To conclude our 'Birdwatching Wednesday' special, I recall that a few years ago I was somewhat tickled by a quote from slovenly artist Tracy Emin, as she unveiled a stick with a sparrow on it in Liverpool (funded by BBC licence payers to the tune of £60,000… ah those carefree ... Read More...
Month: November 2010
Continuing our 'Birdwatching Wednesday' theme, the other night I came across a documentary on Twitchers on BBC4. I watched it for as long as I could endure, which was about a quarter of an hour. Dear me, what is wrong with these people? They seem to have no intrinsic interest in ... Read More...
Ian Vince writes the regular Strange Days column in The Daily Telegraph and is the author of 'The Lie of the Land' - a great new book that attempts to uncover and demystify the UK's fascinating geology (he wrote a guest post for The Dabbler on the subject here.) He is also ... Read More...
Thanks to all of you who entered our Slightly Foxed competition. The Betjeman quote in full is*: Childhood is measured out by sounds and smells and sights, before the dark hour of reason grows. (from Summoned by Bells) We used this random number generator to pick the email from our inbox, the ... Read More...
This Autumn marks the tenth anniversary of the death of RS Thomas. His obituaries portray an enigmatic personality replete with contradictions: a misanthropic Christian, a champion of Welsh who wrote poetry in English, a nationalist who didn't think much of his fellow Welshmen, an undemonstrative man who could write impassioned ... Read More...
In our occasional feature we invite guests to select the six cultural links that might sustain them if, by some mischance, they were forced to spend eternity in a succession of airport departure lounges with only an iPad or similar device for company. Today's voyager is Kevin Musgrove. Kevin was born, twice, in ... Read More...
Don’t forget to enter our competition to win a free annual subscription to Slightly Foxed. The deadline is midnight (GMT) tonight and the winner will be drawn tomorrow. Remember, Google is your friend…. ... Read More...
It is an extraordinary story. When he died in 1910, Mark Twain left behind some 5,000 unedited pages of memoirs, together with instructions saying that he did not want them to be published until at least 100 years after his death, perhaps fearing that their shock value would damage his ... Read More...
Since we’re discussing Diary of a Nobody and Three Men in a Boat, it would be remiss not to give a nod to another classic of English comedy, WC Sellar and RJ Yeatman’s 1066 and All That, available for a penny here. Written in 1930, it’s the best, well, the funniest ... Read More...
