The God-trodden Mount Sinai John and I made a pilgrimage to the summit of Mount Sinai in 2005. We were in Egypt to scuba dive and snorkel in the exquisite Red Sea when the opportunity came up. The year before we had visited New York and again, by chance, seen an exhibition about the Holy Monastery of Saint Catherine at […]
About good writing – but also about good films
Films need plots Good films depend on good stories according to Steven Spielberg. I watched the BBC’s The Little Drummer Girl with dread and delight. Would it be a pleasure? Could it live up to expectations? It was and it did! I sat down happily afterwards to reread John Le Carré‘s brilliant novel. Film and book had to be different but […]
A hundred years of remembering the Great War
The war to end all wars Tomorrow people in Britain will wear red poppies and visit cenotaphs, war memorials, churches and gravesides to remember those they will call the fallen heroes. In Germany they will carry Forget-me-nots, in France they will wear cornflowers. I will think of that song asking where have the flowers, the girls, the young men, the […]
Good, bad, sad, & happy books & trending endings
Books that taught us to be good My grandmother gave me a Victorian children’s anthology. It had tales of Jack Downing who always was second in his class and Jack Upping who was always top of the class. The moral was acceptance of being second best – I can’t remember what the advantages […]
Sunday afternoon, homemade fudge, a book to read in bed
My mother’s recipe for bliss On the Day of Rest, after The Sunday Roast Dinner, there was the Homemade Fudge, and the lie down on your Bed with a Book. (I am not sure if my father either read or slept.) As a devout child, however, I observed the rules and that was the start of my addiction to books. […]