@magistrabeck wishing you good naps, excellent reading, & swift recovery!
English
Greg Kindall
3.4K posts
Greg Kindall
@GregoryKindall
non ridere, non lugere, neque detestari, sed intelligere
Katılım Ekim 2012
1.1K Takip Edilen1.1K Takipçiler
I read A Parish Chronicle, by Haldór Laxness (1970; 2026 translation by Philip Roughton for Archipelago Books).
I thought this delightful. Maybe having once spent a delightful day in the parish had something to do with it?
English
@GregoryKindall That's very cool. I'll have to read up on it
English
A lot of my life can be described by the moment, when tasked with writing about an important historical figure in 10th grade, I wrote about Emma Goldman
English
I read A Wild Sheep Chase, by Haruki Murakami (1982; 1989 translation by Alfred Birnbaum). A shaggy dog story about a wild goose chase, as unputdownable now as the last time I read it (nearly twenty years ago).
English
His friend Alban Berg wrote songs based on five Altenberg "postcard texts":
5 Orchesterlieder nach Ansichtskartentexten von Peter Altenberg, Op. 4
here's a 1960 version with soprano Bethany Beardslee (who turned 100! last Christmas), Robert Craft conducting:
youtube.com/playlist?list=…
Greg Kindall@GregoryKindall
I read Ashantee, by Peter Altenberg (1897; translated by Katharina von Hammerstein, 2007), and Telegrams of the Soul, selections from across PA's career (translated by Peter Wortsman, 2005).
English
In 1896 around 70 Ashanti from the Gold Coast (Ghana) formed a village, an ethnological exhibit, in Vienna's Zoological Garden. Altenberg was smitten with them, befriended many of them, and memorialized them here.
This was particularly interesting to me as my mother spent several years in her youth among the Ashanti (and their cousins the Fante). I grew up with her stories.
English
I read Ashantee, by Peter Altenberg (1897; translated by Katharina von Hammerstein, 2007), and Telegrams of the Soul, selections from across PA's career (translated by Peter Wortsman, 2005).
English
I read Shah of Shahs, by Ryszard Kapuściński (1982).
Useful reminder of how and why the regime ended the way it did, but it's too bad he didn't stick around to exercise that Kapuścińskian irony on the mullahs.
(1985 translation by William R. Brand & Katarzyna Mroczkowska-Brand.)
Polski
Best birthday wishes to John McPhee (b.1931), who has been part of my reading life since high school.
(my collection isn't complete - there are a few titles yet to get.)
English
Stacks for two who share a birthday but are otherwise each truly sui generis, Kōbō Abe (b.1924) & Georges Perec (b.1936).
English
1982 souvenir from Chongqing
Archaeo - Histories@archeohistories
When Coca-Cola entered China in 1927, it arrived without an official Chinese name.... Local shopkeepers stepped in to fill the gap, creating their own phonetic signs that roughly mimicked the sound of "Coca-Cola." Written Chinese has around 40,000 characters, and about 200 of them can produce sounds that approximate "ko-ka-ko-la." Shopkeepers chose characters based on sound alone, with no regard for what those characters actually meant when strung together. The results were disastrous for the brand's image. Some signs translated to "bite the wax tadpole," while others read "female horse fastened with wax" or "wax-flattened mare." These signs spread across Shanghai storefronts before the company had any chance to control its own messaging. Sales were predictably poor, with one account estimating only around 400 bottles sold throughout the entire first year. The company recognized the problem and launched a competition, reportedly offering a 350-pound reward to anyone who could craft a proper Chinese name. A Chinese poet, painter, and calligrapher named Chiang Yee, then living in London, submitted the winning entry. His translation, "Ke Kou Ke Le," used four characters that both approximated the sound of "Coca-Cola" and carried a positive meaning. The phrase translated roughly to "delicious" and "can bring happiness," blending phonetics with genuine cultural resonance. Coca-Cola registered the new name as its official Chinese trademark in 1928. The brand began to recover, and within a few years China had become one of Coca-Cola's largest overseas markets. Bottling plants opened in Shanghai, Tianjin, and Qingdao to meet growing demand. The company even hired a famous Shanghai actress, Yan Lingyu, as a spokesperson, making it one of the earliest examples of influencer marketing in China. Progress halted when Japan invaded China in 1937, severely disrupting business operations across the country. Then, after the Communist revolution ended the Chinese Civil War in 1949, the government banned Coca-Cola entirely, viewing it as a symbol of American capitalism and Western decadence. The brand disappeared from China for three decades. Coca-Cola did not return until 1979, when Deng Xiaoping began opening China to international trade and diplomatic relations with the United States were restored. The company built its first post-revolution bottling plant in Tianjin in 1981, and sales climbed rapidly from there. The Coca-Cola naming disaster in China became one of history's most instructive lessons in cross-cultural brand strategy. It demonstrated that phonetic translation alone is never sufficient when entering a foreign market, because written and spoken languages carry layers of cultural meaning that can make or break consumer trust overnight. The eventual success of "Ke Kou Ke Le" set a template that multinational companies still study today, showing that the right name must balance sound, meaning, and emotional resonance in the target language. The incident also accelerated the use of local cultural advisors and celebrity endorsements in foreign markets, practices that are now standard in global brand launches. Beyond marketing, the story illustrates a broader truth about cultural humility: the brands that succeed across borders are those willing to listen, adapt, and earn their place rather than assume their name alone will carry them. © History Oasis #archaeohistories
Català
A great one.
And I was hoping he'd finally get his Nobel next year.
Dalkey Archive Press@Dalkey_Archive
The great Portuguese writer António Lobo Antunes GCSE has passed away at the age of 83. Antunes died in Lisbon, the city where he was born, the site of his psychiatric practice, and the setting for many of his 30+ works. Portugal has declared a national day of mourning.
English
@GregoryKindall I was very impressed by Jefferies’ proto-apocalyptic fiction “After London” (1885).
English
@noctambulate Sounds interesting! I'll have to check it out.
English
I read Bevis: The Story of a Boy, by Richard Jefferies (1882). Real natural history meets boyish imagination in the adventures of Bevis and his friend Mark.
English
At some point Giorgio Bassani (botd in 1916) decided all his novels and stories were just one big novel, the Novel of Ferrara.
English
For his birthday, my Kapuściński stack...
Greg Kindall@GregoryKindall
I read 'My Morning Walk' [Spacer poranny], by Ryszard Kapuściński, whose birthday it is (1932). Don't miss his beautiful photographs. This was originally published two days after his death in 2007. Polish text, with English, German, & Spanish translations: archive.org/details/spacer…
Polski
I read 'My Morning Walk' [Spacer poranny], by Ryszard Kapuściński, whose birthday it is (1932).
Don't miss his beautiful photographs.
This was originally published two days after his death in 2007. Polish text, with English, German, & Spanish translations:
archive.org/details/spacer…
English