Classifying Witnesses of Violence: Parsing Susan Sontag’s Distinction Between the Voyeur and Non-Voyeur (and a Hesitant Defense of War Photography)

In Regarding the Pain of Others, Susan Sontag, in a way, indicts those who seek out depictions of violence without the intention or ability to provide aid to those being harmed: “Perhaps the only people with the right to look at images of suffering of…extreme order are those who could do something to alleviate it…or those who could learn from it…The rest of us are voyeurs, whether or not we…

Better to Rule in Hell: A Comparison of Satan in Paradise Lost and the Old English Genesis

Why does Satan choose to rebel against God?  While Satan is not mentioned in the Book of Genesis, he is featured prominently in its Old English counterpart.  The story of Satan’s rebellion and fall provided by Old Testament Narratives (OTL) is remarkably similar to that which appears in Milton’s Paradise Lost.  Satan conspires to reign over Heaven, he and his angelic host are overthrown, their luminous forms are twisted into…

Boethius and Augustine and the Non-Existence of Evil

We agreed before that everything that exists is unitary, and that oneness itself is good. It then follows that everything, because it exists, is good. And it also follows that whatever falls from goodness ceases to exist, and that evil men cease to be what they were, having by their wickedness lost their human nature, although they still survive in the form of the human body (118). – Boethius, The…

Naturalism and Medieval Art

When I saw Bartolommeo Bulgarini’s The Crucifixion in the Smart Museum, one big question stuck out to me. Why does it look like that? The heads of the characters seem slightly out of proportion, lodged at awkward and unnatural angles; their hands are rendered in awkward and contrived poses; and Jesus’s torso and legs seemed oddly elongated and alien. These kinds of representational inconsistencies were present in the illustrations we…

Dreams, Movies, Photography: Knowing the Unknowable

In Regarding the Pain of Others, Susan Sontag describes a shift in how we perceive catastrophes:  “A catastrophe that is experienced will often seem eerily like its representation. The attack on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, was described as “unreal,” “surreal,” “like a movie,” in many of the first accounts of those who escaped from the towers or watched from nearby. (After four decades of big-budget Hollywood…

Adam and Eve; Virtue and Vice; Genesis and Paradise Lost

By Spencer Scott, Frances Schaeffler, Jonah Valverde, and Jo Zeng Why exactly did Adam and Eve eat the fruit? The original Bible goes into a little detail, saying in Genesis 3:6-7, that the snake tempted them, they ate, and their eyes were opened. It’s a straightforward story. Now this being the Bible and all, there’s a long history of writers taking this and other stories in their own direction, but…

It’s Cold As Hell

The conception of hell as a frozen wasteland may seem surprising to people, as the general assumed temperature of hell is to be extremely hot. This basis is in fact proven in the Bible in several sections. In Revelations, hell is described as a “lake of fire.” There is also the geographical reasoning that states since Christianity originated from the Middle East and Africa, which are considered arid tropical climates,…

The Beauty in Horror

“On his way up from the Piraeus outside the north wall, he noticed the bodies of some criminals lying on the ground, with the executioner standing by them. He wanted to go and look at them, but at the same time he was disgusted and tried to turn away. He struggled for some time and covered his eyes, but at last the desire was too much for him. Opening his…

The main entrance to "The Holy Land Experience" theme park. Photograph: Kevin Wisniewski/Rex Features

The Holy Lando: Unpacking the Modern and Medieval Passion Play

In Chapter IV of The Confessions, Augustine introduces a story concerning his former student Alypius. After being dragged to the gladiator games, Alypius protests by covering his eyes, as to not bear witness to the violent event. Eventually, Alypius — “yielding to curiosity” — opens his eyes at the cheering noises of the crowd (Augustine, 121). In this passage, Augustine depicts curiosity as a precursor to sin. The condemnation of…

To Look or Not to Look?

       The pieces shown in the smart museum prompted us to think about the role of art in making us simultaneously want to turn away in disgust but also captures our attention as discussed with our readings of Sontag and Augustine. Specifically, the piece by Jacque Callot, The Hangman’s Tree, both captivated our attention while also making our stomachs churn. The stark physical separation between the suspended bodies…