tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4195907108786172736.post3674023276225255668..comments2023-03-29T12:32:19.224+02:00Comments on Compasses: Who is it who can tell me who I am?Lucyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09764296105901909328noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4195907108786172736.post-16592253784995998792009-08-22T14:30:25.008+02:002009-08-22T14:30:25.008+02:00Makes me wonder if this is what it feels like to b...Makes me wonder if this is what it feels like to become lost in Alzheimer's disease. All those rooms in the mind, cluttered with tools whose use we no longer recall...the slow disintegration of self into something no longer recognizable...the descent into madness greater, more insidious, than Lear's.<br /><br />Gives me the shivers to read this. Good writing.<br /><br />:)The Crowhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04846997590157958766noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4195907108786172736.post-4812203076326979232009-08-08T23:33:57.284+02:002009-08-08T23:33:57.284+02:00An interesting project ... and greetings from a Ke...An interesting project ... and greetings from a Kentish lass (or am I a Maid of Kent? - can never remember which side of the Medway is which!). I grew up in Sevenoaks, and spent many happy hours on High Rocks. Saw my first (open air) Shakespeare in The Pantiles...Caroline Gillhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05203454486693014969noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4195907108786172736.post-88180779458761750812009-08-02T05:18:48.342+02:002009-08-02T05:18:48.342+02:00Sorry - got into a muddle with my previous ttempt ...Sorry - got into a muddle with my previous ttempt to comment!<br />Here is a second version:<br />As the layers are peeled back they reveal not a single identity, rather a network of "rooms" where previous selves can be encountered.<br />The narrator is conscious of the effect of time. I really like how the imagery unfolds, the selection of the word "enfilade" and the "dark and ancient guile" of the mirror person.<br />It all adds up to a complex metaphor about what actually endures in the shifting realities of experience.Lucashttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07642126053527835870noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4195907108786172736.post-74423011109436269632009-07-30T13:32:12.614+02:002009-07-30T13:32:12.614+02:00Thanks for helpful comment. On a point of informat...Thanks for helpful comment. On a point of information, Chambers Dictionary defines enfilade as: a number of things arranged as if threaded on a string; a series of rooms with the doors in line affording a continuous passage. It also gives the military definition of raking a line with continuous fire.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06972049290586377462noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4195907108786172736.post-1730522129060032382009-07-27T19:14:47.364+02:002009-07-27T19:14:47.364+02:00Apart from dwelling on the central out-of-body/out...Apart from dwelling on the central out-of-body/out-of-mind experience in which we briefly see ourselves as if through the wrong end of a telescope, I use your dialogue as a tutorial, as a list of possibilities. The opportunity to use (perhaps even slightly misuse, I'm not sure) the wonderfully euphonious "enfilade" or, better still, to evoke the past with:<br /><br /><em>The sadness of the tools eroded worn and bent,<br />Discarded in corners where the dust has fed.</em><br /><br />The trick is to search for poetic potential in the colloquial which might at first glance seem to be an unfruitful source. I am also greatly cheered by the rhymes.Roderick Robinsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16828395545197001637noreply@blogger.com