Olivia Harrison paints a loving portrait of her husband that brings together anecdotes and testimonies from those closest to him throughout his life and marries them perfectly to images that capture his peaceful intensity. What we see in these photographs is the arc of a man's life, from the stark images of the Liverpool he grew up in through family portraits and school photos to those of a young man standing atop cities with thousands of disciples and the world at his feet. George Harrison's own photographs offer the reader a glimpse of how he saw the world himself; pictures of his band mates, fans and the wonderful vistas of India tell us what he thought was beautiful. The testimonies tell us of a man who strived for spiritual peace and we can see from the changes between the manic pictures of the Beatles heyday to the more solemn and pensive images of George meditating in India that he was not content to live a material life.
Monday, 12 December 2011
Sunday, 11 December 2011
A Song of Ice and Fire
I resisted reading A Game of Thrones for a long time before I finally gave in. I knew that once I succumbed I'd be signing away the next month of my life to such an epic fantasy series. Alas once I had watched the series and gotten thoroughly addicted I just couldn't help myself, I've always been impatient and I certainly wasn't going to wait until next year to find out what happened. And now I find myself three weeks in and just starting the second half of the third book having spent all my spare hours engrossed in George R.R. Martin's intricately constructed world.
He is a master of his craft. It's been some years since I last embarked on the reading of such a huge fantasy series and I'd forgotten the joy of being so addicted that you devour book after book. The scope of this story is truly epic and Martin manages to handle a dizzying array of characters and plot lines with incredible skill, dropping hints and teasers only to pick the threads up a thousand pages later and halfway across his world. There is a character to suit everyones tastes so any reader will find someone to champion. My personal favourite is Tyrion Lannister, The Imp, he is exceedingly clever and very well written with hidden depths. John Snow the bastard of Winterfell is another favourite, noble and sad. If you liked Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series then you will love this as much as i do. I couldn't even begin to summarise the plot and I wouldn't want to spoil it for anyone all I can say is read it!
He is a master of his craft. It's been some years since I last embarked on the reading of such a huge fantasy series and I'd forgotten the joy of being so addicted that you devour book after book. The scope of this story is truly epic and Martin manages to handle a dizzying array of characters and plot lines with incredible skill, dropping hints and teasers only to pick the threads up a thousand pages later and halfway across his world. There is a character to suit everyones tastes so any reader will find someone to champion. My personal favourite is Tyrion Lannister, The Imp, he is exceedingly clever and very well written with hidden depths. John Snow the bastard of Winterfell is another favourite, noble and sad. If you liked Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series then you will love this as much as i do. I couldn't even begin to summarise the plot and I wouldn't want to spoil it for anyone all I can say is read it!
Friday, 18 November 2011
The ruins of Detroit by Yves Marchand & Romain Meffre
Without a doubt “The Ruins of Detroit” by Yves Marchand and Romain Meffre is the best photography monograph to come out this year and one of the most beautifully produced art books I’ve ever seen. Within the space of a few months it has become the ultimate work on its subject and it is hard to believe that any future publication will top it.
In this monograph the photographers manage to capture the full scope of the decline and decay experienced by the city of Detroit. Rather than just the usual, well documented, abandoned factories which have become a symbol for this ruined city Marchand and Meffre have chosen subjects from every area of the city’s life. They have photographed churches, schools, theatres, apartment buildings and whole desolated streets. The wide choice of subjects really brings home that the devastation is not confined to the poorer areas of the city, some of the more poignant photographs show the sagging gilt and tattered velvet of theatres and ballrooms lining the main boulevards.
One of the surprising facts “The Ruins of Detroit” reveals is that although we mostly think of the state of the city as a product of previous decline, particularly the great depression of the 1930’s, the abandonment of buildings is still going on today and more and more of the city is being left to rot. In some of the last photographs of the book the authors show a series of pictures of the Jane Cooper Elementary School which was closed in 2007. The first photograph shows a wide view of the building in what the authors refer to as “a gigantic no mans land” and we can see that the residential neighbourhood which once surrounded the school has started to disappear. In the subsequent photographs Marchand and Meffre have shown the state of the schools rooms a year after their abandonment in the spring of 2008 and then again a year later in 2009. In the space of a year between the pictures the school has been stripped, anything left has been smashed and scattered and signs of fire damage can be seen.
The short history of the city at the start of the book and the running comments throughout take us through the story of Detroit’s decline and the magic of the collection as a whole is that it has managed to show us not just what the city has become but what it once was and how far it has fallen. Far from being just a photography monograph this book is a work of social commentary on one of Americas most notorious cities mostly shown through fantastic images taken with a high level of skill and dedication to the subject.
In this monograph the photographers manage to capture the full scope of the decline and decay experienced by the city of Detroit. Rather than just the usual, well documented, abandoned factories which have become a symbol for this ruined city Marchand and Meffre have chosen subjects from every area of the city’s life. They have photographed churches, schools, theatres, apartment buildings and whole desolated streets. The wide choice of subjects really brings home that the devastation is not confined to the poorer areas of the city, some of the more poignant photographs show the sagging gilt and tattered velvet of theatres and ballrooms lining the main boulevards.
One of the surprising facts “The Ruins of Detroit” reveals is that although we mostly think of the state of the city as a product of previous decline, particularly the great depression of the 1930’s, the abandonment of buildings is still going on today and more and more of the city is being left to rot. In some of the last photographs of the book the authors show a series of pictures of the Jane Cooper Elementary School which was closed in 2007. The first photograph shows a wide view of the building in what the authors refer to as “a gigantic no mans land” and we can see that the residential neighbourhood which once surrounded the school has started to disappear. In the subsequent photographs Marchand and Meffre have shown the state of the schools rooms a year after their abandonment in the spring of 2008 and then again a year later in 2009. In the space of a year between the pictures the school has been stripped, anything left has been smashed and scattered and signs of fire damage can be seen.
The short history of the city at the start of the book and the running comments throughout take us through the story of Detroit’s decline and the magic of the collection as a whole is that it has managed to show us not just what the city has become but what it once was and how far it has fallen. Far from being just a photography monograph this book is a work of social commentary on one of Americas most notorious cities mostly shown through fantastic images taken with a high level of skill and dedication to the subject.
Roll up, roll up, take your seats for a literary extravaganza!
Welcome to the literary ramblings of a bookseller and a book studier. Surrounding oneself with books is life's chief pleasure. Knowing that marvellous worlds and great minds are but the turn of a page away makes it easier then ever to slip out of this mundane world. If you've ever spent spent a Friday night counting the books on your shelves and just waiting for the day when you reach the magic one thousand or alphabetising and organising your books by genre then this is the blog for you. Between us we have some fairly eclectic reading tastes and you can expect a wide range of reviews and recomendtons from fantastic fiction to the most aesthetically pleasing photography monographs of the last twenty years. Always expect something surprising. As well as book reviews we'll also be putting up some bits of creative writing as well as musings and ponderings on the nature of all things literary. Have a peruse and if you like what you see hang around.
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