The Poetry of Failure.....

A bunch of limericks

Link thanks to jblaque

A slowly building epic, with some scientific explanation

Link thanks to tjd.

The Poetry of Failure.....

A bunch of limericks

Link thanks to jblaque

A slowly building epic, with some scientific explanation

Link thanks to tjd.

There's a pun in Obama's recent speech....

It includes an historic commitment to comprehensive health care reform - a down-payment on the principle that we must have quality, affordable health care for every American.

I'm not sure that anyone else noticed it.

There's a pun in Obama's recent speech....

It includes an historic commitment to comprehensive health care reform - a down-payment on the principle that we must have quality, affordable health care for every American.

I'm not sure that anyone else noticed it.

A good time to oppose the war on drugs

Ok, this is a do my homework for me sort of question, but does anyone have a preferred organization for opposing the war on drugs?

As I understand it, one of the reasons Prohibition ended was that the Depression made the costliness of it more obvious.

(I have a mental category of "rich enough to be really stupid". It's not that being rich necessarily makes you stupid, it's that if you are stupid, you can afford to do it on a larger scale.)

The war on drugs has been a hideously expensive disaster, and if this fact can be made to register on the general public, this is the time to end the war. It may be necessary to find a way to phrase ending it so that people don't have to admit it was a mistake.

If Obama is looking for ways to cut the deficit in half, ending the war on drugs is a good place to start. The fact that he doesn't have a punitive temperament may help.

Here's one for my curiosity: is there a good overview of the effects of the war on drugs outside the US? I wouldn't necessarily use it as part of the campaign to convince the current administration-- I think Obama's empathy pretty much stops at the US borders, though he's enough of a pragmatist to listen if foreigners say their toes are being stepped on and they have enough clout to make it clear that they'll step on our toes if we don't get off of theirs. (I'm thinking of the recent kerfluffle about "buy American".)

A good time to oppose the war on drugs

Ok, this is a do my homework for me sort of question, but does anyone have a preferred organization for opposing the war on drugs?

As I understand it, one of the reasons Prohibition ended was that the Depression made the costliness of it more obvious.

(I have a mental category of "rich enough to be really stupid". It's not that being rich necessarily makes you stupid, it's that if you are stupid, you can afford to do it on a larger scale.)

The war on drugs has been a hideously expensive disaster, and if this fact can be made to register on the general public, this is the time to end the war. It may be necessary to find a way to phrase ending it so that people don't have to admit it was a mistake.

If Obama is looking for ways to cut the deficit in half, ending the war on drugs is a good place to start. The fact that he doesn't have a punitive temperament may help.

Here's one for my curiosity: is there a good overview of the effects of the war on drugs outside the US? I wouldn't necessarily use it as part of the campaign to convince the current administration-- I think Obama's empathy pretty much stops at the US borders, though he's enough of a pragmatist to listen if foreigners say their toes are being stepped on and they have enough clout to make it clear that they'll step on our toes if we don't get off of theirs. (I'm thinking of the recent kerfluffle about "buy American".)

What drove Don Quixote mad.....

Intro to a chapter-by-chapter translation of Amadis de Gaula.

The Spanish novel Amadis de Gaula ought to be famous. Instead, especially outside of Spain, few people besides scholars have even heard of it. That got my attention.

Based medieval tales of chivalry, the book became Europe's first best-seller in the early 1500s, and it inspired a century of popular sequels and spinoffs in seven languages. Miguel de Cervantes satirized these novels a century later in Don Quixote, and that's how I first heard of it. In fact, if it weren't for Quixote, Amadís would be even more obscure.

And yet at one time even illiterate people knew all about Amadís. How did something so popular become so forgotten?

Most literary histories say that due to Quixote's devastating attacks, and due to a decline in the quality of the stories, chivalric novels simply because unfashionable. But after a little research, I don't think so.

First, not all critics agree that the quality fell, although the writing did change. Some authors began to treat the theme of knights and love with realism, others with increasing fantasy. But critics and defenders alike agreed that they were entertaining — and for some moralists, entertaining meant "worthless time-waster." Worst of all, these books were fantasy.

Despite fewer editions of new books and fewer reprints of existing books as the 1500s drew to a close, the books gained more and more critics in the 1600s. No one complains about something unless it is actually happening. People kept reading and even writing the books all across Europe.

But now the readers weren't kings and other very important people: they were increasingly women, especially young women and girls. A few women even wrote chivalric novels. All the books began to include more female protagonists.

That was just too much for moralists: "They are golden pills that, with a layer of delicious entertainment . . . fill hearts with such ideas about love that, serving as example, they decay in young women and ruin their honest estate of modesty and sense of shame," wrote Benito Remigio Noydens in 1666.

The Spanish Inquisition targeted the novels. Royal decrees limited and finally outlawed their reprinting. The libraries of noble families quietly disposed of them. In other countries, the books received equal condemnation.

Links thanks to ellen_kushner.

What drove Don Quixote mad.....

Intro to a chapter-by-chapter translation of Amadis de Gaula.

The Spanish novel Amadis de Gaula ought to be famous. Instead, especially outside of Spain, few people besides scholars have even heard of it. That got my attention.

Based medieval tales of chivalry, the book became Europe's first best-seller in the early 1500s, and it inspired a century of popular sequels and spinoffs in seven languages. Miguel de Cervantes satirized these novels a century later in Don Quixote, and that's how I first heard of it. In fact, if it weren't for Quixote, Amadís would be even more obscure.

And yet at one time even illiterate people knew all about Amadís. How did something so popular become so forgotten?

Most literary histories say that due to Quixote's devastating attacks, and due to a decline in the quality of the stories, chivalric novels simply because unfashionable. But after a little research, I don't think so.

First, not all critics agree that the quality fell, although the writing did change. Some authors began to treat the theme of knights and love with realism, others with increasing fantasy. But critics and defenders alike agreed that they were entertaining — and for some moralists, entertaining meant "worthless time-waster." Worst of all, these books were fantasy.

Despite fewer editions of new books and fewer reprints of existing books as the 1500s drew to a close, the books gained more and more critics in the 1600s. No one complains about something unless it is actually happening. People kept reading and even writing the books all across Europe.

But now the readers weren't kings and other very important people: they were increasingly women, especially young women and girls. A few women even wrote chivalric novels. All the books began to include more female protagonists.

That was just too much for moralists: "They are golden pills that, with a layer of delicious entertainment . . . fill hearts with such ideas about love that, serving as example, they decay in young women and ruin their honest estate of modesty and sense of shame," wrote Benito Remigio Noydens in 1666.

The Spanish Inquisition targeted the novels. Royal decrees limited and finally outlawed their reprinting. The libraries of noble families quietly disposed of them. In other countries, the books received equal condemnation.

Links thanks to ellen_kushner.