Comments on: Von Ranke redux

By: Emile de Bruijn

Emile de Bruijn — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 21:04:13 +0000

Yes the ‘what’ and the ‘why’ can be explained with static displays, but the ‘how’ needs a live demonstration.

By: Janet

Janet — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 19:53:43 +0000

When done well, costumed interpretation can be invaluable in teaching HOW things functioned. I have seen examples of good and bad, but have to admit I have learned a thing or two along the way. . .

By: Emile de Bruijn

Emile de Bruijn — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 13:40:53 +0000

Julie Wakefield has just told me that Jane Austen describes somewhere how she spent an evening at the Bath Assembly Rooms watching a man being chased around the ballroom by his very drunken wife.

By: columnist

columnist — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 16:34:38 +0000

Well Emile, it’s sweet of you to offer. But now you’ve spoiled the surprise. I’ll know exactly who it came from when it turns up at my door.

By: Emile de Bruijn

Emile de Bruijn — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 13:29:08 +0000

Columnist, yes that is the dressing table to end all dressing tables. Presumably when you say that it would be ideal for the man with taste who has everything, you are hinting that someone should give it to you?

Courtney, the covering of the compartment is marbled paper. A propos historical dirt and squalor, the Dennis Severs house in London does quite a convincing (and also strangely poetic) recreation of that.

By: style court

style court — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 12:01:14 +0000

Emile,

The details of the field dinner table are so handsome. Do you know if the patterned exterior of the interior box is applied paper or fabric?

You raise such a great point at the end of the post. I think period films have sometimes created the illusion that all was quiet and pure in centuries past. We rarely get a sense of the mud, dirt and sounds that must have been part of daily life.

By: columnist

columnist — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 11:46:53 +0000

How extrodinary that you should publish a post that shows a piece of cabinetry not unlike one I have just posted, albeit (the pieces) for different purposes. There are dark forces at work here!

Bath is a very pretty city, and this picture of the house in Trim Street easily demonstrates that. Sadly the noisy behaviour of drunken revellers is quite a common occurrence in that other pretty Georgian city – Edinburgh. Perhaps things haven’t actually changed so much in the last 250 years. This would be re-enactment by an Un-mannered mob!

By: Emile de Bruijn

Emile de Bruijn — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 09:39:15 +0000

Indeed, living history is a subtle art balancing between research and theatre.

But I wouldn’t call historians boring

By: Barbara

Barbara — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 09:33:40 +0000

It must be difficult for historians to cross the line between fact and the fiction one must create to do living history. But most living history portrayers are extremely diligent in researching a wide variety of primary sources, while many historians “specialize” in one particular area. As a boring historian, I have great respect for re-enactors.