http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ A collaborative general-interest blog of history, literature, culture, and stuff en-us benwbrum+horizon@convio.com 2007-05-04T07:52:22-08:00 hourly 1 2000-01-01T12:00+00:00 http://horizon.bloghouse.net/archives/000979.html Horizon is closing its doors. There were no hurled dishes or screaming matches involved; we just each got occupied with other things. Alan Allport graduates from Penn in August, and will probably be lecturing there throughout next year as well... 979@http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ Blogland 2007-05-04T07:52:22-08:00 http://horizon.bloghouse.net/archives/000978.html Commentary Magazine has put online a 1969 exchange between Noam Chomsky, Lionel Abel, and Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. I highly recommend Schlesinger's initial salvo at Chomsky. It is a bit tiresome, but that's typical of effective Chomsky criticism. Schlesinger is... 978@http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ History 2007-03-22T07:17:46-08:00 http://horizon.bloghouse.net/archives/000977.html Anyone interested in reading the actual work the pope was quoting from last year can find a (possibly bootleg) version of Manuel II Palaeologus's Interview with a Persian at this French website. Based on a quick skim, it's an engaging... 977@http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ History 2007-03-06T11:48:46-08:00 http://horizon.bloghouse.net/archives/000976.html Something about this New York Times Magazine article on British genetics set off my bogosity alarm. Think of your smoke detector when you're making blackened catfish. Dr. Oppenheimer’s population history of the British Isles relies not only on genetic data... 976@http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ Language 2007-03-06T11:38:25-08:00 http://horizon.bloghouse.net/archives/000972.html A few months ago I figured I'd try to pick up Yiddish. I've grown much less ambitious in the past year or so, figured the language wouldn't be too hard for someone already familiar with German and Hebrew. In fact,... 972@http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ Language 2007-03-05T06:47:54-08:00 http://horizon.bloghouse.net/archives/000975.html Run by Phyllis Schlafly's kid. Where you want to go if the Bible is your authority on dinosaurs.... 975@http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ Blogland 2007-03-01T21:04:35-08:00 http://horizon.bloghouse.net/archives/000974.html Being slap-happy after yet another morning bout with the Federal Register for my work blog, ">I'm inviting the public to submit any housing-related (non-military) government document containing a string of more than six consecutive mutually modifying nouns. As of today,... 974@http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ Language 2007-02-14T14:04:37-08:00 http://horizon.bloghouse.net/archives/000973.html A friend of mine makes the news.... 973@http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ Culture 2007-02-12T15:03:31-08:00 http://horizon.bloghouse.net/archives/000971.html I'm having great fun with Letters of C. S. Lewis. It's been savagely edited by Lewis's brother. This might disappoint a serious fan, but with the dross removed we're left with witty, perceptive observations on books and life. This is... 971@http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ Language 2007-02-09T06:31:31-08:00 http://horizon.bloghouse.net/archives/000970.html Martha once corrected a commenter here for referring to the "Democrat Party." Apparently it's a sort of playground taunt used by the party's opponents when they're feeling puerile. It was news to me, but apparently not to The Weekly Standard's... 970@http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ Politics 2007-02-08T20:18:29-08:00 http://horizon.bloghouse.net/archives/000969.html Told in a letter from C. S. Lewis to his father, dated 5 June, 1926: The best strike story I have heard is about engines. A train (with amateur driver) set out from Paddington for Bristol, first stop Bath. When... 969@http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ History 2007-02-08T20:09:26-08:00 http://horizon.bloghouse.net/archives/000968.html And here I was getting excited about Tear Down The Mountain: An Appalachian Love Story, when I read this: She'd dislodged more than teeth; Sid's determination drained away when the crockery landed in his pie hole. Or maybe he sensed... 968@http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ Literature 2007-02-08T12:49:18-08:00 http://horizon.bloghouse.net/archives/000967.html Something about the passage I've highlighted in today's IHE interview with Danny Postel just doesn't work. In retrospect I’m self-critical about that. I now think people like Mary Kaldor (from Helsinki Citizens Assembly) and Joanne Landy (of the Campaign for... 967@http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ History 2007-02-08T06:21:39-08:00 http://horizon.bloghouse.net/archives/000966.html This may be old news to everyone else, but I was astonished by Bill Moser's observation in his excellent Nation column "The Way Down South": The parity between the parties, unprecedented in the South's history, was neatly symbolized by the... 966@http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ 2007-02-05T17:30:01-08:00 http://horizon.bloghouse.net/archives/000965.html I've been reading Jane Jacobs' The Death And Life of Great American Cities, and a wonderful productively cranky book it is. I hadn't otherwise heard of Welwyn Garden City except in a snide reference from Orwell in his famous diatribe... 965@http://horizon.bloghouse.net/ Stuff And Things 2007-02-04T12:16:41-08:00