|
2004-11-26 15:25
The organically-grown Danish
Informationbladet is compactifying.
("One point or two?", mathematicians familiar with British habits and
customs will chortle.) But what caught our eye was this:
I England omlagde vores
samarbejdspartner The Independent sidste år avisen til kompaktformat,
og for kort tid siden fulgte selv konservative The Times efter.
In England our collaboration partner The Independent put out a
kompact format newspaper, and a short time later the conservative
[Murdoch] Times followed suit.
I don't buy Engleesh 'bladets, but if I did I'd certainly choose the
Indybladet. So I naturally find myself asking or enquiring:
What is the nature of this collaboration or partnership between these
two such 'bladets?
When my li'l sister lived in Japanland she got the Grauniad
Weekly delivered and it had a deal to recycle articles from Le
Monde and the Washington Post, and now I get snail spam
from Le Monde advertising its own Sélection
Hebdomadaire, but not the existence of any partnerships, although
the weekend Monde publishes a selection from the NYT (in
Engleesh with cute glossaries for the Hard Words and Obscure Idioms).
But what deal do the two I:bladets have going? Enquiring minds
need to know, and so do I. (Starting with a Google of your choice and
the two search terms Independent and Information will
get you nowhere, if you are I, that's for sure.)
(PS: The wind's too high for
hoppning, chiz chiz.)
[Permalink]
2004-11-26 buttergoose (utc)
�0. Polandland, you say?
They're next door to the Ukraine! They're after our
yummy lard! They're in the EU!
But what do we really know of Polandland who only places other than
Polandland know? Hmmmm?
�1. La Pologne? Isn't it terribly cold there?
I demand that you read "Vocabulary" by Winslawa Szymborska in either
the glorious prose-poem
version sanctioned by Mr Faber Mr Faber (it is the nation's poets of
which is being spoken at this point):
"In stanzas composed of raucous whooping, for only such can drown the
windstorms' constant roar, they glorify the simple lives of our walrus
herders."
Or, if you'd rather, in a blanker sort of verse
��������
In their milk-toothed stanzas
the chaotic footfalls of dockworkers scan.
They can translate the worst howling blizzards
into meek songs praising the virtues of sealskin.
�2. Pigs in Polandland!
The BBC sent
some mealy-mouthed muesli-munching moaner (only kidding, Julianna
Kettlewell!) to find out if Polandland's adoption of intensive farming
methods will turn out to be an environmental disaster or just a
ecological catastrophe:
Poland, whose nostalgic landscape would almost befit a Thomas Hardy
novel, has pressed the fast-forward button. Foreign owned companies -
like the US pork giant Smithfield Foods - are taking root around the
country, ready to collar the European pork market.
Small crumbling sheds housing half-a-dozen pigs are giving way to rows
and rows of uniform grey factory buildings, inside which thousands of
porkers fatten at minimum expense.
A spokesperson from Smithfield Foods probably neglected to say, "Them
ain't no pigs, purdy lady, them's hawgs!"
�3. See for yourself!
Why not lay
your next holiday trippning to the heart of the "new" EU?
Eastern-Europe's Warszawa can city for most - at reasonable prices:
Hvorfor ikke legge din neste ferietur til hjertet av det �nye� EU?
�st-Europas Warszawa kan by p� det meste - til en rimelig penge.
Why not lay - oh, wait; we did that bit.
The new Arcadia shoppning complex claims to be Yoorp's largest!
�4. A blogue!
Meech in Polandland! In
Engleesh!
[Permalink]
2004-11-26 09:36
I am a poor wayfaring stranger,
While traveling through this world of woe.
Yet there's no sickness, toil nor danger
In that bright world to which I go.
I'm going there to see my Father;
I'm going there no more to roam.
Cheer up kronprinsess Mette-Marit, it's only Thailand!
- Det gir meg en ekstra glede � introdusere norsk design her i
Thailand fordi dere selv er velkjent for skj�nnhet og design innen
produksjonen av kunsth�ndverk, sa kronprinsesse Mette-Marit i sin
�pningstale, if�lge NTB.
"I declare this something open!" said kronprinsess Mett-Marit in her
opening address, according to me.
Good point, prinsess, and well made!
[Permalink]
2004-11-25 16:14
Americans may do unspeakable things to punkins to celebrate the
opening of the Christmas Shoppnings but Yoorp, as ever, goes one
better: it's hoppning
time!
P� fredag skal det norske hopplandslaget ut i sesong�pning i finske
Kuusamo.
On Frejasday the Norwegish team will be taking part in the season
opening in Kuusamo, Finlandland.
It's the time of year when we start taking a slightly less casual
interest in Hufvudstadsbladet: if
Aftonbladet has a weakness, it's its skihoppning coverage.
[Permalink]
2004-11-25 11:32
Forget your puny general strikes; this time it's serious!
�rets Grand Prix-vinner, Ruslana Lysjytsjko, sier hun vil
sultestreike til st�tte for Viktor Justsjenko som hevder han vant
valget i Ukraina.
This year's Eurovision Song Contest Winner, Ruslana Lysjytsjsko, says
she will go on hunger strike in support of Viktor Justsjenko, who
claims he won the election in Ukrainia.
Hoorah! (Can I take this opportunity to bitch pointlessly about
'Wegian transliteration schemes? Justsjenko is bad, but
Lysjytsjko?!)
[Permalink]
2004-11-25 10:22
�1. Lard, glorious lard!
As the Ukranian lard crisis deepens, over at th'
Timber abb1 offers us some useful advice:
My wife likes good salo. She says you can't get decent salo either in
Switzerland or France, but if you drive thru the Montblanc tunnel to
Aosta, Italy - they sell excellent (according to my wife) salo
there. We almost always stop there to buy some salo. They sell it in
every alimentari. I'm pretty sure salo we buy in Aosta is Italian
product, not Unkranian or Polish, but it's exactly the same (or
better). I hope this helps.
�2. Low-fat disaster: Panic and minor injuries
Ett kraftigt jordskalv som m�tte omkring 5,2 p� Richterskalan
k�ndes i stora delar av norra Italien tidigt p� torsdagen. Skalvet
orsakade panik och en del mindre skador.
A powerful earthquake, measuring 5.2 on the Richter scale, was felt in
large parts of northern Italy early on Thorsday. The quake cause
panik and a quantity of minor injuries.
�3. Our new catchphrase:
Urk! - vilken l�skig l�sk!
I cheated and read the label on the foto: it's a green bean casserole
soda.
[Permalink]
2004-11-24 17:05
I still don't know anything about Ukraine, but that's a headline and a
half, isn't it?
Come on you good guys!
Iouchtchenko!
Justjenko!
Yushchenko!
(Update: Looks like it's been declared for the Bad Guy. It's been a
rubbish year for elections, isn't it?)
[Permalink]
2004-11-24 14:56
�1. My, what a big crowd you
have!
All the better to depose you with, my dear!
(Sadly, we have no grasp of Ukrainian politiques. But that sure is a
big crowd, for sure.)
�2. Sn�kaos [Serving suggestion]
Please to try your nice sn�kaos with lightningslipperiness
:
Sn�kaos - och nu v�ntar blixthalkan
Sn�kaos - and now lightning slipperiness is expected
Flash freezes is that? Or black ice? Anyone?
�3. Ampelfrau!
In Zwickau gibt es seit Dienstag die bundesweit erste Fu�g�ngerampel
mit einer Ampelfrau. Statt eines M�nnchens mit Hut leuchtet hier eine
Dame mit Rock und Z�pfen in Rot und Gr�n.
In Zwickau is it seit Tuesday the bundesweit's first
pedestriansignal with a signalwimmin. Instead of a mannikin with hat
leuchtet, there's a wimmin with coat and Z�pfen in red
and green.
Eastern Germany's hypercartoony Ampelmann (the male version) is an icon
of former east Berlin, and presumably beyond. Just look at the
picture and it'll all make perfect sense.
[Permalink]
2004-11-24 12:54
�1. The crazy thing is I really will miss it
Magyar
Hirlap, a leading Hungarian quotidien has had its quota:
Triste fin pour le Magyar Hirlap. Ce quotidien r�put�, ancien journal
communiste qui a gagn� ses galons d'ind�pendance et sa cr�dibilit�
sous la d�mocratie, a cess� de para�tre le 5 novembre apr�s trente-six
ans d'existence.
Dashed shame about Magyar Hirlap, what? Dashed fine paper, by all
accounts, after the Reds were booted out: independent, and reputable.
But after thirty-six years it's had it as of the 5th of November.
Courrier International and the Beeb both orfen used it as sources, as all
fans of recycled central Yoopean news will be aware. A sad loss.
�2. Foopball and Tact
It's behind the paywall, but I only need a sentence of XL:s Lars Nylin
- for it is their he! - remarks on the great
individuals of bygone eras. In particular, the greatest of them all
Johan Cruyff and the state the Nederlands national team was in when he
signed for them:
D�rtill: hans Holland var avsev�rt s�mre �n Sverige. De orangea var
m�jligen p� Norges niv�.
What's more, his Holland were notably worse than Sweden. The Orange
was possibly about Norways level.
We would hate for any Norwegishes to have missed that.
�3. A prinsess
Oh, hello kronprinsess
Mette-Marit of Norway!
We admire, in the absence of bonnets (Mette-Marit! Put a bonnet on,
love! You'll get frazzled in the Thai sun!) the fotocaptionwriter's
grasp of precedence:
Hellig. Mette-Marit og Haakon Magnus utenfor buddhatempelet i
Bangkok.
Holy. Mette-Marit and some prins outside the Buddist temple in
Bangkok.
It was built i 1782 after Thailand's capital was moved from Ayutthaya
by king Rama I, Aftenposten thoughtfully informs its many
readers.
[Permalink]
today now (utc)
�1. Slavering Slavoj!
We won't attempt a translation of any of this essay
on the Culture Wars itself, but check out the footnote:
Texten har tidigare publicerats i London Review of Books.
This text was previously published in the London Review of Books
And now it's in the mighty Aftonbladet, also our preferred source for
prinsessgossip and sn�kaos stories. Really, Varied Reader, Sweden is
the land of newspaperly milk and honey, and Aftonbladet is its river.
�2. Oops!
Suppose you were the only person who neglected to bring your boat out
of the water before a big freeze; you might feel a bit foolish.
Suppose, further, that you were also the weather person from whom
everyone learned of these impending freeznings; how might you feel
then?
- Pinsamt. Det var sonen som uppt�ckte det. Jag svor en l�ng ramsa,
s�ger [Meteorologen Lage Larsson, 58].
"Embarrassed. It was my son who realised it. I uttered an extended
sequence of rude words", said meterologue Lage Larsson, 58
�3. Slavering Slavoj!
Not one (1) but two (2) of his Swedished books are reviewed.
Where, you ask or enquire, are they reviewed? Why, Aftonbladet, where else?
Slavoj Zizek - hans b�cker �r nu �versatta till 22 spr�k.
Slavoj Zizek - his books have now been translated into twenty-two (22)
langwidges.
They're even available in Engleesh! (Although this may be partly
because they're typically written in it.)
[Permalink]
2004-11-23 tea (utc)
�1. My German?
Almost
dysfluent:
Prinzessin Mary trinkt Sekt mit Klaus Wowereit im Roten Rathaus
Kronprinsessmary drank the cellars dry with Klaus Wowereit in the
Rotten Rathouse.
It is an Irish bar, m'lud.
�2. Crazy Greek Nationalistes Shut Up About Macedonia!
Sort
of:
Greek lawyers are threatening to sue the makers of film epic Alexander
for showing the ruler as bisexual.
�3. Gratuitous volcano link:
Mount Asama, one of Japan's largest and most active volcanoes, erupted
today, rumbling to life with loud explosions. There were no immediate
reports of damage or injuries.
via Giblets
of all entities. (We bow to Giblets's linkage with alacrity, for sure.)
[Permalink]
2004-11-23 12:06
It is Michael
Hofmann on Friedrich "Please Hold" H�lderlin, mostly:
Many of the best poets give least in translation: Baudelaire, Pushkin,
Mandelstam, Heine, Lorca, Brecht.
That's a remarkable thing to be in a position to say first hand, is it
not?
This is not only because they are most inward with their own language,
but also because they have left most trace on it. When you read
H�lderlin, you see feints and variations that put him with Celan; it
was reading H�lderlin that gave Rilke the impetus for his Duino
Elegies (his "Gods" are like Rilke's "Angels", tutelary presences that
don't quite convince us that they exist: "Celebrate - yes, but what?"
H�lderlin writes somewhere, but it sounds eerily like
Rilke). Sometimes reading him can feel as bitterly sacramental as
Trakl, the great Austrian poet who took his life following the battle
of Grodek in the first world war. All that doesn't really
"translate". If you really want to read H�lderlin - or any one of the
other great "national" poets - you should learn German (or Russian or
French or Spanish).
Is it especially because that these are the poets of Great Nations
that this is what we should do? I think I will pick a Swedish poet to
make wild claims for (and perhaps even read): any suggestions?
It is also
Nicholas Lezard on Ciaran Carson's translation of Dante:
Versions of Dante in English offer the reader almost unparalleled
opportunity for learned snobbishness.
Learned snobbishness? Us? Heaven forfend and do please go on...
You can either try to get the sound right, and so lose out on the
literal sense; or you can concentrate on the meaning, and miss out on
the poetry, hoping, perhaps, to use your holiday Italian as a basis
for understanding the original Tuscan while using a crib for the more
arcane vocabulary. (It is, incidentally, quite possible to make
yourself understood in Italy by using Dante's vocabulary, even though
it's seven centuries old.)
In fact, my holiday Italian currently extends no further than the
purchase of bus tickets. (In fact, it currently extends less far than
that.)
If the vocabulary of the Inferno - for it is it! - turns out to be
useful for any future Italian holidays, I'll have bigger and more
pressing problems than that I don't actually know it, isn't it?
[Permalink]
2004-11-23 10:59
It takes talent to be surprised by the sn� every year, for sure,
but to be surprised every
week surely takes genius:
Onsdag er det derimot utsikter til at det kan bli et nytt sn�kaos f�r
temperaturen g�r mot pluss.
However it is anticipated that there could be new sn�kaos on Wednesday
before the temperature gets above zero.
Meanwhile in Sweden:
�nnu vid tiotiden tiotusentals hush�ll utan str�m i �stra Sverige till
f�ljd av sn� och h�rd bl�st.
At ten o'clock there were still tens of thousands of households
without electricity in eastern Sweden on account of sn� and high
winds.
This, too, happens every year.
[A big shout out to the sn�kaos krew of Anna K and Simon!]
[Permalink]
today now (utc)
On not using a dictionary
(No Forren letters today; the snoekaos has meant that many of the lorries carrying them couldn't get through and they're being strictly rationed.) The Swedish phrase "fraemre korsband", rendered with vigorous literalness, means "front crossband". But, suspecting it to be a medical term, we translate it into Graeco-Roman and immediately apprehend that it means "anterior cruciate ligament". Funny chaps, Englishes, isn't it?
samwidge (utc)
An Injustice
I have a better singing voice than Ewan McGregor, and yet I have never kissed Nicole Kidman. That can't be right, surely? (I saw Moulin Rouge on the telly. Great set pieces, less great otherwise, but this is Monday so I won't review it properly.)
2004-11-22 10:20
"Boombastic" Brian Leiter editorialises
over at the Philosophy Gourmet Report, of which he is after all the
editor. We take this opportunity to exhibit our skill at dialectical
commentary:
A reflective, literate person will still find far more nourishment
from the writings of Schopenhauer or Nietzsche, than from the attempts
of some "analytic" philosophers to become free-lance social critics or
purveyors of existential wisdom.
Yes.
Yet as a discipline, in which students are recruited to do doctoral
work, it is a bit silly to think that Philosophy Departments can train
Nietzsches. Genius, one may hope, will find its way in the world
without the benefit of rankings. But for those who want to pursue a
scholarly career in philosophy, one can not do better than to pursue
training in analytic philosophy--even if one plans to work, in the
end, on Hegel or Marx or Nietzsche.
No.
Or, by way of synthesis, it is agreeable to see it acknowledged that
the superstructure of neo-scholastique filosofi is constrained by the
infrastructure of academic meritocracy, but a reflective literate
person is still going to be better off reading Nietzsche's texts than
a neo-scholastique commentary on them.
[Permalink]
previous,
next, latest
|
|
|