Wordy Blog Archive 2017-01
The Brothers Karamazov
The Brothers Karamazov, classic novel, on amazon kindle is now $10. More and more expensive. Kindle edition used to be $4 or such. Also note, this is public domain text, you can download from the web.
The Brothers Karamazov (Russian: Бра́тья Карама́зовы, Brat'ya Karamazovy, pronounced [ˈbratʲjə kərɐˈmazəvɨ]), also translated as The Karamazov Brothers, is the final novel by the Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Dostoyevsky spent nearly two years writing The Brothers Karamazov, which was published as a serial in The Russian Messenger from January 1879 to November 1880. Dostoyevsky died less than four months after its publication.
The Brothers Karamazov is a passionate philosophical novel set in 19th-century Russia, that enters deeply into the ethical debates of God, free will, and morality. It is a spiritual drama of moral struggles concerning faith, doubt, judgment, and reason, set against a modernizing Russia, with a plot which revolves around the subject of patricide. Dostoyevsky composed much of the novel in Staraya Russa, which inspired the main setting.[1] Since its publication, it has been acclaimed as one of the supreme achievements in world literature.
2017-12-15 Wikipedia The Brothers Karamazov
translational poetry, the world consumed by fire and ice
some say the world will be consumed by fire, some say ice. My understanding of desire, agrees with fire. But if consummate twice, i think i understand hatred well too and know ice's power is also bottomless.
translational poetry.
烈 火滅。但如果世界得滅 夠 會 它 也 為 ，有人說在冰 個 ， 認 滅 裡 兩 底 的 裡 有人 。 回 得 人 火 說 就 ， 了 些 在會界世 我 我 是 那 對 想 也 意同我解了的慾欲 我 力 對 壞毀的冰道知解了夠也恨仇
一笑万古春，一啼万古愁。(one smile spring comes, one cry the valley echos) sometimes, a poetic language like chinese, solves the human expression problem. While, a logical language like English, tries.
growth hacking, a new euphemism, meaning, aggressive, abusive, psychology exploiting, tactics for online marketing to grow a business.
word of the day: conviviality
I found Cohen a good listener, but a less interesting thinker, possessed of that relentless conviviality that routinely afflicts career generalists and Rhodes scholars.
prosumer, what a hateful word.
consumptive: relating to or affected with tuberculosis.
etymology of slate
mid-14c., from Old French esclate, fem. of esclat “split piece, splinter” (Modern French éclat; see slat), so called because the rock splits easily into thin plates. As an adjective, 1510s. As a color, first recorded 1813. Sense of “a writing tablet” (made of slate), first recorded late 14c., led to that of “list of preliminary candidates prepared by party managers,” first recorded 1842, from notion of being easily altered or erased. Clean slate (1856) is an image from customer accounts chalked up in a tavern.
[etymology of slate https://www.etymonline.com/word/slate]
etymology of slab
late 13c., “large, flat mass,” of unknown origin, possibly related to Old French escopel, escalpe “thin fragment of wood,” which according to Klein is possibly a Gaulish word (compare Breton scolp, Welsh ysgolp “splinter, chip”). But OED rejects this on formal grounds. Meaning “rectangular block of pre-cast concrete used in building” is from 1927. Slab-sided is “having flat sides like slabs,” hence “tall and lank” (1817, American English).
[etymology of slab https://www.etymonline.com/word/slab]
be my first patreon
now i have a patreon account. be my first patreon. see first post at https://www.patreon.com/xahlee
Pinyin 拼音, Zhuyin 注音, IPA Comparison (updated)
Segmented Sleep and Sleep Hours/Schedule Experiment
i've experimented with sleep hours and schedule since 1991. And my current sleep hours remain ephemeral.
Sometimes i sleep twice a day, 4 hours each.
Usually, my sleep hours shifts by 1 hour per day. For example, if today i sleep at 1, next day i sleep at 2, and next day i sleep at 3.
been doing these since 1991. In the first decade or two, when i was young, the intention is to reduce total hours slept.
but as i'm older, now, it's basically chaotic life habit. I sleep, when i'm tired.
of course, you can't do this if you are not a free man.
here's 2 books i found.
〔At Day's Close: Night in Times Past By A Roger Ekirch. At Buy at amazon〕
“Remarkable…Ekirch has emptied night's pockets, and laid the contents out before us.” ―Arthur Krystal, The New Yorker
Bringing light to the shadows of history through a “rich weave of citation and archival evidence” (Publishers Weekly), scholar A. Roger Ekirch illuminates the aspects of life most often overlooked by other historians―those that unfold at night. In this “triumph of social history” (Mail on Sunday), Ekirch's “enthralling anthropology” (Harper's) exposes the nightlife that spawned a distinct culture and a refuge from daily life.
Fear of crime, of fire, and of the supernatural; the importance of moonlight; the increased incidence of sickness and death at night; evening gatherings to spin wool and stories; masqued balls; inns, taverns, and brothels; the strategies of thieves, assassins, and conspirators; the protective uses of incantations, meditations, and prayers; the nature of our predecessors' sleep and dreams―Ekirch reveals all these and more in his “monumental study” (The Nation) of sociocultural history, “maintaining throughout an infectious sense of wonder” (Booklist).
〔Evening's Empire (New Studies in European History) By Craig Koslofsky. At Buy at amazon〕
What does it mean to write a history of the night? Evening's Empire is a fascinating study of the myriad ways in which early modern people understood, experienced, and transformed the night. Using diaries, letters, and legal records together with representations of the night in early modern religion, literature and art, Craig Koslofsky opens up an entirely new perspective on early modern Europe. He shows how princes, courtiers, burghers and common people 'nocturnalized' political expression, the public sphere and the use of daily time. Fear of the night was now mingled with improved opportunities for labour and leisure: the modern night was beginning to assume its characteristic shape. Evening's Empire takes the evocative history of the night into early modern politics, culture and society, revealing its importance to key themes from witchcraft, piety, and gender to colonization, race, and the Enlightenment.
word of the day: atavistic, predicated, cross-talk, banality
There may be an atavistic longing for quasi-divine kingship that surfaces in unsettled times. Especially after 9/11, with its diffuse sense of peril, we should beware of the seductive dream of the strong man or clan who will shield us from harm. Democracy is predicated on sometimes chaotic cross-talk, not on governance by fiat, the whims of a hereditary elite.
Political dynasties are mythic foster families whose princes rise and fall like flaming stars. Does it signify democracy's nostalgia for royalty? The irony is that authentic royalty, re-glamorized by Diana in the 1980s, has waned back into banality in England and everywhere else.
〔Our failed political dynasties, Pelosi's stylish appeal and George W. Bush as Queen Victoria. Plus: The hot air about global warming. By Camille Paglia. At http://www.salon.com/2007/04/11/global_warming_14/ , accessed on 2017-05-17〕
Classic Paglia, u no unstand!
The Adventure of the German Student (added illustration)
The Arabian Nights (updated intro)
“whatso woman willeth, the same she fulfilleth, however man nilleth. ” from Story Of King Shahryar And His Brother
rereading arabian nights. truly a wonderful story. I spent a year annotating it in 2005. Story Of King Shahryar And His Brother
The Thousand-and-Second Tale of Scheherazade By Edgar Allan Poe (added artwork)
coöperation and preëxisting! the art of diaeresis.
The Masque of the Red Death (added many illustrations)
〔Talking in Euphemisms Can Chip Away at Your Sense of Morality By Laura Niemi, Alek Chakroff, And Liane Young. At http://nymag.com/scienceofus/2017/04/indirect-speech-talking-in-euphemisms.html , accessed on 2017-04-12〕
word of the day: acquiescing. see Word of the Day
word of the day: • beguiling • patchwork • floundering
see Word of the Day
word of the day: • galvanized • pugnacious • relishes • muckraker • facile
see Word of the Day
Hegel and the Girls
Orthography, narrowly, means correct spelling according to established usage. Broadly, It includes capitalization, word breaks, emphasis, punctuation.
Alaeddin; Or, The Wonderful Lamp (new navigation bar)
The Tragedy Of Titus Andronicus (new navigation bar)
Alice in Wonderland, and Through the Looking-Glass (new navigation bar)
The Time Machine by H G Wells (also updated with nav bar. Added more pictures.)
FLATLAND: A Romance of Many Dimensions
Classic scifi. Make you understand 4 dimensions by analogy. Now new navbar.
神奇的二维国 中文版.(Flatland Chinese version). 神奇的二维国 (Flatland)
Gulliver's Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. New navigation bar.
西游记 (Journey to the West; Monkey King) (page redesigned)
How to Tell the Difference Between Chinese, Japanese, Korean? (updated)
the Story of Cupid and Psyche, by Lucius Apuleius (~123 to 180). Classic story.
“Paglia presents herself as a willing academic pariah”
books on writing you liked?
what are some of books on writing? any related to writing, style, grammar, words, linguistics, etc. Suggest away. must be you've read.
comment at:
https://x.com/xah_lee/status/836384960386740225
https://plus.google.com/+XahLee/posts/Zq5qaA9hgkv
see SAT Words
etymology of manual: manus = hand. Handbook.
[etymology of manual https://www.etymonline.com/word/manual]
Arabian Nights, The Tale Of The Ensorceled Prince
Chinese Text 瘟疫論 (On Plague Dieases), 1642. beginning of bacteria/virus study. https://zh.wikisource.org/zh/瘟疫論_(四庫全書本)
amazing that Chinese text thousand years back we can still understand some 60% sans training. this has significant impact on culture.