Some pretty twee writing on a wall prods Nige's memory of a once-famous author... Quotations have their uses. Without them, according to Wodehouse, any conversation between chaps would be nothing but an endless succession of 'What ho's. Oddly, these days, they are increasingly becoming an element of interior design, gracing the ... Read More...
Science was surely never as much fun as it was in the 1790s, when Humphry Davy and various poets were experimenting with laughing gas at the Pneumatic Institute... Nitrous Oxide - 'laughing gas' - is in fashion again for recreational purposes, just as it was back in the 1790s, though it was ... Read More...
Nige recalls some vintage songs banned by the BBC - including some, like a ditty by Cliff Edwards - with good reason... Rattling around in my head, for reasons unknown, was one of Cole Porter's less famous songs, The Physician. This witty - and very catchy - commentary on scientific reductionism ... Read More...
Nige brings us this week's poetry feature: the 'thin uncomprehended song' of a swarming insect... A few years ago I heard a report on the radio about the spectacular mass hatching of Periodical Cicadas in the eastern seaboard states of the US. It put me in mind of Richard Wilbur's poem, Cicadas: You ... Read More...
Nige uncovers a remarkable piece of precocious satire: a young Max Beerbohm sticking it to an Oscar Wilde at the peak of his powers... Browsing my overcrowded bookshelves with a view to some thinning out, I came across a collection of previously uncollected pieces by Max Beerbohm, A Peep into the ... Read More...
Nige visits one of the most touching monuments in the country... Ashbourne in Derbyshire is a fine and flourishing town, full of handsome buildings, including the house of John Taylor, Dr Johnson's old schoolfriend, whom he often visited. A most unclerical cleric, Taylor's chief interest lay in his herd of milch-cows - ... Read More...
Let's face it, if anyone ever deserved a punch in the jaw, then it was Papa Hemingway... I had always believed that Wallace Stevens, poet and insurance company executive, led a life of exemplary dullness, all but devoid of incident. But then I came across a passing reference to the time ... Read More...
Nige appraises Swedish artist Carl Larsson, who along with his wife Karin virtually invented the 'Ikea' style... Born on this day in 1853 was the Swedish painter Carl Larsson. Perhaps it should come as no surprise that this supreme master of the blissful, love-infused domestic interior (and exterior) and celebrator of ... Read More...
Nige reviews two short story collections by 20th Century greats, newly published by Turnpike Books, and finds cause for rejoicing... I recently wrote about Weep Not My Wanton, a selection of short stories by the all but forgotten A.E. Coppard, published by Turnpike Books. Now Turnpike have brought out two more ... Read More...
Nige reviews The Moth Snowstorm: Nature and Joy by Michael McCarthy, published this month, and finds a book 'full of joy and wonder and luminous moments'... If you're of a certain age - I guess 50s and upwards - you'll remember this: driving in the country at night (well, being driven ... Read More...