Posted by Jerry on January 20th, 2004 — Posted in History, Journal, Writing
This morning, my partner Sharon pointed me to a new site from the British Library devoted to virtual exhibitions. The site has some lovely use of flash – tastefully restrained – which livens up the presentation enormously.
I particularly enjoyed the `literary landscapes’ section which marries literary figures with maps and images providing a context for their writing. Having visited Loch Katrine in Scotland (and taken the steam boat ride along its length), I liked the section on Sir Walter Scott despite his highly romanticised view of scotland portrayed in his writings, and the accompanying hand-coloured engraving by FJ Sargent from 1811. The web version has handy navigation icons and a zoom function – which works well on the high resolution images. There are maps too, providing a rich backdrop to a number of Scott’s novels.
Also included are Chaucer’s Kent, Wordsworth’s Lake District, Thomas Hardy’s Dorset, Jane Austen’s Bath (the place, not the ablution), and Defoe’s Moll Flanders.
I had a good poke (okay click) around in the Durham exhibition too – I loved the section on Jarrow Priory.
There is also a great ‘about Collect Britain’ page which talks about the digitisation project and the designers.
All in all a good site, well designed and informative – well worth a visit!
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on January 8th, 2004 — Posted in Journal, Writing
er… happy new year folks! just surfacing at last 😉
And I was reading a new edition of Beowulf – as you do – in this case a new verse translation by Michael Alexander published by Penguin – and found two references to middle earth within the first thousand lines! It’s a great tale – half Tolkien half Star Trek Klingon warrior culture… A classic at the speed of videoclips!
And of course I had to see the new Lord of the Rings on the second day after opening – what a great movie – mobile scars, vanishing cloaks and all 🙂 The trilogy will live like 2001 a Space Odyssey (also drawing on classical references), and the five movies of the Star Wars trilogy, among the great movie experiences of the new Century – of course Tolkien was a fine linguist and Anglo-Saxon scholar – so I was delighted to see the way some of Tolkien’s langage reflects its Anglo-saxon/Old English roots – check out this list:
Tolkien and Beowulf for a good sprinkling…
I particularly liked Fródan as Frodo – the wise!
And for a taste of Beowulf itself – check out:
Beowulf Project Gutenberg Version
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on November 21st, 2003 — Posted in Journal, Writing
It seems to me that blogs are a bit like digital soundings charting one’s course through an ocean of thought. How appropriate then, that the idea of keeping log books derives from a navigational technique that relied on nodal soundings to record one’s speed through the ocean. In a type of navigation called ‘dead reckoning’ the technique relied on one throwing a log, or wooden board overboard from the stern (or back) of the vessel, the board being attached to a rope. The rope had series of knots tied at 7 fathom (6 feet to a fathom = 42foot/12.5metre) intervals. Each knot, paid out from the reel over a period of 30 seconds (as measured by a sand glass) represented a speed of one nautical mile per hour. Observations were made whenever the wind changed in velocity or direction, and recorded in a book – called – you guessed it – the log book! (neat eh?) The distance (calculated by speed over time) and direction were plotted onto a chart, and thus one could navigate without recourse to the stars or a visible land mass.
The knots represent digital nodes, the wind changes: the threads of discussion or thought; the chart, the great canvas of ideas – So perhaps blogs are a kind of chart of ideas!
Cheers
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