Whoosh! Issue 43 - April 2000


The Mirror Of Virtue




Subsets

[71] When it was realized that the Morning Star and the Evening Star were the same planet (Greek for wanderer), and danced in a sort of circle, then perception was wakened, like standing 'Upon a peak in Darien', and the universe was widened and people began to consider that perhaps the Earth danced too. Likewise, the dynamic of the Xena-Gabrielle pairing, and how the others, from warlords to gods, respond to it, mirror it, how all that strikes a musical chord on the lyre that is the collective soul, and shows that the mundane is part of, and extends into, a wider sphere of light, and happiness and, indeed, love. The above diversion attempts to show an inkling of this at the linguistic level. And Greek is only one language. Partway across the desert, somewhere on the way to Egypt, in Tara's town (A TALE OF TWO MUSES), there originated a word (if transcribed without vowels, in the traditional manner) kbi = dance, and a related hieroglyph gb = a (particular type of) goose, which some have taken as an indication of the type of dancing involved, while others think it is an attempt to describe the idea of a never-seen 'swan', swans having beaks something like an everyday, or common, goose. (But the ancient Egyptians also spelled cat as miw, so what would they know?)

[72] Interesting discovery: The word for any hard sweet made from boiled sugar, lolly, is pure Greek, where it means 'pebble', so-called because pebbles in the stream were perceived as prattling, singing, and making sounds as the water flowed over and past them, going la-la-la... ...la-la- la....

...The widest land
Doom takes to part us, leaves thy heart in mine
With pulses that beat double. What I do
And what I dream include thee, as the wine
Must taste of its own grapes. And when I sue [Note 03]
God for myself, He hears that name of thine,
And sees within my eyes, the tears of two.
--Barrett Browning

It's the story... of two lovely ladies...

Who's going to say it first?
I try not to overanalyze my life, like some people.
   --Xena, LOCKED UP AND TIED DOWN


Notes

Note 01:
[73] Arthur MacDonell, A Vedic Reader for Students (1917/1981) OUP p82
Return to article

Note 02:
[74] Emma Shapplin, Carmine meo, track 11 [EMI]
Return to article

Note 03:
[75] Sue, in the original sense of 'submit a pleading to', pray'
Return to article


Music And Lyrics

Author's Note:
[76] Below is a collection of sundry phrases garnered from various episodes of Xena: Warrior Princess, and arranged as if they were the lyrics to a song. The accompanying MIDI file attempts to put a tune to them. The movements of the dance version are best left to someone with choreographic skills.

Ilyx (Ilyx.mid)

[77] (Cello, acoustic grand piano, orchestral harp, glockenspiel)

I love you, Xena
I love you, Gabrielle
Xena
Gabrielle
I love you, Xena
I love you, Gabrielle
Xena
Gabrielle
Xena
Gabrielle
Xena
Gabrielle
I love you, Xena
I love you, Gabrielle
I love you, Gabrielle
Xena, Xena
Gabrielle
Xena, Xena
Gabrielle
I love you, Gabrielle
I love you, Xena
I love you, Gabrielle
I love you I love you
Xena
I love you
Gabrielle
I love you, oh, oh
Gabrielle (Gabrielle.mid)

[78] (Sitar, FX-8, pan flute)

Gabrielle
I love your blonde hair
Will you walk the road with me?
Travellers we will be
Walking together you and me.

Gabrielle
Here's an apple for your care
Will you will you walk the road with me
Keeping your delightful company?

Gabrielle
Will you walk the road with me?
Together on the road we'll be.

Twining (Twining.mid)

[79] (Ocarina, Pad1)

Two melodic life threads, intertwining.

No words.

Reunions (Reunions.mid)

[80] (Shamisen, pad1, electric guitar (muted))

[81] From the Hercules: The Legendary Journeys side of the hill: with each note representing an episode, the entire melody summarises the timbre and tone of the whole series. Composed before the announcements that made Kevin Sorbo start looking for work.

No words

Dumpling (Dumpling.mid)

[82] (music box, shakuhachi, banjo)

I love your dumplings so
They make me oooh inside, they make me glow
So firm and round, so delicious so
That stuff inside's so squishy oh.

Drumroll (XWPDrum.mid)

[83] First part of the LoDuca XWP theme with timpani as the onlyvoice.

The Loduca XWP Theme

[84] as arranged by him for piano solo[[[insert xwptheme.mid]]](with FX-8 as the single, melodic, voice). There Are Even Courses...

[85] From the University of Sydney's Continuing Education course guide for the June-August 1999 period:

Reading trash? Schlock horror!

Kylie Brass, Ruth Walker

Do you read a lot of trashy novels and watch a lot of junk TV? Are you passionately drawn to TV talk shows, mainstream movies, fashion magazines and popular literature? This course provokes thought and lively discussion about those aspects of popular culture which have such a strong impact on our daily lives. Material to be read and screened includes: Oprah's talk show, Vogue Entertaining, Xena Warrior Princess, the Academy Awards, Patricia Cornwell's Postmortem and news articles on Monica Lewinski.

6.30pm - 8.30pm Wednesdays from June 16 8 meetings $112 Course No.9C3A612


References

[86] An 1889 intermediate version of the 7th edition of Liddell and Scott's Greek-English Lexicon was used as a reference.


Citations

Blake: William Blake, From Songs of Experience, Introduction (Leonard p336)

Doolittle: Hilda Doolittle, From Towards the Piraeus (Leonard p154)

Barrett Browning: Elizabeth Barrett Browning, From Sonnets from the Portuguese, VI (Leonard p255)

Leonard: John Leonard (ed), Seven Centuries of Poetry in English (4th ed), Oxford University Press 1998 [ISBN 0 19 550780 0]



Biography

Edward Mazzeri Edward Mazzeri
Occupation: Living on the bed of an old, long-gone Gondwana river, just across the Strymon from New Xenaland, and now at the same distance from (but on the other side of) the equator as southern Japan, northern Africa and, by an interesting coincidence, Los Angeles, he currently works in a city office where he can look at the time on a Xena clock. Interests 1: "If Tapert's old enough to make 'em, I'm old enough to watch 'em." Interests 2: Recent news that the nail- tailed wallabies are (feebly) bouncing back in numbers (with a little bit of help) has stirred up thoughts of starting a Sugarglider or Feathertail page - not to mention one for bilbies, numbats, wombats, koalas, the various rock wallabies, bunyips and for things with no name (such as the onychophorans, the turpentines of the shale country, Angophora costata, that flower at the start of KING CON, the banksias and boronias, the just-rediscovered giant roughy, and even Wolf 359...)...
Favorite episode: Some are like video clips, others like lyric poems, some are like epics - interwoven with tragedy, comedy, tragi-comedy, and the visuals, soundtrack, the scenery, the actors, the directors, the props, the enthusiasm. So, which dish at the yumcha banquet is the dishiest? All episodes make some contribution of 'delicious wit' (David Martindale, "Xena: TV's Warrior Princess", Biography magazine, April 1999) to the feast. Amazed by the examples of synchronicity arising from the show. For example, If the shoe fits ... aired the same might as the serio-comic Twanky double-episode of The Bill, and the next night, there was the talking mirror scene on The Nanny. Arranging such coincidences deliberately would be almost impossible if consciously attempted.
Favorite line: Gabrielle: "Just because someone wrote that on a piece of parchment doesn't make it true. Tell him, Xena." LOCKED UP AND TIED DOWN; Gabrielle: "Xena!" Various episodes; Xena: "Gabrielle!" Various episodes.
First episode seen: DREAMWORKER
Least favorite episode: None


Previous Section
Table of Contents
Return to Top Return to Index