Hi Here I am as promised on a lovely Sunday afternoo with an Anna Trebenko concert playing on the TV which I recorded from Sky arts. Last evening I heard an opera I had never heard before Verdi's Ernani from the Met. It was wonderful. I only wish that I could have afforded to go to our local cinema in Crawley to see it. They are having several operas on screen and I hope to see Manon. I believe that's next month.
At 6.ooam I was listening to the omnibus edition on 4extra of 'Nicholas Nickleby' My favourite Dickens and I was struck by hao brilliant Dickens was at 'dopey' women. Dora Copperfield being one such and Nicholas's mother surpassing them all. She is so vacuous one has to laugh. Although the results of her vacuity for her daughter are not so clever.
As a result of 'Stuck in a book' I read Henry Green's 'Blind' which I ordered from the library stacks so it came free. I really enjoyed the beginning part of the book which is John Hayes journal at Noat public school. Can't help thinking was really Eton.Then in part 2 John is blinded whilst on a train looking out of a window. When he realises he's blind his reaction seemed too calm to me. There are no suggestions of blind school like St Dunstan's which was around in those days where he could have learned skills not least of which would have been braille.
The writing of the whole book is beautiful even if I struggled after part 2.The epilogue is a letter from John to his friend seymour asking him to visit afterall as he writes I can still talk.
Also read 'How it all Began' Penelope Lively. This was from the library but I own several of her
books.Really the whole book is an illustration of John Donne's 'No man is an Island entire of himself'. Charlotte an older lady is knocked down in the process of being mugged and breaks her hip. This leads to the entrance of all the other protagonists. Eventually we see howall arer linked'The delinquent, fourteen years old,male, as it happens despite equal opps' was himself set upon by a hostile gang and relieed of the £67.27..........Beyond him unknown of no9 interest. he had left Charlotte on her crutches.the embattled Daltons,Henry in his humiliation. Marion, Rose, Anton demonstrating that no0 man is an island not even a 14 year old with behavioural problems.
So well written and what I really like in 'Literary' novels so full of all sorts of intertextuality, which make one think or even reach for a source.
Lastly two relaxy novels set in 1837 just as Victoria came to the throne, Death at Dawn and Death of a Dancer by Caro Peacock are so well written. The heroine is 26 year old Liberty Laine who by the end of the second book is a kind of early private eye who sometimes works for Disraeli.I believe Caro also writes as Gillian Lipscott I might have the surname wrong but I have enjoyed those books too.I found Liberty via an audio book. I always have one of these on the go in the kitchen. What I listened to was book 3 in the series. These books are so worth listening to and reading. They have also sent me back to a biog' of Dizzy and his own novels.
Do hope the coming week is a good one. The weather for the last two days has been lovely. I have so much more energy when there is even a little bit of sunshine and warnmth although me and heat don't get on so I'd never go anywhere really hot although I go to Honk Kong at my son's expense but in its cooler seasons and it's not so bad there because everywhere is air conned almost to the point of madness.Only place where this falls down is the church St Josephs where I worshio every Sunday I'm in HK. That can become a trifle warm.
Hope to see The Artist on Thursday afternoon and Wed I'm meeting a friend and we are going to9 the Haj exhibition at the Brit. Mus. Monday I have 2 pupils a 19 year old and a new little girl starting who is 7. Her mum is my accupuncturist so we are swapping skills which is brilliant because ACCup. is so expensive but for me so effective. the cold has left my shoulders and hands in pain but a couple of hours will fix that.Tuesday, I'm visiting a friend who is a hypnotherapist. I try to look after her and the family like her mother my friend would were she not in a home where she has been along time with early onset Alzheimers. She has forgotten who we are and how to talk. Really sad.

Return of the wanderer

Wow I didn't realise that it was two years since I last appeared. Deepak you wrote to me and I accidentally deleted your comment then realised that it was from this year. I'd love to review your book for you. As I write this I'm listening to a Boulez concert which I recorded from Sky Arts. I'm one of those perverse people who cannot think in silence.If I have alittle noise I block it out and really concentrate. Sometimes when i was teaching we'd have classical music playing quietly whilst they did exam practce or wrote essays etc always ready to switch off and hide if any other teacher walked in.It was the same with drinking water. My classroom was 3 sides window and was hot even in winter so I used to allow a drink and in the summer ties at half mast providing drink was hidden and ties shoved up as the class stood. I was old fashioned and my classes always stood for another adult.
Anyway having had a rocky two years with both mental and physical health all seems well now except for tiredness but that can be managed so I shall be here on sundays and at least twice a week. I don't promose every day because I need to read and I am making my this blog majorly non fiction.
First uo is 'As Good as God as clever as the Devil:Life of Mary Benson' Rodney Bolt
Mary Benson was mother to A C, E F and Hugh Benson all writers. Her husband became Archbishop of Canterbury although I couldn't fathom why she didn't feed him arsenic long before then. He was an odious man. He actually decided to marry Mary when she was 11.He was in his twenties. Interestingly none of the boys married but given the law in those times their sexuality was well hidden.Bolt backs up all his ideas with quotations from the novels. A most interesting read.
Last for today is 'The Queen's Agent' John Cooper
This is about Francis Walsingham. I'd always thought of him as a spymaster but boy was he a rabid Protestant. Since I am R C myself some of his comments made my hair stand on end and he was always in pursuit of hidden priests who were very often Jesuits who came to England via Holland or France. He thought torturing them was what one did.I also learnt a great deal about Ireland in Tudor times.We always seemed to be attacking them and really treated them so badly and there was hunger even then.One can see why movements like the IRA grew.Above all this book is so interestingly written. It could have been a big yawn.
Well must go and read so I have something to say on Sunday. I hope to discover how to make this blog look good and how to link because I read some really interesting blogs which anyone who chances here might like to read.