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Max Dvořák, one of the pilasters of the Viennese school of art history, is nowadays widely known for the works of his final years as well as for writings on monument conservation. Through a reconstruction of the historical and academic context and a brief presentation of Dvořák’s studies on the transition period from the fourteenth to the fifteenth century, the author aims to show that the Bohemian scholar made an important contribution to the art historical debate of the time, for which he is hardly appreciated today. This article examines a selection of Dvořák’s early writings from the first decade of the twenthieth century. In particular, the habilitation thesis Das Rätsel der Kunst der Brüder van Eyck (The Enigma of the Art of the Van Eyck Brothers, 1903) is consulted. While many scholars claim that there is a wide gap between his older works and those from the last years of his life, as stated by his former students Karl M. Swoboda and Johannes Wilde in the preface to Kunstgeschichte als Geistesgeschichte (1924), it is argued here that Dvořák’s point of view already presents the basic elements of his more mature conclusions at the beginning of his academic career. Likewise, it is reflected on the fact that Dvořák made a remarkable contribution to a new consideration of the transitional period between the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance, among other workd, with his Enigma, but that this is today attributed not to him but to the cultural historian Johan Huizinga and his work Autumn of the Middle Ages (1919).

Autor u članku postavlja i analizira dva modela pristupa krizi. Klasični se model koji krizu razumijeva kao teško ali prolazno stanje može povezati s dvjema važnim likovima zapadne kulture: starozavjetnim Abrahamom i Euripidovim Agamemnonom. Analiza žrtvovanja Izaka i Ifigenije pokazuje izrazite sličnosti, a temeljno im je zajedničko obilježje da Abrahamova i Agamemnonova odluka posredno rješavaju i zaključuju krizu. S druge strane, analizom modernog razumijevanja krize otvara se posve drukčija mogućnost, tj. razumijevanje krize kao izraza ontološke strukture egzistencije. Simboličan predstavnik takva razumijevanja krize je lik sa slike Krik Edvarda Muncha. U konačnici, pokazuje se da ontološko razumijevanje krize čini krizu svojevrsnim egzistencijalom.

Copyright of Theological Review / Bogoslovska Smotra is the property of University of Zagreb, Catholic Faculty of Theology and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article deals with the changing views of Dutch historian Johan Huizinga (1872–1945) on such topics as Russian culture, 19th-century Russia, and the Soviet Union. While Huizinga did not count them among his core research interests (he never published an independent work on Russia or the Soviet Union), he remained preoccupied with these topics, particularly during the last phase of his life, in relation to his criticism of the declining forms of contemporary culture. Little has been made of the fact that Huizinga prepared a course on 19th-century Russia for students of history at the university of Groningen in 1914 (he taught the course in 1935/6 at Leiden). It was also in 1914 that he became interested in the idea of pan-Slavism in Russia and Central Europe. Huizinga’s unpublished lectures on Russia and pan-Slavism demonstrate his exceptional knowledge of history, surpassing that of his academic contemporaries. The lectures also show Huizinga’s critical attitude towards the political life of 19th-century Russia as well as the Soviet political experiment.

This paper explores Johan Huizinga's cultural pessimism and the developments in his thought during the 1930's. It will contextualize the evolution of his methodology in relation to perhaps the most exemplary cultural pessimist of modernity, Oswald Spengler. This paper traces the evolution of Huizinga's thought, from his initial refutation of Spengler's 'romantical and metaphysical' outlook on world history in a book review, to his eventual assimilation of similar methods and ideas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article addresses the political dimensions of Johan Huizinga's seminal work Homo Ludens: A study of the play element in culture (1938). More than just a foundational text in academic ludology, this text positioned itself as a polemic against the right-wing political discourse going on in contemporaneous Nazi Germany, represented chiefly by Carl Schmitt. Through his concept of play, Huizinga hoped to resolve what he perceived to be the confusion of play and seriousness among a group of reactionary theorists narrowly focused on the Schmittian Ernstfall, the "serious case" of inimical violence. This article analyzes the usage of the concepts of "play" and "seriousness" in Huizinga's and Schmitt's respective corpuses and, finally, places their work in dialogue in order to understand the difficulties involved in defining play as unserious and unpolitical. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article deals with the changing views of Dutch historian Johan Huizinga (1872-1945) on such topics as Russian culture, 19th-century Russia, and the Soviet Union. While Huizinga did not count them among his core research interests (he never published an independent work on Russia or the Soviet Union), he remained preoccupied with these topics, particularly during the last phase of his life, in relation to his criticism of the declining forms of contemporary culture. Little has been made of the fact that Huizinga prepared a course on 19th-century Russia for students of history at the university of Groningen in 1914 (he taught the course in 1935/6 at Leiden). It was also in 1914 that he became interested in the idea of pan-Slavism in Russia and Central Europe. Huizinga's unpublished lectures on Russia and pan-Slavism demonstrate his exceptional knowledge of history, surpassing that of his academic contemporaries. The lectures also show Huizinga's critical attitude towards the political life of 19th-century Russia as well as the Soviet political experiment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article offers a new interpretation of the historical relation between two foundational works in cultural history: Johan Huizinga's 'The Autumntide of the Middle Ages' (1919) and Jacob Burckhardt's 'The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy' (1860). The tension between these works has commonly been understood as a scholarly dispute over the proper historical periodization of European fifteenth-century cultural practices: whilst Burckhardt reconstructed his material in terms of its technical novelty, its ability to 'create' (schöpfen) a post-medieval world, Huizinga emphasized how fifteenth-century culture continued to 're-create' (her-scheppen) culture according to medieval symbolic codes. The present article suggests understanding this tension not as a product of a trans-historical scholarly dispute over the character of a given period of time, but as a consequence of Huizinga's experience of loss and nostalgia, his 'heimwee' for past times. Between 1903 and 1905, Huizinga witnessed a large-scale destruction of early-seventeenth-century architecture in Amsterdam so as to make way for 'the spirit of entrepreneurship,' and it was first in this context that Huizinga grew interested in the importance of historical recreations to European culture. This article shows how Huizinga's experience of urban modernization and 'the inhabited ruin' mediated his critique of Burckhardt's book on Renaissance Italy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

O texto que apresentamos aqui é a primeira tradução para o português da resenha crítica de 1933 que o historiador holandês Johan Huizinga escreveu a respeito do livro Gesammelte Schriften [“Escritos reunidos”], de Aby Warburg, lançado postumamente na Alemanha (1932). Organizada pelos diretores da Kulturwissenschaftliche Bibliotek Warburg [Biblioteca Warburg de Ciência da Cultura], Gertrude Bing e Fritz Saxl, essa primeira edição em dois volumes fazia parte de um projeto editorial mais amplo, jamais realizado, de publicação das “obras completas” de Warburg. Com o título de A renovação do Antiguidade pagã: contribuições científicoculturais para a história do Renascimento europeu3, o livro reunia textos que o historiador alemão havia publicado durante a vida, tal como a sua tese sobre Sandro Botticelli (1893) e o famoso ensaio sobre a astrologia na época de Lutero (1920).

Nonsense and meaning are not necessarily conflicting concepts, but can be conceived of as a hendiadys, that is, not opposites, the one or the other, but as one and the other. The idea that meaning and nonsense are related and coexist is a premise for this article, which describes different structures of meaning in the nonsense poetry of Birgitte Krogsbøll and Kamilla Wichmann’s picture book Funkelgnister: Rim, råb og remser (2015, Glittersparks: Rhymes, Roars and Rigmaroles). By linking our analysis of Funkelgnister to Johan Huizinga’s theory of play as a prerequisite for culture, we reveal how the specific structures and logics of the poems generate meaning and thereby we disclose how children’s nonsense poetry is simultaneously meaningful and nonsensical, as a creative thinking akin to culture developed through play and playfulness. We describe how meaning can be sought in three directions, suggested by Gilles Deleuze: above, below and on the surface. In the first case, we consider nonsense as a seductive acoustic phenomenon. In the second, we focus on nonsense poetry as subversive. And finally, in the third case, we show how it is an event. In all, these different aspects demonstrate how nonsense poetry functions as play and challenges our understanding of what it means to read. Following Jurij Lotman’s understanding of pictorial language as creative thinking, we show how nonsense in Funkelgnister opens up a free space by utilizing an in-between, where meaning takes on different forms as signs and sounds, and how the inherent rejection of normative rules of reading in such a venture, initiates a production of meaning as metonymic activity. We thereby highlight how nonsense generates a ground for a creative development of meaning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This Part II of a two‐part article illustrates how research in evolutionary biology, anthropology, archeology, and psychology illuminates questions arising in philosophy—specifically questions about René Girard's theory of aggression. Part I looked at: (i) how old the systemic practice of severe aggression is; (ii) how much of it results from humanity's mimetic/social and competitive nature and how much from ecological, resource, and cultural conditions; and (iii) if ecological, resource, and cultural conditions are important, might we adapt this information toward greater cooperativity today? Part II investigates Girard's theory of ritual sacrifice—especially human sacrifice—as a societal steam valve for the systemic aggression explored in Part I. It draws on theories of play, theater, and art to examine the role and function of such ritual sacrifice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper concerns Moderata Fonte (Modesta dal Pozzo), a female Venetian writer who lived in the 16th century, and a dialogue she wrote, Il merito delle donne (On the Value of Women), in which seven women gathered in a garden have a lively discussion about men and their flaws. The author of the study presents the book and Fonte's biography in the context of the early-modern dispute over women (querelle des femmes). She then analyses Il merito delle donne in terms of the functionality of both the genre in which it was written and the convention of play (game) that is relevant to the work, in order to answer the question of the importance of these devices for the topic Fonte raises. Skowron writes about what makes Il merito delle donne different from other dialogues published at the time by women, as well as from Balthazar Castiglione's famous Book of the Courtier (Il libro del Cortegiano), and in discussing the motif of the play she uses the definition of the ludic element of Johan Huizinga of Homo ludens. She points to the presence of particular determinants of play in Il merito delle donne, wondering how the voluntary basis of the game, limited time and space, imposed rules or a situation different from ordinary life affect the female characters' freedom to express their opinions in discussion, as well as the reception of the work itself. Il merito delle donne owes its unique character to its form because it allows not only different views in a dispute over women to be presented, but above all it involves the reader in a discussion which does not end with the last page of the dialogue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal for Languages & Literatures of the Faculty of Philosophy in Novi Sad / Zbornik za Jezike i Knjizevnosti Filozofskog Fakulteta u Novom Sadu is the property of Faculty of Philosophy, University of Novi Sad and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article is a series of reflections on the uses Northrop Frye made of Johan Huizinga’s thesis about the play element in culture. It also glances at Frye’s view of homo ludens found in Proverbs 8:30–1 and in Hermann Hesse’s The Glass Bead Game. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a connection between theoretical schemes such as Archizoom's No‐Stop City and the virtual and augmented worlds of today. Guest‐Editor Luke Caspar Pearson, Director of the Undergraduate Architecture Programme at the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London, explores video‐game spaces and his own architectural gaming environments, demonstrating their resonance with avant‐garde concepts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author discusses Johan Huizinga's Homo Ludens and the animating mood that it calls the "play spirit." He argues that these styles of playfulness represent a major practical and theoretical contribution Huizinga offers contemporary studies of play, and he considers Huizinga's methodology in a reading that runs counter to formal definitions of play. Drawing on phenomenological, linguistic, and hermeneutic elements in the text, he presents an alternative understanding of play's form and what resists formalization. By attending to Huizinga's hesitations and rhetorical excess in key moments of explanation, the article unvails the development of play spirit in Homo Ludens and its significance for the study of play and games. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study focuses on the ludic hypostases in Tudor Arghezi's poetry, also exploring some suggestions coming from John Huizinga, Leo Frobenius and Roger Caillois. The analysis concerns the few stages of Arghezi's poetry: on the lower level are the poems in the sphere of the paideic, the pure play, without existential implications, from the cycle entitled "Hore"; then the erotic-bucolic game of "The Evening Book”, the nostalgia of the infinity concealed in the naive-childhood miniature game, to the highest level of the game: the thanathical game, surprised in that metaphorical "Hide'n Seek". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT: Frank Ankersmit is often perceived as a postmodern thinker, as a European Hayden White, or as an author whose work in political philosophy can safely be ignored by those interested only in his philosophy of history. Although none of these perceptions is entirely wrong, they are of little help in understanding the nature of Ankersmit's work and the sources on which it draws. Specifically, they do not elucidate the extent to which Ankersmit raises questions different from White's, finds himself inspired by continental European traditions, responds to specifically Dutch concerns, and is as active as a public intellectual as he has been prolific in philosophy of history. In order to propose a more comprehensive and balanced interpretation of Ankersmit's work, this article offers a contextual reading based largely on Dutch‐language sources, some of which are unknown even in the Netherlands. The thesis advanced is that Ankersmit draws consistently on nineteenth‐century German historicism as interpreted by Friedrich Meinecke and advocated by his Groningen teacher, Ernst Kossmann. Without forcing each and every element of Ankersmit's oeuvre into a historicist mold, the article demonstrates that some of its most salient aspects can profitably be read as attempts at translating and modifying historicist key notions into late twentieth‐century categories. Also, without creating a father myth of the sort that White helped create around his teacher William Bossenbrook, the article argues that Ankersmit at crucial moments in his intellectual trajectory draws on texts and authors central to Kossmann's research interests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evidence of collaborative composition of poetry goes back to the earliest documented phases in the history of Arabic literature. Already during pre-Islamic times, poets like Imruʾ al-Qays used to challenge others to complete their impromptu verse and create poetry collaboratively with them. This practice—commonly called iǧāza or tamlīṭ and essentially different from the better known poetic dueling of the naqāʾiḍ (flytings)—has shown remarkable stability and adherence to its form and dynamics in the pre-modern Arabophone world. In this article, I will discuss evidence of collaborative poetry from pre-Islamic times to the early seventh/thirteenth century, in order to present a picture of the typical situations in which it was practiced, its functions, its composition process, and formal aspects. Although usually not producing poetic masterpieces, this practice has the merit of revealing much about the processes of composing classical Arabic poetry in general. In this respect, its study and critical assessment are highly important, given the fact that medieval Arabic literary criticism does not always reflect praxis or focus on the actual practicalities of composing poetry. This practice and the contextualized way in which it was preserved allow us to see vividly the inextricable link between poetic form and the conditions in which poetry was created. It likewise sheds light on the intricate ways in which poets resisted, influenced, and manipulated others by poetic means. Based on the obvious fact that collaborative composition is imbued with the spirit of play, I offer at the end of the article criticism of Johan Huizinga’s famous play concept and his (much less famous) views of early Arabic culture and poetry in light of the evidence I studied. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present article turns the spotlight onto epistemic-normative dilemmas that, in my estimation, stand at the heart of the humanities as a field of study (the reason for the hyphen between epistemic and normative will become evident as we progress). For the sake of elucidating these productive tensions, we will delve into the thought of Richard Koebner (1885-1958) - a Jewish historian that emigrated from Germany to Palestine in 1934. This transition crystallized the above-mentioned dilemmas in his own mind, from both a personal and theoretical standpoint. More specifically, he developed a critical historiographic outlook on the past and present alike. A major focus of his deliberations was the nature of humanistic knowledge, not least historiography. Though this question preoccupied Koebner throughout his academic career, the new circumstances in Palestine/Israel sharpened and shaped his perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent scholars of religion have begun to explore the relationship between religion and fiction. Within this context, Johan Huizinga’s theory of religion as make believe or play has received considerable attention. James Cameron’s filmAvatar(2009) has inspired behaviour that can be thought of as religious, despite the film’s clear foundations in fiction. Scholarship on fan communities has debated whether such groups can be considered religions. This article develops Huizinga’s account using Kendall Walton’s theory of make believe. Walton’s theory enables the interpretation of fiction into overlapping games of make believe in fan communities. The conversational threads onAvatar Forumsshow how norms of discourse that preclude disagreement allow the frames of reality and fiction to blur. These norms of discourse provide a means of understanding the process by which media myths can become the basis of fiction-based value structures within the cultic milieu. However, the theory also presents significant problems for theorists of religion in terms of the structure of religious belief and religious experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neste artigo, propõe-se uma leitura do fenômeno futebolístico contemporâneo a partir da perspectiva do magistral Homo Ludens, obra do pensador holandês Johan Huizinga (1872-1945), originalmente publicada em 1938. Para isso, após apresentar brevemente o autor e sua obra, exploram-se algumas condições de possibilidade de ocorrência do princípiolúdico na contemporaneidade. Para Huizinga, o “espírito do jogo” preside todas as principais manifestações da cultura humana, em todas as épocas e sociedades. Entretanto, este princípio estaria sendo pervertido no mundo moderno, em que o trabalho assumiu aspectos de um jogo (vencer a concorrência, bater o recorde de vendas) e o mundo dojogo assumiu o caráter de trabalho (atletas profissionais, empresários, contratos, patrocinadores, confederações). Como a perspectiva libertária e humanista de Huizinga acerca do jogo pensaria o mundo do futebol contemporâneo? Ou, dito de outra forma, há espaço para uma prática de lazer criadora e humanizante no mundo do futebol?

En este artículo me gustaría proponer una lectura del fenómeno del deporte contemporáneo, desde la perspectiva del magistral Homo Ludens, obra del filósofo holandés publicado originalmente en 1938. Para esto, después de una breve presentación del autor y su obra, se exploran algunas condiciones de posibilidad de la existencia del principio del juego en el deporte moderno. Para Huizinga, el "espíritu del juego" encabeza las principales manifestaciones de la cultura humana en todas las épocas y sociedades. Sin embargo, este principio se estaría pervirtiendo en el mundo moderno, donde el trabajo asume aspectos de un juego (el ganar de los concurrentes, vencer el récord de las ventas) y el mundo del juego asume el carácter de trabajo (atletas profesionales, negocios, contratos, patrocinadores). ¿Como pensaría la perspectiva humanista y libertaria de Huizinga sobre el juego el mundo de los deportes contemporáneos? O, dicho de otro modo, ¿hay espacio para la práctica de ocio creativo y humanización en el mundo del deporte?

A História ensina? O caráter pragmático da História sempre foi alvo das mais diversas interpretações. Da tópica ciceroniana, Historia Magistra Vitae, passando pelo Historicismo alemão até o “anti-historicismo” pós-Primeira Guerra, o problema da utilidade da História para a vida nunca deixou de fazer parte do horizonte de interrogações que desafiavam o estudioso de História. Se a História deveria se fundar enquanto exemplo (antigos) ou como metodologia (J. G. Droysen), ou ainda como epistemologia (W. Dilthey) – para citar três momentos importantes dessa reflexão sobre a tarefa do conhecimento histórico – isso se devia, em grande parte, ao problema proveniente do questionamento fundamental sobre o vínculo, ou não, que este conhecimento deveria guardar com a vida. Neste artigo pretendemos analisar como o historiador da cultura Johan Huizinga (1872-1945) respondeu a essa interrogação a partir de sua reflexão sobre qual seria o papel da História frente ao seu próprio tempo. Com sua idéia de que a História deveria constituir-se como uma morfologia do passado, acreditamos que Huizinga deu um novo sentido a tópica “História Mestra da Vida”, ressaltando o caráter pragmático fundamental que liga o conhecimento histórico ao presente e a sua compreensibilidade como experiência no tempo.

Lejos del sosegado y espléndido cuadro de su obra más clásica, El otoño de la Edad Media, los primeros derroteros intelectuales del historiador holandés Johan Huizinga [1872-1945] están cargados de fuertes conflictos epistemológicos en torno de la historia y la literatura que aún permanecen en la sombra. Este primer período representa un tiempo clave para comprender no sólo los orígenes de aquella gran obra, sino también la naturaleza de una serie de investigaciones menos difundidas que hacen de Huizinga uno de los principales representantes de la "historia de la cultura" tal como era entendida durante la primera mitad del siglo xx. Para ello, este artículo recupera por primera vez en español el relieve de algunas de esas obras así como parte de la correspondencia que ha mantenido con otros grandes historiadores de aquel período como Henri Pirenne y Lucien Febvre. Cuestiones como la literatura oriental, la filología alemana, los problemas estéticos y filosóficos del conocimiento histórico, el enclave de una historiografía holandesa aún en lento desarrollo, o su lucha contra el cientificismo, son variables de un período de intensas investigaciones y debates intelectuales en los que la participación de Huizinga ha sido clave.Far from the appeased and splendid picture of his classic work, The Autumn of the Middle Ages, the early intellectual routes of the Dutch historian Johan Huizinga [1872-1945] are loaded with strong epistemological conflicts surrounding the history and literature that still remain in the shade. This first period represents a key to understanding not only the origins of that great work, but also the nature of a series of investigations that make of Huizinga one of the leading representatives of the "cultural history" as it was understood during the first half of the twentieth century. We have recuperated for the first time in Spanish some of these works and a part of his correspondence with other major historians of the period as Henri Pirenne ou Lucien Febvre. Issues such as the oriental literature, German philology, philosophical and aesthetic problems of historical knowledge, the site of a Dutch historiography still in slow development, or anti-scientism, are variables in a period of intense research and intellectual debate where Huizinga's participation has been key.

Copyright of História Unisinos is the property of Universidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article analyses the relationship between History and Literature through the 1925 open correspondence between cultural historian Johan Huizinga, and art and literature historian André Jolles, titled Clio and Melpomene. Friends since the late 1890s, Huizinga and Jolles shared throughout their careers a wide range of thoughts on issues surrounding the problem of form, establishing it as a core concept in their investigations into historical writing. In this correspondence, the definition of limits and aproximations between Clio and Melpomene helps shed light on the intellectual trajectory of both authors, as well as on the ongoing debate about the writing of historiographical texts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In El juego del mentiroso and El mal francés, Catalan author Lluís Maria Todó creates a dialogue about the physical and symbolic spaces that his homosexual male protagonists inhabit during the years of Franco's dictatorship and the subsequent Transition. The main characters in Todó's aforementioned novels are gay men who seek to understand their identities and their place in relation to—or in rebellion against—heteronormative society through a literary and physical exploration of the spaces they inhabit. With reference to spacial theory by Fredric Jameson and Michel de Certeau, as well as Johan Huzinga's play theory, this paper proposes an exploration of how the author's textual games (including metafiction, intertextuality, and gay autobiography) and the games played out by the protagonists attempt to create a subversive space for homosexual culture and identity within the larger patriarchal social context. Todó examines the ways in which his protagonists navigate various spaces, presenting those spaces as loci of power that the characters' identities either subvert or are shaped by, leading to a contemplation of the significance of the spaces that the protagonists ultimately create or inhabit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The parallel hunting and bedroom scenes in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight have been much discussed by scholars, though the argument usually centers on Lady Bertilak's role as a hunter. Exploring the poem through the lens of game theory demonstrates that not only is Gawain a hunter, but also that the central Exchanges Game is not a game, but rather an illusion of a game. This revelation opens up a means of investigating the Anglo-Norman and Welsh roles of the landscape and characters that both facilitate such an illusion but also cause a political tension in the poem. This article contends through close readings and historiographic analysis that the reader's identification with Gawain sets up an unease by the end of the poem when the figures of Bertilak, Lady Bertilak, and Morgan La Fay are revealed as both Otherworldly and decidedly Welsh. This discomfort is a means of reacting to and interrogating Anglo-Norman appropriation of Arthuriana. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Dutch historian Johan Huizinga, perhaps best known for his writings on the Middle Ages and on play in human life, also wrote rather extensively on the United States. He both followed and, in certain respects, sharply criticized Alexis de Tocqueville’s views on America, while ultimately echoing many of Max Weber’s views of the United States and more generally of the rationalization of modern life. Given that Huizinga is known primarily for his writings about culture, it is intriguing that his perspective on America was heavily skewed toward an emphasis on the economic aspects of American life. Huizinga’s writings on America offer an intriguing Dutch perspective that has been widely missed in social scientific discussions of the United States and on the notion of American exceptionalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims at looking into the concept of play and its manifestations in language and art in Margaret Atwood's dystopian novel The Handmaid's Tale by utilizing the theories of Johan Huizinga, who, in his study Homo Ludens, argues that civilization itself is an outgrowth of play. By examining the ways play subverts oppressive strategies, it offers a larger view of the disarming and overpowering potential of the ingenious and humorous usage of language and exercise of art as extensions of play. The Handmaid's Tale is narrated by a woman whose function is reduced to the reproductive capacity of her body. Every individual in this society has their assigned places and roles, and any deviation from them is punishable by no less than death. For the authorities of the Republic of Gilead committed themselves to return to a biblically ordained order in which the minimum suffices and there is no place for any forms of excess. However, as Atwood demonstrates, life reduced to biological necessities alone goes against life itself. For that reason, Gileadean regime inadvertently gives rise to subversive acts not only from the oppressed but from the oppressors themselves. Under such severe oppression, subversion asumes a shape that at first sight appears harmless: the human propensity for play. As opposed to the stipulated order in Gilead in which everything is defined by function, play is based on excess, a surplus of need and necessity. Moreover, based on the voluntary participation of all participants, it is an equalizing arena in which one player can only be defeated by a more ingenious one. Therefore, in this paper play will be examined as a platform on which socially-constructed categories based on power structures are fundamentally rejected. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Heimito von Doderer has been regarded primarily as the author of sizeable novels representing the bourgeois society in Vienna between the wars. Two of his most impressive smaller works, the story 'Das letzte Abenteuer' ('The last adventure') and the short novel 'Ein Umweg' ('A detour'), however, depict a somewhat enchanted late medieval and early modern society. Foregrounding Doderer's historical knowledge and interests, this article investigates possible sources for these historical stories. Comparing Doderer's texts with Johan Huizinga's 'Herfsttij der Middeleeuwen', the German translation of which Doderer read in 1927, the influence of Huizinga on Doderer becomes apparent. Close text analysis can show that, in spite of differences between the two authors concerning a general philosophy of history, especially 'The last adventure' and 'Herfsttij der Middeleeuwen' share a number of motifs, particularly the choice of single colors and metaphors. In 'The last adventure' and 'A detour', Doderer combines his historical interests and his typical aesthetic strategy of creating poetical metaphors with questions of personal development and self-insight of the author himself and the leading protagonists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the question why two eminent representatives of the history of civilization, Johan Huizinga (1872-1945) and André Jolles (1874-1946), in 1933 broke off an inspiring friendship that had lasted for more than thirtyfive years. Some historians assume that in 1933 Huizinga rejected Jolles as a friend because of the latter's membership of the NSDAP. I argue, however, that this was not the reason and that - inadvertently - a third person caused their separation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Theoreticians of civilization have defined a series of anomalies of the European culture as cultural maladies. But this notion was used from author to author with very different meanings, being vaguely defined or used as a simple metaphor. In the ideological discourse of the Third Reich the references to the maladies of the European culture are frequently correlated to the references to the savior Reich. The present study suggests the concept of axiological malady in order to designate more precisely a series of unhealthy phenomenon of the European culture, for instance the puerilism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Johan Huizinga and Henri Pirenne belong to the most prominent historians of the twentieth century. The fame of the former is most of all based on Herfsttij der Middeleeuwen (1919), a fascinating study of the Burgundian culture; the latter is widely considered as the innovator of the economic and urban history of the Middle Ages. But both historians were equally highly preoccupied by the question as to which position their countries - the Netherlands in the case of Huizinga, Belgium in the case of Pirenne - should take up in Europe and what were the responsibilities of these engagements in an international community. This preoccupation is the subject of this essay. It tells the story of diplomats from small countries, of disappointment through war and of national pride, a story also in which positions changed repeatedly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]