Riba Rambles:
Musings of a Mental Magpie

Posted by Lis Riba at 10:42 AM

Since all the cool kids lots of people I know are doing this, I may as well start my own Johari Window before the server crashes from overuse.

So, there's this tool out there -- you choose a few terms from a list which you think describe you, and then you let other people who know you choose terms from the same list, and you see how they compare.

If you're interested, and you think you could pick a half-dozen adjectives or so from a list that describe me, I've set one up at http://kevan.org/johari?name=MsLis

I'd be interested in finding out how people perceive me, and how that compares to how I perceive myself.

First seen on my husband's LJ, from whom I stole some of this verbiage and whom you can also rate (if you know him).

PS: Wikipedia on Johari windows

Posted by Lis Riba at 11:01 PM

Okay, as I proposed yesterday, here's my preliminary list of recent Elizabethan Theatre Fiction for children and young adults:

#	Title	Author	Year First Published	Grade Level	Lis has Read?	Setting Year	Common cliches
							Parentless Protagonist	Crossdressing Girl	Time Travel	Shakespeare Cameo
1	Master Rosalind	John Louis Beatty	1974	n/a	Yes	?	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
2	A Murder for Her Majesty	Beth Hilgartner	1986	7-9	Yes	?	Yes	Yes	No	No
3	The Shakespeare Stealer	Gary L. Blackwood	1998	7-9	Yes	1601	Yes	No	No	Yes
4	King of Shadows	Susan Cooper	1999	4-6	Yes	1599	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
5	The Devil and his Boy	Anthony Horowitz	2000	7-9	No	1593	Yes	No	No	Yes
6	The Playmaker	J. B. Cheaney	2000	7-9	Yes	1597	Yes	No	No	Yes
7	Shakespeare's Scribe	Gary L. Blackwood	2000	7-9	Yes	1602	Yes	No	No	Yes
8	A Question of Will	Lynne Kositsky	2001	7-9	No	1595	?	Yes	Yes	Yes
9	Shakespeare and Me	Cynthia Mercati	2001	4-6	No	1599	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
10	Isabel: Taking Wing	Annie Dalton	2002	4-6	No	1592	No	Yes	No	No
11	Meet Me at the Globe	Dalma Takács	2002	7-9	No	1605	?	?	Yes	Yes
12	Stage Fright on a Summer Night	Mary Pope Osborne	2002	3-4	No	?	No	?	Yes	Yes
13	The True Prince	J. B. Cheaney	2002	7-9	No	1598	Yes	No	No	Yes
14	The Wonderful Winter	Marchette Gaylord Chute	2002	4-6	No	1597	Yes	No	No	Yes
15	Shakespeare's Spy	Gary L. Blackwood	2003	4-6	No	1602	Yes	No	No	Yes
16	The Boy, the Bear, the Baron, the Bard	Gregory Rogers	2004	Preschool	No	?	?	?	Yes	Yes
17	Time Will Tell	Suzanne Bush	2004	n/a	No	1596	Yes	?	Yes	Yes
18	The Actor, the Rebel, and the Wrinkled Queen	Terry Deary	2005	Preschool	No	?	?	No	No	Yes
19	The Black Canary	Jane Louise Curry	2005	4-6	Yes	1600	No	No	Yes	No
20	The Secret of the Rose	Sarah L. Thomson	2006	n/a	Yes	1592	Yes	Yes	No	Yes

Warnings: Much of the information on the books' contents (timing and cliches) are guesswork based on memory (where possible), reviews, and sometimes even Amazon's search-within feature. So for now, don't put too much stock into the metadata I've provided. At least, not until I've had the chance to read more of these (again, in some cases). Or, if you notice anything obviously wrong, please leave a comment with corrections.

Also, be forewarned that I haven't quality-controlled any of these links. Several of them have reviews which are lukewarm at best.

A few notes on trends: I cannot emphasize enough what a boon the existence of boy actors on the Elizabethan stage must be for writers. Kids close to the (intended) readers' age, but in the thick of action, interacting with important people and having major roles to play, both onstage and off.

Considering how apprenticeship separated the boys from their families, it's almost surprising how many authors went the extra step to distance the leads from their parents, often to the extreme of orphaning the kid. I wonder how those stats compare to YA fiction in general.
And, of course, Shakespeare provided plenty of fodder for crossdressing and genderbending, in case an author prefers to write about a girl.

Time travel refers to any case where modern characters find themselves in Elizabethan England. It can be intentional or accidental (a la Connecticut Yankee). Again, an easy way to encourage reader-identification, and also makes exposition easier, by having a character who will actually notice things people of the time might take for granted.

I've also found about a half-dozen other books which I'm not sure whether to include. In most of these cases, I don't have enough information to tell whether the book is set amid the Elizabethan theatres or merely... relates to them. I won't list those right now, but if you know of other books that should be on this list, please let me know.

Also, if you have any further suggestions for enhancing the list, let me know. I don't yet have enough data to indicate other prominent big names, (The Black Canary features Ben Jonson, Secret of the Rose Kit Marlowe), whether Elizabeth herself appears, or other common plots (Catholic/Protestant tensions or the Earl of Essex, each in at least 3), possibly even listing which plays are mentioned in the course of the story, or even adding detailed reviews.
Alternately, maybe I should add some age restrictions and omit the picture books for preschoolers. What would you find useful?

I do regret that you can't dynamically re-sort the table, like I can in my original spreadsheet. Right now, I have the books listed chronologically, so you can see the publishing trends. [I wonder how much the opening of Shakespeare's Globe in 1997 can be credited/blamed with opening the floodgates?] But it's also quite interesting to view it by grade-level or by the year in which the story takes place.

PS: I also recalled one other possible series for the list of Adult Elizabethan theatre fics in yesterday's post -- the Nicholas Cooke series by Stephanie Cowell may qualify. Just on the off-chance that you don't care for mysteries...

Posted by Lis Riba at 7:10 AM

I was looking at the Globe Theatre's (London) 2006 season and noticed something:

• Titus Andronicus states "The production will employ Elizabethan staging, clothing and music."
• Coriolanus states "The production will employ Jacobean staging, clothing and music."

If I saw either description in isolation, I'd think duh. But together it makes me curious as to the distinction.

Historically, I know a little about how Elizabethan theatre differed from Jacobean, though mostly I associate that with the move to indoor theaters for higher-class audiences.

But as far as the modern Globe is concerned, can anybody more familiar with their productions elaborate on how they differentiate betwen Elizabethan staging and Jacobean staging?

[Crossposted to thegreatglobe]

Posted by Lis Riba at 10:15 PM

Heard on the radio during my evening commute that Lt. Gov. Kerry Healey officially announced her campaign for governor. Among her campaign proposals, she said she wanted to raise the legal age at which young people can leave high school from 16 to 18.

Allow me to introduce myself, Lt. Governor.

I graduated from high school a few weeks before my 17th birthday. [Hey, I skipped a grade.] Graduated in the top 5% of my class and with various honors.

If I had been subject to the laws you're proposing, where would that leave me?

Would I be forced to waste an extra year in high school until I met your age limit? Would've been a tremendous waste of everybody's time, since I'd already completed all my requirements, and there weren't any more advanced classes in my favorite subjects.

Would you have forced me to attend a local college solely to stay in school? If so, would the state pay for that, or would I have to pay for it out of pocket under penalty of your truancy laws?

And if my situation would be sufficient to exempt me from the rules, what about other sixteen and seventeen year olds who take their GEDs because they're ready to move on?

In short, does your proposal take into consideration those students who leave high school before 18 because they've learned twelve grades worth of material?

PS: I've been searching the Mass General Laws to find the precise rules regarding sixteen-year-olds that the LootGov's talking about changing. No luck so far. 76-1 covers school attendance but seems to state that the maximum age is set by the local board of education, not the state. Did the LootGov get it wrong, or can somebody better versed in the law point me to the correct section so I can read it for myself?

Added later: Thanks to Universal Hub, I've found a transcript of Healey's announcement speech. Here's the relevant excerpt:

"[F]ourteen percent of the children that start high school never make it to twelfth grade--and in some urban districts, the dropout rate is closer to fifteen percent. Fifty years ago, it might have made sense to let young people drop out of school at age sixteen. But today it's a different story altogether. To allow sixteen-year-olds to end their education is to sentence them to a life of disappointment, poverty, or even jail. And in fact, I've been told by some of our sheriffs who are standing here with me today that in some cases, eighty percent of the people in their jails dropped out of high school. You have to wonder where would they be instead if someone had cared about them enough to keep them in school. We don't have to write these kids off. We should raise the age of mandatory school attendance from sixteen to eighteen years old, and expand our alternative education options so that all kids can have a real shot at success in their lives."

No mention of other statutes or programs that might use that cutoff to define their target population. Also, I still haven't found where in Massachusetts the "age of mandatory school attendance" is defined (to see whether it already contains exemptions for precocious graduates), so I'm still seeking assistance with that.

Posted by Lis Riba at 9:25 PM

I just finished reading The Secret of the Rose by Sarah L. Thomson, a YA novel due out this summer. It tells the story of girl in 1592 London who disguises herself as a boy and finds work as Christopher Marlowe's scribe. I'll post a more detailed review of it later (that's, after all, why I've got this advanced copy) but I was quite impressed.

The reason for my glee, however, has nothing to do with the contents of the book.

I'm just happy because finishing this book puts me back over the halfway mark in my Marlowe in Modern Fiction list. I've read 50.9% to be exact: 29 out of 57. So, go me!

Meanwhile a recent aside by a friend has got me started compiling another list, to which The Secret of the Rose also belongs: YA Elizabethan theatre fiction.

Excluding fictionalized biographies, there are quite a few. Some may consider this a glut, but I think it demonstrates proof there's a healthy market for this kind of material. [Keep in mind, unlike adult fiction, most children's books are not purchased by the intended reader. Most children's books are bought by schools, librarians, and adult family members as gifts. Thus the bias towards entertaining books that have an edifying air -- like stories about Elizabethan theatre!]

At any rate, the list's not quite ready for posting, but I've read about a quarter of those I've found. And I keep seeing so many common themes, that I may actually provide more detail than the Marlowe list: orphaned protagonists, crossdressing heroines, time-travelling modern kids, big names making cameo appearances, Catholic-Protestant issues, the Essex rebellion... Maybe even going into specifics of which particular plays get mentioned or performed, or in what year the story's set... (would anybody outside my head find that useful?)

I briefly tried compiling a list of adult Elizabethan theatre novels, but that's proving much more difficult -- complicated by all the biographical novels about Shakespeare, and judgment calls over works already in my Marlowe List.

In short, if you're looking for adult novels about Elizabethan theatre that aren't fictionalized biographies, I can recommend a few series that should keep you going for a while:

• Philip Gooden's 6 books starring actor Nick Revill
• Simon Hawke's 4-book Shakespeare & Smythe series (a fun romp set during Shakespeare's "Lost Years")
• Edward Marston's 15-book series about Nicholas Bracewell and Lord Westfield's Men, which he's been writing since 1989.
  A 16th book is due out this August: The Princess of Denmark

Posted by Lis Riba at 12:20 PM

The Boston Globe recently published "When librarians protect terrorists," an op-ed by Richard L. Cravatts. Cravatts got all huffy because a Newton librarian refused to let law enforcement officials seize library computers without a search warrant*, and used that news to attack librarians' stance regarding the USA PATRIOT Act.

^*Context: Last month, a bomb-threat emailed to Brandeis was traced to the library's IP address. When officers first arrived, they requested the computers, but acknowledged to librarians that it wasn't urgent, time-critical, nor an immediate threat to public safety. Once the proper warrant was obtained, the library cooperated fully.

At any rate, today's Globe printed letters to the editor about that column, offering some high-quality smackdown:

WHILE I couldn't agree less with Richard Cravatts's take on the enforcement of the laws concerning privacy, I will agree with his contention that librarians know the Dewey Decimal System. That a librarian's professional training concentrates on mastering the use of the system is quite off the mark, however, and as enlightened a concept in the 21st century as starting a fire with a stone and a spark.

In any event, should he himself ever need to be catalogued, I've got a spot for him on the shelf at 621.945. That would be the 620s for Engineering, 621.9 for Tools and Fabricating Equipment, and, specifically, 621.945 for Boring Tools.

ERIKA TARLIN
Somerville

The writer is a librarian at Buckingham Browne & Nichols in Cambridge.

BRAVA! Say it, sistah!

The other letter printed today, by Barbara Bryant, also offers up some delicious snark, concluding “A librarian can also tell Mr. Cravatts that correct usage is 'different from,' not 'different than.'” [I wonder if this is the same Barbara Bryant who used to work for the Library of Congress.]

The domain registration on my Librarian Illuminati site has expired, but I feel the need to reiterate a few of my favorite quotes for Mr. Cravatts' edification:

• “Librarians are the secret masters of the world. They control information. Don't ever piss one off.”
             — Spider Robinson
   
• “What can I say? Librarians rule.”
             — Regis Philbin
   
• “Librarians rule. And they will kick the crap out of anyone who says otherwise.”
             — Erica Olsen

That last quote comes from a short manifesto titled Why you should fall to your knees and worship a librarian. I think it would behoove Mr. Cravatts to read the whole thing, in case the lesson hasn't yet sunk in.

Posted by Lis Riba at 9:11 AM

First of all, another heartwarming (though not hearthwarming) big bunny story via Channel 4 & ITN:

A rabbit breeder has become so fond of the bunny that earned him a championship title he has decided to save him from the stewing pot.

Weighing just under a stone and a half, Rudi the rabbit lives up to his rare breed name of the German Grey Giant.

He earned German breeder Erwin Teichmann the Berlin Champion title.

And its made Mr Teichmann so proud, he is taking the unusual step of not eating him.

Mr Teichmann said: "Of course animals with faults which don't fulfil the criteria as outlined in the standards wander into the pot.

But on Rudi he said: "He stays here, of course. He is the king of the barn and he will stay here for the next few years!"

Second, returning to the subject of Rex the Mountain Lion (right), didn't Bush warn against creating human-animal hybrids as one of the most egregious abuses of medical research?

When I first heard that remark, I wondered why the President hated furries so much. I mean, I know they're near the bottom of the geek hierarchy, but I didn't think they were that prominent outside fandom.

Now we know, he was actually warning others within the administration!

Maybe Capitol Critters wasn't fiction?

Posted by Lis Riba at 9:33 PM

Makes me wish for more free time of my own.

So much going on; I wish I had the time to delve into detail regarding the Danish cartoon issue; I wish I could spend all day listening to the Judiciary committee hearings, rather than just catching the wrapup snippets or liveblogged summaries...

So much I'd like to research and write; yet I can barely keep up with my reading. [I keep falling behind in my LiveJournal friendslist :( ] And I didn't even manage an obit for Betty Friedan, whose books I read back in high school.

Oh, and today is popularly observed as Christopher Marlowe's birthday. Well, today in this time zone. I think I just missed it by London time. Lots of things I meant to write up for the occasion, but I've run out of time.

I have managed to update the Marlowe in Modern Fiction List: I recently discovered a short story from 1992; via Peg Kerr's request for Elizabethan fantasy, The Player's Boy, a YA novel by Antonia Forest. Unfortunately, it was published in 1970. When I created the list, I gave it a 30-year cutoff, and the Forest book is just a shade too early. No local libraries have copies, and online booksellers are listing the book for several hundred dollars. I've included it on the page among books outside the scope of the list, but I'm not going to try to expand the list for books written between 1970 and 1976.

For people not me, I remind you of upcoming Marlowe productions:

• A Devilish Exercise, this week at the Rose Theatre, London and
• A free production of Edward II at Julliard, February 18 -- February 23 (I'll be at Boskone that weekend)

If anyone attends either, please tell me all about them.

Posted by Lis Riba at 9:11 PM

Do you read Shakespeare for fun?

About.com has a simple poll up, do you read Shakespeare for fun, yes or no.

Right now it's just about 50/50, with Yes edging out No 51% to 48% 55% to 44%. So go stuff that ballot box!

Copied from Such Shakespeare Stuff;
crossposted to Riba Rambles and shaksper_random

Posted by Lis Riba at 7:15 PM

Well, the Department of Homeland Security has revealed their new mascots for the kids' section of Ready.gov.

Now, I was a teenager in the 1980s, watching New Wave music on MTV and attending a school whose mascot was the Florida cougar.

But even I can tell he's wearing a little too much eyeliner... And notice how he's posing in this shot.

According to DHS, Rex is an explorer and all-around athlete. He loves making friends and playing music. He's also best friend with Hector, whose only interests are speed and picking up chicks -- although the site describes this pursuit in nongendered terms: "When not exploring with Rex, Hector can usually be found on a limb trying to catch the attention of a pretty love bird." Uh-hunh.

Let's see how long this lasts.

Meanwhile, several other executive branch departments have gotten together to create 4parents.gov as "part of a new national public education campaign to provide parents with the information, tools and skills they need to help their teens make the healthiest choices."

In other words, sex ed abstinence and anti-drug messages.

Via Steve Gilliard, I found this page of Conversation Starters, designed to encourage parents to talk with their kids about abstinence.

World O'Crap provides the snarky answers to these stupid questions. A few excerpts:

4parents.gov: “They never talk about STDs on that television show, even though they have lots of stuff about sex. Have you heard about anybody at your school who has gotten an STD?”

Well, have you?  Come on, dish on your peers -- I want to hear all the STD gossip!  Anyway, I heard that Jenny Roberts caught the clap - she's such a slut!  And they say that the Anderson boy's dick had a nasty sore on it a couple of weeks after he went all the way with that red-headed cheerleader ... you know, the one who has crabs.  There really are a lot of skanks at your school.

Now, wasn't it fun to spread rumors and defame your classmates?  But remember, if you ever have sex, the skank everyone is slandering could be YOU!

4parents.gov: “I heard that there was a wild party last weekend after the game. Have your friends been talking about it? Did you know that alcohol and drugs really increase the chances of having sex and geting a disease?”

How did I hear about that wild party?  Oh, I have my sources.  Warrantless wiretaps aren't just for catching al Qaeda affiliates, you know.

4parents.gov: “I overheard a couple of kids from the neighborhood saying that, if you're dating someone, you have to have sex with them in order to prove that you're loyal and you're not cheating on them. Do you think that's what loyalty is about?”

How come I always seem to be eavesdropping on teens when they talk about sex?  Because I am, that's why!  I do it for you.

4parents.gov: “Ms. Martin told me that there are five girls at your school that are pregnant. What do your friends think about teenagers having a baby?”

Yeah, Ms. Martin, your school nurse, is a great source of information about which girls at your school have buns in the oven.  We think that teenagers having babies is shameful and disgusting -- but what do you and your friends think about it?  (And you'd better not mention contraceptives or abortions, because this talk is about abstinence, missy!)

4parents.gov: “Some guys go out for a good time over the weekend, and end up with thousands of dollars taken out of their paychecks for the next 18 years. Do you know how that could happen? ”

If not, let me explain how it works, son.  When a man and a conniving gold digger don't practice abstinence, the result is a brat you have to support until it turns 18.  Got it?

4parents.gov: “I was at the store yesterday and ran into Kendrick, Mrs. Jakes' son. He joined the military after high school. What do you think you want to do when you graduate from high school?”

Son, instead of going out with girls, have you considered joining the Army?  You could shoot guns and ride in jeeps and stuff -- doesn't that sound like a lot more fun than having sex?

That's right, after softening them up with all the sex and drugs talk, let's use this to boost military recruitment...

Does anybody think an approach like this will help?

Posted by Lis Riba at 7:01 PM

Finished two more books this weekend, both of a similar bent:

• King of Shadows by Susan Cooper, first published 1999 (a reread)
• The Black Canary by Jane Louise Curry, published 2005

The two stories are quite similar, which is why I chose to reread Cooper's for the comparison.

Both are YA novels in which a modern American boy visiting London accidentally finds himself in Elizabethan England. The only real fantasy element in either is the means of time-travel.

In conclusion: they're both good solid works, which I think you'll like if the subject matter interests you.

Posted by Lis Riba at 8:00 PM

As I've mentioned before, London's National Portrait Gallery is planning an exhibit on Shakespeare and his contemporaries.

As part of this exhibit, they're gathering together as many extant portraits as they can.

I last mentioned this early November, regarding their restoration of and research into the Grafton portrait.

In the intervening months, they've gone further and today's Sunday Times Magazine (London Times, not NYT) has a roundup on the state of research on all the portraits: Chandos, Flower, Grafton, Sanders, Soest, Janssen. Unfortunately, the online article contains none of the illustrations referenced in the original.

Unsurprisingly, the NPG believes "the most likely of the six main contenders to be a true likeness" is the Chandos, owned by the museum itself.

The full research findings will be broadcast on BBC2 on February 16 (you lucky Brits!) along with two book releases: Shakespeare and His Contempories by Charles Nicholl and Searching for Shakespeare. [Oh look, they are releasing an American edition of the latter in several months. Throw a bone to us Yanks, why don't they...]

Besides these Shakespeare portraits, they'll also have the famous sketch of the Swan Theatre ("the only known contemporary drawing of an Elizabethan stage") and other works related to the Shakespearean stage. [No word on whether they've arranged a loan of the Corpus Christi portrait of Marlowe, but if they have, I'll be really jealous!]

Anyway, lots of cool stuff in the article for fellow Bardophiles.

Thanks to Gary Farber for the link.

Posted by Lis Riba at 6:40 PM

I heard "Who let the dogs out" on the radio this evening.

I immediately thought of bear-baiting...

PS: If you feel like shopping or browsing, there are lots of empty parking spaces around Harvard Square this afternoon.

Posted by Lis Riba at 2:22 PM

Courtesy of the BBC,

one BIG bunny.

This is apparently not photoshopped. Nor, unfortunately, is said rabbit eligible for the Guinness recordbooks, since they've stopped offering animal awards to avoid human mistreatment.

Of course, his owner missed the boat by naming him Herman, instead of Harvey, but he's still impressive.

PS, added later: More big bunny pictures @ GiantRabbitRescue.co.uk

Posted by Lis Riba at 11:15 AM

While Jeff Jacoby uses the current news to once again declaim against the "Islamofascist threat," Julia provides some much needed context to the matter of the Danish-Muslim cartoons. Here's a hint: tensions have been building (largely unreported in America) for months while diplomatic efforts to resolve them failed.

So now embassies are burning and (while mainstream islamic leaders condemn the riots) there is lovely juicy footage of islamic mob violence on every station and in every newspaper just as the effort to escalate against Iran ramps up.

Quel coinkydink.

Read it.

Added later: More from a Kos diarist.