A ramble through landscape & hypermedia

I decided to go for my usual loaf of bread by a circuitous route, over the Pastures; or rather, my feet took me that way while I readied myself to share what I had to say to Olympus, my companion of the road, expert at listening because he’s a state-of-the-art voice recorder. You’ll see from the panorama above that nothing remains of those hillside meadows where cows once grazed—only the name. I didn’t know exactly what route I would take and had no idea what I’d say ’til the moment. As paths branched, some promising topics and routes were left unexplored for the sake of others, which may be taken up another time; bear with me. This, more or less, is what Olympus heard:

“Life is a losing battle, of course. We may be ‘cut off in our prime’, which seems like a cruel stroke of Fate. But what are the alternatives? We may reach our prime; but then it’s all downhill after. Worst of all, we may die young or old without ever passing through any phase we could possibly call ‘prime’.

“Most people I know would call this morbid talk. So this is a good reason to leave them alone and tell the entire world, for somewhere this system of dots and dashes (technically, 0s and 1s) transmitted via the World-Wide Web may reach the Ideal Reader, making the whole intricate process worth while.

“So here we are, and here it is. I find myself liking it more—my life here, on this spot of Earth, as I get fond of the familiar, discovering some new joy in it—even these drab & decaying footpaths which snake in zigzag style between the houses on this hillside whose backyards are often dumps for unwanted items. It’s not a pretty environment by typical aesthetic standards, and yet I find in them some latent beauty or actual beauty to celebrate, even if those who live here don’t, because you’d see their effort and pride reflected otherwise. Perhaps life has not shown much of its celebratory side to them. It’s presumptuous of me to say it, but I’ve become a new person, and believe I can see certain things clearly; as if I have become whole: a properly-functioning microcosm properly integrated into the ambient macrocosm. It’s been a long time coming. It’s true that one should not make judgements: for all I know, the people who inhabit the properties adjacent to the zig-zagging footpaths which join these parallel roads may celebrate and give thanks everyday of their lives for every blessing dropped into their laps, including living here. It may just be that due to earlier circumstances they merely lack the energy, money and vision to clean the place up and make it look as if they are proud to be here—to beautify this densely populated half-urbanized wilderness. In any case I have seen worse. And perhaps the architects didn’t have the specifications, budgets or vision to make these houses look more glorious. Yet still they do look glorious in the sunshine, and indeed, if you are in the mood to see it, in any kind of weather at all.

“And as I talk, I’m going up and up steep steps, after spending days ‘feeling my age’. Bad days, good days. The point is, for everyone, to make the most of what they have. And that should be one of the aims of any teacher, of children especially: an uplifting, fulfilling, egoless vocation, because you are thinking of others’ benefit, not your own. In short a helper. I’ve been inspired by a blogger called The Hickory Wind who has just started “A New Alcuin” which is to discuss his ideas about “finding better ways to prepare children for the world”. It hasn’t got far as yet, but I would summarize his ideas to date like this: compulsory education makes the teacher a custodian, which detracts from his proper role as a helper.”

[I think I’ve been also inspired by the scrapbook of my great-aunt Ollie, who at the age of 23 was so excited by the start of a war against Germany in 1914, for it gave her something to do in her community, and reasons to fuss over her two brothers who enlisted, and suffered their several fates in due course. To the end of her life she dedicated herself to good causes, or what she saw as such.]

“Just as I’m thinking such thoughts, I take a short-cut through the grounds of Mount Zion Baptist Church, and see a list of services, including Tuesday 6 – 7.30: Lamplighter Bible Club (children aged 4 – 7). Lamplighter: an old-fashioned word, describing the humble role of one who at twilight went along the streets lighting gaslamps. I first thought they called it the Lamplighter Club because it took place in the early evening, but that’s unlikely. They probably see it as passing on a flame of salvation to a new generation.”


And when I thought of the old lamplighters I thought of a fine essay by Robert Louis Stevenson in which he regrets the coming of electricity, which will eliminate their picturesque occupation. ‘A sedate electrician somewhere in a back office touches a spring—and behold ! from one end to another of the city, from the Alexandra to the Crystal Palace, there is light ! Fiat Lux, says the sedate electrician.’ I want to quote the whole thing, but you can read it for yourself, I’ve opened the book at the right pages.

And when I think of that essay, it reminds me of when I bought the book, in 1993, and wanted to write about it with quotes and old photos just as I do now. My idea was to include it in a multimedia CD-ROM. In the early Nineties, PC magazines were offering them as freebies and you could buy faancy ones too on many topics. Microsoft had a freebie mini-encyclopedia called “Encarta”, in which you could click a button and get any flag of the world and the national anthem which went with it. I especially liked the section on birds: the text, the picture, and the song. There was talk that CD-ROMs would make Encyclopaedia Brittanica obsolete. This of course was before the World-Wide Web swamped the field. I had never heard of the Web but a work colleague told me about it. He was Nigel Woodhead, a young man who had written a book called Hypertext & Hypermedia whilst still at Oxford. In conversation with him I conceived the idea of a mini-Web-on-a-CD as a new art form. Nigel himself was researching for a CD-ROM on Jack the Ripper, or Victorian London—the concepts were intertwined. It was a miniature museum, or cabinet of curiosities, that you could explore for yourself on your home computer. My own idea was encapsulated in its title, ‘Windows on Other Worlds’. I was rather hoping that Microsoft would complain at my use of their ™-protected word and give me extra publicity; whilst any British judge, I assumed, would laugh them out of court.

Anyhow, by ‘other worlds’ I meant ‘other times, other cultures’ and I was going to quote from Stevenson and various other authors who took my fancy, based on what I had bought in second-hand bookshops lately. My idea remained latent, as furniture to the imagination. [Nigel on the other hand has developed his interests commercially, as you can see from this site.] But I have my blog. And I see that not only can everything be connected through hyperlinking (even in the material world through smartphones & QRcode) but everything has always been connected to everything else, in this cornucopia of wonders that we call the world. At any rate I offer this view by way of excuse for my rambling thoughts and the way they come full circle.

For something strange happened when I was trying to find Stevenson’s “Lamplighter” essay. I was sure it was in the volume of Virginibus Puerisque, that I’d bought in Folkestone. I went through the Table of Contents and it wasn’t listed. But under a section called “Other essays”, there was one “On the enjoyment of unpleasant places”. I made a note to check it. Finally I found the essay I was originally looking for: “A Plea for Gas Lamps”.

So then I went to the “unpleasant places” essay, just on the off-chance that Stevenson had an idea similar to mine, whilst I was zig-zagging between those drab and littered backyards. He did! and his essay is more brilliant than anything I could write, and persuades me that his thoughts are also mine. I must try and choose a brief quote:

With all this in mind, I have often been tempted to put forth the paradox that any place is good enough to live a life in, while it is only in a few, and those highly favoured, that we can pass a few hours agreeably. For if we only stay long enough, we become at home in the neighbourhood. Reminiscencesspring up, like flowers, about uninteresting corners.

My imagined hypermedia CD-ROM, which would have space for so many snippets of literature, snippets of sound, carefully-chosen images—my “Windows on Other Worlds” has expanded as the World-Wide Web until it has become “a little larger than the entire universe”*. So with no trouble at all I can set before you entire essays. Let Stevenson bear witness from beyond the grave to something I was trying to put to words in The Pastures. Here is On the Enjoyment of Unpleasant Places. And here for good measure is his full essay on lamplighters: A Plea for Gas-lamps; which is really a plea for the past to be remembered for its beauties as much as the present.

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*A Little Larger Than the Entire Universe: title of an anthology of poems by Fernando Pessoa.