Re: The Alphabet and the Goddess

["Porrello, Leonard" <leonard -dot- porrello -at- COMPAQ -dot- COM>]

While I admire the sentiment, like the Bible, Shakespeare's works cover so
much ground that one could find almost anything them. Accordingly, apart
from being cute, such findings would be meaningless--unless Shakespeare has
a lesson for us (and he very well may)!

I want to add that what we do is clearly valuable in itself. We don't need
to find precedent in sacred writings to justify ourselves. I'd like to see a
technical communicator write an essay critiquing God's directions to Noah.
As "technical communicators," the Hebrew prophets and God Himself fail
terribly: most of the time their audiences seemed to be clueless about God's
message. Of course, "Thou shall not. . . ." is pretty clear. However, what
if God would have said "You shall not steal because stealing destroys the
social fabric and, therefore, makes society, by which you all live and
prosper, impossible. Furthermore, human nature being as I've created it,
those who steal destroy their own integrity."?

Leonard Porrello
Compaq, Telecom Network Solutions
Pubs, Omaha
402.384.7390


> I think you could make a better case for, say, Herman Melville's Moby Dick
> as tech writing (as, I believe, Robert Waite did a few years ago at an STC
> Annual Conference). Or, if youwant to go WAY back, how about the
> directions
> to Noah on how to build the ark in Genesis?
>
> If you DO find tech writing in Shakespeare, I'd love to see the article
> you
> write!
>
>


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