BALÁZS, Béla. Der sichtbare Mensch oder die Kultur des Films. Vienna & Leipzig: Deutsch-Österreichischer Verlag, 1924. 167 Seiten. Octavo, 167pp. First of three noteworthy books on film by this Hungarian-born, German-speaking pioneer of film theory and practice. Balázs (1884-1949), like his friend Lukács emigrated to Austria after the Hungarian revolution was put down and to Russia after the Nazi takeover, and wrote many film scripts, including The Blue Light for Leni Riefenstahl who considered him a mentor, as well as libretti for Bartok. His American reception has been limited to the Theory of Film, overlooking his fiction and film reviews, which are much sought in Europe. The Visible Man, in the words of historian Lee Congdon, made him "famous overnight" and "almost everyone who counted in the world of film read the book." The silent film, with its disruptive devices such as the close-up, pried open the closed world of classical narrative continuity and permitted access to the soul, to true reality. This he saw as the promise of a visual world, only to be disappointed by the restorationist nature of the talkie. A very attractive copy in publisher's blue quarter-cloth with expressionist illustrated paper-covered boards. An excellent association copy, inscribed by Belázs in 1927 to novelist Leonard Frank.

• Category: History - Culture - Art - Philosophy - Literature
• Keywords: association copies · Film · first books · German
• Language: Deutsch
• Inventory number: 4003LB

Our price: USD 1,750.00