kitsch

Another awful poet

commonplace book, on writing / /

Scotland’s worst poet, William Topaz McGonagall: From “The Tay Bridge Disaster”:

Beautiful Railway Bridge of the Silv’ry Tay!
Alas! I am very sorry to say
That ninety lives have been taken away
On the last Sabbath day of 1879,
Which will be remember’d for a very long time. …

Or here’s a few lines from “Glasgow”:

And as for the statue of Sir Walter Scott that stands in George Square,
It is a handsome statue — few with it can compare,
And most elegant to be seen,
And close beside it stands the statue of Her Majesty the Queen. …

Read more at a site dedicated to William McGonagall, or just search Google. [William McGonagall]

Another awful poet Read More »

A museum I definitely want to visit

commonplace book, cool stuff / /

From Best Undiscovered Museum of Americana:

It’s hard to imagine how anything so big could be such a well-kept secret, but there are only two kinds of people in the world: those who haven’t heard of the Shelburne Museum , and those who rave about it. I’m one of the latter.

Situated on 45 acres outside Burlington, Vermont, the Shelburne has been called the “Smithsonian of New England.” It was founded by Electra Havemeyer Webb, heiress to sugar and railroad fortunes. An avid collector of Americana, Webb built the Shelburne and left an active foundation in place to keep it running and growing. It now encompasses 37 exhibits and buildings, some of them nearly incomprehensible in scope. They built a railroad, for instance, to bring the steamship Ticonderoga to the site. A curved building a quarter of a mile long covers a Lilliputian circus parade, each figure, animal, and cart hand-carved — by one person. The figures are only inches tall, and no two are alike.

A museum I definitely want to visit Read More »