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Tag Archives: George Sand
vichy waters: borborygmic belches
Taking the waters at Vichy. Where fitness was not the only end in view. The thermal spa at Vichy and its warm springs had a very slow rise to international fame. The patronage of Rabelais and generations of consumptive Britons … Continue reading
turgenov: sorely disappointed
…Turgenov. The great emancipator. Turgenov helped bring freedom to the serfs by an ingenuously devastating method: he showed the serfs what their lives were like. Turgenov returns from Berlin to take a post in the Russian Ministry of the Interior… … Continue reading
napoleon: romantic muse and not amused
It was the best of times. It was the worst of times. So said Dickens. But it was. As Napoleon began his rather blood-soaked, chaotic and passionate rule of France he met the force of two women , “femmes fatales” … Continue reading
Posted in Art History/Antiquity/Anthropology, Feature Article, Ideas/Opinion
Tagged 18th Brumaire, alex godfrey, Alison Castle, Antoine-Jean Gros, Eugene Isabey, eulalie morin, felix markham, franz kruger, George Sand, Ingres, J.A.D. Ingres, mme de Stael, Mme Germaine de Stael, Napoleon, Napoleon Bonaparte, prince augustus william of prussia, Stanley Kubrick, stanley kubrick napoleon, tony frewin
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montaigne’s soul daughters
Michel de Montaigne invented what can be termed the “personal essay” at the dawn of the seventeenth-century. It was seen quickly by Marie de Gournay that Montaigne’s disdain for logic and linear progression was part of a larger attack on … Continue reading
heine sight is everything
The personification of a straight line. Those who philosophize everything delicious out of life. Does the ancient land of dreams still exist? Heine did not believe that it would so soon come to pass; there were too many black ravens … Continue reading
small is beautiful: a free man in paris
It was a time when Paris was a city for the young. Students, painters, intellectuals, journalists, grisettes: all were there along with a young German poet who recorded a period of creative ferment between one revolution and the next. …. … Continue reading
Posted in Feature Article, Ideas/Opinion, Literature/poetry/spoken word, Miscellaneous
Tagged Alexandre Dumas, Alfred de Musset, Alfred de Vigny, Amalia Keller, Franz Liszt, Frederic Chopin, Friedrich Nietzsche, George Sand, Gérard de Nerval, giuseppi mazzini, Goethe, Hector Berlioz, Heinrich Heine, Horace Vernet, Niall Ferguson, Paris July Revolution 1831, salomon heine, Stendhal, Victor Hugo, victor-jean nicolle, wolfgang menzel
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chopin of dissonance: nocturnes on renunciations of reality
For sixteen prolific years in France prior to splitting with George Sand, Chopin had produced an uninterrupted stream of masterpieces on such a consistently brilliant level of craftsmanship and invention that it is well-nigh impossible to talk of a bell … Continue reading
Posted in Feature Article, Ideas/Opinion, Miscellaneous, Music/Composition/Performance
Tagged Andre Gide, Bach, Chopin, Felix Mendelssohn, Franz Liszt, Frederic Chopin, George Sand, Hannelore Mundt, Heinrich Heine, Jane Birkin, Oscar Wilde, Pauer, Radek Sikorski, Richard Wagner, Robert Schumann, Schumann, Serge Gainsbourg, Thomas Mann
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Sand and Chopin….. etudes of the muse or the ballade of the…vampire
George Sand is often cast as the villain of the piece, though actually, she did wonders for Frederic Chopin by shielding him from the buffetings of the world. Chopin’s connection with Madame Dudevant, the French novelist, better known as “George … Continue reading
Posted in Cinema/Visual/Audio, Feature Article, Ideas/Opinion, Literature/poetry/spoken word, Miscellaneous, Music/Composition/Performance
Tagged Adam Mickiewicz, Alexandre Dumas, Alfred de Musset, Andre Gide, August Clesinger, Chopin, Eugene Delacroix, Franz Liszt, Friedrich Nietzsche, George Sand, Goethe, Handel, Heinrich Heine, Honore Daumier, Honore de Balzac, Janka Wohl, Michael Lunts, Oscar Wilde, Paganini, Victor Hugo
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liberated from foursquare classical rhythms
His life was brilliant and brief, much like his masterpieces on the piano. This segment tracks Frederic Chopin in Paris. He had left Poland to spend eight inhospitable months in Vienna before making his way to Paris at he time … Continue reading
Posted in Cinema/Visual/Audio, Feature Article, Ideas/Opinion, Miscellaneous, Music/Composition/Performance
Tagged Alfred de Musset, Andre Gide, Eugene Delacroix, Franz Liszt, Frederic Chopin, George Sand, Goethe, Heinrich Heine, Henryk Siemieradzki, Honore Daumier, Jean Louis Bezard, Michael Lunts, William Heath, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
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