Tag: creative writing
The Architect and the Matador
8 February 2021
The Architect and the Matador8 February 2021
By Thomas Gould
On one sheet, a matador;on the other, a design,with measurements, for a cathedral pier. What unites these drawingsis provenance:both, apparently, executedby the architectEugène Viollet-le-Ducin meetings. As Viollet-le-Duc’s mind wanderedfrom doodle to design,my attention,beholding the drawings,is drawn between the two sheets; drawn, by the insistently connective impulseof looking,into associations. Between architect… Read More
Writing Prize 2020: Smudgy Logic – A Short Story
30 November 2020
Writing Prize 2020: Smudgy Logic – A Short Story30 November 2020
‘it is dangerous to unmask images, since they dissimulate the fact that there is nothing behind them.’– Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation ‘so you compute with smudgy pictures?’– K-32, Universal Fabricator ‘But what does it do?’ insisted Kei in his eerily smooth, synthetic voice. ‘Are you really asking me what my drawing does?’ Miho’s… Read More
Behind the Lines 13
10 October 2019
Behind the Lines 1310 October 2019
I selected a distant meadow in the midst of an empty landscape, barren and forlorn, to make a retreat for myself…. No sooner was the house completed than I knew it was not far enough away from everything I wished to leave behind…Later I sold the house and grounds for… Read More
Behind the Lines 12
23 September 2019
Behind the Lines 1223 September 2019
1870Colonel James Clifton-Brown, newly established at Holmbush, his Regency country house in Colgate, West Sussex, has political ambitions – namely, the parliamentary seat for Horsham. He observes that the villagers have only a small cramped chapel in which to fulfil their ambitions to be good Christians. The chapel is not… Read More
Behind the Lines 11
12 August 2019
Behind the Lines 1112 August 2019
Robert Schnebbelie peered into the Egyptian Hall wondering what freak show was on view, and then set himself down next door outside the oil and Italian warehouse, Sherborn & Sams. He looked across Piccadilly at the entrance to Burlington Arcade that created a neat endstop to the long wall of… Read More
Behind the Lines 10
19 June 2019
Behind the Lines 1019 June 2019
It was undoubtedly the doing of that ancient buffer Lutyens, Samuel Hardy reflected sourly, as he stared at the pages of the September 1932 issue of The Builder and saw an illustration of the winning entry. It showed Mr Edward H Banks of ‘Villa Desiré’, Downlands Road, Purley, Surrey’s awful concoction of… Read More
Behind the Lines 9
2 February 2019
Behind the Lines 92 February 2019
Cyril Ponsonby walked anxiously from where he was staying in Wilbury Road, Hove over to the Hotel Metropole on the Brighton sea front. It was 1907, a sunny day in early August. He was hot and bothered. Under his arm he held a sheaf of papers. He went through the… Read More
Behind the Lines 8
4 December 2018
Behind the Lines 84 December 2018
Annette Berthe Schlegel, wife of Adalbert, mother of Mariana, Friedrich, Werner and Elmira, and grandmother to little Wilhelm and Lydia, died peacefully in her cherry wood bed at home in Marienstrasse, Stuttgart, on March 29th, 1812. Adalbert, a successful watchmaker, had held Annette dear, and two weeks after the funeral… Read More
Behind the Lines 7
31 October 2018
Behind the Lines 731 October 2018
Mr. Tassie’s House On June 27th 1807 William Tassie scratched his long nose, dipped a pen in the inkwell, and finished off his letter to Alexander Wilson Esq of Messrs. Dunlop & Wilson, Booksellers of Glasgow: ‘I have been near a twelve month engaged with alterations in my house –… Read More
Behind the Lines 6
13 August 2018
Behind the Lines 613 August 2018
Richard Bentley cracked open the red seal, smiling as he always did at the peculiar crest of a man in a ridiculous long-tasselled hat, and folded out the letter. His mood was anxious; he scratched his head nervously with one hand and knocked over the ink on his drawing table with… Read More
Behind the Lines 5
10 May 2018
Behind the Lines 510 May 2018
Boughton MonchelseaMaidstone September 26, 1828 My lord, Please be so good as to find designs for the lodge that you commissioned, a habitation for your woodman, John Platt. I earnestly hope that it will be the ornament that you desired for your park improvements. I also enclose the books that… Read More
Behind the Lines 14
3 February 2020
Behind the Lines 143 February 2020
By Philippa Lewis
These are just insignificant sketches, but they remind me of the Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques in 1937; by night it was a unique experience – mémorable. You see, one theme of the exposition was light and water: an expression of what could be achieved with the power of modern electricity,… Read More
topographic/cartographic presentation civic & municipal public space behind the lines (series) creative writing