Mémoire (M.A.)--Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières, 2004. / Bibliogr.: f. 106-112.

Zugl.: Berlin, Freie Univ., Diss., 1996.

Este trabalho pretende reconstituir o debate entre Benjamin e Brecht durante a década de 1930 em torno da relação entre recursos formais e engajamento político na produção teatral brechtiana do período do fim da República de Weimar. Para isto, realizaremos um estudo de textos e montagens de determinadas peças, buscando trazer à tona, então, questões presentes nos comentários teóricos e interpretações realizadas pelos autores. O percurso deste trabalho divide-se em quatro partes. Primeiramente, nas duas partes iniciais, trataremos da crítica de Brecht à instituição teatral em seu teor ideológico e do início do desenvolvimento de seu projeto de refuncionalização social do aparelho produtivo teatral, bem como do papel da técnica neste contexto, valorizado por Benjamin. Para isso, realizaremos, inicialmente, uma reconstituição do panorama estético-político do período histórico e trataremos dos experimentos com A Ópera dos Três Vinténs e Ascensão e Queda da Cidade de Mahagonny. Em seguida, voltaremo-nos à peça radiofônica e ao Processo dos Três Vinténs, assim como, buscando aprofundar-nos na peça de aprendizagem, analisaremos o caso da peça A Medida. Em uma terceira parte, realizaremos um estudo da peça Um Homem é um homem, central para tal debate e tomada por Benjamin como modelo do teatro épico. Por fim, abordaremos o debate dos autores acerca da parábola em Kafka, a ser confrontada, então, com o trabalho brechtiano com a parábola. Pretende-se mostrar que se há, nas primeiras partes mencionadas, uma grande aproximação das perspectivas dos autores, nas duas últimas partes deste trabalho surgem, sobretudo em torno de uma tensão, de um conflito de compreensões entre a esfera gestual e a forma da parábola, diferentes interpretações do potencial crítico e da efetividade política do teatro épico. As divergências relacionam-se, em última instância, a diferentes compreensões dos vínculos entre arte e política, bem como a diferentes noções de dialética. / This work aims to reconstruct the debate between Benjamin and Brecht in the 1930\'s on the relation between formal resources and political engagement in Brecht\'s theatre works during the end of the Weimar Republic. To achieve so we will carry out a study of texts and staging of plays, with a view to surface then issues present in theoretical comments and interpretations by the authors. The path followed by this work is divided in four parts. In the first two parts we will deal with Brecht\'s critique to theatre as institution in its ideological content and with the beginning of the development of his project for social \"refunctioning\" of the theatrical production apparatus, in addition to the role of technique within this context, which is valued by Benjamin. In order to do so we will firstly reconstruct the aesthetical and political panorama of the historical period and consider the experiments with The Threepenny Opera and Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny. Subsequently, we will focus on the radio play and on The Threepenny Lawsuit, as well as on his \"learning play\" The Measures Taken. On a third part we will study the play Man equals Man, capital to such debate and understood by Benjamin as \"a model for epic theatre\". Finally, we will tackle the author debate as regards the use of parables by Kafka, which is to be compared to the use of parables by Brecht himself. It is intended to show that if at first there is a great approach of the authors\' prospects, in the last two parts of this work, different interpretations of the critical potential and the political effectiveness of epic theatre appear, especially around a tension, linked to a conflict of understandings between the gestural sphere and the form of the parable. The divergences are related, ultimately, to the different understandings of links between art and politics, as well as to the different notions of dialectics.

Théoricien du régime républicain de 1795 à 1810, Benjamin Constant se doit d'adapter son système institutionnel à la Restauration des Bourbons en 1814. Cependant son attachement à la monarchie constitutionnelle, illustrée par sa participation à la rédaction de l'Acte additionnel durant les Cent-jours n'entraîne pas une renonciation à sa pensée libérale.Malgré cette fidélité apparente aux principes libéraux qu'il défendait déjà en 1800 au sein du Tribunat, et qui entraîna son expulsion en 1802, la pratique de la monarchie constitutionnelle le confronte à différents problèmes auxquels ses écrits théoriques ne répondent pas; ainsi, le pouvoir royal constitue-t-il véritablement un pouvoir neutre, ou son pouvoir de nomination des ministres ne l'entraîne-t-il pas à intervenir directement dans les affaires du pays? De plus, Une fois élu député, en 1819, c'est aussi l'importance des droits de la minorité qu'il doit défendre, notamment envers la majorité ultra de la Chambre «retrouvée» de 1824, et c'est donc l'importance du règlement de l'assemblée, seul cadre légal auquel est astreint la majorité, qu'il va développer.Mais la monarchie constitutionnelle suppose aussi la responsabilité des gouvernants, celle des députés par la réélection, mais aussi celle des ministres, élément central du régime parlementaire. Cette responsabilité ministérielle oscillant entre procédure pénale spéciale et justification politique, comme l'illustre l'acte d'accusation envers Villèle auquel participe Constant en 1827. Mais le contrôle des gouvernants s'effectue aussi indirectement par l'opinion publique dont les journaux sont le relais. Leur développement exponentiel au début du XIXème siècle, expliquant l'importance accordée par Constant aux différentes législations sur la presse intervenant de 1814 à 1830.En tant que journaliste, homme politique et député, Constant participe directement à l'élaboration du gouvernement représentatif qui va devenir le régime parlementaire sous la Monarchie de Juillet, mais cette confrontation à la vie politique l'entraîne-t-elle à abandonner certains éléments de sa doctrine, ou tout au moins à faire évoluer certains éléments pour les adapter à la pratique? De plus, son intervention est-elle réellement décisive dans la mise en place des différents éléments du régime parlementaire ou les désaccords avec les autres libéraux ou avec les doctrinaires l'entraînent-ils à la marge?C'est donc au travers de l'ensemble de son œuvre théorique, ainsi que de ses différents articles de journaux mais aussi par sa participation aux débats de la Chambre des députés et enfin par l'analyse des différentes théories s'affrontant sur le sens de la Charte et la pratique de la Monarchie constitutionnelle, que le rôle de Constant dans la construction du régime parlementaire pourra être analysé. / The Restoration represents the beginnings of the parliamentary in France. This form of government based on the political responsibility of the ministry before the assemblies. .It is built by the practice more than the application of a preconceived theoretical system. Through the interventions of Benjamin Constant in the press and at the House of Representatives we can study the implementation of Parliamentary in France since 1814 to 1830. But the purpose of Constant during this area is also the safeguarding of rights.

A little-known chamber work by Benjamin Britten is the dramatic cantata Phaedra, op.93, for mezzo-soprano and small orchestra. Among his chamber works, the solo cantata was a musical form used only once by Britten, thus making Phaedra unique among Britten's oeuvre. Britten chose a genre that flourished in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the cantata - as a vehicle for the story of Phaedra. He employs clear allusions to Baroque music in Phaedra by the use of harpsichord and continuo in the recitatives, ornamentation, and word painting. The text for Britten's setting of Phaedra is a translation of Jean Racine's Phedre by the American poet Robert Lowell. From Lowell's complete play, Britten extracted Phaedra's key speeches that deal with her three confessions of incestuous love for her stepson, Hippolytus. These monologues are set in a series of recitatives and arias that make up the entirety of this chamber cantata. In order to gain complete understanding of Phaedra, this document will begin with an investigation into the historical background of Racine's Phedre and the conventions of French tragedy from which it arose. Lowell's translation method will then be explored in comparison to Racine's play. In turn, Britten's extractions from Lowell's translation will be examined. Further, the baroque elements of the cantata and the compositional ideas inherited by Britten from Henry Purcell will be included. Finally, there will be an inspection of the character of Phaedra and Britten's interpretation through orchestration and melodic choices. Investigation into the background of Phaedra's character through Racine's play and Lowell's translation along with Britten's dramatic interpretation through music is necessary for complete comprehension of her mental state and underlying thoughts in order to bring about an emotionally accurate portrayal of the role. Britten himself labeled Phaedra a "dramatic cantata." Therefore, the drama and its text-musical relationships must be uncovered.

[pt] Esta dissertação propõe um diálogo da obra do crítico e filósofo Walter Benjamin com a obra do dramaturgo e romancista Samuel Beckett. Os dois escritores do século XX, embora tenham sido contemporâneos durante alguns anos de suas vidas e se afligido por questões em comum, não chegaram a comentar nada um sobre o outro. Isso talvez se explique pelo fato de que, na busca por fugir do regime nazista, sem visto para realizar a travessia da França para a Espanha, Benjamin comete suicídio em 1940, quando Beckett ainda estava no início de sua produção literária. Do contrário, possivelmente o crítico alemão teria pensado sobre a obra do autor irlandês, tantas são as afinidades entre eles. Para torná-las visíveis, esta dissertação se divide em três capítulos. O primeiro investiga, com base na teoria de Benjamin, o declínio das narrativas tradicionais que eram passadas oralmente entre as gerações e a ascensão de outras formas de comunicação possibilitadas pela escrita, como a informação e, sobretudo, o romance no âmbito da literatura. O segundo capítulo pretende explicitar a diferença entre o silêncio involuntário, porque traumático, dos combatentes da Primeira Guerra Mundial, diagnosticado por Benjamin, e o deliberado gesto performativo de silenciar com o qual Beckett busca tornar a linguagem porosa. O terceiro capítulo propõe aproximações entre o corpo fragmentário da escrita ensaística, adotada por Benjamin, e a maneira como Beckett eleva a incompletude da ruína aos corpos de seus personagens, que enfrentam a decadência não apenas de seus membros, mas também de suas memórias e, mais radicalmente, de sua própria identidade. / [en] This dissertation proposes a dialogue between the works from the critic and philosopher Walter Benjamin and the dramatist and romancist Samuel Beckett. The two Twentieth-century writers, although have been contemporaries during some years and afflicted by common issues, didn t have the chance to comment anything one about the other. Maybe this could be explained giving the fact that, in search for flee from the Nazi regime, without a visa to cross the border from France to Spain, Benjamin commited suicide in 1940, while Beckett was still starting his literary production. Otherwise, possibly the German critic would have thought about the work of the Irish author, given so many affinities between them. To make these apparent, this thesis is divided in three chapters: The first investigates, according to Benjamin s theory, the decline of the traditional narratives passed orally between generations and the ascension of other ways of communication made possible by writing, as the press and, especially, the novel within the literature. The second chapter seeks to explain the difference between the involuntary silence, as a trauma, of the First World War combatants, diagnosed by Benjamin, and the deliberate and performative gesture of silencing with which Beckett pursue make the language porous. The third chapter proposes approximations between the fragmentary body of the essayistic writing, adopted by Benjamin, and the way Beckett elevates the incompleteness of ruin to the bodies of his characters, who face de decadence not only of their limbs, but also of their memories and, more radically, of their own identity.

No description available.

No description available.

The thesis entitled Benjamin Franklin: Development of Religious and Ethical Theories is a chronological survey of Franklin's attitudes toward both religion and ethics. Franklin's early attitudes toward religion are traced in Chapter One from youth through subsequent periods of re-evaluation, modification to the conservative Deism he embraced late in life. Franklin's participation in projects to revise, modernize, and modify scripture, prayers and church services is evaluated in the light of his growing religious refinement and sophistication. Considerable attention is paid to the recent scholarship in this area by Carl Van Doren, D. H. Lawrence and Herbert W. Schneider. Franklin's philosophy of utilitarian ethics is the subject of Chapter 'Two. The formulation of Franklin's ethical theory is described from his early four "fundamental virtues" to his ambitious "Art of Virtue," an attempt to achieve moral perfection. Scholarly criticism of Franklin's "Art of Virtue" is surveyed and evaluated, and explanations of apparent contradictions between religious beliefs and Franklin's practice of ethics are proposed.The third and final chapter deals with Franklin's utilitarian pragmatic system of ethics as evidenced in Poor Richard's Almanac, including the highly controversial tract "The Way toWealth." An attempt is made to interpret Franklin's attitudes with greater objectivity than the recent impulsive criticisms of D. H. Lawrence and Charles Angoff. The thesis ends with an analysis reconciling a number of Franklin positions often erroneously interpreted as either contradictory or "hypocritical," giving appropriate credit to Franklin for his development of a unified, practical and workable system of ethics based upon his unique interpretation of Deism.

This thesis compares and contrasts the multiple discourses on photography found in the critical and theoretical writings of Walter Benjamin and Roland Barthes. It seeks to demonstrate that despite the different historical, philosophical, cultural, and linguistic contexts of their work, Benjamin and Barthes engage with a similar constellation of questions and problems that photography uniquely poses. It argues that each author moves towards a practice of redemptive criticism as foregrounded in relation to one privileged photograph in each case (the childhood portrait of Franz Kafka, for Benjamin, and the photograph of the mother-as-child for Barthes). Dedicated to a close reading of relevant texts by each author, the study is divided into three parts, with each corresponding to a different set of themes to which the photographic is related. The first part focuses on the historical and evolutionary development of Benjamin’s and Barthes’s view of photography in the context of wider shifts in their critical practice and methodology, and then in comparison with each other. The second part investigates the complex historical and philosophical influence of Proustian aesthetics on their writing on photography. Suggesting that Proust’s philosophy of memory provides an apt point of departure for Benjamin’s and Barthes’s discussion of photography in relation to memory, it traces how each thinker then moves beyond the Proustian conceptual framework towards similar ends. The third and final part is devoted to Benjamin’s and Barthes’s conceptualisation of photography in relation to singularity. Specifically, it centres on how certain photographs convey singularity as a function of the relation between the photograph, its referent, and its beholder. In total, this study argues that Benjamin and Barthes rightly deserve their often acknowledged places as pioneering figures in the theory of photography. However, while both theorists provide numerous important insights into the historical, cultural, and phenomenological nature and function of the medium, their writing on photography is also marked (perhaps necessarily, in some cases) by ambiguities, contradictions, and problematic evaluative judgements (with respect to both the medium and to particular photographs) which must be acknowledged in order to gain a proper appreciation of their work in this area.