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For anybody who hasn't had the pleasure of this delightful bit of English: London. Michaelmas term lately over, and the Lord Chancellor sitting in Lincoln’s In

For anybody who hasn't had the pleasure of this delightful bit of English: London. Michaelmas term lately over, and the Lord Chancellor sitting in Lincoln’s Inn Hall. Implacable November weather. As much mud in the streets as if the waters had but newly retired from the face of the earth, and it would not be wonderful to meet a Megalosaurus, forty feet long or so, waddling like an elephantine lizard up Holborn Hill. Smoke lowering down from chimney-pots, making a soft black drizzle, with flakes of soot in it as big as full-grown snowflakes —gone into mourning, one might imagine, for the death of the sun. Dogs, undistinguishable in mire. Horses, scarcely better; splashed to their very blinkers. Foot passengers, jostling one another’s umbrellas in a general infection of ill temper, and losing their foothold at street-corners, where tens of thousands of other foot passengers have been slipping and sliding since the day broke (if this day ever broke), adding new deposits to the crust upon crust of mud, sticking at those points tenaciously to the pavement, and accumulating at compound interest.

jimbokun 16d ago
Delightful indeed, and shocked that an English major would struggle with that text.
- kurthr 16d ago
  Exactly, what exactly is an English major going to do, if YA novels are the pinnacle of reading achievement? I'm baffled, and reading more about it, concerned.
Levitz 16d ago
English is my second language, with that in mind, I felt it may be interesting or amusing to some the parts which were "hard" for me to understand. >Michaelmas term lately over I had no idea that "Michaelmas" was even a thing. Nor do I think I have ever encountered the formulation of "term lately over" >As much mud in the streets as if the waters had but newly retired from the face of the earth This puzzled me, as I'd imagine, if there's no water, there surely would be no mud. Apparently a reference to the great flood which makes it make sense. >and it would not be wonderful to meet a Megalosaurus This one was funny since I properly understood (I think?) that it's meant to give a feeling of the savage, untamed, natural feel of the elements taking over London. But then I thought a reference to a Megalosaurus couldn't possibly be that. And it seems it is? The rest was way easier, although I had to make sure what "Dogs, undistinguishable in mire" meant.
- butvacuum 15d ago
  It's not presently on scihub (also, $25 for access? fuck off...), but the whole study stinks of "dickens scholar checks modern reading comp, vastly overestimates familiarity with victorian england and dickens' prose.".... .... here's the bio of the first author of the paper > SUSAN CARLSON is a professor of English at Pittsburg State University, where she teaches courses on nineteenth-century British literature,
mock-possum 16d ago
I guess I’m going to go ahead and pat myself on the back for being able to easily read through this aloud. What exactly would people struggle with here?
- amiga386 16d ago
  Most people outside the UK, and a good portion inside, would not know: - what Michaelmas is (it's a somewhat archaic Christian festival in September) - what Michaelmas term is (and that it's specific to the upper courts of the UK, along with Hilary term, Easter term and Trinity term) - where Lincoln's Inn or its hall is (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln%27s_Inn#Old_Hall https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln%27s_Inn#Old_Hall) - what an "inn" is in this context (i.e. the Inns of Court are not hostelries) - what position the Lord Chancellor holds in UK law and politics - that the name of the role derives from being head of the Court of Chancery (which at the time sat in Lincoln's Inn hall) - what a chancery court does (it awards equitable reliefs) - why such a court is needed (equitable remedies provide what legal remedies cannot: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equitable_remedy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equitable_remedy) Did you know all of the above while reading the second sentence?
  - mock-possum 13d ago
    No of course not, nor did I need to to read the passage. It sounds to me like you are you are overestimating the importance of all these trivial details - getting caught up in the minutia is exactly what might make this seem (falsely) inaccessible to people who don't really know how to read properly. You demand to know whether the reader can pick out the individual trees, when in reality they see the forest just fine. I don't think you need to know any of that to be able to read and understand this passage. What you need to know is: There's a guy who's eating, and then we immediately break away for a lengthy description of the weather and the environment of the city - all of which is easily digestible without dicking about with trivial details of UK law and politics. If you'd get tripped up by anything, I'd imagine it would be "it would not be wonderful to meet a Megalosaurus" given that 'wonderful' in this context means the precise opposite of the common usage today - literally, inspiring wonder - as this dinosaur would be an unremarkable sight, not inspiring wonder. There's all sorts of clever little twists and turns in word usage here, if you're worried about 'Michaelmas' or the etymology of the term 'Chancellor' then you've already lost the plot, imo.

jimbokun 16d ago

Delightful indeed, and shocked that an English major would struggle with that text.

kurthr 16d ago
Exactly, what exactly is an English major going to do, if YA novels are the pinnacle of reading achievement? I'm baffled, and reading more about it, concerned.

Levitz 16d ago

English is my second language, with that in mind, I felt it may be interesting or amusing to some the parts which were "hard" for me to understand. >Michaelmas term lately over I had no idea that "Michaelmas" was even a thing. Nor do I think I have ever encountered the formulation of "term lately over" >As much mud in the streets as if the waters had but newly retired from the face of the earth This puzzled me, as I'd imagine, if there's no water, there surely would be no mud. Apparently a reference to the great flood which makes it make sense. >and it would not be wonderful to meet a Megalosaurus This one was funny since I properly understood (I think?) that it's meant to give a feeling of the savage, untamed, natural feel of the elements taking over London. But then I thought a reference to a Megalosaurus couldn't possibly be that. And it seems it is? The rest was way easier, although I had to make sure what "Dogs, undistinguishable in mire" meant.

butvacuum 15d ago
It's not presently on scihub (also, $25 for access? fuck off...), but the whole study stinks of "dickens scholar checks modern reading comp, vastly overestimates familiarity with victorian england and dickens' prose.".... .... here's the bio of the first author of the paper > SUSAN CARLSON is a professor of English at Pittsburg State University, where she teaches courses on nineteenth-century British literature,

mock-possum 16d ago

I guess I’m going to go ahead and pat myself on the back for being able to easily read through this aloud. What exactly would people struggle with here?

amiga386 16d ago
Most people outside the UK, and a good portion inside, would not know: - what Michaelmas is (it's a somewhat archaic Christian festival in September) - what Michaelmas term is (and that it's specific to the upper courts of the UK, along with Hilary term, Easter term and Trinity term) - where Lincoln's Inn or its hall is (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln%27s_Inn#Old_Hall https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln%27s_Inn#Old_Hall) - what an "inn" is in this context (i.e. the Inns of Court are not hostelries) - what position the Lord Chancellor holds in UK law and politics - that the name of the role derives from being head of the Court of Chancery (which at the time sat in Lincoln's Inn hall) - what a chancery court does (it awards equitable reliefs) - why such a court is needed (equitable remedies provide what legal remedies cannot: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equitable_remedy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equitable_remedy) Did you know all of the above while reading the second sentence?
- mock-possum 13d ago
  No of course not, nor did I need to to read the passage. It sounds to me like you are you are overestimating the importance of all these trivial details - getting caught up in the minutia is exactly what might make this seem (falsely) inaccessible to people who don't really know how to read properly. You demand to know whether the reader can pick out the individual trees, when in reality they see the forest just fine. I don't think you need to know any of that to be able to read and understand this passage. What you need to know is: There's a guy who's eating, and then we immediately break away for a lengthy description of the weather and the environment of the city - all of which is easily digestible without dicking about with trivial details of UK law and politics. If you'd get tripped up by anything, I'd imagine it would be "it would not be wonderful to meet a Megalosaurus" given that 'wonderful' in this context means the precise opposite of the common usage today - literally, inspiring wonder - as this dinosaur would be an unremarkable sight, not inspiring wonder. There's all sorts of clever little twists and turns in word usage here, if you're worried about 'Michaelmas' or the etymology of the term 'Chancellor' then you've already lost the plot, imo.