Schefflera Arboricola

I meant, "from French to English." --Schefflera

Fiction: almost exclusively Jane Austen. I also like reading Ursula LeGuin, even though she has a socialist-anarchist agenda. I almost-thoroughly enjoyed Stanislaw Lem's volume of imaginary book reviews, A Perfect Vacuum, but I haven't read his science fiction. Reading Victor Hugo is frustrating, because I feel like I'm wading through swathes of verbiage to get to the main event--but I think this would probably happen with almost anything you translated from English to French. I read French better than I speak it, so I plan to find a few of his shorter works in the original French. I've read good chunks of We the Living in Italian (Noi Vivi), and of The Fountainhead in Spanish (El Manantial--in which I found at least one rather lengthy cut!) I've read almost all of Schiller's plays, in English, and I'm working on getting through them in German. I'm reading Lessing's Nathan der Weise (Nathan the Wise) in German at the moment. As you may guess, I'm somewhat of a translation snob... Gotta run, the roommates are home and they're making a beeline for the television. --Schefflera

What about the translation? I recall liking the Anthony Burgess translation when I read it about ten years ago. Any other recommendations? --Schefflera

I thought Karl killed Amelia to prevent her death at the hands of another robber. Not that that makes it any better. I just think that detail might be different from the way it was in the retelling. Schiller himself wasn't too fond of <i>The Robbers.</i> --Schefflera

I find it amusing, too. It wouldn't have been as funny if I had called myself Dracaena Warneckii or Chamaedora Elegans. --Schefflera What kind of landscaping are you in? Are you stuck in a hedge? hiding in a topiary? standing knee-deep in overgrown groundcover? --Schefflera

Well, I didn't want to use my real name, because I wanted to be relatively free to discuss personal events and issues without worrying about protecting other people's privacy. But I'm not attached enough to a particular word or phrase to make it my 'nym, so I decided to pick one that had as few connotations and extraneous meanings as possible. --Schefflera

You've got my sentence backwards; I was calling the religious person "terribly mistaken," and the Libertarian "annoyingly mistaken." But I was attempting to be funny in doing so. Perhaps it would have come across more clearly if I put a smiley face at the end of the sentence. I feel silly doing that. --Schefflera

No, because it would be more impossible to have a relationship with the Libertarian. I could love someone who was terribly mistaken, but not someone who was annoyingly mistaken. --Schefflera

First, let me say that I haven't even read the whole thread. If you read my post and think that the view I am arguing against is one that I found in your post, please do not reply and tell me that it's not what you said. I am making generalizations. If the shoe doesn't fit, please don't wear it. It hurts your feet and it's not good for the shoe, either. I get the impression that some people (here and elsewhere) think that being an Objectivist gives you an automatic +5 "Romantically Desirable" modifier. Not necessarily one that other people can see, of course, but <i>objectively</i> speaking, you're just...worth more. You're exchanging values for values, but the non-Objectivist is getting a bargain. So there is consideration of whether the non-Objectivist can or will eventually come up to the Objectivist's standards; how involved the Objectivist should become; whether it's better to wait and hope, or to have a relationship and hope that the non-Objectivist will become "more rational." Et cetera. I would like to read and participate in a discussion that involved more concrete, detailed discussion of the qualities--other than a person's stated explicit philosophy--that make a romantic relationship possible and enjoyable. --Schefflera

Toll! Wo sind sie? --Schefflera

Well, there are already neo-Nazis (as there are in the United States, too), but I don't think you were referring to the fringe. When you say "people in Germany," it sounds like you mean the majority of Germans. On what are you basing your prediction? --Schefflera

"Appreciate" can mean a lot of things. To be honest, I am wondering right now whether jealousy is your actual problem, or whether you are with someone who's trying to make you feel like you shouldn't be jealous if he is sexually involved with other women. I don't mean just having an affair, I mean looking at porn, or fantasizing about other women, or "flirting" with them. --Schefflera

I used to assume that if someone read the same thing I read, and they said they "agreed with it" or "liked it," then they believed as I did, and probably even had similar tastes. I didn't notice myself making this assumption, of course. By the time I figured out what I was doing, I'd made some decisions that I wouldn't have otherwise. (If you're at all clever, that last sentence was an easy exercise in reading between the lines.) The reason I decided to spend some time reading and participating in this board, is to train myself to stop automatically inferring things about people who "like Ayn Rand."

I think we're miscommunicating. I'm not debating whether it's <i>true</i> that if she broke up with you, she would be miserable. That would be silly for me to do. I don't know either of you. What I was trying to point out is literally the unattractive quality of the remark, "If you lost me, you'd be miserable." For one thing, any sentient human resents being <i>told</i> what they feel or think. For another, it comes across as very "needy." Believe me--it's not just Objectivist women who think that clingy men aren't. And finally, think about all that remark implies. It's very close to saying, "Without me, you're nothing." --Schefflera (Edited to turn HTML on for italics.)

Were you replying to my comment? I was not rhetorically asking why you told her that. It was a real question. --Schefflera

From Dorothy Parker: I'd rather fail my Wassermann test Than read a poem by Edgar Guest.

For those who speak German. (Nobody said this had to be in English.) Friedrich Rueckert--"Kehr' ein bei mir!" Du bist die Ruh', Der Friede mild, Die Sehnsucht du, Und was sie stillt. Ich weihe dir Voll Lust und Schmerz Zur Wohnung hier Mein Aug' und Herz. Kehr' ein bei mir, Und schliesse du Still hinter dir Die Pforten zu. Treib' andern Schmerz Aus dieser Brust! Voll sei dies Herz Von deiner Lust. Dies Augenzelt Von deinem Glanz Allein erhellt, O fuell' es ganz. Translation, copyright 2005 by "Schefflera Arboricola." I am choosing to translate as literally as I can, rather than giving a more poetic translation. You are repose, And sweet peace, You are longing, And what stills it. I dedicate to you, Full of joy and pain, As a dwelling, My eyes and heart. Alight with me, And close Quietly behind you The portals. Drive other pain From this breast, Fill this heart With your joy. The temple of my eyes By your glance Alone is filled. Oh, fill it wholly.

I've built all the computers I've owned, and I use Linux because it's free. I'd have to pay for Windows. I use Slackware, because it was the first distribution I got my hands on. Also, I had heard it was the most "difficult" of all the distributions, and usually the things that people call "difficult" are the things I find easy. --Schefflera

Why did you tell her that? It's a very unattractive comment. --Schefflera