one hundred and sixteen

Another to add to the songs that make you want to pick up a book list:

First love, Emmy the Great

 

in other news, today i look like this:

sixty-five

New (totally beautiful) glasses!

It feels so good to be able to see clearly again; I had forgotten that the world is not made of fuzzy edges and blurred pink ovals for faces.

I do worry that come the apocalypse I will be utterly useless: my glasses will break and I'll get eaten by a radioactive rat or something. I would probably have been equally useless living at any other point in history - tripping over people in a pleasure garden, messing up my needlework, misplaying the piano, accidently snubbing prospective suitors as I blundered past them in the street, half-blind... (for some reason I can only think of eighteenth century situations. The supervisors who taught me medieval history would be ashamed).

The earliest written record of using magnification to aid reading dates to the first century AD (Seneca the Younger writes, 'Letter, however small and indistinct, are seen enlarged and more clearly through a globe or glass filled with water'), my weak-eyeling ancestors had to wait a few hundred years for wearable glasses. A portrait of Cardinal Hugh de Provence, painted in 1352 by Tommaso da Modena, is the first pictorial evidence for eyeglasses:

Hey medieval dude, nice hat and specs. (And that is the cutting historical analysis that got me my degree in history.)

fifty-seven

Some things that are on my body today:

Some sounds that are on my speakers (with an eerie hypnotic homemade video, i love you tube):

fifty-five

A couple of weeks ago I went to a fancy dress party; it was country-themed, with every guest trying to embody a different place. I chose Holland, mainly because it gave me an excuse to dress up as Van Gogh. Well, it was that, a windmill or a tulip (if only i had the resources and artistic talent). I settled for a wearing a windmill charm necklace.

Dressing up as a country is very difficult; there were lots of national football shirts worn that evening. Thinking up a way to represent a whole teeming nation in one nifty outfit is challenging, especially if you'd prefer to not spend your time in the centre of a circle of confused gazes.

So, we settle for well established visual markers. We choose the stories we all know about these foreign places, the facts that have travelled with tourists and imperialists and adventurers over the years.

I know almost nothing of Holland, save a smattering of history and art (and, because we had to bring food to this party, the fact that pea soup is a popular dish). I didn't think about it much before this party, and continued to not think too much about it afterward.

Which didn't strike me as that much of a problem, until I substitute Holland for other countries. What if someone came to the party as Japan, dressed as a geisha? Or if someone had come as Benin, dressed in their best Topshop 'tribal' trousers (yes, Topshop sell 'tribal print' trousers) and holding a spear? If Topshop's too pricey, how about visiting a fancy dress shop, as they have a variety of national or 'ethnic' costumes to chose from; how about Samoan dancing girl? Desert Arab?

Suddenly there's something quite unsettling about the whole thing. Britain's modern history pivots on empire - whether it celebrates it (hallo, Niall Ferguson, you douche) or tries to hide it - and the violent domination of lots of people all over the world. Hierarchies of power were developed by telling stories (and I include science as a method of story telling) about other races that diminished the worth, complexity and plurality of non-European people and cultures. Added to that, Europeans plundered culture as well as natural resources, taking bits and pieces to adorn themselves, their homes and their museums.

Caricatures twist and shape the way in which actual people are treated, and they resonate for years. Stereotypes, usually crafted over long periods of time, can reduce power and status, and be used to perpetuate - or even justify - social inequalities. The act of deciding what story gets told about a group of people, and what images get seen and remembered, comes from a place a privilege.

So what does it mean when we engage with foreign places through stereotypes and famous people? Does it matter, if it's only an evening, only a party? So what, you wear a feather headdress and moccasins for a few hours one evening - does it really have a significant impact?

Of course it does.

And when non-western national and racial stereotypes get sold to white westerners as a great idea for a party costume (or a 'sexy' party costume, if you are female), and no one bats an eyelid - more than that, people buy and wear these items and it's GREAT FUN - then it hugely fucking matters.

And of course, I didn't bring any of this up; I was at a party. It's a stark reminder that I have the privilege not to think about representations of nationality - and linked to this, race and culture - when I would rather not.

forty-six

it has been a long time since a what i wore post. voila - and yes, the moody face was part of the outfit. as you can see, my fringe is the same length as the entire history of humanity. i think it has some kind of sentience, coupled with a vendetta against me (since it does its best to blind me/make me walk out in front of cars). i am getting it cut in two weeks, and that day can't come soon enough.

i spent some of today in the british library, as i have done for many days recently. i get to do a morning commute, which i love. travelling on a just-after-rush-hour train is great, as the train isn't like a can of sardines, but it is still early enough for a few business type people to be journeying to work. when i am dressed somewhat smartly (translation: in a blazer) i pretend i too am an adult person with a proper job who Reads Newspapers and has Responsibilities (the job changes daily: today i worked in an small, eccentric architect's office, as a PA). the library visits are because i am doing some research for the Guardian newspaper. this is incredibly exciting because:

1) i love the guardian! it is the middle-class leftie paper of choice.

2) i get paid to sit around reading about kings and queens, picking the most quirky or scandalous things to write about.

3) um, did you see the two above points?

i love the british library. you get a seat number and you have to collect your books from the front desk (leaving me to imagine the labyrinth within. i do like searching about for books myself, but this is the one place i will embrace other people doing the fetching. sometimes things are better left to the imagination). there are reading rooms on three floors, in a kind of receding balcony arrangement; this means that one wall reaches from the bottom to the top, a white cliff face, giving the rooms an airiness and sense of magnitude. when the sun shines through the windows, it leaves little bars of light on this wall, like DNA coding. it is very lovely.

today i was reading about queen victoria, who is actually quite amusing, and william iv , who once complained that he missed england - because the nice westminster girls didn't give him the pox when he fucked them. oh, you dignified royals. i am slightly concerned about my ability to finish the project on time... i shall just breathe deeply and (thankyou, hitchhiker's guide) not panic.

thirty-five

my sister has red hair; people never believe we are related, because i apparantly look greek/italian/spanish/romanian (sometimes i think people just pick nationalities out of a hat and assign them to me), whilst she looks more like a renegade leprechaun. for as long as i can remember, i have wanted red hair, or jet black hair- it was a toss up between the two, and more and more often i come down on the ginger side.

despite my hair's determined brownness- even attempts to dye it fail miserably unless copius amount of bleach are involved- i do think i have the ginger gene. i'm 97% sure of this. in the absence of some genome reading instrument, my belief is based on a solid foundation of instinct and fingers-crossed hope.. though, i do have some pretty convincing evidence: pretty much whenever i see a ginger man, i think 'PROCREATE PROCREATE QUICK' regardless of his attractiveness, and despite the fact i do not want children. what else could this be except the deep urgings of my ginger gene, desperate to repopulate the (allegedly) flagging redhead population?

because redheads are, according to some, a dying breed: over the past few years, the rumour that gingers are going extinct keeps appearing, like some delphic prophecy. julia baum, a photographer and redhead, was inspired by this rumour (which has proved both false and remarkably persistant), and created a series of beautiful portraits 'as a way of documenting and preserving the legacy of redheads'. she continues:

'As redheads, we are used to being one in a crowd and regularly noted for our appearance. Experiencing life in this way from infancy through adulthood influences who we are. As a natural redhead, I know our hair color affects more than just our appearance. As only 1% of the entire human population, our distinctive coloring is a relevant topic from day one.'

i had come across some of the photographs before, ages back, but forgotten about them. i don't know how, because they are stunning.

see more here.

what i wore today:

nemo has heard of the ultimate accessory group on flickr, and is desperate to get involved. fame isn't everything, i've told her, but will she listen? no. she just wants her picture all over the internet.

thirty

my sister gave me a waterstones gift voucher for my birthday- with forty pounds on it, wow. and my brother gave me thirty pounds worth of book tokens. that's seventy pound of books. seven-oh. hang on a sec whilst i explode from happiness. now i have to work out how to spend it....

i bought philip hoare's leviathan or, the whale a couple of days ago, and today i got the bell jar by sylvia plath (i have been intending to buy it for about a year now, i do things very slowly), and ordered the cheese and the worms by carlo ginzburg. i love browsing in bookshops (yes, even the big corporate chain ones), even (especially) when i don't have anything particular to search for; i like the messy rainbow of bookspines, the jumble of fonts, the little handwritten staff recommendations- alas, this only seems to be a feature of waterstones stores. plus, at the moment there is a cute guy working in my local (i talk of bookshops like they are pubs...oh dear) even if he does tuck his tshirt into his jeans. oh cute bookshop boy, why do you do that?

the only problem i have is that my local waterstones is far too small. when i say this, please bear in mind my slightly skewed version of small; after all, it has two floors, and i spent about 45 minutes milling around in there today...still, compared to the mammoth inner london stores, it is but a baby. i was fantastically pleased, therefore, to find out that i can use my giftcard ONLINE. i do not have to rely on the limited stock of the nearest waterstones. oh the wonders of the internet! i prompty ordered the book of other people, edited by zadie smith; i borrowed this from the library a while back and it is glorious, but apparantly not popular enough for my suburban waterstones.

have i mentioned waterstones enough to apply for advertising fees yet?

now i have nought to do but sit and await its arrival. let's hope royal mail doesn't lose it, or misdirect it, or decide that packages are far too much hassle to deliver because, you know, they're heavy and all.

this is what i wore today:



the little darling on the ladder is nemo. she is the loveliest, dribbliest little cat in the world.

twenty-six

today i turned twentyone. it was bright and sunny, and i went to osterley house, an old manor with gardens, lakes and cow-filled meadows.


i found myself walking behind the most amusing dog i have ever seen. he less walked, more waggled along, bottom bobbing up and down like an apple in water. when he came to the edge of a puddle his owner shouted 'no! no! not in the puddle. stay. STAY! NO, STAY!'; unperturbed by this, he went and stood right in its centre.


inside the garden house:



the temple of pan (because who doesn't have a neoclassical garden cabin in which to pass the spring and summer days):



by the lake:


mum- 'pretend to be reading, look interested':



what i wore today:



what i wore today, pt.2:


(oh, to be an eighteenth century man!)

twenty-four

what i wore today:



what i bought:

marjane satrapi's persepolis. i am inlove with this book, and was lucky enough to find it second-hand this morning. yay! one of my absolute favourite pages is:



marx throws a rock at descartes. tee hee.

twenty-two

'Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the drug store, but that's just peanuts to space.'
Douglas Adams.



this week i have been reading about science in eighteenth-century england, and i came across orreries. although i had seen one before, i never knew what they were called. so, my degree IS useful. aren't they beautiful? they plot the course of the planets around the sun (not in any practical, accurate way; they were meant to look pretty and prove you were clever and educated). an intricate metal solar system. sigh. want.


and now, from the wonderful to the awful. exploring bbc iplayer this evening, i found the blurb for a programme that the bbc have chosen to categorise as history: 'Psychic investigator Andy Matthews and his team go in search of Northern Ireland's ghosts'. EXCUSE ME? HISTORY? i am deeply offended on behalf of my subject. huff.

this is what i wore today:



my dad is from grimsby; the tshirt is like some regional injoke.

seventeen

today was an essay-writing day, as well a reading-all-the-sources-i-didn't-read-during-the-week-for-my-class-tomorrow day. a very hyphen full kind of day, as you can see.


i spent far too many hours in this position, or variations of it. i have not yet been able to work out a way to sit at a desk comfortably; it's been two and a half years of historianing now, surely, SURELY that is a long enough time to solve the problem? alas, i just end up slumped backward, feet rested in pulledout drawers -me and my desk are intimate friends. happily, i had grapefruit squash to help me through this diffcult time (see the mug? it's covered in little illustrations of gardening implements. why? noone knows. it is simply brilliant, and there are no further explanations needed).

the reading and writing would have probably taken less time had i not been sucked into flickr- damn you, beautiful, seductive flickr. what kind of person makes BAJILLIONS of wonderful photographs available to me on my laptop? what kind of person does that to a girl trying to do work? eh? eh? mean sadists, that's who.

favourites of the day:



from cluttershop



from Vaguery, who has a fantastic collection of public
domain images, like this one (which, if i'm honest
i found a while back, not today- but it is so beautiful
that i have to gaze upon it periodically)



a girl after my own heart.



thank you, michal, for making my day a bit more beautiful.

eleven

the ancient egyptians were right: cats are great. really great. cats are so good that i used to want to be one. when asked 'and what do you want to be when you grow up?", my answer was not limited to occupation; no, i was planning to change species.

i read books about cats, moving from slinky malinki, to sophie's tom, to james herriot's cat stories. i had an absolutely beautiful copy of t s eliot's old possum's book of practical cats, illustrated by edward gorey (which i have since lost, because i am an idiot). my jewelry had cats on. i stroked every cat i saw, regardless of the fact i was allergic to them. puffed up eyes, a runny nose and difficulty breathing was a price i was willing to pay for cat-time, goddammit. i still think there are few things better than that feeling of curled-up cat on my stomach, their purrs rumbling through my belly.




oh cats, i salute you, and honour you with a tshirt. seriously though guys, why can you only drink water that's old and full of dead leaves and scum, from a cracked bucket that's been sitting in the garden for two years? what is that about? it's a bit rank to be honest.


(i apologise for the shameless linkage to my own flickr account. they are nice photos of cats though)

eight

it is very difficult to take pictures suitable for wardrobe remix when the only camera you have is actually a mobile phone, and the only surfaces you have to balance the phone on are:

1. a windowsill
2. a chest of drawers

oftentimes you end up with no feet. i like feet. feet are important. so, oftentimes you end up doing stupid balances and falling over.



curse you, gravity. and you, sony ericsson phone. i need a robot servant to take photos for me, a robot with a Canon.

six

i think i keep indecently exposing myself to the general public. i still haven't learnt that short skirts are not appropriate attire for folding oneself up in cosy cafe chairs.