The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole of its day, The Diary Of A Nobody is perhaps less hilarious than it was back in 1892, but it’s no less readable and seems to evoke its age better than any of the supposedly naturalist contemporary fiction. By reading it I have learned that: Dull, respectable men in …
George and Weedon Grossmith – The Diary of a Nobody Read More »
Cinema was even more a sideshow attraction than recorded sound in 1892. In pre-Lumiere France, cinematic pioneer Émile Reynaud was projecting slides with moving images in front of painted backgrounds at his Théâtre Optique in Paris. In a sense this had been done for hundreds of years with magic lantern shows, but Reynaud’s innovation was …
Can’t remember when I first hear that yellow wallpaper sent you round the bend, but I would have been very young – then later, hearing that it was a famous short story, I imagined it was one of the anthologised horror stories I liked when I was 13 or so. But it’s not. It’s a …
Firsts Ellis Island opens. Rudolf Diesel applies for a patent for the Diesel engine. The Carnegie Steel Company, Liverpool Football Club and Newcastle United F.C. are founded. Abercrombie & Fitch is established. The “Pledge of Allegiance” is first recited by students in U.S. public schools. The Nutcracker ballet with music by Tchaikovsky is premiered. Viruses …
What was recorded sound for; historical record? dictation of memos? the arts? At this point nobody is really making the case for any one purpose. The phonograph is out there in the homes of the wealthy trend-setters, recording studios are being set up in major cities, and popular entertainers are being sought out to make …
George Frederic Watts — After the Deluge Giovanni Segantini – Midday in the Alps Henri Rousseau — Tiger in a Tropical Storm Emily Maria Eardley (‘Milly’) Childers – Hugh Culling Eardley Childers Paul Gauguin — Tahitian Women on the Beach Philip Hermogenes Calderon — St. Elizabeth of Hungary Pierre Puvis de Chavannes — The …
Thirty-five years after witnessing the last public hanging of a woman in Dorset, Thomas Hardy set out to show how an innocent soul can be so let down by the cruelties and hypocrisies of our society as to end up on the gallows. Tess herself may well be more a representation of an ideal than …
Thomas Hardy – Tess of the d’Urbervilles: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented Read More »
Firsts: Basketball, The London—Paris telephone system, the removable pneumatic bicycle tire, New Scotland Yard, the Tesla coil, the Swiss Army Knife and Stanford University. Carnegie Hall has its grand opening and first public performance, with Tchaikovsky as guest conductor. Disasters: The Springhill Mining Disaster. The SS Utopia, carrying Italian migrants to New York, sinks in …
MP3 download | Patreon | Apple | Mixcloud | Spotify | Castbox | Stitcher | RSS One of the main problems with making this Centuries of Sound thing is representation. The 1890s are the birthplace of ragtime and the blues, Buddy Bolden was playing proto-Jazz down in New Orleans, and over in Europe figures like …
