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For many of us aspiring writers and editors, the Thailand Times was a journalism school. It would not be hyperbole to call this the worst and most preposterous English daily that has ever existed anywhere. During the paper’s reign of errors from 1993 to 1998, one of the most famous was the front-page gaffe showing a photo from the gruesome Easter celebrations in the Philippines of a stand-in for a Roman centurion staring up at a surrogate Christ who is crucified on a wooden cross. The photo caption reads: ‘Prime Minister Chuan Leekpai chats with Foreign Minister Prasong Soonsiri during a break at parliament.’ The actual photo of the Thai politicians had the caption from the Philippines.
Because the majority of the Thai layout artists did not speak much English, these kinds of errors were common. On the features page I edited, they somehow managed to put the cover of a book written by the Pope upside down. No one mentioned the error. Even the head honchos and the staff did not read the paper. As far as I remember the only complaint we ever received was from a high-ranking minister in the government of Laos, who was in Bangkok for an economic forum. He was irate that the paper had referred to his government—this was a joke between two sub-editors that was supposed to be edited out—as the ‘Lao People’s Undemocratic Republic’.
Elvis » Fri Feb 10, 2017 7:57 pm wrote:Thanks, Dada. Patterns of Culture is one of the greatest books I ever read. Ruth Benedict was brilliant, and is fun to read.
Jaynes asserted that, until roughly the times written about in Homer's Iliad, humans did not generally have the self-awareness characteristic of consciousness as most people experience it today. Rather, the bicameral individual was guided by mental commands believed to be issued by external "gods" — commands which were recorded in ancient myths, legends and historical accounts. This is exemplified not only in the commands given to characters in ancient epics but also the very muses of Greek mythology which "sang" the poems: the ancients literally heard muses as the direct source of their music and poetry.
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