tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5502671101756463249.post4433416349244865790..comments2024-03-23T12:38:46.260+00:00Comments on The History Girls: History and Me by Marie-Louise JensenMary Hoffmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06241989732624913706noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5502671101756463249.post-64399053586583139792011-07-15T20:43:43.580+01:002011-07-15T20:43:43.580+01:00I too get that whisper from the past when I go int...I too get that whisper from the past when I go into an old building or stand on an unchanged landscape. I love that tingle down your spine you get when you touch a furnishing that is hundreds of years old, and think of the thousands of ancient hands who touched it before you.Kath McGurlhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02526923882402757423noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5502671101756463249.post-76713909189482781392011-07-15T12:50:34.670+01:002011-07-15T12:50:34.670+01:00I can remember being struck in Florence, as I was ...I can remember being struck in Florence, as I was eating a pizza in a sidewalk restaurant, that the people all around me could easily have walked out of the paintings I'd just seen. Lovely post!adelehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15826710558292792068noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5502671101756463249.post-51218161345623114872011-07-15T08:40:59.365+01:002011-07-15T08:40:59.365+01:00I love this post, Marie-Louise.
I also imagine p...I love this post, Marie-Louise. <br /><br />I also imagine people from the past... but my writer's ear isn't so attuned to empty rooms as yours and Michelle's. I prefer crowded places, rather than empty buildings. For example, in the Piazza Navona in Rome I will sit in a cafe and watch the Italians go by and mentally clothe them in tunics, togas and stolas. I can immediately see who would have been a magistrate and who would have been a first century "Lesbia" (the beauty who stole Catullus's heart) and who would have been a rustic farmer, in to sell his veggies on a market day. <br /><br />Same thing in Nevada. I go into a bar and mentally add cigar smoke and spittoons, and hey presto! I'm in an old West saloon. Some of those faces don't even need the addition of whiskers and beards. They are straight out of the 19th century. <br /><br />I also agree - and detect a theme - that what inspires us to delve into history are books and stories. May we do the same for this next generation!Caroline Lawrencehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07249424644829463560noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5502671101756463249.post-5504179406289137582011-07-15T07:49:25.662+01:002011-07-15T07:49:25.662+01:00I've loved reading your novels, and so it was ...I've loved reading your novels, and so it was fascinating to read about your process of entering an historic building and starting to imagine its previous life. I think buildings do have secret biographies whispering in the walls - perhaps the writers' ears are specially attuned to them? <br /><br /><br />Michelle Lovric<br />writing as anonymous to avoid Blogger's sign-in shenanigansAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com