Jansy:
- Re-VN’s “wod”: those of us exposed to Chaucer from early boyhood (including especially the naughty bits, which our school was wise enough not to expurgate) are familiar with “wood” meaning “mad, enraged.” This re-spelling of Anglo-Saxon “wod” is what you would expect from all those mysterious vowel-shifts (“Good God!”). I share your doubts re-PM’s flamboyant extrapolations, except it’s fun to indulge! For example, “wood” is used in the porn industry, as I accidentally learned while idly flipping TV channels, in relation to erections and the “getting-it-up” problems faced by exhausted actors. Whether that extension of the meaning of “wood=stiff” was known to VN or not may be worth investigation. But it does remind me of Chaucer’s outspoken, cynical, anti-cleric Shipman in the Canterbury Tales: “God us sende / Taillynge ynogh unto our lyves ende.” (May God grant us plenty of “taillynge” while yet we live) A wonderful pun, lost unless you know that “taillynge” meant both “accounting/reckoning/tallying” and “shagging” (which survives in idioms such as “chasing tail;” compare also “tally” with “dalliance” and “dilly-dally”) The ambiguity (bed- and ledger-sheets), of course, is built into the Shipman’s Tale of the Monk borrowing from the Merchant in order to buy the Merchant’s wife’s favors. “That for thise hundred frankes he sholde al nyght / Have hire in his armes bolt upright.”
2. Re-your ref. to Kinbote’s comment on razors and his possible sexual inuendo against Shade. Rather puzzling, unless deliberately anachronistic, is CK’s use of “ordinary razor” in contrast to an “ancient Gillette.” The usual contrast, at the time of PF’s setting, would between the “ancient” single-blade, Sweeny-Tod CUT-THROAT razor of Tennyson’s era, that by, say, the 1940s or earlier (in 1914 Gillettes were adopted en masse by the US military – so much for any sissy implications), was almost universally replaced in the home by the relatively modern, and definitely ordinary “safety” double-bladed razor introduced by “King” Gillette in 1904. In turn, electric razors have gained a big slice of the market since the 1950s. The cut-throat survives today as the professional barbers’ preferred implement, with only a tiny minority risking ritualistic self-decapitation at home. Looking at the hairy-chinned Tennyson, razors are the last thing that spring to mind! And from his dates (1809-1892), the Gillette would not have been an option (nor, realistically, would have been earlier unsuccessful French safety razors). In the unlikely event of LORD Alfred shaving himself (or rather light shaping & trimming), the straight, cut-throat would indeed be ordinary. The clean-chinned, hairy-upper-lipped Housman (1859-1936) is a bird of different plumage. He’s more likely (socio-economically) than Tennyson to have self-barbered. YET, if CK’s right about AEH’s use of the ordinary “macho” cut-throat, he’s hardly right about that being any indication of Housman’s sexual preferences. As the sniggering bio jokes go: Moses Jackson, see UNDER A E Housman. A W Pollock, see also UNDER A E Housman. But no sign of consummation. The evidence is (i) AEH the unrequited homosexual (ii) Tennyon 99% hetero with one near-thing-non-carnal “platonic?” episode with the AHH (Arthur Hallam) dedicatee of “In Memoriam.”
Questions unanswered: Does Kinbote’s “ordinary” SINGLE-BLADED razor really have any sexual undertones? Possibilities are Bold, Brave Macho (straight); Single partner (straight); Single partner (homosexual). None of these points to Tennyson or Housman. But IF CK thinks there’s a connection, which one can he contrast with Shade’s DOUBLE-BLADED Gillette? What, if any, are the sexual indications of the Gillette? E.g., Weak, sissy (homosexual)? Or, as we continue to stretch things, Bi-blade -> BI-sexual?
Does Shade’s antique Gillette have any hidden clues? Sign of a rather fuddy-duddy character hanging on to an old, cheap razor with a mistaken sense of thrift. WE ALL KNOW IT’S THE BLADES THAT MADE GILLETTE’S FORTUNE! In fact, try buying BLADES for an antique Gillette. My working-class father used a trick to sharpen the blades by rubbing them on the inside of a wet glass. Before buying his Gillette, he, like most of his mates would VISIT THE LOCAL BARBER for shaves & haircuts. I’m trying to place this whole shaving business in socio-historic context. Be patient.
Physical facts: the single-blade cut-throat is IDEAL for shaving OTHERS, but damned difficult for SELF-shaving. The safety-razor REVERSES this. Try shaving someone else with a Gillette.
Final point: is the razor comment just CK’s anti-American sarcasm? The traditional, manly EUROPEAN single-blade versus the molly-coddling NEW WORLD safety-razor.
SKB
On 15/02/2009 04:35, "jansymello" <jansy@AETERN.US> wrote:
//snip
In relation to "left-handed" and homosexuality, there are other allusions which shall probably remain undecided. For example, we know that Kinbote rated Housman highly. Therefore when, in Pale Fire, we read:"since both Alfreds [ Housman and Tennyson] certainly used an Ordinary Razor, and John Shade an ancient Gillette, the discrepancy may have been due to the use of different instruments," Kinbote's stress on "Gilette" ( a double-edged razor-blade) may be indicatitve of his familiarity with its sexual innuendoes: ie: was Kinbote thereby suggesting that Shade was a bisexual?
btw: I tried to figure out P.Meyer's additional comments on Kinbote's "wod" and VN's use of the word (PM writes that Eadbald, son of Aethelbert, caused "much damage to the church by his faithlessness and fornication with his father's wife"), because the motive for this chastisement is unrelated to Kinbote's own sexual inclinations and to John Shade's history: is there a link I missed?