David Jones, artist and poet (1895-1974) begins his PREFACE TO THE ANATHEMATA :

'I have made a heap of all that I could find.' (1) So wrote Nennius, or whoever composed the introductory matter to Historia Brittonum. He speaks of an 'inward wound' which was caused by the fear that certain things dear to him 'should be like smoke dissipated'. Further, he says, 'not trusting my own learning, which is none at all, but partly from writings and monuments of the ancient inhabitants of Britain, partly from the annals of the Romans and the chronicles of the sacred fathers, Isidore, Hieronymous, Prosper, Eusebius and from the histories of the Scots and Saxons although our enemies . . . I have lispingly put together this . . . about past transactions, that [this material] might not be trodden under foot'. (2)

(1) The actual words are coacervavi omne quod inveni, and occur in Prologue 2 to the Historia.
(2) Quoted from the translation of Prologue 1. See The Works of Gildas and Nennius, J.A.Giles, London 1841.


20 November 2014

TECHNICALLY SPEAKING...

   
Yesterday, our technical staff were at the media conference of the Minister for Communications, Malcolm Turnbull, at which he announced his government cuts (see : "weasel words" : "cuts" described as "efficiency dividends") to ABC funding.
        
click on image for full display
        
Because the techies were away, yesterday's blog was posted by the illustrators (see photo below) who reckoned they knew what to do. Apparently, they didn't... ?!

As a consequence, you will observe we are having some technical problems. Instead of the home page showing the last 8 or so posts, it's now just showing yesterday's and, with a bit of luck, this one. Also, the November archive is not showing all that it should. (The October archive and beyond are still OK.)

To see the previous recent posts, scroll to the base of the HOME page and click on Older Posts :

We will fix the problem if we can. Meanwhile, thanks for sticking with us. And here's that photo of the offenders in their studio mess - "Back to the drawing boards, you blokes!"
   
Postscript 21 November : It's fixed!
    
 click image to enlarge - notice all the corner pinholes

 detail
 A Person Looks At A Work Of Art/
 someone looks at something ... 

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