HARDY FORUM ARCHIVE H02001 1/1/02 "JANUARY 2002 ANNOUNCEMENTS" ============================================================== Date: Tue, 01 Jan 2002 14:49:47 -0500 Subject: Re: New Year's Greetings and a plea to share course outlines From: "Philip & Andrea Allingham" Happy New Year to All Forum Discussion Members from Philip Allingham and George Landow of the Victorian Web. If anyone feels moved by the spirit of generosity that seizes many of us at this time of the year and would like to share a course syllabus in Victorian literature, history, or ideas, the Victorian Web welcomes any and all contributions at george@landow.com To see what we have currently listed (admittedly this i an embryonic part of the VW), please go to http://www.scholars.nus.edu.sg/landow/victorian/courses/courses.html Once again, all the best in 2002. Philip V. Allingham, Thunder Bay, Ontario-- Where "Winter is white on turf and tree, / And birds are fled" (and who could blame them when it's -20 Celsius?) ========== Date: Fri, 04 Jan 2002 10:52:21 -0600 From: Bill Morgan Subject: Temporary Outage at the Poem of the Month Site Good morning, Some of you will have noticed that the Poem of the Month site is inaccessible; the discussions are being moved onto a new software program, and the process is, of course, slow and tedious. I'm sorry for the inconvenience, but I hope you will find the site to be more functional and easier to use once we have moved from the old NetForum program to a new conference software named NetBoard. Our local technicians here at Illinois State have told me that they expect to have everything functioning early next week. I'll send out my usual notice. Thanks for your patience. Meanwhile, sharpen your pencils or keyboards for our January discussion of "A New Year's Eve in War Time," the first in a short series of conversations about Hardy's holiday poems. cheers, Bill Morgan ========== From: "Michael Barry" Subject: Re: COMPETITION Date: 5 Jan 1997 04:05:03 -0000 A very grateful thanks to the organisers of a fun challenge from a happy prize-winner! I for one look forward to a good read in the near future (once I've finished "A Pair of Blue Eyes" and a reread of "The Hobbit"!). And it was good to know that Wessex (albeit Somerset) displayed such a high level of whateverittakes! With best wishes to all for 2002. Michael Barry ========== Date: Wed, 9 Jan 2002 17:29:15 -0800 From: Betty Cortus Subject: Review of Festschrift Dear list Members, To add to the list of commendatory critical comment being addressed to the growing list of The Thomas Hardy Association's scholarly publications, I am delighted to say that its Festschrift entitled, *Human Shows: Essays in Honour of Michael Millgate* (2000), edited by Rosemarie Morgan and Richard Nemesvari, has received several favorable reviews, and that the latest, by Seth Lachterman, appears this month in "English Literature in Transition*, edited by Robert Langelfeld. Congratulations and grateful thanks to all who contributed essays to this remarkable Festschrift edition, published in celebration of one of our most eminent Hardy scholars: Michael Millgate. Betty Cortus hardycor@mailhost2.csusm.edu ========== Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2002 23:00:38 -0500 From: Rosemarie Morgan Subject: Re: TTHA Poem of the Month for January I have a question: Is anyone else -- aside from myself-- having difficulty getting to the NEW TTHA POTM (accessing the Poem itself) ? Tonight, Bill and I have been trying to figure out what the problem is ( I get to the POTM page but no further) and would like to hear from anyone else who might be experiencing similar difficulties (respond by private email only please ). Many thanks, Cheers Rosemarie ========== Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2002 20:22:24 -0800 From: Charles Herbert Crookston Subject: Re: TTHA Poem of the Month for January Me! ME! -- Roy Buckle www.segr-music.net ========== Date: Sat, 12 Jan 2002 08:24:15 -0500 From: Rosemarie Morgan Subject: Re: TTHA Poem of the Month for January Thanks Charles-- we are trying to iron out some of these glitches-- feedback is good. Cheers, Rosemarie ========== From: "JULIAN WHIPPLE" JWWHIPPLE1@mediaone.net Subject: Re: TTHA Poem of the Month for January Date: Sat, 12 Jan 2002 10:09:40 -0500 Dear Rosemarie, While I had no problems getting to it, I do understand why some had trouble reading it. (I managed by leaning a bit closer!) Perhaps the font could be adjusted, either in a reposting or by the recipients. By the way, all best wishes for the New Year. Hoping to see you and Bill in Dorchester, Julian ========== Date: Sat, 12 Jan 2002 14:45:54 -0600 From: Bill Morgan Subject: The New POTM Site Good afternoon, folks-- Thanks to all of you who have visited the new POTM site--and especially to those who have taken the trouble to report your successes and/or your difficulties either to me privately or to the Forum. We all--your Poetry Page Director in particular, of course--have some work to do in learning how to use this new Webboard software. I will be working diligently on improving my own knowledge of the system, and I would hope within a few weeks to be able to answer most of your queries. Meanwhile, I'm grateful to Illinois State University for offering TTHA the free use of its licensed copy of Webboard (a program which is really meant to be used in conjunction with college and university-level academic courses--which fact perhaps explains it mechanically friendly, overly cheerful greeting system). For now, here's a status report: (1) The URL for the POTM site is: http://webboard.ilstu.edu/~TTHA_POTM_DISCUSSIONS (2) That address should take you to either a login page, where you can choose a password and then log in to see the discussions (called "Conferences" by the program) that are available and the messages that have been posted or, if you have already logged in and are using the same browser, then directly to the "Conferences" and messages. Each month's discussion will be a separate "Conference." If your browser takes you to a different page, look for a "Search" function, and search for "messages." Once you get the login or Conferences screen save it in your bookmarks or favorites file. About half the people who have visited the site and reported back are having some kind of problem; the other half are finding the site to be easy to use. Here are the problems I am aware of and working on: (1) Some users are finding neither the login nor the Conferences screen when they go to the URL. I'm baffled by this problem and have referred it to our local technicians (who of course won't be in until Monday). (2) Some users have expressed the wish that the poem and my introduction to it could appear in the same message; I believe I can make that happen--perhaps with next month's poem. (3) Some users have complained (rightly so, I think) about the font in which the poem has appeared. Check back at the site: Just this afternoon I have figured out how to enlarge the font, but I lost some little features, like line numbers, in so doing. I will continue to tinker. (4) Some users have been put off by the necessity to log in and create a "profile" for yourself in order to use the site. I share your annoyance with this feature of the program, but I think it may be worth it, since you can ask the program to "Watch" a given Conference or Message for you and then notify you when there is a new posting at the site. To my mind, this feature makes logging in and creating a profile worthwhile. In a day or so, I will post whatever messages have appeared at the site to the Forum, just to make sure that anyone who has not been able to access the site will still have a chance to read what's happening there. And of course anyone who has read the poem and the messages and who wants to respond is welcome to send a response to me as an email; I will be happy to post your response for you. And now, back to tinkering. best, Bill Morgan Director, Thomas Hardy Poetry Page ==========