I suppose I am on a cross-country trip, but I wonder if mine counts. Doesn’t, anyway, the mode(s) of transport used vary with the motive for travelling in the first place?

March 20, 2024

You’re going on a cross-country trip. Airplane, train, bus, car, or bike? I am describing a trip I am currently engaged on, and so the simple answer is by train as my photograph from yesterday, below, illustrates. However, as it is for most of these prompts, there is a simple answer that is a kind … More I suppose I am on a cross-country trip, but I wonder if mine counts. Doesn’t, anyway, the mode(s) of transport used vary with the motive for travelling in the first place?

In ‘Martyr’, the main character, Cyrus, learns to love as a queer man. This is a blog about Kaveh Akbar (2024) ‘Martyr’.

March 19, 2024

In Martyr, an amazing funny fable, mythic in its proportions, about a queer American-Iranian former addict, by Kaveh Akbar, the main character, Cyrus, remembers an ‘old-school Muslim fairy tale, maybe it was a discarded hadith I guess, but it was all about the first time Satan sees Adam’. After surveying the first man thoroughly externally ‘like … More In ‘Martyr’, the main character, Cyrus, learns to love as a queer man. This is a blog about Kaveh Akbar (2024) ‘Martyr’.

New notes sounded in revisiting ‘The Mining Art Gallery’ and ‘The Spanish Gallery’: With thoughts on why influential teaching is not always good teaching.

March 18, 2024

A variation on a prompt: New notes sounded in revisiting ‘The Mining Art Gallery’ and ‘The Spanish Gallery’: With thoughts on why influential teaching is not always good teaching. _______________________________________________________________ The 17th March was a very wet and rather depressing day in Bishop Auckland but walk Daisy we must and, given that she will walk … More New notes sounded in revisiting ‘The Mining Art Gallery’ and ‘The Spanish Gallery’: With thoughts on why influential teaching is not always good teaching.

One word? Why? Cannot ‘one’ say: ‘My name is Legion’.

March 17, 2024

If Judaeo-Christian thought gave us an obsession it is that of claiming a false integrity: the view that we are beings that can be summed up in one word – a thing that defines us. It has, in ways that monotheistic cultures must, made us prone to idealise the ONE. In truth this idealisation is … More One word? Why? Cannot ‘one’ say: ‘My name is Legion’.

This blog is a preparation to see ‘Player Kings’ at Manchester with Ian McKellen playing Falstaff. What should I expect?

March 16, 2024

This blog is a preparation to see Player Kings at Manchester Opera House on Tuesday 19th March 18.30 with Ian McKellen, surprisingly, playing Falstaff. Will this production release Shakespeare from the heteronormativity that still tries to strangle in its cradle the appeal to an exceedingly male communal radicalism (with nasty bits like misogyny mixed in) … More This blog is a preparation to see ‘Player Kings’ at Manchester with Ian McKellen playing Falstaff. What should I expect?

“What’s the matter, smart ass, you don’t  know any f##king Shakespeare?” Do not ask me: ‘What’s the Matter?’

March 15, 2024

What is one question you hate to be asked? Explain. It feels like a classic meme, that moment from Scorsese’s 2006 film The Departed. I try and represent it above with some of the symbolism that shows why, once it has been said from above and in a threatening manner to the cop played by … More “What’s the matter, smart ass, you don’t  know any f##king Shakespeare?” Do not ask me: ‘What’s the Matter?’

‘It occurs to me that good songs may haunt the mind not despite their incompleteness, but because of it’. This blog is about Kazuo Ishiguro (2024) ‘The Summer We Crossed Europe In The Rain: Lyrics for Stacey Kent’.

March 14, 2024

‘It occurs to me that good songs may haunt the mind not despite their incompleteness, but because of it’.[1] This blog pays homage for providing a book that, despite my expectations will stick with me for a long time. This blog is about Kazuo Ishiguro (2024) The Summer We Crossed Europe In The Rain: Lyrics … More ‘It occurs to me that good songs may haunt the mind not despite their incompleteness, but because of it’. This blog is about Kazuo Ishiguro (2024) ‘The Summer We Crossed Europe In The Rain: Lyrics for Stacey Kent’.

Alexandra Harris believes that in his new novel ‘Day’, Michael Cunningham writes again of ‘intimate, domestic love of many kinds: straight, gay, motherly, brotherly and avuncular love, and the love between old friends, to name a few, though the writing works against discrete categorisations’. I read it, however’, as a novel about the specificities of queer life; making it the monumental novel it is. Am I wrong or is Harris queer-blind?

March 12, 2024

Alexandra Harris believes that in his new novel Day, Michael Cunningham writes again of ‘intimate, domestic love of many kinds: straight, gay, motherly, brotherly and avuncular love, and the love between old friends, to name a few, though the writing works against discrete categorisations’. Moreover, Harris also seems to thinks that that the focus of … More Alexandra Harris believes that in his new novel ‘Day’, Michael Cunningham writes again of ‘intimate, domestic love of many kinds: straight, gay, motherly, brotherly and avuncular love, and the love between old friends, to name a few, though the writing works against discrete categorisations’. I read it, however’, as a novel about the specificities of queer life; making it the monumental novel it is. Am I wrong or is Harris queer-blind?

O, my centarian, I would like you to be a model of a better self than I am.

March 10, 2024

Write a letter to your 100-year-old self. Dear illusion, I do not (indeed I can not) know the entity to whom I am writing. You are an idea in my head evoked by some request to imagine you. As I read colleagues attempting the same task, they seem confident that the person they imagine is … More O, my centarian, I would like you to be a model of a better self than I am.

Still waters run deep perhaps, but certainly dark! Douglas.

March 9, 2024

What is your middle name? Does it carry any special meaning/significance? The world of given names is one where silliness runs deep; not least where associations between name and ‘special meanings’ are evoked. My middle name is DOUGLAS. It was given to me so that I bore my father’s first name as well as his … More Still waters run deep perhaps, but certainly dark! Douglas.