This administration has done the impossible. It has outdone the Clinton presidency in alarming the people about reckless spending and disregard for their concerns. Whatever his message may have been, Obama’s actions have shown a desire to dispense with representing the people in order to achieve a big step toward a more European socialism.

As for the gaffe about Henry VIII, it’s a minor mix up. What really demonstrates an intellectual shortcoming is the continued reminder that nationalized health care has been proposed repeatedly by progressives for 100 years as a reason for passing it now. Of all the non-sequiturs! I would think that the correct conclusion is that Americans don’t trust such big government schemes and don’t want the federal government inserting itself into their relationship with their health care providers. It’s THEIR money and THEY need it and don’t want it being spent by the federal government!

Austen is a genius. The woman who didn’t even know who she was is appallingly ignorant of one of the gems of Western civilization.

And hell yes, symphonies are superior to folk music.

Unfair: Good literature is being written in Africa, both in English and in various local languages. Just because you’ve never heard of it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.

Please don’t let your (entirely reasonable) dislike for afro-centric assh*les blind you to the existence of quality literature in Africa or elsewhere.

As for that militantly Afrocentric woman who “gave a lecture…on the superiority of African literature”: Not only is it silly on political grounds (part of the pathology of thinking everything African is superior) but it’s also extremely unlikely even on mere statistical grounds: Far, far fewer books are published in Africa than in the West–orders of magnitude fewer (not only in absolute numbers, but as a percentage of population.)

So this experience was more or less of a piece with his editing of the HLR? Color me surprised.

Castleden, Rodney. King Arthur: The Truth Behind the Legend. New York: Routledge, 2000. Reprint, New York: Routledge, 2001.

Castleden actually makes a fairly tight argument not only for the existence of King Arthur, but that a fair amount about his life and death can be reasonably conjectured, based on known practice. Quite a facinating book – the best and most carefully researched book on the subject that I have ever read. There was no Camelot, he suggests, because like many early kings Arthur moved constantly. He also suggests that Arthur was not killed on the battlefield, but was mortally wounded or crippled and retired to a monastary – an “island” either figuaritively or possibly literally – and his fall was kept secret. This, again, has parallels in known practice – see Bede for examples.

Neal Scroggs,
What about Nennius, the reference to Arthur in the 6th century poem Y Gododdin, the mutiple place-names, Gildas, etc.? Geoffrey of Monmouth was a late-comer.

About Arthur, given the times and conditions of dark age Britain I would be surprised if there were not a great number of warlords who could have appeared Arthur-like in some way.

The Arthur story could be an amalgamation of different personalities, legends and oral histories.