In this issue:
Today in History - February 28
Re: Mowing lawns with a sheepish expression
Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
Re: Re: Mowing lawns with a sheepish expression
Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
Mystery of a Hansom Cab
RE: Mystery of a Hansom Cab
RE: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
Re: Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
Re: Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
Re: Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
Re: RE: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
Today in History - March 1
Re: RE: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
Re: RE: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
Re: Today in History - Feb. 25
Re: RE: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
Silly names
Re: Silly names
Re: Today in History - March 1
Re: Silly names
Chat: Silly names
-----------------------------THE POSTS-----------------------------
Date: Fri, 26 Feb 1999 13:34:52 -0700
From: Jerry Carlson <gmc(at)libra.pvh.org>
Subject: Today in History - February 28
1815
Napoleon and 1,200 of his men leave Elba to start the 100-day
re-conquest of France.
1848
Karl Marx and Frederick Engels publish The Communist Manifesto.
1871
France and Prussia sign a preliminary peace treaty at
Versailles.
1901
Boxer Rebellion leaders Chi-Hsin and Hsu-Cheng-Yu are publicly
executed in Peking.
1914
Russian aviator Igor Sikorsky carries 17 passengers in a twin
engine plane in St.
Petersburg.
1916
General Henri Philippe Petain takes command of the French
forces at Verdun.
1917
President Wilson publicly asks Congress for the power to arm
merchant ships.
Born on February 26
1802
Victor Hugo, French novelist and poet whose greatest novel Les
Mis?rables.
1829
Levi Strauss, creator of blue jeans [or, at least, of the idea
of riveting the pockets so that miners
could put nuggets in the pockets without ripping them out]
1832
John George Nicolay, private secretary to Abraham Lincoln
1846
William Frederick Cody, aka "Buffalo Bill".
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Date: Fri, 26 Feb 1999 17:49:54 -0700 (MST) From: "p.h.wood" <woodph(at)freenet.edmonton.ab.ca> Subject: Re: Mowing lawns with a sheepish expression The use of sheep for keeping grass trimmed is by no means out-of-date. Fort Saskatchewan (a suburb of Edmonton, AB) continues the practice as recently as last year, I believe, and will probably do it again this year. It costs less than the power-lawnmower method other municipalities use, and is more environmentally-friendly. A couple of other notes on lawn-grass: the ancient Oxford joke about: "How do you keep you lawns in the college quadrangles so perfect?" "Madam, we simply fertilise, water and mow them for four hundred years" is highly misleading. Four hundred years ago 'lawns' were made of moss, not grass; when Drake heard the news of the Armada's impending arrival, he was (allegedly) playing lawn bowls on a mossy bowling green. Also, until the early nineteenth century, grass lawns were either mowed by a highly-skilled man with a very close-set scythe, or, as Kiwi Carlisle said, nibbled short by sheep; these also provided the organic fertiliser, graduate degrees not having yet been invented.. Peter Wood
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Date: Fri, 26 Feb 1999 19:54:24 -0500 (EST)
From: Robert Champ <rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu>
Subject: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
I can see why Chopin would have wanted to present her protagonist as
a "New Woman." The New Woman defines herself in opposition to the
woman on a pedestal, the woman above sin and naturalness, and certainly
above smoking funny cigarettes. This pedestalled woman is an ideal,
conceived in the minds of men, toward which women strove. The
New Woman, on the other hand, is not a striver after ideals; she is a
person who wishes to dissolve ideals and make her way in the "real" world.
Note, however, the difference between this and the aims of the 19thC
literary world, especially in the Romantic period and especially where
drugs were concerned. The drug experience, it should be said, was never
simply a matter of sensate experience for those writers and poets who
assayed it. It was proof that there was, behind the world of
sensuousness, a world of order, of changelessness, of perfect beauty (this
is certainly part of the "pleasures of opium" to which DeQuincy refers in
his _Confessions_). In fact, this was what most poets--until these latter
years of ours--wanted above all things to capture, though it took the
Romantics to carry it to the extreme of drug use. (Read, for example, the
"Ode to a Nightingale,"in which Keats presents as a kind of trinity of
escape from world-weariness and into the beauty of the ideal opium,
alcohol, and poetry.) Drug experiences acted as a kind of ritual, for
the Romantics at least, whereby the Sacred became accessible (thus proving
the truth of that maxim of Hulme's that Romanticism is "spilt religion").
The Romantics, and after them the Victorians, were an idealizing group;
and if their work in some respects touched upon the East, that was only to
be expected: the East is home, not only to the dark and mysterious but
also to religious belief and thereby to the ideal. Indeed, there could be
no better tribute to the idea of fixedness, of the attempt to perpetuate
an ideal world than the profound stasis of Egyptian religious thought.
The New Woman, by contrast, wants to fall from timelessness into time,
from a "terrible beauty" (as Yeats says on another topic) into the
ordinary. Indeed, this is still a topic abroad among women writers and
poets of the 1990s.
Chopin's use of the New Woman in the story makes a good deal of sense.
And it helps me to realize more better than ever the extent to which
Chopin is being critical of that highly Romantical, self-seeking,
idealizing woman Edna Pointellier. Feminist critics like to point to Edna
as an example of the fate of woman under "patriarchy." But even in the
most perfect feminist society, an Edna would never be happy. She is one
of those people whose pursuit of the ideal is so intense that only death
can offer the prospect of it. She is the female counterpart to those male
poets who likewise sought the Absolute--in all the wrong places.
"An Egyptian Cigarette," however, is a very slender read on which to hang
serious criticism.
Bob C.
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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: Fri, 26 Feb 1999 20:33:50 -0500 (EST) From: Zozie(at)aol.com Subject: Re: Re: Mowing lawns with a sheepish expression In a message dated 2/27/99 12:51:49 AM, you wrote: <<Also, until the early nineteenth century, grass lawns were either mowed by a highly-skilled man with a very close-set scythe, or, as Kiwi Carlisle said, nibbled short by sheep; these also provided the organic fertiliser, graduate degrees not having yet been invented..>> Ahh, Peter, you are a wag!!! I think of the perpetual motion machine I saw in India. A water buffalo attached to a mowing machine. The machine mowed the grass, then the buffalo ate the clippings and... you get it? Very smart. Very tidy. smiling, phoebe
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Date: Fri, 26 Feb 1999 22:02:31 -0500 (EST) From: Zozie(at)aol.com Subject: Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette" In a message dated 2/27/99 12:54:54 AM, Bob Champ wrote: <<This pedestalled woman is an ideal, conceived in the minds of men, toward which women strove. The New Woman, on the other hand, is not a striver after ideals; she is a person who wishes to dissolve ideals and make her way in the "real" world. >> I have some problems with this, Bob and list. The New Woman did not, as I see it, wish to "dissolve ideals", and certainly she was striving towards ideals, just not the ones that the Men had thrust upon her. She was setting up New Ideals as a New Woman. They were not foreign to men, many of them were on his turf, so to speak. And I'm going to quibble here, too, with <<Indeed, there could be no better tribute to the idea of fixedness, of the attempt to perpetuate an ideal world than the profound stasis of Egyptian religious thought.>> The Victorians were excited and enthusiastic about the unfolding of Egypt that Budge and others were bringing back from the Black Land. I don't mean to stretch your meaning, but "Egyptian religious thought" and "profound stasis" seem incompatible to me. What Budge and the others were unveiling was an orderly but chaotic system. Or must have been perceived as somewhat chaotic at that time. And the New Woman, in literary terms involving Yeats and others, was seen in someone like Florence Farr. Egypt got translated into the Golden Dawn in a Romanesque way. A little off-topic from Egyptian Cigarette, which I much enjoyed. But then Chopin always pleases me. greetings to all from snowy Massachusetts, phoebe
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Date: Fri, 26 Feb 1999 23:23:02 -0500 (EST)
From: Robert Champ <rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu>
Subject: Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
On Fri, 26 Feb 1999 Zozie(at)aol.com wrote:
>
> In a message dated 2/27/99 12:54:54 AM, Bob Champ wrote:
>
> <<This pedestalled woman is an ideal,
> conceived in the minds of men, toward which women strove. The
> New Woman, on the other hand, is not a striver after ideals; she is a
> person who wishes to dissolve ideals and make her way in the "real" world. >>
>
> I have some problems with this, Bob and list. The New Woman did not, as I see
> it, wish to "dissolve ideals", and certainly she was striving towards ideals,
> just not the ones that the Men had thrust upon her. She was setting up New
> Ideals as a New Woman. They were not foreign to men, many of them were on his
> turf, so to speak.
Well, out with it, Phoebe--what were these New Ideals? Are new ideals
possible?
>
> And I'm going to quibble here, too, with <<Indeed, there could be
> no better tribute to the idea of fixedness, of the attempt to perpetuate
> an ideal world than the profound stasis of Egyptian religious thought.>>
>
> The Victorians were excited and enthusiastic about the unfolding of Egypt that
> Budge and others were bringing back from the Black Land. I don't mean to
> stretch your meaning, but "Egyptian religious thought" and "profound stasis"
> seem incompatible to me. What Budge and the others were unveiling was an
> orderly but chaotic system. Or must have been perceived as somewhat chaotic
> at that time. And the New Woman, in literary terms involving Yeats and
> others, was seen in someone like Florence Farr. Egypt got translated into the
> Golden Dawn in a Romanesque way.
>
Well, I do believe that Egyptian religious thought was static. The one
great religious pioneer among the Egyptians was Ahknaten (hope I have
that name right), who broke through the Egyptian multiplicity to a
monotheistic concept--a concept never accepted by the priest class of
his era (which tried to erase all traces of Ahknaten's existence after his
death). This fixity is also illustrated in the mammoth representations
of the gods, designed certainly to strike awe into the average Egyptian
(as they strike awe into many a modern observer). In the end, the gods of
the Egyptians were the gods of the royals and anyone else who could afford
to have the proper rituals performed, the Book of the Dead read, the
right prayers recited: all very formulaic. Beautiful perhaps, but dead
at the core. The proof of its stasis is the fact that it collapsed
utterly: an oak in a windstorm. And was replaced by the far more dynamic
faith of Islam--that is to say, by a faith.
> A little off-topic from Egyptian Cigarette, which I much enjoyed. But then
> Chopin always pleases me.
Oh, I think it's very germane to the story. Every problem in the end
resolves into a religious problem.
>
> greetings to all from snowy Massachusetts,
Yes, I must admit that, for once, I am glad that I don't live in New
England--an area of the country that normally attracts me a great deal.
>
> phoebe
>
Bob (as Phoebe would say, "lightly, lightly")
_________________________________________________
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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: Fri, 26 Feb 1999 22:38:55 -0700 From: Deborah McMillion Nering <deborah(at)gloaming.com> Subject: Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette" >tried to erase all traces of Ahknaten's existence after his >death). The reason the priesthood tried to erase Iknaten/Ahknaten's existence is because the Egyptians believed that to write a thing gave it life. To put the name in stone and have it repeated gave that person eternity. To destroy the name was the same as destroying the body. It condemned the person to namelessness and therefore oblivion. It was not because of Ahknaten's personal religious beliefs that his name was gouged out but because he obliterated all other religious beliefs himself. You could say that instead of monotheism, Ahknaten introduced religious intolerence. Before that polytheism was the happy status, the priests had power, Pharoah had power, there was balance (in the Egyptian state of mind). Ahknaten wanted ALL power, so he eliminated the other gods. You must take even Egyptology in context with the times. Do not think of monotheism as the smarter choice or the blessing of an enlightened Pharoah. After he died/was murdered (who knows) the gods were restored, the priests were restored, Tutankhamen (after one or two minor changes in the throne) was the living god (not his evil twin Tutankhaten). Think of what Henry the VIII did to the common man when he stripped England of the Church of Rome. Non-Catholics might think that he did England a favor but at the time and in the context of the time, the common peasant was simply shorn of his faith, without a choice. The backlash was Queen Mary, dubbed "Bloody". >The proof of its stasis is the fact that it collapsed >utterly: an oak in a windstorm. And was replaced by the far more dynamic >faith of Islam--that is to say, by a faith. Not true. If you study Egyptology you will discover that the gods of Egypt reigned for quite a long time afterwards; they had a renaissance under the newer kingdom in Upper Egypt under Nubian kings before finally being taken over by the Greeks and then Rome. It was only under the foot of Rome that the old gods began to lose their grip. However, even after Christianity reigned Isis was still the Mother image for nearly 300 more years. Islam is a mere infant in comparison to the old gods of Egypt. When they last 2-3 THOUSAND years will I say it is a more dynamic faith. Deborah Deborah McMillion deborah(at)gloaming.com http://www.gloaming.com/deborah.html
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Date: Sat, 27 Feb 1999 18:35:55 +1100 From: christa ludlow <cludlow(at)ozemail.com.au> Subject: Mystery of a Hansom Cab Gaslighters, This is my first post and something some of you may find of interest - an article from the Sydney Morning Herald to mark the republishing of Fergus Hume's 'A Mystery of a Hansom Cab'. Unfortunately it doesn't feature the picture of Hume or of 19th C Melbourne in the original. It seems to be part of an effort to sell the book as an Australian classic which is interesting. Hume was one of the first successful Australian writers to focus on the city as a source of adventure, but he also reflects European influences, eg. Gaboriau and journalistic accounts of city low life. Be quick as I think once articles are archived there is a charge for access. The address is http://www.smh.com.au/news/9902/27/text/features11.html Christa Ludlow.
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Date: Sat, 27 Feb 1999 09:04:31 -0500 From: "James E. Kearman" <jkearman(at)mindspring.com> Subject: RE: Mystery of a Hansom Cab Christa Ludlow wrote: > > This is my first post and something some of you may find of interest - an > article from the Sydney Morning Herald to mark the republishing of Fergus > Hume's 'A Mystery of a Hansom Cab'. > Be quick as I think > once articles are archived there is a charge for access. > > The address is http://www.smh.com.au/news/9902/27/text/features11.html Thanks Christa, your debut was a success! This book was reprinted as a paperback in the U.S. by Dover in 1982, and I believe an Australian publisher also reprinted it in that year. Anyone who can't access the article from the Sydney Morning Herald Site is invited to send me an email with "0227A" in the Subject line. My computer will automatically reply with a text-only, attachment-free and uninfected copy of the article. Please click on the mailto line below and type 0227A in the Subject (that's a zero, not an oh). No text needed, I don't read these messages. Cheers, Jim mailto:jkearman(at)iname.com
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Date: Sat, 27 Feb 1999 10:46:30 -0500 From: "James E. Kearman" <jkearman(at)mindspring.com> Subject: RE: "An Egyptian Cigarette" We haven't really discussed the contents of the dream or hallucination itself. The narrator finds herself in a burning desert, crawling toward a river, a place of renewal. She turns from the gods and declares her lost love Bardja is her one, true god. Chopin may be using the dream/hallucination to imply that women who are slavishly devoted to their men are in a sort of living hallucination. Loved and left by Bardja, Madam must drag herself through the desert to the restorative waters of a distant river. Such are the perils of love that takes the place of having a life of one's own. Another tack that occurs to me is her turning away from polytheism toward one true god, who then rides off and leaves her in the desert. Her descriptions of Bardjas moodiness sort of parallel the Old Testament deity, who could be loving and wrathful in quick succession. Has the narrator of the dream lost her faith? Cheers, Jim mailto:jkearman(at)iname.com
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Date: Sat, 27 Feb 1999 15:36:58 -0500 (EST)
From: Robert Champ <rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu>
Subject: Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
On Fri, 26 Feb 1999, Deborah McMillion Nering wrote:
>>tried to erase all traces of Ahknaten's existence after his
>>death).
>The reason the priesthood tried to erase Iknaten/Ahknaten's existence is
>because the Egyptians believed that to write a thing gave it life. To
put
>the name in stone and have it repeated gave that person eternity. To
>destroy the name was the same as destroying the body. It condemned the
>person to namelessness and therefore oblivion.
I wonder if this wasn't where the Soviets came up with the idea of the
"nonperson." Clip Comrade X's name and photo out of the history books,
cleanse official records of any trace of him, and, voila, he never
existed. The Soviets seem to have had some success in imitating the
Egyptians--they even had mummies in the form of Lenin and Stalin; but
if the purpose of of obliterating Ahknaten's name was to send him to
oblivion, they failed: the old fellow has had quite a press in the
modern world.
>It was not because of Ahknaten's personal religious beliefs that his name
>was gouged out but because he obliterated all other religious beliefs
>himself. You could say that instead of monotheism, Ahknaten introduced
>religious intolerence. Before that polytheism was the happy status, the
>priests had power, Pharoah had power, there was balance (in the Egyptian
>state of mind). Ahknaten wanted ALL power, so he eliminated the other
>gods. You must take even Egyptology in context with the times.
Why, Deborah, I never realized that you were such a convinced theocrat
<grin>. But what was poor old Ahknaten--Sunny, as the family called
him (later mispelled Sunni)--to do? He was faced with an entrenched and
very powerful priesthood. In order to put his country on the monotheistic
path, he had to squelch the priests, and of course they resented it. Even
at that, Ahknaten moved his center of operations out into the desert
instead of butchering all the priests and declaring himself the victor,
as most Asiatic potentates would have done.
But history does remember Ahknaten as a man ahead of his time; it just
took the rest of the world awhile to catch up with him.
>>The proof of its stasis is the fact that it collapsed
>>utterly: an oak in a windstorm. And was replaced by the far more dynamic
>>faith of Islam--that is to say, by a faith.
>Not true. If you study Egyptology you will discover that the gods of
>Egypt reigned for quite a long time afterwards; they had a renaissance
>under the newer kingdom in Upper Egypt under Nubian kings before finally
>being taken over by the Greeks and then Rome. It was only under the foot
>of Rome that the old gods began to lose their grip. However, even after
>Christianity reigned Isis was still the Mother image for nearly 300 more
>years.
I didn't mean to imply that, after Ahknaten died, the Egyptian religion
collapsed.
>Islam
>is a mere infant in comparison to the old gods of Egypt. When they last
>2-3 THOUSAND years will I say it is a more dynamic faith.
I think here you mistake what I mean by dynamic. The Egyptian religion
was tied completely to the Egyptian kingdom(s), and although a goddess
like Isis might have penetrated the Roman world, the whole of Egyptian
religion did not. Once political power passed into foreign hands,
the religion collapsed.
Consider the difference between this and Islam. Islam is not dependent
on the political power of one state for its strength. It has spread into
the Far East, Africa, and Eastern Europe, and is today one of the fastest
growing religions in the world. Its dynamism is reflected in its power
to attract adherents, and often not among the wealthiest and most powerful
individuals in a country but some of their poorest and least powerful.
It is a faith built from the ground up, so to speak.
Islam has not been around for as long as the Egyptian religion, obviously.
But duration is not an argument for the dynamism of a religion; it is more
likely to be one for its static nature.
Getting back to Chopin, I believe this stasis (and stasis is certainly
part of any worthwhile idealism) is what her character rejects.
Personally, I think her character is wrong, since behind the religious
quest there is always a search for permanence. Tossing away all the
cigarettes is the act of a fully secularized individual who sees no
purpose in the experience she has had. She is curious about what might
happen to her if she continued, but not curious enough to pursue it.
Bob C.
_________________________________________________
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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: Sat, 27 Feb 1999 16:06:06 -0700 From: Deborah McMillion Nering <deborah(at)gloaming.com> Subject: Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette" >if the purpose of of obliterating Ahknaten's name was to send him to >oblivion, they failed: the old fellow has had quite a press in the >modern world. Quite true, it didn't work for Hatshepsut either. Just to hard to go through everything and obliterate it. Notice, the Soviets didn't have access to the rest of the world's books so all the denial in the world won't help. >In order to put his country on the monotheistic path, he had to squelch You're still looking at this the wrong way. He wasn't trying to put his country on to monotheism, he was simply trying to force everyone to worship HIS god of choice. It wasn't only the priests that resented, it was the common man (and woman). They had had the religious 'freedom' to pick which ever god was popular in their area and keep up the worship whereever they went. In one fell swoop Ahknaten wiped that away. Monotheism wasn't the idea, it was just HIS god. He never said those other gods didn't exist, there was never anything high minded in this at all (stop watching that 1950's movie THE EGYPTIAN for the Christian slanted view). He just wanted HIS god to be IT and to control all the revenues. >instead of butchering all the priests and declaring himself the victo Well, there was some unpleasantness with the priests after all. They were turned out of their jobs wholesale except where his power didn't extend. It's been rather too long to remember the extent but let's just say this wasn't an easy coup. >But history does remember Ahknaten as a man ahead of his time True: Only in terms of our own Judeo-Christian view. I would give him some credit for a different type of art style, the so-called "realistic" Amarna style. Of course, this started getting skewed, too, when all the lords and ladies wanted those long pointy heads whether they had them or not. And how about that extended belly look? Pretty?--I don't think so. All you have to do is look at the throne chair of Tutankhamen to see how even the most stylized art could be charming and tender. But as this is not an Ancient Egyptian list-serv I think it would be best to agree to disagree on this and pretty much likely the rest of the argument on the dynamism of certain religions and how site specific they were in context of their times, etc. That could go on forever! And somewhat far off the track of Chopin however interesting. Cheers Deborah Deborah McMillion deborah(at)gloaming.com http://www.gloaming.com/deborah.html
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Date: Sat, 27 Feb 1999 18:43:53 -0500 (EST) From: Zozie(at)aol.com Subject: Re: Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette" In a message dated 2/27/99 8:39:21 PM, you wrote: <<The Egyptian religion was tied completely to the Egyptian kingdom(s), and although a goddess like Isis might have penetrated the Roman world, the whole of Egyptian religion did not. Once political power passed into foreign hands, the religion collapsed.>> This is not quite accurate. The "religion" was translated through the lenses of both the Greeks and the Romans, and also into the Judica. There are, as many modern commentators note, many many similiarities between Christianity and the basic teachings of the Egyptians. Also, Akhanaten didn't invent a true monotheism (don't believe there really is such a thing, even now). He raised the Aten to be the Supreme deity, but acknowledged other ones. As Deborah has pointed out, to view his tyrannical change as forward-thinking is largely a matter of looking at it from a Christian point of view. It was heresy in ancient Egypt. As with all ancient religions I know about at least, the "faith" of it stressed personal peity. Everyone had a personal shrine at their hearth. It was not organized as religions are now. Public ceremonies were held on feast days (a lot of them, though), the rest of the time people made their daily prayers themselves, the Priests (and some Priestesses) took care of the shrines and temples. Killing the priests would not erase the faith. Lots of work in comparative religion has been done to trace the transformations of many of the basic teachings from this ancient civilization into the nascent ones in the West. All one has to look at, for instance, is Utterance 125 of the Book of the Dead (the correct translation of that is, by the way, The Book of Coming Forth by Day) and you are reading the Golden Rule. More connections are made each year, it seems, as our understanding of the 'glyphs gets better and the digging goes on. best phoebe
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Date: Sat, 27 Feb 1999 18:46:27 -0500 (EST) From: Zozie(at)aol.com Subject: Re: Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette" In a message dated 2/27/99 11:06:34 PM, Deborah wrote: <<But as this is not an Ancient Egyptian list-serv I think it would be best to agree to disagree on this and pretty much likely the rest of the argument on the dynamism of certain religions and how site specific they were in context of their times, etc. That could go on forever! And somewhat far off the track of Chopin however interesting. >> I agree. And as Utterance 125 admonishes: I will not be a stirrer-up of strife. lightly lightly phoebe
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Date: Sat, 27 Feb 1999 18:02:37 -0700 From: Deborah McMillion Nering <deborah(at)gloaming.com> Subject: Re: Re: Re: "An Egyptian Cigarette" > many many similiarities between Christianity >and the basic teachings of the Egyptians. Isis/Horus vs. Madonna/Child You can't help but see it when you see those little statues. Deborah Deborah McMillion deborah(at)gloaming.com http://www.gloaming.com/deborah.html
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Date: Mon, 01 Mar 1999 09:09:09 -0600 From: Chris Carlisle <CarlislC(at)psychiatry.wustl.edu> Subject: Re: RE: "An Egyptian Cigarette" >>> "James E. Kearman" <jkearman(at)mindspring.com> 02/27/99 09:46AM >>> >Another tack that occurs to me is her turning away from polytheism toward >one true god, who then rides off and leaves her in the desert. Her >descriptions of Bardjas moodiness sort of parallel the Old Testament deity, >who could be loving and wrathful in quick succession. Has the narrator of >the dream lost her faith? Dratted monotheism. Always a mistake. Actually, in Christian terms, the sort of love she feels for Bardja (not a very Egyptian sounding name, is it?) could be considered idolatry. I've just requested a biography of Chopin, finding myself consumed with curiousity about where she lived when she was in St. Louis. Kiwi Carlisle carlislc(at)psychiatry.wustl.edu
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Date: Mon, 01 Mar 1999 09:56:16 -0700
From: Jerry Carlson <gmc(at)libra.pvh.org>
Subject: Today in History - March 1
1803
Ohio becomes the 17th state to join the Union.
1808
In France, Napoleon creates an imperial nobility.
1815
In France, returning from Elba, Napoleon lands at Cannes with a
force of 1, 500 men and
marches on Paris.
1871
German troops enter Paris, France, during the Franco-Prussian
War.
1875
Congress passes the Civil Rights Act, which is invalidated by
the Supreme Court in 1883.
1912
Albert Berry completes the first in-flight parachute jump, from
a Benoist plane over
Kinlock Field in St. Louis, Missouri.
1915
The Allies announce their aim to cut off all German supplies,
and assure the safety of the
neutrals.
1919
The Korean coalition proclaims their independence from Japan.
Born on March 1
1810
Fr?d?ric Chopin, composer and pianist.
1860
Suzanna Salter, first female mayor.
1904
Glenn Miller, big band leader during the 1930s and '40s.
1914
Ralph Waldo Ellison, renown African-American author who wrote
Invisible Man.
===0===
Date: Tue, 02 Mar 1999 01:01:32 -0500
From: lpv1(at)is2.nyu.edu
Subject: Re: RE: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
In retrospect, to be honest about it, I thought that EC was a fluff piece.
Still it was fun to read the comments and reactions which were instructive. I
enjoyed them all. I also would like to know more about Chapin. Sometimes I
think that youth thinks it has invented it all, feminism, new ageism, etc. Ah
well, who said, those who ignore history are bound to repeat it - or words to
that effect..
Regarding Bardja, my first reaction was to post a question about the name, was
a he god I've never heard of? Was he the lover who was not a god? Of course,
after I stifled that reaction, I plugged in the name on the Internet search
engines, and came up with several Bardja?s who seem to be from the India and
who have interesting homepages. Well, that settled that.
And now I see that someone commented that Bardja doesn't seem very Egyptian.
Speaking of Egyptian, I just saw an IMax show in the NJ Hall of Science, on
Egyptian mysteries and antiquities. Very impressive. What a civilization ?
and 5,000 years ago and more.
Certainly put the modern world in perspective for me. Left me wondering
whether our civilization will flourish and survive 3000 years.
LuciePaula
===0===
Date: Mon, 01 Mar 1999 15:35:37 -0500 (EST)
From: Robert Champ <rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu>
Subject: Re: RE: "An Egyptian Cigarette"
On Tue, 2 Mar 1999 lpv1(at)is2.nyu.edu wrote:
>
> In retrospect, to be honest about it, I thought that EC was a fluff piece.
> Still it was fun to read the comments and reactions which were instructive. I
> enjoyed them all. I also would like to know more about Chapin. Sometimes I
> think that youth thinks it has invented it all, feminism, new ageism, etc. Ah
> well, who said, those who ignore history are bound to repeat it - or words to
> that effect..
I agree, Lucie-Paula. This is not a major endeavor by any means.
Chopin was a woman who proved that even in the late 1800s, you could
marry, have children, and still have a career in a demanding profession.
Her own life experience is one of the reasons I think she wrote
of the heroine of her most famous work, _The Awakening_, with more than
a little irony.
>
> Regarding Bardja, my first reaction was to post a question about the name, was
> a he god I've never heard of? Was he the lover who was not a god? Of course,
> after I stifled that reaction, I plugged in the name on the Internet search
> engines, and came up with several Bardja?s who seem to be from the India and
> who have interesting homepages. Well, that settled that.
I played with this word a little and thought it might be "Bard yes" (_ja_
being German for yes). I really don't think that Bardja was a god,
although some of those Indian gods (Krishna, for instance) liked nothing
more than to loll around with shapely, dark-eyed maidens.
It must be awful to have somebody think you're a god when you know very
well that you're only human.
>
> And now I see that someone commented that Bardja doesn't seem very Egyptian.
Didn't to me either. This made me think that "Egyptian cigarette" may
have been a generic name referring to any cigarette treated with
psychoactive chemicals. I didn't, however, find it in Brewer's
Dictionary.
>
> Speaking of Egyptian, I just saw an IMax show in the NJ Hall of Science, on
> Egyptian mysteries and antiquities. Very impressive. What a civilization ?
> and 5,000 years ago and more.
> Certainly put the modern world in perspective for me. Left me wondering
> whether our civilization will flourish and survive 3000 years.
>
Well, I suppose you might say they invented the massive "public
works" program. Kept people sweating rather than thinking about priests
and pharoahs and plotting sedition.
Bob C.
_________________________________________________
@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
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
_________________________________________________
@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
===0===
Date: Mon, 01 Mar 1999 16:00:37 -0500
From: Connie Hirsch <Connie_Hirsch(at)HMCO.COM>
Subject: Re: Today in History - Feb. 25
I'm catching up after a long weekend --and the following caught my eye:
<<
1910
The Dalai Lama flees from the Chinese and takes refuge in India.
>>
Is this a misprint, or has the Dalai Lama (presumably, his previous incarnation,
anyway) had to flee Tibet more than once?
- -connie.
connie_hirsch(at)hmco.com
===0===
Date: Mon, 01 Mar 1999 13:56:15 -0700 From: Deborah McMillion Nering <deborah(at)gloaming.com> Subject: Re: RE: "An Egyptian Cigarette" >Regarding Bardja, my first reaction was to post a question about the name, was >a he god I've never heard of? Not Egyptian, didn't even sound Arabic...East Indian makes much more sense. Hmmm. Chopin wasn't doing her research that well here. Deborah Deborah McMillion deborah(at)gloaming.com http://www.gloaming.com/deborah.html
===0===
Date: Mon, 01 Mar 1999 15:08:54 -0600 From: Chris Carlisle <CarlislC(at)psychiatry.wustl.edu> Subject: Silly names >>> Deborah McMillion Nering <deborah(at)gloaming.com> 03/01/99 02:56PM >>> >>Regarding Bardja, my first reaction was to post a question about the name, was >>a he god I've never heard of? >Not Egyptian, didn't even sound Arabic...East Indian makes much more sense. >Hmmm. Chopin wasn't doing her research that well here. At least it's not as bad as, say, "Nefer Nefer Nefer". BTW, Deborah, didn't you say you knew what book that particular bad example came from? Would you remind me if you do? I am in the mood for an antique trashy novel. Am reading "Frolic Wind" but it's too dark to be ideally trashy. Kiwi Carlisle carlislc(at)psychiatry.wustl.edu
===0===
Date: Mon, 01 Mar 1999 14:16:29 -0700 From: Deborah McMillion Nering <deborah(at)gloaming.com> Subject: Re: Silly names >At least it's not as bad as, say, "Nefer Nefer Nefer". BTW, Deborah, >didn't you say you knew what book that particular bad example came from? Mika Waltari's THE EGYPTIAN, movie of the same! Can't miss Victor Mature as the son of a cheesemaker!! Deborah Deborah McMillion deborah(at)gloaming.com http://www.gloaming.com/deborah.html
===0===
Date: Mon, 01 Mar 1999 18:36:09 -0500 (EST) From: Zozie(at)aol.com Subject: Re: Today in History - March 1 Also born this day, in 1864, Rebecca Lee of Boston, MA, the first African- American woman to earn a medical degree. best phoebe
===0===
Date: Mon, 01 Mar 1999 18:57:50 -0500 (EST) From: Zozie(at)aol.com Subject: Re: Silly names In a message dated 3/1/99 9:09:30 PM, Kiwi wrote: <<At least it's not as bad as, say, "Nefer Nefer Nefer".>> Nefer is the ancient Egyptian word meaning "beautiful." phoebe
===0===
Date: Mon, 01 Mar 1999 17:10:23 -0700 From: Deborah McMillion Nering <deborah(at)gloaming.com> Subject: Chat: Silly names ><<At least it's not as bad as, say, "Nefer Nefer Nefer".>> >Nefer is the ancient Egyptian word meaning "beautiful." No, but it was the way it was done in the book/movie: "What is your name?" "Sometimes men, in their foolishness, call me 'beautiful.'" "Nefer...Nefer...Nefer" (he repeats to himself over and over) Yikes! Deborah Deborah McMillion deborah(at)gloaming.com http://www.gloaming.com/deborah.html ------------------------------ End of Gaslight Digest V1 #48 *****************************