Title: Not forgotten chess players of Bedfordshire 1890-1990
Foreword: Scrap that– who would? And you might get desperate and try to rop in darts or snooker players or lesser known F1 drivers instead of a titled chess player! You’ll get the piss taken out of you for that!
Content: Bloody long Introduction
The Players chosen
Their era and playing conditions
How they may be remembered
Facts and Trivia
Collection of games from county players not beaten up for not handing them over at first
Sir not appearing in this publication
It’s a start…
Update 1: first obstacle cleared: define who I am writing for.
Update 2: it’s completely pointless to refrain from a Marxist interpretation on the whole, there may be minor non-contradictory exceptions however.
Update 3: when referring to the Publication Chess in Bedfordshire (1933) don’t just slag it off all the time! Detail it’s shortcomings yes but use language well. And don’t say anything like ‘if I could go back in time, I’d have it’s co-authors strung up and shot against a post’. Commend them for their efforts and criminalize them academically only, or failing that, remember that history is, quintessentially, what historians make it thus multiform.
Update 4: the forray into postmodernism -be it only a decade long already- hasn’t already started -it has only just begun and has to be handled with care -ultimately it is my saviour, beacon of guiding light and something to be proud of, if and only if, it lies latent in the narrative, forging it when needed towards marxist interpretation as subtly as possible (likely to come by itself), and not much in evidence at all as it will place too many demands.
Update 5: the only weight you have to carry on your shoulders is that, most likely, this is all you will be remembered for after your death. But that said, just keep the project as light-hearted as you can. Focus more on your endeavour rather than whatever literary genre the end product will be tossed into and how decadent that may be.
Update 6: enlist help always, no man is an island. I know you know that because you know discourse is a necessary component of history so this is just a reminder.
Update 7: I loathe to admit this but this does mean when those polite requests for scoresheets were coupled with an absence of reply, mostly pertaining to previous posts, this just won’t do this time. I don’t think house calls with a few goons are in order but phone calls maybe: re point 6. Perhaps having games in print will function as a game changer…perhaps not…onwards and upwards and hope for the best.
Update 8: As Eales elucidates in his introduction -no truncating. As you learnt from your MA: you never know where research will take you and there is only one solution to this: access the material in the British Library -the stuff you haven’t yet. Together this constitutes ambition -that thing that the lack thereof drives postmodernists beserk sometimes.
Update 9: email sent already yes but The British Newspaper Archive and their entanglements is paramount.
Update 10: this shouldn’t be too hard as long as your reading habits don’t drop off too much as I do have an axe to grind, and posting related content over 150 times already has kept it there.
Warning 1: I have a creative and casual style when I write. That has to go. Rigeour, academic rigour as framework needs to be there and its been a while. I have enough evidence to show work is involved and greater focus. Thankfully there is no rush but old habits die hard and its a long time since I wrote a paper.
Warning 2: do not fail to consider how your dissertation developed and what you did to complete it.
Warning 3: when writing sessions commence, make sure you haven’t got any shit on your shoes.
M J M
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