No comments about Mochlos IIA: Period IV: The Mycenaean Settlement and Cemetery, The Sites (Prehistory Monographs) (Prehistory Monographs).

1 comments about Dry Rot and Daffodils: Behind the Scenes in a National Trust House.

1. A thorough treatment of an unusual subject. I would recommend this and her other work, Cobwebs and Cream Teas, to anyone interested in the subject. There are a few exciting anecdotes but in the main the reader gets a real flavour of the rhythm, work, and rewards of running a National Trust property. The narrative can be a bit too detailed and a tinge self-important, but, given the amount of work that such a property requires, it is amazing the author had time to put her thoughts to paper at all.

No comments about Conservation of Cultural Property in India.

No comments about Looking After Heritage Places: The Basics of Heritage Planning for Managers, Landowners and Administrators.

No comments about Tourists in Historic Towns: Urban Conservation and Heritage Management.

No comments about Timber: The Dating of Roof Timbers at Lincoln Cathedral (English Heritage Research Transactions).

5 comments about The Future of the Past.

1. Admittedly, I purchased this book because I wanted to read what Alexander Stille's understanding was of the issues of the future of the past, i.e. preserving digital cultural heritage. His concerns with the challenges facing those that collect and maintain heritage, either institutionally or personally are valid, whether they are analogue or digital. What is presented however is eleven chapters that are concerned with the future of the past, mostly analogue, with links, some tenuous, to the social and economic issues associated with digital heritage content production, ownership, and preservation.
   
   Stille writes most convincingly when he is focusing on the case studies he is familiar with and drawing upon his understanding of history, culture, politics and print technology. He outlines the history, provides context, adds his own observations or relays anecdotes and it makes for interesting reading. He sites all manner of influences to the decline of civilisation as we know it, but the evidence he brings forward to outline the contention in the subtitle 'how the information age threatens to destroy our cultural heritage' or his analysis of that is fragmentary and superficial. It is not until chapter eleven where the issues being faced by the US National Archives are outlined that the he really starts to engage with this contention and by chapter twelve, the conclusion, there is simplistic generalisation and the debate appears to veer off into the evils of technology per se and the breakdown of civilisation, to the point he states: "Fragmentation, depoliticization, the decline of newspapers and reading, the personalization of media, the decline of the humanities, the replacement of the citizen with consumer are consequences of electronic technology's gradual replacement of print as our preeminent medium. If print was the technology that helped create our sense of history - the complex sense of periodization and cause and effect - television is a flat world in which everything occurs in a consumer present." (p338) which is very Doomsday-ish.
   
   His final words are: "If people continue to feel that they are losing control of their lives and that they are losing their cultural traditions, they will work to regain control, using technologies in ways that we have not yet imagined." (p339). I think humans have done and continue to do this with what resources they have and through innovation and this is the golden thread that runs through his chapters, the human desire to hold onto the past, draw it into the present and possibly the future. This was the most interesting discussion point, about whether it is preserved "as is" and/or whether it is recreated, and that debate does have links with digital preservation in theories and methodologies associated with emulation or migration technologies and strategies.



2. "Stille takes us on a whirlwind tour of the world's natural and cultural resources, from the most prominent, such as the Sphinx and pyramids of Egypt, to the exotic, such as word carving in the East Indes. He shows that perhaps more than ever societies around the world are being forces to come to terms with the past, what it means, and how they want to preserve it. Approaches to historic preservation have been as diverse as the problems. The one commonality seems to be a heightened urgency of the problem. As societies have adopted some degree of capitalism and modern technology, they have often experienced a growing anxiety about the loss of tradition. As technological change has made available previously unimagined tools for the preservation and stuffy of the past, it has also brought about unprecedented potential to destroy natural and cultural objects. Social and geographic mobility has also had a profound effect. As Stille points out, `Paradoxically, the rootlessness of contemporary society has created a tremendous yearning for a connection with ancient or vanished civilizations.' He illustrates with numerous examples how this `double-edged nature of technological change' (p. xvii) is playing out around the world.

   "Stille's stories demonstrate the common thread running through the debates about both environmental protection and cultural preservation: he realizes that `some of our notions about nature [are] deeply related to issues I was dealing with in the chapter on monuments and museums' (p. xviii). For example, he looks at the debate over who controls `endangered' resources or artifacts. Who decides what gets protected and what does not? The ever-present irony in these debates is that the Western preservationists, environmentalists, and art historians alike, concerned about preserving the past and diverse cultures and societies, often seek to impose their own Western values on the very cultures they purport to be interested in `saving.' It seems that the modernist idea of perpetual change leading to progress has been replaced by an equally postmodernist view that all change is bad and that preservation is the only good. Trying to implement such preservation strategies has often brought Western activists into conflict with the very peoples and cultures they claim to be helping, raising a question about whose interests conservation actually serves: the conservationists or those whose culture is being `preserved'?"

   --

   Excerpted from a review essay, "Can the Past and Future Coexist," by Matthew Brown, in "The Independent Review," Winter 2004.




3. overall excellent book though author digresses in last chapter with minimal basis, e.g., implying - through other thinkers - that internet is more of an echo chamber and likely leads people to be less politically involved. every other chapter is a gem unto itself ~ a fascinating work!



4. This is an extraordinarily informative and entertaining book that sheds light on the problems and differing worldwide attitudes toward conversation and preservation. The author decries the rapid disappearance of historical landmarks, statues, buildings, art and sculpture - as do most of us. The modern effect whereby observation leads directly to degradation he has named the "Heisenberg" principle, based on the German scientist's observation that the very act of viewing affects the properties of light. Moisture, oxygen, germs, exposure - all of these are detrimental agents and all are associated with people.

   He also decries the loss of those items that are elusive - tribal customs now recorded in any medium that have been passed from generation to generation for thousands of years, languages such as Latin, even - and surprisingly - outmoded technology. It is estimated that an enormous collection of data in the National Archives is for all intents and purposes lost since we have lost the technology required for viewing/hearing such data.

   The differing cultural views on preservation were examined, from the rather recent Western one whereby objects remain in their natural state to the Oriental practice of repeatedly copying (in detail) ancient objects to the oral history of Africa. He rightly recalls that this process has been recurring since mankind recognized ancient works as something different.

   But this book was also a personal journey since the author became intimately involved with the participants of this saga. From taking Latin classes in Rome to visiting Chinese and Italian scholars to reviewing the new National Archives and the Vatican Library, this is a "hands on" book that reads like a labor of love.

   Our prosperous culture has created such sins as urban sprawl, deforestation, pollution, crowding, fast food - all of which directly affect not only the objects of the past but our view of the importance of past people's and events. It is this latter problem that seems all the most disturbing. A close reading reveals that the modern urge to preserve is directly related to the rise of industrialism.

   What the book lacked were definitive solutions and perhaps that is not by accident. What is NOT needed are quick fixes or top down solutions. One of the things he has documented with sorrow is the repetitive nature of socialist dictatorships to screw things up with top-down solutions - whether it be Egypt, China or any number of African countries. Solutions should be from the ground up and must be in accordance with the wishes of the inhabitants of the affected area.

   Not only cultural but religious views have affected our past. How much knowledge was destroyed when the library in Alexandria was burned or how much religious statuary was destroyed in the first five centuries of Christiandom? And how many hundreds of thousands of paintings and statues have followers of Islam defaced or destroyed in the recent past? Rare is the culture or religion that demonstrates reverence for alien peoples and the products of their culture.

   The final chapter sums up what we know, what we don't know and where we go from here. An important book that should grace the libraries of every literate American. Get the book, contemplate its message.




5. It's hard to put this great book down. Each chapter is more fascinating than the prior one. A must read.

No comments about Understanding Historic Building Conservation.

1 comments about St. Mark's: The Art and Architecture of Church and State in Venice.

1. Dominating the vast space of Venice's central square is the glory of St. Mark's Cathedral. So often under various stages of reconstruction and restoration that it remains largely unseen by the casual visitor, this cathedral is one of the richest in all of Europe and this heady tome explores not only every aspect of the structure, it also wanders out into the square and surveys the Doge's Palace and the vistas dotted by the ever present pigeons.
   
   Ettore Vio has gathered brilliant historians to commit essays to this definitive volume: there is more significant writing in this book than in most other art books. From the beginnings of the building through the various stages of Venice's history and its effect on St. Mark's, every aspect of the cathedral's presence in Venice is not only documented but rhapsodized!
   
   The art treasures that are an integral part of St. Mark's are some of the more important early works from Italian history. The intricate mosaics, frescoes, and the sculptural works adorning the chapels and standing freely in the eerily lighted spaces are so well photographed they seem tangent. One can imagine from the views of the various sections of the building just what the music of Vivaldi, Monteverdi, Gabrieli and the other Venetian greats must have sounded.
   
   The glories of St. Mark's vie with the treasures of the Vatican and in many ways are more spiritual in that they are less well known to us. This is a large volume of history, architecture, art, and the poilitcal changes of Venice all focused on one grand edifice. Highly Recommended. Grady Harp, November 05

No comments about The Olmsted National Historic Site and the Growth of Historic Landscape Preservation.