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Born September 18th

Sep18

Samuel Johnson, b. 1709, said to be the second most quoted author in the English language, after Shakespeare.

Samuel Johnson’s Life and Faith by James Kiefer

BBC News article, The A to Z of Samuel Johnson

Who Is This Johnson Guy? by Jack Lynch

Some interesting facts about Samuel Johnson:
He was the son of a bookseller. (What fun!)
Johnson’s Dictionary of the the English Language, published in 1755 (making this year the 250th anniversary of the publication of Johnson’s Dictionary), was not the first English dictionary, but it was the authoritative English dictionary for over a hundred years until the publication of the Oxford English Dictionary.
Johnson never graduated from Oxford University, although he did attend there, and he became “Dr. Johnson” because he was given an honorary degree.
Samuel Johnson was half-blind, deaf in one ear, and suffered from scrofula, nervous tics, and depression. Some thought him so odd in his mannerisms that they considered him an idiot until he spoke and revealed himself to be an intelligent man.
Johnson married a widow, Elizabeth Porter, who was twenty years older than he, and by all accounts they were very happily married until her death seventeen years later.

Johnson on wine:
“One of the disadvantages of wine is that it makes a man mistake words for thoughts.”
“There are some sluggish men who are improved by drinking; as there are fruits that are not good until they are rotten.”
“There is nothing which has yet been contrived by man, by which so much happiness is produced as by a good tavern.”
“Wine makes a man more pleased with himself; I do not say it makes him more pleasing to others.”
“Sir, I have no objection to a man’s drinking wine, if he can do it in moderation. I found myself apt to go to excess in it, and therefore, after having been for some time without it on account of illness, I thought it better not to return to it. Every man is to judge for himself, according to the effects which he experiences. One of the fathers tells us, he found fasting made him so peevish that he did not practice it.”
(Perhaps those winebibbers over at the Boar’s Head Tavern who are having a rather disdainful discussion of Southern Baptist teetotalers should heed Johnson’s advice to live and let live. Perhaps I’m overly sensitive because I’m one of those foolish (formerly SBC) teetotalers myself. :))

Johnson on blogging:
“No man but a blockhead ever wrote except for money.”
“Read over your compositions, and when you meet a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike it out.”
“A man who uses a great many words to express his meaning is like a bad marksman who, instead of aiming a single stone at an object, takes up a handful and throws at it in hopes he may hit.”
“What is written without effort is in general read without pleasure.”
“The greatest part of a writer’s time is spent in reading in order to write. A man will turn over half a library to make a book.”
“I never desire to converse with a man who has written more than he has read.”
Good advice, but who can heed it? If a writer could bear to strike out his favorite passages, no one would need an editor.

Johnson on moral relativism:
“But if he does really think that there is no distinction between virtue and vice, why, Sir, when he leaves our houses, let us count our spoons.”
Yes, definitely, count the spoons. We watched a video in our Worldview class on Friday in which a young lady said, “I always follow my heart; it never leads me astray.” Scary . . . time to count the spoons.

Born September 10th

Sep10

Hilda Doolittle, b. 1886, American imagist poet who lived most of her life in Europe. She was associated with Ezra Pound, DH Lawrence, and Amy Lowell, and she underwent therapy with Sigmund Freud in Switzerland. She’s familiarly known as “H.D.” I found these two children’s stories that H.D. wrote when she was very young, in her 20’s, and trying to make a living as a writer. Both deal with the theme of boredom or ennui and imagination, reminding me of The Phantom Tollbooth or Alice in Wonderland.

Winter Woods by H.D.
Old Tommy by H.D.

Franz Werfel, b. 1890, was a Czech-born poet, novelist, and playwright who wrote the novel The Song of Bernadette upon which this 1943 movie is based. I’ve actually never seen the movie although I’ve heard of it. Is it any good? The funny thing is that Werfel was Jewish, never converted to Christianity, but wrote novels and plays with Catholic, Christian and pacifist themes.

Robert McClung, b. 1916, wrote dozens of natural science books, books about animals and insects, for children. Good books.

Carol Kendall and Else Holmelund Minarik

Sep13

The Gammage Cup was published in 1959. The story of five non-conformist Minnipins who become unlikely heroes probably hit a nerve in the non-conformist sixties, but it’s still a great story. The Periods, stodgy old conservatives with names such as Etc. and Geo., are wonderful parodies of those who are still caught up in the forms and have forgotten the meanings. And Muggles, Mingy, Gummy, Walter the Earl, and Curley Green, the Minnipins who don’t quite fit in and who paint their doors colors other than green, are wonderful examples of those pesky artistic/scientific types who live just outside the rules of polite society. One of them, Muggles I think, isn’t consciously a nonconformist nor an artist; she just gets caught up in the adventures of the others and finds out that she, too, has her own desires and dreams and talents. I loved The Gammage Cup by Carol Kendall (b. September 13, 1917) when I was a child, and I still remember images and ideas from it. For instance, I’ve always had a desire to paint my front door red or orange or yellow. And I sort of like being different–sometimes just for the sake of difference.
Today is also the birthday of Else Holmelund Minarik, author of the Little Bear stories for beginning readers. What is your favorite Little Bear story? I really like A Kiss for Little Bear in which Little Bear’s grandmother gets some friends to deliver a kiss to Little Bear. The kiss unfortunately gets “all mixed-up” when a pair of lovestruck skunks keeps exchanging the kiss instead of delivering it, but everything turns out all right in the end. I also like the quote from Little Bear’s grandfather when Little Bear suggests that Grandfather might be tired and need a rest. “Me–tired? How can you make me tired? I’m never tired,” says Grandfather, just before he falls asleep in his lawn chair. Then, there’s the story of how Little Bear visits the moon and comes back in time for supper. Oh, yes, and I love Little Bear’s Friend about Little Bear’s friendship with Emily. Little Bear is about as fun and as profound as Frog and Toad. Who ever said that children’s books were boring or unchallenging? They have to be better than adult books so that we can enjoy reading them over and over again until they’re memorized.