Historical Chronicles Research Articles

ANNA WÜRTH, Aš-Šdaria fi Bab al-Yaman: Recht, Richter und Rechtspraxis an der familienrechtlichen Kammer des Gerichts Süd-Sanaa, (Republik Jemen) 1983–1995 (Berlin: Duncker and Humblot, 2000). Pp. 284.

Allan Christelow once remarked that court documents have the potential to provide a more thorough and unbiased picture of society than most other sources. Anna Würth's study of judicial procedures at a court in a poor Sanעani neighborhood would appear to give credence to this observation. The book covers an important stage in Yemeni post-revolutionary history embracing republican state consolidation, unification of the Yemen Arab Republic (YAR) and the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen (PDRY), and the Islamist challenge. It is based on more than one hundred fifty court cases, legal manuals, and unpublished draft statutes; “participant observation” at the court; historical chronicles; newspaper articles; and interviews with jurists and petitioners. Echoing the work of Mir-Hosseini and Messick, Würth conceives of law and legal practice as mutually constituting rather than separate domains. The book is divided into two main parts, each subdivided into two or more chapters. The first part deals with the norms governing the application of family law by the courts, describing court procedures during the period of Ottoman rule and the Hamid al-Din dynasty. Most chapters are devoted to an analysis of legal reform as part of state transformation from the 1970s to unification in 1990. Readers are offered a valuable overview of the diverse family laws of 1974, 1978, and 1992, their political objectives, and the debates surrounding them. The second part centers on the administration of justice at the court between 1983 and 1995.

Greek Historiography and the Chronicler's History: A Reexamination

Greek Historiography and the Chronicler's History: A Reexamination

Les inscriptions du That Luang de Vientiane : données nouvelles sur l'histoire d'un stūpa lao

Michel Lorrillard The inscriptions of the That Luang of Vientiane The That Luang in Vientiane, the principal religious building of Laos, has until now only been the subject of a purely descriptive architectural study. But we know, since 1930, that the present stupa covers earlier structures and that it is therefore the result of a relatively slow and complex process of construction. Today, the analysis of a certain number of inscriptional sources, the study of information that is to be found in historical chronicles and the interpretation of archaeological data can together bring us closer to the history of the monument and help to improve considerably our understanding of the context in which it was constructed. The That Luang, earlier known also as the "Phra Mahā That Chao Chiang Mai" and the "Lokaculāmani-thupa", was at first the private family building of the three principal Laotian sovereigns of the sixteenth century: Phothisarāt, Setthāthirāt and Hno Muang. It was certainly the most spectacular product of the cultural and political ties that united the two kingdoms of Lān Nā and Lān Xāng at the time, the first of which was already entering upon its phase of decline, while the second had struck a period of development that was to last a century yet.

The ‘Mediaeval Warm Period’ drought recorded in Lake Huguangyan, tropical South China

The geochemistry of dated sediment cores from Lake Huguangyan (21°9′N, 110°17′E), tropical South China, reveals distinct stratigraphical patterns in total organic and inorganic carbon (TOC, TIC), biogenic silica (BS) and total nitrogen (TN) over the past 1400 years. In this hydrologically closed lake, TIC variations may re‘ ect changes in the precipitation/evaporation ratio, which controls the evaporative enrichment of carbonate. TOC, BS and TN in the sediment are proxy indicators of lake productivity and nutrient input, which we believe are linked to local precipitation. High TIC content correlates with low concentrations of TOC, BS and TN, and indicates two drought episodes dated to ad 670–760 and ad 880–1260 in the sediments of Lake Huguangyan. Local historical chronicles support these data, suggesting that the climate of tropical South China was dry during the ‘Mediaeval Warm Period’ (MWP) and wet during the ‘Little Ice Age’ (LIA). The detected MWP drought is temporally correlated with evidence for lower precipitation on the Guliya (China) and Quelccaya (Peru) ice caps, and with increased salinity in Moon Lake (US Great Plains).

Kalhana's Rājataranginī: A Gender Perspective1

This is a study of the treatment of gender in the Rājatarańginī, a twelfth century chronicle of Kashmir by the poet Kalhana. The significance of this text, not just as an exemplar of the Indian historical chronicle tradition, but, more importantly, as an indicator of gender norms and notions in early medieval Kashmir is stressed. The article shows that Kalhana treats women as historically relevant figures, revealing their power and presence in the royal court culture and in the non- royal milieu. To this end, he adopts a deliberately ambiguous attitude towards women in his work whereby he repeatedly juxtaposes accounts of their influence with stereotyped comments on them. The article also stresses the indifference displayed towards the gendered aspects of the Rājatarańginī in most studies on it, thereby rendering a crucial feature of the text invisible.

Evolutionary archeology: Current status and future prospects

AbstractDarwinian evolution can be defined minimally as “any net directional change or any cumulative change in the characteristics of … populations over many generations—in other words, descent with modification”1 (p. 5). In archeology the population comprises artifacts, which are conceived of as phenotypic.2–4 Extension of the human phenotype to include ceramic vessels, projectile points, and the like is based on the notion that artifacts are material expressions of behavior, which itself is phenotypic. Archeology's unique claim within the natural sciences is its access to past phenotypic characters. Thus, historical questions are the most obvious ones archeologists can ask, although admittedly this is hardly a strong warrant for asking them. But if the issue is evolution, then historical questions must be asked. Posing and answering historical questions is the goal of evolutionary archeology.5.

Wars of the Theatres: The Poetics of Personation in the Age of Jonson by Matthew Steggle (review)

Forbidden Matter.Religion intheDramaofShakespeare andhisContemporaries. By GERALD M. PINCISS. Cranbury,NJ:Universityof Delaware Press;London:Associated University Presses. 2000. I42 pp. /25. One of the strikingfeatures of the last years of the twentieth century and the first months of the twenty-first has been the emergence of books on the religious controversiesof, roughly,Shakespeare'stime. These have come fromEarlyModern historiansand, somewhat laggardly,from literaryhistorians.Gerald Pincisswrites about six plays spanning forty years to demonstrate how they reflect the religious controversies of their times. His book opens with a brief (eight-and-a-half-page) account of religion and state censorship as it applied to plays. Pinciss, rightly quoting Richard Dutton's definitiveMastering theRevels (London:Macmillan, 991), agrees that the Revels Office was more permissive, even over religious material, than has often been assumed.Discussionof the sixplaysdoes show that 'playwrights could offera variety of views on mattersof religion, relyingon the intelligence and subtletyof the cleverermembers of theiraudience to applyor decode theirmessage fully'(p. 20). The word 'decode' ringsalarmbells, as allegorizingtexts can produce quite astonishingtheoriesof religiousconspiracy:yet Pincissdoes not often wander down that enticing alley. He disarminglynotes that (in spite of his book'stitle)none of the plays he dealswith caused controversy.He findsthat disturbancein response to Dr Faustuscomes from its theological indeterminacy. He may be right in his assumption that Marlowe must have been impressed deeply by 'the controversy between Calvinistsand Anti-Calvinists[. . .] duringhisyearsat Cambridge'(p. 38). What one misses in these seventeen pages on Marlowe is the experience of that play'snew high drama.The same istrueof the followingnineteen pages, a 'reading' of Measurefor Measure that finds clashing and ambiguous theological positions, and makesthe play, it mustbe said, seem a doctrinalmess. That is a position with which many would agree; but, again, interesting as his commentary is, there is no sense here thatMeasurefor Measure playssatisfyinglywell on the stage. Chapter4 compares Rowley's When You SeeMe You Know Meand Heywood's If You Know NotMe You Know Nobody,'prime examples of Protestant theater in the early Stuart years' (p. 58). Jonson's Bartholomew Fairshows the playwright'stolerance: Pinciss usefullyfollows through the suggestionsof sympathywith English Catholics in the play, alongside that for 'EstablishedChurch' and 'Puritan'figures,though his allegorizingof Grace Wellbornand her destinyis a little far-fetched.John Ford'sPerkin Warbeck is the last play in the volume, 'a Protestantcommentary on his own political world disguised as a chronicle history of the late fifteenth century' (p. io7). A final five-page 'Conclusion'summarizeswhat hasgone before.The fourteenpagesof notes (though not without errors)do make a useful survey of recent writing on the subjects.The sound of gunfire when Early Modern historians write about religion can be distressing,as can theirsense thatliteratureis a forbiddenand unchartedpartof the map where be dragons. Gerald Pinciss's short, rather charming and useful book comes as a refreshingcontrast. HERTFORD COLLEGE, OXFORD DAVIDDANIELL Warsof the Theatres: ThePoeticsof Personation in theAge of Jonson. By MATTHEW STEGGLE. (EnglishLiteraryStudies,75)Victoria, BC:EnglishLiteraryStudies. 1998. I48 pp. $I6. The book investigates English Renaissance satirical comedies representing living people between 1598and I640. Such 'personation',often ofplaywrightsthemselves, Forbidden Matter.Religion intheDramaofShakespeare andhisContemporaries. By GERALD M. PINCISS. Cranbury,NJ:Universityof Delaware Press;London:Associated University Presses. 2000. I42 pp. /25. One of the strikingfeatures of the last years of the twentieth century and the first months of the twenty-first has been the emergence of books on the religious controversiesof, roughly,Shakespeare'stime. These have come fromEarlyModern historiansand, somewhat laggardly,from literaryhistorians.Gerald Pincisswrites about six plays spanning forty years to demonstrate how they reflect the religious controversies of their times. His book opens with a brief (eight-and-a-half-page) account of religion and state censorship as it applied to plays. Pinciss, rightly quoting Richard Dutton's definitiveMastering theRevels (London:Macmillan, 991), agrees that the Revels Office was more permissive, even over religious material, than has often been assumed.Discussionof the sixplaysdoes show that 'playwrights could offera variety of views on mattersof religion, relyingon the intelligence and subtletyof the cleverermembers of theiraudience to applyor decode theirmessage fully'(p. 20). The word 'decode' ringsalarmbells, as allegorizingtexts can produce quite astonishingtheoriesof religiousconspiracy:yet Pincissdoes not often wander down that enticing alley. He disarminglynotes that (in spite...

Carbon dioxide degassing from the Albani Hills volcanic region, Central Italy

The Albani Hills are affected by strong CO 2 degassing processes. The amount of CO 2, which rises from the depths and subsequently dissolves into shallow groundwater, has been estimated to be more than 4.2×10 9 mol year −1. Most of the gas is released in localised anomalous spots (Lavinio, Solforata, and Ciampino–Albano–Nemi areas), generated by fluid leakage processes from buried pressurized reservoirs hosted by structural highs of the calcareous–siliceous marly basement. The groundwater circulating in the anomalous areas becomes CO 2 oversaturated, generating observable gas manifestations whose composition is mainly controlled by gas–liquid separation processes. A gas flow rate of 6.1×10 8 mol year −1 has been measured from the two larger manifestations using the accumulation chamber technique. The presence at shallow level of CO 2 oversaturated groundwater can explain several episodes of sudden release of gas which was documented by historical chronicles from Roman times, until now.

Shakespeare's Edward III : A Consolation for English Recusants

Shakespeare's EdwardIII: A Consolation for English Recusants J. P. CONLAN With the publication of three new editions in the past five years, The Raign ofKing Edward the Third has reemerged as a prominent candidate for inclusion in the Shakespeare canon.1 Nonetheless, the play still continues to be received with suspicion. Critics recognize it is written in a genre, the chronicle history, that Shakespeare dominated in his day and admit the play has the same variety of imagery, a similar texture ofvocabulary, and verbal parallels to Shakespeare's other dramas.2 Notwithstanding, few scholars are willing to embrace the play wholeheartedly as Shakespeare's own. The problem, they claim, is the play lacks dramatic unity. As they see it, the play appears to be divided into two poorly integrated halves. The first two acts focus on the king's campaign to seduce the Countess of Salisbury; then, the theater of operations shifts abruptly to France and the Hundred Years' War to detail the English conquests at Sluys, Crecy, Calais, and Poitiers. This largely unexplained bifurcation within the play between love and war, shame and honor, England and France, has cast the play and its playwright into disrepute for centuries, and it is upon this legacy ofcensure that skepticism about Shakespeare's authorship of the play has its most secure foundation.3 Among those who see Shakespeare's hand in the play, this perceived lack ofdramatic unity has generated a wide range ofspecial pleading. To explain this singular fact, A. F. Hopkinson has told us that Shakespeare's "sublimegeniusspurnedatarbitraryrulesandrestraints,"4thatthetwoplots in themselves must be considered as separate plays, and as the dramatic unity in each is perfect, the play as a whole is therefore in Shakespeare's manner.5 Kenneth Muir has told us that Shakespeare collaborated with 177 178Comparative Drama anotherplaywright, asyet undiscovered.6Melchiori and others havetold us that Shakespeare contributed the king and countess scenes to a play alreadywritten.7 J. J. M. Tobin has told us that EdwardIIIstages an education of princes, its two episodes tied together by a concern for selfmastery .8And Eric Sams, to support his contention that past complaints about EdwardTITs lack ofdramatic unity are overstated, has argued that "each [subplot] is adroitly aligned as a separate aspect ofone single unifyingtopic , namelythe rights and wrongs ofvows and promises,"9 in the process conflating unity oftheme with unity of plot. Such descriptions of"Shakespeare's"craftsmanship,however,leavethisplayabroken thing. In neglecting the rationale that necessitates the sequence of action, the play's defenders inadvertently confirm the century-old hypothesis that "[t]hough there may indeed exist a sort of interior connexion between the episode and the principal plot, yet it appears more than doubtful whether the linkjoining the two parts was easily, ifat all, discoverable by the play-going public ofthe age."10 In actuality, this century-oldhypothesis is unfounded. In sustaining it, critics do not merely consign this play to ignominy. Edward III is most cohesive as a brilliantly incisive critique of the official propaganda sustaining the persecution of English recusants after the Invincible Armada's defeat. Denying the unity of the play and thus Shakespeare's authorship perpetuates the myth ofShakespeare as a Tudor apologist unconcerned with the course ofthe English Reformation. Allusions to the Armada's defeat within Edward III have been used to date the play, but critics remarking on them have tended to assume that the play was originally written to exploit swelling patriotic feeling.11 But this reading ofthe play is entirely too naive. Certainly to Elizabeth, as to other members of Shakespeare's audience who were educated in medieval history and who had seen in Mary's last year on the throne the loss ofCalais, Edward'svictoryinFrance wasbut a temporaryhighpoint, a peak in the long and tumultuous Hundred Years' War. Just as educated viewers would have known that the Black Prince would break his health in later years while pursuing the claim to France, finally dying in 1376, so too they would have been aware that Edward III finally succumbed to his lust, wallowing in the shocking affair with Alice Perrers, /. P. Conlan179 misconduct which encouraged the Good Parliament to impeach the King's lack ofrestraint and introduce...

Violent strombolian and subplinian eruptions at Vesuvius during post-1631 activity

On the basis of historical chronicles and field investigations the tephrostratigraphic sequence of post-1631 activity of Vesuvius is reconstructed. It has been established that, during this period, in addition to numerous totally effusive eruptions and/or normal strombolian activity, 16 explosive events produced well-traceable tephra deposits in the area outside the Mount Somma caldera. Ages of tephra beds were established on the basis of stratigraphic relationships with historical lava flows and comparison with chroniclers information. The dispersal and lithological characteristics of tephra deposits combined with description of explosive activity lead to the identification of three styles: (a) periods of violent strombolian activity; (b) violent strombolian eruptions; and (c) subplinian eruptions. Violent strombolian eruptions and periods of discrete activity are characterized by the formation of lapilli falls from eruptive columns only some kilometers high. Subplinian eruptions are defined on the basis of their lapilli fall volumes which is of the order of 107 m3, on eruptive column heights of approximately 10 km, bt higher than 1.5, and mass discharged rate values not lower than 106 kg/s. During the first century of activity after the 1631 eruption, two periods of violent strombolian activity occurred at Vesuvius (1682–1707 and 1707–1719) preceded, and followed, by a series of violent strombolian eruptions (1660, 1682, 1707, 1723, 1730, 1790, 1872). Between 1730 and 1779 a relevant change in the eruptive style of Vesuvius occurred by an increase in the explosivity of the eruptions. During the past two centuries of activity, only a few eruptions reached subplinian magnitude and only five eruptions had a phreatomagmatic phase (1779, 1794, 1822, 1906, 1944). Therefore, the previously accepted model of cyclic activity, in which each cycle is closed by an important explosive eruption with phreatomagmatic characteristics, is unfounded. The tephrostratigraphy of the 1906 eruption proposed in this work differs substantially from some previous reconstructions, on which the basis for the modeling of Vesuvius’ behavior in this time span was formed.

Treasures from American Film Archives: 50 Preserved Films (review)

Perhaps the urge to chronicle history is part of human instinct. We sense a need to know where we have been to assure ourselves of where we are. Recording the past through sound and visual images has always been as much a part of our behavior as our zeal for progress.

Inside and Outside the Convent Walls: The Norm and Practice of Enclosure in the Reformed Nunneries of Late Medieval Germany

Research on the enclosure of medieval nunneries has mainly analysed nor mative sources. The practice of enclosure, and nuns' perceptions of space and enclosure within the cloister remain neglected questions. This essay will compare the norms of enclosure of religious women during the late medieval period with chronicles written by nuns in reformed convents during the fifteenth century. Monastic reformers advocated that the sisters live together in poverty and chastity, renew the liturgy of the orders and, above all, abide by the regulations of enclosure. Historical chronicles and account books between 1480 and 1520 document the renovations of monastries in the wake of reform, and show how inextricably the reform of a female convent was tied to strict enclosure. The essay examines how the newly ordered space within the confines of the convents structured the nuns' perceptions, oriented their gaze and thereby acted upon their literary productions.

1 Esdras: From Origin to Translation

I Esdras: Form Origin to Translation, by Zipora Talshir. SBLSCS 47. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Litrature, 1999. Pp. xii + 305. $57.00 This book is a study of the formation of the book of 1 Esdras from three different angles represented by three distinct chapters. The first chapter examines the composition of the book, specifically the debate over whether the book is best understood as a fragment of an earlier edition of the Chronicler's History in which Chronicles and Ezra were joined or a later compilation of mostly canonical materials. Talshir contends that neither of these options is entirely correct but that 1 Esdras represents a section deliberately lifted from Chronicles-Ezra-Nehemiah and adapted specifically for the purpose of accommodating the Story of the Three Youths (1 Esd 3:1-5:6), which is therefore the book's raison d'etre. The book likely began with Josiah's Passover, but its ending has probably been broken off. The continuity of Chronicles and Ezra-Nehemiah predates I Esdras. But the author of I Esdras made changes in his Vorlage, not the least of which was the deletion of the Nehemiah memoir so as to substitute the Davidide Zerubbabel for Nehemiah in the Story of the Three Youths. The second chapter focuses on the relationship of the text of 1 Esdras to its Vorlage in 2 Chr 35-36, Ezra 1-10, and Neh 8. Three categories of textual differences are considered: variants, word order, and additions/omissions, with the last category occupying by far the largest portion of the chapter. Talshir challenges R. Klein's well-known 1966 text-critical study (Studies in the Greek Text of the Chronicler [Ph.D. diss., Harvard University]). While she agrees with Klein that 1 Esdras is a faithful translation of a variant text from that of the MT, she contends that the two texts developed independently to such an extent that it is not possible to reconstruct a shorter Urtext by comparing them. They do not represent different stages in the chronological development of a single text but independent developments from a common ancestor that cannot be distinguished because the condition of each text when they took separate routes is unknown. She criticizes Klein for misconstruing the evidence because of an a priori assumption that the text of 1 Esdras is shorter and more original. Rather, both texts have experienced additions as well as omissions. The third chapter analyzes the translation of 1 Esdras in comparison with that of the LXX with respect to the canonical parallels. …

Nurses of All Nations: A History of the International Council of Nurses, 1899-1999

Published to celebrate the International Council of Nurses' Centennial and Conference in July of 1999, this thought-provoking book highlights the ICN's traditions, history, growth, and contributions to the nursing community worldwide. Written by renowned nurse-historians from the United States, England and Canada, - all active members of the ICN - this timeless book offers a range of historical perspectives from nurse-scholars whose writings are familiar to academicians and nursing leaders worldwide. Focusing on the history of the ICN within the events that shape human history, it includes over 80 quality photographs highlight the text. Ideal as a historical chronicle or as a valuable keepsake, Nurses of All Nations is the perfect gift to give yourself, a friend, or colleague

"SOUTH ENGLISH LEGENDARY" STYLE IN ROBERT OF GLOUCESTER'S "CHRONICLE"

I Two huge momuments of later thirteenth-century literary activity, the South English Legendary (SEL), which contains principally saints' lives, and the historical chronicle that goes under the name of Robert of Gloucester, have long been known to be intimately related. They are written in the same septenary couplet metre, and are closely similar in dialect, vocabulary, phrasing, choice of rhyme words, overall narrative technique, and 'outlook': a Christian piety which places them on the side of the oppressed and suffering individual, and in opposition to corrupt and wicked lords of whatever estate. They also have numerous actual lines in common. Two short passages, the first from the Chronicle, will give an idea of the general identity of style:1 The first passage is in praise of Maud, queen of Henry I, the second in praise of St Ursula, but the poetic treatment is indistinguishable. On the basis of the similarity of style and metre Sir Frederic Madden in 1822 ascribed the authorship of the SEL to Robert of Gloucester, the name that will be used throughout this article for the author of the Chronicle.2 Most subsequent scholars have argued instead that the relationship is one of borrowing, and have assembled a corpus of passages in the two works which are textually parallel or virtually so.3 The current consensus, as summarized by Manfred Gorlach, is that Robert of Gloucester was the borrower, to the extent of having taken over more than 500 SEL lines, most significantly from the legends of the English saints Kenelm, Dunstan, AEthelwold, Edward the Elder, Alphege, Edward the Confessor, and Thomas Becket.4 As Gorlach says, Robert's borrowing procedure generally takes the form of 'revision by rephrasing, omission and condensation', but he goes on to demonstrate through an analysis of a shared passage on the madness and death of the Emperor Nero (for which see below) that the textual relationships are not always clear cut. He points out especially, as adding to the uncertainty of the situation, that 'no extant SEL MS contains all the legends used by Robert'. Gorlach's overall conclusion, however, is that Robert 'must have used a more comprehensive SEL volume than we know of'. Accepting Robert as the borrower, he believes that earlier scholars were wrong to admit 'that he might have contributed some portions of the SEL'.5 Compared to the notoriously complex textual relationships of the numerous different versions of the SEL - in effect, one for each of its many manuscripts - the textual state of Robert of Gloucester's Chronicle appears relatively simple. It survives in two versions, each represented by seven manuscripts.6 These versions are broadly identical up to the death of Henry I in AD 1135 (line 9137 of Wright's edition), but they then have wholly different continuations. The longer version carries on in considerable detail, eventually ending (in the most complete manuscript which itself ends fragmentarily)7 almost 3,000 lines later with an event in 1271. The shorter version continues for only 592 lines, quickly running over the years following the death of Stephen in 1154, and terminating with a mention of Edward I's conquest of Wales in the 1280s.8 Earlier in the narrative, however, it interpolates a total of approximately 800 lines not in the longer version, some of which Wright (p. xxx) recognized as deriving from La3amon's Brut. The unrestrained nature of this writer's comments, which extend to sardonic mockery of characters who receive their come-uppance, has led me to describe him as the 'outspoken' SEL poet. …

At the Origins of the Bible

The secular study of the Bible has identified, in what constitutes the sacred book of believers, a type of historical chronicle as well as a literary work in which writings of different genres have been intermingled. In the course of such study the discovery of Ugarit marked an exceptional moment that completely transformed our knowledge of the Canaanite origins of Israelite religion. This in turn advanced the enterprise of gathering all that could be known about Israel's past and the peoples of the Bible. Since the mystery of origins never ceases to fascinate, the interest in verifying the biblical accounts of the wanderings of Abraham and the conquest of Palestine by the Israelites from east of the Jordan River has remained strong. While many have advocated an external origin for the people of Israel as well as for the fundamental elements of their religion, the undeniable agrarian practices attested in the Bible have been treated as an indication of the influence of the indigenous cultural environment, namely that of the Canaanites.

The Vijayan colonization and the archaeology of identity in Sri Lanka

In my tours throughout the interior, I found ancient monuments, apparently defying decay, of which no one could tell the date or the founder; and temples and cities in ruins, whose destroyers were equally unknown. SIR JAMES EMERSON TENNANT(1859: xxv).There are competing, yet interlinked, identities in Sri Lanka through which people ‘establish, maintain, and protect a sense of self-meaning, predictability, and purpose’ (Northrup 1989: 55). These have become established over hundreds of years, and communities are attributed labels including Sinhala, Tamil, Vadda, Buddhist and Hindu (Coningham & Lewer 1999: 857). Sri Lanka is now experiencing what Azar (1990) has called a ‘protracted social conflict’, wherein a section of the Tamil communities led by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) are engaged in a struggle to establish a Tamil honieland or Eelam. International links, especially with south India, have had important implications on the formation of identities in Sri Lanka. Here we will focus on a key influence which has deep archaeological and political implications, whose interpretation has informed and distorted the present understanding of the concept and evolution of identities. This theme, the Vijayan colonization of the island, illustrates the formulation of identities, especially as derived from a historical chronicle, the Mahavamsa, which was ‘rediscovered’ by colonial officials in AD 1826 and has played a major role in determining the dynamics of this conflict.

Forward Soviet! History and Non-Fiction Film in the USSR , and: Zhivye golosa kino: govoriat vydaiushchiesia mastera otechestvennogo kinoiskusstva (30-e–40-e gody). Iz neopublikovannogo (review)

Reviewed by: Forward Soviet! History and Non-Fiction Film in the USSR, and: Zhivye golosa kino: govoriat vydaiushchiesia mastera otechestvennogo kinoiskusstva (30-e–40-e gody). Iz neopublikovannogo Sergei Kapterev Graham Roberts, Forward Soviet! History and Non-Fiction Film in the USSR. London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 1999. xii + 196 pp. ISBN 1-86064-282-9. $39.50. Lev A. Parfenov, ed. Zhivye golosa kino: govoriat vydaiushchiesia mastera otechestvennogo kinoiskusstva (30-e–40-e gody). Iz neopublikovannogo. Moscow: Belyi bereg, 1999. 434 pp. ISBN 5-89652-008-5. The formal dissolution of the Soviet system of thought and behavior has imparted to the phenomenon of the Soviet cinema a finality that, one could expect, would be conducive to the appearance of comprehensive monographs employing advanced methodologies of contemporary film scholarship. Such developments as the close correlation of stylistic patterns and technological innovations, new advances in the field of film semiotics, the influence of cultural studies, the "decentralization" of historiographical research (with greater significance attached to "peripheral" micronarratives and clusters of factual material), and more precise and systematic techniques of textual analysis, all might well be combined with unprecedented opportunities in the realm of archival research.1 Unfortunately, these expectations have remained largely unfulfilled. Too bad: the diversity of Soviet cinema – qualitative, experimental, and paradoxical – can be a stimulus both for cinema studies and the study of Soviet history. Its sad record of unfulfilled creativity – together with a much more optimistic record of resiliency and resistance in the face of formidable ideological pressure, and no less formidable conformity – are likely to retain their didactic value for the foreseeable future. Two recent publications selected for this review provide a glimpse of how the history of the Soviet cinema is treated today outside and inside Russia. The aim of this selection is to compare methodologies and ideologies characterizing contemporary scholarship and to try to establish some of the key issues which, in the opinion of this author, may be blamed for the gnoseological delays in the reassessment of the Soviet cinema's 70-year-long development. [End Page 815] In a time when attacking "grand narratives" has become a norm, British film scholar Graham Roberts's Forward Soviet! is a welcome return to older patterns of storytelling. Describing and analyzing the development of Soviet documentary ("non-fiction") film from its pre-revolutionary origins and first propagandist efforts of the Civil War to the pioneering cinematic exposés of the glasnost' era (the last work in the filmography is a TV production shown in 1989), Roberts concentrates his attention on outstanding talents and works, emphasizing quality and inventiveness. This makes his book both a historiographical work and a treatise on documentary aesthetics: cinematic representations of actuality are evaluated as products of and comments on parallel historical events, and in accordance with their contribution to the development of cinematic art. In seven chapters, the author covers the most significant stages in the development of the Soviet documentary, analyzing its creative growth in the first years of Soviet cinema, the causes of its artistic decline, and, later, partial rebirth in the course of Mikhail Gorbachev's reforms. More often than not, Soviet documentary film exemplified political aesthetics, and Roberts's approach leads the reader to reflect on the dangerous beauty of inspired and sophisticated propaganda. The historical sublime is the object – and the source – of most important examples of the Soviet documentary tradition: Dziga Vertov's delirious advertising of urbanism, industrialization, and communist enterprise; Esfir Shub's assemblage-like historical chronicles; and epic accounts of the Great Patriotic War created by Soviet filmmakers, associated with both non-fiction and fiction cinema, in the 1940s. Knowledge of the enormous losses, crimes, and defeats that constitute the tragic material of Soviet history and that were not allowed to be recorded on film, cannot but make one consider even the most optimistic and aesthetically satisfying Soviet "non-fiction" films as documents of sorrow, as episodes in a grandiose social and human drama. However, the historical and the political do not undermine the artistic: they merge and supplement one another. Roberts points out the "apparent paradox" represented by the willingness of non-fiction filmmakers "to adapt their creative...

História da Vida Privada no Brasil. Volume 2História da Vida Privada no Brasil. Volume 3História da Vida Privada no Brasil. Volume 4

História da Vida Privada no Brasil. Volume 2História da Vida Privada no Brasil. Volume 3História da Vida Privada no Brasil. Volume 4

July Days in Skovsbostrand: Brecht, Benjamin and Antiquity

It is common to stress intellectual differences between Brecht and Benjamin. However, Benjamin’s visits to Brecht in Denmark provided the occasion for productive critical exchanges. This paper identifies significant common ground in the analysis of history the two undertake in the face of fascism. Taking a cue from their understanding of chronicle history, a common dialectical view of temporality is suggested in Benjamin’s essays on the modernism of Kafka and Kraus and Brecht’s exile poetry. The sense that historical understanding requires an imaginative dislocation is central in Brecht’s responses to Benjamin’s study of Baudelaire. A careful reading of Brecht’s notes on Baudelaire, as well as on Benjamin’s book‐project,makes possible a reconstruction of their debate. Baudelaire’s ‘Les petites vieilles’ focusses their views of the relationship between antiquity and modernity. While Benjamin reads there the modern artist’s resignation, Brecht sees parallels with the false classicism of the Nazi spectacle and its petty bourgeois audience. The ‘Parzellenbauer’ from Der achtzehnte Brumaire shows Brecht reflecting on similar issues within a similar historical dynamic in his novel on Julius Caesar and Caesarism, and thus effectively doubling the explanatory force of the relationship between antiquity and modernity which fascinated Benjamin.