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For those of you unlikely to read or enjoy the review of The Misalliance that I just posted (scroll down) I thought I would throw in this bonus post.
You may recall that I decided to keep track of all the London place names that come up in Anita Brookner’s fiction. Her novels are full of London. Not in an overly conspicuous way, but it leaves you no doubt that Brookner is a creature of the city.
Having now finished re-reading six of Brookner’s 24 novels (and working on number seven at the moment), my Gazetteer of Brookner’s London is starting to take shape. I can’t wait to see the list when I’ve finished re-reading all 24. Part of me wants to do this with every book I read that takes place in London but that would be just short of madness.
At some point I will invest the time and/or money into having a map made. But for now it is a list. I know there are London geeks out there who will enjoy looking at it even if you haven’t read Brookner.
the fabulous ben pentreath is getting ready to publish a map like the stunning turgot's plan de paris. it's an old map of london, in huge pieces, taken from an original 1700's map. i can help you with the photoshop part of it if you need it.
https://instagram.com/p/1NGGUIvAxx/?taken-by=benpentreath
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Funny coincidence, I recently came across a London map of Virginia Woolf's Mrs Dalloway, which will either inspire you or be a time suck, or both:
http://mrsdallowaymappingproject.weebly.com/mrsdalloway.html
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An embroidered map with each novel represented by a different color thread would be lovely.
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This is the kind of project I wish I had the patience to work on.
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Knowing almost all of these locations really tickled me! However, I don't have much inclination to read more Brookner I'm afraid.
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I love that map and love all the individual panels. But it gives me a tummy ache thinking of trying to hang all those frames so perfectly.
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Oooh, a perfect site for spending some time.
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And I am being oddly patient about it. I could finish my re-read of the remaining 17 novels in fairly short order but have been spacing them out. However, I think I only read one in 2013 and one in 2104 and at that rate I am going to be older than I want to be when I finish the mapping project. I think I will probably accelerate my reading rate since I know that reading them all a third time will be something to look forward to. They are much like Pym in that regard. One can read them over and over.
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The first trick is to find 24 distinct colors of embroidery floss. The second is that I suspect part of the map is going to be very crowded which is part of what I can't wait to discover.
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Well, as I say elsewhere, she can be an acquired taste so I won't preach. Perhaps given your association with all the places you have more affinity with Brookner the human if not Brookner the author.
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