Mon, 8/4
Location:
SH 1430
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Week 1: Early Works
Frankenstein and Romanticism
"While my companion contemplated with a serious and satisfied spirit the magnificent appearances of things, I delighted in investigating their causes. The world was to me a secret which I desired to divine. Curiosity, earnest research to learn the hidden laws of nature, are among the earliest sensations I can remember" (27).
"But these philosophers, whose hands seem only made to dabble in dirt, and their eyes to pore over the microscope or crucible, have indeed performed miracles. They penetrate into the recesses of nature and show how she works in her hiding-places. They ascend into the heavens; they have discovered how the blood circulates, and the nature of hte air we breathe. They have acquired new and almost unlimited powers; they can commend the thunders of heaven, mimic the earthquake, and even mock the invisible world with its own shadows"(39).
"So much has been done, exclaimed the soul of Frankenstein -- more, far more, will I achieve; treading in the steps already marked, I will pioneer a new way, explore unkown powers, and unfold to the world the deepest mysteries of creation" (39).
"I paused, examining and analysing all the minutiae of causation, as exemplified in the change from life to death, and death to life, until from the midst of this darkness a sudden light broke in upon me -- a light so brilliant and wondrous, yet so simple, that while I became dizzy with the immensity of the prospect which it illustrated, I was surprised that among so many men of genius who had directed their inquiries towards the same science, that I alone should be reserved to discover so astonishing a secret" (44).
"Life and death appeared to me ideal bounds, which I whould first break through, and pour a torrent of light into our dark world. A new species would bless me as its creator and source... No father could claim the gratitude of his child so copmletely as I should deserve theirs... I might in process of time (although I now found it impossible) renew life where death had apparently devoted the body to corruption" (46).
Metropolis, 1926
Directed by Fritz Lang. Cast includes Brigitte Helm (Maria/Robot), Gustave Froelich (Freder), Alfred Abel (John Fredersen) and Rudolf Klein-Rogge (Rotwang). Written by Thea vin Harbou and produced by Erich Pommer.
Here's a pretty good rundown of German Expressionism and its influence on German silent film, by Silent Movie Monsters.
Notes from lecture, 8/7:
Napolean, early 19th C. -- “failure” of French Revolution leading to deep distrust of utopian plans (SF as escapism) but also conquering hero trope (SF as predictions of world domination)
19th Century rise of bourgeois capitalism leads to increasing popularity of novels, and novel writers starting to make money, all in mass-market pop novel forms (gothic, romance, rags-to-riches), establishing a place for the escapist pop fiction nature of SF.
* Gothic/Horror genre: Poe, Stevenson
* Fantasy genre: Carroll, Hawthorne
Karl Marx, Capital, 1867
19th C science:
* Photography, (Daguerre 1840) 1840s-90s
* Darwin and evolutionary theory, Origin of the Species, 1859
* The telephone, 1876, and phonograph, 1877
* Lumiere brothers and cinema, 1895
* Marconi’s radio transmitter, 1896, (“wireless telegraph”)
* Tesla, 1890’s: AC electric conductors, Tesla coils, remote control electric devices.
Jules Verne: (1828-1905). 1st SF-only writer, and 1st writer to make a living at it. (According to Asimov.)
Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864); From the Earth to the Moon (1865); 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1869).
H.G. Wells (1866-1946): The Time Machine (1895), The Island of Dr. Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1896), War of the Worlds (1897)
Early 20th C science:
* Einstein’s Special Theory of Relativity and photoelectric effect theory (Nobel Prize-winning), 1905
* Ford’s Model T factory line, 1910
* Taylorism: Frederick Taylor’s The Principles of Scientific Management, 1911
* Einstein's General Theory of Relativity, 1915
See Nova Online's site on Einstein for comprehensive, comprehensible explanations of the special and general theories of relativity.
Early 20th C history:
* WWI! 1914-1918
* Russian Revolution, 1915 (with major revolt in 1905)
* E.M. Forster “The Machine Stops,” 1908
* Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Herland, 1915 (famous for ”The Yellow Wallpaper”)
* Edgar Rice Burroughs. Lots of popular novels inc. Tarzan of the Apes, 1915, but lots of sci fi throughout teens and 20s.
* Czech playwright Karel Capek inroduces the term robot in the 1921 play R.U.R. -- Rossum’s Universal Robots. The word comes from the Czech robota, which means tedious, forced labor.
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