Rites Of Spring: The Great War And The Birth Of The Modern Age

In “Searching for Nijinsky’s Sacre”, Hodson discusses Nijinsky’s revolutionary lost Sacre. She begins the article by giving a detailed description of Le Sacre du

Human nature is truly a complex thing to understand. Jackie French has lured us into a world bursting with vital historical information, she has entangled in the novel, a series of facts about the many events that occurred in World War II. French has taken the time to structure this novel with sensitivity and sophistication. She has shown great sympathy towards the Jewish people throughout this captivating novel. The author then leads us onto a path to teach us the importance of history and the endless lessons we may learn from the mistakes of previous generations.

When one thinks of a ballet they hear soft rhythmic notes and see elegantly dancing ballerinas softly tip-toeing around the stage. This is also what people in early 1900’s expected to see when they planned to attend a ballet. However, a couple of motivated artists in 1913 literally planned to change the design of ballet, music and dance forever. On May 29, 1913 a ballet named The Rite of Spring premiered in Paris, France. The original title as it translates from Russian to French is; Le Sacre du Printemps, meaning the rite of spring, but the literal translation from Russian to English means “Sacred Spring”. The ballet and music were composed by Igor Stravinsky, with the help of Nicholas Roerich, who proposed the general idea behind the

Chapter 2 sums up the war in a different fashion, showing the contrast between the uselessness of past knowledge and the “raw and emotional skills necessary” in the trenches (20). The duties imposed on the camp by Corporal Himmelstoss symbolize the hours of work and duties done before enlistment that mean nothing during the war. Being “put through every conceivable refinement of parade ground soldiering” shows how schoolbook tasks were diligently performed only for fear of how society would perceive the boys if they were to do otherwise (26). Himmelstoss himself is the embodiment of previous responsibilities that only make the men “howl with rage” at present (26). The death of Kemmerich goes hand in hand with the death of innocence, Kemmerich’s shiny boots being the small glimpse of hope that keeps the men going. Baumer receives saveloy, hot tea, and rum from Muller for salvaging the boots. In return for giving Muller a sense of hope, Baumer receives a more needed sense of comfort and satisfaction. His hunger, one “greater than comes from the belly alone” (33), is thus satisfied. Chapter 7 directly reinforces this transition from an old life into a new one. Baumer “feels an attraction” to the

The topic of war is hard to imagine from the perspective of one who hasn't experienced it. Literature makes it accessible for the reader to explore the themes of war. Owen and Remarque both dipcik what war was like for one who has never gone through it. Men in both All Quiet on the Western Front and “Dulce Et Decorum” experience betrayal of youth, horrors of war and feelings of camaraderie.

99) Along with other narrators, Bromberg has “little to report about the next phase [1932 through the beginning of World War II] until they are directly affected by the war through military conscription or Allied bombing raids on their home town” (Bessel, p. 101). Herbert’s recurring theme is that “’Quiet’, ‘normal’ times, then, clearly leave behind few experiences that are imprinted on the memory and recalled in the narratives; ‘disturbed’, ‘bad’ times are filled with unique and extraordinary experiences, and come up at corresponding length in the life stories” (Bessel, p. 101).

Krebs soon comes to isolate himself and oppose discussing his war experience and the influence it had on him. For Krebs, living in a town that has moved past the war, was his reason to reminisce on his war experiences and the women who would walk the streets in Germany and France. After spending two years in World War I, adapting to the real world was asking Krebs to let go of everything that has shaped him since he has been gone. “He sat there on the porch reading a book on the war. It was a history and he was reading about all the engagements he had been in. It was the most interesting reading he had ever done.” Even after arriving home, attempting to adapt to the fact that the war was over, he studied war events he was part of; routes and war sites he had taken and fought at.

War is always the worst tragedy of mankind in the world. We, as human beings, were experienced two most dolorous wars that were ever happened in our history: World War I and World War II. A young generation actually does not know how much hardship the predecessors, who joined and passed through the wars, undergo. We were taught about just how many people died in the wars, how much damage two participations in the wars suffered or just the general information about the wars. We absolutely do not know about the details, and that’s why we also do not know what the grief-stricken feeling of people joining in the wars really is. But we can somewhat understand that feeling through war novels, which describe the truthfulness of the soldiers’ lives, thoughts, feelings and experiences. All Quiet on the Western Front written by Erich Maria Remarque, which takes World War I as background, is the great war novel which talks about the German soldiers ' extreme physical and mental stress during the war, and the hopeless of these soldiers about the “future” – the time the war would have ended.

4-5). “Surrounded by German and Russian power,” Greta’s trials and tribulations are aptly placed by Eksteins within a broader context, elucidating not merely the diurnal struggles of his great-grandmother’s life but the broader sense of powerlessness in the region (pg. 7). Although Ekstein’s prose is often beautifully executed, the general structure of the work, and particularly his fixation with his familial case-study, quickly becomes overbearing. His traditional historical recollection is interrupted often with a flimsy, unsubstantiated extrapolations, analyzing the life of Grieta, who even Eksteins concedes he knows “little about” (pg. 24-25). Ekstein’s fixation with utilizing a personal account entirely devoid of detail and with a substantial dearth of evidence to draw from, begins to feel oddly detached from the time period he intends to analyze.

Modris Eksteins presented a tour-de-force interpretation of the political, social and cultural climate of the early twentieth century. His sources were not merely the more traditional sources of the historian: political, military and economic accounts; rather, he drew from the rich, heady brew of art, music, dance, literature and philosophy as well. Eksteins examined ways in which life influenced, imitated, and even became art. Eksteins argues that life and art, as well as death, became so intermeshed as to be indistinguishable from one another.

Paying homage to the Russian ballet “The Rite of Spring” with his novel’s title, Eksteins begins his analysis of World War I by discussing Stravinsky’s ballet, which premiered in 1913. The ballet, which shocked audiences by straying from what was most accepted during the time, is used in comparison to Germany and both world wars. According to Eksteins, both the ballet and Germany share similar notions of sacrifice being essential to life, and glorify death. Germany, specifically, glorified death as a means of fighting against the old orders in search of liberation and global acceptance of modernism. Therefore, Germany’s reasoning for fighting in World War I

The novel “The Rites of Spring” is written by a Modris Ekstein is a Latvian author whose family was negatively impacted by the German occupation during the war. This literary work is based on the Ekstein’s claims about modernisms influence in the cause of World War 1. He divides the book into the acts similar to the play in that is the books namesake. Throughout this work, Ekstein argues that the ideology of modernism, which is primarily concerned with “introspection, death, emancipation, primitivism, abstraction, movement, and the creation of myths”; in the modern world, has mixed art and life and made aesthetics more important than previous eras. He further hypothesizes that this progression of Modernism is the cause of the Nazi regime taking hold of leadership in Germany, which resulted in World War 2 led by Adolf Hitler. Eckstein’s understanding of the outcome of the war centers on change that the US society underwent due to the cultural exchange brought on by the war with Germany, which served as the standard for the epitome of modernism. However, despite the influence the US society may have absorbed, Americans still maintain their socialist ideas, preserved their Anglo-American religion, and the ability to not have a consummating ethnocentric view. If war can serve as a medium of cultural exchange, then it is also likely that the ideals of Modernism would soon spread to the Western society via normal interaction outside of war, especially if Modernism is the ultimate

Almost definitely imitating the act of new life waking in the spring soil, Stravinsky starts the haunting introduction to his world-renown ballet, Rite of Spring, with a high-pitched lone bassoon. The unstable eeriness continues as a horn and pair of clarinets join in the rubato tempo. Just as everything wakes and bursts into life in spring, so does the piece as more and more instruments join in. Each instrument seems to have a different theme, but seems necessary in portraying the thick texture needed to symbolize the inevitable climactic arrival of Spring. After the orchestra has finished its first outburst and almost all instruments have initially come in, a strange harmonic effect is applied to the viola. As the orchestra draws to a

The music of Stravinsky has always been “ahead of time” in the way of using new and different ways of presenting music. His early ballets such as Firebird, Petrushka, and The Rite of Spring being a great example of his modernism and will to compose music which is both innovative and shocking. For this essay I have chosen to write about The Firebird (1910) and The Rite of Spring (1913). Firebird was Stravinsky’s first Ballet and his first composition that reached many people because of its modernism and exoticism. The Rite of Spring is still renowned for its portrayal of primitivism, a concept that was accentuated by the riot that happened at its premiere.

“The Rite of Spring” (Le Sacre du Printemps) Part I: The Adoration of the Earth by Igor Stravinsky was written was written in 1913 for the Paris dance troupe, the Ballets Russes company; the productions of Serge Diaghilev. The ballet was considered controversial and caused a small riot during the performance between the two groups; supporters and detractors.