Monty Python's Academic Circus

[Pilgrim]

This article from the Chronicle of Higher Education (an online publication seldom cited here) is a low-key hoot.

http://chronicle.com/article/Monty-Pythons-Academic-Circus/126062/?sid=pm&utm_source=pm&utm_medium=en

How can you not love a conference with a title like: Monty Python in Its British and International Cultural Contexts, or, How to recognize the Spanish Inquisition from quite a long way away.

With announced special guest Johann Gambolputty de von Ausfern-Schplenden-Schlitter-Crass-Cren-Bon-Fried-Digger-Dingle-Dangle-Dongle-Dungle von Knacker-Thrasher-Apple-Banger-Horowitz-Ticolensic-Grander Knotty-Spelltinkle-Grandlich-Grum­blemeyer-Spelter-Wasser-Kurstlich-Himble-Eisenbahnwagen-Gutenabend-Bitte-einen-Nürnburger-Bratwürstel-Gespurten-mit-Weimache-Luber-Hundsfut-Gumeraber-Schönendank­er-Kalbsfleisch-Mittleraucher von Haut­kopft of Ulm.

Perhaps Uwe can parse that for us.

I'm sure most will not read the entire article, as it is, regrettably, rather scholarly.  But if there's ANY group I know who will appreciate the premise, this is it.

[Dave W]

The article is subscriber access only. I did find this site which has a program summary.

TGoo bad they didn't discuss Estimating the Airspeed Velocity of an Unladen Swallow -- although to be fair, that wasn't from the TV show.

[Pilgrim]

The article is subscriber access only. I did find this site which has a program summary.

TGoo bad they didn't discuss Estimating the Airspeed Velocity of an Unladen Swallow -- although to be fair, that wasn't from the TV show.

Dang it!

And it's much too long to post.

I will explain - no, that would take too long; I will sum up.

Academics got together and did a whole Python-themed conference in Poland, in the city of Lodz (which sounds even funnier as pronounced in Polish: "woodge").

Two brief session descriptions, which pass for hilarity among academics:

The Lodz conference featured a broad range of scholarship in progress (and yes, there was a bit of defensiveness about how our colleagues, deans, and spouses regarded our idiosyncratic research interests). Martin Carter, a sen­ior lecturer in stage-and-screen studies at Sheffield Hallam University, in England, has studied how the Piranha Brothers sketch  keenly reworks the lurid careers of two infamous contemporary criminals. Monty Python's Doug and Dinsdale Piranha channel Reggie and Ronnie Kray, who had been arrested the previous year. Closely modeled on a recent BBC documentary, The Name Is Kray, the sketch is an early example of the brilliant English mock­umentary genre. Watching the skit alongside the original show, I was struck by how little is changed in the Python version—life is, indeed, stranger than fiction. As Carter concluded, "It is difficult, if not impossible, to decide where the Kray story ends and that of the Piranha Brothers begins."

Larsen's presentation highlighted the importance of the BBC's archive as a source for Python scholarship. A vast collection that has rarely been accessed (according to the paucity of names on sign-out sheets), it features extensive production details, such as the creation, fracture, and repair of the prop first used in "Self-Defense Against Fresh Fruit," in which Cleese advises that if someone assaults you brandishing raspberries, the thing to do is pull the lever that drops a 16-ton weight on him. Made on Dec. 19, 1969, the weight was broken and fixed in July 1970: After a few uses, it broke when someone didn't bend down fast enough and the weight hit him on the head. Set designers' memos complain about how quickly they were expected to repair the polystyrene prop, which was reused in later sketches.

Probably enough said.

[Highlander]

Is that the European or the African Swallow...?

[Pilgrim]

I believe it's the European academic.  The kind that will bite your kneecaps off.

[Dave W]

Is that the European or the African Swallow...?

What? I don't know that..... aughhh!

[Highlander]

I was going to do something predictable by posting a pic of Spiny Norman but I found this link to a cloud formation (blocked from direct link - copyright stuff) so this is spirit of Norman terrorising the innocent peoples of New Mexico instead...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/10725258@N00/3599244616

[Dave W]

Spiny Norman emigrated? 

Dinsdale must be relieved.

[Pilgrim]

Spiny Norman emigrated? 

Dinsdale must be relieved.