2002-12-01 15:00 (UTC)
I'm ashamed to admit that I've only just discovered VG's dedicated kongehuset page.
It is, of course, a source of deep, deep joy.
This (non-)
story on Mette-Marit, for example, has everything anyone could
reasonably ask for in coverage of world events: a princess (the lovely
Mette-Marit); a pretext significantly short of anything you could call
an "event" (she's learning the subtle arts of Queenliness from her
mother-in-law); in-depth analysis (of her fashion sense and lady-like
car-exiting technique, admittedly); and a prose style geared to the
scholastic underachiever (I'm still aspiring to this level in Norska,
of course).
And, most important of all, no mention of Henry Kissinger to make me
cry and hide under my desk gibbering in rage, terror and disgust.
[Permalink]
2002-12-01 14:09 (UTC)
In pronouncing "Iron Maiden" in British English one does not pronounce
the "r". I do, of course, in tribute to some Scandiwegians I once
encountered in Oslo.
The last laugh is on me, though - until just nu had I not fully
appreciated the extent to which the Maiden of Ironness rocked.
Hell,
yeah.
Tune in some time in tv�tusentiotalet to see me belatedly getting the
point of Eminem...
[Permalink]
2002-11-30 13:35 (UTC)
I've tried bilingual French-English books (Penguin do a bunch of short
stories in this format) but they never really worked for me - the
stories too often leave me cold, and the relative difficulties of the
languages makes the French a non-starter.
But. I was reading the second Harry Potter in French more as a way of
taking my mind off the hook than anything else, but I started to feel
a bit guilty that it wasn't Swedish instead - I have the Swedish
version of volume 2 as well but it would be a slog to read it just
with a dictionary. Parallel reading in French and Swedish is fun,
though. (I recommend put both books on the floor and lying face down
on the bed/futon/sofa, BTW.) All the more so since they are not
designed for the purpose, and there are tiny continuity discrepancies
to boggle over: in one Mr Weasely hands over the school letters, in
another it's Mrs Weasely - why? That the change is of no consequence
whatever only makes it more peculiar that one of the translators felt
it appropriate to deviate from his/her model.
The Swedish version is dead posh, incidentally. There doesn't seem to
be a paperback, so I got the lavishly produced hardback with a running
"snowstorm at night" effect in the header, a similar graphic on a full
double page at chapter changeovers and a proper handwriting-style font
for Hermione's letter. You might think that this would lesson the
pain of it costing about four times as much as the French edition, but
it doesn't. Not only am I mean, but I dislike Lavish Production Value
books in the first place - all those ghastly never-read gilt-edged
Shakespeare and Dickens volumes that used to be de rigeur
among social climbers of my parents' generation have left me with an
(irrational, of course) inverse snobbery about these things to the
extent that I fetishize cheap paperbacks instead. I have
(unreasonably) strong opinions about typesetting, of course, and I
approve of paper that gives a crisp edge to a glyph, certainly, but
these are ergonomic issues - books are for reading.
[Permalink]
2002-11-29 14:00 (UTC+1)
The cover story on New Scientist this week:
CHOMSKY'S THEORY ON TRIAL
Does the language you speak control the way you think?
And it's every bit as embarrassingly bad as that implies. Sapir?
Whorf? Not mentioned.
And as for
the orthodox view that language does not have a strong bearing on
thought or perception. The classic example used by the Chomskians to
back this up is colour.
WTF? The classic work on colour terms is
Berlin
and Kay. Chomsky's claims about Universal Grammar are completely
irrelevant to this question. It's one thing to dispute Chomsky's
ideas - I'm in that queue myself - but it's a completely different
matter not even to know what they are. The alleged journalist here
(one Alison Motluk) appears to have been sold a bill of goods by a
bunch of publicity-seeking psychologists.
I wish I could buy Science & Vie as easily as le
Nouvelle Obs (winner of the hebdo challenge) - New
Scientist has become an embarrassment.
[Permalink]
2002-11-29 09:32 (UTC)
Paying no attention to the republikan behind the curtain, we
note that the newly-single prinsessa Madeleine
has taken
delivery of a couple of strapping bodyguards, although it is less
clear what they're supposed to be for.
Elisabeth Tarras-Spokesberg (hurrah!) declines to offer any
opinion on whether there is a concrete threat:
Finns det en konkret hotbild mot prinsessan Madeleine?
Jag kan inte kommentera det.
See? We remind readers, without any attempt to imply a connection,
that Madeleine's last appearance was in connection with a messy split
with a boyfriend with an assault conviction who was denying there
was a split. What's Swedish for "Leave it Darren, she's not
werffit!"?
[Permalink]
2002-11-28 13:23 (UTC)
Returning to our regularly-scheduled cultural agenda, Point de
Vue provides overdue coverage of the occasion of l'h�riti�re de
la couronne su�doise (viz. Vickan) encountering both ex- and
current boyfriends, both by way of being named Daniel, at the wedding
of a mutual friend.
�Au moins, elle est s�re de ne pas tromper de pr�nom�, they quip
politely.
[Permalink]
2002-11-28 10:20 (UTC)
[kitted and kaboodled off of language hat; Permalink]
Everyone was giving the Arab world grief, after discovering that a
mere 330 books were translated into Arabic per year.
Then someone answered the obvious question: about 400 books per year
are translated into American (excluding technical and scientific stuff
but including everything else: journalism, poetry,
philosophy, whatever).
Which just goes to show, although it isn't clear what. A fair amount
of the French intellectual stuff I'm reading is only translated after
being cut "for space" (Bourdieu's Sketch of a theory of
practice is unpreceded by Algerian ethnography in the English
edition) or "cultural relevance" (Barthes Mythologies is full
of topical French issues of the time) and the price is usually at
least doubled in the process. You'll pay under EUR 10 for anything in
poche format (and a lot of stuff is), vs. 15 quid and up for
posh OUP editions, if what you want happens to be translated and in
print - Penguin dropped their English versions of L�vi-Strauss because
hey, who cares about that?
But anyway, I read stuff in foreign not because I'm a pretentious
skinflint but because it's a defence of diversity, and a chance to
sample a different cultural agenda. And because I'm a pretentious
skinflint, of course.
[Permalink]
2002-11-27 14:04 (UTC)
I started reading
Carolines blog when I saw
it linked from Francis's site - I keep
an eye out for blogs noted there as being p� svenska. It's good
stuff, in a quite accessible style, and apparently underappreciated in
Storbritannien (med Nordirland), since today
she writes:
Kan inte du fr�n Bristol som brukar l�sa det h�r bara skriva en
kommentar eller s� f�r det skulle vara roligt att veta vem du �r :)
(I did, of course.) This isn't the
first time, either.
It's enough to make a man get all bloggteori on yo asses and
be talkin 'bout site-counters and the Death of Lurking.
(Almost.)
[Permalink]
2002-11-27 10:07 (UTC)
Que sais-je? books are normally best thought of as extended
encyclopedia entries rather than conventional textbooks, each one
outlining the elements of a particular subject. This approach risks
degenerating into an amorphous catalogue of observations if neither
the subject nor the author imposes a structure, and this book at times
comes close. Bookended between opening and closing eulogies of
L�vi-Strauss, involving more personal reminiscences from the author
than I would have imagined necessary (e.g., Cl�ment once obtained
permission to write a libretto based on Tristes Topiques on the
condition that L-S wouldn't have to listen to the music. No, I didn't
need to know that either.), we get what seems to be mostly a ramble
through L�vi-Strauss's books in not strictly, but not far off,
chronological order.
The presentation of the Mythologies analysis of American Indian
myths and the transformations which link them is set out carefully and
persuasively; for me, at least, this is the clear highlight of the
book. There's also a brief discussion of the comparable process
linking the use of masks, and the Oedipal myth (the extended one involving
Spartoi killing each other, which readers less uncouth than me are
presumably familiar with) is considered as the inverse of the Grail
myth (with the ritual genuflection to L-S's love of Wagner).
I could have used more effort to place L-S, and thereby structuralism,
in a wider intellectual context. The author quotes L-S's disavowal of
any link to Barthes, Lacan, Foucault, et al., and there's some
discussion of his critique of humanism in general and Sartre in
particular, and some of his admiration for Rousseau, as well as his
"roots" in Marx, Freud and geology. Which sounds like a lot, now that
I come to write it all out, so you'll have to take my word for it that
Cl�ment does manage to spend a substantial amount of space
mythologising him as a sui generis intellectual giant, which
may be accurate but would certainly be a whole lot more convincing if
she ever gave the impression of being familiar with any other work in
anthropology.
Despite my criticisms, though, this is a serviceable overview of
L�vi-Strauss's work; at least to the extent that I feel confident in
using it to structure my reading of his work - I'd be a lot less
comfortable with its use as a substitute, but that's to be expected.
Oh, and it's in French. Caveat emptor!, as they say in Belgium.
[Permalink]
2002-11-26 13:23 (UTC)
Her first solo engagement in her official capacity.
Fotospecial at Aftonposten. Hurrah!
[Permalink]
2002-11-26 12:33 (UTC)
I just installed a new spell-checker, being for the language of
Swedish. When I recover my composure I will attempt French. I'm
still ahead of my classmates on this, though - as mild-mannered
Microsoft mindwashees they can choose between shelling out Big Bucks,
thieving, or doing without, while I just have the fun of dealing with
coaxing my beloved
Emacs and aspell to do as they're told.
[Permalink]
2002-11-26 09:50 (UTC)
- Learn German (already on next year's list, with Russian and
Finnish)
- Persuade the world that I am actually a scion of the ancient
aristocratic von Bladet family
- Somehow desensitise self to preposterous
hats.
- Acquire engagement ring
- Offer aforesaid heretoforementioned ringy jewellry to the lovely
prinsesse
Whichever von Thurn und Taxis
- Marry her and live happily ever after
Sounds simple enough, is it not? Meanwhile, some background on the
illustrious prinsesse Gloria von Future Mother-in-Law und Taxis. The
highlights are: 500-room palace; $1.4 billion inheritance; Europe's
biggest private forest. I'm just in it for the name, of course, but
it's as well to know these things.
[fotolinkage via Birgitte, hoorah]
[Permalink]
2002-11-25 15:14
I don't really know what this story is about,
but we'll use any excuse to get the gloriously-named prinsesse Gloria
von Thurn und Taxis in the bladet. She has daughters of a marriagable
age, apparently, and I think it is being hinted that she thinks
Kronprinsfred is a suitable candidate, which I suspect would be news
to him.
I'd marry either of the twenty-something von Thurn and Taxis, sight
unseen, and not (just) because
the family is [b]landt de rigeste i Europa, either - I just
want to be Mr (Prince? Herr? Whatever.) Des von Thurn und Taxis.
"Can I call you a taxi?"
"You, Sir, will address me as Mr (Prince? Herr? Whatever.) von Thurn
und Taxis."
Every man's dream, surely?
[Permalink]
2002-11-25 11:50 (UTC)
Gale
demythologises Sweden:
Myth #2: All Swedes are sexy.
Nope, sorry. Neither are all
Swedes simmering sexpots. If you come to Sweden expecting lots of
model-beautiful women to have no-strings sex with you, you're likely
to leave disappointed.
Curses! Denmark it is, then. (It is true what they say about Danish women, isn't it?)
The BBC
continues to cover the uselessness of British language education
- this time it's the unwillingness of students to go abroad for their
first job after graduating.
A survey of 5,000 students across Europe found that British students
were less likely than most to speak a foreign language and were more
likely to say they would not want to leave their friends to work
abroad.
Yes, well. It would be pretty stupid or very arrogant to turn up in a
country not speaking the language at all and expecting a graduate
level job; the rest of this is but an herring of redness in my
considered.
I'm officially withdrawing from NaNoWriMo after a second consecutive
weekend of Doing Other Stuff. I'll type up what I have and probably
make that available, and I may continue at a more leisurely pace. It
has been suggested to me by one who knows that Creative Writing
classes are a good way to meet wimmins develop
writerly craft.
And finally, it wouldn't be Desbladet without Princess gossip -
Madeleines
ex-boyfriend is not convinced he's been dumped. Reassuringly, no
one else seems to consider the situation ambiguous, although the
quotage from unnamed sources is not untinged with overtones of axen
a-grinding.
[Permalink]
2002-11-25 8:59 (UTC)
I went to see the Chamber of Whatsits at the weekend, having
taken the precaution of getting thoroughly bladdered beforehand. It's
a very long film, is it not? Surprisingly, given that, it feels
rushed. The director seems to have assumed that everyone has read the
book and so there's no need to motivate any of the events: Colin
Creevey doesn't get space to be a pest; Ginny Weasely first turns up
and is then next encountered in the chamber, without much explanation;
and Dumbledore is toppled and reinstated almost immediately without
any trouble being taken to develop dramatic tension.
It's a visualisation, then, rather than a dramatisation of the book,
and it seems likely that the director drew up - or was given - a bunch
of Key Moments that had to be included and did the bare minimum
required to string them together.
The cinema was packed with people who liked it better than I did,
though, and I suspect that many of them were sober, so clearly other
opinions - however mistaken - are possible.
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