Hay-on-Wye is the place of legend, or so it would have us believe. A place for writers and writings, with its annual book festival, mysteriously situated in Powys, Wales but with a postal address in Herefordshire, England (no bull – geddit?).
So have a guess which other mysterious place – somewhere in the world, perhaps at the other end of the rainbow – is ‘twinned’ with Hay? (No googling just yet, p-lease.) Then, if you get it right, you might wonder Wye!
Just name these few places I visited during my recent trip to the UK.
Unlike Boadicea’s demanding quiz this one should be easy for all aboriginals, so easy that perhaps we should limit the answers to those from expats for a few rounds.
Any takers?
One of the problems that have arisen out of the ubiquity of such internet tools as Google and Wikipedia is our increasing tendency to rely on them for answers to our questions. I am sure we have all had experience of quoting a definition from these sources, only to be disproved subsequently. In any event, when looking for the origins and definitions, I frequently revert to Google Books. Here one can sometimes find definitions that pre-exist the internet era. It is not always a guarantee that such definitions are likely to be any more accurate than those posted by enthusiastic amateurs on Wikipedia or Wiktionary, but they do often provide an interesting alternative.
One such book is this The Etymological Compendium – By William Pulleyn. Written in 1830 it provides all sorts of explanations of the origins of words, customs and inventions. Continue reading “The Etymological Compendium – By William Pulleyn”
You’ve got to admire him, the soon-to-be-former Head Druid. He’s been an inspirational captain of his club. Crosses should be worn. Female clerics and partnering poofters need not apply. And unlike his namesake, he has always expressed himself unequivocally without raising a laugh. He even managed to obtain a ‘don’t know’ from Dawkins in a recent encounter. But now he’s hanging up his boots and it’s back to the groves of academe, in one of the cloistered halls of that polytechnic in the Fens. So bring on the next victim – he’ll need the constitution of an ox, as Rowan says.
Allegedly a new Beeb series called White Heat is getting everybody excited about the swingin’ sixties. Danish TV will probably run it in five years or so, so I’ll let you know what I think. But meanwhile the Grauniad has asked some pundits how they have reacted to the show and one in particular has written this:
Roger McGough, poet, b.1937
“We never wore kaftans or put flowers in our hair Never made the hippy trail to San Francisco Our love-ins were a blushing tame affair Friday evenings at the local church hall disco Continue reading “The real ’60s”
Without wishing to open old wounds, some may find this interesting. The comments are worth a browse as well.
“Androgynous- philosophical. Androgynous- philosophical. Androgynous- philosophical”
The elongated click of the railway sleepers ran a rhythm in Karl Marx’s head as the Edinburgh train heading towards Dundee, slowly approached the Tay Bridge. Continue reading “Tay Bridge 1878”
I may have mentioned that I was a war baby. If not, I was. That meant that Dad worked 12 hours at the Siddeley and Mum continued to cope when he spent half the night doing his duty as an air-raid warden. So bed, I understand, became very precious. And that feeling was passed on to me and my sister. Of course we rebelled a bit as teenagers but in general we respected the hours set aside for sleep. The evening ritual of blacking-out, locking up and filling the kettle lived with us for many years. Continue reading “Time for bed, said Zebedee”
While on the subject of films, but otherwise completely unrelated to the Oscars, so excuse me, I went to see the Hollywood version of ‘The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’, a couple of weeks ago. I suppose at this point I should bow my head and admit to the shame of having read and enjoyed the Millennium Trilogy. Moving swiftly on, I found the film to present an accurate portrayal of the novel with the characters, settings and events, meeting my expectations. However, there was one incident, the details of which I have been trying to recall without success. The story involves a flashback scene to 1965 and a motor accident that occurred on a bridge. What I have been trying to remember is whether the film shows the cars driving on the left or the right. Some of you may remember that until 1967 cars in Sweden drove on the left. What adds a little bit of spice to the story is that Swedish cars were a ‘left hand drive’ as well. It should be fairly easy to spot such an anomaly, so if any of you have seen the film and can recall the moment, perhaps you can put me out my misery and let me know whether the producers got it right.
I am keen to see the Swedish version of the film which I know that some people preferred to the American version, though I suppose it is safe to say, ‘they would wouldn’t they’. I wonder whether they got it right with the bridge scene.
Note: the day on which the Swedes changed sides 3rd September 1967, was known as Dagen H. You can read more about it here. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagen_H
Some of you may remember a post I wrote a couple of years ago about my disillusionment with Richard Dawkins. A copy of that post is here. Yesterday I was reading one of our local papers and I came across this rather dodgy article here, which took me to the original, but equally dodgy article in the Daily Telegraph here. Continue reading “The Jeans of Slave Traders”
Boadicea's Chariot 
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