AtDTdA: (9) 248 Wednesday's kick-ass question

[Michael J. Hußmann]

Tore Rye Andersen (torerye at hotmail.com) wrote:

> Now, the repetition of this phrase must constitute what in GR is called "a 
> bit of redundancy so that the message would not be lost" (GR, 322).
But what 
> exactly is the message? The phrases seem to cluster around certain persons 
> (Dally and Merle), certain locations (Venice), and certain perspectives 
> (views from above).

There may be a reason why views from above should evoke the image of a
map. Bird's-eye-views for maps had been popular for centuries at least.
For example, there is a map of Cologne drawn by Arnold Mercator in 1571,
showing the whole of the city in 3D, each building rendered in
painstaking detail, from a virtual vantage point about 150 meters above
the surface. I believe bird's-eye-views of cities even date back to
Roman times. Now drawing a bird's-eye-view of a city requires
imagination and the mastery of perspective, but only after the invention
of manned balloon-flight could one actually see a city in just the way
its maps had been drawn for centuries.

- Michael


Michael J. Hußmann

E-mail: michael at michael-hussmann.de
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