The strange thing is that these moments of love and loss are not the place where language finds its truest expression of meaning but are in fact the place where meaning itself starts to break down, where language as a whole reveals its incapacities. The cliché is a marker, or a stand-in, for something we aren’t sure how to express. Whether the message is pre-printed or one we resort to writing ourselves, clichés appear where words fail. In this way, greeting cards function as material testament to the lack of articulation at the heart of human experience, drawing attention to the gap between language and life.
Category: words
Is Conspiracy Fiction Dangerous In The Post-Truth Era?
Ned Beauman, who writes conspiracy novels: “When we observe the Alt-Right questioning the established facts and the established world order, the last thing we should do is offer them a monopoly on that attitude. Nonetheless, if I had just written a novel that extolled, say, the spiritual joys of being alone with nature, and meanwhile enormous numbers of ill-prepared people were being found dead in the woods after succumbing to snakebites or dehydration, I might try to introduce some balance into my next paean to the wilderness.”
Barbara Tuchman’s ‘The March Of Folly’, Even After 34 Years, Is All Too Relevant
“‘Wooden-headedness’ in statecraft, which she defined as ‘assessing a situation in terms of preconceived fixed notions while ignoring or rejecting any contrary signs,’ has clearly become a prevailing factor in our politics. As Tuchman wrote, wooden-headedness was best captured in a remark about Philip II of Spain: ‘No experience of the failure of his policy could shake his belief in its essential excellence.'” Historian Jon Meacham argues why “there is a lesson here not only for the president but for the people.”
How People With Depression Use Language Differently
Psychology researcher Mohammed Al-Mosaiwi writes about what computerized data analysis has revealed about the words and phrases depressives use, and about the practical uses for that knowledge.
Lost Work By Galen, Father Of Medical Science, Found In Ancient Monks’ Hymnbook
A translation into Syriac of one of the 2nd-century Greek physician’s treatises has been discovered as a palimpsest on the pages of an 11th-century Syriac psalter that once belonged to the Monastery of St. Catherine in the Sinai. Researchers at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory in Silicon Valley are now scanning the book to recover as much text as possible.
Is There A Short Story Renaissance? Not Really
“[This] isn’t to say 2017 wasn’t a good year for the short story – it was, but the ‘renaissance of the short story’ story is an old one that is rolled out year after year. Does that matter? I think it does. By getting caught up in this recurring phantom narrative” – because the genre never really faded – “and dwelling on press release froth rather than the work being produced, we spurn the opportunity to talk about short stories in a way that might actually deepen how they are understood and engaged with by readers.”
Merriam-Webster Dictionary Admits 850 New Words, Including ‘Embiggen’
“The official ruling … gives embiggen the long-overdue recognition it deserves for being both an incredibly useful word and one of the greatest things to come out of The Simpsons. Though embiggen has definitely enjoyed more popularity because of its frequent use in Ms. Marvel, the word was first introduced (in a modern pop cultural context) in ‘Lisa the Iconoclast,’ the sixteenth episode of The Simpsons‘ seventh season.”
India’s New Literary Prize Is Its Richest (By Far)
The JCB Prize for Literature will recognize (the jury’s choice of) the best work of fiction by an Indian author either written in or translated into English from an Indian language. The winning author will receive 2.5 million rupees ($38,500), and the translator (if applicable) wins 500,000 rupees ($7,700). The aim is not only to promote Indian literature, but to encourage translations between Indian languages and into English.
Project Gutenberg Blocks All Users In Germany
The website, which makes literary works in the public domain available free of charge to users anywhere, was sued by a German publisher for offering books by Thomas Mann, whose works are out of copyright in the U.S. (where Gutenberg is based) but not in Germany. Late last week, a German court ruled in favor of the publisher, and Project Gutenberg made itself unavailable in the the Federal Republic.
Indy Bookstore Boom: Shakespeare & Co. To Open Three More Stores
Like the flagship store, all three new Shakespeare bookstores will be about 3,000 sq. ft. and will have a café with seating and Wi-Fi, as well as a book machine and carefully selected inventory. In addition, a standalone Shakespeare grab-and-go café will open this summer near the Lexington Avenue store, which is the official brick-and-mortar store for Hunter College. The café will be located outside the Hunter College Subway Station.