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My Day by Threetails

My day today started kind of off. Spent way too much on a big lunch, coming to class having to wade through a rather boring topic hoping we'd get to the good stuff soon...

Then I went to financial aid, as per my counselor's recommendation, and got a second opinion on dropping one of my classes this term. I was told last term that if I dropped any more classes I'd be on academic probation, but I've had two people at the financial aid office tell me it's not so; I might just drop another class I really don't need or want and focus more time and attention on the manuscript I'm working with.

Speaking of the manuscript, I went to the library today. First I got my hands on a course-reserved copy of a book on medieval manuscripts. I found an essay about Parisian manuscripts from the 13th century and made a couple of notes from that. But I also found another bibliographical source listed from an essay in that book that actually manages to trace Parisian manuscripts of the era I'm working with to specific artisan's shops! Immediately I checked the course-reserved book back in and run to the computer kiosk to look for this other book. Sure enough, my library had a copy!

Long story short, I might be able to pinpoint which workshop or scribe made the book I'm working with, which as far as I know no scholar has bothered to do on this particular manuscript.

The library will be very pleased if I can pull this off, and this will look DAMNED good on my grad school application!

My Day

Threetails

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    It would be vey cool to trace the origin of the manuscript. You're right, that kind of monograph would be very useful, as well as personally satisfying.

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      It's the chance amateur scholars dream of! Amazingly, as rare as texts like this one are in US collections, that there are still texts that not much is known about, even though the information is out there.

      This is why I love everything about medieval history: there is a LOT of neglected scholarship just waiting to be stitched up, and a lot of sources that are waiting to be synthesized to tell new stories. It's been largely ignored until fairly recently because so much about the era has been taken for granted.

      I want to start writing some non-fiction histories over my gap year, if time permits. I'm hoping that being a good writer with a nose for a good story will make my histories more lively and interesting.

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        Have you read any Barbara Tuchman? I enjoyed her A Distant Mirror. She had a real knack for writing history in an accessible manor.

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          No, I haven't, but I'll give her a look!