A cold, wet February day – perfect backdrop for a journey into Romanticism—off on the M4 bus to the Met to see Caspar David Friedrich: The Soul of Nature The exhibit is there until May 11, 2025 so if you are in NYC it’s highly recommended. To whet your interest – or to compensate if you can’t visit – there is…
Dialogue with Dignity I’ve been thinking about issues of racial justice since I was a teenager. I’m not claiming to have done anything particularly significant or to have any impact, but the topic has been on my mind for a long time. This weekend, my reflections were sharpened by attending the Dalton Diversity Conference, an event that prompted me to…
I kept coming across paintings of London by Yoshio Markino – gauzy portraits of a mysteriously colorful, old-world city often shrouded in gray mist or yellowy brown fog but always dreamily evocative of another era that was both familiar and yet eerily distant. Time to find out more. Yoshio Markino: The Japanese Artist Who Painted London’s Fog Yoshio Markino (1869–1956)…
There’s something irresistible about a crime story set in a school or college. Like the classic snowbound country house setting, it offers the intrigue of a closed, insular community rife with underlying tensions, repressed emotions, and intellectual rivalries. There may be illicit liaisons, secret societies, cultist rituals, unrequited lust, and simmering passions. Academia promises a cast of eccentric characters full…
The two-forty-five express — Paddington to Market Blandings, first stop Oxford—stood at its piatform with that air of well-bred reserve which is characteristic of Paddington trains, and Pongo Twistleton and Lord Ickenham stood beside it, waiting for Polly Pott. The clock over the bookstall pointed to thirty-eight minutes after the hour. Some train engines are simply superior. But it’s not…
Changing your mind is perfectly normal—and often essential. After all, it’s what education is all about – updating your thoughts with new information, experiences, and perspectives. Growth and change are what life and learning are all about. But not all changes are created equal. Enter the reverse ferret: a dramatic, brazen, shameless backtrack, less about improvement and more about saving…
One childhood ritual during the days between Christmas and the return to school was the day trip to London. The main purpose was the January sales and the destination: “the London shops”. Swindon had a department store – McIlroys on Regent Street (it even had those amazing overhead wire and pulley cash railway systems that transported money and sales slips…
“That woman is pursued by demons,” Wally Brigley, the Board chair, declared as he settled into Tim Endibel’s office, plonked his Starbucks cup down on the desk, and eyed the package of mince pies on the coffee table. “Have one,” Tim said. Wally didn’t hesitate, unwrapping the cellophane and taking a bite. “So, what did our Vonnie Braydune want this…
“You look about as festive as a radish sandwich,” Midge had said. And she wasn’t wrong—Tim Endibel, co-head of Wayward St. Etheldreda’s Academy, was in no kind of holiday mood. Three days before winter break, the sounds of the holiday concert rehearsal drifted up the stairwell, a cheery backdrop to his gloom. Tim sat at his desk, dispirited and utterly…
“We were young and we were keen; Europe was in flames, and we were ready for whatever came.” “I used to think that war would make one braver, harder—but instead, it only makes one tired. The glamour of it wears off quickly when you’re pulling bodies from the wreckage.” Train to Nowhere by Anita Leslie Anita Leslie’s Train to Nowhere…
When I was in the emergency room last year having busted my elbow, a nurse asked whether I had ever broken anything else. I expect she was probing to see whether I had acquired that oldies’ habit of throwing yourself to available floors and sidewalks.. I had a ready and precise answer; “Yes. I broke my arm on November 5th,…
Most of us have done it at some point or another – accidentally locked ourselves out of the house. Raymond Carver’s poem tells a quite simple ordinary story but it becomes so much more. Read it to see what he does. He’s locked himself out and of course it’s raining and the people who have the spare key are away.…
Thanks to the #1970 Club, I’ve spent the spare moments of the past week immersed in The Female Eunuch and all things Germaine (rock groupie, celebrity, author, Shakespearian scholar, wrecking ball, rainforest protector, fearless truth-teller) Greer. I borrowed the book from the library, got stuck in, and then started on the videos of talks, interviews, appearances via YouTube. Not being…
Thanks to the #1970 Club, I have a new mog in my life and a new literary best friend in Mog the Forgetful Cat. “Once there was a cat called Mog. She lived with a family called Thomas. Mog was nice but not very clever. She didn’t understand a lot of things. A lot of other things she forgot. She…
The #1970 Club is starting tomorrow (October 14th) and I’m prepared with some reading and re-reading. 1970 offers a rich literary landscape, from Germaine Greer and Graham Greene to children’s classics like Mr. Gumpy. It ranges from Sexual Politics and Mog, the Forgetful Cat, to works by Susan Hill, Shel Silverstein, Iris Murdoch, and Toni Morrison, alongside Ruth Rendell, Robertson…