A lot of the really poetic episode and book titles (which I love for their subtlety) come from Shakespeare or the Bible. Where else?
Provenance of Titles
- Thread starter Laura Cynthia Chambers
- Start date
Does every author experience a kind of "yes, YES!" euphoria moment when they pick the perfect title? I've been there, with one of my fanfics. 
The episode 'Bread and Circuses' comes from the Ancient Roman satirist Juvenal. In the passage he is complaining that the Roman people have traded in their noble Republican values for free bread and numerous festivals and gladiatorial games sponsored by the emperor.
Is there like some big book or collection of obscure phrases and their meanings/applications that writers can reference?
Which series did this most often (I'm guessing TOS)? The least? (Probably ENT or VOY)
Which series did this most often (I'm guessing TOS)? The least? (Probably ENT or VOY)
When I'm stuck for a title, Bartlett's Book of Familiar Quotations can come in handy.
The fanfic I'm speaking of, incidentally, is "Image of The Invisible" so good on multiple levels (my "interview" section at the end of the fic explains in detail)
Thank you for sending me off to Google-define "provenance".
I called the thread this after "Provenance of Shadows" (which I haven't read, but have heard of). It seemed appropriate for a thread about titles to be named after one (albeit a book).
TOS and DS9 had the most "poetic" episode titles, with VOY and ENT using them the least.
Some of my favorites are:
"The Conscience of the King" (TOS)
"For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky" (TOS)
"And the Children Shall Lead" (TOS)
"Let He Who Is Without Sin..." (DS9)
"In the Pale Moonlight" (DS9)
"Treachery, Faith and the Great River" (DS9)
FTWHAIHTTS is the longest by far, and inspired by a line in the episode. Or does it come from some other work?
"wrongs darker than death or night;" is a line from Prometheus Unbound by Shelley.
About FTWHAIHTTS's title being from a book--- I doubt it. If it was, then that old guy who touched the sky not a la Hendrix had read it, 'cause he quoted it onscreen...
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I don't see the connection between seeing that there's a sky and realizing you're living in an asteroid. Why didn't he just have a revelation that there's such a thing as a "surface" and a sky, and that's it?
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Supposedly on a small globe you'd see the horizon differently. It's supposed to seem "closer", though what that looks like I don't know. The curvature of the small sphere might show. He doesn't talk about this though.
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This isn't the place for this matter, and I know it. I'll forget to bring this up on a different thread though. Ignore my OT post if you must.
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I don't see the connection between seeing that there's a sky and realizing you're living in an asteroid. Why didn't he just have a revelation that there's such a thing as a "surface" and a sky, and that's it?
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Supposedly on a small globe you'd see the horizon differently. It's supposed to seem "closer", though what that looks like I don't know. The curvature of the small sphere might show. He doesn't talk about this though.
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This isn't the place for this matter, and I know it. I'll forget to bring this up on a different thread though. Ignore my OT post if you must.
It probably the least mysterious of them all.
The old fellow spoke of the world being hollow and his touching the sky because ... er ... his world was hollow, and he touched the sky, when he climbed a (forbidden) mountain and put his hand on the dome of the outer shell.
"I, Mudd" is a take-off on Isaac Asimov's I, Robot.
"Whom Gods Destroy" is from the ancient Greek saying "Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad."
"Spock's Brain" is a fairly obvious nod to Donovan's Brain.
"Turnabout Intruder" is from Turnabout, which was later done as a sitcom starring John Schuck (the Klingon ambassador in ST IV).
"Whom Gods Destroy" is from the ancient Greek saying "Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad."
"Spock's Brain" is a fairly obvious nod to Donovan's Brain.
"Turnabout Intruder" is from Turnabout, which was later done as a sitcom starring John Schuck (the Klingon ambassador in ST IV).
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Surely I, Claudius more than that. I mean, its premise starts with a harmless(?) idiot(?) rising to become leader of the state.
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