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John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1288
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, April 03, 2005 - 1:21 pm: | 
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OK, we need a name for this mystery caller who tipped off Shirley about Crashaw so she could feed the quote secretly to Mike so that it would look like he knew it before anyone else so that...
Well, I get lost at that point in the scenario, but it's fun nonetheless.
How about...
Quoteman!
That's a good name. Sort of a super hero with a library card or a collection of Crashaw's Complete Works tatooed on his chest. And a cape. And a really good cellular phone plan, of course.
Yes, "it's a librarian, no it's a lit professor, no it Quoteman! -- Secret tipster to the Ripper stars."
Meanwhile, Sir Robert casually contradicts his own posts, providing even more fun.
He writes to me:
"John, I make no pretense at understanding the motivations of anyone in Diary World."
But then he concludes that Mike must not have known the source of the quote all along because he didn't bring forward his copy of the Sphere book at the right time.
So on the one hand he pretends to know Mike's motivations for not producing the book when Robert thinks he should have, but on the other hand he announces he doesn't understand "anyone's" motivations.
Well, with logic like that, it's no wonder the Quoteman! scenario is the best he can come up with.
Lesson one in Diary World:
When in doubt, just make stuff up.
Crashaw in the Sphere Book, "tin matchbox empty" in the police report, the Poste House in Liverpool, the handwriting in a partially modern style, the complete lack of any verifiable provenance, and all the rest of the textual indications of a modern date of composition can all be easily ignored or danced around...
...if you're just willing to make stuff up.
Like Quoteman! for instance.
Shirley and Mike secretly conspiring together to pull of the illusion of Mike being the only one who could find the quote (for no reason whatseover apparently)...
Man, I gotta' hand it to people here, I would have never thought of that one.
Checking to see that it's not still April 1st,
--John (who now needs Quoteman! clipart) |
Sir Robert Anderson
Inspector
Username: Sirrobert
Post Number: 311
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, April 03, 2005 - 1:57 pm: |
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" then he concludes that Mike must not have known the source of the quote all along because he didn't bring forward his copy of the Sphere book at the right time. "
Ahem. Once again, you avoid my question: why didn't Mike say anything about the quote in July ? He didn't need to produce the book, just reference it. Or even reference Crashaw. One simple name and he gives his confession a great deal of credibility.
And once again, I am not saying Shirley and Mike "secretly conspired". I'm saying they talked about the Diary, and Shirley may well have brought the quote to his attention. Someone sure as heck did, because he didn't know about it in July of 1994.
And, finally: for someone that claims the academic credentials that you assert, you don't seem to know a heck of a lot about the depth of reference staff available at the world's largest research facilities. I have no idea what's what with the Liverpool library, other than they've got a copy of the Sphere book. But there is a small army of research staff at the New York Public Library, organized by discipline. Science, classical literature, periodicals, photographs - the list is endless and there's people with degrees up the ying yang to help you. Not to mention that the Diary received worldwide attention.
Not only is it not a reach, it's not even a stretch to say someone recognized the quote, and figured out where it could be found.
"he doesn't understand "anyone's" motivations. "
If you can get into the collective heads of everyone in Diary World, more power to you. You'll need to, because you are building your case using Mike Barrett as a foundation. I'd suggest calling up some reinforcements.
Sir Robert
"I only thought I knew"
SirRobertAnderson@gmail.com
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Chris Phillips
Chief Inspector
Username: Cgp100
Post Number: 798
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, April 03, 2005 - 6:09 pm: |
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Sir Robert
I asked how "someone" could have helped you to identify the Crashaw quotation at the New York Public Library.
Gee, Chris - I dunno. Maybe the small army of reference librarians at the NYPL might have something to do with it. Are you seriously asking this question?
... there is a small army of research staff at the New York Public Library, organized by discipline. Science, classical literature, periodicals, photographs - the list is endless and there's people with degrees up the ying yang to help you.
Yes, I am seriously asking it. How would it help them to have degrees, or to be organised by discipline? Of course, it would help if they had photographic memories, and between them knew the library's stock by heart, but even in the New York Public Library I suspect that's not the case.
How, specifically, could they have found the quotation, except by brute force - except by sitting down and reading tens, or more likely hundreds, of thousands of volumes looking for those five words?
I'm not being pedantic here - this is the whole point, and it seems you still don't get it.
And once again, I am not saying Shirley and Mike "secretly conspired". I'm saying they talked about the Diary, and Shirley may well have brought the quote to his attention.
So when you said originally that Shirley Harrison had "tipped him off", you meant that she had innocently mentioned to him the source of the quotation. And, presumably, that ever afterwards while the controversy raged over how on earth he could have identified the quotation, she concealed the fact that she was the source. And not only did she conceal it, but so did the enterprising reader who contacted her publishers with the source, and so did the publishers themselves.
And we are supposed to believe that Shirley Harrison concealed the source, despite the fact that this concealment provided one of the most damning pieces of evidence against the authenticity of the diary? Even though she has always been extremely eager to promote the authenticity of the diary.
With regard to what I said about libel, perhaps it's just as well the allegation comes as part of such a ludicrous package. If Shirley Harrison does see it, she'll probably be laughing too hard to take offence!
Chris Phillips
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John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1289
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, April 03, 2005 - 8:38 pm: |
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Laughing indeed, Chris. It's too priceless for words.
Shirley gets surreptitiously sent the identity of the quote by the mysterious and masked Quoteman! and she feeds it to Mike for reasons no one can explain so that Mike can claim to find the quote first.
Yes, that makes perfect sense.
Laughing indeed.
Anyway, here's some more fun.
Sir Robert says something about my credentials and then admits:
"I have no idea what's what with the Liverpool library, other than they've got a copy of the Sphere book."
Well, dear friend, perhaps you should learn. (That's part of the whole credentials thing, you know.) I'll tell you this -- their staff in no way compares to that of the entire NYPL. And they had more than one copy of the Sphere Book, by the way. It helps to know what you are talking about sometimes.
But that's beside the point.
Let me just say this:
FIVE WORDS.
That's all Mike had in his hand. FIVE WORDS. No context (other than a fake Ripper diary). No time frame, no explanation, no likely author.
FIVE WORDS, that's it.
Five words which turn out to be from the middle of a poem by a 17th century Catholic metaphysical poet -- and even from the middle of one of his poems that no one has ever found anthologized anywhere ever.
Except of course, there is the case of this particular passage, out of all of his work, which just happens to be cited in two books in the whole history of writing:
The diary and the Sphere Guide.
And we only know of one person in the whole history of the world who owned those two books.
Guess who?
Sir Robert,
You have absolutely no idea what Mike did nor did not know about the quote in July of 1994.
You have no way of knowing anything at all about that.
And if you think you know based on your observation that Mike did not behave in a logical fashion at that time, well then I hate to break it to you but...
Mike has NEVER behaved in a logical fashion.
Ever.
You should hear the tape I have.
So if you are trying to deduce what Mike knew when solely by noting Mike's curious behavior, you are hopelessly lost in a dark region of bad craziness and you will never escape, and in the end you will be forced to invent imaginary conspiracy theories and imaginary playmates like...
Quoteman! (Dum da da Dum Dum, Dum da da Dum Dum, Dum da da Dum Dum, Dmu da da Dum.....)*
It's getting goofy in here now.
Because when you can't account for all the textual evidence, the only thing left to do is...
Make stuff up.
Just another nutty day in Diary World,
--John
* Hum to the tune of Ride of the Valkyries as Quoteman! soars over the sad illiterates below who wouldn't be able to spot a five word phrase if they fell over it, let alone identify it. |
John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1290
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, April 03, 2005 - 9:01 pm: |
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Incidentally, tomorrow at some point Caroline Morris is going to come here and tell us that Shirley could have at least told Mike that the quote sounded like it was from an old poem written in English and that narrows down the books he would have to have looked in on the library shelves to find those five words considerably and she's going to tell us what it says on the spine of the Sphere Guide and how they appeared on those shelves and then she's going to try and argue that I have to rely on Mike's story about owning the Sphere Guide when I can't prove that he did.
So before you read all that, let me send you back to my post to Sir Robert posted above on Saturday, April 02, 2005 - 7:04 am, where I explain what actually happened and why I don't have to believe anything at all that Mike has ever said in order to come to the logical conclusion that he lied about this miracle.
Remember, Mike gave Shirley the line first, in a book he had, a fake diary.
That's why I wrote to Sir Robert:
"Let's say YOU gave ME the line. And then I asked you where it was from. And then you came back with this unlikely and amazing and miraculous ID, the incredible tale of once in a lifetime library luck.
And let's say you've done nothing but lie to me since I met you.
And now you identify a line you gave me that no one else knew and tell me the unlikeliest story imaginary about how you knew that and show me a book with the same line excerpted and cited in it just like it was when you gave it to me.
Now can you see why I would not believe in the miracle, a tale told by a known liar who was, after all, the supplier of the document that had the line in it himself and whose only explanation for how he knew where the line came from was an odds-defying story of a library miracle that defies all the library experience I've ever had or ever heard of?
It's just a ridiculous story, told by a ridiculous and irrational guy, and the logical, common sense conclusion is the very conclusion I jumped to when you identified the line I gave you originally. That you already recognized the line because you had seen it before and knew where it could be found.
But I guess that makes too much sense.
And notice, I did not have to believe anything at all that you might have told me for me to come to that rational and sensible conclusion.
The only reason I would conclude otherwise and believe the miraculous fairy-tale is if I really really wanted you to be telling me the truth for some reason and was wiling to put my common sense aside and buy the nonsense just so I could still, at all costs, believe the book you gave me might be old.
But I have too much respect for the realities of the world for that. I won't do it. I won't believe Mike's story (I don't have to believe any story he told or anything he has ever said to conclude from the events that he already knew the line). And if that makes me 'closed minded' or whatever, that's just fine.
Because at least my position is logical, does not rely on miracles, and makes simple sense.
That's all I'm saying."
So before she argues that I have to believe Mike's story about owning the Sphere Guide to make this case, please notice that I did not have to believe anything at all that Mike might have told anyone for me to come to that rational and sensible conclusion.
And, if you click on the link below, you will find a detailed response to her upcoming desperate attempt to keep the miracle story alive by somehow trying to reduce the odds.
http://casebook.org/cgi-bin/forum/show.cgi?tpc=4922&post=103866#POST103866
But you've seen all this before if you've read last August's posts like you were supposed to, before you turned off your computer and got the hell out of this morass of pure pointless repetition (and I'm including in that description both this post and the post that hasn't arrived yet, the one coming tomorrow from Caroline that will make all her arguments from last August all over again).
On the other hand, if she chooses to come and endorse the new Quoteman! theory of Sir Robert's, and put Shirley into the frame, things might really get to be fun around here.
Let's watch, shall we?
Looking forward to waking up tomorrow,
--John
(Message edited by omlor on April 03, 2005) |
Sir Robert Anderson
Inspector
Username: Sirrobert
Post Number: 312
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, April 03, 2005 - 9:26 pm: |
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"argue that I have to rely on Mike's story about owning the Sphere Guide "
Just curious, John - have you indeed read Mike's story about how he came into possession of the Sphere book and why he didn't produce it or cite it in July when he would have walked on fire to discredit the Diary?
I'm curious, because of the tales told in Diary World, that's up there with the best of them. Or are you not familiar with it?
Sir Robert
"I only thought I knew"
SirRobertAnderson@gmail.com
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John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1292
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 6:28 am: |
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Sir Robert,
I have read it, and fortunately I don't have to believe it, or anything at all that Mike has ever said, to come to the logical and sensible conclusion that he lied about the miracle of the Library. That's what the portion of my earlier post to you which I re-cited above demonstrates.
Now, if you still think the library staff identified the quote for him, try this. Walk into any library of your own choosing (including the NYPL even, if you'd like) and hand them the words "the star that ever glows" and ask them where it's from. Then tell them they can't use computers while they look. See what happens.
No, it was definitely Quoteman!, no doubt about it. That Shirley sure is a sneaky one.
Still waiting for the post to arrive that I know is coming, all the way from last August,
--John
(Message edited by omlor on April 04, 2005) |
Jeff Leahy
Sergeant
Username: Jeffl
Post Number: 46
Registered: 2-2005
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 8:09 am: |
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John
Tom Waite '9th & Hennepin'
Not that I know anything about Tom Waite but I think that the fact that I'm acting on a tip off is ment to be amusing..though I'm more than willing to collect the pint should the information prove correct.
I dont want to get bogged down in the detail about the five lines Barrett did or did not identify. If the Diary is a sophisticated hoax then surely who ever did create it should be able to identify any number of quotes and where they were taken from. The reel forger will have hundreds of such references not just one.
Who ever forged the diary went to considerable trouble to make it look like it was writen in Victorian hand writing but couldnt make the simple step of making it look like Maybricks. Why? I understand what your saying Donald but are we not forced to face the fact that this is a Hoax of some sophistication. And that making it in Maybricks hand would have been the most logical step given the rest of the effort the forger went to?
Almost everthing points to the fact that Mike Barrett was not cappable of producing the Maybrick diary and currently claims that he did not.
My natural curiousity therefore says Who did and why? If the motive was money should we be taking a closer look at those that stood to make the most money out of the forgery?
I'm afraid things do move rather quickly in Maybrick land for me. I'm out on location most of the week so probably wont catch up until next week. But all I can say is I still dont know who forged the diary and still following the threads and differant arguements as best I can.
I still dont buy Barrett did it on what I currently know. Happy week pondering.
Jeff
(PS yes I did mean 1987 yrros) |
John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1294
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 8:43 am: |
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Jeff,
It's Waits, not Waite. They are two different guys.
And more importantly, it wasn't "five lines" it was five WORDS. That's all Mike had. And one of the those five words was "of."
And there are, in fact, no other literary quotes in the diary to identify (unless you count the one from the document that was unavailable to the general public until modern times, of course).
And there are at least two possible explanations for the why the forgers used handwriting that looked nothing at all like the real James Maybrick's One is the explanation Don offered. The other is, they sucked.
The second explanation, by the way, also explains why they got the details of the murders wrong, why they got historical details wrong, why they mentioned a pub that did not even exist by that unique proper name until modern times, why they used a line from a police list that was not available to the public until modern times, why they used a handwriting style that included modern letter formations and all the rest of the stupidity in the text.
Yes, that one explanation accounts for all these textual difficulties.
And no other explanation ever has.
Interesting, that.
--John
PS: You are indeed behind. The pint was awarded to the creator of Quoteman! some time ago.
PPS: I know the August post about library shelves and who has to believe Mike about what is coming soon. Remember my explanation re-cited to Sir Robert above.
PPPS: Remember, I'm not saying Barrett "did" anything. Except lie.
(Message edited by omlor on April 04, 2005) |
Jeff Leahy
Sergeant
Username: Jeffl
Post Number: 48
Registered: 2-2005
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 9:00 am: |
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Does this mean I've missed me pint?..bugger.
Of course the anomilies in the diary point to the fact that it is a forgery. That is not the same thing as pointing to who, where and why it was forged.
I see that your five word argument is compeling but if as you beleive Mike Barrett forged the Diary then I beleive it fair to ask him to demonstrate this and give resonable proof. Surely more than the five words. For the real forger this would be easy surely?
Besides he now apparently claims he didn't forge it anyway?*^?
The textual difficulties dont point at barrett as Hoaxer, just that it was forged.
Jeff
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John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1295
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 9:06 am: |
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Hi Jeff,
Finally we agree on something. The textual difficulties themselves don't point to anyone as hoaxer. They just point over and over again to a modern hoaxer. See the list from August. If you can't find it, let me know and I'll post the link again.
See you later,
--John |
Jeff Leahy
Sergeant
Username: Jeffl
Post Number: 49
Registered: 2-2005
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 9:19 am: |
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I assume by modern Hoaxer you mean after 1987.
Its probable but I dont think on the evidence available its conclusive.
Only acurate dating of the diary will prove this for sure.
Jeff |
Jeff Leahy
Sergeant
Username: Jeffl
Post Number: 50
Registered: 2-2005
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 9:44 am: |
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I assume by modern Hoaxer you mean after 1987.
Its probable but I dont think on the evidence available its conclusive.
Only acurate dating of the diary will prove this for sure.
Jeff |
John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1296
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 9:48 am: |
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Hi Jeff,
"Tin matchbox empty" points to after 1987 or so, when the document became generally available and no old hoax scenario has ever come up with a believable scenario for its finding its way into the diary before that. The Poste House points to after the 1960s or so, when the name first appeared. Parts of the handwriting, as Baxendale noted, point to the sometime after the mid-20th century or so. The mistakes about the murders also point to modern Ripper books that make the very same ones being used, and of course the complete lack of any verifiable provenance for this book as having existed any time before the 1980s also should be noted. There's more, but that'll do for now, since we're still waiting to hear about all about the library miracle and the shelves and the spines and the odds and all the rest of the stuff we heard about last August from Caroline.
Anyway, I agree with the sentiment behind your call for accurate dating.
All the best,
--John |
John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1297
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 9:51 am: |
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One other thing.
I'm afraid I am no longer interested in discovering the secret identity of the hoaxer.
I want to discover the secret identity of Quoteman! now.
He's a far more mysterious and compelling figure, what with his vast literary knowledge and his ability to get secret word to Shirley and convince her to keep this secret for so long and all the rest.
Who WAS this guy?
THAT'S a real mystery worthy of the inquiring minds here in Diary World.
--John |
Jeff Leahy
Detective Sergeant
Username: Jeffl
Post Number: 51
Registered: 2-2005
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 10:23 am: |
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I seem to have come up in double.
Have I got this wrong John, I thought you were saying that Quoteman was Mike Barrett?
I'm afraid that I'm only really interested in the identity of the Hoaxer and WHEN for the purpose of my story. But if someone can prove Barrett fine.
Another thing that really bothers me. Why would the Hoaxer go to such lengths to disguise the writing as Victorian? Why go to such lengths to convince psychologuists about the writers mental state? and yet leave so many holes in more obvious areas (such as Maybricks hand writing?).
The mystery is surely a whole lot more perplexing than a straight forward hoax. If your looking for a modern hoaxer then it is a hoaxer with some ability and strange motivation.
Excuse my ignorance but what about the publisher that worked with barrett and went off with his wife? (Fel**an). Not sure if I can name names here.
Why so much trouble and so much neglect? It just dosnt add up.
Jeff
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Sir Robert Anderson
Inspector
Username: Sirrobert
Post Number: 313
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 10:36 am: |
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"No, it was definitely Quoteman! , no doubt about it. That Shirley sure is a sneaky one."
If your position was on firmer ground, instead of building your case around Mike Barrett (good luck!), you wouldn't need to distort my position.
My argument is built on several points.
1) Mike's explanation of how he came into possession of the Sphere book, and why he couldn't produce it until December of 1994, strikes me as complete and utter tripe. (You seem to agree on this point: "I have read it, and fortunately I don't have to believe it, or anything at all that Mike has ever said.....")
2) What's worse, he didn't even need to claim to have owned a copy in July 0f 1994; simply state that he nicked the quote from Crashaw. Instead, not a peep about Crashaw from him, despite widespread skepticism surrounding his confession.
3) The Diary was published worldwide, and you are arguing that someone, somewhere couldn't have recognized the source. And recognizing the quote, he contacted the publishers. No secret conspiracy, no subterfuge. Just scholarship. Harrison asks/tells Mike about it, and then he hunts down the quote at the Liverpool library, armed not with "5 words" but with "5 words and an author's name". And lo and behold, by DECEMBER of 1994, he's come up with a copy of the Sphere book, which he then eagerly offers up as proof he was the author of the hoax.
Of course, if he realizes how important the Sphere book is to his claims in December, one can only imagine how important it would have been in July. But oddly enough, he doesn't mention Crashaw, the quote or Sphere in July.
He couldn't, because he didn't know. Barrett didn't hoax the Diary.
Sir Robert
"I only thought I knew"
SirRobertAnderson@gmail.com
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John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1298
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 10:55 am: |
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Instead of arguing why Mike would or would not have done anything (which is a stupid and pointless thing to do, since Mike's behavior has never been really rational or explainable in logical terms), I'd rather return to this new Quoteman! theory Robert has just now once again advanced.
Let's look at the latest version of this super hero drama:
"The Diary was published worldwide, and you are arguing that someone, somewhere couldn't have recognized the source. And recognizing the quote, he contacted the publishers. No secret conspiracy, no subterfuge. Just scholarship. Harrison asks/tells Mike about it, and then he hunts down the quote at the Liverpool library, armed not with "5 words" but with "5 words and an author's name". And lo and behold, by DECEMBER of 1994, he's come up with a copy of the Sphere book, which he then eagerly offers up as proof he was the author of the hoax."
So check it out, some mysterious scholar somewhere calls Shirley Harrison or the publisher or someone and tells them the quote is from Crashaw's poem.
What does Shirley do?
She doesn't tell anyone about this call, doesn't tell us she knows the source of the quote, doesn't report this event in her account of her investigations, nothing. No, she tells Mike (without ever admitting to the world that she has done this) and then sends Mike to the library already knowing the source of the quote.
Why?
No one knows, since the effect in the end will be to make it look like Mike wrote the diary, something Shirley does NOT want.
Anyway, Mike is told the source of the quote and off he goes to the library knowing it's a line from Crashaw's poem and where does he go?
Not to Crashaw.
Excellent.
Yes, this is making more and more sense every moment.
I can't wait to see where it's going next.
Is everyone finding this new scenario as much fun as I am?
I hope Shirley is reading this.
All the best, from a delighted,
--John
PS: You have no way at all of knowing what Mike Barrett knew and when he knew it. Fortunately, I don't have to believe anything MIke says about anything to know he was lying (as usual) about the miracle. But I'm sure I'll be shortly corrected about that. |
Jeff Leahy
Detective Sergeant
Username: Jeffl
Post Number: 52
Registered: 2-2005
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 10:56 am: |
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Sorry John
I realize I'm not an expert but I've got to go with Sir Robert on this one.
Why didnt Barrett simply come out with the quote straight away if he did forge the diary. Who ever forged the diary new everything, every detail. Much time and effort went into producing it.
I think the quote means we should keep an open mind to the possibility that Barrett was the forger. At least that he was involved...hey purhaps the real forger is also Mr quoteman?
We still need to re-test and date the Diary.
Jeff |
Chris Phillips
Chief Inspector
Username: Cgp100
Post Number: 800
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 10:57 am: |
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Sir Robert
No secret conspiracy, no subterfuge. Just scholarship. Harrison asks/tells Mike about it, and then he hunts down the quote at the Liverpool library, armed not with "5 words" but with "5 words and an author's name".
OK. If you're persisting with this bizarre theory, please just answer the question you've been asked so many times - WHY would Shirley Harrison have wanted to do such a thing?
And if she had done it, how can you possibly consider that her subsequent silence during the debate about the question would amount to "scholarship" rather than "subterfuge"?
Chris Phillips
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Donald Souden
Inspector
Username: Supe
Post Number: 490
Registered: 10-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 11:27 am: |
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Jeff,
I am at a loss to understand why you think the diary hoax was so sophisticated because it certainly does not seem so to me.
A couple of weekends touring flea markets would certainly turn up a late-Victorian scrapbook. My local historical society regularly holds a workshop for pre-teens that teaches them how to make old inks and use old pens (even quill pens).
As for the diary's content, a few recent books and movies (indeed, it could have been a movie that keyed the whole hoax) would provide all the "factual" knowledge to produce the text. As for the handwriting, it could be cleverness, as I suggested, or, as John has suggested, simply sloppiness on the hoaxer's part.
Do understand, though, that for someone to forge a document the length of the diary in Maybrick's actual hand would be almost impossible and, as I wrote before, anyone that gifted would not waste time on a Maybrick confession.
As for the hoax's relative success . . . well the suspension of disbelief often works wonders. Look at the success of Ireland with his silly efforts simply because people wanted to believe there were more Shakespeare treasures to be enjoyed.
Don.
"He was so bad at foreign languages he needed subtitles to watch Marcel Marceau."
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Jennifer D. Pegg
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Jdpegg
Post Number: 2079
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 11:39 am: |
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For gods sake John i thought we werent going over this again!!
How he found the quote in the way described is quite quite possible - it's simple.
now if you want to discuss whether that means it happened thats another matter.
"All you need is positivity"
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Sir Robert Anderson
Inspector
Username: Sirrobert
Post Number: 314
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 11:50 am: |
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"OK. If you're persisting with this bizarre theory, please just answer the question you've been asked so many times - WHY would Shirley Harrison have wanted to do such a thing? "
Fascinating. I've answered the question before, but as it's not the answer you want, you act as if it's been ignored. And as for whether or not it's bizarre, I find the thought of Mike Barrett as the hoaxer the most bizarre of all.
Try to keep in mind here that for the moment we're not discussing whether or not the Diary is a modern hoax; we're talking about evidence that Barrett hoaxed the Diary. (Or was in on the grift.)
Shirley Harrison, like Caz, is interested in learning the truth about the Diary. Plenty of reasons for her to ask Mike about the quote. And I have no idea as to what exactly was said. Shirley, if you're reading this, and have a moment to respond, I'm curious as to your recollections of these discussions.
Sir Robert
"I only thought I knew"
SirRobertAnderson@gmail.com
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Jeff Leahy
Detective Sergeant
Username: Jeffl
Post Number: 53
Registered: 2-2005
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 12:14 pm: |
|
Hi Don
I beleive I've stated that putting the merorbilia book and ink together is the comparitively easy part of the Hoax. Although if I do ever get a programme of the ground its something I'd very much like to try for visual purposes if some of you are up for it?
My arguments for it being relatively sophisticated are based on my impressions re:
1. Handwriting experts have stated that effort had been made to discuise writing consistant with victorian era (this would require research and knowledge that hand writing varies from generation to generation)
2. Phycologuists have suggested this is the work of someone with pathalogical tendancies. Again research and considerable creative ability...could you create such a character?
3. Although the diary has some mistakes and crossing outs it is created by someone with some skill with pen and ink..If i'd done this they'd be smudges everywhere and beleive it or not I have a graphic degree and have worked with paper and ink.
Of course its possible the forger got lucky but I'm not convinced from what I've read or been told that Mike Barrett forged the diary. I beleive the only way you'll know WHEN is to test it properly and with any luck once you know WHEN you'll know WHO.
Of course the forged Shakespeare plays are interesting in that the motive was to impress his dad. Motives for Hoaxes are an interesting area...politics, love, properganda, a joke, but usually its about money.
If someone went to the trouble to make the writing look like it was in the hand of a victorian person, I'd say that was comparitively sophisticated thinking and execussion.
But perhaps it was just luck as you suggest. I must confess that I've not suddied it face to face.
Jeff |
Chris Phillips
Chief Inspector
Username: Cgp100
Post Number: 801
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 12:34 pm: |
|
Sir Robert
Fascinating. I've answered the question before, but as it's not the answer you want, you act as if it's been ignored.
Oh. The old "I have answered it - you must have missed it" one.
OK, I'll try again.
Why would Shirley Harrison, who has been most eager throughout to argue that the diary is genuine, secretly confide the source of the quotation to Mike Barrett, and why should she carry on keeping the secret when he claimed he had found it himself in Liverpool Library, and why should she carry on keeping the secret when everybody jumped on this as a strong indication that the diary was a modern hoax involving Barrett?
I'll say again that Harrison has always been eager to argue that the diary wasn't a hoax, but was genuine.
Now, if you really have an answer to that, please could you either give it to us now, or else post a link to where you posted it previously?
Chris Phillips
(Message edited by cgp100 on April 04, 2005)
(Message edited by cgp100 on April 04, 2005) |
John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1299
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 12:38 pm: |
|
Jeff,
You should review Dr. Baxendale's report again, especially the part on the handwriting that I cited for you above, because I think you've misunderstood what he's said about how well the hoaxers copied a period hand.
Also, you ask again:
"Why didnt Barrett simply come out with the quote straight away if he did forge the diary."
And I say again, Mike Barrett through this whole affair has time and time again failed to do the logical and common sense thing. His behavior has been nothing if not utterly erratic and unexplainable and unpredictable and deliberately perverse. I have a tape of him trying to answer simple questions that I can send you and you'll see exactly what I mean. So asking this sort of question is pointless and drawing conclusions about what Mike did or did not know based solely on what he did or did not do is completely impossible and doomed to consistent failure.
But that's not even the point.
The point is that Sir Robert just made this whole Quoteman! thing up. There is no evidence of any sort anywhere that it ever happened or that this guy ever existed. It's purely a figment of Robert's over active imagination Not only can he not explain why Shirley would want it to make it look like Mike found the quote rather than just tell everyone that she had been informed of the quote's location from someone else, he also has offered no reason for Shirley to hide the fact that she got this mysterious phone call from this new mysterious stranger during all the time she has written and told the story her work on this project. And he also can't explain why, if Mike already knew when he went to the library that the line was from Crashaw's poetry thanks to Quoteman!, he didn't just go to Crashaw's poetry in the library.
It's just a story, Jeff. Sir Robert made it up.
And I hope Shirley hears about these accusations so she at least has a chance to come here and defend herself against the charge that she has kept this Quoteman! tip secret for so long (and to no purpose) and that she has lied repeatedly about what Mike went to the library with from her.
Remember, I am not claiming that Mike forged the diary. I have always said the evidence needed to make that case does not exist.
I am claiming he lied about the miracle of the library and you don't need to believe anything he said to know that.
Also, of course, the most common sense explanation for how Sir Robert knew the Waits line remains the most common sense explanation for how Mike identified the Crashaw line that appeared in a book he originally gave to Shirley.
Think about this carefully, Jeff.
And Sir Robert, I've got to think someone should write to poor Shirley and tell her what's being said here. It's pretty bizarre.
I remain here in a land of made-up stuff, devised solely out of desperation and an inability to account for the many textual instances that indicate a modern composition and are as of yet inexplicable according to a still non-existent old hoax theory. And I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop, from last August.
Hi Caroline. Don't you love this new theory about Quoteman! and the mysterious phone call and Mike knowing the quote's source before he ever goes to the library? I know I do.
--John
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John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1300
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 12:43 pm: |
|
Please, at some point, someone just admit it.
This whole "Shirley got tipped off about the source of the Crashaw quote by the mysterious unnamed Quoteman! and told Mike the source of the quote before he even went to the library and then she never told anyone" story is really just an elaborate April Fool's joke, right?
It has to be.
I'm not really talking about this with someone who would be advancing this theory seriously.
Please tell me that.
Hoping against hope it's a joke,
--John |
Jeff Leahy
Detective Sergeant
Username: Jeffl
Post Number: 54
Registered: 2-2005
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 12:57 pm: |
|
Must dash but will give your post some thought later. I'm out pounding the beat at the Met archives, victoria, hammersmith and the odd power station in search of teh Stripper. Enough Maybrick land for one week. Have fun.
Jeff |
Donald Souden
Inspector
Username: Supe
Post Number: 491
Registered: 10-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 1:03 pm: |
|
Jeff,
could you create such a character?
Modesty is a virtue I generally honor, but what the hey . . . simple answer is yes, I'm sure I could. I am a writer, an author. I've written novels and short stories and along the way created, I am told, believable characters.
As for the opinions of some psychologists . . . well since some are regularly fooled and manipulated by people that laypeople instantly realize are frauds I would not put much stock in those statements. You, of course, may.
Actually, I did not find the persona revealed within the diary very convincing at all. This is based in part on my experience, when I was a parcticing historian, of reading a number of diaries and journals. But, I could well be wrong and for that matter perhaps the hoaxer was indeed a possessed of pathological tendencies -- I have no opinion on who was the hoaxer.
Well, it has finally stopped raining where I live (taking with it all the remaining snow) so I am off to enjoy the outdoors.
Don.
"He was so bad at foreign languages he needed subtitles to watch Marcel Marceau."
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John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1301
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 1:04 pm: |
|
Jeff,
Did you say "Hammersmith?"
Uh oh,
--John |
John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1302
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 1:06 pm: |
|
Excellent decision, Don.
I applaud it.
--John |
Sir Robert Anderson
Inspector
Username: Sirrobert
Post Number: 315
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 4:56 pm: |
|
"In less than three weeks, however, he sickened of fever, and died not without grave suspicion of having been poisoned. "
Oh, that's just too funny. Apparently our hoaxer had a refined sense of humor as well.
Wikipedia
Richard Crashaw
Richard Crashaw (c. 1613 - August 25, 1650), English poet, styled "the divine," was born in London.
He was the son of a strongly anti-papistical divine, Dr William Crashaw (1572-1626), who distinguished himself, even in those times, by the excessive acerbity of his writings against the Catholics. In spite of these opinions, however, he was attracted by Catholic devotion, for he translated several Latin hymns of the Jesuits. Richard Crashaw was originally put to school at Charterhouse, but in July 1631 he was admitted to Pembroke College, Cambridge, where he took the degree of B.A. in 1634. The publication of Herbert's Temple in 1633 seems to have finally determined the bias of his genius in favour of religious poetry, and next year he published his first book, Epigrammatum sacroruni liber, a volume of Latin verses.
In March 1636 he removed to Peterhouse, was made a fellow of that college in 1637, and proceeded M.A. in 1638. It was about this time that he made the acquaintance and secured the lasting friendship of Abraham Cowley. He was also on terms of intimacy with the Anglican monk Nicholas Ferrar, and frequently visited him at his religious house at Little Gidding. In 1641 he is said to have gone to Oxford, but only for a short time; for when in 1643 Cowley left Cambridge to seek a refuge at Oxford, Crashaw remained behind, and was forcibly ejected from his fellowship in 1644. In the confusion of the civil wars he escaped to France, where he finally embraced the Catholic religion, towards which he had long been tending.
During his exile his religious and secular poems were collected by an anonymous friend, and published under the title of Steps to the Temple and The Delights of the Muses, in one volume, in 1646. The first part includes the hymn to St Teresa and the version of Marini's Sospetto d'Herode. This same year Cowley found him in great destitution at Paris, and induced Queen Henrietta Maria to extend towards him what influence she still possessed. At her introduction he proceeded to Italy, where he became attendant to Cardinal Palotta at Rome. In 1648 he published two Latin hymns at Paris.
He remained until 1649 in the service of the cardinal, to whom he had a great personal attachment; but his retinue contained persons whose violent and licentious behaviour was a source of ceaseless vexation to the sensitive English mystic. At last his denunciation of their excesses became so public that the animosity of those persons was excited against him, and in. order to shield him from their revenge he was sent by the cardinal in 1650 to Loretto, where he was made a canon of the Holy House. In less than three weeks, however, he sickened of fever, and died not without grave suspicion of having been poisoned. He was buried in the Lady chapel at Loretto. A collection of his religious poems, entitled Carmen Deo nostro, was brought out in Paris in 1652, dedicated at the dead poet's desire to the faithful friend of his sufferings, the countess of Denbigh. The book is illustrated by thirteen engravings after Crashaw's own designs.
Crashaw excelled in all manner of graceful accomplishments; besides being an excellent Latinist and Hellenist, he had an intimate knowledge of Italian and Spanish; and his skill in music, painting and engraving was no less admired in his lifetime than his skill in poetry. Cowley memorialized him in an elegy that ranks among the very finest in our language, in which he, a Protestant, well expressed the feeling left on the minds of contemporaries by the character of the young Catholic poet:
"His faith, perhaps, in some nice tenets might
Be wrong; his life, I'm sure, was in the right:
And I, myself, a Catholic will be,
So far at least, dear saint, to pray to thee"
The poetry of Crashaw will be best appreciated by those who can with most success free themselves from the bondage of a traditional sense of the dignity of language. The custom of his age permitted the use of images and phrases which we now justly condemn as incongruous and unseemly, and the fervent fancy of Crashaw carried this licence to excess. At the same time his verse is studded with fiery beauties and sudden felicities of language, unsurpassed by any lyrist between his own time and Shelley's.
There is no religious poetry in English so full at once of gross and awkward images and imaginative touches of the most ethereal beauty. The temper of his intellect seems to have been delicate and weak, fiery and uncertain; he has a morbid, almost hysterical, passion about him, even when his ardour is most exquisitely expressed, and his adoring addresses to the saints have an effeminate falsetto that makes their ecstasy almost repulsive. The faults and beauties of his very peculiar style can be studied nowhere to more advantage than in the Hymn to Saint Teresa.
Among the secular poems of Crashaw the best are Music's Duel, which deals with that strife between the musician and the nightingale which has inspired so many poets, and Wishes to his supposed Mistress. In his latest sacred poems, included in the Carmen Deo nostro, sudden and eminent beauties are not wanting, but the mysticism has become more pronounced, and the ecclesiastical mannerism more harsh and repellent. The themes of Crashaw's verses are as distinct as possible from those of Shelley's, but it may, on the whole, be said that at his best moments he reminds the reader more closely of the author of Epipsychidion than of any earlier or later poet.
Crashaw's works were first collected, in one volume, in 1858 by WB Turnbull. In 1872 an edition, in 2 volumes, was printed for private subscription by the Rev. AB Grosart. A complete edition was edited (1904) for the Cambridge University Press by Mr AR Waller.
Reference
* This entry incorporates public domain text originally from the 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica.
Sir Robert
"I only thought I knew"
SirRobertAnderson@gmail.com
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John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1303
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 7:04 pm: |
|
And guess what?
I already knew all that. Having been married for a time to a scholar who has actually published on Crashaw specifically, I've been through the details of his life and work many times over. And I have even reported most of it, including the bibliographical data, on the old boards. You are largely just repeating info that's already appeared here. I know, because I posted some of it myself a long time ago.
Now then, where's this Quoteman! we've been hearing so much about and what does Shirley think of the fact that she's being accused of keeping such a secret? Surely this whole silly theory about her being tipped off by a mysterious phone call and telling Mike the source of the quote even before he headed to the library really IS an April Fool's Joke, isn't it? Please say it is, because I do want to be able to take you seriously at some point in the future, and if you keep pimping this silly fantasy about a literary superhero who keeps his identity a secret and tips off unsuspecting publishers and authors who then hide his existence from the world, I'm just not going the able to see your name without laughing.
Hoping you really are just kidding about all of this,
--John
PS: If Mike knew the quote was from this guy's poetry when he went to the library, why didn't he get it from this guy's poetry, eh? |
John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1304
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 7:22 pm: |
|
Check this out.
Since Sir Robert brings it up, doesn't anyone find it an amazing coincidence that this particular poem has apparently never been anthologized anywhere ever, and yet the line that just happens to turn up excerpted and cited in the diary is the same line (from this completely unanthologized poem) that just happens to be also excerpted and cited in a prose essay on a completely different poet (Herbert) and not excerpted and cited anywhere else except in that one other book -- the diary that Mike Barrett (the only guy who could identify the quote for everyone) happens to give to Shirley Harrison.
I mean, my lord, what are the odds of all of those things happening at the same time and all of them having nothing at all to do with one another?
Fascinated by some people's willingness to suspend disbelief,
--John
PS: Coleridge would be proud.
PPS: Speaking of the suspension of disbelief, we're still waiting for a repeat of that post from August about shelves and spines and odds and stories, unless Caroline would now like to endorse the new Quoteman! theory of Sir Robert's. I'm sure she finds it a convincing scenario indeed.
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Sir Robert Anderson
Inspector
Username: Sirrobert
Post Number: 316
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 8:05 pm: |
|
"And guess what?
I already knew all that."
Yes, yes - you already know all there is to be known, and all we mere mortals can but hope to follow in your footsteps.
"You are largely just repeating info that's already appeared here."
Amazing hubris. Especially from one who keep repeating the "Poste House" as a mantra.
Try this on for size: the 'fact' that Crashaw might have been poisoned to death may indicate a rather sophisticated sense of humor on the part of the Diarist. Not to mention a fair degree of scholasticism; after all, you've got to be an 'expert' to know these things.
So, two points fall from this.
1) Does Barrett strike you as that kind of sophisticated scholar? Has he evidenced that sort of wit?
2) If he was the hoaxer, why not state IN JULY OF 1994 just what we're kicking around: that the quote was from Crashaw, and that it's evidence of his sense of irony and boy oh boy didn't he fool everyone. IT WOULD HAVE PROVEN HIM THE HOAXER.
In July of 1994 he knew jack squat about Crashaw.
Sir Robert
"I only thought I knew"
SirRobertAnderson@gmail.com
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John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1305
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 8:36 pm: |
|
Sir Robert,
First, please tell you me you haven't abandoned the Quoteman! theory and reassure that this is just a temporary diversion. I really love that one and want you to keep at it.
Anyway, this is the sort of stuff I've seen here way too often. People find out that Crashaw's father once lived in Whitechapel or Crashaw died under mysterious circumstances back in the 17th century and for some reason they think the diarist must have known this or that it is somehow part of the hoax. But let's be clear, and stop just imagining things, shall we?
There is NOTHING in the diary at all about Crashaw, or his bio or his death or any of that other stuff. Nothing at all. There is no sign anywhere in the text that any writer, of any time, was aware of any of this stuff or that it featured any role at all in the production of this hoax.
This is pure fantasy replacing reading, its projection of the worst sort driven solely by desire and without a smidgen of actual textual support from the diary's own words behind it.
It's the sort of reading my students often do when they think they are being clever and they forget what the actual words on the actual page of the text they are supposed to be reading actually say.
It costs them dearly in my criticism classes, as it should also cost those who fantasize about such things and invoke them as a desperate ploy to somehow keep alive an old hoax theory that doesn't even exist.
It's just bad reading, wherein the desires of the readers replace what the actual words say -- they say nothing about any of this and there is no reason, based on anything written in the text, to think that any hoaxer would have to know or did know any of it. The diary contains five words of an unanthologized poem. That's all.
The rest of this silliness is just stage dressing produced by people who can't handle the textual evidence, who can't account for the "tin matchbox line" and the "Poste House" and the handwriting style and the lack of verifiable provenance and all the other textual indicators of a modern composition that really ARE IN THE BOOK. Instead they are forced to do this sort of thing. Trying so hard to create a connection where there is none anywhere in the text.
There is no evidence at all that the hoaxer either knew this stuff or would have had to be in any way sophisticated concerning either poetry or literature. Nothing in the actual writing in the diary indicates he was. And it's the actual writing in the diary that matters, remember?
As for Robert's old point number 2:
Mike Barrett through this whole affair has time and time again failed to do the logical and common sense thing. His behavior has been nothing if not utterly erratic and unexplainable and unpredictable and deliberately perverse. I have a tape of him trying to answer simple questions that I can send you and you'll see exactly what I mean. So asking this sort of question is pointless and drawing conclusions about what Mike did or did not know based solely on what he did or did not do is completely impossible and doomed to consistent failure.
Or have I already said that?
As we can see, Sir Robert knows nothing at all about what Mike might or not have known in July of 1994. That's why he had to invent Quoteman!
I do hope we'll be hearing about him again soon.
Carry on,
--John
PS: Watch the simple logic:
"..you've got to be an 'expert' to know these things."
Yes, but you certainly do NOT have to know these things to have written the words in the diary. So that tells us absolutely nothing at all.
It's conspiracy buff and UFO abduction logic.
Still, it was a nice try, even if the desperation can be felt for miles.
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Sir Robert Anderson
Inspector
Username: Sirrobert
Post Number: 317
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 10:35 pm: |
|
"Sir Robert knows nothing at all about what Mike might or not have known in July of 1994."
I make no pretense at being able to read Barrett's mind - after all, he's YOUR witness, not mine - but I sure as heck can read what he said in July of 1994. Or September. Or October. Or November.
I call your attention to "The Inside Story", pg. 143. On Sept. 30th, Barrett rings Feldman's assistant and says he's found the source of the quotation and is sitting with the book in front of him. He points out the poem actually says "O costly", not "Oh, costly" . (He neglects to point out the "death"/"death(s)" mistake, but we'll let that slide.)
Now, on 10/3/94 Shirley tells Skinner that she's just spoken to Mike, and Mike says he thinks "it's in The Sphere Companion, Vol 6".
Now, expert that you are John, do you think Mike just made a mistake in saying Vol. 6 , when it's Vol. 2, and he is trying to prove to the world he was the hoaxer? It seems like on Sept. 30th he had the book in front of him.
When he had a chance to conclusively prove that he was the hoaxer in July (or knew who the hoaxer was, close enough in my book), he failed miserably despite being blessed with perfect recall later that Fall. By the time November 7th rolled around, he'd realized that "Oh costly intercourse" could indeed prove him as the Diarist.
"It costs them dearly in my criticism classes, "
I shudder at the thought.
Maybrick was believed poisoned, Crashaw ditto. Crashaw lived in Whitechapel for a time, as you so helpfully point out. (Actually, "The Inside Story" credits Begg with highlighting that.) IRRESPECTIVE of when the Diary was hoaxed, I can see a hoaxer playing his funny little joke on his readers. Hardly a great leap of faith, and one with no bearing on the time frame of the Diary's creation. Not helpful to Mike's claims, though.
Sir Robert
"I only thought I knew"
SirRobertAnderson@gmail.com
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Chris Phillips
Chief Inspector
Username: Cgp100
Post Number: 802
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 05, 2005 - 3:47 am: |
|
Sir Robert
Just to remind you we're still waiting for your answer as to why Shirley Harrison should have behaved in the bizarre way you allege, wrecking her whole argument about the diary being genuine and putting her professional reputation at risk, should the unstable Barrett at any time reveal her role.
Sorry if I missed it the first time, but strangely everyone else seems to have missed it too!
Chris Phillips
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Caroline Anne Morris
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Caz
Post Number: 1626
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 05, 2005 - 4:27 am: |
|
Hi Sir Robert,
And of course, you will be told that no late Victorian non-Catholics would have a clue about Crashaw's poetry because it just wasn't in vogue then, and that certainly no respectable periodicals of the time would be urging their readers to sample the somewhat risque delights of this 17th century wordsmith.
You will be told this, but will it be by an expert who really knows, or will it be bluff and bluster coming from blissful and wishful ignorance? 
Hi Don,
A couple of weekends touring flea markets would certainly turn up a late-Victorian scrapbook.
Really? One with more than 63 blank pages?
How many Victorian scrapbooks, containing blank pages, can you recall actually seeing up for grabs? That seems a hell of a lot to me, one every fortnight.
Hi All,
I have no new info to add to the record as it stands regarding the Sphere book saga - I have seen no evidence of anyone ever confirming that Mike had his own Sphere vol.2 when Shirley suggested he do something constructive with his time, eg look in the library for the source of ‘o costly…’. At that point, if he had inside knowledge and could produce his vol.2, he should have appreciated the impact of revealing it. But Mike being Mike, who knows?
Instead of supporting his forgery claim, he comes up with a brand new claim - one that could only undermine his June 1994 story, already riddled with untruths - by announcing he has just found ‘o costly…’ in a library book. So much for his claim to have written the diary single-handed then. He even shares with Feldy’s secretary his flash of inspiration moment when he realises how useful this book will now be in supporting his forgery claim. And how right he was.
So just one problem: the only source for the belief that Mike owned a copy of the book (and would therefore have been able to check that the library had copies on the shelves before astonishing Feldy and Shirley) is Mike himself.
And Mike of course was also the source of the unverified Devereux provenances (initially claiming that his late pal gave him the diary and refused to say how he came by it; then later claiming Devereux was involved in the diary’s creation, along with the Barretts). So I can’t think why RJ would recommend that new researchers start from Nancy Steele’s testimony. How is that going to give fresh insight into the diary’s true origins? Devereux was useful to Mike because he was dead and couldn’t contradict any connection with the diary Mike chose to give him.
In short, there is no evidence that Devereux or his daughters even knew the diary existed when Mike first showed it to Doreen in April 1992, by which time Devereux had been dead for several months. Mike knows how he acquired the diary, but Mike, like Hilarious Belloc’s Matilda, is famous for telling such dreadful lies that I would seriously advise against assuming that any individual (or associates of that individual), who features in this saga as a result of one of Mike’s claims, had inside knowledge concerning the ‘when’, ‘who’ or ‘why’ (or indeed the ‘when not’ or ‘who didn’t’).
Hi Dale,
You say you are assuming Mike’s ‘moral scruples’ got the better of him in June 1994 and that he simply ‘owned up to it’.
But if moral scruples caused him to confess, he nevertheless failed to own up to anything useful, and what he did ‘own up to’ turned out to be untrue or impossible to verify, causing people a lot of extra work in the process.
The fact remains that, bizarre as it sounds, the only ones relying on Mike to have made one or two truthful claims along the way about the diary's origins (whether or not he was aware that they were truthful) are the modern hoax believers.
If Mike has yet to give a truthful account of how and when he acquired the diary, who else was involved, and what he really knows about its origins, if anything, I shouldn’t be a bit surprised.
Love,
Caz
X |
John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1306
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 05, 2005 - 7:30 am: |
|
And here we go...
First, let me note my sincere disappointment that Caroline has nothing at all to say about this new Quoteman! theory we've heard recently that has Shirley actually telling Mike the source of the quote before he goes to the library, because she's been tipped off by an anonymous superhero. Instead, she actually gives us a different story:
"I have seen no evidence of anyone ever confirming that Mike had his own Sphere vol.2 when Shirley suggested he do something constructive with his time, eg look in the library for the source of ‘o costly…’. "
But why would Shirley make such a suggestion if she already knew the source of 'o costly?'"
Perhaps Caroline or Robert would like to explain that.
Perhaps not.
Remember, Mike gave Shirley the quote before she gave it to him. Then he gave her its source.
By the way, she also says something about Mike's "claim to have written the diary single-handed." I'm not going to bother to go back and check, but my recollection of his confessions (dubious as those confessions are) is that he did NOT write it single-handed, but rather that there was at least a second hand in the house. In any case, using a book for reference would certainly not mean you didn't write the book single-handed(ly). I use reference articles and books in my professional writing all the time, but I would still say I wrote my work "single-handed" or by myself. So however you think Mike was claiming to have done it, this "so much for..." nonsense is just wrong. After all, we know the hoaxer used other texts in his creation. How? "TME"
And she seems also to have misunderstood RJ's comment. All he said was that one should return to Steele's testimony, not that it should be used to support Barrett's stories. And he's right. People should read again what she said, simply, and honestly, and they should read it with an open mind. They might be interested. I was.
And then there is this lovely bit of false logic:
"The fact remains that, bizarre as it sounds, the only ones relying on Mike to have made one or two truthful claims along the way about the diary's origins (whether or not he was aware that they were truthful) are the modern hoax believers."
Well, shucks, I shu 'nuff hope she don't mean li'l ole me. Hell maybe I ain't got any of that whatchacall ex-pee-teese or book learnin' bout any of that there poem writin' and readin' stuff (ya' know like one of them fancy doctor dee-grees in such like or nothin like that), but I shu 'nuff don' believe that there Barrett fella' 'bout nuttin'.
And I don't either. And I don't have to in order to make a clear and complete case for the text of the diary indicating a modern date of composition, which is what I have been claiming here all along.
In fact, directly contrary to Caroline's bullshit claim, I am a modern hoax theorist who thinks Barrett was lying about everything, INCLUDING the library miracle. It's she who has to argue (and hope against hope) the he might have been telling the truth. Otherwise, the old hoax theory is in serious trouble -- just like it is doomed if "tin matchbox empty" simply means "tin matchbox empty" or the Poste House simply means the Poste House or Baxendale has correctly described the handwriting or the lack of provenance is simply because there is no provenance or any one of a number of simple and logical things turn out to be true. No she needs not only to hope Mike was telling the truth about the miracle in the library, but also that each and every one of these things has some impossible amazing and unlikely coincidence to explain it. Otherwise, if just one of the simple and obvious and common sense explanations for such things turns out to be the right one, the old theory (which doesn't even exist yet) is instantly dead and buried.
Finally, Caroline insists again that has "seen no evidence of anyone ever confirming that Mike had his own Sphere vol.2..."
But if you read your August's posts, you know that there might well be just such a confirmation.
Of course, Caroline will explain that this too is suspect... She'd sort of have to, wouldn't she?
And we're right back where we were half a year ago, just as I predicted.
Isn't it amazing?
And to my friend Robert, who thinks his discovery about the death of a poet in the 1600s which is never even hinted at in the diary somehow indicates the hoaxer would have known such a thing, despite there being not a single word anywhere in the text itself that would allow him to conclude this (who needs actual words when you are reading, after all?), I offer my sympathies at your desperation. And, out of concern that you really are losing it (what with this silliness that relies only on your desire and nothing at all that's actually written in the text and your recent invention of Quoteman! out of thin air just to explain a miracle), I send you this link.
Here you go. Knock yourself out.
http://www.annexed.net/freedom/kenlin.html
Always happy to help,
--John
(Message edited by omlor on April 05, 2005) |
Sir Robert Anderson
Inspector
Username: Sirrobert
Post Number: 318
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 05, 2005 - 10:36 am: |
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"Just to remind you we're still waiting for your answer as to why Shirley Harrison should have behaved in the bizarre way you allege, wrecking her whole argument about the diary being genuine and putting her professional reputation at risk, should the unstable Barrett at any time reveal her role.
Sorry if I missed it the first time, but strangely everyone else seems to have missed it too! "
I recognize that for you and John, these "discussions" have little to do with either the Diary nor who hoaxed what. It's about your ability to dominate a message board.
If one creates a time line of Barrett's remarks in 1994, it becomes clear that his knowledge of the Crashaw quote and the Sphere guide became increasingly refined as the year progressed.
I am not suggesting that Shirley Harrison did anything odd or sneaky or surreptitious or unethical. She may believe the Diary is genuine, but I also believe she is interested in the truth more than advancing any particular point of view. I am simply saying that she and Mike had a lot of conversations about the Diary, and the mysterious quote. Somewhere, somehow, Mike learned about Crashaw and where "Sancta Maria Dolorum" could be found. HE DIDN'T KNOW SQUAT ABOUT IT WHEN HE FIRST "CONFESSED" TO BEING THE DIARIST.
Now if you want to place faith in "Quoteman" and a mysterious caller, feel free. I am simply suggesting that the party that discussed the Diary the most with Mike was Shirley Harrison, and it is my suggestion that perhaps these conversations were more informative for Mike than intended, or realized.
Hopefully someday Ms. Harrison will chime in here.
Sir Robert
"I only thought I knew"
SirRobertAnderson@gmail.com
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Chris Phillips
Chief Inspector
Username: Cgp100
Post Number: 805
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 05, 2005 - 12:00 pm: |
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Sir Robert
I recognize that for you and John, these "discussions" have little to do with either the Diary nor who hoaxed what. It's about your ability to dominate a message board.
I think you may be mixing us up with someone else there (!).
I am simply saying that she and Mike had a lot of conversations about the Diary, and the mysterious quote. Somewhere, somehow, Mike learned about Crashaw and where "Sancta Maria Dolorum" could be found.
...
I am simply suggesting that the party that discussed the Diary the most with Mike was Shirley Harrison, and it is my suggestion that perhaps these conversations were more informative for Mike than intended, or realized.
I take that as a wholesale retraction of your previous suggestion that the quotation was identified by a reader of the book, who contacted the publisher, who contacted Shirley Harrison, who "tipped off" Mike Barrett about the source of the quotation.
All I can say is that I think that's very sensible of you.
Chris Phillips
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John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1308
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 05, 2005 - 12:09 pm: |
|
Sir Robert writes, not about anyone else here, but about Chris Phillips and about me:
"I recognize that for you and John, these 'discussions' have little to do with either the Diary nor who hoaxed what. It's about your ability to dominate a message board."
Oh yeah. That's exactly what it's about for me. I don't care at all about whether people have actual, material or textual evidence for what they write here or whether they're just making things up purely out of their own desires and imagination. I don't care one whit what all the textual evidence in the diary points to or what the lines actually say or where else the references can be found or anything like that.
Nope. Not me.
I just wanna' "dominate a message board." That's been my life-long dream. When I was a small child, falling asleep at night and seeing that first star in the Diamine sky, I would close my eyes tight and wish hard, "please, first star I see tonight, one day, let me dominate a message board, especially one on a fake diary where the only thing people argue about is whether or not it's an old fake diary or a new fake diary." Yup. Those were my exact thoughts.
By the way whatever happened to the "James wrote it" crowd that stopped by for a minute or two a while back. Those people never seem to stick around.
Sir Robert, whether you realize it or not, by suggesting that Shirley got tipped off by a mysterious Quoteman! caller about where the line was from and then somehow informed Mike (for no imaginable reason that you can offer) before he went off to the library, you are also suggesting that she kept this fact a secret for all these years and years and that she has lied in print about what she knew when she sent Mike to the library (that is, that she did not know the source of the quote at that point). So unless you want to retract the whole fantastic joke of a Quoteman! theory (which not even Caroline will deign to touch), you are still putting her in the frame for at least keeping this odd secret and distorting what happened in her own accounts.
Incidentally, in case no one ever told you this in typing class...
Writing something in all capital letters does not make it true.
Especially when you have no way at all of knowing whether it is true or not.
But thanks for keeping this new masked and mysterious Quoteman! character with us at least in spirit, he is definitely one of my favorite denizens of Diary World now.
Up, up, and away,
--John
PS: Remember, everyone, Mike gave Shirley the quote first, and then he was the only one able to identify it. And one other thing, Sir Robert also writes: "Somewhere, somehow, Mike learned about Crashaw and where "Sancta Maria Dolorum" could be found." Well, yes, except that Mike never actually found this poem, now did he?
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John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1309
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 05, 2005 - 12:13 pm: |
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Hi Chris,
We cross-posted. You think that was a retraction? Well, maybe it was, in its own special way.
I hope so.
Although I'd be sad to see this theory go. It's delightful, and so illustrative of how things work in this part of the world.
Off to "dominate" on the golf course,
--John |
Jennifer D. Pegg
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Jdpegg
Post Number: 2082
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 05, 2005 - 12:19 pm: |
|
you guys crack me up!
"All you need is positivity"
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Mr Poster
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Saturday, April 02, 2005 - 4:07 am: |
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I'll meet you at Grace O'Malley's Irish Pub in St. Pete Beach next Wednesday night at 7 for your free pint.
Well if thats where you're meeting him, its not Guinness you'll be getting!
Regarding this Baxendale man. Is he the only one querying the "style" of writing?
If so, why is his opinion more trustworthy than any of the other isolated opinions/analyses that are ridiculed on a regular basis?
Example:
Israeli document expert states document was written by a person displaying all the signs of a sociopath.
Handwriting expert states handwriting not consistent with period.
Why is the second opinion anymore reliable than the first?
Mr Poster |
Donald Souden
Inspector
Username: Supe
Post Number: 492
Registered: 10-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 05, 2005 - 2:17 pm: |
|
Mr. Poster,
Israeli document expert states document was written by a person displaying all the signs of a sociopath.
There is something very wrong with that statement. A document examiner would not opine that something was written by a sociopath (or if he did, he would be out of his field of expertise). A graphologist might well make the statement and a psychologist might, but in either case such statements would be treated with some skepticism since those judgments are very often not reproduced by other "experts" in the respective fields.
Don.
"He was so bad at foreign languages he needed subtitles to watch Marcel Marceau."
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Donald Souden
Inspector
Username: Supe
Post Number: 493
Registered: 10-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 05, 2005 - 2:43 pm: |
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Caz,
I don't know what it is that Diary World does to you. Whenever you wander out of here your posts are almost always straightforward and insightful, but in DW they are just "inciteful."
A couple of weeks ago you took a line from one of my posts, ignored the rest of what I wrote and claimed it proved your point when in fact it did just the opposite. Since I'm in Diary World on a tourist visa I didn't bother responding.
Now, though, before my visa expires I must respond to your post about my suggesting a couple weekends at flea markets would yield a LVP scrapbook.
How many Victorian scrapbooks, containing blank pages, can you recall actually seeing up for grabs? That seems a hell of a lot to me, one every fortnight. [emphasis added]
No one has to find 26 LVP scrapbooks in a year -- they needed only to find one! Indeed, if no one is buying, it could be the same scrapbook up for grabs for months on end. But nice try at changing the argument by proposing unreasonable expectations.
As it is, a couple years ago I was going with a woman who haunted Bucks County flea markets and I actually came across two such items. I have no idea how many blank pages they had because I had not yet visited this crazy place called Diary World. I do recall, however, that one was totally blank and would not have required ripping out 40 odd pages. Moreover, even a late-modern hoaxer would have purchased such a scrapbook nearly two decades ago and I would guess that such items were more common the further back you go in time.
Incidentally, I have a near-mint guaranteed mid-1940s scrapbook available for anyone considering a "Black Dahlia" hoax confession in the future.
Don.
(Message edited by supe on April 05, 2005)
"He was so bad at foreign languages he needed subtitles to watch Marcel Marceau."
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John V. Omlor
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 1310
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 05, 2005 - 5:39 pm: |
|
Just a word of thanks to Don.
He hit the nail on the head with the handwriting response.
Dr. Baxendale was examining the document and reporting on the style of the handwriting in terms of period styles and the documented history of letter formations.
The other person was doing some sort of "mind reading based on handwriting" thing, suggesting that you can tell a lot about a person's personality just by how they write their letters.
One of these involves simple objective descriptions of lines on the page with reference to a historical record.
The other is performed in a booth at the State Fair for five dollars.
I was raised in Bucks County, incidentally.
All the best,
--John
(Message edited by omlor on April 05, 2005) |
Donald Souden
Inspector
Username: Supe
Post Number: 497
Registered: 10-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, April 05, 2005 - 6:03 pm: |
|
John,
A bit off-topic, but frankly Diary World could use a few digressions.
Since the woman I mentioned was not a Bucks County native, I won't hold you responsible and I'll even agree that some of the blame could be on my side. Still, it was a short-lived and unsatisfactory relationship. Worst thing for me was that while she had a tidy trust fund behind her and several other sources of revenue I can only dream of, she acted as if she were royalty. That is, she always traveled without cash and I was always left holding the bill.
For a free-lance writer that state of affairs cannot long endure -- nor did the affair.
Don.
"He was so bad at foreign languages he needed subtitles to watch Marcel Marceau."
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