Tristan da Cunha
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As far back as I can remember I've always been fascinated with isolation and solitude.
One of my favourite of Tove Jansson's Moomin books is Moominland Midwinter which begins with the eponymous protagonist awakening from his deep hibernation a little too early only to discover that every body else seems to be asleep and he's the only conscious person in the world.
Oscar Wilde when he first got the idea for Dorian Grey was inspired by a book entitled Against the Grain in the English Translation which is basically about a rich man completely shutting himself off from the company of other human beings to simply read and do everything by himself without anyone else being involved whatsoever.
The US SF Author Philip K Dick in his essay on schizophrenia described the difference between koinos kosmos and idios kosmos , terms he got from the Ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus. Basically the idios kosmos is your own private world and the koinos kosmos is the world that everybody shares which he explained as your own private world is the house you live in by yourself and
the reality that you are forced to encounter is when you walk outside and have to cope with everybody else around you.
Finally we get to the title of this Blog entry. Tristan da Cunha is the most isolated island community in the entire world. I first became aware of it because the author Robert A Heinlein almost managed to set foot on it when he was travelling around the world with his wife as recounted in his nonfiction book Tramp Royale.
This is what the main settlement Edinburgh of the Seven Seas looks like on google maps ...
Less than 300 people make up the entire population descended from about 7 main families who first settled there in 1810. They are now connected to the internet which makes them less isolated. They have their own postcode, newspaper , newsletter and even their own website.
Travelling there as a tourist is quite an ordeal timewise but you can do it and even stay on the island for a few days.
Here is their coats of arms and national flag
This is what it looks like if you ever manage to go there ...
It's imporant to remember that
but if there was a woman whose surname was island and her first name was Anne then she would be
Anne Island.