An open thread, where at your weekend leisure, you can discuss anything you like.
Life, Culture and Politics from BrisVegas
Larvatus Prodeo is an Australian group blog which discusses politics, sociology, culture, life, religion and science from a left of centre perspective. more»
» SUBSCRIBE to LP updates.
∞
Wow, six whole hours without a “frist”. Is there a big holiday in Australia, or should one be worried?
I’m gonna skip the rituals and go straight to substance. This past week I was reading Joan Acocella’s marvelous new essay collection “28 Artists and Two Saints,” and the entry on Marguerite Yourcenar inspired me to go back to her masterpiece, “Memoirs of Hadrian”.
Now I know from casual surveillance here, that there are quite a few LPers who, like me, sort of regard “The Once and Future King” as a kind of threshhold work, a rite of passage beyond literary childhood (last stop, LOTR! Everyone off the train!) and the first step (TH White, I mean) into literary adulthood. It seems to me upon re-reading “Hadrian” that Yourcenar deserves more popular support as a canonical second step beyond White, along the Via Literaria Not-fucking-aroundica. Here for instance are some choice “getting-of-wisdom” bits within a 3-page span…
“I have often reflected upon the error that we commit in supposing that a man or a family necessarily share in the ideas or events of the century in which they happen to exist.”
“The true birthplace is that wherein for the first time one looks intelligently upon oneself; my first homelands have been books…”
And this one of particular interest to many LP denizens:
“Grammar, with its mixture of logical rule and arbitrary usage, proposes to a young mind a foretaste of what will be offered to him later on by law and ethics, those sciences of human conduct, and by all the systems wherein Man has codified his instinctive experience.”
It’s part of Yourcenar’s weird genius that she gets you to think you’re hearing the voice of the authentic Genius of Rome (and it’s partly true, given how carefully she researched the book); but more often than not, what you’re really getting is the Genius of Mme. Yourcenar.
Buy the book, and give it to a bright 16-year-old for whom you have high hopes.
Whoops, Due Diligence Dept. —
(Enter chorus, singing and tap-dancing.)
CHORUS: (sing, to the tune of “Letters! We get letters!”)
Diligence!
We do diligence!
We do our utmost to pursue
And to construe
All proper vigilance!
…Apropos that last para above, where I said Give this book to a bright teenager, well obviously, read it yourself first and use your judgement in that regard.
It’s set in ancient Rome, after all, and so it includes lots of… Roman, um, stuff.
Raise your hand if you had to sneak watching “I, Claudius” on PBS when you wuz a kid, cuz of the naughty parts.
jpz,
Watched I, Claudius in one sitting on video.
Remember reading Memoirs of Hadrian years ago. Can’t remember much, except I know I liked it a lot and was very impressed. But even way back then I was a bit of a history head, so I may not have been exactly a normal yoof.
Went to see The Duchess yesterday. A bit slow at the beginning, but as the film progressed it became rivettingly gripping. There are a number of variations from the biography, especially in regard to Charles Grey. And I was amazed how they missed the whole Regency Crisis, and how Prinny didn’t appear even once. He’s quite a major character in the bio. But you can never have everything in a film. (Unless, it seems, its Baz Lurhman’s Australia.
Reading Peter Martin’s bio of Samuel Johnsom. Though its highly enjoyable it still doesn’t shake my opinion that Johnson was one of the most unpleasant characters in the history of English literature, a lazy self-promoting fake, etc, etc. And I have read Johnson’s bio by Boswell, Johnson’s Lives of the Poets,(some of which are brilliant and others, unimpressive) Rasselas, some of his poetry, and glanced at his Dictionary.Though I haven’t read the Rambler essays. A fascinating if highly unlikeable, puffed-up charlatan..
Off to the Dunkeld races and for the first time the 10,000 odd people must buy their piss on course. One can only hope they’ve got more than one bar! Last year our bus had 60 people and 60 full Eskys, so we go from $1.50 a drink to $4.00. The Race Club is blaming the licensing mob. Dodgy. Cameras at the ready for the estimated 6pm return at the Halls Gap pub. being a non-punter I shouldn’t lose too much. Adios!
Raise your hand if you had to sneak watching “I, Claudius” on PBS when you wuz a kid, cuz of the naughty parts.
i asked my dad what an orgy was after reading a bunch of asterix books one day, i think i was about 11, he explained it as a type of party. a few days later he woke me up in what felt like the middle of the night to watch Fellini’s Satyricon. i had some good stories to tell at school that week.
Alan Garner’s Red Shift is good 15-16 year old fodder with Roman transgressions in all their glory. due dilligance as outlined above is recommended.
Thanks for the Yourcenar tip JPZ
Scene twenty minutes ago; rather scared wife and two angry Boarder Collies with very large Brown snake on back lawn near water tank.,near back door.
Locked dogs and wife in house, snake slides under tank to lie with garden hoses,attend to snake , release wife and dogs, wife to buy new garden hose next trip to town..:).
GAAAAHHHHHH
The whole reality TV thing has been discussed and discussed, but one is still left to wonder why they allow such emotionally fragile people to be humiliated for the all the world to see. One does have to allow for choice, but the woman who took her own life in the vicinity of Paula Abdul’s home was clearing both troubled and lacking in musical talent. For both these reasons, she should never have got to the stage where she would have been on national TV.
While i am thinking about books, i want to proclaim the Neal Stephenson’s Anathem is a corker, that rarest of books that had me thinking, about two thirds thro, ‘Oh so this is just the first in a set’ and then wraps itself up nice and neat.
I, Claudius was great; but Seutonius is a better read. “Read Seutonius, see Graves” was my students’ opinion, and I agree.
For the kid who read everything inc Conrad ( but not LDoPompeii & Hereward) my rite of passage was TS Eliot; initially “Hollow Men” then “Wasteland” finally “Four Quartets”. Faber’s “Wasteland+” and “4 Quartets’ go OS on the plane with me; probably because they help me appreciate
” … past experience revived in the meaning
Is not the experience of one life only
But of many generations …”
I’m not a great fiction (esp post-WW II fiction) reader & prefer it strictly escapist. I prefer my D & Ms in poetry, or tucking into Marcus Aurelius.
Yeah I know … weird.
Holy Shit! Another meddlesome priest.
“A priest at a South Carolina Roman Catholic church says his parishioners shouldn’t take Holy Communion if they voted for Barack Obama because of the Democrat’s stance on abortion.”
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/11/14/national/main4603110.shtml
As a youngster, my favorite book in the library was an illustrated version of the Iliad and the Odyssey, wherein all the pictures were done in a style derived from vase painting (not that I understood that at the time). But I read that book dozens of times. When I tracked down a copy at the age of 50, some of those pictures were still fresh in my mind.
As an adolescent I was snared by adult lit when my (much older) brother returned from college entranced by Ulysses. Given my childish enthusiasm, I thought it a natural. Couldn’t understand a word of it, of course. I backed off and tried A Portrait. Ditto. Backed off and tried Dubliners. Took most of year 9 to manage that. But I felt then that I’d stepped over the threshold of adult lit.
dylwah @ 10
Agreed. I really enjoyed Anathem. Even if he does break the xkcd fiction rule of thumb.
OMG. Glomesh is Back! (albeit hiding under a new name: Olga Berg).
The CM’s QWeekend, p33.
Not only back; but identical to an actual c1970 silver evening Glomesh bag I still have in a junk-room drawer (yep, identical; just checked).
I didn’t mind 60-70s houses (exposed beams, raked ceilings, brick feature walls), tables, furniture (teak), colours (white or timber; string or choc … yeah, all right, Mission Brown), big Oz Pots etc coming back in (still have them)… even the cane & plastic hanging chairs (no, never!) Just makes the whole lot more valuable than they were in the FedRevived era. The Carl McConnells we Brizzie Types all bought one another for 21st, graduation, wedding etc etc gifts are doing nicely (& are still magic) as have the … You have checked the marks on your Mum & Gran’s pots & started the “Hint, Hint” routine, haven’t you? (Can recommend some books to search for in junk shops & markets)
Even the JackiO etc sunglasses are back (have just retrieved mine – yep, can still see with them; saves a new pair).
But Dame Edna’s fave Glowmesh?
Nooooooooooo
Lang Mack @ 7,
What happened to the snake? I’ve never had a snake visit my property before and am always curious as to how people handle the situation i.e. kill it, catch it, call someone etc. I gots to know.
Jacques, just freezing & hoping it hasn’t noticed you usually does the trick (even with an eastern brown less than two metres away)
But if it’s an angry eastern brown, someone’s probably going to die. If you don’t think you can keep as still as poss & have someone to drive you to hospital fast, better trust your survival instinct. The OAP lady next door was bailed up by a really irate EB while gardening last year (probably the aforementioned serpent). It struck at her. OAP 1 snake 0.
Learn to listen to/ watch the birds. And I’d recommend a good dog as a close companion.
You’re not talking about the Classics Illustrated series of what used to be called comics are you? I’ve still got my Hamlet and Jane Eyre and Kidnapped somewhere. The Iliad and Oddysey were in the series, which was pretty Teh Canon in garish colours, circa 1964.
joe2 comment 12, says:
“Holy Shit! Another meddlesome priest.”
Would I be right is saying a priest is only “meddlesome” if he’s speaking against something you hold to be right?
Is Obama’s mate, Catholic priest Michael Pfleger a meddlesome priest too?
http://www.catholic.org/politics/story.php?id=28097&page=1
If you haven’t seen Father Michael Pfleger in action click the video on the left side on the linked page.
Gawd, Colin @19 that priest Pfleger is on fire.
It’s a good thing he’s not touring down under or members of the holy church might end up with a stroke. I’d say he was very meddlesome as well. As far as I can tell, though, he was not about telling his own parishioners that a vote for McCain was a guaranteed sin.
Jacgues,What happened to the snake?. well as it was a bit ‘toey’ it was removed from being a threat. How people handle the situation i.e. kill it, catch it, call someone etc. I gots to know. If you gots to know I’d take DeeCee’s advise and go inside and wait. By the way, for any snake you see, there will be a hundred you won’t, with Copper Heads and Black snakes you can ‘usually ‘shoosh’ em off, Tiger and King Browns, or Eastern Browns, if around the house,not much else to do but to fix the situation. As DeeCee’s say’s, a good dog is the first warning, problem is with Boarder Collies that they have no fear and won’t put up with aggression from anything that moves. Also, right or wrong, it’s their job.
.
Best to remove the situation and all’s peachy. I know it’s a hard call for folk who live in more populated areas , and others,however, safety of loved ones takes advantage. Calling someone may well be an idea, meanwhile the bugger has made a camp somewhere handy!!!
New garden hose?, salt into the wound..
The Grim Reaper has been stalking my neighbourhood again. Only six weeks after claiming my upstairs neighbour, sudden death has taken Bruce, the bloke who lived in the house on the corner. He was a bit of a local character, usually seen sitting on his front porch with a stubby in one hand and a fag in the other, with a little pale yellow weiro on his shoulder and his transistor radio tuned to a sport-and-talk station. The parts of his eyes that weren’t the brightest sky blue were riddled with red, and his nose was puffed and purple from the booze. He always said G’day to passersby, even if they hadn’t answered him the last time. Every now and then he’d put on his overalls and fuel up his whipper-snipper and trim the weeds on the surrounding street corners. Who knows why he took it on himself to do this? It was just one of those things he did. I wonder who’ll do it now.
Bruce was racist and sexist and nosey, always keen to know what was going on. He loved heavy machinery and sometimes volunteered to direct traffic when the contractors were resurfacing the roadway or rebuilding the traffic island outside his house. He popped down, the day we found Steve’s body upstairs, to ask what the cop car was doing on my front lawn, and we had a chat about life and death. He told me that day that he’d just started going to TAFE “’cause I reckon it’s time I learned to read and write.” He’d bought a dictionary, and was copying its 1500 pages verbatim into a series of notebooks. I think he was up to “abate” by then. He asked me back to his house to help him hook up his computer to the internet. His bookshelves were filled with videos of movies he’d recorded off the TV. The house smelled of cigarettes, fried food and loneliness.
Vale Bruce, a bloke, aged in his mid-50s.
Lang Mack,
Oh I understood you probably killed it and I didn’t mean to come across as judgemental at all. I was purely curious as to how those situations are handled. If in your shoes I’d do exactly the same thing. Until a couple of weeks ago I had a dog and was thinking if he were still with us and the situation popped up here (neighbours a couple of houses down have chickens, we get rats scurrying along the back fence) I would have to kill it in fear of him or the old cat getting bitten.
Apologies for giving the impression of HOW DARE YOU! etc.
Thanks too Dee Cee.
“Tooral-U
tooral-S
tooral-A
tooral a lama
there’s no one as IRISH as Barack O’Bama.”
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=EADUQWKoVek
(This was the one good bit from this mornings “Insiders”)
When it comes to snakes, in Armidale people used to ring the uni zoology departmwnt. There used to be lots of herpetologists here, but I don’t know if that is still the case. Have been in rooms in houses where people have had heaps of snakes in glass aquarioums and regularly fed them white mice, but it was a few years ago.
Okay joe2 comment 20.
I think I understand your position. You don’t want priests speaking out against any politician or issue? Mmmmm, I guess free speech is only for those people you approve of. You don’t work for Aunty by any chance do you?
At least the priest speaking out against those Catholics who voted for the most pro-abortion President ever did so in a letter that people could choose not to read. Father Pfleger on the other hand gave his pro-Obama routine to a captive audience (not that they seemed to mind).
I’ve got no idea about Father Pfleger, but the anti-Obama priest got a big rap on his knuckles from his diocesan Bishop, by the way.
It’s actually not a free speech issue, but an issue about the appropriate boundaries of religion and politics, I’d suggest.
What was Lost by Catherine O’Flynn.
I hadn’t read anything by this author before. It’s very good.
Like so many novels, it features the child outsider protagonist. In this case it’s a brilliant and original take on the Girl-Detective idea.
this is a hugely enjoyable, satirical look at the life of a shopping centre, with a good dose of creepy mystery thrown in. (Amazon.com.)
There’s one weird thing about the book, which I am about 1/3 of the way through; although it’s set in Birmingham and written by an English author, there are some strange inconsistencies in the words and spelling used; “Mom”, for instance, crops up a lot instead of “mum”, “shining” instead of “polishing.” But the majority of the word usage is UK English – Lift and flat, not elevator and apartment, crisp not chip.
It’s as if some manuscript was being edited for the US market and they sent a partially-edited version to print for the Australian version or something.
I recommend it highly, anyway.
Sorry, that comment should have been in the What are you Reading Defender of the Thesis edition!
Lang Mack #7: I had the exact same experience as a sixteen year old on our semi rural block near Hurstbridge. I had no wish to kill the snake but the dog and cat wouldn’t leave it alone, so I felt I had no choice. I hit it with a shovel. Can’t remember what I did with the corpse.
This is one of the things that galls me about some religious leaders, and why I think it is better to have a personal relationship with God/Christ (as Christ himself advocated) if you are a believer.
As Mark says, Colin@ 26, it is not an issue of free speech but separation of church and state. It might be worthwhile though, as an avid defender of free speech, not to feel free to speak for me. I have no problems with priests speaking on political issues. It would be hard for many to fulfill their role properly without doing so.
Both Pfleger and Newman become “meddlesome” and cross the line when they DIRECTLY act to influence the way people vote. It is an unhealthy power trip from people who should know better.
Ah, Helen with the poor under fed dogs, castironbalcony, blimey you’d think you would fatten ‘em up for a photo shoot
, although my Boarder Collies looked a bit cross eyed , doggie porn?..
Just to say that if you live in town or suburb or whatever, if you have a snake drop in AND you don’t sort of know what to do or have the right gear to handle the situation (not a shovel,sorry Helen not you, but some may cause more problems with hoe’s and shovels than imagined), it really is best just to back off and stay away until the visitor wanders off. Don’t poke or annoy the thing, or be a hero, it’s only trying to make a living like the rest of us. In fact, there is a ‘show’ on shortly on ABC “Rodent Years” , where I’d give full marks for the morals of snakes,the is only a certain level one can get lower than, and snake morals have higher standards, sadly..
Another snake story. Terriers locked up in the yard for their own good all day – one still with multiple stitches after a kangaroo encounter. This evening, the wrens were going berserk – a sure sign of a snake hereabouts, better sentinels than any dog. Outside to investigate – shovel in hand. Sure enough – big brown snake, dead as a doornail. Dog bite marks on it. No marks on terriers, and three hours later, all still seem OK. Hopefully they got away with it. It will be interesting to see if they are still alive in the morning!
I would have done the backing off thing LM, but the dog and cat thought annoying the snake was the best thing ever and they were going to go back to it despite all entreaties. Why didn’t I just lock the both of them up? As I recall I would have had to physically catch them as they were deaf with excitement – and the snake was in kind of close proximity.
Another brown snake story: I was on a National Parks bushwalk when a European woman who I don’t think had been in the country long simply walked right OVER a brown snake which was curled up asleep on the path. She stopped and went OH!!! as it woke up and slithered off. (Big things, brown snakes!) The rest of us behind her stopped dead and our jaws all hit the dirt.
This was just near Mt Langi Ghiran so take care when walking there.
heh, thanks Quog, i hopr that the authors don’t run into any Droogs
Helen Mirren has disgraced herself – Herald Sun
ANyone else cop a load of the Huger ED supplememnt in the OO tday?
shock headline: Group of 8 beleives Group of 8 should get all the research dollars! Why even bother printing that self-serving trash?
Everyone:
Off the air. Computer finally carked-it. [Using someone else's just now]. Waiting for Uncle Kevin’s generous Christmas present for pensioners to come through then I might either get the computer fixed or prowl the For Sale ads for a replacement.
Glad to see j-p-z is back. So His Glorious Imperialness, King George II The Failed, didn’t send him to Gitmo or have him rendered as a farewell gesture in the dying days of His magnificent reign. Good.
http://business.smh.com.au/business/pmp-fails-to-deliver-20081119-6b4f.html?page=2
.
The link is to a story of scamartists masquerading as advisors.
With discussion’s about the economy being motivated by concerns for in what way and for what purpose are new regualtions being considered the minimum I’d love to see is that these types of criminals could be jailed for at least – oh what ? say 12 years minimum before parole.
The facts of the case aren’t too complicated but without effective sanctions why would any white collar crim worry?
Or is this all too much to hope for?