HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: heidi@wolf.net.com (Heidi Wolf)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Bernard Berenson
Date: 14 Sep 92 19:50:49 GMT
Organization: N.E.T., Redwood City, CA

In article <1992Sep14.173140.24316@morrow.stanford.edu> francis@oas.stanford.edu 
(Francis Muir) writes:
>Ron Nadel writes:
 
>>	In his collection of essays "Nothing if not Critical", art 
>>	critic Robert Hughes takes Berenson to task on this point.  
>>	He praises him for bringing an organized system to 
>>	authenticating old works (and in the process BB became the 
>>	foremost expert on the distinguishing features of that period),
>>	[description of negative comments by Hughes deleted]

I was lucky enough to see the Bernard Berenson exhibit in Washington,
D.C., back in 1978.  The National Gallery had gathered together many of
the works Berenson had authenticated, and also organized a biographical
exhibition about Berenson's life.  (Excerpts from his journals; photos
of Berenson in Italy; reminiscences about I Tatti; etc. etc.  Fascinating.)

[this is Francis:]
>What a load of codswallop. [description of said codswallop deleted]
>It has been calculated that there are 10 times more
>Corots in America than the artist ever painted, and my guess is that most

Complete digression here:  Dick Francis has a terrific mystery novel
all about art forgeries, set in Australia and entitled IN THE FRAME.
(I once read a review of this book which said, in part, "Dick Francis
can make the process of falling over a 2nd-floor [British 1st-floor]
balcony into a tree *far* more excruciating than all the violence
in a year's worth of cop films."  The reviewer was right.  I spend
a certain portion of every Dick Francis novel wincing in sympathy.)

>The real problem is that little men like Robert Hughes have to find little
>things to say -- it is in their nature. The real solution is for rabbers
>first to read the masters and then the little folk. Unless, of course, you
>get your jollies from this rather tiresome bashing business. The whole
>thing seems to have been started by Lytton Strachey. What a lot that idiot
>has to answer for.
   
And another digression (are you quite sure, Francis, that you *really*
wanted me to post more often?):  I recently read some very interesting
comments on Lytton Strachey, and what he has to answer for, in John Clive's
NOT BY FACT ALONE, which is a collection of essays on writing history.
Wonderful book; I now have a list of famous historians I want to read.
(Clive has a great piece toward the end of the book in which he contrasts
the styles of Gibbon, Carlyle, and Macaulay:  he writes three different
pastiches of a single (wholly imaginary) historical episode.)


Heidi Wolf (who attended the r.a.b. party and thinks Mark Taranto's
             handsome housemate Bert is the cat's meow)
From: nevins@husc.harvard.edu
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: utopias and distopias
Date: 6 Sep 92 06:21:25 GMT
Article-I.D.: husc10.9209061421.AA07416
Organization: Yale CS Mail/News Gateway

I'm toying with the idea of working on a description of utopias and distopias
in literature, as a course or perhaps as a book.  This idea is still in
very much in its initial phases, but I wonder if the r.a.b. readers might
offer any suggestions--my own stengths lie in the Middle Ages and
Modern periods.  I know of certain sections in Strabo, and suppose there
are other proto-utopias elsewhere in the early encyclopedias, but I
*wonder if they also occur earlier?  I am familiar with utopic elements
in some medieval travel literature (e.g. Mandeville), and naturally
I've noted More's _Utopia_, Butler's _Erewhon_, Johnson's _Rasselas_.
I expect there are many other utopia writings between More and now, and
I also expect that there are several comprehensive academic surveys of
these--which I shall find when I begin my literature search.  What I'm
really interested in is more modern utopia-writing, especially
science-fiction: are there classic sci-fi utopia texts?  Science fiction
will be especially important in my consideration of distopias--from
Orwell on up through the "dirty bad future" of Dick, Blade Runner,
Road Warrior, Brazil, etc.  Can anyone suggest where the distopia
originates?
	I should note that this is very much a side-project, for fun, and
it's also something I've just begun to think about.  I'm not accustomed
to doing my research over the NET (!), but as I'm just in the initial
brainstorming stages, I thought it might be fun to see what the electronic
public thinks.  Any random thoughts will be appreciated, and, should this
project go anywhere, credit will be given to thoughts not my own.
	As I make this request, I'm struck by some of the wisdom in
Walter Ong's ideas about "secondary (electronic) orality"--an idea
I'd never really bought, but which does seem to be supported by the
NET newsgroups--and even more obviously when one reads alt.urban.folklore.

Best
Mark
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: jdnicoll@watyew.uwaterloo.ca (James Davis Nicoll)
Subject: Re: Walpole's _The Castle of Otranto_
Organization: University of Waterloo
Date: Wed, 16 Sep 1992 00:28:15 GMT

In article <1992Sep14.231145.42995@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu> miner@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu writes:
>I just read Walpole's _The Castle of Otranto_ because I wanted to see
>what a man so fed up with his age would come up with.  I am amazed at
>his conception of realism!
>
>In his introduction he says:
>
>	Allow the possibility of the facts, and all the actors comport
>	themselves as persons would do in their situation.
>
>In other words, he believed his characters acted realistically.  But
>who reading this story can fail to be struck by the indifference of Manfred,
>the villain, to repeated visitations of spirits, the appearance of a
>giant helmet from nowhere which crushes his son, blood dripping from
>the noses of statues, claps of thunder, visions of giant body parts
>finally to be assembled into a whole that bursts the castle asunder--
>
>--who after each successive experience of this kind is filled
>with terror and alarm for only a moment or so, thereafter to plunge
>madly on with his schemes.
>
>What accounts for such an odd notion of realism?  Something in the
>Gothic mystique?

	Have a look at the history of the exploration of the Arctic.
Wanton disregard of blatent warning signs was common behavior back
then.

						James Nicoll
From: leavitt@jevex.waisman.wisc.edu
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Used bookstores Providence, R.I.?
Date: 11 Sep 92 21:10:57 GMT
Organization: Waisman Center, University of Wisconsin-Madison

I will be in Providence in a few weeks and would
appreciate recommendations on used-books stores there.

Thanks in advance,
Lewis
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: dani@netcom.com (Dani Zweig)
Subject: Re: books to avoid
Date: Sun, 06 Sep 92 21:22:40 GMT
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services  (408 241-9760 guest) 

"In the tradition of ..."
"If you liked X ..."
"Could be worse."
From: crawford@ben.dev.upenn.edu (Lauren L. Crawford)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Ideas for promotion of short Novel?
Date: 10 Sep 92 13:58:34 GMT
Organization: University of Pennsylvania

In article <12201@optilink.UUCP> cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) writes:
>
>A lurid sex crime with chain saws and livestock?  That should make
>the book sell well.


I'll wait for the movie, thanks.



-- 
Lauren Crawford  //  crawford@ben.dev.upenn.edu

I believe we are on the irreversible trend toward more freedom and
democracy -- but that could change.   -- J. Danforth Quayle
From: Crawford_Kilian@mindlink.bc.ca (Crawford Kilian)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: utopias and distopias
Date: 6 Sep 92 17:35:21 GMT
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Distribution: world

What a good idea for a thread! Utopias and dystopias are important in many
genres, especially science fiction. The list of possible titles is a long one,
and no doubt many people can contribute to it. Let me start with a brief
summary of the major conventions of the genre:
1. The Utopia is an island or otherwise inaccessible region with a strongly
womblike nature (More's Utopia, originally a phallic peninsula, was cut off
from the mainland by Utopos; the major cities are on the shore of an inland
sea, access to which is very difficult.)
2. The Utopian language is morally significant (cf Newspeak in 1984); the
Utopians speak a hybrid Greco-Latin dialect, suggesting that paganism in Utopia
has gone as far it can without the advantages of Christianity--and also
implying a rebuke to Christians for not doing as well.
3. Sex is "rational" or at any rate dealt with in an ostensibly rational way.
In Zamiatin's We, any citizen can claim sexual privileges with any other
citizen; in 1984 there's an Anti-Sex League; and so on.
4. Documents are very important; plot is not. So have travellers' accounts, or
encounters in which some crucial book figures importantly. Winston Smith reads
The Theory of Oligarchical Collectivism, which stops the story dead for many
pages, and 1984 concludes with an essay on Newspeak. Many other utopian novels
are compendiums of letters, reports, and so on.

These are the traits of "anatomy" as defined by Northrop Frye in his Anatomy of
Criticism (1957)--a work I commend to all book-lovers. Frye deals with subject
lucidly and at some length.
From: barclay@RAIL9000.gatech.edu (Barclay Blanchard)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: The Literary Canon
Keywords: race canon
Date: 11 Sep 92 10:36:17 GMT
Organization: Georgia Tech Research Institute

In article <1992Sep10.210137.19224@pony.Ingres.COM> lynnette@Ingres.COM (Lynnette Viste) writes:
>>>In article <67525@hydra.gatech.EDU>, barclay@RAIL9000.gatech.edu (Barclay Blanchard) writes:
>>>I post to rec.arts.books, where liberals attempt to defend the
>>>position that the ancient Greeks weren't white...

I didn't say that.  For the record.


-- 
Barclay Elizabeth Blanchard    barclay@rail9000@gatech.edu
"I've been laughed at by some of the funniest people."
--Lissie, Alice Walker's _The Temple of My Familiar_
From: lew@cbnewsd.cb.att.com (lewis.h.mammel..jr)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: NPR & Freedom of the Press: Part II
Summary: My investigation
Date: 7 Sep 92 02:58:55 GMT
Organization: AT&T

In article <1992Sep5.162429.28860@morrow.stanford.edu>, francis@oas.stanford.edu (Francis Muir) writes:
> Also on NPR today was an interesting and classic tale involving
> Liberalism and Freedom of the Press. No; for "and" read "versus".
> 
> The employees of Walden Books in Georgetown have all been fired.
> This is how it went. The manager received for sale and display a
> spiral-bound calendar with about three days/page. For each day there
> was, in his opinion, a truly tasteless joke, and some of which he
> considered sexist. It was one of those "funny" calendars, and i
> guess we have all seen them. He decided that it was too much, and
> refused to put it on display as his management had requested. As he
> said, "suppose a 16 yr old black girl comes in and reads the "joke"
> about jungle bunnies. This will add to her low self-esteem..." or
> words to that effect. After discussion with the management over the 
> phone, he was told a supervisor would arrive to fire him for insubordination
> if he did not comply with instructions. He refused and was fired,
> as, in turn, were all the other assistant managers (everyone at Walden
> is an AM).
> 
> Comments?
> 
> 							Fido


I went to Walden's at Fox Valley Mall in Aurora, IL ( No I didn't
see Wayne or Garth ) and found "Blanche Knott's Truly Tasteless
Joke-a-Date Calendar for 1993" ( Title approximate ) published
by St Martin's Paperback. This is indubitably the calendar in question.
It is in the form of an appointment calendar and fits the description
given by Fido. It contains "African American" jokes, "JAP" jokes,
other Jew jokes and ethnic jokes ( yes WASP jokes, too )
and sex jokes. I didn't take a census.

The calendar was displayed on a rack with "straight" appointment
calendars. It was the only jokey or off-beat appointment calendar
there. Since these "Truly Tasteless" joke books have been around
for nearly a decade now, I'm guessing that it might have been
the placement of the calendar that precipitated the confrontation.
I guess it's possible that the content of the jokes has gotten
more offensive over the years, too - I don't know.

My thoughts:

1)

If the jokes are "Truly Tasteless", why the use of the term
"African American" and other gentilities. I'm sure these jokes
are often retold in truly tasteless language.

Query: If the jokes were printed in truly tasteless language,
would Walden Books sell them ?

Suggested answer: No, because then it would be "hate literature."

Rejoinder to suggested answer: Then what is it now ?

2)

Question: has this blown over ? or does Walden Books have a problem ?

3)

Walden Books clearly has a right to sell these calendars, but
if it were my book store I don't think I would carry them.
You know, there's plenty of stuff ( e.g. porno ) they don't
carry. Why not ?


Lew Mammel, Jr.
From: cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Progress (Was : Re: The Literary Canon)
Keywords: racism, canon
Date: 8 Sep 92 21:04:53 GMT
Organization: Optilink Corporation, Petaluma, CA

In article <1992Sep4.150138.9110@cci632.cci.com>, dwp@cci632.cci.com (Dana Paxson) writes:
> In article <1992Sep3.155007.29485@athena.cs.uga.edu> heath@athena.cs.uga.edu (Terrance Heath) writes:
# #	WE ARE NOT YET IN THE PROMISED LAND. WE ARE STILL IN THE
# #WILDERNESS.
# 
# I would like to second Terrance Heath on this one.  As I see it,
# we are still in the wilderness when it comes to skin color in the
# USA.  For me, the experiences of listening and witnessing are so
# telling:
# 
# 1)  In 1960, double-dating with an interracial couple (he white, she
#     black), and having the Detroit police pull her over and haul her
#     off to the lockup because they decided she was soliciting (she
#     had been driving).  The cops roughed him up that night when he
#     went to the rest room at the precinct station.  They left me and
#     my date alone.  Guess why.

Racism is certainly an explanation.  But in case you missed it,
this isn't 1960 anymore.

# 2)  In 1992, getting a ride from a garage mechanic, and mentioning
#     the killing in Sarajevo.  His rejoinder:  "The real war is right
#     here.  I've been to 23 funerals this year, of kids killed on the
#     streets in town, kids I knew."  We live in Rochester, New York.
#     He is a middle-aged black man.

But since it's mostly blacks killing blacks, this is hardly evidence
of racism in America.

# 3)  In 1989, seeing the deep marks on my son's wrists from the 
#     handcuffs, after he had been arrested for a minor charge.  He
#     had been thrown, handcuffed, face down in a paddy wagon.  My son
#     is multiracial, and looks somewhat Hispanic.

Not to worry, you can get mistreated by the police if you are white,
also.  I have a brother-in-law with a 25 stitch scar on his head
where he was beaten by a Sacramento policeman.

# Dana Paxson
-- 
Clayton E. Cramer {uunet,pyramid}!optilink!cramer  My opinions, all mine!
Alcohol prohibition didn't work; drug prohibition doesn't work; gun
prohibition won't work.
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: scasburn@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Steven M Casburn)
Subject: Re: Back to Books
Organization: The Ohio State University
Distribution: usa
Date: Fri, 11 Sep 1992 22:18:56 GMT

In article <4994@balrog.ctron.com>, mattb@ctron.com (Matt Brown) writes:

>Read children's literature. Specifically, children's picture books, then
>children's fiction.

     "The Phantom Toolbooth." For $3.95, you get 200 pages of adult-level
observations about the world written in language children can understand plus 
illustrations by Jules Feiffer. I enjoy it as much at 22 as I did at 9. Pick it
up!
-- 
    Steve Casburn (scasburn@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu)
    *The* Ohio State University
    "New occasions teach new duties; Time makes ancient good uncouth /
     They must upward still and onward who would keep abreast of Truth..."
From: twain@milton.u.washington.edu (Barbara Hlavin)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Wonderful Life
Summary: exhuming the dead
Date: 12 Sep 92 16:45:05 GMT
Article-I.D.: u.1992Sep12.164505.23487
Organization: University of Washington, Seattle


Marko Amnell writes:>
>This might make a good idea for a thread:  famous writers (I guess this
>is a fair restriction) and their personal negative proclivities.
>Not the lame stuff about drinking, we want the weird stuff!

No no no; please: forbear, I beg you.

It's this kind of thing that leads writers to burn their personal 
papers, and members of their families to destroy unpublished works. 

As a counter-example, we have the Cheevers... 


--Barbara, who prefers to keep her illusions
From: ncramer@bbn.com (Nichael Cramer)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: books to avoid
Date: 8 Sep 92 17:58:34 GMT
Reply-To: ncramer@labs-n.bbn.com (Nichael Cramer)
Organization: Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc., Interzone Office
NNTP-Posting-Host: bbn.com

spb0457@zeus.tamu.edu (SubGenius) writes:
>A similar opening can be found in Penelope Ashe's _Naked Came the Stranger_,
>as ludicrous and lurid a novel as has been penned:
>	Screwed.

I assume that we all know that NCtS was a hoax, written by a dozen or
writers who worked for Newsday[?] as an experiment to see just what they
could get away with and to discover how seriously a seriously awful book
with serious pretensions could be taken and that, furthermore, there's no
reason to point this all out.  Right?

NICHAEL  
nichael@bbn.com  --                Bush/Gorbachev: One Down, One to Go
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: anand@Cadence.COM (Anand Bemra)
Subject: Re: Worthwhile newspapers (WAS Re: Why I read the Economist
Organization: Cadence Design Systems, Inc.
Distribution: na
Date: Tue, 15 Sep 1992 17:14:51 GMT

oliver@baobab.CS.Berkeley.EDU (Oliver Sharp) writes:

> ... have their uses, as does the San Jose Mercury News, 
> but they just don't come close to replacing the NYT.

May I suggest you to get hold of "Lies Of Our [NY] Times", Sheridan Press,
(212 254 1061) to check out the slant of the NYT. Another recommendation 
would be "Media Monopoly" by Ben Bagdikian. It gives a good insight as to
what factors determine the outlook of a newspaper/magazine.

Cheers,
anand
--
Screw PBS & NPR news. Tired of news "sanitized for your protection?". Try:
misc.activism.progressive, "Lies Of Our [NY]Times", "Z" magazine (Boston).
KPFA 94.1 FM (Bay Area), 90.7 (L.A.), 90.1 (Houston, TX), 89.3 (Washington, DC)
These are my opinions, not my employer's. 
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books,misc.int-property
From: Herman.Woltring@bbs.oit.unc.edu (Herman Woltring)
Subject: Re: moral right and copyright
Summary: Reputation v. making money
Keywords: Paternity, divulgation, integrity
Organization: Extended Bulletin Board Service
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1992 18:14:53 GMT

In article <7501@skye.ed.ac.uk> jeff@aiai.ed.ac.uk (Jeff Dalton) writes:
>I now see thinks like
>
>  The author asserts his [her] moral right to be acknowledged as the
>  author ...
>
>What does this mean?  What does it accomplish?  Should I be using it?
>Is there some less tautological forms of words that has the same
>effect (or course the author is the author -- but what about the
>person sho actually wrote it)?  ("Author" is a technical term in
>copyright law, I believe.)
>
>I know this has been discussed before, but I'm about to write some
>copyright notices, and I want to know what I should have them say.
>
>-- jd
 
The term "moral right" derives from the Berne Copyright (or, more
appropriately) Author's Rights Convention ratified by the USA some
years ago.  Under the old, Universal Copyright Convention regimen,
moral rights didn't count.  Under Berne, the (true or legal?) author
has moral rights as opposed to economic rights including the right
to be mentioned as the author, the right to decide upon first pub-
lication, and the right to oppose modification of the work *even*
after the (economic) copyrights have been transferred to someone else.
Small wonder that the 1988 Copyrights, Designs, and Patents Act in the
UK has excluded software from moral rights protection.

Under Berne in many legislations, a hot issue is whether the legal
maker / author (e.g., the employer under Anglo-american Copyright
law) has the moral rights or whether it is the natural, "real author".
For example, can an employed, natural author (e.g., a software author)
forbid his employer to release software that, in his/her honest opinion,
is not yet sufficiently error-proof?  Of course, it may cost him or her
his or her job but ...
 
Herman J. Woltring <woltring@nici.kun.nl>
(Do not send private comments to the BBS address)

--
   The opinions expressed are not necessarily those of the University of
     North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the Campus Office for Information
        Technology, or the Experimental Bulletin Board Service.
           internet:  bbs.oit.unc.edu or 152.2.22.80
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: fi@grebyn.com (Fiona Webster)
Subject: Re: Looking for two books
Organization: Grebyn Timesharing
Date: Tue, 15 Sep 1992 13:53:17 GMT

Curt Tsui asks about:
>The Shape of Rage: The Films of David Cronenberg (don't know the
>   author's name)
>
>Green Eyes by Lucius Sheperd

The Lucius Shepard *might* have been re-released from Arkham House--
they produced his _The_Jaguar_Hunter_ in one of their typically
gorgeous illustrated editions.

Also try any of the many fantasy-sf-horror outlets, such as Dreamhaven,
The Overlook Connection, etc.  Call your local sf specialty store for
names of private dealers in your area.  Many people make their living
finding out-of-print genre books for seekers such as yourself.

And if all that fails (-:, cross-post your query to alt.horror and
alt.cult-movies.

							--Fiona W.
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: johne@or.credence.com (John Ewing)
Subject: Re: Encyclopedia Brit.
Organization: Credence Systems Corp. Beaverton, OR
Distribution: usa
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1992 19:33:38 GMT

In article <18j2cbINNn9j@grapevine.EBay.Sun.COM> marlon@milpa.EBay.Sun.COM (Marlon Pearson) writes:
>This weekend Encyclopedia Brittainica (sp) was at the local Waldenbooks
>giving a sells pitch. Here is the "limited time offer" they offered me.
>
>                                                 Normal       LTO
>...
>Their great works set 				????         256
>...

I have a few questions about this set.  How much do they want for this?
If you have a set of these, how do you rate them?  What is your experience?
Are there any "great works" that have been left out?  If so, which ones?
It looks like it would be worth while owning, but I'm not sure how much use
I would make of it.

Thanks in advance ...

John Ewing (johne@or.credence.com)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: pollard@spock.ecs.umass.edu (Brian D Pollard)
Subject: Re: Bertrand Russell's Letters
Organization: University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1992 21:30:55 GMT

In article <9209101638.AA21543@cfdev1.shearson.com> mtaranto@shearson.com (Mark Taranto) writes:
>
>Wandering around a bookstore, yesterday, I came across the newly published
>THE LETTERS OF BERTRAND RUSSELL, Vol I.  It includes letters through 1914.
> 
>Does anyone know anything about it?
> 
I believe this was reviewed in the New York Times Book Review about a
month ago.  It was a fairly lengthy article (the cover article, if I
remember correctly), so you might look there.

>I only looked at it briefly.  It did answer one question I've had for
>several years.  Some of you may remember that a few months back, I posted
>excerpts from a letter (reprinted in Clark's biography of Russell) where
>he describes the young T. S. Eliot, when Eliot was his student at Harvard.
>It also mentions a Greek student named Demos.  I mentioned that when I
>read this, I had what Joe Green would describe as an "ontic shudder" since
>I had once had a very old Mathematics professor who was from Greece, was
>named Demos, had gone to Harvard, and might have been there at that time.
>Alas -- the book of letters gave his first name:  it was another Demos.
> 
>Mark
> 
> 
-brian