Einstein and Apple Pi

“Pure mathematics is in its way the poetry of logical ideas.” Albert Einstein (born this day in 1879)

Hope everyone had a nice Pi Day … 3.14

Edward Rodeson Taylor: The Poet and The Poem

I have, of late, steeped myself in a depth-study of a poet most people seem to be unaware of. Edward Robeson Taylor is an incredibly talented and prolific writer of sonnets. His sonnet of choice seems to be the French and the Italian forms. I intend to elaborate a little more in detail on this poet in an upcoming blog post, until then I thought I would share a couple of his short poems. 

As a side note, and I have mentioned this elsewhere, I am nothing less than astounded when it comes to how much content can be expressed in just a few smart lines of a poem. This astonishment is what first drew me to poetry, and the beauty of so many works read have since then kept me captive. 

The Poet

He crushed his heart for wine of song

The sordid souls of men to glad,

By him passed the scoffing throng,

Nor dreamed he was divinely mad. 

—Edward Robeson Taylor

The Poem

All Beauty’s magic-weaving airs

Blow through the Poet’s answering soul, 

Til thrilled with ecstasy he dares
The building of some flawless whole.  —Edward Robeson Taylor

Warfare in Homer's Iliad

In no manner do I glorify warfare, nor am I a devout pacifist. I have mentioned before that the prospect and reality of warfare both horrifies and fascinates me at the same time. I cannot fathom the fact that we have it in ourselves to utterly vanquish one another by means of brutality that darkly transcends the violence we see in the animal kingdom; and at the same time, the methods and strategic means by which we wage war, the competitive ebb and flow of it, intrigues my imagination. Devoid of any morbid fascinations with warfare, it utterly amazes me every time I read passages from Homer’s Iliad how descriptive and poetically visual he renders the violent acts of combat. One of my all time favorite quotes from the Iliad, as I have mentioned in the past, comes from Book 7, lines 275–281:

“War—I know it well, and the butchery of men

Well I know, shift to the left, shift to the right

My tough tanned shield. That’s what the real drill

Defensive fighting means to me. I know it all

How to charge in the rush of plunging horses—

I know how to stand and fight to the finish

Twist and lunge in the War-god’s deadly dance.”

Inasmuch as Homer’s descriptive passages are concerned, and with regard to the language he uses to make their violent acts visibly accessible, below are a hand full that I found to be especially impressive.

“With that he hurled and Athena drove the shaft and it split the archer’s nose between the eye—it cracked his glistening teeth, the tough bronze cut off his tongue at the roots, smashed his jaw and the point came ripping out beneath his chin. He pitched from his car, armour clanged against him, a glimmering blaze af metal dazzling round his back—the purebreds reared aside, hoofs pawing the air and his life and power slipped away on the wind.”

“Eurypylus, chasing Hypsenor fleeing on before him, flailed with a sword, slashed the Trojan’s shoulder and lopped away the massive bulk of Hypsenor’s arm … the bloody arm dropped to the earth, and red death came plunging down his eyes, and the strong force of fate.”

“… Agamemnon lord of men spilled the giant Odius, chief of the Halizonians off his car—the first to fall, as he veered away the spearhead punched his back between the shoulders, gouging his flesh and jutting out through his rids—he fell with a crash, his armour rang against him.”

“Antilochus winged a rock and smashed his elbow—out of his grip the reigns white with ivory flew and slipped to the ground and tangled in the dust. Antilochus sprang, he plunged a sword in his temple and Mydon, gasping, hurled from his bolted car face first, head and shoulders stuck in the dune for a good long time for the sand was deep—his lucky day—till his own horses trampled him down.”

“Meriones caught him quickly, running him down hard and speared him low in the right buttock—the point pounding under the pelvis, jabbed and pierced the blatter—he dropped to his knees, screaming, death swirling around him.”