Subsequent Citations Research Articles

Cleanness’s Fecund and Barren Speech Acts

Cleanness's Fecund and Barren Speech Acts Monica Brzezinski Potkay College of William and Mary Although the alliterative poem known ru; C/eanm.,, evidently concerns its titular virtue, readers frequently point out that the work never explicitly defines what it means by the term "clannesse." Rather, the poem illustrates this concept with a seemingly heterogeneous series of biblical exempla. What concept of cleanness do these exempla point to? What exactly is cleanness? While the poem's definition of cleanness embraces many aspects, surely one of the most important of these is introduced in the poem's opening lines: Clannesse, wher-so kyndly cowpe comende, And rekken vp alle pe resoun3 pat ho by ri3t aske3, Fayre forme3 my3t he fynde in forpering his speche, And in pe contrare kark and combraunce huge.1 These lines are notoriously difficult to translate, yet it is clear that they draw a connection between the quality of "clannesse" and beautiful lan­ guage. They tell us that whoever commends "clannesse" properly, as that quality deserves, will be able to do so through the "fayre formes"-exem­ pla or perhaps rhetorical tropes-he might discover, and which will "forper" or advance his speech.2 Establishing a connection between clean­ ness and eloquence, these lines imply that proper use of language is an important component ofmoral purity. That there is a linguistic facet to the 1 J. ]. Anderson, ed., Cleanness (New York: Barnes and Noble, 1977), lines 1-4. Subsequent citations to Cleanness are to this edition. 2 Andrew and Waldron translate, "Whoever were to commend cleanness fittingly, and reckon up all the arguments that she demands by right, lovely examples would he be able to find in advancing his discourse, and in the reverse enormous trouble and difficulty"; Malcolm Andrew and Ronald Waldron, eds., The Poems ofthe Pearl Manuscript (Berkeley: University ofCalifornia Press, 1982), p. 111. 99 STUDIES IN THE AGE OF CHAUCER virtue of cleanness is borne out by Cleanness's exempla: there the clean characters are depicted as eloquent, and the filthy ones as unskilled in speech. The exempla furthermore work to define clean language as powerfully efficacious. Cleanness depicts its pure characters as speaking a language which has the ability to effect what it signifies. And the poem underscores the power inhering in clean discourse by portraying that power not just on the literal level but on a metaphoric one as well: in the theme of sexual potency the poem finds a salient figure for linguistic potency. Clean charac­ ters are depicted as practicing a sexuality which always results in procre­ ation, as possessing a literal fertility which represents the fecundity oftheir discourse. Yet the poem claims pure and fecund eloquence not only for its exemplary figures but also for itself. Obviously the poet himself is a speaker who commends "clannesse," and the opening of his poem is de­ signed in part to draw attention to his own verbal virtuosity. The opening thus makes a claim for the poem itself: surely this work, since it recom­ mends "clannesse," must be supremely eloquent, must be a paradigm of clean and powerful language. Cleanness, then, not only hopes to explain that an important aspect of cleanness is eloquent and efficacious language but actually puts itself forward as a sublime example of such pure and potent speech. The poem, that is, would practice what it preaches. The concept of the efficacious speech act, the linguistic theory which animates Cleanness, is consistently illustrated in its exempla. All the charac­ ters who are exemplars of "clannesse" are shown to speak graciously and effectively. The connection these stories forge between moral purity and eloquently efficacious language is made most strongly in the section ofthe poem describing the life ofJesus. Here the Savior is described as healing the sick with his words alone: when approached by lepers, the lame, the blind, paralytics, and others suffering from a host of ills described in lines 1093-96, "He heled hem wyth hynde speche of pat pay ask after" (line 1098). Christ's words here are described with the word "hynde"-that wonderfully untranslatable Middle English adjective that connotes not just pleasantness and gentility but skill and dexterity as well. "Hynde" speech is...

Favoritism versus Search for Good Papers: Empirical Evidence Regarding the Behavior of Journal Editors

Journal editors who publish papers authored by colleagues and former graduate students have been charged with practicing favoritism, with the implication that the papers in question are of lower quality than those written by scholars with no ties to the editor. Using citation analysis, the authors find strong evidence that although journal editors occasionally publish subpar papers authored by colleagues and former graduate students, on balance their use of professional connections enables them to identify and 'capture' high-impact papers for publication. This implies that a practice interpreted as favoritism by many scholars in fact serves to enhance efficiency in the market for scientific knowledge. Copyright 1994 by University of Chicago Press.

Melodramatist of the Middle Border: Hamlin Garland's Early Work Reconsidered

Melodramatist of the Middle Border:Hamlin Garland's Early Work Reconsidered Keith Newlin Keith Newlin University of North Carolina—Wilmington Notes 1. "Why Hamlin Garland Finds Wider Fields in the Drama Than in the Writing of Novels," New York Times (April 11, 1909), sec. v, p. 4. Miller of Boscobel was staged by the Donald Robertson Players in two tryouts in Madison and Appleton, Wisconsin, on January 29 and 30, and then in Fullerton Hall at the Art Institute of Chicago on February 3. 2. Garland published only one of these plays, the single-tax melodrama Under the Wheel (The Arena, 2 [1890], 182-228), subsequently revised as the novel Jason Edwards (1892). The remainder of his plays exist in various stages of completion in the Hamlin Garland Collection, Doheny Library, University of Southern California. 3. Mark William Rocha, "The Feminization of Failure in American Historiography: The Case of the Invisible Drama in the Life of Hamlin Garland," diss. University of Southern California, 1988, p. 6. 4. Donald Pizer, Introduction to Main-Travelled Roads (Columbus: Merrill, 1970), p. xiii. Subsequent citations will appear in the text as MTR. 5. Thomas A. Bledsoe, Introduction to Main-Travelled Roads (1954); repr. in The Critical Reception of Hamlin Garland, 1891-1978, ed. Charles L. P. Silet, Robert E. Welch, and Richard Boudreau (Troy: Whitston, 1985), p. 190. 6. Jane Tompkins, Sensational Designs: The Cultural Work of American Fiction, 1790-1860 (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1985), p. xi. 7. Hamlin Garland, A Son of the Middle Border (1917; repr. New York: Colliers, 1917), pp. 343-44. 8. Hamlin Garland, Roadside Meetings (New York: Macmillan, 1930), pp. 39-40. 9. Garland's autograph manuscript of this lecture is extant in the Hamlin Garland Collection, Doheny Library, University of Southern California. Lloyd Arvidson has compiled and published a guide to the collection, Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library, USC Library Bulletin no. 9 (Los Angeles: Univ. of Southern California Press, 1962). Subsequent citations to unpublished letters, notebooks, and manuscripts in this collection will appear in the text with Arvidson's citation numbers. I am grateful to the University of Southern California for permission to quote from Garland's papers. "Edwin Booth as a Master of Expression" (#584a) has recently been edited and made available in Mark Rocha's dissertation. Part One of Rocha's study summarizes and comments briefly upon all of Garland's play manuscripts; Part Two is a selected edition of Garland's dramatic criticism and the text of Rip Van Winkle. Subsequent citations to the Booth lecture are to Rocha's edition and will appear in the text. 10. Garland, A Son, p. 307. Garland's extensive notes on Taine fill two notebooks, dated 1884 (#11) and 1884-85 (#12). 11. Garland, A Son, pp. 306-7. 12. Hippolyte Taine, History of English Literature, Vol. 1, trans. H. van Laun (Philadelphia: David McKay, n.d.), p. 19. 13. Taine, p. 23. 14. Donald Pizer, Hamlin Garland's Early Work and Career (Berkeley: Univ. of California Press, 1960), p. 9. 15. The manuscript of Love or the Law was typed with the uppercase typewriter Garland used 1886-1888. I have not preserved the idiosyncrasies of Garland's typewriter in my transcriptions. Garland was also inconsistent in the conventions of underlining staging cues, enclosing dialogue within quotation marks, and placing periods and commas within quotation marks. I have therefore regularized my transcriptions but have not corrected his punctuation, spelling, and use (and disuse) of the apostrophe. 16. Garland later expanded this scene into "The Huskin'," the first of a series of sketches entitled "Boy Life on the Prairie," and published in the American Magazine, 7 (Jan. 1888), 299-303. Garland then reworked this sketch into chapter 16, "The Corn Husking," of Boy Life on the Prairie (1899). 17. Garland was apparently quite serious about becoming an actor and proposed a collaboration with James Whitcomb Riley in which Garland would act the lead: "How would it do for you and I to write a play? Did I speak of this before? I have a good plan of a new one. 'The McTurgs...

A bibliometric analysis of six economics research groups: A comparison with peer review

The research performance of research units in economics has been evaluated by simultaneous efforts of peers and bibliometricians, with extensive interactive comparison of results afterwards. We studied trends in productivity and impact of six economics research groups in the period 1980–1988. These groups participate in a large (above one million pounds) research programme of a national Research Council. Research performance of the groups was compared to the world average by means of the Journal Citation Score method. In order to investigate the influence of one key scientists (the “star effect‘) we applied a sensitivity analysis to the performance of the research groups by elimination of the papers (and subsequent citations) of one key member. Furthermore, to provide insight into the fields to which a group directs its work, and the fields in which a group has its most important contributions, comparisons were made of publishing and citing journal packets. Similarly, citations to the work of the research groups were analysed for country of origin. We compared the results of the bibliometric part of this study with those of a simultaneous peer review study. The bibliometric study yielded clear and meaningful results, notwithstanding the increasingly applied nature of the research groups. Results from peer review and bibliometric studies appear to be complementary and mutually supportive. The participants of the bibliometrics-peer review “confrontation” meeting regarded the exercise as most valuable, with lessons for the Research Council both for the future of research programmes and the form of evaluation used for large awards.

ANALYSIS OF THEORETICAL, METHODOLOGICAL AND EMPIRICAL RESEARCH IN THE JOURNAL OF REGIONAL SCIENCE*

ABSTRACT. This paper examines the impacts of JRS articles in the areas of theory, methods and empirical analysis, as represented by subsequent citations reported in the Social Sciences Citation Index. A model relating the mix of theoretical, methodological and empirical research published in the JRS to subsequent citations is estimated. The time distribution of theoretical and empirical citations also indicates that the knowledge diffusion process in these two areas may be segmented.

Using international patent data to identify and assess opportunities for technology acquisition from government research agencies

In today's environment of rapid technological change and global competition, it is becoming increasingly difficult for firms to keep up with the advances being made around the world in various high technology fields. This article illustrates how firms can make use of international patent data to identify and assess possible sources of new technology for acquisition, particularly government laboratories. The technological activities of eight French research agencies are assessed through quantitative analyses of the patent applications they filed during the 1980s. The aspects of their technological activities that are examined include: (1) the level and direction of technological activity, measured by counts of international patent families; (2) the technological significance of the work being performed, measured by the number of subsequent patent citations; and (3) the commercial potential of the work, measured by the number of foreign countries in which patent protection for the resulting inventions is sought. It is then shown how firms can interpret this data to identify the technological work of government laboratories that may be of interest for possible licensing or joint venture agreements.

Information science and scientists: JASIS, 1972-1990

This research reports the results of a bibliometric study of nine volumes of the Journal of the American Society for Information Science (JASIS): 1972–1974, 1982–1984, and 1988–1990. For each full-length article, values of six variables were recorded: the year the article was published, the number of citations to the article, the funding status of the work (funded or not funded), the funding agency (if funded), the subject of the paper, and the institutional affiliation of the first author, and several hypotheses were tested. No relationship was found between whether an article was funded and the quality or utility of the article, as measured by the number of subsequent citations to the work. Funding for information science research has declined, especially at the federal levels. JASIS authors who are affiliated with schools of library and information science have the most difficulty in having their work funded, although the work produced by this group of authors is the most highly cited. While the emphasis on theoretical work has remained essentially constant over the past 20 years, the number of articles related to professional issues and related fields has increased, and the number of articles classified as applied has decreased. More JASIS authors are coming from academic departments in universities; fewer are information practitioners. Information science is developing as a discipline and moving away from its practice-oriented roots. © 1992 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Is There Value-Added from the Review Process in Economics?: Preliminary Evidence from Authors

Do referees employed by journals merely screen acceptable from unacceptable manuscripts or are they charged with an additional value-adding responsibility vis-à-vis the papers they review? Drawing from editorial correspondence provided by survey respondents, I address this question by examining the relationship between citations of published papers and comments provided by reviewers and editors. Referees' comments demonstrate a positive impact on subsequent citation of papers, while comments made by editors show no such impact. Value-adding by editors appears to derive principally from efficient matching of papers with reviewers.

The Continued Use of Retracted, Invalid Scientific Literature

Little is known about the ultimate scientific fate of retracted, invalid literature. We identified 82 completely retracted articles by electronic and manual methods and measured their subsequent use in the scientific literature by performing citation analysis. After retraction, these studies were cited, for support of scientific concepts, 733 times. Comparison with a control group revealed that retraction reduces subsequent citation by approximately 35%. There was no evidence that small, obscure journals, non-US journals, or non-US authors were disproportionately responsible for these citations. Although, after retraction, US authors accounted for a smaller percentage of citations, they continued to be the single greatest source. Several possible reasons why invalid information continues to be used were identified. These included a dearth of available information on retracted works; inconsistency in retraction format, terminology, and indexing; and an apparent lack of sufficient attention to manuscripts by some authors and editors.

The Tentacles of Progress: Technology Transfer in the Age of Imperialism, 1850–1940 by Daniel R. Headrick

166 Book Reviews TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE The Tentacles of Progress: Technology Transfer in the Age of Imperialism, 1850-1940. By Daniel R. Headrick. New York: Oxford University Press, 1988. Pp. x + 405; tables, notes, bibliography, index. $32.50 (cloth); $11.95 (paper). In an earlier book, The Tools of Empire: Technology and European Imperialism in the Nineteenth Century (1981), Daniel Headrick argued that Western technology not only facilitated colonial conquests but also motivated them. In the present volume he backs off a bit from his technological determinism and merely describes some instances of technology transfer from Europe (mainly Britain) to the colonies (mainly India). Although the aims and time spans of the two books are slightly different, they overlap to some extent. For example, Tools contains a twelve-page chapter on “The Railroads of India,” Tentacles a forty-eight-page chapter on “The Railways of India”; Tentacles has substantial chapters on “Ships and Shipping” and “The Imperial Te­ lecommunications Networks” (including wireless), whereas Tools has separate shorter chapters on steamships, shipping companies, and submarine cables (but not wireless). Topics treated in Tentacles that do not figure in Tools include “Cities, Sanitation, and Segregation” (case studies of Hong Kong, Calcutta, and Dakar), irrigation (“Hydraulic Imperialism”) in India and Egypt, “Economic Botany and Tropical Plantations,” mining and metallurgy, and technical education. Like Tools, Tentacles is based largely on published secondary works, with incidental reference to archival sources. Unfortunately, Headrick does not provide a comprehensive list of works cited; the brief “Bib­ liographical Essay” merely recapitulates the principal titles cited in the notes, whereas second and subsequent citations in the latter are referred to by the author’s name only. In some cases he cites reprints as “revised” or “second” editions. Headrick makes a useful distinction between the geographic relo­ cation of an element of technology (e.g., a railway in India, a sugar plantation in Java) and the cultural diffusion of modern technology in general. He then goes on to argue that the Europeans were suc­ cessful in the former, but failed in the latter. That involves the as­ sumption that Europeans either intended or should have intended to promote cultural diffusion, but he cites numerous instances that show the contrary. Although not explicit, many passages throughout the book indicate that he has made an implicit moralistic judgment that Europeans should have been more concerned with promoting the cultural diffusion of technology. While people of goodwill may agree that the world would be a better place today if they had been, it is scarcely the role of the historian to make such judgments. Moreover, it is by no means clear that even if they wished to do so the Europeans could have promoted diffusion more effectively than they did. Technological diffusion is an immensely complicated process involving dozens if not hundreds of variables, as the failure of many TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE Book Reviews 167 well-intentioned programs in the last forty years has shown. In his concluding paragraph, Headrick speculates about “alternative pasts” (or, as economic historians say, counterfactual histories) of Europe’s colonies on the assumption that they had not been conquered. They might “have preserved their traditional ways for a few generations more, like China, Afghanistan, or Arabia; or they might have become modern and industrial, like Japan” (p. 384). Or they might have stag­ nated, economically and technologically, like most of Latin America, Thailand, and Ethiopia, with which Headrick might have compared them. India’s history since 1947 provides a clue. Rondo Cameron Dr. Cameron, Wm. Rand Kenan University Professor at Emory University, is vice president of the International Economic History Association. His book,/! Concise History of the Worldfrom Paleolithic Times to the Present, is published by Oxford University Press. The Stubborn Earth: American Agriculturalists on Chinese Soil, 1898—1937. By Randall E. Stross. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of Cal­ ifornia Press, 1986. Pp. xi + 272; illustrations, notes, bibliography, index. $25.00. The Stubborn Earth is well organized, thoroughly researched, insight­ ful, and superbly written. The book is sufficiently comprehensive to provide the uninitiated reader a valuable perspective, and there is enough detail on individual characters and the China of their times to command the interest of specialists...

Legal Satire in The Tale of Beryn

Legal Satire in The Tale ofBeryn Richard Firth Green University of Western Ontario rTALE Of BERYN, though h,rdly a negligible item in the Chaucerian apocrypha, has receivedvery little comment. Perhaps potential readers have been warned offby an untypical lack of enthusiasm in its first editor: its Prologue at least, says Frederick Furnivall, may repay study­ "whoever skips or skims the Tale."1 In what follows I shall be arguing that its very specificlegal satire makes the tale itselfin some ways quite as interest­ ing as its prologue and that it deserves rather better than skipping or skimming. At the end of a prologue which has described the arrival of Chaucer's pilgrims at Canterbury, their visit to the cathedral, their stay at the "Checker of the hope" Inn (where the Pardoner's sexual opportunism gets him into hot water), and their departure next morning, the Merchant volunteers to tell the first tale of the return journey. T hough judged by Furnivall to be an "awfully long-winded one," this tale reworks only the first sixth of its French original, the Roman de Berinus-a section which is largely concerned with its hero's dealings at law.2 In the English version 1 The Tale ofBeryn. ed. F J. Furnivall, EETS, e.s., vol. 105 (London, 1909), p. viii. Subsequent quotations from the tale are taken from this edition (see note 10 below). For studies ofthe prologue, however, see E.J. Bashe, "The Prologue to The Tale ofBeryn," PQ 12 (1933):1-16; S. Kohl, "Chaucer's Pilgrims in Fifteenth-Century Literature," Fifteenth-Cen­ tury Studies 7 (1982):221-36; B. Darjes and T. Rendall, "A Fabliau in the Prologue to the Tale o/Beryn," MS 48 (1985):416-31;]. M. Bowers, "The Tale o/Beryn and The Siege ofThebes: Alternative Ideas of The Canterbury Tales," SAC 7 (1985):23-50; K. A. Winstead, "The Beryn-Writer as a Reader of Chaucer," ChauR 22 (1988):225-33. 2 Ben.nus: Roman en prose du Xlf;e siec/e, ed. Robert Bossuat, SATF, 2 vols. (Paris, 1931-33). Subsequent page citations are to this edition. This prose version is evidently a redaction ofan earlier Berinus in verse, only surviving in cwo fragments; unfortunately both fragments come from near the end ofthe work and thus cannot be directly compared with the English version. Since the French prose Berinus is "en etroit rapport" with these fragments (1.vii), whereas the English poem is a rather free rendition, there seems no way of deciding which of the two French versions the English poet was working from; as Bossuat remarks, Beryn "peut tout aussi bien deriver du Berinus en vers que de son remaniement en prose" (1.viii, n. 2). 43 STUDIES IN THE AGE OF CHAUCER Beryn, a spoiled young Roman nobleman who has fled an unsympathetic stepmother to seek his fortune in foreign trade, is driven off course by a storm and lands in a strange city where he immediately finds himself embroiled in a series of preposterous lawsuits. Two local merchants try to enforce fraudulentcontractsto swindle Beryn outof his cargo, he isaccused by a blind man of having cheated him out of his eyesight, a woman claims to be his abandoned wife, and he is even framed for a murder by the victim's son. With the aid of a man called Geoffrey (once a Roman mer­ chant himself, though long since ruined by the chicanery of the citizens), hesuccessfully extricates himself from these lawsuits-thereby winning the approval of Isope, the local king, who rewards him with the hand of his daughter. In the numerous additions and alterations the author makes to his source, he revealsan obvious concern for the law, and we may reasonably assume that the story had recommended itself to him in the first place as a vehicle forcommenting on contemporary legal practice. As Mary Tamanini has rightly observed, "The law and its processes are central to the develop­ ment of the Tale ofBeryn."3 To claim that The Tale ofBeryn is about "the law" is far easier than to define precisely the kind of law it is about or the kinds of legal issues it raises, yet...

The Intellectual Development of Management Information Systems, 1972–1982: A Co-Citation Analysis

Researchers in all academic disciplines benefit from an understanding of the intellectual development of their field. This understanding is essential for conducting studies which build systematically on prior research. The purpose of this study is to document the intellectual development of the ideas represented by published research in Management Information Systems (MIS) based on an author co-citation analysis. The resulting mapping is intended to serve as a benchmark for future assessments of MIS as a field as well as a means for documenting the emergence of new research specialties. The study sought to identify (1) the subfields which constitute MIS research, (2) the reference disciplines of these subfields, (3) the diffusion of the ideas represented by these subfields to other disciplines, and (4) which of these subfields represent active areas of current MIS research. Nine invisible colleges, or informal clusters of research were uncovered. These nine empirically defined conceptual groupings collectively define the intellectual foundations of MIS as well as the forces currently shaping MIS research. Four of the clusters represent early MIS research themes which are still popular, based on subsequent citation patterns. Despite the centrality of the concept of the organization to widely-accepted definitions of MIS, the results suggest that MIS research is not well-grounded in organization theory nor have MIS research results been widely diffused in the organizational literature. Suggestions for developing a better link between MIS and organizational theory are presented based on the concept of organizational effectiveness.

ARTICLE POPULARITY

This paper briefly examines the causes and consequences of article popularity. Tracing subsequent citations to nearly 6,000 articles published during 1974‐76 reveals that most articles are cited rarely, if ever. Over 90% are cited fewer than 20 times over the ensuing 6 years, whereas only 3/10ths of 1% are cited over 100 times. Regression analysis demonstrates that author reputation, article length, and quality of publishing journal are strong determinants of article popularity.The relative importance of various economics journals, though not their rankings, is sensitive to inclusion of “hit” articles; the differential impact of a journal may be more closely approximated by its ability to attract a significant proportion of the “hit parade” of articles.

METHODOLOGICAL QUALITY AND CITATION FREQUENCY OF THE CONTINUING MEDICAL EDUCATION LITERATURE

Bibliometric analysis of research reports in continuing medical education that were evaluated for their methodological quality is used to assess the relation between methodological rigour and citation frequency. There is a positive, significant but low correlation between rigour and citation, and evidence that rigorous work will be cited independent of where the article is published. There is no strong evidence that study design is correlated with subsequent citation. Of the five methodological standards used in the bibliography, outcome measure is the best predictor of citation frequency. In certain cases citation measures might be used as guides to or indicators of methodologically rigorous research reports.

Quantitative analysis of a visible tip of the peer review iceberg: Book reviews in chemistry

Book reviews are practically unique in being public, “visible” manifestations of the peer review process. Two hundred reviews of 39 books on chemical topics were subjected to statistical context analysis. Dominance of attitudes, consensus among reviewers, correlation between the reviewers' evaluations and the subsequent citation rate of the reviewed book were analysed.

Action research is formative: research at Saskatchewan Hospital, 1957-61.

The author has examined the five lines of research started at a mental hospital between 1957-61 to determine their immediate effects upon practice and subsequent citations in the literature. Three lines of research combining basic and applied studies affected practice and research as measured by literature citations. One line of basic studies of perception and psychopathology influenced research but not practice. Applied studies of perception and psychopathology influenced research but not practice. Applied studies of staff organization had immediate application but disappeared from the professional literature in a short time.

Ovid, Alfonso X, and Juan Rodríguez del Padrón: two Castilian translations of theHeroidesand the beginnings of Spanish sentimental prose

Ovid, Alfonso X, and Juan Rodríguez del Padrón: two Castilian translations of the<i>Heroides</i>and the beginnings of Spanish sentimental prose

THE ORIGINS OF THE LAW OF PROPERTY ACTS 1910–251

The Modern Law ReviewVolume 40, Issue 5 p. 505-522 Free Access THE ORIGINS OF THE LAW OF PROPERTY ACTS 1910–25† Avner Offer, Avner Offer Junior Research Fellow, Merton College, Oxford.Search for more papers by this author Avner Offer, Avner Offer Junior Research Fellow, Merton College, Oxford.Search for more papers by this author First published: September 1977 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2230.1977.tb02439.xCitations: 8 † Full references are given when a source is first cited, followed (in square brackets) by the abbreviated form used in subsequent citations. Grateful acknowledgments are made to Mr. F. Fortescue-Brickdale for permission to quote from the papers of Sir Charles Fortescue-Brickdale [Brickdale Papers] and to Mr. J. Cherry and the late H. F. Rubinstein for oral information. Helpful comments on previous drafts were made by Professor F. M. L. Thompson, Dr. J. M. Winter, Mr. S. Cretney and Mr. K. O. Morgan. They are not responsible for any errors of fact or interpretation in this article. AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditWechat Citing Literature Volume40, Issue5September 1977Pages 505-522 RelatedInformation

A Bibliography of Astronomical Catalogues and the Organization of Stellar Designations

AbstractA comprehensive bibliography of astronomical catalogues for the period 1951-75 inclusive containing over 2000 items and including an index of designations has shown that there is an urgent need to control the use of designation notation. It is suggested that a small data base, similar to the one created for this bibliography could serve as a useful guide to the assignment and subsequent citation of catalogued objects. This in turn would help those compiling inverted files of stellar objects such as the Catalog of Stellar Identifications.

Calderon's Los cabellos de Absalon : A Metatheater of Unbridled Passion

his story, occurring in the scene at the beginning of the second act in which Roca is unable to paint the portrait, underlines the connection between the two. The parallel is fully realized at the end of the third act, however, when Juanete completes his story and is rewarded by the Prince. In the scene immediately following, and in close physical proximity, Juan Roca, who is also under the patronage of the Prince, manages at last to complete his "portrait" of Serafina —by murdering her. Alan K. G. Paterson has argued persuasively that central to the play's meaning is the failure of art in the face of beauty, and, by extension, its inability to capture the vitality of human life.8 Both Juanete's and his master's artworks are successful according to the conventions within which they operate. Both achieve, as it were, the desired effects: Juanete's story gets its laugh, Juan Roca's revenge restores his honor. But both works succeed by compromising the truths they purport to encompass. By the conventions of honor, Serafina's death was long since foretold, and it is unlikely that honor's demands would have been satisfied even by the fact of her relative guiltlessness . But in human terms, Roca's "painting" is disturbingly incomplete, his art still inadequate to the complex reality— subjective as well as external — which confronts him. His intuition of this failure gives his final speech and subsequent withdrawal their special poignancy. Juanete, whose art and failure are of less consequence, has no such awareness. He steps forward to utter the conventional platitudes which close the play. But he remains a point of contrast , not a moral norm.9 NOTES ' Susan L. Fischer, "The Functioned Significance of the Gracioso in Calderón's El pintor de su deshrona," Romance Notes, 14 (1972), 334-40 and Edward M. Wilson, "Hacia una interpretación de El pintor de su deshonra," Abaco, 3 (1970), 49-85. 2 Act III, lines 862-4 in the Clasicos Castellanos edition of Angel Valbuena Briones ( Madrid , 1956). All subsequent citations refer to this edition. 3 Wilson, p. 83. * 1972 MLA Abstracts II, 48. 5 Roca blames his failure on his wife's excessive beauty (II, 89). Alan K. G. Paterson anticipates my reading of the line in his "The Comic and Tragic Melancholy of Juan Roca: A Study of Calderón's El pintor de su deshonra ," FMLS 5 (1969), 244-61, 252-3. My own view of the play has been considerably influenced by Paterson's essay. 6 Paterson, p. 252. 7 See III, 871-6. Fischer (p. 336) draws attention to this point. 8 Op. cit. and in a later article, "Juan Roca's Northern Ancestry: A Study of Art Theory in Calderón's El pintor de su deshonra," FMLS, 7 (1971), 195-210. 9 For a fuller discussion of the play, especially the function of subsidiary roles like "painter" and "story-teller," see my "Diversion in Calderón's El pintor de su deshonra," MLN, 91 (1976), 247-63. CALDERÓN'S LOS CABELLOS DE ABSALON: A METATHEATER OF UNBRIDLED PASSION Susan L. Fischer, Bucknell University Thomas A. O'Connor's essay, "Is the Spanish Comedia a Metatheater," is another chapter in the reigning controversy over the uniqueness or universality of Golden Age theater. ' O'Connor 's argument in its totality is difficult 103 to accept because it is based on an a priori view of the comedia as (in his own words ) "an expression of fixed and preconceived philosophical, theological and dramatic notions" (p. 275). Moreover , O'Connor arrives at his "uniquely Spanish view" by invoking a pastiche of philosophical, theological, and ethical thought which he then lumps in two broad categories: on the one hand there is all that is Christian, Aristotelian, Platonic, Neoplatonic, theocentric, Spanish, moral; and on the other there is all that is anthropocentric, metatheatrical , amoral — and — everything else. This plethora of terminological distinctions merely obfuscates his basic premise, namely, that the Spanish comedia has an essentially medieval world view. While the comedia was obviously conceived against the backdrop of seventeenth-century Spain, with its medieval legacy and its Catholic responses, and while several...