{"id":1066,"date":"2008-09-25T19:57:00","date_gmt":"2008-09-25T19:57:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1066"},"modified":"2008-09-25T19:57:00","modified_gmt":"2008-09-25T19:57:00","slug":"encountering-the-evil-librarian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1066","title":{"rendered":"Encountering the Evil Librarian"},"content":{"rendered":"

She is evil because when I stopped by her office for a chat, she forced<\/span> me to look at four large cartons of books recently “weeded” from the university’s literature and criticism shelves, forced me, I tell you, with the magic words, “They’re free. Take as many as you want.”<\/p>\n

Many (not all) were by little-known writers and critics of the 1890s-1920s. I knew of George Moore, of course, and also recognized the seagoing novelist William McFee<\/a>, because I had been given one of his tramp-steamer novels, In the First Watch<\/em> (1946), as a kid. Here was a book of his magazine pieces, Swallowing the Anchor<\/em> (1925).<\/p>\n

And the rest of my finds:<\/p>\n

• Pierre and His People: Tales of the Far North<\/em> (1894) by a Canadian, Gilbert Parker, who turns out to have been a British propagandist, working in secret to bring the United States into World War One<\/a>. <\/p>\n

• Avowals<\/em> (1919) by George Moore<\/a>, the Irish novelist and poet.<\/p>\n

• Light Freights<\/em> (1901) by W.W. Jacobs<\/a>, best known for one of the most chilling short stories of all time, “The Monkey’s Paw,” but chiefly a writer of sea stories. <\/p>\n

• The Phantom Future<\/em> (1897), by Henry Seton Merriman, which Wikipedia says was the pen name of one Hugh Scott<\/a>, a popular novelist at the turn of the last century.<\/p>\n

One box also held a six-volume collection of the poems of Algernon Swinburne<\/a>, the Decadent<\/a> and somewhat small-p pagan poet of the Victorian era.<\/p>\n

But someone had already spoken for them: the very Catholic Irish-American literature professor, a great admirer of Cardinal Newman<\/a>, etc. Given Swinburne’s heretical and fairly erotic writing — lots of sex and death — you might say he was an original Goth — is this a window into Professor X’s secret kinky side?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

She is evil because when I stopped by her office for a chat, she forced me to look at four large cartons of books recently “weeded” from the university’s literature and criticism shelves, forced me, I tell you, with the magic words, “They’re free. Take as many as you want.” Many (not all) were by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[12],"class_list":["post-1066","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-writing"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-hc","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":6935,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=6935","url_meta":{"origin":1066,"position":0},"title":"Saturnalia with the Romans","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 21, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"We are in the midst of Saturnalia, so consider this article by Classics scholar Mary Beard on \"Five Things the Romans Did at Christmas.\" The headline was just to grab you, because she begins, \"OK, the Romans didn\u2019t actually have Christmas. And even Christian Romans didn\u2019t celebrate Jesus\u2019 birthday on\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Rome\"","block_context":{"text":"Rome","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=rome"},"img":{"alt_text":"io-saturnalia","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/12\/io-saturnalia.gif?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":6604,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=6604","url_meta":{"origin":1066,"position":1},"title":"“Choose How Cute or Evil She Should Be”","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"July 20, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"The sexy witch. The evil witch. The cute witch. What accessories should she wear? What animal is her familiar? And where did she come from? When I ran across this website (another update of the old paper doll), I thought of two things right away. One was a book co-authored\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"witchcraft\"","block_context":{"text":"witchcraft","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=witchcraft"},"img":{"alt_text":"historical witch creator","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/historical-witch-creator.png?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":220,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=220","url_meta":{"origin":1066,"position":2},"title":"The Poison Path and Fatal Fronds","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"July 7, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"While I was in England, M. was Web-searching and turned up the Duchess of Northumberland's \"poison garden,\" which I would like to see today. Part of a much larger garden complex that is under construction but still attracting busloads of garden-loving Brits, it has gotten a lot of press. In\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"England\"","block_context":{"text":"England","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=england"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/images.icnetwork.co.uk\/upl\/nejournal\/mar2010\/4\/1\/duchess-of-northumberland-334905528.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":11887,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=11887","url_meta":{"origin":1066,"position":3},"title":"Why Is the Hippo Goddess Holding a Bull by a Chain in the Northern Sky?","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"November 21, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"This carving comes from a Greco-Roman-era Egyptian temple in Esna,where decorated walls are being carefully cleaned and original colors seen again. As workers in Egypt remove soot and dirt from the temple, sometimes with a mixture of alcohol and distilled water, the original painted carvings and hieroglyphics beneath are so\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"archaeology\"","block_context":{"text":"archaeology","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=archaeology"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/bulls-leg.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/bulls-leg.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/bulls-leg.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/bulls-leg.jpg?resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":961,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=961","url_meta":{"origin":1066,"position":4},"title":"Getting What You Ask For","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 3, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"A New York City principal has been effectively fired for spending the school's money for a Santer\u00eda ceremony to remove negative energy from the school. (Via The Wild Hunt.What an example of the \"be careful what you ask for\" principle. Something in the universe decided that Maritza Tamayo herself embodied\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"magick\"","block_context":{"text":"magick","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=magick"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7553,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=7553","url_meta":{"origin":1066,"position":5},"title":"The War on Halloween","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"October 30, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"It's that time of year, time for the Russians to take their turn at complaining that Halloween is an evil Western import. Segei Aksyonov, who has been placed in charge of the Crimean peninsula, which Russia recently snatched from Ukraine, called the holiday \"cultural colonisation.\" Meanwhile, a spokes-priest for the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"culture\"","block_context":{"text":"culture","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=culture"},"img":{"alt_text":"Sergei_Aksyonov_3486318b","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/Sergei_Aksyonov_3486318b-300x187.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1066","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1066"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1066\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1066"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1066"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1066"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}