. "An appeal for a catch was denied in the umpire's contentious ruling that it was a bump ball". At the end of the over, England captain Wally Hammond spoke with Bradman and criticised him for not "walking"; "from then on the series was a cricketing war just when most people desired peace", Whitington wrote. Bradman regained his finest pre-war form in making 187, followed by 234 during the Second Test at Sydney (Sid Barnes also scored 234 during the innings, many in a still standing record 405 run 5th Wicket partnership with Bradman. Barnes later recalled that he purposely got out on 234 because "it wouldn't be right for someone to make more runs than Bradman"). Australia won both matches by an innings. Jack Fingleton speculated that had the decision at Brisbane gone against him, Bradman would have retired, such were his fitness problems. In the remainder of the series, Bradman made three half-centuries in six innings, but was unable to make another century; nevertheless, his team won handsomely, 3–0. He was the leading batsman on either side, with an average of 97.14. Nearly 850,000 spectators watched the Tests, which helped lift public spirits after the war.
Century of centuries and "The Invincibles"
India made its first tour of Australia in the 1947–48 season. On 15 November, Bradman made 172 against them for an Australian XI at Sydney, his 100th first-class century. The first non-Englishman to achieve the milestone, Bradman remains the only Australian to have done so. In five Tests, he scored 715 runs (at 178.75 average). His last double century (201) came at Adelaide, and he scored a century in each innings of the Melbourne Test. On the eve of the Fifth Test, he announced that the match would be his last in Australia, although he would tour England as a farewell.
Australia had assembled one of the great teams of cricket history. Bradman made it known that he wanted to go through the tour unbeaten, a feat never before accomplished. English spectators were drawn to the matches knowing that it would be their last opportunity to see Bradman in action. RC Robertson-Glasgow observed of Bradman that:
Despite his waning powers, Bradman compiled 11 centuries on the tour, amassing 2,428 runs (average 89.92). His highest score of the tour (187) came against Essex, when Australia compiled a world record of 721 runs in a day. In the Tests, he scored a century at Trent Bridge, but the performance most like his pre-war exploits came in the Fourth Test at Headingley. England declared on the last morning of the game, setting Australia a world record 404 runs to win in only 345 minutes on a heavily worn pitch. In partnership with Arthur Morris (182), Bradman reeled off 173 not out and the match was won with 15 minutes to spare. The journalist Ray Robinson called the victory "the 'finest ever' in its conquest of seemingly insuperable odds".
In the final Test at The Oval, Bradman walked out to bat in Australia's first innings. He received a standing ovation from the crowd and three cheers from the opposition. His Test batting average stood at 101.39. Facing the wrist-spin of Eric Hollies, Bradman pushed forward to the second ball that he faced, was deceived by a googly, and bowled between bat and pad for a duck. An England batting collapse resulted in an innings defeat, denying Bradman the opportunity to bat again and so his career average finished at 99.94; if he had scored just four runs in his last innings, it would have been 100. A story developed over the years that claimed Bradman missed the ball because of tears in his eyes, a claim Bradman denied for the rest of his life.
The Australian team won the Ashes 4–0, completed the tour unbeaten, and entered history as "The Invincibles". Just as Bradman's legend grew, rather than diminished, over the years, so too has the reputation of the 1948 team. For Bradman, it was the most personally fulfilling period of his playing days, as the divisiveness of the 1930s had passed. He wrote:
With Bradman now retired from professional cricket, RC Robertson-Glasgow wrote of the English reaction "... a miracle has been removed from among us. So must ancient Italy have felt when she heard of the death of Hannibal".
Statistical summary
Test match performance
First-class performance
Test records
Bradman still holds the following significant records for Test match cricket:
Batting average
Highest career batting average (minimum 20 innings): 99.94
Highest series batting average (minimum 4-Test series): 201.50 (1931–32); also second-highest: 178.75 (1947–48)
Conversion rate
Highest percentage of centuries per innings played: 36.25% (29 centuries from 80 innings)
Highest percentage of double centuries per innings played: 15% (12 double centuries from 80 innings)
Highest 50/100 conversion rate (minimum 2000 runs): 69.05% (29 centuries converted from 42 innings of ≥ 50 runs)
Highest 100/200 conversion rate (minimum 2000 runs): 41.38% (12 double centuries converted from 29 innings of ≥ 100 runs)
Multiples of 100 runs
Most double centuries: 12
Most double centuries in a series: 3 (1930); also 2 (1931–32, 1934, 1936–37)
Most triple centuries: 2 (equal with Chris Gayle, Brian Lara and Virender Sehwag) Note: Bradman was stranded on 299* in the 4th Test against South Africa in 1932.
Scoring rate
Most centuries accumulated within single sessions of play: 6 (1 pre lunch, 2 lunch-tea, 3 tea-stumps)
Most runs in one day's play: 309 (1930)
Fastest to multiples of 1000 runs
Fewest matches required to reach 1000 (7 matches), 2000 (15 matches), 3000 (23 matches), 4000 (31 matches), 5000 (36 matches) and 6000 (45 matches) Test runs.
Fewest innings required to reach 2000 (22 innings), 3000 (33 innings), 4000 (48 innings), 5000 (56 innings) and 6000 (68 innings) Test runs.
Other
Highest peak Test batting rating: 961
Highest percentage of team runs over career: 24.28%
Highest 5th wicket partnership: 405 (with Sid Barnes, 1946–47)
Highest score by a number 7 batsman: 270 (1936–37)
Most runs against one opponent: 5,028 (England)
Most hundreds against one opponent: 19 (England)
Most runs in one series: 974 (1930)
Most consecutive matches in which he made a century: 6 (the last three Tests in 1936–37, and the first three Tests in 1938)
Cricket context
Bradman's Test batting average of 99.94 has become one of cricket's most famous, iconic statistics. No other player who has played more than 20 Test match innings has finished their career with a Test average of more than 62. Bradman scored centuries at a rate better than one every three innings—in 80 Test innings, Bradman scored 29 centuries. Only 11 players have since surpassed his total, all at a much slower rate: the next fastest player to reach 29 centuries, Sachin Tendulkar, required nearly twice as long (148 innings) to do so.
In addition, Bradman's total of 12 Test double hundreds—comprising 15% of his innings—remains the most achieved by any Test batsman and was accumulated faster than any other total.
For comparison, the next highest totals of Test double hundreds are Kumar Sangakkara's 11 in 223 innings (4.9%), Brian Lara's 9 in 232 innings (3.9%), and Wally Hammond's 7 in 140 innings (5%); the next highest rate of scoring Test double centuries was achieved by Vinod Kambli, whose 21 innings included 2 double centuries (9.5%).
World sport context
Wisden hailed Bradman as, "the greatest phenomenon in the history of cricket, indeed in the history of all ball games". Statistician Charles Davis analysed the statistics for several prominent sportsmen by comparing the number of standard deviations that they stand above the mean for their sport. The top performers in his selected sports are:
The statistics show that "no other athlete dominates an international sport to the extent that Bradman does cricket". In order to post a similarly dominant career statistic as Bradman, a baseball batter would need a career batting average of .392, while a basketball player would need to score an average of 43.0 points per game over their career. The respective records are .366 and 30.1.
When Bradman died, Time allocated a space in its "Milestones" column for an obituary:
Playing style
Bradman's early development was shaped by the high bounce of the ball on matting-over-concrete pitches. He favoured "horizontal-bat" shots (such as the hook, pull and cut) to deal with the bounce and devised a unique grip on the bat handle that would accommodate these strokes without compromising his ability to defend. Employing a side-on stance at the wicket, Bradman kept perfectly still as the bowler ran in. His backswing had a "crooked" look that troubled his early critics, but he resisted entreaties to change. His backswing kept his hands in close to the body, leaving him perfectly balanced and able to change his stroke mid-swing, if need be. Another telling factor was the decisiveness of Bradman's footwork. He "used the crease" by either coming metres down the pitch to drive, or playing so far back that his feet ended up level with the stumps when playing the cut, hook or pull.
Bradman's game evolved with experience. He temporarily adapted his technique during the Bodyline series, deliberately moving around the crease in an attempt to score from the short-pitched deliveries. At his peak, in the mid-1930s, he had the ability to switch between a defensive and attacking approach as the occasion demanded. After the Second World War, he adjusted to bat within the limitations set by his age, becoming a steady "accumulator" of runs. However, Bradman never truly mastered batting on sticky wickets. Wisden commented, "[i]f there really is a blemish on his amazing record it is ... the absence of a significant innings on one of those 'sticky dogs' of old".
After cricket
After his return to Australia, Bradman played in his own Testimonial match at Melbourne, scoring his 117th and last century, and receiving £9,342 in proceeds. In the 1949 New Year Honours, he was appointed Knight Bachelor for his services to the game, becoming the only Australian cricketer ever to be knighted. He commented that he "would have preferred to remain just Mister". The following year he published a memoir, Farewell to Cricket. Bradman accepted offers from the Daily Mail to travel with, and write about, the 1953 and 1956 Australian teams in England. The Art of Cricket, his final book published in 1958, is an instructional manual.
Bradman retired from his stockbroking business in June 1954, depending on the "comfortable" income earned as a board member of 16 publicly listed companies. His highest profile affiliation was with Argo Investments Limited, where he was chairman for a number of years. Charles Williams commented that, "[b]usiness was excluded on medical grounds, [so] the only sensible alternative was a career in the administration of the game which he loved and to which he had given most of his active life".
Bradman was honoured at a number of cricket grounds, notably when his portrait was hung in the Long Room at Lord's; until Shane Warne's portrait was added in 2005, Bradman was one of just three Australians to be honoured in this way. Bradman inaugurated a "Bradman Stand" at the Sydney Cricket Ground in January 1974; the Adelaide Oval also opened a Bradman Stand in 1990, which housed new media and corporate facilities. The Oval's Bradman Stand was demolished in 2013 as the stadium underwent an extensive re-development. Later in 1974, he attended a Lord's Taverners function in London where he experienced heart problems, which forced him to limit his public appearances to select occasions only. With his wife, Bradman returned to Bowral in 1976, where the new cricket ground was named in his honour. He gave the keynote speech at the historic Centenary Test at Melbourne in 1977.
On 16 June 1979, the Australian government awarded Bradman the nation's second-highest civilian honour at that time, Companion of the Order of Australia (AC), "in recognition of service to the sport of cricket and cricket administration". In 1980, he resigned from the ACB, to lead a more secluded life.
Administrative career
In addition to acting as one of South Australia's delegates to the Board of Control from 1945 to 1980, Bradman was a committee member of the SACA between 1935 and 1986. It is estimated that he attended 1,713 SACA meetings during this half century of service. Aside from two years in the early 1950s, he filled a selector's berth for the Test team between 1936 and 1971.
Cricket saw an increase in defensive play during the 1950s. As a selector, Bradman favoured attacking, positive cricketers who entertained the paying public. He formed an alliance with Australian captain Richie Benaud, seeking more attractive play, with some success. He served two high-profile periods as chairman of the board of Control, in 1960–63 and 1969–72. During the first, he dealt with the growing prevalence of illegal bowling actions in the game, a problem that he adjudged "the most complex I have known in cricket, because it is not a matter of fact but of opinion". The major controversy of his second stint was a proposed tour of Australia by South Africa in 1971–72. On Bradman's recommendation, the series was cancelled. Cricket journalist Michael Coward said of Bradman as an administrator:
In the late 1970s, Bradman played an important role during the World Series Cricket schism as a member of a special Australian Cricket Board committee formed to handle the crisis. He was criticised for not airing an opinion, but he dealt with World Series Cricket far more pragmatically than other administrators. Richie Benaud described Bradman as "a brilliant administrator and businessman", warning that he was not to be underestimated. As Australian captain, Ian Chappell fought with Bradman over the issue of player remuneration in the early 1970s and has suggested that Bradman was parsimonious:
Later years and death
After his wife's death in 1997, Bradman suffered "a discernible and not unexpected wilting of spirit". The next year, on his 90th birthday, he hosted a meeting with his two favourite modern players, Shane Warne and Sachin Tendulkar, but he was not seen in his familiar place at the Adelaide Oval again.
Hospitalised with pneumonia in December 2000, he returned home in the New Year and died there on 25 February 2001, aged 92.
A memorial service to mark Bradman's life was held on 25 March 2001 at St Peter's Anglican Cathedral, Adelaide. The service was attended by a host of former and current Test cricketers, as well as Australia's then prime minister, John Howard, leader of the opposition Kim Beazley and former prime minister Bob Hawke. Eulogies were given by Richie Benaud and Governor-General Sir William Deane. The service was broadcast live on ABC Television to a viewing audience of 1.45 million. A private service for family and friends was earlier held at the Centennial Park Cemetery in the suburb of Pasadena, with many people lining both Greenhill and Goodwood Roads to pay their respects as his funeral motorcade passed by.
Legacy
Cricket writer David Frith summed up the paradox of the continuing fascination with Bradman:
As early as 1939, Bradman had a Royal Navy ship named after him. Built as a fishing trawler in 1936, was taken over by the Admiralty in 1939, but was sunk by German aircraft the following year.
In the 1963 edition of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack, Bradman was selected by Neville Cardus as one of the Six Giants of the Wisden Century. This was a special commemorative selection requested by Wisden for its 100th edition. The other five players chosen were: Sydney Barnes, W. G. Grace, Jack Hobbs, Tom Richardson and Victor Trumper.
On 10 December 1985, Bradman was the first of 120 inaugural inductees into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame. He spoke of his philosophy for considering the stature of athletes:
Although modest about his own abilities and generous in his praise of other cricketers, Bradman was fully aware of the talents he possessed as a player; there is some evidence that he sought to influence his legacy. During the 1980s and 1990s, Bradman carefully selected the people to whom he gave interviews, assisting Michael Page, Roland Perry and Charles Williams, who all produced biographical works about him. Bradman also agreed to an extensive interview for ABC radio, broadcast as Bradman: The Don Declares in eight 55-minute episodes during 1988.
The most significant of these legacy projects was the Bradman Museum, opened in 1989 at the Bradman Oval in Bowral. This organisation was reformed in 1993 as a non-profit charitable Trust, called the Bradman Foundation. In 2010, it was expanded and rebranded as the International Cricket Hall of Fame.
When the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame was created in Melbourne in 1996, Bradman was made one of its 10 inaugural members. In 2000, Bradman was selected by cricket experts as one of five Wisden Cricketers of the Century. Each of the 100 members of the panel were able to select five cricketers: all 100 voted for Bradman. The ICC Cricket Hall of Fame inducted him on 19 November 2009.
Bradman's life and achievements were recognised in Australia with two notable issues. Three years before he died, he became the first living Australian to be featured on an Australian postage stamp. After his death, the Australian Government produced a 20-cent coin to commemorate his life. On 27 August 2018, to celebrate 110 years since his birth, Bradman was commemorated with a Google Doodle. To mark 150 years of the Cricketers' Almanack, Wisden named him as captain of an all-time Test World XI.
In 1999, Bradman was named in the six man shortlist for BBC Sports Personality of the Century. Asteroid 2472 Bradman discovered by Luboš Kohoutek is named in his honour.
Family life
Bradman first met Jessie Martha Menzies in 1920 when she boarded with the Bradman family, to be closer to school in Bowral. The couple married at St Paul's Anglican Church at Burwood, Sydney on 30 April 1932. The two had an impeccable marriage and were devoted to each other. During their 65-year marriage, Jessie was "shrewd, reliable, selfless, and above all, uncomplicated...she was the perfect foil to his concentrated, and occasionally mercurial character". Bradman paid tribute to his wife numerous times, once saying succinctly, "I would never have achieved what I achieved without Jessie".
The Bradmans lived in the same modest, suburban house in Holden Street, Kensington Park in Adelaide for all but the first three years of their married life. They experienced personal tragedy in raising their children: their first-born son died as an infant in 1936, their second son, John (born in 1939) contracted polio, and their daughter, Shirley, born in 1941, had cerebral palsy from birth. His family name proved a burden for John Bradman; he legally changed his last name to Bradsen in 1972. Although claims were made that he became estranged from his father, it was more a matter of "the pair inhabit[ing] different worlds", and the two remained in contact through the years. After the cricketer's death, a collection of personal letters written by Bradman to his close friend Rohan Rivett between 1953 and 1977 was released and gave researchers new insights into Bradman's family life, including the strain between father and son.
Bradman's reclusiveness in later life is partly attributable to the ongoing health problems of his wife, particularly following the open-heart surgery Jessie underwent in her 60s. Lady Bradman died in 1997, aged 88, from cancer. This had a dispiriting effect on Bradman, but the relationship with his son improved, to the extent that John resolved to change his name back to Bradman. Since his father's death, John Bradman has become the spokesperson for the family and has been involved in defending the Bradman legacy in a number of disputes. The relationship between Bradman and his wider family is less clear, although nine months after Bradman's death, his nephew Paul Bradman criticised him as a "snob" and a "loner" who forgot his connections in Bowral and who failed to attend the funerals of Paul's mother and father.
The operatic soprano Greta Bradman is his granddaughter.
In popular culture
Bradman's name has become an archetypal name for outstanding excellence, both within cricket and in the wider world. The term Bradmanesque has been coined and is used both within and outside cricketing circles. Steve Waugh described Sri Lankan Muttiah Muralitharan as "the Don Bradman of bowling".
Bradman has been the subject of more biographies than any other Australian, apart from the bushranger Ned Kelly. Bradman himself wrote four books: Don Bradman's Book–The Story of My Cricketing Life with Hints on Batting, Bowling and Fielding (1930), My Cricketing Life (1938), Farewell to Cricket (1950) and The Art of Cricket (1958). The story of the Bodyline series was retold in a 1984 television mini-series, with Gary Sweet portraying Bradman.
Bradman is immortalised in three popular songs from different eras, "Our Don Bradman" (1930s, by Jack O'Hagan), "Bradman" (1980s, by Paul Kelly), and "Sir Don", (a tribute by John Williamson performed at Bradman's memorial service). Bradman recorded several songs accompanying himself and others on piano in the early 1930s, including "Every Day Is A Rainbow Day For Me", with Jack Lumsdaine. In 2000, the Australian Government made it illegal for the names of corporations to suggest a link to "Sir Donald Bradman", if such a link does not in fact exist. Other entities with similar protection are the Australian and foreign governments, Saint Mary MacKillop, the Royal Family and the Returned and Services League of Australia.
Bibliography
How to Play Cricket (2013) by Don Bradman, Orient Paperbacks,
See also
List of Test cricket records
ICC Player Rankings
References
Sources
Baldwin, Mark (2005): The Ashes' Strangest Moments: Extraordinary But True Tales from Over a Century of the Ashes, Franz Steiner Verlag. .
Bradman, Don (1950): Farewell to Cricket, 1988 Pavilion Library reprint. .
Cashman, Richard et al. – editors (1996): The Oxford Companion to Australian Cricket, Oxford University Press. .
Coleman, Robert (1993): Seasons in the Sun: the Story of the Victorian Cricket Association, Hargreen Publishing Company. .
Davis, Charles (2000): The Best Of the Best: A New Look at the Great Cricketers and Changing Times, ABC Books. .
Dunstan, Keith (1988, rev. ed.): The Paddock That Grew, Hutchinson Australia. .
Eason, Alan (2004): The A-Z of Bradman, ABC Books. .
Fingleton, Jack (1949): Brightly Fades the Don, 1985 Pavilion Library reprint. .
Frith, David (2002): Bodyline Autopsy, ABC Books. .
Gibbs, Barry (2001): My Cricket Journey, Wakefield Press. .
Harte, Chris (1993): A History of Australian Cricket, André Deutsch. .
Haigh, Gideon. "Sir Donald Bradman at 100." The Monthly, August 2008.
Haigh, Gideon (1993): The Cricket War – the Inside Story of Kerry Packer's World Series Cricket, Text Publishing Company. .
Hutchins, Brett (2002): Don Bradman: Challenging the Myth, Cambridge University Press. .
O'Reilly, Bill (1985): Tiger – 60 Years of Cricket, William Collins. .
McGilvray, Alan & Tasker, Norman (1985): The Game Is Not the Same, ABC Books. .
Page, Michael (1983): Bradman – The Illustrated Biography, Macmillan Australia. .
Perry, Roland (1995): The Don – A Biography of Sir Donald Bradman, Macmillan. .
Robinson, Ray (1981 rev. ed.): On Top Down Under, Cassell Australia. .
Rosenwater, Irving (1978): Sir Donald Bradman – A Biography, Batsford. .
Wallace, Christine (2004): The Private Don, Allen & Unwin. .
Whitington, RS (1974): The Book of Australian Test Cricket 1877–1974, Wren Publishing. .
Williams, Charles (1996): Bradman: An Australian Hero, 2001 Abacus reprint. .
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack: various editions, accessed via ESPN Cricinfo
External links
Bradman Museum and Bradman Oval
Bradman Digital Library—State Library of South Australia
The Bradman Trail
Don Bradman on Picture Australia
Interview with Bradman 1930
Don Bradman — TV documentary — Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Some images of Don Bradman, including some showing Don Bradman's batting technique
Listen to a young Don Bradman speaking after the 1930 Ashes tour on australianscreen online
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D. G. Bradman's XI cricketers | false | [
"Male-to-female sex reassignment surgery involves reshaping the male genitals into a form with the appearance of, and as far as possible, the function of female genitalia. Before any surgery, patients usually undergo feminizing hormone therapy, though this is not a requirement. There are associated surgeries patients may elect to undergo, including vaginoplasty, facial hair removal, facial feminization surgery, breast augmentation and various other procedures.\n\nHistory \nLili Elbe was the first well-known recipient of male-to-female sex reassignment surgery, in Germany in 1930, the first being Dora Richter. She was the subject of four surgeries: one for orchiectomy, one to transplant an ovary, one for penectomy, and one for vaginoplasty and a uterus transplant. However, she died three months after her last operation.\n\nChristine Jorgensen was likely the most famous recipient of sex reassignment surgery, having her surgery done in Denmark in late 1952 and being outed right afterwards. She was a strong advocate for the rights of transgender people.\n\nFrench actress and singer Coccinelle travelled to Casablanca in 1958 to undergo a vaginoplasty by Georges Burou. She said later, \"Dr Burou rectified the mistake nature had made and I became a real woman, on the inside as well as the outside. After the operation, the doctor just said, 'Bonjour, Mademoiselle', and I knew it had been a success.\"\n\nAnother famous person to undergo male-to-female sex reassignment surgery was Renée Richards. She transitioned and had surgery in the mid-1970s, and successfully advocated to have transgender people recognized in U.S sports.\n\nThe first physician to perform sex reassignment surgery in the United States was Los Angeles-based urologist Dr. Elmer Belt, who quietly performed operations from the early 1950s until 1968. In 1966 Johns Hopkins University opened the first sex reassignment surgery clinic in America. The Hopkins Gender Identity Clinic was made up of two plastic surgeons, two psychiatrists, two psychologists, a gynecologist, a urologist, and a pediatrician.\n\nIn 1997, Sergeant Sylvia Durand became the first serving member of the Canadian Forces to transition from male to female, and became the first member of any military worldwide to transition openly while serving under the Flag. On Canada Day of 1998, the military changed her legal name to Sylvia and changed her sex designation on all of her personal file documents. In 1999, the military paid for her sex reassignment surgery. Durand continued to serve and was promoted to the rank of Warrant Officer. When she retired in 2012, after more than 31 years of service, she was the assistant to the Canadian Forces Chief Communications Operator.\n\nIn 2017, for the first time, the United States Defense Health Agency approved payment for sex reassignment surgery for an active-duty U.S. military service member. The patient, an infantry soldier who identifies as a woman, had already begun a course of treatment for gender reassignment. The procedure, which the treating doctor deemed medically necessary, was performed on November 14 at a private hospital, since U.S. military hospitals lack the requisite surgical expertise.\n\nGenital surgery\n\nWhen changing anatomical sex from male to female, the testicles are removed (castration), and the skin or foreskin and penis is usually inverted, as a flap preserving blood and nerve supplies (a technique pioneered by Sir Harold Gillies in 1951), to form a fully sensitive vagina (vaginoplasty). A clitoris fully supplied with nerve endings (innervated) can be formed from part of the glans of the penis. If the patient has been circumcised (removal of the foreskin), or if the surgeon's technique uses more skin in the formation of the labia minora, the pubic hair follicles are removed from some of the scrotal tissue, which is then incorporated by the surgeon within the vagina. Other scrotal tissue forms the labia majora.\n\nIn extreme cases of shortage of skin, or when a vaginoplasty has failed, a vaginal lining can be created from skin grafts from the thighs or hips, or a section of colon may be grafted in (colovaginoplasty).\n\nSurgeon's requirements, procedures, and recommendations vary enormously in the days before and after, and the months following these procedures.\n\nSince plastic surgery involves skin, it is never an exact procedure. Cosmetic refining to the outer vulva is sometimes required. Some surgeons prefer to do most of the crafting of the outer vulva as a second surgery, when other tissues, blood and nerve supplies have recovered from the first surgery. This relatively minor surgery, which is usually performed only under local anaesthetic, is called labiaplasty.\n\nThe aesthetic, sensational, and functional results of vaginoplasty vary greatly. Surgeons vary considerably in their techniques and skills, patients' skin varies in elasticity and healing ability (which is affected by age, nutrition, physical activity and smoking), any previous surgery in the area can impact results, and surgery can be complicated by problems such as infections, blood loss, or nerve damage.\n\nSupporters of colovaginoplasty state that this method is better than use of skin grafts for the reason that colon is already mucosal, whereas skin is not. Lubrication is needed when having sex and occasional douching is advised so that bacteria do not start to grow and give off odors.\n\nBecause of the risk of vaginal stenosis (the narrowing or loss of flexibility of the vagina), any current technique of vaginoplasty requires some long-term maintenance of volume by the patient using a vaginal expander, or vaginal dilation using graduated dilators to keep the vagina open. Penile-vaginal penetration with a sexual partner is not an adequate method of performing dilation. Daily dilation of the vagina for six months in order to prevent stenosis is recommended among health professionals. Over time, dilation is required less often, but it may be required indefinitely in some cases.\n\nRegular application of estrogen into the vagina, for which there are several standard products, may help, but this must be calculated into the total estrogen dose. Some surgeons have techniques to ensure continued depth, but extended periods without dilation will still often result in reduced diameter (vaginal stenosis) to some degree, which would require stretching again, either gradually, or, in extreme cases, under anaesthetic.\n\nWith current procedures, trans women are unable to receive ovaries or a uterus. This means that they are unable to bear children or menstruate, and that they will need to remain on hormone therapy after surgery to maintain hormone levels.\n\nOther related procedures\n\nFacial feminization surgery\n\nOccasionally these basic procedures are complemented further with feminizing cosmetic surgeries or procedures that modify bone or cartilage structures, typically in the jaw, brow, forehead, nose and cheek areas. These are known as facial feminization surgery or FFS.\n\nBreast augmentation\nBreast augmentation is the enlargement of the breasts. Some trans women choose to undergo this procedure if hormone therapy does not yield satisfactory results. Usually, typical growth for trans women is one to two cup sizes below closely related females such as the mother or sisters. Oestrogen is responsible for fat distribution to the breasts, hips and buttocks, while progesterone is responsible for developing the actual milk glands. Progesterone also rounds out the breast to an adult Tanner stage-5 shape and matures and darkens the areola.\n\nVoice feminization surgery\n\nSome MTF individuals may elect to have voice surgery, which alters an individual's vocal range or pitch. However, this procedure carries a risk of impairing a trans woman's voice forever. Since estrogen alone does not alter a person's vocal range or pitch, some people take the risk that comes along with voice feminization surgery. Other options, like voice feminization lessons, are available to people wishing to speak with less masculine mannerisms.\n\nTracheal shave\n\nA tracheal shave procedure is also sometimes used to reduce the cartilage in the area of the throat and minimize the appearance of the Adam's apple in order to assimilate to female physical features.\n\nButtock augmentation\nSome MTF individuals will choose to undergo buttock augmentation because anatomically, male hips and buttocks are generally smaller than those presented on a female. If, however, efficient hormone therapy is conducted before the patient is past puberty, the pelvis will broaden slightly, and even if the patient is past their teen years, a layer of subcutaneous fat will be distributed over the body, rounding contours. Trans women usually end up with a waist to hip ratio of around 0.8, and if estrogen is administered at a young enough age \"before the bone plates close\", some trans women may achieve a waist to hip ratio of 0.7 or lower. The pubescent pelvis will broaden under estrogen therapy even if the skeleton is anatomically masculine.\n\nSee also\n\n List of transgender-related topics\n Sex reassignment surgery\n Sex reassignment surgery (female-to-male)\n Uterus transplantation\n\nReferences\n\n \nSurgical procedures and techniques",
"Isabella Lombardo is an Australian child with spastic quadriplegic cerebral palsy who underwent a selective dorsal rhizotomy procedure at age four and a separate stem cell surgery at age six. Her story was profiled on an episode of 60 Minutes in 2018, and a feature-length documentary film, The Unknown Upside, about her surgeries and subsequent treatments which premiered in March 2019.\n\nLife\n \nLombardo was born to parents Joseph and Libby Lombardo in Frenchs Forest, New South Wales. It was not immediately clear to her doctors or parents that she was born with any type of condition. At two months old, Lombardo was still unable to lift her head up on her own. It took two years for doctors to correctly diagnose her with spastic diplegia, a form of cerebral palsy. Quadriplegic cerebral palsy prevented her from walking without help from a walking frame or other people, and she only moved independently with a wheelchair. To reduce muscle pain and tension, doctors administered 27 injections every three months.\n \nIn December 2016, Lombardo's parents elected to take her to St. Louis Children's Hospital in St. Louis, Missouri to undergo a selective dorsal rhizotomy surgery to potentially improve her ability to walk and to reduce pain. Lombardo did not qualify for the operation in Australia because she was too young. The cost of the surgery reached $100,000. Her recovery took three months, after which she began extensive courses of physiotherapy and hydrotherapy. At that time, she was also able to run with the help of a walker and was learning to walk with walking sticks.\n \nIn July 2018, Lombardo was taken to the BIOSS clinic in Monterrey, Mexico to undergo an experimental bone marrow stem cell surgery. For a month after the procedure, she underwent another round of extensive physiotherapy in Texas. She was also able to take her first independent steps during this time. She was profiled on an August 2018 episode of 60 Minutes. In December 2018, she was able to ride a modified bicycle from Queenscliff to Manly. In March 2019, The Unknown Upside, a documentary film directed by Tim Skinner that chronicles Lombardo's story, was screened for the first time.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nTeam Isabella Lombardo official website\n\nYear of birth missing (living people)\nLiving people\nPeople with cerebral palsy\nPeople from New South Wales\nAustralian people with disabilities"
]
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[
"Don Bradman",
"Reluctant hero",
"What is the relation between Don Bradman and reluctant Hero?",
"I don't know.",
"What is the Reluctant hero about?",
"making it more difficult to maintain the privacy",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a \"machine-like\" approach to batting.",
"Does he have any help living?",
"He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon.",
"Does he undergo any surgery or in an hospital for a long time?",
"I don't know."
]
| C_ef88bed7f74d4322a1040eb8bdce83a2_1 | What was his wife's name? | 6 | What was Don Bradman's wife's name? | Don Bradman | In 1930-31, against the first West Indian side to visit Australia, Bradman's scoring was more sedate than in England--although he did make 223 in 297 minutes in the Third Test at Brisbane and 152 in 154 minutes in the following Test at Melbourne. However, he scored quickly in a very successful sequence of innings against the South Africans in the Australian summer of 1931-32. For NSW against the tourists, he made 30, 135 and 219. In the Test matches, he scored 226 (277 minutes), 112 (155 minutes), 2 and 167 (183 minutes); his 299 not out in the Fourth Test, at Adelaide, set a new record for the highest score in a Test in Australia. Australia won nine of the ten Tests played over the two series. At this point, Bradman had played 15 Test matches since the beginning of 1930, scoring 2,227 runs at an average of 131. He had played 18 innings, scoring 10 centuries, six of which had extended beyond 200. His overall scoring rate was 42 runs per hour, with 856 (or 38.5% of his tally) scored in boundaries. Significantly, he had not hit a six, which typified Bradman's attitude: if he hit the ball along the ground, then it could not be caught. During this phase of his career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a "machine-like" approach to batting. The South African fast bowler Sandy Bell described bowling to him as, "heart-breaking ... with his sort of cynical grin, which rather reminds one of the Sphinx ... he never seems to perspire". Between these two seasons, Bradman seriously contemplated playing professional cricket in England with the Lancashire League club Accrington, a move that, according to the rules of the day, would have ended his Test career. A consortium of three Sydney businesses offered an alternative. They devised a two-year contract whereby Bradman wrote for Associated Newspapers, broadcast on Radio 2UE and promoted the menswear retailing chain FJ Palmer and Son. However, the contract increased Bradman's dependence on his public profile, making it more difficult to maintain the privacy that he ardently desired. Bradman's chaotic wedding to Jessie Menzies in April 1932 epitomised these new and unwelcome intrusions into his private life. The church "was under siege all throughout the day ... uninvited guests stood on chairs and pews to get a better view"; police erected barriers that were broken down and many of those invited could not get a seat. Just weeks later, Bradman joined a private team organised by Arthur Mailey to tour the United States and Canada. He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. Playing 51 games in 75 days, Bradman scored 3,779 runs at 102.1, with 18 centuries. Although the standard of play was not high, the effects of the amount of cricket Bradman had played in the three previous years, together with the strains of his celebrity status, began to show on his return home. CANNOTANSWER | Jessie Menzies | Sir Donald George Bradman, AC (27 August 1908 – 25 February 2001), nicknamed "The Don", was an Australian international cricketer, widely acknowledged as the greatest batsman of all time. Bradman's career Test batting average of 99.94 has been cited as the greatest achievement by any sportsman in any major sport.
The story that the young Bradman practised alone with a cricket stump and a golf ball is part of Australian folklore. Bradman's meteoric rise from bush cricket to the Australian Test team took just over two years. Before his 22nd birthday, he had set many records for top scoring, some of which still stand, and became Australia's sporting idol at the height of the Great Depression.
During a 20-year playing career, Bradman consistently scored at a level that made him, in the words of former Australia captain Bill Woodfull, "worth three batsmen to Australia". A controversial set of tactics, known as Bodyline, was specially devised by the England team to curb his scoring. As a captain and administrator, Bradman was committed to attacking, entertaining cricket; he drew spectators in record numbers. He hated the constant adulation, however, and it affected how he dealt with others. The focus of attention on his individual performances strained relationships with some teammates, administrators and journalists, who thought him aloof and wary. Following an enforced hiatus due to the Second World War, he made a dramatic comeback, captaining an Australian team known as "The Invincibles" on a record-breaking unbeaten tour of England.
A complex, highly driven man, not given to close personal relationships,
Bradman retained a pre-eminent position in the game by acting as an administrator, selector and writer for three decades following his retirement. Even after he became reclusive in his declining years, his opinion was highly sought, and his status as a national icon was still recognised. Almost 50 years after his retirement as a Test player, in 1997, Prime Minister John Howard of Australia called him the "greatest living Australian". Bradman's image has appeared on postage stamps and coins, and a museum dedicated to his life was opened while he was still living. On the centenary of his birth, 27 August 2008, the Royal Australian Mint issued a $5 commemorative gold coin with Bradman's image. In 2009, he was inducted posthumously into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame.
Early years
Donald George Bradman was the youngest son of George and Emily (née Whatman) Bradman, and was born on 27 August 1908 at Cootamundra, New South Wales (NSW). He had a brother, Victor, and three sisters—Islet, Lilian and Elizabeth May. Bradman was of English heritage on both sides of his family. His grandfather Charles Andrew Bradman left Withersfield, Suffolk, for Australia. When Bradman played at Cambridge in 1930 as a 21 year old on his first tour of England, he took the opportunity to trace his forebears in the region. Also, one of his great-grandfathers was one of the first Italians to migrate to Australia in 1826. Bradman's parents lived in the hamlet of Yeo Yeo, near Stockinbingal. His mother, Emily, gave birth to him at the Cootamundra home of Granny Scholz, a midwife. That house is now the Bradman Birthplace Museum. Emily had hailed from Mittagong in the NSW Southern Highlands, and in 1911, when Don Bradman was about two-and-a-half years old, his parents decided to relocate to Bowral, close to Mittagong, to be closer to Emily's family and friends, as life at Yeo Yeo was proving difficult.
Bradman practised batting incessantly during his youth. He invented his own solo cricket game, using a cricket stump for a bat, and a golf ball. A water tank, mounted on a curved brick stand, stood on a paved area behind the family home. When hit into the curved brick facing of the stand, the ball rebounded at high speed and varying angles—and Bradman would attempt to hit it again. This form of practice developed his timing and reactions to a high degree. In more formal cricket, he hit his first century at the age of 12, with an undefeated 115 playing for Bowral Public School against Mittagong High School.
Bush cricketer
During the 1920–21 season, Bradman acted as scorer for the local Bowral team, captained by his uncle George Whatman. In October 1920, he filled in when the team was one man short, scoring 37* and 29* on debut. During the season, Bradman's father took him to the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) to watch the fifth Ashes Test match. On that day, Bradman formed an ambition. "I shall never be satisfied", he told his father, "until I play on this ground". Bradman left school in 1922 and went to work for a local real estate agent who encouraged his sporting pursuits by giving him time off when necessary. He gave up cricket in favour of tennis for two years, but resumed playing cricket in 1925–26.
Bradman became a regular selection for the Bowral team; several outstanding performances earned him the attention of the Sydney daily press. Competing on matting-over-concrete pitches, Bowral played other rural towns in the Berrima District competition. Against Wingello, a team that included the future Test bowler Bill O'Reilly, Bradman made 234. In the competition final against Moss Vale, which extended over five consecutive Saturdays, Bradman scored 320 not out. During the following Australian winter (1926), an ageing Australian team lost The Ashes in England, and a number of Test players retired. The New South Wales Cricket Association began a hunt for new talent. Mindful of Bradman's big scores for Bowral, the association wrote to him, requesting his attendance at a practice session in Sydney. He was subsequently chosen for the "Country Week" tournaments at both cricket and tennis, to be played during separate weeks. His boss presented him with an ultimatum: he could have only one week away from work, and therefore had to choose between the two sports. He chose cricket.
Bradman's performances during Country Week resulted in an invitation to play grade cricket in Sydney for St George in the 1926–27 season. He scored 110 on his debut, making his first century on a turf pitch. On 1 January 1927, he turned out for the NSW second team. For the remainder of the season, Bradman travelled the from Bowral to Sydney every Saturday to play for St George.
First-class debut
The next season continued the rapid rise of the "Boy from Bowral". Selected to replace the unfit Archie Jackson in the NSW team, Bradman made his first-class debut at the Adelaide Oval, aged 19. He secured the achievement of a hundred on debut, with an innings of 118 featuring what soon became his trademarks—fast footwork, calm confidence and rapid scoring. In the final match of the season, he made his first century at the SCG, against the Sheffield Shield champions Victoria. Despite his potential, Bradman was not chosen for the Australian second team to tour New Zealand.
Bradman decided that his chances for Test selection would be improved by moving to Sydney for the 1928–29 season, when England were to tour in defence of the Ashes. Initially, he continued working in real estate, but later took a promotions job with the sporting goods retailer Mick Simmons Ltd. In the first match of the Sheffield Shield season, he scored a century in each innings against Queensland. He followed this with scores of 87 and 132 not out against the England touring team, and was rewarded with selection for the first Test, to be played at Brisbane.
Test career
Playing in only his tenth first-class match, Bradman, nicknamed "Braddles" by his teammates, found his initial Test a harsh learning experience. Caught on a sticky wicket, Australia were all out for 66 in the second innings and lost by 675 runs (still a Test record). Following scores of 18 and 1, the selectors dropped Bradman to twelfth man for the Second Test. An injury to Bill Ponsford early in the match required Bradman to field as substitute while England amassed 636, following their 863 runs in the First Test. RS "Dick" Whitington wrote, "... he had scored only nineteen himself and these experiences appear to have provided him with food for thought". Recalled for the Third Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, Bradman scored 79 and 112 to become the youngest player to make a Test century, although the match was still lost. Another loss followed in the Fourth Test. Bradman reached 58 in the second innings and appeared set to guide the team to victory when he was run out. It was to be the only run out of his Test career. The losing margin was just 12 runs.
The improving Australians did manage to win the Fifth and final Test. Bradman top-scored with 123 in the first innings, and was at the wicket in the second innings when his captain Jack Ryder hit the winning runs. Bradman completed the season with 1,690 first-class runs, averaging 93.88, and his first multiple century in a Sheffield Shield match, 340 not out against Victoria, set a new ground record for the SCG. Bradman averaged 113.28 in 1929–30. In a trial match to select the team that would tour England, he was last man out in the first innings for 124. As his team followed on, the skipper Bill Woodfull asked Bradman to keep the pads on and open the second innings. By the end of play, he was 205 not out, on his way to 225. Against Queensland at the SCG, Bradman set a then world record for first-class cricket by scoring 452 not out; he made his runs in only 415 minutes. Not long after the feat, he recalled:
Although he was an obvious selection to tour England, Bradman's unorthodox style raised doubts that he could succeed on the slower English pitches. Percy Fender wrote:
The encomiums were not confined to his batting gifts; nor did the criticism extend to his character. "Australia has unearthed a champion", said former Australian Test great Clem Hill, "self-taught, with natural ability. But most important of all, with his heart in the right place." Selector Dick Jones weighed in with the observation that it was "good to watch him talking to an old player, listening attentively to everything that is said and then replying with a modest 'thank you'."
1930 tour of England
England were favourites to win the 1930 Ashes series, and if the Australians were to exceed expectations, their young batsmen, Bradman and Jackson, needed to prosper. With his elegant batting technique, Jackson appeared the brighter prospect of the pair. However, Bradman began the tour with 236 at Worcester and went on to score 1,000 first-class runs by the end of May, the fifth player (and first Australian) to achieve this rare feat. In his first Test appearance in England, Bradman hit 131 in the second innings but England won the match. His batting reached a new level in the Second Test at Lord's where he scored 254 as Australia won and levelled the series. Later in life, Bradman rated this the best innings of his career as, "practically without exception every ball went where it was intended to go". Wisden noted his fast footwork and how he hit the ball "all round the wicket with power and accuracy", as well as faultless concentration in keeping the ball on the ground.
In terms of runs scored, this performance was soon surpassed. In the Third Test, at Headingley, Bradman scored a century before lunch on 11 July, the first day of the Test match to equal the performances of Victor Trumper and Charlie Macartney. In the afternoon, Bradman added another century between lunch and tea, before finishing the day on 309 not out. He remains the only Test player to pass 300 in one day's play. His eventual score of 334 was a world-record, exceeding the previous mark of 325 by Andy Sandham. Bradman dominated the Australian innings; the second-highest tally was 77 by Alan Kippax. Businessman Arthur Whitelaw later presented Bradman with a cheque for £1,000 in appreciation of his achievement. The match ended in anti-climax as poor weather prevented a result, as it also did in the Fourth Test.
In the deciding Test at The Oval, England made 405. During an innings stretching over three days due to intermittent rain, Bradman made yet another multiple century, this time 232, which helped give Australia a big lead of 290 runs. In a crucial partnership with Archie Jackson, Bradman battled through a difficult session when England fast bowler Harold Larwood bowled short on a pitch enlivened by the rain. Wisden gave this period of play only a passing mention:
A number of English players and commentators noted Bradman's discomfort in playing the short, rising delivery. The revelation came too late for this particular match, but was to have immense significance in the next Ashes series. Australia won the match by an innings and regained the Ashes. The victory made an impact in Australia. With the economy sliding toward depression and unemployment rapidly rising, the country found solace in sporting triumph. The story of a self-taught 22-year-old from the bush who set a series of records against the old rival made Bradman a national hero. The statistics Bradman achieved on the tour, especially in the Test matches, broke records for the day and some have stood the test of time. In all, Bradman scored 974 runs at an average of 139.14 during the Test series, with four centuries, including two double hundreds and a triple. As of 2018, no-one has matched or exceeded 974 runs or three double centuries in one Test series; the record of 974 runs exceeds the second-best performance by 69 runs and was achieved in two fewer innings. Bradman's first-class tally, 2,960 runs (at an average of 98.66 with 10 centuries), was another enduring record: the most by any overseas batsman on a tour of England.
On the tour, the dynamic nature of Bradman's batting contrasted sharply with his quiet, solitary off-field demeanour. He was described as aloof from his teammates and he did not offer to buy them a round of drinks, let alone share the money given to him by Whitelaw. Bradman spent a lot of his free time alone, writing, as he had sold the rights to a book. On his return to Australia, Bradman was surprised by the intensity of his reception; he became a "reluctant hero". Mick Simmons wanted to cash in on their employee's newly won fame. They asked Bradman to leave his teammates and attend official receptions they organised in Adelaide, Melbourne, Goulburn, his hometown Bowral and Sydney, where he received a brand new custom-built Chevrolet. At each stop, Bradman received a level of adulation that "embarrassed" him. This focus on individual accomplishment, in a team game, "... permanently damaged relationships with his contemporaries". Commenting on Australia's victory, the team's vice-captain Vic Richardson said, "... we could have played any team without Bradman, but we could not have played the blind school without Clarrie Grimmett". A modest Bradman can be heard in a 1930 recording saying "I have always endeavoured to do my best for the side, and the few centuries that have come my way have been achieved in the hope of winning matches. My one idea when going into bat was to make runs for Australia."
Reluctant hero
In 1930–31, against the first West Indian side to visit Australia, Bradman's scoring was more sedate than in England—although he did make 223 in 297 minutes in the Third Test at Brisbane and 152 in 154 minutes in the following Test at Melbourne. However, he scored quickly in a very successful sequence of innings against the South Africans in the Australian summer of 1931–32. For NSW against the tourists, he made 30, 135 and 219. In the Test matches, he scored , , 2 and ; his 299 not out in the Fourth Test, at Adelaide, set a new record for the highest score in a Test in Australia. Australia won nine of the ten Tests played over the two series.
At this point, Bradman had played 15 Test matches since the beginning of 1930, scoring 2,227 runs at an average of 131. He had played 18 innings, scoring 10 centuries, six of which had extended beyond 200. His overall scoring rate was 42 runs per hour, with 856 (or 38.5% of his tally) scored in boundaries. Significantly, he had not hit a six, which typified Bradman's attitude: if he hit the ball along the ground, then it could not be caught. During this phase of his career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a "machine-like" approach to batting. The South African fast bowler Sandy Bell described bowling to him as, "heart-breaking ... with his sort of cynical grin, which rather reminds one of the Sphinx ... he never seems to perspire".
Between these two seasons, Bradman seriously contemplated playing professional cricket in England with the Lancashire League club Accrington, a move that, according to the rules of the day, would have ended his Test career. A consortium of three Sydney businesses offered an alternative. They devised a two-year contract whereby Bradman wrote for Associated Newspapers, broadcast on Radio 2UE and promoted the menswear retailing chain FJ Palmer and Son. However, the contract increased Bradman's dependence on his public profile, making it more difficult to maintain the privacy that he ardently desired.
Bradman's chaotic wedding to Jessie Menzies in April 1932 epitomised these new and unwelcome intrusions into his private life. The church "was under siege all throughout the day ... uninvited guests stood on chairs and pews to get a better view"; police erected barriers that were broken down and many of those invited could not get a seat. Just weeks later, Bradman joined a private team organised by Arthur Mailey to tour the United States and Canada. He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. Playing 51 games in 75 days, Bradman scored 3,779 runs at 102.1, with 18 centuries. Although the standard of play was not high, the effects of the amount of cricket Bradman had played in the three previous years, together with the strains of his celebrity status, began to show on his return home.
Bodyline
Within the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), which administered English cricket at the time, few voices were more influential than "Plum" Warner's, who, when considering England's response to Bradman, wrote that it "must evolve a new type of bowler and develop fresh ideas and strange tactics to curb his almost uncanny skill". To that end, Warner orchestrated the appointment of Douglas Jardine as England captain in 1931, as a prelude to Jardine leading the 1932–33 tour to Australia, with Warner as team manager. Remembering that Bradman had struggled against bouncers during his 232 at The Oval in 1930, Jardine decided to combine traditional leg theory with short-pitched bowling to combat Bradman. He settled on the Nottinghamshire fast bowlers Harold Larwood and Bill Voce as the spearheads for his tactics. In support, the England selectors chose another three pacemen for the squad. The unusually high number of fast bowlers caused a lot of comment in both countries and roused Bradman's own suspicions.
Bradman had other problems to deal with at this time; among these were bouts of illness from an undiagnosed malaise which had begun during the tour of North America, and that the Australian Board of Control had initially refused permission for him to write a column for the Sydney Sun. Bradman, who had signed a two-year contract with the newspaper, threatened to withdraw from cricket to honour his contract when the board denied him permission to write; eventually, the paper released Bradman from the contract, in a victory for the board. In three first-class games against England before the Tests, Bradman averaged just 17.16 in 6 innings. Jardine decided to give the new tactics a trial in only one game, a fixture against an Australian XI at Melbourne. In this match, Bradman faced the leg theory and later warned local administrators that trouble was brewing if it continued. He withdrew from the First Test at the Sydney Cricket Ground amid rumours that he had suffered a nervous breakdown. Despite his absence, England employed what were already becoming known as the Bodyline tactics against the Australian batsmen and won an ill-tempered match.
The public clamoured for the return of Bradman to defeat Bodyline: "he was the batsman who could conquer this cankerous bowling ... 'Bradmania', amounting almost to religious fervour, demanded his return". Recovered from his indisposition, Bradman returned to the side in Alan Kippax's position. A world record crowd of 63,993 at the MCG saw Bradman come to the crease on the first day of the Second Test with the score at 2/67. A standing ovation ensued that delayed play for several minutes. Bradman anticipated receiving a bouncer as his first ball and, as the bowler delivered, he moved across his stumps to play the hook shot. The ball failed to rise and Bradman dragged it onto his stumps; the first-ball duck was his first in a Test. The crowd fell into stunned silence as he walked off. However, Australia took a first innings lead in the match, and another record crowd on 2 January 1933 watched Bradman hit a counter-attacking second innings century. His unbeaten 103 (from 146 balls) in a team total of 191 helped set England a target of 251 to win. Bill O'Reilly and Bert Ironmonger bowled Australia to a series-levelling victory amid hopes that Bodyline was beaten.
The Third Test at the Adelaide Oval proved pivotal. There were angry crowd scenes after the Australian captain Bill Woodfull and wicket-keeper Bert Oldfield were hit by bouncers. An apologetic Plum Warner entered the Australian dressing room and was rebuked by Woodfull. Woodfull's remarks (that "...there are two teams out there and only one of them is playing cricket") were leaked to the press, and Warner and others attributed this to Australian opening batsman Jack Fingleton, however for many years (even after Fingleton's death) a bitter war of accusation passed between Fingleton and Bradman as to who was the real source of the leak. In a cable to the MCC, the Australian Board of Control repeated the allegation of poor sportsmanship directed at Warner by Woodfull. With the support of the MCC, England continued with Bodyline despite Australian protests. The tourists won the last three Tests convincingly and regained the Ashes. Bradman caused controversy with his own tactics. Always seeking to score, and with the leg side packed with fielders, he often backed away and hit the ball into the vacant half of the outfield with unorthodox shots reminiscent of tennis or golf. This brought him 396 runs (at 56.57) for the series and plaudits for attempting to find a solution to Bodyline, although his series average was just 57% of his career mean. Jack Fingleton was in no doubt that Bradman's game altered irrevocably as a consequence of Bodyline, writing:
The constant glare of celebrity and the tribulations of the season forced Bradman to reappraise his life outside the game and to seek a career away from his cricketing fame. Harry Hodgetts, a South Australian delegate to the Board of Control, offered Bradman work as a stockbroker if he would relocate to Adelaide and captain South Australia (SA). Unknown to the public, the SA Cricket Association (SACA) instigated Hodgetts' approach and subsidised Bradman's wage. Although his wife was hesitant about moving, Bradman eventually agreed to the deal in February 1934.
Declining health and a brush with death
In his farewell season for NSW, Bradman averaged 132.44, his best yet. He was appointed vice-captain for the 1934 tour of England. However, "he was unwell for much of the [English] summer, and reports in newspapers hinted that he was suffering from heart trouble". Although he again started with a double century at Worcester, his famed concentration soon deserted him. Wisden wrote:
At one stage, Bradman went 13 first-class innings without a century, the longest such spell of his career, prompting suggestions that Bodyline had eroded his confidence and altered his technique. After three Tests, the series was one–one and Bradman had scored 133 runs in five innings. The Australians travelled to Sheffield and played a warm up game before the Fourth Test. Bradman started slowly and then, "... the old Bradman [was] back with us, in the twinkling of an eye, almost". He went on to make 140, with the last 90 runs coming in just 45 minutes. On the opening day of the Fourth Test at Headingley (Leeds), England were out for 200, but Australia slumped to 3/39, losing the third wicket from the last ball of the day. Listed to bat at number five, Bradman would start his innings the next day.
That evening, Bradman declined an invitation to dinner from Neville Cardus, telling the journalist that he wanted an early night because the team needed him to make a double century the next day. Cardus pointed out that his previous innings on the ground was 334, and the law of averages was against another such score. Bradman told Cardus, "I don't believe in the law of averages". In the event, Bradman batted all of the second day and into the third, putting on a then world record partnership of 388 with Bill Ponsford. When he was finally out for 304 (473 balls, 43 fours and 2 sixes), Australia had a lead of 350 runs, but rain prevented them from forcing a victory. The effort of the lengthy innings stretched Bradman's reserves of energy, and he did not play again until the Fifth Test at The Oval, the match that would decide the Ashes.
In the first innings at The Oval, Bradman and Ponsford recorded an even more massive partnership, this time 451 runs. It had taken them less than a month to break the record they had set at Headingley; this new world record was to last 57 years. Bradman's share of the stand was 244 from 271 balls, and the Australian total of 701 set up victory by 562 runs. For the fourth time in five series, the Ashes changed hands. England would not recover them again until after Bradman's retirement.
Seemingly restored to full health, Bradman blazed two centuries in the last two games of the tour. However, when he returned to London to prepare for the trip home, he experienced severe abdominal pain. It took a doctor more than 24 hours to diagnose acute appendicitis and a surgeon operated immediately. Bradman lost a lot of blood during the four-hour procedure and peritonitis set in. Penicillin and sulphonamides were still experimental treatments at this time; peritonitis was usually a fatal condition. On 25 September, the hospital issued a statement that Bradman was struggling for his life and that blood donors were needed urgently.
"The effect of the announcement was little short of spectacular". The hospital could not deal with the number of donors, and closed its switchboard in the face of the avalanche of telephone calls generated by the news. Journalists were asked by their editors to prepare obituaries. Teammate Bill O'Reilly took a call from King George V's secretary asking that the King be kept informed of the situation. Jessie Bradman started the month-long journey to London as soon as she received the news. En route, she heard a rumour that her husband had died. A telephone call clarified the situation and by the time she reached London, Bradman had begun a slow recovery. He followed medical advice to convalesce, taking several months to return to Australia and missing the 1934–35 Australian season.
Internal politics and the Test captaincy
There was off-field intrigue in Australian cricket during the antipodean winter of 1935. Australia, scheduled to make a tour of South Africa at the end of the year, needed to replace the retired Bill Woodfull as captain. The Board of Control wanted Bradman to lead the team, yet, on 8 August, the board announced Bradman's withdrawal from the team due to a lack of fitness. Surprisingly, in the light of this announcement, Bradman led the South Australian team in a full programme of matches that season.
The captaincy was given to Vic Richardson, Bradman's predecessor as South Australian captain. Cricket author Chris Harte's analysis of the situation is that a prior (unspecified) commercial agreement forced Bradman to remain in Australia. Harte attributed an ulterior motive to his relocation: the off-field behaviour of Richardson and other South Australian players had displeased the South Australia Cricket Association (SACA), which was looking for new leadership. To help improve discipline, Bradman became a committeeman of the SACA, and a selector of the South Australian and Australian teams. He took his adopted state to its first Sheffield Shield title for 10 years, Bradman weighing in with personal contributions of 233 against Queensland and 357 against Victoria. He finished the season with 369 (in 233 minutes), a South Australian record, made against Tasmania. The bowler who dismissed him, Reginald Townley, would later become leader of the Tasmanian Liberal Party.
Australia defeated South Africa 4–0 and senior players such as Bill O'Reilly were pointed in their comments about the enjoyment of playing under Richardson's captaincy. A group of players who were openly hostile toward Bradman formed during the tour. For some, the prospect of playing under Bradman was daunting, as was the knowledge that he would additionally be sitting in judgement of their abilities in his role as a selector.
To start the new season, the Test side played a "Rest of Australia" team, captained by Bradman, at Sydney in early October 1936. The Test XI suffered a big defeat, due to Bradman's 212 and a haul of 12 wickets taken by leg-spinner Frank Ward. Bradman let the members of the Test team know that despite their recent success, the team still required improvement. Shortly afterwards, Bradman's first child was born on 28 October, but died the next day. He took time out of cricket for two weeks and on his return made 192 in three hours against Victoria in the last match before the beginning of the Ashes series.
The Test selectors made five changes to the team who had played in the previous Test match. Significantly, Australia's most successful bowler Clarrie Grimmett was replaced by Ward, one of four players making their debut. Bradman's role in Grimmett's omission from the team was controversial and it became a theme that dogged Bradman as Grimmett continued to be prolific in domestic cricket while his successors were ineffective—he was regarded as having finished the veteran bowler's Test career in a political purge.
Australia fell to successive defeats in the opening two Tests, Bradman making two ducks in his four innings, and it seemed that the captaincy was affecting his form. The selectors made another four changes to the team for the Third Test at Melbourne.
Bradman won the toss on New Year's Day 1937, but again failed with the bat, scoring just 13. The Australians could not take advantage of a pitch that favoured batting, and finished the day at 6/181. On the second day, rain dramatically altered the course of the game. With the sun drying the pitch (in those days, covers could not be used during matches) Bradman declared to get England in to bat while the pitch was "sticky"; England also declared to get Australia back in, conceding a lead of 124. Bradman countered by reversing his batting order to protect his run-makers while conditions improved. The ploy worked and Bradman went in at number seven. In an innings spread over three days, he battled influenza while scoring 270 off 375 balls, sharing a record partnership of 346 with Jack Fingleton, and Australia went on to victory. In 2001, Wisden rated this performance as the best Test match innings of all time.
The next Test, at the Adelaide Oval, was fairly even until Bradman played another patient second innings, making 212 from 395 balls. Australia levelled the series when the erratic left-arm spinner "Chuck" Fleetwood-Smith bowled Australia to victory. In the series-deciding Fifth Test, Bradman returned to a more aggressive style in top-scoring with 169 (off 191 balls) in Australia's 604 and Australia won by an innings. Australia's achievement of winning a Test series after outright losses in the first two matches has never been repeated in Test cricket.
End of an era
During the 1938 tour of England, Bradman played the most consistent cricket of his career.
He needed to score heavily as England had a strengthened batting line-up, while the Australian bowling was over-reliant on O'Reilly. Grimmett was overlooked, but Jack Fingleton made the team, so the clique of anti-Bradman players remained. Playing 26 innings on tour, Bradman recorded 13 centuries (a new Australian record) and again made 1,000 first-class runs before the end of May, becoming the only player to do so twice. In scoring 2,429 runs, Bradman achieved the highest average ever recorded in an English season: 115.66.
In the First Test, England amassed a big first innings score and looked likely to win, but Stan McCabe made 232 for Australia, a performance Bradman rated as the best he had ever seen. With Australia forced to follow-on, Bradman fought hard to ensure McCabe's effort was not in vain, and he secured the draw with 144 not out. It was the slowest Test hundred of his career and he played a similar innings of 102 not out in the next Test as Australia struggled to another draw. Rain completely washed out the Third Test at Old Trafford.
Australia's opportunity came at Headingley, a Test described by Bradman as the best he ever played in. England batted first and made 223. During the Australian innings, Bradman backed himself by opting to bat on in poor light conditions, reasoning that Australia could score more runs in bad light on a good pitch than on a rain affected pitch in good light, when he had the option to go off. He scored 103 out of a total of 242 and the gamble paid off, as it meant there was sufficient time to push for victory when an England collapse left them a target of only 107 to win. Australia slumped to 4/61, with Bradman out for 16. An approaching storm threatened to wash the game out, but the poor weather held off and Australia managed to secure the win, a victory that retained the Ashes. For the only time in his life, the tension of the occasion got to Bradman and he could not watch the closing stages of play, a reflection of the pressure that he felt all tour: he described the captaincy as "exhausting" and said he "found it difficult to keep going".
The euphoria of securing the Ashes preceded Australia's heaviest defeat. At The Oval, England amassed a world record of 7/903 and their opening batsman Len Hutton scored an individual world record, by making 364. In an attempt to relieve the burden on his bowlers, Bradman took a rare turn at bowling. During his third over, he fractured his ankle and teammates carried him from the ground. With Bradman injured and Fingleton unable to bat because of a leg muscle strain, Australia were thrashed by an innings and 579 runs, which remains the largest margin in Test cricket history. Unfit to complete the tour, Bradman left the team in the hands of vice-captain Stan McCabe. At this point, Bradman felt that the burden of captaincy would prevent him from touring England again, although he did not make his doubts public.
Despite the pressure of captaincy, Bradman's batting form remained supreme. An experienced, mature player now commonly called "The Don" had replaced the blitzing style of his early days as the "Boy from Bowral". In 1938–39, he led South Australia to the Sheffield Shield and made a century in six consecutive innings to equal CB Fry's world record. Bradman totalled 21 first-class centuries in 34 innings, from the beginning of the 1938 tour of England (including preliminary games in Australia) until early 1939.
The next season, Bradman made an abortive bid to join the Victoria state side. The Melbourne Cricket Club advertised the position of club secretary and he was led to believe that if he applied, he would get the job. The position, which had been held by Hugh Trumble until his death in August 1938, was one of the most prestigious jobs in Australian cricket. The annual salary of £1,000 would make Bradman financially secure while allowing him to retain a connection with the game. On 18 January 1939, the club's committee, on the casting vote of the chairman, chose former Test batsman Vernon Ransford over Bradman.
The 1939–40 season was Bradman's most productive ever for SA: 1,448 runs at an average of 144.8. He made three double centuries, including 251 not out against NSW, the innings that he rated the best he ever played in the Sheffield Shield, as he tamed Bill O'Reilly at the height of his form. However, it was the end of an era. The outbreak of World War II led to the indefinite postponement of all cricket tours, and the suspension of the Sheffield Shield competition.
Troubled war years
Bradman joined the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) on 28 June 1940 and was passed fit for air crew duty. The RAAF had more recruits than it could equip and train and Bradman spent four months in Adelaide before the Governor-General of Australia, Lord Gowrie, persuaded Bradman to transfer to the army, a move that was criticised as a safer option for him. Given the rank of lieutenant, he was posted to the Army School of Physical Training at Frankston, Victoria, to act as a divisional supervisor of physical training. The exertion of the job aggravated his chronic muscular problems, diagnosed as fibrositis. Surprisingly, in light of his batting prowess, a routine army test revealed that Bradman had poor eyesight.
Invalided out of service in June 1941, Bradman spent months recuperating, unable even to shave himself or comb his hair due to the extent of the muscular pain he suffered. He resumed stockbroking during 1942. In his biography of Bradman, Charles Williams expounded the theory that the physical problems were psychosomatic, induced by stress and possibly depression; Bradman read the book's manuscript and did not disagree. Had any cricket been played at this time, he would not have been available. Although he found some relief in 1945 when referred to the Melbourne masseur Ern Saunders, Bradman permanently lost the feeling in the thumb and index finger of his (dominant) right hand.
In June 1945, Bradman faced a financial crisis when the firm of Harry Hodgetts collapsed due to fraud and embezzlement. Bradman moved quickly to set up his own business, utilising Hodgetts' client list and his old office in Grenfell Street, Adelaide. The fallout led to a prison term for Hodgetts, and left a stigma attached to Bradman's name in the city's business community for many years.
However, the SA Cricket Association had no hesitation in appointing Bradman as their delegate to the Board of Control in place of Hodgetts. Now working alongside some of the men he had battled in the 1930s, Bradman quickly became a leading light in the administration of the game. With the resumption of international cricket, he was once more appointed a Test selector, and played a major role in planning for post-war cricket.
"The ghost of a once great cricketer"
In 1945–46, Bradman suffered regular bouts of fibrositis while coming to terms with increased administrative duties and the establishment of his business. He played for South Australia in two matches to help with the re-establishment of first-class cricket and later described his batting as "painstaking". Batting against the Australian Services cricket team, Bradman scored 112 in less than two hours, yet Dick Whitington (playing for the Services) wrote, "I have seen today the ghost of a once great cricketer". Bradman declined a tour of New Zealand and spent the winter of 1946 wondering whether he had played his last match. "With the English team due to arrive for the 1946–47 Ashes series, the media and the public were anxious to know if Bradman would lead Australia." His doctor recommended against a return to the game.
Encouraged by his wife, Bradman agreed to play in lead-up fixtures to the Test series. After hitting two centuries, Bradman made himself available for the First Test at The Gabba.
Controversy emerged on the first day of the First Test at Brisbane. After compiling an uneasy 28 runs, Bradman hit a ball to the gully fieldsman, Jack Ikin. "An appeal for a catch was denied in the umpire's contentious ruling that it was a bump ball". At the end of the over, England captain Wally Hammond spoke with Bradman and criticised him for not "walking"; "from then on the series was a cricketing war just when most people desired peace", Whitington wrote. Bradman regained his finest pre-war form in making 187, followed by 234 during the Second Test at Sydney (Sid Barnes also scored 234 during the innings, many in a still standing record 405 run 5th Wicket partnership with Bradman. Barnes later recalled that he purposely got out on 234 because "it wouldn't be right for someone to make more runs than Bradman"). Australia won both matches by an innings. Jack Fingleton speculated that had the decision at Brisbane gone against him, Bradman would have retired, such were his fitness problems. In the remainder of the series, Bradman made three half-centuries in six innings, but was unable to make another century; nevertheless, his team won handsomely, 3–0. He was the leading batsman on either side, with an average of 97.14. Nearly 850,000 spectators watched the Tests, which helped lift public spirits after the war.
Century of centuries and "The Invincibles"
India made its first tour of Australia in the 1947–48 season. On 15 November, Bradman made 172 against them for an Australian XI at Sydney, his 100th first-class century. The first non-Englishman to achieve the milestone, Bradman remains the only Australian to have done so. In five Tests, he scored 715 runs (at 178.75 average). His last double century (201) came at Adelaide, and he scored a century in each innings of the Melbourne Test. On the eve of the Fifth Test, he announced that the match would be his last in Australia, although he would tour England as a farewell.
Australia had assembled one of the great teams of cricket history. Bradman made it known that he wanted to go through the tour unbeaten, a feat never before accomplished. English spectators were drawn to the matches knowing that it would be their last opportunity to see Bradman in action. RC Robertson-Glasgow observed of Bradman that:
Despite his waning powers, Bradman compiled 11 centuries on the tour, amassing 2,428 runs (average 89.92). His highest score of the tour (187) came against Essex, when Australia compiled a world record of 721 runs in a day. In the Tests, he scored a century at Trent Bridge, but the performance most like his pre-war exploits came in the Fourth Test at Headingley. England declared on the last morning of the game, setting Australia a world record 404 runs to win in only 345 minutes on a heavily worn pitch. In partnership with Arthur Morris (182), Bradman reeled off 173 not out and the match was won with 15 minutes to spare. The journalist Ray Robinson called the victory "the 'finest ever' in its conquest of seemingly insuperable odds".
In the final Test at The Oval, Bradman walked out to bat in Australia's first innings. He received a standing ovation from the crowd and three cheers from the opposition. His Test batting average stood at 101.39. Facing the wrist-spin of Eric Hollies, Bradman pushed forward to the second ball that he faced, was deceived by a googly, and bowled between bat and pad for a duck. An England batting collapse resulted in an innings defeat, denying Bradman the opportunity to bat again and so his career average finished at 99.94; if he had scored just four runs in his last innings, it would have been 100. A story developed over the years that claimed Bradman missed the ball because of tears in his eyes, a claim Bradman denied for the rest of his life.
The Australian team won the Ashes 4–0, completed the tour unbeaten, and entered history as "The Invincibles". Just as Bradman's legend grew, rather than diminished, over the years, so too has the reputation of the 1948 team. For Bradman, it was the most personally fulfilling period of his playing days, as the divisiveness of the 1930s had passed. He wrote:
With Bradman now retired from professional cricket, RC Robertson-Glasgow wrote of the English reaction "... a miracle has been removed from among us. So must ancient Italy have felt when she heard of the death of Hannibal".
Statistical summary
Test match performance
First-class performance
Test records
Bradman still holds the following significant records for Test match cricket:
Batting average
Highest career batting average (minimum 20 innings): 99.94
Highest series batting average (minimum 4-Test series): 201.50 (1931–32); also second-highest: 178.75 (1947–48)
Conversion rate
Highest percentage of centuries per innings played: 36.25% (29 centuries from 80 innings)
Highest percentage of double centuries per innings played: 15% (12 double centuries from 80 innings)
Highest 50/100 conversion rate (minimum 2000 runs): 69.05% (29 centuries converted from 42 innings of ≥ 50 runs)
Highest 100/200 conversion rate (minimum 2000 runs): 41.38% (12 double centuries converted from 29 innings of ≥ 100 runs)
Multiples of 100 runs
Most double centuries: 12
Most double centuries in a series: 3 (1930); also 2 (1931–32, 1934, 1936–37)
Most triple centuries: 2 (equal with Chris Gayle, Brian Lara and Virender Sehwag) Note: Bradman was stranded on 299* in the 4th Test against South Africa in 1932.
Scoring rate
Most centuries accumulated within single sessions of play: 6 (1 pre lunch, 2 lunch-tea, 3 tea-stumps)
Most runs in one day's play: 309 (1930)
Fastest to multiples of 1000 runs
Fewest matches required to reach 1000 (7 matches), 2000 (15 matches), 3000 (23 matches), 4000 (31 matches), 5000 (36 matches) and 6000 (45 matches) Test runs.
Fewest innings required to reach 2000 (22 innings), 3000 (33 innings), 4000 (48 innings), 5000 (56 innings) and 6000 (68 innings) Test runs.
Other
Highest peak Test batting rating: 961
Highest percentage of team runs over career: 24.28%
Highest 5th wicket partnership: 405 (with Sid Barnes, 1946–47)
Highest score by a number 7 batsman: 270 (1936–37)
Most runs against one opponent: 5,028 (England)
Most hundreds against one opponent: 19 (England)
Most runs in one series: 974 (1930)
Most consecutive matches in which he made a century: 6 (the last three Tests in 1936–37, and the first three Tests in 1938)
Cricket context
Bradman's Test batting average of 99.94 has become one of cricket's most famous, iconic statistics. No other player who has played more than 20 Test match innings has finished their career with a Test average of more than 62. Bradman scored centuries at a rate better than one every three innings—in 80 Test innings, Bradman scored 29 centuries. Only 11 players have since surpassed his total, all at a much slower rate: the next fastest player to reach 29 centuries, Sachin Tendulkar, required nearly twice as long (148 innings) to do so.
In addition, Bradman's total of 12 Test double hundreds—comprising 15% of his innings—remains the most achieved by any Test batsman and was accumulated faster than any other total.
For comparison, the next highest totals of Test double hundreds are Kumar Sangakkara's 11 in 223 innings (4.9%), Brian Lara's 9 in 232 innings (3.9%), and Wally Hammond's 7 in 140 innings (5%); the next highest rate of scoring Test double centuries was achieved by Vinod Kambli, whose 21 innings included 2 double centuries (9.5%).
World sport context
Wisden hailed Bradman as, "the greatest phenomenon in the history of cricket, indeed in the history of all ball games". Statistician Charles Davis analysed the statistics for several prominent sportsmen by comparing the number of standard deviations that they stand above the mean for their sport. The top performers in his selected sports are:
The statistics show that "no other athlete dominates an international sport to the extent that Bradman does cricket". In order to post a similarly dominant career statistic as Bradman, a baseball batter would need a career batting average of .392, while a basketball player would need to score an average of 43.0 points per game over their career. The respective records are .366 and 30.1.
When Bradman died, Time allocated a space in its "Milestones" column for an obituary:
Playing style
Bradman's early development was shaped by the high bounce of the ball on matting-over-concrete pitches. He favoured "horizontal-bat" shots (such as the hook, pull and cut) to deal with the bounce and devised a unique grip on the bat handle that would accommodate these strokes without compromising his ability to defend. Employing a side-on stance at the wicket, Bradman kept perfectly still as the bowler ran in. His backswing had a "crooked" look that troubled his early critics, but he resisted entreaties to change. His backswing kept his hands in close to the body, leaving him perfectly balanced and able to change his stroke mid-swing, if need be. Another telling factor was the decisiveness of Bradman's footwork. He "used the crease" by either coming metres down the pitch to drive, or playing so far back that his feet ended up level with the stumps when playing the cut, hook or pull.
Bradman's game evolved with experience. He temporarily adapted his technique during the Bodyline series, deliberately moving around the crease in an attempt to score from the short-pitched deliveries. At his peak, in the mid-1930s, he had the ability to switch between a defensive and attacking approach as the occasion demanded. After the Second World War, he adjusted to bat within the limitations set by his age, becoming a steady "accumulator" of runs. However, Bradman never truly mastered batting on sticky wickets. Wisden commented, "[i]f there really is a blemish on his amazing record it is ... the absence of a significant innings on one of those 'sticky dogs' of old".
After cricket
After his return to Australia, Bradman played in his own Testimonial match at Melbourne, scoring his 117th and last century, and receiving £9,342 in proceeds. In the 1949 New Year Honours, he was appointed Knight Bachelor for his services to the game, becoming the only Australian cricketer ever to be knighted. He commented that he "would have preferred to remain just Mister". The following year he published a memoir, Farewell to Cricket. Bradman accepted offers from the Daily Mail to travel with, and write about, the 1953 and 1956 Australian teams in England. The Art of Cricket, his final book published in 1958, is an instructional manual.
Bradman retired from his stockbroking business in June 1954, depending on the "comfortable" income earned as a board member of 16 publicly listed companies. His highest profile affiliation was with Argo Investments Limited, where he was chairman for a number of years. Charles Williams commented that, "[b]usiness was excluded on medical grounds, [so] the only sensible alternative was a career in the administration of the game which he loved and to which he had given most of his active life".
Bradman was honoured at a number of cricket grounds, notably when his portrait was hung in the Long Room at Lord's; until Shane Warne's portrait was added in 2005, Bradman was one of just three Australians to be honoured in this way. Bradman inaugurated a "Bradman Stand" at the Sydney Cricket Ground in January 1974; the Adelaide Oval also opened a Bradman Stand in 1990, which housed new media and corporate facilities. The Oval's Bradman Stand was demolished in 2013 as the stadium underwent an extensive re-development. Later in 1974, he attended a Lord's Taverners function in London where he experienced heart problems, which forced him to limit his public appearances to select occasions only. With his wife, Bradman returned to Bowral in 1976, where the new cricket ground was named in his honour. He gave the keynote speech at the historic Centenary Test at Melbourne in 1977.
On 16 June 1979, the Australian government awarded Bradman the nation's second-highest civilian honour at that time, Companion of the Order of Australia (AC), "in recognition of service to the sport of cricket and cricket administration". In 1980, he resigned from the ACB, to lead a more secluded life.
Administrative career
In addition to acting as one of South Australia's delegates to the Board of Control from 1945 to 1980, Bradman was a committee member of the SACA between 1935 and 1986. It is estimated that he attended 1,713 SACA meetings during this half century of service. Aside from two years in the early 1950s, he filled a selector's berth for the Test team between 1936 and 1971.
Cricket saw an increase in defensive play during the 1950s. As a selector, Bradman favoured attacking, positive cricketers who entertained the paying public. He formed an alliance with Australian captain Richie Benaud, seeking more attractive play, with some success. He served two high-profile periods as chairman of the board of Control, in 1960–63 and 1969–72. During the first, he dealt with the growing prevalence of illegal bowling actions in the game, a problem that he adjudged "the most complex I have known in cricket, because it is not a matter of fact but of opinion". The major controversy of his second stint was a proposed tour of Australia by South Africa in 1971–72. On Bradman's recommendation, the series was cancelled. Cricket journalist Michael Coward said of Bradman as an administrator:
In the late 1970s, Bradman played an important role during the World Series Cricket schism as a member of a special Australian Cricket Board committee formed to handle the crisis. He was criticised for not airing an opinion, but he dealt with World Series Cricket far more pragmatically than other administrators. Richie Benaud described Bradman as "a brilliant administrator and businessman", warning that he was not to be underestimated. As Australian captain, Ian Chappell fought with Bradman over the issue of player remuneration in the early 1970s and has suggested that Bradman was parsimonious:
Later years and death
After his wife's death in 1997, Bradman suffered "a discernible and not unexpected wilting of spirit". The next year, on his 90th birthday, he hosted a meeting with his two favourite modern players, Shane Warne and Sachin Tendulkar, but he was not seen in his familiar place at the Adelaide Oval again.
Hospitalised with pneumonia in December 2000, he returned home in the New Year and died there on 25 February 2001, aged 92.
A memorial service to mark Bradman's life was held on 25 March 2001 at St Peter's Anglican Cathedral, Adelaide. The service was attended by a host of former and current Test cricketers, as well as Australia's then prime minister, John Howard, leader of the opposition Kim Beazley and former prime minister Bob Hawke. Eulogies were given by Richie Benaud and Governor-General Sir William Deane. The service was broadcast live on ABC Television to a viewing audience of 1.45 million. A private service for family and friends was earlier held at the Centennial Park Cemetery in the suburb of Pasadena, with many people lining both Greenhill and Goodwood Roads to pay their respects as his funeral motorcade passed by.
Legacy
Cricket writer David Frith summed up the paradox of the continuing fascination with Bradman:
As early as 1939, Bradman had a Royal Navy ship named after him. Built as a fishing trawler in 1936, was taken over by the Admiralty in 1939, but was sunk by German aircraft the following year.
In the 1963 edition of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack, Bradman was selected by Neville Cardus as one of the Six Giants of the Wisden Century. This was a special commemorative selection requested by Wisden for its 100th edition. The other five players chosen were: Sydney Barnes, W. G. Grace, Jack Hobbs, Tom Richardson and Victor Trumper.
On 10 December 1985, Bradman was the first of 120 inaugural inductees into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame. He spoke of his philosophy for considering the stature of athletes:
Although modest about his own abilities and generous in his praise of other cricketers, Bradman was fully aware of the talents he possessed as a player; there is some evidence that he sought to influence his legacy. During the 1980s and 1990s, Bradman carefully selected the people to whom he gave interviews, assisting Michael Page, Roland Perry and Charles Williams, who all produced biographical works about him. Bradman also agreed to an extensive interview for ABC radio, broadcast as Bradman: The Don Declares in eight 55-minute episodes during 1988.
The most significant of these legacy projects was the Bradman Museum, opened in 1989 at the Bradman Oval in Bowral. This organisation was reformed in 1993 as a non-profit charitable Trust, called the Bradman Foundation. In 2010, it was expanded and rebranded as the International Cricket Hall of Fame.
When the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame was created in Melbourne in 1996, Bradman was made one of its 10 inaugural members. In 2000, Bradman was selected by cricket experts as one of five Wisden Cricketers of the Century. Each of the 100 members of the panel were able to select five cricketers: all 100 voted for Bradman. The ICC Cricket Hall of Fame inducted him on 19 November 2009.
Bradman's life and achievements were recognised in Australia with two notable issues. Three years before he died, he became the first living Australian to be featured on an Australian postage stamp. After his death, the Australian Government produced a 20-cent coin to commemorate his life. On 27 August 2018, to celebrate 110 years since his birth, Bradman was commemorated with a Google Doodle. To mark 150 years of the Cricketers' Almanack, Wisden named him as captain of an all-time Test World XI.
In 1999, Bradman was named in the six man shortlist for BBC Sports Personality of the Century. Asteroid 2472 Bradman discovered by Luboš Kohoutek is named in his honour.
Family life
Bradman first met Jessie Martha Menzies in 1920 when she boarded with the Bradman family, to be closer to school in Bowral. The couple married at St Paul's Anglican Church at Burwood, Sydney on 30 April 1932. The two had an impeccable marriage and were devoted to each other. During their 65-year marriage, Jessie was "shrewd, reliable, selfless, and above all, uncomplicated...she was the perfect foil to his concentrated, and occasionally mercurial character". Bradman paid tribute to his wife numerous times, once saying succinctly, "I would never have achieved what I achieved without Jessie".
The Bradmans lived in the same modest, suburban house in Holden Street, Kensington Park in Adelaide for all but the first three years of their married life. They experienced personal tragedy in raising their children: their first-born son died as an infant in 1936, their second son, John (born in 1939) contracted polio, and their daughter, Shirley, born in 1941, had cerebral palsy from birth. His family name proved a burden for John Bradman; he legally changed his last name to Bradsen in 1972. Although claims were made that he became estranged from his father, it was more a matter of "the pair inhabit[ing] different worlds", and the two remained in contact through the years. After the cricketer's death, a collection of personal letters written by Bradman to his close friend Rohan Rivett between 1953 and 1977 was released and gave researchers new insights into Bradman's family life, including the strain between father and son.
Bradman's reclusiveness in later life is partly attributable to the ongoing health problems of his wife, particularly following the open-heart surgery Jessie underwent in her 60s. Lady Bradman died in 1997, aged 88, from cancer. This had a dispiriting effect on Bradman, but the relationship with his son improved, to the extent that John resolved to change his name back to Bradman. Since his father's death, John Bradman has become the spokesperson for the family and has been involved in defending the Bradman legacy in a number of disputes. The relationship between Bradman and his wider family is less clear, although nine months after Bradman's death, his nephew Paul Bradman criticised him as a "snob" and a "loner" who forgot his connections in Bowral and who failed to attend the funerals of Paul's mother and father.
The operatic soprano Greta Bradman is his granddaughter.
In popular culture
Bradman's name has become an archetypal name for outstanding excellence, both within cricket and in the wider world. The term Bradmanesque has been coined and is used both within and outside cricketing circles. Steve Waugh described Sri Lankan Muttiah Muralitharan as "the Don Bradman of bowling".
Bradman has been the subject of more biographies than any other Australian, apart from the bushranger Ned Kelly. Bradman himself wrote four books: Don Bradman's Book–The Story of My Cricketing Life with Hints on Batting, Bowling and Fielding (1930), My Cricketing Life (1938), Farewell to Cricket (1950) and The Art of Cricket (1958). The story of the Bodyline series was retold in a 1984 television mini-series, with Gary Sweet portraying Bradman.
Bradman is immortalised in three popular songs from different eras, "Our Don Bradman" (1930s, by Jack O'Hagan), "Bradman" (1980s, by Paul Kelly), and "Sir Don", (a tribute by John Williamson performed at Bradman's memorial service). Bradman recorded several songs accompanying himself and others on piano in the early 1930s, including "Every Day Is A Rainbow Day For Me", with Jack Lumsdaine. In 2000, the Australian Government made it illegal for the names of corporations to suggest a link to "Sir Donald Bradman", if such a link does not in fact exist. Other entities with similar protection are the Australian and foreign governments, Saint Mary MacKillop, the Royal Family and the Returned and Services League of Australia.
Bibliography
How to Play Cricket (2013) by Don Bradman, Orient Paperbacks,
See also
List of Test cricket records
ICC Player Rankings
References
Sources
Baldwin, Mark (2005): The Ashes' Strangest Moments: Extraordinary But True Tales from Over a Century of the Ashes, Franz Steiner Verlag. .
Bradman, Don (1950): Farewell to Cricket, 1988 Pavilion Library reprint. .
Cashman, Richard et al. – editors (1996): The Oxford Companion to Australian Cricket, Oxford University Press. .
Coleman, Robert (1993): Seasons in the Sun: the Story of the Victorian Cricket Association, Hargreen Publishing Company. .
Davis, Charles (2000): The Best Of the Best: A New Look at the Great Cricketers and Changing Times, ABC Books. .
Dunstan, Keith (1988, rev. ed.): The Paddock That Grew, Hutchinson Australia. .
Eason, Alan (2004): The A-Z of Bradman, ABC Books. .
Fingleton, Jack (1949): Brightly Fades the Don, 1985 Pavilion Library reprint. .
Frith, David (2002): Bodyline Autopsy, ABC Books. .
Gibbs, Barry (2001): My Cricket Journey, Wakefield Press. .
Harte, Chris (1993): A History of Australian Cricket, André Deutsch. .
Haigh, Gideon. "Sir Donald Bradman at 100." The Monthly, August 2008.
Haigh, Gideon (1993): The Cricket War – the Inside Story of Kerry Packer's World Series Cricket, Text Publishing Company. .
Hutchins, Brett (2002): Don Bradman: Challenging the Myth, Cambridge University Press. .
O'Reilly, Bill (1985): Tiger – 60 Years of Cricket, William Collins. .
McGilvray, Alan & Tasker, Norman (1985): The Game Is Not the Same, ABC Books. .
Page, Michael (1983): Bradman – The Illustrated Biography, Macmillan Australia. .
Perry, Roland (1995): The Don – A Biography of Sir Donald Bradman, Macmillan. .
Robinson, Ray (1981 rev. ed.): On Top Down Under, Cassell Australia. .
Rosenwater, Irving (1978): Sir Donald Bradman – A Biography, Batsford. .
Wallace, Christine (2004): The Private Don, Allen & Unwin. .
Whitington, RS (1974): The Book of Australian Test Cricket 1877–1974, Wren Publishing. .
Williams, Charles (1996): Bradman: An Australian Hero, 2001 Abacus reprint. .
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack: various editions, accessed via ESPN Cricinfo
External links
Bradman Museum and Bradman Oval
Bradman Digital Library—State Library of South Australia
The Bradman Trail
Don Bradman on Picture Australia
Interview with Bradman 1930
Don Bradman — TV documentary — Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Some images of Don Bradman, including some showing Don Bradman's batting technique
Listen to a young Don Bradman speaking after the 1930 Ashes tour on australianscreen online
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D. G. Bradman's XI cricketers | true | [
"Mr What's His Name is a 1935 British film. It stars Seymour Hicks and was based on his play.\n\nIt was shot at Warner Bros' Teddington Studios.\n\nPlot\nA beautician meets and falls in love with a young man, and they soon marry. What she doesn't know, however, is that her new husband is actually a millionaire who is suffering from amnesia—and he already has a wife.\n\nCast\n Seymour Hicks as Alfred Henfield\n Olive Blakeney as Ann Henfield\n Enid Stamp-Taylor as Corinne Henfield\n Garry Marsh as Yates\n Toni Edgar-Bruce as Sylvia\n Martita Hunt as Mrs. Davies\n Henry B. Longhurst as Mr. Bullen\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nMr What's His Name at TCMDB\n\nBritish black-and-white films\nBritish films\n1930s English-language films\n1935 films\nBritish comedy films\n1935 comedy films",
"Takaonna (高女, \"tall woman\") was a Japanese yōkai that appeared in the Gazu Hyakki Yagyō by Toriyama Sekien.\n\nConcept\nThe Gazu (illustrated reference) above depicts a woman with an elongated lower body next to what appears to be a brothel. However, the Gazu Hyakki Yagyō has no explanatory text, so it is unclear what kind of yōkai this depiction was intended to be. Some believe that this yōkai was an original invention designed to parody the Yoshiwara Yūkaku of the Edo period.\n\nThe book Yōkaigadan Zenshū Nihonhen Jō (妖怪画談全集 日本編 上, \"Complete Analysis of Yōkai Paintings, Volume Japan, First Part\") by the folklorist Morihiko Fujisawa explains that in a story from the Wakayama Prefecture called Takanyōbō (高女房, \"Tall Woman\"), a Takaonna would frighten people on the second floors of girō (brothels). \n\nThe book Tōhoku Kaidan no Tabi (Travels for Mysterious Tales of Tōhoku) by the novelist Norio Yamada, the kaidan (mysterious tale) titled \"Takaonna\" depicts the Takaonna as a homely woman who could never be with a man when she was alive. Transformed into a yōkai from her own desire, she wanders the earth, elongating her body to peek into the second floor of brothels to look at what she could never have. \n\nThese two depictions of the Takaonna became generally accepted in post-war literature, but yōkai researcher Kenji Murakami notes that Fujisawa's explanation is nothing more than one interpretation of Sekien's painting and that Yamada's kaidan is a completely different tale that shares the name of Takaonna.\n\nIncident\nIn 2016, August 2, staff at the Hidakakōshioya Ryokuchi Park in Gobō, Wakayama Prefecture discovered that a stone statue of a Takaonna had been severed at its base. This Takaonna statue was based on Mizuki Shigeru's design and has been displayed alongside 9 other yōkai statues since 2009. On the 10th of the same month, the torso of the Takaonna statue was discovered at the bottom of the harbor (at a depth of 4.5 meters) and was raised back up; its right hand was broken. On September 16 at around 5:00 AM, the Gobō police station pressed charges against a male high school student for inflicting property damage after kicking the Takaonna statue (which has an estimated worth of 120 thousand yen). This incident, like the Slender Man Stabbing in America, boosted the popularity of the Takaonna legend.\n\nThe Carpenter and Taka-Onna\n\nOnce in the prefecture of Wakayama was a man who worked wood. This man was married and had a child. He hired 30 servants who went. When her son was five years old, he mysteriously disappeared. After this, his servants began to die one by one. Finally, when there were fewer than half a medium came home and asked what happened. The husband replied that nothing special. The medium then took caution. The man of the house felt strange. His wife asked what had made the medium and the husband said that he had only asked what was happening in the house and then he had retired. The man's wife was neurotic and east to see his reaction, was scared. Then the man lied to his wife he had a fever and went to bed early. Someone came to the foot of his bed and said, \"When your wife looks back appearance and must escape to the mountains. You run and run!\" After hearing this, his wife looked back and as was to lie in bed pretending to sleep. His wife became an oni. It had a height of 2.1 meters. He took off his clothes and became a beautiful lady accompanied by a roar like thunder, but half of her body still remained spellbound. The husband was shocked and escaped into the mountains. His wife was a Taka-onna which could control the length of the parts of your body. She had killed the servants and if the husband had stayed there also have been slain by her.\n\nSee also\nList of legendary creatures from Japan\nRokurokubi\nSlender Man\n\nNotes\n\nExternal links\nTaka-Onna\n\nMythic humanoids\nYōkai\nMythological tricksters"
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"Don Bradman",
"Reluctant hero",
"What is the relation between Don Bradman and reluctant Hero?",
"I don't know.",
"What is the Reluctant hero about?",
"making it more difficult to maintain the privacy",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a \"machine-like\" approach to batting.",
"Does he have any help living?",
"He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon.",
"Does he undergo any surgery or in an hospital for a long time?",
"I don't know.",
"What was his wife's name?",
"Jessie Menzies"
]
| C_ef88bed7f74d4322a1040eb8bdce83a2_1 | What was her role in his life? | 7 | What was Jezzie Menzies' role in Don Bradman's life? | Don Bradman | In 1930-31, against the first West Indian side to visit Australia, Bradman's scoring was more sedate than in England--although he did make 223 in 297 minutes in the Third Test at Brisbane and 152 in 154 minutes in the following Test at Melbourne. However, he scored quickly in a very successful sequence of innings against the South Africans in the Australian summer of 1931-32. For NSW against the tourists, he made 30, 135 and 219. In the Test matches, he scored 226 (277 minutes), 112 (155 minutes), 2 and 167 (183 minutes); his 299 not out in the Fourth Test, at Adelaide, set a new record for the highest score in a Test in Australia. Australia won nine of the ten Tests played over the two series. At this point, Bradman had played 15 Test matches since the beginning of 1930, scoring 2,227 runs at an average of 131. He had played 18 innings, scoring 10 centuries, six of which had extended beyond 200. His overall scoring rate was 42 runs per hour, with 856 (or 38.5% of his tally) scored in boundaries. Significantly, he had not hit a six, which typified Bradman's attitude: if he hit the ball along the ground, then it could not be caught. During this phase of his career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a "machine-like" approach to batting. The South African fast bowler Sandy Bell described bowling to him as, "heart-breaking ... with his sort of cynical grin, which rather reminds one of the Sphinx ... he never seems to perspire". Between these two seasons, Bradman seriously contemplated playing professional cricket in England with the Lancashire League club Accrington, a move that, according to the rules of the day, would have ended his Test career. A consortium of three Sydney businesses offered an alternative. They devised a two-year contract whereby Bradman wrote for Associated Newspapers, broadcast on Radio 2UE and promoted the menswear retailing chain FJ Palmer and Son. However, the contract increased Bradman's dependence on his public profile, making it more difficult to maintain the privacy that he ardently desired. Bradman's chaotic wedding to Jessie Menzies in April 1932 epitomised these new and unwelcome intrusions into his private life. The church "was under siege all throughout the day ... uninvited guests stood on chairs and pews to get a better view"; police erected barriers that were broken down and many of those invited could not get a seat. Just weeks later, Bradman joined a private team organised by Arthur Mailey to tour the United States and Canada. He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. Playing 51 games in 75 days, Bradman scored 3,779 runs at 102.1, with 18 centuries. Although the standard of play was not high, the effects of the amount of cricket Bradman had played in the three previous years, together with the strains of his celebrity status, began to show on his return home. CANNOTANSWER | He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. | Sir Donald George Bradman, AC (27 August 1908 – 25 February 2001), nicknamed "The Don", was an Australian international cricketer, widely acknowledged as the greatest batsman of all time. Bradman's career Test batting average of 99.94 has been cited as the greatest achievement by any sportsman in any major sport.
The story that the young Bradman practised alone with a cricket stump and a golf ball is part of Australian folklore. Bradman's meteoric rise from bush cricket to the Australian Test team took just over two years. Before his 22nd birthday, he had set many records for top scoring, some of which still stand, and became Australia's sporting idol at the height of the Great Depression.
During a 20-year playing career, Bradman consistently scored at a level that made him, in the words of former Australia captain Bill Woodfull, "worth three batsmen to Australia". A controversial set of tactics, known as Bodyline, was specially devised by the England team to curb his scoring. As a captain and administrator, Bradman was committed to attacking, entertaining cricket; he drew spectators in record numbers. He hated the constant adulation, however, and it affected how he dealt with others. The focus of attention on his individual performances strained relationships with some teammates, administrators and journalists, who thought him aloof and wary. Following an enforced hiatus due to the Second World War, he made a dramatic comeback, captaining an Australian team known as "The Invincibles" on a record-breaking unbeaten tour of England.
A complex, highly driven man, not given to close personal relationships,
Bradman retained a pre-eminent position in the game by acting as an administrator, selector and writer for three decades following his retirement. Even after he became reclusive in his declining years, his opinion was highly sought, and his status as a national icon was still recognised. Almost 50 years after his retirement as a Test player, in 1997, Prime Minister John Howard of Australia called him the "greatest living Australian". Bradman's image has appeared on postage stamps and coins, and a museum dedicated to his life was opened while he was still living. On the centenary of his birth, 27 August 2008, the Royal Australian Mint issued a $5 commemorative gold coin with Bradman's image. In 2009, he was inducted posthumously into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame.
Early years
Donald George Bradman was the youngest son of George and Emily (née Whatman) Bradman, and was born on 27 August 1908 at Cootamundra, New South Wales (NSW). He had a brother, Victor, and three sisters—Islet, Lilian and Elizabeth May. Bradman was of English heritage on both sides of his family. His grandfather Charles Andrew Bradman left Withersfield, Suffolk, for Australia. When Bradman played at Cambridge in 1930 as a 21 year old on his first tour of England, he took the opportunity to trace his forebears in the region. Also, one of his great-grandfathers was one of the first Italians to migrate to Australia in 1826. Bradman's parents lived in the hamlet of Yeo Yeo, near Stockinbingal. His mother, Emily, gave birth to him at the Cootamundra home of Granny Scholz, a midwife. That house is now the Bradman Birthplace Museum. Emily had hailed from Mittagong in the NSW Southern Highlands, and in 1911, when Don Bradman was about two-and-a-half years old, his parents decided to relocate to Bowral, close to Mittagong, to be closer to Emily's family and friends, as life at Yeo Yeo was proving difficult.
Bradman practised batting incessantly during his youth. He invented his own solo cricket game, using a cricket stump for a bat, and a golf ball. A water tank, mounted on a curved brick stand, stood on a paved area behind the family home. When hit into the curved brick facing of the stand, the ball rebounded at high speed and varying angles—and Bradman would attempt to hit it again. This form of practice developed his timing and reactions to a high degree. In more formal cricket, he hit his first century at the age of 12, with an undefeated 115 playing for Bowral Public School against Mittagong High School.
Bush cricketer
During the 1920–21 season, Bradman acted as scorer for the local Bowral team, captained by his uncle George Whatman. In October 1920, he filled in when the team was one man short, scoring 37* and 29* on debut. During the season, Bradman's father took him to the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) to watch the fifth Ashes Test match. On that day, Bradman formed an ambition. "I shall never be satisfied", he told his father, "until I play on this ground". Bradman left school in 1922 and went to work for a local real estate agent who encouraged his sporting pursuits by giving him time off when necessary. He gave up cricket in favour of tennis for two years, but resumed playing cricket in 1925–26.
Bradman became a regular selection for the Bowral team; several outstanding performances earned him the attention of the Sydney daily press. Competing on matting-over-concrete pitches, Bowral played other rural towns in the Berrima District competition. Against Wingello, a team that included the future Test bowler Bill O'Reilly, Bradman made 234. In the competition final against Moss Vale, which extended over five consecutive Saturdays, Bradman scored 320 not out. During the following Australian winter (1926), an ageing Australian team lost The Ashes in England, and a number of Test players retired. The New South Wales Cricket Association began a hunt for new talent. Mindful of Bradman's big scores for Bowral, the association wrote to him, requesting his attendance at a practice session in Sydney. He was subsequently chosen for the "Country Week" tournaments at both cricket and tennis, to be played during separate weeks. His boss presented him with an ultimatum: he could have only one week away from work, and therefore had to choose between the two sports. He chose cricket.
Bradman's performances during Country Week resulted in an invitation to play grade cricket in Sydney for St George in the 1926–27 season. He scored 110 on his debut, making his first century on a turf pitch. On 1 January 1927, he turned out for the NSW second team. For the remainder of the season, Bradman travelled the from Bowral to Sydney every Saturday to play for St George.
First-class debut
The next season continued the rapid rise of the "Boy from Bowral". Selected to replace the unfit Archie Jackson in the NSW team, Bradman made his first-class debut at the Adelaide Oval, aged 19. He secured the achievement of a hundred on debut, with an innings of 118 featuring what soon became his trademarks—fast footwork, calm confidence and rapid scoring. In the final match of the season, he made his first century at the SCG, against the Sheffield Shield champions Victoria. Despite his potential, Bradman was not chosen for the Australian second team to tour New Zealand.
Bradman decided that his chances for Test selection would be improved by moving to Sydney for the 1928–29 season, when England were to tour in defence of the Ashes. Initially, he continued working in real estate, but later took a promotions job with the sporting goods retailer Mick Simmons Ltd. In the first match of the Sheffield Shield season, he scored a century in each innings against Queensland. He followed this with scores of 87 and 132 not out against the England touring team, and was rewarded with selection for the first Test, to be played at Brisbane.
Test career
Playing in only his tenth first-class match, Bradman, nicknamed "Braddles" by his teammates, found his initial Test a harsh learning experience. Caught on a sticky wicket, Australia were all out for 66 in the second innings and lost by 675 runs (still a Test record). Following scores of 18 and 1, the selectors dropped Bradman to twelfth man for the Second Test. An injury to Bill Ponsford early in the match required Bradman to field as substitute while England amassed 636, following their 863 runs in the First Test. RS "Dick" Whitington wrote, "... he had scored only nineteen himself and these experiences appear to have provided him with food for thought". Recalled for the Third Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, Bradman scored 79 and 112 to become the youngest player to make a Test century, although the match was still lost. Another loss followed in the Fourth Test. Bradman reached 58 in the second innings and appeared set to guide the team to victory when he was run out. It was to be the only run out of his Test career. The losing margin was just 12 runs.
The improving Australians did manage to win the Fifth and final Test. Bradman top-scored with 123 in the first innings, and was at the wicket in the second innings when his captain Jack Ryder hit the winning runs. Bradman completed the season with 1,690 first-class runs, averaging 93.88, and his first multiple century in a Sheffield Shield match, 340 not out against Victoria, set a new ground record for the SCG. Bradman averaged 113.28 in 1929–30. In a trial match to select the team that would tour England, he was last man out in the first innings for 124. As his team followed on, the skipper Bill Woodfull asked Bradman to keep the pads on and open the second innings. By the end of play, he was 205 not out, on his way to 225. Against Queensland at the SCG, Bradman set a then world record for first-class cricket by scoring 452 not out; he made his runs in only 415 minutes. Not long after the feat, he recalled:
Although he was an obvious selection to tour England, Bradman's unorthodox style raised doubts that he could succeed on the slower English pitches. Percy Fender wrote:
The encomiums were not confined to his batting gifts; nor did the criticism extend to his character. "Australia has unearthed a champion", said former Australian Test great Clem Hill, "self-taught, with natural ability. But most important of all, with his heart in the right place." Selector Dick Jones weighed in with the observation that it was "good to watch him talking to an old player, listening attentively to everything that is said and then replying with a modest 'thank you'."
1930 tour of England
England were favourites to win the 1930 Ashes series, and if the Australians were to exceed expectations, their young batsmen, Bradman and Jackson, needed to prosper. With his elegant batting technique, Jackson appeared the brighter prospect of the pair. However, Bradman began the tour with 236 at Worcester and went on to score 1,000 first-class runs by the end of May, the fifth player (and first Australian) to achieve this rare feat. In his first Test appearance in England, Bradman hit 131 in the second innings but England won the match. His batting reached a new level in the Second Test at Lord's where he scored 254 as Australia won and levelled the series. Later in life, Bradman rated this the best innings of his career as, "practically without exception every ball went where it was intended to go". Wisden noted his fast footwork and how he hit the ball "all round the wicket with power and accuracy", as well as faultless concentration in keeping the ball on the ground.
In terms of runs scored, this performance was soon surpassed. In the Third Test, at Headingley, Bradman scored a century before lunch on 11 July, the first day of the Test match to equal the performances of Victor Trumper and Charlie Macartney. In the afternoon, Bradman added another century between lunch and tea, before finishing the day on 309 not out. He remains the only Test player to pass 300 in one day's play. His eventual score of 334 was a world-record, exceeding the previous mark of 325 by Andy Sandham. Bradman dominated the Australian innings; the second-highest tally was 77 by Alan Kippax. Businessman Arthur Whitelaw later presented Bradman with a cheque for £1,000 in appreciation of his achievement. The match ended in anti-climax as poor weather prevented a result, as it also did in the Fourth Test.
In the deciding Test at The Oval, England made 405. During an innings stretching over three days due to intermittent rain, Bradman made yet another multiple century, this time 232, which helped give Australia a big lead of 290 runs. In a crucial partnership with Archie Jackson, Bradman battled through a difficult session when England fast bowler Harold Larwood bowled short on a pitch enlivened by the rain. Wisden gave this period of play only a passing mention:
A number of English players and commentators noted Bradman's discomfort in playing the short, rising delivery. The revelation came too late for this particular match, but was to have immense significance in the next Ashes series. Australia won the match by an innings and regained the Ashes. The victory made an impact in Australia. With the economy sliding toward depression and unemployment rapidly rising, the country found solace in sporting triumph. The story of a self-taught 22-year-old from the bush who set a series of records against the old rival made Bradman a national hero. The statistics Bradman achieved on the tour, especially in the Test matches, broke records for the day and some have stood the test of time. In all, Bradman scored 974 runs at an average of 139.14 during the Test series, with four centuries, including two double hundreds and a triple. As of 2018, no-one has matched or exceeded 974 runs or three double centuries in one Test series; the record of 974 runs exceeds the second-best performance by 69 runs and was achieved in two fewer innings. Bradman's first-class tally, 2,960 runs (at an average of 98.66 with 10 centuries), was another enduring record: the most by any overseas batsman on a tour of England.
On the tour, the dynamic nature of Bradman's batting contrasted sharply with his quiet, solitary off-field demeanour. He was described as aloof from his teammates and he did not offer to buy them a round of drinks, let alone share the money given to him by Whitelaw. Bradman spent a lot of his free time alone, writing, as he had sold the rights to a book. On his return to Australia, Bradman was surprised by the intensity of his reception; he became a "reluctant hero". Mick Simmons wanted to cash in on their employee's newly won fame. They asked Bradman to leave his teammates and attend official receptions they organised in Adelaide, Melbourne, Goulburn, his hometown Bowral and Sydney, where he received a brand new custom-built Chevrolet. At each stop, Bradman received a level of adulation that "embarrassed" him. This focus on individual accomplishment, in a team game, "... permanently damaged relationships with his contemporaries". Commenting on Australia's victory, the team's vice-captain Vic Richardson said, "... we could have played any team without Bradman, but we could not have played the blind school without Clarrie Grimmett". A modest Bradman can be heard in a 1930 recording saying "I have always endeavoured to do my best for the side, and the few centuries that have come my way have been achieved in the hope of winning matches. My one idea when going into bat was to make runs for Australia."
Reluctant hero
In 1930–31, against the first West Indian side to visit Australia, Bradman's scoring was more sedate than in England—although he did make 223 in 297 minutes in the Third Test at Brisbane and 152 in 154 minutes in the following Test at Melbourne. However, he scored quickly in a very successful sequence of innings against the South Africans in the Australian summer of 1931–32. For NSW against the tourists, he made 30, 135 and 219. In the Test matches, he scored , , 2 and ; his 299 not out in the Fourth Test, at Adelaide, set a new record for the highest score in a Test in Australia. Australia won nine of the ten Tests played over the two series.
At this point, Bradman had played 15 Test matches since the beginning of 1930, scoring 2,227 runs at an average of 131. He had played 18 innings, scoring 10 centuries, six of which had extended beyond 200. His overall scoring rate was 42 runs per hour, with 856 (or 38.5% of his tally) scored in boundaries. Significantly, he had not hit a six, which typified Bradman's attitude: if he hit the ball along the ground, then it could not be caught. During this phase of his career, his youth and natural fitness allowed him to adopt a "machine-like" approach to batting. The South African fast bowler Sandy Bell described bowling to him as, "heart-breaking ... with his sort of cynical grin, which rather reminds one of the Sphinx ... he never seems to perspire".
Between these two seasons, Bradman seriously contemplated playing professional cricket in England with the Lancashire League club Accrington, a move that, according to the rules of the day, would have ended his Test career. A consortium of three Sydney businesses offered an alternative. They devised a two-year contract whereby Bradman wrote for Associated Newspapers, broadcast on Radio 2UE and promoted the menswear retailing chain FJ Palmer and Son. However, the contract increased Bradman's dependence on his public profile, making it more difficult to maintain the privacy that he ardently desired.
Bradman's chaotic wedding to Jessie Menzies in April 1932 epitomised these new and unwelcome intrusions into his private life. The church "was under siege all throughout the day ... uninvited guests stood on chairs and pews to get a better view"; police erected barriers that were broken down and many of those invited could not get a seat. Just weeks later, Bradman joined a private team organised by Arthur Mailey to tour the United States and Canada. He travelled with his wife, and the couple treated the trip as a honeymoon. Playing 51 games in 75 days, Bradman scored 3,779 runs at 102.1, with 18 centuries. Although the standard of play was not high, the effects of the amount of cricket Bradman had played in the three previous years, together with the strains of his celebrity status, began to show on his return home.
Bodyline
Within the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), which administered English cricket at the time, few voices were more influential than "Plum" Warner's, who, when considering England's response to Bradman, wrote that it "must evolve a new type of bowler and develop fresh ideas and strange tactics to curb his almost uncanny skill". To that end, Warner orchestrated the appointment of Douglas Jardine as England captain in 1931, as a prelude to Jardine leading the 1932–33 tour to Australia, with Warner as team manager. Remembering that Bradman had struggled against bouncers during his 232 at The Oval in 1930, Jardine decided to combine traditional leg theory with short-pitched bowling to combat Bradman. He settled on the Nottinghamshire fast bowlers Harold Larwood and Bill Voce as the spearheads for his tactics. In support, the England selectors chose another three pacemen for the squad. The unusually high number of fast bowlers caused a lot of comment in both countries and roused Bradman's own suspicions.
Bradman had other problems to deal with at this time; among these were bouts of illness from an undiagnosed malaise which had begun during the tour of North America, and that the Australian Board of Control had initially refused permission for him to write a column for the Sydney Sun. Bradman, who had signed a two-year contract with the newspaper, threatened to withdraw from cricket to honour his contract when the board denied him permission to write; eventually, the paper released Bradman from the contract, in a victory for the board. In three first-class games against England before the Tests, Bradman averaged just 17.16 in 6 innings. Jardine decided to give the new tactics a trial in only one game, a fixture against an Australian XI at Melbourne. In this match, Bradman faced the leg theory and later warned local administrators that trouble was brewing if it continued. He withdrew from the First Test at the Sydney Cricket Ground amid rumours that he had suffered a nervous breakdown. Despite his absence, England employed what were already becoming known as the Bodyline tactics against the Australian batsmen and won an ill-tempered match.
The public clamoured for the return of Bradman to defeat Bodyline: "he was the batsman who could conquer this cankerous bowling ... 'Bradmania', amounting almost to religious fervour, demanded his return". Recovered from his indisposition, Bradman returned to the side in Alan Kippax's position. A world record crowd of 63,993 at the MCG saw Bradman come to the crease on the first day of the Second Test with the score at 2/67. A standing ovation ensued that delayed play for several minutes. Bradman anticipated receiving a bouncer as his first ball and, as the bowler delivered, he moved across his stumps to play the hook shot. The ball failed to rise and Bradman dragged it onto his stumps; the first-ball duck was his first in a Test. The crowd fell into stunned silence as he walked off. However, Australia took a first innings lead in the match, and another record crowd on 2 January 1933 watched Bradman hit a counter-attacking second innings century. His unbeaten 103 (from 146 balls) in a team total of 191 helped set England a target of 251 to win. Bill O'Reilly and Bert Ironmonger bowled Australia to a series-levelling victory amid hopes that Bodyline was beaten.
The Third Test at the Adelaide Oval proved pivotal. There were angry crowd scenes after the Australian captain Bill Woodfull and wicket-keeper Bert Oldfield were hit by bouncers. An apologetic Plum Warner entered the Australian dressing room and was rebuked by Woodfull. Woodfull's remarks (that "...there are two teams out there and only one of them is playing cricket") were leaked to the press, and Warner and others attributed this to Australian opening batsman Jack Fingleton, however for many years (even after Fingleton's death) a bitter war of accusation passed between Fingleton and Bradman as to who was the real source of the leak. In a cable to the MCC, the Australian Board of Control repeated the allegation of poor sportsmanship directed at Warner by Woodfull. With the support of the MCC, England continued with Bodyline despite Australian protests. The tourists won the last three Tests convincingly and regained the Ashes. Bradman caused controversy with his own tactics. Always seeking to score, and with the leg side packed with fielders, he often backed away and hit the ball into the vacant half of the outfield with unorthodox shots reminiscent of tennis or golf. This brought him 396 runs (at 56.57) for the series and plaudits for attempting to find a solution to Bodyline, although his series average was just 57% of his career mean. Jack Fingleton was in no doubt that Bradman's game altered irrevocably as a consequence of Bodyline, writing:
The constant glare of celebrity and the tribulations of the season forced Bradman to reappraise his life outside the game and to seek a career away from his cricketing fame. Harry Hodgetts, a South Australian delegate to the Board of Control, offered Bradman work as a stockbroker if he would relocate to Adelaide and captain South Australia (SA). Unknown to the public, the SA Cricket Association (SACA) instigated Hodgetts' approach and subsidised Bradman's wage. Although his wife was hesitant about moving, Bradman eventually agreed to the deal in February 1934.
Declining health and a brush with death
In his farewell season for NSW, Bradman averaged 132.44, his best yet. He was appointed vice-captain for the 1934 tour of England. However, "he was unwell for much of the [English] summer, and reports in newspapers hinted that he was suffering from heart trouble". Although he again started with a double century at Worcester, his famed concentration soon deserted him. Wisden wrote:
At one stage, Bradman went 13 first-class innings without a century, the longest such spell of his career, prompting suggestions that Bodyline had eroded his confidence and altered his technique. After three Tests, the series was one–one and Bradman had scored 133 runs in five innings. The Australians travelled to Sheffield and played a warm up game before the Fourth Test. Bradman started slowly and then, "... the old Bradman [was] back with us, in the twinkling of an eye, almost". He went on to make 140, with the last 90 runs coming in just 45 minutes. On the opening day of the Fourth Test at Headingley (Leeds), England were out for 200, but Australia slumped to 3/39, losing the third wicket from the last ball of the day. Listed to bat at number five, Bradman would start his innings the next day.
That evening, Bradman declined an invitation to dinner from Neville Cardus, telling the journalist that he wanted an early night because the team needed him to make a double century the next day. Cardus pointed out that his previous innings on the ground was 334, and the law of averages was against another such score. Bradman told Cardus, "I don't believe in the law of averages". In the event, Bradman batted all of the second day and into the third, putting on a then world record partnership of 388 with Bill Ponsford. When he was finally out for 304 (473 balls, 43 fours and 2 sixes), Australia had a lead of 350 runs, but rain prevented them from forcing a victory. The effort of the lengthy innings stretched Bradman's reserves of energy, and he did not play again until the Fifth Test at The Oval, the match that would decide the Ashes.
In the first innings at The Oval, Bradman and Ponsford recorded an even more massive partnership, this time 451 runs. It had taken them less than a month to break the record they had set at Headingley; this new world record was to last 57 years. Bradman's share of the stand was 244 from 271 balls, and the Australian total of 701 set up victory by 562 runs. For the fourth time in five series, the Ashes changed hands. England would not recover them again until after Bradman's retirement.
Seemingly restored to full health, Bradman blazed two centuries in the last two games of the tour. However, when he returned to London to prepare for the trip home, he experienced severe abdominal pain. It took a doctor more than 24 hours to diagnose acute appendicitis and a surgeon operated immediately. Bradman lost a lot of blood during the four-hour procedure and peritonitis set in. Penicillin and sulphonamides were still experimental treatments at this time; peritonitis was usually a fatal condition. On 25 September, the hospital issued a statement that Bradman was struggling for his life and that blood donors were needed urgently.
"The effect of the announcement was little short of spectacular". The hospital could not deal with the number of donors, and closed its switchboard in the face of the avalanche of telephone calls generated by the news. Journalists were asked by their editors to prepare obituaries. Teammate Bill O'Reilly took a call from King George V's secretary asking that the King be kept informed of the situation. Jessie Bradman started the month-long journey to London as soon as she received the news. En route, she heard a rumour that her husband had died. A telephone call clarified the situation and by the time she reached London, Bradman had begun a slow recovery. He followed medical advice to convalesce, taking several months to return to Australia and missing the 1934–35 Australian season.
Internal politics and the Test captaincy
There was off-field intrigue in Australian cricket during the antipodean winter of 1935. Australia, scheduled to make a tour of South Africa at the end of the year, needed to replace the retired Bill Woodfull as captain. The Board of Control wanted Bradman to lead the team, yet, on 8 August, the board announced Bradman's withdrawal from the team due to a lack of fitness. Surprisingly, in the light of this announcement, Bradman led the South Australian team in a full programme of matches that season.
The captaincy was given to Vic Richardson, Bradman's predecessor as South Australian captain. Cricket author Chris Harte's analysis of the situation is that a prior (unspecified) commercial agreement forced Bradman to remain in Australia. Harte attributed an ulterior motive to his relocation: the off-field behaviour of Richardson and other South Australian players had displeased the South Australia Cricket Association (SACA), which was looking for new leadership. To help improve discipline, Bradman became a committeeman of the SACA, and a selector of the South Australian and Australian teams. He took his adopted state to its first Sheffield Shield title for 10 years, Bradman weighing in with personal contributions of 233 against Queensland and 357 against Victoria. He finished the season with 369 (in 233 minutes), a South Australian record, made against Tasmania. The bowler who dismissed him, Reginald Townley, would later become leader of the Tasmanian Liberal Party.
Australia defeated South Africa 4–0 and senior players such as Bill O'Reilly were pointed in their comments about the enjoyment of playing under Richardson's captaincy. A group of players who were openly hostile toward Bradman formed during the tour. For some, the prospect of playing under Bradman was daunting, as was the knowledge that he would additionally be sitting in judgement of their abilities in his role as a selector.
To start the new season, the Test side played a "Rest of Australia" team, captained by Bradman, at Sydney in early October 1936. The Test XI suffered a big defeat, due to Bradman's 212 and a haul of 12 wickets taken by leg-spinner Frank Ward. Bradman let the members of the Test team know that despite their recent success, the team still required improvement. Shortly afterwards, Bradman's first child was born on 28 October, but died the next day. He took time out of cricket for two weeks and on his return made 192 in three hours against Victoria in the last match before the beginning of the Ashes series.
The Test selectors made five changes to the team who had played in the previous Test match. Significantly, Australia's most successful bowler Clarrie Grimmett was replaced by Ward, one of four players making their debut. Bradman's role in Grimmett's omission from the team was controversial and it became a theme that dogged Bradman as Grimmett continued to be prolific in domestic cricket while his successors were ineffective—he was regarded as having finished the veteran bowler's Test career in a political purge.
Australia fell to successive defeats in the opening two Tests, Bradman making two ducks in his four innings, and it seemed that the captaincy was affecting his form. The selectors made another four changes to the team for the Third Test at Melbourne.
Bradman won the toss on New Year's Day 1937, but again failed with the bat, scoring just 13. The Australians could not take advantage of a pitch that favoured batting, and finished the day at 6/181. On the second day, rain dramatically altered the course of the game. With the sun drying the pitch (in those days, covers could not be used during matches) Bradman declared to get England in to bat while the pitch was "sticky"; England also declared to get Australia back in, conceding a lead of 124. Bradman countered by reversing his batting order to protect his run-makers while conditions improved. The ploy worked and Bradman went in at number seven. In an innings spread over three days, he battled influenza while scoring 270 off 375 balls, sharing a record partnership of 346 with Jack Fingleton, and Australia went on to victory. In 2001, Wisden rated this performance as the best Test match innings of all time.
The next Test, at the Adelaide Oval, was fairly even until Bradman played another patient second innings, making 212 from 395 balls. Australia levelled the series when the erratic left-arm spinner "Chuck" Fleetwood-Smith bowled Australia to victory. In the series-deciding Fifth Test, Bradman returned to a more aggressive style in top-scoring with 169 (off 191 balls) in Australia's 604 and Australia won by an innings. Australia's achievement of winning a Test series after outright losses in the first two matches has never been repeated in Test cricket.
End of an era
During the 1938 tour of England, Bradman played the most consistent cricket of his career.
He needed to score heavily as England had a strengthened batting line-up, while the Australian bowling was over-reliant on O'Reilly. Grimmett was overlooked, but Jack Fingleton made the team, so the clique of anti-Bradman players remained. Playing 26 innings on tour, Bradman recorded 13 centuries (a new Australian record) and again made 1,000 first-class runs before the end of May, becoming the only player to do so twice. In scoring 2,429 runs, Bradman achieved the highest average ever recorded in an English season: 115.66.
In the First Test, England amassed a big first innings score and looked likely to win, but Stan McCabe made 232 for Australia, a performance Bradman rated as the best he had ever seen. With Australia forced to follow-on, Bradman fought hard to ensure McCabe's effort was not in vain, and he secured the draw with 144 not out. It was the slowest Test hundred of his career and he played a similar innings of 102 not out in the next Test as Australia struggled to another draw. Rain completely washed out the Third Test at Old Trafford.
Australia's opportunity came at Headingley, a Test described by Bradman as the best he ever played in. England batted first and made 223. During the Australian innings, Bradman backed himself by opting to bat on in poor light conditions, reasoning that Australia could score more runs in bad light on a good pitch than on a rain affected pitch in good light, when he had the option to go off. He scored 103 out of a total of 242 and the gamble paid off, as it meant there was sufficient time to push for victory when an England collapse left them a target of only 107 to win. Australia slumped to 4/61, with Bradman out for 16. An approaching storm threatened to wash the game out, but the poor weather held off and Australia managed to secure the win, a victory that retained the Ashes. For the only time in his life, the tension of the occasion got to Bradman and he could not watch the closing stages of play, a reflection of the pressure that he felt all tour: he described the captaincy as "exhausting" and said he "found it difficult to keep going".
The euphoria of securing the Ashes preceded Australia's heaviest defeat. At The Oval, England amassed a world record of 7/903 and their opening batsman Len Hutton scored an individual world record, by making 364. In an attempt to relieve the burden on his bowlers, Bradman took a rare turn at bowling. During his third over, he fractured his ankle and teammates carried him from the ground. With Bradman injured and Fingleton unable to bat because of a leg muscle strain, Australia were thrashed by an innings and 579 runs, which remains the largest margin in Test cricket history. Unfit to complete the tour, Bradman left the team in the hands of vice-captain Stan McCabe. At this point, Bradman felt that the burden of captaincy would prevent him from touring England again, although he did not make his doubts public.
Despite the pressure of captaincy, Bradman's batting form remained supreme. An experienced, mature player now commonly called "The Don" had replaced the blitzing style of his early days as the "Boy from Bowral". In 1938–39, he led South Australia to the Sheffield Shield and made a century in six consecutive innings to equal CB Fry's world record. Bradman totalled 21 first-class centuries in 34 innings, from the beginning of the 1938 tour of England (including preliminary games in Australia) until early 1939.
The next season, Bradman made an abortive bid to join the Victoria state side. The Melbourne Cricket Club advertised the position of club secretary and he was led to believe that if he applied, he would get the job. The position, which had been held by Hugh Trumble until his death in August 1938, was one of the most prestigious jobs in Australian cricket. The annual salary of £1,000 would make Bradman financially secure while allowing him to retain a connection with the game. On 18 January 1939, the club's committee, on the casting vote of the chairman, chose former Test batsman Vernon Ransford over Bradman.
The 1939–40 season was Bradman's most productive ever for SA: 1,448 runs at an average of 144.8. He made three double centuries, including 251 not out against NSW, the innings that he rated the best he ever played in the Sheffield Shield, as he tamed Bill O'Reilly at the height of his form. However, it was the end of an era. The outbreak of World War II led to the indefinite postponement of all cricket tours, and the suspension of the Sheffield Shield competition.
Troubled war years
Bradman joined the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) on 28 June 1940 and was passed fit for air crew duty. The RAAF had more recruits than it could equip and train and Bradman spent four months in Adelaide before the Governor-General of Australia, Lord Gowrie, persuaded Bradman to transfer to the army, a move that was criticised as a safer option for him. Given the rank of lieutenant, he was posted to the Army School of Physical Training at Frankston, Victoria, to act as a divisional supervisor of physical training. The exertion of the job aggravated his chronic muscular problems, diagnosed as fibrositis. Surprisingly, in light of his batting prowess, a routine army test revealed that Bradman had poor eyesight.
Invalided out of service in June 1941, Bradman spent months recuperating, unable even to shave himself or comb his hair due to the extent of the muscular pain he suffered. He resumed stockbroking during 1942. In his biography of Bradman, Charles Williams expounded the theory that the physical problems were psychosomatic, induced by stress and possibly depression; Bradman read the book's manuscript and did not disagree. Had any cricket been played at this time, he would not have been available. Although he found some relief in 1945 when referred to the Melbourne masseur Ern Saunders, Bradman permanently lost the feeling in the thumb and index finger of his (dominant) right hand.
In June 1945, Bradman faced a financial crisis when the firm of Harry Hodgetts collapsed due to fraud and embezzlement. Bradman moved quickly to set up his own business, utilising Hodgetts' client list and his old office in Grenfell Street, Adelaide. The fallout led to a prison term for Hodgetts, and left a stigma attached to Bradman's name in the city's business community for many years.
However, the SA Cricket Association had no hesitation in appointing Bradman as their delegate to the Board of Control in place of Hodgetts. Now working alongside some of the men he had battled in the 1930s, Bradman quickly became a leading light in the administration of the game. With the resumption of international cricket, he was once more appointed a Test selector, and played a major role in planning for post-war cricket.
"The ghost of a once great cricketer"
In 1945–46, Bradman suffered regular bouts of fibrositis while coming to terms with increased administrative duties and the establishment of his business. He played for South Australia in two matches to help with the re-establishment of first-class cricket and later described his batting as "painstaking". Batting against the Australian Services cricket team, Bradman scored 112 in less than two hours, yet Dick Whitington (playing for the Services) wrote, "I have seen today the ghost of a once great cricketer". Bradman declined a tour of New Zealand and spent the winter of 1946 wondering whether he had played his last match. "With the English team due to arrive for the 1946–47 Ashes series, the media and the public were anxious to know if Bradman would lead Australia." His doctor recommended against a return to the game.
Encouraged by his wife, Bradman agreed to play in lead-up fixtures to the Test series. After hitting two centuries, Bradman made himself available for the First Test at The Gabba.
Controversy emerged on the first day of the First Test at Brisbane. After compiling an uneasy 28 runs, Bradman hit a ball to the gully fieldsman, Jack Ikin. "An appeal for a catch was denied in the umpire's contentious ruling that it was a bump ball". At the end of the over, England captain Wally Hammond spoke with Bradman and criticised him for not "walking"; "from then on the series was a cricketing war just when most people desired peace", Whitington wrote. Bradman regained his finest pre-war form in making 187, followed by 234 during the Second Test at Sydney (Sid Barnes also scored 234 during the innings, many in a still standing record 405 run 5th Wicket partnership with Bradman. Barnes later recalled that he purposely got out on 234 because "it wouldn't be right for someone to make more runs than Bradman"). Australia won both matches by an innings. Jack Fingleton speculated that had the decision at Brisbane gone against him, Bradman would have retired, such were his fitness problems. In the remainder of the series, Bradman made three half-centuries in six innings, but was unable to make another century; nevertheless, his team won handsomely, 3–0. He was the leading batsman on either side, with an average of 97.14. Nearly 850,000 spectators watched the Tests, which helped lift public spirits after the war.
Century of centuries and "The Invincibles"
India made its first tour of Australia in the 1947–48 season. On 15 November, Bradman made 172 against them for an Australian XI at Sydney, his 100th first-class century. The first non-Englishman to achieve the milestone, Bradman remains the only Australian to have done so. In five Tests, he scored 715 runs (at 178.75 average). His last double century (201) came at Adelaide, and he scored a century in each innings of the Melbourne Test. On the eve of the Fifth Test, he announced that the match would be his last in Australia, although he would tour England as a farewell.
Australia had assembled one of the great teams of cricket history. Bradman made it known that he wanted to go through the tour unbeaten, a feat never before accomplished. English spectators were drawn to the matches knowing that it would be their last opportunity to see Bradman in action. RC Robertson-Glasgow observed of Bradman that:
Despite his waning powers, Bradman compiled 11 centuries on the tour, amassing 2,428 runs (average 89.92). His highest score of the tour (187) came against Essex, when Australia compiled a world record of 721 runs in a day. In the Tests, he scored a century at Trent Bridge, but the performance most like his pre-war exploits came in the Fourth Test at Headingley. England declared on the last morning of the game, setting Australia a world record 404 runs to win in only 345 minutes on a heavily worn pitch. In partnership with Arthur Morris (182), Bradman reeled off 173 not out and the match was won with 15 minutes to spare. The journalist Ray Robinson called the victory "the 'finest ever' in its conquest of seemingly insuperable odds".
In the final Test at The Oval, Bradman walked out to bat in Australia's first innings. He received a standing ovation from the crowd and three cheers from the opposition. His Test batting average stood at 101.39. Facing the wrist-spin of Eric Hollies, Bradman pushed forward to the second ball that he faced, was deceived by a googly, and bowled between bat and pad for a duck. An England batting collapse resulted in an innings defeat, denying Bradman the opportunity to bat again and so his career average finished at 99.94; if he had scored just four runs in his last innings, it would have been 100. A story developed over the years that claimed Bradman missed the ball because of tears in his eyes, a claim Bradman denied for the rest of his life.
The Australian team won the Ashes 4–0, completed the tour unbeaten, and entered history as "The Invincibles". Just as Bradman's legend grew, rather than diminished, over the years, so too has the reputation of the 1948 team. For Bradman, it was the most personally fulfilling period of his playing days, as the divisiveness of the 1930s had passed. He wrote:
With Bradman now retired from professional cricket, RC Robertson-Glasgow wrote of the English reaction "... a miracle has been removed from among us. So must ancient Italy have felt when she heard of the death of Hannibal".
Statistical summary
Test match performance
First-class performance
Test records
Bradman still holds the following significant records for Test match cricket:
Batting average
Highest career batting average (minimum 20 innings): 99.94
Highest series batting average (minimum 4-Test series): 201.50 (1931–32); also second-highest: 178.75 (1947–48)
Conversion rate
Highest percentage of centuries per innings played: 36.25% (29 centuries from 80 innings)
Highest percentage of double centuries per innings played: 15% (12 double centuries from 80 innings)
Highest 50/100 conversion rate (minimum 2000 runs): 69.05% (29 centuries converted from 42 innings of ≥ 50 runs)
Highest 100/200 conversion rate (minimum 2000 runs): 41.38% (12 double centuries converted from 29 innings of ≥ 100 runs)
Multiples of 100 runs
Most double centuries: 12
Most double centuries in a series: 3 (1930); also 2 (1931–32, 1934, 1936–37)
Most triple centuries: 2 (equal with Chris Gayle, Brian Lara and Virender Sehwag) Note: Bradman was stranded on 299* in the 4th Test against South Africa in 1932.
Scoring rate
Most centuries accumulated within single sessions of play: 6 (1 pre lunch, 2 lunch-tea, 3 tea-stumps)
Most runs in one day's play: 309 (1930)
Fastest to multiples of 1000 runs
Fewest matches required to reach 1000 (7 matches), 2000 (15 matches), 3000 (23 matches), 4000 (31 matches), 5000 (36 matches) and 6000 (45 matches) Test runs.
Fewest innings required to reach 2000 (22 innings), 3000 (33 innings), 4000 (48 innings), 5000 (56 innings) and 6000 (68 innings) Test runs.
Other
Highest peak Test batting rating: 961
Highest percentage of team runs over career: 24.28%
Highest 5th wicket partnership: 405 (with Sid Barnes, 1946–47)
Highest score by a number 7 batsman: 270 (1936–37)
Most runs against one opponent: 5,028 (England)
Most hundreds against one opponent: 19 (England)
Most runs in one series: 974 (1930)
Most consecutive matches in which he made a century: 6 (the last three Tests in 1936–37, and the first three Tests in 1938)
Cricket context
Bradman's Test batting average of 99.94 has become one of cricket's most famous, iconic statistics. No other player who has played more than 20 Test match innings has finished their career with a Test average of more than 62. Bradman scored centuries at a rate better than one every three innings—in 80 Test innings, Bradman scored 29 centuries. Only 11 players have since surpassed his total, all at a much slower rate: the next fastest player to reach 29 centuries, Sachin Tendulkar, required nearly twice as long (148 innings) to do so.
In addition, Bradman's total of 12 Test double hundreds—comprising 15% of his innings—remains the most achieved by any Test batsman and was accumulated faster than any other total.
For comparison, the next highest totals of Test double hundreds are Kumar Sangakkara's 11 in 223 innings (4.9%), Brian Lara's 9 in 232 innings (3.9%), and Wally Hammond's 7 in 140 innings (5%); the next highest rate of scoring Test double centuries was achieved by Vinod Kambli, whose 21 innings included 2 double centuries (9.5%).
World sport context
Wisden hailed Bradman as, "the greatest phenomenon in the history of cricket, indeed in the history of all ball games". Statistician Charles Davis analysed the statistics for several prominent sportsmen by comparing the number of standard deviations that they stand above the mean for their sport. The top performers in his selected sports are:
The statistics show that "no other athlete dominates an international sport to the extent that Bradman does cricket". In order to post a similarly dominant career statistic as Bradman, a baseball batter would need a career batting average of .392, while a basketball player would need to score an average of 43.0 points per game over their career. The respective records are .366 and 30.1.
When Bradman died, Time allocated a space in its "Milestones" column for an obituary:
Playing style
Bradman's early development was shaped by the high bounce of the ball on matting-over-concrete pitches. He favoured "horizontal-bat" shots (such as the hook, pull and cut) to deal with the bounce and devised a unique grip on the bat handle that would accommodate these strokes without compromising his ability to defend. Employing a side-on stance at the wicket, Bradman kept perfectly still as the bowler ran in. His backswing had a "crooked" look that troubled his early critics, but he resisted entreaties to change. His backswing kept his hands in close to the body, leaving him perfectly balanced and able to change his stroke mid-swing, if need be. Another telling factor was the decisiveness of Bradman's footwork. He "used the crease" by either coming metres down the pitch to drive, or playing so far back that his feet ended up level with the stumps when playing the cut, hook or pull.
Bradman's game evolved with experience. He temporarily adapted his technique during the Bodyline series, deliberately moving around the crease in an attempt to score from the short-pitched deliveries. At his peak, in the mid-1930s, he had the ability to switch between a defensive and attacking approach as the occasion demanded. After the Second World War, he adjusted to bat within the limitations set by his age, becoming a steady "accumulator" of runs. However, Bradman never truly mastered batting on sticky wickets. Wisden commented, "[i]f there really is a blemish on his amazing record it is ... the absence of a significant innings on one of those 'sticky dogs' of old".
After cricket
After his return to Australia, Bradman played in his own Testimonial match at Melbourne, scoring his 117th and last century, and receiving £9,342 in proceeds. In the 1949 New Year Honours, he was appointed Knight Bachelor for his services to the game, becoming the only Australian cricketer ever to be knighted. He commented that he "would have preferred to remain just Mister". The following year he published a memoir, Farewell to Cricket. Bradman accepted offers from the Daily Mail to travel with, and write about, the 1953 and 1956 Australian teams in England. The Art of Cricket, his final book published in 1958, is an instructional manual.
Bradman retired from his stockbroking business in June 1954, depending on the "comfortable" income earned as a board member of 16 publicly listed companies. His highest profile affiliation was with Argo Investments Limited, where he was chairman for a number of years. Charles Williams commented that, "[b]usiness was excluded on medical grounds, [so] the only sensible alternative was a career in the administration of the game which he loved and to which he had given most of his active life".
Bradman was honoured at a number of cricket grounds, notably when his portrait was hung in the Long Room at Lord's; until Shane Warne's portrait was added in 2005, Bradman was one of just three Australians to be honoured in this way. Bradman inaugurated a "Bradman Stand" at the Sydney Cricket Ground in January 1974; the Adelaide Oval also opened a Bradman Stand in 1990, which housed new media and corporate facilities. The Oval's Bradman Stand was demolished in 2013 as the stadium underwent an extensive re-development. Later in 1974, he attended a Lord's Taverners function in London where he experienced heart problems, which forced him to limit his public appearances to select occasions only. With his wife, Bradman returned to Bowral in 1976, where the new cricket ground was named in his honour. He gave the keynote speech at the historic Centenary Test at Melbourne in 1977.
On 16 June 1979, the Australian government awarded Bradman the nation's second-highest civilian honour at that time, Companion of the Order of Australia (AC), "in recognition of service to the sport of cricket and cricket administration". In 1980, he resigned from the ACB, to lead a more secluded life.
Administrative career
In addition to acting as one of South Australia's delegates to the Board of Control from 1945 to 1980, Bradman was a committee member of the SACA between 1935 and 1986. It is estimated that he attended 1,713 SACA meetings during this half century of service. Aside from two years in the early 1950s, he filled a selector's berth for the Test team between 1936 and 1971.
Cricket saw an increase in defensive play during the 1950s. As a selector, Bradman favoured attacking, positive cricketers who entertained the paying public. He formed an alliance with Australian captain Richie Benaud, seeking more attractive play, with some success. He served two high-profile periods as chairman of the board of Control, in 1960–63 and 1969–72. During the first, he dealt with the growing prevalence of illegal bowling actions in the game, a problem that he adjudged "the most complex I have known in cricket, because it is not a matter of fact but of opinion". The major controversy of his second stint was a proposed tour of Australia by South Africa in 1971–72. On Bradman's recommendation, the series was cancelled. Cricket journalist Michael Coward said of Bradman as an administrator:
In the late 1970s, Bradman played an important role during the World Series Cricket schism as a member of a special Australian Cricket Board committee formed to handle the crisis. He was criticised for not airing an opinion, but he dealt with World Series Cricket far more pragmatically than other administrators. Richie Benaud described Bradman as "a brilliant administrator and businessman", warning that he was not to be underestimated. As Australian captain, Ian Chappell fought with Bradman over the issue of player remuneration in the early 1970s and has suggested that Bradman was parsimonious:
Later years and death
After his wife's death in 1997, Bradman suffered "a discernible and not unexpected wilting of spirit". The next year, on his 90th birthday, he hosted a meeting with his two favourite modern players, Shane Warne and Sachin Tendulkar, but he was not seen in his familiar place at the Adelaide Oval again.
Hospitalised with pneumonia in December 2000, he returned home in the New Year and died there on 25 February 2001, aged 92.
A memorial service to mark Bradman's life was held on 25 March 2001 at St Peter's Anglican Cathedral, Adelaide. The service was attended by a host of former and current Test cricketers, as well as Australia's then prime minister, John Howard, leader of the opposition Kim Beazley and former prime minister Bob Hawke. Eulogies were given by Richie Benaud and Governor-General Sir William Deane. The service was broadcast live on ABC Television to a viewing audience of 1.45 million. A private service for family and friends was earlier held at the Centennial Park Cemetery in the suburb of Pasadena, with many people lining both Greenhill and Goodwood Roads to pay their respects as his funeral motorcade passed by.
Legacy
Cricket writer David Frith summed up the paradox of the continuing fascination with Bradman:
As early as 1939, Bradman had a Royal Navy ship named after him. Built as a fishing trawler in 1936, was taken over by the Admiralty in 1939, but was sunk by German aircraft the following year.
In the 1963 edition of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack, Bradman was selected by Neville Cardus as one of the Six Giants of the Wisden Century. This was a special commemorative selection requested by Wisden for its 100th edition. The other five players chosen were: Sydney Barnes, W. G. Grace, Jack Hobbs, Tom Richardson and Victor Trumper.
On 10 December 1985, Bradman was the first of 120 inaugural inductees into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame. He spoke of his philosophy for considering the stature of athletes:
Although modest about his own abilities and generous in his praise of other cricketers, Bradman was fully aware of the talents he possessed as a player; there is some evidence that he sought to influence his legacy. During the 1980s and 1990s, Bradman carefully selected the people to whom he gave interviews, assisting Michael Page, Roland Perry and Charles Williams, who all produced biographical works about him. Bradman also agreed to an extensive interview for ABC radio, broadcast as Bradman: The Don Declares in eight 55-minute episodes during 1988.
The most significant of these legacy projects was the Bradman Museum, opened in 1989 at the Bradman Oval in Bowral. This organisation was reformed in 1993 as a non-profit charitable Trust, called the Bradman Foundation. In 2010, it was expanded and rebranded as the International Cricket Hall of Fame.
When the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame was created in Melbourne in 1996, Bradman was made one of its 10 inaugural members. In 2000, Bradman was selected by cricket experts as one of five Wisden Cricketers of the Century. Each of the 100 members of the panel were able to select five cricketers: all 100 voted for Bradman. The ICC Cricket Hall of Fame inducted him on 19 November 2009.
Bradman's life and achievements were recognised in Australia with two notable issues. Three years before he died, he became the first living Australian to be featured on an Australian postage stamp. After his death, the Australian Government produced a 20-cent coin to commemorate his life. On 27 August 2018, to celebrate 110 years since his birth, Bradman was commemorated with a Google Doodle. To mark 150 years of the Cricketers' Almanack, Wisden named him as captain of an all-time Test World XI.
In 1999, Bradman was named in the six man shortlist for BBC Sports Personality of the Century. Asteroid 2472 Bradman discovered by Luboš Kohoutek is named in his honour.
Family life
Bradman first met Jessie Martha Menzies in 1920 when she boarded with the Bradman family, to be closer to school in Bowral. The couple married at St Paul's Anglican Church at Burwood, Sydney on 30 April 1932. The two had an impeccable marriage and were devoted to each other. During their 65-year marriage, Jessie was "shrewd, reliable, selfless, and above all, uncomplicated...she was the perfect foil to his concentrated, and occasionally mercurial character". Bradman paid tribute to his wife numerous times, once saying succinctly, "I would never have achieved what I achieved without Jessie".
The Bradmans lived in the same modest, suburban house in Holden Street, Kensington Park in Adelaide for all but the first three years of their married life. They experienced personal tragedy in raising their children: their first-born son died as an infant in 1936, their second son, John (born in 1939) contracted polio, and their daughter, Shirley, born in 1941, had cerebral palsy from birth. His family name proved a burden for John Bradman; he legally changed his last name to Bradsen in 1972. Although claims were made that he became estranged from his father, it was more a matter of "the pair inhabit[ing] different worlds", and the two remained in contact through the years. After the cricketer's death, a collection of personal letters written by Bradman to his close friend Rohan Rivett between 1953 and 1977 was released and gave researchers new insights into Bradman's family life, including the strain between father and son.
Bradman's reclusiveness in later life is partly attributable to the ongoing health problems of his wife, particularly following the open-heart surgery Jessie underwent in her 60s. Lady Bradman died in 1997, aged 88, from cancer. This had a dispiriting effect on Bradman, but the relationship with his son improved, to the extent that John resolved to change his name back to Bradman. Since his father's death, John Bradman has become the spokesperson for the family and has been involved in defending the Bradman legacy in a number of disputes. The relationship between Bradman and his wider family is less clear, although nine months after Bradman's death, his nephew Paul Bradman criticised him as a "snob" and a "loner" who forgot his connections in Bowral and who failed to attend the funerals of Paul's mother and father.
The operatic soprano Greta Bradman is his granddaughter.
In popular culture
Bradman's name has become an archetypal name for outstanding excellence, both within cricket and in the wider world. The term Bradmanesque has been coined and is used both within and outside cricketing circles. Steve Waugh described Sri Lankan Muttiah Muralitharan as "the Don Bradman of bowling".
Bradman has been the subject of more biographies than any other Australian, apart from the bushranger Ned Kelly. Bradman himself wrote four books: Don Bradman's Book–The Story of My Cricketing Life with Hints on Batting, Bowling and Fielding (1930), My Cricketing Life (1938), Farewell to Cricket (1950) and The Art of Cricket (1958). The story of the Bodyline series was retold in a 1984 television mini-series, with Gary Sweet portraying Bradman.
Bradman is immortalised in three popular songs from different eras, "Our Don Bradman" (1930s, by Jack O'Hagan), "Bradman" (1980s, by Paul Kelly), and "Sir Don", (a tribute by John Williamson performed at Bradman's memorial service). Bradman recorded several songs accompanying himself and others on piano in the early 1930s, including "Every Day Is A Rainbow Day For Me", with Jack Lumsdaine. In 2000, the Australian Government made it illegal for the names of corporations to suggest a link to "Sir Donald Bradman", if such a link does not in fact exist. Other entities with similar protection are the Australian and foreign governments, Saint Mary MacKillop, the Royal Family and the Returned and Services League of Australia.
Bibliography
How to Play Cricket (2013) by Don Bradman, Orient Paperbacks,
See also
List of Test cricket records
ICC Player Rankings
References
Sources
Baldwin, Mark (2005): The Ashes' Strangest Moments: Extraordinary But True Tales from Over a Century of the Ashes, Franz Steiner Verlag. .
Bradman, Don (1950): Farewell to Cricket, 1988 Pavilion Library reprint. .
Cashman, Richard et al. – editors (1996): The Oxford Companion to Australian Cricket, Oxford University Press. .
Coleman, Robert (1993): Seasons in the Sun: the Story of the Victorian Cricket Association, Hargreen Publishing Company. .
Davis, Charles (2000): The Best Of the Best: A New Look at the Great Cricketers and Changing Times, ABC Books. .
Dunstan, Keith (1988, rev. ed.): The Paddock That Grew, Hutchinson Australia. .
Eason, Alan (2004): The A-Z of Bradman, ABC Books. .
Fingleton, Jack (1949): Brightly Fades the Don, 1985 Pavilion Library reprint. .
Frith, David (2002): Bodyline Autopsy, ABC Books. .
Gibbs, Barry (2001): My Cricket Journey, Wakefield Press. .
Harte, Chris (1993): A History of Australian Cricket, André Deutsch. .
Haigh, Gideon. "Sir Donald Bradman at 100." The Monthly, August 2008.
Haigh, Gideon (1993): The Cricket War – the Inside Story of Kerry Packer's World Series Cricket, Text Publishing Company. .
Hutchins, Brett (2002): Don Bradman: Challenging the Myth, Cambridge University Press. .
O'Reilly, Bill (1985): Tiger – 60 Years of Cricket, William Collins. .
McGilvray, Alan & Tasker, Norman (1985): The Game Is Not the Same, ABC Books. .
Page, Michael (1983): Bradman – The Illustrated Biography, Macmillan Australia. .
Perry, Roland (1995): The Don – A Biography of Sir Donald Bradman, Macmillan. .
Robinson, Ray (1981 rev. ed.): On Top Down Under, Cassell Australia. .
Rosenwater, Irving (1978): Sir Donald Bradman – A Biography, Batsford. .
Wallace, Christine (2004): The Private Don, Allen & Unwin. .
Whitington, RS (1974): The Book of Australian Test Cricket 1877–1974, Wren Publishing. .
Williams, Charles (1996): Bradman: An Australian Hero, 2001 Abacus reprint. .
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack: various editions, accessed via ESPN Cricinfo
External links
Bradman Museum and Bradman Oval
Bradman Digital Library—State Library of South Australia
The Bradman Trail
Don Bradman on Picture Australia
Interview with Bradman 1930
Don Bradman — TV documentary — Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Some images of Don Bradman, including some showing Don Bradman's batting technique
Listen to a young Don Bradman speaking after the 1930 Ashes tour on australianscreen online
1908 births
2001 deaths
Australia national cricket team selectors
Australia Test cricket captains
Australia Test cricketers
Australian Anglicans
Australian cricket administrators
Australian Cricket Hall of Fame inductees
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Burials in South Australia
Companions of the Order of Australia
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20th-century memoirists
Australian Christians
Royal Australian Air Force personnel of World War II
Royal Australian Air Force airmen
Australian Army personnel of World War II
Australian Army officers
D. G. Bradman's XI cricketers | true | [
"The Bodil Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role () is one of the merit categories presented by the Danish Film Critics Association at the annual Bodil Awards. Created in 1948, it is one of the oldest film awards in Europe, and it honours the best performance by an actor in a supporting role in a Danish produced film. The jury can decide not to hand out the award, which happened numerous times between 1950 and 1985. Since 1986, it has been awarded every year.\n\nHonorees\n\n1940s \n 1948: Ellen Gottschalch won for her role in \n 1949: Karin Nellemose won for her role in\n\n1950s \n 1950: Not awarded\n 1951: Not awarded\n 1952: Sigrid Neiiendam won for her role in \n 1953: Not awarded\n 1954: Not awarded\n 1955: Not awarded\n 1956: Not awarded\n 1957: Not awarded\n 1958: Not awarded\n 1959: Not awarded\n\n1960s \n 1960: Not awarded\n 1961: Not awarded\n 1962: Not awarded\n 1963: Not awarded\n 1964: Not awarded\n 1965: Not awarded\n 1966: Not awarded\n 1967: Not awarded\n 1968: Not awarded\n 1969: won for her role in\n\n1970s \n 1970: Not awarded\n 1971: Not awarded\n 1972: Not awarded\n 1973: won for her role in Oh, to Be on the Bandwagon!\n 1974: Not awarded\n 1975: Not awarded\n 1976: won for her role as Sylvie in A Happy Divorce\n 1977: Bodil Kjer won for her role as Sabine Lund in Strømer\n 1978: Not awarded\n 1979: Grethe Holmer won for her role as Kirsten's mother in In My Life\n\n1980s \n 1980: Berthe Qvistgaard won for her role in Johnny Larsen\n 1981: Helle Fastrup won for her role in \n 1982: Ghita Nørby won for her role in \n 1983: Not awarded\n 1984: Birgitte Raaberg won for her role in In the Middle of the Night\n 1985: Not awarded\n 1986: Catherine Poul Jupont for her role in The Dark Side of the Moon\n 1987: Sofie Gråbøl won for her role in The Wolf at the Door\n 1988: won for her role in Pelle the Conqueror\n 1989: won for her role in Katinka\n\n1990s \n 1990: Kirsten Rolffes won for her role in Waltzing Regitze\n 1991: won for her role in \n 1992: Ditte Gråbøl won for her role in \n 1993: Birthe Neumann won for her role in Pain of Love\n 1994: Pernille Højmark won for her role in Black Harvest\n 1995: won for her role in Nightwatch\n 1996: Anneke von der Lippe won for her role as Eva in Pan\n 1997: Katrin Cartlidge won for her role in Breaking the Waves\n 1998: Birgitte Raaberg won for her role as Judith Petersen in Riget II\n 1999: Anne Louise Hassing won for her role in The Idiots\n\n2000s \n 2000: Paprika Steen won for her role as Stella in The One and Only\n 2001: Lene Tiemroth won for her role as Karen's mother in Italian for Beginners\n was nominated for her role as Liv in The Bench\n was nominated for her role as Connie in The Bench\n 2002: won for her role as Heidi in One-Hand Clapping\n Birthe Neumann was nominated for her role as Elly in Chop Chop\n 2003: Paprika Steen won for her role as Maria in Open Hearts\n Julia Davis was nominated for her role as Moira in Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself\n was nominated for her role in Minor Mishaps\n Birthe Neumann was nominated for her role as Hanne in Open Hearts\n 2004: Ditte Gråbøl won for her role in Move Me\n Bronagh Gallagher was nominated for her role as Sophie in Skagerrak\n Lisa Werlinder was nominated for her role as Maria in The Inheritance\n 2005: Trine Dyrholm won for her role in In Your Hands\n was nominated for her role as Lone Kjeldsen in King's Game\n was nominated for her role in Aftermath\n Sonja Richter was nominated for her role in In Your Hands\n was nominated for her role in \n 2006: Charlotte Fich won for her role as Lisbeth in Manslaughter\n was nominated for her role in Murk\n Tuva Novotny was nominated for her role in Bang Bang Orangutang\n Pernille Valentin Brandt was nominated for her role as Gunnar in Nordkraft\n 2007: Stine Fischer Christensen won for her role in After the Wedding\n Mette Riber Christoffersen was nominated for her role in Life Hits\n Bodil Jørgensen was nominated for her role in \n Sofie Stougaard was nominated for her role in Lotto\n Mia Lyhne was nominated for her role in The Boss of It All\n 2008: Charlotte Fich won for her role as Mette in Just Another Love Story\n was nominated for her role in \n Stine Fischer Christensen was nominated for her role in Echo\n Trine Dyrholm was nominated for her role as Eva in Daisy Diamond\n was nominated for her role as Mother in The Art of Crying\n 2009: won for her role as Karen in Worlds Apart\n was nominated for her role as Selma in Fear Me Not'\n Ghita Nørby was nominated for her role as Sigrid in What No One Knows Paprika Steen was nominated for her role in Fear Me Not 2010s \n 2010: won for her role as Scarlett in Deliver Us from Evil was nominated for her role in Love and Rage Charlotte Fich was nominated for her role in Love and Rage Solbjørg Højfeldt was nominated for her role in Lea Høyer was nominated for her role in 2011: Patricia Schumann won for her role as Sofie in Submarino was nominated for her role as Helena in Everything Will Be Fine Laura Skaarup Jensen was nominated for her role as Karen in The Experiment Rosalinde Mynster was nominated for her role as Julie in Truth About Men Paprika Steen was nominated for her role as Siri in Everything Will Be Fine 2012: Paprika Steen won for her role as Anna in SuperClásico was nominated for her role as Susan in Rebounce Charlotte Gainsbourg was nominated for her role as Claire in Melancholia Anne Louise Hassing was nominated for her role as Sanne in A Family Charlotte Rampling was nominated for her role as Gaby in Melancholia 2013: Frederikke Dahl Hansen won for her role as Maria in You & Me Forever Emilie Kruse was nominated for her role as Christine in You & Me Forever Elsebeth Stentoft was nominated for her role as Ingrid in Teddy Bear was nominated for her role in Trine Dyrholm was nominated for her role as Juliana Maria of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel in A Royal Affair 2014: Susse Wold won for her role as Grethe in The Hunt Anne Louise Hassing was nominated for her role as Agnes in The Hunt Kristin Scott Thomas was nominated for her role as Crystal in Only God Forgives Sonja Richter was nominated for her role as Merete Lynggaard in The Keeper of Lost Causes Uma Thurman was nominated for her role as Mrs H in Nymphomaniac 2015: won for her role in Klumpfisken 2016: Trine Pallesen won for her role as Katrine in Key House Mirror 2017: won for her role in In the Blood 2018: Julie Christiansen won for her role in : won for her role in A Fortunate Man 2020s \n : won for her role in Daniel : Sidse Babett Knudsen won for her role in ''\n\nSee also \n\n Robert Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role\n\nReferences\n\nSources\n\nFurther reading\n\nExternal links \n \n\n1948 establishments in Denmark\nAwards established in 1948\nActress in a supporting role\nFilm awards for supporting actress",
"Ruth Matteson (December 10, 1910 – February 5, 1975) was an American actress. She appeared in more than 20 Broadway plays and had a variety of television roles.\n\nCareer\nMatteson began her acting career in San Francisco with the Henry Duffy Players. Her first Broadway role was in Geraniums in My Window in 1934. In 1936 she replaced Doris Nolan as the lead in Night of January 16th. Her role in George Abbott's production of the comedy What a Life led to a regular spot on The Aldrich Family, a radio program based on the play. In 1940 she took the main female role in The Male Animal.\n\nHer only feature film role was in 1938's The Birth of a Baby, directed by Al Christie. In 1948 she began acting on television, appearing on such shows as Actors Studio and Kraft Television Theatre, while continuing to work in Broadway productions. Her final television role was on The Edge of Night from 1962 to 1963, and her last Broadway appearance was in Neil Simon's Barefoot in the Park in 1965.\n\nPersonal life\nMatteson was born on December 10, 1910, in San Jose, California. She married fellow actor Arthur Pierson in 1937. They later divorced and she married Curt Peterson, an executive with the McCann Erickson advertising agency. She and Peterson lived in Westport, Connecticut, where she died on February 5, 1975.\n\nCredits\n\nBroadway\nGeraniums in My Window (1934)\nSymphony (1935)\nParnell (1935)\nTriumph (1935)\nNight of January 16th (1936)\nThe Wingless Victory (1936)\nSpring Dance (1936)\nBarchester Towers (193)\nWhat a Life (1938)\nOne For the Money (1939)\nThe Male Animal (1940)\nThe Merry Widow (1943)\nTomorrow the World (1943)\nIn Bed We Cry (1944)\nMr. Strauss Goes to Boston (1945)\nAntigone (1946)\nPark Avenue (1946)\nClutterbuck (1949)\nThe Relapse (1950)\nDragon's Mouth (1955)\nThe Happiest Millionaire (1956)\nThere Was a Little Girl (1960)\nBarefoot in the Park (1965)\n\nFilm\nThe Birth of a Baby (1938)\n\nTelevision\nActors Studio (1948-1949)\nThe Philco-Goodyear Television Playhouse (1949-1950)\nKraft Theatre (1949-1954)\nArmstrong Circle Theatre (1950-1951)\nMusical Comedy Time (1951)\nFairmeadows, U.S.A. (1951-1952)\nLook Up and Live (1954)\nPonds Theater (1955)\nThe Ed Sullivan Show (1957)\nThe Edge of Night (1962-1963)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1910 births\n1975 deaths\n20th-century American actresses\nActresses from San Jose, California\nAmerican film actresses\nAmerican stage actresses\nAmerican television actresses"
]
|
[
"Allen Toussaint",
"Minit and Instant Records"
]
| C_c2205f8e0c4f4f738c9c2ab997824cef_0 | What is the minit? | 1 | What is the minit? | Allen Toussaint | In 1960, Joe Banashak, of Minit Records and later Instant Records, hired Toussaint as an A&R man and record producer. He also did freelance work for other labels, such as Fury. Toussaint played piano, wrote, arranged and produced a string of hits in the early and mid-1960s for New Orleans R&B artists such as Ernie K-Doe, Chris Kenner, Irma Thomas (including "It's Raining"), Art and Aaron Neville, the Showmen, and Lee Dorsey, whose first hit "Ya Ya" he produced in 1961. The early to mid-1960s are regarded as Toussaint's most creatively successful period. Notable examples of his work are Jessie Hill's "Ooh Poo Pah Doo" (written by Hill and arranged and produced by Toussaint), Ernie K-Doe's "Mother-in-Law", and Chris Kenner's "I Like It Like That". A two-sided 1962 hit by Benny Spellman comprised "Lipstick Traces (on a Cigarette)" (covered by the O'Jays, Ringo Starr, and Alex Chilton) and the simple but effective "Fortune Teller" (covered by various 1960s rock groups, including the Rolling Stones, the Nashville Teens, the Who, the Hollies, the Throb, and ex-Searchers founder Tony Jackson). "Ruler of My Heart", written under his pseudonym Naomi Neville, first recorded by Irma Thomas for the Minit label in 1963, was adapted by Otis Redding under the title "Pain in My Heart" later that year, prompting Toussaint to file a lawsuit against Redding and his record company, Stax (the claim was settled out of court, with Stax agreeing to credit Naomi Neville as the songwriter). Redding's version of the song was also recorded by the Rolling Stones on their second album. In 1964, "A Certain Girl" (originally by Ernie K-Doe) was the B-side of the first single release by the Yardbirds. The song was released again in 1980 by Warren Zevon, as the single from the album Bad Luck Streak in Dancing School it reached 57 on Billboard's Hot 100. Mary Weiss, former lead singer of The Shangri-Las, released it as "A Certain Guy" in 2007. Toussaint credited about twenty songs to his parents, Clarence and Naomi, sometimes using the pseudonym "Naomi Neville". These include "Fortune Teller", first recorded by Benny Spellman in 1961, and "Work, Work, Work", recorded by the Artwoods in 1966. Alison Krauss and Robert Plant covered "Fortune Teller" on their 2007 album Raising Sand. CANNOTANSWER | Minit Records and later Instant Records, hired Toussaint as an A&R man and record producer. | Allen Richard Toussaint (; January 14, 1938 – November 10, 2015) was an American musician, songwriter, arranger and record producer, who was an influential figure in New Orleans rhythm and blues from the 1950s to the end of the century, described as "one of popular music's great backroom figures". Many musicians recorded Toussaint's compositions, including "Whipped Cream", "Java", "Mother-in-Law", "I Like It Like That", "Fortune Teller", "Ride Your Pony", "Get Out of My Life, Woman", "Working in the Coal Mine", "Everything I Do Gonna Be Funky", "Freedom For the Stallion", "Here Come the Girls", "Yes We Can Can", "Play Something Sweet", and "Southern Nights". He was a producer for hundreds of recordings, among the best known of which are "Right Place, Wrong Time", by his longtime friend Dr. John, and "Lady Marmalade" by Labelle.
Biography
Early life and career
The youngest of three children, Toussaint was born in 1938 in New Orleans and grew up in a shotgun house in the Gert Town neighborhood, where his mother, Naomi Neville (whose name he later adopted pseudonymously for some of his works), welcomed and fed all manner of musicians as they practiced and recorded with her son. His father, Clarence, worked on the railway and played trumpet. Allen Toussaint learned piano as a child and took informal music lessons from an elderly neighbor, Ernest Pinn. In his teens he played in a band, the Flamingos, with the guitarist Snooks Eaglin, before dropping out of school. A significant early influence on Toussaint was the syncopated "second-line" piano style of Professor Longhair.
After a lucky break at age 17, in which he stood in for Huey "Piano" Smith at a performance with Earl King's band in Prichard, Alabama, Toussaint was introduced to a group of local musicians led by Dave Bartholomew, who performed regularly at the Dew Drop Inn, a nightclub on Lasalle Street in Uptown New Orleans. His first recording was in 1957 as a stand-in for Fats Domino on Domino's record "I Want You to Know", on which Toussaint played piano and Domino overdubbed his vocals. His first success as a producer came in 1957 with Lee Allen's "Walking with Mr. Lee". He began performing regularly in Bartholomew's band, and he recorded with Fats Domino, Smiley Lewis, Lee Allen and other leading New Orleans performers.
After being spotted as a sideman by the A&R man Danny Kessler, he initially recorded for RCA Records as Al Tousan. In early 1958 he recorded an album of instrumentals, The Wild Sound of New Orleans, with a band including Alvin "Red" Tyler (baritone sax), either Nat Perrilliat or Lee Allen (tenor sax), either Justin Adams or Roy Montrell (guitar), Frank Fields (bass), and Charles "Hungry" Williams (drums). The recordings included Toussaint and Tyler's composition "Java", which first charted for Floyd Cramer in 1962 and became a number 4 pop hit for Al Hirt (also on RCA) in 1964. Toussaint recorded and co-wrote songs with Allen Orange in the early 1960s.
Success in the 1960s
Minit and Instant Records
In 1960, Joe Banashak, of Minit Records and later Instant Records, hired Toussaint as an A&R man and record producer. He did freelance work for other labels, such as Fury. Toussaint played piano, wrote, arranged and produced a string of hits in the early and mid-1960s for New Orleans R&B artists such as Ernie K-Doe, Chris Kenner, Irma Thomas (including "It's Raining"), Art and Aaron Neville, The Showmen, and Lee Dorsey, whose first hit "Ya Ya" he produced in 1961.
The early to mid-1960s are regarded as Toussaint's most creatively successful period. Notable examples of his work are Jessie Hill's "Ooh Poo Pah Doo" (written by Hill and arranged and produced by Toussaint), Ernie K-Doe's "Mother-in-Law", and Chris Kenner's "I Like It Like That". A two-sided 1962 hit by Benny Spellman comprised "Lipstick Traces (on a Cigarette)" (covered by The O'Jays, Ringo Starr, and Alex Chilton) and the simple but effective "Fortune Teller" (covered by various 1960s rock groups, including The Rolling Stones, The Nashville Teens, The Who, The Hollies, The Throb, and ex-The Searchers founder Tony Jackson). "Ruler of My Heart", written under his pseudonym Naomi Neville, first recorded by Irma Thomas for the Minit label in 1963, was adapted by Otis Redding under the title "Pain in My Heart" later that year, prompting Toussaint to file a lawsuit against Redding and his record company, Stax (the claim was settled out of court, with Stax agreeing to credit Naomi Neville as the songwriter). Redding's version of the song was also recorded by The Rolling Stones on their second album. In 1964, "A Certain Girl" (originally by Ernie K-Doe) was the B-side of the first single release by The Yardbirds. The song was released again in 1980 by Warren Zevon, as the single from the album Bad Luck Streak in Dancing School it reached 57 on Billboard's Hot 100. Mary Weiss, former lead singer of The Shangri-Las, released it as "A Certain Guy" in 2007. Linda Ronstadt released a jazzy version of "Ruler of my Heart" in 1998 on We Ran.
Toussaint credited about twenty songs to his parents, Clarence and Naomi, sometimes using the pseudonym "Naomi Neville". These include "Fortune Teller", first recorded by Benny Spellman in 1961, "Pain In My Heart," first a hit for Otis Redding in 1963, and "Work, Work, Work", recorded by The Artwoods in 1966. Alison Krauss and Robert Plant covered "Fortune Teller" on their 2007 album Raising Sand.
Sansu: Soul and early New Orleans funk
Toussaint was drafted into the United States Army in 1963 but continued to record when on leave. After his discharge in 1965, he joined forces with Marshall Sehorn to form Sansu Enterprises, which included a record label, Sansu, variously known as Tou-Sea, Deesu, or Kansu, and recorded Lee Dorsey, Chris Kenner, Betty Harris, and others. Dorsey had hits with several of Toussaint's songs, including "Ride Your Pony" (1965), "Working in the Coal Mine" (1966), and "Holy Cow" (1966). The core players of the rhythm section used on many of the Sansu recordings from the mid- to late 1960s, Art Neville and the Sounds, consisted of Art Neville on keyboards, Leo Nocentelli on guitar, George Porter Jr on bass, and Zigaboo Modeliste on drums. They later became known as The Meters. Their backing can be heard in songs such as Dorsey's "Ride Your Pony" and "Working in the Coal Mine", sometimes augmented by horns, which were usually arranged by Toussaint. The Toussaint-produced records of these years backed by the members of the Meters, with their increasing use of syncopation and electric instrumentation, built on the influences of Professor Longhair and others before them, but updated these strands, effectively paving the way for the development of a modern New Orleans funk sound.
1970s to 1990s
Toussaint continued to produce The Meters when they began releasing records under their own name in 1969. As part of a process begun at Sansu and reaching fruition in the 1970s, he developed a funkier sound, writing and producing for a host of artists, such as Dr. John (backed by the Meters, on the 1973 album In the Right Place, which contained the hit "Right Place, Wrong Time") and an album by The Wild Tchoupitoulas, a New Orleans Mardi Gras Indians tribe led by "Big Chief Jolly" (George Landry) (backed by the Meters and several of his nephews, including Art and Cyril Neville of the Meters and their brothers Charles and Aaron, who later performed and recorded as The Neville Brothers).
In the 1970s, Toussaint began to work with artists from beyond New Orleans artists, such as B. J. Thomas, Robert Palmer, Willy DeVille, Sandy Denny, Elkie Brooks, Solomon Burke, Scottish soul singer Frankie Miller (High Life), and southern rocker Mylon LeFevre. He arranged horn music for The Band's albums Cahoots (1971) and Rock of Ages (1972), as well as for the documentary film The Last Waltz (1978). Boz Scaggs recorded Toussaint's "What Do You Want the Girl to Do?" on his 1976 album Silk Degrees, which reached number 2 on the U.S. pop albums chart. The song was also recorded by Bonnie Raitt for her 1975 album Home Plate and by Geoff Muldaur (1976), Lowell George (1979), Vince Gill (1993), and Elvis Costello (2005). In 1976 he collaborated with John Mayall on the album Notice to Appear.
In 1973 Toussaint and Sehorn created the Sea-Saint recording studio in the Gentilly section of eastern New Orleans. Toussaint began recording under his own name, contributing vocals as well as piano. His solo career peaked in the mid-1970s with the albums From a Whisper to a Scream and Southern Nights. During this time he teamed with Labelle and produced their acclaimed 1975 album Nightbirds, which contained the number one hit "Lady Marmalade". The same year, Toussaint collaborated with Paul McCartney and Wings for their hit album Venus and Mars and played on the song "Rock Show". In 1973, his "Yes We Can Can" was covered by The Pointer Sisters for their self-titled debut album; released as a single, it became both a pop and R&B hit and served as the group's introduction to popular culture. Two years later, Glen Campbell covered Toussaint's "Southern Nights" and carried the song to number one on the pop, country and adult contemporary charts.
In 1987, he was the musical director of an off-Broadway show, Staggerlee, which ran for 150 performances. Like many of his contemporaries, Toussaint found that interest in his compositions was rekindled when his work began to be sampled by hip hop artists in the 1980s and 1990s.
2000s
Most of Toussaint's possessions, including his home and recording studio, Sea-Saint Studios, were lost during Hurricane Katrina in 2005. He initially sought shelter at the Astor Crowne Plaza Hotel on Canal Street. Following the hurricane, whose aftermath left most of the city flooded, he left New Orleans for Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and for several years settled in New York City. His first television appearance after the hurricane was on the September 7, 2005, episode of the Late Show with David Letterman, sitting in with Paul Shaffer and his CBS Orchestra. Toussaint performed regularly at Joe's Pub in New York City through 2009. He eventually returned to New Orleans and lived there for the rest of his life.
Toussaint is interviewed on screen, served as a musical director, led his band and appears in performance footage in the 2005 documentary film Make It Funky!, which presents a history of New Orleans music and its influence on rhythm and blues, rock and roll, funk and jazz. In the film, he performed a medley of his compositions "Fortune Teller", "Working in the Coal Mine" and "A Certain Girl". He also performed "Tipitina" in a piano duo with Jon Cleary, and accompanied Irma Thomas on "Old Records", Lloyd Price on "Lawdy Miss Clawdy", and Bonnie Raitt on "What is Success".
The River in Reverse, Toussaint's collaborative album with Elvis Costello, was released on May 29, 2006, in the UK on Verve Records by Universal Classics and Jazz UCJ. It was recorded in Hollywood and at the Piety Street Studio in the Bywater section Toussaint's native New Orleans, as the first major studio session to take place after Hurricane Katrina. In 2007, Toussaint performed a duet with Paul McCartney of a song by New Orleans musician and resident Fats Domino, "I Want to Walk You Home", as their contribution to Goin' Home: A Tribute to Fats Domino (Vanguard Records).
In 2008, Toussaint's song "Sweet Touch of Love" was used in a deodorant commercial for the Axe (Lynx) brand. The commercial won a Gold Lion at the 2008 Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival. In February 2008, Toussaint appeared on Le Show, the Harry Shearer show broadcast on KCRW. He appeared in London in August 2008, where he performed at the Roundhouse. In October 2008 he performed at Festival New Orleans at The O2 alongside acts such as Dr. John and Buckwheat Zydeco. Sponsored by Quint Davis of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival and Philip Anschutz, the event was intended to promote New Orleans music and culture and to revive the once lucrative tourist trade that had been almost completely lost following the flooding that came with Hurricane Katrina. After his second performance at the festival, Toussaint appeared alongside Louisiana Lieutenant Governor Mitch Landrieu.
Toussaint performed instrumentals from his album The Bright Mississippi and many of his older songs for a taping of the PBS series Austin City Limits, which aired on January 9, 2015. In December 2009, he was featured on Elvis Costello's Spectacle program on the Sundance Channel, singing "A Certain Girl". Toussaint appeared on Eric Clapton's 2010 album, Clapton, in two Fats Waller covers, "My Very Good Friend the Milkman" and "When Somebody Thinks You're Wonderful".
His late-blooming career as a performer began when he accepted an offer to play a regular Sunday brunch session at an East Village pub. Interviewed in 2014 by The Guardians Richard Williams, Toussaint said, "I never thought of myself as a performer.... My comfort zone is behind the scenes." In 2013 he collaborated on a ballet with the choreographer Twyla Tharp. Toussaint was a musical mentor to Swedish-born New Orleans songwriter and performer Theresa Andersson.
Honors
Toussaint was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1998, the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame in 2009, the Songwriter's Hall of Fame and the Blues Hall of Fame in 2011. In 2013 he was awarded the National Medal of Arts by President Barack Obama. In 2016, he posthumously won the Pinetop Perkins Piano Player title at the Blues Music Awards.
Death
Toussaint died in the early hours of November 10, 2015, in Madrid, Spain, while on tour. Following a concert at the Teatro Lara on Calle Corredera Baja de San Pablo, he had a heart attack at his hotel and was pronounced dead on his arrival at hospital. He was 77. He had been due to perform a sold-out concert at the EFG London Jazz Festival at The Barbican on November 15 with his band and Theo Croker. He was also scheduled to play with Paul Simon at a benefit concert in New Orleans on 8 December. His final recording, American Tunes, titled after the Paul Simon song, which he sings on the album, was released by Nonesuch Records on June 10, 2016.
Toussaint's one marriage ended in divorce. He was survived by his three children, Clarence (better known as Reginald), Naomi, and Alison, and several grandchildren. His children had managed his career in his last years.
Writing in The New York Times, Ben Sisario quoted Quint Davis, producer of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival: "In the pantheon of New Orleans music people, from Jelly Roll Morton to Mahalia Jackson to Fats—that's the place where Allen Toussaint is in". Paul Simon said, "We were friends and colleagues for almost 40 years.... We played together at the New Orleans jazz festival. We played the benefits for Katrina relief. We were about to perform together on December 8. I was just beginning to think about it; now I'll have to think about his memorial. I am so sad."
The Daily Telegraph described Toussaint as "a master of New Orleans soul and R&B, and one of America's most successful songwriters and producers", adding that "self-effacing Toussaint played a crucial role in countless classic songs popularised by other artists". He had written so many songs, over more than five decades, that he admitted to forgetting quite a few.
Discography
The Wild Sound of New Orleans (1958)
Toussaint (1971, aka From A Whisper To A Scream)
Life, Love and Faith (1972)
Southern Nights (1975)
Motion (1978)
I Love A Carnival Ball, Mr Mardi Gras Starring Allen Toussaint (1987)
Connected (1996)
A New Orleans Christmas (1997)
Allen Toussaint's Jazzity Project: Going Places (2004)
The Bright Mississippi (2009)
American Tunes (2016)
References
External links
Allen Toussaint profile, NPR.org; accessed October 5, 2014.
Allen Toussaint profile, discogs.com; accessed October 5, 2014.
[ Allen Toussaint profile], allmusic.com; accessed October 5, 2014.
Allen Toussaint NYNO Records profile, nynorecords.com; accessed October 5, 2014.
List of chart records written by Toussaint, MusicVF.com, accessed November 11, 2015
Allen Toussaint profile, preshallben.tumblr.com, October 5, 2014.
Allen Toussaint speaks about songwriting and creating music NAMM Oral History Interview (2015)
A Conversation with Allen Toussaint (interviewer: Larry Appelbaum), November 1, 2007; from The Library of Congress (Video, Captions, Transcript)
1938 births
2015 deaths
Rhythm and blues musicians from New Orleans
African-American pianists
American people of French descent
American jazz pianists
Record producers from Louisiana
American soul musicians
Bell Records artists
Nonesuch Records artists
Reprise Records artists
Songwriters from Louisiana
American rhythm and blues keyboardists
American blues pianists
American male pianists
United States National Medal of Arts recipients
20th-century American pianists
21st-century American pianists
Jazz musicians from New Orleans
20th-century American male musicians
21st-century American male musicians
American male jazz musicians
African-American songwriters
20th-century African-American musicians
21st-century African-American musicians
American male songwriters | true | [
"Minit Mart LLC is a chain of convenience stores operating in South central and Western Kentucky, Northern middle Tennessee, Eastern Wisconsin, Kansas City, Northeast Illinois, and Northeast Ohio. Its corporate offices are located in Cincinnati, OH, and the chain consists of 231 locations scattered around the United States.\n\nHistory\n\nThe early days\nIn 1967, Fred Higgins, and his father, Ralph, founded a convenience store, known by the name of Minit Mart. By the time Fred graduated from the law school at the University of Kentucky in the spring of 1969, he expanded the operation to a chain of six locations in the metro Lexington area.\n\nFred Higgins served in the U.S. Army in the time between 1969 and 1972. When he returned in 1972, Minit Mart Foods became incorporated with 16 locations. After that time, Fred began acquiring single convenience stores and select sites on which to build new locations across Kentucky.\n\nDuring the 1970s, Minit Mart became one of the first convenience store chains to add gas pumps to their locations. an innovation that has changed the way Americans buy gasoline for their transportation vehicles. Marathon brand gasoline has been part of Minit Mart's offered services since then. Minit Mart has been at the forefront of adding delis and game machines during the same decade. Minit Mart started offering videotaped movie rentals when the VHS format gained popularity in the very late 1970s and early 1980s after it beat out the Betamax videocassette format. DVD movie rentals began to be utilized by Minit Mart around the dawn of the then-new millennium around the year 2000.\n\nRalph Higgins, the co-founder, played an active role in the management of Minit Mart Foods Inc until his 1987 death.\n\nExpansion into Tennessee\nMinit Mart began to expand in Tennessee in 1988 after acquiring 19 Bread Box convenience stores. After that point, Minit Mart had 87 stores in Kentucky and Tennessee. Many locations included Godfather's Pizza, O'Deli's, Baskin-Robbins Ice Cream, and Taco Bell Express, thereby grossing $250 million each year, and employing exactly 1,200 people.\n\nOperation changes\nIn 1998, Fred lost his 25-year-long-time wife to a battle of cancer she was fighting since the diagnosis in 1978. After the loss of his wife, he and the management team thought that it was time that the convenience store chain is in for a change. In 2001, Minit Mart Foods leased its operations to Clark Retail, retaining ownership of the assets. In addition to Clark's original 600 stores, that company also acquired several other chains in the Midwestern United States, mainly in Indiana and Illinois, growing to approximately 1,200 stores. Competition, however, was intense during that time, and Clark eventually ended up in bankruptcy. After filing for bankruptcy, Clark returned 37 stores to Minit Mart Foods Inc.\n\nFred's Minit Mart LLC had taken over the operation in August 2003. A management team was formed, and 34 locations remained in operation.\n\nCurrent slate and recent history\nIn the present day, Minit Mart operates 34 locations. Most of them are in Kentucky, but there are two locations operating in Clarksville, Montgomery County, Tennessee, and one in the Cookeville, Tennessee area. All locations are combinations of convenience and grocery shopping, and for many years, feature Marathon Gasoline. Godfather's Pizza and O'Deli's sub shops continued to be offered in most locations. In addition to those two, most Minit Mart locations also offer World Blends fresh coffee (formerly CuppaJoe), and Minit Mix.\n\nIn 2007, Minit Mart really had the business boost of the store's life when customers took advantage of Godfather's Pizza Large 1-topping pizza that went for $5.00 that summer (later $5.99 in late 2007, and then $7.99 between Spring 2008 and Summer 2010). Regular prices returned in 2009.\n\nIn 2008, Minit Mart introduced Minit Mix, a fountain drink that allows customers to create a soft drink mixed with certain flavors, including vanilla, cherry, and several others. It's a similar service to Coca-Cola's Freestyle machines that were introduced in certain fast food chains several years later.\n\nBeginning in 2012, all Minit Mart locations added ATM kiosks without service charges.\n\nDuring the early 2010s, Minit Mart renovated their location in Glasgow.\n\nAlso in the early 2010s, a new building was built to house the Minit Mart location in Brownsville just a couple hundred feet from the original location. The old building was destroyed a few weeks after the completion and official opening of the new present building due to old age. The destruction of the old building made way for a larger parking lot, a few more entrances, and more fuel pumps.\n\nIn 2015, Fred Higgins sold the Minit Mart convenience store chain to TravelCenters of America for $67 million. In January 2015, Minit Mart purchased additional stores and rebranded them, including a few in the Jackson Purchase region of western Kentucky, including one in Paducah, and one in Centerville, Indiana.\n\nIn late March 2016 TCA closed on the purchase of Quality State Oil's \"QMart Marketplace\" 17-store chain of convenience stores based in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, which were immediately converted into Minit Mart locations. The acquisition was done mainly to acquire the technology and patents for QSO's convenience store industry award-winning RFID keychain card-based loyalty program.\n\nPizza sales\nAccording to Minit Mart's Facebook post on June 17, 2015, two Godfather's Pizza locations within the Minit Mart chain has been listed as the first and second place in terms of pizza sales. The location in Brownsville (Edmonson County) had the highest sales of any non-traditional location in the entire Godfather's Pizza chain nationwide, with one of Minit Mart's Bowling Green locations taking second place.\n\nCompetition in the region\nMinit Mart's main competitors include Jr. Food Stores and Crossroads IGA locations. Both of those chains are owned by Houchens Industries, which also owns their flagship supermarket chain, Houchens Markets, and several IGA Foodliner stores in south central Kentucky. Minit Mart's other competitors include several locally owned convenience stores around southern Kentucky, some of which offer pizza and/or fried chicken, as well as some Speedway locations. Phillips 66-branded stores under the name \"Traveler's Food Plaza\" in areas around Glasgow, Edmonton, and Tompkinsville, Kentucky also competed with Minit Mart for quite some time. Gas stations offering rival branded gasoline also often competed with Minit Mart for consumer allegiances. In the eastern Wisconsin market, Minit Mart's main competitor is Kwik Trip.\n\nKey Dates\n1967: Fred and Ralph Higgins, a father-and-son duo founded a convenience store in Lexington, Kentucky under the name of \"Minit Mart\". \n1969: Minit Mart expands to six locations around the Lexington area. \n1970s: Minit Mart began offering Marathon gasoline. \nLate 1970s: Delis and game machines were added. \nSometime between 1978 and 1983: Videotape rentals were first offered. \nMid 1980s?: Godfather's Pizza became part of Minit Mart's offered services. \n1988: Minit Mart expands to Tennessee after acquiring Bread Box stores in certain parts of that state. \n1999-2000: DVD rentals were offered in tandem with VHS movie rentals. \n2001: Clark Retail leased Minit Mart's operations.\nUnknown date: Minit Mart launches their website. \n2003: Clark Retail went bankrupt, and 37 Minit Mart stores were returned to Fred's Minit Mart LLC. \nJanuary 2008: Earnhardt + Friends had been chosen for the advertising firm of Minit Mart. Both companies experienced growth as a result. It spawned plans to rebuild locations in Harrodsburg and Nicholasville, Kentucky to be rebuilt to add the two food service additions to those locations. \n2008: Minit Mart introduces Minit Mix.\n2008: Minit Mart was named Convenience Store of The year by the Kentucky Association of Convenience stores.\n2011: Fred Higgins, the founder, was inducted in the Kentucky Grocers Association's Hall of Fame.\n2013: The convenience store chain was sold to Travel Centers of America, Inc.\n2015: Bought 19 stores from bankrupt GasMart USA based in Overland Park, Kansas. These 19 stores are C-Stores in Kansas and Missouri.\n2016: Minit Mart enters Kansas City market with re-branding of 59 convenience stores, including convenience stores in Shawnee and De Soto.\n2016: The Minit Mart brand came to several Shell stations in the Lexington area, mainly those with World Blends Coffee.\n\nCommunity Support\nIn March 2014, Minit Mart raised almost $43,000 USD from employees and their customers to the MDA, the Muscular Dystrophy Association, during their annual shamrock fundraising campaign they conduct each year. Paper shamrocks were handed to all employees and customers that give a donation, and write their name on them, and display them on the window of the stores. This takes place around St. Patrick's Day, and this fundraiser helps MDA assist people with the disease.\n\nSee also\nGodfather's Pizza\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nMinit Mart's Official Website\nGodfather's Pizza\nMinit Mart on Social Media\nPromotions and Coupons\nMinit Mart Locations list\nMinit Mart - YouTube\nMinit Mart on Facebook\n\nConvenience stores of the United States\nAmerican companies established in 1967\nRetail companies established in 1967\nEnergy companies established in 1967\nNon-renewable resource companies established in 1967\nGas stations in the United States\n2018 mergers and acquisitions",
"Jimmy Holiday (July 24, 1934 – February 15, 1987) was an American R&B singer and songwriter.\n\nHoliday was born in Sallis, Mississippi, United States. He recorded for Everest Records in the 1960s and later moved to the New Orleans label Minit Records. His first recording \"How Can I Forget\" reached the top ten on the US Billboard R&B chart in 1963. His debut album Turning Point peaked at No. 25 on the Billboard R&B albums chart in 1966.\n\nHoliday's best-known composition is \"Put a Little Love in Your Heart,\" co-written with Jackie DeShannon and Randy Myers. In the United States, it was DeShannon's highest-charting hit, reaching No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 in August 1969 and No. 2 on the Adult Contemporary chart. In late 1969, the song reached No. 1 on South Africa's hit parade.\n \nHoliday died in 1987 in Iowa City of heart failure.\n\nDiscography\n\nAlbums \n 1966: Turning Point (Minit Records)\n 1970: Spread Your Love (Minit Records)\n 1975: United Artists Music Publishing Group Present Songs of Jackie DeShannon, Jimmy Holiday, Eddie Reeves (United Artists Records)\n\nSingles\n\nNotable compositions \n\"Put a Little Love in Your Heart\" (Jackie DeShannon, 1969)\n\"All I Ever Need Is You\" (Ray Charles, 1971)\n\nReferences \n\n1934 births\n1987 deaths\nPeople from Attala County, Mississippi\nAmerican rhythm and blues singer-songwriters\n20th-century American singers\nSinger-songwriters from Mississippi\nMinit Records artists"
]
|
[
"Allen Toussaint",
"Minit and Instant Records",
"What is the minit?",
"Minit Records and later Instant Records, hired Toussaint as an A&R man and record producer."
]
| C_c2205f8e0c4f4f738c9c2ab997824cef_0 | what music did he produce? | 2 | what music did Allen Toussaint produce? | Allen Toussaint | In 1960, Joe Banashak, of Minit Records and later Instant Records, hired Toussaint as an A&R man and record producer. He also did freelance work for other labels, such as Fury. Toussaint played piano, wrote, arranged and produced a string of hits in the early and mid-1960s for New Orleans R&B artists such as Ernie K-Doe, Chris Kenner, Irma Thomas (including "It's Raining"), Art and Aaron Neville, the Showmen, and Lee Dorsey, whose first hit "Ya Ya" he produced in 1961. The early to mid-1960s are regarded as Toussaint's most creatively successful period. Notable examples of his work are Jessie Hill's "Ooh Poo Pah Doo" (written by Hill and arranged and produced by Toussaint), Ernie K-Doe's "Mother-in-Law", and Chris Kenner's "I Like It Like That". A two-sided 1962 hit by Benny Spellman comprised "Lipstick Traces (on a Cigarette)" (covered by the O'Jays, Ringo Starr, and Alex Chilton) and the simple but effective "Fortune Teller" (covered by various 1960s rock groups, including the Rolling Stones, the Nashville Teens, the Who, the Hollies, the Throb, and ex-Searchers founder Tony Jackson). "Ruler of My Heart", written under his pseudonym Naomi Neville, first recorded by Irma Thomas for the Minit label in 1963, was adapted by Otis Redding under the title "Pain in My Heart" later that year, prompting Toussaint to file a lawsuit against Redding and his record company, Stax (the claim was settled out of court, with Stax agreeing to credit Naomi Neville as the songwriter). Redding's version of the song was also recorded by the Rolling Stones on their second album. In 1964, "A Certain Girl" (originally by Ernie K-Doe) was the B-side of the first single release by the Yardbirds. The song was released again in 1980 by Warren Zevon, as the single from the album Bad Luck Streak in Dancing School it reached 57 on Billboard's Hot 100. Mary Weiss, former lead singer of The Shangri-Las, released it as "A Certain Guy" in 2007. Toussaint credited about twenty songs to his parents, Clarence and Naomi, sometimes using the pseudonym "Naomi Neville". These include "Fortune Teller", first recorded by Benny Spellman in 1961, and "Work, Work, Work", recorded by the Artwoods in 1966. Alison Krauss and Robert Plant covered "Fortune Teller" on their 2007 album Raising Sand. CANNOTANSWER | Toussaint played piano, wrote, arranged and produced a string of hits in the early and mid-1960s for New Orleans R&B artists | Allen Richard Toussaint (; January 14, 1938 – November 10, 2015) was an American musician, songwriter, arranger and record producer, who was an influential figure in New Orleans rhythm and blues from the 1950s to the end of the century, described as "one of popular music's great backroom figures". Many musicians recorded Toussaint's compositions, including "Whipped Cream", "Java", "Mother-in-Law", "I Like It Like That", "Fortune Teller", "Ride Your Pony", "Get Out of My Life, Woman", "Working in the Coal Mine", "Everything I Do Gonna Be Funky", "Freedom For the Stallion", "Here Come the Girls", "Yes We Can Can", "Play Something Sweet", and "Southern Nights". He was a producer for hundreds of recordings, among the best known of which are "Right Place, Wrong Time", by his longtime friend Dr. John, and "Lady Marmalade" by Labelle.
Biography
Early life and career
The youngest of three children, Toussaint was born in 1938 in New Orleans and grew up in a shotgun house in the Gert Town neighborhood, where his mother, Naomi Neville (whose name he later adopted pseudonymously for some of his works), welcomed and fed all manner of musicians as they practiced and recorded with her son. His father, Clarence, worked on the railway and played trumpet. Allen Toussaint learned piano as a child and took informal music lessons from an elderly neighbor, Ernest Pinn. In his teens he played in a band, the Flamingos, with the guitarist Snooks Eaglin, before dropping out of school. A significant early influence on Toussaint was the syncopated "second-line" piano style of Professor Longhair.
After a lucky break at age 17, in which he stood in for Huey "Piano" Smith at a performance with Earl King's band in Prichard, Alabama, Toussaint was introduced to a group of local musicians led by Dave Bartholomew, who performed regularly at the Dew Drop Inn, a nightclub on Lasalle Street in Uptown New Orleans. His first recording was in 1957 as a stand-in for Fats Domino on Domino's record "I Want You to Know", on which Toussaint played piano and Domino overdubbed his vocals. His first success as a producer came in 1957 with Lee Allen's "Walking with Mr. Lee". He began performing regularly in Bartholomew's band, and he recorded with Fats Domino, Smiley Lewis, Lee Allen and other leading New Orleans performers.
After being spotted as a sideman by the A&R man Danny Kessler, he initially recorded for RCA Records as Al Tousan. In early 1958 he recorded an album of instrumentals, The Wild Sound of New Orleans, with a band including Alvin "Red" Tyler (baritone sax), either Nat Perrilliat or Lee Allen (tenor sax), either Justin Adams or Roy Montrell (guitar), Frank Fields (bass), and Charles "Hungry" Williams (drums). The recordings included Toussaint and Tyler's composition "Java", which first charted for Floyd Cramer in 1962 and became a number 4 pop hit for Al Hirt (also on RCA) in 1964. Toussaint recorded and co-wrote songs with Allen Orange in the early 1960s.
Success in the 1960s
Minit and Instant Records
In 1960, Joe Banashak, of Minit Records and later Instant Records, hired Toussaint as an A&R man and record producer. He did freelance work for other labels, such as Fury. Toussaint played piano, wrote, arranged and produced a string of hits in the early and mid-1960s for New Orleans R&B artists such as Ernie K-Doe, Chris Kenner, Irma Thomas (including "It's Raining"), Art and Aaron Neville, The Showmen, and Lee Dorsey, whose first hit "Ya Ya" he produced in 1961.
The early to mid-1960s are regarded as Toussaint's most creatively successful period. Notable examples of his work are Jessie Hill's "Ooh Poo Pah Doo" (written by Hill and arranged and produced by Toussaint), Ernie K-Doe's "Mother-in-Law", and Chris Kenner's "I Like It Like That". A two-sided 1962 hit by Benny Spellman comprised "Lipstick Traces (on a Cigarette)" (covered by The O'Jays, Ringo Starr, and Alex Chilton) and the simple but effective "Fortune Teller" (covered by various 1960s rock groups, including The Rolling Stones, The Nashville Teens, The Who, The Hollies, The Throb, and ex-The Searchers founder Tony Jackson). "Ruler of My Heart", written under his pseudonym Naomi Neville, first recorded by Irma Thomas for the Minit label in 1963, was adapted by Otis Redding under the title "Pain in My Heart" later that year, prompting Toussaint to file a lawsuit against Redding and his record company, Stax (the claim was settled out of court, with Stax agreeing to credit Naomi Neville as the songwriter). Redding's version of the song was also recorded by The Rolling Stones on their second album. In 1964, "A Certain Girl" (originally by Ernie K-Doe) was the B-side of the first single release by The Yardbirds. The song was released again in 1980 by Warren Zevon, as the single from the album Bad Luck Streak in Dancing School it reached 57 on Billboard's Hot 100. Mary Weiss, former lead singer of The Shangri-Las, released it as "A Certain Guy" in 2007. Linda Ronstadt released a jazzy version of "Ruler of my Heart" in 1998 on We Ran.
Toussaint credited about twenty songs to his parents, Clarence and Naomi, sometimes using the pseudonym "Naomi Neville". These include "Fortune Teller", first recorded by Benny Spellman in 1961, "Pain In My Heart," first a hit for Otis Redding in 1963, and "Work, Work, Work", recorded by The Artwoods in 1966. Alison Krauss and Robert Plant covered "Fortune Teller" on their 2007 album Raising Sand.
Sansu: Soul and early New Orleans funk
Toussaint was drafted into the United States Army in 1963 but continued to record when on leave. After his discharge in 1965, he joined forces with Marshall Sehorn to form Sansu Enterprises, which included a record label, Sansu, variously known as Tou-Sea, Deesu, or Kansu, and recorded Lee Dorsey, Chris Kenner, Betty Harris, and others. Dorsey had hits with several of Toussaint's songs, including "Ride Your Pony" (1965), "Working in the Coal Mine" (1966), and "Holy Cow" (1966). The core players of the rhythm section used on many of the Sansu recordings from the mid- to late 1960s, Art Neville and the Sounds, consisted of Art Neville on keyboards, Leo Nocentelli on guitar, George Porter Jr on bass, and Zigaboo Modeliste on drums. They later became known as The Meters. Their backing can be heard in songs such as Dorsey's "Ride Your Pony" and "Working in the Coal Mine", sometimes augmented by horns, which were usually arranged by Toussaint. The Toussaint-produced records of these years backed by the members of the Meters, with their increasing use of syncopation and electric instrumentation, built on the influences of Professor Longhair and others before them, but updated these strands, effectively paving the way for the development of a modern New Orleans funk sound.
1970s to 1990s
Toussaint continued to produce The Meters when they began releasing records under their own name in 1969. As part of a process begun at Sansu and reaching fruition in the 1970s, he developed a funkier sound, writing and producing for a host of artists, such as Dr. John (backed by the Meters, on the 1973 album In the Right Place, which contained the hit "Right Place, Wrong Time") and an album by The Wild Tchoupitoulas, a New Orleans Mardi Gras Indians tribe led by "Big Chief Jolly" (George Landry) (backed by the Meters and several of his nephews, including Art and Cyril Neville of the Meters and their brothers Charles and Aaron, who later performed and recorded as The Neville Brothers).
In the 1970s, Toussaint began to work with artists from beyond New Orleans artists, such as B. J. Thomas, Robert Palmer, Willy DeVille, Sandy Denny, Elkie Brooks, Solomon Burke, Scottish soul singer Frankie Miller (High Life), and southern rocker Mylon LeFevre. He arranged horn music for The Band's albums Cahoots (1971) and Rock of Ages (1972), as well as for the documentary film The Last Waltz (1978). Boz Scaggs recorded Toussaint's "What Do You Want the Girl to Do?" on his 1976 album Silk Degrees, which reached number 2 on the U.S. pop albums chart. The song was also recorded by Bonnie Raitt for her 1975 album Home Plate and by Geoff Muldaur (1976), Lowell George (1979), Vince Gill (1993), and Elvis Costello (2005). In 1976 he collaborated with John Mayall on the album Notice to Appear.
In 1973 Toussaint and Sehorn created the Sea-Saint recording studio in the Gentilly section of eastern New Orleans. Toussaint began recording under his own name, contributing vocals as well as piano. His solo career peaked in the mid-1970s with the albums From a Whisper to a Scream and Southern Nights. During this time he teamed with Labelle and produced their acclaimed 1975 album Nightbirds, which contained the number one hit "Lady Marmalade". The same year, Toussaint collaborated with Paul McCartney and Wings for their hit album Venus and Mars and played on the song "Rock Show". In 1973, his "Yes We Can Can" was covered by The Pointer Sisters for their self-titled debut album; released as a single, it became both a pop and R&B hit and served as the group's introduction to popular culture. Two years later, Glen Campbell covered Toussaint's "Southern Nights" and carried the song to number one on the pop, country and adult contemporary charts.
In 1987, he was the musical director of an off-Broadway show, Staggerlee, which ran for 150 performances. Like many of his contemporaries, Toussaint found that interest in his compositions was rekindled when his work began to be sampled by hip hop artists in the 1980s and 1990s.
2000s
Most of Toussaint's possessions, including his home and recording studio, Sea-Saint Studios, were lost during Hurricane Katrina in 2005. He initially sought shelter at the Astor Crowne Plaza Hotel on Canal Street. Following the hurricane, whose aftermath left most of the city flooded, he left New Orleans for Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and for several years settled in New York City. His first television appearance after the hurricane was on the September 7, 2005, episode of the Late Show with David Letterman, sitting in with Paul Shaffer and his CBS Orchestra. Toussaint performed regularly at Joe's Pub in New York City through 2009. He eventually returned to New Orleans and lived there for the rest of his life.
Toussaint is interviewed on screen, served as a musical director, led his band and appears in performance footage in the 2005 documentary film Make It Funky!, which presents a history of New Orleans music and its influence on rhythm and blues, rock and roll, funk and jazz. In the film, he performed a medley of his compositions "Fortune Teller", "Working in the Coal Mine" and "A Certain Girl". He also performed "Tipitina" in a piano duo with Jon Cleary, and accompanied Irma Thomas on "Old Records", Lloyd Price on "Lawdy Miss Clawdy", and Bonnie Raitt on "What is Success".
The River in Reverse, Toussaint's collaborative album with Elvis Costello, was released on May 29, 2006, in the UK on Verve Records by Universal Classics and Jazz UCJ. It was recorded in Hollywood and at the Piety Street Studio in the Bywater section Toussaint's native New Orleans, as the first major studio session to take place after Hurricane Katrina. In 2007, Toussaint performed a duet with Paul McCartney of a song by New Orleans musician and resident Fats Domino, "I Want to Walk You Home", as their contribution to Goin' Home: A Tribute to Fats Domino (Vanguard Records).
In 2008, Toussaint's song "Sweet Touch of Love" was used in a deodorant commercial for the Axe (Lynx) brand. The commercial won a Gold Lion at the 2008 Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival. In February 2008, Toussaint appeared on Le Show, the Harry Shearer show broadcast on KCRW. He appeared in London in August 2008, where he performed at the Roundhouse. In October 2008 he performed at Festival New Orleans at The O2 alongside acts such as Dr. John and Buckwheat Zydeco. Sponsored by Quint Davis of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival and Philip Anschutz, the event was intended to promote New Orleans music and culture and to revive the once lucrative tourist trade that had been almost completely lost following the flooding that came with Hurricane Katrina. After his second performance at the festival, Toussaint appeared alongside Louisiana Lieutenant Governor Mitch Landrieu.
Toussaint performed instrumentals from his album The Bright Mississippi and many of his older songs for a taping of the PBS series Austin City Limits, which aired on January 9, 2015. In December 2009, he was featured on Elvis Costello's Spectacle program on the Sundance Channel, singing "A Certain Girl". Toussaint appeared on Eric Clapton's 2010 album, Clapton, in two Fats Waller covers, "My Very Good Friend the Milkman" and "When Somebody Thinks You're Wonderful".
His late-blooming career as a performer began when he accepted an offer to play a regular Sunday brunch session at an East Village pub. Interviewed in 2014 by The Guardians Richard Williams, Toussaint said, "I never thought of myself as a performer.... My comfort zone is behind the scenes." In 2013 he collaborated on a ballet with the choreographer Twyla Tharp. Toussaint was a musical mentor to Swedish-born New Orleans songwriter and performer Theresa Andersson.
Honors
Toussaint was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1998, the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame in 2009, the Songwriter's Hall of Fame and the Blues Hall of Fame in 2011. In 2013 he was awarded the National Medal of Arts by President Barack Obama. In 2016, he posthumously won the Pinetop Perkins Piano Player title at the Blues Music Awards.
Death
Toussaint died in the early hours of November 10, 2015, in Madrid, Spain, while on tour. Following a concert at the Teatro Lara on Calle Corredera Baja de San Pablo, he had a heart attack at his hotel and was pronounced dead on his arrival at hospital. He was 77. He had been due to perform a sold-out concert at the EFG London Jazz Festival at The Barbican on November 15 with his band and Theo Croker. He was also scheduled to play with Paul Simon at a benefit concert in New Orleans on 8 December. His final recording, American Tunes, titled after the Paul Simon song, which he sings on the album, was released by Nonesuch Records on June 10, 2016.
Toussaint's one marriage ended in divorce. He was survived by his three children, Clarence (better known as Reginald), Naomi, and Alison, and several grandchildren. His children had managed his career in his last years.
Writing in The New York Times, Ben Sisario quoted Quint Davis, producer of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival: "In the pantheon of New Orleans music people, from Jelly Roll Morton to Mahalia Jackson to Fats—that's the place where Allen Toussaint is in". Paul Simon said, "We were friends and colleagues for almost 40 years.... We played together at the New Orleans jazz festival. We played the benefits for Katrina relief. We were about to perform together on December 8. I was just beginning to think about it; now I'll have to think about his memorial. I am so sad."
The Daily Telegraph described Toussaint as "a master of New Orleans soul and R&B, and one of America's most successful songwriters and producers", adding that "self-effacing Toussaint played a crucial role in countless classic songs popularised by other artists". He had written so many songs, over more than five decades, that he admitted to forgetting quite a few.
Discography
The Wild Sound of New Orleans (1958)
Toussaint (1971, aka From A Whisper To A Scream)
Life, Love and Faith (1972)
Southern Nights (1975)
Motion (1978)
I Love A Carnival Ball, Mr Mardi Gras Starring Allen Toussaint (1987)
Connected (1996)
A New Orleans Christmas (1997)
Allen Toussaint's Jazzity Project: Going Places (2004)
The Bright Mississippi (2009)
American Tunes (2016)
References
External links
Allen Toussaint profile, NPR.org; accessed October 5, 2014.
Allen Toussaint profile, discogs.com; accessed October 5, 2014.
[ Allen Toussaint profile], allmusic.com; accessed October 5, 2014.
Allen Toussaint NYNO Records profile, nynorecords.com; accessed October 5, 2014.
List of chart records written by Toussaint, MusicVF.com, accessed November 11, 2015
Allen Toussaint profile, preshallben.tumblr.com, October 5, 2014.
Allen Toussaint speaks about songwriting and creating music NAMM Oral History Interview (2015)
A Conversation with Allen Toussaint (interviewer: Larry Appelbaum), November 1, 2007; from The Library of Congress (Video, Captions, Transcript)
1938 births
2015 deaths
Rhythm and blues musicians from New Orleans
African-American pianists
American people of French descent
American jazz pianists
Record producers from Louisiana
American soul musicians
Bell Records artists
Nonesuch Records artists
Reprise Records artists
Songwriters from Louisiana
American rhythm and blues keyboardists
American blues pianists
American male pianists
United States National Medal of Arts recipients
20th-century American pianists
21st-century American pianists
Jazz musicians from New Orleans
20th-century American male musicians
21st-century American male musicians
American male jazz musicians
African-American songwriters
20th-century African-American musicians
21st-century African-American musicians
American male songwriters | true | [
"Li Xinyi (; born 13 March 1998), also known as Rex (), is a Chinese singer and songwriter. He was a contestant in the survival program, Produce Camp 2019. His debut single, Dream with Me, was released at the 2019 Opening Ceremony of the 5th Annual Jackie Chan International Action Film Week and charted on Billboard China's Social Music Chart at No. 11.\n\nEarly life and education\nLi was born on 13 March 1998 in Liaoning, China. He was an avid basketball player until he was introduced to singing. He attends the Beijing Contemporary Music Academy.\n\nCareer\n\n2019–present: Produce Camp 2019 and solo debut\n\nIn 2019, Li and three other trainees represented SDT Entertainment on Chinese reality boy band show Produce Camp 2019. He placed 13th in the final episode and was eliminated. He did not join the final debuting lineup, R1SE. However, he made his solo debut with the single \"Dream with Me\" on July 16, 2019. His second single, titled \"Walk with You\" was released on August 7, 2019. He released his third single, \"就让我走\", together with the music video on August 26, 2019. Li released his debut EP One, consisting of three songs. He took part in the OST of the television series, 梦回 with the single, \"梦她\".\n\nDiscography\n\nAlbums\n\nSingles\n\nFilmography\n\nTelevision shows\n\nVideography\n\nMusic videos\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\n1998 births\nLiving people\nChinese television personalities\nChinese male singer-songwriters\nProduce 101 (Chinese TV series) contestants\nSingers from Liaoning\n21st-century Chinese male singers",
"\"Nekkoya (Pick Me)\" (; The word 'Naekkeoya' translates to 'You're mine' in Korean ) is a song performed by the contestants of the competition show Produce 48 and serves as the show's theme song. It was released as a digital single on May 10, 2018 by CJ E&M and Stone Music Entertainment, along with a music video.\n\nTrack listing\nDigital downloads as shown on iTunes. The Korean version was listed as the lead track. The piano version was listed separately.\n\nReception\nIn South Korea, the song did not enter the Gaon Digital Chart, but peaked at number 61 on the Mobile Chart and number 100 on the BGM Chart. In Japan, the song did not enter the Billboard Japan Hot 100, but peaked at number 56 on the Japan Hot 100 Download Chart.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nProduce 101\n2018 singles\n2018 songs\nKorean-language songs\nElectronic dance music songs\nK-pop songs\nTelevision game show theme songs"
]
|
[
"Allen Toussaint",
"Minit and Instant Records",
"What is the minit?",
"Minit Records and later Instant Records, hired Toussaint as an A&R man and record producer.",
"what music did he produce?",
"Toussaint played piano, wrote, arranged and produced a string of hits in the early and mid-1960s for New Orleans R&B artists"
]
| C_c2205f8e0c4f4f738c9c2ab997824cef_0 | did he produce an album? | 3 | did Allen Toussaint produce an album? | Allen Toussaint | In 1960, Joe Banashak, of Minit Records and later Instant Records, hired Toussaint as an A&R man and record producer. He also did freelance work for other labels, such as Fury. Toussaint played piano, wrote, arranged and produced a string of hits in the early and mid-1960s for New Orleans R&B artists such as Ernie K-Doe, Chris Kenner, Irma Thomas (including "It's Raining"), Art and Aaron Neville, the Showmen, and Lee Dorsey, whose first hit "Ya Ya" he produced in 1961. The early to mid-1960s are regarded as Toussaint's most creatively successful period. Notable examples of his work are Jessie Hill's "Ooh Poo Pah Doo" (written by Hill and arranged and produced by Toussaint), Ernie K-Doe's "Mother-in-Law", and Chris Kenner's "I Like It Like That". A two-sided 1962 hit by Benny Spellman comprised "Lipstick Traces (on a Cigarette)" (covered by the O'Jays, Ringo Starr, and Alex Chilton) and the simple but effective "Fortune Teller" (covered by various 1960s rock groups, including the Rolling Stones, the Nashville Teens, the Who, the Hollies, the Throb, and ex-Searchers founder Tony Jackson). "Ruler of My Heart", written under his pseudonym Naomi Neville, first recorded by Irma Thomas for the Minit label in 1963, was adapted by Otis Redding under the title "Pain in My Heart" later that year, prompting Toussaint to file a lawsuit against Redding and his record company, Stax (the claim was settled out of court, with Stax agreeing to credit Naomi Neville as the songwriter). Redding's version of the song was also recorded by the Rolling Stones on their second album. In 1964, "A Certain Girl" (originally by Ernie K-Doe) was the B-side of the first single release by the Yardbirds. The song was released again in 1980 by Warren Zevon, as the single from the album Bad Luck Streak in Dancing School it reached 57 on Billboard's Hot 100. Mary Weiss, former lead singer of The Shangri-Las, released it as "A Certain Guy" in 2007. Toussaint credited about twenty songs to his parents, Clarence and Naomi, sometimes using the pseudonym "Naomi Neville". These include "Fortune Teller", first recorded by Benny Spellman in 1961, and "Work, Work, Work", recorded by the Artwoods in 1966. Alison Krauss and Robert Plant covered "Fortune Teller" on their 2007 album Raising Sand. CANNOTANSWER | The early to mid-1960s are regarded as Toussaint's most creatively successful period. | Allen Richard Toussaint (; January 14, 1938 – November 10, 2015) was an American musician, songwriter, arranger and record producer, who was an influential figure in New Orleans rhythm and blues from the 1950s to the end of the century, described as "one of popular music's great backroom figures". Many musicians recorded Toussaint's compositions, including "Whipped Cream", "Java", "Mother-in-Law", "I Like It Like That", "Fortune Teller", "Ride Your Pony", "Get Out of My Life, Woman", "Working in the Coal Mine", "Everything I Do Gonna Be Funky", "Freedom For the Stallion", "Here Come the Girls", "Yes We Can Can", "Play Something Sweet", and "Southern Nights". He was a producer for hundreds of recordings, among the best known of which are "Right Place, Wrong Time", by his longtime friend Dr. John, and "Lady Marmalade" by Labelle.
Biography
Early life and career
The youngest of three children, Toussaint was born in 1938 in New Orleans and grew up in a shotgun house in the Gert Town neighborhood, where his mother, Naomi Neville (whose name he later adopted pseudonymously for some of his works), welcomed and fed all manner of musicians as they practiced and recorded with her son. His father, Clarence, worked on the railway and played trumpet. Allen Toussaint learned piano as a child and took informal music lessons from an elderly neighbor, Ernest Pinn. In his teens he played in a band, the Flamingos, with the guitarist Snooks Eaglin, before dropping out of school. A significant early influence on Toussaint was the syncopated "second-line" piano style of Professor Longhair.
After a lucky break at age 17, in which he stood in for Huey "Piano" Smith at a performance with Earl King's band in Prichard, Alabama, Toussaint was introduced to a group of local musicians led by Dave Bartholomew, who performed regularly at the Dew Drop Inn, a nightclub on Lasalle Street in Uptown New Orleans. His first recording was in 1957 as a stand-in for Fats Domino on Domino's record "I Want You to Know", on which Toussaint played piano and Domino overdubbed his vocals. His first success as a producer came in 1957 with Lee Allen's "Walking with Mr. Lee". He began performing regularly in Bartholomew's band, and he recorded with Fats Domino, Smiley Lewis, Lee Allen and other leading New Orleans performers.
After being spotted as a sideman by the A&R man Danny Kessler, he initially recorded for RCA Records as Al Tousan. In early 1958 he recorded an album of instrumentals, The Wild Sound of New Orleans, with a band including Alvin "Red" Tyler (baritone sax), either Nat Perrilliat or Lee Allen (tenor sax), either Justin Adams or Roy Montrell (guitar), Frank Fields (bass), and Charles "Hungry" Williams (drums). The recordings included Toussaint and Tyler's composition "Java", which first charted for Floyd Cramer in 1962 and became a number 4 pop hit for Al Hirt (also on RCA) in 1964. Toussaint recorded and co-wrote songs with Allen Orange in the early 1960s.
Success in the 1960s
Minit and Instant Records
In 1960, Joe Banashak, of Minit Records and later Instant Records, hired Toussaint as an A&R man and record producer. He did freelance work for other labels, such as Fury. Toussaint played piano, wrote, arranged and produced a string of hits in the early and mid-1960s for New Orleans R&B artists such as Ernie K-Doe, Chris Kenner, Irma Thomas (including "It's Raining"), Art and Aaron Neville, The Showmen, and Lee Dorsey, whose first hit "Ya Ya" he produced in 1961.
The early to mid-1960s are regarded as Toussaint's most creatively successful period. Notable examples of his work are Jessie Hill's "Ooh Poo Pah Doo" (written by Hill and arranged and produced by Toussaint), Ernie K-Doe's "Mother-in-Law", and Chris Kenner's "I Like It Like That". A two-sided 1962 hit by Benny Spellman comprised "Lipstick Traces (on a Cigarette)" (covered by The O'Jays, Ringo Starr, and Alex Chilton) and the simple but effective "Fortune Teller" (covered by various 1960s rock groups, including The Rolling Stones, The Nashville Teens, The Who, The Hollies, The Throb, and ex-The Searchers founder Tony Jackson). "Ruler of My Heart", written under his pseudonym Naomi Neville, first recorded by Irma Thomas for the Minit label in 1963, was adapted by Otis Redding under the title "Pain in My Heart" later that year, prompting Toussaint to file a lawsuit against Redding and his record company, Stax (the claim was settled out of court, with Stax agreeing to credit Naomi Neville as the songwriter). Redding's version of the song was also recorded by The Rolling Stones on their second album. In 1964, "A Certain Girl" (originally by Ernie K-Doe) was the B-side of the first single release by The Yardbirds. The song was released again in 1980 by Warren Zevon, as the single from the album Bad Luck Streak in Dancing School it reached 57 on Billboard's Hot 100. Mary Weiss, former lead singer of The Shangri-Las, released it as "A Certain Guy" in 2007. Linda Ronstadt released a jazzy version of "Ruler of my Heart" in 1998 on We Ran.
Toussaint credited about twenty songs to his parents, Clarence and Naomi, sometimes using the pseudonym "Naomi Neville". These include "Fortune Teller", first recorded by Benny Spellman in 1961, "Pain In My Heart," first a hit for Otis Redding in 1963, and "Work, Work, Work", recorded by The Artwoods in 1966. Alison Krauss and Robert Plant covered "Fortune Teller" on their 2007 album Raising Sand.
Sansu: Soul and early New Orleans funk
Toussaint was drafted into the United States Army in 1963 but continued to record when on leave. After his discharge in 1965, he joined forces with Marshall Sehorn to form Sansu Enterprises, which included a record label, Sansu, variously known as Tou-Sea, Deesu, or Kansu, and recorded Lee Dorsey, Chris Kenner, Betty Harris, and others. Dorsey had hits with several of Toussaint's songs, including "Ride Your Pony" (1965), "Working in the Coal Mine" (1966), and "Holy Cow" (1966). The core players of the rhythm section used on many of the Sansu recordings from the mid- to late 1960s, Art Neville and the Sounds, consisted of Art Neville on keyboards, Leo Nocentelli on guitar, George Porter Jr on bass, and Zigaboo Modeliste on drums. They later became known as The Meters. Their backing can be heard in songs such as Dorsey's "Ride Your Pony" and "Working in the Coal Mine", sometimes augmented by horns, which were usually arranged by Toussaint. The Toussaint-produced records of these years backed by the members of the Meters, with their increasing use of syncopation and electric instrumentation, built on the influences of Professor Longhair and others before them, but updated these strands, effectively paving the way for the development of a modern New Orleans funk sound.
1970s to 1990s
Toussaint continued to produce The Meters when they began releasing records under their own name in 1969. As part of a process begun at Sansu and reaching fruition in the 1970s, he developed a funkier sound, writing and producing for a host of artists, such as Dr. John (backed by the Meters, on the 1973 album In the Right Place, which contained the hit "Right Place, Wrong Time") and an album by The Wild Tchoupitoulas, a New Orleans Mardi Gras Indians tribe led by "Big Chief Jolly" (George Landry) (backed by the Meters and several of his nephews, including Art and Cyril Neville of the Meters and their brothers Charles and Aaron, who later performed and recorded as The Neville Brothers).
In the 1970s, Toussaint began to work with artists from beyond New Orleans artists, such as B. J. Thomas, Robert Palmer, Willy DeVille, Sandy Denny, Elkie Brooks, Solomon Burke, Scottish soul singer Frankie Miller (High Life), and southern rocker Mylon LeFevre. He arranged horn music for The Band's albums Cahoots (1971) and Rock of Ages (1972), as well as for the documentary film The Last Waltz (1978). Boz Scaggs recorded Toussaint's "What Do You Want the Girl to Do?" on his 1976 album Silk Degrees, which reached number 2 on the U.S. pop albums chart. The song was also recorded by Bonnie Raitt for her 1975 album Home Plate and by Geoff Muldaur (1976), Lowell George (1979), Vince Gill (1993), and Elvis Costello (2005). In 1976 he collaborated with John Mayall on the album Notice to Appear.
In 1973 Toussaint and Sehorn created the Sea-Saint recording studio in the Gentilly section of eastern New Orleans. Toussaint began recording under his own name, contributing vocals as well as piano. His solo career peaked in the mid-1970s with the albums From a Whisper to a Scream and Southern Nights. During this time he teamed with Labelle and produced their acclaimed 1975 album Nightbirds, which contained the number one hit "Lady Marmalade". The same year, Toussaint collaborated with Paul McCartney and Wings for their hit album Venus and Mars and played on the song "Rock Show". In 1973, his "Yes We Can Can" was covered by The Pointer Sisters for their self-titled debut album; released as a single, it became both a pop and R&B hit and served as the group's introduction to popular culture. Two years later, Glen Campbell covered Toussaint's "Southern Nights" and carried the song to number one on the pop, country and adult contemporary charts.
In 1987, he was the musical director of an off-Broadway show, Staggerlee, which ran for 150 performances. Like many of his contemporaries, Toussaint found that interest in his compositions was rekindled when his work began to be sampled by hip hop artists in the 1980s and 1990s.
2000s
Most of Toussaint's possessions, including his home and recording studio, Sea-Saint Studios, were lost during Hurricane Katrina in 2005. He initially sought shelter at the Astor Crowne Plaza Hotel on Canal Street. Following the hurricane, whose aftermath left most of the city flooded, he left New Orleans for Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and for several years settled in New York City. His first television appearance after the hurricane was on the September 7, 2005, episode of the Late Show with David Letterman, sitting in with Paul Shaffer and his CBS Orchestra. Toussaint performed regularly at Joe's Pub in New York City through 2009. He eventually returned to New Orleans and lived there for the rest of his life.
Toussaint is interviewed on screen, served as a musical director, led his band and appears in performance footage in the 2005 documentary film Make It Funky!, which presents a history of New Orleans music and its influence on rhythm and blues, rock and roll, funk and jazz. In the film, he performed a medley of his compositions "Fortune Teller", "Working in the Coal Mine" and "A Certain Girl". He also performed "Tipitina" in a piano duo with Jon Cleary, and accompanied Irma Thomas on "Old Records", Lloyd Price on "Lawdy Miss Clawdy", and Bonnie Raitt on "What is Success".
The River in Reverse, Toussaint's collaborative album with Elvis Costello, was released on May 29, 2006, in the UK on Verve Records by Universal Classics and Jazz UCJ. It was recorded in Hollywood and at the Piety Street Studio in the Bywater section Toussaint's native New Orleans, as the first major studio session to take place after Hurricane Katrina. In 2007, Toussaint performed a duet with Paul McCartney of a song by New Orleans musician and resident Fats Domino, "I Want to Walk You Home", as their contribution to Goin' Home: A Tribute to Fats Domino (Vanguard Records).
In 2008, Toussaint's song "Sweet Touch of Love" was used in a deodorant commercial for the Axe (Lynx) brand. The commercial won a Gold Lion at the 2008 Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival. In February 2008, Toussaint appeared on Le Show, the Harry Shearer show broadcast on KCRW. He appeared in London in August 2008, where he performed at the Roundhouse. In October 2008 he performed at Festival New Orleans at The O2 alongside acts such as Dr. John and Buckwheat Zydeco. Sponsored by Quint Davis of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival and Philip Anschutz, the event was intended to promote New Orleans music and culture and to revive the once lucrative tourist trade that had been almost completely lost following the flooding that came with Hurricane Katrina. After his second performance at the festival, Toussaint appeared alongside Louisiana Lieutenant Governor Mitch Landrieu.
Toussaint performed instrumentals from his album The Bright Mississippi and many of his older songs for a taping of the PBS series Austin City Limits, which aired on January 9, 2015. In December 2009, he was featured on Elvis Costello's Spectacle program on the Sundance Channel, singing "A Certain Girl". Toussaint appeared on Eric Clapton's 2010 album, Clapton, in two Fats Waller covers, "My Very Good Friend the Milkman" and "When Somebody Thinks You're Wonderful".
His late-blooming career as a performer began when he accepted an offer to play a regular Sunday brunch session at an East Village pub. Interviewed in 2014 by The Guardians Richard Williams, Toussaint said, "I never thought of myself as a performer.... My comfort zone is behind the scenes." In 2013 he collaborated on a ballet with the choreographer Twyla Tharp. Toussaint was a musical mentor to Swedish-born New Orleans songwriter and performer Theresa Andersson.
Honors
Toussaint was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1998, the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame in 2009, the Songwriter's Hall of Fame and the Blues Hall of Fame in 2011. In 2013 he was awarded the National Medal of Arts by President Barack Obama. In 2016, he posthumously won the Pinetop Perkins Piano Player title at the Blues Music Awards.
Death
Toussaint died in the early hours of November 10, 2015, in Madrid, Spain, while on tour. Following a concert at the Teatro Lara on Calle Corredera Baja de San Pablo, he had a heart attack at his hotel and was pronounced dead on his arrival at hospital. He was 77. He had been due to perform a sold-out concert at the EFG London Jazz Festival at The Barbican on November 15 with his band and Theo Croker. He was also scheduled to play with Paul Simon at a benefit concert in New Orleans on 8 December. His final recording, American Tunes, titled after the Paul Simon song, which he sings on the album, was released by Nonesuch Records on June 10, 2016.
Toussaint's one marriage ended in divorce. He was survived by his three children, Clarence (better known as Reginald), Naomi, and Alison, and several grandchildren. His children had managed his career in his last years.
Writing in The New York Times, Ben Sisario quoted Quint Davis, producer of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival: "In the pantheon of New Orleans music people, from Jelly Roll Morton to Mahalia Jackson to Fats—that's the place where Allen Toussaint is in". Paul Simon said, "We were friends and colleagues for almost 40 years.... We played together at the New Orleans jazz festival. We played the benefits for Katrina relief. We were about to perform together on December 8. I was just beginning to think about it; now I'll have to think about his memorial. I am so sad."
The Daily Telegraph described Toussaint as "a master of New Orleans soul and R&B, and one of America's most successful songwriters and producers", adding that "self-effacing Toussaint played a crucial role in countless classic songs popularised by other artists". He had written so many songs, over more than five decades, that he admitted to forgetting quite a few.
Discography
The Wild Sound of New Orleans (1958)
Toussaint (1971, aka From A Whisper To A Scream)
Life, Love and Faith (1972)
Southern Nights (1975)
Motion (1978)
I Love A Carnival Ball, Mr Mardi Gras Starring Allen Toussaint (1987)
Connected (1996)
A New Orleans Christmas (1997)
Allen Toussaint's Jazzity Project: Going Places (2004)
The Bright Mississippi (2009)
American Tunes (2016)
References
External links
Allen Toussaint profile, NPR.org; accessed October 5, 2014.
Allen Toussaint profile, discogs.com; accessed October 5, 2014.
[ Allen Toussaint profile], allmusic.com; accessed October 5, 2014.
Allen Toussaint NYNO Records profile, nynorecords.com; accessed October 5, 2014.
List of chart records written by Toussaint, MusicVF.com, accessed November 11, 2015
Allen Toussaint profile, preshallben.tumblr.com, October 5, 2014.
Allen Toussaint speaks about songwriting and creating music NAMM Oral History Interview (2015)
A Conversation with Allen Toussaint (interviewer: Larry Appelbaum), November 1, 2007; from The Library of Congress (Video, Captions, Transcript)
1938 births
2015 deaths
Rhythm and blues musicians from New Orleans
African-American pianists
American people of French descent
American jazz pianists
Record producers from Louisiana
American soul musicians
Bell Records artists
Nonesuch Records artists
Reprise Records artists
Songwriters from Louisiana
American rhythm and blues keyboardists
American blues pianists
American male pianists
United States National Medal of Arts recipients
20th-century American pianists
21st-century American pianists
Jazz musicians from New Orleans
20th-century American male musicians
21st-century American male musicians
American male jazz musicians
African-American songwriters
20th-century African-American musicians
21st-century African-American musicians
American male songwriters | true | [
"House of Lords is the fourth album by Lords of the Underground, their first album in eight years. The album was released on August 21, 2007 for Affluent Records and was produced by Marley Marl, K-Def and DJ Lord Jazz. Like the group's previous album Resurrection the album received very little promotion and was a commercial failure, and it did not make it to the Billboard charts nor did it produce any hit singles.\n\nTrack listing\n\"Intro\"- 0:44\n\"I Love Hip Hop\"- 3:14\n\"Fab 3\"- 3:22\n\"English Mami\"- 3:38\n\"Yes Were Fresh\"- 3:20\n\"Belly of the Beast\"- 3:53\n\"Hum It Out\"- 3:22\n\"Slick Talk\"- 3:25\n\"Say My Name\"- 3:54\n\"No Pass\"- 2:37\n\"To Love Me\"- 4:02\n\"The Clinic\"- 3:32\n\"Certified\"- 2:47\n\"What Yall Wanna Know\"- 3:26\n\"What Is an MC\"- 3:21\n\"Remember Me\"- 3:39\n\nLords of the Underground albums\n2007 albums",
"Dual Core is a hip hop duo composed of American rapper int eighty (David Martinjak) and British producer c64 (Chris Hunger). Their music is often categorised as nerdcore (a subgenre of hip hop music).\n\nHistory\nMartinjak, from Cincinnati, met Hunger, from Manchester, in 2003 on an online music forum. They collaborate via the internet to produce their music. Hunger produces beats and sends the files to Martinjak, who records his vocals and uploads them to a server, Hunger downloads these files and uses them to mix the tracks. Dual Core are unusual for a nerdcore act in that it is composed of a rapper and a producer; most nerdcore rappers also produce their own beats. Martinjak and Hunger did not physically meet until after 2007. The song \"All the Things\" appears in 2016 video game Watch Dogs 2.\n\nBand members\n int eighty (sometimes \"int80\") — David Martinjak\n c64 — Chris Hunger\n\nint eighty's stage name is based on an x86 assembly instruction (\"technically 'int 0x80.'\") while c64 refers to both the Commodore 64 computer and a combination of his first initial and his height (6 ft 4 in).\n\nDiscography\n Zero One (2007) - album\n Super Powers (2007) - compilation album\n Lost Reality (2008) - album\n Next Level (2009) - album\n All The Things (2012) - album\n Downtime (2017) - album\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n Official website\n \n\nNerdcore artists\nMusical groups established in 2007\nHip hop duos"
]
|
[
"Allen Toussaint",
"Minit and Instant Records",
"What is the minit?",
"Minit Records and later Instant Records, hired Toussaint as an A&R man and record producer.",
"what music did he produce?",
"Toussaint played piano, wrote, arranged and produced a string of hits in the early and mid-1960s for New Orleans R&B artists",
"did he produce an album?",
"The early to mid-1960s are regarded as Toussaint's most creatively successful period."
]
| C_c2205f8e0c4f4f738c9c2ab997824cef_0 | what did he do that was successful during that time? | 4 | what did Allen Toussaint do that was successful during the early to mid-1960s? | Allen Toussaint | In 1960, Joe Banashak, of Minit Records and later Instant Records, hired Toussaint as an A&R man and record producer. He also did freelance work for other labels, such as Fury. Toussaint played piano, wrote, arranged and produced a string of hits in the early and mid-1960s for New Orleans R&B artists such as Ernie K-Doe, Chris Kenner, Irma Thomas (including "It's Raining"), Art and Aaron Neville, the Showmen, and Lee Dorsey, whose first hit "Ya Ya" he produced in 1961. The early to mid-1960s are regarded as Toussaint's most creatively successful period. Notable examples of his work are Jessie Hill's "Ooh Poo Pah Doo" (written by Hill and arranged and produced by Toussaint), Ernie K-Doe's "Mother-in-Law", and Chris Kenner's "I Like It Like That". A two-sided 1962 hit by Benny Spellman comprised "Lipstick Traces (on a Cigarette)" (covered by the O'Jays, Ringo Starr, and Alex Chilton) and the simple but effective "Fortune Teller" (covered by various 1960s rock groups, including the Rolling Stones, the Nashville Teens, the Who, the Hollies, the Throb, and ex-Searchers founder Tony Jackson). "Ruler of My Heart", written under his pseudonym Naomi Neville, first recorded by Irma Thomas for the Minit label in 1963, was adapted by Otis Redding under the title "Pain in My Heart" later that year, prompting Toussaint to file a lawsuit against Redding and his record company, Stax (the claim was settled out of court, with Stax agreeing to credit Naomi Neville as the songwriter). Redding's version of the song was also recorded by the Rolling Stones on their second album. In 1964, "A Certain Girl" (originally by Ernie K-Doe) was the B-side of the first single release by the Yardbirds. The song was released again in 1980 by Warren Zevon, as the single from the album Bad Luck Streak in Dancing School it reached 57 on Billboard's Hot 100. Mary Weiss, former lead singer of The Shangri-Las, released it as "A Certain Guy" in 2007. Toussaint credited about twenty songs to his parents, Clarence and Naomi, sometimes using the pseudonym "Naomi Neville". These include "Fortune Teller", first recorded by Benny Spellman in 1961, and "Work, Work, Work", recorded by the Artwoods in 1966. Alison Krauss and Robert Plant covered "Fortune Teller" on their 2007 album Raising Sand. CANNOTANSWER | Notable examples of his work are Jessie Hill's "Ooh Poo Pah Doo" (written by Hill | Allen Richard Toussaint (; January 14, 1938 – November 10, 2015) was an American musician, songwriter, arranger and record producer, who was an influential figure in New Orleans rhythm and blues from the 1950s to the end of the century, described as "one of popular music's great backroom figures". Many musicians recorded Toussaint's compositions, including "Whipped Cream", "Java", "Mother-in-Law", "I Like It Like That", "Fortune Teller", "Ride Your Pony", "Get Out of My Life, Woman", "Working in the Coal Mine", "Everything I Do Gonna Be Funky", "Freedom For the Stallion", "Here Come the Girls", "Yes We Can Can", "Play Something Sweet", and "Southern Nights". He was a producer for hundreds of recordings, among the best known of which are "Right Place, Wrong Time", by his longtime friend Dr. John, and "Lady Marmalade" by Labelle.
Biography
Early life and career
The youngest of three children, Toussaint was born in 1938 in New Orleans and grew up in a shotgun house in the Gert Town neighborhood, where his mother, Naomi Neville (whose name he later adopted pseudonymously for some of his works), welcomed and fed all manner of musicians as they practiced and recorded with her son. His father, Clarence, worked on the railway and played trumpet. Allen Toussaint learned piano as a child and took informal music lessons from an elderly neighbor, Ernest Pinn. In his teens he played in a band, the Flamingos, with the guitarist Snooks Eaglin, before dropping out of school. A significant early influence on Toussaint was the syncopated "second-line" piano style of Professor Longhair.
After a lucky break at age 17, in which he stood in for Huey "Piano" Smith at a performance with Earl King's band in Prichard, Alabama, Toussaint was introduced to a group of local musicians led by Dave Bartholomew, who performed regularly at the Dew Drop Inn, a nightclub on Lasalle Street in Uptown New Orleans. His first recording was in 1957 as a stand-in for Fats Domino on Domino's record "I Want You to Know", on which Toussaint played piano and Domino overdubbed his vocals. His first success as a producer came in 1957 with Lee Allen's "Walking with Mr. Lee". He began performing regularly in Bartholomew's band, and he recorded with Fats Domino, Smiley Lewis, Lee Allen and other leading New Orleans performers.
After being spotted as a sideman by the A&R man Danny Kessler, he initially recorded for RCA Records as Al Tousan. In early 1958 he recorded an album of instrumentals, The Wild Sound of New Orleans, with a band including Alvin "Red" Tyler (baritone sax), either Nat Perrilliat or Lee Allen (tenor sax), either Justin Adams or Roy Montrell (guitar), Frank Fields (bass), and Charles "Hungry" Williams (drums). The recordings included Toussaint and Tyler's composition "Java", which first charted for Floyd Cramer in 1962 and became a number 4 pop hit for Al Hirt (also on RCA) in 1964. Toussaint recorded and co-wrote songs with Allen Orange in the early 1960s.
Success in the 1960s
Minit and Instant Records
In 1960, Joe Banashak, of Minit Records and later Instant Records, hired Toussaint as an A&R man and record producer. He did freelance work for other labels, such as Fury. Toussaint played piano, wrote, arranged and produced a string of hits in the early and mid-1960s for New Orleans R&B artists such as Ernie K-Doe, Chris Kenner, Irma Thomas (including "It's Raining"), Art and Aaron Neville, The Showmen, and Lee Dorsey, whose first hit "Ya Ya" he produced in 1961.
The early to mid-1960s are regarded as Toussaint's most creatively successful period. Notable examples of his work are Jessie Hill's "Ooh Poo Pah Doo" (written by Hill and arranged and produced by Toussaint), Ernie K-Doe's "Mother-in-Law", and Chris Kenner's "I Like It Like That". A two-sided 1962 hit by Benny Spellman comprised "Lipstick Traces (on a Cigarette)" (covered by The O'Jays, Ringo Starr, and Alex Chilton) and the simple but effective "Fortune Teller" (covered by various 1960s rock groups, including The Rolling Stones, The Nashville Teens, The Who, The Hollies, The Throb, and ex-The Searchers founder Tony Jackson). "Ruler of My Heart", written under his pseudonym Naomi Neville, first recorded by Irma Thomas for the Minit label in 1963, was adapted by Otis Redding under the title "Pain in My Heart" later that year, prompting Toussaint to file a lawsuit against Redding and his record company, Stax (the claim was settled out of court, with Stax agreeing to credit Naomi Neville as the songwriter). Redding's version of the song was also recorded by The Rolling Stones on their second album. In 1964, "A Certain Girl" (originally by Ernie K-Doe) was the B-side of the first single release by The Yardbirds. The song was released again in 1980 by Warren Zevon, as the single from the album Bad Luck Streak in Dancing School it reached 57 on Billboard's Hot 100. Mary Weiss, former lead singer of The Shangri-Las, released it as "A Certain Guy" in 2007. Linda Ronstadt released a jazzy version of "Ruler of my Heart" in 1998 on We Ran.
Toussaint credited about twenty songs to his parents, Clarence and Naomi, sometimes using the pseudonym "Naomi Neville". These include "Fortune Teller", first recorded by Benny Spellman in 1961, "Pain In My Heart," first a hit for Otis Redding in 1963, and "Work, Work, Work", recorded by The Artwoods in 1966. Alison Krauss and Robert Plant covered "Fortune Teller" on their 2007 album Raising Sand.
Sansu: Soul and early New Orleans funk
Toussaint was drafted into the United States Army in 1963 but continued to record when on leave. After his discharge in 1965, he joined forces with Marshall Sehorn to form Sansu Enterprises, which included a record label, Sansu, variously known as Tou-Sea, Deesu, or Kansu, and recorded Lee Dorsey, Chris Kenner, Betty Harris, and others. Dorsey had hits with several of Toussaint's songs, including "Ride Your Pony" (1965), "Working in the Coal Mine" (1966), and "Holy Cow" (1966). The core players of the rhythm section used on many of the Sansu recordings from the mid- to late 1960s, Art Neville and the Sounds, consisted of Art Neville on keyboards, Leo Nocentelli on guitar, George Porter Jr on bass, and Zigaboo Modeliste on drums. They later became known as The Meters. Their backing can be heard in songs such as Dorsey's "Ride Your Pony" and "Working in the Coal Mine", sometimes augmented by horns, which were usually arranged by Toussaint. The Toussaint-produced records of these years backed by the members of the Meters, with their increasing use of syncopation and electric instrumentation, built on the influences of Professor Longhair and others before them, but updated these strands, effectively paving the way for the development of a modern New Orleans funk sound.
1970s to 1990s
Toussaint continued to produce The Meters when they began releasing records under their own name in 1969. As part of a process begun at Sansu and reaching fruition in the 1970s, he developed a funkier sound, writing and producing for a host of artists, such as Dr. John (backed by the Meters, on the 1973 album In the Right Place, which contained the hit "Right Place, Wrong Time") and an album by The Wild Tchoupitoulas, a New Orleans Mardi Gras Indians tribe led by "Big Chief Jolly" (George Landry) (backed by the Meters and several of his nephews, including Art and Cyril Neville of the Meters and their brothers Charles and Aaron, who later performed and recorded as The Neville Brothers).
In the 1970s, Toussaint began to work with artists from beyond New Orleans artists, such as B. J. Thomas, Robert Palmer, Willy DeVille, Sandy Denny, Elkie Brooks, Solomon Burke, Scottish soul singer Frankie Miller (High Life), and southern rocker Mylon LeFevre. He arranged horn music for The Band's albums Cahoots (1971) and Rock of Ages (1972), as well as for the documentary film The Last Waltz (1978). Boz Scaggs recorded Toussaint's "What Do You Want the Girl to Do?" on his 1976 album Silk Degrees, which reached number 2 on the U.S. pop albums chart. The song was also recorded by Bonnie Raitt for her 1975 album Home Plate and by Geoff Muldaur (1976), Lowell George (1979), Vince Gill (1993), and Elvis Costello (2005). In 1976 he collaborated with John Mayall on the album Notice to Appear.
In 1973 Toussaint and Sehorn created the Sea-Saint recording studio in the Gentilly section of eastern New Orleans. Toussaint began recording under his own name, contributing vocals as well as piano. His solo career peaked in the mid-1970s with the albums From a Whisper to a Scream and Southern Nights. During this time he teamed with Labelle and produced their acclaimed 1975 album Nightbirds, which contained the number one hit "Lady Marmalade". The same year, Toussaint collaborated with Paul McCartney and Wings for their hit album Venus and Mars and played on the song "Rock Show". In 1973, his "Yes We Can Can" was covered by The Pointer Sisters for their self-titled debut album; released as a single, it became both a pop and R&B hit and served as the group's introduction to popular culture. Two years later, Glen Campbell covered Toussaint's "Southern Nights" and carried the song to number one on the pop, country and adult contemporary charts.
In 1987, he was the musical director of an off-Broadway show, Staggerlee, which ran for 150 performances. Like many of his contemporaries, Toussaint found that interest in his compositions was rekindled when his work began to be sampled by hip hop artists in the 1980s and 1990s.
2000s
Most of Toussaint's possessions, including his home and recording studio, Sea-Saint Studios, were lost during Hurricane Katrina in 2005. He initially sought shelter at the Astor Crowne Plaza Hotel on Canal Street. Following the hurricane, whose aftermath left most of the city flooded, he left New Orleans for Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and for several years settled in New York City. His first television appearance after the hurricane was on the September 7, 2005, episode of the Late Show with David Letterman, sitting in with Paul Shaffer and his CBS Orchestra. Toussaint performed regularly at Joe's Pub in New York City through 2009. He eventually returned to New Orleans and lived there for the rest of his life.
Toussaint is interviewed on screen, served as a musical director, led his band and appears in performance footage in the 2005 documentary film Make It Funky!, which presents a history of New Orleans music and its influence on rhythm and blues, rock and roll, funk and jazz. In the film, he performed a medley of his compositions "Fortune Teller", "Working in the Coal Mine" and "A Certain Girl". He also performed "Tipitina" in a piano duo with Jon Cleary, and accompanied Irma Thomas on "Old Records", Lloyd Price on "Lawdy Miss Clawdy", and Bonnie Raitt on "What is Success".
The River in Reverse, Toussaint's collaborative album with Elvis Costello, was released on May 29, 2006, in the UK on Verve Records by Universal Classics and Jazz UCJ. It was recorded in Hollywood and at the Piety Street Studio in the Bywater section Toussaint's native New Orleans, as the first major studio session to take place after Hurricane Katrina. In 2007, Toussaint performed a duet with Paul McCartney of a song by New Orleans musician and resident Fats Domino, "I Want to Walk You Home", as their contribution to Goin' Home: A Tribute to Fats Domino (Vanguard Records).
In 2008, Toussaint's song "Sweet Touch of Love" was used in a deodorant commercial for the Axe (Lynx) brand. The commercial won a Gold Lion at the 2008 Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival. In February 2008, Toussaint appeared on Le Show, the Harry Shearer show broadcast on KCRW. He appeared in London in August 2008, where he performed at the Roundhouse. In October 2008 he performed at Festival New Orleans at The O2 alongside acts such as Dr. John and Buckwheat Zydeco. Sponsored by Quint Davis of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival and Philip Anschutz, the event was intended to promote New Orleans music and culture and to revive the once lucrative tourist trade that had been almost completely lost following the flooding that came with Hurricane Katrina. After his second performance at the festival, Toussaint appeared alongside Louisiana Lieutenant Governor Mitch Landrieu.
Toussaint performed instrumentals from his album The Bright Mississippi and many of his older songs for a taping of the PBS series Austin City Limits, which aired on January 9, 2015. In December 2009, he was featured on Elvis Costello's Spectacle program on the Sundance Channel, singing "A Certain Girl". Toussaint appeared on Eric Clapton's 2010 album, Clapton, in two Fats Waller covers, "My Very Good Friend the Milkman" and "When Somebody Thinks You're Wonderful".
His late-blooming career as a performer began when he accepted an offer to play a regular Sunday brunch session at an East Village pub. Interviewed in 2014 by The Guardians Richard Williams, Toussaint said, "I never thought of myself as a performer.... My comfort zone is behind the scenes." In 2013 he collaborated on a ballet with the choreographer Twyla Tharp. Toussaint was a musical mentor to Swedish-born New Orleans songwriter and performer Theresa Andersson.
Honors
Toussaint was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1998, the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame in 2009, the Songwriter's Hall of Fame and the Blues Hall of Fame in 2011. In 2013 he was awarded the National Medal of Arts by President Barack Obama. In 2016, he posthumously won the Pinetop Perkins Piano Player title at the Blues Music Awards.
Death
Toussaint died in the early hours of November 10, 2015, in Madrid, Spain, while on tour. Following a concert at the Teatro Lara on Calle Corredera Baja de San Pablo, he had a heart attack at his hotel and was pronounced dead on his arrival at hospital. He was 77. He had been due to perform a sold-out concert at the EFG London Jazz Festival at The Barbican on November 15 with his band and Theo Croker. He was also scheduled to play with Paul Simon at a benefit concert in New Orleans on 8 December. His final recording, American Tunes, titled after the Paul Simon song, which he sings on the album, was released by Nonesuch Records on June 10, 2016.
Toussaint's one marriage ended in divorce. He was survived by his three children, Clarence (better known as Reginald), Naomi, and Alison, and several grandchildren. His children had managed his career in his last years.
Writing in The New York Times, Ben Sisario quoted Quint Davis, producer of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival: "In the pantheon of New Orleans music people, from Jelly Roll Morton to Mahalia Jackson to Fats—that's the place where Allen Toussaint is in". Paul Simon said, "We were friends and colleagues for almost 40 years.... We played together at the New Orleans jazz festival. We played the benefits for Katrina relief. We were about to perform together on December 8. I was just beginning to think about it; now I'll have to think about his memorial. I am so sad."
The Daily Telegraph described Toussaint as "a master of New Orleans soul and R&B, and one of America's most successful songwriters and producers", adding that "self-effacing Toussaint played a crucial role in countless classic songs popularised by other artists". He had written so many songs, over more than five decades, that he admitted to forgetting quite a few.
Discography
The Wild Sound of New Orleans (1958)
Toussaint (1971, aka From A Whisper To A Scream)
Life, Love and Faith (1972)
Southern Nights (1975)
Motion (1978)
I Love A Carnival Ball, Mr Mardi Gras Starring Allen Toussaint (1987)
Connected (1996)
A New Orleans Christmas (1997)
Allen Toussaint's Jazzity Project: Going Places (2004)
The Bright Mississippi (2009)
American Tunes (2016)
References
External links
Allen Toussaint profile, NPR.org; accessed October 5, 2014.
Allen Toussaint profile, discogs.com; accessed October 5, 2014.
[ Allen Toussaint profile], allmusic.com; accessed October 5, 2014.
Allen Toussaint NYNO Records profile, nynorecords.com; accessed October 5, 2014.
List of chart records written by Toussaint, MusicVF.com, accessed November 11, 2015
Allen Toussaint profile, preshallben.tumblr.com, October 5, 2014.
Allen Toussaint speaks about songwriting and creating music NAMM Oral History Interview (2015)
A Conversation with Allen Toussaint (interviewer: Larry Appelbaum), November 1, 2007; from The Library of Congress (Video, Captions, Transcript)
1938 births
2015 deaths
Rhythm and blues musicians from New Orleans
African-American pianists
American people of French descent
American jazz pianists
Record producers from Louisiana
American soul musicians
Bell Records artists
Nonesuch Records artists
Reprise Records artists
Songwriters from Louisiana
American rhythm and blues keyboardists
American blues pianists
American male pianists
United States National Medal of Arts recipients
20th-century American pianists
21st-century American pianists
Jazz musicians from New Orleans
20th-century American male musicians
21st-century American male musicians
American male jazz musicians
African-American songwriters
20th-century African-American musicians
21st-century African-American musicians
American male songwriters | true | [
"Southern Gal is the debut album by American singer-songwriter Terry Ellis. It was released by EastWest Records on November 14, 1995. Recorded and released during the time her band En Vogue were on a two-year hiatus, the album includes the R&B Top 40 hit singles, \"Where Ever You Are\" and \"What Did I Do to You?\".\n\nCritical reception\n\nSenior editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine from Allmusic rated the album two out of five stars and found that while Southern Gal \"is a smooth, commercial-oriented, hip-hop-informed, contemporary R&B album with pop leanings [and] Ellis' voice is in fine form [...] the album is far from compelling. Even with all the production detail and Ellis'strong performance, it sinks from its lack of high quality songs.\"\n\nSingles\n\"Where Ever You Are\" was the lead single from the album. It was released on 17 October 1995. The song is Ellis's best selling song to date. It peaked at No.10 in the US R&B Top 40 and peaked at No.52 on the US Hot 100.\n\"What Did I Do To You?\" was the second and final single released from the album. The single was less successful than her previous single. It did however manage to spend 10 weeks on the US R&B Chart, peaking at No.41.\n\nTrack listing\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n1995 debut albums",
"What Did I Do To Deserve This My Lord!? 2 (formerly known as Holy Invasion Of Privacy, Badman! 2: Time To Tighten Up Security!, known as Yūsha no Kuse ni Namaiki da or2, 勇者のくせになまいきだor2, literally \"For a hero, [you are] quite impudent/cheeky/bold] 2)\" in Japan) is a real-time strategy/god game for the PlayStation Portable, sequel to What Did I Do to Deserve This, My Lord?.\n\nThe game was released in Japan in 2008, and was announced for a North American release during Tokyo Game Show 2009. This release was delayed until May 4, 2010, due to NIS America changing the game's name from Holy Invasion Of Privacy, Badman! 2: Time to Tighten Up Security! to What Did I Do to Deserve This, My Lord!? 2 to avoid conflict with the Batman license.. The UMD release includes the first game.\n\nGameplay \nThe gameplay is almost identical to the first game, with a few different additions and changes. These include 'Mutation' (monsters can mutate in three forms: by deformity, by obesity and by gigantism) and 'The Overlord's Chamber', where you can grow monsters and observe their evolution.\nWhat Did I Do To Deserve This, My Lord!? 2 contains \"4 times more stages, 3.3 times more monsters and 2.3 times more heroes\" than the first game.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Official website\n\n2008 video games\nGod games\nPlayStation Portable games\nPlayStation Portable-only games\nReal-time strategy video games\nSony Interactive Entertainment games\nVideo game sequels\nVideo games developed in Japan"
]
|
[
"Jean-Philippe Rameau",
"Rameau and his librettists"
]
| C_6affd0880c764e209d1d4aabc61ddb69_0 | What is a librettist? | 1 | What is a librettist? | Jean-Philippe Rameau | Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacreon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boreades (c. 1763). Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupliniere's salon, at the Societe du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day. Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760). CANNOTANSWER | librettists managed to produce a libretto | Jean-Philippe Rameau (; – ) was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the 18th century. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer of his time for the harpsichord, alongside François Couperin.
Little is known about Rameau's early years. It was not until the 1720s that he won fame as a major theorist of music with his Treatise on Harmony (1722) and also in the following years as a composer of masterpieces for the harpsichord, which circulated throughout Europe. He was almost 50 before he embarked on the operatic career on which his reputation chiefly rests today. His debut, Hippolyte et Aricie (1733), caused a great stir and was fiercely attacked by the supporters of Lully's style of music for its revolutionary use of harmony. Nevertheless, Rameau's pre-eminence in the field of French opera was soon acknowledged, and he was later attacked as an "establishment" composer by those who favoured Italian opera during the controversy known as the Querelle des Bouffons in the 1750s. Rameau's music had gone out of fashion by the end of the 18th century, and it was not until the 20th that serious efforts were made to revive it. Today, he enjoys renewed appreciation with performances and recordings of his music ever more frequent.
Life
The details of Rameau's life are generally obscure, especially concerning his first forty years, before he moved to Paris for good. He was a secretive man, and even his wife knew nothing of his early life, which explains the scarcity of biographical information available.
Early years, 1683–1732
Rameau's early years are particularly obscure. He was born on 25 September 1683 in Dijon, and baptised the same day. His father, Jean, worked as an organist in several churches around Dijon, and his mother, Claudine Demartinécourt, was the daughter of a notary. The couple had eleven children (five girls and six boys), of whom Jean-Philippe was the seventh.
Rameau was taught music before he could read or write. He was educated at the Jesuit college at Godrans, but he was not a good pupil and disrupted classes with his singing, later claiming that his passion for opera had begun at the age of twelve. Initially intended for the law, Rameau decided he wanted to be a musician, and his father sent him to Italy, where he stayed for a short while in Milan. On his return, he worked as a violinist in travelling companies and then as an organist in provincial cathedrals before moving to Paris for the first time. Here, in 1706, he published his earliest known compositions: the harpsichord works that make up his first book of Pièces de Clavecin, which show the influence of his friend Louis Marchand.
In 1709, he moved back to Dijon to take over his father's job as organist in the main church. The contract was for six years, but Rameau left before then and took up similar posts in Lyon and Clermont-Ferrand. During this period, he composed motets for church performance as well as secular cantatas.
In 1722, he returned to Paris for good, and here he published his most important work of music theory, Traité de l'harmonie (Treatise on Harmony). This soon won him a great reputation, and it was followed in 1726 by his Nouveau système de musique théorique. In 1724 and 1729 (or 1730), he also published two more collections of harpsichord pieces.
Rameau took his first tentative steps into composing stage music when the writer Alexis Piron asked him to provide songs for his popular comic plays written for the Paris Fairs. Four collaborations followed, beginning with L'endriague in 1723; none of the music has survived.
On 25 February 1726 Rameau married the 19-year-old Marie-Louise Mangot, who came from a musical family from Lyon and was a good singer and instrumentalist. The couple would have four children, two boys and two girls, and the marriage is said to have been a happy one.
In spite of his fame as a music theorist, Rameau had trouble finding a post as an organist in Paris.
Later years, 1733–1764
It was not until he was approaching 50 that Rameau decided to embark on the operatic career on which his fame as a composer mainly rests. He had already approached writer Antoine Houdar de la Motte for a libretto in 1727, but nothing came of it; he was finally inspired to try his hand at the prestigious genre of tragédie en musique after seeing Montéclair's Jephté in 1732. Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie premiered at the Académie Royale de Musique on 1 October 1733. It was immediately recognised as the most significant opera to appear in France since the death of Lully, but audiences were split over whether this was a good thing or a bad thing. Some, such as the composer André Campra, were stunned by its originality and wealth of invention; others found its harmonic innovations discordant and saw the work as an attack on the French musical tradition. The two camps, the so-called Lullyistes and the Rameauneurs, fought a pamphlet war over the issue for the rest of the decade.
Just before this time, Rameau had made the acquaintance of the powerful financier Alexandre Le Riche de La Poupelinière, who became his patron until 1753. La Poupelinière's mistress (and later, wife), Thérèse des Hayes, was Rameau's pupil and a great admirer of his music. In 1731, Rameau became the conductor of La Poupelinière's private orchestra, which was of an extremely high quality. He held the post for 22 years; he was succeeded by Johann Stamitz and then François-Joseph Gossec. La Poupelinière's salon enabled Rameau to meet some of the leading cultural figures of the day, including Voltaire, who soon began collaborating with the composer. Their first project, the tragédie en musique Samson, was abandoned because an opera on a religious theme by Voltaire—a notorious critic of the Church—was likely to be banned by the authorities. Meanwhile, Rameau had introduced his new musical style into the lighter genre of the opéra-ballet with the highly successful Les Indes galantes. It was followed by two tragédies en musique, Castor et Pollux (1737) and Dardanus (1739), and another opéra-ballet, Les fêtes d'Hébé (also 1739). All these operas of the 1730s are among Rameau's most highly regarded works. However, the composer followed them with six years of silence, in which the only work he produced was a new version of Dardanus (1744). The reason for this interval in the composer's creative life is unknown, although it is possible he had a falling-out with the authorities at the Académie royale de la musique.
The year 1745 was a turning point in Rameau's career. He received several commissions from the court for works to celebrate the French victory at the Battle of Fontenoy and the marriage of the Dauphin to Infanta Maria Teresa Rafaela of Spain. Rameau produced his most important comic opera, Platée, as well as two collaborations with Voltaire: the opéra-ballet Le temple de la gloire and the comédie-ballet La princesse de Navarre. They gained Rameau official recognition; he was granted the title "Compositeur du Cabinet du Roi" and given a substantial pension. 1745 also saw the beginning of the bitter enmity between Rameau and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Though best known today as a thinker, Rousseau had ambitions to be a composer. He had written an opera, Les muses galantes (inspired by Rameau's Indes galantes), but Rameau was unimpressed by this musical tribute. At the end of 1745, Voltaire and Rameau, who were busy on other works, commissioned Rousseau to turn La Princesse de Navarre into a new opera, with linking recitative, called Les fêtes de Ramire. Rousseau then claimed the two had stolen the credit for the words and music he had contributed, though musicologists have been able to identify almost nothing of the piece as Rousseau's work. Nevertheless, the embittered Rousseau nursed a grudge against Rameau for the rest of his life.
Rousseau was a major participant in the second great quarrel that erupted over Rameau's work, the so-called Querelle des Bouffons of 1752–54, which pitted French tragédie en musique against Italian opera buffa. This time, Rameau was accused of being out of date and his music too complicated in comparison with the simplicity and "naturalness" of a work like Pergolesi's La serva padrona. In the mid-1750s, Rameau criticised Rousseau's contributions to the musical articles in the Encyclopédie, which led to a quarrel with the leading philosophes d'Alembert and Diderot. As a result, Jean-François Rameau became a character in Diderot's then-unpublished dialogue, Le neveu de Rameau (Rameau's Nephew).
In 1753, La Poupelinière took a scheming musician, Jeanne-Thérèse Goermans, as his mistress. The daughter of harpsichord maker Jacques Goermans, she went by the name of Madame de Saint-Aubin, and her opportunistic husband pushed her into the arms of the rich financier. She had La Poupelinière engage the services of the Bohemian composer Johann Stamitz, who succeeded Rameau after a breach developed between Rameau and his patron; however, by then, Rameau no longer needed La Poupelinière's financial support and protection.
Rameau pursued his activities as a theorist and composer until his death. He lived with his wife and two of his children in his large suite of rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, which he would leave every day, lost in thought, to take a solitary walk in the nearby gardens of the Palais-Royal or the Tuileries. Sometimes he would meet the young writer Chabanon, who noted some of Rameau's disillusioned confidential remarks: "Day by day, I'm acquiring more good taste, but I no longer have any genius" and "The imagination is worn out in my old head; it's not wise at this age wanting to practise arts that are nothing but imagination."
Rameau composed prolifically in the late 1740s and early 1750s. After that, his rate of productivity dropped off, probably due to old age and ill health, although he was still able to write another comic opera, Les Paladins, in 1760. This was due to be followed by a final tragédie en musique, Les Boréades; but for unknown reasons, the opera was never produced and had to wait until the late 20th century for a proper staging. Rameau died on 12 September 1764 after suffering from a fever, thirteen days before his 81st birthday. At his bedside, he objected to a song sung. His last words were, "What the devil do you mean to sing to me, priest? You are out of tune." He was buried in the church of St. Eustache, Paris on the same day of his death. Although a bronze bust and red marble tombstone were erected in his memory there by the Société de la Compositeurs de Musique in 1883, the exact site of his burial remains unknown to this day.
Rameau's personality
While the details of his biography are vague and fragmentary, the details of Rameau's personal and family life are almost completely obscure. Rameau's music, so graceful and attractive, completely contradicts the man's public image and what we know of his character as described (or perhaps unfairly caricatured) by Diderot in his satirical novel Le Neveu de Rameau. Throughout his life, music was his consuming passion. It occupied his entire thinking; Philippe Beaussant calls him a monomaniac. Piron explained that "His heart and soul were in his harpsichord; once he had shut its lid, there was no one home." Physically, Rameau was tall and exceptionally thin, as can be seen by the sketches we have of him, including a famous portrait by Carmontelle. He had a "loud voice." His speech was difficult to understand, just like his handwriting, which was never fluent. As a man, he was secretive, solitary, irritable, proud of his own achievements (more as a theorist than as a composer), brusque with those who contradicted him, and quick to anger. It is difficult to imagine him among the leading wits, including Voltaire (to whom he bears more than a passing physical resemblance), who frequented La Poupelinière's salon; his music was his passport, and it made up for his lack of social graces.
His enemies exaggerated his faults; e.g. his supposed miserliness. In fact, it seems that his thriftiness was the result of long years spent in obscurity (when his income was uncertain and scanty) rather than part of his character, because he could also be generous. He helped his nephew Jean-François when he came to Paris and also helped establish the career of Claude-Bénigne Balbastre in the capital. Furthermore, he gave his daughter Marie-Louise a considerable dowry when she became a Visitandine nun in 1750, and he paid a pension to one of his sisters when she became ill. Financial security came late to him, following the success of his stage works and the grant of a royal pension (a few months before his death, he was also ennobled and made a knight of the Ordre de Saint-Michel). But he did not change his way of life, keeping his worn-out clothes, his single pair of shoes, and his old furniture. After his death, it was discovered that he only possessed one dilapidated single-keyboard harpsichord in his rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, yet he also had a bag containing 1691 gold louis.
Music
General character of Rameau's music
Rameau's music is characterised by the exceptional technical knowledge of a composer who wanted above all to be renowned as a theorist of the art. Nevertheless, it is not solely addressed to the intelligence, and Rameau himself claimed, "I try to conceal art with art." The paradox of this music was that it was new, using techniques never known before, but it took place within the framework of old-fashioned forms. Rameau appeared revolutionary to the Lullyistes, disturbed by complex harmony of his music; and reactionary to the "philosophes," who only paid attention to its content and who either would not or could not listen to the sound it made. The incomprehension Rameau received from his contemporaries stopped him from repeating such daring experiments as the second Trio des Parques in Hippolyte et Aricie, which he was forced to remove after a handful of performances because the singers had been either unable or unwilling to execute it correctly.
Rameau's musical works
Rameau's musical works may be divided into four distinct groups, which differ greatly in importance: a few cantatas; a few motets for large chorus; some pieces for solo harpsichord or harpsichord accompanied by other instruments; and, finally, his works for the stage, to which he dedicated the last thirty years of his career almost exclusively. Like most of his contemporaries, Rameau often reused melodies that had been particularly successful, but never without meticulously adapting them; they are not simple transcriptions. Besides, no borrowings have been found from other composers, although his earliest works show the influence of other music. Rameau's reworkings of his own material are numerous; e.g., in Les Fêtes d'Hébé, we find L'Entretien des Muses, the Musette, and the Tambourin, taken from the 1724 book of harpsichord pieces, as well as an aria from the cantata Le Berger Fidèle.
Motets
For at least 26 years, Rameau was a professional organist in the service of religious institutions, and yet the body of sacred music he composed is exceptionally small and his organ works nonexistent. Judging by the evidence, it was not his favourite field, but rather, simply a way of making reasonable money. Rameau's few religious compositions are nevertheless remarkable and compare favourably to the works of specialists in the area. Only four motets have been attributed to Rameau with any certainty: Deus noster refugium, In convertendo, Quam dilecta, and Laboravi.
Cantatas
The cantata was a highly successful genre in the early 18th century. The French cantata, which should not be confused with the Italian or the German cantata, was "invented" in 1706 by the poet Jean-Baptiste Rousseau and soon taken up by many famous composers of the day, such as Montéclair, Campra, and Clérambault. Cantatas were Rameau's first contact with dramatic music. The modest forces the cantata required meant it was a genre within the reach of a composer who was still unknown. Musicologists can only guess at the dates of Rameau's six surviving cantatas, and the names of the librettists are unknown.
Instrumental music
Along with François Couperin, Rameau was a master of the 18th-century French school of harpsichord music, and both made a break with the style of the first generation of harpsichordists whose compositions adhered to the relatively standardised suite form, which had reached its apogee in the first decade of the 18th century and successive collections of pieces by Louis Marchand, Gaspard Le Roux, Louis-Nicolas Clérambault, Jean-François Dandrieu, Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, Charles Dieupart and Nicolas Siret. Rameau and Couperin had different styles, and it seems they did not know one another: Couperin was one of the official court musicians; Rameau, fifteen years his junior, achieved fame only after Couperin's death.
Rameau published his first book of harpsichord pieces in 1706. (Cf. Couperin, who waited until 1713 before publishing his first "Ordres.") Rameau's music includes pieces in the pure tradition of the French suite: imitative ("Le rappel des oiseaux," "La poule") and characterful ("Les tendres plaintes," "L'entretien des Muses"). But there are also works of pure virtuosity that resemble Domenico Scarlatti ("Les tourbillons," "Les trois mains") as well as pieces that reveal the experiments of a theorist and musical innovator ("L'enharmonique," "Les Cyclopes"), which had a marked influence on Louis-Claude Daquin, Joseph-Nicolas-Pancrace Royer and Jacques Duphly. Rameau's suites are grouped in the traditional way, by key. The first set of dances (Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, Les Trois Mains, Fanfairenette, La Triomphante, Gavotte et 6 doubles) is centred on A major and A minor, while the remaining pieces (Les tricoteuses, L'Indifferente, Première Menuet, Deuxième Menuet, La Poule, Les Triolets, Les Sauvages, L'Enharmonique, L'Egiptienne [sic]) are centred around G major and G minor.
Rameau's second and third collections appeared in 1724 and 1727. After these he composed only one piece for the harpsichord, the eight-minute "La Dauphine" of 1747, while the very short "Les petits marteaux" (c. 1750) has also been attributed to him.
During his semiretirement (1740 to 1744) he wrote the Pièces de clavecin en concert (1741), which some musicologists consider the pinnacle of French Baroque chamber music. Adopting a formula successfully employed by Mondonville a few years earlier, Rameau fashioned these pieces differently from trio sonatas in that the harpsichord is not simply there as basso continuo to accompany melody instruments (violin, flute, viol) but as equal partner in "concert" with them. Rameau claimed that this music would be equally satisfying played on the harpsichord alone, but the claim is not wholly convincing because he took the trouble to transcribe five of them himself, those the lack of other instruments would show the least.
Opera
After 1733 Rameau dedicated himself mostly to opera. On a strictly musical level, 18th-century French Baroque opera is richer and more varied than contemporary Italian opera, especially in the place given to choruses and dances but also in the musical continuity that arises from the respective relationships between the arias and the recitatives. Another essential difference: whereas Italian opera gave a starring role to female sopranos and castrati, French opera had no use for the latter. The Italian opera of Rameau's day (opera seria, opera buffa) was essentially divided into musical sections (da capo arias, duets, trios, etc.) and sections that were spoken or almost spoken (recitativo secco). It was during the latter that the action progressed while the audience waited for the next aria; on the other hand, the text of the arias was almost entirely buried beneath music whose chief aim was to show off the virtuosity of the singer. Nothing of the kind is to be found in French opera of the day; since Lully, the text had to remain comprehensible—limiting certain techniques such as the vocalise, which was reserved for special words such as ("glory") or ("victory"). A subtle equilibrium existed between the more and the less musical parts: melodic recitative on the one hand and arias that were often closer to arioso on the other, alongside virtuoso "ariettes" in the Italian style. This form of continuous music prefigures Wagnerian drama even more than does the "reform" opera of Gluck.
Five essential components may be discerned in Rameau's operatic scores:
Pieces of "pure" music (overtures, ritornelli, music which closes scenes). Unlike the highly stereotyped Lullian overture, Rameau's overtures show an extraordinary variety. Even in his earliest works, where he uses the standard French model, Rameau—the born symphonist and master of orchestration—composes novel and unique pieces. A few pieces are particularly striking, such as the overture to Zaïs, depicting the chaos before the creation of the universe, that of Pigmalion, suggesting the sculptor's chipping away at the statue with his mallet, or many more conventional depictions of storms and earthquakes, as well perhaps as the imposing final chaconnes of Les Indes galantes or Dardanus.
Dance music: the danced interludes, which were obligatory even in tragédie en musique, allowed Rameau to give free rein to his inimitable sense of rhythm, melody, and choreography, acknowledged by all his contemporaries, including the dancers themselves. This "learned" composer, forever preoccupied by his next theoretical work, also was one who strung together gavottes, minuets, loures, rigaudons, passepieds, tambourins, and musettes by the dozen. According to his biographer, Cuthbert Girdlestone, "The immense superiority of all that pertains to Rameau in choreography still needs emphasizing," and the German scholar H.W. von Walthershausen affirmed:
Rameau was the greatest ballet composer of all times. The genius of his creation rests on one hand on his perfect artistic permeation by folk-dance types, on the other hand on the constant preservation of living contact with the practical requirements of the ballet stage, which prevented an estrangement between the expression of the body from the spirit of absolute music.
Choruses: Padre Martini, the erudite musicologist who corresponded with Rameau, affirmed that "the French are excellent at choruses," obviously thinking of Rameau himself. A great master of harmony, Rameau knew how to compose sumptuous choruses—whether monodic, polyphonic, or interspersed with passages for solo singers or the orchestra—and whatever feelings needed to be expressed.
Arias: less frequent than in Italian opera, Rameau nevertheless offers many striking examples. Particularly admired arias include Télaïre's "Tristes apprêts," from Castor et Pollux; "Ô jour affreux" and "Lieux funestes," from Dardanus; Huascar's invocations in Les Indes galantes; and the final ariette in Pigmalion. In Platée we encounter a showstopping ars poetica aria for the character of La Folie (the madness), "Formons les plus brillants concerts / Aux langeurs d'Apollon".
Recitative: much closer to arioso than to recitativo secco. The composer took scrupulous care to observe French prosody and used his harmonic knowledge to give expression to his protagonists' feelings.
During the first part of his operatic career (1733–1739), Rameau wrote his great masterpieces destined for the Académie royale de musique: three tragédies en musique and two opéra-ballets that still form the core of his repertoire. After the interval of 1740 to 1744, he became the official court musician, and for the most part, composed pieces intended to entertain, with plenty of dance music emphasising sensuality and an idealised pastoral atmosphere. In his last years, Rameau returned to a renewed version of his early style in Les Paladins and Les Boréades.
His Zoroastre was first performed in 1749. According to one of Rameau's admirers, Cuthbert Girdlestone, this opera has a distinctive place in his works: "The profane passions of hatred and jealousy are rendered more intensely [than in his other works] and with a strong sense of reality."
Rameau and his librettists
Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zaïs (1748), Naïs (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacréon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boréades (c. 1763).
Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupelinière's salon, at the Société du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day.
Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760).
Reputation and influence
By the end of his life, Rameau's music had come under attack in France from theorists who favoured Italian models. However, foreign composers working in the Italian tradition were increasingly looking towards Rameau as a way of reforming their own leading operatic genre, opera seria. Tommaso Traetta produced two operas setting translations of Rameau libretti that show the French composer's influence, Ippolito ed Aricia (1759) and I Tintaridi (based on Castor et Pollux, 1760). Traetta had been advised by Count Francesco Algarotti, a leading proponent of reform according to French models; Algarotti was a major influence on the most important "reformist" composer, Christoph Willibald Gluck. Gluck's three Italian reform operas of the 1760s—Orfeo ed Euridice, Alceste, and Paride ed Elena—reveal a knowledge of Rameau's works. For instance, both Orfeo and the 1737 version of Castor et Pollux open with the funeral of one of the leading characters who later comes back to life. Many of the operatic reforms advocated in the preface to Gluck's Alceste were already present in Rameau's works. Rameau had used accompanied recitatives, and the overtures in his later operas reflected the action to come, so when Gluck arrived in Paris in 1774 to produce a series of six French operas, he could be seen as continuing in the tradition of Rameau. Nevertheless, while Gluck's popularity survived the French Revolution, Rameau's did not. By the end of the 18th century, his operas had vanished from the repertoire.
For most of the 19th century, Rameau's music remained unplayed, known only by reputation. Hector Berlioz investigated Castor et Pollux and particularly admired the aria "Tristes apprêts," but "whereas the modern listener readily perceives the common ground with Berlioz' music, he himself was more conscious of the gap which separated them." French humiliation in the Franco-Prussian War brought about a change in Rameau's fortunes. As Rameau biographer J. Malignon wrote, "...the German victory over France in 1870–71 was the grand occasion for digging up great heroes from the French past. Rameau, like so many others, was flung into the enemy's face to bolster our courage and our faith in the national destiny of France." In 1894, composer Vincent d'Indy founded the Schola Cantorum to promote French national music; the society put on several revivals of works by Rameau. Among the audience was Claude Debussy, who especially cherished Castor et Pollux, revived in 1903: "Gluck's genius was deeply rooted in Rameau's works... a detailed comparison allows us to affirm that Gluck could replace Rameau on the French stage only by assimilating the latter's beautiful works and making them his own." Camille Saint-Saëns (by editing and publishing the Pièces in 1895) and Paul Dukas were two other important French musicians who gave practical championship to Rameau's music in their day, but interest in Rameau petered out again, and it was not until the late 20th century that a serious effort was made to revive his works. Over half of Rameau's operas have now been recorded, in particular by conductors such as John Eliot Gardiner, William Christie, and Marc Minkowski.
One of his pieces is commonly heard in the Victoria Centre in Nottingham by the Rowland Emett timepiece, the Aqua Horological Tintinnabulator. Emett quoted that Rameau made music for his school and the shopping centre without him knowing it.
Theoretical works
Treatise on Harmony, 1722
Rameau's 1722 Treatise on Harmony initiated a revolution in music theory. Rameau posited the discovery of the "fundamental law" or what he referred to as the "fundamental bass" of all Western music. Heavily influenced by new Cartesian modes of thought and analysis, Rameau's methodology incorporated mathematics, commentary, analysis and a didacticism that was specifically intended to illuminate, scientifically, the structure and principles of music. With careful deductive reasoning, he attempted to derive universal harmonic principles from natural causes. Previous treatises on harmony had been purely practical; Rameau embraced the new philosophical rationalism, quickly rising to prominence in France as the "Isaac Newton of Music." His fame subsequently spread throughout all Europe, and his Treatise became the definitive authority on music theory, forming the foundation for instruction in western music that persists to this day.
List of works
RCT numbering refers to Rameau Catalogue Thématique established by Sylvie Bouissou and Denis Herlin.
Instrumental works
Pièces de clavecin. Trois livres. "Pieces for harpsichord", 3 books, published 1706, 1724, 1726/27(?).
RCT 1 – Premier livre de Clavecin (1706)
RCT 2 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in E minor
RCT 3 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in D major
RCT 4 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Menuet in C major
RCT 5 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in A minor
RCT 6 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in G
Pieces de Clavecin en Concerts Five albums of character pieces for harpsichord, violin and viol. (1741)
RCT 7 – Concert I in C minor
RCT 8 – Concert II in G major
RCT 9 – Concert III in A major
RCT 10 – Concert IV in B flat major
RCT 11 – Concert V in D minor
RCT 12 – La Dauphine for harpsichord. (1747)
RCT 12bis – Les petits marteaux for harpsichord.
Several orchestral dance suites extracted from his operas.
Motets
RCT 13 – Deus noster refugium (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 14 – In convertendo (probably before 1720, rev. 1751)
RCT 15 – Quam dilecta (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 16 – Laboravi (published in the Traité de l'harmonie, 1722)
Canons
RCT 17 – Ah! loin de rire, pleurons (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) (pub. 1722)
RCT 18 – Avec du vin, endormons-nous (2 sopranos, Tenor) (1719)
RCT 18bis – L'épouse entre deux draps (3 sopranos) (formerly attributed to François Couperin)
RCT 18ter – Je suis un fou Madame (3 voix égales) (1720)
RCT 19 – Mes chers amis, quittez vos rouges bords (3 sopranos, 3 basses) (pub. 1780)
RCT 20 – Réveillez-vous, dormeur sans fin (5 voix égales) (pub. 1722)
RCT 20bis – Si tu ne prends garde à toi (2 sopranos, bass) (1720)
Songs
RCT 21.1 – L'amante préoccupée or A l'objet que j'adore (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.2 – Lucas, pour se gausser de nous (soprano, bass, continuo) (pub. 1707)
RCT 21.3 – Non, non, le dieu qui sait aimer (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.4 – Un Bourbon ouvre sa carrière or Un héros ouvre sa carrière (alto, continuo) (1751, air belonging to Acante et Céphise but censored before its first performance and never reintroduced in the work).
Cantatas
RCT 23 – Aquilon et Orithie (between 1715 and 1720)
RCT 28 – Thétis (same period)
RCT 26 – L’impatience (same period)
RCT 22 – Les amants trahis (around 1720)
RCT 27 – Orphée (same period)
RCT 24 – Le berger fidèle (1728)
RCT 25 – Cantate pour le jour de la Saint Louis (1740)
Operas and stage works
Tragédies en musique
RCT 43 – Hippolyte et Aricie (1733; revised 1742 and 1757)
RCT 32 – Castor et Pollux (1737; revised 1754)
RCT 35 – Dardanus (1739; revised 1744 and 1760), score
RCT 62 – Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756, with new music for Acts II, III & V)
RCT 31 – Les Boréades or Abaris (unperformed; in rehearsal 1763)
Opéra-ballets
RCT 44 – Les Indes galantes (1735; revised 1736)
RCT 41 – Les fêtes d'Hébé or les Talens Lyriques (1739)
RCT 39 – Les fêtes de Polymnie (1745)
RCT 59 – Le temple de la gloire (1745; revised 1746)
RCT 38 – Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour or Les Dieux d'Egypte (1747)
RCT 58 – Les surprises de l'Amour (1748; revised 1757)
Pastorales héroïques
RCT 60 – Zaïs (1748)
RCT 49 – Naïs (1749)
RCT 29 – Acante et Céphise or La sympathie (1751)
RCT 34 – Daphnis et Eglé (1753)
Comédies lyriques
RCT 53 – Platée or Junon jalouse (1745), score
RCT 51 – Les Paladins or Le Vénitien (1760)
Comédie-ballet
RCT 54 – La princesse de Navarre (1744)
Actes de ballet
RCT 33 – Les courses de Tempé (1734)
RCT 40 – Les fêtes de Ramire (1745)
RCT 52 – Pigmalion (1748)
RCT 42 – La guirlande or Les fleurs enchantées (1751)
RCT 57 – Les sibarites or Sibaris (1753)
RCT 48 – La naissance d'Osiris or La Fête Pamilie (1754)
RCT 30 – Anacréon (1754)
RCT 58 – Anacréon (completely different work from the above, 1757, 3rd Entrée of Les surprises de l'Amour)
RCT 61 – Zéphire (date unknown)
RCT 50 – Nélée et Myrthis (date unknown)
RCT 45 – Io (unfinished, date unknown)
Lost works
RCT 56 – Samson (tragédie en musique) (first version written 1733–1734; second version 1736; neither were ever staged )
RCT 46 – Linus (tragédie en musique) (1751, score stolen after a rehearsal)
RCT 47 – Lisis et Délie (pastorale) (scheduled on November 6, 1753)
Incidental music for opéras comiques
Music mostly lost.
RCT 36 – L'endriague (in 3 acts, 1723)
RCT 37 – L'enrôlement d'Arlequin (in 1 act, 1726)
RCT 55 – La robe de dissension or Le faux prodige (in 2 acts, 1726)
RCT 55bis – La rose or Les jardins de l'Hymen (in a prologue and 1 act, 1744)
Writings
Traité de l'harmonie réduite à ses principes naturels (Paris, 1722)
Nouveau système de musique théorique (Paris, 1726)
Dissertation sur les différents méthodes d'accompagnement pour le clavecin, ou pour l'orgue (Paris, 1732)
Génération harmonique, ou Traité de musique théorique et pratique (Paris, 1737)
Mémoire où l'on expose les fondemens du Système de musique théorique et pratique de M. Rameau (1749)
Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1750)
Nouvelles réflexions de M. Rameau sur sa 'Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1752)
Observations sur notre instinct pour la musique (Paris, 1754)
Erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1755)
Suite des erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1756)
Reponse de M. Rameau à MM. les editeurs de l'Encyclopédie sur leur dernier Avertissement (Paris, 1757)
Nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (1758–9)
Code de musique pratique, ou Méthodes pour apprendre la musique...avec des nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (Paris, 1760)
Lettre à M. Alembert sur ses opinions en musique (Paris, 1760)
Origine des sciences, suivie d'un controverse sur le même sujet (Paris, 1762)
See also
Querelle des Bouffons
ReferencesNotesSourcesBeaussant, Philippe, Rameau de A à Z (Fayard, 1983)
Gibbons, William. Building the Operatic Museum: Eighteenth-Century Opera in Fin-de-siècle Paris (University of Rochester Press, 2013)
Girdlestone, Cuthbert, Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Dover paperback edition, 1969)
Holden, Amanda, (Ed) The Viking Opera Guide (Viking, 1993)
Sadler, Graham, (Ed.), The New Grove French Baroque Masters (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)
Trowbridge, Simon, Rameau (2nd edition, Englance Press, 2017)
F. Annunziata, Una Tragédie Lyrique nel Secolo dei Lumi. Abaris ou Les Boréades di Jean Philippe Rameau, https://www.academia.edu/6100318
External links
(en) Gavotte with Doubles Hypermedia by Jeff Hall & Tim Smith at the BinAural Collaborative Hypertext – Shockwave Player required – ("Gavotte with Doubles" link NG)
(en) jp.rameau.free.fr Rameau – Le Site
(fr) musicologie.org Biography, List of Works, bibliography, discography, theoretical writings, in French
(en) Jean-Philippe Rameau / Discography
Magnatune Les Cyclopes by Rameau in on-line mp3 format (played by Trevor Pinnock)
Jean-Philippe Rameau, "L'Orchestre de Louis XV" – Suites d'Orchestre, Le Concert des Nations, dir. Jordi Savall, Alia Vox, AVSA 9882Sheet music'''
Rameau free sheet music from the Mutopia Project
1683 births
1764 deaths
18th-century classical composers
18th-century French composers
18th-century French male musicians
Composers awarded knighthoods
Composers for harpsichord
French Baroque composers
French ballet composers
French opera composers
French male classical composers
French male non-fiction writers
French music theorists
Male opera composers
People from Dijon
Burials at Saint-Eustache, Paris
17th-century male musicians | true | [
"American Lyric Theater (ALT) is an opera company based in New York City and they specialize in the development of new works. It was founded by Lawrence Edelson in 2005.\n\nPrograms \nAmerican Lyric Theater's Composer Librettist Development Program is the only full-time mentorship initiative for emerging operatic writers in the United States. ALT also commissions new operas with the goal of developing a new body of repertoire and attracting new audiences to opera.\n\nCommissions \nAmerican Lyric Theater commissioned The Golden Ticket, a new opera based on Roald Dahl's book, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, by American composer Peter Ash and British librettist Donald Sturrock. The Golden Ticket was commissioned by ALT in partnership with Felicity Dahl, and received its world premiere at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis on June 13, 2010. The company also commissioned The Poe Project, a trilogy of one act operas inspired by the fiction of Edgar Allan Poe: Buried Alive by composer Jeff Myers and librettist Quincy Long; ...of the Flesh by composer Jay Anthony Gach and librettist Royce Vavrek; and Embedded by composer Patrick Soluri and librettist Deborah Brevoort. The Poe Project received a workshop reading at New York's Symphony Space in November 2010 and is being further developed by ALT for future staged production.\n\nFaculty and artistic mentorship team \nAmerican Lyric Theater's faculty and artistic mentorship team includes composer/librettist Mark Adamo, composer Daniel Catán, composer Anthony Davis, dramaturg Cori Ellison, librettist Michael Korie, director Rhoda Levine, and librettist William M. Hoffman.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nAmerican Lyric Theater official website\nOpera America Membership Directory: American Lyric Theater \n\nNew York City opera companies\nMusical groups established in 2005\n2005 establishments in New York City",
"Beth Morrison is an American producer of contemporary opera.\n\nMorrison is known for her collaborations with many artists through her company Beth Morrison Projects includes composers David T. Little, Missy Mazzoli, Du Yun, Paola Prestini, Kamala Sankaram, Darcy James Argue, and David Lang, librettist Royce Vavrek, and performers Lauren Worsham, Abigail Fischer, Nathan Gunn and Courtney Love. With Kim Whitener and Kristin Marting of HERE Arts Center, she created PROTOTYPE Festival, an annual festival of premier opera-theatre and music-theatre by pioneering artists from New York City and around the world.\n\nSelect opera and music-theatre works produced by Beth Morrison\n Soldier Songs (2008, David T. Little, composer and librettist)\n Song from the Uproar: The Lives and Deaths of Isabelle Eberhardt (2012, Missy Mazzoli, composer; Mazzoli and Royce Vavrek, librettists)\n Dog Days (2012, David T. Little, composer; Royce Vavrek, librettist)\n Thumbprint (2014, Kamala Sankaram, composer; Susan Yankowitz, librettist)\n The Source (2014, Ted Hearne, composer; Mark Doten, librettist)\n Kansas City Choir Boy (2015, Todd Almond, composer and librettist)\n Anatomy Theater (2016, David Lang composer; Lang and Mark Dion, librettists)\n Angel's Bone (2016, Du Yun, composer; Royce Vavrek, librettist)\n Aging Magician (2016, Paola Prestini composer, co-created by Prestini, Rinde Eckert and Julian Crouch)\n Breaking the Waves (2016, Missy Mazzoli, composer; Royce Vavrek, librettist)\n p r i s m (2019, Ellen Reid, composer; Roxie Perkins, librettist)\n\nConcert works\n 21c Liederabend (2009, 2011, 2013, 2016)\n A Few Stops on the N Train (2011, Du Yun, composer and lyricist)\n Albert, Bound or Unbound (2013, Marie Incontrera, composer; Royce Vavrek, librettist)\n Brooklyn Village (2012)\n Home (2012) (Sarah Kirkland Snider, composer; Nathaniel Bellows, lyricist)\n Canvas (2012) (Matthew Mehlan, composer; Royce Vavrek, lyricist)\n Am I Born (2012) (David T. Little, composer; Royce Vavrek, librettist)\n The Hubble Cantata (2016, Paola Prestini, composer; Royce Vavrek, librettist)\n\nReferences\n\nLiving people\nOpera managers\nAmerican theatre managers and producers\nWomen theatre managers and producers\nYear of birth missing (living people)"
]
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[
"Jean-Philippe Rameau",
"Rameau and his librettists",
"What is a librettist?",
"librettists managed to produce a libretto"
]
| C_6affd0880c764e209d1d4aabc61ddb69_0 | What is a libretto? | 2 | What is a libretto? | Jean-Philippe Rameau | Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacreon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boreades (c. 1763). Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupliniere's salon, at the Societe du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day. Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760). CANNOTANSWER | operas, | Jean-Philippe Rameau (; – ) was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the 18th century. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer of his time for the harpsichord, alongside François Couperin.
Little is known about Rameau's early years. It was not until the 1720s that he won fame as a major theorist of music with his Treatise on Harmony (1722) and also in the following years as a composer of masterpieces for the harpsichord, which circulated throughout Europe. He was almost 50 before he embarked on the operatic career on which his reputation chiefly rests today. His debut, Hippolyte et Aricie (1733), caused a great stir and was fiercely attacked by the supporters of Lully's style of music for its revolutionary use of harmony. Nevertheless, Rameau's pre-eminence in the field of French opera was soon acknowledged, and he was later attacked as an "establishment" composer by those who favoured Italian opera during the controversy known as the Querelle des Bouffons in the 1750s. Rameau's music had gone out of fashion by the end of the 18th century, and it was not until the 20th that serious efforts were made to revive it. Today, he enjoys renewed appreciation with performances and recordings of his music ever more frequent.
Life
The details of Rameau's life are generally obscure, especially concerning his first forty years, before he moved to Paris for good. He was a secretive man, and even his wife knew nothing of his early life, which explains the scarcity of biographical information available.
Early years, 1683–1732
Rameau's early years are particularly obscure. He was born on 25 September 1683 in Dijon, and baptised the same day. His father, Jean, worked as an organist in several churches around Dijon, and his mother, Claudine Demartinécourt, was the daughter of a notary. The couple had eleven children (five girls and six boys), of whom Jean-Philippe was the seventh.
Rameau was taught music before he could read or write. He was educated at the Jesuit college at Godrans, but he was not a good pupil and disrupted classes with his singing, later claiming that his passion for opera had begun at the age of twelve. Initially intended for the law, Rameau decided he wanted to be a musician, and his father sent him to Italy, where he stayed for a short while in Milan. On his return, he worked as a violinist in travelling companies and then as an organist in provincial cathedrals before moving to Paris for the first time. Here, in 1706, he published his earliest known compositions: the harpsichord works that make up his first book of Pièces de Clavecin, which show the influence of his friend Louis Marchand.
In 1709, he moved back to Dijon to take over his father's job as organist in the main church. The contract was for six years, but Rameau left before then and took up similar posts in Lyon and Clermont-Ferrand. During this period, he composed motets for church performance as well as secular cantatas.
In 1722, he returned to Paris for good, and here he published his most important work of music theory, Traité de l'harmonie (Treatise on Harmony). This soon won him a great reputation, and it was followed in 1726 by his Nouveau système de musique théorique. In 1724 and 1729 (or 1730), he also published two more collections of harpsichord pieces.
Rameau took his first tentative steps into composing stage music when the writer Alexis Piron asked him to provide songs for his popular comic plays written for the Paris Fairs. Four collaborations followed, beginning with L'endriague in 1723; none of the music has survived.
On 25 February 1726 Rameau married the 19-year-old Marie-Louise Mangot, who came from a musical family from Lyon and was a good singer and instrumentalist. The couple would have four children, two boys and two girls, and the marriage is said to have been a happy one.
In spite of his fame as a music theorist, Rameau had trouble finding a post as an organist in Paris.
Later years, 1733–1764
It was not until he was approaching 50 that Rameau decided to embark on the operatic career on which his fame as a composer mainly rests. He had already approached writer Antoine Houdar de la Motte for a libretto in 1727, but nothing came of it; he was finally inspired to try his hand at the prestigious genre of tragédie en musique after seeing Montéclair's Jephté in 1732. Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie premiered at the Académie Royale de Musique on 1 October 1733. It was immediately recognised as the most significant opera to appear in France since the death of Lully, but audiences were split over whether this was a good thing or a bad thing. Some, such as the composer André Campra, were stunned by its originality and wealth of invention; others found its harmonic innovations discordant and saw the work as an attack on the French musical tradition. The two camps, the so-called Lullyistes and the Rameauneurs, fought a pamphlet war over the issue for the rest of the decade.
Just before this time, Rameau had made the acquaintance of the powerful financier Alexandre Le Riche de La Poupelinière, who became his patron until 1753. La Poupelinière's mistress (and later, wife), Thérèse des Hayes, was Rameau's pupil and a great admirer of his music. In 1731, Rameau became the conductor of La Poupelinière's private orchestra, which was of an extremely high quality. He held the post for 22 years; he was succeeded by Johann Stamitz and then François-Joseph Gossec. La Poupelinière's salon enabled Rameau to meet some of the leading cultural figures of the day, including Voltaire, who soon began collaborating with the composer. Their first project, the tragédie en musique Samson, was abandoned because an opera on a religious theme by Voltaire—a notorious critic of the Church—was likely to be banned by the authorities. Meanwhile, Rameau had introduced his new musical style into the lighter genre of the opéra-ballet with the highly successful Les Indes galantes. It was followed by two tragédies en musique, Castor et Pollux (1737) and Dardanus (1739), and another opéra-ballet, Les fêtes d'Hébé (also 1739). All these operas of the 1730s are among Rameau's most highly regarded works. However, the composer followed them with six years of silence, in which the only work he produced was a new version of Dardanus (1744). The reason for this interval in the composer's creative life is unknown, although it is possible he had a falling-out with the authorities at the Académie royale de la musique.
The year 1745 was a turning point in Rameau's career. He received several commissions from the court for works to celebrate the French victory at the Battle of Fontenoy and the marriage of the Dauphin to Infanta Maria Teresa Rafaela of Spain. Rameau produced his most important comic opera, Platée, as well as two collaborations with Voltaire: the opéra-ballet Le temple de la gloire and the comédie-ballet La princesse de Navarre. They gained Rameau official recognition; he was granted the title "Compositeur du Cabinet du Roi" and given a substantial pension. 1745 also saw the beginning of the bitter enmity between Rameau and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Though best known today as a thinker, Rousseau had ambitions to be a composer. He had written an opera, Les muses galantes (inspired by Rameau's Indes galantes), but Rameau was unimpressed by this musical tribute. At the end of 1745, Voltaire and Rameau, who were busy on other works, commissioned Rousseau to turn La Princesse de Navarre into a new opera, with linking recitative, called Les fêtes de Ramire. Rousseau then claimed the two had stolen the credit for the words and music he had contributed, though musicologists have been able to identify almost nothing of the piece as Rousseau's work. Nevertheless, the embittered Rousseau nursed a grudge against Rameau for the rest of his life.
Rousseau was a major participant in the second great quarrel that erupted over Rameau's work, the so-called Querelle des Bouffons of 1752–54, which pitted French tragédie en musique against Italian opera buffa. This time, Rameau was accused of being out of date and his music too complicated in comparison with the simplicity and "naturalness" of a work like Pergolesi's La serva padrona. In the mid-1750s, Rameau criticised Rousseau's contributions to the musical articles in the Encyclopédie, which led to a quarrel with the leading philosophes d'Alembert and Diderot. As a result, Jean-François Rameau became a character in Diderot's then-unpublished dialogue, Le neveu de Rameau (Rameau's Nephew).
In 1753, La Poupelinière took a scheming musician, Jeanne-Thérèse Goermans, as his mistress. The daughter of harpsichord maker Jacques Goermans, she went by the name of Madame de Saint-Aubin, and her opportunistic husband pushed her into the arms of the rich financier. She had La Poupelinière engage the services of the Bohemian composer Johann Stamitz, who succeeded Rameau after a breach developed between Rameau and his patron; however, by then, Rameau no longer needed La Poupelinière's financial support and protection.
Rameau pursued his activities as a theorist and composer until his death. He lived with his wife and two of his children in his large suite of rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, which he would leave every day, lost in thought, to take a solitary walk in the nearby gardens of the Palais-Royal or the Tuileries. Sometimes he would meet the young writer Chabanon, who noted some of Rameau's disillusioned confidential remarks: "Day by day, I'm acquiring more good taste, but I no longer have any genius" and "The imagination is worn out in my old head; it's not wise at this age wanting to practise arts that are nothing but imagination."
Rameau composed prolifically in the late 1740s and early 1750s. After that, his rate of productivity dropped off, probably due to old age and ill health, although he was still able to write another comic opera, Les Paladins, in 1760. This was due to be followed by a final tragédie en musique, Les Boréades; but for unknown reasons, the opera was never produced and had to wait until the late 20th century for a proper staging. Rameau died on 12 September 1764 after suffering from a fever, thirteen days before his 81st birthday. At his bedside, he objected to a song sung. His last words were, "What the devil do you mean to sing to me, priest? You are out of tune." He was buried in the church of St. Eustache, Paris on the same day of his death. Although a bronze bust and red marble tombstone were erected in his memory there by the Société de la Compositeurs de Musique in 1883, the exact site of his burial remains unknown to this day.
Rameau's personality
While the details of his biography are vague and fragmentary, the details of Rameau's personal and family life are almost completely obscure. Rameau's music, so graceful and attractive, completely contradicts the man's public image and what we know of his character as described (or perhaps unfairly caricatured) by Diderot in his satirical novel Le Neveu de Rameau. Throughout his life, music was his consuming passion. It occupied his entire thinking; Philippe Beaussant calls him a monomaniac. Piron explained that "His heart and soul were in his harpsichord; once he had shut its lid, there was no one home." Physically, Rameau was tall and exceptionally thin, as can be seen by the sketches we have of him, including a famous portrait by Carmontelle. He had a "loud voice." His speech was difficult to understand, just like his handwriting, which was never fluent. As a man, he was secretive, solitary, irritable, proud of his own achievements (more as a theorist than as a composer), brusque with those who contradicted him, and quick to anger. It is difficult to imagine him among the leading wits, including Voltaire (to whom he bears more than a passing physical resemblance), who frequented La Poupelinière's salon; his music was his passport, and it made up for his lack of social graces.
His enemies exaggerated his faults; e.g. his supposed miserliness. In fact, it seems that his thriftiness was the result of long years spent in obscurity (when his income was uncertain and scanty) rather than part of his character, because he could also be generous. He helped his nephew Jean-François when he came to Paris and also helped establish the career of Claude-Bénigne Balbastre in the capital. Furthermore, he gave his daughter Marie-Louise a considerable dowry when she became a Visitandine nun in 1750, and he paid a pension to one of his sisters when she became ill. Financial security came late to him, following the success of his stage works and the grant of a royal pension (a few months before his death, he was also ennobled and made a knight of the Ordre de Saint-Michel). But he did not change his way of life, keeping his worn-out clothes, his single pair of shoes, and his old furniture. After his death, it was discovered that he only possessed one dilapidated single-keyboard harpsichord in his rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, yet he also had a bag containing 1691 gold louis.
Music
General character of Rameau's music
Rameau's music is characterised by the exceptional technical knowledge of a composer who wanted above all to be renowned as a theorist of the art. Nevertheless, it is not solely addressed to the intelligence, and Rameau himself claimed, "I try to conceal art with art." The paradox of this music was that it was new, using techniques never known before, but it took place within the framework of old-fashioned forms. Rameau appeared revolutionary to the Lullyistes, disturbed by complex harmony of his music; and reactionary to the "philosophes," who only paid attention to its content and who either would not or could not listen to the sound it made. The incomprehension Rameau received from his contemporaries stopped him from repeating such daring experiments as the second Trio des Parques in Hippolyte et Aricie, which he was forced to remove after a handful of performances because the singers had been either unable or unwilling to execute it correctly.
Rameau's musical works
Rameau's musical works may be divided into four distinct groups, which differ greatly in importance: a few cantatas; a few motets for large chorus; some pieces for solo harpsichord or harpsichord accompanied by other instruments; and, finally, his works for the stage, to which he dedicated the last thirty years of his career almost exclusively. Like most of his contemporaries, Rameau often reused melodies that had been particularly successful, but never without meticulously adapting them; they are not simple transcriptions. Besides, no borrowings have been found from other composers, although his earliest works show the influence of other music. Rameau's reworkings of his own material are numerous; e.g., in Les Fêtes d'Hébé, we find L'Entretien des Muses, the Musette, and the Tambourin, taken from the 1724 book of harpsichord pieces, as well as an aria from the cantata Le Berger Fidèle.
Motets
For at least 26 years, Rameau was a professional organist in the service of religious institutions, and yet the body of sacred music he composed is exceptionally small and his organ works nonexistent. Judging by the evidence, it was not his favourite field, but rather, simply a way of making reasonable money. Rameau's few religious compositions are nevertheless remarkable and compare favourably to the works of specialists in the area. Only four motets have been attributed to Rameau with any certainty: Deus noster refugium, In convertendo, Quam dilecta, and Laboravi.
Cantatas
The cantata was a highly successful genre in the early 18th century. The French cantata, which should not be confused with the Italian or the German cantata, was "invented" in 1706 by the poet Jean-Baptiste Rousseau and soon taken up by many famous composers of the day, such as Montéclair, Campra, and Clérambault. Cantatas were Rameau's first contact with dramatic music. The modest forces the cantata required meant it was a genre within the reach of a composer who was still unknown. Musicologists can only guess at the dates of Rameau's six surviving cantatas, and the names of the librettists are unknown.
Instrumental music
Along with François Couperin, Rameau was a master of the 18th-century French school of harpsichord music, and both made a break with the style of the first generation of harpsichordists whose compositions adhered to the relatively standardised suite form, which had reached its apogee in the first decade of the 18th century and successive collections of pieces by Louis Marchand, Gaspard Le Roux, Louis-Nicolas Clérambault, Jean-François Dandrieu, Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, Charles Dieupart and Nicolas Siret. Rameau and Couperin had different styles, and it seems they did not know one another: Couperin was one of the official court musicians; Rameau, fifteen years his junior, achieved fame only after Couperin's death.
Rameau published his first book of harpsichord pieces in 1706. (Cf. Couperin, who waited until 1713 before publishing his first "Ordres.") Rameau's music includes pieces in the pure tradition of the French suite: imitative ("Le rappel des oiseaux," "La poule") and characterful ("Les tendres plaintes," "L'entretien des Muses"). But there are also works of pure virtuosity that resemble Domenico Scarlatti ("Les tourbillons," "Les trois mains") as well as pieces that reveal the experiments of a theorist and musical innovator ("L'enharmonique," "Les Cyclopes"), which had a marked influence on Louis-Claude Daquin, Joseph-Nicolas-Pancrace Royer and Jacques Duphly. Rameau's suites are grouped in the traditional way, by key. The first set of dances (Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, Les Trois Mains, Fanfairenette, La Triomphante, Gavotte et 6 doubles) is centred on A major and A minor, while the remaining pieces (Les tricoteuses, L'Indifferente, Première Menuet, Deuxième Menuet, La Poule, Les Triolets, Les Sauvages, L'Enharmonique, L'Egiptienne [sic]) are centred around G major and G minor.
Rameau's second and third collections appeared in 1724 and 1727. After these he composed only one piece for the harpsichord, the eight-minute "La Dauphine" of 1747, while the very short "Les petits marteaux" (c. 1750) has also been attributed to him.
During his semiretirement (1740 to 1744) he wrote the Pièces de clavecin en concert (1741), which some musicologists consider the pinnacle of French Baroque chamber music. Adopting a formula successfully employed by Mondonville a few years earlier, Rameau fashioned these pieces differently from trio sonatas in that the harpsichord is not simply there as basso continuo to accompany melody instruments (violin, flute, viol) but as equal partner in "concert" with them. Rameau claimed that this music would be equally satisfying played on the harpsichord alone, but the claim is not wholly convincing because he took the trouble to transcribe five of them himself, those the lack of other instruments would show the least.
Opera
After 1733 Rameau dedicated himself mostly to opera. On a strictly musical level, 18th-century French Baroque opera is richer and more varied than contemporary Italian opera, especially in the place given to choruses and dances but also in the musical continuity that arises from the respective relationships between the arias and the recitatives. Another essential difference: whereas Italian opera gave a starring role to female sopranos and castrati, French opera had no use for the latter. The Italian opera of Rameau's day (opera seria, opera buffa) was essentially divided into musical sections (da capo arias, duets, trios, etc.) and sections that were spoken or almost spoken (recitativo secco). It was during the latter that the action progressed while the audience waited for the next aria; on the other hand, the text of the arias was almost entirely buried beneath music whose chief aim was to show off the virtuosity of the singer. Nothing of the kind is to be found in French opera of the day; since Lully, the text had to remain comprehensible—limiting certain techniques such as the vocalise, which was reserved for special words such as ("glory") or ("victory"). A subtle equilibrium existed between the more and the less musical parts: melodic recitative on the one hand and arias that were often closer to arioso on the other, alongside virtuoso "ariettes" in the Italian style. This form of continuous music prefigures Wagnerian drama even more than does the "reform" opera of Gluck.
Five essential components may be discerned in Rameau's operatic scores:
Pieces of "pure" music (overtures, ritornelli, music which closes scenes). Unlike the highly stereotyped Lullian overture, Rameau's overtures show an extraordinary variety. Even in his earliest works, where he uses the standard French model, Rameau—the born symphonist and master of orchestration—composes novel and unique pieces. A few pieces are particularly striking, such as the overture to Zaïs, depicting the chaos before the creation of the universe, that of Pigmalion, suggesting the sculptor's chipping away at the statue with his mallet, or many more conventional depictions of storms and earthquakes, as well perhaps as the imposing final chaconnes of Les Indes galantes or Dardanus.
Dance music: the danced interludes, which were obligatory even in tragédie en musique, allowed Rameau to give free rein to his inimitable sense of rhythm, melody, and choreography, acknowledged by all his contemporaries, including the dancers themselves. This "learned" composer, forever preoccupied by his next theoretical work, also was one who strung together gavottes, minuets, loures, rigaudons, passepieds, tambourins, and musettes by the dozen. According to his biographer, Cuthbert Girdlestone, "The immense superiority of all that pertains to Rameau in choreography still needs emphasizing," and the German scholar H.W. von Walthershausen affirmed:
Rameau was the greatest ballet composer of all times. The genius of his creation rests on one hand on his perfect artistic permeation by folk-dance types, on the other hand on the constant preservation of living contact with the practical requirements of the ballet stage, which prevented an estrangement between the expression of the body from the spirit of absolute music.
Choruses: Padre Martini, the erudite musicologist who corresponded with Rameau, affirmed that "the French are excellent at choruses," obviously thinking of Rameau himself. A great master of harmony, Rameau knew how to compose sumptuous choruses—whether monodic, polyphonic, or interspersed with passages for solo singers or the orchestra—and whatever feelings needed to be expressed.
Arias: less frequent than in Italian opera, Rameau nevertheless offers many striking examples. Particularly admired arias include Télaïre's "Tristes apprêts," from Castor et Pollux; "Ô jour affreux" and "Lieux funestes," from Dardanus; Huascar's invocations in Les Indes galantes; and the final ariette in Pigmalion. In Platée we encounter a showstopping ars poetica aria for the character of La Folie (the madness), "Formons les plus brillants concerts / Aux langeurs d'Apollon".
Recitative: much closer to arioso than to recitativo secco. The composer took scrupulous care to observe French prosody and used his harmonic knowledge to give expression to his protagonists' feelings.
During the first part of his operatic career (1733–1739), Rameau wrote his great masterpieces destined for the Académie royale de musique: three tragédies en musique and two opéra-ballets that still form the core of his repertoire. After the interval of 1740 to 1744, he became the official court musician, and for the most part, composed pieces intended to entertain, with plenty of dance music emphasising sensuality and an idealised pastoral atmosphere. In his last years, Rameau returned to a renewed version of his early style in Les Paladins and Les Boréades.
His Zoroastre was first performed in 1749. According to one of Rameau's admirers, Cuthbert Girdlestone, this opera has a distinctive place in his works: "The profane passions of hatred and jealousy are rendered more intensely [than in his other works] and with a strong sense of reality."
Rameau and his librettists
Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zaïs (1748), Naïs (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacréon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boréades (c. 1763).
Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupelinière's salon, at the Société du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day.
Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760).
Reputation and influence
By the end of his life, Rameau's music had come under attack in France from theorists who favoured Italian models. However, foreign composers working in the Italian tradition were increasingly looking towards Rameau as a way of reforming their own leading operatic genre, opera seria. Tommaso Traetta produced two operas setting translations of Rameau libretti that show the French composer's influence, Ippolito ed Aricia (1759) and I Tintaridi (based on Castor et Pollux, 1760). Traetta had been advised by Count Francesco Algarotti, a leading proponent of reform according to French models; Algarotti was a major influence on the most important "reformist" composer, Christoph Willibald Gluck. Gluck's three Italian reform operas of the 1760s—Orfeo ed Euridice, Alceste, and Paride ed Elena—reveal a knowledge of Rameau's works. For instance, both Orfeo and the 1737 version of Castor et Pollux open with the funeral of one of the leading characters who later comes back to life. Many of the operatic reforms advocated in the preface to Gluck's Alceste were already present in Rameau's works. Rameau had used accompanied recitatives, and the overtures in his later operas reflected the action to come, so when Gluck arrived in Paris in 1774 to produce a series of six French operas, he could be seen as continuing in the tradition of Rameau. Nevertheless, while Gluck's popularity survived the French Revolution, Rameau's did not. By the end of the 18th century, his operas had vanished from the repertoire.
For most of the 19th century, Rameau's music remained unplayed, known only by reputation. Hector Berlioz investigated Castor et Pollux and particularly admired the aria "Tristes apprêts," but "whereas the modern listener readily perceives the common ground with Berlioz' music, he himself was more conscious of the gap which separated them." French humiliation in the Franco-Prussian War brought about a change in Rameau's fortunes. As Rameau biographer J. Malignon wrote, "...the German victory over France in 1870–71 was the grand occasion for digging up great heroes from the French past. Rameau, like so many others, was flung into the enemy's face to bolster our courage and our faith in the national destiny of France." In 1894, composer Vincent d'Indy founded the Schola Cantorum to promote French national music; the society put on several revivals of works by Rameau. Among the audience was Claude Debussy, who especially cherished Castor et Pollux, revived in 1903: "Gluck's genius was deeply rooted in Rameau's works... a detailed comparison allows us to affirm that Gluck could replace Rameau on the French stage only by assimilating the latter's beautiful works and making them his own." Camille Saint-Saëns (by editing and publishing the Pièces in 1895) and Paul Dukas were two other important French musicians who gave practical championship to Rameau's music in their day, but interest in Rameau petered out again, and it was not until the late 20th century that a serious effort was made to revive his works. Over half of Rameau's operas have now been recorded, in particular by conductors such as John Eliot Gardiner, William Christie, and Marc Minkowski.
One of his pieces is commonly heard in the Victoria Centre in Nottingham by the Rowland Emett timepiece, the Aqua Horological Tintinnabulator. Emett quoted that Rameau made music for his school and the shopping centre without him knowing it.
Theoretical works
Treatise on Harmony, 1722
Rameau's 1722 Treatise on Harmony initiated a revolution in music theory. Rameau posited the discovery of the "fundamental law" or what he referred to as the "fundamental bass" of all Western music. Heavily influenced by new Cartesian modes of thought and analysis, Rameau's methodology incorporated mathematics, commentary, analysis and a didacticism that was specifically intended to illuminate, scientifically, the structure and principles of music. With careful deductive reasoning, he attempted to derive universal harmonic principles from natural causes. Previous treatises on harmony had been purely practical; Rameau embraced the new philosophical rationalism, quickly rising to prominence in France as the "Isaac Newton of Music." His fame subsequently spread throughout all Europe, and his Treatise became the definitive authority on music theory, forming the foundation for instruction in western music that persists to this day.
List of works
RCT numbering refers to Rameau Catalogue Thématique established by Sylvie Bouissou and Denis Herlin.
Instrumental works
Pièces de clavecin. Trois livres. "Pieces for harpsichord", 3 books, published 1706, 1724, 1726/27(?).
RCT 1 – Premier livre de Clavecin (1706)
RCT 2 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in E minor
RCT 3 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in D major
RCT 4 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Menuet in C major
RCT 5 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in A minor
RCT 6 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in G
Pieces de Clavecin en Concerts Five albums of character pieces for harpsichord, violin and viol. (1741)
RCT 7 – Concert I in C minor
RCT 8 – Concert II in G major
RCT 9 – Concert III in A major
RCT 10 – Concert IV in B flat major
RCT 11 – Concert V in D minor
RCT 12 – La Dauphine for harpsichord. (1747)
RCT 12bis – Les petits marteaux for harpsichord.
Several orchestral dance suites extracted from his operas.
Motets
RCT 13 – Deus noster refugium (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 14 – In convertendo (probably before 1720, rev. 1751)
RCT 15 – Quam dilecta (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 16 – Laboravi (published in the Traité de l'harmonie, 1722)
Canons
RCT 17 – Ah! loin de rire, pleurons (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) (pub. 1722)
RCT 18 – Avec du vin, endormons-nous (2 sopranos, Tenor) (1719)
RCT 18bis – L'épouse entre deux draps (3 sopranos) (formerly attributed to François Couperin)
RCT 18ter – Je suis un fou Madame (3 voix égales) (1720)
RCT 19 – Mes chers amis, quittez vos rouges bords (3 sopranos, 3 basses) (pub. 1780)
RCT 20 – Réveillez-vous, dormeur sans fin (5 voix égales) (pub. 1722)
RCT 20bis – Si tu ne prends garde à toi (2 sopranos, bass) (1720)
Songs
RCT 21.1 – L'amante préoccupée or A l'objet que j'adore (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.2 – Lucas, pour se gausser de nous (soprano, bass, continuo) (pub. 1707)
RCT 21.3 – Non, non, le dieu qui sait aimer (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.4 – Un Bourbon ouvre sa carrière or Un héros ouvre sa carrière (alto, continuo) (1751, air belonging to Acante et Céphise but censored before its first performance and never reintroduced in the work).
Cantatas
RCT 23 – Aquilon et Orithie (between 1715 and 1720)
RCT 28 – Thétis (same period)
RCT 26 – L’impatience (same period)
RCT 22 – Les amants trahis (around 1720)
RCT 27 – Orphée (same period)
RCT 24 – Le berger fidèle (1728)
RCT 25 – Cantate pour le jour de la Saint Louis (1740)
Operas and stage works
Tragédies en musique
RCT 43 – Hippolyte et Aricie (1733; revised 1742 and 1757)
RCT 32 – Castor et Pollux (1737; revised 1754)
RCT 35 – Dardanus (1739; revised 1744 and 1760), score
RCT 62 – Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756, with new music for Acts II, III & V)
RCT 31 – Les Boréades or Abaris (unperformed; in rehearsal 1763)
Opéra-ballets
RCT 44 – Les Indes galantes (1735; revised 1736)
RCT 41 – Les fêtes d'Hébé or les Talens Lyriques (1739)
RCT 39 – Les fêtes de Polymnie (1745)
RCT 59 – Le temple de la gloire (1745; revised 1746)
RCT 38 – Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour or Les Dieux d'Egypte (1747)
RCT 58 – Les surprises de l'Amour (1748; revised 1757)
Pastorales héroïques
RCT 60 – Zaïs (1748)
RCT 49 – Naïs (1749)
RCT 29 – Acante et Céphise or La sympathie (1751)
RCT 34 – Daphnis et Eglé (1753)
Comédies lyriques
RCT 53 – Platée or Junon jalouse (1745), score
RCT 51 – Les Paladins or Le Vénitien (1760)
Comédie-ballet
RCT 54 – La princesse de Navarre (1744)
Actes de ballet
RCT 33 – Les courses de Tempé (1734)
RCT 40 – Les fêtes de Ramire (1745)
RCT 52 – Pigmalion (1748)
RCT 42 – La guirlande or Les fleurs enchantées (1751)
RCT 57 – Les sibarites or Sibaris (1753)
RCT 48 – La naissance d'Osiris or La Fête Pamilie (1754)
RCT 30 – Anacréon (1754)
RCT 58 – Anacréon (completely different work from the above, 1757, 3rd Entrée of Les surprises de l'Amour)
RCT 61 – Zéphire (date unknown)
RCT 50 – Nélée et Myrthis (date unknown)
RCT 45 – Io (unfinished, date unknown)
Lost works
RCT 56 – Samson (tragédie en musique) (first version written 1733–1734; second version 1736; neither were ever staged )
RCT 46 – Linus (tragédie en musique) (1751, score stolen after a rehearsal)
RCT 47 – Lisis et Délie (pastorale) (scheduled on November 6, 1753)
Incidental music for opéras comiques
Music mostly lost.
RCT 36 – L'endriague (in 3 acts, 1723)
RCT 37 – L'enrôlement d'Arlequin (in 1 act, 1726)
RCT 55 – La robe de dissension or Le faux prodige (in 2 acts, 1726)
RCT 55bis – La rose or Les jardins de l'Hymen (in a prologue and 1 act, 1744)
Writings
Traité de l'harmonie réduite à ses principes naturels (Paris, 1722)
Nouveau système de musique théorique (Paris, 1726)
Dissertation sur les différents méthodes d'accompagnement pour le clavecin, ou pour l'orgue (Paris, 1732)
Génération harmonique, ou Traité de musique théorique et pratique (Paris, 1737)
Mémoire où l'on expose les fondemens du Système de musique théorique et pratique de M. Rameau (1749)
Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1750)
Nouvelles réflexions de M. Rameau sur sa 'Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1752)
Observations sur notre instinct pour la musique (Paris, 1754)
Erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1755)
Suite des erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1756)
Reponse de M. Rameau à MM. les editeurs de l'Encyclopédie sur leur dernier Avertissement (Paris, 1757)
Nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (1758–9)
Code de musique pratique, ou Méthodes pour apprendre la musique...avec des nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (Paris, 1760)
Lettre à M. Alembert sur ses opinions en musique (Paris, 1760)
Origine des sciences, suivie d'un controverse sur le même sujet (Paris, 1762)
See also
Querelle des Bouffons
ReferencesNotesSourcesBeaussant, Philippe, Rameau de A à Z (Fayard, 1983)
Gibbons, William. Building the Operatic Museum: Eighteenth-Century Opera in Fin-de-siècle Paris (University of Rochester Press, 2013)
Girdlestone, Cuthbert, Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Dover paperback edition, 1969)
Holden, Amanda, (Ed) The Viking Opera Guide (Viking, 1993)
Sadler, Graham, (Ed.), The New Grove French Baroque Masters (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)
Trowbridge, Simon, Rameau (2nd edition, Englance Press, 2017)
F. Annunziata, Una Tragédie Lyrique nel Secolo dei Lumi. Abaris ou Les Boréades di Jean Philippe Rameau, https://www.academia.edu/6100318
External links
(en) Gavotte with Doubles Hypermedia by Jeff Hall & Tim Smith at the BinAural Collaborative Hypertext – Shockwave Player required – ("Gavotte with Doubles" link NG)
(en) jp.rameau.free.fr Rameau – Le Site
(fr) musicologie.org Biography, List of Works, bibliography, discography, theoretical writings, in French
(en) Jean-Philippe Rameau / Discography
Magnatune Les Cyclopes by Rameau in on-line mp3 format (played by Trevor Pinnock)
Jean-Philippe Rameau, "L'Orchestre de Louis XV" – Suites d'Orchestre, Le Concert des Nations, dir. Jordi Savall, Alia Vox, AVSA 9882Sheet music'''
Rameau free sheet music from the Mutopia Project
1683 births
1764 deaths
18th-century classical composers
18th-century French composers
18th-century French male musicians
Composers awarded knighthoods
Composers for harpsichord
French Baroque composers
French ballet composers
French opera composers
French male classical composers
French male non-fiction writers
French music theorists
Male opera composers
People from Dijon
Burials at Saint-Eustache, Paris
17th-century male musicians | true | [
"is the second studio album by singer and cellist Kanon Wakeshima. The song \"Toumei no Kagi\" was released as a digital download prior to the release of the album on September 16, 2009. The song was used as the theme song of the online game Avalon no Kagi. A promotional music video for the song \"Lolitawork Libretto ~Storytelling by Solita~\" was also released prior to the album.\n\nThe album charted at No. 83 on the Oricon Albums Charts and only charted for one week.\n\nThe official full title of the album is \"Lolitawork Libretto: A Libretto on What Makes a Girl Work\".\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel\n Kanon Wakeshima – Vocals, Cello, Piano, Lyrics\n\nReferences \n\n2010 albums\nNeoclassical albums",
"The Libretto is a line of subnotebook computers that was designed and produced by Toshiba. The line was distinguished by its combination of functionality and small size, squeezing a full Windows PC into a device the size of a paperback book. The first Libretto model, the Libretto 20, was released on April 17, 1996 (in Japan only), with a volume of and weighing just , making it by far, the world's smallest commercially available Windows PC at the time, and a trend the Libretto Range continued for many years. The original Libretto line was discontinued in Europe and the U.S. in 1999, but the production continued in Japan with the SS, FF and then the L series until 2002. The first L series Libretto (The L1) was released on 18 May 2001 (in Japan only) and the last (The L5) just 11 Months later on 24 April 2002. Production of all Librettos ceased from 2002 until the release of the Libretto U100 in 2005.\n\nIt was a further five years before the Libretto returned again in 2010 with the limited-edition W100 model, a dual-screen tablet.\n\nModels\n\nThere were many different models. The first Libretto models, the L20 & L30 used 486 processors from Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) and were only available in Japan (Although the L30 was also assembled and Marketed in South Korea under the Comos Brand name). Beginning with the Libretto 50, Toshiba used the Intel Pentium and later Pentium MMX processors. With the introduction of the L series in 2001, a move was made to the Transmeta Crusoe processor. The U100 of 2005 saw a return to Intel with the use of the Pentium M processor.\n\nThe following models were available:\n\nIn 2001, Toshiba released the L series range of Librettos. This was the first major change of footprint since the range was first introduced and represented a significant improvement in performance over the previous models, however it also represented a significant increase in overall size. The L series had moved the Libretto range away from what was a UMPC, to that of an early Netbook.\n\nThe L1 had built-in USB and IEEE1394 Firewire. The L2 dropped the IEEE1394 in favor of an Ethernet port. The L5 was optionally available with built-in Wifi 802.11b. All models featured a widescreen display with the unusual resolution of 1280×600 pixels.\n\nLike the majority of Librettos models produced, the L series were not officially available outside Japan.\n\nIn 2005, Toshiba announced a new model, the Libretto U100:\n\nAll three of the above were essentially the same machine but with different options. The U100 was available in Europe in these variants:\n\n 30 GB HDD (with Win XP Home)\n 60 GB HDD (with XP Pro), both versions included the DVD dock\n In Japan the clock speed was only 1.1 GHz\n In some markets the DVD dock was an optional or bundled accessory\n\nIn 2010, Toshiba announced a new Tablet Libretto model, the W100:\n\nThe W100 was released in August 2010, as a limited-edition model and was only available for a short time. It was available in both English and Japanese versions. There is no VGA port on the W100, the keyboard is virtual (standard, split, or 10-key numeric). The display can be viewed in portrait or landscape mode, though portrait is limited to one direction of change. The case has metal top.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nlibretto (world's first dual-screen laptop)\nToshiba Libretto – Toshiba's information page on the new Libretto\nLibretto World – Regularly updated Libretto site with forum\nCNET Comparison of Latest Libretto Models\nToshiba Libretto W100-U7310 Description and specification Details\nToshiba Libretto 100/110ct – Much information on these models\nToshiba Libretto 100/110CT with 96MB RAM\nToshiba Libretto Information Page – Contains a Libretto FAQ\n\nLibretto\nComputer-related introductions in 1996\nSubnotebooks"
]
|
[
"Jean-Philippe Rameau",
"Rameau and his librettists",
"What is a librettist?",
"librettists managed to produce a libretto",
"What is a libretto?",
"operas,"
]
| C_6affd0880c764e209d1d4aabc61ddb69_0 | How was Rameau's relation with his librettists? | 3 | How was Jean-Philippe Rameau's relation with his librettists? | Jean-Philippe Rameau | Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacreon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boreades (c. 1763). Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupliniere's salon, at the Societe du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day. Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760). CANNOTANSWER | Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. | Jean-Philippe Rameau (; – ) was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the 18th century. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer of his time for the harpsichord, alongside François Couperin.
Little is known about Rameau's early years. It was not until the 1720s that he won fame as a major theorist of music with his Treatise on Harmony (1722) and also in the following years as a composer of masterpieces for the harpsichord, which circulated throughout Europe. He was almost 50 before he embarked on the operatic career on which his reputation chiefly rests today. His debut, Hippolyte et Aricie (1733), caused a great stir and was fiercely attacked by the supporters of Lully's style of music for its revolutionary use of harmony. Nevertheless, Rameau's pre-eminence in the field of French opera was soon acknowledged, and he was later attacked as an "establishment" composer by those who favoured Italian opera during the controversy known as the Querelle des Bouffons in the 1750s. Rameau's music had gone out of fashion by the end of the 18th century, and it was not until the 20th that serious efforts were made to revive it. Today, he enjoys renewed appreciation with performances and recordings of his music ever more frequent.
Life
The details of Rameau's life are generally obscure, especially concerning his first forty years, before he moved to Paris for good. He was a secretive man, and even his wife knew nothing of his early life, which explains the scarcity of biographical information available.
Early years, 1683–1732
Rameau's early years are particularly obscure. He was born on 25 September 1683 in Dijon, and baptised the same day. His father, Jean, worked as an organist in several churches around Dijon, and his mother, Claudine Demartinécourt, was the daughter of a notary. The couple had eleven children (five girls and six boys), of whom Jean-Philippe was the seventh.
Rameau was taught music before he could read or write. He was educated at the Jesuit college at Godrans, but he was not a good pupil and disrupted classes with his singing, later claiming that his passion for opera had begun at the age of twelve. Initially intended for the law, Rameau decided he wanted to be a musician, and his father sent him to Italy, where he stayed for a short while in Milan. On his return, he worked as a violinist in travelling companies and then as an organist in provincial cathedrals before moving to Paris for the first time. Here, in 1706, he published his earliest known compositions: the harpsichord works that make up his first book of Pièces de Clavecin, which show the influence of his friend Louis Marchand.
In 1709, he moved back to Dijon to take over his father's job as organist in the main church. The contract was for six years, but Rameau left before then and took up similar posts in Lyon and Clermont-Ferrand. During this period, he composed motets for church performance as well as secular cantatas.
In 1722, he returned to Paris for good, and here he published his most important work of music theory, Traité de l'harmonie (Treatise on Harmony). This soon won him a great reputation, and it was followed in 1726 by his Nouveau système de musique théorique. In 1724 and 1729 (or 1730), he also published two more collections of harpsichord pieces.
Rameau took his first tentative steps into composing stage music when the writer Alexis Piron asked him to provide songs for his popular comic plays written for the Paris Fairs. Four collaborations followed, beginning with L'endriague in 1723; none of the music has survived.
On 25 February 1726 Rameau married the 19-year-old Marie-Louise Mangot, who came from a musical family from Lyon and was a good singer and instrumentalist. The couple would have four children, two boys and two girls, and the marriage is said to have been a happy one.
In spite of his fame as a music theorist, Rameau had trouble finding a post as an organist in Paris.
Later years, 1733–1764
It was not until he was approaching 50 that Rameau decided to embark on the operatic career on which his fame as a composer mainly rests. He had already approached writer Antoine Houdar de la Motte for a libretto in 1727, but nothing came of it; he was finally inspired to try his hand at the prestigious genre of tragédie en musique after seeing Montéclair's Jephté in 1732. Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie premiered at the Académie Royale de Musique on 1 October 1733. It was immediately recognised as the most significant opera to appear in France since the death of Lully, but audiences were split over whether this was a good thing or a bad thing. Some, such as the composer André Campra, were stunned by its originality and wealth of invention; others found its harmonic innovations discordant and saw the work as an attack on the French musical tradition. The two camps, the so-called Lullyistes and the Rameauneurs, fought a pamphlet war over the issue for the rest of the decade.
Just before this time, Rameau had made the acquaintance of the powerful financier Alexandre Le Riche de La Poupelinière, who became his patron until 1753. La Poupelinière's mistress (and later, wife), Thérèse des Hayes, was Rameau's pupil and a great admirer of his music. In 1731, Rameau became the conductor of La Poupelinière's private orchestra, which was of an extremely high quality. He held the post for 22 years; he was succeeded by Johann Stamitz and then François-Joseph Gossec. La Poupelinière's salon enabled Rameau to meet some of the leading cultural figures of the day, including Voltaire, who soon began collaborating with the composer. Their first project, the tragédie en musique Samson, was abandoned because an opera on a religious theme by Voltaire—a notorious critic of the Church—was likely to be banned by the authorities. Meanwhile, Rameau had introduced his new musical style into the lighter genre of the opéra-ballet with the highly successful Les Indes galantes. It was followed by two tragédies en musique, Castor et Pollux (1737) and Dardanus (1739), and another opéra-ballet, Les fêtes d'Hébé (also 1739). All these operas of the 1730s are among Rameau's most highly regarded works. However, the composer followed them with six years of silence, in which the only work he produced was a new version of Dardanus (1744). The reason for this interval in the composer's creative life is unknown, although it is possible he had a falling-out with the authorities at the Académie royale de la musique.
The year 1745 was a turning point in Rameau's career. He received several commissions from the court for works to celebrate the French victory at the Battle of Fontenoy and the marriage of the Dauphin to Infanta Maria Teresa Rafaela of Spain. Rameau produced his most important comic opera, Platée, as well as two collaborations with Voltaire: the opéra-ballet Le temple de la gloire and the comédie-ballet La princesse de Navarre. They gained Rameau official recognition; he was granted the title "Compositeur du Cabinet du Roi" and given a substantial pension. 1745 also saw the beginning of the bitter enmity between Rameau and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Though best known today as a thinker, Rousseau had ambitions to be a composer. He had written an opera, Les muses galantes (inspired by Rameau's Indes galantes), but Rameau was unimpressed by this musical tribute. At the end of 1745, Voltaire and Rameau, who were busy on other works, commissioned Rousseau to turn La Princesse de Navarre into a new opera, with linking recitative, called Les fêtes de Ramire. Rousseau then claimed the two had stolen the credit for the words and music he had contributed, though musicologists have been able to identify almost nothing of the piece as Rousseau's work. Nevertheless, the embittered Rousseau nursed a grudge against Rameau for the rest of his life.
Rousseau was a major participant in the second great quarrel that erupted over Rameau's work, the so-called Querelle des Bouffons of 1752–54, which pitted French tragédie en musique against Italian opera buffa. This time, Rameau was accused of being out of date and his music too complicated in comparison with the simplicity and "naturalness" of a work like Pergolesi's La serva padrona. In the mid-1750s, Rameau criticised Rousseau's contributions to the musical articles in the Encyclopédie, which led to a quarrel with the leading philosophes d'Alembert and Diderot. As a result, Jean-François Rameau became a character in Diderot's then-unpublished dialogue, Le neveu de Rameau (Rameau's Nephew).
In 1753, La Poupelinière took a scheming musician, Jeanne-Thérèse Goermans, as his mistress. The daughter of harpsichord maker Jacques Goermans, she went by the name of Madame de Saint-Aubin, and her opportunistic husband pushed her into the arms of the rich financier. She had La Poupelinière engage the services of the Bohemian composer Johann Stamitz, who succeeded Rameau after a breach developed between Rameau and his patron; however, by then, Rameau no longer needed La Poupelinière's financial support and protection.
Rameau pursued his activities as a theorist and composer until his death. He lived with his wife and two of his children in his large suite of rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, which he would leave every day, lost in thought, to take a solitary walk in the nearby gardens of the Palais-Royal or the Tuileries. Sometimes he would meet the young writer Chabanon, who noted some of Rameau's disillusioned confidential remarks: "Day by day, I'm acquiring more good taste, but I no longer have any genius" and "The imagination is worn out in my old head; it's not wise at this age wanting to practise arts that are nothing but imagination."
Rameau composed prolifically in the late 1740s and early 1750s. After that, his rate of productivity dropped off, probably due to old age and ill health, although he was still able to write another comic opera, Les Paladins, in 1760. This was due to be followed by a final tragédie en musique, Les Boréades; but for unknown reasons, the opera was never produced and had to wait until the late 20th century for a proper staging. Rameau died on 12 September 1764 after suffering from a fever, thirteen days before his 81st birthday. At his bedside, he objected to a song sung. His last words were, "What the devil do you mean to sing to me, priest? You are out of tune." He was buried in the church of St. Eustache, Paris on the same day of his death. Although a bronze bust and red marble tombstone were erected in his memory there by the Société de la Compositeurs de Musique in 1883, the exact site of his burial remains unknown to this day.
Rameau's personality
While the details of his biography are vague and fragmentary, the details of Rameau's personal and family life are almost completely obscure. Rameau's music, so graceful and attractive, completely contradicts the man's public image and what we know of his character as described (or perhaps unfairly caricatured) by Diderot in his satirical novel Le Neveu de Rameau. Throughout his life, music was his consuming passion. It occupied his entire thinking; Philippe Beaussant calls him a monomaniac. Piron explained that "His heart and soul were in his harpsichord; once he had shut its lid, there was no one home." Physically, Rameau was tall and exceptionally thin, as can be seen by the sketches we have of him, including a famous portrait by Carmontelle. He had a "loud voice." His speech was difficult to understand, just like his handwriting, which was never fluent. As a man, he was secretive, solitary, irritable, proud of his own achievements (more as a theorist than as a composer), brusque with those who contradicted him, and quick to anger. It is difficult to imagine him among the leading wits, including Voltaire (to whom he bears more than a passing physical resemblance), who frequented La Poupelinière's salon; his music was his passport, and it made up for his lack of social graces.
His enemies exaggerated his faults; e.g. his supposed miserliness. In fact, it seems that his thriftiness was the result of long years spent in obscurity (when his income was uncertain and scanty) rather than part of his character, because he could also be generous. He helped his nephew Jean-François when he came to Paris and also helped establish the career of Claude-Bénigne Balbastre in the capital. Furthermore, he gave his daughter Marie-Louise a considerable dowry when she became a Visitandine nun in 1750, and he paid a pension to one of his sisters when she became ill. Financial security came late to him, following the success of his stage works and the grant of a royal pension (a few months before his death, he was also ennobled and made a knight of the Ordre de Saint-Michel). But he did not change his way of life, keeping his worn-out clothes, his single pair of shoes, and his old furniture. After his death, it was discovered that he only possessed one dilapidated single-keyboard harpsichord in his rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, yet he also had a bag containing 1691 gold louis.
Music
General character of Rameau's music
Rameau's music is characterised by the exceptional technical knowledge of a composer who wanted above all to be renowned as a theorist of the art. Nevertheless, it is not solely addressed to the intelligence, and Rameau himself claimed, "I try to conceal art with art." The paradox of this music was that it was new, using techniques never known before, but it took place within the framework of old-fashioned forms. Rameau appeared revolutionary to the Lullyistes, disturbed by complex harmony of his music; and reactionary to the "philosophes," who only paid attention to its content and who either would not or could not listen to the sound it made. The incomprehension Rameau received from his contemporaries stopped him from repeating such daring experiments as the second Trio des Parques in Hippolyte et Aricie, which he was forced to remove after a handful of performances because the singers had been either unable or unwilling to execute it correctly.
Rameau's musical works
Rameau's musical works may be divided into four distinct groups, which differ greatly in importance: a few cantatas; a few motets for large chorus; some pieces for solo harpsichord or harpsichord accompanied by other instruments; and, finally, his works for the stage, to which he dedicated the last thirty years of his career almost exclusively. Like most of his contemporaries, Rameau often reused melodies that had been particularly successful, but never without meticulously adapting them; they are not simple transcriptions. Besides, no borrowings have been found from other composers, although his earliest works show the influence of other music. Rameau's reworkings of his own material are numerous; e.g., in Les Fêtes d'Hébé, we find L'Entretien des Muses, the Musette, and the Tambourin, taken from the 1724 book of harpsichord pieces, as well as an aria from the cantata Le Berger Fidèle.
Motets
For at least 26 years, Rameau was a professional organist in the service of religious institutions, and yet the body of sacred music he composed is exceptionally small and his organ works nonexistent. Judging by the evidence, it was not his favourite field, but rather, simply a way of making reasonable money. Rameau's few religious compositions are nevertheless remarkable and compare favourably to the works of specialists in the area. Only four motets have been attributed to Rameau with any certainty: Deus noster refugium, In convertendo, Quam dilecta, and Laboravi.
Cantatas
The cantata was a highly successful genre in the early 18th century. The French cantata, which should not be confused with the Italian or the German cantata, was "invented" in 1706 by the poet Jean-Baptiste Rousseau and soon taken up by many famous composers of the day, such as Montéclair, Campra, and Clérambault. Cantatas were Rameau's first contact with dramatic music. The modest forces the cantata required meant it was a genre within the reach of a composer who was still unknown. Musicologists can only guess at the dates of Rameau's six surviving cantatas, and the names of the librettists are unknown.
Instrumental music
Along with François Couperin, Rameau was a master of the 18th-century French school of harpsichord music, and both made a break with the style of the first generation of harpsichordists whose compositions adhered to the relatively standardised suite form, which had reached its apogee in the first decade of the 18th century and successive collections of pieces by Louis Marchand, Gaspard Le Roux, Louis-Nicolas Clérambault, Jean-François Dandrieu, Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, Charles Dieupart and Nicolas Siret. Rameau and Couperin had different styles, and it seems they did not know one another: Couperin was one of the official court musicians; Rameau, fifteen years his junior, achieved fame only after Couperin's death.
Rameau published his first book of harpsichord pieces in 1706. (Cf. Couperin, who waited until 1713 before publishing his first "Ordres.") Rameau's music includes pieces in the pure tradition of the French suite: imitative ("Le rappel des oiseaux," "La poule") and characterful ("Les tendres plaintes," "L'entretien des Muses"). But there are also works of pure virtuosity that resemble Domenico Scarlatti ("Les tourbillons," "Les trois mains") as well as pieces that reveal the experiments of a theorist and musical innovator ("L'enharmonique," "Les Cyclopes"), which had a marked influence on Louis-Claude Daquin, Joseph-Nicolas-Pancrace Royer and Jacques Duphly. Rameau's suites are grouped in the traditional way, by key. The first set of dances (Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, Les Trois Mains, Fanfairenette, La Triomphante, Gavotte et 6 doubles) is centred on A major and A minor, while the remaining pieces (Les tricoteuses, L'Indifferente, Première Menuet, Deuxième Menuet, La Poule, Les Triolets, Les Sauvages, L'Enharmonique, L'Egiptienne [sic]) are centred around G major and G minor.
Rameau's second and third collections appeared in 1724 and 1727. After these he composed only one piece for the harpsichord, the eight-minute "La Dauphine" of 1747, while the very short "Les petits marteaux" (c. 1750) has also been attributed to him.
During his semiretirement (1740 to 1744) he wrote the Pièces de clavecin en concert (1741), which some musicologists consider the pinnacle of French Baroque chamber music. Adopting a formula successfully employed by Mondonville a few years earlier, Rameau fashioned these pieces differently from trio sonatas in that the harpsichord is not simply there as basso continuo to accompany melody instruments (violin, flute, viol) but as equal partner in "concert" with them. Rameau claimed that this music would be equally satisfying played on the harpsichord alone, but the claim is not wholly convincing because he took the trouble to transcribe five of them himself, those the lack of other instruments would show the least.
Opera
After 1733 Rameau dedicated himself mostly to opera. On a strictly musical level, 18th-century French Baroque opera is richer and more varied than contemporary Italian opera, especially in the place given to choruses and dances but also in the musical continuity that arises from the respective relationships between the arias and the recitatives. Another essential difference: whereas Italian opera gave a starring role to female sopranos and castrati, French opera had no use for the latter. The Italian opera of Rameau's day (opera seria, opera buffa) was essentially divided into musical sections (da capo arias, duets, trios, etc.) and sections that were spoken or almost spoken (recitativo secco). It was during the latter that the action progressed while the audience waited for the next aria; on the other hand, the text of the arias was almost entirely buried beneath music whose chief aim was to show off the virtuosity of the singer. Nothing of the kind is to be found in French opera of the day; since Lully, the text had to remain comprehensible—limiting certain techniques such as the vocalise, which was reserved for special words such as ("glory") or ("victory"). A subtle equilibrium existed between the more and the less musical parts: melodic recitative on the one hand and arias that were often closer to arioso on the other, alongside virtuoso "ariettes" in the Italian style. This form of continuous music prefigures Wagnerian drama even more than does the "reform" opera of Gluck.
Five essential components may be discerned in Rameau's operatic scores:
Pieces of "pure" music (overtures, ritornelli, music which closes scenes). Unlike the highly stereotyped Lullian overture, Rameau's overtures show an extraordinary variety. Even in his earliest works, where he uses the standard French model, Rameau—the born symphonist and master of orchestration—composes novel and unique pieces. A few pieces are particularly striking, such as the overture to Zaïs, depicting the chaos before the creation of the universe, that of Pigmalion, suggesting the sculptor's chipping away at the statue with his mallet, or many more conventional depictions of storms and earthquakes, as well perhaps as the imposing final chaconnes of Les Indes galantes or Dardanus.
Dance music: the danced interludes, which were obligatory even in tragédie en musique, allowed Rameau to give free rein to his inimitable sense of rhythm, melody, and choreography, acknowledged by all his contemporaries, including the dancers themselves. This "learned" composer, forever preoccupied by his next theoretical work, also was one who strung together gavottes, minuets, loures, rigaudons, passepieds, tambourins, and musettes by the dozen. According to his biographer, Cuthbert Girdlestone, "The immense superiority of all that pertains to Rameau in choreography still needs emphasizing," and the German scholar H.W. von Walthershausen affirmed:
Rameau was the greatest ballet composer of all times. The genius of his creation rests on one hand on his perfect artistic permeation by folk-dance types, on the other hand on the constant preservation of living contact with the practical requirements of the ballet stage, which prevented an estrangement between the expression of the body from the spirit of absolute music.
Choruses: Padre Martini, the erudite musicologist who corresponded with Rameau, affirmed that "the French are excellent at choruses," obviously thinking of Rameau himself. A great master of harmony, Rameau knew how to compose sumptuous choruses—whether monodic, polyphonic, or interspersed with passages for solo singers or the orchestra—and whatever feelings needed to be expressed.
Arias: less frequent than in Italian opera, Rameau nevertheless offers many striking examples. Particularly admired arias include Télaïre's "Tristes apprêts," from Castor et Pollux; "Ô jour affreux" and "Lieux funestes," from Dardanus; Huascar's invocations in Les Indes galantes; and the final ariette in Pigmalion. In Platée we encounter a showstopping ars poetica aria for the character of La Folie (the madness), "Formons les plus brillants concerts / Aux langeurs d'Apollon".
Recitative: much closer to arioso than to recitativo secco. The composer took scrupulous care to observe French prosody and used his harmonic knowledge to give expression to his protagonists' feelings.
During the first part of his operatic career (1733–1739), Rameau wrote his great masterpieces destined for the Académie royale de musique: three tragédies en musique and two opéra-ballets that still form the core of his repertoire. After the interval of 1740 to 1744, he became the official court musician, and for the most part, composed pieces intended to entertain, with plenty of dance music emphasising sensuality and an idealised pastoral atmosphere. In his last years, Rameau returned to a renewed version of his early style in Les Paladins and Les Boréades.
His Zoroastre was first performed in 1749. According to one of Rameau's admirers, Cuthbert Girdlestone, this opera has a distinctive place in his works: "The profane passions of hatred and jealousy are rendered more intensely [than in his other works] and with a strong sense of reality."
Rameau and his librettists
Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zaïs (1748), Naïs (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacréon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boréades (c. 1763).
Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupelinière's salon, at the Société du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day.
Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760).
Reputation and influence
By the end of his life, Rameau's music had come under attack in France from theorists who favoured Italian models. However, foreign composers working in the Italian tradition were increasingly looking towards Rameau as a way of reforming their own leading operatic genre, opera seria. Tommaso Traetta produced two operas setting translations of Rameau libretti that show the French composer's influence, Ippolito ed Aricia (1759) and I Tintaridi (based on Castor et Pollux, 1760). Traetta had been advised by Count Francesco Algarotti, a leading proponent of reform according to French models; Algarotti was a major influence on the most important "reformist" composer, Christoph Willibald Gluck. Gluck's three Italian reform operas of the 1760s—Orfeo ed Euridice, Alceste, and Paride ed Elena—reveal a knowledge of Rameau's works. For instance, both Orfeo and the 1737 version of Castor et Pollux open with the funeral of one of the leading characters who later comes back to life. Many of the operatic reforms advocated in the preface to Gluck's Alceste were already present in Rameau's works. Rameau had used accompanied recitatives, and the overtures in his later operas reflected the action to come, so when Gluck arrived in Paris in 1774 to produce a series of six French operas, he could be seen as continuing in the tradition of Rameau. Nevertheless, while Gluck's popularity survived the French Revolution, Rameau's did not. By the end of the 18th century, his operas had vanished from the repertoire.
For most of the 19th century, Rameau's music remained unplayed, known only by reputation. Hector Berlioz investigated Castor et Pollux and particularly admired the aria "Tristes apprêts," but "whereas the modern listener readily perceives the common ground with Berlioz' music, he himself was more conscious of the gap which separated them." French humiliation in the Franco-Prussian War brought about a change in Rameau's fortunes. As Rameau biographer J. Malignon wrote, "...the German victory over France in 1870–71 was the grand occasion for digging up great heroes from the French past. Rameau, like so many others, was flung into the enemy's face to bolster our courage and our faith in the national destiny of France." In 1894, composer Vincent d'Indy founded the Schola Cantorum to promote French national music; the society put on several revivals of works by Rameau. Among the audience was Claude Debussy, who especially cherished Castor et Pollux, revived in 1903: "Gluck's genius was deeply rooted in Rameau's works... a detailed comparison allows us to affirm that Gluck could replace Rameau on the French stage only by assimilating the latter's beautiful works and making them his own." Camille Saint-Saëns (by editing and publishing the Pièces in 1895) and Paul Dukas were two other important French musicians who gave practical championship to Rameau's music in their day, but interest in Rameau petered out again, and it was not until the late 20th century that a serious effort was made to revive his works. Over half of Rameau's operas have now been recorded, in particular by conductors such as John Eliot Gardiner, William Christie, and Marc Minkowski.
One of his pieces is commonly heard in the Victoria Centre in Nottingham by the Rowland Emett timepiece, the Aqua Horological Tintinnabulator. Emett quoted that Rameau made music for his school and the shopping centre without him knowing it.
Theoretical works
Treatise on Harmony, 1722
Rameau's 1722 Treatise on Harmony initiated a revolution in music theory. Rameau posited the discovery of the "fundamental law" or what he referred to as the "fundamental bass" of all Western music. Heavily influenced by new Cartesian modes of thought and analysis, Rameau's methodology incorporated mathematics, commentary, analysis and a didacticism that was specifically intended to illuminate, scientifically, the structure and principles of music. With careful deductive reasoning, he attempted to derive universal harmonic principles from natural causes. Previous treatises on harmony had been purely practical; Rameau embraced the new philosophical rationalism, quickly rising to prominence in France as the "Isaac Newton of Music." His fame subsequently spread throughout all Europe, and his Treatise became the definitive authority on music theory, forming the foundation for instruction in western music that persists to this day.
List of works
RCT numbering refers to Rameau Catalogue Thématique established by Sylvie Bouissou and Denis Herlin.
Instrumental works
Pièces de clavecin. Trois livres. "Pieces for harpsichord", 3 books, published 1706, 1724, 1726/27(?).
RCT 1 – Premier livre de Clavecin (1706)
RCT 2 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in E minor
RCT 3 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in D major
RCT 4 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Menuet in C major
RCT 5 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in A minor
RCT 6 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in G
Pieces de Clavecin en Concerts Five albums of character pieces for harpsichord, violin and viol. (1741)
RCT 7 – Concert I in C minor
RCT 8 – Concert II in G major
RCT 9 – Concert III in A major
RCT 10 – Concert IV in B flat major
RCT 11 – Concert V in D minor
RCT 12 – La Dauphine for harpsichord. (1747)
RCT 12bis – Les petits marteaux for harpsichord.
Several orchestral dance suites extracted from his operas.
Motets
RCT 13 – Deus noster refugium (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 14 – In convertendo (probably before 1720, rev. 1751)
RCT 15 – Quam dilecta (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 16 – Laboravi (published in the Traité de l'harmonie, 1722)
Canons
RCT 17 – Ah! loin de rire, pleurons (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) (pub. 1722)
RCT 18 – Avec du vin, endormons-nous (2 sopranos, Tenor) (1719)
RCT 18bis – L'épouse entre deux draps (3 sopranos) (formerly attributed to François Couperin)
RCT 18ter – Je suis un fou Madame (3 voix égales) (1720)
RCT 19 – Mes chers amis, quittez vos rouges bords (3 sopranos, 3 basses) (pub. 1780)
RCT 20 – Réveillez-vous, dormeur sans fin (5 voix égales) (pub. 1722)
RCT 20bis – Si tu ne prends garde à toi (2 sopranos, bass) (1720)
Songs
RCT 21.1 – L'amante préoccupée or A l'objet que j'adore (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.2 – Lucas, pour se gausser de nous (soprano, bass, continuo) (pub. 1707)
RCT 21.3 – Non, non, le dieu qui sait aimer (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.4 – Un Bourbon ouvre sa carrière or Un héros ouvre sa carrière (alto, continuo) (1751, air belonging to Acante et Céphise but censored before its first performance and never reintroduced in the work).
Cantatas
RCT 23 – Aquilon et Orithie (between 1715 and 1720)
RCT 28 – Thétis (same period)
RCT 26 – L’impatience (same period)
RCT 22 – Les amants trahis (around 1720)
RCT 27 – Orphée (same period)
RCT 24 – Le berger fidèle (1728)
RCT 25 – Cantate pour le jour de la Saint Louis (1740)
Operas and stage works
Tragédies en musique
RCT 43 – Hippolyte et Aricie (1733; revised 1742 and 1757)
RCT 32 – Castor et Pollux (1737; revised 1754)
RCT 35 – Dardanus (1739; revised 1744 and 1760), score
RCT 62 – Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756, with new music for Acts II, III & V)
RCT 31 – Les Boréades or Abaris (unperformed; in rehearsal 1763)
Opéra-ballets
RCT 44 – Les Indes galantes (1735; revised 1736)
RCT 41 – Les fêtes d'Hébé or les Talens Lyriques (1739)
RCT 39 – Les fêtes de Polymnie (1745)
RCT 59 – Le temple de la gloire (1745; revised 1746)
RCT 38 – Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour or Les Dieux d'Egypte (1747)
RCT 58 – Les surprises de l'Amour (1748; revised 1757)
Pastorales héroïques
RCT 60 – Zaïs (1748)
RCT 49 – Naïs (1749)
RCT 29 – Acante et Céphise or La sympathie (1751)
RCT 34 – Daphnis et Eglé (1753)
Comédies lyriques
RCT 53 – Platée or Junon jalouse (1745), score
RCT 51 – Les Paladins or Le Vénitien (1760)
Comédie-ballet
RCT 54 – La princesse de Navarre (1744)
Actes de ballet
RCT 33 – Les courses de Tempé (1734)
RCT 40 – Les fêtes de Ramire (1745)
RCT 52 – Pigmalion (1748)
RCT 42 – La guirlande or Les fleurs enchantées (1751)
RCT 57 – Les sibarites or Sibaris (1753)
RCT 48 – La naissance d'Osiris or La Fête Pamilie (1754)
RCT 30 – Anacréon (1754)
RCT 58 – Anacréon (completely different work from the above, 1757, 3rd Entrée of Les surprises de l'Amour)
RCT 61 – Zéphire (date unknown)
RCT 50 – Nélée et Myrthis (date unknown)
RCT 45 – Io (unfinished, date unknown)
Lost works
RCT 56 – Samson (tragédie en musique) (first version written 1733–1734; second version 1736; neither were ever staged )
RCT 46 – Linus (tragédie en musique) (1751, score stolen after a rehearsal)
RCT 47 – Lisis et Délie (pastorale) (scheduled on November 6, 1753)
Incidental music for opéras comiques
Music mostly lost.
RCT 36 – L'endriague (in 3 acts, 1723)
RCT 37 – L'enrôlement d'Arlequin (in 1 act, 1726)
RCT 55 – La robe de dissension or Le faux prodige (in 2 acts, 1726)
RCT 55bis – La rose or Les jardins de l'Hymen (in a prologue and 1 act, 1744)
Writings
Traité de l'harmonie réduite à ses principes naturels (Paris, 1722)
Nouveau système de musique théorique (Paris, 1726)
Dissertation sur les différents méthodes d'accompagnement pour le clavecin, ou pour l'orgue (Paris, 1732)
Génération harmonique, ou Traité de musique théorique et pratique (Paris, 1737)
Mémoire où l'on expose les fondemens du Système de musique théorique et pratique de M. Rameau (1749)
Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1750)
Nouvelles réflexions de M. Rameau sur sa 'Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1752)
Observations sur notre instinct pour la musique (Paris, 1754)
Erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1755)
Suite des erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1756)
Reponse de M. Rameau à MM. les editeurs de l'Encyclopédie sur leur dernier Avertissement (Paris, 1757)
Nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (1758–9)
Code de musique pratique, ou Méthodes pour apprendre la musique...avec des nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (Paris, 1760)
Lettre à M. Alembert sur ses opinions en musique (Paris, 1760)
Origine des sciences, suivie d'un controverse sur le même sujet (Paris, 1762)
See also
Querelle des Bouffons
ReferencesNotesSourcesBeaussant, Philippe, Rameau de A à Z (Fayard, 1983)
Gibbons, William. Building the Operatic Museum: Eighteenth-Century Opera in Fin-de-siècle Paris (University of Rochester Press, 2013)
Girdlestone, Cuthbert, Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Dover paperback edition, 1969)
Holden, Amanda, (Ed) The Viking Opera Guide (Viking, 1993)
Sadler, Graham, (Ed.), The New Grove French Baroque Masters (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)
Trowbridge, Simon, Rameau (2nd edition, Englance Press, 2017)
F. Annunziata, Una Tragédie Lyrique nel Secolo dei Lumi. Abaris ou Les Boréades di Jean Philippe Rameau, https://www.academia.edu/6100318
External links
(en) Gavotte with Doubles Hypermedia by Jeff Hall & Tim Smith at the BinAural Collaborative Hypertext – Shockwave Player required – ("Gavotte with Doubles" link NG)
(en) jp.rameau.free.fr Rameau – Le Site
(fr) musicologie.org Biography, List of Works, bibliography, discography, theoretical writings, in French
(en) Jean-Philippe Rameau / Discography
Magnatune Les Cyclopes by Rameau in on-line mp3 format (played by Trevor Pinnock)
Jean-Philippe Rameau, "L'Orchestre de Louis XV" – Suites d'Orchestre, Le Concert des Nations, dir. Jordi Savall, Alia Vox, AVSA 9882Sheet music'''
Rameau free sheet music from the Mutopia Project
1683 births
1764 deaths
18th-century classical composers
18th-century French composers
18th-century French male musicians
Composers awarded knighthoods
Composers for harpsichord
French Baroque composers
French ballet composers
French opera composers
French male classical composers
French male non-fiction writers
French music theorists
Male opera composers
People from Dijon
Burials at Saint-Eustache, Paris
17th-century male musicians | true | [
"Louis de Cahusac (6 April 1706 – 22 June 1759) was an 18th-century French playwright and librettist, and Freemason, most famous for his work with the composer Jean-Philippe Rameau. He provided the libretti for several of Rameau's operas, namely Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zaïs (1748), Naïs (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacréon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boréades (c. 1763). Cahusac contributed to the Encyclopédie and was the lover of Marie Fel.\n\nIn 1754, he published La Danse ancienne et moderne ou Traité historique de la danse (The Hague, Jean Neaulme).\n\nAmong Rameau's librettists, he was the one whose collaboration lasted the longest; the composer had a very bad character and he was also stingy. Only Cahusac managed to work with him permanently.\n\nSources \nCuthbert Girdlestone Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Dover paperback edition, 1969)\nThe New Grove French Baroque Masters ed. Graham Sadler (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Louis de Cahusac on Data.bnf.fr\n\nPeople from Montauban\n1706 births\n1759 deaths\n18th-century French dramatists and playwrights\nContributors to the Encyclopédie (1751–1772)\nFrench male dramatists and playwrights\nFrench ballet librettists\nFrench opera librettists\nFrench male non-fiction writers\n18th-century French male writers",
"Antoine-César Gautier de Montdorge (or Mondorge) (17 January 1701 or 1707 – 24 October 1768) was a French man of letters, best known for writing the libretto for Rameau's opéra-ballet Les fêtes d'Hébé (1739). Born in Lyon, he moved to Paris, where he worked as a financier (with the title \"maître à la Chambre aux deniers du Roi\"). He was a friend and neighbour of Rameau's patron Alexandre Le Riche de La Pouplinière and probably met the composer at La Pouplinière's salon. Montdorge was not identified as the author of Les fêtes d'Hébé on any of its printed editions. It was first attributed to him by Antoine de Léris in the 1763 edition of his Dictionnaire portatif des théâtres. Reviewers severely criticised the literary weakness of the work. The only other opera libretto Montdorge wrote was the one-act comédie-ballet L'opéra de société for Jean-François Giraud in 1762. He described his experience working as a librettist for Rameau in the anonymously published Réflections d'un peintre sur l'opéra (1743).\n\nMontdorge was also interested in the fine arts. He wrote three articles for the Encyclopédie on engraving and published a work on colour printing, L'art d'imprimer les tableaux en trois couleurs, in 1755.\n\nWorks \n Les Fêtes d'Hébé, ou les talents lyriques, opéra-ballet in three acts (music by Rameau) presented in 1739, revived in 1747 and 1766 and printed in-4° ; \n Réflexions d'un peintre sur l'opéra, 1741, in-12 ; \n [Le Blon], L'Art d'imprimer les tableaux en trois couleurs, 1756, in-8° ; \n L'Opéra de société, in one act ; music by Giraud, performed in 1762 ;\n Conte oriental, Paris, 1767.\n\nReferences\n\nSources\nBouissou, Sylvie Jean-Philippe Rameau (Fayard, 2014)\nGirdlestone, Cuthbert, Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Cassell & Company Ltd, 1962; Dover paperback)\nSadler, Graham The Rameau Compendium (Boydell, 2014)\n\nExternal links \n Antoine Gautier de Montdorge on Data.bnf.fr\n\n1768 deaths\nWriters from Lyon\nFrench opera librettists\n18th-century French dramatists and playwrights\nContributors to the Encyclopédie (1751–1772)"
]
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"Jean-Philippe Rameau",
"Rameau and his librettists",
"What is a librettist?",
"librettists managed to produce a libretto",
"What is a libretto?",
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"How was Rameau's relation with his librettists?",
"Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice."
]
| C_6affd0880c764e209d1d4aabc61ddb69_0 | Why didn't he work with the same librettists twice? | 4 | Why didn't Jean-Philippe Rameau work with the same librettists twice? | Jean-Philippe Rameau | Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacreon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boreades (c. 1763). Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupliniere's salon, at the Societe du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day. Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760). CANNOTANSWER | He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, | Jean-Philippe Rameau (; – ) was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the 18th century. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer of his time for the harpsichord, alongside François Couperin.
Little is known about Rameau's early years. It was not until the 1720s that he won fame as a major theorist of music with his Treatise on Harmony (1722) and also in the following years as a composer of masterpieces for the harpsichord, which circulated throughout Europe. He was almost 50 before he embarked on the operatic career on which his reputation chiefly rests today. His debut, Hippolyte et Aricie (1733), caused a great stir and was fiercely attacked by the supporters of Lully's style of music for its revolutionary use of harmony. Nevertheless, Rameau's pre-eminence in the field of French opera was soon acknowledged, and he was later attacked as an "establishment" composer by those who favoured Italian opera during the controversy known as the Querelle des Bouffons in the 1750s. Rameau's music had gone out of fashion by the end of the 18th century, and it was not until the 20th that serious efforts were made to revive it. Today, he enjoys renewed appreciation with performances and recordings of his music ever more frequent.
Life
The details of Rameau's life are generally obscure, especially concerning his first forty years, before he moved to Paris for good. He was a secretive man, and even his wife knew nothing of his early life, which explains the scarcity of biographical information available.
Early years, 1683–1732
Rameau's early years are particularly obscure. He was born on 25 September 1683 in Dijon, and baptised the same day. His father, Jean, worked as an organist in several churches around Dijon, and his mother, Claudine Demartinécourt, was the daughter of a notary. The couple had eleven children (five girls and six boys), of whom Jean-Philippe was the seventh.
Rameau was taught music before he could read or write. He was educated at the Jesuit college at Godrans, but he was not a good pupil and disrupted classes with his singing, later claiming that his passion for opera had begun at the age of twelve. Initially intended for the law, Rameau decided he wanted to be a musician, and his father sent him to Italy, where he stayed for a short while in Milan. On his return, he worked as a violinist in travelling companies and then as an organist in provincial cathedrals before moving to Paris for the first time. Here, in 1706, he published his earliest known compositions: the harpsichord works that make up his first book of Pièces de Clavecin, which show the influence of his friend Louis Marchand.
In 1709, he moved back to Dijon to take over his father's job as organist in the main church. The contract was for six years, but Rameau left before then and took up similar posts in Lyon and Clermont-Ferrand. During this period, he composed motets for church performance as well as secular cantatas.
In 1722, he returned to Paris for good, and here he published his most important work of music theory, Traité de l'harmonie (Treatise on Harmony). This soon won him a great reputation, and it was followed in 1726 by his Nouveau système de musique théorique. In 1724 and 1729 (or 1730), he also published two more collections of harpsichord pieces.
Rameau took his first tentative steps into composing stage music when the writer Alexis Piron asked him to provide songs for his popular comic plays written for the Paris Fairs. Four collaborations followed, beginning with L'endriague in 1723; none of the music has survived.
On 25 February 1726 Rameau married the 19-year-old Marie-Louise Mangot, who came from a musical family from Lyon and was a good singer and instrumentalist. The couple would have four children, two boys and two girls, and the marriage is said to have been a happy one.
In spite of his fame as a music theorist, Rameau had trouble finding a post as an organist in Paris.
Later years, 1733–1764
It was not until he was approaching 50 that Rameau decided to embark on the operatic career on which his fame as a composer mainly rests. He had already approached writer Antoine Houdar de la Motte for a libretto in 1727, but nothing came of it; he was finally inspired to try his hand at the prestigious genre of tragédie en musique after seeing Montéclair's Jephté in 1732. Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie premiered at the Académie Royale de Musique on 1 October 1733. It was immediately recognised as the most significant opera to appear in France since the death of Lully, but audiences were split over whether this was a good thing or a bad thing. Some, such as the composer André Campra, were stunned by its originality and wealth of invention; others found its harmonic innovations discordant and saw the work as an attack on the French musical tradition. The two camps, the so-called Lullyistes and the Rameauneurs, fought a pamphlet war over the issue for the rest of the decade.
Just before this time, Rameau had made the acquaintance of the powerful financier Alexandre Le Riche de La Poupelinière, who became his patron until 1753. La Poupelinière's mistress (and later, wife), Thérèse des Hayes, was Rameau's pupil and a great admirer of his music. In 1731, Rameau became the conductor of La Poupelinière's private orchestra, which was of an extremely high quality. He held the post for 22 years; he was succeeded by Johann Stamitz and then François-Joseph Gossec. La Poupelinière's salon enabled Rameau to meet some of the leading cultural figures of the day, including Voltaire, who soon began collaborating with the composer. Their first project, the tragédie en musique Samson, was abandoned because an opera on a religious theme by Voltaire—a notorious critic of the Church—was likely to be banned by the authorities. Meanwhile, Rameau had introduced his new musical style into the lighter genre of the opéra-ballet with the highly successful Les Indes galantes. It was followed by two tragédies en musique, Castor et Pollux (1737) and Dardanus (1739), and another opéra-ballet, Les fêtes d'Hébé (also 1739). All these operas of the 1730s are among Rameau's most highly regarded works. However, the composer followed them with six years of silence, in which the only work he produced was a new version of Dardanus (1744). The reason for this interval in the composer's creative life is unknown, although it is possible he had a falling-out with the authorities at the Académie royale de la musique.
The year 1745 was a turning point in Rameau's career. He received several commissions from the court for works to celebrate the French victory at the Battle of Fontenoy and the marriage of the Dauphin to Infanta Maria Teresa Rafaela of Spain. Rameau produced his most important comic opera, Platée, as well as two collaborations with Voltaire: the opéra-ballet Le temple de la gloire and the comédie-ballet La princesse de Navarre. They gained Rameau official recognition; he was granted the title "Compositeur du Cabinet du Roi" and given a substantial pension. 1745 also saw the beginning of the bitter enmity between Rameau and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Though best known today as a thinker, Rousseau had ambitions to be a composer. He had written an opera, Les muses galantes (inspired by Rameau's Indes galantes), but Rameau was unimpressed by this musical tribute. At the end of 1745, Voltaire and Rameau, who were busy on other works, commissioned Rousseau to turn La Princesse de Navarre into a new opera, with linking recitative, called Les fêtes de Ramire. Rousseau then claimed the two had stolen the credit for the words and music he had contributed, though musicologists have been able to identify almost nothing of the piece as Rousseau's work. Nevertheless, the embittered Rousseau nursed a grudge against Rameau for the rest of his life.
Rousseau was a major participant in the second great quarrel that erupted over Rameau's work, the so-called Querelle des Bouffons of 1752–54, which pitted French tragédie en musique against Italian opera buffa. This time, Rameau was accused of being out of date and his music too complicated in comparison with the simplicity and "naturalness" of a work like Pergolesi's La serva padrona. In the mid-1750s, Rameau criticised Rousseau's contributions to the musical articles in the Encyclopédie, which led to a quarrel with the leading philosophes d'Alembert and Diderot. As a result, Jean-François Rameau became a character in Diderot's then-unpublished dialogue, Le neveu de Rameau (Rameau's Nephew).
In 1753, La Poupelinière took a scheming musician, Jeanne-Thérèse Goermans, as his mistress. The daughter of harpsichord maker Jacques Goermans, she went by the name of Madame de Saint-Aubin, and her opportunistic husband pushed her into the arms of the rich financier. She had La Poupelinière engage the services of the Bohemian composer Johann Stamitz, who succeeded Rameau after a breach developed between Rameau and his patron; however, by then, Rameau no longer needed La Poupelinière's financial support and protection.
Rameau pursued his activities as a theorist and composer until his death. He lived with his wife and two of his children in his large suite of rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, which he would leave every day, lost in thought, to take a solitary walk in the nearby gardens of the Palais-Royal or the Tuileries. Sometimes he would meet the young writer Chabanon, who noted some of Rameau's disillusioned confidential remarks: "Day by day, I'm acquiring more good taste, but I no longer have any genius" and "The imagination is worn out in my old head; it's not wise at this age wanting to practise arts that are nothing but imagination."
Rameau composed prolifically in the late 1740s and early 1750s. After that, his rate of productivity dropped off, probably due to old age and ill health, although he was still able to write another comic opera, Les Paladins, in 1760. This was due to be followed by a final tragédie en musique, Les Boréades; but for unknown reasons, the opera was never produced and had to wait until the late 20th century for a proper staging. Rameau died on 12 September 1764 after suffering from a fever, thirteen days before his 81st birthday. At his bedside, he objected to a song sung. His last words were, "What the devil do you mean to sing to me, priest? You are out of tune." He was buried in the church of St. Eustache, Paris on the same day of his death. Although a bronze bust and red marble tombstone were erected in his memory there by the Société de la Compositeurs de Musique in 1883, the exact site of his burial remains unknown to this day.
Rameau's personality
While the details of his biography are vague and fragmentary, the details of Rameau's personal and family life are almost completely obscure. Rameau's music, so graceful and attractive, completely contradicts the man's public image and what we know of his character as described (or perhaps unfairly caricatured) by Diderot in his satirical novel Le Neveu de Rameau. Throughout his life, music was his consuming passion. It occupied his entire thinking; Philippe Beaussant calls him a monomaniac. Piron explained that "His heart and soul were in his harpsichord; once he had shut its lid, there was no one home." Physically, Rameau was tall and exceptionally thin, as can be seen by the sketches we have of him, including a famous portrait by Carmontelle. He had a "loud voice." His speech was difficult to understand, just like his handwriting, which was never fluent. As a man, he was secretive, solitary, irritable, proud of his own achievements (more as a theorist than as a composer), brusque with those who contradicted him, and quick to anger. It is difficult to imagine him among the leading wits, including Voltaire (to whom he bears more than a passing physical resemblance), who frequented La Poupelinière's salon; his music was his passport, and it made up for his lack of social graces.
His enemies exaggerated his faults; e.g. his supposed miserliness. In fact, it seems that his thriftiness was the result of long years spent in obscurity (when his income was uncertain and scanty) rather than part of his character, because he could also be generous. He helped his nephew Jean-François when he came to Paris and also helped establish the career of Claude-Bénigne Balbastre in the capital. Furthermore, he gave his daughter Marie-Louise a considerable dowry when she became a Visitandine nun in 1750, and he paid a pension to one of his sisters when she became ill. Financial security came late to him, following the success of his stage works and the grant of a royal pension (a few months before his death, he was also ennobled and made a knight of the Ordre de Saint-Michel). But he did not change his way of life, keeping his worn-out clothes, his single pair of shoes, and his old furniture. After his death, it was discovered that he only possessed one dilapidated single-keyboard harpsichord in his rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, yet he also had a bag containing 1691 gold louis.
Music
General character of Rameau's music
Rameau's music is characterised by the exceptional technical knowledge of a composer who wanted above all to be renowned as a theorist of the art. Nevertheless, it is not solely addressed to the intelligence, and Rameau himself claimed, "I try to conceal art with art." The paradox of this music was that it was new, using techniques never known before, but it took place within the framework of old-fashioned forms. Rameau appeared revolutionary to the Lullyistes, disturbed by complex harmony of his music; and reactionary to the "philosophes," who only paid attention to its content and who either would not or could not listen to the sound it made. The incomprehension Rameau received from his contemporaries stopped him from repeating such daring experiments as the second Trio des Parques in Hippolyte et Aricie, which he was forced to remove after a handful of performances because the singers had been either unable or unwilling to execute it correctly.
Rameau's musical works
Rameau's musical works may be divided into four distinct groups, which differ greatly in importance: a few cantatas; a few motets for large chorus; some pieces for solo harpsichord or harpsichord accompanied by other instruments; and, finally, his works for the stage, to which he dedicated the last thirty years of his career almost exclusively. Like most of his contemporaries, Rameau often reused melodies that had been particularly successful, but never without meticulously adapting them; they are not simple transcriptions. Besides, no borrowings have been found from other composers, although his earliest works show the influence of other music. Rameau's reworkings of his own material are numerous; e.g., in Les Fêtes d'Hébé, we find L'Entretien des Muses, the Musette, and the Tambourin, taken from the 1724 book of harpsichord pieces, as well as an aria from the cantata Le Berger Fidèle.
Motets
For at least 26 years, Rameau was a professional organist in the service of religious institutions, and yet the body of sacred music he composed is exceptionally small and his organ works nonexistent. Judging by the evidence, it was not his favourite field, but rather, simply a way of making reasonable money. Rameau's few religious compositions are nevertheless remarkable and compare favourably to the works of specialists in the area. Only four motets have been attributed to Rameau with any certainty: Deus noster refugium, In convertendo, Quam dilecta, and Laboravi.
Cantatas
The cantata was a highly successful genre in the early 18th century. The French cantata, which should not be confused with the Italian or the German cantata, was "invented" in 1706 by the poet Jean-Baptiste Rousseau and soon taken up by many famous composers of the day, such as Montéclair, Campra, and Clérambault. Cantatas were Rameau's first contact with dramatic music. The modest forces the cantata required meant it was a genre within the reach of a composer who was still unknown. Musicologists can only guess at the dates of Rameau's six surviving cantatas, and the names of the librettists are unknown.
Instrumental music
Along with François Couperin, Rameau was a master of the 18th-century French school of harpsichord music, and both made a break with the style of the first generation of harpsichordists whose compositions adhered to the relatively standardised suite form, which had reached its apogee in the first decade of the 18th century and successive collections of pieces by Louis Marchand, Gaspard Le Roux, Louis-Nicolas Clérambault, Jean-François Dandrieu, Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, Charles Dieupart and Nicolas Siret. Rameau and Couperin had different styles, and it seems they did not know one another: Couperin was one of the official court musicians; Rameau, fifteen years his junior, achieved fame only after Couperin's death.
Rameau published his first book of harpsichord pieces in 1706. (Cf. Couperin, who waited until 1713 before publishing his first "Ordres.") Rameau's music includes pieces in the pure tradition of the French suite: imitative ("Le rappel des oiseaux," "La poule") and characterful ("Les tendres plaintes," "L'entretien des Muses"). But there are also works of pure virtuosity that resemble Domenico Scarlatti ("Les tourbillons," "Les trois mains") as well as pieces that reveal the experiments of a theorist and musical innovator ("L'enharmonique," "Les Cyclopes"), which had a marked influence on Louis-Claude Daquin, Joseph-Nicolas-Pancrace Royer and Jacques Duphly. Rameau's suites are grouped in the traditional way, by key. The first set of dances (Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, Les Trois Mains, Fanfairenette, La Triomphante, Gavotte et 6 doubles) is centred on A major and A minor, while the remaining pieces (Les tricoteuses, L'Indifferente, Première Menuet, Deuxième Menuet, La Poule, Les Triolets, Les Sauvages, L'Enharmonique, L'Egiptienne [sic]) are centred around G major and G minor.
Rameau's second and third collections appeared in 1724 and 1727. After these he composed only one piece for the harpsichord, the eight-minute "La Dauphine" of 1747, while the very short "Les petits marteaux" (c. 1750) has also been attributed to him.
During his semiretirement (1740 to 1744) he wrote the Pièces de clavecin en concert (1741), which some musicologists consider the pinnacle of French Baroque chamber music. Adopting a formula successfully employed by Mondonville a few years earlier, Rameau fashioned these pieces differently from trio sonatas in that the harpsichord is not simply there as basso continuo to accompany melody instruments (violin, flute, viol) but as equal partner in "concert" with them. Rameau claimed that this music would be equally satisfying played on the harpsichord alone, but the claim is not wholly convincing because he took the trouble to transcribe five of them himself, those the lack of other instruments would show the least.
Opera
After 1733 Rameau dedicated himself mostly to opera. On a strictly musical level, 18th-century French Baroque opera is richer and more varied than contemporary Italian opera, especially in the place given to choruses and dances but also in the musical continuity that arises from the respective relationships between the arias and the recitatives. Another essential difference: whereas Italian opera gave a starring role to female sopranos and castrati, French opera had no use for the latter. The Italian opera of Rameau's day (opera seria, opera buffa) was essentially divided into musical sections (da capo arias, duets, trios, etc.) and sections that were spoken or almost spoken (recitativo secco). It was during the latter that the action progressed while the audience waited for the next aria; on the other hand, the text of the arias was almost entirely buried beneath music whose chief aim was to show off the virtuosity of the singer. Nothing of the kind is to be found in French opera of the day; since Lully, the text had to remain comprehensible—limiting certain techniques such as the vocalise, which was reserved for special words such as ("glory") or ("victory"). A subtle equilibrium existed between the more and the less musical parts: melodic recitative on the one hand and arias that were often closer to arioso on the other, alongside virtuoso "ariettes" in the Italian style. This form of continuous music prefigures Wagnerian drama even more than does the "reform" opera of Gluck.
Five essential components may be discerned in Rameau's operatic scores:
Pieces of "pure" music (overtures, ritornelli, music which closes scenes). Unlike the highly stereotyped Lullian overture, Rameau's overtures show an extraordinary variety. Even in his earliest works, where he uses the standard French model, Rameau—the born symphonist and master of orchestration—composes novel and unique pieces. A few pieces are particularly striking, such as the overture to Zaïs, depicting the chaos before the creation of the universe, that of Pigmalion, suggesting the sculptor's chipping away at the statue with his mallet, or many more conventional depictions of storms and earthquakes, as well perhaps as the imposing final chaconnes of Les Indes galantes or Dardanus.
Dance music: the danced interludes, which were obligatory even in tragédie en musique, allowed Rameau to give free rein to his inimitable sense of rhythm, melody, and choreography, acknowledged by all his contemporaries, including the dancers themselves. This "learned" composer, forever preoccupied by his next theoretical work, also was one who strung together gavottes, minuets, loures, rigaudons, passepieds, tambourins, and musettes by the dozen. According to his biographer, Cuthbert Girdlestone, "The immense superiority of all that pertains to Rameau in choreography still needs emphasizing," and the German scholar H.W. von Walthershausen affirmed:
Rameau was the greatest ballet composer of all times. The genius of his creation rests on one hand on his perfect artistic permeation by folk-dance types, on the other hand on the constant preservation of living contact with the practical requirements of the ballet stage, which prevented an estrangement between the expression of the body from the spirit of absolute music.
Choruses: Padre Martini, the erudite musicologist who corresponded with Rameau, affirmed that "the French are excellent at choruses," obviously thinking of Rameau himself. A great master of harmony, Rameau knew how to compose sumptuous choruses—whether monodic, polyphonic, or interspersed with passages for solo singers or the orchestra—and whatever feelings needed to be expressed.
Arias: less frequent than in Italian opera, Rameau nevertheless offers many striking examples. Particularly admired arias include Télaïre's "Tristes apprêts," from Castor et Pollux; "Ô jour affreux" and "Lieux funestes," from Dardanus; Huascar's invocations in Les Indes galantes; and the final ariette in Pigmalion. In Platée we encounter a showstopping ars poetica aria for the character of La Folie (the madness), "Formons les plus brillants concerts / Aux langeurs d'Apollon".
Recitative: much closer to arioso than to recitativo secco. The composer took scrupulous care to observe French prosody and used his harmonic knowledge to give expression to his protagonists' feelings.
During the first part of his operatic career (1733–1739), Rameau wrote his great masterpieces destined for the Académie royale de musique: three tragédies en musique and two opéra-ballets that still form the core of his repertoire. After the interval of 1740 to 1744, he became the official court musician, and for the most part, composed pieces intended to entertain, with plenty of dance music emphasising sensuality and an idealised pastoral atmosphere. In his last years, Rameau returned to a renewed version of his early style in Les Paladins and Les Boréades.
His Zoroastre was first performed in 1749. According to one of Rameau's admirers, Cuthbert Girdlestone, this opera has a distinctive place in his works: "The profane passions of hatred and jealousy are rendered more intensely [than in his other works] and with a strong sense of reality."
Rameau and his librettists
Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zaïs (1748), Naïs (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacréon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boréades (c. 1763).
Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupelinière's salon, at the Société du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day.
Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760).
Reputation and influence
By the end of his life, Rameau's music had come under attack in France from theorists who favoured Italian models. However, foreign composers working in the Italian tradition were increasingly looking towards Rameau as a way of reforming their own leading operatic genre, opera seria. Tommaso Traetta produced two operas setting translations of Rameau libretti that show the French composer's influence, Ippolito ed Aricia (1759) and I Tintaridi (based on Castor et Pollux, 1760). Traetta had been advised by Count Francesco Algarotti, a leading proponent of reform according to French models; Algarotti was a major influence on the most important "reformist" composer, Christoph Willibald Gluck. Gluck's three Italian reform operas of the 1760s—Orfeo ed Euridice, Alceste, and Paride ed Elena—reveal a knowledge of Rameau's works. For instance, both Orfeo and the 1737 version of Castor et Pollux open with the funeral of one of the leading characters who later comes back to life. Many of the operatic reforms advocated in the preface to Gluck's Alceste were already present in Rameau's works. Rameau had used accompanied recitatives, and the overtures in his later operas reflected the action to come, so when Gluck arrived in Paris in 1774 to produce a series of six French operas, he could be seen as continuing in the tradition of Rameau. Nevertheless, while Gluck's popularity survived the French Revolution, Rameau's did not. By the end of the 18th century, his operas had vanished from the repertoire.
For most of the 19th century, Rameau's music remained unplayed, known only by reputation. Hector Berlioz investigated Castor et Pollux and particularly admired the aria "Tristes apprêts," but "whereas the modern listener readily perceives the common ground with Berlioz' music, he himself was more conscious of the gap which separated them." French humiliation in the Franco-Prussian War brought about a change in Rameau's fortunes. As Rameau biographer J. Malignon wrote, "...the German victory over France in 1870–71 was the grand occasion for digging up great heroes from the French past. Rameau, like so many others, was flung into the enemy's face to bolster our courage and our faith in the national destiny of France." In 1894, composer Vincent d'Indy founded the Schola Cantorum to promote French national music; the society put on several revivals of works by Rameau. Among the audience was Claude Debussy, who especially cherished Castor et Pollux, revived in 1903: "Gluck's genius was deeply rooted in Rameau's works... a detailed comparison allows us to affirm that Gluck could replace Rameau on the French stage only by assimilating the latter's beautiful works and making them his own." Camille Saint-Saëns (by editing and publishing the Pièces in 1895) and Paul Dukas were two other important French musicians who gave practical championship to Rameau's music in their day, but interest in Rameau petered out again, and it was not until the late 20th century that a serious effort was made to revive his works. Over half of Rameau's operas have now been recorded, in particular by conductors such as John Eliot Gardiner, William Christie, and Marc Minkowski.
One of his pieces is commonly heard in the Victoria Centre in Nottingham by the Rowland Emett timepiece, the Aqua Horological Tintinnabulator. Emett quoted that Rameau made music for his school and the shopping centre without him knowing it.
Theoretical works
Treatise on Harmony, 1722
Rameau's 1722 Treatise on Harmony initiated a revolution in music theory. Rameau posited the discovery of the "fundamental law" or what he referred to as the "fundamental bass" of all Western music. Heavily influenced by new Cartesian modes of thought and analysis, Rameau's methodology incorporated mathematics, commentary, analysis and a didacticism that was specifically intended to illuminate, scientifically, the structure and principles of music. With careful deductive reasoning, he attempted to derive universal harmonic principles from natural causes. Previous treatises on harmony had been purely practical; Rameau embraced the new philosophical rationalism, quickly rising to prominence in France as the "Isaac Newton of Music." His fame subsequently spread throughout all Europe, and his Treatise became the definitive authority on music theory, forming the foundation for instruction in western music that persists to this day.
List of works
RCT numbering refers to Rameau Catalogue Thématique established by Sylvie Bouissou and Denis Herlin.
Instrumental works
Pièces de clavecin. Trois livres. "Pieces for harpsichord", 3 books, published 1706, 1724, 1726/27(?).
RCT 1 – Premier livre de Clavecin (1706)
RCT 2 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in E minor
RCT 3 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in D major
RCT 4 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Menuet in C major
RCT 5 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in A minor
RCT 6 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in G
Pieces de Clavecin en Concerts Five albums of character pieces for harpsichord, violin and viol. (1741)
RCT 7 – Concert I in C minor
RCT 8 – Concert II in G major
RCT 9 – Concert III in A major
RCT 10 – Concert IV in B flat major
RCT 11 – Concert V in D minor
RCT 12 – La Dauphine for harpsichord. (1747)
RCT 12bis – Les petits marteaux for harpsichord.
Several orchestral dance suites extracted from his operas.
Motets
RCT 13 – Deus noster refugium (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 14 – In convertendo (probably before 1720, rev. 1751)
RCT 15 – Quam dilecta (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 16 – Laboravi (published in the Traité de l'harmonie, 1722)
Canons
RCT 17 – Ah! loin de rire, pleurons (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) (pub. 1722)
RCT 18 – Avec du vin, endormons-nous (2 sopranos, Tenor) (1719)
RCT 18bis – L'épouse entre deux draps (3 sopranos) (formerly attributed to François Couperin)
RCT 18ter – Je suis un fou Madame (3 voix égales) (1720)
RCT 19 – Mes chers amis, quittez vos rouges bords (3 sopranos, 3 basses) (pub. 1780)
RCT 20 – Réveillez-vous, dormeur sans fin (5 voix égales) (pub. 1722)
RCT 20bis – Si tu ne prends garde à toi (2 sopranos, bass) (1720)
Songs
RCT 21.1 – L'amante préoccupée or A l'objet que j'adore (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.2 – Lucas, pour se gausser de nous (soprano, bass, continuo) (pub. 1707)
RCT 21.3 – Non, non, le dieu qui sait aimer (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.4 – Un Bourbon ouvre sa carrière or Un héros ouvre sa carrière (alto, continuo) (1751, air belonging to Acante et Céphise but censored before its first performance and never reintroduced in the work).
Cantatas
RCT 23 – Aquilon et Orithie (between 1715 and 1720)
RCT 28 – Thétis (same period)
RCT 26 – L’impatience (same period)
RCT 22 – Les amants trahis (around 1720)
RCT 27 – Orphée (same period)
RCT 24 – Le berger fidèle (1728)
RCT 25 – Cantate pour le jour de la Saint Louis (1740)
Operas and stage works
Tragédies en musique
RCT 43 – Hippolyte et Aricie (1733; revised 1742 and 1757)
RCT 32 – Castor et Pollux (1737; revised 1754)
RCT 35 – Dardanus (1739; revised 1744 and 1760), score
RCT 62 – Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756, with new music for Acts II, III & V)
RCT 31 – Les Boréades or Abaris (unperformed; in rehearsal 1763)
Opéra-ballets
RCT 44 – Les Indes galantes (1735; revised 1736)
RCT 41 – Les fêtes d'Hébé or les Talens Lyriques (1739)
RCT 39 – Les fêtes de Polymnie (1745)
RCT 59 – Le temple de la gloire (1745; revised 1746)
RCT 38 – Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour or Les Dieux d'Egypte (1747)
RCT 58 – Les surprises de l'Amour (1748; revised 1757)
Pastorales héroïques
RCT 60 – Zaïs (1748)
RCT 49 – Naïs (1749)
RCT 29 – Acante et Céphise or La sympathie (1751)
RCT 34 – Daphnis et Eglé (1753)
Comédies lyriques
RCT 53 – Platée or Junon jalouse (1745), score
RCT 51 – Les Paladins or Le Vénitien (1760)
Comédie-ballet
RCT 54 – La princesse de Navarre (1744)
Actes de ballet
RCT 33 – Les courses de Tempé (1734)
RCT 40 – Les fêtes de Ramire (1745)
RCT 52 – Pigmalion (1748)
RCT 42 – La guirlande or Les fleurs enchantées (1751)
RCT 57 – Les sibarites or Sibaris (1753)
RCT 48 – La naissance d'Osiris or La Fête Pamilie (1754)
RCT 30 – Anacréon (1754)
RCT 58 – Anacréon (completely different work from the above, 1757, 3rd Entrée of Les surprises de l'Amour)
RCT 61 – Zéphire (date unknown)
RCT 50 – Nélée et Myrthis (date unknown)
RCT 45 – Io (unfinished, date unknown)
Lost works
RCT 56 – Samson (tragédie en musique) (first version written 1733–1734; second version 1736; neither were ever staged )
RCT 46 – Linus (tragédie en musique) (1751, score stolen after a rehearsal)
RCT 47 – Lisis et Délie (pastorale) (scheduled on November 6, 1753)
Incidental music for opéras comiques
Music mostly lost.
RCT 36 – L'endriague (in 3 acts, 1723)
RCT 37 – L'enrôlement d'Arlequin (in 1 act, 1726)
RCT 55 – La robe de dissension or Le faux prodige (in 2 acts, 1726)
RCT 55bis – La rose or Les jardins de l'Hymen (in a prologue and 1 act, 1744)
Writings
Traité de l'harmonie réduite à ses principes naturels (Paris, 1722)
Nouveau système de musique théorique (Paris, 1726)
Dissertation sur les différents méthodes d'accompagnement pour le clavecin, ou pour l'orgue (Paris, 1732)
Génération harmonique, ou Traité de musique théorique et pratique (Paris, 1737)
Mémoire où l'on expose les fondemens du Système de musique théorique et pratique de M. Rameau (1749)
Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1750)
Nouvelles réflexions de M. Rameau sur sa 'Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1752)
Observations sur notre instinct pour la musique (Paris, 1754)
Erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1755)
Suite des erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1756)
Reponse de M. Rameau à MM. les editeurs de l'Encyclopédie sur leur dernier Avertissement (Paris, 1757)
Nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (1758–9)
Code de musique pratique, ou Méthodes pour apprendre la musique...avec des nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (Paris, 1760)
Lettre à M. Alembert sur ses opinions en musique (Paris, 1760)
Origine des sciences, suivie d'un controverse sur le même sujet (Paris, 1762)
See also
Querelle des Bouffons
ReferencesNotesSourcesBeaussant, Philippe, Rameau de A à Z (Fayard, 1983)
Gibbons, William. Building the Operatic Museum: Eighteenth-Century Opera in Fin-de-siècle Paris (University of Rochester Press, 2013)
Girdlestone, Cuthbert, Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Dover paperback edition, 1969)
Holden, Amanda, (Ed) The Viking Opera Guide (Viking, 1993)
Sadler, Graham, (Ed.), The New Grove French Baroque Masters (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)
Trowbridge, Simon, Rameau (2nd edition, Englance Press, 2017)
F. Annunziata, Una Tragédie Lyrique nel Secolo dei Lumi. Abaris ou Les Boréades di Jean Philippe Rameau, https://www.academia.edu/6100318
External links
(en) Gavotte with Doubles Hypermedia by Jeff Hall & Tim Smith at the BinAural Collaborative Hypertext – Shockwave Player required – ("Gavotte with Doubles" link NG)
(en) jp.rameau.free.fr Rameau – Le Site
(fr) musicologie.org Biography, List of Works, bibliography, discography, theoretical writings, in French
(en) Jean-Philippe Rameau / Discography
Magnatune Les Cyclopes by Rameau in on-line mp3 format (played by Trevor Pinnock)
Jean-Philippe Rameau, "L'Orchestre de Louis XV" – Suites d'Orchestre, Le Concert des Nations, dir. Jordi Savall, Alia Vox, AVSA 9882Sheet music'''
Rameau free sheet music from the Mutopia Project
1683 births
1764 deaths
18th-century classical composers
18th-century French composers
18th-century French male musicians
Composers awarded knighthoods
Composers for harpsichord
French Baroque composers
French ballet composers
French opera composers
French male classical composers
French male non-fiction writers
French music theorists
Male opera composers
People from Dijon
Burials at Saint-Eustache, Paris
17th-century male musicians | true | [
"Louis de Cahusac (6 April 1706 – 22 June 1759) was an 18th-century French playwright and librettist, and Freemason, most famous for his work with the composer Jean-Philippe Rameau. He provided the libretti for several of Rameau's operas, namely Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zaïs (1748), Naïs (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacréon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boréades (c. 1763). Cahusac contributed to the Encyclopédie and was the lover of Marie Fel.\n\nIn 1754, he published La Danse ancienne et moderne ou Traité historique de la danse (The Hague, Jean Neaulme).\n\nAmong Rameau's librettists, he was the one whose collaboration lasted the longest; the composer had a very bad character and he was also stingy. Only Cahusac managed to work with him permanently.\n\nSources \nCuthbert Girdlestone Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Dover paperback edition, 1969)\nThe New Grove French Baroque Masters ed. Graham Sadler (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Louis de Cahusac on Data.bnf.fr\n\nPeople from Montauban\n1706 births\n1759 deaths\n18th-century French dramatists and playwrights\nContributors to the Encyclopédie (1751–1772)\nFrench male dramatists and playwrights\nFrench ballet librettists\nFrench opera librettists\nFrench male non-fiction writers\n18th-century French male writers",
"Eugène Leterrier (1843 – 22 December 1884 in Paris) was a French librettist.\n\nLeterrier worked at the Hôtel de Ville in Paris but then turned to the theatre. He mainly collaborated in writing libretti with Albert Vanloo. Their working relationship was productive and stress-free.\n\nIn collaboration with Vanloo success first came with Giroflé-Girofla and La petite mariée for Lecocq. The pair went on to provide libretti for Potier, Jacob, de Villebichet, Offenbach, Chabrier, Lacome and Messager. Chabrier was particularly pleased with the honest and hard work he enjoyed with the librettists for his first staged works.\n\nList of libretti\nWith Albert Vanloo\nGiroflé-Girofla (1874)\nLa petite mariée for Lecocq (1875)\nLe voyage dans la lune (1875)\nLa Marjolaine for Lecocq (1877)\nL'étoile (1877)\nLa Camargo for Lecocq (1878)\nUne éducation manquée (1879)\nLa jolie Persane for Lecocq (1879)\nLe jour et la nuit for Lecocq (1881)\nMam'zelle Moucheron for Offenbach (1881)\nLe droit d'aînesse (1883)\nLa Béarnaise (1885)\n\nWith Albert Vanloo and Arnold Mortier\nL'arbre de Noël for Lecocq (1880)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nList of works by Leterrier at the Index to Opera and Ballet Sources Online\n\nFrench opera librettists\n1843 births\n1884 deaths\nFrench male dramatists and playwrights\n19th-century French dramatists and playwrights\n19th-century French male writers"
]
|
[
"Jean-Philippe Rameau",
"Rameau and his librettists",
"What is a librettist?",
"librettists managed to produce a libretto",
"What is a libretto?",
"operas,",
"How was Rameau's relation with his librettists?",
"Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice.",
"Why didn't he work with the same librettists twice?",
"He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists,"
]
| C_6affd0880c764e209d1d4aabc61ddb69_0 | Were any exceptions noted in the article? | 5 | Were any exceptions noted in the article on Jean-Philippe Rameau and his librettists? | Jean-Philippe Rameau | Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacreon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boreades (c. 1763). Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupliniere's salon, at the Societe du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day. Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760). CANNOTANSWER | Louis de Cahusac, | Jean-Philippe Rameau (; – ) was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the 18th century. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer of his time for the harpsichord, alongside François Couperin.
Little is known about Rameau's early years. It was not until the 1720s that he won fame as a major theorist of music with his Treatise on Harmony (1722) and also in the following years as a composer of masterpieces for the harpsichord, which circulated throughout Europe. He was almost 50 before he embarked on the operatic career on which his reputation chiefly rests today. His debut, Hippolyte et Aricie (1733), caused a great stir and was fiercely attacked by the supporters of Lully's style of music for its revolutionary use of harmony. Nevertheless, Rameau's pre-eminence in the field of French opera was soon acknowledged, and he was later attacked as an "establishment" composer by those who favoured Italian opera during the controversy known as the Querelle des Bouffons in the 1750s. Rameau's music had gone out of fashion by the end of the 18th century, and it was not until the 20th that serious efforts were made to revive it. Today, he enjoys renewed appreciation with performances and recordings of his music ever more frequent.
Life
The details of Rameau's life are generally obscure, especially concerning his first forty years, before he moved to Paris for good. He was a secretive man, and even his wife knew nothing of his early life, which explains the scarcity of biographical information available.
Early years, 1683–1732
Rameau's early years are particularly obscure. He was born on 25 September 1683 in Dijon, and baptised the same day. His father, Jean, worked as an organist in several churches around Dijon, and his mother, Claudine Demartinécourt, was the daughter of a notary. The couple had eleven children (five girls and six boys), of whom Jean-Philippe was the seventh.
Rameau was taught music before he could read or write. He was educated at the Jesuit college at Godrans, but he was not a good pupil and disrupted classes with his singing, later claiming that his passion for opera had begun at the age of twelve. Initially intended for the law, Rameau decided he wanted to be a musician, and his father sent him to Italy, where he stayed for a short while in Milan. On his return, he worked as a violinist in travelling companies and then as an organist in provincial cathedrals before moving to Paris for the first time. Here, in 1706, he published his earliest known compositions: the harpsichord works that make up his first book of Pièces de Clavecin, which show the influence of his friend Louis Marchand.
In 1709, he moved back to Dijon to take over his father's job as organist in the main church. The contract was for six years, but Rameau left before then and took up similar posts in Lyon and Clermont-Ferrand. During this period, he composed motets for church performance as well as secular cantatas.
In 1722, he returned to Paris for good, and here he published his most important work of music theory, Traité de l'harmonie (Treatise on Harmony). This soon won him a great reputation, and it was followed in 1726 by his Nouveau système de musique théorique. In 1724 and 1729 (or 1730), he also published two more collections of harpsichord pieces.
Rameau took his first tentative steps into composing stage music when the writer Alexis Piron asked him to provide songs for his popular comic plays written for the Paris Fairs. Four collaborations followed, beginning with L'endriague in 1723; none of the music has survived.
On 25 February 1726 Rameau married the 19-year-old Marie-Louise Mangot, who came from a musical family from Lyon and was a good singer and instrumentalist. The couple would have four children, two boys and two girls, and the marriage is said to have been a happy one.
In spite of his fame as a music theorist, Rameau had trouble finding a post as an organist in Paris.
Later years, 1733–1764
It was not until he was approaching 50 that Rameau decided to embark on the operatic career on which his fame as a composer mainly rests. He had already approached writer Antoine Houdar de la Motte for a libretto in 1727, but nothing came of it; he was finally inspired to try his hand at the prestigious genre of tragédie en musique after seeing Montéclair's Jephté in 1732. Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie premiered at the Académie Royale de Musique on 1 October 1733. It was immediately recognised as the most significant opera to appear in France since the death of Lully, but audiences were split over whether this was a good thing or a bad thing. Some, such as the composer André Campra, were stunned by its originality and wealth of invention; others found its harmonic innovations discordant and saw the work as an attack on the French musical tradition. The two camps, the so-called Lullyistes and the Rameauneurs, fought a pamphlet war over the issue for the rest of the decade.
Just before this time, Rameau had made the acquaintance of the powerful financier Alexandre Le Riche de La Poupelinière, who became his patron until 1753. La Poupelinière's mistress (and later, wife), Thérèse des Hayes, was Rameau's pupil and a great admirer of his music. In 1731, Rameau became the conductor of La Poupelinière's private orchestra, which was of an extremely high quality. He held the post for 22 years; he was succeeded by Johann Stamitz and then François-Joseph Gossec. La Poupelinière's salon enabled Rameau to meet some of the leading cultural figures of the day, including Voltaire, who soon began collaborating with the composer. Their first project, the tragédie en musique Samson, was abandoned because an opera on a religious theme by Voltaire—a notorious critic of the Church—was likely to be banned by the authorities. Meanwhile, Rameau had introduced his new musical style into the lighter genre of the opéra-ballet with the highly successful Les Indes galantes. It was followed by two tragédies en musique, Castor et Pollux (1737) and Dardanus (1739), and another opéra-ballet, Les fêtes d'Hébé (also 1739). All these operas of the 1730s are among Rameau's most highly regarded works. However, the composer followed them with six years of silence, in which the only work he produced was a new version of Dardanus (1744). The reason for this interval in the composer's creative life is unknown, although it is possible he had a falling-out with the authorities at the Académie royale de la musique.
The year 1745 was a turning point in Rameau's career. He received several commissions from the court for works to celebrate the French victory at the Battle of Fontenoy and the marriage of the Dauphin to Infanta Maria Teresa Rafaela of Spain. Rameau produced his most important comic opera, Platée, as well as two collaborations with Voltaire: the opéra-ballet Le temple de la gloire and the comédie-ballet La princesse de Navarre. They gained Rameau official recognition; he was granted the title "Compositeur du Cabinet du Roi" and given a substantial pension. 1745 also saw the beginning of the bitter enmity between Rameau and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Though best known today as a thinker, Rousseau had ambitions to be a composer. He had written an opera, Les muses galantes (inspired by Rameau's Indes galantes), but Rameau was unimpressed by this musical tribute. At the end of 1745, Voltaire and Rameau, who were busy on other works, commissioned Rousseau to turn La Princesse de Navarre into a new opera, with linking recitative, called Les fêtes de Ramire. Rousseau then claimed the two had stolen the credit for the words and music he had contributed, though musicologists have been able to identify almost nothing of the piece as Rousseau's work. Nevertheless, the embittered Rousseau nursed a grudge against Rameau for the rest of his life.
Rousseau was a major participant in the second great quarrel that erupted over Rameau's work, the so-called Querelle des Bouffons of 1752–54, which pitted French tragédie en musique against Italian opera buffa. This time, Rameau was accused of being out of date and his music too complicated in comparison with the simplicity and "naturalness" of a work like Pergolesi's La serva padrona. In the mid-1750s, Rameau criticised Rousseau's contributions to the musical articles in the Encyclopédie, which led to a quarrel with the leading philosophes d'Alembert and Diderot. As a result, Jean-François Rameau became a character in Diderot's then-unpublished dialogue, Le neveu de Rameau (Rameau's Nephew).
In 1753, La Poupelinière took a scheming musician, Jeanne-Thérèse Goermans, as his mistress. The daughter of harpsichord maker Jacques Goermans, she went by the name of Madame de Saint-Aubin, and her opportunistic husband pushed her into the arms of the rich financier. She had La Poupelinière engage the services of the Bohemian composer Johann Stamitz, who succeeded Rameau after a breach developed between Rameau and his patron; however, by then, Rameau no longer needed La Poupelinière's financial support and protection.
Rameau pursued his activities as a theorist and composer until his death. He lived with his wife and two of his children in his large suite of rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, which he would leave every day, lost in thought, to take a solitary walk in the nearby gardens of the Palais-Royal or the Tuileries. Sometimes he would meet the young writer Chabanon, who noted some of Rameau's disillusioned confidential remarks: "Day by day, I'm acquiring more good taste, but I no longer have any genius" and "The imagination is worn out in my old head; it's not wise at this age wanting to practise arts that are nothing but imagination."
Rameau composed prolifically in the late 1740s and early 1750s. After that, his rate of productivity dropped off, probably due to old age and ill health, although he was still able to write another comic opera, Les Paladins, in 1760. This was due to be followed by a final tragédie en musique, Les Boréades; but for unknown reasons, the opera was never produced and had to wait until the late 20th century for a proper staging. Rameau died on 12 September 1764 after suffering from a fever, thirteen days before his 81st birthday. At his bedside, he objected to a song sung. His last words were, "What the devil do you mean to sing to me, priest? You are out of tune." He was buried in the church of St. Eustache, Paris on the same day of his death. Although a bronze bust and red marble tombstone were erected in his memory there by the Société de la Compositeurs de Musique in 1883, the exact site of his burial remains unknown to this day.
Rameau's personality
While the details of his biography are vague and fragmentary, the details of Rameau's personal and family life are almost completely obscure. Rameau's music, so graceful and attractive, completely contradicts the man's public image and what we know of his character as described (or perhaps unfairly caricatured) by Diderot in his satirical novel Le Neveu de Rameau. Throughout his life, music was his consuming passion. It occupied his entire thinking; Philippe Beaussant calls him a monomaniac. Piron explained that "His heart and soul were in his harpsichord; once he had shut its lid, there was no one home." Physically, Rameau was tall and exceptionally thin, as can be seen by the sketches we have of him, including a famous portrait by Carmontelle. He had a "loud voice." His speech was difficult to understand, just like his handwriting, which was never fluent. As a man, he was secretive, solitary, irritable, proud of his own achievements (more as a theorist than as a composer), brusque with those who contradicted him, and quick to anger. It is difficult to imagine him among the leading wits, including Voltaire (to whom he bears more than a passing physical resemblance), who frequented La Poupelinière's salon; his music was his passport, and it made up for his lack of social graces.
His enemies exaggerated his faults; e.g. his supposed miserliness. In fact, it seems that his thriftiness was the result of long years spent in obscurity (when his income was uncertain and scanty) rather than part of his character, because he could also be generous. He helped his nephew Jean-François when he came to Paris and also helped establish the career of Claude-Bénigne Balbastre in the capital. Furthermore, he gave his daughter Marie-Louise a considerable dowry when she became a Visitandine nun in 1750, and he paid a pension to one of his sisters when she became ill. Financial security came late to him, following the success of his stage works and the grant of a royal pension (a few months before his death, he was also ennobled and made a knight of the Ordre de Saint-Michel). But he did not change his way of life, keeping his worn-out clothes, his single pair of shoes, and his old furniture. After his death, it was discovered that he only possessed one dilapidated single-keyboard harpsichord in his rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, yet he also had a bag containing 1691 gold louis.
Music
General character of Rameau's music
Rameau's music is characterised by the exceptional technical knowledge of a composer who wanted above all to be renowned as a theorist of the art. Nevertheless, it is not solely addressed to the intelligence, and Rameau himself claimed, "I try to conceal art with art." The paradox of this music was that it was new, using techniques never known before, but it took place within the framework of old-fashioned forms. Rameau appeared revolutionary to the Lullyistes, disturbed by complex harmony of his music; and reactionary to the "philosophes," who only paid attention to its content and who either would not or could not listen to the sound it made. The incomprehension Rameau received from his contemporaries stopped him from repeating such daring experiments as the second Trio des Parques in Hippolyte et Aricie, which he was forced to remove after a handful of performances because the singers had been either unable or unwilling to execute it correctly.
Rameau's musical works
Rameau's musical works may be divided into four distinct groups, which differ greatly in importance: a few cantatas; a few motets for large chorus; some pieces for solo harpsichord or harpsichord accompanied by other instruments; and, finally, his works for the stage, to which he dedicated the last thirty years of his career almost exclusively. Like most of his contemporaries, Rameau often reused melodies that had been particularly successful, but never without meticulously adapting them; they are not simple transcriptions. Besides, no borrowings have been found from other composers, although his earliest works show the influence of other music. Rameau's reworkings of his own material are numerous; e.g., in Les Fêtes d'Hébé, we find L'Entretien des Muses, the Musette, and the Tambourin, taken from the 1724 book of harpsichord pieces, as well as an aria from the cantata Le Berger Fidèle.
Motets
For at least 26 years, Rameau was a professional organist in the service of religious institutions, and yet the body of sacred music he composed is exceptionally small and his organ works nonexistent. Judging by the evidence, it was not his favourite field, but rather, simply a way of making reasonable money. Rameau's few religious compositions are nevertheless remarkable and compare favourably to the works of specialists in the area. Only four motets have been attributed to Rameau with any certainty: Deus noster refugium, In convertendo, Quam dilecta, and Laboravi.
Cantatas
The cantata was a highly successful genre in the early 18th century. The French cantata, which should not be confused with the Italian or the German cantata, was "invented" in 1706 by the poet Jean-Baptiste Rousseau and soon taken up by many famous composers of the day, such as Montéclair, Campra, and Clérambault. Cantatas were Rameau's first contact with dramatic music. The modest forces the cantata required meant it was a genre within the reach of a composer who was still unknown. Musicologists can only guess at the dates of Rameau's six surviving cantatas, and the names of the librettists are unknown.
Instrumental music
Along with François Couperin, Rameau was a master of the 18th-century French school of harpsichord music, and both made a break with the style of the first generation of harpsichordists whose compositions adhered to the relatively standardised suite form, which had reached its apogee in the first decade of the 18th century and successive collections of pieces by Louis Marchand, Gaspard Le Roux, Louis-Nicolas Clérambault, Jean-François Dandrieu, Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, Charles Dieupart and Nicolas Siret. Rameau and Couperin had different styles, and it seems they did not know one another: Couperin was one of the official court musicians; Rameau, fifteen years his junior, achieved fame only after Couperin's death.
Rameau published his first book of harpsichord pieces in 1706. (Cf. Couperin, who waited until 1713 before publishing his first "Ordres.") Rameau's music includes pieces in the pure tradition of the French suite: imitative ("Le rappel des oiseaux," "La poule") and characterful ("Les tendres plaintes," "L'entretien des Muses"). But there are also works of pure virtuosity that resemble Domenico Scarlatti ("Les tourbillons," "Les trois mains") as well as pieces that reveal the experiments of a theorist and musical innovator ("L'enharmonique," "Les Cyclopes"), which had a marked influence on Louis-Claude Daquin, Joseph-Nicolas-Pancrace Royer and Jacques Duphly. Rameau's suites are grouped in the traditional way, by key. The first set of dances (Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, Les Trois Mains, Fanfairenette, La Triomphante, Gavotte et 6 doubles) is centred on A major and A minor, while the remaining pieces (Les tricoteuses, L'Indifferente, Première Menuet, Deuxième Menuet, La Poule, Les Triolets, Les Sauvages, L'Enharmonique, L'Egiptienne [sic]) are centred around G major and G minor.
Rameau's second and third collections appeared in 1724 and 1727. After these he composed only one piece for the harpsichord, the eight-minute "La Dauphine" of 1747, while the very short "Les petits marteaux" (c. 1750) has also been attributed to him.
During his semiretirement (1740 to 1744) he wrote the Pièces de clavecin en concert (1741), which some musicologists consider the pinnacle of French Baroque chamber music. Adopting a formula successfully employed by Mondonville a few years earlier, Rameau fashioned these pieces differently from trio sonatas in that the harpsichord is not simply there as basso continuo to accompany melody instruments (violin, flute, viol) but as equal partner in "concert" with them. Rameau claimed that this music would be equally satisfying played on the harpsichord alone, but the claim is not wholly convincing because he took the trouble to transcribe five of them himself, those the lack of other instruments would show the least.
Opera
After 1733 Rameau dedicated himself mostly to opera. On a strictly musical level, 18th-century French Baroque opera is richer and more varied than contemporary Italian opera, especially in the place given to choruses and dances but also in the musical continuity that arises from the respective relationships between the arias and the recitatives. Another essential difference: whereas Italian opera gave a starring role to female sopranos and castrati, French opera had no use for the latter. The Italian opera of Rameau's day (opera seria, opera buffa) was essentially divided into musical sections (da capo arias, duets, trios, etc.) and sections that were spoken or almost spoken (recitativo secco). It was during the latter that the action progressed while the audience waited for the next aria; on the other hand, the text of the arias was almost entirely buried beneath music whose chief aim was to show off the virtuosity of the singer. Nothing of the kind is to be found in French opera of the day; since Lully, the text had to remain comprehensible—limiting certain techniques such as the vocalise, which was reserved for special words such as ("glory") or ("victory"). A subtle equilibrium existed between the more and the less musical parts: melodic recitative on the one hand and arias that were often closer to arioso on the other, alongside virtuoso "ariettes" in the Italian style. This form of continuous music prefigures Wagnerian drama even more than does the "reform" opera of Gluck.
Five essential components may be discerned in Rameau's operatic scores:
Pieces of "pure" music (overtures, ritornelli, music which closes scenes). Unlike the highly stereotyped Lullian overture, Rameau's overtures show an extraordinary variety. Even in his earliest works, where he uses the standard French model, Rameau—the born symphonist and master of orchestration—composes novel and unique pieces. A few pieces are particularly striking, such as the overture to Zaïs, depicting the chaos before the creation of the universe, that of Pigmalion, suggesting the sculptor's chipping away at the statue with his mallet, or many more conventional depictions of storms and earthquakes, as well perhaps as the imposing final chaconnes of Les Indes galantes or Dardanus.
Dance music: the danced interludes, which were obligatory even in tragédie en musique, allowed Rameau to give free rein to his inimitable sense of rhythm, melody, and choreography, acknowledged by all his contemporaries, including the dancers themselves. This "learned" composer, forever preoccupied by his next theoretical work, also was one who strung together gavottes, minuets, loures, rigaudons, passepieds, tambourins, and musettes by the dozen. According to his biographer, Cuthbert Girdlestone, "The immense superiority of all that pertains to Rameau in choreography still needs emphasizing," and the German scholar H.W. von Walthershausen affirmed:
Rameau was the greatest ballet composer of all times. The genius of his creation rests on one hand on his perfect artistic permeation by folk-dance types, on the other hand on the constant preservation of living contact with the practical requirements of the ballet stage, which prevented an estrangement between the expression of the body from the spirit of absolute music.
Choruses: Padre Martini, the erudite musicologist who corresponded with Rameau, affirmed that "the French are excellent at choruses," obviously thinking of Rameau himself. A great master of harmony, Rameau knew how to compose sumptuous choruses—whether monodic, polyphonic, or interspersed with passages for solo singers or the orchestra—and whatever feelings needed to be expressed.
Arias: less frequent than in Italian opera, Rameau nevertheless offers many striking examples. Particularly admired arias include Télaïre's "Tristes apprêts," from Castor et Pollux; "Ô jour affreux" and "Lieux funestes," from Dardanus; Huascar's invocations in Les Indes galantes; and the final ariette in Pigmalion. In Platée we encounter a showstopping ars poetica aria for the character of La Folie (the madness), "Formons les plus brillants concerts / Aux langeurs d'Apollon".
Recitative: much closer to arioso than to recitativo secco. The composer took scrupulous care to observe French prosody and used his harmonic knowledge to give expression to his protagonists' feelings.
During the first part of his operatic career (1733–1739), Rameau wrote his great masterpieces destined for the Académie royale de musique: three tragédies en musique and two opéra-ballets that still form the core of his repertoire. After the interval of 1740 to 1744, he became the official court musician, and for the most part, composed pieces intended to entertain, with plenty of dance music emphasising sensuality and an idealised pastoral atmosphere. In his last years, Rameau returned to a renewed version of his early style in Les Paladins and Les Boréades.
His Zoroastre was first performed in 1749. According to one of Rameau's admirers, Cuthbert Girdlestone, this opera has a distinctive place in his works: "The profane passions of hatred and jealousy are rendered more intensely [than in his other works] and with a strong sense of reality."
Rameau and his librettists
Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zaïs (1748), Naïs (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacréon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boréades (c. 1763).
Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupelinière's salon, at the Société du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day.
Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760).
Reputation and influence
By the end of his life, Rameau's music had come under attack in France from theorists who favoured Italian models. However, foreign composers working in the Italian tradition were increasingly looking towards Rameau as a way of reforming their own leading operatic genre, opera seria. Tommaso Traetta produced two operas setting translations of Rameau libretti that show the French composer's influence, Ippolito ed Aricia (1759) and I Tintaridi (based on Castor et Pollux, 1760). Traetta had been advised by Count Francesco Algarotti, a leading proponent of reform according to French models; Algarotti was a major influence on the most important "reformist" composer, Christoph Willibald Gluck. Gluck's three Italian reform operas of the 1760s—Orfeo ed Euridice, Alceste, and Paride ed Elena—reveal a knowledge of Rameau's works. For instance, both Orfeo and the 1737 version of Castor et Pollux open with the funeral of one of the leading characters who later comes back to life. Many of the operatic reforms advocated in the preface to Gluck's Alceste were already present in Rameau's works. Rameau had used accompanied recitatives, and the overtures in his later operas reflected the action to come, so when Gluck arrived in Paris in 1774 to produce a series of six French operas, he could be seen as continuing in the tradition of Rameau. Nevertheless, while Gluck's popularity survived the French Revolution, Rameau's did not. By the end of the 18th century, his operas had vanished from the repertoire.
For most of the 19th century, Rameau's music remained unplayed, known only by reputation. Hector Berlioz investigated Castor et Pollux and particularly admired the aria "Tristes apprêts," but "whereas the modern listener readily perceives the common ground with Berlioz' music, he himself was more conscious of the gap which separated them." French humiliation in the Franco-Prussian War brought about a change in Rameau's fortunes. As Rameau biographer J. Malignon wrote, "...the German victory over France in 1870–71 was the grand occasion for digging up great heroes from the French past. Rameau, like so many others, was flung into the enemy's face to bolster our courage and our faith in the national destiny of France." In 1894, composer Vincent d'Indy founded the Schola Cantorum to promote French national music; the society put on several revivals of works by Rameau. Among the audience was Claude Debussy, who especially cherished Castor et Pollux, revived in 1903: "Gluck's genius was deeply rooted in Rameau's works... a detailed comparison allows us to affirm that Gluck could replace Rameau on the French stage only by assimilating the latter's beautiful works and making them his own." Camille Saint-Saëns (by editing and publishing the Pièces in 1895) and Paul Dukas were two other important French musicians who gave practical championship to Rameau's music in their day, but interest in Rameau petered out again, and it was not until the late 20th century that a serious effort was made to revive his works. Over half of Rameau's operas have now been recorded, in particular by conductors such as John Eliot Gardiner, William Christie, and Marc Minkowski.
One of his pieces is commonly heard in the Victoria Centre in Nottingham by the Rowland Emett timepiece, the Aqua Horological Tintinnabulator. Emett quoted that Rameau made music for his school and the shopping centre without him knowing it.
Theoretical works
Treatise on Harmony, 1722
Rameau's 1722 Treatise on Harmony initiated a revolution in music theory. Rameau posited the discovery of the "fundamental law" or what he referred to as the "fundamental bass" of all Western music. Heavily influenced by new Cartesian modes of thought and analysis, Rameau's methodology incorporated mathematics, commentary, analysis and a didacticism that was specifically intended to illuminate, scientifically, the structure and principles of music. With careful deductive reasoning, he attempted to derive universal harmonic principles from natural causes. Previous treatises on harmony had been purely practical; Rameau embraced the new philosophical rationalism, quickly rising to prominence in France as the "Isaac Newton of Music." His fame subsequently spread throughout all Europe, and his Treatise became the definitive authority on music theory, forming the foundation for instruction in western music that persists to this day.
List of works
RCT numbering refers to Rameau Catalogue Thématique established by Sylvie Bouissou and Denis Herlin.
Instrumental works
Pièces de clavecin. Trois livres. "Pieces for harpsichord", 3 books, published 1706, 1724, 1726/27(?).
RCT 1 – Premier livre de Clavecin (1706)
RCT 2 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in E minor
RCT 3 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in D major
RCT 4 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Menuet in C major
RCT 5 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in A minor
RCT 6 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in G
Pieces de Clavecin en Concerts Five albums of character pieces for harpsichord, violin and viol. (1741)
RCT 7 – Concert I in C minor
RCT 8 – Concert II in G major
RCT 9 – Concert III in A major
RCT 10 – Concert IV in B flat major
RCT 11 – Concert V in D minor
RCT 12 – La Dauphine for harpsichord. (1747)
RCT 12bis – Les petits marteaux for harpsichord.
Several orchestral dance suites extracted from his operas.
Motets
RCT 13 – Deus noster refugium (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 14 – In convertendo (probably before 1720, rev. 1751)
RCT 15 – Quam dilecta (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 16 – Laboravi (published in the Traité de l'harmonie, 1722)
Canons
RCT 17 – Ah! loin de rire, pleurons (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) (pub. 1722)
RCT 18 – Avec du vin, endormons-nous (2 sopranos, Tenor) (1719)
RCT 18bis – L'épouse entre deux draps (3 sopranos) (formerly attributed to François Couperin)
RCT 18ter – Je suis un fou Madame (3 voix égales) (1720)
RCT 19 – Mes chers amis, quittez vos rouges bords (3 sopranos, 3 basses) (pub. 1780)
RCT 20 – Réveillez-vous, dormeur sans fin (5 voix égales) (pub. 1722)
RCT 20bis – Si tu ne prends garde à toi (2 sopranos, bass) (1720)
Songs
RCT 21.1 – L'amante préoccupée or A l'objet que j'adore (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.2 – Lucas, pour se gausser de nous (soprano, bass, continuo) (pub. 1707)
RCT 21.3 – Non, non, le dieu qui sait aimer (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.4 – Un Bourbon ouvre sa carrière or Un héros ouvre sa carrière (alto, continuo) (1751, air belonging to Acante et Céphise but censored before its first performance and never reintroduced in the work).
Cantatas
RCT 23 – Aquilon et Orithie (between 1715 and 1720)
RCT 28 – Thétis (same period)
RCT 26 – L’impatience (same period)
RCT 22 – Les amants trahis (around 1720)
RCT 27 – Orphée (same period)
RCT 24 – Le berger fidèle (1728)
RCT 25 – Cantate pour le jour de la Saint Louis (1740)
Operas and stage works
Tragédies en musique
RCT 43 – Hippolyte et Aricie (1733; revised 1742 and 1757)
RCT 32 – Castor et Pollux (1737; revised 1754)
RCT 35 – Dardanus (1739; revised 1744 and 1760), score
RCT 62 – Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756, with new music for Acts II, III & V)
RCT 31 – Les Boréades or Abaris (unperformed; in rehearsal 1763)
Opéra-ballets
RCT 44 – Les Indes galantes (1735; revised 1736)
RCT 41 – Les fêtes d'Hébé or les Talens Lyriques (1739)
RCT 39 – Les fêtes de Polymnie (1745)
RCT 59 – Le temple de la gloire (1745; revised 1746)
RCT 38 – Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour or Les Dieux d'Egypte (1747)
RCT 58 – Les surprises de l'Amour (1748; revised 1757)
Pastorales héroïques
RCT 60 – Zaïs (1748)
RCT 49 – Naïs (1749)
RCT 29 – Acante et Céphise or La sympathie (1751)
RCT 34 – Daphnis et Eglé (1753)
Comédies lyriques
RCT 53 – Platée or Junon jalouse (1745), score
RCT 51 – Les Paladins or Le Vénitien (1760)
Comédie-ballet
RCT 54 – La princesse de Navarre (1744)
Actes de ballet
RCT 33 – Les courses de Tempé (1734)
RCT 40 – Les fêtes de Ramire (1745)
RCT 52 – Pigmalion (1748)
RCT 42 – La guirlande or Les fleurs enchantées (1751)
RCT 57 – Les sibarites or Sibaris (1753)
RCT 48 – La naissance d'Osiris or La Fête Pamilie (1754)
RCT 30 – Anacréon (1754)
RCT 58 – Anacréon (completely different work from the above, 1757, 3rd Entrée of Les surprises de l'Amour)
RCT 61 – Zéphire (date unknown)
RCT 50 – Nélée et Myrthis (date unknown)
RCT 45 – Io (unfinished, date unknown)
Lost works
RCT 56 – Samson (tragédie en musique) (first version written 1733–1734; second version 1736; neither were ever staged )
RCT 46 – Linus (tragédie en musique) (1751, score stolen after a rehearsal)
RCT 47 – Lisis et Délie (pastorale) (scheduled on November 6, 1753)
Incidental music for opéras comiques
Music mostly lost.
RCT 36 – L'endriague (in 3 acts, 1723)
RCT 37 – L'enrôlement d'Arlequin (in 1 act, 1726)
RCT 55 – La robe de dissension or Le faux prodige (in 2 acts, 1726)
RCT 55bis – La rose or Les jardins de l'Hymen (in a prologue and 1 act, 1744)
Writings
Traité de l'harmonie réduite à ses principes naturels (Paris, 1722)
Nouveau système de musique théorique (Paris, 1726)
Dissertation sur les différents méthodes d'accompagnement pour le clavecin, ou pour l'orgue (Paris, 1732)
Génération harmonique, ou Traité de musique théorique et pratique (Paris, 1737)
Mémoire où l'on expose les fondemens du Système de musique théorique et pratique de M. Rameau (1749)
Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1750)
Nouvelles réflexions de M. Rameau sur sa 'Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1752)
Observations sur notre instinct pour la musique (Paris, 1754)
Erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1755)
Suite des erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1756)
Reponse de M. Rameau à MM. les editeurs de l'Encyclopédie sur leur dernier Avertissement (Paris, 1757)
Nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (1758–9)
Code de musique pratique, ou Méthodes pour apprendre la musique...avec des nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (Paris, 1760)
Lettre à M. Alembert sur ses opinions en musique (Paris, 1760)
Origine des sciences, suivie d'un controverse sur le même sujet (Paris, 1762)
See also
Querelle des Bouffons
ReferencesNotesSourcesBeaussant, Philippe, Rameau de A à Z (Fayard, 1983)
Gibbons, William. Building the Operatic Museum: Eighteenth-Century Opera in Fin-de-siècle Paris (University of Rochester Press, 2013)
Girdlestone, Cuthbert, Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Dover paperback edition, 1969)
Holden, Amanda, (Ed) The Viking Opera Guide (Viking, 1993)
Sadler, Graham, (Ed.), The New Grove French Baroque Masters (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)
Trowbridge, Simon, Rameau (2nd edition, Englance Press, 2017)
F. Annunziata, Una Tragédie Lyrique nel Secolo dei Lumi. Abaris ou Les Boréades di Jean Philippe Rameau, https://www.academia.edu/6100318
External links
(en) Gavotte with Doubles Hypermedia by Jeff Hall & Tim Smith at the BinAural Collaborative Hypertext – Shockwave Player required – ("Gavotte with Doubles" link NG)
(en) jp.rameau.free.fr Rameau – Le Site
(fr) musicologie.org Biography, List of Works, bibliography, discography, theoretical writings, in French
(en) Jean-Philippe Rameau / Discography
Magnatune Les Cyclopes by Rameau in on-line mp3 format (played by Trevor Pinnock)
Jean-Philippe Rameau, "L'Orchestre de Louis XV" – Suites d'Orchestre, Le Concert des Nations, dir. Jordi Savall, Alia Vox, AVSA 9882Sheet music'''
Rameau free sheet music from the Mutopia Project
1683 births
1764 deaths
18th-century classical composers
18th-century French composers
18th-century French male musicians
Composers awarded knighthoods
Composers for harpsichord
French Baroque composers
French ballet composers
French opera composers
French male classical composers
French male non-fiction writers
French music theorists
Male opera composers
People from Dijon
Burials at Saint-Eustache, Paris
17th-century male musicians | true | [
"The Berne three-step test is a clause that is included in several international treaties on intellectual property. Signatories of those treaties agree to standardize possible limitations and exceptions to exclusive rights under their respective national copyright laws.\n\nBerne Convention \nThe three-step test was first established in relation to the exclusive right of reproduction under Article 9(2) of the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works in 1967. Article 9 of the Berne Convention states that:\nRight of Reproduction: 1. Generally; 2. Possible exceptions; 3. Sound and visual recordings - (1) Authors of literary and artistic works protected by this Convention shall have the exclusive right of authorizing the reproduction of these works, in any manner or form. 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(3) Any sound or visual recording shall be considered as a reproduction for the purposes of this Convention. \n\nThe test is vague, but spelled out in the formulation of Hugenholtz and Okediji, the three steps are:\n Limitations and exceptions cannot be \"overly broad\" [= \"certain special cases\"]\n Limitations and exceptions cannot \"rob right holders of a real or potential source of income that is substantive\" [= \"conflicting with normal exploitation of the work\"]\n Limitations and exceptions cannot \"do disproportional harm to the rights holders\" [= \"prejudice legitimate interests\"]\n\nThe three-step test in Article 9(2) of the Berne does not apply to copyright exceptions that are implemented under other parts of the Berne convention that have a separate standard, such as those in articles 2(4), 2(7), 2(8), 2 bis, 10, 10 bis and 13(1), or the Berne Appendix.\n\nOther copyright treaties \nSince then, the three-step test has been modified and transplanted into the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, the WIPO Copyright Treaty (Article 10), the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty (Article 16(2)), the EU Computer Programs Directive (Article 6(3)), the EU Database Directive (Article 6(3)), and the EU Copyright Directive (Article 5(5)).\n\nThe test as included in Article 13 of TRIPs reads:\n\"Members shall confine limitations and exceptions to exclusive rights to certain special cases which do not conflict with a normal exploitation of the work and do not unreasonably prejudice the legitimate interests of the rights holder.\"\n\nThe WTO three-step test does not apply to cases where the Berne or Rome Conventions provide separate standards for exceptions, or for rights not covered in the TRIPS Agreement.\n\nInterpretation \nThe technical legal reasoning which has been applied to suggest how this wording should be interpreted is arcane (see the references below). To date, only one case (before a WTO dispute settlement panel, involving U.S. copyright exemptions allowing restaurants, bars and shops to play radio and TV broadcasts without paying licensing fees, passed in 1998 as a rider to the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act) has actually required an interpretation of the test. \n\nThe three-step test may prove to be extremely important if any nations attempt to reduce the scope of copyright law, because unless the WTO decides that their modifications comply with the test, such states are likely to face trade sanctions. Exceptions to copyright protection are required to be clearly defined and narrow in scope and reach. For instance, the three-step test was invoked as a justification for refusing certain exceptions to copyright wished for by members of the French parliament during the examination of the controversial DADVSI copyright bill.\n\nPatents \nTRIPs Article 30, covering limitations and exemptions to patent law, is also derived from a somewhat different three-step test, that includes \"taking account of the legitimate interests of third parties.\" Exceptions to exclusive patent rights are not subject to this test if they are implemented through Article 31 of the TRIPS, or Articles 6, 40 or 44.2.\n\nSee also\n Fair use\n Fair dealing\n\nReferences\n\nFurther reading\n\n Ficsor M. 2002 \"How much of what? The \"three-step test\" and its application in two recent WTO dispute settlement cases\", Revue Internationale du Droit D'auteur 192 pp 110–251.\n Ginsburg, J.C. 2001 Toward supranational copyright law? The WTO Panel decision and the \"three-step test\" for copyright exceptions, Revue Internationale du Droit D'auteur 187, p 3.\n Gervais, D. J., Towards A New Core International Copyright Norm: The Reverse Three-Step Test, Marquette Intellectual Property Law Review, Vol. 9, p. 1, Spring 2005\n World Trade Organization 2000 Dispute Resolution Panel Report on Section 110(5) of the United States Copyright Act, http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/dispu_e/1234da.pdf\n Guibault L.M.C.R. 2002 Copyright Limitations and Contracts. An Analysis of the Contractual Overridability of Limitations on Copyright., Kluwer Law International \n Rodrigues Jr., E.B. 2012 The General Exception Clauses of the TRIPS Agreement: Promoting Sustainable Development, New York: Cambridge University Press.\n Senftleben M. 2004 Copyright, Limitations and the Three-Step Test, Kluwer Kaw International\n Koelman K.J., 2006, Fixing the Three-Step Test, European Intellectual Property Review, p. 407, https://ssrn.com/abstract=924174\n Westkamp, G., The Three-Step Test and Copyright Limitations in Europe: European Copyright Law between Approximation and National Decision Making [2008] 56 Journal of the Copyright Society of the USA 1-65.\n\nCopyright law\nLegal tests",
"The Freedom of access to information (2003/4/EC) is a European Union directive with the formal title \"Directive 2003/4/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 28 January 2003 on public access to environmental information and repealing Council Directive 90/313/EEC\".\n\nThe purpose of the Directive is to ensure that environmental information is systematically available and distributed to the public. The Directive requires Member States to ensure that public authorities are required to make the environmental information they hold available to any legal or natural person on request.\n\nIn 1998, the European Community signed a Convention on access to information, public participation in decision-making and access to justice in environmental matters (the Aarhus Convention). The Freedom of access to information Directive implements the Convention.\n\nExceptions\n\nPublic authorities are required to release information on request subject to the following exceptions:\n\nthe authority does not hold the requested information\nthe request is manifestly unreasonable;\nthe request is too general;\nthe requested information is in the course of completion;\nthe request concerns internal communications;\nthe disclosure of the information would adversely affect:\nthe confidentiality of the proceedings of public authorities or of commercial or industrial information;\npublic security or national defence;\nthe course of justice;\nintellectual property rights;\nthe confidentiality of personal data;\nthe interests of the person who supplied the information on a voluntary basis; or\nthe protection of the environment.\n\nStructure\n\nRecital\nArticle 1 – Objectives\nArticle 2 – Definitions\nArticle 3 – Access to environmental information upon request\nArticle 4 – Exceptions\nArticle 5 – Charges\nArticle 6 – Access to justice\nArticle 7 – Dissemination of environmental information\nArticle 8 – Quality of environmental information\nArticle 9 – Review procedure\nArticle 10 – Implementation\nArticle 11 – Repeal\nArticle 12 – Entry into force\nArticle 13 – Addressees\nAnnex – Correlation table\n\nImplementation\n\nIn the United Kingdom, the Directive has been implemented by the Environmental Information Regulations 2004. In the Republic of Ireland, the Directive has been implemented as the European Communities (Access to Information on the Environment) Regulations 2007.\n\nSee also\n\nList of European Union directives\n\nReferences\n\nEuropean Union directives\nEuropean Union and the environment\nEnvironmental law in the European Union\n2003 in law\n2003 in the environment\n2003 in the European Union"
]
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[
"Jean-Philippe Rameau",
"Rameau and his librettists",
"What is a librettist?",
"librettists managed to produce a libretto",
"What is a libretto?",
"operas,",
"How was Rameau's relation with his librettists?",
"Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice.",
"Why didn't he work with the same librettists twice?",
"He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists,",
"Were any exceptions noted in the article?",
"Louis de Cahusac,"
]
| C_6affd0880c764e209d1d4aabc61ddb69_0 | Why was de Cahusac an exception? | 6 | Why was Louis de Cahusac an exception? | Jean-Philippe Rameau | Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacreon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boreades (c. 1763). Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupliniere's salon, at the Societe du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day. Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760). CANNOTANSWER | collaborated with him on several operas, | Jean-Philippe Rameau (; – ) was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the 18th century. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer of his time for the harpsichord, alongside François Couperin.
Little is known about Rameau's early years. It was not until the 1720s that he won fame as a major theorist of music with his Treatise on Harmony (1722) and also in the following years as a composer of masterpieces for the harpsichord, which circulated throughout Europe. He was almost 50 before he embarked on the operatic career on which his reputation chiefly rests today. His debut, Hippolyte et Aricie (1733), caused a great stir and was fiercely attacked by the supporters of Lully's style of music for its revolutionary use of harmony. Nevertheless, Rameau's pre-eminence in the field of French opera was soon acknowledged, and he was later attacked as an "establishment" composer by those who favoured Italian opera during the controversy known as the Querelle des Bouffons in the 1750s. Rameau's music had gone out of fashion by the end of the 18th century, and it was not until the 20th that serious efforts were made to revive it. Today, he enjoys renewed appreciation with performances and recordings of his music ever more frequent.
Life
The details of Rameau's life are generally obscure, especially concerning his first forty years, before he moved to Paris for good. He was a secretive man, and even his wife knew nothing of his early life, which explains the scarcity of biographical information available.
Early years, 1683–1732
Rameau's early years are particularly obscure. He was born on 25 September 1683 in Dijon, and baptised the same day. His father, Jean, worked as an organist in several churches around Dijon, and his mother, Claudine Demartinécourt, was the daughter of a notary. The couple had eleven children (five girls and six boys), of whom Jean-Philippe was the seventh.
Rameau was taught music before he could read or write. He was educated at the Jesuit college at Godrans, but he was not a good pupil and disrupted classes with his singing, later claiming that his passion for opera had begun at the age of twelve. Initially intended for the law, Rameau decided he wanted to be a musician, and his father sent him to Italy, where he stayed for a short while in Milan. On his return, he worked as a violinist in travelling companies and then as an organist in provincial cathedrals before moving to Paris for the first time. Here, in 1706, he published his earliest known compositions: the harpsichord works that make up his first book of Pièces de Clavecin, which show the influence of his friend Louis Marchand.
In 1709, he moved back to Dijon to take over his father's job as organist in the main church. The contract was for six years, but Rameau left before then and took up similar posts in Lyon and Clermont-Ferrand. During this period, he composed motets for church performance as well as secular cantatas.
In 1722, he returned to Paris for good, and here he published his most important work of music theory, Traité de l'harmonie (Treatise on Harmony). This soon won him a great reputation, and it was followed in 1726 by his Nouveau système de musique théorique. In 1724 and 1729 (or 1730), he also published two more collections of harpsichord pieces.
Rameau took his first tentative steps into composing stage music when the writer Alexis Piron asked him to provide songs for his popular comic plays written for the Paris Fairs. Four collaborations followed, beginning with L'endriague in 1723; none of the music has survived.
On 25 February 1726 Rameau married the 19-year-old Marie-Louise Mangot, who came from a musical family from Lyon and was a good singer and instrumentalist. The couple would have four children, two boys and two girls, and the marriage is said to have been a happy one.
In spite of his fame as a music theorist, Rameau had trouble finding a post as an organist in Paris.
Later years, 1733–1764
It was not until he was approaching 50 that Rameau decided to embark on the operatic career on which his fame as a composer mainly rests. He had already approached writer Antoine Houdar de la Motte for a libretto in 1727, but nothing came of it; he was finally inspired to try his hand at the prestigious genre of tragédie en musique after seeing Montéclair's Jephté in 1732. Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie premiered at the Académie Royale de Musique on 1 October 1733. It was immediately recognised as the most significant opera to appear in France since the death of Lully, but audiences were split over whether this was a good thing or a bad thing. Some, such as the composer André Campra, were stunned by its originality and wealth of invention; others found its harmonic innovations discordant and saw the work as an attack on the French musical tradition. The two camps, the so-called Lullyistes and the Rameauneurs, fought a pamphlet war over the issue for the rest of the decade.
Just before this time, Rameau had made the acquaintance of the powerful financier Alexandre Le Riche de La Poupelinière, who became his patron until 1753. La Poupelinière's mistress (and later, wife), Thérèse des Hayes, was Rameau's pupil and a great admirer of his music. In 1731, Rameau became the conductor of La Poupelinière's private orchestra, which was of an extremely high quality. He held the post for 22 years; he was succeeded by Johann Stamitz and then François-Joseph Gossec. La Poupelinière's salon enabled Rameau to meet some of the leading cultural figures of the day, including Voltaire, who soon began collaborating with the composer. Their first project, the tragédie en musique Samson, was abandoned because an opera on a religious theme by Voltaire—a notorious critic of the Church—was likely to be banned by the authorities. Meanwhile, Rameau had introduced his new musical style into the lighter genre of the opéra-ballet with the highly successful Les Indes galantes. It was followed by two tragédies en musique, Castor et Pollux (1737) and Dardanus (1739), and another opéra-ballet, Les fêtes d'Hébé (also 1739). All these operas of the 1730s are among Rameau's most highly regarded works. However, the composer followed them with six years of silence, in which the only work he produced was a new version of Dardanus (1744). The reason for this interval in the composer's creative life is unknown, although it is possible he had a falling-out with the authorities at the Académie royale de la musique.
The year 1745 was a turning point in Rameau's career. He received several commissions from the court for works to celebrate the French victory at the Battle of Fontenoy and the marriage of the Dauphin to Infanta Maria Teresa Rafaela of Spain. Rameau produced his most important comic opera, Platée, as well as two collaborations with Voltaire: the opéra-ballet Le temple de la gloire and the comédie-ballet La princesse de Navarre. They gained Rameau official recognition; he was granted the title "Compositeur du Cabinet du Roi" and given a substantial pension. 1745 also saw the beginning of the bitter enmity between Rameau and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Though best known today as a thinker, Rousseau had ambitions to be a composer. He had written an opera, Les muses galantes (inspired by Rameau's Indes galantes), but Rameau was unimpressed by this musical tribute. At the end of 1745, Voltaire and Rameau, who were busy on other works, commissioned Rousseau to turn La Princesse de Navarre into a new opera, with linking recitative, called Les fêtes de Ramire. Rousseau then claimed the two had stolen the credit for the words and music he had contributed, though musicologists have been able to identify almost nothing of the piece as Rousseau's work. Nevertheless, the embittered Rousseau nursed a grudge against Rameau for the rest of his life.
Rousseau was a major participant in the second great quarrel that erupted over Rameau's work, the so-called Querelle des Bouffons of 1752–54, which pitted French tragédie en musique against Italian opera buffa. This time, Rameau was accused of being out of date and his music too complicated in comparison with the simplicity and "naturalness" of a work like Pergolesi's La serva padrona. In the mid-1750s, Rameau criticised Rousseau's contributions to the musical articles in the Encyclopédie, which led to a quarrel with the leading philosophes d'Alembert and Diderot. As a result, Jean-François Rameau became a character in Diderot's then-unpublished dialogue, Le neveu de Rameau (Rameau's Nephew).
In 1753, La Poupelinière took a scheming musician, Jeanne-Thérèse Goermans, as his mistress. The daughter of harpsichord maker Jacques Goermans, she went by the name of Madame de Saint-Aubin, and her opportunistic husband pushed her into the arms of the rich financier. She had La Poupelinière engage the services of the Bohemian composer Johann Stamitz, who succeeded Rameau after a breach developed between Rameau and his patron; however, by then, Rameau no longer needed La Poupelinière's financial support and protection.
Rameau pursued his activities as a theorist and composer until his death. He lived with his wife and two of his children in his large suite of rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, which he would leave every day, lost in thought, to take a solitary walk in the nearby gardens of the Palais-Royal or the Tuileries. Sometimes he would meet the young writer Chabanon, who noted some of Rameau's disillusioned confidential remarks: "Day by day, I'm acquiring more good taste, but I no longer have any genius" and "The imagination is worn out in my old head; it's not wise at this age wanting to practise arts that are nothing but imagination."
Rameau composed prolifically in the late 1740s and early 1750s. After that, his rate of productivity dropped off, probably due to old age and ill health, although he was still able to write another comic opera, Les Paladins, in 1760. This was due to be followed by a final tragédie en musique, Les Boréades; but for unknown reasons, the opera was never produced and had to wait until the late 20th century for a proper staging. Rameau died on 12 September 1764 after suffering from a fever, thirteen days before his 81st birthday. At his bedside, he objected to a song sung. His last words were, "What the devil do you mean to sing to me, priest? You are out of tune." He was buried in the church of St. Eustache, Paris on the same day of his death. Although a bronze bust and red marble tombstone were erected in his memory there by the Société de la Compositeurs de Musique in 1883, the exact site of his burial remains unknown to this day.
Rameau's personality
While the details of his biography are vague and fragmentary, the details of Rameau's personal and family life are almost completely obscure. Rameau's music, so graceful and attractive, completely contradicts the man's public image and what we know of his character as described (or perhaps unfairly caricatured) by Diderot in his satirical novel Le Neveu de Rameau. Throughout his life, music was his consuming passion. It occupied his entire thinking; Philippe Beaussant calls him a monomaniac. Piron explained that "His heart and soul were in his harpsichord; once he had shut its lid, there was no one home." Physically, Rameau was tall and exceptionally thin, as can be seen by the sketches we have of him, including a famous portrait by Carmontelle. He had a "loud voice." His speech was difficult to understand, just like his handwriting, which was never fluent. As a man, he was secretive, solitary, irritable, proud of his own achievements (more as a theorist than as a composer), brusque with those who contradicted him, and quick to anger. It is difficult to imagine him among the leading wits, including Voltaire (to whom he bears more than a passing physical resemblance), who frequented La Poupelinière's salon; his music was his passport, and it made up for his lack of social graces.
His enemies exaggerated his faults; e.g. his supposed miserliness. In fact, it seems that his thriftiness was the result of long years spent in obscurity (when his income was uncertain and scanty) rather than part of his character, because he could also be generous. He helped his nephew Jean-François when he came to Paris and also helped establish the career of Claude-Bénigne Balbastre in the capital. Furthermore, he gave his daughter Marie-Louise a considerable dowry when she became a Visitandine nun in 1750, and he paid a pension to one of his sisters when she became ill. Financial security came late to him, following the success of his stage works and the grant of a royal pension (a few months before his death, he was also ennobled and made a knight of the Ordre de Saint-Michel). But he did not change his way of life, keeping his worn-out clothes, his single pair of shoes, and his old furniture. After his death, it was discovered that he only possessed one dilapidated single-keyboard harpsichord in his rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, yet he also had a bag containing 1691 gold louis.
Music
General character of Rameau's music
Rameau's music is characterised by the exceptional technical knowledge of a composer who wanted above all to be renowned as a theorist of the art. Nevertheless, it is not solely addressed to the intelligence, and Rameau himself claimed, "I try to conceal art with art." The paradox of this music was that it was new, using techniques never known before, but it took place within the framework of old-fashioned forms. Rameau appeared revolutionary to the Lullyistes, disturbed by complex harmony of his music; and reactionary to the "philosophes," who only paid attention to its content and who either would not or could not listen to the sound it made. The incomprehension Rameau received from his contemporaries stopped him from repeating such daring experiments as the second Trio des Parques in Hippolyte et Aricie, which he was forced to remove after a handful of performances because the singers had been either unable or unwilling to execute it correctly.
Rameau's musical works
Rameau's musical works may be divided into four distinct groups, which differ greatly in importance: a few cantatas; a few motets for large chorus; some pieces for solo harpsichord or harpsichord accompanied by other instruments; and, finally, his works for the stage, to which he dedicated the last thirty years of his career almost exclusively. Like most of his contemporaries, Rameau often reused melodies that had been particularly successful, but never without meticulously adapting them; they are not simple transcriptions. Besides, no borrowings have been found from other composers, although his earliest works show the influence of other music. Rameau's reworkings of his own material are numerous; e.g., in Les Fêtes d'Hébé, we find L'Entretien des Muses, the Musette, and the Tambourin, taken from the 1724 book of harpsichord pieces, as well as an aria from the cantata Le Berger Fidèle.
Motets
For at least 26 years, Rameau was a professional organist in the service of religious institutions, and yet the body of sacred music he composed is exceptionally small and his organ works nonexistent. Judging by the evidence, it was not his favourite field, but rather, simply a way of making reasonable money. Rameau's few religious compositions are nevertheless remarkable and compare favourably to the works of specialists in the area. Only four motets have been attributed to Rameau with any certainty: Deus noster refugium, In convertendo, Quam dilecta, and Laboravi.
Cantatas
The cantata was a highly successful genre in the early 18th century. The French cantata, which should not be confused with the Italian or the German cantata, was "invented" in 1706 by the poet Jean-Baptiste Rousseau and soon taken up by many famous composers of the day, such as Montéclair, Campra, and Clérambault. Cantatas were Rameau's first contact with dramatic music. The modest forces the cantata required meant it was a genre within the reach of a composer who was still unknown. Musicologists can only guess at the dates of Rameau's six surviving cantatas, and the names of the librettists are unknown.
Instrumental music
Along with François Couperin, Rameau was a master of the 18th-century French school of harpsichord music, and both made a break with the style of the first generation of harpsichordists whose compositions adhered to the relatively standardised suite form, which had reached its apogee in the first decade of the 18th century and successive collections of pieces by Louis Marchand, Gaspard Le Roux, Louis-Nicolas Clérambault, Jean-François Dandrieu, Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, Charles Dieupart and Nicolas Siret. Rameau and Couperin had different styles, and it seems they did not know one another: Couperin was one of the official court musicians; Rameau, fifteen years his junior, achieved fame only after Couperin's death.
Rameau published his first book of harpsichord pieces in 1706. (Cf. Couperin, who waited until 1713 before publishing his first "Ordres.") Rameau's music includes pieces in the pure tradition of the French suite: imitative ("Le rappel des oiseaux," "La poule") and characterful ("Les tendres plaintes," "L'entretien des Muses"). But there are also works of pure virtuosity that resemble Domenico Scarlatti ("Les tourbillons," "Les trois mains") as well as pieces that reveal the experiments of a theorist and musical innovator ("L'enharmonique," "Les Cyclopes"), which had a marked influence on Louis-Claude Daquin, Joseph-Nicolas-Pancrace Royer and Jacques Duphly. Rameau's suites are grouped in the traditional way, by key. The first set of dances (Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, Les Trois Mains, Fanfairenette, La Triomphante, Gavotte et 6 doubles) is centred on A major and A minor, while the remaining pieces (Les tricoteuses, L'Indifferente, Première Menuet, Deuxième Menuet, La Poule, Les Triolets, Les Sauvages, L'Enharmonique, L'Egiptienne [sic]) are centred around G major and G minor.
Rameau's second and third collections appeared in 1724 and 1727. After these he composed only one piece for the harpsichord, the eight-minute "La Dauphine" of 1747, while the very short "Les petits marteaux" (c. 1750) has also been attributed to him.
During his semiretirement (1740 to 1744) he wrote the Pièces de clavecin en concert (1741), which some musicologists consider the pinnacle of French Baroque chamber music. Adopting a formula successfully employed by Mondonville a few years earlier, Rameau fashioned these pieces differently from trio sonatas in that the harpsichord is not simply there as basso continuo to accompany melody instruments (violin, flute, viol) but as equal partner in "concert" with them. Rameau claimed that this music would be equally satisfying played on the harpsichord alone, but the claim is not wholly convincing because he took the trouble to transcribe five of them himself, those the lack of other instruments would show the least.
Opera
After 1733 Rameau dedicated himself mostly to opera. On a strictly musical level, 18th-century French Baroque opera is richer and more varied than contemporary Italian opera, especially in the place given to choruses and dances but also in the musical continuity that arises from the respective relationships between the arias and the recitatives. Another essential difference: whereas Italian opera gave a starring role to female sopranos and castrati, French opera had no use for the latter. The Italian opera of Rameau's day (opera seria, opera buffa) was essentially divided into musical sections (da capo arias, duets, trios, etc.) and sections that were spoken or almost spoken (recitativo secco). It was during the latter that the action progressed while the audience waited for the next aria; on the other hand, the text of the arias was almost entirely buried beneath music whose chief aim was to show off the virtuosity of the singer. Nothing of the kind is to be found in French opera of the day; since Lully, the text had to remain comprehensible—limiting certain techniques such as the vocalise, which was reserved for special words such as ("glory") or ("victory"). A subtle equilibrium existed between the more and the less musical parts: melodic recitative on the one hand and arias that were often closer to arioso on the other, alongside virtuoso "ariettes" in the Italian style. This form of continuous music prefigures Wagnerian drama even more than does the "reform" opera of Gluck.
Five essential components may be discerned in Rameau's operatic scores:
Pieces of "pure" music (overtures, ritornelli, music which closes scenes). Unlike the highly stereotyped Lullian overture, Rameau's overtures show an extraordinary variety. Even in his earliest works, where he uses the standard French model, Rameau—the born symphonist and master of orchestration—composes novel and unique pieces. A few pieces are particularly striking, such as the overture to Zaïs, depicting the chaos before the creation of the universe, that of Pigmalion, suggesting the sculptor's chipping away at the statue with his mallet, or many more conventional depictions of storms and earthquakes, as well perhaps as the imposing final chaconnes of Les Indes galantes or Dardanus.
Dance music: the danced interludes, which were obligatory even in tragédie en musique, allowed Rameau to give free rein to his inimitable sense of rhythm, melody, and choreography, acknowledged by all his contemporaries, including the dancers themselves. This "learned" composer, forever preoccupied by his next theoretical work, also was one who strung together gavottes, minuets, loures, rigaudons, passepieds, tambourins, and musettes by the dozen. According to his biographer, Cuthbert Girdlestone, "The immense superiority of all that pertains to Rameau in choreography still needs emphasizing," and the German scholar H.W. von Walthershausen affirmed:
Rameau was the greatest ballet composer of all times. The genius of his creation rests on one hand on his perfect artistic permeation by folk-dance types, on the other hand on the constant preservation of living contact with the practical requirements of the ballet stage, which prevented an estrangement between the expression of the body from the spirit of absolute music.
Choruses: Padre Martini, the erudite musicologist who corresponded with Rameau, affirmed that "the French are excellent at choruses," obviously thinking of Rameau himself. A great master of harmony, Rameau knew how to compose sumptuous choruses—whether monodic, polyphonic, or interspersed with passages for solo singers or the orchestra—and whatever feelings needed to be expressed.
Arias: less frequent than in Italian opera, Rameau nevertheless offers many striking examples. Particularly admired arias include Télaïre's "Tristes apprêts," from Castor et Pollux; "Ô jour affreux" and "Lieux funestes," from Dardanus; Huascar's invocations in Les Indes galantes; and the final ariette in Pigmalion. In Platée we encounter a showstopping ars poetica aria for the character of La Folie (the madness), "Formons les plus brillants concerts / Aux langeurs d'Apollon".
Recitative: much closer to arioso than to recitativo secco. The composer took scrupulous care to observe French prosody and used his harmonic knowledge to give expression to his protagonists' feelings.
During the first part of his operatic career (1733–1739), Rameau wrote his great masterpieces destined for the Académie royale de musique: three tragédies en musique and two opéra-ballets that still form the core of his repertoire. After the interval of 1740 to 1744, he became the official court musician, and for the most part, composed pieces intended to entertain, with plenty of dance music emphasising sensuality and an idealised pastoral atmosphere. In his last years, Rameau returned to a renewed version of his early style in Les Paladins and Les Boréades.
His Zoroastre was first performed in 1749. According to one of Rameau's admirers, Cuthbert Girdlestone, this opera has a distinctive place in his works: "The profane passions of hatred and jealousy are rendered more intensely [than in his other works] and with a strong sense of reality."
Rameau and his librettists
Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zaïs (1748), Naïs (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacréon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boréades (c. 1763).
Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupelinière's salon, at the Société du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day.
Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760).
Reputation and influence
By the end of his life, Rameau's music had come under attack in France from theorists who favoured Italian models. However, foreign composers working in the Italian tradition were increasingly looking towards Rameau as a way of reforming their own leading operatic genre, opera seria. Tommaso Traetta produced two operas setting translations of Rameau libretti that show the French composer's influence, Ippolito ed Aricia (1759) and I Tintaridi (based on Castor et Pollux, 1760). Traetta had been advised by Count Francesco Algarotti, a leading proponent of reform according to French models; Algarotti was a major influence on the most important "reformist" composer, Christoph Willibald Gluck. Gluck's three Italian reform operas of the 1760s—Orfeo ed Euridice, Alceste, and Paride ed Elena—reveal a knowledge of Rameau's works. For instance, both Orfeo and the 1737 version of Castor et Pollux open with the funeral of one of the leading characters who later comes back to life. Many of the operatic reforms advocated in the preface to Gluck's Alceste were already present in Rameau's works. Rameau had used accompanied recitatives, and the overtures in his later operas reflected the action to come, so when Gluck arrived in Paris in 1774 to produce a series of six French operas, he could be seen as continuing in the tradition of Rameau. Nevertheless, while Gluck's popularity survived the French Revolution, Rameau's did not. By the end of the 18th century, his operas had vanished from the repertoire.
For most of the 19th century, Rameau's music remained unplayed, known only by reputation. Hector Berlioz investigated Castor et Pollux and particularly admired the aria "Tristes apprêts," but "whereas the modern listener readily perceives the common ground with Berlioz' music, he himself was more conscious of the gap which separated them." French humiliation in the Franco-Prussian War brought about a change in Rameau's fortunes. As Rameau biographer J. Malignon wrote, "...the German victory over France in 1870–71 was the grand occasion for digging up great heroes from the French past. Rameau, like so many others, was flung into the enemy's face to bolster our courage and our faith in the national destiny of France." In 1894, composer Vincent d'Indy founded the Schola Cantorum to promote French national music; the society put on several revivals of works by Rameau. Among the audience was Claude Debussy, who especially cherished Castor et Pollux, revived in 1903: "Gluck's genius was deeply rooted in Rameau's works... a detailed comparison allows us to affirm that Gluck could replace Rameau on the French stage only by assimilating the latter's beautiful works and making them his own." Camille Saint-Saëns (by editing and publishing the Pièces in 1895) and Paul Dukas were two other important French musicians who gave practical championship to Rameau's music in their day, but interest in Rameau petered out again, and it was not until the late 20th century that a serious effort was made to revive his works. Over half of Rameau's operas have now been recorded, in particular by conductors such as John Eliot Gardiner, William Christie, and Marc Minkowski.
One of his pieces is commonly heard in the Victoria Centre in Nottingham by the Rowland Emett timepiece, the Aqua Horological Tintinnabulator. Emett quoted that Rameau made music for his school and the shopping centre without him knowing it.
Theoretical works
Treatise on Harmony, 1722
Rameau's 1722 Treatise on Harmony initiated a revolution in music theory. Rameau posited the discovery of the "fundamental law" or what he referred to as the "fundamental bass" of all Western music. Heavily influenced by new Cartesian modes of thought and analysis, Rameau's methodology incorporated mathematics, commentary, analysis and a didacticism that was specifically intended to illuminate, scientifically, the structure and principles of music. With careful deductive reasoning, he attempted to derive universal harmonic principles from natural causes. Previous treatises on harmony had been purely practical; Rameau embraced the new philosophical rationalism, quickly rising to prominence in France as the "Isaac Newton of Music." His fame subsequently spread throughout all Europe, and his Treatise became the definitive authority on music theory, forming the foundation for instruction in western music that persists to this day.
List of works
RCT numbering refers to Rameau Catalogue Thématique established by Sylvie Bouissou and Denis Herlin.
Instrumental works
Pièces de clavecin. Trois livres. "Pieces for harpsichord", 3 books, published 1706, 1724, 1726/27(?).
RCT 1 – Premier livre de Clavecin (1706)
RCT 2 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in E minor
RCT 3 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in D major
RCT 4 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Menuet in C major
RCT 5 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in A minor
RCT 6 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in G
Pieces de Clavecin en Concerts Five albums of character pieces for harpsichord, violin and viol. (1741)
RCT 7 – Concert I in C minor
RCT 8 – Concert II in G major
RCT 9 – Concert III in A major
RCT 10 – Concert IV in B flat major
RCT 11 – Concert V in D minor
RCT 12 – La Dauphine for harpsichord. (1747)
RCT 12bis – Les petits marteaux for harpsichord.
Several orchestral dance suites extracted from his operas.
Motets
RCT 13 – Deus noster refugium (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 14 – In convertendo (probably before 1720, rev. 1751)
RCT 15 – Quam dilecta (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 16 – Laboravi (published in the Traité de l'harmonie, 1722)
Canons
RCT 17 – Ah! loin de rire, pleurons (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) (pub. 1722)
RCT 18 – Avec du vin, endormons-nous (2 sopranos, Tenor) (1719)
RCT 18bis – L'épouse entre deux draps (3 sopranos) (formerly attributed to François Couperin)
RCT 18ter – Je suis un fou Madame (3 voix égales) (1720)
RCT 19 – Mes chers amis, quittez vos rouges bords (3 sopranos, 3 basses) (pub. 1780)
RCT 20 – Réveillez-vous, dormeur sans fin (5 voix égales) (pub. 1722)
RCT 20bis – Si tu ne prends garde à toi (2 sopranos, bass) (1720)
Songs
RCT 21.1 – L'amante préoccupée or A l'objet que j'adore (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.2 – Lucas, pour se gausser de nous (soprano, bass, continuo) (pub. 1707)
RCT 21.3 – Non, non, le dieu qui sait aimer (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.4 – Un Bourbon ouvre sa carrière or Un héros ouvre sa carrière (alto, continuo) (1751, air belonging to Acante et Céphise but censored before its first performance and never reintroduced in the work).
Cantatas
RCT 23 – Aquilon et Orithie (between 1715 and 1720)
RCT 28 – Thétis (same period)
RCT 26 – L’impatience (same period)
RCT 22 – Les amants trahis (around 1720)
RCT 27 – Orphée (same period)
RCT 24 – Le berger fidèle (1728)
RCT 25 – Cantate pour le jour de la Saint Louis (1740)
Operas and stage works
Tragédies en musique
RCT 43 – Hippolyte et Aricie (1733; revised 1742 and 1757)
RCT 32 – Castor et Pollux (1737; revised 1754)
RCT 35 – Dardanus (1739; revised 1744 and 1760), score
RCT 62 – Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756, with new music for Acts II, III & V)
RCT 31 – Les Boréades or Abaris (unperformed; in rehearsal 1763)
Opéra-ballets
RCT 44 – Les Indes galantes (1735; revised 1736)
RCT 41 – Les fêtes d'Hébé or les Talens Lyriques (1739)
RCT 39 – Les fêtes de Polymnie (1745)
RCT 59 – Le temple de la gloire (1745; revised 1746)
RCT 38 – Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour or Les Dieux d'Egypte (1747)
RCT 58 – Les surprises de l'Amour (1748; revised 1757)
Pastorales héroïques
RCT 60 – Zaïs (1748)
RCT 49 – Naïs (1749)
RCT 29 – Acante et Céphise or La sympathie (1751)
RCT 34 – Daphnis et Eglé (1753)
Comédies lyriques
RCT 53 – Platée or Junon jalouse (1745), score
RCT 51 – Les Paladins or Le Vénitien (1760)
Comédie-ballet
RCT 54 – La princesse de Navarre (1744)
Actes de ballet
RCT 33 – Les courses de Tempé (1734)
RCT 40 – Les fêtes de Ramire (1745)
RCT 52 – Pigmalion (1748)
RCT 42 – La guirlande or Les fleurs enchantées (1751)
RCT 57 – Les sibarites or Sibaris (1753)
RCT 48 – La naissance d'Osiris or La Fête Pamilie (1754)
RCT 30 – Anacréon (1754)
RCT 58 – Anacréon (completely different work from the above, 1757, 3rd Entrée of Les surprises de l'Amour)
RCT 61 – Zéphire (date unknown)
RCT 50 – Nélée et Myrthis (date unknown)
RCT 45 – Io (unfinished, date unknown)
Lost works
RCT 56 – Samson (tragédie en musique) (first version written 1733–1734; second version 1736; neither were ever staged )
RCT 46 – Linus (tragédie en musique) (1751, score stolen after a rehearsal)
RCT 47 – Lisis et Délie (pastorale) (scheduled on November 6, 1753)
Incidental music for opéras comiques
Music mostly lost.
RCT 36 – L'endriague (in 3 acts, 1723)
RCT 37 – L'enrôlement d'Arlequin (in 1 act, 1726)
RCT 55 – La robe de dissension or Le faux prodige (in 2 acts, 1726)
RCT 55bis – La rose or Les jardins de l'Hymen (in a prologue and 1 act, 1744)
Writings
Traité de l'harmonie réduite à ses principes naturels (Paris, 1722)
Nouveau système de musique théorique (Paris, 1726)
Dissertation sur les différents méthodes d'accompagnement pour le clavecin, ou pour l'orgue (Paris, 1732)
Génération harmonique, ou Traité de musique théorique et pratique (Paris, 1737)
Mémoire où l'on expose les fondemens du Système de musique théorique et pratique de M. Rameau (1749)
Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1750)
Nouvelles réflexions de M. Rameau sur sa 'Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1752)
Observations sur notre instinct pour la musique (Paris, 1754)
Erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1755)
Suite des erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1756)
Reponse de M. Rameau à MM. les editeurs de l'Encyclopédie sur leur dernier Avertissement (Paris, 1757)
Nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (1758–9)
Code de musique pratique, ou Méthodes pour apprendre la musique...avec des nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (Paris, 1760)
Lettre à M. Alembert sur ses opinions en musique (Paris, 1760)
Origine des sciences, suivie d'un controverse sur le même sujet (Paris, 1762)
See also
Querelle des Bouffons
ReferencesNotesSourcesBeaussant, Philippe, Rameau de A à Z (Fayard, 1983)
Gibbons, William. Building the Operatic Museum: Eighteenth-Century Opera in Fin-de-siècle Paris (University of Rochester Press, 2013)
Girdlestone, Cuthbert, Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Dover paperback edition, 1969)
Holden, Amanda, (Ed) The Viking Opera Guide (Viking, 1993)
Sadler, Graham, (Ed.), The New Grove French Baroque Masters (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)
Trowbridge, Simon, Rameau (2nd edition, Englance Press, 2017)
F. Annunziata, Una Tragédie Lyrique nel Secolo dei Lumi. Abaris ou Les Boréades di Jean Philippe Rameau, https://www.academia.edu/6100318
External links
(en) Gavotte with Doubles Hypermedia by Jeff Hall & Tim Smith at the BinAural Collaborative Hypertext – Shockwave Player required – ("Gavotte with Doubles" link NG)
(en) jp.rameau.free.fr Rameau – Le Site
(fr) musicologie.org Biography, List of Works, bibliography, discography, theoretical writings, in French
(en) Jean-Philippe Rameau / Discography
Magnatune Les Cyclopes by Rameau in on-line mp3 format (played by Trevor Pinnock)
Jean-Philippe Rameau, "L'Orchestre de Louis XV" – Suites d'Orchestre, Le Concert des Nations, dir. Jordi Savall, Alia Vox, AVSA 9882Sheet music'''
Rameau free sheet music from the Mutopia Project
1683 births
1764 deaths
18th-century classical composers
18th-century French composers
18th-century French male musicians
Composers awarded knighthoods
Composers for harpsichord
French Baroque composers
French ballet composers
French opera composers
French male classical composers
French male non-fiction writers
French music theorists
Male opera composers
People from Dijon
Burials at Saint-Eustache, Paris
17th-century male musicians | true | [
"Louis de Cahusac (6 April 1706 – 22 June 1759) was an 18th-century French playwright and librettist, and Freemason, most famous for his work with the composer Jean-Philippe Rameau. He provided the libretti for several of Rameau's operas, namely Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zaïs (1748), Naïs (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacréon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boréades (c. 1763). Cahusac contributed to the Encyclopédie and was the lover of Marie Fel.\n\nIn 1754, he published La Danse ancienne et moderne ou Traité historique de la danse (The Hague, Jean Neaulme).\n\nAmong Rameau's librettists, he was the one whose collaboration lasted the longest; the composer had a very bad character and he was also stingy. Only Cahusac managed to work with him permanently.\n\nSources \nCuthbert Girdlestone Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Dover paperback edition, 1969)\nThe New Grove French Baroque Masters ed. Graham Sadler (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Louis de Cahusac on Data.bnf.fr\n\nPeople from Montauban\n1706 births\n1759 deaths\n18th-century French dramatists and playwrights\nContributors to the Encyclopédie (1751–1772)\nFrench male dramatists and playwrights\nFrench ballet librettists\nFrench opera librettists\nFrench male non-fiction writers\n18th-century French male writers",
"Anacréon is an opera by Jean-Philippe Rameau which was first performed at Fontainebleau on 23 October 1754. Its libretto is by Louis de Cahusac. It takes the form of an acte de ballet in one act. Rameau also composed another Anacréon in 1757. The latter was an act added to a revival of the opéra-ballet Les surprises de l'Amour and has sometimes been performed and recorded as a stand-alone opera. It too features the Ancient Greek poet Anacreon as its hero, but the libretto (by Pierre-Joseph-Justin Bernard) and its plot are totally different.\n\nBackground and performance history\nThere is some evidence that the 1754 Anacréon was not originally intended as an independent work but was to be part of a multi-act opéra-ballet entitled Les beaux jours de l'Amour. The other sections were La naissance d'Osiris and the unfinished Nélée et Myrthis. Rameau had problems completing the project and instead salvaged Anacréon and La naissance d'Osiris for performances before the royal court at Fontainebleau in 1754. The Duc d'Aumont subjected them to rehearsal and screening before they were given approval for staging because of the poor reception other works by Rameau had met the previous year. Anacréon appeared on 23 and 26 October 1754, the only performances during the composer's lifetime. Rameau and Cahusac revised the score and this version appeared posthumously at the Paris Opéra in 1766. A brief run in 1771 was the last staging of the work until the 20th century. The first modern revival was an abridged version conducted by Claude Debussy in 1909.\n\nRoles\n\nSynopsis\nIn this opera, the old poet Anacreon pretends he is going to marry his protégée Cloë. She is in love with the young Bathylle, also under Anacreon's protection. Finally, the poet reveals he had planned to marry the two lovers all along. The work was performed \"with great success\".\n\nRecording\n Anacréon (1754) Matthew Brook (Anacréon), Anna Dennis (Chloë), Agustin Prunell-Friend (Batile), Choir and Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment conducted by Jonathan Williams (Signum Classics, 2015)\n\nReferences\n\nSources\nOriginal libretto: Anacréon, Ballet Heroique, Représenté devant le Roi à Fontainebleau, le (..) Octobre 1754, Paris, Ballard, s.d. (accessible for free online in Gallica, Bibliothèque Nationale de France\nGirdlestone, Cuthbert, Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work, New York: Dover, 1969 (paperback edition)\nHolden, Amanda (Ed.), The New Penguin Opera Guide, New York: Penguin Putnam, 2001 \n Pitou, Spire, The Paris Opéra. An Encyclopedia of Operas, Ballets, Composers, and Performers – Rococo and Romantic, 1715–1815, Greenwood Press, Westport/London, 1985 ()\n Sadler, Graham (Ed.), The New Grove French Baroque Masters Grove/Macmillan, 1988\nWilliams, Jonathan, essay in the booklet notes to his recording of Anacréon (details listed above)\n\nOperas by Jean-Philippe Rameau\nFrench-language operas\nOne-act operas\nOperas\n1754 operas"
]
|
[
"Jean-Philippe Rameau",
"Rameau and his librettists",
"What is a librettist?",
"librettists managed to produce a libretto",
"What is a libretto?",
"operas,",
"How was Rameau's relation with his librettists?",
"Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice.",
"Why didn't he work with the same librettists twice?",
"He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists,",
"Were any exceptions noted in the article?",
"Louis de Cahusac,",
"Why was de Cahusac an exception?",
"collaborated with him on several operas,"
]
| C_6affd0880c764e209d1d4aabc61ddb69_0 | Were any of their collaborations listed in the article? | 7 | Were any of Louis de Cahusac and Jean-Philippe Rameau's collaborations listed in the article? | Jean-Philippe Rameau | Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacreon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boreades (c. 1763). Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupliniere's salon, at the Societe du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day. Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760). CANNOTANSWER | Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), | Jean-Philippe Rameau (; – ) was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the 18th century. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer of his time for the harpsichord, alongside François Couperin.
Little is known about Rameau's early years. It was not until the 1720s that he won fame as a major theorist of music with his Treatise on Harmony (1722) and also in the following years as a composer of masterpieces for the harpsichord, which circulated throughout Europe. He was almost 50 before he embarked on the operatic career on which his reputation chiefly rests today. His debut, Hippolyte et Aricie (1733), caused a great stir and was fiercely attacked by the supporters of Lully's style of music for its revolutionary use of harmony. Nevertheless, Rameau's pre-eminence in the field of French opera was soon acknowledged, and he was later attacked as an "establishment" composer by those who favoured Italian opera during the controversy known as the Querelle des Bouffons in the 1750s. Rameau's music had gone out of fashion by the end of the 18th century, and it was not until the 20th that serious efforts were made to revive it. Today, he enjoys renewed appreciation with performances and recordings of his music ever more frequent.
Life
The details of Rameau's life are generally obscure, especially concerning his first forty years, before he moved to Paris for good. He was a secretive man, and even his wife knew nothing of his early life, which explains the scarcity of biographical information available.
Early years, 1683–1732
Rameau's early years are particularly obscure. He was born on 25 September 1683 in Dijon, and baptised the same day. His father, Jean, worked as an organist in several churches around Dijon, and his mother, Claudine Demartinécourt, was the daughter of a notary. The couple had eleven children (five girls and six boys), of whom Jean-Philippe was the seventh.
Rameau was taught music before he could read or write. He was educated at the Jesuit college at Godrans, but he was not a good pupil and disrupted classes with his singing, later claiming that his passion for opera had begun at the age of twelve. Initially intended for the law, Rameau decided he wanted to be a musician, and his father sent him to Italy, where he stayed for a short while in Milan. On his return, he worked as a violinist in travelling companies and then as an organist in provincial cathedrals before moving to Paris for the first time. Here, in 1706, he published his earliest known compositions: the harpsichord works that make up his first book of Pièces de Clavecin, which show the influence of his friend Louis Marchand.
In 1709, he moved back to Dijon to take over his father's job as organist in the main church. The contract was for six years, but Rameau left before then and took up similar posts in Lyon and Clermont-Ferrand. During this period, he composed motets for church performance as well as secular cantatas.
In 1722, he returned to Paris for good, and here he published his most important work of music theory, Traité de l'harmonie (Treatise on Harmony). This soon won him a great reputation, and it was followed in 1726 by his Nouveau système de musique théorique. In 1724 and 1729 (or 1730), he also published two more collections of harpsichord pieces.
Rameau took his first tentative steps into composing stage music when the writer Alexis Piron asked him to provide songs for his popular comic plays written for the Paris Fairs. Four collaborations followed, beginning with L'endriague in 1723; none of the music has survived.
On 25 February 1726 Rameau married the 19-year-old Marie-Louise Mangot, who came from a musical family from Lyon and was a good singer and instrumentalist. The couple would have four children, two boys and two girls, and the marriage is said to have been a happy one.
In spite of his fame as a music theorist, Rameau had trouble finding a post as an organist in Paris.
Later years, 1733–1764
It was not until he was approaching 50 that Rameau decided to embark on the operatic career on which his fame as a composer mainly rests. He had already approached writer Antoine Houdar de la Motte for a libretto in 1727, but nothing came of it; he was finally inspired to try his hand at the prestigious genre of tragédie en musique after seeing Montéclair's Jephté in 1732. Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie premiered at the Académie Royale de Musique on 1 October 1733. It was immediately recognised as the most significant opera to appear in France since the death of Lully, but audiences were split over whether this was a good thing or a bad thing. Some, such as the composer André Campra, were stunned by its originality and wealth of invention; others found its harmonic innovations discordant and saw the work as an attack on the French musical tradition. The two camps, the so-called Lullyistes and the Rameauneurs, fought a pamphlet war over the issue for the rest of the decade.
Just before this time, Rameau had made the acquaintance of the powerful financier Alexandre Le Riche de La Poupelinière, who became his patron until 1753. La Poupelinière's mistress (and later, wife), Thérèse des Hayes, was Rameau's pupil and a great admirer of his music. In 1731, Rameau became the conductor of La Poupelinière's private orchestra, which was of an extremely high quality. He held the post for 22 years; he was succeeded by Johann Stamitz and then François-Joseph Gossec. La Poupelinière's salon enabled Rameau to meet some of the leading cultural figures of the day, including Voltaire, who soon began collaborating with the composer. Their first project, the tragédie en musique Samson, was abandoned because an opera on a religious theme by Voltaire—a notorious critic of the Church—was likely to be banned by the authorities. Meanwhile, Rameau had introduced his new musical style into the lighter genre of the opéra-ballet with the highly successful Les Indes galantes. It was followed by two tragédies en musique, Castor et Pollux (1737) and Dardanus (1739), and another opéra-ballet, Les fêtes d'Hébé (also 1739). All these operas of the 1730s are among Rameau's most highly regarded works. However, the composer followed them with six years of silence, in which the only work he produced was a new version of Dardanus (1744). The reason for this interval in the composer's creative life is unknown, although it is possible he had a falling-out with the authorities at the Académie royale de la musique.
The year 1745 was a turning point in Rameau's career. He received several commissions from the court for works to celebrate the French victory at the Battle of Fontenoy and the marriage of the Dauphin to Infanta Maria Teresa Rafaela of Spain. Rameau produced his most important comic opera, Platée, as well as two collaborations with Voltaire: the opéra-ballet Le temple de la gloire and the comédie-ballet La princesse de Navarre. They gained Rameau official recognition; he was granted the title "Compositeur du Cabinet du Roi" and given a substantial pension. 1745 also saw the beginning of the bitter enmity between Rameau and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Though best known today as a thinker, Rousseau had ambitions to be a composer. He had written an opera, Les muses galantes (inspired by Rameau's Indes galantes), but Rameau was unimpressed by this musical tribute. At the end of 1745, Voltaire and Rameau, who were busy on other works, commissioned Rousseau to turn La Princesse de Navarre into a new opera, with linking recitative, called Les fêtes de Ramire. Rousseau then claimed the two had stolen the credit for the words and music he had contributed, though musicologists have been able to identify almost nothing of the piece as Rousseau's work. Nevertheless, the embittered Rousseau nursed a grudge against Rameau for the rest of his life.
Rousseau was a major participant in the second great quarrel that erupted over Rameau's work, the so-called Querelle des Bouffons of 1752–54, which pitted French tragédie en musique against Italian opera buffa. This time, Rameau was accused of being out of date and his music too complicated in comparison with the simplicity and "naturalness" of a work like Pergolesi's La serva padrona. In the mid-1750s, Rameau criticised Rousseau's contributions to the musical articles in the Encyclopédie, which led to a quarrel with the leading philosophes d'Alembert and Diderot. As a result, Jean-François Rameau became a character in Diderot's then-unpublished dialogue, Le neveu de Rameau (Rameau's Nephew).
In 1753, La Poupelinière took a scheming musician, Jeanne-Thérèse Goermans, as his mistress. The daughter of harpsichord maker Jacques Goermans, she went by the name of Madame de Saint-Aubin, and her opportunistic husband pushed her into the arms of the rich financier. She had La Poupelinière engage the services of the Bohemian composer Johann Stamitz, who succeeded Rameau after a breach developed between Rameau and his patron; however, by then, Rameau no longer needed La Poupelinière's financial support and protection.
Rameau pursued his activities as a theorist and composer until his death. He lived with his wife and two of his children in his large suite of rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, which he would leave every day, lost in thought, to take a solitary walk in the nearby gardens of the Palais-Royal or the Tuileries. Sometimes he would meet the young writer Chabanon, who noted some of Rameau's disillusioned confidential remarks: "Day by day, I'm acquiring more good taste, but I no longer have any genius" and "The imagination is worn out in my old head; it's not wise at this age wanting to practise arts that are nothing but imagination."
Rameau composed prolifically in the late 1740s and early 1750s. After that, his rate of productivity dropped off, probably due to old age and ill health, although he was still able to write another comic opera, Les Paladins, in 1760. This was due to be followed by a final tragédie en musique, Les Boréades; but for unknown reasons, the opera was never produced and had to wait until the late 20th century for a proper staging. Rameau died on 12 September 1764 after suffering from a fever, thirteen days before his 81st birthday. At his bedside, he objected to a song sung. His last words were, "What the devil do you mean to sing to me, priest? You are out of tune." He was buried in the church of St. Eustache, Paris on the same day of his death. Although a bronze bust and red marble tombstone were erected in his memory there by the Société de la Compositeurs de Musique in 1883, the exact site of his burial remains unknown to this day.
Rameau's personality
While the details of his biography are vague and fragmentary, the details of Rameau's personal and family life are almost completely obscure. Rameau's music, so graceful and attractive, completely contradicts the man's public image and what we know of his character as described (or perhaps unfairly caricatured) by Diderot in his satirical novel Le Neveu de Rameau. Throughout his life, music was his consuming passion. It occupied his entire thinking; Philippe Beaussant calls him a monomaniac. Piron explained that "His heart and soul were in his harpsichord; once he had shut its lid, there was no one home." Physically, Rameau was tall and exceptionally thin, as can be seen by the sketches we have of him, including a famous portrait by Carmontelle. He had a "loud voice." His speech was difficult to understand, just like his handwriting, which was never fluent. As a man, he was secretive, solitary, irritable, proud of his own achievements (more as a theorist than as a composer), brusque with those who contradicted him, and quick to anger. It is difficult to imagine him among the leading wits, including Voltaire (to whom he bears more than a passing physical resemblance), who frequented La Poupelinière's salon; his music was his passport, and it made up for his lack of social graces.
His enemies exaggerated his faults; e.g. his supposed miserliness. In fact, it seems that his thriftiness was the result of long years spent in obscurity (when his income was uncertain and scanty) rather than part of his character, because he could also be generous. He helped his nephew Jean-François when he came to Paris and also helped establish the career of Claude-Bénigne Balbastre in the capital. Furthermore, he gave his daughter Marie-Louise a considerable dowry when she became a Visitandine nun in 1750, and he paid a pension to one of his sisters when she became ill. Financial security came late to him, following the success of his stage works and the grant of a royal pension (a few months before his death, he was also ennobled and made a knight of the Ordre de Saint-Michel). But he did not change his way of life, keeping his worn-out clothes, his single pair of shoes, and his old furniture. After his death, it was discovered that he only possessed one dilapidated single-keyboard harpsichord in his rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, yet he also had a bag containing 1691 gold louis.
Music
General character of Rameau's music
Rameau's music is characterised by the exceptional technical knowledge of a composer who wanted above all to be renowned as a theorist of the art. Nevertheless, it is not solely addressed to the intelligence, and Rameau himself claimed, "I try to conceal art with art." The paradox of this music was that it was new, using techniques never known before, but it took place within the framework of old-fashioned forms. Rameau appeared revolutionary to the Lullyistes, disturbed by complex harmony of his music; and reactionary to the "philosophes," who only paid attention to its content and who either would not or could not listen to the sound it made. The incomprehension Rameau received from his contemporaries stopped him from repeating such daring experiments as the second Trio des Parques in Hippolyte et Aricie, which he was forced to remove after a handful of performances because the singers had been either unable or unwilling to execute it correctly.
Rameau's musical works
Rameau's musical works may be divided into four distinct groups, which differ greatly in importance: a few cantatas; a few motets for large chorus; some pieces for solo harpsichord or harpsichord accompanied by other instruments; and, finally, his works for the stage, to which he dedicated the last thirty years of his career almost exclusively. Like most of his contemporaries, Rameau often reused melodies that had been particularly successful, but never without meticulously adapting them; they are not simple transcriptions. Besides, no borrowings have been found from other composers, although his earliest works show the influence of other music. Rameau's reworkings of his own material are numerous; e.g., in Les Fêtes d'Hébé, we find L'Entretien des Muses, the Musette, and the Tambourin, taken from the 1724 book of harpsichord pieces, as well as an aria from the cantata Le Berger Fidèle.
Motets
For at least 26 years, Rameau was a professional organist in the service of religious institutions, and yet the body of sacred music he composed is exceptionally small and his organ works nonexistent. Judging by the evidence, it was not his favourite field, but rather, simply a way of making reasonable money. Rameau's few religious compositions are nevertheless remarkable and compare favourably to the works of specialists in the area. Only four motets have been attributed to Rameau with any certainty: Deus noster refugium, In convertendo, Quam dilecta, and Laboravi.
Cantatas
The cantata was a highly successful genre in the early 18th century. The French cantata, which should not be confused with the Italian or the German cantata, was "invented" in 1706 by the poet Jean-Baptiste Rousseau and soon taken up by many famous composers of the day, such as Montéclair, Campra, and Clérambault. Cantatas were Rameau's first contact with dramatic music. The modest forces the cantata required meant it was a genre within the reach of a composer who was still unknown. Musicologists can only guess at the dates of Rameau's six surviving cantatas, and the names of the librettists are unknown.
Instrumental music
Along with François Couperin, Rameau was a master of the 18th-century French school of harpsichord music, and both made a break with the style of the first generation of harpsichordists whose compositions adhered to the relatively standardised suite form, which had reached its apogee in the first decade of the 18th century and successive collections of pieces by Louis Marchand, Gaspard Le Roux, Louis-Nicolas Clérambault, Jean-François Dandrieu, Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, Charles Dieupart and Nicolas Siret. Rameau and Couperin had different styles, and it seems they did not know one another: Couperin was one of the official court musicians; Rameau, fifteen years his junior, achieved fame only after Couperin's death.
Rameau published his first book of harpsichord pieces in 1706. (Cf. Couperin, who waited until 1713 before publishing his first "Ordres.") Rameau's music includes pieces in the pure tradition of the French suite: imitative ("Le rappel des oiseaux," "La poule") and characterful ("Les tendres plaintes," "L'entretien des Muses"). But there are also works of pure virtuosity that resemble Domenico Scarlatti ("Les tourbillons," "Les trois mains") as well as pieces that reveal the experiments of a theorist and musical innovator ("L'enharmonique," "Les Cyclopes"), which had a marked influence on Louis-Claude Daquin, Joseph-Nicolas-Pancrace Royer and Jacques Duphly. Rameau's suites are grouped in the traditional way, by key. The first set of dances (Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, Les Trois Mains, Fanfairenette, La Triomphante, Gavotte et 6 doubles) is centred on A major and A minor, while the remaining pieces (Les tricoteuses, L'Indifferente, Première Menuet, Deuxième Menuet, La Poule, Les Triolets, Les Sauvages, L'Enharmonique, L'Egiptienne [sic]) are centred around G major and G minor.
Rameau's second and third collections appeared in 1724 and 1727. After these he composed only one piece for the harpsichord, the eight-minute "La Dauphine" of 1747, while the very short "Les petits marteaux" (c. 1750) has also been attributed to him.
During his semiretirement (1740 to 1744) he wrote the Pièces de clavecin en concert (1741), which some musicologists consider the pinnacle of French Baroque chamber music. Adopting a formula successfully employed by Mondonville a few years earlier, Rameau fashioned these pieces differently from trio sonatas in that the harpsichord is not simply there as basso continuo to accompany melody instruments (violin, flute, viol) but as equal partner in "concert" with them. Rameau claimed that this music would be equally satisfying played on the harpsichord alone, but the claim is not wholly convincing because he took the trouble to transcribe five of them himself, those the lack of other instruments would show the least.
Opera
After 1733 Rameau dedicated himself mostly to opera. On a strictly musical level, 18th-century French Baroque opera is richer and more varied than contemporary Italian opera, especially in the place given to choruses and dances but also in the musical continuity that arises from the respective relationships between the arias and the recitatives. Another essential difference: whereas Italian opera gave a starring role to female sopranos and castrati, French opera had no use for the latter. The Italian opera of Rameau's day (opera seria, opera buffa) was essentially divided into musical sections (da capo arias, duets, trios, etc.) and sections that were spoken or almost spoken (recitativo secco). It was during the latter that the action progressed while the audience waited for the next aria; on the other hand, the text of the arias was almost entirely buried beneath music whose chief aim was to show off the virtuosity of the singer. Nothing of the kind is to be found in French opera of the day; since Lully, the text had to remain comprehensible—limiting certain techniques such as the vocalise, which was reserved for special words such as ("glory") or ("victory"). A subtle equilibrium existed between the more and the less musical parts: melodic recitative on the one hand and arias that were often closer to arioso on the other, alongside virtuoso "ariettes" in the Italian style. This form of continuous music prefigures Wagnerian drama even more than does the "reform" opera of Gluck.
Five essential components may be discerned in Rameau's operatic scores:
Pieces of "pure" music (overtures, ritornelli, music which closes scenes). Unlike the highly stereotyped Lullian overture, Rameau's overtures show an extraordinary variety. Even in his earliest works, where he uses the standard French model, Rameau—the born symphonist and master of orchestration—composes novel and unique pieces. A few pieces are particularly striking, such as the overture to Zaïs, depicting the chaos before the creation of the universe, that of Pigmalion, suggesting the sculptor's chipping away at the statue with his mallet, or many more conventional depictions of storms and earthquakes, as well perhaps as the imposing final chaconnes of Les Indes galantes or Dardanus.
Dance music: the danced interludes, which were obligatory even in tragédie en musique, allowed Rameau to give free rein to his inimitable sense of rhythm, melody, and choreography, acknowledged by all his contemporaries, including the dancers themselves. This "learned" composer, forever preoccupied by his next theoretical work, also was one who strung together gavottes, minuets, loures, rigaudons, passepieds, tambourins, and musettes by the dozen. According to his biographer, Cuthbert Girdlestone, "The immense superiority of all that pertains to Rameau in choreography still needs emphasizing," and the German scholar H.W. von Walthershausen affirmed:
Rameau was the greatest ballet composer of all times. The genius of his creation rests on one hand on his perfect artistic permeation by folk-dance types, on the other hand on the constant preservation of living contact with the practical requirements of the ballet stage, which prevented an estrangement between the expression of the body from the spirit of absolute music.
Choruses: Padre Martini, the erudite musicologist who corresponded with Rameau, affirmed that "the French are excellent at choruses," obviously thinking of Rameau himself. A great master of harmony, Rameau knew how to compose sumptuous choruses—whether monodic, polyphonic, or interspersed with passages for solo singers or the orchestra—and whatever feelings needed to be expressed.
Arias: less frequent than in Italian opera, Rameau nevertheless offers many striking examples. Particularly admired arias include Télaïre's "Tristes apprêts," from Castor et Pollux; "Ô jour affreux" and "Lieux funestes," from Dardanus; Huascar's invocations in Les Indes galantes; and the final ariette in Pigmalion. In Platée we encounter a showstopping ars poetica aria for the character of La Folie (the madness), "Formons les plus brillants concerts / Aux langeurs d'Apollon".
Recitative: much closer to arioso than to recitativo secco. The composer took scrupulous care to observe French prosody and used his harmonic knowledge to give expression to his protagonists' feelings.
During the first part of his operatic career (1733–1739), Rameau wrote his great masterpieces destined for the Académie royale de musique: three tragédies en musique and two opéra-ballets that still form the core of his repertoire. After the interval of 1740 to 1744, he became the official court musician, and for the most part, composed pieces intended to entertain, with plenty of dance music emphasising sensuality and an idealised pastoral atmosphere. In his last years, Rameau returned to a renewed version of his early style in Les Paladins and Les Boréades.
His Zoroastre was first performed in 1749. According to one of Rameau's admirers, Cuthbert Girdlestone, this opera has a distinctive place in his works: "The profane passions of hatred and jealousy are rendered more intensely [than in his other works] and with a strong sense of reality."
Rameau and his librettists
Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zaïs (1748), Naïs (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacréon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boréades (c. 1763).
Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupelinière's salon, at the Société du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day.
Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760).
Reputation and influence
By the end of his life, Rameau's music had come under attack in France from theorists who favoured Italian models. However, foreign composers working in the Italian tradition were increasingly looking towards Rameau as a way of reforming their own leading operatic genre, opera seria. Tommaso Traetta produced two operas setting translations of Rameau libretti that show the French composer's influence, Ippolito ed Aricia (1759) and I Tintaridi (based on Castor et Pollux, 1760). Traetta had been advised by Count Francesco Algarotti, a leading proponent of reform according to French models; Algarotti was a major influence on the most important "reformist" composer, Christoph Willibald Gluck. Gluck's three Italian reform operas of the 1760s—Orfeo ed Euridice, Alceste, and Paride ed Elena—reveal a knowledge of Rameau's works. For instance, both Orfeo and the 1737 version of Castor et Pollux open with the funeral of one of the leading characters who later comes back to life. Many of the operatic reforms advocated in the preface to Gluck's Alceste were already present in Rameau's works. Rameau had used accompanied recitatives, and the overtures in his later operas reflected the action to come, so when Gluck arrived in Paris in 1774 to produce a series of six French operas, he could be seen as continuing in the tradition of Rameau. Nevertheless, while Gluck's popularity survived the French Revolution, Rameau's did not. By the end of the 18th century, his operas had vanished from the repertoire.
For most of the 19th century, Rameau's music remained unplayed, known only by reputation. Hector Berlioz investigated Castor et Pollux and particularly admired the aria "Tristes apprêts," but "whereas the modern listener readily perceives the common ground with Berlioz' music, he himself was more conscious of the gap which separated them." French humiliation in the Franco-Prussian War brought about a change in Rameau's fortunes. As Rameau biographer J. Malignon wrote, "...the German victory over France in 1870–71 was the grand occasion for digging up great heroes from the French past. Rameau, like so many others, was flung into the enemy's face to bolster our courage and our faith in the national destiny of France." In 1894, composer Vincent d'Indy founded the Schola Cantorum to promote French national music; the society put on several revivals of works by Rameau. Among the audience was Claude Debussy, who especially cherished Castor et Pollux, revived in 1903: "Gluck's genius was deeply rooted in Rameau's works... a detailed comparison allows us to affirm that Gluck could replace Rameau on the French stage only by assimilating the latter's beautiful works and making them his own." Camille Saint-Saëns (by editing and publishing the Pièces in 1895) and Paul Dukas were two other important French musicians who gave practical championship to Rameau's music in their day, but interest in Rameau petered out again, and it was not until the late 20th century that a serious effort was made to revive his works. Over half of Rameau's operas have now been recorded, in particular by conductors such as John Eliot Gardiner, William Christie, and Marc Minkowski.
One of his pieces is commonly heard in the Victoria Centre in Nottingham by the Rowland Emett timepiece, the Aqua Horological Tintinnabulator. Emett quoted that Rameau made music for his school and the shopping centre without him knowing it.
Theoretical works
Treatise on Harmony, 1722
Rameau's 1722 Treatise on Harmony initiated a revolution in music theory. Rameau posited the discovery of the "fundamental law" or what he referred to as the "fundamental bass" of all Western music. Heavily influenced by new Cartesian modes of thought and analysis, Rameau's methodology incorporated mathematics, commentary, analysis and a didacticism that was specifically intended to illuminate, scientifically, the structure and principles of music. With careful deductive reasoning, he attempted to derive universal harmonic principles from natural causes. Previous treatises on harmony had been purely practical; Rameau embraced the new philosophical rationalism, quickly rising to prominence in France as the "Isaac Newton of Music." His fame subsequently spread throughout all Europe, and his Treatise became the definitive authority on music theory, forming the foundation for instruction in western music that persists to this day.
List of works
RCT numbering refers to Rameau Catalogue Thématique established by Sylvie Bouissou and Denis Herlin.
Instrumental works
Pièces de clavecin. Trois livres. "Pieces for harpsichord", 3 books, published 1706, 1724, 1726/27(?).
RCT 1 – Premier livre de Clavecin (1706)
RCT 2 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in E minor
RCT 3 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in D major
RCT 4 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Menuet in C major
RCT 5 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in A minor
RCT 6 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in G
Pieces de Clavecin en Concerts Five albums of character pieces for harpsichord, violin and viol. (1741)
RCT 7 – Concert I in C minor
RCT 8 – Concert II in G major
RCT 9 – Concert III in A major
RCT 10 – Concert IV in B flat major
RCT 11 – Concert V in D minor
RCT 12 – La Dauphine for harpsichord. (1747)
RCT 12bis – Les petits marteaux for harpsichord.
Several orchestral dance suites extracted from his operas.
Motets
RCT 13 – Deus noster refugium (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 14 – In convertendo (probably before 1720, rev. 1751)
RCT 15 – Quam dilecta (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 16 – Laboravi (published in the Traité de l'harmonie, 1722)
Canons
RCT 17 – Ah! loin de rire, pleurons (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) (pub. 1722)
RCT 18 – Avec du vin, endormons-nous (2 sopranos, Tenor) (1719)
RCT 18bis – L'épouse entre deux draps (3 sopranos) (formerly attributed to François Couperin)
RCT 18ter – Je suis un fou Madame (3 voix égales) (1720)
RCT 19 – Mes chers amis, quittez vos rouges bords (3 sopranos, 3 basses) (pub. 1780)
RCT 20 – Réveillez-vous, dormeur sans fin (5 voix égales) (pub. 1722)
RCT 20bis – Si tu ne prends garde à toi (2 sopranos, bass) (1720)
Songs
RCT 21.1 – L'amante préoccupée or A l'objet que j'adore (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.2 – Lucas, pour se gausser de nous (soprano, bass, continuo) (pub. 1707)
RCT 21.3 – Non, non, le dieu qui sait aimer (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.4 – Un Bourbon ouvre sa carrière or Un héros ouvre sa carrière (alto, continuo) (1751, air belonging to Acante et Céphise but censored before its first performance and never reintroduced in the work).
Cantatas
RCT 23 – Aquilon et Orithie (between 1715 and 1720)
RCT 28 – Thétis (same period)
RCT 26 – L’impatience (same period)
RCT 22 – Les amants trahis (around 1720)
RCT 27 – Orphée (same period)
RCT 24 – Le berger fidèle (1728)
RCT 25 – Cantate pour le jour de la Saint Louis (1740)
Operas and stage works
Tragédies en musique
RCT 43 – Hippolyte et Aricie (1733; revised 1742 and 1757)
RCT 32 – Castor et Pollux (1737; revised 1754)
RCT 35 – Dardanus (1739; revised 1744 and 1760), score
RCT 62 – Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756, with new music for Acts II, III & V)
RCT 31 – Les Boréades or Abaris (unperformed; in rehearsal 1763)
Opéra-ballets
RCT 44 – Les Indes galantes (1735; revised 1736)
RCT 41 – Les fêtes d'Hébé or les Talens Lyriques (1739)
RCT 39 – Les fêtes de Polymnie (1745)
RCT 59 – Le temple de la gloire (1745; revised 1746)
RCT 38 – Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour or Les Dieux d'Egypte (1747)
RCT 58 – Les surprises de l'Amour (1748; revised 1757)
Pastorales héroïques
RCT 60 – Zaïs (1748)
RCT 49 – Naïs (1749)
RCT 29 – Acante et Céphise or La sympathie (1751)
RCT 34 – Daphnis et Eglé (1753)
Comédies lyriques
RCT 53 – Platée or Junon jalouse (1745), score
RCT 51 – Les Paladins or Le Vénitien (1760)
Comédie-ballet
RCT 54 – La princesse de Navarre (1744)
Actes de ballet
RCT 33 – Les courses de Tempé (1734)
RCT 40 – Les fêtes de Ramire (1745)
RCT 52 – Pigmalion (1748)
RCT 42 – La guirlande or Les fleurs enchantées (1751)
RCT 57 – Les sibarites or Sibaris (1753)
RCT 48 – La naissance d'Osiris or La Fête Pamilie (1754)
RCT 30 – Anacréon (1754)
RCT 58 – Anacréon (completely different work from the above, 1757, 3rd Entrée of Les surprises de l'Amour)
RCT 61 – Zéphire (date unknown)
RCT 50 – Nélée et Myrthis (date unknown)
RCT 45 – Io (unfinished, date unknown)
Lost works
RCT 56 – Samson (tragédie en musique) (first version written 1733–1734; second version 1736; neither were ever staged )
RCT 46 – Linus (tragédie en musique) (1751, score stolen after a rehearsal)
RCT 47 – Lisis et Délie (pastorale) (scheduled on November 6, 1753)
Incidental music for opéras comiques
Music mostly lost.
RCT 36 – L'endriague (in 3 acts, 1723)
RCT 37 – L'enrôlement d'Arlequin (in 1 act, 1726)
RCT 55 – La robe de dissension or Le faux prodige (in 2 acts, 1726)
RCT 55bis – La rose or Les jardins de l'Hymen (in a prologue and 1 act, 1744)
Writings
Traité de l'harmonie réduite à ses principes naturels (Paris, 1722)
Nouveau système de musique théorique (Paris, 1726)
Dissertation sur les différents méthodes d'accompagnement pour le clavecin, ou pour l'orgue (Paris, 1732)
Génération harmonique, ou Traité de musique théorique et pratique (Paris, 1737)
Mémoire où l'on expose les fondemens du Système de musique théorique et pratique de M. Rameau (1749)
Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1750)
Nouvelles réflexions de M. Rameau sur sa 'Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1752)
Observations sur notre instinct pour la musique (Paris, 1754)
Erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1755)
Suite des erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1756)
Reponse de M. Rameau à MM. les editeurs de l'Encyclopédie sur leur dernier Avertissement (Paris, 1757)
Nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (1758–9)
Code de musique pratique, ou Méthodes pour apprendre la musique...avec des nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (Paris, 1760)
Lettre à M. Alembert sur ses opinions en musique (Paris, 1760)
Origine des sciences, suivie d'un controverse sur le même sujet (Paris, 1762)
See also
Querelle des Bouffons
ReferencesNotesSourcesBeaussant, Philippe, Rameau de A à Z (Fayard, 1983)
Gibbons, William. Building the Operatic Museum: Eighteenth-Century Opera in Fin-de-siècle Paris (University of Rochester Press, 2013)
Girdlestone, Cuthbert, Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Dover paperback edition, 1969)
Holden, Amanda, (Ed) The Viking Opera Guide (Viking, 1993)
Sadler, Graham, (Ed.), The New Grove French Baroque Masters (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)
Trowbridge, Simon, Rameau (2nd edition, Englance Press, 2017)
F. Annunziata, Una Tragédie Lyrique nel Secolo dei Lumi. Abaris ou Les Boréades di Jean Philippe Rameau, https://www.academia.edu/6100318
External links
(en) Gavotte with Doubles Hypermedia by Jeff Hall & Tim Smith at the BinAural Collaborative Hypertext – Shockwave Player required – ("Gavotte with Doubles" link NG)
(en) jp.rameau.free.fr Rameau – Le Site
(fr) musicologie.org Biography, List of Works, bibliography, discography, theoretical writings, in French
(en) Jean-Philippe Rameau / Discography
Magnatune Les Cyclopes by Rameau in on-line mp3 format (played by Trevor Pinnock)
Jean-Philippe Rameau, "L'Orchestre de Louis XV" – Suites d'Orchestre, Le Concert des Nations, dir. Jordi Savall, Alia Vox, AVSA 9882Sheet music'''
Rameau free sheet music from the Mutopia Project
1683 births
1764 deaths
18th-century classical composers
18th-century French composers
18th-century French male musicians
Composers awarded knighthoods
Composers for harpsichord
French Baroque composers
French ballet composers
French opera composers
French male classical composers
French male non-fiction writers
French music theorists
Male opera composers
People from Dijon
Burials at Saint-Eustache, Paris
17th-century male musicians | false | [
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"This is a list of cities in Asia that have several names in different languages, including former names. Many cities have different names in different languages. Some cities have also undergone name changes for political or other reasons.\n\nThis article does not offer any opinion about what the \"original\", \"official\", \"real\", or \"correct\" name of any city is or was. Cities are listed alphabetically by their current best-known name in English. The English version is followed by variants in other languages, in alphabetical order by name including any historical variants and former names.\nlu\nForeign names that are the same as their English equivalents may be listed.\n\nNote: The blue asterisks generally indicate the availability of a Wikipedia article in that language for that city; it also provides additional reference for the equivalence. Red asterisks or a lack of an asterisk indicate that no such article exists, and that these equivalents without further footnotes should be viewed with caution.\n\n\n\nA\n\nB\n\nC\n\nD\n\nE\n\nF\n\nG\n\nH\n\nI\n\nJ\n\nK\n\nL\n\nM\n\nN\n\nO\n\nP\n\nQ\n\nR\n\nS\n\nT\n\nU\n\nV\n\nX\n\nY\n\nZ\n\nSee also\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\nAsian cities\nAsian cities\nAsian cities\nAsian cities\n *\nCities"
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[
"Jean-Philippe Rameau",
"Rameau and his librettists",
"What is a librettist?",
"librettists managed to produce a libretto",
"What is a libretto?",
"operas,",
"How was Rameau's relation with his librettists?",
"Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice.",
"Why didn't he work with the same librettists twice?",
"He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists,",
"Were any exceptions noted in the article?",
"Louis de Cahusac,",
"Why was de Cahusac an exception?",
"collaborated with him on several operas,",
"Were any of their collaborations listed in the article?",
"Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756),"
]
| C_6affd0880c764e209d1d4aabc61ddb69_0 | What other librettists did he work with? | 8 | What other librettists did Jean-Philippe Rameau work with in adition to Louis de Cahusac? | Jean-Philippe Rameau | Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacreon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boreades (c. 1763). Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupliniere's salon, at the Societe du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day. Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760). CANNOTANSWER | Voltaire | Jean-Philippe Rameau (; – ) was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the 18th century. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer of his time for the harpsichord, alongside François Couperin.
Little is known about Rameau's early years. It was not until the 1720s that he won fame as a major theorist of music with his Treatise on Harmony (1722) and also in the following years as a composer of masterpieces for the harpsichord, which circulated throughout Europe. He was almost 50 before he embarked on the operatic career on which his reputation chiefly rests today. His debut, Hippolyte et Aricie (1733), caused a great stir and was fiercely attacked by the supporters of Lully's style of music for its revolutionary use of harmony. Nevertheless, Rameau's pre-eminence in the field of French opera was soon acknowledged, and he was later attacked as an "establishment" composer by those who favoured Italian opera during the controversy known as the Querelle des Bouffons in the 1750s. Rameau's music had gone out of fashion by the end of the 18th century, and it was not until the 20th that serious efforts were made to revive it. Today, he enjoys renewed appreciation with performances and recordings of his music ever more frequent.
Life
The details of Rameau's life are generally obscure, especially concerning his first forty years, before he moved to Paris for good. He was a secretive man, and even his wife knew nothing of his early life, which explains the scarcity of biographical information available.
Early years, 1683–1732
Rameau's early years are particularly obscure. He was born on 25 September 1683 in Dijon, and baptised the same day. His father, Jean, worked as an organist in several churches around Dijon, and his mother, Claudine Demartinécourt, was the daughter of a notary. The couple had eleven children (five girls and six boys), of whom Jean-Philippe was the seventh.
Rameau was taught music before he could read or write. He was educated at the Jesuit college at Godrans, but he was not a good pupil and disrupted classes with his singing, later claiming that his passion for opera had begun at the age of twelve. Initially intended for the law, Rameau decided he wanted to be a musician, and his father sent him to Italy, where he stayed for a short while in Milan. On his return, he worked as a violinist in travelling companies and then as an organist in provincial cathedrals before moving to Paris for the first time. Here, in 1706, he published his earliest known compositions: the harpsichord works that make up his first book of Pièces de Clavecin, which show the influence of his friend Louis Marchand.
In 1709, he moved back to Dijon to take over his father's job as organist in the main church. The contract was for six years, but Rameau left before then and took up similar posts in Lyon and Clermont-Ferrand. During this period, he composed motets for church performance as well as secular cantatas.
In 1722, he returned to Paris for good, and here he published his most important work of music theory, Traité de l'harmonie (Treatise on Harmony). This soon won him a great reputation, and it was followed in 1726 by his Nouveau système de musique théorique. In 1724 and 1729 (or 1730), he also published two more collections of harpsichord pieces.
Rameau took his first tentative steps into composing stage music when the writer Alexis Piron asked him to provide songs for his popular comic plays written for the Paris Fairs. Four collaborations followed, beginning with L'endriague in 1723; none of the music has survived.
On 25 February 1726 Rameau married the 19-year-old Marie-Louise Mangot, who came from a musical family from Lyon and was a good singer and instrumentalist. The couple would have four children, two boys and two girls, and the marriage is said to have been a happy one.
In spite of his fame as a music theorist, Rameau had trouble finding a post as an organist in Paris.
Later years, 1733–1764
It was not until he was approaching 50 that Rameau decided to embark on the operatic career on which his fame as a composer mainly rests. He had already approached writer Antoine Houdar de la Motte for a libretto in 1727, but nothing came of it; he was finally inspired to try his hand at the prestigious genre of tragédie en musique after seeing Montéclair's Jephté in 1732. Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie premiered at the Académie Royale de Musique on 1 October 1733. It was immediately recognised as the most significant opera to appear in France since the death of Lully, but audiences were split over whether this was a good thing or a bad thing. Some, such as the composer André Campra, were stunned by its originality and wealth of invention; others found its harmonic innovations discordant and saw the work as an attack on the French musical tradition. The two camps, the so-called Lullyistes and the Rameauneurs, fought a pamphlet war over the issue for the rest of the decade.
Just before this time, Rameau had made the acquaintance of the powerful financier Alexandre Le Riche de La Poupelinière, who became his patron until 1753. La Poupelinière's mistress (and later, wife), Thérèse des Hayes, was Rameau's pupil and a great admirer of his music. In 1731, Rameau became the conductor of La Poupelinière's private orchestra, which was of an extremely high quality. He held the post for 22 years; he was succeeded by Johann Stamitz and then François-Joseph Gossec. La Poupelinière's salon enabled Rameau to meet some of the leading cultural figures of the day, including Voltaire, who soon began collaborating with the composer. Their first project, the tragédie en musique Samson, was abandoned because an opera on a religious theme by Voltaire—a notorious critic of the Church—was likely to be banned by the authorities. Meanwhile, Rameau had introduced his new musical style into the lighter genre of the opéra-ballet with the highly successful Les Indes galantes. It was followed by two tragédies en musique, Castor et Pollux (1737) and Dardanus (1739), and another opéra-ballet, Les fêtes d'Hébé (also 1739). All these operas of the 1730s are among Rameau's most highly regarded works. However, the composer followed them with six years of silence, in which the only work he produced was a new version of Dardanus (1744). The reason for this interval in the composer's creative life is unknown, although it is possible he had a falling-out with the authorities at the Académie royale de la musique.
The year 1745 was a turning point in Rameau's career. He received several commissions from the court for works to celebrate the French victory at the Battle of Fontenoy and the marriage of the Dauphin to Infanta Maria Teresa Rafaela of Spain. Rameau produced his most important comic opera, Platée, as well as two collaborations with Voltaire: the opéra-ballet Le temple de la gloire and the comédie-ballet La princesse de Navarre. They gained Rameau official recognition; he was granted the title "Compositeur du Cabinet du Roi" and given a substantial pension. 1745 also saw the beginning of the bitter enmity between Rameau and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Though best known today as a thinker, Rousseau had ambitions to be a composer. He had written an opera, Les muses galantes (inspired by Rameau's Indes galantes), but Rameau was unimpressed by this musical tribute. At the end of 1745, Voltaire and Rameau, who were busy on other works, commissioned Rousseau to turn La Princesse de Navarre into a new opera, with linking recitative, called Les fêtes de Ramire. Rousseau then claimed the two had stolen the credit for the words and music he had contributed, though musicologists have been able to identify almost nothing of the piece as Rousseau's work. Nevertheless, the embittered Rousseau nursed a grudge against Rameau for the rest of his life.
Rousseau was a major participant in the second great quarrel that erupted over Rameau's work, the so-called Querelle des Bouffons of 1752–54, which pitted French tragédie en musique against Italian opera buffa. This time, Rameau was accused of being out of date and his music too complicated in comparison with the simplicity and "naturalness" of a work like Pergolesi's La serva padrona. In the mid-1750s, Rameau criticised Rousseau's contributions to the musical articles in the Encyclopédie, which led to a quarrel with the leading philosophes d'Alembert and Diderot. As a result, Jean-François Rameau became a character in Diderot's then-unpublished dialogue, Le neveu de Rameau (Rameau's Nephew).
In 1753, La Poupelinière took a scheming musician, Jeanne-Thérèse Goermans, as his mistress. The daughter of harpsichord maker Jacques Goermans, she went by the name of Madame de Saint-Aubin, and her opportunistic husband pushed her into the arms of the rich financier. She had La Poupelinière engage the services of the Bohemian composer Johann Stamitz, who succeeded Rameau after a breach developed between Rameau and his patron; however, by then, Rameau no longer needed La Poupelinière's financial support and protection.
Rameau pursued his activities as a theorist and composer until his death. He lived with his wife and two of his children in his large suite of rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, which he would leave every day, lost in thought, to take a solitary walk in the nearby gardens of the Palais-Royal or the Tuileries. Sometimes he would meet the young writer Chabanon, who noted some of Rameau's disillusioned confidential remarks: "Day by day, I'm acquiring more good taste, but I no longer have any genius" and "The imagination is worn out in my old head; it's not wise at this age wanting to practise arts that are nothing but imagination."
Rameau composed prolifically in the late 1740s and early 1750s. After that, his rate of productivity dropped off, probably due to old age and ill health, although he was still able to write another comic opera, Les Paladins, in 1760. This was due to be followed by a final tragédie en musique, Les Boréades; but for unknown reasons, the opera was never produced and had to wait until the late 20th century for a proper staging. Rameau died on 12 September 1764 after suffering from a fever, thirteen days before his 81st birthday. At his bedside, he objected to a song sung. His last words were, "What the devil do you mean to sing to me, priest? You are out of tune." He was buried in the church of St. Eustache, Paris on the same day of his death. Although a bronze bust and red marble tombstone were erected in his memory there by the Société de la Compositeurs de Musique in 1883, the exact site of his burial remains unknown to this day.
Rameau's personality
While the details of his biography are vague and fragmentary, the details of Rameau's personal and family life are almost completely obscure. Rameau's music, so graceful and attractive, completely contradicts the man's public image and what we know of his character as described (or perhaps unfairly caricatured) by Diderot in his satirical novel Le Neveu de Rameau. Throughout his life, music was his consuming passion. It occupied his entire thinking; Philippe Beaussant calls him a monomaniac. Piron explained that "His heart and soul were in his harpsichord; once he had shut its lid, there was no one home." Physically, Rameau was tall and exceptionally thin, as can be seen by the sketches we have of him, including a famous portrait by Carmontelle. He had a "loud voice." His speech was difficult to understand, just like his handwriting, which was never fluent. As a man, he was secretive, solitary, irritable, proud of his own achievements (more as a theorist than as a composer), brusque with those who contradicted him, and quick to anger. It is difficult to imagine him among the leading wits, including Voltaire (to whom he bears more than a passing physical resemblance), who frequented La Poupelinière's salon; his music was his passport, and it made up for his lack of social graces.
His enemies exaggerated his faults; e.g. his supposed miserliness. In fact, it seems that his thriftiness was the result of long years spent in obscurity (when his income was uncertain and scanty) rather than part of his character, because he could also be generous. He helped his nephew Jean-François when he came to Paris and also helped establish the career of Claude-Bénigne Balbastre in the capital. Furthermore, he gave his daughter Marie-Louise a considerable dowry when she became a Visitandine nun in 1750, and he paid a pension to one of his sisters when she became ill. Financial security came late to him, following the success of his stage works and the grant of a royal pension (a few months before his death, he was also ennobled and made a knight of the Ordre de Saint-Michel). But he did not change his way of life, keeping his worn-out clothes, his single pair of shoes, and his old furniture. After his death, it was discovered that he only possessed one dilapidated single-keyboard harpsichord in his rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, yet he also had a bag containing 1691 gold louis.
Music
General character of Rameau's music
Rameau's music is characterised by the exceptional technical knowledge of a composer who wanted above all to be renowned as a theorist of the art. Nevertheless, it is not solely addressed to the intelligence, and Rameau himself claimed, "I try to conceal art with art." The paradox of this music was that it was new, using techniques never known before, but it took place within the framework of old-fashioned forms. Rameau appeared revolutionary to the Lullyistes, disturbed by complex harmony of his music; and reactionary to the "philosophes," who only paid attention to its content and who either would not or could not listen to the sound it made. The incomprehension Rameau received from his contemporaries stopped him from repeating such daring experiments as the second Trio des Parques in Hippolyte et Aricie, which he was forced to remove after a handful of performances because the singers had been either unable or unwilling to execute it correctly.
Rameau's musical works
Rameau's musical works may be divided into four distinct groups, which differ greatly in importance: a few cantatas; a few motets for large chorus; some pieces for solo harpsichord or harpsichord accompanied by other instruments; and, finally, his works for the stage, to which he dedicated the last thirty years of his career almost exclusively. Like most of his contemporaries, Rameau often reused melodies that had been particularly successful, but never without meticulously adapting them; they are not simple transcriptions. Besides, no borrowings have been found from other composers, although his earliest works show the influence of other music. Rameau's reworkings of his own material are numerous; e.g., in Les Fêtes d'Hébé, we find L'Entretien des Muses, the Musette, and the Tambourin, taken from the 1724 book of harpsichord pieces, as well as an aria from the cantata Le Berger Fidèle.
Motets
For at least 26 years, Rameau was a professional organist in the service of religious institutions, and yet the body of sacred music he composed is exceptionally small and his organ works nonexistent. Judging by the evidence, it was not his favourite field, but rather, simply a way of making reasonable money. Rameau's few religious compositions are nevertheless remarkable and compare favourably to the works of specialists in the area. Only four motets have been attributed to Rameau with any certainty: Deus noster refugium, In convertendo, Quam dilecta, and Laboravi.
Cantatas
The cantata was a highly successful genre in the early 18th century. The French cantata, which should not be confused with the Italian or the German cantata, was "invented" in 1706 by the poet Jean-Baptiste Rousseau and soon taken up by many famous composers of the day, such as Montéclair, Campra, and Clérambault. Cantatas were Rameau's first contact with dramatic music. The modest forces the cantata required meant it was a genre within the reach of a composer who was still unknown. Musicologists can only guess at the dates of Rameau's six surviving cantatas, and the names of the librettists are unknown.
Instrumental music
Along with François Couperin, Rameau was a master of the 18th-century French school of harpsichord music, and both made a break with the style of the first generation of harpsichordists whose compositions adhered to the relatively standardised suite form, which had reached its apogee in the first decade of the 18th century and successive collections of pieces by Louis Marchand, Gaspard Le Roux, Louis-Nicolas Clérambault, Jean-François Dandrieu, Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, Charles Dieupart and Nicolas Siret. Rameau and Couperin had different styles, and it seems they did not know one another: Couperin was one of the official court musicians; Rameau, fifteen years his junior, achieved fame only after Couperin's death.
Rameau published his first book of harpsichord pieces in 1706. (Cf. Couperin, who waited until 1713 before publishing his first "Ordres.") Rameau's music includes pieces in the pure tradition of the French suite: imitative ("Le rappel des oiseaux," "La poule") and characterful ("Les tendres plaintes," "L'entretien des Muses"). But there are also works of pure virtuosity that resemble Domenico Scarlatti ("Les tourbillons," "Les trois mains") as well as pieces that reveal the experiments of a theorist and musical innovator ("L'enharmonique," "Les Cyclopes"), which had a marked influence on Louis-Claude Daquin, Joseph-Nicolas-Pancrace Royer and Jacques Duphly. Rameau's suites are grouped in the traditional way, by key. The first set of dances (Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, Les Trois Mains, Fanfairenette, La Triomphante, Gavotte et 6 doubles) is centred on A major and A minor, while the remaining pieces (Les tricoteuses, L'Indifferente, Première Menuet, Deuxième Menuet, La Poule, Les Triolets, Les Sauvages, L'Enharmonique, L'Egiptienne [sic]) are centred around G major and G minor.
Rameau's second and third collections appeared in 1724 and 1727. After these he composed only one piece for the harpsichord, the eight-minute "La Dauphine" of 1747, while the very short "Les petits marteaux" (c. 1750) has also been attributed to him.
During his semiretirement (1740 to 1744) he wrote the Pièces de clavecin en concert (1741), which some musicologists consider the pinnacle of French Baroque chamber music. Adopting a formula successfully employed by Mondonville a few years earlier, Rameau fashioned these pieces differently from trio sonatas in that the harpsichord is not simply there as basso continuo to accompany melody instruments (violin, flute, viol) but as equal partner in "concert" with them. Rameau claimed that this music would be equally satisfying played on the harpsichord alone, but the claim is not wholly convincing because he took the trouble to transcribe five of them himself, those the lack of other instruments would show the least.
Opera
After 1733 Rameau dedicated himself mostly to opera. On a strictly musical level, 18th-century French Baroque opera is richer and more varied than contemporary Italian opera, especially in the place given to choruses and dances but also in the musical continuity that arises from the respective relationships between the arias and the recitatives. Another essential difference: whereas Italian opera gave a starring role to female sopranos and castrati, French opera had no use for the latter. The Italian opera of Rameau's day (opera seria, opera buffa) was essentially divided into musical sections (da capo arias, duets, trios, etc.) and sections that were spoken or almost spoken (recitativo secco). It was during the latter that the action progressed while the audience waited for the next aria; on the other hand, the text of the arias was almost entirely buried beneath music whose chief aim was to show off the virtuosity of the singer. Nothing of the kind is to be found in French opera of the day; since Lully, the text had to remain comprehensible—limiting certain techniques such as the vocalise, which was reserved for special words such as ("glory") or ("victory"). A subtle equilibrium existed between the more and the less musical parts: melodic recitative on the one hand and arias that were often closer to arioso on the other, alongside virtuoso "ariettes" in the Italian style. This form of continuous music prefigures Wagnerian drama even more than does the "reform" opera of Gluck.
Five essential components may be discerned in Rameau's operatic scores:
Pieces of "pure" music (overtures, ritornelli, music which closes scenes). Unlike the highly stereotyped Lullian overture, Rameau's overtures show an extraordinary variety. Even in his earliest works, where he uses the standard French model, Rameau—the born symphonist and master of orchestration—composes novel and unique pieces. A few pieces are particularly striking, such as the overture to Zaïs, depicting the chaos before the creation of the universe, that of Pigmalion, suggesting the sculptor's chipping away at the statue with his mallet, or many more conventional depictions of storms and earthquakes, as well perhaps as the imposing final chaconnes of Les Indes galantes or Dardanus.
Dance music: the danced interludes, which were obligatory even in tragédie en musique, allowed Rameau to give free rein to his inimitable sense of rhythm, melody, and choreography, acknowledged by all his contemporaries, including the dancers themselves. This "learned" composer, forever preoccupied by his next theoretical work, also was one who strung together gavottes, minuets, loures, rigaudons, passepieds, tambourins, and musettes by the dozen. According to his biographer, Cuthbert Girdlestone, "The immense superiority of all that pertains to Rameau in choreography still needs emphasizing," and the German scholar H.W. von Walthershausen affirmed:
Rameau was the greatest ballet composer of all times. The genius of his creation rests on one hand on his perfect artistic permeation by folk-dance types, on the other hand on the constant preservation of living contact with the practical requirements of the ballet stage, which prevented an estrangement between the expression of the body from the spirit of absolute music.
Choruses: Padre Martini, the erudite musicologist who corresponded with Rameau, affirmed that "the French are excellent at choruses," obviously thinking of Rameau himself. A great master of harmony, Rameau knew how to compose sumptuous choruses—whether monodic, polyphonic, or interspersed with passages for solo singers or the orchestra—and whatever feelings needed to be expressed.
Arias: less frequent than in Italian opera, Rameau nevertheless offers many striking examples. Particularly admired arias include Télaïre's "Tristes apprêts," from Castor et Pollux; "Ô jour affreux" and "Lieux funestes," from Dardanus; Huascar's invocations in Les Indes galantes; and the final ariette in Pigmalion. In Platée we encounter a showstopping ars poetica aria for the character of La Folie (the madness), "Formons les plus brillants concerts / Aux langeurs d'Apollon".
Recitative: much closer to arioso than to recitativo secco. The composer took scrupulous care to observe French prosody and used his harmonic knowledge to give expression to his protagonists' feelings.
During the first part of his operatic career (1733–1739), Rameau wrote his great masterpieces destined for the Académie royale de musique: three tragédies en musique and two opéra-ballets that still form the core of his repertoire. After the interval of 1740 to 1744, he became the official court musician, and for the most part, composed pieces intended to entertain, with plenty of dance music emphasising sensuality and an idealised pastoral atmosphere. In his last years, Rameau returned to a renewed version of his early style in Les Paladins and Les Boréades.
His Zoroastre was first performed in 1749. According to one of Rameau's admirers, Cuthbert Girdlestone, this opera has a distinctive place in his works: "The profane passions of hatred and jealousy are rendered more intensely [than in his other works] and with a strong sense of reality."
Rameau and his librettists
Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zaïs (1748), Naïs (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacréon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boréades (c. 1763).
Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupelinière's salon, at the Société du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day.
Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760).
Reputation and influence
By the end of his life, Rameau's music had come under attack in France from theorists who favoured Italian models. However, foreign composers working in the Italian tradition were increasingly looking towards Rameau as a way of reforming their own leading operatic genre, opera seria. Tommaso Traetta produced two operas setting translations of Rameau libretti that show the French composer's influence, Ippolito ed Aricia (1759) and I Tintaridi (based on Castor et Pollux, 1760). Traetta had been advised by Count Francesco Algarotti, a leading proponent of reform according to French models; Algarotti was a major influence on the most important "reformist" composer, Christoph Willibald Gluck. Gluck's three Italian reform operas of the 1760s—Orfeo ed Euridice, Alceste, and Paride ed Elena—reveal a knowledge of Rameau's works. For instance, both Orfeo and the 1737 version of Castor et Pollux open with the funeral of one of the leading characters who later comes back to life. Many of the operatic reforms advocated in the preface to Gluck's Alceste were already present in Rameau's works. Rameau had used accompanied recitatives, and the overtures in his later operas reflected the action to come, so when Gluck arrived in Paris in 1774 to produce a series of six French operas, he could be seen as continuing in the tradition of Rameau. Nevertheless, while Gluck's popularity survived the French Revolution, Rameau's did not. By the end of the 18th century, his operas had vanished from the repertoire.
For most of the 19th century, Rameau's music remained unplayed, known only by reputation. Hector Berlioz investigated Castor et Pollux and particularly admired the aria "Tristes apprêts," but "whereas the modern listener readily perceives the common ground with Berlioz' music, he himself was more conscious of the gap which separated them." French humiliation in the Franco-Prussian War brought about a change in Rameau's fortunes. As Rameau biographer J. Malignon wrote, "...the German victory over France in 1870–71 was the grand occasion for digging up great heroes from the French past. Rameau, like so many others, was flung into the enemy's face to bolster our courage and our faith in the national destiny of France." In 1894, composer Vincent d'Indy founded the Schola Cantorum to promote French national music; the society put on several revivals of works by Rameau. Among the audience was Claude Debussy, who especially cherished Castor et Pollux, revived in 1903: "Gluck's genius was deeply rooted in Rameau's works... a detailed comparison allows us to affirm that Gluck could replace Rameau on the French stage only by assimilating the latter's beautiful works and making them his own." Camille Saint-Saëns (by editing and publishing the Pièces in 1895) and Paul Dukas were two other important French musicians who gave practical championship to Rameau's music in their day, but interest in Rameau petered out again, and it was not until the late 20th century that a serious effort was made to revive his works. Over half of Rameau's operas have now been recorded, in particular by conductors such as John Eliot Gardiner, William Christie, and Marc Minkowski.
One of his pieces is commonly heard in the Victoria Centre in Nottingham by the Rowland Emett timepiece, the Aqua Horological Tintinnabulator. Emett quoted that Rameau made music for his school and the shopping centre without him knowing it.
Theoretical works
Treatise on Harmony, 1722
Rameau's 1722 Treatise on Harmony initiated a revolution in music theory. Rameau posited the discovery of the "fundamental law" or what he referred to as the "fundamental bass" of all Western music. Heavily influenced by new Cartesian modes of thought and analysis, Rameau's methodology incorporated mathematics, commentary, analysis and a didacticism that was specifically intended to illuminate, scientifically, the structure and principles of music. With careful deductive reasoning, he attempted to derive universal harmonic principles from natural causes. Previous treatises on harmony had been purely practical; Rameau embraced the new philosophical rationalism, quickly rising to prominence in France as the "Isaac Newton of Music." His fame subsequently spread throughout all Europe, and his Treatise became the definitive authority on music theory, forming the foundation for instruction in western music that persists to this day.
List of works
RCT numbering refers to Rameau Catalogue Thématique established by Sylvie Bouissou and Denis Herlin.
Instrumental works
Pièces de clavecin. Trois livres. "Pieces for harpsichord", 3 books, published 1706, 1724, 1726/27(?).
RCT 1 – Premier livre de Clavecin (1706)
RCT 2 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in E minor
RCT 3 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in D major
RCT 4 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Menuet in C major
RCT 5 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in A minor
RCT 6 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in G
Pieces de Clavecin en Concerts Five albums of character pieces for harpsichord, violin and viol. (1741)
RCT 7 – Concert I in C minor
RCT 8 – Concert II in G major
RCT 9 – Concert III in A major
RCT 10 – Concert IV in B flat major
RCT 11 – Concert V in D minor
RCT 12 – La Dauphine for harpsichord. (1747)
RCT 12bis – Les petits marteaux for harpsichord.
Several orchestral dance suites extracted from his operas.
Motets
RCT 13 – Deus noster refugium (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 14 – In convertendo (probably before 1720, rev. 1751)
RCT 15 – Quam dilecta (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 16 – Laboravi (published in the Traité de l'harmonie, 1722)
Canons
RCT 17 – Ah! loin de rire, pleurons (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) (pub. 1722)
RCT 18 – Avec du vin, endormons-nous (2 sopranos, Tenor) (1719)
RCT 18bis – L'épouse entre deux draps (3 sopranos) (formerly attributed to François Couperin)
RCT 18ter – Je suis un fou Madame (3 voix égales) (1720)
RCT 19 – Mes chers amis, quittez vos rouges bords (3 sopranos, 3 basses) (pub. 1780)
RCT 20 – Réveillez-vous, dormeur sans fin (5 voix égales) (pub. 1722)
RCT 20bis – Si tu ne prends garde à toi (2 sopranos, bass) (1720)
Songs
RCT 21.1 – L'amante préoccupée or A l'objet que j'adore (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.2 – Lucas, pour se gausser de nous (soprano, bass, continuo) (pub. 1707)
RCT 21.3 – Non, non, le dieu qui sait aimer (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.4 – Un Bourbon ouvre sa carrière or Un héros ouvre sa carrière (alto, continuo) (1751, air belonging to Acante et Céphise but censored before its first performance and never reintroduced in the work).
Cantatas
RCT 23 – Aquilon et Orithie (between 1715 and 1720)
RCT 28 – Thétis (same period)
RCT 26 – L’impatience (same period)
RCT 22 – Les amants trahis (around 1720)
RCT 27 – Orphée (same period)
RCT 24 – Le berger fidèle (1728)
RCT 25 – Cantate pour le jour de la Saint Louis (1740)
Operas and stage works
Tragédies en musique
RCT 43 – Hippolyte et Aricie (1733; revised 1742 and 1757)
RCT 32 – Castor et Pollux (1737; revised 1754)
RCT 35 – Dardanus (1739; revised 1744 and 1760), score
RCT 62 – Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756, with new music for Acts II, III & V)
RCT 31 – Les Boréades or Abaris (unperformed; in rehearsal 1763)
Opéra-ballets
RCT 44 – Les Indes galantes (1735; revised 1736)
RCT 41 – Les fêtes d'Hébé or les Talens Lyriques (1739)
RCT 39 – Les fêtes de Polymnie (1745)
RCT 59 – Le temple de la gloire (1745; revised 1746)
RCT 38 – Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour or Les Dieux d'Egypte (1747)
RCT 58 – Les surprises de l'Amour (1748; revised 1757)
Pastorales héroïques
RCT 60 – Zaïs (1748)
RCT 49 – Naïs (1749)
RCT 29 – Acante et Céphise or La sympathie (1751)
RCT 34 – Daphnis et Eglé (1753)
Comédies lyriques
RCT 53 – Platée or Junon jalouse (1745), score
RCT 51 – Les Paladins or Le Vénitien (1760)
Comédie-ballet
RCT 54 – La princesse de Navarre (1744)
Actes de ballet
RCT 33 – Les courses de Tempé (1734)
RCT 40 – Les fêtes de Ramire (1745)
RCT 52 – Pigmalion (1748)
RCT 42 – La guirlande or Les fleurs enchantées (1751)
RCT 57 – Les sibarites or Sibaris (1753)
RCT 48 – La naissance d'Osiris or La Fête Pamilie (1754)
RCT 30 – Anacréon (1754)
RCT 58 – Anacréon (completely different work from the above, 1757, 3rd Entrée of Les surprises de l'Amour)
RCT 61 – Zéphire (date unknown)
RCT 50 – Nélée et Myrthis (date unknown)
RCT 45 – Io (unfinished, date unknown)
Lost works
RCT 56 – Samson (tragédie en musique) (first version written 1733–1734; second version 1736; neither were ever staged )
RCT 46 – Linus (tragédie en musique) (1751, score stolen after a rehearsal)
RCT 47 – Lisis et Délie (pastorale) (scheduled on November 6, 1753)
Incidental music for opéras comiques
Music mostly lost.
RCT 36 – L'endriague (in 3 acts, 1723)
RCT 37 – L'enrôlement d'Arlequin (in 1 act, 1726)
RCT 55 – La robe de dissension or Le faux prodige (in 2 acts, 1726)
RCT 55bis – La rose or Les jardins de l'Hymen (in a prologue and 1 act, 1744)
Writings
Traité de l'harmonie réduite à ses principes naturels (Paris, 1722)
Nouveau système de musique théorique (Paris, 1726)
Dissertation sur les différents méthodes d'accompagnement pour le clavecin, ou pour l'orgue (Paris, 1732)
Génération harmonique, ou Traité de musique théorique et pratique (Paris, 1737)
Mémoire où l'on expose les fondemens du Système de musique théorique et pratique de M. Rameau (1749)
Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1750)
Nouvelles réflexions de M. Rameau sur sa 'Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1752)
Observations sur notre instinct pour la musique (Paris, 1754)
Erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1755)
Suite des erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1756)
Reponse de M. Rameau à MM. les editeurs de l'Encyclopédie sur leur dernier Avertissement (Paris, 1757)
Nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (1758–9)
Code de musique pratique, ou Méthodes pour apprendre la musique...avec des nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (Paris, 1760)
Lettre à M. Alembert sur ses opinions en musique (Paris, 1760)
Origine des sciences, suivie d'un controverse sur le même sujet (Paris, 1762)
See also
Querelle des Bouffons
ReferencesNotesSourcesBeaussant, Philippe, Rameau de A à Z (Fayard, 1983)
Gibbons, William. Building the Operatic Museum: Eighteenth-Century Opera in Fin-de-siècle Paris (University of Rochester Press, 2013)
Girdlestone, Cuthbert, Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Dover paperback edition, 1969)
Holden, Amanda, (Ed) The Viking Opera Guide (Viking, 1993)
Sadler, Graham, (Ed.), The New Grove French Baroque Masters (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)
Trowbridge, Simon, Rameau (2nd edition, Englance Press, 2017)
F. Annunziata, Una Tragédie Lyrique nel Secolo dei Lumi. Abaris ou Les Boréades di Jean Philippe Rameau, https://www.academia.edu/6100318
External links
(en) Gavotte with Doubles Hypermedia by Jeff Hall & Tim Smith at the BinAural Collaborative Hypertext – Shockwave Player required – ("Gavotte with Doubles" link NG)
(en) jp.rameau.free.fr Rameau – Le Site
(fr) musicologie.org Biography, List of Works, bibliography, discography, theoretical writings, in French
(en) Jean-Philippe Rameau / Discography
Magnatune Les Cyclopes by Rameau in on-line mp3 format (played by Trevor Pinnock)
Jean-Philippe Rameau, "L'Orchestre de Louis XV" – Suites d'Orchestre, Le Concert des Nations, dir. Jordi Savall, Alia Vox, AVSA 9882Sheet music'''
Rameau free sheet music from the Mutopia Project
1683 births
1764 deaths
18th-century classical composers
18th-century French composers
18th-century French male musicians
Composers awarded knighthoods
Composers for harpsichord
French Baroque composers
French ballet composers
French opera composers
French male classical composers
French male non-fiction writers
French music theorists
Male opera composers
People from Dijon
Burials at Saint-Eustache, Paris
17th-century male musicians | true | [
"Louis de Cahusac (6 April 1706 – 22 June 1759) was an 18th-century French playwright and librettist, and Freemason, most famous for his work with the composer Jean-Philippe Rameau. He provided the libretti for several of Rameau's operas, namely Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zaïs (1748), Naïs (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacréon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boréades (c. 1763). Cahusac contributed to the Encyclopédie and was the lover of Marie Fel.\n\nIn 1754, he published La Danse ancienne et moderne ou Traité historique de la danse (The Hague, Jean Neaulme).\n\nAmong Rameau's librettists, he was the one whose collaboration lasted the longest; the composer had a very bad character and he was also stingy. Only Cahusac managed to work with him permanently.\n\nSources \nCuthbert Girdlestone Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Dover paperback edition, 1969)\nThe New Grove French Baroque Masters ed. Graham Sadler (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Louis de Cahusac on Data.bnf.fr\n\nPeople from Montauban\n1706 births\n1759 deaths\n18th-century French dramatists and playwrights\nContributors to the Encyclopédie (1751–1772)\nFrench male dramatists and playwrights\nFrench ballet librettists\nFrench opera librettists\nFrench male non-fiction writers\n18th-century French male writers",
"Eugène Leterrier (1843 – 22 December 1884 in Paris) was a French librettist.\n\nLeterrier worked at the Hôtel de Ville in Paris but then turned to the theatre. He mainly collaborated in writing libretti with Albert Vanloo. Their working relationship was productive and stress-free.\n\nIn collaboration with Vanloo success first came with Giroflé-Girofla and La petite mariée for Lecocq. The pair went on to provide libretti for Potier, Jacob, de Villebichet, Offenbach, Chabrier, Lacome and Messager. Chabrier was particularly pleased with the honest and hard work he enjoyed with the librettists for his first staged works.\n\nList of libretti\nWith Albert Vanloo\nGiroflé-Girofla (1874)\nLa petite mariée for Lecocq (1875)\nLe voyage dans la lune (1875)\nLa Marjolaine for Lecocq (1877)\nL'étoile (1877)\nLa Camargo for Lecocq (1878)\nUne éducation manquée (1879)\nLa jolie Persane for Lecocq (1879)\nLe jour et la nuit for Lecocq (1881)\nMam'zelle Moucheron for Offenbach (1881)\nLe droit d'aînesse (1883)\nLa Béarnaise (1885)\n\nWith Albert Vanloo and Arnold Mortier\nL'arbre de Noël for Lecocq (1880)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nList of works by Leterrier at the Index to Opera and Ballet Sources Online\n\nFrench opera librettists\n1843 births\n1884 deaths\nFrench male dramatists and playwrights\n19th-century French dramatists and playwrights\n19th-century French male writers"
]
|
[
"Jean-Philippe Rameau",
"Rameau and his librettists",
"What is a librettist?",
"librettists managed to produce a libretto",
"What is a libretto?",
"operas,",
"How was Rameau's relation with his librettists?",
"Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice.",
"Why didn't he work with the same librettists twice?",
"He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists,",
"Were any exceptions noted in the article?",
"Louis de Cahusac,",
"Why was de Cahusac an exception?",
"collaborated with him on several operas,",
"Were any of their collaborations listed in the article?",
"Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756),",
"What other librettists did he work with?",
"Voltaire"
]
| C_6affd0880c764e209d1d4aabc61ddb69_0 | What did he work on with Voltaire? | 9 | What did Jean-Philippe Rameau work on with Voltaire? | Jean-Philippe Rameau | Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacreon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boreades (c. 1763). Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupliniere's salon, at the Societe du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day. Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760). CANNOTANSWER | the Samson project | Jean-Philippe Rameau (; – ) was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the 18th century. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer of his time for the harpsichord, alongside François Couperin.
Little is known about Rameau's early years. It was not until the 1720s that he won fame as a major theorist of music with his Treatise on Harmony (1722) and also in the following years as a composer of masterpieces for the harpsichord, which circulated throughout Europe. He was almost 50 before he embarked on the operatic career on which his reputation chiefly rests today. His debut, Hippolyte et Aricie (1733), caused a great stir and was fiercely attacked by the supporters of Lully's style of music for its revolutionary use of harmony. Nevertheless, Rameau's pre-eminence in the field of French opera was soon acknowledged, and he was later attacked as an "establishment" composer by those who favoured Italian opera during the controversy known as the Querelle des Bouffons in the 1750s. Rameau's music had gone out of fashion by the end of the 18th century, and it was not until the 20th that serious efforts were made to revive it. Today, he enjoys renewed appreciation with performances and recordings of his music ever more frequent.
Life
The details of Rameau's life are generally obscure, especially concerning his first forty years, before he moved to Paris for good. He was a secretive man, and even his wife knew nothing of his early life, which explains the scarcity of biographical information available.
Early years, 1683–1732
Rameau's early years are particularly obscure. He was born on 25 September 1683 in Dijon, and baptised the same day. His father, Jean, worked as an organist in several churches around Dijon, and his mother, Claudine Demartinécourt, was the daughter of a notary. The couple had eleven children (five girls and six boys), of whom Jean-Philippe was the seventh.
Rameau was taught music before he could read or write. He was educated at the Jesuit college at Godrans, but he was not a good pupil and disrupted classes with his singing, later claiming that his passion for opera had begun at the age of twelve. Initially intended for the law, Rameau decided he wanted to be a musician, and his father sent him to Italy, where he stayed for a short while in Milan. On his return, he worked as a violinist in travelling companies and then as an organist in provincial cathedrals before moving to Paris for the first time. Here, in 1706, he published his earliest known compositions: the harpsichord works that make up his first book of Pièces de Clavecin, which show the influence of his friend Louis Marchand.
In 1709, he moved back to Dijon to take over his father's job as organist in the main church. The contract was for six years, but Rameau left before then and took up similar posts in Lyon and Clermont-Ferrand. During this period, he composed motets for church performance as well as secular cantatas.
In 1722, he returned to Paris for good, and here he published his most important work of music theory, Traité de l'harmonie (Treatise on Harmony). This soon won him a great reputation, and it was followed in 1726 by his Nouveau système de musique théorique. In 1724 and 1729 (or 1730), he also published two more collections of harpsichord pieces.
Rameau took his first tentative steps into composing stage music when the writer Alexis Piron asked him to provide songs for his popular comic plays written for the Paris Fairs. Four collaborations followed, beginning with L'endriague in 1723; none of the music has survived.
On 25 February 1726 Rameau married the 19-year-old Marie-Louise Mangot, who came from a musical family from Lyon and was a good singer and instrumentalist. The couple would have four children, two boys and two girls, and the marriage is said to have been a happy one.
In spite of his fame as a music theorist, Rameau had trouble finding a post as an organist in Paris.
Later years, 1733–1764
It was not until he was approaching 50 that Rameau decided to embark on the operatic career on which his fame as a composer mainly rests. He had already approached writer Antoine Houdar de la Motte for a libretto in 1727, but nothing came of it; he was finally inspired to try his hand at the prestigious genre of tragédie en musique after seeing Montéclair's Jephté in 1732. Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie premiered at the Académie Royale de Musique on 1 October 1733. It was immediately recognised as the most significant opera to appear in France since the death of Lully, but audiences were split over whether this was a good thing or a bad thing. Some, such as the composer André Campra, were stunned by its originality and wealth of invention; others found its harmonic innovations discordant and saw the work as an attack on the French musical tradition. The two camps, the so-called Lullyistes and the Rameauneurs, fought a pamphlet war over the issue for the rest of the decade.
Just before this time, Rameau had made the acquaintance of the powerful financier Alexandre Le Riche de La Poupelinière, who became his patron until 1753. La Poupelinière's mistress (and later, wife), Thérèse des Hayes, was Rameau's pupil and a great admirer of his music. In 1731, Rameau became the conductor of La Poupelinière's private orchestra, which was of an extremely high quality. He held the post for 22 years; he was succeeded by Johann Stamitz and then François-Joseph Gossec. La Poupelinière's salon enabled Rameau to meet some of the leading cultural figures of the day, including Voltaire, who soon began collaborating with the composer. Their first project, the tragédie en musique Samson, was abandoned because an opera on a religious theme by Voltaire—a notorious critic of the Church—was likely to be banned by the authorities. Meanwhile, Rameau had introduced his new musical style into the lighter genre of the opéra-ballet with the highly successful Les Indes galantes. It was followed by two tragédies en musique, Castor et Pollux (1737) and Dardanus (1739), and another opéra-ballet, Les fêtes d'Hébé (also 1739). All these operas of the 1730s are among Rameau's most highly regarded works. However, the composer followed them with six years of silence, in which the only work he produced was a new version of Dardanus (1744). The reason for this interval in the composer's creative life is unknown, although it is possible he had a falling-out with the authorities at the Académie royale de la musique.
The year 1745 was a turning point in Rameau's career. He received several commissions from the court for works to celebrate the French victory at the Battle of Fontenoy and the marriage of the Dauphin to Infanta Maria Teresa Rafaela of Spain. Rameau produced his most important comic opera, Platée, as well as two collaborations with Voltaire: the opéra-ballet Le temple de la gloire and the comédie-ballet La princesse de Navarre. They gained Rameau official recognition; he was granted the title "Compositeur du Cabinet du Roi" and given a substantial pension. 1745 also saw the beginning of the bitter enmity between Rameau and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Though best known today as a thinker, Rousseau had ambitions to be a composer. He had written an opera, Les muses galantes (inspired by Rameau's Indes galantes), but Rameau was unimpressed by this musical tribute. At the end of 1745, Voltaire and Rameau, who were busy on other works, commissioned Rousseau to turn La Princesse de Navarre into a new opera, with linking recitative, called Les fêtes de Ramire. Rousseau then claimed the two had stolen the credit for the words and music he had contributed, though musicologists have been able to identify almost nothing of the piece as Rousseau's work. Nevertheless, the embittered Rousseau nursed a grudge against Rameau for the rest of his life.
Rousseau was a major participant in the second great quarrel that erupted over Rameau's work, the so-called Querelle des Bouffons of 1752–54, which pitted French tragédie en musique against Italian opera buffa. This time, Rameau was accused of being out of date and his music too complicated in comparison with the simplicity and "naturalness" of a work like Pergolesi's La serva padrona. In the mid-1750s, Rameau criticised Rousseau's contributions to the musical articles in the Encyclopédie, which led to a quarrel with the leading philosophes d'Alembert and Diderot. As a result, Jean-François Rameau became a character in Diderot's then-unpublished dialogue, Le neveu de Rameau (Rameau's Nephew).
In 1753, La Poupelinière took a scheming musician, Jeanne-Thérèse Goermans, as his mistress. The daughter of harpsichord maker Jacques Goermans, she went by the name of Madame de Saint-Aubin, and her opportunistic husband pushed her into the arms of the rich financier. She had La Poupelinière engage the services of the Bohemian composer Johann Stamitz, who succeeded Rameau after a breach developed between Rameau and his patron; however, by then, Rameau no longer needed La Poupelinière's financial support and protection.
Rameau pursued his activities as a theorist and composer until his death. He lived with his wife and two of his children in his large suite of rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, which he would leave every day, lost in thought, to take a solitary walk in the nearby gardens of the Palais-Royal or the Tuileries. Sometimes he would meet the young writer Chabanon, who noted some of Rameau's disillusioned confidential remarks: "Day by day, I'm acquiring more good taste, but I no longer have any genius" and "The imagination is worn out in my old head; it's not wise at this age wanting to practise arts that are nothing but imagination."
Rameau composed prolifically in the late 1740s and early 1750s. After that, his rate of productivity dropped off, probably due to old age and ill health, although he was still able to write another comic opera, Les Paladins, in 1760. This was due to be followed by a final tragédie en musique, Les Boréades; but for unknown reasons, the opera was never produced and had to wait until the late 20th century for a proper staging. Rameau died on 12 September 1764 after suffering from a fever, thirteen days before his 81st birthday. At his bedside, he objected to a song sung. His last words were, "What the devil do you mean to sing to me, priest? You are out of tune." He was buried in the church of St. Eustache, Paris on the same day of his death. Although a bronze bust and red marble tombstone were erected in his memory there by the Société de la Compositeurs de Musique in 1883, the exact site of his burial remains unknown to this day.
Rameau's personality
While the details of his biography are vague and fragmentary, the details of Rameau's personal and family life are almost completely obscure. Rameau's music, so graceful and attractive, completely contradicts the man's public image and what we know of his character as described (or perhaps unfairly caricatured) by Diderot in his satirical novel Le Neveu de Rameau. Throughout his life, music was his consuming passion. It occupied his entire thinking; Philippe Beaussant calls him a monomaniac. Piron explained that "His heart and soul were in his harpsichord; once he had shut its lid, there was no one home." Physically, Rameau was tall and exceptionally thin, as can be seen by the sketches we have of him, including a famous portrait by Carmontelle. He had a "loud voice." His speech was difficult to understand, just like his handwriting, which was never fluent. As a man, he was secretive, solitary, irritable, proud of his own achievements (more as a theorist than as a composer), brusque with those who contradicted him, and quick to anger. It is difficult to imagine him among the leading wits, including Voltaire (to whom he bears more than a passing physical resemblance), who frequented La Poupelinière's salon; his music was his passport, and it made up for his lack of social graces.
His enemies exaggerated his faults; e.g. his supposed miserliness. In fact, it seems that his thriftiness was the result of long years spent in obscurity (when his income was uncertain and scanty) rather than part of his character, because he could also be generous. He helped his nephew Jean-François when he came to Paris and also helped establish the career of Claude-Bénigne Balbastre in the capital. Furthermore, he gave his daughter Marie-Louise a considerable dowry when she became a Visitandine nun in 1750, and he paid a pension to one of his sisters when she became ill. Financial security came late to him, following the success of his stage works and the grant of a royal pension (a few months before his death, he was also ennobled and made a knight of the Ordre de Saint-Michel). But he did not change his way of life, keeping his worn-out clothes, his single pair of shoes, and his old furniture. After his death, it was discovered that he only possessed one dilapidated single-keyboard harpsichord in his rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, yet he also had a bag containing 1691 gold louis.
Music
General character of Rameau's music
Rameau's music is characterised by the exceptional technical knowledge of a composer who wanted above all to be renowned as a theorist of the art. Nevertheless, it is not solely addressed to the intelligence, and Rameau himself claimed, "I try to conceal art with art." The paradox of this music was that it was new, using techniques never known before, but it took place within the framework of old-fashioned forms. Rameau appeared revolutionary to the Lullyistes, disturbed by complex harmony of his music; and reactionary to the "philosophes," who only paid attention to its content and who either would not or could not listen to the sound it made. The incomprehension Rameau received from his contemporaries stopped him from repeating such daring experiments as the second Trio des Parques in Hippolyte et Aricie, which he was forced to remove after a handful of performances because the singers had been either unable or unwilling to execute it correctly.
Rameau's musical works
Rameau's musical works may be divided into four distinct groups, which differ greatly in importance: a few cantatas; a few motets for large chorus; some pieces for solo harpsichord or harpsichord accompanied by other instruments; and, finally, his works for the stage, to which he dedicated the last thirty years of his career almost exclusively. Like most of his contemporaries, Rameau often reused melodies that had been particularly successful, but never without meticulously adapting them; they are not simple transcriptions. Besides, no borrowings have been found from other composers, although his earliest works show the influence of other music. Rameau's reworkings of his own material are numerous; e.g., in Les Fêtes d'Hébé, we find L'Entretien des Muses, the Musette, and the Tambourin, taken from the 1724 book of harpsichord pieces, as well as an aria from the cantata Le Berger Fidèle.
Motets
For at least 26 years, Rameau was a professional organist in the service of religious institutions, and yet the body of sacred music he composed is exceptionally small and his organ works nonexistent. Judging by the evidence, it was not his favourite field, but rather, simply a way of making reasonable money. Rameau's few religious compositions are nevertheless remarkable and compare favourably to the works of specialists in the area. Only four motets have been attributed to Rameau with any certainty: Deus noster refugium, In convertendo, Quam dilecta, and Laboravi.
Cantatas
The cantata was a highly successful genre in the early 18th century. The French cantata, which should not be confused with the Italian or the German cantata, was "invented" in 1706 by the poet Jean-Baptiste Rousseau and soon taken up by many famous composers of the day, such as Montéclair, Campra, and Clérambault. Cantatas were Rameau's first contact with dramatic music. The modest forces the cantata required meant it was a genre within the reach of a composer who was still unknown. Musicologists can only guess at the dates of Rameau's six surviving cantatas, and the names of the librettists are unknown.
Instrumental music
Along with François Couperin, Rameau was a master of the 18th-century French school of harpsichord music, and both made a break with the style of the first generation of harpsichordists whose compositions adhered to the relatively standardised suite form, which had reached its apogee in the first decade of the 18th century and successive collections of pieces by Louis Marchand, Gaspard Le Roux, Louis-Nicolas Clérambault, Jean-François Dandrieu, Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, Charles Dieupart and Nicolas Siret. Rameau and Couperin had different styles, and it seems they did not know one another: Couperin was one of the official court musicians; Rameau, fifteen years his junior, achieved fame only after Couperin's death.
Rameau published his first book of harpsichord pieces in 1706. (Cf. Couperin, who waited until 1713 before publishing his first "Ordres.") Rameau's music includes pieces in the pure tradition of the French suite: imitative ("Le rappel des oiseaux," "La poule") and characterful ("Les tendres plaintes," "L'entretien des Muses"). But there are also works of pure virtuosity that resemble Domenico Scarlatti ("Les tourbillons," "Les trois mains") as well as pieces that reveal the experiments of a theorist and musical innovator ("L'enharmonique," "Les Cyclopes"), which had a marked influence on Louis-Claude Daquin, Joseph-Nicolas-Pancrace Royer and Jacques Duphly. Rameau's suites are grouped in the traditional way, by key. The first set of dances (Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, Les Trois Mains, Fanfairenette, La Triomphante, Gavotte et 6 doubles) is centred on A major and A minor, while the remaining pieces (Les tricoteuses, L'Indifferente, Première Menuet, Deuxième Menuet, La Poule, Les Triolets, Les Sauvages, L'Enharmonique, L'Egiptienne [sic]) are centred around G major and G minor.
Rameau's second and third collections appeared in 1724 and 1727. After these he composed only one piece for the harpsichord, the eight-minute "La Dauphine" of 1747, while the very short "Les petits marteaux" (c. 1750) has also been attributed to him.
During his semiretirement (1740 to 1744) he wrote the Pièces de clavecin en concert (1741), which some musicologists consider the pinnacle of French Baroque chamber music. Adopting a formula successfully employed by Mondonville a few years earlier, Rameau fashioned these pieces differently from trio sonatas in that the harpsichord is not simply there as basso continuo to accompany melody instruments (violin, flute, viol) but as equal partner in "concert" with them. Rameau claimed that this music would be equally satisfying played on the harpsichord alone, but the claim is not wholly convincing because he took the trouble to transcribe five of them himself, those the lack of other instruments would show the least.
Opera
After 1733 Rameau dedicated himself mostly to opera. On a strictly musical level, 18th-century French Baroque opera is richer and more varied than contemporary Italian opera, especially in the place given to choruses and dances but also in the musical continuity that arises from the respective relationships between the arias and the recitatives. Another essential difference: whereas Italian opera gave a starring role to female sopranos and castrati, French opera had no use for the latter. The Italian opera of Rameau's day (opera seria, opera buffa) was essentially divided into musical sections (da capo arias, duets, trios, etc.) and sections that were spoken or almost spoken (recitativo secco). It was during the latter that the action progressed while the audience waited for the next aria; on the other hand, the text of the arias was almost entirely buried beneath music whose chief aim was to show off the virtuosity of the singer. Nothing of the kind is to be found in French opera of the day; since Lully, the text had to remain comprehensible—limiting certain techniques such as the vocalise, which was reserved for special words such as ("glory") or ("victory"). A subtle equilibrium existed between the more and the less musical parts: melodic recitative on the one hand and arias that were often closer to arioso on the other, alongside virtuoso "ariettes" in the Italian style. This form of continuous music prefigures Wagnerian drama even more than does the "reform" opera of Gluck.
Five essential components may be discerned in Rameau's operatic scores:
Pieces of "pure" music (overtures, ritornelli, music which closes scenes). Unlike the highly stereotyped Lullian overture, Rameau's overtures show an extraordinary variety. Even in his earliest works, where he uses the standard French model, Rameau—the born symphonist and master of orchestration—composes novel and unique pieces. A few pieces are particularly striking, such as the overture to Zaïs, depicting the chaos before the creation of the universe, that of Pigmalion, suggesting the sculptor's chipping away at the statue with his mallet, or many more conventional depictions of storms and earthquakes, as well perhaps as the imposing final chaconnes of Les Indes galantes or Dardanus.
Dance music: the danced interludes, which were obligatory even in tragédie en musique, allowed Rameau to give free rein to his inimitable sense of rhythm, melody, and choreography, acknowledged by all his contemporaries, including the dancers themselves. This "learned" composer, forever preoccupied by his next theoretical work, also was one who strung together gavottes, minuets, loures, rigaudons, passepieds, tambourins, and musettes by the dozen. According to his biographer, Cuthbert Girdlestone, "The immense superiority of all that pertains to Rameau in choreography still needs emphasizing," and the German scholar H.W. von Walthershausen affirmed:
Rameau was the greatest ballet composer of all times. The genius of his creation rests on one hand on his perfect artistic permeation by folk-dance types, on the other hand on the constant preservation of living contact with the practical requirements of the ballet stage, which prevented an estrangement between the expression of the body from the spirit of absolute music.
Choruses: Padre Martini, the erudite musicologist who corresponded with Rameau, affirmed that "the French are excellent at choruses," obviously thinking of Rameau himself. A great master of harmony, Rameau knew how to compose sumptuous choruses—whether monodic, polyphonic, or interspersed with passages for solo singers or the orchestra—and whatever feelings needed to be expressed.
Arias: less frequent than in Italian opera, Rameau nevertheless offers many striking examples. Particularly admired arias include Télaïre's "Tristes apprêts," from Castor et Pollux; "Ô jour affreux" and "Lieux funestes," from Dardanus; Huascar's invocations in Les Indes galantes; and the final ariette in Pigmalion. In Platée we encounter a showstopping ars poetica aria for the character of La Folie (the madness), "Formons les plus brillants concerts / Aux langeurs d'Apollon".
Recitative: much closer to arioso than to recitativo secco. The composer took scrupulous care to observe French prosody and used his harmonic knowledge to give expression to his protagonists' feelings.
During the first part of his operatic career (1733–1739), Rameau wrote his great masterpieces destined for the Académie royale de musique: three tragédies en musique and two opéra-ballets that still form the core of his repertoire. After the interval of 1740 to 1744, he became the official court musician, and for the most part, composed pieces intended to entertain, with plenty of dance music emphasising sensuality and an idealised pastoral atmosphere. In his last years, Rameau returned to a renewed version of his early style in Les Paladins and Les Boréades.
His Zoroastre was first performed in 1749. According to one of Rameau's admirers, Cuthbert Girdlestone, this opera has a distinctive place in his works: "The profane passions of hatred and jealousy are rendered more intensely [than in his other works] and with a strong sense of reality."
Rameau and his librettists
Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zaïs (1748), Naïs (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacréon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boréades (c. 1763).
Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupelinière's salon, at the Société du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day.
Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760).
Reputation and influence
By the end of his life, Rameau's music had come under attack in France from theorists who favoured Italian models. However, foreign composers working in the Italian tradition were increasingly looking towards Rameau as a way of reforming their own leading operatic genre, opera seria. Tommaso Traetta produced two operas setting translations of Rameau libretti that show the French composer's influence, Ippolito ed Aricia (1759) and I Tintaridi (based on Castor et Pollux, 1760). Traetta had been advised by Count Francesco Algarotti, a leading proponent of reform according to French models; Algarotti was a major influence on the most important "reformist" composer, Christoph Willibald Gluck. Gluck's three Italian reform operas of the 1760s—Orfeo ed Euridice, Alceste, and Paride ed Elena—reveal a knowledge of Rameau's works. For instance, both Orfeo and the 1737 version of Castor et Pollux open with the funeral of one of the leading characters who later comes back to life. Many of the operatic reforms advocated in the preface to Gluck's Alceste were already present in Rameau's works. Rameau had used accompanied recitatives, and the overtures in his later operas reflected the action to come, so when Gluck arrived in Paris in 1774 to produce a series of six French operas, he could be seen as continuing in the tradition of Rameau. Nevertheless, while Gluck's popularity survived the French Revolution, Rameau's did not. By the end of the 18th century, his operas had vanished from the repertoire.
For most of the 19th century, Rameau's music remained unplayed, known only by reputation. Hector Berlioz investigated Castor et Pollux and particularly admired the aria "Tristes apprêts," but "whereas the modern listener readily perceives the common ground with Berlioz' music, he himself was more conscious of the gap which separated them." French humiliation in the Franco-Prussian War brought about a change in Rameau's fortunes. As Rameau biographer J. Malignon wrote, "...the German victory over France in 1870–71 was the grand occasion for digging up great heroes from the French past. Rameau, like so many others, was flung into the enemy's face to bolster our courage and our faith in the national destiny of France." In 1894, composer Vincent d'Indy founded the Schola Cantorum to promote French national music; the society put on several revivals of works by Rameau. Among the audience was Claude Debussy, who especially cherished Castor et Pollux, revived in 1903: "Gluck's genius was deeply rooted in Rameau's works... a detailed comparison allows us to affirm that Gluck could replace Rameau on the French stage only by assimilating the latter's beautiful works and making them his own." Camille Saint-Saëns (by editing and publishing the Pièces in 1895) and Paul Dukas were two other important French musicians who gave practical championship to Rameau's music in their day, but interest in Rameau petered out again, and it was not until the late 20th century that a serious effort was made to revive his works. Over half of Rameau's operas have now been recorded, in particular by conductors such as John Eliot Gardiner, William Christie, and Marc Minkowski.
One of his pieces is commonly heard in the Victoria Centre in Nottingham by the Rowland Emett timepiece, the Aqua Horological Tintinnabulator. Emett quoted that Rameau made music for his school and the shopping centre without him knowing it.
Theoretical works
Treatise on Harmony, 1722
Rameau's 1722 Treatise on Harmony initiated a revolution in music theory. Rameau posited the discovery of the "fundamental law" or what he referred to as the "fundamental bass" of all Western music. Heavily influenced by new Cartesian modes of thought and analysis, Rameau's methodology incorporated mathematics, commentary, analysis and a didacticism that was specifically intended to illuminate, scientifically, the structure and principles of music. With careful deductive reasoning, he attempted to derive universal harmonic principles from natural causes. Previous treatises on harmony had been purely practical; Rameau embraced the new philosophical rationalism, quickly rising to prominence in France as the "Isaac Newton of Music." His fame subsequently spread throughout all Europe, and his Treatise became the definitive authority on music theory, forming the foundation for instruction in western music that persists to this day.
List of works
RCT numbering refers to Rameau Catalogue Thématique established by Sylvie Bouissou and Denis Herlin.
Instrumental works
Pièces de clavecin. Trois livres. "Pieces for harpsichord", 3 books, published 1706, 1724, 1726/27(?).
RCT 1 – Premier livre de Clavecin (1706)
RCT 2 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in E minor
RCT 3 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in D major
RCT 4 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Menuet in C major
RCT 5 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in A minor
RCT 6 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in G
Pieces de Clavecin en Concerts Five albums of character pieces for harpsichord, violin and viol. (1741)
RCT 7 – Concert I in C minor
RCT 8 – Concert II in G major
RCT 9 – Concert III in A major
RCT 10 – Concert IV in B flat major
RCT 11 – Concert V in D minor
RCT 12 – La Dauphine for harpsichord. (1747)
RCT 12bis – Les petits marteaux for harpsichord.
Several orchestral dance suites extracted from his operas.
Motets
RCT 13 – Deus noster refugium (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 14 – In convertendo (probably before 1720, rev. 1751)
RCT 15 – Quam dilecta (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 16 – Laboravi (published in the Traité de l'harmonie, 1722)
Canons
RCT 17 – Ah! loin de rire, pleurons (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) (pub. 1722)
RCT 18 – Avec du vin, endormons-nous (2 sopranos, Tenor) (1719)
RCT 18bis – L'épouse entre deux draps (3 sopranos) (formerly attributed to François Couperin)
RCT 18ter – Je suis un fou Madame (3 voix égales) (1720)
RCT 19 – Mes chers amis, quittez vos rouges bords (3 sopranos, 3 basses) (pub. 1780)
RCT 20 – Réveillez-vous, dormeur sans fin (5 voix égales) (pub. 1722)
RCT 20bis – Si tu ne prends garde à toi (2 sopranos, bass) (1720)
Songs
RCT 21.1 – L'amante préoccupée or A l'objet que j'adore (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.2 – Lucas, pour se gausser de nous (soprano, bass, continuo) (pub. 1707)
RCT 21.3 – Non, non, le dieu qui sait aimer (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.4 – Un Bourbon ouvre sa carrière or Un héros ouvre sa carrière (alto, continuo) (1751, air belonging to Acante et Céphise but censored before its first performance and never reintroduced in the work).
Cantatas
RCT 23 – Aquilon et Orithie (between 1715 and 1720)
RCT 28 – Thétis (same period)
RCT 26 – L’impatience (same period)
RCT 22 – Les amants trahis (around 1720)
RCT 27 – Orphée (same period)
RCT 24 – Le berger fidèle (1728)
RCT 25 – Cantate pour le jour de la Saint Louis (1740)
Operas and stage works
Tragédies en musique
RCT 43 – Hippolyte et Aricie (1733; revised 1742 and 1757)
RCT 32 – Castor et Pollux (1737; revised 1754)
RCT 35 – Dardanus (1739; revised 1744 and 1760), score
RCT 62 – Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756, with new music for Acts II, III & V)
RCT 31 – Les Boréades or Abaris (unperformed; in rehearsal 1763)
Opéra-ballets
RCT 44 – Les Indes galantes (1735; revised 1736)
RCT 41 – Les fêtes d'Hébé or les Talens Lyriques (1739)
RCT 39 – Les fêtes de Polymnie (1745)
RCT 59 – Le temple de la gloire (1745; revised 1746)
RCT 38 – Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour or Les Dieux d'Egypte (1747)
RCT 58 – Les surprises de l'Amour (1748; revised 1757)
Pastorales héroïques
RCT 60 – Zaïs (1748)
RCT 49 – Naïs (1749)
RCT 29 – Acante et Céphise or La sympathie (1751)
RCT 34 – Daphnis et Eglé (1753)
Comédies lyriques
RCT 53 – Platée or Junon jalouse (1745), score
RCT 51 – Les Paladins or Le Vénitien (1760)
Comédie-ballet
RCT 54 – La princesse de Navarre (1744)
Actes de ballet
RCT 33 – Les courses de Tempé (1734)
RCT 40 – Les fêtes de Ramire (1745)
RCT 52 – Pigmalion (1748)
RCT 42 – La guirlande or Les fleurs enchantées (1751)
RCT 57 – Les sibarites or Sibaris (1753)
RCT 48 – La naissance d'Osiris or La Fête Pamilie (1754)
RCT 30 – Anacréon (1754)
RCT 58 – Anacréon (completely different work from the above, 1757, 3rd Entrée of Les surprises de l'Amour)
RCT 61 – Zéphire (date unknown)
RCT 50 – Nélée et Myrthis (date unknown)
RCT 45 – Io (unfinished, date unknown)
Lost works
RCT 56 – Samson (tragédie en musique) (first version written 1733–1734; second version 1736; neither were ever staged )
RCT 46 – Linus (tragédie en musique) (1751, score stolen after a rehearsal)
RCT 47 – Lisis et Délie (pastorale) (scheduled on November 6, 1753)
Incidental music for opéras comiques
Music mostly lost.
RCT 36 – L'endriague (in 3 acts, 1723)
RCT 37 – L'enrôlement d'Arlequin (in 1 act, 1726)
RCT 55 – La robe de dissension or Le faux prodige (in 2 acts, 1726)
RCT 55bis – La rose or Les jardins de l'Hymen (in a prologue and 1 act, 1744)
Writings
Traité de l'harmonie réduite à ses principes naturels (Paris, 1722)
Nouveau système de musique théorique (Paris, 1726)
Dissertation sur les différents méthodes d'accompagnement pour le clavecin, ou pour l'orgue (Paris, 1732)
Génération harmonique, ou Traité de musique théorique et pratique (Paris, 1737)
Mémoire où l'on expose les fondemens du Système de musique théorique et pratique de M. Rameau (1749)
Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1750)
Nouvelles réflexions de M. Rameau sur sa 'Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1752)
Observations sur notre instinct pour la musique (Paris, 1754)
Erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1755)
Suite des erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1756)
Reponse de M. Rameau à MM. les editeurs de l'Encyclopédie sur leur dernier Avertissement (Paris, 1757)
Nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (1758–9)
Code de musique pratique, ou Méthodes pour apprendre la musique...avec des nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (Paris, 1760)
Lettre à M. Alembert sur ses opinions en musique (Paris, 1760)
Origine des sciences, suivie d'un controverse sur le même sujet (Paris, 1762)
See also
Querelle des Bouffons
ReferencesNotesSourcesBeaussant, Philippe, Rameau de A à Z (Fayard, 1983)
Gibbons, William. Building the Operatic Museum: Eighteenth-Century Opera in Fin-de-siècle Paris (University of Rochester Press, 2013)
Girdlestone, Cuthbert, Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Dover paperback edition, 1969)
Holden, Amanda, (Ed) The Viking Opera Guide (Viking, 1993)
Sadler, Graham, (Ed.), The New Grove French Baroque Masters (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)
Trowbridge, Simon, Rameau (2nd edition, Englance Press, 2017)
F. Annunziata, Una Tragédie Lyrique nel Secolo dei Lumi. Abaris ou Les Boréades di Jean Philippe Rameau, https://www.academia.edu/6100318
External links
(en) Gavotte with Doubles Hypermedia by Jeff Hall & Tim Smith at the BinAural Collaborative Hypertext – Shockwave Player required – ("Gavotte with Doubles" link NG)
(en) jp.rameau.free.fr Rameau – Le Site
(fr) musicologie.org Biography, List of Works, bibliography, discography, theoretical writings, in French
(en) Jean-Philippe Rameau / Discography
Magnatune Les Cyclopes by Rameau in on-line mp3 format (played by Trevor Pinnock)
Jean-Philippe Rameau, "L'Orchestre de Louis XV" – Suites d'Orchestre, Le Concert des Nations, dir. Jordi Savall, Alia Vox, AVSA 9882Sheet music'''
Rameau free sheet music from the Mutopia Project
1683 births
1764 deaths
18th-century classical composers
18th-century French composers
18th-century French male musicians
Composers awarded knighthoods
Composers for harpsichord
French Baroque composers
French ballet composers
French opera composers
French male classical composers
French male non-fiction writers
French music theorists
Male opera composers
People from Dijon
Burials at Saint-Eustache, Paris
17th-century male musicians | true | [
"Ériphyle is a tragedy in five acts by Voltaire. He began working on it in 1731 and it was completed and performed in 1732. The poor success of the stage premiere prompted Voltaire to cancel the printed version.\n\nAction\nVoltaire drew his material from Bayle's Dictionnaire historique et critique as well as from the classical original in the Bibliotheca of Pseudo-Apollodorus. The action takes place in the temple of Jupiter at Argos. Ériphyle, married to the king and commander Amphiaraos, nevertheless maintains a relationship with his rival and enemy, Hermogide. Amphiaraos falls victim to a plot.\n\nAlcméon, promoted to commander by Hermongide, falls in love with the queen. The spirit of his father appears to him to the temple, demanding revenge and the high priest proves to Alcméon that he is the son of Amphiaraos, long believed dead. In his struggle with Hermongide, Alcméon accidentally kills his mother.\n\nComposition and reception\nThe play was written at great speed while Voltaire spent several months in Rouen to focus on his work. In June 1731 Voltaire said he had written it, together with La Mort de César and Histoire de Charles XII in just three months. In September of the same year he felt that despite further work the play was not yet worthy of the public, or of himself. He continued revising it intensively right up to the first performance. The numerous reworkings of the scene in which Alcméon kills his mother were intended to ensure the effect Voltaire sought as with his other scenes of matricide (in and Sémiramis); not to shock the audience but to reintroduce to French tragedy the element of 'terror' which Voltaire felt had been lost as a result of the taste for gallantry on stage.\n\nVoltaire's correspondence in March 1732 with Moncrif, secretary to the Comte de Clermont, indicates that the actors of the Comédie-Française may have been reluctant to perform the play: Voltaire wanted to dedicate the work to Clermont and urged Moncrif to ensure that his master recommended the work to them, so they knew it enjoyed his patronage.\n\nThe play premiered at the Comédie-Française on 7 March 1732. Voltaire made revisions to it until the beginning of May. The last of the total of twelve performances was on 1 May 1732. Critical reception, particularly in Mercure de France, was lukewarm. Although box office receipts for the premiere of 3,970 livres do not indicate that the play was a flop, it did not meet Voltaire's own expectations. The appearance of a ghost in the play, unusual in French drama, was one element to which the public did not respond well.\n\nPrinted versions\nVoltaire had already commissioned the printing of the work from a trusted publisher, :fr:Claude-François Jore of Rouen, with whom he was to quarrel two years later. The last changes and corrections were sent to his friend Cideville on 8 May, but the very next day he wrote again insisting that the printing be stopped and the manuscript returned. He continued to work on it for many months after this, while working on new projects, but for the rest of his life he refused to publish the play, but borrowed verses from the manuscript for his later tragedies Mérope and Sémiramis.\n\nVoltaire's final trip to Paris in 1778 and the staging of Iréne led to the printing, by an unknown publisher, of an error-filled stage version of the manuscript which had been retained by the actor Lekain. This version was the basis for the later Kehl edition. The 1877 Moland edition derives from a different manuscript version, owned by Voltaire's secretary Sébastien G. Longchamps (1718–1793).\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nÉriphyle, digital version of first printing\nLiterature on Éryphile, Société des Etudes Voltairiennes\n\nPlays by Voltaire\nTragedy plays\n1732 in France\n1732 plays",
"Ooky Spooky is the fifth studio album by Cuban American dark cabaret/Dark Wave singer Voltaire. It was released on July 31, 2007 by Projekt Records, being the last Voltaire album to do so, since his contract with Projekt Records expired. Voltaire has stated that he wanted this album to be more fun and silly, as opposed to his more serious albums Almost Human and Boo-Hoo.\n\nVoltaire worked with Amanda Palmer of The Dresden Dolls on the song \"Stuck with You\", which is about an unhappily married couple who cannot divorce because of their religion.\n\nLive versions of the songs \"Cantina\", \"Zombie Prostitute...\" and \"Hell in a Handbasket\" have already been released on Live!. A live version of \"Hell in a Handbasket\" also appeared on Zombie Prostitute..., as did the track \"Zombie Prostitute...\", and a demo of \"Cantina\". Also appearing on the Maxi-CD was the Spanish version of the song \"Day of the Dead\". The album is available on iTunes.\n\n\"Land of the Dead\" was originally written for The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy direct-to-TV film Billy & Mandy's Big Boogey Adventure. Voltaire previously worked for The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy with the song \"BRAINS!\", in the episode \"Little Rock of Horrors\".\n\nThe cover features Voltaire in a black and purple sombrero with a silver bottom holding a skeleton. The O's in the title are replaced by skulls\n\nTrack listing\n\nSources\n\nVoltaire (musician) albums\nProjekt Records albums\nSka albums by American artists\n2007 albums"
]
|
[
"Jean-Philippe Rameau",
"Rameau and his librettists",
"What is a librettist?",
"librettists managed to produce a libretto",
"What is a libretto?",
"operas,",
"How was Rameau's relation with his librettists?",
"Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice.",
"Why didn't he work with the same librettists twice?",
"He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists,",
"Were any exceptions noted in the article?",
"Louis de Cahusac,",
"Why was de Cahusac an exception?",
"collaborated with him on several operas,",
"Were any of their collaborations listed in the article?",
"Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756),",
"What other librettists did he work with?",
"Voltaire",
"What did he work on with Voltaire?",
"the Samson project"
]
| C_6affd0880c764e209d1d4aabc61ddb69_0 | What was the Samson project? | 10 | What was the Samson project? | Jean-Philippe Rameau | Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacreon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boreades (c. 1763). Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupliniere's salon, at the Societe du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day. Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760). CANNOTANSWER | came to nothing | Jean-Philippe Rameau (; – ) was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the 18th century. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer of his time for the harpsichord, alongside François Couperin.
Little is known about Rameau's early years. It was not until the 1720s that he won fame as a major theorist of music with his Treatise on Harmony (1722) and also in the following years as a composer of masterpieces for the harpsichord, which circulated throughout Europe. He was almost 50 before he embarked on the operatic career on which his reputation chiefly rests today. His debut, Hippolyte et Aricie (1733), caused a great stir and was fiercely attacked by the supporters of Lully's style of music for its revolutionary use of harmony. Nevertheless, Rameau's pre-eminence in the field of French opera was soon acknowledged, and he was later attacked as an "establishment" composer by those who favoured Italian opera during the controversy known as the Querelle des Bouffons in the 1750s. Rameau's music had gone out of fashion by the end of the 18th century, and it was not until the 20th that serious efforts were made to revive it. Today, he enjoys renewed appreciation with performances and recordings of his music ever more frequent.
Life
The details of Rameau's life are generally obscure, especially concerning his first forty years, before he moved to Paris for good. He was a secretive man, and even his wife knew nothing of his early life, which explains the scarcity of biographical information available.
Early years, 1683–1732
Rameau's early years are particularly obscure. He was born on 25 September 1683 in Dijon, and baptised the same day. His father, Jean, worked as an organist in several churches around Dijon, and his mother, Claudine Demartinécourt, was the daughter of a notary. The couple had eleven children (five girls and six boys), of whom Jean-Philippe was the seventh.
Rameau was taught music before he could read or write. He was educated at the Jesuit college at Godrans, but he was not a good pupil and disrupted classes with his singing, later claiming that his passion for opera had begun at the age of twelve. Initially intended for the law, Rameau decided he wanted to be a musician, and his father sent him to Italy, where he stayed for a short while in Milan. On his return, he worked as a violinist in travelling companies and then as an organist in provincial cathedrals before moving to Paris for the first time. Here, in 1706, he published his earliest known compositions: the harpsichord works that make up his first book of Pièces de Clavecin, which show the influence of his friend Louis Marchand.
In 1709, he moved back to Dijon to take over his father's job as organist in the main church. The contract was for six years, but Rameau left before then and took up similar posts in Lyon and Clermont-Ferrand. During this period, he composed motets for church performance as well as secular cantatas.
In 1722, he returned to Paris for good, and here he published his most important work of music theory, Traité de l'harmonie (Treatise on Harmony). This soon won him a great reputation, and it was followed in 1726 by his Nouveau système de musique théorique. In 1724 and 1729 (or 1730), he also published two more collections of harpsichord pieces.
Rameau took his first tentative steps into composing stage music when the writer Alexis Piron asked him to provide songs for his popular comic plays written for the Paris Fairs. Four collaborations followed, beginning with L'endriague in 1723; none of the music has survived.
On 25 February 1726 Rameau married the 19-year-old Marie-Louise Mangot, who came from a musical family from Lyon and was a good singer and instrumentalist. The couple would have four children, two boys and two girls, and the marriage is said to have been a happy one.
In spite of his fame as a music theorist, Rameau had trouble finding a post as an organist in Paris.
Later years, 1733–1764
It was not until he was approaching 50 that Rameau decided to embark on the operatic career on which his fame as a composer mainly rests. He had already approached writer Antoine Houdar de la Motte for a libretto in 1727, but nothing came of it; he was finally inspired to try his hand at the prestigious genre of tragédie en musique after seeing Montéclair's Jephté in 1732. Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie premiered at the Académie Royale de Musique on 1 October 1733. It was immediately recognised as the most significant opera to appear in France since the death of Lully, but audiences were split over whether this was a good thing or a bad thing. Some, such as the composer André Campra, were stunned by its originality and wealth of invention; others found its harmonic innovations discordant and saw the work as an attack on the French musical tradition. The two camps, the so-called Lullyistes and the Rameauneurs, fought a pamphlet war over the issue for the rest of the decade.
Just before this time, Rameau had made the acquaintance of the powerful financier Alexandre Le Riche de La Poupelinière, who became his patron until 1753. La Poupelinière's mistress (and later, wife), Thérèse des Hayes, was Rameau's pupil and a great admirer of his music. In 1731, Rameau became the conductor of La Poupelinière's private orchestra, which was of an extremely high quality. He held the post for 22 years; he was succeeded by Johann Stamitz and then François-Joseph Gossec. La Poupelinière's salon enabled Rameau to meet some of the leading cultural figures of the day, including Voltaire, who soon began collaborating with the composer. Their first project, the tragédie en musique Samson, was abandoned because an opera on a religious theme by Voltaire—a notorious critic of the Church—was likely to be banned by the authorities. Meanwhile, Rameau had introduced his new musical style into the lighter genre of the opéra-ballet with the highly successful Les Indes galantes. It was followed by two tragédies en musique, Castor et Pollux (1737) and Dardanus (1739), and another opéra-ballet, Les fêtes d'Hébé (also 1739). All these operas of the 1730s are among Rameau's most highly regarded works. However, the composer followed them with six years of silence, in which the only work he produced was a new version of Dardanus (1744). The reason for this interval in the composer's creative life is unknown, although it is possible he had a falling-out with the authorities at the Académie royale de la musique.
The year 1745 was a turning point in Rameau's career. He received several commissions from the court for works to celebrate the French victory at the Battle of Fontenoy and the marriage of the Dauphin to Infanta Maria Teresa Rafaela of Spain. Rameau produced his most important comic opera, Platée, as well as two collaborations with Voltaire: the opéra-ballet Le temple de la gloire and the comédie-ballet La princesse de Navarre. They gained Rameau official recognition; he was granted the title "Compositeur du Cabinet du Roi" and given a substantial pension. 1745 also saw the beginning of the bitter enmity between Rameau and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Though best known today as a thinker, Rousseau had ambitions to be a composer. He had written an opera, Les muses galantes (inspired by Rameau's Indes galantes), but Rameau was unimpressed by this musical tribute. At the end of 1745, Voltaire and Rameau, who were busy on other works, commissioned Rousseau to turn La Princesse de Navarre into a new opera, with linking recitative, called Les fêtes de Ramire. Rousseau then claimed the two had stolen the credit for the words and music he had contributed, though musicologists have been able to identify almost nothing of the piece as Rousseau's work. Nevertheless, the embittered Rousseau nursed a grudge against Rameau for the rest of his life.
Rousseau was a major participant in the second great quarrel that erupted over Rameau's work, the so-called Querelle des Bouffons of 1752–54, which pitted French tragédie en musique against Italian opera buffa. This time, Rameau was accused of being out of date and his music too complicated in comparison with the simplicity and "naturalness" of a work like Pergolesi's La serva padrona. In the mid-1750s, Rameau criticised Rousseau's contributions to the musical articles in the Encyclopédie, which led to a quarrel with the leading philosophes d'Alembert and Diderot. As a result, Jean-François Rameau became a character in Diderot's then-unpublished dialogue, Le neveu de Rameau (Rameau's Nephew).
In 1753, La Poupelinière took a scheming musician, Jeanne-Thérèse Goermans, as his mistress. The daughter of harpsichord maker Jacques Goermans, she went by the name of Madame de Saint-Aubin, and her opportunistic husband pushed her into the arms of the rich financier. She had La Poupelinière engage the services of the Bohemian composer Johann Stamitz, who succeeded Rameau after a breach developed between Rameau and his patron; however, by then, Rameau no longer needed La Poupelinière's financial support and protection.
Rameau pursued his activities as a theorist and composer until his death. He lived with his wife and two of his children in his large suite of rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, which he would leave every day, lost in thought, to take a solitary walk in the nearby gardens of the Palais-Royal or the Tuileries. Sometimes he would meet the young writer Chabanon, who noted some of Rameau's disillusioned confidential remarks: "Day by day, I'm acquiring more good taste, but I no longer have any genius" and "The imagination is worn out in my old head; it's not wise at this age wanting to practise arts that are nothing but imagination."
Rameau composed prolifically in the late 1740s and early 1750s. After that, his rate of productivity dropped off, probably due to old age and ill health, although he was still able to write another comic opera, Les Paladins, in 1760. This was due to be followed by a final tragédie en musique, Les Boréades; but for unknown reasons, the opera was never produced and had to wait until the late 20th century for a proper staging. Rameau died on 12 September 1764 after suffering from a fever, thirteen days before his 81st birthday. At his bedside, he objected to a song sung. His last words were, "What the devil do you mean to sing to me, priest? You are out of tune." He was buried in the church of St. Eustache, Paris on the same day of his death. Although a bronze bust and red marble tombstone were erected in his memory there by the Société de la Compositeurs de Musique in 1883, the exact site of his burial remains unknown to this day.
Rameau's personality
While the details of his biography are vague and fragmentary, the details of Rameau's personal and family life are almost completely obscure. Rameau's music, so graceful and attractive, completely contradicts the man's public image and what we know of his character as described (or perhaps unfairly caricatured) by Diderot in his satirical novel Le Neveu de Rameau. Throughout his life, music was his consuming passion. It occupied his entire thinking; Philippe Beaussant calls him a monomaniac. Piron explained that "His heart and soul were in his harpsichord; once he had shut its lid, there was no one home." Physically, Rameau was tall and exceptionally thin, as can be seen by the sketches we have of him, including a famous portrait by Carmontelle. He had a "loud voice." His speech was difficult to understand, just like his handwriting, which was never fluent. As a man, he was secretive, solitary, irritable, proud of his own achievements (more as a theorist than as a composer), brusque with those who contradicted him, and quick to anger. It is difficult to imagine him among the leading wits, including Voltaire (to whom he bears more than a passing physical resemblance), who frequented La Poupelinière's salon; his music was his passport, and it made up for his lack of social graces.
His enemies exaggerated his faults; e.g. his supposed miserliness. In fact, it seems that his thriftiness was the result of long years spent in obscurity (when his income was uncertain and scanty) rather than part of his character, because he could also be generous. He helped his nephew Jean-François when he came to Paris and also helped establish the career of Claude-Bénigne Balbastre in the capital. Furthermore, he gave his daughter Marie-Louise a considerable dowry when she became a Visitandine nun in 1750, and he paid a pension to one of his sisters when she became ill. Financial security came late to him, following the success of his stage works and the grant of a royal pension (a few months before his death, he was also ennobled and made a knight of the Ordre de Saint-Michel). But he did not change his way of life, keeping his worn-out clothes, his single pair of shoes, and his old furniture. After his death, it was discovered that he only possessed one dilapidated single-keyboard harpsichord in his rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, yet he also had a bag containing 1691 gold louis.
Music
General character of Rameau's music
Rameau's music is characterised by the exceptional technical knowledge of a composer who wanted above all to be renowned as a theorist of the art. Nevertheless, it is not solely addressed to the intelligence, and Rameau himself claimed, "I try to conceal art with art." The paradox of this music was that it was new, using techniques never known before, but it took place within the framework of old-fashioned forms. Rameau appeared revolutionary to the Lullyistes, disturbed by complex harmony of his music; and reactionary to the "philosophes," who only paid attention to its content and who either would not or could not listen to the sound it made. The incomprehension Rameau received from his contemporaries stopped him from repeating such daring experiments as the second Trio des Parques in Hippolyte et Aricie, which he was forced to remove after a handful of performances because the singers had been either unable or unwilling to execute it correctly.
Rameau's musical works
Rameau's musical works may be divided into four distinct groups, which differ greatly in importance: a few cantatas; a few motets for large chorus; some pieces for solo harpsichord or harpsichord accompanied by other instruments; and, finally, his works for the stage, to which he dedicated the last thirty years of his career almost exclusively. Like most of his contemporaries, Rameau often reused melodies that had been particularly successful, but never without meticulously adapting them; they are not simple transcriptions. Besides, no borrowings have been found from other composers, although his earliest works show the influence of other music. Rameau's reworkings of his own material are numerous; e.g., in Les Fêtes d'Hébé, we find L'Entretien des Muses, the Musette, and the Tambourin, taken from the 1724 book of harpsichord pieces, as well as an aria from the cantata Le Berger Fidèle.
Motets
For at least 26 years, Rameau was a professional organist in the service of religious institutions, and yet the body of sacred music he composed is exceptionally small and his organ works nonexistent. Judging by the evidence, it was not his favourite field, but rather, simply a way of making reasonable money. Rameau's few religious compositions are nevertheless remarkable and compare favourably to the works of specialists in the area. Only four motets have been attributed to Rameau with any certainty: Deus noster refugium, In convertendo, Quam dilecta, and Laboravi.
Cantatas
The cantata was a highly successful genre in the early 18th century. The French cantata, which should not be confused with the Italian or the German cantata, was "invented" in 1706 by the poet Jean-Baptiste Rousseau and soon taken up by many famous composers of the day, such as Montéclair, Campra, and Clérambault. Cantatas were Rameau's first contact with dramatic music. The modest forces the cantata required meant it was a genre within the reach of a composer who was still unknown. Musicologists can only guess at the dates of Rameau's six surviving cantatas, and the names of the librettists are unknown.
Instrumental music
Along with François Couperin, Rameau was a master of the 18th-century French school of harpsichord music, and both made a break with the style of the first generation of harpsichordists whose compositions adhered to the relatively standardised suite form, which had reached its apogee in the first decade of the 18th century and successive collections of pieces by Louis Marchand, Gaspard Le Roux, Louis-Nicolas Clérambault, Jean-François Dandrieu, Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, Charles Dieupart and Nicolas Siret. Rameau and Couperin had different styles, and it seems they did not know one another: Couperin was one of the official court musicians; Rameau, fifteen years his junior, achieved fame only after Couperin's death.
Rameau published his first book of harpsichord pieces in 1706. (Cf. Couperin, who waited until 1713 before publishing his first "Ordres.") Rameau's music includes pieces in the pure tradition of the French suite: imitative ("Le rappel des oiseaux," "La poule") and characterful ("Les tendres plaintes," "L'entretien des Muses"). But there are also works of pure virtuosity that resemble Domenico Scarlatti ("Les tourbillons," "Les trois mains") as well as pieces that reveal the experiments of a theorist and musical innovator ("L'enharmonique," "Les Cyclopes"), which had a marked influence on Louis-Claude Daquin, Joseph-Nicolas-Pancrace Royer and Jacques Duphly. Rameau's suites are grouped in the traditional way, by key. The first set of dances (Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, Les Trois Mains, Fanfairenette, La Triomphante, Gavotte et 6 doubles) is centred on A major and A minor, while the remaining pieces (Les tricoteuses, L'Indifferente, Première Menuet, Deuxième Menuet, La Poule, Les Triolets, Les Sauvages, L'Enharmonique, L'Egiptienne [sic]) are centred around G major and G minor.
Rameau's second and third collections appeared in 1724 and 1727. After these he composed only one piece for the harpsichord, the eight-minute "La Dauphine" of 1747, while the very short "Les petits marteaux" (c. 1750) has also been attributed to him.
During his semiretirement (1740 to 1744) he wrote the Pièces de clavecin en concert (1741), which some musicologists consider the pinnacle of French Baroque chamber music. Adopting a formula successfully employed by Mondonville a few years earlier, Rameau fashioned these pieces differently from trio sonatas in that the harpsichord is not simply there as basso continuo to accompany melody instruments (violin, flute, viol) but as equal partner in "concert" with them. Rameau claimed that this music would be equally satisfying played on the harpsichord alone, but the claim is not wholly convincing because he took the trouble to transcribe five of them himself, those the lack of other instruments would show the least.
Opera
After 1733 Rameau dedicated himself mostly to opera. On a strictly musical level, 18th-century French Baroque opera is richer and more varied than contemporary Italian opera, especially in the place given to choruses and dances but also in the musical continuity that arises from the respective relationships between the arias and the recitatives. Another essential difference: whereas Italian opera gave a starring role to female sopranos and castrati, French opera had no use for the latter. The Italian opera of Rameau's day (opera seria, opera buffa) was essentially divided into musical sections (da capo arias, duets, trios, etc.) and sections that were spoken or almost spoken (recitativo secco). It was during the latter that the action progressed while the audience waited for the next aria; on the other hand, the text of the arias was almost entirely buried beneath music whose chief aim was to show off the virtuosity of the singer. Nothing of the kind is to be found in French opera of the day; since Lully, the text had to remain comprehensible—limiting certain techniques such as the vocalise, which was reserved for special words such as ("glory") or ("victory"). A subtle equilibrium existed between the more and the less musical parts: melodic recitative on the one hand and arias that were often closer to arioso on the other, alongside virtuoso "ariettes" in the Italian style. This form of continuous music prefigures Wagnerian drama even more than does the "reform" opera of Gluck.
Five essential components may be discerned in Rameau's operatic scores:
Pieces of "pure" music (overtures, ritornelli, music which closes scenes). Unlike the highly stereotyped Lullian overture, Rameau's overtures show an extraordinary variety. Even in his earliest works, where he uses the standard French model, Rameau—the born symphonist and master of orchestration—composes novel and unique pieces. A few pieces are particularly striking, such as the overture to Zaïs, depicting the chaos before the creation of the universe, that of Pigmalion, suggesting the sculptor's chipping away at the statue with his mallet, or many more conventional depictions of storms and earthquakes, as well perhaps as the imposing final chaconnes of Les Indes galantes or Dardanus.
Dance music: the danced interludes, which were obligatory even in tragédie en musique, allowed Rameau to give free rein to his inimitable sense of rhythm, melody, and choreography, acknowledged by all his contemporaries, including the dancers themselves. This "learned" composer, forever preoccupied by his next theoretical work, also was one who strung together gavottes, minuets, loures, rigaudons, passepieds, tambourins, and musettes by the dozen. According to his biographer, Cuthbert Girdlestone, "The immense superiority of all that pertains to Rameau in choreography still needs emphasizing," and the German scholar H.W. von Walthershausen affirmed:
Rameau was the greatest ballet composer of all times. The genius of his creation rests on one hand on his perfect artistic permeation by folk-dance types, on the other hand on the constant preservation of living contact with the practical requirements of the ballet stage, which prevented an estrangement between the expression of the body from the spirit of absolute music.
Choruses: Padre Martini, the erudite musicologist who corresponded with Rameau, affirmed that "the French are excellent at choruses," obviously thinking of Rameau himself. A great master of harmony, Rameau knew how to compose sumptuous choruses—whether monodic, polyphonic, or interspersed with passages for solo singers or the orchestra—and whatever feelings needed to be expressed.
Arias: less frequent than in Italian opera, Rameau nevertheless offers many striking examples. Particularly admired arias include Télaïre's "Tristes apprêts," from Castor et Pollux; "Ô jour affreux" and "Lieux funestes," from Dardanus; Huascar's invocations in Les Indes galantes; and the final ariette in Pigmalion. In Platée we encounter a showstopping ars poetica aria for the character of La Folie (the madness), "Formons les plus brillants concerts / Aux langeurs d'Apollon".
Recitative: much closer to arioso than to recitativo secco. The composer took scrupulous care to observe French prosody and used his harmonic knowledge to give expression to his protagonists' feelings.
During the first part of his operatic career (1733–1739), Rameau wrote his great masterpieces destined for the Académie royale de musique: three tragédies en musique and two opéra-ballets that still form the core of his repertoire. After the interval of 1740 to 1744, he became the official court musician, and for the most part, composed pieces intended to entertain, with plenty of dance music emphasising sensuality and an idealised pastoral atmosphere. In his last years, Rameau returned to a renewed version of his early style in Les Paladins and Les Boréades.
His Zoroastre was first performed in 1749. According to one of Rameau's admirers, Cuthbert Girdlestone, this opera has a distinctive place in his works: "The profane passions of hatred and jealousy are rendered more intensely [than in his other works] and with a strong sense of reality."
Rameau and his librettists
Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zaïs (1748), Naïs (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacréon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boréades (c. 1763).
Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupelinière's salon, at the Société du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day.
Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760).
Reputation and influence
By the end of his life, Rameau's music had come under attack in France from theorists who favoured Italian models. However, foreign composers working in the Italian tradition were increasingly looking towards Rameau as a way of reforming their own leading operatic genre, opera seria. Tommaso Traetta produced two operas setting translations of Rameau libretti that show the French composer's influence, Ippolito ed Aricia (1759) and I Tintaridi (based on Castor et Pollux, 1760). Traetta had been advised by Count Francesco Algarotti, a leading proponent of reform according to French models; Algarotti was a major influence on the most important "reformist" composer, Christoph Willibald Gluck. Gluck's three Italian reform operas of the 1760s—Orfeo ed Euridice, Alceste, and Paride ed Elena—reveal a knowledge of Rameau's works. For instance, both Orfeo and the 1737 version of Castor et Pollux open with the funeral of one of the leading characters who later comes back to life. Many of the operatic reforms advocated in the preface to Gluck's Alceste were already present in Rameau's works. Rameau had used accompanied recitatives, and the overtures in his later operas reflected the action to come, so when Gluck arrived in Paris in 1774 to produce a series of six French operas, he could be seen as continuing in the tradition of Rameau. Nevertheless, while Gluck's popularity survived the French Revolution, Rameau's did not. By the end of the 18th century, his operas had vanished from the repertoire.
For most of the 19th century, Rameau's music remained unplayed, known only by reputation. Hector Berlioz investigated Castor et Pollux and particularly admired the aria "Tristes apprêts," but "whereas the modern listener readily perceives the common ground with Berlioz' music, he himself was more conscious of the gap which separated them." French humiliation in the Franco-Prussian War brought about a change in Rameau's fortunes. As Rameau biographer J. Malignon wrote, "...the German victory over France in 1870–71 was the grand occasion for digging up great heroes from the French past. Rameau, like so many others, was flung into the enemy's face to bolster our courage and our faith in the national destiny of France." In 1894, composer Vincent d'Indy founded the Schola Cantorum to promote French national music; the society put on several revivals of works by Rameau. Among the audience was Claude Debussy, who especially cherished Castor et Pollux, revived in 1903: "Gluck's genius was deeply rooted in Rameau's works... a detailed comparison allows us to affirm that Gluck could replace Rameau on the French stage only by assimilating the latter's beautiful works and making them his own." Camille Saint-Saëns (by editing and publishing the Pièces in 1895) and Paul Dukas were two other important French musicians who gave practical championship to Rameau's music in their day, but interest in Rameau petered out again, and it was not until the late 20th century that a serious effort was made to revive his works. Over half of Rameau's operas have now been recorded, in particular by conductors such as John Eliot Gardiner, William Christie, and Marc Minkowski.
One of his pieces is commonly heard in the Victoria Centre in Nottingham by the Rowland Emett timepiece, the Aqua Horological Tintinnabulator. Emett quoted that Rameau made music for his school and the shopping centre without him knowing it.
Theoretical works
Treatise on Harmony, 1722
Rameau's 1722 Treatise on Harmony initiated a revolution in music theory. Rameau posited the discovery of the "fundamental law" or what he referred to as the "fundamental bass" of all Western music. Heavily influenced by new Cartesian modes of thought and analysis, Rameau's methodology incorporated mathematics, commentary, analysis and a didacticism that was specifically intended to illuminate, scientifically, the structure and principles of music. With careful deductive reasoning, he attempted to derive universal harmonic principles from natural causes. Previous treatises on harmony had been purely practical; Rameau embraced the new philosophical rationalism, quickly rising to prominence in France as the "Isaac Newton of Music." His fame subsequently spread throughout all Europe, and his Treatise became the definitive authority on music theory, forming the foundation for instruction in western music that persists to this day.
List of works
RCT numbering refers to Rameau Catalogue Thématique established by Sylvie Bouissou and Denis Herlin.
Instrumental works
Pièces de clavecin. Trois livres. "Pieces for harpsichord", 3 books, published 1706, 1724, 1726/27(?).
RCT 1 – Premier livre de Clavecin (1706)
RCT 2 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in E minor
RCT 3 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in D major
RCT 4 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Menuet in C major
RCT 5 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in A minor
RCT 6 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in G
Pieces de Clavecin en Concerts Five albums of character pieces for harpsichord, violin and viol. (1741)
RCT 7 – Concert I in C minor
RCT 8 – Concert II in G major
RCT 9 – Concert III in A major
RCT 10 – Concert IV in B flat major
RCT 11 – Concert V in D minor
RCT 12 – La Dauphine for harpsichord. (1747)
RCT 12bis – Les petits marteaux for harpsichord.
Several orchestral dance suites extracted from his operas.
Motets
RCT 13 – Deus noster refugium (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 14 – In convertendo (probably before 1720, rev. 1751)
RCT 15 – Quam dilecta (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 16 – Laboravi (published in the Traité de l'harmonie, 1722)
Canons
RCT 17 – Ah! loin de rire, pleurons (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) (pub. 1722)
RCT 18 – Avec du vin, endormons-nous (2 sopranos, Tenor) (1719)
RCT 18bis – L'épouse entre deux draps (3 sopranos) (formerly attributed to François Couperin)
RCT 18ter – Je suis un fou Madame (3 voix égales) (1720)
RCT 19 – Mes chers amis, quittez vos rouges bords (3 sopranos, 3 basses) (pub. 1780)
RCT 20 – Réveillez-vous, dormeur sans fin (5 voix égales) (pub. 1722)
RCT 20bis – Si tu ne prends garde à toi (2 sopranos, bass) (1720)
Songs
RCT 21.1 – L'amante préoccupée or A l'objet que j'adore (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.2 – Lucas, pour se gausser de nous (soprano, bass, continuo) (pub. 1707)
RCT 21.3 – Non, non, le dieu qui sait aimer (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.4 – Un Bourbon ouvre sa carrière or Un héros ouvre sa carrière (alto, continuo) (1751, air belonging to Acante et Céphise but censored before its first performance and never reintroduced in the work).
Cantatas
RCT 23 – Aquilon et Orithie (between 1715 and 1720)
RCT 28 – Thétis (same period)
RCT 26 – L’impatience (same period)
RCT 22 – Les amants trahis (around 1720)
RCT 27 – Orphée (same period)
RCT 24 – Le berger fidèle (1728)
RCT 25 – Cantate pour le jour de la Saint Louis (1740)
Operas and stage works
Tragédies en musique
RCT 43 – Hippolyte et Aricie (1733; revised 1742 and 1757)
RCT 32 – Castor et Pollux (1737; revised 1754)
RCT 35 – Dardanus (1739; revised 1744 and 1760), score
RCT 62 – Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756, with new music for Acts II, III & V)
RCT 31 – Les Boréades or Abaris (unperformed; in rehearsal 1763)
Opéra-ballets
RCT 44 – Les Indes galantes (1735; revised 1736)
RCT 41 – Les fêtes d'Hébé or les Talens Lyriques (1739)
RCT 39 – Les fêtes de Polymnie (1745)
RCT 59 – Le temple de la gloire (1745; revised 1746)
RCT 38 – Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour or Les Dieux d'Egypte (1747)
RCT 58 – Les surprises de l'Amour (1748; revised 1757)
Pastorales héroïques
RCT 60 – Zaïs (1748)
RCT 49 – Naïs (1749)
RCT 29 – Acante et Céphise or La sympathie (1751)
RCT 34 – Daphnis et Eglé (1753)
Comédies lyriques
RCT 53 – Platée or Junon jalouse (1745), score
RCT 51 – Les Paladins or Le Vénitien (1760)
Comédie-ballet
RCT 54 – La princesse de Navarre (1744)
Actes de ballet
RCT 33 – Les courses de Tempé (1734)
RCT 40 – Les fêtes de Ramire (1745)
RCT 52 – Pigmalion (1748)
RCT 42 – La guirlande or Les fleurs enchantées (1751)
RCT 57 – Les sibarites or Sibaris (1753)
RCT 48 – La naissance d'Osiris or La Fête Pamilie (1754)
RCT 30 – Anacréon (1754)
RCT 58 – Anacréon (completely different work from the above, 1757, 3rd Entrée of Les surprises de l'Amour)
RCT 61 – Zéphire (date unknown)
RCT 50 – Nélée et Myrthis (date unknown)
RCT 45 – Io (unfinished, date unknown)
Lost works
RCT 56 – Samson (tragédie en musique) (first version written 1733–1734; second version 1736; neither were ever staged )
RCT 46 – Linus (tragédie en musique) (1751, score stolen after a rehearsal)
RCT 47 – Lisis et Délie (pastorale) (scheduled on November 6, 1753)
Incidental music for opéras comiques
Music mostly lost.
RCT 36 – L'endriague (in 3 acts, 1723)
RCT 37 – L'enrôlement d'Arlequin (in 1 act, 1726)
RCT 55 – La robe de dissension or Le faux prodige (in 2 acts, 1726)
RCT 55bis – La rose or Les jardins de l'Hymen (in a prologue and 1 act, 1744)
Writings
Traité de l'harmonie réduite à ses principes naturels (Paris, 1722)
Nouveau système de musique théorique (Paris, 1726)
Dissertation sur les différents méthodes d'accompagnement pour le clavecin, ou pour l'orgue (Paris, 1732)
Génération harmonique, ou Traité de musique théorique et pratique (Paris, 1737)
Mémoire où l'on expose les fondemens du Système de musique théorique et pratique de M. Rameau (1749)
Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1750)
Nouvelles réflexions de M. Rameau sur sa 'Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1752)
Observations sur notre instinct pour la musique (Paris, 1754)
Erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1755)
Suite des erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1756)
Reponse de M. Rameau à MM. les editeurs de l'Encyclopédie sur leur dernier Avertissement (Paris, 1757)
Nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (1758–9)
Code de musique pratique, ou Méthodes pour apprendre la musique...avec des nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (Paris, 1760)
Lettre à M. Alembert sur ses opinions en musique (Paris, 1760)
Origine des sciences, suivie d'un controverse sur le même sujet (Paris, 1762)
See also
Querelle des Bouffons
ReferencesNotesSourcesBeaussant, Philippe, Rameau de A à Z (Fayard, 1983)
Gibbons, William. Building the Operatic Museum: Eighteenth-Century Opera in Fin-de-siècle Paris (University of Rochester Press, 2013)
Girdlestone, Cuthbert, Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Dover paperback edition, 1969)
Holden, Amanda, (Ed) The Viking Opera Guide (Viking, 1993)
Sadler, Graham, (Ed.), The New Grove French Baroque Masters (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)
Trowbridge, Simon, Rameau (2nd edition, Englance Press, 2017)
F. Annunziata, Una Tragédie Lyrique nel Secolo dei Lumi. Abaris ou Les Boréades di Jean Philippe Rameau, https://www.academia.edu/6100318
External links
(en) Gavotte with Doubles Hypermedia by Jeff Hall & Tim Smith at the BinAural Collaborative Hypertext – Shockwave Player required – ("Gavotte with Doubles" link NG)
(en) jp.rameau.free.fr Rameau – Le Site
(fr) musicologie.org Biography, List of Works, bibliography, discography, theoretical writings, in French
(en) Jean-Philippe Rameau / Discography
Magnatune Les Cyclopes by Rameau in on-line mp3 format (played by Trevor Pinnock)
Jean-Philippe Rameau, "L'Orchestre de Louis XV" – Suites d'Orchestre, Le Concert des Nations, dir. Jordi Savall, Alia Vox, AVSA 9882Sheet music'''
Rameau free sheet music from the Mutopia Project
1683 births
1764 deaths
18th-century classical composers
18th-century French composers
18th-century French male musicians
Composers awarded knighthoods
Composers for harpsichord
French Baroque composers
French ballet composers
French opera composers
French male classical composers
French male non-fiction writers
French music theorists
Male opera composers
People from Dijon
Burials at Saint-Eustache, Paris
17th-century male musicians | true | [
"Samson is a fictional superhero that appeared in comic books published by Fox Feature Syndicate. He first appeared in Fantastic Comics #1 (Dec. 1939). The writer was uncredited, but is believed to be Will Eisner; the artist was Alex Blum, using the pseudonym \"Alex Boon\".\n\nPublication history\n\nAfter appearing in Fantastic Comics in 1939, Samson was given his own title in the fall of 1940. He simultaneously appeared in Big 3 comics, along with the Flame and the Blue Beetle. Samson's origin story was revealed in Samson comics #1.\n\nFantastic Comics ceased publication in November 1941 with issue #23. After six issues, Samson comics was changed to Captain Aero (September 1941) and Samson no longer had his own title. Finally, Samson was replaced in Big 3 comics in issue #7 (Jan. 1942; this issue proved to be last) by the patriotic hero V-Man.\n\nA short-lived revival appeared in 1955 from another publisher, Ajax-Farrell.\n\nSamson is among the public domain characters Image Comics revived in a new anthology title, The Next Issue Project, which premiered in December 2007. Another version of the character is slated to appear in the October issue of Savage Dragon.\n\nProject Superpowers, a similar golden-age revival project from Alex Ross and Dynamite Entertainment also announced in 2007, also features a character that is ostensibly the Fox Features Samson, though the visual design seems to have been inspired by the Gold Key Comics character Mighty Samson.\n\nBackground\nSamson (he had no secret identity, although he was called \"Sam\" the few times he was shown wearing street clothes) was a direct descendant of the biblical figure. Like his ancestor, Samson had immense strength and endurance, but could lose his powers when his hair was cut. Samson only learned about his heritage when he was a grown man, after his mother revealed his ancestry.\n\nWhile in college, his friend Professor Brun showed him a new invention, an \"iconoscope\", which allowed the viewer to watch remote scenes without a transmitter. The iconoscope picked up the image of an eastern holy man, who was praying for a higher power to send someone to battle evil. Samson used his superpowers to visit the holy man, and agreed to be that champion.\n\nAccording to Jess Nevins' Encyclopedia of Golden Age Superheroes, Samson fights \"giant robots, monsters, mad scientists, thugs, dinosaurs, dictators, warmongers, zombies, and radium thieves\".\n\nKurt Mitchell and Roy Thomas wrote: \"Pitting his superhuman strength against whole armies, Samson's feats outdid the contemporary Superman but he was far more ruthless, killing his foes barehanded without batting an eye\".\n\nIn issue #10 of Fantastic Comics, Samson gained a young orphan sidekick whom he named David (his real name was unrevealed). David had no apparent superpowers yet was the sole survivor of a plane crash. Orphaned after the crash, Samson took him into his care. David's role mainly consisted of being rescued by Samson after being captured by criminals.\n\nPowers and abilities\nSamson, due to his relation to the Biblical character, had super strength and endurance, and invulnerability. He lost these powers if his hair was cut. These powers were restored once his hair regrew. Samson's hair grew at an accelerated rate.\n\nFootnotes\n\nReferences\nBackground on Samson and other Fox heroes\n\nDynamite Entertainment characters\nFox Feature Syndicate superheroes\nFox Feature Syndicate titles\nComics characters introduced in 1939\nGolden Age superheroes\nPublic domain comics",
"Paul Samson (4 June 1953 – 9 August 2002) was an English guitarist, closely associated with the new wave of British heavy metal.\n\nBorn Paul Sanson, his first band in 1968 was a local Kent based group called 'The Innocence' which consisted of him, Stewart Cochrane, Phil Stranders and the late Martin Kirrage. After a period in several obscure bands, Samson formed his own eponymous outfit, Samson, in 1977, consisting of Chris Aylmer on bass guitar, and Clive Burr on drums. Burr left, and eventually joined Iron Maiden, and was replaced by Thunderstick, who wore a gimp mask on stage. In 1979, the line-up was expanded to a four-piece, with the addition of Bruce Dickinson on vocals (with the stage name \"Bruce\".\n\nThe band enjoyed a cult following in the new wave of British heavy metal, releasing the albums, Survivors, Head On and Shock Tactics, until 1981 when both Thunderstick and Dickinson left, the latter to join Iron Maiden.\n\nNicky Moore was recruited as a replacement, and Mel Gaynor then Pete Jupp took over drums, and this line-up released Before the Storm and Don't Get Mad - Get Even. These two albums sold in higher quantities than the first three, and the band toured more countries and played to bigger audiences than the Bruce/Thunderstick line-up, although the New Wave of British Heavy Metal was by now said to be a spent force. The band formally split up in 1984.\n\nSamson spent the subsequent years in a variety of solo and group projects, including various temporary reformations of Samson, and had success as a record producer, and also as a blues player, spending a year in Chicago, Illinois, United States.\n \nDespite some listings crediting Samson for playing on the Ram Jam 1977 hit single, \"Black Betty\", he did not play on the record. Although, Stewart Cochrane (musician and close friend to Samson since their early band days of the late 1960s, their first band at 15 years old \"The Innocence\" and short time member of the band \"Samson\") was told by Samson in 1978 that he played on the demo of the hit record \"Black Betty\", and was paid a paltry £20 for the session. Samson was very peeved about the payment, as he insisted to Cochrane that it was his guitar playing from the demo recording used in the final \"Black Betty\" pressing, and that he was missing out on a large amount of royalty payments. Cochrane can only confirm what Samson informed him of the alleged switch.\n\nSamson died of cancer on 9 August 2002 in Norwich, whilst recording a new Samson album with Nicky Moore.\n\nDiscography\n\nStudio albums\nJoint forces (1986) (Samson album originally issued as Paul Samson solo record)\nP.S.... (2006) (Samson album posthumously issued as Paul Samson solo record)\n\nLive albums\n Paul Samson's Empire – Live at the Marquee (Original Concert Recorded in 1986 later Remastered in 1994)\n Live - The Blues Nights (2003)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nOfficial Paul Samson website\n\n1953 births\n2002 deaths\nEnglish heavy metal guitarists\nDeaths from cancer in England\nSamson (band) members\n20th-century British guitarists"
]
|
[
"Jean-Philippe Rameau",
"Rameau and his librettists",
"What is a librettist?",
"librettists managed to produce a libretto",
"What is a libretto?",
"operas,",
"How was Rameau's relation with his librettists?",
"Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice.",
"Why didn't he work with the same librettists twice?",
"He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists,",
"Were any exceptions noted in the article?",
"Louis de Cahusac,",
"Why was de Cahusac an exception?",
"collaborated with him on several operas,",
"Were any of their collaborations listed in the article?",
"Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756),",
"What other librettists did he work with?",
"Voltaire",
"What did he work on with Voltaire?",
"the Samson project",
"What was the Samson project?",
"came to nothing"
]
| C_6affd0880c764e209d1d4aabc61ddb69_0 | Why did the Samson project come to nothing? | 11 | Why did the Samson project come to nothing? | Jean-Philippe Rameau | Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fetes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zais (1748), Nais (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacreon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boreades (c. 1763). Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupliniere's salon, at the Societe du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day. Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760). CANNOTANSWER | because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. | Jean-Philippe Rameau (; – ) was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the 18th century. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer of his time for the harpsichord, alongside François Couperin.
Little is known about Rameau's early years. It was not until the 1720s that he won fame as a major theorist of music with his Treatise on Harmony (1722) and also in the following years as a composer of masterpieces for the harpsichord, which circulated throughout Europe. He was almost 50 before he embarked on the operatic career on which his reputation chiefly rests today. His debut, Hippolyte et Aricie (1733), caused a great stir and was fiercely attacked by the supporters of Lully's style of music for its revolutionary use of harmony. Nevertheless, Rameau's pre-eminence in the field of French opera was soon acknowledged, and he was later attacked as an "establishment" composer by those who favoured Italian opera during the controversy known as the Querelle des Bouffons in the 1750s. Rameau's music had gone out of fashion by the end of the 18th century, and it was not until the 20th that serious efforts were made to revive it. Today, he enjoys renewed appreciation with performances and recordings of his music ever more frequent.
Life
The details of Rameau's life are generally obscure, especially concerning his first forty years, before he moved to Paris for good. He was a secretive man, and even his wife knew nothing of his early life, which explains the scarcity of biographical information available.
Early years, 1683–1732
Rameau's early years are particularly obscure. He was born on 25 September 1683 in Dijon, and baptised the same day. His father, Jean, worked as an organist in several churches around Dijon, and his mother, Claudine Demartinécourt, was the daughter of a notary. The couple had eleven children (five girls and six boys), of whom Jean-Philippe was the seventh.
Rameau was taught music before he could read or write. He was educated at the Jesuit college at Godrans, but he was not a good pupil and disrupted classes with his singing, later claiming that his passion for opera had begun at the age of twelve. Initially intended for the law, Rameau decided he wanted to be a musician, and his father sent him to Italy, where he stayed for a short while in Milan. On his return, he worked as a violinist in travelling companies and then as an organist in provincial cathedrals before moving to Paris for the first time. Here, in 1706, he published his earliest known compositions: the harpsichord works that make up his first book of Pièces de Clavecin, which show the influence of his friend Louis Marchand.
In 1709, he moved back to Dijon to take over his father's job as organist in the main church. The contract was for six years, but Rameau left before then and took up similar posts in Lyon and Clermont-Ferrand. During this period, he composed motets for church performance as well as secular cantatas.
In 1722, he returned to Paris for good, and here he published his most important work of music theory, Traité de l'harmonie (Treatise on Harmony). This soon won him a great reputation, and it was followed in 1726 by his Nouveau système de musique théorique. In 1724 and 1729 (or 1730), he also published two more collections of harpsichord pieces.
Rameau took his first tentative steps into composing stage music when the writer Alexis Piron asked him to provide songs for his popular comic plays written for the Paris Fairs. Four collaborations followed, beginning with L'endriague in 1723; none of the music has survived.
On 25 February 1726 Rameau married the 19-year-old Marie-Louise Mangot, who came from a musical family from Lyon and was a good singer and instrumentalist. The couple would have four children, two boys and two girls, and the marriage is said to have been a happy one.
In spite of his fame as a music theorist, Rameau had trouble finding a post as an organist in Paris.
Later years, 1733–1764
It was not until he was approaching 50 that Rameau decided to embark on the operatic career on which his fame as a composer mainly rests. He had already approached writer Antoine Houdar de la Motte for a libretto in 1727, but nothing came of it; he was finally inspired to try his hand at the prestigious genre of tragédie en musique after seeing Montéclair's Jephté in 1732. Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie premiered at the Académie Royale de Musique on 1 October 1733. It was immediately recognised as the most significant opera to appear in France since the death of Lully, but audiences were split over whether this was a good thing or a bad thing. Some, such as the composer André Campra, were stunned by its originality and wealth of invention; others found its harmonic innovations discordant and saw the work as an attack on the French musical tradition. The two camps, the so-called Lullyistes and the Rameauneurs, fought a pamphlet war over the issue for the rest of the decade.
Just before this time, Rameau had made the acquaintance of the powerful financier Alexandre Le Riche de La Poupelinière, who became his patron until 1753. La Poupelinière's mistress (and later, wife), Thérèse des Hayes, was Rameau's pupil and a great admirer of his music. In 1731, Rameau became the conductor of La Poupelinière's private orchestra, which was of an extremely high quality. He held the post for 22 years; he was succeeded by Johann Stamitz and then François-Joseph Gossec. La Poupelinière's salon enabled Rameau to meet some of the leading cultural figures of the day, including Voltaire, who soon began collaborating with the composer. Their first project, the tragédie en musique Samson, was abandoned because an opera on a religious theme by Voltaire—a notorious critic of the Church—was likely to be banned by the authorities. Meanwhile, Rameau had introduced his new musical style into the lighter genre of the opéra-ballet with the highly successful Les Indes galantes. It was followed by two tragédies en musique, Castor et Pollux (1737) and Dardanus (1739), and another opéra-ballet, Les fêtes d'Hébé (also 1739). All these operas of the 1730s are among Rameau's most highly regarded works. However, the composer followed them with six years of silence, in which the only work he produced was a new version of Dardanus (1744). The reason for this interval in the composer's creative life is unknown, although it is possible he had a falling-out with the authorities at the Académie royale de la musique.
The year 1745 was a turning point in Rameau's career. He received several commissions from the court for works to celebrate the French victory at the Battle of Fontenoy and the marriage of the Dauphin to Infanta Maria Teresa Rafaela of Spain. Rameau produced his most important comic opera, Platée, as well as two collaborations with Voltaire: the opéra-ballet Le temple de la gloire and the comédie-ballet La princesse de Navarre. They gained Rameau official recognition; he was granted the title "Compositeur du Cabinet du Roi" and given a substantial pension. 1745 also saw the beginning of the bitter enmity between Rameau and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Though best known today as a thinker, Rousseau had ambitions to be a composer. He had written an opera, Les muses galantes (inspired by Rameau's Indes galantes), but Rameau was unimpressed by this musical tribute. At the end of 1745, Voltaire and Rameau, who were busy on other works, commissioned Rousseau to turn La Princesse de Navarre into a new opera, with linking recitative, called Les fêtes de Ramire. Rousseau then claimed the two had stolen the credit for the words and music he had contributed, though musicologists have been able to identify almost nothing of the piece as Rousseau's work. Nevertheless, the embittered Rousseau nursed a grudge against Rameau for the rest of his life.
Rousseau was a major participant in the second great quarrel that erupted over Rameau's work, the so-called Querelle des Bouffons of 1752–54, which pitted French tragédie en musique against Italian opera buffa. This time, Rameau was accused of being out of date and his music too complicated in comparison with the simplicity and "naturalness" of a work like Pergolesi's La serva padrona. In the mid-1750s, Rameau criticised Rousseau's contributions to the musical articles in the Encyclopédie, which led to a quarrel with the leading philosophes d'Alembert and Diderot. As a result, Jean-François Rameau became a character in Diderot's then-unpublished dialogue, Le neveu de Rameau (Rameau's Nephew).
In 1753, La Poupelinière took a scheming musician, Jeanne-Thérèse Goermans, as his mistress. The daughter of harpsichord maker Jacques Goermans, she went by the name of Madame de Saint-Aubin, and her opportunistic husband pushed her into the arms of the rich financier. She had La Poupelinière engage the services of the Bohemian composer Johann Stamitz, who succeeded Rameau after a breach developed between Rameau and his patron; however, by then, Rameau no longer needed La Poupelinière's financial support and protection.
Rameau pursued his activities as a theorist and composer until his death. He lived with his wife and two of his children in his large suite of rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, which he would leave every day, lost in thought, to take a solitary walk in the nearby gardens of the Palais-Royal or the Tuileries. Sometimes he would meet the young writer Chabanon, who noted some of Rameau's disillusioned confidential remarks: "Day by day, I'm acquiring more good taste, but I no longer have any genius" and "The imagination is worn out in my old head; it's not wise at this age wanting to practise arts that are nothing but imagination."
Rameau composed prolifically in the late 1740s and early 1750s. After that, his rate of productivity dropped off, probably due to old age and ill health, although he was still able to write another comic opera, Les Paladins, in 1760. This was due to be followed by a final tragédie en musique, Les Boréades; but for unknown reasons, the opera was never produced and had to wait until the late 20th century for a proper staging. Rameau died on 12 September 1764 after suffering from a fever, thirteen days before his 81st birthday. At his bedside, he objected to a song sung. His last words were, "What the devil do you mean to sing to me, priest? You are out of tune." He was buried in the church of St. Eustache, Paris on the same day of his death. Although a bronze bust and red marble tombstone were erected in his memory there by the Société de la Compositeurs de Musique in 1883, the exact site of his burial remains unknown to this day.
Rameau's personality
While the details of his biography are vague and fragmentary, the details of Rameau's personal and family life are almost completely obscure. Rameau's music, so graceful and attractive, completely contradicts the man's public image and what we know of his character as described (or perhaps unfairly caricatured) by Diderot in his satirical novel Le Neveu de Rameau. Throughout his life, music was his consuming passion. It occupied his entire thinking; Philippe Beaussant calls him a monomaniac. Piron explained that "His heart and soul were in his harpsichord; once he had shut its lid, there was no one home." Physically, Rameau was tall and exceptionally thin, as can be seen by the sketches we have of him, including a famous portrait by Carmontelle. He had a "loud voice." His speech was difficult to understand, just like his handwriting, which was never fluent. As a man, he was secretive, solitary, irritable, proud of his own achievements (more as a theorist than as a composer), brusque with those who contradicted him, and quick to anger. It is difficult to imagine him among the leading wits, including Voltaire (to whom he bears more than a passing physical resemblance), who frequented La Poupelinière's salon; his music was his passport, and it made up for his lack of social graces.
His enemies exaggerated his faults; e.g. his supposed miserliness. In fact, it seems that his thriftiness was the result of long years spent in obscurity (when his income was uncertain and scanty) rather than part of his character, because he could also be generous. He helped his nephew Jean-François when he came to Paris and also helped establish the career of Claude-Bénigne Balbastre in the capital. Furthermore, he gave his daughter Marie-Louise a considerable dowry when she became a Visitandine nun in 1750, and he paid a pension to one of his sisters when she became ill. Financial security came late to him, following the success of his stage works and the grant of a royal pension (a few months before his death, he was also ennobled and made a knight of the Ordre de Saint-Michel). But he did not change his way of life, keeping his worn-out clothes, his single pair of shoes, and his old furniture. After his death, it was discovered that he only possessed one dilapidated single-keyboard harpsichord in his rooms in Rue des Bons-Enfants, yet he also had a bag containing 1691 gold louis.
Music
General character of Rameau's music
Rameau's music is characterised by the exceptional technical knowledge of a composer who wanted above all to be renowned as a theorist of the art. Nevertheless, it is not solely addressed to the intelligence, and Rameau himself claimed, "I try to conceal art with art." The paradox of this music was that it was new, using techniques never known before, but it took place within the framework of old-fashioned forms. Rameau appeared revolutionary to the Lullyistes, disturbed by complex harmony of his music; and reactionary to the "philosophes," who only paid attention to its content and who either would not or could not listen to the sound it made. The incomprehension Rameau received from his contemporaries stopped him from repeating such daring experiments as the second Trio des Parques in Hippolyte et Aricie, which he was forced to remove after a handful of performances because the singers had been either unable or unwilling to execute it correctly.
Rameau's musical works
Rameau's musical works may be divided into four distinct groups, which differ greatly in importance: a few cantatas; a few motets for large chorus; some pieces for solo harpsichord or harpsichord accompanied by other instruments; and, finally, his works for the stage, to which he dedicated the last thirty years of his career almost exclusively. Like most of his contemporaries, Rameau often reused melodies that had been particularly successful, but never without meticulously adapting them; they are not simple transcriptions. Besides, no borrowings have been found from other composers, although his earliest works show the influence of other music. Rameau's reworkings of his own material are numerous; e.g., in Les Fêtes d'Hébé, we find L'Entretien des Muses, the Musette, and the Tambourin, taken from the 1724 book of harpsichord pieces, as well as an aria from the cantata Le Berger Fidèle.
Motets
For at least 26 years, Rameau was a professional organist in the service of religious institutions, and yet the body of sacred music he composed is exceptionally small and his organ works nonexistent. Judging by the evidence, it was not his favourite field, but rather, simply a way of making reasonable money. Rameau's few religious compositions are nevertheless remarkable and compare favourably to the works of specialists in the area. Only four motets have been attributed to Rameau with any certainty: Deus noster refugium, In convertendo, Quam dilecta, and Laboravi.
Cantatas
The cantata was a highly successful genre in the early 18th century. The French cantata, which should not be confused with the Italian or the German cantata, was "invented" in 1706 by the poet Jean-Baptiste Rousseau and soon taken up by many famous composers of the day, such as Montéclair, Campra, and Clérambault. Cantatas were Rameau's first contact with dramatic music. The modest forces the cantata required meant it was a genre within the reach of a composer who was still unknown. Musicologists can only guess at the dates of Rameau's six surviving cantatas, and the names of the librettists are unknown.
Instrumental music
Along with François Couperin, Rameau was a master of the 18th-century French school of harpsichord music, and both made a break with the style of the first generation of harpsichordists whose compositions adhered to the relatively standardised suite form, which had reached its apogee in the first decade of the 18th century and successive collections of pieces by Louis Marchand, Gaspard Le Roux, Louis-Nicolas Clérambault, Jean-François Dandrieu, Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, Charles Dieupart and Nicolas Siret. Rameau and Couperin had different styles, and it seems they did not know one another: Couperin was one of the official court musicians; Rameau, fifteen years his junior, achieved fame only after Couperin's death.
Rameau published his first book of harpsichord pieces in 1706. (Cf. Couperin, who waited until 1713 before publishing his first "Ordres.") Rameau's music includes pieces in the pure tradition of the French suite: imitative ("Le rappel des oiseaux," "La poule") and characterful ("Les tendres plaintes," "L'entretien des Muses"). But there are also works of pure virtuosity that resemble Domenico Scarlatti ("Les tourbillons," "Les trois mains") as well as pieces that reveal the experiments of a theorist and musical innovator ("L'enharmonique," "Les Cyclopes"), which had a marked influence on Louis-Claude Daquin, Joseph-Nicolas-Pancrace Royer and Jacques Duphly. Rameau's suites are grouped in the traditional way, by key. The first set of dances (Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, Les Trois Mains, Fanfairenette, La Triomphante, Gavotte et 6 doubles) is centred on A major and A minor, while the remaining pieces (Les tricoteuses, L'Indifferente, Première Menuet, Deuxième Menuet, La Poule, Les Triolets, Les Sauvages, L'Enharmonique, L'Egiptienne [sic]) are centred around G major and G minor.
Rameau's second and third collections appeared in 1724 and 1727. After these he composed only one piece for the harpsichord, the eight-minute "La Dauphine" of 1747, while the very short "Les petits marteaux" (c. 1750) has also been attributed to him.
During his semiretirement (1740 to 1744) he wrote the Pièces de clavecin en concert (1741), which some musicologists consider the pinnacle of French Baroque chamber music. Adopting a formula successfully employed by Mondonville a few years earlier, Rameau fashioned these pieces differently from trio sonatas in that the harpsichord is not simply there as basso continuo to accompany melody instruments (violin, flute, viol) but as equal partner in "concert" with them. Rameau claimed that this music would be equally satisfying played on the harpsichord alone, but the claim is not wholly convincing because he took the trouble to transcribe five of them himself, those the lack of other instruments would show the least.
Opera
After 1733 Rameau dedicated himself mostly to opera. On a strictly musical level, 18th-century French Baroque opera is richer and more varied than contemporary Italian opera, especially in the place given to choruses and dances but also in the musical continuity that arises from the respective relationships between the arias and the recitatives. Another essential difference: whereas Italian opera gave a starring role to female sopranos and castrati, French opera had no use for the latter. The Italian opera of Rameau's day (opera seria, opera buffa) was essentially divided into musical sections (da capo arias, duets, trios, etc.) and sections that were spoken or almost spoken (recitativo secco). It was during the latter that the action progressed while the audience waited for the next aria; on the other hand, the text of the arias was almost entirely buried beneath music whose chief aim was to show off the virtuosity of the singer. Nothing of the kind is to be found in French opera of the day; since Lully, the text had to remain comprehensible—limiting certain techniques such as the vocalise, which was reserved for special words such as ("glory") or ("victory"). A subtle equilibrium existed between the more and the less musical parts: melodic recitative on the one hand and arias that were often closer to arioso on the other, alongside virtuoso "ariettes" in the Italian style. This form of continuous music prefigures Wagnerian drama even more than does the "reform" opera of Gluck.
Five essential components may be discerned in Rameau's operatic scores:
Pieces of "pure" music (overtures, ritornelli, music which closes scenes). Unlike the highly stereotyped Lullian overture, Rameau's overtures show an extraordinary variety. Even in his earliest works, where he uses the standard French model, Rameau—the born symphonist and master of orchestration—composes novel and unique pieces. A few pieces are particularly striking, such as the overture to Zaïs, depicting the chaos before the creation of the universe, that of Pigmalion, suggesting the sculptor's chipping away at the statue with his mallet, or many more conventional depictions of storms and earthquakes, as well perhaps as the imposing final chaconnes of Les Indes galantes or Dardanus.
Dance music: the danced interludes, which were obligatory even in tragédie en musique, allowed Rameau to give free rein to his inimitable sense of rhythm, melody, and choreography, acknowledged by all his contemporaries, including the dancers themselves. This "learned" composer, forever preoccupied by his next theoretical work, also was one who strung together gavottes, minuets, loures, rigaudons, passepieds, tambourins, and musettes by the dozen. According to his biographer, Cuthbert Girdlestone, "The immense superiority of all that pertains to Rameau in choreography still needs emphasizing," and the German scholar H.W. von Walthershausen affirmed:
Rameau was the greatest ballet composer of all times. The genius of his creation rests on one hand on his perfect artistic permeation by folk-dance types, on the other hand on the constant preservation of living contact with the practical requirements of the ballet stage, which prevented an estrangement between the expression of the body from the spirit of absolute music.
Choruses: Padre Martini, the erudite musicologist who corresponded with Rameau, affirmed that "the French are excellent at choruses," obviously thinking of Rameau himself. A great master of harmony, Rameau knew how to compose sumptuous choruses—whether monodic, polyphonic, or interspersed with passages for solo singers or the orchestra—and whatever feelings needed to be expressed.
Arias: less frequent than in Italian opera, Rameau nevertheless offers many striking examples. Particularly admired arias include Télaïre's "Tristes apprêts," from Castor et Pollux; "Ô jour affreux" and "Lieux funestes," from Dardanus; Huascar's invocations in Les Indes galantes; and the final ariette in Pigmalion. In Platée we encounter a showstopping ars poetica aria for the character of La Folie (the madness), "Formons les plus brillants concerts / Aux langeurs d'Apollon".
Recitative: much closer to arioso than to recitativo secco. The composer took scrupulous care to observe French prosody and used his harmonic knowledge to give expression to his protagonists' feelings.
During the first part of his operatic career (1733–1739), Rameau wrote his great masterpieces destined for the Académie royale de musique: three tragédies en musique and two opéra-ballets that still form the core of his repertoire. After the interval of 1740 to 1744, he became the official court musician, and for the most part, composed pieces intended to entertain, with plenty of dance music emphasising sensuality and an idealised pastoral atmosphere. In his last years, Rameau returned to a renewed version of his early style in Les Paladins and Les Boréades.
His Zoroastre was first performed in 1749. According to one of Rameau's admirers, Cuthbert Girdlestone, this opera has a distinctive place in his works: "The profane passions of hatred and jealousy are rendered more intensely [than in his other works] and with a strong sense of reality."
Rameau and his librettists
Unlike Lully, who collaborated with Philippe Quinault on almost all his operas, Rameau rarely worked with the same librettist twice. He was highly demanding and bad-tempered, unable to maintain longstanding partnerships with his librettists, with the exception of Louis de Cahusac, who collaborated with him on several operas, including Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour (1747), Zaïs (1748), Naïs (1749), Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756), La naissance d'Osiris (1754), and Anacréon (the first of Rameau's operas by that name, 1754). He is also credited with writing the libretto of Rameau's final work, Les Boréades (c. 1763).
Many Rameau specialists have regretted that the collaboration with Houdar de la Motte never took place, and that the Samson project with Voltaire came to nothing because the librettists Rameau did work with were second-rate. He made his acquaintance of most of them at La Poupelinière's salon, at the Société du Caveau, or at the house of the Comte de Livry, all meeting places for leading cultural figures of the day.
Not one of his librettists managed to produce a libretto on the same artistic level as Rameau's music: the plots were often overly complex or unconvincing. But this was standard for the genre, and is probably part of its charm. The versification, too, was mediocre, and Rameau often had to have the libretto modified and rewrite the music after the premiere because of the ensuing criticism. This is why we have two versions of Castor et Pollux (1737 and 1754) and three of Dardanus (1739, 1744, and 1760).
Reputation and influence
By the end of his life, Rameau's music had come under attack in France from theorists who favoured Italian models. However, foreign composers working in the Italian tradition were increasingly looking towards Rameau as a way of reforming their own leading operatic genre, opera seria. Tommaso Traetta produced two operas setting translations of Rameau libretti that show the French composer's influence, Ippolito ed Aricia (1759) and I Tintaridi (based on Castor et Pollux, 1760). Traetta had been advised by Count Francesco Algarotti, a leading proponent of reform according to French models; Algarotti was a major influence on the most important "reformist" composer, Christoph Willibald Gluck. Gluck's three Italian reform operas of the 1760s—Orfeo ed Euridice, Alceste, and Paride ed Elena—reveal a knowledge of Rameau's works. For instance, both Orfeo and the 1737 version of Castor et Pollux open with the funeral of one of the leading characters who later comes back to life. Many of the operatic reforms advocated in the preface to Gluck's Alceste were already present in Rameau's works. Rameau had used accompanied recitatives, and the overtures in his later operas reflected the action to come, so when Gluck arrived in Paris in 1774 to produce a series of six French operas, he could be seen as continuing in the tradition of Rameau. Nevertheless, while Gluck's popularity survived the French Revolution, Rameau's did not. By the end of the 18th century, his operas had vanished from the repertoire.
For most of the 19th century, Rameau's music remained unplayed, known only by reputation. Hector Berlioz investigated Castor et Pollux and particularly admired the aria "Tristes apprêts," but "whereas the modern listener readily perceives the common ground with Berlioz' music, he himself was more conscious of the gap which separated them." French humiliation in the Franco-Prussian War brought about a change in Rameau's fortunes. As Rameau biographer J. Malignon wrote, "...the German victory over France in 1870–71 was the grand occasion for digging up great heroes from the French past. Rameau, like so many others, was flung into the enemy's face to bolster our courage and our faith in the national destiny of France." In 1894, composer Vincent d'Indy founded the Schola Cantorum to promote French national music; the society put on several revivals of works by Rameau. Among the audience was Claude Debussy, who especially cherished Castor et Pollux, revived in 1903: "Gluck's genius was deeply rooted in Rameau's works... a detailed comparison allows us to affirm that Gluck could replace Rameau on the French stage only by assimilating the latter's beautiful works and making them his own." Camille Saint-Saëns (by editing and publishing the Pièces in 1895) and Paul Dukas were two other important French musicians who gave practical championship to Rameau's music in their day, but interest in Rameau petered out again, and it was not until the late 20th century that a serious effort was made to revive his works. Over half of Rameau's operas have now been recorded, in particular by conductors such as John Eliot Gardiner, William Christie, and Marc Minkowski.
One of his pieces is commonly heard in the Victoria Centre in Nottingham by the Rowland Emett timepiece, the Aqua Horological Tintinnabulator. Emett quoted that Rameau made music for his school and the shopping centre without him knowing it.
Theoretical works
Treatise on Harmony, 1722
Rameau's 1722 Treatise on Harmony initiated a revolution in music theory. Rameau posited the discovery of the "fundamental law" or what he referred to as the "fundamental bass" of all Western music. Heavily influenced by new Cartesian modes of thought and analysis, Rameau's methodology incorporated mathematics, commentary, analysis and a didacticism that was specifically intended to illuminate, scientifically, the structure and principles of music. With careful deductive reasoning, he attempted to derive universal harmonic principles from natural causes. Previous treatises on harmony had been purely practical; Rameau embraced the new philosophical rationalism, quickly rising to prominence in France as the "Isaac Newton of Music." His fame subsequently spread throughout all Europe, and his Treatise became the definitive authority on music theory, forming the foundation for instruction in western music that persists to this day.
List of works
RCT numbering refers to Rameau Catalogue Thématique established by Sylvie Bouissou and Denis Herlin.
Instrumental works
Pièces de clavecin. Trois livres. "Pieces for harpsichord", 3 books, published 1706, 1724, 1726/27(?).
RCT 1 – Premier livre de Clavecin (1706)
RCT 2 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in E minor
RCT 3 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Suite in D major
RCT 4 – Pièces de clavecin (1724) – Menuet in C major
RCT 5 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in A minor
RCT 6 – Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin (1726/27) – Suite in G
Pieces de Clavecin en Concerts Five albums of character pieces for harpsichord, violin and viol. (1741)
RCT 7 – Concert I in C minor
RCT 8 – Concert II in G major
RCT 9 – Concert III in A major
RCT 10 – Concert IV in B flat major
RCT 11 – Concert V in D minor
RCT 12 – La Dauphine for harpsichord. (1747)
RCT 12bis – Les petits marteaux for harpsichord.
Several orchestral dance suites extracted from his operas.
Motets
RCT 13 – Deus noster refugium (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 14 – In convertendo (probably before 1720, rev. 1751)
RCT 15 – Quam dilecta (c. 1713–1715)
RCT 16 – Laboravi (published in the Traité de l'harmonie, 1722)
Canons
RCT 17 – Ah! loin de rire, pleurons (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) (pub. 1722)
RCT 18 – Avec du vin, endormons-nous (2 sopranos, Tenor) (1719)
RCT 18bis – L'épouse entre deux draps (3 sopranos) (formerly attributed to François Couperin)
RCT 18ter – Je suis un fou Madame (3 voix égales) (1720)
RCT 19 – Mes chers amis, quittez vos rouges bords (3 sopranos, 3 basses) (pub. 1780)
RCT 20 – Réveillez-vous, dormeur sans fin (5 voix égales) (pub. 1722)
RCT 20bis – Si tu ne prends garde à toi (2 sopranos, bass) (1720)
Songs
RCT 21.1 – L'amante préoccupée or A l'objet que j'adore (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.2 – Lucas, pour se gausser de nous (soprano, bass, continuo) (pub. 1707)
RCT 21.3 – Non, non, le dieu qui sait aimer (soprano, continuo) (1763)
RCT 21.4 – Un Bourbon ouvre sa carrière or Un héros ouvre sa carrière (alto, continuo) (1751, air belonging to Acante et Céphise but censored before its first performance and never reintroduced in the work).
Cantatas
RCT 23 – Aquilon et Orithie (between 1715 and 1720)
RCT 28 – Thétis (same period)
RCT 26 – L’impatience (same period)
RCT 22 – Les amants trahis (around 1720)
RCT 27 – Orphée (same period)
RCT 24 – Le berger fidèle (1728)
RCT 25 – Cantate pour le jour de la Saint Louis (1740)
Operas and stage works
Tragédies en musique
RCT 43 – Hippolyte et Aricie (1733; revised 1742 and 1757)
RCT 32 – Castor et Pollux (1737; revised 1754)
RCT 35 – Dardanus (1739; revised 1744 and 1760), score
RCT 62 – Zoroastre (1749; revised 1756, with new music for Acts II, III & V)
RCT 31 – Les Boréades or Abaris (unperformed; in rehearsal 1763)
Opéra-ballets
RCT 44 – Les Indes galantes (1735; revised 1736)
RCT 41 – Les fêtes d'Hébé or les Talens Lyriques (1739)
RCT 39 – Les fêtes de Polymnie (1745)
RCT 59 – Le temple de la gloire (1745; revised 1746)
RCT 38 – Les fêtes de l'Hymen et de l'Amour or Les Dieux d'Egypte (1747)
RCT 58 – Les surprises de l'Amour (1748; revised 1757)
Pastorales héroïques
RCT 60 – Zaïs (1748)
RCT 49 – Naïs (1749)
RCT 29 – Acante et Céphise or La sympathie (1751)
RCT 34 – Daphnis et Eglé (1753)
Comédies lyriques
RCT 53 – Platée or Junon jalouse (1745), score
RCT 51 – Les Paladins or Le Vénitien (1760)
Comédie-ballet
RCT 54 – La princesse de Navarre (1744)
Actes de ballet
RCT 33 – Les courses de Tempé (1734)
RCT 40 – Les fêtes de Ramire (1745)
RCT 52 – Pigmalion (1748)
RCT 42 – La guirlande or Les fleurs enchantées (1751)
RCT 57 – Les sibarites or Sibaris (1753)
RCT 48 – La naissance d'Osiris or La Fête Pamilie (1754)
RCT 30 – Anacréon (1754)
RCT 58 – Anacréon (completely different work from the above, 1757, 3rd Entrée of Les surprises de l'Amour)
RCT 61 – Zéphire (date unknown)
RCT 50 – Nélée et Myrthis (date unknown)
RCT 45 – Io (unfinished, date unknown)
Lost works
RCT 56 – Samson (tragédie en musique) (first version written 1733–1734; second version 1736; neither were ever staged )
RCT 46 – Linus (tragédie en musique) (1751, score stolen after a rehearsal)
RCT 47 – Lisis et Délie (pastorale) (scheduled on November 6, 1753)
Incidental music for opéras comiques
Music mostly lost.
RCT 36 – L'endriague (in 3 acts, 1723)
RCT 37 – L'enrôlement d'Arlequin (in 1 act, 1726)
RCT 55 – La robe de dissension or Le faux prodige (in 2 acts, 1726)
RCT 55bis – La rose or Les jardins de l'Hymen (in a prologue and 1 act, 1744)
Writings
Traité de l'harmonie réduite à ses principes naturels (Paris, 1722)
Nouveau système de musique théorique (Paris, 1726)
Dissertation sur les différents méthodes d'accompagnement pour le clavecin, ou pour l'orgue (Paris, 1732)
Génération harmonique, ou Traité de musique théorique et pratique (Paris, 1737)
Mémoire où l'on expose les fondemens du Système de musique théorique et pratique de M. Rameau (1749)
Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1750)
Nouvelles réflexions de M. Rameau sur sa 'Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie (Paris, 1752)
Observations sur notre instinct pour la musique (Paris, 1754)
Erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1755)
Suite des erreurs sur la musique dans l'Encyclopédie (Paris, 1756)
Reponse de M. Rameau à MM. les editeurs de l'Encyclopédie sur leur dernier Avertissement (Paris, 1757)
Nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (1758–9)
Code de musique pratique, ou Méthodes pour apprendre la musique...avec des nouvelles réflexions sur le principe sonore (Paris, 1760)
Lettre à M. Alembert sur ses opinions en musique (Paris, 1760)
Origine des sciences, suivie d'un controverse sur le même sujet (Paris, 1762)
See also
Querelle des Bouffons
ReferencesNotesSourcesBeaussant, Philippe, Rameau de A à Z (Fayard, 1983)
Gibbons, William. Building the Operatic Museum: Eighteenth-Century Opera in Fin-de-siècle Paris (University of Rochester Press, 2013)
Girdlestone, Cuthbert, Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work (Dover paperback edition, 1969)
Holden, Amanda, (Ed) The Viking Opera Guide (Viking, 1993)
Sadler, Graham, (Ed.), The New Grove French Baroque Masters (Grove/Macmillan, 1988)
Trowbridge, Simon, Rameau (2nd edition, Englance Press, 2017)
F. Annunziata, Una Tragédie Lyrique nel Secolo dei Lumi. Abaris ou Les Boréades di Jean Philippe Rameau, https://www.academia.edu/6100318
External links
(en) Gavotte with Doubles Hypermedia by Jeff Hall & Tim Smith at the BinAural Collaborative Hypertext – Shockwave Player required – ("Gavotte with Doubles" link NG)
(en) jp.rameau.free.fr Rameau – Le Site
(fr) musicologie.org Biography, List of Works, bibliography, discography, theoretical writings, in French
(en) Jean-Philippe Rameau / Discography
Magnatune Les Cyclopes by Rameau in on-line mp3 format (played by Trevor Pinnock)
Jean-Philippe Rameau, "L'Orchestre de Louis XV" – Suites d'Orchestre, Le Concert des Nations, dir. Jordi Savall, Alia Vox, AVSA 9882Sheet music'''
Rameau free sheet music from the Mutopia Project
1683 births
1764 deaths
18th-century classical composers
18th-century French composers
18th-century French male musicians
Composers awarded knighthoods
Composers for harpsichord
French Baroque composers
French ballet composers
French opera composers
French male classical composers
French male non-fiction writers
French music theorists
Male opera composers
People from Dijon
Burials at Saint-Eustache, Paris
17th-century male musicians | true | [
"Samson was an opera by the French composer Jean-Philippe Rameau with a libretto by Voltaire. The work was never staged due to censorship, although Voltaire later printed his text. Rameau intended the opera on the theme of Samson and Delilah as the successor to his debut Hippolyte et Aricie, which premiered in October 1733. Like Hippolyte, Samson was a tragédie en musique in five acts and a prologue. Voltaire had become a great admirer of Rameau's music after seeing Hippolyte and suggested a collaboration with the composer in November 1733. The opera was complete by late summer 1734 and went into rehearsal. However, a work on a religious subject with a libretto by such a notorious critic of the Church was bound to run into controversy and Samson was banned. An attempt to revive the project in a new version in 1736 also failed. The score is lost, although Rameau recycled some of the music from Samson in his later operas.\n\nBackground\n\nRameau and Voltaire in 1733\nRameau was 50 when he made his operatic debut with the tragédie en musique Hippolyte et Aricie at the Paris Opéra on 1 October 1733. Hippolyte provoked immense controversy, with conservative critics attacking it because of the music's \"quantity, complexity and allegedly Italianate character\". They also feared Rameau's new style would destroy the traditional French operatic repertoire, especially the works of its founder Jean-Baptiste Lully. Disputes would rage for years between Rameau's supporters, the so-called ramistes (or ramoneurs, literally \"chimney sweeps\"), and his opponents, the lullistes.\n\nBy 1733 Voltaire had enjoyed considerable success as a playwright but had written nothing for the operatic stage. Early that year he wrote his first libretto, Tanis et Zélide, set in ancient Egypt. He had also attracted controversy of his own and been imprisoned in the Bastille for his satirical writings in 1717.\n\nFirst attempt: 1733—1734 \nVoltaire knew little about Rameau before the premiere of Hippolyte. He was initially sceptical about the composer and his new musical style, writing, \"He is a man who has the misfortune to know more about music than Lully. In musical matters he is a pedant; he is meticulous and tedious.\" However, on further acquaintance his doubts about Rameau and his music changed to enthusiasm and a desire to work with the composer. He put aside Tanis and began writing a new tragédie en musique based on the story of Samson with Rameau in mind.\n\nThe choice of a Biblical subject was surprising as neither Voltaire nor Rameau were devoutly religious and Voltaire had a growing reputation for impiety. However, both had been educated at schools run by the Jesuits, where they had probably seen stagings of sacred dramas. There was also the recent example of Montéclair's opera Jephté, premiered in Paris in 1732 and based on the Old Testament story of Jephthah. Even that had faced problems with censorship when the Archbishop of Paris had temporarily suspended performances, but Voltaire probably believed that the story of Samson would be more acceptable because it was less religious than that of Jephthah. A translation of an Italian play about Samson had also been performed in Paris in the spring of 1732 with no complaints from the authorities.\n\nThe first mention of Samson comes from a letter of 20 November 1733. Rameau urged Voltaire to finish the libretto as soon as possible and by December it was ready. A notice in the journal Anecdotes ou lettres secrètes shows that Rameau had completed the score by August 1734. By that time there were already doubts about the likelihood of the work being able to pass the censor unscathed. In June 1734 the Parliament of Paris had condemned Voltaire's Lettres philosophiques and the book had been burned publicly in front of the Palais de Justice. Voltaire fled to Cirey to escape imprisonment in the Bastille. On 14 September Voltaire's friend Madame du Châtelet wrote that the censors of the Sorbonne had begun to make nitpicking complaints about Samson, for example, Voltaire had attributed some of the miracles of Moses to Samson, he had made fire from heaven fall from the right rather than the left (\"a great blasphemy\"), and he had only put one column in the Philistine temple instead of the requisite two.\n\nAlthough Voltaire's absence made work on the opera difficult, rehearsals of Samson went ahead on 23 October 1734 at the home of Louis Fagon, the Intendant des finances. Madame du Châtelet commented on the music in a letter, praising the overture, some airs for the violin, a chaconne and the music of the third and fifth acts. However, the censor Abbé Hardion now forbade the work from being staged. The libretto's mixture of the sacred and profane, as well as the choice of Delilah (a seductress and betrayer) as heroine, together with Voltaire's recent clash with the authorities, all probably contributed to the ban. As Graham Sadler writes, Samsons central theme was \"the struggle against tyranny and religious intolerance.\"\n\nSecond attempt: 1736\nAfter the success of Rameau's opéra-ballet Les Indes galantes in 1735, Voltaire persuaded Rameau to revive the Samson project. Voltaire finished his reworking of the libretto on 10 February 1736 and Rameau completed the music some time that Spring. Despite rumours that Samson would appear at the Opéra after 6 April, it was never staged. The reasons why are unclear but were mostly probably censorship again, as Voltaire claimed when the libretto was finally published in 1745.\n\nVoltaire's innovations\nVoltaire wanted his libretto to be as groundbreaking as Rameau's music had been for Hippolyte et Aricie. The following are some of the innovative features of Samson'''s libretto, not all of which Rameau accepted:\n\nDiscarding the prologue. Tragédies en musique in the Lullian style always began with an allegorical prologue, usually with no direct relation to the main action of the opera. Voltaire wanted to get rid of this feature and only grudgingly supplied a prologue after Rameau begged him to do so. Samsons prologue is remarkably short, only 85 lines long. Rameau would only dispense with the prologue in his Zoroastre in 1749. \nReduction of the amount of recitative. Voltaire found recitative boring and reduced it in favour of a greater number of ensembles and choruses, things he felt were Rameau's strong suit.Dill, pp. 124—125\nThe character of Delilah. Rameau was worried that Delilah only appears in the third and fourth acts. The love interest in a tragédie lyrique usually began in the first act and the heroine had a rival, creating a love triangle. In Samson there are no female voices - outside the chorus - in the first two acts, something which troubled Rameau. Voltaire replied that this was necessary to establish the warlike character of Samson and, besides, the acts were relatively short. He predicted that not everyone would appreciate the character of Delilah: \"An opera heroine who is not at all amorous will perhaps not be accepted. While my detractors say my work is too impious, the parterre will find it too wise and too severe. They will be disheartened at seeing love treated only as a seduction in a theatre where it is always consecrated as a virtue.\"\nA dramatic ending. French operas usually finished with a divertissement, with celebratory choruses and dancing. Voltaire ends Samson abruptly when the hero brings down the Philistine temple, killing himself and his enemies. This finale probably appealed to Rameau's dramatic instincts.\n\nRameau's reuse of the music\nIn his preface to the printed libretto of 1745 Voltaire wrote that Rameau had salvaged some of the music from Samson for use in later operas. He specified which works in a letter to Chabanon in 1768, naming \"Les Incas de Pérou\" (the second act of Les Indes galantes), Castor et Pollux and Zoroastre. The Rameau specialist Cuthbert Girdlestone doubts the reliability of Voltaire's memory here. An anonymous correspondent in the Journal de Paris of 5 January 1777 quoted \"someone who had often heard the celebrated Rameau assert\" that many of the \"finest pieces\" in Les fêtes d'Hébé were originally from Samson:\"...[and] that the music of the River divertissement in the first act was the piece intended to portray the water spurting from the rock [Samson, Act 2]; that the great piece for Tyrtée had been put in Samson's mouth when he reproached the Israelites for their cowardice [Samson, Act 1]; that the divertissement in the third act was the Festival of Adonis [Samson, Act 3], finally, that the chaconne of Les Indes galantes was used in Samson to summon the people to the feet of the true God.\"Bouissou, pp. 358—359\nTwo pieces from Samson later appeared in two operatic collaborations between Rameau and Voltaire in 1745: an aria for Delilah became \"Echo, voix errante\" in La princesse de Navarre; and an aria for Samson became \"Profonds abîmes du Ténare\" in Le temple de la Gloire.Dubruque, p. 16 Graham Sadler also suggests that some music may have been reused in the 1753 version of Les fêtes de Polymnie.\n\nGirdlestone regretted the loss of Samson, regarding the libretto as \"the best Rameau was ever to set.\" The failure of Samson did not end the collaboration between Rameau and Voltaire. In 1740 Voltaire proposed setting his libretto Pandore. This came to nothing, but the composer and playwright eventually collaborated on three works which did make it to the stage in 1745: Le temple de la gloire, La princesse de Navarre and Les fêtes de Ramire. Camille Saint-Saëns took some inspiration from Voltaire's Samson when working on the first draught of his opera Samson et Dalila.\n\nRoles\n\nSynopsis\n\nPrologue\nLa Volupté (Sensual Pleasure) celebrates her long reign over the people of Paris. Hercules and Bacchus admit that love has made them forget about their famous military victories and they offer their obedience to Pleasure. Suddenly, Virtue arrives in a blinding light. She reassures Pleasure that she has not come to banish her but to use her help in persuading mortals to follow the lessons of truth. She says he will now present the audience with a true, not a mythical, Hercules (i.e. Samson) and show how love caused his downfall.\n\nAct 1\nOn the banks of the River Adonis, the Israelite captives deplore their fate under Philistine domination. The Philistines plan to force the Israelites to worship their idols. Samson arrives, dressed in a lion skin, and smashes the pagan altars. He urges the defenceless Israelites to put their faith in God who has given him the strength to defeat the Philistines.\n\nAct 2\nIn his royal palace the King of the Philistines learns of Samson's liberation of the captives and the defeat of the Philistine army. Samson enters, carrying a club in one hand and an olive branch in the other. He offers peace if the king will free the Israelites. When the king refuses, Samson proves that God is on his side by making water spontaneously flow from the marble walls of the palace. The king still refuses to submit so God sends fire from heaven which destroys the Philistines' crops. Finally, the king agrees to free the Israelites and the captives rejoice.\n\nAct 3\nThe Philistines, including the king, the high priest and Delilah, pray to their gods Mars and Venus to save them from Samson. An oracle declares that only the power of love can defeat Samson.\n\nFresh from his victories, Samson arrives and is lulled to sleep by the murmuring of a stream and the music of the priestesses of Venus, celebrating the festival of Adonis. Delilah begs the goddess to help her seduce Samson. Samson falls for her charms in spite of the warnings of a chorus of Israelites. He reluctantly leaves for battle again, after swearing his love for Delilah.\n\nAct 4\nThe High Priest urges Delilah to find out the secret of Samson's extraordinary strength. Samson enters; he is prepared to make peace with the Philistines in return for Delilah's hand in marriage. He overcomes his initial reluctance for the wedding to take place in the Temple of Venus. Delilah says she will only marry him if he reveals the source of his strength to her and Samson tells her it lies in his long hair. There is a roll of thunder and the Temple of Venus disappears in darkness; Samson realises he has betrayed God. The Philistines rush in and take him captive, leaving Delilah desperately regretting her betrayal.\n\nAct 5\nSamson is in the Philistine temple, blinded and in chains. He laments his fate with a chorus of captive Israelites, who bring him news that Delilah has killed herself. The king torments Samson further by making him witness the Philistine victory celebrations. Samson calls on God to punish the king's blasphemy. Samson promises to reveal the Israelites' secrets so long as the Israelites are removed from the temple. The king agrees and, once the Israelites have left, Samson seizes the columns of the temple and pushes them over, bringing down the whole building on himself and the Philistines.\n\nReferences\n\nSources\nCuthbert Girdlestone, Jean-Philippe Rameau: His Life and Work, Dover, New York 1969 (paperback edition).\nAmanda Holden (ed.): The Viking Opera Guide, Viking, New York 1993.\nCharles Dill: Monstrous Opera: Rameau and the Tragic Tradition. Princeton University Press, Princeton/NJ 1998.\nSylvie Bouissou: Jean-Philippe Rameau: Musicien des lumières. Fayard, Paris 2014.\nGraham Sadler: The Rameau Compendium. Boydell Press, Woodbridge/UK 2014.\nJulien Dubruque, essay on \"The Stormy Collaboration Between Voltaire and Rameau\" in the book accompanying Guy Van Waas's recording of Le temple de la Gloire'' (Ricercar, 2015).\n\nOperas by Jean-Philippe Rameau\nFrench-language operas\nOperas\n18th-century operas\nLost operas\nWorks by Voltaire\nCultural depictions of Samson",
"Samson is a fictional superhero that appeared in comic books published by Fox Feature Syndicate. He first appeared in Fantastic Comics #1 (Dec. 1939). The writer was uncredited, but is believed to be Will Eisner; the artist was Alex Blum, using the pseudonym \"Alex Boon\".\n\nPublication history\n\nAfter appearing in Fantastic Comics in 1939, Samson was given his own title in the fall of 1940. He simultaneously appeared in Big 3 comics, along with the Flame and the Blue Beetle. Samson's origin story was revealed in Samson comics #1.\n\nFantastic Comics ceased publication in November 1941 with issue #23. After six issues, Samson comics was changed to Captain Aero (September 1941) and Samson no longer had his own title. Finally, Samson was replaced in Big 3 comics in issue #7 (Jan. 1942; this issue proved to be last) by the patriotic hero V-Man.\n\nA short-lived revival appeared in 1955 from another publisher, Ajax-Farrell.\n\nSamson is among the public domain characters Image Comics revived in a new anthology title, The Next Issue Project, which premiered in December 2007. Another version of the character is slated to appear in the October issue of Savage Dragon.\n\nProject Superpowers, a similar golden-age revival project from Alex Ross and Dynamite Entertainment also announced in 2007, also features a character that is ostensibly the Fox Features Samson, though the visual design seems to have been inspired by the Gold Key Comics character Mighty Samson.\n\nBackground\nSamson (he had no secret identity, although he was called \"Sam\" the few times he was shown wearing street clothes) was a direct descendant of the biblical figure. Like his ancestor, Samson had immense strength and endurance, but could lose his powers when his hair was cut. Samson only learned about his heritage when he was a grown man, after his mother revealed his ancestry.\n\nWhile in college, his friend Professor Brun showed him a new invention, an \"iconoscope\", which allowed the viewer to watch remote scenes without a transmitter. The iconoscope picked up the image of an eastern holy man, who was praying for a higher power to send someone to battle evil. Samson used his superpowers to visit the holy man, and agreed to be that champion.\n\nAccording to Jess Nevins' Encyclopedia of Golden Age Superheroes, Samson fights \"giant robots, monsters, mad scientists, thugs, dinosaurs, dictators, warmongers, zombies, and radium thieves\".\n\nKurt Mitchell and Roy Thomas wrote: \"Pitting his superhuman strength against whole armies, Samson's feats outdid the contemporary Superman but he was far more ruthless, killing his foes barehanded without batting an eye\".\n\nIn issue #10 of Fantastic Comics, Samson gained a young orphan sidekick whom he named David (his real name was unrevealed). David had no apparent superpowers yet was the sole survivor of a plane crash. Orphaned after the crash, Samson took him into his care. David's role mainly consisted of being rescued by Samson after being captured by criminals.\n\nPowers and abilities\nSamson, due to his relation to the Biblical character, had super strength and endurance, and invulnerability. He lost these powers if his hair was cut. These powers were restored once his hair regrew. Samson's hair grew at an accelerated rate.\n\nFootnotes\n\nReferences\nBackground on Samson and other Fox heroes\n\nDynamite Entertainment characters\nFox Feature Syndicate superheroes\nFox Feature Syndicate titles\nComics characters introduced in 1939\nGolden Age superheroes\nPublic domain comics"
]
|
[
"Ed Barrow",
"Return to baseball"
]
| C_fdd107875b0c4772925599906971c74a_0 | What year did he return to baseball? | 1 | What year did Ed Barrow return to baseball? | Ed Barrow | Barrow returned to baseball in 1910, managing Montreal. The Eastern League hired Barrow as its president the next year, giving him an annual salary of $7,500 ($196,982 in current dollar terms). He served in this role from 1911 through 1917, and engineered the name change to "International League" before the 1912 season. As league president, he contended with the creation of the Federal League in 1914, which competed as a major league, and established franchises in International League cities, including Newark, New Jersey, Buffalo, New York, and Baltimore, Maryland. He attempted to gain major league status for the league in 1914, but was unsuccessful. When the Federal League collapsed, Barrow was the only league president to forbid the outlaw players from playing in his league. After the 1917 season, Barrow attempted to organize the "Union League", to compete against the AL and NL as a third major league, by merging four International League clubs with four teams from the American Association. Several International League owners opposed Barrow's policies, including his attempt to form the Union League, and felt he was too close personally to Ban Johnson. When the league's owners voted to cut his pay to $2,500 after the 1917 season ($47,753 in current dollar terms), Barrow resigned. Barrow became manager of the Boston Red Sox in 1918. As the team lost many of its better players during World War I, Barrow encouraged owner Harry Frazee to purchase Stuffy McInnis, Wally Schang, Bullet Joe Bush, and Amos Strunk from the Philadelphia Athletics for $75,000 ($1,220,243 in current dollar terms). During the season, Barrow feuded with his assistant, Johnny Evers, who undermined Barrow's leadership. The Red Sox won the 1918 World Series. Recognizing that star pitcher Babe Ruth was also a great power hitter, Barrow had Ruth pinch hit on days when he wasn't scheduled to pitch. When Ruth told Barrow that he could only pitch or hit, Barrow decided that Ruth's bat was more useful than his pitching, and transitioned him from a pitcher into an outfielder. After the 1918 season, Frazee, now in debt, began selling the contracts of star players. He traded Dutch Leonard, Duffy Lewis, and Ernie Shore to the New York Yankees, obtaining Ray Caldwell, Slim Love, Frank Gilhooley, Roxy Walters, and cash. Frazee sold Carl Mays to the Yankees during the 1919 season. The Red Sox struggled in 1919, finishing sixth in the AL. Frazee sold Ruth to the Yankees after the season, against Barrow's warnings. The Red Sox finished in fifth in 1920. CANNOTANSWER | 1910, | Edward Grant Barrow (May 10, 1868 – December 15, 1953) was an American manager and front office executive in Major League Baseball. He served as the field manager of the Detroit Tigers and Boston Red Sox. He served as business manager (de facto general manager) of the New York Yankees from 1921 to 1939 and as team president from 1939 to 1945, and is credited with building the Yankee dynasty. Barrow was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1953.
Born in a covered wagon in Springfield, Illinois, Barrow worked as a journalist and soap salesman before entering the business of baseball by selling concessions at games. From there, Barrow purchased minor league baseball teams, also serving as team manager, and served as president of the Atlantic League. After managing the Tigers in 1903 and 1904 and returning to the minor leagues, Barrow became disenchanted with baseball, and left the game to operate a hotel.
Barrow returned to baseball in 1910 as president of the Eastern League. After a seven-year tenure, Barrow managed the Red Sox from 1918 through 1920, leading the team to victory in the 1918 World Series. When Red Sox owner Harry Frazee began to sell his star players, Barrow joined the Yankees. During his quarter-century as their baseball operations chief, the Yankees won 14 AL pennants and 10 World Series titles.
Early life
Barrow was born in Springfield, Illinois, the oldest of four children, all male, born to Effie Ann Vinson-Heller and John Barrow. Barrow's father fought in the Ohio Volunteer Militia during the American Civil War. Following the war, Barrow's parents, with John's mother, brothers, and sisters, traveled in a covered wagon to Nebraska; Barrow was born on a hemp plantation belonging to relatives during the trip. The Barrows lived in Nebraska for six years before moving to Des Moines, Iowa. His middle name, Grant, was bestowed on him in honor of Ulysses S. Grant, the Civil War general.
Barrow worked as mailing clerk for the Des Moines News in 1887, receiving a promotion to circulation manager within a year. He became a reporter for the Des Moines Leader after graduating from high school. He became city editor, earning $35 a week ($ in current dollar terms). In his last two years living in Des Moines, Barrow established a baseball team, which included future baseball stars Fred Clarke, Ducky Holmes, and Herm McFarland.
Barrow moved to Pittsburgh in 1889, where he worked as a soap salesman, believing there was money in this business. However, Barrow lost all of money in this business, and went to work as a desk clerk in a Pittsburgh hotel.
Baseball career
Early career
Barrow partnered with Harry Stevens in 1894 to sell concessions at baseball games. He helped George Moreland form the Interstate League, a Class-C minor league, in 1894. Barrow, with Stevens and Al Buckenberger, purchased the Wheeling Nailers of the Interstate League in 1896. Barrow served as field manager until the collapse of the league that season. The team continued in the Iron and Oil League for the rest of the year.
Barrow then bought the Paterson Silk Weavers of the Class-A Atlantic League, managing them for the rest of the 1896 season. Barrow discovered Honus Wagner throwing lumps of coal at a railroad station in Pennsylvania, and signed him to his first professional contract. Barrow sold Wagner to the Louisville Colonels of the National League (NL) for $2,100 the next year ($ in current dollar terms). With poor attendance, Barrow brought in professional boxers as a draw: he had James J. Corbett play first base while John L. Sullivan and James J. Jeffries umpired. He also hired Lizzie Arlington, the first woman in professional baseball, to pitch a few innings a game.
From 1897 through 1899, Barrow served as president of the Atlantic League. During this time, in the winter of 1898–99, Barrow and Jake Wells established a movie theater in Richmond, Virginia. Barrow managed Paterson again in 1899, but the league folded after the season.
With the money earned from the sale of the Richmond movie theater, Barrow purchased a one-quarter share of the Toronto Maple Leafs of the Class-A Eastern League in 1900 from Arthur Irwin, and served as the team's manager. Irwin, hired to be the manager of the Washington Senators of the NL, brought his most talented players with him. Rebuilding the Maple Leafs, Barrow acquired talented players, such as Nick Altrock, and the team improved from a fifth-place finish in 1899, to a third-place finish in 1900, and a second-place finish in 1901. The Maple Leafs won the league championship in 1902, even though they lost many of their most talented players, including Altrock, to the upstart American League (AL).
Barrow managed in the major leagues with the Detroit Tigers of the AL in 1903, finishing fifth, a 13-game improvement from their 1902 finish. With the Tigers, Barrow feuded with shortstop Kid Elberfeld. Tigers' owner Sam Angus sold the team to William H. Yawkey before the 1904 season. Barrow managed the Tigers again in 1904, but unable to coexist with Frank Navin, Yawkey's secretary-treasurer, Barrow tendered his resignation. He then managed the Montreal Royals of the Eastern League for the rest of the season. He managed the Indianapolis Indians of the Class-A American Association in 1905 and Toronto in 1906. Disheartened with baseball after finishing in last place, Barrow hired Joe Kelley to manage Toronto in 1907, and after signing the rest of the team's players, became manager of the Windsor Arms Hotel in Toronto.
Return to baseball
Barrow returned to baseball in 1910, managing Montreal. The Eastern League hired Barrow as its president the next year, giving him an annual salary of $7,500 ($ in current dollar terms). He served in this role from 1911 through 1917, and engineered the name change to "International League" before the 1912 season. As league president, he contended with the creation of the Federal League in 1914, which competed as a major league, and established franchises in International League cities, including Newark, New Jersey, Buffalo, New York, and Baltimore, Maryland. He attempted to gain major league status for the league in 1914, but was unsuccessful. When the Federal League collapsed, Barrow was the only league president to forbid the outlaw players from playing in his league.
After the 1917 season, Barrow attempted to organize the "Union League", to compete against the AL and NL as a third major league, by merging four International League clubs with four teams from the American Association. Several International League owners opposed Barrow's policies, including his attempt to form the Union League, and felt he was too close personally to Ban Johnson. When the league's owners voted to cut his pay to $2,500 after the 1917 season ($ in current dollar terms), Barrow resigned.
Barrow became manager of the Boston Red Sox in 1918. As the team lost many of its better players during World War I, Barrow encouraged owner Harry Frazee to purchase Stuffy McInnis, Wally Schang, Bullet Joe Bush, and Amos Strunk from the Philadelphia Athletics for $75,000 ($ in current dollar terms). During the season, Barrow feuded with his assistant, Johnny Evers, who undermined Barrow's leadership. The Red Sox won the 1918 World Series. Recognizing that star pitcher Babe Ruth was also a great power hitter, Barrow had Ruth pinch hit on days when he wasn't scheduled to pitch. When Ruth told Barrow that he could only pitch or hit, Barrow decided that Ruth's bat was more useful than his pitching, and transitioned him from a pitcher into an outfielder.
After the 1918 season, Frazee, now in debt, began selling the contracts of star players. He traded Dutch Leonard, Duffy Lewis, and Ernie Shore to the New York Yankees, obtaining Ray Caldwell, Slim Love, Frank Gilhooley, Roxy Walters, and cash. Frazee sold Carl Mays to the Yankees during the 1919 season. The Red Sox struggled in 1919, finishing sixth in the AL. Frazee sold Ruth to the Yankees after the season, against Barrow's warnings. The Red Sox finished in fifth in 1920.
To date, Barrow is the only manager to win a World Series without previously playing in organized baseball, whether in the minors or majors.
New York Yankees
After the 1920 season, Barrow resigned from the Red Sox to become the business manager of the Yankees, replacing the deceased Harry Sparrow. He took control of building the roster, which was usually the field manager's responsibility in those days. With the Yankees, Barrow handled the signing of player contracts, although owner Jacob Ruppert personally handled the contracts of Ruth and Lou Gehrig.
Barrow installed himself in the Yankees' infrastructure between co-owner Tillinghast L'Hommedieu Huston and manager Miller Huggins, as Huston frequently criticized Huggins. Barrow told Huggins: "You're the manager, and you'll not be second guessed by me. Your job is to win; mine is to get you the players you need to win." When Huggins suspended Ruth indefinitely on August 29, 1925 for "misconduct off the playing field", while also fining him $5,000 ($ in current dollar terms), Barrow supported Huggins.
In his first move with the Yankees, Barrow brought Red Sox coach Paul Krichell with him to New York as a scout. He purchased a share in the club in 1924. He also discovered executive George Weiss, whom he mentored. Barrow also orchestrated a series of trades with his former club, mainly to keep Frazee afloat. These trades netted the Yankees such stars as Bullet Joe Bush, Joe Dugan and George Pipgras. It has been argued that these trades only looked lopsided in favor of the Yankees only because the players sent to Boston suffered a rash of injuries. However, this is belied by the fact that Barrow almost certainly knew who was coming to New York in these deals; he'd managed nearly all of them in Boston.
The Yankees sought to develop their own players, rather than buying them from other teams, especially after the investment of $100,000 ($ in current dollar terms) in Lyn Lary and Jimmie Reese in 1927. However, Weiss and Bill Essick convinced Barrow to approve the purchase of Joe DiMaggio from the Pacific Coast League.
Barrow was considered a potential successor to AL president Ban Johnson in 1927, but Barrow declared that he was not interested in the job. When Huggins died in 1929, Barrow chose Bob Shawkey to replace him as manager, passing over Ruth, who wanted the opportunity to become a player-manager. Barrow also effectively blackballed Ruth from MLB's managerial ranks by suggesting to executives of other teams that Ruth was not equipped to manage a baseball team. Although Ruth and Barrow had been together for all but one season from 1918 to 1934, the two never got along. The Sporting News named Barrow their Executive of the Year in 1937.
After Ruppert's death in 1939, his will left the Yankees and other assets in a trust for his descendants. The will also named Barrow president of the Yankees, with full authority over the team's day-to-day operations. Barrow was named Executive of the Year by The Sporting News in 1941, the second time he won the award. The estate sold the team to a group of Larry MacPhail, Dan Topping, and Del Webb in 1945, and Barrow sold his 10% stake in the team to the group. Barrow remained as chairman of the board and an informal adviser. Though he signed a five-year contract to remain with the team, he exercised a clause in his contract to free himself as of December 31, 1946, in order to officially retire from baseball. AL president Will Harridge offered Barrow the job of Commissioner of Baseball to succeed Kenesaw Mountain Landis; Barrow declined, as he felt he was too old and his health was in decline.
Managerial record
Personal life
Barrow was known as "Uncle Egbert" to his friends; according to writer Tom Meany, Babe Ruth referred to him as "Barrows," treating him as if he were "a butler in an English drawing room comedy." He resided in Rye, New York. He first married in 1898, but did not discuss it in any of his writings. His second marriage was to Fannie Taylor Briggs in January 1912; he raised her five-year-old daughter from her previous marriage, Audrey, as his own daughter.
Barrow was an able boxer. He once fought John L. Sullivan in an exhibition for four rounds.
Barrow was hospitalized on July 7, 1953 at the United Hospital of Port Chester, New York and died on December 15, at the age of 85, due to a malignancy. His body was kept at Campbell's Funeral Home and interred in Kensico Cemetery in Valhalla, Westchester County, New York.
Legacy
Barrow was the first executive to put numbers on player uniforms. He also announced the retirement of Lou Gehrig's uniform number, the first number to be retired. Barrow was also the first executive to allow fans to keep foul balls that entered the stands. Barrow was also the first to require the playing of "The Star-Spangled Banner", the United States' national anthem, before every game, not only on holidays.
In May 1950, an exhibition game was played in honor of Barrow, with Barrow managing a team of retired stars. Barrow was named on the Honor Rolls of Baseball in 1946 and elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame by the Veterans Committee in 1953.
On April 15, 1954, the Yankees dedicated a plaque to Barrow; the plaque first hung on the center field wall at Yankee Stadium, near the flagpole and the monuments to Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Miller Huggins. The plaques were later moved to the stadium's Monument Park.
References
Further reading
In-line citations
External links
Ed Barrow: The Bulldog Who Built the Yankees' First Dynasty
1868 births
1953 deaths
Sportspeople from Springfield, Illinois
National Baseball Hall of Fame inductees
Minor league baseball executives
Major League Baseball general managers
Boston Red Sox managers
Detroit Tigers managers
Indianapolis Indians managers
Montreal Royals managers
Toronto Maple Leafs (International League) managers
New York Yankees executives
Burials at Kensico Cemetery
World Series-winning managers | true | [
"Adam William \"Ad\" Swigler (September 21, 1895 – February 5, 1975), nicknamed \"Doc\", was an American professional baseball pitcher. Swigler played for the New York Giants in the season. In 1 career game, he had a 0-1 record, with a 6.00 ERA. He batted and threw right-handed. Due to an arm injury, he did not return to professional baseball, but did continue to play semi-professional ball. He was an alumnus of the University of Pennsylvania School of Dental Medicine.\n\nSwigler was born and died in Philadelphia.\n\nUniversity of Pennsylvania\nSwigler received a baseball scholarship to attend the University of Pennsylvania. While there, he lettered in baseball, track, football, and basketball. After his professional baseball season, Swigler served as the Freshman baseball coach at Penn.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1895 births\n1975 deaths\nNew York Giants (NL) players\nMajor League Baseball pitchers\nBaseball players from Philadelphia\nPenn Quakers baseball players\nNashville Vols players\nNewark Bears (IL) players\nUniversity of Pennsylvania School of Dental Medicine alumni\nAmerican dentists\nUnited States Army personnel of World War I\nUnited States Army officers\nPenn Quakers baseball coaches\nPenn Quakers football players",
"Daniel Allan Ramirez (born May 1, 1957) is a former Major League Baseball pitcher. He attended Rice University.\n\nIn 1975, Ramirez was drafted by the Philadelphia Phillies in the 23rd round (535th overall) but opted not to sign. Three years later, he was drafted by the Texas Rangers in the 10th round (254th) but still did not sign. One year later, he was drafted by the Baltimore Orioles in the 5th round (123rd) and did sign.\n \nHis professional career started one year later, in 1979 in the FSL. Even though his record in his first season was 3-9, his ERA of 2.61 was enough to earn him a promotion to AA, where he went 16-8 with a 2.98 ERA in 29 games the next season. His 1981 season with AAA Rochester was less successful, with a 4.17 ERA over 8 games. Ramirez spent time in A-ball that year too, going 0-1 with a 2.77 ERA. \n \nOn June 8, 1983, at the age of 26, he made his Major League debut with the Baltimore Orioles. Over the course of 11 games pitched for the Orioles that the season, he gave up 30 walks while striking out only 20 batters, and he did not return the majors. \n\nRamirez currently resides in Victoria, Texas.\n\nExternal links\nBaseball Reference\n\n1957 births\nLiving people\nMajor League Baseball pitchers\nBaltimore Orioles players\nBaseball players from Texas\nHagerstown Suns players\nRice Owls baseball players\nDaytona Beach Admirals players\nPeople from Victoria, Texas"
]
|
[
"Ed Barrow",
"Return to baseball",
"What year did he return to baseball?",
"1910,"
]
| C_fdd107875b0c4772925599906971c74a_0 | What had he been doing before that? | 2 | What had Ed Barrow been doing before he returned to baseball? | Ed Barrow | Barrow returned to baseball in 1910, managing Montreal. The Eastern League hired Barrow as its president the next year, giving him an annual salary of $7,500 ($196,982 in current dollar terms). He served in this role from 1911 through 1917, and engineered the name change to "International League" before the 1912 season. As league president, he contended with the creation of the Federal League in 1914, which competed as a major league, and established franchises in International League cities, including Newark, New Jersey, Buffalo, New York, and Baltimore, Maryland. He attempted to gain major league status for the league in 1914, but was unsuccessful. When the Federal League collapsed, Barrow was the only league president to forbid the outlaw players from playing in his league. After the 1917 season, Barrow attempted to organize the "Union League", to compete against the AL and NL as a third major league, by merging four International League clubs with four teams from the American Association. Several International League owners opposed Barrow's policies, including his attempt to form the Union League, and felt he was too close personally to Ban Johnson. When the league's owners voted to cut his pay to $2,500 after the 1917 season ($47,753 in current dollar terms), Barrow resigned. Barrow became manager of the Boston Red Sox in 1918. As the team lost many of its better players during World War I, Barrow encouraged owner Harry Frazee to purchase Stuffy McInnis, Wally Schang, Bullet Joe Bush, and Amos Strunk from the Philadelphia Athletics for $75,000 ($1,220,243 in current dollar terms). During the season, Barrow feuded with his assistant, Johnny Evers, who undermined Barrow's leadership. The Red Sox won the 1918 World Series. Recognizing that star pitcher Babe Ruth was also a great power hitter, Barrow had Ruth pinch hit on days when he wasn't scheduled to pitch. When Ruth told Barrow that he could only pitch or hit, Barrow decided that Ruth's bat was more useful than his pitching, and transitioned him from a pitcher into an outfielder. After the 1918 season, Frazee, now in debt, began selling the contracts of star players. He traded Dutch Leonard, Duffy Lewis, and Ernie Shore to the New York Yankees, obtaining Ray Caldwell, Slim Love, Frank Gilhooley, Roxy Walters, and cash. Frazee sold Carl Mays to the Yankees during the 1919 season. The Red Sox struggled in 1919, finishing sixth in the AL. Frazee sold Ruth to the Yankees after the season, against Barrow's warnings. The Red Sox finished in fifth in 1920. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Edward Grant Barrow (May 10, 1868 – December 15, 1953) was an American manager and front office executive in Major League Baseball. He served as the field manager of the Detroit Tigers and Boston Red Sox. He served as business manager (de facto general manager) of the New York Yankees from 1921 to 1939 and as team president from 1939 to 1945, and is credited with building the Yankee dynasty. Barrow was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1953.
Born in a covered wagon in Springfield, Illinois, Barrow worked as a journalist and soap salesman before entering the business of baseball by selling concessions at games. From there, Barrow purchased minor league baseball teams, also serving as team manager, and served as president of the Atlantic League. After managing the Tigers in 1903 and 1904 and returning to the minor leagues, Barrow became disenchanted with baseball, and left the game to operate a hotel.
Barrow returned to baseball in 1910 as president of the Eastern League. After a seven-year tenure, Barrow managed the Red Sox from 1918 through 1920, leading the team to victory in the 1918 World Series. When Red Sox owner Harry Frazee began to sell his star players, Barrow joined the Yankees. During his quarter-century as their baseball operations chief, the Yankees won 14 AL pennants and 10 World Series titles.
Early life
Barrow was born in Springfield, Illinois, the oldest of four children, all male, born to Effie Ann Vinson-Heller and John Barrow. Barrow's father fought in the Ohio Volunteer Militia during the American Civil War. Following the war, Barrow's parents, with John's mother, brothers, and sisters, traveled in a covered wagon to Nebraska; Barrow was born on a hemp plantation belonging to relatives during the trip. The Barrows lived in Nebraska for six years before moving to Des Moines, Iowa. His middle name, Grant, was bestowed on him in honor of Ulysses S. Grant, the Civil War general.
Barrow worked as mailing clerk for the Des Moines News in 1887, receiving a promotion to circulation manager within a year. He became a reporter for the Des Moines Leader after graduating from high school. He became city editor, earning $35 a week ($ in current dollar terms). In his last two years living in Des Moines, Barrow established a baseball team, which included future baseball stars Fred Clarke, Ducky Holmes, and Herm McFarland.
Barrow moved to Pittsburgh in 1889, where he worked as a soap salesman, believing there was money in this business. However, Barrow lost all of money in this business, and went to work as a desk clerk in a Pittsburgh hotel.
Baseball career
Early career
Barrow partnered with Harry Stevens in 1894 to sell concessions at baseball games. He helped George Moreland form the Interstate League, a Class-C minor league, in 1894. Barrow, with Stevens and Al Buckenberger, purchased the Wheeling Nailers of the Interstate League in 1896. Barrow served as field manager until the collapse of the league that season. The team continued in the Iron and Oil League for the rest of the year.
Barrow then bought the Paterson Silk Weavers of the Class-A Atlantic League, managing them for the rest of the 1896 season. Barrow discovered Honus Wagner throwing lumps of coal at a railroad station in Pennsylvania, and signed him to his first professional contract. Barrow sold Wagner to the Louisville Colonels of the National League (NL) for $2,100 the next year ($ in current dollar terms). With poor attendance, Barrow brought in professional boxers as a draw: he had James J. Corbett play first base while John L. Sullivan and James J. Jeffries umpired. He also hired Lizzie Arlington, the first woman in professional baseball, to pitch a few innings a game.
From 1897 through 1899, Barrow served as president of the Atlantic League. During this time, in the winter of 1898–99, Barrow and Jake Wells established a movie theater in Richmond, Virginia. Barrow managed Paterson again in 1899, but the league folded after the season.
With the money earned from the sale of the Richmond movie theater, Barrow purchased a one-quarter share of the Toronto Maple Leafs of the Class-A Eastern League in 1900 from Arthur Irwin, and served as the team's manager. Irwin, hired to be the manager of the Washington Senators of the NL, brought his most talented players with him. Rebuilding the Maple Leafs, Barrow acquired talented players, such as Nick Altrock, and the team improved from a fifth-place finish in 1899, to a third-place finish in 1900, and a second-place finish in 1901. The Maple Leafs won the league championship in 1902, even though they lost many of their most talented players, including Altrock, to the upstart American League (AL).
Barrow managed in the major leagues with the Detroit Tigers of the AL in 1903, finishing fifth, a 13-game improvement from their 1902 finish. With the Tigers, Barrow feuded with shortstop Kid Elberfeld. Tigers' owner Sam Angus sold the team to William H. Yawkey before the 1904 season. Barrow managed the Tigers again in 1904, but unable to coexist with Frank Navin, Yawkey's secretary-treasurer, Barrow tendered his resignation. He then managed the Montreal Royals of the Eastern League for the rest of the season. He managed the Indianapolis Indians of the Class-A American Association in 1905 and Toronto in 1906. Disheartened with baseball after finishing in last place, Barrow hired Joe Kelley to manage Toronto in 1907, and after signing the rest of the team's players, became manager of the Windsor Arms Hotel in Toronto.
Return to baseball
Barrow returned to baseball in 1910, managing Montreal. The Eastern League hired Barrow as its president the next year, giving him an annual salary of $7,500 ($ in current dollar terms). He served in this role from 1911 through 1917, and engineered the name change to "International League" before the 1912 season. As league president, he contended with the creation of the Federal League in 1914, which competed as a major league, and established franchises in International League cities, including Newark, New Jersey, Buffalo, New York, and Baltimore, Maryland. He attempted to gain major league status for the league in 1914, but was unsuccessful. When the Federal League collapsed, Barrow was the only league president to forbid the outlaw players from playing in his league.
After the 1917 season, Barrow attempted to organize the "Union League", to compete against the AL and NL as a third major league, by merging four International League clubs with four teams from the American Association. Several International League owners opposed Barrow's policies, including his attempt to form the Union League, and felt he was too close personally to Ban Johnson. When the league's owners voted to cut his pay to $2,500 after the 1917 season ($ in current dollar terms), Barrow resigned.
Barrow became manager of the Boston Red Sox in 1918. As the team lost many of its better players during World War I, Barrow encouraged owner Harry Frazee to purchase Stuffy McInnis, Wally Schang, Bullet Joe Bush, and Amos Strunk from the Philadelphia Athletics for $75,000 ($ in current dollar terms). During the season, Barrow feuded with his assistant, Johnny Evers, who undermined Barrow's leadership. The Red Sox won the 1918 World Series. Recognizing that star pitcher Babe Ruth was also a great power hitter, Barrow had Ruth pinch hit on days when he wasn't scheduled to pitch. When Ruth told Barrow that he could only pitch or hit, Barrow decided that Ruth's bat was more useful than his pitching, and transitioned him from a pitcher into an outfielder.
After the 1918 season, Frazee, now in debt, began selling the contracts of star players. He traded Dutch Leonard, Duffy Lewis, and Ernie Shore to the New York Yankees, obtaining Ray Caldwell, Slim Love, Frank Gilhooley, Roxy Walters, and cash. Frazee sold Carl Mays to the Yankees during the 1919 season. The Red Sox struggled in 1919, finishing sixth in the AL. Frazee sold Ruth to the Yankees after the season, against Barrow's warnings. The Red Sox finished in fifth in 1920.
To date, Barrow is the only manager to win a World Series without previously playing in organized baseball, whether in the minors or majors.
New York Yankees
After the 1920 season, Barrow resigned from the Red Sox to become the business manager of the Yankees, replacing the deceased Harry Sparrow. He took control of building the roster, which was usually the field manager's responsibility in those days. With the Yankees, Barrow handled the signing of player contracts, although owner Jacob Ruppert personally handled the contracts of Ruth and Lou Gehrig.
Barrow installed himself in the Yankees' infrastructure between co-owner Tillinghast L'Hommedieu Huston and manager Miller Huggins, as Huston frequently criticized Huggins. Barrow told Huggins: "You're the manager, and you'll not be second guessed by me. Your job is to win; mine is to get you the players you need to win." When Huggins suspended Ruth indefinitely on August 29, 1925 for "misconduct off the playing field", while also fining him $5,000 ($ in current dollar terms), Barrow supported Huggins.
In his first move with the Yankees, Barrow brought Red Sox coach Paul Krichell with him to New York as a scout. He purchased a share in the club in 1924. He also discovered executive George Weiss, whom he mentored. Barrow also orchestrated a series of trades with his former club, mainly to keep Frazee afloat. These trades netted the Yankees such stars as Bullet Joe Bush, Joe Dugan and George Pipgras. It has been argued that these trades only looked lopsided in favor of the Yankees only because the players sent to Boston suffered a rash of injuries. However, this is belied by the fact that Barrow almost certainly knew who was coming to New York in these deals; he'd managed nearly all of them in Boston.
The Yankees sought to develop their own players, rather than buying them from other teams, especially after the investment of $100,000 ($ in current dollar terms) in Lyn Lary and Jimmie Reese in 1927. However, Weiss and Bill Essick convinced Barrow to approve the purchase of Joe DiMaggio from the Pacific Coast League.
Barrow was considered a potential successor to AL president Ban Johnson in 1927, but Barrow declared that he was not interested in the job. When Huggins died in 1929, Barrow chose Bob Shawkey to replace him as manager, passing over Ruth, who wanted the opportunity to become a player-manager. Barrow also effectively blackballed Ruth from MLB's managerial ranks by suggesting to executives of other teams that Ruth was not equipped to manage a baseball team. Although Ruth and Barrow had been together for all but one season from 1918 to 1934, the two never got along. The Sporting News named Barrow their Executive of the Year in 1937.
After Ruppert's death in 1939, his will left the Yankees and other assets in a trust for his descendants. The will also named Barrow president of the Yankees, with full authority over the team's day-to-day operations. Barrow was named Executive of the Year by The Sporting News in 1941, the second time he won the award. The estate sold the team to a group of Larry MacPhail, Dan Topping, and Del Webb in 1945, and Barrow sold his 10% stake in the team to the group. Barrow remained as chairman of the board and an informal adviser. Though he signed a five-year contract to remain with the team, he exercised a clause in his contract to free himself as of December 31, 1946, in order to officially retire from baseball. AL president Will Harridge offered Barrow the job of Commissioner of Baseball to succeed Kenesaw Mountain Landis; Barrow declined, as he felt he was too old and his health was in decline.
Managerial record
Personal life
Barrow was known as "Uncle Egbert" to his friends; according to writer Tom Meany, Babe Ruth referred to him as "Barrows," treating him as if he were "a butler in an English drawing room comedy." He resided in Rye, New York. He first married in 1898, but did not discuss it in any of his writings. His second marriage was to Fannie Taylor Briggs in January 1912; he raised her five-year-old daughter from her previous marriage, Audrey, as his own daughter.
Barrow was an able boxer. He once fought John L. Sullivan in an exhibition for four rounds.
Barrow was hospitalized on July 7, 1953 at the United Hospital of Port Chester, New York and died on December 15, at the age of 85, due to a malignancy. His body was kept at Campbell's Funeral Home and interred in Kensico Cemetery in Valhalla, Westchester County, New York.
Legacy
Barrow was the first executive to put numbers on player uniforms. He also announced the retirement of Lou Gehrig's uniform number, the first number to be retired. Barrow was also the first executive to allow fans to keep foul balls that entered the stands. Barrow was also the first to require the playing of "The Star-Spangled Banner", the United States' national anthem, before every game, not only on holidays.
In May 1950, an exhibition game was played in honor of Barrow, with Barrow managing a team of retired stars. Barrow was named on the Honor Rolls of Baseball in 1946 and elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame by the Veterans Committee in 1953.
On April 15, 1954, the Yankees dedicated a plaque to Barrow; the plaque first hung on the center field wall at Yankee Stadium, near the flagpole and the monuments to Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Miller Huggins. The plaques were later moved to the stadium's Monument Park.
References
Further reading
In-line citations
External links
Ed Barrow: The Bulldog Who Built the Yankees' First Dynasty
1868 births
1953 deaths
Sportspeople from Springfield, Illinois
National Baseball Hall of Fame inductees
Minor league baseball executives
Major League Baseball general managers
Boston Red Sox managers
Detroit Tigers managers
Indianapolis Indians managers
Montreal Royals managers
Toronto Maple Leafs (International League) managers
New York Yankees executives
Burials at Kensico Cemetery
World Series-winning managers | false | [
"\"What She's Doing Now\" is a song co-written and recorded by American country music singer Garth Brooks. It was released in December 1991 as the third single from his album Ropin' the Wind. It spent four weeks at the top of the Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart. It was co-written by Pat Alger.\n\nContent\nThe song is a ballad about a man who wonders what his former lover is currently doing and what her whereabouts are (\"last I heard she had moved to Boulder\"). While the singer has no idea what she is doing now, he proclaims \"what she's doing now is tearing [him] apart\".\n\nBackground and production\nBrooks provided the following background information on the song in the CD booklet liner notes from The Hits:\n\n\"What She's Doing Now\" was an idea I had a long, long time about a man wondering what a woman was doing. And it was very simple. What is she doing now? Is she hanging out the clothes? Is she running a business? Is she a mother? Is she married? Who is she with? When I told the idea to Pat Alger, he looked at me with a smile and said, 'I wonder if she knows what she's doing now to me?' When I heard that, the bumps went over my arms and the back of my neck, and I knew that he had something. Crystal Gayle cut this song back in 1989. It came back to us for the Ropin' The Wind album. It is a song that has crossed all boundaries and borders around the world. This has made me extremely happy because the greatest gift a writer can ask for is to relate to someone. I can't help but think that this song might relate to a lot of people.\"\n\nOther versions\nWhile Garth Brooks penned the song, he was not the first person to release it. On the 1990 release Ain't Gonna Worry'', Crystal Gayle recorded the song as \"What He's Doing Now\"; her version was not released as a single.\n\nTrack listing\nEuropean CD single\nLiberty CDCL 656\n\"What She's Doing Now\"\n\"Shameless\"\n\"We Bury The Hatchet\"\nUS 7\" Jukebox single\nLiberty S7-57784\n\"What She's Doing Now\"\n\"Friends in Low Places\"\n\nChart positions\n\nYear-end charts\n\nReferences\n\n1991 singles\nCrystal Gayle songs\nGarth Brooks songs\nSongs written by Pat Alger\nSongs written by Garth Brooks\nSong recordings produced by Allen Reynolds\nLiberty Records singles\n1991 songs",
"\"I Love What Love Is Doing to Me\" is a song written by Johnny Cunningham. It was recorded by American country music artist Lynn Anderson and released as a single in 1977 via Columbia Records, becoming a top 40 hit that year.\n\nBackground and release\n\"I Love What Love Is Doing to Me\" was recorded in April 1977 at the Columbia Studio, located in Nashville, Tennessee. The sessions was produced by Glenn Sutton, Anderson's longtime production collaborator at the label and her first husband. It was co-produced by Steve Gibson, making the session Anderson's first experience under the co-production of Gibson. Nine additional tracks were recorded at this particular session, including the major hit \"He Ain't You.\"\n\n\"I Love What Love Is Doing to Me\" was released as a single in May 1977 via Columbia Records. The song spent ten weeks on the Billboard Hot Country Singles chart before reaching number 22 in July 1977. The song was issued on Anderson's 1977 studio album I Love What Love Is Doing to Me/He Ain't You.\n\nTrack listings \n7\" vinyl single\n \"I Love What Love Is Doing to Me\" – 2:10\n \"Will I Ever Hear Those Churchbells Ring?\" – 3:32\n\nChart performance\n\nReferences\n\n1977 singles\n1977 songs\nColumbia Records singles\nLynn Anderson songs\nSong recordings produced by Glenn Sutton"
]
|
[
"Ed Barrow",
"Return to baseball",
"What year did he return to baseball?",
"1910,",
"What had he been doing before that?",
"I don't know."
]
| C_fdd107875b0c4772925599906971c74a_0 | What did the return to baseball involve? | 3 | What did Ed Barrow's return to baseball involve? | Ed Barrow | Barrow returned to baseball in 1910, managing Montreal. The Eastern League hired Barrow as its president the next year, giving him an annual salary of $7,500 ($196,982 in current dollar terms). He served in this role from 1911 through 1917, and engineered the name change to "International League" before the 1912 season. As league president, he contended with the creation of the Federal League in 1914, which competed as a major league, and established franchises in International League cities, including Newark, New Jersey, Buffalo, New York, and Baltimore, Maryland. He attempted to gain major league status for the league in 1914, but was unsuccessful. When the Federal League collapsed, Barrow was the only league president to forbid the outlaw players from playing in his league. After the 1917 season, Barrow attempted to organize the "Union League", to compete against the AL and NL as a third major league, by merging four International League clubs with four teams from the American Association. Several International League owners opposed Barrow's policies, including his attempt to form the Union League, and felt he was too close personally to Ban Johnson. When the league's owners voted to cut his pay to $2,500 after the 1917 season ($47,753 in current dollar terms), Barrow resigned. Barrow became manager of the Boston Red Sox in 1918. As the team lost many of its better players during World War I, Barrow encouraged owner Harry Frazee to purchase Stuffy McInnis, Wally Schang, Bullet Joe Bush, and Amos Strunk from the Philadelphia Athletics for $75,000 ($1,220,243 in current dollar terms). During the season, Barrow feuded with his assistant, Johnny Evers, who undermined Barrow's leadership. The Red Sox won the 1918 World Series. Recognizing that star pitcher Babe Ruth was also a great power hitter, Barrow had Ruth pinch hit on days when he wasn't scheduled to pitch. When Ruth told Barrow that he could only pitch or hit, Barrow decided that Ruth's bat was more useful than his pitching, and transitioned him from a pitcher into an outfielder. After the 1918 season, Frazee, now in debt, began selling the contracts of star players. He traded Dutch Leonard, Duffy Lewis, and Ernie Shore to the New York Yankees, obtaining Ray Caldwell, Slim Love, Frank Gilhooley, Roxy Walters, and cash. Frazee sold Carl Mays to the Yankees during the 1919 season. The Red Sox struggled in 1919, finishing sixth in the AL. Frazee sold Ruth to the Yankees after the season, against Barrow's warnings. The Red Sox finished in fifth in 1920. CANNOTANSWER | managing Montreal. | Edward Grant Barrow (May 10, 1868 – December 15, 1953) was an American manager and front office executive in Major League Baseball. He served as the field manager of the Detroit Tigers and Boston Red Sox. He served as business manager (de facto general manager) of the New York Yankees from 1921 to 1939 and as team president from 1939 to 1945, and is credited with building the Yankee dynasty. Barrow was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1953.
Born in a covered wagon in Springfield, Illinois, Barrow worked as a journalist and soap salesman before entering the business of baseball by selling concessions at games. From there, Barrow purchased minor league baseball teams, also serving as team manager, and served as president of the Atlantic League. After managing the Tigers in 1903 and 1904 and returning to the minor leagues, Barrow became disenchanted with baseball, and left the game to operate a hotel.
Barrow returned to baseball in 1910 as president of the Eastern League. After a seven-year tenure, Barrow managed the Red Sox from 1918 through 1920, leading the team to victory in the 1918 World Series. When Red Sox owner Harry Frazee began to sell his star players, Barrow joined the Yankees. During his quarter-century as their baseball operations chief, the Yankees won 14 AL pennants and 10 World Series titles.
Early life
Barrow was born in Springfield, Illinois, the oldest of four children, all male, born to Effie Ann Vinson-Heller and John Barrow. Barrow's father fought in the Ohio Volunteer Militia during the American Civil War. Following the war, Barrow's parents, with John's mother, brothers, and sisters, traveled in a covered wagon to Nebraska; Barrow was born on a hemp plantation belonging to relatives during the trip. The Barrows lived in Nebraska for six years before moving to Des Moines, Iowa. His middle name, Grant, was bestowed on him in honor of Ulysses S. Grant, the Civil War general.
Barrow worked as mailing clerk for the Des Moines News in 1887, receiving a promotion to circulation manager within a year. He became a reporter for the Des Moines Leader after graduating from high school. He became city editor, earning $35 a week ($ in current dollar terms). In his last two years living in Des Moines, Barrow established a baseball team, which included future baseball stars Fred Clarke, Ducky Holmes, and Herm McFarland.
Barrow moved to Pittsburgh in 1889, where he worked as a soap salesman, believing there was money in this business. However, Barrow lost all of money in this business, and went to work as a desk clerk in a Pittsburgh hotel.
Baseball career
Early career
Barrow partnered with Harry Stevens in 1894 to sell concessions at baseball games. He helped George Moreland form the Interstate League, a Class-C minor league, in 1894. Barrow, with Stevens and Al Buckenberger, purchased the Wheeling Nailers of the Interstate League in 1896. Barrow served as field manager until the collapse of the league that season. The team continued in the Iron and Oil League for the rest of the year.
Barrow then bought the Paterson Silk Weavers of the Class-A Atlantic League, managing them for the rest of the 1896 season. Barrow discovered Honus Wagner throwing lumps of coal at a railroad station in Pennsylvania, and signed him to his first professional contract. Barrow sold Wagner to the Louisville Colonels of the National League (NL) for $2,100 the next year ($ in current dollar terms). With poor attendance, Barrow brought in professional boxers as a draw: he had James J. Corbett play first base while John L. Sullivan and James J. Jeffries umpired. He also hired Lizzie Arlington, the first woman in professional baseball, to pitch a few innings a game.
From 1897 through 1899, Barrow served as president of the Atlantic League. During this time, in the winter of 1898–99, Barrow and Jake Wells established a movie theater in Richmond, Virginia. Barrow managed Paterson again in 1899, but the league folded after the season.
With the money earned from the sale of the Richmond movie theater, Barrow purchased a one-quarter share of the Toronto Maple Leafs of the Class-A Eastern League in 1900 from Arthur Irwin, and served as the team's manager. Irwin, hired to be the manager of the Washington Senators of the NL, brought his most talented players with him. Rebuilding the Maple Leafs, Barrow acquired talented players, such as Nick Altrock, and the team improved from a fifth-place finish in 1899, to a third-place finish in 1900, and a second-place finish in 1901. The Maple Leafs won the league championship in 1902, even though they lost many of their most talented players, including Altrock, to the upstart American League (AL).
Barrow managed in the major leagues with the Detroit Tigers of the AL in 1903, finishing fifth, a 13-game improvement from their 1902 finish. With the Tigers, Barrow feuded with shortstop Kid Elberfeld. Tigers' owner Sam Angus sold the team to William H. Yawkey before the 1904 season. Barrow managed the Tigers again in 1904, but unable to coexist with Frank Navin, Yawkey's secretary-treasurer, Barrow tendered his resignation. He then managed the Montreal Royals of the Eastern League for the rest of the season. He managed the Indianapolis Indians of the Class-A American Association in 1905 and Toronto in 1906. Disheartened with baseball after finishing in last place, Barrow hired Joe Kelley to manage Toronto in 1907, and after signing the rest of the team's players, became manager of the Windsor Arms Hotel in Toronto.
Return to baseball
Barrow returned to baseball in 1910, managing Montreal. The Eastern League hired Barrow as its president the next year, giving him an annual salary of $7,500 ($ in current dollar terms). He served in this role from 1911 through 1917, and engineered the name change to "International League" before the 1912 season. As league president, he contended with the creation of the Federal League in 1914, which competed as a major league, and established franchises in International League cities, including Newark, New Jersey, Buffalo, New York, and Baltimore, Maryland. He attempted to gain major league status for the league in 1914, but was unsuccessful. When the Federal League collapsed, Barrow was the only league president to forbid the outlaw players from playing in his league.
After the 1917 season, Barrow attempted to organize the "Union League", to compete against the AL and NL as a third major league, by merging four International League clubs with four teams from the American Association. Several International League owners opposed Barrow's policies, including his attempt to form the Union League, and felt he was too close personally to Ban Johnson. When the league's owners voted to cut his pay to $2,500 after the 1917 season ($ in current dollar terms), Barrow resigned.
Barrow became manager of the Boston Red Sox in 1918. As the team lost many of its better players during World War I, Barrow encouraged owner Harry Frazee to purchase Stuffy McInnis, Wally Schang, Bullet Joe Bush, and Amos Strunk from the Philadelphia Athletics for $75,000 ($ in current dollar terms). During the season, Barrow feuded with his assistant, Johnny Evers, who undermined Barrow's leadership. The Red Sox won the 1918 World Series. Recognizing that star pitcher Babe Ruth was also a great power hitter, Barrow had Ruth pinch hit on days when he wasn't scheduled to pitch. When Ruth told Barrow that he could only pitch or hit, Barrow decided that Ruth's bat was more useful than his pitching, and transitioned him from a pitcher into an outfielder.
After the 1918 season, Frazee, now in debt, began selling the contracts of star players. He traded Dutch Leonard, Duffy Lewis, and Ernie Shore to the New York Yankees, obtaining Ray Caldwell, Slim Love, Frank Gilhooley, Roxy Walters, and cash. Frazee sold Carl Mays to the Yankees during the 1919 season. The Red Sox struggled in 1919, finishing sixth in the AL. Frazee sold Ruth to the Yankees after the season, against Barrow's warnings. The Red Sox finished in fifth in 1920.
To date, Barrow is the only manager to win a World Series without previously playing in organized baseball, whether in the minors or majors.
New York Yankees
After the 1920 season, Barrow resigned from the Red Sox to become the business manager of the Yankees, replacing the deceased Harry Sparrow. He took control of building the roster, which was usually the field manager's responsibility in those days. With the Yankees, Barrow handled the signing of player contracts, although owner Jacob Ruppert personally handled the contracts of Ruth and Lou Gehrig.
Barrow installed himself in the Yankees' infrastructure between co-owner Tillinghast L'Hommedieu Huston and manager Miller Huggins, as Huston frequently criticized Huggins. Barrow told Huggins: "You're the manager, and you'll not be second guessed by me. Your job is to win; mine is to get you the players you need to win." When Huggins suspended Ruth indefinitely on August 29, 1925 for "misconduct off the playing field", while also fining him $5,000 ($ in current dollar terms), Barrow supported Huggins.
In his first move with the Yankees, Barrow brought Red Sox coach Paul Krichell with him to New York as a scout. He purchased a share in the club in 1924. He also discovered executive George Weiss, whom he mentored. Barrow also orchestrated a series of trades with his former club, mainly to keep Frazee afloat. These trades netted the Yankees such stars as Bullet Joe Bush, Joe Dugan and George Pipgras. It has been argued that these trades only looked lopsided in favor of the Yankees only because the players sent to Boston suffered a rash of injuries. However, this is belied by the fact that Barrow almost certainly knew who was coming to New York in these deals; he'd managed nearly all of them in Boston.
The Yankees sought to develop their own players, rather than buying them from other teams, especially after the investment of $100,000 ($ in current dollar terms) in Lyn Lary and Jimmie Reese in 1927. However, Weiss and Bill Essick convinced Barrow to approve the purchase of Joe DiMaggio from the Pacific Coast League.
Barrow was considered a potential successor to AL president Ban Johnson in 1927, but Barrow declared that he was not interested in the job. When Huggins died in 1929, Barrow chose Bob Shawkey to replace him as manager, passing over Ruth, who wanted the opportunity to become a player-manager. Barrow also effectively blackballed Ruth from MLB's managerial ranks by suggesting to executives of other teams that Ruth was not equipped to manage a baseball team. Although Ruth and Barrow had been together for all but one season from 1918 to 1934, the two never got along. The Sporting News named Barrow their Executive of the Year in 1937.
After Ruppert's death in 1939, his will left the Yankees and other assets in a trust for his descendants. The will also named Barrow president of the Yankees, with full authority over the team's day-to-day operations. Barrow was named Executive of the Year by The Sporting News in 1941, the second time he won the award. The estate sold the team to a group of Larry MacPhail, Dan Topping, and Del Webb in 1945, and Barrow sold his 10% stake in the team to the group. Barrow remained as chairman of the board and an informal adviser. Though he signed a five-year contract to remain with the team, he exercised a clause in his contract to free himself as of December 31, 1946, in order to officially retire from baseball. AL president Will Harridge offered Barrow the job of Commissioner of Baseball to succeed Kenesaw Mountain Landis; Barrow declined, as he felt he was too old and his health was in decline.
Managerial record
Personal life
Barrow was known as "Uncle Egbert" to his friends; according to writer Tom Meany, Babe Ruth referred to him as "Barrows," treating him as if he were "a butler in an English drawing room comedy." He resided in Rye, New York. He first married in 1898, but did not discuss it in any of his writings. His second marriage was to Fannie Taylor Briggs in January 1912; he raised her five-year-old daughter from her previous marriage, Audrey, as his own daughter.
Barrow was an able boxer. He once fought John L. Sullivan in an exhibition for four rounds.
Barrow was hospitalized on July 7, 1953 at the United Hospital of Port Chester, New York and died on December 15, at the age of 85, due to a malignancy. His body was kept at Campbell's Funeral Home and interred in Kensico Cemetery in Valhalla, Westchester County, New York.
Legacy
Barrow was the first executive to put numbers on player uniforms. He also announced the retirement of Lou Gehrig's uniform number, the first number to be retired. Barrow was also the first executive to allow fans to keep foul balls that entered the stands. Barrow was also the first to require the playing of "The Star-Spangled Banner", the United States' national anthem, before every game, not only on holidays.
In May 1950, an exhibition game was played in honor of Barrow, with Barrow managing a team of retired stars. Barrow was named on the Honor Rolls of Baseball in 1946 and elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame by the Veterans Committee in 1953.
On April 15, 1954, the Yankees dedicated a plaque to Barrow; the plaque first hung on the center field wall at Yankee Stadium, near the flagpole and the monuments to Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Miller Huggins. The plaques were later moved to the stadium's Monument Park.
References
Further reading
In-line citations
External links
Ed Barrow: The Bulldog Who Built the Yankees' First Dynasty
1868 births
1953 deaths
Sportspeople from Springfield, Illinois
National Baseball Hall of Fame inductees
Minor league baseball executives
Major League Baseball general managers
Boston Red Sox managers
Detroit Tigers managers
Indianapolis Indians managers
Montreal Royals managers
Toronto Maple Leafs (International League) managers
New York Yankees executives
Burials at Kensico Cemetery
World Series-winning managers | true | [
"The Hunter Eagles were formed for the ABL 1994-95 season after purchasing the Sydney Wave's licence, who had left the league two seasons earlier. The Eagles played in the ABL until the ABL 1997-98 season, and did not have sufficient funds to remain in operation.\n\nThe Hunter Eagles expected to return to ABL competition after the completion of the new Gosford stadium in 1999, But with the collapse of the ABL it did not eventuate.\n\nHistory\n\nSee also \nSport in Australia\nAustralian Baseball\nAustralian Baseball League (1989–1999)\n\nSources\n http://www.pflintoff.com/AMLBHIST.htm\n\nExternal links\nThe Australian Baseball League: 1989–1999\n\nAustralian Baseball League (1989–1999) teams\nDefunct baseball teams in Australia",
"Jason Joseph Groome (born August 23, 1998) is an American professional baseball pitcher for the Boston Red Sox of Major League Baseball (MLB). He attended Barnegat High School in Barnegat Township, New Jersey, and was considered a top prospect in the 2016 MLB draft, where he was the 12th overall selection.\n\nHigh school career\nGroome began high school at Barnegat High School in Barnegat Township, New Jersey. He made the school's varsity baseball team as a freshman, and as a sophomore, had a 6–2 win-loss record and 0.57 earned run average (ERA) in innings pitched for the school's baseball team. He transferred to the IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida, before his junior year, and committed to attend Vanderbilt University on a college baseball scholarship. Groome pitched to a 5–0 record and a 1.22 ERA with 81 strikeouts and nine walks in 43 innings as a junior.\n\nDue to feeling homesick, Groome opted to return to Barnegat for his senior year. However, the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association ruled that Groome was ineligible to pitch for Barnegat in April 2016 because the transfer did not involve a change of address. He regained his eligibility after 30 days, or half of Barnegat's games.\n\nProfessional career\nGroome throws a fastball between , a changeup, and a curveball. He was a potential first overall pick in the 2016 MLB Draft, and worked out for the Philadelphia Phillies, who had the first pick. Prior to the draft, Groome changed his college commitment from Vanderbilt to Chipola College, a junior college in Florida. He was selected 12th overall by the Boston Red Sox in the draft, falling in part due to a reported signing bonus demand of $4 million and because of his change in college commitment; teams had signability concerns. The Red Sox and Groome agreed to a $3.65 million signing bonus.\n\nIn 2016, Groome made two starts for the rookie-level Gulf Coast League Red Sox before being promoted to the Lowell Spinners of the Class A-Short Season New York-Penn League. He posted a combined 2.70 ERA in three games for the Red Sox and Spinners. He spent 2017 with both Lowell and the Greenville Drive of the Class A South Atlantic League, going 3–9 with a 5.69 ERA in 14 games between both teams.\n\nAt the start of the 2018 season, Groome did not play, with what was initially thought to be a flexor strain. On May 9, 2018, the Red Sox announced that Groome would undergo Tommy John surgery to repair a torn ulnar collateral ligament of the elbow. In April 2019, Groome was projected to return mid-way through the 2019 season; he made his first appearance on August 21, pitching an inning for the Gulf Coast League Red Sox. After another one-inning appearance in the Gulf Coast League, Groome made one appearance with Lowell; overall for the season he pitched four innings, allowing five hits and one run (2.25 ERA). After the 2020 minor league season was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Groome was invited to participate in the Red Sox' fall instructional league. Following the 2020 season, Groome was ranked by Baseball America as the Red Sox' number six prospect.\n\nOn November 20, 2020, Groome was added to the 40-man roster. In May 2021, he was assigned to Greenville, now a High-A team. In early September, he was promoted to the Double-A Portland Sea Dogs.\n\nPersonal life\nGroome has two older sisters and two younger brothers. , Jay Groome was living in Fort Myers, Florida. In December 2020, Groome married Amanda Muller, also of Barnegat, New Jersey; the two were expecting their first child in July of 2021.\n\nReferences\n\nFurther reading\n\nExternal links\n\nSoxProspects.com\n\nLiving people\n1998 births\nPeople from Barnegat Township, New Jersey\nBarnegat High School alumni\nSportspeople from Ocean County, New Jersey\nBaseball pitchers\nBaseball players from New Jersey\nGulf Coast Red Sox players\nLowell Spinners players\nGreenville Drive players\nPortland Sea Dogs players"
]
|
[
"Ed Barrow",
"Return to baseball",
"What year did he return to baseball?",
"1910,",
"What had he been doing before that?",
"I don't know.",
"What did the return to baseball involve?",
"managing Montreal."
]
| C_fdd107875b0c4772925599906971c74a_0 | How did Montreal do under his management? | 4 | How did Montreal do under Ed Barrow's management? | Ed Barrow | Barrow returned to baseball in 1910, managing Montreal. The Eastern League hired Barrow as its president the next year, giving him an annual salary of $7,500 ($196,982 in current dollar terms). He served in this role from 1911 through 1917, and engineered the name change to "International League" before the 1912 season. As league president, he contended with the creation of the Federal League in 1914, which competed as a major league, and established franchises in International League cities, including Newark, New Jersey, Buffalo, New York, and Baltimore, Maryland. He attempted to gain major league status for the league in 1914, but was unsuccessful. When the Federal League collapsed, Barrow was the only league president to forbid the outlaw players from playing in his league. After the 1917 season, Barrow attempted to organize the "Union League", to compete against the AL and NL as a third major league, by merging four International League clubs with four teams from the American Association. Several International League owners opposed Barrow's policies, including his attempt to form the Union League, and felt he was too close personally to Ban Johnson. When the league's owners voted to cut his pay to $2,500 after the 1917 season ($47,753 in current dollar terms), Barrow resigned. Barrow became manager of the Boston Red Sox in 1918. As the team lost many of its better players during World War I, Barrow encouraged owner Harry Frazee to purchase Stuffy McInnis, Wally Schang, Bullet Joe Bush, and Amos Strunk from the Philadelphia Athletics for $75,000 ($1,220,243 in current dollar terms). During the season, Barrow feuded with his assistant, Johnny Evers, who undermined Barrow's leadership. The Red Sox won the 1918 World Series. Recognizing that star pitcher Babe Ruth was also a great power hitter, Barrow had Ruth pinch hit on days when he wasn't scheduled to pitch. When Ruth told Barrow that he could only pitch or hit, Barrow decided that Ruth's bat was more useful than his pitching, and transitioned him from a pitcher into an outfielder. After the 1918 season, Frazee, now in debt, began selling the contracts of star players. He traded Dutch Leonard, Duffy Lewis, and Ernie Shore to the New York Yankees, obtaining Ray Caldwell, Slim Love, Frank Gilhooley, Roxy Walters, and cash. Frazee sold Carl Mays to the Yankees during the 1919 season. The Red Sox struggled in 1919, finishing sixth in the AL. Frazee sold Ruth to the Yankees after the season, against Barrow's warnings. The Red Sox finished in fifth in 1920. CANNOTANSWER | He served in this role from 1911 through 1917, and engineered the name change to "International League" before the 1912 season. | Edward Grant Barrow (May 10, 1868 – December 15, 1953) was an American manager and front office executive in Major League Baseball. He served as the field manager of the Detroit Tigers and Boston Red Sox. He served as business manager (de facto general manager) of the New York Yankees from 1921 to 1939 and as team president from 1939 to 1945, and is credited with building the Yankee dynasty. Barrow was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1953.
Born in a covered wagon in Springfield, Illinois, Barrow worked as a journalist and soap salesman before entering the business of baseball by selling concessions at games. From there, Barrow purchased minor league baseball teams, also serving as team manager, and served as president of the Atlantic League. After managing the Tigers in 1903 and 1904 and returning to the minor leagues, Barrow became disenchanted with baseball, and left the game to operate a hotel.
Barrow returned to baseball in 1910 as president of the Eastern League. After a seven-year tenure, Barrow managed the Red Sox from 1918 through 1920, leading the team to victory in the 1918 World Series. When Red Sox owner Harry Frazee began to sell his star players, Barrow joined the Yankees. During his quarter-century as their baseball operations chief, the Yankees won 14 AL pennants and 10 World Series titles.
Early life
Barrow was born in Springfield, Illinois, the oldest of four children, all male, born to Effie Ann Vinson-Heller and John Barrow. Barrow's father fought in the Ohio Volunteer Militia during the American Civil War. Following the war, Barrow's parents, with John's mother, brothers, and sisters, traveled in a covered wagon to Nebraska; Barrow was born on a hemp plantation belonging to relatives during the trip. The Barrows lived in Nebraska for six years before moving to Des Moines, Iowa. His middle name, Grant, was bestowed on him in honor of Ulysses S. Grant, the Civil War general.
Barrow worked as mailing clerk for the Des Moines News in 1887, receiving a promotion to circulation manager within a year. He became a reporter for the Des Moines Leader after graduating from high school. He became city editor, earning $35 a week ($ in current dollar terms). In his last two years living in Des Moines, Barrow established a baseball team, which included future baseball stars Fred Clarke, Ducky Holmes, and Herm McFarland.
Barrow moved to Pittsburgh in 1889, where he worked as a soap salesman, believing there was money in this business. However, Barrow lost all of money in this business, and went to work as a desk clerk in a Pittsburgh hotel.
Baseball career
Early career
Barrow partnered with Harry Stevens in 1894 to sell concessions at baseball games. He helped George Moreland form the Interstate League, a Class-C minor league, in 1894. Barrow, with Stevens and Al Buckenberger, purchased the Wheeling Nailers of the Interstate League in 1896. Barrow served as field manager until the collapse of the league that season. The team continued in the Iron and Oil League for the rest of the year.
Barrow then bought the Paterson Silk Weavers of the Class-A Atlantic League, managing them for the rest of the 1896 season. Barrow discovered Honus Wagner throwing lumps of coal at a railroad station in Pennsylvania, and signed him to his first professional contract. Barrow sold Wagner to the Louisville Colonels of the National League (NL) for $2,100 the next year ($ in current dollar terms). With poor attendance, Barrow brought in professional boxers as a draw: he had James J. Corbett play first base while John L. Sullivan and James J. Jeffries umpired. He also hired Lizzie Arlington, the first woman in professional baseball, to pitch a few innings a game.
From 1897 through 1899, Barrow served as president of the Atlantic League. During this time, in the winter of 1898–99, Barrow and Jake Wells established a movie theater in Richmond, Virginia. Barrow managed Paterson again in 1899, but the league folded after the season.
With the money earned from the sale of the Richmond movie theater, Barrow purchased a one-quarter share of the Toronto Maple Leafs of the Class-A Eastern League in 1900 from Arthur Irwin, and served as the team's manager. Irwin, hired to be the manager of the Washington Senators of the NL, brought his most talented players with him. Rebuilding the Maple Leafs, Barrow acquired talented players, such as Nick Altrock, and the team improved from a fifth-place finish in 1899, to a third-place finish in 1900, and a second-place finish in 1901. The Maple Leafs won the league championship in 1902, even though they lost many of their most talented players, including Altrock, to the upstart American League (AL).
Barrow managed in the major leagues with the Detroit Tigers of the AL in 1903, finishing fifth, a 13-game improvement from their 1902 finish. With the Tigers, Barrow feuded with shortstop Kid Elberfeld. Tigers' owner Sam Angus sold the team to William H. Yawkey before the 1904 season. Barrow managed the Tigers again in 1904, but unable to coexist with Frank Navin, Yawkey's secretary-treasurer, Barrow tendered his resignation. He then managed the Montreal Royals of the Eastern League for the rest of the season. He managed the Indianapolis Indians of the Class-A American Association in 1905 and Toronto in 1906. Disheartened with baseball after finishing in last place, Barrow hired Joe Kelley to manage Toronto in 1907, and after signing the rest of the team's players, became manager of the Windsor Arms Hotel in Toronto.
Return to baseball
Barrow returned to baseball in 1910, managing Montreal. The Eastern League hired Barrow as its president the next year, giving him an annual salary of $7,500 ($ in current dollar terms). He served in this role from 1911 through 1917, and engineered the name change to "International League" before the 1912 season. As league president, he contended with the creation of the Federal League in 1914, which competed as a major league, and established franchises in International League cities, including Newark, New Jersey, Buffalo, New York, and Baltimore, Maryland. He attempted to gain major league status for the league in 1914, but was unsuccessful. When the Federal League collapsed, Barrow was the only league president to forbid the outlaw players from playing in his league.
After the 1917 season, Barrow attempted to organize the "Union League", to compete against the AL and NL as a third major league, by merging four International League clubs with four teams from the American Association. Several International League owners opposed Barrow's policies, including his attempt to form the Union League, and felt he was too close personally to Ban Johnson. When the league's owners voted to cut his pay to $2,500 after the 1917 season ($ in current dollar terms), Barrow resigned.
Barrow became manager of the Boston Red Sox in 1918. As the team lost many of its better players during World War I, Barrow encouraged owner Harry Frazee to purchase Stuffy McInnis, Wally Schang, Bullet Joe Bush, and Amos Strunk from the Philadelphia Athletics for $75,000 ($ in current dollar terms). During the season, Barrow feuded with his assistant, Johnny Evers, who undermined Barrow's leadership. The Red Sox won the 1918 World Series. Recognizing that star pitcher Babe Ruth was also a great power hitter, Barrow had Ruth pinch hit on days when he wasn't scheduled to pitch. When Ruth told Barrow that he could only pitch or hit, Barrow decided that Ruth's bat was more useful than his pitching, and transitioned him from a pitcher into an outfielder.
After the 1918 season, Frazee, now in debt, began selling the contracts of star players. He traded Dutch Leonard, Duffy Lewis, and Ernie Shore to the New York Yankees, obtaining Ray Caldwell, Slim Love, Frank Gilhooley, Roxy Walters, and cash. Frazee sold Carl Mays to the Yankees during the 1919 season. The Red Sox struggled in 1919, finishing sixth in the AL. Frazee sold Ruth to the Yankees after the season, against Barrow's warnings. The Red Sox finished in fifth in 1920.
To date, Barrow is the only manager to win a World Series without previously playing in organized baseball, whether in the minors or majors.
New York Yankees
After the 1920 season, Barrow resigned from the Red Sox to become the business manager of the Yankees, replacing the deceased Harry Sparrow. He took control of building the roster, which was usually the field manager's responsibility in those days. With the Yankees, Barrow handled the signing of player contracts, although owner Jacob Ruppert personally handled the contracts of Ruth and Lou Gehrig.
Barrow installed himself in the Yankees' infrastructure between co-owner Tillinghast L'Hommedieu Huston and manager Miller Huggins, as Huston frequently criticized Huggins. Barrow told Huggins: "You're the manager, and you'll not be second guessed by me. Your job is to win; mine is to get you the players you need to win." When Huggins suspended Ruth indefinitely on August 29, 1925 for "misconduct off the playing field", while also fining him $5,000 ($ in current dollar terms), Barrow supported Huggins.
In his first move with the Yankees, Barrow brought Red Sox coach Paul Krichell with him to New York as a scout. He purchased a share in the club in 1924. He also discovered executive George Weiss, whom he mentored. Barrow also orchestrated a series of trades with his former club, mainly to keep Frazee afloat. These trades netted the Yankees such stars as Bullet Joe Bush, Joe Dugan and George Pipgras. It has been argued that these trades only looked lopsided in favor of the Yankees only because the players sent to Boston suffered a rash of injuries. However, this is belied by the fact that Barrow almost certainly knew who was coming to New York in these deals; he'd managed nearly all of them in Boston.
The Yankees sought to develop their own players, rather than buying them from other teams, especially after the investment of $100,000 ($ in current dollar terms) in Lyn Lary and Jimmie Reese in 1927. However, Weiss and Bill Essick convinced Barrow to approve the purchase of Joe DiMaggio from the Pacific Coast League.
Barrow was considered a potential successor to AL president Ban Johnson in 1927, but Barrow declared that he was not interested in the job. When Huggins died in 1929, Barrow chose Bob Shawkey to replace him as manager, passing over Ruth, who wanted the opportunity to become a player-manager. Barrow also effectively blackballed Ruth from MLB's managerial ranks by suggesting to executives of other teams that Ruth was not equipped to manage a baseball team. Although Ruth and Barrow had been together for all but one season from 1918 to 1934, the two never got along. The Sporting News named Barrow their Executive of the Year in 1937.
After Ruppert's death in 1939, his will left the Yankees and other assets in a trust for his descendants. The will also named Barrow president of the Yankees, with full authority over the team's day-to-day operations. Barrow was named Executive of the Year by The Sporting News in 1941, the second time he won the award. The estate sold the team to a group of Larry MacPhail, Dan Topping, and Del Webb in 1945, and Barrow sold his 10% stake in the team to the group. Barrow remained as chairman of the board and an informal adviser. Though he signed a five-year contract to remain with the team, he exercised a clause in his contract to free himself as of December 31, 1946, in order to officially retire from baseball. AL president Will Harridge offered Barrow the job of Commissioner of Baseball to succeed Kenesaw Mountain Landis; Barrow declined, as he felt he was too old and his health was in decline.
Managerial record
Personal life
Barrow was known as "Uncle Egbert" to his friends; according to writer Tom Meany, Babe Ruth referred to him as "Barrows," treating him as if he were "a butler in an English drawing room comedy." He resided in Rye, New York. He first married in 1898, but did not discuss it in any of his writings. His second marriage was to Fannie Taylor Briggs in January 1912; he raised her five-year-old daughter from her previous marriage, Audrey, as his own daughter.
Barrow was an able boxer. He once fought John L. Sullivan in an exhibition for four rounds.
Barrow was hospitalized on July 7, 1953 at the United Hospital of Port Chester, New York and died on December 15, at the age of 85, due to a malignancy. His body was kept at Campbell's Funeral Home and interred in Kensico Cemetery in Valhalla, Westchester County, New York.
Legacy
Barrow was the first executive to put numbers on player uniforms. He also announced the retirement of Lou Gehrig's uniform number, the first number to be retired. Barrow was also the first executive to allow fans to keep foul balls that entered the stands. Barrow was also the first to require the playing of "The Star-Spangled Banner", the United States' national anthem, before every game, not only on holidays.
In May 1950, an exhibition game was played in honor of Barrow, with Barrow managing a team of retired stars. Barrow was named on the Honor Rolls of Baseball in 1946 and elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame by the Veterans Committee in 1953.
On April 15, 1954, the Yankees dedicated a plaque to Barrow; the plaque first hung on the center field wall at Yankee Stadium, near the flagpole and the monuments to Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Miller Huggins. The plaques were later moved to the stadium's Monument Park.
References
Further reading
In-line citations
External links
Ed Barrow: The Bulldog Who Built the Yankees' First Dynasty
1868 births
1953 deaths
Sportspeople from Springfield, Illinois
National Baseball Hall of Fame inductees
Minor league baseball executives
Major League Baseball general managers
Boston Red Sox managers
Detroit Tigers managers
Indianapolis Indians managers
Montreal Royals managers
Toronto Maple Leafs (International League) managers
New York Yankees executives
Burials at Kensico Cemetery
World Series-winning managers | true | [
"Andy Nulman, born 1959, is a Montreal-based businessman best known for his activities in co-founding and promoting the Just For Laughs comedy festival; under Nulman's stewardship, the festival grew from a two-day show to a month-long event drawing international audiences. Nulman also sold multimillion-dollar corporate sponsorships and creator and/or executive producer of more than 150 Festival TV shows, in a variety of languages, all over the world. He wrote, produced and hosted the 1997 CBC production of \"The Worst of Just For Laughs,\" created the Gemini-award nominated gay sketch comedy show In Thru the Out Door for CBC and Showtime in 1998, and won a \"Best Variety Series\" Gemini Award for \"The Best of Just For Laughs\" in 1993.\n\nIn 1999, Nulman left the Festival's full-time employ; but he directed its major gala shows at the St. Denis Theater every July, and remained on the board of directors of the Festival's parent company until 2010 when he returned as president of festivals and television. He left the company in 2015 to work on the city of Montreal's 375 Anniversary Celebrations, and to launch Play The Future, a predictive gaming platform.\n\nOther Than Just For Laughs\nIn 1999, Nulman co-founded and was both president and CMO of Airborne Mobile, a pioneering mobile media company. In 2005, he and partner Garner Bornstein sold the company to Japan's Cybird Holdings for close to $100 million . In 2006, Airborne was cited as North America's 4th-Fastest Growing Tech Company by the Deloitte Fast 500. In June 2008, Nulman and Bornstein re-purchased the company.\n\nIn 2015, he launched the predictive gaming platform Play The Future, a lifelong passion which takes the \"future-telling\" principles of fantasy sports and applies them to multiple real-life data points, including weather, financial markets, film box office, concert attendance, chart position and other pop culture events.\n\nBefore joining Just For Laughs, Nulman was a journalist, starting at the age of 16 at the weekly tabloid The Sunday Express, where he stayed for six years, and was eventually promoted to the positions of Entertainment Editor and Promotion Manager. During that period, he also freelanced for publications the likes of Variety, Us Magazine and the rock 'n' roll music bi-weekly Circus Magazine. He attended the Desautels Faculty of Management at McGill University where he graduated with a Bachelor of Commerce degree in 1983.\n\nOther Accomplishments\nNulman is a well-traveled public speaker, and has spoken at conferences the likes of TED Active in California and C2MTL in Montreal. He has written three books: \"How To Do The Impossible,\" \"I Almost Killed George Burns\" \"Pow! Right between The Eyes! Profiting From The Element of Surprise.\" He has also been a frequent speaker at McGill University, including being honored to speak at the prestigious McGill Alumni Leacock Luncheon and the McGill Institute for the Study of Canada. For three years, he also taught the revolutionary \"Marketing and Society\" class in McGill's BCom program, where his students learned how to build YouTube channels and use them as a powerful corporate tool. Other accomplishments include being named one of the \"Top 40 Under 40\" business leaders by the Financial Post in 1997, being voted one of the Top 100 Montrealers of the 20th Century by the Montreal Gazette in 2000, and named a recipient of the McGill Management Achievement Award in 2004. He is a board member of Montreal's StartupFest, and won Startup Canada's 2016's Lifetime Achievement Award for Quebec.\n\nReferences\n\nLiving people\nBusinesspeople from Montreal\nCanadian Screen Award winners\nPlace of birth missing (living people)\n1959 births\nAnglophone Quebec people\nJust for Laughs\nMcGill University Faculty of Management alumni",
"Claude Mongeau is a Canadian railroad executive who served as the president and chief executive officer of Canadian National Railway (CNR) from January 1, 2010, to July 1, 2016. He succeeded Hunter Harrison. During his tenure as president of CN, he \"tried to improve ... frayed relations with the railway's customers and partners through a series of service agreements.\"\n\nBorn in Montreal, Quebec, Mongeau began his railroad career when he joined CN in 1994. \nHe held the positions of vice-president of strategic and financial planning, and assistant vice-president of corporate development. He was appointed executive vice-president and chief financial officer in October 2000.\n\nBefore joining CN, Mongeau was a partner with Groupe Secor, a Montreal-based management consulting firm providing strategic advice to large Canadian corporations such as Bombardier and Bell Canada. He also worked in the business development unit of Imasco Inc., a diversified holding company with subsidiaries operating in the manufacturing, retail, and financial services sectors. His career started in Europe with Bain & Company, a leading American consulting firm.\n\nIn 1997, Mongeau was named one of Canada's top 40 executives under 40 years of age by the Financial Post Magazine. In 2005, he was selected Canada's CFO of the Year by an independent committee of prominent Canadian business leaders.\n\nOn 26 April 2017 CN announced that the training center would be named after Mongeau.\n\nAccomplishments\nDirectorships:\n Norfolk Southern Corporation\n Cenovus Energy\n Toronto-Dominion Bank\n Telus Communications (2017-2019)\n Canadian National Railway Company (2009-2016)\n Nortel Networks Corporation (2006-2009)\n SNC-Lavalin Group (2003-2015)\n Railway Association of Canada\n The Canadian Council of Chief Executives\n\nEducation:\n\n McGill University Desautels Faculty of Management\n Institut Supérieur des affaires (France)\n University of Quebec in Montreal\n\nProfessional experience:\n\n Canadian National Railway Company\n Imasco Ltd\n Groupe Secor Inc.\n Bain & Company (Paris)\n \nAwards:\n\n Canada's CFO of the Year for 2005\n Canada's Top 40 under 40\n\nReferences \n\nLiving people\nCanadian National Railway executives\nCanadian chief executives\nChief financial officers\nMcGill University Faculty of Management alumni\nBusinesspeople from Montreal\nYear of birth missing (living people)"
]
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