Walk with Frank down memory lane as he recalls some of the enticing acts who appeared at the Bodger's Spinney Variety Theatre during its golden age: Nobby Puck : The Human Windsock. Bells clanged whenever Nobby Puck appeared on stage. For ten awful days in the summer of 1907 he was held ... Read More...
Oddities
Is it a giant cormorant? A particularly vicious mosquito? Or something else? The Wikiworm consults this weird Wikipedia article to get to the truth behind the fantastical boobrie... The boobrie is a mythological shapeshifting entity inhabiting the lochs of the west coast of Scotland. It commonly adopts the appearance of a gigantic ... Read More...
A musical treat for you today, as The Dabbler presents Dear Bonkers Maisie, music by OutaSpaceman, lyrics by Frank Key... I have long believed that what the world lacks is a lovely romantic song about lead poisoning, so in the end I had to write one myself. Dear Bonkers Maisie, thou art ... Read More...
This week, Frank is unafraid to confront the most fundamental questions related to the human condition... Whither art? It’s a question I often ask myself, usually when tucking into a plate of smokers’ poptarts or other breakfast-based snack food. I like to get art out of the way early on in the day, ... 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...
Ambrose Bierce was the most brutal book reviewer of his era. It's probably just as well he never had to give his verdict on Oscar Wilde... In his 1967 biography of Ambrose Bierce [above], Richard O'Connor noted that the “chore” of book-reviewing hackwork “unleashed [Bierce's] most savage energies”. We are given two ... Read More...
He wrote animal stories of exquisite prose, yet Henry Williamson ended up as an overt, unapologetic Nazi. In this Dabbler classic, Jonathan Law looks at the good and the (alarmingly) bad sides of the author of Tarka the Otter... If we’re honest, most of us have at least one friend that we ... Read More...
Just who was the mysterious 'Eighth Dwarf'? Frank attempts to shed some light on this much-discussed question... Over the years, there has been a great deal of discussion about the exact identity of the so-called “fifth Beatle”, as there has been regarding which pinniped deserves the title “the seventh seal”. Much ... Read More...
Gaw relays the exploits of one of the most remarkable soldiers this country has produced... Adrian Carton de Wiart's soldiering career extended from Boer to Second World Wars, taking in many events of large historical importance. He was usually to be found in the thick of the action, winning a VC ... Read More...
Today, a classic from the Frank Key oeuvre. For more such uncategorisable fictive brilliance, you should buy the Dabbler Editions ebook By Aerostat to Hooting Yard: A Frank Key Reader... My mother had a tin ear and a voice like a corncrake. In spite of these shortcomings, she saw it as her maternal ... Read More...