Two Centuries in Fifty Minutes

Jean-Honore Fragonard, The Swing, 1766

While today's fill-in-the-gap lecture was nothing compared to the one where we covered the fourth to twelfth centuries, it was still a challenge to explain all the myriad artistic developments that came between the Baroque, where Dr. Cooper left off, and the late 19th century, where Dr. Silk will pick up on Monday. The Rococo is pretty fun to talk about (and I highly recommend this video, an advertisement for "Rococo Puffs"), but Neoclassicism and Romanticism can be, in my mind, a little bit dull. I tried to liven things up as much as possible by telling the most dramatic stories, like Napoleon's self-coronation, his escape from exile on Elba, the triumph of crossing the Alps, etc. These kids have so little knowledge of history! My question about what happened at the end of the 18th century in France that would have made an aristocratic style like Rococo unpopular, for example, was met with blank looks. I'm finding that they have only the very broadest sketches of major historical figures like Napoleon, so I tried to emphasize that although today he's become something of a caricature of the short-statured egoist, in his time he managed an imperial conquest on a scale that hadn't been seen since Alexander the Great. Yes, it ended ignominiously for him, but still, for a few years, Napoleon ruled most of the 'civilized' world.

Since I won't be there next week to hand back their exams, I also took the opportunity today of pointing out the errors that I've seen most commonly. To my complete and utter disgust, more than a few students identified Chartres Cathedral and then couldn't tell me what city it was in. This DESPITE my warning in class that I'd better not see this again, after the issue with the Theater AT Epidavros on the first exam. Spelling was also a big issue--I'll grant that spelling Velazquez isn't easy, but c'mon, you should be able to spell the word tempera! Especially since we had a specific reading dedicated to it. "Tempera" is egg-based paint. "Tempura" is Japanese fried batter. "Tempra" is....I don't even know.

Despite this, they did markedly better on this exam since the first; one class' average rose from 77 to 82. I'd like to think that this is thanks to me and my knowledge of this period, but let's be honest, it was probably just an easy test.