THE REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE
Before After
“NARRATIVE HISTORY” AMOUNTS TO FABULATION, THE REAL STUFF BEING MERE CHRONOLOGY
“Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project Alexander Dyce HDT WHAT? INDEX
ALEXANDER DYCE REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE
1798
June 30, Saturday: In the federal capital, “An Act supplementary to the act intituled [sic] ‘An Act to provide an additional Armament for the further protection of the trade of the United States, and for other purposes’” prepared the national government to purchase warships from private subscribers in exchange for federal 6% certificates of obligation.
Alexander Dyce was born in Edinburgh, the 1st son of Lieutenant-General Alexander Dyce of the East India Company’s Madras infantry. In the following year his parents would sail for India, leaving him in Scotland to be reared by a couple of his father’s sisters, at Aberdeen. He would be educated at the Edinburgh High School.
NOBODY COULD GUESS WHAT WOULD HAPPEN NEXT
Alexander Dyce “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX
REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE ALEXANDER DYCE
1815
The orphaned Edgar Allan Poe’s family of affiliation, the Allans, were living in England and Scotland until 1820, due to Mr. Allan’s work as an exporter of tobacco (he was a “sotweed factor”). Poe during this period would be spending three years at a fine classical preparatory school at Stoke Newington.
Having completed his preparation at the Edinburgh High School, 17-year-old Alexander Dyce matriculated at Exeter College of Oxford University, where he would be taking his bachelor’s degree in 1819.
DO I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION? GOOD.
Alexander Dyce “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX
ALEXANDER DYCE REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE
1818
While still an undergraduate at Exeter College of Oxford University, Alexander Dyce edited John William Jarvis’s attempt at a dictionary of the language of William Shakespeare.
(Lieutenant-General Alexander Dyce of the East India Company’s Madras infantry’s plan was for his son likewise to enter the service of the East India Company — but the college student would soon elect instead to take holy orders.)
We would derive our term “bowdlerize” from Thomas Bowdler’s activities in this year, expurgating a ten- volume edition of William Shakespeare’s plays entitled FAMILY SHAKESPEARE, “in which nothing is added to the original text; but those words and expressions are omitted which cannot with propriety be read aloud in a family.”
In the next six years this edition would go through four printings and, emboldened with his success, the expurgator would turn to producing a similarly needed six-volume reduction of Edward Gibbon’s 12- HDT WHAT? INDEX
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volume THE HISTORY OF THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE.
LIFE IS LIVED FORWARD BUT UNDERSTOOD BACKWARD? — NO, THAT’S GIVING TOO MUCH TO THE HISTORIAN’S STORIES. LIFE ISN’T TO BE UNDERSTOOD EITHER FORWARD OR BACKWARD.
“Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project Alexander Dyce HDT WHAT? INDEX
ALEXANDER DYCE REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE
1819
Alexander Dyce received a BA from Exeter College of Oxford University. His father Lieutenant-General Alexander Dyce of the East India Company’s Madras infantry’s idea had been to prepare him to enter the service of the East India Company, but he would elect instead to take holy orders. He would become a curate at the fishing village of Llanteglos near Fowley in Cornwall, and subsequently at Nayland in Suffolk.
Henry Nelson Coleridge was 2d for the university scholarship at King’s College of Cambridge University.
THE FUTURE IS MOST READILY PREDICTED IN RETROSPECT
“Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project Alexander Dyce HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1821
The Reverend Alexander Dyce’s SELECT TRANSLATIONS FROM QUINTUS SMYRNAEUS. QUINTUS SMYRNAEUS HDT WHAT? INDEX
ALEXANDER DYCE REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE
1825
The Reverend Alexander Dyce’s SPECIMENS OF BRITISH POETESSES. BRITISH POETESSES HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1826
The Reverend Alexander Dyce began an annotated edition of the works of Christopher Marlowe. CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE HDT WHAT? INDEX
ALEXANDER DYCE REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE
1827
The Reverend Alexander Dyce’s edition of THE POETICAL WORKS OF WILLIAM COLLINS. He abandoned his curacy at Nayland in Suffolk and took lodgings at Gray’s Inn Square, in order to pursue a literary life in London. WILLIAM COLLINS’S POEMS HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1829
The Reverend Alexander Dyce’s annotated edition of the works of George Peele. GEORGE PEELE, VOL. I GEORGE PEELE, VOL. II HDT WHAT? INDEX
ALEXANDER DYCE REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE
1830
The Reverend Alexander Dyce’s annotated edition of the works of John Webster. JOHN WEBSTER, VOL. I JOHN WEBSTER, VOL. II JOHN WEBSTER, VOL. III JOHN WEBSTER, VOL. IV HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1831
Publication of THE DRAMATIC WORKS OF ROBERT GREENE, TO WHICH ARE ADDED THIS POEMS. WITH SOME ACCOUNT OF THE AUTHOR, AND NOTES, BY THE REV. ALEXANDER DYCE, B.A., in two volumes, at London, by the firm of William Pickering (in about 1843 Henry Thoreau would extract from this edition, into his Literary Notebook). ROBERT GREENE’S WORKS ROBERT GREENE’S WORKS HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1833
The Reverend Alexander Dyce’s SPECIMENS OF BRITISH SONNETS. BRITISH SONNETS
He completed an edition of James Shirley left unfinished by William Gifford. JAMES SHIRLEY HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1836
From this year into 1838, the Reverend Alexander Dyce would be editing the works of Richard Bentley. RICHARD BENTLEY, VOL. 1 RICHARD BENTLEY, VOL. 2 RICHARD BENTLEY, VOL. 3 HDT WHAT? INDEX
ALEXANDER DYCE REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE
1840
The Reverend Alexander Dyce prepared, for the Camden Society, KEMPS NINE DAIES WONDER: PERFORMED IN A DAUNCE FROM LONDON TO NORWICH. NINE DAYS OF FROLICING
He also began a multi-volume annotated edition of the works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher. BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER
As if he didn’t have enough already on his plate, he also began an annotated edition of the works of Thomas Middleton. THOMAS MIDDLETON, VOL. I THOMAS MIDDLETON, VOL. II THOMAS MIDDLETON, VOL. III THOMAS MIDDLETON, VOL. IV THOMAS MIDDLETON, VOL. V HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1843
The Reverend Alexander Dyce’s revised edition of John Skelton. JOHN SKELTON, VOL. I JOHN SKELTON, VOL. II HDT WHAT? INDEX
ALEXANDER DYCE REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE
1844
The Reverend Alexander Dyce’s REMARKS ON COLLIER’S AND KNIGHT’S EDITIONS OF SHAKESPEARE. REMARKS OF A. DYCE HDT WHAT? INDEX
REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE ALEXANDER DYCE
1853
The Reverend Alexander Dyce’s A FEW NOTES ON SHAKESPEARE. NOTES ON SHAKESPEARE HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1854
The Reverend Alexander Dyce contributed biographies of William Shakespeare, Alexander Pope, Akenside, and Beattie to the series PICKERING’S ALDINE POETS. HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1856
The Reverend Alexander Dyce’s RECOLLECTIONS OF THE TABLE TALK OF SAMUEL ROGERS. ROGERS’S TABLE TALK HDT WHAT? INDEX
ALEXANDER DYCE REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE
1857
The Reverend Alexander Dyce’s edition of William Shakespeare was published by Moxon (a 2d edition would be issued by Chapman & Hall in 1866). WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE HDT WHAT? INDEX
REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE ALEXANDER DYCE
1859
The Reverend Alexander Dyce’s STRICTURES ON COLLIER’S NEW EDITION OF SHAKESPEARE brought to an end a long friendship. A. DYCE’S STRICTURES
The jury was in, in regard to the little matter of whether the noted Shakespeare scholar John Payne Collier was or was not a fraud. The Duke of Devonshire, owner of the original copy of the “Perkins” copy of the 2d folio of Shakespeare’s plays, had submitted that document to experts at the British Museum so that the “paper trail” on these emendations made by Collins could be most closely examined — and, Collier’s story that he had merely been following emendations that had originated elsewhere and elsewhen, with “an old corrector” from a previous generation of Shakespeare scholarship, was entirely discountenanced. It had become abundantly clear that these emendations were recent, amounting to forgeries, and that Collier was either himself the forger or the unknowing dupe of some other contemporary scholar who was the forger.
WHAT I’M WRITING IS TRUE BUT NEVER MIND YOU CAN ALWAYS LIE TO YOURSELF
Alexander Dyce “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX
ALEXANDER DYCE REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE
1869
May 15, Saturday: Alexander Dyce died. The body would be interred beneath a granite ledger at marker #21,559 in Square 140 at London’s Kensal Green cemetery.
Before After
He left his library to the South Kensington Museum (now the Victoria and Albert Museum).
May 22, Saturday: The New-York Times reported the receipt, by way of a cablegram, of intelligence of the death in the 72d year of his age of the well-known commentator on the works of William Shakespeare, the Reverend Alexander Dyce, B.A. (We note not only that their obituary is carelessly constructed, in that it omits the date of the deceased’s death, gets the deceased’s birthdate wrong –placing his birth even in the wrong year so that they calculate him to have died in the 72d year of his age when he had reached 70 years and 11 months– but also we see that they are still, as of 2011 on the internet, as America’s self-proclaimed “newspaper of record,” making this original bum scoop generally available.)
“MAGISTERIAL HISTORY” IS FANTASIZING: HISTORY IS CHRONOLOGY
“Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project Alexander Dyce HDT WHAT? INDEX
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ALEXANDER DYCE REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE
COPYRIGHT NOTICE: In addition to the property of others, such as extensive quotations and reproductions of images, this “read-only” computer file contains a great deal of special work product of Austin Meredith, copyright 2014. Access to these interim materials will eventually be offered for a fee in order to recoup some of the costs of preparation. My hypercontext button invention which, instead of creating a hypertext leap through hyperspace —resulting in navigation problems— allows for an utter alteration of the context within which one is experiencing a specific content already being viewed, is claimed as proprietary to Austin Meredith — and therefore freely available for use by all. Limited permission to copy such files, or any material from such files, must be obtained in advance in writing from the “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project, 833 Berkeley St., Durham NC 27705. Please contact the project at
“It’s all now you see. Yesterday won’t be over until tomorrow and tomorrow began ten thousand years ago.” – Remark by character “Garin Stevens” in William Faulkner’s INTRUDER IN THE DUST
Prepared: September 26, 2014 HDT WHAT? INDEX
REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE ALEXANDER DYCE
ARRGH AUTOMATED RESEARCH REPORT
GENERATION HOTLINE
This stuff presumably looks to you as if it were generated by a human. Such is not the case. Instead, someone has requested that we pull it out of the hat of a pirate who has grown out of the shoulder of our pet parrot “Laura” (as above). What these chronological lists are: they are research reports compiled by ARRGH algorithms out of a database of modules which we term the Kouroo Contexture (this is data mining). To respond to such a request for information we merely push a button. HDT WHAT? INDEX
ALEXANDER DYCE REVEREND ALEXANDER DYCE
Commonly, the first output of the algorithm has obvious deficiencies and we need to go back into the modules stored in the contexture and do a minor amount of tweaking, and then we need to punch that button again and recompile the chronology — but there is nothing here that remotely resembles the ordinary “writerly” process you know and love. As the contents of this originating contexture improve, and as the programming improves, and as funding becomes available (to date no funding whatever has been needed in the creation of this facility, the entire operation being run out of pocket change) we expect a diminished need to do such tweaking and recompiling, and we fully expect to achieve a simulation of a generous and untiring robotic research librarian. Onward and upward in this brave new world.
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