Althouse: "A professor's opinion: Not Shakespeare is the thing, but the commentary on him."

October 7, 2008

"A professor's opinion: Not Shakespeare is the thing, but the commentary on him."

An aphorism that made me think:

A blogger's opinion: Not MSM is the thing, but the blogging on it.

15 comments:

MadisonMan said...: Aphorisms are great. There's one about Government in that book too:

Whatever is not nailed down is mine. Whatever I can pry loose is not nailed down.; 10/7/08, 9:06 AM
Henry said...: A commenters opinion: Not blogging is the thing but the commenting on the blogging.; 10/7/08, 9:08 AM
rhhardin said...: I don't like Shakespeare at all; but criticisms of him are superb, as by Wm. Empson, Stanley Cavell.

It's their own thoughts that come out of it, not Shakespeare's, who was only the occasion.; 10/7/08, 9:10 AM
Ernesto Ariel Suárez said...: Chekhov was a Russian nihilist!
Just joking.

Now seriously, if I have a mole (which I do) does not talking about it make it disappear?

Does talking about the MSM create the problem or does it exist regardless of the attention we pay to it?

And yet, some could argue that there is no problem if one doesn't take exception to it, and voice it.

So, what is it?; 10/7/08, 9:11 AM
Paul said...: Come on, y'all. You're missing the gem set there on the page in front of you:

"There is often found in commentators a spontaneous strain of invective and contempt more eager and venemous than is vented by the most furious controvertist in politics against those whom he is hired to defame." Dr. Johnson

Amen to that!; 10/7/08, 9:23 AM
Ernesto Ariel Suárez said...: Ah, Paul, c'est verité. Fantastic catch!; 10/7/08, 9:27 AM
Anonymous said...: "Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana"

Groucho Marx; 10/7/08, 9:33 AM
Anonymous said...: MM:
"Aphorisms are great. There's one about Government in that book too:

Whatever is not nailed down is mine. Whatever I can pry loose is not nailed down."

Corollary for lawyers : What ever is mine, is mine. What ever is yours is negotiable.; 10/7/08, 9:34 AM
MadisonMan said...: And I should add: MO is that aphorisms -- like the Chekhov one -- should not make you think What? You should read it and chuckle and say Too right!

So Boo to Chekhov's tangled syntax. Or to whomever translated it.; 10/7/08, 9:46 AM
Ernesto Ariel Suárez said...: MadisonMan said...
And I should add: MO is that aphorisms -- like the Chekhov one -- should not make you think What? You should read it and chuckle and say Too right!

So Boo to Chekhov's tangled syntax. Or to whomever translated it.

9:46 AM

Да моы друг, MadisonMan, it is the translations that sucks, big time.; 10/7/08, 9:50 AM
Ann Althouse said...: "So Boo to Chekhov's tangled syntax. Or to whomever translated it."

Ahem.

That should be: Or to whoever translated it.; 10/7/08, 10:18 AM
bearbee said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 10/7/08, 10:49 AM
bearbee said...: No place affords a more striking conviction of the vanity of human hopes than a public library.
Dr Johnson

Vanity:
The quality of being valueless or futile;
Feelings of excessive pride.

Can one come to two conclusions?; 10/7/08, 11:00 AM
MadisonMan said...: Yeah yeah yeah. I was debating a long time (well, some seconds) which to use. Should've debated longer. :); 10/7/08, 11:11 AM
George M. Spencer said...: From King Lear, III, iv on the storm-blasted heath with Lear, Kent, Edgar, and the fool.

Lear, mad, to the naked Edgar, who is pretending to be mad:

"Why, thou wert better in thy grave than to answer
with thy uncovered body this extremity of the skies.
Is man no more than this? Consider him well. Thou
owest the worm no silk, the beast no hide, the sheep
no wool, the cat no perfume. Ha! here's three on
's are sophisticated! Thou art the thing itself:
unaccommodated man is no more but such a poor bare,
forked animal as thou art. Off, off, you lendings!
come unbutton here."

The scene also contains Lear's supremely magnificent lines:

Poor naked wretches, whereso'er you are,
That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm,
How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides,
Your loop'd and window'd raggedness, defend you
From seasons such as these? O, I have ta'en
Too little care of this! Take physic, pomp;
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,
That thou mayst shake the superflux [superfluities of life] to them,
And show the heavens more just.

...

Tom's a-cold.; 10/7/08, 12:55 PM