Subject
Re: Fw: Fwd: color and word "blue", not Nabokov J-1,may9
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----- Forwarded message from jansy@aetern.us -----
Date: Thu, 12 May 2005 21:34:21 -0300
From: Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello <jansy@aetern.us>
Reply-To: Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello <jansy@aetern.us>
Subject: Re: Re: Fw: Fwd: color and word "blue", not Nabokov J-1,may9
---------------- Message requiring your approval (114 lines)
------------------
Hello, Jerry
I didn´t say the Greeks used blue ribbons or drank from blue cups. If I did
let such a meaning pass it must have been due to faulty thinking while
writing.
My intention was to contrast the experience the Greeks must have had with
"iridal" blues while at sea ( by the prismatic breaking down of the light,
"wave lenghts") and our modern familiarity with blue tinted or pigmented
objects ( by absorbed or reflected light ).
I had no idea about what kind of blue implements the Greeks possessed but I
have just learned from Mary Bellino - who wrote:
"I should add too that the more usual Greek word for 'blue,' kuanos, does
indeed occur in Homer, at Odyssey 7.87. It is thought to derive from
cobalt-blue enamel decorations used at the Minoan Place of Knossos, though
in practice it generally referred to a darker, less brilliant blue".
Did Homer, I now wonder, describe any kind of blue flower?
Jansy
----- Original Message -----
From: "Donald B. Johnson" <chtodel@gss.ucsb.edu>
To: <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2005 9:02 PM
Subject: Re: Fw: Fwd: color and word "blue", not Nabokov J-1,may9
> ----- Forwarded message from jerry_friedman@yahoo.com -----
> Date: Thu, 12 May 2005 16:00:45 -0700 (PDT)
> From: Jerry Friedman <jerry_friedman@yahoo.com>
> Reply-To: Jerry Friedman <jerry_friedman@yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: Fw: Fwd: color and word "blue", not Nabokov J-1,may9
> ----------------- Message requiring your approval (73 lines)
> ------------------
> --- "Donald B. Johnson" <chtodel@gss.ucsb.edu> wrote:
>
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: "Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello" <jansy@aetern.us>
> > To: "Vladimir Nabokov Forum" <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
> > Sent: Sunday, May 08, 2005 9:52 PM
> > Subject: Re: Fwd: color and word "blue", not Nabokov
> >
> >
> > Carolyn and Mary Krimmel
> > I wonder what the seafarers saw in that which so completely surrounded
> > them as did the sky and the sea, plus the changing colors following
> > cloudy
> > or sunny days with warnings about deathly tempests or unstirring calm.
> > They must have been specialists in what we sometimes too easily label as
> > "blue", be it celestial or marine.
> > And yet their "bluishnesses" must have been felt as pertaining to a
> > different ( phenomenical, transient, "iridal") category from,say, a
> > painted
> > blue cup or a tinted blue ribbon.
> > Jansy
>
> Not necessarily. Gold used to be described as "red" (as you know
> from the Oldmanhatten word "ridge"), but I'll bet people still
> put it in the same category as daffodils, not red tulips. Shade
> points out, but we all know already, that "white" people aren't
> really white. The use of a color word might be a matter of
> convention.
>
> (I wonder whether the Greeks of Homer's time had blue-painted cups.
> Did they have blue paint at all--maybe made from ground lapis lazuli?
> Or blue dyes, maybe indigo?)
>
> More below.
>
> > > > > ----- Original Message -----
> ...
> > > > > > At 06:30 PM 5/7/05 -0700, you, Carolyn, wrote:
> > > > > >
> > > > > > >An interesting point - - the ancients had no word for (and
> > didn't
> > > see?)
> > > > > > >blue.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > An interesting question. If they did see blue, it is hard to
> > imagine
> > > > > having
> > > > > > no word. If they had no word, it is hard to suppose that they
> > saw
> > > blue.
> ...
> > > > > > Mary Krimmel
>
> Not so hard. As far as I can tell, by the same logic no one can
> hear musical notes or chords unless they know their names; no one
> could have told one chess move from another until notation had
> been invented. On the contrary, animals with color vision can
> recognize colors (flying to the blue disk but not the red one if
> nectar has been provided only at blue disks).
>
> I won't deny the power of words and other notation, but it's clear
> that a lot can happen without words. Also, most people aren't as
> verbal as Nabokov and his typical readers.
>
> Jerry Friedman is trying to make this on-topic by referring to
> Nabokov, chess, and butterflies.
>
>
>
> __________________________________
> Yahoo! Mail Mobile
> Take Yahoo! Mail with you! Check email on your mobile phone.
> http://mobile.yahoo.com/learn/mail
>
> ----- End forwarded message -----
>
>
>
----- End forwarded message -----
Date: Thu, 12 May 2005 21:34:21 -0300
From: Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello <jansy@aetern.us>
Reply-To: Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello <jansy@aetern.us>
Subject: Re: Re: Fw: Fwd: color and word "blue", not Nabokov J-1,may9
---------------- Message requiring your approval (114 lines)
------------------
Hello, Jerry
I didn´t say the Greeks used blue ribbons or drank from blue cups. If I did
let such a meaning pass it must have been due to faulty thinking while
writing.
My intention was to contrast the experience the Greeks must have had with
"iridal" blues while at sea ( by the prismatic breaking down of the light,
"wave lenghts") and our modern familiarity with blue tinted or pigmented
objects ( by absorbed or reflected light ).
I had no idea about what kind of blue implements the Greeks possessed but I
have just learned from Mary Bellino - who wrote:
"I should add too that the more usual Greek word for 'blue,' kuanos, does
indeed occur in Homer, at Odyssey 7.87. It is thought to derive from
cobalt-blue enamel decorations used at the Minoan Place of Knossos, though
in practice it generally referred to a darker, less brilliant blue".
Did Homer, I now wonder, describe any kind of blue flower?
Jansy
----- Original Message -----
From: "Donald B. Johnson" <chtodel@gss.ucsb.edu>
To: <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2005 9:02 PM
Subject: Re: Fw: Fwd: color and word "blue", not Nabokov J-1,may9
> ----- Forwarded message from jerry_friedman@yahoo.com -----
> Date: Thu, 12 May 2005 16:00:45 -0700 (PDT)
> From: Jerry Friedman <jerry_friedman@yahoo.com>
> Reply-To: Jerry Friedman <jerry_friedman@yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: Fw: Fwd: color and word "blue", not Nabokov J-1,may9
> ----------------- Message requiring your approval (73 lines)
> ------------------
> --- "Donald B. Johnson" <chtodel@gss.ucsb.edu> wrote:
>
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: "Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello" <jansy@aetern.us>
> > To: "Vladimir Nabokov Forum" <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
> > Sent: Sunday, May 08, 2005 9:52 PM
> > Subject: Re: Fwd: color and word "blue", not Nabokov
> >
> >
> > Carolyn and Mary Krimmel
> > I wonder what the seafarers saw in that which so completely surrounded
> > them as did the sky and the sea, plus the changing colors following
> > cloudy
> > or sunny days with warnings about deathly tempests or unstirring calm.
> > They must have been specialists in what we sometimes too easily label as
> > "blue", be it celestial or marine.
> > And yet their "bluishnesses" must have been felt as pertaining to a
> > different ( phenomenical, transient, "iridal") category from,say, a
> > painted
> > blue cup or a tinted blue ribbon.
> > Jansy
>
> Not necessarily. Gold used to be described as "red" (as you know
> from the Oldmanhatten word "ridge"), but I'll bet people still
> put it in the same category as daffodils, not red tulips. Shade
> points out, but we all know already, that "white" people aren't
> really white. The use of a color word might be a matter of
> convention.
>
> (I wonder whether the Greeks of Homer's time had blue-painted cups.
> Did they have blue paint at all--maybe made from ground lapis lazuli?
> Or blue dyes, maybe indigo?)
>
> More below.
>
> > > > > ----- Original Message -----
> ...
> > > > > > At 06:30 PM 5/7/05 -0700, you, Carolyn, wrote:
> > > > > >
> > > > > > >An interesting point - - the ancients had no word for (and
> > didn't
> > > see?)
> > > > > > >blue.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > An interesting question. If they did see blue, it is hard to
> > imagine
> > > > > having
> > > > > > no word. If they had no word, it is hard to suppose that they
> > saw
> > > blue.
> ...
> > > > > > Mary Krimmel
>
> Not so hard. As far as I can tell, by the same logic no one can
> hear musical notes or chords unless they know their names; no one
> could have told one chess move from another until notation had
> been invented. On the contrary, animals with color vision can
> recognize colors (flying to the blue disk but not the red one if
> nectar has been provided only at blue disks).
>
> I won't deny the power of words and other notation, but it's clear
> that a lot can happen without words. Also, most people aren't as
> verbal as Nabokov and his typical readers.
>
> Jerry Friedman is trying to make this on-topic by referring to
> Nabokov, chess, and butterflies.
>
>
>
> __________________________________
> Yahoo! Mail Mobile
> Take Yahoo! Mail with you! Check email on your mobile phone.
> http://mobile.yahoo.com/learn/mail
>
> ----- End forwarded message -----
>
>
>
----- End forwarded message -----