John Crowley Little and Big

The grim slide

2013-05-20T16:08:14Z

In Michael Dirda's fine and heartfelt overview of the work of James Salter, in the new issue of what Rodger Cunningham dubbed the New York Review of Each Other's Books, that amid James Salter's journalism is an interview with Vladimir Nabokov for People magazine. Salter interviews Nabokov for People. This sounds like an alternative universe, but it's only the past, another country where they did things differently.

New Saint

2013-05-13T14:27:02Z

Saints are named fro proven miracles and lives of heroic virtue. Some more miraculogenitive and heroic than others. But I think it will be a while before this new saint is beaten out for Longest Saint Name(NYTimes):

Pope Francis named Laura of St. Catherine of Siena Montoya y Upegui, who toiled as a spiritual guide to indigenous people in the 20th century, as a potential source of inspiration to the country’s peace process.

Me in Seattle, at work

2013-05-13T04:13:06Z

I am in Seattle, doing a workshop for Les Howle and Clarion -- "Writing from the End," about causality in fictiona dn other things, and also offering help and counsel to those who need iT:

http://www.bestseattlecriminaldefenseattorneys.com/serious-felony-lawyer-john-crowley-seattle-tacoma-yakima-tri-cities-snohomish/

Above average, really

2013-05-07T10:34:24Z

Stephen Hawking's famous quote-quote, repeated in a nice -looking new scince mag called Nautilius:

“The human race is just a chemical scum on a moderate-sized planet, orbiting around a very average star in the outer suburb of one among a hundred billion galaxies.”

Great name for a neo-punk rock band (if any such were needed) -- "Chemical Scum."

RU Nutz 2?

2013-05-06T10:34:19Z

From a Yemeni jihadist site called "Lone Mujahid Pocketbook" which trains American jihadist wannabes with advice and instruction:

“R U dreamin’ of wagin’ jihadi attacks against kuffar?” the 64-page manual asks, using a pejorative term for unbeliever. “Have u been lookin’ 4 a way to join the mujahideen in frontlines, but you haven’t found any? Well, there’s no need to travel abroad, because the frontline has come to you.”

I don't know why, but the delicacy of those unlikely apostrophes is particularly hateful.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/06/us/terrorists-find-online-education-for-attacks.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20130506

No-doz Redux

2013-05-04T11:25:36Z

Didn't we used to have caffeinated gum? I seem to remember. But I may be confusing it with Aspergum, which was gum infused with aspirin. Certainly we had access to caffeine outside the cup. We were unafraid, unregulated, and sleepless.

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/05/03/caffeine-laced-foods-spur-f-d-a-investigation/?ref=health

Don't Take Me to your Leaders

2013-05-04T11:21:17Z

A blue ribbon panel gathers in Washington to consider alien monitoring of the planet, ans what the government has been covering up about it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/04/us/politics/panel-convenes-in-washington-to-discuss-aliens.html?ref=science

Former Senator Mike Gravel is among the notables. And also this person:

“I’ve been exploring how we might get this issue out of the shadows of the lunatic fringe,” said Roscoe G. Bartlett, a former Republican representative from Maryland.

And another:

“I’ve come to understand and appreciate the importance of open, transparent government and the power of truth,” said Paul T. Hellyer, who served as Canadian minister of defense during the 1960s.

“We are not alone in the cosmos,” he added.

I agree.

Sacre bleu!

2013-05-01T02:03:57Z

For the Francophone readership, and certainly Matthieu -- here is video of a panel I took part in at the French conference L'Etonnants Voayageurs. To my right is the tireless translator ( who at one point is so stressed he starts speaking in English) and to my left is Doug Headline, who -- I think I can claim this -- began the American-style publishing of genre fantasy and science fiction in France (identifiable covers, brand-named lines, etc.). This was 13 years ago, when i was young and strong. I not only couldn't speak French i could hardly speak at all. You can send away for a transcript in English (but i can't imagine where.)

http://vimeo.com/65047676

In the future nothing will be forgotten, which is not different than to say in the future nothing can be remembered,

The Flash

2013-04-30T21:33:48Z

A student asks if there is such a thing as SF flash fiction. He thought it would be hard to write and rare. I said I thought there were probably whole books of it, I didn't know, but I knew where to find out.

crowleycrow @ 2013-04-20T15:41:00

2013-04-20T19:42:22Z

David Remnick in the New Yorker says that Chechens speak Russian with a thick accent but also their own language, Noxchiin Mott. Lovely name for a character in an international spy novel/thriller, or parody of one.

Boston grassy knoll

2013-04-20T13:02:36Z

Somewhere in the course of yesterday a taxi was stopped on Commonwealth Avenue and two passengers taken into custody. A pipe bomb was removed from the taxi and exploded on the green nearby by the bomb squad. The taxi was taken away on a police trailer. As far as I can tell nothing further has been said about this incident. Who were those people and what became of them?

Jesus!

2013-04-17T12:47:16Z

Stanley Fish explores the academic and philosophic implications of an exercise in which students were asked to step on a paper with the name of Jesus written on it. Fish suggested that a thought experiment ("what would you think of stepping....") would have been as effective and less controversial than making students do it for real. He got 522 comments (and counting).

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/04/15/stepping-on-jesus/

Since my response elicited only a single recommendation despite being highly suggestive and sort of secretly profound (story of my life), I copy it here:

Write a paper analyzing your different responses if the name on the paper were a) Jesus b) Mohammed c) Abraham Lincoln d) your mother. Consider whether you would be as willing to step on Jesus's name if you understood that those around you were horrified at the thought though you yourself are indifferent. Think about what your different responses would be to the demand that you step on the name of Jesus you wrote yourself, or that the teacher wrote, or that was given you as a printed paper. Describe your response as compared to being asked to step on (or step into) a pair of Jesus brand jeans. Consider your willingness to step on Jesus's name after watching fellow students step on Jesus's name a) with casual indifference; b) hooting with laughter; b) grimacing, covering their eyes, and weeping. Respond to the question "I believe my teacher when he tells me that refusing to participate in this experiment will not affect my grade." Extra-curricular credit: Gather with fellow students and keg and decide what names you would be so ready to stamp on.

Indistinguishable

2013-04-14T02:17:06Z

At Yale I am a Senior Lecturer but at Harvard apparently a Distinguished one. And Distinguished Lecturers give Distinguished Lectures. (Do they?)

http://c-emergencyinformatics.tamu.edu/ai1ec_event/distinguished-lecture-april-17-2013-410pm-124-hrbb/?instance_id=

Bazooka Joe

2013-04-11T11:20:59Z

A mention of bazookas caused me to wonder if the weapon came before the bubble gum or the other way around. Why would a weapon be named after bubble gum? But why would bubble gum be named after a weapon?

Time Marches On

2013-04-11T11:15:56Z

NY Times article announces a Xerox invention of teeny "chiplets" that can be strewn over printed circuits and attach in the right places to make electronic... okay, lost the train of thought there, read it yourself:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/09/science/tiny-chiplets-are-a-new-level-of-micro-manufacturing.html?ref=science

Here it touts the enormous changes that the chiplet has over the chip:

Moreover, the research could have tremendous economic consequences — feeding the emergence of a new digital era in manufacturing, much as laser printing transformed publishing three decades ago.

By replacing the circuit boards now assembled in factories, the technology would vastly compress a supply chain that spans the globe and employs hundreds of thousands of workers.

Progress!

Utopia On Film

2013-04-09T11:06:47Z

Now that my class has read through a number of Utopian fictions, they have conceived the idea of a Utopian film bash. Lost Horizon of course, and Things to Come, and... what? NOT dystopian, plenty of which come immediately to mind -- though the question of why dystopia is more popular remains unsettles (is it simply easier, or more convincing?)

Anyway -- suggestions?

crowleycrow @ 2013-04-08T07:18:00

2013-04-08T11:18:42Z

NY Times article about the proliferation of pseudo-academic journals that publish anything submitted, for a fee, and hold fake-ish conferences etc., a growing problem.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/08/health/for-scientists-an-exploding-world-of-pseudo-academia.html?ref=us

Journals and conferences are given names hard to tell from the respectable ones. A librarian in Colorado is keeping a black list of these journals:

One publisher on Beall’s list, Avens Publishing Group, even sweetened the pot for those who agreed to be on the editorial board of The Journal of Clinical Trails & Patenting, offering 20 percent of its revenues to each editor.

I think I might have smoked that one out.

Ben Katchor Again

2013-04-02T18:51:42Z

Paul Di Filippo, whose always reliable and witty reviews in the Barnes &Noble monthly online magazine are not to be missed, outdoes himself with this fine appreciation of one of my own favorite modern artists:

http://bnreview.barnesandnoble.com/t5/In-the-Margin/Hand-Drying-in-America/ba-p/10197

Let alone again before

2013-03-29T22:11:12Z

Grazing for something in old LJ entries, I find that I, or we, discussed the new deformation the usage of "let alone" meaning a more specific or recondite thing (that's a poor definition).

http://crowleycrow.livejournal.com/125167.html

Some of the smart people who commented on that original back in the dim days of 2009 have not visited here lately. Sigh.

Bull session

2013-03-27T11:56:49Z

This is from Maureen Dowd's NYT column today:

“Same-sex couples have every other right,” Chief Justice John Roberts said, sounding inane for a big brain. “It’s just about the label in this case.” He continued, “If you tell a child that somebody has to be their friend, I suppose you can force the child to say, ‘This is my friend,’ but it changes the definition of what it means to be a friend.”

This is entirely unintelligible to me. It sounds like the remark of someone who hasn't thought before speaking. What's the difference between telling a child he has to be someone's friend and making him say it? What is the analogy here? WHo in the real-world analog is the child, who is the friend, and who is the person saying the child must be a friend? What definition has been changed by asserting a lie?

Captcha the Flag

2013-03-24T21:28:44Z

I apologize to all Anonymous commenters here, and hope they will not be discouraged, but after getting 62 (!) anonymous comments on a recent post, all of them spam, I have decided to ask anonymous posters to resolve a Captcha in order to comment. I have recently heard that Captcha is far from foolproof and (some say) ineffectual altogether. No doubt some posters here have opinions. But for the moment, these fragments I have shored against my ruins.

War Story

2013-03-20T01:20:07Z

For the 10th anniversary of Operation Iraqi Freedom:

A month or so into the shooting war, I heard an NPR broadcast in which a breathless reporter in Iraq announced that a warehouse full of Scud missiles with what could only be atomic warheads for them stored offsite. Teams were on their way to secure the site and certify the weapons. I was rather downcast -- I'd begun to expect nothing would be found. I listened on and off through the day for the followup. Nothing, No mention of the Scuds or the warheads ever came again.

Anyone else remember that?

Yahoops

2013-03-16T23:04:50Z

Why suddenly does typing a search into the top slot in Google bring up a Yahoo search page? How did Yahoo manage that? And why by the way do high-tech inventions always have to have goofy names, as though they were sugary snacks or snap-together toys? Actually I don't need that question answered, only the first.

Vikings

2013-03-12T18:14:45Z

Many interesting obwservations and insights about Vikings, but the most shocking revelation comes last.

http://news.yale.edu/2013/03/08/vikings-yale-historian-looks-myths-vs-history?utm_source=YNemail&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=yn-03-12-13

Next we'll be told that the ancient Scots didn't wear tartans!

Let Alone Let Alone

2013-03-12T11:27:37Z

It seems to me I have been seeing this formulation more often in public (virtual) prints. This example from David Brooks's column today about America's coming dominance in gas and oil production:

“OPEC will find it challenging to survive another 60 years, let alone another decade,” Edward Morse, Citigroup’s researcher, told CNBC.

Tell me this is not backward. The more extreme instance ought to be the one you must let alone, if even the less extreme is speculative. "Another decade, let alone 60 years." I suppose if rapidity of threat to survival is the measure, then a decade is the greater reach. Even so the formulation is wrong. "Another sixty years, perhaps not even so much as another decade" avoids being, well, wrong.