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Crimean punishment

Tuesday, June 7, 2022

Attempting – unsuccessfully – to get my head round the roots of the Ukraine war, via Orlando Figes’ magisterial Crimea. — For Perspective

Filed in Journalism, review | Also tagged Alaska, Alexander Morrison, Andrey Kurkov, audiobooks, Austria, Bessarabia, Blackadder, Britain, Christianity, Circassians, Cossacks, Crimea, Florence Nightingale, imperialism, Islam, Jerusalem, Kalmuks, Malk Williams, maps, NATO, Nicholas I, Nikita Kruschev, non-fiction, Orlando Figes, Perspective, religion, Russia, Ruthenia, Tatars, the Army, the Baltic, the Black Sea, the Caucasus, the Danube, the Falklands, the Great Game, the Mediterranean, the Ottoman Empire, the Pacific, the press, the Royal Navy, the Soviet Union, trade, Turkey, Ukraine, Vladimir Putin, Wallachia, war, WWI | Comments (0)

Kreises of conscience

Saturday, August 21, 2021

All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days The True Story of the Woman at the Heart of the German Resistance to Hitler by Rebecca Donner Canongate, £16.99, pp576 . In 1928, modest young blue-collar English lecturer Mildred Fish arrives in Berlin to begin her PhD in American Literature. In the febrile, polyglot atmosphere at the […]

Filed in Journalism, review | Also tagged Adolf Hitler, America, Berlin, biography, Canongate, capitalism, Communism, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Goethe, Great Britain, history, Hjalmar Schacht, Jews, John Dos Passos, Joseph Goebbels, literature, Lufthansa, Mildred Harnack, non-fiction, Operation Barbarossa, Operation Walkyrie, Plötzensee Prison, propaganda, Rebecca Donner, Rebecca West, spies, Stalin, the Soviet Union, The Spectator, Theodore Dreiser, trench coats, Winsconsin, WW2 | Comments (0)

Trouble at’ Mill

Monday, May 31, 2021

Notes on the life (and afterlife) of JS Mill, philosopher . The classical liberal philosopher John Stuart Mill was born and died this month – in, respectively, 1806 and 1873 – and in between he wrote (or co-wrote, with his wife, and then his step-daughter) On Liberty, Utilitarianism, Principles of Political Economy, Considerations of Representative Government, […]

Filed in correspondence, Journalism | Also tagged Amazon Kindle, Avignon, Bertrand Russell, bookshops, champagne, Charles Darwin, Colombo, death, Dilsiri Welikala, economics, education, Edward 'Clerihew' Bentley, Eliza Jarvis, Falkland Islands Radio Service, finance, Florence Nightingale, Frederick Langmead, furniture, GF Watts, Greek, Harriet Taylor Mill, health, Helen Taylor, Homer, housing, India, James Mill, Jean-Henri Fabre, Jeremy Bentham, John Milton, John Stuart Mill, Journalism, Joy Lo Dico, Kalpitiya, Latin, Matt RIdley, medicine, Millicent Fawcett, Monty Python, obituaries, philosophy, politics, Rupert Jarvis, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Sri Lanka, the Chapman brothers, the East India Company, the Falklands, the London Stereoscopic Company, The Spectator, The Times, Thomas Babington Macaulay, Thomas Carlyle, Tom Holland, UCL, Utilitarianism, Vernon Bogdanor, Westminster, women, writing | Comments (0)

Zooming windows

Saturday, March 20, 2021

Interview with members of the George Formby Society, as they attempt to break an online ukulele-playing record. — For The Critic

Filed in feature, interview, Journalism | Also tagged Alastair Cook, America, army, Australia, banjos, Batley, BBC, Bette Davis, bingo, Blackpool, Canada, Covid-19, cricket, Cyprus, dating, Ed Balls, Facebook, Falkland Islands Radio Service, Frank Skinner, friends, George Formby, German, Germany, grandmothers, Guinness, Gyles Brandreth, Harry HIll, Hawaii, Humphrey Bogart, Italy, jellyfish, lyrics, mental health, music, naturism, nuclear power, proletarians, Queen Elizabeth II, records, Royal Albert Hall, Russia, Simon Rose, smut, Swahili, The Critic, The Daily Telegraph, the George Formby Society, the Queen Mother, the RAF, Tottenham, ukuleles, Warrington Museum, Welsh, windows, WWII, Yorkshire, Zoom | Comments (0)

NEWS AT A GLANCE

Monday, August 24, 2020

. The Challenger voyage report is in 48 volumes, which weigh over 400lb. — The Nelson Evening Mail, Thursday, November 22 1906 . In the Republic of Cameroon Guinness is thought to be an aphrodisiac. A search for ‘fat naked German man chasing pig’ did not match any image results. Bernard Lout was buried in […]

Filed in Journalism, NEWS AT A GLANCE | Also tagged apparel, Bernard Lout, books, bookshelves, Cameroon, Challenger, Chrysippus, death, emus, England, finance, food, Germans, government, Greeks, Guinness, humour, machine guns, Nelson Evening Mail, news, nudity, pigs, quizzes, satire, science, sex, Testudines, the Falklands, the internet, vocabulary, Warren Buffett | Comments (0)

The Ones That Got Away

Sunday, June 14, 2020

Introduction to a new column on photographic misfires, beginning with my own amateur misadventures. — For the Sri Lankan Sunday Times

Filed in column, Journalism | Also tagged Antarctica, Argentina, birds, cows, England, Ethiopia, Gamini Jayantha Molligoda, Gundulf, in-laws, Instagram, leopards, London, phones, photography, Russia, South Africa, statuary, Sunday Times (SL), technology, The Fast Show, The One That Got Away, Wilpattu | Comments (0)

Trouble at t’Mill

Wednesday, January 8, 2020

The curious life of John Stuart Mill, philosopher . When JS Mill was born, his father, James, challenged a friend to ‘race with you in the education of… the most accomplished and virtuous young man.’ That other child has not gone down in history – but he may well have dodged a serious bullet. Learning […]

Filed in feature, Journalism | Also tagged Avignon, Bertrand Russell, Blackadder, crime, education, Edward 'Clerihew' Bentley, England, fathers, Florence Nightingale, Greek, India, James Mill, Jeremy Bentham, John Milton, Journalism, JS Mill, love, Milicent Fawcett, Monty Python, philosophy, Poetry, politics, Reading, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Smith, sons, the East India Company, the Liberal Party, The Spectator, Thomas Babington Macaulay, Thomas Carlyle, UCL, Utilitarianism, women's suffrage, Wordsworth | Comments (0)

A biographical note on Duncan Grant (apropos one of those Facebook challenges that do the rounds occasionally)

Monday, March 4, 2019

A weapons-grade Bloomsburyist, Duncan Grant (1885-1978) spent much of his early childhood in India (natch), where his grandfather had been Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal. He ‘became interested in Japanese prints’ while still at prep school. After attending St Paul’s, Westminster School of Art and the Slade School – interspersed with stints in Italy and France, of […]

Filed in Non-fictions | Also tagged Abyssinia, art, Bengal, Bloomsbury, Clive Bell, David Garnett, Duncan Grant, fancy dress, Horace de Vere Cole, India, Italy, Leonard Woolf, painting, portraits, Royal Navy, St Paul's Cathedral, St Paul's School, The Slade School, Vanessa Bell, Virginia Woolf, Westminster School of Art, WWI, WWII | Comments (0)

Portrait of a ‘lady’ – Constance Markievicz, by Sarah Purser

Friday, November 30, 2018

Tonight, the Irish journalist Mary Kenny has a play on at the Irish Cultural Centre. Entitled Dearest Old Darling, it’s based on letters sent between the Dublin feminist, socialist, communist, Sinn Fein MP (elect, but never sitting) Constance Markievicz – née Gore-Booth – and her sister Eva. My great-great-great-aunt, Sarah Purser, portraitist, landscape artist, and […]

Filed in correspondence, Journalism | Also tagged Académie Julian, air travel, An Túr Gloine, aristocracy, bathing, Brendan Behan, burglary, Communism, Constance Markievicz, Count Casimir Markievicz, Douglas Hyde, Dublin, Elizabeth Coxhead, Eva Gore-Booth, exploration, feminism, Georgina Gore-Booth, grandmothers, Guinness, Huguenots, Ireland, Jack Yeats, James Joyce, John Butler Yeats, John O'Grady, Kathleen Kearney, Lady Gregory, landlords, letters, Lissadell, Mary Kenny, Maud Gonne, Municipal Gallery of Modern Art, National Gallery of Ireland, Oliver Gogarty, painting, politics, portraits, religion, Roger Casement, Rome, Royal Dublin Society, Royal Hibernian Academy of Arts, Sarah Purser, Sinn Fein, Sir Henry Gore-Booth, Sligo, socialism, stained glass, the Arctic, the British, the Irish Cultural Centre, theatre, Yeats | Comments (0)

NEWS AT A GLANCE #2

Thursday, November 15, 2018

The Spanish Inquisition, and other matters unexpectedly arising. — For Queen Mob’s Tea House

Filed in Journalism, NEWS AT A GLANCE | Also tagged Angola, anthems, Bosnia, Brazil, cricket, Croatia, De Selby, death, Denmark, Ecuador, film, Finland, Fox News, Germany, Greece, Guinea, Guyana, Haiti, housing, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Laos, libraries, money, Mongolia, Nelson Evening Mail, Nepal, New Zealand, November, peace, Portugal, Queen Mob's Tea House, rainbows, religion, roosters, satire, Senegal, sex, sexting, Spain, Spike Lee, Switzerland, Tajikistan, the Forth Bridge, the Marseillaise, the Victorians, Tonbridge School, train-travel, Trinidad and Tobago, trousers, UK, Venezuela, writing, Yorkshire | Comments (0)