Knit your fragile veins to the wrists of your friends

[sovay]

I have successfully accomplished curbside pickup of an order from Porter Square Books: I now own Edith Maud Eaton/Sui Sin Far's Mrs. Spring Fragrance (1912), which I am looking forward to reading as soon as it has sat out in the sun for a day, as well as Kit Wright's Ode to Didcot Power Station (2014). My mother swung by with red bean buns and my niece; I got a masked hug from the latter and a meow from Lucy, her new plushie Siamese. I was finally able to give my mother her present of Charlotte Armstrong's The Chocolate Cobweb (1948). Have a couple of links.

1. You're All Just Jealous of My Jetpack is one of the webcomics I forget about for months on end and then catch up on suddenly. I feel a number of people may find the review dice relatable, although the theory problem was the one that made me crack up.

2. I discovered Yiddish Wit while trying to figure out what a tallit katan is actually called in Yiddish. Answer: arbe-kanfes. Also a site that illustrates Yiddish aphorisms, curses etc. with Victorian clip art macros is a major time sink. This one is very possibly my favorite contrafactual. I had never actually heard this definition of a shlimazl before.

3. A friend who is not on DW linked me to George Orwell on Rudyard Kipling. He's arguing with T.S. Eliot and I am fascinated that his political criticism of Kipling is a normal mix of fair, nope, and dude, check thyself and his literary criticism of Kipling is from Mars. I don't think it played to his strengths. Unkindly, I want to track down his own few published poems and see if they meet his standards for good poetry—which he takes for granted is an objective reality, although he does not define it except by passing reference to Shakespeare and Gerard Manley Hopkins; Hopkins is fair game, but criticizing an English poet for not being Shakespeare ranks among the tactical nukes of literary dick moves—or if he would have dismissed his own work as condescendingly as he does Kipling's as "good bad poetry," by which he seems to mean poetry which a person of taste is allowed to admit to enjoying only if they have first disclaimed it for all to hear as vulgar trash. (Eric, your Eton is showing.) Look, I know it didn't spring full-blown from the head of Tumblr, but I want to dropkick this attitude into the sun just as wholeheartedly when I encounter it in 1941 as in 2020. I fully believe Orwell was embarrassed by his affection for the Barrack-Room Ballads, but that's no excuse for assuming his feelings were universally shared by "every enlightened person . . . thinking and decent people . . . the intellectual." He faults Eliot for not making more of Kipling's trashiness as though it were disingenuity on the editor's part as opposed to maybe, just maybe Eliot didn't think that technically-aesthetically Kipling sucked that much. tl;dr I can't believe the state of the properly woke reaction to a problematic fave hasn't altered in eight decades and I have no idea what in the hell Orwell actually thought poetry was.

Comments

[skygiants]

A shlimazl falls on his backside and bruises his nose. - it's me!!! (thank you for the link to the site)

[sovay]

(thank you for the link to the site)

You're welcome!

[sara]

Hah. You will pry "If" from my unapologetic hands on the twelfth of never. Yes he's a terrible colonialist. I will probably be viewed in a similar light someday myself, my best efforts notwithstanding.

[sovay]

You will pry "If" from my unapologetic hands on the twelfth of never. Yes he's a terrible colonialist.

Allowing for natural variation in the work to be pried, I think this is the relationship of most of the people I know to Kipling! I don't feel the need to argue otherwise in order to justify the importance of his work to me. The thing that confuses me about Orwell is that he doesn't even seem to be arguing that the terrible colonialism made for bad poetry. He just thinks the poetry is bad on its own time. And I don't understand his criteria.

[ethelmay]

I actually sort of agree with Orwell, in the sense that I do in fact have that same sensation of eating cheap sweets about a lot of Kipling's verse. Is it only snobbery in me? Because I don't think I knew until I was grown up that Kipling was considered something to be snobby about.

[sovay]

Is it only snobbery in me? Because I don't think I knew until I was grown up that Kipling was considered something to be snobby about.

I think the salient point is that you're not trying to convince me that I should feel the same way just because you do. I accept a wide range of personal variation in reactions to art! I have more trouble with subjective experience presented as obvious fact.

[rachelmanija]

I can't believe the state of the properly woke reaction to a problematic fave hasn't altered in eight decades

Hahaha. I kind of love those "the more things change, the more they stay the same" moments.

[sovay]

I kind of love those "the more things change, the more they stay the same" moments.

I was impressed.

[gwynnega]

Yay curbside book pickup!

The theory problem made me laugh.

I had heard that definition of shlimazl, but I can't remember where from.

[sovay]

Yay curbside book pickup!

It was very well arranged: a table set up in front of the half-open door where you wait at a distance marked out on the sidewalk, a bookseller comes out and asks for your name, brings your order in a paper sleeve, places it on the table and steps away, and then you can step forward and pick it up. It was the absolute worst place a smoker could have parked themselves on a nearby bench, which caused me to spend most of my wait time holding my breath, but otherwise it was quick and efficient and now I have new books!

The theory problem made me laugh.

It was also very relatable.

I had heard that definition of shlimazl, but I can't remember where from.

Leo Rosten? I always remember the one about if it were raining soup, the shlimazl would only be carrying a fork.

[larryhammer]

Reminds me of the setup for curbside pickup for our local library.

[sovay]

Reminds me of the setup for curbside pickup for our local library.

I think it's neat that your local library does curbside pickup! Ours are still very firmly closed.

[larryhammer]

No browsing -- pickups are only for holds placed online -- and a limit of 30 minutes inside to use computers or copiers, but yes, we have a library open yays.

[legionseagle]

Quite apart from anything else "Kipling spent the later part of his life in sulking, and no doubt it was political disappointment rather than literary vanity that account for this" is a quite appalling dismissal of the mental attitude of a man who had lost two out of his three children, and who wrote some unbearably poignant stories and verse about this (and who was doing extraordinary things with the short story form more generally: OK, I know Orwell was commenting on Eliot's introduction to "A Choice of Kipling's Verse" but leaving out Kipling's mastery of the short story form and the things he was saying in that form when considering Kipling's literary talents is appallingly dishonest.)

[sovay]

a quite appalling dismissal of the mental attitude of a man who had lost two out of his three children, and who wrote some unbearably poignant stories and verse about this

I agree with that. I also side-eye lines like "If anything, Kipling overdoes the horrors, for the wars of his youth were hardly wars at all by our standard." I would expect a critic who actually had fought to know that trauma is not a competitive sport.

OK, I know Orwell was commenting on Eliot's introduction to "A Choice of Kipling's Verse" but leaving out Kipling's mastery of the short story form and the things he was saying in that form when considering Kipling's literary talents is appallingly dishonest.

Orwell seems to take Kipling personally. I don't want to say that it's funny to me, because I know everyone's tolerances are different and no one has to justify their own, but I take Kipling a lot less personally and I'm Jewish. I am never on the inside of these stories, certainly not the one with the benevolent conspiracy of international Jewish financiers. I wasn't born into that empire and expected to inherit it and pass it on. I understand the discomfort of being an intended audience, because I was born into America. But I like to think it doesn't make me such a lousy critic.

[selenak]

re: Kipling, I may have mentioned this before, but when Lion Feuchtwanger had his big international breakthrough in the mid 1920s, starting with an English translation and a review in the Observer by Arnold Bennett, and on his first visit to Britain was asked who his favourite living English writer was, he said "Rudyard Kipling", and everyone went: ?!? But you're German! And sort of socialist? And he's an old fashioned imperialist! While to Feuchtwanger, and a great many of the German writers of the day (notably NOT the future fascists), Kipling really was THE modern poet. (The entire Neue Sachlichkeit also owes a deal to Kipling, imo.) First and foremost, of course, to Brecht, and we talked about young BB falling in love with Kipling at the least likely time, i.e. mid WWI. No idea what Orwell thought of Brecht, if anything, but I think it's a lovely literary irony that arguably Kipling's greatest influence on a 20th century writer who in turn would influence so many was on a German.

As far as Orwell dissing other writers is concerned, I must confess I have a fondness of his summary of Graham Greene regarding hell "as an exclusive Catholics-only night club", but these Kipling objections are truly from Mars.

[tree_and_leaf]

Huh, that's fascinating, I had no idea!

[sovay]

No idea what Orwell thought of Brecht, if anything, but I think it's a lovely literary irony that arguably Kipling's greatest influence on a 20th century writer who in turn would influence so many was on a German.

Agreed. And I don't think you had told me about Feuchtwanger before, so thank you for the story. (I remember talking about Kipling and Brecht. I probably asserted that the "Kanonen-Song" is the best barrack-room ballad that Kipling never wrote.)

I must confess I have a fondness of his summary of Graham Greene regarding hell "as an exclusive Catholics-only night club"

That is a good line.

[tree_and_leaf]

Despite the quotability of the last verse of this, I think I'll stick with Kipling, thank you very much....

OK, that is possibly not the best of Orwell's works, but from what I've looked at on the Orwell Foundation's website, he really seems to be technically-aesthetically a good deal poorer than Kipling.

[larryhammer]

I've never heard an Orwell poem sing, nor run smoothly on its own cadence. Kipling, often.

[sovay]

Kipling, often.

As I finally managed to articulate elsenet, I have no problem with reactions like "I understand this art is technically well-done, but it doesn't do anything for me" or "I understand this art is technically well-done, but my knowledge of the artist removes it from the category of things I might enjoy" or even "I have no idea what anyone sees in this art, but I accept that people who aren't me see something." I have a ton of difficulty with "Everyone who doesn't agree with me that this art sucks either doesn't know any better or is lying," especially when the person making this statement does not actually bother to explain what sucks about it. The closest Orwell comes is his objection to eye dialect (a fair point in that it is often employed in classist and racist ways and I personally find it difficult to read) and his claim that Kipling is memorable because he is sententious (slightly marred by grafting his exhibit-A couplet onto the end of a different verse from the same poem). Phrases like "his snack-bar wisdom and his gift for packing much cheap picturesqueness into a few words" are terrific zingers and I want examples. What is cheaply picturesque about "palm and pine"? It's basic metonymy, nice alliteration, not quite assonance: a sort of ecological slant rhyme. I'd like to write phrases that snap into place that cleanly.

[larryhammer]

I'd LOVE to write phrases that snap that cleanly, or even snap that well at all.

[sovay]

Despite the quotability of the last verse of this, I think I'll stick with Kipling, thank you very much....

That said, I had not actually gotten around to tracking down any of Orwell's poems and the last verse is charming.

OK, that is possibly not the best of Orwell's works, but from what I've looked at on the Orwell Foundation's website, he really seems to be technically-aesthetically a good deal poorer than Kipling.

It definitely doesn't give him much ground to disparage Kipling as a third-rate music-hall turn.

[cmcmck]

Criticising an English poet for being Gerard Manley Hopkins is also a pretty unwise move!

Orwell's Eton all too often shows, especially when he condescends to working people!

[sovay]

Criticising an English poet for being Gerard Manley Hopkins is also a pretty unwise move!

Hopkins is a high bar to clear—and also working in an entirely different direction of poetry from Kipling, so it's sort of an apples-to-dragonfruit comparison—but Shakespeare is just like the banhammer of God.

Orwell's Eton all too often shows, especially when he condescends to working people!

I am sorry to hear that. I am still going to read Homage to Catalonia, because like three different people have recommended it to me recently.

[larryhammer]

I can be a fourth, if that'd be helpful. Or not, if it wouldn't.

[sovay]

Or not, if it wouldn't.

Nah, I just need to figure out how to get hold of a copy in an age without libraries. My parents have some random Orwell lying around the house, but I'm not sure Catalonia is one of them.

[larryhammer]

A legal in Canada link.

[sovay]

A legal in Canada link.

HOORAY ONCE AGAIN FOR NON-AMERICAN COPYRIGHT LAW.

[larryhammer]

The website linked is excellent, and even better than Project Gutenberg Canada (and maybe even better than Gutenberg Australia).

[sovay]

The website linked is excellent, and even better than Project Gutenberg Canada (and maybe even better than Gutenberg Australia).

It just crossed my radar for the first time yesterday—I am not yet used to thinking of it as a resource, but it enabled me to read Cornell Woolrich's Phantom Lady (1942), which has all the badass heroine values of the movie and none of the Hollywood stupidity of the third act.