The Reading Room

Bookworm

03:04

0

Q: What historical reference is Stevenson making with "shouting in the streets"?

In The Master of Ballantrae, in the section “The Master's Wanderings”, Stevenson writes: and I dare say these plaudits had their effect on Master Teach in the cabin, as we have seen of late days how shouting in the streets may trouble even the minds of legislators. The book was written between ...

robert-louis-stevenson

0

Q: In Frontier Wolf, what is the importance of the swordsmith's daughter?

In Rosemary Sutcliff's novel Frontier Wolf, tensions rise between the Romans and the Votadini after Connla, younger brother of the Votadini chieftain Cunorix, steals the Roman Praepositus's horse. Cunorix is very angry at his brother, but Connla is unrepentant: "The Chieftain said he wished to b...

rosemary-sutcliff frontier-wolf

verbose

06:02

16

Q: Short story where the protagonist’s brain has a switch between two selves

Looking for a short story where the protagonist’s brain has a switch between two selves, identical. He flips the switch a few times and notices no difference. Until near the end of the story when he flips it and loses control to the other self, who he’s been suppressing without knowing. And who...

story-identification short-stories

Isn't that Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde? speaking of RLS

@Bookworm I'm working on an answer (though Mr Rees will prolly beat me to it, unless his attendance at the coronation keeps him too occupied. It's fine if he gets in there first, 'tain't a race). But how did you like Emma, @Mithical? Inquiring minds wanna know. I loved the novel, but I know people who don't like it all that much.

Mithical

haven't finished it yet, about halfway through

verbose

oh.

I hope you're enjoying it, then! it's a great read.

I dunno why I'm so fond of three Victorian novels, all by girls. Emma, Middlemarch, and Wuthering Heights. It's been some time since I re-read that last one (it is not a fun read) so maybe my opinion of it will change on my next re-read. Certainly I like Jane Eyre a good bit less than I used to.

I mean Middlemarch really is in a class by itself

only one not very interesting q (no answers) about it on the site, alas.

verbose

06:27

of the other two qs re: George E., one has a decent if somewhat underbaked answer, and the other has been answered by Gareth, irreproachable and illuminating as always. There are some great answerers here (Rand, Tsundoku, Matt, Spagirl, Clara, the list goes on) but Gareth is the only one who nearly always makes me think, "I wish I'd written that."

verbose

06:39

The rest, I think, "wow, great answer" and move on with my life.

@GarethRees I'm not entirely sure I agree. I think this is receipt v 2, sense 3:

To mark (an amount or bill) as having been paid. Also *figurative*

The example cited for the figurative use:

She receipted Portia's remark with an upward jerk of the chin.

From Elizabeth Bowen's Death of Heart (1938)

Anyhoo, here's how I think that sense pertains. We look the past in the face. Transport or Delight acknowledges our look. That is to say, our having looked the past in the face is acknowledged or marked by Transport or Delight.

So yeah, "us" is still the direct object, but the verb is not receive sense 4 or receipt 1 sense 3 in my reading. But we're splitting hairs here.

@GarethRees could you vtc then? I think so far the q has gotten downvotes but only two close votes

Clara Diaz Sanchez

07:07

@Bookworm I'm trying to remember a quotation now, along the lines of "All progress in the world is due to blokes trying to impress their birds".

Rand al'Thor

07:33

@verbose It's one vote away from being closed now. I do agree with Gareth that this is worth a meta post, to have a clear justification for closing such a question.

verbose

@Randal'Thor yep I agree with that idea too

Rand al'Thor

@ClaraDiazSanchez Congrats on 5k reputation (the highest rep-based privilege level here) and entering the top 20 users :-)

verbose

@Randal'Thor @ClaraDiazSanchez 🎉

hope your flight was good, Randolph. Literally fleeing town ahead of the coronation, eh

Rand al'Thor

or maybe i should write my own answer elaborating that instead of asking OA to! someday — verbose 1 hour ago

verbose

what

Rand al'Thor

07:37

Looking forward to a verbose answer there :-) The existing answer does make some good points but I never accepted it, feeling like there might be more to be said.

verbose

m yeah well it's been a few since I read marner, will've to review etc.

Rand al'Thor

@verbose Yep, I got an exit-row seat, so no view but lots of legroom, made it more comfortable to kip on the plane.

People at airport check-in desks often give me exit-row seats when they see my height.

verbose

I've never managed to sleep on a plane. Even when I flew from Frisco to Auckland, which was like 18+ hours in the air, I couldn't manage more than a very light doze.

@Randal'Thor Do tell.

Rand al'Thor

@verbose Same here, I read it for English Lit GCSE, but I think it's my only exposure to George Eliot.

verbose

oh man you should read Middlemarch. Everyone should. I'm also fond of Daniel Deronda and The Mill on the Floss

2

Rand al'Thor

07:41

@verbose Like Mr Wednesday in American Gods, I'm blessed with the talent of being able to sleep anywhere, anytime.

Did you find any aucks in Auckland? Or only orcs?

Gareth Rees

@verbose I have added my close vote to the ChatGPT identification question

verbose

@Randal'Thor That's fantastic. I can sleep in any comfortable position at any time (except when I have a cough), but I can't get comfortable on a plane. Or when I have a cough, as I do at the moment. It's not COVID (I'm testing regularly) but it's a reaction to a COVID exposure. That is to say, my immune system killed the virus before it took hold, but the immune system effects linger.

@GarethRees thanks, you're a champ

@Randal'Thor Mostly Geordies. Hilarity ensued. I asked if there was an equivalent to the Oyster card, and my very very Newcastle on Tyne host said, "Yes, you want an op card."

I said, Op?

he reiterated, Op, nodding sagely.

I said, "oh pee, op?!"

He looked at me like I was an idiot and spelt (or spelled) it out:

HAITCH oh pee, op.

Gareth Rees

@verbose That's one way to read it, but for me it's not strong enough in context: looking back at the past can provoke vivid emotions, so I want a sense of "receipt" that's stronger than "acknowledge", so that the first stanza is more similar in intensity to the second, where the Past is an artillery gunner

verbose

I loved Craig, but honestly, I had the hardest time understanding his accent.

@GarethRees well I know better than to argue with you

That said, Auckland has to be one of the most beautiful cities in the world. NZ pampers the eye. Everything is so gorgeous, it's hard to know where to focus your rapt attention.

Rand al'Thor

I've not been to Auckland, only Dunedin and around.

verbose

07:51

It's also endearing. Like, Kiwis actually think of Auckland (pop. 100,000) as a major metropolis. One enthusiastic denizen said to me, in tones of wonder, "We even have a gay bar!"

@Randal'Thor ah. I stayed on the North Island. Someday.

Rand al'Thor

@verbose Hm? Auckland pop 1.5 million according to a quick Google search, and ISTR it has like 1/3 of the NZ population.

verbose

@Randal'Thor I know it's not that tiny. I was joking. But I grew up in Bombay (pop. some 20+ million) and live in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Gareth Rees

@verbose I concur -- Middlemarch is one of the great Engish novels. But since its main theme is marriage, it might mean more to readers with experience of matrimony.

Rand al'Thor

@verbose Ah OK.

verbose

So my idea of what counts as a large city and a gay-friendly place are somewhat out of sync with the experience of most kiwis, I guess

@GarethRees oh interesting. I read it for my masters, back when pigs spoke rhyme and monkeys chewed tobacco. I was in my early 20s. I didn't get married till my late 30s, but I fell promiscuously in love with Middlemarch at first read.

Rand al'Thor

07:55

@verbose That reminds me of another (true) story about a guy who went asking around for a gay bar in Damascus, probably around 1980. Not the best idea.

He was young and foolish enough to go around Damascus openly asking "where's the gay bar", but quick-witted enough to respond, when the police questioned him, "oh, I heard that's where the other European people hang out" rather than outing himself as gay.

Clara Diaz Sanchez

@Randal'Thor Gracias! So I have no more worlds to conquer... :(

verbose

I was predisposed to liking Eliot though. I mean, I read The Mill on the Floss for my bachelor's, and didn't like it at first read—I thought the plot was preposterous. Which it is. But since it was a set text, I was forced to re-read it, and pretty soon into the second reading, I realized, "you know what, this writer is really, really brainy and I should benefit from that instead of resenting having to read this book again." And I ended up liking it a lot.

Then someone I trust talked up Middlemarch to me, so when I had to read it, I absolutely was floored by its intelligence, its marvelous construction, and its compassion.

Its insight.

And @GarethRees there are so few happy marriages in that book. The Garths (Caleb and ... oh dear, I've forgotten her name). James Brooke and Celia. The Cadwalladers. All pretty much on the periphery. The central marriages are miserable.

@Randal'Thor yikes. That couldn't have ended well. Damascus is the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world, yes? Or is that Aleppo?

oh well, good night, sweet ladies, I'm off to bed.

Rand al'Thor

@ClaraDiazSanchez 10k rep? Top 15 users?

@verbose I think there's a few cities that claim that honour, but Damascus is one of them at least.

Goodnight!

Bookworm

09:56

1

Q: Of what people, of what liquor-agency does Thoreau speak in this paragraph from "The Last Days of John Brown"?

In The Last Days of John Brown, Thoreau writes: All through the excitement occasioned by his remarkable attempt and subsequent behavior, the Massachusetts Legislature, not taking any steps for the defence of her citizens who were likely to be carried to Virginia as witnesses and exposed to the v...

historical-context essays henry-david-thoreau

Bookworm

12:56

2

Q: What aspects of quantum mechanics occur in "Treacle Walker"?

Treacle Walker is a (very) short novel by Alan Garner, the author of many classic works of children's fantasy. Published in 2021, it reached the shortlist of the 2022 Booker Prize. The Booker Prizes website describes the book as: Joe Coppock, a boy with poor vision, lives alone. His inner world ...

interpretation alan-garner treacle-walker

Clara Diaz Sanchez

20:30

@MattThrower Thanks for posting an answer to my "quantum mechanics" question. There are some parts that I really like, and I think shed light on Garner's intention. There are some other parts I'm less happy about - I guess a PhD in physics makes me more fussy than most about terminology.

verbose

20:49

@Bookworm HNQ. But how does treacle walker keep his feet from sticking fast, is what I wanna know.

verbose

21:02

@GarethRees I'm unable to parse the following parenthesis in this answer:

 since we only have eighteen or nineteen of Euripides’ ninety-plus plays and elevent of Aristophanes’ forty

I looked up elevent in the OED but got nothing

oh wait is that a typo for eleven

yes it is, nvm

Matt Thrower

@ClaraDiazSanchez I can imagine. I'd love to know how it could be improved. My background is biology & chemistry so my knowledge of quantum effects is limited to their results (i.e. the shape of orbitals) rather than any of the theory plus some pop science reading. It's a subject I'm very curious about so would appreciate hearing your suggestions.

Gareth Rees

21:27

@verbose There's also a "Howwever" in that answer. I feel as though I make a lot of typos but maybe it's just that I write a lot of words

verbose

@GarethRees I guess my eye glazed over that one. I wish I'd spotted it, as I corrected the "elevent" typo (because I found it genuinely confusing) and it'd've been nice to catch the other one too. One consolation is that "howwever" is readily recognizable as a typo whereas "elevent" at least to me seemed plausible as a technical term

verbose

21:41

@MattThrower biology and chemistry? I thought you were a computer scientist who wrote gaming blogs and read Literature™ for fun. What are you, some kind of polymath or sth?

Matt Thrower

22:29

@verbose at 18 I had a choice between English literature or biochemistry at university and chose the latter. Went on to do a doctorate in biology but ballsed it up, then taught myself to program as a way to get into an IT career. It was the middle.lf the dotcom boom & places were so desperate for programmers that lack of qualifications wasn't an issue.

I picked up the journalism almost by chance after blogging about my hobby for years just for fun. Q Now I'm back at the point where I want to can my day job and do the literature degree after all :)

So I think to be classed as a polymath you actually have to be good in all the fields you study. I'm just a dabbler :)

verbose

23:19

Turning to IT after ballsing up a doctorate seems painfully familiar to me, I wonder why.

I miss @Tsundoku. Would that he return soon! Come back, Strobby, all is forgiven

Clara Diaz Sanchez

23:45

@MattThrower I'd prefer to say "classical physics" rather than "normal physics", and I'd avoid mentioning superluminal communication in the context of entanglement (even though you cleverly tiptoed around actually saying whether they were connected).

In fact the examples are really examples of superposition rather than entanglement as such, which is indeed a genuinely quantum effect anyway. The box that was full of jugs and plates, and then collapsed down to one jug when Joe made a measurement is a nice example.

I actually wonder whether Garner really intended to reference QM though. Rovelli's quote is from his book on pondering the nature of time, and there is a lot of classical physics there (entropy, relativity, and so on), apart from QM.

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