Fortnightly Books Index 2024

 Like last year (and indeed even more so than last year), this was a busy year with a highly irregular schedule that chopped my time up into little bits; this is the worst possible situation for the Fortnightly Book, and, indeed, for the first time the series essentially stalled out at the end of the year. Even before that time, the year had a fair number of three-week and even four-week 'fortnights'. I am hoping that next year is a bit more amenable, and that I won't be forced to convert this series into the Sesquifortnightly Book. Nonetheless, the series covered significant ground, with literature from Britain, Norway, Italy, America, Germany, and Greece. I think the Christiad was the one I most enjoyed, although partly because it was a much stronger work than I had been expecting from comments about it, followed by Wace's Roman de Brut; of the re-reads, I think I came to appreciate a great deal more about The Last Unicorn than I previously had.

January 7: Iris Murdoch, A Fairly Honourable Defeat
Introduction, Review

January 28: Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island
Introduction, Review

February 11: Mortimer J. Adler, Philosopher at Large
Introduction, Review

February 25: Sigrid Undset, Saga of Saints
Introduction, Review

March 17: Marco Girolama Vida, Christiad
Introduction, Review

March 31: Peter Christen Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Engebretsen Moe, The Complete and Original Norwegian Folktales of Asbjørnsen & Moe
Introduction, Review

April 14: Blind Harry, The Wallace
Introduction, Review

May 19: Bede, Ecclesiastical History of the English People
Introduction, Review

June 9: Peter S. Beagle, The Last Unicorn
Introduction, Review

June 23: Eric Nguyen, Things We Lost the Water
Introduction, Review

July 7: Wace, Roman de Brut
Introduction, Review

July 28: Michael Flynn, In the Belly of the Whale
Introduction, Review

August 18: Hartmann von Aue, Arthurian Romances, Tales, and Poetry: The Complete Works of Hartmann von Aue
Introduction, Review

September 8: The Saga of the Jomsvikings
Introduction, Review

September 22: Charles Dickens, Sketches by Boz
Introduction, Review

October 27: Euripides, Three Great Plays by Euripides: Medea, Hippolytus, Helen
Introduction, Review

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Fortnightly Books Index 2023

Fortnightly Books Index 2022

Fortnightly Books Index 2021

Fortnightly Books Index 2020

Fortnightly Books Index 2019

Fortnightly Books Index 2018

Fortnightly Books Index 2017

Fortnightly Books Index 2016

Fortnightly Books Index 2015

Fortnightly Books Index 2014

Fortnightly Books Index 2012-2013

Once on the Year's Last Eve

 New Year's Eve
by Archibald Lampman

Once on the year's last eve in my mind's might
Sitting in dreams, not sad, nor quite elysian,
Balancing all 'twixt wonder and derision,
Methought my body and all this world took flight,
And vanished from me, as a dream, outright;
Leaning out thus in sudden strange decision,
I saw as it were in the flashing of a vision,
Far down between the tall towers of the night,
Borne by great winds in awful unison,
The teeming masses of mankind sweep by,
Even as a glittering river with deep sound
And innumerable banners, rolling on
Over the starry border glooms that bound
The last gray space in dim eternity. 

And all that strange unearthly multitude
Seemed twisted in vast seething companies,
That evermore with hoarse and terrible cries
And desperate encounter at mad feud
Plunged onward, each in its implacable mood
Borne down over the trampled blazonries
Of other faiths and other phantasies,
Each following furiously, and each pursued;
So sped they on with tumult vast and grim,
But ever meseemed beyond them I could see
White-haloed groups that sought perpetually
The figure of one crowned and sacrificed;
And faint, far forward, floating tall and dim,
The banner of our Lord and Master, Christ.

Evening Notes Index 2024

 My schedule the past year has been quite irregular and difficult to work around, so, as with the past two years or so, Evening Notes have tended to be rare -- it's a format that works best when I have a regular schedule that doesn't chop up my time into many little pieces. I'm hoping that the next year will give me a bit more room for it again.

November 17: Guised Being

September 20: Dwarven Economies

June 28: Olbers' Paradox

May 20: Forms of Music Listening

May 12: Frieren: Beyond Journey's End

March 27: Illocutionary Points

Evening Notes Index 2023
Evening Notes Index 2022
Evening Notes Index 2021
Evening Notes Index 2020
Evening Notes Index 2019
Evening Notes Index 2018
Evening Notes Index 2017b
Evening Notes Index 2017a

By Experience They See Principles

 Thomas Aquinas, ST 2-2.49.3 co. (my translation): 

 As said above, prudence is concerned with particular practicables. As such things are almost infinitely diverse, no one man can adequately consider them all, nor in a short time rather than through a long period of time. Thus in things relevant to prudence, man especially needs to be taught by others, and particularly by elders, who have achieved sensible understanding of practicable ends [qui sanum intellectum adepti sunt circa fines operabilium]. Thus the Philosopher says, in VI Ethic., "It is fitting to attend no less to the indemonstrable claims and opinions of experienced people who are older and prudent, than to their demonstrations, for by experience they see principles." Thus also it is said in Prov. III, "Do not lean on your own prudence"; and it is said in Eccli. VI, "Stand in the multitude of presbyters," that is, elders, "that are prudent, and join yourself from the heart to their wisdom." And this pertains to teachableness [docilitas], to be very receptive to learning. And so teachableness is appropriately posited as a part of prudence. 

 You can read the Dominican Fathers translation here.