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Act II, Scene 7
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Regency (73). |
The style prevalent in England during the regency of George, Prince of Wales (later George IV) from 1811 to 1830. The principle trend in furnishings and architecture was neoclassical.
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deterministic universe (73). |
The belief that every act, decision, moral choice and event is the inevitable consequence of antecedents that are independent of and precludes human will.
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"Your teas gets cold by itself, it doesn't get hot by itself." (78). |
A reference to the principle of entropy (see: "Second law of thermodynamics" above), the inevitable and steady deterioration of a system.
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"I had a dream . . ." (79). |
A quote from Darkness, Lord Byron's poem written in 1816.
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'Culpability' Noakes (83). |
A play on Capability Brown (see above).
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Hobbes . . . Leviathan (84). |
Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) was an English political philosopher. In his book Leviathan (1651) he declares the pessimistic philosophy that humans are fundamentally brutish and selfish creatures.
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Euclid (84). |
A Greek mathematician in the Third century B.C. He applied the deductive principles of logic to elementary plane geometry and used this method (now called Euclidean geometry) to derive statements from clearly defined axioms. His Elements was a presentation of the mathematics of his day. A non-Euclidean geometry was developed independently by Nikolai Lobachevsky in 1826 and J‡nos Bolyai in 1832.
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Newcomen steam pump (85). |
An atmospheric steam engine used to pump water invented in 1711 by Thomas Newcomen, an English inventor. This was a predecessor of James Watt's practical steam engine (1769). A steam engine converts heat energy into mechanical energy. When water boils into steam its volume increases producing a force that is used to move a piston back and forth in a cylinder. The piston is attached to a crankshaft back-and-forth motion into rotary motion for driving machinery.
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curlew (86). |
A brown, long-legged shore bird with long, slender, downward-curving bills.
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parterre (89). |
An ornamental flower garden with the beds and paths arranged in a pattern.
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gloss (90). |
A brief note explaining or translating a difficult or technical expression sometimes inserted between lines of a text or in the margin of a manuscript.
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Jane Austen (90). |
(1775-1817) English novelist noted for her comedies of middle-class manners and morality in the English counties. Her work is full of irony, morality, wit, style and penetrating characterization. Her themes often involve the quest for proper husbands for marriageable daughters. Her novels include Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park (1814), and Emma (1816).
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mitre (91). |
The liturgical headdress of a Christian bishop. It is a tall pointed hat with peaks in front and back, worn at all solemn functions.
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