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Booksheds

Tuesday, June 2, 2020

As Colombo emerges from the Covid lockdown, I go immediately to one of my favourite places. – For The Critic

Filed in correspondence, Journalism | Also tagged Alfred Douglas, Andre Gide, Arthur C Clarke, bibliomania, books, Borges, Ceylon, coconuts, Colombo, colonialism, Covid-19, Craig Raine, Cyril Connolly, David Blacker, David Kugultinov, David Nichol Smith, Dee Brown, Dervla Murphy, Dickens, Edmund Waller, education, EM Forster, English, fauna, Georges Bataille, Gerald Manley Hopkins, Harold Nicolson, Henry Fielding, Jane Austen, Joan Collins, Joseph Conrad, Kalmykia, Lenin, libraries, Lionel Shriver, Louis Mountbatten, Madeleine Albright, Maradana, Michael Ondaatje, Nabokov, Peter Ackroyd, Richard Flanagan, Simon Sebag Montefiore, Sinhala, Sri Lanka, Tamil, Teilhard de Chardin, The Critic, the Duke of Pirajno, The New Yorker, Tom Wolfe | Comments (0)

Did The English Patient send me to Afghanistan?

Tuesday, October 16, 2018

Two nights from now, by way of (ahem) a birthday present, I will be attending a live-orchestra screening of The English Patient at the Albert Hall. I had invited an old friend, a raven-haired young lady (named in Debrett’s) of impossibly romantic tendency, who first exposed me to the film in, I’d say, about 1998 [...]

Filed in correspondence, Journalism | Also tagged Academy Awards, Afghanistan, Ahmed Hassanein, air travel, American University in Cairo, anatomy, Anthony Minghella, Arabic, army, Banana Republic, bedouin, Benny Goodman, Booker Prize, books, Brighton, Bruce Chatwin, Byron, Canada, Charing Cross Road, Christopher Hitchens, clothing, Debrett's, deserts, Dorset, Egypt, Egyptology, exploration, film, French Foreign Legion, Gabriel Yared, Geoff Dyer, Geographical, Geographical Journal, Herodotus, Hungarian, Hungary, JM Coetzee, John Ball, John Hare, Joseph Conrad, Justin Marozzi, Kensington Gore, Kristen Scott Thomas, László Almásy, London, Long Range Desert Group, Lorenz Hart, love, Michael Ondaatje, mountains, music, novels, Orientalism, Oscar Wilde, Oxford, Picador, plums, Ralph Bagnold, Ralph Fiennes, Ranulph Fiennes, Richard Bermann, Robert Twigger, Royal Albert Hall, Royal Geographical Society, Saul Kelly, Sinai, SOE, song, South Africa, the Himalayas, the Nile, The Oldie, the Sahara, the Western Desert, war, WG Sebald, William Golding, wind, women, WW2, YouTube, Zerzura | Comments (0)

Failure to launch?

Thursday, September 14, 2017

To Daunt’s in Marylebone, last night, where former pretty-boy and nightclub bouncer (and Amorist ‘Fiascos’ columnist) Anthony McGowan launched his latest literary venture, The Art of Failing. Subtitled Notes from the Underdog, the book chronicles a year in the life of West Hampstead’s shambolic would-be flâneur, by way of library mishaps, bad packed lunches, and [...]

Filed in correspondence, Journalism | Also tagged Anthony McGowan, Charlie Campbell, cricket, Daunt, drink, Facebook, health, London, love, Oneworld Publications, parties, publishing, Sebastian Faulks, sex, Stewart Lee, The Amorist, Tom Holland, West Hampstead, wives | Comments (0)

23.10.12 – UPDATE (1)

Tuesday, October 23, 2012

1645 Pick up Derek Walcott’s Selected Poems in bookshop. p197 ‘the madman who tore Achille’s undershirt from one shoulder also tore at his heart.’ – FROM Omeros (1990)

Filed in Non-fictions | Also tagged books, Derek Walcott, diary, micro-non-fiction, Poetry | Comments (0)