If genius is an infinite capacity for taking pains, blogging is in my case an infinite capacity for recycling old material. For example, I wrote The Origins of the Third World War in the late 1980s, largely, I should say in my defence, as a vehicle for practising my typing skills with my Amstrad PCW word processor.Indeed, I cannot swear to it, but I could very well have written the wretched thing out in longhand in the first instance.
At some point in the intervening years, I must have scanned the hard copy, uploaded it into Word, and then forgot all about it. When I chanced across it the other day, even I was shocked by the number of mistakes in the text, and it was only later that I realised that most of them could be pinned on the shortcomings of the OCR software.
Looking back on this leaden effort from a distance of almost thirty years, I think that the only thing that can be said in its favour is that it captures quite well the language employed in diplomatic histories.
At some point in the intervening years, I must have scanned the hard copy, uploaded it into Word, and then forgot all about it. When I chanced across it the other day, even I was shocked by the number of mistakes in the text, and it was only later that I realised that most of them could be pinned on the shortcomings of the OCR software.
Looking back on this leaden effort from a distance of almost thirty years, I think that the only thing that can be said in its favour is that it captures quite well the language employed in diplomatic histories.
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