Nietzsche's first book was called Birth Of Tragedy and was a study of the plays of the Ancient Greeks and an analysis of why there was plays at all, what purpose did it serve, etc... I don't believe in trying to summarize Nietzsche. People have taken what he said and used parts of it to support one thing and other people have taken some things he said and used it to support the opposite thing and people aren't wrong to do that. I don't think summarizing him does his thought justice.
That being said, he focused on how all plays were either Dionysian, done to bring people pleasure, or tragedies and that it was unclear why people loved tragedies so much because the characters have every bad thing happen to them, but somehow people loved them. I think Nietzsche went on to say that through the coming centuries, people either loved plays that emphasize pleasure or tragedy and he preferred tragic periods and had a lot of criticism for plays done for pleasure.
Also, I think in the past people lauded writers more than actors and the work was much better. For instance, in Russia, people were waiting for who would be the next Tolstoy. There were even special schools where writers would go to to try to become the next Tolstoy. In the US, in the 1920s, 30s, 40s, 50s, and maybe even some after that and some before it, people could read short stories by good writers like F.Scott Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Faulkner etc.. and nearly everyone would read them. So educated people were all thinking about which writer was best and thinking about it and I think the quality of story was much better.
In Victorian London, writers like Charles Dickens, and a lot of others, would compete to publish novels in small bits and pieces in weekly newspapers. So, there must have been hundreds of writers trying to make a living that way.
Anyway, that's what I know about this topic. I think that it changed when it went from being about finding the next good writer to finding the next good actor. I guess it had to do with photographs and then movies and now how everyone photographs and films everything which is ironic because the more they use their cameras, the less quality photos emerge.
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Date: 20 November 2015 03:53 am (UTC)That being said, he focused on how all plays were either Dionysian, done to bring people pleasure, or tragedies and that it was unclear why people loved tragedies so much because the characters have every bad thing happen to them, but somehow people loved them. I think Nietzsche went on to say that through the coming centuries, people either loved plays that emphasize pleasure or tragedy and he preferred tragic periods and had a lot of criticism for plays done for pleasure.
Also, I think in the past people lauded writers more than actors and the work was much better. For instance, in Russia, people were waiting for who would be the next Tolstoy. There were even special schools where writers would go to to try to become the next Tolstoy. In the US, in the 1920s, 30s, 40s, 50s, and maybe even some after that and some before it, people could read short stories by good writers like F.Scott Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Faulkner etc.. and nearly everyone would read them. So educated people were all thinking about which writer was best and thinking about it and I think the quality of story was much better.
In Victorian London, writers like Charles Dickens, and a lot of others, would compete to publish novels in small bits and pieces in weekly newspapers. So, there must have been hundreds of writers trying to make a living that way.
Anyway, that's what I know about this topic. I think that it changed when it went from being about finding the next good writer to finding the next good actor. I guess it had to do with photographs and then movies and now how everyone photographs and films everything which is ironic because the more they use their cameras, the less quality photos emerge.