Getting a grip on Demons (EWINGTON UNIT)
- The Great Russian novels: Reputation & Reimagining
- Names are complicated; patronymics & French names
- Anglo-American literature has a specific structure; Russia’s “big-baggy monsters” are written without careful structure; technically not novels
- Self-referential: understanding context to appreciate novel
- Context: Revolution(s) & Reactions
- Rousseau: Russians are barbarians, Peter is an imitative mastermind (Westernization), “This revolution appears to me inevitable.”
- Dostoyevsky: Russia is (not a republic…Jacobinism…communism, but) the embodiment of Orthodoxy; we shall smash those European fetters
- Nicholas I(1825 – 1855): reaction to December’s revolution, Westernizers(catch up to Europe through imitation) and Slavophiles(Peter mistake, follow Russia’s own historical path)
- Men of the 40s(Stepan Trofimovich, “jolly liberal chatter,” talk & think) vs. Men of the 60s(?, take down Russia, action)
- Dostoyevsky & Demons: reaction to Reform/Revolution
- Secret societies & emergence of new ideologies common in his time
- 20s: religious fervor vs. European ideas
- Arrested for having a printing press, surviving execution, sent to Siberia
- Notes from the House of the Dead (1864)
- Coming home to a new, different Russia; Alexander II (1855 – 1881)& social freedoms
- Nihilism
- Dostoyevsky: reason vs. freedom & individuality
- St. Petersburg’s Church of the Spilled Blood, commemorating Alexander IIwho was assassinated, Men of the 70s(political terrorism)
- Title of the book: Demons/Devils/The Possessed
- Work of art
- Plot
- Serfs (Dasha, Shatov), neglectful father (Stepan)
The Baader-Meinhof complex (DENHAM UNIT)
Berlin
Tyranny of Iran’s emperor (Shah); Police brutality in Germany June 2nd; American Imperialism; Department store burning, arrest; Rudi Dutschke assassination attempt; “Release from fear”; Talk in jail with Gudrun, taking action, “theoretical masturbation”; Peter
Italy
Andreas; Meinhof in Italy, RAF; Children; Rescuing Andreas Baader
Jordan
Military training
Germany
Arrest of RAF members; New calculation methods to uncover underground terrorists; RAF member dead; Bombing of US embassies, police stations; Individually targeted terrorism; Alarm before attacks, ignore -> capitalism; “Fine line” between us and the enemies; Arrest of Baader; Arrest of Gudrun; Arrest of Meinhof; Olympics; The murder of Israeli athletes by athletes; “Terrorism as the new war”; Hunger strike, forced feeding; RAF member death in prison -> assassination of bureaucrat; Shooting in German embassy in Stockholm
In prison
Mental breakdown of Meinhof; Grudges in confinement; “Not able to defend myself”; Meinhof’s suicide
Outside prison
Peter as Charlie; Assassination of bureaucrats; Kidnapping Schleyer
Iraq
Hostage in exchange of operation; Plane hijacked, 86 hostages; Escalation of violence by 2nd and 3rd generation RAFs; Failed negotiation, suicide of RAF members; Reality check, not government execution; Execution of Schleyer
