## Metadata: Title: Eisenstein as Theoretician Preliminary Considerations Full Reference: Type: #sources/chapter Author(s): Edoardo G.Grossi, #Author/EdoardoGrossi Zotero Link: [Eisenstein as Theoretician Preliminary Considerations](zotero://select/items/@ggrossi_eisenstein_2005) Index: ## Summary: ## Notes: #LiteratureNotes > These very interesting reflections by Francesco Casetti help explain how, by taking stock of Eisenstein as a theoretician of cinema and also as a theoretician of art, we can discern his complexity as well as the importance of his multifaceted æuvre. [G.Grossi 2005:1](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/ZWGGB4RF?page=1) > This emphasis is all the more important in view of the epithet ‘genius’ (accepted by both Shklovsky and Jakobson) and its corollary, ‘a unique and irreplaceable figure’, both of which encourage us to see Eisenstein as an isolated thinker. We have in mind here the studies by film critics, even the best of which, by Aumont and Andrew, take only a partial view of the links between Eisenstein and the main currents of twentieth-century thought. [G.Grossi 2005:4](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/ZWGGB4RF?page=4) > This example, like the subjects of those books which remained at the project stage, Method and Grundproblem, shows that we need to situate Eisenstein in a much wider context than that of the ‘historical avantgardes’, especially if we take into account all his theoretical speculation of the 1930s and 1940s. [G.Grossi 2005:6](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/ZWGGB4RF?page=6) > A brief examination of several such objections will reveal one of the essential problems involved in reading Eisenstein critically: the fact that his thought developed not only in relation to the theory of cinema but also in the much wider field of the theory of art. [G.Grossi 2005:7](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/ZWGGB4RF?page=7) > At this point, it may be interesting to see in more detail how the approach outlined so far applies to specific aspects of Eisenstein’s theoretical research. [G.Grossi 2005:7](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/ZWGGB4RF?page=7) > Walt Disney, dating from the 1940s, which are among the most important of his studies to be published recently. [G.Grossi 2005:7](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/ZWGGB4RF?page=7) > There is a constant orientation in his thought which leads it to seize analogies both superficial and profound (in relation to meaning and ideology) between literary, linguistic, musical and pictorial sign systems and strictly cinematic sign systems. [G.Grossi 2005:9](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/ZWGGB4RF?page=9)