{"id":10953,"date":"2015-04-01T01:10:02","date_gmt":"2015-04-01T06:10:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/paganpages.org\/content\/?p=11348"},"modified":"2015-03-31T10:30:36","modified_gmt":"2015-03-31T15:30:36","slug":"seeing-the-signs-12","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/2015\/04\/01\/seeing-the-signs-12\/","title":{"rendered":"Seeing the Signs"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bibliomancy: divination with books<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

As a writer, I have often gone through periods of writer\u2019s block. Some periods have been worse than other periods. Sometimes I all am able to do is a few lines \u2013 maybe an entire paragraph \u2013 in my daily journal. Sometimes it\u2019s just jottings in the little notebook I carry with me everywhere I go. But sometimes I cannot produce anything at all. No poetry, no prose, no song, no dance. The merest email is like pulling teeth.<\/p>\n

Last month, I wrote about the I-Ching and the only reason I wrote about this subject was because, unable to come up with any ideas at all, I opened up Sasha Fenton\u2019s The Fortune-Teller\u2019s Workbook at random and it just happened to open at page 81 \u2013 \u201cThe I Ching\u201d. Once again I am at my wit\u2019s end trying to write and so I will write about bibliomancy \u2013 the art of finding an answer by opening a book by random.<\/p>\n

The first time I had ever heard of this as a divinatory process was when I saw the movie \u201cRunning with Scissors\u201d. The characters use the Bible to figure out what to do next in a house where absolutely nothing makes sense (the patriarch of the house looks at his own turds for divinatory guidance). According to Wikipedia, which of course is always taken with a hefty grain of salt, the Bible and the Qu\u2019ran are the most \u201ccommonly used\u201d, although of course the Bible forbids divination in general.<\/p>\n

Crystalinks.com refers to Bibliomancy as Stitchomancy or Libromancy, both meaning \u201cdivination from lines\u201d. Crystalinks.com also says that the book used must be a \u201cHoly Book\u201d but who gets to decide what\u2019s \u201choly\u201d and what is not? I have always had problems with these kind of terms<\/p>\n

The book I like to use the most is The Norton Shakespeare, based on the Oxford edition, with the complete works of Shakespeare, all the plays, sonnets, commentary, biography and notes. If you can\u2019t find it in here, you\u2019re not going to find it. So here I am, asking the question: Why is writing like pulling teeth lately:
\n(Closing my eyes and opening the book at random and using my right index finger to find the passage)
\nThe Answer:<\/p>\n

\n\u201cFor I must tell you friendly in your ear,<\/em>
\n \u201cSell when you can. You are not for all markets.\u201d<\/em>
\nThat was Rosalind to Phoebe in \u201cAs You Like It\u201d. Act 3, Scene 5 (page 1637)<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

So maybe what I\u2019m being told is I\u2019m trying too hard. I\u2019m trying to write too much, too many projects at once, too many irons in the fire. I\u2019m not focused enough. And maybe just write and stop trying to be so perfect. Submit my work and stop being so obsessed with it.<\/p>\n

Of course in this digital age, there\u2019s a place you can go online if you want the computer to generate a reading for you. Go to http:\/\/www.facade.com\/bibliomancy\/<\/a> and give it a try. There\u2019s only four religions to choose from but it\u2019s still fun. Personally, I think they should add readings from Shakespeare but I\u2019m just a lover of the Bard.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

References<\/strong><\/span>
\nGreenblatt, Stephen, General Editor. The Norton Shakespeare: Based on the Oxford Edition<\/span>. Londond: W.W. Norton Company, 1997
\nhttp:\/\/www.facade.com\/bibliomancy\/<\/a>
\nhttp:\/\/www.crystalinks.com\/bibliomancy.html<\/a>
\nhttp:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Bibliomancy<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bibliomancy: divination with books As a writer, I have often gone through periods of writer\u2019s block. Some periods have been worse than other periods. Sometimes I all am able to do is a few lines \u2013 maybe an entire paragraph \u2013 in my daily journal. Sometimes it\u2019s just jottings in the little notebook I carry with me everywhere I go. But sometimes I cannot produce anything at all. No poetry, no prose, no song, no dance. The merest email is like pulling teeth. Last month, I wrote about the I-Ching and the only reason I wrote about this subject was because, unable to come up with any ideas at all, I opened up Sasha Fenton\u2019s The Fortune-Teller\u2019s Workbook at random and it just happened to open at page 81 \u2013 \u201cThe I Ching\u201d. Once again I am at my wit\u2019s end trying to write and so I will write about bibliomancy \u2013 the art of finding an answer by opening a book by random. The first time I had ever heard of this as a divinatory process was when I saw the movie \u201cRunning with Scissors\u201d. The characters use the Bible to figure out what to do next in a house where absolutely nothing makes sense (the patriarch of the house looks at his own turds for divinatory guidance). According to Wikipedia, which of course is always taken with a hefty grain of salt, the Bible and the Qu\u2019ran are the most \u201ccommonly used\u201d, although of course the Bible forbids divination in general. Crystalinks.com refers to Bibliomancy as Stitchomancy or Libromancy, both meaning \u201cdivination from lines\u201d. Crystalinks.com also says that the book used must be a \u201cHoly Book\u201d but who gets to decide what\u2019s \u201choly\u201d and what is not? I have always had problems with these kind of terms The book I like to use the most is The Norton Shakespeare, based on the Oxford edition, with the complete works of Shakespeare, all the plays, sonnets, commentary, biography and notes. If you can\u2019t find it in here, you\u2019re not going to find it. So here I am, asking the question: Why is writing like pulling teeth lately: (Closing my eyes and opening the book at random and using my right index finger to find the passage) The Answer: \u201cFor I must tell you friendly in your ear, \u201cSell when you can. You are not for all markets.\u201d That was Rosalind to Phoebe in \u201cAs You Like It\u201d. Act 3, Scene 5 (page 1637) So maybe what I\u2019m being told is I\u2019m trying too hard. I\u2019m trying to write too much, too many projects at once, too many irons in the fire. I\u2019m not focused enough. And maybe just write and stop trying to be so perfect. Submit my work and stop being so obsessed with it. Of course in this digital age, there\u2019s a place you can go online if you want the computer to generate a reading for you. Go to http:\/\/www.facade.com\/bibliomancy\/ and give it a try. There\u2019s only four religions to choose from but it\u2019s still fun. Personally, I think they should add readings from Shakespeare but I\u2019m just a lover of the Bard.   References Greenblatt, Stephen, General Editor. The Norton Shakespeare: Based on the Oxford Edition. Londond: W.W. Norton Company, 1997 http:\/\/www.facade.com\/bibliomancy\/ http:\/\/www.crystalinks.com\/bibliomancy.html http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Bibliomancy<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":197,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":1,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10953","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10953","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/197"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10953"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10953\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10573,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10953\/revisions\/10573"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10953"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10953"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}