Mourning Dove (Zenaida macroura) from ‘Birds of America’
What would your Desert Island Discs choices be?
It’s one of those things that’s in the culture – the sort of thing that’s used as an ice-breaker at awaydays (although the last time this happened, one person didn’t understand the cultural reference and chose a machete as his luxury).
Funnily enough, I’ve touched on this in a couple of previous posts.
Back in 2013, I wrote “I am Desert Island Discs worst nightmare. Basically, if I was abandoning ship in the middle of the South Pacific, my thoughts would not automatically turn to rescuing key elements of my almost non-existent CD collection.”
The book is easier – Aubedon’s Birds of America (1827-1838); undoubtedly the most beautiful book ever published (and with the additional benefit of being big enough to double as a temporary shelter). I just think that you would never get tired of looking at those amazing images – a true marriage of artistry and exacting scientific observation.
Of course you also get Shakespeare, which I’m now, finally, starting to appreciate and the Bible – preferably the NIV with David Suchet reading it.
As for a luxury – I suppose Blackwell’s would be out of the question? A complete set of In Our Time podcasts? An inexhaustible supply of paper and writing materials? Although if Birds of America is printed on one side only, I might be able to make my own pen and ink using parrot feathers and berries. So a solar-powered digital camera and electronic darkroom it is. I could write in the sand and photograph what I’d written …
Image: John James Audubon [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
A request for a Grand Piano failed on the basis that the requestee could shelter under it. Personally I’d have kept quiet about the potential dual use of your favourite book.
Feel free to edit/condense my earlier email and use it if you wish