|k| clippings: 2015-10-27 — mad goodness

WORK

“There is a sort of sweet madness about you and me, a sort of mad bewilderment and astonishment oblivious to the Nasties and the Meanies; you’re the only person, of course your’re the only person from here to Aldebaran and back, with whom I’m free entirely; and I think it’s because you’re as innocent as me. Oh I know we’re not saints or virgins or lunatics; we know all the lust and lavatory jokes, and most of the dirty people; we can catch buses and count our change and cross the road and talk real sentences. But our innocence goes awfully deep, and our discreditable secret is that we don’t know anything at all, and our horrid inner secret is that we don’t care that we don’t.”

—Dylan Thomas
—from a letter to Caitlin McNamara, 1936
—found in The Collected Letters (edited by Paul Ferris)

WORD(S)

agathist /A-gə-thist/. noun. One who believes things naturally tend toward the good. A systemic optimist. An adherent to the doctrine of agathism, a doctrine of optimism and a life devoted to the good. From Greek agath (good).

“From the agathist point of view, religion at its best is self-conscious, disciplined pursuit of knowledge of the good plus devotion to it. Such a life may or may not involve belief in a personal, transcendent God.” (Richard E. Creel)

“The existence of evil compels Dr. Miller to substitute the moderate title of ‘Agathist’ for that of ‘Optimist.’ Pawns, therefore, must fall, and bishops; but he will in part indemnify us by pointing out the reason.” (The Edinburgh Review)

WEB

1. 99% Invisible visits the USPS Dead Letter Office. The results are intriguing and disappointing; so much more should have been done, so many more stories produced.

2. ‘NPR Voice’ Has Taken Over the Airwaves. Pairs well with: An Example. Of. The NPR Podcast. Voice. And Why It’s. So Annoying.

3. I love the close attention Medium pays to typography and design. Their latest, on getting quotation marks right, is a typographical primer replete with info for type geeks. As was their piece on crafting link underlines. And pilcrows. They even have a typographical pod at their office…

4. Worth checking out just for the few photos of these remarkable books » A magical glimpse into the Tudor imagination: Lost library of John Dee to be revealed

5. Today in 1914, poet Dylan Thomas is born in Swansea. Thomas’s dazzling linguistic gifts have been obscured by the stories (and myths) of his destructive, alcoholic behavior and early demise as well as the curious and paradoxical diminishing that accompanies continuous inclusion in anthologies and references in popular culture. But give even his most anthologized poems such as “The force that through the green fuse drives the flower” or “And Death Shall Have No Dominion” (both written when Thomas was a teenager) or “Do not go gentle into that good night” some slow, attentive reading time and be amazed anew at one of the greatest English wordsmiths.

WATCH/WITNESS

►Starlings Take Off at 200 Frames Per Second. Awesome.

REPRISES/RESPONSES/REJOINDERS/RIPOSTES

• Reader B. on Lorca: “It’s fascinating how different is Lorca’s Wall Street from our own. ¶ ”herds of men who cannot count past three, herds more who cannot get past six, scorn for pure science" ¶ now Wall Street contains tons of quants, and thrives on science. The parts about gold and death still hold, though.

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