A Chasm in Time by Patricia R. Andrew

 A Chasm in Time cover

A Chasm in Time: Scottish War Art and Artists in the Twentieth Century by Patricia R. Andrew is a beautifully produced book and a great read. Anyone interested in art and history will find it fascinating I’m sure, you don’t have to be Scottish!

I was most interested in the World War 1 art which features such images as warships in Scapa Flow and the Firth of Forth, but it isn’t only war and weaponry that feature in the paintings. I particularly like James McIntosh Patrick’s Tay Bridge painting, but I hadn’t realised that this was the view from the front of the artist’s house. The government had commissioned art which showed the civilian side of life during the war.

The Tay Bridge from my Studio Window

Tay Bridge
The domestic scene below is of the view from the back of the artist’s house, showing his wife hanging out the washing and their wee daughter helping.

A City Garden
a city garden

There was only one thing that annoyed me about this book – it should have been proof read more closely. I know, I know, you could say that for almost any book nowadays. I think people run a spell checker and think that will sort things out but it doesn’t weed out such things as abroad when aboard should have been printed, or panting instead of painting. There were also quite a lot of hyphenated words where no hyphens should have been, such as wit-nessed, com-bination and Cran-ston. I think these must have come about when the book was being set out differently and not corrected when the design was changed. But that’s me being nit-picking, it’s just that I know that if I had written such a lovely book I would have been furious at these mistakes.

I borrowed this from the library but I intend to buy a copy of it as I know I’ll want to dip into it now and again.

5 thoughts on “A Chasm in Time by Patricia R. Andrew

  1. I agree absolutely about poor proof-reading. It spoils the reading experience for me – and I can’t imagine what it must do to the writer. This does sound a lovely book though đŸ™‚

    • Sandra,
      It seems that the publishers want to save money by dodging the crucial proof-reading part, a false economy of course. It is a lovely book.

  2. I love those paintings. I think it’s so interesting that Britain had Official War Artists. I don’t think the US did. I agree with you about proof reading. I found several errors in the book I just finishes. Twice they repeated a word ‘the the’. I think you need a human proof reader to catch those things.

      • Joan,
        How often I – doh! as I see something wrong just as I push publish! I’m surprised you don’t have Official War Artists in the US, I think we’ve had them here since at least Victorian times and they are still used today in ‘conflicts’.

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