The Spire by William Golding
When I found this book (hardcover, great condition from Alexander Books) I thought "Well, Lord of the Flies was excellent, so this will be also." While it was a good, psychological book, I didn't fall in love with it. It kind of drug on and wasn't quite as tense as you'd think.
It might help if I summarize the novel. Jocelin, the dean of the cathedral, receives funding to build the largest spire ever. Everyone sees that it cannot technically be built (without collapsing utterly), but Jocelin drives them onward. As the story progresses, he becomes sick and starts having delusions, thus only adding to his fanatical drive to see his impossibly tall spire built. I recall several parts of the book where the construction workers say that they can hear the walls singing and screaming under the pressure of the spire above. Creepy!
The sketch is just an imagining of the spire, near completion. I am not an expert on architectural drawings, as you can see, but it is pretty fun to make up stuff as you're going along.
6 comments:
oooo I like it. It makes me feel all spooky inside.
This reminds me of the song "Stargazer" by Rainbow. It's about these slaves in ancient Egypt that build this tower 9 miles high for this priest so that he can climb to the top, jump off, and fly to the star where their God lives- Then at the end of the song he jumps off and dies. I guess it's not the same...but i just thought about it.
I likes the sketch though!
I opened this and just said, "wowwwwww!"
I really love the "non-architecturalness" of it... the wonky angles... and the perspective.
very cool!
Denise
Ten minutes into roughing out the spire, I thought "Oh this is not going to be good." I don't know anything about reproducing architecture, but drawing buildings from imagination is always particularly interesting. So, in the end, all the little details managed to make the illustration turn around and become interesting, in my opinion.
Thanks for the comments!
Very cool, Burt.
I like this one. I love the perspective and the definition of the bricks and stones.
Aww, C, you don't like ALL of them?? ;)
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