December 14, 2012 at 11:34 am
Relating to the work of CC202, which inspects Mozart, is an essay arguing that revivals of classic works do not hold back the opera genre from blossoming. Here is an excerpt:
Nothing, perhaps, will ever be as good as Shakespeare, but that doesn’t prevent Tony Kushner or David Mamet from writing marvellous plays now. Shostakovich didn’t worry about whether he was living up to his idols Rossini, Mussorgsky and Berg when he gave us Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District; he just did it.
The full essay can be found here: http://bit.ly/TYS2V5
By mdimov
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Posted in Curriculum, Great Questions
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Tagged CC202, classic, influence, inspiration, Mozart, opera, play, revival, theater
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December 7, 2012 at 2:56 pm
Relating to temperance, and the work of John Locke studied in CC203, here is today's analect:
For esteem and reputation being a sort of moral strength, whereby a man is enabled to do, as it were, by an augmented force, that which others, of equal natural parts and natural power, cannot do without it; he that by any intemperance weakens this his moral strength, does himself as much harm as if by intemperance he weakened the natural strength either of his mind or body, and so is equally vicious by doing harm to himself.
By mdimov
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Posted in Academics, Analects, Curriculum, Great Ideas
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Tagged CC203, harm, importance, Moral, natural, power, strength, temperance, weakness
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December 7, 2012 at 2:45 pm
As a tribute to all sleep-deprived Core students and faculty near the semester's end, here is today's analect in celebration of Sleep's regenerative power:
A man in a distant field, no hearthfires near, will hide a fresh brand in his bed of embers to keep a spark alive for the next day; so in the leaves Odysseus hid himself, while over him Athena showered sleep that his distress should end, and soon, soon. In quiet sleep she sealed his cherished eyes (Odyssey, Book V).
By mdimov
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Posted in Analects, Curriculum
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Tagged beginning, end, fire, regeneration, relax, rest, semester, sleep, The Odyssey
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December 6, 2012 at 4:17 pm
David Eckel, Professor and Director of the Core, has released a new piece of work based on his visit to Myanmar in January, 2012.
Here is an image from his work:
The moat of the royal palace in Mandalay, with Mandalay Hill in the distance
Here is an excerpt from his work:
Myanmar lacks the elaborate tourist infrastructure of neighboring Thailand, but it is possible to experience the country with a sense of freshness and directness that would never be possible though the window of a tour bus.
The full piece can be found here: http://bit.ly/YSo4Ws
By mdimov
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Posted in Art, Core Lecturers, Faculty Publications, Great Photograph, Uncategorized
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Tagged awakening, Eckel, explore, Myanmar, photos, travel, trip
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December 5, 2012 at 1:00 pm
Expanding further on the works studied in CC106, here is the next analect from Nick Lane's Life Ascending: The Great Inventions of Evolution:
We may not enjoy the fact much, but we've recognized since the early 1920's that going moderately hungry prolongs life. It's called calorie restriction. Rats fed a balanced diet, but with about 40 per cent fewer calories than normal, live half as long again as their well-nourished siblings, and suffer fewer diseases of old age.
By mdimov
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Posted in Analects, Curriculum, Quotes, Uncategorized
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Tagged CC106, diet, evolution, hunger, life, longevity
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December 5, 2012 at 12:43 pm
From a book that sometimes plays a part in CC106, Jared Diamond's Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed, here is today's analect:
The Greenland Norse did succeed in creating a unique form of European society, and in surviving for 450 years as Europe's most remote outpost. We modern Americans should not be too quick to brand them as failures, when their society survived in Greenland for longer than our English-speaking society has survived so far in North America.
By mdimov
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Posted in Analects, Curriculum, Quotes, Uncategorized
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Tagged CC106, Collapse, failure, Norse, remote, society
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December 4, 2012 at 12:47 pm
To celebrate the new page on the Core blog, Marginalia, we present a poem on the topic of the marginal note itself. The American poet illustrates its variation and beauty. This sample may be very relevant to Core students:
Students are more modest
needing to leave only their splayed footprints
along the shore of the page.
One scrawls "Metaphor" next to a stanza of Eliot's.
Another notes the presence of "Irony"
fifty times outside the paragraphs of A Modest Proposal.
The full poem can be found here: http://bit.ly/UmgSMV
By mdimov
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Posted in Art, Marginalia
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Tagged boundary, marginal, note, pages, poem
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December 3, 2012 at 12:02 pm
Relating to the class of CC202 where we study Francisco Goya's art, here is a link to his Black Paintings: http://bit.ly/YHuZBM
How the darkness works in these paintings is, of course, open to interpretation.
By mdimov
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Posted in Uncategorized
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