Membro: biblioarchy

hi b-a...

noticed you had 'Ben Jonson (Rereading literature)' by Peter Womack -- do you have an opinion on it? i saw a copy on a list cheap and wondered whether it was life-changing, or it sucked, or something in between.

tnx!

publicado por Crypto-Willobie às 1:06 pm (EST) em Jul 22, 2009

Hi, How do you enjoy your weekend?

publicado por CraigChaffin123 às 10:35 pm (EST) em May 3, 2009

Good to meet you!

Robert

publicado por RobertKoger123 às 8:56 am (EST) em Apr 11, 2009

Hi,How do you manage to find the time to read all these books?

publicado por CraigChaffin123 às 4:39 am (EST) em Apr 10, 2009

Hi,

Was wondering if you'd be interested in reviewing my new novel and posting your comments here as well as a few other book-related sites. Saw you liked Butcher Boy, and I thought you might like my novel since it's also about a disturbed adolescent and a bit dark. I could e-mail you the novel in an e-book format if you'd like. Let me know if you're interested. Here's a link to a summary in case you're interested:

http://christophertusa.com/blog/?page_id...
Thanks,

Chris

publicado por cmtusa às 8:40 am (EST) em Mar 25, 2009

Hi, I just joined this site. I noticed that you're into Memoir Books. Have you read Home After Dark? Here's a link: http://www.fivestarpublications.com/afte...

publicado por DarylRobidoux às 5:59 am (EST) em Mar 24, 2009

Hi, I just joined this site. I noticed that you're interested in parenting books. Have you read The Ultimate Guide for Stay at Home Parents? Here's a link: http://www.ulitmateparents.blogspot.com

publicado por RobertKoger123 às 10:27 pm (EST) em Mar 10, 2009

Hi, I'm Robert. Just thought I might connect with you. It's always nice to meet people who like similar books.

publicado por RobertKoger123 às 4:12 am (EST) em Mar 4, 2009

To Be a King: It's a pretty good fictional story. Nicely told, and makes Christopher Marlowe interesting. In positing one of the standard theories, it's thought provoking, and gets one rather interested in the whole Shakespeare authorship thing. Might not be so provocative to one who's deep into De Vere, but still makes a case for Marlowe being a collaborator or assistant.

publicado por highland65 às 11:37 am (EST) em Dec 24, 2008

B
i read all anti-stratfordian books with relish, but i must admit that reading mrs. ford's book was like looking for a haystick in a needle. the endless doggerell on the edge of lunacy put a strain on my sunny nature. the book claims her as the best Shake-speare scholar of the last 400 years. higher than the redoubtable gary taylor, can you believe it! she thought filthy lucre wd. get her to the bottom of the Mystery, but as any good reader of norman o. brown knows: it just gets your hands dirty. but you must read it for your self, naturally, but you will not have an appetite for doggerrel for a long time to come.
fraternally yrs.
pgt.

publicado por Porius às 2:31 am (EST) em Dec 20, 2008

hello B
i took it upon myself to join the Mystery club keeping my record of not belonging to any club that wd. choose me as a member. as not the most clubbable (tho not a few wd. take a swipe at me now and then) of men, if i'm accepted i wd. need to know abt. what a club such as this, does. write better sentences than this last one, i trust. don't mean to be a pest but this LT thing is great fun. i've only been in the electronic world for a couple of months, so i'm like a pig in shit. well, let me know all abt. it.
yrs. thru the fat times and the lean,
pgt

publicado por Porius às 3:52 am (EST) em Dec 18, 2008

hello Biblioarchy
it takes my breath away to be on the same interesting list with lordnigelknickknack. many thanks. have you read dominic dromgool's memoir Will & Me? very good on what i call Enantiodromia Vision. what about John Barton's Acting Shakespeare Series? 12 parts with may RSC, or old RSC members including McKellen, Kingsley, Lapotaire, et al. and my own favorite Dicky Pasco. let me know how much or how little you want to trade notes. i'm an insomniac so this LT biz is much to my liking. give it to me straight, i have thick skin like Sogliardo in Ben Jonson's play. my alternate name on this sight is NOTWITHOUTMUSTARD.
pgt

publicado por Porius às 2:48 am (EST) em Dec 16, 2008

There is no Shakespeare authorship mystery.

publicado por Crypto-Willobie às 6:00 am (EST) em Dec 13, 2008

hello biblioarchy
thanks and many thanks for the friendship nod. i must admit to liking very much the sending off of a little note on a moments notice. some are mis-chheevios, tho i hope not malicious. i love the anti-stratfordians and old rob. anton wilson, may he r.i.p. so we should have more than a little to blather abt. now and then. thanks again.
pgt

publicado por Porius às 8:58 pm (EST) em Dec 9, 2008

You've got soo many books! I'm impressed!

publicado por ysol às 8:15 am (EST) em Nov 30, 2008

And another correction: The extraneous u is the one after the first o.

publicado por LordNigelKnickKnack às 12:35 am (EST) em Nov 15, 2008

Another correction: DoubtAboutWill.org

publicado por LordNigelKnickKnack às 8:55 pm (EST) em Nov 14, 2008

Good God! No! Nothing Star Wars!

When did You begin to doubt the offical story? Was Vere your first and final suspect or did you previously lean towards Bacon or Marlowe?

The Internet has been a Godsend for me, if for no other reason, for allowing me to think that there are other doubters out there. -Speaking of which: Have you signed The Declaration of Doubt yet? If not, then get to it! They have a deadline for the newest batch of Declared Doubters ending in just a few days.

www.DoubtAboutWill.com

publicado por LordNigelKnickKnack às 9:04 pm (EST) em Nov 13, 2008

First off, let me say that I am flattered by your befriendment. It is also a little victory whenever my humble library is noticed and deemed "interesting".

I really do savor my anonymity, however, and for just that reason will strenuously avoid LibraryThing members with those ISP-tracking LocoMaps. I can sympathize strongly with anyone writing under cover of an alias (or aliases), but in my own particular case it is more of a normal desire for peace and privacy than some inordinate fear of a knock on the door. And, yes, there is that sweetly savored sense that someone is out there frantically Google-ing "Castle Knick-Knack, overlooking the Sahr Chasm", "Castle Knick-Knack, within earshot of Wails", or "Castle Knick-Knack, currently afflicted with Turrets Syndrome".

Now, to the Vere-y heart of the matter: I admit to severe doubts on the Authorship Question going back to my first year of University, thirty-five years ago. I was a conceited and arrogant ass on a full academic scholarship who would, as a matter of course, challenge his professors at every turn. Amusement from Abusement. One of my most frequent tactics was to write my required paper for each course on the Instructor's favorite writer and to demean that writer as meanly as could be done. Another oft-used ploy was to argue for the most cock-eyed and completely contrary interpretation of a literary work that I could devise. None of that Harold Bloom-ish "Where Shall Wisdom be Found?", more like "Where Will That Wise-Ass Strike Next?".

One professor, who looked more kindly on my brand of scorched-earth scholarship and persuaded me to add English as my second major, thought that Shakespeare Studies needed some fresh blood (either my own or others') and arranged for this undergraduate to attend some post-graduate courses in Elizabethan and Jacobean era literature. My first paper, "What, the Fair Ophelia?" was a character assassination of the Instructor's most beloved Shakespeare heroine (-He even had that Victorian picture of her floating among the waterlilies hung on his office wall!). The man erupted into an earthquake of apoplexy. My spies in the English Office conveyed to me that the Shakespeare Professor had to be "talked down" by his peers and that a consortium of professors was convened to arrive at a fair and impartial assessment of the paper's merits and assign a grade to said paper. Elizabethan Drama, indeed! (I'm very sorry that I am taking such a roundabout way of getting to your question, but I did want a fellow Oxfordian to get the gist of where I'm coming from.)

As it turned out, one of that committee whose intervention forestalled any rash and imprudent retaliations upon myself was a brilliant and genial professor whose specialty was Ben Jonson. He arranged a meeting where he promptly swore me to complete and utter confidentiality and then shared his concerns about the physical health of his associate who had but a year to go before retirement. He also showed me the xeroxed copy he had made of my "Ophelia" paper and confessed that he had read it several times and had never read a paper so maliciously entertaining. He invited to sign up for his sparsely attended courses on Jonson and I accepted the invitation.

While I still considered myself "a Shakespeare man", there was much in Jonson to my liking. Jonson was a completely different kettle of fish and deliberately so. Jonson's style and his objectives were not the same as Shakespeare's and comparing the two did a gross disservice to both writers. This was a idea that I wanted to carry into my paper "Every Man In and Out of His Humour".

Yes, this paper dealt with both of Jonson's Humour plays and how Jonson's aesthetics and sense of justice contrasted with Shakespeare's. But, more than that, my paper forced me to deal with the War Between the Playwrights, the Poetomachia, that involved several of the era's leading dramatists.

Jonson lampooned and criticized his peers and contemporaries and they, in turn, fired back -at him and at each other. Jonson provoked a metaphorical fireworks show that, for all of the rockets exploding, left one black hole in the night sky: that place where Shakespeare would be. This was a big deal. Why wasn't the leading playwright of that time more in the thick of it?
It is true that Hamlet was written at this time and contains some forms of rejoinder to the matters addressed, but I had somehow expected and wanted more participation in the rough and tumble. My paper gave a brief survey of the goings-on when the Humour Plays were written and mentioned the Poetomachia as historical background that sort of "set the stage" for Jonson's didactic comedies, but I gave no indication of how disappointed I was that Shakespeare managed to keep such a low (-and some might say, nonexistent) profile.

I was schooled in The New Criticism and it should not have mattered to me what the author's aims or motives were or even who the author was. Just deal with the words as they appear on the page. They may mean more or less or even something different than the author intended. I can accept that to a great degree. But when professors or critics base their reading of a text in any way on what "was" meant, well, then we'll have to do some digging around to verify some background matters. In the case of Shakespeare, there is no "there" there. There is only a brick wall papered over with sentimental assumptions and traditional assertions. Every biography of Shakespeare should be labelled "speculative fiction".

I believe in the Jesus of the Gospels, but I cannot believe in the Shakespeare that has been handed down to us.

After several years of casting about for a suitable and credible candidate, I am close to convinced that Edward de Vere, seventeenth Earl of Oxford is the man. He has been at the top of my list for over twenty-five years now. I am still of open mind and can be yet persuaded to another of the usual suspects, but it would take an overwhelming wealth of evidence to Vere me from my present allegiance.

publicado por LordNigelKnickKnack às 7:21 pm (EST) em Nov 12, 2008

A glance at your Most recent activity would seem to indicate a particular shared interest. You've probably already guessed that I am in the Oxford camp and were only wondering whether I am ensconced with this faction in fact or in jest. I wonder also.

publicado por LordNigelKnickKnack às 2:19 am (EST) em Nov 11, 2008