GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH & WHAT'S IN A NAME

The Kid Himself

Oh, you know, just reading Geoffrey of Monmouth's History of the Kings of Britain, which is only the direct source for a) two complete Shakespeare plays (Lear and Cymbeline), b) Milton's Comus and c) Drayton's Poly-Olbion, besides launching the entire Arthurian tradition in Britain. Originally in Latin (here's a version with the typically thorough German commentary from waaay back). Reading this translation by Thompson/Giles from even waaayer back w/ occasional glances at the Latin for the sake of speed. It's been on my reading list since the Triassic period, but I finally decided to pilfer it for De Inanibus material before NaNoWriMo. And oh what material there is.

[Full disclosure: I'm only at Book V, Ch. XVII of the whole work, so I've got a ways to go.] Ma the Historia Regum Britanniae almost seems to've been written as a compendium of legendary characters for later authors to plunder. Ostensibly a legitimate chronicle derived from Welsh sources (per Geoffrey's dedicatory letter to the Earl of Gloucester), it follows a whacky, haphazard course through a long series of legendary British kings descended from Brutus (a Trojan war vet) who founded the first kingdom on the island after a complicated series of international misadventures. All the characters are treated with this unique, quirky combination of abruptness and amicability, as if the very cursory portraits and set-pieces somehow lends them a special charm. And the work proceeds in a breathless, Looney Tunes-like blur of reckless abandon and bonhomie. In a word, the book's just fun.

It also features some of the most eclectic and delightful names for a medieval chronicle (a genre which specializes in eclectic and delightful names). So here's a partial census through Book V, Ch. XVII:

  ✣ Corineus
  ✣ Imbertus
  ✣ Goffarius Pictus
  ✣ Turonus
  ✣ Goemagot
  ✣ Lud
  ✣ Antenor 
  ✣ Locri
  ✣ Albanact
  ✣ Kamber
  ✣ Aballac
  ✣ Estrildis
  ✣ Menpricius & Maxin, sons of Maddan
  ✣ Assaracus
  ✣ (geo.) Mount Paladur
  ✣ Aganippus
  ✣ Ferrex & Porrex, sons of Gorobgudo
  ✣ Staterius
  ✣ Brennius
  ✣ Elsingius
  ✣ (geo.) Calatarium
  ✣ (geo.) Trinovantum  
  ✣ Gorbonian
  ✣ Cap
  ✣ Blegabred
  ✣ Arthmail
  ✣ Eldol
  ✣ Samuilpenissel
  ✣ Cirdisus
  ✣ Evelinus
  ✣ Kymbelinus (=Cymbeline)

MONDAY LINKS

Positive review of Michael Schmidt's The Novel: A Biography. Link courtesy of Big Pocket.

Encyclopædia Iranica. Fantastic resource I stumbled upon for all things Persian. Reminds me I need to get to the Shahnama.

And that's all folks. Finished Polybius last night. Interesting description of how the Roman army constructed their marching camps. Also the famous bit on the Roman government. Fun to read from a slightly more primary-ish source.

POLYBIUS MEETS ABRAHAM VAN HELSING, OR NOT

Darius I stomping on Gaumata

Reading Waterfield's translation of Polybius' Histories and in V.43 he states that "Mithridates claimed to be descended from one of the seven Persian Magus-slayers." This evoked images of some  kind of multi-generational series of beturbaned Van Helsings hunting evil magi through decaying ziggurat-topped underground cities, in other words: I had no idea what this referred to (although, turns out I should've). I found an 1889 translation on the Perseus Digital Library by Evelyn S. Shuckburgh which gives the more normal "seven Persians who killed the Magus" and glossed it with a succinct "the false Smerdis," but even then I still didn't recognize the reference.

[For the curious, the original Greek phrase is: τῶν ἑπτὰ Περσῶν ἑνὸς τῶν ἐπανελομένων τὸν μάγον.]

The unfortunately named Shuckburgh also gives a reference to Herodotus 3.61-82. This passage presents a complicated story with that uniquely Herodotean blend of gravity and the bizarre. Severely truncated, the tale relates how a Magus -- Gaumata -- impersonated Smerdis (Gr. Σμέρδις, OP Bardiya), the brother of Cyrus, and ruled for nearly a year before being killed by a group of seven Persian nobles. It's far more complicated than that, so here's a link to the relevant bit on Perseus. Wikipedia also has some info on the Behistun Inscription which refers to Gaumata. And apparently "Mazda" (a la Ahura Mazda) is Avestan for wisdom, which just makes Miatas even more awesome.

So mystery solved. Although the more interesting mystery of why in heck Waterfield chose to use  "Persian Magus-slayers" isn't. Guess it sounds cool.

Also, Herodotus claims the Persians celebrate a festival called the μαγοφόνια ("massacre of the Magi") which was the "greatest holy day that all Persians alike keep" (ταύτην τὴν ἡμέρην θεραπεύουσι Πέρσαι κοινῇ μάλιστα τῶν ἡμερέων) and "while the festival lasts no Magus may go outdoors."

VICO AND NOT MUCH ELSE

Still reading a bit of Vico's Scienza Nuova ogni giorno. Greeted by the promising title Del diluvio universale e de' giganti, and it delivers: Vico describes the devolution of the descendants of Cam, Giafet and Sem (i.e. Ham, Japheth and Shem) into "uno stato affatto bestiale e ferino" (a state truly bestial and wild). Basically, Vico says that after Noah's death his sons renounced the "vera religione del loro comun padre Noè" and reverted to a sort of primal state, roaming the "gran selva della terra" which -- and this is Vico in a nutshell -- grew so abundantly after the Flood that man's progeny "crescere vigorosamente robusti, e sì provenire giganti" (they grew vigorous and robust, and became giants) because of their rough-and-tumbles lives in a jungle "che per lo fresco diluvio doveva esser foltissima." He also mentions Caesar and Tacitus' comments on Germanic gigantism, before finally embarking on an extended discussion of Greek and Latin philology that apparently support the existence of these post-diluvian man-giants.

That's Vico for you.

I'd also like to know where the "great forest of the earth" motif first appeared.

TIL WE HAVE FACES

Speaks for itself.

HISTORIES OF POLYBIUS: CARTHAGINIAN BABEL. AND 17TH CENTURY TAPESTRY

Enjoying Robin Waterfield's translation of the Histories of Polybius. Writes a real riproaring batte scene, I must say. Also, a fun little historical anecdote of linguistic interest: he mentions the enormous variety of languages spoken by the mercenaries in the Carthaginian army during the First Punic War, which made direct commands impossible and, as Waterfield renders it, causes a "complete jumble of uncertainty, distrust, and failed communication." Something about B.C.-era cosmopolitanism has always fascinated me.

Besides cinematic battle descriptions, Polybius cultivates a certain drily understated tone. Vide "So the lemboi sailed back home and King Agron received his officer's report of the battle. It afforded him enormous pleasure to think that he had defeated the arrogantly self-assured Aetolians, and he gave himself over to celebration, with so much drinking that he contracted pleurisy and died just a few days later." (79)

I recently read and enjoyed Waterfield's translation of the Anabasis which prompting me to read this. So here we is.

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Neat post over at the Getty tumblr. It's oh so proto-rococo, no?

UN PO' D'ITALIANO, A SMATTERING OF GREEK, AND VICO

First up, some more Italian gems grazie a Using Italian: A Guide to Contemporary Usage.

1.) la mangiasoldi - lit. money-eater, actually, a slot-machie.

2.) acquascooter - jetski. This word is awesome. Apparently there's a such thing as a "water-scooter," but if all English-speakers referred to jet-skis as acquascooters, the world would be a better place.

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Just a quick link to an interesting article on learning ancient Greek vocabulary, specifically how the unusually small number of high-frequency words makes the Wortschatz easier to learn at a beginner/intermediate level. He claims 1,100 lemmas make up 80% of lemmas in ancient Greek (comp. 80% of English = 2,200-2,300 lemmas). The article's doubly fantastic because it includes lists of the said lemmas w/ English definition (50% list and an 80% list). Once I get over my current Italian binge I may proceed to this, circumstances allowing --- though I could start memorizing 10/day while bagging ice. That shouldn't be hard.

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And, last but not least, a brief update on my current reading of Giambattista Vico's Scienza Nuova. In a nutshell, this book is awesome. It's on par with Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus in that it weds artistry with analytical investigation to such an extent that you can't tell whether it's more poem or more treatise. Vico himself refers to it as "nostra mitologia istorica" and it's basically that: a grand cyclical vision of history across three ages and a final transition in which society reverts back to it's original (or slightly more advanced-than-original) state. But it's the vast amalgamation of stories, anecdotes, myths, legends and linguistic speculation that thrusts the Scienza Nuova into the realm of cosmic epic (like, we're talkin Ovidian, Tolkienian, Homeric, Joycean epic epic). And, lest we forget, Vico was one of the first to argue that myths could be a legitimate historical artifact: an idea that has grown especially fashionable of late (Robert Darnton (of the Great Cat Massacre fame) springs to mind as a fairly well-known example). He also has an interesting-looking bit on Homer in the third bird (Discoverta del vero Omero) but I haven't reached that point yet. More to come surely.*

Toodle pip!

*And of course if some of this sounds familiar, Joyce definitelyprobably used it as a framework for Finnegans Wake. I'll address that at some length eventually. Probablydefinitely.

POEM #4 MEMORIZED

1024. I went with Sonnet LXV because I couldn't make up my mind and because it's so like and unlike Keat's Grecian Urn, and who doesn't like a little lack of variety every now and then? It's not the prettiest, wittiest, sweetest, cleverest or profoundest of the sonnets by half imho, but it's number sixty-five, and it was printed in black ink...or pixels...and technically the text on this page is dark shade of gray...so phooey to the naysayer. You've got to start somewhere. If on the off-chance I were self-absorbed, I would point out that, on the basis of Grecian Urn and this, I have a problem with mortality. Or else I like history and memory. Or else I don't have problem w/ mortality, but appreciate the extra-temporal qualities in Grecian Urn and LXV. Lucky I'm not self-absorbed. Ecco il sonetto: 

     Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea, 

     But sad mortality o'ersways their power,

     How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea, 

     Whose action is no stronger than a flower? 

     O! how shall summer's honey breath hold out, 

      Against the wrackful siege of battering days,

      When rocks impregnable are not so stout,

      Nor gates of steel so strong but Time decays?

      O fearful meditation! where, alack,

      Shall Time's best jewel from Time's chest lie hid?

      Or what strong hand can hold his swift foot back?

      Or who his spoil of beauty can forbid?

          O! none, unless this miracle have might, 

         That in black ink my love may still shine bright.

THOMAS ADAMS: A PREMATURE APPRAISAL

Thomas Adams (1583-1653) was an English clergyman about whom we know essentially nothing. His sermons are exhortatory in a rather dull, unimaginative and Christian-"lite" sort of way. He diligently toes the line from an exegetical and a political pt of view (exhibit a: constant and acidic references to the various evils of "Popery"). At the risk of being unfair to both parties, Adams strikes me as the seventeenth-century equivalent to a well-intentioned tent revivalist or TV-evangelist.

However, Adam's style is frankly astounding. His every word bursts with an irrepressible vigor, every clause betrays a keen sense of wit, and every prolonged simile or metaphor (even when they cross into quaintness for a modern ear) demonstrate a total passion for wordweaving. His imagery is bold and precise, and his sense of sound impeccable. The interplay between message and his means of communicating it (the content's plodding regularity versus the high flights and melodic meanderings of his words) lends the sermons a weird, almost contrapuntal quality. At times, of course, he tries a bit too hard and is a bit too clever and becomes wincingly strained, but the sheer fact that he's turning platitudes into poetry is worth at least a skimread. Not to mention puns in Latin.

He also has some real zingers. Taken from a single page selected at random: "A dangerous brood of Jesuits in foreign courts croaking like frogs" and "Harlots, scattering their stews, like the lice of Egypt, over all the world."

FABLE OF A MAN, A SERPENT, AN ASS, AN EAGLE, AND TWO STONES

This from Thomas Adam's complete works (see yesterday's post). This "pretty fable" deserves some kind of batty, stopmotion short-film treatment. Hope I'm not the only one that finds this amusing. The fact that I'm not cognizant of its origin reminds me that I should read Aesop at some point. Click to expand and enjoy cybervoid:

And here's a freebie: an aria from Caldara's Maddalena ai piedi di cristo.

QUOTE OF THE DAY: THOMAS ADAMS SMACKTALKS "FLING-BRAND FRATERNITY" PURITAN-STYLE

"Aristotle calls discretion virtutum normam et formam -- the eye of the soul, the soul of virtue. I would to God some amongst us had one dram of this grace mingled with their whole handfuls of zeal. it would a little cool the preternatural heat of the fling-brand fraternity, as one wittily calleth them."

The works of Thomas Adams : being the sum of his sermons, meditations, and other divine and moral discourses (1861), vol. I (p. 125).

"Fling-brand fraternity" is now my preferred term for basically everyone in or out of the news.

AARDVARKS, CONIFERS & PALM-TREES, PLUS A TOLKIEN REFERENCE

Heard Marc Lynch featured on On the Media this morning, discussing the public fear of ISIS and the media narrative of same. Liked what he said, and the fact that he snickered when Gladstone quoted certain semi-contradictory poll results. Googling him revealed that he is indeed of a Choplogic disposition. Look no further than his blog title: Abu Aardvark.

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1024. I've wanted to include some German poetry in my memorization effort, figured the best starting-point's a little scrap of Heinrich Heine:

     Ein Fichtenbaum steht einsam,
     Im Norden auf kahler Höh.
     Er schläfert, mit weißer Decke
     Umhüllen ihn Eis und Schnee.

     Er träumt von einer Palme,
     Die, Fern im Morgenland,
     Einsam und schweigend trauert
     Auf brennender Felsenwand.

Two Trees of Valinor

Stupid simple, but so evocative. Rather like Telperion and Laurelin, except w/ an added double-edge of grassisalwaysgreener and Einsamkeit. I just love the word Morningland. The compounds just make German so much more visual than English: Orient ... what is that? What three kings'd ever journey across an Orient? Not to mention the Near East or the Middle East. Asia's a bit better. But Orient? Too mathy and navigational. But Morgenland is different. It's both Morrowland and Dawnland. It's almost Neverland. You can see the sun start to peek over the hills before it rolls over the desert, only to lose itself again in an endless swell of twinkling stars and forevertwilight. Just that one word. The way it evokes sunshine and time and weather and space and stars and dawning and dying. I suppose this isn't nearly as apparent to a native speaker, so praise Thoth I can see it from the outside. I read somewhere that the nights aren't as clear in the Middle East as we think.

This was so short it barely felt like memorization, though. May look into some Rilke next. Or Goethe. I'd like to memorize a Shakesonnet or four but I couldn't decide which five to go with. Chi troppo vuole nulla stringe.

Squillatong

A language w/ an extremely high-density of the "skwee" phoneme. I will call it Squillatong.*

Ei-yuh! Squigee squibbing squimjimsquaw. Squack a squillo, sqoofloops.

I think this is hilarious, and I am clearly suffering from severe cabin-fever. Way back when in highschool (in the old Walrus-and-the-Carpenter-performed-by-Donovan-days), I invented a language with the sole purpose of collating all the most amusing-sounding phonemes I could think of it. Been racking my memory trying to remember what I called it, but can't quite fetch it.

*W/ a tip of the hat to the Italian squillare.

Wonderment, God's Derision and the Death of Tragedy: A Triple Revery Induced by Thomas Adams and a Lack of Sleep

Revery First ~ "Wonderment," by which I mean a sort of abundant appreciation for life or knowledge thereof or lack of knowledge thereof or better yet being, is the intellectual equivalent of kindness & love. Most kids have it, most adults do not. It is the boy cradling a frog in the palm of his hand. It is the voice that says Beauty is truth, truth beauty. It is Terence Malick. À la marveille indeed. Philosophy begins in. It does not scrutinize, but embraces. Finnegans Wake doesn't "end" w/ yes, but with the far more wondrous and expectant the

Wherefore art thou so serious?

Revery Second ~ Why is hilarity so close to despair? Why do clowns terrify so many people (besides the obvious reasons)? Why does God hide his laughter more than any other attribute? -- Quod Deus loquitur ridens, tu lege lacrymans. -- Are clowns terrific because they ask us, Is it only from our present skewed perspective that anyandall laughter or smile from a God would appear mocking, or will God's face be revealed at theendofallthings as a gigantic clownface of cruel derision? (This revery is only 1/3 halfserious.)

Revery Third ~ Heaven, aesthetically speaking, is a state in which tragedy will seem as unreal and slight as most stories of genuine happiness do today. Tragedy will be boring. There is no greater bliss.

Psychoanalysts, enjoy.

They wept like anything to see / such quantites of sand.

Casting about for more 1024 material (got the Sunne Rising and Grecian Urn down pat). Fighting the urge to go w/ some light verse (I hate that term) -- so, Edward Lear or perhaps W.S. Gilbert's Bab Ballads. In other words, the greatest comfort-stuffs outside of Renaissance madrigals and walking. Still, the stuff's a real trip down memory lane. I remember that musical rendition of the Walrus and the Carpenter ye olde Hirohito* sent me way back when [Google has informed me it was Donovan]. Wish we (=humankind) appreciated "light verse" more. And, really that melodramatic, extravagant, fanciful, clever, sadhappy Gilbert-and-Sullivan-style doggerel is partly what I want to bring to De Inanibus, so, why not?

Totally unrelated, but this has immediately jumped to the top of my to-read list. Fun stuff.

One of my friends mentioned reading the Iliad, and I responded with an opinionated flurry of translator comparisons. Barring learning Greek, I still rate Pope's as the highest in actual poetic quality. Its language is infinitely more Homeric than any of the pansy renditions of the 20th century. It gets an unfairly bad rap cuz we pretentious postmoderns can't deal w/ Pope's format ("Heroic couplets? How quaint!") So, Pope > Lattimore > Fagles. Fact. Actually, someone agrees w/ me for once. Thank you cybervoid for confirming my bias.


*Great Scott, Hirohito! It's Mary Todd Lincoln.

And, of course, the unquestionable themesong for this evening is this (featuring the voice cast of The Princess Bride (starting around 6:48) and the phonetic twin of Paul McCartney). This was my childhood. Really, just listen to the entire album.

Frigg's Day: Brief Update on Writing Plans & Phoenician Religion

I've decided to go ahead w/ my (working title) De Inanibus for NaNoWriMo. I've got more than enough material to work w/, so it's just a matter of sitting down and forcing myself to write. Also compiling notes for An Iceman Always Keeps His Cool. Alas, too many ideas and too little motivation.

Enjoying Giambattista Vico's Scienza Nuova. Vico mentions a certain Sancuniate (p. 60 of this edition), also known as Sanchuniathon. To my eternal shame, I was unacquainted with this reticent philological specimen until now, but Wikipedia has shown me the light. He's the purported author of several works on religion in the Phoenician language. Eusebius of Caesarea, quoting (perhaps rather liberally) a Greek translation by Philo of Byblos, provides our only source for the material. So, ancient near eastern cosmogonies FTW! Phoenicia's always had a special aura for some reason. Tyrian purple. Cedars. The Sea Peoples. Swan-prowed ships. Númenor.

Also: Because who doesn't like eggcorns (courtesy of Languagehat).

And...

Thor's Night, Magic, Words and Ode on a Grecian Urn

§1 (p. 318) Maimonides refs Ibn Wahsiya's On the Nabataean Agriculture, which apparently features the fable of a millenia-long dispute between an althea and mandragora, among the assorted talismanic or otherwise magical properties of various plants, as well as a small reference library of sympatheticmagic practices from Babylonian times. In other words, alaka-ZAM, mofo. Unfortunately, it appears that it has not been properly Englishified to date (excepting this partial translation w/ a skyscraping price-tag). Found this unfamiliar but nifty-looking website w/ some more information. I'll put this one in my ancient husbandry/falconry practices research backlog.

§2 Another fun paronym: baleno/balena = lightning/whale.

Also, I move to replace the word "balloon" in the English language w/ the infinitely more delightful palloncino.

§3 1024. Here's a go at Spode on Phoe'cian Bern. Puts total at 80 lines (Donne's The Rising Sunne (30) + Ode on a Grecian Urn (50) since ... whenever I started. A few weeks ago, if memory serves.)

Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness,
Thou foster-child of silence and slow time
sylvan historian who canst thus express
a flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme
what leaf-fringed legends haunt about thy shape
of deities or mortals or of both
in tempe or the dales of arcady
what men or gods are these what maidens loth
what mad pursuit what struggle to escape
what pipe and timbrels what wild ecstasy

heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard
are sweeter, therefore, ye soft pipes play on
not to the sensual ear, but more endearin
pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone
fair youth beneath the trees thou canst never leave
thy song nor ever can those trees be bare
bold lover never never canst thou kiss
though winning near the goal, yet do not grieve
she cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss
forever wilt thou love and she be fair

a happy happy boughs that cannot shed
your leaves nor ever bid the spring adieu
and happy melodist unwearied
for ever piping songs for ever new
more happy love more happy happy love
for ever warm and still to be enjoyed
for ever panting and forever young
all breathing human passions far above
that leave a heart high-sorrowful and cloy'd
a burning foreheard and a parching tongue

who are these coming to the sacrifice
to what green altar, o mysterious priest,
leadst thou that heifer lowing at the skies
and with all her silken flanks in garlands drest
what little town by river or sea-shore
or mountain-built with peaceful citadel
is emptied of its folk this pious morn
and, little town, thy streets forevermore
will silent be, and not a soul to tell
why thou art desolate, can e'er return

o attic shape! fair attitude. with brede
of marble men and maidens overwrought
with forest branches and the trodden weed
thou silent form dost tease out thought
as doth eternity cold pastoral
when old age shall this generation waste
thou shalt remain in midst of other woe
than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say'st
beauty is truth, truth beauty, that is all ye know
on earth --- and all ye need to know. [Q.E.D.]

 

Odin's Day: Maimonides & Italian

With just the rare deviation, Maimonides follows a progression from philology to philosophy to theology/exegesis to mysticism (a peculiar brand-blend of intellectual mysticism to boot).


Fun w/ Italian paronyms (courtesy of Using Italian: A Guide to Contemporary Usage):

Impazzire - to go mad.
Impazzare - to run wild.

Forca - hay-/pitchfork
Forcina - hairpin
Forcone - dung-fork, pitchfork
Forchetta - fork (for eating)

See auch Der Geisterfahrer over atl Constanze's bog.

Monday Night Lethargy

Inspection-prep at work today, which means the day was long and this post is short.

1024. Slowly, sloowly creeping thru Toad on a Cretian Fern.

Yeah, I got nuthin. I could rant about a variety of things, but why bother, really?

Actually, read a bit of Maimonides. Finished the latter half of Part II of the Guide for the Perplexed, which is far more exegesis than the hard-boiled philosophy of the earlier half. In the last chapter (XLVIII), a propos God-as-cause, argues that "the providing of a cause, in whatever manner this may take place, by substance, accident, freewill, or win, is always expressed by one of the five terms, commanding, saying, speaking, sending, or calling. "

So no real distinction exists between an "active"/"passive" or direct/indirect cause, and even "the prophets therefore omit sometimes the intermediate causes." Lady Luck, oh my!

In other news, the trichotillomania's worsened.

Fun with Maimonides

§1. Maimonides (p. 156), has a fun little passage expounding the motion of the fifth element, or celestial sphere, arguing that the sphere is an "intellectual being" inasmuch as its circular motion derives from "some idea" rather than a "natural property" (i.e. gravity). And I quote:

"For it would be absurd to assume that the principle of the circular motion of the spheres was like that of the rectilinear motion of a stone downward."

And thus the whirligig of time brings in his revenges. Gravity is pretty absurd, really.

§2. Maimonides later quotes Pr xxv.2, which surely has been used as an epigraph for some novel somewhere.

"It is the glory of God to conceal things,
but the glory of kings is to search things out."(ESV)

 Cf. for kicks and giggles:*

"Gloria Dei est celare verbum et gloria regum investigare sermonem." (Vulgate)
"La gloria di Dio è di celar la cosa; Ma la gloria dei re è d’investigare la cosa." (Giovanni Diodati, 1649)
"E’ gloria di Dio nascondere le cose; ma la gloria dei re sta nell’investigarle." (Riveduta, 1927)

*Phrase copyright me.

§3. Adam & Eve as conjoined twins. Quotes (w/o identifying) commentator who said "Adam and Eve were at first created as one being, having their backs united."Apparently unnamed commentator supported w/ "bone of my bones, flesh of my flesh." Brings another disturbing dimension to the already ripe "cleave unto" which Maimonides also quotes.

All Roads Lead to Rome

"Rome may have been built in a day, but it only took a single trumpet to bring down the walls of Jericho." - Roderick Spode, amateur dictator.

Sped outrageously to Rome and then sped outrageously back again. Being on campus made me glad I'm not there any more, but it was wonderful seeing friends.

And shout-out to Spiegel Online for always having the best pictures. See e.g.

Nothing Much, or, Doldrums of the Friday Night Mind

a. There's a certain dignity that comes w/ hard physical labor w/ optional shaving. Today my gloves, pants, overshirt and socks were all different shades of green.

b. È venerdi, grazie a Dio. Stanotte dormirò come un ghiro.

Stavo sognando ad occhi aperti...NaNoWriMo?

c. Gonna start Vico's Nuova Scienza in the next couple o' days. Read a bit of Maimonides this evening, but nothing terribly interesting, and really just vado a dormire.

This is the Doldrums of the Friday Night Mind.

1024. Slowly working thru Grecian Urn. Lessee if I can write it out while listening to this:

Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness

Thou foster child of silence and slow time

Sylvan historian, who canst thus express

a flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme.

What leaf-fringed legends haunt about thy shape

of deities or mortals, or of both

in Tempe or the dales of Arcady?

What men or gods are these? what maidens loth?

what mad pursuit? what struggle to escape?

what pipes and timbrels? what wild ecstasy?

Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard

are sweeter, therefore, ye soft pipes, play on

not to the sensual ear, but more endearing,

pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone.

fair youth beneath the trees thou canst never leave

thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare.

bold lover, never, never canst thou kiss

though winning near the goal, yet do not grieve,

she cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss

forever wilt thou love, and she be fair

oh happy happy boughs......and my memory stutterspluttertripfall....

Oh, let's go with this. Had it stuck in my head all day at work. Buona notte, cybervuoto. I'll have something more interesting to say later when I'm not nodding off. 

Haydn's Die Schöpfung vis-a-vis Mozart's Requiem in D minor: A Revery

Thinking about NaNoWriMo got me thinking about the opening of my Mega-novel got me thinking about Haydn's Die Schöpfung got me thinking about Haydn's Die Schöpfung v. Mozart's Requiem (be warned, previous link is one of Harnoncourt's "period-instrument" performances. See this if that's not your thing). It makes sense, I swear. If I ever get around to writing the thing maybe it'll be more apparent.

Anyhoo, soapbox: although it's considered one of Haydn's best, Die Schöpfung is criminally under-appreciated. This is an objective fact. The 8-minute "Chaos" sequence followed by the Fiat lux is handsdown the most hair-raising musical experience that exists. Flipside: Mozart's Requiem is criminally over- and mis-used by film directors everywhere, and it's still criminally under-appreciated.


Although they differ in technical genre (oratoria/mass), both Haydn's Creation and Mozart's Requiem speak the same language (and I don't mean they're both works for choir + super-sized orchestra w/ extended vocal solos). They're concerned w/ the same things. They're on the same wave-length. They're both massive gravity-wells of the universal Story. Flipside: they're opposite sides of same coin. Obviously, the subject/genre has a lot to do w/ this. Where Haydn's work has a lighter touch, Mozart's...not light. Heavy's not the right word. Dense perhaps? Nope. "Strong" is getting there. Anyhoo, both concerned w/ what I will spontaneously choose to refer to as the Perennial Monomythohistory, but reflect opposite sides of it: Haydn's piece (being the chummy Haydn) focuses on the jubilant, positive, creative aspect of creation), whereas Mozart's focuses on the tragic.

So, yeah.

This matters cuz my goal in life for the last seven-ish years has been to capture the experience of hearing the first ten minutes of Die Schöpfung in writing. A tad unattainable, granted, but one can dream. So many abandoned poems. I need to start writing writing rather than tossing letters around like a preschooler. Mhm. Must craft, hone, sculpt, try, try again.

Here's a Haydn freebie. An oldie but such a goodie.
 

Wednesday Gallimaufry

Courtesy of a friend: The Strife of the Chase. Decent.

Maimonides discussing Tetragrammaton and various devices Jewish priests used to conceal name of god from the increasingly "impious people." Mentions a forty-two letter name of God. Kertwang.

Have a lot of creative writing projects coalescing in me noggin right now. Think, job/living situation allowing, I may actually do NaNoWriMo for once. Probs just do my sprawling, gratuitous, Ovidian cosmo-epic mega-novel to get the creative juices flowing. Work on Music of the Spheres after that. For some reason cut-and-dry philosophy always inspires me just as much as the best poetry (almost never get the same jolt from prose).

And let it be done: I will find a way to use the line "pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone" in my great American novel.

Tuesday farrago

1024. Figure I'll go with Grecian Urn rather than Nightingale. Bit more chipper and suits my chosen major better.

Lavoro. Last Friday I got swarmed by fire ants when moving a barricade, still itch like cuh-razy and I keeping waking up to discover I've been scratching them in my sleep. Arms look like I have chicken pox.

Reading, mhm. Going thru Maimonides' Guide for the Perplexed. Been on my long list for a while. Spends an inordinate number of pages convincing his readers that only the initiated/properly prepared should study metaphysics. Compares wisdom to the ocean: those who know how to swim will dive to the bottom and retrieve pearls, those who do not will drown. Lots of fun Hebrew words (including a bit relevant to the Wind Choplogic theme of the moment, supongo -- see picture below). Prob post in more detail at a later pt.

Otherwise, going thru Oxford Book of Mystical Verse and bouncing between Cortazar's Rayuela and some Italian studying. Want to read Scienza Nuova and some Bruno (see Joycean connection). E ancora sto cercando lavoro.

Because vento:

Links

Most recent finds:

Ioci Antiqui

Bryn Mawr Classical Review

Laudator Temporis Acti

Curculio

Let 'er riff! Free Writing Take #1.5

Mozart's Fantasy in D minor. Also: Because.

Attempt to partially clarify reaction to The Tempest. Hwaet! The argument: The Tempest is the closest Shakespeare comes to showing the essential unity between music and literature. The overall tenor is so uncanny, and the work itself demands such a multitude of emotional reactions that it defies verbal articulation - it's music, or magic, whichever you prefer. The peculiar combination of both fairy-tale outlandishness and a far more "personal" feeling both heightens the emotional reaction and a reader's emotional interaction w/ the play, mirroring a person's response to a musical piece - something almost infinitely abstracted and yet soul-stirringly intimate. See also the constant references to sounds and the auditory aspects of the Island itself + the frequency of lyrics w/in the script (Rondo in A minor). The Tempest, in other words, draws attention to the musica de la palabra. Anyhoo, think the basic "writing about music is like dancing about architecture" principle applies here. That's about that. It's Saturday, praise Bacchus. Mhm. Memorizing Ode to a Nightingale. Not a terribly original choice, but who needs originality when you have Keats going all highschool-angsty? "My heart aches, and a dull numbness pains / my sense, as though from hemlock I had drunk / or emptied some dull opiate to the drains / one minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk" if my memory serves. Still probs gonna try'n'memorize Tempest dough. Not terribly original for free-writing either. Guess I think in loops. In loops. In loops. Looper. Lark looper. I want to write a person. Will this make me a nicer human being? I doubt it. But I want to write a person. Lark Looper? Ditzy. Highschooler. Big glasses. Calls to mind a less rugged, pudgier version of Gordon-Levitt in Brick if he'd read less hard-boiled pulp fiction. Likes baseball because he likes stats. Quiet at first, warms up quickly. Genuine guy. Father out of the picture, mother bubbly elementary teacher. Only child, apple of said mother's shining blue eye. Happy enough, wants a life, doesn't know where or how to get it. Half-subconsciously resents mother's attention, better off remarried. Plays drums in highschool marching band, looks like a dork when he does it, loves it anyway. Friends few but loyal, mostly oddballs, "hi/bye" friends many. Watches inordinate amts of TV for no apparent reason, baseball and miscellaneous. Bright in everything but math. Not lazy, but not terribly enterprising either. Doesn't care about appearances. This isn't a person. What makes Lark Looper tick? Lark's got "nice-guy syndrome," unable to say no. Starts booking? Friday evenings he takes a 91 Miata (fathers?) and goes for long cruises w/ the top down to nowhere. Blegh.

Theme song for this evening.

Trueno en la distancia. La gatita duerme. No he escrito nada en espanol, aunque he leido un monton. Tenqo que practicar: tal vez tendre una mamacita latina - nunca se sabe. El trabajo fue tan arduo hoy como ayer, pero manana es viernes y nada mas importa. Vi The World's End esta noche, y me gusta, salvo cuando la accion se siguiendo demasiado larga. Es "slick" como todos las peliculas de ellas, y Pegg es buenisimo como siempre. Voy a ver una adaptacion de Shakespeare, creo. Esta bastante bien. Necesito una libra por la grammatica, claramente. Leerlo cuando termino Rayuela y unos novelos de  Marquez. Tal vez memorizare unas poemas por Pablo Neruda. "Si tu me olvidas"? Recuerdo ese titulo, al menos. Still, I'm fighting the urge to just straight up memorize The Tempest. The night's still young-ish. Although debo que ducharme antes de dormir, y estoy taaan cansado. Enough of this, I'm off to read Johnne Donne. Then's it Petrarch. Or maybe The Tempest. Or maybe sleep. Sonare con algos? Supongo que voy a memorizar La Tempestad, aunque en realidad seria mejor que practicare las idiomas. Creo que la grammatica no es correcto en la frase ultima. The rest is silence.

Magical Mystery Tour: Elbow macaroni. Elbow macaroni? Elbow macaroni.

Good eventide and well come ladies and gentlesirs. Here's a selection of the interweb's choicer sweetmeats:

Your Dialogue is Unrealistic - Just found this via the comments section on the ever-stimulating LanguageHat. Five years & still going.

Howl of Minerva - Had a post about Heraclitus, which inspired Dumb Idea #3042: Ella Fitzgerald singing Heraclitean fragments to the tune of Cole Porter's Anything Goes entitled Everything Flows (wah-wah-wah). Yes.

* * *

Been on my annualish month-or-so-long-ish Beatlemania frenzy. So be on the lookout for a Beatles/Muppets Choplogic FEATURETTE in the vewy neaw futuwe. N.B. Elbow Macaroni elbow macaroni elbow macaroni should be sung to the fast, patter-section in the Sgt. Pepper reprise.

La la la la strange mood brain dump and now for something completely different

Well the rents're gone to FL and the cat won't sit still long enough to engage in conversation, so I may as well blog into the windy cybervoid... Massive lightning storm at work today. Emerged from white clinic-closet-from-hell block room, greeted by pitch-black skies and tossing trees and claps of thunder. Slumped right down against the door. It was beautiful and aweful. Just kind of peered around from under the tall tin roof, rain-mist on my face, squatting on wet concrete. Felt like a bird must tucked in a tree, just barely out of the elements damp not wet. Afternoon breaks in general (when they occur) feel almost out-of-body, surreal certainly. They may last five minutes, but something about that little concrete pad under that tall tin roof surrounded by old tin fences and old wood pallets and old old equipment gives it a timeless quality, and the way the trees and the blue or black or white (hazy) skies that're always there take you out of geography and drop your somewhere rich and strange. Reminds me of that trippy moment I had in the dental office years ago looking thru the window at the wind in the trees w/ Lennon crooning Imagine over the office radio. I'm listening to Pärt's Für Alina as I type. How perfect. It's almost over, though. But to the thunderstorm. Das Gewitter. That says it all. Das Gewitter. Words're so rich and strange. Ah! I must memorize that passage next. And 'sfrom The Tempest. It all works out doesn't it? I've started memorizing poetry just for the sake of memorizing poetry, and because it's an easy thing to practice while I'm stuck bagging ice for eight hours a day. I only started a few days a go, so I've only got Donne's The Sunne Rising down and I'm looking for some material I'm really keen on. Love Sunne Rising b/c it's playful, silly, sweet and true. Donne doesn't (always) let his cleverness get in the way of earnestness. I've considered some Keats, but I'm not feeling him somehow. Donne's touching in the same way Haydn is, since he comes across as a genuinely heartfelt guy and not a sickly, possibly disturbing sort-of delinquent (vide Keats & most every other artist the world over). They're both more "craftsman"-like than Beethoven-style Inspiration w/ capital-I. All these people have been dead hundreds of years. Maybe I've been dead hundreds of years, mhm. Don's not been dead hundreds of years, unless he uses a lot of product. He's a nice guy, hard-working. Though that can be an irritation at times. But it's all one. Today was brutal work-wise. Don't have the proper bags for the machine, so I have to maintain this excruciating position where I hunch over at the waist 45 degrees but hold my arms straight out level w/ the floor and move bags w/o any support. Gets to be a bit much after 8 hours of standing that way. Hopefully I won't get back problems from this job. How plebeian. < How snobbish. Why am I writing this? I don't know. Maybe I'll look at this in 10 years. I'll be 32. Wonder what that'll be like. Listening to Sibelius choral pieces. Ah, Finnish you so fine. Half-listening's probs more accurate, though, since I'm typing this at the same time. I considered watching a movie, and I may still, and of course I could read, but I want to produce something for once. Produce isn't the word. I use it in opposition to consume, but that's not precisely the dichotomy here. Ick been so a lion, ick wilby sea-hung u. verb-ending haven mit yea manned. Ab, er, vee u. vo? That was fun. That's also the crux of this whole Matter. Wonder will anyone I know understand it. Well, they'd "understand" "it" but "decipher" "it," I mean. I'd really like to read Finnegan from begin to fin again. I considered memorizing bits of that, as well. We shall see. What a dweeb am I. Beginning to feel less of a compulsion to write absolutely nothing. 'Sa pity "crux" sound so hideous. It's a splendid word. Does a good job, unimpeachable etymological heritage. And here's Donne's The Sunne Rising typed from memory sans punctuation:

Busy old fool unruly sun
why dost thou thus
thru windows and thru curtains call on us?
must to thy motions lovers seasons run
saucy pedantic wretch go chide
late schoolboys and sour prentices
go tell court huntsmen that the king will ride
call country ants to harvest offices
love all alike no season knows nor clime
nor hour day month which are the rags of time

thy beams so reverend and strong
why shouldst thou think
I could eclipse and cloud them with a wink
but that I would not lose her sight so long.
If her eyes have not blinded thine
look and tomorrow late tell me
whether both the indias of spice and mine
be where thou leftst them or lie her with me
ask for the kings thou sawst yesterday
and thou shalt hear all here in one bed lay.

she's all states and all princes i
nothing else is.
princes do but play us; compared to this
all honor's mimic, all wealth alchemy.
thou sun art half so happy as we
in that the world's contracted thus.
Thine age asks ease and since thy duties be
to warm the world, that's done in warming us
shine here to us, and thou art everywhere
this bed thy center is, these walls thy sphere.

Good stuff. Yup, think The Tempest'll make for a good follow-up. In the mean time, the world continues to whirl on w/o much participation from me. Moody Blues' Night In White Satin on now. Suppose not many people up to much at 9:18 on a Wednesday evening. My future has a paradoxically ubi sunt vibe to it. How strange. Rich and strange? I think the reason the phrase rich and strange is so rich and strange is that both of those words have such a myriad of connotations, even by the highly meaning-thick standard of English vocabulary. Rich and strange. Rich as in food, non-monetary value, monetary value, "that's-rich!"-ness or whatever other shades of meaning that don't come to mind now [Tuesday Afternoon now]. But future. What does it mean to say a future exists? Does it mean anything? This is silly. I'm avoiding the question. What is the question? Insert Hitchhiker's Guide reference. Never written like this. Not sure what I think about it. It sounds like my brain, for good or ill. I know I should write more and hone my quill. I was proud of using "quill-pusher" for a scribe in an essay at Berry. Dunno if externalizing all this does a jot of good. Suppose it gets me used to typing if nothing else (pianoter, lol). Free association typing is a scary thing. I should come up w/ one good pt and then expand it....Now it's Dawn is a Feeling in Days of Future Passed. Man, the music tonight's so spot-on w/ my mood it's not even funny. I'd say I need to learn to play an instrument, and I should, but I don't know. The wind.

The wind's a peculiar thing. One of the most ubiquitous elements in nature, and still one of the most emotive. It lends itself to metaphors as well as anyone. Chaff in the wind. Dust in the wind. Chaff, dust mean so very little unless they're put in the wind. Then it feels real. I suppose it's b/c the wind is the most unknowable thing that's still immediately perceivable, so of course it becomes associated with the inexplicable things (spirit, time, motion, etc.) from the Greeks > us. In Barry Lyndon, the most perfectly beautiful film I've ever seen, the simple shot of the Lyndon mansion surrounded by wind-tossed trees is one of the most beautiful. In The Sopranos, those stupidly simple shots of leaves in the wind that they probs filmed on Chase's porch are the ones that always stuck w/ me. Sinatra singing Summer Wind speaks for itself. This may, of course, just be me. But I'm not the one who actually put these in to begin with. So it can't be. Just me. There's something in the wind. An evanescent ishiness. This is something like what I thought sitting out in the middle of the storm. I wasn't really thinking them as so much as feeling them. Don't suppose this'd do anybody any good, though I wish it could. That's what I want: something I can do that would do anyone any good at all.  I suppose that's really too much to ask out of life, though.

Had an interview recently w/ a little Christian school. Strange interview. But not rich and strange. Sour strange. Unwholesome strange. Normal sort of interview preamble: Handshakes, "Hot weather we're having. Ready for fall. I like some heat, but this, whew." Then wham: "let's pray." This bothered me the rest of the half-hour/so. Wasn't expecting a Christian school to be Christian christian, I suppose. I feel so strongly about All That and yet whenever I try to express my opinions/notions/whathaveyou with someone I feel disingenuous, and I think they perceive me as such. Have to tell myself that doesn't mean I actually am disingenuous. Oder? Religion's too personal for me to bring to a workplace anyhoo. All shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well. That'd sound good in french. Tout sera bien et tout sera bien et toutes sortes de chose seront bien.