Gumby's Close Encounter

A play on color, shadows, perspective and a defamiliarized sense of place

Max Beckmann - Winding path in the Black Forest, 1936

Arthurian Legend: Notes and Sources

Arthurian Legend

British Library Article
Project Gutenberg Complete Text of Thomas Mallory's Le Morte Darthur   

 

English Sources

 

Geoffrey of Monmouth, History of the Kings of Britain (Historia regum Britanniae)  (12th century, 1135-39)

 

Wace of Jersey

Layamon

Tristan and Iseult  (12th century)

 

            Anglo-Norman, Inspired by Keltic Legend:

 

                        Deirdre and Naoise

 

                        Diarmuid Ua Duibhue

 

                        Grainne

 

The Pearl Poet, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (14th century)

 

French Sources

 

Chrétien de Troyes Perceval (Grail story)  (12th century)

 

“a Group of Cistercian Monks”(?), Vulgate Cycle  (1210-1230)

 

Prose Lancelot

 

Robert de Boron, Merlin (13th century)

 

“Post-Vulgate Grail Romance” (combining Arthurian Romance with the Tristan Romance)

 

(Mallory’s chief sources were these French romances)

 

 

Welsh Sources

 

Gildas, De excidio et conquest Britanniae, Fall and Conquest of Britain  (mid-6th century)

 

Nennius, Historia Brittonum, History of the Britons (9th century)

 

Annales Cambriae, Cabbrian Annals (late 9th century)

 

The Mabinogion   (12th- 13thcenturies, first English version by Charlotte Guest, 1838-49);

 

Culhwch and Olwen (12th century)

 

 

“Modern” versions and related stories

 

Thomas Mallory, Le Morte Darthur   (late 15th century)

 

Thomas Love Peacock, The Misfortunes of Elphin  (1829)

 

Sources: The Myvyrian Archaiology of Wales  (chiefly in Welsh), Cambro-Briton (periodical ca. 1819); The Mabinogion (first English version by Charlotte Guest, 1838-49); Taliesin (first English version by Nash, 1858).

 

Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Idylls of the King       (1842, 1859, 1888)

 

Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “The Lady of Shallot”   (1832, 1842)

 

T. H. White, The Once and Future King     (1958)

 

Marion Zimmerman Bradley, The Mists of Avalon     (1982)

 

 

Themes:

 

Religion

Myth and Religion

History

Sociology

Psychology

Ethics

Anthropology (typologies)

Fantasy(?)

Nostalgia

King Arthur (Nigel Terry) and Guenevere (Cherie Lunghi) in Frank Boorman's Excalibur (1981)

One hour of soundscapes by Jean-Claude Heudin, inspired by Forbidden Planet

Matsu Basho: a poem about lightning, 17th century

A flash of lightning: 

Into the gloom 

Goes the heron's cry.

More evidence of an "imperative" to explore...

Christmas Meditation: Jonah 2

2 Then Jonah prayed unto the Lord his God out of the fish's belly,

² And said, I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the Lord, and he heard me; out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice.

³ For thou hadst cast me into the deep, in the midst of the seas; and the floods compassed me about: all thy billows and thy waves passed over me.

⁴ Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight; yet I will look again toward thy holy temple.

⁵ The waters compassed me about, even to the soul: the depth closed me round about, the weeds were wrapped about my head.

⁶ I went down to the bottoms of the mountains; the earth with her bars was about me for ever: yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O Lord my God.

⁷ When my soul fainted within me I remembered the Lord: and my prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple.

⁸ They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy.

⁹ But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that that I have vowed. Salvation is of the Lord.

¹⁰ And the Lord spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land.

 Jonah — Albert Pinkham Ryder

  

 

 

 

Jesus Appearing to Mary — Albert Pinkham Ryder

 

 

Alien Sunsets

 

We need to get out there and look around, evidently. 

"Syama Tara"

Descriptive Material (unknown source):

Syama Tara, Eastern Tibet, 18th century. This title is usually translated as "Green Tara," although Syama means "dark," and is often used to describe Vaishnava deities such as Krishna (which also means "dark") and Rama. (In these cases Syam manifests as Blue.) This form of Tara represents protective Compassion, and helps people to overcome obstacles, fear, and suffering. For this, she is known as Jetsun Drölma, "Venerable Liberator" (or savior").

But the deep story of Tara is her desire for liberation, which was inseparable from her womanhood. The vow of Tara: "I have developed bodhicitta as a woman. For all my lifetimes along the path I vow to be born as a woman, and in my final lifetime when I attain Buddhahood, then, too, I will be a woman." 

Pleasing signifiers collocated in a "balanced farrago" of complementry Blue, Blue-Green and Olive fields vaguely exciting mid-20th century nostalgia

 

 

For more on the subject of "nostalgia", please click HERE.

Space sounds for study and recreation

00:00 Intro

00:18 Saturn Radio Emission

00:31 Eerie Sound of Phobos

00:55 Radar Echoes From Titan's Surface

01:34 Helix Nebula's 'Scream'

01:49 Crab Pulsar

02:09 Supermassive Black Hole Feeding

02:31 Earth Whistler

02:53 Enceladus

03:04 Jupiter Ionosphere

03:28 Sound of Sirius A

Visual "nonsense" with clarifying captions

Return to Homeostasis

Cloud Tops

Inter-dimensional Portal with Periodic Phase Transitions

Optative Public Space (Data Center Locus Parameter Plaza)

Linked images: Writer's Block / Vitasta Raina dot com

 

Footnote to Aristotle on politics and reason: a possible derivation applicable to our aesthetic and ethical understanding

“The soul is divided into two parts, of which the one has reason itself, while the other does not have it in itself, but is capable of obeying reason.”        

                                                 Aristotle - Politics

My derivation: 

Application to aesthetics:  the creative action is divided into two parts, of which one is a capacity, practice and cultivation of reason; the other is a capacity for a sort of "indiscipline" or "wildness" that is capable (and despite itself) of obeying reason. This is artistic aspiration flourishing in the wilderness; or, indeed, the human conscience fully alive and taking good action in the community and in the universe.

Symmetry in asymmetry achieved through figurate repetition, with participatory human observers in other-world context

Joseph Mugnaini (1912 - 1992) - Italian-born American artist and illustrator -  'Fire Balloons' from Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles, 1974

Fun with English History

Catharsis, or something else entirely?

Alternative Highbrow post title: "Technology vs. the geopolitical Id in mid-20th century Japanese television, a childhood sanctuary"

Don your thinking cap: Beethoven String Quartet No. 4 in C minor, Op. 18, No. 4

 

(Or a tinfoil hat.)

General Advisory

Multivalent vehicles, multivalent tenors

Richard Powers

Karel Thole

Trevor Webb

George Wilson

Josh Kirby

Highbrow at a number of levels: spatial orientation, perspective, eye-hand coordination, digital articulation, pattern recognition, inquiry into imaginative parameters, philosophical distinctions between imagination and belief...

Reminder: Emanations 12 Call for Submissions (click the image)

Digital collage by Bienvenido Bones Bañez, Jr. 

Jazz with Mimes: Kraan - "Vollgas Ahoi" (1977)

Alexander Andreev - Poster for the film Aelita: Queen of Mars - 1924 - The Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts

Click HERE to view and learn about the film.

Highbrow Helicopterfest: #4 Fairey Rotodyne

Hardly an obscure subject, but worth a look:

Period aesthetics: an exuberant image

Cutting a startling yet respectable figure before the public

"6 November 1957: XE521 made its first flight at White Waltham with Squadron Leader Wilfred Ronald Gellatly, AFC, and Lieutenant Commander John George Peter Morton in the cockpit."  Source

Dynamic image of Rotodyne in a steep bank to port

Source

General Characteristics (wikipedia) 

·         Crew: two

·         Capacity: 40–48 passengers

·         Length: 58 ft 8 in (17.88 m) of fuselage

·         Wingspan: 46 ft 6 in (14.17 m) fixed wings

·         Height: 22 ft 2 in (6.76 m) to top of rotor pylon

·         Wing area: 475 sq ft (44.1 m2)

·         Airfoil: NACA 23015

·         Empty weight: 22,000 lb (9,979 kg)

·         Gross weight: 33,000 lb (14,969 kg)

·         Fuel capacity: 7,500 lb (3,402 kg)

·         Powerplant: 2 × Napier Eland N.El.7 turboprops, 2,800 shp (2,100 kW) each 

·         Powerplant: 4 × rotor tip jet , 1,000 lbf (4.4 kN) thrust each

·         Main rotor diameter: 90 ft 0 in (27.43 m)

·         Main rotor area: 6,362 sq ft (591.0 m2) Rotor aerofoil: NACA 0015

·         Blade tip speed: 720 ft/s (220 m/s)

·         Disc loading: 6.14 lb/ft2 (30 kg/m2)

·         Propellers: 4-bladed, 13 ft (4.0 m) diameter Rotol propellers

The production version of the Fairey Rotodyne, dubbed Rotodyne Z, was to have had 10ft greater wingspan, with tapered outer panels, more powerful ailerons and four tailfins. New, more powerful engines would have been fitted, giving the production Rotodyne an even better performance and improved load-carrying capability.

To achieve take-off, engine gases were ducted to the tips of the rotor blades, producing rotation without torque, thus a tail rotor was unnecessary.  Once airborne and moving forward, the rotor reverted to auto-rotate mode, and the craft flew along like a "gyroplane", propelled by the thrust of the conventional turboprops.

A dramatic parting shot

Click HERE for more Highbrow Helicopterfest action.

Jazz Trance ... from Terra em Transe ("Entranced Earth" - "World in a Trance", also called "Land in Anguish" or "Earth Entranced" - Brazil -1967 - Dir. Glauber Rocha)

"Investigation" continued: remarks from Anonymous

My November 28 Highbrow post "Investigation" elicited lively comments from "Anonymous".  Here are Anonymous's observations with a light copy-edit, and a few of my remarks (in red):

The truth about fake intelligence: Some people look intelligent until they start talking. Because the truth is, a lot of what people do to appear smart actually exposes how insecure they are. Psychology says we crave the feeling of intelligence more than actual growth. We want to seem sharp, sound logical, and look confident, and even if deep down we don't know what we're talking about. These are the habits that fool your brain into thinking you're smart while quietly keeping you average. 

Habit #1 One, you over-explain everything. You think you're showing intelligence by adding detail. But according to research on over-justification bias, people who explain too much often do it to hide uncertainty. Smart people simplify. They don't drown meaning in words. If you always feel the need to prove your point, you're probably not sure of it yourself. 

Well, sometimes we are inclined to be verbal as we explore our thinking and knowledge, and this is acceptable within reason.  But, yes, when we become truly fluent in  our understanding of something, we should strive for and achieve a succinct style, a suave manner, a glowing aura, and--at appropriate junctures in our presentation--twinkling eyes.

Habit #2 Two, you chase information, not understanding. You read books, watch videos, and even quote psychology. But ask yourself, can you teach what you just learned? If not, you're stuck in what psychologists call the illusion of knowledge, where your brain confuses exposure for mastery. Real intelligence isn't about how much you know, it's how deeply you can connect ideas. 

Yes, but in the meantime prudence, good form, the spirit of geniality, the Human Condition, etc. behoove us to increase our knowledge.

Habit #3 Three, you argue to win, not to learn. Ever notice how some people can't stand being wrong? That's not intelligence. That's ego anxiety. It's your brain protecting your self-image, not seeking truth. Psychologically, it's called motivated reasoning. You twist facts to support what you already believe. So, you may sound confident, but you're actually trapped inside your own bias. 

There is a great (and appropriate) "honor" in admitting you don't know something.  See my remark following "Habit #4".

Habit #4 Four, you confuse scepticism with wisdom. You think doubting everything makes you smart, but extreme scepticism is just defensive ignorance. It's easier to reject things than to understand them. Smart people question things to learn. Fake smart people question things to look superior. 

Perhaps the "essence" of good scepticism is a willingness to admit 1) "I/we don't know, and let's proceed with that understanding. And 2) Let's agree to disagree when we do, but otherwise let's work earnestly together in a spirit of collegiality and good faith.

Habit #5 Five. You use logic to avoid emotion. Many people brag about being logical. But neuroscience shows emotion and logic are not separate systems. They cooperate. People who suppress emotion make worse decisions, not better ones. If you dismiss feelings as weakness, you're not logical. You're emotionally blind. 

Of course, it is a matter of thoughtful emotions (or emotions intelligently considered) and appropriate responses.  

Habit #6 Six, you correct others to feel superior. Grammar, pronunciation, fun facts. You jump at every small mistake to fix people. But studies show this is linked to linguistic insecurity. A psychological need to reassert power when you feel small. Smart people don't prove knowledge. They share it when it's needed. 

Still, good grammar attends thoughtfulness and precision. Effectively teaching and encouraging good grammar is to be applauded. Indeed, many professors in English, infatuated as they are by their authors and the latest "sensation" at a recent conference, ahem, are too distant from the philosophical joy of teaching subjects and predicates, prepositional phrases, verb tense, subject-verb agreement, and the delightful and hilariously absurd variations represented by all those quirky irregular verbs!

Habit #7 Seven, you hide behind big words. You use complex vocabulary to sound intellectual, but that's actually a red flag of insecurity. A Princeton study found people who deliberately use complicated language are perceived as less intelligent because clarity is a sign of depth. Confusion is a sign of disguise. 

Very true. I could evoke Wittgenstein and Einstein here, but why bother?

Habit #8 Eight, you think knowing about it equals understanding it. Knowing about philosophy doesn't make you wise. Knowing about psychology doesn't make you emotionally intelligent. And knowing about success doesn't make you disciplined. Knowledge is a mirror. It shows you who you could be. But until you act, it means nothing. 

Lots of good points here.  Suffice it to say, if you can describe and explain something accurately, effectively and in a manner appropriate to your audience, you know your material.

Real intelligence is quiet. Here’s the truth. Fake intelligence impresses people who don't think. Real intelligence changes the way you think. You don't need to look smart. You need to stay curious, humble, and brutally honest with yourself. Because the moment you stop trying to look intelligent, that's the moment you actually become it [i.e. "intelligent"].

Captain Zep – Space Detective

A marriage destined to a dreadful and unjust end--but the union will issue Elizabeth, which figures carefully in our moral and historical considerations

King Henry and Anne Boleyn Deer shooting in Windsor Forest by William Powell Frith, 1903

 Click HERE to learn about Anne Boleyn.

The Divine Comedy, Inferno Canto I, in Italian

Quick Comparison: the Flood Stories in Genesis and Gilgamesh

	Genesis	Gilgamesh
Extent of flood	Global	Global
Cause	Man's wickedness	Man's sins
Intended for whom?	All mankind	One city & all mankind
Sender	Yahweh	Assembly of "gods"
Name of hero	Noah	Utnapishtim
Hero's character	Righteous	Righteous
Means of announcement	Direct from God	In a dream
Ordered to build boat?	Yes	Yes
Did hero complain?	Yes	Yes
Height of boat	Several stories (3)	Several stories (6)
Compartments inside?	Many	Many
Doors	One	One
Windows	At least one	At least one
Outside coating	Pitch	Pitch
Shape of boat	Rectangular	Square
Human passengers	Family members only	Family & few others
Other passengers	All species of animals	All species of animals
Means of flood	Ground water & heavy rain	Heavy rain
Duration of flood	Long (40 days & nights plus)	Short (6 days & nights)
Test to find land	Release of birds	Release of birds
Types of birds	Raven & three doves	Dove, swallow, raven
Ark landing spot	Mountain -- Mt. Ararat	Mountain -- Mt. Nisir
Sacrificed after flood?	Yes, by Noah	Yes, by Utnapishtim
Blessed after flood?	Yes	Yes

  Source: Lorey, Frank.  “The Flood of Genesis and the Flood of Gilgamesh” 

View from the Araratian plain near the city of Artashat, Armenia; Little Ararat (left) and Greater Ararat (right); by Սէրուժ Ուրիշեան (Serouj Ourishian) Wiki

Mount Nisir? (Pir Omar Gudrun or Pira Magrun?)