InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "life's like a box of chocolate"

theatresm (theatresm) wrote,
@ 2007-09-14 23:43:00

Marduk was a sissy-boy sonovahoor
Ya know, just when the Internet has lulled you into a false sense of security -- that is, you think you can find ANYTHING on it -- it lets you down and kicks you in the nuts. In other words, I cannot find Ancient Sumerian phonetic spellings OR the cuneiform text for "Bite my camel's ass, loser." Or for "May that goat-fucking president's dick shrivel up and fall off," either.

Also missing in action: the REALLY interesting words we want to know, like "bastard," "son of a whore," "shithead," and that staple of the human race, "[Insert favorite deity here] dammit."

My protagonist shall have to choose something more prosaic and less colorful. Woe.

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Try this.
(Anonymous)
2007-09-15 08:29 am UTC (link)

"[Insert favorite deity here] dammit."

No. 1 is the picture of a star; it represents primarily the Sumerian word an, "heaven." The very same sign, however, is used to represent the word dingir, "god."

The chart showing No. 1 can be found at http://www.sacred-texts.com/ane/sum/img/fig01.jpg

You might also try emailing John Halloran about his Sumerian Lexicon, if you haven't already. If you comb through what there is of it online and use equal pinches of creativity and patience, you can come up with some pretty colorful invective, though perhaps not precisely what you were after in your posting. Alternately, there are some rather detailed tomes in the archives of the Louvre. Hmm ... if only you knew someone near Paris with a penchant for archaeology ...

Finally, re: Steppenwolf. If you want me to pursue those tickets, we need to talk dates, as I've got to firm up a number of other plans for the upcoming family/business trip. So ... the usual email address if you are interested.

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Re: Try this.

theatresm
2007-09-16 06:13 pm UTC (link)

've checked several of the online dictionaries *based* on Halloran, but I don't think I looked at his specifically. Will do.

Oh, thanks so much, but please don't go to the trouble on Steppenwolf. I've been very much a homebody (though that may change in the next week -- keep fingers crossed for me, please). If it works out I'm going to have a learning curve to negotiate, and I probably won't have time to get up to Chi Town.

More later in email.

Hope you guys are doing well --

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	Re: Try this. (Anonymous) 2007-09-16 06:35 pm UTC (link)
	Will definitely keep my fingers crossed for you, and also hope to hear/see more on the Sumerian story one day. In return, keep your fingers crossed for X. It goes out in the mail tomorrow, beginning the tortuous process of agent shopping. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	Re: Try this. theatresm 2007-09-16 10:57 pm UTC (link)
	AAAAAAAACK! Let me know how it goes. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	ann_mcn 2007-09-15 01:54 pm UTC (link)
	You're writing? Yay! (Reply to this) (Thread)

theatresm
2007-09-16 06:22 pm UTC (link)

Verrrrry old original piece, something I'd posted a snippet of on LJ and then pulled, since it nudged me to turn it into something bigger. I actually have about 39,000 words (probably 1/16 - 1/8 of which can die), but haven't touched it for the two years I was preoccupied at you-know-where.

The distance has done me good. While I tend to work by the Splooge System (aka "Just get it all on the page, content-edit *later*"), re-read has already identified several problems, found solutions, and has redacted numerous darlings and put them in the "supplementary exposition" file.

And if I ever finish it and get going on its sequel, I'm seriously considering going for a slush submission or submission as an ebook.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

ann_mcn
2007-09-16 11:32 pm UTC (link)

Hm, so the largest part of it is worth keeping, even two years later. That is very encouraging!

Analogy alert!
Way back, 100 years ago, people made their own music, because the professionals were few and seldom available, especially if you lived away from a city, but as recordings and radio became common, most people cannot make their own music -- heck, they don't even think to.

Storytelling and reading has been like that, with the printing press making it easy for everyone to read the stories of the pros with the result that few people felt competent to story tell. But now with the Internet, the wheel has turned and now a wider variety of people are able to write and be read by a wide circle of people, not just their immediate friends.

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