Tag Archives: language

‘It’s More Than It Initially Appears’

Posted on November 11, 2022 by JMN

The comment attributed to a museum director about Jennifer Guidi’s painting reminded me of Mark Twain’s remark that Wagner’s music is “better than it sounds.” “I’m thinking of color as a way to connect — a way to engage — … Continue reading →

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Rough Handling of Paint

Posted on November 9, 2022 by JMN

[His] early Sugar Bowl, Pears and Blue Cup (1865-70)… shows Cézanne seeing and painting in a relatively traditional way. Apart from the rougher handling of paint, it is a close relative of traditional scenes like Harmen Steenwyck’s… (Matthew Wilson) I … Continue reading →

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The Zephyr Soughs My True Love’s Name: Saoirse… Saoirse… Saoirse…

Posted on November 8, 2022 by JMN

Step aside, Italian. Fair English, most mellifluous of tongues, is queen of poesy and opera. (c) 2022 JMN — EthicalDative. All rights reserved

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‘O Thou There, Who Barkest at the Bènū ‘s Sīd’

Posted on November 5, 2022 by JMN

Below is jargon improvised for gauging how a translation navigates its source text. Note how the verbiage is strewn with hedging adverbials, conceding a priori that the labels are judgments, which by definition are subjective, privative, compromised, blinkered and fallible. … Continue reading →

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The Case for Rhythm and Emptiness

Posted on November 1, 2022 by JMN

Brazilian artist Maxwell Alexandre speaks of how exposure to Kerry James Marshall’s painting made him aware of “an absence of representation. You would ask a Black kid to draw a person and he would draw a white person… Just by … Continue reading →

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The Precedent: El Precedente

Posted on October 28, 2022 by JMN

Traducción:“Don’t talk to me that way!”Translation:“¡No me hables así!” Traducción:I’m the Precedent of the Unighted Steaks!”Translation:¡Soy Precedente de los Bistecs Anochecidos!” Traducción:Don’t EVER talk to the Precedent that way!”Translation:¡No le hables NUNCA al Precedente de esa manera!” (Filtered from the … Continue reading →

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Three Deaths

Posted on October 23, 2022 by JMN

Angela Lansbury (1925 – 2022): ActorPatrick Healy, theater reporter and deputy Opinion writer for The New York Times, recounts how the actor gamely and gracefully confronted the vulnerabilities of advancing age in pursuing her long career (1). In the past … Continue reading →

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When Is a Viper Just a Snake?

Posted on October 21, 2022 by JMN

I share my neck of the world with rattlesnakes, water moccasins, copperheads, coral snakes (red-on-yellow, kill a fellow) and cottonmouths. I can’t tell a moccasin from a cottonmouth — they frequent water, and I don’t. When I see one of … Continue reading →

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Je pense, donc je blague

Posted on October 19, 2022 by JMN

When I’m tempted to post something here with greater frequency than usual, I ask myself: Am I in thrall to a voracious craving for plaudits? Am I a prelapsarian Ozymandias? An attention-seeking missile? Look what I’ve thought — done! — … Continue reading →

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The ‘Burden of Exegesis’

Posted on October 15, 2022 by JMN

There is almost nothing to see, and yet everything is there. (Laura Cumming) Cumming gives a lyrical account of her responses to Cezanne. (I learn from her that the artist dropped the acute accent from his name in his signature.) … Continue reading →

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