That’s such a visceral reaction to the British Museum, Rosie. I haven’t visited it for several years. I’ve sometimes found it overwhelming in terms of size, or been awestruck or occasionally creeped out. I haven’t felt the kind of claustrophobia you describe, but I’m visiting as a Brit. Really interesting to hear your perspective.
You’re packing a lot of culture into your trip. Enjoying these accounts, thank you.
My daughter Becky worked at the Natural History Museum in London for a while and found some of the behind the scenes artefacts troubling. I remember her writing a poem about a mummy preserved in sand that was stored in a drawer. The ethics of what should or shouldn’t be kept or displayed is such a hot topic.
When I first went to London on my own aged 17 I didn’t even know what I knew about London. The rest of the world was books to me not real places to which I should tightly fasten art or fiction. I had little sense of writers having lives and _none_ of how fiction was built upon experience. I’d encountered world changing radical ideas in rural Florida Everglades and had no expectations of London except that people visited it. It took another 20 years before I started wanting to visit cities rather than forests. All of which is to say that I envy you linking the poetry and Marx (which I did know) so closely to the steps you take.
By the time I went back to London aged 27 I was overwhelmed by feeling about Britain as a whole what you felt in the British Museum.
That said, I’m not attached to generational ownership or inheritance and still feel the museum has been open to all for centuries now and more people of the cultures they came from, as well as from Britain, have shared more experience than they would have done had it all remained where it was made so it evens out. So long as it is public and not valued for specious worth.
There were so many living people, and also dead people, which was definitely part of my freak out. I don't object to Museums on principle, in fact I love them... There were so many things in there that I really wanted to see, but I could immediately tell that there would never be enough space or quietness during visiting hours for me to be able to truly look at anything.
Another great postcard. I'm really enjoying reading them. Your descriptions of London from a magical outsider perspective shine a fresh light on places that have become dull from habitual seeing. You are illuminating neglected corners. Thank you for your generous vision.
The coffee, yes, you were warned 😆. Love reading your fresh insights. And I know what you mean about the museum...the colonial dread, etc. But also the overwhelm...so much stuff! Had similar reaction in Natural History Museum, the Louvre... I was thinking about William Blake just a few days ago...I guess because Teac Damsa are touring Nobodaddy at the moment. X
I love your work so much!!! It is worthy of three exclamation marks. You did exactly what I would have done. All the weirdness of doing magic in public. I recently did a whole ritual to the landvaettir of Cuba St in Wellington, involving a gift of very good food and gin for a group of steel pipes. I read the plague year during the pandemic. It is hard to remember Dafoe was not quite a contemporary; it was so vivid. Thank you for writing these taut, sharp little messages
I found the Plague Year parallels super interesting, especially as he states in the book that he has written it to advise anyone who finds themselves in a similar situation: "I have set this particular down so fully, because I know not but it may be of moment to those who come after me, if they come to be brought to the same distress, and to the same manner of making their choice; and therefore I desire this account may pass with them rather for a direction to themselves to act by than a history of my actings, seeing it may not be of one farthing value to them to note what became of me."
The day after singing to Blake on his birthday, my Godmother messaged me in the morning telling me to go to Treadwell's. She said it was the true magicest bookshop in London. When I walked in the door, Rob was saying to the counter-person "When I emerged from the Tube station, there were Welsh boys in the street singing Jerusalem..."
That was enough of a sign for me. I asked if they had Tarot readers in, and when the person behind the counter pointed at Rob and said he was the reader, I electronically crossed his palm with silver, and he took me into a small room wallpapered with exotic birds and read my cards with poetic precision. I knew he was a fellow Wizard just by one look in his eyes, and sure enough it was one of the best readings I've ever had-- I say that as a Tarot-Wizard myself. Often when people read for me I'm like, 'Yes, but also no,' but in the case of Rob, I was still thinking about what he had said days and days later.
So if you're in the vicinity of London and mystified about something, go see Rob and tell him I sent you. He's a Wizard's Wizard.
I absolutely love these postcards.
https://www.islingtontribune.co.uk/article/poetic-justice-as-blakes-grave-gets-its-own-stone
Blake's beautiful stone was carved by Lida Cardozo: https://www.kindersleyworkshop.co.uk/
That’s such a visceral reaction to the British Museum, Rosie. I haven’t visited it for several years. I’ve sometimes found it overwhelming in terms of size, or been awestruck or occasionally creeped out. I haven’t felt the kind of claustrophobia you describe, but I’m visiting as a Brit. Really interesting to hear your perspective.
You’re packing a lot of culture into your trip. Enjoying these accounts, thank you.
To be honest it took me by surprise: I love Museums, and had been looking forward to this one...
My daughter Becky worked at the Natural History Museum in London for a while and found some of the behind the scenes artefacts troubling. I remember her writing a poem about a mummy preserved in sand that was stored in a drawer. The ethics of what should or shouldn’t be kept or displayed is such a hot topic.
When I first went to London on my own aged 17 I didn’t even know what I knew about London. The rest of the world was books to me not real places to which I should tightly fasten art or fiction. I had little sense of writers having lives and _none_ of how fiction was built upon experience. I’d encountered world changing radical ideas in rural Florida Everglades and had no expectations of London except that people visited it. It took another 20 years before I started wanting to visit cities rather than forests. All of which is to say that I envy you linking the poetry and Marx (which I did know) so closely to the steps you take.
By the time I went back to London aged 27 I was overwhelmed by feeling about Britain as a whole what you felt in the British Museum.
That said, I’m not attached to generational ownership or inheritance and still feel the museum has been open to all for centuries now and more people of the cultures they came from, as well as from Britain, have shared more experience than they would have done had it all remained where it was made so it evens out. So long as it is public and not valued for specious worth.
There were so many living people, and also dead people, which was definitely part of my freak out. I don't object to Museums on principle, in fact I love them... There were so many things in there that I really wanted to see, but I could immediately tell that there would never be enough space or quietness during visiting hours for me to be able to truly look at anything.
I guess my historical knowledge is idiosyncratic, personal, and often highly specific (self-taught)
Another great postcard. I'm really enjoying reading them. Your descriptions of London from a magical outsider perspective shine a fresh light on places that have become dull from habitual seeing. You are illuminating neglected corners. Thank you for your generous vision.
The coffee, yes, you were warned 😆. Love reading your fresh insights. And I know what you mean about the museum...the colonial dread, etc. But also the overwhelm...so much stuff! Had similar reaction in Natural History Museum, the Louvre... I was thinking about William Blake just a few days ago...I guess because Teac Damsa are touring Nobodaddy at the moment. X
If you can go, go: https://www.sadlerswells.com/whats-on/michael-keegan-dolan-teac-damsa-nobodaddy/
Just reading this interview, and there is a passage about the Highgate cemetery that might interest you: https://www.theautumnsalon.com/aswritings/darkplacesofwisdom
Great interview, thank you!
I love your work so much!!! It is worthy of three exclamation marks. You did exactly what I would have done. All the weirdness of doing magic in public. I recently did a whole ritual to the landvaettir of Cuba St in Wellington, involving a gift of very good food and gin for a group of steel pipes. I read the plague year during the pandemic. It is hard to remember Dafoe was not quite a contemporary; it was so vivid. Thank you for writing these taut, sharp little messages
Thanks! City-magic is my jam. Cuba Street is the heart of Wellington... I'll write sometime about the Stone Tarot I made to talk to the city with...
I found the Plague Year parallels super interesting, especially as he states in the book that he has written it to advise anyone who finds themselves in a similar situation: "I have set this particular down so fully, because I know not but it may be of moment to those who come after me, if they come to be brought to the same distress, and to the same manner of making their choice; and therefore I desire this account may pass with them rather for a direction to themselves to act by than a history of my actings, seeing it may not be of one farthing value to them to note what became of me."
The day after singing to Blake on his birthday, my Godmother messaged me in the morning telling me to go to Treadwell's. She said it was the true magicest bookshop in London. When I walked in the door, Rob was saying to the counter-person "When I emerged from the Tube station, there were Welsh boys in the street singing Jerusalem..."
That was enough of a sign for me. I asked if they had Tarot readers in, and when the person behind the counter pointed at Rob and said he was the reader, I electronically crossed his palm with silver, and he took me into a small room wallpapered with exotic birds and read my cards with poetic precision. I knew he was a fellow Wizard just by one look in his eyes, and sure enough it was one of the best readings I've ever had-- I say that as a Tarot-Wizard myself. Often when people read for me I'm like, 'Yes, but also no,' but in the case of Rob, I was still thinking about what he had said days and days later.
So if you're in the vicinity of London and mystified about something, go see Rob and tell him I sent you. He's a Wizard's Wizard.
https://www.treadwells-london.com/rob
See this Note for photos of Bunhill. (I could only upload them once I got home.)
https://substack.com/profile/113174145-rosie-whinray/note/c-81678598