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Welcome to Week 5 of the Big White Farmhouse’s Summer Integrated Humanities program! Today we’re talking about power.
Just jumping in? You can find the links to the previous weeks here: Week 1 // Week 2 // Week 3 // Week 4
ARTIST OF THE WEEK: BENJAMIN WEST
Benjamin West “was an American-born painter of historical, religious, and mythological subjects who had a profound influence on the development of historical painting in Britain.” (via)
I first learned about Benjamin West when reading the book, Benjamin West and His Cat Grimalkin, to my kids for school. “Because Benjamin’s family didn’t approve of his art, he had to make his own painting supplies. The local Native Americans taught him how to mix paints from earth, clay, and plants. And his cat, Grimalkin, sacrificed hair from his tail for Ben’s brushes.” Making paints from natural materials may make an interesting rabbit trail!
A LITTLE MORE SHAKESPEARE
Macbeth “is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, estimated to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the physically violent and damaging psychological effects of political ambitions and power.” (via)
You can read the play with the book or use it to follow along with this adaptation from the Folger Theatre and Two River Theater Company.
“OZYMANDIAS” BY PERCY SHELLEY
This poem is a metaphor about the fleeting nature of political power. How transient this life is! Very thought provoking. Check out this poem guide for more thoughts.
Ozymandias
by Percy Bysshe ShelleyI met a traveller from an antique land,
Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal, these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
OBSERVING THE STARS ONE MORE TIME
This week, we’re going to search the skies for the Summer Triangle stars: Vega, Altair and Deneb.
The three stars of the Summer Triangle appear similar in brightness. Vega in the constellation Lyra the Lyre is the brightest of the trio and the 5th brightest of all stars. In Carl Sagan’s novel “Contact,” Vega is the source of the first message ever received from an alien civilization. The 1997 movie version features actress Jodie Foster’s quest for the senders of the Vega message. Back in the real world, we’ve yet to hear anything from the possible inhabitants of the Vega system, but researchers are listening to Vega and thousands of other stars every day, just in case.
Altair, in Aquila the Eagle, is another Hollywood star. In the 1956 film “Forbidden Planet,” the fourth planet in the Altair system (Altair IV) is home to the relics of an ancient alien civilization and to an eccentric Earth scientist and his beautiful daughter (Walter Pidgeon and Anne Francis). Altair is the 2nd brightest member of the Summer Triangle and the 13th brightest star. We don’t know if Altair is surrounded by any planets, so Altair IV may or may not exist.
Number three in the Summer Triangle and the 20th brightest star is Deneb, which marks the tail of Cygnus the Swan. Alas, Deneb has never starred in a major motion picture, but it has other claims to fame. Whereas Vega and Altair are relatively close to us in astronomical terms—25 and 17 light-years respectively—Deneb is much farther away, an estimated 2,600 light-years from Earth. A light-year is the distance light travels in one year—a big, BIG number!
Read the rest of the article here. (You can even print a sky map there too.)
MISCELLANEOUS RABBIT TRAILS…
+ The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli has a controversial take on power: the author contends that immoral acts are justifiable if they achieve political glory. In his view, the end justifies the means. Do you agree or disagree?
+ The Metamorphoses: Tales of Change audio story series “involve[s] some form of transformation and explore[s] many aspects of human nature: greed, curiosity, vanity, generosity, arrogance, creativity.”
+ Can you find Shakespearean themes in modern-day movies? This article, 25 Best Movies You Didn’t Realize Are Based on Shakespeare Plays, can help!