On the Genealogy of Morals is a book about the history of ethics and about interpretation. Nietzsche rewrites the former as a history of cruelty, exposing the 4entral values of the Judaeo-Christian and liberal traditions - compassion, equality, justice - as the product of a brutal process of conditioning designed to domesticate the animal vitality of earlier cultures. The result is a book which raises profoundly disquieting issues about the violence of both ethics and interpretation. Nietzsche questions moral certainties by (...) showing that religion and science have no claim to absolute truth, before turning on his own arguments in order to call their very presuppositions into question. The Genealogy is the most sustained of Nietzsche's later works and offers one of the fullest expressions of his characteristic concerns. This edition places his ideas within the cultural context of his own time and stresses the relevance of his work for a contemporary audience. (shrink)

This article examines Bazin's theory of cinema through his reaction to widescreen technology. Bazin endorsed CinemaScope as a means of enhancing cinematic realism, but was critical of its launch vehicle, Henry Koster's The Robe, which recounts the story of a Roman consul whose acquisition of the dead Christ's robe leads him to convert to Christianity. To emphasize the photographic trace of the real that defines his ontology of cinema, Bazin refers to relics alleged to retain the outline of Christ's features (...) after contact, so The Robe inadvertently offers a crass thematization of Bazin's theory of cinema, uncomfortably mimicking Bazin's belief that film carries the imprint of a once-living presence. However, on closer inspection, instead of demystifying Bazin's theory of cinema by removing its religious garb, the critical encounter with The Robe demonstrates its complexity by revealing its multiple layers. (shrink)

The Birth of Tragedy is a book about the origins of Greek tragedy and its relevance to the German culture of its time. For Nietzsche, Greek tragedy is the expression of a culture which has achieved a powerful balance between insight into the chaos and suffering which underlies all existence and the discipline and clarity of rational Apollonian form. In order to promote a return to these values, Nietzsche undertakes a critique of the complacent rationalism of late nineteenth-century German culture (...) and makes an impassioned plea for the regenerative potential of the music of Wagner. In its wide-ranging discussion of the nature of art, science and religion, Nietzsche's argument raises important questions about the problematic nature of cultural origins which are still of concern today. (shrink)

At Pech Merle in 1952, André Breton provoked a controversial incident by damaging a Palaeolithic wall painting that he suspected to be a fake. This episode provides an insight into the contested status of prehistoric sites in post-war France and the theoretical and ideological implications of their cultural mobilization. Such sites allowed for a disavowal of wartime trauma and supported the reaffirmation of French national identity and its civilizing mission by locating the birthplace of human culture on French soil. Yet (...) their extreme age also threw into relief the relative fragility of the recently invented nation-state. Breton's vandalism cast doubt on the models of cultural progress and pre-eminence that sought to instrumentalize prehistoric art but failed to appreciate the subversiveness of its ‘deep’ history. Ironically, however, Breton's scepticism ultimately enhanced the subversive dimension of archaeology by allowing it to demonstrate the authenticity and age of cave art. (shrink)

This study traces the transvaluations or transformations in value and meaning Nietzsche's work underwent during the first century of its reception in France. These transvaluations, Smith argues, resulted as various critics, both within and outside the philosophical establishment, contested Nietzsche's theories. He offers a historical perspective on the continuing importance of Nietzsche's work to contemporary debates within the arenas of philosophy and critical theory.