There are some who might say this artist's conception of the Bellman is a base and underhanded attack upon the same, suggesting as it does that the Bellman was literally birdbrained and furthermore, that his colleagues possessed the collective wisdom and general prescience of a flock of chickens on the way to the abattoir.
But this is not the case.
I put it to you that the English penchant for all things avian is well-known. I put it to you that Lewis Carroll populated his verse and prose with many avian and semi-avian portmanteaux (or portmantanimaux?) such as the Jubjub Bird and the Borogrove.
I put it to you that the Bellman has suffered the ill-effects of a Violent Unknown Event and that he has metamorphasized into an avian state common amongst avant-garde English cineastes. The wisdom on his face is actually the smug look of a sporting wallah who finally knows for certain which came first, the chicken or the egg.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Put a sock in it, Wittgenstein, we're talking snark here!
I submit for your perusal the word uffish in the above lines. Lewis Carroll explained it thus: "it (uffish) seemed to suggest a state ...
-
Yes, that’s all very well, dear reader, aren’t you clever to have remembered that Lewis Carroll’s doppelgänger, Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, wa...
-
The Bellman continues his Indictment with the accusation of Ambition, tempered by the observation that all Snarks, like the intestines or th...
-
All aboard! At one and the same time, the Bellman delivers himself from an impending watery grave, snatches a coveted berth aboard the H.M.S...

No comments:
Post a Comment