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Thread: France - Page 5







Post#101 at 04-23-2012 05:21 PM by herbal tee [at joined Dec 2005 #posts 7,116]
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Socialist candidate leads after the first round of the French presidential election.

Quote Originally Posted by Christian Science Monitor
A late surge of Socialist Party candidate Francois Hollande, at 28.4 percent according to exit polls, eclipsed the 25.5 percent of president Sarkozy, and represents the first time in modern France an incumbent has not taken the lead after Round 1.

Political experts have stressed for weeks that Mr. Sarkozy, elected in 2007, needs to use Round 1 to create momentum if he is to win on May 6 and stay in office.

Round 1 winnows the French field from 10 candidates to two.







Post#102 at 12-27-2012 02:54 PM by Chas'88 [at In between Pennsylvania & Pennsyltucky joined Nov 2008 #posts 9,432]
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Having just seen the musical adaptation of the film I was brought back to wondering of the timeline of France again... based on a conversation that The Grey Badger and I have been having thanks to Les Miserables:

Obvious High Dates
Obvious Awakening Dates
Obvious Unraveling Dates
Obvious Crisis Dates
Unsure

Important Dates:

1786 - Great crisis of the monarchy, it became apparent that the kingdom was bankrupt from previous military endeavours (in particular the Seven Years' War and the American War of Independence) and needed fiscal reform to survive

1789 - Storming of the Bastille

1792 - Overthrow of Louis XVI

1793 - Death of Marat by Corday

1794 - Committee of Public Safety & Reign of Terror

1799 - Coup of 18 Brumaire

1803 - War with England ends

1804 - First French Empire founded by the crowning of Napoleon

1806 - Treaty of Tilsit, most of Europe bows down to Napoleon

1810 - Napoleon divorces Josephine

1814 - Napoleon abdicates, is sent to Elba

1815 - Napoleon escapes and is defeated at Waterloo, House of Bourbon is restored with Louis XVIII

1824 - Charles X comes to power

1827 - Charles is confronted by an unruly National Guard that insults him and his neice, the economy takes a turn for the negative

1830 - July Revolution establishes a Constitutional Monarchy, Charles abdicates, Louis-Philippe is chosen as figurehead; Balzac is inspired to begins to organize his works into the eventual evolvement of La Comedie humaine; Victor Hugo premiers his play Hernani, which is met with large riots and demonstrations

1831 - Victor Hugo publishes Notre-Dame de Paris (The Hunchback of Notre-Dame)

1832 - June Rebellion takes place (Les Miserables depicts this), Hugo is caught unexpectedly in between the two sides and takes shelter where he can

1834 - The massacre of the rue Transnonain, Paris

1835 - Assassination attempt on the King

1836 - Bonapartist Uprising

1838 - Strikes in the textile, clothing, and construction industries

1839 - Strikes cause Economic distress

1841 - Balzac signs a contract outlining all the parts of La Comedie humaine

1842 - National Railway Network is organized

1843 - Marx comes to Paris, which is home to German, British, Polish, and Italian Revolutionaries

1844 - Three Musketters is published by Dumas

1845 - The Count of Monte Cristo is publised by Dumas

1848 - Year of Revolution, overthrow of the July Monarchy, establishment of the Second Republic

1851 - Coup of the Bonapartists

1852 - Napoleon III establishes the Second Empire

1856 - Second Opium War begins in China

1859 - France goes to war with Austria over Italy

1860s - Five o'clock PM is commonly referred to as: l'heure verte ("the green hour"), due to the amount of Absinthe being consumed

1860 - Free trade treaty with the British, Second Opium War ends with Anglo-French victory

1861 - French forces storm Veracruz, Mexico

1862 - French forces are defeated in Mexico on May 5, Les Miserables is published

1863 - The French forces plant Emperor Maximillion I as ruler of Mexico, Napoleon III establishes a temporary Salon of the Refused, to display work that was rejected from the Salon of Paris, so the public could "judge for itself" whether the rejected art pieces were quality or not

1866 - France retreats from Mexico due to insustability in the country, French campaign in Korea fails

1867 - French campaign in Japan fails, attempts by artists to petition Napoleon to establish a second Salon of the Refused fails

1870 - Battle of Sedan, Second Empire Dissolved

1871 - Treaty of Frankfurt ends the Franco-Prussian War & the Paris Commune

1872 - Jules Claretie coins the phrase Japonisme to describe the intense fascination with everything Japanese (especially wood-block prints), attempts by the artists to petition for the establishment of another Salon of the Refused fails again

1873 - Monet, Renoir, Pissarro, and Sisley organized the Société Anonyme Coopérative des Artistes Peintres, Sculpteurs, Graveurs ("Cooperative and Anonymous Association of Painters, Sculptors, and Engravers") to exhibit their artworks independently

1874 - Louis Leroy coins the phrase "Impressionism" based on a title of a Monet painting, he wrote: Impression—I was certain of it. I was just telling myself that, since I was impressed, there had to be some impression in it ... and what freedom, what ease of workmanship! Wallpaper in its embryonic state is more finished than that seascape.

1875 - Bizet's Carmen premiers

1877 - Public opinion swinging heavily in favour of a republic, the President of the Republic, Patrice MacMahon, himself a monarchist, made one last desperate attempt to salvage the monarchical cause by dismissing the republic-minded Prime Minister Jules Simon and reappointing the monarchist leader the Duc de Broglie to office. He then dissolved parliament and called a general election. If his hope had been to halt the move towards republicanism, it backfired spectacularly, with the President being accused of having staged a constitutional coup d'état, known as le seize Mai after the date on which it happened.

1879 - Republicans returned triumphant, finally killing off the prospect of a restored French monarchy by gaining control of the Senate on 5 January 1879.


1881 - Legitamists are pushed out of power and the Republic is finally governed by Republicans, Le Chat Noir is founded

1882 - Religious Instruction is removed from all state schools, Incoherents (French Art Movement) is founded

1889 - Last major influence of the Incoherents, it prooves to be a fiasco

1890s - Les Nabis begins to exhibit their art at public exhibitions

1892 - Panama Scandals

1893 - Freedom of the Press is limited after a failed attempt to bomb the National Assembly

1894 - Dreyfuss Affair

1896 - Les Nabis breaks up; Ubu Roi by Alfred Jarry premiers, well noted for its first word: Merdre! (Pshit!) and its fat, lazy, and greedy protagonist, the play is considered a forerunner of Surrealism

1900 - Paris Exhibition

1901 - The Radical-Socialist Party is founded and remained the most important party of the Third Republic

1904 - Picasso and Modigliani establish an artist's commune at Le Bateau-Lavoir

1906 - Dreyfuss is pardoned after the papers convicting him turn out to be a forgery

1913 - Riot over the premire performance of the The Rite of Spring occurs

1914 - France enacts Absinthe Prohibition. After SFIO (French Section of the Workers' International) leader Jean Jaurès's assassination a few days before the German invasion of Belgium, the French socialist movement, as the whole of the Second International, abandoned its antimilitarist positions and joined the national war effort. First World War begins.

1920 - the socialist movement split with the majority forming the French Communist party.

1923 - Germany defaults on Reparations, sends French economy into a bit of a Debt Crisis, US steps in and negotiates for Germany to repay at smaller levels, doesn't completely solve the economic troubles

1926 - Taxation policies were inefficient, with widespread evasion, in response Poincaré levied new taxes, reformed the system of tax collection, and drastically reduced government spending in order to balance the budget and stabilize the franc. Holders of the national debt lost 80% of the face value of their bonds, but runaway inflation did not happen. From 1926 to 1929, the French economy prospered and manufacturing flourished.

1927 - France gains from European economic crisis by being the largest holder of gold

1931 - The Great Depression finally effects France

1934 - 6th of February Crisis, Popular Front Party is organized

1936 - Socialist-leaning Popular Front Party is elected

1940 - Third Republic is dissolved, founding of Vichy France

1942 - Southern France is occupied by German and Italian forces

1944 - Liberation of Paris, liberation of France, fall of the Vichy government, Provisional Governemtn of France established

1946 - Fourth Republic is established attempting to rationalize the Parliamentary style of government

1947 - Prime Minister calls for a vote of confidence on his cabinet, weaking his power


1958 - Fourth Republic collapses due to inability to effectively deal with decolonization issues, Fifth Republic is established as a Semi-Presidential system

~Chas'88
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."







Post#103 at 12-28-2012 07:03 PM by Chas'88 [at In between Pennsylvania & Pennsyltucky joined Nov 2008 #posts 9,432]
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France in 1808:

Marat/Sade

This play clearly has a High feel to it, and though it comes from our High/Awakening era, it has a basis in fact. The Marquis de Sade (clearly a Nomad archetype) did actually organize little plays with the mentally ill about this time, and the rising Civic-esque Bourgeoisie of the time came to see them. In this one, Sade portrays the death of Marat--with his Bourgeoisie patron having to constantly interfere and tell the audience that the barbarity of the play is "all in the past" and that they "live very differently now" thanks to "our beloved Emperor, Napoleon".



~Chas'88
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."







Post#104 at 12-28-2012 07:10 PM by Chas'88 [at In between Pennsylvania & Pennsyltucky joined Nov 2008 #posts 9,432]
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France in 1832:

Les Miserables

Though the film does a fine job of capturing the mood of the High, the film culminates with this Awakening moment. Based on Victor Hugo--who is quite encyclopedic and is based on his own experiences getting caught in the crossfires of this revolutionary moment.



Jean Valjean is either a Nomad/Civic or an Anomolous Civic, with Javert being a dogmatic Artist (the rules must be followed)--or even a Civic/Artist. And I don't need to explain how Marius and Cosette are Idealists.

~Chas'88
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."







Post#105 at 12-28-2012 07:20 PM by Chas'88 [at In between Pennsylvania & Pennsyltucky joined Nov 2008 #posts 9,432]
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France in 1871:



~Chas'88
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."







Post#106 at 12-28-2012 07:31 PM by Chas'88 [at In between Pennsylvania & Pennsyltucky joined Nov 2008 #posts 9,432]
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France in 1896:



Not the most accurate of pictures, but it gets the general idea across.

~Chas'88
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."







Post#107 at 12-28-2012 07:37 PM by Chas'88 [at In between Pennsylvania & Pennsyltucky joined Nov 2008 #posts 9,432]
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France in 1830:



~Chas'88
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."







Post#108 at 12-28-2012 07:44 PM by Chas'88 [at In between Pennsylvania & Pennsyltucky joined Nov 2008 #posts 9,432]
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France in 1900:



This one better captures the flavor IMO than Can-Can.

~Chas'88
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."







Post#109 at 12-28-2012 07:51 PM by Chas'88 [at In between Pennsylvania & Pennsyltucky joined Nov 2008 #posts 9,432]
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Wonderful Bio-pic:



~Chas'88
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."







Post#110 at 12-29-2012 01:55 AM by Eric the Green [at San Jose CA joined Jul 2001 #posts 22,504]
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I have thought that the French saeculum is like this, and I see France also embedded in a larger Western European saeculum, from which the American had earlier split off:

1763-1783 unravelling. Sometime along in here, Louis XV says "after me, the deluge." After the 7 Years War, the problems in the French state multiply gradually, while the decadent aristocracy keeps building up its power. Louis XVI comes to the throne.

1783-1799 crisis. The state's finances spiral downward in a huge crisis, precipitated by French investment in the American Revolution as payback for its loss to Britain in 1763. Then crop failures fuel the outbreak of the Revolution, which reaches its peak in 1793 in the Reign of Terror during a world war started by the revolutionaries. Royal invaders are turned back in 1792 and the First Republic is established. All citizens and resources are called up for duty in a mass levy. Everything is changed in a roots-deep transformation of society.

1799-1815 high. Napoleon specifically "ended" the Revolution in 1799. An era of empire building, reform, and conformity followed. Although self-destructive in the long run, Napoleon was the most successful ruler in French history.

1815-1834 awakening. After the fall of Napoleon, student and soldier movements mushroom. The romantic movement takes hold, and revolutions break out in 1830. The movement is crushed in 1834.

1834-1848 unravelling. Europe and France awaits the inevitable revolution. Stalemate ensues. There are many assassination attempts against the citizen king, but no movement can get anywhere. Economic decline continues, and at the end there is a depression fueled by the Irish Famine, which destroys the old agrarian economy.

1848-1871 crisis. The citizen-king is finally overthrown and the empire is restored in a bloody coup. It is a mild crisis for a while (like the 1850s in America), because there is prosperity and an industrial boom. But the new Napoleon plots wars of national liberation, and thanks to him in 1859 a series of them breaks out, culminating in the Fall of Napoleon III himself in the Franco-Prussian War, followed by the bloody Paris Commune uprising.

1871-1885 high. This is a somewhat weak high, coming after a crisis with two big bookends, with an indian summer in the middle. The French Third Republic is established, and survives amid much dithering, but it is the first one to last. These are times of materialism and industrial expansion. Anti-cleric policies are in the ascendant.

1885-1908 awakening. The Bulgarian Crisis, though not specifically French, is the first one leading to World War I, so it makes people nervous and stimulates French nationalism and increasing fear of Germany, especially after William II takes the German throne in 1888 and fires Bismarck in 1890. France makes an alliance with Russia soon afterward in 1892-94. Meanwhile, the great belle epoch in the arts and bohemian culture expands. Post-impressionism begins modern art starting in 1885, and the drug-fueled subculture of symbolism and the permissive sex of the age of the Moulin Rouge grows. The fin de siecle mood ripens, fueling questioning of traditional culture and authority. The Dreyfus Affair magnifies the mood in 1898 and reawakens interest in the French Revolution. Labor unrest grows.

1908-1931 unravelling. 1908 is the year of another great crisis leading directly to the war, and this one in Bosnia that year is the most crucial. The arms race heats up dramatically and small wars follow, and in 1914 the spark in Bosnia ignites World War I. Of course this is much worse than the usual unravelling, because this is a time of a change in civilization; a much bigger and more significant cycle is in play, and it hits France as a main target. Disillusion magnifies in the jazz age that follows the war; Paris is its epicenter.

1931-1951 crisis. The stock market crash wipes out leading banks in Europe by 1931. Labor unrest leads to a general uprising in 1936. Hitler threatens and invades, occupying the country in a horrible oppression, wiping out the Third Republic. The Allies rescue France, and the 4th Republic is established. Post-war devastation is eased by the Marshall Plan. 1951 was a general and very-noticeable easing of the mood of austerity in Britain, signalled by Churchill's restoration as PM, and so I assume this was so in France, though I'm not certain of the first high year. NATO's establishment in 1949 could also be the first high year.

1951-1968 high. The economy rebuilds under American protection and the Common Market, established under French leadership in 1957. The Fifth Republic is established in 1958 under DeGaulle, a contemporary Napoleon.

1968-? awakening. Obviously the student-labor general strike of 1968 brings the counter-culture and protest movement to France in a big way. The post-modern cultures develop out of this event. DeGaulle resigns and dies. The following socialist reforms are successful and transform the country by the 1980s. I'm not sure where to draw the line of unravelling after that; somewhere around 1988 perhaps.

2009-? But clearly Europe is in economic crisis since about 2009 or 2010, thanks again to an American crash, and France is feeling the pinch.
Last edited by Eric the Green; 12-29-2012 at 02:12 AM.
"I close my eyes, and I can see a better day" -- Justin Bieber

Keep the spirit alive,

Eric A. Meece







Post#111 at 12-29-2012 02:02 AM by Chas'88 [at In between Pennsylvania & Pennsyltucky joined Nov 2008 #posts 9,432]
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Except the Great Depression doesn't effect France until 1931, and it's much milder considering the economy they had going on at the time & a lot of gold reserves. In fact 1926 - 1931 are economic boom years from what I've looked into--so 1929 doesn't really work for me for France.

~Chas'88
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."







Post#112 at 12-29-2012 02:11 AM by Eric the Green [at San Jose CA joined Jul 2001 #posts 22,504]
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Quote Originally Posted by Chas'88 View Post
Except the Great Depression doesn't effect France until 1931, and it's much milder considering the economy they had going on at the time & a lot of gold reserves. In fact 1926 - 1931 are economic boom years from what I've looked into--so 1929 doesn't really work for me for France.

~Chas'88
Yes that seems a good revision.
"I close my eyes, and I can see a better day" -- Justin Bieber

Keep the spirit alive,

Eric A. Meece







Post#113 at 12-29-2012 11:43 AM by Odin [at Moorhead, MN, USA joined Sep 2006 #posts 14,442]
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Quote Originally Posted by Eric the Green View Post
I have thought that the French saeculum is like this, and I see France also embedded in a larger Western European saeculum, from which the American had earlier split off:

1763-1783 unravelling. Sometime along in here, Louis XV says "after me, the deluge." After the 7 Years War, the problems in the French state multiply gradually, while the decadent aristocracy keeps building up its power. Louis XVI comes to the throne.

1783-1799 crisis. The state's finances spiral downward in a huge crisis, precipitated by French investment in the American Revolution as payback for its loss to Britain in 1763. Then crop failures fuel the outbreak of the Revolution, which reaches its peak in 1793 in the Reign of Terror during a world war started by the revolutionaries. Royal invaders are turned back in 1792 and the First Republic is established. All citizens and resources are called up for duty in a mass levy. Everything is changed in a roots-deep transformation of society.

1799-1815 high. Napoleon specifically "ended" the Revolution in 1799. An era of empire building, reform, and conformity followed. Although self-destructive in the long run, Napoleon was the most successful ruler in French history.

1815-1834 awakening. After the fall of Napoleon, student and soldier movements mushroom. The romantic movement takes hold, and revolutions break out in 1830. The movement is crushed in 1834.

1834-1848 unravelling. Europe and France awaits the inevitable revolution. Stalemate ensues. There are many assassination attempts against the citizen king, but no movement can get anywhere. Economic decline continues, and at the end there is a depression fueled by the Irish Famine, which destroys the old agrarian economy.

1848-1871 crisis. The citizen-king is finally overthrown and the empire is restored in a bloody coup. It is a mild crisis for a while (like the 1850s in America), because there is prosperity and an industrial boom. But the new Napoleon plots wars of national liberation, and thanks to him in 1859 a series of them breaks out, culminating in the Fall of Napoleon III himself in the Franco-Prussian War, followed by the bloody Paris Commune uprising.

1871-1885 high. This is a somewhat weak high, coming after a crisis with two big bookends, with an indian summer in the middle. The French Third Republic is established, and survives amid much dithering, but it is the first one to last. These are times of materialism and industrial expansion. Anti-cleric policies are in the ascendant.

1885-1908 awakening. The Bulgarian Crisis, though not specifically French, is the first one leading to World War I, so it makes people nervous and stimulates French nationalism and increasing fear of Germany, especially after William II takes the German throne in 1888 and fires Bismarck in 1890. France makes an alliance with Russia soon afterward in 1892-94. Meanwhile, the great belle epoch in the arts and bohemian culture expands. Post-impressionism begins modern art starting in 1885, and the drug-fueled subculture of symbolism and the permissive sex of the age of the Moulin Rouge grows. The fin de siecle mood ripens, fueling questioning of traditional culture and authority. The Dreyfus Affair magnifies the mood in 1898 and reawakens interest in the French Revolution. Labor unrest grows.

1908-1931 unravelling. 1908 is the year of another great crisis leading directly to the war, and this one in Bosnia that year is the most crucial. The arms race heats up dramatically and small wars follow, and in 1914 the spark in Bosnia ignites World War I. Of course this is much worse than the usual unravelling, because this is a time of a change in civilization; a much bigger and more significant cycle is in play, and it hits France as a main target. Disillusion magnifies in the jazz age that follows the war; Paris is its epicenter.

1931-1951 crisis. The stock market crash wipes out leading banks in Europe by 1931. Labor unrest leads to a general uprising in 1936. Hitler threatens and invades, occupying the country in a horrible oppression, wiping out the Third Republic. The Allies rescue France, and the 4th Republic is established. Post-war devastation is eased by the Marshall Plan. 1951 was a general and very-noticeable easing of the mood of austerity in Britain, signalled by Churchill's restoration as PM, and so I assume this was so in France, though I'm not certain of the first high year. NATO's establishment in 1949 could also be the first high year.

1951-1968 high. The economy rebuilds under American protection and the Common Market, established under French leadership in 1957. The Fifth Republic is established in 1958 under DeGaulle, a contemporary Napoleon.

1968-? awakening. Obviously the student-labor general strike of 1968 brings the counter-culture and protest movement to France in a big way. The post-modern cultures develop out of this event. DeGaulle resigns and dies. The following socialist reforms are successful and transform the country by the 1980s. I'm not sure where to draw the line of unravelling after that; somewhere around 1988 perhaps.

2009-? But clearly Europe is in economic crisis since about 2009 or 2010, thanks again to an American crash, and France is feeling the pinch.
Wow, my thinking on the French saeculum is pretty much identical. My only difference is that I put the start of the Napoleonic 1T with the Thermidorean Reaction and the overthrow of the Jacobins.
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Post#114 at 12-29-2012 10:34 PM by Tussilago [at Gothenburg, Sweden joined Jan 2010 #posts 1,500]
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Quote Originally Posted by Chas'88 View Post
Having just seen the musical adaptation of the film I was brought back to wondering of the timeline of France again... based on a conversation that The Grey Badger and I have been having thanks to Les Miserables:

Obvious High Dates
Obvious Awakening Dates
Obvious Unraveling Dates
Obvious Crisis Dates
Unsure

Important Dates:

1786 - Great crisis of the monarchy, it became apparent that the kingdom was bankrupt from previous military endeavours (in particular the Seven Years' War and the American War of Independence) and needed fiscal reform to survive

1789 - Storming of the Bastille

1792 - Overthrow of Louis XVI

1793 - Death of Marat by Corday

1794 - Committee of Public Safety & Reign of Terror

1799 - Coup of 18 Brumaire

1803 - War with England ends

1804 - First French Empire founded by the crowning of Napoleon

1806 - Treaty of Tilsit, most of Europe bows down to Napoleon

1810 - Napoleon divorces Josephine

1814 - Napoleon abdicates, is sent to Elba

1815 - Napoleon escapes and is defeated at Waterloo, House of Bourbon is restored with Louis XVIII

1824 - Charles X comes to power

1827 - Charles is confronted by an unruly National Guard that insults him and his neice, the economy takes a turn for the negative

1830 - July Revolution establishes a Constitutional Monarchy, Charles abdicates, Louis-Philippe is chosen as figurehead; Balzac is inspired to begins to organize his works into the eventual evolvement of La Comedie humaine; Victor Hugo premiers his play Hernani, which is met with large riots and demonstrations

1831 - Victor Hugo publishes Notre-Dame de Paris (The Hunchback of Notre-Dame)

1832 - June Rebellion takes place (Les Miserables depicts this), Hugo is caught unexpectedly in between the two sides and takes shelter where he can

1834 - The massacre of the rue Transnonain, Paris

1835 - Assassination attempt on the King

1836 - Bonapartist Uprising

1838 - Strikes in the textile, clothing, and construction industries

1839 - Strikes cause Economic distress

1841 - Balzac signs a contract outlining all the parts of La Comedie humaine

1842 - National Railway Network is organized

1843 - Marx comes to Paris, which is home to German, British, Polish, and Italian Revolutionaries

1844 - Three Musketters is published by Dumas

1845 - The Count of Monte Cristo is publised by Dumas

1848 - Year of Revolution, overthrow of the July Monarchy, establishment of the Second Republic

1851 - Coup of the Bonapartists

1852 - Napoleon III establishes the Second Empire

1856 - Second Opium War begins in China

1859 - France goes to war with Austria over Italy

1860s - Five o'clock PM is commonly referred to as: l'heure verte ("the green hour"), due to the amount of Absinthe being consumed

1860 - Free trade treaty with the British, Second Opium War ends with Anglo-French victory

1861 - French forces storm Veracruz, Mexico

1862 - French forces are defeated in Mexico on May 5, Les Miserables is published

1863 - The French forces plant Emperor Maximillion I as ruler of Mexico, Napoleon III establishes a temporary Salon of the Refused, to display work that was rejected from the Salon of Paris, so the public could "judge for itself" whether the rejected art pieces were quality or not

1866 - France retreats from Mexico due to insustability in the country, French campaign in Korea fails

1867 - French campaign in Japan fails, attempts by artists to petition Napoleon to establish a second Salon of the Refused fails

1870 - Battle of Sedan, Second Empire Dissolved

1871 - Treaty of Frankfurt ends the Franco-Prussian War & the Paris Commune

1872 - Jules Claretie coins the phrase Japonisme to describe the intense fascination with everything Japanese (especially wood-block prints), attempts by the artists to petition for the establishment of another Salon of the Refused fails again

1873 - Monet, Renoir, Pissarro, and Sisley organized the Société Anonyme Coopérative des Artistes Peintres, Sculpteurs, Graveurs ("Cooperative and Anonymous Association of Painters, Sculptors, and Engravers") to exhibit their artworks independently

1874 - Louis Leroy coins the phrase "Impressionism" based on a title of a Monet painting, he wrote: Impression—I was certain of it. I was just telling myself that, since I was impressed, there had to be some impression in it ... and what freedom, what ease of workmanship! Wallpaper in its embryonic state is more finished than that seascape.

1875 - Bizet's Carmen premiers

1877 - Public opinion swinging heavily in favour of a republic, the President of the Republic, Patrice MacMahon, himself a monarchist, made one last desperate attempt to salvage the monarchical cause by dismissing the republic-minded Prime Minister Jules Simon and reappointing the monarchist leader the Duc de Broglie to office. He then dissolved parliament and called a general election. If his hope had been to halt the move towards republicanism, it backfired spectacularly, with the President being accused of having staged a constitutional coup d'état, known as le seize Mai after the date on which it happened.

1879 - Republicans returned triumphant, finally killing off the prospect of a restored French monarchy by gaining control of the Senate on 5 January 1879.


1881 - Legitamists are pushed out of power and the Republic is finally governed by Republicans, Le Chat Noir is founded

1882 - Religious Instruction is removed from all state schools, Incoherents (French Art Movement) is founded

1889 - Last major influence of the Incoherents, it prooves to be a fiasco

1890s - Les Nabis begins to exhibit their art at public exhibitions

1892 - Panama Scandals

1893 - Freedom of the Press is limited after a failed attempt to bomb the National Assembly

1894 - Dreyfuss Affair

1896 - Les Nabis breaks up; Ubu Roi by Alfred Jarry premiers, well noted for its first word: Merdre! (Pshit!) and its fat, lazy, and greedy protagonist, the play is considered a forerunner of Surrealism

1900 - Paris Exhibition

1901 - The Radical-Socialist Party is founded and remained the most important party of the Third Republic

1904 - Picasso and Modigliani establish an artist's commune at Le Bateau-Lavoir

1906 - Dreyfuss is pardoned after the papers convicting him turn out to be a forgery

1913 - Riot over the premire performance of the The Rite of Spring occurs

1914 - France enacts Absinthe Prohibition. After SFIO (French Section of the Workers' International) leader Jean Jaurès's assassination a few days before the German invasion of Belgium, the French socialist movement, as the whole of the Second International, abandoned its antimilitarist positions and joined the national war effort. First World War begins.

1920 - the socialist movement split with the majority forming the French Communist party.

1923 - Germany defaults on Reparations, sends French economy into a bit of a Debt Crisis, US steps in and negotiates for Germany to repay at smaller levels, doesn't completely solve the economic troubles

1926 - Taxation policies were inefficient, with widespread evasion, in response Poincaré levied new taxes, reformed the system of tax collection, and drastically reduced government spending in order to balance the budget and stabilize the franc. Holders of the national debt lost 80% of the face value of their bonds, but runaway inflation did not happen. From 1926 to 1929, the French economy prospered and manufacturing flourished.

1927 - France gains from European economic crisis by being the largest holder of gold

1931 - The Great Depression finally effects France

1934 - 6th of February Crisis, Popular Front Party is organized

1936 - Socialist-leaning Popular Front Party is elected

1940 - Third Republic is dissolved, founding of Vichy France

1942 - Southern France is occupied by German and Italian forces

1944 - Liberation of Paris, liberation of France, fall of the Vichy government, Provisional Governemtn of France established

1946 - Fourth Republic is established attempting to rationalize the Parliamentary style of government

1947 - Prime Minister calls for a vote of confidence on his cabinet, weaking his power


1958 - Fourth Republic collapses due to inability to effectively deal with decolonization issues, Fifth Republic is established as a Semi-Presidential system

~Chas'88
Thanks. This is pretty much the way I look at French history also.

I might just as well take the opportunity to dispel doubts about the European post war years as well. If the larger S&H lay out is correct, the entire period from the end of the war until the 60's cannot practically be considered anything but a High. I would also lean towards placing the beginning of the European Awakening to 1963, coinciding with Beatlemania.
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Post#115 at 12-30-2012 04:12 AM by Chas'88 [at In between Pennsylvania & Pennsyltucky joined Nov 2008 #posts 9,432]
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Quote Originally Posted by Tussilago View Post
Thanks. This is pretty much the way I look at French history also.

I might just as well take the opportunity to dispel doubts about the European post war years as well. If the larger S&H lay out is correct, the entire period from the end of the war until the 60's cannot practically be considered anything but a High. I would also lean towards placing the beginning of the European Awakening to 1963, coinciding with Beatlemania.
Swinging London is an Artist subculture--akin to Haight-Ashbury or Greenwich Village before the boomers showed up. The American Boomers showed up at H-A circa 1966--and the Artists who previously inhabited it all had a negative reaction to them (considered them dirty, barefoot, drug-addled teenagers who wanted to turn their artistic alternative lifestyle into a rejection of "mom and "dad"). The artists held a funeral for "hippies" and moved out to the country, abandoning H-A to the drug-addled teens. Heck the Beatles had a negative reaction to American Boomers that scream Silent/Artist:

"I went there expecting it to be a brilliant place, with groovy gypsy people making works of art and paintings and carvings in little workshops. But it was full of horrible spotty drop-out kids on drugs, and it turned me right off the whole scene. I could only describe it as being like the Bowery: a lot of bums and drop-outs; many of them very young kids who'd dropped acid and come from all over America to this mecca of LSD.

...

It certainly showed me what was really happening in the drug culture. It wasn't what I'd thought - spiritual awakenings and being artistic - it was like alcoholism, like any addiction. The kids at Haight-Ashbury had left school and dossed out there, and instead of drinking alcohol they were on all kinds of drugs." --George Harrison

I'd go along with McCarthy being a British Boomer, perhaps, but he'd be the only Beatle I'd label as such.

As for 1963 being the start, I look at this British documentary from 1967 and it says all that needs to be said:

"They say London swings, it doesn't. Not even the King's Road, Chelsea. But here and there, amongst the conformist fat cat crowds is a lean cat or two, that might swing, if given some encouragement."

If the supposed center of the counter-culture movement doesn't "swing" then I think it's pretty safe to say that "Swinging London" is an Artist archetype counter-culture creation along the lines of Greenwich Village in the late 1950s/early 1960s.

As for Beatlemania, I look at their quote of those early years: "Lennon said little thought went into composition at the time; he and McCartney were "just writing songs à la Everly Brothers, à la Buddy Holly, pop songs with no more thought of them than that—to create a sound. And the words were almost irrelevant." The prototypical Beatles' song of the period is "I Want to Hold Your Hand" which is right about the same level of "Awakening-ness" as the Elvis song: "Wear My Ring Around Your Neck"--i.e. not at all. Beatlemania in '63 is along the same lines of Elvis and Buddy Holly in the late 50s in America. (Heck their name is after all a reference back to the fact Buddy Holly's band was The Crickets).

None of that really sounds Awakening to me. I mean if you're going to claim the British Awakening starts earlier than what's generally accepted, then choose something more along the lines of Joe Orton's Loot orWhat the Butler Saw. Or give me the works of the Angry Young Men like The L-shaped Room, or Look Back in Anger. I mean in those works they're clearly against the main authority or "the man", heck Joe Orton wrote letters to the newspaper editor pretending to be an elderly lady (named Edna Welthorpe) complaining about his own plays in order to lampoon that type of audience member. And if you argued this route, you'd have to argue that the Awakening started in the mid 1950s--which it didn't (and their influence waned from the pop culture mindset between 1966 & 1968). You could also throw Alfie in there (even with Alfie's decision at the end to lead a decent non-selfish life taken into account with the fact he gets cheated on by the person he decided to settle down with), but keep in mind that's a play, novel & film written by a 1910 cohort (a Civic no matter how you cut it).

All their themes have to deal with lower-class gents caught in a stratified class system, an incompetent nationalizing Police force, and a Nationalized Welfare state that is full of shady characters. This leads them to being angry at the system and the way things are and expressing that frustratedly (or humorously like in Loot or Alfie), that it seems these things are in power and can't be changed. It's something that echoes later with the rise of the British Punks IMO. The Punks are the children and inheritors of the Angry Young Men IMO--lower-class Brits, tired of a system that doesn't work, and they're not gonna take it anymore (but they're not gonna fix it either--because unlike the Angries who thought that things could possibly be fixed, the Punks didn't think they could or should).

The above are much more Awakening than the early Beatlemania you're using, and they're all focusing on one thing: Air Raider culture. I can easily say that 1963 - 1968 in Britain is their "micro-Crisis", that I'll wholeheartedly agree with, but outright Awakening? No.

So I still go for England 1968, it's the important year listed for their Boomers and when they begin to develop their own personality as a generation. Although if you insist on earlier, I'd say the earliest I'd go is 1966 for Britain. Even with 1966's To Sir with Love compared as the British version of 1955's Blackboard Jungle.

The 1966 - 1968 period is the point that the Air Raiders have begun to shift out of the "Angry Young Man" phase and enter the "Angry Mid-Life" phase, or if they're Joe Orton, then they get murdered by their gay lover. While the young British Boomers don't really formulate a voice as a generation until 1968, hence the reason why everyone (including yourself) refer to them as '68ers.

~Chas'88
Last edited by Chas'88; 12-30-2012 at 04:16 AM.
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."







Post#116 at 12-30-2012 06:27 AM by Tussilago [at Gothenburg, Sweden joined Jan 2010 #posts 1,500]
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Quote Originally Posted by Chas'88 View Post
Swinging London is an Artist subculture--akin to Haight-Ashbury or Greenwich Village before the boomers showed up. The American Boomers showed up at H-A circa 1966--and the Artists who previously inhabited it all had a negative reaction to them (considered them dirty, barefoot, drug-addled teenagers who wanted to turn their artistic alternative lifestyle into a rejection of "mom and "dad"). The artists held a funeral for "hippies" and moved out to the country, abandoning H-A to the drug-addled teens. Heck the Beatles had a negative reaction to American Boomers that scream Silent/Artist:

"I went there expecting it to be a brilliant place, with groovy gypsy people making works of art and paintings and carvings in little workshops. But it was full of horrible spotty drop-out kids on drugs, and it turned me right off the whole scene. I could only describe it as being like the Bowery: a lot of bums and drop-outs; many of them very young kids who'd dropped acid and come from all over America to this mecca of LSD.

...

It certainly showed me what was really happening in the drug culture. It wasn't what I'd thought - spiritual awakenings and being artistic - it was like alcoholism, like any addiction. The kids at Haight-Ashbury had left school and dossed out there, and instead of drinking alcohol they were on all kinds of drugs." --George Harrison

I'd go along with McCarthy being a British Boomer, perhaps, but he'd be the only Beatle I'd label as such.

As for 1963 being the start, I look at this British documentary from 1967 and it says all that needs to be said:

"They say London swings, it doesn't. Not even the King's Road, Chelsea. But here and there, amongst the conformist fat cat crowds is a lean cat or two, that might swing, if given some encouragement."

If the supposed center of the counter-culture movement doesn't "swing" then I think it's pretty safe to say that "Swinging London" is an Artist archetype counter-culture creation along the lines of Greenwich Village in the late 1950s/early 1960s.

As for Beatlemania, I look at their quote of those early years: "Lennon said little thought went into composition at the time; he and McCartney were "just writing songs à la Everly Brothers, à la Buddy Holly, pop songs with no more thought of them than that—to create a sound. And the words were almost irrelevant." The prototypical Beatles' song of the period is "I Want to Hold Your Hand" which is right about the same level of "Awakening-ness" as the Elvis song: "Wear My Ring Around Your Neck"--i.e. not at all. Beatlemania in '63 is along the same lines of Elvis and Buddy Holly in the late 50s in America. (Heck their name is after all a reference back to the fact Buddy Holly's band was The Crickets).

None of that really sounds Awakening to me. I mean if you're going to claim the British Awakening starts earlier than what's generally accepted, then choose something more along the lines of Joe Orton's Loot orWhat the Butler Saw. Or give me the works of the Angry Young Men like The L-shaped Room, or Look Back in Anger. I mean in those works they're clearly against the main authority or "the man", heck Joe Orton wrote letters to the newspaper editor pretending to be an elderly lady (named Edna Welthorpe) complaining about his own plays in order to lampoon that type of audience member. And if you argued this route, you'd have to argue that the Awakening started in the mid 1950s--which it didn't (and their influence waned from the pop culture mindset between 1966 & 1968). You could also throw Alfie in there (even with Alfie's decision at the end to lead a decent non-selfish life taken into account with the fact he gets cheated on by the person he decided to settle down with), but keep in mind that's a play, novel & film written by a 1910 cohort (a Civic no matter how you cut it).

All their themes have to deal with lower-class gents caught in a stratified class system, an incompetent nationalizing Police force, and a Nationalized Welfare state that is full of shady characters. This leads them to being angry at the system and the way things are and expressing that frustratedly (or humorously like in Loot or Alfie), that it seems these things are in power and can't be changed. It's something that echoes later with the rise of the British Punks IMO. The Punks are the children and inheritors of the Angry Young Men IMO--lower-class Brits, tired of a system that doesn't work, and they're not gonna take it anymore (but they're not gonna fix it either--because unlike the Angries who thought that things could possibly be fixed, the Punks didn't think they could or should).

The above are much more Awakening than the early Beatlemania you're using, and they're all focusing on one thing: Air Raider culture. I can easily say that 1963 - 1968 in Britain is their "micro-Crisis", that I'll wholeheartedly agree with, but outright Awakening? No.

So I still go for England 1968, it's the important year listed for their Boomers and when they begin to develop their own personality as a generation. Although if you insist on earlier, I'd say the earliest I'd go is 1966 for Britain. Even with 1966's To Sir with Love compared as the British version of 1955's Blackboard Jungle.

The 1966 - 1968 period is the point that the Air Raiders have begun to shift out of the "Angry Young Man" phase and enter the "Angry Mid-Life" phase, or if they're Joe Orton, then they get murdered by their gay lover. While the young British Boomers don't really formulate a voice as a generation until 1968, hence the reason why everyone (including yourself) refer to them as '68ers.

~Chas'88
First, in regard to Haight Ashbury and Silent/Boomer generational conflict, a Turning is a period with various generations caught up in it. It does not require any one specific generation to set the agenda. The alternative part of Silenthood in the early to mid 60's, something like 1963-1967 perhaps, were the main proponents of the Awakening during this period. Then the Boom took over the stick, highlighted by the 1968 uprisings, if you will, becoming the main generation in the late 60's. And the only reason I/we construe it this way is because we have divided up said generations in this manner.

"They say London swings, it doesn't. Not even the King's Road, Chelsea. But here and there, amongst the conformist fat cat crowds is a lean cat or two, that might swing, if given some encouragement."
Whatever the substantiation of that BBC narrator, they had been saying it since 1964 at least, but if you are going to argue like this, you could as easily say there never existed a Consciousness Revolution in any shape or form anywhere at any time. After all, those involved in the student uprisings in 1968 constituted a minority of the student body. An Awakening is not an outrageous carnival on Carnaby Street, it's a social mood, a collective sense of Springtime in the Air.
Such a mood is born from the feeling of security and progress in a High coupled with a certain amount of innocence generated during the same period (or at least, those were the preconditions in the early 60's) and it engenders a sense of euphoric boundlessness that to no irrelevant extent is actually a form of hubris. But since it is a mood it can be pretty difficult to pin down in retrospect, especially if you have never known such a mood yourself. I see that inability again and again on this site, especially from younger members who maybe above all were born in the 80's on.

Now, I ought to back up what I've been writing with empirical evidence, loads of links to sources, but I don't have the time nor likely the ability to arrange for it. I must contend myself with getting a conceptual framework across, which in scientific terms would constitute nothing but a flimsy hypothesis. Nevertheless, I believe this at least was one defining book of the early Awakening: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_Kill_a_Mockingbird

Now, you can go ahead and shoot it down and tear it apart while I enjoy my breakfast. Hopefully though, someone with his spritual roots in Ensalen like Eric or perhaps Lady Badger might arrive to assist the case.
Last edited by Tussilago; 12-30-2012 at 10:20 AM.
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Post#117 at 12-30-2012 06:47 PM by The Grey Badger [at Albuquerque, NM joined Sep 2001 #posts 8,876]
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Chas'88 noted "Even with 1966's To Sir with Love compared as the British version of 1955's Blackboard Jungle. "

Oh, yes, no doubt about it. I saw them both when they first came out and they are totally in the same genre and period.
How to spot a shill, by John Michael Greer: "What you watch for is (a) a brand new commenter who (b) has nothing to say about the topic under discussion but (c) trots out a smoothly written opinion piece that (d) hits all the standard talking points currently being used by a specific political or corporate interest, while (e) avoiding any other points anyone else has made on that subject."

"If the shoe fits..." The Grey Badger.







Post#118 at 12-30-2012 06:52 PM by The Grey Badger [at Albuquerque, NM joined Sep 2001 #posts 8,876]
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Chas' also quoted George Harrison of the Beatles as saying "Heck the Beatles had a negative reaction to American Boomers that scream Silent/Artist:

"I went there expecting it to be a brilliant place, with groovy gypsy people making works of art and paintings and carvings in little workshops. But it was full of horrible spotty drop-out kids on drugs, and it turned me right off the whole scene. I could only describe it as being like the Bowery: a lot of bums and drop-outs; many of them very young kids who'd dropped acid and come from all over America to this mecca of LSD.

...

It certainly showed me what was really happening in the drug culture. It wasn't what I'd thought - spiritual awakenings and being artistic - it was like alcoholism, like any addiction. The kids at Haight-Ashbury had left school and dossed out there, and instead of drinking alcohol they were on all kinds of drugs." --George Harrison"

One of the urban fantasy series I followed until it died down was the Bordertown series. The thesis of Bordertown is that Elfland has come back, and this city on the border between Elfland and the mundane world has become a mecca for young dropouts and misfits - most of whom apparently are artists, musicians and suchlike. The series acknowledges the reality of drugs, an entire novel, Emma Bull's Finder, is devoted to the Finder and Tinker tracking down ... well, no spoilers if you haven't read it. Tinker is a young Elf woman who ran away so that she might play with machinery; she is Bordertown's #1 mechanic.

Now -- Boomer? Or Silent? I certainly found it spoke to my heart.

Link here: http://bordertownseries.com/
How to spot a shill, by John Michael Greer: "What you watch for is (a) a brand new commenter who (b) has nothing to say about the topic under discussion but (c) trots out a smoothly written opinion piece that (d) hits all the standard talking points currently being used by a specific political or corporate interest, while (e) avoiding any other points anyone else has made on that subject."

"If the shoe fits..." The Grey Badger.







Post#119 at 12-30-2012 07:12 PM by Chas'88 [at In between Pennsylvania & Pennsyltucky joined Nov 2008 #posts 9,432]
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I was talking to my father about the theory, and he got interested in this conversation about the start and of the Awakening occurring at different times in different countries. From his memory he generally agreed, stating that until the late 1960s Europe was occupied and being oppressed far too much due to the Cold War. Copying down his thoughts, because I thought it might be interesting since neither one of us were alive to have memories of the 60s:

"Having lived through it, the early - mid 60s in America was a revolution of the Flower Child. The taking of drugs, the free sex, the revolution thereof was such that it carried through the early - mid 70s in America. The British equivalent didn't even have the opportunity to start until the late 60s because they were trying to promulgate a culture of their own with the Beatles, etc. And the Beatles basically were an off-chute of Elvis and Buddy Holly (Elvis being an off-chute of Holly). The British didn't have an opportunity to create their own pop-culture until the late 60s. Picadilly Circus is the infamous British equivalent of Greenwich Village of the Americas and you never even heard of them in America until the late 60s. And the first time the Beatles performed in this country was in '64, but they really didn't catch on until the late 60s. Their first tour in this country was a flop. When they returned in '66 is when they really caught on in America.

The biggest thing I remember of the 60s was Folk music, which was an off-chute of the Flower Children. That was bigger than Presley, Holly, and all of them. Another reason why Presley didn't had his hiatus until the late 60s was because of the predominance of folk music."

~Chas'88
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."







Post#120 at 12-30-2012 08:16 PM by Chas'88 [at In between Pennsylvania & Pennsyltucky joined Nov 2008 #posts 9,432]
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Quote Originally Posted by Tussilago View Post
First, in regard to Haight Ashbury and Silent/Boomer generational conflict, a Turning is a period with various generations caught up in it. It does not require any one specific generation to set the agenda. The alternative part of Silenthood in the early to mid 60's, something like 1963-1967 perhaps, were the main proponents of the Awakening during this period. Then the Boom took over the stick, highlighted by the 1968 uprisings, if you will, becoming the main generation in the late 60's. And the only reason I/we construe it this way is because we have divided up said generations in this manner.
This is true, however it's also the period when Prophets replace Artists as society's perceived "young adult" or "younger generation", and thus when they acquire a "voice" as it were.

Whatever the substantiation of that BBC narrator, they had been saying it since 1964 at least, but if you are going to argue like this, you could as easily say there never existed a Consciousness Revolution in any shape or form anywhere at any time. After all, those involved in the student uprisings in 1968 constituted a minority of the student body. An Awakening is not an outrageous carnival on Carnaby Street, it's a social mood, a collective sense of Springtime in the Air.
This I won't disagree with, but it's a feeling that originally emerges in the mid-High and eventually culminates in the flowering of the Awakening emerging. The High ends and the Awakening begins at the same moment proclaiming: "There's a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow". Where we're disagreeing is when it flowers, and when it still is in the process of being a bud. Such a mood is still visible in such things in the 1970s as: Oh, God, or Eastbound and Down, and even The Dukes of Hazard. This wide-eyed euphoria of spirit that is exuberant and non-cynical, when we see ourselves as almost "super human" and can solve and tackle nearly every problem: Bionic Woman. A world where "we're gonna do what they say can't be done". It is a fuzzy and soft palate world of ease and plenty--little to physically worry about, but much to spiritually and ethically worry about (every Star Trek episode ever filmed). A world where our dreams can all come true: Fantasy Island, and where we could "boldly go where no man has gone before": Star Trek.

I'm well aware of it, having been raised on that culture from my parents (mother's milk), who never really understood the cynicism of the Unraveling (one could say they were in denial the High & the Awakening ever ended). My mother was quite adverse to anything that "upset" her (such as an unhappy ending--the fact that I found and gravitated towards unstable personalities for friends and liked stories that were "unsettling" further upset her--I recall before she died, her breaking down quite often over something as silly as a character dying in a story or in not achieving personal/material success). She wanted 1958 - 1966 to come back and stay put where it belonged--where everyone could be materially happy and well provided for, and there would be no possibility of anything untoward happening because everyone still looked out for one another. Yeah, she was messed up.

My father was too absorbed with trying to make a living to really notice much else about the Unraveling. It wasn't until I went to school that I got the culture shock that all adults weren't living such lives. I remember as a young child having a hard time understanding the concept of sarcasm--and thinking that I was the only one who couldn't. I now realize that a lot of that had to do with my parents' (mostly my mother's) attempt to live in perpetual May when it obviously was October.

Now, I ought to back up what I've been writing with empirical evidence, loads of links to sources, but I don't have the time nor likely the ability to arrange for it. I must contend myself with getting a conceptual framework across, which in scientific terms would constitute nothing but a flimsy hypothesis. Nevertheless, I believe this at least was one defining book of the early Awakening: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_Kill_a_Mockingbird
I trust and assume you have much more things to occupy your time and that deserve your attention than this discussion and this board, hence why your presence is extremely sporadic with long absences between visitations. POC'67 is much the same way.

Now, you can go ahead and shoot it down and tear it apart while I enjoy my breakfast. Hopefully though, someone with his spritual roots in Ensalen like Eric or perhaps Lady Badger might arrive to assist the case.
To Kill a Mockingbird, a story about a Silent girl in the middle of the Great Depression observing how injust the accepted culture of downtrodden the African-American people was in the 1930s South. I can see how it plays a large part with the Civil Rights Movement most definitely--especially since that's a large concern of the 1950s with the arrival of the Civil Rights Movement (the Civil Rights Movement changed with the Awakening from the tone it had in the high of "we fight and die for you, therefore we deserve the same treatment as you", to the Awakening version of "Black Power"--those are two completely different attitudes, with To Kill a Mockingbird definitely part of the older dialogue of the Civil Rights Movement, but inspiring the new dialogue to come forth after it.

Are you sure you didn't mean this novel: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest? That was based on the author's experience as a janitor attempting to get access to the drugs he had taken as part of a military test, and has much more of the influences you're mentioning in the final paragraph.

But still what do either have to do with Britain in the 1960s? I mean, I understand that you see Western society as all acting in lock-step, but I don't see how Britain has the racial problems of To Kill a Mockingbird (except in regards to South Africa). Britain had the problems of social class conflict--as already mentioned with the Angry Young Men works in my previous posts--that's partially what their Awakening was about as every piece of Awakening film I can find from Britain all focuses on the wiley lower class characters outwitting everyone else. I do see One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest as holding sway and influence as it inspired the drug culture of the hippies, but that's here in America first and much later spreading to Britain (my interpretation, The Beatles came to America in '64, smoked pot for the first time, and had their lives irrevocably altered--but that was only because they came to a country that was experiencing the Awakening first--and the only reason we got to it first is because we were the only ones who didn't have to rebuild after WWII).

~Chas'88
Last edited by Chas'88; 01-01-2013 at 07:41 PM.
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."
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