Lake Defiance

The forty-eight-acre lake at the center of Moraine Hills State Park formed when a large piece of ice broke away from the main glacier (Wisconsonian glaciation period) and melted. The name of the park refers to the geologic formation moraine, which is the boulders, stones, and debris from a glacier.

While crouching by Lake Defiance's shores today we spotted a snake gliding over the water, watched a huge snapper gulp up a sun fish, exclaimed over several beautiful birds, including cedar waxwings and herons, and giggled about the freckle crops sprouting on the noses of our favorite people in the world.

Yes, we know that too much sun is dangerous. Everything in moderation, right?

And, yes, the overalls (see opening shot) are supposed to be that short. They are capris. This (see shot below) is, of course, the more stylish way of sporting them, but Birks are a foolish choice for long explores along a moraine.



Earlier this holiday weekend, we did something decidedly, well, suburban: We purchased a grill at Wal*Mart and roasted hot dogs and, later, marshmallows. It was so much fun that we did it again today before our expedition. There's been some ballyhoo about hotdogs causing cancer. Again, everything in moderation.

I never had much use for purple...

... until we moved to the little house in the tiny woods on the prairie.

Now I wonder, how did I live without it?

On the nightstand (under the pillow, in the knapsack, etc.)

Or out on the Adirondack chair I picked up at Jewel for $10.99. All the comfort for one-fifteenth the price of the "real" ones at Ace. Heh, heh, heh.

Well, it's that time again. This is our eighteenth "On the nightstand" entry. Many books reshaped the landscape of our imaginations since we last wrote. Here are a few of them.


Chess
Mr. and Master M-mv are anxious for the women folk to grasp the fundamentals of chess. We're going to give it a yeoman's try.

The Usborne Guide to Playing Chess

Samurai Chess: A Guide for Chess Players at All Levels (Michael J. Gelb and Raymond Keene

Chess for Dummies (James Eade)

Did you see this article earlier in the week? From "Cold War Chess" (Prospect, June 2005):

Chess has always been a simulacrum for political and military confrontation, with its gambits and endgames, stalemate and checkmate. We imagine diplomats or generals facing each other across a board. The game has been internationally popular for more than two centuries, but, like the literary genre of the spy thriller, it came into its own in the cold war.

Nature
Pulled out my copy of Anna Botsford Comstock's Handbook of Nature Study to look something up on Wednesday. Opened the book and was immediately taken in by this passage:

Their nerves were at such a tension that with one more thing to do they must fall apart. The question in my own mind during these conversations was always, how long can she stand it! I asked some of them, "Did you ever try a vigorous walk in the open country every Saturday or every Sunday of your teaching year?" "Oh no!" they exclaimed in despair of making me understand. "One Sunday we must go to church or see our friends and on Saturday we must do our shopping or our sewing. We must go to the dressmaker's lest we go unclad, we must mend, and darn stockings; we need Saturday to catch up."

Yes, catch up with more cares, more worries, more fatigue, but not with more growth, more strength, more vigor, and more courage for work. In my belief, there are two and only two occupations for Saturday afternoon or forenoon for a teacher. One is to be out-of-doors and the other is to lie in bed, and the first is best. Out in this, God's beautiful world, there is everything waiting to heal lacerated nerves, to strengthen tired muscles, to please and content the soul that is torn to shreds with duty and care.

This passage, of course, plays out in my reader's mind a little differently. With a couple of words substituted here and there Comstock's mild rant is not unlike my own about parenting and home-educating. How do you find the time? they all ask. How do you not? I reply.


Wish I hadn't bothered
Did you read our 5.12.2005 entry, "This Is Your Brain on Motherhood."? Couldn't help myself. Had to check Ellison's book out of the library. I repeat, using your head while parenting isn't special; it's what you're supposed to do. Can we stop clapping each other on the back for being mothers now? It's just. not. that. hard.


Not bad
Confessions of a Slacker Mom (Muffy Mead-Ferro)

I guess that's why fanatic record-keeping bugs me. It's not just the tedium. I'm leery of making such a big deal out of my child's very existence, because there's a big difference between real accomplishment and just being present.

Ayup.


Family book club
I read Canticle for Leibowitz once-upon-a-time-ago, but Mr. and Master haven't. I'm game for a re-read.

Pound pastrami, can kraut, six bagels--bring home for Emma.

On writing
From Steering the Craft (Ursula K. LeGuin):

Rhythm is what keeps the song going, the horse galloping, the story moving. Sentence length has a lot to do with the rhythm of prose. So an important aspect of the narrative sentence is -- prosaically -- its length.

Teachers trying to get school kids to write clearly, and journalists with their weird rules of writing, have filled a lot of heads with the notion that the only good sentence is a short sentence.

This is true for convicted criminals.

Heh, heh, heh.

Compostion in the Classical Tradition (Frank J. D'Angelo)
Glad I borrowed this one... because now I can return it. No question, Winifred Bryan Horner's Rhetoric in the Classical Tradition is the superior text for teaching upper-level rhetoric and comp.


Classics
Classic Poetry: An Illustrated Collection (selected by Michael Rosen)
You don't need a plan or a permission slip to enjoy poetry with your family. Simply pull down a collection of poems and read. Play with the language. Take turns delighting in silly poems. Teach one another the importance of old favorites. Recite from memory the poems you've learned. Let favorite pieces become part of the pattern of your family's secret language, like lines from favorite books and films.

Love of language and learning does not grow from lists or lesson plans.

It blossoms in the place where children hear:

To fling my arms wide,
In some place of the sun,
To whirl and to dance
Till the white day is done,
Then rest at cool evening
Beneath a tall tree
While night comes on gently,
Dark, like me --
That is my dream!

and can imagine the speaker, draw him, talk to him, and know what he'd say next.

You don't need a plan. You need a passion for this work. And the maturity to work.

Each and every day.

No matter what.

More about poetry: Patterns in Poetry: Recognizing and Analyzing Poetic Form and Meter (Greg Roza).


More classics
Abel's Island (William Steig)
Abel's Island (read by George Guidall)

The Magician's Nephew (C.S. Lewis)
The Magician's Nephew (read by Kenneth Branagh)
We've had the most wonderful success with books on tape. As entertainment in the car. As friends on the treadmill. As stand-ins when Mrs. and Master have run out of steam. And as a way to improve comprehension and speed in young readers.


History
The American Flag (Patricia Ryon Quiri)

The Flag Maker (Susan Campbell Bartoletti)

The Story of Jamestown (Marilyn Prolman)

The Story of the Mayflower (Norman Richards)

The Young Nation: American 1787-1861 (David M. Brownstone)


A mystery for my knapsack
The Mermaids Singing (Val McDermid)


Previous "On the nightstand" entries
4.18.2005
3.20.2005
2.14.2005
1.14.2005
12.21.2004
11.21.2004
10.12.2004
9.13.2004
8.24.2004
7.19.2004
6.12.2004
5.19.2004
4.22.2004
3.12.2004
2.15.2004
1.26.2004
12.31.2003

Vulcan death grip

Every once in a while my youngest, a mathemagician, will experience a brain-tootle while reading. That is, confronted with a word she knows, she blanks -- or, more often, overthinks.

A couple of days ago, she read aloud to Master M-mv, stumbling when she arrived at "face."

"How can you get 'acknowledge' and not this?" Master M-mv asked in mock horror and surprise.

"Hey, Boy-boy. You're supposed to help me," Miss M-mv(ii) countered. "Fac. Facci. Fa--."

Master puts his hand gently on his sister's face. Envision his hand framing her face like a catcher's mask, or like a spider squatting on a ball, legs splayed.

"Here's a hint," Master said.

"This word is way too short to be 'Vulcan Death Grip,'" replied Miss M-mv(ii).

What makes me laugh even typing this is that she was serious.

"Here's your sign."

Mr. M-mv and I are up late tonight. Working. We're scheduled for a four-day holiday, so, of course, our respective employers are experiencing a crisis. You know how it goes. Over pizza and large mugs of coffee, we manned our dueling laptops and shared stories of how we ended up in this place at 10:46 p.m. on the eve of our short vacation. Both stories end the same:

"Here's your sign."

Nothing like saying that in a merry voice when someone else's act of sheer stupidity would otherwise reduce us to tears of woe for the fate of mankind.

"Here's your sign."

Surely you've heard the Bill Engvall schtickl. No? Oh, sit back, honey. This one is funny.

Stupid people should have to wear signs that just say, "I'm stupid." That way you wouldn't rely on them, would you? You wouldn't ask them anything. It would be like, "Excuse me...oops...never mind. 'didn't see your sign."

It's like before my wife and I moved. Our house was full of boxes and there was a U-Haul truck in our driveway. My neighbor comes over and says, "Hey, you moving?"

"Nope. We just pack our stuff up once or twice a week to see how many boxes it takes. Here's your sign."

A couple of months ago, I went fishing with a buddy of mine. We pulled his boat into the dock, I lifted up this big ol' stringer of bass, and this idiot on the dock goes, "Hey, y'all catch all them fish?"

"Nope. Talked 'em into giving up. Here's your sign."

I was watching one of those animal shows on the Discovery Channel. There was a guy inventing a shark-bite suit, and there's only one way to test it. "All right, Jimmy, you got that shark suit on, it looks good. They want you to jump into this pool of sharks, and you tell us if it hurts when they bite you."

"Well, all right, but hold my sign. I don't wanna lose it."

Last time I had a flat tire, I pulled my truck into one of those side-of-the-road gas stations. The attendant walks out, looks at my truck, looks at me, and I SWEAR he said, "Tire go flat?" I couldn't resist. I said, "Nope. I was driving around and those other three just swelled right up on me. Here's your sign."

We were trying to sell our car about a year ago. A guy came over to the house and drove the car around for about 45 minutes. We get back to the house, he gets out of the car, reaches down and grabs the exhaust pipe, then says, "Darn that's hot!" See, if he'd been wearing his sign, I could have stopped him.

I learned to drive an 18-wheeler in my days of adventure. Wouldn't you know, I misjudged the height of a bridge. The truck got stuck, and I couldn't get it out, no matter how I tried. I radioed in for help, and eventually a local cop shows up to take the report. He went through his basic questioning. Okay. No problem. I thought for sure he was clear of needing a sign...until he asked, "So, is your truck stuck?" I couldn't help myself! I looked at him, looked back at the rig and then back to him, and said, "No, I'm delivering a bridge. Here's your sign."

I stayed late at work one night and a co-worker looked at me and said, "Are you still here?" I replied, "No. I left about 10 minutes ago. Here's your sign."

Anybody you know need a sign today?

The next time someone says something stupid, ask them where their sign is.

We're not sure where our bosses' bosses' bosses' signs are, but we're willing to print them up some new ones.

Here you go, folks. Here's your sign.

Heh, heh, heh.

Neil Steinberg on Star Wars:

I haven't seen the new "Star Wars" movie yet, and am not exactly running to the theater. The old ones were dumb, serving up heaping helpings of faux mystical philosophy, feel-instead-of-think anti-intellectualism, flashy clunkiness and, of course, the saccharine, death-worthy Ewoks.

I was afraid I might be alone in this contempt, so was gratified by the May 23 New Yorker, which contains a fine Anthony Lane vivisection of George Lucas' intergalactic cash cow.

Here's Lane's "vivisection."

Untitled

From "Escargot? Oui. Google? Sacre Bleu" (Wired, 5/11/05):

A relationship marked by lows such as Freedom Fries and EuroDisney would seem to have no room to go any lower.

And yet: When U.S.-based Google announced plans in December to undertake the cost of digitizing the world's books and making them searchable to the public for free, France called foul, with the country's top librarian complaining loudly of yet another example of "crushing American domination."

Did you notice?
We restored the links from the sidebar of our old template.


What I read this weekend
Liberalism in the Classical Tradition (Ludwig von Mises)
Confessions of a Slacker Mom (Muffy Mead-Ferro)

And, yes, the juxtaposition of these two texts was odd. Okay. Positively surreal.

It's time for an "On the nightstand" entry, I know. The holiday weekend should offer me time to cobble it together.


What I'm thinking

I think we are well advised to keep on nodding terms with the people we used to be, whether we find them attractive company or not. Otherwise they turn up unannounced and surprise us, come hammering on the mind's door at 4 a.m. of a bad night and demand to know who deserted them, who betrayed them, who is going to make amends.

-- Joan Didion in Slouching towards Bethlehem

Discovered Didion during the California years. One of only a handful of good things about that experience, I'll tell you.

"Nodding terms" represents just about the right mix of introspection and action, I think. It's something to shoot for, anyway.

Paying for college: A rant of modest proportions

No.

Not now. Not ever.

Not on my dime.

I will invest nearly every ounce of my time, talent, and treasure on my children's learning adventures until they finish high school. And then, well... I look forward to following their journey --- with my Visa, my checkbook, my wallet, and my retirement plan completely intact.

This may mean that they (wisely) complete general education courses such as composition I and II, U.S. history, literature, biology, chemistry, etc. at one of the city's community colleges while they wrap up their high school studies. Such preparation will save them time and money.

This may mean that they will prepare for and take AP examinations in subjects in which they excel. Scores of four or five will translate into college credit. Such preparation will save them time and money.

This may mean that they pursue internships, apprenticeships, business opportunities, etc. that will not only (potentially) earn them money but also set them apart from same-aged peers with whom they may compete for admission into special programs and/or scholarships. Such preparation will save them money.

This may mean that, like their parents, they will work while attending college --- they will work parttime jobs so that they need not take out loans, and they will work their bums off so that they, like their parents, earn recognition and scholarships. All such preparation will save them time and money.

And it will likely spare them the devastating debt that many of today's grads face upon graduation. (See "Graduates fear debt more than terrorism," USA Today, May 18, 2005.)

We are "trained" to see college as the next logical step for bright kids --- like our kids: educated classically with heaps of individual tutoring and time to learn and grow. But the truth is, many of our teens are already better educated than freshmen in our "good" state schools. They (our teens) are better read, more capable, and almost in a class of their own when it comes to writing, thinking, and drawing parallels between the disciplines of history, literature, philosophy, and science.

A big-tag college education may not be their ticket.

And that's okay.

"They keep creating new ways to celebrate mediocrity."

Bob Parr: It's not a graduation. He's moving from the 4th grade to the 5th grade.
Helen Parr: It's a ceremony.
Bob Parr: It's psychotic! They keep creating new ways to celebrate mediocrity.

Ayup. But we don't have to play by those rules, do we? Here's to some good, clean elitism... because saying, "Everyone's special, Dash," is just "another way of saying no one is."

And we know that's not true.

To have and to hold

When entering into a marriage one ought to ask oneself: do you believe you are going to enjoy talking with this woman up into your old age? Everything else in marriage is transitory, but most of the time you are together will be devoted to conversation.

-- Friedrich Nietzsche

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Caught reading

This image first appeared in our 1.3.2005 entry.

For Sherry over at Semicolon, a worthwhile virtual destination if there ever were one.

Volo Bog

Yeah, we've written about the bog before (here and here). It's the only "quaking" bog in Illinois to have an open water center.

And, simply put, it's cool.

Today at the Volo Bog State Natural Area, the Lake County Astronomical Society joined astronomy organizations around the world in "Bringing Astronomy to the People!" The daytime activities included training in safe observation of the sun and building your own comet (with a little help from dry ice). In about two hours, participants will reconvene for a star party.

Of course, we're looking forward to it. It's the only kind of partying this group does.

We know.

We're geeks.

In between talks with the participating astronomers, the Misses M-mv completed the Volo Bog scavenger hunt, a requirement of the junior naturalist program. One of the questions concerned hte Tollund Man. His story may interest M-mv readers, thinkers, and autodidacts.

Some day I will go to Aarhus
To see his peat-brown head,
The mild pods of his eye-lids,
His pointed skin cap.

From Seamus Heaney's poem "The Tollund Man."

And, yes, we spend part of each visit draped over the boardwalk railing, wondering, What is sunk in the Volo Bog?

"This Is Your Brain on Motherhood."

Katherine Ellison, author of The Mommy Brain: How Motherhood Makes Us Smarter, writes (NYT, May 8, 2005 (registration required but free and easy)):

The human brain, we now know, creates cells throughout life, cells more likely to survive if they're used. Emotional, challenging and novel experiences provide particularly helpful use of these new neurons, and what adjectives better describe raising a child? Children constantly drag their parents into challenging, novel situations, be it talking a 4-year-old out of a backseat meltdown on the Interstate or figuring out a third-grade homework assignment to make a model of a black hole in space.

"[B]eing a dedicated parent strengthens our minds," maintains Ellison. Oh, if only it were that simple, huh? Sure, I have become smarter during these years of parenting and home-educating; I have, after all, had so many, many opportunities to redress academic wrongs. But I think I am simply part of that (shrinking) percentage of our species who reads, thinks, learns, synthesizes, writes, etc. (i.e., does the hard work needed to grow smarter -- or at least to avoid stagnation), children or no.

I would add only that distracting a child to avoid a backseat meltdown is really no different than manipulating a boss. Deciphering a homework assignment? Hello? Scope of work for a needy client, anyone? Kids don't make you smarter. Using your head makes you smarter.

Using your head while parenting isn't special; it's what you're supposed to do. Can we stop clapping each other on the back for being mothers now? It's just. not. that. hard.

Again with the Bard

Last night I received an email message from K.B.:

I followed your link to Kiernan Ryan's article on Shakespeare. I like that he dared contend with the "universal stories" theory, but, try as I might, I just can't understand, and therefore agree with, his conclusion. For me, it's the language, which I wrote about, then proposed a set of Shakespeare questions, which I would be intrigued to know your responses to.

1. Name the first five lines of Shakespeare that come into your head.

In a second message, K.B. added:

No rush, but I do challenge you to brainstorm the first quotes rather than ponder them out. Just write the first five that come up, even if they're from the same play, then check them later. I look forward to your response!

Here are the first five:

"Would he were fatter!" (Julius Caesar)

"O God, I could be bounded in a nutshell and count myself king of infinite space -- were it not that I have bad dreams." (Hamlet)

"O Kate, nice customs curtsey to great kings." (Henry V)

"Well, thou hast comforted me marvelous much." (Romeo and Juliet)

"I am not in the giving vein today... Thou troublest me; I am not in the vein." (Richard III)

But, to be truthful, a lot of lines arrived at the entrance of my mental cattle chute at the same time. The above were those that pushed through. These others were fast on their hooves.

"If this were played upon a stage now, I could condemn it as improbable fiction." (Twelfth Night)

"... for I will be horribly in love..." (Much Ado about Nothing)

"Your means are very slender and your waste is great." (Henry IV, Part I) [I say this at least a dozen times a month: on the fifteenth and thirtieth while writing bills and in any store when I have company.]

"Away, you scullion! You rampallion! You fustilarian!" (Henry IV, Part I) [Heh, heh, heh. This is one case in which we have chosen to ignore the lexicon. We continue to ascribe to these epithets innocuous meanings, as in, for example, "Get on with you, you big pain in the butt! You bologna head! You baby!" The true glosses are "kitchen servant," "prostitute," and "untidy fat woman."]

2. The last Shakespeare play you went to see on stage.
The Shakespeare Project of Chicago's theatrical reading of The Winter's Tale in February.

3. The last Shakespeare film homage or adaptation you watched at home or at the movies.
Over the weekend, we watched (yet again) scenes from Branagh's Henry V and Much Ado about Nothing.

4. What Shakespeare homage/adaptation/plays are on your to be read/seen list?
A production of Hamlet with Derek Jacobi in the title role.

5. Name a favorite Shakespeare-inspired work.
I'm not sure what you're looking for here, but two favorite titles on my Shakespeare shelves are Harold Bloom's Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human and the brilliant (at times, painfully so) memoir Hamlet's Dresser by Bob Smith.

6. Why do you think Shakespeare's plays are still popular?
I'm with Bloom on this one:

Bardolatry, the worship of Shakespeare, ought to be even more a secular religion than it already is. The plays remain the the outward limit of human achievement: aesthetically, cognitively, in certain ways morally, even spiritually. They abide beyond the end of the mind's reach; we cannot catch up to them. Shakespeare will go on explaining us, in part because he invented us....

If Harold Bloom's Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human is a catechism of bardolatry, then this is the holy book, no? I'm not so sure the plays are, as you say, "popular" -- they are essential.

Four-leaf clover

After announcing her discovery with a characteristic squeal of delight, she handed the plucked clover to me. "Here, Mom! I love you!"

The four-leaf clover is a symbol of luck, according to Irish folklore. The first three leaves represent hope, faith, love; the fourth, luck or fortune.

Thin arms around my ample waist. The embrace goes on and on, and I gaze at the green wonder in my palm. It would be neat to experience a windfall, I think. Hell. Neat, nothing. It would freakin' awesome. It would be a gift to know that our family will always enjoy good health. Happiness. That's always nice, too.

But luck? Fortune?

"Here, Mom! I love you!"

I am already the luckiest woman in the world.

Sisters

Researchers have found similarities in non-verbal language and space usage within families. Brothers select similar areas and houses to live in, sisters decorate homes in a similar manner.[Emphasis added.]

From a neat article I read this morning: "Zoning into the personal sphere," which appeared in the Daily Times -- in Pakistan.

The internet is cool.

A link, some (e)mail, and a bit of shameless self-promotion

Yeah, it's a multi-purpose, Saturday-evening entry, folks.

A link to make you think
From "The Roads to Serfdom" by Theodore Dalrymple (City Journal, Spring 2005):

Collectivist thinking arose, according to Hayek, from impatience, a lack of historical perspective, and an arrogant belief that, because we have made so much technological progress, everything must be susceptible to human control. While we take material advance for granted as soon as it occurs, we consider remaining social problems as unprecedented and anomalous, and we propose solutions that actually make more difficult further progress of the very kind that we have forgotten ever happened. While everyone saw the misery the Great Depression caused, for example, few realized that, even so, living standards actually continued to rise for the majority. If we live entirely in the moment, as if the world were created exactly as we now find it, we are almost bound to propose solutions that bring even worse problems in their wake.

From the (e)mailbag
From M.B.:

"Read, laugh, think, learn, love, live."

One thing I love about your writing is the simple profundity of it. You say it so well. One of my favorite [Mrs. M-mv] quotes surfaced lately. "If you want children who enjoy museums, you must take children to museums." I love (and remember) the great planet analogy as well.

The quote above made me realize that I really like to read, laugh, learn, love, and live. But, (much to my horror) I realized that given the choice... I prefer not to think. It is so much easier to be spoonfed or accept the status quo. I think that is why I became a math major in college. There is knowledge and learning going on, but no synthesis of ideas or philosophies. My natural instinct is to take the easy way out and settle for easy answers and ideas.

I am fighting this in myself. Being a math major I was never forced to look deeply at what makes quality literature. I have always loved to read, but even with reading I often take the easy (pop-fiction genre) way out. This is why I have been so committed to actually reading books that you (and Diane) read. You are both people who I respect and consider good thinkers. If I surround myself with enough books that "thinkers" like, I may figure out for myself what makes for good quality
literature.

This is an extremely long introduction to my question. Once a long time ago you said that you did not like the book The Secret Life of Bees. I decided to read it also to get a comparison of things you like and don't like. But, I was really curious what it is that you don't like about it. It was not a favorite of mine either, but I can't really express what I didn't like about it. The book seemed to fit into a genre that I don't really like. I call it the "Oprah" genre that seems
to be so filled with angst. I know you are busy, but I'd love to hear your summary in a couple of sentences when you have time.

The Oprah-Pick nature of the book is precisely what I loathed about it. Poorly rendered angst, in a nutshell. Predictable. Overwrought. You've already defined what I disliked.

The difference between The Secret Life of Bees and, let's say, Bee Season (Myla Goldberg), another fiction title published about the same time, is that the latter demands that the reader think, feel, remain engaged. The first demands nothing of the reader, and, in the end, it does little to reshape the geography of one's imagination. I hasten to add that not every book must do this. I've repeatedly mentioned how much I enjoy mental M&Ms now and again. But books in the M.B.-dubbed "Oprah genre" are pop fiction masquerading as "Important Lit." (The use of caps and quotation marks indicate heavy sarcasm there.) I.L. is hard enough to swallow. Novels pretending to be I.L.? One word: Yuck.

What is literature? What should people read? I mused on these and similar questions back when we started the un-blog. From "Book wars" (11.30.2003):

[A] reader must contend with the fact that his choices are as good as infinite; he cannot read all that there is to read, so he must choose some books and reject others. While we cannot always afford a meal at a five-star restaurant, we also cannot endure a steady diet of candy bars. There is a balance, "a tolerant citizenry" of books. It probably doesn't include much James Patterson, Nicholas Sparks, Jackie Collins, or "chick lit," though....

Thank you, as always, for your note and kind words, M.B. Hey, and for what it's worth, I wouldn't mind a healthy dose of your math magic. Don't sell yourself or your talents short.

More from the (e)mailbag soon.


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Shakespeare

From "Creator of worlds" by Kiernan Ryan (The Guardian, April 23, 2005):

Even a veteran of Bard-biz like me couldn't fail to be awed all over again by the magnitude of the mind that hatched plays as diverse as Henry V, Twelfth Night, Hamlet and The Tempest. And I fell to musing on the secret of the plays' enduring power and global appeal four centuries after Shakespeare penned them.

Embedding the plays in the culture that cradled them can teach us all sorts of invaluable things that enhance our understanding of them. But it's hopeless at explaining why the glovemaker's lad from Stratford still captivates audiences on every continent, while the other dazzling dramatists of his day do not.

Shakespeare's drama still thrills us because it allows us to see his world from the standpoint of a world that men and women are still struggling to create. Shakespeare's gift to our time is an extraordinary one: the power to view the past that shaped the present as if we were already citizens of centuries to come.

Be a sun.

Or, Thoughts on parenting (culled from material I posted in another forum a year or two ago)

Many folks home educate principally so that they can tailor lessons, learning environments, and the like to their children’s unique needs and desires. But only so much of this sort of thing is (a) necessary and (b) realistic.

Let’s face it: Too much catering grows suns. (In other words, the world doesn’t (or shouldn’t, anyway) revolve around the kids or their personalities.) Personally, I’m raising planets. Each is on his or her own path around the sun. Each has unique and wonderful features. But Jupiter may not disrespect Saturn, and Saturn may not disrespect Earth, and Earth may not disrespect Jupiter. And so on.

Overheard in my universe (because from now until at least 2016, I am their sun):

So, you don’t like rings? Well, isn’t it good that you don’t have any, huh, my dear little Earth? Okay. Well, we’re talking rings right now, so you have three choices: (1) Get over yourself. (2) Continue on your revolution (i.e., leave the room until we ve wrapped up ring talk). (3) Suffer in silence. Oh, Earth! You’re an easy one. You get over yourself pretty durned quickly. Good. Now, moving right along on that ring talk....

Ah, yes, Jupiter. You’re the biggest. No denying that, now is there? Look at you. Well, we’re doing decidedly little-female-planet-type stuff right now, so you have three choices: (1) Get over yourself. (2) Continue on your revolution (i.e., leave the room until we’ve wrapped up decidedly little-female-planet-type stuff). (3) Suffer in silence. Now, you’ve never been good at suffering in silence, so can I recommend options 1 or 2? Good. See you soon.

Earth and I are having a moment, Saturn. Since you’re not too fond of our games, how 'bout you choose option two in our customary line-up. And don't stomp on your way. Out.

And so on.

Introverted or extroverted, serious or playful, all of us must learn how to cope with with different personalities, birth order traits, traditions, styles, etc. What better place to learn than at home in the universe? Dear home-educating parent, be a sun to their planets. Get them on the right revolution.

Then relax a little. Make them take some responsibility for coping with each other. This gig is nowhere near as difficult as many make it out to be.

No loitering

(Just kidding!)



The sign was Master M-mv's other gift to me. Just cracked us up, it did.

And, yes, that's Entertainment Weekly up there -- a gift from my mother-in-law. She also sent us a renewal to Popular Science, though, so... there you go. And Reader's Digest -- a gift to Master M-mv from Aunt M-mv, although it is Miss M-mv(ii)'s "favorite magazine in all the world!" Never ordinary. That's our motto. Gotta like a family who can loiter with The Atlantic Monthly and Entertainment Weekly, no?

From the (e)mail bag

From R.T.:

Shakespeare wrote for the groundlings! Of course! And for the nobility. And for the middle class. He also wrote for the innocent and the damned.

A new documentary titled "Shakespeare Behind Bars," which has been nominated for Sundance Film Festival award, demonstrates the continuing wide reach of his impact as it chronicles the rehearsal and performance of The Tempest by a group of prison inmates in Kentucky.

Read about it.

We will be re-discovering the truth in his work, the lessons they teach, and the awareness they bring, as long as we are human, because his words contain the essence of what it means to range the course of feeling, thinking and being in the world. No matter "who" we are.

From M.:

I thought of you at the Carnegie Natural History Museum in Pittsburgh yesterday. We were looking at the bird exhibit, and the sight of stuffed birds lying on their backs reminded me of the tray of birds. (The Monty Python dead parrot sketch reference came later.) We had a wonderful time and we'll have to make an effort to go there more than a couple times a year. The kids are really starting the enjoy the place now that they are "older and wiser." I realized that I'm wiser, too: I've picked up an amazing amount of natural history information from those Patrick O'Brian novels (reading #19 now). The icing on the cake was discovering a new route that takes 20 minutes off the two-hour driving time. The cherry on top was the M-mv entry on museum visits.

On turning off the television: did you see the article "Watching TV Makes You Smarter" in The New York Times Magazine?

In pointing out some of the ways that popular culture has improved our minds, I am not arguing that parents should stop paying attention to the way their children amuse themselves. What I am arguing for is a change in the criteria we use to determine what really is cognitive junk food and what is genuinely nourishing. Instead of a show's violent or tawdry content, instead of wardrobe malfunctions or the F-word, the true test should be whether a given show engages or sedates the mind. Is it a single thread strung together with predictable punch lines every 30 seconds? Or does it map a complex social network?

He seems to argue that complexity always trumps content, which I just cannot agree with. And then there's this:

If they want to watch a mystery show, encourage '24' over 'Law and Order.'

Heresy!

Agreed.

From A.:

I like having a TV turnoff week. It strikes me that most people in the U.S. don't know that they have a choice about watching television, reading books, choosing their child's education, going carless, exercising, firing their doctor, quitting a job, etc. Anything that points out to them their choices in life seems to me to be a good thing.

We built a log cabin in the wilds of Montana when I was pregnant with our daughter. No one understood why we would choose to do that. I breastfed her, and folks were aghast that we didn't use bottles. We decided to homeschool her, and no one understood that, either. Our decision to be TV-less appalled my parents, who do nothing in the evening but watch mindless show after mindless show. The most common reaction to all our decisions was, "People can't DO that can they?" To our smiling response of "Of course you can choose to be...(insert whatever word you want followed by -less)," they said, "Huh?"

Folks I know generally believe that they have very few choices in life, that life and society is fixed and immutable, and going against the grain makes one subversive. LOL, me as a subversive. What a fun idea!

Thanks, folks. You three always make me think.

Birthday booty

World's Best Mom ribbon (From Miss M-mv(ii).)

A coffee mug (Handle it "with great care," says Miss M-mv(i).)

Yankee Candle (Macintosh -- the only scent worth $20.99, as far as this thrifty gal is concerned.)

A Cozy Up Warmer

New reading glasses

Leif Enger's Peace Like a River

Audrey Niffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife (From Aunt M-mv, who also sent Trader Joe's French roast, subscriptions to The Atlantic Monthly and a weekly publication that is our little secret, gift cards, a battery charger, a recommendation that I use Ponds in that tender eye area, and Case Histories (Kate Atkinson) -- among other wonderful gifts. Yes, I felt happily spoiled.)

Our Latin Heritage, Book II (1966. From the library sale last weekend -- does Master M-mv know his mom, or what? He also picked up Maureen Daly's Seventeenth Summer from one of my wish lists. A photo of something else he gave me will appear on M-mv tomorrow or the next day.)

My own copy


There was more. Heh, heh, heh. As I said, I felt happily spoiled.