GardenPages

I have just had a look at my blog for the first time since February. I am not the most dedicated of bloggers, obviously.

In doing so, I discovered that yesterday, 22 April, there were 85 views of my blogs about my work on Cecil Pinsent. This has made me curious as to WHY? Who are these people and what do they hope to find? The internet brings us together in a big community, but at the same time retains the anonymity of a big crowd.

So, today is too cold and rainy to garden, but I have more important things to do — namely sort through a trove of Pinsent documents that have just come my way. And just in the nick of time, too, as my book is about to go into layout, the final draft is finally final, and already the PR machine is oiling its gears. Among the treasures are a collection of photos of Cecil Pinsent to add to the half-dozen I have already, which have been part of my lectures since the first one I gave at a Pinsent seminar in 1993 at Villa Le Balze, Fiesole.

Pinsent’s photos and writings tell me so much more about him than the obvious record of his work and the circle of people and clients who became his friends and intimates. It also makes me wonder what this online life will leave behind? No troves of handwritten correspondences, no musty albums of photos that have been focused through the lens of an individual’s memories to serve as a catalogue of that life’s singular journey, that’s for sure.  Will we remain anonymous in the overcrowded archive of the digital world? I think so.