Mountebank Blog

Wednesday I was listening to an interesting show on Chicago Public Radio’s “Odyssey.” It’s a good program, and this episode, on “The Ghost in American Culture” (audio available here), featured interviews with Renee Bergland (Associate Professor of English at Simmons College) and Jeffrey Weinstock (Assistant Professor of Language and Literature, Central Michigan University). They both had some interesting things to say, and Weinstock in particular made some good points about the ideological work ghosts do in American literature, historically and in the present (I’d like to take a look at Spectral America: Phantoms and the American Imagination, which he edited).

But at one point in the conversation, Renee Bergland referred to the “Indian burial ground” theme (asking, “I have a house for sale, but it’s on an Indian burial ground. Are you interested in buying?”). It’s a very common theme, I don’t dispute that at all, but she went on to say that this was a device which Stephen King had used many times. I think she said “specializing.”

That claim is just not right. Stephen King has almost never used the Indian burial ground…in fact, the only time I can think of is in the (relatively minor and unsuccessful) Pet Sematary–and that’s not even a use of the theme in the way that Bergland meant.

It’s fine (and a good idea) for academics to connect their study of “canonical” literature to popular culture–I do it all the time. But if we can’t get it right–if we haven’t at least read Stephen King well enough, and respectfully enough, to make the connections accurate, then we’re really better off sticking with Hawthorne and Henry James.

It’s a bit embarassing to be so far wrong, but a year later I finally discovered that the lovely bug I found last summer was not even close to what I thought it was. I was thinking some kind of leafhopper (of which there are many, some colored just as nicely), but it turns out I was way, way, off. It’s not even a homoptera of any kind, not even a beetle at all. I was looking at the pictures again, as I assembled some albums for the new flickr photo album, and I realized those antennae were awfully long–way too long for it to be a leafhopper. Then I started looking around, and found a very similar plate in the Peterson’s Guide. The “ermine moth” (yponomeutidae). A little internet sleuthing, and I’ve got a definite ID.

It’s an Ailanthus Webworm Moth (Atteva Punctella)–which makes perfect sense, because we’ve got plenty of Ailanthus growing here in Brooklyn.

I thought I was a better observer than that–the differences between lepidoptera and homoptera should be apparent even to my casual eye. In my own defense, I could say that I didn’t capture or kill (much less dissect) the little guy, but I looked at him closely enough to take those photos–you’d think I’d realize that he was a moth, not a hopper!

Better late than never, I guess. 😳

According to Science Blog, two former Cornell entomologists have named three new species of slime mold beetles (g. Agathidium) for Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld.

The incident reminds me of a very similar scene in The Nutmeg of Consolation. Stephen Maturin visits Thomas Stamford Raffles (the lieutenant governor-general of Java):

‘I am about to achieve immortality [he tells Raffles]. Mr. Sowerby intends to name a nondescript plant after me.’
‘There’s glory for you!’ cried Raffles. ‘May we look at it?’
Stephen broke the seal, and from several layers of specimen-paper inside the letter he drew a flower and two leaves.
‘I have never seen it before,’ said Raffles, gazing at the dirty brown and purple disc. ‘It has a superficial resemblance to a stapelia, but of course it must belong to an entirely different family.’
‘Sure, it smells like some of the more fetid stapelias too,’ said Stephen. ‘Perhaps I should move it to the window-sill. He found it growing as a parasite on the glabrous bugwort. These viscid tumescent leaves with inward-curling margins incline me to think that it is also insectivorous.’ They considered the plant in silence, breathing as it were sideways, and then Stephen said ‘Do you think the gentleman may have had some satirical intent?’

I have to ask the same question of the two entomologists! 😉 Although they protest, with completely straight faces, that their intent was nothing of the kind…I still have to wonder.

If so, if satire was the intent….then bravo, Doctors Miller and Wheeler! 🙂

Based on admittedly very limited momentary experience, but here’s some things I’ve noticed: people actually say, with no irony intended, things like “ah appreciate y’all,” and “ain’t you the cutest li’l thing!” (after hearing that for the third time, my daughter said “people are funny here.”)…women wear makeup. Lots of makeup…everybody wears t-shirts with slogans related to alcohol, sex, and NASCAR. Or all of the above…nobody wears black…words are pronounced differently, and it’s not just an accent (a couch, coffee table, and an armchair are a “living room suit” and those delicious chocolates are from “the Godova chocolate store)…Applebee’s and Friday’s and Chili’s are considered not just acceptable (which they’re not) but actually desirable. A rare treat.

The red states (probably suburbs in blue states, too–in a way the red states are all just giant suburbs) really, truly, are different.

Well, not only childish, but actually children. I’m with my daughter and her team at the 2005 US Chess Federation Supernationals III Tournament in Nashville, Tennessee. The team (the PS 282 Royals) is doing quite well.

This is no powerhouse team, it’s only their second year and first trip to this level of tournament, but they’re playing right up there with the big winners. And it’s a team of boys and girls (more boys than girls–that’s a problem in the chess world, and one that needs more attention than it gets, but there is some effort at least to address it. I’ve discussed it with several other more experienced chess moms and dads this weekend) who really demonstrate the diversity that makes NYC, and particularly Brooklyn, and more particularly PS 282, so great. Most of chess outside of NYC is a white world (and some Asians), it seems (mostly–there are two Native American teams I’ve seen, and a Black team from Detroit). These kids are teammates, and that means a lot to them. Some are stronger players, some are weaker, some are sweet, some are obnoxious, but they care about each other and they care about their team. Even I’m feeling warm towards even some of the obnoxious ones!

So far, there has been vomiting, diarrhea, and stomach pain, headaches, tears, bloody lips, and tantrums, but no actual fatalities. It’s an imposing (frightening?) sight to see 5,200 children, all playing chess, all discussing their moves and strategies, as well as running, wrestling, screaming, overeating, swimming in the pool, and whining like other children.

I’m a proud parent–not just because she’s winning (which she’s not, much) but because she’s competing with such a positive spirit, and working so hard, and bonding with her team-mates. Today, after a very hard match (the fifth in two days) which ended with a loss at about 30 minutes past her normal bedtime, I told her that if she was too tired, she could skip analyzing the game with her coach (a normal part of the routine), and just have ice cream and go to bed.

“No, Dad,” she told me. “I think I played poorly this time, and I want to learn from this game. I’d like to analyze it with Mr. O. That would help me learn.”

If you’ve ever seen a dad so blown away with pride he swelled up like a blimp…that was me.

As I said in an earlier post, I’m a lot like Nathaniel Martin in Patrick O’Brian’s The Far Side of the World.

like most normally constituted writers Martin had no use for any candid opinion that was not wholly favourable.

And now that I’ve received the response from a reviewer and the editor of New Directions in Folklore to the article (“‘Quacks, Yokels, and Light-Fingered Folk:’ Oral Performance Art at the Fair”) that I submitted over a year ago, I’m feeling even more normally constituted than ever!

The response was favorable, and they want to publish the article, but it wasn’t wholly favorable, and they want some improvements first. I can see their point and (partially) agree, but I also think there’s some ways in which they’re quite simply misunderstanding my point, and my approach. I’m not a folklorist, that’s part of the problem, and that’s why I was happy to submit to New Directions in Folklore. But they’re pushing me a bit towards a traditional folklore approach (preservationist, exoticizing, romanticizing, and outside-in) and that’s just plain not the approach I want to take.

So, how much of my resistance is “normally constituted” affection for my own words, and how much is legitimate and appropriate insistence that my approach is unique and valuable? Or is there a difference? I want them to publish the piece, so I’ll do my best to follow the suggestions. But at the same time I’m not going to abandon what (to me) makes the article work so well.

I’ll take the time to work on a second draft. I’ll try to make my approach and the reasons why I think it’s worthwhile more clear. But the editor’s already made clear that I’m going to be working uphill on that, to some extent. I’ll do what I can do. And I’ll get what I get.