Unless their “stuff” is debt repayment plans, there might be more hitches to this scheme than implied by the joke. Unfortunately, paying the piper, saving for the future and other such “outdated” concepts will not boost as much commercial activity as these clowns seem to think.
We, as a country, have been spending beyond our means for quite a long time and now we are going through a long needed retraction in debt and spending. In the long run the country will be stronger for it.
There are some silver linings in all the gloomy clouds. With many people un-employed or under-employed it has focused the government on the economy and kept them from spending time on freedom reduction plans like: Cap and Trade on Carbon, worrying about what goes on in people’s bedrooms, finding new ways to harass pot smokers and the list goes on.
Eventually the government will figure out that it, too, doesn’t have unlimited credit and it will start making the hard choices about where it spends it’s money.
But until then we will have to listen to self-important bureaucrats tell us about how hard they are working to make things better for the common man in their district even while they are cutting deals in the back room that are designed to favor some special interest group.
‘There are some silver linings in all the gloomy clouds. With many people un-employed or under-employed it has focused the government on the economy and kept them from spending time on freedom reduction plans like: Cap and Trade on Carbon, worrying about what goes on in people’s bedrooms, finding new ways to harass pot smokers and the list goes on.’
Well, Cap and Trade is a good thing (even if it doesn’t go far enough, fast enough), as for the rest- when exactly did they stop?
There are those in the GOP still raising money over the back of ‘teh evil gayz’.
“YOU?” Bruce, don’t you mean “US?” Or are you moving to another planet?
Ooh, and what terrible impositions. Gas that still costs less than what it already costs in Europe. Having to wear sweaters inside. And omg, how did humanity ever survive before the advent of AC?! And actually have get exercise on the way to work! Or-gasp-even have to find a job, because there certainly isn’t anyone looking for a job now, thanks to the way the “conservatives” gave the banks carte blanche to screw us over.
Wow, remember when Americans had the reputation of being hard-working, courageous, and intelligent? From the example of Bruce here, have to say the majority has become a bunch of lazy, scared, nitwits who will believe whatever propaganda gets flung their way.
You might want to research the phrase “paradigm shift.” History shows us what happens when the wealthy get too full of themselves.
good toon Ted! no one is hiring because most see the coming greater depression hitting.
Let’s inflate the dollars, u know, print 3 trillions of it to cover the war debts(www.costofwar.com), then raise prices 3X to cover it.
(just like we did after vietnam war),
of course then the 4 billion war reparations Lord Kissinger(given his brit title for crashing the US economy). agreed to at the peace talks…wont have to pay for 20 years….then pay them off at a Discount.
crash is a-coming, the red chinese are DUMPing the us dollars and selling t-bills to buy gold. I cant wait to buy gasoline for $9.00 a gallon, makes greenie energy almost feasible, eh?
Thanks for the recitation of mindless right wing sound bites, Bruce4671.
Taxing exhalations? That’s just plain dumb.
If there is a carbon tax, there will be no need for offsets.
Do I really need to address the rest of the moronic nonsense in that post?
You can tell the really bright ones when they resort to name-calling after you puncture their poor little illogical egos and internally inconsistent ramblings.
sirrom567 : For the longest time that was my toddler’s favourite bedtime story! Ok, it was *my* favourite bedtime story because I enjoyed saying it aloud. She probably just humoured me.
When I use a word, it means what I want it to mean. No more, no less.
Contrariwise, I might with some justification call my self a Christian, but I don’t, because when I look at others who call themselves such I’m clearly not one of them, and likewise they would look at me and draw the same conclusion.
By the way, in case you’re wondering, the new “Alice in Wonderland” has little to do with Lewis Carroll. It’s an heroic fantasy-adventure that throws around Rev’d Dodgson’s names and places, and it’s OK if you like that sort of thing, but they could have easily avoided some glaring errors like referring to to the monster as “the Jabberwocky”. The monster is the Jabberwock. The poem is called “Jabberwocky.” Also, the dormouse seems to have absorbed too much caffeine from sleeping in the teapot, because he’s now a swashbucking, sword-weilding whirlwind of activity…
Oh, you should give “300” a rent; it’s ripping entertainment, and it’s “faithful”, if you think of the source material as being Frank Miller’s graphic novel and not the actual history. Some of these “adapted from” or “inspired by” movies can be quite satisfying, if you think of them as simply being stories about some other guy named Beowulf, or two other guys named Achilles and Hector. I even enjoyed the Richard Gere/Sean Connery “First Knight”, once I realized it was about some other people who happened to be named Arthur, Launcelot, and Guenivere…
Luckily, Homer, Herodotus, Virgil, and Malory are still available to us, and quite entertaining in their way (especially Herodotus) without the interference of directors and actors.
^ and ^^I’m not opposed to modernizations, if they’re good. Have you come across Derek Walcott’s *Omeros”? Homeric themes in the Caribbean, written in loose terza rima.
There’s a new book out called “Ransom”, by an Australian author named David Malouf. It deals with the aftermath of Achilles’ killing and subsequent desecration of the corpse of Hector, centered mostly on Priam’s plea to have the body returned. Supposed to be very good, but I haven’t gotten a chance to check it out…
Certainly, modern adaptations of the material, like Giraudoux’s “La guerre de Troie n’aura pas lieu” (“Tiger at the Gates” in English) are eminently worthwhile and relevant to 20th-century events, specifically, and universal in their own right, to the degree that they were created by artists of sufficient gravitas. Even “Camelot” and “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead” have their undeniable charms, and don’t do disservice to their sources. But reducing the “Iliad” or “Beowulf” to big-screen action epics leaves contemporary audiences with a much diminished appreciation of their literary and cultural significance, and is symptomatic of the dumbed down, comic-book-and-video-game popularization of works that few anymore take the trouble to acquaint themselves with in their original form. (Shakespeare himself reworked classical material in plays like “Troilus and Cressida” and the Roman plays, but I’d be the last to begrudge him the right to do so. Robert Zemeckis, Wolfgang Petersen, and Zack Snyder have a ways to go to be considered in that league.)
Oh, don’t get me wrong. I don’t consider moderrnizations or ataptations to be substitutes for the source material. In the best of all possible worlds, a modern film with mass appeal which is based on classical or pre-contemporary materials will spark the interest of at least some modern audiences in things they would otherwise have missed. Someone who goes to see “Troy” simply to look at Brad Pitt might be inspired to read the “Iliad” (or at least become more familiar with it) when that person might otherwise have shunned it entirely. To use an example from my own experience, I know a woman who never would have crossed the street to see “Romeo and Juliet” who was inspired to change her mind by “Shakespeare In Love.” The same no doubt occurred when “West Side Story” fist appeared.
“Legends” are often merely history passed down through poets (classical histories even moreso). Homer wasn’t at Troy. The written versions of the Iliad and Odyssey aren’t even by Homer. Herodotus wasn’t at Thermopylae. I’ve read Shakespeare’s histories of English Kings, and I’ve read Geoffrey of Monmouth’s, and I’ll stick with Shakespeare’s. Mallory was retelling old stories of Arthur in his own way, and T.H. White retold Mallory in his own way. Hamlet was a legendary Danish King, whose “history” passed throgh Saxo Grammaticus and Belleforrest and some unknown Englishman before Shakespeare got it, and that Stoppard’s play is a masterpiece in its own right neither diminishes Shakespeare’s play nor erases it. “Sons of Anarchy” might lead to an increased modern interest in and familiarity with “Hamlet.” Is that a bad thing?
The movie “To Kill a Mockingbird” is a great movie, despite its divergences from the book, which is a great book. If an experience of one leads an audience to seek out the other, it’s win-win.
Agreed. If it’s really good, it’s really good whether it’s original or derivative. And a bad production can leech all the life out of even Shakespeare. Heck, I’d rather see Hollywood spend its millions on a mediocre adaptation of some timeless classic than just another slasher or disaster movie.
^ and ^^: Great conversation. And then part of the interest is the meaning which is added by the new work precisely because of the deviations from the original. So the meaning is not located in the single work, but in the interaction between the two.
Agreed. But the new work should also be able to stand entirely on its own, regardless of its sources. (All works of art are built upon what has gone before, in any case, even those that consciously attempt to deviate from or destroy their precedents.) If, hypothetically, it were the single item from a civilization to survive the extinction of that civilization, it would of necessity have to be judged on its own merits, even if its original origin were as nothing more than a footnote to some lost prototypical masterpiece.
Unfortunately, bad productions of Shakespeare are the norm. Everybody is so interested in revisionist “Hamlets” and “A Hamlet for TODAY!” that it never occurs to anybody that it’s nearly impossible to see an authentic “Hamlet” on the stage anymore. Contrariwise, the ones who at least attempt to do a “traditional” Shakespeare tend to treat it like a museum piece, and are so reverential that they forget that it’s also entertainment.
When I was in London a couple of years ago, I saw two productions at the replica Globe. No Hamlet, unfortunately, but I saw “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” done, as close as possible, in the way it would have been seen while the FIRST Elizabeth was on the throne (there was some artificial lighting, to allow evening performance, but no spotlights, microphones, proscenium, etc.). I laughed my BUTT off!
The other production I saw there was something called “A Shakespeare Party” by a travelling troupe called The Footsbarn Theatre. It was a revue, made up of Shakespearean-themed skits and songs and isolated scenes and speeches from the plays, all using effects and music and costumes that would have been available in 1600. Again, it was bloody marvelous. The woman who performed a solo version of Ophelia’s Mad Scene that put every other Ophelia I’ve ever seen to shame. They also did the “It is the nightingale/It is the lark” scene from “Romeo and Juliet” using puppets, and it was so beautiful I’m tearing up thinking about it even now…
And for something completely different, on my last night in town I saw a production of “The Revenger’s Tragedy” at the Royal National. This was done with the original text, but with sound and lighting effects, modern costume, modern music, everything to enhance the sex-and-violence aspects of the play. It, too, was bloody marvelous (accent on the “bloody”). The idea being that, if the Elizabethans and Jacobeans had had modern theatercraft at their disposal, they would have used it (Shakespeare included).
The Globe productions and the Royal National production took different approaches towards making 400-year old material accessible and entertaining, while still being true to the sources…
Italics? – just lean over a little bit – works for me. (I think there’s a style book for this site – I remember that someone mentioned it – but I’ve never looked for it.)
But seriously – sirrom – I think your scenario is perhaps too extreme to account for what actually happens in reading. (Though my own field – archaic Greek poetry – sometimes approaches the situation you describe).
Take parody as a limit case – without the original, the point is lost. I would argue that a lot of literature is sort of the same. Take Sartre’s The Flies, for instance – yes, it can be read on its own, but surely part of the meaning comes from the difference between his play and the Greek Orestes plays. Antigone also.
On the other hand, I’ve just been reading Paul and Virginia, which is clearly based on Daphnis and Chloe – and certainly everyone at the time realized the relation. But the editor of the Penguin edition either didn’t know or didn’t see a reason to mention the connection. Clearly the novel works even if you don’t know Daphnis and Chloe.
Or James M. Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice – I am absolutely sure that Cain intended a reference to Aeschylus’ Agamemnon, but I am also positive that very few readers get the reference. Again, it stands on its own. I do think there is an increase in meaning if you notice, however.
Certainly, the more memories – dare I say data? – you have stored, the more meanings you will discover, some of them not even intended consciously by the artist. And it’s definitely frustrating to watch or read a parody of something that is doubtless quite familiar to everybody else, and not get the joke.
To get italics, put an asterisk immediately before and after your text (no spaces).
For boldface, use double asterisks.
For bold italics, use triple asterisks.
There are a couple of ins and outs to learn (for instance, you can’t isolate single letters, and for lined verse you need your asterisks before and after each line), but you’ll figure those out pretty quickly.
There are other ways to do this too, I’ve heard, but that’s how I do it.
Yeah Ted, either the government takes care of most of the industries and production, nationalizing them for the benefit of all, or we all should work for AIG.
Free markets should only be for the small stuff, but oil, gas, electricity, banks, for example, should all be nationalized.
edmondd: To complete the ideal socialism paradigm, all those industries should be internationalized. Nation-states, like city-states and fiefdoms before them, have become counterproductive and ought to be obsolete.
Don’t make my head hurt, lonecat! I’ll just answer with another question: Does regulating them at any level of government actually work nowadays?
On the other hand, the E.U. does have a large number of regulations that do seem to work across international lines. I suppose it’s really just a question of putting teeth into those regulations with an effective enforcement regime.
jgcp1 about 14 years ago
Unless their “stuff” is debt repayment plans, there might be more hitches to this scheme than implied by the joke. Unfortunately, paying the piper, saving for the future and other such “outdated” concepts will not boost as much commercial activity as these clowns seem to think.
Lavocat about 14 years ago
Our plan: do nothing but wait things out. The American entrepreneurial spirit at its pro-active best!
Well, at least we can pride ourselves on not having outsourced the doing nothing and waiting things out.
Mephistopheles about 14 years ago
We, as a country, have been spending beyond our means for quite a long time and now we are going through a long needed retraction in debt and spending. In the long run the country will be stronger for it.
There are some silver linings in all the gloomy clouds. With many people un-employed or under-employed it has focused the government on the economy and kept them from spending time on freedom reduction plans like: Cap and Trade on Carbon, worrying about what goes on in people’s bedrooms, finding new ways to harass pot smokers and the list goes on.
Eventually the government will figure out that it, too, doesn’t have unlimited credit and it will start making the hard choices about where it spends it’s money.
But until then we will have to listen to self-important bureaucrats tell us about how hard they are working to make things better for the common man in their district even while they are cutting deals in the back room that are designed to favor some special interest group.
AdmNaismith about 14 years ago
‘There are some silver linings in all the gloomy clouds. With many people un-employed or under-employed it has focused the government on the economy and kept them from spending time on freedom reduction plans like: Cap and Trade on Carbon, worrying about what goes on in people’s bedrooms, finding new ways to harass pot smokers and the list goes on.’
Well, Cap and Trade is a good thing (even if it doesn’t go far enough, fast enough), as for the rest- when exactly did they stop? There are those in the GOP still raising money over the back of ‘teh evil gayz’.
mattro65 about 14 years ago
Cap and Trade is a business friendly cop out. A carbon tax is what is needed.
MrDichotomies about 14 years ago
“YOU?” Bruce, don’t you mean “US?” Or are you moving to another planet?
Ooh, and what terrible impositions. Gas that still costs less than what it already costs in Europe. Having to wear sweaters inside. And omg, how did humanity ever survive before the advent of AC?! And actually have get exercise on the way to work! Or-gasp-even have to find a job, because there certainly isn’t anyone looking for a job now, thanks to the way the “conservatives” gave the banks carte blanche to screw us over.
Wow, remember when Americans had the reputation of being hard-working, courageous, and intelligent? From the example of Bruce here, have to say the majority has become a bunch of lazy, scared, nitwits who will believe whatever propaganda gets flung their way.
You might want to research the phrase “paradigm shift.” History shows us what happens when the wealthy get too full of themselves.
Motivemagus about 14 years ago
Ted Rall has nailed it. (And I’m a management consultant…I see across a lot of business…)
jaxaction about 14 years ago
good toon Ted! no one is hiring because most see the coming greater depression hitting.
Let’s inflate the dollars, u know, print 3 trillions of it to cover the war debts(www.costofwar.com), then raise prices 3X to cover it. (just like we did after vietnam war), of course then the 4 billion war reparations Lord Kissinger(given his brit title for crashing the US economy). agreed to at the peace talks…wont have to pay for 20 years….then pay them off at a Discount.
crash is a-coming, the red chinese are DUMPing the us dollars and selling t-bills to buy gold. I cant wait to buy gasoline for $9.00 a gallon, makes greenie energy almost feasible, eh?
mattro65 about 14 years ago
Thanks for the recitation of mindless right wing sound bites, Bruce4671. Taxing exhalations? That’s just plain dumb. If there is a carbon tax, there will be no need for offsets. Do I really need to address the rest of the moronic nonsense in that post?
MrDichotomies about 14 years ago
You can tell the really bright ones when they resort to name-calling after you puncture their poor little illogical egos and internally inconsistent ramblings.
pbarnrob about 14 years ago
Often telegraphed by sputtering (in person), loss of spelling discipline (in print), decline to epithets. Of course, some start there.
We can see that the Karl Rove and Lee Atwater school of political winning (you only need 50% plus one) at any cost is still working.
Divide and conquer worked in ancient times, and we still fall for it.
Pick a wedge, any wedge, and you can split your opponents into two camps, and go happily about raiding the treasury unhindered.
And of course, the function of a politician is still to get (re-)elected.
sirrom567 about 14 years ago
‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves Did gyre and gimble in the wabe; All mimsy were the borogoves, And the mome raths outgrabe.
OmqR-IV.0 about 14 years ago
sirrom567 : For the longest time that was my toddler’s favourite bedtime story! Ok, it was *my* favourite bedtime story because I enjoyed saying it aloud. She probably just humoured me.
lonecat about 14 years ago
Thanks, sirrom, for words of wisdom. Does the second amendment protect vorpal swords?
sirrom567 about 14 years ago
It protects all sorts of nonsense.
lonecat about 14 years ago
I, for one, will rest under almost any tree, lying on my tumtum.
fritzoid Premium Member about 14 years ago
When I use a word, it means what I want it to mean. No more, no less.
Contrariwise, I might with some justification call my self a Christian, but I don’t, because when I look at others who call themselves such I’m clearly not one of them, and likewise they would look at me and draw the same conclusion.
By the way, in case you’re wondering, the new “Alice in Wonderland” has little to do with Lewis Carroll. It’s an heroic fantasy-adventure that throws around Rev’d Dodgson’s names and places, and it’s OK if you like that sort of thing, but they could have easily avoided some glaring errors like referring to to the monster as “the Jabberwocky”. The monster is the Jabberwock. The poem is called “Jabberwocky.” Also, the dormouse seems to have absorbed too much caffeine from sleeping in the teapot, because he’s now a swashbucking, sword-weilding whirlwind of activity…
lonecat about 14 years ago
fritzoid – thanks for the movie review – I will probably skip it, just as I skipped Troy and 300.
fritzoid Premium Member about 14 years ago
Oh, you should give “300” a rent; it’s ripping entertainment, and it’s “faithful”, if you think of the source material as being Frank Miller’s graphic novel and not the actual history. Some of these “adapted from” or “inspired by” movies can be quite satisfying, if you think of them as simply being stories about some other guy named Beowulf, or two other guys named Achilles and Hector. I even enjoyed the Richard Gere/Sean Connery “First Knight”, once I realized it was about some other people who happened to be named Arthur, Launcelot, and Guenivere…
sirrom567 about 14 years ago
Luckily, Homer, Herodotus, Virgil, and Malory are still available to us, and quite entertaining in their way (especially Herodotus) without the interference of directors and actors.
lonecat about 14 years ago
^ and ^^I’m not opposed to modernizations, if they’re good. Have you come across Derek Walcott’s *Omeros”? Homeric themes in the Caribbean, written in loose terza rima.
fritzoid Premium Member about 14 years ago
There’s a new book out called “Ransom”, by an Australian author named David Malouf. It deals with the aftermath of Achilles’ killing and subsequent desecration of the corpse of Hector, centered mostly on Priam’s plea to have the body returned. Supposed to be very good, but I haven’t gotten a chance to check it out…
sirrom567 about 14 years ago
Certainly, modern adaptations of the material, like Giraudoux’s “La guerre de Troie n’aura pas lieu” (“Tiger at the Gates” in English) are eminently worthwhile and relevant to 20th-century events, specifically, and universal in their own right, to the degree that they were created by artists of sufficient gravitas. Even “Camelot” and “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead” have their undeniable charms, and don’t do disservice to their sources. But reducing the “Iliad” or “Beowulf” to big-screen action epics leaves contemporary audiences with a much diminished appreciation of their literary and cultural significance, and is symptomatic of the dumbed down, comic-book-and-video-game popularization of works that few anymore take the trouble to acquaint themselves with in their original form. (Shakespeare himself reworked classical material in plays like “Troilus and Cressida” and the Roman plays, but I’d be the last to begrudge him the right to do so. Robert Zemeckis, Wolfgang Petersen, and Zack Snyder have a ways to go to be considered in that league.)
fritzoid Premium Member about 14 years ago
Oh, don’t get me wrong. I don’t consider moderrnizations or ataptations to be substitutes for the source material. In the best of all possible worlds, a modern film with mass appeal which is based on classical or pre-contemporary materials will spark the interest of at least some modern audiences in things they would otherwise have missed. Someone who goes to see “Troy” simply to look at Brad Pitt might be inspired to read the “Iliad” (or at least become more familiar with it) when that person might otherwise have shunned it entirely. To use an example from my own experience, I know a woman who never would have crossed the street to see “Romeo and Juliet” who was inspired to change her mind by “Shakespeare In Love.” The same no doubt occurred when “West Side Story” fist appeared.
“Legends” are often merely history passed down through poets (classical histories even moreso). Homer wasn’t at Troy. The written versions of the Iliad and Odyssey aren’t even by Homer. Herodotus wasn’t at Thermopylae. I’ve read Shakespeare’s histories of English Kings, and I’ve read Geoffrey of Monmouth’s, and I’ll stick with Shakespeare’s. Mallory was retelling old stories of Arthur in his own way, and T.H. White retold Mallory in his own way. Hamlet was a legendary Danish King, whose “history” passed throgh Saxo Grammaticus and Belleforrest and some unknown Englishman before Shakespeare got it, and that Stoppard’s play is a masterpiece in its own right neither diminishes Shakespeare’s play nor erases it. “Sons of Anarchy” might lead to an increased modern interest in and familiarity with “Hamlet.” Is that a bad thing?
The movie “To Kill a Mockingbird” is a great movie, despite its divergences from the book, which is a great book. If an experience of one leads an audience to seek out the other, it’s win-win.
sirrom567 about 14 years ago
Agreed. If it’s really good, it’s really good whether it’s original or derivative. And a bad production can leech all the life out of even Shakespeare. Heck, I’d rather see Hollywood spend its millions on a mediocre adaptation of some timeless classic than just another slasher or disaster movie.
lonecat about 14 years ago
^ and ^^: Great conversation. And then part of the interest is the meaning which is added by the new work precisely because of the deviations from the original. So the meaning is not located in the single work, but in the interaction between the two.
sirrom567 about 14 years ago
Agreed. But the new work should also be able to stand entirely on its own, regardless of its sources. (All works of art are built upon what has gone before, in any case, even those that consciously attempt to deviate from or destroy their precedents.) If, hypothetically, it were the single item from a civilization to survive the extinction of that civilization, it would of necessity have to be judged on its own merits, even if its original origin were as nothing more than a footnote to some lost prototypical masterpiece.
fritzoid Premium Member about 14 years ago
Unfortunately, bad productions of Shakespeare are the norm. Everybody is so interested in revisionist “Hamlets” and “A Hamlet for TODAY!” that it never occurs to anybody that it’s nearly impossible to see an authentic “Hamlet” on the stage anymore. Contrariwise, the ones who at least attempt to do a “traditional” Shakespeare tend to treat it like a museum piece, and are so reverential that they forget that it’s also entertainment.
When I was in London a couple of years ago, I saw two productions at the replica Globe. No Hamlet, unfortunately, but I saw “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” done, as close as possible, in the way it would have been seen while the FIRST Elizabeth was on the throne (there was some artificial lighting, to allow evening performance, but no spotlights, microphones, proscenium, etc.). I laughed my BUTT off!
The other production I saw there was something called “A Shakespeare Party” by a travelling troupe called The Footsbarn Theatre. It was a revue, made up of Shakespearean-themed skits and songs and isolated scenes and speeches from the plays, all using effects and music and costumes that would have been available in 1600. Again, it was bloody marvelous. The woman who performed a solo version of Ophelia’s Mad Scene that put every other Ophelia I’ve ever seen to shame. They also did the “It is the nightingale/It is the lark” scene from “Romeo and Juliet” using puppets, and it was so beautiful I’m tearing up thinking about it even now…
And for something completely different, on my last night in town I saw a production of “The Revenger’s Tragedy” at the Royal National. This was done with the original text, but with sound and lighting effects, modern costume, modern music, everything to enhance the sex-and-violence aspects of the play. It, too, was bloody marvelous (accent on the “bloody”). The idea being that, if the Elizabethans and Jacobeans had had modern theatercraft at their disposal, they would have used it (Shakespeare included).
The Globe productions and the Royal National production took different approaches towards making 400-year old material accessible and entertaining, while still being true to the sources…
sirrom567 about 14 years ago
I’m pretty sure that if Shakespeare were alive today he would be a filmmaker.
(Aside: Can anyone tell me how to do italics?)
lonecat about 14 years ago
Italics? – just lean over a little bit – works for me. (I think there’s a style book for this site – I remember that someone mentioned it – but I’ve never looked for it.)
But seriously – sirrom – I think your scenario is perhaps too extreme to account for what actually happens in reading. (Though my own field – archaic Greek poetry – sometimes approaches the situation you describe).
Take parody as a limit case – without the original, the point is lost. I would argue that a lot of literature is sort of the same. Take Sartre’s The Flies, for instance – yes, it can be read on its own, but surely part of the meaning comes from the difference between his play and the Greek Orestes plays. Antigone also.
On the other hand, I’ve just been reading Paul and Virginia, which is clearly based on Daphnis and Chloe – and certainly everyone at the time realized the relation. But the editor of the Penguin edition either didn’t know or didn’t see a reason to mention the connection. Clearly the novel works even if you don’t know Daphnis and Chloe.
Or James M. Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice – I am absolutely sure that Cain intended a reference to Aeschylus’ Agamemnon, but I am also positive that very few readers get the reference. Again, it stands on its own. I do think there is an increase in meaning if you notice, however.
sirrom567 about 14 years ago
Certainly, the more memories – dare I say data? – you have stored, the more meanings you will discover, some of them not even intended consciously by the artist. And it’s definitely frustrating to watch or read a parody of something that is doubtless quite familiar to everybody else, and not get the joke.
fritzoid Premium Member about 14 years ago
To get italics, put an asterisk immediately before and after your text (no spaces).
For boldface, use double asterisks.
For bold italics, use triple asterisks.
There are a couple of ins and outs to learn (for instance, you can’t isolate single letters, and for lined verse you need your asterisks before and after each line), but you’ll figure those out pretty quickly.
There are other ways to do this too, I’ve heard, but that’s how I do it.
sirrom567 about 14 years ago
Most grateful, fritzoid.
fritzoid Premium Member about 14 years ago
Think nothing of it, sirrom.
edmondd about 14 years ago
Yeah Ted, either the government takes care of most of the industries and production, nationalizing them for the benefit of all, or we all should work for AIG.
Free markets should only be for the small stuff, but oil, gas, electricity, banks, for example, should all be nationalized.
I like this bold type font trick!
sirrom567 about 14 years ago
edmondd: To complete the ideal socialism paradigm, all those industries should be internationalized. Nation-states, like city-states and fiefdoms before them, have become counterproductive and ought to be obsolete.
lonecat about 14 years ago
sirrom: do you propose to regulate those industries in some way? How would you do it?
sirrom567 about 14 years ago
Don’t make my head hurt, lonecat! I’ll just answer with another question: Does regulating them at any level of government actually work nowadays?
On the other hand, the E.U. does have a large number of regulations that do seem to work across international lines. I suppose it’s really just a question of putting teeth into those regulations with an effective enforcement regime.
lonecat about 14 years ago
Thanks, sirrom, that clarifies your position helpfully. I didn’t mean to make your head hurt. You’ve been a pleasure to talk with.
sirrom567 about 14 years ago
The feeling’s mutual, lonecat. My head hurts anyway. Time for a new cartoon, I’d say.
lonecat about 14 years ago
^ You got your wish. But I’m not sure what they mean.