(Source)

In the Petrarchan sonnet the problem [posed in the octet] is often solved by reasoned perception or by a relatively expansive and formal meditative process, for the sestet allows enough room for the undertaking of prudent, highly reasonable resolutions. But in the Shakespearean sonnet, because resolution must take place within the tiny compass of a twenty-syllable couplet, the “solution” is more likely to be the fruit of wit, or paradox, or even a quick shift of sophistry, logical cleverness, or outright comedy.

- Paul Fussell, *Poetic Meter and Poetic Form*, chp 7

It is possible to think of scheme not as a mold of form into which meaning is poured, but rather as a sort of crucible in which trope is cooked and which then is itself consumed in the cooking.

- John Hollander, Melodious Guile, ch. 1

Carson Holloway’s recent “What’s Really the Matter with Pop Music?” disappoints. He begins the essay (a Part 2 of 2) by rehearsing the ancient and intriguing claim that “the music itself” –the rhythm, tune, etc.,–and not lyrics, are the more influential element of songs, in moving the listener toward good or ill. I’d have really enjoyed hearing him out on this point, but the remainder of the essay builds to the more familiar argument that the modern practice of censorship (e.g., replacing potty words with beeps or honks) only lowers our standards of what counts as “good”; and that instead, we ought to listen to music that “encourage[s] our pursuit of the highest goods attainable”: “reason’s enjoyment of moral nobility and theoretical truth.”

When somebody is a little bit wrong–say, when a waiter puts nonfat milk in your espresso macchiato, instead of lowfat milk–it is often quite easy to explain to them how and why they are wrong. But if somebody is surpassingly wrong–say, when a waiter bites your nose instead of taking your order–you can often be so surprised that you are unable to say anything at all.

- Lemony Snicket, The Reptile Room (A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book the Second), ch. 5

When reading an ancient text…we have to start somewhere, and in the end, I’m not sure that it matters much where. Should we begin with the contexts and assumptions of the ancient world and work our way towards the present situation? Should we begin with present forms of understanding and work our way back towards the ancient text’s lifeworld? Though we are accustomed to the idea that readers need to be governed by the right hermeneutic, in fact theory and method mean next to nothing in reading. [...W]e may not have as much choice [about the "tools we bring to the task of reading"] as we think we do anyway.

- Alan Jacobs, “The Genesis of Wisdom,” an essay on Leon Kass’s The Beginning of Wisdom: Reading Genesis, originally in First Things, but reprinted in Shaming the Devil: Essays in Truthtelling (Eerdmans, 2004). My emphasis.

If we examine more closely our ordinary notion of reality, perhaps we should find that we do not consider real what actually happens but a certain manner of happening that is familiar to us.

- José Ortega y Gasset, Meditations on Quixote (1914)

The impostor of whom we have been speaking [Simon Magus], as though his mind’s eye had been struck by a divine miraculous flash of light when earlier, in Judaea, his mischievous practices had been exposed by the apostle Peter, promptly undertook a very long journey overseas from east to west, and fled precipitately, thinking that only so could he live according to his inclinations. [...] Close on his heels, in the same reign of Claudius, the all-gracious and kindly providence of the universe brought to Rome to deal with this terrible threat to the world, the strong and great apostle, chosen for his merits to be spokesman for all the others, Peter himself. Clad in the divine armour, like a noble captain of God, he brought the precious merchandise of the spiritual light from the East to those in the West, preaching the good news of light itself and the soul-saving word, the proclamation of the Kingdom of Heaven.

- The History of the Church, 2.14 (G.A. Williamson’s translation)

This may sound like an odd thing to say about a 900-page novel, but doesn’t Nicholas Nickleby end rather abruptly? I just finished listening to a fantastic production by Blackstone Audio, so the end of the last track may have seemed especially sudden to me. But beyond this factor of the medium, the story itself left (uncharacteristically for Dickens) several strands unwoven into the denouement. We never learn the particulars, for example, of the “conspiracy” for which Mr. Squeers the Schoolmaster will be tried upon his return from Australia. We know his crimes, of course, but in which of those was he found out? Nicholas promises to describe the details to the Browdies, but never mentions it in our hearing again, and neither does the narrator.

Similarly, Sir Mulberry Hawk’s vague threat about Nicholas being attacked in a day or two is never referred to again. Even after the “serious Catastrophe” of the duel between this Falstaffian villain and his onetime pupil, I expected some attempt to be made on Nicholas’s life. Hawk is too cunning and wicked to have been emptily boasting.

Another lacuna: we never meet Ms. Madeleine Bray (pardon the misspellings, if there are any in these few lines – I listened to the story in my car, and had no dramatis personae to refer to as each new character’s name was first pronounced). Of course we learn her story as mediated through the “doll Cherrybles” (Chesterton’s phrase), and we overhear the eleventh-hour conversation between herself and Nicholas about her imminent marriage to Gride. But the narrator does not open up her mind to us as he does with so many other characters. Why is this? Perhaps because she would seem too similar to Kate Nickleby (both strong-willed, humble, poor [until the last], young ladies) to warrant her own depiction. And we do know Kate.

But what a treasure of a novel: Newman Noggs, the Brothers Cherryble, Mr. Mantalini, Mr. Lillyvick (“_____, sir?”), Smike, Tim Linkinwater and the former Mrs. LaCreevy, Victor Crummles and company – even Ralph Nickleby – these are unforgettable persons. And though they deserve much more thought and writing than this, I’ve got other homework to do.

By the end of the fourth century, there is a strong sense in some writers that the worshipper at the Eucharist stands in the presence of Christ sacrificed. John Chrysostom, for example, speaks of ‘the most awesome sacrifice’ and of ‘the Lord sacrificed and lying there and the priest bending over the sacrifice and interceding.

- R. J. Halliburton, The Study of Liturgy, Pt 2, ch 3.7, “The Patristic Theology of the Eucharist”

Welcome, Daisy.

More pictures here.

Moreover, the seemingly automatic assumption that “sophisticated” works such as Rushdie’s somehow pack a potent (if nebulous) political punch is closely related to the assumption, by now thoroughly ingrained in the discourse of Western literary studies, that complexity is by definition a good thing, a clear sign (and for that matter, a prerequisite) of “genuine” art and thorough thought.

…. But there is a certain value in clarity…

- M. Keith Booker, “Midnight’s Children, History, and Complexity: Reading Rushdie after the Cold War,” Critical Essays on Salman Rushdie, ed. M. Keith Booker (New York: G.K. Hall & Co.), 284. I’m not (yet, anyway) sympathetic with Booker’s Marxist commitments, but I was delighted to read this earlier tonight.

Here: the English Broadside Ballad Archive, no subscription required. The archive contains high-quality digital versions of the ballads collected in five volumes by Samuel Pepys. It also includes what they call “facsimile transcriptions” – digital representations of the broadsides which attempt to retain the feel of the original, while replacing the text with more legible, modern type.

Wow.

…he was just nine Years old when having got the play of Hamlet to read in his Father’s Kitchen, he read on very qu[i]etly till he came to the Ghost Scene, when he hurried up Stairs to the Shop Door that he might see folks about him. This Story he was not unwilling to tell as a Testimony to the Merits of Shakespear.

- Hester Lynch Piozzi, Dr Johnson by Mrs Thrale: The ‘Anecdotes’ of Mrs Piozzi in their Original Form (1786), ed. Richard Ingrams (London: Chatto & Windus; The Hogarth Press, 1984), 6-7.