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*logorrhoea n pathologically excessive and often incoherent talkativeness or wordiness, prolixity [Gr logos word + roia flow, stream]
blogorrhoea n online manifestation of the above
more ways to use your words
Wednesday, August 30, 2006
Scene: the kitchen, sometime between the first and second cups of coffee of the day. Rebecca is being ... well, two, really:
Me (pleadingly): Becca, cooperate with Daddy, please!
Becca: NO!!! I GOING TO COOPERATE WITH YOU!!!
another great moment in children's lit
Tuesday, August 29, 2006
'Hey, I've got an idea. Let's play "Drive The Bus"! I'll go first!'
– Mo Willems, Don't Let the Pigeon Drive The Bus (New York: Hyperion, 2003)
'eh?' of the day
Monday, August 28, 2006
The novels of Philip Roth have seemed as free of embedded literary allusions, as devoid of mythic parallels and archetypal symbols, as a comic monologue by the late Rodney Dangerfield.
– Philip Marchand in the Toronto Star
I'm not sure how to interpret this, not being familiar with the late Mr D's œuvre. But The Human Stain (2001) fairly hums with references to Greek tragedy, particularly ideas about predestination and inevitability, makes deliberate use of such classical devices such as foreshadowing (and outright revealing the ending), and even has a sort of Chorus in the person of Zuckerman. And one of its principal themes is the weight of myths and stories and how they govern and direct our lives, their reliability and their deceptiveness, and their destructive power.
Sorry, got a bit carried away there. I'm updating Roth's biography at the mo, and might be overdoing the research just a tad.
fakin' it
Last night I jammed with the Klezmer Rebs, whose regular fiddle player is in Europe. (Or somewhere Overseas, anyway.) It was great fun -- harmonic minors a-go-go -- and I now have Ot Azoy jigging around my brain. You can too, if you want to listen here.
Sunday, August 20, 2006
Seeing as every woman and her bitch seems to be cranking out a motherhood how-to these days, I've come up with the title for mine:The Barely Adequate Mother. Whaddyareckon?
the latest project from what were they thinking studios
Saturday, August 19, 2006
No good can come of this. For one thing, no one is going to be allowed to set fire to Nicolas Cage. Worse luck.
great moments in children's literature #2
One of the family looked out and said, "There's a strange dog in the back garden...by the way, has anyone seen Harry?"
– Gene Zion, Harry the Dirty Dog. Pictures by Margaret Bloy Graham (New York: Harper, 1956)
laughter and merriment
Friday, August 18, 2006
A good week: finished my lecturing and got the notes all edited and pretty and up on the University network; also knocked off the Alan Bennett biog update and sent that off too. Thank heavens for standby days at nursery! Even managed a brisky windy walk this afternoon up through the Bot Gardens to go and get another Philip Roth from the Vic library: am updating him next. Strolling back downhill, I noticed that some of the daffs are out already, and the white magnolia's beginning to show itself too; the purple stuff's been out for weeks. Which leads me to wonder: why for interior decorating purposes does 'magnolia' designate dingy off-white? Today I saw one magnolia tree with grey branches at the end of which were huge deep purple tulips. Others bore flowers that were a vivid heather colour. When I was young I used to think of magnolias as 'vulture trees' finding them slightly sinister because of the way the flowers looked like they were lurking up there, bunched over, waiting.
great moments in children's literature
Saturday, August 12, 2006
"EEEEEOWWWFFTZ!"
said Scarface Claw.
Lynley Dodd, Hairy Maclary from Donaldson's Dairy (Wellington: Mallinson Rendel, 1983).
page 46 in very small type
Wednesday, August 09, 2006
In which Matt Seaton points out that in the Floyd-related feeding frenzy, the British media has virtually ignored Nicole Cooke's success in the Tour de France Féminin.
a word from the ivory tower
Thursday, August 03, 2006
Two lectures down outta nine, and this morning I'm happily ensconced in a borrowed office in the French dept (hurray for sabbaticals) putting the finishing touches to this afternoon's session. Surrounded by books, free from interruptions for the next blissful three hours, and with several excellent coffee-purveying establishments within dictionary-hurling distance: I could get used to this. Although I probably won't get time to, alas, so let's hope the honeymoon period lasts the (short) distance.