Et le printemps m'a apporté l'affreux rire de l'idiot.
(Arthur Rimbaud, Une Saison en Enfer)
"And springtime brought me the frightful laugh of an idiot."
(Arthur Rimbaud, A Season in Hell)
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Monday, March 30, 2009
New Look, New Site
From this...
...to this...
The International Herald Tribune unveiled today a new look for its print edition including a "cleaner" nameplate emphasizing international.
The readers of the Web site have been redirected to a new global edition, global.nytimes.com. The new site combines content from the IHT and The New York Times.
[E&P]
...to this...
The International Herald Tribune unveiled today a new look for its print edition including a "cleaner" nameplate emphasizing international.
The readers of the Web site have been redirected to a new global edition, global.nytimes.com. The new site combines content from the IHT and The New York Times.
[E&P]
The Emperor of Public Toilets
Emperor Titus Flavius Sabinus Vespasianus, founder of the Flavian dynasty, was born on 17 November 9 AD.An exhibition in Rome celebrates his 2000th birthday.
The Flavians ruled the Roman Empire between 69 and 96 AD, with the reigns of Vespasian (69–79) and his sons Titus (79–81) and Domitian (81–96).
Far from the Romans' grandeur and the imperial Latin, Vespasiano in Italian means public urinal. It is because Vespasian introduced a tax on public urinals. When his son Titus remonstrated with him over this measure, the emperor held out a handful of coins for him to sniff. These come from the urinal tax, he said, pecunia non olet: "Money has no smell."
More: Hail, Caesar: Rome Marks Birth of Emperor Who Built the Colosseum, Independent.
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Comics...
"You... you... you're firing me?"
(Glamorous reporter-turned-editor Brenda Starr, who has worked in the newsroom of the Daily Flash since 1940)
[Brenda Starr, Newseum]
Farewell, Daily Print
The front page of the March 27, 2009 final daily edition of the Christian Science Monitor. As the final daily issue of the 100-year-old Christian Science Monitor was put to bed Thursday, the newspaper was planning its rebirth as a spruced-up weekly.[E&P, CSMonitor]
Friday, March 27, 2009
JH Newman
"We are in a world of facts, and we use them; for there is nothing else to use. We do not quarrel with them, but we take them as they are, and avail ourselves of what they can do for us. [...]. I am what I am, or I am nothing. [...]. I cannot avoid being sufficient for myself, for I cannot make myself anything else, and to change me is to destroy me. If I do not use myself, I have no other self to use. My only business is to ascertain what I am, in order to put it to use." (John Henry Newman, An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent)
"Ten thousand difficulties do not make one doubt." (John Henry Newman, Apologia Pro Vita Sua)
"Ten thousand difficulties do not make one doubt." (John Henry Newman, Apologia Pro Vita Sua)
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Fort Apache
In his new movie Fortapasc, which is Neapolitan for Fort Apache, Italian director Marco Risi takes on the real-life story of Giancarlo Siani, a journalist killed for his reporting by the Camorra (the Naples Mafia) in 1985 at the age of 26.
The trailer:
The trailer:
Venetian Spoken Here
Linguaveneta.it offers an online free dictionary to translate between English and Venetian language (or dialect).
More: The language of Venice is older, less artificial and more influential than Italian itself. [The Times Literary Supplement]
More: The language of Venice is older, less artificial and more influential than Italian itself. [The Times Literary Supplement]
Monday, March 23, 2009
Spokesman of the World
'When in 1909 F. T. Marinetti had his first manifesto of Futurism published in the newspaper Figaro of Paris, I believe he imagined he was a poet, a thinker, an innovator, but surely not a prophet.
'That manifesto and the others that followed it over the years down to the very recent past seem to us full of commonplaces, contradictions, garbled statements and odd notions, but as a whole they constitute a document of the crisis that was to break out in a few years and whose end is not yet in sight.
'F. T. Marinetti was not a thinker nor a serious artist but rather a charlatan and traveling salesman gifted with that secret sense which charlatans, politicians, traveling salesmen and gamblers have and that makes them prophets to a degree. Their profession compels them to heed not the dictates of lucid reason and enlightened imagination but those of fortuitous powers that operate in the profound unknown of history. The details of what they say are inaccurate, the reasons adduced are absurd, the general statement incoherent. On listening to these persons, one meets with large patches of obscurity. But there is something in them that more rational and lucid minds do not see. There is no doubt that the outburst of emotions and clash of interests set off by the war of 1914, and which have not yet subsided, had been indicated by the figurative lance hurled in the right direction by the Futurist manifesto of 1909. The reign of the machine, the cynicism and ferocity employed to realize the aims of States, the worship of violence, the defense of war as an activity leading society back to health, were all a revelation of Futurism. It spread all over the world, from America to Russia, and came to mean many different trends in art and morality but always with the common label of revolt against the past. "Anything," they seemed to say, "even disorder, crime and idiocy is better than the present mediocre, bourgeois state of affairs."
'As always happens when a vogue becomes widespread, it is now easy to see how Futurism was prepared and facilitated by forerunners. The anarchists, the readers of Nietzsche, Stirner and Sorel, the aesthetes of the Oscar Wilde and Walter Pater variety, the imperialist of the Kipling school, the disorganizers of poetry like Mallarmé and the disintegrators of painting like Picasso - how many names, books, theories, how many works of art can be cited that have all merged in the chaotic stream of Futurism! But the fact remains that this word appeared to sum up in a fascinating manner the dissatisfaction of the intellectual generations after 1900. Today, when we turn back to certain artists and writers adhering to the Futurist movement we see them in a truly different guise and it seems incredible to us that at a certain moment Futurism could answer the needs of their spirit.
'Futurism was the glorification of the machine and of speed, of nationalism and of war. It fought religion, pacifism and democracy. In poetry it emphasized the demise of rhythm and proclaimed and realized the suppression of syntax. In painting it accepted the abolition of visible forms and desired the representation of the movements of bodies. In sculpture it demanded that the setting be fused with the subject. In architecture it did away with ornamentation and based itself on functional and mechanical styles of building, with a tendency towards the machine-house and the factory-city. To the stage it brought fast-moving, concentrated and epigrammatic plays. In music it attempted to introduce noise among and above sounds. In typography it made fantastic use of symbols and colors. Its purpose everywhere seems to have been to distort, disrupt and disunite the achievements of time.
'All this turmoil is of small concern to the aims of this book. Important is the fact that with Futurism Italy seemed to resume her function as spokesman of the world. For a moment Futurism provided Italy with the feeling of having expressed the urged needs of the new generations in other countries.'
(The Legacy of Italy by Giuseppe Prezzolini, Professor of Italian, Columbia University, 1948)
'That manifesto and the others that followed it over the years down to the very recent past seem to us full of commonplaces, contradictions, garbled statements and odd notions, but as a whole they constitute a document of the crisis that was to break out in a few years and whose end is not yet in sight.
'F. T. Marinetti was not a thinker nor a serious artist but rather a charlatan and traveling salesman gifted with that secret sense which charlatans, politicians, traveling salesmen and gamblers have and that makes them prophets to a degree. Their profession compels them to heed not the dictates of lucid reason and enlightened imagination but those of fortuitous powers that operate in the profound unknown of history. The details of what they say are inaccurate, the reasons adduced are absurd, the general statement incoherent. On listening to these persons, one meets with large patches of obscurity. But there is something in them that more rational and lucid minds do not see. There is no doubt that the outburst of emotions and clash of interests set off by the war of 1914, and which have not yet subsided, had been indicated by the figurative lance hurled in the right direction by the Futurist manifesto of 1909. The reign of the machine, the cynicism and ferocity employed to realize the aims of States, the worship of violence, the defense of war as an activity leading society back to health, were all a revelation of Futurism. It spread all over the world, from America to Russia, and came to mean many different trends in art and morality but always with the common label of revolt against the past. "Anything," they seemed to say, "even disorder, crime and idiocy is better than the present mediocre, bourgeois state of affairs."
'As always happens when a vogue becomes widespread, it is now easy to see how Futurism was prepared and facilitated by forerunners. The anarchists, the readers of Nietzsche, Stirner and Sorel, the aesthetes of the Oscar Wilde and Walter Pater variety, the imperialist of the Kipling school, the disorganizers of poetry like Mallarmé and the disintegrators of painting like Picasso - how many names, books, theories, how many works of art can be cited that have all merged in the chaotic stream of Futurism! But the fact remains that this word appeared to sum up in a fascinating manner the dissatisfaction of the intellectual generations after 1900. Today, when we turn back to certain artists and writers adhering to the Futurist movement we see them in a truly different guise and it seems incredible to us that at a certain moment Futurism could answer the needs of their spirit.
'Futurism was the glorification of the machine and of speed, of nationalism and of war. It fought religion, pacifism and democracy. In poetry it emphasized the demise of rhythm and proclaimed and realized the suppression of syntax. In painting it accepted the abolition of visible forms and desired the representation of the movements of bodies. In sculpture it demanded that the setting be fused with the subject. In architecture it did away with ornamentation and based itself on functional and mechanical styles of building, with a tendency towards the machine-house and the factory-city. To the stage it brought fast-moving, concentrated and epigrammatic plays. In music it attempted to introduce noise among and above sounds. In typography it made fantastic use of symbols and colors. Its purpose everywhere seems to have been to distort, disrupt and disunite the achievements of time.
'All this turmoil is of small concern to the aims of this book. Important is the fact that with Futurism Italy seemed to resume her function as spokesman of the world. For a moment Futurism provided Italy with the feeling of having expressed the urged needs of the new generations in other countries.'
(The Legacy of Italy by Giuseppe Prezzolini, Professor of Italian, Columbia University, 1948)
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Complexes
Suffering from an evident complex of moral inferiority, a lot of journalists are interested in teaching the Pope how to do the Pope. Suffering from an evident complex of moral superiority, a lot of priests are interested in teaching journalists how to do journalism. But the worst of all are the journalist-priests...
Friday, March 20, 2009
Monks and Managers
It seems that the Rule of St Benedict, written by Benedict of Nursia in the sixth century, works as well for managers as it does for monks.
This will be the subject of a seminar on Sunday at Abbazia di Praglia, an abbey on the Euganean Hills, just outside Padua, northeastern Italy. The title of the meeting is "L'organizzazione perfetta: la Regola di San Benedetto, una saggezza antica al servizio dell'impresa moderna" (The Perfect Organization: the Rule of St Benedict, An Ancient Wisdom at the Service of Modern Firm).
If you don't believe it, read the following excerpt from the Rule:
But if any of the work of the artists is to be sold, let them, through whose hands the transaction must pass, see to it, that they do not presume to practice any fraud on the monastery. Let them always be mindful of Ananias and Saphira, lest, perhaps, the death which these suffered in the body, they and all who practice any fraud in things belonging to the monastery suffer in the soul.
On the other hand, as regards the prices of these things, let not the vice of avarice creep in, but let it always be given a little cheaper than it can be given by seculars, That God May Be Glorified in All Things.
(The Holy Rule of St Benedict, The 1949 Edition Translated by Rev. Boniface Verheyen, OSB of St Benedict's Abbey, Atchison, Kansas, Chapter 57).
This will be the subject of a seminar on Sunday at Abbazia di Praglia, an abbey on the Euganean Hills, just outside Padua, northeastern Italy. The title of the meeting is "L'organizzazione perfetta: la Regola di San Benedetto, una saggezza antica al servizio dell'impresa moderna" (The Perfect Organization: the Rule of St Benedict, An Ancient Wisdom at the Service of Modern Firm).
If you don't believe it, read the following excerpt from the Rule:
Artifices si sunt in monasterio cum omni humilitate faciant ipsas artes, si permiserit abbas. Quod si aliquis ex eis extollitur pro scientia artis suae, eo quod videatur aliquid conferre monasterio, hic talis erigatur ab ipsa arte et denuo per eam non transeat, nisi forte humiliato ei iterum abbas iubeat.If there be skilled workmen in the monastery, let them work at their art in all humility, if the Abbot giveth his permission. But if anyone of them should grow proud by reason of his art, in that he seemeth to confer a benefit on the monastery, let him be removed from that work and not return to it, unless after he hath humbled himself, the Abbot again ordereth him to do so.
Si quid vero ex operibus artificum venumdandum est, videant ipsi per quorum manus transigenda sint ne aliquam fraudem praesumant. Memorentur semper Ananiae et Saphirae, ne forte mortem quam illi in corpore pertulerunt, hanc isti vel omnes qui aliquam fraudem de rebus monasterii fecerint in anima patiantur.
In ipsis autem pretiis non surripiat avaritiae malum, sed semper aliquantulum vilius detur quam ab aliis saecularibus dari potest, ut in omnibus glorificetur Deus.
(Regula Sancti Benedicti, LVII)
But if any of the work of the artists is to be sold, let them, through whose hands the transaction must pass, see to it, that they do not presume to practice any fraud on the monastery. Let them always be mindful of Ananias and Saphira, lest, perhaps, the death which these suffered in the body, they and all who practice any fraud in things belonging to the monastery suffer in the soul.
On the other hand, as regards the prices of these things, let not the vice of avarice creep in, but let it always be given a little cheaper than it can be given by seculars, That God May Be Glorified in All Things.
(The Holy Rule of St Benedict, The 1949 Edition Translated by Rev. Boniface Verheyen, OSB of St Benedict's Abbey, Atchison, Kansas, Chapter 57).
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
A Burning Matter
On 24-26th March the Royal Courts of Justice in London will review Britain's cremation laws and decide whether Baba Davender Kumar Ghai, the founding president of the Anglo-Asian Friendship Society, an independent charity based in Newcastle, deserves the legal right to a Hindu religious cremation on an open air funeral pyre.
If successful, the case could set a precedent for designated natural cremation sites around the country. The 70-year-old Baba Ghai argues 'natural cremation' is already lawful - and tested the law in July 2006 by lighting the funeral pyre of Mr Rajpal Mehat in Northumberland (BBC, Times).
Newcastle City Council oppose Mr Ghai's last wish, arguing the practice is outlawed by the 1902 Cremation Act.
The High Court hearing is the culmination of 3 years of legal preparations by human rights specialist barristers Ramby de Mello and Tony Muman.
Opinion amongst British Hindus and Sikhs was divided when Mr Ghai lodged the judicial review application in 2006. Since then, even staunch opponents such as the Hindu Council UK (HCUK) have been won over and reversed their former policy, stating that, "individual choice of those Hindus who wish to follow the ancient Hindu scriptures and wish to have open air funerals should be honoured."
Their U-turn came after Mr Ghai's claim attracted support from eminent religious authorities support from the 'Hindu Pope' (and HCUK Spiritual Counsel) Shankaracharya Dibyanand and Professor H.R. Sharma of Banaras Hindu University.
HCUK opposition was even cited in the LSC's challenge to Mr Ghai's legal aid funding but they now join in consensus with every Hindu national umbrella organisation in Britain, collectively representing over 90% of the 559,000 Hindus in Britain (according to the 2001 census).
In response to protests amongst some British Sikh organisations, the President of the 'Sikh Parliament' at the Golden Temple in Amritsar formally urged the Indian Prime Minister to lobby for Britain for natural cremation grounds. Prof Satvinder Juss will address the High Court on behalf of a corpus of Sikh gurdwaras, led by Mr Gulzar Singh Sahota of Hitchin Ramgharia Gurdwara.
Statement of Mr Ghai:
If successful, the case could set a precedent for designated natural cremation sites around the country. The 70-year-old Baba Ghai argues 'natural cremation' is already lawful - and tested the law in July 2006 by lighting the funeral pyre of Mr Rajpal Mehat in Northumberland (BBC, Times).
Newcastle City Council oppose Mr Ghai's last wish, arguing the practice is outlawed by the 1902 Cremation Act.
The High Court hearing is the culmination of 3 years of legal preparations by human rights specialist barristers Ramby de Mello and Tony Muman.
Opinion amongst British Hindus and Sikhs was divided when Mr Ghai lodged the judicial review application in 2006. Since then, even staunch opponents such as the Hindu Council UK (HCUK) have been won over and reversed their former policy, stating that, "individual choice of those Hindus who wish to follow the ancient Hindu scriptures and wish to have open air funerals should be honoured."
Their U-turn came after Mr Ghai's claim attracted support from eminent religious authorities support from the 'Hindu Pope' (and HCUK Spiritual Counsel) Shankaracharya Dibyanand and Professor H.R. Sharma of Banaras Hindu University.
HCUK opposition was even cited in the LSC's challenge to Mr Ghai's legal aid funding but they now join in consensus with every Hindu national umbrella organisation in Britain, collectively representing over 90% of the 559,000 Hindus in Britain (according to the 2001 census).
In response to protests amongst some British Sikh organisations, the President of the 'Sikh Parliament' at the Golden Temple in Amritsar formally urged the Indian Prime Minister to lobby for Britain for natural cremation grounds. Prof Satvinder Juss will address the High Court on behalf of a corpus of Sikh gurdwaras, led by Mr Gulzar Singh Sahota of Hitchin Ramgharia Gurdwara.
Statement of Mr Ghai:
As a Hindu, I believe my soul should be liberated in consecrated fire ('Agni') after death - a sacramental rebirth, like the mythical phoenix arising from the flames anew. I have lived my entire life by the Hindu scriptures and they have inspired me to charitably serve this country for over 30 years. In the frailty of my twilight, I now yearn to die by them.More: Guardian: Why are funeral pyres illegal?, Independent: The burning issue of Hindu funeral pyres, Northumberland Gazette: Burial laws 'put Hindu man's soul at risk'.
I will not deny my claim is provocative, least of all in a nation as notoriously squeamish towards death as our own. However, I honestly do not believe natural cremation grounds would offend public decency - as long as they were discreet, designated sites far from urban and residential areas.
My proposals may be contrary to current norms but norms are ever-changing. My loyalty is to Britain's values of fairness, tolerance and freedom - not its passing norms. If I cannot die as a true Hindu, it will mean those values have died too - and that would be a great loss indeed.
I want to clarify and enforce the law, not disrespect it. I want equality, not exemptions.
Local Authorities routinely provide separate Muslim and Jewish burial grounds and out-of-hours registration and immediate or weekend burials. Hindus should cremate before the following sunset too and yet we, along with the general public, wait for up to a week. No one expects Hindus to marry in a church - so why are Hindu funerals shoehorned through Chapels of Rest designed like Anglican churches?
Hindu and Sikh families in Britain often accompany their deceased loved one's coffin down into the industrial innards of the crematorium. I have witnessed the crematorium incineration process there many times and must say that it is a mechanised humiliation of dignity. I want my own son to light my funeral fire - not a technician flicking a switch.
Gas crematoria are available in India too but, were it needed, the Mumbai atrocities showed the grieving families of slain Police Commissioners and other civic martyrs gathered around funeral pyres, lit with full state honours. I pray I am not denied that same solace on my dying day.
I fully respect that many Hindu-origin people will prefer the speed and convenience of crematoria but for practicing Hindus like me, receiving last rites is quite literally a matter of life and death. Far beyond my own death, I hope my struggle will provide a legacy for those who would not be in a position to undertake such an enormous challenge.
A shoestring legal aid budget has forced me to borrow and spend virtually every penny I have on the case. I am thankful to God that we have reached this far and if I die knowing my last rites will be honoured, my last breath can be taken without fear or regret. Until I receive the High Court verdict, however, no peace of mind is possible whilst the soul itself is in jeopardy.
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
The Journalist, the Exorcist, the Devil
When he first heard about a Vatican-sponsored course on exorcism for priests, Rome-based investigative journalist Matt Baglio was intrigued by the idea of this ancient ritual taking place in the modern world. In his new book, The Rite: The Making of a Modern Exorcist, Baglio follows American priest Father Gary — sent to Rome to train as an exorcist — and his apprenticeship with Father Carmine.Father Gary was working as a parish priest in California when he was asked by his bishop to travel to Rome for training in the rite of exorcism. Though initially surprised, and slightly reluctant, he accepted this call, and enrolled in a new exorcism course at a Vatican-affiliated university, which taught him, among other things, how to distinguish between a genuine possession and mental illness. Eventually he would go on to participate in more than eighty exorcisms as an apprentice to a veteran Italian exorcist. His experiences profoundly changed the way he viewed the spiritual world, and as he moved from rational skeptic to practicing exorcist he came to understand the battle between good and evil in a whole new light.
Journalist Matt Baglio talked to Time magazine about belief, skeptical priests and the particulars of the exorcism ritual.
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Everywhere, Everything
Pantheism owns divine
dawns and her hips -
drowsy smiles the morning
after - kissable lips -
love-words,
engraved trunks, dreams - sheets
between which she sleeps.
Pantheism has godlike beauties,
peaches sparrows hills -
silent waters, blasphemies of crows,
cattle pan-pipes gills -
starlets, stars -
the frigid
fridge and cars -
crosses and crescents -
chimneys, broccoli...
breath puff wind - wings.
Perfection, deity
everywhere - everything -
something in things.
(Léon Bertoletti, Everywhere - Everything)
dawns and her hips -
drowsy smiles the morning
after - kissable lips -
love-words,
engraved trunks, dreams - sheets
between which she sleeps.
Pantheism has godlike beauties,
peaches sparrows hills -
silent waters, blasphemies of crows,
cattle pan-pipes gills -
starlets, stars -
the frigid
fridge and cars -
crosses and crescents -
chimneys, broccoli...
breath puff wind - wings.
Perfection, deity
everywhere - everything -
something in things.
(Léon Bertoletti, Everywhere - Everything)
Friday, March 13, 2009
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Apocalypse Now
Michael Spencer (InternetMonk.com) prophesied "the arrival of an anti-Christian chapter of the post-Christian West."
"Intolerance of Christianity will rise to levels many of us have not believed possible in our lifetimes, and public policy will become hostile toward evangelical Christianity, seeing it as the opponent of the common good. Millions of Evangelicals will quit. Thousands of ministries will end. Christian media will be reduced, if not eliminated. Many Christian schools will go into rapid decline..."
[Christian Science Monitor]
"Intolerance of Christianity will rise to levels many of us have not believed possible in our lifetimes, and public policy will become hostile toward evangelical Christianity, seeing it as the opponent of the common good. Millions of Evangelicals will quit. Thousands of ministries will end. Christian media will be reduced, if not eliminated. Many Christian schools will go into rapid decline..."
[Christian Science Monitor]
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Lady Vamp
A female skeleton found in a 16th century mass grave in Venice had a brick in the mouth, suggesting the woman was thought to be a vampire, scientists said.The skeleton was in a grave used for victims of the Black Death on the island of Lazzaretto Nuovo, the Italian news agency ANSA reported. The island had been a quarantine hospital since the 14th century.
Experts say people thought putting a stake through a skull stopped vampires in their tracks.
[UPI, Telegraph]
Monday, March 09, 2009
Neither Left Nor Right
"The way to salvation leads neither to the left nor to the right."
(Herman Hesse, Wandering, Notes and Sketches)
(Herman Hesse, Wandering, Notes and Sketches)
Sunday, March 08, 2009
The Zenkali Voice
There are days in which newspapers seem to be like the Zenkali Voice of Gerald Durrell's The Mockery Bird.
Thursday, March 05, 2009
Kepler
I measured the skies, now the shadows I measure.
Sky-bound was the mind, earth-bound the body rests.
(Johannes Kepler's epitaph, as he composed it)
Sky-bound was the mind, earth-bound the body rests.
(Johannes Kepler's epitaph, as he composed it)
Wednesday, March 04, 2009
Hell/Heaven
Hell is where the police are German, the chefs are British, lovers are Swiss, mechanics are French and everything is organised by the Italians.
Heaven is where the police are British, the chefs are Italian, lovers are French, mechanics are German and everything is organised by the Swiss.
Heaven is where the police are British, the chefs are Italian, lovers are French, mechanics are German and everything is organised by the Swiss.
Marinettism
Zang! Tumb!! Tuuumb!!!
Caffeine in Europe!!!!!
The life of Filippo Tommaso Marinetti... in comics!
Caffeine in Europe!!!!!
The life of Filippo Tommaso Marinetti... in comics!
In the Name of St Anthony
Cantuale Antonianum: A Franciscan friar blogging in Italian from the basilica of St Anthony in Padua, Italy...
Journalism Pioneer
Barney Kilgore, the inventor of the modern Wall Street Journal and, in important respects, the best of America journalism as we know it, died back in 1967. But he has something to say about journalism today.
Monday, March 02, 2009
Latin and the Mass
A 'dead' language?
"The language of formulae, in its formal informality, even pronounced in different ways and in a way different from antiquity, refuses the attribute of 'dead'; not because it has to be or is comprehensible, but because, even if incomprehensible, it gives off warmth, evokes images, works on people as a series of proper names, as a caption for the pictures of that symbolical book which is the Ritual."
(Giacomo Devoto, Italian linguist, 1897-1974, trans. Léon Bertoletti)
"The language of formulae, in its formal informality, even pronounced in different ways and in a way different from antiquity, refuses the attribute of 'dead'; not because it has to be or is comprehensible, but because, even if incomprehensible, it gives off warmth, evokes images, works on people as a series of proper names, as a caption for the pictures of that symbolical book which is the Ritual."
(Giacomo Devoto, Italian linguist, 1897-1974, trans. Léon Bertoletti)
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