Rita recalls the most embarrassing incident of her life... Americans still hear my English accent, but in England people think I’m an American. In truth my accent must be hovering somewhere in the mid-Atlantic after so many years immersion in the American dialect. It takes a long time for an accent ... Read More...
Month: November 2012
Michael ('Peter Simple') Wharton's book The Missing Will is one of the finest, funniest memoirs you'll ever read. In this exclusive article from Slightly Foxed magazine, Jeremy Lewis introduces one of the last of Fleet Street's heroic drinkers... I got to know Michael Wharton in the early 1980s, when I was ... Read More...
To Bristol Zoo again, this time for bangless fireworks. Quick visit to the monkeys to say nighty-night first. The fireworks were bangless because animals don’t like bangs. Nor do tiny infants so we thought this would be a good opportunity to introduce the youngest daughter to Guy Fawkes night. What ... Read More...
This week Mahlerman searches for serious music in the Emerald Isle, and not in the pubs... 'They lived and laughed and loved and left' James Joyce - Finnegans Wake London, 1741. George Frederic Handel is ill, and virtually bankrupt. The 56 year old has had some success with operas, but a number of ... Read More...
Despite having fuddy-duddy connotations, I was surprised to discover that the pastime we call bird watching isn’t actually that old – or at least the term isn’t. Bird watching is popularly thought of as the sort of thing dweeby old guys do to get away from the Missus. The twitcher’s ... Read More...
To Kent for a couple of half-term days. Is this the most under-rated English county? It's got everything that southern England can offer, but no-one makes much of a fuss over it. I suppose it suffers from being a place one travels through to get to warmer climes - with ... Read More...
Several years ago, in one of those broadsheet “Books Of The Year” round-ups, Jeanette Winterson chose one of her own titles for the supreme accolade. In that spirit, we asked Frank Key to review his own new paperback. The title of this fat collection is taken from “The Windhover” by Gerard ... Read More...
Want to get into publishing? Here's a unique opportunity for an enthusiastic book-lover... The Dabbler Book Club currently has approximately 1000 members, who receive a monthly email newsletter and are entered into regular free draws to win new books, along with various other goodies and freebies. Now we’re looking for someone to ... Read More...
The leading lexicographer of slang salutes his predecessor... How embarrassing. There he is. Always has been. Right under my nose. Or at least right behind me. And I never noticed. My very own predecessor: without whom and all that stuff. Really. I had better make amends. Eric Honeywood Partridge was born in ... Read More...
Laugh-out-loud funny but undeniably rum, Nige discovers a true original... Does anyone read Rose Macaulay these days? She seems to be one of those writers who figure large in their own time - their books sell well, they know everybody, are in everybody's memoirs and letters - and then, after death, ... Read More...