The Last Days of Roger Federer: And Other Endings By Geoff Dyer (Audiobook read by Richard Burnip, 11h 29m, Canongate Books, £21.87) . It’s late June, Wimbledon’s upon us, and Geoff Dyer is talking about his tennis injuries. Geoff Dyer is always talking about his tennis injuries. It’s one of his endearing features. But when […]
Filed in Journalism, review
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Also tagged 9/11, Achilles, age, Al Pacino, Alfred Tennyson, Americans, Andy Murray, Anthony Powell, Beethoven, Bjorn Borg, Bob Dylan, Burning Man, Canongate, Chuck Yeager, Coetzee, Custer, David Cameron, David Thomson, De Chirico, death, DH Lawrence, drugs, epigraphs, football, footnotes, Geoff Dyer, George Best, George Saunders, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Gillian Slovo, Gillian Welch, health and safety, Henry James, humour, James Last, jazz, Jean Rhys, JMW Turner, John Berger, John Coltrane, Jorah Mormont, London, loo roll, Martin Scorsese, Mike Tyson, Mohicans, Nietzsche, non-fiction, Paris, Pete Sampras, Peter Ackroyd, Philip Larkin, Raymond Williams, Rebecca West, references, Richard Burnip, Roger Federer, shampoo, Tarkovsky, TC Boyle, tennis, The Doors, the Duke of Edinburgh's Award, the Olympics, trains, William Basinski, Wimbledon, work, WWII, YouTube
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Attempting – unsuccessfully – to get my head round the roots of the Ukraine war, via Orlando Figes’ magisterial Crimea. — For Perspective
Filed in Journalism, review
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Also tagged Alaska, Alexander Morrison, Andrey Kurkov, Austria, Bessarabia, Blackadder, Britain, Christianity, Circassians, Cossacks, Crimea, Florence Nightingale, France, 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
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In the run-up to the 40th anniversary commemorations, a review of James O’Connell’s step-by-step first-hand account of one of the Falklands War’s bloodiest battles. — For Perspective
Filed in Journalism, review
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Also tagged 3 Para, Aldershot, Argentinians, bayonets, Brian Bowles, Brigadier General Julian Thompson, christenings, Colin Mace, communications, death, Elliot Fitzpatrick, Freddie Gaminara, Geoffrey Lumb, grenades, helicopters, Huw Parmenter, Ian McKay, injuries, James O'Connell, Joe Gaminara, Korea, landmines, Max Hastings, mental health, Moody Brook, Mt Longdon, non-fiction, Oseloka Obi, Paul Panting, Penelope Rawlins, Perspective, plastic surgery, Port Stanley, Sam Newton, shit, Simon & Garfunkel, tea, the Falkands War, the Victoria Cross, the Victory Bar, Union Jack, war, youth
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Review of Tracy Chevalier’s treatment of Mary Canning’s life, in Remarkable Creatures. — For Perspective
Filed in Journalism, review
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Also tagged Bishop Usher, British Association for the Advancement of Science, Bullock's Egyptian Hall, Deshan Tennekoon, Dickens, Dissenters, Dorset, Elizabeth Philpot, fiction, film, Geological Society, history, International Women's Day, John Fowles, Lyme Regis, Mary Anning, men, Oxford University, palaeontology, Perspective, poverty, religion, Saxony, science, the Bible
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Tuesday, February 1, 2022
Review of Robert Macfarlane and Stanley Donwood’s poem/song/story/play on where past and present meet at Orford Ness. — For Perspective magazine
Filed in Journalism, review
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Also tagged fiction, Hugh Brunt, landscape, Max Porter, music, non-fiction, Orford Ness, Penguin, Perspective, Poetry, Radiohead, Robert Macfarlane, Scarfolk, Stanley Donwood, Stephen Dillane, Suffolk, the Falklands, war
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Friday, December 10, 2021
Forever and a Day: a James Bond novel by Anthony Horowitz (Random House Audiobooks, read by Matthew Goode, 7hrs 36mins) . Around the final Daniel Craig installment, there’s been inevitable talk of who should be the next James Bond. Well, I’ll tell you who it shouldn’t be, and that’s Matthew Goode. Three years ago, Anthony […]
Filed in Journalism, review
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Also tagged Anthony Horowitz, Britain, cars, CIA, Corsica, fiction, food, French, German, Ian Fleming, James Bond, languages, Matthew Goode, McDonald's, MI6, Norway, Radio 3, Random House, Russians, Scots, wine, women, WW2
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Review of Werner Herzog’s Das Dämmern der Welt – or (probably) The Twilight/Dawn (of the?) World. — For Perspective
Filed in Journalism, review
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Also tagged army, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Audible, Emperor Akihito, Ferdinand Marcos, German, Google Translate, Hanser, Hiroo Onoda, Japan, kochbananen, Lubang, non-fiction, Perspective, Philippines, the Falklands, the moon, the Stasi, translation, TS Eliot, Vietnam, war, Weltanschauung, Werner Herzog, WG Sebald, WWII
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Conundrum by Jan Morris Ukemi Audiobooks read by Roy McMillan . Born in 1926, into Anglo-Welsh upper-middle comfort, James Humphry Morris was educated at Christ Church, Lancing, and Christ Church again, served in the dashing 9th Queen’s Royal Lancers during WWII, climbed much of Everest and broke the news of Hillary and Tenzing’s successful 1953 […]
Filed in Journalism, review
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Also tagged Adolf Eichmann, cabbies, cars, Casablanca, class, gender, identity, in-laws, Jan Morris, Journalism, Lancing College, memoir, men, Mount Everest, Oxford, Perspective, Roy McMillan, Suez, surgery, the Olympics, the Queen's Royal Lancers, transsexuals, travel, women, writing, WWII
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On Bram Stoker, #indexday, and the weird and wonderful history of the hapax legomenon. — For The Spectator
Filed in correspondence, Journalism
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Also tagged #indexday, Amazon Kindle, Audible, BRam Stoker, British National Corpus, Catullus, dogs, Egyptology, Foundling Museum, Gaelic, Galway, Greek, Greg Wise, hapax legomenon, Harkhuf, Hebrew, hieroglyphs, indexes, Ireland, Jeremy Paxman, Latin, Mayan, National Indexing Day, Old High German, Oxford English Dictionary, Poetry, prayer, pygmies, religion, Sam Leith, Shakespeare, Society of Indexers, TE Lawrence, The Spectator, University Challenge, vampirism, zoophagy
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Monday, February 27, 2017
. A man is generally at his heaviest in his 40th year. — The Nelson Evening Mail, October 10 1906 . The Museum of Emotions in London has a game with yes/no answers. Adolf Hitler fixed the Nazi Party registrations, to make it seem they had more members than they did. The endnotes to David Foster […]
Filed in Journalism, NEWS AT A GLANCE
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Also tagged Adolf Hitler, Afghanistan, barns, boys, crime, David Foster Wallace, emotions, finance, France, girls, government, health, London, maps, men, meteorology, Midsomer, Nazis, Nelson Evening Mail, Northern Ireland, painting, physics, radio, religion, sex, ships, vandalism, waltzes
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