MONS SHAIBA
Just got back from a road-trip to Dorchester with my friend D. We drove around the town, stayed in a little country hotel where we played a comical tennis (it being 12 years since Conrad last picked up a racquet), sampled the local ales, took tea at the cheap Oak Room, strolled a neolithic henge, and resisted the temptation to buy second-hand books. Spotted:
1. Dali's obscure portrait of Pablo Picasso, made into a small toy sculpture, in the window of 'Change of Seen'.
2. The statuated and epitaphed tomb of local dialect poet, William Barnes, outside St. Peter's Church.
4. A crop-spraying truck on the motorway: is there any machine quite so scary?
5. In the compound of the Dorchester post-depot, the words painted over an old archway: MONS SHAIBA. A go-ogle turns up nothing. Any idea what it means?
We also went down to Poundbury, Prince Charles' model village. It's a strange place; airy and empty for the most part, friendly and dandified, though quite bland, with an electricity cabin decked out as a classical temple and daubed all over in aggressive graffiti. We watched a builder at work in the Phase 2 developments; he was cladding a breezeblock wall in dry stone bricks, sanding and adjusting, at the greatest leisure. They wanted 319 grand for a 4-bedroom house. In the local supermarket, the Sport is on sale, but turned around to protect gentle eyes from bottom de stunneuse. Now the residents are protesting against the larger-scale projects in the expansion areas. Last week at the Tate Modern, Quinlan Terry (another of Charlie's pet architects) spouted predictable fogeyisms about the ugliness of 1960s architecture, sticking in another oar for his revivalist proposals. He would have been right at home here, among the reclaimed brickwork and mock-antique mosses, the bowed column-work of the town-hall, and the low-rise aridness of the residential blocks. What is it that makes Middle Englanders want to live in such a spectral utopia?
1. Dali's obscure portrait of Pablo Picasso, made into a small toy sculpture, in the window of 'Change of Seen'.
2. The statuated and epitaphed tomb of local dialect poet, William Barnes, outside St. Peter's Church.
ZOO NOW I HOPE HIS KINDLY FEACE3. On the high street, an expressionistic memorial plaque for the Tolpuddle Martyrs.
IS GONE TO VIND A BETTER PLEACE
BUT STILL WI' VO'K A-LEFT BEHIND
HE'LL ALWAYS BE A-KEPT IN MIND
4. A crop-spraying truck on the motorway: is there any machine quite so scary?
5. In the compound of the Dorchester post-depot, the words painted over an old archway: MONS SHAIBA. A go-ogle turns up nothing. Any idea what it means?
We also went down to Poundbury, Prince Charles' model village. It's a strange place; airy and empty for the most part, friendly and dandified, though quite bland, with an electricity cabin decked out as a classical temple and daubed all over in aggressive graffiti. We watched a builder at work in the Phase 2 developments; he was cladding a breezeblock wall in dry stone bricks, sanding and adjusting, at the greatest leisure. They wanted 319 grand for a 4-bedroom house. In the local supermarket, the Sport is on sale, but turned around to protect gentle eyes from bottom de stunneuse. Now the residents are protesting against the larger-scale projects in the expansion areas. Last week at the Tate Modern, Quinlan Terry (another of Charlie's pet architects) spouted predictable fogeyisms about the ugliness of 1960s architecture, sticking in another oar for his revivalist proposals. He would have been right at home here, among the reclaimed brickwork and mock-antique mosses, the bowed column-work of the town-hall, and the low-rise aridness of the residential blocks. What is it that makes Middle Englanders want to live in such a spectral utopia?
1 comment:
Yeah, I saw this but it never really clicked. I don't know what the connection to Mons is; perhaps Dorchester locals were involved in both battles--but then what about other ones? It's a bit odd.
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