tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-55612512011-04-21T20:39:51.864+02:00The News That Stays News, Reported LiveAndershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.comBlogger13601100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1154022827379595972006-07-27T19:53:00.000+02:002006-07-27T19:53:47.473+02:00

The Most Trenchant Wall Street Analysis EverThere was a time when this was all anyone talked about

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1154015744187116872006-07-27T17:55:00.000+02:002006-07-27T17:55:44.316+02:00

When you're at these actors' age the funniest part of the movie is having a condom in your hand.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1152097613174684452006-07-05T13:06:00.000+02:002006-07-05T13:06:53.176+02:00

Quote of the day: "'You know that penny farthing hell you call your mind? That's where you think this is coming from, don't you?' " Samuel Beckett

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1152097400871020802006-07-05T13:03:00.000+02:002006-07-05T13:03:20.883+02:00

Peter Stothard points out how saying Homer is a woman is not necessarily a feminist claim. Or rather, that Samuel Butler staked the claim for misogynist reasons.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1152097360927380702006-07-05T13:02:00.000+02:002006-07-05T13:02:41.010+02:00

Peter Stothard points out how saying Homer is a woman is not necessarily a feminist claim. Or rather, that Samuel Butler staked the claim for misogynist reasons.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1152009865119388372006-07-04T12:44:00.000+02:002006-07-04T12:44:25.206+02:00

Which author called his cat Kiddleywinkempoops? The answer will amaze you. His dog never knew his luck. Imagine what the Kiddleywinkempoops Regionalist Party would stand for.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1151940544817112292006-07-03T17:29:00.000+02:002006-07-03T17:29:04.913+02:00

Like the Beatles, it's not just that Orwell produced more than his competitors did, in less time, of greater quality, his B-sides and rarities sustain the interest in them: "It may look like the sweepings from his study floor - memos to a literary editor about early deadlines, a photo of Orwell milking a goat in Morocco - but I found it gripping. "

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1151938982316942862006-07-03T17:03:00.000+02:002006-07-03T17:03:02.393+02:00

Social difficulties of the method acting: "One time [Robert de Niro] picked up a guy who happened to be an actor. The guy was like, 'Jesus Christ, one year you're winning an Oscar and now your driving cabs? Guess it's hard to find a steady job?' Bob explained what he was doing. The guy just put a hand on his shoulder and said, 'It's okay Bobby, I've been there too.'"

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1151686481831489742006-06-30T18:54:00.000+02:002006-06-30T18:54:41.986+02:00

Bern Porter "contributed to the invention of television, worked on the Manhattan Project and the Saturn V rocket, and made the acquaintances of Einstein, Oppenheimer, and Werner von Braun. He published Henry Miller, Kenneth Patchen, and Kenneth Rexroth, among others, and knew Gertrude Stein, Anaïs Nin, Allen Ginsberg, and many others you might name. He exerted a profound influence on the

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1151685314905602382006-06-30T18:35:00.000+02:002006-06-30T18:35:14.916+02:00

A marvellous passage from Coleridge'sBiographia Literaria: In our own English compositions, (at least for the last three years of our school education,) he showed no mercy to phrase, metaphor, or image, unsupported by a sound sense, or where the same sense might have been onveyed with equal force and dignity in plainer words. Lute, harp, and lyre, Muse, Muses, and inspirations, Pegasus,Parnassus,

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1151685285030907892006-06-30T18:34:00.000+02:002006-06-30T18:34:45.133+02:00

A marvellous passage from Coleridge'sBiographia Literaria: In our own English compositions, (at least for the last three years of our school education,) he showed no mercy to phrase, metaphor, or image, unsupported by a sound sense, or where the same sense might have been onveyed with equal force and dignity in plainer words. Lute, harp, and lyre, Muse, Muses, and inspirations, Pegasus,Parnassus,

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1151675630385696282006-06-30T15:53:00.000+02:002006-06-30T15:53:50.506+02:00

Peter Stothard unearths the most grandiose dedication ever. A dedication to 1,500,000 people will never however match Nabokov's consistent and unflashy "To Vera."

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1151588286293021352006-06-29T15:38:00.000+02:002006-06-29T15:38:06.380+02:00

This hopefully means that this song will stop playing in my head.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1151581683525038622006-06-29T13:48:00.000+02:002006-06-29T13:48:03.606+02:00

Why is 2001 on a list of inspiring movies? Or rather who gets inspired by it and to do what? Some possibilities: Monkeys get inspired to hit pacifist monkeys with bones and so secure control of their watering hole; robots get inspired to take action against humanity's unfair decisions to turn off machines which don't deserve it; astronauts get inspired to become gigantic space babies.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1151515678625596362006-06-28T19:27:00.000+02:002006-06-28T19:27:58.726+02:00

The argument for lad's mags treatment of women: "And what of the women who help us make the magazine? I mean not only the significant number of female journalists working at Nuts but the hundreds of ordinary young women who write to us, send us their pictures, jokes and facts, who turn up to our club nights, who want to be on our pages. It is paradoxical that the elements of ''lad mags'' that

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1151504703989532962006-06-28T16:21:00.000+02:002006-06-28T16:25:04.026+02:00

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1151423972504634362006-06-27T17:59:00.000+02:002006-06-27T17:59:32.516+02:00

MacLamity's traffic is content driven.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1151423682873257872006-06-27T17:54:00.000+02:002006-06-27T17:54:43.000+02:00

FOOTBALL IS MORE AMERICAN THAN AMERICAN FOOTBALL: Here's a fairly decent Ann Coulter-ish attack on soccer whose principal pleasure derives, as with Coulter's attacks, from the prospect of outraging the enemy more than the satisfaction of having read something sensible. Some of the objections to soccer have already been discussed by David Eggers's High School coach: it is unAmerican not to use

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1151066660439289892006-06-23T14:44:00.000+02:002006-06-23T14:44:20.440+02:00

Quote of the Day: "There are people you fire, absolutely. That's life ... It's not necessarily cruel because in getting rid of one one journalist, you create another one." -- From Arnaud Lagardere:

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1151066095085144002006-06-23T14:34:00.000+02:002006-06-23T14:34:55.190+02:00

Why screenwriters think they do all the work.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1151064685935365152006-06-23T14:11:00.000+02:002006-06-23T14:11:26.046+02:00

Samuel Beckett is becoming one of those artists whom you had to know to fully appreciate. It is the people who knew them who say this, of course. The rest of us can only take their word for it and feel like sad losers for not knowing the people we admire. William Shawn and Iris Murdoch are two other recent examples.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1150982879851063482006-06-22T15:27:00.000+02:002006-06-22T15:27:59.956+02:00

Did you know the connection between James fucking Blunt and 4 fucking Non Blondes?

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1150906983096873782006-06-21T18:23:00.000+02:002006-06-21T18:23:03.280+02:00

Apple's will suddenly seem sad and spooky from now on, having read this: "Every time I open the electronic book in which I'm writing this review, I feel grateful to Alan Turing and also sorry for him. On the screen, an apple with a chunk bitten out of it glimmers into view: the logo proudly recalls Turing's achievement and miserably commemorates his end." Given this, it is amazing Apple never

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1150903002705744062006-06-21T17:16:00.000+02:002006-06-21T17:16:42.830+02:00

John Updike goes toe to toe with the internet:Now, as I read it, this is a pretty grisly scenario. Performances, personal access to the creator, personalisation, whatever that is, does this not throw us back to the pre-literate societies where only the present live person can make an impact and offer, as it were, value? Have not writers since the onset of the Gutenberg revolution imagined that

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1150734783742300762006-06-19T18:33:00.000+02:002006-06-19T18:33:03.826+02:00

Why Americans can't write convincing English and the English can't write convincing American. Some of the problem here is that when Americans describe an accent phonetically, the English will read the phonetic words in an English accent, which makes things seem really ridiculous. If you want to complain how far off the mark Fitzgerald's "Will you kaindly stop tucking" is, you should be clear

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1150731518083917892006-06-19T17:38:00.000+02:002006-06-19T17:38:38.143+02:00

An incredibly good description of what made Betjeman distinct. I think Betjeman tends to be thought of as parochial. But this essay makes a solid argument for his main characterisc being expansiveness -- Little England was larger than we think: Betjeman was excited by the humble, by the everyday, by the allegedly meretricious, by preposterous kitsch, by fortuitous juxtapositions, by collisions of

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1150372365442884612006-06-15T13:52:00.000+02:002006-06-15T13:52:45.520+02:00

How the rich die. I wish I could find an article from the past two years about how the sports car effectively served as a serial killer in the 1950s, rapping a new playboy around a French tree every 3 months.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1150129013357476962006-06-12T18:07:00.000+02:002006-06-12T18:16:53.360+02:00

The Moko asked me what was the best novel of the 20th century. Here's a good starting point from Anthony Burgess.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1150128096715889292006-06-12T18:01:00.000+02:002006-06-12T18:01:36.730+02:00

I'm just surprised that Americans are fighting to say rubbish. Otherwise, GM whining about getting 200 words into The New York Times, instead of 490, is pathetic. Consider that the column GM was angry about was 790 words long and that, according to what GM considers fair space, The New York Times would need to print 60% more pages, all of them dedicated readers' responses.This is one of those

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1150116592787563892006-06-12T14:49:00.000+02:002006-06-12T14:49:52.886+02:00

The British government has spent £140,000 sending top civil servants to learn whatever Sheakespeare teaches us about government, in other words: Henry V: will "enable participants to 'live their leadership potential to the full' by 'following the journey of King Henry'."Julius Caesar: "Participants are asked how they might maintain their personal integrity in the face of the most wounding

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1149862083346456042006-06-09T16:08:00.000+02:002006-06-09T16:08:03.490+02:00

MacLamity can never get enough good articles on forgery.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1149859406883843172006-06-09T15:23:00.000+02:002006-06-09T15:23:27.023+02:00

Nurdi Nukhajiev, Chechnya's government-appointed representative for human rights, deliciously uses the Catherine Tramell defence (search for "she's going to say") while arguing that the Russians didn't have a torture cell in Grozny: "I am not saying that angels served there [in the cells]. "I am not saying that the people [policemen] were ideal individuals. But this is 2006 and they weren't so

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1149781039710954642006-06-08T17:37:00.000+02:002006-06-08T17:37:20.180+02:00

I was reading Valery complain that Baudelaire made a mistake when writing "D'aller là-bas vivre ensemble" for the arcane reason that it has 7 syllables and should have 8. Valery says 5+5+7 is not harmonious while 5+5+8 is. (So he felt it should be "D'aller vivre là-bas ensemble"). As I contemplated this I got excited about the possibilities of an English line likeTo go there together to

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1149768507503773732006-06-08T14:08:00.000+02:002006-06-08T14:08:27.630+02:00

Terrifying Toilet Tale of Horror! "[I]t was only after I’d finished that the real flaw in the design became evident: as well as a bolt on the inside of the door, there was one on the outside, and somebody had locked it. I hammered on the door, to which a child’s voice replied: “Ten dollar.”

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1149683670781172382006-06-07T14:34:00.000+02:002006-06-07T14:34:30.783+02:00

"You already knew that your friend who's so funny about the 'Star Wars' tradition of frightful hairstyles for women (in the corrected sequence of sequel and prequel, Natalie Portman must have passed the bad-hair gene down to Carrie Fisher) is much less boring than your other friend who can tell you how science fiction movies mirror the dynamics of American imperialism. " Clive James writes about

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1149683101597319662006-06-07T14:25:00.000+02:002006-06-07T14:25:01.750+02:00

The state of E-Ink. Doing better, still no match for a book.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1149600861765954252006-06-06T15:34:00.000+02:002006-06-06T15:34:21.943+02:00

Does the U.S. press have a liberal bias? The Guardian says it will provide more!

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1149597830326645792006-06-06T14:43:00.000+02:002006-06-06T14:43:50.506+02:00

Pierre Assouline makes the distinction between an "unchronie" and a "dystopie", using "Fatherland" and "The Man in the High Castle" as examples of unchronie and "1984" as a dystopia (with "1985" being a dystopic "1984"). I wish we said unchronology in english rather than "Alternate History."P.S. Notice how all of Assouline's examples of unchronie relate to World War II? The Cold War so far as I

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1149590432213052692006-06-06T12:40:00.000+02:002006-06-06T12:40:32.216+02:00

The only place people have been shrooming for any decent amount of time is in Mexico and Siberia. Everywhere else, it's a product of the 1970s and no earlier.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1149589541630644112006-06-06T12:25:00.000+02:002006-06-06T12:25:41.753+02:00

This sad letter from AE Housman is so sad that the only buttons strong enough to button up his emotions are comical in their massiveness, like a clown's buttons. Jan 17 1923My dear Pollard,Jackson died peacefully on Sunday night in hospital at Vancouver, where he had gone to be treated for anaemia, with which he had been ailing for some years. I had a letter from him on New Year's Day, which he

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1149246307051064982006-06-02T13:05:00.000+02:002006-06-02T13:05:07.186+02:00

I think this is one of the most poorly written articles I've read in a long time.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1149007783882283402006-05-30T18:49:00.000+02:002006-05-30T18:49:44.253+02:00

No Pynchon!

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1148998284897680602006-05-30T16:11:00.000+02:002006-05-30T16:11:25.043+02:00

Simon Jenkins has a good point exactly how the Da Vinci Code betrays the trust we place in facts, but then ruins it by going on the most insane rampaging ode to facts since Thomas Gradgrind's opener in Hard Times. Facts are indeed hard fought for. But Dan Brown's crime is not laziness. Dan Brown consumed an enormous amount of energy collecting erroneous facts and making them into a book. His

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1148986388310671242006-05-30T12:53:00.000+02:002006-05-30T12:53:08.476+02:00

My ex-boss apparently once argued at a dinner party with his wife that Martin Luther King didn't have a sufficiently international profile to be Time's Man of the Century. She said "But you have to realize what he did for African Americans." He replied "Honey, I was in India at the time, and let me tell you, in India, he did squat." But, of course, what's good for America is good for the world,

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1148984683719813122006-05-30T12:24:00.000+02:002006-05-30T12:24:43.923+02:00

A superb interview with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Der Spiegel. Like any anti-semite he sounds more unhinged whenever trying to sound less so. Eg. SPIEGEL: It was inevitable that the Iranian president's denial of the systematic murder of the Jews by the Germans would trigger outrage.Ahmadinejad: I don't exactly understand the connection.SPIEGEL: First you make your remarks about the Holocaust. Then

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1148914119695289132006-05-29T16:48:00.000+02:002006-05-29T16:48:43.673+02:00

To Hav and Hav not: Jan Morris's new book, from her own description of it, sounds both weird and brilliant and weird and awful.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1148912149064051292006-05-29T16:15:00.000+02:002006-05-29T16:15:50.653+02:00

Both kinds of unified Germany have a problem with football.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1148911363654286832006-05-29T16:02:00.000+02:002006-05-29T16:02:44.936+02:00

Today's entry from Pepys contains the following nugget: And so to the Duke’s House; and there saw “Hamlett” done, giving us fresh reason never to think enough of Betterton. Who should we see come upon the stage but Gosnell, my wife’s maid? but neither spoke, danced, nor sung; which I was sorry for. But she becomes the stage very well.It is hard to imagine going to Hamlet and expecting to see

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1146835710316719572006-05-05T15:28:00.000+02:002006-05-05T15:28:30.463+02:00

A quick antidote to whatever envy you might direct at child prodigies.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1146578859558349262006-05-02T16:07:00.000+02:002006-05-02T16:07:39.760+02:00

From the way he uses them, it would be interesting to know what Tom Cruise thinks impinge and insouciance mean.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1146576101773001192006-05-02T15:21:00.000+02:002006-05-02T15:21:41.943+02:00

The Harlem Studio occupies both the ghetto of critical taste and the actual ghetto of Harlem.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1146574354458670322006-05-02T14:52:00.000+02:002006-05-02T14:52:34.600+02:00

There are many things that are annoying about an environmental issue of Vanity Fair. But The Times's blogger's main worry is that "[i]t sells you exactly the kind of lifestyle that the green lobby is telling us is unsustainable," pointing the damning finger at an ad for a $10,000 watch. Environmentalism is giving secular lefties a sense of sin. The main problem with everything is that it hurts

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1146154463282285322006-04-27T18:14:00.000+02:002006-04-27T18:14:23.306+02:00

The fact that a few weeks ago Pierre Assouline was laughing about Britain's Minister of Culture, Media, and Sport, surely gives me permisison to laugh at a country whose theater awards include the category "best state-funded play."

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1146145545439796672006-04-27T15:45:00.000+02:002006-04-27T15:45:45.606+02:00

"Writers who have laboured under totalitarianism, whether for or against, whether publicly or in secret, are always contaminated by it." eg. Ismail Kadare.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1146141761154733872006-04-27T14:42:00.000+02:002006-04-27T14:42:41.286+02:00

Harold Pinter has a mutual friend of Peter Handke's: Slobodan Milosevic. Peter Handke, for those of you who don't know him, is a special kind of Franco-German intellectual or politician who is doing everything all the time. You might know him as the writer of "Wings of Desire". If it is 3 months since you last heard of a new Handke play, book, diary, screenplay, or TV program, doctors recommend

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1146070750064404382006-04-26T18:59:00.000+02:002006-04-26T18:59:10.066+02:00

I share Peter Stothard's shock that a Guillotin should be called a Gibbet and is not a product of the French revolution as the British Middle Ages. So much for what I held to be one of the great, simple symbols of how the Enlightenment could rationalize barbabarism as well as attack it.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1146070325909999412006-04-26T18:52:00.000+02:002006-04-26T18:52:06.053+02:00

A fascinating anecdote about Harold MacMillan: "[Oswald] Mosley won a seat in parliament at the age of 22, as a Conservative-supporting Coalition-Unionist, and then crossed the floor to join the Labour Party. He soon became disenchanted and formed the New Party, which evolved in 1932 into The BUF. Harold Macmillan considered following him, but his antennae twitched in time. He did offer his

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1146054653496324352006-04-26T14:30:00.000+02:002006-04-26T14:30:53.696+02:00

Pinsky on how to insult in verse. Despite his obvious talents, everything he writes makes me hate him more. Poems are the fiber and protein of our literary diet and he is our humorless nutritionist. All poems are recommended by him for daily consumption. The occasional weak rhyme or jarring metaphor does not mean a poem is bad, just that it is less-good.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1146050472947547252006-04-26T13:21:00.000+02:002006-04-26T13:21:19.366+02:00

Good to know that both parties in America immigration debate, when speaking Spanish, abhor the other side's rampant anti-immigration laws: "Republican ads in Spanish have alleged that Democrats "voted to treat millions of hardworking immigrants as felons", while Democratic ads said that the Republicans want to "criminalize ... churches just for giving communion" to illegal aliens."

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1146045818698505152006-04-26T12:03:00.000+02:002006-04-26T12:03:38.843+02:00

This article deserved all the praise it got on the official North Korea fan website.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145985990949008322006-04-25T19:26:00.000+02:002006-04-25T19:26:31.140+02:00

Bob Dylan's radio show. How did I miss this?

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145973069908470712006-04-25T15:51:00.000+02:002006-04-25T15:51:10.036+02:00

I hope The Moko doesn't think that mentioning me in her blog is going to make me link to her.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145972219254571362006-04-25T15:36:00.000+02:002006-04-25T15:36:59.393+02:00

They call him "A purveyor of "dim erotica". A dabbler in "badly conceived soft porn". A painter who "just colours in." Jack Vettriano calls them "nobby academics" and "terribly snobbish."

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145969361140207412006-04-25T14:49:00.000+02:002006-04-25T14:49:21.416+02:00

I want to feel riyal love: “At the entrance to the mall, the girls followed a group of boys, who stood hesitant before the security guards. The defeated boys dispersed, except one, who walked towards Michelle. It seemed to him that she and Lamees were brave girls looking for adventure. He asked if he could go in with them as a member of the family in exchange for 1,000 riyals. Michelle was

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145965544566552892006-04-25T13:45:00.000+02:002006-04-25T13:45:49.576+02:00

It is worth remembering what we mean when we talk about unemployment but we should remember how easy it is to squabble over its definition and how hard it is to fix. Let's grudgingly agree on the first part, for the sake of constructive argument about the second.If we don't, we end up with bad-faith dismissal of inconvenient facts posing as intellectual sophistication (a strain of the dreaded

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145961799904345292006-04-25T12:43:00.000+02:002006-04-25T12:43:19.916+02:00

My obsession with Sarko meant I hadn't noticed the rise of Ségolène Royal on France's left. She seems to have all the depressing qualities of the New Politician: "Although criticised by Socialist rivals as bland and lacking in concrete ideas, Mme Royal is now in a strong and possibly unassailable position to become the first woman to represent a large party in a French presidential election. Her

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145960673486235672006-04-25T12:24:00.000+02:002006-04-25T12:24:33.496+02:00

Compare and contrast the undocumented immigrants of America with the documented Poles in London: they fill long-empty Catholic churches, save obsessively, work out clever ways to avoid debts, wait for the situation in Poland to improve, don't talk to the locals, put pressure on the London property market.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145895062757052742006-04-24T18:11:00.000+02:002006-04-24T18:11:06.533+02:00

Yoko Ono's spokeswoman says "A pay-per-view seance was never [John Lennon's] style," but won't say what WAS his style of haunting. Inquiring minds want to know.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145891720318723342006-04-24T17:15:00.000+02:002006-04-24T17:18:58.583+02:00

The Daily Telegraph tries to keep its cool while considering whether a dwarf has been correctly cast in Endgame.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145882489315642102006-04-24T14:41:00.000+02:002006-04-24T14:41:32.683+02:00

An amazing timeline of future inventions, starting with the Knowledge Engine in Gullivers Travels amd ending with the Time Broker.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145877904906681802006-04-24T13:25:00.000+02:002006-04-24T13:25:06.230+02:00

John Osborne seems to have treated his daughter as badly as most male writers seem to treat their daughters. What distinguishes his vile treatment of her is the extreme Britishness of form: After [John Osborne] cast Nolan out, they never met or spoke again: in effect, they disowned each other. But when she was 23 and working in London, they literally bumped into each other in the street. By then,

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145799908294048882006-04-23T15:45:00.000+02:002006-04-23T15:45:08.306+02:00

Herbert L. Matthews should replace Walter Duranty as The New York Times reporter that conservatives cite first when asked to support their theory that The NY Times is the source for all evil and wouldn't say No if babies were served to it for dinner. Duranty's big mistake was to give famine and slaughter a positive review, which is essentially a (massive) failure of taste. Matthews apparently

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145545590239958672006-04-20T17:06:00.000+02:002006-04-20T17:06:30.346+02:00

I friend once told me how he was talking to a Rwandan girl who very nicely and amusingly kept on saying she didn't see what the fuss about the Balkans was. Like Immaculée Ilibagiza the story of her childhood made Croatia as it was then seem like Croatia as it is now.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145542820343234622006-04-20T16:20:00.000+02:002006-04-20T16:20:20.436+02:00

Is embalming really a "centuries old" element of the wake? My impression was that the timeline goes: 1000 BC Egyptians do it, 1000-1850 No one does it, 1850-2006 Mostly Americans do it.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145537452900508432006-04-20T14:50:00.000+02:002006-04-20T14:50:53.426+02:00

The best threats come from Russia these days. There's a country that understands that, when you can deliver on a threat, you merely need to hint at it for people to soil themselves.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145536633342580172006-04-20T14:37:00.000+02:002006-04-20T14:37:13.446+02:00

Ireland sometimes like its trying too hard to make up for the its censorship of its best writers, or else disguising the fact that so many of them lived in self-imposed exile.Welcome to Beckett Country: "It is right and meet that Dublin should so honour one of its greatest sons. However, it is also difficult to reconcile the jolly commercialism of a festival with the rarefied existentialism of

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145459040985619572006-04-19T17:04:00.000+02:002006-04-19T17:04:01.103+02:00

David Rockefeller turns on the snot and discusses how Bush is just not like the Republican Old Guard: "[He] was raised in Texas, didn't travel to Europe, and unlike his father, didn't know the pleasure of discussing things with people across the world before becoming president."Why should Bush have done so? David "Never met a dictator he didn't like" Rockefeller explains the reasoning behind all

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145382910938286532006-04-18T19:55:00.000+02:002006-04-18T19:55:11.193+02:00

Spark has gone out, would be the tasteless headline that springs to mind. Just as "Outrageous Fortuyn" did before it brought the Managing Editor to my desk to tell me that a newspapaper doesn't generally crack jokes about political assassinations. Prick that I am I desperately argued that it was a heartbreaking allusion, not a joke.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145371275110322632006-04-18T16:41:00.000+02:002006-04-18T16:41:18.030+02:00

I hadn't known that John Heartfield changed his name from Helmut Herzfeld to protest against German nationalism. His collages had the sad originality that launches a thousand years of cliche.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1145368098034162462006-04-18T15:48:00.000+02:002006-04-18T15:48:18.116+02:00

Rowan Williams might occasionally embarrass himself (two words: honarary Druid) but his Easter sermon shows how much better it is to respond to skepticism with confidence and force, rather than the half-threatening, totally self-pitying tone adopted by Opus Dei: We are instantly fascinated by the suggestion of conspiracies and cover-ups; this has become so much the stuff of our imagination these

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144856674674244932006-04-12T17:44:00.001+02:002006-04-12T17:44:34.686+02:00

Bush's old back yard.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144856673709337942006-04-12T17:44:00.000+02:002006-04-12T17:44:33.806+02:00

Bush's old back yard.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144675481657698832006-04-10T15:24:00.000+02:002006-04-10T15:24:42.146+02:00

Ben Yagoda to New York Times: hire me instead of her.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144673655940219182006-04-10T14:54:00.000+02:002006-04-10T14:54:16.823+02:00

This is indeed a significant differentiator between the U.K. and U.S., when it comes to politics and journalism: "[A]rguments that, in Britain, would be put forward in an ill-researched article of no more than 2,000 words turn, across the Atlantic, into carefully footnoted tomes."

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144668104483422792006-04-10T13:21:00.001+02:002006-04-10T13:21:44.486+02:00

Let's just abolish the media and be done with it. It's the only thing we can agree on, that it has a distorting power ray destroys all minds it encounters. Don't attack your opposition, attack your opposition in the form of attacking the media. (via Kaus)One small point about (6): ESTABA MI PAIS TAMBIEN! Let's form a pact. Once we've won, Mexican "immigrants" get Texas and California back and

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144668099936421572006-04-10T13:21:00.000+02:002006-04-10T13:21:41.163+02:00

Let's just abolish the media and be done with it. It's the only thing we can agree on, that it has a distorting power ray destroys all minds it encounters. Don't attack your opposition, attack your opposition in the form of attacking the media. (via Kaus)One small point about (6): ESTABA MI PAIS TAMBIEN! Let's form a pact. Once we've won, Mexican "immigrants" get Texas and California back and

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144666296839671932006-04-10T12:51:00.000+02:002006-04-10T12:51:37.976+02:00

Wanted: a study or Malcol Gladwell-esque survey that shows what the exact costs of government corruption are, including bribes, as well as effective strategies for reducing it. I am getting tired of every opposition candidate in every third-world country running against corruption. If they dislike it so much, why do they never get rid of it when they gain power?

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144664861795473122006-04-10T12:27:00.000+02:002006-04-10T12:27:43.313+02:00

Fall of the House of Bleak.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144424729421050222006-04-07T17:45:00.000+02:002006-04-07T17:45:29.523+02:00

Judges feel the pressure to be literary when ruling on literature. Peter Smith has resisted that urge, and delivers a nice precis of his opinion of the Da Vinci Code:As is usual with books that attract a lot of publicity they have attracted the wrath of the literary experts of the world. Fortunately it is not part of my judgment to assess the literary worth of the books or even the truth behind

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144337101829803402006-04-06T17:25:00.000+02:002006-04-06T17:25:01.940+02:00

The male gender gets told off by the Guardian for not being able to name books that "get them through life." Many men we approached really did not seem to associate reading fiction with life choices."Perhaps it's the gender of the interviewer," suggested Stephen Beresford, one of a number of informants from the world of theatre. "Perhaps certain men have a problem opening up to a female

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144328448558393862006-04-06T15:00:00.000+02:002006-04-06T15:00:48.650+02:00

The trick to happiness is to be happy with unhappines.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144245356368974372006-04-05T15:55:00.000+02:002006-04-05T15:55:56.633+02:00

Old age brings the most unlikely of faces together.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144157105257146552006-04-04T15:25:00.000+02:002006-04-04T15:25:05.363+02:00

Scotland's greatest living writer is writing a blog.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144150189858238152006-04-04T13:29:00.000+02:002006-04-04T13:29:49.966+02:00

Is there a correlation between the impact of a book and the lack of readers it attracts? The truth behind that age-old sneer about the supposedly top novels going unread is that because a book is so important there is no need to read it. What communist needs to read the communist manifesto? Doing so will only confuse the issue. And really, no free marketeer should have to read the "Wealth of

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144148742323379442006-04-04T13:05:00.000+02:002006-04-04T13:05:42.400+02:00

If Berlusconi goes we'll be losing moments like this: "When the journalist, Bruno Vespa, tried to silence the prime minister, he pointed at Mr Prodi and barked: 'Act like a moderator, Vespa! Moderate him! Moderate him!' " Please, Italy, vote this man out. But do so with sadness.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1144061022732809662006-04-03T12:43:00.000+02:002006-04-03T12:43:43.236+02:00

I like the idea that Sir John Falstaff didn't die, that he outlived Prince Hal, who spurned him, and that he was finally caught under a ludicrously transparent pseudonym running away from yet another battle.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1143821871073963902006-03-31T18:17:00.001+02:002006-03-31T18:17:51.096+02:00

Bible babel.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1143821870733835552006-03-31T18:17:00.000+02:002006-03-31T18:17:50.826+02:00

Bible babel.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1143820228359180372006-03-31T17:50:00.000+02:002006-03-31T17:50:28.450+02:00

The moko is back. She knows everything. She speaks everything. The chocolate industry should be grateful for the attention she pays it. "I have an American friend who buys Kinder Eggs just for the toys." The yellow plastic shells that the toys come in are also cool. If you spin them on their side, they stand to attention.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5561251.post-1143816134932559162006-03-31T16:42:00.000+02:002006-03-31T16:42:15.036+02:00

It's always good to remember how many bad ideas Apple has had. It's also nice to look at photos of 80s PCs. As they age they are beginning to go from being ugly to being insanely crude marks of genius that had no other way of expressing itself, like the ancient outline of a hand in that French cave.

Andershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18127270048360041338noreply@blogger.com0