#venice 74

[detective-dipstick]

Murder on the Orient Express (1974) vs. Murder on the Orient Express (2017)

Never read the book so I'm considering plot-related things that probably happened in the book as the creations of the movies and it will count towards their rewards and penalties.

Things I liked from both:

-the handkerchief! big fan. the mystery of the handkerchief was better than the mystery of who murdered that guy.

-I like the locations in both. I like the scenery. I think they played with the being stuck on a train thing in their own ways and it worked out.

-There was a third thing I can't remember.

Things I despised from both:

-the ending. the dumbest ending in mystery history. mstry hstry. miss tree his tree.

-sorry i got distracted. literally it was so anticlimactic and SOOOO dumb. I had a friend who really liked the ending but he had horrible opinions about everything so fork spotted in the kitchen i guess. anyway drives me insane to this day.

Things I liked better in 74:

-The train. Looks like a real train. We get to look at it for a long time. A movie made for train-lovers, which is the main draw of Orient Express as a concept anyway.

-Generally better looking cinematography. I like.

-Hector. Freaking. McQueen.

-First of all, Anthony Perkins? Damn. Second, Anthony Perkins as McQueen? GAYYYYY (flirtatious). Noticed him the moment he appeared on screen. Totally in love with everything he did. No notes except a tiny one with my number on it. Anyway

-Ms. Hubbard. Genuinely annoying af as God intended. and she didn't have a random wig reveal (although that was funnnny. again that Branagh melodrama that's so ridiculous sometimes but admirably bold every time). anyway idk i like her. I don't like her but I do. the girlboss effect in action.

-The Armstrong case summarized in the BEGINNING thank you for making sense. Was so jarring in the 2017 version that they just randomly mention it later in the movie. No prior allusion to it or anything. Those first few scenes in the 74 version were unsettling to me in a good way.

-They look so relieved and happy when Poirot and Bianchi vote to pin the murder on the imaginary guy. It's just a cute little moment idk. Some of them hug each other. McQueen smiles and stands up and sits down for some reason.

Things I liked better in Branagh's:

-Branagh as Poirot. I feel like I'll be unjustifiably assassinated for this but I like him a lot. In this movie specifically, he's great. I dislike Orient Express compared to his three Poirot movies in almost every other respect but he was very refreshing here.

-From what I've seen of Branagh as a director, he excels at melodrama, and it shows here.

-Loveee how during the breakdown Poirot had no fucking idea who did it. When he said "it is time to solve this case" he meant it so literally. He meant "well we're on a deadline so I'm just gonna start talking and hope it all works out." Relatable af that's me writing my essays and shit. Also very funny.

-So there’s a scene, right? There’s a scene with Hildegarde (great name btw) and Poirot where he questions her in German so the princess can’t understand it and then she mentions seeing “the other conductor” in the sleeping car and he’s so shocked he switches to English and he’s like “WHAT other conductor???” and that was so cool you had to be there it was cool. Too bad it didn’t mean anything but it was sick.

-I like Bouc slightly better than Bianchi. Now, Bianchi has the better name. Fun to say. He was very silly and cool. But I can’t pretend I don’t love Bouc. C’mon.

-The count and countess. WOW. They were charming in 74 but in this one they are HOT. Holy shit. Even better somehow that we don’t meet them right away. They’re talked about in the beginning but we only see them when Poirot goes to their cabin to question them for reasons I can’t remember (I recall he originally wasn’t going to. They were in a different car or diplomatic immunity or something idk I was born yesterday). Anyway him just showing up at the elusive count and countess’s later in the movie and turns out the whole time they were just in there doing hot people shit. They were in two scenes but really carried the film with their sexual energy. 

General thoughts:

For the record, I wouldn’t recommend either of these movies. If this post inspired u to watch them for some reason, don’t you dare think of me. Goodnight.

[animusrox]

TOP 10

Past Lives

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse

How to Blow Up a Pipeline

Poor Things

Oppenheimer

Barbie

BlackBerry

The Holdovers

The Iron Claw

Killers of the Flower Moon

MY LETTERBOXD Grade A 11.    The Killer 12.    Beau Is Afraid 13.    Dream Scenario 14.    Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 15.    Godzilla Minus One 16.    American Fiction 17.    They Cloned Tyrone 18.     Evil Dead Rise 19.    Eileen 20.    The Artifice Girl 21.   Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem 22.    Talk to Me 23.    Reality 24.    Leave the World Behind 25.    A Thousand and One 26.    Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One 27.    Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret. 28.    Theater Camp 29.   Carmen 30.    Merry Little Batman 31.    Priscilla 32.    Society of the Snow 33.    Infinity Pool 34.    Enys Men 35.    Sanctuary 36.    Rye Lane 37.    Skinamarink 38.    Monster 39.    Anatomy of a Fall 40.    Landscape with Invisible Hand 41.    Reptile 42.    Sisu 43.    Pinball: The Man Who Saved the Game 44.    No One Will Save You 45.    Tetris 46.    May December 47.    The Zone of Interest 48.    V/H/S/85 49.    Dumb Money 50.    El Conde 51.    Arnold 52.    Maestro 53.    Napoleon 54.    20 Days in Mariupol 55.    Influencer 56.    The Creator 57.    Origin 58.    Thanksgiving 59.    Next Goal Wins 60.    The Boy and the Heron 61.    Bottoms 62.    Wonka

[Press Keep Reading For The Full Graded List]

Grade B

63.   God Is a Bullet 64.    No Hard Feelings 65.    Joy Ride 66.    Fair Play 67.     Cocaine Bear 68.    NYAD 69.    Asteroid City 70.    Nowhere 71.    The Angry Black Girl and Her Monster 72.    Divinity 73.    The Equalizer 3 74.    The Last Voyage of the Demeter 75.    Venus 76.    Butcher’s Crossing 77.    Somewhere in Queens 78.    The Persian Version 79.    Boston Strangler 80.    Polite Society 81.    Miguel Wants to Fight 82.    The Color Purple 83.    The Royal Hotel 84.    Saw X 85.    All of Us Strangers 86.    Fallen Leaves 87.    Ferrari 88.    Elemental 89.    Peter Pan & Wendy 90.    Renfield 91.    Cat Person 92.    Scream VI 93.    The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes 94.    BS High 95.    Blue Beetle 96.    Huesera: The Bone Woman 97.    When Evil Lurks 98.    Dark Harvest 99.    A Good Person 100.    Final Cut 101.    Knock at the Cabin 102.    Quiz Lady 103.    Leo 104.    Air 105.    The Super Mario Bros. Movie 106.    Batman: The Doom That Came to Gotham 107.    John Wick: Chapter 4 108.    Beaten to Death 109.    The Wrath of Becky 110.    Passages 111.    Transformers: Rise of the Beasts 112.    Gran Turismo 113.    65 114.    Sick 115.    Sister Death 116.    The Blackening 117.    Please Don’t Destroy: The Treasure of Foggy Mountain 118.    Flamin’ Hot 119.    Nimona 120.    Cobweb 121.    Totally Killer 122.    What’s Love Got to Do with It? 123.     Sharper 124.    Unseen 125.    Dunki 126.    Bird Box Barcelona 127.    The Marvels 128.    Shazam! Fury of the Gods

Grade C

129.   Wildflower 130.    Freelance 131.    M3GAN 132.    Strays 133.    Sympathy for the Devil 134.    Creed III 135.    Chevalier 136.    The Marsh King’s Daughter 137.    A Haunting in Venice 138.    The Little Mermaid 139.    Silent Night 140.    Master Gardener 141.    The Flash 142.    Fast X 143.    The Pope’s Exorcist 144.    Saltburn 145.    Kandahar 146.    Stand 147.    Plane 148.   Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny 149.    Fingernails 150.    Quicksand 151.    Fool’s Paradise 152.    Migration 153.    Rustin 154.    The Covenant 155.    Good Burger 2 156.    The Pod Generation 157.    Alice, Darling 158.    Insidious: The Red Door 159.    Missing 160.    Shotgun Wedding 161.    You Hurt My Feelings 162.    The Boogeyman 163.    Showing Up 164.    Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom 165.    Champions 166.    Consecration 167.    The Nun II 168.    Biosphere 169.    House Party 170.    The Exorcist: Believer 171.    Big George Foreman 172.    Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves 173.    Children of the Corn 174.    The Beanie Bubble 175.    Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania

Grade F

176.    Anyone But You 177.    Marlowe 178.    Paint 179.    Extraction 2 180.    It Lives Inside 181.    Deliver Us 182.    Trolls Band Together 183.    Finestkind 184.    Corner Office 185.    Wish 186.    Prisoner’s Daughter 187.    Pain Hustlers 188.    Foe 189.    The Mother 190.    Old Dads 191.    Ghosted 192.    Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken 193.    Haunted Mansion 194.    Mafia Mamma 195.    Five Nights at Freddy’s 196.    The Machine 197.    Justice League: Warworld 198.    We Have a Ghost 199.    What Comes Around 200.    Legion of Super-Heroes 201.    The Boys in the Boat 202.    Attachment 203.    Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre 204.    About My Father 205.    You People 206.    Meg 2: The Trench 207.    Pathaan 208.    Rebel Moon - Part One: A Child of Fire 209.    Assassin 210.    Dalíland 211.    Vacation Friends 2

Bottom 10

212.    Sound of Freedom 213.    Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey 214.    When You Finish Saving The World 215.    Heart of Stone 216.    Family Switch 217.    Expend4bles 218.    Sweetwater 219.    Hypnotic 220.    80 for Brady 221.    Spinning Gold

[v-akarai]

References in Servamp

Arabian mythology

Jinn. Ch. 16

Greek mythology

Elpis. Ch. 75

Moirai. Ch. 108

Pandora. Ch. 130

Pygmalion. Ch. 123

Pandora's Box. Ch. 97

Japanese mythology

Gashadokuro. Ch. 129

Kitsune. Ch. 3

Raijin. Ch. 85

Norse mythology

Baldr. Ch. 39

Bifröst. Ch. 88

Brunhild. Ch. 88

Fimbulwinter. Ch. 40

Freya. Ch. 65

Frey. Ch. 131

Gleipnir. Ch. 101

Hati. Ch. 91, 131

Hod. Ch. 39

Hliðskjálf. Ch. 96

Idunn. Ch. 65

Loki. Ch. 15

Mimir. Ch. 29

Mjölnir. Ch. 53

Ragnarök. Ch. 101, 122, 131

Sigurd. Ch. 101

Thor. Ch. 41

Yggdrasil. Ch. 42

Biblical references

Abel. Ch. 8

Adam. Ch. 128

Boaz and Jachin. Ch. 42

Eden. Ch. 21

Eve. Ch. 1

John the Baptist. Ch.122

Lucifer. Ch. 135

Nod. Ch. 29, events

Hinduism

Asura. Ch. 57.5, 89.

Tarot

The Fool - Mahiru. Ch. 50

I. The Magician – Night trio. Ch. 41

II. The High Priestess – Mikuni. Ch. 42

V. The Hierophant - Shuhei. Ch. 77

X. Wheel of Fortune - Junichiro. Ch. 53

XII. The Hanged Man - Tsurugi. Ch. 50

XV. The Devil – Shamrock. Ch. 72

XVI. The Tower - Touma. Ch. 47

XVII. The Star - Iduna. Ch. 73

XVIII. The Moon - Yumikage. Ch. 69

XX. Judgement - Mikuni. Ch. 144

Literary references

 "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" Lewis Carroll. Ch. 3, 4, 7, 19, 98, 122. Misono, Lily, Dodo, Mitsuki, Yamane, Hattori, Mikuni, Bad B and Good B.

"As You Like It" William Shakespeare. Ch. 10, 38.5. Mikuni's spell.

"My Fair Lady" English nursery rhyme. Ch. 10 Mikuni's spell.

"Dracula" Bram Stoker. Ch. 12, 30. Hugh.

"Romeo and Juliet" William Shakespeare. Ch. 23, 34. Hyde, Ophelia.

"Faust" by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Ch. 29 Johannes.

"Through the Looking-Glass" Lewis Carroll. Ch. 29, events. Mikuni, Johannes.

"Julius Caesar" William Shakespeare. Ch. 23, 84. Hyde.

"Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" Robert Stevenson. Ch. 23, 37. Hyde, Licht.

"Macbeth" William Shakespeare. Ch. 24, 31. Kuro, Saint Germain, Mahiru.

"Night on the Galactic Railroad" Kenji Miyazawa. Ch. 26, 142. Higan, Tsubaki.

"The Little Prince" Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. Ch 30, 67. Kuro, Mahiru, Sloth demon, Gear, probably Jeje.

"Hamlet" William Shakespeare. Ch. 33, 34. Hyde, Ophelia.

"The Phantom of the Opera" Gaston Leroux. Ch. 36 Licht and Hyde technique.

"Peter and Wendy" James Barry. Ch. 44, 56, 74. Tsurugi, Touma, Mahiru.

"Ring a Ring o' Roses" nursery rhyme. Ch. 53 Junichiro's spell.

“Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens” James Barry. Ch. 53, 75. Tsurugi, Touma.

"Death in Venice" Thomas Mann. Ch. 55 Gilbert technique.

"Total Eclipse" a play by Christopher Hampton. Ch. 55 Rayscent's technique.

"The Morning of the Last Farewell" Kenji Miyazawa. Ch. 57.5 Tsubaki.

"Spring and Asura" Kenji Miyazawa. Ch. 57.5 Tsubaki.

"The Catcher in the Rye" Jerome Salinger. Ch. 62 Shuhei.

"Four and Twenty Blackbirds" Agatha Christie. Ch. 62 Shuhei's spell.

"Metamorphosis" Franz Kafka. Ch. 62 Shamrock technique.

“The Nighhawk's Star” Kenji Miyazawa. Ch. 62, 76. Shamrock technique.

"Rock-a-bye Baby" an English lullaby. Ch. 70 Touma's spell.

“Schlafe, mein Prinzchen, schlaf ein” lullaby. Ch. 70 Touma's spell.

"Who Killed Cock Robin" an English nursery rhyme. Ch. 70 Yumikage's spell.

"The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" Lyman Frank Baum. Ch. 70, 88. Tsukimitsu brothers’ spells.

"Daddy-Long-Legs" Jean Webster. Ch. 74. Dark Night Trio, Touma.

"King Lear" William Shakespeare. Ch. 86. Hyde.

"The House of the Sleeping Beauties" Yasunari Kawabata. Ch. 86. Iori.

"The Divine Comedy" Dante Alighieri. Ch. 118, 120, 121. Niccolo, Ildio, Gluttony demon.

“A Brute's Love” (人でなしの恋) Edogawa Rampo. Ch. 122 Mikuni, Lily.

"Coppelia" ballet Leo Delibes. Chapter 122 Mikuni, Lily.

"Salome" Oscar Wilde. Ch. 122 Mikuni, Lily.

"Turandot" opera by Giacomo Puccini based on the play by Carlo Gozzi. Ch. 129, 136. Lily.

"The Tempest" William Shakespeare. Ch. 131. Licht and Hyde.

"The Old Man and the Sea" Ernest Hemingway. Ch. 134 Hugh.

"Flowers for Algernon" Daniel Keyes. Ch. 135 Hugh.

"Jane Eyre" Charlotte Brontë. Ch. 136. Hokaze.

"Madama Butterfly" opera by Giacomo Puccini. Ch. 136. Lily.

"Hansel and Gretel" the Brothers Grimm. Ch. 140. Faust and Otogiri.

Music

"Für Elise" by Ludwig van Beethoven. Ch. 34

"Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring" by Johann Sebastian Bach. Ch. 125

Sonata No. 17 "Tempest" by Ludwig van Beethoven. Ch. 131

Movies

"It's a Wonderful Life" (1946). Ch. 131

"Life is Beautiful" (1997). Ch. 131

I believe this list can be expanded. Somewhere I’ve written only chaps when some reference was mentioned for the first time and omitted all further mentions.

Special thanks to hello-vampire-kitty, joydoesathing and passmeabook, because some works wouldn’t be included in the list without their observations.

[armandposting]

okay I've gotten about halfway through, which I think actually covers most of the sexual violence. i intend to come back for the second half in a reblog of this post, as I can't remember for sure if there's more sexual violence there and either way want to mark the particularly disturbing physical violence in the second half.

page numbers for sexual and physical violence in The Vampire Armand

using Ballatine Books mass market paperback, first edition (2000). I've used both page and chapter numbers so hopefully this is somewhat usable even with other copies. if you want to just blanket avoid the worst of the sexual stuff, I'd advise just skipping chapters 2-5, although you will miss most of the Venice years by doing this.

use notes:

if you don't want to know anything of what happens, just use the page numbers and don't read the descriptions. the descriptions specify what happens in each scene I've marked. I've tried to balance accurately covering everything that happens so people can effectively use the descriptions as a risk assessment without going into too much detail.

sex scenes in this book tend to be pretty esoterically described with a lot of flowery euphemisms, though to an adult reader it's clear what's happening. i have used the word rape to describe various sex acts occurring even when armand doesnt understand exactly what's happening or is enjoying it. I havent specified which sex acts are happening in these notes.

during the Venice years, armand sleeps in marius's bed and is frequently held and kissed by him, but I haven't marked all mentions of this, only times when sex acts or particularly erotic blood sharing is involved.

the other violence tends to be more graphic/directly described than the sex and I've noted those scenes as well.

to avoid confusion I've referred to armand as "armand" throughout, even though he doesn't get that name until later in the book.

armand is about 15 when marius first buys him and about 17 by chapter 4. he's turned later in his 17th year. most of the sex happens between these two events, the majority in chapter 4. 

the page numbers do not necessarily pick up every time that armand thinks about these things happening to him in passing or their impacts on him, so even skipping all of these pages is not going to be completely trigger-free.

chapter 2, pages 29-35: description of armand first being sold after his abduction from Kiev, slightly more descriptive than what's told in the show. we're told that he's raped, beaten, and eventually begins to refuse food and drink, but it's not described in detail, except for a brief description of other boys in the brothel molesting him. 36-37: marius takes armand to his house and bathes him. he rapes armand in the tub. 51-52: marius rapes armand.

chapter 3, page 66: marius and armand are intimate, unclear whether sex occurs or if it's particularly charged blood sharing. 67-71: armand tries to offer sex to marius, they share blood several times. 73: more blood sharing, only briefly described.

chapter 4, pages 74-75: marius drops armand off at a brothel so that he can learn about sex. multiple sex acts between armand and the sex workers are briefly described. 76: after marius picks armand up again, he lets armand mimic some of the things from the brothel on him. they share blood. 78-79: marius drops armand off at another brothel, this time with boys and eunuchs. multiple sex acts are described. 80-82: armand "lets himself be seduced" by an englishman at least twice his age, they have sex and the englishman threatens to kill him. armand doesnt feel particularly threatened by this at the time and leaves. 83-86: upset by the experiences described above, armand goes to bianca, who is a friend of his, and they have sex. armand feels guilty and sees it as a "rape" and a "ravaging" but bianca participates and isn't upset about it. (note: bianca's age is never really clear to me; she's younger than marius appears to be but runs her own household.) 92-97: marius beats armand with a switch. armand pretends to enjoy it for a while to piss him off. marius only stops when armand is bleeding and thinks he won't be able to walk. marius then undresses armand and heals the wounds, hitting armand a few more times when he talks back. all of this is very sexually charged. marius eventually rapes him and they share blood. in my opinion the most upsetting scene in terms of sexual violence.

chapter 5, pages 114-131: this scene is kind of a doozy but I'll try to hit the main points. marius has brought armand along to kill a group of men who have been forcing bianca to poison people. the men hit on armand and try to give him gifts for sex. some of them start touching him before marius starts killing people. one of the men continues to come onto armand who starts to get increasingly upset. marius asks if armand will have sex with the man as his dying wish, unclear if he's joking. the last man alive asks for a kiss, armand, now extremely upset, kisses him on the cheek but the man turns his head to kiss his mouth. marius, after killing the last man, berates armand about the value of human life or whatever and kisses armand several times. 138-144 [this is split over the end of chapter 5 and the beginning of 6]: the englishman armand previously had sex with comes to the palazzo in a jealous rage and kills several of the other boys. some are noted to be as young as seven. armand fatally stabs the englishman and is wounded with his poisoned blades. I've ended the page numbers after the fight is over but armand continues to be dying from the poison for the rest of chapter 6 and 7.

chapter 8 is when armand is turned, but it's not particularly sexually charged for once.

nothing else of note up to chapter 10, which is where I'll pick up for part two.

[travelling-my-little-pony]

Masquerade is looking around Venice (and the surrounding islands).

In Italy.

Masquerade is admiring the view from the Basilica San Marco, and looking like one of the bronze horses is about to stomp.

This is photo number 74 of 366.

[huariqueje]

Campo San Giacomo, Venice   -   Bruno Zupan

American, b. 1939 -

watercolor on Arches paper ,   29 x 42 in.    74 x 107 cm.

[ltwilliammowett]

The capture of the Rivoli by the Victorious 22 February 1812, by Nicholas Matthew Condy (1818- 1851)

Following a succession of defeats during the Adriatic Campaign of the Napoleonic Wars,  the French Navy sought to strengthen their fleet with the recently completed 74-gun Rivoli in Venice.

To counter this threat the 74-gun HMS Victorious, accompanied by the 18-gun brig HMS Weazel, were sent from the Mediterranean with the intention of intercepting and capturing Rivoli on her maiden voyage. This initially resulted in a stand-off, as the British blockaded the Venitian port from mid-February but in the wake of heavy fog on 21st February, Rivoli and five smaller escort ships attempted to escape unnoticed.

Contrary to the plan, the commander of Victorious, Captain John Talbot, sighted a French brig and a pursuit began. When the French brig Mercure fell behind, Rivoli shortened sail allowing the British vessels to reach them at which point Weazel engaged with the escort vessels, while Victorious continued after Rivoli. An action soon ensued lasting three hours and after Weazel rejoined Victorious, the combined British fire overwhelmed Rivoli and she lost her mizzenmast, as can be seen in this work. She eventually surrendered and was later added to the Navy. 

[luciidsimmer]

Favorite CC 2023: Part Two!

CC linked below!⇩

Check out my Current Favorite CC: 2023 video HERE

Part One | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five

Part One: Presets, Sliders, Skin Details & Hair Part Two: Hair & Accessories Part Three: Accessories, Makeup & Body Part Four: Body & Clothing Part Five: Clothing

Hair

Hair

24. Rin 25. Amelie 26. Monet 27. Kirsty 28. Amy 29. Sabrina 30. Tiffany 31. Fleur 32. Kiera 33. Matlida 34. Charlotte 35. Amaya 36. Miriam 37. Raquel 38. Avyanna 39. Viola 40. Daphne 41. Cairo 42. Kenny 43. Jennifer 44. Selena 45. Esme 46. Charlotte 47. Madison 48. Leighton 49. Angele 50. Mimi 51. Kappa 52. Girlboss 53. Fleur 54. North 55. Faerie 56. Sabrina 57. Skylight 58. Tatima 59. Braids 60. Jean 61. Cassie 62. Janette 63. Queenie 64. Silk Drape 65. Maria 66. Neema 67. Deimos 68. Hecate 69. Charline 70. Seona 71. Hava 72. Candace 73. Matilda 74. Andrine 75. Larisa 76. Light 77. Aina 78. Tamara 79. Buzzcut 80. Holtzman 81. Pecan 82. Cassata 83. Twists 84. Twists 85. Joy 86. Vilna

Accessories

Hats

1. Beanie 2. Helia 3. Asteria 4. Beach Hat 5. Aurora 6. Cowboy Hat 7. Bonnet 8. Baseball Cap 9. Flower Crown 10. Tahliah

Face Piercings

1-3. Piercing Collection

Headphones

1. Downtown

Earrings

1. Bow 2. Playlist 3. Occultic 4. Lucent 5. Tartot 6. Almond 7. Venice 8. Chloe 9. Kali 10. Squiggle 11. Aine 12. Lita 13. Cuerpo 14. Geode 15. Glitter 16. Ritual 17. Mission 18. Nouveau 19. Soma 20. Neutral

[blakegopnik]

THE FRIDAY PIC is a photo by Stephen Shore titled "Kingston, New York, November 8, 2020, 41°56.9443167N, 74°1.7406167W." (I love all that specificity.) The image is from Shore's fabulous new show of photographs shot from drones, at 303 gallery in New York.

I'm amazed that Shore can preserve — and yet transform — the trademark feel of his art while looking through the eyes of a remotely-piloted flying machine.

That remote, disembodied gaze reminds me of the products of a similar, much earlier one: The gaze we witness in constructed, one-point perspective.

When Renaissance perspectivists wanted to show off, they'd choose a viewpoint that no human eye was likely to achieve. Think the "bird's eye" view of Jacopo de' Barbari's great, balloon-free map of Venice, or the worm's-eye view in Mantegna's famous oculus in Mantua. They wanted to demonstrate the power of their artifice, and how it was independent of mere human observation.

Even though we know how Shore achieved his new views of America — how he got his "eye" to where it was in each shot — his images retain a whiff of Renaissance artifice. Somehow, that lets them emphasize the cultural construction of the land we live in.

[brigittemarlt]

Derek as Gratiano in The Merchant of Venice, first performed in 1970 by The National Theatre and since revived (the production will be taped for the 1973-74 American television season). « Director Jonathan Miller's decision to make Antonio an old man heightens the contrast between his languor and the young Gratiano's ebullient cynicism. Derek Jacobi's Gratiano is a character of considerable prominence in this production. In these opening moments the audience's attention goes in two directions: we listen to Gratiano spin out his fancy and we note the distance in more than age between him and Antonio. Antonio cannot be reached, and can draw on social energies only when Bassanio enters and Antonio is at last moved to sit down with his friend at a side-walk table. Listlessness gives way to paternal concern and affection » (Patrick J. Sullivan)

[tina-aumont]

Tina Aumont interview 6

Next Mauro Bolognini's Metello.

So there, yes! A very beautiful film. There we find three women and a young man. Love story, therefore, in Tuscany, with the beginning of the syndicalist at the beginning of the century. In this story, I have the role of seducer. We went to present the film in Cannes. Needless to say, I really like this film and its director. in 69, again, I acted in “Le Lit de la Vierge”. It's a film that we were making with friends. Well, that's the impression I had at the time. A film by Phillipe Garrel. I also shot “Les Hautes Solitudes” with him in 74 with Jean Seberg. I haven't seen it, except for a few extracts. I don't think there was even any sound. It's quite frustrating. No storyline. We were improvising, indeed. It was very neat, tracking shots, etc. He didn't work bad at the time, he's finally recognized.

70 is the year of “Casanova, a teenager in Venice” by Luigi Comencini. A film you like, I think, right?

Yes, absolutely, Comencini is a wonderful person, and his film, aesthetically, is superb.

This Casanova's motive is more comic than dramatic, right?

But Comencini has a way with children. It's not a children's film, but three quarters of the film shows Casanova as a kid, Comencini is in his element. Her daughter played in it, she played the one who wanted to leave for the convent at the end of the film.

Every time I watch the film again, I regret that you didn't have a bigger role.

Me too, I saw it again not long ago… It's right at the end of the film, it's frustrating.

Yes, because you give a lot of freshness to the character.

As a teenager, Casanova meets three young girls. This is what will change his vocation from priest to the one we know him to be, a great seducer and adventurer. The film ends there. Comencini tells these kinds of stories well.

Tina interviewed by Antoine Cervero in 2001. Published in January/June 2002 Cine Zine Zone number 134.

Very special thanks to @74paris for sharing this gem.

[beautifulvenezia]

Day 74: Olivetti Showroom | Daily Venice for you!

[hereandnowlife]

William Shakespeare, Shakespeare also spelled Shakspere, byname Bard of Avon or Swan of Avon, (baptized April 26, 1564, Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England—died April 23, 1616, Stratford-upon-Avon), English poet, dramatist, and actor often called the English national poet and considered by many to be the greatest dramatist of all time.

Shakespeare occupies a position unique in world literature. Other poets, such as Homer and Dante, and novelists, such as Leo Tolstoy and Charles Dickens, have transcended national barriers, but no writer’s living reputation can compare to that of Shakespeare, whose plays, written in the late 16th and early 17th centuries for a small repertory theatre, are now performed and read more often and in more countries than ever before. The prophecy of his great contemporary, the poet and dramatist Ben Jonson, that Shakespeare “was not of an age, but for all time,” has been fulfilled.

William Shakespeare

Category: Arts & Culture

Baptized: April 26, 1564 Stratford-upon-Avon England

Died: April 23, 1616 Stratford-upon-Avon England

Notable Works: “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” “All’s Well That Ends Well” “Antony and Cleopatra” “As You Like It” “Coriolanus” “Cymbeline” First Folio “Hamlet” “Henry IV, Part 1” “Henry IV, Part 2” “Henry V” “Henry VI, Part 1” “Henry VI, Part 2” “Henry VI, Part 3” “Henry VIII” “Julius Caesar” “King John” “King Lear” “Love’s Labour’s Lost” “Macbeth” “Measure for Measure” “Much Ado About Nothing” “Othello” “Pericles” “Richard III” “The Comedy of Errors” “The Merchant of Venice” “The Merry Wives of Windsor” “The Taming of the Shrew” “The Tempest” “Timon of Athens”

Movement / Style: Jacobean age

Notable Family Members: spouse Anne Hathaway

It may be audacious even to attempt a definition of his greatness, but it is not so difficult to describe the gifts that enabled him to create imaginative visions of pathos and mirth that, whether read or witnessed in the theatre, fill the mind and linger there. He is a writer of great intellectual rapidity, perceptiveness, and poetic power. Other writers have had these qualities, but with Shakespeare the keenness of mind was applied not to abstruse or remote subjects but to human beings and their complete range of emotions and conflicts. Other writers have applied their keenness of mind in this way, but Shakespeare is astonishingly clever with words and images, so that his mental energy, when applied to intelligible human situations, finds full and memorable expression, convincing and imaginatively stimulating. As if this were not enough, the art form into which his creative energies went was not remote and bookish but involved the vivid stage impersonation of human beings, commanding sympathy and inviting vicarious participation. Thus, Shakespeare’s merits can survive translation into other languages and into cultures remote from that of Elizabethan England.

Shakespeare the man

Life

Although the amount of factual knowledge available about Shakespeare is surprisingly large for one of his station in life, many find it a little disappointing, for it is mostly gleaned from documents of an official character. Dates of baptisms, marriages, deaths, and burials; wills, conveyances, legal processes, and payments by the court—these are the dusty details. There are, however, many contemporary allusions to him as a writer, and these add a reasonable amount of flesh and blood to the biographical skeleton.

Shakespeare Reading, oil on canvas by William Page, 1873-74; in the collection of the Smithsonian American Museum of Art, Washington, D.C. (William Shakespeare)

Shakespeare's birthplace

The parish register of Holy Trinity Church in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, shows that he was baptized there on April 26, 1564; his birthday is traditionally celebrated on April 23. His father, John Shakespeare, was a burgess of the borough, who in 1565 was chosen an alderman and in 1568 bailiff (the position corresponding to mayor, before the grant of a further charter to Stratford in 1664). He was engaged in various kinds of trade and appears to have suffered some fluctuations in prosperity. His wife, Mary Arden, of Wilmcote, Warwickshire, came from an ancient family and was the heiress to some land. (Given the somewhat rigid social distinctions of the 16th century, this marriage must have been a step up the social scale for John Shakespeare.)

Stratford enjoyed a grammar school of good quality, and the education there was free, the schoolmaster’s salary being paid by the borough. No lists of the pupils who were at the school in the 16th century have survived, but it would be absurd to suppose the bailiff of the town did not send his son there. The boy’s education would consist mostly of Latin studies—learning to read, write, and speak the language fairly well and studying some of the Classical historians, moralists, and poets. Shakespeare did not go on to the university, and indeed it is unlikely that the scholarly round of logic, rhetoric, and other studies then followed there would have interested him.

Instead, at age 18 he married. Where and exactly when are not known, but the episcopal registry at Worcester preserves a bond dated November 28, 1582, and executed by two yeomen of Stratford, named Sandells and Richardson, as a security to the bishop for the issue of a license for the marriage of William Shakespeare and “Anne Hathaway of Stratford,” upon the consent of her friends and upon once asking of the banns. (Anne died in 1623, seven years after Shakespeare. There is good evidence to associate her with a family of Hathaways who inhabited a beautiful farmhouse, now much visited, 2 miles [3.2 km] from Stratford.) The next date of interest is found in the records of the Stratford church, where a daughter, named Susanna, born to William Shakespeare, was baptized on May 26, 1583. On February 2, 1585, twins were baptized, Hamnet and Judith. (Hamnet, Shakespeare’s only son, died 11 years later.)

How Shakespeare spent the next eight years or so, until his name begins to appear in London theatre records, is not known. There are stories—given currency long after his death—of stealing deer and getting into trouble with a local magnate, Sir Thomas Lucy of Charlecote, near Stratford; of earning his living as a schoolmaster in the country; of going to London and gaining entry to the world of theatre by minding the horses of theatregoers. It has also been conjectured that Shakespeare spent some time as a member of a great household and that he was a soldier, perhaps in the Low Countries. In lieu of external evidence, such extrapolations about Shakespeare’s life have often been made from the internal “evidence” of his writings. But this method is unsatisfactory: one cannot conclude, for example, from his allusions to the law that Shakespeare was a lawyer, for he was clearly a writer who without difficulty could get whatever knowledge he needed for the composition of his plays.

Career in the theatre of William Shakespeare

The first reference to Shakespeare in the literary world of London comes in 1592, when a fellow dramatist, Robert Greene, declared in a pamphlet written on his deathbed:

There is an upstart crow, beautified with our feathers, that with his Tygers heart wrapt in a Players hide supposes he is as well able to bombast out a blank verse as the best of you; and, being an absolute Johannes Factotum, is in his own conceit the only Shake-scene in a country.

What these words mean is difficult to determine, but clearly they are insulting, and clearly Shakespeare is the object of the sarcasms. When the book in which they appear (Greenes, groats-worth of witte, bought with a million of Repentance, 1592) was published after Greene’s death, a mutual acquaintance wrote a preface offering an apology to Shakespeare and testifying to his worth. This preface also indicates that Shakespeare was by then making important friends. For, although the puritanical city of London was generally hostile to the theatre, many of the nobility were good patrons of the drama and friends of the actors. Shakespeare seems to have attracted the attention of the young Henry Wriothesley, the 3rd earl of Southampton, and to this nobleman were dedicated his first published poems, Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece.

One striking piece of evidence that Shakespeare began to prosper early and tried to retrieve the family’s fortunes and establish its gentility is the fact that a coat of arms was granted to John Shakespeare in 1596. Rough drafts of this grant have been preserved in the College of Arms, London, though the final document, which must have been handed to the Shakespeares, has not survived. Almost certainly William himself took the initiative and paid the fees. The coat of arms appears on Shakespeare’s monument (constructed before 1623) in the Stratford church. Equally interesting as evidence of Shakespeare’s worldly success was his purchase in 1597 of New Place, a large house in Stratford, which he as a boy must have passed every day in walking to school.

Globe Theatre

How his career in the theatre began is unclear, but from roughly 1594 onward he was an important member of the Lord Chamberlain’s company of players (called the King’s Men after the accession of James I in 1603). They had the best actor, Richard Burbage; they had the best theatre, the Globe (finished by the autumn of 1599); they had the best dramatist, Shakespeare. It is no wonder that the company prospered. Shakespeare became a full-time professional man of his own theatre, sharing in a cooperative enterprise and intimately concerned with the financial success of the plays he wrote.

Unfortunately, written records give little indication of the way in which Shakespeare’s professional life molded his marvelous artistry. All that can be deduced is that for 20 years Shakespeare devoted himself assiduously to his art, writing more than a million words of poetic drama of the highest quality.

Private life

Shakespeare's house in Stratford-upon-Avon

Shakespeare had little contact with officialdom, apart from walking—dressed in the royal livery as a member of the King’s Men—at the coronation of King James I in 1604. He continued to look after his financial interests. He bought properties in London and in Stratford. In 1605 he purchased a share (about one-fifth) of the Stratford tithes—a fact that explains why he was eventually buried in the chancel of its parish church. For some time he lodged with a French Huguenot family called Mountjoy, who lived near St. Olave’s Church in Cripplegate, London. The records of a lawsuit in May 1612, resulting from a Mountjoy family quarrel, show Shakespeare as giving evidence in a genial way (though unable to remember certain important facts that would have decided the case) and as interesting himself generally in the family’s affairs.

No letters written by Shakespeare have survived, but a private letter to him happened to get caught up with some official transactions of the town of Stratford and so has been preserved in the borough archives. It was written by one Richard Quiney and addressed by him from the Bell Inn in Carter Lane, London, whither he had gone from Stratford on business. On one side of the paper is inscribed: “To my loving good friend and countryman, Mr. Wm. Shakespeare, deliver these.” Apparently Quiney thought his fellow Stratfordian a person to whom he could apply for the loan of £30—a large sum in Elizabethan times. Nothing further is known about the transaction, but, because so few opportunities of seeing into Shakespeare’s private life present themselves, this begging letter becomes a touching document. It is of some interest, moreover, that 18 years later Quiney’s son Thomas became the husband of Judith, Shakespeare’s second daughter.

Shakespeare’s will (made on March 25, 1616) is a long and detailed document. It entailed his quite ample property on the male heirs of his elder daughter, Susanna. (Both his daughters were then married, one to the aforementioned Thomas Quiney and the other to John Hall, a respected physician of Stratford.) As an afterthought, he bequeathed his “second-best bed” to his wife; no one can be certain what this notorious legacy means. The testator’s signatures to the will are apparently in a shaky hand. Perhaps Shakespeare was already ill. He died on April 23, 1616. No name was inscribed on his gravestone in the chancel of the parish church of Stratford-upon-Avon. Instead these lines, possibly his own, appeared:

Sexuality of William Shakespeare

Like so many circumstances of Shakespeare’s personal life, the question of his sexual nature is shrouded in uncertainty. At age 18, in 1582, he married Anne Hathaway, a woman who was eight years older than he. Their first child, Susanna, was born on May 26, 1583, about six months after the marriage ceremony. A license had been issued for the marriage on November 27, 1582, with only one reading (instead of the usual three) of the banns, or announcement of the intent to marry in order to give any party the opportunity to raise any potential legal objections. This procedure and the swift arrival of the couple’s first child suggest that the pregnancy was unplanned, as it was certainly premarital. The marriage thus appears to have been a “shotgun” wedding. Anne gave birth some 21 months after the arrival of Susanna to twins, named Hamnet and Judith, who were christened on February 2, 1585. Thereafter William and Anne had no more children. They remained married until his death in 1616.

Were they compatible, or did William prefer to live apart from Anne for most of this time? When he moved to London at some point between 1585 and 1592, he did not take his family with him. Divorce was nearly impossible in this era. Were there medical or other reasons for the absence of any more children? Was he present in Stratford when Hamnet, his only son, died in 1596 at age 11? He bought a fine house for his family in Stratford and acquired real estate in the vicinity. He was eventually buried in Holy Trinity Church in Stratford, where Anne joined him in 1623. He seems to have retired to Stratford from London about 1612. He had lived apart from his wife and children, except presumably for occasional visits in the course of a very busy professional life, for at least two decades. His bequeathing in his last will and testament of his “second best bed” to Anne, with no further mention of her name in that document, has suggested to many scholars that the marriage was a disappointment necessitated by an unplanned pregnancy.

What was Shakespeare’s love life like during those decades in London, apart from his family? Knowledge on this subject is uncertain at best. According to an entry dated March 13, 1602, in the commonplace book of a law student named John Manningham, Shakespeare had a brief affair after he happened to overhear a female citizen at a performance of Richard III making an assignation with Richard Burbage, the leading actor of the acting company to which Shakespeare also belonged. Taking advantage of having overheard their conversation, Shakespeare allegedly hastened to the place where the assignation had been arranged, was “entertained” by the woman, and was “at his game” when Burbage showed up. When a message was brought that “Richard the Third” had arrived, Shakespeare is supposed to have “caused return to be made that William the Conqueror was before Richard the Third. Shakespeare’s name William.” This diary entry of Manningham’s must be regarded with much skepticism, since it is verified by no other evidence and since it may simply speak to the timeless truth that actors are regarded as free spirits and bohemians. Indeed, the story was so amusing that it was retold, embellished, and printed in Thomas Likes’s A General View of the Stage (1759) well before Manningham’s diary was discovered. It does at least suggest, at any rate, that Manningham imagined it to be true that Shakespeare was heterosexual and not averse to an occasional infidelity to his marriage vows. The film Shakespeare in Love (1998) plays amusedly with this idea in its purely fictional presentation of Shakespeare’s torchy affair with a young woman named Viola De Lesseps, who was eager to become a player in a professional acting company and who inspired Shakespeare in his writing of Romeo and Juliet—indeed, giving him some of his best lines.

Apart from these intriguing circumstances, little evidence survives other than the poems and plays that Shakespeare wrote. Can anything be learned from them? The sonnets, written perhaps over an extended period from the early 1590s into the 1600s, chronicle a deeply loving relationship between the speaker of the sonnets and a well-born young man. At times the poet-speaker is greatly sustained and comforted by a love that seems reciprocal. More often, the relationship is one that is troubled by painful absences, by jealousies, by the poet’s perception that other writers are winning the young man’s affection, and finally by the deep unhappiness of an outright desertion in which the young man takes away from the poet-speaker the dark-haired beauty whose sexual favours the poet-speaker has enjoyed (though not without some revulsion at his own unbridled lust, as in Sonnet 129). This narrative would seem to posit heterosexual desire in the poet-speaker, even if of a troubled and guilty sort; but do the earlier sonnets suggest also a desire for the young man? The relationship is portrayed as indeed deeply emotional and dependent; the poet-speaker cannot live without his friend and that friend’s returning the love that the poet-speaker so ardently feels. Yet readers today cannot easily tell whether that love is aimed at physical completion. Indeed, Sonnet 20 seems to deny that possibility by insisting that Nature’s having equipped the friend with “one thing to my purpose nothing”—that is, a penis—means that physical sex must be regarded as solely in the province of the friend’s relationship with women: “But since she [Nature] pricked thee out for women’s pleasure, / Mine be thy love and thy love’s use their treasure.” The bawdy pun on “pricked” underscores the sexual meaning of the sonnet’s concluding couplet. Critic Joseph Pequigney has argued at length that the sonnets nonetheless do commemorate a consummated physical relationship between the poet-speaker and the friend, but most commentators have backed away from such a bold assertion.

A significant difficulty is that one cannot be sure that the sonnets are autobiographical. Shakespeare is such a masterful dramatist that one can easily imagine him creating such an intriguing story line as the basis for his sonnet sequence. Then, too, are the sonnets printed in the order that Shakespeare would have intended? He seems not to have been involved in their publication in 1609, long after most of them had been written. Even so, one can perhaps ask why such a story would have appealed to Shakespeare. Is there a level at which fantasy and dreamwork may be involved?

The plays and other poems lend themselves uncertainly to such speculation. Loving relationships between two men are sometimes portrayed as extraordinarily deep. Antonio in Twelfth Night protests to Sebastian that he needs to accompany Sebastian on his adventures even at great personal risk: “If you will not murder me for my love, let me be your servant” (Act II, scene 1, lines 33–34). That is to say, I will die if you leave me behind. Another Antonio, in The Merchant of Venice, risks his life for his loving friend Bassanio. Actors in today’s theatre regularly portray these relationships as homosexual, and indeed actors are often incredulous toward anyone who doubts that to be the case. In Troilus and Cressida, Patroclus is rumoured to be Achilles’ “masculine whore” (V, 1, line 17), as is suggested in Homer, and certainly the two are very close in friendship, though Patroclus does admonish Achilles to engage in battle by saying,

Again, on the modern stage this relationship is often portrayed as obviously, even flagrantly, sexual; but whether Shakespeare saw it as such, or the play valorizes homosexuality or bisexuality, is another matter.

A woman impudent and mannish grown

Certainly his plays contain many warmly positive depictions of heterosexuality, in the loves of Romeo and Juliet, Orlando and Rosalind, and Henry V and Katharine of France, among many others. At the same time, Shakespeare is astute in his representations of sexual ambiguity. Viola—in disguise as a young man, Cesario, in Twelfth Night—wins the love of Duke Orsino in such a delicate way that what appears to be the love between two men morphs into the heterosexual mating of Orsino and Viola. The ambiguity is reinforced by the audience’s knowledge that in Shakespeare’s theatre Viola/Cesario was portrayed by a boy actor of perhaps 16. All the cross-dressing situations in the comedies, involving Portia in The Merchant of Venice, Rosalind/Ganymede in As You Like It, Imogen in Cymbeline, and many others, playfully explore the uncertain boundaries between the genders. Rosalind’s male disguise name in As You Like It, Ganymede, is that of the cupbearer to Zeus with whom the god was enamoured; the ancient legends assume that Ganymede was Zeus’s catamite. Shakespeare is characteristically delicate on that score, but he does seem to delight in the frisson of sexual suggestion.

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Fairytale talk: A brief history of fairytales

Fairytales have a very old and rich history, some being as old as humanity itself (well, I'm exaggerating, but since they are oral stories inspired by myths and legends they are fairly old).

However, we can pinpoint a precise point at which a "fairy tale" or "fairytale" became a true literary genre.

Italy, 16th century. The birth of the genre of fairytales.

With one work: Le Piacevoli Notti. The Facetious Nights, by Giovanni Francesco Straparolla.  The grandfather of all fairytales. Published between 1550 and 1553, this book is a collection of what would later be known as "fairytales" inspired by the extremely famous Italian novel the "Decameron".

The Decameron, by Boccace, is a collection of short stories framed by one overall narrative: a group of ten young people leave a plague-infested Florence to rest in the beautiful countryside. During their stay, they invent a game. Each day, someone will decide a theme and the others will have to tell a tale based on the choice. As a result, for ten days, the ten young men and women each tell a tale. 10 X 10 = a hundred tales in total. The Decameron is not a fairytale book: the stories in it are mostly centered around women, love and sex, ranging from epic, beautiful, poetic romances, to funny, grotesque, lustful stories, all in a realistic and not at all magical context. But this book (dating from 1349/1353) became a classic of Italian medieval literature, and had a HUGE cultural impact on the following literary works, such as The Facetious Nights.

The Facetious Nights work in a similar way to the Decameron: a group of young, wealthy people reunite in a palace near Venice. Each night, names are chosen among their company and they have to tell stories. Each "night" opens with a madrigal and ends with an enigma, the stories told in between. Here, the stories clearly take a more magical, folkloric and "fairy" identity. While there are 74 stories or "fables" in total in the book, not all are actually fairytales - there is also a lot of  erotic/grotesque stories. In fact, some people tend to reduce the list of "fairytales" in the book to 22 tales.

Another major fairytale work of Italy is the Pentamerone, that some known better under the title of "Tale of Tales".

Published between 1634 and 1636 by Giambattista Basile, inspired by both the Decamerone and the Facetious Nights, the Pentamerone is a collection of 49 fairytales. Just like in the previous works, these tales are linked together by an over-arching narrative, except here the "tale of tales" in question is one of the fairytales too. And once again, the fairytales are divided into five "days" - each split into ten parts (the narrative tale being the 50th fairytale).

While Italy was the beginning of fairytales, the landmark, the grandfather, the genre only popularized itself thanks to FRANCE! Glorious France!

France is the next step of the history of fairytales. In the 17th century, fairytales became THE literary fashion in France. No need to tell you that, at the time, literary circles and literary clubs were a hobby and passion of the wealthy, noble and powerful, far away from the peasants. As a result, the French fairytales became the toys of dukes, countesses and princes. It was at the time the "preciosity" movement, a literary and cultural moment which demanded delicate, refined, intellectual, beautiful, poetic things. And so were the fairytales: fairytales were beautiful, refined, intellectual stories supposed to entertain nobles and royalty. This is why some fairytales were told in verse, like a poem, and why many had a "moral" at the end, to imitate the genre of fables. There were numerous female authors who tried themselves at the making of fairytales, like L'Héritier de Villandon or Madame d'Aulnoy. But THE most remembered and famous French fairytale author was a man. Charles Perrault, and his "Contes de ma Mère l'Oye" (Tales of Mother Goose). This collection of eight fairytales was a tremendous literary success which deeply marked French culture - today, Charles Perrault is better remembered in France than the Brothers Grimm.

The popularity of fairytales lasted in France to the 18th century. Three main events can be noted in this century: the French "translation" and publication of the Arabian Nights, or One Hundred and One Nights, which made Europe discover the genre of the "Arabian fairytale" ; the publication of "Beauty and the Beast" (first by Gabrielle-Suzanne de Villeneuve, then by Marie Le prince de Beaumont) ; and finally the publication of "Le Cabinet des Fées", a collection of fairytales spread over 41 volumes, and which collects as much the French fairytales written in the previous centuries, and "Arabian fairytales", exotic tales from Arabia, Turkey, India, China...

While France popularized the genre of fairytales, it would be Germany tht would immortalize it, thanks to the Brothers Grimm.

Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm decided to collect in one book all of the legends, folkloric tales and fairytales of Germany. This resulted in the "Kinder und Haüsmarchen", Children's and Household Tales. First published in 1812, their book was criticized for not being "kid-friendly" enough and thus they published a revised, "censored" version in 1815 - this is the one most people know of. Several other editions were made, up to 1850, and with each edition they added new tales : where the first edition had 86 tales, the final edition of the Grimm book had 200 fairytales (without counting the appendix). They also were the ones who popularized the German word "Märchen" for fairytales (in French we call them "contes de fée" ou "contes merveilleux". In Italian... I do not know)

The 19th century was also the century of the British Isles in term of farytales. Two names can be remembered.

The first is Andrew Lang, a Scottish poet, writer and critic, who spent a huge part of his career collecting fairytales. After translating Perrault's fairytales, he decided to start his collection called "The Fairy Books". In 1889 was published The Blue Fairy book, a first collection of fairytales, followed by The Red Fairybook in 1890, and so forth. In totel there were twelve Fairybooks, each of a different color, the series ending in 1910 with The Lilac Fairy Book.

The second name is Joseph Jacobs, an English historian who actually published between 1890 and 1910 a series of books collecting fairytales, nursery rhymes, ballads and other little magical stories, inspired by the work of the Brothers Grimm. His six books had their own big impact on fairytales (for example he was the one who popularized the Three Little Pigs fairytale): English Fairy Tales ; More English Fairy Tales ; Celtic Fairy Tales ; More Celtic Fairytales ; Indian Fairytales ; and European Folk and Fairy Tales.

The 19th century also had other folklorists, inspired by the Brothers Grimm, collecting fairytales in their own countries, though they are not well known in the Western World, such as Alexander Afanasyev who is considered the Russian equivalent of the Brothers Grimm, Petre Ispirescu, who collected Romanian fairytales, or even Yei Theodora Ozaki who collected Japanese fairytales in his "Japanese Fairy Book" (though this one is not in the 19th century, since the book was published in the 1900s).

And precisely, the 20st century was the start of a new trend: the creation of fairytales.

Famous authors decided to write their own fairytales, "artifical" fairytales that nonetheless became as iconic and well-known ass the regular fairytales. Agai, here I can mention two names. Hans Christian Andersen, the Danish author behind tales such as "The Little Mermaid", "The Snow Queen", "Thumbelina" ; and George MacDonald, the Scottish creator of tales like "The Light Princess", "The Lost Princess" or "The Wise Woman".

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