three days off and now back to work. strange to say i'm looking forward to it, but it's true. there are all these fixtures i want to dust. i'm looking out the front window at a pirate ship. that's what it looks like, sans jolly roger. the masts are hung with white sheeting, a crow's nest sits atop it all, prow long and thin... i almost hear the bellowing call of the yeoman, booming across the deck. there was some sort of reenactment the other day. two such ships met each other in the bay and shot cannon fire (no cannons, of course) at each other. the sun was so bright behind them, i couldn't see. only heard the boom and boom as we walked - the whole family - along the bluff to my favorite taco shop. (whereupon i stuffed myself sick, as usual.)
because you were all wondering what I'm writing my dissertation on, here's a brief synopsis of my 'research context': When James Macpherson published his Fragments of Ancient Poetry in 1760, he went to great lengths to make the Fragments appear to be authentic remains of an ancient, heroic oral tradition. His reasons for this were largely political, and as such, influenced the content of the epics themselves. As an attempt to establish a particularly Scottish identity, the poems were quite effective. However, to do so required both a simplification and a manipulation of traditional mythology. Stripped of anagogical significance, the Ossian epics more or less represented an Enlightenment version of history, tradition, and mythic heritage. The stories themselves were changed by their very purpose and in turn changed the manner of representing myth in future narratives. Moreover, the emphasis on the Ossian epics as authentic tales from the past, as ‘fragments,’ served...
Beware the fish tacos! Arrrrrrg!
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