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26th january 2004Reading John Buchan's Huntingtower (he didn't say that about the Jews again did he? He did? Well, just bleep over it and get to the good stuff) I came across this passage: The walls were of a green marble veined like malachite, the ceiling was of a darker marble inlaid with white intaglios. Scattered everywhere were tables and cabinets laden with celadon china, and carved jade, and ivories, and shimmering Persian and Rhodian vessels. In all the room there was scarcely anything of metal and no touch of gilding or bright colour. The light came from green alabaster censers, and the place swam in a cold green radiance like some cavern under the sea.
and thought, that's just like the room in A Game of Chess, and went and read A Game of Chess, and no, it wasn't just like it, only sort of. But then I noticed that Huntingtower was published in 1922, the same year as The Waste Land. So I felt that something had been achieved, I don't know what.
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