Birds of Academe

The negative attitude of the University establishment was not so much directed against his Lamarckian theories, but rather an expression of the usual hostility of the grey birds in the groves of Academe against the coloured bird with the too-melodious voice.

Arthur Koestler, The Case of the Midwife Toad (NY: Random House, 1971), 49-50.

My friend Aldo Carrasco quoted this wonderful observation on academia in a letter (August 17, 1982). All these years later, I decided to track down its source.

Related post
Letters from Aldo

Background
The Case of the Midwife Toad (Museum of Hoaxes)

A late addition to the pantheon

Dinah: goddess of short-order cooking.

Overheard

"That was projectile speaking."

All "Overheard" posts (via Pinboard)

Syllabi

Adviser and adjunct instructor Monica D'Antonio proofreads other people's syllabi at Temple University:

When I was an undergraduate, I was always afraid of a professor with a detailed syllabus. To me, the longer the syllabus, the more work I was going to have to do, and the more thorough the professor was going to be.

That isn't always true. But after proofreading so many syllabi, I have concluded that the professors with the most detailed syllabi sometimes did require the most work but were also the ones who seemed most approachable and helpful.

Read it all:

If Your Syllabus Could Talk (Chronicle of Higher Education)

Harry Potter?

[After thinking a bit.] Yes. This post is all I have to offer re: Potter.

From the BBC series Extras: Andy Millman (Ricky Gervais) is filming an episode of his television series When the Whistle Blows (aka The Wind in the Willows). Andy's agent Darren Lamb (Stephen Merchant) is on the phone, fielding a proposal for his client:

He'd definitely be interested in a film, yeah. Who else is in it? Fellow who played who? Harry Potter? I've never heard of him. What? Little magical kid with glasses? You know Andy's in his forties, do you? That's — they got someone for him? Okay.

When work is done, it's time to pitch the project:

Darren: I'd like to talk some business. How do you fancy three days with Halle Berry?

Andy: Three days with Halle Berry?

Darren: Yeah. Good money; you'd be in and out.

Andy: What are you talking about?

Darren: You know, Halle Berry, little magical kid with glasses.

Andy: Do you mean Harry Potter?

Darren: [After thinking a bit.] Yes.

Related post
Moleskine sighting in Extras

Great names in spam

Jessica, Joshua, Susan, Tom: These are not the names that have made me marvel and cut and paste to a text file before emptying my spam folder. The quality of the spam names sent my way has declined of late into a plausible-first-name-only blandness, even if the sales pitches are as arresting as before. If Jessica and Joshua and company had last names, they'd be Dull and Boring.

But here, in remembrance of things past, are ten great names in spam, culled from my spam-names file:

Exie Deedee
Foggy Derek
Xzavier Folk
Pagan Jerome (Saint's older brother?)
Llamour Leventhal
Fabiola MacCorley
Hines X. Meggy
Lesedi Mongold
Lothario Vanvliet (A Captain Beefheart relation?)
Comfort Wurtz

Related posts
Achilles and stochastic
English professor spam
The folks who live in the mail
Introducing Rickey Antipasto
The poetry of spam
Spam names

Proust beats Malcolm Gladwell

A partial anecdote told by Prince Von captures the thesis of Macolm Gladwell's Blink (2005) — that quick intuitive judgments can have surprising accuracy:

"I'm rather inclined to compare the Kaiser," continued the Prince, whose inability to pronounce the word "archaeologist" (that is, as though it were spelled with a "k") did nothing to stop him from taking every opportunity to use it, "to an old archaeologist" — which the Prince pronounced as "arsheologist" — "we have in Berlin. If you set him in front of a genuine piece of Assyrian antiquity, this old arsheologist weeps. But if it is a modern fake, if it is something that is not really old, he fails to weep. And so, when they want to know whether an arsheological piece is really old, they take it to the old arsheologist. If he weeps, they buy the piece for the museum. If there are no tears, they send it back to the dealer and prosecute him for fraud."

The Guermantes Way, translated by Mark Treharne (New York: Penguin, 2002), 524

All Proust posts (via Pinboard)

Xenía in D.C.

Last month's news but still worth thinking about:

It started about midnight on June 16 when a group of friends was finishing a dinner of marinated steaks and jumbo shrimp on the back patio of a District of Columbia home. That's when a hooded man slid through an open gate and pointed a handgun at the head of a 14-year-old girl.

"Give me your money, or I'll start shooting," he said, according to D.C. police and witnesses.

Everyone froze, including the girl's parents. Then one guest spoke.

"We were just finishing dinner," Cristina "Cha Cha" Rowan, 43, told the man. "Why don't you have a glass of wine with us?"

The intruder had a sip of their Chateau Malescot St-Exupery and said, "Damn, that's good wine."

The story gets even stranger, with Camembert and hugs.

I'm hoping that any of my Homer-reading students who come across this news item pause to think on the ancient Greek practice of ξενία (xenía), hospitality. The Iliad ends with an extraordinary moment of xenía, when Achilles as host treats Hector's father Priam with respect and compassion. The two share a meal before Priam departs with Hector's returned corpse. The Odyssey is a running display of xenía and its opposite: virtually every scenario in the poem hinges upon the practice or abuse of hospitality. And hospitality isn't limited to better homes and palaces: the swineherd Eumaeus acquits himself as a perfect host by offering Odysseus that best that he has: food, shelter, and a cloak to stay warm (almost literally the shirt off his back).

What's remarkable in this D.C. story is that one person's quick thinking changed — in a moment, for everyone involved — a dismally familiar scenario into something far more humanly complicated. How odd this robber must've felt to be seen not as a terrifying monster but as a guest. And how odd his potential victims must've felt to be recognizing his need for affection (however chemically induced that need may have been).

Attempted robbery ends in group hug (Yahoo News, via Boing Boing)

Harvey Pekar's The Quitter

Dear Harvey Pekar,

I'm writing to tell you how much I liked reading The Quitter. I've read the two American Splendor anthologies, Our Cancer Year, Our Movie Year, and Unsung Hero, and I've always found your observations about everyday life funny, rueful, and moving. I think though that The Quitter moves into more difficult territory. It's a courageous move to write the story of your early life as frankly as you have — your teenaged effort to establish your toughness, and the various failed attempts at work and schooling that followed. The overall story reminds me of Proust's In Search of Lost Time: the mistakes and missteps turn out to be the materials of your vocation as a writer.

Your collaborations with R. Crumb are my favorites, but Dean Haspiel's art is beautiful and complementary, especially in the way it suggests shadowy brooding, in both the past and present.

Will an enlightened publisher someday put out a collection of your writing on jazz, supplemented perhaps by interviews? I'd welcome a Harvey Pekar Reader.

I hope these words find you in domestic, financial, and creative happiness.

All best wishes,

Michael Leddy

The Quitter (Amazon)

About Harvey Pekar (harveypekar.com)
Harvey Pekar (Wikipedia)
American Splendor (Wikipedia)
Archive of Harvey Pekar's reviews (Austin Chronicle)
Archive of Harvey Pekar's reviews (Weekly Wire)

Related post
On Unsung Hero

Notary Public

Another find while decluttering: The Art-Official Notary and Corporation Handbook ("Important information concerning the duties and functions of notaries public, and useful general data"), with a 1959 copyright. I found this item in an office supply store, just a few years ago, and had to buy it. (Cf. Charlie Brown and his tree: "I think it needs me.") In the early 1990s, this store had 45-year-old pencils still for sale.

The last fifteen pages of the handbook show sample seals from various states and counties. These two pages caught my attention:



Amid Smiths and a Doe, one name stands out as genuine. The Social Security Death Index lists no Isidore Charkatz, but it does list an Isadore Charkatz. Mr. Charkatz was born in 1910 and died in 2001. His Social Security card was issued in Maryland, and his residence at the time of his death was Baltimore. I wonder whether his family has a copy of the little book that displays his seal.

Another decluttering post
Covering v. uncovering