July 31– “The Education of Women” by Daniel Defoe (1719)

 A MISERABLE LITTLE PILE OF SECRETS!

July 31– “The Education of Women” by Daniel Defoe (1719)

Summary: Women aren't dumb, we should let them learn stuff.

Commentary: I'm trying to decide if his plans for a triangular school with a moat is meant to be satirical. The rest seems fairly straightforward (school for women would be good), but I'm not sure if that part is a real appeal to people's concerns about modesty or just him poking a bit.

The building should be of three plain fronts, without any jettings or bearing-work, that the eye might at a glance see from one coin to the other; the gardens walled in the same triangular figure, with a large moat, and but one entrance.

 There's a fair bit of "oh, women are so angelic, etc., etc.", that eventually gets into slut shaming attractive women, so it's not that progressive.

I think the passage that jumped out to me the most was:

The soul is placed in the body like a rough diamond, and must be polished, or the lustre of it will never appear.  And it is manifest that as the rational soul distinguishes us from brutes, so education carries on the distinction, and makes some less brutish than others.

I more often read about how the body/mind/world corrupts the soul, and how we don't need education, we need to just trust the soul/God than that we need education to refine the soul. (Or, the modern alternative: everyone is awful, but if you work really hard you can be marginally less awful) It's an interesting viewpoint vis a vis self improvement. All people are born with the capacity to be good (moral) people, but you need to work to be one. 

 

Casually Completing Classics #2 The Odyssey Book 2

 Book 2

I noticed something interesting when I was comparing translations with my step-daughter. Fitzgerald actually has more lines than Wilson. Apparently she broke the lines differently (trying to match Homer exactly). Always interesting to see all the weird background stuff that goes into translation.

Anyway, at line 69 (nice!) in the Fitzgerald, Telemachus asks the suitors, "Where is your shame?" which is a delightfully modern phrase for a sixty year old translation of a couple thousand year old book.

Zeus sends some eagles to rip a dude's throat out as an omen and the suitors are like, "nbd, it's just a bird." Eagles totally kill people everyday, no reason to be concerned. One guy does say, "I'm old enough to know a sign when I see one," which is another fun phrase.

Mentor yells at the Ithacans for letting the suitors get away with it. He points out that there's a lot more of them than there are suitors. If most people just did the right thing, the crappy people would get away with a lot less.

We get a cool version of, "mean what you say/keep your word" will around 287: "he finished what he cared to say, and what he took in hand he brought to pass."

I also like him telling his nurse to tell Penelope he left... eventually. Eleven or twelve days. Or until she missed him. Or hears that he's gone. Wilson's translation is a bit more definitive here. 

July 30– From “Sir Humphrey Gilbert’s Voyage To Newfoundland” (1583) by Edward Haies

Let's watch some standup.

July 30– From “Sir Humphrey Gilbert’s Voyage To Newfoundland” (1583) by Edward Haies

Summary: Starting colonies to educate the natives (not to make loads of money).

Commentary: There's a joke about Star Wars: Episode I that goes something like, "You know what kids like in sci-fi movies? TRADE DISPUTES!" and I feel like it's much the same here. This is less about some guy going on a voyage, starting a colony, surviving hardships, missionarying to natives, etc. It's about how the borders of the colonies got divided between countries with an occasional, "because God!" thrown in for good measure.

Reflections on Week 30 (July 22-28)

     Link to readings

If you're reading and entry this week, I probably actually wrote it today! Trying to get back ahead some.

Quick review on this week's readings:

July 22 The Odyssey by Homer: 4/5 Hitting a real "classic's classic" here 

July 23 "Envy" by Francis Bacon: 4/5 Mostly still good and relevant.

July 24 The Voyage of The Beagle by Darwin: 3/5 Would've liked more first hand accounts, but mostly good.

July 25 "The Lay of Brynhild" from The Elder Edda: 2/5 Too fragmented

July 26 The Imitation of The Christ By Kempis: 1/5 I'm so tired of reading different versions of, "God is awesome! You suck!"

July 27 "On the Antiseptic Principle of the Practice of Surgery" by Lister: 4/5 Yay for primary source science!.

July 28 "Of Agriculture" by Cowley: 1/5 Pastoral hipsters gonna hipster pastorally.

Average: 2.71 Plenty of good stuff this week!

Overall Thoughts on The Project:

Overall, this was a pretty solid week. Four strong pieces, and even "Of Agriculture" feels like it has some value in showing historical examples of something most people probably think of as more modern (evidently it goes all the way back to ancient Greece. You can never get too nostalgic for pastoralism!)

But the stand out here is The Imitation of The Christ for the reasons I talked about in its entry. It's always weird when the super traditional/conservative Christian texts come up, since they feel so opposed to the entire idea of T5FSOB. All people are terrible, stupid, worthless, etc. is a constant theme in them. But look at this quote from Dr. Eliot in 15MAD:

Before the reading plan represented by The Harvard Classics had taken definite form, I had more than once stated in public that in my opinion a five-foot—at first a three-foot—shelf would hold books enough to afford a good substitute for a liberal education to anyone who would read them with devotion, even if he could spare but fifteen minutes a day for reading.

As I've written before (and he talks about later in the same intro) the defining characteristic of a liberal education is its suitability for someone who is free, creative, etc. While Eliot also notes that we're not supposed to agree with everything in the collection, it's meant to show the overall arc of thought, etc. it's still hard to reconcile something so opposed to the basic purpose's conclusion, except as a way to show how misguided it is. I've entertained this theory before, but the fawning introductions and frequency of these kinds of selections makes me doubt it.

July 29– From "English Traits" by Ralph Waldo Emerson (1876)

 All I think of is Stonehenge!

July 29– From English Traits by Ralph Waldo Emerson (1876)

Summary: Waldo spends some time musing about how his friend hates museums, then talks crazy Stonehenge conspiracy theories.

Commentary: Don't give us an actual historians thought on Stonehenge or anything, Dr. Eliot. I really needed to read some hipster's travel blog about other hipsters trying to out hipster him.

July 28– “Of Agriculture” by Abraham Cowley (1650)

 Normally, I don't link reading here, but check out this awesomely bad old school site design!

July 28– “Of Agriculture” by Abraham Cowley (1650)

Summary:

Commentary: There's trancendentalist hipsters, and then there's, "life isn't pastoral enough in 1650" hipsters! Throw in some semi-relevant quotes (at least he translates the Latin) and you've got a great example of how faux-highbrow nostalgic ludditism hasn't changed in four centuries. 

We get this pull quote (evidently from Virgil):

To be a husbandman, is but a retreat from the city; to be a philosopher, from the world; or rather, a retreat from the world, as it is man’s, into the world, as it is God’s.

This feels backwards to me. Philosophy (as I like it) involves looking inward and deeper at the world, not retreating from it. 

The utility (I mean plainly the lucre of it) is not so great, now in our nation, as arises from merchandise and the trading of the city, from whence many of the best estates and chief honors of the kingdom are derived

I do love "I mean plainly the lucre of it" and would like to start using it.

But yeah, mostly just your standard "Farmers are divine in their purity" that we still get today. 

 

 

July 27– “On the Antiseptic Principle of the Practice of Surgery” by Joseph Lister (1867)

 Same guy Listerine is named after

July 27– “On the Antiseptic Principle of the Practice of Surgery” by Joseph Lister (1867)

Summary: If you put antiseptic on wounds, they don't get infected.

Commentary: I've been getting a lot of mileage out of Fordham's online stuff lately. Good for things that are small, have weird formatting, etc. that can be hard to find or awkward on Gutenberg. I know I said something about same paragraph footnotes recently, and this one has them. Maybe that's all the Fordham stuff, or just a coincidence. 

The usual "wow, this is neat"/"wow, more people should know this stuff" on medical/scientific primary source documents applied here. My main comment on this specific piece that all of these treatments (which consist largely of soaking a rag in antiseptic, swabbing out wounds, and covering it until it scabs) sound incredibly painful.

July 26– From "The Imitation of Christ" by Thomas A. Kempis (~1420) translated by William Benham

 Intro quote

July 26– From The Imitation of Christ by Thomas A. Kempis (~1420) translated by William Benham

Summary: Everyone needs Jesus.

Commentary: That's really all this is. There's a bit of half decent advice in here:

We must not trust every word of others or feeling within ourselves, but cautiously and patiently try the matter,

But then it immediately goes back into:

whether it be of God. Unhappily we are so weak that we find it easier to believe and speak evil of others, rather than good

 Which seems rather contradictory to the whole "liberal education for a free person to make good decision" gist behind the whole 5FSOB project.

July 25– “The Lay of Brynhild” from the "Elder Edda" translated by Eiríkr Magnússon and William Morris

 One time, I drove through town playing "Ride of The Valkyries" as loud as my speakers would go with the windows down.

July 25– “The Lay of Brynhild” from the Elder Edda translated by Eiríkr Magnússon and William Morris

Summary: Sigurd gets Caesered.

Commentary: Tiny (and incomplete) fragment today, so not a ton to say. I'm kind of surprised this is only the second time 15MAD was from the Eddas, considering how much Aeneid, Odyssey, and Iliad. I guess since it has to share the "Norse Nights" with Beowulf.

Casually Completing Classics #1 Intro and The Odyssey Book 1

    Welcome to a new sub series I'll be working on here: Casually Completing Classics, where I actually finish some of these classical books I've talked about. There won't be a ton of super serious research, commentary, etc. going on. Rather, I'll read them the way you'd read a novel. At whatever pace is comfortable, taking only light notes on things that are interesting/confusing, and jotting a quick summary for each chapter. I have a few used books where people wrote summaries, and I enjoyed having them. I figure I should try doing it myself.

    This is partially inspired by my stepdaughter listening to EPIC: The Musical. I told her I'd read one of the books from it with her, and she picked The Odyssey. I figured we'd do a chapter a week or something, but she's plowing ahead to try to whole thing on summer break. There's no way I can do a in-depth, close read with research at that speed, and keep up with all my other projects. So, I'm trying it this way. 

    I've also been thinking about how I'd like to actually finish some of the pieces I've done excerpts from anyway, and this is a nice way to get started. I have a couple others available. If this goes well, I'll continue with others. If not, I'll keep going with the regular daily updates and do longer reads later. I'm going to try to get one up every Wednesday (to go with the weekly recaps on Monday and Star Wars Classics on Friday). No set timeline for when I'll finish The Odyssey (I'm a little over halfway through this reread), but probably late summer or early fall.

    One last note: I'm primarily using the Fitzgerald translation for this, but I have the Butcher/Lang (the one from T5FSOB), Fagles, and Wilson (the one my stepdaughter is reading) translations at hand (and I suppose anything that's easily on the internet). This isn't a hardcore translation analysis, but it might come up a little, and I wanted people to know which I was using if they looked at my quotes.

The Odyssey: Books 1-

Intro:

    Alright, dusk jacket summary if you've somehow made it to this blog, but don't know what The Odyssey is. It's the second of two epics by Homer (who we know very little about, including whether there even is one actual "Homer" person) dealing with the Trojan war. The Odyssey deals with how Odysseus (the dude who came up with the Trojan horse) gets home from Troy. It introduces a bunch of famous Greek mythological stories and monsters like The Cyclops and the Scylla. At least that's what everybody says.

    I'd argue the voyage home from Troy is actually (an important) subplot, not the main thrust of the book. Odysseus doesn't even show up for the first ten percent of the book, and then by around the halfway point he's already home. At best, the voyage is maybe a third of the story (and that's with some generous accounting of asides, retellings, etc.) Instead, it's a story about how Odysseus's family deals with the suitors who have come to try to seduce Penelope (his wife) in his absence, with each character having their own arc within that plot. Odysseus: Sail home, fight monsters. Telemachus: Look for his father, grow into a man himself. Penelope: Trick horny men, deal with her son growing up. Penelope gets the short end of the stick.

    

     Book 1:

    I love the way these old epic poems start.

Sing in me, Muse, and through me tell the story

of that man skilled in all ways of contending

    I'm a sucker for a good frame story/epistolary format. It's interesting that frame stories are still pretty popular, but you don't see this style very often anymore. Why can't your urban fantasy story start with: Hey buddy, tell me about that time Sam Skulldudger outfoxed the lycans, vamps, and necros all in one night!

(Beowulf gets the best one, since you get an all purpose interjection as the first word and can make it YO! or HEY! or BRO!)

     Zeus gives a summary of a good chunk of the book. I mostly like this as a preview, but I do think that giving up that the whole thing is Poseidon's fault is a mistake. Talk about Odysseus being lost, fighting monsters, etc. cool. Makes me want to read the book. But I like the idea of the initial inciting incident being a bit more mysterious. Maybe everyone just knows that if you're lost at sea it's Poseidon's fault though.

    Athena goes to Ithaca to talk to Telemachus and send him to look for Odysseus. The suitors are sitting in "easy chairs" which is an interesting phrase to read in an ancient Greek context. Usually I think of an easy chair as a fancy La-Z-Boy or something. It's probably like a chaise. She meets Telemachus and he askes her a million questions, then we get the first appearance of "winedark sea." Most people would call that more of a dark red, but not Homer.  

    There's a whole line of study about how cultures invent words for colors, etc. The consensus seems to be that yes, the ancient Greeks could see blue, but they didn't have a word for it since it's so "default" in nature (sea and sky). Curiously, the word blue does show up a couple times in most translations of The Iliad and The Odyssey, but it's more inferred from other words (descriptions of eyes) than a direct translation. Translation is weird and cool and crazy.

    Stopping there for today. I'd like to do more than one book a day in general, but I've got about a hundred books to put on a shelf.

July 24– From "The Voyage of The Beagle" by Charles Darwin (1839)

 I Feel The Earth Move

July 24– From The Voyage of The Beagle by Charles Darwin (1839)

Summary:

Commentary: I learned that a mayor-domo is a thing, and not just a misspelling of majordomo. I don't know that fact will ever come up in my life, I just think it's good to note that I'm still learning stuff from these.

 To a person who had formerly known them, it possibly might have been still more impressive; for the ruins were so mingled together, and the whole scene possessed so little the air of a habitable place, that it was scarcely possible to imagine its former condition

This makes me want to read an account of the same from someone who did live there. Sometimes a more distance perspective is helpful, but Darwin wouldn't know as much. It would be interesting to see them together.

Captain Fitzroy also has an account, but we get it second hand through Darwin, and it's not clear how familiar he is with the area. 

July 23– Essays by Francis Bacon (1597)

 Topical Reference

July 23– Essays by Francis Bacon (1597)

Summary

Commentary: I somehow did today's reading back in June by mistake, so I subbed in today's instead. Same book, different section. 

A man that hath no virtue in himself, ever envieth virtue in others.

Bacon starts calling people out early. Honestly, a lot of this is still stuff we say today, just paraphrased.

Men of noble birth, are noted to be envious towards new men, when they rise. For the distance is altered, and it is like a deceit of the eye, that when others come on, they think themselves, go back.

Something something... when you're used to priviledge, equality looks like oppression.

For he that cannot possibly mend his own case, will do what he can, to impair another's;

 [...]

 Again, envy is ever joined with the comparing of a man's self; and where there is no comparison, no envy 

Stop worrying about other people and take care of your own stuff.

Now, to speak of public envy. There is yet some good in public envy, whereas in private, there is none. For public envy, is as an ostracism, that eclipseth men, when they grow too great. And therefore it is a bridle also to great ones, to keep them within bounds.

    I'm interested in this, but he never really backs it up. I can see how it might be worth it to say that if you're just jealous of a person (private envy) it's pointless, but if a group wants to take down a douchebag kind, billionaire, whatever it might be good.

Reflections on Week 29 (July 15-21)

    Link to readings

I almost started a new series today, but I decided three posts in one day was overkill.

Quick review on this week's readings:

July 15 “Of the Food and Diet of the English” by Harrison: 3/5 Better than his dogs piece. 

July 16 The Quran translated by E. H. Palmer: 2/5 There appear to be two Quran readings in T5FSOB. This one is mostly just a retelling of the Bible.

July 17 Phaedra by Racine: 4/5 The good play for the week.

July 18 A Blot in The 'Stucheon by Browning: 1/5 The bad play for the week.

July 19 The Discovery of Guiana By Raleigh: 1/5 This was like a boring Darwin.

July 20  Pilgrim’s Progress by Bunyan: 4/5 I did not expect to like this one, but I'm a sucker for a good Biblical anime fight.

July 21 BURNSSSSSS: 0/5 Please stop. (We get at least 2 Burns in August)

Average: 2.1 Burns ruins everything.

Overall Thoughts on The Project:

This week was interesting since it had the skeleton of some kind of theme going on. Two age gap plays, two pieces responding to the Bible.

On the one hand, I like that every night I get something different and have no idea what I'm going to read. On the other, I sometimes wish we did get a little tighter theming. It might be cool to look at a similar concept as presented by people over the years or from different places. 

July 22– From "The Odyssey" by Homer translated by S.H. Butcher and A. Lang

I think I posted this before, but it got taken down.

July 22– From The Odyssey by Homer translated by S.H. Butcher and A. Lang

Summary: NOMAN kills the Cyclops.

Commentary: I'm actually working on a series of posts on The Odyssey, since my stepdaughter is reading it, so I'll save most of my thoughts on this section in general for there. A couple notes on this specific version.

I really appreciate the same paragraph footnotes. Usually they're out of section or way way out there and I just get rid of them. 

The traditional Outis/Nemo is translated here as Noman, rather than the more common "Nobody." This gives it a real Lord of The Rings flair.

Finally:

Exactly how I picture it when the men hide under the sheep to escape.

July 21– BURRRRRNSSSS

Burn

July 21– BURRRRRNSSSS

Summary: Ugh

Commentary: Still garbage

July 20– From "Pilgrim’s Progress" (1678) by John Bunyan

 How Apollyon fights

July 20– From Pilgrim’s Progress (1678) by John Bunyan

Summary: A Christian Pilgrim has a shonen anime fight with a chimera!

Commentary: It's been a while since we had one of these Christian allegory readings. Usually, this is where I complain that they're boring, and make Yahweh look like an asshole. Today, we get an epic fight with bible verses mixed in.

Check out how awesome Apollyon looks! (https://kenpulsmusic.com/pilgrimsprogress51.html)

    If Eliot is trying to get us to support Christianity, he'd have been better suited leading with the fight with a badass demon with dart throwing and swords and one liners. There are some Job callbacks, which are interesting, since I read the original Job way back in January. It's terrible, but it sounds cool when you say it while fighting a horde of demons.

July 19– From "The Discovery of Guiana" (1596) by Sir Walter Raleigh

 They go to Guiana at some point in this show

July 19– From The Discovery of Guiana (1596) by Sir Walter Raleigh

Summary: Discovery means exploring.

Commentary: The Discovery* (exploration) is such a great way to start this. I think we should start discovering* more things. Nice discovering* Christopher Columbus. Also, not sure what's up with writing the 17. for the 17th. Kind of distracting. Don't bring that back. 

As always, I appreciate when people translate. Especially when it's a long block like this.

July 18– From "A Blot In The ’Stutcheon" (1843) by Robert Browning

 When I typed A Blot In The Stucheon in Youtube, this is what comes up.

July 18– From A Blot In The ’Stutcheon (1843) by Robert Browning

Summary: More older women going after young men.

Commentary: Another beginning of a play! Not as thrilled with this one. It's labeled as a tragedy, but seems more like a (not that funny) comedy, and was hard to follow. Doesn't help that I couldn't find a performance.

July 17– "Phaedra" by Jean Baptiste Racine (1677) translated by Robert Bruce Boswell

I don't miss Zoom theatre. At least not Zoom versions of existing plays. Some of the stuff made FOR Zoom is cool.

July 17– Phaedra by Jean Baptiste Racine (1677) translated by Robert Bruce Boswell

Summary: What are you doing, step-mom?

Commentary: An opening, with a twist, and a decent soliloquy? Eliot must be feeling generous.

July 16– From the Quran translated by E. H. Palmer

24/7 Quran!

July 16– From the Quran translated by E. H. Palmer 

Summary: Mary and Elizabeth have kids, even though one's a virgin and one is old. And then lots of damnation.

Commentary: Good to see the Quran keeping up the "all damned; all the time" theme. I'm of two minds on this selection. On the one, picking the Christian section of the Quran feels a little bit like going to Mecca to order McDonalds. On the other, I guess picking a section that ties into something Eliot's intended audience already knows makes sense. 

July 15– “Of the Food and Diet of the English” by William Harrison (1587)

 Not like this

July 15– “Of the Food and Diet of the English” by William Harrison (1587)

Summary: Rich people eat a lot more food than poor people.

Commentary: This is bordering on a list with just enough other writing to connect it. The bread parts were a bit more interesting than the meat parts. 

Reflections on Week 28 (July 8-14)

   Link to readings

Blog, blog, bloggity, blog.

Quick review on this week's readings:

July 8 The Cenci by Shelley: 3/5 Only got a small snippet, but enjoyable. 

July 9 Essays by Bacon: 3/5 These would be good "filler" to help fill in days with short readings or if there was a tightly themed week with only 5 or 6 days.

July 10 The Saga of Erik The Red by Erikson: 2/5 This one was kind of disjointed. Might make more sense as a full piece. Cool primary source at least.

July 11 "The Extent of The Universe: by Newcomb: 4/5 If Cosmos came out in 1904...

July 12 "Walking" By Thoreau: 1/5 Less hipsters; more Nessmucks.

July 13 Pericles by Plutarch: 3/5 Surprisingly interesting for a Plutarch..

July 14 Reflection On The Revolution of France by Burke: 3/5 Authoritarians gonna Authoritate, but N INTERESTING READ.

Average: 2.7 HIPSTERS!

Overall Thoughts on The Project:

We don't read enough stuff by authoritarians who aren't frothing whack jobs. I still don't agree with Burke, but I appreciate someone putting that kind of thought into a coherent framework.

"Extent of The Universe" was great and I'm going to try to take a stargazing trip with some of my friends this fall.

July 14– From "Reflections On The Revolution of France" (1790) by Edmund Burke

Back to anthems!

July 14– From Reflections On The Revolution of France (1790) by Edmund Burke

Summary: You know, the French Revolution was a mess in the end.

Commentary: Obviously, getting rid of the king is a good idea. But Burke isn't entirely wrong (this is not the first time we've read someone being mad about the proles getting uppity) that there would be issues. (The Reign of Terror wasn't for a few more years, and I'm not up enough on my history of the time to pinpoint how badly things were going at this point.)

Without a stronger background, it's hard for me to say if Burke is simply an authoritarian supporting monarchism, or if he saw how things were going to go and made some good points. I lean more towards the former from his tone here (there's a lot of defense of what we'll call "reasonable oppression"). I think the public (at least here in the US) generally accepts the Frev as virtuous, but it's a lot messier than I think it's presented. 

Denying, as I am well warranted to do, that the nobility had any considerable share in the oppression of the people, in cases in which real oppression existed, I am ready to admit that they were not without considerable faults and errors. A foolish imitation of the worst part of the manners of England, which impaired their natural character, without substituting in its place what perhaps they meant to copy, has certainly rendered them worse than formerly they were. Habitual dissoluteness of manners, continued beyond the pardonable period of life, was more common amongst them than it is with us; and it reigned with the less hope of remedy, though possibly with something of less mischief, by being covered with more exterior decorum. They countenanced too much that licentious philosophy which has helped to bring on their ruin. There was another error amongst them more fatal. Those of the commons who approached to or exceeded many of the nobility in point of wealth were not fully admitted to the rank and estimation which wealth, in reason and good policy, ought to bestow in every country,—though I think not equally with that of other nobility. The two kinds of aristocracy were too punctiliously kept asunder: less so, however, than in Germany and some other nations.

July 13– From Plutarch’s Lives: "Pericles" translated by Dryden and edited by A. H. Clough

Same guy

July 13– From Plutarch’s Lives: Pericles translated by Dryden and edited by A. H. Clough

Summary: Guy spends taxes on assorted showy things, gets yelled at, and then says he'll spend his own money if he can get the credit. People tell him to spend tax money instead.

Commentary: This was the most interesting "Lives" so far, so that's nice. Beyond that, I guess I mostly want some more context. As Plutarch writes it, Pericles mostly does good things, some people object, but he shit talks them into coming around. It's hard to tell from only a few pages how good these things actually were, how spending there instead of elsewhere affected Athens, etc. Maybe he could've done a matching thing. City buys the library, he buys the books or whatever. I hear that's sometimes an issue with these kind of big charity initiatives. They pay for a part, but not the whole thing, or not the upkeep. Great that someone gets a building or whatever, but they can't use it.

We get this weird pull quote from when one of his advisors goes on a hunger strike for attention:

 "Pericles," said he, "even those who have occasion for a lamp

  supply it with oil."

That's how lamps work. If you used it and didn't fill it, it'd be pointless. It seems like it'd make more sense to say, "even those who don't use their lamps keep them filled" or something. 

 

From “Walking” (1851) by Henry David Thoreau

 Nature Break

From “Walking” (1851) by Henry David Thoreau

Summary: Walking in nature is good for you.

Commentary: On the one hand, walking in nature is good for you. On the other, Thoreau is a pretentious hipster, and you should go read George "Nessmuch" Sears instead. He lived around the same time as the transcendentalists, but instead of being a rich guy who went to play in the woods, he's more of an authentic bushcrafter. Better writer, too. Writes in a fun, conversational tone, instead of trying to really make sure he gets the most out of the stuff he picked up in his intro to lit class.

Let's do a pull comparison from early in "Walking" and from Sear's Woodcraft and Camping

Thoreau:

It is true, we are but faint-hearted crusaders, even the walkers, nowadays, who undertake no persevering, never-ending enterprises. Our expeditions are but tours, and come round again at evening to the old hearth-side from which we set out. Half the walk is but retracing our steps. We should go forth on the shortest walk, perchance, in the spirit of undying adventure, never to return,—prepared to send back our embalmed hearts only as relics to our desolate kingdoms. If you are ready to leave father and mother, and brother and sister, and wife and child and friends, and never see them again,—if you have paid your debts, and made your will, and settled all your affairs, and are a free man; then you are ready for a walk.

Vs Sears:

It is an age of hurry and worry. Anything slower than steam is apt to "get left." Fortunes are quickly made and freely spent. Nearly all busy, hard-worked Americans have an intuitive sense of the need that exists for at least one period of rest and relaxation during each year, and all—or nearly all—are willing to pay liberally, too liberally in fact, for anything that conduces to rest, recreation and sport. I am sorry to say that we mostly get swindled. As an average, the summer outer who goes to forest, lake or stream for health and sport, gets about ten cents' worth for a dollar of outlay. A majority will admit—to themselves at least—that after a month's vacation, they return to work with an inward consciousness of being somewhat disappointed—and beaten. We are free with our money when we have it. We are known throughout the civilized world for our lavishness in paying for our pleasures; but it humiliates us to know we have been beaten, and this is what the most of us know at the end of a summer vacation. To the man of millions it makes little difference. He is able to pay liberally for boats, buckboards and "body service," if he chooses to spend a summer in the North Woods. He has no need to study the questions of lightness and economy in a forest and stream outing. Let his guides take care of him; and unto them and the landlords he will give freely of his substance. 

Thoreau tells us that we're not hard core enough walkers, since we stop sometimes. Sears just wants you to stop overpaying for shitty vacations.

Whenever I read Thoreau, I feel like one of two things is happening. He's peaking at me mid monologue to see if I'm buying his rambles about the nobility of walking (or whatever) or that he's trying to talk himself into buying what he's selling. Sears is much more earnest and trustworthy.

Sears wants you to take some time to enjoy nature in your busy life. Thoreau is convinced if you don't spend your life dedicated to nature (between going home to have your mom do your laundry) you're not even human.

July 11– “The Extent of The Universe” by Simon Newcomb (1904)

 It's big!

July 11– “The Extent of The Universe” by Simon Newcomb (1904)

Summary: The universe is giant and pretty and keeps going even when life sucks.

Commentary: I hate light pollution. Looking up at the sky is awesome, and I'm lucky enough to live in a semi-rural area, so ours is pretty good. But I've never seen the Milky Way stretch across the sky or anything. I guess I'm lucky that I've lived and visited a variety of places, some of which were very bright and some fairly dark, so I can at least say, "Yeah, light pollution is a real thing. It doesn't sound like it, but if you drive 3 hours that way there's 10 times more stars." I did find a list of good dark places here. Some of them aren't that far, and it is camping season. Maybe I'll take a trip.

That's your homework, go find somewhere dark (even if it's not one of the CERTIFIED DARKER THAN BLACK places) and go see how many more stars there were. And you all got to actually learn something practical tonight and see that list.

Also, really interesting combination of math and wanderlust tonight. Half of it is, "THE UNIVERSE IS BEAUTIFUL AND SPIRITUAL" and then you get to a word problem in the middle.

July 10– From "The Saga of Erik The Red" by Leif Erikson (~1000) translated by A. M. Reeves

Vinland Saga OP 1

July 10– From The Saga of Erik The Red by Leif Erikson (~1000) translated by A. M. Reeves

Summary: Leif Erikson comes to America

Commentary: This is another one of those "summary" readings, where it feels less like one story, and more like shortened versions of five semi-connected stories.

July 9–Essays by Sir Francis Bacon (1597)

 Another Famous Bacon

July 9–Essays by Sir Francis Bacon (1597)

Summary: A bunch of short essays on various topics.

Commentary: These were interesting. Kind of "coffee break philosophy." That might work better if they were a bit more modern (hard to do a quick bite of something when you need to work to parse it. Lots of untranslated Latin.) but interesting nonetheless. 

He draws an interesting contrast between Christian priests, who emphasize how terrible death is (barring God saving you) vs older philosophers who often said (in some form or another) that death isn't as scary as we make it out to be.

July 8– From The Cenci by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1820)

I'm getting better at finding these.

July 8– From The Cenci by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1820) 

Summary: Cenci is an asshole. Sure would be a shame if someone killed him.

Commentary: This is a pretty solid production. Very college theatre, but the music accompaniment is well done.

Reflections on Week 27 (July 1-7)

   Link to readings

Back to updating this on Monday, oh yeah.

Quick review on this week's readings:

July 1 The Origin of Species by Darwin: 2/5 For some reason, we're reading the prologue today. 

July 2 Caesar from Plutarch's Lives: 1/5 I wonder if these are better when you read them "in parallel" between the Greek and Roman lives as he intended. As is, meh.

July 3 The Battle of Gettysburg by Haskell : 3/5 More contemporaneous primary sources!

July 4 "The Declaration of Independence" by AMERICA: 4/5 More like 1776/5.

July 5 "The Story Told by The Tailor" from 1001 Nights: 2/5 Finally, another decent 1001 Nights story.

July 6 Utopia by More: 2/5 After 6 months of random sections in the middle of things that were hard to understand, we're pivoting hard towards boring intros this week.

July 7 The School For Scandal by Sheridan: 3/5 A good opening!

Average: 2.43/5 All intros all the time!

Overall Thoughts on The Project:

I posted a more general thoughts about the whole project over the weekend to mark the mid year. Really, my main thought line for this week is about the selection and all the intros.

It felt like 15MAD spent the first five months or so of the year carefully avoiding intros, giving out passages from the same book out of order, jumping around, overlapping, etc.

Now, it's leaning hard into intros, often in places that make no sense or are uninteresting. A twelve page summary of a bunch of people who thought of evolution before Darwin didn't feel super relevant, and the opening of Utopia doesn't tell us much. Then cycle around to The School For Scandal, which had a fine opening, but reminded me of the "start in the middle" weirdness of earlier in the year.

July 1– Act 1 of "The School For Scandal" (1877) by Richard Brinsley Sheridan

 With subtitles (and footnotes!)

July 1– Act 1 of The School For Scandal (1877) by Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Summary: Snake Supports Scheming Sneerwell Starting Scandals 

Commentary: Another day, another Act 1 after we've already seen another part. The one I used last time was taken off Youtube, which is a shame. This production seems passable, but I really like the subtitling, which includes notes on the Georgian slang, etc. It runs a little fast, but it's a cool idea.

All in all, probably an amusing play if we watched the whole thing. It seems almost satirical, as a spoof of a manners play about a manners play or something, but I think at the time it was probably a more sincere comedy. That might be splitting hairs though.

Whooah, we're half way there– Midyear Reflection

Is this still the last song of the night a clubs, or was that a local/temporal thing when I was younger?

That's a weird music video. I don't think I've seen it before.

    This week's usual reflection/review post will be up in the next couple days, but I wanted to take a moment to reflect and celebrate making it half way through the year (technically July 1st due to the leap year) without missing any days! I think there was one day where the post technically went up at like 12:05 the next morning, but I read the selection the day before, so it counts.

Success Kid: All of today's image will be vintage memes. (Wikipedia)

How's the project going?

    

    I think pretty well. I'm still doing it, I'm still mostly enjoying it, and I'm still learning things. I don't really know (short of getting a fabulously lucrative book deal out of this blog that I don't advertise at all) it could be going substantially better.

What've I learned:

    I've said this a number of times before, but the biggest things I've learned from T5FSOB and the reading plan is that anyone with a little gumption can learn this stuff, and that something doesn't have to be a directly marketable skill or whatever to have value. I've alluded to not loving my college experience before, but I don't think I've ever spelled out how completely opposite those two statements are from how college was for me.

    The biggest lesson most of my professors wanted to impart to us is that we were stupid. Their goal was to fail as many of us as possible, and we were fools for even trying. Whether that was because we belonged to whatever group they hated for some reason (black, gay, man, atheist, vaccinated, etc.) or simply because most people were idiots who couldn't hope to learn anything. Especially philosophy. Philosophy is even harder. According to the prof it was literally impossible for anyone under the age of thirty, and even then you had to be a genius to even scratch the surface. Then he would wander out of class to get high in his office. 

    The second thing we learned was that nothing they taught mattered. According to them, we'd learn more in the first week on the job than we did in all our classes combined. Thus, they were free spend most of class ranting about things like how we needed to get into more fistfights while bigfoot hunting (clearly advanced concepts in a geology class) or telling us how everything we learned last semester was wrong (because that professor was clearly an idiot, unlike the obvious genius teaching the current class). I'm pretty sure if I just spent all my class hours skimming related Wikipedia articles, I'd probably have learned more.

How I think my "Geology" prof viewed himself. (Joke Battles Wiki)

    Now, I am technically over thirty, but I'm pretty sure I could've handled most or all of the texts in T5FSOB 10 years ago and some of the things I've learned do have some value. Not in the super concrete, "this is how you x" sense, but I do think they're helping me to better understand myself and the world around me. Also, people really like listening to me talk about it (in real life, although at least one or two of you seem to enjoy reading about it too). That really surprised me. I thought I'd mostly get a mix of, "Wow, old books, what a fucking nerd," and "Wow, old books, what a fucking Nazi," but it's actually been a great conversation starter at parties and stuff.

    And it really makes me feel better to know that so much of what we're grappling with in the world today, and that I'm concerned or curious or struggling with personally is stuff people were trying to figure out one or two hundred or a thousand years ago. Sometimes, they have good answers. Sometimes, they don't. When they do, awesome! I can use what they wrote, continue to read larger sections or later related works, and have some good ideas for myself. When they don't, it's reassuring that we've been working on it for however long, the world hasn't ended since we haven't figured it out, and the world is (mostly/probably) a better place than it was back then anyway.

    

It's 2024, and we still don't know exactly what it means to be human. But we have some cool ideas, and we're not dead.

    I'm excited to keep going and read the rest of the year's selections. I'm excited to go back and reread full versions of the ones I liked. I'm excited to look for other stuff from later in history, or from cultures that Eliot didn't really include. 

    And I think that's really the one thing I want to criticize, as I have a ton of times before. It's not entirely clear who wrote the 15 Minutes a Day (which I will start calling 15MAD to go with T5FSOB) reading guide. It's presented as though it was done by Eliot, but he makes it clear he worked with any number of people, particularly on the supporting materials for T5FSOB. If you look around online, some people claim it was done entirely by a Collier employee to help them sell the collections. Either way, some of it is whack. Some people like to cast aside the whole enterprise and say the only worthwhile way to study the classics is to meticulously go over them page by page, taking copious notes, and months to read a book. Nah. You can get a lot out of your 15 Minutes a Day and some minimal snarky note taking. But there are some real questionable ones over the weeks. We'll leave aside my unending hatred of BUUUURNNNNS, but what's up with reading a novel all out of order (The Betrothed), or overlapping sections of the same book (Darwin and Herodotus), or hacking through an introduction and stopping right before things get interesting (More). So yeah, that's my one criticism for the project. I think 90% of the texts are worthy for inclusion in a most important books list, but the parts that are in the guide are questionable.

    At the end of the day, here's what I keep coming back to. There's all kinds of cool stuff to know out there, I'll never learn it all, but anyone that wants can learn and use a lot of it. And if you try, you can be smart and moral, even if you're the guy sitting next to me in band wearing a pro wrestling t-shirt, which leads to the entire lesson being about how evil pro wrestlers are instead of trombones.

July 6– From Utopia (1516) by Thomas More translated by Ralph Robinson

 Utopia

July 6– From Utopia (1516) by Thomas More translated by Ralph Robinson

Summary: Nothing happened.

Commentary: Or, more correctly, something sort of starts to happen in the last page or so. Not sure why we only got a five page selection that seems to start on page four. In general, I feel like the selections have been shorter lately. Maybe Eliot wanted to give us the summer off.

July 5– “The Story Told by the Tailor” from "1001 Nights"

Barbering!

July 5– “The Story Told by the Tailor” from 1001 Nights

Summary: A barber talks so much a guy breaks his leg trying to escape him.

Commentary: I was a little wary about another 1000 Nights. I liked the first couple, but the last couple haven't been as good. This one was better. Funny. It reminds me of a time my dad was upset because he found a new barber much closer than his old one, but got upset since the new one talked so much it took longer to drive there and get his hair cut than to drive to the older further away one.

Reflections on Week 26 (June 24-30)

   Link to readings

It's nice to be home.

Quick review on this week's readings:

June 24 "The Story Told by the Christian Broker" from 1001 Nights: 1/5 I really liked the first couple 1000 Nights selection, but they've gotten kind of boring and repetitive. I'd probably have whacked off her head by now.

June 25 Poems by Robert Herrick: 3/5 Not the most creative poetry, but it knows what it is and it gets on with it.

June 26 Beowulf : 2.5/5 Beowulf in T5FSOB? Yes. Beowulf in the reading guide? Yes. This section of Beowulf in the reading guide? Ehhhhh.

June 27 "Of Friendship" by Bacon: 3/5 Much like the Herrick poems, this isn't terribly profound, but it is effective.

June 28 The Voyage of The Beagle by Darwin: 3/5 Darwin screws up hunting, and it's pretty funny. Not quite as informative as some other sections.

June 29 Macbeth by Shakespeare: 2/5 I gave the Beowulf section a pass. This one is just a bad choice

June 30 "On Liberty" John Stuart Mill : 4/5 It's nice to read a "tyranny of the majority" essay that isn't just whining by a guy who would thinks it should be legal to own people.

Average: 2.64/5 A week that broadly improved as it went on.

Overall Thoughts on The Project:

I feel similarly to Herrick as I do about Rosseau from a few weeks ago. He's not the most profound poet (a decent Shakespeare sonnet is certainly better than anything in this sample), but he's very readable, and its clear what he's trying to do in his writing. I think he'd be a great middle ground between "silly kid poems" like "The Itsy Bitsy Spider" and "serious adult poems" that would help people be able to better read and understand poetry.

I've both Beowulf and Macbeth the last couple years. What the heck is going on with those selections? Beowulf, at least we got a major scene. Not one I'd have picked, but it's a major scene. But who goes, "You know what I love about Macbeth? The dinner!" You've got to be a theatre/Shakespeare nerd to even know that one exists.

Mill is great. I'm really looking forward to digging into his stuff in general once I get some time.

July 4– The Declaration of Independence (1776)

 Old School / New School

July 4– The Declaration of Independence (1776)

Summary: No more colonies.

Commentary: Let's do a longish pull quote today:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

 While we have always been entirely successful in living up to those ideals as a nation, I think that this paragraph, more or less, sums up the goals of any politician, law, etc. of a functional liberal/democratic government.

 all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

That's the point of the whole thing. If you're not doing this, you're not doing liberty, democracy, etc. at all.

 Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.

It's interesting to think about the spectrum from "soap box to ammo box" as the saying goes. How much do things have to be wrong before it's worthwhile to go and riot, storm Congress, etc.? Especially in a democracy where people can have conflicting views, but aren't necessarily wrong (or where both can be right and wrong in different ways).

I think, overall, if we keep those ideals in the beginning of the paragraph in mind, we'll most avoid the second half of the paragraph and mostly do the right thing. Mistakes happen, but strongly held principles are the best way to guide ourselves on a good path. And, while the examples in this paragraph are great, you need to be able to define your own values for it to really matter.

July 3– From "The Battle of Gettysburg" (1898) by Frank Aretas HI askell

 Cyclorama!

July 3– From The Battle of Gettysburg (1898) by Frank Aretas Haskell

Summary: How do you summarize Gettysburg? A lot of men died, and the Union won, I guess.

Commentary: I had another selection for this book, "American Historical Documents" a week or so ago. I don't think that label really applies (maybe First Hand Accounts of History instead). If we didn't have AN ENTIRE VOLUME OF BURRRRNNNNSSSS Elliot could've put in a few more historical documents (maybe expanding it to the rest of the world) and then had a whole book of accounts also, rather than smooshing them awkwardly in one.

I don't have a ton to say about the particular entry. Decent enough writing. Reasonably significant topic. Solid 3 on the rating scale.

July 2– From "Plutarch’s Lives: Caesar" translated by Dryden and edited by A. H. Clough

I love this guy's outfit

July 2– From Plutarch’s Lives: Caesar translated by Dryden and edited by A. H. Clough

Summary: Caesar changed the calendar and got assassinated.

Commentary: We already got a Caesar reading back in March. The summary for today is all about him changing the calendar, but we only got like one paragraph of that. Kind of disappointing, I thought a reading about calendar math/history might be interesting. The current (Georgian) calendar is a very minor revision to the Julian calendar, built around standardizing leap years. It's an improvement, but only in about the smallest possible way. People have come up with so many better calendar systems since then, and we haven't used any of them. My favorite is Symetry454, which:

1. Is perpetual (the minimum improvement for any new calendar we should consider): All days are the same day of the week every year e.g. January 1st is always Monday, July 2nd is always Tuesday.

2. All same numbered days are on the same day of the week month to month. The 1st is always a Monday, the 18th is always a Thursday, etc.

3. All holidays are now fixed. While the goofy "Xth Thursday after Y" construction is kind of fun, it's not very practical.

4. Aligns most or all major civil and religious holidays, keeps a traditional sabbath cycle, and avoids Friday the 13th, accommodating a variety of superstitions that a lot of other alternate calendars ignore.

5. No non-calendar days (many alternate proposals add in a weird day somewhere that doesn't have a real date and make you call it sprok day or something).

6. Evenly divisible weeks, months, and quarters. Always starting on Monda7y and ending on Sunday.

I don't love the Leap Year implementation, but I don't know that there are any calendars that I do, between overly complicated (every 4 years, but not 100s, except 400s) or (as above) involve adding weird semi-days.

From the site linked:

It is a leap year only if the remainder of ( 52 × Year + 146 ) / 293 is less than 52.

That's not very hard math (it looks like a lot, but it's nothing you couldn't work out on pencil and paper in grade school), but I don't love that it works out to sometimes 5 years between leaps and sometimes 6.

We get a whole leap week instead of a leap day. Again, that sounds like a lot, but it keeps things more regular (making one of the 4 week months into a 5 prevents breaking anything).

July 1– From "The Origin of Species" (1859) by Charles Darwin

 Evolution

July 1– From The Origin of Species (1859) by Charles Darwin

Summary:

Commentary: For the first time (and somewhat bizarrely) this one starts with T5FSOB introduction, then proceeds with a "pre-introduction" from the actual book summarizing the study of evolution. Apologies for any typos in the initial section, I don't have any clean/easily copyable copies of T5FSOB itself, just pdfs that're readable, but not perfect. 

I think the weirdest thing about the study of evolution (and this is obviously grossly oversimplifying) is that it should be pretty clearly evident that it can/does happen. We've been breeding working animals for desired traits thousands of years ago, and the same with fruit. I guess it's a bit of a stretch to imagine that something could evolve into both an elephant and a mouse, but it makes sense if you think about the billion things that branch in between them. The Aristotle quote in the beginning more or less illustrates this. I don't often nod along with Aristotle, but we're good here.

It doesn't even necessarily rule out some kind of divine intervention. A deity could make a bunch of living things however long ago, and over time they grow and change. A variant of this is mentioned by several of the quoted writers in the text.

Darwin leaves a lot of untranslated foreign text (mostly French) here. I'm really grateful for machine translation, since they're far too long for me to try to force my way through with a dictionary. Although it would be a good excuse to find someone to collaborate and help translate otherwise.