Personal Info (Marilyn Miller):
To the right is Allegro Con Molto BRIO, winner of the 1997 Traver Ridge Cutest Pet contest. For more revealing pictures of my better half, click on the turtle.
I'm currently employed at the Middle English Dictionary as a Review Editor and assembly
language programmer. (Not everyone can get two dead languages into one job description!) The
Dictionary, now nearing completion, is an enormous project that makes the language of 1100-1500 intelligible not only to literature students (the period includes Chaucer and most of the
Arthurian material) but also to those interested in the history of medicine, technology, political
thought, agriculture--every known work written in Middle English is included, so its scope is
large. To look in on plans for the electronic MED, look at the Middle English Compendium.
(If this link fails, try the Humanities Text Initiative project.)
In another life, I had the privilege of working with the Urban Design and Development Group of
Detroit in the seventies on a project to help the neighborhood groups that were then attempting to
make use of federal funds to improve their neighborhoods. We designed a simulation that would
help them explore the federal resources available and cope with the mass of paperwork needed to
make effective requests for funds. Working with the groups was extraordinarily satisfying.
Although those particular federal programs have ended, I've continued to be interested in the
well-being of Detroit.
As a Flint native, I grew up thinking of Detroit as the big metropolis, with a wealth of cultural
assets, and I've found it reassuring that in the years since, great efforts have been made to ensure
that such treasures as the DIA have remained accessible to all. And it is with considerable
bitterness that I've viewed the loss of WQRS. Only a local station can make Detroit's musical
assets available to all. For information on efforts to restore educational, fine arts programming to
the Detroit area, take a look at the home of the
Detroit
Classical Radio Corporation..
I was fortunate enough to have grown up with music, and that gave me a lot of advantages. My
father has for most of his life been a tenor soloist with a church choir. The thrill of my life came
when as a 12-year-old I was able to play a piano concerto with the Flint Symphony. And
although as an adult, piano performance has followed a downhill course, my interest as a listener
has grown. Given exposure, classical music can grip a kid, but for the introduction to music
handed to me, others may have to turn to a radio. Once given a taste of all that is available in 500
years of memorable music, there is no way to keep from wanting more. I still get together with
friends when possible for chamber music, but mostly get friends together around a piano to sing.
Talk shows on TV and radio are very popular these days, but that's simply letting one or two
people yammer at everyone else. It is singing together that creates ties.
Well, enough of my sermon. Time to go to
