Download or read book John Harrison and the Quest for Longitude written by and published by . This book was released on 2023-02-28 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: John Harrison and the Quest for Longitude, in a revised and updated edition, is a fascinating account of the life and achievements of John Harrison, the man who designed and built the first accurate marine chronometers. Inspired by the prize offered in 1714 to provide a solution to the problem of determining longitudinal position at sea, John Harrison - a carpenter by trade - set out to develop portable clocks that would rival even the most precise watches of the time. His famous 'H' timepieces went on to revolutionise sea travel and save many thousands of lives. Now housed in the collection of Royal Observatory Greenwich, they are milestones in clock- making history. Beautifully illustrated with images that showcase the intricate detail and mechanisms of the timepieces,John Harrison and the Quest for Longitudetells the story of one man driven by the need to solve one of the greatest practical problems of his time.
Download or read book Settling the World written by M. John Harrison and published by Comma Press. This book was released on 2020-08-20 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Throughout his career, M. John Harrison’s writing has defied categorisation, building worlds both unreal and all-too real, overlapping and interlocking with each other. His stories are replete with fissures and portals into parallel dimensions, unidentified countries and lost lands. But more important than the places they point to are the obsessions that drive the people who so believe in them, characters who spend their lives hunting for, and haunted by, clues and maps that speak to the possibility of somewhere else. This selection of stories, drawn from over 50 years of writing, bears witness to that desire for difference: whether following backstreet occultists, amateur philosophers, down-and-outs or refugees, we see our relationship with ‘the other’ in microscopic detail, and share in Harrison’s rejection of the idea that the world, or our understanding of it, could ever be settled.
Download or read book You Should Come With Me Now written by M. John Harrison and published by Comma Press. This book was released on 2017-11-23 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: M. John Harrison is a cartographer of the liminal. His work sits at the boundaries between genres – horror and science fiction, fantasy and travel writing – just as his characters occupy the no man’s land between the spatial and the spiritual. Here, in his first collection of short fiction for over 15 years, we see the master of the New Wave present unsettling visions of contemporary urban Britain, as well as supernatural parodies of the wider, political landscape. From gelatinous aliens taking over the world’s financial capitals, to the middle-aged man escaping the pressures of fatherhood by going missing in his own house… these are weird stories for weird times. ‘M. John Harrison’s slippery, subversive stories mix the eerie and familiar into beguiling, alarming marvels. No one writes quite like him; no one I can think of writes such flawless sentences, or uses them to such disorientating effect.’ – Olivia Laing, author of The Lonely City ‘These stories map a rediscovered fictional hinterland, one tucked behind the glossier edifices of modernity and genre with views down alleyways into pubs and flats where Patrick Hamilton glares balefully at J. G. Ballard.’ – Will Eaves, author of This is Paradise ‘M. John Harrison moves elegantly, passionately, from genre to genre, his prose lucent and wise, his stories published as SF or as fantasy, as horror or as mainstream fiction. In each playing field, he wins awards, and makes it look so easy. His prose is deceptively simple, each word considered and placed where it can sink deepest and do the most damage.’ – Neil Gaiman, author of American Gods ‘With an austere and deeply moving humanism, M. John Harrison proves what only those crippled by respectability still doubt – that science fiction can be literature, of the very greatest kind.’ – China Miéville, author of Perdido Street Station
Download or read book Longitude written by Dava Sobel and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2010-07-05 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The dramatic human story of an epic scientific quest and of one man's forty-year obsession to find a solution to the thorniest scientific dilemma of the day--"the longitude problem." Anyone alive in the eighteenth century would have known that "the longitude problem" was the thorniest scientific dilemma of the day-and had been for centuries. Lacking the ability to measure their longitude, sailors throughout the great ages of exploration had been literally lost at sea as soon as they lost sight of land. Thousands of lives and the increasing fortunes of nations hung on a resolution. One man, John Harrison, in complete opposition to the scientific community, dared to imagine a mechanical solution-a clock that would keep precise time at sea, something no clock had ever been able to do on land. Longitude is the dramatic human story of an epic scientific quest and of Harrison's forty-year obsession with building his perfect timekeeper, known today as the chronometer. Full of heroism and chicanery, it is also a fascinating brief history of astronomy, navigation, and clockmaking, and opens a new window on our world.
Download or read book Light written by M. John Harrison and published by Hachette UK. This book was released on 2012-09-27 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On the barren surface of an asteroid, located deep in the galaxy beneath the unbearable light of the Kefahuchi Tract, lie three objects: an abandoned spacecraft, a pair of bone dice covered with strange symbols, and a human skeleton. What they are and what they mean are the mysteries explored and unwrapped in LIGHT, M. John Harrison's triumphant novel.
Download or read book Viriconium written by M. John Harrison and published by Spectra. This book was released on 2007-12-18 with total page 482 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A magnificent city existing on the ringes of the past, and on the brink of destruction, Viriconium • With a foreword by Neil Gaiman Available to American readers for the first time, this landmark collection gathers four groundbreaking fantasy classics from the acclaimed author of Light. Set in the imagined city of Viriconium, here are the masterworks that revolutionized a genre and enthralled a generation of readers: The Pastel City, A Storm of Wings, In Viriconium, and Viriconium Nights. Back in print after a long absence, these singular tales of a timeless realm and its enigmatic inhabitants are now reborn and compiled to captivate a whole new generation. Praise for M. John Harrison’s Viriconium “The world that Harrison depicts is intricate and authentic, peopled with a multitude of strange yet lifelike characters—a combination which serves to make his richly imagined empire of Viriconium feel very real indeed. . . . This omnibus collection from the author of Light is canon-reading for those who wish to know the genre's roots, as well as the heights, to which it can aspire.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review) “Brilliant, beautiful, and absolutely essential reading. The breadth of vision and imagination alone in these books is unparalleled. It is truly one of a kind and will continue to haunt you in the best possible way for years.”—Jonathan Carroll, author of White Apples “Harrison’s Viriconium sequence is the jewel in the crown of 20th-century fantasy, a work that proves irrefutably that fantastic literature can be Art with a capital A, holding its own alongside the very finest writing of our time, or any other.”—Elizabeth Hand, author of Mortal Love “M. John Harrison is a true master of English prose. He possesses the eye of a painter, the ear of a bard, and a rigorous and playful intellect. The Viriconium novels and stories are infused with a haunting genius that never falters.”—K.J. Bishop, author of The Etched City
Download or read book The Course of the Heart written by Michael John Harrison and published by Victor Gollancz. This book was released on 1992-01-01 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Synaesthesia written by John E. Harrison and published by . This book was released on 2001 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Synaesthesia is a confusion of the senses, whereby stimulation of one sense triggers stimulation in a completely different sensory modality. A synaesthete might claim to be able to hear colors, taste shapes, describe the color, shape, and flavor of someone's voice or music, the sound of which looks like 'shards of glass'. Throughout history, many notable artists and writers have claimed to suffer from synaesthesia, including, Arthur Rimbaud, Wassily Kandinsky, Vladimir Nabokov, and David Hockney. The condition remains as controversial now as when first brought to the public eye many years ago--one notable scientist dismissing it as mere 'romantic neurology.' In Synaesthesia: the strangest thing, a world authority on synaesthesia takes us on a fascinating tour of this mysterious condition, looking at historical incidences of synaesthesia, unraveling the theories for the condition, and additionally, examining the claims to synaesthesia of the likes of Rimbaud, Baudelaire, and others. The result is an exciting, yet scientific account of an incredible condition--one that will tell us of a world rich with the most unbelievable sensory experiences.
Download or read book The Sunken Land Begins to Rise Again written by M. John Harrison and published by Gollancz. This book was released on 2021-04-15 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: *WINNER OF THE GOLDSMITHS PRIZE 2020* *A New Statesman Book of the Year* 'A mesmerising, mysterious book . . . Haunting. Worrying. Beautiful' Russell T. Davis 'Brilliantly unsettling' Olivia Laing 'A magificent book' Neil Gaiman 'An extraordinary experience' William Gibson Winner of the Goldsmiths Prize 2020, this is fiction that pushes the boundaries of the novel form. Shaw had a breakdown, but he's getting himself back together. He has a single room, a job on a decaying London barge, and an on-off affair with a doctor's daughter called Victoria, who claims to have seen her first corpse at age thirteen. It's not ideal, but it's a life. Or it would be if Shaw hadn't got himself involved in a conspiracy theory that, on dark nights by the river, seems less and less theoretical... Meanwhile, Victoria is up in the Midlands, renovating her dead mother's house, trying to make new friends. But what, exactly, happened to her mother? Why has the local waitress disappeared into a shallow pool in a field behind the house? And why is the town so obsessed with that old Victorian morality tale, The Water Babies? As Shaw and Victoria struggle to maintain their relationship, the sunken lands are rising up again, unnoticed in the shadows around them.
Download or read book The Pastel City written by Michael John Harrison and published by . This book was released on 1971-01-01 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Centauri Device written by M. John Harrison and published by Gateway. This book was released on 2010-12-30 with total page 159 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: John Truck was to outward appearances just another lowlife spaceship captain. But he was also the last of the Centaurans, or at least half of him was, which meant that he was the only person who could operate the Centauri Device, a sentient bomb which might hold the key to settling a vicious space war. M. John Harrison's classic novel turns the conventions of space opera on their head, and is written with the precision and brilliance for which is famed.
Download or read book Signs of Life written by M. John Harrison and published by . This book was released on 1998-01 with total page 255 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Harrison Decoded written by Rory McEvoy and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2020-04-27 with total page 212 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Harrison Decoded: Towards a Perfect Pendulum Clock brings together the output of a forty-year collaborative research project that unpicked and put into practice the fine details of John Harrison's extraordinary pendulum clock system. Harrison predicted that his unique method of making pendulum clocks could provide as much as one-hundred-times the stability of those made by his contemporaries. However, his final publication, which promised to describe the system, was a chaotic jumble of information, much of which had nothing to do with clockwork. One contemporary reviewer of Harrison's book could only suggest that the end result was a product of Harrison's 'superannuated dotage.' The focus of this book centres on the making, adjusting, and testing of Clock B which was the subject of various trials at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich. The modern history of Clock B is accompanied by scientific analysis of the clock system, Clock B's performance, the methods of data-gathering alongside historical perspectives on Harrison's clockmaking, that of his contemporaries, and some evaluation of the possible influence of early 18th century scientific thought.
Download or read book Line Wash written by Wendy Jelbert and published by . This book was released on 1997 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Methods of merging soft luminous washes with sharp, crisp definite penwork are made easy with this book. Each stage of the painting process is illustrated in a highly practical way, using step-by-step photographs and a colourful selection of finished paintings.
Download or read book Spellbound written by John Harrison and published by . This book was released on 2009-08-01 with total page 440 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Love Your Disease written by John Harrison and published by . This book was released on 1984-01 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Quest for Longitude written by William J. H. Andrewes and published by Collection of Historical Scientific Instruments. This book was released on 1996 with total page 456 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Quest for Longitude is a book for students and for teachers, for collectors and for scholars, and for the thousands of people who, having enjoyed Sobel's Longitude, desire a well-illustrated reference that describes in detail the many fascinating devices and the intriguing characters who, by solving the ancient problem of finding longitude at sea, changed the world forever. 250 illustrations, 120 in color.
