5 perlepigraphs - list of Perl release epigraphs
9 Many Perl release announcements included an I<epigraph>, a short excerpt
10 from a literary or other creative work, chosen by the pumpking or release
11 manager. This file assembles the known list of epigraph for posterity,
12 and also links to the release announcements in mailing list archives.
14 I<Note>: these have also been referred to as <epigrams>, but the
15 definition of I<epigraph> is closer to the way they have been used.
16 Consult your favorite dictionary for details.
20 =head2 v5.15.9 - Bob Dylan - Blowin' In The Wind
22 L<Announced on 2012-03-20 by
23 Abigail|http://nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/184824>
25 How many roads must a man walk down
26 Before you call him a man?
27 Yes, 'n' how many seas must a white dove sail
28 Before she sleeps in the sand?
29 Yes, 'n' how many times must the cannonballs fly
30 Before they're forever banned?
31 The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind
32 The answer is blowin' in the wind
34 How many years can a mountain exist
35 Before it's washed to the sea?
36 Yes, 'n' how many years can some people exist
37 Before they're allowed to be free?
38 Yes, 'n' how many times can a man turn his head
39 Pretending he just doesn't see?
40 The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind
41 The answer is blowin' in the wind
43 How many times must a man look up
44 Before he can see the sky?
45 Yes, 'n' how many ears must one man have
46 Before he can hear people cry?
47 Yes, 'n' how many deaths will it take till he knows
48 That too many people have died?
49 The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind
50 The answer is blowin' in the wind
52 -- Bob Dylan, Spring 1962
54 =head2 v5.15.8 - The KLF - The Manual-How To Have A Number One The Easy Way
56 L<Announced on 2012-02-20 by Max
57 Maischein|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2012/02/msg183919.html>
59 "Doctor Who, hey Doctor Who
60 Doctor Who, in the Tardis
61 Doctor Who, hey Doctor Who
62 Doctor Who, Doc, Doctor Who
63 Doctor Who, Doc, Doctor Who"
65 Gibberish of course, but every lad in the country under a certain
66 age related instinctively to what it was about. The ones slightly
67 older needed a couple of pints inside them to clear away the mind
68 debris left by the passing years before it made sense. As for
69 girls and our chorus, we think they must have seen it as pure crap.
70 A fact that must have limited to zero our chances of staying at The
71 Top for more than one week.
73 Stock, Aitkin and Waterman, however, are kings of writing chorus
74 lyrics that go straight to the emotional heart of the 7" single
75 buying girls in this country. Their most successful records will kick
76 into the chorus with a line which encapsulates the entire emotional
77 meaning of the song. This will obviously be used as the title. As
78 soon as Rick Astley hit the first line of the chorus on his debut
79 single it was all over - the Number One position was guaranteed:
81 "I'm never going to give you up"
83 =head2 v5.15.7 - Penelope Lively, The Voyage of QV66
85 L<Announced on 2012-01-20 by Chris 'BinGOs' Williams
86 |http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2012/01/msg182230.html>
88 "Laboratories," announced Henry. "Kindly don't touch anything."
90 He led us into a long low brick shed. Outside there was a
91 notice on a piece of board, crudely printed in red paint,
92 which said GRATE SIENCE DISCOVERYS DONE HERE SSSH! BRING YOUR
93 OWN BUKKIT NO PINCHING ANYWUN ELSE'S EXPERRYMENTS CANTEEN OPEN
96 There were a lot of large black monkeys inside, all intently
97 busy on what they were doing. Some of them were pouring stuff
98 out of bottles into buckets and carefully stirring the ensuing
99 mixture; others were at work with glass tubes and jars, blowing
100 and measuring and mixing; others were crouched over long benches
101 with tools and heaps of bits and pieces of metal, cutting and
102 bending and constructing. There was a great deal of noise and
103 chatter. Every now and then one of them would give a whoop of
104 excitement and all the others would gather round and jump up and
105 down cheering and applauding.
107 "Chimps," said Henry. "They're awfully clever."
109 =head2 v5.15.6 - Ursula K. Leguin, A Wizard of Earthsea
111 L<Announced on 2011-12-20 by Dave
112 Rolsky|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/12/msg180962.html>
114 Ged had thought that as the prentice of a great mage he would enter at once
115 into the mystery and mastery of power. He would understand the language of the
116 beasts and the speech of the leaves of the forest, he thought, and sway the
117 winds with his word, and learn to change himself into any shape he
118 wished. Maybe he and his master would run together as stags, or fly to Re Albi
119 over the mountain on the wings of eagles.
121 But it was not so at all. They wandered, first down into the Vale and then
122 gradually south and westward around the mountain, given lodging in little
123 villages or spending the night out in the wilderness, like poor
124 journeyman-sorcerers, or tinkers, or beggars. They entered no mysterious
125 domain. Nothing happened. The mage's oaken staff that Ged had watched at first
126 with eager dread was nothing but a stout staff to walk with. Three days went
127 by and four days went by and still Ogion had not spoken a single charm in
128 Ged's hearing, and had not taught him a single name or rune or spell.
130 =head2 v5.15.5 - Nikolai Gogol, The Diary of a Madman
132 L<Announced on 2011-11-20 by Steve
133 Hay|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/11/msg179588.html>
135 This day - is a day of the greatest solemnity! Spain has a king. He has
136 been found. I am that king. Only this very day did I learn of it. I
137 confess, it came to me suddenly in a flash of lightning. I don't understand
138 how I could have thought and imagined that I was a titular councillor. How
139 could such a wild notion enter my head? It's a good thing no one thought of
140 putting me in an insane asylum. Now everything is laid open before me. Now
141 I see everything as on the palm of my hand. And before, I don't understand,
142 before everything around me was in some sort of fog. And all this happens, I
143 think, because people imagine that the human brain is in the head. Not at
144 all: it is brought by a wind from the direction of the Caspian Sea. First
145 off, I announced to Mavra who I am. When she heard that the king of Spain
146 was standing before her, she clasped her hands and nearly died of fright.
147 The stupid woman had never seen a king of Spain before. However, I
148 endeavoured to calm her down and assured her in gracious words of my
149 benevolence and that I was not at all angry that she sometimes polished my
150 boots poorly. They're benighted folk. It's impossible to tell them about
151 lofty matters. She got frightened because she's convinced that all kings of
152 Spain are like Philip II. But I explained to her that there was no
153 resemblance between me and Philip II, and that I didn't have a single
154 Capuchin . . . I didn't go to the office . . . To hell with it! No friends,
155 you won't lure me there now; I'm not going to copy your vile papers!
157 -- Nikolai Gogol, The Diary of a Madman,
158 trans. Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky
160 =head2 v5.15.4 - Steve Jobs
162 L<Announced on 2011-10-20 by Florian
163 Ragwitz|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/10/msg178412.html>
165 A lot of people in our industry haven't had very diverse experiences. So they
166 don't have enough dots to connect, and they end up with very linear solutions
167 without a broad perspective on the problem. The broader one's understanding of
168 the human experience, the better design we will have.
170 =head2 v5.14.2 - L<< Larry Wall, January 12, 1988 <992@devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> |http://groups.google.com/group/comp.sources.d/msg/5d17fa68c250b9b2 >>
172 L<Announced on 2011-09-26 by Florian
173 Ragwitz|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/09/msg177618.html>
176 It's not so much that people don't value the programs after they have them--they
177 do value them. But they're not the sort of thing that would ever catch on if
178 they had to overcome the marketing barrier. (I don't yet know if perl will
179 catch on at all--I'm worried enough about it that I specifically included an
180 awk-to-perl translator just to help it catch on.) Maybe it's all just an
181 inferiority complex. Or maybe I don't like to be mercenary.
183 So I guess I'd say that the reason some software comes free is that the
184 mechanism for selling it is missing, either from the work environment, or from
185 the heart of the programmer.
188 =head2 v5.15.3 - Oscar Wilde, All Art is Quite Useless
190 L<Announced on 2011-09-20 by Stevan
191 Little|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/09/msg177427.html>
193 All art is at once surface and symbol. Those who go beneath
194 the surface do so at their peril. Those who read the symbol
195 do so at their peril.
197 It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors.
198 Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the
199 work is new, complex, and vital. When critics disagree, the
200 artist is in accord with himself.
202 We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as
203 he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless
204 thing is that one admires it intensely.
206 All art is quite useless.
208 -- Oscar Wilde, From the preface to The Picture of Dorian Gray
211 =head2 v5.15.2 - Rainer Maria Rilke, The Third Duina Elegy
213 L<Announced on 2011-08-20 by Ricardo
214 Signes|http://www.xray.mpe.mpg.de/mailing-lists/perl5-porters/2011-08/msg00694.html>
216 True, it is strange to live no more on earth,
217 no longer follow the folkways scarecely learned;
218 not to give roses and other especially auspicious
219 things the significance of a human future;
220 to be no more what one was in infinitely anxious hands,
221 and to put aside even one's name, like a broken plaything.
222 Strange, to wish wishes no longer. Strange, to see
223 all that was related fluttering so loosely in space.
224 And being dead is hard, full of catching-up,
225 so that finally one feels a little eternity.–
226 But the living all make the mistake of too sharp discrimination.
227 Often angels (it's said) don't know if they move
228 among the quick or the dead. The eternal current
229 hurtles all ages along with it forever
230 through both realms and drowns their voices in both.
232 -- Rainer Maria Rilke, Duino, The First Elegy
233 trans., C. F. MacIntyre
235 =head2 v5.15.1 - Greg Egan, "Permutation City"
237 L<Announced on 2011-07-20 by Zefram|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/07/msg175014.html>
239 Carter held out a hand towards the middle of the room. `See that
240 fountain?' A ten-metre-wide marble wedding cake, topped with a
241 winged cherub wrestling a serpent, duly appeared. Water cascaded
242 down from a gushing wound in the cherub's neck. Carter said, `It's
243 being computed by redundancies in the sketch of the city. I can
244 extract the results, because I know exactly where to look for them --
245 but nobody else would have a hope in hell of picking them out.'
247 Peer walked up to the fountain. Even as he approached, he noticed
248 that the spray was intangible; when he dipped his hand in the water
249 around the base he felt nothing, and the motion he made with his
250 fingers left the foaming surface unchanged. They were spying on
251 the calculations, not interacting with them; the fountain was a
254 Carter said, `In your case, of course, nobody will need to know
255 the results. Except you -- and you'll know them because you'll
258 =head2 v5.15.0 - Neil Gaiman, "The Graveyard Book"
260 L<Announced on 2011-06-20 by David Golden|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/06/msg173748.html>
262 If you dare nothing, then when the day is over, nothing is all
263 you will have gained.
265 =head2 v5.12.4 - William Schwenck Gilbert, "Trial By Jury"
267 L<Announced on 2011-06-20 by Leon Brocard|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/06/msg173725.html>
269 You cannot eat breakfast all day,
270 Nor is it the act of a sinner,
271 When breakfast is taken away,
272 To turn his attention to dinner;
273 And it's not in the range of belief,
274 To look upon him as a glutton,
275 Who, when he is tired of beef,
276 Determines to tackle the mutton.
277 Ah! But this I am willing to say,
278 If it will appease her sorrow,
279 I'll marry this lady today,
280 And I'll marry the other tomorrow!
282 =head2 v5.14.1 - L<< Larry Wall, January 12, 1988 <992@devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> |http://groups.google.com/group/comp.sources.d/msg/5d17fa68c250b9b2 >>
284 L<Announced on 2011-06-16 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/06/msg173650.html>
286 At this point I'm no longer working for a company that makes me sign
287 my life away, but by now I'm in the habit. Besides, I still harbor
288 the deep-down suspicion that nobody would pay money for what I write,
289 since most of it just helps you do something better that you could
290 already do some other way. How much money would you personally pay
291 to upgrade from readnews to rn? How much money would you pay for
292 the patch program? As for warp, it's a mere game. And anything you
293 can do with perl you can eventually do with an amazing and totally
294 unreadable conglomeration of awk, sed, sh and C.
296 =head2 v5.12.4-RC2 - James Russell Lowell, "Eleanor makes macaroons"
298 L<Announced on 2011-06-15 by Leon Brocard|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/06/msg173609.html>
300 Now for sugar, -- nay, our plan
301 Tolerates no work of man.
302 Hurry, then, ye golden bees;
303 Fetch your clearest honey, please,
304 Garnered on a Yorkshire moor,
305 While the last larks sing and soar,
306 From the heather-blossoms sweet
307 Where sea-breeze and sunshine meet,
308 And the Augusts mask as Junes, --
309 Eleanor makes macaroons!
311 =head2 v5.12.4-RC1 - Ogden Nash, "The Clean Plater"
313 L<Announced on 2011-06-08 by Leon Brocard|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/06/msg173352.html>
315 Pheasant is pleasant, of course,
316 And terrapin, too, is tasty,
317 Lobster I freely endorse,
318 In pate or patty or pasty.
319 But there's nothing the matter with butter,
320 And nothing the matter with jam,
321 And the warmest greetings I utter
322 To the ham and the yam and the clam.
325 And I think very fondly of food.
326 Through I'm broody at times
327 When bothered by rhymes,
331 =head2 v5.14.0 - L<< Larry Wall, January 12, 1988 <992@devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> |http://groups.google.com/group/comp.sources.d/msg/5d17fa68c250b9b2 >>
333 L<Announced on 2011-05-14 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/05/msg172326.html>
335 At the start of any project, I'm programming primarily to please
336 myself. (The two chief virtues in a programmer are laziness and
337 impatience.) After a while somebody looks over my shoulder and says,
338 "That's neat. It'd be neater if it did such-and-so." So the thing
339 gets neater. Pretty soon (a year or two) I have an rn, a warp, a patch,
340 or a perl. One of these years I'll have a metaconfig.
342 I then say to myself, "I don't want my life's work to die when this
343 computer is scrapped, so I should let some other people use this. If I
344 ask my company to sell this, it'll never see the light of day, and nobody
345 would pay much for it anyway. If I sell it myself, I'll be in trouble with
346 my company, to whom I signed my life away when I was hired. If I give it
347 away, I can pretend it was worthless in the first place, so my company
348 won't care. In any event, it's easier to ask forgiveness than permission."
350 So a freely distributable program is born.
352 =head2 v5.14.0-RC3 - American Airlines Gate Agent, last call
354 L<Announced on 2011-05-11 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/05/msg172282.html>
356 This is the last call for flight 1697 with service to Chicago and
357 continuing service to San Francisco. All passengers should already be
358 aboard. If you aren't aboard at this time, you will be denied boarding
359 and your bags will be offloaded.
361 =head2 v5.14.0-RC2 - Greg Grandin, Fordlandia, "the Rise and Fall of Henry Ford's Forgotten Jungle City"
363 L<Announced on 2011-05-04 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/05/msg171879.html>
365 Over the course of nearly two decades, Ford would spend tens of millions
366 of dollars founding not one but, after the plantation was defastated
367 by leaf blight, two American towns, complete with central squares,
368 sidewalks, indoor plumbing, hospitals, manicured lawns, movie theaters,
369 swimming pools, golf courses, and, of course, Model Ts and As rolling
370 down their paved streets.
372 Back in America, newspapers kept up their drumbeat celebration, only
373 obliquely referencing reports that things were not progressing as the
374 company had hoped. But there was one note of skepticism. In late 1928,
375 the Washington Post ran an editorial that read in its entirety: "Ford will
376 govern a rubber plantation in Brazil larger than North Carolina. This is
377 the first time he has applied quantity production methods to trouble"
379 =head2 v5.14.0-RC1 - Bill Bryson, "In a Sunburned Country"
381 L<Announced on 2011-04-20 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/04/msg171253.html>
383 But then Australia is such a difficult country to keep track of. On
384 my first visit, some years ago, I passed the time on the long flight
385 reading a history of Australian politics in the twentieth century,
386 wherein I encountered the startling fact that in 1967 the prime minister,
387 Harold Holt, was strolling along a beach in Victoria when he plunged into
388 the surf and vanished. No trace of the poor man was ever seen again.
389 This seemed doubly astounding to meE<0x2014>first that Australia could
390 just I<lose> a prime minister (I mean, come on) and second that news of
391 this had never reached me.
393 =head2 v5.13.11 - Walt Whitman, L<Leaves of Grass|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leaves_of_Grass>
395 L<Announced on 2011-02-20 by Florian Ragwitz|http://www.xray.mpe.mpg.de/mailing-lists/perl5-porters/2011-03/msg00560.html>
397 When the full-grown poet came,
398 Out spake pleased Nature (the round impassive globe, with all its
399 shows of day and night,) saying, He is mine;
400 But out spake too the Soul of man, proud, jealous and unreconciled,
401 Nay he is mine alone;
402 --Then the full-grown poet stood between the two, and took each
404 And to-day and ever so stands, as blender, uniter, tightly holding hands,
405 Which he will never release until he reconciles the two,
406 And wholly and joyously blends them.
408 =head2 v5.13.10 - Egill Skalla-Grímsson, L<Egils saga Skalla-Grímssonar|http://www.heimskringla.no/wiki/Egils_saga_Skalla-Gr%C3%ADmssonar>
410 L<Announced on 2011-02-20 by Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/02/msg169340.html>
412 Skalat maðr rúnar rísta,
414 Þat verðr mörgum manni,
415 es of myrkvan staf villisk.
417 tíu launstafi ristna.
419 langs ofrtrega fengit.
421 =head2 v5.13.9 - John F Kennedy, L<Inaugural Address January 20, 1961|http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/John_F._Kennedy%27s_Inaugural_Address>
423 L<Announced on 2011-01-20 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/01/msg168335.html>
425 In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been
426 granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I
427 do not shrink from this responsibility -- I welcome it. I do not believe
428 that any of us would exchange places with any other people or any other
429 generation. The energy, the faith, the devotion which we bring to this
430 endeavor will light our country and all who serve it. And the glow from
431 that fire can truly light the world.
433 And so, my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you;
434 ask what you can do for your country.
436 My fellow citizens of the world, ask not what America will do for you,
437 but what together we can do for the freedom of man.
439 Finally, whether you are citizens of America or citizens of the world,
440 ask of us here the same high standards of strength and sacrifice which
441 we ask of you. With a good conscience our only sure reward, with history
442 the final judge of our deeds, let us go forth to lead the land we love,
443 asking His blessing and His help, but knowing that here on earth God's
444 work must truly be our own.
446 =head2 v5.13.8 - Roger Williams, L<"The Fifth Gift"|http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2005/8/19/21304/8493>
448 L<Announced on 2010-12-19 by Zefram|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/12/msg167271.html>
450 The aliens called the box a "matter generator," but we'd be more inclined
451 to call it a matter duplicator. By connecting switches and potentiometers
452 between the copper posts it was possible to make the box mark off two
453 cubic rectangular areas of volume. Make a certain contact, and these
454 areas would be isolated within perfectly reflective fields. They could
455 be expanded or contracted by altering resistances between other posts.
456 As I worked out the user interface I built a little control panel for
457 the device. It was actually a clever way for the aliens to do things;
458 instead of trying to build controls we could use, they built us an
459 interface we could attach to controls that made sense to us. It could
462 Once you had made the contact that established the shielded volumes,
463 if you made another certain contact the contents of the first volume
464 were copied to the second. The machine copied metal, plastic, steel,
465 and diamond with equal ease. Copies of copies of copies of copies were
466 indistinguishable from the originals at any magnification, even using
467 techniques like X-ray crystallography.
469 =head2 v5.13.7 - Andy Wachowski and Lana Wachowski, 'The Matrix'
471 L<Announced on 2010-11-20 by Chris 'BinGOs' Williams|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/11/msg166162.html>
473 [Neo sees a black cat walk by them, and then a similar black cat walk by them just like the first one]
477 [Everyone freezes right in their tracks]
479 Trinity: What did you just say?
480 Neo: Nothing. Just had a little deja vu.
481 Trinity: What did you see?
482 Cypher: What happened?
483 Neo: A black cat went past us, and then another that looked just like it.
484 Trinity: How much like it? Was it the same cat?
485 Neo: It might have been. I'm not sure.
486 Morpheus: Switch! Apoc!
488 Trinity: A deja vu is usually a glitch in the Matrix. It happens when they change something.
490 =head2 v5.13.6 - Haruki Murakami, "Kafka on the Shore"
492 L<Announced on 2010-10-20 by Tatsuhiko Miyagawa|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/10/msg165183.html>
494 The boy called Crow softly rests a hand on my shoulder, and with that
497 "From now on -- no matter what -- you've got to be the world's toughest
498 fifteen-year-old. That's the only way you're going to survive. And in order
499 to do that, you've got to figure out what it means to be tough. You following
502 I keep my eyes closed and don't reply. I just want to sink off into sleep
503 like this, his hand on my shoulder. I hear the faint flutter of wings.
505 "You're going to be the world's toughest fifteen-year-old," Crow whispers
506 as I try to fall asleep. Like he was carving the words in a deep blue tattoo
509 (Translated from Japanese by Philip Gabriel)
511 =head2 v5.13.5 - Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, "The Room in the Dragon Volant"
513 L<Announced on 2010-09-19 by Steve Hay|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/09/msg164238.html>
515 Candle in hand I stepped in. I do not know whether the quality of
516 air, long undisturbed, is peculiar; to me it has always seemed so, and
517 the damp smell of the old masonry hung in this atmosphere. My candle
518 faintly lighted the bare stone wall that enclosed the stair, the foot
519 of which I could not see. Down I went, and a few turns brought me to
520 the stone floor. Here was another door, of the simple, old, oak kind,
521 deep sunk in the thickness of the wall. The large end of the key
522 fitted this. The lock was stiff; I set the candle down upon the
523 stair, and applied both hands; it turned with difficulty, and as it
524 revolved, uttered a shriek that alarmed me for my secret.
526 For some minutes I did not move. In a little time, however, I took
527 courage, and opened the door. The night-air floating in puffed out
528 the candle. There was a thicket of holly and underwood, as dense as a
529 jungle, close about the door. I should have been in pitch-darkness,
530 were it not that through the topmost leaves there twinkled, here and
531 there, a glimmer of moonshine.
533 Softly, lest any one should have opened his window at the sound of the
534 rusty bolt, I struggled through this till I gained a view of the open
535 grounds. Here I found that the brushwood spread a good way up the
536 park, uniting with the wood that approached the little temple I have
539 =head2 v5.13.4 - Lewis Carroll, "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"
541 L<Announced on 2010-08-20 by Florian Ragwitz|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/08/msg163150.html>
543 `How the creatures order one about, and make one repeat lessons!' thought Alice;
544 `I might as well be at school at once.' However, she got up, and began to repeat
545 it, but her head was so full of the Lobster Quadrille, that she hardly knew what
546 she was saying, and the words came very queer indeed:--
548 "'Tis the voice of the Lobster; I heard him declare,
549 "You have baked me too brown, I must sugar my hair."
550 As a duck with its eyelids, so he with his nose
551 Trims his belt and his buttons, and turns out his toes.'
554 `That's different from what I used to say when I was a child,' said the Gryphon.
556 `Well, I never heard it before,' said the Mock Turtle; `but it sounds uncommon
559 Alice said nothing; she had sat down with her face in her hands, wondering if
560 anything would ever happen in a natural way again.
562 `I should like to have it explained,' said the Mock Turtle.
564 `She can't explain it,' said the Gryphon hastily. `Go on with the next verse.'
566 `But about his toes?' the Mock Turtle persisted. `How could he turn them out
567 with his nose, you know?'
569 `It's the first position in dancing.' Alice said; but was dreadfully puzzled by
570 the whole thing, and longed to change the subject.
572 =head2 v5.13.3 - Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett, "Good Omens"
574 L<Announced on 2010-07-20 by David Golden|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/07/msg162230.html>
576 Look at Crowley, doing 110 mph on the M40 heading towards
577 Oxfordshire. Even the most resolutely casual observer would
578 notice a number of strange things about him. The clenched teeth,
579 for example, or the dull red glow coming from behind his
580 sunglasses. And the car. The car was a definite hint.
582 Crowley had started the journey in his Bentley, and he was
583 dammned if he wasn't going to finish it in the Bentley as well.
584 Not that even the kind of car buff who owns his own pair of
585 motoring goggles would have been able to tell it was a vintage
586 Bentley. Not any more. They wouldn't have been able to tell
587 that it was a Bentley. They would only offer fifty-fifty that it
588 had ever even been a car.
590 There was no paint left on it, for a start. It might still have
591 been black, where it wasn't a rusty, smudged reddish-brown, but
592 this was a dull charcoal black. It traveled in its own ball of
593 flame, like a space capsule making a particularly difficult
596 There was a thin skin of crusted, melted rubber left around the
597 metal wheel rims, but seeing that the wheel rims were still
598 somhow riding an inch above the road surface this didn't seem to
599 make an awful lot of difference to the suspension.
601 It should have fallen apart miles back.
603 =head2 v5.13.2 - Iain M Banks, "Use of Weapons"
605 L<Announced on 2010-06-22 by Matt S Trout|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/06/msg161112.html>
607 We deal in the moral equivalent of black holes, where the normal laws -
608 the rules of right and wrong that people imagine apply everywhere else
609 in the universe - break down; beyond those metaphysical event-horizons,
610 there exist ... special circumstances.
612 =head2 v5.13.1 - Miguel de Unamuno, "The Sepulchre of Don Quixote"
614 L<Announced on 2010-05-20 by Ricardo Signes|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/05/msg160275.html>
616 And if anyone shall come to you and say that he knows how to construct
617 bridges and that perhaps a time will come when you will wish to avail
618 yourself of his science in order to cross over a river, out with him! Out
619 with the engineer! Rivers will be crossed by wading or swimming them, even
620 if half the crusaders drown themselves. Let the engineer go off and build
621 bridges somewhere else, where they are badly wanted. For those who go in
622 quest of the sepulchre, faith is bridge enough.
624 =head2 v5.13.0 - Jules Verne, "A Journey to the Centre of the Earth"
626 L<Announced on 2010-04-20 by LE<0xe9>on Brocard|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/04/msg159275.html>
628 The heat still remained at quite a supportable degree. With an
629 involuntary shudder, I reflected on what the heat must have been
630 when the volcano of Sneffels was pouring its smoke, flames, and
631 streams of boiling lava -- all of which must have come up by the
632 road we were now following. I could imagine the torrents of hot
633 seething stone darting on, bubbling up with accompaniments of
634 smoke, steam, and sulphurous stench!
636 "Only to think of the consequences," I mused, "if the old
637 volcano were once more to set to work."
639 =head2 v5.12.3 - Howard W. Campbell, Jr., "Reflections on Not Participating in Current Events"
641 L<Announced on 2011-01-21 by Ricardo Signes|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2011/01/msg168368.html>
643 I saw a huge steam roller,
644 It blotted out the sun.
645 The people all lay down, lay down;
646 They did not try to run.
647 My love and I, we looked amazed
648 Upon the gory mystery.
649 'Lie down, lie down!' the people cried.
650 'The great machine is history!'
651 My love and I, we ran away,
652 The engine did not find us.
653 We ran up to a mountain top,
654 Left history far behind us.
655 Perhaps we should have stayed and died,
656 But somehow we don't think so.
657 We went to see where history'd been,
658 And my, the dead did stink so.
660 =head2 v5.12.2 - William Gibson, "Pattern Recognition"
662 L<Announced on 2010-09-06 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/09/msg163852.html>
664 CPUs. Cayce Pollard Units. That's what Damien calls the clothing
665 she wears. CPUs are either black, white, or gray, and ideally
666 seem to have come into this world without human intervention.
668 What people take for relentless minimalism is a side effect
669 of too much exposure to the reactor-cores of fashion. This
670 has resulted in a remorseless paring-down of what she can and
671 will wear. She is, literally, allergic to fashion. She can
672 only tolerate things that could have been worn, to a general
673 lack of comment, during any year between 1945 and 2000. She's a
674 design-free zone, a one-woman school of and whose very austerity
675 periodically threatens to spawn its own cult.
677 =head2 v5.12.2-RC1 - William Gibson, "Pattern Recognition"
679 L<Announced on 2010-08-31 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/08/msg163670.html>
681 The front page opens, familiar as a friend's living room. A frame-grab
682 from #48 serves as backdrop, dim and almost monochrome, no characters in
683 view. This is one of the sequences that generate comparisons with
684 Tarkovsky. She only knows Tarkovsky from stills, really, though she did
685 once fall asleep during a screening of The Stalker, going under on an
686 endless pan, the camera aimed straight down, in close-up, at a puddle on
687 a ruined mosaic floor. But she is not one of those who think that much
688 will be gained by analysis of the maker's imagined influences. The cult
689 of the footage is rife with subcults, claiming every possible influence.
690 Truffaut, Peckinpah -- The Peckinpah people, among the least likely, are
691 still waiting for the guns to be drawn.
693 =head2 v5.12.1 - Kurt Vonnegut, "Cat's Cradle"
695 L<Announced on 2010-05-16 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/05/msg160109.html>
697 "Now suppose," chortled Dr. Breed, enjoying himself, "that there were
698 many possible ways in which water could crystallize, could freeze.
699 Suppose that the sort of ice we skate upon and put into highballs --
700 what we might call ice-one -- is only one of several types of ice.
701 Suppose water always froze as ice-one on Earth because it had never
702 had a seed to teach it how to form ice-two, ice-three, ice-four
703 ...? And suppose," he rapped on his desk with his old hand again,
704 "that there were one form, which we will call ice-nine -- a crystal as
705 hard as this desk -- with a melting point of, let us say, one-hundred
706 degrees Fahrenheit, or, better still, a melting point of one-hundred-
709 =head2 v5.12.1-RC2 - Kurt Vonnegut, "Cat's Cradle"
711 L<Announced on 2010-05-13 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/05/msg160066.html>
713 San Lorenzo was fifty miles long and twenty miles wide, I learned from
714 the supplement to the New York Sunday Times. Its population was four
715 hundred, fifty thousand souls, "...all fiercely dedicated to the ideals
718 Its highest point, Mount McCabe, was eleven thousand feet above sea
719 level. Its capital was Bolivar, "...a strikingly modern city built on a
720 harbor capable of sheltering the entire United States Navy." The principal
721 exports were sugar, coffee, bananas, indigo, and handcrafted novelties.
723 =head2 v5.12.1-RC1 - Kurt Vonnegut, "Cat's Cradle"
725 L<Announced on 2010-05-09 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/05/msg159971.html>
727 Which brings me to the Bokononist concept of a wampeter. A wampeter is
728 the pivot of a karass. No karass is without a wampeter, Bokonon tells us,
729 just as no wheel is without a hub. Anything can be a wampeter: a tree,
730 a rock, an animal, an idea, a book, a melody, the Holy Grail. Whatever
731 it is, the members of its karass revolve about it in the majestic chaos
732 of a spiral nebula. The orbits of the members of a karass about their
733 common wampeter are spiritual orbits, naturally. It is souls and not
734 bodies that revolve. As Bokonon invites us to sing:
736 Around and around and around we spin,
737 With feet of lead and wings of tin . . .
739 =head2 v5.12.0 - Lewis Carroll, "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"
741 L<Announced on 2010-04-12 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/04/msg158820.html>
743 'Please would you tell me,' said Alice, a little timidly, for she was
744 not quite sure whether it was good manners for her to speak first, 'why
745 your cat grins like that?'
747 'It's a Cheshire cat,' said the Duchess, 'and that's why. Pig!'
749 She said the last word with such sudden violence that Alice quite
750 jumped; but she saw in another moment that it was addressed to the baby,
751 and not to her, so she took courage, and went on again:--
753 'I didn't know that Cheshire cats always grinned; in fact, I didn't know
754 that cats COULD grin.'
756 'They all can,' said the Duchess; 'and most of 'em do.'
758 =head2 v5.12.0-RC5 - Lewis Carroll, "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"
760 L<Announced on 2010-04-09 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/04/msg158720.html>
762 'Not QUITE right, I'm afraid,' said Alice, timidly; 'some of the words
765 'It is wrong from beginning to end,' said the Caterpillar decidedly, and
766 there was silence for some minutes.
768 =head2 v5.12.0-RC4 - Lewis Carroll, "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"
770 L<Announced on 2010-04-06 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/04/msg158567.html>
772 'It was much pleasanter at home,' thought poor Alice, 'when one wasn't
773 always growing larger and smaller, and being ordered about by mice and
774 rabbits. I almost wish I hadn't gone down that rabbit-hole--and yet--and
775 yet--it's rather curious, you know, this sort of life! I do wonder what
776 can have happened to me! When I used to read fairy-tales, I fancied that
777 kind of thing never happened, and now here I am in the middle of one!
779 =head2 v5.12.0-RC3 - Lewis Carroll, "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"
781 L<Announced on 2010-04-02 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/04/msg158346.html>
783 At last the Mouse, who seemed to be a person of authority among them,
784 called out, 'Sit down, all of you, and listen to me! I'LL soon make you
785 dry enough!' They all sat down at once, in a large ring, with the Mouse
786 in the middle. Alice kept her eyes anxiously fixed on it, for she felt
787 sure she would catch a bad cold if she did not get dry very soon.
789 'Ahem!' said the Mouse with an important air, 'are you all ready? This
790 is the driest thing I know. Silence all round, if you please! "William
791 the Conqueror, whose cause was favoured by the pope, was soon submitted
792 to by the English, who wanted leaders, and had been of late much
793 accustomed to usurpation and conquest. Edwin and Morcar, the earls of
794 Mercia and Northumbria --"'
796 =head2 v5.12.0-RC2 - no announcement
798 Available on CPAN since 2010-04-01.
800 =head2 v5.12.0-RC1 - Lewis Carroll, "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"
802 L<Announced on 2010-03-29 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/03/msg158060.html>
804 So she was considering in her own mind (as well as she could, for the
805 hot day made her feel very sleepy and stupid), whether the pleasure of
806 making a daisy-chain would be worth the trouble of getting up and
807 picking the daisies, when suddenly a White Rabbit with pink eyes ran
810 There was nothing so VERY remarkable in that; nor did Alice think it so
811 VERY much out of the way to hear the Rabbit say to itself, 'Oh dear! Oh
812 dear! I shall be late!' (when she thought it over afterwards, it
813 occurred to her that she ought to have wondered at this, but at the time
814 it all seemed quite natural); but when the Rabbit actually TOOK A WATCH
815 OUT OF ITS WAISTCOAT-POCKET, and looked at it, and then hurried on,
816 Alice started to her feet, for it flashed across her mind that she had
817 never before seen a rabbit with either a waistcoat-pocket, or a watch to
818 take out of it, and burning with curiosity, she ran across the field
819 after it, and fortunately was just in time to see it pop down a large
820 rabbit-hole under the hedge.
822 In another moment down went Alice after it, never once considering how
823 in the world she was to get out again.
825 =head2 v5.12.0-RC0 - no epigraph
827 L<Announced on 2020-03-21 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/03/msg157761.html>
829 =head2 v5.11.5 - Samuel Taylor Coleridge, "Christabel"
831 L<Announced on 2010-02-21 by Steve Hay|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/02/msg156957.html>
833 A little child, a limber elf,
834 Singing, dancing to itself,
835 A fairy thing with red round cheeks,
836 That always finds, and never seeks,
837 Makes such a vision to the sight
838 As fills a father's eyes with light;
839 And pleasures flow in so thick and fast
840 Upon his heart, that he at last
841 Must needs express his love's excess
842 With words of unmeant bitterness.
843 Perhaps 'tis pretty to force together
844 Thoughts so all unlike each other;
845 To mutter and mock a broken charm,
846 To dally with wrong that does no harm.
847 Perhaps 'tis tender too and pretty
848 At each wild word to feel within
849 A sweet recoil of love and pity.
850 And what, if in a world of sin
851 (O sorrow and shame should this be true!)
852 Such giddiness of heart and brain
853 Comes seldom save from rage and pain,
854 So talks as it's most used to do.
856 =head2 v5.11.4 - Fyodor Dostoevsky, "Crime and Punishment"
858 L<Announced on 2010-01-20 by Ricardo Signes|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2010/01/msg155848.html>
860 And you don't suppose that I went into it headlong like a fool? I went
861 into it like a wise man, and that was just my destruction. And you
862 mustn't suppose that I didn't know, for instance, that if I began to
863 question myself whether I had the right to gain power -- I certainly
864 hadn't the right -- or that if I asked myself whether a human being is a
865 louse it proved that it wasn't so for me, though it might be for a man
866 who would go straight to his goal without asking questions.... If I
867 worried myself all those days, wondering whether Napoleon would have
868 done it or not, I felt clearly of course that I wasn't Napoleon.
870 =head2 v5.11.3 - Mark Twain, "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer"
872 L<Announced on 2009-12-20 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2009/12/msg154838.html>
874 "Say -- I'm going in a swimming, I am. Don't you wish you could? But of
875 course you'd druther work -- wouldn't you? Course you would!"
877 Tom contemplated the boy a bit, and said: "What do you call work?"
879 "Why ain't that work?"
881 Tom resumed his whitewashing, and answered carelessly: "Well, maybe it
882 is, and maybe it aint. All I know, is, it suits Tom Sawyer."
884 "Oh come, now, you don't mean to let on that you like it?"
886 The brush continued to move. "Like it? Well I don't see why I oughtn't
887 to like it. Does a boy get a chance to whitewash a fence every day?"
889 That put the thing in a new light. Ben stopped nibbling his apple. Tom
890 swept his brush daintily back and forth -- stepped back to note the effect
891 -- added a touch here and there-criticised the effect again -- Ben
892 watching every move and getting more and more interested, more and more
893 absorbed. Presently he said: "Say, Tom, let me whitewash a little."
895 =head2 v5.11.2 - Michael Marshall Smith, "Only Forward"
897 L<Announced on 2009-11-20 by |http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2009/11/msg153646.html>
899 The streets were pretty quiet, which was nice. They're always quiet here
900 at that time: you have to be wearing a black jacket to be out on the
901 streets between seven and nine in the evening, and not many people in
902 the area have black jackets. It's just one of those things. I currently
903 live in Colour Neighbourhood, which is for people who are heavily into
904 colour. All the streets and buildings are set for instant colourmatch:
905 as you walk down the road they change hue to offset whatever you're
906 wearing. When the streets are busy it's kind of intense, and anyone
907 prone to epileptic seizures isn't allowed to live in the Neighbourhood,
908 however much they're into colour.
910 =head2 v5.11.1 - Joseph Heller, "Catch-22"
912 L<Announced on 2009-10-20 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2009/10/msg152360.html>
914 Milo had been caught red-handed in the act of plundering his countrymen,
915 and, as a result, his stock had never been higher. He proved good as his
916 word when a rawboned major from Minnesota curled his lip in rebellious
917 disavowal and demanded his share of the syndicate Milo kept saying
918 everybody owned. Milo met the challenge by writing the words "A Share"
919 on the nearest scrap of paper and handing it away with a virtuous disdain
920 that won the envy and admiration of almost everyone who knew him. His
921 glory was at a peak, and Colonel Cathcart, who knew and admired his
922 war record, was astonished by the deferential humility with which Mil
923 presented himself at Group Headquarters and made his fantastic appeal
924 for more hazardous assignment.
926 =head2 v5.11.0 - Mikhail Bulgakov, "The Master and Margarita"
928 L<Announced on 2009-10-02 by Jesse Vincent|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2009/10/msg151376.html>
930 Whispers of an "evil power" were heard in lines at dairy shops, in
931 streetcars, stores, arguments, kitchens, suburban and long-distance
932 trains, at stations large and small, in dachas and on beaches. Needless
933 to say, truly mature and cultured people did not tell these stories
934 about an evil power's visit to the capital. In fact, they even made fun
935 of them and tried to talk sense into those who told them. Nevertheless,
936 facts are facts, as they say, and cannot simply be dismissed without
937 explanation: somebody had visited the capital. The charred cinders of
938 Griboyedov alone, and many other things besides, confirmed it. Cultured
939 people shared the point of view of the investigating team: it was the
940 work of a gang of hypnotists and ventriloquists magnificently skilled in
943 =head2 v5.10.1 - Right Hon. James Hacker MP, "The Complete Yes Minister: The Diaries of a Cabinet Minister"
945 L<Announced on 2009-09-23 by Dave Mitchell|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2009/08/msg150172.html>
947 'Briefly, sir, I am the Permanent Under-Secretary of State, known as
948 the Permanent Secretary. Woolley here is your Principal Private
949 Secretary. I, too, have a Principal Private Secretary, and he is the
950 Principal Private Secretary to the Permanent Secretary. Directly
951 responsible to me are ten Deputy Secretaries, eighty-seven Under
952 Secretaries and two hundred and nineteen Assistant Secretaries.
953 Directly responsible to the Principal Private Secretaries are plain
954 Private Secretaries. The Prime Minister will be appointing two
955 Parliamentary Under-Secretaries and you will be appointing your own
956 Parliamentary Private Secretary.'
958 'Can they all type?' I joked.
960 'None of us can type, Minister,' replied Sir Humphrey smoothly. 'Mrs
961 McKay types - she is your Secretary.'
963 I couldn't tell whether or not he was joking. 'What a pity,' I said.
964 'We could have opened an agency.'
966 Sir Humphrey and Bernard laughed. 'Very droll, sir,' said Sir
967 Humphrey. 'Most amusing, sir,' said Bernard. Were they genuinely
968 amused at my wit, or just being rather patronising? 'I suppose they
969 all say that, do they?' I ventured.
971 Sir Humphrey reassured me on that. 'Certainly not, Minister,' he
972 replied. 'Not quite all.'
974 =head2 v5.10.1-RC2 - no epigraph
976 L<Announced on 2009-08-18 by Dave Mitchell|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2009/08/msg150015.html>
978 =head2 v5.10.1-RC1 - no epigraph
980 L<Announced on 2009-08-06 by Dave Mitchell|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2009/08/msg149498.html>
982 =head2 v5.10.0 - Laurence Sterne, "Tristram Shandy"
984 L<Announced on 2007-12-18 by Rafael Garcia-Suarez|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2007/12/msg131636.html>
986 He would often declare, in speaking his thoughts upon the subject, that
987 he did not conceive how the greatest family in England could stand it
988 out against an uninterrupted succession of six or seven short
989 noses.--And for the contrary reason, he would generally add, That it
990 must be one of the greatest problems in civil life, where the same
991 number of long and jolly noses, following one another in a direct line,
992 did not raise and hoist it up into the best vacancies in the kingdom.
994 =head2 v5.10.0-RC2 - no epigraph
996 L<Announced on 2007-11-25 by Rafael Garcia-Suarez|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2007/11/msg130978.html>
998 =head2 v5.10.0-RC1 - no epigraph
1000 L<Announced on 2007-11-17 by Rafael Garcia-Suarez|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2007/11/msg130653.html>
1002 =head2 v5.9.5 - no announcement
1004 L<Pre-announced on 2007-07-07 by Rafael Garcia-Suarez|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2007/07/msg126358.html>,
1005 available on CPAN with same date, but never actually announced.
1007 =head2 v5.9.4 - no epigraph
1009 L<Announced on 2006-08-15 by Rafael Garcia-Suarez|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2006/08/msg115782.html>
1011 =head2 v5.9.3 - no epigraph
1013 L<Announced on 2006-01-28 by Rafael Garcia-Suarez|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2006/01/msg109086.html>
1015 =head2 v5.9.2 - Thomas Pynchon, "V"
1017 L<Announced on 2005-04-01 by Rafael Garcia-Suarez|http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=20050401150702.2b4a70d5@grubert.mandrakesoft.com>
1019 This word flip was weird. Every recording date of McClintic's he'd
1020 gotten into the habit of talking electricity with the audio men and
1021 technicians of the studio. McClintic once couldn't have cared less
1022 about electricity, but now it seemed if that was helping him reach a
1023 bigger audience, some digging, some who would never dig, but all
1024 paying and those royalties keeping the Triumph in gas and McClintic
1025 in J. Press suits, then McClintic ought to be grateful to
1026 electricity, ought maybe to learn a little more about it. So he'd
1027 picked up some here and there, and one day last summer he got around
1028 to talking stochastic music and digital computers with one
1029 technician. Out of the conversation had come Set/Reset, which was
1030 getting to be a signature for the group. He had found out from this
1031 sound man about a two-triode circuit called a flip-flop, which when
1032 it turned on could be one of two ways, depending on which tube was
1033 conducting and which was cut off: set or reset, flip or flop.
1035 "And that," the man said, "can be yes or no, or one or zero. And
1036 that is what you might call one of the basic units, or specialized
1037 `cells' in a big `electronic brain.' "
1039 "Crazy," said McClintic, having lost him back there someplace. But
1040 one thing that did occur to him was if a computer's brain could go
1041 flip or flop, why so could a musician's. As long as you were flop,
1042 everything was cool. But where did the trigger-pulse come from to
1045 =head2 v5.9.1 - Tom Stoppard, "Arcadia"
1047 L<Announced on 2004-03-16 by Rafael Garcia-Suarez|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/8587d77c565f2d43>
1049 Aren't you supposed to have a pony?
1051 =head2 v5.9.0 - Doris Lessing, "Martha Quest"
1053 L<Announced on 2003-10-27 by Rafael Garcia-Suarez|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/63a8c34385de82a1>
1055 What of October, that ambiguous month
1057 =head2 v5.8.9 - Right Hon. James Hacker MP, "The Complete Yes Minister: The Diaries of a Cabinet Minister"
1059 L<Announced on 2008-12-14 by Nicholas Clark|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2008/12/msg142571.html>
1061 Frank and I, unlike the civil servants, were still puzzled that such a
1062 proposal as the Europass could even be seriously under consideration by
1063 the FCO. We can both see clearly that it is wonderful ammunition for the
1064 anti-Europeans. I asked Humphrey if the Foreign Office doesn't realise
1065 how damaging this would be to the European ideal?
1067 'I'm sure they do, Minister, he said. That's why they support it.'
1069 This was even more puzzling, since I'd always been under the impression
1070 that the FO is pro-Europe. 'Is it or isn't it?' I asked Humphrey.
1072 'Yes and no,' he replied of course, 'if you'll pardon the
1073 expression. The Foreign Office is pro-Europe because it is really
1074 anti-Europe. In fact the Civil Service was united in its desire to make
1075 sure the Common Market didn't work. That's why we went into it.'
1077 This sounded like a riddle to me. I asked him to explain further. And
1078 basically his argument was as follows: Britain has had the same foreign
1079 policy objective for at least the last five hundred years - to create a
1080 disunited Europe. In that cause we have fought with the Dutch against
1081 the Spanish, with the Germans against the French, with the French and
1082 Italians against the Germans, and with the French against the Italians
1083 and Germans. [The Dutch rebellion against Phillip II of Spain, the
1084 Napoleonic Wars, the First World War, and the Second World War - Ed.]
1086 In other words, divide and rule. And the Foreign Office can see no
1087 reason to change when it has worked so well until now.
1089 I was aware of this, naturally, but I regarded it as ancient history.
1090 Humphrey thinks that it is, in fact, current policy. It was necessary
1091 for us to break up the EEC, he explained, so we had to get inside. We
1092 had previously tried to break it up from the outside, but that didn't
1093 work. [A reference to our futile and short-lived involvement in EFTA,
1094 the European Free Trade Association, founded in 1960 and which the UK
1095 left in 1972 - Ed.] Now that we're in, we are able to make a complete
1096 pig's breakfast out of it. We've now set the Germans against the French,
1097 the French against the Italians, the Italians against the Dutch... and
1098 the Foreign office is terribly happy. It's just like old time.
1100 I was staggered by all of this. I thought that the all of us who are
1101 publicly pro-European believed in the European ideal. I said this to Sir
1102 Humphrey, and he simply chuckled.
1104 So I asked him: if we don't believe in the European Ideal, why are we
1105 pushing to increase the membership?
1107 'Same reason,' came the reply. 'It's just like the United Nations. The
1108 more members it has, the more arguments you can stir up, and the more
1109 futile and impotent it becomes.'
1111 This all strikes me as the most appalling cynicism, and I said so.
1113 Sir Humphrey agreed completely. 'Yes Minister. We call it
1114 diplomacy. It's what made Britain great, you know.'
1116 =head2 v5.8.9-RC2 - Right Hon. James Hacker MP, "The Complete Yes Minister: The Diaries of a Cabinet Minister"
1118 L<Announced on 2008-12-06 by Nicholas Clark|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2008/11/msg142422.html>
1120 There was silence in the office. I didn't know what we were going to do
1121 about the four hundred new people supervising our economy drive or the
1122 four hundred new people for the Bureaucratic Watchdog Office, or
1123 anything! I simply sat and waited and hoped that my head would stop
1124 thumping and that some idea would be suggested by someone sometime soon.
1126 Sir Humphrey obliged. 'Minister... if we were to end the economy drive
1127 and close the Bureaucratic Watchdog Office we could issue an immediate
1128 press announcement that you had axed eight hundred jobs.' He had
1129 obviously thought this out carefully in advance, for at this moment he
1130 produced a slim folder from under his arm. 'If you'd like to approve
1133 I couldn't believe the impertinence of the suggestion. Axed eight
1134 hundred jobs? 'But no one was ever doing these jobs,' I pointed out
1135 incredulously. 'No one's been appointed yet.'
1137 'Even greater economy,' he replied instantly. 'We've saved eight hundred
1138 redundancy payments as well.'
1140 'But...' I attempted to explain '... that's just phony. It's dishonest,
1141 it's juggling with figures, it's pulling the wool over people's eyes.'
1143 'A government press release, in fact.' said Humphrey.
1145 =head2 v5.8.9-RC1 - Right Hon. James Hacker MP, "The Complete Yes Minister: The Diaries of a Cabinet Minister"
1147 L<Announced on 2008-11-10 by Nicholas Clark|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2008/11/msg141515.html>
1149 A jumbo jet touched down, with BURANDAN AIRWAYS written on the side. I
1150 was hugely impressed. British Airways are having to pawn their Concordes,
1151 and here is this little tiny African state with its own airline, jumbo
1154 I asked Bernard how many planes Burandan Airways had. 'None,' he said.
1156 I told him not to be silly and use his eyes. 'No Minister, it belongs to
1157 Freddie Laker,' he said. 'They chartered it last week and repainted it
1158 specially.' Apparently most of the Have-Nots (I mean, LDCs) do this - at
1159 the opening of the UN General Assembly the runways of Kennedy Airport are
1160 jam-packed with phoney flag-carriers. 'In fact,' said Bernard with a sly
1161 grin, 'there was one 747 that belonged to nine different African airlines
1162 in a month. They called it the mumbo-jumbo.'
1164 While we watched nothing much happening on the TV except the mumbo-jumbo
1165 taxiing around Prestwick and the Queen looking a bit chilly, Bernard gave
1166 me the next day's schedule and explained that I was booked on the night
1167 sleeper from King's Cross to Edinburgh because I had to vote in a
1168 three-line whip at the House tonight and would have to miss the last
1169 plane. Then the commentator, in that special hushed BBC voice used for any
1170 occasion with which Royalty is connected, announced reverentially that we
1171 were about to catch our first glimpse of President Selim.
1173 And out of the plane stepped Charlie. My old friend Charlie Umtali. We
1174 were at LSE together. Not Selim Mohammed at all, but Charlie.
1176 Bernard asked me if I were sure. Silly question. How could you forget a
1177 name like Charlie Umtali?
1179 I sent Bernard for Sir Humphrey, who was delighted to hear that we now
1180 know something about our official visitor.
1182 Bernard's official brief said nothing. Amazing! Amazing how little the FCO
1183 has been able to find out. Perhaps they were hoping it would all be on the
1184 car radio. All the brief says is that Colonel Selim Mohammed had converted
1185 to Islam some years ago, they didn't know his original name, and therefore
1186 knew little of his background.
1188 I was able to tell Humphrey and Bernard /all/ about his background.
1189 Charlie was a red-hot political economist, I informed them. Got the top
1190 first. Wiped the floor with everyone.
1192 Bernard seemed relieved. 'Well that's all right then.'
1196 'I think Bernard means,' said Sir Humphrey helpfully, 'that he'll know how
1197 to behave if he was at an English University. Even if it was the LSE.' I
1198 never know whether or not Humphrey is insulting me intentionally.
1200 Humphrey was concerned about Charlie's political colour. 'When you said
1201 that he was red-hot, were you speaking politically?'
1203 In a way I was. 'The thing about Charlie is that you never quite know
1204 where you are with him. He's the sort of chap who follows you into a
1205 revolving door and comes out in front.'
1207 'No deeply held convictions?' asked Sir Humphrey.
1209 'No. The only thing Charlie was committed too was Charlie.'
1211 'Ah, I see. A politician, Minister.'
1213 =head2 v5.8.8 - Joe Raposo, "Bein' Green"
1215 L<Announced on 2006-02-01 by Nicholas Clark|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/28caf52e41ebe723>
1217 It's not that easy bein' green
1218 Having to spend each day the color of the leaves
1219 When I think it could be nicer being red or yellow or gold
1220 Or something much more colorful like that
1222 It's not easy bein' green
1223 It seems you blend in with so many other ordinary things
1224 And people tend to pass you over 'cause you're
1225 Not standing out like flashy sparkles in the water
1228 But green's the color of Spring
1229 And green can be cool and friendly-like
1230 And green can be big like an ocean
1231 Or important like a mountain
1234 When green is all there is to be
1235 It could make you wonder why, but why wonder why?
1236 Wonder I am green and it'll do fine, it's beautiful
1237 And I think it's what I want to be
1239 =head2 v5.8.8-RC1 - Cosgrove Hall Productions, "Dangermouse"
1241 L<Announced on 2006-01-20 by Nicholas Clark|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/d231fc554af8cc51>
1243 Greenback: And the world is mine, all mine. Muhahahahaha. See to it!
1245 Stiletto: Si, Barone. Subito, Barone.
1247 =head2 v5.8.7 - Sergei Prokofiev, "Peter and the Wolf"
1249 L<Announced on 2005-05-31 by Nicholas Clark|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/9a545704a0062f16>
1251 And now, imagine the triumphant procession: Peter at the head; after him the
1252 hunters leading the wolf; and winding up the procession, grandfather and the
1255 Grandfather shook his head discontentedly: "Well, and if Peter hadn't caught
1256 the wolf? What then?"
1258 =head2 v5.8.7-RC1 - Sergei Prokofiev, "Peter and the Wolf"
1260 L<Announced on 2005-05-20 by Nicholas Clark|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2005/05/msg100711.html>
1262 And now this is how things stood: The cat was sitting on one branch. The
1263 bird on another, not too close to the cat. And the wolf walked round and
1264 round the tree, looking at them with greedy eyes.
1266 In the meantime, Peter, without the slightest fear, stood behind the
1267 gate, watching all that was going on. He ran home,got a strong rope and
1268 climbed up the high stone wall.
1270 One of the branches of the tree, around which the wolf was walking,
1271 stretched out over the wall.
1273 Grabbing hold of the branch, Peter lightly climbed over on to the tree.
1274 Peter said to the bird: "Fly down and circle round the wolf's head, only
1275 take care that he doesn't catch you!".
1277 The bird almost touched the wolf's head with its wings, while the wolf
1278 snapped angrily at him from this side and that.
1280 How that bird teased the wolf, how that wolf wanted to catch him! But
1281 the bird was clever and the wolf simply couldn't do anything about it.
1283 =head2 v5.8.6 - A. A. Milne, "The House at Pooh Corner"
1285 L<Announced on 2004-11-28 by Nicholas Clark|http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=20041128000836.GA304@Bagpuss.unfortu.net>
1287 "Hallo, Pooh," said Piglet, giving a jump of surprise. "I knew it was
1290 "So did I,", said Pooh. "What are you doing?"
1292 "I'm planting a haycorn, Pooh, so that it can grow up into an oak-tree,
1293 and have lots of haycorns just outside the front door instead of having
1294 to walk miles and miles, do you see, Pooh?"
1296 "Supposing it doesn't?" said Pooh.
1298 "It will, because Christopher Robin says it will, so that's why I'm
1301 "Well," aid Pooh, "if I plant a honeycomb outside my house, then it will
1302 grow up into a beehive."
1304 Piglet wasn't quite sure about this.
1306 "Or a /piece/ of a honeycomb," said Pooh, "so as not to waste too much.
1307 Only then I might only get a piece of a beehive, and it might be the
1308 wrong piece, where the bees were buzzing and not hunnying. Bother"
1310 Piglet agreed that that would be rather bothering.
1312 "Besides, Pooh, it's a very difficult thing, planting unless you know
1313 how to do it," he said; and he put the acorn in the hole he had made,
1314 and covered it up with earth, and jumped on it.
1316 =head2 v5.8.6-RC1 - A. A. Milne, "Winnie the Pooh"
1318 L<Announced on 2004-11-11 by Nicholas Clark|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2004/11/msg95786.html>
1320 "Hallo!" said Piglet, "whare are /you/ doing?"
1322 "Hunting," said Pooh.
1326 "Tracking something," said Winnie-the-Pooh very mysteriously.
1328 "Tracking what?" said Piglet, coming closer.
1330 "That's just what I ask myself, I ask myself, What?"
1332 "What do you think you'll answer?"
1334 "I shall have to wait until I catch up with it," said Winnie-the-Pooh.
1335 "Now, look there." He pointed to the ground in front of him. "What do
1338 "Track," said Piglet. "Paw-marks." He gave a little squeak of
1339 excitement. "Oh, Pooh!" Do you think it's a--a--a Woozle?"
1341 =head2 v5.8.5 - wikipedia, "Yew"
1343 L<Announced on 2004-07-19 by Nicholas Clark|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/68340e2e4c39222c>
1345 Yews are relatively slow growing trees, widely used in landscaping and
1346 ornamental horticulture. They have flat, dark-green needles, reddish
1347 bark, and bear seeds with red arils, which are eaten by thrushes,
1348 waxwings and other birds, dispersing the hard seeds undamaged in their
1349 droppings. Yew wood is reddish brown (with white sapwood), and very
1350 hard. It was traditionally used to make bows, especially the English
1353 In England, the Common Yew (Taxus baccata, also known as English Yew) is
1354 often found in churchyards. It is sometimes suggested that these are
1355 placed there as a symbol of long life or trees of death, and some are
1356 likely to be over 3,000 years old. It is also suggested that yew trees
1357 may have a pre-Christian association with old pagan holy sites, and the
1358 Christian church found it expedient to use and take over existing sites.
1359 Another explanation is that the poisonous berries and foliage discourage
1360 farmers and drovers from letting their animals wander into the burial
1361 grounds. The yew tree is a frequent symbol in the Christian poetry of
1362 T.S. Eliot, especially his Four Quartets.
1364 =head2 v5.8.5-RC2 - wikipedia, "Beech"
1366 L<Announced on 2004-07-09 by Nicholas Clark|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/f92175725af7a5ad>
1368 Beeches are trees of the Genus Fagus, family Fagaceae, including about
1369 ten species in Europe, Asia, and North America. The leaves are entire or
1370 sparsely toothed. The fruit is a small, sharply-angled nut, borne in
1371 pairs in spiny husks. The beech most commonly grown as an ornamental or
1372 shade tree is the European beech (Fagus sylvatica).
1374 The southern beeches belong to a different but related genus,
1375 Nothofagus. They are found in Australia, New Zealand, New Guinea, New
1376 Caledonia and South America.
1378 =head2 v5.8.5-RC1 - wikipedia, "Pedunculate Oak" (abridged)
1380 L<Announced on 2004-07-07 by Nicholas Clark|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/ca6ce4a7ed9f219c?pli=1>
1382 The Pedunculate Oak is called the Common Oak in Britain, and is also
1383 often called the English Oak in other English speaking countries It is a
1384 large deciduous tree to 25-35m tall (exceptionally to 40m), with lobed
1385 and sessile (stalk-less) leaves. Flowering takes place in early to mid
1386 spring, and their fruit, called "acorns", ripen by autumn of the same
1387 year. The acorns are pedunculate (having a peduncle or acorn-stalk) and
1388 may occur singly, or several acorns may occur on a stalk.
1390 It forms a long-lived tree, with a large widespreading head of rugged
1391 branches. While it may naturally live to an age of a few centuries, many
1392 of the oldest trees are pollarded or coppiced, both pruning techniques
1393 that extend the tree's potential lifespan, if not its health.
1395 Within its native range it is valued for its importance to insects and
1396 other wildlife. Numerous insects live on the leaves, buds, and in the
1397 acorns. The acorns form a valuable food resource for several small
1398 mammals and some birds, notably Jays Garrulus glandarius.
1400 It is planted for forestry, and produces a long-lasting and durable
1401 heartwood, much in demand for interior and furniture work.
1403 =head2 v5.8.4 - T. S. Eliot, "The Old Gumbie Cat"
1405 L<Announced on 2004-04-22 by Nicholas Clark|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/c7333acf03ef4015>
1407 I have a Gumbie Cat in mind, her name is Jennyanydots;
1408 The curtain-cord she likes to wind, and tie it into sailor-knots.
1409 She sits upon the window-sill, or anything that's smooth and flat:
1410 She sits and sits and sits and sits -- and that's what makes a Gumbie Cat!
1412 But when the day's hustle and bustle is done,
1413 Then the Gumbie Cat's work is but hardly begun.
1414 She thinks that the cockroaches just need employment
1415 To prevent them from idle and wanton destroyment.
1416 So she's formed, from that a lot of disorderly louts,
1417 A troop of well-disciplined helpful boy-scouts,
1418 With a purpose in life and a good deed to do--
1419 And she's even created a Beetles' Tattoo.
1421 So for Old Gumbie Cats let us now give three cheers --
1422 On whom well-ordered households depend, it appears.
1425 =head2 v5.8.4-RC2 - T. S. Eliot, "Macavity: The Mystery Cat"
1427 L<Announced on 2004-04-16 by Nicholas Clark|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/84f6fdd73cc56a1b>
1429 Macavity's a Mystery Cat: he's called the Hidden Paw --
1430 For he's the master criminal who can defy the Law.
1431 He's the bafflement of Scotland Yard, the Flying Squad's despair:
1432 For when they reach the scene of crime -- /Macavity's not there/!
1434 Macavity, Macavity, there's no one like Macavity,
1435 He's broken every human law, he breaks the law of gravity.
1436 His powers of levitation would make a fakir stare,
1437 And when you reach the scene of crime -- /Macavity's not there/!
1438 You may seek him in the basement, you may look up in the air --
1439 But I tell you once and once again, /Macavity's not there/!
1441 =head2 v5.8.4-RC1 - T. S. Eliot, "Skimbleshanks: The Railway Cat"
1443 L<Announced on 2004-04-05 by Nicholas Clark|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/e500353440769ebf>
1445 There's a whisper down the line at 11.39
1446 When the Night Mail's ready to depart,
1447 Saying 'Skimble where is Skimble has he gone to hunt the thimble?
1448 We must find him of the train can't start.'
1449 All the guards and all the porters and the stationmaster's daughters
1450 They are searching high and low,
1451 Saying 'Skimble where is Skimble for unless he's very nimble
1452 Then the Night Mail just can't go'
1453 At 11.42 then the signal's overdue
1454 And the passengers are frantic to a man--
1455 Then Skimble will appear and he'll saunter to the rear:
1456 He's been busy in the luggage van!
1457 He gives one flash of his glass-green eyes
1458 And the the signal goes 'All Clear!'
1459 And we're off at last of the northern part
1460 Of the Northern Hemisphere!
1462 =head2 v5.8.3 - Arthur William Edgar O'Shaugnessy, "Ode"
1464 L<Announced on 2004-01-14 by Nicholas Clark|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/968fb8d71e23af69>
1466 We are the music makers,
1467 And we are the dreamers of dreams,
1468 Wandering by lonely sea-breakers,
1469 And sitting by desolate streams; --
1470 World-losers and world-forsakers,
1471 On whom the pale moon gleams:
1472 Yet we are the movers and shakers
1473 Of the world for ever, it seems.
1475 =head2 v5.8.3-RC1 - Irving Berlin, "Let's Face the Music and Dance"
1477 L<Announced on 2004-01-07 by Nicholas Clark|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/5ced50bebcd11c96>
1479 There may be trouble ahead,
1480 But while there's music and moonlight,
1481 And love and romance,
1482 Let's face the music and dance.
1484 Before the fiddlers have fled,
1485 Before they ask us to pay the bill,
1486 And while we still have that chance,
1487 Let's face the music and dance.
1489 Soon, we'll be without the moon,
1490 Humming a different tune, and then,
1492 There may be teardrops to shed,
1493 So while there's music and moonlight,
1494 And love and romance,
1495 Let's face the music and dance.
1497 =head2 v5.8.2 - Walt Whitman, "Passage to India"
1499 L<Announced on 2003-11-06 by Nicholas Clark|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/4714574f93967673>
1501 Passage, immediate passage! the blood burns in my veins!
1502 Away O soul! hoist instantly the anchor!
1503 Cut the hawsers - hall out - shake out every sail!
1504 Have we not stood here like trees in the ground long enough?
1505 Have we not grovel'd here long enough, eating and drinking like mere brutes?
1506 Have we not darken'd and dazed ourselves with books long enough?
1508 Sail forth - steer for the deep waters only,
1509 Reckless O soul, exploring, I with the and thou with me,
1510 For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go,
1511 And we will risk the ship, ourselves and all.
1514 O farther farther sail!
1515 O daring job, but safe! are they not all the seas of God?
1516 O farther, farther, farther sail!
1518 =head2 v5.8.2-RC2 - Eric Idle/John Du Prez, "Accountancy Shanty"
1520 L<Announced on 2003-11-03 by Nicholas Clark|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/7669de5804b792f6>
1522 It's fun to charter an accountant
1523 And sail the wide accountan-cy,
1524 To find, explore the funds offshore
1525 And skirt the shoals of bankruptcy.
1527 =head2 v5.8.2-RC1 - Edward Lear, "The Jumblies"
1529 L<Announced on 2003-10-28 by Nicholas Clark|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/83680ef3bbf7378d>
1531 They went to sea in a Sieve, they did,
1532 In a Sieve they went to sea:
1533 In spite of all their friends could say,
1534 On a winter's morn, on a stormy day,
1535 In a Sieve they went to sea!
1536 And when the Sieve turned round and round,
1537 And everyone cried, "You'll all be drowned!"
1538 They cried aloud, "Our Sieve ain't big,
1539 But we don't care a button, we don't care a fig!
1540 In a Sieve we'll go to sea!"
1542 Far and few, far and few,
1543 Are the lands where the Jumblies live;
1544 Their heads are green, and their hands are blue,
1545 And they went to sea in a Sieve.
1547 =head2 v5.8.1 - epigraph same as v5.7.1
1549 L<Announced on 2003-09-25 by Jarkko Hietaniemi|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2003/09/msg82678.html>
1551 =head2 v5.8.1-RC5 - Terry Pratchett, "Lords and Ladies"
1553 L<Announced on 2003-09-22 by Jarkko Hietaniemi|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2003/09/msg82476.html>
1555 No matter what she did with her hair it took about
1556 three minutes for it to tangle itself up again,
1557 like a garden hosepipe in a shed [Footnote: Which,
1558 no matter how carefully coiled, will always uncoil
1559 overnight and tie the lawnmower to the bicycles].
1561 =head2 v5.8.1-RC4 - Terry Pratchett, "Interesting Times"
1563 L<Announced on 2003-08-01 by Jarkko Hietaniemi|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2003/08/msg79184.html>
1565 Grand Viziers were /always/ scheming megalomaniacs.
1566 It was probably in the job description: "Are you a
1567 devious, plotting, unreliable madman? Ah, good,
1568 then you can be my most trusted minister."
1570 =head2 v5.8.1-RC3 - Terry Pratchett, "Interesting Times"
1572 L<Announced on 2003-07-30 by Jarkko Hietaniemi|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2003/07/msg79048.html>
1574 Lord Hong had a mind like a knife, although possibly
1575 a knife with a curved blade.
1577 =head2 v5.8.1-RC2 - Terry Pratchett, "Interesting Times"
1579 L<Announced on 2003-07-11 by Jarkko Hietaniemi|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2003/07/msg78102.html>
1581 Many an ancient lord's last words had been, "You can't kill
1582 me because I've got magic aaargh."
1584 =head2 v5.8.1-RC1 - Terry Pratchett, "Interesting Times"
1586 L<Announced on 2003-07-10 by Jarkko Hietaniemi|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2003/07/msg78009.html>
1588 Cohen was familiar with city gates. He'd broken down a number
1589 in his time, by battering ram, siege gun, and on one occasion
1592 But the gates of Hunghung were pretty damn good gates. They
1593 weren't like the gates of Ankh-Morpork, which were usually wide
1594 open to attract the spending customer and whose concession to
1595 defense was the sign "Thank You For Not Attacking Our City.
1596 Bonum Diem." These things were big and made of metal and there
1597 was a guardhouse and a squad of unhelpful men in black armor.
1599 =head2 v5.8.0 - Terry Pratchett, "Reaper Man"
1601 L<Announced on 2002-07-18 by Rafael Garcia-Suarez|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2002/07/msg63720.html>
1603 There was the faint sound of footsteps.
1604 "Chap with a whip got as far as the big sharp spikes last week,"
1605 said the low priest.
1606 There was a sound like the flushing of a very old dry lavatory.
1607 The footsteps stopped. The High Priest smiled to himself.
1608 "Right," he said. "See your two pebbles and raise you two pebbles."
1609 The low priest threw down his cards. "Double Onion," he said.
1610 The High Priest looked down suspiciously.
1611 The low priest consulted a scrap of paper. "That's three hundred
1612 thousand, nine hundred and sixty-four pebbles you owe me," he said.
1613 There was the sound of footsteps. The priests exchanged glances.
1614 "Haven't had one for poisoned-dart alley for quite some time,"
1615 said the High Priest.
1616 "Five says he makes it", said the low priest. "You're on."
1617 There was a faint clatter of metal points on stone.
1618 "It's a shame to take your pebbles."
1619 There were footsteps again.
1621 =head2 v5.8.0-RC3 - no epigraph
1623 L<Announced on 2002-07-13 by Jarkko Hietaniemi|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2002/07/msg63234.html>
1625 =head2 v5.8.0-RC2 - no epigraph
1627 L<Announced on 2002-06-21 by Jarkko Hietaniemi|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2002/06/msg62013.html>
1629 =head2 v5.8.0-RC1 - no epigraph
1631 L<Announced on 2002-06-01 by Jarkko Hietaniemi|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2002/06/msg60317.html>
1633 =head2 v5.7.3 - Terry Pratchett, "Reaper Man"
1635 L<Announced on 2002-03-04 by Jarkko Hietaniemi|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2002/03/msg53652.html>
1637 Light thinks it travels faster than anything but it is wrong.
1638 No matter how fast light travels it finds the darkness has always
1639 got there first, and is waiting for it.
1641 =head2 v5.7.2 - Terry Pratchett, "Small Gods"
1643 L<Announced on 2001-07-13 by Jarkko Hietaniemi|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2001/07/msg40370.html>
1645 His philosophy was a mixture of three famous schools --
1646 the Cynics, the Stoics and the Epicureans -- and summed up
1647 all three of them in his famous phrase, "You can't trust any
1648 bugger further than you can throw him, and there's nothing
1649 you can do about it, so let's have a drink."
1651 =head2 v5.7.1 - Terry Pratchett, "The Colour of Magic"
1653 L<Announced on 2001-07-13 by Jarkko Hietaniemi|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2001/04/msg33851.html>
1655 "What happens next?" asked Twoflower.
1657 Hrun screwed a finger in his ear and inspected it absently.
1659 "Oh,", he said, "I expect in a minute the door will be
1660 flung back and I'll be dragged off to some sort of temple
1661 arena where I'll fight maybe a couple of giant spiders
1662 and an eight-foot slave from the jungles of Klatch and then
1663 I'll rescue some kind of a princess from the altar and then
1664 I'll kill off a few guards or whatever and then this girl
1665 will show me the secret passage out of the place and we'll
1666 liberate a couple of horses and escape with the treasure."
1667 Hrun leaned his head back on his hands and looked at the
1668 ceiling, whistling tunelessly.
1670 "All that?" said Twoflower.
1674 =head2 v5.7.0 - Terry Pratchett, "Moving Pictures"
1676 L<Announced on 2000-09-02 by Jarkko Hietaniemi|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2000/09/msg17730.html>
1678 The Librarian had seen many weird things in his time,
1679 but that had to be the 57th strangest.
1680 [footnote: he had a tidy mind]
1682 =head2 v5.6.2 - Sterne, "Tristram Shandy"
1684 L<Announced on 2003-11-15 by Rafael Garcia-Suarez|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/deb8cb9ad918716f>
1686 When great or unexpected events fall out upon the stage of this
1687 sublunary word--the mind of man, which is an inquisitive kind of
1688 a substance, naturally takes a flight, behind the scenes, to see
1689 what is the cause and first spring of them--The search was not
1690 long in this instance.
1692 =head2 v5.6.2-RC1 - Sterne, "Tristram Shandy"
1694 L<Announced on 2003-11-15 by Rafael Garcia-Suarez|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/e3d4acc7a8dd3ce5>
1696 "Pray, my dear", quoth my mother, "have you not forgot to wind up the clock?"
1698 =head2 v5.6.1 - J R R Tolkien, "The Hobbit", Riddles in the Dark
1700 L<Announced on 2001-04-08 by Gurusamy Sarathy|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2001/04/msg33823.html>
1702 `What have I got in my pocket?' he said aloud. He was talking to
1703 himself, but Gollum thought it was a riddle, and he was frightfully
1706 `Not fair! not fair!' he hissed. `It isn't fair, my precious, is it,
1707 to ask us what it's got in its nassty little pocketses?'
1709 Bilbo seeing what had happened and having nothing better to ask
1710 stuck to his question, `What have I got in my pocket?' he said
1713 `S-s-s-s-s,' hissed Gollum. `It must give us three guesseses,
1714 my precious, three guesseses.'
1716 =head2 v5.6.1-foolish - no epigraph
1718 L<Announced on 2001-08-04 by Gurusamy Sarathy|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2001/04/msg33421.html>
1720 =head2 v5.6.1-TRIAL3 - I can't find the announcement
1722 No announcement available.
1724 =head2 v5.6.1-TRIAL2 - no epigraph
1726 L<Announced on 2001-01-31 by Gurusamy Sarathy|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2001/01/msg29934.html>
1728 =head2 v5.6.1-TRIAL1 - no epigraph
1730 L<Announced on 2000-12-18 by Gurusamy Sarathy|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2000/12/msg27738.html>
1732 =head2 v5.6.0 - J R R Tolkien, "The Hobbit", The Last Stage
1734 L<Announced on 2000-03-23 by Gurusamy Sarathy|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2000/03/msg10341.html>
1736 The dragon is withered,
1737 His bones are now crumbled;
1738 His armour is shivered,
1739 His splendour is humbled!
1740 Though sword shall be rusted,
1741 And throne and crown perish
1742 With strength that men trusted
1743 And wealth that they cherish,
1744 Here grass is still growing,
1745 And leaves are a yet swinging,
1746 The white water flowing,
1747 And elves are yet singing
1748 Come! Tra-la-la-lally!
1749 Come back to the valley.
1751 =head2 v5.6.0-RC3 - no epigraph
1753 L<Announced on 2000-03-22 by Gurusamy Sarathy|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2000/03/msg10140.html>
1755 =head2 v5.005_05-RC1 - no epigraph
1757 L<Announced on 2009-02-16 by LE<0xe9>on Brocard|http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2009/02/msg144227.html>
1759 =head2 v5.005_04 - no epigraph
1761 L<Announced on 2004-03-01 by LE<0xe9>on Brocard|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/6c240ad0b189cb47>
1763 =head2 v5.005_04-RC2 - Rudyard Kipling, "The Jungle Book"
1765 L<Announced on 2004-02-19 by LE<0xe9>on Brocard|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/83e5421124a7b49d>
1767 The monkeys called the place their city, and pretended to despise
1768 the Jungle-People because they lived in the forest. And yet they
1769 never knew what the buildings were made for nor how to use
1770 them. They would sit in circles on the hall of the king's council
1771 chamber, and scratch for fleas and pretend to be men; or they would
1772 run in and out of the roofless houses and collect pieces of plaster
1773 and old bricks in a corner, and forget where they had hidden them,
1774 and fight and cry in scuffling crowds, and then break off to play up
1775 and down the terraces of the king's garden, where they would shake
1776 the rose trees and the oranges in sport to see the fruit and flowers
1779 =head2 v5.005_04-RC1 - Lewis Carroll, "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"
1781 L<Announced on 2004-02-05 by LE<0xe9>on Brocard|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/6aaeb6ec699bd116>
1783 Either the well was very deep, or she fell very slowly, for she had
1784 plenty of time as she went down to look about her and to wonder what was
1785 going to happen next. First, she tried to look down and make out what
1786 she was coming to, but it was too dark to see anything; then she looked
1787 at the sides of the well, and noticed that they were filled with
1788 cupboards and book-shelves; here and there she saw maps and pictures
1789 hung upon pegs. She took down a jar from one of the shelves as she
1790 passed; it was labelled 'ORANGE MARMALADE', but to her great
1791 disappointment it was empty: she did not like to drop the jar for fear
1792 of killing somebody, so managed to put it into one of the cupboards as
1795 =head2 v1.0_16 - Johan Vromans, extemporarily
1797 L<Announced on 2003-12-18 by Richard Clamp|http://groups.google.com/group/perl.perl5.porters/msg/9281dc6194d15940>
1799 =head1 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
1801 This document was originally compiled based on a list of epigraphs
1802 on L<Perl Monks|http://perlmonks.org> titled
1803 L<Recent Perl Release Announcement|http://perlmonks.org/?node_id=372406>