Notes on the Death of Culture : : Essays on Spectacle and Society
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Metamorphosis of a word -- The civilization of the spectacle -- A brief discourse on culture -- Forbidden to forbid -- The disappearance of eroticism -- Culture, politics, and power -- The opium of the people -- Final thoughts.
"A provocative essay collection that finds the Nobel laureate taking on the decline of intellectual life In the past, culture was a kind of vital consciousness that constantly rejuvenated and revivified everyday reality. Now it is largely a mechanism of distraction and entertainment. Notes on the Death of Culture is an examination and indictment of this transformation-- penned by none other than Mario Vargas Llosa, who is not only one of our finest novelists but one of the keenest social critics at work today. Taking his cues from T. S. Eliot-- whose essay "Notes Toward a Definition of Culture" is a touchstone precisely because the culture Eliot aimed to describe has since vanished-- Vargas Llosa traces a decline whose ill effects have only just begun to be felt. He mourns, in particular, the figure of the intellectual: for most of the twentieth century, men and women of letters drove political, aesthetic, and moral conversations; today they have all but disappeared from public debate. But Vargas Llosa stubbornly refuses to fade into the background. He is not content to merely sign a petition; he will not bite his tongue. A necessary gadfly, the Nobel laureate Vargas Llosa, here vividly translated by John King, provides a tough but essential critique of our time and culture"-- Provided by publisher.
"New essays attacking the precipitous decline of contemporary culture by the Nobel Laureate Mario Vargas Llosa"-- Provided by publisher.
REVIEWS & SUMMARIES
Publishers Weekly ReviewSummary / Annotation
Table of Contents
Fiction Profile
Author Notes
COMMUNITY REVIEWS
w submitted by Kenes on July 12, 2020, 5:16pm spectacle and society
PUBLISHED
New York : Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2015.
Year Published: 2015
Description: 227 pages ; 22 cm.
Language: English
Format: Book
ISBN/STANDARD NUMBER
9780374123048
0374123047
ADDITIONAL CREDITS
King, John, 1950-
SUBJECTS
Civilization, Modern -- 20th century -- Philosophy.
Culture -- Philosophy -- 20th century.
Social problems -- History -- 20th century.