Apocalypse

Question

My comments are promoted by the heading "Apocalypse Then" in the BBC Homepage of a feature article on the history of the Vietnam War 30 years on.

According to my Collins Cobuild dictionary, "The apocalypse is the total destruction and end of the world". And I remember "Apocalypse Now" is an old movie about Americans fighting the Vietnam War.

My question is why is this movie called "Apocalypse Now" even taking into account the tendency for movie makers to give catchy titles to attract viewership ? The Vietnam war was of course very horrific and deadly for soldiers, fighters and civilians on both side. But it was not really the total destruction and end of the world, which is much bigger than just Indochina and America.
John

Usenet · Accepted Answer

John, you're taking the word a little too literally. Vietnam really did seem like the end of the world (and it was the end of many lives). So "Apocalypse Now" was a fitting title for the film. It's a great film, too. Check it out sometime.

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]John, you're taking the word a little too literally. Vietnam really did seem like the end of the world (and ... lives). So "Apocalypse Now" was a fitting title for the film. It's a great film, too. Check it out sometime.[/nq]
Not really. I am not taking the word 'a little too literally". I don't know where you are from. In selecting the title, were the movie makers so narrow in their outlook to think that America was the world ? I am sure they were aware that non-Americans were going to see the movie. Well, perhaps they did not care.
John

Usenet · Answer

[nq:2]John, you're taking the word a little too literally. Vietnam ... film. It's a great film, too. Check it out sometime.[/nq]
[nq:1]Not really. I am not taking the word 'a little too literally". I don't know where you are from. In ... I am sure they were aware that non-Americans were going to see the movie. Well, perhaps they did not care.[/nq]
The word "apocalypse" not only means the complete destruction of the whole world, it can also be used to describe devastating destruction that falls short of this. It also carries connotations of the struggle between good and evil. In some senses, it could be argued that the rule of kurtz over the Montagnard tribe he dominates parallels the rule of the Anti-Christ, a major them in the Book of revelation of St. John, also known as the Apocalypse - indeed this is where the word comes from originally.
The final holocaust as the village is destroyed by firebombing B52s resembles nothing more than an apocalyptic vision of tha destruction of the world, all in the context of a vision of the futility and insanity of war. John ford Coppola quite deliberately chose the title to emphasise the destruction, the struggle between "good" and "evil" where "good" uses the same methods as "evil" and a whole series of other themes that can be found in the Book of Revelation (and in teh book on which the film is loosely based, Joseph Conrad's "The Heart of Darkness", which in apointed reference can be fleetingly seen as Kurtz's bedside reading).
In addition, artists are allowed considerable poetic license in their use of images. And all in all, I believe that the film "Apocalypse Now" is one of the most powerful artistic statements I've ever-experienced. I still find the imagery and the soundtrack electrifying and ovedrwhelming even on the small screen.
Regards, Einde O'Callaghan

Usenet · Answer

What manner of English teacher would go on and on and on about the meaning of the word "apocalypse" without looking it up? Why that particular, utterly foreign, word was chosen as the title of the last book of the New Testament instead of something else might have been important to the structure of the general discussion here. The much more mundane "Revelations" is the other name of that book. Did you think they might have something in common? Oh no...just spin out the bull and go with the flow.
"Apocalypse," in its root form, is a Greek loanword that means discovery or, duh, revelation. It has come to mean the same as the ending of the world only through its association with Christianity. I am sure Coppola or one of the umpteen people he had working for him spent the three minutes necessary to look it up in the days of paper references (not the fifteen seconds of today) and to think about it (depends on the quality of the mind involved) before posting it up.

"...carries connotations of the struggle of good and evil..."

"...parallels the rule of the Antichhrist..."
"...final holocaust..."
"...quite deliberately chose the title to emphasise the destruction..."

"...apocalyptic vision..." (oxymoron)
The horror...the horror...

Usenet · Answer

credoquaabsurdum wrote on 09 May 2005:
[nq:1]What manner of English teacher would go on and on and on about the meaning of the word "apocalypse" without ... of the Antichhrist..." "...final holocaust..." "...quite deliberately chose the title to emphasise the destruction..." "...apocalyptic vision..." (oxymoron) The horror...the horror...[/nq]
Why do you snip everything you're responding to? It's very inconvenient to have to go back to the original post to see what it is you're talking about and whether what you have to say is, in fact, a reasonable response to the OP's question or statement.

Franke: EFL teacher & medical editor
For email, replace numbers with English alphabet.

Usenet · Answer

I snip everything in my posts as a matter of throwaway habit. You mentioned that point in another thread. Let's rectify that now with an explanation.
John C's question (the original poster) was prompted by the fact that he was working out of a learner's dictionary to find out what "Apocalypse" meant. Moreover, he was wondering if, by using the expression, the creators of the film were being narrowminded. He was probably right.
However, in a quite silly series of pseudo-critical maneuvers based on a jackanape's understanding of a very simple word, reader of this thread were expected to believe that the extension of his powers of linguistic perception beyond that of mortal ken was possible by the native speaker of the language posting, while the non-native speakers of English were locked within cramped prisons of visionless mental poverty, thanks to their inferior linguistic background.

I finally got around to debunking a load of small-minded claptrap, in other words.

Usenet · Answer

credoquaabsurdum wrote on 09 May 2005:
[nq:1]I snip everything in my posts as a matter of throwaway habit.[/nq]
I see. Thank you for the explanation.
I snipt the balance of the post because I would have preferred to see what the OP said rather than read what seems to be a tendentious and judgmental summary of previous statements and events. I'm not saying that your summary is at all inaccurate, but simply that I would have preferred to make my own judgments, had I felt they were called for.

Franke: EFL teacher & medical editor
For email, replace numbers with English alphabet.

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]credoquaabsurdum wrote on 09 May 2005:[/nq]
[nq:2]I snip everything in my posts as a matter of throwaway habit.[/nq]
[nq:1]I see. Thank you for the explanation. I snipt the balance of the post because I would have preferred to ... inaccurate, but simply that I would have preferred to make my own judgments, had I felt they were called for.[/nq]
The quotes seem to be from a post by me referring to Coppola's thinking behind choosing the title. If you want I can post it again - I think my browser automatically makes a copy of my posts to newsgroups - or else you can make a Google search under the title of the the thread.

Our friend, Absurd Believer (admittedly a rather rough and ready translation of his handle), seems to believe that because the word "apocalypse" is of Greek origin and the Greek means "revelation" this means that in modern English "apocalypse" can only mean "revelation".

My argument is that the primary modern meaning derives from the vision of the end of the world in the Book of Revelation of St. John, which is also known as the Apocalypse. This is certainly the meaning intended by Coppola and and I believe it was also the meaning understood by most of those who saw the film. Indeed I would even venture to say that Coppola's film probably even strengthened this meaning of the word. I suspect that only some theologians and perhaps some literal-minded people of Greek origin would think that the word was primarily a synonym for "revelation", although I'm quite happy to accept that this is a secondary meaning.
Regards, Einde O'Callaghan

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]I snipt the balance of the post because I would have preferred to see what the OP said rather than ... inaccurate, but simply that I would have preferred to make my own judgments, had I felt they were called for.[/nq]
Point taken and understood. Thanks for the civility of this response, CyberCypher. In light of the sundry comments I've floated around this board in recent days, I could easily have expected to have been flamed down to a pork rind.
Let's see if I can fix some of the damage...

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]Our friend, Absurd Believer (admittedly a rather rough and ready translation of his handle), seems to believe that because the ... that the word was primarily asynonym for "revelation", although I'm quite happy to accept that this is a secondary meaning.[/nq]
OK, Einde. I'm done with my first full day of classes, and I've snapped back to pre-griffin mode. You have a point, so do I. You should have looked it up before telling the OP (who writes the kind of English that only an extraordinary commitment to the language-learning process can produce in a non-native speaker) "You just don't understand because you don't know my language. I know what the word truly means, and now I'm going to interpret the film in light of my deeper understanding."

If we look at the work that you rightly pointed to as the inspiration of that film, The Heart of Darkness (original title in magazine publication), which is an extraordinary novel in English written by a non-native speaker (off the top of my head, I seem to remember something about Conrad learning English in his teens), I think it would be fair to say our manner of dealing with the unknown is something that the film attempts to question.
(Shades of Fredric Jameson (style or lack thereof) and Jacques Derrida (substance of lack thereof)...I'm regressing.)
All in all, it would have been fair to the poster to look it up before tossing off an answer that privileged original access to language as the primary means of understanding the film.
Essentially, it's the same infuriatingly smug argument used by the Greeks to justify how wonderful and special Greek Orthodox Christianity is in contrast to every other variant. It goes something like this, "Our language is better, we have better access to the original language of the Bible and hence the original meaning, and therefore we understand Christ, *** and religion better than you do." That's what that whole display at the Olympic opening ceremonies was all about.
While we're on the subject, has anyone seen the videotape of what happened in Jerusalem yesterday? An elderly, frail priest tried to smuggle bundles of cash and documents out of the Patriarch's compound (which that gentleman has chained himself into), in black plastic garbage bags under his robes. A younger, more muscular priest saw him and grabbed at the money, ripping the trash bags and scattering the loot all over the place.

All the priests involved then started grabbing for dollars, euros and shekels. The first old priest lost it and performed the Greek equivalent of giving the second priest the finger before storming off, all on camera. The second priest, arms filled with ripped garbage bags and money galore, walked into the assembly hall and called the Patriarch of Jerusalem, latest inheritor of a line of apostolic succession, a traitor.
Kyrie eleison! Is anyone else getting that feed? The networks here are running it every fifteen minutes and it's better than Pay-Per-View!
Getting back to the message:
In my previous post in this, the "Apocalypse" thread, I made several mean-spirited comments and used several inflammatory words that have no right or reason to exist in a group like this. All of them were directed at you, Einde. It was low, and you have not responded in kind. You're a better man than I.

Apocalypse

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