Professor Arthur Chandler

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• Professor Arthur Chandler
  
• Office HUM 409
• Mailbox HUM 410
• Phone [phone] or 338-1099 (Department Office)
• email arthurc_at_sfsu.edu

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The Syllabus Goals and Visions

• The purpose of this course is to comprehend,
  criticize, and appreciate some of the great works
  of Paris. Humanities 375 is the biography of a
  city, the story of her sources, resources,
  achievements and failures, changing phases and
  permanent nature....
• There will be some lectures on crucial points of
  Parisian history. But "Biography of a City
  Paris" is a humanities study, not a history
  course. We will concentrate, not so much on what
  went into the making of Paris, but what came out
  of her creative energies.
• And finally, we will seek to understand one of
  the central mysteries of any person or place
  worth knowing
• What is the nature of the soul of the city?

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Basic Purposes of this Class

• 1. Know the lore of the city's past history is
  character
• 2. Encounter appreciate some of her greatest
  works
• 3. Understand unique personality of Paris

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HUMANITIES

• How many have taken a Humanities course? A
  dynamics of the city course?
• What ARE the humanities?
• Literature, the fine arts, philosophy, history
• What IS Humanities ?
• The integrative study of society, ideas, and the
  arts
• The best that has been thought and expressed

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The Syllabus WORK

• Mid-term examination
• 30 of final grade
• Final examination
• 60 of final grade
• Essay/Web Page
• Due on Final Exam Day 10 of final grade
• Only written medical excuses are allowed for
  missing an examination. No make-up examinations
  will be given.
• Percentages are approximate. Other factors,
  such as class participation, may also affect the
  final grade.

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TERM ESSAY

• The term essay is optional. You can write one
  just for the knowledge gained, or for test
  insurance. For your subject, you may choose any
  French painting, drawing, sculpture, tapestry or
  craftwork (furniture, jewel boxes, etc.) in the
  Palace of the Legion of Honor in San Francisco or
  the Haggin Museum in Stockton(!). In a 8-10 page
  essay or web page
• 1) Describe the work in detail.
• 2) How is the work typical of the era in which it
  was produced? What kind of Parisians would use or
  admire this work?
• 3) What special characteristics tell you of the
  artist's unique style in the work?
• 4) On a separate page, include a bibliography of
  at least three works that would let the reader
  find out more about the subject.
• 5) If possible, provide a reproduction
  photograph, drawing, xerox copy, etc. of the
  work you are writing about.
• 6) Final essays will be evaluated for excellence
  in form and content. Be sure your projects are
  presented to me as error-free and elegant as
  possible!
• DUE DATE July 12 firm (no late papers accepted)

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Required Reading

• Molière, The Misanthrope (optional)
• La Rochefoucauld, Maxims AND Maxims of Madam de
  Sablé
• Balzac, Old Goriot
• Baudelaire, Paris Spleen
• Hemingway, Moveable Feast

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Required Viewing and Listening

• All Slides, Music, Video, and Powerpoint
  Presentations
• What if I miss a class?

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About the Prof

• Played electric flute in Thesis, 1969-1971
• Taught Paris since 1981
• Won The National Fels Award for Non-Fiction

• Came to SFSU in year of longest student strike in
  American history

Charles D. Perlee Award as Outstanding Humanities
Educator NIST Grant for Distributed Manufacturing
Systems Development Current Grooves The
Internet, SOMA, Ballroom Dancing, MR2, Goa
Trance, Vienna
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• Paris Climacterics
• Whats a climacteric?
• 1.A period or year of life when physiological
  changes take place in the body.
• 2. A critical stage, period, or year.
• 1100-1500
• 1643-1789
• 1789-1871
• 1851-present

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THE FOUR SIGNATURE BUILDINGS OF PARIS

• A signature building is one whose stature, form
  and purpose proclaim the dominant value of its
  host city at the time when it was built. The four
  signature buildings of Paris have been
• The Age of Faith NOTRE DAME
• Ancien Régime LES INVALIDES
• Revolution ARC DE TRIOMPHE
• City of Light TOUR EIFFEL

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The value enshrined in Notre Dame is WHAT CAN I
DO TO BE SAVED? The name of the building, the
Last Judgement sculptures in the central
tympanum, the call of the bells and the voice of
the organ, the rose windows and the rituals at
the altar all combine to exhort the mortal to
seek salvation through the guidance of the
church.
A serious place on serious earth it isIn whose
blent air all our compulsions meet,Are
recognized, and robed as destinies. Philip
Larkin
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The church of the Hotel des Invalides was built
in lesser part by Louis XIV to minister to the
spiritual needs of the soldiers who fought his
wars, and in greater part to remind Paris of its
new central concern HOW CAN I HELP FRANCE
ACHIEVE GLORY?
Glory I prefer to all things and to life
itself, a lofty reputation. The ardor that we
feel for la gloire is not one of those feeble
passions that cool with possession. Her favors,
which can never be obtained except with effort,
never cause disgust, and he who can refrain from
longing for fresh ones is unworthy of all those
he has received. Louis XIV
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The Arc de Triomphe was commissioned by Napoleon
in part to commemorate French Victory over
foreign foes, and in part to monumentalize his
imposition of the new reigning value for Paris
HOW CAN PARIS BECOME THE EMPIRE OF THE WORLD?
O France, adieu! Thou art too great to remain
merely a fatherland. To become a goddess, thou
must be separated from motherhood. Soon thou
shalt vanish in a transfiguration. Thou shalt no
longer be France thou shalt be Humanity! No
longer a nation, thou shalt be Ubiquity. Thou
art destined to dissolve utterly, radiating
outward, transcending thy frontiers. Resign
thyself to thy immensity. Adieu, O people!
Hail, Humankind! Submit to thy sublime and
fateful enlargement, O my country and as Athens
became Greece, as Rome became Christianity, thou,
France, become the world! Victor Hugo
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The Eiffel Tower is the explicit symbol of Paris
as the new capital of the Avant-Garde. It
proclaims WE SHALL PROGRESS BY THE APPLICATION
OF TECHNOLOGY FOR THE IMPROVEMENT OF HUMAN LIFE.
Old abandoned towers, no one listens to you any
more. Surely you see that the poles of the world
have shifted and that the world now turns on my
iron axis? I am universal force disciplined by
design. Human thought courses through my limbs.
My brow shines with the light drawn from the
source of all light. You are ignorance I am
knowledge. You enslave man I free him. I know
the secrets behind those miracles which terrified
believers of old. My limitless power will remake
the universe and will establish your paradise
here on earth. I do not need your God, invented
to explain the creation whose laws I comprehend.
These laws are enough for me. They are enough
for those souls I have wrested from you and shall
never return. Eugene Melchior de Vogué
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The Motto of Paris
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finis