TECHNO-ART Normally my Techno-Art bits are appended as two-sentence feuilletons to something bigger. But Michael Frayn's "Copenhagen" deserves a full-scale post.
I don't for a second understand atomic physics but - as with very difficult poetry, Ezra Pound say - I think I love its shape, its size, its sound or its very obscurity. The great thing about "Copenhagen" is that the hard stuff is at the very heart of the story. Bohr and Heisenberg have been wrestling with a third character, the atom, and they get to talk about how many rounds they think they have won. And they do this in the persuasively allusive language one might expect from professionals.
There are moral issues too but these are interwoven with the darkly fascinating study of what was then - perhaps still is - science's last barrier. On the whole, the theatre (other than masterpieces and then mainly Shakespeare) frequently disappoints me but not on this occasion. Nor did it disappoint my sister-in-law, who accompanied my wife and I, and who had never heard of "Copenhagen" before entering the theatre.
Friday, 9 May 2008
To get there, go by way of punctuation
SATNAV - PART TWO The technology may be imperfect but the achievement is huge. Nevertheless familiarity is the key to getting the best out of the system. Especially in France.
I was aiming for Villeneuve-sur-Lot. By the time I'd keyed in "Villen-" the predictive software had come up with Villeneuve. I accepted this, inserted a space and put in the "s" of "sur". Another prediction offered just two Villeneuve variations. Now anyone who knows France is well aware there are lots of Villeneuves. It took me a long time to realise that the machine was waiting for a hyphen.
Having spent most of my working life picking up such punctuative pedanticisms I might have been expected to appreciate this nicety. But the map I was using in conjunction with the satnav (when navigating always use all forms of assistance) spelled out the town name without hyphens.
I have since checked my big Michelin road atlas and hyphens are in. Which means it wasn't the technology that failed, rather the human cartographer who labelled the map. Also all this happened in France. I suspect that any reasonably Cartesian Frenchman would claim to be able to recognise V-s-L pronounced with and without hyphens.
I was aiming for Villeneuve-sur-Lot. By the time I'd keyed in "Villen-" the predictive software had come up with Villeneuve. I accepted this, inserted a space and put in the "s" of "sur". Another prediction offered just two Villeneuve variations. Now anyone who knows France is well aware there are lots of Villeneuves. It took me a long time to realise that the machine was waiting for a hyphen.
Having spent most of my working life picking up such punctuative pedanticisms I might have been expected to appreciate this nicety. But the map I was using in conjunction with the satnav (when navigating always use all forms of assistance) spelled out the town name without hyphens.
I have since checked my big Michelin road atlas and hyphens are in. Which means it wasn't the technology that failed, rather the human cartographer who labelled the map. Also all this happened in France. I suspect that any reasonably Cartesian Frenchman would claim to be able to recognise V-s-L pronounced with and without hyphens.
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