Coming Of Age As A Writer

In this painting, located in the Florence Nightingale Museum, is Florence and older sister Parthenope. While the two had slightly different personalities, they were extremely close. Florence and Parthenope remind me of Briony and Cecilia, except for the fact that Parthenope's lover isn't sent away to prison for a crime he didn't commit..... 

One of my favorite museums thus far: The Imperial War Museum. Being able to see many of the artifacts from war was amazing, and really is mind blowing seeing it all in person. Atonement was set during World War II, so I was able to make a lot of connections between the novel and this museum. 

Taken at the Florence Nightingale Museum, here lies Florence's best selling book: Notes On Nursing. Similar to Briony, Florence herself (obviously) wrote Atonement, and it too is a best selling book. Florence and Briony are extremely similar in many ways. They both are the youngest, very organized, grow up to become nurses, and as shown above, have some seriously rad writing skills. 

As we discussed in our prompt on the day we attended the Imperial War Museum, many of the children were forced to grow up at a young age. And as we can all clearly see in the painting above, it was a really, really, really young age for some. The 1942 painting, done by Elsie Harwood depicts children getting ready for nursery school. They appear to be taking off their own clothes and putting on their uniform for another busy day. As written under the painting, "Total war changed the lives of even the youngest members of society." 

And one last picture of my favorite area of London, because I love this city and will miss it oh so dearly. We walked over to this area overlooking Parliament and Big Ben, and were able to score some great views and pictures along the way. Inside the Florence Nightingale Museum, I remember seeing actual photographs of men in their hospital beds, with this exact view in their background. 

                                                          Coming of Age As A Traveler

Ahh, the London Eye. My personal favorite spot in London. I manage to make a walk here everyday, and enjoy the beautiful view while I am here!

London From Greenwhich Park

In this painting, the main focus is nature. In this high painting, the grass and sky adage to take up most of it. Lucy also greatly appreciates nature. 

Venus and Mars, Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510) 

In this painting of Venus and Mars, they have just been intimate. In the painting, Mars was "vanquished" by Venus, and in the novel, George is "vanquished" by Lucy when she is very stand offish following their kiss. 

Rome from the Vatican 

The focal point of this painting is the artist selling his work. Similar to Lucy, Turner too has the same views on seeing the world. This painting claims that it was painted on the way home, so everything that we see in tis painting is just in "hindsight."

Venus and Mars, by Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510)

Although this is the same painting, I am taking a different approach at it. Venus is the God of love and beauty, while Mars is the God of war. In the painting, Venus is covered, whereas Mars is (almost) in the nude. Similarly, Lucy has not quite exposed her femininity and can somewhat be thought of as "covered" or "sheltered."

Coming of Age as a Thinker and Skeptic

This stunningly beautiful stained glass window at Eltham Palace represents Catholicism, as stained glass something that one would find in most Catholic churches, and being a Catholic myself- I can vouch for that. This stained glass represents the same stained glass in the novel Brideshead Revisited, and symbolizes Lady Marchmain's (and inevitably her family's) unbreakable Catholic faith. 

Besides being my favorite "visit" this week, this fountain at Oxford is also a representation of the fountain at Brideshead, that played many roles in the novel. It represents many things; Holy-ness and rebirth playing as two very important connections made to the fountain. 

This chapel at Eltham Palace represents the same chapel at Brideshead. Similar to Eltham Palace, the Marchmain's also had a chapel connected to their home- one that was frequently used.

This picture is meant to represent the stunning "baroque" architecture at Hampton Court Palace. While Hampton Court Palace had both baroque and tudor architecture, this picture in particular represents a more baroque part. As we learned during class, baroque, in England, more so represents Catholicism "cleaning up it's act." Baroque architecture is very easy to point out, especially because it typically is very clean and symmetric.

Oxford campus was absolutely stunning... This picture- although only being one angle of the campus- doesn't even do it justice. I sincerely enjoyed our tour, and really felt like I learned a lot from our tour guide, and just being able to walk around and explore on our own. Our tour guide showed us many different areas of Oxford, and I remember one area in particular where she said that the students will typically hang out. I also remember her pointing out an area (as shown in the picture above) that she said students are not permitted to be in, as it is only for staff. I could picture Sebastian and Charles hanging out in an area like that, just because they always seemed to be breaking rules and causing mischief, (especially Sebastian... ;)

                              Coming of Age As A Worker 

This BREATHTAKING image was taken in the garden just outside of the Geffrye Museum.

A photo of a woman speaking to orphan children, taken at the Foundling Museum. 

The individual tokens, each belonging to a different child. Taken at the Foundling Museum.

This colorful art piece was planted in the center of the Tate Britain Museum.

As shown in the description, The Court Room was a place where meetings were held in the Foundling Hospital.