Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Entertainment/2024 May 27

= May 27 =

seeking Shchedryk sheet
Where do people look for written scores these days, preferably open-source & academic types instead of sketchy sites and annoying apps? I would love a Carol of the Bells in four voices. Temerarius (talk) 02:43, 27 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Try IMSLP for public-domain works. Unfortunately, the English lyrics are still under copyright, so the scores only have lyrics in Ukrainian (as well as Italian and Spanish translations by respective editors who released them under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0). Double sharp (talk) 08:08, 27 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks very much @Double sharp! Temerarius (talk) 21:36, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Shams al-Ma'arif as a model for the Necronomicon?
Could it be that Lovecraft used the book "Shams al-Ma'arif" as a model for his fictional book Necronomicon? 2A02:8071:60A0:92E0:0:0:0:992A (talk) 14:57, 27 May 2024 (UTC)


 * It's possible that he had heard of it, but as the first English translations appeared in 2022, and I'm fairly sure that Lovecraft could not read Arabic (or Urdu or Turkish, into which it has also been translated), he would likely not have known it in detail.
 * In his Lovecraft: A Biography (New York, Doubleday, 1975), L.Sprague de Camp states (p167) that "The name [Necronomicon] was probably suggested by the Astronomica of Manilius . . . quoted by Lovecraft in his newspaper columns." De Camp goes on to cite a number of real, legendary and fictional books that Lovecraft mentioned in prose and correspondence, but Shams al-Ma'arif is not amongst them.
 * Those real books include William Scott-Elliot's The Story of Atlantis (1896) and The Lost Lemuria (1904), Joseph Glanvil's [sic] Sadducismus Triumphatus (1668, published 1681), The ancient Egyptian Book of Thoth, and Helena Blavatsky's The Book of Dzyan (plagiarised from Sanscrit texts).
 * Of course, Lovecraft was a voluminous correspondent, and it's possible that references to Shams al-Ma'arif have turned up in papers of his studied since 1975. I can certainly see why you make the suggestion.
 * One further possibility: Lovecraft was an avid fan of The One Thousand and One Nights from early childhood, and in two separate letters recounted that he adopted the pseudonym of Abdul Alhazred around the age of five (see Lin Carter Lovecraft: A Look Behind the Cthulhu Mythos (New York, Ballantine Books, 1972, Chapter 1)). Having access to his maternal grandfather's "voluminous" library, he probably read an adult rather than child's version, so if Shams al-Ma'arif is mentioned, he would have learned of its existence thus. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.67.173 (talk) 20:29, 27 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Other potential sources of inspiration are the Picatrix and the Kitāb al-nawāmīs, of which the text was accessible. --Lambiam 09:48, 28 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Beware of The Necronomicon edited by George Hay - Skoob Books Edition 1992, a very convincing spoof. MinorProphet (talk) 17:25, 9 June 2024 (UTC)