AKICIF New York History department.
aRJay
heard anything about this, I said no but would ask on the net.
Apparently back in 1689? the soon to be notorious Captain Kidd loaned
some equipment and land for the building of Trinity church and now his
descendants are claiming it back, my father said something about there
being a lot of them but the one on the radio? was getting several
millions as his share.
Can the New Yorkers (or anyone else) amongst us spread more light on
this?
--
How does a rocket/jet engine work?
"It's not that hard.
Stuff goes in, stuff happens, stuff goes out faster than it came in."
- Ian Stirling
aRJay
Steve Davies
> I was round at my parents for tea earlier when my father asked if I
had
> heard anything about this, I said no but would ask on the net.
>
OK, here's the story as given in The Independent last Sunday. New
evidence uncovered at the public records office at Kew has confirmed the
long-held belief that Robert Edwards (apparently a Welsh pirate) owned
about 77 acres of Manhattan some time around 1690. He apparently leased
the land to Trinity Church on the understanding that it would revert to
his descendants after 99 years. This failed to happen for reasons
unknown, but the situation appears to have been confused at this point
by the actions of a corrupt governor of New York, Colonel Fletcher
(apparently while under arrest for walking down Broadway dressed as a
woman) who gave away large areas of the city and generally confused the
legal/land grant situation.
Back in the present day, there are 5400 known descendants of Robert
Edwards, 2000 in the UK and the rest in the US. The area of land under
dispute is worth around $680bn and if divided equally would give each of
them around $110 million. Trinity Church is relying for its defence on
the statute of limitations which states that any claim must be made
within 15 years of the start of the dispute. The heirs of Robert Edwards
believe they can show that there was some sort of legal error which
means that they should be allowed to revive their claim. For that much
money I think I'd clutch at straws too. The whole thing has been stirred
up by a federal court ruling last week in Pittsburgh which (I think) set
aside a previous ruling against the claimants on the grounds that the
claimants' lawyers had embezzled all their money instead of actually
trying to press the claim.
Don't know any more than that, I'm afraid.
Steve Davies
Plokta News Network -- www.plokta.com/pnn
Andy Hickmott
Note that if someone sends you a letter saying that you've been
identified as one of the possible claimants and offering to represent
you (for *ahem* a nominal fee -- nothing much, really), you should
immediately report them to the local bunco squad. This is a
well-known con.
If you are actually a descendant of Robert Edwards, contact a real
lawyer with a real reputation for advice on how to proceed.
--
Andy Hickmott
How fleeting are all human passions compared with
the massive continuity of ducks. [Dorothy Sayers]
Gary Farber
Steve Davies <st...@vraidex.demon.co.uk> wrote:
I've yet to see a word about this in any NYC, or US newspaper or news
source, but I may just be missing that, of course.
I did a bit of poking about on the Web, but doubtless haven't investigated
many sources of NY history which are out there. And in a case like this,
books and libraries are almost certainly still far better sources for such
old and detailed history as is called for here.
But a few errors are clearly visible in the above account.
<http://www.trinitywallstreet.org/looking.html>, the official Trinity
Church website, and others, confirm that Governor Fletcher was Governor
then. I've seen nothing about him being corrupt, though he was disliked,
and nothing about any 99-year lease. Which proves nothing, of course.
From the above website's history timeline:
1696
Governor Benjamin Fletcher grants his approval for
the Anglican community in Manhattan to purchase land for a new
church.
May 6, 1697
Trinity receives its charter and a land grant from
King William III of England. An annual rent of "one peppercorne" to
the English crown is set.
1698
The first building to house Trinity's
worshipers was a modest rectangular
structure with a gambrel roof and small
porch. According to historical records,
Captain Kidd lent his runner and tackle for
hoisting the stones.
So here's Captain Kidd in the story.
1705
Queen Anne of England grants Trinity valuable
acreage, increasing Trinity's holdings to 215 acres. In the centuries
that follow, Trinity divests most of this land to establish and endow
other churches and institutions, including what is now Columbia
University.
The church's real estate holdings currently include 27 commercial
buildings on Trinity land totaling approximately 6 million square feet of
office, retail, and manufacturing space, located primarily in the Hudson
Square area of New York City.
They are indeed immensely wealthy, and fund a lot of other churches and
charities; they run their own tv production company, among many other
endeavors.
As they say, "Trinity is one of the largest commercial landlords in New
York City. The income from Trinity's properties is earmarked for the
programs and ministry of the parish at home and abroad."
See <http://www.trinityrealestate.org/>
Then a bit more history from a history of Columbia University's
antecedent, King's College, and a subsidiary listing of NY Royal
Governors, and we see the confusion over the cross-dressing; wrong
Governor:
<http://beatl.barnard.columbia.edu/kingsv1/NYGovs.htm>
7
Benjamin Fletcher
1692-1697
Secured Ministry Act
privileging Anglicans in southern NY
8
Earl of Bellomont
1698-1702
Hostile to Trinity Church;
threatened takeback of land
9
Viscount Cornbury
1702-1708
Friend of Trinity Church;
suspected cross-dresser
Then, some selections from
<http://beatl.barnard.columbia.edu/kingsv1/timeline.htm>:
1693 -- NY provincial government under Governor Benjamin Fletcher
passes Ministry Act -- provides financial support from provincial tax
receipts for Anglican churches in NYC, Westchester, Queens and Staten
Island; Anglicans therefater see themselves as the colony's established
church
1695 -- Governor Fletcher approves grant of land in New York City for
an Anglican Church; allows Dutch to use their taxes to support Dutch
Reform clergy; greatly expands land patents to favored supporters
1697 -- Trinity Church founded by NYC Anglicans with royal charter
from King William; given 7-year lease of 32 acres of prime NYC
property [ "Queens Farm"] by Governor Fletcher; William Vesey
(Harvard, 1688) named first rector of Trinity Church; held position to
1745
1697 -- Virginian Anglicans open William & Mary College in
Williamsburg; the second college in English North America; soon
thereafter functionally reverts to a grammar school
1700 -- New York's 7th governor, Richard Coote, Earl of Bellomont, a
Whig, threatens to reclaim land earlier provided Trinity Church by
Governor Fletcher; bans Catholics from holding religious services in
NYC
1705 -- Trinity Church permanently ceded "Queens Farm" by NY
Governor Edward Cornbury for its uses, Trinity Vestryman Lewis Morris
declared the site "a fit place for a colledge"
1708 -- Governor Cornbury forced to leave New York following attacks
from critics of his pro-Anglican policies; charged by Robert Livingston
with cavorting about town in women's clothes
Trinity went on throughout NY history to do all sorts of important stuff,
but that's all that's relevant to this issue.
--
Copyright 1999 by Gary Farber; For Hire as: Web Researcher; Nonfiction
Writer, Fiction and Nonfiction Editor; gfa...@panix.com; Northeast US
Gary Farber
NEW YORK
by Theodore Roosevelt
Wonder whatever happened to him?
This is from the 1899 edition, which is in the public domain. The entire
book, a history of New York, may be read at
<http://members.aol.com/dann01/tr-ny.html>. But it doesn't do any good to
quote a URL for a lesser part, because it's all one huge file.
A couple of excerpts about the previously discussed Governors, though,
forthwith, in which we see no mention of corruption by Fletcher, but
mention of objections to him, and a bit more about the cross-dressing of
Lord Cornbury:
The favor shown to the pirates brought scandal on the name of more than
one royal governor of New York. This was especially the case with Governor
Benjamin Fletcher, a stout, florid soldier of fortune, who came over to
take control in 1692, the year after the tragic end of Leisler's
rebellion. He possessed both energy and courage, but was utterly unfitted
for a civil post of such difficulty as that to which he was now appointed.
Being a fawning courtier to the king, he naturally took a tone of insolent
command in dealing with the colony. Though very strict in religious
observances he was a loose liver, fond of luxury, and of extravagant
habits; he was therefore continually in want of money, and both he and
some of his council were in the habit of receiving valuable
gifts--amounting to blackmail--from the different pirate ships. Finally,
the scandal grew so great that he was recalled.
Other causes, however, contributed to bring about the recall. Fletcher was
a staunch supporter of the colonial aristocracy, and bitterly opposed to
the popular party. He interfered actively against the latter in the
elections for the General Assembly, and helped to achieve a triumph which
was largely due to wholesale intimidations--for the partisans of the
governor and the richer classes mobbed their opponents, and in many places
drove them by force from the polling--booths. He granted the public lands
right and left, doing his best to divide the soil of the province among a
few rich families. He thus sought to build up a system of gigantic
tenant-farmed estates, instead of allowing the country to become filled
with small freehold farmers. He also connived at the acquisition by
private individuals of great tracts of land from the Indians; and his
grants were made to ministers and churches as well as to laymen. In short,
his whole theory was to depress the freemen of small means, and to
concentrate power and wealth in the hands of the Church and the
aristocracy; and according to [p. 430] his capacities he was an
unwholesome and vicious force in the body politic.
For some of Fletcher's acts, however, there was at least much excuse; and
in certain of the wrangles in which he became engaged, his opponents
behaved no better than he did. Thus, he allowed the merchants to evade the
iron laws of trade. He probably winked at these evasions, partly from
dislike of trouble, partly, perhaps, from worse motives; but it may be
that he felt some genuine impatience with the restrictions by which the
merchants of England sought to hem in the growth of the colonies and to
keep their trade solely for the benefit of the ruling country. As regards
most articles, the colonists could only trade outright with England, and
the consequent loss to the merchants was immense. Of course, such a system
put a premium on smuggling, and, for the matter of that, on trading with
pirates, too, and on every other method by which the laws could be evaded.
Yet these same laws were so in accord with the spirit of the time that
there was little open protest against them, though they doubtless
contributed to the growth of the vague feeling of discontent with the home
government which gradually crept into colonial hearts. On the other hand
the Assembly, or popular branch of the colonial legislature, was always
striving to throw, as nearly as might be, the whole burden of colonial
defense on the British Crown and Parliament; and its selfishness,
shortsightedness, and very moderate ability, together with its unlimited
capacity for ignoble squabbling, spake but ill for the body of electors to
whose suffrages it owed its being.
The different colonies, moreover, cared not a jot for one another's
misfortunes. Well-settled, thriving New England was quite content to let
thinly settled, struggling New York get on as best she might when almost
overwhelmed by the Canadians and Indians. The Puritan commonwealths were
well pleased to have such a buffer between them and French aggression.
They looked on with cold and selfish indifference until the danger was
brought home directly to their own thresholds; the [p. 431] money-making
spirit was as yet too strong in their breasts to leave room for more
generous and disinterested emotions. Fletcher spent much of his time in a
wordy warfare with the New Englanders, because of their desertion of New
York, and in quarrelling with the Assembly of the latter province for its
multifarious misdeeds, and especially for the heinous sin of endeavoring
to whittle down his own salary. He was recalled to England early in 1698.
Fletcher's successor was a nobleman of strong and high character, the Earl
of Bellomont--a man of pure life and strict honor, and altogether of far
nobler type than the average colonial governor. He belonged to that
limited class in the English aristocracy which combined intense pride and
exclusiveness in social matters with a genuine belief in popular liberty
and political equality, and a dislike of privilege and privileged castes.
He seems to have clearly seen that the establishment in New York of an
oligarchy such as Fletcher and the wealthy citizens in general dreamed of,
meant injustice to the mass of the people for the time being, and
therefore in the end an uprising, and the destruction of the iniquitous
system by violence. His duty appeared to him plain; and he attacked the
intrenched evils with the utmost resolution.
[more about Bellomont deleted here; read it on the website or in the
book, if you like; Teddy like him; oh, and who can neglect a mention of
the Leislerians?; everyone remembers *them*, right?]
In 1702, when Queen Anne had just ascended the throne, her nephew, Lord
Cornbury, came out as governor. He promptly restored order by putting down
the Leislerians; and by his influence the aristocracy were once more
placed in power. [p. 434] To say truth, the popular party, by its
violence, and the corruption of some of its chiefs, had done much to
forfeit the good-will of the respectable middle classes.
Cornbury, however, did the democracy a good turn by forthwith drowning the
memory of its shortcomings in the torrent of his own follies and misdeeds.
He was very nearly an ideal example of what a royal governor should not
be. He was both silly and wicked. He hated the popular party, and in all
ways that he could he curtailed the political rights of the people. He
favored the manorial lords and rich merchants as against the commonalty;
but he did all he could to wrong even these favorites when it was for his
own interest to do so. He took bribes, very thinly disguised as gifts. He
was always in debt, and was given to debauchery of various kinds. One of
his amusements was to masquerade in woman's garments being, of all things,
inordinately proud that when thus dressed he looked like Queen Anne. He
added bigotry to his other failings, and persecuted the Presbyterians, who
were endeavoring to get a foothold in the colony; he imprisoned their
ministers and confiscated their little meeting- houses. In this respect,
however, he was but a shade worse than the men he ruled over; for the
Assembly had passed a law condemning to death all Catholic priests found
in the colony--a law of which the wickedness was neither atoned for nor
justified by the fact that the same measure of iniquity was meted out to
the Protestants in the countries where the Catholics had control.
[There's more about Cornbury; Teddy *didn't* like him]
Gary Farber
Why, NYC is famous as a city of prostitutes.
<http://www.salwen.com/apple.html>.
Dave Weingart
>Other NYC history: how did New York become known as "The Big Apple"?
>
>Why, NYC is famous as a city of prostitutes.
Don't be talking about Giuliani that way!
--
73 de Dave Weingart KA2ESK Want to help me raise funds for
mailto:phyd...@liii.com cancer research? Sponsor me in
http://www.liii.com/~phydeaux the NYC Marathon, Nov 7, 1999.
Email me for more info!
Janice Gelb
>In <VA.0000048c.0276f082@klono>
>Steve Davies <st...@vraidex.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>: Back in the present day, there are 5400 known descendants of Robert
>: Edwards, 2000 in the UK and the rest in the US. The area of land under
>: dispute is worth around $680bn and if divided equally would give each of
>: them around $110 million. Trinity Church is relying for its defence on
>: the statute of limitations which states that any claim must be made
>: within 15 years of the start of the dispute. The heirs of Robert Edwards
>: believe they can show that there was some sort of legal error which
>: means that they should be allowed to revive their claim. For that much
>: money I think I'd clutch at straws too. The whole thing has been stirred
>: up by a federal court ruling last week in Pittsburgh which (I think) set
>: aside a previous ruling against the claimants on the grounds that the
>: claimants' lawyers had embezzled all their money instead of actually
>: trying to press the claim.
>
>: Don't know any more than that, I'm afraid.
>
>I've yet to see a word about this in any NYC, or US newspaper or news
>source, but I may just be missing that, of course.
>
>I did a bit of poking about on the Web, but doubtless haven't investigated
>many sources of NY history which are out there. And in a case like this,
>books and libraries are almost certainly still far better sources for such
>old and detailed history as is called for here.
>
I found a site listing the history of the dispute, at
http://texoma.net/~richard/edwards/fortune/fortune.htm
The relevant portion is below (although the previous
history is also fascinating):
> In 1930 the International Consolidation of Edwards Heirs filed suit in
> New York. The suit failed, as others had before, for the simple reason
> that the State of New York had a Statute of Limitations that provided
> that if no claim was made within fifteen years after the expiration of
> a lease by the lessor or his heirs, the occupants or possessors of the
> property received full title by adverse possession.The property was
> theirs no longer. The Judge had done his work well.
>
> In 1947 Fannie Mae resumed the fight. She wrote to the mayor of New
> York City who replied that he could not give her any information. She
> appealed directly to the Trinity Corporation, stating the family claim
> and asking for justice. Their attorney, Mr. Shepard, wrote her that the
> Supreme courts of both New York State and the United States had up-held
> their title and they would not recognize any claim against it. She
> wrote him again in 1948. He replied:"...I may say that I am constantly
> receiving letters from all parts of the world from people claiming an
> interest in the property owned by Trinity Church..." but insisted that
> there was no possibility of recognizing her claim.
>
> A suit was filed against Trinity by British subjects residing in
> England, Canada and New Zealand. This case was dismissed. Fannie Mae
> then employed John F. X. Brown, an attorney in New York, in October of
> 1948 and paid him a fee. He reported at length in January of 1949,
> citing court cases, saying that the case was hopeless. She wrote the
> Department of Justice in Washington in June of 1949. She also wrote the
> Chief Post Office Inspector, President Harry S. Truman, the American
> Arbitration Association in New York, to Honorable W. M.Tuck, Governor
> of Virginia, to the Lord Mayor of Cardiff, Wales; all to no avail. In
> 1953 another suit was filed by the Hael Heirs and the New York Sunday
> News gave the entire story a spread in the Dec. 13, 1953issue. The case
> was dismissed.
>
> In 1954 Fannie Mae made another appeal to Mr. Shepard, attorney for the
> Trinity Corporation. His answer was courteous but firm on April
> 23,1954:
>
> "The courts have definitely held that any possible claims are barred by
> the Statute of Limitations. It would, therefore, be useless to discuss
> the matter any further."
>
*****************************************************************
Janice Gelb | The only connection Sun has with
janic...@eng.sun.com | this message is the return address.
http://www.geocities.com/Area51/8018/index.html
"These are my opinions. If they were the Biblical truth, your
bushes would be burning" -- Randy Lander
Gary Farber
: One day in Teletubbyland, Gary Farber <gfa...@panix.com> said:
:>Other NYC history: how did New York become known as "The Big Apple"?
:>
:>Why, NYC is famous as a city of prostitutes.
: Don't be talking about Giuliani that way!
Yeah, he might protect me from Evil Art in museums.
"My Mayor, The Censor"; what a sucky new comedy show.
Pierre Jelenc
>
> I've yet to see a word about this in any NYC, or US newspaper or news
> source, but I may just be missing that, of course.
It was in the Daily News on Monday.
Pierre
--
Pierre Jelenc | The Cucumbers' "Total Vegetility" is out!
| Pawnshop's "Three Brass Balls" is out!
The New York City Beer Guide | RAW Kinder's "CD EP" is out!
http://www.nycbeer.org | Home Office Records http://www.web-ho.com
Rob Hansen
>In <7sqgu6$dga$1...@cedar.liii.com> Dave Weingart <phyd...@liii.com> wrote:
>: One day in Teletubbyland, Gary Farber <gfa...@panix.com> said:
>:>Other NYC history: how did New York become known as "The Big Apple"?
>:>
>:>Why, NYC is famous as a city of prostitutes.
>
>: Don't be talking about Giuliani that way!
>
>Yeah, he might protect me from Evil Art in museums.
>
>"My Mayor, The Censor"; what a sucky new comedy show.
As I understand it, the offending piece uses Christian imagery but,
despite being constructed in part from elephant dung, is not otherwise
disrespectful. Is this correct? If so, it would appear that it's the
use of dung in connection with Christianity that is provoking the
outrage. Oddly enough, my employers have been using horseshit for
centuries in the manufacture of the bells they supply to churches, all
without a peep of protest.
--
Rob Hansen
================================================
My Home Page: http://www.fiawol.demon.co.uk/rob/
Feminists Against Censorship:
http://www.fiawol.demon.co.uk/FAC/
Berni Phillips
> But as we know, we must never associate the Virgin Mary with the
> private parts of women. That would be, you know, like, dirty. Like
> she had something to do with actually giving birth to somebody, and
> that whole mess.
I've been studying various statues and paintings of the Blessed Mother
the past few months, and I'd say that the majority show her totally flat
chested. Even the ones which include Jesus shown as an infant do not
generally have what I would consider to be the bust of a nursing
mother. I suspect the artists consider a full-figured woman to not be
the picture of purity and innocence.
Berni Phillips
Doug Wickstrom
Weholt) excited the ether to say:
>I heard the artist himself is Catholic, a Brit of African descent, who
>uses elephant dung in all his works (has something to do with making a
>statement that he comes from the soil of Africa, or something). I
>also heard that maybe one person in a million just looking at the
>piece would be able to tell it was about the Virgin Mary ... of
>course, the title indicates that the woman in the piece is the Virgin
>Mary so that pretty much gives it away. There are also pictures of
>vaginas clipped from magazines pasted around the central figure. I've
>seen a photograph of the piece and it just looks like a kind of
>folk-artsy figure surrounded by stuff. It's not like the effect of
>the piece is to show some holy icon splattered with elephant crap, or
>anything.
And this is supposedly art?
--
Doug Wickstrom
塑碰の紊い裴は句に掐ている。呢话脚虾
Laura Burchard
Actually, yes. In fact, at least in photos it looks pretty interesting.
Certainly more fun to defend than Serrano, if not as much fun as
Mapplethorpe. God I hated defending Serrano's kitschy junk (ever seen any
of his portrait series? Ultra saturated pose cliches with *no* insight
into the person photographed. Bleah.) It's much more fun being on the
battlements when it's a great artist like Mapplethorpe.
What is privately amusing me is that I can't help but regard this as some
sort of performance art by Guilani himself. The exhibit would have passed
unnoticed except for the standard NYT etc reviews if it hadn't been for
him, so he's the one making it a 'Sensation.'
But I'm easily amused.
Laura
Laura Burchard -- l...@radix.net -- http://www.radix.net/~lhb
X-Review: http://traveller.simplenet.com/xfiles/episode.htm
"Good design is clear thinking made visible." -- Edward Tufte
Avedon Carol
Weholt) wrote:
>Keeping in mind this is all second-hand art criticism, I'd say, yeah,
>that pretty much makes it art. In my book, anyway.
<applause>
Those few paragraphs, for me, are what art is *about*. It upsets
people to look at what something _is_? Then they really need to look
at it. Bad. They need "offensive" art.
Avram Grumer
> And this is supposedly art?
It's a painting -- a figurative one, even, with pretty colors -- with
elements of collage and sculpture. I'd say that fits well within the
borders of what most people would consider art.
--
Avram Grumer | Any sufficiently advanced
Home: av...@bigfoot.com | technology is indistinguishable
http://www.bigfoot.com/~avram/ | from an error message.
Avram Grumer
Weholt) wrote:
> I get the feeling (through viewing a photo of the piece and through
> hearing a supporter of the artist speak about him) that the fellow who
> created this piece has a high regard for his Catholicism, a high
> regard for Mary, a high regard for vaginas, and a high regard for his
> connection to Africa. And so he has created a piece that not only
> expresses his regard for all those things individually, but also
> his regard for how they connect in his mind and, if you will, his
> soul.
I've also seen images of the piece in question (on the web at
<http://www.oasinet.com/postmedia/art/ofili.htm> and briefly on TV), and
and read about the artist (Chris Ofili) and heard (on NPR) from a critic
who is a fan of his work, and your paragraph sums up my conclusions pretty
well.
mike weber
Sep 1999 02:45:02 -0500,
>On Wed, 29 Sep 1999 19:58:31 GMT, awnb...@panix.com (Michael R
>Weholt) excited the ether to say:
>
>>I heard the artist himself is Catholic, a Brit of African descent, who
>>uses elephant dung in all his works (has something to do with making a
>>statement that he comes from the soil of Africa, or something). I
>>also heard that maybe one person in a million just looking at the
>>piece would be able to tell it was about the Virgin Mary ... of
>>course, the title indicates that the woman in the piece is the Virgin
>>Mary so that pretty much gives it away. There are also pictures of
>>vaginas clipped from magazines pasted around the central figure. I've
>>seen a photograph of the piece and it just looks like a kind of
>>folk-artsy figure surrounded by stuff. It's not like the effect of
>>the piece is to show some holy icon splattered with elephant crap, or
>>anything.
>
>And this is supposedly art?
>
panel is "art" -- yes.
If photographically rendered gigantic paintings of Campbell's soup
cans are "art" -- yes.
If building a "fence" running across the middle of a huge section of
deserted land, where hardly anyone will see it, for no real reason is
"art" -- yes.
--
===============================================================================
Dogs can't REALLY smell fear. mike weber
Dogs CAN smell wet pants. kras...@mindspring.com
Half-Finished Website of Xeno: http://weberworld.virtualave.net
mike weber
01 Oct 1999 22:56:31 GMT,
:
Cue Loudy Wainright's "Jesse Don't Like it."
Alan Winston - SSRL Admin Cmptg Mgr
>In article <7svdjb$pk_...@news.panix.com>, awnb...@panix.com (Michael R
>Weholt) wrote:
>
>> I get the feeling (through viewing a photo of the piece and through
>> hearing a supporter of the artist speak about him) that the fellow who
>> created this piece has a high regard for his Catholicism, a high
>> regard for Mary, a high regard for vaginas, and a high regard for his
>> connection to Africa. And so he has created a piece that not only
>> expresses his regard for all those things individually, but also
>> his regard for how they connect in his mind and, if you will, his
>> soul.
>
>I've also seen images of the piece in question (on the web at
><http://www.oasinet.com/postmedia/art/ofili.htm> and briefly on TV), and
>and read about the artist (Chris Ofili) and heard (on NPR) from a critic
>who is a fan of his work, and your paragraph sums up my conclusions pretty
>well.
All this discussion has enabled me, incidentally, to understand the cartoon
on page 78 of the October 4, 1999 _New Yorker_, showing an art supply store
with shelves labeled OILS-ACRYLICS, CHALK-PASTELS, and ELEPHANT DUNG.
All knowledge _is_ contained in fandom.
-- Alan
===============================================================================
Alan Winston --- WIN...@SSRL.SLAC.STANFORD.EDU
Disclaimer: I speak only for myself, not SLAC or SSRL Phone: 650/926-3056
Physical mail to: SSRL -- SLAC BIN 69, PO BOX 4349, STANFORD, CA 94309-0210
===============================================================================
Eric Mayer
weber) wrote:
>Doug Wickstrom <nims...@aol.com> is alleged to have said, on Thu, 30
>Sep 1999 02:45:02 -0500,
>:
>>On Wed, 29 Sep 1999 19:58:31 GMT, awnb...@panix.com (Michael R
>>Weholt) excited the ether to say:
>>
>>>I heard the artist himself is Catholic, a Brit of African descent, who
>>>uses elephant dung in all his works (has something to do with making a
>>>statement that he comes from the soil of Africa, or something). I
>>>also heard that maybe one person in a million just looking at the
>>>piece would be able to tell it was about the Virgin Mary ... of
>>>course, the title indicates that the woman in the piece is the Virgin
>>>Mary so that pretty much gives it away. There are also pictures of
>>>vaginas clipped from magazines pasted around the central figure. I've
>>>seen a photograph of the piece and it just looks like a kind of
>>>folk-artsy figure surrounded by stuff. It's not like the effect of
>>>the piece is to show some holy icon splattered with elephant crap, or
>>>anything.
>>
>>And this is supposedly art?
>>
>If a huge, uncredited and unauthorised enlargement of a single comic
>panel is "art" -- yes.
>
No accounting for taste
>If photographically rendered gigantic paintings of Campbell's soup
>cans are "art" -- yes.
>
Some people think Muswell Hillbillies is the Kinks worst album!
>If building a "fence" running across the middle of a huge section of
>deserted land, where hardly anyone will see it, for no real reason is
>"art" -- yes.
I'm certainly not sure what art is or isn't, but I am sure that it is
not what some politician says it is or isn't.
--
Eric Mayer
http://home.epix.net/~maywrite
Julie Stampnitzky
> I've been studying various statues and paintings of the Blessed Mother
> the past few months, and I'd say that the majority show her totally flat
> chested.
Are these all from a single time and place, or are various eras
represented?
Is she much more flat-chested than other subjects portrayed by the same
artists or their contemporaries?
--
Julie Stampnitzky http://www.yucs.org/~jules
Rehovot, Israel http://neskaya.darkover.org
"...Do you find it easy to get drunk on words?" "So easy that, to
tell you the truth, I am seldom perfectly sober." (_Gaudy Night_)
Marty Helgesen
<SNIP>
>>And this is supposedly art?
>If a huge, uncredited and unauthorised enlargement of a single comic
>panel is "art" -- yes.
>cans are "art" -- yes.
>deserted land, where hardly anyone will see it, for no real reason is
>"art" -- yes.
-------
Marty Helgesen
Bitnet: mnhcc@cunyvm Internet: mn...@cunyvm.cuny.edu
"Ever noticed how many people claim it's organized religion they
object to? Makes me wonder what's so great about incoherent
religion." Teresa Nielsen Hayden
Help outlaw spam. For further information see http://www.cauce.org/
Avram Grumer
<MN...@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU> wrote:
> In article <37f5912c...@news.mindspring.com>,
kras...@mindspring.com (mike weber) says:
> <SNIP>
> >>And this is supposedly art?
>
> >If a huge, uncredited and unauthorised enlargement of a single comic
> >panel is "art" -- yes.
>
> >If photographically rendered gigantic paintings of Campbell's soup
> >cans are "art" -- yes.
>
> >If building a "fence" running across the middle of a huge section of
> >deserted land, where hardly anyone will see it, for no real reason is
> >"art" -- yes.
>
> In other words, it's not art.
How about oversized images of faces or fruit, rendered in something that
came out of a chicken's ass?
Mike Kozlowski
Marty Helgesen <MN...@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU> wrote:
>In article <37f5912c...@news.mindspring.com>, kras...@mindspring.com (mike weber) says:
>>>And this is supposedly art?
>
>>If a huge, uncredited and unauthorised enlargement of a single comic
>>panel is "art" -- yes.
>>If photographically rendered gigantic paintings of Campbell's soup
>>cans are "art" -- yes.
>>If building a "fence" running across the middle of a huge section of
>>deserted land, where hardly anyone will see it, for no real reason is
>>"art" -- yes.
>
>In other words, it's not art.
Well, that's a pretty assertion, but it's ultimately just an assertion.
If you'd like to back it up with a definition of art, it might be more
meaningful.
And then for an encore, you can define science fiction.
--
Michael Kozlowski
http://www.ssc.wisc.edu/~mkozlows/
Doug Wickstrom
Grumer) excited the ether to say:
>In article <99277.10...@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>, Marty Helgesen
><MN...@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU> wrote:
>
>> In article <37f5912c...@news.mindspring.com>,
>kras...@mindspring.com (mike weber) says:
>> <SNIP>
[missing attribution reinserted here: Doug Wickstrom wrote:}
>> >>And this is supposedly art?
>>
>> >If a huge, uncredited and unauthorised enlargement of a single comic
>> >panel is "art" -- yes.
>>
>> >If photographically rendered gigantic paintings of Campbell's soup
>> >cans are "art" -- yes.
>>
>> >If building a "fence" running across the middle of a huge section of
>> >deserted land, where hardly anyone will see it, for no real reason is
>> >"art" -- yes.
>>
>> In other words, it's not art.
>
>How about oversized images of faces or fruit, rendered in something that
>came out of a chicken's ass?
I presume you mean the egg-yolk component of tempera?
--
Doug Wickstrom
"I have so many goals. I want to open a hair salon. I want to own some
buildings. I want to be a model. I want to have my own label. I just
don't want to have to work when I'm twenty-three." --Brandy
Avram Grumer
(Mike Kozlowski) wrote:
> In article <99277.10...@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>,
> Marty Helgesen <MN...@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU> wrote:
> >
> >In other words, it's not art.
>
> Well, that's a pretty assertion, but it's ultimately just an assertion.
> If you'd like to back it up with a definition of art, it might be more
> meaningful.
>
> And then for an encore, you can define science fiction.
It's whatever Rudy Giuliani is pointing at to when he threatens to take
away your funding.
--
Avram Grumer | av...@bigfoot.com | http://www.bigfoot.com/~avram/
If music be the food of love, then some of it be the Twinkies of
dysfunctional relationships.
Avram Grumer
> On Mon, 04 Oct 1999 14:38:13 -0400, av...@bigfoot.com (Avram
> Grumer) excited the ether to say:
> >
> >How about oversized images of faces or fruit, rendered in something
> >that came out of a chicken's ass?
>
> I presume you mean the egg-yolk component of tempera?
Yup.
Gary Farber
Avram Grumer <av...@bigfoot.com> wrote:
: In article <7tasur$d3k$1...@news.doit.wisc.edu>, mkoz...@guy.ssc.wisc.edu
: (Mike Kozlowski) wrote:
:> In article <99277.10...@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>,
:> Marty Helgesen <MN...@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU> wrote:
:> >
:> >In other words, it's not art.
:>
:> Well, that's a pretty assertion, but it's ultimately just an assertion.
:> If you'd like to back it up with a definition of art, it might be more
:> meaningful.
:>
:> And then for an encore, you can define science fiction.
: It's whatever Rudy Giuliani is pointing at to when he threatens to take
: away your funding.
It's been joyous reading much of the news. This is the largest attendance
the Brooklyn Museum has ever had in its entire history. That, with the
three nearest subway stops coincidentally closed. Their membership has
surged in the largest growth spurt ever. They've never gotten publicity
like this. It's enough to make you think they paid off Rudy to do this.
Or that Saatchi has. (Why, it's almost as of Saatchi knows something
about advertising.)
And Rudy was raucously booed when he attended the Metropolitan Opera two
days ago, according to yesterday's NY Times. Even supporters of his are
grumbling about "time to find a new mayor, who isn't always fighting and
attacking."
And it's hard to see him getting many supporters from this against Hilary
Clinton that he didn't already have; whereas he's most certainly going to
lose some swing votes.
Overall, not an unhappy result, eh? Rather. . . sensational.
On the question up top, well, I may not know what I like, but I know Art.
(Art Widner, fine fellow.)
But seriously, yolks: "that's not art"? Please, can we move along to the
*fifth* grade questions?
mike weber
Mon, 4 Oct 1999 10:11:06 EDT,
>
>>If a huge, uncredited and unauthorised enlargement of a single comic
>>panel is "art" -- yes.
>
>>If photographically rendered gigantic paintings of Campbell's soup
>>cans are "art" -- yes.
>
>>If building a "fence" running across the middle of a huge section of
>>deserted land, where hardly anyone will see it, for no real reason is
>>"art" -- yes.
>
>
convince enough people to agree with you on.
--
=============================================================
"They put manure in his well and they made him talk to lawyers!"
-- Cat Ballou
mike weber -- kras...@mindspring.com
Avram Grumer
> It's been joyous reading much of the news. This is the largest attendance
> the Brooklyn Museum has ever had in its entire history. That, with the
> three nearest subway stops coincidentally closed.
Sorta kinda. That's not actually an accurate description of the subway
closings, but it is true that it would have been more inconvenient for
many travelers to get home from the museum over the weekend if the city
hadn't provided shuttle bus service. I can go into details if anyone
cares; I live right near the museum, and regularly use the station right
in front of it.
> And Rudy was raucously booed when he attended the Metropolitan Opera two
> days ago, according to yesterday's NY Times. Even supporters of his are
> grumbling about "time to find a new mayor, who isn't always fighting and
> attacking."
I hadn't heard about this. It fills me with joy. Of course, we were
going to have a new mayor after the next election anyway. I can only hope
that this shows all of the state how terrible a senator Giuliani would be.
Gary Farber
Avram Grumer <av...@bigfoot.com> wrote:
: In article <7tchnt$s4j$2...@news.panix.com>,
: Gary Farber <gfa...@panix.com> wrote:
:> It's been joyous reading much of the news. This is the largest attendance
:> the Brooklyn Museum has ever had in its entire history. That, with the
:> three nearest subway stops coincidentally closed.
: Sorta kinda. That's not actually an accurate description of the subway
: closings, but it is true that it would have been more inconvenient for
: many travelers to get home from the museum over the weekend if the city
: hadn't provided shuttle bus service. I can go into details if anyone
: cares; I live right near the museum, and regularly use the station right
: in front of it.
They've been closed to Manhattan-bound traffic; I probably should have
specified this, or "closed in one direction," but this seemed a fine
detail to me; are there even finer details worth mentioning?
[. . .]
: I hadn't heard about this. It fills me with joy. Of course, we were
: going to have a new mayor after the next election anyway. I can only hope
: that this shows all of the state how terrible a senator Giuliani would be.
But he has all the skills for being a legislator, despite never having
been one: he's easy to get along with, a consensus-seeker, good at
persuasion, a deal-maker, even-tempered, best when working with others,
never seeking to grab credit, and is just all around a people-person, as
well as beloved in the Republican Party. What's not to like?
Teehee.
Avram Grumer
> In <avram-05109...@manhattan.crossover.com>
> Avram Grumer <av...@bigfoot.com> wrote:
> : In article <7tchnt$s4j$2...@news.panix.com>,
> : Gary Farber <gfa...@panix.com> wrote:
>
> :> It's been joyous reading much of the news. This is the largest attendance
> :> the Brooklyn Museum has ever had in its entire history. That, with the
> :> three nearest subway stops coincidentally closed.
>
> : Sorta kinda. That's not actually an accurate description of the subway
> : closings, but it is true that it would have been more inconvenient for
> : many travelers to get home from the museum over the weekend if the city
> : hadn't provided shuttle bus service. I can go into details if anyone
> : cares; I live right near the museum, and regularly use the station right
> : in front of it.
>
> They've been closed to Manhattan-bound traffic; I probably should have
> specified this, or "closed in one direction," but this seemed a fine
> detail to me; are there even finer details worth mentioning?
It's not the three closest stations to the museum that were closed to
Manhattan-bound traffic, it was the three local stops (Bergen, Eastern
Parkway, and Grand Army Plaza) between Atlantic and Franklin Avenue. The
Franklin Ave. station is closer to the museum than the Bergen St. one is;
it may even be closer than the Grand Army Plaza station is. So, I think,
is the (Brooklyn) Seventh Avenue station, which is on a different line.
Kevin J. Maroney
>But [Benito Giuliani]
>has all the skills for being a legislator, despite never having
>been one: he's easy to get along with, a consensus-seeker, good at
>persuasion, a deal-maker, even-tempered, best when working with others,
>never seeking to grab credit, and is just all around a people-person, as
>well as beloved in the Republican Party. What's not to like?
Indeed, and well-summarized. It's hard to imagine why Benito is
running for the senate instead of challenging Pataki for the
governorship; the NY governorship is much more like the type of
unfettered dictatorship he seeks, and is a better stepping-stone to
the presidency than the US Senate ever could hope to be.
--
Kevin Maroney | kmar...@crossover.com
Kitchen Staff Supervisor, New York Review of Science Fiction
http://www.nyrsf.com
Andy Hickmott
weber) wrote:
>Marty Helgesen <MN...@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU> is alleged to have said, on
>Mon, 4 Oct 1999 10:11:06 EDT,
>>
>>In other words, it's not art.
>>
>No -- "art" is what you're looking at when you say "art" and can
>convince enough people to agree with you on.
I've recently been finding it either useful or amusing -- your call --
to look at things and say, "It must be Art. I can't think of anything
else it could be."
--
Andy Hickmott
How fleeting are all human passions compared with
the massive continuity of ducks. [Dorothy Sayers]
Gary Farber
: It's not the three closest stations to the museum that were closed to
: Manhattan-bound traffic, it was the three local stops (Bergen, Eastern
: Parkway, and Grand Army Plaza) between Atlantic and Franklin Avenue. The
: Franklin Ave. station is closer to the museum than the Bergen St. one is;
: it may even be closer than the Grand Army Plaza station is. So, I think,
: is the (Brooklyn) Seventh Avenue station, which is on a different line.
Ah. Thank you for the correction. I always used to use the Franklin
Avenue shuttle, grungy as it was, during all the years I was a teen
volunteer at the Museum.
Jo Walton
hick...@interport.net "Andy Hickmott" writes:
> I've recently been finding it either useful or amusing -- your call --
> to look at things and say, "It must be Art. I can't think of anything
> else it could be."
Science? In the Science Museum in London last Saturday, where we were
for Sasha's birthday treat, I looked at a very beautiful Kline bottle and
said "Look, _pure science_." Science sitting around looking beautiful
and being quietly scientific, for it's own sake and unconnected to technology
and usefulness. Fractals in pretty colours are another example of that.
The Difference Engine is also really cool.
--
Jo - - I kissed a kif at Kefk - - J...@bluejo.demon.co.uk
http://www.bluejo.demon.co.uk - Interstichia; Poetry; RASFW FAQ; etc.
Avram Grumer
kras...@mindspring.com wrote:
> No -- "art" is what you're looking at when you say "art" and
> can convince enough people to agree with you on.
That's pretty close to what they told us at art school: "Art is whatever
you can get away with."
A. Sharp
J...@bluejo.demon.co.uk (Jo Walton) writes:
>Science? In the Science Museum in London last Saturday, where we were
>for Sasha's birthday treat, I looked at a very beautiful Kline bottle and
>said "Look, _pure science_." Science sitting around looking beautiful
>and being quietly scientific, for it's own sake and unconnected to technology
>and usefulness. Fractals in pretty colours are another example of that.
Three jolly sailors from Blaydon-on-Tyne
All went to sea in a bottle by Klein
Since the sea was entirely INSIDE the hull
The scenery seen was exceedingly dull.
THE SPACE CHILD'S MOTHER GOOSE.
Couldn't resist.
A. Sharp
ax...@pge.com
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Andrew Plotkin
> In article <37faa29d...@news.interport.net>
> hick...@interport.net "Andy Hickmott" writes:
>
>> I've recently been finding it either useful or amusing -- your call --
>> to look at things and say, "It must be Art. I can't think of anything
>> else it could be."
>
> for Sasha's birthday treat, I looked at a very beautiful Kline bottle and
> said "Look, _pure science_." Science sitting around looking beautiful
> and being quietly scientific, for it's own sake and unconnected to technology
> and usefulness. Fractals in pretty colours are another example of that.
That's math, I think, rather than science.
(Maths, on your side of the Sea.)
Science for its own sake is, hm, science museums do that too... beachballs
floating on columns of air via Bernoulli effect. Shadow-catching walls
made of zinc sulfide. Strobes freezing streams of water droplets. Plasma
spheres, before they got so common that everyone stopped caring.
One of the better science exhibits I've seen recently was simply an
infra-red camera set up connected to a TV screen. You could see heat. On
you, your clothing, your possessions, anything you touched. Taking an
important element of our physical environment and making it immediately
visible so you can *play* with it; that's teaching science.
--Z
(So, this episode of rasff-lurking lasted nearly two days before I broke
down and posted... sigh.)
"And Aholibamah bare Jeush, and Jaalam, and Korah: these were the
borogoves..."
Gary Farber
: In article <37faa29d...@news.interport.net>
: hick...@interport.net "Andy Hickmott" writes:
:
:> I've recently been finding it either useful or amusing -- your call --
:> to look at things and say, "It must be Art. I can't think of anything
:> else it could be."
: Science? In the Science Museum in London last Saturday, where we were
: for Sasha's birthday treat, I looked at a very beautiful Kline bottle and
: said "Look, _pure science_." Science sitting around looking beautiful
: and being quietly scientific, for it's own sake and unconnected to technology
: and usefulness. Fractals in pretty colours are another example of that.
: The Difference Engine is also really cool.
I think those are craft, and arguably art, too. I don't think science is
something that can be seen; I think it's something people do. It's a
process, and artifacts it produces are not themselves "science," any more
than the physical results of "philosophy" are themselves "philosophy."
A. Sharp
Andrew Plotkin <erky...@netcom.com> writes:
>Jo Walton <J...@bluejo.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>> In article <37faa29d...@news.interport.net>
>> hick...@interport.net "Andy Hickmott" writes:
>>
>>> I've recently been finding it either useful or amusing -- your call --
>>> to look at things and say, "It must be Art. I can't think of anything
>>> else it could be."
>>
>> Science? In the Science Museum in London last Saturday, where we were
>> for Sasha's birthday treat, I looked at a very beautiful Kline bottle and
>> said "Look, _pure science_." Science sitting around looking beautiful
>> and being quietly scientific, for it's own sake and unconnected to technology
>> and usefulness. Fractals in pretty colours are another example of that.
>That's math, I think, rather than science.
>(Maths, on your side of the Sea.)
>Science for its own sake is, hm, science museums do that too... beachballs
>floating on columns of air via Bernoulli effect. Shadow-catching walls
>made of zinc sulfide. Strobes freezing streams of water droplets. Plasma
>spheres, before they got so common that everyone stopped caring.
>One of the better science exhibits I've seen recently was simply an
>infra-red camera set up connected to a TV screen. You could see heat. On
>you, your clothing, your possessions, anything you touched. Taking an
>important element of our physical environment and making it immediately
>visible so you can *play* with it; that's teaching science.
One of the most delightful I've ever seen was
a billboard advertising a local hands-on science place, the
Exploratorium, at that time doing a special exhibit on "wind."
The billboard was a mass of silver sequins -- discs
which rippled beautifully with every breeze. It was a pity
that eventually the exhibit changed and the billboard
went back to, probably, beer.
A. Sharp
ax...@pge.com
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Robert Sneddon
<J...@bluejo.demon.co.uk> writes
>
>Science? In the Science Museum in London last Saturday, where we were
>for Sasha's birthday treat, I looked at a very beautiful Kline bottle and
>said "Look, _pure science_." Science sitting around looking beautiful
>and being quietly scientific, for it's own sake and unconnected to technology
>and usefulness.
Neat magic trick with a Klien bottle - pour liquid in, and turn it
upside down the "correct" way, and nothing comes out. Right it, and turn
it the other way, and the liquid comes out again. Applause.
>
>The Difference Engine is also really cool.
>
Not Y1.8K compliant though. They'll be shutting it down for an upgrade
later this year, to make it Y1.9K compliant, once they find the source
code.
--
To reply by email, send to nojay (at) public (period) antipope (dot) org
Robert Sneddon
Cally Soukup
> One of the better science exhibits I've seen recently was simply an
> infra-red camera set up connected to a TV screen. You could see heat. On
> you, your clothing, your possessions, anything you touched. Taking an
> important element of our physical environment and making it immediately
> visible so you can *play* with it; that's teaching science.
My favorite interactive science exhibit of all time was one I saw at
the Exploratorium in San Fransisco. The setup is easy, though a bit
hard to describe.
There is a chair for person A to sit in, with a white screen behind.
Opposite that chair, there is a counter with a chin rest for person
B. In front of the chin rest there is a mirror, positioned such that
one of B's eyes looks straight ahead at person A, while the other is
redirected to B's right, where there is a white board that takes up
the right eye's entire field of vision. There is a standard
blackboard eraser handy to B's right hand.
If person A sits very very still, (and B keeps B's head very still on
the chinrest), B can "erase" A's face, using the blackboard eraser
(or a hand, or anything moving) on the whiteboard to the right. The
image of the moving eraser in B's right eye takes priority over the
unmoving person in B's left eye. The really eerie thing is, if
you've successfully erased A's face, and A blinks, suddenly there's a
pair of eyes looking from the blank white. Or if A smiles without
moving the rest of the face, a mouth will appear. Truly the Cheshire
Person.
--
"I may disagree with what you have to say, but I will defend
to the death your right to say it." -- Beatrice Hall
Cally Soukup sou...@pobox.com
Gary Farber
Andrew Plotkin <erky...@netcom.com> wrote:
[. . .]
: (So, this episode of rasff-lurking lasted nearly two days before I broke
: down and posted... sigh.)
Good to see you here; you're cream of r.a.sf.written crop. Welcome, and
pull up a chair and drip some grain across it.
Andrew Plotkin
> In <7tg56c$7...@dfw-ixnews8.ix.netcom.com>
> Andrew Plotkin <erky...@netcom.com> wrote:
> [. . .]
> : (So, this episode of rasff-lurking lasted nearly two days before I broke
> : down and posted... sigh.)
>
> Good to see you here; you're cream of r.a.sf.written crop.
Thanks, I guess.
It may not last. Our office compile-and-test machine dropped out of
service yesterday, so I was suddenly cursed with free time. But there's a
replacement in place now. I may decide not to keep the extra
Usenet-reading burden. If I fade out, don't panic. )
> Welcome, and
> pull up a chair and drip some grain across it.
Plus there's all the time it takes to soak up the local in-jokes.
--Z
Mary Kay Kare
> In article <939201...@bluejo.demon.co.uk>
> J...@bluejo.demon.co.uk (Jo Walton) writes:
>
> >Science? In the Science Museum in London last Saturday, where we were
> >for Sasha's birthday treat, I looked at a very beautiful Kline bottle and
> >said "Look, _pure science_." Science sitting around looking beautiful
> >and being quietly scientific, for it's own sake and unconnected to technology
> >and usefulness. Fractals in pretty colours are another example of that.
>
> Three jolly sailors from Blaydon-on-Tyne
> All went to sea in a bottle by Klein
> Since the sea was entirely INSIDE the hull
> The scenery seen was exceedingly dull.
>
> THE SPACE CHILD'S MOTHER GOOSE.
>
> Couldn't resist.
Do you know where I can get that book. Jordin has been wanting a copy for
as long as I can remember and it's just 2 weeks til his birthday...
MK
--
Mary Kay Kare
Science Fiction Fandom: where people contradict you just to be polite.
Marilee J. Layman
wrote:
>In <7tg56c$7...@dfw-ixnews8.ix.netcom.com>
>Andrew Plotkin <erky...@netcom.com> wrote:
>[. . .]
>: (So, this episode of rasff-lurking lasted nearly two days before I broke
>: down and posted... sigh.)
>
>Good to see you here; you're cream of r.a.sf.written crop. Welcome, and
>pull up a chair and drip some grain across it.
Andrew met Jo at James', too. He didn't look like I expected, either.
;)
--
Marilee J. Layman Co-Leader, The Other*Worlds*Cafe
relm...@aol.com A Science Fiction Discussion Group
Web site: http://www.webmoose.com/owc/
AOL keyword: BOOKs > Chats & Message > SF Forum > The Other*Worlds*Cafe
Evelyn C. Leeper
Mary Kay Kare <ka...@sirius.com> wrote:
> >
> > Three jolly sailors from Blaydon-on-Tyne
> > All went to sea in a bottle by Klein
> > Since the sea was entirely INSIDE the hull
> > The scenery seen was exceedingly dull.
> >
> > THE SPACE CHILD'S MOTHER GOOSE.
> >
> as long as I can remember and it's just 2 weeks til his birthday...
Alas, it is out of print and the only copy in bookfinder.com is a first
edition priced higher than you probably want to spend.
--
Evelyn C. Leeper, http://www.geocities.com/evelynleeper
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over
public relations, for nature cannot be fooled." -- Richard Feynman.
Marty Helgesen
<SNIP>
>> >If building a "fence" running across the middle of a huge section of
>> >deserted land, where hardly anyone will see it, for no real reason is
>> >"art" -- yes.
>>
>
>came out of a chicken's ass?
>
way egg yolk is used for mixing tempera paint then paintings done
using that hypothetical paint would be, or at least could be, art.
Note that the show in question has other non-art exhibits, including,
as I recall -- I can't lay my hands on a description over this holi-
day weekend -- animal carcasses in formaldehyde (I typoed "formalde-
hype" and thought of leaving it) and part of an animal with maggots.
I think all of the other items in Mike's list have at best a dubious
claim to being art. Until she retired in January I worked with a
librarian who told me that when she was in college she and her best
friend had the idea that it would be fun to silk screen a Campbell's
soup can on a T-shirt. They never did it. She said that if they had
done it they could have been rich and famous. I replied that she was
mistaken. If they had done it they would have considered it a joke,
and would not have claimed it was Art.
-------
Marty Helgesen
Bitnet: mnhcc@cunyvm Internet: mn...@cunyvm.cuny.edu
"Ever noticed how many people claim it's organized religion they
object to? Makes me wonder what's so great about incoherent
religion." Teresa Nielsen Hayden
Help outlaw spam. For further information see http://www.cauce.org/
Marty Helgesen
<SNIP>
>>In other words, it's not art.
>
>If you'd like to back it up with a definition of art, it might be more
>meaningful.
>
>And then for an encore, you can define science fiction.
define science fiction, and thank you for calling attention to the
similarities. Although I will not try to define science fiction, I
will say that _War and Peace_ is not science fiction, but _Starship
Troopers_ is. I'll also say the _Valley of the Dolls_, which I have
not read, is not science fiction, but _Yargo_ by the same author,
which I also have not read, reportedly is. (To confirm my recollec-
tion of the title I looked it up at Amazon.com and noted with inter-
est that although it is out of print there are a number of rave
reviews from its dedicated fans.)
Avram Grumer
<MN...@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU> wrote:
> In article <avram-04109...@manhattan.crossover.com>,
av...@bigfoot.com (Avram Grumer) says:
> <SNIP>
> >>
> >> In other words, it's not art.
> >
> >How about oversized images of faces or fruit, rendered in something
> >that came out of a chicken's ass?
> >
> If elephant dung were routinely used as a base for mixing paint the
> way egg yolk is used for mixing tempera paint then paintings done
> using that hypothetical paint would be, or at least could be, art.
Chris Ofili routinely uses elephant dung in his artwork, and has done so
ever since he visited Zimbabwe, where it is commonly used as a decorative
material, even being used for making sacred objects (or so I have read).
Ofili also uses what we consider traditional materials in his art. His
works are _paintings_, quite accomplished paintings, with elements of
collage and sculpted elephant dung added.
> Note that the show in question has other non-art exhibits, including,
> as I recall -- I can't lay my hands on a description over this holi-
> day weekend -- animal carcasses in formaldehyde (I typoed "formalde-
> hype" and thought of leaving it) and part of an animal with maggots.
Yes, Damien Hirst's animals in formaldehyde. What's your point?
> I think all of the other items in Mike's list have at best a dubious
> claim to being art. Until she retired in January I worked with a
> librarian who told me that when she was in college she and her best
> friend had the idea that it would be fun to silk screen a Campbell's
> soup can on a T-shirt. They never did it. She said that if they had
> done it they could have been rich and famous. I replied that she was
> mistaken. If they had done it they would have considered it a joke,
> and would not have claimed it was Art.
It might also have been fun to paint the Last Supper in oils. Surely had
she done this she'd have become rich and famous. Or if not, paintings of
the Last Supper in oils must not be art.
My take on Warhol is that he was not a painter in the sense of an artist
whose medium is paint. Warhol's medium was fame; painting was his subject
matter.
Mitch Wagner
demonstrate an alliance between Pope Pius XII and Hitler?
--
mitch w. thri...@sff.net
P Nielsen Hayden
-10109917...@avram.dialup.access.net>:
>Chris Ofili routinely uses elephant dung in his artwork, and has
>done so ever since he visited Zimbabwe, where it is commonly used as
>a decorative material, even being used for making sacred objects (or
>so I have read).
Yeah, and he's also a serious Catholic. Which makes the demonstrations
and protests (which we drove past today) even sillier.
One gets the impression that very few of the parties to this absurd
dust-up are thinking for more than two seconds.
Giuliani's attempt to portray the whole think as persecution of
Catholics is crude electioneering, and plenty of smart Catholics aren't
buying it for a minute.
--
Patrick Nielsen Hayden : p...@panix.com : http://www.panix.com/~pnh
P Nielsen Hayden
<99283.14...@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>:
>Note that the show in question has other non-art exhibits,
>including, as I recall -- I can't lay my hands on a description over
>this holi- day weekend -- animal carcasses in formaldehyde (I typoed
>"formalde- hype" and thought of leaving it) and part of an animal
>with maggots.
>
>I think all of the other items in Mike's list have at best a dubious
>claim to being art.
Oh, piffle. "Art" doesn't mean "good."
Take it from me. I grew up in the art world. My parents are pros.
Tons of modern art (certainly including a lot of the silliness in the
now-notorious "Sensation" exhibition) is terrible. It's still art.
And it's still terrible. (Lather, rinse, repeat.)
P Nielsen Hayden
<MPG.126ab25eb...@news.elcjn1.sdca.home.com>:
>Marty, what's your opinion of the current book which purports to
>demonstrate an alliance between Pope Pius XII and Hitler?
You didn't ask me, but I've read a lot about HITLER'S POPE in the last
couple of weeks, and the sense I've been getting is that the author
nails some points while badly overreaching on others.
One thing the book isn't about is "an alliance between Pius XII and
Hitler." John Cornwall's basic charge against Pius is that, when push
came to shove, he was more interested in extending the power of the
Vatican than in risking it in confrontations with the Nazis. Cornwall
also makes a case that Pius was personally extremely anti-Semitic and
that this affected his actions and inactions during the 1930s and
1940s.
I find it notable that some of the book's more critical reviews have
come from writers who are relatively anti-Vatican in their outlook.
Some flimsiness in Cornwell's evidence for Pius's anti-Semitism has
been adduced. The apparent fact that Pius was strongly praised after
the war by some Jewish leaders (like Albert Einstein) has also been
brought up.
It's certainly true that Pius was deeply interested in extending the
power of the Vatican. The Concordat of 1933 (signed under his
predecessor Pius XI, negotiated by Pius XII in his previous indentity
as Monsignor Pacelli, Vatican Secretary of State) and the attendant
disbanding of the German Centre Party was a devil's bargain; what the
Vatican seemed most interested in was getting Rome the absolute control
over Germany's bishops that it had long coveted, and for that it was
willing to trade away Germany's Centre Party, one of the last
democratic parties to oppose the Nazis. On the other hand, it was also
Pacelli who wrote Pius XI's later encyclical Mit Brennender Sorge,
which described Hitler as a "mad prophet of repulsive arrogance." And
even later there was Pius XII's peripheral involvement in one of the
assassination plots against Hitler, and his various schemes to get
Vatican passports into the hands of some number (stories differ) of
Rome's Jews.
Which was the real Pius XII? Hard to tell. He was definitely an
unappealing character, weird, withdrawn, brittle, and unapproachable,
hardly the tower of strength one would have liked in the Vatican during
those years. There's almost certainly a lot we don't know about the
Curia's various dealings with Fascism and the Nazis, and ya know, I'll
bet some of it entails pretty unpleasant stuff. But I'm just not
getting the sense that Cornwall's book is the magisterial job of cast-
iron research the subject really deserves. I'll probably read it, or
at least browse it, when I find a copy in the library, and maybe the
emerging reviewer consensus is all wrong -- but it doesn't really look
like it settles anything.
John Boston
says...
>
>In article <99283.14...@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>, Marty Helgesen
><MN...@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU> wrote:
>
>> In article <avram-04109...@manhattan.crossover.com>,
>av...@bigfoot.com (Avram Grumer) says:
>> <SNIP>
>> >>
>> >> In other words, it's not art.
>> >
>> >How about oversized images of faces or fruit, rendered in something
>> >that came out of a chicken's ass?
>> >
>> If elephant dung were routinely used as a base for mixing paint the
>> way egg yolk is used for mixing tempera paint then paintings done
>> using that hypothetical paint would be, or at least could be, art.
>
>ever since he visited Zimbabwe, where it is commonly used as a decorative
>material, even being used for making sacred objects (or so I have read).
>
>works are _paintings_, quite accomplished paintings, with elements of
>collage and sculpted elephant dung added.
[snip]
At the risk of risibility, let me put in a word for elephant dung, a
substance which I had the opportunity to inspect closely, accompanied
with commentary by knowledgeable local residents, during my recent
vacation. Elephant dung is actually a rather pleasant-looking and
not-too-bad-smelling substance, and allegedly it doesn't taste too
bad either, though I confess I passed on the offer to try it. There's
a reason for this. The digestive tract of the elephant is one of the
most inefficient in the animal kingdom, and it really doesn't do too
much to the stuff that passes through it. It doesn't look like, well,
shit; it looks more like something you might be served in a vegetarian
restaurant. Nobody said anything about sacred objects, but a couple
of our guides did mention that it is commonly used by Africans to polish
their wood floors, and they also said, virtually verbatim, "We do not
think of dung as excrement."
In short, the attacks on Ofili's artwork represent American cultural
insensitivity and ignorance, for real and not in slogan-world.
John "Giving New Meaning to Info-Dump" Boston
Vicki Rosenzweig
Thank you for pointing this out.
We all grant that Sturgeon's Law means that "is it science fiction?"
and "is it good?" are separate questions; nobody claims that bad
poetry isn't poetry (some may claim that certain forms aren't
poetry, but a bad sonnet is a bad sonnet, not a non-sonnet); and
there are certainly bad songs and bad plays. But somehow, people
seem to think "I don't like it" or "it's poorly done" implies
"that's not art."
I suspect this has something to do with the idea of "art" as
separate from what ordinary people do.
--
Vicki Rosenzweig | v...@redbird.org
r.a.sf.f faq at http://www.redbird.org/rassef-faq.html
"I get by with a little help from my friends." -- Lennon/McCartney
Vicki Rosenzweig
>thri...@sff.net (Mitch Wagner) wrote in
><MPG.126ab25eb...@news.elcjn1.sdca.home.com>:
>
>>Marty, what's your opinion of the current book which purports to
>>demonstrate an alliance between Pope Pius XII and Hitler?
>
>You didn't ask me, but I've read a lot about HITLER'S POPE in the last
>couple of weeks, and the sense I've been getting is that the author
>nails some points while badly overreaching on others.
>
>One thing the book isn't about is "an alliance between Pius XII and
>Hitler." John Cornwall's basic charge against Pius is that, when push
>came to shove, he was more interested in extending the power of the
>Vatican than in risking it in confrontations with the Nazis. Cornwall
>also makes a case that Pius was personally extremely anti-Semitic and
>that this affected his actions and inactions during the 1930s and
>1940s.
>
<snip some to save bandwidth>
>Which was the real Pius XII? Hard to tell. He was definitely an
>unappealing character, weird, withdrawn, brittle, and unapproachable,
>hardly the tower of strength one would have liked in the Vatican during
>those years. There's almost certainly a lot we don't know about the
>Curia's various dealings with Fascism and the Nazis, and ya know, I'll
>bet some of it entails pretty unpleasant stuff. But I'm just not
>getting the sense that Cornwall's book is the magisterial job of cast-
>iron research the subject really deserves. I'll probably read it, or
>at least browse it, when I find a copy in the library, and maybe the
>emerging reviewer consensus is all wrong -- but it doesn't really look
>like it settles anything.
I suspect that the book is, or ought to be, sufficient evidence
in the hands of the advocatus diaboli to prevent the current Pope
from declaring Pius XII a saint--but that's rather different from
proving that, on balance, he was a bad person.
Like Patrick, I haven't read the book and am going only on what
I've read in reviews--maybe they're all misrepresenting the text,
but I would be surprised.
P Nielsen Hayden
<2=ABOKT6QvfpMhS...@4ax.com>:
[on HITLER'S POPE by John Cornwell]
>I suspect that the book is, or ought to be, sufficient evidence
>in the hands of the advocatus diaboli to prevent the current Pope
>from declaring Pius XII a saint--but that's rather different from
>proving that, on balance, he was a bad person.
Good point. Certainly there appear to have been (predictably enough in
this papacy) recent moves toward beatifying Pius XII. And it's
certainly not outrageous to speculate that the publication of
Cornwell's book might simply be a move in some deep game inside the
Vatican. Cornwell is not only a Catholic, he's also the writer who was
recruited by the Vatican to examine the (flimsy) evidence that John
Paul I was murdered -- and who wrote a book that, many people felt,
convincingly demolished that theory. So Cornwall's definitely wired to
some Powers or other.
It's hard to know what to say when Pius XII is being considered for
beatification and John XXIII isn't.
Rob Hansen
wrote:
>I suspect that the book is, or ought to be, sufficient evidence
>in the hands of the advocatus diaboli to prevent the current Pope
>from declaring Pius XII a saint--but that's rather different from
>proving that, on balance, he was a bad person.
It ought to be, but I'd be very surprised if it is.
--
Rob Hansen
================================================
My Home Page: http://www.fiawol.demon.co.uk/rob/
Feminists Against Censorship:
http://www.fiawol.demon.co.uk/FAC/
Richard Horton
wrote:
>I suspect that the book is, or ought to be, sufficient evidence
>in the hands of the advocatus diaboli to prevent the current Pope
>from declaring Pius XII a saint--but that's rather different from
>proving that, on balance, he was a bad person.
>
>Like Patrick, I haven't read the book and am going only on what
>I've read in reviews--maybe they're all misrepresenting the text,
>but I would be surprised.
I read a rather dry refutation of some of the points by the man who is
leading the effort to declare Pius XII a Saint. Some of his points
seemed sound, but on balance, I'd agree that enough questions remain
that he ought not to be a Saint. Though I was surprised to begin with
that he was under consideration. (And would he be St. Eugenio, or St.
Pius?)
I was quite disappointed in the Atlantic review, which seemed to
accept Cornwell's positions without question. I was hoping to find a
skeptical review: so far I have only seen reviewers who take
Cornwell's work as Gospel, and the one refutation, which is likely
biased in the other direction. Has anyone seen a more balanced
review?
--
Rich Horton | Stable Email: mailto://richard...@sff.net
Home Page: http://www.sff.net/people/richard.horton
Also visit SF Site (http://www.sfsite.com) and Tangent Online (http://www.sfsite.com/tangent)
Steve Davies
> In article <avram-04109...@manhattan.crossover.com>,
av...@bigfoot.com (Avram Grumer) says:
> <SNIP>
> >
that
> >came out of a chicken's ass?
> >
> If elephant dung were routinely used as a base for mixing paint the
> way egg yolk is used for mixing tempera paint then paintings done
> using that hypothetical paint would be, or at least could be, art.
>
> -------
> Marty Helgesen
Dung was used as a base for camouflage paint in North Africa during
World War 2. However I believe this was actually camel dung (there not
being many elephants in that part of Africa) rather than elephant and I
don't think they ever got around to painting madonnas with it. Tanks on
the other hand...
Steve Davies
Plokta News Network -- www.plokta.com/pnn
James Nicoll
P Nielsen Hayden <p...@panix.com> wrote:
snip
>It's hard to know what to say when Pius XII is being considered for
>beatification and John XXIII isn't.
Isn't yet, surely?
--
"You know, it's getting more and more like _Blade Runner_ down
here."
A customer commenting on downtown Kitchener
David G. Bell
jam...@ece.uwaterloo.ca "James Nicoll" writes:
> In article <8E5C761...@198.7.7.86>,
> P Nielsen Hayden <p...@panix.com> wrote:
>
> snip
>
> >It's hard to know what to say when Pius XII is being considered for
> >beatification and John XXIII isn't.
>
> Isn't yet, surely?
I can never sort out the numbers. If John XXIII was the unusually
short-lived Pope, preceding the current one, it shouldn't be surprising.
So much depends on ordinary Catholics knowing about the person, and
praying to them for intercession, and getting a result.
--
David G. Bell -- Farmer, SF Fan, Filker, and Punslinger.
Katie Schwarz
>>in the hands of the advocatus diaboli to prevent the current Pope
>>from declaring Pius XII a saint--but that's rather different from
>>proving that, on balance, he was a bad person.
The role the "Devil's Advocate" who argues against a proposed saint,
as if in a courtroom, was eliminated in 1983. This was the outcome of
decades of controversy -- many in the church felt the back-and-forth
adversarial process was repetitive and artificial -- but it means that
now everyone involved in the sainthood process has a stake in a
positive outcome.
P Nielsen Hayden <p...@panix.com> wrote:
>It's hard to know what to say when Pius XII is being considered for
>beatification and John XXIII isn't.
Yes, he is. In fact, more money has been donated to the cause of
canonizing John XXIII than it can spend (the excess is invested and
applied to charity or the causes of other saints). There are already
over twenty miraculous healings credited to his intercession. John's
successor, Paul VI, initiated the causes of both John and Pius XII at
the same time, as sort of a political juggling act between opposing
progressive and conservative factions.
All information from the very readable _Making Saints: How the
Catholic Church determines who becomes a saint, who doesn't, and why_
by Kenneth L. Woodward, 2nd edition, 1996.
--
Katie Schwarz
"There's no need to look for a Chimera, or a cat with three legs."
-- Jorge Luis Borges, "Death and the Compass"
Katie Schwarz
[Pope John XXIII considered for canonization?]
>
>I can never sort out the numbers. If John XXIII was the unusually
>short-lived Pope, preceding the current one, it shouldn't be surprising.
John XXIII was pope from 1958-1963. He was the very popular liberal
pope who called the Vatican II council.
>So much depends on ordinary Catholics knowing about the person, and
>praying to them for intercession, and getting a result.
Yes. John XXIII is very well off in that aspect, but there are
hundreds of beatifieds who lack only a final miracle for sainthood and
will probably never get it because they're little known and don't
attract prayers from the public.
Mitch Wagner
> thri...@sff.net (Mitch Wagner) wrote in
> <MPG.126ab25eb...@news.elcjn1.sdca.home.com>:
>
> >Marty, what's your opinion of the current book which purports to
> >demonstrate an alliance between Pope Pius XII and Hitler?
>
> You didn't ask me, but I've read a lot about HITLER'S POPE in the last
> couple of weeks, and the sense I've been getting is that the author
> nails some points while badly overreaching on others.
Thanks.
When I was in Hebrew School, growing up in the 1970s, I was taught that
the Vatican did nothing to stop the Holocaust. I wouldn't be surprised to
learn that's wrong.
--
mitch w. thri...@sff.net
"Anyone can do any amount of work provided it isn't the work he's
supposed to be doing at the moment." -- Robert Benchley
Avedon Carol
wrote:
>Yes. John XXIII is very well off in that aspect, but there are
>hundreds of beatifieds who lack only a final miracle for sainthood and
>will probably never get it because they're little known and don't
>attract prayers from the public.
In retrospect, he did have a miracle. He was a pope I actually liked.
P Nielsen Hayden
ether.berkeley.edu>:
>P Nielsen Hayden <p...@panix.com> wrote:
>>It's hard to know what to say when Pius XII is being considered for
>>beatification and John XXIII isn't.
>
>Yes, he is. In fact, more money has been donated to the cause of
>canonizing John XXIII than it can spend (the excess is invested and
>applied to charity or the causes of other saints). There are already
>over twenty miraculous healings credited to his intercession. John's
>successor, Paul VI, initiated the causes of both John and Pius XII at
>the same time, as sort of a political juggling act between opposing
>progressive and conservative factions.
I knew Pope Paul initiated John XXIII's cause, but I was under the
impression it's seriously stalled and probably won't get anywhere under
this pope. Admittedly, I am not an expert on Vatican politics.
>All information from the very readable _Making Saints: How the
>Catholic Church determines who becomes a saint, who doesn't, and why_
>by Kenneth L. Woodward, 2nd edition, 1996.
Thanks for the rec.
P Nielsen Hayden
>In article <8E5BCCB...@198.7.7.86>, p...@panix.com says...
>> thri...@sff.net (Mitch Wagner) wrote in
>> <MPG.126ab25eb...@news.elcjn1.sdca.home.com>:
>>
>> >Marty, what's your opinion of the current book which purports to
>> >demonstrate an alliance between Pope Pius XII and Hitler?
>>
>> You didn't ask me, but I've read a lot about HITLER'S POPE in the
>> last couple of weeks, and the sense I've been getting is that the
>> author nails some points while badly overreaching on others.
>
>Thanks.
>
>When I was in Hebrew School, growing up in the 1970s, I was taught
>that the Vatican did nothing to stop the Holocaust. I wouldn't be
>surprised to learn that's wrong.
Let's not get carried away. Cornwell's basic point, that Pius could
probably done a ton and a half more and didn't, is pretty solid.
It's also worth remembering that Pius was the fun-filled guy who wrote
to the papal legate in Britain late in the war to express the hope that
the Allies could forebear sending any of those, you know, _colored_
soldiers into Rome, since that would obviously pose a danger to the
virtue of Italian girlhood.
Clearly a man with a grasp of the _important_ issues of the day.
mike weber
on Tue, 12 Oct 99 11:51:10 GMT,
>I can never sort out the numbers. If John XXIII was the unusually
>short-lived Pope, preceding the current one, it shouldn't be surprising.
>So much depends on ordinary Catholics knowing about the person, and
>praying to them for intercession, and getting a result.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Are you *trying* to start trouble?
--
"A cat who sits on a hot stove will never sit on a hot stove
again. She will also never sit on a cold one." Mark Twain
<mike weber> <kras...@mindspring.com>
Ambitious Incomplete web site: http://weberworld.virtualave.net
Sandra Bond
<db...@zhochaka.demon.co.uk>, silping a nuclear fizz in the insurgent
manner, wrote:
>> >It's hard to know what to say when Pius XII is being considered for
>> >beatification and John XXIII isn't.
>>
>
>I can never sort out the numbers. If John XXIII was the unusually
>short-lived Pope, preceding the current one, it shouldn't be surprising.
That was John Paul I. Apparently it's true and genuine that there was a
British football club (Birmingham City?) who didn't score a single goal
in his entire reign...
Sandra
--
"I couldn't park any closer to the kerb because
there was a man asleep in the gutter."
-- excuse for a parking ticket, Sydney
{sandra bond: san...@ho-street.demon.co.uk}
Robert Sneddon
street.demon.co.uk> writes
>
>That was John Paul I. Apparently it's true and genuine that there was a
>British football club (Birmingham City?) who didn't score a single goal
>in his entire reign...
>
Then again, have you seen City play? Reminds me of the old joke about
the guy who thought a team's name was Partick Thistle Nil, because
that's the way it was always read out on the radio.
--
To reply by email, send to nojay (at) public (period) antipope (dot) org
Robert Sneddon
Robert Sneddon
<p...@panix.com> writes
>
>It's also worth remembering that Pius was the fun-filled guy who wrote
>to the papal legate in Britain late in the war to express the hope that
>the Allies could forebear sending any of those, you know, _colored_
>soldiers into Rome, since that would obviously pose a danger to the
>virtue of Italian girlhood.
>
>Clearly a man with a grasp of the _important_ issues of the day.
>
Which day? He was born in the middle of the last century, and spent his
life, from seminary to the papal office, insulated in the world of
Italian Catholicism. The latter part of his career he spent in the
Vatican, even more thoroughly insulated from the real world.
For him, some things were important and some things were not. He
wouldn't have understood your carping, and he wouldn't have understood
why you were indignant over his opinions, even if you tried to explain
in words of one syllable or less.
JPII is not yer average Pope, and it's a bad idea to compare other
Popes with him.
P Nielsen Hayden
<W+uR1YA$+JB4...@ibfs.demon.co.uk>:
>In article <8E5DE15...@198.7.7.86>, P Nielsen Hayden
><p...@panix.com> writes
>>
>>It's also worth remembering that Pius was the fun-filled guy who wrote
>>to the papal legate in Britain late in the war to express the hope that
>>the Allies could forebear sending any of those, you know, _colored_
>>soldiers into Rome, since that would obviously pose a danger to the
>>virtue of Italian girlhood.
>>
>>Clearly a man with a grasp of the _important_ issues of the day.
>>
>
>Which day? He was born in the middle of the last century, and spent his
>life, from seminary to the papal office, insulated in the world of
>Italian Catholicism. The latter part of his career he spent in the
>Vatican, even more thoroughly insulated from the real world.
Um, I do know all this. The "day" I meant was the latter part of World
War II. I don't think you have to be a liberal intellectual of the 1990s
to think that, in 1944, there were things a Pope ought to have been more
concerned about than whether black American soldiers would violate young
Italian women.
I agree very strongly that we need to assess historical figures in the
context of their time, but I think you're taking it too far in this
instance. The priorities demonstrated here are unfortunately not all that
untypical of conservative Italian Catholic churchmen at midcentury, but
they don't really match up to the claims of virtue being made for Pius XII
by leaders of the Church right now in 1999.
>For him, some things were important and some things were not. He
>wouldn't have understood your carping, and he wouldn't have understood
>why you were indignant over his opinions, even if you tried to explain
>in words of one syllable or less.
This is of course equally true of Julius Caesar, Joan of Arc, and Al
Capone. That being the case, it's not really a useful observation.
Goodness, we are different from others and they are different from us.
And?
>JPII is not yer average Pope, and it's a bad idea to compare other
>Popes with him.
This, on the other hand, is a very impressive non sequitur. I think you
must have a very odd notion of my views on JPII.
Dave Weingart
> JPII is not yer average Pope, and it's a bad idea to compare other
>Popes with him.
Isn't the time-averaged Pope a c. 1100 CE Italian?
--
73 de Dave Weingart KA2ESK Never set the cat on fire.
mailto:phyd...@liii.com You only will annoy it.
http://www.liii.com/~phydeaux -- Frank Hayes
Jo Walton
k...@socrates.berkeley.edu "Katie Schwarz" writes:
> Yes. John XXIII is very well off in that aspect, but there are
> hundreds of beatifieds who lack only a final miracle for sainthood and
> will probably never get it because they're little known and don't
> attract prayers from the public.
How many miracles does the Venerable Bede need for promotion?
--
Jo - - I kissed a kif at Kefk - - J...@bluejo.demon.co.uk
http://www.bluejo.demon.co.uk - Interstichia; Poetry; RASFW FAQ; etc.
Bernard Peek
<no...@nospam.demon.co.uk> writes
>In article <8E5DE15...@198.7.7.86>, P Nielsen Hayden
><p...@panix.com> writes
>>
>>It's also worth remembering that Pius was the fun-filled guy who wrote
>>to the papal legate in Britain late in the war to express the hope that
>>the Allies could forebear sending any of those, you know, _colored_
>>soldiers into Rome, since that would obviously pose a danger to the
>>virtue of Italian girlhood.
>>
>>Clearly a man with a grasp of the _important_ issues of the day.
>>
>
> Which day? He was born in the middle of the last century, and spent his
>life, from seminary to the papal office, insulated in the world of
>Italian Catholicism. The latter part of his career he spent in the
>Vatican, even more thoroughly insulated from the real world.
The Vatican is insulated from the real world in much the same way that
Parliament is insulated from politics, that is not at all.
The Vatican has ambassadors whose job is to gather information from
around the world and pass it back to head office. They have teams of
analysts there who spend their lives keeping track of what is going on.
--
Bernard Peek
b...@shrdlu.com
b...@shrdlu.co.uk
Robert Sneddon
<p...@panix.com> writes
>><p...@panix.com> writes
>>>
>>>It's also worth remembering that Pius was the fun-filled guy who wrote
>>>to the papal legate in Britain late in the war to express the hope that
>>>the Allies could forebear sending any of those, you know, _colored_
>>>soldiers into Rome, since that would obviously pose a danger to the
>>>virtue of Italian girlhood.
>>>
>>>Clearly a man with a grasp of the _important_ issues of the day.
>>>
>>
>>Which day? He was born in the middle of the last century, and spent his
>>life, from seminary to the papal office, insulated in the world of
>>Italian Catholicism. The latter part of his career he spent in the
>>Vatican, even more thoroughly insulated from the real world.
>
>War II. I don't think you have to be a liberal intellectual of the 1990s
>to think that, in 1944, there were things a Pope ought to have been more
>concerned about than whether black American soldiers would violate young
>Italian women.
>
the Vatican, which he had rarely left for perhaps twenty years or more.
His worldview was of the Catholic Church, with some peripheral notice of
what was going on in Rome, his Bishophric. The rest of the physical
world? I doubt he thought about it very much.
>I agree very strongly that we need to assess historical figures in the
>context of their time, but I think you're taking it too far in this
>instance. The priorities demonstrated here are unfortunately not all that
>untypical of conservative Italian Catholic churchmen at midcentury, but
>they don't really match up to the claims of virtue being made for Pius XII
>by leaders of the Church right now in 1999.
Virtue is different from attitude. He could have been spiritually
perfect, and still unworldy enough to make stupid mistakes. What the
Church now wants to do with him is similar, I suspect, to the traditions
of the Roman Emperors of naming their predecessors as Gods - a sort of
Buggins Turn.
>
>>For him, some things were important and some things were not. He
>>wouldn't have understood your carping, and he wouldn't have understood
>>why you were indignant over his opinions, even if you tried to explain
>>in words of one syllable or less.
>
>This is of course equally true of Julius Caesar, Joan of Arc, and Al
>Capone. That being the case, it's not really a useful observation.
>Goodness, we are different from others and they are different from us.
>And?
The morality of their times is not the morality of our times. The
future we live in now doesn't work under the same rules as the present
those eminent members of society lived through.
>
>>JPII is not yer average Pope, and it's a bad idea to compare other
>>Popes with him.
>
>This, on the other hand, is a very impressive non sequitur. I think you
>must have a very odd notion of my views on JPII.
JPII is not Italian. He is not the Vatican recluse the Popes of the
last three hundred years have been. He makes his ministry among people,
rather than having them come to his Throne. He is not an isolated
figurehead, unworldly and without knowledge of the universe his
predecessors turned their backs on when they donned the white surplice
and became the Bishop of Rome.
He may be a temporary aberration, and the next Pope may restore the old
ways, but for the moment, wonder at the sight of a Pope who is actually
aware of public opinion.
Richard Horton
wrote:
>In article <7u02cu$8af$1...@agate-ether.berkeley.edu>
> k...@socrates.berkeley.edu "Katie Schwarz" writes:
>
>> Yes. John XXIII is very well off in that aspect, but there are
>> hundreds of beatifieds who lack only a final miracle for sainthood and
>> will probably never get it because they're little known and don't
>> attract prayers from the public.
>
>How many miracles does the Venerable Bede need for promotion?
He was sainted a long time ago.
It's St. Bede, thank you. <g>
Richard Horton
<no...@nospam.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> Virtue is different from attitude. He could have been spiritually
>perfect, and still unworldy enough to make stupid mistakes. What the
>Church now wants to do with him is similar, I suspect, to the traditions
>of the Roman Emperors of naming their predecessors as Gods - a sort of
>Buggins Turn.
But how many Popes have been sainted? I don't know, actually, and
perhaps I should, but I hadn't thought it was that many.
Vicki Rosenzweig
<no...@nospam.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>In article <8E5DE15...@198.7.7.86>, P Nielsen Hayden
><p...@panix.com> writes
>>
>>It's also worth remembering that Pius was the fun-filled guy who wrote
>>to the papal legate in Britain late in the war to express the hope that
>>the Allies could forebear sending any of those, you know, _colored_
>>soldiers into Rome, since that would obviously pose a danger to the
>>virtue of Italian girlhood.
>>
>>Clearly a man with a grasp of the _important_ issues of the day.
>>
>
> Which day? He was born in the middle of the last century, and spent his
>life, from seminary to the papal office, insulated in the world of
>Italian Catholicism.
The day, obviously, being the second World War. Does anyone
really think that keeping Italian women from being tempted
by dark-skinned soldiers was one of the key issues of World
War II?
Is Italian Catholicism somehow less connected to the rest of the
world than Catholicism elsewhere, or for that matter than
non-Catholic cultures? Personally, I don't think being Italian,
or being Catholic, makes someone unable to understand the world.
In particular, and relevant to the subject under discussion,
I can't help thinking that Italian Catholicism is, shall we say,
acquainted with Italy, and that the average Italian Catholic
probably had noticed World War II.
>The latter part of his career he spent in the
>Vatican, even more thoroughly insulated from the real world.
>
> For him, some things were important and some things were not. He
>wouldn't have understood your carping, and he wouldn't have understood
>why you were indignant over his opinions, even if you tried to explain
>in words of one syllable or less.
Not even if you pointed out that his religion taught that Jesus
died to save _all_ mankind?
>
> JPII is not yer average Pope, and it's a bad idea to compare other
>Popes with him.
I doubt, actually, that the current Pope has that many fans in
this newsgroup; what are you getting at?
Rachael Lininger
Robert Sneddon <no...@nospam.demon.co.uk> wrote:
[canonizing Pious]
> Virtue is different from attitude. He could have been spiritually
>perfect, and still unworldy enough to make stupid mistakes. What the
>Church now wants to do with him is similar, I suspect, to the traditions
>of the Roman Emperors of naming their predecessors as Gods - a sort of
>Buggins Turn.
I dunno. I think I'd question the spiritual perfection of someone who had
such contemptuous attitudes towards his fellow man.
I suppose that one of my notions of virtue is believing in the possibility
in others.
But I don't know anything about Catholicism, and am not arguing very hard.
Rachael
--
Rachael Lininger | "A sentence without syntax
lininger@ | is like an egg without salt."
chem.wisc.edu | --Noel Langley
Robert Sneddon
<Ber...@shrdlu.com> writes
>
>The Vatican is insulated from the real world in much the same way that
>Parliament is insulated from politics, that is not at all.
>
>The Vatican has ambassadors whose job is to gather information from
>around the world and pass it back to head office. They have teams of
>analysts there who spend their lives keeping track of what is going on.
And does that information ever get to the Head of the Church, or does
it stop at the senior Cardinals, the men who set policy and make
decisions, leaving spiritual control to Il Papa?
I suspect it varies from Papacy to Papacy, and as time marches on and
the incumbent becomes more and more frail, mentally and physically, the
burdens of command are lifted from his shoulders, as he prepares to meet
his Maker, the only One who can tell him to retire.
Gary Farber
: In article <7u02cu$8af$1...@agate-ether.berkeley.edu>
: k...@socrates.berkeley.edu "Katie Schwarz" writes:
:> Yes. John XXIII is very well off in that aspect, but there are
:> hundreds of beatifieds who lack only a final miracle for sainthood and
:> will probably never get it because they're little known and don't
:> attract prayers from the public.
: How many miracles does the Venerable Bede need for promotion?
Why does he need a promotion? I've always thought so well of him for
being, you know, venerable.
I've always wanted, if truth be known, a nice prefix like that. Or at
least to be a certified pundit.
--
Copyright 1999 by Gary Farber; For Hire as: Web Researcher; Nonfiction
Writer, Fiction and Nonfiction Editor; gfa...@panix.com; Northeast US
Gary Farber
Robert Sneddon <no...@nospam.demon.co.uk> wrote:
: In article <hgJiRqAA...@shrdlu.com>, Bernard Peek
I, myself, suspect it is invariably the same from Papacy to Papacy, and
that as the incumbent ages, mentally and physically, he asks for more and
more information, and spends more and more time each day absorbing and
analyzing more clearly the vast increase in information he is capable of
understanding, while working out at the gym.
But I possess only normal mortal powers of deduction, and yours are
obviously deeper than most of us, thus leading us to insightful
revelations as above.
Next: Robert Sneddon reveals that Vatican is believed to be somewhere near
Italy.
Sandra Bond
<v...@redbird.org>, silping a nuclear fizz in the insurgent manner, wrote:
>> JPII is not yer average Pope, and it's a bad idea to compare other
>>Popes with him.
>
>I doubt, actually, that the current Pope has that many fans in
>this newsgroup; what are you getting at?
The more of this thread I read, the more I find running through my head
the song by Fascinating Aida, 'I Fancy The Pope'.
Philip Plumbly
>In article <7u02cu$8af$1...@agate-ether.berkeley.edu>
> k...@socrates.berkeley.edu "Katie Schwarz" writes:
>
>> Yes. John XXIII is very well off in that aspect, but there are
>> hundreds of beatifieds who lack only a final miracle for sainthood
and
>> will probably never get it because they're little known and don't
>> attract prayers from the public.
>
>How many miracles does the Venerable Bede need for promotion?
Once, a few years ago on a drunken wandering across the northlands,
Mike Cheater and I visited his tomb in Durham cathedral. Truth to tell
I got a bigger kick and sense of awe out of visiting that simple tomb
than I have had from visiting the tombs of saints and kings. The
Venerable Bede doesn't need promotion, his histories still speak to us
from across the gulf of centuries, and will continue to do so, that
was a rare gift he had.
--
Phil Plumbly
South Hants SF Group,
2nd & 4th Tuesday evenings every month,
Lounge Bar, The Magpie Public House,
Fratton Road, Fratton, Portsmouth , UK
Come and visit, all welcome.
P Nielsen Hayden
>In article <8E5E976...@207.237.131.215>, P Nielsen Hayden
><p...@panix.com> writes
>>no...@nospam.demon.co.uk (Robert Sneddon) wrote in
>><W+uR1YA$+JB4...@ibfs.demon.co.uk>:
>>>JPII is not yer average Pope, and it's a bad idea to compare other
>>>Popes with him.
>>
>>This, on the other hand, is a very impressive non sequitur. I
>>think you must have a very odd notion of my views on JPII.
>
>JPII is not Italian. He is not the Vatican recluse the Popes of the
>last three hundred years have been. He makes his ministry among
>people, rather than having them come to his Throne. He is not an
>isolated figurehead, unworldly and without knowledge of the universe
>his predecessors turned their backs on when they donned the white
>surplice and became the Bishop of Rome.
>
>He may be a temporary aberration, and the next Pope may restore the
>old ways, but for the moment, wonder at the sight of a Pope who is
>actually aware of public opinion.
Wow, you really have bought the entire John Paul II Press Release Kit,
hook, line, and sinker.
If all "his predecessors turned their backs on" the world, what exactly
accounted for the immense reforms of Vatican II (1962-1965, begun under
John XXIII, finished under Paul VI)?
And if John Paul II is so concerned about "public opinion," why have
the twenty-one years of his reign been so completely focused on rolling
back the reforms of Vatican II?
Strangely enough, Church history and politics are complicated. Not all
of JP2's predecessors were unworldly recluses, nor is the real JP2
entirely recognizable in the papal paragon you describe. It's hard to
avoid the sense that you are, um, imperfectly acquainted with what
you're talking about.
Jo Walton
Philip....@ukgateway.net "Philip Plumbly" writes:
> Jo Walton wrote in message <939840...@bluejo.demon.co.uk>...
> >In article <7u02cu$8af$1...@agate-ether.berkeley.edu>
> > k...@socrates.berkeley.edu "Katie Schwarz" writes:
> >
> >> Yes. John XXIII is very well off in that aspect, but there are
> >> hundreds of beatifieds who lack only a final miracle for sainthood
> and
> >> will probably never get it because they're little known and don't
> >> attract prayers from the public.
> >
> >How many miracles does the Venerable Bede need for promotion?
>
> Once, a few years ago on a drunken wandering across the northlands,
> Mike Cheater and I visited his tomb in Durham cathedral. Truth to tell
> I got a bigger kick and sense of awe out of visiting that simple tomb
> than I have had from visiting the tombs of saints and kings. The
> Venerable Bede doesn't need promotion, his histories still speak to us
> from across the gulf of centuries, and will continue to do so, that
> was a rare gift he had.
I went into Winchester Cathedral in Wincon and was thrilled to
discover Bishop Stigand, an old friend of mine who was excommunicated
five times by four different popes IIRC, the extremely controversial
Archbishop of Canterbury who managed to seriously annoy everyone on all
sides of all the arguments in the first half of the eleventh century.
Dear old Stigand, it's not that they don't make them like that any more,
it's just nice to think they get remembered and boxes on top of rood
screens.
Though the really famous people buried in Winchester are, of course,
Jane Austen and Canute. I have a poem about them I'm going to put on
my web-page RSN when I get round to doing the HTMLing.
Katie Schwarz
>Robert Sneddon <no...@nospam.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> [Pope Pius XII]
>>What the
>>Church now wants to do with him is similar, I suspect, to the traditions
>>of the Roman Emperors of naming their predecessors as Gods - a sort of
>>Buggins Turn.
>
>perhaps I should, but I hadn't thought it was that many.
"Of Pope John [XXIII]'s 260 predecessors as bishops of Rome, 81 are
regarded by the church as saints. But this figure is grossly
misleading. In addition to the Apostle Peter, it includes 47 of his
48 successors ... half of whom were martyrs and all of whom died
before the year 500. Of the remainder, 30 died before 1100, more
than a century before the church developed even rudimentary procedures
for investigating the lives of potential saints. ...
"In the last nine hundred years, therefore, only three popes have been
declared saints. The first of these, moreover, was hardly a model
pope: Celestine V, an ascetic hermit who was ill-cast and inept as
Supreme Pontiff, abdicated the papacy in 1294 after only five months
in office."
--Kenneth L. Woodward, _Making Saints_
[The two others were Pius V (1566-1572) of the Counter-Reformation and
Pius X (1903-1914).]
Philip Plumbly
Yes it is, I like Winchester Cathedral they seem to do this sort of
thing quite well there.
>Though the really famous people buried in Winchester are, of course,
>Jane Austen and Canute. I have a poem about them I'm going to put on
>my web-page RSN when I get round to doing the HTMLing.
You forgot to mention St Swithun who is buried outside the cathedral,
and every July the media does it's St Swithun's day item. You know, a
media person stands under an umbrella and a member of the film crew
turns on a hose to simulate rain, and we get reminded yet again that
if it rains on St Swithun's day it will rain for 40 days and nights...
Did you spot the memorial to the deep sea diver who saved Winchester
Cathedral BTW? A little bit of eccentricity and trivia that foxes most
people when asked.
David G. Bell
J...@bluejo.demon.co.uk "Jo Walton" writes:
> Though the really famous people buried in Winchester are, of course,
> Jane Austen and Canute. I have a poem about them I'm going to put on
> my web-page RSN when I get round to doing the HTMLing.
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a monarch with good counsel
need not attempt to turn back the tide.
--
David G. Bell -- Farmer, SF Fan, Filker, and Punslinger.
Marty Helgesen
<SNIP>
>How many miracles does the Venerable Bede need for promotion?
need for promotion?
He is already a saint and a Doctor of the Church. He is sometimes
referred to as St. Bede the Venerable. The New Catholic Encyclopedia
says, "The 'venerable' by which he is commonly known was probably the
title given to priests." He undoubtedly was canonized before the
current formal process of canonization came into effect so his
title does not mean he is at an early stage awaiting beatification.
-------
Marty Helgesen
Bitnet: mnhcc@cunyvm Internet: mn...@cunyvm.cuny.edu
"Ever noticed how many people claim it's organized religion they
object to? Makes me wonder what's so great about incoherent
religion." Teresa Nielsen Hayden
Help outlaw spam. For further information see http://www.cauce.org/
Mitch Wagner
says...
> You forgot to mention St Swithun who is buried outside the cathedral,
> and every July the media does it's St Swithun's day item. You know, a
> media person stands under an umbrella and a member of the film crew
> turns on a hose to simulate rain, and we get reminded yet again that
> if it rains on St Swithun's day it will rain for 40 days and nights...
>
That must be the British TV news equivalent of ridin the elephant.
--
mitch w. thri...@sff.net
"Anyone can do any amount of work provided it isn't the work he's
supposed to be doing at the moment." -- Robert Benchley
Cally Soukup
> Martin Wisse wrote:
>> "But you can easily remove the spamblock if you want to contact me"
>>
>> Maybe so, but why should I jump through hoops to mail you?
> For the same reason nobody minds me having a latch on my front door?
> Or a lock on my car, which some people can open as if it wasn't there?
> Because there's no such thing as 'perfect security,' but the person who
> makes no attempt at all has essentially given up on maintaining their
> privacy and may as well give everything away?
Yes, but some "security" is worse than no security. I used to lock
my car doors, especially in neighborhoods I didn't know. One day, I
was visiting my sister in Chicago, and came out of her apartment to
discover that someone had grabbed the top of the passenger door and
pulled and bent it out so they could get into the car. They did
about a thousand dollars worth of damage to steal -- a five dollar
cheap am battery radio and a library book.
Since I don't keep anything in my car that would cause me great
financial or emotional damage if it went missing, and since my car is
a stick shift, and most car thieves are adolescent joyriders who
don't drive stick (and the rest are professionals who won't be
interested in an old Tercel), it's better for me to *not* lock the
car. Once in a while I'll notice that someone has looked in my glove
compartment and left it open, but I've never since had any problem
that cost me more than the minor annoyance of closing the glovebox.
Since I don't want to annoy my friends, nor hasten the Death of the
Internet (film at 11), and since I have a reasonable Procmail filter
and don't mind deleting unread the occasional spam I do get, I don't
spamblock my email address.
From what I can tell, more spam comes from entering your email
address on websites than it does from Usenet, anyway.
--
"I may disagree with what you have to say, but I will defend
to the death your right to say it." -- Beatrice Hall
Cally Soukup sou...@pobox.com
P Nielsen Hayden
<7ud9ea$hde$2...@news.panix.com>:
>In <380cedf1...@news.demon.nl> Martin Wisse <mwisse@ad
>-astra.demon.nl> wrote: [. . .]
>: The spam problem, not unlike the virus hysteria, is overrated.
>: Yes, there are times when I get ten-fifteen spam e-mails a day,
>: but a good filtering system and actively complaining to the
>: responsible admins take care of them. A spamblock is not the
>: solution, it just makes it harder for legitimate e-mail to reach
>: you.
>
>: "But you can easily remove the spamblock if you want to contact
>: me"
>
>: Maybe so, but why should I jump through hoops to mail you?
>
>Exactly. It's goddammed rude behavior. It imposes the burden on
>everyone but the person who is spam-blocking. Why should I bother
>to send e-mail to someone who insists I go to trouble to do so when
>*they* won't go to the trouble of dealing with their spam in a
>responsible manner? What makes them think this is acceptable
>behavior? (Not to mention that it violates the RFCs, the closest
>thing the Internet has to rules.)
I agree in substance, but it seems pertinent to note that all one has
to do is edit the "To" line in email, for heaven's sake. Hardly worth
even a single goddamn, much less this disproportionate spluttering.
Mind you, I don't spamblock, and I agree with all the agreements
against doing so. Still.
Marty Helgesen
<SNIP>
>>I think all of the other items in Mike's list have at best a dubious
>>claim to being art.
>
>Oh, piffle. "Art" doesn't mean "good."
>
>Take it from me. I grew up in the art world. My parents are pros.
>Tons of modern art (certainly including a lot of the silliness in the
>now-notorious "Sensation" exhibition) is terrible. It's still art.
>And it's still terrible. (Lather, rinse, repeat.)
I know "Art" doesn't mean "good". In my reply to Mike Kozlowski, in
which I declined to define either art or science fiction, I wrote,
"Although I will not try to define science fiction, I will say that
_War and Peace_ is not science fiction, but _Starship Troopers_ is.
I'll also say the _Valley of the Dolls_, which I have not read, is
not science fiction, but _Yargo_ by the same author, which I also
have not read, reportedly is." In both pairs I deliberately gave a
highly regarded work and another work that is, ah, less highly re-
garded.
My point was that a lot of things that are called Art nowadays do not
meet any definition of art that I consider reasonable. It seems that
Art is anything that Artists say is Art and Artists are people who
produce Art.
Two examples of the misuse of the word "art" come to mind, both of
which appeared years ago in the _Village Voice_. The first, which is
not on the face of it a major problem, was a photograph of the ends
of boards or wooden beams in a pile at a construction site in lower
Manhattan. At the moment a photographer was passing the angle of the
Sun was such that there was an interesting pattern of light and
shadow, so he took a picture which the _Voice_ published. My objec-
tion, which I thought about putting in a letter to the editor but
didn't, was that the caption said the pile of wood, which had been
put there by construction workers, was art. It was not. It was not
art any more than the Grand Canyon or a sunset is art. There was no
art involved in stacking the wood. The photograph was art because
the photographer was an artist. If I had passed that site, I might
have noticed the attractive pattern and admired it as I would admire
a sunset. I probably would not have thought of taking a picture,
even if I had had a camera with me. And in the unlikely event that
I had a camera and took a picture, it would have been a snapshot, not
an artistic photograph because I do not have a photographers eye. He
probably took a number of exposures at slightly different angles and
with different settings on his camera.
My more serious example is an article that appeared about some
"performance artist" although I don't know if that bizarre term had
come into use yet. (I call it a bizarre term because it seems to
cover only performances that have nothing to do with art while ex-
cluding artistic performances. If a great violinist plays works of
Mozart or Beethoven, that is a performance and it is art. If a great
blues singer sits down on a stage with a guitar or harmonica and
plays and sings the blues, that is a performance and it is art. So
far as I know, neither of them would be considered Performance Art by
the Artists who define Art.) This article was about a woman whose
artistic performance featured standing naked on a stage and shoving
yams up her ass. I think the title of her show was called "Yams Up
My Ass". I do not think that performance constitutes art. Other
people had the same reaction. A week or so later the _Voice_ pub-
lished a letter thanking it for raising the letter writer's artistic
consciousness. He said, and this is a rough summary which might have
some details wrong because the article and letter appeared long ago,
that after reading it he happened to see a dirty, disheveled man
urinating on a subway station platform, or similar place. In the
past he would have considered him a drunken bum committing a public
nuisance, but after having read the article about this "Yams Up My
Ass" artist he realized that he was watching an artist at work. He
congratulated the artist who replied with obscenities. He withdrew,
properly abashed for having disturbed an artist in the middle of the
creative process.
To return to the painting which started this controversy, a letter to
the editor of the Daily News on October 13 said succinctly:
Just because a lot of art is crap doesn't mean a lot of crap is
art.
Marty Helgesen
>
>Marty, what's your opinion of the current book which purports to
>demonstrate an alliance between Pope Pius XII and Hitler?
I haven't read a whole lot about it, and I've been so busy I haven't
had time to do much searching. However, the October issue of _Cata-
lyst_, the newsletter of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil
Rights, which was started some years ago as a Catholic counterpart of
the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith, reported that the October
issue of _Vanity Fair_ had an excerpt from it. It then quoted a
statement that the Catholic League president, William Donohue, Ph.D.,
issued commenting on the article:
"Scholarship which purports to be ground-breaking must offer
evidence that is ground-breaking. On this score, John Cornwell fails
miserably. His article is laced with conjecture and innuendo of the
most scurrilous kind. Not satisfied to advance the old canard that
Pius XII was 'silent' during the Holocaust, Cornwell now wants us to
believe that the pope was an active agent servicing Hitler. Make no
mistake about it, all of this is being done in an attempt to derail
the beatification of this saintly man.
"In 1945, when the war was over, and again in 1958, when Pius
XII died, the world Jewish community rightly acknowledged his hero-
ism. They knew that _no one_ did more to save Jews than Pope Pius
XII. Cornwell offers no evidence that these Jews were fooled.
"Just last month, Lorenzo Cremonesi, Jerusalem correspondent for
the Italian newspaper _Corriere della Sera_, went public with a docu-
ment that he found in the Israeli archives: in a letter dated October
27, 1945, Msgr. Montini (the future Pope Paul VI) gave a detailed
account of a private audience between Pius XII and Leo Kubwitsky,
then-secretary general of the World Jewish Congress (WJC). On behalf
of the WJC, Kubwitsky gave Pius XII a gift that would be worth more
than one million dollars in today's currency; Kubwitsky expressed
'his gratitude to the august pontiff for his work in support of perse-
cuted Jews.'
"As for _Vanity Fair_, it is a sure bet that its editors would
never publish an excerpt from a book that defends Pius XII."
A box on the same page says:
Cornwell, a former seminarian, said 10 years ago that he was a
self-described "lapsed Catholic for more than 20 years." He now
says he is a "practicing Catholic." Members should know that on
September 10, Cornwell formally turned down an offer by Donohue
that the Catholic League was prepared to give him an all-expenses
paid week in New York provided that he agree to debate Donohue on
radio and TV.
I find that fact significant. Authors like to plug their books, and
many have written of the hardships of book tours in which they travel
from city to city to appear on local radio and television stations.
Cornwell turned down to spend a week in one city (no red-eye flight),
New York City, which has many attractions for tourists and other
visitors and which has a large audience even for local programs in
addition to being the place many network shows are produced. Those
facts all seem to be incentives to accept. The only disincentive is
that instead of being interviewed by the hosts of various shows who
at most may have read the book but more likely have read only a
summary from the publisher he would be debating a man who has studied
the facts of the case himself and could point out flaws in the book
and in Cornwell's remarks on the programs.