P
This is the infamous Starbuck question.
Answer: 62500
Comments
When I finally figured out that I wasn't going to find the numbers in a George Starbuck poem and took a second look at "Sonnet With A Different Letter At The End Of Every Line", I immediately saw its reference to Rimbaud, and checked out his Complete Works (surprisingly long for someone who lived so briefly) to look for poems about butterflies and celestial creatures.
I found that in "A Season In Hell" the narrator encounters a fallen angel in the underworld who says, "I belong to an ancient race; my ancestors were Norsemen." The narrator then goes into a detailed account of his friendship with the demon. I thought I had found my "member of the lowest order of the celestial hierarchy, of a certain Scandinvian origin," but scanning the text closely revealed no discussion of the fallen angel's height or wingspan (although it did say that he had wings). I was so sure that I was on the right track, though, that I started looking for cryptic or subtle references, first in English and then in the original French, but to no avail.
It was then that I went back to the Starbuck poem, found the unfamiliar name Winfield Townley Scott, and Googled it. Of course the second link that turned up was a passage from "The Annual Legend" that began "A million butterflies rose up from South America." From there I put all of Scott's works on order at the library and found "The Swedish Angel."
What I'm wondering is, was the refernce to the Scandinavian creature an intentional misdirection meant to steer us towards Rimbaud?
Posted by: Andrew | Jan 31, 2004 1:56:57 PM
No, that was just coincidence. Actually, I had at first forgotten Rimbaud was also mentioned in the sonnet. I just used "Scandinavian" to widen the search, expecting solvers to look in Granger's, as I did, at a list of Scott's works and spot "Swedish Angel" and "Annual Legend" matching the clue wording. This started from a small poetry anthology in my mother's library, containing dozens (perhaps hundreds) of poets, and the ONLY two poems by Scott in it are those two. I did a Google on Scott which popped up the Sonnet. I had never heard of Starbuck before then. I later checked at my own public library to be sure all was also accessible without the internet, albeit with some difficulty in some locations. I realize it's a crapshoot whose library is going to have kept which out of print books, but that's always going to be part of the game.
Posted by: Bob Lodge | Jan 31, 2004 3:23:32 PM
There is a George Starbuck answer, if you ignore some facts of the clue. The number of five for butterflies is found in a George Starbuck poem. The wing size of a cherub ( albeit, a statue) is from the book of Kings in the Bible. Kathryn Starbuck was amused.
I intentionally left my home e-mail address and Kathy Starbucks e-mail. She was very pleased, as you can see.
The George Starbuck numbers don't work, but....
-----Original Message-----
From: Kathystarbuck@aol.com [mailto:Kathystarbuck@aol.com]
Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2003 7:20 PM
To: joconnor3@nc.rr.com
Subject: George Starbuck
Dear Jim O'Connor-
I'm so sorry you had so much difficulty making contact. I have recieved a goodly number of such queries. George would have been delighted by this and would likely have responded with clues in verse. He started out in math as a 15 year old at Cal Tech and never lost his fascination with games.
The second work that is referred to is likely a poem called "The Sad Ballad of the Fifteen Consecutive Rhymes," which was first collected in 1978 in his book "Desperate Measures," David Godine, Boston. It was included in a selection of his poems in 1982 in the volume "The Argot Merchant Disaster," Atlantic Monthly Press, NYC and Martin, Secker & Warburg, Ltd., London. I did not include that poem in "The Works." Both Desperate Measures and Argot Merchant are out of print but, as with almost all of his books, copies are often offered I'm told by collectors who sell them on the internet.
In "The Sad Ballad..." he includes this line
"Now seemed enciente with butterfly quintuplets"
The lowest order of the celestial hierarchy is, I believe, the cherub. Its wingspan and height would I imagine be revealed in the Bible.
This information, I hope, will help you solve the puzzle. Please do me the kindness of letting me know the solution when you get it. Good luck and thanks for your interest in George's work.
Yrs sincerely,
Kathy Starbuck
Posted by: Jim O'Connor | Feb 2, 2004 2:01:16 PM
Thanks for posting that, Jim! How interesting - and good of Kathy Starbuck to reply as she did. I wonder if she got tired of reading "a goodly number of such queries."
Posted by: nichole | Feb 2, 2004 3:45:45 PM
I, too, was stumped on this question for a long time. So long, in fact, I came up with the following "poetry". Not mine, really, but an adaptation on "Twas the Night Before Christmas". I hope you like it.
"The contestants were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of George Starbuck poems danced in their heads."
Posted by: James | Feb 2, 2004 5:30:18 PM
OK, so there are a million butterflies, according
to Bartelby and the wingspan/height ratio must be
16, to get 62500.
Would somebody post Swedish Angel, so we can see
the context?
Tim
I used to have a copy of Oscar Williams' book of
modern verse, with the angel poem. My brother
abandoned it when he moved out. We used
to make fun of it, because he included Eliot,
Pound, Moore, Frost and Oscar Williams and a just a
little William Carlos Williams. A postage-stamp
sized picture of Oscar was on the cover, among the
great poets, like Woody Allen's "Zelig".
I sold it for a nickel at a garage sale, so I
couldn't check to see if Winfield Townley Scott or
George Starbuck were in it.
Posted by: Tim | Feb 3, 2004 3:31:16 PM
I don't want to violate any copyrights by posting the whole poem, but for literary purposes only, here are the first two lines of the poem:
The Swedish angel is nine inches high and shaped all of blond straw.
All of blond straw is her little body and her great seven-inch wings.
Posted by: MartinD | Feb 3, 2004 3:46:07 PM
By the way, as bad as this question was, I did myself in twice. Even after my first epiphany led me to Swedish Angel by Scott, I was parsing the clue wrong. I was reading it like Scott had two poems about angels, one of which I'd found, and then the butterfly piece was unrelated to the poets. Stupid, I know, but hey, we're all entitled to a few of those.
I found the butterfly legend by Googling numbers of butterflies that were perfect squares likely to appear in a legend. e.g.:
"100 butterflies" and "legend"
When I found the million butterflies in a poem by Scott, I just about broke my keyboard with my head.
Posted by: Addison | Feb 3, 2004 4:21:09 PM
I got the answer through what Bob calls "reverse engineering" before I found "The Swedish Angel." After I found "The Annual Legend" on the internet, I looked around the equation. I found that big Omega was likely to be between 7200 and 8000, and P was likely to be one-fourth of a perfect square (and thus a perfect square itself) based on the "sqrt[NP]" at the end. 62500 was the only number that got me this, and it was a factor of 1000000 to boot. When the Winfield Scott books I'd placed on order at the library finally arrived, they only confirmed what I'd concluded was the answer for P.
Posted by: Andrew | Feb 3, 2004 4:32:30 PM
The only one where I actually ended up at a library! Found the butterflies fairly easily at Bartleby's and had the angel sizes reverse engineered but I HAD to actually see the poem in print. From the basement of the county library the research librarian pulled a dusty anthology for me ...
Wonder when I'll ever get to visit the library again???
Posted by: Gneen | Feb 25, 2004 5:33:55 PM
I love libraries. I'll do my best to chase you folks to a few more of them in the future.
Posted by: Bob Lodge | Feb 26, 2004 6:24:26 PM
I can hardly stand the wait for your next puzzle, Bob!
Posted by: Paula | Feb 27, 2004 9:24:00 AM
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