C.17: aka Jack Degree

[cfalbert]

Do not neglect the link back to Pope's extensive play on the word
degree.....and the numerous definitions offered by Prof. Wood.....



love,
cfa


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Jasper Fidget" <jasper at hatguild.org>
To: <pynchon-l at waste.org>
Sent: Monday, August 18, 2003 4:46 PM
Subject: NPPF: C.17: aka Jack Degree


> "Jack Degree or Jacques de Grey": degree (Anglo Saxon "građa"):
>
> Jack-in-the-Green: the Green Man, a woodland spirit often rendered in a
> frame of leaves who is ceremonially put to death during the Pagan Beltane
> festival (May 1) to celebrate the coming of Spring.  His execution is said
> to release the spirit of summer.  Now also: "A chimney sweep enclosed in a
> framework of boughs, carried in Mayday processions" (Webster's).
>
> http://website.lineone.net/~dominicow/green_man_folklore.htm
>
> An intersection between Pagan and Christian (a border zone, as with the
> color grey): of the Green Men decorating Gloucester Cathedral: "Perhaps he
> reminds us of our interconnectedness with nature and the greening power of
> trees and plants. [...] The Green Man probably arrived in the Christian
> Church as a part of a general sense of Spirit in Nature, an inheritance
from
> the Pagan past, an inheritance which was doubtless more subconscious than
> deliberate."
>
> http://www.gloucestercathedral.uk.com/2001/greenman.asp
>
> See also "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight":
> http://www.hti.umich.edu/cgi/c/cme/cme-idx?type=header&idno=Gawain (Middle
> English edited by J.R.R. Tolkein)
>
> http://alliteration.net/Pearl.htm (modern translation by Paul Deane)
>
> Implies the (abundant) Celtic and Anglo Jack legends and tales ("Jack the
> Giant Killer", "Jack and the Beanstalk"), concerned mainly with a
trickster
> protagonist who beats someone stronger through cunning (but who may not
> always live happily ever after).  There's even one branch ("Jack and
Molly",
> _Jack Tales_) localized to Appalachia.
>
>
http://www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/youth/fantasy/TheBlueFairyBook/
> chap39.html
>
> http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/type0328jack.html
>
> http://www.mwg.org/production/websites/jacktales/who/
>
> http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0395669510/qid=1061236132
>
> Jack is also a name associated with various villains, including
> Jack-the-Lad, "the nickname of Jack Sheppard, an 18th-century thief [...]
> (a) a young troublemaker; (b) a working-class hero; (c) a wanted
criminal."
> (OED); and Jack-the-Ripper.  Also a general villain of nature: Jack Frost.
> (We'll see Gradus assume the role of several historical and fictional
> villains before finally becoming Jack Grey.)
>
> Jack: "A thing which saves human labour; a device, a tool." (OED)
>
> Jack-of-the-Clock: A figure of a man which strikes the bell on the outside
> of a clock. (OED)
>
> Jack-at-a-pinch. (a) One called upon to take the place of another in an
> emergency. (b) An itinerant parson who conducts an occasional service for
a
> fee. (Webster's Revised)
>
> Everyman-Jack: colloq. each and every person. (OED)
>
> Jack-of-all-trades: one who can turn his hand to any kind of work.
> (Webster's Revised)
>
> Jack-in-a-box: A child's toy, consisting of a box, out of which, when the
> lid is raised, a figure springs. (Webster's)
>
> Jack-in-office: an insolent fellow in authority. --Wolcott. (Webster's)
>
> Jack-o'-Lantern comes from an old Irish legend about a man who won a pact
> with the devil which kept him from going to hell, but who was too wicked
to
> get into heaven, so was doomed to wander the marshes for eternity,
swinging
> a ghostly lantern.
>
> http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_o_lantern
>
>
> -=Jasper Fidget=-
>
>