Liddell and Scott: a Matter of Belief

People are saying that there is no way any real human being holding an immense Greek lexicon could be as happy as the "Doc" seems to be in this picture from my novel:


Real people, I mean in the real world, just don't get so joyful about large, specialized reference books like that.

Well, since you do not believe accurate, carefully drawn artistic renderings (I mean, it is difficult to get an impression of just how heavy that book is from the picture) perhaps you will believe a photograph of the Doctor, holding the text in question?


Yes, an authentic text, which I ordered from "Weaver's Books" in Quayment. Well, not exactly, but truth is stranger than fiction. Yes, that's the reference section, where I do most of my laughing, I mean, my work. Please note, I am much larger than the photo suggests. The artist also had a difficult time, but that's because I was wearing a lab coat then.

It is also true that Professor Henry George Liddell (1811-1898) was a Greek scholar, and the father of Alice Liddell - her name will live in fantasy fiction forever, because Liddell's friend C. L. Dodgson was a math professor at the same time, and wrote under the pen name "Lewis Carroll". Yes, his daughter was that Alice.

Of course, the pun is that the Greek word aletheia means "truth"... a fitting enough choice for a character in a fantasy by a mathematician.

But the smile on the Doctor seen above is just as truthful. (No, I don't have a moustache any more; that was just for the novel. I also had a haircut. Hee hee.)