Miscellanea

I've been busy this month. On January 23, I'll be accompanying the Vocal Arts Ensemble of Durham in a performance of Leonard Bernstein's fabulous Chichester Psalms. The concert will be at Judea Reform Synagogue, as part of the synagogue's 50th anniversary celebrations. In addition to spending extra time practicing, I've also been teaching some writing workshops for grad students in the Engineering School. Thus, dear reader(s), I trust you will understand the recent lack of blog posts. Today, however, I bring you two exciting tidbits that I hope you'll find were worth the wait.

Tidbit 1

The writing workshops have made me refreshingly more attuned to things like this Tom's of Maine toothpaste tube:


In case you can't read the blurry photo, the text says (in part):

"Embrace the Power of Mother Nature! At Tom's of Maine that means we use authentic and effective natural ingredients.^[1] We use zinc citrate sourced from zinc--a naturally occurring mineral and xylitol, a natural ingredient derived from birch bark or corn.^[2]"

^[1] Did you catch the missing comma after the introductory element? Tolkien left those commas out all the time, which I'm told is common in British English. Since Tom's of Maine is located in Maine, U.S.A., I hold the company to American English standards for comma usage. Aside from that, can anyone tell me what an "inauthentic" ingredient would be?

^[2] I think they meant "We use zinc citrate (synthesized from naturally-occurring zinc ore) and xylitol (a natural ingredient derived from birch bark or corn)," but hey, I'm not a chemist. By the way, isn't saying "we use zinc citrate sourced from naturally-occurring zinc" kind of like saying "we use water sourced from naturally-occurring hydrogen and oxygen"?

Tidbit 2

While driving home the other day, I happened to observe that if the sum of the digits in a number is a multiple of 9, the number itself is evenly divisible by 9 (an extension of the similar tidbit about numbers being divisible by 3 if the sum of their digits is divisible by 3). This is old news to mathematicians, but brand new news to me. I don't know about you, but I feel empowered knowing, without doing any long division, that one trillion four billion seven hundred thousand five hundred one is divisible by 9.

My mathematician dad would want me to understand why this works, as opposed to simply knowing it works. I never appreciated that attitude when I was a kid bumming help from him on my math homework--in fact, I distinctly resented it--but I appreciate it now. So here you go, dad:

One trillion four billion seven hundred thousand five hundred one
= 1,004,700,501
= 1*(1+999,999,999) + 4*(1+999,999) + 7*(1+99,999) + 5*(1+99) + 1
= 1 + 4 + 7 + 5 + 1 + (a bunch of numbers divisible by 9).
Thus, if 1 + 4 + 7 + 5 + 1 is divisible by 9 (it is) then 1,004,700,501 is too.

In case you're wondering, I was thinking about nines because I've been doing a lot of Ken-Ken recently, a habit that started as a way to procrastinate finishing the Lord of the Rings trilogy (which, incidentally, I finished on Dec. 31, 2010).

Resolutions

I need to start an Etsy store. That will go on my list of New Year's resolutions, along with coming up with a way to take decent photos of my work, building a gas or soda kiln in the back yard, and learning to repair plaster walls. Can you tell which of the Klein Bottles below were photographed by a professional photographer and which were photographed by me using a low-tech piece of white poster board propped on a chair as a backdrop?

I didn't make any specific New Year's resolutions on January 1, 2010, but some goals did crop up along the way. I'm pleased to report that I have successfully renewed my devotion to Robert Schumann (to whom, incidentally, I dedicated my Master's thesis in Astronomy way back in 1989) by learning the six B-A-C-H fugues for organ. For those who question the absolute brilliance of the fugues, might I recommend several months of worshipful practice and analysis?

By comparison, I've been resisting my way through The Lord of the Rings, but with December 31 looming, I've bumped things up a notch and am now a mere 200 pages away from finishing The Return of the King (not counting the hundreds of pages of appendices). By New Year's Eve, I hope to call my cultural literacy oath to Tolkien fulfilled.

The Two Towers: a recitation on females therein

The dramatic midpoint have I reached: the end of Tolkien's The Two Towers; through the myriad preparations and battles of Book 3, wherein was saved Helm's Deep, and then southward through Book 4 to Minas Morgul. En route encountered I yet two more females with names, and learned much of race (the discussion of which must wait), and of the need for slow plebes to attach themselves to hereditary leaders of great strength, wisdom, and handsome boldness (which also must wait), and of the ancient linguistic origins of Yoda's subject-verb reversals. Now eagerly up stand I, clasping my hands behind my back (as is my charming rustic habit whenever I am about to "talk Tolkien"), and recite thus:

Ladies? Few. All pale, of course, in Galadriel's radiant light.
Up next we meet fair Éowyn, who trembles within sight
of virile Aragorn. Perhaps new sexual tension's nigh?
We'll have to wait until Book 5 to find out if, how, why.

She does not say much, Éowyn; grave, thoughtful is her glance;
Hair like gold, and dressed in white, she later puts on pants:
Fearless and high-hearted, she will lead in Théoden's lieu.
Alas, ten pages text, no more: her Book 3 role is through.

In Book 4 enters one more lass, less stunning than the rest;
and yet she stuns: her will's her own: to sunder is her quest.
Antithesis could be her name, for ('tis an ancient view)
a woman's either beautiful or evil through and through.

Bloated, fat, she feasts upon whatever happens by:
she spins her web, snares Men, Elves, Orcs in lair up near the sky.
Shelob would like to suck the blood of swooning Frodo too,
but Samwise stabs her underside, releasing yucky goo.

Victory is mine!

It's been a long slog, and I interrupted it to read Jon Krakauer's Eiger Dreams, but I am pleased to report that, only a few decades late, I have finally finished The Fellowship of the Ring.

The Fellowship of the Ring scores points for its contrasting heroic archetypes. First there's diminutive Frodo, a kind and good hobbit. When fate thrusts the terrifying role of Ring Bearer upon him, he finds solace in duty, friendship, and perseverance. He suffers without complaint both physically and emotionally, trudging on despite wounds or weather, although--because he's a tender, sensitive type--he is likely to swoon, shiver uncontrollably, sleep fitfully, or faint before the day or night is out.

Frodo's heroic foil is Aragorn. Aragorn has a lineal suffix surname ("son of Arathorn"), but he prefers to go by "Strider" and assorted other one-word nicknames when he is out and about because he finds the accompanying anonymity useful. He bathes in invigorating streams of testosterone every morning so that he always smells of virility even when he's travel worn. He is tall, handsome, wise, knowledgeable, trained in herbal healing arts, capable of carrying hobbits through head-high snow drifts, poetic, musical, contemplative, vigilant, efficient, and modest. He looks just as good in rustic earth tones as in shimmering green elvenwear. Protector and guide, he inspires trust and is (literally) a born leader. He doesn't faint.

There are three semi-prominent female characters in the book, and all of them have names, so that's some improvement over The Hobbit. The first is the river spirit Goldberry, wife of Tom Bombadil, whose job it is to look inspiringly pretty and to laugh with a sonorous tinkle. She and Tom appear early on in the book, when Tolkien was still writing a children's story instead of a profound fantasy epic for adults. The second female is the elf Arwen, whose job it is to sit still and quietly in Rivendell and be breathtakingly beautiful. As the only quiet, unmarried, breathtakingly beautiful female in the book, she is a suitable beloved for Aragorn, who is so strong and silent that he can mention her only obliquely and only to elves. The third female is the wise elf ruler, the Lady Galadriel. She's poised, elegant, wise, and magical, not to mention inspiringly beautiful.

As for the story's action, my favorite part of the book was when arrogant Boromir tried to persuade Frodo to yield the ring; the charged dialog and plot twist were very dramatic, and they occurred only a few pages from the end of the book, which made the reading all the more rewarding. Thereafter, I immediately commenced The Two Towers and was impressed with the speed with which Tolkien dispatched Boromir. Nowhere else, not even in tragic opera, has a character so promptly kicked the bucket in payment for his sins.

A new style for A Long-expected Party

Given that my childhood experience with Tolkien began with The Hobbit, I now understand, as an adult, why it also ended there. Nonetheless, tonight our quest for cultural literacy entered new territory as E and I commenced The Fellowship of the Rings. Happily, we can already tell this book differs considerably from its predecessor. Indeed, a mere five pages into the tale, we came upon this remarkable sentence:

"The flowers glowed red and golden: snap-dragons and sunflowers, and nasturtians* trailing all over the turf walls and peeping in at the round windows."

Yes folks, there's a colon in that sentence--the first of several in just the opening chapter alone! And semicolons abound in the book, not to mention commas and all other variety of punctuation. And there are italics and ALL CAPS to add emphasis and clarify meaning, and verbs and subjects enjoying intimate proximity, and pronouns pointing to clear antecedents. Just as Bilbo provides a rich abundance of foods for his birthday feast in Hobbiton, so Tolkien provides a rich abundance of linguistic cues in his prose, contributing greatly to the ease of reading out loud and, consequently, to our overall conviviality. Let the next adventure begin!

*According to the OED, "nasturtiums" predates "nasturtians," but it is nasturtians that grow in Middle Earth.

Grammar in Esgaroth

My friend Susan, who is well versed in religious and epic texts in assorted languages of old, insists I would appreciate Tolkien's prose more if I were better read in Middle English and Icelandic. Every sentence I threw at her, she read smoothly, without batting an eye or stumbling over a single missing comma.

So I decided to continue on with open mind after the death of Smaug in Esgaroth by Bard's last and best-aimed arrow [<--see what I in the narrative, that unfolds within the improvisational mind, have learned about strings of prepositional phrases!]. Full on the next paragraph I fell, and read aloud with epic voice these sentences: [<--apologies for the colon, I'm new at this]

"[The wind] twisted the white fog into bending pillars and hurrying clouds and drove it off to the West to scatter in tattered shreds over the marshes before Mirkwood. Then the many boats could be seen dotted dark on the surface of the lake, and down the wind came...No, dagnabbit. Wait a sec...and down the wind came...and down the...Ah, got it...and down the wind...came the voices of the people of Esgaroth lamenting their lost town and goods and ruined houses."

Reading with the epic voice helps.

Grammar at Bag-End

A geek's confession: I have never read The Lord of the Rings, and I only know The Hobbit because my fifth grade teacher read it out loud over several weeks of "quiet time" in 1977.

Recently, in post-Harry Potter and Percy Jackson 2010, the eight- and nine-year-old males in my son's peer group have started carrying around assorted Tolkien books. The paperback covers are worn and tattered, mainly from falling out of perpetually unzipped backpacks, but I suspect some of the boys are actually reading the books too.

So I decided it's time for some mother-son bonding: I would nip E's potential cultural illiteracy in the bud, and (long overdue) make up for my own, by reading the books out loud to him.

We are now nearing the end of The Hobbit, and I think I've discovered the reason I never felt any affinity for it. It isn't because most of the book is about a long arduous slog, nor because the peoples of Middle Earth somehow managed to procreate (as evidenced by the existence of characters) without there being any females around. No, even the book's admittedly good moments--like Bilbo's riddle duel with Gollum--aren't enough to make up for its thoroughly annoying grammar.

I've therefore taken it upon myself to decipher some of Tolkien's rules, so that the path might be easier for other wannabe LotR fans.

Rule 1: After introductory elements only weak minds need commas.

Exhibit A: "In spite of the dangers of this far land bold men had of late been making their way back into it from the South, cutting down trees, and building themselves places to live in among the more pleasant woods in the valleys and along the river-shores."

Exhibit B: "Following him they found themselves in a wide hall with a fire-place in the middle. Though it was summer there was a wood-fire burning and the smoke was rising to the blackened rafters in search of a way out through an opening in the roof."

I suppose it doesn't make sense to say it was summer in a wide hall with a fire-place in the middle. Still, I wouldn't have had to back track from "Though it was summer there" to "Though it was summer, there" had Tolkien included a comma.

Exhibit C: "As Bilbo's sharp inquisitive eyes got used to seeing things he could catch glimpses of them whisking off the path and scuttling behind tree trunks."

Fun with back-tracking! Find your favorite introductory element:
a. "As Bilbo's sharp inquisitive eyes got used to seeing things he could catch glimpses of,"
b. "As Bilbo's sharp inquisitive eyes got used to seeing things he could catch,"
c. "As Bilbo's sharp inquisitive eyes got used to seeing things,"

Rule 2: Ambiguous pronoun references add depth to them.

Exhibit D: "Then at last they [Bilbo and the dwarves] said good-bye to their ponies and turned their heads for home. Off they trotted very gaily, seeming glad to put their tails towards the shadow of Mirkwood."

E and I suspected something was amiss when Bilbo's party headed in the wrong direction, and we confirmed it when the hobbits and dwarves sprouted tails.

Rule 3: Separating subjects and verbs over as vast a distance as possible, and recalling thus certain tape-worm-like sentence structures composed by authors in the German language and also sometimes apparently even in English, gets readers' attention.

Exhibit E: "Occasionally a slender beam of sun that had the luck to slip in through some opening in the leaves far above, and still more luck in not being caught in the tangled boughs and matted twigs beneath, stabbed down thin and bright before them."

Rule 4: Remember this, colons are bad.

Exhibit F: "All the time they ate, Beorn in his deep rolling voice told tales of the wild lands on this side of the mountains, and especially of the dark and dangerous wood, that lay outstretched far to the North and South a day's ride before them, barring their way to the East, the terrible forest of Mirkwood."

This is a nifty example because it deals with several of the rules and their exceptions: "All the time they ate, [surprise comma!] Beorn in his deep rolling voice [observe delay of verb] told tales of the wild lands on this side of the mountains, and especially of the dark and dangerous wood, [this unnecessary comma confounds the reader] that lay outstretched far to the North and South a day's ride before them, barring their way to the East, [colons are bad, but a colon would be helpful here] the terrible forest of Mirkwood."

Rule 5: Because an idle mind is the devil's workshop to figure out your meaning, make your readers struggle.

Exhibit G: "The barrels now all lashed together creaked and fretted."

You choose the error: is it (a) lack of commas separating items in a list ("The barrels now all lashed together, creaked, and fretted"), or (b) missing commas around a participial phrase ("The barrels, now all lashed together, creaked and fretted")? (Ooh, ooh, choose (b)!)

Exhibit G occurs about two thirds of the way through The Hobbit, by which point you are no longer likely to be surprised by such comma-less constructions.