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Flight 714: identification of bird needed

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yamilah
Member
#11 · Posted: 21 Sep 2005 22:20
jock123
If you can't demonstrate why Snowy (debateably) having five paws is more significant than Tintin having no arm, then they are of equal significance, and your entire thesis is null... For example, it might mean that Tintin is armless or "(h)armless" - again as "good" a pun, but of no significance... But as long as you can decide what is and isn't a rebus, there is no rigour, and no plausible code.

Errrrrrr... I don't decide anything, contrary to some other persons...
I'm simply cross-matching various facts that all together hint there's is 'something else' in the Tintinverse...

In order to impel the discussion, could you precise where exactly in the Tintinverse you did read and/or see Tintin was (h)armless, please?

Thanks in advance.

For those who don't know the first original drawings of Tintin in the Land of the Soviets, please see the 'sym-pathique 5-pawed' Snowy here
jock123
Moderator
#12 · Posted: 25 Sep 2005 00:57
yamilah
Errrrrrr... I don't decide anything, contrary to some other persons...
But you do - you decide to select some things as significant (Snowy having five paws (possibly)), and ignore other things (as I pointed out before, Tintin is drawn as having no arm in the same frame, just a dis-embodied hand holding the pole; there are numerous similar gaffes/ lapses in accuracy - a window disappears from the first drawn panel to the second, the bogey of the train also appears different, Tintin has a round-necked garment under his coat in the first picture, and an Eton collar and tie in the second, and the table we see in Tintin’s compartment also vanishes and reappears. It is far easier to posit - on balance of the evidence, and due to the sheer number of these “errors” - that Hergé was merely an inexperienced young comic-strip artist in a rush with numerous chores to do to get his paper out, than that he was systematically encoding a message, unless you can give precise reasons for all these items too. If not, then the possibility of Snowy having a fifth paw is most likely (in fact almost a certainty) a case of Hergé having inked in the drawing incorrectly, and you don’t have to shoe-horn in the rather desparate pun of “cinq pattes” not-quite -sounding-like “sympathique”…

I'm simply cross-matching various facts
Again you are deciding that these are facts…
It is hard to see that much of what you are saying is strictly speaking factual - you are weighting the evidence by saying that you are using facts. You are taking inferences, and self-referencing them against other references.

In order for your decoding to work you need a rosetta stone, an anchor, a key, a fixed-point - something un-equivocal and unchanging - which is the only true way to show that there is a) a coded message, and b) that it can be solved.

In order to impel the discussion, could you precise where exactly in the Tintinverse you did read and/or see Tintin was (h)armless, please?
See above for the missing arm: in many accents of English an intial “h” is dropped, therefore armless/harmless sound the same. However, you would have to show exemplars of Hergé studying Cockney, for example, for this to be in any way a meaningful pun; likewise, show me an authority that says that Hergé chose Tintin’s name in advance in 1929, so that he could do a pun on “toucan” many years later, and your theory will gain credibility in my eyes. Without it, it can only remain a will o’ the wisp…
yamilah
Member
#13 · Posted: 26 Sep 2005 23:06
jock123
In order for your decoding to work you need a rosetta stone, an anchor, a key, a fixed-point - something un-equivocal and unchanging - which is the only true way to show that there is a) a coded message, and b) that it can be solved.

Rosetta stone is the word. Months ago, I mentioned that in 1979, Herge admitted the use of a 'martingale', that applied to art implicitly makes it not random, just like a proverb's syllables would do with a rebus' images...

As you say quite rightly, this rosetta-martingale must be unequivocal and unchanged (unlike its multiple linguistic avatars, though), if the author wants to be understood one day, but this can't be discussed here, as you know...

Let's sum up the various text & image relations already mentioned:

- '(h)armless' in Soviets (2nd frame): this image isn't cross-matchable with the nearby text, contrary to the 5-pawed Snowy; it's not 'avataresque', namely this image can't match with syllables related to it (contrary to toucan*/tintin), nor the text match with this image (contrary to gauche/clumsy)...
And anyway, an adjective such as 'harmless' isn't clearly drawable...

- as you mentioned it quite rightly, the cross-matchable '5-pawed sym-pathetic dog' or the 'toucan/tin+tin' (among others, most likely) are 'meaningless', except they may some day interpellate some reader by saying 'Hey, look, I'm a rebus-like poor pun done by an ordinary fellow! How come? and what's up in the books by this unwordly guy?'...

- the likely 'erstwhile artist' mentioned on another thread doesn't show in a rebus, but in a bundle of data that match with Tintin and his creator's master, who wrote about comic strips 'its mixed form is the reason that obviates its analysis', well before Herge could offer the oddest imaginable solution to this problem, by associating text and image more narrowly...

show me an authority that says that Hergé chose Tintin’s name in advance in 1929

Lol... Frankly, I wouldn't trust any authority but Tintin & his syllabic system, that can't be but childish...

Just consider your reaction when facing the above-mentioned desperate or poor puns, and then imagine what happens when it comes to a litterate's, a psychoanalyst's, or any other public person's ego...

Such persons appearently don't mind to insult Herge's memory by preferring to ignore it, or paradoxically become more irrational than excited when you hint at anything like a real message in the Tintinverse: implicitly, such reactions just mean they are aware of something, imho, all the more as some keep on pretending 'Tintin hasn't yet delivered all his secrets'...
* please search for related threads...
jock123
Moderator
#14 · Posted: 26 Sep 2005 23:33
yamilah
Herge admitted the use of a 'martingale', that applied to art implicitly makes it not random
I fail to see how this is making implicit a code - many many artists have aesthetic systems in their work, to guide them (I take it this is the meaning you are giving “martingale”, as in a harness?), nothing to do with codes. The recurring use of circles in the Crystal Balls/ Prisoners books is one - it informs the look of the work, but doesn’t mean that there is a code.

I am giving the benefit of the doubt to what you mean by “martingale”, as I am sure you don’t mean the foolish, dis-credited “system” of betting, which has the gambler constantly doubling his stake in order to try and cover his ever increasing losses…

Anyway, you are ignoring the fact that a Rosetta Stone would require there to be a message encoded, with the translation there for people to see; your single, doubtful example from “Soviets” is not enough to begin to describe a code system. If you want to be perfectly truthful, Snowy doesn’t have five “pattes” in the frame you make such a fuss of - he doesn’t have any! Not a single paw - Hergé has drawn legs, but no paws - the bottoms of his legs are clearly not there, as they are obscured in the passage… So, to address the point you make later, 5-pawed dog is as meaningless as my “(h)armless” Tintin, or “Two-tin-can/ toucan”…

anyway, an adjective such as 'harmless' isn't clearly drawable...
Well that’s a surely a ridiculous thing to say, when using as rigorous a “rebus-like” interpretation (as you do for your examples) of Tintin having no arm, I have just shown that you can. It is certainly clearer, and requires no stretch of the language in the way that “cinq pattes” doesn’t really sound like “sympathique”. There won’t be a French speaker on the planet who would say “cinq pattes” and “sympathique” and make them sound the same; there are English speakers who say “armless” for “harmless” (and even vice-versa).

As you didn’t object the first time I brought it up, I suspect that you are saying that now because it demonstrates a flaw in your argument…

You also fail to address the point which you previously stressed that I was apparently guilty of - you are self-selecting the bits that you want to be significant, and ignoring anything and everything else. For the code to be a code, the system of selecting the significant elements must be clear and indisputable - if it isn’t, error will definitely come in…
yamilah
Member
#15 · Posted: 27 Sep 2005 00:16
What I write must be very disturbing to trigger funny reactions such as Snowy doesn't have five "pattes" in the frame...

...which is perfect French indeed, for you can't say 'jambes' (legs) for a dog...

'Armless' is certainly more easily drawable than 'harmless', imho...

Can anyone confirm all this is becoming ridiculous, please?

I put it to you that you're the only one on this site to express a systematically negative opinion about Herge's rebus...

And I doubt you'll manage to prevent any person of good faith interested in Tintin & in Archipelagos' languages to discover sooner or later how Tintin was intimately inspired by Herge's very sad family secret...
Snowy
Member
#16 · Posted: 27 Sep 2005 03:14
Yamilah wrote:
"I put it to you that you're the only one on this site to express a systematically negative opinion about Herge's rebus"

You needn't put that to Jock123, Yamilah. A few people have already been just as vocal in questioning your claims and I suspect that most others like myself have simply remained quiet because Jock123 usually states what we were already thinking in an eloquent fashion that need not be added to.*

But you have put it out there so now I'll step up to the plate too.

Jock123 may sometimes have come across as having expressed as you say "a systematically negative opinion" about the rebus you claim to exist in Herge's work; but for the most part, I think it would be fairer to say that he has been sceptical. I have been following these threads for a while now, I believe I have read all of your posts and Jock123's replies and I can say with certainty that he didn't attack or simply denounce your claims as some others did from the beginning. Largely, it seems to me, he has merely questioned you and pushed you to provide evidence for your theory.

As such, I think you should be flattered in a sense that somebody has taken enough interest in the often difficult posts that you have written to question you about them. (On the verge of quoting Jock123 himself); What value would your hypothesis have if it didn't stand up to questioning? All theories are proved or disproved through analysis and experimentation. And this is the crux of the matter.

The meat of your hypothesis, or examples of evidence that you have provided thus far are regarded by myself - and I am sure most people - as being either mistakes, anomalies or simply objects of no more meaning than to create atmosphere within the story.

I am not going to dispute your claims further than that here. As I said earlier, Jock123 has already done an eloquent job of questioning you about most of them. The trouble is that when he has done so, instead of providing a clear answer you seem to skirt around the issue, sometimes accusing him of holding a negative opinion about your theory (as you have done here), sometimes stating that he doesn't understand enough about your theory (for which I think you are accountable) and sometimes just painting yourself as inscrutable and sage.

Let me make this clear, I don't denounce that there is any truth behind what you have said and from what I have read, it doesn't look like Jock123 ever has written you off in such a way either. Although I did lose patience with your tracking game in the end, I sincerely had given it a go for a good portion of time and posited some questions for you to answer. I'm still waiting.

In regard for your theory in general, (which by the way, I believe you should be calling as such, since it has not yet been proven) I am interested to know exactly what it is you think. However, until you begin to present clear, indisputable evidence for your claims I for one will not accept them. You have just dropped a bombshell here; as typically indescript as it may be:

Yamilah wrote:
"Tintin was intimately inspired by Herge's very sad family secret..."

Do you realise that this is a magnificant claim? Do you not realise that it is extremely rude and arrogant to the people who appreciate Herge's work to purport this as a fact? Not to mention Herge's close friends and family.

Since this knowledge is not generally understood (among Tintinologists no-less) it would presumably be something that - if true - were only known by Herge's close friends and family, whom I do not believe you are connected to. In which case, or even in the case that you happened upon something through your studies that nobody else knows - still assuming this is true - you really ought to be dealing more respectfully with your claim. And by respectfully, I mean that the only course of action is to lay out the evidence as you see it and then state that this is a fact which you believe to be true. If it isn't true, then you should be ashamed of yourself for stating that it is.

I have to add (if the tone of this post isn't clear enough) that I feel insulted by your manner of dealing with the other members of this forum. You are clearly intelligent and quite a character; and it may be just that which is responsible for your inability to understand where Jock123 and others are coming from; but I add my two cents here in the hope that it will make a difference.


* please search for related topics.
jock123
Moderator
#17 · Posted: 27 Sep 2005 08:48
yamilah
What I write must be very disturbing to trigger funny reactions such as Snowy doesn't have five "pattes" in the frame...
I’m not at all disturbed, but thank you for checking; I’m merely analysing what you have to say, rather than accepting it blindly.

...which is perfect French indeed, for you can't say 'jambes' (legs) for a dog...

That’s very odd, because I can say it, as can the author of this diagram, which quite clearly shows the jambe is part of the dog’s leg - and (just to show that it isn’t a one-off, this dog breed page also uses “jambe” in their description. I’m sure I could find many more, but as you would say, please search… But that’s by-the-by… This is a side-track issue, as “jambes” only just came up… [NB: In fairness, I have edited the above slightly, as I misinterpreted the text on the diagram, and took a label for part of the leg as specifying the “patte” as the paw; this is an error. However, it does still show the “jambe” of a dog…]

Armless' is certainly more easily drawable than 'harmless', imho...
Yes, indubitably - which, imho, is why a man engaged in creating a rebus-like system would choose to draw it that way - as armless. And it is definitely more believable than cinq pattes/ sympathique - I have provided a true pair of homophones for many English speakers, and one which would be immediately available to almost all English speakers; you have given a pun which would need to be explained, and is at best very laboured, even for Francophones…

Can anyone confirm all this is becoming ridiculous, please?
It occurs to me that I haveonly been trying to demonstrate that the proposition you have been offering is tenuous at best; if you yourself now wish to characterise it as ridiculous, I can only agree with your own analysis.

I put it to you that you're the only one on this site to express a systematically negative opinion about Herge's rebus...
Actually, I thought I was perhaps extending you the courtesy of looking in to what you have to say, and consistently addressing your many questions and requests for information; if you don’t want me to try and work my way through your labyrinthan effusions, well I’m sorry to have troubled you.

I have been systematically sifting your evidence, that is true, and finding it wanting; if you choose to characterise analysis of your own material which doen’t agree with you as negative, then that is your perogative - however, I think it is better to say that I have been a fair critic of your theory.

I also dare say that it is somewhat presumptious to assume that the silence of the vast majority is the silence of agreement…

I also think that you are trying to undermine what I am saying merely by attacking my position of scepticism, rather than by defending your own position, which does it no credit; I have never done this to you - I merely use logic and rigour to offer a different interpretation of your evidence, and ask you to provide proof for the “hidden message”.

And I doubt you'll manage to prevent any person of good faith interested in Tintin & in Archipelagos' languages to discover sooner or later how Tintin was intimately inspired by Herge's very sad family secret...

Setting aside the suggestion that I am not a person of good faith because I disagree with you, which is just plain rude, I think a person of good faith would wish to look objectively at both sides of the argument and weigh the evidence. As it stands, I am fairly certain that you have offered not a shred of evidence to back up the points, some of which I repeat once more:
* That Hergé, as a youth drawing a children’s comic-strip, embarked on a 50-odd year coded message
* That he knew any method of doing this
* That he could make it systematic
* That there is any documentary evidence of this code, although his research material, notes and correspondence for more than fifty years are largely extant, and the subject of research

If you come up with a body of evidence which is factual and not interpretative, then there would be real material to debate.

Snowy, thank you for your support; you are very kind.

PS: Drat! Drifted off topic - sorry! The bird is a tintin - I mean can-can, that is a two-can…
yamilah
Member
#18 · Posted: 27 Sep 2005 09:20
Snowy
Thanks for your answer and thanks to all members for their admirable patience...

rude and arrogant to the people who appreciate Herge's work to purport this as a fact?
Sorry if anyone could feel insulted, but personally as an adult I do appreciate and understand Tintin now more than when I was a kid...

Herge's close friends and family, whom I do not believe you are connected to.

Herge is a public person, whose life and books have been studied by various sciences, by which anyone can just say or prove anything...
Tintin & Co syllables' study just brings another brick to his unique world's huge wall, after all...

jock123

You won't hear people say 'jambe' for a rear animal's leg, except maybe biologists or vets...

Anyway, the problem with your (h)armless pun is that it does not offer any text-image cross-matching, e.g. there is no 'bras' (nor any other exotic syllable meaning 'arm') mentioned in the nearby text to replace the arm you think is missing...

Above all, Herge declared Tintin & other characters where himself, not hardly drawable or cross-matchable adjectives...

Thanks for your sustained interest, jock123.

[Moderator Note: Combined two consecutive posts.]
jock123
Moderator
#19 · Posted: 27 Sep 2005 10:17
yamilah
You won't hear people say 'jambe' for a rear animal's leg, except maybe biologists or vets...
It rather runs contrary to your flat assertion that it wasn’t French then…

Anyway, the problem with your (h)armless pun is that it does not offer any text-image cross-matching
But that is a decision that you have imposed on the affair - show me where it says it has to be so?

Tintin could be described as “harmless” simply because he does good, not harm in the world. That makes as much if not more sense than your example, which I continue to say is very laboured. To work as a rebus, there doesn’t need to be an arm anywhere to substitute…

the arm you think is missing...
It is quite clearly missing, which is more evident than the purported “fifth leg”…
Anyway, what you continue to fail to address is that Snowy’s so-called fifth leg (which isn’t actually connected to him in any way) is most likely to be an example of Hergé’s loose, elementary drawing style than anything else - as is the “missing” arm.

Herge declared Tintin & other characters where himself, not hardly drawable or cross-matchable adjectives...
I’m sorry, I don’t understand what you mean.

Thanks for your sustained interest, jock123.
I would be more interested if you dealt with the outstanding questions, rather than ignoring them, or rubbishing them; debate I don’t mind - in fact I welcome it - but you mounted an attack on the position I have taken, rather than what I had to say, and although I offered a response to that, you have failed to address the points I made. That is disappointing, and again rather undermines your position.

Update: I realise that I missed the following exchange between Snowy and yamilah:
Snowy:
Herge's close friends and family, whom I do not believe you are connected to.
yamilah:
Herge is a public person, whose life and books have been studied by various sciences, by which anyone can just say or prove anything...


This is a paradoxical situation: Snowy is making a point about the the ethics of hinting broadly at a “sad family secret” (previously referred to here as the testimony of a 'child abuse') without offering proof to back up the allegation, and you are defending yourself by saying that Hergé is in effect a public figure and cannot be protected from such insinuation.

Yet you have avoided the issue of explaining yourself previously by making such comments as well known ethical rules that hinder any public divulgation. This is clearly a case of wanting to have your cake and eat it too. (I think “divulgation” is an inadvertent slip into French, for which you should read “disclosure”.)

Paradox is a tool which you have used many times in your posts, such as the following:
“Herge's secret has been publicized a few years ago, and just like any other secret there is nothing exciting about it”

A secret which is has been publicized is scarcely a secret, and many secrets are exciting. So, in a single sentence, the proposition that there is a“secret” is justified by the fact that it is in fact public knowledge (?); to then suggest that it isn’t in fact even an “exciting” one, is to make it seem as if you are dangling something at once hidden, and therefore desirable and mysterious, but snatching it away because it isn’t in fact exciting, and because it is therefore mundane and boring, you needn’t say what it is…

So what is one to think? You can make insinuations about public figures and child abuse, but you don’t have to “ante up” any evidence for it because that would be discourteous? I think you need to make a decision about the ethics of your approach, because it does not do yourself, or Hergé, justice, to sit on the fence in this way.
Phalanx
Member
#20 · Posted: 2 Oct 2005 15:34
Bringing this back on topic, I'm pretty sure this bird is a Wreathed Hornbill (Rhyticeros undulatus), not a toucan. Not all hornbill have prominent horns.

Also, you can check out the images on this page about Wreathed Hornbills and compare it to the one in the panel in 714. There are a few minor differences such as the colour of the orbital eye skin, but otherwise it's 99% exactly like the said hornbill.

Oh I'm new here, love the books and why yes, I used to be one of the crazy people who run about in the woods with a pair of binoculars ;)

Please could someone tell us what type of bird is seen in Flight 714, page 22 (B1, i.e. 4th frame)?

Thanks in advance.

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