Riddle 47

"The Secret Powers of Time"

2010-06-25T16:00:00.001-04:00

Today, as part of the orientation for my summer tutoring job, I was shown this video. I think it has some interesting ideas, and certainly some underlying implications for education--teaching, learning, and curriculum (for both secondary and higher education). I thought I'd post it to see what you all think. After all, I think we all are deeply invested in thinking about education (individual and institutional) from many different angles.

Here's the video:

Dream School...

2010-03-28T00:20:00.000-04:00

Michael Drout has posted an interesting vision of his pedagogical dream over at his blog. I think this post presents an intersection of many interests on this blog: academics, pedagogy, educational systems/institutions, and the medieval (to name a few of the first things that strike me). There is certainly a lot to unpack in his post, and I'm hoping for some of your collective input on the idea. What are the aspects of cultural wealth and liabilities (to use Martin's terms--which are always, forevermore, with me) inherent in this type of project? Could such ideals be presented in other types of educational curricula (e.g. public high schools, other sites of education in our society)?

My first reactions to Drout's vision is favororable: after all, I will be looking for a teaching/research/academic job of my own in about 4 years, and this type of opportunity would be great. My own desires to see opportunities like the one Drout proposes is especially fueled by increasingly public discussions of the role(s) of humanities in educational institutions, and the anxieties surrounding jobs in these areas (for a few examples of the emerging dialog, see articles here [esp. this one!], here, here, here, and here). Also, I'm largely a proponent of presenting students with the complexities of higher level academics at the high school level; in large part, I think my senior-year English teacher did this (esp. with mythology and medieval literature), and I continue to carry those influences on my life. I see a lot of Jane Roland Martin's own ideas coming out here, in terms of cultural wealth and liabilities, and I think this opens up a lot of theoretical space for thinking about the ways in which society presents information and education. Drout's ideas do well to bring out the ways in which society may need to reshape such (re)presentations. For example, is one of our cultural liabilities the ways in which we conceptualize academics as the "White Tower" of the University or Academy? With a school like Drout has envisioned, could one of our inherent cultural wealths be the opportunity to push some students toward new intellectual avenues?

Essentially, I'm hoping that these intersecting ideas will help spark a new form of dialog--touching on many of the issues brought out before, but also pointing toward other issues to frame how academics and society intersect.

Just because...

2010-03-24T07:57:00.003-04:00

Because Hark! A Vagrant is brilliant. And regularly makes me miss you people.

The long view of the long ships

2009-12-30T21:15:00.003-05:00

Robert Ferguson's recently published omnibus history of the viking era [The Vikings, A History. published by Viking, appropriately enough] gets two thumbs up. If I were to teach my dream course on Northern European Life and Literature (a combo of Monks, Monsters, and Manuscripts and Swords, Sails, and Serpents), this would be one of the base texts for the course (I should dream up that syllabus and post it for feedback). The scope of the book is broad--chronologically, geographically, and topically. The general flow of the narrative starts before the 'insular big-bang' of Lindesfarne in 793, but works its way forward ending with the gradual incorporation of Sweden into European (Roman) Christendom in the 12th century. The chapters move from theater to theater--generally concerned more with the Vikings abroad than at home, but as Ferguson makes clear, the story is easier to tell when there are multiple sorts of sources, literary as well as archaeological. (Though the details of the narrative thread is lost in the North, the light is better on Watling Street, etc.)

Ferguson's strength as an author is his deep familiarity with the literary sources as well as with the archaeological record, successive historical treatments, and contemporary or near contemporary chronicles and annals. He makes measured and meaningful use of the truer sources (the poetry) to illuminate other sources. From a teaching perspective, the great virtues of the text are three-fold. First, Ferguson tells a coherent tale that helps the reader keep the big picture in view as the successive threads unfold and intertwine. Second, he let's the loose ends show so that readers can see where conjecture replaces relative certainty. He acknowledges differences of opinion among experts, generally without grinding anyone's particular axe. Third, he models a respect for the various types of sources, giving (in my interpretation) some pride of place to the work of the poets.

The only drawback to the book is probably inevitable: in covering so much, there is little time to tarry with anyone's favorites. (How can we hear so little of Egil Skallagrimson?) No unreasonable or unacceptable gaps appear, however. The one possibly controversial aspect of the interpretation implied in the work is the framing: for Ferguson, the grand sweep of the story is defined by the gradual cultural and religious transition from a separate and independent Nordic community to a post-heathen, at least nominally Christian set of societies, each integrated into larger European society. His parting view of Odin from Snorri's biography of Olaf Trygvasson--as an old man trying to smuggle horse steaks onto the King's table--is a poetic touch. Some might question the choice of making the religious shift the central organizing principle--but I think it works.

Read on--and don't forget to write!

Norse Gods get an upgrade

2008-08-01T23:45:00.002-04:00

Too Human is the title of an upcoming game in which the player will be taking on the role of Baldur, one of the Aesir. However, these gods are not all they are told to be in the mythology. Instead of being actual supernatural creatures, they are cybernetically enhanced humans. Baldur [son of Odin] is seen as being insufficiently advanced, and is thusly labeled "too human."

Wikipedia informs me in its article:
In Too Human, the Norse gods are cybernetically enhanced humans. Baldur, son of Odin, is one of these gods and it is his duty to protect the human race from an onslaught of an advancing machine presence determined to eradicate all human life.
The story chronicles the ongoing struggle between cybernetic Norse gods, the invading machine presence and mortal men, it features many Norse gods and characters from Norse mythology including Thor, Loki, Odin, Heimdall, Freyja, and Mimir. Yggdrasil: the tree of life acts as a gateway to an alternate world known as Cyberspace that is accessed through the advanced technology of the gods.The human gods are using cybernetic implants to supplement their own abilities, thus becoming more machine like. Conversely, the advancing machine army is harvesting human blood and limbs in an attempt to become more human.

Until the game is released, later this month, there will be little more for me to say about it. Also, I do not have a 360, the creator's platform of choice, and will have to wait to steal...er...borrow my brother's in order to have a chance to play. The game is being released in trilogy format, further slowing my understanding of it's use of the actual mythology. What I ask here is this:

By bastardizing mythology with technology and turning it into a video game, are we exploiting our cultural pasts for sheer entertainment, or are we, perhaps, utilizing a modern medium to bring our culture's elder foundations to a new generation? Or is it both?

In conclusion, I leave you this, because it was the only non-mature trailer I could find that was of decent quality.

And I thought it was funny.

Recommended Call for Submissions...

2008-06-04T10:45:00.002-04:00

Over at the blog Modern Medieval, Matthew Gabriele (a professor of Medieval/Renaissance Studies at Virginia Tech) has posted a sort of "Call for Submissions" to a project he wants to develop: a sort of "blog forum about what medieval studies and/ or medievalism has to offer a wider public." He especially has asked for voices from academics and non-academics (and non-medievalists) alike. Because of the nature of our small thought community here on this blog as well as our backgrounds, our current work, and our general interests (both collectively and individually), I think this call is especially appropriate for us all to contribute.

Take a look at the call for submissions, with Gabriele's overall proposal and aims, and consider contributing to this discussion. The initial deadline (next Friday) for thoughts, short essays, etc. may be close--and some of you have the habit of dropping off of the earth for amounts of time--but I think all of your thoughts would really help foster some great dialog, since this is something we've worked on before together both formally (such as the Education conference some of us presented at) and in our musings on this blog.

No excuse for tardiness. Moving on.

2008-05-15T09:10:00.003-04:00

Marvelous.

I have just finished reading [rereading most of it as I went] the essay on the Marvelous in Le Goff. I am still not entirely sure where he is coming from or where in the world he may be going. True, in the first circuitous definition of imagination, he picked and pulled to at least form an idea, if not a solidified concept, but in this chapter I felt as though he did actually define the marvelous quite clearly. Somewhere between the words, perhaps, slipping behind a handy h right when you turn to look, like that spook behind the pillar next to you.

The one connection I managed to maintain is that the marvelous is something natural, something old. It is not magic because magic, in the Christian sense at least, has been sourced outside the world itself to Satan [who then could be sourced to God but a bastardization of holy power and everything kind of jumbles itself around in a mental tussel with no clear winner in my head, but that is unrelated to this conversation]. It is not miraculous because that, too, has the implied source, though in God. So marvels are of nature. How does one then define nature and manage to diferentiate between when something that happened was either miraculous or marvelous?

I was interested in his dredging up of the literature and lore of the knights and lower nobility, which brought to mind Once and Future King, The Faerie Queene, and Dante [yes, in that order, though the first and second are hardly as applicable as the first and the latter two are both based in some overt form of Christianity. I did not see fit to include Phantastes, though it also was sluiced in], bringing with them the images [which Le Goff believes is also an important part of the marvelous] of a sword coming from a lady in a lake, and a tree that is bleeding.

And here is where my thoughts trailed off into bafflement...comment. Question. Answer. Something.

Medieval fish sticks--not again!

2008-05-04T21:15:00.005-04:00

Nothing changes more than history. The reputation of the Vikings seems to be in a state of constant flux. Thanks to archaeologists of the codfish trade (another in the ever-expanding set of niches for medieval geneticists), it begins to appear that some of the poor Norse were just long-distance fishmongers (think Amazon grocery delivery a-la 10th century). This opens a whole new set of possibilities for interpreting the prayers for protection from the Northmen! It's interesting, but as an explanation for Viking mobility in general, well, it sounds a little fishy.

Yea, I've been to Vinland, only it should have...

2008-04-13T14:57:00.004-04:00

I had never heard of novelist Thomas Holt, but I picked up his Meadowlands in some Swedish-American bookstore somewhere (probably at the American Swedish Institute in Minneapolis) because of its subject. Meadowlands is a novelization of the Vinland Sagas told from the perspective of two 'regular guys' who crewed the ships of 5 voyages from Greenland to Vinland. They recount their adventures to a Greek civil servant whom they are accompanying, as members of the Varangian Guard, on a trip across Greece.

The re-telling is pretty faithful to the accounts in the Sagas and is pretty effective in getting the reader to think in some detail about the lives that are sketched so sparingly in the source material. What was it like to sail on small ships packed with people and material? What was it like to be cooped up in a turf-built house throughout the dark winter? How did the regular folks view the families in charge? What would it have meant to be part of the fatal, fraught last expedition? The narrative voices sound a little like 20th century English working-class types, but that's as good a way to get into the social space as any, I suppose.

The frame and some of the dialogue between the narrators and their Greek auditor are good reminders that the Norse of the 11th century were connected both to the end of the European-known world and to the most sumptuous center of European power; they were culture watchers as well as travelers and traders, and Holt, the author, seems to have done his homework well. He represents the Norse view of the world and of human significance in contrast with the Mediterranean; the reflective moments challenge the question of interior considerations (motivation) versus the consequences of actions. Holt also plays with the problem of oral transmission; both narrators are eye-witnesses, and should have virtually identical perspectives, and yet...

The book has an interesting 'what could have been, if only' twist at the end when Harald Sigurdson (the silent junior member of the Varangian trio of guards) weighs the potential risks and benefits of conquering England or settling Vinland. Recommended for pleasure reading.

For what it's worth, I hate Thomas Holt. He was born in the same year I was and has written nearly 40 historical novels. Ah well, fate goes always as it must! mlp

Not dead yet!

2008-03-31T07:56:00.004-04:00

After a week of the creeping misery [also known as a sinus infection of sorts], I have finally regained my mental prowess [though none more than already had, don't expect much] and thusly am finally approaching the bench for a report on Le Goff [whose name still makes me giggle inwardly]. I apologize for the delay. And the fact that this is just a bit on the intro, as my brain still has no focus power, and I didn't make it to the Marvelous just yet.

Anywho.

Let me join both of Mark and Brandon in congratulating/thanking Le Goff for poking out of the historical boundaries into a broader realm. There is great truth behind his statement that "the life of men and societies depends just as much on images as it does on more palpable realities...the imagination nourishes man and causes him to act" (5). It brought to mind a quote from Lewis in which he states that "Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art... It has no survival value; rather it is one of those things that give value to survival." To imagine and create is an imperative for man, for whatever technical or philosophical reason and to separate any examination of man that goes beyond the physiological from such a thing would be silly. Incomplete, as it were. As Le Goff says, "a history without imagination is a mutilated, disembodied history" (5). [I liked page five.]

Outside of that, I would just like to attempt to clarify his definition of the imagination as, though he provided three "nots," he did not set it outright for me to see. Kind of like trying to set up a square pasture with three fences--the proverbial cows are guided in a direction but are set roaming after a certain point. Or maybe it is just me. Bear with me as I basically walk through what he says.

What is imagination, then? Le Goff sets it next to three similar concepts with which it may be confused and proceeds to separate them. The first was "representation" which he defined as "the mental image of an external reality" (1). Put simply enough, it is a mental construct of something in the physical reality, his example being our idea of a cathedral as gleaned from art or literature. Imagination, he states, "is more comprehensive than representation. Fantasy is nto limited by the intellect" (1). Symbolism [add the lisping, elongated s there, Brandon!] is applied when the object in question is used to make "reference to an underlying system of values," a process possibly involving the imagination, but not imagination itself (1). Lastly is ideology, the imposition of a conception of the world, possibly upon an image of some sort. Ideology and imagination again are simlar with a fuzzy boundary, but ideology is a preformed notion that will, when applied to either, distort temporal and imagination based reality.

My conclusion is that this reality he is attempting to describe is one completely created through the "inner" sensibilities, which he notes are often linked to the divine or supernatural (6). The presentation of these worlds are creations are unique historical realities in and of themselves; "aesthetic values and ideas of beauty are in themselves historical constructs" (4). These, being their own self-contained entities, cannot be interpreted through the same lens as techincal historical documents, which may still have small applications of the imagination through set up and presentation, etc.

Does this make sense, and can you help further the concretization of these thoughts with comments, gentlement [and Mandy, if she has time]?

I am looking forward to see how all this comes together in the essays. And I again apologize for my tardiness and incomplete reading. [sheepish]

The marvels of history

2008-03-02T19:05:00.003-05:00

Thanks, Brandon, for putting us on this course. I've now read the introduction and the essay on marvels. As a relative latecomer to the study of wider European history of the first 15 centuries of the 'common era' (having looked at the span of time mostly through a Scandinavian lens for the past 25 years), I am happy to see facile periodization disrupted. The threads of history have always seemed more tangled than the standard periods would have them to be. The idea of the long middle ages (paralleling the long twilight of antiquity in the eastern Mediterranean) makes sense, and his determination to cut the Renaissance down to size is particularly welcome.

I am also glad to see another intellectual set of categorical straight-jackets challenged as well: the boundaries of the contemporary academic disciplines. From page 3: "The academic disciplines are scandalously specialized...This poses obstacles to interdisciplinary research, making all but inevitable failures to which those who have done everything in their power to make success impossible then point with unseemly amusement." (The same can be said of interdisciplinary teaching as of interdisciplinary research, unhappily for us all.) So I applaud this work and its focus in imagination.

Turning to the chapter on marvels, I am intrigued, though again very much aware of my status as a novice in the field. I have read just enough marvelous material in saints lives and passions, and in vernacular texts and histories, to recognize and affirm several of his distinctions. And his sense of development and social location of the marvelous also seems reasonable against the limited set of examples I can call to mind. So I guess the value of the essay as given is that it helps to frame the extent and the social location of marvels across several centuries. So far so good. I'm still left wondering what to make of the baby saint (name escapes me) who came out of the womb demanding baptism and preaching conversion before dying three or four days later. I wonder how the perfect stone coffin showed up for Ætheldreda in the swamps of Ely, or how Cuthbert made the fires go out. I wonder about these things from a material standpoint, but I also wonder about them in terms of what the people of the time period made of them--how they understood them, and how they made use of them in navigating through life. So Le Goff has been intriguing, the essay provides a good basis for framing questions and observations, but happily, I am left with more questions than ever!

Getting our Leg Off the Ground*...

2008-02-22T20:00:00.000-05:00

Well, since we've finally chosen a book to tackle together, and since I know that Mark and Leslie have them by now (for a few day), I thought I would start some thoughts here about the introduction to Jacques Le Goff's The Medieval Imagination.

Among Le Goff's definitions and beginning to sort out his use of imagination as a methodology to think about history, I found it striking how he saw it so central to human thought.
was the following:

The images of interest to the historian are collective images as they are shaped, changed, and transformed by the vicissitudes of history. They are expressed in words and themes. They are bequeathed in traditions, borrowed from one civilization to another, and circulated among the various classes and societies of man. They are a part of social history but not subsumed by it.... The imagination nourishes the man and causes him to act. It is a collective, social, and historical phenomenon. A history without the imagination is a mutilated, disembodied history. (5)

In its eloquence, this passage struck me, but, more than that, it also informs some of the discussions we've had about the collectivity of history and literature. It thrilled me to see a scholar embracing such a definition as the core of his methodology in searching for the past. All of this also points toward his strong sense of interdisciplinarity--using literature, art, historical documents, philosophy.

Another aspect that I found fascinating is Le Goff's sense of time and the medieval period, as he writes, "when one takes a broad view of human evolution, it is clear that certain slowly developing systems or phases persist for relatively long periods" (9)--an idea he uses to justify the long Middle Ages and his even longer approach to history of the period (further developed in his first chapter). I'm interested in your thoughts about his views here and in the first chapter "For an Extended Middle Ages."

No doubt there are myriad other concepts to focus on--for me, I'm also greatly pulled toward Le Goff's examination of the marvelous, since I've always gravitated toward that sort of aspect of history and literature. Hopefully that's enough to get us started!

*Again with the punny title, I know. Please continue in your forgiving attitudes.

Books and links.

2008-02-18T18:34:00.003-05:00

No Brandon, I haven't done the meme yet, but I'm working on it. Sort of.

Since we have created this plot to read Le Goff's The Medieval Imagination, I stopped by Borders to see if they had it [a. because of the general immediacy of a book store and b. I currently have a 40% off coupon...I'm so shallow]. For some inexplicable reason, however, they did not. Instead of walking away upon discovering this, as would have been the bright thing to do, I allowed myself to drool over the following three books:

Mysteries of the Middle Ages [which I did not buy for price's sake]
History of the Franks [which I did not buy for the fact that it is amply available online]
and, to cap it off in a veritable pool of mental drool [gross, but to the point]
Beowulf: An Illustrated Edition [which I did not for the fact that I own at least two copies not in anthologies already, if not three]

There were a number of other books I would love to mention, but for now these are the titles I remembered and desired to share.

Mainly that last one.

It's really pretty.

Meme...

2008-01-29T20:00:00.000-05:00

In an effort to force you all to post something, I've tagged all of you fellow Riddlers for the mutated medieval meme. You can find the details in my version of the meme, posted at PoKR. I know you're all busy, but I'm expecting good things from you all!

Sir Gawain and the Gush of Translations...

2008-01-17T17:30:00.000-05:00

Today in my email I received a link to a new "innovative translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight" by Adam Golaski (professor of creative writing at the University of Connecticut), which he has titled Green. So far, Golaski's released on section a month, started in December: here is fit one, part one; here is fit one, part two.

I also recently bought the new (and also acclaimed as innovative) translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight by Simon Armitage (W. W. Norton, 2007), and have so far read about the first fit.

Why all the surge of Sir Gawain? I don't know, but he (and his poem) seems to be gaining popularity in the public eye. Perhaps he'll start giving Beowulf a run for his money, although that might take a major motion picture release, and we haven't seen (or hear rumors of ) one of those since 1984 (film title: Sword of the Valiant: The Legend of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight). I'm interested in people's thoughts on this: either about the growing popularity of the Middle English poem or about the translations. As Gawain himself would say, "Haf at þe þenne!"

[Cross-posted at Point of Know Return.]

This really does not belong here, but...

2008-01-16T19:20:00.000-05:00

...I GOT MY DEGREE FROM HOUGHTON!

I'm officially out of there and smart and stuff, just like the rest of you!

[And post already, will you? I don't have anything to say right around this time.]

Finally read it! NotR

2008-01-06T23:27:00.000-05:00

I am a lapsed novel reader, and every year at Christmas I promise to climb back on the wagon. For the second holiday season, Umberto Eco provided the means. This season, I finally read Name of the Rose. In the interest of keeping NYR (New Year's Resolution) 1--namely to post more on R47--and in hopes that the ensuing conversation might help encourage me to keep NYR2 (read more novels)--I'll make a brief post here.

Brandon, I remember you posting something somewhere about the book--could you provide a link? General reaction: I enjoyed the book and felt transported into the 14th century. (And I wanted to stay there, although I think the burning of the library may have totally undone me--I would have become a wandering mad mendicant.) Eco plays with a lot of things, and I lament my lack of Latin yet once more as it means I missed key issues that were at play. One theme that I enjoyed thinking about, and one that seems ever relevant, is the danger of certainty and the shifting sands of knowledge and justification. Both the philosophical issues (Aristotle, later Bacon, vs, Plato, Plotinus, Augustine) and the theological issues (the chronology of the attainment of the beatific vision, and the role of poverty in the life of Christ, the Church, the believer) are imminently current.

So what do you all recall/review from the book, and what did you make of it?

Happy new year!

2008-01-03T09:54:00.000-05:00

May God continue grace us all with his love, patience and presence.
Stay warm, friends. Stay safe.

Follow-up re: Amazon's brain improvement tool

2007-12-09T07:27:00.000-05:00

This is a follow-up post to Leslie's query about the Kindle. I think I agree with this commentary at The American Prospect. (And I am really loosing my luddite edge--which would be a blunt edge, I guess... I just figured out how to put a link in a post!) Be well!

Beowulf Movie...

2007-12-01T21:30:00.000-05:00

Leslie has been asking me to post my thoughts on the new Beowulf movie, so I'm offering the following.

I saw Beowulf (the movie), but I'm hesitant to post any sort of review; there are already so many Anglo-Saxonist (and other medievalist) voices out there talking about it, I don't think I would add much to the many thoughts. I recommend reading a few that have sparked certain amounts of resonance with what I thought about the movie. Here are some names and links to their reviews and thoughts. Beware of plot spoilers.
Michael Drout
Dr. Virago
Jennifer Lynn Jordan (another newly acquainted blogging medieval studies grad student)

The review I most resonate with is Mary Kate Hurley's, over at ITM, not so much for its general perceptions, but for her discussion of what such an adaptation means for the long and continuing history of Beowulf. It's a beautiful post, with great reflections on the life of the poem. She's put into words some of the things I was searching for in my "Prevailing Poetry," and she says them better than I could.

I was was having a conversation with one of my friends in the English MA here at UConn about the Beowulf movie, which then moved into a discussion about translations. Toward the end of the conversation, he mentioned how fascinating it is to realize that we always go back to the Old English poem. Although we keep translating, over and over, those translations still need reworked after a time, the old renderings set aside, the new ones reworked for a new audience. He said that he thinks this was the goal of Seamus Heaney with his translation--to provide a new rendering that spoke to the audience of everyone, not only English majors who would read the poem but also anyone who wanted to pick up the poem and enjoy it. Then he hinted that, someday, even Heaney's translation will be set aside for a new one. But we will always return to the original text, the Anglo-Saxon words that still speak to us and fascinate us from over one thousand years ago. And I think that this life--the life of a poem that keeps speaking to us--is the one that MKH is alluding to in her post. That life is not ended. I especially think the last words of her post speak most powerfully of her reflections:

Maybe there's something yet to learn from this Beowulf, beyond Angelina Jolie's nudity and Beowulf's bad lines. Maybe it can speak to something more than the sum of the parts of the past it inherited. Maybe its resurrection at this cultural moment is itself of value. And maybe we're too close -- temporally, spiritually -- to see this movie for what it might be: another performance of a poem whose ending has not been written yet.

As to my own opinion about the movie, I mostly enjoyed it--as a movie. Walking into the theater, I set aside my critical nature as someone who dissects texts as well as my Anglo-Saxonist side, and I went in hoping to watch and enjoy a movie based upon a story I have loved since I was ten years old. As both a movie and an interpretation, of course it had flaws. Gaiman and Avery made interesting interpretive moves that clearly brought out certain parts of the poem, at the expense of certain other aspects. Of course, those moves also brought out certain aspects that were important to put into the movie. The central plot change--of the relationships between the monsters--helped to smooth over the poem into a more unified poem, with a plot line that moved with connections to everything previously--a sense found in the poem only in the character of Beowulf, not in the actual plot. Of course, this should have been expected, given the nature of plot-driven Hollywood films. I never expected a movie exactly corresponding to the poem; we can never expect that of a movie. But we can at least find certain merits (Grendel's mother playing a philological game with Beowulf's name, the integration of Christian and pagan elements, the postmodern questions about storytelling, to name just a few) for watching the movie and engaging in discussion about it.

[Cross-Posted at Point of Know Return.]

Gift from God or mark of the beast?

2007-11-24T08:20:00.000-05:00

Or maybe not either extreme...I just wanted to get this link out for somethoughts on Amazon's new Kindle. Please, my friends and fellow bibliophiles, go and read some of the page and watch their little videos.

How does one react?

[The wannabe-independent-bookstore-owner in me cries out in frustration and despair.]

Friendship, deals and murder.

2007-11-16T06:37:00.000-05:00

Scary title, eh? All that for this:

Levity somewhat aside, I must apologize for the image as my drawing and my photography thereof can really only go so far. In my mind Grendel is far more than a simply humanoid monster. He isn't even a perversion of humanity in the sense of Tolkien's orcs [or whichever is which], but really he is a grotesque human. He has lived on the outskirts of humanity, feasting on the self-pity and hate and jealousy that created him, or defiled his lineage, to the point where he chose to refuse the standard signs of humanity. He wears no clothing and does not speak in words. His bones are more solid than twenty men together [good thing Beowulf is strong as thirty, right?], and he has not stopped growing and changing [much like a lizard, ew]. His skin has hardened and toughened from this miserable life to the point where he is more of a pallid fleshy granite. While ridiculously strong [ripping folks asunder and all that], he isn't all body-builder but lithe and still thin from a sick sort of malnutrition. His hands and feet, the strongest points of his skin yet, are calloused to the point of being unfeeling beyond the knowledge of grasping a victim. As you can see I did choose to accentuate both the hands and the feet but also the rib-cage...I don't know why that is part of it, but it is.

I am the least happy with his face and head--not abnormally sized or shaped, just lacking color and general expression. You can see he is frowning [perhaps in thought as he wonders which part to munch first], but I don't imagine him drooling or screaming at all times. Grendel is a representative of pure isolation and antisocial ways and is thereby unable to be content or happy and, therefore in my mind, has become a sort of sullen anger at all times. A profoundly sad rage.

Not that I really have any pity. I just don't think the opposite of good humour and fellowship is anger. I think it is misery and that is why he acts [he hears them partying and gets a little p-oed] as he does.

Make sense? Sorry the text, my favored medium, isn't wholly aesthetically pleasing or coherent. I figured it was good to get this out before I forgot again and someone [coughbrandoncough] threw a hissy fit.

Anyway, this is my Grendel...as crummy as it may be.

--Leslie

[Cross posted at Box of Chaos. In reference to this post at PoKR.]

Prevailing Poetry...

2007-11-15T19:30:00.000-05:00

In case any of you are interested, I've posted the contents of my paper presentation about representations of Beowulf in popular culture over at Point of Know Return. It's a three-part series, in light of the upcoming movie.

While visions of Grendel danced in their heads...

2007-11-04T14:30:00.000-05:00

Recently, I was talking to a colleague in the medieval studies department here at UConn about the new Beowulf movie, and we hit upon what we think is a very interesting project to undertake. As happy (or unhappy, for some people) as we are to see Anglo-Saxon literature hitting the big screen, it will, like all movies, present an interpretation of the material that will influence a far greater audience than any of the others. Because of this, my friend and I proposed the Grendel Drawing Project to our department. In the same spirit, I'm also proposing the project to readers and contributors of this blog in the hopes that you all will help me in this effort.

Grendel is not described in much detail in the Anglo-Saxon text, and because of this, readers' conceptions of him vary widely. So what does your Grendel look like? Because of this, I'm looking to get as many people as possible to draw Grendel for me, using whatever media they wish. It does not matter whether you can draw well or not--we simply want to see your version. I'd like to use these images in a future project, probably as part of my ongoing fascination with the Beowulf story in popular consciousness. I'm interested (before the movie taints your visions of Grendel) in how many people view the creature in their minds.

I know it's a busy part of the semester for everyone, but in the next few weeks, could you take time out of your schedule to draw up your vision of Grendel? This is supposed to be a fun project, so let your imagination loose! Please feel free to spread the word, too (as I could use images from anyone who has read the poem). If you find the time, email your image to me at: brandonwhawk [at] gmail [dot] com.

[Cross-posted at Point of Know Return.]

Because we're all wading throught he quagmire of life right now...

2007-10-16T00:11:00.000-04:00

...here's a little [emphasis on little] motivation...

[And silliness]

knocks some cobwebs from the corners

2007-09-26T19:33:00.000-04:00

Okay folks, I think it is time to make a few things very clear. Two things, in particular, need addressing. One is that this poor blog is in desperate need of company [it is no good to ignore such a handy device of communication]. The second is that we have also been ignoring an up and coming piece of media that, perhaps, we all should be paying close attention to.

This piece of media is the newest adaptation of Beowulf.

Now, if you're sitting there with your mouth slightly agape and scratching your head saying, "they made another one?" I will inform you, sadly, yes. They have made yet another Beowulf film, one that chills me to my core. To glean more on the subject, here is a trailer link: http://video.uk.msn.com/v/en-gb/v.htm

[Edit to include movie site which now has many clips to watch: http://www.beowulfmovie.com/]

Go. Watch. Maybe try and find some of the other trailers on Youtube. Then, my friends...then we shall talk.

Curiousity Assuaged

2007-08-19T14:52:00.000-04:00

Catalog copy (Oxford University Press, no less) for a new book by Richard North on the origins of Beowulf caught my eye. The review of the book by Michael Lapidge (http://www.history.ac.uk/reviews/paper/lapidge.html) satisfied my curiousity (and saved me the price of the book). Caveat lector.

Titles I left behind

2007-08-16T17:18:00.000-04:00

The kids and I have just returned from over a month in England, and in cramming our belongings and acquisitions into our semi-expandable luggage, some things had to be left. Among them were a few books--left only because some future occupants of the HC flats may pick them up and read them. I'll mention two of them here in case they are of interest to you.

1. Dissolution by C.J. Sansom.
This is a novel set at the time of the dissolution of monasteries (1538 or so) by Henry VIII (boo hiss); the central character is a hunchbacked lawyer named Matthew Shardlake who is sent to investigate the sudden execution-like death of another 'commissioner' sent to prod the abbot of a south-coast monastery into voluntarily surrendering to the crown. It's a mediocre novel, but pretty good social history. It's interesting too in that the author tries to present the very real tensions between the shortcomings of the existing, exhausted monasticism, and the excesses of the emerging, brutal reformist impulses. For those interested in a creative interpretation of social history, I recommend the title, and will probably read at least one more in what appears will be a series.

2. Without roots: the west, relativism, Christianity, Islam by Cardinal Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict) and Marcello Pera, an Italian philosopher turned politician.

In this volume, two lectures (one by each author) are published along with letters between the two. The topic is the role that Christianity has played in the development of European culture and the difficulties that contemporary European politicians are having in understanding and framing that role (particularly in the language of legal frameworks for the EU). I valued the insight it gave me into the current occupant of the Holy See; also, as the other author is an agnostic academic, it was interesting to see the similarities in their arguments that contemporary Europe must acknowledge and re-embrace it's Christian heritage. Both point out, for example, that the heritage of tolerance that allows Islamic intolerance (not that all Muslims are intolerant, but that strain is of particular concern) is a Christian heritage, and that the tension between accepting difference but insisting on reciprocity will require difficulty confrontations. I recommend it.

Sorry this is slim on details, but it's time for the sweet corn to go in the pot! (There are a FEW things that Western NY has that England has not :-)

Er...

2007-08-14T22:09:00.000-04:00

I honestly don't know how I feel about this.

http://www.lulu.com/

Thoughts?

Anglo-Saxons in Music...

2007-07-19T17:00:00.000-04:00

I recently (re)found and (re)started listening to a band that I've listened to on and off for a while now, known as The Mountain Goats, and in doing so I got a few more of their albums. On the albums, I found a few songs that may be of interest, titled "The Anglo-Saxons" and "Grendel's Mother." While I was listening and thinking about the intersection of medieval and our contemporary music, I also remembered that in the Anglo-Saxon course with MLP he compared a song by Bob Dylan to the Old English poem "The Wanderer"--mostly for some of their similarities in elegiac style and thematic elements.

I'm posting the lyrics to the songs by The Mountain Goats (below), but I also want to ask a few questions and get some reactions and ruminations:
What are your reactions to these songs, especially in their content and connection to the Anglo-Saxons and their culture, as well as Beowulf (in the case of "Grendel's Mother")?
Where else are their connections and intersections of the medieval and popular music--a la Bob Dylan, etc.--that we can point to and discuss? Any thoughts on these intersections? I would hazard a guess that this whole idea connects to our discussions of neomedievalism (such as medieval concepts in postmodern popular literature and movies), but what other reactions and thoughts might you have about these? Furthermore, what sort of concepts do these musical connections to the Middle Ages present about oral transmission, oral art, and poetry in culture? Any thoughts are welcome!

Here are the lyrics by The Mountain Goats:

The Anglo-Saxons

[Spoken:] "We'd like to dedicate this song to our friends, the former inhabitants of the British isles!"

[Sung:] They used to paint their bodies blue,
A couple of them might be distantly related to you.
According to Caesar they shaved their entire bodies,
Except for the upper lip and the head.

Yeah, the Anglo-Saxons!
Yeah, the Anglo-Saxons!

A sub-literate bunch of guys,
Though some sources say otherwise.
Yeah, the Anglo-Saxons!

Yeah, they were men on a mission,
Preserving their poetry by oral tradition.
Yeah, oral tradition is all you get
Until Saint Augustine brought in the alphabet.

Yeah, the Anglo-Saxons!
Yeah, the Anglo-Saxons!
In 1065 they were ragin',
But 1066 brought the Norman Invasion.
Yeah, the Anglo-Saxons!

Grendel's Mother

The cave mouth shines
By pure force of will.
I look down on the world
From the top of this lonesome hill.
And you can run, and run some more
From here all the way to Singapore,
But I will carry you home in my teeth.

In the great hall you drink red wine,
You chew meat off the bone.
I beat down the new path to the castle,
I come naked and alone.
I laid my son on the bier; I burned the wreath,
Fire overhead, water underneath.
You can stand up, or you can run,
You and I both know what you've done,
And I will carry you home.
I will carry you home.
I will carry you home in my teeth.

Redirection to Medieval Sheep...

2007-07-17T18:40:00.000-04:00

Several months ago, I mentioned Michael Drout's research in comparing the DNA of medieval ms vellum, which he talked about over at Wormtalk and Slugspeak. In his latest post, he's expounded a few more details and given an update on how the research is going so far. It's fascinating, and looks to lend quite an innovative aspect to interdisciplinary work and the field of medieval studies. Go check out the post for more information.

ITM Book Club...

2007-07-02T13:00:00.000-04:00

Some of you may be interested in this post and this post over at ITM (if you don't get to regularly check it out)--announcing an online book club & discussion focused on various aspects of the Middle Ages. I just received the first book in the mail (which I found more than 50% reduced from a seller over at Amazon--perhaps you can find as good a deal if you hurry!), and it's already fascinating reading. Even if you're not into cannibalism (but, really, who wouldn't be?), keep your eyes out for future books, as some of the suggestions look like great reads.

More on What Jack Says...

2007-06-24T21:30:00.000-04:00

Following the last thread on Lewis's views of mythology and literature, I dug out a correspondence from a few years ago. It came from Perry Bramlett (a Lewis scholar), who visited Houghton and gave a seminar on Lewis. When I asked him about Lewis's views on myth, he promised to email me; the following was his response. Perhaps it will help focus anyone who wants to read up on Lewis--especially for those who have his woks handy. (Consider the rest of this post quoted from Bramlett's email.)

Walter Hooper's "C S Lewis: Companion & Guide" (if you can find it in the library or order it) has several discussions of Lewis and mythology. And "The C S Lewis Readers' Encyclopedia" (which I wrote for) has a good article (by Wayne Martindale of Wheaton College) on "Lewis and myth."

Lewis mentioned mythology several times in his writings, and some of these are:

1) In "The Weight of Glory" (chap 5) he mentioned mythology and paganism...

2) In the same book (chap 1) he had a quote about mythology and poetry...

3) In "God in the Dock" (pp 57-58, 66-67, 83-84, 132) he mentions mythology as the precursor to Biblical religion...

4) In "Surprised By Joy" (chap 7) he refers to Christianity as the Christian mythology... In the same book (chap 5) he mentions that in mythology he was almost sent back to the false gods to acquire some capacity for worship...

5) In "Reflections on the Psalms" (chap 10) he mentions the death and rebirth pattern in mythology as not accidental and that it teaches the truth that humans must undergo some sort of death in order to truly live...

6) In his "Letters" (24 Oct 1931) he mentions that the desire for a "vague something" as seen in pagan mythology shows a first and rudimentary form of the "idea of God"

7) In "The Weight of Glory" (chap 5) he says that if Christianity is a mythology it is not the one he likes the best... (This was before he became a Christian; he said he liked Greek, Irish and Norse mythology better)

Jack says this...

2007-06-03T22:35:00.000-04:00

Conversation with someone (probably one of the R47 group) led me to pick up Gordon MacDonald's Phantastes this weekend. The edition we had on the shelf includes an adaptation of Lewis's introduction to an earlier (1946) anthology of MacDonald's work. The intro is interesting; Lewis pulls no punches in pointing out MacD's limitations:

The texture of his writing as a whole is undistinguished, at times fumbling. Bad pulpit traditions cling to it; there is sometimes a nonconformist verbosity, sometimes an old Scotch weakness for florid ornament...

Yet for all this, Lewis avers that MacDonald writes fantasy better than anyone else--but that creates a problem for the critic: what is fantasy, after all? Is what MacDonald accomplishes properly a literary art? Lewis' reason for asking this introduces a take on the relationship between myth and literature--indeed, between myth and language--that I would love to discuss with R47-ers and their ilk. Lewis again:

The critical problem with which we are confronted is whether this art--the art of myth-making--is a species of the literary art. The objection to so classifying it is that the Myth does not essentially exist in words at all. We all agree that the story of Balder is a great myth, a thing of inexhaustible value. But of whose version -- whose words -- are we thinking when we say this? ... For my own part, the answer is that I am not thinking of any one's words. No poet...has told this story supremely well. I am not thinking of any particular version of it. If the story is anywhere embodied in words, that is almost an accident. What really delights and nourishes me is a particular pattern of events, which could equally delight and nourish if it had reached me by some medium which involved no words at all.

Lewis goes on to say that this independence from the words distinguishes myth from poetry. Again, he says it best:

In poetry the words are the body and the 'theme' or 'content' is the soul. But in myth, the imagined events are the body and something inexpressible is the soul: the words, or mime, or film, or pictorial series are not even the clothes--they are not much more than a telephone.

He goes on to say that myths get under our skin, 'shock us more fully awake,' cause us to question all that we hold certain. They give us delight, wisdom, and strength that we never anticipated. So herewith a few questions:

Are you with Jack on this one? (And how does this work with J Campbell's and others' takes on myth?
Where do you draw the line around what is and isn't myth, what's primary and what derivative (and where does JRRT fit on that scale?)?
Thinking about part of the BABEL project discussion, can he be right in saying that words themselves might not even be needed? (I myself am skeptical on that one -- but I am admittedly logocentric.)

Be well, and post!

Redirection...

2007-04-27T01:00:00.000-04:00

For a brief summary of my honors thesis that in turn led to another post pontificating on general thoughts on neomedievalism and its implications for our culture, head over to Point of Know Return: Part I and Part II. Please feel free to leave comments there or extend your comments into a responsive post here.

Where have all the mead halls gone...

2007-04-13T00:27:00.000-04:00

...and where are all the bards?

Pop-culture references aside, I have recently realized that thinking about mead halls saddens me.

Why?

Perhaps it is because I am a dreamer with an eye inclined to the heroic, the fantastic, and the charm of things old-worldly. Or perhaps I am wishing for what the mead halls represent: pride, togetherness and a fine oral tradition. Either way, the buildings are no more.

In their steads we have fast food restaurants, diners and the various and sundry bars and pubs. No more does the community get together because they are a community and share that bond. The annual chicken barbeque is close enough. Lost in individual lives, food is tasty but serious meals are a waste of time. Our time-charged consumermobiles drive us from point to point, picking up burgers on the way.

Being a self-proclaimed writer of sorts, I find this disheartening on a number of levels. One is the fact that everything has managed to balance the appearance of being dynamic with a static and homogenized reality that nothing actually seems to happen--nothing worth immortalizing. Birth, growth, school, work and death, with a light chance of success and a smattering of relationships. Another is that, by downplaying the importance of meals and togetherness, individually and as a whole, the would-be bards are ostracized to dark corners and holes to dig up materials for the next contest or open mic night. The bard becomes disconnected rather than immersed, tolerated rather than welcomed.

Food cannot be blamed for it all, though I maintain it plays its own role in the problem. It is also that, in the race to win any more, a body needs so much information with immediacy and in abundance. We have ready access. With food, knowledge and even networked relationships flying hither and yon at the speed of irradiated humming birds, the attention span slips slowly thorugh mechanized processers, diminishing. Bards, for all of their love, interest and care for their communities, have no place here. The places closest to their beloved halls are regular bar stools or the table set aside for the coffee regulars in some small-town diner. Through there has never been such a capacity for communication, people have become distant and dazed. Some lose the ability for apt face-to-face discussions, while others never are given the chance to learn.

Never before has the village that raises the child been so hands-off. In disconnecting ourselves, we have lost our feel for the underlying themes and strings that bind humans together. Ye olde truths and tales from the bard are become relics--shiny baubles and memories of past eras. How quaint.

It seems that communications galore have closed off our minds. People no longer talk with the stars or walk with the gods. The man who swam in the sea last week has met no mermaids and has slain no krakkens.

Like he said...

2007-04-10T22:55:00.000-04:00

Hey All,

Pop over to Point of Know Return for a refreshing read of an old standard.

Thanks to Leslie for the loan of the Hitchhiker's Guide omnibus--earth was just detroyed, and I'm sure there's much fun ahead.

What will be our next task?

Credits, Rolling!

2007-03-22T22:21:00.000-04:00

These are the members of Riddle 47. Left to right we have Dr. Mark, our fearless leader; Brandon, our actual obsessor; Mandy, our leading femnist scholar; Janie, our resident horse lover and psych person; and me, also known as Leslie, the token daydreamer.

These people are brilliant. Heed what they say and ponder it. You can even laugh sometimes--don't worry. They haven't figured out how to kill you with their brains.

...yet...

[Picture by me. I'm also the token doodling fool.]

The first shall be last...

2007-03-21T21:34:00.000-04:00

Well, I don't think God had procrastination in mind when He wrote that one... but since I was the first to suggest this and the last to post, I thought it an appropriate title.
So I'm finally taking the time to recommend books, since I've been shamed into it. They are all pretty light-hearted, since that's what I'm in the mood for currently.

1. The Prisoner of Zenda. This is a classic gothic romance, and a favorite of mine, but not at all a serious book. If you don't already know the plot, it is as follows: English man (highly superior by nature) travels to foreign country and while walking into the woods, comes face to face with the soon to be crowned king. Astonishingly, they look exactly alike! That night (the eve of his inauguration), the king is kidnapped, so that the evil man next in line for the throne can take over in his absence. Englishman steps in, and is inaugurated under the pretence of actually being the king. Being naturally superior (he is an Englishman, after all), he is a very good king...but will he help restore the throne to the rightful king?

2. The Crocodile in the Sandbank, by Elizabeth Peters. This is the first book in the Amelia Peabody series. The main character, Amelia Peabody is an intrepid, bloomer-wearing, feminism spouting, Victorian Englishwoman who has just inherited a tidy sum of money, and spurning matrimony, decides to travel the world. On the way she picks up a "fallen woman" in Rome and the attracts the attentions of a reanimated mummy in Egypt. The series spoofs all kinds of books, from the detective mystery, to the Victorian comedy of manners, to the Prisoner of Zenda-type romance (in fact, I think in one of the later books, she actually reads the Prisoner of Zenda). Underneath the spoof, however, Elizabeth Peters manages to weave in a lot of the concerns of feminism and postcolonialism, especially in the later books (in fact, the middle couple books in the series are my favorites).

3. Speak. by Laurie Halse Anderson. Ok, so this isn't lighthearted. And you may have all read it already, but I suddenly felt the need to recommend it. This is one of the best adolescent books I have ever read, and if you haven't read it, you need to. It would be diffucult to do justice to the plot in just a little blub, so I'll just let you look it up on amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Speak-Laurie-Halse-Anderson/dp/014131088X/ref=pd_bbs_2/002-9490063-3798440?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1174528455&sr=8-2

Bonus: since I waited so long, I decided to give you a bonus (on a slightly more scholarly level)-- the introduction to Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex. Also, under the topic of medieval stuff, I just finished taking notes from Rape and Ravishment in the Literature of Medieval England, by Corinne Saudners, and it was really interesting, if a bit gruesome.

You might not run across these...

2007-03-18T15:47:00.000-04:00

Three books, not already read or discussed by the R47 crew. Well, here are three you may not have run across: a Swedish novel, a work of theology, and a Lewis novel (OK, we may all have read it--but not discussed it).

Den keltiska ringen by Bjorn Larsson. I read books in Swedish when I can to keep from losing touch with that language. This novel is available in translation, though I have no idea how good the translation is. The novel's narrator is an unrooted Swede who lives alone on a sailboat in a Danish harbor. A chance meeting on a ferry, and unsought custody of a doomed Finnish sailor's log book send Ulf and his loner friend Torben (a bookworm with an interest in all things Celtic) on a dangerous sail across to North Sea into a series of near-fatal encounters with political and religious branches of a pan-Celtic revival. It's a pretty good adventure--pushes the limits of my nautical vocabulary in Swedish, so I'm glad I didn't have to translate it. As I was finishing the book, I caught an article in a Swedish newspaper reporting a resurgence of Scottish separatism. Once gain, fiction is prophetic!

Flame of Love by Clark Pinnock. This book is a theology of the Holy Spirit. I'm glad I read it because it forced me to think about the role of the Spirit in the trinity. It is contains some beautiful articulations of Arminian theology's wide and geneours vision of God's grace. I particularly enjoyed the chapters on Trinity (1) , Creation (2) and (especially) Universality (6).

Until we have faces by C.S. Lewis. So maybe everyone has read it already. I think I had started it a couple of times, but I decided to see it through when I was sick an couple of weeks ago. I'm glad I finished it this time, and find it interesting on a couple of levels. I'm mostly intrigued by Lewis' handling of myth. Someday I would like to read it with a group; the episode where the narrator discovers the shrine to the "newly godded" Psyche would be fun to discuss.

Three Books...

2007-03-17T16:30:00.000-04:00

In response to the challenge, I give three books, with a little explanation for each. I couldn't decide to recommend only fiction or nonfiction, so I gave three books, each in a different category -- one fiction, one theological, and one literary criticism -- all three of which have affected my thinking. Consequently, this is the order in which I first read them.

1) The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand
A novel about a non-conformist architect, this novel follows the protagonist and the main antagonist in their parallel lives. Based mostly on Rand's ideals of Objectivism (her self-made philosophy), this book is a full of story, literary greatness, and provocative concepts to make the reader think.

2) Four Views on Hell edited by William Crockett
Based on Christian views of Hell, this book explores the four major ways of approaching the subject: literal, metaphorical, purgatorial, and conditional. Each chapter is written by the proponent of one of the views, followed by brief responses by each of the other three writers. A good book for anyone interested in Christian theology/philosophy, especially the nature and views of Hell in Christian circles.

3) Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays by Northrop Frye
Four essays on critical thought, drawing on much previous criticism and the tradition of literary history. These four essays touch on historical, ethical, archetypal, and rhetorical criticism as Frye looks at Western literature as forming one great arc of tradition -- difficult to summarize in short, but worth the read for anyone interested in literary theory.

Leslie goes a-listing!

2007-03-16T15:22:00.000-04:00

And thusly our suggestions begin to pour forth. My selection is a combining of a current focus and things that I just happen to think are fabulous that I saw sitting on my school shelf. All three are fiction but highly edifying nonetheless.

First and foremost - The Man Who was Thursday by Gilbert Kieth Chesterton.
Not only does this book have one of the most fabulous titles known to man, it is a fascinatingly twisted mystery that makes you wonder. The dialogue is powerful and do I even have to mention the anarchists?

Suggestion the next - Lillith by George MacDonald.
This is not necessarily an easy read, but more than well worth the time. MacDonald's descriptions are vivid and bring to life his magnificent characters and deeply immerses you in his world. It is fairly clear, I would say, why Lewis (as in C. S.) was attracted to his writing. If you're into theological concepts surrounding prayer or Lillith as Adam's first wife, there is a whole other layer for you to explore.

Last but in no way least - Dracula by Bram Stoker.
I adore this novel. It has been long enough that I don't think I can manage quite to explain how or why, but it is fascinating. Plus, a character in it, bet you cannot guess which one, is based on Vlad the Impaler. How cool is that?

Thar ya be. Happy reading.

The Book-Hoard

2007-03-15T16:01:00.000-04:00

"If we encounter a man of great intellect, we should ask him what books he reads."
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Since we are all admitted bibliophiles, I thought that it would be appropriate for our first discussion to be a reading list. ;~)
(This is mostly an excuse for me to add more books to my list...)
So here's the challenge:
List 3 books that you think are highly recommendable. My only stipulations are:

No books you know we've already all read.
No books that we've discussed extensively (in other words, Neil Gaimon is a given. As is Hero with a Thousand Faces).
No repeats (you can second another person's opinion, but you still have to come up with your own list)

I can't wait to see what we come up with! (and now I have to stop avoiding my work...)

Beoð ge gesunde!

2007-03-14T15:30:00.000-04:00

As I write this, our first post, I am merely the scribe among poets; yet I speak for the whole of our group as I present our statement of purpose:
A continuation of the Old English/Old Norse reading group, begun in Autumn, Ano Domini 2005, by a group of scholar-servants at Houghton College, as an effort to prolong our connections after graduation and the parting of our fellowship. The posts on this blog will come mostly from our moments of epiphany and inspiration, as well as the desire to share random knowledge, recommendations, etc.