Emotion Flashcards
Emotion & Medieval Film
Medieval emotion as childlike
Medieval emotion as following its own coherent norms
Self-control vs emotional expression in the middle ages
Difficulties of portrayal on film
Disinterest in displaying on film
Medieval emotion is childlike
Historiography Jan Huizinga Norbert Elias Barbara Rosenwein Seventh Seal & Flagellants
Medieval emotion as following its own coherent norms
“Emotion” as a word Emotion as culturally constructed Post 1960s: Cognitive assessments of emotion Social constructionism, post 1970s: Emotional communities: Own distinct set of norms / behaviours: Becket & love between men:
Self-control vs emotional expression in the middle ages
Medieval traditions guiding emotional norms
Medieval emotion as political - indicating whether a figure was good/bad
Films adhering to contemporary norms instead
El Cid
Nevsky
Difficulties of portrayal on film
Logistical limitations
Actors
Acknowledgement of difficulty Joan of Arc:
Lack of recognition of difference:
Disinterest in displaying on film
Lack of interest in difference:
Medieval emotion as childlike 1
Historiography:
Jan Huizinga, “The Waning of the Middle Ages” (1919): childlike nature of medieval emotional life - violent contrasts, excitement / passion in everyday life, despair vs joy, cruelty vs pious tenderness.
Norbert Elias, “The Civilising Process” (1939): “People [in the Middle Ages] are wild, cruel, prone to violent outbreaks and abandoned to the joy of the moment.”
Marc Bloch, Feudal Society - does not adhere to conventions
Carol Stearns and Peter Stearns - standards of emotional propriety less precise - “emotionology” - society’s attitudes to emotion
Barbara Rosenwein.
Hydraulic theory of emotion: like great liquids - eager to be let out - have to be restrained - makes emotion > universal, binary, either on or off dependent on restraints - not tenable.
Medieval emotion as childlike
Seventh Seal & Flagellants
¬ Chronicon Henrici de Hervodia: “using these whips they beat and whipped their bare skin until their bodies were bruised and swollen and blood rained down, splattering the walls nearby”.
¬ Hysterical emotionalism of the crowd watching and the flagellants themselves; all the people in the village, praying, begging, crying, etc. Audience given distance by mid-length shots of the impassive faces of the Knight, Jöns, the girl they rescued.
¬ Does not give context of the framework by which this makes sense - penance for sins, Black death etc - or the fact some responded to it less emotionally (Clement VI October 1349 banning it). Fear more broadly w/o eschatological framework.
¬ Emotions belong to baser characteristics - Plog’s angst over his love; or the childishness of Jof and Mia.
Medieval emotion as following its own coherent norms 1
Emotion as culturally constructed - post 1960s:
- Social constructionism, post 1970s: emotions & displays are constructed - formed & shape by society - strong: no basic emotions at all; weak: language, cultural practises, expectations, and moral beliefs.
- Cognitive assessments of emotion: emotions part of a process of perception & “appraisal” - judgements of weal or woe (dependent on culturally determined ideas good / bad).
- Emotional communities: same as social communications, judging one another’s emotions, “the modes of emotional expression that they expect, encourage, tolerate and deplore” - every society different; w/I societies - contradictory values/models.
- Emotives: William Reddy historicises emotions by essentially basing them on the concept that (given the fact that emotions are culturally constructed) different societies have different “emotional regimes”, where more emotional freedom > better. Understands “emotives” - descriptive appearance; relational intent; self-exploring & self-altering affects.
Medieval emotion as following its own coherent norms 2
Own distinct set of norms / behaviours
- Inappropriate / appropriate emotion - contextually specific - as McGrath points out in here “The Politics of Chivalry” - “anger could mean clear proof of his or her base moral character, or confirmation of their righteousness & devotion to justice”.
- Dependent on identity - displays of emotion gendered - Vaught gives the example of excessive displays of grief, which are viewed traditionally as unmanly and characteristic of women.
Medieval emotion as following its own coherent norms 3
Becket & love between men:
¬ Language of love: “I would have sacrificed the whole kingdom for you. And laughed about it. I loved you, and you didn’t love me, did you? So this is how you say thank you.”
¬ Lifshitz: Peter Glenville, gay man, 1967, rejection of wife/children/family; never seeing either of them alone in bed w/ a woman. Inserting lines into the script.
1. Eleanor: “Becket! Always Becket! I am a woman! I am your wife!”
2. Matilda: “You have an obsession about [Becket] which is unhealthy and unnatural”.
¬ Medieval context: Jaeger & Kasten: early MA, love between men glorified > indicates honour/virtue > love of men for women rejected - men supposed to remain fortified against emotions of women (situated in the bedroom, privately, rather than publicy).
Self-control vs emotional expression in the middle ages 1
Medieval traditions guiding emotional norms
- Stoicism: resisting emotions - influential for medieval tradition
- Christian adaptation - excessive emotion of certain kinds > sinful
- Augustine - in public; private is fine - in the site of God. Confessions & his mother’s death - holding his emotions in mourning for his mother’s death; cries later at home (Jaeger & Kasten distinguish between emotion - private - and sensibilities - public).
¬ “Gift of tears” - tears for longing for heaven; fear of hell / faith - sign of God’s presence and also functioning as washing away one’s sins. Leaves out of Nevsky primarily b/c of emotion but also b/c can’t cry for god when opposed to Christianity?
Self-control vs emotional expression in the middle ages 2
Medieval emotion as political - indicating whether a figure was good/bad
- Gerd Althoff: anger as a rulership practise indicating loss of favour - violence & directness - pure politics; mechanisms of power - telegraphed information - performance of emotions > communication.
- Stephen White - loss of honour - anger and grief
- J. E. A. Jollife - Henry II ruling through his passions - tears, praying, violence, contrition - tools of statecraft - w/o sense of control, but still indicates use of these emotions politically.
Self-control vs emotional expression in the middle ages 3
Emotions adhering to contemporary norms instead 1:
El Cid
¬ Self-control of the Cid: consistently subordinating his emotion to his duty; leaving Jimena, his love, for the men cheering him who have joined him in exile; distance masculinity, leader who remains strong for his men in the face of death.
¬ Love between Jimena & the Cid:
1. Aberth interview w/ Heston in which he insists that the Cid’s “clear love” for Jimena, “which I don’t think has ever been challenged, is crucial”.
2. Evoked poignantly in Poema de Mio Cid (by 1207) - before the Cid departs from exile, takes leave of Jimena, “with such pain as when the fingernail is torn away from the flesh.” But emphasised here when he is re-constructed as a Christian hero; influenced by French epic - courtly love?
3. Carmen Campidoctoris (at least c.1200) & Historici Roderici (c.1145) emphasise his (indiscriminate) violence more than love. Jimena: relative of the king, does not go w/ him to exile, ruled in Valencia after his death.
4. Garcia Ordonez, one of the leading magnates of Alfonso VI, tutor to Alfonso’s son - set up in medieval sources as Rodrigo’s rival at court. In the film, motivated by love for Jimena.
Self-control vs emotional expression in the middle ages 4
Emotions adhering to contemporary norms instead 2:
Alexander Nevsky
Nikolai Cherkov: Nevksy & self-controlled masculinity:
¬ restrained, statuesque actions, does not emote throughout regardless of how bad things get / how dangerous they are etc. Part of his role as leader: strong, masculine; Soviet tradition of acting.
¬ Cf. the actual displays of emotion suitable for a leader - in the Life of Nevsky, he is portrayed as crying before the battle of Neva (gift of tears, showing proper father / dedication to God); anger also an appropriate emotion he does not show.
Difficulties of portrayal on film 1
Logistical limitations - Evidence
¬ Some forms of evidence - Ann Rasmussen - emotions appear in medieval texts as:
1. Observations, descriptions & expressions of emotions by characters & narrators (“emotion talk”)
2. Vocalizations, actions & gestures that communicate emotions.
3. Physical changes such as blushing, fainting, trembling.
¬ Stephen White points out - lots of emotion talk in medieval texts. But on a case by case basis with these films; tricky & b/c it is very difficult to know what these emotion words mean, how they would have been understood at the time, considered appropriate / inappropriate, w/o explicit study - the process of re-creating would still be immensely difficult even w/ this information. Well understood conventions.
Difficulties of portrayal on film 2
Acknowledgement of difficulty- Joan of Arc
¬ Dreyer: Focuses on the sympathetic aspects of Joan; resists the idea of Joan the warrior, emphasising instead Joan as a victim of institutional oppression (negative portrayal of the church, disfigured faces w/ cartoonish villain features). Audience made to feel acutely (and uncomfortably) aware of her emotions w/ the very intese close up shots held on her weeping face / bewilderment. Marina Warner - childlike Joan “eliminate complications; by remaining childish, [she does] not present…. Moral dilemmas or ambiguities.” Technique of abstraction, Renee Jean Falconette - “inner, nor outer, life”.
¬ Bresson: Bresson, on the other hand - surrenders any claim to knowing her internal state. Minimalist focus on the text of the trial itself; Joan plated by non-professional actress (Florence Delay), structured to speak, rather than to act, her lines (though interpreted w/ second trial).
Difficulties of portrayal on film 3
Lack of recognition of difference - the Sorceress
¬ The Sorceress & invented rape: the addition of the rape scenes as character motivation for Stephen de Bourbon and the healing women in order to make their actions explicable; cannot justify Stephen’s anger at the heretics & Elda w/o giving him guilt (at one point on the floor face down b/c of guilt) / a crime to make-up for. Functions the same way contemporary emotion would, considers individuals / consciousness in the same way modern individuals do.
Disinterest in displaying on film
Creating a certain emotional lanscape for affect 1. Nevsky
¬ Nevsky: Sergei Eistenstein’s “montage of attraction” - developed in 1923 initially for theatre & his films, in order to produce specific emotionally responses in the viewer; calculated for emotional shocks - juxtaposing ideas / images in the audience’s psyche to build up chains of associations. Teutonic knights / cruelty in parallel, inhuman / throwing babies to their death - showing the knights afterwards recalls association. Join in anti-Nazi fight.
Disinterest in displaying on film 2
Creating a certain emotional landscape for affect 2. Stephen the King
¬ Stephen the King: Koppany’s emotional power - forthright, angry - three wives, sex appeal - played by an actual rock star, masculine. Emotional challenge to Stephen - wanting to fight face to face - “shall we be captives, or shall we be free?” Stephen: pop songs, lack of meaningful relationship w/ wife, manipulation by mother - mirroring Janos Kadar, worked w/ the Soviets to crush the riots and take power from former leader Imre Nagy - w/o him, would the 1956 uprising the successful? Did he save Hungary, or did he undermine Hungary’s progress?
