What a blessed land is this England! What a hallowed land of milk and honey, never to have been scourged by the electric slide!
I’m packing my bags and movin’ back to London! It’s a done deal!
“Hi! I’m working on a doctorate in historical linguistics, and I just thought you might be interested to know that Arthur is technically wrong about Zeus and Jupiter being completely different names. In fact, they’re etymologically related. So, Greek and Latin (and English, and Irish, and Russian, and Hindi) are all part of the same language family- Indo-European. “Zeus” is the Greek outcome of the Proto-Indo-European word *Dyeus (which means “sky god” as best we can figure). “Jupiter” is the outcome of *Dyeus-piter, or “sky god-father”. Language is weird sometimes, huh?”
It really is! That’s fascinating! I’ve never seen the linguistic roots of both laid out like that. Thanks, Julia!
We had lots of papers signing up in Fall, and we’ve already had one new school signing up for Spring. Want Sheldon in your college paper? Just read over the info page, then e-mail me to get started! You can be running Sheldon toons in tomorrow’s edition!
There was an incredibly nice book review in New York’s Post-Standard on the most recent Sheldon book, “A Blizzard of Lizards”. Huge thanks to journalist Jeff Kapalka for the kind, kind words.
If you’re on the fence about picking up a copy of the book, have a read through a (larger-sized) copy of the review, here!
We put a lot of work into making sure the Sheldon books come out as best as we can make ’em… and it’s always gratifying to hear it’s working. If you’re new to the Sheldon books, pick up your first one over at The Sheldon Store! Thems good readin’!
The current crop of squees stirred an interesting thought from Sheldon reader Noah A. about the relationship between Flaco and Arthur. It’s a character-construction idea I had never before formalized in thought, and I found it interesting. Here’s his idea:
This just came to me, I noticed a parallel between Flaco & Arthur and R2-D2 & C3PO.
Here’s my angle: In a recent interview with Anthony Daniels [the actor who played C3PO in “Star Wars”], the interviewer gave Daniels props for helping to create R2-D2’s character; seeing as he was with R2 the majority of the time, he understood him and translated that vocally to the audience, thus R2’s character being born right there on the screen. Well, I feel the same goes for good ol’ Arthur & Flaco. Arthur obviously being the “C3PO” figure in this case, helping the audience understand Flaco and his personality. Granted, Flaco has much more to work with as far as true expression than our famous, dome-shaped droid, with his bulbous eyes, flexible body (and tongue, mind you). However, I really do feel that Arthur is just as much part of Flaco’s character as Flaco himself is. Does that make any sense?
It does, actually. And I had never really thought of it that way before. In fact, I’m now sifting my brain, trying to think of mute or near-mute fictional characters who have been “translated” for by another character… and so become part-and-parcel of the audience’s relationship with them…?
Penn & Teller? Laurel & Hardy? Groucho and Harpo? …I guess there’s some truth to the idea, Noah! Neat thought!
Solid advice that I clearly didn’t follow!
With luck, tonight’s strip will be e-mailed out, as usual.
Boo!
Slowly but surely, though, the fever is becoming less feverish, and the dizziness is undizzying itself, and standing up is seeming like a more and more viable option for me.
It’s funny: This cartoon only makes me laugh when I’ve been sick. But then, alas, it rings all too true.
Here’s the link Wilbert found listing all Kane’s work.
Wow!
