Continuing in its line of artful, boundary-pushing not-quite-games, Tale of Tales this month released Fatale, an "interactive vignette" inspired by Oscar Wilde's 1894 play Salomé.
Explore a living tableau filled with references to the legendary tale and enjoy the moonlit serenity of a fatal night in the orient. Fatale offers an experimental play experience that stimulates the imagination and encourages multiple interpretations and personal associations.
There's also The Path, released earlier this year, a meandering, introspective horror game based on Little Red Riding Hood in which six sisters wander in a foreboding forest and one by one lose their innocence. Completely open-ended, the game eschews goals and challenges and invites the player to simply explore and experience.
Six sisters live in an apartment in the city. One by one their mother sends them on an errand to their grandmother, who is sick and bedridden. The teenagers are instructed to go to grandmother's house deep in the forest and, by all means, to stay on the path! Wolves are hiding in the woods, just waiting for little girls to stray.
But young women are not exactly known for their obedience, are they? Will they be able to resist the temptations of the forest? Will they stay clear of danger? Can they prevent the ancient tale from being retold?
After months of waiting, two new Gargoyles trade paperbacks were released last month. There are new books from both the main Gargoyles series, Clan Building Volume 2, which collects the last of the published single issues plus four more issues that were never released individually, and the spin-off, Bad Guys Volume 1, which collects all the single issues of Bad Guys plus one new one.
Disney raised the cost of the Gargoyles license in the middle of the production run and Slave Labor Graphics wasn't able to renew, so the previously unpublished issues were allowed to be released in the trades only through a fortunate loophole where they are included as "bonus material." No more issues are currently in production, and the future of the Gargoyles comics looks uncertain — but at last we have a complete set of the Clan Building and Bad Guys arcs, and we get to see the conclusion of Redemption, the Stone of Destiny arc, and the very first Timedancer story with Brooklyn's journey through time. This isn't a cheap knock-off or filler material, but the true, canon continuation of the story as penned by creator Greg Weisman. It's a great set of wonderful new material, required reading for any Gargoyles fan.
A great place for reconnecting with the Gargoyles universe is Station Eight, a hub which links an active comment room, info about the comics, a Q&A with Greg Weisman at Ask Greg, and the comprehensive GargWiki, which might be useful for keeping track of the comics' sprawling cast of characters if you can't remember your Canmores from your Constantines or need to brush up on the Battle of Bannockburn.
Last week, a vampire-killing kit dated to the turn of the 19th century was sold at an estate sale for the sum of $14,850. I expect this price represents an excellent deal, as the savvy vampire hunter always waits until after the Halloween rush to snap up occult supplies at steep discounts. It's like 75%-off chocolate hearts on February 15th, or the free Christmas trees you can pick up on street corners all January long.
The well-appointed kit contains "stakes, mirrors, a gun with silver bullets, crosses, a Bible, holy water, candles and even garlic, all housed in a American walnut case with a carved cross on top."
This is not the first such antique vampire-hunting kit to turn up on the market in recent years. Boing Boing has recorded for posterity another vampire-slaying kit, purportedly from 19th century Romania, that was sold on eBay in 2006. From the auction description:
The knife is 13.1 inches long with a metal handle. It's made of heavy metal and can be easily thrown - it will always hit the target with the sharp tip. Has a gothic theme and detailing of fangs.
The metal box contains one syringe and it can be used to inject liquid garlic or secret serums into vampires. It has a small cross on it made of silver . The syringe can sustain temperatures up to 200 Celsius degrees. The cross is very old, with one beautiful black stone and is on a very old metal chain .
The metal teeth plier ( 7.5 inches ) was used in the past to remove the vampire's teeth. There is also a special tool called Dentol ( 5.5 inches ) used in the past to remove the vampire's teeth.
Then there's Professor Ernst Blomberg. This is the dedicated footsoldier in the War on the Undead whose name appears on many of the antique vampire-hunting kits that occupy prized spots in private collections and museum exhibits, and have lately been turning up at various auction houses and on eBay. Here is one of his creations that was reportedly originally sold at the Great Exhibition in London in 1851, and more recently at Sotheby's, where it fetched $12,000 in an auction conducted on October 30th (that is, the day before Halloween) in 2003.
From the original description:
This box contains the items considered necessary for the protection of persons who travel into certain little known countries in Easter Europe where the populace are plagued with a peculiar manifestation of evil, known as Vampires... Professor Ernst Blomberg respectfully requests that the purchaser of this kit carefully studies his book. Should evil manifestations become apparent, he is then equiped to deal with them efficiently... Professor Blomberg wishes to announce his grateful thanks to that well known gunmaker of Liege, Nicholas Plombeur, whose help in compiling of the special items, the silver bullets,etc., has been most efficient. The items enclosed are as follows...
1. An efficient pistol with its usual accoutrements 2. A quantity of bullets of the finest silver 3. Powdered flowers of garlic (one phial) 4. Flour of Brimstone (one phial) 5. Wooden stake (Oak) 6. Ivory crucifix 7. Holy Water (one phial) 8. Professer Blomberg's New Serum
Here's another of Blomberg's kits that also sold for $12,000 to a Seattle man in a 1997 auction.
This one was donated in 1989 to the Mercer Museum in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, where it currently resides. The attached description is nearly identical to the other Blomberg kits:
This box contains the items considered necessary, for the protection of persons who travel into certain little known countries of Eastern Europe, where the populace are plagued with a particular manifestation of evil known as Vampires. Professor Ernst Blomberg respectfully requests that the purchaser of this kit, carefully studies his book in order, should evil manifestations become apparent, he is equipped o deal with them efficiently. Professor Blomberg wishes to announce his grateful thanks to that well known gunmaker of Liége, Nicholas Plomdeur whose help in the compiling of the special items, the silver bullets &c., has been most efficient. The times enclosed are as follows.
(1) An efficient pistol with its usual accoutrements. (2) Silver bullets. (3) An ivory crucifix. (4) Powdered flowers of gaelie. (5) A wooden stake. (6) Professor Blomberg’s new serum.
Vampire Killing Kit, second half of the 19th century The pistol dates from the 18th century and was brought back from the expedition. Brought back from an expedition to Russia and Mongolia in September 2001
The Vampire Killing Kit was sold by Professor Ernst Blomberg in the second half of the 19th century. The kit was made by Nicolas Plomdeur, a well-known gunmaker from Liège.
This particular box, which has been in the Surnateum's collection since the late 19th century, has recently been reunited with the accompanying pistol (made in Spain in the late 18th century, originally a flintlock but later converted to a percussion cap in the first half of the 19th century); the gun was lost under circumstances described below. Manufactured in two separate stages, it contains all of the accessories used to maintain the pistol, as well as a large bottle of holy water, small bottles which once contained Professor Blomberg's anti-vampire serum and garlic juice to impregnate the silver bullets, a small bottle of sulphur powder, whose odour could drive off vampires. A crucifix made of wood and copper, various blessed medals, a small bottle of salts, a copy of the 1819 book entitled Histoire des Fantômes et des Démons by Gabrielle de P. (see the Library).
And another. This one was sold through Stevens Auction Company and said to come from New Orleans.
Lina's Lookbook features two vampire-slaying kits that were up for sale from Sotheby's last year. There is no mention of Professor Blomberg in connection with these, but the description of the larger of the two, a French kit dated to about 1900, reads:
the box in solid mahogany, the hinged lid with a copper cross to the front, opening to a compartmentalized interior comprised of an ivory inlaid crucifix-shaped gun bearing the date 1591, lead bullets, a small glass bottle, a small power keg, a metal bullet mold, and a mahogany stake, with original paper label stating an attribution to Nicolas Plomdeur.
Of course, there is no Professor Ernst Blomberg, and these are not actually antiques. Michael de Winter, the creator of the original Blomberg kit, confesses.
My story starts in or around 1970 when I was employed in the printing industry. My hobby was buying, selling and refurbishing antique guns. I sold mainly at the famous Portobello Market in London. My usual stock of guns for sale was only 10-20 at any one time and these tended to be of superior quality. I had a number of regular clients who arrived every week to see if I had any new stock. One of my regulars wanted a fine flintlock pistol and asked me to take in part exchange a Belgian percussion pocket pistol. I grudgingly agreed and allowed him £15.00 off the price of the flintlock.
So, here it is, a poor quality pocket pistol in mediocre condition! What to do with it? That was my question. Having an extremely fertile imagination and being an avid reader, I was inspired. It occurred to me that I could produce something unique that would be a great advertising gimmick and would attract people to my stall. The Vampire Killing Kit was on its way.
De Winter cobbled together and sold the first vampire-killing kit, along with its note attributing the contents to the fictitious personages of Professor Ernst Blomberg and Nicholas Plomdeur, the Gunmaker of Liège, as a novelty item for £1000. The rest, he claims, are imitators — counterfeits of a forgery!
Then again, perhaps he isn't to believed, either. The Mercer Museum figures that its fake Blomberg kit dates to the 1920's, which would neatly preclude de Winter as the originator. Lies upon lies.
If these purported antiques, hoaxes, copies and forgeries auctioning in the tens of thousands baffle and bewilder you, perhaps it's time to turn to genuine, 100% authentic works of art. Alex CF is an assemblage artist who creates detailed, absorbing "cryptozoological scientific art" in the form of handsome boxed kits and framed collections. Among his many horror, antique, and steampunk-themed pieces are a number of fascinating vampire-related items, including, yes, a fully-stocked slaying kit.
Called upon to look into the supposed intervention of demonic possession of a small child, bled to death whilst sleeping, an unnamed cleric found evidence of an all together more natural cause of death. A bite, where the murderer had drained the body of all fluid. Baffled by this hideous mystery the cleric took it upon himself to understand this unknown species. His travel altar became his reliquary of artifacts, a place to house the evidence he found whilst on his travels. Throughout Europe he traveled, tracing the roots of a dynasty unseen by man.
• The partial skull fragment of a Homo Wampyrus, housed within a glass display dome • Optical apparatus: Multi armed magnifying lense device, with extendable mirror and vice amateur for examination of blood and bone fragments • Foetal Homo Wampyrus • Blood samples taken from 7 newly infected humans • Slide comparison of human and vampiric blood • Test tubes, spare tube • Tissue sample • Silver nitrate and its properties • Glass specimen jars with garlic, various roots/samples • Dried plant samples, for suppressing vampiric strain • A dissecting kit within a metal tin • A candle holder/spair candles wrapped in paper and string • The teeth and blood from an ancient aristrocratic vampire, housed within a glass/brass box • Extensive notes and anatomical studies, spair examination tools, scissors/scalpels etc. • A small moleskine notebook, containing various notes/diagrams • An envelope holding a collection of daguerreotypes (early photographs) • A bible, a large crucifix, and a book of psalms, mere relics of his past belief • A map, with needles and thread plotting his first journey to find the roots of the species • A picture of Lady Bathory
This is the mysterious Vampire Legacy Box. No notes are provided on this intriguing item.
Echogenesis is an interactive flash artwork in which you are encouraged to explore and engage with a series of natural environments, moving tableaux inhabited by various creatures and suffused with smooth ambient soundtracks. There's no game, no goal, just the experience, like a pleasant jaunt through a virtual biodome.
Tale of Tales is a progressive development studio that fosters a gaming experience that goes beyond traditional mainstream genres. Emphasizing "innovative forms of interaction, engaging poetic narratives and simple controls," their projects tend to eschew competitive goal-oriented formats to focus on folkloric storytelling and the artistic experience.
The Endless Forest is a shared multi-user online 3d environment (it can be run as a game, and doubles as a screensaver) that exemplifies the Tale of Tales aesthetic. The world is an infinitely tiling forest which players are free to roam in the form of strangely eerie human-faced deer. Various items and locations in the environment produce various magical effects, such as changing the pelt or horns of your or another's avatar, and during special events the environment itself might become mutable, and experience transformations such as falling snow or a field of flowers coming into bloom.
Interaction with other players, who are identified by unique glowing glyphs in lieu of names, is entirely nonverbal, conducted in the cervine manner of head shakes, foot stomps, bellows, and nuzzles. Not only are you thus insulated from the possibility of encountering foul-mouthed trolls shouting "PwNeD, N00b" and the like, but people have tried and failed to disturb the tranquility of the environment: "it's impossible to grief the other damn deers!" lament a gang of Age of Conan PvPers, after all their hostile gestures are interpreted as friendly overtures. When there is no wealth or status to accumulate, nothing but the experience itself, there is nothing to threaten.
The Graveyard is not properly a game, but a kind of interactive visual poem using a game-like interface. You "play" an old woman hobbling slowly through a graveyard towards a bench. (Don't try to go off exploring on the side-paths -- as soon as I started my adventurer spirit got the better of me, and I soon got my avatar trapped in a corner off-screen. Stick to the path, lady.) Once you sit on the bench, you are treated to a song. Then you leave. That's the so-called "trial" version -- the full version, available for $5, is identical except that it includes the possibility of death.
With its painfully unheroic protagonist, strictly linear path, and moody, black-and-white visuals reminiscent of an old, distressed film, The Graveyard uses the gaming format to challenge the very idea of what a game is, and explores the possibilities of the medium as an avenue for artistic expression. The Graveyard is uninterested in setting you a challenge; it's telling you a story.
The Path and 8 are two more traditional games both in development by Tale of Tales. Based respectively on the folkloric roots of the Red Riding Hood and Sleeping Beauty stories, they are conceived as story-driven adventures incorporating unusual gameplay features, such as 8's semi-autonomous main character who must be coaxed and guided rather than directly controlled.
Thatgamecompany specializes in games with innovative, offbeat mechanics that offer challenging gameplay in tranquil, pleasant environments.
Their breakout hit, flOw (featured here previously), the game where you play a simple sea creature continuously growing as you consume other creatures, folded a deceptively simple concept into an immensely satisfying experience. It was developed into a download for PS3, and has won numerous awards.
Their second offering, Cloud, which also garnered a couple of awards, was inspired by Katamari Damacy among other things, and features a unique game mechanic in which you fly around the skies controlling masses of clouds, in order to form particular shapes or make rain. It's a dreamy, exciting experience, offering a kind of wish-fulfillment for the longing to fly and a joyful, no-pressure challenge to complete.
Thatgamecompany recently announced their latest project for the PS3, Flower, which from the looks of the trailer will embody a the same sense of beauty and freedom as celebrated in Cloud -- perhaps this time with flower petals standing in for water vapor.
The Truth is What You Believe is an interactive flash work that invites you to "Participate in the world of Tom and Daisey", and promises "total consciousness on your death bed" if you complete it. It resembles a Samorost-style game in that you must hunt pixels to trigger events that will get you to the next stage, but the imagery is oneiric, poetic rather than narrative. It is essentially the abstracted world of a dream collage, where such basic logic as "keys open doors" applies, but otherwise all bets are off. More flash curiosity is to be found on the main site.
Tiny Grow is a charming and diverting little toy where you use a spinner to randomly grow alien plants and plantlike-devices, which you can then manipulate in various ways. There's no goal and no point, just some neat and strange things to play with.
Describing itself as a "digital poem/game/net artwork hybrid of sorts," game, game, game and again game is a kind of anti-game manifesto in an interactive, game-like form, in which the stated object is "move around, think." Executed in scribbles of pen and crayon, spattered with words and fragments of text, this game is a parody of a game, its pointlessness a shouted challenge.
I discovered today that one of my longstanding wishes has finally come true: The Endicott Studio (publisher of the online Journal of Mythic Arts) now has a blog. It's edited by Midori Snyder with contributions from Terri Windling and the rest of the Endicott staff, and has all the articles, reviews, events, art, links, poems, news and tidbits about all things mythic and folkloric that I had hoped to see from the Endicott Studio. I am delighted.
While I'm at it, I should highlight some of the other myth/folklore/fairytale blogs I discovered when I thought there really should be some good ones out there and began to make a concerted search for them.
Cu Sith Myth is "a Blog of Ancient and Modern Myth" with articles, discussions, and links on topics from the meaning of old tales to current events, art, books, myth and society, and more. Wonderful stuff.
Myth Happens is a personal livejournal by sovay, aka poet and storyteller Sonya Taafe. There's always something fascinating from this blog in the heart of the mythic literary world.
Chaos and old nighties, the livejournal of nineweaving, is by turns personal, poetic, whimsical, and magical, just like a fairy tale. Everything she writes is steeped in myth.
Take me to your Leda (which I had on my blogroll for a long time as "Living in Legends and Lore" -- I had trouble deciding which was the title), is a great blog devoted primarily to classical and ancient mythologies, Graeco-Roman and otherwise. It hasn't been updated for a little while, but it hasn't yet reached my six-month cutoff, and I like it so I'm hoping things pick up again.
Jasminembla's personal blog wanders from film to art to literary experiences, all suffused with a heavy dose of the fantastic, mythical, and magical.
Living in Season is an illuminating blog full of real folklore -- principally plant lore and the rites and traditions of the changing seasons. In-depth, well-researched insights into the properties, histories, magical significance and folk traditions connected with common things we take for granted.
If you know of any other good myth or folklore blogs out there, please do share.
All Hallow's Eve is past, which means that today is All Hallows or All Saint's Day and also the Mexican Day of the Dead, and tomorrow is All Souls Day. Did you think the spirits all vanished after Halloween? Quite the contrary.
The Catholic canon is so crowded with saints that there aren't nearly enough days for them all; All Saint's Day is a catch-all for the rest who aren't honored with a specific holiday. The day before, All Hallow's Eve, is a sort of riotous, supernatural free-for-all for the dark spirits who come out to roam the earth before the dawning of this holy day. Though Samhain in the old Celtic tradition marked the New Year, it was a time of death, with winter approaching and the world turning cold. The dead wandered the earth, and were placated with offerings of food and drink. The dead were also celebrated half a world away in Mexico, where on November 1st and 2nd, ancestors and relatives were remembered and honored in traditions that originated with the rites of Aztec deities.
The Wilson's AlmanacBook of Days features a wide-ranging selection of historical and cultural information for every day of the year; check out the November 1st and November 2nd pages for more All Saints and All Souls lore, including a collection of poems and quotes, historical info, loads of links, and even a recipe for soul cakes.
It occurred to me that not everyone knows why we dress up in costumes every year and demand candy door-to-door and bob for apples and slice up pumpkins...if you've ever been curious about the origin and meaning of these traditions, I hope this might satisfy you.
I turned up this bunch of links that have been mouldering in the folder for some time -- several interesting articles and conversations by and with cool people about the latest in sci-fi, fantasy and fairy tales. Enjoy.
TIME recently had a very nice interview with Joss Whedon and Neil Gaiman about their new movies out, Serenity and Mirrormask, as well as Firefly, Neil's new book Anansi Boys, and geek culture going mainstream.
TIME: I almost miss the stigma that used to attach to these things. Now everybody's into Tolkien. And I feel a little like, hey, I've been into that stuff my whole life. And in fact, you used to beat me up for it.
JW: I miss a little of that element, the danger of, oh, I'm holding this science fiction magazine that's got this great cover. There a little bit of something just on the edge that I'm doing this. That's pretty much gone. Although when I walk into a restaurant with a stack of comic books, I still do get stared at a little bit.
NG: I always loved, most of all with doing comics, the fact that I knew I was in the gutter. I kind of miss that, even these days, whenever people come up and inform me, oh, you do graphic novels. No. I wrote comic books, for heaven's sake. They're creepy and I was down in the gutter and you despised me. 'No, no, we love you! We want to give you awards! You write graphic novels!' We like it here in the gutter!
A film about fairy tales and about the two men who collected the traditional German tales that migrated across the Atlantic to become part of our folklore, The Brothers Grimm delivers a startling reminder that the narratives started out as adult entertainment—violent, bawdy, melodramatic improvisations that emerged in the evening hours, when ordinary chores engaged the labor of hands, leaving minds free to wander and wonder. Fairy tales, John Updike has proposed, were the television and pornography of an earlier age—part of a fund of popular culture (including jokes, gossip, news, advice, and folklore) that were told to the rhythms of spinning, weaving, repairing tools, and mending clothes. The hearth, where all generations were present, including children, became the site at which miniature myths were stitched together, tales that took up in symbolic terms anxieties about death, loss, and the perils of daily life but also staged the triumph of the underdog.
Salon has an interview with "Fantastic friends" Neil Gaiman and Susanna Clarke, author of Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, which I will read as soon as I can get my hands on it. They discuss their friendship, their respective books, the elusiveness of an authentic English fairy tradition, and the nebulousness of the fantasy genre.
Do you make this material up or do you go back to the folklore?
S.C.: I do go back to the folklore and to Katharine Briggs. That's the only bit of the magic in "Strange & Norrell" that I really researched. English folk tales and fairy beliefs are very fragmentary. Scottish, Irish and Welsh are a bit more developed. They have more remnants to pick at. Obviously, though, you also pick out stories from books you've read as a child. So I can't say I've been absolutely strict about it. It's just what's useful at the moment.
Do you think it's the lack of a developed folk tradition that spurs the imaginations of British writers?
N.G.: We don't know! We can lie, though. We're writers.
S.C.: That's the theory I'm beginning to come up with.
N.G.: It gets really interesting when you start trying to look for English folk tales. You wind up in places like the Appalachians, reading the Jack stories. Except the Jack stories in the Appalachians have no magic. It's all gone. So you think, well, they were telling these stories in England and the king in them would have been a real king, not the rich man at the other end of the road. Reading any book of English folk tales, what you're mostly struck by is the grumblings of the people who in the 19th century went out on the road trying to collect them and discovered that all they had was bits of stuff that had come over from [the Brothers] Grimm or [Charles] Perrault that people had been reading and passing on.
Jake's (Heath Ledger) appointment as secretary of Jerome Bonaparte's library in WESTPHALIA! Will's (Matt Damon's) contributions to the Deutsches Wörterbuch, foundation of modern German etymology! Jake's literary endeavors! The publishing of the three-volume DEUTSCHE GRAMMATIK!
Imagine a Life of Noam in which, through the miracle of miniaturization, the heroic Chomsky (played by Brad Pitt in a revealing latex bodysuit) takes a band of brawling adventurers into the deepest recesses of the human brain, to recover bits of the language organ for sale through his start-up company -- a sort of cerebral 21st-century Fantastic Voyage. Appalling.
Or alternatively:
... 200 years from now a movie (or whatever form of mass entertainment they may use) on Spielberg's harrowing attempt to fight off dinosaurs from the Temple of Doom with the help of his loving extra-terrestrial friend.
My original reactions to the movie's trailer here. I should really just see this movie and get it over with already.
Who were you in your last life? Try the Past Life Analysis to reveal your soul's true history.
My diagnosis:
I don't know how you feel about it, but you were male in your last earthly incarnation. You were born somewhere in the territory of modern North Japan around the year 775. Your profession was that of a sailor or shoemaker. Your brief psychological profile in your past life: Such people are always involved with all new. You have always loved changes, especially in art, music, cooking. The lesson that your last past life brought to your present incarnation: Your lesson is to learn discretion and moderation and then to teach others to do the same. Your life will be happier if you help those who lack reasoning. Do you remember now?
The exact origins of the Sage will probably never be confirmed. However, given the location of the find, it is more than possible that the author or authors were members of the Knatii, a nomadic group of mystics that inhabited the area during that period.
Given the difficulties of translation, and the often obscure and ambiguous tone of the answers, the scroll's contents weren't released until 1977, when they appeared as an academic paper. This paper entitled The Ala-Dagh Sage, was given to a distinguished audience of linguists at the Salzburg Theosophical Symposium.
In 1999 a new (and more poetic) translation of the Sage was commissioned, and the following electronic version is one of the outcomes of that enterprise. When consulting the Sage it is important to remember that its wisdom is only fully revealed when the questioner accepts the sense within nonsense.
Wow. The new Brothers Grimm movie coming out Friday looks really, really bad. I hadn't gotten around to watching the trailer until now, and now I'm pretty depressed. The visuals, which I had figured for a sure thing, aren't even that seductive. Everything looks cartoonish and overblown, like a Halloween haunted house -- huge overdose of atmosphere, when less is usually more. And the goofy, kiddie humor looks walk-outingly awful. I'm not even going to talk about the outrageous myths being perpetrated about the brothers themselves. It's Terry Gilliam and everything, but it looks so damn Disney.
Why?
Gilliam, forget this crap and go make Good Omens, dammit.
The Daily Pick recently featured a great post, SuperBlog: Fairy Tales, with loads of great fairy-tale links, many of which I will reproduce here because they're great. I'll throw in a few of my own.
There are loads of sites online where you can read the entire texts of fairy tales or fairy tale collections for free. These are all that I've found so far.
First, folklore or world tales:
Tales of Wonder is an archive with a sampling of folk and fairy tales from around the world, including Central Asia, Central Europe, Scandinavia, Japan, Africa, the Middle East, and more.
An online collection of more than 656 of Aesop's Fables at Aesopfables.com. Translations are either Rev. George Fyler Townsend (1814-1900), Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914), or Jean de la Fontaine's French rendered into English by "several good internet souls."
There are a lot of other great things at Mythfolklore.net. There are a number of great rotating content scripts which will produce a number of cool random of of-the-day features: there are English, Latin, and Greek proverbs, the Roman calendar, Lang fairy tales (the tale of the day is now featured at the bottom of this page), Arabian Nights tales, Aesop's fables, myths, and more. There's also a random Myth Image generator, which I would love to put on my blog, but it's too big, or simply put in this post, but I can't post javascript. It's a shame, because the images are really lovely. So you'll just have to go see.
With the Proppian Fairy Tale Generator, you can select the mythic functions you want, and from them generate a semi-coherent tale based on Vladimir Propp's model. I would have included this in Make-Your-Own, if I'd remembered. Via The Daily Pick.
SurLaLune is simply the best resource out there for everything fairy-tale related. There are articles, illustrations, book recommendations, annotated tales, full texts of books, a discussion board, and lots and lots of links. Just about all you could need.
The Endicott Studio is another great all-around resource for fairy tales, folklore, and myth. Home to the Journal of Mythic Arts, they have a reading room of excellent articles and fiction, a poetry coffeehouse, an art gallery, multimedia arts, a discussion board, and more.
I am tempted to post a few more links dealing with myth right now, but it does say "fairy tales" in the header, so I think I'll save all that for another time.
UPDATE: I forgot one of the links I really wanted to post. McSweeny's offers up a great list of Klingon Fairy Tales, including such classics as "Goldilocks Dies With Honor at the Hands of the Three Bears" and "There Was an Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe With a Big Spike on It."
Today is Moon Day, the 36th anniversary of the July 20, 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing.
To commemorate the day, Google has adapted its Google Maps system to create Google Moon, a map of the moon's surface using NASA imagery, with the sites of the Apollo landings marked out. Pretty limited, but cute. Now when do we get a full map of the moon to play with? And all the planets? C'mon, Google Solar System...
If Google Moon has only whetted your appetite for lunar exploration, try Moon Base, a 3d chat environment where you can bounce around the moon, ride moon buggies, and, if you like, exchange chatter with other bouncing astronauts.
The moon, by the bye, will be almost but not quite full tonight...the full moon is tomorrow. Ah, well. Go out and look at it tonight, anyway. Happy Moon Day.
I have it in my head that "errata" should mean a collection of miscellaneous, meandering things, wandering here and there, but it doesn't. Pity.
I've submitted my senior project, had my board. The semester -- the year -- college -- is ending. I've got my Class of 2005 shirt on right now. Lots to be said about that, but I don't feel like going into it at the moment. So instead, I'll empty out some links I've been collecting.
First, because of all the language and lit blogs I read, stuff about ... well, language and lit.
An April Fool's joke proposing a march to end the abuse of the widely misused phrase, "beg the question." Sounds like a worthy cause to me.
It came up in our field studies class, so Bill sent us all a list (several lists, actually...this was the first and seemed sufficient to me) of collective nouns for groups of animals. I knew there were some crazy ones, but there are some crazy ones. A charm of hummingbirds? An ostentation of peacocks? I like "a memory of elephants" and "a storytelling of rooks" ... and "a tower of giraffes" is pretty amazing, as is a "crash" or "bloat" of hippotami. Last of all is the impressive "zeal of zebras"...
The entire literary edifice of the West is built on a lie. According to one suspicious sleuth, "Proust didn't know from madeleines,", and his famous crumbly scallop-shaped cookie never existed.
I'm increasingly considering copyediting as a profession. Which is probably why this article, an interview with a number of copy editors discuss the details of their largely uncredited and overlooked work, is interesting to me and me alone.
They're having a concert in California of orchestral music from video games performed live. It's called Video Games Live, and Jack Wall, the composer of the brilliant music in Myst III: Exile, is one of the people behind it.
The Forbes.com article Is Sex Necessary? discusses all the beneficial effects conferred by "having regular and enthusiastic sex."
Last category...a kind of alarming article that I post for the public benefit:
"The End of Analog TV? Will America's favorite technology really go dark next year?" Analog television broadcasts are supposed to be discontinued next year, to be replaced by entirely digital broadcasts. It was all part of a federal ruling aimed at switching everyone over to digital -- only no one bought digital, and now the deadline for the change is coming up. Even if it doesn't happen next year -- it will likely be postponed -- it will be happening pretty soon, and currently there is no warning in place for those who buy new analog tvs telling them that their sets might be obsolete in a year! So if you buy a new tv -- buy digital!
I think that's all for now... I'll post some talky stuff later.
