De caballos y otros animales en el teatro francés medieval

Clipperton Atoll (Île de La Passion) is the only atoll in the Tropical Eastern Pacific (TEP) ecoregion and, owing to its isolation, possesses several endemic species and is likely an important stepping stone between Oceania, the remainder of the TEP, including other oceanic islands and the west coast of Central America. We describe the biodiversity at this remote atoll from shallow water to depths greater than one thousand meters using a mixture of technologies (SCUBA, stereo baited remote underwater video stations, manned submersible, and deep-sea drop cameras). Seventy-four unique taxa of invertebrates were identified during our expedition. The majority (70%) of these taxa were confined to the top 400 m and consisted mostly of sessile organisms. Decapod crustaceans and black corals (Antipatharia) had the broadest depth ranges, 100–1,497 m and 58–967 m, respectively. Decapods were correlated with the deepest depths, while hard corals were correlated with the shallow depths. There were 96 different fish taxa from 41 families and 15 orders, of which 70% were restricted to depths <200 m. While there was a decreasing trend in richness for both fish and invertebrate taxa with depth, these declines were not linear across the depth gradient. Instead, peaks in richness at ∼200 m and ∼750 m coincided with high turnover due to the appearance of new taxa and disappearance of other taxa within the community and is likely associated with the strong oxygen minimum zone that occurs within the region. The overall depth effect was stronger for fishes compared with invertebrates, which may reflect ecological preferences or differences in taxonomic resolution among groups. The creation of a no-take marine reserve 12 nautical miles around the atoll in 2016 will help conserve this unique and relatively intact ecosystem, which possesses high predator abundance.

The Theater of Scholastic Erudition Jody Enders For centuries now, the suspense created by the anticipation of a verdict coaxed from arguments pro and contra has kept audiences spellbound as readers and/or spectators awaited that most crucial of dénouements: the rendering of judgment. It should not be surprising, then, that during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries a similar disputational spectacle was drawing numerous and varied observers to the Parisian rue du Fouarre. Twice a year at Advent and Lent, all classes were canceled at the University of Paris so that the maximum number of university personnel might attend one of the most intriguing shows of the Middle Ages: the quodlibet.' Students and teachers, civil and religious authorities all flocked to the streets surrounding the Sorbonne as other university activities ground to a halt to allow them to witness and participate in this academic rite of passage for students of theology.2 If, however, the quodlibet did indeed inspire the public to turn out in droves, then the operative question is why: what was the appeal? I argue here that the quodlibet continues the dramatic declamatory tradition canonized and transmitted by Greco-Roman rhetorical practice. Characterized by such crucial theatrical components as theatrical space, costume, gesture, conflict, and audience participation, the quodlibet offered to medieval spectators a ritual spectacle that was as much a protodrama as the Christian liturgy.3 Still, it has yet to be properly acknowledged as what the late O. B. Hardison dubbed one of many unexpected places where we discover new origins of medieval drama. In 1925 in a "first orientational study," Palemón Glorieux made an eloquent plea for the scholarly rehabilitation of the quodlibet as a "literary genre" whose history had yet to be written (LQ, I, 6-11). Even within the framework of his avowedly modest goal of furnishing helpful background information about the "fifty years following the death of Saint Thomas" (I, 6), 341 342Comparative Drama Glorieux speculated that the quodlibet had literary repercussions so extraordinary (II, 7-8) that its participants were "actors" (I, 21) in a two-act play (I, 17). While his penchant for the theatrical register derived more from a dramatic writing style than from any systematic generic analysis, Glorieux 's intuition was correct: the quodlibet was in fact a form in which there was a crucial commingling of academic ritual and dramatic representation that has remained virtually unexplored in studies of the theater. However, where Glorieux theorized that the literary emphasis in the medieval theology curriculum might have encouraged a literary style of redaction of the quodlibet (I, 51-55), the converse is equally plausible: namely, that the performance of the quodlibet might have encouraged a scholastic style of dramatic conception.4 For example, in the striking case of Arnoul Gréban, we find a fifteenth-century dramatist distilling the entire Mystère de la Passion into the answer to a series of scholastic quaestiones. Apparently influenced by two specific quodlibeta of Thomas Aquinas ("utrum voluntas daemonum sit obstinata in malo" ["whether the will of demons is fixed on evil"] and "utrum fuerit magis conveniens quod persona Filii assumeret humanam naturam quam alia persona divina" ["whether it was more appropriate for the person of the Son to assume a human nature rather than a different person of the Trinity"]), Gréban is reported to have composed the play "seulement pour monstrer la difference du peché du deable et de l'omme et pourquoy le peché de l'homme ha esté reparé et non pas celluy du deable" ("only to show the difference between the sin of the Devil and that of Man and why the sin of Man was redeemed while that of the Devil was not").5 The introduction to his mystère might just have easily have announced a quodlibetal disputation: S'argurons que sy et que non comme saint Thomas l'a traictié soubtillement en son traictié sur le tiers livre des Sentences. Si ourrez arguz et deffenses pourquoy le mal pechié dampnable du deable fust irreparable, condempné a l'éternel feu; et pourquoy l'omme alegié fust, non obstant son pechié tres grief. (11. 1692-1701) Thus we will argue sic et...

Dear Cécile, I feel so honoured and privileged, as a former colleague and a close friend, to be able to initiate this dialogue across languages, cultures and continents with you. Since 1995, you have been publishing poems, short stories, novels and essays, while leading a career as Associate Professor of English at the University of Paris 12 and continue to bring out remarkable volumes of such creations, winning several prestigious awards on the way. However, I would like to single out my favourite text – A fleur de mots, La passion de l'écriture (2004) which is an incredibly beautiful essay on writing generally and your own creative process. I personally think that this book needs to be translated into English, without any further delay, for the benefit of the Anglophone audience worldwide. There you refer to the page as "this strange country of water and reflections" and describe your passion for words, specifying that there is "no special time for writing". The need for space, "a room of one's own", seems to be still the preoccupation of many writers. At the same time, because of your diverse peregrinations (an artist mother who had lived in India, a maternal family in Canada, relatives in Belgium, and your husband's roots in Tunisia, students in Finland), you have travelled to and discovered the history and memory of nations and peoples. Is Space or Time that stirs you most into writing?

Prise dans une phase de transition religieuse, l’histoire de l’une des premières saintes de l’Afrique romaine, Perpétue, martyrisée en 203 après J.-C. à Carthage, donne à voir l’effet de chevauchement des formes de sensibilité. Le récit de son martyre, la Passion de Perpétue et Félicité , est riche d’épisodes illustrant la confrontation des époques et des rapports d’historicité : les chrétiens les plus convaincus, notamment ceux qui apparaissent dans les sources martyrologiques, veulent s’inscrire dans un nouveau régime sensible, mais continuent de vivre dans une société où ils ont appris à se comporter en pères ou mères de famille, en citoyens libres ou esclaves, en civils ou soldats. Le récit de l’exécution de Perpétue contient ce type d’opposition entre deux modes d’existence devenus inconciliables, comme le montre en particulier ce moment où la sainte, renversée dans l’arène par une vache furieuse, voit sa tunique se déchirer et ses cheveux se détacher. La chrétienne ramène un pan de son vêtement sur sa cuisse dénudée, puis cherche une fibule pour se recoiffer. Se devine à travers ces gestes l’exigence chrétienne du martyre joyeux : la sainte ne veut pas être prise pour une pleureuse ou une suppliante. L’éclairage ethnologique peut aider à mieux saisir les enjeux sensibles de cet épisode minuscule. L’histoire de Perpétue gagne à être lue au prisme des techniques corporelles et de leur savoir partagé. La longue durée des gestes émotifs entre aussi en correspondance avec ce que Aby Warburg a pu désigner comme les résurgences ou survivances de très anciennes manières de faire, repérables dans l’art comme dans le monde social. L’enquête de Ernesto De Martino sur les prefiche de l’Italie méridionale permet d’élargir encore l’analyse : les gestes attendus précèdent l’émotion collective, ils la génèrent et la résument.

Le pote ngre, je veux dire, ce pote dont le coeur est filiale pulsation au rythme du tam-tam d'Afrique, parle ce langage des fleurs, exprime ses sentiments et ides travers les images, aussi dans un langage lmentaire par-del spirituel.(p.18) Faut-il, ici, parler de l'intuition comme source d'inspiration potique, parce que connaissance non rationnelle relevant du simple sentimentou prorer sur la maeutique potique, c'est--dire l'art d'accoucher les pomes.Bien au contraire, il s'agit cans d'interroger l'espace textuel de Prince Arnie Matoko, peupl de "mtaphores obsdantes", et o les mots se heurtent, se pressent, se chevauchent, coulent harmonieusement et se groupent en images (Lablenie, cite par Mpala-Lutebele, 2008, p.129).En d'autres termes, ce travail s'attle interprter des symboles obscurs et flamboyants autour du substantif coeur, sige de toute sensation et motion, pour en faire dcouvrir le sens cach, mettant en relief, tout au moins, les motivations psychologiques inconscientes du pote.De ce fait, il parat sant et imprieux d'apporter compendieusement des prcisions conceptuelles relatives aux vocables "symbolique" et "coeur", tout en considrant les notions sous-jacentes.Le terme "symbolique", l'oeil non voil, renvoie illico aux symboles, puisque la symbolique, en croire Le Robert, est la thorie des symboles, c'est--dire un ensemble des relations et des interprtations lies un symbole qui peut tre un objet, une image, un mot crit ou un son qui reprsente Rsum: La prsente tude porte sur la symbolique du coeur dans l'oeuvre potique de Prince Arnie Matoko.Elle consiste analyser et interprter la vie intrieure du pote par le truchement des symboles lis au substantif "coeur", sige de toute sensation et motion, pour en dbusquer le sens cach, mettant en relief, tout au moins, les motivations psychologiques inconscientes de ce dernier.Allant des interrogations significatives aux hypothses mises, en passant par l'exploitation des axes bien structurs, et s'appuyant essentiellement sur l'hermneutique et la psychocritique, cette tude a dmontr que la posie de Prince Arnie Matoko, saupoudre de mythe personnel et de mtaphores obsdantes, est, en bonne partie, rattache l'expression de la passion et de la rvolte du "je personnel", mais aussi, et surtout, du "je collectif".Ceci dsigne, par-dessus tout, la plurivocit de la symbolique du coeur chez Prince Arnie Matoko dont l'inconscient potique, travers ses vers, dvoile la virginit de son me et celle des autres.

It was long believed that Arnoul Greban, the author of the Mystère de la Passion, was born in the city of Le Mans and it was often emphasized his links with Paris, where his work was played. Yet, we now know that he was a native of Cambrai. Examination of the language he uses reveals that it bears sharp Picardy markings. We have noted here some graphic forms and especially twenty typical words: admonstrer, amais, amés, bescousse, broignee, bucquier, depostir, despaisier, encepper, ensoinne, esseullé, famis, forbastir (ou forbatre), fouans, hastereaux, loudier, palletoz, puraine, rapostir, scrutiner. We have been able to add two lexical picardisms, hitherto unknown, fremeux, which is the past participle of the verb formouvoir, et brioler, which is the good lesson in a passage often modified by the copyists.

1 COMPARATIVE ? ama Volume 27Winter 1993-94Number 4 Writing Before the Eye: The N-Town Woman Taken in Adultery and the Medieval Ministry Play Gail McMurray Gibson Richard Beadle has recently observed that "If any area of medieval English studies can be said to have changed out of all recognition over the past twenty years or so, it must be that of the drama."1 Certainly, twenty years ago I could have asserted the perversity of teaching a field of scholarly inquiry—the medieval English mystery play—whose very name ("mystery" play) was a modern scholarly invention perpetuating a linguistic confusion . As E. K. Chambers had nagged in 1903, the word 'mystery ' "is not English at all, in a dramatic sense, and in France first appears as misterie in the charter given by Charles VI in 1402 to the Parisian confrérie de la Passion." In a note he adds: "The first English use of the term 'mystery' is in the preface to Dodsley's Select Collection ofOld Plays (1744)."2 The medieval "mystery" plays, as I have more than a few times nagged to my own students, were in fact, ministerium plays, that is, plays performed by medieval craft or parish guilds. The Latin word ministerium and its vernacular Middle English forms 'myster' or 'mysterie' meant occupation, craft, or ministry. The biblical plays thus came to be called 'mysteries' in the sense of the post399 400Comparative Drama Reformation Chester Banns: "by xxiiii"e occupationes—artes, craftes, or misterye—these pagiantes should be played."3 But all medievalists must eventually learn to accept linguistic confusion as evidence of divine providence—which, as medieval theologians and exegetes knew, loves nothing so much as a good Latin pun. So it is that after twenty years I have come to realize that though, linguistically speaking, the field of my scholarship should be "the ministry play," the biblical drama of the streets of England was indeed a mystery—that is, a mysterium—and have come to see that it was an art form of signs and actions curiously antithetical to ministry. I have even come to see that E. K. Chambers was wrong in saying that there is no medieval English use of the word mysterium for this drama; John Lydgate 's banns for a London Corpus Christi procession quite explicitly call those pageants "mysteries grounded in scripture": This hye feste nowe for to magnefye, Feste of festes moost hevenly and devyne, In goostly gladnesse to governe vs and guye, By which al grace doothe vppon vs shyne; For now this day al derkenesse tenlumyne; In youre presence fette out of fygure, Shal beo declared by many unknouthe signe Gracyous misteryes grounded in scripture.4 Nor was Chambers correct in insisting that even the French use of "mystery" in a dramatic sense was an afterthought; as early as 1372 the French soldier, diplomat, and scholar Phillipe de Mézières wrote a play of the Presentation of the Virgin Mary in the Temple—written in Latin, though to be played, as he explains , either in Latin or in the vernacular as one wills—and in his lengthy, self-conscious prologue explained that since the play is to be in honor of Mary whose human life "reveals what is deep and hidden," its actions in fleshly acts and signs are means by which the mind, released from the weight of the flesh, may be enabled to arrive at knowledge of the invisible and visible elements of God's mysteries [misteriorum Dei] as it were through visible things, signs, and works, in accord with apostolic teaching.5 The Latin word mysterium, from Greek mysterion, originally signaled the secret initiations into epiphanies showing the riddles of life and of death in the cult religions of the Graeco-Roman world. According to Hippolytus, the climax of the famous Eleusinian mystery cult observed near Athens was a single harvested Gail McMurray Gibson401 head of grain revered in profound simplicity and silence.6 But the esoteric Greek word mysterion and then the Latin vulgate's mysterium (and finally 'mystery') entered the mainstream of Western tradition because of its surprising use, especially by the apostle Paul, in the New Testament. In...

Etalage complaisant! The Torments of Christ in French Passion Plays Véronique Plesch The study of the mystère de la Passion in France is in fact the study of the extraordinary expansion of the dramatic material , from the earliest plays of the fourteenth century to the cyclical monuments of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries which were performed over several days. This paper aims at showing how the development of sequences of the torments of Christ contributed to the general expansion of French Passion plays—its amplification to use a term from the poetic arts.1 It will also show how these violent and bloody scenes, so often misunderstood by the modern reader, are in fact far from being an "étalage complaisant des supplices du Christ, avec une fatigante multiplication de détails atroces" ("the pandering display of Christ's torture, with a tiresome multiplication of atrocious details"), as Alfred Jeanroy called them.2 These scenes are certainly not the product of the authors' sadism or even, as has been traditionally considered , aimed at satisfying the vilest and lowest instincts of the rabble.' We will see that the ways in which these scenes are expanded follow specific guidelines that in turn reveal their meaning . In other words, these scenes are expanded because they are meaningful: the modalities of their expansion are rooted in their meaning. In order to show this, I will first survey the dramatic and textual means used to amplify the scenes, then 1 will demonstrate that many of their sources can be traced back to exegetical readings and finally conclude by determining the kind of response sought by the texts likewise expanded. I base my analysis on four of the most important French Passion plays of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries: two fourteenth -century plays, the Palatine Passion4 and the Passion Sainte-Geneviève;'' and two fifteenth-century plays, the Passion a"Arras? and the Passion by Arnoul Greban.7 The scenes of 458 Véronique Plesch459 torture that will be considered take place in the Passion narrative between Christ's arrest and the departure for the way to Calvary, during the different moments of the trial of Christ.8 The question of the modalities used for the expansion of the material in French mystères has been previously addressed. For example, in her 1959 doctoral dissertation Mary Faith McKean identified five "techniques of dramatic presentation" that allowed the fatiste (the playwright) to develop the Gospel account: expansion , conversational realism, explicitation, reiteration, and objectivation of subjective notions.' These categories are still valid and can be applied to sequences of torments. "' But scenes of torments in plays are perhaps more than anything else primarily visual sequences. To state the obvious, gesture is fundamental to physical violence. To limit the staging of these scenes to a purely visual evocation—that is, to leave them mute—would give them a status secondary to scenes with words. As a result, the means of the expansion of these particular scenes are of a different order than that which McKean described. Also, gesture needs to be somehow fixed in the text, and, for this, stage directions are not sufficient. The sequences devoted to Christ's Passion before the way to Calvary are developed through an increase in the number of scenes, in the number of actors intervening and of actions performed , and through dramatic dialogue. The four Gospels provide the narrative skeleton of the story and fix the different types of torments: the mocking of Christ, the crowning with thorns, the flagellation. Over time, the Gospel accounts were complemented by scenes that, while not specifically mentioned by the Evangelists , were products of exegetical elaborations. For example, the motif of the ductio Christi" the leading of Christ from one place to the other, is an occasion for more torture. The Evangelists use the verbs duxerunt or adduxeruntr~ but do not mention the brutalities that are found in mystères such as the Passion SainteGenevi ève, the Passion d'Arras, and the Passion of Greban.'' Likewise, exegetical elaborations account for tortures occurring during the night following Christ's arrest which do not appear in the Gospels. In the Gospel of John. Christ is simply led...

The Passion Isabeau (1398) and its Relationship to Fifteenth-Century Mystères de la Passion

Der vorliegende Essay untersucht eine enthusiastische christliche Volksbewegung und ihre Rolle beim Bau der neuen Abteikirche Sankt Salvator in Sankt Martial von Limoges in den 1020er Jahren. Die ersten Erscheinungsformen dieser Religiosität waren die Gottesfriedensversammlungen in den Jahren 990-1030 ; Pilgermassen eilten durch das Land, die Heiligenverehrung und damit verbundene Liturgien wurden initiiert oder neu belebt und schließlich verbreiteten sich ikonoklastische „Häresien“ im einfachen Volk, die die Kirche und ihre Liturgie ablehnten. In Limoges flammte bei einer Gottesfriedensversammlung 994 der Kult um Sankt Martial auf und von nun an eilten alljährlich in der Fastenzeit Scharen von Pilgern herbei. 1018 wurde die Menge zu Tode getrampelt ; nach Ansicht Adémars de Chabannes bestärkte dieses Ereignis anti-kirchliche Bewegungen. In diesem Schmelztiegel im Limoges der 20er Jahre des neuen Jahrhunderts wurde der Bau einer neuen Kirche maiori amplitude in Angriff genommen, deren Grundriss auf die Aufnahme der Pilgerscharen zugeschnitten war. Die neue Architektur gewährte Laien, einfachen Leuten aus dem Volk, Männern und Frauen einen bis dahin nie dagewesenen Zugang. Mit den großen Pilgerkirchen eröffnete sich für die Pilger ein neues Zeitalter, in dem neue religiöse, ökonomische, soziale und intellektuelle Bewegungen entstanden.

It is not known where Jean Bellegambe, born circa 1470 in Douai, where he probably died in 1535/36, received his training. Artists in this region were exposed to influences from both Flanders and France. Bellegambe's stylistic development falls into two phases: the first (circa 1508 - circa 1 5 2 5) is rather archaistic, drawing on the school of Valenciennes (Marmion et al. and Provost); the second displays the more marked influence of Antwerp mannerism. The triptych discussed here, the Mystical Bath in Lille, made for the monastery at Anchin in view of the arms of the abbey and its abbot, Charles Coguin, on the wings, was only discovered in 1877. Comparison with Bellegambe's principal work, the polyptych The Holy Trinity, and the wings of the Immaculate Conception, both in Douai, has established it as his work. An examination of various published datings leads to the conclusion that this triptych is an example of the artist's second stylistic phase, which began in circa 1525, and was problably painted around that date. The association of the representation of 'Tons Pietatis' with the Office of the Holy Blood was based on the assumpion that the texts on Jean Bellegambe's Mystical Bath (a `Fons Pietatis' with bathing worshippers) derive from the Office ritual in Anchin. The texts however are literal quotations from the bible, the Office of the Holy Blood not being fixed in Bellgambe's day; the Anchin Office merits closer study. The idea that the cult of a relic of the Holy Blood in Anchin abbey may have influenced the iconography of at least the Mystical Bath is not supported by historical facts. Mâle's observation of a relationship between the Holy Blood cult and the representation of the 'Fons Pietatis' is thus reduced to a theologically underpinned assumption. Old and New Testament quotations with reference to the bible passages-not a new phenomenon as such may be connected with the renewed interest for the literal biblical text in the early sixteenth century. This suggests circa 1520 as the earliest date of the triptych. With his female figure of a repentant Mary Magdalene divesting herself of her garments and jewellery, Bellegambe introduces this theme into art. The motif and its combination with the `Fons Pietatis' motif seem to derive from religious drama, notably Jean Michel's Mystère de la Passion, performed in Mons in 1501. Although, in connection with the early sixteenth-century cult of Mary Magdalene, a revived interest in literal bible texts can be observed, it can not be demonstrated in Bellegambe's triptych. The fact that it was dccadcs before the jewellery-removing theme returned to art as an interior scene, may be due to Bellegambe's isolated position. The theological virtues and their attributes derive from a type developed in illuminated manuscripts of literary and philosophical texts, and may also have been inspired by the tableaux vivants enacted in Rouen and Amiens in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth century. Coguin's contacts with the 'Clercs Parisiens' in Douai seem to be reflected in these iconographic details of the Mystical Bath. The representation is addressed to both the inmates of the abbey, who according to the rule of the order are speeding towards salvation, and the lay people, who could identify with the pseudo Mary Magdalene on the steps in front of the bath and a few non-clerical male figures. Owing to the lack of archive sources, the precise context of the piece cannot be ascertained.

Animal cognition as the praxist views it

Inthe last decades, putative nonhuman linguistic skills have been proposed as an essential trait to better understand animal mind and communication, and the evolution of human language. This paper offers a critique of Animal Language Research (ALR) to date and posits that the methodological and interpretative problems of ALR derive from some key theoretical paradoxes implicit in the premises of the research Based on evolutionary and continuity arguments, ALR has assumed that nonhuman animals may posses some "rudiments" of human language. In contrast, it is argued that (a) the evolutionary origins of human language do not necessarily require the presence of linguistic capacities in nonhumans;. (b) animal communicative skills could be best understood through the study of their behavioral natural repertoire; and (c) the performance of animals in language studies can be an indicator of their cognitive abilities but not of their linguistic competence.

‘Have you ever read it?’ asks Socrates, and with his words Protagoras — a fifth-century BC philosopher none of whose writings survive intact — becomes an unwitting spokesman and byword in the centuries-long struggle to place non-human animals within the moral register of human beings. Buried in the corpus of Classical literature there is a diverse and enlightening narrative of man’s opinions of animals and a history of man’s interaction with the wider animal world. These works, in diverse genres from epic poetry and drama to rhetorical treatise and polemic, have been systematically mined and re-interpreted in the modern era and continue to provide historical parallels and insight into most areas of human behaviour, but until recent years only a few attempts had been made to synthesize their potential to shed light on the moral status of animals as expressed in this exceptionally well-documented period in human (or rather ‘human’) history. The best-known academic attempt to understand the nature of man’s moral relationship with non-human animals is Richard Sorabji’s 1993 Animal minds and human morals: the origins of the Western debate, and for all subsequent scholarship (including the present volume) the book remains a cornerstone in the study of ancient and modern moral understanding and the history of theorizing non-human animals’ mental faculties.

Le Quattro volte (2010) – which translates as ‘the four turns’ – tracks what the director Michelangelo Frammartino describes as ‘the journey of a soul’ through Pythagorean processes of transmigration, as the narrative focus shifts from an elderly goatherd to a kid goat to a tree to a batch of charcoal.1 While Le Quattro volte thus extends its attention across human, animal, vegetable and mineral realms, I wish to focus in this essay on the nonhuman animals – the dog, goats, ants and snails – that populate the film. Le Quattro volte might appear to invest uncritically in an image of pastoral idyll through its nostalgic focus on farming practices in Calabria (the region of Italy in which the film is set), thereby undermining any progressive positioning of animals as agents or political beings. Yet while Le Quattro volte takes risks, not only in its nostalgic rural vision but also in its mystical positioning of life cycles, the film balances this with a democratizing mode of human–animal representation. Drawing on the work of Jane Bennett, I explore questions of animal agency in the context of what I call Frammartino's ‘horizontalist’ aesthetics – a mode of cinematic presentation that works against speciesist hierarchies of being. I read questions of animal agency, objectification and performance both within and against this horizontalist aesthetics in order to consider Le Quattro volte's cinematic and democratic reimagining of cross-species relationality.2