Gamine

Adventures in Logophilia, No. 206

gamine

These days, a gamine is a girl or a young woman with playfully attractive, boyish charm.  In the nineteenth century, a gamine was actually a female street urchin, which explains why Anne Hathaway's hair is often described this way - having played the shorn-haired Fantine in Les Miserables.  For one about to embark on a similar style, it's nice to be able to put a chic French term to it: gah-MEEN. 

Anne Hathaway with her Oscar
usmagazine.com

Efflorescence

Adventures in Logophilia, Episode 205:

efflorescence

 

 

Efflorescence is the state of being flowery, blooming or having such an appearance, a perfect word for the budding, opening and awakening of blossoms.  Like those above, I amazed to see these dobs of color give life to an otherwise struggling lawn. Many people remarked yesterday in Boston that flowering trees were in fantastic bloom on a day that saw so much anxiety and pain.  Spring is hope.  And here is proof.

Boston Disembogued

Adventures in Logophilia, No. 204:

disembogue

This verb means "to flow out or empty, as water does from a channel."  That is one of many words I can think of to describe the many images that have emerged of empty, quiet Boston today - a truly eerie sight.  A lively, bustling city has been emptied of people. 

Gloucester Street by Brad Kelly

Slate.com

A Quicksilver Month

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 203:

mercurial

Anything mercurial is characterized by the rapid or unpredictable changeableness of one's mood.  It also might mean something is more directly related to the element, the planet, or the mythological messenger god.  Sometimes all of these at once.  The general adjective and the element are no doubt named for the god Mercury's ability to change places so quickly.  The element was once called quicksilver, because it looks like moving, living, moody silver. 

Quicksilver by Keith Moseley at flickr

Mercurial seems to best describe April 2013, half-spent as it is.  Living in the middle of the continent, we've seen March and April change their moods frequently from calm, halcyon days to blustry wintry ones.  Snow and rain have been competing for territory this week, leaving us in a state of jaded confusion: I thought we were done with winter!  Look, there are flowers!  It shouldn't be snowing when there are flowers!  What is wrong with this world?  Global warming!  Well, I say.  At least it's wet.  Perhaps we've finally begun to turn this neverending drought around.

I'm not a climatologist, and this is not a science blog, although I can say our fears about weather, climate and our inability to properly harness them make for great science fiction.  Spring has a temper in general: it has good days and bad days: the lion and the lamb; blizzards, tornadoes and thunderstorms; sunshine, daffodils and birdsong.  This month is absolutely and indeniably alive.  I'm sure February is mighty jealous.  And May will be especially glorious when all calms down!

Mercury by Mary Harrsch

Indomitable

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 202:

indomitable

cannot be overcome, subdued or vanquished; unconquerable, unyielding; not giving into defeat.

Light by Jidhu Jose on flickr

The events of yesterday have taken a toll on our spirits.  Thinking of and praying for Boston and the friends I have there, quaking in the aftermath of the Marathon bombing and the terror that has our nation quaking once again, I now there is resilience in dark times, that the human spirit can overcome this with sparks of our own light.  Brought together, those sparks can make a glorious, indomitable, unquenchable fire to chase the dark away.  Light is hope.  Hope is light. 

Amen.

Downton Abbey and Mayhem

Word 201 is...

mayhem

Mayhem, as you may have surmised from the Allstate commercials featuring the ironic personification of mayhem ("I'm a branch about to fall on your car", etc), is a willful and permanent crippling, mutilation or disfigurement of any part of the body - especially involving the loss of a limb or a digit. In other words, needless, willful damage or violence.  Which brings us to Downton Abbey...

Several months have passed and I believe most of us Downton fans (or addicts, as the case may be) are aware of how the third series ended.  Matthew Crawley, happily married and new, proud father, dies in a car crash.  The final image is of lifeless Matthew, lying in a growing pool of blood, his eyes opened.  Not moments before, he'd been holding his baby son.  Naturally, this has sparked a wide range of outbursts from fans of the show.  My father exclaimed, "he was the only one in that family who made sense!" 

Dramatic death is the plot-mover and shaker in Downton.  The show opened with the death of the then-heir Patrick on the Titanic.  A few episodes later a young Turkish nobleman died suddenly in bed (whose bed being the compelling secret of the series).  Series Two saw the first world war, bringing on the death of a beloved footman and Matthew's apparent paralysis (which he later miraculously overcame) and the Spanish flu which killed off Matthew's fiancee, Lavinia.  Series Three saw Lady Sibyl die in childbirth, leaving behind her husband (the former chauffeur) and her baby daughter.  Mayhem is unavoidable here, the life blood of the show.

Matthew Crawley's final moments with Mary and son

It does seem remarkably unfair to have killed off Sibyl and Matthew in the same series, and neither instance was very pleasant.  Yet, on a more pragmatic note, Jessica Brown-Findlay and Dan Stevens both wanted to move onto other projects once their contracts had expired.  The story lines had to shift to accommodate them, even if devastating those of us who finally FINALLY saw joy come to their respective characters.  If an actor feels the call of Broadway, as Mr. Stevens certainly has, he should be free to follow that call wherever it leads him.  We've seen this before: in The X-Files, Agent Mulder is abducted by aliens so that David Duchovny can focus on a film career; in Doctor Who, the Doctor has regenerated many times now*, a death loophole that frees the actor but lets us keep the character in a brand new incarnation; Tasha Yar in Star Trek: The Next Generation; Charlie in Lost; Daniel Jackson in Stargate SG-1... the list goes on...

The Tenth Doctor regenerates.

The ordinary mayhem of non-renewed contracts brings opportunities for the creative minds behind these shows.  Interesting opportunities.  Story, in whatever form, has the unique ability to shift direction, flexible and resilient against such challenges.  It shows me that any obstacle I may encounter with a plot line in my own fiction is not The End of All Things, but a chance to bend the story onto a new vector I had not considered.  It's a matter of realizing - hey, there's a dead-end here, but I can 1.) build a door right here, or 2.) find that secret passageway I know is hidden around here somewhere... what a thrill to find the solution right there, waiting.

For Downton, rumor has it that the fourth series will focus on the grief and recovery of Lady Mary, Matthew's widow.  As an aside, I have a soft spot for haughty, stern, self-righteous Mary; as a character she has grown through her mistakes and her sorrows.  And the question now can be about her ability as a character to grow stronger from this tragedy... remaking her, revitalizing her and revivifying her as her story continues on.

Matthew's exit is unavoidable but may contain blessings in disguise. The creator of Downton Abbey, Julian Fellowes, remarked that the happy Matthew had to go, because happiness is next to impossible to write. And to this end, killing Matthew when he was at the peak of happiness seems to have been the best option.  He died happy and a success, instead of fading away out of monotony or boredom into a shadow of himself.  Explaining Matthew away in a divorce would be cruel judging from the richness of the story he and Mary have shared for the last three years.   

If the spirit of the story is preserved, if other characters are allowed to grow in new ways to become better versions of themselves, then I look forward to the fourth series of Downton Abbey.  Even if more mayhem awaits us in the form of stock market crashes and love affairs.

* On terms of Doctor Who - a totally different animal - there were similar reactions when David Tennant left the show.  The Doctor, having been fatally dosed with radiation to save a companion, regenerated dramatically into Matt Smith's Doctor.  While at the very core he is the same man, alive, well and frenetic as ever, something very real died in his explosive regeneration. His is a death: a chapter closed and forever cut off from new adventures. (... unless they involve the fiftieth anniversary special, that is.  Doctor Who is infamous for its loopholes.)  But, as we are reminded by the watchful Ood Sigma, the story itself does not end.  Doctor Who simply experienced a changing of the guards: new Doctor, new head writer and producer (Stephen Moffat).  It was the same and not the same, and that is okay. 

To Earwig or Eavesdrop

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 200:

earwig

To earwig is to annoy or attempt to influence by way of private discussion.  In Britain, this is another word for "eavesdrop."  This comes from an insect of the same name, a long-bodied little creature with pinchers.  In the Anglo-Saxon days (which shows just how old the word is), earwigs were thought to crawl into the human ear.  I know what you're thinking: eww and oww!  I'd imagine that this would be a medieval explanation for madness or demon possession... or perhaps medieval term for, well, bugged or wired. As if the creature is a piece of demonic espionage equipment.  Purely a conjecture straight out of my wacky imagination.  I prefer not to think of the ear-bugs (who would?) but the little insistent whispers that give away an earwigging discussion.

Eavesdropping fascinates me, too.  Not only does this verb mean "listening in on someone else's conversation", but it had its origins in the 1600s... a person who supposedly stood under the eaves of someone's house to listen to the conversations within.  The eavesdrop, according to Oxford Dictionaries, was actually the ground directly below the eaves, where the water runs off. 

Which word is your favorite: earwig or eavesdrop?

Eavesdrop by Marsha Aninditha

Cacography

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 199:

cacography

Surely you know that cacophony is "harsh sound." In that same vein, cacography is both "bad spelling" or "bad handwriting."  I take this to mean that when you attempt to sit down and read something border on chicken-scratch illegibility, your head begins to hurt... like your reaction to hearing the classic horror-sound of fingernails a-clawing on a chalk board.  In other words, harshness of writing.  When I come across passages in a novel that could have been better edited, I cringe in the same way. 

Adamantine

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 198:

adamantine

This adjective describes something or someone that is unyielding, inflexible or unbreakable... or very adamant.  This is from the Latin word adamanitus, which means "hard as steel." Peter Oborne of the Daily Telegraph describes the late Baroness Thatcher thus: "The magnificence of Thatcher was her adamantine refusal to accept the conventional wisdom of her age."  (Emphasis mine.)  And this woman, hard as steel, will not be forgotten for quite sometime.  If the United States elects a woman into the office of President, she will have to be as strong as Britain's only female prime minister.  It is not a job for wilting flowers.

Margaret Thatcher on the cover of Time Magazine

Bernard Bujold - LeStudio1

Virga

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 197:

virga

Virga is a mass of streaks, wisps or stripes of rain appearing to hang underneath a cloud, but evaporating before reaching the ground.  This is the Latin word for "rod" or "stripe."  While out and about yesterday, I saw many a virga looming overhead, an eerie, ghostly premonition of the thunderstorms that would arrive later in the night.  Weather, in case you couldn't tell, fascinates me in its changeability - the mood swings of the region, the continent and the world.  There is still so little we know about the workings of the atmosphere; imagination will always fill in the gaps of our knowledge.

Virgas by Francois Roche

Aureate

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 196:

aureate

This adjective describes something that is of a golden color or brilliance or something that is marked by a grandiloquent and rhetorical style.  Nothing is more aureate in nature than an awesome sunrise, methinks... unless it's a work of prose rendered in sharp, simple, beautiful words.

Sunrise by Sean MacEntee

Rhapsody

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 195:

rhapsody

Oxford Dictionaries indicates that rhapsody is a Latinate word taken from the Greek word rhapsoidia - a combination of the words for "stitch" and "ode" or "song."  A rhapsody - whether Bohemian, Blue or otherwise - is simply that: an expression of extravagant praise.  This is usually manifest in musical compositions that are irregular, unusual or otherwise, ahem, Bohemian.  

Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue on youtube

Whale Song on the Plains

Stories come from the strangest of combination of places, events and people.  They hit me over the head sometimes as I'm walking - often times quite actually because my head is usual off pondering in the clouds.  This is a wild circle of thought that occurred to me this week:

Tornado Sirens

It is early spring and they've begun testing the tornado sirens in our city, as they do most places with a tornado warning system.  The siren blares out in thick waves of sound - not merely loud but inescapable.  This is sound you can feel rattling the pavement beneath your feet, shaking your ribcage, startling the air, stopping your heart.  You are breathing in that sound.  Unlike the eardrum-cracking call of ambulances and police cruisers, it does not fade away as trouble races down the center lane.  Growing up in Nebraska, this is typical of the spring and summer months - the worry that sudden disaster may be hurtling nearby. 

by Anthony Woods

Sirens and Whales

When I was a little girl standing my grandparents' driveway  I remember asking my mother what that horrible drone was.  She said it was a whale, perhaps out of sarcasm.  (She might have actually said "dying whale" but I doubt she would have been that mean.)  I was a gullible imaginative child and wanted to see this whale, marvelling at the idea there was an actual whale somewhere in our landlocked state.  As we drove home, I had a vivid picture in my head of a whale lying out on the plains somewhere... not exactly making the connection that if, by some strange set of events, a whale was lying out in the middle of Nebraska, it would be a very sad story.

Whale Fluke 6 October 2012, Gloucester, Mass.

 

Whales in Nebraska

The closest whales have come to Nebraska was the in the Cretaceous Period when a great north-south swath of the continent was a shallow sea called the Western Interior Seaway, stretching from the Gulf of Mexico to the Arctic.  The "whales" were plesiosaurs (probably smaller than modern whales) - head of a brontosaurus and sea turtle flippers. 

By Dee Jay Morris

A Sea in Nebraska

Then it strikes me that Nebraska geology and paleontology is rich.  We had a sea!  We were underwater!  Okay, "we" weren't but the land that became our state (and Kansas, South and North Dakota, Minnesota and Texas) was underwater.  Comparing that reality to our current drought, the heat, the snow storms, the farmland, the ranches, the bison herds, the sand dunes... wow!  This storyteller is struck by the malleability of the earth beneath our feet, the fact that some day Nebraska may not look like it does now.  I don't know what the projections indicate for our geologic future, but if the Rockies continue to grow, so might our Plains.  This might become a desert or a marshland.  Someday Nebraska may have native camels (yes, camels) or saber-toothed cats (the descendents of our urban ferals?), bear dogs or a new breed of bison.  Or will there be a sea big enough for humpbacks and dolphins to swim down to greet us?

by Petter Sandell

And there will probably be tornadoes spilling across whatever version of the Plains comes to pass.  Will the whales warn us with their song? 



Smokescreen

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 194:

smokescreen

A smokescreen is a cloud of smoke created to conceal military operations from others, or a ruse designed to hide someone's real intentions or activities.  In one of the earlier episodes of The X-Files, Mulder's insider contact "Deep Throat" describes the alien crash landing at Roswell to be a smokescreen to conceal what the government really has been doing with alien technology.  There is something spooky about this.

World War Two destroyers putting up a smokescreen against the enemy (Jim Phillips)

Lissom

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 193:

lissom

Sometimes spelled lissome, this adjective means thin and easily flexed with graceful movements; lithe, limber or supple.  Lissom is an alteration of lithesome.  I remember this word describing Tinkerbell in Peter Pan - the perfect word for a weightless, airy creature with the wings of a butterfly.

I also, of course, think of ballerinas and their long, strong limbs and feet.  They may look fragile, but in fact, they're incredibly strong.

 

by sebastian ayala

Insular

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 192:

insular

dwelling or situated on an island.  This has come to mean narrow-minded, as well as isolated and detached.

a Croatian island by Sphinx

Lately, I've come to realize the value of writing in an island mind set.  This is similar to my ideas in the post on hermetic, writing in an air-tight environment, keeping the door shut and visualizing Schrodinger's cat.  "Island writing" would point not only to keeping things contained, but also separating oneself so nothing can come in.  This is a challenge in the internet age where were swamped with commentary and blurbs and tweets and informational flashes everywhere we turn.  There is also a greater pressure for writers, especially for beginning, unpublished writers such as myself, to "build our platforms" online or create a following on Twitter, as well as visiting blogs, keeping blogs, reading, reading, reading the insights of others out there in the world.  It is confusing and exhausting.  When most of the time, all I want to do is write.

I've noticed that several months on Twitter leave me feeling this way at times.  Don't worry, I'm not about to leave the community, I'm simply taking this network with a grain of salt.  When those I follow tweet about insightful blog posts or articles, I am grateful.  Those things are innocuous, helpful and encouraging.  Some people really have a knack for crafting lovely, funny or intriguing tweets.  Yet... sometimes it amounts to a lot of distracting visual noise.  Too much of a good thing: read me! read this! you should be doing this!  you never should do that!  Ahh!

Much of this might be due to my struggles with anxiety.  When tweets suddenly feel like commentary on my personal writing life, I know it's time to retreat over the moat, pull up the drawbridge and write alone and unbothered in the tower... putting some distance between myself and others until the energy is back.  Just retreat and write.  It's all good!

Insentient

Hello again!  I took an inadvertent break from delving into the depths of my logophilia collection to devote some serious time to editing and novel-building. 

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 191:

insentient

unfeeling, unconscious; incapable of understanding human things or showing sympathy; in other words, inanimate.

Does this man look insentient to you?

I have been watching Star Trek: the Next Generation for the first time in fifteen years or so.  Having spent a good deal of my childhood immersed in this world, there a few questions I find myself revisiting.  For one, I believe the one-of-a-kind android Commander Data feels a great deal more than he lets on.  I find it hard to believe that C-3PO and R2D2 are more capable of producing emotion - oftentimes irrational, biting emotion - than Data claims to.  Why?

Data is driven to understanding and becoming an acceptable participant in humanity.  We first see him whistling "Pop Goes the Weasel."  He proves himself an artist, classical musician and Shakespearean actor.  He is fascinated with Sherlock Holmes (aren't we all?).  He experiences grief many times.  Confusion and bewilderment, also.  He's been in love.  He expresses the desire to be a parent.  He owns a ginger-stripe cat named Spot - only a human would be able to embrace the irony of that.  Above all, he is a loyal member of the crew of the Enterprise, a friend to many, an enemy to few. 

And yet through all of this Data will declare that he has no emotions and is incapable of understanding love, grief, fear, humor because they (supposedly) reside outside of his original programming.  His brother Lore was the android outfitted with emotions, but he soon turned out to be the defective model prone to misanthropy and evil.  

Here's my theory.  Data was created by a human being - a human being he will refer to as "Father." He works with humans (and others) on a regular basis.  Without emotion, he'd have no drive, no curiosity, no will power to adapt, to learn or to better himself.  Without emotion, he'd reside in a closet until it's time for him to go to the bridge, would not be embraced by his crew, nor would he be a respected, trusted senior officer.  I'm not an expert on Starfleet, but would they really give such privileges to an insentient automaton?  My argument is that Data does have emotions.  The evidence is overwhelming.  He simply does not know what to do with them.  That said, he is like a child constantly learning about his world. 

Again, if 3PO can express pain, mourn, worry, spew insults, panic and whine, then Data can, too.  (Someone would argue - "hey! They're in two separate universes!" That's true. But it makes no difference to me.  I could very easily throw in a blurb about Daleks or Cybermen.)  When Data is outfitted with an "emotion chip" in the later years, it doesn't necessarily produce his emotions but allows him to experience and express them more fully... though this gets him into a great deal of trouble.

In the film Star Trek: Generations, Data goofs around with a tricorder puppet, is paralyzed with fear when Geordi is kidnapped by Klingons, expresses triumph when the crew wins a victory, and cries with joy when Spot is found alive in the wreckage of the Enterprise.  It wasn't the chip that produced these emotions.  These emotions were there all along, just buried in his android programming, waiting to come out.

So try to tell me that Data has no emotions, and you'll  be hearing from me.  He's more human than he realizes.  He just happens to be a well-made machine.  But aren't we all?

Wisdom from Oscar Wilde

The Telegraph yesterday featured an article on a recently discovered letter that Oscar Wilde wrote to a would-be writer around 1890.  It felt like he was speaking to me from the dawn of the last century:

"The best work in literature is always done by those who do not depend on it for their daily bread, and the highest form of literature, Poetry, brings no wealth to the singer... Make some sacrifice for your art and you will be repaid but ask of art to sacrifice itself for you and a bitter disappointment may come to you."

To me this sounds like: "so you're a novelist who earns her living as a receptionist? Excellent!  You're able to let your art remain art!  I know you dream of one day earning your living by your novels, but it might not be as rosy as you think.  Until then, use this time to grow as a writer and a student of language and see where it takes you.  You might go farther than you think."  Thank you, Mr. Wilde.

***

In a similar vein, author Matt Haig also had thirty pieces of encouraging wisdom to share via the Telegraph. My favorites were:

• Being published doesn't make you happy.  It just swaps your old neuroses for new ones.
• Success depends on great words and passionate people.  The words are up to you.  The people you have to pray for, and stand by them once you have them.
• Beauty breeds beauty, truth triggers truth.  The cure for writer's block is therefore to read.

Risible

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 190:

risible

having the ability or power of laughing; ludicrously funny.  Something that incites or triggers laughter.  Something worthy of laughter.  That strange moment when you feel like your life has suddenly transformed into a sitcom worthy of Seinfeld or The Office.  Happens to me all the time - if you cannot find a way to laugh in the middle of a stressful day, you'll be crying. It also makes for great comedic material.  And if you're as walking-into-walls clumsy as I am, well, there are plenty of opportunities!

laugh by matteo procopio

Thole

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 190:

thole

This word is in my lexicon because I like unusual, archaic things.  If you're an American, like myself, you've probably not heard or seen this word outside of classic British literature.  Thole is Scottish verb meaning to endure (a thing) without complaint, to tolerate something unpleasant or difficult.  

I am in this unknown period that is seeking an agent.  I probably will be for some time.  The process has been overwhelming and far from easy.  When you send what you assume to be your best impression of your novel (in the query) and no one shows any interest in it whatsoever, it cuts you deep to your soul.  No matter how many times you can defend the agents for their difficult job sorting through a slush pile of queries, you cannot help but feel yourself lose energy, lose faith in yourself, and begin to doubt the merit of your writing.  It simply is the way of things.  I felt this in the days when I was hoping for graduate school; rejections felt like a door slamming in my face.  

But... as much as it hurts now,  there will be a door somewhere in this long corridor of agents that will be open, and will someday stay opened.  Until then, my job is to rewrite my query letter (many times if necessary), to listen to feed back about weak spots in the novel's plot, to do what I can to stay moving.  It's non-specific stuff.  It feels half the time like I am not doing anything useful at all.  But I'm going to thole it anyway.  There is always hope - with each draft, with each nugget of wisdom from colleagues out there in the world.  If I didn't believe my novel was something beautiful I wanted desperately to share with the world, I wouldn't be here.  I'd have given up long ago.

climbing by sara kallado

Hub

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 189:

hub

A hub is the center part of a wheel, rotating on or with the axle, the spokes radiating outward from it.  From this object comes the over-arching macrocosm: the effective, productive, bustling center of an activity, a network or particular region.  Example: New York City is often described as the hub for the publishing industry - so it is no wonder that so many (though definitely not all) literary agents operate from such a place.

The London Eye by Brian Robertson

Bajiggity

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 188:

bajiggity

You may not have heard this word before because I first heard it from my mother, who invented it.  You can imagine it took me a while to figure out the proper spelling of this word. Bajiggity is one of those words you find yourself saying to describe a feeling or a state of being that no "real" word can accurately describe.  Bajiggity is an adjective in the vein of "going berserk," describing (as far as I'm concerned) a state of agitation or hyperactivity brought on by excessive caffeine, stress, adrenaline, or related anxiety issues. This is pronounced ba-JIG-ity.

My mother says: "The definition is unknown, but we all know what it means."

by Samantha T

You might say I'm bajiggity because filming for Sherlock Series 3 begins today.  My cat is usually bajiggity in the evenings, when her nocturnal senses are piqued and she wants to play (using her teeth, of course), resulting in the occasional hippity (another word from Mom), or jaunty little skip. 

Ombrifuge etc

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 187:

ombrifuge

Anything that provides shelter from the rain - from an enclosed porch to an umbrella to a gazebo.  Any word beginning with ombro- will relate to rain, as ombros is the Greek word for rain shower.  On this note, one of my other favorite rain words is ombrogenous which describes a bog or that icky stuff called peat which depends on large amounts of rain in order to form.  Spring is by nature ombrogenous. 

rain in scotland by Nicolas Valentin

Neverwhere on BBC4

I have just finished listening to the BBC Radio production of Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere.  It is exciting to hear one of my favorite novels transformed into such drama; nothing unlocks inspiration quite like hearing a story unfold, and letting the visuals come to life inside the imagination.  Neverwhere, though it has its short-comings, is one of the richest worlds ever created... from the streets of London Above to the sewers Below, to conversations with rat lords and the bustle and chatter and chaos of the floating market.  It has its own rules, legends, and dangers.  The first episode made for an excellent, transporting hour that I was sad to see (or rather, hear) end. 

Episodes will be broadcast in 30 minute episodes this week through Friday, and then they will be available until the end of March.  Neverwhere features the voice talents of James McAvoy, Benedict Cumberbatch, Christopher Lee, Bernard Cribbins, David Harewood, Sophie Okondeo and Natalie Dormer.  Visit Mr. Gaiman's blog for a fun cast photo.

Click on this cast photo for a link to the program website!

Trust me - you want to make yourself an artist date and lose yourself in London Below this week!

Whirligig

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 186:

whirligig

This is a child's toy that operates in a whirling motion, like a pinwheel, a weathervane or the seed pod from a maple tree blown by the wind.  More generally this means one that continuously whirls or changes or is constantly in motion.  A whirligig more universally can describe a whirling or circling course of events, particularly those out of our control.  This describes my writing life 80% of the time.

Doff

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 185:

doff

To remove an article of wear (clothing: jacket, hat etc) from the body - taking off ones hat as a sign of respect.  In a more general sense it means to rid oneself of something or put it aside.  Think of Mr. Darcy taking off his hat to Lizzie Bennet.

British gentleman doffing his hat by Alistair

Panache

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 184:

panache

A dash of individual flamboyance and style in one's actions or creations; a flash of distinct personality, i.e. writing style and voice, a pair of red shoes with a grey dress. This came into English from French and Italian versions of the Latin word pinnaculum, which means "little feather" referring to the ornamental feathers and tufts worn on the helmets of soldiers, perhaps Roman soldiers.  What does your panache look like? 

malias gideon on flickr

Jejune

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 183:

jejune

This adjective describes something that is lacking in any sort of nutritive value, or (aside from food) without significance or interest, or something that is generally simplistic, naive or superficially rendered.  This is from the Latin jejunus, meaning "barren or fasting".  Somewhere along the line this came to mean "not intellectually nourishing." (Oxford Dictionaries)

It's important to be conscious of how we're feeding ourselves intellectually, because that will feed into the writing we produce.  The things we read - from novels to newspaper articles to tweets - can either amount to tons of cake or a bowl of highly nutritious blueberries.  Too much television is comparable to a surfeit of caffeine. Are we going for the superficial and the sugary or the vitamins and antioxidants?  Are we learning?  Or are we merely being entertained?  Are we energized or left feeling tired?  Believe me, I struggle with these things all the time.

Blueberries are better than cake.

I've learned that staying intellectually healthy may include:

• Not letting Twitter run your writing life.
• Reading "new" things - books and stories outside of the comfort zone, whatever that may mean.
• Getting off the internet (ahem, Pinterest) and the computer and basking in some quiet time.
• Taking walks without the aid of an iPod soundtrack.
• Reducing caffeine intake.  
• Keeping a journal and writing by hand (to maintain tactile connections between the act of writing and the connections made in the brain).
• Watching television sparingly.  I don't believe that television is completely bad for us, because it is an alternate form of storytelling... although I find it is not very helpful on terms of craft.  Nothing clears the brain faster after a stressful day than losing oneself in an episode or two of something that makes me wonder about life.
• Getting out of the chair.  We tend to work best planted in a sedentary fashion - there really is no way around that.  But getting up and moving around pushes blood into the brain and keeps us thinking.  Do it!
• Sleep!

Microcosm

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 182:

microcosm

A little world, especially: the human race or human nature seen as an epitome of the world at large or the universe.  Generally, a microcosm is a small community or other unity that in some way mirrors a larger society.  I prefer focusing on microcosms rather than macrocosms.  The microcosm is the immediate setting, the macrocosm would be the era, the year and the country (or planet) in which the story unfolds. 

snow globe = microcosm

Volant

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 181:

volant

This adjective means having the wings extended as if in flight, like a heraldic bird; generally used to describe something flying or capable of flight, or simply quick and nimble - metaphorically, moving as if flying.  This is from the Latin verb volare, to fly.

juvenile least tern in flight by mike forsman

Blackthorn Winter

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 180:

blackthorn winter

Generally, a blackthorn winter is a spell of cold weather at the time of early spring when the blackthorn trees are in bloom.  Though it is not officially spring, we are right on the cusp.  March is that odd time of year when anything can happen with the weather.  Yesterday, temperatures climbed to 60 degrees and I took a breezy walk in the sunshine.  It was warm enough that I had to take off my sweater.  Spring was definitely in the air.  Then, this morning I woke up to discover a world transformed from muddy, nascent spring to blustery, white winter.  The robins seem mightily confused.  But this is a good omen, methinks, for a wet spring and a greener summer to follow.

snow crocus by corbeau du nord

 

Sprite

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 179:

sprite

A sprite is an elf or a fairy, an Middle English warp of the word spirit.  The word has also come to refer to flashes of red light in the atmosphere during thunderstorms as electrons clash with other high-energy molecules.  This is related to spright, an alternative spelling.  Someone who is described as sprightly is spirited, vivacious and cheerful lightness about them.  I find March to be quite sprightly, delightfully so after another (inevitably) gray February.

Adumbrate

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 178:

adumbrate

to give off a faint shadow or slight representation of something.  In writing, this is an outline we write out for ourselves to guide the way through a novel, and also the technique of foreshadowing events to come.  This is an art - the ability to intimate by overshadowing, to shed light on other things by putting all the distractions in shadow, to draw what's important out into the light.  A little meta, no?

Coif

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 177:

coif

A girl from Breton (France) wearing a traditional coif.

James Holland.

A coif is a woman's close-fitting cap, now only worn by nuns underneath their veils.  It was also the term for the skullcap men would wear with their armor in battle.  In America, coif is short for coiffure, which means one's particular hairstyle.  

Coifs in general fascinate me.  I went through phases as a kid where I wore a knitted beret over my hair most of the time - not just because I was trying to grow my hair out and thought it looked gross, but because the hat looked cool.  And, you know, it did have the shape of one of those coifs worn by the kitchen staff in Downton Abbey. 

Folly

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 176:

folly

Folly is the lack of good sense, understanding or adequate foresight; an act of foolishness, or more specifically, a costly undertaking which results in embarrassing or ludicrous ruin.  This word is Middle English, which means it was borrowed from the Old French word folie, meaning "madness." (Oxford Dictionaries.)

The Fool, as seen on a tarot card, is about to fall step off the edge of a cliff.

I actually don't believe folly is all that bad - it is the state you start out in when embarking on a journey.  I've learned that I am still the fool when it comes to this trying-to-get-an-agent business.  The important thing is to realize that blunders will be made.  I will trip and fall several times.  I will have to go back and rewrite that one chapter I thought was perfect.  I will write stupid tweets and worry about what people are thinking, if anything at all.  Folly is a learning curve; I've learned that the Fool on the tarot card is represented as a perpetual youth... and aren't we all?  I don't mean perpetually young, but constantly learning.  How else can we learn but through trying and stumbling and getting scraped up... and picking ourselves up again?  

Embrace the fool.  He's really not that bad.  Or fatal.  Or stupid.  He just has convictions about things that haven't been (but need to be) tested.  He doesn't watch where he's going, but he'll soon learn his lesson.  I'd like to see him after he picks himself from tumbling off that cliff, dusting himself off, examining his bruises and looking up to see where he came from. "Well, that was dumb," he might say, "but I don't regret a moment of it."  

So... write like a fool to write better.  Laugh at yourself.  Move on.  Harbor no regrets.  I think I can handle that.

Hegemony

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 175:

hegemony

the over-arching influence or authority over others, domination. 

Elucubrate

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 174:

elucubrate

 

by louveciennes

to express studious efforts, working (composing, studying, reading) by lamplight.  I suppose this might be where "burning the midnight oil" comes in.  Whether it's late at night or early in the morning, we all put this to practice because art is calling us.  And there is something about a single lamp (whether electric or flame-illumined) lit in the dark, quiet hours that promises peace. 

Burgeon

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 173:

burgeon

to put forth fresh growth, or to grow vigorously, flourish.  

I think we're all about ready for Spring, aren't we?  In another sense, after a week of craziness at work and strange stomach issues on top of that, I am ready to get back into my writing soil and put down roots once again.

 

I remember I saw this word on the cover description of a novel I read a lot as a kid.  I didn't know how to pronounce it, so I took it to my dad who say "maybe, bur-GOYN?" So for years, that was how I said it, perhaps incurring many a puzzled look.   I later realized that it rhymes with "surgeon," and was actually quite relieved.

Intercalate

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 172:

intercalate

to insert a day into a calendar, or to insert between or among already existing layers or elements.  Every four years we intercalate February 29, otherwise known as Leap Day.

Matt Preston

I've always had this strange fantasy of mixing up the months which contain 30 days with the those containing 31 days.  It would be an easy mistake to make, wouldn't it?  I don't know much about our calendar and why certain months were given a certain number of days to total out to 365 or 366.  I imagine that if we had to insert another day into our calendar to, say, balance out dramatic changes in time, adding days to November, February, April, June and September would be an easy change.  There's a science fiction story brewing here.  I just know it.  Dibs!

Tessera

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 171:

tessera

A tessera was a small tablet made of wood, clay or bone, which the Romans used as a ticket, tally-token, voucher or even a means of ID.  These came into play in The Hunger Games, as the number of tessera traded and bargained for by eligible candidates for the Games could mean the difference between surviving and starving under the rule of Panem.  It is just one of many Roman flavors Suzanne Collins gave her series. 

Quincunx

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 170:

quincunx

an arrangement of five things in a square in a square or rectangle, one at each corner and one in the middle.  I always think of five pillars when this word comes up: four pillars holding up a structure at each of the distinct corners, the fifth secretly holding up the middle. 

A series of quincunx from an ancient puzzle.

Univocal

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 169:

univocal

This adjective indicates "only one meaning", unambiguous, and quite clear.

Lemniscate

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 168:

lemniscate

the symbol representing infinity, or (to be more mathematical) a figure-eight shaped curve whose polar coordinates are p²=a² .  This is from the Latin word lemniscata, meaning "hanging ribbons."

Rowel

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 167:

rowel

This verb means to goad with or as if with the pointed disk at the end of a spur, or more generally to vex or trouble.  This is from the Anglo-Saxon word roele, meaning "small wheel", indicating the spurs on a knight's (or a cowboy's) boots.

Christopher Nixon

Nychthemeron

Apologies for this late posting.  I am blogging from an oblique position, as I've been enduring a mild stomach bug this afternoon and evening.  No Oscars party for me.  

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 166:

nychthemeron

a full period of night and day, from the Greek - literally, night (nykt) + day (hemera).  (Merriam Webster)

 

by sophie wilson

Confessions of an Anxious Writer: Episode II

Episode II:  Playing Chess

By Old One Eye on flickr

I've found recently that novel writing is like playing a continuous, unhurried game of chess with oneself.  When it comes to anxiety, this has been good - not as a mere distraction - but a problem-solving exercise. 

I have to admit, I'm not very good at the actual game, but my own sort of chess tends to challenge me in similar feats of strategy.  Instead of trying to defeat an opponent and losing pieces, I try to execute a scene with the best combination of plot, character nuance, and word choice, as possible.  Particularly in the early drafts of a novel, when the story is just beginning to emerge and could become anything under the sun (or beyond the sun), what grabs my attention is the great puzzle of Making It Work.  

Each draft is a testing ground, with the squares clearly marked and the pieces in place - each character, each event that I have mapped out (more or less solidly), every possible "move" visible.  I learn by testing the waters.  If I put my main character in situation A, I can see how a secondary character might react or retaliate, resulting in situation B.  Instead of checks, I can move backwards, retracing my steps and write them again, taking a different path to achieve my goal and seize a particular square on the board.  Writing and rewriting (and re-rewriting) teach me particular patience, especially with myself: "Okay, that doesn't work.  What can I move around to make it work?  Ah, have A come into the room instead of C, and have B listen in from the other room..."

This is a kinder game than chess actually is, but it is no less strenuous.  In chess, the queen, knights, bishops, rooks and pawns move to protect the king.  If the king is check mated, the game is over. In writing, each piece is an element (characters and events), maintaining the forward momentum and central focus of a story.  If the king falls, I know what can be fixed, and made better.  I have an arsenal of queens at my disposal.

When it comes to my chronic anxiety, this game of chess is not an escape but a calming technique.  Everyday life is invariably out of our immediate control, and anxiety sufferers feel this deeply.  While there is no way to remedy that, the plot tangles and twists I create provide a puzzle that can almost always be solved.  Most of the time this has a particular organizing and calming affect.  Other wise, being in the midst of the story is an excellent gauge of my anxiety: if I am suddenly worried about a plot line or not being able to make something work, I know it is probably time for a rest... to put the pieces away for a day or two and come back to the scenario when the brain has cooled down.  The best way to cool down?  Using a different part of my brain.  I often resort to Latin exercises when I'm stressed, which requires more logic. 

I will always be prone to seasons of self-doubt.  That is unavoidable for us all. The bottom line is that the challenge of writing, my most natural way of interacting with the world, has not only shown me where my limits are, but where my strengths lie.  And the wonderful thing is that having the courage to complete the game will make me stronger and more patient with myself. 

How has writing helped you through your challenges?

Waif

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 165:

waif

A late Middle English term (Oxford Dictionaries) referring to a stray person or animal, especially a homeless child, found without an owner and quite by chance. Waif can also refer to an unclaimed piece of property found (as if washed up by the sea) or stolen goods abandoned by an absconding thief.  I am currently reading The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey, a beautiful novel about a such mysterious waif who enters the lives of a husband and wife on the Alaskan frontier ca. 1920.

 

Patina

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 164:

patina

A film (usually green) that forms naturally on copper and bronze due to long-term exposure (or artificial acid treatments), valued for its color.  I love this word - it is the surface mark of something that has grown beautiful with age and use.  It also describes ones appearance or aura derived from association, habit or established character.  More generally: a superficial exterior.

Melliferous

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 163:

melliferous

an adjective which means "yielding or producing honey."

Duende

Adventures in Logophilia, Day 162:

duende

Pronounced du-'en-dey, this is the power to attract through one's personal magnetism and charm.  Duede comes from the Spanish word for ghost or goblin, and is used to describe to the magnetic power or force that draws an audience to the performance of a flamenco dancer.