Sunny & still. Everything still seems very wet, but evidently there was no rain last night. Made up some more of the path. Unable to do much else, as the wheelbarrow is about at its last & I was trying to repair it.
5 eggs.
Tags: eggs, path, weather, wheelbarrow
November 9, 2009 at 7:33 am
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November 9, 2009 at 10:10 am
Logical question: in his phrase “evidently there was no rain last night” what meaning can George be conveying by his word “evidently” – given his contrary perception of universal extreme wetness (“everything seems very wet”).
Evidently, all seems wet. Evidently it did not rain last night. Evidently, George left the sprinkler on? No, surely we are right to entertain some doubt as to whether there was rain, despite his denial.
I feel sorry for the man: wartime, wife in London, slaving in a wet garden, rain gauge evidently non-existent. Wheelbarrow stuffed.
November 9, 2009 at 10:34 am
Perhaps he means that it still hasn’t dried out from the lengthy rainy spell?
November 9, 2009 at 12:28 pm
But-but what about the word “seems”? Doesn’t that imply a lack of evidence?
In trying to reconcile his use of the vague terminology in this personal log, I have concluded that, when he used words like “evidently” and “seems”, Orwell injected them with many other words; thus creating Word Capsules. These capsules will pop if poked.
My interpretation, therefore, is that he wrote this at dawn this morning while standing on his back porch. At that particular nanosecond in time, Orwell decided that he didn’t want to get his toes wet and, as an alternative, he chose to create a fictional path. I don’t imagine he gave the wheelbarrow much more than a disgusted glance as he turned and went back inside to his word processor.
Meanwhile, the infamous Venlo Incident plays out like a “B” movie.
November 10, 2009 at 1:21 am
“Seems madam? Nay, it is. I know not seems.”
BTW Venlo Incident reworked and fictionalised wonderfully by William Boyd in his recent novel Restless.