Grotesque / grotesco

[Alfonso]

Boys and girls, ladies and gentlemen,

I wish you to help me with a definition of a really sliding concept: lo grotesco / the grotesque. I know every person here can look it up in a dictionary and tell, but I don’t think this copy and paste thought is worth it. What I wish you to do, if possible, is to close your eyes, to think intensively (don’t stop breathing) about the grotesque, and tell me what does this word mean to you, what does it suggest to you, what images come to your mind, what kind of events do you think are grotesque, what animal is the most grotesque in the world under your point of view...

If necessary, you can ask your wife, your husband, your parents, your neighbours, your friends, your enemies, your pet, your hairdresser, your boss... Whoever!

I really need this information, as I’m trying to help someone, a lady, who’s writing something about the subject. So, with your help, you are also maybe contributing to love to come out.

I hope this will be enough for you to know that this is as urgent and necessary as sure it is that the summer will finally leave.

Thanks in advance for your help!

[poli]

Grotesque is something that is beyond bad taste. It's bigger and better(maybe worse would be a more appropriate term, but for the sake of morbosidad I chose better)!
Next to something grotesque, something hortera loses and will have to die of shame.

Grotesque has something to do with size. I should be very large--huge in fact, so that you cannot avoid seeing it even if you try-- so you just have to surrender, look, and be appalled.

Grotesque can be used to describe a wrongdoing. (example: a grotesque
violation of justice)

Sometimes grotesque can apply to works of art, and it is there that
I will give examples, because other examples might get me banned from
this forum. The Prado museum has beautiful examples of grotequeries.
Titan (Jupiter) Devouring His Son by Goya and others from his dark period, and also (less famously but just as grotesque) Jupiter Devouring His Son by Rubens. This must have been a popular subject for the royal family! Also there's a painting called La Monstrua that is notably grotesque. There are many more examples in the Prado right in you home town of Madrid. Lucky you!
There is an American film director named John Waters who explored
the grotesque very effectively in his early films with his muse named Divine. Maybe for grotesque you can rent Pink Flamingos
I am sorry I did not write this in Spanish because I am a little bit aprisado
today. I you have any questions regarding my English use, just ask.

[poli]

Originally Posted by Alfonso

Boys and girls, ladies and gentlemen,

I wish(more commonly: (I would like) you to help me with a definition of a really sliding concept: lo grotesco / the grotesque. I know every person here can look it up in a dictionary and tell, but I don’t think this copy and paste thought is worth it. What I wish you to do, if possible, is to close your eyes, to think intensively (don’t stop breathing) about the grotesque, and tell me what does this word mean to you, what does it suggest to you, what images come to your mind, what kind of events do you think are grotesque, what animal is the most grotesque in the world in your point of view...

If necessary, you can ask your wife, your husband, your parents, your neighbours, your friends, your enemies, your pet, your hairdresser, your boss... Whoever!

I really need this information, as I’m trying to help someone, a lady, who’s writing something about the subject. So, with your help, you may also be contributing to love as an outcome.

I hope this will be enough for you to know that this is as urgent and necessary as sure as the summer will finally leave.

Thanks in advance for your help!

Que insólito: un discurso de lo grotesco como un sendero que llega
al amor. En inglés decimos: sounds kinky

[CrOtALiTo]

I tought in the word grotesque, and really, it's very strange, because, immediately, I imagined, in a animal called spider, and it's is very grotesque for me, the animals in some occasions, they can to be very uglies, in their form, color, and type of animal, it's the case of the spider, another thing what can to be grotesque, it's the a person that hasn't hygiene, because a person very dirty give bad aspect, I think, what the word grotesco is when don't you like something it could be a person, animal, place, ect. It's depending of the form or expresion what don't you like.


The wake up very hearly is some grotesque, because I'm sleepy, and I didn't sleep very well.

[Elaina]

Sad but true in my eyes......... The Elephant Man

The paintings that Poli described are quite grotesque but at the same time "sick" beyond words.

Jabba the Hutt is grotesque.

I dislike many, many animals but I wouldn't say they are grotesque.

Too early to think of other grotesque things......aside from the elephant man (God rest his soul) I don't think there are very many living things that I find "grotesque".

Sorry if this is not what you are looking for.

[sosia]

para mi grotesco, así sin más, es siempre una escena (suelo relacionarlo más con escenas que con historias. Al final de una historia grotesca siempre se me queda una imagen grotesca) que encierra o una gran maldad, o una gran irrealidad (aunque sea real)
.
escenas grotescas malvadas (normales, por desgracia): cadáveres tras una ejecución, personas veraneando en la playa junto a cadáveres ahogados, gente sacándose fotos frente a personas muertas, madres que enferman a sus hijos para estar en el hospital, padres que amtan a sus hijas por "deshonrar el honor familiar", niñas casadas a los 6 años, decapitaciones, canibalismo, etc

escenas irreales (aunque sean reales, o generadas por ordenador): un niño con la barriga excesavemente grande por hambre, personas disecadas, sacar fotos a personas muertas en posiciones normales (aunque antes era común), gente comiendo hasta devolver, personas con malformaciones físicas muy grandes, etc

ya se que es bastante sombrío, pero no asocio grotesco con ninguna imagen positiva.
Además, todavía no he mirado el diccionario para saber el significado exacto de grotesco.
saludos, Alfonso.
PD Y como ahora me he puesto triste y me voy a leer algo divertido y tratar de olvidar estas imágenes.

[Tomisimo]

Here's an example of a grotesque crime: 40-year-old suspect held in gruesome Manitoba bus killing.

[Elaina]

UGH!!!!!!!!! That is disgusting.........yes "grotesque"

Thank you David.....I think...:thumbs down:

[poli]

Lo grotesco es algo malformado o torcido i literadamente o en metáforo.
Entonces una matanza en un autobus puede ser grotesco si lo mira en
metáforo, pero literadamente no es.
If you have time, please correct this. I am sure there is a error here with the i and the o.

[Marsopa]

I agree that (extreme) physical malformations can be grotesque. At least emotionally, although I try to overcome that gut feeling and see them as variations of normal.

Marsopa

[Jane]

Originally Posted by Alfonso

Boys and girls, ladies and gentlemen,

I wish you to help me with a definition of a really sliding concept: lo grotesco / the grotesque. I know every person here can look it up in a dictionary and tell, but I don’t think this copy and paste thought is worth it. What I wish you to do, if possible, is to close your eyes, to think intensively (don’t stop breathing) about the grotesque, and tell me what does this word mean to you, what does it suggest to you, what images come to your mind, what kind of events do you think are grotesque, what animal is the most grotesque in the world under your point of view...

If necessary, you can ask your wife, your husband, your parents, your neighbours, your friends, your enemies, your pet, your hairdresser, your boss... Whoever!

I really need this information, as I’m trying to help someone, a lady, who’s writing something about the subject. So, with your help, you are also maybe contributing to love to come out.

I hope this will be enough for you to know that this is as urgent and necessary as sure it is that the summer will finally leave.

Thanks in advance for your help!

Alfonso, sweetheart, what has grotesque/grotesco got to do with love?

[gomey]

Not sure if the word "horrible" can be used to mean the same as "grotesque", but I think that war is horrible, and its results are grotesque. The images of the beheadings in Iraq were beyond horrible and grotesque. I cannot think of any animal that fits the definition of being grotesque.

No estoy segura si la palabra "horrible" se puede usar en vez de la palabra "grotesco", pero en mi opinion la guerra is horrible y sus resultados grotescos. Las imagenes de los "beheadings" (no se come se diria en Espanol) en Irak para mi fueron mas alla de horrible y grotescos. No se de ningun animal que le quede la palabra "grotesco" para definirlo.

[Alfonso]

Originally Posted by poli

Lo grotesco es algo malformado o torcido, literalmente o en metáfora.
Entonces una matanza en un autobus puede ser grotesca si se mira en (mejor: si se ve como una...) metáfora, pero literalmente no lo es.
If you have time, please correct this. I am sure there is a error here with the i and the o.

.....

[Alfonso]

Originally Posted by gomey

No estoy segura (de) si la palabra "horrible" se puede usar en vez de la palabra "grotesco", pero en mi opinion la guerra es horrible y sus resultados grotescos. Las imagenes de los "beheadings" (no se cómo se diría (esto) en español) en Irak para mi fueron más allá de horrible y grotescos. No sé de ningún animal que le quede la palabra "grotesco" para definirlo.

Sure you don't have the opportunity to write accents. I put them for you.

[Alfonso]

Thank you very much all of you for your great and very meditated responses!

I really do appreciate all of them. Let me please some time to allow other people to answer this before saying what grotesque means to me, as I read something about the subject and, therefore, my opinion doesn't come from the deep inside of my being, as it seems yours do. I really appreciate it.
Any other opinion? Please, consider, as Poli said, that I'm on the unusual road that comes from the grotesque to love. So any help will be welcome!

[Elaina]

Maybe it is easy to confuse "grotesque" and "gruesome".......

any scene of violence and beheadings would be gruesome and horrible, in my opinion.

As Marsopa said, human disfigurations would be seen as "grotesque"

[María José]

Originally Posted by poli

Grotesque is something that is beyond bad taste. It's bigger and better(maybe worse would be a more appropriate term, but for the sake of morbosidad I chose better)!
Next to something grotesque, something hortera loses and will have to die of shame.

Grotesque has something to do with size. I should be very large--huge in fact, so that you cannot avoid seeing it even if you try-- so you just have to surrender, look, and be appalled.

Grotesque can be used to describe a wrongdoing. (example: a grotesque
violation of justice)

Sometimes grotesque can apply to works of art, and it is there that
I will give examples, because other examples might get me banned from
this forum. The Prado museum has beautiful examples of grotequeries.
Titan (Jupiter) Devouring His Son by Goya and others from his dark period, and also (less famously but just as grotesque) Jupiter Devouring His Son by Rubens. This must have been a popular subject for the royal family! Also there's a painting called La Monstrua that is notably grotesque. There are many more examples in the Prado right in you home town of Madrid. Lucky you!
There is an American film director named John Waters who explored
the grotesque very effectively in his early films with his muse named Divine. Maybe for grotesque you can rent Pink Flamingos
I am sorry I did not write this in Spanish because I am a little bit aprisado
today. I you have any questions regarding my English use, just ask.

Wow, Poli. You should go into writing. I love what you have written here.

[María José]

After reading all your answers I'm thinking of having my IQ tested... All I can say is that grotesque has negative connotations. I associate it more with weird than with horrible.
My dad used to use this word as an insult sometimes meaning simply stupid.
You are all

[María José]

I was just reading one of my mags and I came across this article about conjoined twins and I don't know why that brought to mind Elaina's post about the Elephant Man.
I'm sorry, Elaina, but I have to disagree. I cannot find these things grotesque, just plain sad.
Please excuse me if I sound "saintly". Anyway,I confess I am full of morbid curiosity when it comes to these topics...

[Elaina]

I know Gemma........but conjoined twins is not grotesque to me..... just over the line disfigurations. My heart goes out to them and their physical appearance is not their fault. They are the true innocents of the world.