The song that lifts the mood today ought to be Scarborough Fair Baz on Scarbough South Bay beach, the dog-accessible portion. Once he had been there he wanted to be absolutely nowhere else. Obviously the song that I use to answer this prompt question is not chosen for either its relevance or appropriateness to the … More The song that lifts the mood today ought to be ‘Scarborough Fair’.
Believe it or not some people still claim that that they have found or are still seeking a ‘soulmate’ who is the only ‘One’ ever intended to be THE ONE for them with which to match, ‘mate’ and live together with. Though I have a partner and husband I love and whom I never intend … More The forgotten issue in the debate on finding the ‘One’ person to love forever.
When minimalism becomes the sign,not of simplicity of life, but of opulence of style and materials. Minimalism has to ‘disambiguated’ by a long list in Wikipedia, for it has a specialist meaning in specific domains and sub-domains of knowledge. My suspicions that most might answer this question in terms of it being about one or … More Minimalism: Essence or Style.
We all remember the scene from the film Gone With the Wind, even if not the details. The shallow life of Scarlett O’Hara, played by Vivien Leigh, is revealed when she is in weeds of mourning with her home, Tara (the paradisal halls of Tara in Irish mythology are enwrapped herein), compromised by the loss … More Movies that last often are as potent in pricking the bubble of someone else’s sense of their own dramatic moment, as when Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O’Hara (in the film of ‘Gone With the Wind’) says in despair: “Where shall I go? What shall I do?”and Clark Gable as Rhett Butler responds: “Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn.”
How to ‘finish’ a book. Is it the same thing as ‘reading’ a book. When I was a child, I was obsessed with having to finish a book. It was a measure of the endurance, fortitude or passion (with varying degrees of drive and amounts of compulsion enforced from some internalised diktat or standard) to … More How to ‘finish’ a book. Is it the same thing as ‘reading’ a book.
The walk was short but I didn’t know that when I parked up on Warren Street between Twelfth Street and Eleventh Street (pit villages and towns oft have numbered streets, lined on each sides by redbrick terraces, rather than names – perhaps to emphasise the fact that they housed such numbers of men, in the … More Walking to the ‘The Playhouse’ at Horden from Warren St. to see Hamlet in the First Quarto
There is no such thing as an unlimited budget that is not paradoxically limited by its duration (as it is in this question for 24 hours) but the whole point is that budgets that are swollen are essential to the magical thinking of self-interest that is supposed to be the driver to capitalist economies. The … More There is no such thing as an unlimited budget that is not paradoxically limited by its duration (as it is in this question for 24 hours) but the whole point is that budgets that are swollen are essential to the magical thinking of self-interest that is supposed to be the driver to capitalist economies. The feeling of the magic bulge of growth in the National Theatre’s ‘The Playboy of the Western World’ seen yesterday night.
Let’s clear up the right to name this well known verse of the Bible a proverb, first, though it appears more correct to call it an aphorism. Traditionally we make contradistinction between the forms of ‘saying’ known as aphorism and proverb respectively by thinking of proverbs as saying something wise or true (it is not … More “As a dog returneth to his vomit, so a fool returneth to his folly.” [‘Proverbs’, chapter 26, verse 11]. It may not be a ‘proverb’ (the wise call it an ‘aphorism’) and it certainly does not translate into clear meaning or human application, but it is neither ‘completely wrong’ nor ‘completely right’: it just is human vomit up for grabs by any old dog.
Some books just must be read and Ilan Pappé (2024 – with new preface on Gaza as well as the original of 2017 – Ten Myths About Israel, London, Verso Press is one of them. The edition of 2024 gives a necessary set of words about Gaza that now requires updating again, for as Pappé … More Ilan Pappé (2024) ‘Ten Myths About Israel’, London, Verso Press.
‘What’s something you’d love to see in the future, but know you probably won’t live to witness?’ This question is stuck in the mud of illusion, for as Thomas Hardy said, in a work no-one ever reads, “if a way to the Better there be, it Begins with a Full Look at the Worst’. There … More ‘What’s something you’d love to see in the future, but know you probably won’t live to witness?’ This question is stuck in the mud of illusion, for as Thomas Hardy said, in a work no-one ever reads, “if a way to the Better there be, it Begins with a Full Look at the Worst’.
In the loosest of uses of the word ‘moment’, I want to identify a ‘moment’ as that period of time over which I realised that reality is constantly reshaped by the means of its description. It is the kind of ‘moment’ that might be used as an answer to the title of James’ Baldwin’s novel … More It is the kind of ‘moment’ that might be used as an answer to the title of James’ Baldwin’s novel ‘Tell Me How Long The Train’s Been Gone’, wherein moments have duration and measure in so many domains including measures of time and the quality, rather than quantity, of our attention to a phenomenon: the time scales, for instance, of narrative, history and self-awareness wherein ‘reality’ is at a premium.
Inviting Socrates to dine at homewith us is, as always, your idea.You always leave out Xenophon, evenPlato is not asked to come dine with us.You know Soc. likes his words to be writtenin their limpid but authoritativestyle, and not storied over by thin talkfrom our poor crowd. Oh well! He’ll sit againAt our table’s head … More Dining with Socrates
