The commons · Spring Term

Conversation, in the margins.

A quieter kind of forum. Read what others are noticing; post a question worth keeping.

Threads · 6

  • Is the change of basis a moral choice?

    Holloway said in the seminar that picking a basis is taking a position. That sounded grand at the time, but I've been chewing on it. Where's the line between aesthetics and rhetoric here?

    i2 repliesiilast reply 2h agoiiiposted by Maya O. · The Geometry of Persuasion

  • On opening paragraphs that immediately leave the room

    The first paragraph of Sebald's Rings of Saturn opens a window and walks out of it. Anyone got other examples?

    i1 repliesiilast reply 6h agoiiiposted by Noor A. · The Novel as a Room

  • Kettle: I think mine is wrong

    The whistle starts before the rolling boil. Is that pressure equalising, or am I imagining it?

    i0 repliesiilast reply 15h agoiiiposted by Abdullah · The Quiet Physics of Everyday Things

  • Iris's seminars are slower than I expected

    Twenty minutes on a single paragraph today. I started impatient and ended grateful. Is anyone else finding the pace itself the lesson?

    i1 repliesiilast reply 1d agoiiiposted by Felix L. · Attention and Action

  • Recommended type specimens for 12pt body?

    I keep wanting to set a long paragraph in something with a slight stoop. Cyran mentioned three options. What did he mean?

    i0 repliesiilast reply 1d agoiiiposted by Priya R. · Typography as Rhetoric

  • Re-reading Robinson, Housekeeping

    Anyone else noticing how often Marilynne Robinson lets a paragraph end without resolving it? It's almost ledger-like.

    i0 repliesiilast reply 2d agoiiiposted by Priya R. · The Novel as a Room