You must resist the common urge toward the comforting narrative of divine law, toward fairy tales that imply some irrepressible justice. The enslaved were not bricks in your road, and their lives were not chapters in your redemptive history. They were people turned to fuel for the American machine. Enslavement was not destined to end, and it is wrong to claim our present circumstance—no matter how improved—as the redemption for the lives of people who never asked for the posthumous, untouchable glory of dying for their children. Our triumphs can never compensate for this.
—Ta-Nehisi Coates
—from Between the World and Me
cuckold /KUK-əld/. noun or verb. A man whose spouse has been unfaithful or the act making a cuckold of someone. Of late, a scornful political term embraced most strongly by white nationalists to describe their opponents, often abbreviated as cuck. From Middle English cukeweld (same meaning), from Old French cucuault: cocu (cuckoo) + pejorative suffix -ault.
The interesting aspect of the etymology is its roots in the behavior of the female cuckoo bird, some of which lay their eggs in the nests of—and leave them to be cared for by—other birds, leading to the figurative word we are becoming all too familiar with today.
“Wasn’t I yet another cuckolded husband, slightly distinguished by knowing how to self-define with an Old English word?” (Sherman Alexie)
“There is a word for taking another man’s wife – to cuckold. But what is the word for taking another man’s daughter?” (Zadie Smith)
“…Keith launched into a squalid decameron of recent gallops and tumbles, instant liaisons, valiant cuckoldries, eagerly requited grabbings and gropings, quickies and workouts and hip-twangers and knee-tremblers…” (Martin Amis)
“Once at the facility we got hold of a bootleg video of a group of cuckolded Guilter husbands talking about the difficulties of living with simultaneous rage and gratitude.” (George Saunders)
“To be a cuckold once was the luck of the game, but his double cuckoldry had a whiff of revenge about it.” (William Trevor)
“His face shone as if he had newly washed it with soap, so radiant was he in his enjoyment of his past experience of being robbed, cuckolded, and deserted, and in his sure and certain hope of being so again.” (Rebecca West)
A stupendous photo of wave-like structures in Saturn’s rings…and the story behind it. || Pairs with an amazing photo of the starry sky as seen in Finland. || And how about the most arresting images of Jupiter I’ve ever seen?
Investigations range in subject from George Bush and the Prime Minister of Pakistan to Justin Timberlake… → Meet the Font Detectives
Palimpsests! → Lost Languages Discovered in One of the World’s Oldest Continuously Run Libraries [back in 2014, it was the WORD]
Mondegreens! → I don’t even know if vaseline is edible. [perhaps the most famous example of a mondegreen is hearing Jimi Hendrix’s lyric as “excuse me while I kiss this guy.”] || See also, the classic Science Behind Mondegreens.
Eggcorns! → The Eggcorn Database [Eggcorns are similar to mondegreens (misheard lyrics) but aren’t part of songs. For instance, “Holland days” instead of “Hollandaise” sauce.]
Reading lists! → More Than 100 Exceptional Works of Journalism || 100 Great Works OF Dystopian Fiction || 2017 National Book Awards longlists
Thousands of examples of main titles from films as far back as 1920. → The Movie Title Stills Collection
“When you memorize, you start to notice the things that you notice, your own habits of attention, your habits of reading.” → Memorize That Poem
“A collaborative project with almost 90 artists and one instruction: look up.” → One Sky
Today in 1849, Harriet Tubman escaped from slavery in Maryland to Philadelphia. Tubman’s brothers Ben and Harry accompanied her at first but had second thoughts, so Tubman accompanied them home before making her own escape. Not content to remain safely in the North, Tubman returned to the South many times, eventually guiding more than 60 slaves—including her parents and many siblings—to freedom. After the Civil War, Tubman settled on a small property sold to her by the abolitionist senator William Seward (yes, he of Seward’s Folly fame), establishing a family center and eventually a rest home before her death in 1913.
Tom Gauld on Twitter: “Useful abbreviations for the time-pressed online reader”. Time to celebrate…Tom has a new book, Baking with Kafka, coming out. If you don’t have all of Gauld’s books, you should!
Inside the Weird and Wonderful World of Pet Portraits
Reader K.: “I can’t stop laughing, I mean literally laughing, at those kitchen fails!”
Reader C.: “We share first names and something else. I was also obsessed with the Guinness Book of World Records as a kid.”
Reader W.: “I was wondering if you would consider adding to the website at the same time as the newsletter? I am constantly trying to send links to friends from the current edition and they aren’t on the site yet!” — I hope you’ll consider (or continue to) refer your friends to the email newsletter. I think Katexic Clippings is best experienced that way and the website is already a concession to reader demand that I don’t want to make into a full replacement.
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