Monday, February 21, 2011

Classical Literary Criticism and the Sublime

Last week in class, we had our first group presentation. Their main focus was on Classical Literary Criticism, and also discussed the Longinus’ sublime. Sublime means something that lifts up the soul, inspiration, happy, and that feeling where your heart feels like its going to stop. According to one of the presenters, “real sublimity contains much food for thought. It is difficult/impossible to resist. It has a strong impression on the memory.” Watching the video clip the presenters had set up was amazing. They were all different by sublime in their own way. According to Longinus and our presenters, thee five sources of sublimity are conceived of great thought, strong and inspired emotion, certain king of figures, noble diction, and elevated word arrangement. According to Longinus, at least one of the above mention sources must be discussed for the piece to be sublime. I liked how they wrote on the chalk board as we as classmates had something visual to work off of. We also discussed how the film “Avatar” is sublime. Overall their presentation was very informational. I learned a lot from it and thought the presentation was very well done.

Then the Professor started to discuss the Enlightenment which began in Western Europe in the 17th century. We discussed how this era was very important. People never thought for themselves. Orders always had to be followed. When Descartes came along, people began to think for themselves, have their own mind and this was something very new. Thinking for themselves brought new ideas, and with new ideas came thinking and using ones mind. Overall, last weeks class was very informational and amazing. I picked up on everything the presentation was about and understood it. I also loved how their presentation brought up such a great class discussion.

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