Ukraine's European Revolution?

[Queequeg]

Tarkovsky, Eisenstein, Mayakovsky, Tsvetaeva (both killed themselves, though Mayakovsky may have been assassinated), Isaak Babel (admittedly executed), Lissitzky (died of starvation in Moscow in 41), Ivan Bilibin (ditto in Leningrad in 42). 

Of those I recognized Eisenstein, and he was way overrated.

Your cultural illiteracy isn't my problem.

[Queequeg]

I just don't get this argument on a basic level.  The Ukraine has some of the most fertile land on the planet.  And it's not even that cold. 

[Barrister]

AR-Russia has never stood out culturally?

I was referring to the Ukraine, but since Russia is in the same area it is a fair point.

As for the 'Ukraine has never stood out culturally'...

That's because Ukraine, historically, was not a nation.  For the type of high culture you're talking about (music, books, poetry), was made by the elites and for the elites.  And the elites in Ukraine didn't speak Ukrainian - that was a peasant language.  Instead they spoke Polish, or German (and then later on of course they started to speak Russian).

Of course Ukraine has wonderful folk culture and art - the craftmanship to make a pysanky, the Ukrainian easter egg, is remarkable.  But don't expect a bunch of Ukrainian-speaking peasants to start writing operas.

[Queequeg]

Also, Ukrainian Jews. 

[Queequeg]

Honestly, how absurd is this argument going to get?  I can name a half dozen European nations that never produced the likes of Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Gogol or Bulgakov, the latter two of whom were "ethnic Ukrainians."

[derspiess]

Your cultural illiteracy isn't my problem.

[The Brain]

Novels with too many notes are a sign of cultural greatness? OK.

[Queequeg]

Your cultural illiteracy isn't my problem.

Yes.  Clearly.  Knowledge of art and culture makes one a nerd, while the ignorance of it makes you awesome. 

[Queequeg]

Though TBH my glasses do actually look like that.

[garbon]

Your cultural illiteracy isn't my problem.

Yes.  Clearly.  Knowledge of art and culture makes one a nerd, while the ignorance of it makes you awesome. 

I have to side with Spellus on this one.

[Admiral Yi]

I have to side with Spellus on this one.

You think to be considered culturally literate one has to know who Tsetsefly was? 

I don't know anything about those three guys either.

[Queequeg]

I think Tarkovsky, Mayakovsky, Malevich and Babel are reasonably well known.  Malevich, Kandinsky and Picasso basically invented modern art between the three of them, and Lissitzky is one of the most influential designers of the 20th century. Admittedly Tsvetaeva might be a bit obscure; maybe Akhmatova and Solzhenitsyn are better examples. 

[alfred russel]

The Roman Empire?  The Catholic Church?  The free market?  The modern nation state? Liberal democracy?  The corporation?

I don't think that those make the difference when you look at a long enough time frame. Efficient and effective means of organization survive; those that aren't fail. Institutions evolve to meet the needs of society or are discarded. Good ideas travel.

In the short term--or even as long as a century or so--that is a different story.

[Queequeg]

I don't think that those make the difference when you look at a long enough time frame. Efficient and effective means of organization survive; those that aren't fail. Institutions evolve to meet the needs of society or are discarded. Good ideas travel.

Way too teleological. 

[derspiess]

Your cultural illiteracy isn't my problem.

Yes.  Clearly.  Knowledge of art and culture makes one a nerd, while the ignorance of it makes you awesome. 

I have to side with Spellus on this one.