ultima thule

Via Strange Company, we learn that on this in 1848, Edgar Allen Poe sat for a daguerreotype portrait with the vernacular caption above in a studio in Providence in the state of Rhode Island. From the Latin designation for the extreme limits of exploration and travel, the term comes from Poe’s poem Dream-Land: 

I have reached these lands but newly 

From an ultimate dim Thule— 

From a wild, weird clime that lieth, sublime 

Out of Space—out of Time 

This title was coined by spiritualist and romantic interest of Poe, Sarah Helen Whitman, whom had met three years prior through shared interests.

boy those germans have a word for everything

Having grown accustomed to the point of reliance on the term Schadenfreude, it was refreshing to learn that there is a perfectly cromulent English synonym, epicaricacy, that conveys the same sense of deriving pleasure from the misfortune of others. From the Greek From Ancient Greek ἐπιχαιρεκακία for “joy upon evil” (see previously), it is rarely found in print (other than in mentions of words to be adopted and rehabilitated) with one of the more recent citations being in C.S. Lewis’ 1933 Pilgrim’s Regress as a personified character, an eponymous gloating and sadistic woman.

bnt162b2

Though preliminary reports are from a company press release and have not been independently verified, news that the COVID-19 candidate vaccine being developed and trialled by a partnership between the Mainz-based BioNTech and the US drug concern Pfizer vaccine exceeds effectiveness targets by a sizable margin (on par with the best childhood inoculations against measles) and suggests that protection is enduring is significant and hopeful. No serious safety concerns or side-effects were observed and the companies are already under contract to deliver tens of millions of doses.

egress and exeunt

Via Super Punch we are reminded of the obsession with optics and the lengths that some politicians—particularly UK leaders—have gone to avoid unfortunate juxtapositions with exit signs. In order to assuage the concerns of host building and venue coordinators saying this PR anti-stunt could cause a hazard in case of a fire or other emergency, some handlers have produced bespoke, fitted sign-coverings to keep on hand for the range of signage standards.

world freedom day

Rather presumptively first proclaimed by George W. Bush on this day in 2001 (sort of like rededicating Armistice Day as Veterans’ Day, also positing that the alternative was the right and only one)—reaffirmed by several US presidential administrations—as an homage to the idea that Ronald Reagan’s policies were solely responsible for the collapse of the Soviet Union and the influence it held over central and eastern Europe as the anniversary of the opening of the Berlin Wall, though the commandeering of the holiday is not widely observed. Because the date coincides with Schicksalstag (the Day of Fate), witness to many pivotal events including the execution of liberal leader Robert Blüm which suppressed the democratic revolution of 1849, the abdication of the Kaiser following the November Revolution of 1918, Albert Einstein’s win of the Nobel Prize for physics in 1922, the 1923 Beer Hall Putsch, the 1938 Reichspogromnacht which saw the large-scale destruction of Jewish property and of course the wall coming down (German reunification not celebrated on this day because of the prior associations). The German Sprachraum instead marks this day as Inventor’s Day—in homage to Austrian actor and Erfinderin Hedy Lamarr (*1914 - †2000) for her discovery of frequency hopping that led to cellular telephony and Bluetooth technology.

forth and bargy

Via the always engaging Nag on the Lake, we are treated to an audio sampling of a sadly extinct, very distinct Anglo-Frisian language variant and accent of English that evolved from Middle English in a pocket of County Wexford. Referred to as Yola—meaning Old in the dialect—it was replaced along with other regional vernaculars by standard Irish English that was more or less mutually intelligible (see also) across the isles. Phonologically closer to Dutch and German, Yola had a fuller compliment of pronouns, including reflexive ones and uses –en to form the plural of nouns, retained in oxen and children. Though heavily influenced by Anglo-Saxon vocabulary, it contains many French and Irish borrowings as well.

web of deception

On this day in 1999, Bruce Miller was found murdered in his scrapyard in Flint, Michigan, victim of a conspiracy between his wife Sharee Paulette Kitley Miller (*1971) and her online liaison Jerry Cassaday—who was convinced to carry out the shooting by Sharee for Miller’s money, arguing a divorce could not generate enough alimony since the couple had only been married for a few months. Mortified by his actions, Cassaday, a former police officer who knew forensics and thus how to commit a perfect crime, took his own life afterwards and Sharee was apprehended the following February after finding their chat logs, printed out and left in a briefcase along with Cassaday’s suicide note.

Individuals should know that their actions (even in that then new media) have consequences and have been sentenced accordingly but I wonder in what ways does hindsight temper judgment. What do you think? Sometimes time vilifies and exculpates but never universally and one has to wonder about our own naivety. With headlines like “Murder by Instant Message,” the investigation and trial were recorded as the first internet based homicide.

quodlibet

From the Latin term for whatever one wishes (“what” + “pleases”), as a subgenre of the trompe-l’œil technique of hyper-realistic rendering refers to desk notions painted and arranged as to appear just left lying around and in artistic disarray, we find the aesthetic in its highest form of expression in the works of Antwerp and Copenhagen court painter Cornelis Norbertus Gijsbrechts (*1625 – †1675). Though the “deceive the eye” style didn’t receive that particularly categorisation until around 1800 when French artist Louis-Léopold Boilly titled one of his pieces as such—the reverse of a canvas with a cat, a log and a dried fish peering through, an homage possibly to Gijsbrechts’ own strikingly modern and meta creation—artists have been developing a flair for the realistic and forced perspective since Antiquity. Much more to explore with Public Domain Review at the link above.