Proust is a way for you and your family to share and preserve your stories, one question at a time.
The site takes its name from the
Proust Questionnaire. Stories can be viewed in several different ways and be set as private or
public.
posted by unliteral
on Jul 19, 2011 -
17 comments
Hilary Mantel's
Diary
Three or four nights after surgery – when, in the words of the staff, I have ‘mobilised’ – I come out of the bathroom and spot a circus strongman squatting on my bed. He sees me too; from beneath his shaggy brow he rolls a liquid eye. Brown-skinned, naked except for the tattered hide of some endangered species, he is bouncing on his heels and smoking furiously without taking the cigarette from his lips: puff, bounce, puff, bounce. What rubbish, I think, actually shouting at myself, but silently. This is a no-smoking hospital. It is impossible this man would be allowed in, to behave as he does. Therefore he’s not real, and if he’s not real I can take his space. As I get into bed beside him, the strongman vanishes. I pick up my diary and record him: was there, isn’t any more.
posted by adamvasco
on Nov 4, 2010 -
22 comments
"Kavus has got into an irritating habit of holding up his middle finger at you when you speak to him." In 2005, the
Alphabet Business Concern announced that
Cardiacs, its cult-favorite prog-punk outfit, would maintain
an online diary chronicling the band's daily goings-on. The result is a surreal, hilarous interplay between the band's personalities — childish, whiny Tim Smith, pandering narcissist Kavus Torabi, contemplative Jim Smith, and the seemingly perpetually drunk Bob "Babba" Leith.
[more inside]
posted by Rory Marinich
on Oct 12, 2010 -
7 comments
The Age of Uncertainty is my new favorite blog. It's by a gentleman bookseller who works in a warehouse in Sussex processing lorryfuls of used books. He shares the most interesting things he finds, commenting with wit and sensitivity. He also writes entertainingly about his everyday life. Let me point you towards his series of extracts from a diary that came to his warehouse, detailing the life of Derek, an employee of the government who converted to Mormonism. It was a fairly normal life, but the excerpts are fascinating. Here are the entries in order:
1,
2,
3,
4,
5 and
6. He also posts beautiful images he finds, such as Victorian color plates:
1 and
2. Still, it is the remains of ordinary lives washing up on his shores that most enthralls me, such as
this tear-inducing post about a family photo album which was sent to his used books warehouse.
posted by Kattullus
on Aug 13, 2010 -
27 comments
“People talk a little more of the war, but very little. As always hitherto, it is impossible to overhear any comments on it in the pubs, etc. Last night, E[ileen] and I went to the pub to hear the 9 o’c news. The barmaid was not going to have it on if we had not asked her, and to all appearances nobody listened.”
On
May 28, 1940, George
Orwell began keeping a
war time diary. Printed in “full and in chronological
order” by the
Orwell Trust, 70 years after he wrote
them, with selected historian’s notes. Pre-war entries are a little duller, focusing on topics like
recipes (
macon!), the weather, gardening and farming.
(Previously)
posted by stratastar
on Jun 18, 2010 -
21 comments
In 1970, while burning captured enemy documents with no military intelligence value, Fred Whitehurst came across a tiny diary. Advised not to burn it by his translator, he kept it and took it with him to America when his tour was over. Thirty five years later,
the diary came back
home.
[more inside]
posted by LenaO
on Jun 25, 2009 -
5 comments
‘Even to this day the diary has a slight aroma of cocoa,’ says Steve Dickinson about a
diary kept by his uncle Robert Dickinson while a prisoner at
Servigliano, an Italian war camp, in the 1940s. The diary has a cover made of old cocoa tins (hence the smell) with a broadcast aerial design incorporating the title 'Servigliano Calling.' It begins with his capture by the Germans in November 1941, and finishes, about six months before his death, in September 1944. Via
The Diary Junction blog.
posted by amyms
on Jul 2, 2008 -
14 comments
Diary Junction. "An internet resource for those interested in historical and literary diaries and diarists." Information pages on over five hundred diarists are included.
posted by jayder
on Jan 12, 2008 -
3 comments
Some fancy security for 6 to 14-year-old girls Anne's Diary is a Canadian social network for 6 to 14-year-old girls (I read about it on
the CBC's Spark blog). It has two interesting security features to fend off child molesters and the like. To sign up for the service, kids need to get a non-parental adult professional as a 'sponsor' who validates their identity and age (much like applying for a passport). Secondly, you get a USB fingerprint scanner with your initial package, and I gather the kids use this to log in to the service. And yes, that's Anne with an 'e'. No Prince Edward Island gable was ever this secure.
[more inside]
posted by dbarefoot
on Dec 6, 2007 -
31 comments
WW1: Experiences of an English Soldier This blog is made up of transcripts of Harry Lamin's letters from the first World War. The letters will be posted exactly 90 years after they were written. "Dear Kate, Just a line to let you know I’m going on alright. We had an exciting time and this time up the line. We had only been in about six hours when fritz’s came over to us. We had an hour and a half of it but we beat them back and they lost a good many men too not many got back I can tell you. We lost #### (pencilled out –censored?) which I’m sorry to say and about #### wounded. I think the mug will be all right for Willie which Jack is getting for him. If you send me anything it will come in very nice the chocolate is very good I should like a bit of cake, if you could afford it really gets crushed so if it is not packed careful. With best love from Harry"
posted by feelinglistless
on Oct 7, 2007 -
6 comments
Basra Diary (Google Video)
"Last year, I completed my first tour of duty, in Basra, southern Iraq. I kept a video diary. This is the film I made, which details the experiences of both myself, and my colleagues, told in my own words."
posted by Mwongozi
on Sep 29, 2007 -
25 comments
Tony Blair's ex-Master of Spin and closest adviser is on a media whirlwind promoting his diary. Campbell's apparently straight talking nature gives the prospects of some tantalizing insight into the inner workings of number 10 for the majority of Blair's premiership. He's not getting it all his own way, though. BBC Radio 4's John Humphrey's on the
Today Programme (
Real audio) (
MP3) was more interested in the failings of a government and political movement for which he was an architect and key player, and particularly Campbell's legacy of elevating the role of spin in British politics, even in the inner working of government, allegedly sexing up an intelligence dossier in order to make a more compelling case for war in Iraq (
See 10 ways to sex up a dossier). The Guardian, in an article titled
Did he mean me?, invited some of those named in his diaries to give feedback, or should that be biteback?
posted by nthdegx
on Jul 11, 2007 -
7 comments
Henry's Machyn's sixteenth-century Chronicle was nearly destroyed in an eighteenth-century fire, but editors Richard W. Bailey, Marilyn Miller, and Colette Moore have just published a new online scholarly edition, comprising both a reconstructed text (thanks to the very posthumous assistance of John Strype) and images of all the pages. There are several other sixteenth- and seventeenth-century diaries and chronicles online, including Dana F. Sutton's edition of William Camden's
Diary (in both Latin and English), J. G. Nichols' Victorian edition of the
Chronicle of the Grey Friars of London, and the Earls Colne
project's transcription of the diary of clergyman
Ralph Josselin. (Machyn link via the very handy
Textual Studies, 1500-1800.)
posted by thomas j wise
on Dec 11, 2006 -
4 comments
Alex Ramsey's journal gives an account of his journey westward to join the 1849 Gold Rush, a laborious trek of no more than twenty-five miles a day which ended in illness and disappointment. "I am now convinced that I done very wrong in coming here with the hope of bettering my pecuniary condition alone and I now declare and humbly ask God to enable me to perform my promise that if I am again permitted to return to a land of peace and quietude, that I will strive to be content." From the
Wyoming State Archives' Document Photo Gallery.
posted by Miko
on Sep 14, 2006 -
16 comments
Mozart's musical diary - kept between 1784 and 1791 - goes online today courtesy of the British Library. There is a helpful audio commentary if you can't decipher his handwriting, plus excerpts from some of his music.
The same site also has works by artists and authors such as Jane Austen, Leonardo da Vinci and Lewis Carroll.
posted by greycap
on Jan 12, 2006 -
5 comments
The Numeric Diaries... So cool. After entering, use the side arrows to navigate back and forth, choose from the drop-down menu, or use the
thumbnails to view images going back to
October 1, 2003. Some images mouse over or click through for further treats or links. And when you're done, you can visit the main site at
Trezart for a lot more art and fun. (French language, via the archives of the great
gmtPlus9)
posted by taz
on Feb 16, 2005 -
4 comments
To live in a pristine land ... to roam the wilderness ... to choose a site, cut trees, and build a home ... Thousands have had such dreams, but Richard Proenneke lived them. In 1968, at 51 years of age,
Richard Proenneke retired to Upper Twin Lakes, Alaska and using nothing but hand tools,
built a cabin where he lived for the next 30 or so years. He
filmed the cabin's construction (as well as much of nature's wonder) and kept meticulous notes on the back of wall calendars. In 1973,
Sam_Keith produced a book
(One Man's Wilderness: An Alaskan Odyssey) based on Proenneke's journal entries and photography. In 1999, at the age of 82, Proenneke could no longer endure the harsh winters of Alaska and moved to California to be with his family. He
died there on Easter Sunday, 2003.
posted by a_day_late
on Feb 10, 2005 -
16 comments
Quantum Diaries - follow physicists from around the world as they experience the World Year of Physics 2005.
posted by Gyan
on Feb 1, 2005 -
4 comments
Ivan Noble's Tumour Diary The BBC's Ivan Noble has been keeping an online diary of his fight against a malignant brain tumour. Alas, his illness is now getting the better of him, and this will be his final column.
He has been, at times, an inspiration, incredibly brave and totally honest about his illness. As a former colleague, he shall also be remembered fondly.
Start from
the beginning, it's a must read.
posted by scaryduck
on Jan 27, 2005 -
10 comments
Nick Nolte's (baffling) blog. Then I saw a middle-aged woman wearing a black t-shirt that had the word "Ferrari" printed on it. Maybe it was Ron's influence, but I found the woman mesmerizing and depressing but otherwise encouraging about the direction of human events. What a strange shirt, diary. Worn without irony or malice. Anyway, Manolo won't go clean out the bird cage, so later days.
Nolte's blog is not as cute as
Melanie Griffith's, though.
(via laobserved)
posted by matteo
on Oct 15, 2004 -
31 comments
This is Jon's diary. Jon is in prison on money laundering and drugs charges. "My new co-habitants are enduring the twin evils of a broken swamp-cooler and a cockroach infestation. A neighbouring asthmatic inmate happily described how he inhaled a cockroach that had crept into his nebulizer. He could feel the insect crawling around inside him and promptly vomited his stomach contents. Unfortunately the cockroach was not ejected, as it was lodged in his lung."
posted by urban greeting
on Sep 9, 2004 -
13 comments
?????? ????? - Name:Zena Amaar / Location:baghdad, Iraq
I am 13 years old. I am in the 2nd class in AL-MUTAMAYSAT secondary school whech means the secondary school for excellent student.
I spend most of my time working on computer and reading stories, i have a library of about 75 books some of them are stories and the others are poetical books. Also i help my mother in housework.
My father is a lucturer in the colleg of engineering. At the same time he is postgradute student. He is working hardly to get the PhD in computer engineering.
My mother is assestant prof. in the colleg of engineering.
I have only one brother. He is in the primary school in the 4th class. I love my family so much. (via
sylloge :)
posted by kliuless
on Jul 13, 2004 -
14 comments
Martha Ballard's Diary Includes a transcription of the diary (written between 1785-1812), images of the original MS, and a number of contextual documents and photographs, plus many other things. (Those of you who enjoy old diaries should bear in mind that one of the greatest diarists of them all,
Samuel Pepys, has a
blog.)
posted by thomas j wise
on Jun 12, 2004 -
5 comments
Diaries of the Lewis and Clark Journey. American Journeys has a collection or primary source documents about the Lewis and Clark Journey across America, including the diary of Sergeant Charles Floyd (the only member of the expedition to die en route), Jefferson's letter to Clark where he suggests the expedition, and 63 engravings of Places and People. If you're into history, you might also want to vote on
Wisconsin Turning Points, a ballot to determine the most interesting topics in Wisconsin History.
posted by rev-
on May 21, 2004 -
3 comments
