December 12, 2011
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Further proof that nothing is truly new: oh, crafty hipsters, you thought you were the first ones to rock owl-covered everything? Owl patch for your bag? Owl tattoo? Knitted owl prophylactic holder? (I may own one of these.) May I present to you CLARA BOW WEARING A HAT OF AN OWL EATING A RAT. Like a boss, 1920s style…like a boss.
June 15, 2011
I usually find attempts to make literature all modern and techy and NEW MEDIA! a little desperate, but this Salon article’s description of a digital version of "The Waste Land", complete with audio performances and visual aids of Ezra Pound’s edits, may have just changed my mind. I remember having to create an annotated version in high school, and having to write in teeeeeensy-tiny letters to fit in all my notes on classical references, earlier drafts, and connections to contemporary history.
I also—and this is probably coming out of my recent viva-studying and associated academic pretension—think it’s particularly fascinating because of how it might provide a workaround for the marginalia dilemma. Notes in the margins or footnotes can often provide useful information for a reader, but the act of providing side information simultaneously distracts the reader from the actual text and places the text underneath the commentary in a hierarchy of time and/or knowledge. Oh god, and there goes my scholarly voice, I REALLY CAN’T STOP IT—but anyone who’s struggled to stop themselves from automatically checking every last gloss, even when they already know what the word being glossed means, knows what I’m talking about. There’s something about providing background knowledge that assumes the reader needs that knowledge, which I think has the potential to create quite a misleading relationship between the writer (or editor, or translator) and the reader.
To be able to provide a text that offers historical or linguistic background without forcing it onto the page with the text, though—that’s a really interesting idea. And note that Miller suggests a digital version of “The Canterbury Tales” as another text ripe for exploring—now, that I can definitely get behind. My boyfriend does keep saying he and I should find a techy project to work on together—I may have to tell him I’ve found just the one…
March 16, 2011
I was born in 1981. This means you can safely assume a few things about me. I remember being in classrooms with the U.S.S.R. taking over the right side of the map. I, if pressed, could probably still write a program to make a turtle draw a little circle for you. And if I can’t, it’s because I spent way too much time drowning oxen and letting little Jonathan die of smallpox on my way to Oregon. Oh that’s right, kids, I just opened a post with an Oregon Trail reference.
Oh Oregon Trail. So low-tech, so cheesy, so full of pixellated hunting carnage. (As a side note, I’d like to mention, as someone who’s been a vegetarian since age eleven, I am waaaay too good at downing rabbits when it’s time to hunt my settlers up some meat.) I think spending my formative years debating the merits of different types of river fording have left me with a deep appreciation for any computer game that is aggressively anti-fast graphics and/or heavily reliant on ticky boxes.
If you, too, get a nostalgic thrill out of references to dysentery, then allow me to point you to my new favorite games: the “Mind Your Manners!” tests on the Musee McCord Museum’s website.
Jezebel recently linked to the Victorian version, which is how I stumbled upon this completely awesome site. (What is the museum? I…have not clicked ahead that far yet.) Basically, you choose to be a man or a woman, then have to navigate three or four different social arenas (family dinner, nightclub, train station…) and successfully pick the best way to respond to tricky etiquette dilemmas. This often involves picking the appropriate outfit from a small collection. It. Is. AMAZING. The Victorian version is delightful, but less challenging than the Twenties option—if you are a nice Victorian lady or gentleman, it’s safe to bet the least aggressive option is the right one (dismembered finger in your soup at the dinner party? Quietly set it on your plate and hope you haven’t drawn attention to yourself!). Meanwhile, by the Roaring Twenties certain manners are changing, so modesty is no longer the way to draw a gentleman’s attention—silk stockings, lipstick, and a bucket of gin will do nicely, toots.
Also, I must point out, at the end of the Victorian version you climb up a series of ladders and clouds to illustrate your social standing, and if you get to the highest level (which I have, for both sexes, because I am a model of nineteenth-century-decorum, you dirty bitches) then you are joined by a crowd of Victorians who proceed to cackle and bounce up and down like some third-generation Monty Python animation. It is GLORIOUS. I have been playing it all day.
