Monday, February 23, 2009

great tit, parody, hollandaise

Posted by Picasa Great tit just in focus.

What is best about parodies is the respect that have for what is parodied. They aren't always easy to write, but sometimes they come together tidily with the idea that prompts them. I don't know whether the one I found myself writing the other is any good, but it came into my head and had to work itself out. I suppose that Gerard Manley Hopkins' Glory be to God for Dappled Things is much parodied, but made me look at the poem again to see how much of it I had remembered. I wonder whether Dave Bonta's meme-like essay, in which, reflecting some irritation with the mode, he lists 25 gloriously surreal, random things about himself, could be described as a parody. It certainly mocks gently certainly made me and, apparently, a lot of other people laugh out loud. You'll find it, a few posts back, on http://www.vianegativa.us/

A large disgruntled looking brill from the fish stall at the Pantiles farmers' market demands a Hollandaise, and gets one. Hollandaise is one of those things, like bread and mayonnaise, which it resembles, that are notable because they translate original ingredients into something quite beautiful and completely different.

3 comments:

Lucy said...

Sorry, dear heart, blue tit! It's a lovely photo though.

I loved your collared dove's ruby eye too.

Unknown said...

It's not the first time I've made a mistake of this sort. The birds are very similar from a distance. This one does look like a blue tit, (the colour of its head, in particular, but I was misled by the stripe down its breast, and the call "tea-cher, tea-cher", which it seemed to be making at the time. But the RSB web site confirms that the bird I phographed was indeed a blue tit. The stripe on the breast of the great tit, is more pronounced, and the bird has a glossy black cap.

Roderick Robinson said...

Oh dear. Despite knowing the difference I managed to confuse pussy-willows and catkins on Lucy's blog and I too was corrected in the same elegant way so that it hardly hurt at all.

As to the Hopkins parody, let all and sundry know that it forms a comment to my recent agonising post about the dangers of blogging and perfectly provides the Twin Cultures bridge I was seeking to establish myself.

And, since imitation is the sincerest form of buttery, I am delighted to note Plutarch picking up on an early December post of mine about molecular magic in the kitchen, as exemplified by hollandaise sauce.