One of my childhood great authors’ was Jules Verne, but the problem with his books was that as an 8-10 year old I could hardly understand some more ‘technical’ parts of his stories. Remember, there was no Google back in the day to tell and show what is what, how it works, etc., and encyclopedias often provided only quite dry explanations which weren’t of much help, so eventually I’ve found it best to let my imagination roam free whenever I’ve come across such a tera incognito, and let it give these words a secret life of their own. Amazingly, in some cases I’d say my imagination would create things so much superior to the actual thing that I’d be even somewhat disappointed to learn that this previously unknown thing is just… this dull and regular thing
Nowadays I have to turn to this reading ‘technique’ mostly when I read books in languages which aren’t my mother tongue. Some time ago I’ve been reading this book set during WWII, and I stumbled upon such a tera incognito – peek a boo hair style. Ah, my experiences readily prompted me with some period appropriate hair styles to choose from, but I could not be sure which one was the right one. Later I’ve found out which one was that, but to tell you the truth the version my imagination settled with while reading the book was SO much better. Add some punkiness and spikiness to the sleek look, mix a ‘boo’ into the equation, and you might get somewhere close to where my imagination took me
A classic peek a boo |