The Link Between The Violence And Modernism In The 1936 Berlin Olympics
Introduction
Historians have oft referred to the twentieth century as the most violent in human history. Indeed, it was a period of much turbulence that included two cataclysmic wars of a scope that had never been seen before. In addition to violence, it was also a century that bore new ideas about Western society, including its philosophy, politics, and arts. This period of modernism, which began in the late nineteenth century, entailed great innovation while challenging the ideas and norms that preceded it. Thus, the first half of the twentieth century was both tumultuous and paradoxical, with the violence of the two world wars in one plane and modernism in the other. But while the violence and modernism of the century existed in parallel …show more content…
In order to fully understand the link between the two, it is necessary to be cognizant of Olympia’s background. Released in 1938, the film documents the 1936 Berlin Olympics. It is fitting that the documentary was released just before the height of the Third Reich, because it paints a portrait of a perfected society. The film is so technically masterful that it is not difficult to imagine the nation it portrays existing for a thousand years. Riefenstahl uses allusions, music, camera angles, and other techniques to create a Nazi-Aryan conception of man that greatly resembles Greco-Roman masculine …show more content…
In Nietzsche’s eyes, the early days of human civilization had a purity and perfection that man had since lost. Rome, too, embodied the perfection of human existence. Consequently, Nietzsche believed that the only way humanity could progress was by choosing “ascent” over “exhaustion.” This ascent would entail inequality between people, but, as Nietzsche often said, “‘what does not destroy me makes me strong; that which is falling should be pushed.’” How literally Nietzsche meant this is unclear, but quotations such as this were exactly the ones so often taken for their own by the Nazis. His indecipherable language and oversimplified ideas, however, were only some of the reasons his words had so much influence in Hitler’s
Historians have oft referred to the twentieth century as the most violent in human history. Indeed, it was a period of much turbulence that included two cataclysmic wars of a scope that had never been seen before. In addition to violence, it was also a century that bore new ideas about Western society, including its philosophy, politics, and arts. This period of modernism, which began in the late nineteenth century, entailed great innovation while challenging the ideas and norms that preceded it. Thus, the first half of the twentieth century was both tumultuous and paradoxical, with the violence of the two world wars in one plane and modernism in the other. But while the violence and modernism of the century existed in parallel …show more content…
In order to fully understand the link between the two, it is necessary to be cognizant of Olympia’s background. Released in 1938, the film documents the 1936 Berlin Olympics. It is fitting that the documentary was released just before the height of the Third Reich, because it paints a portrait of a perfected society. The film is so technically masterful that it is not difficult to imagine the nation it portrays existing for a thousand years. Riefenstahl uses allusions, music, camera angles, and other techniques to create a Nazi-Aryan conception of man that greatly resembles Greco-Roman masculine …show more content…
In Nietzsche’s eyes, the early days of human civilization had a purity and perfection that man had since lost. Rome, too, embodied the perfection of human existence. Consequently, Nietzsche believed that the only way humanity could progress was by choosing “ascent” over “exhaustion.” This ascent would entail inequality between people, but, as Nietzsche often said, “‘what does not destroy me makes me strong; that which is falling should be pushed.’” How literally Nietzsche meant this is unclear, but quotations such as this were exactly the ones so often taken for their own by the Nazis. His indecipherable language and oversimplified ideas, however, were only some of the reasons his words had so much influence in Hitler’s