Tuesday 23 March 2010

Literary Tattoos


Tattoos are an interest of mine. I enjoy looking at all the beautiful artwork as well as talking to people about the stories behind their tattoos. Of course not all tattoos are beautiful, some are ugly, tasteless or poorly done (some are a mixture of all three!)

When I began taking a serious interest in reading it wasn't long before I discovered a trend which has appeared in popular tattoo culture relatively recently called literary tattoos. Literary tattoos are quite simply tattoos of a persons favourite book passage or sometimes an image from that book. The picture I've posted features a literary tattoo from the book 'Peter Pan' by J.M Barrie.

I love the idea of literary tattoos, in a world where many people seem to get the same boring thing over and over I think something as unique as words from a favourite book is really special and inventive.

Literary tattoos can also be from favourite song lyrics, poetry, plays, movies, essays or even an article and sometimes aren't of words at all but an image from that story.

I don't have any literary tattoos myself but thats only because I haven't found any yet that grab me sufficiently but when I do I'll definately be getting one.

Here is a link to a great literary tattoo site which is updated regularly

http://www.contrariwise.org/

By Chris

4 comments:

  1. I am familiar with tattoos, but I've never heard of the literary tattoo. I like it.

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  2. First I have to say I love your park bench picture! Second, you mentioned a book of tattoos on my blog when I posted my WG post. What's the name of the book? I'm curious now... :D

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  3. I've been literary tattoos around online quite a bit lately, and it's been a lot of fun to see all of the literary art.

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  4. Christina - the book I have is called 'Body Type, Intimate messages etched in flesh' by Ina Saltz. The chapters are things like 'Literature, Love, Politics, Homage, Typography etc etc

    They are lovely but the pain is too much for me

    Posted by Jess

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