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John V. Omlor
Detective Sergeant
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 121
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, September 11, 2003 - 7:58 am: |       |
Just to demonstrate how completely unknown Francis Thompson was in 1888, here's the story of his first published work, which appeared in that year. Thompson, while living on the street, "earning a few pence by selling matches and calling cabs, often famished, often cold, receiving occasional alms," had composed a few pieces of verse and prose.
"Having seen some numbers of a new Catholic magazine, 'Merry England', he sent these works to the editor, Mr. Wilfrid Meynell, in 1888, giving his address at a post-office. The manuscripts were pigeonholed for a short time, but when Mr. Meynell read them he lost no time in writing to the sender a welcoming letter which was returned from the post-office. The only way then to reach him was to publish the essay and the poem, so that the author might see them and disclose himself. He did see them, and wrote to the editor giving his address at a chemist's shop. Thither Mr. Meynell went, and was told that the poet owed a certain sum for opium, and was to be found hard by, selling matches. Having settled matters between the druggist and his client, Mr. Meynell wrote a pressing invitation to Thompson to call upon him. That day was the last of the poet's destitution. He was never again friendless or without food, clothing, shelter, or fire. The first step was to restore him to better health and to overcome the opium habit. A doctor's care, and some months at Storrington, Sussex, where he lived as a boarder at the Premonstratensian monastery, gave him a new hold upon life. It was there, entirely free temporarily from opium, that he began in earnest to write poetry."
It would be another few years before Thompson becomes known in any real way to the public as a poet.
By this time, however, the Ripper had already done his work, having had the opportunity to see only two small pieces by an unknown author in a new Catholic magazine.
No, Caz, I don't think any Ripper, in 1888, was learning about Crashaw from the works of Francis Thompson.
Bye,
--John |
John V. Omlor
Detective Sergeant
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 122
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, September 11, 2003 - 8:24 am: | |
Oh, and one more thing, because this is really absurd.
We're not talking about the works of Richard Crashaw, in any case.
We're talking about two lines, from one his lesser known works.
And we're talking about a poet who was demonstrably even more obscure in 1888, outside of a small specific circle of Catholic literature enthusiasts, than he is today. See the archive on the cd for clear evidence of this and a review of the literary history.
And, in case anyone has forgotten amidst all this smoke, we're talking about the the very same exact two lines from this obscure work by this lesser known poet that just happen to be excerpted and cited conveniently in the middle of an essay which appears in a literature text owned at the time by Mike Barrett, the guy who brought the diary forward.
--John
|
Christopher T George
Inspector
Username: Chrisg
Post Number: 325
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, September 11, 2003 - 1:01 pm: | |
Hi, RJ:
You wrote--
"[In] my analysis of the diary. . . I had gone through the tedious task of a line-by-line analysis, listing all the verifiable 'facts' that the [Diary] author would have needed to know about Maybrick & the Maybrick household. I forget now the exact number; it was relatively small. Something like 63 'facts.' Bobo's nickname, details of the will, Lowry, Maybrick's mother & father being buried in the same plot, etc."
Of course this might be entirely coincidence, R.J., but I was struck by the fact that you found "Something like 63 'facts'" -- which coincides with the 63-page length of the existing Diary as we know it.
I wonder if whomever wrote the Diary thought that "If I have one verifiable fact from James Maybrick's life for about every one page of the manuscript, it will more likely seem as if it was written by Maybrick."
We should therefore check the occurrence of these facts and see if they are about every page or so. My guess is that they are not clumped but do occur about every page. Is that possible? Have you already checked for such a correlation of fact(s) per page, R.J.? If such a pattern exists, it might be another example of the questionable nature of the document and an indication that it was likely "concocted" by someone pretending to be Maybrick and not written by the cotton merchant -- who would not need to seed the mix with allusions to his personal or business life but would do so more naturally and in possibly a more sporadic fashion, and probably in a clumped fashion.
Best regards
Chris George
|
Caroline Anne Morris
Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 336
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, September 11, 2003 - 1:21 pm: | |
Hi John,
Thanks for the info on Frank Thompson - that's why I asked, I thought there was a good chance you could help.
History and theology are different.
You don't say. It was also you who said 'Nice try Caz', suggesting that the spirits of the three men would be in different heavens and hells because of their different faiths while alive. 
We're not talking about the works of Richard Crashaw, in any case.
We're talking about two lines, from one his lesser known works.
You talk about what you want, and I'll talk about what I want. I merely wanted to know if you had an opinion on whether Crashaw's poetry was the sort of stuff that a serial killer could get a buzz out of if he were to read it. If you think the question absurd and/or irrelevant, fine, ignore it.
I didn't know this was a no-smoking zone, nor that honest debate has been, or ever could be, stifled in the way you suggest. I thought that as long as one sticks to the truth, any threats of the sort you keep hinting at so darkly must be empty.
But you learn something new every day. And if you don't care to engage in 'honest' debate, what does that make your whispers?
Love,
Caz |
Caroline Anne Morris
Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 337
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, September 11, 2003 - 1:28 pm: | |
Hi Chris,
You need more evidence that the diary was written by someone only pretending to be Maybrick?
You amaze me!
I'm going to have a little lie down. I've come over all faint.
Love,
Caz |
Christopher T George
Inspector
Username: Chrisg
Post Number: 326
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, September 11, 2003 - 1:33 pm: | |
Hi, Caz:
I will be right round with the arsenic smelling salts.
Chris |
R.J. Palmer
Inspector
Username: Rjpalmer
Post Number: 151
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, September 11, 2003 - 3:26 pm: | |
Chris--Hi. I can't recall the exact number of facts, it may have been only 55 or so. Since you're interested, I looked , but unfortunately I can only find one page of my original notes, having thrown most of them away. It seems to me there wasn't any discernable pattern (though I could be wrong). The diary grows rather rambling & abstract toward the end; more on the Ripper & funny little rhymes & less about the Maybrick household. There's quite a lot of specific information dropped in the first few pages.
The goal of the exercise was meant to be objective, but there were certain judgement calls that had to be made in regards to the diary, as the narrator is so often vague. For instance, the diarist writes
"The bitch has no inclination."
Seemingly, this could just be a throw-away line. But in my system, I had to give the diarist the benefit of the doubt. This simple phrase had to count in favor of 'inside information,' because, theoretically, there could be something in the historical record to show that Florie was a rabid nymphomaniac that demanded sex from Sir Jim every morning, noon & night. So, I had to find out whether or not the fact that Florie "had no inclination" was consistant with secondary sources. It didn't have to be true, mind you, only consistent. Actually, both Morland (p 208) and Ryan (28/32). mention that the couple quit sleeping together.
Of course, most everything was fairly straight forward. Maybrick has a son nicknamed Bobo, had cold hands from arsenic use, had a good friend named George (Davidson); Edwin travelled to America that winter; Florie was young "unlike me", etc.
While Caz & others might remain entirely unimpressed, I find it rather telling. If a genuinely old primary source came to light after 75+ years, one would think that it would contain something new that could be confirmed through research. Instead, we get just the same old information published in books written in the 1950s or 60s. Of course, the diarist could have known the same information by being James Maybrick aka Jack the Ripper or by reading contemporary news reports and letters and trial transcripts. It just seems mighty odd to me that if this was the case we don't get something "new." Of course, if someone could confirm the existance of a neighbor named Mrs. Hammersmith (not in Morland or Christie or Ryan) it would be far more impressive.
All the best.
|
John V. Omlor
Detective Sergeant
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 124
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, September 11, 2003 - 3:40 pm: | |
Caz,
You write:
"I didn't know this was a no-smoking zone, nor that honest debate has been, or ever could be, stifled in the way you suggest."
Then I guess you've never received in your mailbox the irrational personal threats of lawyers and formal "action" being brought against you for writing stuff here on the boards.
Trust me, putting up with such nonsense is not worth my time (or anyone else's), and it makes writing my thoughts about such things here a no-win proposition, regardless of the facts. And thus debate about certain issues is efficiently stifled.
Too bad,
--John
PS: Everyone else -- I almost forgot. The story gets better. Guess who is the first person to identify for everyone the source for those two unidentified, isolated, and obscure lines of poetry in the diary.
Yup.
And guess in what book he finds them conveniently excerpted.
Yup. |
John R. Fogarty
Sergeant
Username: Goryboy
Post Number: 43
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, September 11, 2003 - 4:10 pm: | |
John (O):
Good job, then, I say. When (not IF) the Diary is finally proved beyond all doubt to be a hoax, your literary sleuthing will be one of the reasons.
Also, hasn't anyone else noticed that the "author" of the alleged diary uses the personal pronoun "I" instead of "me" as a direct object -- just as Mike Barrett does?
From the Diary: "She reminded me of the whore. So young unlike I." (p. 241)
From Barrett's First Confession: "At about the same time as all this was being discussed by my wife and I."
From the Diary: "...I will treat them to the finest, the very finest, they deserve that at least from I." (p. 217)
From Barrett's Second Confession: "I made reference on Tape that the hatred between Ann Barrett and I must stop."
Another coincidence? I think not.
Also, note how blatantly the "author" of the alleged diary throws in known tidbits from the police reports: "her sweet scented breath" (Stride); "damnit the tin box was empty" (Eddowes), etc., and etc. No, this is obviously a forgery of recent vintage, and I take Barrett's word on that much, at least. He wrote it. Anne copied it out in longhand. Feldy ripped it off. Case (as P Cornwell would say) Closed.
Cheers,
John e-Rotten
(a.k.a., Goryboy) |
John V. Omlor
Detective Sergeant
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 125
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, September 11, 2003 - 4:21 pm: | |
Hey there, Gory.
Thanks, but just to be clear, I didn't find anything. I have a PhD in literature and I wouldn't have known where specifically to look for those two isolated, obscure lines which appear in the diary without any identifying context whatsoever.
But Mike Barrett found them!
And, yes, he "found" them conveniently excerpted in the middle of a prose essay inside a book that he also just happened to have a copy of at home!
Imagine that.
-John (who just loves this story) |
John R. Fogarty
Sergeant
Username: Goryboy
Post Number: 44
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, September 11, 2003 - 5:21 pm: | |
Ah, I see. Thanks for clearing that up for me, John. I didn't know it was Barrett himself who pointed out the lines. What a putz! Drink does that to a person, though, especially if they already have low self-esteem. ("Look what I found! And to prove it, look what else I found in my own house!") Yeeeesh.
CAZ: Absolutely it was written after 1988-89. The real Ripper would have made some reference to Martha Tabrum, if only to distinguish his killings from some other pretender to the throne. Also, before 1988, we didn't have the MJK autopsy, indicating her heart was missing. Only the real Ripper, or someone writing the diary after 1988-89, would have known that. But you already know all this; it's the minister preaching to the choir.
Barrett's forgery is simply too blatant; he tried too hard to incorporate information from police reports, inquest statements, etc -- some of which weren't published before 1988. Thus, it was either indeed written by the Ripper, or a recent hoax. I opt for the latter.
Finally, since the diary's language so closely mimicks that of the "Dear Boss" letter, which is in all likelihood a hoax, then the diary itself is also (in all likelikhood) a hoax.
Barrett was clever, oh so clever...but not clever enough ha ha.
Cheers,
John e-Rotten
(a.k.a., Goryboy) |
Christopher T George
Inspector
Username: Chrisg
Post Number: 327
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, September 12, 2003 - 9:03 am: | |
Hi, Goryboy:
Sorry but I don't think the construction "Anne and I" or "my wife and I" in Barrett's confessions to be similar to the Diary writer's "So young unlike I" (p. 241) or "...I will treat them to the finest, the very finest, they deserve that at least from I" (p. 217).
Both of those constructions in the diary are oddly worded and not at all akin to "XXX and I," instead of "me" as the direct object, which is extremely common. Consider the title of an article Christian Science Monitor of September 10, 2003: "Mel and I reached an understanding", the musical "The King and I," etc., etc. As you know, John, I am a Diary skeptic but I don't find your post persuasive that Mike Barrett's usage of "Anne and I" or "my wife and I" in any way proof or even an indication that Barrett wrote those passages in the Diary. Rather, I think that odd constructions in the Diary such as "So young unlike I" or "they deserve that at least from I" are indicative of someone trying to write the way they think a Victorian merchant such as James Maybrick would. It is thus, to my mind, merely mock Victorian language.
All the best
Chris
|
Martin Fido
Detective Sergeant
Username: Fido
Post Number: 147
Registered: 6-2003
| | Posted on Friday, September 12, 2003 - 10:13 am: | |
No, Caz. No serial killer would be likely to get a buzz out of Crashaw. Crashaw is one of England's very rare baroque extremists - (usually English baroque is like Wrenn or Handel or Milton: dignified rather than wild). But Crashaw is akin to Spanish baroque - El Greco or Gongora: extravagantly passionate and mannered, and so risky that he can slip into unintentional comedy or extreme tastelessness. Consider this stanza describing the tears of Mary Magdalene:
Every morning from hence
A brisk cherub something sips
Whose soft influence
Adds sweetness to his sweetest lips;
Then to his music: and his song
Tastes of his breakfast all day long.
And that's from one his his three or four best known, best liked, and most accessible poems!
Very few people today have a taste for this sort of poetry - and I'm sure James Maybrick wouldn't have given it a moment's attention. (Even Michael would have thought it silly stuff).
The actual line misquoted in the diary suggests that the BVM's broken heart and Jesus' death are intertwined to make something new and intensely precious: an enormously baroque conceit, that I'm sure meant nothing to the Barrett/s, who only saw in it the combined words "intercourse" and "death", (in the absence of the the rest of the poem and only a commentary by Christopher Ricks which won't have meant a thing to Mike - and precious little, I'd imagine to Ann). But to the diary's composer it looked appropriate wording for a serial killer to quote.
All the best,
Martin F |
John R. Fogarty
Sergeant
Username: Goryboy
Post Number: 45
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, September 12, 2003 - 11:45 am: | |
Hi, CTG:
Point taken. However, I must quibble with the example from the Christian Science Monitor: "Mel and I reached an understanding" is grammatically correct, the phrase "Mel and I" functioning as the subject of the sentence. Reverse it, however (as is our Diarist's wont), with the personal pronoun as the direct object, and you'd have "An understanding was reached by Mel and I," or "the hatred between Anne and I." True, these are common mistakes, as you aver. But Barrett makes them in the most eggregious way -- as does the Diarist.
Like you, I get the feeling our forger was trying to sound Victorian, thus ending his sentences with "I" as the direct object. It's rather like sticking up one's pinkie finger while sipping tea, a faux pas committed by the ignorant in an attempt to seem posh.
Still, I find the grammatic coincidences between Barrett's various confessions and the Diary somewhat glaring. I'm convinced Barrett wrote the thing, with Anne transcribing it in longhand for him.
Cheers,
John e-Rotten
(a.k.a., Goryboy) |
Caroline Anne Morris
Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 341
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, September 12, 2003 - 1:04 pm: | |
Hi Goryboy,
Others may be happy to watch you settle for this dead end, but I think it’s only fair to warn you. If you believe Mike Barrett wrote the diary, I can only assume that you have a lot more reading to do on the subject, including all the information contained in the book I’ve just co-written with Seth and Keith. Melvin Harris, for one, is in no doubt whatsoever that Mike did no such thing. But if, when you have all the facts to hand, you still believe ‘absolutely’ that the diary was written by Mike and/or Anne, I’m afraid I will have to leave you in your dead end.
It’s also only fair to mention in passing that there is really nothing to suggest Mike knew where the lines of poetry came from until the end of September 1994, three months after his initial ‘confession’. I rarely offer an opinion, preferring to challenge others if they claim to be certain of something that the facts don’t appear to support. But in this case I’ll make an exception.
I don’t think Mike Barrett had to be clever to get certain people to believe he was involved in forgery. The circumstances were near-perfect for him to convince some of the cleverest people around with a minimum of effort and as much piffle as he could dream up. Those who demand proof just to confirm what seems bleedin’ obvious to others were to be disappointed that no amount of effort on Mike’s part could deliver the goods.
Does it not even give you pause, Gory, that had your solution been the right one, rather than just the obvious one, others would have thought of it way back in 1993, and the millions of words written on the subject ever since – many of them by very clever people who can offer no such easy solution – would not need to have been written?
Love,
Caz
|
Caroline Anne Morris
Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 342
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, September 12, 2003 - 1:24 pm: | |
Hi Martin,
Good to see you and thanks for the interesting Crashaw info. If it were not for so many other factors in this whole merry saga, I'd have little difficulty accepting that the little faker lifted the Crashaw lines from Mike's Sphere book and plopped them into the diary at what was thought a suitable point. But since I cannot accept on the currently available information that Mike knew where to put his hand on the lines when a modern forger would have been busily at work composing his 'masterpiece', it makes things a whole lot more tricky than that.
By the way, I am not arguing that Maybrick was a fan of Crashaw, or wrote the diary, or was the ripper, and only wondered if the faker - as it absolutely wasn't Mike (sorry, Goryboy) - was aware of some of the more gory imagery that I thought Crashaw was capable of. In the paragraph immediately preceding the quote, for instance, our faker writes: 'I keep seeing blood pouring from the bitches', and: 'Damn him for creating them', and: 'See if their eyes pop'. It just seems odd that after all this heavy stuff he/she decides it would spice things up to introduce the words intercourse and death! Spice things up? More like reduce it in an instant to the most basic level.
Love,
Caz
|
Caroline Anne Morris
Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 343
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, September 12, 2003 - 1:52 pm: | |
Hi John (O),
Then I guess you've never received in your mailbox the irrational personal threats of lawyers and formal "action" being brought against you for writing stuff here on the boards.
Of course not, John. I prefer to write stuff on the boards that won’t leave me vulnerable in law.
If you always come to the boards equipped with the facts to back up what you want to write about, you need never feel vulnerable or stifled. 'Honest' debate and the truth can't be stifled, John. But everyone has the right to be protected from stuff that falls short.
Love,
Caz
|
Ally
Detective Sergeant
Username: Ally
Post Number: 63
Registered: 4-2003
| | Posted on Friday, September 12, 2003 - 3:34 pm: | |
What a sanctimonious pile of manure. People on this board who consider themselves to be more important than they actually are, consistently yell and threaten lawsuit at any possible slight, real or imagined, either to drum up interest in their lackluster product or to prop up their fragile ego. Facts have nothing to do with it and rarely enter into it.
Any person who has to resort to a lawsuit to defend their good name probably doesn't have one to begin with. People of real reputation don’t need lawyers to defend it. |
Martin Fido
Detective Sergeant
Username: Fido
Post Number: 148
Registered: 6-2003
| | Posted on Friday, September 12, 2003 - 5:09 pm: | |
Hi Caz -
Oh, yes: Crashaw's tastelessness can be very gory. He has a repellent epigram on the BVM's breasts as the blessed teats that suckled Jesus, which concludes, referring to the wound in Christ's side - (and I quote from memory) -
He'll have his teat ere long - a bloody one!
The Mother then shall suck the Son.
Yuk!
(And, not wishing to pick a quarrel or anything, but I have read your book carefully and enjoyed it very much, but it didn't come anywhere near convincing me that the Barretts couldn't have forged the diary. I only offer this lest anyone reading your postings and not the book might conclude that their innocence has been proved. I'm not, of course, suggesting that it has been disproved. But I don't think that the cloud of suspicion inevitably hanging over them in preference to anyone else has come anywhere near being lifted. Bonesy's observations and opinions don't get quite as much of an innings in the book as I'd have thought useful).
All the best,
Martin F |
Caroline Anne Morris
Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 347
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, September 12, 2003 - 5:54 pm: | |
Hi Ally,
I don't know anyone 'on this board' who has 'consistently' yelled or threatened lawsuit. I do know that John has been reduced to whispers because facts didn't enter into what he wanted to write.
I wonder why this isn't taken to email with whoever John has a problem with.
Love,
Caz
|
Caroline Anne Morris
Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 348
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, September 12, 2003 - 6:19 pm: | |
Hi Martin,
That's fine. In the end we will inevitably be left to form our own conclusions about the Barretts' roles in bringing the diary forward. I firmly believe no one will ever prove either of them helped write it, but I can't expect everyone to feel this way.
Love,
Caz
|
John V. Omlor
Detective Sergeant
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 126
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, September 12, 2003 - 7:32 pm: | |
Bunk, Caz.
You write:
"I do know that John has been reduced to whispers because facts didn't enter into what he wanted to write."
But this is ridiculous nonsense and you "know" no such thing.
I have reduced myself to whispers because saying the truth or even what I believe to be the truth and what I believe the evidence shows to be the truth brings me only irrational threats of lawyers and court proceedings that are simply not worth my time or energy since none of this really matters all that much.
And I have had my say via e-mail and will have no further correspondence with any of the parties involved, on sensible and solid advice from my own legal council, who constantly reminds me not to engage with those whose reactions are so out of proportion to the situation as to be simply a waste of my time.
I still have the relevant mail. I have no intention of getting dragged into that slime again over such a trifle as the diary. It's simply not worth it, despite the facts.
Neither, I now think, is discussing such a thing with you, someone who obviously enjoys making excuses for such irrational and out of all proportion behavior. (No wonder you also manage to find excuses for the presence of the obscure lines from Crashaw that only Mike Barrett could identify.)
See, as I told you before Gory-Boy, there's simply no fighting the desire not to know.
Hi Martin,
I hope you are enjoying classes. I am.
And I suspect we both know that the presence of those two lines in both the Ricks' essay and the diary is simply too much of a "coincidence."
I'm out of here. The same old nonsense is beginning to stink again and I remember why I stayed away from here for so long. It's become an unpleasant topic that is routinely discussed in unpleasant ways.
Bye,
--John
|
Martin Fido
Detective Sergeant
Username: Fido
Post Number: 149
Registered: 6-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, September 13, 2003 - 7:47 am: | |
Hi Caz!
Keith points out to me that my comment on Bonesy's views might be read as suggesting that your book suppresses information in the interest of giving a mild pro-Barretts slant. May I say immediately that I KNOW this is not the case: limitations of space obviously dictated the summarization and excision of a good many incidents and opinions, and I might (if arguing about something different) have noted the omission of Caroline Barrett's alleged evidence (before she was quite properly shielded from intrusive enquiries) that she actually remembered her dad coming home with the paper parcel and expressing bewilderment when he unwrapped it to find the diary. Coming from a little girl who did not appear to enquirers to have been coached - (Martin Howells and Paul Begg, as well as Feldy, I believe) - this is remarkably strong evidence for the unlikely Devereux story. Like the scientific evidence on the watch, this is a very difficult pill for those of us to swallow who still think the simplest and most obvious explanations of the Maybrickiana appearances are likely to be true.
Hi John!
Obviously there's been some nasty dirt going on which I've missed. But threats of legal action have in the past played very dirty roles indeed in the disputes over the diary, and those interested purely in honest debate - (I include Caz and Keith, not to mention Shirley under that head: I don't know Seth, but I'm sure he must be charged with innocence by association!) - may find themselves playing in the foreground of quite unseemly activity initiated by others.
Of course I agree over Crashaw. Oddly, when I first heard that "costly intercourse" had been identified as his work, my immediate reaction (as I told Shirley) was that it let the Barretts right off the hook, as they were manifestly incapable of reading and quoting from him. It was only when one learned that Mike owned the Sphere book, that one had yet another transparently obvious pointer.
Am loving term, as usual. (I'm a much more comitted and competent teacher than I am a writer and researcher.) This semester I appear to have one student who thinks she's a witch, and another who thinks drinking coffee is sinful! A wonderful background for examining Screwtape and Satan and Mephistopholis and Mephistopheles and Gil-Martin and Auld Clootie and Woland, Behemoth & Korovyev!
Do you ever attend MLA conventions? I'm giving thought to resuming hitting them occasionally: I used to attend regularly when I was in the West Indies, to keep up with what was going on (i.e. for the conference and not the cattle market).
All the best,
Martin F |
RosemaryO'Ryan
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Thursday, September 11, 2003 - 5:44 pm: | |
Dear John,
I have a copy too!
Dear Goryboy,
So its a hoax. Prove it!
Rosey :-) |
John V. Omlor
Detective Sergeant
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 127
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, September 13, 2003 - 8:48 am: | |
Hi Martin,
"It was only when one learned that Mike owned the Sphere book, that one had yet another transparently obvious pointer."
Yup. And when, added to that, I learned that it was Mike who was the first to identify the source of the quote for everyone; and that he did so by just happening to stumble on it in the middle of a prose essay in the middle of a copy of that very same book, it was too much. I know, as I'm sure you do, what would have been involved, in the pre-google days, in actually locating two obscure, unidentified, slightly mis-transcribed lines of poetry with no historical, authorial, or literary context whatsoever accompanying their use.
I can tell you all about the legal nonsense I was threatened with another time (and even send you the sad and silly mail I was sent).
And of course such threats do have a stifling effect on debate regardless of the facts because, well, to be blunt, some of us actually have lives. And consequently, even if we were absolutely certain about everything we ever wrote and had indisputable facts to support it all, the idea of spending serious time with lawyers and in courtrooms over something as silly as all of this is utterly ridiculous. It's not worth the energy. The diary, for most of us, is a bad joke, and this is only an amusement. So regardless of the "facts," there would be no reason to engage with those whose first response is an irrational and over-the-top series of threats to prosecute or bring legal "action" over words written here.
On a more pleasant note, yes, I too used to go to all the MLA conferences. But I now have a job I love and work I love and a boss I love and a program I love and so, unless it happens to be in a city that I feel like visiting for other less scholarly purposes, I generally spend that week between Christmas and New Years at home and with family nowadays. A very close friend, however, is one of those hard workers who sits on one search committee after another and so is at all of the conferences, interviewing people non-stop. It is dizzying and, too often, a much too pressurized world for me. I do, however, still go to smaller conferences in my field -- especially theory ones -- because I like the discussions and hearing the latest stuff.
My one student story so far this semester:
The first day of class this term a colleague from our Philosophy department walks up and introduces me to the young lady at his side. A small, pale girl with sandy, blond hair and a perpetual downward glance. She is his daughter. He tells me that she'll be in both of my classes this term (a novels class on madness, art, and obsession, and an epistemology course). He mentions that this is her first semester enrolled as a full time student at the university.
She is thirteen years old.
She turns out to be the only one in either section who has already read two of the novels I'll be teaching -- Crime and Punishment and Love in the Time of Cholera. In the other class, she's already finished The Republic before we start.
After the first class, I ask her if this is strange for her, being among all the big kids. No, she says, she sat in on a course here last year (when she was twelve). I ask her which class, and she says, quietly, "Advanced Japanese."
I'm looking forward to the rest of the term.
Have a great week and enjoy the work.
All the best,
--John |
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