Archive for posts on Books

2009/2010 Thursday, December 31st, 2009

2009 has been a strange and brilliant year for me. It started with an ending, when Katie broke up our four-year relationship. It was devastating, yet entirely the right thing to do, and, as it turned out, 2009 was the best year of my life (so far). I’ve visited the US, Holland, Scotland, Spain and Denmark; I’ve walked from Petersfield to Brighton. And in between each of these I’ve been in this beautiful city of mine, Oxford. I’ve befriended people from six of seven continents. I’ve discovered a hundred things about myself - my sexuality, my dreams, my fears. I’ve had my mind read and my pulse stopped and drunk the best cup of tea I’ve ever had (all in the space of an hour). I’ve chased thieves down the alleyways of Barcelona and danced at Parliament Square. People keep telling me I’ve been on BBC News as well as Have I Got News For You.

I had two resolutions in 2009 - the first of my life. One was to go permanently vegetarian. This I succeeded in. The other was to write Katie a letter every week. It would have been strange to have succeeded at that one.

I have lots of resolutions for 2010. My friends tell me they’re all cliches, but they’re sincere. Most of them are just things I’ve been meaning to do and the opportunity to do them seems to have arisen at the end of this year, but I am resolved to do them nonetheless:

Go vegan
I’ve been steering myself towards veganism since July and, despite a massive lapse in December (due to trips to Copenhagen and my parents’ - shh don’t judge me), I hit veganism at the beginning of November. In 2010, though, it’s going to become permanent, and I’m going to throw myself into learning to cook well.

Read
Ever since I got hold of The Wire I’ve stopped reading in bed, which means that - apart from policy papers and invoices - I’ve stopped reading altogether; and I miss it. I made a point of finishing The Wire before Copenhagen so that, when I returned, I could get back to the habit of burying myself in a book before snuggling down for the night.

Get creative
I used to take photographs and record music and write stories and I don’t any more. So let’s have some more of that again.

Learn Spanish
You know, it’s the second most spoken language in the world. And it’ll set me up nicely for COP16 in Mexico (estoy bromeando).

Run a/two marathon/s
Not really a resolution as I committed to it months ago, but running both the Paris and Berlin marathons is my Big Challenge for 2010.

Find someone to cuddle
2009 was the first year of my adult life that i was single and it was immensely good for me in ways I wouldn’t have predicted. But now I’m ready to find someone to cuddle again.

No flying
I took 10 flights in 2009 - 9 of them after beginning my job in the Climate Change Campaign team… So this year I’m taking none.

Keep campaigning
I’ve made so many friends and found so much meaning in campaigning this year, and I can only see that passion and energy growing in 2010. I’d like to start physically campaigning on more than just climate change.

It’s going to be an exciting year…

Here’s a meme about 2009, for those who are interested.

Posted in Art and photographs, Books, Climate change, Oxfam, Oxford, Paris Marathon 2010, Personal, Politics, Trailwalker 2009, Travel, USA • No comments

I can’t believe this is the first time I’m writing about this. Thursday, October 15th, 2009

Today is Blog Action Day, and this year’s topic is climate change. That means that this post is one of over 7,000 in over 130 countries, with a readership of over 11,268,800 readers, writing about this issue today.

I first became engaged in the problem of climate change when I was offered a job fighting it. In fact, even that engagement happened pretty gradually - since it didn’t happen because it was necessary: it happened because it was unavoidable. Every day I’m exposed to two quite polar things: the evidence of the effects that climate change is already having on thousands of people every day; and the massive, powerful and inspiring movement working to combat it.

One of the researchers at Oxfam told me a story about workers at a banana plantation in Malawi. The plantation had been washed away by floods, and many of the (ex)workers, who were mostly women, headed to the towns to prostitute themselves, which of course led in turn to greater rates of HIV and AIDS. It’s astonishing just how broad and significant the far-reaching effects of climate change are. Even in my home town of Felixstowe businesses have been swept straight from the shore.

We have an opportunity not just to solve the problems of the present, but also to shape a beautiful future on an unprecedented scale

What’s equally strange, frustrating and wonderful is that the solutions to this problem are both readily available and very exciting. We have an opportunity not just to solve the problems of the present, but also to shape a beautiful future on an unprecedented scale. Finding and executing answers to climate change means creating new jobs, new communities, new businesses, new friendships, locally, nationally, internationally. It is a chance for a fresh start. And just as exciting - although we would prefer it to be unnecessary - is the movement campaigning for those with the power to support us in this fresh start to do so.

Last weekend I was lucky enough to meet - and be part of - another group in this movement: the UK Youth Climate Coalition. It was moving and motivating to spend several days with a group of people so selflessly and passionately dedicated to doing something so very vital. It was also reassuring: I feel secure in the knowledge that there are so many intelligent, brilliant people fighting for a clean and safe future for us all.

I would absolutely encourage you to do whatever you can, whatever you want to, to help combat the biggest problem humanity has ever faced

Getting involved can mean anything from civil disobedience to signing a petition, from climate camping or scaling the houses of parliament to painting your face blue or just dancing your socks off. But it is immensely rewarding to know that you have been involved in the fight for a better future for everyone, and I would absolutely encourage you to do whatever you can, whatever you want to, to help combat the biggest problem humanity has ever faced. This December, decision makers from around the world will gather in Copenhagen to decide what action to take on climate change. We need to ensure that the deal they come to is fair - insisting those most responsible for climate change support those least responsible, who are also those hit first and hardest - ambitious enough to tackle the problem, and binding. Now is our best - and perhaps last - chance to act.

Below are some great videos, and if you want to find out more I would recommend visiting the websites 350 and TckTckTck.

Posted in Books, Climate change, Films, Oxfam, Oxford, Personal, Politics, Science and technology • No comments

Lovely changes Saturday, November 17th, 2007

I miss my Katie lots. Being in Oxford will be great for next year when she’s nextdoor in London, but right now it makes getting in touch harder, and when loneliness sometimes strikes it makes the blow even firmer.

Anyway, here are some lovelier changes:

1. I live in Oxford now. Oxford is actually a much smaller city than you might expect, and I like it a lot. There are grand old buildings peeking out against the skyline everywhere and everybody rides bicycles, which reminds me of Amsterdam and makes me happy.

2. I’m volunteering at Oxfam now. Currently I’m working on the intranet, and it’s a fairly dull job but also one that I find quite easy, which means that I’ll have the task finished sooner than planned and I can have a look around other departments that I’m more interested in. The people I work with are all lovely and there is something a little liberating about working for free, at least for an organisation that deserves the support. I suppose the knowledge that you’re not prostituting yourself is quite a nice one.

3. I’m going out now to send query letters to agents who may be interested in working with me to get my children’s stories published. I’ve been wanting to send out the queries for weeks but one complication after another has arisen and I’ve only just reached the point where it’s both possible and smart to do so. Perhaps now that I live in Oxford I will have greater credibility as a writer!

4. I’m a vegetarian now. I’ve wanted to turn vegetarian for some years and only recently felt that I could handle it: this seemed like a good time to make the switch, given all of the other changes occurring (especially since I’m only just really learning to cook), and it’s worked out nicely.

Posted in Books, Charles Charles and the Snow Morgle, Oxfam, Oxford, Personal, Short Tall Tales • 7 comments

3-2-1 Monday, October 29th, 2007

Some exciting things:

1. I’m moving to Oxford. I’ll be staying in an amazing freshly refurbished house (”the loveliest house in Oxford,” one of my housemates correctly said) with three other guys, all lovely, and starting an internship with Oxfam, which will, I hope, lead to a permanent position in a few months. It’s all happening; I’ll be off within the next couple of weeks. I’m excited to gain my independence, to do something professionally that I think is worthwhile, and to move to one of the nicest locations in England. Yay!

2. Katie was accepted to come to London with college next semester. With her in London and myself in Oxford, we can see each other at weekends and even some evenings and at not much expense. Yay!

3. Charles Charles and the Snow Morgle is ready to send to prospective agents, and I’m very excited about getting query letters out there (I’m waiting until I’ve moved). Wish me luck!

Some less exciting things:

1. Anybody who had trouble seeing my web site before should be much better off now. I’ve made it much simpler and more streamlined so that it should work on any computer. It’s not as much fun as before but on the whole it’s an improvement. Fascinating, yes?

2. There are fifty-seven days until Christmas.

Something depressing:

Why has it suddenly become de rigeur for huge corporations to cut thousands of jobs? Cadburys, Royal Mail and the BBC are all planning absurd quantities of redundancies because the people at the top still want more money for themselves. It’s “definitely in the best interests of the BBC,” says Michael Lyons. What about the interests of the people who work for the BBC, with families to feed and rent to pay?

3-2-1. Not a bad ratio, I think.

Posted in Books, Charles Charles and the Snow Morgle, Oxfam, Oxford, Personal, Short Tall Tales, kkcom • 5 comments

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Friday, August 24th, 2007

Such is the internet. I was searching for Jeremy James books online today and I ended up writing a review of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Here it is (don’t worry, there are no spoilers):

Though it picks up towards the end, this final Potter adventure, for the first two lengthy thirds, reaches a level of dullness unprecedented by the rest of the series. Little (or, indeed, sometimes, nothing) happens until the finale.

Rowling constructed an effective pattern for her first four books and proceeded to destroy it for the last three, and it’s this, primarily, that makes them confusing, aimless and dull. Deathly Hallows concerns Harry, Ron and Hermione and rarely devotes any attention to the rest of the extensive cast, causing a serious lack of action and a reader’s boredom with the few characters involved. The greater ensemble is also denied any closure in the epilogue, which isn’t really acceptable when your readers have spent six previous books nurturing a fascination with them. Only one character is given any further exposition or depth (it’s worth noting that the discovery of this character’s flaws are probably the closest that Deathly Hallows has to a saving grace). What few deaths occur seem like nothing more than publicity stunts, and, bar one, the characters are dispatched with plain, unemotional writing.

The skill level of the writing is, incredibly, lower than Rowling’s usual standard. She typically writes in a childish but endearing manner, never artistic but somehow always gripping; in Deathly Hallows she manages to be amateurish with her uninspiring prose and lack of expressive imagination (and a strange and infuriating obsession with the word “slightly” that serves to kill any description that might otherwise be evocative). Of course, the phrase “appeared out of thin air” makes its customary appearance.

The plot is not terribly exciting and certainly not unexpected. There’s little sight of the brilliant twists and “red herrings” that so wonderfully littered the earlier books. It’s for this reason that the book is barely worth reading.

Finally, the ending, while essentially satisfying, is very underwhelming and done with far too quickly. The epilogue is cagey, uncompelling and unfulfilling. The book would have fared much better if she had concluded it one chapter sooner.

My verdict on the entire series: read the first four, then stop. Little else happens and the subsequent books are so detached from their ancestors that it feels like moving from one smart series to a distinctly inferior one.

I hadn’t realised until I wrote the review just how much I disliked the book!

Posted in Books • No comments

What I’ve been up to Friday, August 10th, 2007

Well, I spent the Summer (so far) with Katie in New Milford and Tulsa Oklahoma. I explained before that there were a few reasons: I got to spend lots of time with my sweetheart and other rarely-seen friends, and get away from a withstandable but menial job, and get some illustrations from Mrs. Robson to accompany my short stories. I had such a wonderful time; it’s difficult to explain what a relief it is to be able to socialise with everybody without the ominous knowledge that I’ll be leaving in one week, five days, two days, surrounding every event like an uncast shadow. I’m really excited for Katie coming to England in January, when she’ll be staying for five months (and, if I’m wily, I can sneak into her Shakespeare classes at the Globe theatre…)! The Robsons got so used to me that they were looking for ways to keep me in the country, which was so sweet and very ego-inflaming. The US immigration system is set against me coming permanently, though. There are endless variations of visas available to non-US citizens, but I’m eligible for none of them. Did you know that there is a visa available for which the only criteria is a high enough salary? Incredible.

My menial job will be up for grabs again towards the end of September. That gives me a month and a half of free time, in which I’m going to try some street performing. There’s a pretty little town called Colchester a short train ride away from me - it’s the oldest recorded town in England and a tourist haven. Perfect! If I can make a half-decent living from it, I won’t return to Argos, because why would I when I can stand and play blues and entertain people all day instead, and choose my own hours?

Mrs. Robson just doesn’t have time to illustrate a whole book. She drew some concept sketches for me and they were wonderful but we both have to accept that an entire book, albeit a short one, isn’t going to happen, let alone four books. That’s fine. In fact:

That’s why it’s lucky that I discovered a delightful program called ArtRage, which is literally a virtual canvas upon which you can draw, sketch, paint, smudge and so on. The paintbrush even runs out of paint, and you have to wash it off in order to avoid the colours mingling.

I’m really pleased with the results. I have no skill at all with a tangible paintbrush, so being able to create something vaguely pleasant to look at was a nice surprise. Hopefully, soon, I’ll have finished the illustrations for my first story and somebody with a gambling personality will take an interest in publishing it…

(Click the pictures to englarge them.)
Illustrations © Kinders Kinley. All rights reserved.

Posted in Books, Charles Charles and the Snow Morgle, Personal, Short Tall Tales • No comments

Knobs on the doors in America! Thursday, March 29th, 2007

Kris at work asked me the other day how often I see Katie in a year. “Three or four times,” I told him, and we both laughed. Kris is one of the loveliest people I know and he wouldn’t laugh at my situation spitefully. He wouldn’t laugh if I didn’t also. And I laugh because, as they say, you’ve got to, haven’t you?

In any case, I’ll be seeing rather less of Kris and more of Katie in the months to come. The Robsons have, absurdly generously, agreed to look after me for, not the two weeks surrounding my birthday as was planned, but a period nearer to three months. In no particular order, the benefits or reasons are these:

• Mrs. Robson has promised to illustrate my short stories (now numbering four and a half), but, vile woman that she is, she works too hard and as such doesn’t have the time - or, I would expect, the energy - to draw silly pictures of weird fuzzy critters. So, for three months, I’m going to steal as much of her work away from her as possible and chain her to a table with pencils in her hands. I’m really proud of these “short tall tales” and I’m genuinely hoping to have them published as soon as possible. If we can achieve that, I can earn some credit as a storyteller and perhaps some money as well, both of which are very helpful when it comes to making films (which is next on my list of vocations…).

• May, June and July are the three months that Katie will be home from college. We’ve never spent more than three weeks together, so three months is going to be wonderful. Honestly, spending four hundred pounds to see your fiancÈ for two weeks every four months is laughable, isn’t it? Katie is planning to come to England for Spring semester ‘08, so, over the next year, we should get to spend a lot of time together.

• This is a perfect reason for me to leave my job, which, as I’ve mentioned, I’ve been feeling less and less comfortable with recently. What happens when I return is uncertain at the moment (an ambiguity that I’m quite reveling in). Perhaps I’ll head to Africa. I expect I’ll take up street performing as I’ve threatened. Human statuing is fun, and I also had a wonderful notion of getting an ugly old honky tonk piano (though of course I have no idea where in London [or Colchester, or wherever] I would keep a piano, and taking along my digital piano or a keyboard just doesn’t have the same charm…) and setting it up outside somewhere to play rhythm ‘n’ blues for passing pedestrians, which I could happily do all day long.

• A lot of the people reading this are my American friends. I get to see you! Although I saw most of my closest Pineappleers last July, I haven’t been to the States since - crikey - February ‘06, and I very much miss Betsy and Scott and Mr. and Mrs. R and Loki and you. It’ll be strange to be, for a little while, part of the social circle, rather than just a guest. Strange and wonderful. And I’ll get to meet some of Katie’s extended family and watch the fireworks on July 4th. I delight in fireworks.

It’s moving how accommodating the Robsons are to me. I made sure everybody was given the opportunity to object to my staying for so long, because three months is a long time to intrude on other people’s lives, but I’m led to believe that, as is their way, nobody raised a finger in defiance. I suppose I should expect my fiancÈ’s family not to be too bothered about putting me up, especially given the circumstances, but I’m still unspeakably grateful for how lovely they all are to me.

Posted in Books, Personal, Short Tall Tales • 9 comments

Furthering my scientific education Wednesday, May 31st, 2006

Reading this book will have increased the amount of ordered information in your brain. However, during the same time, the heat released by your body will have had a much greater effect increasing the disorder in the rest of the universe: about ten million million million times the increase in order in your brain. I suggest you stop reading now.

I’ve been reading (very slowly) An Illustrated A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking. It’s astonishing how accessible he’s made some of the most complicated scientific ideas in history, and he has a brilliant sense of humour to support it.

Look at this distinctly Python-esque illustration, which, in the context of the book, sounds more like a suggestion than a hypothesis:

It may be the best illustration ever.

Posted in Books, Science and technology • No comments

Who is Walter? Monday, May 8th, 2006

Evidently sometimes I begin to write things that I promptly go on to forget all about.

Walter’s smile had been permanently downturned by the irrepressible forces of gravity. It was the pressure within the strange little cellar that he resided in from eight o’clock until six each day; there was no window and little light, and the air came from a tin sat upon his crusty old desk. Indeed, often it felt to Walter as though there was no door.

In fact, there was a door. At five feet and seven inches small, it was fractionally too much so for its most frequent entrant, and the curved indentations and flaking plaster at the top and center of the frame were a sad reminder of his early lessons in Avoidance of Contact with Solids. There were also one or two crevices in Walter’s forehead as a result of the same encounters.

Walter’s hair was spiky (when it wasn’t flattened by meetings with partitions in the building). It looked like he had taken great care both to create and to preserve the style of his golden-yellow locks each day. He hadn’t. Walter was not the sort to take great care with anything any more.

Posted in Books • No comments

Everybody should… Thursday, November 24th, 2005

Everybody should read the screenplay for American Beauty. It’s probably the most expertly written screenplay in the history of film. You can buy it here (UK) or here (US), because I constantly find myself referencing it, or you can get a cheaper and more immediate copy here. And isn’t it wonderful?

It’s hard to stay mad, when there’s so much beauty in the world. Sometimes I feel like I’m seeing it all at once, and it’s too much, my heart fills up like a balloon that’s about to burst…

…and then I remember to relax, and stop trying to hold on to it, and then it flows through me like rain and I can’t feel anything but gratitude for every single moment of my stupid little life…

You have no idea what I’m talking about, I’m sure. But don’t worry…

You will someday.

Everybody should listen to Everybody Hurts by R.E.M., because it’s beautiful, and it’s just what all you angsty teens need, because it was written just for you.

When you’re sure you’ve had enough of this life
Well hang on
Don’t let yourself go, ’cause everybody cries
And everybody hurts
Sometimes

Everybody should read The Little Prince, because it’s true. Because it’s unpretentious and profound, it’s childish (because grown-ups really are quite extraordinary) and simple and it’s about love, and what else is there to be about?

The little prince went away to look again at the roses.

“You are not at all like my rose,” he said. “As yet you are nothing. No one has tamed you, and you have tamed no one. You are like my fox when I first knew him. He was only a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But I have made a friend, and now he is unique in all the world.”

And the roses were very much embarrassed.

“You are beautiful, but you are empty,” he went on. “One could not die for you. To be sure, an ordinary passerby would think that my rose looked just like you - the rose that belongs to me. But in herself alone she is more important than all the hundreds of you other roses: because it is she that I have watered; because it is she that I have put under the glass globe; because it is for her that I have killed the caterpillars (except the two or three we saved to become butterflies); because it is she that I have listened to, when she grumbled, or boasted, or even sometimes when she said nothing.

“Because she is my rose.”

Everybody should watch Citizen Kane. It is one of the most wonderful examples of what people, mere people can do when they truly make an effort to see the beauty and the potential and the utter amazing possibilities of something that had always been so mundane before. It is the greatest film of all time because, without it, there would be no more great films. And it is utterly astonishing.

“Rosebud.”

Everybody should feel the rough slide of steel strings beneath their fingers with a guitar rested in their lap; they should know, at least once a week, the contentment of turning the final page of a beautiful book; everybody should understand the beautiful realisation that they have bettered themselves in a way they couldn’t conceive of because they had never before realised that what they were doing was wrong; everybody should be part of a crowd that moves like a wave and rides on itself to the rhythm of music performed by a live band, and that band should be Marillion, playing an eighteen minute perfect rendition of Ocean Cloud.

All of these things it is up to you to discover only by your own initiative. But there is one more thing that everybody should do, and it is clichÈ and predictable and absolutely fucking wonderful, and it seems not so simple:

Everybody should fall in love. And if it seems that it doesn’t suit this list, it is because it is misunderstood. It needs to be sought, it needs to be coaxed; it is out there looking for you, and when you look for it yourself, it will appear…

There. Wasn’t that profound?

Posted in Books, Films, Misc • No comments

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