Librari[d]an

Um, maybe that big muscled guy with the gun shot Rousseau? See a glimpse of the sniper here.

Also, it’s interesting to note that this scene holds a reference to Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (and many other films that use the same device). The manner in which Karl is shot (see the double assassination here) is highly reminiscent of how Indy’s friend - posing as a waiter - is killed in the opening scene of Temple of Doom. (See a video here; the shooting occurs at 7:18.)

Update: According to here only one of the shot people are killed. Based on the video, I put my money on Rousseau surviving. Also, wouldn’t it be deliciously twisted - and in line with his character - if it was an Other and Ben had ordered the hit?

:: Bibliography ::

• AstroJones. 4×08: Who Shot Rousseau?. Sledgeweb’s LOST … STUFF. http://lost.cubit.net/archives/2008/03/4×08-danielle-shot-in-back.php (22 March 2008).
• Note: Images from the above source. Their copyright is held by whoever owns Lost. (I think it’s Disney.)

Shut up! No, really. Shut up. In all likelihood you haven’t even seen Alfred Hitchcock’s Marnie (1964), let alone viewed it recently with a critical eye. I was like you once. I thought the film was a joke, the beginning of Hitchcock’s cinematic decline. I have come to realize, over time, that this is far from the truth; Marnie was Hitchcock’s last truly great film.

Marnie falls easy prey to critics for an obvious reason: Like Hitchcock’s Spellbound, the emphasis on psychoanalysis dates the film. (For a bizarre look at the not-so-hidden sexual imagery/dialog embedded in the film, check out this video. I think the creep who made it has to be a total freak, a “sex maniac” if you will.) Marnie lacks the clout that a dream sequence created by Salvador Dalí and star power (Ingrid Bergman, Gregory Peck) provide. Don’t get me wrong, Sean Connery and Tippi Hedren are stars… However they’ve both developed an air of camp.

So what makes Marnie so good, despite the flaws? (It certainly isn’t the sloppy stunt work with the horse!) And let’s not rely on silly auteur prattle about motifs in Hitchcock’s canon of work. (She’s blonde? Amazing. She adopts a variety of identities? You don’t say!) But let’s begin with that blonde. The blonde with the pinched features and shrill voice. The perfectly imperfect Hitchcock blonde, Tippi Hedren. Hedren became the Galatea to Hitchcock’s Pygmalion because she was a natural in front of the camera. Now, the title role in Marnie isn’t exactly an easy part to play: Sexually frigid. Kleptomaniac safe-cracker. Compulsive and convincing liar. Phobic of the color red and thunder/lightning. (No wonder why the French title is Pas de printemps pour Marnie, “No Spring for Marnie”. This woman’s got problems!) Yet somehow Hedren is able to pull it off. Just look at the film’s infamous rape scene, in which Hedren is equal parts desperate, defenseless child and resistant woman (resistant in terms of her passivity, her utter disconnect from the physical violation she suffers). And what about the scene at the racetrack, where Hedren has to convey the schism between her false persona (socially adept businesswoman) and true one (nervous, saturnine anomic). Of course, there are many scenes in which Hedren simply can’t hold her character together. (”The colors! Stop the colors!”) But who could?

The second redeeming quality of the film is Bernard Herrmann’s lavish, misunderstood score. (Listen to the Prelude in this theatrical trailer for the film. Also, note Hitchock’s hilarious one-liners: “She does seem a rather excitable type” reduced me to tears!) It is mostly considered a melodramatic, Romantic mess of a composition. This may or may not be true. What his music does reflect, however, is an externalization of the emotional, child-like tumult Hedren’s character experiences thrroughout the film. Of course, I would be remiss in not crediting the director, Hitch, for making a contribution or two. Remember the scene in which Marnie robs an employer after hours? The audience is on tenterhooks as she cracks and empties the safe, removes her shoes, and soberly attempts her escape without being noticed by a cleaning woman–only to drop one of her high-heels! This suspenseful sequence alone is worth forgiving Hitchcock the sillier fare in the final reel.

I plan on posting more about the formal achievments of Marnie in the future. Keep an eye peeled.

L’amour de l’étymologie is a feature exploring the etymology of English words. Today’s definition is mesmerism. You may occasionally find this noun capitalized, for reasons that will be made evident presently.

Mesmerism, unlike most words, is derived from a rather modern proper noun. Mesmer was the surname of an 18th Century Austrian physician, Friedrich Anton Mesmer. The -ism at the end was probably borrowed from the French word mesmérisme, which first appeared in print in 1973.

So what, exactly does this word mean? People often use it as a synonym for hypnosis, but they’d be wrong. (For derivative terms, like mesmerize, the conflation is often considered acceptable.) The Oxford English Dictionary defines Mesmerism as a chiefly historical word, which refers to “A therapeutic doctrine or system, first popularized by Mesmer, according to which a trained practitioner can induce a hypnotic state in a patient by the exercise of a force (called by Mesmer animal magnetism)”. It could also mean “[1] the process or practice of inducing such a state; [2] the state so induced, or [3] the force supposed to operate in inducing it.” (Brackets are mine.)

The adherent of Mesmerism, a mesmerizer, can use mesmerism (1) on a mesmerizee, using mesmerism (3) to induce a state of mesmerism (2). Nyuck!

In 1778 Mesmer relocated to Paris after other physicians in his homeland accused him of being a sham. Six years later, in 1784, Louis XVI of France commissioned a group of scientists to evaluate Mesmer’s claims. (One of which, if memory serves, included sitting in a bathtub full of metal filings.) Some of the top minds of the time participated in the evaluation, including Benjamin Franklin and Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier. Franklin is the first recorded English speaker to use the word in writing. In 1784 he wrote that “Some think it will put an End to Mesmerism.” I’d like to know what that  something was. But I guess it’s irrelevant: Despite there being no scientific grounds for Mesmer’s practices, they remained wildly popular into the late 18th and early 19th centuries. For example, Edward FitzGerald exclaimed in an 1889 letter than “Miss Martineau has been cured of an illness of five years by Mesmerism!”

However, it is true that one of the most hilariously insane and unspeakably dense humans was an anti-mesmerism crusader. Mary Baker Eddy, founder of the cult religion Christian Science, believed that mesmerism was real, but kinda evil. Go figure.

:: Bibliography ::

“Mesmerism.” Oxford English Dictionary. 2008. 11 Jan. 2008 <http://dictionary.oed.com/cgi/findword?query_type=word&queryword=mesmerism&find.x=0&find.y=0&find=Find+word>

French president Nicolas Sarkozy has canceled France 24! For those of you who don’t know, France 24 is a news channel funded by the French government that broadcasts in Arabic, English, and French. It is also one of my top five primary news sources. The reason for the cancellation is more horrifying than I could have ever imagined. According to Sarkozy: “With taxpayers’ money, I am not prepared to broadcast a channel that does not speak French”. (BBC)

This is insane. If the BBC can offer 32 languages other than English, Sarkozy can scrounge up some euro to support France 24. If anything, they should be expanding the number of languages as originally planned!

In the end, however, this is not a question of money. This is definitive proof that Sarkozy is turning his back on the Arabic-as-a-first-language population within France. These people need more than word-of-mouth news in their communities. Removing an official news source in their mother tongue will further isolate them in, what may seem like and very well may be, a sea of ethnocentrism and open xenophobia.

It also smacks of the effort to protect the French language from the imperialism of the English language. But I don’t really care if Sarkozy doesn’t want to help English-speakers understand “a French perspective on world events”. (France 24) There are more important things at stake.

Encore: What France needs is an official news source in Arabic to reach the mono and bilingual Arabic communities, both legal and illegal, within the country. Tell the French Ambassador so using this form, by sending him a letter via post (to Pierre Vimont 4101 Reservoir Road, NW Washington, DC 20007), by telephoning the embassy (202.944.6000), or faxing the embassy (202.944.6166)!

:: Bibliography ::

“About France 24.” France 24 9 Jan. 2008. 9 Jan. 2008 <http://www.france24.com/france24Public/en/page-footer/about-france-24.html>.

“Sarkozy says ‘non’ to France 24.” BBC News 9 Jan. 2008. 9 Jan. 2008 <http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7178158.stm>.

L’amour de l’étymologie is a feature exploring the etymology of English words. Today’s entry: the noun vertigo! You may rarely find this word spelled (vertego, verteego, virtigo) and pronounced (although this is the standard pronunciation) in any number of ways. If you’re feeling adventuresome, branch out and use related words such as the adjective “vertiginous”!

Let’s get one thing out of the way: Vertigo should not be confused with acrophobia, the fear of heights.

I have been consistently fascinated by the word vertigo since childhood, having seen Hitchcock’s classic of the same name at a tender age. Hypnotized by the film’s salient imagery, captivating score, and general pathos, I found myself returning to the term time and again. Only about a year ago I discovered that the title - Hitchcock’s personal favorite for the film - barely survived the journey to the marquee. (There were around fifty suggested titles ready and waiting to oust Vertigo.) In late October of 1957 the studio asserted that “No execs like Vertigo and believe it handicap to selling and advertising picture whether potential customers know what word vertigo means or not”. (Auiler 113)

This quote most likely explains why the original trailer for Vertigo opens with a shot of a dictionary. The book opens and the camera zooms in on a page as a quick dissolve takes viewers to a detail shot of the entry for “vertigo”. A voice-over informs the audience that the word means “a feeling of dizziness … a swimming in the head … figuratively a state in which all things seem to be engulfed in a whirlpool of terror.” As the book spins and dissolves into one of Saul Bass and John Whitney’s iconic spiral motifs - known properly by the name “Lissajous spirals” - it seems reasonable to ask just how much of this definition is fact and how much is hyperbole.

In truth, the clever mind that thought up this educational prelude got the meaning pretty much right.

In the original Latin, vertigo meant “a turning around, giddiness”. The Romantic languages inherited this term, and it can be assumed that Anglophones adopted the word from either French or Spanish. The first known use of vertigo in English has been dated to 1528 in Paynell’s Salerne’s Regim, which describes “The heed ache called vertigo: whiche maketh a man to wene that the world turneth”. The main gist of vertigo has followed this pathological assessment. The Oxford English Dictionary’s primary entry: “A disordered condition in which the person affected has a sensation of whirling, either of external objects or of himself, and tends to lose equilibrium and consciousness; swimming in the head; giddiness, dizziness”. The term can also be applied to animals such as horses, sheep, and hawks–although any link between dizziness and these animals’ diseases seems tenuous.

All that jazz is without adding an article. You can slap an “a” or “the” before vertigo if you don’t mind sounding a bit backward. Similarly, using plural forms (vertigos, vertigoes, verteegoes, vertigines) may sound awkward to contemporary ears.

Figurative uses of the word came along later, with the first recorded use in 1634. Vertigo in this case means “A disordered state of mind, or of things, comparable to giddiness.” The OED quotes people who wrote that art, power, and intellectualism may induce this state.

The final use of vertigo is as a noun which encapsulates the “act of whirling round and round.” Although loaded with poetic potential, this usage seems relatively rare; the only historical quote the OED cites is 19th Century writer Thomas de Quincey’s use of the word to describe a top in his Autobiographical Sketches.

That’s all she wrote. Stay tuned for more etymologies and musings on Hitchcock’s Vertigo!

:: Bibliography ::

Auiler, Dan. Vertigo: The Making of a Hitchcock Classic. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1998. ISBN: 0312169159.

“Vertigo.” Oxford English Dictionary. 2008. 2 Jan. 2008 <http://dictionary.oed.com/cgi/findword?query_type=word&queryword=vertigo&find.x=0&find.y=0&find=Find+word>.

L’amour de l’étymologie is a feature exploring the etymology of English words. Today’s entry: Estivate, from the original æstivate, is a word I came across and wrote down, only to forget about and find years later on a scrap of paper. As you can imagine from the ash (”æ”) in the alternate spelling, estivate is rooted in Latin and came to anglophones by way of French.

The first recorded usage occurred in 1626 in Henry Cockeram’s The English dictionarie, or an interpreter of hard English words. (Strange subtitle, that.) The meaning has remained surprisingly unchanged over the centuries: It’s a verb that means “To spend the summer.” So the next time your parents are going to summer estivate in Cape May, use this more interesting and precise word instead!

Estivate also has a zoological meaning: “To pass the summer in a state of torpor or suspended animation.” So it’s basically the summer equivalent of hibernation, and occurs when reptiles, small mammals, and other organisms go into a state of dormancy to avoid the harshness of - what should more accurately be described as - the dry season. One super neat example is the lungfish, a fish that burrows deep into mud to survive summer droughts.

:: Bibliography ::

“Æstivate.” Oxford English Dictionary. 2007. 16 Dec. 2007 <http://dictionary.oed.com/cgi/findword?query_type=word&queryword=aestivate&find.x=0&find.y=0&find=Find+word>.

I’ve been thinking about cartography quite a bit too much lately, thanks to two buddies who have been encouraging my interest in maps with their enthusiasm and creative writing. So today, I thought to myself, I would begin a feature seductively (gahaha!) entitled “L’amour de l’étymologie”. Silly I know, but shit like this sounds pleasantly oceanic in French, so get off my back. Justifications aside, I chose the word legend because of maps.

Legend can be used as a noun in any number of ways. (Next time, for the sake of my sanity, I will choose a word that cannot be used in any number of ways.) Most of the archaic ones deal with the lives of saints, collections of the lives of saints, instructional booklets which conatin educational information on the lives of saints(!), etc. Some other obsolete meanings include: a history/account and a roll/list/record. It can be used to refer to writing(s) in general, but this is a rare usage.

Legend can also mean an inscription impressed on a coin/medal or the “written explanatory matter accompanying an illustration, map, etc. Also attrib., as legend-line.” I like the alliteration of that last one. (Hey, check out that rockin’ font they used on the legend-line. Death to Helvetica!)

Contemporary meanings that include variants of what we sorta-kinda thought we knew what legend meant: “An unauthentic or non-historical story, esp. one handed down by tradition from early times and popularly regarded as historical.” For an individual: “A person of such fame or distinction as to become the subject of popularly repeated (true or fictitious) stories”. The person may be “famous or notorious only for a short period of time, within a limited social circle, or in one’s own estimation”. Often, the person may be described as a legend in one’s own time.

The word has a nautical meaning: “Applied to the estimated or planned displacement, speed, etc., of a ship before construction or testing.” I don’t have a firm grip on this definition (rhetorical lie), so here’s an example from that old blatherer, Sir Winston Churchill: “If you ask your people [the Admiralty] to give you a legend for a 16-inch-gun ship, I am persuaded they would show you decidedly better proportions than could be achieved at 14-inch.”

As a transitive verb, to legend means “To tell as a legend”; to “legend out” means “to tell stories of; to tell of in legend”. This usage was first recorded in 1597, but is now considered obsolete. (Example: I’m totally glad George W. DaSent legended the burning of Bergthorsknoll in English. Totally.)

At this time, I refuse to define urban legend, urban myth, and legend’s many attributive uses.

:: Bibliography ::

“Legend.” Oxford English Dictionary. 2007. 12 Dec. 2007 <http://dictionary.oed.com/cgi/findword?query_type=word&queryword=legend&find.x=0&find.y=0&find=Find+word>.