...Is Reverent

What does it mean to be reverent in a society with multiple mutually incompatible religions? One can't believe everything about all of them. Even if one does "mix 'n' match", as it were, some core idea is going to be central to your beliefs; and in a multi-culti environment, some cross-fertilization is inevitable.

Reverence starts first with respect for the beliefs of your family and community. Please note that this is not necessarily the same as your personal beliefs. This environment, nonetheless, for good or ill, affects your world view. You should strive to understand what your religion believes, no matter how bizarre it may seem to you, because without understanding you may falter on the next step. It is unlikely that everybody in your community believes exactly the same thing, and you should learn about religions and ideologies other than your own. (A book on world religions is handy at this juncture). You may find wisdom in unexpected sources. You will learn that often two people can reach the same conclusion from different premises, and different conclusions from the same premise, all while maintaining a human level of rationality. The key here is to understand that some people in your community sincerely believe and have reasons for their belief.

So after you've read up, ingested, and ruminated, what next?

Callimachus: The Nerd of Alexandria

 After the completion of the Oedipus at Colonus, the group chose to take an 'interregnum' before starting the Hippolytus of Euripides. In this period the group is studying Callimachus' Epigrams. This involves a changes in meter and in dialect. For more than a thousand lines, the meter has been iambic trimeter admixed with the complex yet partly predictable meters of the Chorus. The meter of epigrams, however, is elegiac couplet, a topic which this blog has addressed in previous posts. For those who might not be familiar with the elegiac couplet in Greek literature, it might be best compared to a limerick - a poem of predictable pattern but not constrained to the frivolity of the latter. A couplet, as one might guess from the name, has two lines. The first is a dactylic hexameter similar to that of epic poetry. The second is a pair of two and a half feet, of which the second must be two dactyls and the beginning of a foot. That consistency drives home the identity of the couplet as a unit. The end of the unit must reinforce the nature of the poetry. In longer works, such as epic poetry, extending to hundreds or thousands of lines, there may be exceptions; but if there were such in a poem of six lines, the irregularity could be construed as poor composition. 

The matter of length raises a different matter: the form is called a couplet because it is short. The minimum length of a couplet is two lines. There is no specific maximum length, but the form implies brevity, especially in the Callimachean school of aesthetics, where a big book is a bad book. This limitation of space drives a further phenomenon, that of the hapax legomenon. There is less room for description in a shorter form of poetry, nor does Callimachus deem it desirable, so references must be brief and potent. A word or phrase in such poetry invokes an entire scene of Homer or Hesiod. Critically, this invocation only works if the audience has what one would call today media literacy. The circumstances in the epigram may be different in way subtle or gross from the passage so invoked, but this method only works if the original source is known. There was no annotated Aeschylus in the era of Callimachus!

The other change is that of dialect. For those who start Greek from Attic, which is most learners, they may know the rule about etas and alphas after vowel and rho, but they may not realize that Attic's rule is a sign of incomplete linguistic change which the Ionic dialect fulfilled (whether or not Zeus was involved). It is a minor difference which does not affect meter. The next difference does affect meter. The adjective for singular you in Attic is 'sos'. In Ionic it is 'teos'. Even without extensive linguistic training, it is easy to note that the first is one syllable, while the second is two. In a meter as constricted as elegiac couplet, this difference has an oversize impact. The first may be short or long and therefore combined with a suitable element as the poet desires, but the second must be a pyrrhic if the second syllable is short and an iamb if the second syllable is long. In The Ionic option, that means one syllable of flexibility down!

Awa Pit

Lately, I've been digging in the linguistic mines of Awa Pit, a South American language which has a feature with the fear-inducing name of conjunct-disjunct. The core concept is actually quite simple. If you are familiar with any non-English European language, you have come across conjugations - in French je chante, tu chantes, il chante, in Spanish canto, cantas, canta, in German ich singe, du singst, er singt. Even English conjugates, just barely, I sing, you sing, he sings. The good news? In Awa Pit, there is one conjugation marker per I/you/he sit.

This marker is best explained by analogy. If this worthy poster wrote a note saying "Gone fishing." and placed it on your fridge, you would interpret the sentence as "I have gone fishing." If this poster, however, sent you a text "Gone fishing?", you would interpret the question as "Have you gone fishing?" In other words, the English punctuation provides enough context without the pronouns "I" and "you" to interpret the sentences. Awa Pit, as a language of the South American jungle, is seldom written down, and therefore uses suffixes at the end of verbs to indicate this distinction.

Sophocles' Oedipus at Colonus: The Anti-Iliad

 Recently our Greek group finished reading Oedipus at Colonus, the last, posthumously produced, play of the tragedian Sophocles of Colonus (this is the famous Sophocles, but the specification is relevant here). The 'trilogy' of Theban plays known today is not a true trilogy, but rather three individual plays from three trilogies from a tragedian who has a deep attachment to the Theban Cycle. Not only are these plays separate, but it is impossible to tell for certain where they fit into the cycles of their respective trilogies. 

One may, nonetheless, form opinions about such matters. It seems likely that the Oedipus at Colonus is the last of its trilogy. The correspondence of the agedness of the protagonist and the playwright, who fittingly did not live to see the premier performance, is one piece of evidence. The Oedipus at Colonus is also heavy on the talking, even for a Greek tragedy. The choice of protagonist and setting, in the Grove of the Kindly Ones forces the other characters to come to Oedipus rather than mingling freely. Each of Oedipus' male relatives come to him as petitioners as if he were already apotheosized. Oedipus fills the prophetic role usually reserved for Tiresias in Theban material. Oedipus undergoes apotheosis at the end, thereby removing himself from any following plays - this apotheosis prompted one of our group to describe the Oedipus at Colonus as the anti-Iliad, since Achilles' arc in that work involves his realization that, no matter how mighty he is, no matter his lineage, he is nonetheless mortal. Oedipus, in contrast, becomes more and more aloof from mortal concerns as the Oedipus at Colonus continues, culminating in his ascent in status to a hero cult, the level accorded to those below the falling angel and above the rising ape. The details surrounding this apotheosis are not always clear in their symbolism, but this is to be expected of a ritual which ends a play that frequently enjoins reverent silence. 

One could argue that the many speeches of Theban partisans in the Oedipus at Colonus are a way of setting up the conflicts and this is therefore the first of its trilogy. In that case, the shadow of the Colonus would hang over the participants in the coming war. This is less likely than the above for two reasons. The first is that Sophocles had already written the angry aftermath of conflict in Antigone, the earliest of his extant Theban plays. The more mature approach of Oedipus Tyrannus, the chronologically middle play, suggests that Sophocles, as playwright, was writing the plays according to his aging and increase in understanding rather than the internal chronological order of the Theban Cycle. The last trilogy, therefore, would focus on the last days of Oedipus just as Sophocles is declining, although perhaps not as much as his sons and heirs might wish. The second reason is that Sophocles is a Colonus lad himself, possessing a great interest in the cycle around the hero. The other two surviving plays are set at Thebes, but the shrine is at Colonus. The playwright's last work should end where he began.

Seven Lines for Book the Seventh

Tu quoque litoribus nostris, Aeneia nutrix

aeternam moriens famam, Caieta, dedisti;

et nunc servat honos sedem tuus ossaque nomen

Hesperia in magna, siqua est ea gloria, signat.

At pius exsequiis Aeneas rite solutis,

aggere composito tumuli, postquam alta quierunt

aequora, tendit iter velis portumque relinquit.

- Aen. 7.1-7

 Book Seven is the more Iliadic latter half of the Aeneid, the portion just past the sections required for grades; in this way it is much like Doctor Seuss' On Beyond Zebra. The first four lines form an epigram. Aeneid Book Seven is a beginning, just not the beginning. As a beginnig, it must observe the conventions of that position, at least in part.

The first line of Book Seven violates the standard pattern of the ending of the dactylic hexameter line by ending in two spondees rather than a dactyl and spondee. The end of a line is an important location for identifying the meter of a poem; without establishing and reconfirming the predetermined meter, poetry devolves into elevated prose. Such a break in the standard pattern here, therefore, in such a prominent position, must have a purpose. Virgil establishes this intentionality in line five, which not only carries the right pattern of dactyl and spondee, but even contains the phrase rite solutis "after they had been done properly." Thus the Watsonian sense of proper funeral rites and the Doylist of continuing the narrative are resolved.

The first four lines of Book Seven form two couplets, since the couplet is the appopriate number of lines for the epigrammatic tradition. The first of these couplets in composed of the first two lines, These lines are an invocatio, an invocation of Aeneas' nurse Caieta, hitherto unmentioned and probably eponymous with a local coast feature. The Roman and the Greeks loved words, but to say that they understood linguistics would be lie. The first line begins with tu quoque "thou also," suggesting that addressee as someone known to the original audience. The spondaic conclusion of the line, Aeneia nutrix "nurse of Aeneas," further supports a known identity. Yet this nurse, Caieta, has not received a single mention in the preceding six books! The nurse of Aeneas appears posthumously like that of Dido, but at least she recieves a name, like that of Anna! Caieta's death provides eternal fame. This contrast is mortality is fitting in the transition between Book Six, in which Aeneas spent most of his time in the Underworld with the Sibyl, and the rest of Book Seven, in which he has returned to the upper world. The mention of a mortal rather than an immortal indicates that this is not true invocatio, which would require a goddess, Muse, or august patron close to the divine. On a more grammatical angle, the phrase litoribus nostris is probably either locational with an elided preposition or else a direct object of dedisti. Also note the alliterative alternation of a and n in nostris Aeneia nutrix/aeternam.

The preferred alliteration in the second couplet switches out a for s. The second couplet also switches from second person to third and from perfect tense to present. The bones of Caieta now receive honor in Italy. It is notably, however, that the word for Italy is the poetic synonym Hesperia and the form of honor is archaic honos. Both could be the result of internal and line-initial alliteration and assonance, but honor and Italia would fit the meter equally well. The final portion of the funerary epigram contains an element of memento mori in siqua est ea gloria "if this is any kind of glory." This sentiment is appropriate for a funerary epigram, but it also indicate the vacillation of the hero Aeneas, who continually turns over matters in his mind, whether or not the other Trojans know.

Caieta's brief appearance is also an indicator, a prefiguration of the many characters who will appear in this half of the Aeneid only to die at the hands of a mightier or more plot-relevant warrior. The manner in which Caieta brought fame to Italy remains unknown.

The next three lines of Book Seven are a series of three clauses related to past actions followed by a generic statement, Their unity can be measured by the alliteration of a in the first words of each line - at, aggere, and aequora - as well as the structure of the three clauses. The first two clauses are ablative absolutes, while the third is a temporal clause with postquam. Aeneas, here given his epithet of pius Aeneas, is the grammatical subject of the main verb relinquit, but the ablative absolutes exclude him and the calming of the sea was not his doing. The final past tense subordinate clause is bound to the main clause in the similarity of postquam alta quierunt and portumque relinquit. Not only do they posess an identical metrical pattern, a similarity insufficient by itself for argument, but they also contain an identical consonant inventory. The only consonant present in the sixth line and absent in the sevent in the s of postquam. Both portions start with p and contain t as the third consonant. The phrases alta quierunt and relinquit are almost anagrams. The -am of postquam is elided according to the rules of Latin poetry, but both lines contain a nasal consonant - n in the former and m in the latter.

The actions in the latter three lines are not just third person, but third person narration in the past leading to the present. Both quierunt and relinquit reinforce the temporal change. Aeneas has performed the rites correctly; he has built the burial mound; the sea has become calm.

The combination of the funeral rites, calm sea, and the sailing forth is a reminder of the opening of the Trojan War, of which the Iliad related a part. Aeneas is a better man than Agamemnon, however, whom his former analogue Odysseus witnesses in his own catabasis. The member of the family for whom Aeneas mourns is his beloved nurse rather than his daughter cruelly deceived. The resulting departure, however, leads to wars for both men.

The first seven lines of Book Seven of the Aeneid are a complex work. The first four lines are a funerary epigram combined with a false invocatio and covert refrences to prior nunrses and mental states, The next tree lines are a tightly composed triplet to move the story to the next point. The use of alliteration and assonance helps to define each section. When both sections come together, the seven lines from a reference to the beginning of the Trojan War, an apposite reference for the Iliadic half of the Aeneid.

Searchers of the Flower Moon

 A piece of trivia easily passed over in the grim Killers of the Flower Moon is the reference to a Scout troop aiding in the search for the missing woman. This is not a Boy Scouts of America troop, because the incident occurred in 1909, far away from New York City. Instead, the group must have used Baden-Powell's Scouting for Boys. The Osage reservation was not near any major cities, but the book had been around for five years, so there is no difficulty in believing that someone had brought the book to Oklahoma. Furthermore, youth organizations such the Sons of Daniel Boone and the Woodcraft Indians already existed. The former organization's very name suggests that it would not have found purchase on the reservation; the latter organization would be more likely, as both it and the YMCA's Indian Guides appropriated - with the aid of the white founders' indigenous friends - local cultures. 

Yet the sociopolitical situation of the Osage indicates why Scouting for Boys rather than The Birch Bark Roll would be the book adopted. The Osage, through the carelessness of the Oklahomans and a touch of serendipity, had come int money and had begun to adopt the white man's sedentary ways. Such a change always risks the loss of traditional skills and knowledge, an abandonment of historical manliness. The potential loss of manly virtue was a driving force in the growth of youth organizations among the white and increasingly urban population of the United States. Although the racist element of this concern could have been absent among the Osage, the use of a book about Scouting and woodcraft written by white man would have been a socially acceptable way of preserving indigenous tradition. The history of Scouting may have an official reason to pass over this Osage troop, but its existence should be included in the greater history of the movement within the United States. Perhaps other indigenous nations or overlooked minorities have more tales to tell of Scouts in action!

Genoa: One Hell of An American Town

 Genoa, Nevada (pronounced je-NO-a) might be the most American town ever, right down to its assocation with the most American religion ever. Genoa was founded as Mormon Station by Latter Day Saints, but it was more than just a town. It was a strategic outpost in the church's claim to the great and powerful state of Deseret stretching from Salt Lake to the Pacific Ocean. The Saint, like many despised religious minorities, utilized trade as a way to become indispensable to their enemies. The settlers who reached the base of the Sierra Nevada would be less discriminate about heretics and blasphemers in order to replenish their supplies. The mixture of religion and empire could not have been more American. 

The road to wealth shifted north after the discovery of the Comstock lode, a mass of silver named after a man whose cultural relevance would flatter his ego. The Saints were recalled to fight - and lose - the Utah War against the United States government, The pragmatism born of this experience correlates well with the future of this town, renamed Genoa in the wake of antebellum hostility to the Saints of God - the name Mormon Station seemed less friendly after the growing consciousness by Gentiles of Mormon elite polygamy. The local Washo no doubt did not appreciate the racial theology of the Church, but the white settlers, even the Gentiles, would not have cared.

The town of Genoa suffered the fate of nearly all strategic settlements and many genre books - passed over for the new exciting places such as Virginia City, the Disneyland of ghost towns. Genoa was still, however, on a critical trade route. Its most ephemeral instance might be its most famous - the Pony Express. The Pony Express lasted less than a year, eclipsed by the railroad, but its media portrayal in the Young Riders lasted thrice as long - much like the eleven-year Korean War in the universe of MASH. Distorting the past to reflect on the present is not unique to America. It is, however, quite popular.

Genoa also had the honor of experiencing another of America's small town pasttimes - budget woes. When the town installed the first streetlight, the annual budget was already settled - it did not include the nineteenth century equivalent of high speed rail. The splendidly name Mrs.Virgin, therefore, recruited her friends to have a bake sale to fund the light. This instance of necessity became an annual tradition and quickly turned into a party. You can still attend.

Genoa had another brush with fame when a local boy made good at the Chicago World's Fair, the birthplace of American industrial miracles, Mr. Ferris had observed the water wheel in Genoa and thought "what if I made it bigger and more fun?" The American obsession with size is not just a contemporary phenomenon. There were many challenges to the construction of the first Ferris Wheel in the wastelands of Chicago - metal fatigue and frozen mud being foremost. Yet he succeeded in creating one of the most iconic fairground rides of early twentieth century America.

Genoa also experienced the youth-oriented aspect of America the Great - inadequate education, The lack of schooling perturbed some of the ladies of the great town of Genoa, so a brief academy was established before a true school system could exist. The old courthouse eventually became the schoolhouse, a circumstance about which the students therein no doubt made many tasteless jokes.

Just as the fortunes of Genoa shifted with the times, so too, early on, did the boundary. The initial placement of the boundary marker between California and Nevada in Genoa was deemed inaccurate. The original surveyor, therefore, moved it, but not very far and not up the mountain slope. Perhaps we should not be too harsh on him, since there were many errors, accidental and intentional, in establishing boundaries of territory and state.

Genoa reflects the quirks, both good and bad, of the American experience, from the Latter Day Saints to boom and bust economies to shortfalls in education and utilities to the local boy who gave his name to something famous. If any of these aspects intrigues you, I urge you to visit Genoa yourself. If you enjoyed this or have any comments or questions, feel free to contact me. There is much I have omitted and I would love to talk more about this corner of the world.