let me entertain you.

chanced upon.

as early as 2006.

howl. linked from here.

'Those were, however – with the exception of pointing out the occasional objective mistake – simply my opinions, and I don’t consider them to be privileged. Once you’ve written something it’s not yours any longer: it belongs to other people, and they all have opinions about it, and every single one of those opinions is as correct as that of the author – more so, perhaps. Because those people have read the work as something perfectly new, and, barring amnesia, an author is never going to be able to do that. There will be too many ghost-versions of the story in the way, and besides, the author cannot read it for the first time, wondering what happens next, comparing it to other things that he or she has read.

So while I may, opinionated myself, disagree with some of the conclusions presented here, I am quite content for the opinions to exist; after all, the people who came to them read the work for the first time, which is more than I’ve ever managed... I’ve always enjoyed it, perhaps because I’ve always had a healthy respect for academia. Even when I'm puzzled by it, it treats art like it matters. And for those of us who make art, that’s a fine thing to experience.

I’m always particularly delighted by academic attention to comics – partly because I think we need the best critical minds to point to what we do and explain it to ourselves, and partly, even mostly, because it shows how much things are changing. (A decade ago I was invited to speak at one major American university by the art department, and was informed, apologetically, that the English department were, ah, boycotting my talk, because, after all, I did comics. These days the invitations come from the English departments...)'


the branagh, in one of his moments of obtuse honesty, said he thought actors were nice people. well, i think academics are nice people. and i think the department of english is a marvellous thing.

the cite is from the journal. the man can write.
but then, it is the sort of writing i would like, because of how much reading there is in it.

i dare say there was no call for it. but i have just scared myself silly reading some blake. there is some gall to a man who can do that in that kind of metrical ease.

we got the masculinities.

je voyais, j'ecoutais

edith piaf
je ne regrette rien

paroles: michel vocaire
musique: charles dumont

Non ! Rien de rien
Non ! Je ne regrette rien
Ni le bien qu'on m'a fait
Ni le mal tout ça m'est bien égal !

Non ! Rien de rien
Non ! Je ne regrette rien
C'est payé, balayé, oublié
Je me fous du passé !

Avec mes souvenirs
J'ai allumé le feu
Mes chagrins, mes plaisirs
Je n'ai plus besoin d'eux !

Balayées les amours
Et tous leurs trémolos
Balayés pour toujours
Je repars à zéro

Non ! Rien de rien
Non ! Je ne regrette rien
Ni le bien, qu'on m'a fait
Ni le mal, tout ça m'est bien égal !

Non ! Rien de rien
Non ! Je ne regrette rien
Car ma vie, car mes joies
Aujourd'hui, ça commence avec toi !

among the many he pointed out.

the why. a different sort of why. very valid.

weekend.

now improvising, having run out of space on my own account.
i must say i have no dearth of excitement.

miltonweek.

out of sorrow.
there is an unrepeatability about figures like that. for obvious reasons, perhaps, but even so.

this is young dibbo's idea, and the delay is because it is singularly difficult for me to shuffle my music. i have gone to great organisational heights in the last few months, and the result is that my music is actually even on different drives. o well, i have shuffled the little bits i had scattered around, some repeats from stuff i have elsewhere, but really, much more of the colourful music is in classified folders, all.
also, power is important. we have current now, incidentally.

Rules:
1. Put any music player (like Windows Medias Player, Winamp, iPod) on shuffle/random mode
2. For each question, press the next button to get your answer.
3. You must write the name of the song no matter what. No cheating!

1. IF SOMEONE SAYS “IS THIS OKAY?” YOU SAY?
try and catch the wind - donovan
that's a bit like swapanda, actually, asking little kids to look for question papers in refrigerators.

2. WHAT WOULD BEST DESCRIBE YOUR PERSONALITY?
streets of philadelphia - bruce springsteen
never been there, i'm afraid. but i do love to walk, there's that.

3. WHAT DO YOU LIKE IN A GUY/GIRL?
there is an end - holly golightly
even i won't own to that!

4. HOW DO YOU FEEL TODAY?
(a bagpipe rendition, folk)
very lovely.

5. WHAT IS YOUR LIFE’S PURPOSE?
while my guitar gently weeps - beatles.
escapes me.

6. WHAT IS YOUR MOTTO?
just the two of us - grover washington jr with bill withers
i don't know.

7. WHAT DO YOUR FRIENDS THINK OF YOU?
wind of change - scorpions
ask them. but i usually think of my friends with a mild sort of sympathy. this is why. i drag them around willy nilly quite enough. most of them are great sports, i should say.

8. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR PARENTS?
summer wine -bono and the corrs
complete overdose.

9. WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT VERY OFTEN?
only you - grania renihan (from starlight express, andrew lloyd webber)
o well.

10. WHAT IS 2+2?
the music of the night - john diedrich (phantom of the opera, again andrew lloyd webber)
there is a logic to this, i think.

11. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR BEST FRIEND?
evergreen tree - cliff richard
although i doubt i would ever put it like this. sometimes cliff richard can be very persuasive.

12. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE PERSON YOU LIKE?
berkeley woman - john denver
likable, yes.

13. WHAT IS YOUR LIFE STORY?
ballad of a thin man - bob dylan.
because something is happening here
but you don't know what it is

14. WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP?
(a piano rendition, i don't know who by)
nicely obscure, albeit very melodic.

15. WHAT DO YOU THINK WHEN YOU SEE THE PERSON YOU LIKE?
cotton fields - the new christy minstrels
nope. songs of distant lands and distant things.

16. WHAT DO YOUR PARENTS THINK OF YOU?
southwind -john denver
they try not to think very much on this subject, actually.

17. WHAT WILL YOU DANCE TO AT YOUR WEDDING?
seeing is believeing - janis kelly (aspects of love, andrew lloyd webber)
that's nicely sceptical.

18. WHAT WILL THEY PLAY AT YOUR FUNERAL?
over and over - nana mouskuri
i wouldn't, all said and done!

19. WHAT IS YOUR HOBBY/INTEREST?
anywhere is - enya
admitted. BIG interest, all of that.

20. WHAT IS YOUR BIGGEST SECRET?
crying - don mclean
mm?

21. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR FRIENDS?
year of the cat - al stewart
mm. sort of.

22. WHAT SHOULD YOU POST THIS AS?
puff the magic dragon - the brothers four
i have this thing with dragons, admitted.

i tag the long-suffering hack. and am myself going to resist all and any tags hereonwards.

photographs.
but 'whatever we have done, [he] did first.'

'I used to work in a shed in my garden. But it got too crowded with books and manuscripts and all kinds of bits and pieces, and I got fed up with being down at the end of the garden, especially on rainy days; and then we moved house anyway, and I had to decide whether to take the shed with us or leave it there. In the end I gave it to a friend, the illustrator Ted Dewan - on condition that when he's finished with it, he'll give it to another writer. He's replaced the windows and some of the roof, and I like the idea that it'll get passed on to lots of other writers and illustrators, and each of them will replace this bit or that bit until there isn't an atom of the original shed left.'

blake, dickinson, and above all milton, who is turning 400 soon. a most fervent 'long live' for that last.

but to come back to what i was saying -- pullman and his dark materials. over the recent film.
(and some drawings from the books.)

i can see how to think pullman's thrust contradicts milton's, but the point is milton makes him think like that at all. i should say that i can see difference, but not what i would call contradiction. but i don't have to argue very hard. pullman is quite vocal about his affection.

walking the city, 'I’d rather concentrate on ideas than the technical side of things.'
and other things.

shame.
the headline is a little hysteric, but i get the point.

from the visit.