Gerald Berg

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Gerald Berg has posted 311 annotations/comments since 4 March 2013.

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About Monday 5 August 1667

Gerald Berg  •  Link

"all that pains should have been taken upon so bad an instrument."

So says the flageolet player...

Is this the same Nell that Sam dallied with in his home just weeks ago? And she's a gossip? Sounds very risky. A parting shot as she scoots out the door to ruin both boss' day?

About Monday 29 July 1667

Gerald Berg  •  Link

Yes, gossip high and low. Am I mistaken in the impression that the gossip Pepy's relays is (most days) largely erroneous?

About Saturday 20 July 1667

Gerald Berg  •  Link

So much for SP's correcting his nature! His are not thought 'crimes' but rather the opposite and an illustration of what was wrong with the friar's formulation Moore was writing about. Pepy's thought was to correct his nature -- not worth much more than that it seems. Failure being the norm.

About Friday 5 July 1667

Gerald Berg  •  Link

I am with you on this Louise. Only Nan is now married and so presumably no longer a 'whore' whereas Sam is and remains a whoremonger.

About Sunday 30 June 1667

Gerald Berg  •  Link

"...and troubled that Creed did see so much of my dalliance, though very little." Good thing SP is a good judge of what is "fit time and place". Otherwise Creed might have had a real "raree-show" to talk about!

About Friday 28 June 1667

Gerald Berg  •  Link

A horse can gallop for around 2 miles before being fatigued. Unlikely to be galloping while pulling a coach even though John Ford films indicate otherwise!

About Monday 27 May 1667

Gerald Berg  •  Link

Pepys behaviour is not so strange as Mensur is still practised today-- albeit with better protection. One thinks of Franz Boas - father of modern anthropology and of the well scarred face!

MENSUR: Academic fencing (German akademisches Fechten) or Mensur is the traditional kind of fencing practiced by some student corporations (Studentenverbindungen) in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Latvia, Estonia, and, to a minor extent, in Belgium, Lithuania, and Poland. It is a traditional, strictly regulated épée/rapier fight between two male members of different fraternities with sharp weapons. The German technical term Mensur (from Latin, dimension) in the 16th century referred to the specified distance between each of the fencers

About Thursday 23 May 1667

Gerald Berg  •  Link

I am imagining that Mrs. Daniels thought it would be "safe" seeing the man in his home. Instead, it seems to have inflamed him recklessly. What Freud have to say about it all!

About Monday 13 May 1667

Gerald Berg  •  Link

War of the Pacific aka The Guano Wars. Tristan Jones in The Incredible Voyage (1978) recounts taking his sailboat up to Lake Titicaca and so becoming the first ocean going vessel to dock in Bolivia since that war. He was very well received by the Bolivian Yacht Club. At the same time he noticed some members were Nazi Kreigsmariners.

About Tuesday 7 May 1667

Gerald Berg  •  Link

Shrinking out of the collar. A ox is yoked, a horse is collared.

I think Carcasse is suppose to be the collar. To my mind this implies making some people responsible for having Carcasse appointed to the NB. Pen manages to shrink away from this 'collar of responsibility' for either Carcasse's hire or his subsequent behaviour. Bruckner cannot shrink from it.

About Monday 6 May 1667

Gerald Berg  •  Link

TF, one almost needs an update on Berwick post Brexit! Which side did they choose and how do they feel about Scotland now?

About Sunday 21 April 1667

Gerald Berg  •  Link

...but contrarily, that I am almost ashamed to be seen in a hackney, and therefore if I can have the conveniency...

Ashamed? I feel shame therefore I can have conveniency? Doesn't quite resolve for me.
Perhaps ashamed means embarrassment?

About Wednesday 3 April 1667

Gerald Berg  •  Link

A Day at Home in Early Modern England: Material Culture and Domestic Life, 1500–1700
by Tara Hamling and Catherine Richardson
Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art/Yale University Press, 311 pp., $75.00

Got this from Far Dabhoiwala review in the NYRB:

“Enclosed chimney flues remained a novel and somewhat precarious technology. When, in 1626, the London woodturner Nehemiah Wallington tried to improve his kitchen by installing one, the entire gable end of his house collapsed, and all three chimneys fell in. This was one reason why heated chambers remained a rare luxury. Another was probably the perpetual danger of fire, especially at night. Being able to light the house after dark was a sign of middling status, but unguarded candles were a constant concern. On the evening of July 4, 1629, Wallington’s apprentice Obadiah Seeley disobeyed the house rules and took a candlestick up to his room. Awaking after midnight to find their bed, mattress, and bedclothes in flames, he and his fellow apprentice “did start up and pissed out the fier as well as they could.” On another occasion, in bed with his wife and newborn daughter, Wallington himself woke up to find his hair on fire from a candle that had burned through its wire frame and fallen onto him.”

About Tuesday 2 April 1667

Gerald Berg  •  Link

Halfnotes — my speculation would be that she is having difficulty keeping in tune on her single tone when the other voices have moving lines against hers. Especially in the event that the other parts are dissonant with this pitch. It takes familiarity with how the other parts react to your own pitch against these variety of pitches.

The best way to undermine a soloist or section leader is to play a bit sharp in the underlying harmonies which the soloist/leader is then forced to tune against.

Well you might ask why anyone would do this? In her case inexperience but in mine? Callow youth and in my defence, only in rehearsal. This is what practical jokes look like to musicians.