tags & needles

Congratulations to Kathleen on getting into grad school at Temple. ROCK ON.

Date: Thu, 22 Apr 2004 08:54:30 -0700 (PDT)
From: Kathleen
To: Christine
Subject: Neck face
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So i'm designing the set for a kid's show called The Outsiders. Themes include gang warfare, urban decay, Gone With The Wind, and kids burning to death in churches. Children's theatre at its best. Much of the set is covered in grafitti. I've spent several days, and will probably spend another week, writing every name I can think of in spraypaint and fat marker. In honor of your neck face obsession, I bring you this homage on my set.
K

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"It's all fun and games..."-T-shirt for a production of Oedipus Rex

voicemail, also last week.

Christine, this is Kathleen, and I keep coming across this phrase in the Thousand Nights and a Night—I'm on night sixteen now, I have a long way to go—and the phrase is my story is so strange that if it were written with a needle on the corner of an eye yet would it serve as a lesson to the circumspect. I was just wondering if you'd know what that means. I get the part about serving as a lesson to the circumspect but what the fuck is up with writing it with a needle on the corner of an eye? Does that mean writing it really small? I thought maybe you could tell me. I don't know, it just seems like you might. I dunno. call me back.

Ideas, anyone?

Comments

[gwynne]

CONGRATULATIONS KATHLEEN! Philly will be a greater city for your presence.

And I have no idea why you would take a needle to the corner or your eye.

[caseyjames]

How come I never got a sushiesque.com congratulations for getting into UK, LSU and UT?

[unsinn]

I was in The Outsiders in 8th grade. I played the main female character's friend, the one without so many lines, which was too bad, because I was the only one who knew the main female character's lines. Even the popular kids who always made fun of me said I should have gotten the role. Stupid The Outsiders.

To write on the corner of your eye with a needle would be to write it very small. Dunno why an "eye", though. Perhaps it's a translation issue, like the biblical phrase about a camel going through a needle's eye, where "needle" may refer to an obelisk rather than the little thing you use to sew.

[sushiesque]

CONGRATULATIONS CASEYJAMES YOU ARE SMART WOULD YOU LIKE A COOKIE

[tasneem]

talking point #1: the outsiders was my favorite book in eighth grade. stay gold, pony boy.

talking point #2: there is a mexican food truck a few blocks west of temple's campus that sells these sweet potato and roasted red pepper quesadilla things that are, well, most precious to me than any living person in my life.

[caseyjames]

Only if the cookie is a nice, warm and chewy oatmeal raisin.

If not, you can keep your cookie.

[oboreruhito]

I thought the eye of a needle, actually. Either way, it's all about the method of the storytelling being a warning of how strange the story is. A modern example would be if he wrote the story in assembly. Because, you see, that would be MESSED UP, and any story written in assembly must be doubly so.

casey: wasn't getting to live in Baton Rouge cookie enough? Wasn't TIGER FOOTBALL cookie enough?! WASN'T IT?!

[bethday]

i'm thinking writtne wit a needle on the corner of the eye means it's really hard to see. it's wirtten really small, and in a palce it's really hard to see. (what place can you see less with your eyes than its own corner?) so it's sof fucking strange that even if it was so small and hard to see it would still "serve as a lesson to the circumspect"

[unsinn]

It makes more sense (in the sense of it being a very strange story) if the needle had written the story on its own eye, which is very difficult and odd in so many ways.

Now I'm wondering what the original said. Anyone know Arabic?

[Kathleen]

Hmm, things to think about. I'm now on night twenty-six, and the needle/eye thing has become a cliche. Almost every story has someone telling someone else about how strange their story is, and if it were written with a needle in the corner of their eye, still would it serve as a lesson to the circumspect.

Grafitti is fun and I can completely understand why people do it on buildings.

[Gwynne]

Thanks to Tasneem and Caseyjames, I'm going to go looking in vain for a lunch of red pepper quesadillas and oatmeal cookies.

[unsinn]

Success! I have solved the puzzle!

In the Burton translation, the line runs as such: "and mine is a tale which, if it were written upon
the eye corners with needle gravers, were a warner to whoso would
be warned." Burton's footnote reads: "This is a favourite jingle, the play being upon "ibrat" (a
needle-graver) and " 'ibrat" (an example, a warning)."

[sushiesque]

A COOKIE FOR LITTLE SUMMER

[Kathleen]

Ah hah! I'm reading the Mardrus and Mathers translation, which I've heard is clearer, but which is completely unfootnoted.