»AltaVista was created by researchers at Digital Equipment Corporation's Network Systems Laboratory and Western Research Laboratory, who were trying to provide services to make finding files on the public network easier. Paul Flaherty was responsible for the original idea, and two key participants were Louis Monier, who wrote the crawler, and Michael Burrows, who wrote the indexer. The name AltaVista was chosen in relation to the surroundings of their company at Palo Alto. AltaVista was publicly launched as an internet search engine on December 15, 1995 at altavista.digital.com.
At launch, the service had two innovations which set it ahead of the other search engines: it used a fast, multi-threaded crawler (Scooter) which could cover many more Web pages than were believed to exist at the time and an efficient search running back-end on advanced hardware. As of 1998, it used 20 multi-processor machines using DEC's 64-bit Alpha processor. Together, the back-end machines had 130 GB of RAM and 500 GB of hard disk space, and received 13 million queries per day. This made AltaVista the first searchable, full-text database of a large part of the World Wide Web.
»In 1996, AltaVista became the exclusive provider of search results for Yahoo!. In 1998, Digital was sold to Compaq and in 1999, Compaq redesigned AltaVista as a web portal, hoping to compete with Yahoo!. Under CEO Rod Schrock, AltaVista abandoned its streamlined search page and focused on features like shopping and free email. [...] In June 1999, Compaq sold a majority stake in AltaVista to CMGI, an internet investment company. CMGI filed for an initial public offering for AltaVista to take place in April 2000, but as the internet bubble collapsed, the IPO was cancelled. Meanwhile, it became clear that AltaVista's portal strategy was unsuccessful, and the search service began losing market share, especially to Google. After a series of layoffs and several management changes, AltaVista gradually shed its portal features and refocused on search. By 2002, AltaVista had improved the quality and freshness of its results and redesigned its user interface. In February 2003, AltaVista was bought by Overture Services, Inc. In July 2003, Overture itself was taken over by Yahoo!.
Source: youtube: Asking AltaVista in 1996 - This video show how the AltaVista search engine worked in late 1996. How queries could be presented in simple and advanced mode, and how reults were displayed.


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HomeNewsHavana Syndrome continues to baffle U.S. officers
Havana Syndrome continues to baffle U.S. officers
U.S. officers stay decided to resolve mysterious, neurological "anomalous well being incidents" which have befallen a rising variety of diplomats, army personnel and intelligence officers.
Senior leaders within the Biden administration have ramped up efforts to deal with these with the mysterious signs, which a December Nationwide Academy of Sciences report mentioned "are according to the consequences of directed, pulsed radiofrequency (RF) power."
The suspected assaults — inflicting what's generally known as Havana Syndrome, after a rash of studies from U.S. Embassy workers in Cuba — trigger usually debilitating signs, together with vertigo and complications, that may final years. Many suspect the assaults are from a microwave or directed-energy weapon.
Congress, too, has stepped up its efforts, passing laws this month to offer monetary help to victims.
However as for definitively pinning down the supply and who could also be accountable, the U.S. stays baffled.
"I really feel, nonetheless, a powerful diploma of humility about with the ability to offer you a greatest guess, as a result of it may very well be utterly flawed," Home Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, California Democrat, instructed reporters final week.
Mr. Schiff mentioned the U.S. authorities has not dominated something out when it comes to who or what could also be inflicting the incidents. He mentioned not all the reported incidents could also be "attributable to the identical trigger."
"On the identical time, the seriousness of the accidents and the proliferating nature of those anomalies calls for are full, for the deployment of sources throughout the federal government to search out out," he mentioned.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken and CIA Director William J. Burns have each made agency commitments to figuring out the trigger, and making certain victims are cared for.
"This was one of many few points that Secretary Blinken requested to have added to his roster of briefings, even earlier than he was sworn in," a State Division spokesperson mentioned Friday. "He wished to make it possible for we get a full understanding of the place we had been when it comes to understanding anomalous well being incidents, and what extra we would have liked to do."
Mr. Blinken stays personally engaged within the matter and has appointed a senior official to supervise the State Division's work alongside the Nationwide Safety Council, the Division of Protection and the intelligence neighborhood to proceed to press for solutions.
Mr. Burns instructed NPR in July that the assaults on CIA personnel had been amongst his high priorities.
"I'm definitely persuaded that what our officers and a few relations, in addition to different U.S. authorities staff, have skilled is actual, and it's critical," Mr. Burns instructed NPR. "I'm completely decided … to resolve the query of what and who prompted this."
In August, Mr. Burns recalled the chief of station in Vienna after company officers decided he didn't adequately tackle a number of anomalous well being incidents in Austria.
Earlier this month, Secretary of Protection Lloyd Austin urged service members to return ahead in the event that they expertise any signs.
"As a part of a government-wide effort, the Division is dedicated to discovering the trigger and the supply of those AHI and making certain that affected people obtain applicable medical care as attainable when wanted," Mr. Austin mentioned in a memo.
Some estimate that greater than 200 officers have been focused within the assaults, which have affected officers from the State Division, the Protection Division and the Central Intelligence Company.
Because the preliminary diagnoses in 2016, the variety of U.S. officers across the globe reporting signs, together with on U.S. soil, has continued to swell.
In Could, studies revealed details about two U.S. officers struck by Havana syndrome close to the White Home.
In August, a "attainable anomalous well being incident" — which some believed to be a Havana syndrome case — was reported by the U.S. Embassy in Hanoi and briefly delayed Vice President Kamala D. Harris' journey to Vietnam.
Earlier this month, a CIA officer reported signs whereas touring in India, on the identical time Mr. Burns was within the nation.
When the incidents first started being reported, a number of officers mentioned their circumstances had been dismissed by management inside the State Division and CIA, and that the federal government denied them entry to medical therapy for the signs. In some circumstances, the victims had been compelled to finish their service as a result of accidents they sustained, which they mentioned had been ignored.
In an early investigation into the rash of studies from the U.S. embassy in Cuba, the State Division in 2018 commissioned a examine by the JASON advisory group, which investigated sounds recorded by victims who suffered from anomalous well being incidents in Havana.
The report, a declassified model of which was printed Thursday by Buzzfeed, paints an image of the uphill battle early victims confronted.
In its report, JASON concluded that the recorded sounds had been "mechanical or organic in origin, slightly than digital" and never according to a microwave power assault. The report additionally concluded that "a attainable clarification for the reported signs is a psychogenic sickness," although it stopped wanting declaring a focused assault by a foul actor.
The State Division has since dismissed the 2018 examine, based on a spokesperson who mentioned the report reveals a number of shortcomings, together with reliance on scant information and an absence of "broad entry to data and efficient personnel vital to totally perceive such a fancy situation." The researchers behind the JASON report interviewed just one one that had reported signs generally related to anomalous well being incidents.
"And it was due to the failings and shortcomings in prior research together with this one, that we now have centered on sharing data throughout departments and companies and making all of that information out there to the [intelligence community's] professional panel," he mentioned.
The State Division spokesperson mentioned the JASON report isn't "aligned with this administration's understanding" of the anomalous well being incidents and has not "knowledgeable" the federal government's more moderen inquiry into the matter.
"I feel we've made a variety of enhancements when it comes to how the federal government, the entire authorities, is treating those that are affected by these anomalies," Mr. Schiff mentioned.
However Mr. Schiff says there are nonetheless inquiries to be answered. He mentioned he nonetheless thinks there may very well be quite a lot of causes behind the signs.
"These assaults, there's definitely a lot of them that appear fairly deliberate and what the causes and what the motivation is, what the intent is — I feel these are nonetheless very a lot open questions," he mentioned. "However I do suppose that we're getting nearer to a few of the solutions, and bringing new instruments to bear to assist us get these solutions."
Mr. Schiff mentioned he's nonetheless open to the chance that Havana Syndrome isn't a results of focused assaults.
However, he mentioned, "if a nation-state actor is behind it or a couple of nation-state actor, and these are deliberate assaults the place their efforts are undertaken with the data that they're inflicting folks bodily harm, I'm additionally assured there'll be very critical repercussions."
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The plans would see 75 new homes built in Rendlesham Picture: CCD LTD.
The new development would sit north of existing homes on Gardenia Close and Garden Square.
It would also include 165 car parking spaces and a play area.
Documents submitted to planners on behalf of the applicant, Capital Community Developments, indicate that the new development would take around three years to construct.
An application was previously made for a development on the site last June but was refused by authorities three months later.
At the time Suffolk Coastal District Council was concerned that the site would overdeveloped if it let the plans go ahead with the council preferring a smaller estate of around 50 homes.
It also raised concerns about the level of affordable housing on the site and the properties' design which was described as poor in the initial application.
Now, however, the developers say that they have worked through the issues listed in the application with council officials.
The latest application includes an increased number of affordable homes on the site from 20 to 25 with the document stating that the developers had "denied themselves perfectly legitimate profit margins in order to satisfy planning requirements".
In addition to this there were a number of changes to some of the building designs to reduce concerns about homes being overlooked and overshadowed by proposed architectural features.
Parker Planning Services Ltd, which resubmitted the plans on behalf of the applicant. said it was happy with the resubmission.
A spokesman for the company said: "Parker Planning Services Ltd. were pleased to resubmit this planning application which, echoing recent trends in planning at the local and national levels, embodies the sustainable Garden Village approach to housing development.
A decision on the future of the site will be taken in the next few months.


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Papillion is a city in and the county seat of Sarpy County, Nebraska. The city developed in the 1870s as a railroad town and suburb of Omaha. The city is part of the larger five-county metro area of Omaha. Papillion's population was 24,159 at the 2020 census. Its growth since the late 20th century has reflected Omaha's.

Overview
The city was named after the creek of the same name which flows through its center; this had been named by early French explorers, as France had claimed this territory through the eighteenth century. The name Papillion is derived from the French term (papillon) for butterfly. According to local tradition, the early French explorers named the creek as Papillon because they saw so many butterflies along its grassy banks. The spelling was changed through a transliteration of the French word.

Papillion was platted in 1870 when the railroad was extended to that point. Papillion (sometimes referred to as "Papio" by its residents) is one of the last of the late 18th-century, Paris-inspired frontier cities left in the Midwestern United States.

Halleck Park, a recreation area in the heart of the city, includes many trails, open spaces, trees and a number of areas of interest, including Papio Fun Park, Papio Bay Aquatic Park, Papio Pool, and Papio Bowl. The park also offers tennis courts, volleyball courts, playgrounds, "The Duck Pond", Monarch Field ("The Pit"), and E.A. Fricke Field.

It also has nine other softball diamonds within the park for youth.  The diamonds are sited on three fields: Halleck, Blonde, and Papio Bay.  Village Park, Papio Bay Aquatic Center (including two water slides and a zero depth pool) and Walnut Creek recreational park are among the other recreational amenities in the city.

Papillion Middle School is in the downtown area south of Papio Creek; the building formerly was used as the high school until August 1971. The former junior high was located directly west, across the street.

Also downtown are the Old A.W. Clarke banking house, Sump Memorial Library, Portal One-Room School House, Papillion Municipal Building (Sarpy County Courthouse until 1970), and the John Sautter House. Other areas of interest in Papillion include the Sarpy County Court House and Jail, Shadow Lake Towne Center, and Midlands Hospital, all along Nebraska Highway 370 in the southern portion of the city.

Papillion has a Triple-A Minor League Baseball team. Werner Park, located  west of the city on Highway 370 in unincorporated Sarpy County, opened in 2011 as the new home of the Omaha Storm Chasers of the Pacific Coast League. The Storm Chasers were formerly the Omaha Royals; after 42 years at Rosenblatt Stadium in south Omaha, the team moved out following the 2010 season and changed their nickname. They have been the only Triple-A affiliate of the Kansas City Royals, an expansion club that entered the American League in 1969. In conjunction with Major League Baseball's restructuring of Minor League Baseball in 2021, the Storm Chasers were placed into the new Triple-A East.

Politics

Papillion is divided into four wards, with two councilmembers elected from each. One seat for each ward is up for election every two years, with each term lasting four years.  The mayor is the head of the city council and is elected at-large to four-year terms. The council meets every two weeks. Following former Mayor James Blinn's resignation on July 7, 2009, city council president David Black succeeded to become mayor of Papillion. He was elected in 2010 for his first full term; as of October 2022, he had been mayor for 13 years, running unopposed in the 2022 election cycle.

Geography
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , of which  is land and  is water.

Demographics

2010 census
As of the 2010 census,  there were 18,894 people, 6,925 households, and 5,079 families living in the city. The population density was . There were 7,240 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the city was 90.7% White, 3.3% African American, 0.4% Native American, 1.5% Asian, 1.5% from other races, and 2.7% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino people of any race were 5.2% of the population.

There were 6,925 households, of which 38.1% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 59.5% were married couples living together, 10.1% had a female householder with no husband present, 3.7% had a male householder with no wife present, and 26.7% were non-families. 22.5% of all households were made up of individuals, and 9% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.68 and the average family size was 3.15.

The median age in the city was 36.8 years. 27.3% of residents were under the age of 18; 9.1% were between the ages of 18 and 24; 24.3% were from 25 to 44; 28.5% were from 45 to 64; and 11% were 65 years of age or older. The gender makeup of the city was 48.8% male and 51.2% female.

Schools
Papillion is part of the Papillion-La Vista Public School District, which includes two high schools, three middle schools and fifteen public elementary schools. Papillion-La Vista South High School, the newer of the two high schools, opened in 2003. It is located in southwest Papillion while Papillion-La Vista High School, opened in 1971, is located in the northern part of the city close to the LaVista border. The school district has well over 8,000 students and is one of the fastest-growing districts in Nebraska.

Papillion is home to Nebraska Christian College, accredited by the Association for Biblical Higher Education.

Climate

Notable people
Abbie Cobb, actress and author
Brandon Curran, soccer defender
Merle Curti, historian
Cade Johnson, football wide receiver
Alonzo Martinez, mixed martial artist
Chris Petersen, guitarist
Amber Rolfzen, volleyball player
Becca Swanson, powerlifter and wrestler
Allison Weston, volleyball player

References

External links

 papillion.org - City of Papillion website

1870 establishments in Nebraska
Cities in Nebraska
Cities in Sarpy County, Nebraska
County seats in Nebraska
French-American history of Nebraska
History of Omaha, Nebraska by community area
Populated places established in 1870

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
May We Be Forgiven: A Novel
By A. M. Homes
New Price: $17.00
Used Price: $1.10
Book Previews
June Preview: The Millions Most Anticipated (This Month)
We wouldn't dream of abandoning our vast semi–annual Most Anticipated Book Previews, but we thought a monthly reminder would be helpful (and give us a chance to note titles we missed the first time around). Here's what we're looking out for this month. Let us know what you're looking forward to in the comments, and get excited for the GREAT SECOND-HALF PREVIEW, which we will roll out in the second week of July.
(Also, as Millions founder and publisher C. Max Magee wrote recently, you can help ensure that these previews, and all our great books coverage, continue for years to come by lending your support to the site as a member. The Millions has been running for nearly 15 years on a wing and a prayer, and we're incredibly grateful for the love of our recurring readers and current members who help us sustain the work that we do.)
Kudos by Rachel Cusk: When I first encountered Cusk's writing in the mid-aughts I wrote her off as an author of potentially tedious domestic drama. I was woefully wrong. It's true Cusk is a chronicler of the domestic: she is as known for her memoirs of motherhood and divorce as she is for her novels, but her writing is innovative, observant, and bold. The New Yorker declared that with the trilogy that her latest novel Kudos completes, Cusk has "renovated" the novel, merging fiction with oral history, retooling its structure. Cusk has said: "I've never treated fiction as a veil or as a thing to hide behind, which perhaps was, not a mistake exactly, but a sort of risky way to live." (Anne)
There There by Tommy Orange: Set mostly in Oakland, Orange's polyphonic novel describes the disparate but connected lives of group of Native Americans, many of them self-identified "urban Indians," who come together for the Great Oakland Powwow. There, personal and communal and national histories propel events–and his cast of characters–toward a shocking denouement. Orange's novel has been called a "new kind of American epic" by the New York Times; read more here. (Lydia)
Florida by Lauren Groff: After collecting fans like Barack Obama with her bestselling novel Fates and Furies, Groff's next book is a collection of short stories that center around Florida, "the landscape, climate, history, and state of mind." Included is "Dogs Go Wolf," the haunting story that appeared in The New Yorker earlier in the year. In a recent interview, Groff gave us the lay of the land: "The collection is a portrait of my own incredible ambivalence about the state where I've lived for twelve years...I love the disappearing natural world, the sunshine, the extraordinary and astonishing beauty of the place as passionately as I hate the heat and moisture and backward politics and the million creatures whose only wish is to kill you." (Claire)
Number One Chinese Restaurant by Lillian Li: A family chronicle, workplace drama, and love story rolled into one, Li's debut chronicles the universe of the Beijing Duck House restaurant of Rockville, Md., run by a family and long-time employees who intertwine in various ways when disaster strikes. Lorrie Moore raves, "her narratives are complex, mysterious, moving, and surprising." Read an excerpt from the novel here at Buzzfeed. (Lydia)
The Terrible by Yrsa Daley-Ward: A poet's memoir in prose and verse about a tempestuous adolescence in England, where the author was born to immigrant parents and raised by Seventh-Day Adventist grandparents. The memoir describes her experiences with drugs and alcohol, her relationships with men and with sex work, the struggles of her brother, and her development as an artist. A starred Kirkus review says "Daley-Ward has quite a ferociously moving story to tell." (Lydia)
Confessions of the Fox by Jordy Rosenberg: A work of speculative historical fiction exploring queer and trans histories through the story of notorious 19th-century London thieves Jack Sheppard and Edgeworth Bess. This is a publishing event, the first work of fiction to be released by esteemed editor Chris Jackson's One World imprint, and it has received accolades from every trade publication and a host of writers including Victor LaValle, China Miéville, and Maggie Nelson. (Lydia)
Ayiti by Roxane Gay: This is a reissue of Roxane Gay's first book, a collection of short stories about Haiti and the diaspora, with two new stories. Ayiti was first published by the small press Artistically Declined Press in 2011, before the author was routinely at the top of the New York Times bestseller list. Kirkus says "Gay has addressed these subjects with more complexity since, but this debut amply contains the righteous energy that drives all her work." (Lydia)
The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai: This third novel from the acclaimed author of The Borrower and The Hundred-Year House interlaces the story of an art gallery director whose friends are succumbing to the AIDS epidemic in 1980s Chicago with a mother struggling to find her estranged daughter 30 years later in contemporary Paris. "The Great Believers is by turns funny, harrowing, tender, devastating, and always hugely suspenseful," says Margot Livesey, author of Mercury. (Michael)
Good Trouble by Joseph O'Neill: Frequent New Yorker and Harper's readers will know that O'Neill has been writing a lot of short fiction lately. With the new Good Trouble, the Netherland author now has a full collection, comprised of 11 off-kilter, unsettling stories. Their characters range from a would-be renter in New York who can't get anyone to give him a reference to a poet who can't decide whether or not to sign a petition. (Thom)
Days of Awe by A.M. Homes: A new collection of stories from the prolific author of May We Be Forgiven featuring humorous, melancholy reflections on American life. The title story involves friends becoming lovers at a conference about genocides. The great Zadie Smith calls it "a razor-sharp story collection from a writer who is always 'furiously good.'" (Lydia)
The Good Son by You-jeong Jeong (translated by Chi-Young Kim): South Korea's best-selling crime novelist is a woman, although she is nonetheless marketed as "the Stephen King of Korea." This novel, a sensation in South Korea and her first to be translated into English, is a psychological thriller involving a possible matricide, for "fans of Jo Nesbo and Patricia Highsmith." (Lydia)
Upstate by James Wood: It's been 15 years since Wood's first novel, The Book Against God, was published. What was Wood doing in the meantime? Oh, just influencing a generation of novelists from his perch at The New Yorker, where his dissecting reviews also functioned as miniature writing seminars. He also penned a writing manual, How Fiction Works. His sophomore effort concerns the Querry family, who reunite in upstate New York to help a family member cope with depression and to pose the kinds of questions fiction answers best: How do people get through difficulty? What does it mean to be happy? How should we live our lives? (Hannah)
Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata (translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori): A 36-year-old woman in modern-day Tokyo has worked a convenience store for 18 years of her life, watching family and friends pairing off, having children, or climbing professional ladders. She eventually enters into a sham marriage with a coworker to embody an idealized notion of adulthood, but the plan backfires, and the book is a meditation on work, life, and "normalcy." Kirkus says "Murata skillfully navigates the line between the book's wry and weighty concerns and ensures readers will never conceive of the 'pristine aquarium' of a convenience store in quite the same way." (Lydia)
Half Gods by Akil Kumarasamy: A collection of linked stories about a family devastated by the Sri Lankan civil war, which claims the lives of a mother and two sons. The father and remaining daughter flee to New Jersey, and the collection moves across time and place and between points of view to describe the dislocation of its characters and the enduring consequences of trauma. Publisher's Weekly calls it "a wonderful, auspicious debut." (Lydia)
History of Violence by Édouard Louis (translated by Lorin Stein): A fictionalized account of a true story. The author survived a violent sexual assault and this novelization exploring the aftermath, including his return to his family's village, became a bestseller in France for its frank reckoning with the effects of sexual violence, as well a broader look at French society. (Lydia)
Sweet and Low by Nick White: A new entry in the field of southern gothic (complete with Faulkner homage), a collection of stories exploring masculinity, sexuality, and place in the deep south that has garnered praise from Jesmyn Ward and Alissa Nutting. Publisher's Weekly called it "an atmospheric and expertly crafted collection." (Lydia)
We Begin Our Ascent by Joe Mungo Reed: A debut novel that follows the travails of a team of professional cyclists–who happen to be doping–in the Tour de France, exploring ideas of competition, ambition, and team dynamics. The novel has drawn several comparisons to Don DeLillo, and George Saunders raved: "A dazzling debut by an exciting and essential new talent: fast, harrowing, compelling, masterfully structured, genuinely moving. Reed is a true stylist." (Lydia)
Dead Girls by Alice Bolin: A collection of essays exploring the ubiquitous "dead girl" in popular culture, using shows like Twin Peaks and Pretty Little Liars to point to the misogyny that thrums through so many of the cultural products we consume. These are interwoven with personal essays about her arrival in Los Angeles. Kirkus calls it "an illuminating study on the role women play in the media and in their own lives." (Lydia)
Sick by Porochista Khakpour: In her much anticipated memoir, Khakpour chronicles her arduous experience with illness, specifically late-stage Lyme disease. She examines her efforts to receive a diagnosis and the psychological and physiological impact of being so sick for so long, including struggles with mental health and addiction. Khakpour's memoir demonstrates the power of survival in the midst of pain and uncertainty. (Read an excellent piece in The New Yorker here.) (Zoë)
The Captives by Debra Jo Immergut: Immergut published a collection of short stories in 1992, shortly after graduating from the Iowa Writers' Workshop, but her debut novel comes over 25 years later, a literary thriller that takes place in a prison where a woman is serving a sentence for second-degree murder. Her appointed psychologist once pined for her in high schhol. Publishers' Weekly says "Immergut's book begins as in incisive psychological portrait of two mismatched individuals and morphs into a nail-biting thriller." (Lydia)
Tonight I'm Someone Else by Chelsea Hodson: Examining the intersection of social media and intimacy, the commercial and the corporeal, the theme of Hodson's essay collection is how we are pushed and pulled by our desire. The Catapult teacher's debut has been called "racingly good…refreshing and welcome" by Maggie Nelson. (Tess)
Fight No More by Lydia Millet: Millet's 2010 collection Love in Infant Monkeys was a Pulitzer Prize finalist. Eight years later she's released another collection of stories arranged around a real estate broker and their family as they struggle to reconnect. Millet's satire is well-known for it's sharp brutality—and its compassionate humanity. Both sides are on full display here. (Kaulie)
Invitation to a Bonfire by Adrienne Celt: On the heels of her critically praised debut, The Daughters, Celt gives us a love-triangle story that, according to the publisher, is "inspired by the infamous Nabokov marriage, with a spellbinding psychological thriller at its core." The protagonist is a young Russian refugee named Zoya who becomes entangled with her boarding school's visiting writer, Leo Orlov, and his imperious wife, Vera. Our own Edan Lepucki praised the novel as "a sexy, brilliant, and gripping novel about the fine line between passion and obsession. I am in awe of Celt's mastery as a prose stylist and storyteller; I can't stop thinking about this amazing book." (Sonya)
Essays, Notable Articles
The Audacity of Prose
Chigozie Obioma | 55
In one of his essays, the late Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe stated that "no one be fooled by the fact that we write in English, for we intend to do unheard-of things with it." That "we" is, in essence, an authoritative oratorical posture that cast him as a representative of a group, a kindred of writers who — either by design or fate — have adopted English as the language of literary composition. With these words, it seems that to Achebe the intention to do "unheard-of" things with language is a primary factor in literary creation. He is right. And this should be the most important factor.
Achebe was, however, not merely speaking about the intention of his contemporaries alone, but also of writers who wrote generations before him. Among them would be, ironically, Joseph Conrad, whose prose he sometimes queried, but who embodied that intention to the extent that he was described by Virginia Woolf as one who "had been gifted, so he had schooled himself, and such was his obligation to a strange language wooed characteristically for its Latin qualities rather than its Saxon that it seemed impossible for him to make an ugly or insignificant movement of the pen." That "we" also includes writers like Vladimir Nabokov of whom John Updike opined: "Nabokov writes prose the way it should be written: ecstatically;" Arundhati Roy; Salman Rushdie; Wole Soyinka; and a host of other writers to whom English was not the only language. The encompassing "we" could also be expanded to include prose stylists whose first language was English like William Faulkner, Shirley Hazzard, Virginia Woolf, William Golding, Ian McEwan, Cormac McCarthy, and all those writers who, in most of their works, float enthusiastically on blasted chariots of prose, and whose literary horses are high on poetic steroids. But these writers, it seems, are the last of a dying breed.
The culture of enforced literary humility, encouraged in many writing workshops and promoted by a rising culture of unobjective literary criticism, is chiefly to blame. It is the melding voice of a crowd that shouts down those who aspire to belong to Achebe's "we" from their ladder by seeking to enthrone a firm — even regulatory — rule of creative writing. The enthroned style is dished out in the schools under the strict dictum: "Less is more." Literary critics, on the other hand, do the damage by leveling variations of the accusation of writing "self-conscious (self-important; self-aware…) prose" on writers who attempt to do "unheard-of" things with their prose. The result, by and large, is the crowning of minimalism as the cherished form of writing, and the near rejection of other stylistic considerations. In truth, minimalism has its qualities and suits the works of certain writers like Ernest Hemingway, Raymond Carver, John Cheever, and even, for the most part, Chinua Achebe himself. With it, great writings have been produced, including masterpieces like A Farewell to Arms. But it is its blind adoption in most contemporary novels as the only viable style in the literary universe that must be questioned, if we are to keep the literary culture healthy.
One of the insightful critics still around, Garth Risk Hallberg, describes this phenomenon in his 2012 New York Times Review of A.M Homes's May We Be Forgiven with these apt observations:
The underlying problem here is style. Homes's ambitions may have grown in the quarter-century since The Safety of Objects was published, but her default mode of narration remains mired in the minimalism of that era: an uninflected indicative voice that flattens everything it touches. Harry gets some upsetting news: 'Two days later, the missing girl is found in a garbage bag. Dead. I vomit.' Harry gets a visitor: 'Bang. Bang. Bang. A heavy knocking on the door. Tessie barks. The mattress has arrived.'
Hallberg goes on to describe, in the next two paragraphs, the faddist nature of the style:
Style may be, as Truman Capote said, 'the mirror of an artist's sensibility,' but it is also something that develops over time, and in context. When minimalism returned to prominence in the mid-80s, its power was the power to negate. To record yuppie hypocrisies like some sleek new camera was to reveal how scandalous the mundane had become, and how mundane the scandalous. But deadpan cool has long since thinned into a manner. Its reflexive irony is now more or less the house style of late capitalism. (How awesome is that?)
As a non-Western writer, knowing the origin of this fad is comforting. But as Hallberg pointed out, context, not tradition, is what should decide or generate the style of any work of fiction. Paul West noted in his essay, "In Praise of Purple Prose," written around the heyday of minimalism in 1985, that the "minimalist vogue depends on the premise that only an almost invisible style can be sincere, honest, moving, sensitive and so forth, whereas prose that draws attention to itself by being revved up, ample, intense, incandescent or flamboyant turns its back on something almost holy — the human bond with ordinariness." This rationale, I dare say, misunderstands what art is and what art is meant to do. The essential work of art is to magnify the ordinary, to make that which is banal glorious through artistic exploration. Thus, fiction must be different from reportage; painting from photography. And this difference should be reflected in the language of the work — in its deliberate constructiveness, its measured adornment of thought, and in the arrangement of representative images, so that the fiction about a known world becomes an elevated vision of that world. That is, the language acts to give the "ordinary" the kind of artistic clarity that is the equivalence of special effects in film. While the special effect can be achieved by manipulating various aspects of the novel such as the structure, voice, setting, and others, the language is the most malleable of all of them. All these can hardly be achieved with sparse, strewn-down prose that mimics silence.
The sinuous texture of language, its snakelike meandering, and eloquent intensity is the only suitable way of telling the multi-dimensional and tragic double Bildungsroman of the "egg-twin" protagonists of Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things. Roy's narrator, invested with unquestionable powers of insight and deliberative lens, is able to maintain a concentrated force of focus on a very specific instance, scene, or place, or action. Hence, the writer — like a witness of such a scene — is able to move with the sweeping prose that will at once appear gorgeous and at the same time be significant and memorable. Since Nabokov's slightly senile narrator in Lolita posits that "you can always trust a murderer for a fancy prose style," we are able to understand why Humbert Humbert would describe his lasped sexual preference for Dolores while in bed with her mum in this way: "And when, by means of pitifully ardent, naively lascivious caresses, she of noble nipple and massive thigh prepared me for the performance of my nightly duty, it was still a nymphet's scent that in despair I tried to pick up, as I bayed through the undergrowths of dark decaying forests." Even though the playfulness of Humbert's elocution is apparent, one cannot deny aptness — and originality — of the description of Humbert's response to the pleasure his victim is giving him is.
It is not, however, that the "less is more" nugget is wrong, it is that it makes a blanket pronouncement on any writing that tends to make its language artful as taboo. When sentences must be only a few words long, it becomes increasingly difficult to execute the kind of flowery prose that can establish a piece of writing as art. It also establishes a sandcastle logic, which, if prodded, should crash in the face of even the lightest scrutiny. For the truth remains that more can also be more, and that less is often inevitably less. What writers must be conscious of, then, is not long sentences, but the control of flowery prose. As with anything in this world, excess is excess, but inadequate is inadequate. A writer must know when the weight of the words used to describe a scene is bearing down on the scene itself. A writer should develop the measuring tape to know when to describe characters' thoughts in long sentences and when not to. But a writer, above all, should aim to achieve artistry with language which, like the painter, is the only canvas we have. Writers should realize that the novels that are remembered, that become monuments, would in fact be those which err on the side of audacious prose, that occasionally allow excess rather than those which package a story — no matter how affecting — in inadequate prose.
In the same vein, describing a writer's prose as "self-conscious" isn't wrong, it is that it misallocates blames to an ailing part of a writer's work. Self-consciousness is a term that mostly describes the metafictional qualities of a work; it cannot, in effect, describe the use of language. "The hand of the writer" can appear in the framing of a story, in its structure, in the characterization, in the form of experimental works and frame narratives, but it cannot appear in its language. "Self-consciousness" cannot be applied to the use of words on the page, just as Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart cannot be accused of self-conscious tune or Yinka Shonibare of self-conscious art. Self-consciousness or pomposity cannot be reflected in a piece of writing, except in its tone, and in fiction, this is even harder to detect. What can be reflected in a piece of writing is excess and lack of control, which can stand in the way of anything at all in life. What critics should be calling out should be pretentious, unsuccessful gloss that lacks measure and control. They should call out images that might be inexact, ineffective, or superfluous. When critics plunge head-on against great writers (Don Delilo, Cormac McCarthy, etc.,) in the manner of B.R. Myers's agitated fracking masquerading as "criticism," they only end up scaring other writers from attempting to pen artistic prose. Fear might be what many writers writing today seem to be showing by indulging in the writing of seemingly artless prose. Authorial howls of artful prose as created by James Joyce, Faulkner, Nabokov, Cormac McCarthy, Shirley Hazzard, are becoming increasingly rare — sacrificed on the altar of minimalism. Hence, it is becoming more and more difficult to differentiate between literary fiction and the mass market commercial genre pieces, which, more often than not, are couched in plain language.
The gravest danger in conforming to this prevailing norm is that contemporary fiction writers are unknowingly becoming complicit in the ongoing disempowering of language — a phenomenon that the Internet and social media are fueling. Words were once so powerful, so revered, that, as culture critic Sandy Kollick once observed, "to speak the name of something was in fact to invoke its existence, to feel its power as fully present. It was not then as it is now, where a metaphor or a simile merely suggests something else. To identify your totem for a preliterate gatherer-hunters was to be identical with it, and to feel the presence of your clan animal within you." But no more so. Too many words are being produced in print and visual media that the power of words is diminishing. There are now simply too many newspapers, too many books, too many blogs, too many Twitter accounts for words to maintain their ancestral sacredness. And as writers adjust the language of prose fiction to conform to this era of powerless words, language is disempowered, leading — as Kollick further points out — to the inexorable "emptying out of the human experience," the very object fiction was meant to preserve in hardbacks and paperbacks.
It is therefore necessary that writers everywhere should see it as their ultimate duty to preserve artfulness of language by couching audacious prose. Our prose should be the Noah's ark that preserves language in a world that is being apocalyptically flooded with trite and weightless words. "The truest writers," Derek Walcott said, "are those who see language not as a linguistic process, but as a living element." By undermining the strongest element of our art, we are becoming unconscious participants in the gradual choking of this "living element," the life blood of which is language. This we must not do. Rather, we must take a stand in confirmation of the one incontestable truth: that great works of fiction should not only succeed on the strength of their plots or dialogue or character development, but also by the audacity of their prose.
Image Credit: Wikipedia.


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Kuala Lumpur: Japan's last-gasp elimination to Belgium in the Round of 16 ended Asia's hopes at the 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia, but the Continent's five sides produced some excellent performances on the global stage.
As the competition now enters the latter stages, the-AFC.com looks back to highlight that stats and facts that stood out from our teams' thrilling contribution to football's biggest showpiece.
Who was the Asian star of the group stage?
Asia's representatives amassed a record points total of 15 in Russia, with four of the five teams securing a win and every side gaining at least a point.
The previous highest had been set in 2002, when Japan and Korea Republic gained seven points apiece, and in 2010, when the points were shared between the East Asian pair and Australia.
Saudi Arabia grew into the competition after a late start, no one more so than midfielder Salman Al Faraj, who created 11 chances for his teammates in the group stage.
Only four players in the whole tournament (Neymar, Kevin De Bruyne, Carlos Vela and Kieran Trippier) are currently above Al Faraj – and they have all played a game more.
Japan defender Maya Yoshida was kept busy at the back, playing a huge part in his side's run to the knockout rounds, and making 33 clearances over the Samurai Blue's four games.
Not only is that more than his Asian counterparts, it is also a tournament-leading total. Yoshida is two ahead of Russia's Sergei Ignashevich and four in front of Denmark's Simon Kjaer.
Son Heung-min is out on front when it comes to efforts on goal, with the Taeguk Warrior trying his luck a total of 13 times in just three games, three more than Australia's Matthew Leckie.
The forward enhanced his reputation with a stunning late strike against Sweden, before rounding off one of the shocks of the tournament with a 97th-minute goal in the 2-0 win over Germany.
The Islamic Republic of Iran showed the world just how stubborn their defence can be, with their supremely organised backline conceding just twice, despite the caliber of opposition they faced.
Goalkeeper Alireza Beiranvand was another who gained plenty plaudits, with the save from Ronaldo's penalty the highlight of a tremendous display as the last line of defence.
Asian sides found the back of the net a combined total of 15 times in Russia, with each team registering at least two goals and Japan out in front with six.
One third of the goals, meanwhile, were penalties as four of the five teams were awarded spot kicks. Australia's Mile Jedinak netted both the Socceroos' goals from 12 yards out.
Eiji Kawashima's 14 saves were more than any other goalkeeper from an Asian side, with Korea Republic's Cho Hyun-woo (12) and Australia's Mat Ryan (10) next, both having played a game less.
The Japanese custodian was third on the overall standings after the Round of 16, with only Mexico's Ochoa Guillermo (25) and Denmark's Kasper Schmeichel (17) above him.
Iran, Korea Republic and Saudi Arabia scored seven goals between them and, amazingly, all of them came in added time, with Morocco's own-goal against the Iranians starting the trend.
Salem Al Dawsari's 95th-minute strike gave the Saudis three points against Egypt, while Kim Young-gwon and Son sealed victory over Germany in stoppage time.