To make a call the writer had to travel 18 miles
July 3, 2014 11:32 AM   Subscribe

 
Enjoyed reading this - thanks.
posted by ryanshepard at 11:55 AM on July 3, 2014


I guess I like that you can't drive all the way up to Barnhill, even though it means that, being both lazy and anxious about trespassing, it means it's unlikely I will ever go there.

I was on Islay last fall and had thought idly about taking the little car ferry to Jura and driving to the north end of the island (because of Orwell and the tidal whirlpool in the straits up there) until I realized the road was closed to cars beyond a certain point.

I loved the solitude you can find even on the relatively touristed (compared to Jura certainly) Islay, though. We went for walks on several trails and beaches and were usually not aware of anyone else around. Except for the shaggy brown pony grazing near the path to Saligo Bay. ;-)
posted by aught at 12:21 PM on July 3, 2014


What was the story where Orwell forced guests to his island to row boats or something, and when the rowboat inevitably sank, he forced them to walk home in bare feet over sharp rocks?
posted by KokuRyu at 12:52 PM on July 3, 2014


The emotional confusion under which he labored is communicated by the quantity of work he produced at the time. Following O’Shaughnessy’s death he published some 130 essays—one article every two to three days.

God, this is good stuff, thanks for posting. I also recall Orwell writing almost dispassionately about traveling from France to see her in Newcastle, but she died before he got there.
posted by KokuRyu at 1:04 PM on July 3, 2014 [1 favorite]


This is a cool story, thanks for posting it.

Random aside: is there a name for this kind of web design? It's like the same template you see over and over now. I think it started w/ that NYT bit about the avalanche and just anyone and everyone does it. Big text, big scrolly photos that lock in place...
posted by xmutex at 1:18 PM on July 3, 2014


I don't know about making visitors walk barefoot on rocks but there is a NY Times article from 1998 about the journalist making the pilgrimage to Barnhill here. It does mention he almost drowned some visiting friends by rowing them too close to the Corryvreckan whirlpool. (That might or might not be a different take on the same incident.)
posted by aught at 1:20 PM on July 3, 2014 [1 favorite]


Ah, here we go with more details about the rowboat and the sharp rocks.
posted by aught at 1:24 PM on July 3, 2014 [1 favorite]


is there a name for this kind of web design?

Responsive design, which is supposed to look good on both mobile and desktop devices. Try resizing your browser window width and see how it behaves.
posted by aught at 1:25 PM on July 3, 2014


Hugh Caswell abandoned everything and went to the old family cottage on Jura, restored it with his own hands and went on recording the album he had in his head when he decided to leave London.

this entry from his blog is about Orwell on Jura: George Orwell and the Generator (the sound of which ended up on the record).
posted by Substrata at 1:42 PM on July 3, 2014


Also on Jura.
posted by Paul Slade at 2:37 PM on July 3, 2014 [1 favorite]


aught: Responsive design

I don't think that's at all what xmutex is getting at- it's more specific than that... responsive design is everywhere these days!

I think what xmx is referring to is the long vertical page with blocks of text broken up by large format photos.. a lot of the time the photos would be parallax scrolling- "big scrolly photos that lock in place" - though not with this particular article.
posted by Philby at 2:46 PM on July 3, 2014


The book Raw Spirit: In Search of the Perfect Dram by the late Iain Banks includes a visit to this cottage that's worth a read. Banks visited Jura while attempting to visit all malt distilleries in Scotland.
posted by Sunburnt at 5:02 PM on July 3, 2014


is there a name for this kind of web design?

Generally, multimedia storytelling, although one of the common tropes used is the infinite scroll. The knockoff code builder Scroll Kit (once sued by the NYT, now acquired) hints at this. Much of it also falls under the longform rubric, although that doesn't really mean it's multimedia by itself. Other terms you may see: interactive and/or immersive journalism, visual storytelling, digital narrative/presentation, etc. Since the tools are evolving and the form is being tinkered with in a lot of different places with different approaches, the names have a little variety.
posted by dhartung at 5:17 PM on July 3, 2014


Good article. Thanks, Chrysostom.
posted by homunculus at 1:38 PM on July 4, 2014


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