http://blogcritics.org/ A sinister cabal of superior bloggers on music, books, film, popular culture, politics, and technology - updated continuously. en Copyright 2005-2007 by the authors Thu, 26 May 2005 08:27:21 EDT http://backend.userland.com/rss Blogcritics.org custom software http://blogcritics.org/ Phillip WinnSunday, August 26, 2007, marks the switch of all Blogcritics.org article feeds from full-content to short-content. This is the result of several converging factors, and is unfortunately a permanent decision (as permanent as any decision can be on the web, that is). We are aware of all of the reasons that this is a Bad Idea, and we are aware that some of you will be quite upset about having to click on something to read the free content, and we're sorry. Unfortunately, despite great effort, full-content feeds are not currently economically viable. Two other factors are involved: full-content feeds have resulted in an unprecedented level of content theft, with BC content appearing on many websites, usually spam sites, without attribution or permission. This duplicate content causes a cascading set of problems, not the least of which is that search engines generally aren't favorable to duplicate content, and don't always guess correctly. Finally, our RSS advertising partner is strongly in favor of short-content feeds. We hope that you'll continue to subscribe to BC via RSS, and when an article grabs your eye, it's only a click away, still free on the BC website. Thank you for your understanding. Administration0@blogcritics.org Sun, 26 Aug 2007 12:00:00 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2005/05/26/082721.php XanadaI'm reading a piece of historical mystery fiction, something that I don't ordinarily enjoy, being much too rooted in the near present for some reason. But Rules of Engagement by Bruce Alexander is pretty good. Set in England's 18th century, it features a blind London magistrate, Sir John Fielding, and his amanuensis, a boy who plans on becoming a lawyer. Never completely happy, I cavil at the gavel. Time and time again Alexander has "the blind beak of Bow Street" pound his gavel to bring order to the Hogarthian scene in the courtroom. I don't think so.English and Canadian judges don't use gavels. Don't need to to get decorum that way. Gavels are an American thing. You'd think that someone doing research in the legal scene in England in the 1700's would pay attention to this sort of thing. If it happened once or twice (I've read two of his books now), no big deal; but it must happen twenty times per a book.Oddly, I can't find clear evidence of this English lack. But the best proof I can offer of the gavelless nature of English courtrooms comes from the Oxford English Dictionary, where all but one of the many meanings of "gavel" have to do with "rent" or "payment" or "tithe" (this "gavel" is related to the word "give"). The last meaning is stamped "US" and talks about a mallet used by Masons in their rites. There are no usage quotations at all from England, so it's hard to imagine that gavels were used but never written about.If anyone has literary or pictorial evidence to the contrary, let me know. From here on in, keep gavels confined to U.S. courtrooms, eh? Books30164@blogcritics.org Thu, 26 May 2005 08:27:21 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2005/05/23/145848.php XanadaBack when I was reading about Carl Jung, I learned about Eugen Bleuler, Jung's mentor and the one who first introduced the term schizophrenia. In his 1911 book Dementia praecox oder Gruppe der Schizophrenien, there's a young woman's report of a hallucination that I found quite touchingly beautiful. I translated it and set it out as a found poem:Think of it Papa, I've Become a Child ProdigyMany things come to light from my pretty blue peepers, like bed sheets, ready-smoothed, pillows complete with feather beds, white or coloured, bed- stead, potty, and the like, baskets thread ready-to-wear stockings in all colours clothes from the simplest to the most elegant and finally people fly out, luckily not naked but completely dressed.It could be made to read as a poignant German poem, too. Here's the passage in the original, unbroken:Denke dir Papa, ich bin ein Wunderkind geworden. Aus meine lieben blauen Äugelein kommen viel Sachen heraus, zum Beispiel Leintücher, fix und fertig gebügelt, Kopfkissen mid sampt Plumeau, Weiβ oder farbig, Bettstatt, Kommode und so weiter, Körbe, Faden, ganze fertige Strümpfe von allen Farben, Kleider, einfach bis zu den elegantesten, und zum Schluβ Menchen fliegen heraus, zum Glück nicht nackt sondern fix und fertig gekleidet. Books30001@blogcritics.org Mon, 23 May 2005 14:58:48 EDT