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The Letters of Vincent Van Gogh

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Books

Published: 22 May 2009

Hits: 1643

Edited and Introduced by Mark Roskill

Now this is a great book. Here, in 1 volume, are the collected letters of Vincent Van Gogh to his brother Theo. 

That said, it's not perfect. It's a 1963 paperback with black and white plates of his work. Van Gogh is sold short in full color prints, there's no point to black and white prints at all. But it's an old book, so you can't really expect better. It's been edited, which is a bad thing, and there are notes to certain letters advising that certain of Vincent's observations to Theo are left out as being irrelevant. While I appreciate this is probably true, I'd prefer to judge that for myself. There are notes as well that reference other letters Van Gogh wrote to Gauguin on the back of his letters to Theo, but not reproduced. This is a bit of a tease. There are notes as to sketches that Van Gogh sent to Theo along with his letters, or drawings on the page, but these again are not reproduced. And it would be good to see Theo's responses to Van Gogh's letters, to form perhaps a better idea of their correspondence.

So in short, there's no criticizing Van Gogh, but the editing could be better done. Things I'd look for were I to buy this again:

• More notes as to the paintings and what became of them (He describes quite vividly what he's working on in the letters, but only some of them are footnoted. Many of his works went missing as well, and it would be curious to know what's survived and what's missing, as well as where the surviving works are currently.)
• Something that attempted to reproduce the drawings that accompanied his letters
• Letter from Theo, as well as surviving letters from Vincent to Gauguin, etc.

Garage Sale Finds - Week 5

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Miscellany

Published: 18 May 2009

Hits: 3322

And a big scurry about Okotoks yesterday, woke the children early and packed them into the car for a tour of their garage sales. Lots of garage sales, the Okotoks parade of garage sales is an annual thing, literally hundreds of them. 

Most of them are drive-bys, you don't need to get out of the car, tables filled with Barbies or Stage West Mugs have a low likelihood of having anything I might value, and so we simply drive by. Ones that offer some hope we stop at.

No great treasures this weekend. A trumpet for the boy, with case, in very good condition. And, because I found something for the boy I had to find something for the girl and tracked down a couple of gameboy games and a small number of Pokemon cards. A vintage 1930's Remington Typewriter, remarkable only in the fact that it appears to be in virtually new condition. With bright red keys, which is a plus.

The typewriter was it, in the end. I've already laid great plans for it. I'll take it to The Higher Ground in Kensington and "Plug it in" where all the computer junkies have their laptops docked. And I'll begin rattling away on my novel.

"Dear Diary" I'll begin...

"The Time Machine worked, but I seem to have found myself thrown into the future. It's a different world, the God now is Google and people are incessantly asking him to ...."

It'll be great. I'll have to refine the novel a bit, get a good plot worked up before I go in to type it out, but the look of the typewriter (I need an apple logo for the case), the "clickclickclick" when you wind in the paper, the percussion of the keys and the bell when I reach the end of the line, it'll be a performance art masterpiece.... 

Moon Phase with Westminster Chime

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Dreams

Published: 16 May 2009

Hits: 2031

And while I'm missing the stabbing party downstairs I'm dreaming, completely out, and it took a while this morning to remember the dream. It came to me in bits and pieces...

I'm in a restaurant, Teatro's I think, but it's not it's someplace else, an old converted church. I'm catching up with an old girlfriend, Cheryl Howe, and I've brought along a bag of watches to show her, some are for her. It's late, but we haven't noticed the time. I've noticed the hostess, however, she's thin and blonde and tall, real tall, maybe 8 feet, but she's pleasant and that's how I know that it was a dream and not really Teatro's.....

So while I'm emptying my bag of watches to show to Cheryl I'm rediscovering some of them, there's this one, a gold case, moon-phase, westminster chime, the alarm bells ring a different tune every hour, I think I wore it there but never noticed it, then the eight foot hostess tells us they are closed, they've been for some while, they're only waiting for us to leave and gosh it's late so Cheryl leaves, I gather up my watches, I'll find her hotel later, show her the watches, but I'm lost in the neighborhood, my dream, and I wake up....