The Reading Room

Q: StoryID: Tragedy About Bear Whose Mom Died

1:05 AM

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Trigger warning: question mentions death, depression, abuse of animals. I haven't been able to find this short story. I don't recall if I heard it as part of a podcast or read it online. The story features a bear whose mother dies. The bear reacts by seeking sympathy from the forest community ins...

3:17 AM

I've made myself a list of things that I would post on Meta SE if I had an account there. Currently five items long. If (when) it manages to get to seven I'll bite the bullet and make an account, them somehow convince my mind that it's okay to not participate at the same level I would a regular site.

Though as of right now I could get the "Curious" badge if I waited a day between questions :)

As for my "Inquisitive" badge here, it seems cruel that my 30th question is the first to not get an upvote :(

4:44 AM

@bobble uh-oh, I just remembered two other posts that I had in the back of my mind for main-meta

that makes 7...

Mithical

ding ding ding

I shall stall myself more by writing up all the questions before posting any of them

The posts are 4 bugs, 1 feature request, and 2 burninate requests

5:02 AM

I also have two Lit answers, one Puzzling answer, (and that tag FAQ) in progress, and various Real Life things. So when I start posting these main-meta questions will be entirely determined by if I get annoyed at the bugs one day and hit the button.

Mithical

5:19 AM

Just make sure you're not biting off more than you can chew.

7:17 AM

@Tsundoku I upvoted your pseudonym answer, but it'll take a while to become the top one.

That's the problem with many of these meta discussions from the very early days: we had a lot of people writing answers, maybe without being actually all that knowledgeable about literature, who hadn't thought of all the different situations that might arise.

DForck42's answer makes a lot of sense when you think about famous pseudonyms like Mark Twain or Lewis Carroll or Robert Jordan or George Eliot; less so (at least as a universal principle) if you happen to know about Currer Bell and "his" "brothers".

@Tsundoku I'm sure your answer is better than mine, given my ignorance of the whole topic of song-lyrics.

7:56 AM

@Bookworm @Randal'Thor still planning to migrate? I upvoted @bobble's comment suggesting migration

@bobble probably?

@Randal'Thor wait that seems backward. I thought we used poetry for shorter poems that don't merit their own tags.

@verbose I'm not sure. It could probably be on-topic here, if it were edited to be narrowed down to one example and the context of one literary work.

@Randal'Thor My personal preference would be to use theatre for technical aspects of theatre and to use one-act-plays or drama for shorter plays, analogous to short-stories

@verbose We do. But apparently we also use a work tag AND poetry for longer poems that do merit their own tags.

@Mithical I hope she's not biting or chewing bugs.

@Randal'Thor I don't think that is consistent. We don't use novels or theatre for all examples of those ... Is there a meta discussion that explains why we make an exception for poetry?

@verbose Sure, we can do that. I don't like drama as a tag name because the word is used (in ordinary English if not in literature) in too many different senses - people'd be adding a drama tag to every question about a story or scene they felt was dramatic.

8:04 AM

Dammit I hate that the close bracket key is right next to the return key. I keep posting my chat comments when I mean to actually close a pair of brackets.

@Randal'Thor Well, the ordinary way people speak of writing is "prose, poetry, and drama." They don't say "prose, poetry, and theatre." Nor, sadly, do they use the nicely alliterative "prose, poetry, and plays."

@verbose Well, we don't have a novels tag ... and I'm not sure if we're consistent about this use of poetry or not.

I think this is what I was thinking of:

Sep 29 '20 at 20:40, by Gareth Rees

Well, anyway my plan is to tag the r-austin-freeman questions with dr-thorndyke instead of short-stories and similarly for g-k-chesterton and father-brown (where appropriate)

short-stories AND a series tag, like poetry AND a long-poem tag.

@Tsundoku "neck." Given your Victorian sensibilities, I'm sure you meant "neck."

@Tsundoku I think "don't use an anthology tag" overstates things a bit. If someone asks a question like "Why does Braithwaite use a nonstandard periodization of literary history in The Book of Georgian Verse?" I think we'd want a tag for that anthology.

@bobble fixed

@Randal'Thor yep, I downvoted yours and upvoted @Tsundoku's so you'd each have the same number of votes. Now if only your answer could get magically unaccepted. Which reminds me, were you able to look at Catija's answer and see if you wanted to revoke your upvote?

@Randal'Thor not really. "Metallic light" means the same in both contexts, it's just what the term means. I don't see how literary context affects it at all?

@Randal'Thor It doesn't make sense to tag works that have perfectly fine descriptive tags otherwise (like sherlock-holmes) with short-stories as well, IMO. Especially given that there are also novels in the Holmes universe and we don't have individual work tags for those on the grounds that they are part of a series.

But then we do tag all the hercule-poirot novels individually. Sigh.

I think at some point I'll ask a meta question about all that.

For now I think that we could create one-act-plays for really short works like the Hill play.

Or leave that play tagged with just susan-hill as it is now.

8:38 AM

@verbose Turns out I can't revoke my upvote on Catija's answer, as it hasn't been edited since I voted.

Skooba, would you consider unaccepting the answer here? People have recently started re-discussing this old meta, and the consensus now seems to be shifting against the top answer. Admittedly consensus on meta is determined by votes, not acceptance, but it'd be nice not to have an answer pinned to the top if it's one that doesn't reflect current practice and that the current community doesn't agree with. Maybe unaccept at least until the voting stabilises again? — Rand al'Thor ♦ 45 secs ago

^ but I left a comment on the question about unacceptance

@Randal'Thor thanks! I didn't realize that one's up- or downvotes were irrevocable. Or is that just a meta thing?

@verbose True, we (mostly) haven't used short-stories for Sherlock Holmes questions. Hmm, this might be worth a new meta: "Should we use [short-stories]/[poetry] together with series/long-work tags, or not?" I can see arguments both ways.

@verbose You get 5 minutes to undo a vote, anywhere; after that it's locked in until the post is edited.

@Randal'Thor ah

@verbose Agreed.

@Randal'Thor Should I do it now?

I mean, it's bedtime already

but I could ...

Q: What does "with that slightly haughty tone that creeps into her voice when she’s been shown up" mean here?

8:52 AM

Sure, it's just 4 questions to edit that I know of.

(3 Hill and 1 Beckett)

@verbose Fair enough. I'll migrate it and write a nice comment to explain that the OP is more than welcome to ask meaning questions with literary context here.

Eng Lit Learner

9:47 AM

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I am wondering what "with that slightly haughty tone that creeps into her voice when she’s been shown up" means in the following sentences: ‘Such fond memories of Brighton,’ Mum is saying to Hannah. ‘You know, I performed down there a couple of times.’ Oh God. Not long before she starts telling ...

Q: What does "we wouldn’t know anywhere" mean here?

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I am wondering what "we wouldn’t know anywhere" means in the following sentences: ‘Such fond memories of Brighton,’ Mum is saying to Hannah. ‘You know, I performed down there a couple of times.’ Oh God. Not long before she starts telling everyone about that time she had penetrative sex on screen...

Q: What does "If I had anything to do with it" mean here?

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I am wondering what "If I had anything to do with it" means in the following sentences: ‘Er – no,’ Hannah says. And then, quickly, ‘But as I say, we’re so out of the loop we wouldn’t know anywhere, even if it’s the place to go.’ She’s kind, Hannah. That is one of the things I know about her. It ...

Q: What does "the mistrustful way he acts around Will" mean here?

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I am wondering what "the mistrustful way he acts around Will" means in the following sentences: I watch Charlie until his gaze snags on mine – I make sure I’m the first to glance away. And I wonder: is he now the jealous one? I’ve seen the mistrustful way he acts around Will, as though he’s tryi...

Q: The Turn of the Screw: Arguments in favour of the governess being a reliable narrator

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I'm writing an essay in which I have to outline arguments both for and against the reliability of the governess in The Turn of the Screw. There are endless sources arguing that she is unreliable but basically none for the other side. Can anyone provide either sources or reasoned arguments as to w...

narrator the-turn-of-the-screw henry-james

Eng Lit Learner

10:09 AM

-1

Q: What does "Despite the impression she works hard to convey of bohemian vagueness" mean here?

I am wondering what "Despite the impression she works hard to convey of bohemian vagueness" means in the following sentences: ‘How sweet,’ Mum’s saying to Hannah. ‘Five’s a lovely age.’ She’s certainly doing a very good job of acting interested. ‘And how are your two, Ronan?’ she calls down the ...

Q: Meaning of "What is in hear?"

10:58 AM

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This passage is from The Children's Bach by Helen Garner What is this, thought Vicki. What is in here? It is a warehouse, it has no walls or rooms. There is a row of windows, each one shaped like an eye with its brow raised. There is a TV, a phone on the floor, a bed like a big pink cloud. Where...

meaning the-childrens-bach helen-garner

New Topic Challenge Suggestion

3:00 PM

@verbose's Old English topic challenge suggestion has a higher score (7) than any other topic challenge proposal for more than a year.

3:11 PM

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A: New Literature SE Topic Challenge Suggestions Thread

Lasha Bugadze This Georgian author achieved national notoriety in the early 2000s when his short story "პირველი რუსი" ("The First Russian" - available online in Georgian), about the failed marriage of Queen Tamar with Yuri Bogolyubsky and published when the author was only 23 years old, caused a ...

@NewTopicChallengeSuggestion You've gotta be pretty ballsy to write a short story about ancient history, get threatened by your country and church for disrespect, and then proceed to write a novel about your experiences with those very people who were threatening you.

I dunno how much the culture of Georgia changed between 2001 and 2017, but the same guy's been patriarch of the Georgian Orthodox Church for all that time (1977-present).

3:30 PM

@Mithical Don' worry, I'll take it slow, and I've read "How to participate in Meta and not die trying" more than I'd care to admit

So much history to be discovered. Who knew that the Georgian royal family, out of power since the Russians/Soviets took over Georgia, is apparently "Europe's oldest royal family" and one of the oldest Christian dynasties in the world?

(Yeah, I've sort of branched out in cultural/historical tangents since finding a collection of Georgian literature in last month's Words Without Borders.)

May as well take the chance to promote Words Without Borders here again: a great resource for discovering the literature of innumerable languages and cultures around the world, in bite-size pieces so that you can decide if you want more or not.

</gush>

Q: Where does the known information about Elene Dariani/Bakradze come from?

3:46 PM

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Elene Dariani is said to be one of the most mysterious figures in Georgian literary history - quite an achievement for someone who died in 1979, in a literary tradition over a millennium and a half. Quoting from the first page linked above: A collection of 14 poems under the title "Dariani Cycle"...

pseudonym georgian-literature elene-dariani

5:55 PM

@Bookworm HNQ.