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DonorsChoose.org summer updates

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Literature & Writing

academia, copyright, and open access: two different views

Those who criticise must understand what they are criticising

In the 30th April 2009 issue (1,894) of the Times Higher Education magazine, Prof Kathryn Sutherland of Oxford Unviersity wrote an ill-considered and wrong-headed attack on digital communication in general and on Open Access in particular titled Those who disseminate ideas must acknowledge the routes they travel.

In her article, Prof Sutherland claims that easy access to electronic versions of others’ writing automatically leads to a degradation of the respect for the other as the source of that writing.  She makes the serious mistake of generalising from fiction (and other artistic forms such as poetry) to scholarly writing.  read on

Hat tip Archivalia

for german speakers: erstes inoffizielles köln-archiveinsturz-gedicht

Der Archiveinsturz (Köln, 3. März 2009)

In weißen Schachteln,
beschriftet: Firma Reisswolf,
lagert Papiergekröse.
Selten ist Pergament dabei,
das haltbare.
Schachtel um Schachtel
öffnen die weiß gewandeten Helfer.
Ausfegen, verpacken, aufschreiben.
Ausfegen, verpacken, aufschreiben.
Ausfegen, verpacken, aufschreiben.
Zerfetzte Geschichte,
geborstenes Gedächtnis.
Soviel an Sorge
ließ angedeihen nie
man den alten Schriften,
solange still sie ruhten
und unbeschadet in den
Archivgelassen.

***

Erstes inoffizielles Köln-Archiveinsturz-Gedicht
Von Assessor des Archivdienstes Dr. Klaus Graf
Archivalia

the library in the new age – what will become of research libraries?

From The New York Review of Books a free article:

Volume 55, Number 10 · June 12, 2008
The Library in the New Age
By Robert Darnton

"Information is exploding so furiously around us and information technology is changing at such bewildering speed that we face a fundamental problem: How to orient ourselves in the new landscape? What, for example, will become of research libraries in the face of technological marvels such as Google?

"How to make sense of it all?"  Read the answer

it’s not you, it’s your books

Have a good chuckle!

Essay

It’s Not You, It’s Your Books

By RACHEL DONADIO

Published: March 30, 2008, NYT

Among the bookish, even casual literary references can turn into romantic deal breakers.

on translating fiction

Being bi-lingual and interested in languages and literature, I have or so I like to believe, a fine ear (or eye) for literary translations in the languages I know.  Here is a recent experience:  A short while ago, I read The Rest Is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century by Alex Ross, a history of classical music in and of the 20th century.  Excellent!  Related blog, with musical examples.  The author relates that a number of American musicians/composers have read Thomas Mann's Doctor Faustus: The Life of the German Composer Adrian Leverkuehn As Told by a Friend. This sent me back to my library to re-read the novel, in the original German, about a composer who makes a Doctor Faustus-like deal with the Devil and eventually sinks into insanity, coinciding with the turmoil of the 1920s in Germany and the rise of Nazism.  The novel is a tour de force in prose, and I wondered how this could actually be translated into English without loosing its impact.  Not very well, I decided, after I had borrowed the above linked 1997 edition, translated by John E. Woods.  As a matter of fact, I could not bring myself reading much of the book, it was too painful.  Somewhere out there, there is a translation authorized by Thomas Mann, but it's out of print. 

The question though is, do translations ever work satisfactorily?

a vote for latin

Op-Ed Contributor (New York Times)
A Vote for Latin
By HARRY MOUNT
Published: December 3, 2007
None of today’s leading presidential candidates studied Latin at a high level. How things have changed since the founding fathers.

AT first glance, it doesn’t seem tragic that our leaders don’t study Latin anymore. But it is no coincidence that the professionalization of politics — which encourages budding politicians to think of education as mere career preparation — has occurred during an age of weak rhetoric, shifting moral values, clumsy grammar and a terror of historical references and eternal values that the Romans could teach us a thing or two about. As they themselves might have said, “Roma urbs aeterna; Latina lingua aeterna.”  Read on

Latin Version: A Vote for Latin

"a good mystery: why we read"

From the New York Times:

Page Turner
A Good Mystery: Why We Read
By MOTOKO RICH
Published: November 25, 2007
At a time when books appear to be waging a Sisyphean battle against the forces of the Internet, the notion that someone could move from literary indifference to devouring passion seems, sadly, farfetched.

Image Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

shakespeare's julius caesar

Still slightly handicapped in writing and typing, I have attacked the to-be-read pile and am right now in the middle of A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare, 1599 by James Shapiro, currently available at Amazon.com Bargain Price.

James Shapiro is the Larry Miller Professor of English at Columbia University and a Shakespearean and Elizabethan culture scholar.

1599 was a pivotal year for Shakespeare.  He and his troupe built the Globe Theatre (Wikipedia, handle with care) and became independent of other theaters, and he was ready for new plays.  In this year, he wrote Henry V, Julius Caesar, As You Like It and Hamlet, at the same time bringing his work to a new dramatic and intellectual level.

no blogging by irene for a while - broken elbow

Broke my right elbow cum surgery.

No blog post from me until I can get the hang of doing all this with my left (non-dominant) hand. Hopefully, Bingley has some material.

gone fishing . . .

. . . for classical music and other things.

(dicky laptop too)

temporary blogging hiatus (irene)

Due to computer problems, I'll have to suspend blogging until this is fixed.

historical figures in “the dream of scipio” – II : the cathars

In the 14th century part of our current read, The Dream of Scipio, Olivier de Noyen encounters two “heretics” and learns of their beliefs, one of which is reincarnation.  In the novel, this is traced back to the 5th century protagonist Manlius, his philosophical treatise on The Dream of Scipio, and his philosopher friend Sophia.

As in so much in the novel, there is a grain of truth to it, and we were reminded of the Cathars, which were quite familiar to some in our reading group.  Wikipedia (handle with care as usual) has an extensive article on Catharism, with a number of external links, one of which is Cathars and Cathar Beliefs in the Languedoc  (Cathars and the Cathar Crusade: history, cathar theology, crusade leaders, explanations, maps and source documents).

and another comparison to the roman empire…

"The only sure thing that can be said about the past is that anyone who can remember Santayana’s maxim is condemned to repeat it.  As a result, the danger of not understanding the lessons of history is matched by the danger of using simplistic historical analogies.  Those who have learned the lessons of Munich square off against those who have learned the lessons of Vietnam, and then they both invoke the bread-and-circus days of the overstretched Roman empire in an attempt to sound even more subtle and profound."

Amen!  to Walter Isaacson's above comment introducing his on the whole favorable review of  Are We  Rome?:  The Fall of an Empire and the Fate of America by Cullen Murphy in the New York Times:

Books / Sunday Book Review

The Empire in the Mirror

By WALTER ISAACSON

Published: May 13, 2007

Cullen Murphy examines parallels between the United States today and the world of ancient Rome.

The question is: Do we need another of these books?  Is it a bandwagon thing?

request for starter book suggestions on roman history

In this comment, a reader poses the question:

"…I managed to land a job as a tour guide in Rome.  Now, one of the things I get asked a lot by normal people (that is, probably not all the interested before but could become interested) what would be some good starter books for Roman History.  Most of what I know comes from lectures and scholarly materials and the classics themselves, which are not going to fly with a lay audience, so I've been looking for other options.  I feel a bit uneasy recommending something like McCullough (although I do) because she's so long.  I had read good thing's about Goldsworthy's new Caesar biography, although I haven't really looked for it in Italy.  And I feel tentative about something like Tom Holland's "Rubicon" because it struck me as a bit pulpy (but then again, could be more appealing to the normal reader than most other things)."

Any helpful comments are appreciated!

gone fishing…

… for the next ten days or so.

There may be sporadic blogging.

OUP – “what were they thinking?”

Another rant!

Last month our local historical society, The Stamford Historical Society, belatedly received a copy of a book into which we had input:  Escaping Salem: The Other Witch Hunt of 1692 by Richard Godbeer. (book description below)

This is the first volume in a newish series of small books from Oxford University Press called “New Narratives in American History.”

It's handsomely put together and nicely illustrated; HOWEVER:  There is no index!  So I'm asking: What were they thinking?

kurt vonnegut, writer of classics of the american counterculture, dies at 84

Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times

Kurt Vonnegut, Writer of Classics of the American Counterculture,
Dies at 84

By DINITIA SMITH, New York Times

Published: April 11, 2007

Kurt Vonnegut, whose dark comic talent and urgent moral vision in novels like "Slaughterhouse-Five,"  "Cat's Cradle" and "God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater" caught the temper of his times and the imagination of a generation, died last night when in Manhattan. He was 84.  more…

Books by Kurt Vonnegut.

tangentially – harry turtledove aka h.n. turteltaub

For Harry Turtledove (known to me mainly as H.N. Turteltaub) fans, a blog and a new alternative history novel: 

Winter of Our Discontent: The Impeachment & Trial of John F. Kennedy, Written by Harry Turtledove & Bryce Zabel  or:  What if John Kennedy survived Dallas?

Mr. Turtledove holds a Ph.D. in Byzantine History, and according to Wikipedia (obviosuly approved by Turtledove as it's linked from his blog), as H.N. Turteltaub he not only wrote the Byzantine novel Justinian – about the 7th century Justinian – which at one time we discussed in our reading group, but also this 4th century BC Hellenistic Traders Series set shortly after the death of Alexander the Great:

toynbee on historical novels

I'd like to share these observations by Arnold J. Toynbee on historical novels, via David Derrick’s Toynbee Convector:

It is difficult to achieve success in writing “historical” plays and novels, i.e. plays and novels in which the social background is not that of the writer or of the public for whom he is writing.  The effort to resuscitate an alien social background seldom produces effects that do not seem either shoddy or laboured.  The reason is that social facts, when presented as a setting for personal relations, must be sketched in with a touch which is at the same time light and sure;  and this touch is difficult to achieve except when the artist is portraying social facts with which he is intimately acquainted at first hand.

[however…] read on

With today's proliferation of historical novels, the question arises:  Does the above still hold true, and if so, to what extent?

Postscript:  This may be an awkward way to pose this question.  Maybe the observation is more true than ever, given today’s tendency towards “political correctness”?