Yes: I grew up near major wartime factories like BSA and Joseph Lucas which
the Luftwaffe missed but instead demolished several cinemas and blocks of
flats which were still open sites in the late fifties/early sixties. This
was then followed by slum clearance which created enormous temporary areas
of abandonment: I can remember walking about huge swathes of Aston with
nobody any longer in, street after deserted street.
Except for the ghosts of course!
On 2 April 2010 22:38, Stephen Vincent <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> My London friends talk about playing in the rubble, and loving it! The
> mystery of the powers of destruction lurking around twisted metal, broken
> bricks, etc. Ghosts.
>
> Stephen
> http://stephenvincent.net/blog/
>
> --- On Fri, 4/2/10, David Bircumshaw <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> From: David Bircumshaw <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Re: was: oxford prof of poetry? now state of the world
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Date: Friday, April 2, 2010, 2:18 PM
>
> Although I gre up in a hideous Victorian inner cityscape thanks to the
> Luftwaffe there were plenty of unexpected open spaces :)
>
> On 2 April 2010 18:13, Douglas Barbour <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> > I like that term, 'Third Landscape,' Stephen. It names what we had way
> back
> > when, certainly I & my friends did when I was between 3 & oh 10 or
> more....
> >
> > I remember them well..., which is to say they are good memories, make me
> > feel well...
> >
> > But then, as Mark's post of those two quotes suggests, we were perhaps
> > privileged in manhy other ways, as well....
> >
> >
> > Doug
> > On 1-Apr-10, at 11:47 AM, Stephen Vincent wrote:
> >
> > Additionally, particularly in terms of suburbs, gates communities, even
> >> urban condo complexes, these places are not people or kid friendly.
> Their
> >> landscapes are so over-managed - no empty lots with free growing grasses
> >> and/or weeds and dirt mounds, etc. No real creeks. It's hard for either
> old
> >> or young to feel imaginatively implicated - spontaneously or otherwise
> - in
> >> these places. Unfortunately much of the 'civilized world' resists these
> >> Third Landscapes, as these kinds of spaces are called. Instead we are
> given
> >> neighborhoods, particularly in the suburbs, that are totally under
> control,
> >> or, alternatively, untouchable, highly restricted wildnerness areas
> which
> >> are not to be creatively 'tampered' or played with - such as the once
> empty
> >> lot in the neighborhood.
> >>
> >
> > Douglas Barbour
> > [log in to unmask]
> >
> > http://www.ualberta.ca/~dbarbour/
> >
> > Latest books:
> > Continuations (with Sheila E Murphy)
> > http://www.uap.ualberta.ca/UAP.asp?LID=41&bookID=664
> > Wednesdays'
> >
> >
> http://abovegroundpress.blogspot.com/2008/03/new-from-aboveground-press_10.html
> >
> > The secret
> >
> > which got lost neither hides
> > nor reveals itself, it shows forth
> >
> > tokens.
> >
> > Charles Olson
> >
>
>
>
> --
> David Bircumshaw
> "A window./Big enough to hold screams/
> You say are poems" - DMeltzer
> Website and A Chide's Alphabet
> http://www.staplednapkin.org.uk
> The Animal Subsides http://www.arrowheadpress.co.uk/books/animal.html
> Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/david.bircumshaw
> twitter: http://twitter.com/bucketshave
> blog: http://groggydays.blogspot.com/
>
--
David Bircumshaw
"A window./Big enough to hold screams/
You say are poems" - DMeltzer
Website and A Chide's Alphabet
http://www.staplednapkin.org.uk
The Animal Subsides http://www.arrowheadpress.co.uk/books/animal.html
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/david.bircumshaw
twitter: http://twitter.com/bucketshave
blog: http://groggydays.blogspot.com/
|