Arts & Letters

The Atlas of True Names

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One of my favorite blogs is Strange Maps, a blog dedicated to unusual cartography. The blog explores how we use maps to organize and display information about spatial relationships.  

This post leads us to the Atlas of True Names. The  Atlas  of True Names [scroll down for maps] is a project by two German artists that takes standard place-name maps and changes the names to their original  etymological  meanings.  

Texas, for example, becomes “The Land of Friends”. Houston becomes “Heart’s Town” and the Rio Grande becomes “The Great River”. America becomes “Land of the Home Ruler”.

The creators caution that original etymological meanings are often guesswork so we should take everything with a grain of salt and regard this more as art than history. Still it is interesting to see something of the story behind the labels we slap on places.  

The Nature of Man Versus the Ideas of Man

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In high school, we were taught that there are four kinds of dynamic tension in a story: man vs. man, man vs. nature, man vs. machine and man vs. himself. Our libraries are full of tales that fit neatly into these categories. The nature of man versus the ideas of man fits as well, but is perhaps the most censored, repressed, politically volatile concept of our day.

You can find pearls of wisdom in the unlikeliest places.

The Emperor and the Assassin

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I just saw The Emperor and the Assassin, an epic Chinese film about King Ying Zheng, who wants to unify all of China, at any cost. Here is a scene from the movie.

Paul Monk’s excellent review essay is here. It has spoilers, but since the movie is about historical events, maybe that does not matter so much.

The essay is included in his excellent book Thunder From the Silent Zone: Rethinking China, reviewed here.

I highly recommend the movie (available from Netflix), the book, and the essay.

Evil Fictional Corporations

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Via Instapundit comes this review of science fiction movies at Popular Science. The review of the movie “Moon” caught my eye:

 In this space drama, Sam Rockwell plays a lonely lunar miner who is nearing the end of a multi-year contract. With communication satellites down, he’s cut off from the outside world, with little to keep him company other than a Kevin Spaceyvoiced  computer  named Gerty (and his own demons, naturally). While the space dramas of the ’70s and ’80s were dominated by acid-spewing aliens, this movie’s monster is scarier yet: a negligent corporate bureaucracy.  [Emph. added.]

WTF? You set a movie on the freaking Moon and the scariest, most dramatic conflict you can come up with involves tight-fisted accountants? Who’s going to be the scary monster in the sequel, those  weenies  in marketing?  

This follows a pronounced trend I have seen in popular entertainment: Corporations are always portrayed as evil. This is  especially  true in entertainment  aimed at young people, such as animation and video games.  

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New Deal Again

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If the 1930s are really back, it won’t be long now before they remake Confidence, starring Oswald the Lucky Rabbit as an economist. Sorry, embedding was disabled.

Notes on the cartoon: Oswald was originally drawn, but not owned, by Walt Disney. A few tweaks and a change of species later, Mickey Mouse was born. Take a good look at the mice on drums in the band – it was probably an in-joke. Also, check the credits: Tex Avery (Bugs Bunny) and Walter Lantz (Woody Woodpecker), among others.