Mary Shelley: “a godlike science”

A creature learning a language:


Mary Shelley, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus (1818).

[The phrase “articulate sounds” may be an echo of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poem “Frost at Midnight”: “falling on mine ear / Most like articulate sounds of things to come!” Elsewhere Shelley unmistakably echoes a phrase from the poem: Coleridge’s “the sole unquiet thing” becomes Shelley’s “the only unquiet thing.” Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner figures much more prominently in the novella. Our household’s Four Seasons Reading Club (formerly the Summer Reading Club) is happily trekking through Frankenstein .]

Small-town crown

What it can be like to live in a small town, or at least in our small town:

Elaine lost her crown (dental, that is). At seven this morning, she called our dentist’s office. They start early. “Are you dressed?” Yes. “Can you come in right now?” Yes.

There was no charge.

Our dentist, now eighty-seven, has been our dentist for the past thirty-one years.

A related post
Dentistry at dawn

1992 : 2016 :: 1968 : 1992

From The New York Times :

Mr. Clinton seemed especially irritated that New Hampshire, after lifting his 1992 bid for the Democratic nomination and handing [Mrs. Clinton] a comeback win in 2008, would now abandon his wife.

Time is relative: we hear half-century-old music playing in the supermarket and think nothing of it. But the idea that Bill Clinton’s 1992 success in New Hampshire should have anything to do with a 2016 election seems to me quite bonkers. It’s like thinking about Bill Clinton’s first presidential bid in relation to somebody else’s 1968 primary.

Besides, it’s not “New Hampshire” that votes. It’s individual citizens, many of whom are feeling the Bern. Some of them weren’t even born in 1992.

The Lettermate

For anyone who has trouble addressing an envelope in straight lines: The Lettermate.

Thank you, Rachel.

Related reading
All OCA letters posts (Pinboard)

Letters and vultures

Jean-Dominique Bauby writes that he receives many letters. Some discuss “the meaning of life” and “fundamental questions.” But not all:


Jean-Dominique Bauby, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly , trans. Jeremy Leggatt (New York: Vintage Books, 1997).

Related reading
All OCA letters posts (Pinboard)
Sunday TV (Also from this book)

Sunday TV

Jean-Dominique Bauby, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly , trans. Jeremy Leggatt (New York: Vintage Books, 1997).

This luminous book, written, or composed, against all odds, may be read in an afternoon. It will be an afternoon well spent.

Verlyn Klinkenborg on writing

Verlyn Klinkenborg on what writing does:

It shares your interest in what you’ve noticed.
It reports on the nature of your attention.
It suggests the possibilities of the world around you.

Several Short Sentences About Writing (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2012).

I take those three sentences as a good account of what it means to do this kind of writing, post by post.

Related reading
All OCA Verlyn Klinkenborg posts (Pinboard)

Word of the day: kindie

I noticed the word on a poster: “The face of kindie music.” It was easy to figure out: k + indie — an indie version of kids’ music, with nice overtones of the German kinder and of what kids used to (and still do?) call kindygarden .

Kindie has thus far eluded dictionary definition, but Wordnik has a page for the word, with a citation that does a nice job of defining. From a Washington Post article about XM Radio’s Kenny Curtis:

Fortunately for Curtis and the millions of parents seat-belted within listening range, this is the golden age of “kindie” rock, a new generation of quality folk, pop and world music geared toward kids and parents alike.

The recent appearance of vinyl for the young must be a related development.

More on kindie music
Kindie rock (Slate ) : Stars of Kindie Rock (Time )

“Anthony! Anthony!”

Mary Fiumara was the voice in the Prince Spaghetti commercial.

That commercial sticks in my head because Bob and Ray made use of Mrs. Fiumara’s signature line. We would now say that they sampled it: “Anthony! Anthony!” followed by Bob and/or Ray saying something like “Will somebody stop that kid?” Yes, an imaginary Anthony was running through the Bob and Ray studio.

Jack Elrod (1924–2016)

Jack Elrod has died at the age of ninety-one. He began working on the comic strip Mark Trail in 1950, took over from Ed Dodd in 1978, and retired in 2014.

Related reading
All OCA Mark Trail posts (Pinboard)