Espionage and Cultural Decadence
With Professor John Stroup
In this series of talks and film discussions, Professor Stroup expands upon the late Jacques Barzun’s indictment, made in a 1965 article for The American Scholar, of the central role that espionage was already playing in government and culture. Stroup analyzes espionage as a marker of late-stage cultural decadence, and he interprets the anti-heroic features of the iconic spy hero as among the most telling markers of this decay. Subjects explored include the breakdown of social trust and its relationship to the rise of intelligence culture; the replacement of the classical knight with the spy as a heroic ideal; voyeurism, surveillance, and pornography as intertwined indicators of decadence; and more. Each episode ends with a shorter segment devoted to one or more films.