“The Writer as Migrant” by Ha Jin
These are three essays on the notion of migration for the writer, mostly explained through other writers such as Nabokov, Conrad, Kundera and Naipaul. In the first essay,…
Monday morning inspiration
If you are kind, people may accuse you of ulterior motives. Be kind anyway. If you are honest, people may cheat you.…
Art at the Barbican
I went to the Barbican recently for two exhibitions – Radical Nature and the Free Art Fair. I liked the first more…
Congratulations, Ruth Dugdall!
Last year I won the Luke Bitmead Writer’s Bursary, an event that changed my life and led to the publication of On…
Biological debt
Saw this interesting take on the body’s energy levels. At the moment I am working nights to supplement my writing income, so…
“The Death of Ivan Ilyich” by Leo Tolstoy
A man dies slowly and in great agony. He ponders the meaning of life, and this increases his anguish: even worse than the physical pain of a slow,…
Media hoaxes and churnalism
Greg Watts just linked to an interesting article in the Financial Times about the recent spate of media hoaxes, like a boy…
“The Iron Duke” by L. Ron Hubbard
I don’t generally read this kind of thing, but it was given away free by a very nice lady on the L.…