HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: lew@cbnewsd.cb.att.com (lewis.h.mammel..jr)
Subject: Re: Fictitious Fiction
Organization: AT&T
Distribution: na
Date: Sat, 26 Sep 1992 20:18:23 GMT
Summary: a neat trick

In article <DAVEH.92Sep25154714@marassa.Morgan.COM>, daveh@Morgan.COM (David Haan) writes:

> S.Lem's "A Perfect Vacuum" contains reviews of several imaginary 
> books, including S.Lem's "A Perfect Vacuum".


Wow! and I thought I read it - must have been dreaming.



Lew Mammel, Jr.
From: cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Enforced Shakespeare?
Date: 5 Oct 92 20:16:52 GMT
Organization: Optilink Corporation, Petaluma, CA

In article <26391@castle.ed.ac.uk>, cam@castle.ed.ac.uk (Chris Malcolm) writes:
> In article <5871@mccuts.uts.mcc.ac.uk> zzassgl@uts.mcc.ac.uk (Geoff Lane) writes:
# #As the marking of exams is now supposed to take into account the spelling
# #and grammar used in the answers for subjects such as physics and chemistry
# #(a GOOD IDEA) AND Shakespeare is to be used as an example of "good" English
# #would you be marked down if your physics exam answers were expressed using
# #the grammar and spelling used within the good old bard's plays?  
# 
# I congratulate you on the excellence of your pupils! If mine were to
# use Shakespeare's spelling and grammar (as found in the school
# editions which use modern spellings) they would be doing a damn sight
# better than they do at the moment!
# -- 
# Chris Malcolm    cam@uk.ac.ed.aifh          +44 (0)31 650 3085

I'll bet your pupils even know to use both upper and lower case
when writing a term paper.

Last semester, one of the history classes I took was a history
of the 20th century.  In addition to being a class that history
majors take, it was also one of the general education requirements.
When the professor returned the first papers done, he made a point
of reminding everyone, "We don't turn in papers all upper case."
There were three papers turned in that way in a class of about
50 students.  

As it happened, the student sitting next to me was one of the 
offenders.  It was NOT because he was using a Teletype machine.
He had done this on a Macintosh, and had apparently consciously
chosen to do it all caps.  By the way, that was the least of the
problems with his paper.

Don't get me wrong -- if you attend a California high school, and
are prepared to work hard, you can learn the proper written
forms of English composition.  And if you don't want to?  Well,
that's OK too.
-- 
Clayton E. Cramer {uunet,pyramid}!optilink!cramer  My opinions, all mine!
Lesson learned from Gov. Wilson's signing of AB 2601: if you don't get 
your way, have a riot.  Next time, Gov. Wilson will cower appropriately.
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: jchokey@leland.Stanford.EDU (James Alexander Chokey)
Subject: Re: She's baaaaack.....Camille Paglia
Organization: DSG, Stanford University, CA 94305, USA
Date: Sun, 27 Sep 92 21:13:00 GMT

In article <1992Sep27.200248.22182@CSD-NewsHost.Stanford.EDU> baker@Xenon.Stanford.EDU (Andrew Baker) writes:
>In article <jyc.717613880@Leland> jyc@leo.Stanford.EDU (Jon Corelis) writes:
>>
>>   (It is with some interest that I have noted in the course of this
>>discussion that conservatives' much-vaunted immunity to trendy humbug
>>seems to evaporate when the humbug is on their side of the fence.) 
>
>Nonsense.  I haven't seen hordes of conservatives jumping in line behind
>Paglia.  Can you give the names of all the well-known conservative
>publications or pundits who have endorsed her ideas?
>
>
>I don't know much about Paglia, but from what I do know, she doesn't seem
>to be much of a conservative.  And the discussion of her here (including
>that moronic quote from that SF newspaper) certainly hasn't given me a
>desire to learn anything more about her.  So my immunity is intact! . . .
>I think I will go read a book by Gertrude Himmelfarb instead; I hope that is
>sufficiently untrendy.

	I've been surprised that Himmelfarb has managed to hang on as long as
she has.  Unlike Paglia, who is challenging current trends in academia,
Himmelfarb never really seems to have understood what many of the changes
in historical (or more generally academic) thought since the 1960's have
even been about.  (See her article "Some Reflections on the New History"
in the Forum section of _American Historical Review_ 94 (1989), and Joan
Scott's response to it.)  Himmelfarb does not really challenge "trendy"
ideas and beliefs in the same way that Paglia, because Himmelfarb is, more or
less oblivious to the changes that have gone on in the historical profession 
(and academia in general) over the past half-century--  if not longer.  I
mean, this is someone who thinks that historical scholarship has gone steadily
downhill from the publication of Lytton Strachey's _Eminent Victorians_ back 
in 1918.  As far as she's concerned, Annalistes like Bloch and Braudel,
social historians like E.P. Thompson and Natalie Zemon Davis, and historians
who have followed the linguistic/discursive turn (such as Joan Scott or
Dominick LaCapra), are all indistinguishable practitioners of "New History."
	To be fair to Himmelfarb, though, I have to admit that I can empathize
with her.  Her complaints about the various changes in history, it seems to
me, all boil down to aesthetic concerns--  she likes the idea of having _a_
history, one grand meta-narrative of great and important people and events,
rather than a plurality of uncomplementary (and occasionally incompatible)
histories.  It's a rather old-fashioned idea (in academic circles at any rate)
but I can understand its appeal. 

	--  Jim C. <jchokey@leland.stanford.edu>
From: cam@castle.ed.ac.uk (Chris Malcolm)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: She's baaaaack.....Camille Paglia
Date: 29 Sep 92 12:09:36 GMT
Organization: Edinburgh University

Paglia published a page-long article in the UK Guardian about the
significance of the Prince Charles/Princess Diana marriage problems.
It is the only thing I have read of Paglia's, and without question the
clearest, tautest, most intelligent, and well-written article on the
topic I saw in the acres of newsprint the British press devoted to the
topic. Whatever else may be said about her, she is clearly an
excellent writer and a formidable thinker.
-- 
Chris Malcolm    cam@uk.ac.ed.aifh          +44 (0)31 650 3085
Department of Artificial Intelligence,    Edinburgh University
5 Forrest Hill, Edinburgh, EH1 2QL, UK                DoD #205
From: s891961@minyos.xx.rmit.oz.au (Peter David Cupit)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Buchan (was: Re: RE: Poll: The Greatest Adventure Story Ever
Date: 28 Sep 92 09:29:52 GMT
Organization: RMIT Computer Centre
NNTP-Posting-Host: minyos.xx.rmit.oz.au



    It's not useful to judge John Buchan by 'The 39 Steps',  this book was
    meant to be an attempt to write 'a dime novel' (whatever that is),  
    I think meaning that the book wasn't meant to be taken as very 
    serious work.  Just good clean fun.

    However,  if a comparison is made between any of Desmond Bagley's
    books (for example) and even the lowely 39 steps well John Buchan
    is in a whole other class.  Much much better.

    Some Buchan books not mentioned: 'The Dancing Floor',  about witchcraft,  or
    'The Path of The King'.  

    If there is a Poll tho' I would perhaps pick Rogue Male by Geoffrey
    Household.  


    Peter Cupit.


  s891961@minyos.xx.rmit.oz.au
  s891961@godzilla.cgl.rmit.oz.au
Organization: Penn State University
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 1992 23:21:58 EDT
From: <MRS110@psuvm.psu.edu>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Laura Ingalls Wilder
 <1992Sep25.181315.27760@src.honeywell.com>

hey, I'm a LIW buff, and I agree, the long winter's great--I read it every
christmas between semesters so I can remember how lucky I am.  I read Laura
A biography, but I can't remember who wrote it.  It talks about a trip--by
car--that LIW and Rose took together back to some of the places Laura lived
as a child.  there's no mention of a poor relationship between mother and
daughter that I remember.  About reading it to your kids--I never thought of
this until it came up in a class of mine, but there are quite disturbing
parts in "Little House On The Prairie" about American Indians.  about how ma
smelled their terrible smell, and things of that sort.  I read something
about how this young american indian woman grew up without knowledge of the
books and then found that her parents had kept them from her because of the
racist remarks within the stories.  This struck me since I grew up loving
the books and didn't remember the particular instances.  but then I'm not a
Native American.  Just something to think about--and something I'll be sure
to discuss with my children someday.  Maria at Penn State
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: spb0457@venus.tamu.edu (SubGenius)
Subject: Re: Laurence Sterne's _Tristram Shandy_
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    
Organization: Texas A&M University, Academic Computing Services
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1992 19:09:00 GMT

Vance Maverick writes...
>Let me recommend, then, the Penguin edition (Graham Petrie, ed., 1967),
>which does right by the black page, and gives the curlicue a full 7 cm.
>Also, distinguishing itself from other Penguins, it doesn't deface the
>text with endnotes -- they're there if you want them, but you look them
>up by page number at the end.  Nice typeface, too, whose gentle archaism
>suits the text well....
>	Vance
+-------------------------------------------SubG------------------------------+
A fair recommendation, and fairly made.

But candor insists that I point out that although I mentioned the Everyman's
Library edition that should not be taken to imply that that was either the
only edition I am familiar with or the only edition I own, any more than
quoting from the Burton Raffel translation of _Gargantua_ or _Pantagruel_
implies that I'm unfamiliar with the Urqhardt (sp?) or Coen translations.

On other fronts (or indeed middles), I've noticed that Penguin has introduced
several innovations to their line of late;  noticably the elimination of the
endnote flags and dingbats and an erstwhile unheard of willingness to bind
their paperbacks and trade editions in colour schemes other than their black-
spine-and-an-ugly-yellow-border-around-the-cover-illustration trademark style
(although the yellow border was something on which they were historically
more flexible;  my _Don Quixote_ knows no such bounds).







Yours etc.,




SubGenius

Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: mtaranto@shearson.com (Mark Taranto)
Subject: Re: literature students
Organization: Yale CS Mail/News Gateway
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1992 18:48:25 GMT



SHIT! Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!


I wrote:

>> "In my day we read Joyce *against* our professors," he observed, and
>> it was almost the only thing I recall from his course 30 years later.

> Was Joyce REALLY not taught in 1962?  I know that there were Joyce
> courses at Villanova a mere 8 years later.  And Villanova was a good
> 10-20 years behind the times in nearly EVERYTHING.  

I didn't realize that Crawford was quoting Lionel Trilling saying something
a while ago.  I thought it was Crawford's own statement made NOW.

Ooops.

Still -- Joyce has become someone who is taught -- so there might be
hope for Barclay, who would like to teach people who are not now taught.

Mark

Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: francis@oas.stanford.edu (Francis Muir)
Subject: Re: Reinforced Burns (was Re: Enforced Shakespeare?)
Organization: Stanford Exploration Project
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 1992 15:04:40 GMT

sometimes a Poorly Informed Wombat writes:

	Craig Cockburn writes:

		 ... Robert Burns, probably the world's best known poet.

	I looked at this several times before finally realizing that 
	this was tongue in cheek. I still don't QUITE get the joke, 
	but I'm now quite willing to laugh quietly and politely along 
	with others.

There is a world outside North America. Craig is arguably correct. 
I have heard Tam O'Shanter recited by heart by the then Prime Minister
of Western Region, Nigeria, Chief Awolowo, at a Burns Night dinner in
Ikedja, some distance out of Lagos. I am sure that many others can recount 
similar experiences from all over the globe. In Soviet Russia Burns was 
certainly more widely distributed than any other foreign poet -- maybe 
any other poet. 

Read Burns and find out why. 

							Fido
From: tmaddox@netcom.com (Tom Maddox)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Kafka's "Metamorphasis"
Date: 5 Oct 92 03:51:57 GMT
Organization: Netcom Online Communications Services (408-241-9760 login: guest)


	Brian Aldiss has a quite funny story (whose title I do not remember)
in which a cockroach awakens to find itself turned into Gregor Samsa.

	He will read it aloud if the venue seems proper.


-- 
				Tom Maddox
		    	    tmaddox@netcom.com
		"The Reptoids eat humans like we eat chickens."
				Alex Alexander
From: istn100@indyvax.iupui.edu
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Lady mystery writers (was Sue Grafton)
Date: 6 Oct 92 13:07:20 -0500

In article <1992Oct3.194502.21559@dg-rtp.dg.com>, cochran@spam.rtp.dg.com (A. Jing Hippy) writes:
> I've grown very fond of books by Sharyn McCrumb.  The first couple that I read
> seemed to follow a set pattern, but her writing style and her humor offset
> that pretty well.   I'm particularly fond of her books that have
> Elizabeth McPherson as the main character.
> 
> She has two books that take place at science fiction/fantasy fairs:
> "Bimbos of the Death Sun" and "Zombies of the Gene Pool".  Neither of these
> were as good as her other books, IMO, and I think that I have now read them
> all.

Grin.  Can you tell from "Bimbos" that Sharyn McCrumb isn't all that fond
of science fiction fandom? 

Seriously, various friends who have read both of these 'Jay Omega' books
("Bimbos" and "Zombies") and who are all in sf fandom tend to agree that
"Bimbos" was pretty good.  The portrayal of sf fandom was obviously
exaggerated in some areas, but lots of it was pretty true-to-life.
Unfortunately, "Zombies" is decidedly inferior; it's a fairly blatant 
attempt to capitalize on the formula that worked in "Bimbos" - combining
a mystery with some sf fandom.  It worked once, but not twice, because it's 
basically a gimmick.

If this post is getting a little disjointed, its because the editor is
going totally crazy here and moving lines all around the screen.  I sure
hope that when I post this, everything will be in th right order! ;-)

Ellen - the Crime Doctor
ISTN100@indyvax.iupui.edu

Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: daynem@byron.u.washington.edu (Dayne Miller)
Subject: Robert Jordan's _The Shadow Rising_
Organization: University of Washington, Seattle
Date: Sun, 4 Oct 1992 21:33:08 GMT

For anyone in the greater Seattle area:

As of Friday night (10/2/92), the Tower Books in Bellevue was the only book-
store anywhere near Seattle (to my knowledge) that has _The Shadow Rising_
in stock. They've got about 25 copies (as of then); most other bookstores
I've talked to don't expect it for at least two weeks.

If you give them a call, they'll reserve copies for up to 5 days.

Also, the book only cost me $18.89 (not the $24 + that some have had to pay).

Good luck. It's a damn fine piece of writing.

     -daynem@u.washington.edu

Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: francis@oas.stanford.edu (Francis Muir)
Subject: Re: Books as decoration?
Organization: Stanford Exploration Project
Date: Sun, 27 Sep 1992 13:04:18 GMT

sometimes a Wombat [Rossetti's?] writes:

	There is an excellent condition edition of Thomas Moore's 
	poems (inscribed to someone who was leaving Scotland for 
	America in 1834) at a local used book store that I have 
	avoided buying (tho' I much want my own copy of LALA RHUK 
	(sp?) and "The Fudge Family in Paris") because (speaking 
	out of parenthesis) the pages are uncut.  It is probably 
	worth more than the $10 marked inside.  But I don't buy to
	collect, I buy to have and use.

It sounds, then, as though you'll go no more a roving into the night.
Its Lalla Rookh, by the way. Personally I could never quite buy into
believing all of Moore's endearing young charms -- Byron left Moore
his memoirs and on the advice of Byron's lawyers -- Moore himself was
a lawyer -- destroyed them. Thank you Lawyer Moore.

Back to uncut books. Simple solution. Learn how to cut them. What's 
the problem?

						Fido



Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: john@slinky.bsd.uchicago.edu (John Lodder)
Subject: Harold Brodkey
Organization: University of Chicago Computing Organizations
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1992 21:40:43 GMT

There I was, minding my own business in Powell's, when a hardbound copy of  
"Stories in an Almost Classical Mode" lept off the shelf and attached  
itself to my hand.  Whoever says "Paris Review" interviews don't lead to  
impulse buys has never frequented used book stores after dark with spare  
money in their wallet.  Though Harold seems to have an existence all his  
own, independent of the folks in Flushing, and the folks who frequent used  
book stores...
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: chucks@uars2.acd.ucar.edu (Chuck Smythe)
Subject: Re: Golding's _The Spire_ query
Organization: Ntl Center for Atmospheric Research, Atmospheric Chemistry
Date: Sun, 27 Sep 1992 17:59:17 GMT

In article <26SEP199218153815@venus.tamu.edu> spb0457@venus.tamu.edu (SubGenius) writes:
>miner@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu writes...
>>Roger Squires writes:
>>>you write:
>>>>Some time ago I read William Golding's _The Spire_.  I want to re-read
>>>>it but I've been told, or read somewhere, that to really grasp what
>>>>he's doing you need a knowledge of cathedral architecture.
......
>>> 	flying buttress exteriors?  In any case, I do recall a PBS
>>> 	series on the building of a medieval cathedral, and there
>>> 	was a companion volume; perhaps this would suit you.  I
>>> 	believe the title is simply _Cathedral_.
........
>I don't see as one needs to be hip to all the intricacies of spire construction
>to catch the drift, anymore than one needs to be a political scientist or
>child psychologist to suss out _Lord of the Flies_.

SubG's dismissal as may be, the construction of Gothic Cathedrals is a fun
subject in its own right.  _Cathedral_ is one of the series of beautiful
graphical tales by McCauley (hope I spelled that right; the reference is at
home).  He tells the tale in a series of remarkable illustrations.  A  
"children's" book; i.e. you and I will enjoy it at least as much as a child.
He is also responsible for _Pyramid_, _City_, _How Things Work_, and I believe
_Motel of the Mysteries_.  All highly recommended.

Another, utterly different work is Robert Mark's _The Structure of Gothic
Cathedrals_ (title approximate) in which he studied the structural stability
of several famous examples.  In the process, he passes along a lot of
history and aesthetics, and makes some fascinating discoveries about how a
subculture of unlettered craftsmen, in an age innocent of structural 
engineering, managed such a startling architectural revolution - and about the
mistakes they made.  (It _is_ startling.  I've been through the Dom in
Cologne, and it is possibly the most wonderful building I've ever seen.)
Mark, a professor of art history and architecture at Princeton, has also
published _Light, Wind, and Structure_, in which he extends the same methods
to (e.g.) the Pantheon, St. Mark's, St. Sophia, the Sydney Opera House, the
Kresge Auditorium.... 

				Chuck Smythe


Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: jmc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (John McCarthy)
Subject: Re: Enforced Shakespeare?
Reply-To: jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU
Organization: Computer Science Department, Stanford University
Date: 6 Oct 92 18:40:27

Mark Taranto writes:

     Clayton strikes me as the kind of person who, when asked if
     the proverbial glass is half full or half empty will reply
     "Look at all the flouride."

Why does Mark Taranto think Clayton Cramer would misspell "fluoride"?
He must be prejudiced against Sonoma State University.
--
John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
*
He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.

Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: fehr@ms.uky.edu (Jeff Davis)
Subject: Exit Shakespeare....
Distribution: usa
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 1992 17:48:39 GMT
Organization: Austerlitz, Gershovitz, and Carmichael

As a partial reprieve from the Enforced Shakespeare gas...who
would be our Shakespeare, say, had the little balding bugger
been skewered poaching deer? I mean...someone would be. Chaucer?
"par-fit kan-nicked"? I dunno. Milton? Too dour. Too....pedagogical.
Ben Jonson? 2nd tier. Donne? Warmer...maybe...Wordsworth...("Damn...
"The Excursion"!!!)...no...("whew!")....someone more beautiful....
could it be...John Keats? Yes...that's the ticket. 

But...could one imagine the alternate usenet discussion about
Enforced Keats and the threat to civilization if studies about
him were delayed? 

As a tangent...what the h*** would "The Sound and The Fury"  have been
called w/o WS's existence? Cry Uncle? Forever Panting? Watch the Watch?
-- 
Jeff Davis <davis@keats.ca.uky.edu> 
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: hhenderson@vax.clarku.edu
Subject: John Buchan Vindicated
Organization: Clark University
Date: 1 OCT 92 13:58:54 GMT

>jyc@leo.Stanford.EDU (Jon Corelis) writes:
>>hhenderson@vax.clarku.edu writes:
>>
>>Well, I went back and read "Greenmantle" to see if there was anything
>>I might have missed, and I really don't detect an "underlying
>>ambivalence", or any attitude of Hannay's that indicates he would
>>sympathize with this "will-to-power strain" that you mention.
>>Do you think you could refer to specific examples in the text?
>
>  I'd rather excuse myself from quoting chapter and verse here because
>1) I don't have the book to hand, 2) if I wait until I simultaneously
>have it and remember to post a follow-up it might never happen, and 3)
>Buchan being a minority taste probably not many people here will find
>it of great interest.  Also 4) I probably wouldn't convince you
>anyway!

I can be convinced by good argument backed up by facts.  I also know
Buchan's work quite well, and I suggest to you that, while your argument
is pretty enough, there are not sufficient facts to support it .

To paraphrase the noted deconstructionist Bob Newhart: John Buchan
did not have any ambivalent feelings toward Fascism, and if he did,
he kept them to himself.

>   I recently came across a book on Buchan which included several
>pictures of him.  He seemed to be a fair, wiry, square-jawed sort of
>bloke -- in other words, the image of Dick Hannay!

Rather more brains, though.

Heather
HHENDERSON@vax.clarku.edu
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: fi@grebyn.com (Fiona Webster)
Subject: Re: literature students
Organization: Grebyn Timesharing
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1992 22:39:38 GMT

Fido makes some moany-whiny noises:
>Oh I dunno. 12 years in a bloody tent in two dozen countries, and look what
>a boring old fart I've become...

Oh come on, Muir!  You're letting yourself off too easily!  

We require of you *more* self-abasing, self-denigrating, and 
irritatingly ingratiating comments of that nature.

More, Muir!  More!  <provide your own sound effects in this space>

					--the woman who said too much