4.0115 Particles, Words, and Nerds (3/50)
Elaine Brennan & Allen Renear (EDITORS@BROWNVM.BITNET)
Wed, 23 May 90 20:03:39 EDT
Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 4, No. 0115. Wednesday, 23 May 1990.
(1) Date: 22 May 90 22:04:00 EDT (27 lines)
From: Mary Dee Harris <mdharris@guvax.georgetown.edu>
Subject: Misplaced Particles ( and such)
(2) Date: Tue, 22 May 90 22:10 PDT (8 lines)
From: KESSLER <IME9JFK@UCLAMVS.BITNET>
Subject: Re: 4.0098 Words: Wordolitarianism
(3) Date: Wed, 23 May 90 12:02 PDT (15 lines)
From: KESSLER <IME9JFK@UCLAMVS.BITNET>
Subject: Nerds
(1) --------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 22 May 90 22:04:00 EDT
From: Mary Dee Harris <mdharris@guvax.georgetown.edu>
Subject: Misplaced Particles ( and such)
I've been out of town (and off HUMANIST) for about 10 days and am just
now catching up, so my comments may seem quite delayed. But I couldn't
resist --
Charles Young referred to the graduate student who wrote "Hester Prynne
had to leave the town that branded her behind."
When I was a graduate English major at UT Austin, we had a select
society of those who had read all seven books of "The Faerie Queen" --
not at all a large group, but one which I belonged to. I recall at one
of our society meetings (invariably over some sort of spirited
beverages) that I was the only one to remember the scene in the 5th or
6th book, when Spenser describes Una and her donkey after their long
trek through the woods, as (and I paraphrase) "And Una lay down with her
ass in the moonlight."
Who says that grad. students have a monopoly on the pseudo-scatological!
Mary Dee Harris
mdharris@guvax.bitnet
mdharris@guvax.georgetown.edu
(2) --------------------------------------------------------------214---
Date: Tue, 22 May 90 22:10 PDT
From: KESSLER <IME9JFK@UCLAMVS.BITNET>
Subject: Re: 4.0098 Words: Wordolitarianism; Pronounciation & Syntax (79)
Nissim: your d'annunzio anecdote is delicious. Many thanks! There is I
think a freudian sexological symbolism in Mussolini's formulation, too
obvious to explicate, I should think. Kessler @ucla
(3) --------------------------------------------------------------213---
Date: Wed, 23 May 90 12:02 PDT
From: KESSLER <IME9JFK@UCLAMVS.BITNET>
Subject: Re: 4.0088 3 Nerds and a Doddle (69)
Before the NERD there was the turkey, no? I was surprised by it in an
essay in the year 1958, and asked what turkey was doing in the closet of
the frat house? They laughed at me. It wasnt part of my vocabulary for
jerk and the like. Now a nerd is also an asshole, a term of opprobrium
I dislike, but which, heavens! came yesterday in the synonym list for
Micrfsoft's Thesaurus Desk Accessory called WORD FINDER! Was I
surprised! The talking asshole first appeared in an extended joke, to
my first reading that is, in Burroughs' NAKED LUNCH, but it must have
been around much earlier, given his fascination with that orifice and its
vicissitudes. Kessler cleaning up his email