We have all been well entertained by the new revelations about the Russians spies in America who are about to be sent home in a swap arrangement for American spies in a scene which reminds me of the great espionage…
I am an enthusiast for the work of the Seventeenth Century French painter Nicolas Poussin (1594-1665) and I had reason to look at one of his greatest works again this morning: Christ and the woman taken in adultery (1653 Musee…
I did two on-line poetry readings last night at the end of a seven day period when I had been working through the typical writer’s neurosis about never being able to write again. I went on a two week lying…
Yes, I know I have my iPod nano and it is a wonderful piece of gear. I listen to it in the street, on the train, at the gym and I took it away with me on holiday and sat…
I couldn’t make it to the unveiling of the new Thomas Paine statue in my town of Lewes, England yesterday but I went down later and managed to take a photograph before the light faded. I wrote about the other…
Thomas Paine Born 1737 Thetford, Norfolk, England, Great Britain Died 1809 New York, United States of America. On Sunday, American Independence Day, here in Lewes England, I am proud to say that my home town is unveiling a statue to…
When the sun rises above the mound at the back of my house it feels like it is coming from the “other side.” It floods into my garden setting it alight and transforming it into a pagan paradise. Brack Mound…
The great Spanish tenor Placido Domingo has been getting rave reviews for his performance in the baritone role of Simon Boccanegra in Verdi’s powerful and gloomy opera of that name. Domingo is now nearly 70 and has been singing professionally…
One of my favourite public monuments is the splendid statue in Hereford of, the great and sublime English composer Edward Elgar propped up against his bicycle gazing at the sky in romantic contemplation of, we are led to assume, the…
There were some pictures of people hiking whilst wearing only walking boots and rucksacks in my copy of The Times this morning. Shocking you may think but it was a story about how a Swiss man has just won his…