Tag Archives: historical epics

Dissertation Days (28): Chipping Away

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Today was a remarkably productive day, considering the fact that I just got back from traveling and that I had to take Beast for a vet visit. I managed to chip away at Chapter 3, getting rid of some extraneous sentences and other bits of fluff that were clogging up the works. I am still not as happy with the prose as I would like to be at this stage, but I’m also realistic enough to know that at some point you just have to move on. As one of my committee members always says, the best dissertation is a finished one.

Fortunately, I’ve been in an editing frame of mind lately–thanks to an editorial project I’m still interning for–so that has really helped to hone my instincts in terms of chopping out bits of Chapter 3 that aren’t necessary and finessing some of the clunkier bits of prose. Despite the challenges, it actually feels good to be at the point where taking stuff out is actually a good thing rather than an absolute pain.

Chapter 4 is also coming along much better than I had expected it would, given that I have a few key concepts that are forming the core of the chapter. The historical gaze has actually proven to be more central than I had realized, and it fits in pretty seamlessly with my dissertation’s emphasis on the unknowable and inexorable power of history. I’m still fleshing out the links between the various parts of the chapter and how they work together, but today for the first time it felt like I was really making some genuine progress.

To that end, I focused most of my writing energies today on the close reading portions. I’ll get back to the historical context soon, and I still have to figure out how exactly I’m going to work in a theoretical context, but it’ll get there.

Tomorrow, I need to make sure that I stay a little more focused than I did today. I sort of was writing all over the place, but I want to start writing enough in each section that it begins to fill out. That way, I’ll have a stronger sense of how each part will look when it’s fully developed. Now that it’s the final draft (hopefully), it’s time to get really serious about this.

Onward and upward friends. As the lady says, tomorrow is another day.

Dissertation Days (27): Progress?

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Today was a very successful day when it comes to Chapter 4. I met the goal of writing 1,000 words again! I am really excited about the historical context section. There’s something really compelling about the late 1950s and early 1960s, given that they marked the ultimate nadir of colonial and imperial ambitions, and I really think that there is a profound imperial anxiety in the films produced in this period.

I do want to avoid doing an allegorical reading of these films. While I think that’s one useful way of thinking about them, ultimately I’m more interested in how these films engage with the question of imperial history and the telescoping of temporality. It’s a rather complex and slippery set of concepts, and all the reading I’ve been doing has really helped to clarify what I’m aiming for in this chapter. There’s a long way to go, but I know I can do it.

Still, there’s no question that this is the most difficult chapter that I’ve written so far. I’ve known from the beginning that it’s the most challenging one. In larger part it’s because it’s actually a vestigial reminder of an earlier arrangement of the dissertation, one that I’ve still managed to incorporate into the revamped version. However, it’s precisely the fact that this chapter is such a strange beast that it’s taking so long to carve into some measure of intelligibility.

Despite all of that, I’m pretty proud of the progress that I’ve made over this last year. This time last year I had just submitted Chapter 2, and now I have at least some version of Chapters 3 and 4 done. It’s not as far along as I might like, but it’s still good progress.

I fear that I didn’t get as much done on Chapter 3, and I only made it through it through a few pages of actual revision. Nevertheless, as I make my way through it, I have to say that I’m pretty happy with how it ended up conceptually. It’s probably still a little rough around the edges, and I’m sure that it will need a bit more revision before it’s truly ready.

The next couple of days will probably be a little less productive. I’m headed back to Syracuse on Sunday, so I’m spending tomorrow with the BF before headed northward. Once I get back, though, I’ll be submitting Chapter 3!

I can do this.

Onward!

Dissertation Days (25): A New Day, A New Chapter 4

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In between the chaos of moving and travel (I’m about ready to set off for another round tomorrow), I managed to squeeze in a little work time today. Since I’d rather hit a wall with Chapter 4 as it was, I started a new version, one which really, consciously sets out to be the version I want to submit at the end of July.

To that end, I only managed to write 500 words today, but I’m pretty happy with them. I managed to bring together everything I wanted to argue in this chapter, in a way that’s more coherent than I’ve managed to attain so far. As I’ve said before, I want to focus on what I’m calling “imperial melancholia,” a yearning for a form of political stability that seems to always exist frustratingly out of reach, perpetually tantalizing with the possibility that it might be brought into fruition.

A lot of my thinking on this has been shaped by recent reading I’ve been doing on the role of spectacle in the way that film works, as well as my most recent reading research, a history of the Cleopatra icon by the British author Lucy Hughes-Hallett. Spectacle, to me, has always been frustratingly vaguely defined, and one of the things I hope to do in this chapter is to tease out the sort of meanings inherent in this oft-used cinematic expression. It is all part of my redemptive critique of the epic, my attempt to take it seriously as a means of engaging with the larger questions posed by modern (and ancient) history.

Once I return to my normal work schedule, I’m really hoping to get back into my old habit of writing 1,000 words a day, especially since I want to have a really strong draft of this ready for submission to the adviser by the end of July. If I can do that, and if I can get Chapter 3 and 4 approved by the very early Fall by pretty much everyone, I’ll feel like a great deal of pressure has been lifted off me. It’s a tall order, but I think I can do it.

I’ll be hitting the road for yet more traveling tomorrow and throughout the weekend into the early part of next week, so don’t expect any updates from me until then. After that, though, I should be able to get back into the swing of things.

Onward.

Dissertation Days (24): Chapter 4

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So, today was the first day in quite a while that I didn’t work on Chapter 3 at all, but instead focused my energies on Chapter 4.

I have to say, all of that effort paid off. I managed to get 500 good words, and I think I am edging closer to a fully-fleshed argument. If you know how irritated I have been with this Chapter and how much I have struggled to put together a coherent argument that fits in with what I have been doing in the other chapters of the Dissertation, you no doubt know why this would be such a big deal.

As I mentioned yesterday, that essay from Tom Brown has proven to be extremely helpful in enabling me to make a compelling argument about these films. I have to say, the core of this chapter–the emphasis on empire–is a bit of a holdover from the very earliest concepts of this dissertation as a whole, but I do think that it has something in it that fits with how the project has taken shape.

If I’m being completely honest, this is the chapter that I’ve been dreading the most. I’ve done a lot of research, and there is still a lot to do, but I’m gradually clawing and groping my way toward a conclusive set of arguments.

While I’m still uncertain whether my set of claims about Anthony Mann’s Fall of the Roman Empire really make a substantial contribution to the understanding of the film, I do think that what I have to say about Cleopatra is useful. Like The Bible: In the Beginning, the film has suffered from a really extensive study from a film studies perspective, still less from a textured historicist analysis. That’s basically what I hope to provide in this chapter, since I believe that the film deserves more critical appreciation than it has largely achieved, either in mainstream of scholarly film criticism.

I’m getting ready for another bout of travel, so my updates will be rather sporadic. Sunday will probably be the next day that I get a chance to really work on the dissertation, but even so, I’m sure the project will not be far from my mind. It never really is.

Once I’m able to settle down for a bit (in about a week and a half), it’ll be a real crunch time.

I can do this.

I can.

Dissertation Days (23): Is this the End?

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At the end of Quo Vadis, the delightfully queer Nero (played by Peter Ustinov) declaims: “Is this the end of Nero?”

I’ve now been led to ask: “Is this the end of Chapter 3?” Fortunately, I think that it just might be, or at the very least that I’m closer than I have been for a long time. I’ve pretty much finished with the third section (the one that discusses Quo Vadis), and now that leaves only the conclusion to really flesh out. Fortunately, I wrote the majority of that some time ago, so that shouldn’t take too long to finish.

Needless to say, I feel really good.

While there is some material that I want to reflect on more–there’s still a little bit of something that continues to elude my attempts to capture and put it on paper–I have come to accept that this isn’t the last version of this chapter that I will ever write. Indeed, it will probably go through several further iterations before that wonderful day when it finally sees the light of day as part of a book.

In Chapter 4 news, I think I have finally found the missing theoretical piece that has so far been eluding me. I’ve been reading an excellent book about spectacle in classic Hollywood (by Tom Brown), and his articulation of the vertical axis of spectacle vs. the horizontal one of narrative that I find really helpful.

It is in his essay on Gone with the Wind for the British film journal Screen, though, that I find to be especially useful, as he shows how the “historical gaze” mobilized by Scarlett enables her command a measure of agency denied many of the other characters.

As I work through Chapter 4, I think I am going to make the argument that the later epics of the midcentury cycle allow some characters a measure of Brown’s historical gaze, even as it denies it to others. It is the power of the spectacle that allows these characters to forge their own political destinies, to allow the film to remain suspended in a moment of profound, utopian potential, even as the inexorability of narrative ultimately brings ruin to these grandiose ambitions.

That’s what I’m thinking for the chapter now, though I hope to continue nuancing it based on historical context.

Time is ticking, and I have to tick with it.

(I don’t know what that means).

Dissertation Days (22): Siiiiggghhh

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This third chapter, I am starting to feel, is a right pain in the ass. I feel like I’m just creeping along, making a few edits here and a few edits there, bringing in some material from an earlier draft in the hopes that it will help to make some sense. I do think, though, that it’s almost there. It really is all about pushing it over the finish line that is the hardest part.

To be quite honest, today was not the most productive day. There’s a lot going on with helping the Boyfriend move, but I’m still carving out a bit of each day to do at least some work on both chapters, even if that work doesn’t seem to have an immediate payoff. Still, it’s always helpful in these situations to keep an eye on the long game, eve though that can be tremendously difficult on days like this.

I will say, though, that I managed to write some good stuff in those close reading sections of Chapter 4. I really do think that I have something I want to say about Cleopatra, which is an epic film that has been tremendously undervalued (if not outright condemned and derided) by film critics and scholars alike. Given the film’s troubled production history–and the dubious distinction of losing money even though it was successful at the box office–there’s quite a lot to be done. If you know me, however, you know that I love rescuing derided films from their critical obscurity. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be working on the epic.

Still a little concerned about my section dealing with Mann’s The Fall of the Roman Empire. I’m not sure how much I’m really going to be able to say that’s new about the film–there are already some really good books and essays on it–but hopefully I’ll be able to at least add a slight layer of nuance to what’s already been written.

So…no work shall be done tomorrow, since it’s basically moving day. However, I’ll be back into something of a regular schedule on Wednesday, though Thursday and Friday will be a bit touch-and-go, since I’ll be traveling again. I’m a busy little bee this summer, but I still have to make time to get some of this Dissertation done.

After all, I have a deadline to meet, and I shall do it.

Heaven help me, I will.

Dissertation Days (21): Roadblocks

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I’ve reached that stage in Chapter 3 where I know that the end is in sight, but it’s precisely the nearness of accomplishment that proves more than a little debilitating. Still, it is precisely in those moments that one has to continue onward, pushing past the mental barricades to get to the rich intellectual material beneath.

I did manage to eke out some new material in Chapter 3, both by writing some new stuff and also by importing a paragraph from an earlier draft. The third section still needs a little development to fully cohere, and it’s going to take some doing to make sure that it fits together both internally and with the rest of the chapter, but I think that’s doable, so long as I don’t let myself get bogged down too much.

That being said, I do feel like I made some genuine progress today, and I’m setting Wednesday as the day that I would like to be done with the heavy lifting on this draft. That puts me at just about two months revision which, considering all that’s been going on–pet loss and illness, travel, family obligations–isn’t bad at all. I really do have to keep my momentum going if I want to defend by this coming spring (which I basically have to do regardless). So, any positive thoughts and encouragement y’all could send my way would be much appreciated.

In terms of Chapter 4, I wrote 500 words, mostly in two of my sections that deal with the films. Today, I focused mostly on Anthony Mann’s The Fall of the Roman Empire and John Huston’s The Bible: In the Beginning. At the moment, I’m trying to think through the utopian sensibility that these films express, even as they also acknowledge the rather dystopian realities of history.

Once I settle down again, I am going to need to rewatch both Fall and The Bible. It’s been a while since I’ve seen them, and I need to make sure that I have the type of detail that enables a textured film analysis. Given how much of a stickler I am for sound film criticism, I have to be extra careful to practice what I preach.

On tomorrow’s agenda: keep plodding away at Chapter 3 (as usual). Then it’s on to Chapter 4, and I think I have a rich vein of inquiry ready to be tapped.

Tomorrow is going to be great.

Dissertation Days (18): Increments

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Well, I finally returned to the semi-normal writing schedule. Today, I mostly worked on a read-through of Chapter 3, finessing some of the prose that has been rather clunky. Of course, I made sure to clip out a few of those pesky couplets that are such a troubling part of my prose (gods I hate those fucking couplets). There are still a couple that have resisted all efforts to get rid of them, but I’ve been successful for the most part.

I managed to make it to page 20 of the draft, and I’m pretty happy with the way that this first section looks. I’ve had to really hard to make sure that the section has allusions to what happens later, so that it’s clear from the beginning how the context that I’m laying out relates to the parts that come later. I think, at least in a dissertation chapter, that you want to have a number of signposts so that your reader can keep the bigger picture in mind.

Tomorrow, I hope to get through another 20 pages, and then I should just about be ready to get back into that section on Nero’s queerness. I am really struggling to get that section to fit into what I’ve written before, but I’m confident that I can at last corral everything into a coherent whole.

I also managed to write 500 words of Chapter 4, almost entirely in the historical context section. Gradually filling that out allows me to clarify what it is that I’m trying to accomplish with the chapter as a whole. The conceptual framework is still a little hazy, but I’m inching closer to a coherent argument. If I can manage to eke out a draft, no matter how rudimentary, by the end of July I will be happy.

Tomorrow is definitely going to be a busy day. I’m going to try to keep up the momentum with Chapter 4, as I don’t want to lose sight of that. It’s very easy to let my wheels start spinning in the midst of the revisions on Chapter 3, with the result that I can’t really accomplish anything else. Now that the end of Chapter 3 is (I think) at last in sight, I should be able to resume concerted work on the final chapter. (Can I just say how glorious it is to write that final sentence).

Tomorrow is going to be a glorious day.

Dissertation Days (16): Chapter 4!

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In keeping with my promise of last night, I did indeed manage to do a bit of work in Chapter 4. At this point, I’m still sketching in the broader outlines of the historical context, because I think that doing so will help me to get a stronger sense of what it is that I am trying to argue in the chapter as a whole. I’m still doing some of the primary research that I need, but I do think that I have enough basic material to make a solid start in my close analysis of the films.

I’m really trying to work out the tension I see between the spectacle of imperial zenith and the narrative patterns that inevitably connect such splendour with immanent and imminent decline. I’m looking at this phenomenon through three of the final films of the postwar cycle: Cleopatra, The Fall of the Roman Empire, and The Bible: In the Beginning. I’m not sure how well this is going to hold together in the final analysis, but I do think that are some interesting things to argue and say about the utopian longings for a more stable political world that can never really be attained.

Produced in a world that was increasingly full of political doubt and philosophical instability, these films express a form, I think, of imperial melancholy. They mourn a world that was never actually brought into being, a world that is always subjected to the relentless forces of historical change and the inexorable forward movement of time.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get as much work done on Chapter 3 as I would have liked. Family commitments intervened in those attempts, though I hope to get some bits of it done tomorrow. I would like to highlight this particular bit, though, which I think nicely sums up what I’m doing with Nero’s queerness: “He is, in other words, the embodiment of all the terrifying power of history writ large on the great stage of the cinema.”

Tomorrow looks like it’s going to be another day that’s rather tied up with obligations, so who knows how much I’m going to actually be able to get done. Hopefully, though, I can manage to get through some more portions of Chapter 3. If I keep on as I am, it should definitely be ready by the end of next week. Then I can just edit.

On we go.

Dissertation Days (15): Three Outta Five Ain’t Bad!

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I know it’s been a while since I posted a dissertation update. My Parents and I lost a furry member of our family, so we’ve been grieving. Today, though, I knew I had to get back in the swing of things. And here we are.

So, this chapter of my dissertation has basically five complete sections: context (historical); context (theoretical); close reading of Samson and Delilah; close reading of David and Bathsheba; and close reading of Quo Vadis. There is also, of course, a very brief conclusion.

So far, I’ve managed to finish three out of those five, especially since I managed to finish up my close reading of David and Bathsheba. It’s a little briefer than the one about Samson and Delilah, but that’s okay. It’s basically meant to be a complement to that earlier reading, an elaboration of the many ways in which the historico-biblical epic engages with the question of desire and history.

Overall, I’m pretty happy with the way that this section turned out, and I think I’ve added some nuance to the ways in which scholars have already talked about the film. I really think that thinking about colour adds a new layer of understanding to the way in which the film engages with the question of history and desire. David and Bathsheba may not have attained quite the canonical status of some other epics of the midcentury period, it does, I think, deserve more critical consideration than it typically receives.

Tomorrow, I’ve got to get deep into the weeds on the section of Quo Vadis. I’ve thought about excising it from the chapter, but have opted not to. I do think there is a strong case to be made for the way in which queer desire in the film operates at the level of form, and it makes a compelling counterpoint to the question of female desire raised by the other films discussed. So, it stays in for right now.

I was planning on submitting this chapter later this month, but since I’ll be traveling for quite a while, I’m going to submit it around the middle of June. However,  I going to continue working on Chapter 4 (which I fully intend to do tomorrow, in addition to my other work).

There is still a lot of work, but I think most of it will be done this week.

It can be done.