George Orwell’s diaries are being published as a blog, posted in realtime exactly 70 years after the entries were written. Incredible.
From the 8/11 entry:
This morning all surfaces, even indoors, damp as a result of mist. A curious deposit all over my snuff-box, evidently residue of moisture acting on lacquer.
Parker Dundee wants to know what his father’s job really was. He’s going to have to find Mr. Abernathy first.
(Previously.)
Random Items On Top Of My Dresser This Morning:
I really want to know what kind of scary things Nighttime Me is up to.
The Beinecke Library has an interesting web exhibition about the American history of the Utopian dream, from the establishment of New Haven in 1638 to modern sustainable communes like Twin Oaks.
The exhibit has a comprehensive list of the most important “utopian” communities in the US1, with manuscripts and documents from the library’s collections.
Also included are short lists of Utopian and Dystopian literature from the collection2. It’s a neat set of images and facts, if you’re interested in the subject and haven’t seen an overview of it presented in such a way.
Two nitpicks that I have, though: 1) The sentence “the goal of removal from the heart of civilization to the wilderness” in the intro text is misleading as a blanket statement - More’s original Utopia was one of social and political perfection, rather than one based on any pastoral or nature-based ideals; and 2) it would be nice if all the manuscript/ephemera page images enlarged into higher-res versions.
