While working on  the revisions, basically abridgements, of the long script on sketch stories, I will drop bits and pieces of the work in progress in Chapters.

AN APOLOGY TO ALL WHO SENT ME LETTERS: ONLY RECENTLY I DISCOVERED A FUNCTION WHICH WILL ALLOW ME TO ANSWER ALL YOUR LETTERS: I WILL TRY ....  

For Xmas I have added a new page with Crime Stories, my own. So far, unpublished. There will be four or five in different languages.

2024

The new year will open with a page which was part of an extinct website linked to the WIKI entry on Rolando Hinojosa (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolando_Hinojosa-Smith). Rolando loved to people his series of novels on the fictive "Belken County" with more and more characters related to each other in complex ways. I had compiled an index of all those names for researchers (roughly a thousand), and here it is: Klail City Index.

Jan 4

Dutch painting has become more important in my research on verbal sketching. The numerous 17c painters increassingly specialized in certain types of subjects, often connected to the so-called "genre painting".  

I also publish a draft version on an article written in 2010 on the poet Steven Wallace and Mussolini. If anybody is interested in researching the topic "Fascism and Stevens" I could provide further notes to follow this up.

Jan 19

I have added a political sketch by Maria Lydia Child in the series of sample sketches, illustrating the development of sketching.

As a historical frame for the English settler colony, the USA, and its Hegemony I have used the World System delineated by F. Braudel (Alltag - Handel - Kapital) and I. Wallerstein's Core - Semiperiphery - Periphery of the System (New York moves from Periphery to Core between  1700 and 2000). You will find both outlines under Abstracts.

Jan 27

For the 21c I have added Piketty on "Gleichheit" and Class, Gender, and Ethnicity (Racism) under Abstracts.

Starting in February I will post passages  on single authors from the chapters.

FEb 01

Under Chapters I have added a travel sketch from Irving*s seminal Sketchbook (1819/20), the prototype for many sketch-stories in the 19c. (Kap. 3)

Feb 11

I have added a new page under versions, earlier unpublished articles. This one is on meditation in poetry, to be followed by one on "contemplation", a kind of sequel. Both are connected to the sketch-story. We will find traces of both in Irving's  sketchbook.

Feb 24

Here is Lukian, a clarification on method and a central concept of chapter 1.. "PROTOTYPE". This will allow you to navigate through the following chapters.

March 06.

W. Scott is an important mentor and model for Washington Irving. This is a lengthy passage on Waverley, in chapter 3, to be reduced in the final version.

March 17

This is not a book on theory, and prototype semantics is getting very complex. To support  chapter 1, I have written a short abstract of George Lakoff's Theoryof prototypes with an exemplification from Toni Morrison. See: Appendix.

March 30

THe passage on Mather in chapter 2.. is too long. To share the quotes I publish it here, before I abridge it. Frohe Ostern! Next week I will update the first three abstracts.

April 1

This is not a book on the history of aesthetics. But Addison derived from J. Locke a theory of verbal sketching which informs the whole 18c. His essay series on Imagination/Fancy (1712) anticipates Lakoff and prototype theory by three centuries. Don't be fooled. An excerpt goes into the Appendix.

April 21

A sample from chapter 4 on Hawthorne who has undergone serious re-writing. Similar samples on Poe and Child will follow. 

I have also replaced an older  version of the introductory chapter.