BMW R1200R!

According to WebBikeWorld, BMW Motorrad has released the replacement for my bike: the R1200R! Oh, baby. Ever since they introduced the critically acclaimed R1200GS, I have been waiting for this bike.

The R1200R is an evolution of the R1150R and R850R, which had combined sales of almost 60,000 units since 2001. BMW feels that there is market demand for a “roadster” type motorcycle that provides a continuance of the BMW classic design combining “unique character with timeless elegance”.

The new Roadster takes up the general trend towards enhanced dynamics without neglecting the strengths of the basic concept, combining a significantly higher standard of agility with excellent all-round touring qualities.

The 1,200-cc power unit develops 109 hp and thus exceeds the output of the former engine by almost 28%. This flat-twin power unit comes with the same level of development already boasted in the R 1200 RT, with the oil cooler on the new Roadster now fitted behind the wheel fork.

The bike is still air-cooled and uses the same engine as the GS.

Compared with the R 1150 R, the new Roadster offers almost 28% more power at a higher engine speed and approximately 17% more torque. And at the same time the engine is 7% lighter than its predecessor and BMW claims that it’s particularly smooth and sophisticated, reducing vibrations to a minimum.

109 horsepower will probably feel a bit more spritely than an already very responsive R1150R’s 89hp.

I’m nost sure I like what they did with the tank stylings, nor with the gauges, but I do like the overall look of the bike, even fully loaded. It appears that the center stand is now “optional” — bummer, but it does come with a standard “electronic immobilizer” coded to the key. I think I’d rather have a center stand.

A few notes on the design:

Compact in its overall proportions, the new R 1200 R consciously features body components reduced in terms of their form and style in order to highlight the technical features of the drivetrain and, in particular, of the engine.

The headlight also pays tribute to classic motorcycle design then carried forward to the most modern and advanced technology through the free-form reflectors. Indeed, close integration of the headlight into the overall line of the motorcycle creates an almost “bullish” front end harmonizing smoothly with the slender proportions of the rear section. [ . . . ]

The optical “lightness” of the new R 1200 R also comes out clearly from the rider’s perspective: With the radiator at the side having been dropped, the entire tank area is now a lot more compact and slender. And being made of sheet metal in genuine BMW tradition, the fuel tank also highlights the classic design and style of the entire machine.

Last but certainly not least, the color concept again accentuates the character of the new BMW R 1200 R, the three color variants available as an option interpreting the classic roadster theme in a very different, distinctive manner.

I guess it’s that “lightness” that I might not like, reminding me too much of the tank of the Honda 919 (not that the Honda sucks).

Well, I’ll be excited to try one out. Maybe in a few years, I’ll actually be able to afford one. ‘Bout time for this bike, BMW! The only thing I didn’t see was the price. I’m thinking about $13K.

Last.fm

Fun with Bibliographies

Who knew that works cited pages could be so fun?

With the help of Ron Jerome‘s Bibliography module for Drupal, I’m beginning to really geek-out on my professional web site. Instead of a list of works that I have cited on this blog, I can how have individual entries for every work I cite (like the one for Sterling’s new book), and a complete bibliography of entries. It still has some issues — like not having a place for page numbers when citing a journal article, or not being able to use SmartyPants — but it is an excellent module for researchers. This is the coolest thing for academics who use Drupal since Norton came out with their new Western Literature anthologies — maybe cooler! Can you feel the excitement? Thanks, Ron.

According to WebBikeWorld, BMW Motorrad has released the replacement for my bike: the R1200R! Oh, baby. Ever since they introduced the critically acclaimed R1200GS, I have been waiting for this bike.

The R1200R is an evolution of the R1150R and R850R, which had combined sales of almost 60,000 units since 2001. BMW feels that there is market demand for a “roadster” type motorcycle that provides a continuance of the BMW classic design combining “unique character with timeless elegance”.

The new Roadster takes up the general trend towards enhanced dynamics without neglecting the strengths of the basic concept, combining a significantly higher standard of agility with excellent all-round touring qualities.

The 1,200-cc power unit develops 109 hp and thus exceeds the output of the former engine by almost 28%. This flat-twin power unit comes with the same level of development already boasted in the R 1200 RT, with the oil cooler on the new Roadster now fitted behind the wheel fork.

The bike is still air-cooled and uses the same engine as the GS.

Compared with the R 1150 R, the new Roadster offers almost 28% more power at a higher engine speed and approximately 17% more torque. And at the same time the engine is 7% lighter than its predecessor and BMW claims that it’s particularly smooth and sophisticated, reducing vibrations to a minimum.

109 horsepower will probably feel a bit more spritely than an already very responsive R1150R’s 89hp.

I’m nost sure I like what they did with the tank stylings, nor with the gauges, but I do like the overall look of the bike, even fully loaded. It appears that the center stand is now “optional” — bummer, but it does come with a standard “electronic immobilizer” coded to the key. I think I’d rather have a center stand.

A few notes on the design:

Compact in its overall proportions, the new R 1200 R consciously features body components reduced in terms of their form and style in order to highlight the technical features of the drivetrain and, in particular, of the engine.

The headlight also pays tribute to classic motorcycle design then carried forward to the most modern and advanced technology through the free-form reflectors. Indeed, close integration of the headlight into the overall line of the motorcycle creates an almost “bullish” front end harmonizing smoothly with the slender proportions of the rear section. [ … ]

The optical “lightness” of the new R 1200 R also comes out clearly from the rider’s perspective: With the radiator at the side having been dropped, the entire tank area is now a lot more compact and slender. And being made of sheet metal in genuine BMW tradition, the fuel tank also highlights the classic design and style of the entire machine.

Last but certainly not least, the color concept again accentuates the character of the new BMW R 1200 R, the three color variants available as an option interpreting the classic roadster theme in a very different, distinctive manner.

I guess it’s that “lightness” that I might not like, reminding me too much of the tank of the Honda 919 (not that the Honda sucks).

Well, I’ll be excited to try one out. Maybe in a few years, I’ll actually be able to afford one. ‘Bout time for this bike, BMW! The only thing I didn’t see was the price. I’m thinking about $13K.

Fun with Bibliographies

Who knew that works cited pages could be so fun?

With the help of Ron Jerome‘s Bibliography module for Drupal, I’m beginning to really geek-out on my professional web site. Instead of a list of works that I have cited on this blog, I can how have individual entries for every work I cite (like the one for Sterling’s new book), and a complete bibliography of entries. It still has some issues — like not having a place for page numbers when citing a journal article, or not being able to use SmartyPants — but it is an excellent module for researchers. This is the coolest thing for academics who use Drupal since Norton came out with their new Western Literature anthologies — maybe cooler! Can you feel the excitement? Thanks, Ron.

The Strangeness of Homer’s Iliad

Can Achilles really be the first great hero of our literature? He seems a fool, an infantile narcissist. The first word of Western literature is menin — in old Greek, “rage” or “wrath.” Homer means Achilles’ rage, the kind of rage that has an element of divine fury in it and that destroys armies and breaks cities. But to us (though not to the early Greeks), Achilles’ anger seems less divine than vain and egotistical. His war booty has been stolen by another man, and he sits sulking in his tent. Is the immense size of his anger not absurdly out of proportion to its cause? Yet Achilles dominates the poem even as he withdraws; his moody self-preoccupation is part of what makes him fascinating. He creates an aura, a vibration of specialness. We understand something of who he is from Marion Brando’s glamorously sullen performances in his youth. A greater destiny flows from Achilles’ angry will than from the settled desires of simpler men.

He is very young, perhaps in his early twenties, fearless, tall, fleetfooted, strong, a compound of muscle and beauty with so powerful a sense of his own precedence that he is willing to let the war go badly when his honor is sullied. The Trojans, led by their stalwart, Hector, kill many Greeks and come close to burning the Greek ships and cutting off their retreat. Hoping to stem the tide, Achilles’ tentmate and beloved friend Patroclus enters the battle. He dons Achilles’ armor, and in that armor — as a substitute for Achilles — he is slain by Hector. Achilles’ withdrawal now comes to an end. Enraged, inconsolable, he prepares at last to enter the battle (we are deep into the poem, and we have not yet seen him fight), an event accompanied by a cataclysmic rending of the heavens and the seas. The sky darkens, the underworld nearly cracks open. Huge forces, unstoppable, move into place. Achilles begins to fight, expelling his anguish in a rampage. As Book XXI opens, he is driving the Trojans back toward Troy:

But when they came to the crossing place of the fair-running river
of whirling Xanthosa stream whose father was Zeus the immortal,
there Achilleus split them and chased some back over the flat land
toward the city, where the Achaians themselves had stampeded in terror
on the day before, when glorious Hektor was still in his fury.
Along this ground they were streaming in flight; but Hera let fall
a deep mist before them to stay them. Meanwhile the other half
were crowded into the silvery whirls of the deep-running river
and tumbled into it in huge clamour, and the steep-running water
sounded, and the banks echoed hugely about them, as they outcrying
tried to swim this way and that, spun about in the eddies.
As before the blast of a fire the locusts escaping
into a river swarm in air, and the fire unwearied
blazes from a sudden start, and the locusts huddle in water;
so before Achilleus the murmuring waters of Xanthos
the deep-whirling were filled with confusion of men and of horses.

But heaven-descended Achilleus left his spear there on the bank
leaning against the tamarisks and leapt in like some immortal,
with only his sword, but his heart was bent on evil actions,
and he struck in a circle around him. The shameful sound of their groaning
rose as they were struck with the sword, and the water was reddened
with blood. As before a huge-gaping dolphin the other fishes
escaping cram the corners of a deepwater harbour
in fear, for he avidly cats up any lie can catch;
so the Trojans along the course of the terrible river
shrank under the bluffs. He, when his hands grew weary with killing,
chose out and took twelve young men alive from the river
to be vengeance for the death of Patroklos, the son of Menoitios.
These, bewildered with fear like fawns, lie led out of the water
and bound thcir hands behind them with thongs well cut out of leather,
with the very belts they themselves wore on their ingirt tunic
sand gave them to his companions to lead away to the hollow ships,
then himself whirled back, still in a fury to kill men. (XXI, 1-33)

Homer didn’t have to tell his listeners that the leather thongs, tightening as they dried, would cut into the flesh of Achilles’ Trojan captives. Nor did he have to explain why Achilles later kills a Trojan warrior, an acquaintance, who begs for mercy at his knees. But how is the American reader supposed to respond to this? He comes from a society that is nominally ethical. Our legal and administrative system, our presidential utterances, our popular culture, in which TV policemen rarely fail to care for the victims of crime, are swathed in concern. Since the society is in fact often indifferent to hardship, it is no surprise that irony and cynicism barnacle the national mood. By contrast, the Greek view was savage but offered without hypocrisy. Accepting death in battle as inevitable, the Greek and Trojan aristocrats of the Iliad experience the world not as pleasant or unpleasant, nor as good and evil, but as glorious or shameful. We might say that Homer offers a conception of life that is noble rather than ethical — except that such an opposition is finally misleading. For the Greeks, nobility has an ethical quality. You are not good or bad in the Christian sense. You are strong or weak; beautiful or ugly; conquering or vanquished; living or dead; favored by gods or cursed. Here were some of Tayler’s “binary opposites,” but skewed into matching pairs alien to us, in which nothing softened Homer’s appraisal of quality.

Academic opponents of courses in the Western classics constantly urge readers to consider “the other” — the other cultures, odd or repugnant to Western tastes, which we have allegedly trampled or rendered marginal and also the others who are excluded or trivialized within our own culture: women, people of color, anyone who is non-white, non-male, non-Western. But here, at the beginning of the written culture of the West (the Iliad dates from perhaps the eighth century B.C.E.), is something like “the other,” the Greeks themselves, a race of noble savages stripping corpses of their armor and reciting their genealogies at one another during huge feasts or even on the field of battle. Kill, plunder, bathe, eat, offer sacrifices to the gods — what do we have to do with these ancient marauders of the eastern Mediterranean?

[From “Does Homer Have Legs?”]

Iliad Observations

In my old undergraduate notes, I found some sections from Great Books that deal with the Iliad. I cannot give the exact reference, as whatever professor gave me the photocopy had neglected to put in that information. If anyone knows, please let me know so I can give proper credit. From David Denby’s The New Yorker article “Does Homer Have Legs?”

Here, Denby gives his initial impressions of the Iliad, supplying some background information that new readers might not be aware of. He also expresses some discomfort at the Homer’s style: in that the poet offers no guidance through the carnage that was the Trojan war.

By the time the action of the Iliad begins, the deed that set off the whole chain of events — a man making off with another man’s wife — is barely mentioned by the participants. Homer, chanting his poetry to groups of listeners, must have expected everyone to know the outrageous old tale. Years earlier, Paris, a prince of Troy, visiting the house of the Greek king Menelaus, took away, with her full consent, Helen, the king’s beautiful wife. Agamemnon, the brother of the cuckold, then put together a loose federation of kings and princes whose forces voyaged to Troy and laid siege to the city, intending to punish the proud inhabitants and reclaim Helen. But after more than nine years of warfare, the foolish act of sexual abandonment that set the whole cataclysm in motion has been largely forgotten. By this time, Helen, abashed, considers herself merely a slut (her embarrassed appearance on the walls of Troy is actually something of a letdown), and Paris, her second “husband,” more a lover than a fighter, barely comes out to the battlefield. When he does come out, and he and Menelaus fight a duel, the gods muddy the outcome and he war goes on. After nine years, the war itself is causing the war.

How can a book make one feel injured and exhilarated at the same time? What’s shocking about the Iliad is that the cruelty and the nobility of it seem to grow out of each othcr, like the good and evil twins of some malign fantasy who together form a single unstable and frightening personality. After all, Western literature begins with a quarrel beween two arrogant pirates over booty. At the beginning of the poem, the various tribes of the Greeks (whom Homer calls Achaeans — Greece wasn’t a national identity in his time), the various tribes assembled before the walls of Troy are on the verge of disaster. Agamemnon, their leader, the most powerful of the kings, has kidnapped and taken as a mistress from a nearby city a young woman, the danghter of one of Apollo’s priests; Apollo has angrily retaliated by bringing down a plague onthe Greeks. A peevish, bullying king, unsteady in command, Agamemnon, under pressure from the othcr leaders, angrily gives the girl back to her father. But then, demanding compensation, he takes for himself the slave mistress of Achilles, his greatest warrior. The women are passed around like gold pieces or helmets. Achilles is so outraged by this bit of plundering within the ranks that he comes close to killing the king, a much older man. Restraining himself at the last minute, he retires rom the combat and prays to his mother, the goddess Thetis, for the defeat of his own side; he then sits in his tent playing a lyre and “singing of men’s fame” as his friends get cut up by the Trojans. What follows is a series of battles whose savagery remains without parallel in our literature.

It is almost too much, an extreme and bizarre work of literary art at the very beginning of Western literary art. One wants to rise to it, taking full in the face, for the poem depicts life at its utmost, a nearly ceaseless activity of marshaling, deploying, advancing, and fleeing, spelled by peaceful periods so strenuous — the councils and feasts and games — that they hardly seem like relief at all. Reading the poem in its entirety is like confronting a storm that refuses to slacken or die. At first, I had to fight my way through it; I wasn’t bored but I was rebellions, my attention a bucking horse unwilling to submit to the harness. It was too long, I thought, so brutal and repetitive and, for all its power as a portrait of war, strangely distant from us. Where was Homer in all this? He was every where, selecting and shaping the material, but he was nowhere as a palpable presence, a consciousness, and for the modern reader his absence was appalling. No one tells us how to react to the brutalities or to anything else. We are on our own. Movie-fed, I wasn’t used to working so hard, and as I sat on my sofa at home, reading, my body, in daydreams, kept leaping away from the seat and into the bedroom, where I would sink into bed and turn on the TV, or to the kitchen, where 1 would open the fridge. Mentally, I would pull myself back, and eventually I settled clown and read and read, though for a long time I remained out of balance and sore.

In my old undergraduate notes, I found some sections from Great Books that deal with the Iliad. I cannot give the exact reference, as whatever professor gave me the photocopy had neglected to put in that information. If anyone knows, please let me know so I can give proper credit. From David Denby’s The New Yorker article “Does Homer Have Legs?”

Here, Denby gives his initial impressions of the Iliad, supplying some background information that new readers might not be aware of. He also expresses some discomfort at the Homer’s style: in that the poet offers no guidance through the carnage that was the Trojan war.

By the time the action of the Iliad begins, the deed that set off the whole chain of events — a man making off with another man’s wife — is barely mentioned by the participants. Homer, chanting his poetry to groups of listeners, must have expected everyone to know the outrageous old tale. Years earlier, Paris, a prince of Troy, visiting the house of the Greek king Menelaus, took away, with her full consent, Helen, the king’s beautiful wife. Agamemnon, the brother of the cuckold, then put together a loose federation of kings and princes whose forces voyaged to Troy and laid siege to the city, intending to punish the proud inhabitants and reclaim Helen. But after more than nine years of warfare, the foolish act of sexual abandonment that set the whole cataclysm in motion has been largely forgotten. By this time, Helen, abashed, considers herself merely a slut (her embarrassed appearance on the walls of Troy is actually something of a letdown), and Paris, her second “husband,” more a lover than a fighter, barely comes out to the battlefield. When he does come out, and he and Menelaus fight a duel, the gods muddy the outcome and he war goes on. After nine years, the war itself is causing the war.

How can a book make one feel injured and exhilarated at the same time? What’s shocking about the Iliad is that the cruelty and the nobility of it seem to grow out of each othcr, like the good and evil twins of some malign fantasy who together form a single unstable and frightening personality. After all, Western literature begins with a quarrel beween two arrogant pirates over booty. At the beginning of the poem, the various tribes of the Greeks (whom Homer calls Achaeans — Greece wasn’t a national identity in his time), the various tribes assembled before the walls of Troy are on the verge of disaster. Agamemnon, their leader, the most powerful of the kings, has kidnapped and taken as a mistress from a nearby city a young woman, the danghter of one of Apollo’s priests; Apollo has angrily retaliated by bringing down a plague onthe Greeks. A peevish, bullying king, unsteady in command, Agamemnon, under pressure from the othcr leaders, angrily gives the girl back to her father. But then, demanding compensation, he takes for himself the slave mistress of Achilles, his greatest warrior. The women are passed around like gold pieces or helmets. Achilles is so outraged by this bit of plundering within the ranks that he comes close to killing the king, a much older man. Restraining himself at the last minute, he retires rom the combat and prays to his mother, the goddess Thetis, for the defeat of his own side; he then sits in his tent playing a lyre and “singing of men’s fame” as his friends get cut up by the Trojans. What follows is a series of battles whose savagery remains without parallel in our literature.

It is almost too much, an extreme and bizarre work of literary art at the very beginning of Western literary art. One wants to rise to it, taking full in the face, for the poem depicts life at its utmost, a nearly ceaseless activity of marshaling, deploying, advancing, and fleeing, spelled by peaceful periods so strenuous — the councils and feasts and games — that they hardly seem like relief at all. Reading the poem in its entirety is like confronting a storm that refuses to slacken or die. At first, I had to fight my way through it; I wasn’t bored but I was rebellions, my attention a bucking horse unwilling to submit to the harness. It was too long, I thought, so brutal and repetitive and, for all its power as a portrait of war, strangely distant from us. Where was Homer in all this? He was every where, selecting and shaping the material, but he was nowhere as a palpable presence, a consciousness, and for the modern reader his absence was appalling. No one tells us how to react to the brutalities or to anything else. We are on our own. Movie-fed, I wasn’t used to working so hard, and as I sat on my sofa at home, reading, my body, in daydreams, kept leaping away from the seat and into the bedroom, where I would sink into bed and turn on the TV, or to the kitchen, where 1 would open the fridge. Mentally, I would pull myself back, and eventually I settled clown and read and read, though for a long time I remained out of balance and sore.

Let’s Just Ignore Them

It seems that I’m not the only one who has a problem with Ratemyprofessors.com (digg it). Eric Strand, in the Chronicle of Higher Education, suggests that we sue this ridiculous web site for misrepresenting our teaching ability with animated emoticons and flippant one-sentence dismissals that could become a profesional liability when on the job market. Strand compares RMP to a gossip column, or a MySpace for the socially inept egghead.

My advice to you, Eric: stay away from RMP. It can only cause you grief, and any hiring or tenure/promotion that would use this as a way to gauge prospective tenure-track professors suggest an institution that I wouldn’t want to devote my hard work and loyalty. Be strong and let the kids have their fun at our expense. In fact, I like your conclusion:

Henceforth, no more Mr. Nice Guy. RateMyProfessors has created a teacher who is going to make sure his students sweat for their A’s and B’s. The hardworking students (and there are plenty of them) will not have a problem with that, but a few others will resent me and take revenge. And that’s fine.

No need to sue afterall.

It seems that I’m not the only one who has a problem with Ratemyprofessors.com (digg it). Eric Strand, in the Chronicle of Higher Education, suggests that we suethis ridiculous web site for misrepresenting our teaching ability with animated emoticons and flippant one-sentence dismissals that could become a profesional liability when on the job market. Strand compares RMP to a gossip column, or a MySpace for the socially inept egghead.

My advice to you, Eric: stay away from RMP. It can only cause you grief, and any hiring or tenure/promotion that would use this as a way to gauge prospective tenure-track professors suggest an institution that I wouldn’t want to devote my hard work and loyalty. Be strong and let the kids have their fun at our expense. In fact, I like your conclusion:

Henceforth, no more Mr. Nice Guy. RateMyProfessors has created a teacher who is going to make sure his students sweat for their A’s and B’s. The hardworking students (and there are plenty of them) will not have a problem with that, but a few others will resent me and take revenge. And that’s fine.

No need to sue afterall.