Monthly Archives: June 2009

One in Sixty Million or So

Posted on Sunday: June 21, 2009 by Michael Hendry

The Perseus Collection of Greek and Roman Materials provides a convenient list of Word Counts by Language. As of half an hour ago, the totals were: English (42,956,587 words) French (2,001 words) German (426,929 words) Greek (8,263,757 words) Italian (178 … Continue reading →

Posted in Orbilius | 1 Comment

Testing a Greek Font

Posted on Sunday: June 21, 2009 by Michael Hendry

Glycon (A.P. 10.124): Πάντα γέλως, καὶ πάντα κόνις, καὶ πάντα τὸ μηδέν·     πάντα γὰρ ἐξ ἀλόγων ἐστὶ τὰ γινόμενα. All is laughter, all is dust, all is nothing, for all that is cometh from unreason. Is this Greek legible? I’m … Continue reading →

Posted in General | 3 Comments

Are My Tastes Hopelessly Proletarian?

Posted on Friday: June 19, 2009 by Michael Hendry

In Nineteen Eighty-Four, Orwell twice quotes a song popular among the proles of his imagined future, “composed without any human intervention whatever on an instrument known as a versificator”. He calls it “dreadful rubbish” and a “driveling song”, but it … Continue reading →

Posted in Culture: Fiction, Music | 2 Comments

Quotation of the Day

Posted on Saturday: June 6, 2009 by Michael Hendry

An English English professor — I mean an Englishman who is also a professor of English — mocks the hard sciences to a mathematician: A great poet is always timely. A great philosopher is an urgent need. There’s no rush … Continue reading →

Posted in Culture: Plays | 1 Comment