Erasmus was an internationalist who sought to establish a borderless Christian union; Luther was a nationalist who appealed to the patriotism of the German people. Where Erasmus wrote exclusively in Latin, Luther often used the vernacular, the better to reach the common man. Erasmus wanted to educate a learned caste; Luther, to evangelize the masses. For years, they waged a battle of ideas, with each seeking to win over Europe to his side, but Erasmus’s reformist and universalist creed could not match Luther’s more emotional and nationalistic one.
Month: February 2018
Pop Culture Isn’t Just Bad Art, It Has An Insidious Impact
Like many émigrés, Theodor Adorno was initially disoriented by US mass culture, which had not yet overrun Europe as it would after the war. This disorientation became a principled distrust. He claimed that capitalist popular culture – jazz, cinema, pop songs, and so on – manipulates us into living lives empty of true freedom, and serves only to distort our desires. Popular culture is not the spontaneous expression of the people, but a profit-driven industry – it robs us of our freedom and bends us to conform to its needs for profit.
Are Music Lessons Killing My Kid’s Love Of Music?
“Might I be killing off my son’s love of music as I force him to slowly murder Mozart’s Eine kleine Nachtmusik on the piano?”
LA Chamber Orchestra Gets A New Music Director
Principal flute of the Royal Philharmonic and London Philharmonic orchestras and of the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Jaime Martín turned to conducting full-time five years ago. He is principal conductor of Sweden’s Gävle Symphony and chief conductor of the Cadaqués Orchestra, a chamber ensemble in Spain.
Why Artists And Criminals Have A Leg Up On Predicting The Future
“I decided to take a page out of William Gibson’s playbook and go and find some artists and criminals and see what they were doing with new technologies. As I see it, artists and criminals have something in common: Neither is constrained by social conventions. In a later interview Gibson said, “Criminals are in effect entrepreneurs with the brakes off. They look at whatever the latest technology is and think, ‘What can I do with this?’ Artists are unconstrained by the limits of business and societal conventions.”
The Founding Father Of Art History (And Italian Renaissance Gossip)
“Giorgio Vasari has been variously called the father of art history, the inventor of artistic biography, and the author of ‘the Bible of the Italian Renaissance’ – a little book called The Lives of the Artists. It’s a touchstone for scholars looking to get a peek at life in Michelangelo’s day, and quite fun, too, depending on whose wildly embellished life you’re reading. Ingrid Rowland joins us on the [Smarty Pants] podcast to tell the story of the man behind the men of the Renaissance that we know so well – and, of course, to gossip a bit about Florentine egos, and even a few naughty monkeys.”
There’s Always A Downside. Why We Should Listen To Artists
There is a kind of optimism that it takes to be an inventor. But the father of the Internet thinks inventors need the artists. “It’s the mind-stretching practice of trying to think what the implications of technology will be that makes me enjoy science fiction,” Cerf says. “It teaches me that when you’re inventing something you should try to think about what the consequences might be.” The artists are the ones who recognize a fundamental truth: Human nature hasn’t changed much since Shakespeare’s time, no matter what fancy new tools you give us.
This ‘Onion Public Radio’ Podcast Sticks It To ‘Serial’ And ‘S-Town’
“‘Do you know the girl who was shot then brutally stabbed over and over until her face was barely recognisable?’ If you’re familiar with the gory juggernaut of a genre that is the true-crime podcast, you will know this scenario is only a slight exaggeration – and that the genre is ripe for a spoof. Which is where intrepid investigator David Pascall comes in, alongside the residents of Bluff Springs, Nebraska, in A Very Fatal Murder.”
Can Chicago’s Lyric Opera Survive Doing Opera?
“I love West Side Story. I can’t wait to see this coproduction with Houston Grand Opera and the Glimmerglass Festival, though the cast is yet to be announced. But the schedule makes a point as unmistakable as the high-wire high F tenor Lawrence Brownlee’s been hitting in Lyric’s current, very traditional production of I Puritani: in spite of years of trying to build it, the audience for opera, in comparison to the fans who’ll turn out for Broadway musicals, is paltry.”
Turning Cute Kids Into Social Media Stars Is ‘Bad News For Our Relationships With Real Children’
Indeed, the entire “marketplace of cuteness”, argues Rebecca Onion, is problematic at best: “the marketplace of cuteness has less interest in age-appropriate gibberish. Instead, it demands that kids fit into an adult’s idea of what’s funny, even as they obviously, being children, are not in on the joke.”