Authors, Writing

F. Scott Fitzgerald

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F. Scott Fitzgerald is one of Minnesota’s most famous sons, though it’s hard to imagine any author less typically Minnesotan. I once visited some people who lived in the town house he once occupied, on St. Paul’s toney Summit Avenue.

Anyway, Robert J. Avrech, one of the consistently most interesting writers at Big Hollywood, posts about Fitzgerald’s sojourn in Hollywood today. Although he doesn’t agree entirely, he quotes the opinion of one of Fitzgerald’s friends, John Lee Mahin, who blamed at least part of the author’s implosion on political pressures from the film community’s burgeoning Communist movement.

His work was condemned, they said, and he believed them. He denounced himself even more harshly than his judges, accusing his work of being trivial and superficial.

“He actually told me he’s ashamed of The Great Gatsby,” John fairly snarled. “Those cursed Do-gooders… they’ve got him believing his work isn’t worth a tinkers damn just because he wasn’t waving a banner or marching in a picket line. They’ve destroyed him, as sure as God made little apples.”

Publishing

Jeepers creepers, where’d they put the peepers?

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Joe Carter, over at First Things, blogs about an interesting trend in current book cover design—pictures of women with the eyes cut off.

In spite of one commenter who thinks it’s just a way to focus on… a different feature, I think there’s something more complex going on here.

Mystery is a very compelling quality, in men and women. I think there are still mystery men in our cultural world, but the mystery woman seems to have pretty much disappeared. Any woman who isn’t “in your face,” “letting it all hang out” is looked on as some kind of throwback to the Victorian era. Female movie stars used to keep their private lives private (the studios often made up entirely fictional biographies for them). They never showed up in public without make-up, and dressed to the nines. The mystery, the “glamor” (which comes from an Irish word meaning “a magical power to deceive”) was a major part of their allure. For most female stars today, a nude scene is a rite of passage, and their affairs and break-ups are conducted in front of a battery of cameras.

Where are the women on the book covers looking? Are their expressions quizzical, or frightened, or knowing, or arrogant? The mystery is intriguing. It draws you in. I’d be willing to wager psychologists suggested this design element, to get readers to think, unconsciously, “There’s mystery here. I must buy this book to find out what it is.”

I wonder if eye contact means as much to normal people as it does to me. Because of my shyness disorder, making eye contact is very difficult for me. I avoid it. (I expect some people think me dishonest because of it, which I regret.) I have to make a distinct effort to make eye contact. When I meet someone’s gaze, I feel almost as if I’d been shocked, as if a spark has been struck. And I feel vulnerable, as if I’d opened my door to a stranger. Even if the person is someone I know and have no reason to distrust.

The up side is, I live a life full of mystery.

Uncategorized

Despair: New and Improved

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Looking for that perfect Christmas gift? Look no further. Despair.com offers gifts “for the person who has everything, but still isn’t very happy about it.” Here’s a great suggestion for the business executive or the corporate stooge in your life. Get him the Demotivation lithograph, which says, “Sometimes the best solution to morale problems is just to fire all of the unhappy people.” Or the Worth lithograph: “Just because you’re necessary doesn’t mean you’re important.”

Priceless.

Uncategorized

The queen of Asgard?

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Here’s an interesting puzzle that’s got people in Viking studies scratching their heads these days. If you go to this link at the Old Norse News blog, you’ll see a picture of a little silver figurine recently unearthed by archaeologists near the ancient royal site of Lejre, in Denmark.

The figure is seated on an elaborate throne. If you look closely, you’ll note that a bird sits on each arm of the throne.

Now Snorri Sturlusson’s Prose Edda, our chief source of information on the Norse myths, tells us that the god Odin had a throne in Asgard, and that he kept a pair of ravens, Hugin and Munin, who flew out every day to get news of the world, and then flew back to light on their master’s shoulders and whisper what they’d learned to him. Obviously, this figurine is a pretty good match for Odin. It even seems to have a damaged eye, and Odin was one-eyed.

The problem is that the clothing is clearly female.

What does this mean?

One possibility that comes to my mind is the obvious joke—it might be Odin in drag. One thing we know about his cult is that he was associated with a shamanistic ceremony called seið. There are numerous indications that seið was generally performed by women, and that men who participated in it were deemed to have performed a kind of unmanly act, comparable to sodomy.

Perhaps that’s the meaning of the figurine. Maybe Odin has changed genders to perform a seið. Purely a guess, from someone who has no great love of Odin.

One thing to bear in mind when studying Norse mythology is that, when Snorri wrote the material in the Prose Edda down, he was under the Church’s eye. He was purposely making the case that one could study the old gods academically, without falling into heathen practices.

Which makes it likely he left some stuff out.

Authors, Blogs, Socials

“Thanks for stopping by”

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This is one of the intangible rewards of blogging.

A few days ago I wrote about the death of mystery writer Stuart M. Kaminsky, mentioning how much I liked his books.

Today Kaminsky’s son Peter responded in the comments.

How very strange and satisfying.

Writing

Ask Me Another Question

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Last night, I was talking about sex with some guys . . . wait, that doesn’t sound right. I was talking . . . I was minding my own business when suddenly someone asked me what ‘the birds and the bees” had to do with . . . the subject at hand.

Today I have an answer from our Etymology Desk: We don’t know. The phrases appears to have developed last century, but note this article from The Phrase Finder on suggested origins. None of them actually use “the birds and the bees” in reference to the act of marriage. There’s a 1927 newspaper article, but it couldn’t have been the coining of the phrase. Perhaps this is the influence of teachers whose oral instruction permeated the culture.

As for a related phrase, The Word Detective tells us that we don’t know the origin of “naked as a jay bird.” Why pick on jays when they aren’t unclothed any more than any other animal? Evan Morris says maybe it’s because blue jays are stand out among birds, obnoxiously so, in color and volume. On a discussion forum, someone says the folk wisdom he was told has to do with baby jays being pushed out of their nests before they have any feathers. Still, the printed evidence of this fails.

Reviews

Disney’s A Christmas Carol

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I went to see Disney’s new A Christmas Carol on Sunday. I didn’t like it as much as Ted Baehr and Michael Medved, whose glowing reviews persuaded me to see it in the first place, did. But I did like it, and I suspect it may grow on me, and the DVD will end up on my Christmas Carol shelf, along with the Sim, Scott and Finney versions, which I watch liturgically every Yuletide.

One bit of good news is that the familiar computer animation technique, which director Robert Zemeckis seems to have infinite faith in, has improved considerably. The eye problem, especially—the way all the characters in Beowulf seemed to be blind, because they couldn’t track the objects they were observing—has been solved. Facial expressions are also much better. Still, I find the animated people—almost human-looking but not quite, and mostly with slightly enlarged heads—a little off-putting. On the plus side, Tiny Tim (with whom I’ve never been very happy ) is much less irritating than usual here, and only spends a short time onscreen.

The animation technique brings one big, solid advantage. Here, at long last, we have a Scrooge who looks like Scrooge, a Scrooge who looks like the man I imagined when I first read the story (and I’ll bet you did too, if you’ve ever read it. Which is worth the trouble). Sim, Scott and Finney, for all their excellences (and they had many) didn’t really look like Scrooge. Their noses and chins weren’t long enough, and did not incline toward one another. Jim Carrey doesn’t look like Scrooge either, but the magic of CGI changes that (he also looks like the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Yet to Come, as he plays all those roles. There’s a very odd scene where Christmas Past, along with Old Scrooge, is watching Young Scrooge, so you actually have a Carrey watching a Carrey watching a Carrey). Continue reading Disney’s A Christmas Carol →

Writing

Harping with Bells On

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I wondered today how the word harp came to mean “talking tediously or nagging.” Is that meaning of the word related to the instrument by the same name? Are they different words which have developed into the same one over the years? Apparently, they are the same word, and the phrase “to harp on one string” was used in print as far back as 1513. I have no doubt that this phrase has something to do with bar patrons whistling for their beer at one time, but that story has yet to be concocted.

The stories are being concocted for the origin of the phrase “with bells on,” because there isn’t enough print material to argue well for any of them. Have you ever used this phrase or had it used on you? Why would anyone go to a party with bells on, or the British variation, “with brass knobs on”? How did the phrase develop to mean not only enthusiasm but also intensity, such as “He retaliated with bells on”?

Authors

Lynn Vincent on Conservative Politics

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Here’s a great lecture with Q&A by World Magazine’s Lynn Vincent on political dialogue today and where conservatives stand. This is very interesting and not at all exaggerated as some political speeches are.

Religion

Of belts and breastplates

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It’s not often I come up with anything that, I imagine, could actually contribute to biblical studies, in even the tiniest way. Like never. But I think I’ve got something. Maybe it’s old news. Maybe somebody pointed it out long ago, and I just don’t know about it. But I’ve never heard it mentioned, that I can recall.

This Big Insight does not rise from the depth of my spirituality, or from my profound understanding of the words of Scripture. It arises from the fact that, as a Viking reenactor, I wear and use armor from time to time, something your average biblical scholar only gets to do during that crazy week in the senior year at seminary, when he gets initiated into the Secret Global Conspiracy and undergoes the Unspeakable Rite.

Just kidding.

Anyway, I’m thinking of the famous “full armor of God” passage, from Ephesians 6:10-18:

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes…. Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place….” Continue reading Of belts and breastplates →