4.6.2022 – mononymously

mononymously
Raffaello Sanzio
known as Raphael

Always on the lookout for remarkable, or worthy of a remark, words and remarkable words brought together in a remarkable fashion, I came across this line in Wikipedia this morning:

Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino; (28 March or 6 April 1483 – 6 April 1520) known mononymously as Raphael, was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance.

I always wish I had studied Italian for no other reason than it LOOKS like fun to talk like that.

I imagine little Raphael in kindergarten and the teacher reading the role, calling Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino, and little Raphael saying ‘presente’.

Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino was on my mind this morning due a review I read of an exhibition now in London.

I might as well read about it even though I am not going to London and even if I was I know that I wouldn’t be able to get the ticket to see the exhibition and even I was able to get a ticket I most likely wouldn’t be able to afford it let alone the ticket to London.

The reviewer writes: “Of the big three of the High Renaissance, he was the most straightforward, the most productive, and for 300 years, the most influential.”

When talking of the High Renaissance, the big three were Leonardo, Michelangelo and Raphael.

I remember being in lectures on these fellers back in college as History of Art was my minor but all that I really remember is that of the three, it was Raphael who took a step back, looked at the suffering, angst and anguish that went into the art of the other two and said to himself, “there has got to be a better way” then went out and found one.

He lived the good life and it shows in the life and color that is in his work.

But on the one hand both Leonardo and Michelangelo lived to be crabby old men and Raphael, like Mozart, died in his late 30’s.

The review of the exhibition brought me to search him out and if you throw a name into the google, you will get Wikipedia links back and Wikipedia threw the word mononymously into my brain and it got me thinking.

I love the word and never knew it existed until one hour ago.

Mononymously.

My spell check throws it out.

The Google pretty much throws it out.

Online dictionaries find mononymous and mononym and the Macmillan Online Dictionary has the curious line, There is also some evidence for a derived noun mononymity, meaning something like: ‘the state of only using one name’.

Some evidence?

The Committee is still out on this one I guess.

But no mention of the adverb Mononymously or the act of being known by one name.

Is that just supposed to be understood?

Then it got me to thinking of those folks truly known mononymously.

So often anyone known mononymously owes to their current celebrity.

As Paul Simon wrote:

He’s so unhip that when you say Dylan
He thinks you’re talking about Dylan Thomas
Whoever he was
The man ain’t got no culture

And I would have bet a doughnut that with a name like Dylan, you would be able to achieve mononymity.

Of course, Mr. Simon does mix first and last names here but you get my drift.

Does a name have to be unusual to achieve true mononymity?

I don’t think so but it helps.

When you say ‘Michael’ do you mean Michael Jackson or Michael Jordan?

When you say ‘Elvis’ do you mean, well, Elvis or Elvis Grbac who played quarterback at Michigan who threw the touchdown pass to Desmond Howard to beat Notre Dame that my wife witnessed but doesn’t remember (the game, the pass or that there was someone named Elvis in the building).

According once again to Wikipedia, 100 Billion people have lived and died in the history of the world.

And somehow, someway, some folks achieve mononymity.

That the big three of the High Renaissance achieved it and have held it for the last 500 years must say something.

I, on the other hand, have achieved anonymity and am happy with that.

One source says one third of the American males are named Michael.

I once saw a printed birthday card that had Happy Birthday Mike on the front … and inside something like, don’t get excited, half the world could get this card.

A search of the Google for my name in quotes shows 1.1 million hits ( in .63 seconds – which is a ridiculous amount of time even when you consider it is often longer than the time separating most Olympic Gold and Bronze medal winners).

Yet in MY CHILDHOOD, when I went to school in 7th grade, three teachers called the role that first day of school and got my name wrong.

I was marked absent for three days until those teachers looked at me and asked who was I?

I said my name was Mike and that I had no idea who Michelle Hoffman was.

I’ll take anonymity.

4.5.2022 – Courage was mine, I

Courage was mine, I
had mystery; Wisdom was
mine, had mastery:

Adapted from the poem, Strange Meeting by Wilfred Owen, who wrote some of the best British poetry on World War I, composed nearly all of his poems in slightly over a year, from August 1917 to September 1918. In November 1918 he was killed in action at the age of 25, one week before the Armistice. Only five poems were published in his lifetime.

The punctuation is in the original.

Strange Meeting

It seemed that out of battle I escaped
Down some profound dull tunnel, long since scooped
Through granites which titanic wars had groined.

Yet also there encumbered sleepers groaned,
Too fast in thought or death to be bestirred.
Then, as I probed them, one sprang up, and stared
With piteous recognition in fixed eyes,
Lifting distressful hands, as if to bless.
And by his smile, I knew that sullen hall,— 
By his dead smile I knew we stood in Hell.

With a thousand fears that vision’s face was grained;
Yet no blood reached there from the upper ground,
And no guns thumped, or down the flues made moan.
“Strange friend,” I said, “here is no cause to mourn.” 
“None,” said that other, “save the undone years,
The hopelessness. Whatever hope is yours,
Was my life also; I went hunting wild
After the wildest beauty in the world,
Which lies not calm in eyes, or braided hair,
But mocks the steady running of the hour,
And if it grieves, grieves richlier than here.
For by my glee might many men have laughed,
And of my weeping something had been left,
Which must die now. I mean the truth untold,
The pity of war, the pity war distilled.
Now men will go content with what we spoiled.
Or, discontent, boil bloody, and be spilled.
They will be swift with swiftness of the tigress. 
None will break ranks, though nations trek from progress.
Courage was mine, and I had mystery;
Wisdom was mine, and I had mastery: 
To miss the march of this retreating world
Into vain citadels that are not walled.
Then, when much blood had clogged their chariot-wheels, 
I would go up and wash them from sweet wells,
Even with truths that lie too deep for taint.
I would have poured my spirit without stint
But not through wounds; not on the cess of war.
Foreheads of men have bled where no wounds were.

“I am the enemy you killed, my friend.
I knew you in this dark: for so you frowned
Yesterday through me as you jabbed and killed.
I parried; but my hands were loath and cold.
Let us sleep now …”

4.4.2022 – April cruellest month

April cruellest month,
lilacs out dead land, mixing
memory desire

Part of the series of Haiku inspired by The Wasteland by T.S. Eliot and the article, ‘It takes your hand off the panic button’: TS Eliot’s The Waste Land 100 years on by Andrew Dickson.

Mr. Dickson asks, ‘Is it genuinely one of the greatest works in the language, or – as the poet once claimed – just “a piece of rhythmical grumbling“?’

Readers of this blog may remember that from time to time I struggle with the weight of effort of producing a daily Haiku and any thoughts I may have about the words and time that went in the Haiku that day.

This daily schedule of missing a day can bring on a personal mental paralysis wherein writing these entries becomes impossible.

I learned to deal with this by not dealing with it and let it go.

Then when I look at my register of entries and see blank days with no post, I will grab a topic or book or poem for a source and produce a series of Haiku to fill in those blank dates.

This is one of the great benefits of this effort being my blog and my blog, my rules.

It IS cricket because I say it is.

It is ‘according to Hoyle’ because I say it is.

Thus I have this series based on ‘The Wasteland.’

A thoroughly enjoyable connection of wordplay and source of endless discussion in the search for meaning.

For myself, I like that bit about a piece of rhythmical grumbling by Mr. Eliot so said Mr. Eliot.

I have remembered this story before in these posts, but it reminds me of a story told by the actor Rex Harrison.

Mr. Harrison recounted rehearsing a play by George Bernard-Shaw and that the company was having a difficult time with a certain scene when, wonder of wonder, Bernard-Shaw himself dropped by to watch rehearsal.

Mr. Harrison tells how great this was as they went to the play write and asked how did he see this scene – what was he striving for?

Bernard-Shaw asked for a script and read over the scene, read it over again and a third time, then looked up and said, “This is rather bad isn’t it.”

4.3.2022 – endless ruin has

endless ruin has
overtaken enemies
memory perished

Based on Psalm 9:6

Endless ruin has overtaken my enemies,
you have uprooted their cities;
even the memory of them has perished. (NIV)

The Psalm also includes:

The nations have fallen into the pit they have dug;
    their feet are caught in the net they have hidden.
16 The Lord is known by his acts of justice;
    the wicked are ensnared by the work of their hands.[c]
17 The wicked go down to the realm of the dead,
    all the nations that forget God.
18 But God will never forget the needy;
    the hope of the afflicted will never perish.

4.2.2022 – take time, understand

take time, understand
once a week, moment to pause,
reflect, consider

I happened to be reading the papers this morning off of my desktop computer instead of a tablet and came across the links at the bottom of the home page of The Guardian.

Readers of this blog will not be surprised that The Guardian (or Manchester Guardian) is my favorite source for news.

The stories are well written and for the most part adapted for Americans when it comes to spelling colour and theatre and centre.

And the history of the paper, that it was founded and endowed by a family back in 1850 or thereabouts so it would not have to depend on advertisers and could print the truth.

At least the truth as they saw it.

Across the bottom of the home page are links to other Guardian News options and one of the those options is the Guardian Weekly edition.

The blurb with the link states:

Take time to understand the week:
Once a week, take a moment to pause, reflect and consider. In the Guardian Weekly we select the highlights from our newspapers to bring you a deeper, more rounded view of world events.

I thought about that.

And I thought that I should take time to understand my week.

And I thought that once a week, I should take a moment to pause, reflect and consider.

So I tried it.

I tried to understand my week.

I took a moment and paused, reflected and considered my week.

First thing that happened is that I threw up.

Then I got back in bed and pulled the covers up over my head.

I may stay there a while.

I am in zugzwang and I cannot get out.

Zugzwang, you might remember, is a term from chess.

You are in zugzwang when it is your turn and you have to make a move and every move you can make is a bad move.

The online dictionary defines zugzwang as “a situation in Chess in which the obligation to make a move in one’s turn is a serious, often decisive, disadvantage.”

I am reminded of the short story, “A Box to Hide In” by James Thurber.

The story ends with:

But I still have this overpowering urge to hide in a box.

Maybe it will go away.

Maybe I’ll be all right.

Maybe it will get worse.

It ‘s hard to say.

The story 1st appeared in print in The New Yorker in January 24, 1931.

90 years ago, 190 years ago, 1900 years ago.

As Mr. Thoreau said, “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation.”

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.

As they say, I shall endeavor to persevere.

Here in a poorly formatted format is the story:

A Box to Hide In - James Thurber 

I waited till the large woman with the awful hat took up her
sack of groceries and went out, peering at the tomatoes and
lettuce on her way. The clerk asked me what mIne was.
"Have you got a box," I asked, "a large box? I want a box to
hide in"

"You want a box?" he asked.

"I want a box to hide in," I said.

"Whatta you mean?" he said. "You mean a big box?"
I said I meant a big box, big enough to hold me. "I haven't
got any boxes," he said. "Only cartons that cans come in." I
tried several other groceries and none of them had a box big
enough for me to hide in. There was nothing for it but to
face life out. I didn't feel strong and I had this overpowering
desire to hide in a box for a long time.

"What do you mean, you want to hide in this box?", one
grocer asked me.

"It's a form of escape", I told him. "Hiding in a box, it
circumscribes your worries and the range of your anguish.
You don't see people, either".

"How in the hell do you eat when you're in this box?" ,
asked the grocer. "How in the hell do you get anything to
eat?".

I said I'd never been in a box and didn't know, but that
would take care of itself. "Well", he said finally, "I haven't
got any boxes, only some pasteboard cartons that cans come
in." It was the same every place. I gave up when it got dark
and the groceries closed, and hid in my room again. I turned
out the light and lay on the bed. You feel better when it gets
dark.

I could have hid in a closet, I suppose, but people are always
opening doors. Somebody would find you in a closet. They
would be startled and you'd have to tell them why you were
in the closet. Nobody pays any attention to a big box lying
on the floor. You could stay in it for days and nobody'd
think to look at it, not even the cleaning woman."

My cleaning woman came the next morning and woke me
up. I was still feeling bad. I asked her if she knew where I
could get a large box.

"How big a box you want?", she asked. "I want a box big
enough for me to get inside of", I said. She looked at me
with big, dim eyes. There's something wrong with her
glands. She's awful. But she has a big heart, which makes it
worse. She's unbearable, her husband is sick and her children
are sick and she is sick too. I got to thinking how pleasant it
would be if I were in a box now, and didn't have to see her
I'd be in a box right there in the room, and she wouldn't
know.

I wondered if you have a desire to bark or laugh when
someone who doesn't know walks by the box you're in.
Maybe she would have a spell with her heart if I did that and
would die right there. The officers and the elevator man and
Mr Grammage would find us.

"Funny, dog gone thing happened at the building last
night", the doorman would say to his wife. "I let in this
woman to clean up 10-F and she never came out, see? She
never there more than an hour. But she never came out,
see?" So when it get time for me to get off duty, I says to
Crimmack in the elevator, "I says what the hell you suppose
happened to the woman that cleans 10-F?" He says he didn't
know. He says he never seen her after he took her up. So I
spoke to Mr Grammage about it. "Sorry to bother you, Mr.
Grammage", I says, "but there's something funny about that
woman that cleans 10-F". So I told him - he said we better
have a look. And we all three goes up, knocks on the door,
rings the bell, see, and nobody answers

So he said we'd have to walk in. So Crimmack opened the
door and we walked in. And there was this woman, cleans
the apartment, dead as a herring on the floor, and the
gentleman that lives there was in a box.

The cleaning woman kept looking at me. It was hard for me
to realize she wasn't dead. "It's a form of escape", I
murmured. "What say?", she asked dully? "You don't know
of any large packing boxes, do you?", I asked. "No, I don't,
she said."

I haven't found one yet. But I still have this overpowering
urge to hide in a box. Maybe it will go away. Maybe I'll be
all right. Maybe it will get worse. It 's hard to say.

You can read the short story here.