a mutual aid society of composed of the many pseudonyms of a curiously nipple-obsessed independent scholar
I don't see why this couldn't be a perfectly good mouseover text.
That article is WAY too long. Can we get a summary please, albeit one that is longer than the excessively summary in the OP. I have important matters elsewhere that require my attention and I would appreciate your assistance in this matter. Thank you.
"Excessively short," that is to say. Thank you in advance for preparing a summary of precisely the right length.
The main point of the article is that you need to learn to love yourself. I missed some of the details.
Are we completely sure the linked article isn't a big Borgesian fiction-as-nonfiction?
No! That's what makes it so wonderful!
Though I guess one could look up the works of the main player(s).
I remember reading this Slate thing on the purported meetup but don't actually remember what it says. I guess I could read it again!
5: if you don't love yourself how the hell you gonna love somebody else? Can I get an amen up in here?
6 - I'm just going to assume it is, or else it's F. R. Leavis' What Mad Universe.
Holy crap, that article is indeed way too fucking long.
Read until you get bored, then read the last two paragraphs.
The tone of that article is rather odd: it sounds like the writer is intent on dissing (as quite beneath us all) the various players ... er, quoting at length for those disinclined to read:
Coincidentally, I had already come across Leo Bellingham's name, in a discussion of university novels. Moonlighting from my teaching of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky, I had been putting together a new seminar on campus fictions; Bellingham's name had just crossed my radar, initially in an article written by an independent, Cambridge-based scholar named John Schellenberger. In 1980 Bellingham had published Oxford: The novel. Plodding, with stilted dialogue and tiresome, archly constructed scenes of eavesdropping and retelling, the book chronicles the student hero's pursuit - some might say stalking - of the elusive woman who will eventually become his wife.
The tone is normal for some, but I have a hard time believing it's not put on.
I don't know why you people think the article is too long.
I just got to the end, skimming style.
It is not only that the apparent practice of submitting articles under fictitious names to scholarly journals might well have a chilling effect on the ability of really existing independent scholars to place their work. Nor is it just the embarrassment caused to editors who might in an ideal world have taken more pains to check the contributions of Stephanie Harvey or Trevor McGovern, but who accepted them in good faith, partly out of a wish to make their publications as inclusive as possible.
...
How many pages, like double-spaced with 1 inch margins, is 10000 words? (I want to translate this to paper length.)
Too long, I'm sure, for young people in these days of supersonic hedgehog brothers and ready-sliced golf-shots.
I can't take it seriously if it's not written in longhand in cursive.
What does the wordcount or the number of pages have to do with whether or not it's too long?
(FTR I highly doubt it's 10,000 words long.)
More fool me! It is about 10,000 words!
Yeah, it totally is. You were so wrong, nosflow. So very wrong.
Not too long! And also SUPER CRAZYPANTS.
(I'm just annoyed because I took the time to select-all, copy, and paste it into a text-editor to check, only to see that you'd already acknowledged your mistake. Damn you.)
The tone is normal for some, but I have a hard time believing it's not put on.
Indeed, I believe it's a big Borgesian metafiction (or possibly F. R. Leavis' What Mad Universe).
The paragraphs are ridiculously long as well, that's the thing.
It's actually hilarious:
Last year a new edition of Oxford: The novel was published by Brewin Books of Warwickshire. It is presented as though a first edition, and the author's name is given as A. D. Harvey. Leo Bellingham is nowhere mentioned, and the blurb calls Warriors of the Rainbow Harvey's "previous novel". The plot is the same, the prose more ornate - the nipples are now described as "everted" - and the hero's wife continues to believe that the TLS is "beyond criticism". Yet several months ago, when I contacted A. D. Harvey through an intermediary to enquire what if anything he knew about the Dostoevsky- Dickens encounter, he asked that I be forwarded an article on the Luftwaffe and aerial combat in the Second World War, which he characterized as a good example of his recent work.
Now that's just funny. (I'll stop quoting at length now -- it's for those who're unlikely to read or skim.)
10000 words is the equivalent of what, 500 Borges stories?
The paragraphs are long … ?
Don't you sell books for a living?
That article is WAY too long awesome.
FTFY.
12 seems like good advice. It's very interesting until you get bored. Which I bet varies for different people.
The author of the article has worked on Nabokov. The whole thing feels sorta Nabokovian to me. I'm not sure if I want to figure out if it's true or not.
The author of the article has worked on Nabokov. The whole thing feels sorta Nabokovian to me. I'm not sure if I want to figure out if it's true or not.
I know, right? There is this, but... still.
28: Online reading is better served by shorter paragraphs, for various reasons, don't you think? They don't need to be those one-sentence paragraphs you frequently see, but large solid blocks of text are more difficult on the screen than on paper, I think.
I mean, certainly the article about Dickens and Dostoyevsky really was in The Dickensian, since there are all kinds of stories about that on the web. I guess I'll assume it's all true.
27: Or 1666 Hemingway shorts (and the oddly anticlimactic "For sale: Baby shoes").
Nobody complains about the websites that do long exposés of people with Munchausen by Internet making scores of supportive facebook profiles and so on, and this is basically the same thing. I enjoyed the article and think the length and thus depth improved it.
the websites that do long exposés of people with Munchausen by Internet making scores of supportive facebook profiles and so on
Oh, right, those things. (What's that, now?)
Let me be the first to say the linked article is too long.
Oh, right, those things. (What's that, now?)
Anyone want to pool some money with me so we can buy letusgooglethatforparsimon.com?
Ok, I've now read the linked article. The only appropriate summary would be the same article, minus the pull quotes.
41: I'm in for zillions of dollars!
That is an amazing article. Yes, it's long, but it's well worth the time it takes to read the whole thing. If you must have a summary, neb's OP is an excellent one.
I just tried to give someone the cliffnotes of the first third, which I had read, over dinner. I took maybe 10 minutes, which included breaks to order and eat burritos, and a side tangent to explain who Dostoevsky is. When I was done he said, "that was not the cliff notes version. The cliff notes version is there was some dude and he likes fooling people by pretending to write articles and books under different fake names which reference each other." I like the "Munchausen by journal article" phrasing better though.
He then told me about this which seems like a fine dessert piece to the rest of the OP which I think I might now finish. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/08/health/for-scientists-an-exploding-world-of-pseudo-academia.html?smid=tw-nytimesscience&seid=auto&_r=1&pagewanted=all&
. Yet several months ago, when I contacted A. D. Harvey through an intermediary to enquire what if anything he knew about the Dostoevsky- Dickens encounter, he asked that I be forwarded an article on the Luftwaffe and aerial combat in the Second World War
"Fyodor! Break left! Messerschmitts coming in high!"
"Oh, I don't care. Let them catch me."
Obvious reference: the Fabian Aces. (via John Holbo, of course.)
Radio-listeners and newsreel-watchers worldwide thrill to the exploits of ex-Royal Indian Air Force pilot Eric "Dusty" Blair, Frenchman Antoine "Santo" de Saint-Exupéry, and the rest of the international rogue's gallery of volunteer aviators known as the Fabian Aces.With the help of two-fisted American mechanic "Papa" Hemingway, the Aces are the backbone of the Loyalist resistance, turning back Franco and his moros again and again. The worldwide popularity of Blair and his Aces is a constant goad to the Fascist governments and an ever-present rebuke to the Liberals' policy of neutrality. When Blair's De Havilland finally meets Fascist ace Charles Lindbergh's Messerschmitt over Barcelona, the back of Franco's coup is broken. Though the United States will not allow the League of Nations to act, Britain and France, shamed by the bravery of their countrymen, nevertheless enter the war on the Loyalist side...
48. Fuck. That was possibly my favourite site of all time, but I'd completely forgotten that entry.
Actually I am quite enjoying "What If Famous 19th Century Authors Had Been WW2 Fighter Pilots". Mark Twain lying about his name and nationality in order to enlist. "Of course I am Canadian, sir! I am merely from Southern Canada."
Wow. I didn't know that site. Totally brilliant.
48: you know who's parsimonious with his words? that holbo fellow.
unrelatedly, I judged the linked article to be of perfect length, but will more people please reassure me about the facticity of the whole thing? I would feel annoyed had it been a self-indulgent article by an individual with an unhealthy obsession with areolae.
That would make me more likely to read it.
52: Well, rfts's link in 32 suggests it's true. Amazon lists several other books by A.D. Harvey, at least a few of which were mentioned in the article. So there's at least some promising circumstantial evidence that it's true.
"Fyodor! Break left! Messerschmitts coming in high!"
"Oh, I don't care. Let them catch me."
He would later reference this episode in his unfinished work, The Brothers Kamikaze.
Interesting contrast between this thread and CT. Over there there are a bunch of scolds getting all bent out of shape about how this is fraud and academic misconduct and that just isn't funny you know. One person even calls it "nauseating". I still go with "awesome".
With the help of two-fisted American mechanic "Papa" Hemingway, the Aces are the backbone of the Loyalist resistance
That's only slightly more fanciful than the real life Hemingway. From Anthony Beevor's book on the Battle of Normandy:
In the town of Rambouillet, Leclerc's officers were suprised to find at the Hôtel du Grand Veneur a cast of characters worthy of an improbable play...Ernest Hemingway, officially a war correspondent for Collier's magazine, was far more interested in acting as an irregular soldier with the local Resistance. He openly carried a heavy automatic pistol, even though it was strictly illegal for a non-combatant. According to John Mowinckel, an American intelligence officer stationed there, Hemingway wanted to interrogate a pathetic German prisoner hauled in by his new Resistance friends. "I'll make him talk," he boasted. Take his boots off. We'll grill his toes with a candle." Mowinckel told Hemingway to go to hell and released the boy, who clearly knew nothing. [...]
When the fighting was over, most of the correspondents headed for the Hôtel Scribe, which they had known from before the war. Hemingway and David Bruce, surrounded by some of the writer's improvised militia, went straight to the Ritz, which Hemingway was determined to "liberate".
56
Interesting contrast between this thread and CT. Over there there are a bunch of scolds getting all bent out of shape about how this is fraud and academic misconduct and that just isn't funny you know. One person even calls it "nauseating". I still go with "awesome".
Well of course it is easy to be amused if you don't take literary criticism seriously in the first place.
How would feel about someone who went to similar lengths to get fake measurements into the physics literature?
Re: 59 yeah, essear, how would you feel if your field featured cranks who went to elaborate, oft-fraudulent lengths to get their work noticed after perceived snubs by the academy? You should just be glad that definitely never happens in physics.
This article is great and very easy to read. I don't see how it could be summarized better than it is in the OP.
Indeed, whether someone devotes his academic career to creating a fabricated backing for his theory of how something damages the heart, or spends his time fabricating data on how stress affects vultures, nobody is amused.
Amazon lists several other books by A.D. Harvey, at least a few of which were mentioned in the article. So there's at least some promising circumstantial evidence that it's true.
Someone on metafilter claims to own Sex in Georgian England; another chimes in with "Harvey's 1978 article, 'Prosecutions for Sodomy in England at the Beginning of the Nineteenth Century' (JSTOR) is still widely cited as showing that there was a moral panic about homosexuality in the early nineteenth century. It's a pioneering article in its way, as not many scholars in the mid-1970s were doing serious archival research on the history of sexuality. However, Harvey's book on Sex on Georgian England is deeply flawed, as this 1995 review points out".
Presumably A.D. Harvey is in every thread about this under a pseudonym, right?
Now that I think about it, the article doesn't mention Harvey introducing any actual lies into the historical record at all, in all his years of sock-puppetry, except the one Dickens/Dostoevsky anecdote. Everything else just seems to be a roundabout campaign to convince people that the work of A.D. Harvey is worth reading. And since that campaign was a total bust, maybe nobody would have noticed at all if not for the weird Dickens/Dostoevsky thing.
64: I wonder who "Eric Naiman" really is.
He's no Edmund Backhouse, that's for sure.
64: If not, we should add that to the standard list of suggested pseuds, along with Wry Cooter.
It occurs to me that I own Sex in Georgian England, though I couldn't put my hand to it at the moment. One of those things you pick up while browsing a second hand store, read once and never get round to giving it to Oxfam.
How ironic if it transpires that the entire TLS is produced by one balding middle-aged man living in a basement somewhere.
I own 'Sex in Georgian England,' though I couldn't put my hand to it at the moment IYKWIMAITTYD
I thought the whole thing was sweet.