Word: chalks
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...three drawings by Michelangelo, the sculptor struggles to discover the proper angle for a tensely muscular leg, later carved in marble for the famous figure Night in the Medici Chapel of San Lorenzo in Florence. Titian is represented by a study of legs done in thick black chalk a decade before the resulting painting, Martyrdom of St. Lorenzo, was hung in the church of the Jesuits in Venice. On a sheet of paper measuring 5¼ in. by 5¾ in., Leonardo da Vinci crammed almost two dozen men and half a dozen horses in two detailed, swirling battle scenes...
...temptation to discuss a great theorist abstractly, and to capitalize on the jargon which has grown up around him, has proved fatal to many critics. Any thoughtful discussion of Brecht must actually concern itself with the practicing playwright, and I will attempt to discuss The Caucasian Chalk Circle in relation to Brecht's broader accomplishment. This play enjoyed a successful run at the University last fall, and in the volume under discussion, represents to Bentley a peak of the author's accomplishment...
...Caucasian Chalk Circle was written during Brecht's exile during the early '40s, and was based upon Klabund's adaptation of a Chinese folk tale (The Chalk Circle), well known to the Berlin theater public twenty years before. Drifting gradually from the original version, Brecht crafted an original story of his own, by creating Azdak, a village scribe, who as an exradical retains a blend of disenchantment and idealism...
Finally, the Governor's wife demands the child back, and Azdak settles the case by the ancient test of the Chalk Circle. She who has the strength to pull the child out of the circle must be adjudged his real mother. Both pull, and suddenly Grusha yields. And so the child is awarded to Grusha, who would not harm...
...have not recounted the full story of Chalk Circle; the play contains a prologue, setting the action within the Soviet Union. The War is over, and a tract of land must be redistributed amongst various collective farmers. The Chalk Circle sequence, or the play proper, is thus set as a play within the play, designed to point the moral that the Soviets will invariably make the right and just decisions...