Christa to take plunge, bungee cord left at home.

My little sister's getting married!

But she's not in grade school anymore. Wendy and I are driving up to Oklahoma for the shindig. We're looking forward to seeing family gathered from the ends of the earth. And we are especially excited for Christa and Joe!

There will be veritable mountains of cake, right?

Backyard possum

I noticed a possum rooting around in our backyard when I got up this morning. They are nocturnal creatures, and the sun was just beginning to peek over the eastern horizon. Wendy thinks they're ugly, but I have a soft spot for possums. A sixth-grade substitute teacher brought his pet possum to our science class. I decided it was one of the coolest possums I had ever seen. Nevermind that a possum once stood and hissed at me when I caught it scrounging through the trash on our back porch at the B-Side in Valparaiso. I told it to shove off and placed the lid firmly back on the trash can. It stayed right where it was. (There was always great potential for confrontation with nature at the B-Side.)

I left the window to find Wendy's digital camera, and the possum left. I should have stayed to see where it went. I have a sneaky suspicion it's living under the trailer. Here's a photo of a very similar possum courtesy of the Missouri Botanical Garden:

My friend Tim Roberts told me about a time his mom and dad, newly wed, were living in a trailer over in Seminole. A possum had taken up residence under their domicile, and they decided they had to get rid of it (can't remember why). In the middle of a Florida summer, they cranked the heat of the mobile home to exorcise the beast. As it fled its sweltering confines and sprinted out from under the trailer, Tim's dad slew it with a fake tourist's sword. Something like that. Welcome to life in northwest Florida.

Fortunately, I won't ever have to dispatch an unwelcome creature (at least of that size) with a heavy, blunt object meant for displaying on your mantel. At least, not at the Trailer of Paradise. That's the beauty of renting. That's the landlady's job.

Whatever happened to the silent "o" at the front of possum? You know, "opossum." Obviously, possum is short of opposum. Not sure who decided that one. According to the 2006 Random House Unabridged Dictionary (that is, according to dictionary.com - yes, I cheat for backyard fauna), opossum is Virginia Algonquin for "white dog."

Post-rock bedtime stories

I've always thought Slint's post-rock masterpiece Spiderland would make a fantastic horror film soundtrack. But a kid's book? You're kidding me! The stuff of nightmares, I'm sure. Still, you'd be the coolest parents on the block if you read this stuff to your kids. Could this be the birth of a new genre: ga-ga-gothic?

History of Intellectual Culture e-journal

The University of Calgary provides a great internet resource for intellectual history with its electronic journal History of Intellectual Culture. See U.S. Intellectual History for a good summary.

Worst theologian ever

I rarely read comments on other blogs (except for my family members' blogs - I love you guys!). They tend to act as a forum for unending exhibitions of vituperation and ignorance, though I suppose I have been known to contribute in my day. (Wheaton professor Alan Jacobs made some insightful observations on the nature of blogging in a 2006 Books & Culture article, calling it "the friend of information but the enemy of thought." Not one to toss the baby with the bath water, Jacobs blogs at more than 95 theses and contributes to The American Scene.)

However, I found myself completely absorbed by the comments on a recent post at Inhabitatio Dei, provocatively titled "The Worst Theologian Ever?" I fully expected the comments to descend into a firestorm of name-calling... which they did, but not necessarily in a bad way. The commentors provided a fascinating gallery of controversial theologians, who are also often the most interesting.

I think the aforementioned "firestorm" began in the best possible way with a commentor named Andrew replying simply, "me." (As another commentor pointed out, "Very Chesterton-esque.") Dan Belcher brought some much-needed gravitas to the discussion:

"Doesn’t this just play to our already bent prone toward scapegoating?... Isn’t this simply a clever ruse on our part to divert attention away from our own complicity with and to the destruction of “the church,” or perhaps of faithfulness to the community that professes obedience to the Word of God? It also seems to be a way for people to prop up or repristinate their already entrenched biases."

Wise words. All in all, a bracing discussion. I even read the comments all the way to the end. I, of course, know next to nothing about the esoteric end of theology (which contains the vast majority of theological thought), nor of the vast panoply of theologians throughout history. However, if pressed, I would cast my vote for Charles Finney. Then me.

Notes on the Kinks, Britishness, and nostalgia

The Kinks' magnum opus Village Green Preservation Society displays a certain irony toward the idea of Britishness (Englishness?), slyly unmasking nostalgia as something not quite real, yet acknowledging something very real (an ideal? a virtue?) lying behind the nostalgia. Muswell Hillbillies does not maintain this ironic distance, idealizing the lost values of pre-industrial England with little hint of skeptism. Arthur, however, is highly critical of Great Britain's legacy. Note the subtitle: Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire. Arthur, from what I understand, was largely influenced by the Davies' sister's move to Australia.

Lola vs. the Powerman & the Money-Go-Round is an oddity couched between Arthur and Muswell Hillibillies. Though mostly known for spawning the goofy transvestite song "Lola," the album is largely a bitter fusillade against the recording industry (and one should not ignore the accusatory subtext roiling beneath "Lola's" veneer of absurdity). This is a very personal album in a different way than the preceding Kinks' albums in that it explicitly confronts immediate difficulties in the life of the band. The grand, abstract theme of Britishness has receded, although Ray Davies still anchors many of the album's songs to concrete references to British life (names, places, etc.). Lola's songs about the recording industry level a direct charge of greed and casuistry at anyone with whom the Kinks had to share their profits.

The other songs on Lola are more abstract and generally deal with a longing for escape. "Apeman," the first truly regrettable Kinks song, prefigures the primitivism of the following album, Muswell Hillbillies, which constitutes a full-fledged retreat from modern industrial society and handles the theme with infinitely greater charm and intelligence. "Lola" seems to summarize the confusion at the heart of the album.

Stone on Georgia conflict at HNN

"There is a great deal of blame to go around for the disastrous war over South Ossetia. Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili deserves the greatest share, for starting a war to reassert control over South Ossetia that Russia can now finish on its own terms."

This from David Stone at History News Network. I have to agree. Saakashvili has demonstrated an uncanny ability to unhinge diplomacy with rash statements and actions. Nevertheless, as Stone then states, Russia has taken the opportunity to exercise the utmost tyranny. He goes on to note the role of precedents set by American actions in Kosovo. Ah, that fateful law of unintended consequences!

Russia without honor

Russia has clearly violated the Olympic Truce (among others). Should not the Russian Olympic athletes be stripped of their medals and banned from the Beijing games?

Gulf South Conference 2008 presentation

Here is the abstract for my paper presentation at the upcoming 2008 Gulf South History & Humanities Conference in Galveston, Texas, in October:

Paper Title: Palmetto Beach: Pensacola’s Electric Park

Abstract: As the use of electricity swept across the American urban landscape at the turn of the twentieth century, many trolley companies established amusement parks – illuminated wonderlands powered by electricity – as getaways from the drudgery of urban life. Pensacola was no exception. The Pensacola Electric Company, which ran a trolley line from downtown Pensacola to nearby Fort Barrancas, established Electric Park at nearby Palmetto Beach in 1905, followed by Palmetto Beach Amusement Park in 1909. While each park proved popular with Pensacola residents, both ventures were short-lived. Drawing upon contemporary accounts and documents, this paper explores the story of Palmetto Beach’s amusement attractions within the broader socio-economic context of turn-of-the-century Pensacola as it transformed into a modern city. This work also seeks to locate the place of Palmetto Beach within the national amusement park trend. While relying heavily upon primary sources such as legal documents, newspaper reports, and other eyewitness accounts, this paper also engages current scholarly work on both turn-of-the-century Pensacola and the history of American amusement parks.

Bereft of bossa nova

I knew this dreary moment would arrive sooner or later. My wife Wendy has tired of bossa nova. How can anyone find "Vivo Sonhando" or "Agua de Beber" wearisome? Even when I play it all day everyday? Well, I guess "Girl from Ipanema" gets pretty old (thanks for ruining it, Sinatra). Gilberto, Getz, and Jobim will have to take a break on the shelf for a while. But they shall return. Oh yes. (Don't tell Wendy.)

Thankfully, there's always some Berlin IDM (does anyone still use that term?) to fill the void.

Theopolitical thoughts on Walker Percy

Davey Henrickson at Theopolitical makes a great case for reading of Walker Percy, one of my favorite novelists, theologically. (Be sure to read parts 2 and 3.) For a jaunty discussion of Percy's classic first novel, The Moviegoer, check out the NYT Reading Room.



In other news, my favorite tea of the moment, Stash Acai Berry.

Whigs and teleology

In his essay "The Writing of Early Modern European Intellectual History, 1945-1995," (in Routledge's wonderful 1997 Companion to Historiography, edited by Michael Bentley), Daniel Woolf notes that much 20th-century intellectual history exhibits a certain teleology, or a temptation to interpret the history of scholarship as "inherently progressive, marching towards the modern system of critical research and evaluation of evidence." It seems that he refers to the same fallacy as Butterfield's Whig interpretation of history. If so, teleology seems a much more fitting term, or at least more universal. Is "teleology" now the common parlance, and at what point did it supersede "Whig interpretation?"

So long, Pauline Baynes

The Eerdmans August newsletter reports:

Children’s book illustrator Pauline Baynes passed away on August 1, 2008, at the age of 85. Baynes drew the original line illustrations for J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings and C. S. Lewis’s The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Her portrayals of Middle-earth and Narnia helped transform the books into towering classics which, in 2000, were voted Book of the Millennium and Children’s Book of the Millennium respectively by the Library Association in Great Britain. Baynes was also awarded a Kate Greenaway Medal for the Dictionary of Chivalry.

I first encountered Pauline Baynes when I first noticed the Narnia Chronicles sitting on Pastor Wine's (yes, funny name for a Baptist, but Stewart Wine is a funny guy) desk in the study of our wonderfully creepy nineteenth-century English church building - a great setting for an introduction to Ms. Baynes. Her work possesses a style that struck me as peculiar even as a third-grader - otherworldly, yet quite welcoming; playful, yet most serious (not unlike the effect of medieval art). Perhaps I'm making too much weather out of her work. Regardless, her illustrations are infinitely superior to the melodramatic teen-romance schlock, completely lacking in mythic quality, that currently disgrace the covers of Lewis' classic series.

Read Baynes' obituaries in The Guardian, The Independent, and The Telegraph. You can spy samples of her classic work at the Tolkien Library. I wonder if Ms. Baynes may have provided some inspiration for Tolkien's exultant short story "Leaf by Niggle."

EXTRA: Be sure to check out Brian Sibley's post on Pauline Baynes, complete with cool photo.

History habits + Jack Boykin

While this blog chronicles general aspects of my life and thought that I feel worth mentioning, I will be funneling my writings on history into my Historiographically Speaking blog. Be on the lookout for more frequent posts on history and historians by the end of the month.

In other news, congratulations to Brad and Jordan Boykin on their new baby boy, Jack!

Yikes! I'm honored: Notes... joins the coveted Cliopatria blogrolll

The pleasantly unexpected happened today (always a welcome experience). I scrolled down the History News Network's esteemed pantheon of history blogs, the Cliopatria blogroll, and a very familiar title caught my eye: Notes from the Front Porch. This little corner of the mobile home has caught the attention of powers on high! How did that happen? I am honored, perplexed, and very glad to be included. But does this mean I'll have to behave?

I never imagined this blog would end up there. It began as a chronicle of my reading habits and has since become a chronicle of my habits in general (at least those that don't embarrass Wendy). Notes... does not strike me as a very historical blog. Perhpas that is why it has been assigned to the Academic Lives section. In that case, it does seem fitting. I am academic... I live... ergo... Thanks, Cliopatria! I guess I'll have to tone down my anti-Adamson screeds.

History News Network is a great website. I may or may not be an addict.

Tudor antiquaries for the 21st century

Somebody needs to publish a critical edition of Camden's Britannia. Sounds like a job for Boydell Press. (By the way, I used to live in Woodbridge. Right down the road from Sutton Hoo.) While they're at it, let's have new critical editions of Leland's Itineraries, Lambarde's Perambulation of Kent, and Stow's Survey of London. I think it's time for some fresh readings of these classic antiquarian texts.

Butterfield on history

"History is not the study of origins; rather it is the analysis of all the mediations by which the past was turned into our present."
-Herbert Butterfield, The Whig Interpretation of History

Goodbye Solzhenitsyn

A hero fell today: Alexandr Solzhenitsyn, prophetic scourge of the late Soviet Empire (and, in many ways, of the waning American Empire), died today at the age of 89. He burst upon the international literary scene in 1962 with One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, a book about life in the Siberian gulag. I read it years ago, but as I recall, it's a strangely optimistic book in the sense that grace, brotherhood, and love of life thrive even amidst horrible political oppression. It's also one of the few (only?) classics of 20th-century literature that portrays a Baptist in a positive light.

After publishing One Day in the Life in the Soviet Union, Solzhenitsyn defected to the United States and exposed the horrific conditions behind the Iron Curtain. Though it's hard to believe today, many Western intellectuals embraced the Soviet experiment even up to that time. However, Solzhenitsyn's courage to tell the truth of the ill-fated Russian communist experiment played a key role in the thaw of the Cold War and the fall of the Soviet Union.

Be sure to read his 1978 Harvard address. Also check out the Solzhenitsyn Reader. And here is a lengthy eulogy from the New York Times.

(I received the news via telephone from Tokyo - thanks for the tip, Josh.)

Historiographically speaking...

You may have noticed that I have foreshortened my Blogarium considerably. I've moved the history blog links to my new blog, Historiographically Speaking, where you can catch all the history action. For all things Alconbury (my high school alma mater), see the Alconbury Digital Archive. For everything else involving the world of Bill Clifton, you're right where you need to be.

Bibliography: "Historical Revolution Revisited"

I intend to revisit my revisitation and expand it into an article for publication within the year. In the meantime, here is a working bibliography:

Books
Baker, Herschel. The Race of Time: Three Lectures on Renaissance Historiography. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1967.

Bentley, Michael, ed. Companion to Historiography. London: Routledge, 1997.

Butterfield, Herbert. The Whig Interpretation of History. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1965.

Ferguson, Arthur B. The Articulate Citizen and the English Renaissance. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1965.

Ferguson, Arthur B. Clio Unbound: Perception of the social and cultural past in Renaissance England. Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press, 1979.

Fussner, F. Smith. The Historical Revolution: English Historical Writing and Thought 1580-1640. New York: Columbia University Press, 1962.

Fussner, F. Smith. Tudor History and the Historians. New York: Basic Books, Inc., 1970.

Gransden, Antonia. Historical Writing in England, c. 1307 to the Early Sixteenth Century. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1982.

Hay, Denys. Annalists and Historians: Western Historiography from the Eighth to the Eighteenth Centuries. London: Methuen & Co. Ltd, 1977.

Herendeen, Wyman H. William Camden: A Life in Context. Woodbridge, UK: The Boydell Press, 2007.

Hill, Christopher. Intellectual Origins of the English Revolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1965.

Kelley, Donald R. Foundations of Modern Historical Scholarship: Language, Law, and History in the French Renaissance. New York: Columbia University Press, 1970.

Kelley, Donald R. Versions of History from Antiquity to the Enlightenment. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1991.

Levine, Joseph M. Humanism and History: Origins of Modern English Historiography. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1987.

Levy F. J. Tudor Historical Thought. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2004.

McKisack, May. Medieval History in the Tudor Age. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971.

Patterson, Annabel. Nobody’s Perfect: A New Whig Interpretation of History. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2002.

Pocock, J. G. A. The Ancient Constitution and the Feudal Law: English Historical Thought in the Seventeenth Century. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1967.

Woolf, D. R. The Idea of History in Early Stuart England: Erudition, Ideology, and ‘The Light of Truth’ from the Accession of James I to the Civil War. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990.

Woolf, D. R. Reading History in Early Modern England. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.


Articles
Clark, Stuart, “Bacon’s Henry VII: A Case-Study in the Science of Man.” History and Theory (May 1974).

Colie, R. L., “Review of The Historical Revolution by F. Smith Fussner.” Political Science Quarterly (June 1963).

Douglas, David, “Review of The Historical Revolution by F. Smith Fussner.” The English Historical Review (April 1964).

Eisenstein, Elizabeth L., “The Advent of Printing and the Problem of the Renaissance.” Past and Present (November 1969).

Elton, G. R., “Review of Tudor History and the Historians by F. Smith Fussner.” History and Theory (1971).

Elton, G. R., “Review of Clio Unbound by Arthur B. Ferguson.” History and Theory (1981).

Farnell, James E., “The Social and Intellectual Basis of London’s Role in the English Civil Wars.” The Journal of Modern History (December 1977).

Ferguson, Arthur B., “Review of Tudor History and the Historians by F. Smith Fussner.” Renaissance Quarterly (Winter 1971).

Finlayson, Michael, “Clarendon, Providence and the Historical Revolution.” Albion (Winter 1990).

Fussner, F. Smith, “Review of Tudor Historical Thought by F. J. Levy.” History and Theory, Vol. 8, No. 3 (1969), pp. 371-387.

Kelley, Donald R., “History, English Law and the Renaissance.” Past and Present (November 1974).

Lewin, Joan, “Review of The Historical Revolution by F. Smith Fussner.” British Journal of Educational Studies (May 1963).

MacCaffrey, Wallace T., “Review of Medieval History in the Tudor Age by May McKisack.” Journal of Interdisciplinary History (1972).

MacCaffrey, Wallace T., “Review of Tudor History and the Historians by F. Smith Fussner, Political History: Principles and Practices by G. R. Elton.” Journal of Interdisciplinary History (Winter 1972).

Mendyk, Stan, “Early British Chorography.” Sixteenth Century Journal (Winter 1986).

Nadel, George H. “Review of The Historical Revolution by F. Smith Fussner.” History and Thought (1963).

Preston, Joseph H., “Was there an Historical Revolution?” Journal of the History of Ideas, Vol. 38, No. 2, (April – June, 1977): pp. 353-364.

Schiffman, Zachary Sayre, “An Anatomy of the Historical Revolution in Renaissance France.” Renaissance Quarterly (Autumn 1989).

Southgate, W. M., “Review of Tudor Historical Thought by F. J. Levy.” The Journal of Modern History (March 1964).

Stearns, Raymond P., “Review of The Historical Revolution by F. Smith Fussner.” History and Theory (1963).

Sypher, G. Wylie, “Similarities between the Scientific and the Historical Revolutions at the end of the Renaissance.” Journal of the History of Ideas, Vol. 26, No. 3 (July – September, 1965), pp. 353-368.

Thomas, Keith, “Review of Tudor Historical Thought by F. J. Levy.” The Review of English Studies (February 1969).

Tinkler, John F., “The Rhetorical Method of Francis Bacon’s History of the Reign of King Henry VII.” History and Theory (February 1987).

Trevor-Roper, H. R., “Review of Intellectual Origins of the English Revolution by Christopher Hill.” History and Theory (1966).

Woolf, Daniel R., “Speech, Text, and Time: The Sense of Hearing and the Sense of the Past in Renaissance England.” Albion (Summer 1986).

Woolf, Daniel R., “Erudition and the Idea of History in Renaissance England.” Renaissance Quarterly (Spring 1987).

Woolf, Daniel R., “Review of Humanism and History by Joseph M. Levine.” Albion (Autumn 1987).

Woolf, Daniel R., “The ‘Common Voice:’ History, Folklore and Oral Tradition in Early Modern England.” Past and Present (August 1988).

Woolf, Daniel R., “Review of Utter Antiquity by Arthur B. Ferguson.” Albion (Winter 1993).

Woolf, Daniel R., “The Writing of Early Modern European Intellectual History, 1945-1995.” Companion to Historiography. London: Routledge, 1997.

Historical Revolution Revisited

A summary of a recent seminar paper, "Historical Revolution Revisited: The Waning Influence of F. Smith Fussner in Tudor-Stuart Historiography":

We moderns view history, the past, notions of continuity and change in time, etc., very differently from, well, people in the past. The medieval understanding in particular stood in opposition (and was in some ways superior) to our modern notions of time. (Medievals overemphasized permanence, we overemphasize change.) The Renaissance/Reformation was an imporant transitional period for the understanding and writing of history. The many intellectual, social, and material innovations that occurred during the 15th, 16th, and 17th centuries (especially the 16th, in my opinion) caused a shift in our understanding of the past and our relationship to it, and they paved the way for the creation of the modern discipline of historical studies.

Where does my paper fit into this? The big debate is whether the shifts in ideas and practices in history (and in the Renaissance in general) were gradual or punctuated, evolutionary or revolutionary, political or intellectual or social or material, etc. How should we define this shift in historical understanding? F. Smith Fussner, professor of history at Reed College (at the time), published his book The Historical Revolution: English Historical Writing and Thought 1580-1640 in 1962, arguing that nothing short of a "historical revolution" analogous to the widely-acknowledged "scientific revolution" occurred in England between 1580 and 1640 (or 1660, as he sometimes suggests - F. Smith, will you make up your mind!).

Fussner's thesis proved very influential among early modern historians. This is not to say that everyone agreed with him. Some scholars bought his argument in its entirety, and some completely rejected it, arguing that shifts in historical understanding in this time were mere extensions of medieval thought. Most, however, disagreed with specifics of his thesis, yet agreed that significant changes (often amounting to a "revolution" of some sort) definitely occurred in historical understanding and practices during this period. My paper basically tracks these arguments among 20th-century historians from Fussner's 1962 book to Wyman H. Herendeen's 2007 book William Camden.

Basically, my paper is a historiographical survey (a history of historians) of 20th-century historians on 16th-century historians (a history of histories of historians). Bracing stuff, indeed.

Revisiting the historical revolution revisited...

I turned my paper in Tuesday morning. Huzzah! However, Dr. Daniel Miller, my supervising professor, still needs to read and approve it. He may suggest significant changes. This merry-go-round has not yet stopped.

What is this paper, you ask? I'll explain it briefly. We moderns view history, the past, notions of continuity and change in time, etc., very differently from, well, people in the past. The medieval understanding in particular stood in opposition (and was in some ways superior) to our modern notions of time. (Medievals overemphasized permanence, we overemphasize change.) The Renaissance/Reformation was an imporant transitional period for the understanding and writing of history. The many intellectual, social, and material innovations that occurred during the 15th, 16th, and 17th centuries (especially the 16th, in my opinion) caused a shift in our understanding of the past and our relationship to it, and they paved the way for the creation of the modern discipline of historical studies.

Where does my paper, "Historical Revolution Revisited: The Waning Influence of F. Smith Fussner in Tudor-Stuart Historiography," fit into this? The big debate is whether the shifts in ideas and practices in history (and in the Renaissance in general) were gradual or punctuated, evolutionary or revolutionary, political or intellectual or social or material, etc. How to define this shift in historical understanding? F. Smith Fussner, professor of history at Reed College (at the time), published his book The Historical Revolution: English Historical Writing and Thought 1580-1640 in 1962, arguing that nothing short of a "historical revolution" analogous to the widely-acknowledged "scientific revolution" occurred in England between 1580 and 1640 (or 1660, as he sometimes suggests - F. Smith, will you make up your mind!).

Fussner's thesis proved very influential among early modern historians. This is not to say that everyone agreed with him. Some scholars bought his argument in its entirety, and some completely rejected it, arguing that shifts in historical understanding in this time were mere extensions of medieval thought. Most, however, disagreed with specifics of his thesis, yet agreed that significant changes (often amounting to a "revolution" of some sort) definitely occurred in historical understanding and practices during this period. My paper basically tracks these arguments among 20th-century historians from Fussner's 1962 book to Wyman H. Herendeen's 2007 book William Camden.

Basically, my paper is a historiographical survey (a history of historians) on 20th-century historians on 16th-century historians (a history of histories of historians). Bracing stuff, indeed.