Category Archives: humanities

busk to the future

The poet Tom Digby asks (on his own list): Didn’t bards of old live largely on tips and free meals and such, rather than from some giant corporation pushing packaged “product”? Might the Internet move us back toward that model? … Continue reading

Posted in economics, futures, history | Leave a comment

no surprise in Zimbabwe

Am I the only one who remembers that in or about 1980 Robert Mugabe said frankly that his plan was for an orderly legal transition to a one-party state? Maybe it’s a false memory.

Posted in history, politics | Leave a comment

orthoepy

Anybody in France: Is Le Pen pronounced like pin, pan or penne? Update: François Velde writes, “The last; it rimes with haine . . .” [‘hate’]

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just a bit late for April 19

Riot in Boston: How Today’s Media Would Have Reported It

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lexicon lust

Saturday at Moe’s I found a recent reprint of the great Monier-Williams dictionary of Sanskrit (1899) for $35, about a quarter of what I had expected to pay someday for it. Whee. I find, by the way, that Indian printing … Continue reading

Posted in California, language, me!me!me! | 1 Comment

where the Chicks are

I’ve just been invited to join Amazing Grace Tract Fellowship on InJesus.com. We provide Chick tracts and other materials to Evangelical Christian Missionaries worldwide. Is this someone’s twisted joke, or was my address harvested because I mentioned Chick last month?

Posted in cartoons, religion | Leave a comment

the late unpleasantness

Recent reading: The Real Lincoln: A New Look at Abraham Lincoln, His Agenda, and an Unnecessary War by Thomas J. DiLorenzo (Prima/Forum, 2002). Despite the title, this book is less about Lincoln himself than about his ambition, Republican policy in … Continue reading

Posted in constitution, history | Leave a comment