The Witching Well

They say these things happen in threes, but we’ve had FOUR celebrity deaths over this past weekend. Darren McGavin. Don Knotts. Dennis Weaver. Octavia Butler. Three were elderly actors whose works filled my childhood with images of heroes and clowns. The other a brilliant woman, far too young (58), who was not only the first major African-American woman science fiction writer (a Hugo and Nebula winner) but the only science fiction writer ever to win a MacArthur Foundation “genius grant.”

Rest in peace.

The final ballot is up for the 2005 Nebula Awards. Three cheers for Kelly Link, who’s up for both Best Novella and Best Novelette. (Disclaimer: I’m acquainted with her IRL, but that doesn’t for a moment change the fact that she’s brilliant!)

I don’t know enough about how a major port is run to be able to speak to the security concerns that people are voicing over the Dubai World Ports bruhaha, but I do have objections to giving major contracts in the US to companies owned by foreign governments that have the kind of human rights profile that the United Arab Emirates has. Look over Amnesty International’s recent documents on the UAE and tell me you like what you see. Tell me you think we ought to do business with governments that refuse to crack down on human trafficking in their own countries — especially trafficking in children. And how about the way they treat gay people? And of course, adultery is still punishable by stoning, and premarital sex by flogging, under Sharia law.

Let’s talk about the reaction of some portions of the world’s Muslim population to the publishing of some insulting cartoons in Denmark, shall we? On the one hand, while it is perfectly allowable by law in a free country to be an insensitive, bigoted jerk and to portray the revered founder of anyone’s religion in a insulting way, it is still not a good thing to do, even if only from the standpoint of good taste. On the other hand, when you protest a portrayal of your faith as being violent by committing violence and making death threats, you do tend to undermine the point you are trying to make: that the cartoons were wrong, and that your religion is not about hurting others.

Believe me, I know what it feels like to have your religion made the object of other people’s tastless humor. I am a Witch, after all. Every October the mainstream media finds the most unbalanced and flamboyant people they can who call themselves Witches and hold them up for the general population to shake their heads and laugh at. Don’t think it doesn’t insult me. And don’t think that I don’t bristle every time I hear a difficult or unlikable woman called a witch, or portrayed as one in a cartoon.

But do I put on green face-paint to protest my portrayal that way? Of course not. And if I was being accused of being prone to violence against those who disagree with me, I would most certainly not march out into the street and start wreaking destruction on the nearest people who look like or might be associated with the people who pissed me off. It’s a stupid thing to do, and it just makes the original insult look all the more accurate. It would undermine my cause and make the bigots look right.

I’m not saying that Muslims need to grow a sense of humor about their own faith. It would be helpful, but it’s not required. What’s required is the ability to calmly and maturely articulate the hurt and the anger in a way that opens up dialogue. Because rioting in the streets and attacking embassies isn’t going to help them get the respect they want; it’s only going to ensure that they don’t.

I’ve been playing with my calligraphy pens lately. I had put them away last spring when the winning bidders for the two pieces of custom Tengwar work that I put up for the Museum of Science’s winter party silent auction failed to ever actually decide what they wanted me to do for them (charity aside, who pays for something and then never claims it?). But I was sorting through some stuff on my desk a few weeks ago and unearthed the box from a stack of notes about linguistics and genealogy, so I started doodling with them a bit.

Which led to a bit of internet surfing, looking for lettering styles to play with. Which, in turn, led to the following conclusion:

What most people these days think of when they think of calligraphy is the swirly stuff that you see on formal wedding invites. This is Ornamental Penmanship, or sometimes Copperplate. And it’s beautiful. Precise. Graceful. Elegant. Difficult to do well.

And boring as all hell.

I’m sure that some people find making all those delicately-traced letters relaxing, not to mention lucrative. But the whole idea of spending hours planning and then drawing out all those spidery curls… well, it makes think about how badly my kitchen floor needs mopping.

On the other hand, I seem to find endless entertainment in playing with the letterforms of Carolingian, or Uncial, or just trying to imitate the handwriting of historical figures like Thomas Jefferson and Ben Franklin. I’m in love with the old long-s character, and the half-r, and the alternate letterforms in other historical hands.

Maybe it’s the history? I’m not sure, but for some reason I feel as though older lettering styles have more life in them. More personality. More presence.

And I’ve acquired a craving for a really good fountain pen. And a nice dip-pen and inkwell. And a penknife and lessons in how to cut a quill.

Teresa Nielsen Hayden has some interesting thoughts on the effects of modern copyright extension laws on the legacies of individual authors. Makes me hope that whoever inherits any intellectual property I leave behind will realize that I’d rather have it out there where people can see it than moldering while they wait for that big media deal that’ll never happen.

And that goes double if I somehow manage to become the next JRR Tolkien (ha!). I hear that the estate has such a choke-hold on the professor’s copyrights that it occasionally tries to prevent people from using the Tengwar and, of course, the languages. From what I hear, the only reason the movies ever got made was that Tolkien himself sold the film rights before he died.

I mean, really. Do you think Walt Disney would appove of telling kids that they can’t have Mickey on their birthday cakes because the cake shop isn’t allowed to reproduce his image?

It shouldn’t be more about the money than about the enjoyment of the art.