The sea in culture

The sea has played an important role in culture for centuries. Because humans have experienced the ocean in contradictory ways: powerful yet calm, beautiful yet terrifying.[2] Human consciousness of the ocean can be found in art forms such as literature, art, poetry, film, drama, and Western classical music. The earliest representations of boats in art date back 40,000 years. Since then, the sea has been depicted in the art and culture of various countries. Archeologically, the sea has been thought of as a hostile environment, home to a variety of mythical creatures: the Biblical Leviathan, the Isonade of Japanese mythology, and the Kraken of later Norse mythology. The sea symbolizes the individual and collective unconscious in dream interpretations by psychiatrist Carl Jung.

(Katsushika Hokusai, c. 1830)[1]

 From the simple paintings on the walls of Lamur huts to the seascapes of Joseph Turner and the Dutch Golden Age paintings – images of the sea and ships have come in many forms. Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai captures the various moods of the sea in colorful prints, including the Ripples of Kanagawa. Descriptions of the sea can be found in literature from the time of Homer's epic poem The Odyssey (eighth century BC). The sea returns repeatedly as a theme in the haiku poems of the Edo period Japanese poet Matsu Baso (松尾 芭蕉) (1644-1694).

 The sea takes a major role in Homer's epic Odyssey. This book chronicles the ten-year voyage of the Greek hero Odysseus. In the poem, it is shown that he was returning home after fighting various sea monsters. The sea also featured in various romances in the Middle Ages. An example is the legend of Tristan, whose themes included imaginary islands and motorized ships. Pilgrimage is a common theme in stories and poems such as The Book of Margery Kemp. From the early modern period, the transatlantic slave trade and penal transport transported people against their will on voyages from one continent to another, often for permanent settlement. This creates strong cultural resonance. Moreover, since the era of Egypt, Greece and Roman civilization, the practice of burial at sea had been practiced in various ways.

The sea takes a major role in Homer's epic Odyssey. This book chronicles the ten-year voyage of the Greek hero Odysseus. In the poem, it is shown that he was returning home after fighting various sea monsters. The sea also featured in various romances in the Middle Ages. An example is the legend of Tristan, whose themes included imaginary islands and motorized ships. Pilgrimage is a common theme in stories and poems such as The Book of Margery Kemp. From the early modern period, the transatlantic slave trade and penal transport transported people against their will on voyages from one continent to another, often for permanent settlement. This creates strong cultural resonance. Moreover, since the era of Egypt, Greece and Roman civilization, the practice of burial at sea had been practiced in various ways.

Contemporary maritime-inspired novels by Joseph Conrad, Herman Woeck and Herman Melville; Poems about the sea were written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Rudyard Kipling and John Masefield. The sea has also inspired music for centuries. Examples include Sea Shanty Folksong, Richard Wagner's The Flying Dutchman, Claude Debussy's La Mar (1903–05), Charles Villiers Stanford's Songs of the Sea (1904) and Songs of the Fleet (1910), Edward Elgar's Sea Pictures (1899) and Ralph Vaughan. Williams's A C Symphony (1903–1909).