PIX. Blogos

Given the ease with which I can make the facile play on words contained in the title of this chapter ["Problog"], and then again, in slightly different form, in the heading for the chapter’s second part ["Prologue/blogpost"], and then yet again in the title for this section, it may be a bit surprising to discover that the log at the heart of the term “weblog” is actually different from the log at the heart of the word “prologue.”

The term “prologue,” which is roughly synonymous with “preface,” comes to us by way of the French, and originates in the Greek logos, speech, reason, word.

The term “blog” -– from “web-log” you will remember –- derives instead from “log-book,” a term that describes a chronological record and itself derives more specifically from the record-books of ocean-going vessels which calculated their rate of motion over time by means of an apparatus called a log-board, log-slate, or log-chip. The log-board was originally a thin quadrant of wood loaded with lead to make it float still and upright, attached to an on-board log-line divided into equal segments (called knots). The log-board was tossed overboard for a half-minute, during which time the number of knots that would unreel from the pull of the stationary board would register the actual distance traveled by the vessel and from which its velocity was then calculated and recorded.

The log in “blog” is connected then to timber, to the “log” that is a felled tree.

“Logging” describes the enterprise of clearing a forest of its trees and leaving behind a benuded blank where woods once stood, while at once describing the enterprise of filling a blank page derived from that wood with a record of words.

With the digitization of textual production especially the “log” in blog has become a driftwood itself, listing conspicuously away from wood into word, from log toward logos.

The material of the prologue you are reading right now first appeared as a series of individual posts to my personal blog, Amor Mundi. I first began posting these sections onto the blog on Friday, April 9, 2005. The post that corresponds to the section you are reading at this moment, appeared there on Thursday morning, April 14. It is worthwhile to think about some of the ways in which the versions differ.

Go to Next Section of Pancryptics
Go to Pancryptics Table of Contents