Old News Needs Bigger Print

For years now I’ve been studying European history. I’ve studied Europe in general from the medieval to the modern period. I’ve studied more specific time periods. I’ve studied specific events, specific political systems. This year I studied a specific country and a specific time period. Although, thanks to years of English classes, I’ve actually been studying Victorian Britain most of all.


I’ve learned a lot over the years. For instance, Victorians were totally OCD over newspapers. Not only were a bunch printed daily, but people would read more than one daily. Also, many people have probably noticed this, but no one writes like the Victorians. Nowhere else have I seen a paragraph take up two pages of a novel. They were pretty nifty people those Victorian Brits.


In all my years of study however, I never thought to ask this question. I’m shocked it never occurred to me before. One of my professors gave us an assignment: to find a newspaper from April 10, 1848. It wasn’t very difficult. Our library actually has digital access to The Times. So I found the paper The Times put out on April 10, 1848. Wanna take a wild guess at what my first thought was? I’ll give you options. Was it:

1. Holy crap! History! This could only be better if I was holding it in reality!


2. WTF? I can’t read that!


3. I wonder what it would smell like...

Maybe this will help you. Though I must admit, now that I’ve put it out there, I am kind of wondering what it would smell like, which I suppose also kind of implies a). I know... weird, but I tend to like the smell of books and paper. You can get a pretty good idea of where something’s been stored by its smell... you know... mothballs (probably locked away, forgotten in an attic or basement), cigarette smoke (bookshelf or table in common/high traffic area), dust (bookshelf, never moved)... I’ll stop now. The answer was b). Look how friggin’ tiny that writing is!


This brings me to the question that had never been thought and has never been answered: On average, how many Victorians wore glasses? How else could they see that? Or did they read with magnifying glasses. Or opera glasses? The common denominator here appears to be glasses. Of course, I could always assume that my eyesight has been marred by years of staring at computer screens.


In conclusion, I will not likely get black-lung or VD, but the Victorians could see better than me? One of my papers is all about evolution and degeneration. Have we simultaneously evolved and degenerated? Let’s all think about that and take it back up tomorrow.


Oh, one more thing. Thank God for PDFs. Magnification: 50%.


Lauren.