La suite est moins rose. La seule cause majeure des changements des teneurs en CO2 et en O2 est le vivant. Et aussi nombres de vers et mollusques. Apparition des plantes terrestres: La plus illustre probablement: Clairement, ces organismes doivent pouvoir nous apprendre des choses sur les mondes anciens. Luttant contre la traction des vagues refluantes, ces animaux extraordinaires marchaient lentement vers la plage. Et pourtant, elles persistaient. La mort par paralysie des muscles respiratoires intervient dans les 16 heures.

Contrairement aux crabes, leur exosquelette ne contient pas beaucoup de calcium, et il est essentiellement fait de chitine, un polysaccharide. Mais une question demeure: Les oiseaux sont malins et ont une excellente vision. Comme nous sommes superficiels…. Cela signifie-t-il que maintenant les enfants trouvent les limules adorables? Pendant ces 50 m. Il y a environ m. Les poissons se multiplient. De nombreuses plantes ont aussi disparu. Amphibiens et reptiles envahissent les terres. Les dinosaures — du grec deinos: On y trouve aussi plusieurs genres de crocodiles: Depuis, en , des chercheurs argentins ont, avec un os de titanosaure de 2,40 m, provisoirement battu ce record du monde.

Il est plus beau et bien plus vrai que tous les contes de notre enfance. Nous ne serons jamais seuls au monde tant que le monde entier sommeillera en nous. Bouquins Robert Laffont Premiers proboscidiens du grec proboskis: Cela va durer pendant une quinzaine de m. Les deux groupes de Primates vont se partager le monde des cimes: Mais les arbres ont aussi besoin des Primates, et ceci est encore plus vrai des arbres angiospermiens que des gymnospermiens.

Nous sommes toujours en Afrique: Cela ne surprendra pas: La motivation est alimentaire. Le grand se penche sur le petit et lui envoie un oiseau pour lui tenir compagnie la nuit. Ils nous ressemblent, me dit-elle. Comment pourrait-on les traiter comme de la viande? Et pourtant cela arrive chaque jour en mer. En bon marin, il ne laissait rien au hasard. Des monades et des bancs. Le silence de la salle sembla plein de respect. Les baleines nous ressemblent, elles sont physiologiquement proches de nous.

Elles ont le sang chaud, des poumons, une intelligence, un langage. Elles ont des mamelles et allaitent leurs petits. Personne ne sait la raison de ces chants. On dirait deux chevaux en rut. Sa puissance se convertissait en douceur. Si les orques venaient, ou les hommes, elle sacrifierait sa vie pour lui. Elle lui enseignait mille choses que nous ignorions. Le corps se creusait, le museau se redressait, la queue propulsait la masse. La baleine faisait des acrobaties lentes. Elle ne caracolait pas. Nous avons fait de la baleine une proie glorieuse et les plus courageux ont parcouru les mers pour chasser.

Il savait que la baleine sauterait encore une fois. Le plus grand — plus de 5 m. Dominique Lestel , philosophe. Pas extraordinaire non plus: Son extraction est devenue essentielle. Ils descendaient, toujours plus profond.

Wikipédia:Oracle/semaine 24 2008

Il regarde la nappe, et poursuit: Et il y a de quoi! Trop chaud pour un incendie naturel. Laurent Bruxelles prend le relais: Regardez les bosquets autour de vous. De quoi exhumer encore quelques merveilles. Mais ces nouvelles datations absolues vont permettre des comparaisons attendues depuis longtemps. Au sol, les cailloux. La peau ne trompe pas: Si les deux techniques sont simples, elles ne sont pas primitives! Il y a eu un apprentissage, une transmission de la fabrication. Pour comprendre ces outils, il faut aussi les refaire, ajoute -Sonia Harmand.

Le Turkana, il faudra y revenir. Rappelons-nous que toutes nos conclusions ne reposent que sur un seul site! On ne les retrouvera probablement jamais. Lucy devient une star, et le restera: Arabie et Afrique du Nord: Rien de plus commun, mais, pourtant, rien de plus faux. Ceux qui veulent se droguer, qu'ils se droguent et s'ils n'ont pas l'argent pour se soigner quand ils sont malades, qu'ils crevent mais ne vivent pas ou ne recoivent pas de soins sur le dos de la communaute. Il existe donc une islamisation "raisonnable" et une islamisation qui ne l'est pas?

Et pour soutenir l'islamisation "raisonnable", il faut soutenir l'UMP? C'est bien de nous le dire: Ce sont nos enfants.. Elle vous en dirait plus qu'un long discours;. Mon commentaire n'etait pas dirige contre vous J'ai toujours ete pour la depenalisation des drogues qu'elles soient alcooliques, euphorisantes des cellules cerebrales, hallucinogenes, dopantes, hilarantes, etc.

Je n'ai pas pour habitude de toujours rendre responsable la societe et je responsabilise plutot l'individu. Apres tout, la societe n'est rien d'autre qu'un ensembles d'individus. J'ai connu des individus abandonnes a la naissance, eleves par des oncles ou des tantes, maltraites, meprises et qui non seulement n'ont jamais sombre dans la drogue ou l'alcoolisme, mais sont devenus des gens de droite qui ont cree des entreprises florissantes et non pas des gauchos militants paumes. Responsabiliser toujours la societe, c'est pratique, c'est convenient, c'est arrangeant. Non, pour moi, chaque individu est responsable de la condition dans laquelle il se trouve.

C'est en deresponsabilisant l'individu et en rendant responsable la societe de tous les maux qu'on cree les pires criminels, les pires psychopathes qui, diront-ils, sont devenus comme ca a cause de la societe. C'est la meme le principe de base, l'essence du socialisme! La drogue, j'ai fait mes experiences entre 16 et 17 ans.

Des joints au LSD. Puis, j'ai decide d'arreter. Des amis a moi qui en prenaient aussi a l'epoque et qui n'etaient pourtant pas plus malheureux que moi ni moins bien lotis, n'ont jamais arrete. Et pourtant, tout ca malgre une penalisation tres severe des drogues. Donc je dis qu'il faut depenaliser car il n'y aura pas plus de drogues mais au moins il n'y aura plus de cartels, de mafias, de dealers, etc J'ai des amis de l'epoque, qui eux avaient 13 ou 14 ans et qui ont ete abuses par des pedophiles socialement bien etablis et qui les droguaient a l'heroine en leur fournissant gratuitement les doses.

Et c'etait le chantage. Le gamin etait devenu accro a l'heroine et le pedophile pouvait en abuser a volonte. Si tu parles, tu n'auras plus tes doses! Bien sur, j'ai appris tout ca plus tard, une fois que les jeunes en question se soient suicides a 17, 18 ou 19 ans et que les bruits courraient.

Les responsables, mis a part les protagonistes,sont les individus qui savaient et n'ont jamais rien dit! Jeanne Rien ne vous oblige a considerer les Juifs comme les "freres aines". Merci, merci infiniment pour ces mots, Koah. Vous ne voulez rien devoir au christianisme, et pourtant Vous en pratiquez couramment?

Et je ne vous demande pas de me remercier pour quoi que ce soit. Et votre petit discours signifie en clair que les femmes ne doivent pas serrer la main des hommes ou inversement Les cyniques qui abusent des jeunes ont les mains encore plus libres Toi tu passes ton temps a cracher sur leur religion. Ce forum c'est un peu contre 1 non?

Donc permet moi au moins de citer tout ce que tu diffames. Et puis de la propagande pour convertir quoi au juste? Ceux qui viennent ici savent parfaitement que la religion c'est du pipo. En plus tu remarquera que celui qui a les mots de haine dans sa bouche ,c'est toi,pas moi. Faut faire la guerre pour la paix Orwell le sait bien Pour les autres qui me disent d'ouvrir ,les yeux de l'islamo-fascisme.

Vous avez pas compris qu'on se fout de vous? De plus un autre principe fondamental existe: Il sait aussi que la peine de mort est abolie de facto. Car enfin, que veut-elle? Ce qui n'est malheureusement pas votre cas, et cela m'attriste. Je vais ici reprendre tous vos arguments sur cette page, et vous faire part de mes quelques remarques qui pourraient vous aider. Les mots ont un sens. Le Likoud n'est en rien fasciste.

L'hindouisme a permis de lutter contre la domination culturelle et religieuse arabo-persane. C 'est dommage pour les juifs. Encore un abus de votre part. C'est un raisonnement raciste. Seul Dieu est juge si vous tuez en son nom. C'est ce que pensent ceux qui le font. Comme quoi l'ignorance conduit a la violence Prenez soin avec les formulations "comme quoi": Assumez vos propres tropismes.

C'est une grave erreur.

Aujourd'hui, les musulmans d'Asie du Sud-Est ont remis le moteur en route. Si je me soumets, Allah ne punira pas le musulman qui m'est amical. Les versets les plus abjects? Ou vous les comprenez de travers, ou vous les ignorez. Plaisir d'autant plus grands que comme pour Platon, les horreurs qu'ils justifient Averroes et la guerre juste en droit islamique: A remarquer qu'au Danemark il y a plus de musulmans partageant toutes nos valeurs qu'en France, mais qu'il y a aussi plus de musulmans ne partageant pas du tout nos valeurs qu'en France. Vous voulez pas ouvrir vos deux yeux, vous?

L'un n'efface pas l'autre. Cela nous change de Canut Reprenons point par point,meme si cela ne sert strictement a rien vous concernant. Cela te fera le plus grand bien. C'est pas grave,je post pour le plaisir,et pour les autres. Votre propagande ressemble comme 2 goutes d'eau a la propagande nazi occidental il y a ans. Un peu comme maintenant. L'homme est un berger dans sa famille et il est responsable de son troupeau. Ainsi ,chacun d'entre vous est un berger et chacun est responsable de son troupeau.

Fredo est un cas de psychiatrie assez grave et je le dis sans faire de caricature. Le fait de citer des versets du Coran discriminatoires comme paroles d'amour en est bien la preuve absolue. OU te cachais tu.. Et c'est pas des musulmans. Zapatero prend les commandes. Certes plus spectaculaire un attentat,mais moins 'efficace'. Interdiction de tuer des innocents. Et effectivement,c'est triste d'en arriver la. La violence n'arrange absolument rien,tu devrais le savoir. Tu devrais rentrer sur le site de Maxilo, sur la page d'accueil, il y a un decompte du nombre d'attaques terroriste depuis le 11 septembre , ainsi qu'un decompte hebdomadaire et mensuel avec le nombre de tues et de blesses dans un etat critique.

Tu plaisantes ou quoi? De quel droit ce monsieur se permet-il de sous-entendre que leur religion ne vaut rien??? Mais s'ils refusent, on les zigouille?!?!? Quand je t'ai dit plus haut: Poitiers, Roncevaux, Saint Louis et les Croisades…. Ils pillent les biens Tout au plus des pillages. Ni plus, ni moins. Elle retrace des faits Balak, furieux, renvoie Bilaam. Il ne sait que faire.

La raison est simple: Le Verbe plus fort que le glaive! Que nous enseigne cette histoire? Le peuple juif est en exil, disons en Egypte. Ce sera la puissance du verbe, des mots qui tuent. Mais il ne faut pas oublier que ce personnage est un mercenaire; autrement dit un homme qui n'agit pas de son propre chef. Qui est pris qui croyait prendre! C'est vrai,un peu de retard a l'allumage.

Les derniers seront les premier comme disait l'autre. Aujourd'hui les juifs c'est combien dans le monde? Les musulmans 1,5 milliards. Il supprime les fables qui ne veulent rien dire. Impose un langage direct entre dieu et le croyant. Et que nous sommes ici a parler d'Islam. Tu le salues quand tu le rencontres,tu acceptes son invitation,tu lui donnes conseil quand il te le demande,tu lui dis: Traite donc bien ton voisin,tu seras croyant,Desire pour autrui ce que tu desires pour toi-meme,tu seras musulman.

Pardonnez aux autres est un acte qui n' offre a l'homme que plus de puissance. Y a pas que des abrutis dans ce pays;. Ce fol orgueil est le vice radical du musulman. Les citations ne faisant que conforter mes dires. Toi tu es incapables de contredire 1 seul argument. C'est donc pas vraiment un compliment.

La mention de quelques principes suffira: On peut encore citer: Ce n'est plus de l'ordre de l'opinion tordue. Et a la limite pourquoi pas? CE serait logique en quelques sortes. Faut il encore avoir l'esprit d'ouverture. Par contre soit juste dans tes analyses. Ce que la constitution occidental droit de l'hommiste permet,le coran le permet. Alors comme c'est l'heure.. Par exemple, quand je t'ai dit: Et bien, tu ne manques d'air mon gars! Tu le veux vraiment? Applaudissements Nous ne pouvons pas imposer la paix.

Jean Il est bien beau le discours d'Obama, mais parler a une lampe serait plus productif. Mais que dit Michel Rocard au juste? A Canut Abouya dites moi, les degeneres qui se font exploser en afghanistan, Pakistan Enfin, je sais, c'est trop vous demander. C'est quoi cette oligarchie qui nous bafoue et s'engraisse sur notre dos? Obama fait dans la repentance en terre d'islam Mais a-t-on entendu des responsables musulmans faire repentance? Pourquoi, pourquoi, pourquoi, pourquoi, pourquoi?

The "Big first One". Rappelez-vous, le 6 juin , sur les plages normandes: C'est pour quand la prochaine fois? Un article du journal "Le Temps": El Magnifico Pour etre plus precis, le jour ou Israel disparaitra, la planete entiere disparaitra. Canut Expliquez moi le rapport entre un attentat suicide perpetre pas un gamin en Afghanistan ou au Pakistan et Israel. Y a-t-il un pont pres de chez vous? Canut, Tu aimes cette phrase: Petite anecdote de la diversitude actuelle: Remember, comme disait l'autre!! Partie fasciste qui partage le pouvoir actuellement 5. Un certain art de vivre!

Un art de vivre. Ou d'aller travailler sas leur demander la permission. Oui, canut, un art de vivre! Ils n'ont pas de casseroles Fredo J'ai mon ami gitan fait gaffe l'homosexualite est passible de la peine de mort. JLV Tout est faux? Par contre,si tu as des textes a poster,cite l'auteur Et certains osent dire qu'il a du courage Je vais vous raconter une anecdote: ELLE Mais c'est minable ce que tu dis!

Etienne charles de Beauregard, j'ai bien envie de vous rendre visite en Sologne! Et ce qu'il dit me convient. Neckar A propos de votre amie. Yo no entiendo tu idioma que me parece un poquito.. Que pensera le Sarkozy d'alors? Ouvrez un peu les yeux. A Fredo le propangiste: Notes de la traduction. Le plus proche est 9: Mais il est tout fier de son charabia Vous m'en direz tant! Jeanne Les Etats colonialistes n'etaient-ils pas deja laics? Aux curieux je laisse soin pour s'informer sur le parcours militaire. Politique politicienne et sectaire.

Vous allez surement vous defiler comme d'hab. Quant aux couple Juifs orthodoxes, comme vous l'avez ecrit, ils peuvent divorcer. Elles peuvent voter et se faire elire comme les femmes musulmanes elles peuvent passer le permis de conduire. Maxilo je rajouterai que l'etude de la Torah ne se fait pas uniquement avec le sens literal de ce qui est ecrit. Le Monde et les Temps Changent Koah me demande "Jeanne Les Etats colonialistes n'etaient-ils pas deja laics?

Zed Vous savez aussi bien que moi que le simple contact physique ne serait ce que deux mains qui se serrent peuvent eveiller chez l'homme des desirs. Oliveoil Et meme si Israel devient une Theocratie, qu'est ce que ca change. Canut, Tu fais ici une erreur d'analyse flagrante: Philiberte " Suis la loi, ne la suis pas, la vie est ce que tu en fais: Extraits d'un post lu sur le Figaro.

Cher Webmestre, Deux heures sans autres messages, c'est normal? Jeanne Etes vous un homme pour savoir si oui ou non nous pouvons avoir une erection rien qu'en serrant la main d'une femme? Je l'ai precise plus haut l'homme est faible et non la femme. Quant au message de l'acrobate, voyez le resultat, des idolatres. Si seulement, vous aviez raison Jean le Pape a parle dans le vide lors de son voyage en Jordanie. Martin Je ne cherche pas a convertir qui que ce soit. Alouette Je ne dis pas que c'est ce qui se passe automatiquement, mais cela peut arriver.

Je suis ravi de vous avoir fait rire. Zed Tous les interdits dont la pedophilie sont decrits dans la Torah parce qu'ils existaient et ils existent encore aujourd'hui meme chez les Rabins qui ne sont que des hommes. Oui, je sais, vous allez me dire: Jean qui a dit: Alors je fais avec.. Michel, De quel mot d'ordre parlez-vous? Jox, Mon commentaire n'etait pas dirige contre vous Avec les drogues depenalisees, on aurait pas pu les faire chanter. Ah excusez moi foxrenard.. La peine de mort est encourue pour: Fredo tu pars dans tous les sens. Il dijoncte le Fredo D'un cote Tu ecris: Raconte moi le Darfour.

Tu as un cerveau, ou quoi? Fredo, le propagandiste Quand je t'ai dit plus haut: Jeudi 11 juin Rappelons les faits: Vieille tactique de bloggeur, celle de Fredo. Allez, fredo, prenez le chemin de l'exil! Vous aurez la une d'Al-Manar et Cie! Ridley said he was helped by voluminous footnotes and documentation that were included with Ms. For decades, however, scholars have been trying to untangle the literal truth of Mr. Davis and Henry Louis Gates Jr. Olney was explaining pressures that created a certain uniformity of content in the popular slave narratives, with recurring themes that involved insistence on sometimes questioned personal identity, harrowing descriptions of oppression, and open advocacy for the abolitionist cause.


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Stepto did not question Mr. In an interview by phone on Friday, David A. Fiske — who recently joined Clifford W. Stepto had a further reservation, however. Ridley said the heavily documented story, with its many twists and turns, had an unpredictability that is a hallmark of the real. By Getting It Wrong. At the beginning of 12 Years a Slave, the kidnapped freeman Solomon Northup Chiwetel Ejiofor , has a painful sexual encounter with an unnamed female slave in which she uses his hand to bring herself to orgasm before turning away in tears. And yet, for all its verisimilitude, the encounter never happened.

This embellishment is by no means an isolated case in the film. For instance, in the film version, shortly after Northup is kidnapped, he is on a ship bound south.

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A sailor enters the hold and is about to rape one of the slave women when a male slave intervenes. The sailor unhesitatingly stabs and kills him. This seems unlikely on its face—slaves are valuable, and the sailor is not the owner. And, sure enough, the scene is not in the book. A slave did die on the trip south, but from smallpox, rather than from stabbing. Northup himself contracted the disease, permanently scarring his face.

It seems quite likely that the single most powerful moment in the film was based on a misunderstood antecedent. Other changes seem less intentional. Perhaps the most striking scene in the film involves Patsey, a slave who is repeatedly raped by her master, Epps, and who as a consequence is jealously and obsessively brutalized by Mistress Epps. This scene derives from the following passage at the end of Chapter 13 of the autobiography:. Nothing delighted the mistress so much as to see [Patsey] suffer, and more than once, when Epps had refused to sell her, has she tempted me with bribes to put her secretly to death, and bury her body in some lonely place in the margin of the swamp.

Gladly would Patsey have appeased this unforgiving spirit, if it had been in her power, but not like Joseph, dared she escape from Master Epps, leaving her garment in his hand. As you can see, in the book, it is Mistress Epps who wants to bribe Northup to drown Patsey. Patsey wants to escape, but not to drown herself. Slate, following the lead of scholar David Fiske see both the article and the correction does the same.

In short, it seems quite likely that the single most powerful moment in the film was based on a misunderstood antecedent. His point is well-taken. The critics Butler discusses may sometimes reduce the first to the second, but they do so in part because works of fiction themselves often rely on a claim to accuracy in order to make themselves appear true. This is nowhere more the case than in slave narratives themselves. Often published by abolitionist presses or in explicit support of the abolitionist cause, slave narratives represented themselves as accurate, first-person accounts of life under slavery.

The First Century of Afro-American Autobiography, the representation of accuracy, and, for that matter, of first-person account, required a good deal of artifice. To single out just the most obvious point, Andrews notes that many slave narratives were told to editors, who wrote down the oral account and prepared them for publication. Though Northup was literate, his autobiography was written by David Wilson, a white lawyer and state legislator from Glens Falls, New York.

The first sex scene, for example, speaks to our post-Freud, post-sexual-revolution belief that, isolated for 12 years far from home, Northup would be bound to have some sort of sexual encounters, even if especially if? You can only experience it by experiencing it. Pretending otherwise is presumptuous. The autobiography, for instance, actually includes many legal documents as appendices. It also features lengthy descriptions of the methods of cotton farming. To modern readers, though, the touristy attention to local customs can make Northup sound more like a traveling reporter than like a man who is himself in bondage.

Which, of course, a white man named David Wilson did. A story about slavery, a real, horrible crime, inevitably involves an appeal to reality—the story has to seem accurate if it is to be accepted as true. But that seeming accuracy requires artifice and fiction—a cool distance in one case, an acknowledgement of sexuality in another. Given the difficulties and contradictions, one might conclude that it would be better to openly acknowledge fiction. But refusing to try to recapture the experience and instead deciding to, say, treat slavery as a genre Western, can be presumptuous in its own way as well.

The writers of the original slave narratives knew that to end injustice, you must first acknowledge that injustice exists. Accurate stories about slavery—or, more precisely, stories that carried the conviction of accuracy, were vital to the abolitionist cause. Outright lies about slavery and its aftermath, from Birth of a Nation to Gone With the Wind, have defaced American cinema for a long time. To go forward more honestly, we need accounts of our past that, like the slave narratives themselves, use accuracy and art in the interest of being more true.

Pointing out the complexity of the task is not meant to belittle their attempt, but to honor it. How Accurate Is 12 Years a Slave? What happens in between, as Northup is kidnapped into 12 years of slavery in the South, frequently beggars the imagination. Should you believe even the most incredible details of its story? With a few rare exceptions, yes. While much of the story is condensed, and a few small scenes are invented, nearly all of the most unbelievable details come straight from the book, and many lines are taken verbatim.

Solomon was born a free man and received an unusually good education for a black man of his time, eventually coming to work as a violinist and a carpenter. As in the movie, he was married to Anne Hampton, who was of mixed race, and they had three children—Elizabeth, Margaret, and Alonzo. His wife and children were away when he was offered an unusually profitable gig from his eventual kidnappers, who called themselves Hamilton and Brown. Solomon, while enslaved, turns to find an unidentified woman in bed with him. She grabs his hand and uses it to bring herself to orgasm.

McQueen has said of the scene: She takes control of her own body. In his book, Northup refused to say whether Hamilton and Brown were guilty of his kidnapping. He notes that he got extraordinary headaches after having a drink with them one night, and became sick and delirious soon afterward, but cannot conclude with assurety that he was poisoned. Northup came around to accepting their role in his kidnapping and unlawful sale—an unusual occurrence, but not unique to Northup—soon after the book was published.

A judge, Thaddeus St. John of New York, read the book soon after its release, and realized that he himself had run into the two kidnappers when they were with Northup. John, who knew them, not use their real names around Northup. The next time St. John saw them, they had come into some newfound wealth: They carried ivory canes and sported gold watches. John eventually met up, recognized each other immediately, and brought their case against Merrill and Russell.

A note about the case appeared in the New York Times. Merrill and Russell apparently got off unpunished, after their case was dropped on technicalities. Northup says he was beaten with a paddle until the paddle broke, only to be whipped after that, all just for asserting his true identity. We see this in the movie. But an attempted mutiny by Northup and others ends much differently in the film than it does in his own account. Northup did hatch an elaborate plan to take over a ship with a freeman named Arthur and a slave named Robert played in the movie by Michael K.

But that plan did not end with Robert coming to the defense of Eliza Adepero Oduye against an apparent rape attempt by a sailor, and then being stabbed by that sailor. What foiled their plans was simpler: Robert got smallpox and died. Northup gives a more charitable account of his onetime master, William Ford, than the movie does. Northup actually had two violent encounters with Tibeats. The first scuffle, over a set of nails, is shown in the movie: Afterward, Northup was left bound and on the point of hanging for several hours, before Ford rescued him.

According to Northup, he again prevailed, but was afraid of the repercussions, and so this time attempted to run away. Unable to survive on his own in the surrounding swamps, he eventually returned in tatters to Ford, who had mercy on him. The scene that introduces Epps—his reading of Luke As we see in the film, Mistress Epps encourages Master Epps to whip her, out of her own jealousy.

As in the book, Mistress Shaw is the black wife of a plantation owner. One devastating detail is left out: After 12 years apart, Margaret did not recognize her father. This post was corrected to suggest a scene from the movie 12 Years a Slave was drawn from the book. The original article was accurate: The original language has been restored. Historian at the Movies: As part of our new series, Dr Emily West, an associate professor of history at the University of Reading, reviews 12 Years a Slave — a true story about a free black man from upstate New York who is abducted and sold into slavery.

The subject matter made 12 Years a Slave a very uncomfortable film to watch, although some of the actors gave astonishing performances. In one incident, Edwin Epps forces Solomon Northup at gunpoint to whip another slave, Patsey, until she collapses from pain. For example, Edwin Epps rapes Patsey and takes a sadistic pleasure in seeing her whipped. White women rarely sought to help their enslaved women enduring sexual abuse. I have never seen a film represent slavery so accurately. I found the scene in the New Orleans slave market especially moving because of the juxtaposition between the refined, midth-century house, from which a trader sold enslaved people, and the raw nakedness and commodification of the black bodies within it.

We also heard a lot about the ideology behind enslavement. Masters such as William Ford played by Benedict Cumberbatch and Edwin Epps, although very different characters, both used an interpretation of Christianity to justify their ownership of slaves. Masters such as Edwin Epps commonly hired out their slaves in times of economic need, and in the film we see Solomon Northup and other enslaved men being hired to a man to chop sugar cane — a crop grown primarily in Louisiana in the United States. Solomon Northup comes into contact with various white men of lower social standing, some of whom are paid by Epps to labour alongside slaves.

Bass brings an acquaintance of Solomon Northup to the plantation to confirm his free status, after which Northup returns to his family. The film also got the smaller details right. For example, all enslaved people leaving their plantations had to have a written pass, in case they came across white patrollers people employed to track down runaway slaves. When Solomon Northup leaves his plantation on an errand for Mrs Epps, he wore such a pass around his neck.

The film also succeeded in highlighting the stark visual contrast between the opulence of plantations mansions and the dingy, cramped, over-crowded quarters of the enslaved. In the film, Northup appears as a wealthy, successful individual, making a good living as a carpenter and musician. He wears smart clothes and appears to live in a tolerant, racially integrated community where skin colour does not matter. An Essentially American Narrative. A free black man living in Saratoga, N. Ejiofor, who portrays Northup, and Mr. While the material was developed by Americans including the screenwriter John Ridley the director and most of the major cast members are British, a topic of concern among some early black commentators.

These are excerpts from the conversation. I wanted to start with contemporary analogues. One thing that came to mind was stop and frisk, a way the New York City police could stop a black or Latino male. I thought of Solomon as a character who, for a lot of contemporary audiences, would be that young black person. Ejiofor] When you were seeking a way into the slave story, was what happens now part of that? History has a funny thing of repeating itself. Over a century and a half to the present day. I mean, you see the evidence of slavery as you walk down the street.

McQueen The prison population, mental illness, poverty, education. We could go on forever. I was trying to tell the story of Solomon Northup as he experienced his life. My journey started finishing a film in Nigeria. The last day, I went to the slave museum in Calabar, which was four or five rooms and some books, some interesting drawings of what they thought happened to people when the boats took them over. I left the following day and came to Louisiana. In my own way, I traveled that route. Professor, your reaction to the film, its place in the contemporary discussion about slavery.

Eric Foner I believe this is a piece of history that everybody — black, white, Asian, everybody — has to know. You cannot understand the United States without knowing about the history of slavery. Slavery was a horrific institution, and it is not the same thing as stop and frisk. In a way, putting it back to slavery takes the burden off the present. The guys who are acting in ways that lead to inequality today are not like the plantation owner. But what it really highlights is the capriciousness of it.

In fact slavery is like that at large. I had a conversation with John Ridley, and I said: I want her to have tea. Give her a voice. Foner There were four million slaves in the U. It had every kind of human variation you can imagine. There were black plantation owners in Louisiana, black slave owners. Walker I was going to ask a question about a black woman who appears, a mysterious woman Solomon has sex with.

She has sex with him, rather. McQueen Slaves are working all day. Their lives are owned, but those moments, they have to themselves. I just wanted a bit of tenderness — the idea of this woman reaching out for sexual healing in a way, to quote Marvin Gaye. Solomon has a wife beforehand. In the film it seems as if he lived with Eliza [a fellow slave]. Then obviously [he has] some kind of relationship with Patsey, a friendship. Ejiofor His sexuality felt slightly more of a tangent. I think the real story is where sex is in terms of power.

Foner Remember, this book is one of the most remarkable first-person accounts of slavery. Foner Harriet Jacobs was condemned by many people for revealing this, even antislavery people. You put the camera there, and you let us experience the moment that is part of the lore of America, the slave master raping the black female slave [Patsey].

Within that you see his actual love for her in a way. Walker Staying on that scene and coming back to Patsey over and over, she is abused and deteriorating and wanting to die. McQueen I have huge sympathy for Epps, though. Why is he in love with this slave? He goes about trying to destroy his love for her by destroying her.

One of the things that has come up in early response to the film is a question from some black folks in America about the perspective, the fact that you are both foreigners, as it were. McQueen Can I jump in there, please? My parents are from Grenada. My mother was born in Trinidad. Stokely Carmichael is Trinidadian. We could go on and on. Ejiofor When I was in Savannah, Ga. I loved the fact that there were people from different places coming together to tell this story. McQueen The only thing you can say about it is: Why was this book lost in America?

Maybe it will be now. Along with Frederick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs, this is probably the most widely read of what we call the slave narratives. Most Hollywood history is self-important in a way that this movie is not. Walker The audience is intelligent. Over the years, you have this kind of heavy-handed style of narration. And some of these stories are great stories.

But you have a couple of movies do incredibly good business. Walker But Obama also wrote his autobiography. All of them suffer from what I see as the problem of Hollywood history. Walker I was going to disagree a little bit. All of that makes him a much more complicated figure in a way. Is that relevant to you? I feel like that still deserves its own reflection.

I wanted to see the aftermath of that, psychological and physical. I feel sometimes people take slavery very lightly, to be honest. I hope it could be a starting point for them to delve into the history and somehow reflect on the position where they are now. The texture of the film made me want to stay in this space that would not be hospitable to me.

Thinking also about who would see the film, I think about my parents, in Georgia. I think about the theater where they will see the film. People will go to the mall to see one of those Tyler Perry films and action films. Would this film make it there, and if it did, would it translate? Foner I think this movie is much more real, to choose a word like that, than most of the history you see in the cinema. It gets you into the real world of slavery.

Also, there are little touches that are very revealing, like a flashback where a slave walks into a shop in Saratoga. Yes, absolutely, Southerners brought slaves into New York State. People went on vacation, and they brought a slave. McQueen I think people are ready. I think people actually want to reflect on that horrendous recent past in order to go forward. When people start trash-talking good movies! The best picture frontrunner is always targeted, and this one is no exception.

They did a wonderful job. The New York Post ran a story on Oct. According to them, Phillips had a reputation for recklessness, disregarded warnings about piracy that could have prevented the incident and has since reframed the facts to make himself appear more heroic. I stand by the picture I give in the film, absolutely. Critics have cheered the drama for portraying space so convincingly, but some scientists have received it less kindly. The film revolves around one Cecil Gaines, a black man who worked in the White House under each president from Eisenhower to Reagan.

The character is based on Eugene Allen, a black man who worked in the White House under each president from Truman through Reagan. Disney was, in fact, not just a happy-go-lucky dreamer, but also a somewhat controversial figure: The film has been wholeheartedly endorsed by composer Richard Sherman, who was one of only two songwriters ever under contract to Disney — the other was his late brother and collaborator Robert, with whom he co-wrote the score for Mary Poppins — and who knew Walt better than just about anyone who is alive today.

In 12 Years a Slave, a broken Christianity. The root of the word is ligare. It is the same root as the word ligature, the stuff that holds the skeleton together. At its best, religion helps us to see the spiritual ligature that connects us, and shows us that the notion that we are individual particles floating separate and apart in a beam of sunlight is a deception.

We are tied together by the breath of life. When religion rips, tears, breaks, fractures, it leaves our fragile humanity broken, dazed, confused, and dangerous. From this brokenness true horrors are born. It is a powerful film that tells a powerful story that many people in the United Sates do not want to remember. The movie shows us a fractured Christianity. People take their Bible in pieces. A slave owner uses a tiny fragment of Scripture to justify torture.

An African American woman who has found favor with her master, who lives well with servants serving her, finds solace in the story of the Exodus of the Hebrew slaves from Egypt. Then there is the white itinerant worker who tells the slave owner that there is no justice in slavery, that there are laws that apply to all human beings equally. Did the slave system break religion or did a broken religion allow the slave system? In the movie we see how the songs of faith —Roll Jordan Roll— gave enslaved people the strength to endure the degradations of slavery.

And those indignities were numerous: Someone else can use your body for work, sex, revenge, physical and psychological torture, and the satisfaction of their own insane will-to-power. We see the sad fact that oppression oppresses everyone—slave master, mistress, all classes and all races. Thomas Jefferson knew this to be true about slavery.

His prediction on the possibility of the races ever living together in harmony in the United States is thoroughly pessimistic. However he is clear-eyed when he sees the harm slavery does to both master and slave. The Almighty has no attribute which can take side with us in such a contest. The fear of such retribution has kept white supremacy in place all these years. The fear that if oppressed people ever get power that they will perpetrate the same oppression as was perpetrated against them forces people to continue living inside delusions of race, class, sex, sexual orientation.

And we too often use religion as a justification for this fear. It is important to see so that we may knit together the various strands of our religious faith and let it bind us back to true human unity, back to our own humanity, back to justice and even to love. Some are subtle; most are painfully simple. But all of them come in an immersive experience that operates from the inside out, that moves the viewer by engaging the whole person — body, mind, and soul.

The story is based on the narrative of Solomon Northrup Chiwetel Ejiofor , a free black citizen from New York who is kidnapped while on a trip to Washington, D. When he awakes in a basement cell, the camera pans slowly upward to the Washington skyline, juxtaposing icons of freedom and democracy with the painful image of imprisonment and oppression.

Bloc-notes: l'Europe bonasse ne peut faire rêver

Except how can one be too heavy handed about slavery? In many ways, Northrup, an educated free man, is the ideal avatar for the modern audience. He, like us, does not come to slavery naturally or easily. Also like us, he tries and fails to understand slavery, master its internal logic, and use his intelligence to do the right things in order to survive.

But what if there is no rhyme or reason, no logic, no right move to be played? How can someone find protection in being a perfect slave, when slavery itself is a series of irreconcilable orders and impossible commands? We all like to believe that we could transcend these circumstances, that the values and beliefs instilled in us could equip us to make the right decisions. But what about when one must always do more with less — with, for instance, a quota system that calls for whipping a man at the end of each day if he picks less than average?

When the demands of a mistress and those of a master are in conflict, how can one please them both? What about when the choice is between picking up a lash or consigning others to the noose? But Bass acts out of a sense of duty, not personal goodness. In a scene that may resonate the most with modern audiences, Master Ford Benedict Cumberbatch gives in to evil against his own inclination for the most prosaic of reasons — debt — and the film shines here, and throughout, when it illustrates and explores different kinds of bondage without undercutting the place of total enslavement in the hierarchy of evils.

Of course, we would all rather be in debt than enslaved. But perhaps by seeing how going against conscience chips away at our humanity rather than simply blasting it to smithereens , we begin to understand how some of the conflicts faced by the characters are primal and eternal, not just political or of the moment. Because 12 Years a Slave frames its moral conundrums in these terms, it feels the most contemporarily relevant of all the depictions of slavery we see at the movies.

It seems important here to understand how the film depicts religion and, specifically, Christianity. McQueen often lets the sound or dialogue from one scene continue after the visuals have transferred to the next, and this device is used pointedly when the words of sermons given by Master Ford are superimposed onto the reality of the lives his slaves live. Yet the film is not simply and only anti-Christian. Others are able to find solace in furtive expression of faith.

Even that moment comes with some bitterly cynical overtones: God keep him better than he kept him in this life. Ejiofor is able to convey so much in his vocal inflections: It contains multiple usages of painful language, depictions of lynching, murder, and torture. There is nudity and depictions of human sexuality. A major theme of the film is the dehumanizing effects of slavery.

In presenting such a theme, it is often painful to watch, as it should be. The Realism Canard, Or: Hello Dish readers and others who have been sent here from various corners of the internet. This is Parabasis, a blog about culture and politics. I write most but not all of this site. You all might be particularly interested in The Fandom Issue, a special week-long series we did devoted to issues of fandom in popular culture.

Every work of fictional narrative art takes place within its own world. That world may resemble our world. But it is never our world. It is always the world summoned into being in the gap between its creators and its audience. Yet at the same time, the art we experience shapes our view of the world. As Oscar Wilde puts it in the Decay of Lying:. Life imitates Art far more than Art imitates Life.

It is a theory that has never been put forward before, but it is extremely fruitful, and throws an entirely new light upon the history of Art. This odd tension— that narrative art creates its own world yet helps shape our view of ours— has given birth to or at least popularity to a new brand of criticism that measures a story against real life to point out all the ways that it is lacking. The presence of these conventions is not a sign of quality. The Realism Canard is the most depressing trend in criticism I have ever encountered. Dismissive snark, after all, just reflects badly on whomever wrote it at best and at worst cheapens the work it is written about.

The Realism Canard gradually cheapens art itself over time. And I suspect on some level this is part of the point of the The Realism Canard. That art in its size and complexity is too much to handle sometimes, and too troubling. So we must take it down a peg, to a point where it is beneath us and thus can be put in its place. The accuracy question with regard to Breaking Bad is a complete sideshow. Breaking Bad is not a work of realism. Its aesthetic and language is highly stylized, and its plotting is all clockwork determinism, as anyone who has watched the second season can attest.

At least it has something beyond factchecky questions to ask. Are there exceptions to this? And there are ways of discussing the differences between art and life that illuminate rather than reduce. Or ways that treat these differences not as a form of criticism, but rather a form of interesting trivia.

Or, in the case of Mythbusters, edutainment. It does not matter, for example, that the social and economic structure of The Hunger Games makes absolutely no sense. What matters is whether or not the world works towards the purposes of the novel rather than undermining them.

Le Temps retrouvé/II - Wikisource

One of them ends with a cat coming back from the dead. There is no way that Hamsterdam would exist in present day Baltimore. No one really cares, because it works within the confines of the show. The problem, in other words, has nothing to do with whether it would really happen, or how journalism or policing really work. At the end of his story the fugitive makes a memorable offer: The Life of William Grimes was the first book-length autobiography by a fugitive American slave, in effect launching a new literary genre, the slave narrative. The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, published in , is widely regarded as the first ever, but Equiano published his book in Britain.

Scholars have identified about American slave narratives published between and , with many more following after the end of the civil war.

The most famous are those by Frederick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs, but the release of a new film has stirred interest in the account of a man named Solomon Northup. His book, Twelve Years a Slave, one of the longest and most detailed slave narratives, was a bestseller when it appeared in Slave narratives are the most powerful corrective we have to such distortions and evasions, firsthand accounts from some of the people who suffered the atrocities of slavery.

Unlike most authors of slave narratives, Northup was not a fugitive when he co-authored his book with a white man named David Wilson: In the year-old son of a former slave was living in upstate New York with his wife and children.