From: sanjiva@ecrc.de (Sanjiva Prasad)
Subject: Quote Unquote
Reply-To: sanjiva@ecrc.de (Sanjiva Prasad)
Organization: European Computer-Industry Research Centre, Munich
Date: Thu, 27 Aug 1992 17:43:49 GMT

In article <1992Jul27.140008.10012@cs.umn.edu> prabhak@cs.umn.edu (Satya Prabhakar) writes:
>nagappa@Rosie.UH.EDU writes:
>>	Although the statistics on single parents on the US is 
>>startlingly high (about 50% black babies and 25% white babies are born to
>>sinle mothers), it does *not* mean that there is a collapse of family values
>>and it would be unfair to write-off an entire society because of this.
>
>Really??
>
>In his celebrated funeral speech, Mark Antony claims that if every
>wound of Caesar had a voice, they would in unison drive Romans to
>mutiny.
>
>If the children of these broken marriages and divorces, caused by
>myopic pursuit of the forever-elusive bliss and happiness, had
>a voice of their own, perhaps then the 'collapse' and 'degradation'
>would become clearer and drive us to our senses.
>
>And Marcus Antony continues in his speech:
>
> "Oh! Judgment!! Thou hast fled to brutish hearts,
>  And men (and women) have lost their reason!!"
>
>Satya Prabhakar

The following is written by The Bastard Critic From Hell (the typos are mine).
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		Quote Unquote Quibble Quibble

Every time I see something written by Satya Prabhakar (wasn't it he who started
a long article about India with "India is at the crossroads of its career"?
Since when did countries have careers?  Maybe they moonlight on the sly...)
I have a hard time figuring out what he's trying to say. He seems to love
quoting from literature, even though the quotations seem quite inapt or, at 
best, stretch the readers imagination considerably to discover a connection. 
Like the one above. It must be quite awful being condemned to writing a bunch 
of mixed metaphors, zeugmas and random selections from the Oxford Book of 
Quotations.

When quoting, especially from Shakespeare and other biggies, one is apt
to misconstrue the sense of the quotation. One of the most misused
phrases is the business about it being an ill wind that blows no one any good.
The phrase is meant to be used in the sense that there always is someone who
benefits from any turn of events (so why not me?), and does not mean that
we are experiencing an ill wind (bad times).

One may not even get the quotation right -- how many times have you heard 
"fresh fields and pastures new" instead of "fresh woods ..." and 
"water, water everywhere but not a drop to drink" instead of "... everywhere 
nor any drop ..."?

Quoting (accurately) can also be embarrassing.  Apart from intentional
plagiarism (e.g. Biden's borrowing from Kinnock), here are a couple of 
instances involving two Indian politicians reputed to have impressive memories
who were drawn into controversy by being too accurate in quoting.  
India's philosopher-president Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan was once sued for 
plagiarism. He defended himself in court by saying that it was entirely
possible that he had unknowingly memorized the original on reading it and
reproduced it while writing -- and proceeded to astonish the audience by
accurately reciting a long tract after just glancing at it.  The second 
instance involved Indira Gandhi, whose memory was not quite as prodigious as
Radhakrishnan's. This was an even more sensitive affair, since it had some
diplomatic ramifications.  In an speech at an international  forum, she 
departed from her prepared text and argued a point at some length.  The 
trouble was that she was reciting verbatim, without attribution, a couple 
of paragraphs from an article  written by a Pakistani economist that she
had evidently committed to memory. 

Besides, I'd much rather be quoted (fat chance) than quote. Not that I
am dead against quoting, but it strikes me as a very unstylish thing
to do.  I much prefer literary allusions that flow smoothly in the
course of the speech or text to direct quotations.  The quotation is
often thrown in to impress the reader with one's scholarship.  A 
well-selected literary allusion doesn't bother the normal reader
this way, but makes the finely-tuned antennae of a Literary Allusion
Watcher tingle with delight at knowing that he and the writer have been
reading the same stuff.

Coming back to the quote from "Julius Caesar" (don't you think it wonderful
irony that the main character in the play is the honourable Marcus Brutus,
whereas the title character, who doesn't live long into the play, comes
across as a rather vain and foolish old man?), I am always amazed at the
number of literate Indians who can recite Mark Antony's (Marcus Antonius) 
famous funeral speech from "Julius Caesar" in its entirety and yet fail to
see that it is a beautifully crafted bit of demagoguery inciting Romans to
wreak vengeful violence of the same kind that we saw in India following
Indira Gandhi's assassination in 1984. 

All right, I'm dumping unfairly on Satya Prabhakar, who seems to be a pretty
decent guy (but hey, I am The Bastard Critic From Hell). Shouldn't I be
looking down my very aquiline nose at the crummy stuff spewed by good
martians and Murthy Gandekouta (whose pathetic dirty doggerel is abysmal)?
But a critic's gotta be discriminating in what a critic reviews, and I
only bother with what has resulted from conscious thought. 

- TBCFH
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