[lit-ideas] Re: Walls and such
- From: Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 4 Apr 2011 13:55:33 +0100 (BST)
--- On Mon, 4/4/11, John Wager <john.wager1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Sometimes a wall is just the absence of not-wall.
>
> A good example would be the western part of Ireland, where
> you see the touristically pretty fields sliced up into small
> walled sections. These walls were buildt because the
> fields were too full of stones to try to grow anything, and
> the walls were built at the points where lifting and
> carrying the stones seemed to be most efficient. The walls
> are just convenient places to put the stones from the
> fields, not "things" in themselves; they are the absence of
> something, growable land.
This is a beautful theory, developed and promoted by Bord Failte [Irish Tourist
Board] in the early 1960s, and later used to obtain millions in grants from the
European Community to further wall-building as an indigeous art form deserving
protection. In truth, they were attempts, stretching back as far as the
mesolithic era, to keep the English out.
Donal
Builder of walls and bridges
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