Sunday 14 August 2005

Busy busy

Well aren't you all busy little readers: see the comments on the last post, what a nice surprise to see some exotic visitors posting, as well as my old friends!

I'm afraid I've been rather busy this week. I have been writing furiously, trying to make up for the lost time in Italy. I met my supervisor and had a chat about it and gave him the chapter-section to read. We'll talk about it when I get back from Ireland. I'm leaving on Wednesday. Before then, I must pack and leave my room. I've been in a nice two-room set this past year (a priviledge for the MCR president), and it if full of stuff. I had a huge cull today and threw out two black refuse sacks of clothes, papers, and rubbish. Great feeling.

I have such an amount of work to do it is not funny...

Over the past few days I've also been going into Blackwell's to read Ralph Hanna's new book London Literature, 1300-1380 (Cambridge, 2005). I haven't had the cash to blow on it, but I think that I will when I get back, it's well worth it. It's a brilliantly accomplished book, actually so good it makes the hairs stand on the back of your neck. I've read the first three chapters and when I went in yesterday someone had bought the only copy on the shelf! Oh well. I might post a review when I read the rest of it. Absolutely essential reading - no medievalist can afford not to read it. I mean that!

Despite the disappointment of not being able to finish my free read in Blackwell's, I did pick up a lovely mint copy of The Oxford Guide to Style, which I'd been meaning to look for to check a couple of things. (Yes, expect things to get elevated from now on...). Barnardo's on the Cowley Road is not where you'd go first for books, but actually there were more than a few interesting things. And (in Oxfam) I picked up a nice (-ish) recording of Renata Tebaldi in La Wally, an opera I'd only known bits of before. Better than its low profile would suggest. I heard her sing a recital a few years ago in Bologna, one of her last public appearances. Her voice had weakened a lot in the higher register, but for the easy stuff it was very nice. And she left in a kind of breeze of adulation only to come scrambling back on stage becasue she had lost her diamond bracelet. Not very dignified. But kind of funny.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

And what perquisites after serving make running for JCR president worthwhile? :)

But seriously... was your purchase of the style guide an effect of the comment discussion about style, or just a random event? ;)

Miglior acque said...

MCR (as opposed to JCR, which is for the undergraduates) president is basically someone who thinks they can change the world and make a lot of difference and then realizes that s/he can't. Never mind. I enjoyed doing it and I'm not sorry I did.

No, the style guide was something I have been thinking of for a while. A friend pulled me up on the following punctuation: "...-, ...", so I wanted to see. Ritter says NO NO NO. So I've stopped doing it.

Anonymous said...

D'you think the hairs on the back of Ralph Hanna's neck stand on end while he reads your blog?

Miglior acque said...

I have a feeling Ralph has better things to be doing than reading my blog! Praise from too far down the food chain doesn't really make much difference anyway!

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