A Village Lost and Found

Book info: A Village Lost and Found (Hardcover, 240 pages) – Frances Lincoln, 2009. Language: English.

Based on 30 years of research, Brian May's painstaking excavation of exquisite stereo photographs from the dawn of photography transports readers to the lost world of an Oxfordshire village of the 1850s. At the book's heart is a reproduction of T. R. Williams' 1856 series of stereo photographs, "Scenes In Our Village." Using the viewer supplied with this book, the reader can become absorbed in a village idyll of the early Victorian era: the subjects seem to be on the point of suddenly bursting back into life and continuing with their daily rounds. The book is also something of a detective story, as the village itself was only identified in 2003 as Hinton Waldrist in Oxfordshire, and the authors' research constantly reveals further clues about the society of those distant times, historic photographic techniques, and the life of the enigmatic Williams himself, who appears, Hitchcock-like, from time to time in his own photographs. Editorial Reviews Review "T. R. Williams seems to have created 'Our Village' as a labor of love, recording the scenes of his childhood summers and documenting a place and way of life that was already vanishing through the effects of the industrial revolution. His extraordinary dedication to the project and his quest for perfection in stereographic imagery are both honored and mirrored in the years of research, photographic explorations and thoughtful presentation that have made possible this book, A Village Lost and Found — clearly another labor of love." —John Dennis, Stereo World

"The awesome thoroughness of this book is worthy of a PhD thesis...a triumph of scholarship and credit to all concerned." —The Royal Photographic Society

"It's like magic and makes me feel like a child again." --—Observer About the Author Paul Balmer worked on this project with luthier John Diggins, who has built custom 'Jaydee' guitars for Toni Iommi of Black Sabbath and Angus Young of AC/DC. Paul has written all previous books in the guitar manual series - in every case with John's expert guidance - and is also the author of the Drum-Kit Manual. He lives near Corby in Northamptonshire.