A timely post in today's @PublicDomainRev brings us the storied history of "The Revolutionary Colossus," a recurring image of "a king-eating colossus" that spread widely and in many forms during the French Revolution.

publicdomainreview.org/essay/revoluti…

1/
One classic depiction comes from Erasmus Darwin (Charles Darwin's grampa) in "The Economy of Vegetation" a poem in 1791's "The Botanic Garden."

2/     Long had the Giant-form on GALLIA’S plains     Inglori
Or as @sswesner summarizes it for we poesie-impaired types: "Between thick dungeon walls, a giant lies asleep. He’s chained to the ground, large limbs folded, enmeshed in a web of ropes, a blindfold over his closed eyes."

3/
"Suddenly, as if touched by a flame, he awakes, and gazes around in amazement. He starts up, shreds the ropes entangling him, breaks chains, smashes walls, and rises to his feet. Towering over the world, shadow stretching out below, he calls out with a voice like thunder."

4/
While the poetic invocations of the colossus are quite stirring, they're not a patch on the imagery, like Villeneuve's 1790 engraving, "The French People Overwhelming the Hydra of Federalism."

parismuseescollections.paris.fr/fr/musee-carna…

5/
Or 1793's "The People, King-Eater," whose artist is lost to the mists of time:

gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv…

6/
The Colossus is a lineal descendant of the image of Hobbes's Leviathan, a 1651 image that is so striking it is still widespread today.

commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Levi…

7/
Visually, though, the most contemporary Colossus comes from British caricaturist James Gillray, whose 1794 lampoon of the French Revolution and the Terror is straight out of EC Comics (or vice-versa) (obviously).

gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv…

8/
It wasn't just foreign enemies of the Republic who appropriated the Colossus for political ends: French reactionaries like Poirier de Dunckerque made king-eating into an act of monstrous cannibalism.

gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv…

9/
The image found its way into the public imagination as a depiction of the doubl-edged sword of revolutions, with a Colossus-descended Frankenstein's monster engraged on the frontispiece of Shelley's MODERN PROMETHEUS in 1831.

wellcomecollection.org/works/p67zzz4d…

10/
Wesner: "Placing the revolutionary Colossi in a genealogy that stretches from Darwin’s Bastille giant through to Frankenstein’s horrific creature invites us to consider the particular emotional register within which each appears."

11/
"If for Darwin, revolution could be allegorized to the electrified awakening of an embodied Third Estate, then Frankenstein allegorizes a revolution stripped of both its epic scale and its promise."

12/
"Our attention shifts from the patriot-flame and the Colossus to the 'modern Prometheus' of Shelley’s subtitle, who gave fire to mankind and lived to regret it."

eof/
ETA: Here's a surveillance-free, tracker-free blogpost version of this thread:

pluralistic.net/2021/01/07/rev…

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Cory Doctorow #BLM

Cory Doctorow #BLM Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @doctorow

9 Jan
As Parler disappears from the Android and Ios app stores and faces being kicked off of Amazon's (and other) clouds, people who worry about monopolized corporate control over speech are divided over What It Means.

1/ Image
There's an obvious, trivial point to be made here: Twitter, Apple and Google are private companies. When they remove speech on the basis of its content, it's censorship, but it's not GOVERNMENT censorship. It doesn't violate the First Amendment.

2/
And yes, of course it's censorship. They have made a decision about the type and quality of speech they'll permit, and they enforce that decision using the economic, legal and technical tools at their disposal.

3/
Read 22 tweets
9 Jan
Happy Birthday to the queen of the scream queens, Barbara Steele! wilwheaton.tumblr.com/post/639862088… Image
Happy Birthday to the queen of the scream queens, Barbara Steele! wilwheaton.tumblr.com/post/639862088…
Happy Birthday to the queen of the scream queens, Barbara Steele! wilwheaton.tumblr.com/post/639862088…
Read 13 tweets
9 Jan
Young Frankenstein (1974) dir. Mel Brooks mckitterick.tumblr.com/post/639862954…
Young Frankenstein (1974) dir. Mel Brooks mckitterick.tumblr.com/post/639862954…
Young Frankenstein (1974) dir. Mel Brooks mckitterick.tumblr.com/post/639862954…
Read 5 tweets
9 Jan
In 1963, SCOTUS ruled in Brady v Maryland. They held that when prosecutors called on police officers to testify against a defendant, the prosecutors had a legal duty to inform defendants about the officers' records of misconduct and false testimony.

1/ Image
Since then, prosecutors have created "Brady lists" of cops who can't be trusted to take the stand. They avoid cases that rely on these officers' testimony, or seek out alternate witnesses to call. Brady lists have done much to advance the right to a fair trial in America.

2/
Brady lists are secret, and they shouldn't be. An officer on their local prosecutors' Brady list is an officer whom those prosecutors believe to be a corrupt liar. Yes, that officer is unlikely to be called upon to testify against you, but they still wield enormous power.

3/
Read 8 tweets
9 Jan
David Byrne performing in Buenos Aires, Argentina byrneinmotion.tumblr.com/post/639853302…
David Byrne performing in Buenos Aires, Argentina byrneinmotion.tumblr.com/post/639853302…
David Byrne performing in Buenos Aires, Argentina byrneinmotion.tumblr.com/post/639853302…
Read 4 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Too expensive? Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal Become our Patreon

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us on Twitter!