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It must be the holidays...
Dec. 28th, 2007 11:01 pmI've watched four movies today. The final one was The History Boys which I thought was rather wonderful. I'm now gutted that I never got my act together to go and see on stage.
On a similar topic I found a copy of the following quote whilst clearing out a drawer in my old bedroom at my parents' house. Shame I don't have a record of who wrote it in the first place:
"The appeal of history to us all is in the last analysis poetic. But the poetry of history does not consist of imagination roaming at large, but of imagination pursuing the fact and fastening upon it. That which compels the historian to 'scorn delights and live laborious days' is the ardour of his own curiosity to know what really happened long ago in that land of mystery which we call the past. To peer into that magic mirror and see fresh figures there every day is a burning desire that consumes and satisfies him all his life, that carries him each morning, eager as a lover, to the library and the muniment room. It haunts him like a passion of terrible potency, because it is poetic. The dead were and are not. Their place knows them no more, and is ours today. Yet shadows like them...The poetry of history lies in the quasi-miraculous fact that once, on this earth, once, on this familiar spot of ground, walked other men and women, as actual as we are today, thinking their own thoughts, swayed by their own passions, but now all gone, one generation vaniching into another, gone as utterly as we ourselves shall shortly be gone, like ghosts at cockrow."
This explains why I love history and why I chose to study it at university. I wanted to learn about history. I didn't think about what career it would lead me to or whether it would make me a more rounded person. I just love to learn. Watching the movie this evening reminded me of how much I enjoyed school and university and of the wonderful teachers who inspired me. I hope one day I can give up on the paper pushing and go back to studying again. I recently met the person formerly known in this journal as my evil ex-finace for a drink. He now has a daughter. We were talking about the fact I am 100% sure I don't want to have children. He asked whether I wanted to leave anything behind when I'm gone. I said that I didn't, I'd be happy just to fade away. In retrospect that is not strictly true. I would love to do a really groundbreaking piece of research work, or to add to a major historical debate in some way. At the moment I need to find a way to get back to the point where I can achieve that.
On a similar topic I found a copy of the following quote whilst clearing out a drawer in my old bedroom at my parents' house. Shame I don't have a record of who wrote it in the first place:
"The appeal of history to us all is in the last analysis poetic. But the poetry of history does not consist of imagination roaming at large, but of imagination pursuing the fact and fastening upon it. That which compels the historian to 'scorn delights and live laborious days' is the ardour of his own curiosity to know what really happened long ago in that land of mystery which we call the past. To peer into that magic mirror and see fresh figures there every day is a burning desire that consumes and satisfies him all his life, that carries him each morning, eager as a lover, to the library and the muniment room. It haunts him like a passion of terrible potency, because it is poetic. The dead were and are not. Their place knows them no more, and is ours today. Yet shadows like them...The poetry of history lies in the quasi-miraculous fact that once, on this earth, once, on this familiar spot of ground, walked other men and women, as actual as we are today, thinking their own thoughts, swayed by their own passions, but now all gone, one generation vaniching into another, gone as utterly as we ourselves shall shortly be gone, like ghosts at cockrow."
This explains why I love history and why I chose to study it at university. I wanted to learn about history. I didn't think about what career it would lead me to or whether it would make me a more rounded person. I just love to learn. Watching the movie this evening reminded me of how much I enjoyed school and university and of the wonderful teachers who inspired me. I hope one day I can give up on the paper pushing and go back to studying again. I recently met the person formerly known in this journal as my evil ex-finace for a drink. He now has a daughter. We were talking about the fact I am 100% sure I don't want to have children. He asked whether I wanted to leave anything behind when I'm gone. I said that I didn't, I'd be happy just to fade away. In retrospect that is not strictly true. I would love to do a really groundbreaking piece of research work, or to add to a major historical debate in some way. At the moment I need to find a way to get back to the point where I can achieve that.
