{"id":1776,"date":"2004-02-06T23:24:10","date_gmt":"2004-02-07T07:24:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kith.org\/journals\/jed\/2004\/02\/06\/1776.html"},"modified":"2004-02-06T23:24:10","modified_gmt":"2004-02-07T07:24:10","slug":"steerpike","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/2004\/02\/06\/steerpike\/","title":{"rendered":"Steerpike"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Someone's mention of <cite>Gormenghast<\/cite> reminded me that I didn't especially like <cite>Titus Groan<\/cite> (the first book) but that it did contain one of my favorite paragraphs\/exchanges.  Some day I'll get around to reading the second and third books, for cultural-literacy purposes even if I don't actually enjoy them.  Anyway, here's the quote, Steerpike flattering Clarice and Cora Groan:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>'Glorious,' said Steerpike, 'is a dictionary word.  We are all imprisoned by the dictionary.  We choose out of that vast, paper-walled prison our convicts, the little black printed words, when in truth we need fresh sounds to utter, new enfranchised noises which would produce a new effect.  In dead and shackled language, my dears, you are glorious, but oh, to give vent to a brand new sound that might convince you of what I really think of you, as you sit there in your purple splendor, side by side!  But no, it is impossible.  Life is too fleet for onomatopoeia.  Dead words defy me.  I can make no sound, dear ladies, that is apt.'<\/p>\n<p>'You could try,' said Clarice.  'We aren't busy.'<\/p>\n<p>&#8212;Mervyn Peake, <cite>Titus Groan,<\/cite> p. 305 of the most common paperback edition<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Someone&#8217;s mention of Gormenghast reminded me that I didn&#8217;t especially like Titus Groan (the first book) but that it did&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[48,18,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1776","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-commonplace-book","category-humor","category-language"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1776","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1776"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1776\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1776"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1776"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1776"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}