tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post4065937253456092612..comments2024-03-07T12:57:35.296-05:00Comments on Varieties of Unreligious Experience: Palaeological grammarConrad H. Rothhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01916542057749474124noreply@blogger.comBlogger13125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-19939803927566341892007-09-25T05:05:00.000-04:002007-09-25T05:05:00.000-04:00Ah yes, always good to meet a fellow Palaeologian....Ah yes, always good to meet a fellow Palaeologian. Sadly, <A HREF="http://www.unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com" REL="nofollow">Mencius Moldbug</A> snagged the last cheap copy on abebooks. Thank for your comment.Conrad H. Rothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01916542057749474124noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-50015949103240844912007-09-24T18:39:00.000-04:002007-09-24T18:39:00.000-04:00As the "special petitioner" who asked for your vie...As the "special petitioner" who asked for your views on <I>Michael Palaeologus His Grammar</I>, I would like to express my appreciation of your extensive commentary, which I only discovered today while again searching the web for references to this strange and wonderful book. While reading the <I>Grammar</I> for the first time, my response varied between puzzlement, intrigue, and bafflement, even as an undercurrent of high amusement remained throughout. Was it serious, or a spoof, a satire, or in code? Apparently, all of the above. While I still do not claim to understand what it is all about, this is obviously a book that demands to be read and re-read again and again over the coming years. Many, many thanks for your helpful analysis. If you should ever stumble upon the identity of the author, please do post it, and I promise to leave a comment on this blog if I discover any related clues. Meanwhile, I am pleased to note that my mint-condition, five-quid copy is worth at least 100 pounds on the internet. Not that I would sell it, but I can fully identify with your feelings on holding it in my hand for the first time (at Greyfriars second-hand bookshop in Inverness...): "Within moments of perusing its pages, I had a purchase." This is one I am especially proud of having bagged.Dead Hippohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03563727337887812372noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-78866784572393601892007-05-21T08:56:00.000-04:002007-05-21T08:56:00.000-04:00Amanda: No, sadly not!LH: Yes, congratulations! Su...Amanda: No, sadly not!<BR/><BR/>LH: Yes, congratulations! Suggestions of this sort are, of course, always appreciated.Conrad H. Rothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01916542057749474124noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-89566301792165976592007-05-21T08:49:00.000-04:002007-05-21T08:49:00.000-04:00Pourquoi?Oh, I just ran across him in the process ...<I>Pourquoi?</I><BR/><BR/>Oh, I just ran across him in the process of googling around that your post inspired, and he seemed like the sort of obscure writer who would be of interest to you. Since you've actually read one of his books, I congratulate myself for my perspicacity.Languagehathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13285708503881129380noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-30970009206522584082007-05-21T04:31:00.000-04:002007-05-21T04:31:00.000-04:00I am amused by the illustrations and would like to...I am amused by the illustrations and would like to know if there were any depictions of...a Snark!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-81834843901222997712007-05-20T22:32:00.000-04:002007-05-20T22:32:00.000-04:00"combed the memoirs"Yes, it's possible. I hunted t..."combed the memoirs"<BR/><BR/>Yes, it's possible. I hunted through the 'Meaning of Meaning' symposium, and the Corpus Christi register, but couldn't find anything. Originally I thought Schiller himself was a pretty good candidate--and one of Schiller's diagrams from the <EM>Mind</EM> symposium is reused in the <EM>Grammar</EM>, but Palaeologus alludes to his British schooldays, and Schiller was an immigrant.<BR/><BR/>As for Geoffey, I've read his <EM>Poetria Nova</EM>, but don't know much more than that. Pourquoi?Conrad H. Rothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01916542057749474124noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-62985448653935257112007-05-20T20:26:00.000-04:002007-05-20T20:26:00.000-04:00And what else, after all, is the Varieties for?Ind...<I>And what else, after all, is the Varieties for?</I><BR/><BR/>Indeed, and I trust you didn't think I was in any way either deprecating or depreciating the post!<BR/><BR/>And surely if one combed the memoirs and correspondence of those chuckling chaps one could piece together enough clues to nail down the identity of the perpetrator.<BR/><BR/>Say, know anything about Geoffrey of Vinsauf?Languagehathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13285708503881129380noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-80021195846916852422007-05-20T16:02:00.000-04:002007-05-20T16:02:00.000-04:00Ack. Trust an urban slang dictionary to ruin a per...Ack. Trust an urban slang dictionary to ruin a perfectly good portmanteau.<BR/><BR/>I don't think 'bitter' is quite the right word. Maybe 'poignant'. Also I have no idea about the book's contemporary popularity; maybe all the <EM>Mind</EM> fellows were chuckling over it. Presumably they knew who wrote it. The mood is certainly of its time, and would persist in the mainstream until the 60s or so. (Compare the first quotation from Bates' <EM>Intertraffic</EM> on my <A HREF="http://vunex.blogspot.com/2007/03/foos-wont-moos.html" REL="nofollow">Joyce translations post</A>.) How many once-popular books are now long out-of-print and forgotten? And what else, after all, is the <EM>Varieties</EM> for?Conrad H. Rothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01916542057749474124noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-74821707377604037732007-05-20T09:04:00.000-04:002007-05-20T09:04:00.000-04:00Lucubrious? Lucubratory? Lugubrious?Localized lexi...<A HREF="http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=lucubrious" REL="nofollow">Lucubrious</A>? Lucubratory? Lugubrious?<BR/><BR/>Localized lexical confusion aside, a fascinating entry about a book I would have suspected you of inventing if not for the scanned images. (And upon investigation I find Amazon.com has a <A HREF="http://www.amazon.com/Michael-Neo-Palaeologus-His-Grammar/dp/B000PYIKKI/" REL="nofollow">copy</A> on offer for the princely sum of $95.13.) I very much look forward to further posts on Neo Palaeologus; my main reservation about this sort of learned japery is that, as you say, it will be read by none. Surely "laughter at that which breaks away from common sense, from judgement, from taste, and from the organic" is a trifle bitter if shared only with one or two persons a decade? (And for that matter, how on earth did Dent arrive at the decision to publish such a book?) Aristophanes, after all, laughed the same laughter, but managed to do so in a way that captivated the entire population of his polis. I know, I know, caviare to the general. But I do sometimes wonder about the psychology of self-selected recondity.Languagehathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13285708503881129380noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-86634378398974434642007-05-19T22:01:00.000-04:002007-05-19T22:01:00.000-04:00I personally support the Taborites and frequent de...I personally support the Taborites and frequent defenestration, if there's any doubt about that.John Emersonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12058849885222086640noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-22525451043647016532007-05-19T15:50:00.000-04:002007-05-19T15:50:00.000-04:00Emerson: thanks, you must be right. This pdf gives...Emerson: thanks, you must be right. This <A HREF="http://www.edwardjayne.com/critical/Richards.pdf" REL="nofollow">pdf</A> gives 'utraquistic' for Richards, and the etymology makes more sense. (It also seems to be an obsolete psychological term, and Richards was fun of re-using those, see also 'overdetermination'.) Perhaps it was a typo in some editions and not in others.<BR/><BR/>Cowan: Well, yes, although the image of the relevant card does appear at the head of each chapter. <EM>Mind!</EM> would be a nice little thing to own; I assume you have an original copy, and not the 1960s reprint?Conrad H. Rothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01916542057749474124noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-40636944347557931952007-05-19T11:04:00.000-04:002007-05-19T11:04:00.000-04:00Oh, splak me! You meant that the chapter titles a...Oh, <A HREF="http://gamegrene.com/wiki/Splak" REL="nofollow">splak</A> me! You meant that the chapter titles are the <I>names</I> of playing cards. I thought they were, like, <I>actual</I> playing cards. Or printed representatives thereof. But what am I saying? See the <A HREF="http://recycledknowledge.blogspot.com/2005/06/tangled-references-and-representations.html" REL="nofollow">palette paradox</A>....<BR/><BR/>I myself, I, actually <I>own</I> an actual copy of <I>Mind!</I>. Inherited from my father. Who among you can say <I>that</I>, eh, sweeties?<BR/><BR/>And who can mention Ogden and Richards and limericks in a single post and leave out this gem?<BR/><BR/>Two experts, to explicate Meaning,<BR/>Wrote a book called <I>The Meaning of Meaning</I>.<BR/> The world still perplexed,<BR/> Three experts wrote next<BR/><I>The Meaning of "Meaning of Meaning".</I>John Cowanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11452247999156925669noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-83089657118557268252007-05-19T09:53:00.000-04:002007-05-19T09:53:00.000-04:00"Ultraquist" is a common misspelling of "utraquist..."Ultraquist" is a common misspelling of "utraquist", the name of the more conciliatory faction of Hussites. Whether Rchards had that in mind I don't know. <BR/><BR/>More later.John Emersonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12058849885222086640noreply@blogger.com