by Jeff Shih
When a girl puckers up to kiss me, her lips sometimes transform into a bewitching mirror that slowly expands outward until it completely covers her face. And suddenly, before me my own face is reflected and I’m forced to reconsider my action. A retired narcissist, I take pride in finding faults with myself in the same manner old men reconcile with age. One must realize that when I say I hate myself, I am really congratulating myself on having fulfilled my life’s mission. When I declare I should be more considerate toward others, I’m really congratulating myself underneath for such upstanding citizenship. Likewise, old men certainly do not admit to their feebleness because they truly believe in it. With little effort, their resignation can turn into evidence for their clarity of mind in knowing themselves and their environment, a sign of remaining vitality. So when girls loved me, I never could find the hear to love them back. No, it’s rather that she hasn’t been able to find me to love from the heart. When I look into this face-mirror and see my own visage transfigured on the uneven reflective surface, I lose sight of the real me, and I fall in love with only with the beautiful yet amorphous reflection. This is why I do not distinguish between the daytime glances of admirers and nocturnal masturbation. Only beautiful people kiss, I think. And by saying this, you cannot imagine how ugly my reflection has become, so don’t say it. I have come to the point of telling myself that girls who fall in love with me are really in love with themselves. I am a beauty mirror, after all. My shower of compliments washes away their insecurities so they can afford to reduce their use of expensive cosmetics. And because girls in general tend to downplay the complexities of men — they have transformed men at large into simple reflections like myself, a mask they wear on their faces before an audience. On the other hand, it is also possible that girls in love with me cannot love themselves. Why fall in love with an old man who has retired from love to hate himself? Who can possibly bear such punishment other than the most extreme masochists? To disassociate myself with this peculiar group of sexual mal-adjusts, I indulge in my habit of staring into my mirror. I have become most at ease in the company of enemies because they share with me a common enemy, me. I demand absolute confidence in their hatred of me. I shall be glad when they make me into a gigantic monster, angry if they belittle me. To defeat my enemy, I force myself to admire him, but seeing per se defeats me, and thus I remain not undefeated before my mirror. And this is why all my life I haven’t been able to love anyone else but myself, haven’t been able to do anything else but love myself. And now that I’ve decided to be retired from this profession, I have no more use for myself and my reflection. I shall remain here until true love hits and shatters me in my ripe age. When that day comes, I shall kiss for the first time.
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by Dennis Liu
On May 16, 1998, the Department premiered this year’s senior play, Oscar Wilde’s Lady Windermere’s Fan. A play set in fin-de-siecle London of the late 1890s, it is reinterpreted by the director to give the audience a contemporary (yet still very Wildean) insight into the phenomena of gossip in the late 1990s. From May 16 to May 21 the senior class staged six performances, and all of them received applause and many bouquets from the audience. Two other short plays were performed along with Lady Windermere’s Fan. Dennis Liu, a senior, wrote and directed a parody of the department, Mis-understanding(s), or, How to Learn Some (Filthy) Languages in Thirty Minutes (editor’s note: this is indeed a very lenghty-filthy title). It is the very first play ever staged in the department’s long history that parodies the department itself. It is also the first multilingual play, mixed with verbal jokes in German, French, and some really naughty Japanese. During the performance the laughter never stopped, and apparently the audience enjoyed the ending, in which hundreds of Durexes were thrown upon Richard, the male engineering student in the play. Another short play, Key to the Elevator (French title: La cle d'ascenseur), is written by French playwright Agota Kristof (who is also the author of Le Grand Cahier, a famous novel translated into Chinese as ). This play features a woman imprisoned in a castle, built in order to be happy with her husband forever. Yet the only way out of the castle is an elevator, and the key doesn’t belong to her. Claustrophobic and fueled with horror, the audience responded to this experimental staging with awe. For those who missed the play, there is a homepage which features reviews and “theater p.b.” (a virtual theater experiment which stands for “theater playback”). You can visit the homepage at http://www-ms.cc.ntu.edu.tw/~b3208017/dfllplay.html, and hey, it’s bilingual. The senior play team, performers and staff members By Laura Jane Wey
‘What second foreign language are you taking?’ I am asked about once a week on average. No surprise, this being classic chit-chat material for people once they know you’re a foreign languages major. Eyes twinkling, I would enunciate a clear, deliberate 'Ancient Greek,’ and lean back to watch the results. Invariably, the eyebrows would go up, followed by a gasp, 'Ancient Greek?’ After my nonchalant nod, the Standard Question would be popped. 'Why on earth would you want to study something like that?’ Good question, that. It’s a language deader than Latin, if there are indeed different degrees to death. Latin is still useful in fields of medicine and religion, but Ancient Greek – what use can one possibly have for it? The last person who knew how to speak it died more than a thousand years ago. Right. But then it is The Language from which the whole of Western civilization was derived. The epics of Homer, the Tragedies, the histories of Herodotus and Thucydides, the works of Plato and Aristotle – through countless ages up to the present, these are musts for anyone who wishes to be deemed at all educated. It is reasonable then that the language in which they are written should be worth studying, if for nothing more than the freedom to enjoy these masterpieces in the original. As everybody knows, literature loses its poignancy to some extent through translations; that is, naturally, true of Ancient Greek as well. Inevitably, some of the beauty will be lost; a regrettable thing, since it is truly a beautiful language, from the shapes of its letters down to the passion and vivacity of the culture behind it. If you have no idea what Ancient Greek looks like, here’s an example. As recorded in the Appendix of the Greek Anthology, when a common man inquired of the Oracle of Apollo what the outcome would be if he enlisted and went to war, the Oracle responded thus: Now, there’s more to these few words than you might think. Unlike English, Ancient Greek has no subject-verb-object pattern; similar to Latin, it depends on 'cases’ instead of word order to determine what the subjects and objects are in a sentence. Consequently, the Oracle’s answer could be taken in two entirely opposite ways: a) You will go / you will return / you will not die in the war; or b) You will go / you will return not / you will die in the war. The ambiguity is there, obvious in the original, yet untranslatable; the Oracle would’ve been right, whatever the outcome. Of all the seven second foreign languages offered in the department, Ancient Greek is beyond a doubt the most extraordinary one. It is a demanding course, but rewarding; starting from scratch, students would be floundering through simplified classical texts by year’s end, and tackling the real stuff’ – unabridged work straight from the masters – by the second year. It really isn’t as alarming as it sounds, for with a steady amount of work each week, it is not difficult to keep abreast of the class. So if you have a fascination for classical literature, if you are a fast learner looking for a course that moves along fast enough without boring you, or if you are, simply, a curiosity-seeker looking for something rare – check this course out, for what it has to offer is spectacular. Just imagine – sitting beside the pond at sundown, eating Greek 'springrolls’ as the sound of a mellow voice reciting Sappho comes floating on the evening breeze – how many courses can boast a syllabus like this? by Charly Tsai
(Editor’s note: If you’re reading this article using a Chinese browser, you may encounter characters that are illegible; if such is the case, please go to your browser menu, look for “document encoding” or “character set” settings, and set it to “Western/European” character sets.) Have you ever read anything in Swedish? If not then you will get a chance to do it now. In Swedish there are 29 letters in the alphabet, the three extra ones being å, ä and ö, which appear at the end of the alphabet. The sound of “å” is like a + o pronouced together, “ä” sounds like the [a] sound, in other words an “a” dragged to an “e” at the end, and the for last one “ö” you say “o” and drag the ending into an “e” sound too. Well have you got the sounds? They are not so hard so give it a try and then try to read this: Kyssande vind Han kom som en vind. Vad bryr sig en vind om förbud? Han kysste din kind, Han kysste allt blod till din hud. Det borde ha stannat därvid: Du var ju en annans, blott lånad En kvåll i syrenernas tid Och Gullregnens månad. Han kysste ditt öra, ditt hår. Vad faster en vindsig vid om han får? På ögonenn kyste du blind. Du ville, forstås, ej allsI borjan besvara hans trånad. Men snart låg du in arm om hans hals I gullregnens månad Från din mun har han kysst Det sista av motstånd som fanns Din mun ligger tyst Med halvöppna läppar mot hans Det kommer en vind och går: Och hela din världsbild rasar For en fläkt från syrenernas vår Och gullregnens klasar. Kissing Wind He came like a wind What does the wind care about prohibition He kissed your cheek He kissed all blood to your skin It should have had a stop there You belonged to an other, borrowed One night in the lilacs time And golden rain month He kissed your ear, your hair What will a wind stickIf he might On eyes he kissed you blind Of course you didn’t want it in the beginning you rejected his pining But soon were your arms around his neck In golden rain month From your mouth he had kissed The last resistance Your mouth lay quiet With half open lips in his It comes like a wind and it goes And your whole world breaks For a spot from lilacs spring And golden rain crashes (From “Love in the twentieth century”,by Hjalmar Gullborg) After you have read this poem you will find a lot of Swedish words are similar to the English. For examples : Från - From Vind - Wind Halv - Half Blod - Blood In - In Arm - Arm by Grace Weng
“What do proverbs, epigrams, maxims, and cliches have in common? How are they different?” “Can cliches be considered as expressions of wisdom?” “What is the difference between wisdom and knowledge?” Such are the sorts of questions Prof. Hammond starts out by asking his students when discussing the Book of Proverbs in Bible and Literature class. With his profound literary knowledge and excellent teaching style, along with his pleasant British accent, Prof. Gerald Hammond has inspired many students during the ten months he’s been at NTU. Prof. Hammond is a visiting professor from the University of Manchester. He’s currently teaching two courses at NTU – Bible and Literature and Milton Studies. Being a highly respected literary critic and Biblical scholar, he may offer us more insights into a literary career as well as give some suggestions to our students based on his teaching experience. Prof. Hammond received his Ph.D. from the University of London, and later taught at the University of Manchester. His specialties are English Renaissance Literature and the Bible. When asked how he decided on these fields of study, he pointed out that he had grown up in the 1960s, a time of great social change and radical politics, and in becoming interested in politics and social phenomena one has to be interested in the 17th century in England. On the other hand, the Bible is a great book of literature which has had major influences upon the cultural and social traditions in many different places throughout Western history. Prof. Hammond has always encouraged his students to study literature in relation to society and history.“ I’ve always taught literature as something very closely connected with history, and therefore connected with politics, with social movement. I don’t believe that literature is something remote from history. That’s what I’ve been trying to teach people here as well, to take a historical approach to literature.” To many of us, the term literary critic may only draw up a vague idea of someone who interprets literature and publishes his views from time to time. In fact, the responsibilities of a literary critic are far greater than that. According to Prof. Hammond, there are two main purposes of his job: to keep the culture alive, and to rediscover materials which have not been known and appreciated before. For example, the poems and writings of John Donne as well as many early feminist writings were discovered only later and popularized by critics. In terms of keeping the culture alive, his aim is to let people understand the present in connection with the past, and the continual interpretation of literature serves that purpose. The constant development of new interpretations also reflects social trends, as we see changing perspectives on the same materials through time. By sustaining literature from different time periods, one is also preserving the entire culture which embodies it. The most direct way to achieve this goal is simply by teaching it. As Prof. Hammond says, “the thing I enjoy most of all is teaching. I like teaching because I like being around young people. And I think teaching good students and seeing them learn more can make you very happy.” When I asked him about his impression of students at NTU, he responded with some very positive comments. “Students at Taida are very intelligent, and they work very hard.” Does he find them somewhat different from students in Britain? “Yes. I think students in Taiwan are less likely to think independently, but they are more likely to work harder, and to research something in depth.” One suggestion he would give to the students here is “Don’t believe everything the teacher says.” It is very important for students to question, and decide for themselves what is most convincing. He went on to say that if he could combine the hardworking nature of Taiwanese students with the independent thinking of British students, he would have the perfect students! He has also had many amusing teaching experiences during his long teaching career. There was a student who got up in the middle of an ordinary literature class and shouted that she was the bride of Jesus Christ, and the whole class went completely silent at that point. Another time when he was driving above the speed limit, he was stopped by an ex-student who had entered the police force. It turned out that the student soon recognized him and let him go. He is also very amused when students go to sleep in class, and he often tries different ways to wake them up. For those of you who are considering further studies in literature, you might wonder about the differences between studying in the US and England. As Taiwanese students have had a longer tradition of going to the States, we are less familiar with the lifestyle and academic environment in Britain. Prof. Hammond also provided very valuable information concerning this question. “I think American graduate programs are better planned and better organized at the moment than British programs, but I think the British are improving radically. I think you get a more professional kind of treatment in the United States. If you get into a good British university, though, you get some really excellent teaching and guidance, especially for graduate students.” He also suggested that students here should try to take advice from people who’ve already been to Britain, such as some of the teachers from our department. You can also go to a British organization in Taiwan called ATEC and get information there. “I think Taiwanese students will be surprised if they come to Britain. If they only have an image of Britain, the reality will be amazing to them, because I think the idea of Britain that Taiwanese students have is that it’s a very conservative place where everybody is white. In reality, today’s Britain is a multicultural society with a huge number of different races.” Prof. Hammond surprised me when he told me that there are 76 different first languages spoken by children in Manchester schools. So there is no doubt that students will come across a great amount of diversity if they go to Britain, especially a big city like Manchester. Another benefit of staying in Europe is that one can easily travel from country to country, and experience a whole new set of social and cultural values. Professor Hammond believes that one goes to university not just to study English or other subjects, but more importantly, to learn about other cultures and different ways of looking at the world. When asked how he looks at Taipei, he remarked that it’s a very nice place and the people are very friendly. However, he thinks Taiwan should try to promote itself more to the world. He feels that many people in the world have not caught up with the progress Taiwan has made in the past ten years, and they have no idea of the freedom, living standards, and advanced technology here. He encourages students to travel around the world more so people from other countries will know more about Taiwan. Prof. Hammond will be returning to England in June to become the Dean of Faculty of Arts at the University of Manchester. During the interview I have found him to be not only an erudite scholar, but also someone who is very open-minded and friendly. We hope that his stay in Taipei has been an enjoyable experience, and he will continue to inspire students (and get away with speeding!) in England. by Eddie Zhan
Are you a normal person? Look at yourself and think about it. What surprises you? Is it true that you like to take things too seriously? Is there too much pressure? Is there too much noise that bothers you? Do you worry too much? Do you easily get angry and nervous? Can you sleep at night? Can you relax? How often do you actually laugh from your heart? In fact, nobody is normal! Everyone has his or her own problems. If one person does not worry at all, can fall asleep anyway, smile all the time, and always keep himself very relaxed, then there must be something wrong with him. Because it is against nature; Mother Nature gives everyone the gift to worry when something happens, even if it is a good thing. Ergo, nobody is normal; everyone is sick! It just a matter of how sick one is. I believe you must have a good time seeing As Good As It Gets. You must admit that it is very hard to play cool when watching the film. Don’t worry, it’s normal if you laugh; it is not if you don’t. There is a man who likes to lock the door several times, wash his hands with a great deal of soap, bring his own silverware when eating in a restaurant, and furthermore he even staggers on the street. It is funny but miserable. I wonder if anyone could handle that in real life. Meanwhile, why don’t you look around? How about yourself and people you have met? What do you find? Maybe weird is just not enough. You have to invent other words for them. Take myself for example. I am the kind of guy who cannot sleep if there is noise. No matter how tiny the noise is, I cannot fall asleep! Even if there is no sound at all, I still can’t, because I’ll create my own illusion of noise! Is it funny? Personally I think not. It queer, however, that I can easily fall asleep when teachers are lecturing in class. You know, the atmosphere is peaceful, the frequency is steady, the pitch and timbre are perfect, the sound is monotonous, the chair is comfortable, everything is so harmonious like a Mozart symphony and just like that, I fall asleep. Laura Jane has a similar story. Once she went camping with her family and friends during summer vacation. There was a woman, about 30 years old, who asked everybody for a towel in the evening. She did not need it for a bath but for something else. She wanted to wear it around her stomach so that she could fall asleep. She got one at last, but did not sleep well, since the texture was a little bit different from what she was used to. When this woman was a kid, she was very naughty. The sheet on her always disappeared during the night. Her mother started to worry that she might catch cold. She came up with an idea, and the towel was the result! As time went by, the naughty girl had grown up. She might not be naughty any more, but she could no longer sleep without a towel! Can you imagine that? It had been 30 years! You may wonder why things like this take place. People’s strange behaviors can be either physical or mental, sometimes both, and so are the factors that result in them. These factors and people’s responses usually interact with each other continuously, which leads to worse and worse conditions. You might call it a psychiatric type of AIDS, for people suffering those problems are usually too weak to fight against some-thing that is offensive to them. Let’s go back to our first example again. In the beginning, I tried to sleep at midnight but couldn’t thanks to the noise caused by my roommate. Physically, I heard the noise; mentally, I felt offended, for it was past 12 o'clock and under no circumstances should anybody make any noise. I tried to negotiate with my roommate, but it was no use. I then tried to play my favorite CD Legends of the Fall, in order to cover the noise, but that made my roommate misunderstand that I was not in bed and having a good time listening to the music. What was even worse, I began to hate my CD. Whenever I listened to Legends of the Fall, I couldn’t avoid the illusion that my roommate was making noise. Therefore, Legends of the Fall = noise. It didn’t take too long that I hated all my favorite CDs! Being aware of that drove me crazy. Now whenever I hear the sound of the door opening, I cannot help getting nervous because I know my roommate has come home. The very existence of my roommate implies noise. Physically whether there is noise or not, mentally I am always anxious and kept highly defensive as long as I am aware of the existence of my roommate! As to the second example, we can apply the same logic. The woman in question must put on a towel around her stomach so that she can have a feeling of safety. The towel is the physical factor while safety is mental. That can also explain why some people cannot sleep in another bed than their own. Human beings are very complex; they can not only feel, but think as well. For that reason, we can say everybody has some mental illness. Some people are ill to a higher degree than others. Some are relatively normal and some are relatively abnormal. And as for the environment where crazy people live, is our society itself normal? Isn’t it a mad city that we live in. The fear, the pressure, the noise, the busy streets, traffic, hijackings, and so many crazy things surround us; how couldn’t people go crazy? I would say it is a crazy-people factory. Even dogs on the street go crazy, too. Generally, city dogs abide by traffic regulations when crossing the road. Unfortunately, human drivers don’t. So our dog-citizens must be confused. However, life will find its way. No matter how good or bad the world is, nature will take its course. There is no need to worry; maybe this is just as good as it gets! by Wei-chun Lin
Do you like reading novels, even writing them? Now you can show your literary talent on the World Wide Web. There is a new Chinese website established by the United Daily News in Taiwan, called the “Literature Cafe” (http://novel.udngroup.com.tw). At the beginning of the month, the UDN workshop will invite a famous novelist as “resident” novelist to choose a topic and write the first part of a story. They put this part of the story on the homepage, and ask anybody who is interested to give whatever ending he or she likes. Contributions are 500 words or less, and entrants send them by E-mail to [email protected]. At the end of the month, the panel of judges selects 3 or 4 of the best, and publishes them on the Literature Cafe homepage and the literature page of the United Daily News. This activity began in November 1997, and the first stage will end in June. Many famous Taiwanese novelists have written their stories for it, such as Ai-Ya (愛 亞), Ma-Son (馬 森), Li-Li (李 黎), and so on. Ai-Ya wrote a story about several adolescents planning to pee as a joke; Ma-Son’s story is about the scandal of a writer; Li-Li’s is about someone who disappeared in a computer company. All the contributions are so different and so creative, I am so astonished that the entrants could make so many unexpected associations. Perhaps you would wonder why they hold this novel “relay”? The UDN workshop said that they want to find more young people who have the potential to be novelists. Maybe they could create a Taiwan Parnassus. If literature becomes popular entertainment like the Internet, culture in Taiwan might be gradually enriched. So they have chosen an easy and fun way to attract more people to join in. Do you want to be a part-time novelist? This is your chance!! Join in, and you could be the next winner! by Michelle Pan
Do you know who the most famous cat in Japan is? She is a cat without a mouth and is already 23 years old. If you walk on the streets of Tokyo, you can see her almost everywhere, on backpacks, on portable phones, or on pagers. “Kitty” is her name. “Kitty Cat” was created by Sanrio Company in 1976. The picture of her is very simple and it seems that everyone can easily imitate and draw it. At first, she was designed for children. Her picture was printed on many kinds of things that kids needed, for example, handkerchiefs, stationery, water bottles, etc. With the prevalence of Kitty, the company even produced a series of cartoons of her. They had created a fashion among little girls. I still remember that when I was an elementary school student, many girl friends of mine would have her products, like stickers, notebooks, and pencil boxes. However, when I was in Tokyo during this winter vacation, I saw many women in their forties using Kitty products, too! Take portable phones for example, they were pink and similar to the toys that little girls play with but you will see women using them everywhere. It seemed weird; just like a man in suit carrying a briefcase with a Batman mark. Why are middle-aged women so fond of this cartoon character? According to the reports of Japanese magazines, women explained that with Kitties around, they feel themselves much younger and seem to go back to the sweet times when they were little girls. So they tend to carry Kitty products with them. Moreover, the company even makes Kitty ovens, Kitty toasters, and Kitty pots for those who need to cook. Maybe these would remind the housewives of playing house before. The Kitty fashion has come to Taiwan during these last months. And I can prove they really can make you feel younger. I’m no longer sure how old I am when my friends use Kitty white-out, wear Kitty rings and socks. You can follow this fashion if you have money to spare, because it costs you three times as much money to buy things with Kitty’s picture on it. by Joyce Lee
Your life is paralyzed like still water. Everything that exists seems to increase your frustration, and you can find nothing interesting in your daily life. You feel upset. You are always isolated from others, and you don? know why that whenever you try to talk to others, you always get cold looks. You are shocked when your boy/girlfriend wants to break up with you. Full of sadness, anger, and hatred, you feel it the end of the world. Have you ever experienced the situations described above? When you meet these problems, to whom are you going to pour out your feelings and where can you go for help? Family? Friends? Your diary? Or just let the vexation gnaw at you until you are unable to go on? At Taida, there is a place that always keeps its doors open to you. It is the NTU Student Counseling Center, which is located in the Department of Psychology building. The main services that the NTU Student Counseling Center provides include individual counseling, psychological testing, and mutual support groups. The most important service of all is individual counseling. There are seven staff members in the Counseling Center, four of them are counselors. By talking to them, you can help your problems and find possible ways to improve them. Any topic that you want to talk about is acceptable and would be kept secret. The only purpose is to become more aware of your own feelings and needs. But before going, you have to call for reservations because the counselors are always busy. Psychological testing is not fortune-telling or an exam but a measurable tool to increase your self-understanding, which can help you to become more aware of your present condition. The tests that the Counseling Center provide include personality, vocational interests, personal interests, intelligence and aptitude tests. About one week after you have taken the test, the counselor will make an appointment with you to analyze the results of your test. The mutual support groups are small worlds that students who participate in can share their experiences with each other so that they can learn communication skills and understand how personal life influences the development of relationships with others. There are different kinds of groups which meet in the Counseling Center. The peer support group gives training to students who are enthusiastic about helping others. After training they will understand themselves more and will be leaders of groups. The little pea support group is held for freshmen to adapt themselves to college life. They also have a gender communication group, a career development group, and a communication development group. There is a maximum of twelve students in each group so that everyone gets sufficient attention. The Counseling Center also has information about department transfers, which you can get on the internet. And there is also a newly-established sex discrimination and sexual harassment prevention committee, which is located in the administration building. There is a hotline open twenty-four hours per day and you can also use their mailing address to get in touch with them. There are students who have some misunderstandings about the Counseling Center. They think that to see a counselor and talk about private problems means that you cannot handle your problems well, or some people feel that they lose their privacy when being studied by the “experts”. But as Ms. Pan, one of the counselors, says, “everyone will meet problems in their life, and the ways each person finds to solve those problems will be different. Here we provide a space.” by Laura Jane Wey
‘She has China eyes,’ said I 'China-blue eyes you mean,’ Said my brother, swinging by With a girl who had The bluest eyes I’d never seen. 'China eyes I say, And China eyes I mean.’ I did not like the way They thought all pretty eyes Needed a blue sheen. I wandered outside then And thought of her, my pearl -- Long gleaming hairWith nary a curl A velvety pair Of slanting dark eyes Mystic, elusive, alluring -- My beautiful China girl. |
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May 2024
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