In this issue:
George and Ira's Dad <WAS: Today in History -- Dec 13>
Re: Today in History -- Dec 15
Re: Chat: British history Druids
Picnic at Hanging Rock (movie)
Re: Picnic at Hanging Rock (movie)
RE: Gerald Dickens Performs in Wilmington, Delaware
Re: Today in History -- Dec 15
Re: A non-literary(sort of)query
Today in History -- Dec 16
Stoker's Jewel of Seven Stars
Re: Stoker's Jewel of Seven Stars
RE: Picnic at Hanging Rock (movie)
RE: Stoker's Jewel of Seven Stars
Re: Stoker's Jewel of Seven Stars
RE: Picnic at Hanging Rock (movie)
Novels with two endings
Re: Novels with two endings
Re: A non-literary(sort of)query
Re: Re: Novels with two endings
Nell Shipman <WAS:Today in History -- Dec 16>
RE: Novels with two endings
Re: Re: Novels with two endings
Wicker Man
Re: Nell Shipman <WAS:Today in History -- Dec 16>
Chat: Wicker Man and current stories
Re: Novels with two endings
Re: Novels with two endings
Re: Re: Re: Novels with two endings
Re: Re: Novels with two endings
Re: Re: Re: Novels with two endings
Chat Re: Re: Re: Novels with two endings
Re: Chat Re: Re: Re: Novels with two endings
Re: Nell Shipman <WAS:Today in History -- Dec 16>
Today in History -- Dec 17
-----------------------------THE POSTS-----------------------------
Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1999 10:11:07 -0700
From: sdavies(at)MtRoyal.AB.CA
Subject: George and Ira's Dad <WAS: Today in History -- Dec 13>
Bob C. notes George Gershwin's premiere of "An American in Paris" on this day in
1928.
I have to relat an anecdote about the Gershwin family which will be suitable for
retailing during the party season if you can master the accent.
As George and Ira were having their first successes with pop songs in the
1920's, they grew immensely rich, very quickly. They proudly bought their
father a new roadster, which he incorrigibly drove too quickly thru the streets
of New York.
Gershwin senior was pulled over for driving thru a red light, and grew indignant
with the traffic cop. <With accent>"You can't do this to me! Don't you know who
I am? I'm George Gershwin's father!"
To which the impressed cop replies: "Who? Judge Gershwin? Oh, I'm sorry." And
he let him go.
Stephen
mailto:SDavies(at)mtroyal.ab.ca
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Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1999 10:07:25 -0800 From: Patricia Teter <PTeter(at)getty.edu> Subject: Re: Today in History -- Dec 15 Bob C. wrote: << In 1892 J. Paul Getty, business tycoon (Hey, Patricia, any celebrations at the Museum?)>> Sadly, no, however, my department usually raises a glass to J. Paul and the old days at the Getty. How far we have come since those days, when Mr. Getty hesitated buying a box of pencils for the Curator! He also had a pay phone installed at his home at Sutton Place for guests. He certainly believed in saving his money! :-) best, Patricia
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Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1999 13:27:52 -0500 (EST)
From: Robert Champ <rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu>
Subject: Re: Chat: British history Druids
I admit that despite being of Celtic origin myself I don't know a great
deal about the Celts, at least not as much as Deborah, James, and others
on the list. I do have a sense of Caesar's _Gallic Wars_, however, having
translated a good deal of it in second year Latin class. Caesar may have
made up the burning scenario, but his writing reveals a man for whom such
imaginative flights of invention would have been rare indeed. His book
was pretty much composed on the march. He was a soldier, looking at
peoples, customs, landscapes from a practical view: What do I need to know
in order to be successful in a particular campaign? Who are the leaders in
such and such a society and can they be bargained with? Where should I
deploy my troops. The _Gallic Wars_ does not read like the sort of book in
which a man would indulge in fancies.
Caesar was going to slaughter the Celts, and it has been suggested that he
may have presented a picture of the Celts as barbarous in order to justify
his acts. But there is material enough to suggest that barbarous customs
were common in the ancient world and to note that if Caesar intended
using sacrificial burnings as an excuse, he would have made a very poor
case.
Bob C.
On Wed, 15 Dec 1999, James Rogers wrote:
>
> The practice of burning "Midsummer giants" provided a fascinating
> passage in Frazer....who has the virtue of being in our period. Although he
> cannot bear out the sacrificial references in Caesar and Strabo, he is
> clearly of the opinion that the ritual was a real one. The most interesting
> aspect, I thought, was that this custom survived very, very far into
> historical times, minus the human victims. Though a lot of Frazer has been
> nibbled to death by later scholars his argument here seemed pretty cogent
> to me.
>
_________________________________________________
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Robert L. Champ
rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu
Editor, teacher, anglophile, human curiosity
Whatever things are pure, whatever things are
lovely, whatever things are of good report, if
there is any virtue and if there is anything
praiseworthy, meditate on these things
Philippians 4:8
rchamp7927(at)aol.com robertchamp(at)netscape.net
_________________________________________________
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Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1999 12:41:58 -0800 From: Alan Gullette <alang(at)creative.net> Subject: Picnic at Hanging Rock (movie) I have always loved this movie and counted it among my favorites due to the haunting quality and the lingering mystery of what actually happened. How disappointing that the book upon which it is based is fiction! Knowing that something is fiction which is presented as fact surely makes the "willing suspension of disbelief" more difficult to attain, and in this case I wonder if I'll continue to rank this movie so highly... (Thanks a lot, Deborah!) (In general, I don't believe in the supernatural, but one cannot deny the feelings one gets from good supernatural literature -- and films!)
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Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1999 14:02:44 -0700 From: Deborah McMillion Nering <deborah(at)alice.gloaming.com> Subject: Re: Picnic at Hanging Rock (movie) >How disappointing that the book upon which it is based >is fiction!I wonder if I'll continue to >rank this movie so highly... (Thanks a lot, Deborah!) Sooo, sorry! But the original "Haunting" isn't based on something true and it's still a marvelous movie. I understand the movie, Picnic, has been reissued and is enjoying a revival. True or not it's a beautifully done movie and that shouldn't affect it's power. When I read the book I was surprised to find it was a fiction...has anyone read the missing chapter about how Joan Lindsay 'solved' the mystery? I haven't seen a copy of this yet and am tempted to order the new paperback from AmazonUK. It's sort of like the 'first' and 'second' endings of Bram Stoker's JEWEL OF THE SEVENTH STAR (another nonfiction story!). I find the original ending of this far more mysterious and edgy but I have to say I find more comfort in the second (and as a lover of mummy stories it's nice once in awhile when the poor dead, dry person isn't some misunderstood killer!). Deborah Deborah McMillion deborah(at)gloaming.com http://www.gloaming.com/deborah.html
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Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1999 15:53:36 -0700
From: sdavies(at)MtRoyal.AB.CA
Subject: RE: Gerald Dickens Performs in Wilmington, Delaware
- ---------------------- Forwarded by Stephen Davies/Academic/MRC on 12/15/99
09:18 AM ---------------------------
Date: Fri, 10 Dec 1999 18:05:25 -0500 (EST)
Subject: RE: Gerald Dickens Performs in Wilmington, Delaware
To: Gaslight-announce(at)mtroyal.ab.ca, VICTORIA(at)listserv.indiana.edu,
DICKNS-L(at)ucsbvm.ucsb.edu
http://www.delaforum.com/magazine/columns/column%2011-26.htmColumn:
Dickens
http://www.delaforum.com/magazine/columns/column%2011-26.htm
Here is a link to an online review of the Gerald Dickens November 26, 1999
performance at the Riverfront Arts Center in Wilmington, Delaware. There are
some great pictures.
He was wonderful and the three generation audience was spellbound for a hour.
Carol Digel
LoracLegid(at)aol.com
www.focdarley.org
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Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1999 23:13:07 -0500 (EST) From: Zozie(at)aol.com Subject: Re: Today in History -- Dec 15 From *that* calendar, another birthday... poet, author Muriel Rukeyser, born 1913. phoebe
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Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1999 21:42:29 -0700 From: Guy Boss <gboss(at)uswest.net> Subject: Re: A non-literary(sort of)query Ann Hilgeman wrote: > A friend is searching for a book that contains information on medical > practices of the American Civil War period. She's searched the web to no > avail, asked medical professionals, and still can't find out information > like--did they use ether or chloroform. I know of no book, but when I worked for the Univ of Michigan Medical Library in the 70s they had several years worth of a journal published by, if I remember correctly, the Union Army's Medical Corp. From what I read in it they did not use ether or chloroform routinely. And John Barclay replied: > American Civil war medicine was very crude. As the idea of germs was not > known sergons often infected thier patients as they were treating them. Most > drugs were unknown and certinly in short supply, wounds were usually treated > by amputation and cauterising. I think you are making it sound better than it was. The article that I remember most completely involved the saving of a man's leg. While the man was a civilian worker in a foundry casting cannons, they felt the technique might be applicable to military hospitals. A bucket of molten iron had swung against his leg burning it down to the bone. The conventional treatment would have been to immediately amputate the leg, but for reasons I forget a more radical treatment was decided upon. The article gives a day by day description of treatment that would send all but the most hard-hearted HMO director running for safety. Let's just say it involved letting the wound drain, keeping the bigger bits of filth out of it, and -- sorry, I don't remember an 'and.' The thing I do remember is that the record states that on Day 23 the man's sheets were changed, and, as a result, his morale seemed to improve. Going back to my dark corner in the stacks. Guy
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 02:10:43 -0500 (EST) From: Robert Champ <rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu> Subject: Today in History -- Dec 16 Interesting things that happened December 16th: Birthdays on this date: In 1770 Ludwig von Beethoven (in Bonn, Germany), composer In 1775 Jane Austen (in England), novelist (Pride and Prejudice) In 1863 George Santayana, philosopher, poet, humanist In 1871 Ernest Shipman, film producer (Back to God's Country) In 1899 Sir Noel Coward, playwright In 1900 V.S. Pritchett, literary critic In 1901 Margaret Mead, anthropologist (Coming of Age in Samoa) In 1913 George Ignatieff, diplomat In 1917 Arthur C. Clarke, science-fiction author (2001, Childhood's End) Events worth noting: In 1857 Earthquake in Naples, Italy. In 1864 Battle of Nashville. In 1893 Anton Dvorak's "New World Symphony" premieres. In 1905 "Variety", covering all phases of show business, first published. In 1907 Great White Fleet sails from Hampton Downs on it's World Cruise. In 1909 US pressure forces Nicaraguan Pres Jos? Santos Zelaya from office. In 1911 South Pole first reached, by Norwegian Roald Amundsen.
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 10:42:33 -0600 From: Andy Duncan <dunca012(at)bama.ua.edu> Subject: Stoker's Jewel of Seven Stars >===== Original Message From Deborah McMillion ===== >It's sort of like the 'first' and 'second' endings of Bram Stoker's >JEWEL OF THE SEVENTH STAR (another nonfiction story!). I find the >original ending of this far more mysterious and edgy but I have to >say I find more comfort in the second (and as a lover of mummy >stories it's nice once in awhile when the poor dead, dry person isn't >some misunderstood killer!). I have a copy of the 1989 edition of this novel, a Carroll & Graf mass-market paperback, but I didn't realize that multiple endings existed. My copy concludes with a chapter titled "The Great Experiment" and the words: "She dreamed her dream; and that is all that any of us can ask!" I'd be interested to find out more about the other ending(s). I'd also be interested to know how this novel could be considered a "nonfiction story." Was it purportedly based on fact, or advertised as such initially? -- Andy Andy Duncan Department of English Box 870244 103 Morgan Hall University of Alabama Tuscaloosa, AL 35487 andrew.duncan(at)ua.edu www.angelfire.com/al/andyduncan
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 09:58:38 -0700 From: Deborah McMillion Nering <deborah(at)alice.gloaming.com> Subject: Re: Stoker's Jewel of Seven Stars > I'd be interested to find out more about the other ending(s). There are so many new editions of this book on Amazon that I can't tell which paperbacks include both endings. I know the Oxford version I got last year had both. The Clive Leatherdale has great annotations as well as the original ending and the 'happy ending'. Your copy sounds like it is the 'happy' ending. Does he get married in the end?--then it's the happy one. >"nonfiction story." Sorry...that was actually an error...I meant FICTION, it's another fiction, as in not true. Typo! Typo! Deborah Deborah McMillion deborah(at)gloaming.com http://www.gloaming.com/deborah.html
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 10:54:47 -0600 From: Andy Duncan <dunca012(at)bama.ua.edu> Subject: RE: Picnic at Hanging Rock (movie) >===== Original Message From Alan Gullette ===== >How disappointing that the book upon which it is based >is fiction! Knowing that something is fiction which is presented >as fact surely makes the "willing suspension of disbelief" more >difficult to attain, and in this case I wonder if I'll continue to >rank this movie so highly... (Thanks a lot, Deborah!) I tend to be delighted by fiction that masquerades as fact, as so much gaslight-era fiction does -- all those diary entries and Afghan-veteran memoirs and mss. found in bottles and so on. Most recently I was delighted by _The Blair Witch Project_ and its televised companion, _Curse of the Blair Witch_ -- a marvelous conceit. But on the odd occasion when I belatedly find out I've been "had," that something marketed as non-fiction was actually fiction -- as was the case with Stevenson's _Man Called Intrepid_, for example, or Kermit Schafer's old "blooper" albums -- I have indeed felt resentful and angry. It's the difference, I suppose, between being in on the joke and being the butt of the joke. Many credulous teens, upon finding out _Blair Witch_ wasn't "real," apparently felt they, too, had been "had." -- Andy Andy Duncan Department of English Box 870244 103 Morgan Hall University of Alabama Tuscaloosa, AL 35487 andrew.duncan(at)ua.edu www.angelfire.com/al/andyduncan
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 10:57:52 -0600 From: Andy Duncan <dunca012(at)bama.ua.edu> Subject: RE: Stoker's Jewel of Seven Stars >===== Original Message From Deborah McMillion ===== >Your copy sounds like it is the 'happy' ending. Does he get married >in the end?--then it's the happy one. Yes, indeed: "In the autumn Margaret and I were married. On the occasion she wore the mummy robe and zone and the jewel which Queen Tera had worn in her hair." And so on. Well, this is good to know; I'll keep my eye out for other editions. Thanks. -- Andy Andy Duncan Department of English Box 870244 103 Morgan Hall University of Alabama Tuscaloosa, AL 35487 andrew.duncan(at)ua.edu www.angelfire.com/al/andyduncan
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 11:04:25 -0600 From: Chris Carlisle <CarlislC(at)psychiatry1.wustl.edu> Subject: Re: Stoker's Jewel of Seven Stars Though I won't spoil anyone's fun by going into deep detail about the original ending, I'll just say it's one of my favorites in horror fiction. It gives me a pleasurable frisson just to think of it. The first time I saw the second ending I felt betrayed as a reader! Kiwi
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 10:08:18 -0700 From: Deborah McMillion Nering <deborah(at)alice.gloaming.com> Subject: RE: Picnic at Hanging Rock (movie) > when I belatedly find out I've been "had," that something marketed >as non-fiction was actually fiction -- I have indeed felt resentful >and angry. I haven't seen Picnic in a few years, does the movie pass itself off as true? I do remember hearing the rumor it was based on a true story but...I had the book which said not. Deborah Deborah McMillion deborah(at)gloaming.com http://www.gloaming.com/deborah.html
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 11:33:54 -0600 From: Chris Carlisle <CarlislC(at)psychiatry1.wustl.edu> Subject: Novels with two endings We've read a few novels here by A. A. Merrit, and I'd like to mention one of his novels that has the same problem as Jewel of Seven Stars, i.e. two endings. The earliest edition OCLC lists is 1924, not too far out of our period. There's a paperback edition I bought a copy of in the 1980's which gives the story a happy ending, rather than the wonderful, sad, melodramatic ending of its original. BTW, if you can find the lovely 1949 "Memorial Edition" with the illustrations by Virgil Finlay (often this is the edition in libraries and it's pretty available from book dealers), do it!! They enhance the story wonderfully. Too bad editors and publishers feel they have to interfere in the interest of "what the public wants". I can just see the fiends urging Stoker and Merritt to get rid of that nasty original ending so they can market the book to a wider and less sophisticated group of readers. Sigh. Kiwi
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 10:49:36 -0700 From: Deborah McMillion Nering <deborah(at)alice.gloaming.com> Subject: Re: Novels with two endings >Too bad editors and publishers feel they have >to interfere in the interest of "what the public >wants". I'm sure you also are aware of the ending changes for movies, as well. The prime example I remember was Hitchcock's "Suspicion" with Cary Grant and Joan Fontaine. If you've ever read the book this movie was based on you know it had a very creepy, rather nasty ending. Hitchcock was originally going to use this ending but it was so nasty and creepy and, well, Cary Grant? It just wasn't going to happen. Frankly that ending left such an awful taste in my mouth I was grateful for the one in the movie (but that's personal taste). Sometimes it seems as if some new books end on a downer just to be 'cool' and manipulative to get you to 'feel' something artificially. Especially if the characters are not well developed. Kill them and that will bring a tear to the eye. But other times it becomes cloying when editors or movie companies have to make things palatable for us. Imagine something like MY COUSIN RACHAEL with a happy ending? Are there other books, from our era or close, that suffer this fate of changes? I can see it happening more easily in a movie but it seems very strange that they would change a book. Deborah Deborah McMillion deborah(at)gloaming.com http://www.gloaming.com/deborah.html
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 09:53:30 -0800 From: Telyn <telyn(at)gte.net> Subject: Re: A non-literary(sort of)query There is a National Museum of Civil War Medicine in Frederick, Maryland. In addition to a lot of really grim and grizzly exhibits, they have a good bookstore. Their web page is at: http://www.civilwarmed.org/. (I'm new to the list, and still feel a bit like Alice wandering into the Queen's croquet-ground, but I've enjoyed the discussions so far very much, and I'm very glad to be here!) Suzanne > > Ann Hilgeman wrote: > > > A friend is searching for a book that contains information on medical > > practices of the American Civil War period. She's searched the web to no > > avail, asked medical professionals, and still can't find out information > > like--did they use ether or chloroform. > > I know of no book, but when I worked for the Univ of Michigan Medical > Library in the 70s they had several years worth of a journal published > by, if I remember correctly, the Union Army's Medical Corp. From what I > read in it they did not use ether or chloroform routinely. > - -- Suzanne Guldimann telyn(at)gte.net
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 13:03:31 -0500 (EST) From: Zozie(at)aol.com Subject: Re: Re: Novels with two endings In a message dated 12/16/99 5:52:54 PM, you wrote: <<Are there other books, from our era or close, that suffer this fate of changes? I can see it happening more easily in a movie but it seems very strange that they would change a book.>> Wasn't there a flap about Dreiser's Sister Carrie? phoebe
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 11:25:35 -0700
From: sdavies(at)MtRoyal.AB.CA
Subject: Nell Shipman <WAS:Today in History -- Dec 16>
Bob C. mentions that today is Ernest G. Shipman's birthday. I can't find that
he ever produced many films, but he must be related to Nell Shipman whom I
mentioned in March of this year. Her film _Back to God's country_ (1919) was
restored by the Canadian Film Institute recently; being a popular film of its
day, and not an art film, it has suffered the neglect that most film product
receives. It was first marketed with the tagline "Is nude rude?"
Try this link at
http://www.infoculture.cbc.ca/archives/theatre/theatre_03151999_pollockm.html to
find more about her.
She was a member of a touring vaudeville group which took her from Victoria,
B.C., and finally to pre-Hollywood Hollywood, Ca (c. 1912). She stopped acting
during her pregnancy, (giving birth to prolific screenwiter, Barry Shipman) but
returned to films as a director/producer and eventually a popular actress. She
collected a menagerie of animals which she transferred to her new base in Idaho
and incorporated into her independent movies. She had four husbands, so I'll
guess Ernest was one of the first.
The Nell Shipman exhibit in Glendale, Ca. has several items from the Boise State
University. This quotation is probably taken from her autobiography, _The
Silent Screen and My Talking Heart: An Autobiography._
http://www.ci.glendale.ca.us/doctors_house/nell/Page4b.html
Shipman took her art very seriously, but rarely herself. Self-mockingly, she
describes her script of _Under the Crescent_
about an American actress who marries an Egyptian prince: "I . . . plunked the
lady into a harem, veiled her, abused her,
put her through a series of nerve-shattering adventures by stirring in parts
of the British Army, added an American lover and
spiced the potage with intrigue, poison, passion, dancing houris and most
everything Universal's set department and
wardrobe might devise."
Stephen D
mailto:SDavies(at)mtroyal.ab.ca
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 12:40:41 -0600 From: Andy Duncan <dunca012(at)bama.ua.edu> Subject: RE: Novels with two endings >===== Original Message From Deborah McMillion ===== >I'm sure you also are aware of the ending changes for movies, as >well. The prime example I remember was Hitchcock's "Suspicion" with >Cary Grant and Joan Fontaine. If you've ever read the book this >movie was based on you know it had a very creepy, rather nasty >ending. Hitchcock was originally going to use this ending but it was >so nasty and creepy and, well, Cary Grant? It just wasn't going to >happen. The DVD of Hitchcock's _Vertigo_ includes an alternate ending, filmed but not used, in which Scotty goes to Mitch's apartment after the second plunge from the tower, and a radio announcer describes the arrest of Gavin Ulster in Europe. This must be one of the rare instances in which the MORE disturbing ending was used, because the final shot of the released version strongly implies that Scotty is about to fall/jump from the tower himself. Of course, Hitchcock had a lot more clout in Hollywood when he made _Vertigo_ than when he made _Suspicion_, and was his own producer to boot. More often than not, though, Hollywood opts for the safer ending, as with _Suspicion_ or Siegel's _Invasion of the Body Snatchers_ -- or even something as innocuous as _Notting Hill_, which I watched last night on DVD, complete with excised scenes. The _Notting Hill_ ending that wasn't used was more subtle and ambiguous than the happy-happy music video that now, somewhat jarringly, ends the movie. -- Andy Andy Duncan Department of English Box 870244 103 Morgan Hall University of Alabama Tuscaloosa, AL 35487 andrew.duncan(at)ua.edu www.angelfire.com/al/andyduncan
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 13:48:47 +0300 From: cbishop(at)interlog.com (Carroll Bishop) Subject: Re: Re: Novels with two endings >In a message dated 12/16/99 5:52:54 PM, you wrote: > ><<Are there other books, from our era or close, that suffer this fate >of changes? I can see it happening more easily in a movie but it >seems very strange that they would change a book.>> Haven't been following this conversation, but aren't there two endings to THE FRENCH LIEUTENANT'S WOMAN? Deliberately as I remember....but it was a long time ago. Carroll
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Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1999 00:49:15 +0000 From: Simon Coleman-Smith <simon(at)dryadsbubble.freeserve.co.uk> Subject: Wicker Man Seconded (thirded? fourthed?) on the recommendation of this film. One of my wife's and my faves. Jolly frightening, atmospheric, disturbing, and you get to see Britt Ekland's chest (tho' not her bum -- that was a double), so I'm happy :-) Cracking soundtrack for any folkies out there too, and at least one musical in-joke: as Sergeant Howie is being led to the final venue, the tune the band plays is Willie o' Winsbury. But it's more famously (slightly!) done by Fairport Convention with words by Richard Thompson as the appropriate 'Farewell Farewell'. Go for the longest version you can, there's far too much left out of the 90-odd minute cut. TTFN, Simon PS Not that I'm not enjoying the history and film stuff, but aren't we supposed to be discussing certain stories? :-) (Don't want to cause a feline/avian interface here but . . . )
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 13:09:06 -0600 From: athan chilton <ayc(at)UIUC.EDU> Subject: Re: Nell Shipman <WAS:Today in History -- Dec 16> , dancing houris and most >everything Universal's set department and > wardrobe might devise." Cousin Roger's channeler would like to see this film in order to ascertain who the 'dancing houris' might have been in real life, if they were given screen credit. A number of Middle Eastern dancers appeared in Hollywood films some decades ago, and were very likely high points in such cinematic productions. I wonder if "Under the Crescent" is available anywhere--or at least its cast list?? ayc(at)uiuc.edu
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 12:27:52 -0700 From: Deborah McMillion Nering <deborah(at)alice.gloaming.com> Subject: Chat: Wicker Man and current stories >PS Not that I'm not enjoying the history and film stuff, but aren't we >supposed to be discussing certain stories? :-) (Don't want to cause a >feline/avian interface here but . . . ) We can under the offline: "Chat". I am not up to date on what story we are reading this week...when were we reading SLEEPY HOLLOW? What are we reading? I'd rather chat discussions than nothing at all. All to often things used to shut down over Xmas and I'd be left on Gaslight all alone with good old Gildy and we'd talk about anything. At least under the chat we have been touching back to the Gaslight era back and forth--Bram Stoker and PICNIC are both connected there. But I would be delighted to discuss the next story...lead on Simon? Deborah Deborah McMillion deborah(at)gloaming.com http://www.gloaming.com/deborah.html
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 14:36:48 -0500 (EST)
From: Robert Champ <rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu>
Subject: Re: Novels with two endings
One of the most famous novels of our era, Dickens's _Great Expectations_,
has two endings. In the first ending Pip and Estella meet by chance.
Estella is in her carriage and sees Pip walking along with Joe and Biddy's
son. She assumes the boy belongs to Pip and that Pip is married. The two
part, somewhat amiably but with the clear understanding (on the part of
both readers and characters) that they will not meet again.
Enter Edward Bulwer-Lytton (a writer we know well both for his glory and
his literary pap). Bulwer-Lytton convinced Dickens that his audience
would never go for an ending that saw Pip and Estella part for good. So
Dickens produced another ending in which the two meet at the
ruins of Satis House, Miss Havisham's old house, where they first met.
The conversation between them provides for an ambiguous ending, with
Estella insisting that they "will continue friends, apart" whereas Pip
says, in what is possibly the most gorgeous concluding line in all of
Dickens, "...I could not see the shadow of another parting from her." In
other words, Dickens tries to have his cake and eat it, too--hinting at
his original ending through Estella and leaving readers with the
possibility of an eventual union in Pip's last line.
Since _Great Expectations_ is, to a great extent, about partings, the
first ending makes more sense; but the second ending is one of the best
pieces of writing Dickens ever did. I have to go with the second, though
somewhat uncomfortable with it.
The Penguin edition of _Great Expectations_ has both endings (the original
in an appendix).
Bob C.
On Thu, 16 Dec 1999, Chris Carlisle wrote:
> We've read a few novels here by A. A. Merrit,
> and I'd like to mention one of his novels that
> has the same problem as Jewel of Seven Stars,
> i.e. two endings. The earliest edition OCLC
> lists is 1924, not too far out of our period.
>
_________________________________________________
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Robert L. Champ
rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu
Editor, teacher, anglophile, human curiosity
Whatever things are pure, whatever things are
lovely, whatever things are of good report, if
there is any virtue and if there is anything
praiseworthy, meditate on these things
Philippians 4:8
rchamp7927(at)aol.com robertchamp(at)netscape.net
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 12:55:10 -0700 From: Deborah McMillion Nering <deborah(at)alice.gloaming.com> Subject: Re: Novels with two endings > "...I could not see the shadow of another parting from her." Interesting, because I think one could almost interpret this line as "I couldn't bear to be parted from her again; therefore, we shall not meet again, so we shall not be parted again." That's what I thought it meant. Deborah Deborah McMillion deborah(at)gloaming.com http://www.gloaming.com/deborah.html
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 16:35:12 -0500 (EST) From: Zozie(at)aol.com Subject: Re: Re: Re: Novels with two endings In a message dated 12/16/99 6:50:48 PM, you wrote: <<Deliberately as I remember....but it was a long time ago.>> Yes. I thought it worked. phoebe
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 16:38:46 -0500 (EST) From: Zozie(at)aol.com Subject: Re: Re: Novels with two endings In a message dated 12/16/99 7:38:52 PM, you wrote: <<Since _Great Expectations_ is, to a great extent, about partings, the first ending makes more sense; but the second ending is one of the best pieces of writing Dickens ever did. I have to go with the second, though somewhat uncomfortable with it.>> I directed the stage version of this a couple of years ago. The actress playing Estella and I worked together on how it ended... I felt, in some ways, it was an actor's choice although I am something of a tyrant as a director (theatre is a feudal system -- pun intended)... She opted to let him go. That felt right the way our production was done. Left Pip alone onstage at the end. phoebe
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 16:57:26 +0300 From: cbishop(at)interlog.com (Carroll Bishop) Subject: Re: Re: Re: Novels with two endings >In a message dated 12/16/99 6:50:48 PM, you wrote: > ><<Deliberately as I remember....but >it was a long time ago.>> > >Yes. I thought it worked. > >phoebe This "you" is me, and this is French Lieutenant's Woman? Yes so did I. And I loved Sarah's ending up in one version at least in Rossetti's studio. Carroll
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 17:32:46 -0500 (EST) From: Zozie(at)aol.com Subject: Chat Re: Re: Re: Novels with two endings In a message dated 12/16/99 9:58:16 PM, Carroll wrote: <<This "you" is me, and this is French Lieutenant's Woman? Yes so did I. And I loved Sarah's ending up in one version at least in Rossetti's studio.>> Getting slothful here... Sorry. A propos of films, we have been speaking of films, I liked the film of French Lieutenant... like the subsitution Pinter did -- he wrote the screenplay as I recall -- to making a film to get the odd parallel of the book. chagrined, promising to do better, phoebe
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 18:39:53 +0300 From: cbishop(at)interlog.com (Carroll Bishop) Subject: Re: Chat Re: Re: Re: Novels with two endings Phoebe said: >chagrined, promising to do better, >phoebe I hope not, Phoebe! -- You should see Pinter's performance in MANSFIELD PARK, he's excellent. -- In Canada, we called it THE FRENCH LEFTENANT'S WOMAN. I wanted a cloak like that, in fact I got a cloak like that (had it made) -- it's now in the Conner wardrobe, and I'm told it went to a prom or maybe a Hallowe'en party on the back of Lovely Liz. I had it copied from Beata Beatrix.
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Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 21:08:57 -0800
From: Robert Birchard <bbirchard(at)earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: Nell Shipman <WAS:Today in History -- Dec 16>
sdavies(at)MtRoyal.AB.CA wrote:
> Bob C. mentions that today is Ernest G. Shipman's birthday. I can't find that
> he ever produced many films, but he must be related to Nell Shipman whom I
> mentioned in March of this year. Her film _Back to God's country_ (1919) was
> restored by the Canadian Film Institute recently; being a popular film of its
> day, and not an art film, it has suffered the neglect that most film product
> receives. It was first marketed with the tagline "Is nude rude?
Ernest Shipman was Nell's husband. He fancied himself a film promoter and
was
involved with all sorts of deals in the Teens, but was only periferally
involved in
producing Nell's movies.
- --
Bob Birchard
bbirchard(at)earthlink.net
http://www.mdle.com/ClassicFilms/Guest/birchard.htm
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Date: Fri, 17 Dec 1999 00:38:02 -0500 (EST)
From: Robert Champ <rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu>
Subject: Today in History -- Dec 17
Interesting things that happened December 17th:
Birthdays on this date:
In 1778 Sir Humphry Davy, discovered several chemical elements
In 1797 Joseph Henry, American scientist and inventor
In 1807 John Greenleaf Whittier, poet
In 1853 Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree, English actor, theater manager
In 1874 William Lyon Mackenzie King (L), 10th Canadian PM (1921-30, 1935-48)
In 1894 Arthur Fiedler, Boston Pops conductor
In 1903 Erskine Caldwell, author (Tobacco Road, God's Little Acre)
In 1908 Willard Frank Libby, invented carbon-14 "atomic clock"
Events worth noting:
In 1777 France recognizes the independance of the 13 US colonies.
In 1790 Aztec calendar stone discovered in Mexico City.
In 1791 New York City traffic regulation creates the first one-way street.
In 1792 Opening of first legislative assembly of Lower Canada in Quebec
city.
In 1843 "A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens published in London.
In 1852 First Hawaiian cavalry organized.
In 1860 Anaheim Township created in Los Angeles County.
In 1875 Violent bread riots at Montreal.
In 1903 At 10:35AM, for 12 seconds, first sustained motorized aircraft
flight (36 meters) by Wright Brothers at Kitty Hawk, NC.
In 1920 Japan receives League of Nations mandate over Pacific islands.
(One of our local FM stations has spent the day offering a Beethovan
birthday salute--going through all the Beethoven symphonies, among other
things. Sometimes there is almost nothing better in the world than a good
working radio!)
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End of Gaslight Digest V1 #122
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