It is necessary,” answered Don Quixote, “to know everything in the profession I follow.”
— Miguel de Cervantes
Category: Writ
My own serious stuff; the craft itself; literary (and authorial) inspiration; the art of reading.
Welcome To An AI-Free, Almost All-Text Zone!
You’re busy, so I’ll be quick:
1. If you’re eager to meet Prosatio Silban, the self-defrocked holyman in a fantastic land who ekes out a meager but honest living as a mercenary cook, then allow me to introduce you.
2. I’d also take it as a kindness if you dialed into my very brief (as in, “about 15 seconds”) podcast, Short Attention Span Wisdoms. (Enlightenment optional.)
3. And/or if you perused this blogging-since-2001 assortment of rusty recollections, offbeat observations, friendly particularism, tasty recipes, unpretentious poetry, entertaining quotes, recreational science, and wry spirituality, all of which I hope you enjoy reading as much as I enjoyed writing.
4. Something to ask or say? Please drop me a line.
Thank you for your patronage, and be well,
First Graf (rather, Line): The Lord of the Rings
OF THE 90% PETER JACKSON got right in his 11-hour and 22-minute adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s best-beloved work – the lush landscapes, the Balrog, Elves, the Nazgul, Sauron, Orcs and Uruk-hai, Gollum, Ents, hobbits (MY GHAWD! THE HOBBITS!!!), the Ring, Grima, the very different cultures and props and sets and cities and overall “look” – he got right in abundance.
But that other 10% … oy.
Read the actual books and you’ll discover that Aragorn is not a timid wimp, Gimli is not comic relief, Arwen isn’t an avenging angel, Saruman and Gandalf never duked it out with magic staves, Faramir didn’t try to bring the Ring to his father, the dialogue is more formal and less modern (except for the rustic hobbits), there’s a wonderful character named Tom Bombadil, and the book features a single climax instead of three simultaneous ones. And that well-traveled literary road begins, quite simply, like this:
When Mr. Bilbo Baggins of Bag End announced that he would shortly be celebrating his eleventy-first birthday with a party of special magnificence, there was much talk and excitement in Hobbiton.
First Graf: Sidereus Nuncio
PERHAPS THE GREATEST THING ABOUT Galileo Galilei’s first publication, translated from the Latin as The Sidereal Messenger, is his sense of adventure at being the first known human to telescopically observe and painstakingly chronicle the night sky.
Galileo recorded his unprecedented experience in 1610 CE, a time of adventurous European discoveries in general. His detailed and methodical observations will be thrilling to anyone also observing the same celestial sights for the first time through a simple 20x (read: low-power) backyard telescope. Science historian Albert Van Helden’s superb 1989 translation reveals Galileo’s excitement and wonder on every page, and adds valuable context via explanatory bookending and notes.
That era being one of grand aspirations and flowery speech, Galileo’s grateful bow to his patron, Duke Cosimo II de Medici, is fully titled, “SIDEREAL MESSENGER, unfolding great and very wonderful sights and displaying to the gaze of everyone, but especially philosophers and astronomers, the things that were observed by GALILEO GALILEI, Florentine patrician and public mathematician of the University of Padua, with the help of a spyglass lately devised by him, about the face of the Moon, countless fixed stars, the Milky Way, nebulous stars, but especially about four planets flying around the star of Jupiter at unequal intervals and periods with wonderful swiftness; which, unknown by anyone until this day, the first author detected recently and decided to name MEDICIAN STARS.” (That honorific didn’t stick; instead, the “four planets” are now called by astronomers the “Galilean moons.”)
Let us skip Galileo’s five-page introductory paean to the Duke de Medici and dive right into the first paragraph of the work itself:
In this short treatise I propose great things for inspection and contemplation by every explorer of Nature. Great, I say, because of the excellence of the things themselves, because of their newness, unheard of through the ages, and also because of the instrument with the benefit of which they make themselves manifest to our sight.
Points of Honor, Literary and Otherwise
– STUFFING SENTENCES TO CARRYING CAPACITY.
– Never starting a blog post (or sermon) with “I.”
– Punctuality.
– Creative segues.
– Repeating verbatim whatever someone wants said to another.
– That only what I actually heard appears inside quotation marks.
– One-sentence ledes.
– Snappy ledes. (“If you can do that, you’ll never be out of a job,” quoth a mentor.)
– Keeping an open mind, especially when it’s difficult.
– Never speaking in absolutes. (Present list excluded.)
– Crediting my sources.
– Communicating as accurately as I can. (Challenging, but aspirational.)
– Pushing through my shyness. (Also aspirationally challenging.)
– Being kind to cashiers, sales clerks, waiters, and tradesfolk.
– Saying “Take your time” whenever necessary.
– Waving at passing cars.
– Not speculating.
– “Killing my darlings” (per Wm. Faulkner, via Stephen King).
– Making an effort to pet stray cats.
– Greeting passersby with (at least) a smile.
– Concisifying.
(And yours?)
Free Verse: “And God Said”
SEEK ME, EACH OF YOU,
in your own way.
And when you find Me?
Prove it:
Leave each other
the hell alone.
originally published: 2011.06.04
Prosatio Silban and the Ravenous Inebriate
WHEN YOU’RE ROUSTED FROM A warm bed around midnight, it had better be worthwhile.
What in the Nine Hells is that racket? Prosatio Silban thought, rolling out of his sleeping berth and onto his galleywagon’s ornate braided rug. Is something on fire? A rampage of animals? Natural disaster? What? and more so, why?
The loud and rhythmic rapping at his door was then punctuated by slurred cries of “Hey! Cook! Wake up! I’m hungry!” Continue reading “Prosatio Silban and the Ravenous Inebriate”
Prosatio Silban and the Grave Matter
ALTHOUGH THE UULIANS COMMONLY CREMATE their deceased, it is also common for the bereaved survivors – at least, those with means – to erect quaint stone monuments in favored locations. Rare is the park, garden, or waterside lacking at least one discreet marker listing a decedent’s name, death date, and tender qualities, thus:
Melora Hyart
13 Jackal, Year of the Panting Cat
Beloved Friend, Wise Mentor, and Devoted Daughter-in-Law
On occasion, the memorial might also mention an achievement of some sort – Honest Launderer, perhaps, or Accomplished Throat-Musician, or Taxidermist Supreme.
And sometimes, the “achievement” was a favorite recipe. Continue reading “Prosatio Silban and the Grave Matter”
First Day In Orbit
“ENSIGN MULDOON. RISE AND SHINE.”
“What? Huh? What? Time is it?”
“Oh eight hundred.”
“Oh EIGHT hundred? But it’s still dark ou– oh.”
The Poet
HE COULDN’T TELL WHETHER HE
loved beauty or women more
until the day he called his mom and said
“Guess what? I’m marrying a sunset.”
Prosatio Silban and the Comedic Situation
IT ALL BEGAN WHEN Prosatio Silban leapt forward.
“Look out!” he bellowed, grabbing the careless man’s belt and yanking him back from the edge of the algae-slick dock.
“Blessed All-Mother!” the man exclaimed, straightening. “You saved me life!”
Prosatio Silban smiled. “Not really. All I did was –”
“All you did was save me life!” the man finished, taking his rescuer’s hand and shaking it with deep feeling. “As sure as my name is Gremo Elyp, I’ll never forget it!” Continue reading “Prosatio Silban and the Comedic Situation”
Fable, With Apocalypse
IN THE MIDDLE OF A flat grey wasteland, under a grey streaky sky, a handful of figures warm themselves at a snapping fire.
“Hey! What are you doing?”
One of the figures has turned to gape across the waste: a vast landscape of broken dryers and tumbledown swingsets, with here and there half a gas station or bowling alley.
“Don’t do that,” says the speaker. He takes the gaper and turns him tenderly toward the flames to warm his hands again.
“Thanks.”
“It’s why I’m here. And that” — a sweeping arm — “is why that’s there. The wasteland is only good for wasting you.”
“Thanks again.”
“Don’t mention it. Just keep your hands warm. Even when you’re the last one here.”