Mackenzie's London Adventure

Week four's focus involved analyzing what it means to grow up as a writer, particularly during the war. While it seems like a very niche experience to relate to, I found myself sympathizing with the trials of Briony, Cecilia, Lola, and Robbie, in the novel Atonement, and overall I was able to understand how growing up in an unforgiving world can shape and change even those of a controlling nature. Day one took us to the British Library, where we examined the Magna Carta, as well as other treasured documents and information about them. What stood out to me the most about the Magna Carta was that it was famous more for what it stood for than what it literally said, which especially connected to Briony's reason for her final draft of Atonement , in that she wanted to give Robbie and Cecilia happiness in the end, even though it didn't reflect what actually happened to them. The Imperial War Museum on Wednesday taught us about the difficulties of growing up dur...

Week three took us back to analyzing art, relics, and surprisingly, tourist attractions! The focus was on growing up as a traveller, and with this came many intriguing realizations that not only applied to Lucy in A Room with a View,  but also to all of us as students and young adults. Our first venture took us to Soane's collection, which was only a 15 minute walk from our flats! While no photography was allowed, I was able to capture just a few pieces of the seemingly endless collection of artifacts through sketch. The focus on Greek, Egyptian, and Italian art throughout the collection exhibited the appreciation tourists, especially the British, had for those cultures in particular, and what they deemed the 'essential' parts of a country when touring it. For instance, even Soane's wife's tomb has elements of Greek architecture in its design, which is notable because even a great collector and connessuier of the arts will draw from pieces he fancies ...

Week two has been full of exciting excursions! This week's focus revolved around growing up as a skeptic, and what that can mean based on all the different features of buildings from varying eras, and how religion does/does not play a role in each. At Christ Church in Oxford, we saw where Sebastian from Brideshead Revisited would have lived during university, and the significant impact Catholicism had on the schematics of the college and what went on within it. The cathedral embedded in Christ Church, naturally, had more imagery in the stained glass and relics around the corridors that relayed the history of the religion with the college. The difference between Tudor/Gothic styles and Baroque at Eltham Palace provided a deeper understanding for how styles evolved in places of high class and/or royalty. At the Hampton Court palace, the gorgeous frescoes and oil paintings throughout lend themselves to religious subjects, but instead show the political figu...

The first week of class has been really fun! The first day, we visited the Foundling Museum to learn about orphanhood in the 1800's. Learning about the strife of orphans in the time of Jane Eyre helped me understand a lot of what shaped her into a young adult. What I found most interesting were the various tokens, that sometimes told what circumstance the mother was in to give her child away. The second day involved seeing what a governess' quarters might have looked like, and how that placement made her both closer to, yet more structured in the family she served. Later that day, we visited Westminster and got to see Big Ben! I could feel the rich culture all around me, despite it being a touristy zone. Overlooking the Thames! Finally, on the third day, we visited the Tate Britain art museum, which had not only modern pieces, but period pieces that visually explained what it was like to be a woman in the 19th century. As a collective, ...