Archive Category: Book & Lit

Words That Changed Their Meanings

Posted by Alex in Bathroom Reader, Book & Lit on June 29, 2009 at 5:20 am

The following is an article from Uncle John's Bathroom Reader Golden Plunger Awards

By most estimates, the English language includes about one million words, yet native speakers regularly use only about 5,000. And they don't always get the ones they do use correct. Like all languages, English is constantly changing - new words are added, old words are phased out, and new word combinations are formed all the time.

But the following examples of language changes cause trouble for people who like to use their words correctly because these words and phrases have pretty much lost their original meanings.

Beg The Question

If an event or happening raises a question for someone it's almost certain he or she will say, "This begs the question ..." But it doesn't. Begging the question is a verbal trick speakers use to avoid a question, not bring one up. The original definition of begging the question meant to assume that what is being questioned had already been proven to be true, so the answer sidestepped the thing in question. Say you were asked a question that just required a simple yes or no answer. But instead of saying yes, you answer with a statement that assumes the thing in question is already true. That's begging the question.

For example, if the question is, "Senator, will this new crime bill be effective?" and he or she answers with a statement that doesn't answer it - "I've been fighting crime my entire career, and this crime bill is the latest example of that" - then the speaker has begged the question.

It's a common practice in formal debate, and it's especially prevalent in politics. In the example above, the speaker is acting as though the crime bill is definitely effective, even though he or she never answered the basic question with a yes or no. Assuming the question is true is not evidence that it is.

From that, beg the question evolved in the language to mean that the statement invites another obvious question. Anytime you run verbal circles around the question without answering it can be called begging the question in this sense (although strict grammarians frown upon it; they like to keep the original meaning).

Decimate

It's hard to believe that such a simple word hides such a horrific history. The original definition of "decimate" was "to kill one in ten." The brutal practice was used by the Roman army beginning around the 5th century B.C. and was implemented as a way to inspire fear and loyalty. Lots were drawn, and one out of every 10 soldiers would be killed - by their own comrades. If one member of a squad acted up, anybody could pay the ultimate price. Captured armies often fell victim to this practice as well.

Today, "decimate" has lost that meaning, but some grammarians still like to preserve it ... at least in the sense of "to reduce by 10 percent." The "dec" prefix means "ten" - it's the same Latin root that gives us decade, for example. So to use "decimate" to mean just "destroy" contradicts the meaning of that prefix. (Note: Language snobs really get up in arms when someone says "totally decimate." Totally reduce by ten? We don't get it, either.)

Could Care Less

This is an easy mistake to make. The correct phrase, of course, is "couldn't care less" - as in, "I don't care at all, so it wouldn't be possible for me to care any less about this." But over the years, that's morphed into a new phrase (with the same meaning), and even though the Harper Dictionary of Contemporary Usage criticized the change in 1975, saying it was "an ignorant debasement of language," "could care less" seems to be around to stay.

Language historian say "couldn't care less" was originally a British phrase that became popular in the Untied States in the 1950s. "Could care less" appeared about a decade later. No one knows exactly why the incorrect form came into being, since it doesn't make sense. But the phrase has stuck, and a lot of grammarians care very much that it's not being used correctly. (Regular people, of course, couldn't care less.)

Card Sharp

No, that's not a misspelling. Sure it sounds weird to the ear, but people who know the term's history and meaning prefer the original. "Card sharp" first appeared in the 1880s and meant a card player who tricked or scammed others. "Card shark" appeared much later, in the 1940s.

Many people assume that the mix-up simply comes from speakers who either thought "shark" sounded better or misheard the word originally. But that may not be the case. Linguists have traced the history of both "sharp" and "shark" to their original usages, and though it doesn't appear that either word derived from the other, there are a lot of similarities in meaning. "Shark" comes from a 17th-century German word schurke, which meant "someone who cheats." "Sharping" came about around the same time and meant "swindling or cheating." The words "loan shark" and "sharp practice" come from these words as well.

So technically, "card shark" could be correct. But because "card sharp" appeared first, many linguists want to preserve it. Whether they'll succeed is anyone's guess, but it's a sharp point of contention for many.

Spit and Image

If you think you're the spitting image of your parents, you're forgiven. People have been messing this one up for decades. "Spit and image" was the original term, used from about 1825 on. The Oxford English Dictionary defined it as "the very spit of, the exact image, likeness, or counterpart of." "Spitting image" came about some 80 years later and was followed by a few other variations, including "spitten image" and "splitting image" (neither of which really caught on). In this case, "spitting image" has overtaken the use of "spit and image" for most English speakers. But when you're spitting out this phrase, take a moment to remember its original use and think about the image you're trying to project.

Ironic

Few words cause as much confusion or are used incorrectly as often as "ironic." Not that it's hard to understand why - the definition is not simple: "a pretense of ignorance and of willingness to learn from another assumed in order to make the other's false conceptions conspicuous by adroit questioning ... the use of words to express something other than and especially the opposite of the literal meaning." What?

In 1996, Alanis Morissette wrote an entire song titled "Ironic," which consistently used the word incorrectly. And even the people who are supposed to know what it means get it wrong. The American Heritage Dictionary gave the word "irony" to its distinguished panel of experts (the ones who help ensure the accuracy of all the words the dictionary defines) and asked them if either of the following sentences used the word correctly:

1. "In 1969, Susie moved from Ithaca to California, where she met her husband-to-be, who, ironically, also came from upstate New York." Seventy-eight percent of the panel's members agreed that this was an incorrect use of the word.

2. "Ironically, even as the government was fulminating against American policy, American jeans and videocassettes were the hottest items in the stalls of the market." In contrast, though, 73 percent agreed that this sentence used it properly.

How "ironic" came to be defined as "coincidence" is anybody's guess, but for our purposes, we like to refer to the following quote from the 1994 film Reality Bites. When Ethan Hawke's character is asked to define "ironic," he says, "It's when the actual meaning is the complete opposite of the literal meaning." Thank goodness for Hollywood.

The article above was reprinted with permission from Uncle John's Bathroom Reader Golden Plunger Awards

Forget the Oscars and the Grammys - the awards committee at the Bathroom Readers' Institute is handing out its own honors... the highly coveted Golden Plungers. We've scoured the globe to bring you the people, places, and events most worthy of throne-room recognition.

Since 1988, the Bathroom Reader Institute had published a series of popular books containing irresistible bits of trivia and obscure yet fascinating facts.

If you like Neatorama, you'll love the Bathroom Reader Institute's books - go ahead and check 'em out!

 
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Wanted: “People-Effective” Person for $197,000 Job

Posted by Alex in Book & Lit, Money & Finance on June 27, 2009 at 1:23 pm

Psst, want a £119,000 job? (That’s US$197,000 for us Yanks) The job of "Director of Organisation Development" in Yorkshire can be yours … if only you can decipher the want ad:

Huddersfield-based Kirklees Council’s job description mangled the language with phrases like "cross functional experience" and "people effective".

The council advertised the position as "a key leadership role that will help make a complex organisation increasingly confident, energetic and focused as it delivers the outcomes that the Kirklees communities require".

It said the successful candidate would be "a leader with presence, passion and panache" who would "play a key role in ensuring the effective integration of national, regional and local drivers".

Another impenetrable passage warns that the new director will face the challenge of making sure "that the diversity of Kirklees is understood by all in the organisation; is valued as a strength but a strength that challenges us to respond to its complex implications; and is reflected in the career structures within the organisation".

Link

 
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Comic Origins of Phrases

Posted by Alex in Bathroom Reader, Book & Lit, Cartoon & Comic on June 26, 2009 at 9:09 am

The following is an article from Uncle John's Triumphant 20th
Anniversary Bathroom Reader

Who says that comic books don't contribute much to literature? Here's a few choice phrases, which origin can be traced back to comic strips:

Security Blanket

Pioneering child psychologist Richard Passman is given credit for identifying the phenomenon of children habitually clutching or carrying a favorite toy for comfort and security.

Charles Schulz first used the concept in June 1, 1954, Peanuts comic strip by giving Linus a blanket to carry everywhere he went. Linus called it his "security blanket." The term is now used by psychologists to define a child's (or anyone's) excessive attachment to a particular object. (Photo: Time Magazine 1965 cover)

"We Have Met The Enemy And He Is Us"


Pogo Earth Day Poster by Walt Kelly (image via Wikipedia)

After winning the Battle of Lake Erie in the War of 1812, Commodore Oliver Perry wrote in a dispatch to General William Henry Harrison, "We have met the enemy, and he is ours." Walt Kelly, author of the comic strip Pogo, reworded the phrase as "We have met the enemy and he is us," in the foreword to his 1953 Pogo collection The Pogo Papers. The meaning: Mankind's greatest threat is ... mankind. The quote became better known when Kelly used it on a poster he was hired to illustrate for the first Earth Day in 1970.

The Heebie-Jeebies

Billy DeBeck coined the term in his hugely popular 1920s comic strip, Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, about a community of backwoods hillbillies and moonshiners. It first appeared in a 1923 strip where Barney tells someone to "get that stupid look offa your pan. You gimme the heeby jeebys!" It meant "a feeling of discomfort."

Other phrases coined by DeBeck: "horsefeathers," "hotsie-totsie," and "googly-eyed" (after Barney Google, who had huge, bulbous eyes). The strip also gave us the nickname "Sparky," from the name of Barney's horse, Sparkplug. (Many young comic-strip fans were given the name "Sparky," among them, Peanuts creator Charles Schulz.)

Palooka


Joe Palooka by Ham Fisher - via Wikipedia

It came from the main character of the 1920s strip Joe Palooka. Joe Palooka was a boxer - likeable but dumb, a trait that probably came from repeated blows to his head in the ring. Soon after the strip's debut, any big, dumb guy might be called a palooka.

Milquetoast

"Milk toast" was a simple dish (toast served in milk) frequently served at soup kitchens in the 1920s. Harold Webster named the main character in his late 1920s strip, The Timid Soul, Caspar Milquetoast.

Thanks to the comic strip, by the 1930s the word "milquetoast" had become common slang to describe anybody who, like Milquetoast, was weak and timid.

Sadie Hawkins Day


The First Sadie Hawkins Day, by Al Capp

It's from Al Capp's L'il Abner. One day a year in the comic strip's rural setting of Dogpatch, single women would chase the single men around. If they caught one, they got to keep - er, marry him. The day got its name from Sadie Hawkins, the first woman in Dogpatch who caught a husband that way. High schools in the United States still hold "Sadie Hawkins Dances," to which the girls invite the boys.

Foo Fighter


(photo: Gasoline Alley Antiques - lots of neat vintage books there!)

In Bill Holman's 1930s strip Smokey Stover, the title character rode around in a bizarre-looking two-wheeled fire engine (with a fire hydrant attached to it) that Smokey called a "foo fighter." The term was used by World War II pilots for any unidentified aircraft (including UFOs). The phrase became popular again in the 1990s when it was used as the name of the rock band Foo Fighters.

The article above was reprinted with permission from Uncle John's Triumphant 20th Anniversary Bathroom Reader.

Proving that some things do get better with age, the latest Bathroom Reader is jam-packed with 600 pages of fascinating trivia, forgotten history, strange lawsuits and other neat articles.

Since 1988, the Bathroom Reader Institute had published a series of popular books containing irresistible bits of trivia and obscure yet fascinating facts.

If you like Neatorama, you'll love the Bathroom Reader Institute's books - go ahead and check 'em out!

 
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Wikipedia as a Book

Posted by Alex in Arts & Crafts, Blog & Internet, Book & Lit, Pictures on June 21, 2009 at 7:34 am

What would Wikipedia look like if it were printed out as a traditional encyclopedia? Rob Matthews decided to make it his art project: behold, the 5,000 pages of Wikipedia (featured articles only, mind you) in book form: Link
- via Cliff Pickover’s Reality Carnival

 
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I Before E, Except After C Rule Left to D-I-E

Posted by Alex in Book & Lit on June 20, 2009 at 3:22 pm

Is nothing sacred anymore? After decades of having the rule (it was even made into a Charlie Brown song), the British government is ditching it:

Advice sent to teachers says there are too few words which follow the rule and recommends using more modern methods to teach spelling to schoolchildren.

The document, entitled Support for Spelling, is being distributed to more than 13,000 primary schools. [...]

It says: "The i before e rule is not worth teaching. It applies only to words in which the ie or ei stands for a clear ee sound. Unless this is known, words such as sufficient and veil look like exceptions.

"There are so few words where the ei spelling for the ee sounds follows the letter c that it is easier to learn the specific words." These include receive, ceiling, perceive and deceit.

The document recommends other ways to teach pupils spelling, like studying television listings for compound words, changing the tense of a poem to practise irregular verbs and learning about homophones through jokes such as "How many socks in a pair? None — because you eat a pear."

Link

 
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Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Video Contest: Deep Thoughts From the Throne

Posted by Alex in Book & Lit on June 19, 2009 at 4:40 am

Why wasn’t I told that June is National Bathroom Reading Month? I’ve been celebrating it all year long!

Anyways, to celebrate this momentous occasion, our pal Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader is running a neat contest: Deep Thoughts From the Throne.

You can win nifty prizes (including an iPhone, a set of Bathroom Reader books autographed by Uncle John himself and a year’s supply of toilet paper - a year! - now that’s a prize) for entering a video clip you create about … your bathroom!

Here’s the details: Contest Rules | Visit Uncle John’s YouTube channel for approved entries

 
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The 7 Most Impressive Libraries Throughout History

Posted by Queuebot in Book & Lit on June 16, 2009 at 3:42 am

Ever since the dawn of civilization, men have demonstrated their cultural sophistication, scientific knowledge and philosophical aptitude in written word kept in libraries for peers and, less often, the public, to access and review.

We have a tendency to assume that knowledge and the availability thereof is a modern concept, but in actuality the huge Great Library of Alexandria and the Celsus library in Ephesus prove that the concept of libraries is an ancient one.

We tend to take for granted the notion that the people of the world can or should be taught to read. The ability to read is even used as an indicator of poverty and development. In 1998, the UN defined 80% of the world population as literate, defined as the ability to read and write a simple sentence in a language. It was not always thus. In ancient times, literacy was the trade secret of professional scribes.

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by Arby.

 
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Daily Routines of Famous People

Posted by John in Book & Lit on June 13, 2009 at 1:50 pm

The blog Daily Routines culls news services and books for information about the daily routines of famous people, such as Mr. Rogers, John Grisham, Winston Churchill, and Earnest Hemingway. Here’s a selection from the John Grisham piece, citing a San Francisco Chronicle article:

When he first started writing, Grisham says, he had “these little rituals that were silly and brutal but very important.”

“The alarm clock would go off at 5, and I’d jump in the shower. My office was 5 minutes away. And I had to be at my desk, at my office, with the first cup of coffee, a legal pad and write the first word at 5:30, five days a week.”

His goal: to write a page every day. Sometimes that would take 10 minutes, sometimes an hour; ofttimes he would write for two hours before he had to turn to his job as a lawyer, which he never especially enjoyed. In the Mississippi Legislature, there were “enormous amounts of wasted time” that would give him the opportunity to write.

Featured people are categorized in the right-hand sidebar by occupation and habits.

Link via TigerHawk

image by flickr user Tony Newell used under creative commons license

 
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60th Anniversary of Nineteen Eighty-Four

Posted by John in Book & Lit on June 12, 2009 at 2:19 pm

George Orwell’s classic dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four was released sixty years ago this week.  It’s doubleplusgood.  To say otherwise is crimethink and will result in being sent to a joycamp.

You can read the full text here.

Via Hit & Run

 
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96-Year-Old Grad Student: All-Nighters Work!

Posted by Queuebot in Book & Lit on June 12, 2009 at 12:29 pm

A 96-year-old Taiwanese man finished a master’s degree program in Philosophy after being told "he was too old to continue as a volunteer at a local hospital." Known as "Grandpa Chao", this old man was able to compete with younger
students by pulling all-nighters before exams.

“I was bored after I left the hospital,” Chao said Thursday. “I don’t play mahjong or have other hobbies. I felt I had to do something with my life.”

Chao said the most difficult part of his studies was coping with a poor memory.

“I can’t remember things as well as my fellow students,” he said. “So before a test I would wake up at midnight and study all night. That way, the material was still fresh in my mind when the test began.”

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by dradell.

 
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The Millionth English Word: Web 2.0

Posted by Alex in Book & Lit on June 10, 2009 at 1:33 pm

A new English word is created about every 98 minutes, according to the website The Global Language Monitor. Based on that rate, English passed the millionth word mark earlier today.

Here are the 10 latest words in the English language:

1,000,000: Web 2.0 – The next generation of web products and services, coming soon to a browser near you.

999,999: Jai Ho! – The Hindi phrase signifying the joy of victory, used as an exclamation, sometimes rendered as “It is accomplished”. Achieved English-language popularity through the multiple Academy Award Winning film, “Slumdog Millionaire”.

999,998: N00b — From the Gamer Community, a neophyte in playing a particular game; used as a disparaging term.

999,997: Slumdog – a formerly disparaging, now often endearing, comment upon those residing in the slums of India.

999,996: Cloud Computing – The ‘cloud’ has been technical jargon for the Internet for many years. It is now passing into more general usage.

999,995: Carbon Neutral — One of the many phrases relating to the effort to stem Climate Change.

999,994: Slow Food — Food other than the fast-food variety hopefully produced locally (locavores).

999,993: Octomom – The media phenomenon relating to the travails of the mother of the octuplets.

999,992: Greenwashing – Re-branding an old, often inferior, product as environmentally friendly.

999,991: Sexting – Sending email (or text messages) with sexual content.

For the full story, visit the GLM website: Link

 
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New Book Smell in a Can

Posted by Queuebot in Book & Lit on June 7, 2009 at 2:14 pm

Do you love your Kindle, but feel like it’s lacking a certain je ne sais quoi?  Spray it with "New Book Smell" and get that satisfaction you’ve been missing.

Smell of Books comes in four additional aromas: Classic Musty, Crunchy Bacon, Eau You Have Cats, and Scents of Sensibility, for Jane Austen fans.

“Now you can finally enjoy reading e-books without giving up the smell you love so much. With Smell of Books you can hve the best of both worlds, the convenience of an e-book and the smell of your favoirte paper book.”

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by Marilyn Terrell.

 
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20 Brilliant Bookcases

Posted by Queuebot in Book & Lit, Home & Garden on May 29, 2009 at 9:40 pm


I could spend hours looking at the unique creations of furniture and industrial designers.  Here is a wonderful collection of twenty strange, unusual and modern design bookcases.  My favorite is this ‘Round Sofa’ - which is yours?

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by tj241.

 
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Student Thwarts School’s Book Ban by Forming Secret Lending Library

Posted by John in Book & Lit on May 26, 2009 at 2:27 pm

A pseudonymous (presumably) student named Kat Atreides responded to her school’s ban on a large number of books by forming a secret library in her locker, and then loaning out banned books to students:

I go to a private school that is rather strict. Recently, the principal and school teacher council released a (very long) list of books we’re not allowed to read. I was absolutely appalled, because a large number of the books were classics and others that are my favorites. One of my personal favorites, The Catcher in the Rye, was on the list, so I decided to bring it to school to see if I would really get in trouble. Well… I did but not too much. Then (surprise!) a boy in my English class asked if he could borrow the book, because he heard it was very good AND it was banned!

I hope that the school administrators were actually trying to trick students into reading, and weren’t so foolish as to imagine that banning books would lead to teenagers not reading them.

Link via Jessamyn West

image by flickr user florian.b used under creative commons license

 
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Today is Towel Day, a Day in Honor of Douglas Adams

Posted by John in Book & Lit on May 25, 2009 at 1:38 pm

In addition to being Memorial Day in the United States, today is Towel Day — a day to honor Douglas Adams and the importance of carrying a towel around with you, as advised by The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy:

A towel, it says, is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitch hiker can have. Partly it has great practical value - you can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold moons of Jaglan Beta; you can lie on it on the brilliant marble-sanded beaches of Santraginus V, inhaling the heady sea vapours; you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert world of Kakrafoon; use it to sail a mini raft down the slow heavy river Moth; wet it for use in hand-to-hand-combat; wrap it round your head to ward off noxious fumes or to avoid the gaze of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal (a mindboggingly stupid animal, it assumes that if you can’t see it, it can’t see you - daft as a bush, but very, very ravenous); you can wave your towel in emergencies as a distress signal, and of course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough

Link

 
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The Dettmer Book Autopsies

Posted by Queuebot in Arts & Crafts, Book & Lit on May 19, 2009 at 8:56 am

Brian Dettmer, an American artist takes a very sharp knife and performs autopsies - on books of all things.  So far so literary Damien Hirst, you might say.  However, Dettmer does not simply slice inanimate objects in two, he nips, he tucks, he teases.  The result; books which may never have been opened again are given a new lease of life and a new audience gets to read them in an altogether different way than originally intended.

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by taliesyn30.

 
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One Sentence Commencement Speeches

Posted by John in Arts & Crafts, Book & Lit on May 17, 2009 at 1:42 pm

Frank Warren, the artist behind Post Secret, recently delivered the commencement address at St. Mary’s College in Maryland. In preparation for it, he asked members of the graduating class to write a one-sentence response to the question “What do my classmates, and I, need to hear on Graduation Day?” Here are a few of his responses:

Be wise enough not to be reckless, but brave enough to take great risks.

It’s okay to fail – learn from it and you will succeed.

It’s better to be pissed-off than pissed-on.

If you were to asked to deliver a commencement speech that was only one sentence long, what would it be?

Link

 
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The Many Sides of Shel Silverstein

Posted by Stacy in Book & Lit, Neatorama Only on May 17, 2009 at 10:55 am

Most of us are familiar with Shel Silverstein through his amazing works of art and poetry for children. But Sheldon Alan Silverstein was a lot more than that, so to honor the 10th anniversary of his passing, here are a few sides to Shel that you may not be familiar with.


The Playboy Writer and Cartoonist

Shel wasn’t quite in on the ground floor of Playboy, but he probably hit the first floor. He and Hugh Hefner had a lot in common - they both grew up in Chicago, they both served in the army, they were both cartoonists and they both loved women (more on that later). At the time, the magazine was so new that when Shel didn’t hear back from Hef within a month or so of dropping his cartoons off for review, he just assumed that the fledgling magazine had gone under. When he went back to pick up his portfolio, though, Hef personally told Shel that he was buying several cartoons and forked over a check right then and there. But the check was more to Shel than just money - it represented his ability to support himself on his talent, which his dad had mercilessly mocked him about for years. He cashed Hef’s check immediately, went home and threw the money down on his parents’ table and told them he was moving out and was going to support himself as a cartoonist. Shel’s first work for the Bunny Pages showed up in the August 1956 issue. He quickly moved from penning cartoons to doing entire travel articles where he acted as writer, photographer and illustrator; the first one appeared in the February, 1957 issue (”Return to Tokyo”). He did a whole series of travelogues and they became the second-most beloved part of the magazine (I’ll let you guess what takes first place).

The Ladies’ Man

It may well have been his first “real” job at Playboy that shaped his love of women, or maybe it was because he had never had much luck with girls in high school. But Shel loved women and had a voracious appetite for them. But he never lied to them - he was very straightforward that he was all about his career and just wanted to have fun flings, never a relationship. Diane Chandler, the Playmate of the Year for 1966, said Shel had a particular way of shooting down women who had gotten a little too attached to him: “He instantly saw the signs and would say something like, ‘Well, let’s see, where shall I put you on my list?’ to let the girls know that they shouldn’t expect anything from him.” But for the most part, girls were OK with that. Women flocked to Shel by the hundreds and would do just about anything for him. He even had a sampler on his wall done by a Playboy Playmate. It said, “Shel Silverstein told me to make this for him.”

The Dad

We don’t know much about Shel’s relationship with his children, but we know that he had two of them (and given the rate he went through women, maybe more). His daughter, Shoshanna, was born on June 30, 1970. Because of Shel’s nomadic and completely unpredictable lifestyle, she stayed with her mom, Susan Hastings. Sadly, Susan died in 1975 when Shanna was just five, but instead of Shel taking her in, Shanna went to live with her maternal grandparents. Apparently there was no question of Shel settling down to be a full-time dad. Sadly, Shanna died of a cerebral aneurysm just six years later at the age of 11. He dedicated A Light in the Attic to her.

The second, Matt, was born on November 10, 1983. His mom was Sarah Spencer, a woman who drove the conch train in Key West and inspired Shel’s “The Great Conch Train Robbery” song. Shel bought a house in Key West and settled down there - at least “settled” for Shel; he still came and went - and spent much more time with Matt than he had with Shanna. Friends said that though he didn’t discuss it much, one of his biggest regrets was that he hadn’t been a better father to his daughter. Shel dedicated Falling Up to Matt.

The Friend

It seems like creative people find one another - it has happened with countless literary groups for years, from Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein and F. Scott Fitzgerald to J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis. And it happened with Shel, who was close friends with a number of creative types - Herb Gardner, Lois Nettleton, Bob Gibson and LeRoy Neiman.

He was also very good friends with Jean Shepherd - yep, A Christmas Story Jean Shepherd, who was also published in Playboy. Shel wrote the liner notes and drew the cover for Jean’s 1959 album, “Jean Shepherd and Other Foibles.” He managed to sneak the words “Jean Shepherd is a dirty rotten, one-way sneaky son of a bitch” into the art by spelling it out backward. In fact, it was because of Jean that Shel wrote one of his most famous songs…

The Lyricist


…”A Boy Named Sue.” Yep, Shel was an accomplished songwriter who had several hit songs under his belt, but this one is probably the most beloved. And if you didn’t know that Shel wrote the lyrics, wait until you hear it again - you’ll shake your head and realize that of course he wrote those lyrics. The story goes that he was inspired to write the song after hearing Jean Shepherd frequently recall how much he got teased as a kid for having a girl’s name. He also wrote Cash’s “25 Minutes to Go; “Sylvia’s Mother,” “The Ballad of Lucy Jordan” and “The Cover of the Rolling Stone,” all originally performed by Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show; “One’s on the Way,” performed by Loretta Lynn; and “The Unicorn” by The Irish Rovers. He didn’t find it odd to switch from Playboy to children’s poems to song writing - Shel believed that creative people could move about within their fields pretty easily:

“I think that if you’re truly creative, you can work in certain related fields of creativity, but then there are others that are beyond you. For instance, a man who works well with words might work as a writer and as a poet and as a lyricist. But if he tried to work in sculpture, he might get absolutely nowhere. And a guy who is very visual might easily work in painting and drawing, could also work in costume design, if he leaned that way, could work in stage setting, and in those related fields. I do believe that a person who is truly observant in one of the arts will be truly observant and sensitive in the others as well, but it’s his ability to express these things that would limit him. I believe that a man who is a sensitive painter is sensitive to life, and therefore would be sensitive as a writer or as a storyteller, but having the ability to write is something more than merely seeing. Having the ability to paint is something more than merely seeing the colors, seeking the form. It’s in execution, in skill.”

 
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The 10 Most Disturbing Books Of All Time

Posted by Queuebot in Book & Lit on May 13, 2009 at 1:03 pm

Everyone has read something at some point that left them feeling like they’d been kicked in the gut. PopCrunch has a list of ten books that pretty much guaranteed to leave you feeling that way.

Take, for instance, The Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs:

Naked Lunch is another ode to drug addiction. While it’s not as flat out depressing as Requiem For A Dream, it’s a hell of a lot more strange. The story is told in a series of dream like vignettes that never allow the reader to really get their bearings and includes acts of child murder, auto-erotic asphyxiation, lots of drug use, cop killing, and orgies. The book was banned in many sections of the United States when it came out in 1959, and it’s not hard to see why. This book is easily one of the most bizarre I’ve ever read.

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by redsfaithful.

 
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FEMA’s Coloring Book of Disasters

Posted by Alex in Book & Lit, Pictures, Politics on May 6, 2009 at 12:37 am

It’s often difficult to help children cope with crises and disasters, so FEMA came up with this idea (brilliant or silly? Your call): a children’s coloring book of disasters. Now, the coloring book has been yanked from FEMA’s website after some people complained:

The coloring book, titled “A Scary Thing Happened,” was created after the tornadoes in Glenville as a tool for children to use with a responsible parent or adult to help cope with the disaster, said Rose Olmsted, coordinator of the Freeborn County Crisis Response Team, on Wednesday. It has since been widely distributed across the country to aid children in other disasters.

Olmsted said she has not received a clear explanation from FEMA about why the coloring book is being taken down from the FEMA Web site, other than that the organization is redesigning its Web site and that there was a complaint from a parent about some of the images in the book. The cover features an image of the Twin Towers, with one tower already on fire and a plane approaching the other tower. A similar image is inside the book for children to color.

Sarah Stultz of Abert Lea Tribune has the story: Link - via On Deadline

 
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Poets Ranked by Beard Weight

Posted by Miss Cellania in Book & Lit, Fashion on May 5, 2009 at 11:01 am

A little-known leaflet by Upton Uxbridge Underwood circulated in 1913 judges men in a different way, not by their works, but by their fabulous facial hair.

His masterpiece, The Language of the Beard, an epicurean treat confected for the delectation of fellow bon vivants, vaunts the premise that the texture, contours, and growth patterns of a man’s beard indicate personality traits, aptitudes, and strengths and weaknesses of character. A spade beard, according to Underwood’s theories, may denote audacity and resolution, for example, while a forked, finely-downed beard signifies creativity and the gift of intuition, a bushy beard suggests generosity, and so on.

See 15 poets and their beards described and rated. Pictured is the highly-rated beard of Sidney Lanier. Link -Thanks, peacay!

 
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10 Things Science Fiction Got Right

Posted by Alex in Bathroom Reader, Book & Lit, Movies & SciFi on May 5, 2009 at 12:28 am

The following is a reprint from Uncle John's Bathroom Reader Plunges Into the Universe. A while ago, we posted "10 Things That Science Fiction Got Wrong" but believe it or not, there are many things that sci-fi got right as well. From communication satellites to robotic pets, here are a few of the things that science fiction nailed before they happened.

Science fiction is supposed to predict future events - and to be entirely honest, some of us are getting impatient waiting for our own rocket cars to the Moon, which we understood we'd have by now. Be that as it may, here are some things dreamed up by science fiction writers that are part of our real world.

1. Moon Visits

Lots of science fiction writers had this one covered, but the question is: Who got closest to the real thing first?

The best candidate is good ol' Jules Verne, whose 1865 novel, From the Earth to the Moon, and the 1870 follow-up, Around the Moon, nailed a lot of the minutiae of a moon visit, including weightlessness, the basic size of the space capsule, the size of the crew (three men), and even the concept of splashdown into the ocean on return to Earth. In one of those fun coincidences, the fictional splashdown in Around the Moon was just a few miles from where the actual Apollo 8 capsule splashed down (and, interestingly enough, the fictional launch pad was just a few miles from Cape Canaveral).

Verne was tremendously prolific, writing two novels a year for much of his creative life and dying with quite a few novels unpublished. It's not entirely surprising that he's credited with a number of other predictions, including trips by balloon, helicopters, tanks, and electrical engines. One "discovery" he's famously credited for, the submarine, is inaccurate, since submarines existed prior to the 1870 publication of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.

2. Robots (and Robot Pets!)

"Robot" comes from the Czech word robota, which means "drudgery"; robotnik is a word for "serf." Since today's robots are typically found in industrial setting doing mindlessly repetitive work, this is a strangely appropriate term.

The word "robot" was popularized in Karel Capek's 1920 play R.U.R., which stood for Rossum's Universal Robots. In the play, robots were manufactured humans who were used as cheap labor. One day they got fed up with this and decided to have a revolution and kill all the humans, proving once again that good help really is hard to find.

One thing people don't seem to know about Capek's "robots" is that they're not actually mechanical - they're made out of synthetic flesh, although that flesh was then put into a stamping mill to make the bodies.

The concept of robots as mechanical beings came later and was most famously popularized in fiction by writer Isaac Asimov in his Robot series. It's probably not a coincidence that a humanoid robot manufactured by Honda is called "Asimo."

Robot pets, like the Sony Aibo robot dog, have also been a staple of science fiction. The most famous example of this is probably Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, the Philip K. Dick novel that was the source material for the movie Blade Runner.

The main character in the book is saving up to buy a realistic electric sheep for his lawn, so he'll be the envy of his neighbors (the movie had none of this suburban one-upmanship going on).

Woody Allen, of all people, nailed the robot dog in 1973's Sleeper, in which we're introduced to Rags ("Hi! I'm Rags! Woof woof!"). Allen's reaction: "Is he housebroken? Or will he be leaving little piles of batteries all over the place?"

3. Cloning and Genetic Engineering

Humans haven't been cloned yet (as far as we know), but sheep, cats, cow, and rabbits have. And humans have used genetic engineering and gene therapy to improve their bodies. In June 2002, for example, it was announced that genetically modified cells helped to create functioning immune systems in two "bubble boys" who were born without immune systems of their own.

The most famous work of science fiction with cloning and genetic engineering is also one of the earliest: 1932's Brave New World , by Aldous Huxley. In it, humans are "graded" into jobs and social classes based on the number of clones that were made from their originating embryos; the higher the number of clones, the less bright they are and the more menial their jobs (this was backed by a social agenda that assured each level of humanity that they were actually the best, so everyone went along with it).

4. The Internet

Okay, now, who wants to be blamed for this one? There are so many culprits. Author William Gibson is credited with coining the term "cyberspace" in his 1981 short story "Burning Chrome," and kick-started the whole media fascination with computers and the Internet and all that geekiness with his seminal 1984 novel Neuromancer.

But even before Gibson, John Brunner's 1975 novel, The Shockwave Rider, posited a continent-wide information net, "hackers" who broke into the net, identity theft (when someone pretends to be someone else online), and most famously, computer viruses and worms - the terminology for these, in fact, comes from Brunner's book. Brunner imagined using viruses and worms as part of warfare - something that worries today's military quite a bit.

It should be noted that in 1975 a proto-form of the Internet did exist, thought not in the scope and complexity imagined by Brunner. It existed in the form of ARPANET, a decentralized computer system that the US Department of Defense created and which by 1975 also included several research universities as "nodes." Internet features created by 1975 include E-mail, online chat, and mailing lists. The most popular mailing list in 1975? One on science fiction, of course.

5. The World Wide Web

... which, despite the propaganda of the 1990s, is not the whole Internet, just a subsection of it - was created in 1991 by Tim Berners-Lee and hit the big time with the creation of the Mosaic Web browser in 1993.

The dynamic of the Net had been described before then. In 1990's Earth, David Brin imagined a streaming audio and video and clickable hypertext links. And in a 1989 short story, "The Originist," based in Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" universe, Orson Scott Card also created a linking system similar to today's hyperlinking.

6. Webcams?

Imagined (sort of) by every single science fiction author who ever wrote about a picture phone. There are too many of those to bother counting.

7. Waterbeds

Yes, waterbeds. Robert Heinlein used them in 1961's Stranger in a Strange Land ; the first modern waterbed was created in 1967 in San Francisco by design student Charles Hall, who dubbed it the "pleasure pit" (naughty boy).

Heinlein also thought up the idea of remotely controlled machines to manipulate dangerous materials; he called them "waldoes," and that's what they're called today.

8. Communications Satellites

Science fiction master Arthur C. Clarke is famous for having thought of these in 1945.

9. Space Tourists

When millionaire Dennis Tito put down his $20 million and hitched a ride into space with the Russians, he became the first tourist in space.

The idea of punting rich folks beyond the stratosphere is not new; in 1962's A Fall of Moondust , Arthur C. Clarke told the tale of some rich tourists who get stranded in a moon crater.

More whimsically, author Roald Dahl imagined a "Space Hotel, USA" in 1973's Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator, complete with a staff of "managers, assistant managers, desk-clerks, waitresses, bellboys, chambermaids, pastry chefs, and hall porters."

10. Miniaturized Surgery

Doctors these days use miniaturized tools to perform surgery that's less invasive and more precise than traditional surgery, a practice suggested by Isaac Asimov in his 1966 novel, Fantastic Voyage.

It's worth noting, however, that along with miniaturized surgical tools, Asimov also shrunk the doctors to fit into the patient's body. We haven't managed that one yet.

The article above is reprinted with permission from Uncle John's Bathroom Reader Plunges Into the Universe.

Since 1988, the Bathroom Reader Institute had published a series of popular books containing irresistible bits of trivia and obscure yet fascinating facts.

If you like Neatorama, you'll love the Bathroom Reader Institute's books - go ahead and check 'em out!

 
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Reading Bram Stoker’s Dracula In Real Time

Posted by Queuebot in Blog & Internet, Book & Lit on May 3, 2009 at 6:49 pm

Today marks the first day in the year (May 3rd) of what would be Jonathan Harker’s journal. Dracula Feed has started an experiment of blogging Jonathan’s journal in "real time", publishing each journal entry the day it would have happened.

Experience Bram Stoker’s Dracula in a new way — in real time. Dracula is an epistolary novel (a novel written as a series of letters or diary entries,) and this blog will publish each diary entry on the day that it was written by the narrator so that the audience may experience the drama as the characters would have.

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by MonkeyDay.

 
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A Pop-Up Guide to the Personal Computer

Posted by Queuebot in Book & Lit, Pictures on May 2, 2009 at 1:32 pm

Say what you will, but Goodwill can be a treasure trove of weird and wonderful stuff. Jonathan Ryan went to one a few days ago and found this gem: a pop-up book titled "Inside the Personal Computer" published in 1984.

The book describes - in delightful pop-up glory - everything from read/write heads to the inner workings of a CRT.

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by JonathanRyan.

Update 5/2/09 by Alex: Here’s a YouTube clip of the book in action.

 
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William Shatner? William Shatner. William Shatner!

Posted by John in Book & Lit, Movies & SciFi on April 29, 2009 at 8:06 pm

Shatnerquake is a novel by Jeff Burk. Here’s the premise:

It’s the first ShatnerCon with William Shatner as the guest of honor! But after a failed terrorist attack by Campbellians, a crazy terrorist cult that worships Bruce Campbell, all of the characters ever played by William Shatner are suddenly sucked into our world. Their mission: hunt down and destroy the real William Shatner.

This is so Shatnerific that I’m having a screaming Shatnergasm right now.

Link via Topless Robot

 
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Talk Like Shakespeare Day

Posted by Miss Cellania in Book & Lit on April 23, 2009 at 7:21 am


Today is the 445th anniversary of the birth of William Shakespeare. In honor of this occasion, today is Talk Like Shakespeare Day. Here are some ways to do it:


1. Instead of you, say thou. Instead of y’all, say thee.
2. Rhymed couplets are all the rage.
3. Men are Sirrah, ladies are Mistress, and your friends are all called Cousin.
4. Instead of cursing, try calling your tormenters jackanapes or canker-blossoms or poisonous bunch-back’d toads.
5. Don’t waste time saying “it,” just use the letter “t” (’tis, t’will, I’ll do’t).
6. Verse for lovers, prose for ruffians, songs for clowns.
7. When in doubt, add the letters “eth” to the end of verbs (he runneth, he trippeth, he falleth).
8. To add weight to your opinions, try starting them with methinks, mayhaps, in sooth or wherefore.
9. When wooing ladies: try comparing her to a summer’s day. If that fails, say “Get thee to a nunnery!”
10. When wooing lads: try dressing up like a man. If that fails, throw him in the Tower, banish his friends and claim the throne.

Forsooth, ’tis a pity methinks, if no one deigns to understandeth me. Link -via the Presurfer

 
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Inconceivable! How Could Anyone Misspell That?

Posted by Alex in Book & Lit, Travel & Places on April 21, 2009 at 4:20 pm


Photo: Bree Bailey [Flickr]

We’ve had our share of typsos here on Neatorama, so we understand how misspellings can happen even to the best of us. But misspelling the name of this lake in Webster, Massachusetts? Why, it’s inconceivable how anyone couldn’t spell it correctly:

In an embarrassing mistake, officials in Massachusetts have been forced to admit that some road signs pointing to Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg have spelling mistakes in them.

The typos, which are completely baffling considering how easy it is to spell Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg, were revealed by a local newspaper, the Worcester Telegram & Gazette, which has been covering the misspelling scandal since 2003.

Link

 
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A Book of Tweets

Posted by Queuebot in Book & Lit on March 30, 2009 at 3:30 pm

"Thursday Jan. 1, 2009  18:20 Rousing from torpor to go to shops then come back and cook good things. Fried things, in all likelihood."

James Bridle decided to collect all his Twitter messages from the past two years and print them up in a hardcover book.  He will make one for you, "if you ask nicely and pay me a lot of money."

Why do such a thing?  Bridle explains, "When Twitter is inevitably replaced by something else, I don’t wan to lose those incidentals, the casual asides, the remarks and responses.  That’s all really.  This seems like a nice way to do it, and I’ll probably do it again in a couple of years."



Link - via izreloaded

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by Marilyn Terrell.

 
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Russian Lit Greats… in Gingerbread

Posted by Stacy in Book & Lit, Food & Drinks on March 28, 2009 at 10:56 am

Wow. My gingerbread decorations = two blobs for eyes and a curved line for a smile. Talented Craftster Woolylogic made detailed likenesses of Russian literature greats. And they’re good. That’s Dostoyevsky in the picture; click the link for cookie versions of Turgenev, Tolstoy and Gogol.

Link

 
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The Blackboard Blogger of Africa

Posted by Alex in Blog & Internet, Book & Lit, Pictures on March 23, 2009 at 2:05 pm

Alfred Sirleaf is a blogger. Not just any blogger - no sir, Alfred is an analog blogger. He runs the "Daily News," a news hut in the middle of Monrovia, the capital of a Liberia, a country on the west coast of Africa. The lack of electricity doesn’t even faze him:

Alfred serves as a reminder to the rest of us, that simple is often better, just because it works. The lack of electricity never throws him off. The lack of funding means he’s creative in ways that he recruits people from around the city and country to report news to him. He uses his cell phone as the major point of connection between him and the 10,000 (he says) that read his blackboard daily.

Not all Liberians who read his news are literate, so he makes use of symbols. Whether it’s a UN or military helmet, a poster of a soccer player or a bottle of colored water to denote gas prices, he is determined to get the message out in any way that he can.

Link | A 2005 article on NYT on Alfred Sirleaf - via Onelargeprawn

 
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