Kino und Kunst

Hermann HäfkerProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.2

Word count: 187K words
Chapters: 19

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Kino und Kunst by Hermann HäfkerAuthor: Häfker, Hermann, 1873-1939,Language: German, Class: PN: Language and Literatures: Literature: General, Criticism, Collections, Release Date: May 23, 2014

Editor's review

This is an early German-language document of film theory discussing the relationship between film and art, a product of the period of debate over film aesthetics. Its significance lies in showing how the intellectuals of the time confronted a new medium: whether film was technological entertainment or a new form that could be incorporated into the artistic system. The argument of the author, Hermann Häfker, is marked by a distinct awareness of the problems of its era; the prose is argumentative and conceptually dense, and it is best read as primary material for understanding the context of early film theory. For today's readers, the specific judgments in the book may not all hold, but the questions it raises—medium specificity, audience perception, the boundaries of art—remain valid. There is no need to ponder every sentence; one may first grasp the author's position and argumentative structure, then compare with later film theory to see which questions were continued and which were superseded. Suitable for thematic reading by readers interested in media history and aesthetic debate.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Students and researchers of early film theory and media aesthetics
Readers of German intellectual texts who wish to practice academic German reading
Literature and arts enthusiasts concerned with the boundaries of art and the relationship with new technology
Instructors who need primary argumentative materials for film history courses

Not a good fit for

Casual readers who only want plot summaries or film appreciation
Readers without German reading ability and without a parallel translation
Practitioners expecting a systematic film technique tutorial or shooting guide

Reading tips

Read the opening and conclusion first to grasp the author's core judgment on the artistic status of film, then fill in the middle argument.
Prepare pen and paper to sort out the key concepts the author uses; German terms can be noted in a Chinese-English glossary.
Read alongside a film history textbook timeline to place the argument in its specific historical context.
If German is difficult, first build a foundation with a Chinese overview of related film theory, then return to the original.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Does this book discuss feature films or documentaries?

The available information only confirms that the book is a German-language treatise on the relationship between film and art, belonging to the category of language, literature, and criticism; no specific film titles are provided. It should be read as a general aesthetic argument rather than a specialized analysis of a particular type of film.

Can I read this book without any German?

The original is in German, and without German ability direct reading is very difficult. It is advisable to first use secondary literature in Chinese or English on the history of film theory to understand the background of the contemporaneous debate, then decide whether to read paragraph by paragraph with a dictionary or to look for relevant translations and excerpts.

Do the views in this book still have reference value today?

Its specific assertions bear obvious limitations of their time, but the questions it raises—whether a new medium can become art, how audience perception is changed, who draws the boundaries of art—still recur in today's discussions of digital media, and thus it has reference value at the level of problem history.

What should I note when reading the electronic edition?

This book comes from a free Project Gutenberg e-book, in German plain-text formatting, and may contain old spellings and word divisions. It is advisable to use a reader with adjustable font and line spacing and to enable dictionary lookup; when encountering long compound words, break them down into roots before understanding.

Comments

Find this book

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Hermann Häfker Author · German · 1873–1939

Hermann Häfker (1873–1939) was a German writer and an important early author in film criticism and film education. He was active at a time when the artistic status of cinema was still being debated, and he focused on the dual potential of film as an art form and as a medium for spreading knowledge, editing popular series of books on cinema for a general readership. His representative works include Kino und Kunst, which discusses the relationship between film and art, and Kino und Erdkunde, which addresses film and geography education, reflecting his view of cinema as a medium with both aesthetic and instructional value. Two of his works are held in this collection, while common classification information is currently unavailable. Public information about the details of his life is limited, but his surviving writings show that he wrote mainly on the artistic qualities and educational functions of film in an accessible style aimed at ordinary readers, leaving a useful sample of early German-language film criticism and film education literature.