The Reading Room

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6:04 AM

@NapoleonWilson Sure, but there's more of them so it's not as interesting to be near one, and they're not considered to be round numbers (quite the opposite).

4 hours later…

AncientSwordRage

10:04 AM

@NapoleonWilson snowclone

easy mistake to make

Napoleon Wilson

@AncientSwordRage I know. ;-)

AncientSwordRage

@Randal'Thor good point rand

@NapoleonWilson this is a snowglobe

Rand al'Thor

in The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, 18 hours ago, by Napoleon Wilson

@Randal'Thor I'm sure he knows that.

AncientSwordRage

10:27 AM

@Randal'Thor maybe? It's hard to know

2 hours later…

Tsundoku

12:37 PM

Ongoing topic challenges: Munshi Premchand and Belarusian Literature (redux).

2 hours later…

Spagirl

2:22 PM

I've never updated or edited a tag, but I'm thinking the "Francišak Bahuševič" could probably do with having his pseudonyms added, the question becomes 'where to stop?'

By my count he had at least 16 names under which he wrote at different times. Some of that number is down to Ukraniane, Russian, Polish and Belarussian renderings of his three main pseudonyms, but there are bunch of more anonymous ones too which I think he contributed to magazines and papers under.

I feel as if its possible for someone to come to the site looking for him under one name and not find him, if they have stumbled across him fairly randomly. Even his main works suffer from similar problems, sometimes it's Belarusian Pipe, sometimes Belarusian Fife, sometimes Fiddlestick, sometimes Bow. where does one stop?

Rand al'Thor

3:04 PM

AFAIK there's no limit on the number of synonyms we can add to a single tag. If you want to make a list, @Spagirl, a mod can add them all as synonyms of the main tag name, so anyone typing any version into the tag box will reach the right tag.

Bookworm

Q: Can anyone explain this quote by Oscar Wilde 'Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming...that is all'

Full quote'“Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming. This is a fault. Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. For these there is hope. They are the elect to whom beautiful things mean only Beauty. There is no such thing...

bobble

3:58 PM

@Bookworm did you even Google?

(or I mean just use a search engine in general)

Tsundoku

4:50 PM

@bobble They'll duck[duckgo] the question ;-)

Bookworm

5:10 PM

Q: Are all Aesop's fables available in English?

There is an index of all Aesop's fables, called Perry Index, that was organized by Ben Edwin Perry in the 20th century. But some stories are nowhere to be found, like "579 - The Sword and the Passer-by" and "621 - Peacock stripped of Feathers", and many others, at least in English. Is there a pla...

aesop

Rand al'Thor

@Bookworm It's a dupe, but the dupe target has been a magnet for short answers ...

1 hour later…

Gareth Rees

6:21 PM

It's a difficult paragraph, and none of the answers has properly got to grips with it, I think.

Gareth Rees

6:46 PM

A satisfying reading of the paragraph should have candidates for "beautiful things" and "those who find ugly meanings", and should adduce evidence from the text to back this up.

For example, can we read "beautiful things" = "the Aesthetic movement" and "those who find ugly meanings" = "John Ruskin, who was 'enraged by self-justified amoral art'"? And if so, does Hallward represent the aesthetes (or one particular painter, e.g., Whistler) and Wootton represent Ruskin?

Another reading, based on Wilde's biography, might take "beautiful things" = "homosexual love" and "those who find ugly meanings" = "prudes and scolds". Is there anything in the text of Dorian Gray to suggest that this reading is more than a biographical fallacy?

I'm not an expert on Wilde or Dorian Gray but it seems to me that some analysis along these lines is needed.

bobble

7:04 PM

I read it in last year's English class but don't remember enough to write a thing.

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