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| 2005/6/17-19 [Computer/SW/Languages/Java, Academia/Berkeley/CSUA/Motd] UID:38167 Activity:high |
6/16 Do any of you essentially not read books any more? I find it
interesting there are people who are bright and by any measure
successful who read maybe .5 - 1 book a year, e.g. my housemate
has an MBA from MIT/Sloane and is essentially retired at 48.
I'm not sure he has read 2 books in the 2yrs I've lived here.
He does watch various news and informational TV programs so he's
not clueless about the world. This does not include "HowTo" books.
\_ I generally don't make time for reading, though several times
a year I go crazy and read all the books I buy in my off periods.
In general, though, the books I do try to read when I'm not devoting
most of my time to it are difficult reads that I go through them
very slowly.
\_ I am neither bright nor successful, but I don't really read
very much. -- ilyas
\_ I read a lot when commuting on BART. Since I had to start driving,
I've pretty much stopped.
\- I'm not talking about very much. I mean zero. And I'm not
talking about do you knock off a Shakespeare now and them ...
I mean people who dont even read The Da Vinci Code or Michael
Crichton or other "airplane pilp".
Crichton or other "airplane pulp".
\_ When I read, I tend to read classics or books of an
informational nature. Most newer fiction is not for me.
The last book I read was 'Dune' (again) about a year ago.
I am not sure that reading books (especially fiction)
indicates much of anything at our age. I used to read a
lot more when I was younger and had the time. FWIW, I
don't watch TV or go to the movies either. I do read the
newspapers and magazines like 'The Economist' religiously.
BTW, how come your housemate is a 'housemate' when he has a
good degree from a good school? Is he lazy?
\- I'm not suggesting anything about "our age" ... this was
asked on the soda MOTD and I'd think the soda motd has
a marginally higher literacy rate than "our age". Of course
people here are more likely to have the web suck up their
time. And I am not talking about reading but reading
books. A lot of these smart-but-non-readers read the
newspaper and other practical books like the Idiot's
Guide to DVD burning etc.
I dont understand the "why is your housemate a housemate"
part of the question.
\_ What I mean by 'our age' is that a kid who reads a
lot is probably bright (not sure about which is the
cause and which is the effect). I do not think this
is true once you reach adulthood. If someone reads
10 bodice rippers a week does that imply anything about
his or her intellect or lack thereof? 'Number of
books read' by itself is meaningless at this stage of
intellectual development. Someone who reads the NYT
and Wall Street Journal every day is quite likely
doing more for themselves than the bodice ripper
person. As for your housemate, I am wondering why
he doesn't have his own place when he has a graduate
degree from MIT. That sounds rather odd. I'd worry
about that more than about how many books he reads.
\- I was not the one equating "reads" with
intelligence. If anything I was saying that I
found it odd a fair number of pretty intelligent
people *dont* read ... or if you go to their homes
you will not see 10 books. I agree a lot of people
who read pulp somehow think that is supirior to
wantching TV, when they are essentially the same
thing ... and then there are people who watch a
HISTORY CHANNEL show on Rome and think that is
50% of the way to reading R. SYME: THE ROMAN
REVOLUTION when it is closer to like 3%. Re: house-
mate: he owns multiple millions of dollars in
real estate. I can only assume he lets me live here
because of my wit and charm, since he clearly doesnt
need my meagre rent.
\_ I haven't read a book 'for fun' since I graduated several years ago.
Reading is on my 'todo' list but never rises to the top. I have
other things I'd rather be doing or need to be doing.
\_ Interesting. I didn't have time to read at college, but now
that I work I read voraciously.
\_ Before to law school I was reading about 1 book every 2 weeks
or so (mostly non-fiction - science/history/&c.). Now I pretty
much only read my casebooks or related material which amounts
to around 300 pages a week (or more).
\_ I had pretty much stopped reading for pleasure by my junior year as
an undergrad. Then I married a librarian. I read like crazy now
(and keep having to get more bookshelves). -emarkp
\_ Why does being related to a librarian always make people
read more? Is it because they bring home books, or that
they get good recommendations at work, or that they read
a lot themselves and pass the book on, or what? I've known
several sons/daughters of librarians, and they're all
avid readers.
\_ If you didn't love books, you wouldn't become a librarian
\_ Speaking as the son of a librarian, I think the
factors are mostly envionmental. My mother read to
me a lot as a child. There are always books around
the house. We went to the library (as a family)
weekly. We got books as presents. Mom was always
reading books. etc. -jrleek
\_ In my case, she had a lot of great books that I'd never
read. Now we recommend books to each other. -emarkp
\_ No, we're too busy reading motd. =) But seriously, I read newspaper
and website for things that used to be available on printed media.
\_ Sometimes books have a hard time competing for my attention with
all the other stuff there is to do... I don't read as much as I
would have liked. I occasionally get into a mode of reading a number
of books. If I get "stalled" in a book it tends to kill my reading
habit for a while and I'll go play videogames instead or whatever.
I stalled out of a few books lately when I tried reading more
classic literature... I made it halfway through Karamazov before
giving up. Master and Margarita didn't capture me after a partial
attempt. For Whom the Bell Tolls I picked up after really enjoying
The Sun Also Rises, but I kind of trailed off halfway through that
also. I'm 3/4 through The Iliad translated by Robert Fagles, which
doesn't seem as poetic as whatever unknown translation I read
a little bit of in college. And the storyline gets a little bogged
down with the endless battling and slaughter.
I hope to just get those two done and then stick with lighter
stuff for a while. I had fun reading short stories since they
can be done in one sitting. Hard Boiled detective stories and Fritz
Leiber's Lankhmar tales were the latest I read.
Lately I've just been listening to audiobooks while I fall asleep or
over breakfast... at least I get through stuff that way.
\- imho, the iliad is not something you can read without "guidance".
best is to read it in a class with a good teacher, but even
reading a good introduction may be enough. i say this for two
reasons: 1. it is a very "alien" work so you are likely to
arrive at some incorrect interpreations unless you are waved
off [like say with the metrical rather than descrptive function
of the ephithets] 2. it is an amazingly complicated work and
there are some structures/methods that you'll need some
examples pointed out ... after you know what to look for,
there are some structures/methods that you'll need some to be
pointed out ... after you know what to look for,
then you can look for these on your own [like some details of
"ring composition", or the way HELEN is described in the
famous "Teikoskopia"].
\_ You're probably right... this book does have a relatively
long introductory/preface section and appendices etc. and
I did have part of the Iliad as class material at Cal (but
I really bailed on that class and I think the focus was
not on the literature but the mythological ideas). It does
describe at least some of what you're talking about. I have
describe at least some of what you're talking about. I
have to be in the proper mood for it... I also have the
Odyssey from the same guy. I did not compare translations
beforehand so I kind of wonder if I'm missing out on something
But it's hard to say what the "real" approach should be. The
guy of course argues his way best captures the feel. Oh well.
\_ psb is right. It's not just a matter of being in the
'mood,' you need a lot of background on their society, the
way they thought, their entire moral and metaphysical
framework was completely different from ours.
\_ I meant in the mood to enjoy reading it. This motd
stuff got me into it again for now...
\- "moral and metaphysical framework" nicely captures
what is at issue in my first point about the "alieness"
of the "world of odysseus". but the structural elements
unique to oral composition [the parry-lord-parry stuff]
in general or homeric epic in particular [like the
telescoping of the 10 years of the conflict into the
short period covered by the iliad] is a different set
of issues. in fact there is one more, which is the
philological ... like greek language has "aspect"...
but that stuff is beyond me. and i think that has
\_ I wish schoen@@csua would login and post. He would
know more about this I bet. -- ilyas
\- are you a russian? doesnt the russian language
have notoriously difficult aspect in addition to
tense? then this may be easier for you to follow.
the closest i've read to a philology heavy book
is G. Nagy: The Best of the Achaeans. very good.
\_ I think aspect distinctions exist in English,
too. English just lacks a general mechanism.
I don't know how sophisticated greek aspect is
compared to russian aspect. -- ilyas
I didn't know what aspect was, so I found this elucidating: _/
http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/encyclopedia/G/Gr/Grammatical_aspect.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_aspect
\-yes that was sort of my point. some of this stuff
is not like "oh yes the clever boy in the english
class got more out of reading Ozymandias than i
did" ... there is no hope you will get some of this
stuff because it just doesnt exist in your brain,
it's not a matter of insight and figuruing it out.
diminishing returns for a "normal person". i note that
even 5th cent BC athens is much less "alien" and
easier to understand. with some exceptions like the
Oresteia.
\-BTW, I like the Lattimore trans the most probably
but I think Fitzgerald and Fagles are reasonable.
\-BTW, I like the Lattimore trans the most, but
I think Fitzgerald and Fagles are reasonable.
Perhaps the 100s of pages of Fagles cant compare
to the "highlights" you remember from college.
if you want to really go for the poetic one, look
at the pope translation. not user-friendly, tho.
FACTOID: T.E. Lawrence (of Arabia) did a prose
trans. of the Iliad and Odyssey.
\_ That may have been it; I will look into it next time
I'm in a book place. There are a couple of passages
I will know it by. I found Pope online and this too:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?lookup=Hom.+Il.+1.1
That last version has some ridiculous (IMO)
Shakespeare dialogue like "wherefore art thou" that
seems out of place. The Fagles stuff is certainly
very readable; I guess it seems too casual at times.
\- Butler->ass
\- Butler -> ass |
| 7/9 |
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| www.absoluteastronomy.com/encyclopedia/G/Gr/Grammatical_aspect.htm imperfective aspect, although it is possible to create grammati cal models which use additional or different aspects with Indo-European languages. As linguistic tense-forms often convey distinctions of both t ime ('past', 'present', 'future') and aspect ('aorist', 'perfective', 'i mperfective'), many discussions of grammar conceive of both aspect and t ime as mutually distinct and subsumed under tense. It is somewhat difficult to explain the idea of aspect in English (and mo st other modern Indo-European languages) since they use the same pattern s to encode in tense both the time and the aspect of a verb together. for example, whether the event was/is/will be of some fixed range of time, or whether it was/is/will be an ongoing process. The two do not necessarily have to be represented together, a distinction that h as been long since lost in English, where the verb tense-form now encode s both aspect and time together. There are a number of languages which care much more about aspect than time. Prominent in this category is Quick Facts about: Chinese Any of the Sino-Tibetan languages spoken in China; Chinese, which differenti ates a whole slew of aspects but relies exclusively on (optional) time-w ords to temporally pinpoint an action. In other language groups, such as most modern Indo-European languages, aspect has become entirely conflat ed with the tense system. Ara bic shows a contrast between dynamic and static aspect For example, the concepts 'ride' and 'mount' are shown by the same verb, rukubun, static in the former case and dynamic in the latter. Slavic linguists) dra w a distinction between whether aspectual qualities are expressed in ter ms of grammatical changes, or whether each aspect is stored as a differe nt lexical entry. German term Aktionsart (meaning "method s of action") to refer to lexical semantic distinctions. English-speakin g linguists tend to use the term "aspect" for both. In Serbian, the verb exists in perfective and imperfective aspects; it could be tra nslated either as "jesti" (imperfective) or "pojesti" (perfective). Now, each aspect could be used with each tense of Serbian (except present te nse). Notice that, in first two examples, what is expressed in English w ith two different tenses is expressed in Serbian in the same tense, but with two different aspects. The second and third pair of examples show h ow aspects are combined with other tenses. Past Perfect Continuous (progressive, perfect): "I had been eating" (Note that while many elementary discussions of English grammar would cla ssify the Present Perfect as a past tense, from the standpoint of strict linguistics--and that elucidated hereit is clearly a species of the pre sent, as we cannot say of someone now deceased that he "has eaten"/"has been eating"; the present auxiliary implies that he is in some way prese nt (alive), even if the action denoted is completed (perfect) or partial ly completed (progressive perfect). He can/may/will have been doing (progressive, perfect) One ought not derive the impression from the above that auxiliary verbs i n English serve only to convey aspect; subjunctive mood, and the further complicating optional us age of the first person "shall"/"should" auxiliaries (to distinguish wil lingness from futurity), the English system of modals has become quite l oose, at times ambiguous, and difficult to formalize so as to reflect co mmon, accepted practice. It is to be stressed that these are the structural expressions of aspect and can convey meanings that would be expressed by separate and differen t aspects in other languages. The typical contrasts of aspect in many la nguages can be distinguished in English only with the aid of phrases; Bats, which distinguishes this aspectual difference for just six verbs. Compare so wodze I fell down (through no fault of my own, accidentally) and as wodze I fell down (through something I did, or on purpose). |
| en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_aspect imperfective aspect, although it is possible to create grammatical models that use additional or different aspects with Indo-Eu ropean languages. As linguistic tense-forms often convey distinctions of both time ('past', 'present', 'future') and aspect ('aorist', 'perfecti ve', 'imperfective'), many discussions of grammar conceive of aspect and time as mutually distinct, yet subsumed together under tense. It is somewhat difficult to explain the idea of aspect in English or in m ost other modern Indo-European languages, since they use the same patter ns to encode in tense both the time and the aspect of a verb together. Aspect signals the duration that the event covers (a nd perhaps its commencement, continuation, completion, or repetition, et c); for example, whether the event was/is/will be of some fixed range o f time, or whether it was/is/will be an ongoing process. Time and aspect do not necessarily have to be represented together; but any clear disti nction has long been lost in English, where the verb tense-form now enco des both aspect and time together. past time and perfective aspect (an action represented as completed), whereas "I was eating" normally expresses both past time and imperfective aspect (an action represented as ongoing or unfinished ). edit Usage of aspects In some languages, aspect and time are very clearly separated, making the m much more distinct to their speakers. There are a number of languages that mark aspect much more saliently than time. In these terms, aspect is a specialized grammatical catego ry for the expression of Aktionsart. Aktionsart can be expressed in all languages, but the grammatical category aspect is only found in very spe cific languages. Slavic languages there are two grammatical aspects: perfective and imperfective. Perfective aspect allows the speaker to describe the acti on as finished, completed; imperfective aspect does not present the acti on as finished, but rather as continuing or repeating. Serbian Example Tense Aspect Ja sam jeo past imperfective Ja sam pojeo perfective Ja sam bio jeo pluperfect imperfective Ja sam bio pojeo perfective Ja u jesti future imperfective Ja u pojesti perfective Ja sam pojeo signals that the action was completed. Its meaning can be gi ven as "I ate (something) and I finished eating (it)"; Estonian, among others, have a grammatical aspect con trast between telic and atelic. Telic sentences signal that the intended goal of an action is achieved. Atelic sentences do not signal whether a ny such goal has been achieved. For example, the (implicit) purpose of shooting is to kill, such that: * Ammuin karhun -- "I shot the bear (succeeded)"; Sometimes, corresponding telic and atelic forms have as little to do with each other semantically as "take" has with "take off". For example, nai da means "to marry" when telic, but "to have sex with" when atelic. shall", by use of a present form, as in "tomorrow we go to Newark", or by some o ther means). But present and past are expressed using direct modificatio ns of the verb, which is then modified further by one or more non-simple aspects; Each tense is named according to its combination of aspects a nd time. So we have for the present tense: * Present Simple (not progressive/continuous, not perfect; and for the past tense: * Past Simple (not progressive/continuous, not perfect; simple): "I ate " * Past Imperfect (progressive, not perfect): "I was eating" * Past Perfect (not progressive, perfect): "I had eaten" * Past Perfect Continuous (progressive, perfect): "I had been eating" (Note that, while many elementary discussions of English grammar would cl assify the Present Perfect as a past tense, from the standpoint of stric t linguistics and that elucidated here it is clearly a species of th e present, as we cannot say of someone now deceased that he "has eaten" or "has been eating"; the present auxiliary implies that he is in some w ay present (alive), even if the action denoted is completed (perfect) or partially completed (progressive perfect). When combined with these auxiliaries the infinitive form changes to accom modate the same combinations of aspect available for the two genuine ten ses, providing English speakers with, among other semantic possibilities , a working future "tense": * He can/may/will do (not progressive, not perfect) * He can/may/will be doing (progressive, not perfect) * He can/may/will have done (not progressive, perfect) * He can/may/will have been doing (progressive, perfect) One ought not to derive the impression from the above that auxiliary verb s in English serve only to convey aspect; subjunctive mood, and the further complicating optional usag e of the first person "shall" and "should" auxiliaries (to distinguish w illingness from futurity), the English system of modals has become quite loose, at times ambiguous, and difficult to formalize so as to reflect common, accepted practice. It is to be stressed that these are the structural expressions of aspect and can convey meanings that would be expressed by separate and differen t aspects in other languages. The typical contrasts of aspect in many la nguages can, arguably, only be distinguished in English with the aid of phrases. Bats, which distinguishes this aspectual difference for just six verbs. Compare so wodze I fell down (through no fault of my own, accidentally) and as wodze I fell down (through somethi ng I did, or on purpose). |
| www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?lookup=Hom.+Il.+1.1 Let me not find you, old man, by the ho llow ships, either tarrying now or coming back later, lest your staff an d the wreath of the god not protect you. as she walks to and fro before the loom and serves my be d But go, do not anger me, that you may return the safer. The Annenberg CPB/Project provided support for entering this text. The Iliad with an English Translation by AT Murray, PhD in two volumes. |